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

[lifeaftr_mods]

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.

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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!

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LOGS ● OOC ● STORIES ● MAIN NAVIGATION

( CODED BY BOOTYCALL )

Comments

[justribbing]

Yikes.

There's a lot going on here, which makes it far more than Sans really feels like dealing with, so he doesn't. There's a lot he could say, but that, too, feels like a helluva lot more bother than it's worth. 'Yesterday' -- for what it's worth, trying to assign a timeframe to all of this -- Sans watched the world around him splinter apart, watched the people he actually came to care about die. Pointlessly. Casualties a 'war' that wasn't even theirs, just a giant temper tantrum by a mad matriarch.

So, yeah, maybe neither of them acclimated to their respective lifestyles: Sans is still here, for example. Is it easy to adapt to a new weapon?

"I wouldn't know," Sans tosses in, a few throwaway words under the illusion of attentiveness. But there are a few things Sans does know. Like how it's hard to be a hero with no villains or victims. That humans aren't the only sentient beings capable of savage judgment. That history is written by the survivors, with all their biases intact.

And that no one is entitled to forgiveness.

"Sounds like you regret it."

[mttbrandlegs]

"I regret many things. I regretted my choices hurting someone else, enough to suffer an ignoble fate that should never have befallen me. But that regret wasn't worth what it brought upon me.

So I think I'd prefer never to regret again."

Mettaton's words have an edge of cruelty to them, and it's more than a little clear that he's learned a very painful lesson, wherever he'd come from. Enough that simply talking about it didn't ease his spite. And it never would.

"Am I boring you?" he asks after a moment, raising an eyebrow. Just a question; his skills of people-reading had probably deteriorated from his tenure in Nyoi-Cho, surrounded by judgmental little hellions who desecrated the dead, placed their unyielding judgment on his shoulders, and made a social pariah out of a child.

He might be getting it wrong, but Sans certainly doesn't sound as if he gives a damn. And honestly? Mettaton wouldn't really be insulted if he didn't. Not even surprised, at that.

Talking about it to someone who cared might just turn them against him. Again.

[justribbing]

"You're outta luck," says Sans, "The only guiltless ones out there don't have a heart. We're monsters, buddy, get used to it." It's what they're told, growing up. Monster souls are full of compassion, they love swiftly, the only 'cure' for the condition of feeling so much is LV. The only people without regret have sacrificed their capacity to experience sympathy for others.

He might be wrong, but Sans is pretty sure he's right.

Is Mettaton boring Sans? There's no answer he could give that wouldn't be dishonest or possibly make an enemy where he doesn't want the bother, except for one:

"This really ain't about me."