2124: Prologue

[Business Scrub]

Prologue: Awakening

It is dark when you awaken, so much that you think it is night time. But no, light does seep in from above you, a maddening tease that there is more elsewhere. Cramped and nauseated, you try to explore this new place you've found yourself in. A box, of some sort. Maybe... three feet, four? Not enough to stand or sit even. Naked, from the feel of it.

Besides the obvious, you can tell something is wrong. You can't seem to remember what happened before this. Or before that. Or before... anything. Anything about your life eludes you, your name, your age, and more importantly who you are. All you know is the cold metal box. The sound of people shifting near you, maybe waking up themselves. And of course the darkness.
You always know the dark.

[dark.sun.druid]

Sabio blinked deliberately in the near-darkness, pressing his hands along the sides of his prison. The walls were metallic and cold, and an antiseptic smell hung thickly in the air. He reached up to touch his face, and felt stubble on his chin. He didn't remember having stubble on his chin. Actually, he couldn't remember much. He tried to lick his lips, and found that his mouth was dry. He worked his tongue to soften things up a bit, and then tried to roll onto his side simply for the sake of movement - his joints felt stiff and unresponsive. As he turned over, however, he was assaulted by a wave of nausea that forced him back down. Pressing a hand to his forehead, he waited for it to pass. After several uncomfortable seconds, he attempted to sit up.

This time it wasn't nausea that stopped him but, rather, the top of the box, against which he banged his head with a noisy crack. He fell back again, uttering a groan of pain and frustration. For several minutes he did not attempt to move again, instead just lying quietly in the darkness and waiting for the pounding in his head to subside.

Eventually, he decided to try again. However, this time, he held his hands above his head to feel where the lid of the box was. Once he had sat up as much as possible - which wasn't all that much - he pressed against the top of the box experimentally, to see if it would move...

[Jzadek]

Emma opened her eyes slowly, and upon awakening felt an immediate sense of claustrophobia. The box felt almost as if it were closing in on her, and the oppressive sterile smell made it even more difficult to breathe. She began to panic, beating wildly against the walls and ceiling of the box with her hands and feet, screaming, not in fear, but in frustration - the icy-cold sides of the container didn't budge. She relaxed herself as best she could. No point in continuing a futile effort.

She lay back and thought the situation through. So, she was trapped in a box, that much was obvious.
Cause and effect dictated that for her to be locked in a box, someone must have done the locking. Then, the question was why. She could think of a hundred reasons - human trafficking, she'd heard that was on the rise. It could be some kind of sick experiment, maybe she was some kind of Schrödinger's Cat. Perhaps, more pleasantly, she was in some kind of cryogenic colonisation pod, going to a new planet. Or had just been banged up by some crazy with a grudge against her. If that was the case, though, she remember what she had done that would warrant this.

To be honest, she couldn't remember anything she had done, nor anything else about herself; not even her name. She was just... a girl in a box. No, not a girl, that implied too much humanity. She had no memories, no name, nothing. There wasn't really a word for that.

Existential crisis aside, she could see light. Not a lot of light, but enough to remind her that light, at least, still existed. And... yes, movement, voices. People. They were here too! For a moment, she thought to cry out, tell them she was here, and needed help. But then she realised that in all probability, it was them who put her here in the first place.

She felt a rumbling in her stomach, and suddenly realised how hungry she was. Thirsty, too, her mouth felt like she'd been gulping down sand. And she definitely felt the call of nature.

Staying here, she realised, was very possibly a death sentence, and if the sound of people stopped, and never came back, she'd be mummified forever in this clinical steel sarcophagus. She took a deep breath, spluttering from the disinfectant or whatever other vile chemical filled the air, and spoke, her words feeling rusty and unreal.

"Hello?"

[Murska]

Kevry awakens with a start, trying to sit up and banging his head in the process. He falls back down and rubs his head.

"Ouch."

Something is strange. It's worse than the usual morning grogginess. What did he smash his head against? Reaching out, he touches the top, feels around a bit and pushes.

