lifeaftr | July Adventure: Where the Weeds are Now Growing Free

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July Adventure: Where the Weeds are Now Growing Free

NEW ISLAND: UMUI

Who: Everyone!
What: Umui appears, and a new adventure begins
When: July 10th and onward
Where: Umui
Warnings: Tag as you go!

'Cause the Dirt is Up to My Eyes
As of July 10th, the mana pools on Ensō and its islets will now allow for travel to the new island of Umui.

Travelers will arrive on a mana pool situated on the C1 square. The thick crops of flowers spring freely across the lush, grassy landscape, clustered in dense knots. The variety behind these growths seems profoundly limited: it is as though each flower has only sprouted around others of its kind, mingling solely at the edges. A large building looms in the corner of the region, a twisting, unfurling mass of piping and a half-crumbled metallic shine.

Whatever lays inside, or beyond the island's limits, is for you to discover for yourself.

Welcome to the new island of Umui! As the island is now accessible, feel free to begin preparations and explorations in this log, or create new ones of your own! For further information in regards to the island, or plotting, the following links may prove handy:

[ ♆ ] OOC info and introductory post
[ ♆ ] Optional future event sign-up
[ ♆ ] Umui on the Locations page
[ ♆ ] Search Requests page

LOGS ● OOC ● STORIES ● MAIN NAVIGATION

( CODED BY BOOTYCALL )

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ Zelda isn't exactly oblivious to her companions' conversations: she hears them, but her mind is elsewhere. This is uncharted territory, and without the threat of... say, a very hungry elevator, the princess can devote herself fully into the pursuit of - ]

Look! [ The pursuit of the buildings in the distance, which begin to rise gradually into their view. Where she had been turning one of the sparse flowers between her fingers a moment before, Zelda can now see countless blooms, bright and inviting.

She doesn't quite run on ahead, but she's very clearly eager. ]

Do you know anything about that place? What it might be? [ They have more experience on the islands, after all... though, this one is supposedly new to everyone. ]

It's not me I'm -

[He abandons the justification the moment Zelda speaks up. It's fucking troubling, is the only bottom line he has to offer, and that's obvious enough for everyone to have grasped it thoroughly from the get-go.]

Everything seems abandoned. There's these houses, but they're always in groups of ten. And full of flowers, like everything else.

[Two-by-five rows - a sameness that he finds unsettling.]

[ She knows. She gets it, and she's wary too, but also, there's no use worrying about it now. They're already here, and too far from the mana pool to be able to get off the island quickly. Even if it is a bad idea, it's too late now.

Besides, at least one of their little party seems enthusiastic enough. CT shoots Wash what she hopes he recognizes as a sympathetic look, then follows Zelda's gaze, peering at the buildings ahead with a frown. ]

Only what everyone else has found.

[ It's her first time on the island, but she's been silently reading the remnants people have been posting on the stones or reading aloud, and not liking the conclusions she's coming to. ]

Probably housing. For the -

The infected.

The infected... [ She repeats the words, frowning as she comes to a stop. What they've learned about this island and its former inhabitants is - not good, to say the least. Zelda swallows, thinking of the place being full of life and business, and then... to have it all swallowed up with disease.

Infection of any kind is ugly, even one of flowers. ]

We should see if there are any survivors. [ Zelda murmurs, optimistic to the last. And then, to avoid sounding too naive: ] ... Or else, more information about the kind of lives that they led.

I'd be surprised if there were any. Everything seems pretty...old.

[Maybe that's what rubs him wrong about this many flowers. It's exactly like standing on a mass grave. As far as they know, that may as well be what this is, all of it. No matter what the initial intention must have been, it's plain from the state of things that it didn't succeed.]

[That, or...the people just left, eventually.]

[He's not holding out hope on that bit.]

Either of you seen those automatons yet?

[ CT nods in somber agreement, throwing Zelda a sympathetic look. It's a nice thought, but... ]

I think everyone here's been dead for a long time.

[ She glances at Wash, shaking her head. ]

Not me. What about you?

I haven't. [ But she'd like to, and soon. ] How do you expect they factored in to this society? Were they - helpers?

[ Guardians, perhaps? That would be a little too close to home, though - thank the Goddess, Hyrule has seen no flower-producing disease like this. ]

Is it possible that the flowers still growing here are... able to spread their sickness?

[ It's a dire thought, and one that pales her. ]

People are talking about them like they were...nurses. I think the documentation keeps calling them "guardian units," so it'd fit the bill.

[SO THEY'RE TOTALLY TAKING THIS SEVENTEEN-YEAR-OLD ON A STROLL THROUGH A HOSPICE ISLAND. GREAT.]

...I don't think diseases last that long. [But, yeah, he has that concern. He has that very fucking heavy concern, and no idea how to reasonably alleviate it. Nor is he going to lie to the kid about it.] Plenty of people have been coming to and from this place without any signs that they've been getting sick.

