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 Posted: Thu Sep 08, 2011 1:54 pm
********* was firmly planted upon the child's shoulder as they arrived. She offered a simple "How do you do?" to whichever escort was waiting for them.
The manx felt it was necessary to remain with the chibi senshi for a trip of this sort. Though, she also wasn't about to let other members of her team get off without doing something. From Hygiea's senshi phone, ********* had sent Sailor Iris a message to follow up the emergency broadcast Zue had sent.
"I expect you to show up to assist. Bring food!"
"...there will be another showing up after us," she mentioned to the escort as she comfortably remained on her chibi senshi's shoulder.
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Posted: Thu Sep 08, 2011 1:56 pm
If there had ever been a 'what the hell am I doing ?!' moment in Naica's short powered life, this had to be it. It was a message from a knight he did not know, Lina, that had gotten his attention to this matter. And what a matter it seemed to be. No wonder the zodiacs - whoever they are - needed help with this.
People in space. Civilians in space. This was the weirdest thing he'd heard about in his whole life, and he had heard of a lot of weird a** s**t lately. He was still wraping his mind around the whole thing, and there came the insane curveball from hell. Civlians. Normal people. In space. Who couldn't get back down to Earth, for some reason. What was even the hell about that ?
Wouldn't people... you know... Die ? In Space ? This whole no oxygen thing seemed pretty significant to him, at least. And no pressure. And no gravity.
It didn't need a physics major to think about these things ! He could buy senshi and knights surviving and fill it under the ambiguous 'magic' thing, but really ? Normal people ?
Oh, god damn. Mein Gott. None of this s**t made sense, maybe he was better off giving up on understanding it completely. File it was 'ambigeous magic stuff' and move on.
Naica had no experience and no knowledge, and only perhaps the barest silver of bravery that showed up on some occasions, but he has disposable income. A lot of disposable income, which could really be helpful here. He just hoped his parents didn't notice the sudden spike in credit card bills. They probably wouldn't, or not care about it. He'd always been responsible with his money. Right ?
He hoped, because this wouldn't be a fun conversation if they noticed. Because if anyone did an intervention, it was gonna be his father.
So there were a ton of stuff that Naica took with him - medicine, first aid kits, sleeping bags, soap, bottled water, food...
This was going to take more than one trip to beam up, for sure. and he had... 'burrowed' a grocery cart for the purpose of carrying it all in one go easily, even. Even with the enhanced strength of a knight, he wouldn't have enough arms to carry it all.
Hey, he was gonna take it back ! He was feeling bad enough about the whole thing as it was, really !
"N-Naica of Cosmos." Good lord. The girl in the veil looked important, and knowledgeable, and, and... and that made him nervous.
To be fair, pretty much everything made Naica nervous. Nothing too new here, at all. "I-I brought some things... H-Hopefully it's gonna help ?"
Stutter stutter stutter. A normal day in the life of Naica Page, pretty much.
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Posted: Thu Sep 08, 2011 1:58 pm
Zirconia pretty much answered by switching out of her civilian form in seconds and following the Hug-Bell hot on her heels. She didn't like being a babysitter, but dammit, she was going to take this seriously. Especially since there would be civilian repercussions if anything happened to the chibis tonight.
She was also curious about the surrounding and the Zodiacs, and probably would've come to assist if she had heard through any other means as well.
She just sat down and puffed out her little chest as the others introduced themselves to Virgo, keeping close to Hug-Bell, who wasn't just her charge for the night, but her designated packmule too.
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Posted: Thu Sep 08, 2011 2:36 pm
Another senshi she didn't know! It was like they were crawling out of the walls in droves. "Thank you," she said; the civilians were going to get awfully tired of spaghetti-os, but hopefully the cooks at Leo Outpost could think of something to do with them. "Captain Virgo, of the Zodiac Guard. We appreciate your assistance--and yours too!" This was said to the girl in blue; another knight? She didn't know, this one looked so different!
But maybe. Magic was strange.
