♥ September Event Log

[hugtopiamods]

September (Ohnir) Event Log
Ohnir is in full swing now and the weather, while still boasting hot days, is starting to cool slightly at night. The residents are recovering after the lightning storms from the previous month and, curiously, most of the robots that had been damaged in the storms are back. They don't look the same as before, but they seem to act the same, still happy, still thankful that the offworlders are here. A few even thank those who carried their bodies to the temples with small gifts of painted stones. Havenwell continues as it always has and welcomes their new arrivals with a few rather odd changes...

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❥ PROMPT I: Robot Crossing

Now that all the new and old arrivals have mingled and met, the robotic natives start pointing everyone toward the VR cafes. The bright lights and cozy insides have been decorated with fake leaves and carved and painted plaster approximations of fruits and vegetables in odd colors. When an offworlder comes in, they explain that back when they were still in their flesh bodies, the month of Ohnir was one for harvest and celebrations of the summer bounties. Now, without any real farms or need to eat, they've translated the Harvest Festival into a game, so why not play?

Logging in with another character will net you a little farm and a variety of games to choose from:

1. Pick and harvest as many Aellyn vegetables and fruits as you can before the timer runs out! The more you pick, the better your score. Work together with your partner to clear the field in any way you can. Strangely, once you finish clearing a tree or a field row of their bounty, they seem to magically refill when you turn your back. Oh well, at least you won't run out before the timer hits zero and with the sheer number of levels and combinations of trees and fields with obstacles in your way to make harvesting a little more challenging with each new level, you certainly won't be running out of things to do.
   
2. With a partner, use the giant slingshot to launch comically large fruits into a garden patch of other colored fruits. Match a line of 3 or more similarly shaped fruits to clear it from the field. The more fruits you can clear, the higher your score - aka welcome to Fruit Crush. Stack lines of 6 or more to get shining clear diamond fruits that clear the entire row and snag yourself some bonus points.
   
3. You and your partner(s) are given a magical golden pumpkin and it's your job to grow it into the largest pumpkin possible. Why? There's a county fair of course and the largest pumpkin wins! But how do you grow this pumpkin? Well, there are a lot of methods! You could gather up materials and work together to stick it to the pumpkin until it absorbs them and grows. You could do a song and dance routine together to encourage the pumpkin's soul to grow big and bright. You could hold hands and share stories and entertain the pumpkin until it feels encouraged enough to grow on its own. The possibilities are endless, so get to work making the best pumpkin that (digital) fair has ever seen!

As always, when playing the game, the picture and quality seems to increase as long as you're in contact with another person. Once the games are over and your scores tallied, the cafe attendant walks over and asks to see your communicators. To the winners, he or she attaches a little floating charm in the shape of one of Aellyn's weirder fruits. It looks like a cross between a blue rambutan and the hala aka puhala fruit, and it's called the sikheen fruit here. The sikheen are extremely rare nowadays, but their appearance is so unique that Havenwell residents still like to remember it for the Harvest Festival. Enjoy your prize!

❥ PROMPT II: Paint by Number

The new arrivals get to enjoy Havenwell in all its glory for about a week before suddenly, one day everyone wakes up to find the entire city has gone gray. And not a natural, nice gray either, but a strange dull, lifeless gray. Everything from the sky to the houses to the grass to the native people have all turned the exact same shade of graphite gray. Even the natives are confused and the devout flock to the temples while the science-minded head to the labs to study this new phenomenon. The only ones who seem spared from this strange color drain are the offworlders and the statues of the gods in the center of town. Or, well, at least most of the offworlders are spared. A few people might notice that their colors aren't as bright as they once were, or that parts of them are starting to turn gray as well. Those offworlders unlucky enough to lose some of their own can touch another player character to regain what was lost easily enough. Overall though, no one seems harmed by this sudden loss of color, but they're certainly perplexed.

A few days later and round silver platforms start showing up around the city, dragged out of storage by the natives. The first arrivals might remember these as the fireworks platforms that are activated by people standing and holding hands on them. The temple priests and scientists encourage the offworlders to stand on the platforms again and to hold hands or engage in some other sort of physical contact on them and wait.

When characters do as asked, the platforms shoot fireworks like they did before - in brilliant colors instead of the dull gray everywhere. And wherever the sparks fall, color starts returning to the world in splotches. The natives are overjoyed and move the platforms all across the city, asking the offworlders to find and use them wherever possible to return the color to their town.

❥ PROMPT III: Sharing is Caring

Ohma's temple is particularly lively during Ohnir and the priests are busy cleaning and sweeping, decorating it with rolls of parchment and digital inkwells and quills that write as if they were actually fountain pens. The natives, especially adherents of Ohma, start to make pilgrimages to the temple in little processions, some playing music, others flying banners. It would probably be far more impressive if the colors weren't still so gray and splotchy, but they're trying their best.

