When there's trouble...

...Seriously, though. We can't just leave Dantes in the infirmary. I'm not sure if we should give him a burial-at-sea, so to speak. Or... well, on an emotional level, recycling him seems grotesque, but it's not really different from burying or cremating someone.... Or something else? Bury him? In the ice or something? ...He was Catholic, right?

...Can we take a vote, or something?

I've been up all night reading Edmond's journals. They document a downward spiral into depression, the private cries of a man slipping away from reality. He spent too many years in that horrible prison. Being imprisoned again... broke him.

Edmond Dantes rests in the infirmary, for now. We should have some kind of funeral. I'm not sure... what we should do with him, though. I guess... give him up to the ocean of space. I don't like the idea of just rolling him off a cliff, though, to be flung outwards by centrifugal force. Maybe... take him up in the elevator, let him go, gently, at the center of spin? Send him towards the Sun, towards home? ...What do you guys think?

...Maybe They will show up to retrieve the body.

Well, yeah, obviously we make our bets each round with chips, like they do in Vegas. But in Vegas you have to buy the chips, and if you win the game you redeem them for cash. So the question is whether we make our chips worth something outside of the game. Chores is an idea, even if that stuff's all voluntary anyway. I mean, the point is we do the stuff we're willing and able to do, and other people do the other stuff. Maybe we could buy into the game by offering services, like... "I will do your laundry," "I will bake you a cake," "I will make a power adapter to recharge the battery in your radio" or whatever, redeemable to whoever wins the game. ...Of course, that hinges on the winner actually wanting whatever service is being offered.

Robin's log, 3/13

We've only had one new arrival since my last entry, I-pin. I'm still trying to figure out what ties us all together. What is it about us that someone would bring us here? The biggest commonality we have is Earth. We're all either native Earthlings, or were brought here from Earth, or both. Another commonality is that we're all fluent in English. I think both of these are important; it's significant that this colony was clearly built by and/or for English-speaking Earthlings, most likely humans. So far we've been grabbed from a range of time of a little over 700 years... I'm not sure whether to think that's a big window or a small one, and I don't know whether it's significant. I find it interesting that most of us were brought from a very narrow eight-year period, from 2006-2019. My gut tells me that has to mean something, but I don't know what it could be. It's too early to say whether there are any other significant patterns, or any patterns at all.

On our survival here on the colony: unless a whole horde of new people show up very soon, I don't think we've much to worry about on the food front. The kelp and snails are thriving, although the prawns never hatched. The chickens are laying nicely, and we've got a nice flock of chicks as well. We've been getting greens, and the first of our fruits and grains and beans will be ready soon. It'll be time to collect seeds for the next generation of plantings soon as well. A note, since I didn't think of it and someone else might not: we don't have bees, so we need to remember to pollinate by hand.

We had a bit of a setback when the chickens somehow managed to escape and ate a significant portion of our youngest sprouts, but I think we'll survive. No one's yet owned up to leaving the door open. ...Mysteriously, within the same few hours in which the chickens escaped, one of the chicks seems to have turned into an adult rooster. It seems likely that the two events are related; in any case, I'm completely baffled. If anyone can shed some light on this, I'd appreciate it. ...And does anyone know where a bent, rubber-ended lever came from, and how it ended up putting a dent in the corridor wall outside of the hangar? ...It's probably not important.

Escape efforts continue, slowly. Still no reply on the radio. Isis tells me the effective communications range is about 20 AU, so... we're looking at other objects in the Kuiper belt. Other colonies or passing ships. I'm planning on building a ship, starting with making and storing the fuel, hydrogen and oxygen. ...It's going to take a while. Cyril attempted to locate the signature left by certain types of teleportation devices, to see if we could figure out the location of the device used to bring us here. No luck. Shadow's been looking for the source of the field that prevents him from teleporting away, including x-raying the entire tether. No luck.

On the subject of Shadow the Hedgehog: be careful around him. I don't think he cares one way or the other about the well-being of anyone else on the colony. He has and may attack without reason or warning, and when used as a weapon that Chaos Energy of his is not something you want to be on the receiving end of, trust me.

Shadow, I assume you're reading this. I don't know if you thought that was funny or if you really could care less, but I repeat: don't do that again. Do not attack me or anyone else on this colony in any way or for any reason. This is the only warning you're going to get.

Tex, Church, your flashlight is ready. It's in the machine shop, along with a recharge cord for the battery.

Let me know if you find anything interesting.

((It's a pistol-style flashlight, with a power switch where the trigger would be and one of the sulfur microwave lamps where the mouth of the barrel would be. A hefty homemade battery sits behind the lamp. The battery, wiring, and other delicate innards are protected by molded aluminum sheeting, and there's a plug in the back for the charge cord.))

Robin's log, 2/17

I've decided to keep a log summarizing important information and discoveries made so far, for everyone's reference and to aid new arrivals.

Speaking of which, we had a new arrival yesterday, 2/16. His name's Cyril.