His effort is interrupted by another realization. He not only does not remember anything about how he got here, he's completely unaware of... well, anything. Some part of his mind notes how strange the feeling of knowing things without remembering anything is, but the majority of his psyche is busy quickly freaking out.

He starts banging on the lid.

"Let me out!"

[Morcleon]

As the first few threads of consciousness begin to awaken, James could see nothing. He lay there, in total darkness, attempting to gather his thoughts. It wasn't until a few seconds later that he realized that the cause of his inability to see wasn't a matter of the environment, but merely the fact that he had yet to open his eyes.

Mentally cursing his foggy brain, he cracked open his eyes to see the world outside. It was again, pitch black, but now with a tantalizingly thin stream of light. Sighing, he reached up to rub his temples, trying in vain to stave of the incoming headache. Reaching up, he felt the cool metal surface of the box, wondering how he came to be in there.

Reaching into his memories, he found... nothing. His mind was blank, with no memories to be found. His childhood, his previous actions, not a speck of memory at all. Shaking his head to clear this train of thought, he resolved to pursue this mystery at a later date. Concentrating on the box, he felt around the edges, trying to find a way out. Unsuccessful, he let out an exasperated breath, and sat there for a few seconds until he heard what he thought was a human voice, muffled and distant. No, not just one voice. Several, although he couldn't identify any of them.

“Hello? Anyone out there?” Even as he called out into the darkness, his mind was working at full capacity, trying to determine a reason for why he would be trapped in a box. The most logical conclusion was a colony ship, and cryogenic freezing. But he couldn't feel any cold or stiffening of the limbs that would come with cryo. Another option was illegal human trafficking. However, in that case, it would probably only be a matter of minutes until the hypothetical slavers would come around and drag him out. Sighing, he waited for a response to his verbal probing...

[Jzadek]

Voices! Emma wasn't alone, then. She found that somewhat comforting, even if they sounded as if they were in the same position as her.
"Someone is here!" she replied, shouting at the top of her voice, despite the heavy feeling in her lungs from the anti-septic that clouded her supplies of air.

Was she here, though? No memory, no one to observe her. She felt more and more like the poor feline in Schrödinger's thought experiment by the second. But that was a pointless feeling. She was here to observe her, even if she had no idea who she was. She could feel pain - pain in her chest from the thick, chemical air, pain in her joints from being locked up for god knew how long.
"How many of you are there out there?" she asked, looking for conversation, something to cling onto and give her a sense of humanity, "And does anyone have any idea how we got into this mess?"

There. A question. And if luck would have it, she would be greeted with a reply from a new ally, rather than some angry slaver. Now, there was nothing to do but wait for some sort of an answer. She shut her eyes. Her lungs were beginning to feel awfully tight...

[Morcleon]

A victorious grin split James' face. The voices outside were indeed there, and, for the moment, not hostile, merely inquisitorial. He took a few deep breaths into to calm his beating heart before he replied. "There's at least three people here. You, me, and at least one other, from the voices I've heard."

"But I've no idea how or why we're trapped here."[/B] After a few seconds, he threw in another comment. "I'm assuming you're in a small, rather uncomfortable box too?"

Sitting there, awaiting an answer, James tried to stretch out his aching body a little, but to no avail. Sighing again, he sat as still as he could for a reply he hoped was coming.

[dark.sun.druid]

Sabio had given up pressing against the box's lid -- which barely moved at all, despite all of his efforts -- and had settled himself back on the bottom of the box when he heard the voices. People were shouting. Someone asked a question. How many other are out there? The voice was muffled and indistinct, but he could at least make it out. There was an answer: at least three others.

Clearing his throat dryly, Sabio called, "Make that four." The words felt unnatural on his tongue, as if he had been a long time without speaking, and his voiced sounded rough and weak. "Is everyone out there trapped like this?" He knocked his knuckles against the cold metal interior of his prison, to emphasize his point.