Maia also got a smile; a group of three was usually the most she could take, but, well. This time, she felt like the Surrounding was literally pulling her back home, though. She used her own energy to get back, but it still wasn't as hard as it should have been. Too, the few hours of sleep she'd managed to grab in little batches lent themselves to her strength. In this case, with so many more people to move--
Children. She did not want children at the Surrounding, especially not after that whale. It was too dangerous, and they were just babies… She wanted to say no. Instead, what she said was, "Neither of you are leaving the Outpost I bring you to, or you will not be returning once a Zodiac takes you back," in a tone that brooked no argument. When she found the cat who'd awakened babies and sent them to fight a war, she'd give it an earful, if she didn't just decide to ignore it.
"As well as can be expected," she said suspiciously to the cat that was perched on one of the children's shoulders.
She nodded to the timid-seeming knight. "It's alright. You're going to be just fine," she said, assuming his nervousness was about space. A lot of people were. She expected it, almost. So she gathered everyone into a circle and made them hold hands--no way could she get contact made with all the people there on her own. "When you're ready to return, find me or another Zodiac. The senshi and civilians already there will be able to assist you in locating one." To the chibis, she gave a stern look. "I am serious in that you will not be allowed to return if you leave the Outposts for the Surrounding. The Surrounding is dangerous, and not a place for children."
Maybe she could get the speed-transit working and send them to Chronos, like in the old days.
With a sigh, she vanished with a pop. The group went with her, and when she returned to Earth she was extremely winded. She also had a bag of cookies and a water bottle, though, so hopefully that wouldn't last too long.
[Chibi players: The "stay at the outpost you arrived at" rule can be skirted by saying that Zodiac brought you up, or your chibi can risk traveling on the surrounding. It's up to you.]
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Posted: Thu Sep 08, 2011 7:22 pm
A giant basket with freckled legs appeared, staggering its way towards the arranged meeting spot. The basket stopped a couple of feet away from Virgo, then was dropped with much relief onto the ground, revealing a somewhat frazzled redhead.
“ Pomona reporting with fresh produce.”
The message had been a surprise to Pomona, and had left her with many questions. What was The Surrounding? Why were civilians there? How would they be housed? With a desire to be useful and a need for answers, Pomona was stumped. She didn’t have healing power and probably everyone that responded would have bandages. As a civilian she could cook or buy food, but not nearly enough for 51, not without raising suspicion. Then a thought struck her: her planet!
Abandoned though Planet Pomona may be, it was also overgrown with plant life, much of which still produced fruit and vegetables. Pomona had gone to her planet with a giant basket and filled it, then returned to Earth, near her house. That had been a mistake; her house was not exactly close to the meeting point, she so had to drag the basket of fruits and vegetables half-way across town. In retrospect, she should have taken the time to grab a wagon or shopping cart or something.
“ I can cook it too, if that’d be useful.” And that was all Pomona was going to say for now, since she wanted to catch her breath. Seeing as how the girl – Virgo? – didn’t look much better, she figured she’d be forgiven.
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Posted: Thu Sep 08, 2011 7:40 pm
Ascleipus had just completed perhaps the most frantic shopping trip of her life, having bought out several bottles of hydrogen peroxide, a value-pack of alcohol wipes, what felt like a mile of gauze, and three extra first-aid kits for good measure. All were stuffed into a cloth bag printed with the "Keep Calm and Carry On" poster design in white-on-red, conveniently matching the small backpack on her back.
She landed a bit hard near the statue, stumbling on her heels, but managed not to fall. Breathing hard with the effort of having come running, she approached the statue, glancing it over and then offering a quick smile to the unfamiliar senshi waiting there.
"Asclepius, Senshi of Medicine," she offered in introduction, leaning down as she worked to catch her breath, then straightened and extended one hand in greeting. "I'm ready to go." Short, sweet, and to the point. If people needed help, then this was no time for too many frivolous pleasantries.
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Posted: Thu Sep 08, 2011 7:44 pm
Sailor Iris was grumbling. All of her frozen burritos were going to be fed to absolute strangers. It was a good thing that Cost-Mart was ridiculously cheap, but if there was one thing she had somewhat learned from her Dad, it was how to be stingy about certain things.
