[ Kate is framed from shoulders up, in a black tank and ponytail. Over her shoulder some might recognize a shuttle bay. She looks annoyed, mouth set in a thin line, dark brows angled inwards. The camera is panned so she is out of frame and instead there are rows of half-built spacecraft, smaller than the shuttles in the main bay. She talks from off-screen. ]

These are fighter craft. Attack ships. We haven't got a single one finished yet, which is kind of a problem since in case you missed it or somehow forgot, Van Rijn knows where we are now and is sending more ships after us. These need to get built, and people need to learn to fly them. And the ship's guns need repairing.

[ She turns the camera around again, still annoyed but trying very hard to be serious and persuasive and not just irritable/irritating. There's a smudge of grease on her bicep and she swipes at it with her free hand but only makes it worse. ]

I don't know shit about engineering or mechanics, I could barely put the chain back on my own bicycle before I got here. But I am pitching in and trying to learn because if we don't get this stuff done we are dead in the water. Okay? This shit is important. It is the most important, right now. So even if you're in another department already, you should be here helping with this, and if you're not in a department you should absolutely be helping with this. Also, who the hell doesn't want to learn to fly a spaceship or shoot giant spacecannons? So go sign up already and do your part, or I want to know why you aren't.

And I know people love polls, so we'll end with a poll. Are you not helping out because you're:

A) confused
B) lazy
C) hoping we all die
or
D) all of the above?

If it's A then read the things I've linked below and sign up, or ask me whatever and then sign up. I know being new sucks and is confusing and I'm happy to help but it's your asses we're trying to protect here too, so you should still be pitching in. If it's B, C, or D, still read the things below and sign up. No excuses. Everyone just please get on this, okay?


Att: volunteer sign-ups
Att: gunnery sign-ups

[ Charles Xavier has managed to time this video for a moment when he isn't bleeding from the face, but his face is quite white, like maybe he has been not so long ago. When he speaks, his tone is level and informative-- but in most other ways, a certain amount of anxiety radiates off of him.

One of his eyes has blood blotting over white at the corner from burst blood vessel. ]

I wanted to share something I found when I was asked to examine Felix Laurens. Some of you know I have psychic abilities and-- well, now all of you do. [ Ha. Ahh. Anyway. ] I sought to find out what-- prevented him from speaking directly, or caused him to behave in strange ways, and a little about how he came to be here at all. Last we knew, he was dead.

What I found was a second presence, buried deep in his mind. His consciousness was separated from it by a sort of psychic, membranous barrier, which I don’t know the nature of. In my haste, I broke through the barrier so I could understand what it was, and-- initially, it was just. Sounds. Memories. Thousands of them, and I wasn't able to make any sense of it. But there was something else, too, something intelligent and aware that seemed to see me, like a single searching eye, and tried to-- do something. Pull me in, is what it felt like, to all that noise. Felix helped break off the connection before that could happen, and I experienced symptoms not unlike the ones we're experiencing now.

[ Charles hesitates. Taps his fingers against the desk. Continues, to the point. ]

It's in everyone. Everyone's mind.

This barrier is, anyway. It reads to me as being "thinner" [ you can hear the quotation marks in his tone ] for those who have been here longer, and "thinner" for those that attended Shepard's recon mission a while back. I haven't looked beneath it since I observed it in Laurens, but only because I fear that I'd find the same thing.

It's also-- I believe-- causing the rolling side effects we're all experiencing now, or has something to do with them. I've observed that there is a resistance happening, a ripping, like the barrier is trying to detach from our minds, and then when we seek physical contact and the symptoms abate, the barrier strengthens. Perhaps it isn't a barrier at all, but a--

[ He stops. He hadn't want to ramble and speculate. ]

Study is ongoing, anyway, about what it means for us, what it does to us. I'll put up my own findings in the archival timeline, and keep it up to date. If-- if anyone like me is looking to confirm this phenomenon, I can't stress enough that it's important you go carefully. It will overpower you, given the chance.

[ Grim public service announcement executed, he tries to consider how to sign off. ]

For those that are newer, my name is Professor Xavier, with Xenogen. Sorry about all that.