Anyone who chooses to follow can observe the natives going up to the altar and sharing stories with one another. They talk about things they did over the past year or things that are far, far in their past. Some of the stories are happy and result in the procession laughing and some are...well, not everyone came back from the lightning storms. The priests diligently write every story down on those parchment rolls and deposit them onto the waiting altar, where they're summarily lit on fire to the cheers of those present. The more emotional the story it seems, the brighter and bluer the flame that it emits and the louder the procession cheers.

As the file out, they notice you watching and urge you to go up with someone else in the temple to clear your heart and offer up your own stories. They can be stories of home, information about your worlds, or stories about your life. It seems the more personal the story, the brighter the flame though and the more Dora that will mysteriously show up in your account at a later date. If the priests are asked about this donation later, they're just as perplexed. No one they know would have paid anyone for an offering to Ohma, so where could it have come from....?

❥ PROMPT IV: Sleep Sweet

With Ainea's temple familiars finally back where they belong, quiet returns to the city at night. We're sure that first long uninterrupted sleep felt heavenly, right? Although there may not be color in the city, the world of dreams at least is fully technicolor and safe. Which might be weird for some characters in case they don't normally dream or remember their dreams because now everyone is dreaming at night. Most of the dreams are the usual variety that your character always has, but every so often in the midst of a pleasant dream about home or a funky one about flying pizza (whatever it is you usually dream about, we don't judge), there's a glitch.

Out of the corner of your eye or just on the edge of your vision, a person appears. Their face can't be seen and their arms are longer than they have any right to be, but they appear and stand there, watching. Trying to focus on this person causes them to flit away and it's easy enough to dismiss as a random event, until it keeps happening. And it keeps happening, and it keeps happening, and every time you see this person, they get closer and even less distinct. Waking up and talking to or holding someone might help calm that disquiet in your heart, offworlder, so hopefully there's someone around to help you.

---

This event will run from September 16th to September 30th. 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 on the OOC Entry.

Feel free to also use the OOC Plotting Post for planning what your character is up to!

Comments

[flawed_immortality]

II. Paint By Number
[Cor is not one for a lot of physical affection, though Havenwell has certainly done it's best to get him more comfortable with it. Still, he's a very independent man and spending so much of his time with others is just not how he works. So it's really not long at all before his colors begin to fade. It's difficult to tell at first, dressed as he is in full sleeves and long pants, all in blacks and deep blues. Black boots, black pants, black shirts. It's the slight tint towards blue in his jacket that begins to give it away. His hair, too, has been getting greyer for years so even that's not immediately apparent. (Ignis, not a word.)
Eventually though this whole fireworks thing gets the better of his curiosity and he can be found eyeing one of these platforms uncertainly. It reminds him a bit of celebrations back in Insomnia, the view from the Caelum Via, birthdays and festivals and celebrations from a world that seems so far away now, lost to the past. A bittersweet nostalgia.]

III. Sharing is Caring
[Maybe it's nostalgia from the previous nights. Maybe it's a respect for the native's customs. Maybe it's just the boredom of this place fully settling in. Regardless Cor finds himself in Ohma's temple instead of Diacht's. Training is done and he has nothing much left to fill his day with until nightfall. Listening to tales of distant lands and, hopefully, of the history of Havenwell is pleasant background noise as he settles in with a block of wood and a knife and determination. He will make a rook, dammit.

If the stories being told bring something to mind from the days before Insomnia's fall he will be all to happy to share some of the shenanigans his King and his friends used to get up to. He does, of course, have newer more painful stories he could tell but he'll keep those to himself as much as possible.]

IV. Sleep Sweet - Lucis House
[Cor rarely slept in the first place, usually only cat naps on the couch at that. Sleeping, deep sleeping, meant opening himself up to nightmares. Which was part of the reason he spent so much time drinking coffee throughout the day. But as the days wear on and the strange figure creeping through their dreams becomes a standby he slowly becomes even worse than usual.

It is not uncommon to find him up and making a pot of coffee at one in the morning despite everyone knowing full well he starts his day at 6. That he can also be found on the couch not an hour later dozing slightly, half a cup of coffee that's more dessert than caffeine cooling on the end table, tablet against his chest where he'd had to surrender reading because his eyes refused to focus any longer means that he'll be up and pacing off another dream by 4.]

iv

[scourgingstars]

[No matter how little he needed it, sleep was one of the few things Ardyn seemed willing to do. So the fact that he couldn't was endlessly frustrating, and it was around one or so that he chose to change back into the casual clothes Regis had helped him find and head outside.]

[...Or he would have, had he not caught sight of Cor and frozen on the spot like an anak calf in headlights.]

[flawed_immortality]

[Cor, for his part, just blinks up at Ardyn, surprised to see anyone else coming out of their room at this hour. Ah, yes... nightmares for all. He offers Ardyn a sympathetic nod and lifts his mug to take a sip.]

