Welcome To Your Life (Jailbreak Mingle)

[midpointmods]

You find yourself in jail. An old-fashioned, dusty jail: three cells wide, six foot to a side and below ground level, judging from the tiny barred window half a foot from the ceiling, that looks out onto a flat expanse. Shimmering heat waves are already starting to form, the sun already burning hot, but your cell is comfortably cool and dry.

And empty. The only things in your cell are a sturdy plank bench, chained to the wall like a hammock, a solid-looking pillow and a hairy blanket sitting thereon. Any items you might have had on your person are sitting on the wall opposite your cell, nearly four feet away from the iron bars holding you: propped up on wooden shelves, hanging from thick metal hooks, or sitting on the floor if the item is particularly large.

Outside the occasional jangle of leather and metal, and the occasional chuffing breigh suggests that there must be horses outside, but otherwise the area is silent. Before too long, though, there's the sound of footsteps and jangling keys echoing from upstairs, getting louder and clearer as someone makes their way down to you...

I. Sooey Jail

The view from the windows drops off quite suddenly, about a mile past the bare scrubland bushes and occasional screeching roadrunner. In the distance, a plume of smoke is the only sign of a freight train rushing along its tracks, until the faint echo of its whistle hits the ear. While Inara Serra will likely be entirely unimpressed by the lacking cell, Daylight vis Lornlit will find it's far too small for him. Bucky Barnes is near silent as he dismounts outside.

II. Southern Point

The walls of the cells here are distinctly discoloured to nearly five feet high, an ugly brown with black mold growing in the cracks around the benches and corners of the room. The air is musty and damp, in sharp contrast to the hot, dry wind that blows in through the windows. Quicksword Irene will find her ever-present claymore on the wrong side of the bars, but Hajime Aikawa has company behind his - Ryo has come along, too. The sound of Fuwa tying his horse up is interrupted by a sharp yelp of annoyance.

III. Mountain Hole

The windows are cast in shade in these morning hours, which makes the cells distinctly cooler than the glimpses of clear blue sky and rolling heat waves suggest. Fully grown trees with needle-like leaves are visible outside, and the keen might just hear the echo of a chugging train. Taako will no doubt find the scene familiar; Yoda as well, if less sandy than some oft complained about; Jiro Azuma is undoubtedly the most confused here. Rocket and Groot can be heard outside, approaching and bickering.

IV. Dead Man's Doorstep

The higher the sun rises, the warmer it gets in the cells; even before midday it's unspeakably stuffy, and the hot breeze carries light waves of sand into the cells. The sound of ropes creaking, gentle and intermittent, under the strain of something heavy echoes through the cells, adding a disconcerting background noise to the already alarming context. Jo Harvelle will find sand in her hair; Sara Lance finds it everywhere else. Outside, Misty Day and Sam Wilson tie their horses together, and brace for their new teammates.

Comments

III. Mountain Hole

[cicadashell]

[Jiro doesn't know what to make of this place at first. He's never seen an old American Western, and the jail cell looks very different than what he imagined a prison owned by the Bureau would. Yet, that's where he assumes he is. He doesn't recognize the landscape out that tiny window whatsoever. It's just sand and pointy weird trees.]

Where the fuck is this?

[Attempts at just ripping the cell door don't work, nor do smashing through the walls. That hurt, even. Throughout his assessment of the cell, he's talking to himself, or not, but it looks like it.]

Don't fucking nap now! Piece of shit cat.

[He kicks the cell door one last time, and then slides down to sit on the floor until there's someone of authority coming in for him to yell at.]

[quitsmiling]

Upstairs, the bickering that can be heard sounds something like this:

"Yeah, I know. I heard you the first time, Groot. And the time before that."

"I am Groot."

"Saying it again is not gonna change my mind. Leave it alone. Geez. See what the mission's gonna be this time, will ya? I'll check on the poor saps downstairs."

Also, there's only one set of footfalls up there, making the floorboards creak, so one might wonder who exactly is talking to whom.

[cicadashell]

[Jiro doesn't recognize the name, or possibly rank, of Groot. Is it even a word? At this point, he's still sticking to his Bureau theory because they(?) are talking about missions. But if that conversation can be heard from down here, he's going to scream at them while they're on their way down.]

WHAT THE FUCK'S GOING ON HERE!?

[He's not happy.]

I.

[unofficial_ambassador]

[Okay, not good. Waking up in an unknown place is never desirable, but waking up in an unknown cell so soon after hiring an assassin to take out a popular public figure is certainly suggestive of a few things that Inara doesn't particularly care for.

