Final Destination
:'''''Note:''' The Arcadia website is currently undergoing reconstruction due to a previous database corruption. Content is in progress and will be available in [[User:Sasoriza|the webmaster]]'s time.''
Arcadia # 2691 | |
| original continuity | |
| — Reverse Course — | |
| |
| year | 316 CE (2379) |
| posted | December 29 2002 |
| previous | All It Takes |
| next | Decision Time |
Sunday Dec. 29th 2002
OOC:
OMG, OMG, OMG... you aren't going to believe what just happened to me. I was sitting here, thrilled that I got my keyboard working right again, trying to think of what to do for a post, when the doorbell rang. I hate being interrupted when I'm writing. With a sigh I got up, went downstairs (my computer's on the second floor of our house), opened the door and there stood none other than... Mel Gibson. Well, I thought it was at first, but the beard and the gray eyes... I got a chill when it sunk in who I was actually seeing.
Stephen April. My own creation. In the flesh. Standing before me. He looked shorter than I thought he would be.
I didn't know what to say. I couldn't say anything at first, knowing the storyline we've been doing here on the sim dealing with this very sort of thing – the Arcadia crossing over into the real world. My jaw just hung while the Goosebumps Dancing Orchestra decided to stage a concert on my skin. It was scary. I mean, I've imagined what it would be like to see one of my characters, to have them in front of me, alive, moving, able to speak & interact... but I never thought it'd actually happen. And this very idea occurred to me, not moments before... thinking how wild it would be if I wrote a post pretending this really happened. If the crew of the Arcadia was here in our own world, the real world, and, say, able to walk up and meet us, their creators... and here it was taking place! He didn't say anything at first either. We just stood there at the back door, sizing each other up, April targeting me with that hard steel gaze. (I'll tell ya, those eyes are spookier to look at in real life than you might imagine.)
I finally managed to sputter one word: "Whoa."
[Earlier... Arcadia, sickbay]
Jenna took a moment gathering her thoughts. Into that silent interval came a com-voice: "Ensign Wildberry to Captain April."
April made a face and turned away, touching his com-badge: "Here."
"Captain, we're receiving a telemetry link-up request directed at the shuttlebay. Looks like Commander Jallez, trying to interface with the Arrow."
"Can you get him online?"
"Negative, sir, but it carries his personal security signature. Transmission requesting automated flight clearance."
April looked at Jenna then looked away again. Could Jal have been caught by authorities, forced to give up codes? Not if April knew Jallez like he thought he did. Maybe Jallez sought to extract himself without drawing more unwanted presences. April's hunch told him to let it happen. "Open the shuttlebay doors and let it go, Mr. Wildberry." April hesitated, thinking he COULD just go down with the Arrow... but something told him Jallez might not take kindly to April making use of his personal craft. Engineers were too damn protective of what they perceived as their turf (never minding the fact the turf in question occupied a Starfleet shuttle bay, on a Starfleet ship – Starfleet's turf – and they were supposed to be old friends, he and Jallez...) "Prep a runabout," he continued to Wildberry. "I'm going for a spin. April out." Having checked transporters status with Chief Tala on his way to sickbay, April found beaming down was still borderline risky. Going back in yet another small craft threatened to compound the problem, certainly... but it was an acceptable risk, in his eyes. He needed answers. He'd rather fight local air traffic than get his molecules scattered or stuck past the degrading point in the buffer. He turned back to Jenna. "Well, Jen? What do you say?"
[Later, near Area 51]
April banked Synergy away from a New Mexican rock face and peeled across the Painted Desert, a dust trail in his wake. None of the runabout's phase-systems worked, of course, but it was still relatively easy to simulate the appearance of this era's stealth-craft to local tracking devices. He wondered why he didn't just use Synergy for the L.A. jaunt, for that reason – one of the questions he meant to get answered shortly. Invisible to all but visual sensors, he pulled back and shot straight up into clouds, watchful for liners crisscrossing the airways. He came closer to one 747 than intended; a minor adjustment kept him clean of its path & thus disrupting its trajectory. Leveling out and altering course, he flung towards his next destination... the Midwestern United States, along the coast of Lake Michigan.
That laptop Jenna used had unveiled something else via the Internet. Inputting the keyword Arcadia, they found a couple websites of particular interest. Scanning through the content on those sites... well, you can guess what the reaction was.
April had one person left to meet: his original target in this venture.
The creator of the Arcadia.
▷ TBC ◁
