goneawayworld | SHIFTING THE PARADIGM

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SHIFTING THE PARADIGM - ADVERSE RIG EVENT

SHIFTING THE PARADIGM

PLOT DESCRIPTION
To say that the New Hires are unlucky is something of an understatement. After all, they're here, aren't they? They were the unlucky ones swept out of their worlds, left unconscious for Jorgmund to find, "hired," implanted with shock collars. They were unlucky enough to get caught, and now they're being mega, double, septuple screwed by a casual backhand of fate.

The rig doesn't often face a full breach. It does today.

The announcements start with a tinny warning: "RED ALERT: SEVERE STUFF STORM COALESCING OFF STARBOARD SIDE. PREPARE FOR RIG TO COME TO FULL STOP."

Anyone near windows can see it on the side facing the Wilds, a roiling, thundering mass of gray clouds that look a little more liquid than normal clouds. Lightning crackles, illuminating it from within but the color of the lightning isn't just white or yellow. Each thundering crackle flashes in a prism of unnatural colors.

The rig comes to a stop. Since it was going so slow, there isn't much of a change in momentum but they can feel it in the vibration of the braking mechanisms and creaking and groaning of tons of metal suddenly facing some minor strain. The storm expands up to the top of the atmosphere, anvil-shaped, flattening against the tropopause.

"RED ALERT: SEVERE STUFF STORM COALESCING STARBOARD SIDE. PREPARE FOR POSSIBLE ADVERSE RIG EVENT. SHELTER IN QUARTERS AND OTHER SHIELDED AREAS. CHILD CARE STAFF, RELOCATE YOUR CHARGES TO NEAREST SHIELDED BUNKER. ALL STAFF, REPORT ANY UNREALITY EVENTS TO RIG COMMAND FROM THE NEAREST ALARM PHONE, AND FIND SHELTER UNTIL SECURITY TEAM IS DEPLOYED."

The Stuff storm slams into the rig, making it sway just slightly. The wind pouring through the gaps in the rig structure howls in a way that sounds like inhuman screams. Thanks to the Stuff visibility drops to a very gray 0%.

A prerecorded message now starts playing. Celeste Lillian, with her soothing voice, speaking mantras:

"Staff members and couriers of hope, in this stressful time, I remind you to pause, take a moment, and breathe so deeply your lungs cannot hold any more of our Mother Earth's air. Breathe in, breathe out. The act of breathing is so precious because it's both necessary and voluntary. It is a gift you give yourself. Value yourself enough to give yourself the gift of a full, honest, complete breath."

Super helpful, right?

"Clear your minds, let go of any thoughts. Remember: 'The ocean changes. I can float.'"

But all hell breaks loose and mantras won't do a thing to stop it. The rig's many ventilation shafts have filters and metal covers to help shield against stuff, but they aren't replaced as often as they should be. Inspections are thorough but some material resources are scarce.

Stuff breaks through the covers and ventilation filters, sweeps through the rig, and reality gets less real.

"RED ALERT: FULL BREACH. RED ALERT: FULL BREACH. RED ALERT: FULL BREACH..."

SCENARIO #1 - PRODUCTIVITY

The rig's staff instantly increases by several orders of magnitude. The new employees don't talk and for the most part they don't pay attention to anyone else. They mill through the hallways, gesturing to each other as if they're colleagues walking and talking about the last meeting as they move through the halls.

Most of them are in full professional dress, suits and ties. But sometimes this dress is from a variety of eras, hearkening back to the idea of business. That means a lot of power suits and shoulder pads, and even some old fashioned bow ties, top hats, and glittering gold pocketwatch chains. Here and there, sometimes there's even a glimpse of someone in older merchant's clothing, flashy in a way that suggests "people send me regular complaints on cuneiform tablets about how I sold them inferior copper ingots." The mystery executives despawn and respawn randomly, phasing in and out of existence. Sometimes two will spawn in the same spot, somehow superimposed, like a glitch in a video game, twitching helplessly until reality goes "whoops!" and phases them back out of existence.

They have no faces, but the way they sometimes randomly turn to face the New Hires, staring them down, body language wary, makes it clear they can somehow see or sense without eyes. They sometimes speak with no mouths but the sounds don't sound like real language, and are always muffled.

New office or meeting room doors start flickering in and out of existence. Each time one appears it draws the nearest New Hires in, warping the metal floor in front of them so every step draws them inexorably inward. Inside, the New Hires find themselves pinned by stares from nonexistent eyes, the drones expectant. Maybe even impatient.

They're late.

