Hold Your Questions

[airlockedmods]

[This won’t come as a complete surprise. Yl’lb Ein told everyone yesterday that a press conference had been scheduled, and Jaycee had Spat the same thing at the survivors’ account shortly afterwards. Yl’lb himself is strangely absent when it begins, but he mentioned the channel, and surely one of you can work the remote by now.

The broadcast shows a small room packed wall-to-wall with reporters of various species. The stage at the front of the room is small, just large enough to fit a long table with a microphone sitting in front of the centermost seat. Though the room itself is nondescript, the table’s draped with a cloth showing the InterGal 7 logo.

A human-looking woman in a knee-length sleeveless grey dress, flanked by a pair of hairy, beefy-looking alien bodyguards, steps into frame behind the long table. She’s small, almost delicate, compared to her Chewbacca-like bodyguards even with the several-inch high heels she’s wearing that are visible under the table. The woman takes a seat at the lone chair at the center of the table, her bodyguards standing on their side of her, and finishes the message she’s been rapidly typing on the handheld device she’s been staring at since she came into view. Finally she sets it down on the table and looks out at the crowd of reporters with a wide, dazzling smile.]

Good afternoon. My name is Rox Petuu, and I will be representing InterGal 7 in this press conference. Let’s get started, shall we?

You may recognize me as a former host of the network’s flagship series, Airlocked!. Because of this, as a result of some...professional differences with other previous hosts, the Network has kindly asked me to represent them today. [Her smile fades as her welcoming expression shifts to something more serious for this bit of news.] Unfortunately, due to a recent spate of ruthless pirate attacks on Network-affiliated ships and locations, the executives have been relocated for their own safety and production of a brand new season of Airlocked! has been temporarily suspended pending the apprehension of these raiders.

In the meantime, we understand that this is an inconvenience to you the fans, and so not only will the Network be temporarily making our exclusive bonus content free to all viewers on our brand new InterGal 7 streaming service, but we will also be re-airing the newly remastered Season One of Airlocked!. [She grins brightly but if you’re used to seeing humans smile it looks off. Showing too many teeth and it never quite seems to reach her eyes like an excited grin should.]

For a limited run only, we’re giving you the chance to see where it all began. The drama, the suspense.... And yours truly, of course. [She chuckles a little and lifts a hand to lightly touch her collarbone, showing off a small, smooth black device on her wrist, almost the size and shape of a worry stone. It’s in a different form than the survivors are used to but nonetheless recognizable: a hardlight projector.] And it wouldn’t be reruns of Season One without following it with a marathon of Lovelocked!, the story of two sweethearts who captured the hearts of a galaxy.

But we’d like to reassure our fans, as soon as the matter of these pesky pirates has been sorted out, we’re coming back with the brand new final season of Airlocked! just as soon as we can. I think you’ll love what we have planned.

Thank you. There will be no questions today. Thank you everyone for coming.

[And with a few more dismissive thank yous to the reporters shouting questions, she stands up from her chair and leaves the stage, flanked by her bodyguards.]

Comments

[stitch_in_time]

...Anyone else just a little worried about the sound of that "final season"?

[daughterofthemark]

...if they mean to end this on their own, can that really be a bad thing?

[nightcure]

Looks like we really gave them trouble.

[ Noctis is tense as he watches the briefing, his mouth set in a hard line. ]

At least they aren't kidnapping any more people yet.

[ratherdoweddings]

Yet. But that teaser... I'm worried.

[daughterofthemark]

Indeed, you seem to have been most effective at disrupting their operations.

[induality]

Y-yeah but that's... only because they're looking for us...

[Which is real bad news itself.]

[scourgingstars]

[Ardyn didn't know with any certainty what had happened to the others in Jamie's round; mostly mentions of Blaze, something about a simulation, and the rather obvious fact that Jamie was the only one left. He wasn't stupid enough that he couldn't guess the rest of it. They weren't among the other survivors for a reason; either they hadn't been recovered from the simulation, or-]

[They were just being mocked, every last one of them. (Your heart's desire, so close now.) There was nothing they could do but watch, and even the network knew it. Maybe they were even just buying time until they could track down these broken, struggling survivors and gods only knew what would happen then.]

