thearena | Team...whatsit.

Entry tags:

Team...whatsit.

WHO Ariadne, Amy Reese, Kaidan, Garrus, Sheppard? I think that's everyone.
WHAT Mingle post for the awesome team of soon-to-fail.
WHERE Up near the showline. Let's say... 3-I? Maybe they found a good campsite there, by the stream? I'm thinking Amy and Ariadne found the camp while Kaidan was off doing his open-log things. If there are objections to this, let me know! Happy to edit.
WHEN Wednesday - Friday
NOTES Tag around, form threads, mingle and do stuff. Time is flexible, and mods might toss in an attack or two, so be wary.

The campsite is a secluded clearing, close to the snow, colder than the low altitudes but perhaps safer. Rocky ledges provide some shelter from the elements, and a cold snow-fed stream flows by.

Wednesday night, after the camp is first established, a silver parachute drops in with a blanket and a box of matches.

After Garrus joins, more gifts come, in the form of food for him and a couple more blankets.

All in all, it's starting to feel more like a camping trip than a fight to the death.

Of course, this is soon to change.

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She forces herself to eat a few bites, making a mental note that there isn't much to go around. She also sips on some water. Nothing has any taste to it, but she can't recall if it ever did even before today.

For a moment, she shuts her eyes. Not to sleep, but in effort to quiet her racing, screaming mind. For days, things had felt like a hyper-realistic and often times slow-paced bad dream, but now things were encroaching into nightmare territory. She's faced worse and more traumatic things in her life already, but at least there had always been some sort of light at the end of the tunnel. Even situations where death seemed likely eminent, things has looked better. Because at least then, she would have been dying for a reason.

Here? Death was the only thing that awaited all but one of them. And even if she lived... what then?

Nothing. But what good would come from thoughts like that?

Nothing.

No, she needed to get her head back in straight. Find objectives. Safety. Shelter. Survive. So, she passes the remaining share of her food to the other girls and with slow, light movements, prods at the most tender spots on her back, just to make sure that their little journey down the mountain hadn't made anything worse.

"A few more minutes, and will you be ready to move again?"

For the duration of their rest, Ariadne's eyes are locked on Shepard. She's concerned, nervous; she knows, from past experience in the dreams, that when people are injured, you can never be sure what will happen. Though she trusts that Shepard will be all right, there's no saying what might happen from here on out.

She's not really quite so concerned about Amy; the other girl isn't much to worry about, if their conversations were ever anything to go off of.

Still, it's not nearly the same as the nervousness she felt around Cobb. This is a much more comfortable discomfort, though she's not sure how to word that without sounding insane. She's glad, though, that this isn't a dream, even though it would allow her to build beyond anyone's imaginations; she could outwit even the Gamemakers, if only they were all asleep.

It was wishful thinking, all in all, but Ariadne could still hope for it. She hadn't expected building to play such a part in her life, but Arthur was right all along - she had to come back.

Shepard's voice snap her back from her reverie, and her eyes come back into focus; she nods assent, finishing up the brief snack. She still isn't used to any of this. It's easier to take orders and figure it out, but she almost wishes she could just step back for ten minutes and figure out what was happening. Certainly, she has a mental map of the Arena, but it's rough; she doesn't know where anyone else is.

Ariadne pauses, letting out a soft exhale not unlike an exclamation or sorts before she begins clearing the area up, removing all traces of their having been there.

The break and the food had helped, and now the movement.... maybe she's just getting used to the pain, or maybe she's just hyper-aware of her Cerberus implants being put to good use, but either way it doesn't seem as bad as it had been just a short while ago. Or maybe it's all in her head. She's not sure it matters in the end, so long as she can keep herself going.

The encroaching darkness and steep terrain makes movement slow, but better slow and steady than standing still she believes. At least there is less and less snow as they continue on their way, and hey... no harm looking for something good about this hellish day, right?

