theianlogs | Welcome to Theia!

Entry tags:

Welcome to Theia!

Who: Your mysterious caretakers and you
When: September 1st
Where: The Town Square
What: The welcome wagon has arrived!
Warnings: Minor gore, death

It's a white envelope that finds its way under every door, through every nook and cranny a day or two after your arrival. With the peculiar, bloodstained fingerprints lovingly applied as though they were a signature scrawled into its thin paper body, it doggedly persists--it will find you--until you open it and read the letter written ever so meticulously in fine script. It's a cordial invitation to a party hosted in your honor in the town square today. You should hurry, hurry, hurry! You wouldn't want to be late and keep your generous hosts waiting... or so says that oddly compelling feeling pressing into the back of your head. You make your way to the square, the urgent tugging feeling growing stronger the closer you get, and when you turn the corner to get a glimpse of the festivities, you find it's... not quite what you had been expecting.

The square is small, and looks rather out of general use. The fountain in the center is dusty and crumbling, and if there was ever any water in it it's long gone now. Most of the cobbled stones are broken and loose in the road. There are two long tables stocked with refreshments along either side of the walkway to the fountain, and what appears to be a small stage of some sort right in front of it, holding a large, ornate chair and a third table. The most unsettling thing, however, is the rest of the décor.

The theme is death, or so it would appear. Beside the food table to your left sits a bespectacled man wearing a scarf, but was the scarf always red, or is it only stained so because his head is hanging onto his neck by a thread? Against his lap rests a beautifully crafted cello, which appears to be missing its G-string... Oh. There it is--it's still stuck in the gashed man's neck. The poor bastard has been garrotted with the strings of his cello! Talk about hoisted by your own petard. Where his head lolls against the table, you may notice that behind those glasses, his eyes are missing.

Near the fountain is a large, wrought-iron statue of an archer, where... well, he's made his first kill, apparently. The body of a young girl with long dark hair is speared neatly through the chest by the archer's arrow, her little feet a good half a yard off the ground, now sticky with her blood. If you step closer to peer into the fountain, you'll find another body, this one a man with short dark hair, his face twisted into a mask of desperation and his gloved hands around his own throat as though he were gasping for air. Oddly, his lower jaw appears to be missing. Did he drown? There is no water in the fountain...

In the ornate chair on the platform is the body of another man, this one with his head completely removed from his shoulders. Oh... there it is, in his lap, his hands carefully arranged in his wild black hair. Wait, it seems there are too many hands, though! A second body dangles from a large tree that looms over the square, the rope frayed and dirty where it is wrapped around another man's neck, a strangely peaceful smile on his face, blue though it is. His hands rest atop the first man's, as though making certain the severed head remains still.

On the table in front of the chair rests a chest, its lid wide open and a glittering bounty inside.

If you peer inside, you will see a collection of eggs! Scaly, cool to the touch, and about the size of a football, they come in several colors. There is a note pinned to the inside of the trunk's lid--

Do you take an egg, as the note suggests? Dare you? (Dare you not?)

That pressing feeling in the back of your head has left you now, now that you are here to be welcomed to the city, now that you are here in the presence of your caretakers, but it is difficult to take comfort in the relief from the compulsion when surrounded by so much destruction. Who has done this to the faithful sentinels of the city? Who has killed the Watcher, the Interloper, the Guardian, the Nightingale, and the Keeper? Why have they been left here, at your welcoming home party?

Before you can turn to ask your neighbor, before you can wonder any further, a sound breaks the silence--a terrible, wet crunching noise like a sheet of ice breaking under your feet. You turn over your shoulder to see that it isn't anything so simple as ice. In the middle of the square is one final body, a body that wasn't there but a moment ago. She is small, thin, with dark hair and eerily pale eyes wide in terror. You know this girl, she met you on the elevator, expressed pleasure that you had been found (had you been lost?), and welcomed you home. Where did she come from? It's as though she simply... fell out of the sky! The Dreamer now dreams forever.

As you turn to survey the carnage all around you, a pleasant chiming sound seems to fill the air. It would seem that your mirror has a message for you! Upon inspection, you will find a new icon on the main viewscreen.

If you touch the icon, it will take you to a new application. Welcome to the Task Board! Here you will find a multitude of errands you can run for... whoever is running the city, now. Boy, what a way to announce things are under new management!

Welcome back to Theia, wayward children. Please enjoy the refreshments--watch out for the Nightingale's eyes, they may have fallen into the punch--get reacquainted with your friends and neighbors, and do take good care of those eggs. Or else...