Shadow the Hedgehog arrived 2/9. The rest of us arrived 2/1: Pvt. Leonard Church, Freelancer Tex, Col. Samantha Carter, James May, Richard Hammond, the Count of Monte Cristo, and myself, Robin. We seem to have been taken from different universes and different times; there's no clear pattern to who's been taken, although Church and Tex know each other, as do May and Hammond. I expect people will continue to arrive; there are beds enough for fifty people.

None of us remember "volunteering". We don't know anything about who built this place, who brought us here, or their purpose for doing so beyond what is contained in the letter we've all received upon our arrival. ISES ("Isis"), the user-interface software for the Icelus Station Essential Systems computer, claims not to have any further information in her database about N.A.S.S.E.S. or the purpose of this station. What we've been able to get out of ISES is this: we're at Icelus Station, a self-sufficient colony in the Kuiper belt of Earth's solar system. The colony is located on an asteroid called Icelus; Icelus is tethered to a larger asteroid called Morpheus and the whole system is spinning, providing Earth-normal gravity in the colony. Our current position is supposedly 62.1 AU from the Sun; aphelion is 63 AU, perihelion is 32 AU. The asteroids are pretty typical Kuiper belt bodies: primarily water ice with ammonia, nitrogen, carbon monoxide, and methane ices.

We've been broadcasting and listening in on various radio frequencies, but have made no contact. Furthermore, Shadow says his ability to teleport is restricted, somehow; he can teleport within the Icelus-Morpheus system, but is unable to teleport elsewhere. It seems clear that not only have we been isolated, but we are actively being prevented from leaving.

We've been provided with food stores that, at current rate of consumption, will last us about three months. We've also been provided livestock and seeds and starters for hydroponic and aeroponic crops, with which we could support ourselves indefinitely. We're working hard to get the "greenhouse" levels up and running while we try to figure out how to get out of here.

The colony seems to be entirely self-contained, and most systems are run automatically by the ISES computer. Air and water is recycled, temperature is regulated by heat exchange with the outside, power is solar. We're protected from cosmic rays by an electromagnetic field projected around the colony. We seem to have been provided with tools and replacement parts to repair anything that breaks or gets damaged. We're trying to make regular surveys of the colony to make sure we know of any maintenance problems as soon as possible. Sam Carter and I are also working on a way to distill water from the ice in case an emergency requires it.

Outside conditions are pretty hazardous. Ladders, stairways, and walkways provide access to the solar panels on the side of Icelus and the rotational thrusters beneath the asteroid, but one slip and someone could fall off the world. The curvature of the asteroid blocks radio transmissions as well. The ice contains hazardous chemicals, so it's very important to de-ice before reentering the airlock. Supposedly there's a car that'll take someone across the tether to Morpheus, but so far no one's made the journey; Shadow's the only one who's been to the other asteroid.

...So that's it. We've got a duty roster up in the kitchen to make sure we do the necessary work to keep ourselves alive until we can be rescued or escape. Otherwise our time is our own.

Updates periodically.

A meeting is a good idea, I was going to suggest the same thing. I'll be there. Someone will have to tell the Count in person. If he is who he says he is, I suspect he hasn't figured out how to use the computers.

...I'm not sure if everyone is aware, but we have a new arrival. He's... not human.

Duty Roster
I've tried to organize the schedule to maximize "daylight" hours. Pencil your name in where you're willing to commit to a shift/duty. Multiple people on a shift/duty is acceptable and encouraged. If anyone wants to do extra work, great, but at the very least let's see if we can all commit to a few hours of scheduled work every day. We'll all need to roll our sleeves up and work together if we want to survive this.

Maintenance volunteers, come find me or talk to Isis for information about the heat-exchange system.
-R

Crops and Livestock
7:00-11:00
Robin
Sam

12:00-16:00
Hammond
The Count of Monte Cristo

17:00-21:00
May
The Count of Monte Cristo

Radio Broadcast/Monitor
7:00-9:00
Tex

10:00-12:00
Hammond

13:00-15:00
Robin

16:00-18:00
Church

19:00-21:00
Church

Maintenance Patrol
Morpheus (weekly)
Robin
Sam

Icelus- colony exterior, heat-exchange, solar panels, jets (daily)
Robin
May
Sam

Colony walk-through, ventilation, heat-exchange
A.M.
Church
Hammond

P.M.
Robin
Tex
Sam

Good idea, we should also try and take turns preparing the evening meal in teams of two. And try to at least eat dinner as a group each night.
-Sam

It's a thought. I'm willing. We'd have to adjust the schedule to free up time in the evening... that's probably a good idea anyway. Let's check with the others.
-R

((So this is a bit unusual with how the game's set up, but hey. Robin's written this in pencil on a piece of paper and duct taped it to the front of the refrigerator in the kitchen; next to it he's duct taped a length of yarn tied around the end of a pencil. If your character would like to sign up for shifts, comment with where they'd like their name scribbled in, and I'll edit the post accordingly. ^_^))