[...If Ardyn had been upset to see Noctis before the last season began, that was nothing compared to his reaction now. He locked up rigidly in place, turning white and making a quietly choked noise in his throat as if he had immediately forgotten how to breathe.]

[How does it feel to be powerless, echoed the mocking voice in his head; his own, always his own voice fueled by malicious joy and bitter rage. Can't help your friends if you can't help yourself. When he finally managed to get words out, it was like he'd forgotten what language to speak, or he was just so far gone that wires were immediately crossing and short-circuiting in his head.]

Nos postulo ut relinquam, it isn't safe, it--we're...

['As soon as the matter of these pesky pirates has been sorted out, we’re coming back with the brand new final season-']

We have to get the hell out of here. Th- [He half-choked on his own words, sounding like he was trying very hard to hold back a state of complete panic.] ...they're buying time. They have to be.

[daughterofthemark]

Lord Ardyn.

[Arianna is very suddenly by his side, holding him by the arm.]

Please, wait a moment.

[nightcure]

[ Noctis is... well, he doesn't miss any of this. Noctis has his arms crossed tight against his chest. He's not sure about running, and this whole announcement about a rerun... well, he's not sure it'll affect him personally. After all, who could possibly have been taken from Eos? He'd have known...

Right?

... There's one thing he might be able to do. ]

Space pirates are keeping them busy, right? You guys stay here. We can keep giving them hell to keep them off our backs.

[misanthropicprinciple]

['...brand new final season of Airlocked! just as soon as we can.'

Junpei can think of one, maybe two things that would make that a show to remember.]

Yeah.

[He can't disengage from his own gut reaction in time to help work Ardyn through his. Can't turn off hero mode, can't stop turning the problem in his hands for every possible scrap of action they can take.]

Probably too late on that front, but at least we can try to buy some of our own time, too.

[serrata]

[ nnnnnope nope this isn't happening. We're not doing this today.

So of course Yuuri's at his side the instant she can get there, doing her best to at least look calm even if the tremble in her voice betrays her somewhat. ]

Breathe, Dad. I know. We were always going to have to move on from here, weren't we? It's just a little more urgent now. Just -- deep breaths for now, okay?

[refusedtoleave]

[She's wringing her hands together...Thinking.]

Buying time for what though? The final season she mentioned or something else?

[She keeps her gaze on him, she's not even suprised.]

[ratherdoweddings]

[Yurika breathes in and out. She tenses and her eyes set on the TV in a way that only her fellow R1s have seen.]

All right. It looks like the new group attacking the network really helped, but they're probably looking for you even more so they can get back to stealing innocent people from their homes. With that in mind, they're probably afraid of a fourth group of escapees messing things up, which also explains why she said the next season would be the last one.

Now that the bonus content is free, we can watch our friends without piggybacking on Jaycee-san's account or risking ourselves setting up a new one, but the most important thing is to focus on keeping all of us safe but still finding some way to keep that "last season" from happening. Does anybody have any suggestions?

[scourgingstars]

I vote we start by getting a ship big enough for all of us, file the serial numbers off, and get halfway across the universe before this even starts airing.

Staying in one place this long makes us too easy to locate. They'll find us eventually.

[tokencanadian]

[Pyrrha was already anticipating the worst when she heard there was going to be a press conference about Airlocked! by the time she gets to the TV, and watches this woman step out, she can already feel an encroaching dread inside her.

And then she hears the woman's name. And, suddenly, Pyrrha's gone dead silent. She just stands there and stares as this woman lays out the future of the TV show they we're working so hard to strike back against. She can't even chuckle at the obvious trouble this has caused them.

The first season... and more then that? What else could they have? But that wasn't what she was thinking about.]