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

( one step forward, two steps back. frying pan, fire and so on.

prompto didn't think he'd ever say this, but once the undeniable sensation of comfort the letter triggered had dissolved into nothing, it occurs to the gunner that he rather does prefer the older wayward pines to this... new evolution, whatever it is - it was a lot less dreary before, for one thing.

the transformation is drastic, the town a completely new place he's never seen; the skyline's gone, entire layout reshuffled as if someone was playing a sim game on random, but the patch that remains over prompto's still-tender eye is proof that this isn't a dream, or rather, that he's still from the same continuity as he last remembers. the chocobo waiting in what supposedly is his room is all the remaining confirmation he needs despite not recognising the house itself or the street it sits on, and when the invitation finds him caution leads the gunner to venture out again with the chick tucked safely in a backpack he unearths from within one of the cupboards.

what he finds in the town square is, unsurprisingly, nauseating enough to stop him in his tracks before morbid curiosity gets the better of him (and the last body falling elicits a panicked yelp like prompto's never heard from himself before, not even when the naga stole him through the darkness of fociaugh hollow.) it's not the first time he's encountering a public display corpses and entrails, but the gunner doesn't think he'll ever get used to it. )

Um. S'kinda early for Halloween, right?

[ Aranea can't move quite as quickly as she normally would thanks to the still-healing wound over her abdomen, but hearing that - and seeing Prompto, when she whips around - sure makes her want to make the effort. She nearly drops the egg she's carrying in her hurry to get there, questions forming faster than she can move. How is he here, does he know where they are, does he remember her (and that one, along with memories of people not remembering her the way she remembers them is enough to stop her from grabbing at him) -

but unfortunately, what comes out of her mouth is ]

What'd you do to your eye?

( now there's a familiar voice, one that's more than welcome in this gently building clusterfuck, and the relief that floods prompto to hear it overrides any thought he'd have to wonder why aranea's asking what she is -- after all, it's not the first time she's seen it, or asked. ) Aranea!

( that all comes secondary, though, and the fondness in his voice is unmistakeable. ) This? It's still healing, s'why the patch hasn't come off yet. Think it's gonna be a couple more weeks or so before I can remove it...

[ Well, that's a relief. As far as she remembers, last time she asked someone about their eyes he was fucking blind, and hearing that's not the case for Prompto has her lifting her hand to trace careful fingers along the side of the patch, even before the warm familiarity in his voice registers. ]

Good.

[ Which. Could probably use an explanation, but there are more pressing issues. Yes, even more pressing than the corpses. ]

Tell me you remember Wayward Pines.

( it's slight, but prompto still leans faintly into the touch even though it traces a spot that's still sore, some measure of tension seeping out of his shoulders until 'tell me you remember wayward pines', and he blinks, puzzled. ) Y-yeah? We were just there 'til -- well. I dunno, I'd say it was yesterday, but somehow I don't think that's really it. Can't have been long? Pretty sure someone - or something - moved us, 'cause unless you're playing one of those city building games I don't think anyone's got the power to rearrange a whole town just like that.

( a muffled chirping comes from the bag on his shoulders, something inside nudging at the fabric, and the blond's expression brightens up as he maneuvers it around to be unzipped, revealing the unmistakable face of the baby chocobo. ) Oh! Also - look who else was here!

[ She closes her eyes for just a beat, a little smile forming around a quiet sigh. So: a new place, with new rules and apparently new ways to fuck with them, but he's her Prompto. That's the first good news since she woke up - and then Miss Fluffles is there too, blinking sedately from her cozy spot in the pack and Aranea actually laughs. ]

Hey there. Good to see you.

[ It's directed to the bird, but she moves to hook and arm around Prompto's waist and tucks her head against his shoulder. Its a brief thing - nothing like being surrounded by corpses to suck the romance out of a moment - but it's enough to make her feel a little less angry at the whole situation. ]

( the chocobo seems satisfied upon visual confirmation of who it is that matches the voice she heard, wiggling in prompto's arms until she finds a comfortable spot once more. hugging the pack just a little tighter to his chest as if anticipating some sort of attack to come around the corner at any moment, the blond finds he isn't quite... as bothered by their predicament. granted - this whole thing's fucked up, and he is disturbed, but aranea's presence one he takes comfort in as she leans into him.

it then occurs to prompto that she and the chocobo are the only ones he recognises, so far. ) Did you see anyone else on your way here? Gladio? Steve, or - or Nat? Or Nyx, even --

You're the first person I've recognized here. From anywhere.

