lifeaftr | August Intro: You Think...You Wink...You Do A Double Blink...

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August Intro: You Think...You Wink...You Do A Double Blink...

INTRO LOG: AUGUST

Who: Everyone!
What: New souls arrive to the archipelago of LifeAftr.
When: August 3rd
Where: Ensō
Warnings: Mark as needed!

Part I: Get Wrekt
You rouse to a splash of sea salt drying on your skin. A haze of glass-white sand glitters in your vision, dappled by lush palms and thick, curling foliage that disappears into a jungle of deep jade. From behind, crackling wood and sawing rope groan from a mangled life raft ran ashore. A petering wash of tide over pebbled sand fills your ears as you struggle to gain your bearings in a vast portrait of tropical color…

No...no, no, that’s not precisely how this story starts.

Why don't we start over?

You rouse to a splash of sea salt, spraying across yourself and the wooden floor beneath you as it breaks across the edge of the platform. The light as it dances across the sea is blinding, dappling white spots across your vision as you slowly come back to consciousness and realize that - this is not where you last remember being.

The middle of the ocean is likely not a place most recall being at all. As you struggle to fully comprehend the new scenario in which you have found yourself, three things become quickly apparent. The raft you find yourself upon barely constitutes as something that should float, never mind a boat. In the distance, perhaps a few hours away at most, a large island beckons to you, a wide strip of beach surrounded by cliffs making it very clear where the most fortuitous of directions shall be.

Lastly, of course, you’re not alone. Hopefully your new companion(s) are just as keen to get ashore before nightfall as you, or voyaging together will not be the most positive experience. At your side you will find a knapsack, one to every member of your raft party, and upon inspecting its contents, you will discover any rewards you may have accrued - as well as a few other items to give you a fighting chance.

A note to those who participated in the Test Drive Meme: those threads, if all parties involved would like, can be game canon in the form of dream-like memories involving a place very much like this one, though the layout is considerably different.

Part II: Choose Your Own Adventure

By fortune (or misfortune, as it were), you eventually find your feet meeting sand, blessed shore to stagger upon as you shake off your newly found sea-legs. There are those that may find this place familiar, as though it appeared in a dream, though the expanse of shore certainly seems larger. The beach stretches off into the distance on both sides, curving around sharp ridges and cliffs, mist obscuring the view the farther along it goes.

So here you are. You’ve found land. Company. Supplies. The sun is now beginning to trek rather low upon the horizon…spending the night outside in such an unfamiliar land is unappealing at best and outright dangerous at the worst.

There is one silver lining in the midst of this mess. Directly ahead, the beach curves up a gentle slope until it meets forest, some manner of building visible through the trees. Further exploration of this area will reveal a dilapidated building of sorts; the architecture is indiscernible to even the most skilled eye. Despite looking as if it has seen better days, there are areas that offer some form of shelter...and who knows what else. Just because it appears uninhabited doesn’t mean you won’t wind up pleasantly, or unpleasantly, surprised.

So what shall you do from here, traveller? There is land to be explored, strangers to meet, friends to reunite with. Supplies to inspect and plenty of questions in need of being said aloud. Choose your path, make haste, and above all else: survive. And whatever you will, take heart.

Your story is about to begin anew.

Feeling a tad adrift? Make sure to check the Locations Page, which has details regarding the starting areas and a handy map for those who feel better with a bird's eye view!

LOGS ● OOC ● STORIES ● MAIN NAVIGATION

( CODED BY BOOTYCALL )

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It's a kid. Another kid. Too many of those stranded here with them, and Sans, who still doesn't buy that this all isn't some elaborate dream his dying soul's consoling itself with on its way out, can't decide if the fact this bothers him is a waste of time.

The smile makes something gnaw in the empty pit of him. He's probably just hungry.

"At your age? Some might cry abalone-y, but I'd call that an acclampishment," Sans jokes, habitually, "Especially since you're, what? Eleven? Fourteen?" He shrugs, the tip of a phalanx scratching above the supraorbital ridge of one eye socket, "Shell if I know, you humans all look alike."

Why are you talking to this kid? There's other people here, capable people, people who give a damn about making it to see tomorrow. One of them can take care of a kid, surely.

