Tasha wakes up in the middle of the night. There's a moon overhead, or at least the projection of one, as she stirs atop the coiled up Gwyndrael (and have under one of her wings). She must have slept for six hours or so.
Tasha's yawn is cavernous. It's followed by a brief look around, a common activity for someone who tends to wake up in a different place every day, sometimes very different indeed. She quickly recalls how she ended up here on tis tower, sleeping atop a dragon, and gives Gwyndrael a fond pat before carefully making her way down and locating her clothes.
After dressing, Tasha scans the world, such as it is. The moon is novel but somehow comforting; she feels like she could get used to having a moon or moons overhead. Once done sight seeing, she readies herself to take wing and head towards the galley.
The top of the tower gives a good view of the valley, and the air is clear of any flying monsters between the castle and the base. The command center is quiet, since there isn't anyone normally there at night. The cafeteria is also quiet, without even the hum of machinery that she almost expects to be there. But efficiency has killed it!
Tasha internally laments the death of a noisy world, but that won't keep her from eating. She locates something called a 'bagel', strange highly compressed disks that auto-bake themselves and turn their wrapper in to a crispy crust. She puts two of these to do their thing, sets slices of bacon and assorted local meat to heating, and puts the water to boil to make some tea, feeling the dead of night isn't the time for coffee.
Boiling water seems a bit anachronistic. But she's never seen what an actual modern kitchen could do. If kitchens still exist. Maybe room service is just universal somehow. But the kettle pings when the water is boiling, and the tea is added in the familiar way.
The young woman admits to herself she really has no idea what most of these devices do and, according to Gabriel and others, many are long obsolete. She knows they could do it all faster, better, and with fewer lost ingredients, but sometimes she wants food now. Usually. Often.
Once her meal's ready -- a neat double stack bagel sandwich with some green tea -- she carries it over to a bench, one closest to the wrap around windows, and looks out at the moon and the quiet night.
The windows have good view of the airfield, where Tasha can glimpse something moving around.
A very frowny Tasha tracks the movement as she takes an oversized bite of her bagel burger. Strange movement isn't unusual in this place, but within the base limits that movement more likely to be people -- or people-like entities -- than some sneaking monster. She wonders who is out and about this late.
As for nocturnal types, it could be any of the Karnors, or the Eeee, or Tia or Kai.. or Mressa? All of the Kobolds and half-dragons are still back at the castle, and she's pretty sure Lapi don't run around at night.
Tasha supposes she won't get to eat her sandwich in quiet peace; she's too curious, too martial, and too busy to leave a mystery alone when it's right there in front of her. And so she wolfs down some of her food, has a hard few sips, then stands up and carries the now much more portable bagel sandwich and tea combo with her out the door, to go have a look.
The transition back to outdoors brings a lot of smells with it, but the bacon in her hand overpowers a lot of them. She saw the mysterious figure dodge towards the 'vintage' drop-ship, where Sasha likes to hide out.
Tasha doesn't need her hands to fight, so she doesn't feel as awkward as one might walking in to what's possibly danger armed with only a bagel, tea, and curiosity. She does give herself a wide berth, however, keeping away from shadows and putting space between herself and all corners, listening and looking. When she nears the ship she calls out, "Hello?"
"Shh!" comes the whispered response. "Hurry over before they see you." It sounds like Hakeber.
"They?" Tasha walks over, but not in a hurry and not dropping her guard. Just in case.
The Karnor scholar is hiding at the back of the landing craft, and trying to be stealthy as she looks around the corner towards the only other ship on the airfield, the Astraea.
Tasha plays along, hunching down -- and also moving her food to the side away from Hakeber. "Why are we spying on the Astraea," she then inquires, quite a logical question to her mind. "Who are we spying on?"
"The new guy, the Eeee," Hakeber says. "He's been with Tia since he arrived. All his stuff is at her ship and they even loaded it in. Now they're.. inspecting the ship or something."
"I think they met before, in the future, or some alternate timeline. I didn't ask because I didn't want to disturb chronicle linearity," Tasha notes before taking another bite of her food and nodding, as if preserving timelines is just something else she does in a day.
"What's his deal then?" Hakeber asks. "There were times when they both seemed to just disappear, and I even forgot about them until I came across the scent trail. I think it was that weird mind mojo, but it doesn't work on noses apparently."