Food was one of those things she was stingy about. However, she didn't want to waste time, so she simply took two large boxes of frozen burritos with her to the meeting place (one box under each arm).
As she made her way to the gathering point, Iris noticed a familiar red-head standing there. "Oh hey... um... Pomona..." That was her name, right? "Ya have any time t'get any of those f*ckin' amazin' peppers lately?" She grinned, giving the other senshi a nod of approval.
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Posted: Thu Sep 08, 2011 9:29 pm
Pomona’s heart rate and breathing were leveling back out, so when Iris made an appearance she was able to do more then gasp out a couple of sentences. She nodded to the Rainbow Senshi before nudging the basket at her feet.
“ About a third of this is different kinds of peppers, including a couple of really hot ones. Can’t figure out how they could be cooked, but I figured some people might like them anyway.”
Pomona was actually including bell peppers in her count because really, what good were that many hot peppers except for chili or curry?
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Posted: Thu Sep 08, 2011 10:21 pm
Flora returned, once again, to give Virgo a breather. Teleporting people to the Surrounding consumed quite a bit of energy; she had dozed off on the stairs in the Castle to take a quick power nap. She didn't look completely refreshed, but did feel much better, giving a grateful smile to the Snehis who had turned up.
"That looks good!" Flora said to Pomona, and linked arms with her. She took Asclepius' hand with a nod, noting with relief that she had announced herself as the Senshi of Medicine. That would certainly help quite a bit! "They're cooking at Leo, I believe!" She motioned for Iris to take the other's hands and they disappeared off to the Surrounding.
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Posted: Thu Sep 08, 2011 10:30 pm
Ainsley had spent the afternoon at the library after she had been freed from the manacles of her school schedule where she remained undisturbed until she left. It wasn't until then that she got the message, walking home for dinner. It was hard to say for sure it she had only just gotten the message just then, but she couldn't have gotten it that long ago right?
She stood there on the sidewalk staring at it for a moment, reading the message over and again. She had gotten in from Zue, and if memory served the ten year old correctly, which it certainly did in this situation, Zue was the guardian cat of the Zodiacs that she had run into at the park that night. She remembered snuggling him, and how fluffy he was before smiling at the thought of Princess Chronos and then deciding now was not the time to fawn over both of them. At least not until she seemed to fully grasp the problem at hand.
"We have identified the location of the missing fifty-nine civilians; they are in space, on the Zodiac homeworlds. They are injured and in severe need of medical assistance, as well as food, bedding and general supplies. We request assistance in protecting these lives, and especially in healing them. Healing senshi are especially necessary. If you would like to help, please meet the Zodiac Soldiers in front of the fountain of Dike Triumphant in Times Circle.
Thank you for your assistance."
After the third read over or so, it finally started to sink in . The news coverage was wrong, there were more people missing and they just hadn't noticed! Ainsley couldn't help but linger on that thought, wondering if anyone cared at all for those eight missing people that no one had looked for. However, the fact there were eight more people missing didn't seem nearly as pressing as the fact that they were found, as odd as this sounded, and they were injured. How could they have been found in SPACE? How could they be hurt in space? What hurt them? Were they going to be okay? All the same worries she had before she knew where they were fell back into place while all the unanswered questions passed through the child's head as she made her way down the sidewalk, getting closer and closer to home.
She had decided that yes, they would be okay. Why would they be okay? They would be okay because Ainsley was going to go to Times Circle and go and help them. She had a stop to make before she could do that though and that stop was home.
"Bell, Xavier?" She called out. "I'm home!"
Ainsley didn't wait for an answer, not that there would be one. All of the rooms were empty of human, or otherwise defined as senshi, life. She didn't question the fact no one was home, and she certainly didn't complain about it. She wanted to help them and that was that, if there was no one here then there was no one here to stop her from trying to go if that were the case. It seemed unlikely that Xavier would, already offering to patrol with her before, but at least it was one last thing she had to think of.
