Imaginary Island Mods (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
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imaginarylogs2020-07-12 05:21 pm
imaginarymods) wrote in imaginarylogs2020-07-12 05:21 pm
Entry tags:
- ace attorney: phoenix wright,
- ddlc: monika,
- ddlc: natsuki,
- ddlc: sayori,
- digimon: erika mishima,
- final destination: alex browning,
- final destination: clear rivers,
- golden kamuy: hyakunosuke ogata,
- homestuck: terezi pyrope,
- idolm@ster: nana abe,
- jjba: guido mista,
- original: christine delacroix,
- original: mira delacroix,
- overwatch: jesse mccree,
- persona: shinjiro aragaki,
- power rangers: tommy oliver,
- prelude,
- red vs blue: agent washington,
- red vs blue: leonard church,
- steven universe: rose quartz,
- story log,
- the good place: michael,
- umineko: lion ushiromiya,
- umineko: willard h wright,
- undertale: papyrus,
- undertale: sans,
- wktd: venus
prelude {{ Log 01.
Island Prelude ; Log 01
Life's a beach—
You wake up on the beach.
Okay, scratch that: you wake up on a beach. Some beach, somewhere. You don't know where it is, much less why you're there. You can feel the warm sun and a light breeze on your skin, along with the insidious prickle of sand worming its way into your fantasy Nikes. You have no memory of being here — but then again, you might not have any memory of being anywhere else.
At least you're not alone. There are other people scattered along this beach, toes trailing in the surf as they brush sand out of their shirts or shake seaweed from their weapons. Each and every one of them has an unremovable bracer locked around their wrist. Maybe you should get up. Lend a helping hand, or ask for one. Maybe somebody else knows more about the situation than you do. Maybe somebody else knows where that music is coming from. Is there a beach party going on?
—& then you d̵̡̪̻̿̽͒i̸̟͓͍͌̾͐ë̸͖͇̪́̔͊.
There's only so far you get before noticing that something's wrong, though. Even if you've got no memories but your name, something in you knows that trees aren't supposed to look like that. They're not supposed to be so . . . low-res. Right?
But these trees, not to put too fine a point on it, kind of suck. Some of them, anyway. Every few trees has one patch that flickers in and out of existence like an old neon sign. Every couple rocks seems to have spasmed and frozen up in one large pixel blob. If you touch these glitched spaces, nothing happens to you, but it certainly doesn't feel right. It doesn't feel like you're touching anything at all.
Looking back to the space you woke up, you might notice a pattern. The section of beach strewn with newly-conscious amnesiacs is exceptionally glitchy. There are a couple small patches of sky that seem to just be missing. And out at sea? There's way more of them out there.
If you're a strong swimmer, you might try swimming out toward the horizon. There's only so far you can go, though. After about half a mile, you hit some kind of resistance and blip back onto the beach. Watch the sea long enough, and you might see some boats making the same mistake — although they just end up closer to shore rather than beached, fortunately for them. Boats are expensive, and the barrier, whatever it is, seems to be doing its best not to damage them.
(Jaws Theme)
Walking up the beach towards the source of the music, you start to feel a little bit watched. Turn, and there's no one there. Just a quaint thatch-roofed vending machine with a strange cat face on the plate. Innocuous, though, and certainly nothing to worry about. So you keep going.
Except then you feel it again. And if you manage to pause in time, you'll hear this shuffling sound, like wood dragging through sand. Turn again, and the vending machine is right behind you. Like, right behind you. There's no way it moved fast enough to close that distance, and yet.
There are some options here. You can run — but it'll catch up. You can try to fight it — but you'll just hurt your hand (or other appendage). You can try to reason with it — but it's unrelenting. What it wants, as you'll soon discover, is to yeet a small bottle of dark, thick liquid at your face. It's also very insistent that you drink it. If you don't, it'll just fling another one at you, and keep flinging them, until you're crushed to death by vials or drink one, whichever comes first.
Everyone gets this treatment. The vending machine is never in two places at once, but its ubiquity might make it seems as though it is. When one inevitably breaks down and drinks the Kool-aid, it tastes just awful, but at least it's over and done with now. Surely this will never come up again.
