taxonomites | 001: A Sudden (Yet Inevitable) Abduction [Holo]

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001: A Sudden (Yet Inevitable) Abduction [Holo]

“You know, there was a time when this sort of thing would have seemed really strange to me.”

Wash lived on a spaceship. Communicators? Fine. Holographs? Lovely. Sonic devices of assorted effectiveness? Great.

But teleporters? Teleporters that picked up an almost entirely innocent pilot while he was sitting on the bridge and moved him – without warning – to an unknown location?

They sounded as of they came straight out of science fiction.

“That was before I met the psychic who could kill me with her brain,” he continued, raising his voice to address the invisible culprits, “And before subversive organisations started hiring sinister bounty hunters to capture my crew mates.”

He paused, still glancing at the devices around him with unconcealed astonishment.

“Or maybe it was before I ate that shrimp protein when we visited Newhall? That would explain a lot…”

Wash climbed down from the platform with as much dignity as he could muster, worriedly examining the bracelet on his wrist.

“They’ll be coming to rescue me!” he called out, “You can’t keep me in your shiny little prison forever. I’m not scared of you or your strange jewellery.”

He felt that it was very important to make sure that his kidnappers knew that. He wasn’t as brave as Mal or as stoic as Zoe, but it was amazing what a brief show of bravado could do for your confidence. Although he was just the pilot – the one who made inappropriate jokes and sat around in a Hawaiian shirt, playing with dinosaurs while other people went out to obtain war stories and fresh scars – Wash could almost feel his chest swelling with pride as he straightened up and stated his bravery in his most authoritative voice.

(It wasn’t very authoritative, though, was it? Authority usually came in the form of muscular men with boots and slick hairstyles, and although Wash had one out of three he suspected that the boots weren’t the most important part of the look.)

Pausing for effect, or possibly because he was actually hoping for a response, Wash glanced around the room. He spotted the tablet resting nearby, but didn’t pick it up. The fact that it didn’t look like a torture tool was a bit of a comfort, but that didn’t mean that it wasn’t going to explode when he wandered over to examine it.

After a moment of silence – several moments, in fact – Wash gave up.

”You’re not going to probe me, are you?” he asked, “Because … probing … doesn’t sound like a whole lot of fun...”

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"No probing that I know of," Ianto informed him. He'd half been expecting that himself when he'd arrived, and even though there'd been no sign of their abductors so far, he still wasn't certain there wouldn't be at some point.

Not that he was going to say that. Reassurance seemed to be the least he could do, given their current situation.

"That's always good to know."

Wash picked up the device at last, pressing a few switches until he produced a holographic image of his own. This, at least, was something he could understand. It was a bit sleeker than the technology he was familiar with, but at least it wasn't entirely alien.

There was that word again. He was going to stay calm until he actually saw one, though.

(Of course, if they had tentacles, all the rules would go out of the window.)

"I wasn't actually expecting a welcoming committee."

Ianto shrugged at that. "I'm not a welcome committee. I'm just one person for starters, and I'm far too unorganised. Don't have a clue what's going on, really. Besides that, I'm really hoping we don't have to stay here. A leaving committee might be nicer."

He might even have considered joining a leaving committee if he weren't so desperate to get back home.

"You don't have any balloons or streamers, either," Wash noted, "And you look human. If I'm going to be abducted, I want to be abducted by a proper alien race, with slime and tentacles."

He paused, considering the various things that could go rapidly wrong if that sort of alien emerged from the sleek silver machinery.

"A nice, peaceful race. A race that definitely won't want to strangle anyone with those tentacles."

"Probably because I am human," he pointed out. "No slime, tentacles, or otherwise unusual."

"I don't think you get too many peaceful aliens. Or at least none of the ones I've met, seem to be."

Knowing his luck, most aliens are actually peaceful, and it just so happens none of them have ever bothered paying any attention to Cardiff.

"You've met aliens?"

Wash had foolishly hoped that the appearance of a human would be enough to disprove his 'alien abduction' theory. Apparently that wasn't going to be the case, although he didn't take Ianto's words as proof. Perhaps he was just fong luh?

"That probably isn't the question I should be asking. As long as they're not here, I'm happy. I'm Wash. And I'm not supposed to be here."

Inara is pacing just outside the area where she first arrived, fiddling with the tablet in her hand...it's trying to direct her somewhere is what she's worked out so far, with the annoying little flashing indicator in one corner of the screen that changes its position as she turns the device around.

She presses something, and then suddenly: Wash.

"Wash?" She says, blinking. Of all the people to see in a place like this, but with her theory of there being some sort of mad Companion-stealing bandit on the loose dashed she's starting to formulate a better idea of what she thinks has happened, and Wash's presence only serves to further prove it in her mind.

"Inara?"

Wash had been expecting to hear any number of replies - from everyone from his wife to a purple alien with three heads and a voice like a sneeze - but he hadn't been expecting to hear from Inara, of all people! She'd been a long way away from Serenity and the crew, and, since Wash was fairly certain that he'd remember flying from the Outer Rim to New Melbourne, he could only conclude that things were about to get even stranger.