She's wearing the plain sundress she arrived in, which is in itself strange since she's clearly been searched and her hidden knife, as well as all of her hairpins, have been removed. Don't prisons typically have uniforms? Maybe jails are different. She's never really had to know this sort of thing. There's a large... thing in another of the cells, but she can't tell from here what it is. It looks like a big pile of brightly coloured scrap metal.

She would sit, but the blanket honestly looks like she might catch a disease if she touches it, so she stands at the centre of the cell, trying to seem calm about all of this.]

Hello? Is anyone there?

[worthallthis]

[There is in fact someone there. Soldat doesn't shout back down, though: they give their horse a little pat, sigh to themselves, and pace into the room above the jail to find the keys. There's footsteps, an odd gait that's heavier on the left side, carefully loud enough to make enough noise for the people below to hear them. They pause just inside, as Soldat flips open the folder of intel for a glance, then continue.

Then there's the metallic clatter of something that could conceivably be large iron keys on a ring.]

[unofficial_ambassador]

[The silence coupled with the obvious footsteps is perhaps not as comforting as it's meant to be. Many of Inara’s old clients (as well as her current lover) had been prisoners in the war, and she's heard enough to know how this sort of thing works. Whoever is up there wants to build up anticipation before stomping down the stairs to jab her with a cattle prod.

She doesn't want to seem overly affected or jittery and she's already called out once, so Inara just waits.]

[sunborne]

[ when he's inevitably filled in on the situation (and then some), day makes his way to inara, his final teammate in this, hm.

he supposes the best word to describe the scenario is 'predicament', because the rest of the words that come to mind are curses. yeah. predicament will have to do. ]

Hey there. [ he raises a servo and flashes what he hopes is viewed is a friendly smile. ] I'm Day. Sorry for making you wait, ma'am. [ he rubs the back of his neck, huffing in clear annoyance. ] I'll do what I can to help you two while we're doing this... this. I have a feeling I'll mostly be doing brute force and stuff so, point me to a direction that needs stuff done and yeah. I'll see what I can do.

And, hm, what else...? Oh! Feel free to also ask me to meet your eyes proper when we're talking? If you want? It's going to be a while before I'm used to being the biggest one in the group again.

[unofficial_ambassador]

Are you all right? You were still... unconscious... when I woke up.

[She’d thought he was a pile of garbage, but that seems rude to say.]

I hope that we won't have much use for brute force in this scenario, but I'll keep that in mind.

II

[chalicejoker]

Hajime's not exactly a fan of these accommodations. What's worse, is that while he doesn't exactly miss not having the Network constantly chattering away in his head, he does miss being able to quietly and privately use that psychic connection to talk to Ryo, because without it, well.

"Hajime! Hajime, I can't get out!" The little mantis (if a foot tall could be considered little for a mantis) isn't particularly alarmed, just very curious. He's also scurried out of Hajime's reach and is walking around upside-down on the ceiling as he chatters in his childlike voice. "Is very interesting! Can't open door back to Liminal to get out that way, either!"

"Keep it down!" Hajime's now standing on the plank that passes for a bed, trying to grab at Ryo. "Not until we know what's going on!"

"Maybe is magic jail!"

Hajime can't help himself. "For what?"

They're going to carry on like this, just a little too loudly, until someone stops them.

[ragingwolf]

"No, magic jail is about right."

The voice is male, even but amused, and the source quickly steps out from the stairway and into the main jail area. He's wearing a thick black coat with a fur-lined hood, over a white shirt and black slacks despite the oppressive heat outside, and is lazily swinging a large metal ring in one hand, on which several keys jangle happily. "If you have any kind of magic, you're not going to be able to get out of it."

[chalicejoker]

The only thing that suggests magic might be involved (outside of Ryo's everything) is the neat stack of cards (not even a full deck, just the suit of Hearts) outside of Hajime's cell.

Hajime can't say he was expecting someone to just walk on in like that, but the appearance of a strange with keys has him on his feet and very focused on those keys. "Who are you?"

Ryo nimbly hops from the ceiling to atop Hajime's head. "Man with keys! Can let us out!"

III MOuntain Hole

[youwillbe]

[There's not much variety to Yoda's days, normally. That's to be expected when being a hermit, after all. This is the most variety he's had in quite a while.]

The swamp this is not...

[It doesn't take long for him to notice what meager possessions he has on the other wall. And hold up a hand trying to summon them.]