[Business Scrub]

As Emma panics, her hand strikes something. It's impossible to see it in the dark, but it feels like some sort of knob connected to the box.

Everyone can hear voices, raised as if in shouting, but muffled through a wall.

[Murska]

Hearing some apparently friendly voices calms Kevry down somewhat. Besides, his hands are starting to hurt and nobody's opening the lid, so it doesn't look like what he's doing is very useful.

"I'm also stuck in a box."

Rather obvious, that. But he's not really at his best for witty comments...

Instead of banging the lid, he starts feeling around the box. Maybe there's some sort of a way to open it from the inside?

[Business Scrub]

Kevry, too, finds a small knob on inside his box. The small amount of light shines on it, revealing it to be attached to a panel about an inch or two, as if it could slide open.

[Jzadek]

Struggling for air, Emma tried for the knob, but in her breathlessness, her hand slipped right past it. Her chest felt like it was being constricted, as if the walls of her box were closing in around her. She tried to cry out, but couldn't get her voice to come. Her muscles began to hurt as if from exercise, and black dots began to swim in the air in front of her eyes.

Swim was an appropriate word; she felt as if she was drowning, losing breath, and the box around her seemed to be distant somehow, like she was underwater. Vague memories of water floated through her head before disappearing again as she tried to grasp at them, some past experience. She desperately wanted to hold it, to have some kind of memory, but she couldn't quite catch it. And then she caught something, her hand closed around something, something solid, pulling her lurching back to the real world.

It was the knob. Seizing her chance, she twisted it and push upwards, with all the strength her fatigued muscles could muster.

[Morcleon]

Hearing the voices, James' eyes widen in the darkness. There was someone other than them in the vicinity. He took a deep calming breath and focused. He was trapped in a box, with absolutely nothing to use as a weapon or tool. There were a number of possible allies in similar boxes. There was a group of unknown and possibly hostile people nearby.

He scowled. This was not good. Shifting around in his confined prison, he moved his hands and arms around the sides, trying to see if there was anything useful in the box that he had missed in the near darkness. After but a second, his hand struck a protrusion on the surface. With a grim determination born of frustration, he moved it, first in one direction, then in another, attempting to get some sort of change.

[Business Scrub]

Hands shaking, Emma manages to slide open the small door of metal, and instinctively grab what is inside. It's small, squarish, made of metal. It's hard to tell with no light, but it resembles... the head of a faucet.

James finds a similar door in his box, and with the top of his container slightly more open then the rest his eyes begin to adjust to the light. Inside the metal door in the box is a paperclip, slightly bent from use.

[Murska]

Kevry slides open the panel, reasoning that if it's on the inside of his box, it's most likely meant to help the occupant in some manner.

"I found some sort of a panel on the inside of this box. You should look for one as well."

[dark.sun.druid]

Sabio, who had been laying flat back against the cold metal bottom of the box, heard someone calling out about a hidden panel. Intrigued and hopeful, he pressed his hands first along the sides of the box and then, once he remembered that he had already done that earlier, he felt his way along the lid of the box, searching for anything that felt like it might slide or swing open.

However, his efforts came to naught, "I don't know about you all, but there's nothing like that in here." He was vaguely disappointed, and he went back to lying down on the metallic surface, eyes open but staring into nothing but darkness. The panel might have provided him with a means of escape. But no, the inside of the box was as smooth and unrelenting as ever, walling him in with only the confines of his own mind to explore.

Not that his own mind was much solace at this point. Everything before the moment he had awoken in the box was darkness, even deeper and more impenetrable than the physical darkness that surrounded him. He had the occasional fuzzy recollection, but the memories were indistinct and seemingly unrelated. He could coerce no meaning from them. Where in the world am I? Who in the world am I? I can't remember anything, I can barely move, and soon I'll be dying of thirst. His one hope, at this point, was that someone else would escape and, hopefully, find him a way out of this prison.

[Business Scrub]

Kevry finds a small metal rectangle. In the darkness it's impossible to see, however there is a small wheel on the top.

