MURDERWORLD [mod plot] [Reunion/Rescue]

[letsgolegion]

Who| Everyone who wants in
What| The reunion/rescue of the folks in Murderworld
Where| The Temperate Zone
When| Day 3, at the very end of the arena
Warnings/Notes|

Thanks to the heroes that broke into Arcade's control room, the arena was officially over, and now that the Science Police and Legion had been contacted, people were being gathered up in an area in the temperate Zone and being extracted by portable threshold gates. A first aid station had been set up to triage those who needed immediate emergency care and patch up what injuries they could to hold people over until they got home.

Grief counselors were already on standby to help the Legionnaires and Harrubian dissidents and their families deal with the crisis they had just faced.

Arcade had already been taken away by the Science Police to face trial for multi-murder, and while some of the raw footage of the arena had already been uploaded to the UP internet, the Legionnaires had made the best of a bad situation.

The fact of the matter was every Legionnaire that had been kidnapped had survived. Arcade had been stopped. Almost all of Arcade's "Tributes" had been killed or detained by the Legionnaires and some of the Harubbian dissidents. The arena had ended on Day 3 instead of Day 30, which had saved dozens of lives. And the upload of the raw footage had been stopped mid-stream so that only a few people would have to deal with their ordeal becoming public knowledge.

Now it was time for friends and teammates to reunite and for everyone to head back to the safety of Legion World.

[ooc: Anyone can start a thread, regardless of whether they're a Legionnaire that was in the arena, or a Legionnaire outside the arena checking up on their friends.]

Comments

[unrecovered]

Wash won't stop. More accurately, he can't.

It's been three days of hell: three days of being attacked every time he turns around; three days of finding teammates alive only to be teleported away from them and left worrying about whether they'd make it out in one piece; three days of knowing he's being watched and hunted and the odds are against him; three days of little rest and constant injury. His paranoia and insomnia were getting better on Legion World; after the past three days, they're worse than they've been in a very long time. He's going to have a lot of work to do to get back to where he'd been before this whole mess had started, but he can't do it now. Once Wash stops to think - if he even pauses for reflection - the weight of it all is going to come crashing down on him all at once, and he'll eventually have to drag himself out the other side. It's going to be a very ugly breakdown, and he is not having it in public. He refuses to even come close.

So he's given the grief counselors a wide berth, waved off the ministrations of the first aid station ("It's healed. They've all healed. I'm fine," being the very definition of two truths and a lie), and is currently making his way around the area, searching for familiar faces and making sure everyone's intact. It's easy enough to see that he's not okay - he's still twitchy and way too keyed up to be anywhere close to 'okay' - but he's not about to talk about that right now. He'd rather make sure everyone else is okay and deal with his imminent breakdown later, or possibly not at all.

[goddamngrenades]

It's probably a fucked up kind of commentary that this isn't all that unfamiliar. The framing of it- shit yeah- that's weird as balls. An arena full of violent delights? Stuff out of science fiction, he thinks, with an AI subletting part of his brain. But the palpable wave of exhaustion and grief, the relief stringing through the air, huddled people limping to a medic's station or grief counseling?

Ok they didn't have counseling available immediately after their return from the front but damn if that isn't a sign that these people care more.

It's all a little familiar. Which makes, well, finding a familiar face a little less odd than it should be. At least until he gets close enough in the crowd to see signs of...age. Wash was younger than him, was the bright eye'd rookie, was the focused optimist, sorta. And now it's like- well. Looking at himself after his first fucking tour. But worse. "Wash!"

Jesus fuck the kid (doesn't look like a kid, gonna skip that) looks like he needs a hug and a nap.

[unrecovered]

Wash stops short when he hears a familiar voice (and he hasn't heard that voice in so long) call his name. He turns, searches for the source, and-

This isn't happening. It's just not possible.

He reaches out and taps the shoulder of the person nearest him (one of the triage workers, probably on their way to someone who needs their help a hell of a lot more than he does) and points. "That guy over there with the scar over his eye - you see him, right?"

The triage worker looks unsure. "Yeah?"

Unsure isn't good enough. "So he's actually there, right?"

Now the worker just looks concerned. "Yeah. He is."

"Great." Wash pats their shoulder and lets them go before they start asking him too many questions; instead, he files away the fact that he's not hallucinating and looks over at...

At York.

Deep down, he'd known this was always a possibility. The Time Trapper had grabbed Grif from an earlier point on the timeline, after all; there's no reason for the rest of Wash's past to be off limits. God knows he's got some damned capable people back there.