"Cora! Cora!" She called out, making her way upstairs.
"Cora did you get the message?" She called again.
She needed to get things for everyone and the first thing she thought of was her own bedding. It was a bit of a struggle to get it off her bunkbed, but after the child finally did she gathered it all into her arms and carefully made her way downstairs. She would use this as a way to carry everything and then when she got to space she could give it to people to keep them warm and cozy!
The first thing she grabbed was any non-perishable food she could find that was in the cupboards. Whatever Bell and Xavier hadn't taken out, Ainsley quickly gathered up and dropped into the center of the blanket and bedding that she had laid out on the floor.
It was somewhere around now that Ainsley noticed Cora. Did she say she was going to come too and that she wanted to help? Ainsley looked around the kitchen direly for something that Cora could carry before running out to the hall and opening up her backpack. She wasn't careful about it, dumping the entire contents of the backpack onto the floor in the hallway before grabbing it as well as the lunch tote and taking it back to the kitchen.
"I will make lunch, and you can take it, how about that?" She suggested, setting the lunch tote onto the table while she let Cora pick out whatever she wanted to put in the lunch tote. She waited a bit, and then when Cora had decided she packed it all away and zipped up the tote tightly so all the contents would be safe.
"Here you go!" She said, rubbing Cora's head softly. "If you find anything, put it in the bedding or my backpack!"
Then Ainsley ran off again, running back upstairs and to the bathroom this time. She needed to bring stuff for the hurt people and as impractical as it may have been the first thing she grabbed were the trusty Band-Aid pack. In theory, Band-Aids and kisses solved all of the world's pain and that's exactly what Ainsley had in mind before she went to leave the bathroom. She paused though, turning to look at the medicine cabinet and then around the bathroom. Was she missing anything?
There was soap, and there were over the counter pain medicine in there, unquestionably from all the brawls and injuries the house of senshi seemed to find themselves with. She grabbed a couple boxes of soap that were lying around from the opened package and then the container of medicine. She shook it a bit, curious at it. It wasn't very full, but it would do. Most importantly: it would help.
At this point Ainsley had made her way back downstairs, putting what she had gathered into the pile along with anything Cora had gathered while she was upstairs. She made sure they had everything and after asking Cora one more time if there was anything else they should bring and then waiting a moment so Cora could put it in the pile or in her backpack, she wrapped up the blanket and zippered up her backpack.
This was the difficult part though. First she went to put on her backpack but how many times had she powered up and then had it disappear? She shook her head, thinking about it. It wouldn't disappear if she didn't have it on, right? It seemed like possible logic and so Ainsley powered up right then and there to find everything the way she left it.
It was a relief and after a moment of shuffling around in her slippers, she put the backpack on, gathered the blanket up and fled outside. She waited for Cora and then she made sure to lock the door behind her, hiding the key outside so she didn't go and lose it in space. Locking the door seemed pretty irrelevant at this point, considering the state Ainsley had left the house in. Everything was opened, things were sprawled all over the floor. If anyone hadn't known any better, when Bell and Xavier came home, they would think they had been ransacked.
It is then that Sailor Chibi Hypnos made her way toward the meeting place, slow and steady, lugging all the stuff she could carry with her. She hoped that herself would be an asset too, thinking of ways she could help everyone when she got there. She had come to a conclusion, but she didn't know for sure if it would work or not. She was going into the unknown, despite having been to space before, and she didn't know what to expect.
It was too late to turn back if the thought had occurred to her, seeing Times Circle around the bend. She had seen a familiar person upon getting there, remembering them from once upon a dream. She didn't waste time, hurrying toward them with Cora beside her.
"Sailor Hypnos, Senshi of Sleep" she announced, leaving the chibi part out, "and this is Cora, my Guardian Cat."
"We have brought supplies to help, I hope it can be useful. I want to protect everyone, and I promise to try my best," there was a pause, as she thought about her earlier thought. "I am not a healer but I thought maybe I could try help but helping those who can't sleep get to sleep..." She thought it was worth a shot, and if that failed she could always help in other ways. Sailor Chibi Hypnos was diligent, and stubborn and she believed she could do it.
