lifeaftr | April Intro: Better Get to Digging

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April Intro: Better Get to Digging

INTRO LOG: APRIL

Who: New arrivals, and you!
What: New souls arrive to the archipelago of LifeAftr
When: April 4th and onward
Where: Cahypdo
Warnings: Mark as needed!

Waking up to the gentle proddings of what appears to be very curious, sentient trees isn't the worst wake up call LifeAftr has to offer. For our newest arrivals, however, it may be a tad…odd.

Situated in the valley between two mountains, Elower is a scenic village filled with the friendly Roaka, tree-like beings that are rather peaceable and happy to assist those who have just arrived. I'’s a peaceful location for one to start their adventures - though, unfortunately, it doesn't stay peaceful for long.

Cahypdo: You'll Bury Me Low
Those who have explored the new island of Cahypdo in the last month will undoubtedly recall the series of quakes that shook the island throughout March. With the arrival of LifeAftr's newest adventurers comes Cahypdo's largest tremor to date, striking without warning and more than enough force to throw even the steadiest and sturdiest of your number to the ground. With a low rumble, the mountains heaped on either side of the island will start to shed an abundance of slag and debris, pouring down their slopes. Anyone who's scaling those peaks risks being flung bodily off them when the outpouring of shale comes roaring down those mountains, and anyone at the mountain bases risks being crushed beneath.

As one might expect, unsuspecting newcomers aren't all that have been shaken up. Though protected by netting and retaining walls, the cliffs around and above the village of Elower can only take so much pressure before giving way - a threshold that has been crossed entirely. With a sound like thunder, rocks fall.

Everyone dies?

Only if you don't act quickly. Roaka housing is sturdy in build, enough to protect a decidedly less sturdy body from all but the heaviest of boulders. Hiding inside any of their village constructs built into the sides of the mountains will certainly save you from taking a new weight onto your shoulders. They will not, however, save you from being buried alive.

For those who become trapped inside any of those abodes, your options appear limited. Work to free yourself, or wait for help to arrive. Though, speaking of help, those outside may think to offer the Roaka a helping hand in getting their trapped people - and yours, at that - a few breaths of fresh air.

Before you suffocate.

Cahypdo: Stay Acting Brave
Such seismic activity will also stir up the local wildlife, of course. Those unfortunate enough to come across them will recognize the restless shark-dragon hybrids, hydrac, now prowling across the shorelines, while the wickedly fanged wabbits will also be far more frequent, traveling in larger numbers in the jungle and at the bases of the mountains. Taking care to avoid them would be wise - though another creature may make that venture much more difficult.

Lorbies have been unlocked in the bestiary!

A strange mix between owl and serpent, the recent quake has clearly startled these usually reclusive creatures into the open. Alone, a lorby is a rather skittish animal, prone to hiding from most perceived threats. Useless for food due to the toxicity of their flesh, lorbies do have the potential to be tamed...but this comes with its own risks.

A lorby may be prone to flight rather than fight when encountered solo, but in groups, these feathery critters are far more hostile. A defensive lorby emits a piercing cry alone, but a group is an almost ear-piercing experience, capable of rendering the unfortunate unstable on their feet at best, and unconscious at worst. For the days that follow the severe earthquake that so rocked everyone's foundations, any hope for silence is lost in the infrequent bursts of almighty screeching by colonies of lorbies who have so rudely had their homes overturned and disturbed.

While the lorby is omnivorous, it may not think to take a bite at anything so much larger than them. That doesn't mean that conflict with these fluffy creatures won't attract something much more willing to take advantage of the fact that you may or may not have been reduced to a prone sack of meat. If something else does arrive, you best hope that it's a friendly face.

If you're interested in keeping a lorby for your own, bear LifeAftr's companion limit in mind - two per character, and no more. The lorby is omnivorous and can survive off of most odds and ends: insects, fruits, berries, critters it can dig up in the sand, and more. However, the process of trying to tame a lorby is not always successful. We recommend use of a d10, with the following guidelines:

Rolling a 10: Critical success! This lorby will love and adore you, and may even feel comfortable enough to drape itself along your neck like a beautiful, furry scarf, churring softly all the way.
Rolling 7-9: This lorby will prove high-strung and timid, even if safely befriended, and will take several weeks to warm up to you. But once it does, it's yours!
Rolling 2-6: Failure. The lorby enters a state of distress and starts screaming. Hope you brought earplugs, or you'll be snoozing for several long hours for your efforts.
Rolling a 1: Critical failure. Not only does the lorby start screaming, but its panic attracts a colony of its friends, and they all start screaming too.