But...but it's his past. He put it behind him. He'd had to. The past had tried to eat him alive for a good long while, and he'd let it: let it drive him to commit ill-conceived revenge that wasn't entirely his to take; let it nearly get him killed over and over; let it ruin him worse than he already had been. He'd buried it, because it was the only way he could move forward and make things better. If he let it back in, it would consume him-

And yet here it is, here and now, calling his name and staring him in the face, when he's so far past his breaking point he can't even see it anymore and is barely clinging to stability by his fingertips, and he-

He can't do this right now. He just can't.

He turns on his heel and walks away.

[goddamngrenades]

Is he asking what I think he's asking? Lipreading, it's a hell of a skill.

It appears he is, in fact, asking if you're real instead of a hallucination. Delta's voice remains an amused tinge of green in the back of York's mind and, shit, this does not bode well. Was there psychological torture in that arena? Tormenting him with, what, visions of people he'd known before?

It is far more likely that he is from further along, considering the visible signs of aging. Meaning we are likely-

NOPE not thinking about it. Not even a little. Those thoughts are shoved into a little box labeled 'NEVER LOOK AT EVER' in a bad way as he starts weaving through the crowd. This is the first familiar face he'd seen in this whole buiness and-

Well.

He'd left him behind. One more drop of guilt in a sea of bad decisions (fight for humanity, save the world, get brainfucked, also have you seen our medical benefits?) but it's the one drop he can finally do something about if Wash would just not. Turn around and run away. For fuck's sake, that is HIS schtick and how dare the rookie assume he can do it with half as much style or grace.

Careful weaving becomes more overt jogging, threading through the crowd with a frown. "Wash, come on buddy-"

[unrecovered]

Honestly, he'd known it wouldn't fix anything. York didn't- doesn't- can't- fuck- let things go. Just look at Carolina - he couldn't let her go. Can't. Of course York would chase him, when the only thing Wash wants right now is to be left alone so he can get his head straight.

Of course.

He stops when York calls his name again, listening to him approach, timing it-

And then he turns and grabs York's shoulders, forcing him to stay at arm's length. For someone flirting with exhaustion, there sure is a lot of desperate strength in his grip. It would probably be a lot more impressive if he weren't shaking.

"I cannot deal with you right now," he grinds out, all hard edges and steel walls, one last show of strength before he collapses under the mental strain of the past few days. "I just can't."

He fucking hates that he's shaking - hates it - but there's nothing he can do about that right now.

[goddamngrenades]

This is a point in favor of our being-

Stow it- D.

Not thinking about that. He has gotten this far with adjusting to the whole future, space suit, become a legionnaire thing by not thinking about that and he will continue to not think about it and what it means as long as avoiding the issue keeps working. Of course that doesn't extend to letting Wash ignore him because, um, rude-

Or maybe Wash is just as desperate for a little space, if the trembling and cold steel determination to NOT is anything to go by. "Okay-"

His hands come up easy as breathing and catches at Wash' arms, eye flicking to memorize each new scar, each new sign of time passed. More drops in that ocean of guilt. "Okay. Just. Let me walk you to your bunk or something?"

And where the fuck was this big brother instinct when Wash was actually younger than him, huh? Where were the fucks he gave when it might've mattered? "...Lemme help you out and then I'll go. Promise."

[unrecovered]

Wash jerks away from the touch almost instinctually - nearly everything that's reached for him over the past few days has been trying to kill him, and he's still acting on survival reflexes. York either doesn't get it, or he doesn't care- it doesn't matter what Wash says, York's higher up on the board and therefore he knows better- he hasn't changed-

But everything else has. This isn't Project Freelancer. Wash has been a Legionnaire for longer than York - hell, he's been on this godforsaken mission for longer than York's been on Legion World at all. Wash has changed, and York doesn't know shit about him anymore-

And Wash can't stand here and struggle to mesh the past with the present. Every passing thought brings him closer to breaking down, and he refuses to break in public, and York still won't listen to him-

"No!" It comes out loud and shrill, more than Wash would have wanted had he been more in control of the situation and of himself, and it turns a few heads in their direction. Wash doesn't care - his priority is getting the fuck out of here before this becomes an even bigger scene for everyone to witness. "What part of I can't do this do you not get?!"

[goddamngrenades]

Wash twitches and York's hands drop away in an instant, held out to the side, palms open, no visible weapons. Not a threat. Just him. Except for the fact that just being him seems threatening enough to what little calm Wash has left- which he loses in short order.

So.

