hugtopia_logs | ♥ September Event Log

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♥ September Event Log

a wide green pasture at dusk with a red-leafed tree in the foreground

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...

❥ PROMPT I: Robot Crossing

a farmer holding a bountiful box of vegetables

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:

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.
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.
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

a book open with images and words popping out

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!

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[He'd stuck to Lup, of course, and so had she, on the other side. Some irony, there, having every reason to be close and yet so far. Lup had taught her so much about care during a time when she was so ill-equipped for it, helped her to reach a part of herself that had been shut off for years, lost, buried and forgotten.

Once Kova is immersed in his play, she leans down to gently scritch at the cat as he nibbles away at the ball, and he scoots closer to accept it, natural as can be.]

Thank you. You're not wrong. It has been... quite a journey since then.

[He snorts and draws his legs up, wavering between picking up a new cup and nursing his mostly empty one. The panic has subsided after holding onto Honerva for a bit, so now he's just at a loss of what to do. He doesn't do heart-to-hearts. That's Lup's department.

He makes a non-committal noise of agreement, then twists the cup in his hands.]

Yeah, a year can do a lot to change a person if you have the right motivational factors in play.

[Through the thin fabric of his shirt, he can see the outline of his bracer, still inert, and bites back a grimace. A year can be a lot or too little in so many ways.]

Guess you just had the right ones.

I did. We met at the... right time.

[She had been ready for a change, even if she hadn't fully been aware of what that all would encompass at the time. Her understanding had been so limited. It was strange to reflect on such things, if only because she felt like a different person, these days.]

More importantly, we are still together now.

[He almost lets himself smile at that. Almost.

But as soon as the urge overtakes him, he throws it out the window along with everything else as he throws his legs off the couch and forces his body to follow along. He's a little dizzy after slamming two drinks in a row, but it's not any worse than any other night drinking with the Starblaster crew.

He points at her with the cup in his hand and makes a face that's halfway between touched and horrified, mostly a joke but still a little bit uncomfortable at the thought of letting himself be at all vulnerable again.]

Nope! If you're going to be mushy, Taako's out! I'll break out in hives.

[She raises an eyebrow at him, but stays where she is, still petting Kova.]

If you do not wish for me to be sentimental, then what do you prefer?

[Because little did he know, she usually was mushy, these days. Especially with Lup.]

I dunno.

[He squints at her for a moment, then shrugs, using a Mage Hand to levitate the cup back to the table as he shoves his hands into his pockets.]

Just not that. You can do whatever or be whatever you want, but Taako doesn't do [He pulls one hand out, wiggling it side to side.] mushy.

[She's quiet for a moment, thinking that over, and shakes her head slightly.]

... Well. I am still sorting all of that out, you realize. It was not my intention to cause you discomfort.

[There they are again, the eggshells.]

[Right.

Shit.

She's still learning about the whole "How to People" thing, which makes this difficult. Taako is dodgy at the best of times, and when it comes to feelings that aren't stemming from complaining or his libido, he's total shit.

After a moment of watching her, he sighs and throws his hands up.]

We need to get you a hobby that isn't pouring out your emotions into an unfit receptacle then. I'm not-

[He bites his lip, crossing his arms over his chest while looking away.]

I'm not like Lup, alright? I'm not that great of a person. She's the better of us, so just don't. Expect. A lot from me.

[She has a lot of feelings to deal with, it's true. Stakes were... high, the risk of losing everything always seeming right there. Not everyone could handle that from another person and she could barely handle it herself.]

A way for us to find... some middle ground, then.

[She murmurs. The rest of what she has to say is... far more difficult, but she has to get it all out there, even if there's a risk he doesn't want to hear it.]

I know that you and Lup are different, but that does not mean I wish to think poorly of you. We... are going to the same world, after all. What... I would like is for us to be ... closer, in some way.

[Hopefully that isn't too mushy. But she wants him to know the stakes as much as she allows him to set the parameters.]

For her, and... for ourselves, too.

[He laughs, a little bitterly at that. Think poorly? That's all people usually do with him and that was just fine.]

Oh, yeah, no doubt, but also? I wouldn't blame you if you did think poorly of me. No skin off my back.

[He shrugs because it's what's expected of him. Let all that negativity roll right off his back one of Magnus's wooden ducks.]

She's the one who cares. I'm the one who keeps us alive. She's got the heart, but I'm the greedy pragmatist between us which doesn't exactly win you a lot of- [He purses his lips, humming as he thinks of the word.] -friends. So don't get all bent out of shape if you end up not liking what you see.

[He didn't even like what he saw in himself sometimes.]

It's no skin off my back.

[She knows that he is putting up a front and maybe she did say too much. This whole thing was so unnecessarily... difficult. He was trying to brace for her rejection while rejecting her at the same time.

And yet she'd remembered what he'd said to her before, when she'd asked him that question. She remembers what Lup had said, about defeating expectations. Even if it hadn't been about them, at the time, it was still... important. It still stuck with her, that time under the tree and everything that followed.

That's the thought that has her take a breath, her own, quick but unexpected laugh.]

As if someone like me has any right to think poorly of anyone else.

[She lifts her head, looking back up at him.]

But I know this has already been ... a lot for you, so I will not press further about that now. We can see... if things change. Or seek other topics, if you prefer.

"Just 'cause you're shitty sometimes doesn't mean you can't call other people out on their bullshit" - take those words of wisdom from the master.

[Of shitty behavior. He shrugs and runs a hand across the back of his neck, shaking himself out like he's sloughing off a particularly heavy blanket.]