Bear in mind that these are only guidelines; you are free to predetermine successes or failures as you'd like, presuming your character can sustain the companion! Our discord channel has a room for dice-rolls, if you prefer.

All new arrivals will awake with knapsacks, their names stitched to the front. The contents of said knapsacks can all be found in your acceptance notices!

As a final note to those who participated in the Test Drive Meme, bear in mind that 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.

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 )

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ From the corner of his eye, Maine looks down at Wash. Wonders at the odd stress in his friend's voice. Wonders, and adds it to an ever-growing list of questions — right alongside why Wash asked his name.

After grunting in acknowledgment, Maine considers Wash's words. Finds himself almost immediately annoyed that there's not something they can do to get a definitive answer. He doesn't like uncertainty. Prefers things to be concrete, or at least actionable.

And so, in the vein of dreams: ]

Could pinch.

[ What? It might work. ]

[Wash laughs. It's not a full-throated thing - just a breathy little huff of noise, tired and strained.]

Yeah. Yeah, you could. Would verify whether we're both really seeing this, sure thing.

[Whether he's really seeing his friend.]

[(He's seen him so many times, too many times, to know if he's really seeing him.)]

[If a pinch would do it, he won't complain. He'd forgive entirely too much, over and over again, for no reason besides the obvious: that Maine is here, and he's his friend, and he'd give anything it took to hold him back from what waits for him past this exact moment.]

[But he can't.]

[So instead, Wash crouches, picks one of those flowers that always grows near the mana pool, and twirls it between gloved fingertips.]

[ That's not a great laugh. It might be better than nothing, but it still sounds bad. Still emphasizes how tired Wash obviously is, even with his face concealed by his helmet.

Maine puts those feelings aside. Hums in consideration as he mag-locks his pistol to his thigh and picks a flower as well, mimicking his friend once again. The flower is a nice one, Maine thinks. Has a long enough stem that he can hold it between two fingers while he uses his thumb and forefinger to … well. Pinch himself.

Fully armored, there's not a whole lot available to pinch. But unlike most Freelancers, Maine's shoulders aren't covered by an outer shell. So he pinches the black bodysuit covering his upper arms. Grunts a little when he feels it.

Dammit.

Seeking a second opinion, Maine gestures to Wash and taps the same spot — "pinch."

Sure, it's ridiculous. But it's less ridiculous than trusting a giant rabbit. ]

Oh, what? You're serious?

[Maybe Maine can hear it: the smile in his tone, right-cornered and wry. It's a simple measure, but...it makes sense, the way things here follow their own kind of shitty logic. They met in a dream, and it felt like a dream - a more linear dream than most of his, and less horrifying than his dreams tend to be, but it felt like it enough for him to accept it at face value.]

[Not so much anymore. Can't shrug that away.]

All right, buddy.

[He's quick about it. Reaches up at the black bodysuit and pinches, and - yep. Feels real.]

[ Simple, direct solutions are often the most effective ones, in Maine's opinion. And he feels the pinch. It feels real. He doesn't think that a hallucination could do that. Combine the sharp twinge of pain with everything else…

Shit. This probably is real.

The big Freelancer nods; he felt that. Then, determined not to think on it too hard until he gets that sitrep, Maine raises the flower.

They throw these in the pool, right? ]

[That kind of reaction is one of the things about Freelancer that Wash, though hard-pressed to admit it, might genuinely miss. The ability to take whatever shit is happening and assimilate it into your world-view, because combat won't wait for you to be perturbed or shocked at the presence of anomalies - of aliens, of A.I. jabbering to each other, of armor mods going haywire. You take it into account, and move on.]

[Have your existential crises on your own time.]

Think islets. That's where we're at.

[By we he means the Alpha A.I. you probably have no idea even exists and the plant-tiger that our former teammate adopted, but you know what? He's going to save those explanations for when he has to make them.]

[Fast travel now. Explanations later. A good philosophy.]

[Wash tosses his flower in before he can catch himself second-guessing that.]