That's still the same. And the sharp pitch of his frustrated and exhausted voice really shouldn't be comforting. But it. Kind of is. Because their lives are a mess on a good day and this very much isn't a good day for either of them. "Uh-"

Delta suggests listening for once. Just this once, maybe, and deal with their rather selfish feelings on the matter later. Delta is, of course, a reasonable person with solid ideals of what is and isn't appropriate in public due to several years of having York explain that shit to him. Delta is- well.

Easy to ignore in the moment.

"The part where I haven't done anything but walk over to check on you? I'm trying to help, man, that's all." Like he didn't when they ran from the MOI. Like he didn't in the field. Like he never fucking tried during the project and sure, acting out of guilt isn't exactly reasonable or responsible. "You look like you're about to collapse. Seriously."

[prettycoolguy]

The Chief's alright, for a Spartan value of 'alright'. He's been hurt worse, slept less, and stayed in the field longer before, and it didn't take long to check him over. As a person who is alright, his first priority is to make sure things don't get worse for the ones that aren't.

Things are getting worse over here.

Like several others who've turned to see what's going on, it's Wash's raised voice that gets his attention. It's not long after the snap that the Chief appears at York's elbow, standing way too close and with an expression made of battle plate.

He's not sure exactly what he's breaking up, but he can see that Wash has been pushed to the point of shaking. Any awkward conversation he throws himself into here is worth it to give Wash a chance to get out.

"Can I help you?" he asks. The Chief isn't an aggressive person, but he's big and scarred up and has one hell of a scowl.

[unrecovered]

He can't get away.

York won't stop - York never listened to him, to what he wanted, why the fuck would he start now - and now Wash can't get away and he can't set himself straight right here and now and he looks like he's about to collapse because he is and he-

He nearly jumps out of his skin at Chief's arrival. It takes a moment to process, but...but he has help now. Chief's taking one for the team (because they've been a team for a while now, haven't they). It's a hell of a grenade for him to throw himself onto - York talks circles around people as a matter of course, and Chief's just bad at talking - but he's doing it anyway. He's giving Wash an out.

The thought hits his system like a live wire. He can leave. He can get out of here, he's going to have a breakdown anyway and now he has a chance to do it in private, he-

He turns and leaves, as fast as he can go without actually breaking into a run, and doesn't stop - doesn't let himself be stopped - until he's through a threshold gate and back on Legion World. He owes Chief one, and he'll pay him back later. For now, he needs time to himself.

[iamresponding]

Rich had taken the arena pretty well other than worrying like crazy about Sam after getting separated. Even with Vance and Nita, he'd worried but also trusted that they could look out for themselves, so mostly he was concerned with Sam making it because he was so young. In the end, though, Sam had come through, and Vance and Nita were alive. Nobody on the team had died, Arcade had been stopped, and dozens of innocents had been saved. He chalked that up as a win.

That meant he'd weathered things pretty well, mentally. Really, nothing could compare to the horrors of the Annihilation War, and for exactly that reason, the only part of this whole business that had gotten him twitchy and shaky was those damn giant bugs.

Because he was doing okay, that meant he was with it enough to keep an eye out for anyone that maybe wasn't, and Wash had "not-okay" all over his face. Rich was good at spotting not-okay. How many times had he pulled a soldier off a position of importance because he could tell they were suffering from shell shock and needed to be rotated out? More time than he could count.

Right now, though, it wasn't about strategy, now he could try to help someone else breathe because they deserved to. So he grabbed some of the stuff provided by the aid station, stuffed it in a pocket and went over to Wash.

"Hey, I checked in and everyone on the team's been accounted for. Some injuries, but nothing serious, especially with the med-tech on Legion World. A whole hell of a lot of the Harrubians were saved, too. Dozens, they said, and a lot of the ones that died were killed before we even showed up. We gave Arcade such a hard time that he focused most of the heat on us and it gave them better chances." He held out a bottle of water. "You look like you're about to vibrate out of your own skin. It's okay to take a minute and just breathe."

Rich wasn't in the best physical state himself, what with having one arm in a sling, a bloodied face, and a few long nasty cuts on his torso and legs scabbing up, but otherwise, he was visibly pretty relaxed.

[unrecovered]

Wash hears Rich coming and turns to face him - too quickly, with a glance over his shoulder, as though he's still expecting to be attacked...which, in all honesty, he kind of is. The arena may be over and done with, but Wash's reflexes haven't exactly gotten the news update.

"That's good," he says after a moment, accepting the water bottle. He opens it and promptly downs half of it in one go, partially because he's a lot more dehydrated than he'd thought and partially as an excuse to not have to talk for the next few seconds. Everyone's alive, at least in terms of kidnapped Legionnaires. Everyone's okay, or they will be. It's a much better outcome than he could have hoped for, and he's having a hell of a time trying to enjoy it.

