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

[postictal]

Something about the self-deprecating slant seems to work. It's for the best that someone in this band has a little more self-respect than the average guy. Gladio's got the tattoo-clad badass biker look and plays drums like an animal, which makes it hard, at times, for someone like Tim to understand why someone so objectively cool would bother with a music nerd just south of "freak" and a little west of "hipster."

The motorcycle's a telltale sign that the place isn't empty when Tim nudges the door open, and he actually grins once he actually gets a handle on what it is he's looking at.

"Battle of the bands," he reads, which only has one connotation that can't be right, because that would imply they're actually, uh. Good? "You set your sights high, huh?"

[piercetheheart]

Tim, c'mon dude, you wound him.

"We can definitely rock this." He claps a hand on Tim's shoulder, urging him to come along with him into the kitchen. "I've been going through songs. Trying to decide which ones we should do." Because there's so many options, right?

Why wouldn't they know a ton of songs? Why would Gladio know any songs? Wait-

[postictal]

“You sure? ‘Cause I think this flyer says they only want good bands, and...” He trails off, but there’s no hiding the right-handed smirk that cuts one side of his face as he shakes his head and slouches into the kitchen after. “How’d you hear about this, anyway? Kinda higher profile than a house party or a dive bar.”

Even in a fantasy, Tim can’t help but play the cynic. It’s what he’s best at.

[piercetheheart]

"You shut your face." Damn Tim, don't be so negative. This is an awesome opportunity.

"Stopped by the parlor and they said we should try out." As he says it he taps his left shoulder, just to clarify what he means. "And we should! Just gotta get the rest of the guys together and decide on songs." Even as he says it his expression starts to fall. Who are the other guys?

[postictal]

An awesome opportunity, sure, but the feeling that it’s somehow bizarrely undeserved won’t lie docile in his head, for...whatever reason. There’s no way they’ve got anywhere near the requisite talent or familiarity for something like this, right?

“We might need to bribe Jay into this. Can’t see him loving this kinda crowd.” And...that can’t be it, right? There’s someone on vocs, there has to be, just - hell if he can remember who.

Weird. Must be blanking.

[piercetheheart]

Jay, right, how could he forget? Except...

"Who's Jay?" Slow, suspicious, and now he's starting to really wonder just what is going on here. If Tim is blanking then Gladio is blanking even more. There's so many details that, now they're talking about it are... just...

Gone.

[postictal]

“Jay? Uh, the guy who plays bass?” His smile wavers, broken through with a sense of uncertainty building in the pit of his stomach. For some reason, the fact that there’s a blank spot where ordinary, everyday knowledge should be squeezes at his temples, painfully.

Why would something like they upset him?

But why would Gladio forget someone as important as Jay?

“This, uh...isn’t funny, man.”

[piercetheheart]

"Not... trying to be funny, dude." Gladio frowns, watches Tim's expression.

"Hey, you need something? Water? Caffeine? Look like you've got a headache." Then he's moving across the kitchen to grab a glass, only it's the wrong cupboard. A room he'd been so very familiar with ten minutes ago now feeling foreign to him. It all felt a little strange, honestly.

[postictal]

"Could ask the same for you," says Tim, trying for teasing but landing more in the realm of...concerned, maybe. This isn't good. This isn't right.

Now that he thinks of it, though, his throat feels pretty goddamn parched. Like he hasn't eaten or drank anything in...days, maybe? Kinda ridiculous, because he's been doing objectively pretty fine, hasn't he? He should be fine. He is fine. Everything is fine.

"I guess I...yeah. I'm pretty thirsty."

[piercetheheart]

It took a couple of tries but he found the right cupboard, got a glass of water for Tim and handed it over. Then turned to the fridge to grab himself another drink.

"Don't got any Ebony do ya?" He's not usually one for coffee but right now it sounds like a good idea, something to keep him awake and alert. He's not meant to be sleeping. Is he? Hmmm, no there's a reason he needs to stay awake and it's something more important than a battle of the bands.

[postictal]

"Any...what?" The question shoots a jag of something sickening through his gut, unfurling in the cavity of his chest like some ugly flower taking root, clotting the roof of his mouth with the taste of stale bile.

He gulps down a mouthful of water, and then another. It does nothing to chase the foul, cloying taste.

It's getting hard to breathe.

"Something...smells."

[piercetheheart]

"You leave something in the fridge again?" But the smell wasn't coming from the fridge, it didn't seem to be coming from anywhere specific. He turns around, eyes Tim for a moment, then the house in general. It doesn't really look like anywhere in Insomnia, now that he thinks of it. Too rural.

"What is that?" It's hard to concentrate on the inconsistencies with that stench though.

[postictal]

"It smells like..." He doesn't wanna complete the sentence. It'd be weird to say it smells like plants, because he doesn't keep plants. Does he look like a gardener? Alabama has its fair share of ag majors, sure, but he's never been one of them.

"If this is some kind of practical joke," mutters Tim, all concerns about music abandoned as he starts to open cupboards, drawers, scouring the place in search of a source of whatever the hell is reeking like that.

[piercetheheart]

Gladio'd be more keen to liken it to fertilizer. After the Night fell Monica had always smelled subtly of it. Compost and leaf litter and while Tim dug through cabinets Gladio tugged open the back door, stepping out onto the deck, searching for the cause of the smell.

Tim didn't really seem like the type to compost but maybe?

He ducked his head back inside, nose wrinkled in disgust. "It's the same outside, dude. I don't think this is a joke."

[postictal]

"Yeah, 'cause I don't know anyone who would pull this shit." Emphasis on shit, maybe. Brian could pull off a practical joke or two, but he knows Tim's not really...he's not someone who favors that sort of thing.

Something's wrong.

Something is very deeply wrong, and it's like there's an itch under his skin, like there's something bubbling in his chest that refuses to be clawed out.

"You know me, right?" he says abruptly, staring Gladio dead in the face. "You know me. We - we know each other. Have forever. Right?"

[piercetheheart]

He's halfway to marching into the living room, leaving the thorough search of the kitchen to Tim when that question stops him in his tracks.

Have forever.

It's wrong, he knows it is. He's known Ignis and Noctis for as long as he can remember. So maybe not forever but surely he's known Tim for ages too.

"Why can't I remember how we met?" Because that's the sort of thing you remember about lifelong friends. "I... know..." you. It's meant to be a reassurance but the last word sticks in his throat and it feels like a lie. Does he? Does he really?

"Tim...?" He frowns, looks around the room once more, so foreign, so strange to him now. "I don't... think this is... how it's supposed to be."

[postictal]

"Then how is it?"

How'd we meet? He doesn't know. There's something swimming underneath all this, something dark and ugly and too tall and he doesn't want to look at it, but it's leering out at him without eyes and it'll shred him alive, it's like water sticking in his lungs in his throat, it's like electricity firing off in his brain. You've always been sick, Timothy Wright. You've always been sick.

There's something outside the window.

Then there isn't.

The world shivers, like static tearing through a still frame, stripping away the curtain for a split second to reveal the dark, earthy interior of something else.