[AR-ORP] Organization is the key!

[Iris_virus]

((Basically just a meet and greet/ ORP for anyone staying in the Aquarius post during the first days))

In truth Menthe wanted nothing more then to simply go home and resume her average, everyday, normal and boring life. She wanted to sit in her apartment and watch tv, curled up in blankets, or to resume the humdrum routine of work. But it had become apparently fairly quickly that no one really knew how to accomplish that and that they should get themselves comfortable perhaps for a lengthy stay.

She hadn't had any problem with the Leo Outpost where she'd first arrived. The people there had been friendly enough, pleasant even amid all the chaos and horror that had surrounded them. And Leo, he'd seemed very capable, calm and in control which was a soothing source she would have enjoyed in times like these. But when she'd heard of the different outposts and what was housed in each, she quickly made up her mind where she wanted to be. Sure she loved to eat, but she wasn't much of a cook at all, so the kitchens weren't really her forte.

Aquarius outpost though, record keeping sounded right up her alley. In her regular life she had been a secretary in a large office building. She made phone calls, typed, faxed, copied, kept track of office supply inventories and people's files. Hiding away behind a desk and keeping busy had always been a comfort for her, and the oppurtunity to do that again, here and now served as the perfect way for her to keep her mind off of horrible thoughts.

The outpost was beautiful, foreign and spectacular. She lingered for a little before she entered the main room, eyes quickly finding a slew of tasks she could set herself to do.

The place was pretty dusty, eventually she'd see if she could help start to clean it up and tidy things a bit. But her first focus was on the massive walls filled with books, and the other books scattered across the floor and on tables and chairs. It wouldn't do to have anyone just heaving and shoving them around, so Menthe set to the task of slowly gathering them up.

Picking up her first book she attempted to slip it into the giant shelves, pausing with a look of confusion when she found the task impossible. They certainly looked like books... not like one of those fake painting walls. It was almost like glass blocked her path. Frowning a little thoughtfully she resigned herself to setting the book on the ground, out of the way atleast and near the bookcase.

Each book after that she'd brush the dust off softly with her silk blouse (it was already messed up anyway thanks to the slashed sleeve and dried blood), before setting it on the first, slowly making a growing stack. She couldn't really make out the titles.. but that was a mere curiousity for now. Maybe as the day or ohh... hopefully not weeks(!) passed perhaps she'd have the desire and drive to try and actually peek through the tomes.

Oblivious to anyone that might have already been there, or came in since she'd first arrived, the 5'2 secretary with mint green hair tucked up in a bun, gathered and placed books. Her heels clacked softly through the large and echoing room.  

[DivineSaturn]

All Sailor Aquarius had wanted was to go to space. She hadn't wanted to find a bunch of random people up there, or be responsible for their well-being. She hadn't particularly wanted to clean up a pretty decrepit house, though even as she thought that, something at the back of her mind grew angry at her own insult. There was a part of her that remembered Aquarius Outpost in all its glory: mosaics gleaming, bookshelves full and well-maintained, a different experiment in every room. Her vision of it was foggy, a misty overlay on a dust-covered world. No wonder it was hard for her to see straight.

But she could think about the past later. In the present, there was information to find, and Aquarius always worked best when it was on something that interested her. The hows and whys of her unexpected houseguests interested her. Having to deal with the mess her former self had left, not so much. The proper word for the task was "daunting," though "impossible" flitted through her mind a few times as she surveyed the damage.

At least she was not alone. Aquarius ducked back through the curtain into the entrance hall, to find somebody already at work there. She watched for a few moments before joining in, taking a book from off the floor and glancing at its contents. "Thanks for starting on this. I'd tell you where things go, but I'm not really sure myself." The book contained nothing but strings of random numbers, so she snapped it shut, sending a small cloud of dust into the air. "Do you mind if we talk while we work? I know you've been through some tough experiences, but you might have some really important information."
 

[Iris_virus]

Timid thing that she was, she seemed to jump just a little as the voice caught her off guard, before turning to take in the source. She wasn't certain at first if the woman was one of 'the victims' or one of 'them', considering some of the strange outfits some of the LARPers had come in.. not that it particularly mattered that much. But when she spoke Menthe decided she must be one of the later.

"It's not a problem" She squeaked in response to the thanks, her tiny voice not traveling far in the massiveness of the room.