[ CT presses her mouth into a thin line. She has exactly the same concerns that Wash does, but like him, she's not about to voice them to a teenager. Especially one as sheltered and naive as Zelda seems to be. ]

We don't even know who was living here back then. They could have had entirely different immune systems than we do.

[ She's talking out of her ass, but as long as Zelda doesn't figure that out, what does it matter? If they are at risk, nothing she says or doesn't say is going to change that now. ]

Even if the - virus, or whatever, was still viable, we might not even be able to catch it.

Of course. [ That's right, CT: those people could have been a different species entirely. Zelda nods firmly, thoughts drifting back to theories and away from worrying about the potential for infection. ] If it was very intense and quick to spread throughout the population, it may have been shorter-lived than some other sicknesses. ... And, without victims, it might have died out entirely, if it was something that needed a host to survive...

[ She doesn't look enthused at this possibility and is still frowning hard, fretting over the well-being of people who are long dead. ]

Exactly. [C.T. knows him well enough to hear the drawn-tight wire of tension clenched beneath the veneer of relief, as he says it, but he nods for Zelda's benefit - as well as his own. There's no plausible reason a virus would have survived without hosts. He's not a biologist, but there's just...no way. Right?]

But there's a lot of pieces here we're still picking up, like...

[He stops in front of a pair of rusted-up automatons, snarled in vines. Counts them out carefully: six total.]

Like these. For example.

[ CT steps closer, studying the half-rusted forms lying in the dirt. ]

Shit...

[ She glances up at Wash. ]

We've gotta be able to get something out of these, right?

[ As they discuss the possibility of scavenging, Zelda closes in on the automatons. The princess gets down on her knees, peering down and around the machines with such interest that she may, at some points, have her nose nearly touching the rusted metal. ]

These were their caretakers, then? Or - perhaps there were different jobs assigned to the machines. Some of them may have been here for protection... To fight anyone who...

[ Well, is it impossible that someone though it better to eliminate the infected population rather than to try an heal them? It makes her heart ache to imagine it, but it isn't as if this is something that's never happened before in history. ]

Materials, if nothing else.

[He exchanges her look, concern and uncertainty, before crouching at the feet of one of them.]

I guess they weren't immune. The growth's coming from inside this one. [He nudges the vines that are flowing out from the gaps in its neck joints, curling up around its chassis.]

No wonder these people died out.

How did machines get infected with this?

[ Implausible as the whole thing is to begin with, the idea of nonorganics suffering the same fate seems downright impossible. She bends in closer, squinting at the thing. ]

Maybe they didn't? Maybe this is just...you know, overgrowth. From however long they've been lying here.

I... don't know. [ She looks from the machines back to CT, brow still furrowed in thought and mounting concern. ] I would think that - well, it's as you say. But...

[ It makes more sense that it would be overgrowth. More than that, it doesn't make sense that human and machine could suffer from the same malady. ... And yet, is it possible, in this realm of seemingly-endless impossible things? ]

We should continue on. There may be more that we can learn ahead.

[He's not an engineer here, and there are probably people more suited ot the task of taking these things apart. Wash straightens, regarding the tangle of machinery parts skeptically.]

We can come back for them, I guess. They might be good for parts, or...something.

[ But. Zelda doesn't even have to finish the thought. Of course it seems impossible, but isn't all of this impossible? Why should this be the exception?

She straightens when Wash does, nodding in agreement and glancing around to get her bearings, to make sure she can find the place again. ]

Or information.

[ There has to be something. She brushes herself off with a frown, glancing briefly up at the sky. At this rate, they're going to have to find a place to camp out here. Great. ]

Come on, let's check out a couple of these buildings.

[ Zelda simply nods, following CT and Wash as they begin to move forward. Ideally, yes, they'll be able to take the machines apart in order to understand them a bit better. For now, there's more to see... and, hopefully, to learn. ]

You must have much more advanced technology in your world than what's found here. [ Or in Hyrule. She eyes their armor and weapons, trying to liken it to anything she's really seen in her studies, but coming up short. ] Is this all very primitive to you?

Not...primitive, I'd say. Just outdated, maybe.

[None of these things are on the same level as, say, Texas's gynoid body, or even Lopez's haphazard, oft-destroyed construct cobbled together by a bunch of morons in a box canyon.]

It's hard to say when everything here already looks like it's been laying around for years.

I've seen primitive. This isn't it.

[ But Wash is right. With how rusted out everything is, with the flowers growing all over everything, it's hard to tell much about it at all. She sighs, then nods towards the building ahead of them, glancing up at the sky, the sun lowering towards the horizon. ]

We might wanna think about finding a place for the night.

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July Adventure: Where the Weeds are Now Growing Free

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