[ As far as Maine's concerned, rolling with the punches is the only way to live. If he let himself go to pieces every time an orderly mission went to chaos, he would've died on his first deployment. All he can do is move forward. Deal with whatever emotional bullshit crops up later — or just suppress it until it explodes in the form of anger. Historically, Maine has favored the latter.

"We" gets another look. He hadn't thought to ask Wash who else might be here. But he doesn't interrupt to do it now. He thinks "islets," waits until his friend tosses the flower, then — feeling a little ridiculous — Maine follows suit.

Before Maine can wonder how the hell this is supposed to work, it's already done. ]

[Wash at least has the benefit of experience with teleportation, thanks to Grif's grenades. (He still refuses to call them "futurecubes" out of principle of it.) He can take disorientation in stride, shaking away the disconcerting feeling of the ground abruptly no longer being the ground beneath his feet.]

[Breathe out.]

All right. Ground here is solid.

[ Maine, on the other hand, has zero experience with teleportation. His stomach twists; he feels like he's falling; his feet find the ground, and he immediately staggers. It's not graceful by a long shot. And the low growl between his teeth may be wordless, but it manages to summarize a whole slew of curses.

Fucking shit, he doesn't like that feeling. At all.

To his credit, Maine recovers from the shock quickly enough. But, judging by the dark look he casts the mana pool, he's not eager to travel again.

When Maine looks to his teammate, the nod he gives is an expectant one. All right, they're on solid ground. What now? ]

You okay?

[And he was so certain he'd never be doing the anxious friend-hover thing. That was a fucking joke, sure. If he takes his eyes off him for two seconds, the terror that he'll just be gone again is very much real.]

[But he's not.]

[This hallucination isn't dispersing, and he's proven himself alarmingly solid, and there's a weight in the pit of Wash's stomach that won't fade because of it.]

Can be kind of disorienting the first time. We can take a minute if you...need that.

[When has Maine ever needed a minute, Wash. Jesus.]

[ When, indeed.

The suggestion earns a startled look from Maine. Not offended — there's no growl, huff, or snort of dismissal — but honestly surprised. Like Maine's not sure what to make of it.

He's not critically wounded. He's not at risk of bleeding out. As far as he knows, he hasn't suffered any head injuries. He still doesn't understand the situation, and rectifying that is his top priority.

He can handle disorientation and feeling slightly sick because of it. He's fine.

He's always fine.

So Maine shakes his head. Grunts out: ]

Sitrep.

[ That's what he needs. Not a minute to collect himself. ]

[No more delays, Agent.]

[He's stalled for long enough.]

[Wash...flounders. For a minute, there might be something familiar in the uncertainty that averts his gaze, has him looking at his feet, fumbling to figure out the right way to say what needs saying. Where to even begin. Feels like being a rookie again, coming up against the barrier of agents who were stronger and smarter and better than him in every way, and that didn't matter so much except when they could hold that over his head and shut him up.]

...right. Okay. So - few months ago, right? I end up here. I'm not alone, either. C.T., she's here too.

[ Unlike the strange silence and the way Wash seemed to scrutinize him earlier, this delay is a familiar one. This is one brought on by Wash working to gather his thoughts. This is uncertainty. Maybe insecurity.

Other Agents might tell Wash to hurry up and spit it out. Maine — who chooses his own words so carefully when he elects to use them — stays quiet. He waits, attentive but not impatient.

He doesn't mind the delay. Never has.

"C.T." takes a second to process. It's a relatively new change, and it's one that Maine's still adjusting to. When he gets it, he nods, encouraging Wash to continue. ]

[How much does he get into here. Good lord.]

She'd been through...a lot. She was from a different point - she'd been somewhere else. We knew her, and then she ended up in a place like this one, but not this one. Somewhere...thousands of years ahead, in the future.

[He hates this. He hates this so much because now having to explain the plot of Airlocked when he wasn't even there is proving nigh impossible.]

If that doesn't make any sense to you, don't worry. It didn't make sense to me either. What mattered is she knew things about...how things were going to end up with the Project, since she was from...later than I was.

[ Wash is right: it doesn't make sense to Maine. Then again, what does make sense here? Between the giant rabbit, the dream with Wash that wasn't a dream, the tree-creature that prodded him awake, and the fact that Wash is somehow years older, Maine's idea of 'what makes sense' is starting to become a little skewed.

