lifeaftr | July Intro: Dancing in the Dark

Entry tags:

July Intro: Dancing in the Dark

INTRO LOG: JULY

Who: New arrivals, and you!
What: New souls arrive to the archipelago of LifeAftr
When: July 4th - July 10th
Where: Primarily Io, as well as Ensō
Warnings: Mark as needed!

Last month, the island of Io saw a massive overhaul, as Eleu reunited with their lost half, Zum, to take their rightful place as the island's Avatar of Fun. Eleu'zum is aware that Io will not be remaining in the archipelago for much longer, and thus have opted to go all out in the celebration of their rejuvenation.

New arrivals may awake at any of the locations listed below.

Waterslides: Don't Let Me Get Down
For this week only, the waterslides threading throughout the bathhouses of Io have been equipped with some special new features, namely the light-up water jets laid out across the outdoor areas, as well as diving boards placed at extreme heights for thrill seekers. Sure, you could just sit around and relax in the heated water, but where's the fun in that?

The supplies at the bathhouses have also been outfitted with wide varieties of inflatable tubes and pool toys, pool noodles, beach balls, dive toys, and squirt guns of every shape, size, and color. And yes, we really do mean every possible type you can imagine.

So have a blast, get soaked, shoot off of high-speed waterslides, or try and avoid the chaos to get a little relaxation time - the choice is yours. But enjoy the bathhouses and pools while you have access to them, before Io disappears.

Go-Karts: Don't Lie Me Down
That new go-kart track by the vineyard is in dire need of some test drivers. With corkscrew turns and twisting roads, those tracks look very much like they might be a tad hazardous, especially if your kart goes off-track...but don't fear! No matter how badly you spin out, you'll find that your kart will never leave the road, thus keeping spectators safe from any and all roadside dangers.

However, just because they're safe from you doesn't mean that you're safe from them. You've got plenty of items to use against your fellow racers, but you've got nothing to protect yourself against the turrets mounted at the sides of the tracks, placed for the enjoyment of spectators who feel like getting a little more participatory. The roadside turrets are capable of spitting all sorts of additional threats upon racers: banana peels, balls of fire, jets of water, and so on.

However, bear in mind that this feature is a two-way street; climb onto one of those turrets to target racers, and they'll find that they'll have no difficulty targeting you in retaliation.

Whether you're here to watch, here to race, here to make things difficult, or simply here to place bets and keep score, you've still got plenty of drinks to wash away the shame of defeat, or celebrate your first place victory.

Hedge Maze & Butterfly House: Back into the Easy Days
Newly mounted atop the tea gardens is a brand new butterfly house, hosting a spectacular abundance of gloriously colorful specimens. With jewel-bright wings and unusually bold dispositions, one will find that these butterflies are very, very easy to behold up close. They don't seem to mind visitors at all, and will happily flutter down to light on the hands, head, and shoulders of whoever draws near, assuming they don't swat them away. The butterfly house comes equipped with small dishes of sugar water to feed them, if you desire, though you could just as easily simply spend time here to relax and look out across the island. From up here, you have quite the spectacular view.

The tea gardens have also gained a rather grandiose hedge maze threaded around the tea trees. The paler pathways are for leisurely, scenic strolls, or playful games of who can reach the finish line first. The darker pathways, on the other hand, are for the more competitive, as well as the more daredevilish; those who take those pathways will quickly find themselves racing to reach the exit before some rather large bees catch up to them.

Despite their potentially fearsome appearance, these creatures are quite harmless, but there's still nothing quite like turning around and seeing that buzzing loudly after you. If they catch you, the bees will promptly burst into a large cloud of multicolored glitter that will coat you from head to toe. And if anyone has any experience with glitter, that can be quite a pain to get rid of. You'll probably be shaking it out of your hair and brushing it from your joints for weeks.

Rollercoaster & Carnival: Overlooking Trouble Gone Bad
The rollercoaster is the newest addition to the Honeycomb, and it's as much a thrill to behold as it is to ride. There are no lines, no tickets, and no entry fees; simply climb aboard! Once the cart is full, or if no further passengers enter, it will take off at breakneck speeds, twisting and loop-de-looping in a breathtaking series of physics-defying turns and arcs.

That's not all, however. The campsites on Io have also opted to make some slight alterations to celebrate the Avatar's return to form. Those large, colorful tents have gone from mere sites of sleeping and relaxation to a full-blown carnival. There are booths where you can play simple ring-toss games and the like, as well as stands for the acquisition of cotton candy, popcorn, and just about any snack you'd find typical of a carnival...as well as a few flavors that might seem a tad bit unconventional. But, hey - as long as it's here, why not sample what's free to eat? Even if you might run into seaweed ice cream, squid-ink sundaes, crab-cake kettle-corn, and many more besides, peppered among your more ordinary flavors.

A small collection of rides have also been provided, of course; what carnival would be fit without them? A carousel with cariborn- or beowolf-styled mounts might be a bit strange to behold at first, but it rides just as well as any other. A small ferris wheel allows you to oversee the sights of Io at the peak of its curve, while whirling teacups can make for a delightful if potentially nausea-inducing escapade.

The island of Io will be disappearing from the archipelago as of July 10th, so you'd better enjoy these additions while you can! For once, there will be no strings attached!