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Posted: Thu Sep 08, 2011 10:41 pm
Another Chibi Senshi? Virgo had brought two already and she seemed to have great misgivings about them. Flora privately agreed; she was rather worried about the safety for the children. What if the space whale came back? Still, if they wanted to help, she couldn't very well stop them. The Season Senshi gave Hypnos a small smile, and Cora a rub on the head. "Please be careful, okay? The Surrounding is dangerous; we had a monster attack us a while back." It was best to warn them of the dangers, in case they didn't heed the warnings and wander out. "Stay in the Outposts, okay?" But at the very least, they had Guardian Cats, and they would know to take care of the children.
With a deep breath, she took Hypnos' hand and then brought the two to the Surrounding.
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Posted: Fri Sep 09, 2011 3:09 am
Sailor Albireo had received the message asking for help, and for a little while--she all but ignored it.
She was still new, why would they want her? Who would know her anyway...but...
She sighed, buying well over two dozen toothbrushes from the local dollar mart, then getting quite a few tubes of toothpaste as well. She put her spoils into a pillow case, then proceeded to throw in some jars of peanut butter, jelly and four loaves of bread, then heading to the meeting spot.
When she arrived she gave a small little smile. "Um, Sailor Albireo...Senshi of Swans...I've brought some things to help the civilians, do you still need aid? I'd love to assist."
Why hadn't she just left well enough alone? Oh well. It was time to do her duty. These were people too. What if Merric had been one of the people taken? She would have been offering her assistance the moment she got the letter. Yeah. These were people like Merric. People she had to help protect.
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Posted: Fri Sep 09, 2011 9:54 am
A distress call was a distress call, and no matter who sent it or what time of night, you responded to a distress call. That was what Magellan thought, anyway, and this particular call had spoken to her because there was something she could do; it wasn't about fighting gigantic youma or organizing some kind of military assault, which she wouldn't have been exactly effective for, but rather it was taking care of people. Taking care of people, to Magellan, meant managing them -- managing and organizing and making sure that things ran according to plan. It meant schedules. It meant being bossy, in short.
She was good at that.
She'd explained to her parents that she was working on an intense project and needed to go stay with a friend to manage it, and she'd booked it for a twenty-four hour super store. Given that the call had gone out pretty much Destiny City-wide, or at least that was her assumption, she debated strongly on what she should bring. You could never have too much food or medical supplies, but she'd only brought one backpack with her -- it was a big one, a camping backpack, but still.
Magellan had spent a good hour in the store, combing through the aisles to find what she thought would be most important, and eventually she figured she had enough for her backpack and what her two arms could carry. Sure, some of it people might have raised their eyebrows at -- the jumbo box of condoms, for example -- but Magellan figured if over fifty people were stuck in space, someone was going to get stupidly passionate, and she didn't know if you could conceive out in space but it was just better to be safe than sorry.
If they needed more medical supplies, she'd come back for them. Definitely. Right now, she was trying to think of odds and ends -- and that totally included that bright pink notebook that she could barely zip her backpack over in the end. Yeah, that was definitely going to have a practical use.
When she arrived at the surrounding, she looked like she was ill-equipped for a camping trip. She had an enormous backpack on, sleeping back tucked tight over the top of that, and her arms were laden with about four shopping bags each. The skin of her forearms were bright red from the strain of carrying them all, but she'd wanted to be as helpful as she could in one trip, so...
Arriving at the specified meeting place, she zeroed in on the other senshi who looked to be in charge and flashed her a friendly, if brief, smile. "Super Sailor Magellan. Sorry I'm late."
She shifted her weight from foot to foot, glancing around. Well. Hopefully nobody was watching this location... that would be pretty awkward, seeing what she hoped were tons of senshi approaching and then poofing shortly after. That'd be awkward to explain.