So Maine takes it in stride as best he can. Just asks— ]

Time travel?

[ — to make sure he's following. ]

Less...travel, and more...you know, things keep moving. Not everyone shows up from the same...time. Basically.

[Church told him he was the worst and explanations, and Wash is beginning to suspect that this is true. He's doing a terrible job of explaining this.]

So C.T. was from...later.

And so am I.

[How much later?]

[God but he does not want to say.]

[ Yeah, that's a pretty terrible explanation. Which Wash may be able to gather from the way that Maine just … stares at him.

And stares.

And keeps staring.

Wanna try that one again, buddy? ]

[LONG SIGH. He is trying. He is trying and learning that explanations are not among his skillset. Which he knew already, but he's getting a good strong reminder.]

Time keeps moving back home. We end up here, and things...freeze. According to the Storyteller. If we go back, things keep going. So it's like we were never here, the timeline keeps progressing, and sometimes people get picked from different points in that timeline.

[Probably not that much better.]

[ It still doesn't seem possible (physically or otherwise), but the explanation is better than the last attempt. Maine considers it for a moment, remembers that he's not a fucking physicist, and just. Decides to roll with it.

Really, what else can he do? Maine doesn't understand exactly how slipspace works either, though he's certainly traveled through it enough. They're being yanked here from different points in time. Sure. Fuck it. Why not?

So Maine nods, accepting the explanation. Then he asks: ]

She good?

[ C.T., he means. ]

...

[Well, that's proof enough that he's pretty shitty at laying things out.]

She's gone now. I don't know.

[The words come out rougher than he expected. They were...close during the Project, as close as agents can be when the very environment discourages it. And after she'd gone, there was never really a chance to say it: goodbye.]

[(The part of him that hates goodbyes would be grateful, but he knows it's not really him who's thinking it.)]

That's the other part of it. Sometimes people go home.

[ In retrospect, Maine realizes that he should've picked up on that. Wash used past tense: "she was"; "she knew." But Maine didn't notice. And now it seems he's kicked a sore spot.

Dammit.

The big Freelancer doesn't apologize in so many words. But he shifts his weight and grunts a wordless, "My bad." Acknowledging the error as his. Then, aloud: ]

Know how?

[ A longshot — why would Wash still be here if he knew how to get home? — but he'd be remiss not to ask. ]

[He's sorry for chafing things raw. Wash waves it off, shrugs armored shoulders. She's gone. If he let grief blindside him every time someone disappeared, he'd be a wreck. Processing someone else's grief in triplicate, in the burning pit of Epsilon's nerves as they chewed him inside and out, gave him enough practice to accept and discard it as it comes.]

[That's probably not healthy.]

Sometimes they die. C.T. just...disappeared. You ask the Storyteller, they'll usually confirm what happened to them. Though how much of that is true is another thing entirely. [Trust is a hard thing to come by; a rabbit god doesn't make the cut.]

[ That gets a low grumble of agreement. It's hard enough for Maine to accept that the talking rabbit is real. Actually trusting such a creature is another matter entirely.

It's good, he thinks, that C.T. didn't die — though vanishing doesn't sound much better. Judging by the tone of Wash's voice, his friend's not happy about her disappearance.

Maine chooses not to press the issue.

Another shift of his weight, back to center. Maine's not at attention — this isn't a formal briefing — but it's the same sort of focus. A silent signal for Wash to proceed. ]

Right. Okay.

[He's...not sure how best to proceed.]

Carolina? She was here too. Same...same thing. Here for a bit, and then she just disappears, no warning. The Director too.

[It takes him a minute to banish the residual heatwave of fury that pronouncement engenders. Breathe, smooth it down, and...yeah. He was here. Now he's not. It doesn't matter.]

[ Having no animosity toward the Director himself, Maine's not sure what to make of the shift in Wash's mood. He tilts his head slightly, puzzled. Considers asking about it, but decides not to.

They had leadership here. It's gone now. Wash had people he knew, and now they're gone.

Anger is understandable. Fuck knows Maine falls back on it all the time.

Seeking to pull Wash's focus from past events, he prompts: ]

Currently?

[ What does he need to know about the present situation? ]

April Intro: Better Get to Digging

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