Outside, the voices get louder. You can hear a female shouting, but are too far away to make out any specific words.

[Murska]

Kevry grabs the thing and fiddles with it a little. Doesn't feel like it'll open the box, so maybe it's not that important.

Seems like the only real way to get out is to have somebody on the outside do it.

"Hey! Somebody open this thing!"

[Business Scrub]

In his fiddling, Kevry spins the wheel, bringing a small flame to life. By the light of the tiny fire, he can see that it's a small, cheap lighter.

[Murska]

Kevry quickly looks around in the light for any way to get out of the box, and then shuts the lighter to avoid wasting fuel and air.

[Morcleon]

Furrowing his brow in slight confusion, James picks up the paper clip. Turning it around in his fingers, he looks at it closely. It seems normal enough. Shrugging, he glances up at the slit of light and grimaces. He waits a few agonizing seconds for his vision to adjust, and begins moving his head from side to side as rapidly as possible in order to build up enough afterimages on his retina to piece together an image.

[Business Scrub]

After a moment the image from outside the box plays on his retinas, and James can calmly make some sense of it. His container is right next to another, within a finger's length, perhaps. Little is visible of the other box besides where the lid meets the sides, and the locking method that keeps it there. The lid is secured by a hook of sorts, very precariously placed.

As James shifts around in his box, there is a short, loud screech, like that of metal bending. The ceiling to his container bends in a bit, and James can tell that his box isn't locked shut. Yet for one reason or another, any attempt to move the lid doesn't work.

[Morcleon]

James tilts his head to the side, thinking. He takes his paper clip, bending it into a straight line with a small hook at the end. With this improvised tool, he passes it through the slit and waves it around carefully, searching for any locking mechanism on his box.

[Business Scrub]

There's no lock mechanism on James' own cage, yet the paperclip snags on the lock of the container next to him, which starts to slip loose at the pressure.

[Jzadek]

Head pounding, Emma grasped the faucet tightly, and twisted with all the strength she could muster. She was not religious, but found herself praying to the universe at large that soon, she would get some fresh air. Hearing the voices coming, she banged once again on the lid with her knee, ignoring the intense pain it brought, and trying again and again. It echoed through the box like a gong, piercing her ears, but she didn't care. She was overcome with adrenalin, which focussed her on only one thing - getting... the hell... out.

[Morcleon]

For the second time since his awakening, James feels a surge of triumph. He continues pushing with the paper clip, careful not to drop it. During this process, he tries to see out of the box in the same fashion that he did before, only slightly more cautiously, out of fear that the box may suddenly collapse in on him.

[Business Scrub]

James' improvised tool catches on the lock and pulls it open. With a resounding slam, the Lid to Emma's cage flies open.

She is in a large, strange room. Polished wooden floors and dark red wallpaper coat the edges, and a faint mahogany scent wafts around. The lights are dim, but plenty bright enough to see by.The room is... Victorian is the historical word for it, but few remember why it is called that. Four chairs sit nearby with clothes stacked neatly on each. Against the far wall a fireplace rests, cold but filled with wood and kindling. Nearby, there is a sink, though it seems out of place from the rest of the room. In addition to Emma's box, there are three others, and while two of them are securely locked, the third simply has a massive metal slab on the top. There are no windows in the room, although a large metal door is set into the closest wall.

[Jzadek]

