hugtopia_logs | ♥ September Intro Mingle Log

♥ September Intro Mingle Log

a park scene in autumn with a lake, trees, a bench, leaves on the ground

September Intro Mingle Log
Welcome to Hugtopia, and to the city of Havenwell. This mingle is meant for new arrivals to get settled and meet the other inhabitants. New characters should be the only top-levels but everyone should feel free to tag around and make new friends. Who knows, you may find that Perfect Hug in here. You can use the prompts here, or create a wildcard of your own.

ICly, this takes place from the 2nd to the 16th and then we'll have a shiny new event post up for you all soon after that date range. The prompts below are optional, but are a way to get you started if you wish. To help you create your own prompts, please take a look through our Settings and FAQ. Click on each prompt's title to see the text. If you have any questions, feel free to direct them to the FAQ or to the Mod Question thread below.

❥ PROMPT I: Awakening

When you awaken, you're in the last outfit you remember wearing, three of your belongings laid nearby or your animal friend curled up by you, waking as you do. It's not the most comfortable place to sleep, a stone slab, but once you're awake, a humanoid-looking robot comes in and explains you're in Havenwell and leads you out of the room and into the main portion of the temple where a welcoming committee of similarly humanoid-looking robots hand over a clear smartphone-sized tablet, some starting funds, and explain their dilemma. Then they release you into Havenwell to pick your new home from free housing in the city and give you the chance to settle. It might be a bit disorienting, but thankfully there seem to be a lot of robots and even some non-robots around. Maybe ask them for help?

❥ PROMPT II: Buddy System

two fingers together with smiling faces drawn on

With all the changes going on, it might be hard to be a new arrival to Havenwell. The natives understand! Sort of. When some new arrivals begin to appear at the temples, receive the welcome speech, get their communicators and the simple map of the city, they get taken to the front of the temple by a helpful robotic priest. Rather than turn the newcomers loose right away, they pull someone seemingly at random off the street and push the two people together with a cheerful, "Here's your guide to Havenwell! It's dangerous to go alone, so be buddies!" before going back inside.

They try to place a new arrival with one of those who previously arrived, but who can keep track of all that, right? Characters may find themselves thrown together with an actual veteran or with another new arrival who only came here a day or even just an hour before them! Good luck helping each other out, offworlders, and don't lose your buddy!

❥ PROMPT III: Weather Wildcard

a vertical slice of several different weather conditions, from sunny to storms

Havenwell's weather is generally so well controlled, with beautiful blue skies and temperate climes that it's hard to remember that there's a whole world out there that might not be so nice. Every so often, however, the controls break and something not so nice and temperate comes through. Pockets of unpleasant weather happens all over the city at random intervals and new arrivals might find themselves and others caught without warning. Is that a snowstorm with green snow? Sure is. A windstorm that only seems to affect three streets? Yup. Did a deluge of rain just pour the equivalent of an Olympic sized swimming pool of water on you? Uh-huh, sure did. A deep cold fog that suddenly rolls in and blankets your entire area? Yeeaaah... hopefully there's someone around to help you get about and find shelter or just dry off and get away from it all. Good luck, offworlder.

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[He would like to think it impossible, but if this is not a shard of the Source, then he is well and truly ignorant of this world's workings and that of its gods or primals, whatever they may be. He himself draws on energies to sustain himself, though they are stored in the Tower he... once maintained. But that energy came once from a sun, not from a living person.]

[It is something he will need to look into deeper in the near future, for certain, and for now, that is most of which he is certain.]

There is a cause behind everything your people do. You have made as much quite clear with no doubt as to your honesty in that.

[Though that, in his own heart, is what concerns the Exarch. He holds a grain of doubt against every word from the man's lips, but his track record thus far has been true. If Emet's words should fall to lies, the people of this world might not know it until it was too late, and they are the only two he knows who are aware of what went on on the Source and its reflections.]

[The Tower still stands somewhere amiss, and the Warrior is not here to help him this time, should Emet decide suddenly that this world would be better off left to dust. He doesn't like it, but he has no choice, and he knows Emet knows it. Still, he returns the look anyway, even and collected.]

