[Open Broadcast]

[protect_and_serve]

Who: Everyone on the telepathic network (which is everyone)
When: Just after the new arrivals show up.
What: Joscelin attempting to get things organized.

[There’s a lot of chatter going on, literally making it hard to hear yourself think, between veterans gossipping and speculating what the new wave of Travelers means, and accidental broadcasts by panicked new arrivals, until one hard-edged thought cuts through it all.]

Enough.

You all need to stop this before we drive ourselves insane.

Anyone with experience on the Network, I want a few organized broadcasts offering help and information to newcomers. We don’t call them Fools.

If you’re new, stay calm. No-one can overhear you unless you’re projecting. Try to divide yourselves as evenly as you can between the people giving you answers. That much is instinctive, you won’t have trouble as long as you can imagine it.

Anyone who’s been here longer and wants to speculate? Don’t do it publicly. Find your own little corners, or keep it off the network.

New telepaths. You’ll need to find someone more experienced more than anyone else does.

And everyone be ready for a new Jaunt.

Comments

[superieure]

Perhaps you do. I'm not inclined.

[She won't have a choice in the matter, but for now she's extremely unwilling to accept that.]

Do we even get paid?

[superieure]

It's common to you?

[Anyone calm enough to ask about this first has her attention, if only to satisfy her curiosity.]

[thezerothlaw]

[There's some hesitation before he answers -- old habits, and he certainly couldn't hide that he's telepathically gifted now.]

I would not call it common, but I was familiar with telepathy, albeit in a different form.

[protect_and_serve]

More likely, they were left behind when the Jaunt ended, or sent through a different Portal. We had a bad time of it, and they... gave up. And declared they gave up.

[protect_and_serve]

Sometimes whatever you do serves no purpose.

[notinthecards]

I have cash from seven worlds in my pockets. Even from one I don't think I've ever been too. How well you think that spends back home, chere?

[He laughs, and shakes his head.]

Non. You salvage what you can, maybe learn a few new tricks... a few people used to think we'd get rewarded at the end, but just like everybody else, they never make it there, so how likely is that?

[abetterway]

I'm glad to hear that.

...You do have ten, I hope.

[thezerothlaw]

Perhaps it is as you say. I still wish to try.

[moredakka]

So they just - just got left behind? With no chance to go back home ever?

[rekkaning]

[Must be something that feels natural, then, if Lightning can say it with such confidence. She tries it, and—aha. The voices are blocked out. She lets it back in.]

You mentioned "what we do." What do we do? And what makes you so altruistic about it?

[unabatedly]

I could, I believe. It would depend on the size of the groups and how far apart they were from one another.

[rekkaning]

[That's about the extent of her tactical planning. Not that she set out deliberately to think about that.]

Who are you associated with?

[unabatedly]

[That's a bit of a loaded question.]

Here? No one, other than our fellow Travelers. Back home? I'm a Warden.

[rekkaning]

[She was wondering if there's any common ground, and she supposes that counts.]

In other words, a protector?

[sparkstriker]

[Lightning purses her lips, but doesn't do anything else aside from peer at her from over her shades]

You can be suspicious all you like, but getting used to all of this, and accepting help from other Travelers will help make sure you don't die. Because what we do are Jaunts-- we get sent to different worlds to accomplish something, and they can be dangerous.

[rekkaning]

I was just curious. [She knows she'd get tired of explaining the basics one or two times.] Everything about this is suspicious but...

[Aaand she doesn't finish that thought. After a second, she says instead—] Who does the sending?

[sparkstriker]

Nobody knows. We call them "Trumps" sometimes, but we've never really seen any of them.

[As far as she can tell anyway. She cant remember anything before Moebius, after all.]

[rozpetac]

And not in my hand right?

...lovely. And he's king of the pack with the most useful skill at least in here right?

[rozpetac]

There's that usually there that makes me a little iffy-feeling about this thing.

Trumps. Like Trumps as in Trump Card?

[blackhand]

You'll learn as you go. [Gurl pls he's a thief, he's the worst kind of person to be an investigator.] Stick with someone who's familiar with a Jaunt, and that'll help.

[superieure]

[This is the equivalent of dangling a carrot in front of an excited horse; Monet's expression, however, is far more restrained, but she leans forward, sparks of excitement decorating the shared connection. For once she's more curious than dismissive.]

How so?

[thezerothlaw]

A... friend of mine obtained some mental ability. He was able to both sense and adjust the emotions of those around him. He ceased to function, but he passed the programming matrix that allowed him to do this to me shortly before I came here. What I experience here is very different.

[detectivewonder]

He probably could be, if he wanted to be. But then again, if he tried to make a power play with the water supply, he'd probably wind up with a sword to his throat.

[protect_and_serve]

That's right. It's as good a name as any for them.

[protect_and_serve]

It's too early to say ever. We've gotten others back.