Speaking to a child doesn't immediately designate responsibility- thankfully. Poor Clementine deserves better. One might even argue that Chara had deserved better.

Isn't it lucky that he isn't all they've got, here.

"If you're fishing for a laugh, sir, you won't find one here." They counter. A hand goes to their mouth, eyes crinkling, slightly- LOVE keeps surging in their throat, and for a few moments, they're afraid it will all come right back up. Drown them from the inside out. "I have to give credit to my shark skills and intellect."

Definitely no bells, then? Not a squint, not a sudden shift in mood that leaves them having...a bad time?

Very lucky. Considering how little progress he has made (that is, none, he hasn't bothered to do much of anything once ashore), Sans won't last the week, let alone be anything anybody could rely on.

The kids deserve better. Maybe everyone else here deserves better, but between this and where he just came from, he'd call this a far more pleasant place to die. No danger of spending the rest of forever as a shambling, mindless drone made of roiling shadow, with eyes that look like a light shining through a hole torn through paper.

Their hand flies to their mouth and Sans mistakes their expression for the amusement he'd expect in someone giving as good as they get, and the dim lights in his sockets get a little brighter as he chuckles.

"Heh. You sound pretty shore of yourself, kid. I'll take your word for it."

A bony hand gestures vaguely at the whorls and hollows carved into the rocks by the waves, their tidal pools teeming with mollusks, starfish, the occasional scuttling crab. Have a seat, if you're inclined. Or on the sand, wherever.

"I'm Sans, by the way," he adds, eyeing a cluster of mussels, "You probably wanna scoop some of these things up. Saw some other humans doin' it, probably means they're good eats."

He's not faking.
If they're happy, why does their chest hurt so much?
"Kidwun." They respond- the word feels foreign on their tongue, even if their tone doesn't shift too much. Rather than meet his gaze, they take the opportunity given to look down; at what must be some kind of...seafood, perhaps. Maybe. Crouching down, they lean closer to one of the pools, eyes slightly narrowed.

"...I wouldn't know the first thing about whether they're edible or not." An honest answer, this time. They've never seen the sea before, outside of pictures and videos. The vastness is...somewhat different in comparison to a stream, or a lake. "I guess you wouldn't either? Do skeletons need to eat?"

Kidwun..?

"Heh heh, come on."

With one supraorbital ridge lifting a smidge higher than the other, he jokes, "Reminds me of those old video games. Player 1 and 2, know what I mean?" Still, the kid said it with enough conviction to pass, but it seems like Sans doesn't buy it. Could mean anything. Could mean the kid is a good liar. Could mean they have their reasons not to give their name out to random strangers.

On the other hand, he's probably too lazy to bother pressing a kid he doesn't know for personal information. None of his business anyway.

"Eh," he says of their question, "Not hungry. Not these guys, though. Most of these guys are gonna be on a seafood diet. Take it from me: if you seafood, you betta eat it."

They smile.

"Perhaps that's why our parents named us that way." Player one and player two. Partners in crime, as it were.

Names always did have significant meaning, didn't they.

"I'll try it, but then, I've never had seafood before." Chara responds, moving right along, before more insightful commentary comes their way. "We could both hate it- and then we'd wind up throwing it all trout."

That seems like a waste, doesn't it?

Holy moly. And he thought the King was bad at names. He's not so sure he buys it, there's something a little too airy about their answer. Maybe he's imagining it. The way they answer, though, makes him think there's probably two of them. For some reason, the idea that there's probably a 'Player 2' seems like a natural, logical conclusion.

He's starting to think about something else when they change the subject. It's none of his business, either way.

"Don't knock it 'til you've tried it," Sans chortles, a few wheezy sounds that end in a sigh. "Betcha anything you don't like could be used for bait or somethin'." The skeleton shrugs, adding, with some uncertainty, "You, uh, gonna be ok with that sweater? I ain't an expert on humans, but even I can tell you're overdressed for this."

"I suppose- it still seems a waste, considering how slim our resources are currently." They could simply SAVE and LOAD their hunger away- so long as it was out of sight and mind of the skeleton. He wouldn't know; even if he had a vague idea of something occurring on the islands, why suspect two kids he never knew?

Looking down, they pluck at the fabric stuck against their chest, raising their shoulders in a lax shrug.

"I could ask the same of you."