[ From Wayward Pines or from home, which somehow seems even further away in this place than it did in that messed up little town. She says it surely, matter-of-fact, and unaware of the way she shrugs lightly as the the words form. It's not a place that makes it easy to be sure about anything. ]

I've been trying to figure out what the hell is going on here since I woke woke up, and I've got nothing. The crazy sure showed up a lot faster this time.

You're the first person I've met here. I mean -- there was someone talking to me when I woke up, but she's - she's right over there. ( gingerly he casts a glance at the tiny body crumpled over itself in the square and averts his gaze again in an instant. it doesn't seem right to look at all. ) Gods, the whole apocalypse deal in Wayward Pines was one thing, but I didn't expect to get dumped into some kinda horror movie. Doesn't look like they were even trying to hide the crazy, either.

[ She follows the line of his gaze over to that small form, holds it a little longer - it almost feels like an insult to look away, like she's trying to deny the gravity of what happened to the girl, but in the end the horror of it wins out over any guilt - before her attention snaps back to Prompto's face. ]

Apocalypse?

[ It had felt like it, sure. Those things swarming in, worse than the daemons, and then - well. But Prompto's usually given to a very different kind of hyperbole, and it doesn't sit right. ]

Yeah? Told you about it when you came back, remember? Some scientists made a - well, they called it a mutagen but I guess y'could just say virus - that got smart and mutated most of the world's population into those things that overran the place. ( a beat, then, to compose himself; aranea may've returned, against all odds, but he remembers seeing the light fade from her eyes like it was just yesterday, and unconsciously the gunner leans in just a little closer in response. ) We were facing extinction, they said. Totally an apocalypse situation t'me.

I don't remember that.

[ It's as matter of fact as she can make it, through the low-simmering frustration. It explains his response when she asked about his eye, anyway; how he'd brushed past it instead of making a joke like she might have expected. But it's aggravating to know there's another gap there, and she shakes her head. She's all ready to bitch about it when his words shuffle around a little in her mind, things he'd said as if they were background detail jumping out at her as more important. Came back. From where, she'd ask, except he's talking about the creatures that invaded the town, and -

well, they'd known that death didn't seem to stick. It just seems like a shame not to have been around for her own resurrection. ]

The attack, yeah. [ She gestures to her abdomen by way of illustration, the still-healing scar visible. ] Coming back, getting the history lesson, not so much.

Huh? ( it's like a cold drop in his stomach, and prompto's brows knit in what can only be described as bewildered incredulity; he remembers it, the brief, wild thought that he surely must've gone completely nuts seeing aranea at the door days after her passing, how that notion was quickly replaced by a completely rational fear of some sort of haunting, but that wasn't it. ) You did come back, and it scared the crap out of me 'cause I thought maybe you were a ghost or something even if y'did show up in the daytime since ghosts don't usually do the whole daytime thing...

( he can't have imagined it, but aranea wouldn't have reasons to make this up either. ) What's the last thing you remember? Before coming here.

[ It's aggravating to know there's yet another snarl in things, and she can't take any pleasure in how confused he looks, but his saying that he'd thought she was a ghost makes her smile. It does sound like him. ]

I remember you. [ It's quiet. Just that, for a moment, because... well, it had been awful, but she's here and she's fine and there's part of her that suspects it might have been worse for him. ] I called out to you, and one of them got me. And you held me right until the end.

[ She's grateful for that. More than she can say, so she reaches up and tweaks the end of one of those long strands of hair framing his face. ]

Not a great display of survival instinct there, shortcake.

( just the mention of her death hurts, the wound still stinging as if it were new all over again. ) Well... yeah, but I wasn't gonna just leave you, okay? Even if I'd known you were gonna come back. It wasn't right. ( prompto ducks his head, a little sheepish - why is his face burning, anyway? ) Nyx had to drag my ass outta there.

Nyx ever shows up here, remind me to buy him a drink.

[ It's dry as anything she says, but she watches him a moment - face tipped down, cheeks flooding with pink - and she softens. It mean a lot. It had been painful, terrifying, and while she can't be happy he had to see it she can only imagine how much harder it would have been to do it alone. So she puts fingertips under his chin, tips his face back up. ]

Hey. Thanks.