Each room has a different scenario that must be satisfied to make the room go away, all of them the subconscious corporate imaginings of rig executives and staff, fears and secret wishes and ambitious aspirations all rolled together. The drones watch the New Hires carefully to make sure they follow "corporate policy" and obey the rules of the scenario, their body language growing more and more aggressive and threatening the more they fight it. They will eventually attack if New Hires don't follow through. There's no such thing as simply reporting someone to HR in their (nonexistent) eyes.

When each scenario is forced to completion by the New Hires playing ball until conditions are satisfied, the drones...dissolve. Trees suddenly sprout through their clothes, then flower. The petals scatter through a sudden breeze that always smells of grass and leaves and wet plants and gentle rains.

Finally free.

PROMPTS

a) resource management
The room has a table and chairs at the front. It's stacked with piles of unsharpened pencils and several electric or manual pencil sharpeners. The table looks out on rows of chairs, filled with faceless drones.

Watching... waiting...

Every time you finish sharpening a pencil there's light applause. It's a big pile of pencils, but at least it's an easy task. The drones don't seem to mind if you talk to break up the monotony.

Like so much of corporate life? Thrilling.

b) flipping through the deck
Have you ever had a nightmare where you had to do an oral test in front of the class that you weren't prepared for? Now imagine one where your teacher and classmates will beat you senseless if you get it wrong.

The slideshow being shown on the smartboard is completely nonsensical. That means the presentation can be just as nonsensical. New Hires can work together to bullshit on any topic, or maybe even just spout total nonsense. Either way, the drones around the conference table occasionally offer light applause and then turn to each other to confab in their nonsense mutterings, before turning back to watch once more.

When the meeting is perceived to be over, the drones stand, lightly clap, and flower.

Sometimes in rooms like this the drones hand over a list of corporate buzzwords that must be included, but they don't seem to care if it's in context.

Buzzwords: Break down the silos, tee it up, paradigm shift, low-hanging fruit, move the needle, run it up the flagpole, on the bleeding edge, synergy, core competency, leverage.

c) on the spot improvisation
Similar to the other presentation rooms except...

Oh, these are actual Jorgmund executives. The door sucked you into a normal meeting that they're cheerfully having despite the Stuff breach. They ask you your opinions on improving rig operations and quality of life and expect you to give honest answers.

But not too honest.

d) you've got some splainin' to do
You're handed hair nets and aprons and glared at until you put them on. The room is a small room in a factory line, with a conveyor belt passing through. The drone that henpecked you into putting on the aprons holds up a chocolate, points to the aperture the chocolates go through at the end of the conveyor belt, and shakes her head furiously. Then she wraps the chocolate in one of the wrappers from a stack of them, points back to the aperture and nods.

The garbled nonsense she "says" doesn't communicate it, but the gestures do: Wrapped chocolates go through, unwrapped ones don't.

Once the New Hires are in place in the conveyor line, the drone smacks a hand twice against the wall and the conveyor belt starts. Fortunately the drone leaves, but now the New Hires have chocolates they have to wrap, and they have to wrap them quickly.

The line is fast but not impossible. It's still a scramble and chocolate might have to be shoved in their hats and clothes to keep the drone from coming back and getting angry. Fortunately, you only have to reach a quote of 100 (as stated by a helpful sign on the wall) before the room spits you back out - sticky and smeared with chocolate - and fades away.

One perk: the chocolate won't disappear, but it's definitely some waxy, cheap stuff and sometimes the filling is a flavor that doesn't really pair well with chocolate.

e) the it crowd
You're led to desk with computers that don't actually work. Only nonsense words and memes (and nonsense memes) show up on the screens. That's fine because the people calling in on the phones are real people on the rig, trying to work despite the Stuff storm because of Company Loyalty™, and that means their problems are real stupid. Even laymen might be able to guide them through it.

They may include questions about the "cupholder," them not realizing the monitor has to be turned on, and issues easily resolved by a restart. Since the calls are real, there's a chance you can use some good old fashioned psychological engineering to gain useful things like usernames an passwords.

The drones don't seem to care if you chat among yourselves between calls, confer with one another (or mock the caller) while the phone is on mute, or whether the advice is even good. They only care that it's given. After a seemingly random quota is met, the drones expire, and room spits you back out and disappears. You'll find you have a small rubber duck in your pocket after you're spit back out again.

The ducks seem to not do anything. Yet.

Players can request the mods come up with idiotic IT issues for their thread.

f) breaking the ice
What is with this place's obsession with never-ending icebreakers?

