Ch. 1 The long way home

[wrathgon]

The count reaches zero like so many other times, but this time is different. You all come out of time stop but the counter is still at 0, which means you are still traveling to the location.

 

Jake's whole screen flashes red, it takes him a second to start to read what it was telling him. "Hmmmm" is all he says and turns on the viewscreen. There is a planet right in front of you, one that you are about to enter its atmosphere at full speed with no chance to slow down.

 

"Can someone tell me why there is a planet in front of us and we are still in timestream....? Never mind Jake get us out of here.."

 

Way too late for that, your hull is already as bright red as the fire heats up the hull in uncontrolled reentry into the atmosphere.

 

Then more bad news comes. You all start to feel funny. Things that you knew are true stop being so, the laws that grown your existence shatter and things start to change...

 

For anyone who is staying d20, the pain you feel is nothing like you ever experience in your life, it's like someone just turns you inside out and back again. You fall over in pain if sitting or fall to the ground if standing.

 

Those that give in and conform to the forced changes of existence are rewritten to follow the rules that govern this place. You think you hear between the screams of your crewmates fighting this " All will confirm to Fates will."

 

The capt tries to speak from his own discomfort "Don't fight against it, we are being rewritten to follow local laws of existence we will revert back when leave...."

 

Everyone is just jab with pain that makes them see white spots and then all is black you pass out from the pain while still heading down at full speed.

[wrathgon]

You all expect to awake in a fiery wreck or not at all but instead, you all hear a familiar voice calling Jake's name.

 

"JAKE Christ's sake wake up I told you to stop you know the drill we need to stop in the Kuiper belt to do the scans of the alt Earth system. HOOOOO so this is when it happens." Capt yells from his captain chair.

As you clear your head and look around you are not on the Wandering Soul. Each of you sits in a very human-looking terminal with an advanced computer system in front of you in a MUCH bigger bridge.

 

"Computer runs Time-slip protocols auth Capt THeo Vesh 3456GHDF."

 

A computer voice answers him " Yes Capt start now." All your terminals go blank as power is cut to them. " Securing personal items and backing up and deleting entry logs of all crewmembers. Scrubbing all crew quarters and moving all items to storage. will continue to follow the order you can proceed. "

 

Capt stands up, "Welcome back to the future crewmate! I been waiting so long to stay that!"

[darlis moonbeam]

Jakes head was splitting a part. That seemed like his whole existence right now, but other things started to burrow their way into his head, like the sound of the captains voice speaking. He slowly cracks open his eyes and hisses in pain and blinks his eyes, he was no longer on the wandering soul it seemed. He turned to the captains voice "Listen old man, don't go blaming me for your faulty navigation. I jumped to where you said to jump. Its not my fault there turned out to be a planet there, speaking of which, shouldn't there be fail safes in place to prevent such a thing, what happened? Also where the hell are we?

 

As his brain clears more he tries and thinks back on what all happened, did he actually hear a voice in his head telling him to conform to fates will? "To hell with that, he was conforming to no ones will, if he had his way he would never conform to anything's will ever again. "

 

He looks around for the rest of the crew "Is everyone ok?"

[cheezal]

Kartesh raises up in a crumbled over form ,clearly still recovering from the intense pain he had just undergone.

"Unfortunately that's not exactly how it works Jake! I believe the wisdom of an old pilot that once said "Navigating through space isn't like dusting crops boy! you could fly into a star,or an asteroid field ,and find yourself floating home" You can plot a course sure, but if you don't study the data and maps before engaging ,this can happen"

he looks around the room,confused trying to take in the whole scene.

[evedgebah]

Enoch does his usual full spectrum scans, including temporal, relaying findings. He makes sure to scan "behind" the ship, not just what's ahead.

[wrathgon]

Capt sits down "Good old Enoch, not fazed by just being thrown into the future wants to get back to work! But let's have a quick chat first and I can tell you some things and I won't tell you others, you should be used to that by now right?" He laughs a bit. it does seem a bit more light-hearted than the one you travel with. He looks exactly the same age, but he would as you know what you see is not what he looks like.