That'll come later, once he calms down. Maybe. He hopes.

"I keep forgetting," he finally says, and it's a lie but it's relatable and it flows, "how much it sucks to have the heat on you for days at a time." He raises an eyebrow at Rich's sling. The past few days were hell, right? Great, they all have common ground. They should talk about that instead of how badly Wash is dealing with the Arena now that it's over. He'd love a good subject change right about now.

[iamresponding]

"Especially this kind of heat."

Rich took a seat on one of those weird little toadstools and took another bottle of water out of his pocket, and then holding it between his knees and struggling with the cap until he got it off. He took a long drink.

"I've been to war but I've also been strapped upside down in a death trap or two in my time. With psychos like Arcade, being under their thumb is...it's rough if it's something you're not used to."

War was its own kind of awful, but this was a different kind.

"And he's not even close to being the worst villain from my world. But you get used to it after a while -- and not in a bad way. Once you break out of enough traps, and stop enough crazy plans, and beat people like him enough times, it gets a lot less terrifying -- 'cause you know you can do it again."

That was why he hadn't really felt too disturbed by the arena. It was just one more lunatic villain pulling one more lunatic plan, and just like always, he got busted and taken in.

And that was a way of dealing with it all. Understanding that it was a passing thing, and that if it ever did happen again, there was an ebb and flow to this kind of thing. These people tended to go down hard, and there was always hope.

[unrecovered]

Wash can do war. Sadly, Wash is really good at war. This right here was a whole other flavor of bullshit and he's not terribly fond of it.

And according to Rich, it doesn't stop-

"Why do we have to get used to it?" The question is sharp and sudden, almost as though it's been torn out of him. "Arcade said he'd read the books in prison. He's a repeat offender. So, what, we try him and put him in jail and he just- escapes, eventually, and does this shit all over again? He gets out and kills people and we just bring him in again and repeat the cycle? Is that how this shit works?" He's getting upset and therefore getting loud, and he manages to catch himself and bring the volume back down.

A Legionnaire should probably not be yelling this next part anyway. "At what point do we stop deciding that his life is worth more than the lives of the people he's killed?" He's starting to regret not snapping Arcade's neck when he had the chance, especially if Arcade is known for this sort of thing and has pulled it more than once.

[iamresponding]

Rich put the water bottle on the ground specifically so his hand was free. He held it up in a calming gesture, the kind of gesture he sometimes made with his troops to let them know he wanted a respectful pause so he could talk, and that what he had to say might help with whatever issue they were dealing with.

"I'm not saying anyone should get used to the same villain over and over. Some people in my world won't kill no matter what -- and I'm not one of 'em. Sometimes people are just too awful and powerful to leave alive. Sometimes there are situations, like what we just went through with the Tributes, where there's no legal recourse or reliable prisons to hold a bad guy. Sometimes a bad guy is getting away with horrible things every other week -- and in that case, I take care of it. Permanently."

He dropped his hand, with a slight shrug.

"Which definitely isn't the norm in my world." He shook his head. "But I've checked up on things here, and Takron Galtos has only one prison breakout on record. It ain't exactly the revolving door the prisons are back home."

He tried to find a better way to explain.

"I just meant that...in a world like this, there's lots of villains. Because that's how it works with criminals and supervillains. You can put one away forever and there's still always gonna be more. But there's ways to cope. To understand each time it happens, with each new bad guy, that you can get through the other side."

[unrecovered]

He recognizes that gesture and stops short. It's not the first time someone higher up the chain of command has told him to shut up and listen in so many words (or so few). Right now, it's easier to think of Rich as a higher-up - at the very least, he has more experience in death trap bullshit, so hopefully whatever he has to say is worth hearing.

Turns out it is. Given the situation, Wash isn't exactly expecting that, but there it is.

It says something about Wash that 'I kill my villains before they become repeat mass murderers' is reassuring; then again, it was all too satisfying to hear Felix take a long fall off a high ledge. Given how frequently his past comes back to haunt him, it's nice to hear that someone else - someone who's done this insane superhero thing for a lot longer than Wash has - shares Wash's views on permanent solutions.

"That helps," he admits, taking another long pull from his water bottle. It's bullshit, but at least it's doable. "Do you ever have problems with copycats? Because the last thing we need is another death arena."