This time it's less optional. You're are forced to sit in chairs across from each other or in a ring if more than two of you are pulled in. A sign on a small table between you says "2 truths, 1 lie" or "Truth or truth" (The drones seem to have forgotten the dare part). But sometimes a different game (of players' choosing) is displayed. The drones can seemingly sense whenever New Hires are lying and their behavior starts to grow hostile if they do, relaxing when they tell the truth.

The room won't release New Hires until there's been enough growth or honesty equivalent to a life-changing field trip.

g) corporate (property) restructuring
The drones are based on the thoughts of employees and that means the things they dream of doing, like taking a bat and going ham on a printer-copier. When you're pulled into a nonexistent department you're handed baseball bats and pointed at various pieces of office equipment.

The hostile language of the suited drones - also with their own baseball bats - means it would be wise for you to direct your un-vented frustrations at the equipment. All of it.

Or the drones might vent their aggression - with bats - at you. At least smashing shit up with a buddy - old or new - is cathartic? And that baseball bat can maybe be tucked away in a hideyhole somewhere for later use.

h) staring at the camera like...
This room is a small office space with chairs against a wall that has a window with closed blinds. The drones have a professional looking camera set up, pointing at the chairs, like it's some kind of confessional. These drones look more like the crew of a documentary than the other office drones, but have the same blank faces.

They gesture for the New Hires to sit down and hold up a paper that says: "Tell us how you really feel about this place and your fellow employees."

It's not like the drones are Jorgmund employees so maybe it's a safe place to let loose and have a vent session with a fellow New Hire? Interacting with each other during the vent gets nods of approval from the directors and crew. Trashing Jorgmund? Gets even more approval. They're loving that chemistry, guys.

i) wild card
Have a scenario idea that we haven't thought of? Go crazy! Pick some weird corporate scenario to play around with. The Stuff has plenty to work with thanks to the anxieties of the real corporate drones working for Jorgmund, and also because of all the office-related TV and movies they consume.

SCENARIO #2 - VIOLENCE
Some beings created by Stuff are alive and/or sentient. These are the New, but the drones are not New. They don't think and are therefore unable to reify the occasional wisp of stuff around the rig. They're more like programs in the computer of reality or like animations set into motion by the minds animating them.

But even if they're not alive, they are dangerous. They have no brains, no vital organs, no easy way to kill them. Since you need a thick skin to survive corporate life, it's very hard to break through their skin. When this finally occurs they start bleeding odd substances and objects. Cyan, magenta, yellow, and black printer ink. Paper clips. Sometimes it's thumb tacks, which makes walking and fighting very fraught. Go down even once and you might have a butt or back full of them.

No matter how much they bleed, however, they don't deflate or bleed to death. Only total destruction or dismemberment can slow them down. Fortunately, how much it takes to damage them seems to always be magically scaled to what the New Hires in the room are capable of.

That means it's somewhat unwise to fight them but it's at least not impossible. New Hires that want to try will be given their weapons and gear if they manage to make their way down to the armory near the training room. While New Hires will be hunted down later if they don't return most weapons and specific gear items, the chaos means some of the more disposable items - grenades, arrows, throwing knives - might possibly be tucked away somewhere without notice. For later. Excuses can be made about their use or loss, after all.

Players that know ahead of a time they want a fight scenario can always list one of the other scenarios above and note their preference for combat.

Since New Hires will have to go to the armory to get equipped, they can also have some threads with weapons and others without, to suit player needs.

OOC DETAILS
➤ Finite threat: While the doors can open anywhere and suck anyone in, the total number of rooms that need to be eliminated is finite. This means the New Hires clearing them out can eventually shut them all to avoid permanent, perilous addition to the rig's reality. They'll notice the number of doors that flash in and out of existence decreasing the more they go through scenarios.

➤ Opt out: Players may opt out of the plot by having it so New Hires mysteriously find their room door locked and impossible to open, even by force. Or players can make use of the "alternate reality" mechanic, where the characters are shifted temporarily into a calmer, alternate version of the timeline where they have a normal, quiet rig day. That band of possible reality will collapse and fold them back into the main rig reality when the event is over. This means if players want to completely ignore the event and work on their old threads, they don't even have to come up with a handwave. Their character might just be a little confused and need to be filled in when the event is over and reality folds them back in.

➤ NPC request: If you'd like the mods to npc a stupid IT call in a thread, hit the thread below and link to where they should come in.

➤ Questions: If you have questions about the event, want to know what your characters can get away with during the chaos, want to know if your characters can squirrel away secure info or grenades etc., feel free to hit the questions comment below to make your requests.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"What, these hot potatoes?" Saturday indicates the grenades with her foot. "Yes. They go boom. Since the drones keep putting themselves in small rooms, I figured I should take advantage."