But yeah, topic change? Totally recommended because, no offense, but I'm not exactly going to go spilling my soul out to anyone. I'm the prickly asshole and I have a rep to uphold.

[Sometimes? More like several lifetimes worth of "sometimes", even if it was just how things were, with nothing to compare it to at the time. Perhaps for Taako it was still a choice to continue that behavior, and that was the difference. To call him out on it when his moods were so dual in the first place? They were not quite there yet. She did not feel so comfortable when her position was still so precarious.

Either way, he wanted to move on, and she shrugs a little as well, as Kova hops closer to her for a rest.]

Then... what would you prefer to speak about?

I dunno.

[He kneads at his own neck with one hand before realizing what he's doing and dropping it into his lap, only to pick it up a moment later and inspect his nails.]

Let's keep it easy to the present and avoid all the bullshit that was our really fucked up pasts. I assume you had one, too. And you don't need to hear the dumb sob story of our lives, so keep it light.

What new shit are you doing right now?

... That is fair.

["New things", huh. It certainly seemed that anything she was doing at all would be new to him.

As for the rest, she already knows a lot about his life thanks to Lup. Which is what makes it difficult, to keep the conversation from wandering into such areas. But these were the rules, to help this be... easier for both of them to adjust to.]

... I am not certain where this qualifies, but, Lup has been assisting me with learning Elvish.

[Since the intent had been for her to pass as one, once they finally got to their destination.]

Unfortunately we have run into an issue where there are... insufficient materials to work with, given the city seems to lack basic writing materials.

[Which probably should have been expected, but even so.]

[Elvish, huh? That's...well, that makes sense. She was supposed to pass for a weird elf when they got home, so it isn't a stretch to think that Lup would be teaching her their language. But when she mentions that they've run into a roadblock with materials, Taako rolls his eyes and then gestures to the walls around them.]

You got all the writing space you need here.

And?

[He gestures widely to himself.]

I'm a transmutation specialist, dingus. Why not just ask me to transmute some charcoal or ink or whatever for writing?

[Probably because she didn't like to ask for things or knew that she could. And then why hadn't Lup asked? Maybe waiting for Honerva to figure it out herself.]

I do not know if the walls would be optimal.

[Seems? Weird? To cover the walls in writing? Especially since she was trying to privately study?]

It would be better to have something more practical. If... you can help provide that.

[She's not too familiar with the concept of a chalk board or whatever a better version of that would be, either.]

Walls are always optimal for everything.

[Except they really aren't, but at least for writing they work pretty damn well.]

If you're asking me to transmute a bunch of leaves into a notebook or change a rock into a chalkboard, sure. But you need to gather up the leaves or rocks for me.

[He sighs, draping an arm over his forehead.]

I'm so tired, I don't think I could bear the physical labor required.

More components then.

[If that was what was required. She was already putting in the work to locate various items, even if some things were just difficult to find given the way this world was.]

If that is all that's required, then I will see about getting them to you ... [She pauses, purposefully dramatic for his benefit, she might as well put in a little effort at humor here even if it's a simple request. Like the fashion advice.] benevolent one.

[He's about to retort something, but that pause and the addition?

Well, fuck him. He laughs, honestly and openly, giving her a mock bow from his position on the other side of the couch. It's amazing to see how much she's changed and how, in little ways, she's starting to loosen up.]

Truly, I am the greatest, I know.

[He sweeps the last cup of booze off the table and then swings his legs off the couch, tipping himself up at the same time as he tips the cup back, downing it in one go.]

But! I better start looking into drawing up plans for your request.

[His nightmares are gone now anyway. The last vestiges of them chased off by that much needed laughter.]

Dinner's gonna be pasta I think. You cool with that?

Indeed.

[And there they were, the roller coaster resuming. Taako was receptive, Taako was laughing, and so, she could relax again. The lack of consistency was draining, but there was certainly worth in the little in between moments like this. The tips of her ears have perked a bit, a slight flit from the shift in emotion.

She could transmute items herself, all things considered, but Taako was also more experienced in knowing what these practical items were offhand, while she was still getting used to the concept of such things. Her own room still lacked decor, anyway, so it seemed suitable to have him be involved.

She thanks him in Elvish.

As for dinner... her tastes were still on the simplistic side for all his efforts, mostly surfacing in her preferences for sweeter fruits and crisp vegetables that he'd managed to draw out of her. More difficult still, to figure her out on the more complex flavored dishes. Pasta, at least, was only as complex as one made it, depending on the sauce or other fixings with it. She preferred it lighter of course, sparing while she was still barely able to identify different ingredients.]

Pasta, is it? That should be fine.

[It was sometimes strange to remember a time when she wasn't even familiar with it or the other meals, or even welcome the notion of it.]

[He glances down at her and notes how her ears move, just a little. A new trait again, something she'd learned from them perhaps? The elves from their original world had much more expressive ears than the ones in Aber-Toril, and unless Honerva's race of space elves were similar, it was interesting to note that she could pick up physical cues from them as well as everything else.

He shoots her a pair of finger guns and grins, tossing back a "no probs" in Elvish which...might be more complicated than anything she's learned yet. Oh well.]

And cool. I'm gonna go get white wine wasted while I cook. You chill out and if you hear me scream or something explode, come in. Otherwise, you know the drill.

[No one in his kitchen while he's cooking but him. Or Lup. Or Honerva. Or Carl. Honesty, why does he even have that rule.]

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♥ September Event Log

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