imaginarylogs | prelude {{ Log 01.

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 your ~~sea~~ island 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.

NAVIGATION ⯈

code bases by tricklet

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Hmmm... So it's a riddle.

[Which doesn't stop him from thinking hard about thinking hard about thinking about nothing, a recursive loop that ends as he (fails) to snap a finger through his gloves.]

I get it! Meditation must be... not thinking. [At least it's easy to say.]

[Sans feels like it's been a while since he's seen another skeleton. Even with that feeling, even with knowing this is someone from that photograph, no memories return.]

Hey, you figured it out already. [Or something. Did that even qualify as a riddle?] You taking meditation classes or something?

I guess I am. [Papyrus shifts the notes in his arms enough to consider the note, which instructs him to gaze into the candle as he meditates, but nothing more.] It's supposed to help... They didn't say how.

[He felt puzzled enough by the ambiguous instructions, and could have gotten stuck there all day - only for the solution to nearly be a pun. Think about nothing. Not thinking. It was for sure a riddle.]

Maybe they're tellin' you to relax. [That's what meditation is for, maybe. Honestly, Sans isn't entirely sure.]

To relax...? [Papyrus scowls at the suggestion, and he doesn't even know why. Is it that he doesn't know how? That it doesn't feel natural? That it's this skeleton suggesting it? Who knows.]

I guess. Maybe. [He repeats, dismissively, before dismissing his dismissive tone and comments with a shake of his head. Just a whole lot of throwing out the mental garbage, before considering this guy.] What about you? What are you doing here?

Relaxing. [That isn't at all what he's doing, but with how dismissive this guy had been about the whole idea of it, Sans couldn't resist.] You're the first skeleton I've seen on this island besides me. Weird, huh?

[Sans has no idea if it's weird, actually. He can't decide how he feels about it.]

[Somehow, he should have known to expect that answer.]

It's weird. [That much, at least, he agrees with.] There's loads of dogs and birds and humans...

[And other people, who aren't quite humans, he thinks, but aren't unlike humans, either. It must mean something, that he doesn't have a word for them... But he's not sure what.]

So why not more skeletons??

Maybe they didn't have the guts to show up. [This isn't helping Sans get information on this mysterious skeleton from the photograph at all, but something in Sans just can't help himself. Well, can't help himself even more than usual when it comes to dumb jokes.]

Pffft! [Papyrus is startled into laughter, not expecting the play on words and appreciating it like it's the first time he's ever heard it - for all he knows, it is. Rather than just be shown up, he digs around and offers:] But... But you'd think they'd... have the backbone to do it anyway!

[Sans is always pleased when someone plays along, but he feels more pleased than usual for some reason.] See, that's the problem--they've gotta find their spines first.

Guess that makes us skeleton ambassadors around here.

[Papyrus nods agreeably enough to the imitation pun; even beyond joking around, it sounds true enough.]

And here we are, already in uniform! Red scarves are the uniform, right? [He can't think of many other reasons for such a fashion coincidence, not between two guys who already have such a unique thing in common as being skeletons.]

[Sans reaches to touch the one he's wearing once it's mentioned. He'd had other things on his mind before, but they are both wearing red scarves. Sans wasn't in the photo. Is that important? Well, it probably means that red scarves are in fact not a skeleton uniform. Sans has two of them, though--the second is stuffed in his hoodie pockets right now. Why does he have two? Sans's memory remains a frustrating void.]

Guess they are now. [Sans stuffs his--well, left hand and right arm, he's missing his right hand--back into his hoodie pockets.] The name's Sans.

Sans, huh? [He doesn't expect it to strike a bell... and it doesn't. He smiles politely enough, straightening to make a little better impression.] Well, good to meet you, Sans. I'm... Papyrus.

[It feels like... something's off. Like... his introduction should be grander, for one. He's missing something. Maybe an extra name? Some people were giving more than one name. Hopefully it'll come to him, whether one from before or a brand new burst of inspiration. At least his name has more syllables.]

I'm sure there should be more to it, especially if I'm an ambassador... but I'll figure it out!

[Given Sans's photograph, he feels like the name Papyrus should ring a bell, but it doesn't. He doesn't think he has enough of a memory intact to strain it for additional knowledge, even though he tries. He has to settle for shrugging like nothing's bothering him.]

Eh, you can workshop it. But I think I'll just stick with Sans.

If you think that's enough... [Sans. Sans what, pizzazz? Papyrus isn't convinced, and mulls the matter over.]

'Skeleton Ambassador Sans' isn't terrible... And hey! If you find something with an N... You could even spell your name.

[Of course, nobody's gone spelling their names in this introduction, no writing or gestures of fingers to indicate letters. And yet, there's no doubt in his mind how Sans is spelled.]

[Sans considers this for a moment.]

Skeleton Ambassador Nnnnnnn Sans.

[He did not put in any effort at all.]

...Nnnno? What is that.

[The strongest part of brother instincts are the bother instincts, it would seem]

I mean, like that, except with a word.

Oh, got ya. [Sans thinks some more!] Skeleton Ambassador Nsans Sans.

Is that even a word??

[It is slowly dawning on him that this Sans guy is messing with him, on purpose.]

Oh. Oh, is this like your meditating advice?

Yes. [It's not, but Sans really wants to see Papyrus try to solve this.] So, what's your suggestion?

Wh-what, you're asking me to pick it for you??

[So conflicted. On the one hand, talk about not thinking. On the other hand, it's almost... a gesture of trust, or respect, to seek his opinion out like this???]

Na... Nu... [He starts to suggest a word, cuts himself, and reconsiders a couple times.] N-No, I just don't know you well enough to suggest anything good!

[Sans had a feeling Papyrus was going to take this more seriously than he should, but this feels like a different kind of serious than he was expecting. He shrugs, waving his left hand dismissively. It's obvious, now that both of his arms aren't in his pockets, that he's missing his right hand entirely.]

Then I'll just keep stickin' to Sans. Who're they gonna mix me up with, you?

[That would be ridiculous, they look nothing alike.]

[Oh, it was just more messing with him, and there he was getting terribly sentimental out of the blue. Is it just the relief of talking with another skeleton, after so many people whose skeletons - if they even have any - are hidden away?]

Ugh. Of course not. [After all, all they have in common is being here, and made of bones, and having scarves and bracers.]

But don't come crying to me if more skeletons show up, and no one shows you the respect an ambassador deserves!

[If he were being completely honest with himself, the idea of being an ambassador... It seems right. He knows what it is, like he knows what bones and gloves and dogs are... Well, maybe not as well as he knows bones.]

[Sans's immediate thought is "where'd you get the idea I deserve that kind of respect?", and it's sharp enough to startle him into a noticeable silence. Where did that come from? He does his best to brush the thought away, but his expression is cloudier. Of course, Sans's expression is mostly solid, but it shows around his eyes more than anything.]

I'll just work somethin' out if they get here. I'm an improvisation kinda guy.

[No, that's not exactly right.]

[The silence catches his attention, and that expression... It's hard to pin down, but something's not right. More than Sans's explanation, after, accounts for.]

Oh, is... that what it is. [Papyrus can't find it in him to believe that - but he can't find it in him to challenge the answer, either. More lightly, he offers:]

Well, we can't all be master planners. If I get an idea, I'll let you know! Keep your phone on.

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