There's more coffee in the kitchen if you want a cup.

[scourgingstars]

I...I'm alright.

[He backed off a little, watching Cor warily. And a little unwilling to mention ancient Lucis didn't have coffee.]

I don't really need anything of the sort.

[flawed_immortality]

Fair enough... It's not the best coffee.

[A sigh, another sip from his mug and he makes a face. He's not moving, just sitting on the couch, leaning on the arm, one knee propped on the cushion beside him. There's an armchair, loveseat, and the other half of the couch. Plenty of places to sit and not be in his space and he's doing his best not to appear threatening. Noth that he's really awake enough to be any real threat just this moment.]

Even full of caramel it's not fantastic. But it serves it's purpose for now.

[scourgingstars]

...

[Slowly, he sank into the chair a bit stiffly.]

I've never...had it before.

ii. gathers more ffxv to my chest

[pinkmin]

[Luckily it was Vianca that was happening upon this tall, dark stranger this time around. There was no room for accidental mixups with slender dream men here!

So here, Cor, have a bright spot of pink approaching you. She was a little less concerned with what he was looking at, and more concerned with him.]

Excuse me. Hello.

[flawed_immortality]

[He sees the flash of pink while he's examining the platform and immediately looks up thinking it is, perhaps, Arete come to scold him again, likely with Will close behind. But no it's a young girl and Cor tilts his head curiously as she approaches him.]

Hello... Can I help you with something?

[Is she lost? He doesn't recall a pink girl, only an auburn one.]

Are you looking for Aqua?

[That was her name right? The woman that was trying to gather all the kids and mom them? He has it written down somewhere...]

[pinkmin]

[There was a pause, and then Vianca shook her head. She wasn't sure who (?) that was, but that wasn't the concern right now.]

No, thank you, I am alright.

[She held out her hands, peering up at him.]

If you wouldn't mind, could I see your hands please?

[flawed_immortality]

[The request only has him more curious. Cor takes a moment to dust his hands off on his pants, he's been poking around at this platform which seems to have been in storage for quite some time after all. Then he lowers himself to one knee so that he is closer to Vianca's height, able to meet her gaze without straining either of their necks as he presents his hands for inspection, laying them in hers palm up.]

Like this?

[pinkmin]

[Oh, that gesture was appreciated, Mr. Mountain of a Man. It also made it easier for her to really look at him, trying to identify if his eyes were naturally grey or just. Magically grey. Hm.

She nodded.]

Yes, that is good. Thank you.

[The point was, you see, for her to hold his hands with hers. Which was what was happening right now as Vianca carefully cupped her hands around his.]

II

[shroudedsecrets]

[Ah, that's a familiar enough person nearby to get Honerva's idle notice. So far, she's not used the platforms so much as observed them. It's curious, how all too convenient it is that these machines would have a hand in fixing this problem. When there was no clear reason for why it had occurred in the first place, aside from...

Well, her own mind could go on and on about her reasoning but that wouldn't do much, circling about in her head. She can't help but study Cor's appearance though; the world around them is dim, and his choices of clothing doesn't help, but having experienced the color drain for herself and not appreciating it, she's very attentive, that he's not seeming to stand out much from the surroundings.]

... What are your thoughts?

[It's not quite a proper greeting, but she doesn't have his name, exactly, and it seems just easier to get to the point when they're both here to just be pensive and disturbed about this whole situation.]

[flawed_immortality]

[He's aware of his audience but a glance assures him there's no immediate threat. She looks as unsettled as he feels and he will let her approach him when she is ready. If she even wants to. Which is why she only gets the barest of glances when she finally addresses him.

Cor steps back to stand beside her, arms crossed over his chest defensively, frown deepening as he eyes the platform as if it had personally offended him.]

That it's a convenient fix, a bandaid if you will. It does nothing to solve the source of the problem and I have to wonder how they knew these platforms would correct the issue... temporarily at least.

[But the cheerful platitudes from the natives have him more and more convinced they've been tampering with their own memories in the name of this advanced immortal society. Watching others be repaired, or more likely reinstalled into a new body from some sort of back up hard drive, and carry on as though nothing had happened is only further evidence to support that theory.]

[shroudedsecrets]

It is... convenient.

[She's pleased that his thoughts do mirror hers, in some form anyway, though she had known to expect that as well, with the level of wariness he tended to display.]

Perhaps something in the machine is powered by the energy gathered into this world, serving a function that can adapt almost immediately for the changes the city is experiencing. Something that... reacts to the imbalance to correct it, though it does not solve the greater problem. It does not seem that the natives are able to activate it properly without us.

[She's musing a bit, but her mindset tends to linger on the applications of "energy", even if its form was so incomprehensible thus far in this world, not something quite tangible for a proper study. As for the persistent cheery state of the natives themselves... that certainly was another issue altogether.]