...It's her. It's her. That... [She searches for the right word, swearing under her breath.] The woman I talked to, before we escaped! That's her?!

[daughterofthemark]

Dame Pyrrha, you've met her?!

[She... yeah she took "talked" literally.]

[daughterofthemark]

[Well that was... strangely anticlimactic. It was important information, certainly, but for some reason Arianna was expecting more. Like, explosions, or monsters attacking, or something.]

When she says "re-airing..."

[ratherdoweddings]

A rerun. They're going to show what happened to Jamie-san and his friends. ...He's the only one left, Arianna-chan. It wasn't like with us.

[refusedtoleave]

...I think we already know who the 'pirates' from these attacks are... [She nods at some of the season 4 cast. Then some of the others.]

It's us isn't it? Unless I missed something they only destroyed that ship. We're the ones who went to that warehouse...

[She's including that as an attack.]

[daughterofthemark]

During the time when their season was airing, Lord Noctis's group was performing acts of piracy.

[natsuhi did you get left out of explanations again? we're all very sorry]

[unhappylittletrees]

[It's fine. This is fine.

That's what Jamie keeps telling himself Rox (he'd never expected to see her again but he'd thought the same about Dudely too) chatters on to the reporters. He's quiet while everything plays out, his arms folded across his chest on the couch and his fingers only digging his biceps a little through his shirt. Visibly he's doing better than that first blast from the past but internally his head is filling with the unpleasant fog of dissociation.

And then the words "Lovelocked marathon" come out of her mouth and Jamie springs to his feet with an angry energy none of them have probably ever seen before.]

Are you fucking shitting me?!

[ratherdoweddings]

I know! What is wrong with these people?

[desperateprayer]

[ Clarith is gone for a long while after this announcement, deep in thought. When she finally speaks up again, it's quiet, and she seems uncomfortable. ]

...It's another trap. They're trying t-to demoralize us. Scare us.

[ She touches the PIP lightly, looking down a the ground. ]

...To make us panicked, worried, upset. Something. Just reckless enough.

[ratherdoweddings]

You're right. But we don't have to. If we can just find a way to catch them off guard instead of the other way around...

[misanthropicprinciple]

[Junpei's quiet through the press release and only stays a while afterwards to talk strategy before slipping out. Rather than stay in the house, he leans against the wall outside the front door with his arms crossed and thinks.

He doesn't know about Jane's group, but IG7 let the survivors of Seasons 3 and 4 go. In one way or another, they outsourced oversight of said seasons to others; no one's had direct contact with EP since Xander, the Network didn't care about losing Kip, Blaze was tricked into running his own show with, Pyrrha thinks, little enough of the Network's resources poured in.

Season One ended with two survivors. After that, there was Lovelocked!, which... wasn't that what became popular, actually? If everything after that was a way of assuaging public demand without much effort on the Network's part, then what exactly were they buying time for? What's allowing them to declare a final season?

Stolen AIs, brain scans, the perfect preservation of bodies after death... what does it all mean?

Junpei eventually sighs and presses a hand over his eyes, tilting his head back against the wall.]

Damn it. I don't understand any of this shit...

[power_of_dominance]

[Junpei's "uncle" has been absorbing all this in silence, staying close to Ardyn but not interfering with his season-mates' efforts to ground the shaken man. He knows he's still relatively a stranger, common ground or no. But he takes a moment to touch Ardyn's shoulder, to offer solidarity, before going to Junpei.]

Just when we think we're getting to them even a little, we find out we've been played all along. Our season's piracy... what if it did more harm than good?

[serrata]

[ People who don't want to be here: Yuuri Wakasa
People who are here regardless: see above

She's got her arms folded across her chest to start with but as the conference goes on, she starts fidgeting with the clover pendant on her necklace like a worry stone. It's the only visible indicator of her distress she allows herself and her face is a mask of forced calm. ]

... Final season. I don't like how that sounds.