"You're here as well? You don't happen to know where here is, do you?"

OOC: LJ ate my reply :(

"I don't have the slightest idea..." she says distractedly, frowning at her surroundings. "It looks more like a Core world than anything but..." Her nose wrinkles with mild distaste. "Not one of the nice parts..."

Her attention wanders back to the holograph of clearly perplexed Wash. "Is it just you there? Is...Are the others here?" It's probably a bit early to be asking him anything of the sort if he'd arrived the way she had, but she's a bit anxious. Thrown off. "Has anyone turned up to threaten you or make any demands or question you yet? That's sort of how I was expecting this to go but so far there's just these..."

She taps her wrist, worrying at the bracelet.

OOC: Boo LJ! Hate it when that happens!

"Just me," he confirmed, his confusion turning into visible worry that he quickly smoothed away. Niska was safely out of the way, as was that charming Jubal Early, but that didn't mean that the crew didn't have an ample supply of rather creative enemies.

"As torture chambers go," he remarked, "It isn't bad, is it? It's low on weaponry and electrical probes. I'm not very fond of the probes. Or the weaponry."

"Torture?" She blinks, looking at Wash...or the nearest holographic Wash facsimile...with mild alarm. "Are you being tortured?"

That decides her on heading towards the flashing on her tablet map sort of thing. At the very least the flashing is not here and it's not far either. "Also, I think you can leave the room once you pick up your...this," she says, holding up her tablet and starting to walk with a purpose. "I didn't think to try the door either until a man in a very Core worlds sort of suit told me so."

[OOC: Would Wash like to join the "we're lookin' at the ship which is most certainly a trap" party over in the Mal's-first-holopost (http://community.livejournal.com/taxonomites/7235.html)? >D ]

"No!" Wash assured her quickly, with a vehement shake of his head, "I'd know if I was. And I'm not."

He was also fairly certain that this wasn't a hallucination brought on by any form of torture. If he was hallucinating, he'd surely pick Zoe, Mal and Jayne - preferably heavily armed - on a rescue mission, rather than a slightly confused Inara?

"The only man I've spoken to was talking about aliens," said Wash, which may have been his fault. It had been a reassuring conversation, though, since Wash's first concern had been abduction, probing and strange creatures with a variety of tentacles. "So I just ... pick it up? It won't explode?"

OOC: Yes, he would! Shall I wait until Inara tries to contact him with the tablet?

"Well...mine didn't blow up. I really can't promise that yours won't...but probably it won't?" She winces slightly, aware that she's not being very reassuring. It's not a very reassuring situation. "Mine has a map, and blips, and flashing things, and I have no idea why something like this would be left for us as it seems to function as some kind of communications device?"

His aliens theory is starting to seem uncomfortably plausible, especially if it's anything like the stories of abductions and experiments...which is silly. There's no such thing as aliens, no matter what the carnival barkers and conspiracy theorists say. But now she's not certain that she should be moving towards whatever the flashing point on her tablet is telling her to move towards all that quickly...

[OOC: And she has now attempted to contact him in the other thread! :D ]

"I'll have to settle for probably," he said, gingerly following Inara's suggestion. He paused, briefly, with the device in his hand, holding his breath as he waited for explosions and screams and all manner of unpleasant things.

Nothing happened.

It was almost anticlimactic, really.

This whole thing was anticlimactic. What was the point of playing a game with people if you didn't even tell them the rules first?

"Why would our kidnappers give us maps and communicators?"

OOC: And he's there.

"It's a very good question..." Inara says with a frown, taking a deep breath when she gets outside. There's an odd quality to the air, not quite an odor but a sense of stillness that is uncommon to the outdoors. She turns back to her tablet, prodding at it a few more times experimentally...yes, there's still a flashing. Does she really want to follow it?

"Is there...on your device, is it giving you any sort of readouts or..." She prods the blip labeled Inara Serra with her stylus and suddenly the holograph shuts off.

Tā shì suŏyŏu dìyù de biăozi de mā!

After several frustrated attempts to get it to turn back on she sighs and heads towards the blip. Even if it's a trap it should likely give her a better idea of what the actual situation is.

When Inara disappeared, Wash let a fluid string of vehement curses in Chinese. (Vehement for him, anyway. They talked about elephants and monkeys and craziness in a terribly serious and almost threatening fashion.)

He prodded his own tablet for a moment, but wasn't particularly surprised when nothing happened. He hadn't had much time to examine it yet, but the pilot knew that poking at and yelling at technology rarely managed to be useful. He also knew that Inara was very capable of looking after herself.

(She was probably more capable that he was, actually.)

Considering his options - and there weren't many - Wash decided that there was only, really, one thing for it. He was going to have to do a bit of exploration.

If he found Inara, so much the better. If he found a slimy space alien ... well, he could run quite well, for a man who lived behind a pilot's seat.

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001: A Sudden (Yet Inevitable) Abduction [Holo]

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