And also hide a few around the rig, just in case; some of them are flashbangs, hidden in with the others so no one notices and asks awkward questions about how useful they'd be against things with no eyes. No use whatsoever, is the answer, but probably useful against jorgbots and upper level execs.

"Oh nice. I should... get some." Catra smirks for a moment, glancing at the armory. Not that she knows exactly how they work, but having something stashed for uh, emergencies? That sounds like a really good plan. She's not in the know enough to differentiate between the two types herself.

"How do you use them?"

"Pull the pin and throw." Saturday picks one up and shows her the pin, carefully not pulling it or giving Catra a chance to grab at it. "Don't ever pull the pin except as part of the throw. Once it's out you have about the count of three until it blows, and it can't be stopped. See?" She points out the mechanism. "The pin is the only thing stopping the trigger, so once it's gone it's bye-bye to everything in five-meter radius. They're not forgiving weapons."

She gestures to a cluster of trunks, one already open. Little rows of boom-boom are lined up neat as grocery store eggs. "Take as many as you want, no one's countin'"

And if you think that's an odd thing to say after her speech, it's only because you never met the man who raised her.

"Does the detonating mechanism come off? Or are they just armed all the time?" Catra asks as she peers at the grenade. She shuffles over to the trunk on hands and knees and considers her options, then reaches over to grab a backpack from the wall, which she begins to casually stuff with explosives.

"Usually I get by with my claws, but... always good to have options."

Catra doesn't get that far, because Saturday lunges over, grabs her around the waist and hauls her away from the boom before she can set anything off.

"Yes! They are always armed! Which is why you don't carry or store them loose in a bag!" She takes a moment to catch her breath. "Okay. You see those belts there, with the pouches? Go get one, and I'll show you how to load them out properly."

The rack she's indicated has a dozen belts with about four pouches each. Next to it is a rack with grenade launchers and boxes of 40mms, but Saturday isn't going to mention what those are for.

There's an unhappy yowl, like a cat that has been halted in the middle of chewing on the electrical cable to your television, and Catra glares at Saturday.

"You could have just said so," she grumbles. But she does move to grab a couple belts instead of a bag--she's not going to doubt Saturday's word on something that has the potential to go boom in a bad way.

Saturday is too busy gingerly checking the box Catra had gotten in, replacing anything awry. Once Catra has retrieved the belts, she takes one grenade from her array and sits cross-legged on the ground, her own belt in her lap.

"Okay, this is your basic frag grenade," she begins, holding the grenade up so Catra can see. "From what I've seen, you're right-handed. So you hold it like this. See? Keep the lever on the side pressed, and your finger off the ring until you're ready t'throw."

With her other hand, she opens the pouches on the belt. "It goes in like this. Keep the lever down, it's part of the safety mechanism. You slide it in like so, so that the cloth keeps the level pressed for you, an' keep the ring down 'cause that's farthest from the pin. Strap 'em in like so. There we go. And done."

She stretches her arms out about a meter. "This is a meter. Killzone for a boom like this is five meter raidus. 15 meter radius, serious wounds. Up to two hundred thirty for scratches, cuts, bruises, concussions, general real bad time. One of these tossed in a room reduces everything in it to chunky salsa. Don't use them lightly."

Catra sits and sulks as she waits for Saturday to continue the lesson.

"I can take care of myself," she says just once, in a sullen voice, before Catra begins her instruction. She leans forward, ears perked, and watches with interest at the way Saturday positions the grenades in the belt and explains the safest way of carrying them.

"Cool. Great. Don't throw them unless I have someplace to hide or I can throw them really far. Got it." She takes grenades and starts stuffing them into pouches. At least she's doing it the way Saturday showed her?

"Careful. There you go. Good job." Saturday takes a moment to observe Catra's technique, considering some potential responses. "An' also, don't use them unless you want to kill what you're throwing them at. They don't discriminate. You can't aim for somewhere less lethal. Be sure you want to kill before you take one out, because the only outcome for this weapon is somebody's death."

She gets up, without waiting for or seeming to need any assurance from Catra. Instead she rummages through a nearby cabinet and tosses Catra a kit with a red swiss cross on the cover.

"An' don't forget this. Self-setting bandages, painkillers, some pick-me-ups. Enough to get you back here in one piece."