[ Aaand cut. ]

[ Home vs. the Tranquility is an obvious choice for most people. For the ones from somewhere particularly awful, the ship's the better option; and for some, there isn't much of an option at all.

Fitz had spent several months thinking he was part of the latter group. He'd thought home meant certain death, so he should appreciate cheating it while he had the chance. Since that had been proven wrong, home had resumed being the obvious choice, despite all its complications — but now Jemma's here, and things are somehow better than they'd been back at the Playground. Add to that a friendly research team offering help to the passengers of the TQ, and the end result is dwelling on questions he probably shouldn't be.

And a broad question for the network, minus much context. ]

Whenever the ship's docked somewhere, it's been too dangerous to stay. But if it wasn't, or if you could get off the ship without going home, would you? If it were possible to go somewhere safe. Different, and not home, but safe.

[Behold, all and sundry shipmates, a young woman, most likely unfamiliar to you all. She has dark hair, she's wearing expensive-looking sunglasses, she has a cigarette between her manicured fingers, and she's not smiling. As a matter of fact, she looks more bored than anything, which wouldn't be inaccurate. It's Penelope, and she's annoyed. Get accustomed to this.]

Okay, so. Quick question.

Are you seriously telling me that this spaceship is not only haunted as fuck, because it is obviously haunted as fuck, you guys, what the fuck is up with that, but nobody has tried to set up any wards or barriers or anti-evil magic protection of any kind? I mean come on, this should be like kindergarten baby shit. Surely somebody's tried something, but since there's no like, history books of this hideous floating evil space basement we all appear to be trapped in, I have to ask.

Nobody's tried magic? Seriously?

[There's a brief pause as she attends to her cigarette, and then it goes back to balancing between the fingers of her hand. She tends to gesture with it, vaguely, as she speaks, presumably for emphasis since her voice is a practiced monotone of affected disinterest. It's all extraordinarily irritating, and it's very much intended to be so.]

Apropos of nothing, since there's so many honest-to-god wolves on board, are there any werewolves around? I need a donation.

That's all. Back to your regularly scheduled cowering-in-fear-awaiting-all-our-inevitable-hideous-deaths, or whatever it is you do for fun around here.

[...That bit about the werewolves goes totally unexplained, because Penelope promptly ends the feed.]

 [First, the screen is black, and there's the sound of scuffling, possibly half-dragged feet.

Then the comms unit tilts and whirls — turns upward to reveal a sweat-drenched kid's face, slightly wild hair in need of a trim and plastered to his forehead. He doesn't seem to pay the screen much mind, looking ahead in what appears to be a random, dim hallway. Not very far from home base, but enough that he clearly should have thought this through better. But then, Takeshi hasn't noticed that, now that he's found himself in a particularly hot spot... well, the power suit's not blocking out the heat anymore (not like last month, but he doesn't even realize the ship is making things worse--); in fact, it's making things way worse, and it's clear by the pale skin and the nauseated face that it's actually giving him heat exhaustion. Probably didn't help that he was chasing after something for a few minutes before that, using up valuable coolness and energy.]

Sorry... I thought — I thought I saw a lady, but maybe it wasn't a lady. Maybe it coulda' been any kind... But I saw them go in the hallways... I wanted to stop them 'cus if they go too far, they're gonna get lost...

[He breathes heavy, blinking just as heavily. His head hurts, and he wants to get mad, but he's also kinda' tired. He finally addresses the feed, wiping at his face with a black-gloved hand, all leather, all heavy, grimacing his lips at the discomfort. He blinks hard and forces himself to refocus, even though he feels a little dizzy. Dizzy, but more determined. Or something close to it. He speaks a little louder:]

S'hot out here. They're gonna... get into trouble.

But I dunno' where I am now.

My power suit's... not... M'getting hot. I don't remember getting hot like this before. I think my suit's broken.

Did anyone see a person run in the hall? Did they see anybody? Maybe someone found them. I swear, I saw a person. I don' want them to die — people die and get lost too much. Like Chase... Don't want the monsters to get them. Someone tell them not to go no more.