Pausing a moment at the request to 'talk', she nodded finally, obligingly as she rearranged her glasses mildly. "That's okay I guess. Though I don't know if I'll be much help"

"But you can ask if you like. I'll try my best." Her voice was trailing softly as she bent to pick up another book.  

[Melodine Cantus]

After he had healed his shoulder at Virgo; which looked utterly boring because it was more of an infirmary than anything else, and he had enough of hanging around hospitals, or a place that resembled one, to interview people. Especially when the coma incident was still fresh in his mind. No. Aquarius seemed interesting enough; record keeping meant that he could probably nose through them for information! Jarold Rivera had immediately perked up at this thought and volunteered for helping to 'organize' the books.

The first drawback was that he couldn't understand a goddamn word that was written inside them, and he had flipped through dozens of books. The second drawback was that when he had decided to shelve some of them... the bookshelves would not let him, like there was a glass barrier over it. This was very very strange indeed.

"I'm sure," He spoke up, in the midst of sorting some books by strange symbols on some of the covers, "you have more information than us. You live here after all." He motioned around the place and then looked thoughtfully at Aquarius. "I don't suppose you can read these, can you? Or even remotely know what they're about? History of the place? Space whales? Or hell, even space octopi? How everything here functions, or do you guys all just handwave it and say it's magic?"  

[DivineSaturn]

In a way, Menthe reminded Aquarius of a friend of hers back home. They were both short, with soft voices and always seemed like they were trying to make themselves even smaller. It was unlikely that Aquarius, who thrived on attention and often failed to notice the less obvious hints people gave her, would ever fully understand the quiet, understated type. But being friends with Yvette had given her some practice, so she was able to lower her volume to about half of what it would normally be. Still plenty loud enough to carry across the room, but more intimate.

"You never know what could be important," she said reassuringly, looking over her shoulder at the newcomer. This one was harder for her to place, and his assumptions annoyed her. "I don't live here," she informed Jarold. "I haven't even been here before." That wasn't exactly true, but getting into a long-winded discussion about the technicalities of reincarnation was not what she was going for at the moment. Interesting though it might have been, it lacked the urgency of the current dilemma.

His question was cause for more thought. Aquarius shifted the book she was carrying from one hand to the other. It was lucky she wasn't tasked with this job alone, or it would never be done. "It's kind of hard to say. I can't read it, but I can recognize certain things. They're not all in the same language, for one. And some of them... I don't think they're languages, really. Codes, maybe? Like this one." She opened her book again, flipping a few pages to display the numbers covering each one. "It could be a book of just numbers, but that wouldn't make a whole lot of sense, so it's probably some kind of code."

She had heard about the space whale. For once, Aquarius was quite glad to be late for something important. "I don't know how things work. Or maybe it's better to say that I don't know until I know." So many of her memories of the past were based not on people or events, but on concepts and theories that she could neither identify nor relate to. Maybe something at the outpost would give her a clue, but so far, nothing had clicked. "It's definitely magic, but why handwave it? Or are you not interested in the answers if they're not handed to you?"

It was a bit of a cutting remark, but his comments had bothered her more than she wanted him to know. She searched desperately for a change of subject, and turned back to Menthe with a sheepish look. "Did you start organizing things in a certain way? I don't want to mess up any system we have going here."
 

[Iris_virus]

Another person arrived and she glanced back briefly at him as 'Aquarius' spoke. She wasn't the most social person but she had noticed the subtle difference in the way she'd spoken to her.. and then him. It was curious, but not unwanted. Her words to the man had been a little scary, but the soft words to her..

"Oh no. I couldn't read them so... I was just trying to stack them out of the way and clear the floor." She motioned softly to the slowly growing multistacks, though she hardly needed to.

"I figured if we're here long enough we can organize it after the fact. By symbols I suppose if we have to..."

It was actually a kind of thrilling thought for Menthe. She wasn't a puzzle master by any means.. but she did a mean crossword puzzle. Figuring out and fitting words into the boxes. Matching and fitting mysterious symbols together seemed like the next evolution.

"If you'd prefer we do it now though..." She fretted softly. The woman hadn't been trying to hint that they should, was she? Menthe would oblige of course if that was the case.  