Once more, we are in agreement, but until the rain passes, little else may reveal itself. [That said, he turns back to the storm beyond their shelter, watching the droplets pour down upon the streets. He missed this on the First, dearly so.]

[It is only the rain, but the rain can have be soothing indeed to those who have no other way to quiet their souls.]

In some ways, the rain itself is revealing - you're familiar enough, I imagine, with how aetherial imbalance affects the weather. Allag's Rejoining was the unusual one in that regard; most of what you call Calamities were storms of some kind or another.

[He lifts his gaze to the sky above them, where the clouds have a sudden edge.]

I dislike having to do the basic work of gathering such data myself, but it appears there's nothing else do be done.

[Having spent time in intensive study in Sharlayan and abroad, he is well aware of what shifts in quantity and quality of aether in an area can do with the weather. The tattoos now covered by crystal and cloth are not there for show - he had earned each of them. But he no longer carries the spectacles that could he help him see what changes may be here or there, and the weather in this world is strange enough that he can't help but wonder either way.]

[But he doesn't make mention of it, not immediately. Emet isn't inclined to ask and he isn't inclined to divulge. The scholar in him finds some fascination in the conversation's turn, in a distant sort of way. A survivor of not one, but two Calamities on the Source have given him a different perspective of such events, one he knows he does not share with the Ascian.]

These people have not come as far as they have completely ignorant of all of what makes their world turn. [To say nothing of the gods, but they're both very aware of what happens when they don't understand the deities who could make or break their existence in so short a time. He intends to quell his own curiosity in research later and puts no voice to it.]

[Unlike some people, he's never known you as anything but the Exarch. Even an Ascian can't be everywhere (especially when they're ruling an empire).]

Oh, that is certainly true. But I don't need to tell you the dangers of trusting in someone's words when you can't be sure of their motivations, no?

[Bold words from an Ascian, but nonetheless true. Perhaps it is in the nature of one who lives in so many layers of masks to be suspicious.]

Through intent or otherwise, we can't be sure any data they might give us is unbiased. And then there is the matter that some of the information I intend to collect I could not leave even to my own peers, much less to you or the natives - no slight intended.

[More idle talk, he expects, to hear something other than the sounds of the rainfall around them. It isn't lost on them that he is more vocal in this interaction than he has been in many with the Ascian prior to this. A tick of the world around him now and its plight, he'll guess, but he'll be of no help to these people where Emet is concerned. Any relation between them, for his part, will be neutral, without the joy and pleasure the natives seem to need of them.]

[It may not be detrimental to this world, but he'd rather not all the same.]

Hardly. I expect you not to be forthcoming with your findings, so I will not disappoint you in that myself. Perhaps in agreeing to disagree, we may benefit this world after all.

[He won't hold his breath for it.]

[Another huff with a wounded look.]

And what reason would I have to keep anything I discover secret?

[A more serious look, then. One that would meet the eyes beneath the hood, should the Exarch look to meet it.]

You are more like to be capable than any of the others here; more to the point, you have the rare honor of having managed to surprise me. Should I come across anything that I thought required a second opinion, yours is the first and perhaps only I would find worth seeking in this place.

[It is perhaps the closest Emet-Selch can come to saying 'I respect you' to one of the Sundered. The moment, as with many of his more genuine ones, shatters almost instantly with a dismissive wave of his hand.]

Of course, if you have no wish to hear such things...

[That look garners no effect, as have similar looks pointed to him from the same man in previous days, but he does turn his head again. He could explain quite a few reasons in his own belief as to why Emet would keep something to himself, but will not.]

We shall see. While I will not concede to work with you willingly, this world's survival is our primary concern, is it not? Do forgive me if not all that I learn I would feel I can share easily with you in passing, if it does not serve that end.

[The meaning behind those words isn't lost on him, though it flatters him about as much as the rain on his clothing, which is to say none at all. But for once, for the time being, they seemed to be working toward a common goal. How much of that was one of them working and the other simply there to observe had yet to be seen, but all they had now was time.]

Oh, I would hardly expect you to share all your secrets.

[As he indisputably keeps many. Nor would Emet-Selch share all of his - there's no need to explain the intricacies of Black Rose, Allagan aetherochemistry, or any number of things. The sole reason he might bring them up would be to see what the Exarch knows in turn.]

