sixthiterationlogs | OTA - First Things First

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OTA - First Things First

WHO: Steve McGarrett and YOU
WHERE: Fountain, Forest, Village (behind and in between buildings)
WHEN: September 3rd
OPEN TO: All
SCRUB COLOR: Hunter Green
WARNINGS: None to start
STATUS: Open

[ Fountain ]

Coming to, Steve knows instantly that he’s underwater. Fighting the upwards momentum, he opens his eyes and tries to get some idea of what the hell is going on. All he sees is darkness with light shining down from above. He knows which way to go and after confirming he’s alone without any detectible threat in the water he kicks up.

Slowing just before surfacing, he eases his eyes and nose above the water with barely a splash. SEAL training coming in especially helpful at the moment. He scans his surroundings, only to find that nothing looks familiar.

The last he remembered was taking Wo Fat prisoner and flying a chopper from an island not far off Hawaii. They’d been over the pacific, he remembers that, but then nothing until coming to in the water. Had someone shot them down? The chances of him landing in the fountain he found himself in was extremely slim, but it is possible someone attempted to dispose of him there. The landscape doesn’t look familiar and he doesn’t think he’s on the islands anymore. Which makes him wonder how long he’s been out and where exactly he is.

But first things first. Easing up high enough to see over the edge of the fountain, he sees what looks to be... a park?

[ Forest ]

Out of the fountain, he makes quick work of getting some distance between him and it. It’s not till he has some cover in the trees does he notice what he’s wearing. It strikes him odd to find himself in scrubs and instantly he misses his cargo pants and everything he normally keeps in his pockets. What he misses most though is a weapon.

Taking inventory of what he has in the backpack, he decides against changing at the moment. Changing may help him fit into whatever mess he’s found himself in, but until he has more intel he’ll stay as he is. Instead he removes only one sock from the backpack and with a quick look around him he picks up a rock about the size of his fist and slips it into the sock. Not a great weapon, but it’s better than nothing until he has time to either acquire some or make something better.

With the backpack secured to his back, he carefully scouts out the forest staying as concealed as possible while also gathering as much information as he can. As he moves through he does some light tracking of any animal trails that he might find as well as notes any vegetation that could be useful for food, weapons, tools or anything else he may need. He may not need any of it, and doesn’t waste time lingering, but if he needs it later he’ll know where to find it.

[ Village ]

Once he ventures out far enough from the fountain, he sees the buildings. With the fountain he had figured there was a settlement of some sort not far off and now that he finds it, he’s curious to see what he’s up against. Attempting to keep as concealed as possible, he peaks into windows and around corners.

The town isn’t what he was expecting and he’s still confused about where he is and why. His leading theory is that Wo Fat somehow managed to get the upper hand, knock him out and brought him here, but seeing the village and the people walking around without weapons he realizes that doesn’t seem likely either.

After watching for a bit he slips his ‘rock-in-a-sock’ into his backpack and ventures in closer. He can only find out so much information by remaining hidden and so far he’s not detected a specific threat. Still, he came to by almost drowning in the fountain and as far as he knows, any one of these people could have tossed him there... Along with a backpack with three days worth of clothing. Whoever put him in the fountain hadn't expected him to die there. So, he’s ready for anything.

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Now that Johanna has a few weapons in her possessions made of the fallen trees, she's back out at work because the chill at night is enough to let her know that it's going to be fall soon enough and they'll need the firewood to keep things burning. She's also making sure that she's going around to check on how many trees they still have, because it's not like they've been getting many opportunities to plant more and she hadn't really thought about it, earlier in the season.

Last thing she needs to worry about is being fucked for wood at some point, but that's a bridge to cross later. She's working on one of the larger trees that ought to provide the whole village with something for a while when she hears noise in the forest. With one hard drive, she gets the axe in the trunk of the tree, easing back to wipe away the sweat and looking towards the disturbance, seeing a man in the distance. He's trying to conceal himself and he's doing a good job. Shame of it is that she's so far away and at a weird angle, so he probably hadn't been looking down her way.

"Are you lost?" she shouts towards him, hoping her voice carries across the distance.