[quitsmiling]

[Good luck with that, Yoda. All magic-- including the connection to the Force-- is nullified by that jail cell you're sitting in. Nothing so much as twitches.

A furry... person? ... about the same size as Yoda himself comes bounding down the steps.]

Well, that's new. Somebody not four times my size.

[youwillbe]

[He doesn't recognize this species, but it's a big galaxy]

Matter little does size.

IV. Dead Man's Doorstep

[vigilanteclub]

This isn't the first time Sara's woken up in jail. It isn't even the first time she's woken up in jail without clear recollection of how she got there. The fact that probing her memory for what she might have done in the very recent past to wind up in a jail cell with what feels like half a desert clinging to her skin turns up nothing but a blank expanse instead of the patchwork of blurred images she'd associate with a really fun night or a moderately bad concussion, though? That's disquieting.

She pushes herself up to a sitting position on the hard bench, frowning in apparent confusion as she studies the cell and the jail beyond. Everything about it - the wood-and-metal construction, the heat, the sand, the dull creak of what the corner of her mind steeped in dubious-quality movies as a child immediately labels a laden gallows - screams gold rush prison, but even leaving aside the troubling amnesia, there's something off about it.

It's her gear, she decides, the knives clearly visible - if out of immediate reach - on the shelves facing her cell. Details like chain of custody might have been a little nebulous during the time period this building appears to be emulating, but leaving a prisoner's weapons where a desperate lunge might reach them the moment someone opens the cell door? That happens in video games, in movies, in novels, not in real life. It reeks of a set-up.

"What," she says, grimacing a little at the dry rasp of her voice and leathery stickiness of her tongue, "the hell. Gideon?"

She's not expecting an answer. The absence of a familiar voice in her ear is still disappointing.

[notabirdcostume]

Sam dismounts from the horse. He hasn't been here long, but at least he's gotten to the point where he doesn't have nearly trip when he dismounts or feel intensely sore. Who knew riding a horse was so rough? He glances over at the extra horses nearby -- it wasn't so long ago that he'd been the one down below in the cell -- and pats his own horse gently.

"Good girl, stay here, we'll be back out soon."

He takes his hat off, wipes his brow, and then fans himself a bit, "I thought dry heat was supposed to be better...this is worse than D.C." He steps inside, hoping the shade will help -- it doesn't. Despite having gone through this himself, he's still not entirely sure what or perhaps more importantly who to expect. He glances over at the table with the information for their next mission -- he's tempted to look at it first, but then he hears someone shouting from downstairs.

Sam nods to Misty, "I'll take this one, you can handle the next." Sam still didn't know her very well, though Bucky (not-Bucky) seemed to like her well enough, so that was enough for Sam at the moment.

Welp, time to get this next show on the road, right? He starts making his way down to the holding area, snagging the key to open the cells in the process, and a weird kind of dejavu settling over everything. He shakes his head and calls down, "Don't know who Gideon is -- but I can assure you it's probably not them you should be blaming."

[vigilanteclub]

That it's not blame so much as it is hope that her ship's AI has some intel to fill in the disquieting gap in her memory isn't something Sara's particularly inclined to disclose to a complete stranger on the other side of prison bars. She lets the assumption stand, turning her head slightly to track the progress of the man's footsteps down the stairs.

"The one buying the drinks last night," she replies, keeping her tone bright, like she's certain this is all a mistake and not at all a situation that will require her to bury a knife in someone's throat. "Don't suppose you're here to tell me who is responsible for this mess?"

I. Sooey Jail.

[sunborne]

[ urrrrrrrgh… what happened…?

it takes a few force restarts of his groggy processors to clear away the static in his booting optics, slowly picking up the details of his unfamiliar environment. no longer in the reception hall, he's certain, but where is he then? surely he didn’t party that hard in the afterparty of nightbreak and dialup's ceremony.

… and surely he didn’t party that hard it would warrant someone throwing him in a cell of all places. and making it a point to have him stuck in a small cell at that. jeez, talk to him if you had an issue with what he said or something. no need to go this far, mystery offended guest-or-something.

daylight presses a servo against his helm, trying to stem the steady, irritating throb that comes from force activating his systems to function before they're ready. headache later, he tells himself, answers now. ]

Fuck— Hello? Anyone there? [ might as well test the cell door, he decides. see if he can walk on out of here.

he tries to stand up properly but his sides scrape against the walls and hahaha, nope. that hurts too much for someone who feels like he's just gotten run over by a class a starship. ] If someone could give me a hand and pull me out of this cell, that would be great. I think I'm stuck. Last thing I want to do is cheese someone off and add the destruction of public property for whatever I did to get here.