"We could just go ask, you know," Tasha asides reasonably. She sits down to continue to work on her food, which is in constant danger so long as Hakeber is nearby. "Why, are you worried they're doing something bad?"
"I've never seen Tia interact with anyone for this long," Hakeber says. "We can't just interrupt them!"
"Why are we whispering?" a new voice asks from right behind Tasha.
"/Hakeber is playing nosy spy and I'm playing along,/" Tasha whispers back to the mystery voice. She doesn't even turn around, but she does eat more of her meal. "/Sho, Tia'sh hrangin' ourt wiff the Heee and tha'sh'not somethring shee dosh moch." She waggles her tea cup Tia-ward, indicatingly.
"Ah, Hakeber is nosier than I expected," the voice replies. From the tone it's probably Kai, since the others that could sneak up on them wouldn't have a reason to.
"I have a normal sized nose," Hakeber counters, then goes back to spying. "They're on top of the.. high part. Near one of the thingies that look like engines."
"I know right? Is this what she does when we -- well not you Kai -- aren't looking?" Tasha sounds mildly scandalized. "And the Eeee just joined, too. We're going to give a bad impression if they catch us."
"I doubt they'd notice, as Tia has her ansible connection turned off, and the Eeee would have heard Hakeber if his attention wasn't focused on Tia," Kai claims. "And if found, just claim you were snooping on Tia and not him."
"Any idea how they know each other? Darksight tipped his hand a little when he admitted they hadn't met yet from his perspective. So they've met before, but Tia's timeline isn't there yet. Which has implications for all of us too," Tasha muses. She then polishes off her meal, leaving her to sip her tea giving her the mild, attentive expression of someone watching a holovid while enjoying a beverage.
"He may have just been eager to meet her," Kai notes. "Or he sometimes sees a bit into a sideways future. They seem to be getting along though. I imagine he had a lot of questions."
"That could be. I mean, his name is Darksight. He's always had a mystical quality. From what I know of him, he was rescued from from some other reality by a Waymaker and brought here. he's been trying to find a way home changeline," Tasha explains.
"Ah, tricky situation then," Kai claims. "They're in a similar position, since Tia can't get back to her own home reality."
"So they've got something in common and... ohhhhhh," Hakeber says.
"Why not? I thought just the world was destroyed, not the entire reality -- or did her 'escape pod' eject her from that reality? Don't you know where it is?" Tasha puts her drink aside now that it's empty, then pulls in her knees and rests her head on them. "You know this really isn't how I do things, I feel weird spying on them."
"Never been to that reality," Kai says. "I was in cold storage while Kainudy was there, and even she got there by accident."
"We need to make sure they hook up," Hakeber turns and insists.
"Wasn't that the one with the world full of dragons, before the not-quite-Shadows attacked? I saw some visions of it during the attack on Tianudy's place." Tasha then reaches up and really scratches at an ear. "Oh no, I'm not getting involved in Tia's love life. My relationship to her is convoluted enough as it is."
"That was Kainudy's home.. well, the world she helped make, not her home world," Kai explains. "The world where Tia was created was the one she fell into after the war, while transiting between two fae realms on her 'victory tour'."
"I think I need a timeline brochure to keep track of everything," Tasha admits, ears flicking. "So originally Kainudy was from an Earth-parallel, then she ended up in the fae realms, then she got sabotauge-booted to Tia-world, then at some point she ended up at the home-she-made-world, and then that got destroyed and she ended upin her pocket universe?"
"Close. She start on an Earth-parallel - which is where she got me from - then she created a new world for the drakes, that's the one you saw Daniarood in. Then she traveled a bit with Persephone to alternate Earths, and from one of those she got to the fae realms. She worked her way up the political ladder there, which got her into the war. She was wrecked after that, so the elves shuffled her around until they could figure out what to do with her, and during that she ended up in another reality on a world where she eventually created Tia, sort of. Then she left to fight in another war against the Ogdoad sorts that had been released from their prison, and they wrecked everything, burning Tia's home. Tia's larger self pushed her through a gateway to another universe before being killed. When Kainudy got back from the war, she was more broken than ever and retreated to her sanctuary dimension," Kai explains.
"That's a rough life," Tasha notes, reaching for her drink but finding it empty. She frowns in to the cup, then puts it back down again. "Which is why we shouldn't make this more awkward for Tia than it probably already is."