Hearing the voice, Steve's head quickly whips around to where he believes the sound to have come from and he starts scanning. It's fairly clear when he spots her as he starts making his way to her. He's watching her carefully, looking for weapons as he comes closer. The 'rock-in-a- sock' hangs from his hand, ready to be used if need be, but he's really hoping that it won't come to that.

There's no use denying that he has no clue where he's at, it's not like he can fudge it. "Not in the sense that I just wandered in, but... Where am I?"

Great, he's actually lost. Johanna hadn't really banked on getting an answer, had more been hoping to dissuade the man from fucking up what she's doing, but apparently that's not happening today. Eyeing him dubiously, her gaze slides to the sock, and as she leverages her foot on the tree, she digs out her axe as if in warning.

Hers beats his, not that she's counting (not out loud, anyway). "You crawled out of a fountain, right?" she guesses, as if she's got some deep, secret knowledge. "Turned up here in a pair of scrubs?"

The ax is only useful if she's skilled in using it in a fight and while he doesn't know if she's skilled or to what level, he's really not looking for one. That being said, he stops out of swinging range of the ax. No reason to push his luck with so much still unknown.

Tilting his head, he narrows his eyes slightly. "So I'm not the first." Useful to know but at this point doesn't tell him much. The scrubs she's mentioned, he's still wearing. They're hunter green under the mud and grime from skulking around wet in the forest. "To what purpose?"

"No, I've lost count," is Johanna's even reply, not wanting to pick a fight with someone who's only fault had been speaking to Johanna when he didn't know better. Besides, she's not even in that bad of a mood, which means she's willing to indulge in a little conversation with someone who just fumbled his way out.

She squints at the sock, deciding not to ask, and then at his scrubs. She's still wearing the red bottoms, but the tank top serves as enough as she works, hair tied back with twine. "No fucking idea," is her irritated reply. "I've been nearly a year, it feels like, but I still can't figure out why, but if I had a guess, I'm still saying it's some kind of punishment."

So, there have been others, her included if he understood her correctly. He's not sure if that makes this better or worse. The squint at the sock isn't lost on him, but if she's not asking, he's not telling. Not feeling that she's an immediate threat, he eases his stance so he doesn't appear as much of one either. Until he knows exactly what is going on, he'd much rather avoid confrontation. He also notes that she's wearing some of the same clothing, although in different colors, and he's starting to build a nice list of questions.

"A year...?" That's not what he wanted to hear. He has no interest in staying around here for anywhere near that long. He's got a life and a job to do back in Hawaii. Staying here for a year is out of the question. Looking around without turning his head from her direction, he's not seen any sign of fencing, guards or surveillance to indicate a prison, but there must be something keeping them here. They've only just met, but she doesn't seem to be the type to stick around if she doesn't have to. As concerning as that is, her final word is considerably more so. "Punishment... How?"

"I don't know, maybe? It feels like ten," she complains with a roll of her eyes, seeing as it's not like Johanna would've ever chosen to be stuck anywhere, but being in an arena-type simulation for this long without the chance to kill everyone and get out isn't something that she knows how to deal with.

No one gave her the rules to this game, because if they did, Johanna would've stopped at nothing to win it. "Let me guess," she notes wryly. "Never heard of Panem, have you," she supposes, seeing as no one else has but the other victors, which means they don't understand what going against the Capitol means. Maybe it's punishment for them, but she doesn't know what the hell the others are doing here.

Being a prisoner can do that to you. Days drag, then bleed into one another and time takes on a different type of feel to it. Steve's been a prisoner before. Didn't care for it much then and he's not keen on the idea now.

"Pan-Am?" The name rings a bell, but not likely how she means it, and not realizing he's got the name slightly wrong. "As in the Pan-American Games?" He looks around, not seeing how that fits into this, but he has a question of his own. "Do you know the name Wo Fat?" Wo Fat had been in the chopper with Steve, and as he was transporting him as a prisoner and with their history, he wouldn't be surprised if Wo Fat was behind all this.

"I've never heard of it, but I also don't spend much time caring about people's names," Johanna replies, bored, as she leans on her axe and gives the man a slow look. He's built like he might come out of one of the career districts, but he's too old for that. Also? The sock thing. Johanna doesn't think they go around teaching people from One and Two how to make weapons with clothing.

