Exploration Event: Neverwere

[lifeaftr_mods]

EXPLORATION EVENT: NEVERWERE

Who: Everyone!
What: Your wildest dreams come true!
When: May 15th to May 18th
Where: Ziziphus, those still on Ensō...and Mu
Warnings: Mark as needed!

Then Know That My Life Was Just a Killer Dream
You can find most of the information you need in the OOC info post! In the meantime, feel free to use this log as a catch-all for your dream worlds, as well as detailing your efforts to free one another. Whether they're on Ziziphus or Ensō at the time of the dreams' capture, your character is free to access as many dreams as you like, as the interlocking mental landscape allows for that sort of crossing over apropos of nothing. And time, of course, is very fluid in dreams - many days, months, and years can transpire in a matter of mere minutes.

Will you fight your way free from Ziziphus's vines or Mu's thrall, or are you content to die in your sleep?

Remember to let us know if your character dies during this event!

Event Timeline

[ ♆ ] May 15th: The vines make their move, ensnaring characters in ideal fantasy worlds
[ ♆ ] May 17th: The Storyteller will make contact with those they can, as well as issue information and a potential solution
[ ♆ ] May 18th: Those that have not freed themselves from the vines or from Mu will suffer a death

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LOGS ● OOC ● STORIES ● MAIN NAVIGATION

( CODED BY BOOTYCALL )

Comments

[onegreeneye]

I don't know.

[It's not possible. None of this is possible. Or at least it shouldn't be.]

What... what do you mean, you're seeing things, what here do you think you're imagining?

[The bar? The town? Ginko himself?]

cw: internalized ableism

[postictal]

It's...I'm not right. I'm -

[What is he, he - he's fucking crazy, isn't he? He's fucking out of his mind, he's lost it, he's losing it, losing it, losing everything, just - just wrung out and empty and seeing things and - ]

I'm crazy, right? I'm fucking crazy, I...

[In that precise moment, the table beneath his hands cracks, a loud roar of splintering wood that nearly bisects it across its face. The roar of the surrounding crowd has faded to a dim hubbub, and then to nothing at all.]

[...when did it get so empty?]

[onegreeneye]

Why would I know if you're crazy-- [Okay. Calm down, calm the hell down, just--

He winces, jerking back from the splintering wood of the table, the sound all the sharper in contrast with the sudden quiet in the bar. Ginko is quiet for a couple moments before speaking up, his voice quiet and shaky.]

...If you're seeing things right now, then so am I. Whatever is going on, it's-- not just you.

[And if it's not just Ginko, and it's not just Tim... some piece of a puzzle slides into place, forming a picture, however vague, that seems obvious once it's been painted.]

There's something else in play here. It's not us.

[postictal]

[It smells rank. Like something was left to die behind the doors. He could tear the door open and step out onto the street and, for some reason, it feels an awful fucking lot like he'd just find himself standing in an icy pool of utter nothingness, chill and void and leaching into his bones.]

Then what?

[It's whispered, rusty and horrified.]

What's that smell?

[onegreeneye]

Something. I don't know yet.

[He takes a step away from the table, looking around, searching for... something else, some clue.

Then he stops, brow furrowing.]

I... don't know.

[He's not sure he wants to.]

[postictal]

Why's it so empty?

[The words break - he feels, abruptly, acutely, like he did when he was small, huddling in the corners of white-walled rooms and counting down over and over again until he could make the monsters go away.]

[Except there were no monsters. He grew up fine. There's nothing in his head. There never has been.]

[(But he can feel It like a weight, pressing on the back of his neck.)]

[(Watching.)]

[onegreeneye]

[Ginko takes another step back, as if trying to get more space in this empty room. And it is empty, that seems all the more obvious now that Tim points it out.]

I don't... know.

[He kneels, checking under the table for... something, he doesn't know what. A sign of reality, of unreality.]

There's got to be a reason behind all of it. There's always something behind it.

[Like what?]

[postictal]

What're you looking for?

[Fear has made him skittish, is causing him to snap and snarl. As if by digging beneath a veneer of unpleasantness, he might turn over the soil and expose whatever's caused this - whatever is bleeding into the landscape of something that's feeling more and more like a nightmare.]

[onegreeneye]

I don't know yet. I need-- [He stands up again and looks around the bar, tense and focused.] I need to find more signs of what's going on here. More that's here and shouldn't be, or shouldn't be but is.

...Maybe we should check outside. [Which might be a bad idea.]

[postictal]

[The walls are too layered, closed too tightly, and he's not sure why he didn't notice it - the claustrophobic hitch in his chest, the way everything seems too tight-packed, even if the room is completely empty.]

[He nods, vigorous in his agreement, and immediately makes for the door.]

Yeah. Yeah, it - it'll be better out there.

[At least there'll be more space.]

[onegreeneye]

[Ginko nods; he's already up, so he heads right for the door ahead of Tim, moving urgently. After only an instant of hesitation, he pushes the door open.]

[postictal]

[That's when the world breaks.]

[Or - something to that effect. He loses everything in a fragmenting of the narrative, void-dark droplets of emptiness breaking across the seams. He opens his mouth, to shout, to scream, to call for help, something, and succeeds only inhaling the sickly scent of dead plant matter.]

[It's the pressure against his chest that follows him into waking.]