[and be blue]

Veer had been desperately hoping that a little wander around Aquarius's workroom would find him some kind of computer, some kind of technology, some kind of internet access -- but no. It appeared that there was nothing with whirring fans or a hard drive anywhere to be found. His next stop was going to be trying to coax a phone or something out of his fellow strandees.

But he was a little waylaid by the piles of books.

His hair was still wet from a not-quite-voluntary dunk and tumbling crookedly across his face, stuck to dark skin. He was dressed in clothes that didn't quite fit him properly, too baggy around the waist and too short in the leg. It all made him look younger than nineteen, certainly, and also a little bit strange. As if he wasn't already strange...

"Did someone say code?" It was a key word, something that made his eyes light up and drew him slowly across toward the sound of a woman's voice. Or an alien's voice, perhaps -- she was one of the ones in the crazy outfits. He wasn't sure which one. He hadn't been paying very good attention. "...I like code."  

[Melodine Cantus]

Jarold was not too terribly fazed by Aquarius' change in tone while talking to him. It was common, as a reporter, to hear this sort of snippy comments, and he was well conditioned to all this. It wasn't as if he had ruder interviewees before, and he had managed to handle them quite patiently to drag out what exactly e wanted from them.

"So we could, theoretically, break the code if we actually sat down and did patterns and what not?" Not that he actually wanted to; he wasn't sure if he was good at this sort of thing, but if it was to give him answers, he could always try his best with a sheet of paper and a pen. If it was here, it had to mean something, right? There was no sense in keeping books with loads of gibberish in them.

"But you are a Zodiac." He pointed out quite bluntly. "And from what I gathered, this is Zodiac territory. All the 'oh no, civilians aren't allowed here and now we are responsible for them', isn't it?"

"You misunderstand; I work hard for answers." A chuckle. "I don't simply just throw my hands up midway, my dear; it's just that, well, magic is strange, isn't it? We, as ordinary people, don't exactly know the rules Senshi, or well, Zodiac magic conforms to, so we can speculate all we want, but we could very well be heading down the wrong track."

He looked towards the newcomer, raising an eyebrow. "If you want to decode one of these strange books, go for it. I'd imagine they'd have some interesting information we could learn." Of course, it depended on what kind of code he was referring to. This man looked as though he was a little... off.  

[phoenix kiss]

Jasper had spent a day at the Virgo Outpost, getting healed -- he'd expected nothing more than a quick bracing and the agonizing pop! of having his shoulder jammed back into place, but it had been much quicker, less painless. It left him feeling much better, but almost cheated: he'd been preparing for the worst, now why wasn't it here? He hadn't been able to find either of his two friends; he remembered blacking out and hitting the floor, and distantly hearing the sounds of Veer and Raph doing the same before all went dark and cold.

And now he was in space, in some dusty and worn-down outpost, filled with people he didn't know and one girl who looked absolutely ridiculous in that getup -- but there was Veer.

Jasper rubbed idly at his shoulder as he crossed the room in two or three quick strides to stand beside Veer: "Your pants are too big, kid."  

[TheMadHatter]

He'd come at the call of the Zodiacs and found himself quickly drawn straight to the one outpost that seemed to contain the place he coudl be most helpful. Book and information seemed to be what he was best at so he might as well put his brain to use trying to sort out the mess that way rather than with brawn.

Peering into the Sailor Arsinoe looked around for anyone who looked like him. He was -not- good at the whole social thing but it seemed easier for him to talk to other Senshi than to your average person.

"Um .... is Aquarius here? I came to help with sorting out the books and trying to see what happened."  

[Iris_virus]

More people were filtering in to the large room, which was good for the books and mess, a little less so for the woman who had began to clean the area in the first place. Or rather.. maybe it was, if the rest of the them chattered and talked maybe she could just fade into the background again and get some work done. In fact, that's exactly what she was going to do, bending down she picked up another book, wiping it gently with her shirt.

Words were being thrown around. Codes.. working for answers. Zodiac. Pants..?

One question however was enough to gain a response from her, answer softly as she pointed gently towards the woman near her, Sailor Aquarius. "She is here."  

[DivineSaturn]

"If you don't have a system, I'm not going to worry about it." Aquarius closed her book again and gently set it on top of the nearest stack. "You're right, one step at a time. If we try to organize before we know what's here, we'll never get anything done." Or was that based on her usual experience with trying to organize books? She had the bad habit of reading them as she tried to put them away, and never got beyond a book or two before someone came in to yell at her. At least that wasn't a danger here.