 

"So right now your future selves are desperately trying NOT to crash onto that planet that appeared in front of us after the time jump, and to answer Jake's unfounded accusations of my lack of skill at navigating, thoa thank you Kar Tesh for defending me, was that planet was not on the star maps cause it sits in the time stream and since we traveled in the time stream we tried to fly through thought it! If we were flying normally we would have been fine. " He nods to Kar Tesh and shakes his finger at Jake.

 

"They fail, but I am still here so I survive right haha! We crash land and break one of the planet's ancient, what you would call nuclear shelters, open-releasing people that have not been part of the planet's society for over 100,000 years! We, unaware of this till later in the day, spend the day clearing a base of killer robots so we can safely decide what we will do. The ship is damaged and we dump the time jump ring, so you will have to find that and the necromancer and puddle jumper, on the planet before you leave. " He stops to let you all sink things in before he hits you with the next statement.

 

"You will be stuck there for 20 years, because even after you get back the ring you cant jump while in timeslip, and so you have to wait for the planet to come back out, which luckily will be in about 20 of their years. So get comfortable and build some lives to enjoy the time there, as much as you on that planet. You need to find someone to keep you warm if you have not already" giving a wink to Kara and Kar Tesh.

 

"So I do some research and when I saw I, future Enoch does, and gets me the low down on the planet since you all have lived there for 20 years already and even speak the language. Of course, they don't tell me anything about it now. You see gods cant time travel which is why I was not swapped with the rest of you. Tell my past self though watch out for the immortal Magic, he is a real bastard and I will leave it at that. So your future selves knew what was going on so Enoch access the vault system and added all of us into their system and hide the bench from the AIs on the planet."

He stops to look at Enoch to say something else but stops himself.

 

"From what I remember you guys swap back in in the upload room of the system. So to tell you, we are being uploaded into a computer Sim to give you the training to can join society again and give you some cash, equipment, and some of your spaceship that can only be used on the planet as you cant leave yet. At first chance learn both the vaulter language and some of the local languages so you don't seem out of place. "

 

He stops again to gauge your reactions to all this but continues regardless. " So as I cannot really talk when you get back I will tell you what I was thinking. I am sure this system will detect the difference between me and Samuel here so don't get too close or contact me in the system unless it is a chance encounter, I will be watching and testing over the test of you. You need to get out clean it's important," he again glances at Enoch before continuing, " and the best news is until you are back in space our contracts are null and you are not beholden to my commands, so effectively you can do what you and I cannot say anything about that. That doesn't mean I won't still ask but it will be an ask instead of a command. So any questions that I CAN answer?

Edited August 6, 2023 by wrathgon (see edit history)

[darlis moonbeam]

Jake listens as the Old man described what was going on. He quirks an eyebrow at the mention of being uploaded to some Sim program. It almost sounded like he could rewrite his life to make himself a better version of himself. Perhaps he would not make the same mistakes a second time around. Though he does blink at the astounding amount of time they would need to spend stuck on this planet. While he was a relatively young man right now, he would not be once this was all over. He was not immortal like the captain. How would he keep doing this. Not to mention the fact all of this still seemed to be prodding him towards some expected fate. He had not forgotten the voice in his head telling him to conform to fates design. He was really getting sick and tired of being pushed to do things that he had no control over.

He almost snorts in laughter when the captain mentions being beholden to his commands. It almost seemed like he thought Jake actually did his bidding, I mean he certainly listened to what he had to say, might even do some of what he asked from time to time if it made sense. Though not without a smartass comment to let him know how he felt about it. "So twenty years on this god-forsaken rock and we need to cozy up with the natives. Live a full life and then leave all of that behind for the ultimate mission, that we will still want to accomplish once we are old and grey? What if I do not like what fate has in store for me, any chance I can sidestep fate and not conform?"

He wondered if the others had heard that voice in their head as well or if it was just him. He was becoming angry just thinking some being thought they could lead him around like some puppet on marionette strings.