"Not Pan Am, Panem," she says, a little clearer. "The districts? I'm from Seven," she says, even though she can already tell this is a pointless conversation.

If Wo Fat was the one keeping her here, Steve figures she would know his name. Not that it's not possible that he's hiding behind others, much like he did with Noshimuri and the Yakuza.

Steve shakes his head, what she's talking about is equally as unfamiliar to him. "Sorry, no. I'm from Hawaii, part of the United States. Where is Panem? Is it part of South America?" He's less familiar with that part of the world.

Frustrated, he looks around and then back at her, then the ax, and then back to her. "So what is it you've been doing here for the last year?" Prisons don't usually allow the inmates access to weapons. Although, nor do inmates generally need to chop firewood either. "Do you know who is keeping you here? Punishing you?"

Johanna doesn't even bother to hide her disdain when she realizes that she's talking to another one of these people who think that they're in some place called the United States. She's beginning to imagine that it might have existed before Panem, before the Capitol and the war, but she has no idea how it goes from them to what she lives with.

"Not the prisons you know, but all the prisons I've been put in, they've made sure to give me something sharp," is her reply. "Sometimes, people get put into trapped places because people need entertainment. Not here, though," she says, even though she'd love to keep pulling his leg. "Here, it looks like some fucked up science experiment, so why not give us weapons? We can't exactly go anywhere."

Steve sees the disdain but it doesn't bother him. As a Navy SEAL often deployed in areas that the locals would much rather the United States not have military forces in, he's more than accustomed to seeing that look and ignoring it. Like then, there's nothing he can personally do to change where he's at.

To the level of prison entertainment that she's talking about Steve is not familiar with, but he's aware of the concept, and it makes him wonder what she's done to end up in those types of prisons. If she wasn't fully on the list of people for him to keep an eye on before she is definitely there now.

"Science experiment?!" That was not what he was expecting, although he is aware of projects that have tested drugs on specific populations, or towns created to simulate life in another country to train sleeper agents. "What type of experiments?" With her also having said punishments, he's guessing whatever they are it's not pleasant. "What's preventing us from escaping?" Because if they have basic tools and supplies, Steve's fairly certain he can come up with something.

"I'm assuming a dome-like forcefield, though taking a run at it is never a smart idea. I've seen people fried that way," she says evenly, like she isn't talking about watching people die, not to mention that it had been Blight and someone that she'd actually been somewhat neutral about. It's not like she's sad about it, still, but he'd been from home. He'd been familiar.

"Who knows why the fuck they want us? DNA, testing, some reason to keep us around and test us, maybe some way to create new fucked up animals and muttations, for their Capitol," she says, annoyed as she looks him over. "What, doesn't the government do that where you come from?" she asks, with mock innocence. "No secret agendas?"

The force-field she describes brings a pinched frown to his face. The temptation is there to look up to see if he can see something in relation to what she's talking about but he resists, at least for now.

"Great..." He mumbles under his breath and shakes his head. The last thing Steve has any interest in being is the lab rat in any experiment. That being said, the place she describes as the world she knew prior to being here doesn't sound like any place he's familiar with back home. Doesn't mean she's wrong about here, she has been here a considerable time after all, but it sounds like she's made some assumptions and perhaps those are based more on her previous situation than the one present.

"No, they have their own secret agendas. Nothing quite so... elaborate as dome-like force-fields or creating new mutations unless you believe in the stories surrounding Area 51." Which Steve didn't. "Secret experimentation isn't unheard of, but not to this degree of a setup to my knowledge. Not as to how I came to be here anyway."

Although, it would have been the perfect time for someone to take him if they had wanted. He'd been AWOL from his team, the plane he was on crashed on a remote island and they'd been coming in dark to begin with, and those who had come after them were Japanese mafia. His team, and possibly the Navy, would be looking for him but there wasn't much for them to go on to track him down. If he wanted to get out of here, it was going to be of his own doing... And, he planned to get out of here.