[flawed_immortality]

If it is merely an imbalance that is causing the changes that is a very good theory.

[He sighs, offering the platform a wistful glance. To be able to solve all your problems with fireworks....]

But then one would think there were other instances of these types of problems caused by the imbalances and how did they deal with it prior to our arrival?

[shroudedsecrets]

If there is energy that is being used to pull us here, it could have caused a change. A reaction, to that sudden lack of energy and perhaps an uneven distribution of any it may gain from our presence. And given how they are continuing to pull others here, such changes should perhaps, be anticipated...

[She makes a very slight gesture, indicating the rest of the city around them.]

This location was already presumably built and isolated for the sake of preservation, before we were brought here. Perhaps the use of these machines is from a time before the natives had given up their bodies. It could have been intended for some forgotten ritual that they were unable to perform in their current state.

IV. Sleep Sweet - Lucis House

[kingkingcxiii]

[Usually after he's been awakened by his own nightmares, Regis remains in his room. Not because he thinks he will be able to go back to sleep, but because he doesn't want to give people more reason to worry about him, especially after last month. This particular dream, though, is so vivid he still can feel the fingers closing around his throat long after waking. It's around 4 in the morning when he finally gets tired at jumping at even the slightest brush of anything against his throat and decides to head downstairs. He's not really sure what he is going to do, but hopefully getting out of his room will help break the last holds the dream has on him.

Somehow, when he catches sight of Cor up and pacing, he can't find it in himself to be surprised. A tired smile crosses his face as he calls out to his friend.]

Does it help? The pacing, I mean.

[flawed_immortality]

[It's a testament to how tired Cor is that he doesn't realize Regis has come downstairs until the other man speaks. He jumps a little, halts his steps and just blinks at Regis slightly. Help?]

Mmm... keeps me awake at least.

[If the walking dream he feels like he's in is really "awake". It's at least conscious enough to not dream.]

Coffee?

[Because there's plenty of that to go around.]

[kingkingcxiii]

Now I know you're not completely awake. You're offering me coffee instead of telling me to go back to sleep.

[Regis makes his way over to Cor's side, taking his arm to lead him back toward the couch.]

Sit with me? Talking will probably work better than putting more caffeine in your system.

[flawed_immortality]

I'm not going to force you to sleep if your dreams are as haunted as mine.

[He actually wavers on his feet slightly when Regis takes his arm then just leans into his King a little as they move to the couch. He's used to needing to steady Regis so he makes a point of walking a little slower, on his right side, bracing to take more weight than he needs to.

It isn't until they sit down that he realizes what he was doing.]

Talking... perhaps.

[kingkingcxiii]

[An understanding frown crosses Regis' face at Cor's answer, though he doesn't say anything until they are both sitting. It's not like he has to confirm to Cor his dreams are just as bad. He wouldn't be up if that wasn't the case.]

There is, supposedly, another answer, but we both seem to be willfully ignoring it, so talking is what is left.

II

[twistedempathy]

[It may be a little hard to see him in the darkness; Will's colors have been fading in and out over the course of the month, and he's currently a rather grey-muddied version of himself, colors dull and cloudy, but not entirely gone. It's not hard to notice someone eyeing the platform he's been waiting on, though--Will grabs the railing and kicks off the platform, leaning forward to balance himself precariously on his hands.]

Corrrrr! Come make fireworks with me?

[flawed_immortality]

[The fact that he was able to startle Cor says a lot about the trickery the lack of coloring is playing on his depth perception. Hmm perhaps an old man should get some glasses? Nonsense.

He looks up at the younger man and immediately frowns. Will, so vibrant and cheerful, should definitely not be so discolored. What would take coaxing from anyone else requires exactly one wheedle from a monotone Will for Cor to step up onto the platform with him.]

Six, look at you. [Worry and disapproval in one and, once on that small platform, Cor reaches out to offer Will his arm.]

[twistedempathy]

Hehehe~ Looks like I've been rolling around in the dust, doesn't it?

[He seems more amused by the transformation than anything else, lowering himself back to his feet and gladly Cor's hand. A shapeless streak of sparkling pink bursts across the sky overhead immediately, throwing a broad spray of sparks with it.]

You look a little frost-nipped yourself.

[flawed_immortality]

[Will can be amused all he wants, Cor is worried.

He glances up at the streak of pink, then shakes his head dismissively. The hand Will has taken squeezes slightly, a nudge to draw his attention back to Cor from the sky overhead.]

We don't know what detrimental effects might go along with this discoloration. Will... You need to take better care of yourself.

[That same feeling that had woken him in the middle of the night is there again in the back of his mind, not so strong or panicked but there nonetheless. For Will himself this time instead of his King. I don't want to lose you.]