Emma clambered out of her box, taking wonderful deep breaths of the clean air, but she was still desperately thirsty, and would have been hungry too had her stomach not been churning so much.
Groaning, she stumbled over to the basin, in which she was promptly sick. She turned the tap, cursing herself, cleaning the sink and splashing water on her face and hands. Cupping them, she caught some of the water in her palms, and before it dribbled between them, took a gulp. She repeated this for some time, until her dehydration was quenched.
Right, she thought, Time to think about what to do next.
First of all, those boxes clearly had people in them. Given that three of them were firmly locked, she wasn't sure what she could do about that, but the one with the slab across it... that might be easier. It looked heavy, and she didn't feel particularly athletic.
However...
Rapping on the top of the box with her knuckles, Emma spoke to whoever was inside.
"Hello?" she called, "Is there someone in there? I was just in one of these, I'm going to try to get you out. Okay?"
She went over to the chairs, and picked one up, carrying it over to where the box lay on the floor. She tipped it back, trying to get the back of the chair to hook underneath the slab. Once that was done, she pressed down on the chair.
Give me a lever, and a place to stand on, and I will move the world... or a slab, as may be.
Now, she could only hope that the chair was strong enough not to break.

If she can get the metal slab off, Emma is going to try and move it over to the door, and barricade it. Given that whoever's out there probably put them in the boxes in the first place, she doesn't want them coming right in.

[Business Scrub]

The sink, upon closer inspection, is broken, though enough water slowly trickles out that Emma can quench her thirst. The head of the faucet has been removed.

The clothes fall off the chair as Emma pries it under the box, but the slab is far too heavy and the chair leg begins to snap under the pressure. James hears Emma's knocks loudly in his box, and everyone in the room can hear her speak.

From outside, only Emma can hear voices, clearer now; "See? One of them is out already. Calm yourself."

[Morcleon]

James smiles. Perhaps there was a chance at escape after all. He opens his mouth to speak, but winces at the loud splintering of wood. "I take it that your first attempt to free me has failed, then? Perhaps if you could give me a description as to how my box is sealed, then I could assist your efforts."

He flicks his eyes downward and chuckles. "Oh, and if you could see if there are any clothes in the general vicinity, that would be much appreciated. My current state of dress is not exactly... socially presentable, as it were."

[Murska]

Well, at least somebody got out.

"Great. If you can figure out a way to open this thing, I'd be very happy!"

Kevry bangs on the lid a few more times out of half frustration and half wish that he'd be the next one released.

[dark.sun.druid]

From outside his metallic coffin, Sabio could hear the sound of people moving. Metal slammed on metal, and he guessed -- correctly -- that someone had found their way out of their box. He pressed the top of his box again, and found that it was still securely shut. So he waited, and shortly heard what sounded to be knocking. Someone shouted, but they weren't at his box. Slightly worried, Sabio continued to wait. The cold from the metal was creeping into his limbs now, and he could hardly swallow for want of water. Dimly, he heard the sound of cracking wood, but he didn't know what to think about that.
For now, I wait, he thought, rubbing his arms to warm them up.

[Jzadek]

As James mentioned his state of undress, Emma realised that she too wasn't wearing any clothes. It took only a quick scan of the room to reveal the stack of clothes, which she hastily threw on.
"Okay," she began, "There's a heavy metal slab on top of your coffin-thing."
At once she wished she hadn't said that. While she had somehow managed to get out, it was a genuine possibility that she wouldn't be able to get the others out, and anyway, she didn't quite trust herself not to run - trying to think everything through was a struggle through the rising sense of panic when her fight-or-flight mechanism told her only to escape.
"Why don't you try pushing upwards, and I'll try to lift?" she suggested, "Together we might be able to-"
Hearing the voices from outside, Emma froze.
"Damn... everyone, be quiet," she hissed.
She was wrong about the urge to run, she realised. It wasn't the urge for flight. It was the urge to fight.
Lifting the broken wood from the chair, she snuck over to the door, and raised it into the air. Anyone who came in would have it slam down upon their head. Further than that, she'd just have to wing it...

[Morcleon]

James grimaces. This new occurrence would cause a delay. He sighs and waits, knowing that there is nothing to be done without the help of his newfound ally.

[Business Scrub]

The voices go quiet for a while, and Emma can hear the sound of footsteps, one heavy and one soft on the other side as whoever was there walks away.

[Jzadek]

Hearing them coming, Emma tensed, ready to strike. With one hand, she absently fiddled with the faucet, pressing it and shaking it, wondering what it did, and whether that would help her.