Johanna isn't sure she believes that, but then, Panem didn't start out like they did. It took the rebellion for the Capitol to decide to start punishing them after wiping Thirteen off the map, so maybe once, her government looked a lot like his. "Well, lucky you," is her response, teeming with annoyed sarcasm, because of course it figures that other people don't have to deal with the crap she does.

"Now you're here, as trapped as everyone else. If you need firewood, I've got plenty. We could do a trade," she offers boredly.

Wherever Johanna is from is not the same as where Steve is, but they have their own problems in his as well. One of those problems he'd been in the process of taking care of before he was abducted and brought here. It does make him wonder what happened to Wo Fat... He's still not convinced he isn't behind all this.

"We'll see about that," he mumbles under his breath. Being trapped is not an concept he takes easily and even though he doesn't have a plan yet, he will. "I don't have much of anything right now," nor did he need firewood at the moment, but that could change and he wasn't about to shut any doors. "What is it you'd want in return?"

Eyeing him, Johanna can see him being plenty at home in any of the Capitol districts, which means that if things get shitty around here, then she could use an ally like him. Narrowing her eyes, she doesn't have anything she wants right now, but that doesn't mean something won't pop up. "Favor," is what she says. "Maybe your muscles or help when things go pear-shaped like they tend to."

"I may be vicious, but sometimes, I lack in brute strength," Johanna admits, shrugging because it would take an idiot to come straight at her. "So, I'd want your help, at some point in the future. That's all."

It's really not a difficult call for Steve but he takes a moment to appear to think things over all the same. He's new here and while he's starting to get an idea of what he's somehow gotten himself into he's not been around long enough to know details he should before making deals or arrangements. The thing is though, should things go pear-shaped or if she ever needed help, he'd help her without needing anything back in return, but that's just the type of guy he is.

"Right now I don't need firewood," he says casually enough. "But should I in the future, or when you do need some assistance, I'd be willing to discuss that type of an arrangement." At this point he's not really had a good look around to know what shape they are in as far as a community goes, but he can make some educated guesses. "What other services are in need? I'm going to guess hunting? Are there farms for crops or animals? Security?"

Johanna arches her brow when he denies her help, unable to help the way that rubs against her like a frictioned edge, making her feel somewhat off her game and far from sure-footed to a degree she doesn't like, but she's careful to make it look like she doesn't care. "There's hunting. Farms. Crops. Things people need to stay alive," she's willing to confirm, giving him a steely-eyed look.

"Security? People watch out for the things out there, but you can't stop it," she guarantees. "Take care of yourself, your allies, that's the best you can do, I figure."

He's not fully denying her help, more that he doesn't need what she's offering right at the moment. "So we have the basics at least. Not quite as bad as roughing it, but not living in comfort either." Actually it sounded like they were much closer to the roughing it than in comfort, but Steve was completely okay with that. In fact he preferred it.

There's an eyebrow raised at not being able to stop the things that are out there. It doesn't sound to him she means the other creatures that might live in these woods. That she uses the word allies instead of friends is something Steve notices. It's more tactical and military in thinking than community. "Are their structured alliances established here?"

Johanna gives him a look of disbelief, mainly because she wants to know where in the world there aren't structured alliances. "People always gravitate one way or another," she points out, seeing as that's just how the world works, as far as she's concerned. "It's pretty much us versus them. The 'them', in this case, being the people who trapped us here."

Because no matter how irritated Johanna might be with some of the people here, most of her ire is reserved for the ones trapping them. If it turns out to be the Capitol, then all that anger can be stored up and shared together, conveniently.

There's a raised eyebrow to match her look of disbelief. She's thinking in a much larger picture than he currently is and it takes him a second to realize that's the reason behind her look. "Of course," he says in agreement. "I take it then those of us who are trapped generally work together for survival."

The picture he has in his mind's eye of where he's ended up is slowly starting to form. It's not ideal and he'd much rather be almost anywhere else but here, but that the community works together is a positive thing to him.

With a soft sigh he looks around and nods. "I'll let you get back at it but uh... Thanks for the information. When I need firewood, I'll be sure to let you know. Otherwise, if you need some brute strength... Well it sounds like I shouldn't be too difficult to find."

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OTA - First Things First

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