[ if he doesn't get a reply in five minutes, he's so going to add destruction of public property for whatever he did to get here. paint nanites are a pain to recover. ]

[worthallthis]

[The voice is familiar. Older, maybe, (And a swear, Jesus, what happened to you, pal?) but not different enough that it's not still Daylight. Soldat has been waiting upstairs for him to wake up, anxious and trying to keep Inara occupied, but at the first sound of a voice, they scoop up the keys again and try not to jog down the stairs.

It's a brisk walk, though.]

Hey. Sorry. Was waiting for you to wake up.

[Daylight will see a broad human man in jeans, a flannel shirt rolled up to display a metal forearm and hand on the left side, a cowboy hat over long hair, and a slightly anxious expression.]

II

[givemyrightarm]

Irene's face is impassive as she surveys her surroundings. That this is not her shack in the woods is undeniable, but the hows of this elude her. She doesn't even remember coming under attack, let alone being dragged away, and judging by the wind blowing in through the windows taken a considerable distance. She could almost believe this to be the work of the Organization and their current warriors... if there was any yoma energy to be detected besides her own. And there isn't.

Her sword sits against the opposite wall, almost mocking her. She dislikes having it so far away from her, but for now she sets her unease about that aside, concentrating instead on examining her cell more closely, even testing the strength of the bars with her hand. She gives the occupants of the other inhabited cell a brief assessing once-over - not yoma or Awakened Beings, although the situation is still too unclear for her to consider them as potential allies even if she did have any sense of their actual abilities - before turning her attention to the sounds from outside and the limited view from the window. There doesn't seem to be much for her to work with if she wants to escape this place, not yet anyway; she's going to have to be patient and bide her time. Fortunately, she's gotten quite good at that over the years.

None of this inner turmoil shows, of course; to an onlooker, Irene looks and acts perfectly calm. Potentially infuriatingly so, since she also doesn't seem inclined to be social just yet; she just continues to test various parts of her cell before eventually giving up for now and seating herself on the bench, silent and still in her heavy cloak.

[ragingwolf]

There's a jingling of keys shortly after she starts testing her cell and before she sits back down there's a man of average height in a black coat walking briskly down the stairs, pausing at the bottom when he sees her up and about.

"You're finally awake, then." He walks up to the cage, and Irene will see a ring of keys dangling from his hand. "You must be Irene."

IV: Dead Man's Doorstep

[knifecollecting]

[When Jo awakes in a jail cell, she is almost certain she hasn't awoken.

It didn't make sense. They hadn't been anywhere near Carthage's prison - and even if they had been, the view she can see out the window doesn't make sense.

Missouri isn't hot mid-November.

She half-heartedly yanks the at the cell door and sighs. The chances of it being open were low anyway. She knew that.]

What the hell?

[Jo hangs her arms out of the cell through the bars, reaching for the lock just to make sure she can't open it that way.

No luck. She can see her knapsack a few feet away. If only she had her knife.

What was even going on? Was it a trap? Mind games? It didn't seem like Lucifer would do something like this without more pointed punishment.]

Hey! Mom? [A short-lived shout.]

Is anyone out there?

[shadowsran]

People, sure! Not, uh - not anybody's mom, last I checked.

[Comes a female, Cajun-accented voice from some unseen space beyond Jo's current vantage point. It's followed in short enough order by the lady herself, toting a key ring and her own removed hat, for self-fanning purposes. Her smile is the pinched sort that accompanies needing to get through bad news-- and then some mild surprise. Is that-? Well, she'll see.]

Okay, there's a lot to get through and in advance: I'm real sorry. You're not gonna be the type to take a swing at me when I open the door, right?

III

[elderflowermacarons]

Elves don't sleep. The meditate. It is very elegant and positively luxuriant, in its way, full of the wisdom that comes only of knowing all about tree beef.

So it can't possibly be thunderously loud snoring coming from Taako's cell.

At least the towering, rune-bedecked wizard's hat, half as tall as its spindly owner, does something to muffle the effect, but it still rattles the walls a bit. He's not all that concerned about being here, apparently.

Thus all the... meditation.

[quitsmiling]

As the last one to wake up and get a move on, Taako gets his cell door rattled noisily. "Wakey wakey, buddy," he calls in. "Time to get your introduction to all this crap."