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Posted: Fri Sep 09, 2011 11:50 am
Sam was busying playing videos games when the message came in. Not that he heard it right away. The young senshi, in civilian form, was immersed in playing Mario Galaxy 2. Even though the game had been out for some time, Sam still hadn’t found all the stars, and once in a while it was nice revisit old games to try and finish them. He whirled the wii-mote around while his senshi phone buzzed. But Sam couldn’t hear it. Large headphone covered the boy’s ears, so that the sound from his game didn’t annoy his mom.
It wasn’t until well after he had finished playing his game and ate a hearty meal that he noticed his senshi phone. Picking it up, Sam stared at the screen and the name ‘Zue’ on it. He had never, ever heard that name before. Which led him to wonder if senshi phone could get spam texts. Shrugging it off, Sam slid open his phone and read the message that had been sent. There was trouble, in space! Apparently there was some kind whale attack and civilians stuck there like refugees.
This was exactly like the kind of thing his school did every year. Food drives and donations for the needy, refugees or just simply those who needed a bit of help come Christmas. A few years of doing donations at school, Sam knew the kind of stuff people always needed. Toothpaste and tooth brushes, pencils and pens, canned food items and peanut butter. Practical things that would last for a while.
Given his last incident in space, with Hypnos, Sam wasn’t very sure he wanted to go. What if it was just another troublesome place full of darkness and skeletons? Sam shook his head, and tried to tell himself that no. Space would be better this time, there were more adults around! And what was better to prove that he was just as much a senshi as anyone else, than to go aid civilians?
“Mom! I forgot to tell you! Jeremy invited me for a sleep-over! Can I go?” It was a lie, but a believable one.
“Huh, oh. Sure honey. Do you want me to drive you?”
“No, I’ll bike!”
“Okay Sweetie! Have fun. Don’t forget to call to check in.” Delia Colt was well aware of missing people by now and was adamant that her son check in with her when he was going out now.
Sam was quick to ransack his home for items that would be useful, but not rise suspicion. The dark-haired boy grabbed a sleeping bag, and a few random items from his parent’s washroom. Lucky for him, his father did a lot of traveling for work and always brought home those little hotel shampoo and soap things. Sam tossed all of what he could find in his bag. Getting food was a bit trickier, but Sam managed to smuggle a few boxed of mac and cheese, dry pasta and canned beans from the kitchen without his mother seeing him. He grabbed a bag of cookies as well, just because.
After he left the house and got closer and closer to the meeting spot. Sam transformed into Sailor Chibi Ixion. The grey and orange chibi, who was really almost the same size of several other senshi, dragged a duffel bag behind him as he walked up to the statue.
“Hi! Still need things. I brought beans. And those fancy hotel soaps. That’s good right? I’m Ixion!” Ixion grinned, thinking he had done a good job and that there was definitely no reason to deny him. “But I have to be back by tomorrow afternoon or my mom is gonna worry.”
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Posted: Fri Sep 09, 2011 8:27 pm
"Am I the only one who seems to think that children don't belong here?" Super Sailor Corvus had arrived; cross as always, stormy eyes drifting over the chibi-senshi as she spoke. While her path didn't often cross with those of the Zodiacs, she could remember them well enough from the first great Senshi Meeting and a call to arms was a call to arms, especially when there were civilians involved.
Granted, it could be said that the whole lot of them were little more than children. How old had she been then? How old was the youngest before the chibis?
The Senshi of Vengeance wrinkled her nose, shifting the pack she'd brought on one shoulder, the sleeping back in her other hand. "Count me in on the next transport. Sailor Corvus, Senshi of Vengeance." Goddamn Batgirl to those who recalled that meeting...
...
Not far behind her, waiting until after Corvus had left before stepping forward, was Sailor Thisbe. She had gathered what first aide supplies she could along with the extra sleeping bags her father had purchased one year for a 'family trip' that they'd all never agreed to go on before making her way to the call point. That Corvus had arrived first was coincidence. That she had waited for the other young woman to leave? Was not.
"Don't mind her, kid. She's always been that unpleasant." Even in the past. "Sailor Thisbe. Here to help where I can."
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