[iamresponding]

"Occasionally, but killing the original wouldn't change that." Hell, if they killed Arcade, some sick psycho would possibly decide that was the kick in the pants to replace him and copy what he did. "In any case, we learn from this. There are things we know to look out for -- and to train for -- that we didn't think of before this."

A pause.

"Wilderness survival being one of them. For instance." He shook his head. "I'm from New York. The most hunting I've ever done is hunting for a decent hot dog cart."

[deafleppard]

Gwen is a certain definition of "okay" for right now. While she might keeping it together for the most part, but the moment she makes it back to her room? She is going to faceplant straight into her bed and quite possibly sleep for a couple of days straight. That, or just head straight to the mess hall and stuff herself with corndogs, and then do the whole faceplanting thing.

But that was for later. Right now she was still hanging about the extraction point. Or sitting, actually. A nice good spot on the floor.

And it felt good to not be be ambushed or attacked by anything. So good.

She waved over at Wash once she saw him. "What's up? Feels good to have this all over and done with, yeah?"

[unrecovered]

Wash catches the wave out of the corner of his eye - Gwen's not exactly at eye level right now - and heads over. He doesn't join her on the floor, however; he's not stopping until he can stop for a good long while, and that includes wrapping himself as tightly as he can in his blankets on his bed in his room and sleeping for the next forty-eight hours at the very least.

So no sitting. No collapsing. Not quite yet.

"Honestly, I don't think I'll feel good about any of this until I'm back on Legion World and I've had about a week to process this." He shrugs. "Are you handling it okay?"

[deafleppard]

Gwen sort of just shrugged. "I've had lizards, koalas, and psychic interdimensional vampires try to kill me. And that was before I even got here. Adding your typical nutjob to the list almost seems like a step down, really. Doesn't make it any less wrong but, I don't know maybe I'm just not that shocked by it? Or maybe it just hadn't really settled in for me yet."

Who was to say? Gwen surely wasn't up for too much heavy thinking right now.

Instead, she just sort of held out a bottle of water? "Want some? It's cold and definitely not poisonous or contaminated."

[unrecovered]

She's had what now. Wash pauses and raises an eyebrow. "You've had koalas try to kill you." Well, they are from Australia, and everything from Australia is homicidal. It makes about much sense as anything else here, at least.

"My list tends to be mostly homicidal aliens and homicidal humans, so 'elaborate death trap' is still pretty new." Not that he wants to repeat the experience in any capacity.

The water looks good - evidently he's more dehydrated than he'd thought. "You know," he says, accepting the water bottle, "normally I'd be suspicious of someone insisting the water they're handing me isn't poisoned, but right now, I'm pretty sure you're telling the truth." The two of them having helped one another take out Arcade might have something to do with that. He twists the cap off the bottle and chugs about a third of it in one go. Yep, definitely dehydrated.

[deafleppard]

One of these days, Gwen would tell him all about that time she had to fight off dozens koalas trying to kill her. Them and Koala Kommander.

Yep.

"I'm pretty sure I'm telling the truth, too, but thanks for keeping the faith alive." She just watched as he downed the water. She already knew. Ordinary bottled water never tasted so good until just now.

"So, how you holding up?"

[unrecovered]

"Okay, well, if you're not sure if you're telling the truth, then we're both fucked." Which isn't going to stop him from taking another long drink from the bottle. He knows exactly how good clean water can taste, especially after being on high alert and with limited supplies for such a long time.

He takes another drink as she asks the question and makes it last, finishing off the bottle to buy himself time to think. He doesn't exactly want to talk about it, but avoiding the question altogether will just be suspicious, and the last thing he needs right now is focus on him.

So he picks a middle ground and hopes it's the right one. "I fought six of Arcade's tributes in thee days. I'm going to need some recovery time." He crunches the bottle against his hip and screws the cap back on. "How about you?"

[deafleppard]

"I forced myself into a cage match with one of my friends and we kicked all sorts of ass. It was awesome. Not so awesome was being chased by way too many killer rabbits while in the middle of freezing my butt off." But the cage match? Yeah, that part kind of ruled.

"But right now I'm just glad we're done here. And I'm strongly hoping that this is my last time being forced to compete inside a death arena."

Goodbye Murderworld. You will definitely not be missed.

[unrecovered]

"Killer rabbits." Cage matches he can believe; homicidal fauna, not so much. Not that flavor, at least. "Like..." He trails off and makes a three-fingered gesture in front of his mouth that indicates really big teeth. It's straight out of Monty Python, but sometimes life just is.

The followup comment just has him rolling his eyes. "You know that, now that you've said that, you've doomed us all to another one." There's something to be said for narrative causality - namely that it sucks.