"Nothin' gets under my skin. Nice deflection, though," says Sans, parroting the kid's shrug. Besides making a very tired joke about the fact that he's nothing but bones, and, uh, pointing out that the kid's not having any of his concern, he's puzzling over the fact that something feels just a little wrong, here.

Just can't put a phalanx on it.

"Tibia'nest, kid, I'd give you the shirt off my back," he says, spreading his hands. Where he's going, he won't need it, "But, heh heh, this hasn't seen the inside of a washer in a long time. You probably got standards."

"What can I say? I'll survive." They always do. Haha.

He offers them his shirt so easily, and they wonder if that is a product of the changes that have come from memories that don't exist anymore, or if this is just them getting the brunt of the same, jokey persona Frisk was exposed to, for the majority of their time in the Underground. They suspect the latter.
It shouldn't hurt as much as it does.
"Thank you for the offer, but I'm sure we will survive just fine. Unless you're patella-n me you've got two shirts.

"Nah," Sans says, leaning back on his arms, "It's just dead weight. S'not like I need it, and, heck, just more laundry to do," he adds, whose last attempt to do laundry had flooded a hallway with a veritable tide of detergent suds.

Good times.

"I still got my hoodie. But like I said, it's pretty gross, so it doesn't matter."

He considers giving it a rinse in the water, hanging it on a rock to bake in the sunlight. Might end up crusty with salt and sand but whoever comes across it would have an extra shirt that won't have all his dust on it when he finally... yeah.

"Gotta question for ya, though. You said 'we'." They said it before, too, they mentioned parents naming them that way. "You here with family or something?"

Their eyes narrow, slightly suspicious. Regardless of how lazy he is, they've never taken Sans as a...naturalist, per say.

Little far off the finish line to be saying goodbye, aren't we?

"If your shirt is as bad as your hoodie, perhaps you should consider keeping it." They say lightly, smile widening. Ah, well here. Here's the moment of truth, isn't it? "I am, sir. Would you like to meet my sibling?"

Chara doesn't wait for his response. Turning away, they cup their hands over their mouth, shouting out for a child who comes when they're called.

"Kittu, come see what I found!"

Someone as observant as Sans might have long noticed the second child, crouched like a gargoyle beneath the shade of a glistening palm. Even called by a foreign name, they rise before Chara is done speaking; sweep a palm over their jeans, cut jaggedly into shorts at the knees, and approach the two in silence. As they leave the shade, the sun and glossy sand light up their blue sweater with a saturated glow.

There's none of the same shine in their expression as they come to a stop next to Chara, standing so close that their shoulders nearly touch. The gaze they turn on the skeleton is steady, neutral, and entirely practiced. As many things that have been jossed in the script -- heat and salt where there had once been mildew-scented snow, the presence of a child at their side instead of clutching the mended shards of their SOUL together -- it's really, almost hilarious.

How good Frisk still as at pretending they have never met him in their life.

They search him, quietly, and the bitter knife of a question remains tucked behind their teeth. Sans, this was the second biggest mistake they've ever made. And you didn't get a choice about loving them anyway, this time. Here's tomorrow. The deal is off. Frisk and Chara -- they always were dirty cheaters.

They could hold out their hand, of course, but why give themself away?

They still haven't learned how to greet a new pal, after all.

"Holy moly," Sans remarks, a huff of laughter in there, somewhere. "You weren't kidding."

Kid one and kid two? There's really a human or two out there even worse at names than Asgore. He'd been joking when he referenced player one and player two, but this is sad. And a little, uh. Impressive.

He looks.

Most humans, despite his own observation skills, look the same to Sans. It's because when compared with monsters and their incredible diversity of form and function, humans have a certain, uh, standard sameness. In spite of this, Sans looks for similarities between the two and doesn't really find any besides age and species.

And yet, the image before him seems right, somehow. Probably because they're so close, so they seem like, uh, a believable unit, or something. Yeah.

"Heya," he says, without offering his hand to shake. Doesn't much see a point, he has no jape lurking at the ready, and doesn't think he'll be around long enough to make new friends. "I hear you two are siblings. Real nice that you got each other," shrugs the skeleton.

Seems he doesn't recognize them at all.

"I'm Sans."