"Well.. he did move his stuff in with her, so that's probably a good sign right?" Hakeber says.
"It could be more of a functional partnership, like working buddies, or just people with a similar goal," Tasha suggests, then she shrugs. "I'm sure if we need to be informed they'll let us know."
"You need to go to the ship soon too, Tasha," Kai whispers. "Tia has been expecting you. Vasha and Sharon already went."
"By soon do you mean, like, right now? Because I'll go, I just don't want them both turning around and staring at me like I interrupted something major," Tasha inquires, muzzle tilting.
"Well, you may want to try calling her first, just in case," Kai suggests.
"Can-do." Tasha puts her finger to the side of her head to indicate she is calling with her brain now. "Tasha to Tia, I just woke up and ate, do you need me to come over now? Hake had some thing she was interested in, but we're done now, so I'm free."
"Yes, you should come over and get into your tube," Tia responds.
"Wow, memories." Not great memories for Tasha, but it is what it is and she starts getting up. "I have to 'get in my tube' now, so I'll just be going. Hake, can you take my cup back?" Hakeber gets handed the cup anyway. "See you both.. Eventually?"
"You didn't leave any bacon for me?" Hakeber whisper-whines, but picks up the mug. "Don't worry, I'm sure whatever changes get made will look cute on you," Kai says with a big smile that shows her teeth. It's always weird when Humans do that.
"Ugh, Human teeth." Tasha reaches over and playfully tries to push Kai's lips closed as she heads on out. "And everything looks cute on me, I'm incredible." She winks, then she's heading outside.
So as to not make it seem like she's arriving from the ship right next door, she angles around a building so to seem to come from residential.
The landing gangway of Astraea is open, and the interior lights up when Tasha approaches. There's no sign of Tia though, or her new friend.
The red woman hopes she's not about to get jumped because she did something in some alternative timeline, future, reality or worldline and now it's time for revenge or something; whatever the case, she walks in undaunted. "Hello? I'm here to check in for my ten o'clock tubing."
"Just head for an empty one," Tia says in her head. "Vasha and Sharon are already in theirs. I'll get Sasha later."
"Alrighty," goes Tasha. She makes her way in to the ship, then to the tubes. After locating them, she pauses to take a look at what she's seeing -- and maybe see if there's a best tube. Maybe one with a window view.
The corridor has tubes on either side, so at best Tasha could get one with a view of her sisters in their tubes. They both look asleep and oddly innocent. And they have their clothes on, which is a first for tube stuff.
Tasha pats each tube as she goes along, to let them know they're not alone, even if they asleep. To maintain the line and thus show camaraderie, she takes the next tube in the line of sisters, avoiding breaking the pattern. And since everyone's clothed she doesn't bother to undress, she just opens the tube and steps in.
The glass door closes once Tasha is in position. "I'll need to turn you off," Tia informs her. "The modifications are preset, so shouldn't need my supervision."
"Most people try to turn me on, so it's a nice change of pace," Tasha quips. "Before I take a nap, how are you and Darksight getting on? I notice he mentioned you in a non-linear way, but I didn't want to dig and potentially cause a temporal chronicling problem."
"He can get ahead of himself is all," Tia claims. "The trick is not to trip over yourself when it happens. I am fairly certain we will be having sex soon, while your ansible is being repaired and other upgrades are being installed."
"Well, good for you two! I'm glad you seem to have found someone; he seems like he could use someone, too. Well, I'll leave you both to it. Don't do anything weird on our tubes, either. You'll scandalize Sharon and Vasha might make fun of you." Tasha stretches. And she just woke up, too. Well, there's no helping it, and there's precious little to do this late at night anyway. She may as well get this sorted.
"I will try to keep the number of tentacles to a minimum then," Tia says. "Would you like to count down from ten or should I just flip the switch?"
"Just flip it, I don't need bracing." Tasha drops her arms and leans back in to what she hopes is a respectable sleeping beauty pose, just in case she ends up sealed for a thousand years or something.
The switch is flipped. Tasha blinks, slowly waking up.. and with odd images of tentacles in her mind. She feels heavy. Not physically, though. There are little sparks of light at the edges of her vision until her eyes focus.