Shepard grew up on a space station, and called an Alliance starship frigate home, so she was actually quite used to a steady, regulated 72 degrees. Training and exposure had given her the necessary experience she needed to know how to deal with it, but that didn't exactly translate into her having any sort of fond feelings toward the cold. Until now, her most recent memory of dealing with snow was back on Noveria. Back when she'd had both Kaidan and Garrus at her side. She thinks maybe it's best to move away from it as much as possible. Plus, snow is far easier to leave tracks in, and basically anyone with a set of working eyes can follow a trail in the snow. She'd rather not have that.

The area they are headed is...as familiar as anything else in this region of the Arena. Since the Cornucopia and before her meeting up with the girls and Kaidan and Garrus, she'd wandered much of the west, as far as she could go. It ended about a kilometer west of their position in nothingness; a cliff-side and an unfamiliar sort of energy barrier. It wasn't a mass effect field, so... well, at least it was something to rule out.

"I never asked..." Shepard breaks their silence, voice still quiet so as not to make too much noise. But with the darkness getting even blacker around them, she needs more than her eyes to make sure they're close by. "Where are you from?"

Ariadne certainly does prefer the lack of snow; while it doesn't necessarily bother her, it's just easier to move, to survive without it. It does keep people at bay, though - she's grateful for that. She thinks that - and the alliance - might be what are keeping her alive.

She doesn't mind soft-spoken conversation in the dark; her own nerves are starting to work as darkness falls, and the sound of everyone's voices nearby alleviates that a little bit. "Paris. I was studying architecture before all of this."

'All of this'. The vaguest way to include both Cobb's arrival into her life, and the Arena. Both could be considered along the same lines of life and death, though nothing Cobb put her up to ever involved killing other people. Watching them die, perhaps, but never killing them directly. Probably a good thing.

"Paris, huh?" Shepard smiles at the word, even gives the smallest hint of a laugh, because she knows Paris. Or, of Paris at least. She's never been, herself. To be perfectly honest, she's only had her feet on the surface of the Earth itself maybe a total of a few months' worth of time, if she were to add it all up. "You know, I half expected you to say some place I'd never heard of. It's a lovely place, if the vids are anything to go by."

She pauses a moment. A shuffle in the leaves catches her attention and she can feel the adrenaline already starting to pump through her veins, until sh spies a squirrel scurry out from the underbrush and up the trunk of a tree.

She isn't wholly certain of how to take the laugh, but Shepard's next words relieve her somewhat; truth be told, she isn't exactly certain that she'll often run into people from places she's familiar with either. She lets herself laugh a little with the other woman, making the most of it while it lasts.

"It is-" She hesitates when the squirrel passes by, lowering her voice more as she continues: "It's just as lovely, I'm sure, even if there's no video that could possibly give you the feeling of being surrounded by everything."

"What made you want to study architecture?" she has to wonder. It's always been a bit fascinating to her, to learn what led others down the paths they found themselves on. The ones they chose for themselves, at least. The life of a soldier had really been the only thing Shepard had really wanted in life.

For a moment, she thinks that maybe this isn't such a good idea, asking questions like these. To get to know someone just a little bit, before one of them inevitably dies. But then, she remembers the cameras. That thing Amy caries around with her, and all the others around them, out there in the rocks and trees, hidden from view. And maybe... maybe making things personal isn't all that bad. Sympathy for their cause - make the outside world see them as real people. It wouldn't hurt anything, except maybe her own heart in the end.

"I'd always loved creating. It was like drawing, but with that one step further. Being able to see something like that through from its initial conception to the end...it's amazing." She's aware that she's rambling a little bit, but she feels strongly about it.

The worst part of all of this is that she won't be able to build anything like that again. Not in dreams, not in reality. But she doesn't let that show on her face as they walk; she only lets the fact that she truly loves what she does show clearly. Shepard has the right idea anyway - maybe this way, they can get a little bit more sympathy garnered towards them in the end.