It seemed she was attracting an audience. That always did wonders for Aquarius' mood. She perked up considerably as she picked up another book, this one from a chair. Then she looked at the chair again and saw another one, jammed behind a cushion. Tucking the first book under her arm, she retrieved the second one, then sat in the chair and put both books on her lap. "I like codes too! It's frustrating, not knowing what's going on here- especially when people think you should." That wasn't a direct jab at Jarold, but at others who had expressed similar opinions as well. "But you could look at it this way: this entire place is a code. I'm part of it. You're part of it too, or you wouldn't be here." She gestured at the room at large, indicating everyone. "But just because we're pieces of the puzzle doesn't mean we know what the complete picture looks like."

Not a bad analogy, if she did say so herself. She opened the topmost book of her small stack and leafed through it absently. "I think we're capable of anything, given the right circumstances and enough drive. Did you think you could be in space without a helmet before this? Magic is strange, but it follows rules just like everything else does. The trick is knowing the rules. They're not easy to learn, but you're in as good a position to learn now as you'll ever be, and you've got plenty of time on your hands." Though she did hope he would actually pitch in and help with the cleaning. Not that she wasn't enjoying the debate, but if she got sidetracked chatting with everyone, their lungs would be coated with dust within the week.

And then another visitor, this one a senshi. Aquarius looked up from her book when she heard her name, though she had felt him before he entered. Then she looked around at her other guests. Did he really have to ask who the senshi in this room was? Maybe he was distracted, but it still didn't bode well. "I'm Aquarius," she said, inclining her head in a sort of bow- she was in no mood to shuffle her books and get up to do a real greeting. "I'm not sure how much sorting we'll be doing yet, but you're welcome to help with the stacking while we assess the situation. You are?"

It occurred to Aquarius that she had been conversing with the others without learning their names. It was never the first task on her list, introductions, mostly because she had a hard time keeping names straight. But if they were to live with each other for a while, she had best make an effort. "That goes for all of you. You know my name, obviously, but I'm afraid I don't know any of yours."
 

[TheMadHatter]

"Sailor Arsinoe." He smiled slightly as he headed further into the room to look at the growing piles of books. He'd know the other senshi was in the room but felt it more polite to ask than to just barge in. Manners were still important so long as no one was currently in danger.

"Is there a method to the stacking? Or are we just getting them up off the floor." He picked up a couple books at looked at the covers. One of them was in strange symbols and the other, while in letters he could understand, just looked like gibberish.  

[Iris_virus]

Names, names, always names. Once again she obliged with the introductions, looking specifically at Aquarius as she asked. Her voice was quiet enough that people much further away might not have noticed, or might have had to strain to hear. "Menthe Syliva"

Inspecting the other senshi curiously, but without trying to look like.. rude staring, who knew if all the senshi were nice? Or what they could do to her if they decided not to be nice!? "Just staking out of the way for now..."

"But I guess if someone wanted to start organizing what we have already..." She certainly wasn't going to try and stop anyone from doing anything. Heck, if one of them told HER to start doing it, she'd quickly change her task.  

[Melodine Cantus]

"Well, it is pretty confusing." Jarold remarked, drumming his fingers on a pile of books he had made. "Technically this is your property, but you guys don't seem to know very much about it, and it looks like it's been abandoned for quite a while. So, is it an inheritance of sorts? Like part of the deal of being a Senshi is that you have to clean up an old place that is kind of like your home, but not really?" He would think that he would make more sense, having reported on so many Senshi ongoings, but Jarold was starting to come to the conclusion that he had only skimmed the tip of the iceberg before. This? He was fairly deep into the iceberg, witnessing things for himself.

So what she meant was that all the people here were technically connected of sorts? "Well, I doubt we have the same backgrounds." There were teenagers, there were nurses, there were office ladies... But it was definitely plausible that they weren't just simply randomly yanked off the streets.

For a moment, Jarold Rivera shifted his gaze to the Senshi who called himself Arsinoe. Hmmmmm, he doubted that this one knew much; his name didn't seem very Zodiac-y.

"You seemed to have a system in mind." He remarked to Menthe. "Shall it we do it by symbols then? We could write down the symbols we've come across so far and then use that to organize things?"

"Oh, and I'm Jarold Rivera." He added, as an afterthought.