"Right. Yeah." Killing is not a new concept for Catra. It's just incindental that she and Adora had somehow managed not to kill each other over the years. She stands and layers both belts onto herself, one resting more or less on each hip. She looks up as Saturday tosses a kit towards her and she catches it with a grunt.

"Thanks." The medkit is stuffed into one of the many pockets of the jumpsuit--along with a series of other items. Throwing knives, a handgun and a few magazines of ammunition (she wasn't sure she'd need it but hey), and a few other odds and ends. Testing her load out, she bounces in place and does some stretches and other movements, then makes adjustments to make sure everything stays where it's supposed to.

"I can look after myself," she says. Of course, what Catra means by that is 'thanks for caring, Saturday,' but Catra is bad at expressing her emotions so that will have to do.

[mod got back to me and said no medkits so pretend that was a power bar]

"I know you can. Even the best runners do better with a crew, though."

Saturday munches her own power bar, apparently not planning to leave yet. "You got a plan of attack for out there?"

"Not yet, but I'm working on it," Catra says.

"I'm mostly just gonna try and avoid a fight if I can help it, but someone has to look after Adora." She shakes her head, as if that poor girl couldn't handle it herself. Not like Adora has been kicking her ass for years, right?

"After she grabbed some gear, she headed off towards the rear." Saturday nods in that general direction. Good fighter, that woman."

She gestures to a rack of thin ballistic vests. "Take some protection. Those things hit harder than you think."

"They'd have to hit me first," Catra says with a perhaps unhealthy degree of cocky certainty. Perhaps a bit unearned considering her combat history, but what could one do with Catra? She squints at the vests, then reaches out to pick one out.

"...What if it hampers my movement?"

"They don't usually hamper mine, but give it a shot and see how it feels. The trick is getting the fit right."

Saturday shrugs one on to demonstrate. "It wants to sit high on the chest, which yeah, exposes the stomach, but that's better than catching it in the heart or lungs. Also means you shouldn't have trouble bending. The weight is gonna catch you off-guard if you're not used to it, but it's not hard to compensate."

To prove it, she does a backflip.

"See?"

"Oh. Nice." Catra nods admiringly at the backflip.

Catra tries to fit one. It takes a few minutes, not least because when she tries to put it over her jumpsuit (which is still too big and too baggy) it ends up just being uncomfortable and awkward. Finally, after struggling for a few minutes, she snarls and unzips the front down to her waist. She tugs her arms out of the sleeves, exposing the simple sports-style undergarments she's wearing, then ties the sleeves tight around her waist.

"Guh! I hate this thing," She mutters as she shrugs into the vest again. This time she seems to have an easier time of it and soon the ballistic vest is fitted nice and snug. She sways a little, testing her balance.

"Not bad."

"All right." Saturday nods approval. "Now, remember it ain't magic. It'll stop a bullet, but not in its tracks. You'll still get some nasty bruising and the wind knocked out of you, maybe a few broken ribs. Still better'n'dying, though."

She gives Catra's kit a once-over, professionally and so quickly that she's done before Catra can protest about being able to look after herself.

"Okay then, tiger. You look about ready, I'd say. Good hunting."

Catra rolls her eyes. She can handle herself and it annoys her that Saturday seemed to know that she would say that. Huff.

"Tiger? Really?"

"What? You preferred Cats? It's not very creative." Saturday is 100% messing with her. "I could use Panthra, instead. Puss-in-jumpsuit? Tomcat?"

"Oh, shut it. You're worse than Scorpia with her stupid 'Wildcat' nickname..." Though, now that she said that she really... does miss Scorpia and her stupid nicknames and her upbeat happiness and everything. Catra huffs again, scowls.

"Whatever."

"All right, if it really bothers you." Saturday, as always, seem unperturbed. "Is Catra your handle or your wallet name, anyway? You don't gotta answer that if it's private."

"My what?" Catra stares at Saturday, completely flat.

"A wallet name? I don't have a handle? What am I, a carrying case?"

"We talked about it before a bit? A nickname you use when it's not safe for someone to know your real name. You seemed to get the idea, so I was, you know, wondering."

Also trying to figure out what kind of person names a cat-person "Catra." There's a distinct lack of creativity there that feels like it has to mean something.

"Oh. Right." Catra frowns, then scratches her head.

"Uh, no. Catra's the only name I've ever had."

"I swear I've heard it before." Saturday frowns. "Eh, can't be that big a deal or something would have jogged my memory. Anyway," she waves a hand. "Don't wait around on my account. Lemme finish my power bar and I'll be right back out there with ya."

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

SHIFTING THE PARADIGM - ADVERSE RIG EVENT

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