"Creativity is something I find very fascinating. A friend once told me that creativity was a sign of cultural progression. Music? Art? It's all over the galaxy, in so many forms and mediums. But I don't have a creative bone in my body," Shepard says with an almost-smile. "Couldn't draw my way out of a paper bag, no less imagine up an entire building."

It was pleasant - no, that was too tame a word. It was fascinating to hear that the galaxy was filled with people like her, all creating all manner of things as they saw fit. She even smiled, wider than usual, as the conversation progressed. "What about an entire city? An entire world?"

She laughs again, "Me? Imagine up an entire world? No. I think not. I think my mind is just shifted a little differently. You say words like buildings and cities and worlds, and where you imagine designs and ways to make them beautiful and functional, I try to find weaknesses: the easiest wall to crumble, the best place to set up a perfect shot."

Her last few words stir up a small ping of sorrow and loss. Memories of talking sniper vantage points and scopes with Garrus in the main battery during nights neither of them could sleep....

"I can't even imagine of what you would think of Ilos..." she says almost to herself, since she's pretty certain Ariadne will not know what she's talking about. Though it doesn't make her any less sure that the girl would love it. "A place scattered with sprawling ancient cities built hundreds of thousands of years ago; humans were still drawing pictures in caves with sticks when these places were raised; beautiful, massive places built by a people far more advanced than we. I've never seen a place more impressive, and I've seen... well, let's say I've seen my fair share of things."

She pauses, makes sure she's got her footing as they cross over a frigid bubbling stream in the darkness, the moon overhead is still giving them plenty of pale silver light to walk by and the lightness of their conversation seems to have made the pain in every step she takes a little less noticeable. "But say, hypothetically... you could design an entire world? How would you even begin? I'm curious."

She lets Shepard's words roll over her; it's not like she ever wants anything she builds to be destroyed, but she knows it happens from time to time. Eames, putting in an entirely separate line that circumvented all her hard work, taking liberties with her designs. She couldn't really hate him for it, considering how well he did his job, but it was frustrating. What architect didn't want to see their work stand forever?

But even in limbo, nothing stood forever. Things broke down, things gave way. Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold.

Truthfully, she hasn't the slightest as to what Shepard is talking about when the reference to Ilos comes. All the same, the description gets her a little bit giddy, and she lets out a soft gasp at the very imagination of it. Things like the caves of Lascaux mixing with the more decent designs of Dubai, all towering structures and juxtapositions of style and movement. "It sounds amazing," she finally states, letting a bit of her awe slip into her voice.

Ariadne waits until they've crossed the stream before she even tries to explain the process. "It's easier than it sounds. All you need is the basic concept, and it evolves from there. As long as you have that, you have your cohesion, and it'll look like it all belongs. Even with a client, you still have enough room to do whatever you like: it's pure creation, through and through."

"You must love it," she says, because it's clear in Ariadne's voice that she does. "How long have you studied for? You... forgive me, but you don't exactly sound like you're from France. Is that what you went to Paris for? Architecture?"

She smiles simply, knowing full well the statement needs no clarification; she does, through and through. And then there's a light nod, "I just thought...why not study architecture in a city filled with it? I've been there for a few years now, and it's, by far, my favourite city to live in. Even the college is just..." She trailed off, shrugging one shoulder in a small gesture, "Filled with inspiration."

"Go where all the action is," Shepard agrees, "It's always easy to learn something when you can immerse yourself in it fully." She doesn't know, well, much of anything at all about architecture, but she's pretty sure that concept is true for just about anything. "How long did you study?"

"Exactly," she agrees, pausing for a moment. "I was nearly done my Master's degree. Around five years, I suppose. Until all of this, of course."

Her smile slips slightly, even if it hadn't been the fault of the Games that she didn't finish. That had been Cobb's fault. But it would be the Games that kept her from finishing at all.

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Team...whatsit.

officially off my haitus now; have a small backtag novel!

yaaay, novels! \o/

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