"Twins, actually." Chara lifts their chin, tone- almost proud. In the manner of a child who is clearly the more forward (or perhaps simply protective), their hand goes out, covering Frisk's own.
They're sorry, Partner.
This had to happen sometime. Best it be when they're around.

Wordlessly, Frisk's hand opens, flips around to fold their palms together, fingers weaving into an effortless seam. They don't look away from Sans at all. The joke here, of course, is that he's left-handed. If he had put his hand out for a greeting, the one Frisk would have received it with is unfortunately occupied, now.

It's a bit of a shame. They think Sans would have appreciated that punchline in his cynical way, if he had known it even existed.
It's OK.
"You're a skeleton," they say, as if they're either incredibly dull or incredibly unimpressed. If they were going for surprise at never having seen such a thing in their life, they've failed at it.

"Yeah," says the skeleton, eyelights moving between the two children. Twins, huh.

He supposes he really doesn't know enough about humans to tell if that's true or not. He's heard of 'human twins', but only ever saw the occasional advertisement in a soggy magazine that featured humans with identical features, and often matching clothes. Maybe it's a little different than how family relations work with monsters.

Besides, Yukio and Rin had seemed pretty dissimilar in their own ways, too.

Sans's scrutiny of the two humans drops at last with a lungless, weary sigh. "Look, usually there'd be questions. Where're you two from, how you holdin' up, you know." He shrugs, like a couple of ten to thirteen year old kids might have any idea at all. Like maybe getting cut loose on a deserted island might just be normal enough to know what sorts of questions to expect from older people.

Which, of course, doesn't make sense.

"I'll be honest," he adds, shoulders slouching, "I don't wanna know. So let's skip that stuff. Anyway... This looks like a nice place, you kids should be playing or chattin' up someone who might actually look after you.

"Don't, uh, take it personally."

That doesn't necessarily make his rejection any gentler. He knows he's being... unkind. Figures it's even more unkind to string a couple of lonely kids on when he doesn't expect to see another day.

"I just ain't here long, ok?"

Edited 2017-09-15 21:36 (UTC)

The more he speaks, the more Chara's grip tightens. In the end, it takes conscious effort not to crush Frisk's hand entirely, thumb briefly rubbing over their palm in apology.

"Wow," They say, entirely too chipper. "Who knew skeletons could be so depressing?"

How dare he.

"Please don't take the wrong impression from this sir. We're not looking for an adult. If all of them are like you, I think we're better continuing as we are. Alone." And in a motion of complete dismissal, they turn their attention to Frisk, smile too wide. Too wide, too thin. Too much.

"If you're done here, why don't we go find something worth paying attention to."

Edited 2017-09-19 02:50 (UTC)

Chara attempts to crush their hand.

I just ain't here long, ok?

They allow it.

Stiffly, pupils surrounded by rust drill into the dim pinpricks of his eyelights. They say nothing, but they know that their impression of dullness is shattered, in the only way Frisk is capable of ruining everything: their own intensity, their own Determination, pulling apart the subtle flicks and tics in a skeleton's widely unchanging expression. One might think they've learned how to read a face that emotes even less than theirs. But that would be preposterous.

He ain't around long.
(what was the point? what was the point? what was the point? what was the-)
Fine. They won't think about this anymore, then.

"OK," they say to Kidwun, and as ever -- just ok. Just. Chara smiles at them, and they don't smile back, and the game has changed; but have the players, really?

They don't look back at the skeleton.

"Bye, Sans."

Bye, Sans.

He might have thought something of that, if he hadn't just introduced himself. So, even if the sound of that voice saying those two words makes something twist sharply in him, Sans lets it be. Chalks it up to one last ditch scrabble at slippery oil, looking for anything of substance to latch onto, a last life preserver.

He knows-- or at least, suspects -- that this is little more than one last illusion to console him as he dies.

Right?

He's not sure why it'd show him human children, or a man recently blinded who is unfailingly loyal to his king who himself is destined to self-sacrifice, why it'd show him Muffet and not his brother.

Well, that ain't his call either.

"Yeah," he agrees, too readily, too rustily, "Have fun, kids."

He doesn't say see you later.

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August Intro: You Think...You Wink...You Do A Double Blink...

whale here we go

two tags and I'm hooked

hey now i wasn't fishing for compliments!

but here I am, ready to give them trout

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