This sparks joy
If you follow the music for long enough, you'll find yourself in easily one of the busiest places on the Island. The marketplace that spreads out before you is known as the Boardwalk, a fact that's easy to discover from any of the friendly locals. For most of you, these will be the first people you've encountered who didn't wash up on the beach alongside you. They're very fuzzy faces, too. The Animalians, a menagerie of anthropomorphic animals, almost all speak Common and seem pretty unfazed by the cluster of bewildered strangers. After all, new faces mean new customers!There are a truly ridiculous number of things for sale on the Boardwalk. The predominant one is food, of course, and the smells hanging over the canvas tents and open-air stalls are positively mouth-watering. There are a wide variety of foods represented here. Maybe one or two of them will strike you as familiar, or trigger a memory? Pretty much all of them are delicious, though, so there's nothing to lose by digging in. Other goods include clothing, weaponry, art, and jewelry in a variety of styles. If you're lucky, you might find a tent that sells beautiful locally-made instruments — a Bard's dream!
Lack of coinage won't be too much of a handicap here. Barter is welcome, and should you not have enough to barter with, most sellers are happy to trade goods for services. It's highly likely that a newcomer or two will be found up to their elbows in dishes by the end of the night, or doing similar odd jobs for vendors.
Still, no one gets through an excursion to the Boardwalk without being swept into at least one dance. It comes out of nowhere: an Animalian's paw or claw on your elbow, a gentle nudge at the small of your back, and you're swept toward the gazebo, the source of the music that's been swelling all day and into the evening. It's joyous and captivating, the Animalians' love of dance infectious. Even buzzkills might be tempted to softshoe just a little.
What's this? What's this?
The Island seems to be sprouting miscellanea. Extremely distinctive weaponry stuck up a tree, books half-buried in sand or earth, clothing neatly folded or possibly being worn by an animal, or Animalian . . . At some point, it just becomes chaos. There's a great deal to recover, or to steal if that's more your bag. On the other hand, you might choose to be helpful and match belongings with their owners. You never know: a found item might help someone find the memory that goes along with it.Just west of the Boardwalk, there's something else that might be familiar. At the center of a saltwater lake, easy to get to by rowboat, is a miniature island and swim-up bar. Each place is adorned by a menu listing strange and deja vu-inducing items, from nanchos to decaf espresso paradox. Some are helpful. Some are harmful. Some are just weird? He'll make you anything on the menu, but nothing more. Strangely, should you be overcome by the urge to ask the chef for something special and unique, he will gravely extend one of his tentacles and place a single, smooth, heart-shaped stone in your palm. The squid does not speak Common, but you understand an IOU when you're delicately, slimily handed one.
There's so much to explore here that, by the end of the day when you stumble back to the cabanas and attempt to sort out where you're going to collapse for the night, you haven't covered more than a sliver of it. There's tomorrow and the days after for looking around more, for stumbling across more of your belongings (or other people's), for discovering ruins and murals and memories. No matter how much time you take to fuss over sleeping arrangements, everyone ends up more or less in the same place: an open-air cabana, with the breeze blowing over them through the night and into the morning.
Everyone dreams — peacefully — of the moon.
OOC
Welcome, everyone, to the first Island log, our Prelude! While we will not be taking RNG requests during this log, we encourage you to stretch out, explore the space, and get yourseaisland legs. For questions pertaining to this log, go here. For general questions, head to the FAQ. For more places to explore in this first log, check out the Setting and NPC pages.
no subject
Time to ignore it! She dutifully checks for a name tag as the man suggests, which is sort of a comical sight of her turning the bow every which way and then feeling around the backpack.] I can't find a tag...
[She touches the bow on her hat again and then looks to the other girl.] I— maybe? I mean, I don't really remember, but I'm wearing one right now...so maybe I did!
[And then, to Will, holding up the bow in indication but staying out of the way as requested:] This isn't yours, right?
no subject
Then there's another question and the bow is observed for a moment. It sparks nothing. But Everything sparks Nothing, so this isn't surprising. There's a few more attempts to jostle a memory, but the only thing that comes out is: ]
I think my hair's too short.
[ These are your cabana buds now, Clear. This is your life. ]
So it's yours now. Someone tries to take it, smack 'em.
no subject
[This comes out absently as she watches Will fumble with the mosquito netting as though she's watching television. He's not doing a very good job, is he. Maybe she should offer to help, but . . .]
[. . . Nah. She turns to Sayori instead.]
He's right, though. You should just keep them. Process of elimination, they're yours.
no subject
[But if he insists...