[ And she presses a kiss - brief and dry, but warm - to his lips. ]

( prompto's pretty sure his face is hot enough to rival the fires of in the heart of ravatogh at this point, and just when he thinks it couldn't get any crazier aranea's lips are on his own and the gunner has never been more convinced that spontaneous combustion is a very, very real thing even as he leans back into it. for those few seconds, though, prompto can almost forget about the crapsack town they're both trapped in. they are, at the very least, still in this together.

the colour in his cheeks hasn't yet left entirely, but when they pull apart the blond has it in himself to look aranea in the eye. ) It's nothing. Seriously. Y'don't need to thank me. And I don't mean it's nothing like "it didn't mean a thing" but it was more of -- you know... the "no sweat" kinda way? Sorry, I just mean -- you're really strong, okay? And I'm not saying you aren't but even so, dying couldn't have been fun. ( especially for aranea, his own despair aside. just thinking about it triggers a surge of some sort of longing, and prompto shifts slightly to bump their noses together, seeking comfort in the contact. ) Let's maybe not do that again.

Deal.

[ That's easy to agree to. She's not exactly excited to repeat the process, and if they can make sure he never goes through the same thing? All the better. It's probably a shitty thing to be happy that someone's stuck in a nightmare with her, but there it is. He's close and warm and okay (eyepatch aside), and with everything as messed-up as it is that feels like everything.

Still - they're in the middle of a murder scene, surrounded by people, and while she's always a little perversely pleased to see him blush there's part of her that worries about making her affection for him so clear. You want to mess someone up, easiest way to do it is through their loved ones. That's why she tried not to have any until now. So she pulls back, shifts her helmet around to display the egg she's put in it, large and red and frankly kind of awesome-looking. ]

Hey, check it out. Kinda cool, huh?

(no subject)

failtography - 2017-09-19 17:24 (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

unweaving - 2017-09-19 20:38 (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

failtography - 2017-09-20 17:53 (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

unweaving - 2017-09-22 05:28 (UTC) - Expand

That's between you and your higher power.

[ gintoki drawls, coming up along with him and staring at the same thing. dead bodies, inside to outside, skulls and entrails and the familiar stench of rot, permeating through the very air itself. he might not be a stranger to massacres, but something about this snags at the memory, crawls under his skin like a filthy, dirty thing, a mystery waiting to be decoded, and gintoki really isn't in the mood for this kind of shit.

but he's standing beside a young, blond dude who looks like he'd just stepped out of an rpg (and what's with that eyepatch? cutie item? prelude to a tragic backstory? then again the last one's a copout, any story that ends with your eye probably getting gouged out isn't going to be a happy one), and gintoki's expression is a taciturn mask because freaking out is probably going to send the kid beside him into a full-fledged panic and that is not gonna help anyone, is it? ]

For some people, every day is Halloween.

[ those are probably the kinds of people you want to avoid, son. he doesn't look away from the horrific sight -- those wide eyes pale with horror. not too long ago, that scrawny little thing was welcoming him 'home'. ] The welcome wagon's not too friendly today, is it?

( prompto's still recovering from the shock that the sudden, new presence does little to unnerve him, turning to face the newcomer with a small sound of confusion. the sight doesn't seem to faze this white-haired stranger too much - if at all - and the mellow aura he exudes does, perhaps, help the gunner remain relatively calm as well.

doesn't mean the sight before them both isn't still disturbing as hell, though. ) Y-yeah, tell me about it. Pretty sure I just saw one of these folks earlier, too...

[ easy, there. they might have one hell of a homicidal maniac on their hands, but they'll cross the bridge when they get there. the horrific tableau on display seems like someone's sending a message, but what? at least the young man beside him isn't freaking out -- small blessings. ]

Which one?

The - the girl in the middle. ( he isn't openly freaking out yet, but his mind's already wandering faster than is desirable - shouldn't have watched all those horror movies way back when - and prompto's voice, though mostly steady, is still thin with trepidation. ) Said she knew me, somethin' about being welcome back... I've never been here before, but all the notes and stuff said I was -- ( still, for how bizarre the situation seems, the gunner still keeps his head enough to recall how things were in wayward pines with its own brand of memory fuckery and find solace in the fact that, at the very least, this isn't his first rodeo. )

Her, huh...

[ yes, he sees her. how many people has she welcomed here? the dude beside him looks shaken, but admirably put together, considering the grotesque and unnerving circumstances -- he's had the same treatment, which deepens the mystery. just who brought them here? ]

Maybe they did something with our memories. [ which is just asking for a beatdown, because no one fucks with that kind of thing. ] You okay?

Ugh. ( well. he certainly was thinking it, but to hear someone else vocalise his thoughts makes it infinitely more jarring, uncertainty turning into a sort of rising frustration as prompto scrubs one hand across his face. ) Not again with the memories...

What memories?

[ because dude, that's weird. ] You been through this before?

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only