[daughterofthemark]

[rii-san are you pretending not to have emotions again because that is not allowed. at least you're worse at it now.]

...at least we can be assured that this will end soon.

[motherfucking_ghost]

Meh, boring, I thought maybe we'd get a hint about anything. [people who still have not seen season 2 and has no desire to, much less season 1]

Kinda curious about her, though. Isn't she wearing a hardlight?

[misanthropicprinciple]

Looks like it. Man, why the human-passing bias with this bullshit? Hasn't everyone we've met off-set been an alien?

[cyan_maid]

...A final season, huh...

[How do you justify taking such a now highly popular property and ending it like that? Still...it could potentially mean that there won't be anyone else hurt once this is all done. Just. Possibly themselves, as many folks are picking up on. But like hell Jane wants to let that happen.

If InterGal7 wants their big finale, they're not going to get it easily, if at all. Nothing will keep her from fighting if she has to - at least, that's what she thinks right now.]

Well...reruns shouldn't be so terrible, right? And...hm.

[Maybe it would be better to ask Jamie about what happened, rather than obsessively watching the show. Where is he?]

[ratherdoweddings]

That's true, but none of us have even looked it up, have we? I mean, I felt too weird to do it, since poor Jamie-san doesn't want to be reminded.

[induality]

N-now we've really done it...

[They were holding off on everything else to do re-runs even though they had plans for more? That sounded terribly ominous. They were looking for them, which meant...]

I-If they catch us now, I d-don't think just killing us is what they have in mind...

[Just. A suspicion. That would be too easy. Or... no. Maybe she's just being paranoid. That would be nice, wouldn't it...]

[daughterofthemark]

...they have enacted cruel punishments in the form of this "show" before. such as with Sir Jamie and Sir Bolton.

[arianna you're so close]

But they will not have that chance.

[curdle]

[ No, she thinks, with no real reason for such a vicious reaction, after Rox's speech is done and they're left to dissect what information was actually given. No, no, no.

It had been months before ever the devil showed himself on the farm, but he had always been there, watching, in full understanding of the secret contents of their hearts. The only real difference is the literal nature of the Network's residing-place within them, on their wrists. They never did get rid of their PIPs. They never, ever, could have truly hidden from the network.

And they won't be ending this by leaving them to live peacefully. Jamie and Bolton were made to host a round of this, and that when they didn't fully know what Airlocked was, in retaliation for no crime greater than their survival. What will they do to them now, those who thought they could flee and interfere with the network's designs, who know the truth of their captivity and could tell others of it? ]

We will never escape this. They'll kill us all.

[ Maybe, if they split up, they would have a better chance of evading whatever they might be planning, but this too is the same as the farm. Thomasin has no ability to fly a ship, let alone survive on her own in a world like this. Even if she could, she doesn't want to -- she already made her choice about this at the sixth trial. But that's very hard to remember now, i.e. in the beginning stages of a panic attack. She looks around herself and feels nothing but dread and anger at every face she sees. Why are they (except Ardyn u cool) trying to be calm about this? Why do they think they can do anything about it when they've all seen exactly what they're up against? Talk is worthless, planning is worthless, the idea that they stand to win because they stand together is worthless-- ]

[cyan_maid]

...Thomasin?

[Oh. Oh boy. Honey, please don't - if one person starts to panic, it's reasonable to assume others will follow, and then they'll be thoroughly fucked. Jane makes her way over to the other girl's side, wringing her hands, admittedly not sure how to help.]

Hey - come now, we've survived this long, haven't we? We're not going to let them hurt us anymore. We're not.

[everylittlesecret]

[Yeah, the only reason Nari is here is because this seemed important enough to come out of her blanket nest under a table for.

It seems maybe having insisted on staying down there would have been better. THAT LADY IS SCARY....]

Hm. Well. This is certainly not going to be fun. [Just a moment of quiet.] We're gonna need more alcohol this season. And blankets.

[daughterofthemark]

[nari are you a cat now too]

Not fun, perhaps, but important.