She looks to Clear, and then peers down to the glittery pink bow again. It almost feels too pretty for her to wear. If it doesn't belong to either of the other two, though, then...
Her eyes travel to the backpack. This must be hers too.]
...
Wait, I don't wanna smack anyone!
[Ah, yes.]
no subject
But hers looks nice.
[ God, why are people so dumb???
But maybe it is too long. Maybe he'll cut it later, he still has that knife onhand. Back to the current problem. The clasp switches hands, one finger loops around the offending part, and in one yank the latch snaps off, easy as breaking a toothpick. Problem solved. Hole. Clasp. Secure. Next. Repeat. There's another pause at the outburst and hey - there's an expression this time!
It is 100% confusion. ]
Why not? Do you need more practice? [ The hand that just snapped solid metal makes a vague swatting motion in the air. Left-handed bitchslap. See? Easy. Anyway - Sayori just successfully stole some shit. So the proper follow-up is: ] What's your haul?
no subject
[wow]
[Well. Unlike Will, she does at least understand the concern here. Drumming her fingers on her knee for a second, she offers a brief explanation for her reasoning. Not that it's great.]
You have a right to protect what's yours if somebody tries to take it from you. Hopefully you won't need to slap anyone, but . . . [A shrug, which communicates a great deal of possibility. Who knows what may come to pass? Or to slap?]
no subject
This is a lot to track.
Clear's reasoning tracks, though. She frowns slightly.] I guess that makes sense... But I don't want to practice slapping people so hopefully nobody tries to do that. [She proceeds with investigating the contents of the backpack, which—] Whoa! [And, in answer to Will, or maybe just in general:] There's a bunch of stuff in here!
[A shocking amount of useful stuff, frankly. She pulls out a notebook as something else occurs to her.] Wait— do you guys have any stuff in here?
no subject
But next time, missy. Slap practice. ]
No. [ That was weirdly certain. Clarification might be best. ] It's your bag, now. Thus, it's your stuff now.
[ Ez pz ]
no subject
[Hm. Okay, this is weird. There's this moment where Clear feels like the world is compressing and expanding in front of her, a long tunnel changing in length. The heat of the air around them presses in against her cheeks specifically, in a way that almost hurts.]
[She closes her eyes, frowns, concentrating. No, that's—]
I don't have anything. Nothing would have made it through anyway. [And blink. Eyes open, perplexed.] So it's all yours, yeah. You won't . . . yeah.
[Won't find anything of hers. Because there isn't anything of hers. Because she doesn't have anything.]
[That's . . . what?]
no subject
She means to clarify what she meant, because she's seeing a bunch of the stuff in the backpack that seems familiar as she pulls it out, but then. The other girl gets an...expression on her face.
Sayori pauses with a small canvas bag in her hand, her eyebrows furrowed in concern as she regards Clear. She casts Will a glance too, a silent ? just in case she's imagining what a weird response that is.
It's still weird when she looks back to Clear, so she just asks outright.] Um— are you okay?
no subject
Shitposting in brackets aside, that answer earns another pause. Sayori's glance is like looking at a mirror, all confusion and concern, and when their eyes lock, he shakes his head once. No, that's as worrying as you think. ]
Yeah, that... [ No, better not. It might come off as ganging on up on her. Different angle. ] There's iced coffee in the cooler. If it'd help.
no subject
[. . . She's not dumb. But she's. She's pretty scared, isn't she? And mad. That tingly feeling in her fingertips, the curl of her toes, the punch of her heartbeat in her ears. Yeah.]
[Okay. She swallows it, shakes her head. Breathes.] Coffee. Yeah. Coffee'd be good. [Her assumption here is that Will's going to get it for her, because of course it is. She offers Sayori a faint smile, because of course she does.] I'm fine. I don't really know why I said that.
[Which is a lie, kind of. She's starting to know, but she needs to figure out the whole shape of it.]
no subject
With Will on coffee duty, she's happy to take on the conversational aspect. The tilt of Clear's smile is encouraging but not convincing, and Sayori smiles back as she shoves the backpack aside on the couch. She doesn't really have to, it's a huge couch, but it's more of a representative gesture.] It's okay. This whole thing is super weird, huh?
[And she plops down on the couch, the space next to her an open invitation.] You wanna sit with me? This is a pretty comfy couch, ehehe.
[Translation: you look shaky, please sit.]