Tasha has a moment of temporal disconnect. She's pretty sure she was about to sleep for upgrades, but now she's awake, and she feels different. Long experience tells her the process has passed and she's still alive, which is always a plus, but in what form of life she no longer knows. And, it's not the first time she's woken up as something else, a feeling that gives her a strange sense of both time and being, a universality of self, yet also a disconnection from an essential, maintained self, a self one can relate to through a life. That form of existence is behind her; for her, something else, then.
The door of the tube slides open, which probably means that whatever Tia was doing to her has completed. Her scalp, palms and arms tingle oddly.
Tasha takes it slow; it'd be embarrassing to have been upgraded just to trip and break her nose. She takes hold of one side of the tube, then the other, and eases herself out.
There is a little bit of dizziness, which is very odd given that she's sober. It passes quickly though.
From grabbing the sides of the tube though, she can feel something is slightly off in the way her palms feel.
Tasha supposes having so much modified -- especially so many things connected to her brain -- might make for some dizziness. And despite what people might think some times, she does use her brain. Once out she looks for something reflective to check herself in, being a visually-oriented sort of being. Seeing herself is mapping herself.
The closest reflective surface is the tube across the corridor, which is empty.
Tasha decides to head for that then, taking careful steps, then reaching to brace herself on the tube for that extra safety.
The curved surface gives a distorted reflection, but what catches Tasha attention is that her irises have more golden striations in them now.. noticeable because they're glowing. At least for a moment, then the glow fades, and it's just her familiar face reflecting back at her.
Huh, thinks Tasha. Well, that's new. Leaning back she takes some time to examine herself in more detail, looking to her greater body.
She looks the same.. but does discover something in her palms. She finds a small golden gem embedded near the center, between the pads. It's nearly invisible due to the fur there, but for a moment she catches golden flickers of light beneath the dark skin of the pads, looking like they're tracing out the nerves. The light fades, and the slight tingle she was feeling fades with them.
Skin gems, Tasha notes, adding that to the current selection of changes along side 'glowing eyes' and 'subsurface neural-wiring'. She suspects a lot of what's been done isn't something she can see with the naked eye, which again makes her wish she came with a manual. The Melchior came with a manual, and that was very helpful.
Tasha suppose she ought to done one more quick pass, and so turns around slowly to make sure there isn't anything else she missed. It would be equally embarrassing if she decided not to and ended up chopping someone's arm off because her tail has a sword on it, or similar problems.
Everything else looks and feels the same, including her tail and wings. She hasn't sprouted golden shoes on her hooves either.
Tasha decides the rest must be internal, so she steps away, turning to see if the rest of her -- her sisters and brother -- are all done, or if they're still under maintenance. She might have been the last one, being the potentially most complicated.
The other tubes are empty, so Vasha and Sharon have been released already.
The red woman wonders if Sasha had been in and out as well. With nothing more to be done here she starts heading for the exit, assuming Tia is already aware of the fact. "I'm heading out, Tia, unless you need me? And, thanks for the hard work."
"Be sure to check your ansible interface for the upgrades," Tia responds. "You spent 36 hours in the tube."
"Beats my last record in the tube, unless you count with Charon." Tasha starts heading out, and as she does, she tries to bring up the ansible menu for inspection. "Did anything happen while I was under?"
"An infinite number of things happened, but nothing much of note," Tia says. "The new girl was abducted by Gwyndrael, though, if that is important? Sasha went to rescue her."
The menu shows that 'battery' capacity is now ten times what it was, and there's a new entry called Projection.
"That was something we had been planning, so I'm glad to see that's underway. I wasn't sure who would rise up to the occasion, a few of me are still scared by the dragons. I should check in on him -- or not? Maybe it's best I let him accomplish the task without me. Nora'd like that." Tasha stops walking to focus more on the menu, leaving her to appear to be frowning at empty space for a moment, as if that particular tract of air had underperformed somehow. "Lets see.. I notice battery capacity is way up, that will come in handy. I quite nearly got headbutted to death a few days back. Thanks for saving me indirectly, by the way. Annnd.. Projection. Lets see." She selects 'Projection', curious if it'll lead to more menus, or if the effect will be immediate.
There are more menus: Disguise, Tools and Weapons.
Tasha decides to hurry outside, just in case anything she selects might open a hole in the Astraea, which would be a very awkward scene, and an even more awkward conversation with, potentially, everyone.
Once outside she checks the sky, and therefore the time, and to ensure no one's nearby.