But so far as restoring the life of this world, we can agree that our goals align. The both of us, after all, are survivors of such things to one extent or another.

[Bond with commonality, separate with difference. It's one of the simplest tools in his arsenal.]

[He's more than aware of Emet's tragedy and how it was painted over on the Source and its shards again and again with the seven Calamities, and an eighth that now will not happen. What the Exarch survived twice over and lived through the remnants of a third, the Ascians lived thrice over.]

[He understands, perhaps more than Emet will accept, what it is like to lose everything. Reflection of a once-whole soul or no, he does. Being part of a soul does not make him - any of them - any less of a person with all the depth of feeling and range and capacity of emotion that goes with it. He marks the thought only with a lowering of his gaze before returning to observe the rain.]

Through touch, somehow. Positive touch, as between that of friends or lovers or well-meaning acquaintances.

[That, in itself, baffles him, and it will until he has a chance to look further into the matter. Never has he seen gods or primals ask such a thing of their followers. He can't help but wonder how something so simple is meant to help.]

Indeed. Through something that has never been known to generate any kind of energy that we could measure. And yet this is how they claim salvation will come.

[The sarcasm peaks, and then falls again.]

You see why I might be perhaps a bit suspicious.

[It's certainly a wild claim, and grows the wilder when you are as familiar with such things as gods and the life of a planet as he is.]

[There is a level of empathy within those statements, one to which he will not yet admit outright. Between the First and the Source, they had their similarities and differences of course, and one thing which worked or looked or tasted or smelled the same would inevitably have its variations on the other.]

[But they were reflections of each other, those worlds, and this one is not a part of what they knew at all. How much of this could they truly expect to parallel the Source or any of its shards?]

Then it would behoove us to understand that which we do not, if we are to be of any use to this city. [In one way or another.]

And to each other.

[Some people don't have inherent suspicion in their bones, do they? He would have thought the Exarch wise enough to not need the reminder.]

I do, of course, intend to aid this ailing world; but for the same reasons that you and yours have myriad reasons to be suspicious of me and mine, I do not intend to place all of my trust in our hosts.

[Better to be prepared for whatever direction events may flow. To look as though you have every contingency planned out is much simpler than actually doing so; indeed, the latter is impossible. But to have enough possibilities in mind to ride the wave - that is a skill he has much practice in.

He really has grown old, if even the thought of a bit of mentoring is crossing his mind.]

The key to it is in understanding what they want - and 'to save this world' can mean any number of things, as I'm sure you're well aware.

[Considering how sharply their perspectives on the matter differ.]

[The thought of working with Emet-Selch on anything a second time settles about as well with him as the thought of removing his own, as yet hidden tail, but the choice had not been his on the First. Now that it is, however much it runs against his better judgement, there are some benefits that he cannot rightly deny - for the moment, in any case.]

[How long that moment would last was left entirely to the Ascian. This world was not their own, and perhaps Emet had little to benefit from in indirectly orchestrating its end, but he was no fool past his years. To let this go without care might well have been to place himself and this world on the proverbial chopping block. Not something he would do.]

If their gods are dying, and the powers of their gods keep this world alive, and them by proxy, then it stands to reason keeping their gods alive keeps them alive. [A familiar story, if nothing.] Or so they have told us. What remains next in any course but to wait out the weather and to go our separate ways, as we will undoubtedly do?

Hmm. Well, should I find anything of particular importance, I shan't hesitate to inform you.

[He doesn't ask for reciprocation, or even imply it. Trust, sometimes, is best earned through allowing someone to keep their secrets.

And the Exarch, however much he may try to hide it, is at his core, a good man. And good men are ever wracked by guilt when they fail to reciprocate such overtures; that alone will deliver him more, and more helpful, information than any kind of active pressure.]

[Tit for tat, he suspected. Even on the First amid a begrudgingly accepted, albeit temporary truce, the Exarch expected Emet would want a return on his investment in the Warrior's cause. It would have been a vain and foolish hope from any of them to vie for anything other than, and he couldn't hope for a perfect world.]

[There was no such thing.]

[Well above them, the rain seemed to give no thought to letting up; he watched it without any real thought to it and kept them to himself.]

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♥ September Intro Mingle Log

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