[evedgebah]

"We've fought time lords, advanced aliens of all sorts, and more. Little that we encounter CAN surprise me now captain. Sounds like they've got some very advanced tech down there. I'd honestly spend 20 years studying it if my life span was prolonged. Got any magic for that? I joined up with you because I was in a tight spot and rather bored of my Earth's technology stagnation, but with all the constant danger, this will hopefully be a welcome break from constantly being shot at. I get to focus on my work for a time.

That being said, 20 years is a long time to build a new life. What if we want to bring someone or something with us?

Enoch replies coolly as usual.

 

[wrathgon]

Capt said " am sure my past self can complete the transformation to unliving o wait no he cant, so I could send you back immortal as unliving if like?. Capt replied.

Edited August 6, 2023 by wrathgon (see edit history)

[evedgebah]

"Not until I figure out how to keep my cybernetics working."

[wrathgon]

" What exactly do they do, maybe I can create perm magic to replace them until you figure it out?" The future Capt offers.

[evedgebah]

"They greatly Enhance my abilities." He replies

 

[wrathgon]

Biofunction Regulator (Implant): Immune to Daze/Nausea, +2 vs Poison, Disease, Endurance Feat

Anti Stun (Implant): Immune to Stun

 

Auditory Baffles (Implant): Immune to loud noises, +4 vs Sonic

Nasal Filter (Implant): +6 Vs Gas effects

 

looking over the list he said "These ones you wouldn't need you to be immune already, you just can't you use a computer normally without having it in your brain right seem like a sweet trade-off so not to die? (Neural Link and Microcomputer). I mean I get having extra feats is nice but you can learn all that over the next 1000 years so do you really need that either? All these attempts to protect yourself you would not need, as unliving you get all those immunities and more and you all the time in the world to try to make the metal work on the unliving. I don't see anything that you NEED there.."

 

[wrathgon]

11 hours ago, darlis moonbeam said:

Jake listens as the Old man described what was going on. He quirks an eyebrow at the mention of being uploaded to some Sim program. It almost sounded like he could rewrite his life to make himself a better version of himself. Perhaps he would not make the same mistakes a second time around. Though he does blink at the astounding amount of time they would need to spend stuck on this planet. While he was a relatively young man right now, he would not be once this was all over. He was not immortal like the captain. How would he keep doing this. Not to mention the fact all of this still seemed to be prodding him towards some expected fate. He had not forgotten the voice in his head telling him to conform to fates design. He was really getting sick and tired of being pushed to do things that he had no control over.

He almost snorts in laughter when the captain mentions being beholden to his commands. It almost seemed like he thought Jake actually did his bidding, I mean he certainly listened to what he had to say, might even do some of what he asked from time to time if it made sense. Though not without a smartass comment to let him know how he felt about it. "So twenty years on this god-forsaken rock and we need to cozy up with the natives. Live a full life and then leave all of that behind for the ultimate mission, that we will still want to accomplish once we are old and grey? What if I do not like what fate has in store for me, any chance I can sidestep fate and not conform?"

He wondered if the others had heard that voice in their head as well or if it was just him. He was becoming angry just thinking some being thought they could lead him around like some puppet on marionette strings.

"Well you could get married and not want to leave, stranger things have happened Jake, just remember once the ship leaves you are stuck on a planet that only has access to space every 1000 years for a few hours."

[cheezal]

Captain's Quote

"We crash land and break one of the planet's ancient, what you would call nuclear fallout shelters, open-releasing people that have not been part of the planet's society for over 100,000 years! We, unaware of this till later in the day, spend the day clearing a base of killer robots so we can safely decide what we will do. The ship is damaged and we dump the time jump ring, so you will have to find that and the necromancer and puddle jumper, on the planet before you leave. "

Kartesh enquires the following "Will telling us how long before this event happen's have any effect on the timestream? ,Are we aware of the number of continients on this new world? ,and have any idea of the trajectory and co ordinates of the Necromancer and The Puddle Jumper when they set down?"

he awaits the Captain's reply...