It's nearly noon from the position of the sun, and so a bit warm for people to be idling on the tarmac.
Tasha finds the rays of the faux-sun to be welcome after spending so much time in a climate controlled environment, even if the environment she's in now is arguably also climate controlled -- by an elf. She isn't entirely sure if it's the dragon-spirit side of her, and thus the pyrovoric, thermally inclined part of her, or if she just likes the sun. Such it is with becoming something else so often; and now, here, she'll be trying out more of that.
Tasha opts for Disguise, as it seems safest to start with.
There's only one option under Disguise: Vasha. Or rather a Tasha-sized version of Vasha.
Tasha wonders why she only has Vasha, but perhaps, she thinks, the menu just hasn't been populated yet. Much like an empty database, maybe she needs more time and data patterns loaded in, and Vasha is some sort of default test option, the music track to show you that, yes, the music player can in fact play music. She selects Vasha and waits to see what happens.
It feels like donning a mask at first. The power meter dips as fur turns to feathers, she looses her pinkies and her toes fuse together. Her breasts also get bigger. There really aren't a lot of changes needed to turn her into a Vartan.
Tasha had expected a pure illusion, such as a warp in the ambient light field. This is more transformation than she expected, which surprises her quite a bit. And, to amuse herself, she checks her boobs. "Ha," she goes, to amuse herself further, "she better at me on one thing."
Whatever it is, it's drawing power, although the meter is also being refilled at nearly the same rate, leaving her with three-quarters available. Tia's own shape-shifting is done with some sort of matter projection, so Projection may not deal with light projection at all.
Tasha decides she's had her fun and learned something too, so she orders the disguise to drop, not wanting to burn through her batteries. Two-thirds is a lot to lose, especially given her previous capacity was a tenth of what it is now, and thus this disguise would have been impossible before.
Next on the list is Tools, so she opts for that, and because it's probably safer than Weapons.
There are a lot of options here, from pry-bars to rope and cord, screwdrivers, hammers and more esoteric things that look like scanners, along with weird organic devices of unknown function.
Tasha decide she'd better keep it to the known options, and something simple. She'll request a more detailed list later so that she knows what she's working with and has some time to actually practice using the more technical and or esoteric devices. So as a test run she tries a pry-bar.
The tool appears in her right hand, and she saw the crystal glow before it appeared. The power draw on this is barely noticeable.
Pry-bar: low power, Tasha notes. Basic tools, then, seem to require very little power. She wonders if it's a function of how static they are; after all, the disguise needed to move, shift, and maybe function biologically -- or at least appear to do so. That's complex unlike, she assumes, the pry-bar in her hands. To test this she dismisses the pry-bar and tries a powered saw, a tool wuth both moving parts and, normally, a battery.
This causes a more pronounced dip in power, but hardly as much as the disguise.
To test further, Tasha activates the blade to see if it's movement draws from her, or draws from some fabricated power source that had already been rendered in to existence as part of 'the deal'.
The main power gauge doesn't move any while the saw operates, so it's drawing from it's own battery.
Tasha decides this is very fancy technology indeed. She isn't articulating the blade, so it's not a visual facsimile, it's an actual saw 'matter projected' in to existence. She wonders if it works like the interior of the Dark Horse, but that's about as far as her speculation can go, being a world of science beyond her understanding except at the surface level.
The saw is dismissed, leaving Tasha to peruse the most ominous section: Weaponry. She starts walking towards the edge of the base, the treeline and the open fields. Better safe than 'why is tower five on fire, rubble, a crater,' and so on.
There is a large catalog of knives, pistols, rifles (including what looks like a gauss gun) before getting into more alien-looking weapons. Tia has apparently seen a lot of weapons.
The realization she's now a walking arsenal is a heady one for Tasha. Going from 'I better make sure I bring the right equipment' to 'I am all of the equipment' will take some planning changes. It also begs a question, and so Tasha asks, "Tia, is it possible to add to the Tool and Weapon catalogs? I made some custom gear in the past."
"I would need to build a model of anything you wanted to enter," Tia claims.
"Okay, so it's more than just a simple scan. I don't have any immediate plans, but I might in time. Thank you, Tia." Tasha claps her hands together, now done with her assessment. She decides to take wing, to see if anyone is up to anything interesting form a high vantage point.