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

This is officially more familiarity than Tim's generally okay with. He tenses at once, trying to flinch away from this guy's...everything. It's not hard to gauge that, between the rigidity of his stance and the rapid beat of his breath, he's not exactly a fan of this.

(Knife in his pocket. Lighter. Back pocket - another knife. He's not unarmed. He's not unprepared. He'd just really, really prefer to not have to use those on some new guy with no regard for personal space.)

"Great," he says, doing his best to try and squirm out from under the arm over his shoulders. "Glad to hear it."

When Tim starts wriggling, Roman lets him get away. He keeps grinning, the edges too wide, the creases under his eyes strained. Here he was trying to pretend nothing was wrong, like the Easter Bunny just didn't make his life worse and this guy has to come and wreck it.

"So what's your name? The Bunnyman decided we're in some kind of story. I wanna know everybody. We've got t-to be good for something."

"You mean the Storyteller?" Everyone's gotta nickname for them. At least he's not forcing Tim to remain uncomfortably close, which is a relief. His heart's a hammer. It's fine. All of it's fine. Nothing's wrong. Nothing's weird. The guy's smiling too much, but plenty of people do that. To cope, or whatever.

Just breathe.

Breathe, and answer the question.

"...Tim. Yours?"

Roman let his tail lash back and forth behind him. He felt like he was on top of this situation even in his clueless state.

"Roman. Nice to meet you, T-Tim." Roman bent down to start collecting his treasures again. "What were you doing when you got yanked away from home? Were you doing something important? There's gotta be something we got in c-common. I'm gonna figure it out and then blow this place. I got stuff to do."

"No. I wasn't." It's been so long since he's thought about where he came from, that the question catches him off guard, very visibly; his eyebrows lift and then scrunch downward in a frown. That's not really "home" anymore. It's just...a place he was, and now no longer is.

"Don't plan on going back, either."

Sorry, Roman. That's not one for the things we have in common column.

Roman notes that face journey that Tim goes on and turns his head so that he can look at the other man with one eye.

"Ooookay, cool." He snass his fingers and points a pair of finger-guns at Tim, carefully balancing his gotten gains in his elbows. "Touchy subject, got it! Enough about you, let's t-talk about me. I was doing something very important. I'm on a sort of spirit journey quest, I guess, and this place is a huge detour. Y'wanna help me out?"

Roman has known Tim for about ten minutes and is already on his bullshit.

The alternative here is saying no and leaving Roman to it, which might be a pretty bad idea when he doesn't even know what he's up to. Tim's expression closes off again as he sighs with the sound of someone wearily accepting that this is just their lot in life now. That's how he takes most things that come to him: with flat resignation and the assumption that he'll have to have a hand in fixing this later.

"Depends on what you mean by 'help'."

But he's also not stupid.

"I need to find somebody who needs help." Roman tries to adjust all the junk in his arms and eventually settles for just dumping it there on the fairway and keeping the bright orange water gun. It's somebody else's mess to clean up now. Tim is far more interesting. "Like a good deed k-kind of thing."

"And again, I gotta ask - depends on what you mean by help. What kind of good deeds are you aiming for?"

What is it he can do, is what Tim needs to know. The why is also definitely a question, but he's not there yet. "You know you can help people whenever you want. That's kind of the cool thing about helping people. There's not really a time limit on that or anything."

Roman's sly grin begins to fall apart. The corner of his mouth dips downward and his brows furrow just a little bit. Maybe Tim didn't get it...or maybe he did. Humans were craftier than they liked to let on.

The demon shoved the water pistol's barrel into the hem of his shorts and folded his arms behind his back so that he could pace a wide circle around Tim.

"Sure, but they have t-t-to want it. Say you had a broken leg. Say you just...fell off the pier and hit a rock real bad. You'd be all--oh! Oh, I wish my leg weren't broken! And then I, not unlike The Jesus Man, would appear and offer my aid. You know where I can find anybody like that, Tim?"

There's a moment as Tim regards him with a faint frown, digesting that diatribe to its fullest extent. Then he folds his arms across his chest. It doesn't sound like a threat, but it's hard to tell.

He's just - clearly said the wrong thing here. What a shock. Doesn't he always.

"I'm gonna go ahead and say that if you try to break my leg 'cause you feel like you really wanna help me, we're gonna have a problem."

"I'm not gonna break your leg!" Roman made sure to sound extra offended. "You look like you have enough problems as it is."

He lifted a brow and gestured to Tim's All of Him.

"It was just an example! The thing is, somebody has t-to be looking for help and I have to show up. Where do the people hang out? This place is dead."

He waved his tail at the empty stalls. Only a few rides were screaming in motion behind them and they were far from packed.

"Did the world end while I was hanging out with the Easter Bunny or what?"

"Thanks." That's not the worst thing anyone's ever said to him, at least. He just gives off the air of someone who has a lot of...problems, doesn't he? No avoiding it.

Great.

Tim blows out a slow sigh, and rubs at the bridge of his nose.

"There's maybe...sixty, seventy of us total? I dunno, man. You walk around for long enough and you'll probably run into someone else. Can't promise they're gonna need, uh, help, though."

"That's so weird..." He turned around fully, his back to Tim, and looked out toward the bath houses. "How have you guys not gone full Lord of the Flies yet? Isn't that what happens when you stick a bunch of people on an island?"

Humans were awful but...he'd seen a few that weren't. And there was his scaly ass. Maybe the jumbled population stopped that. It couldn't be that they'd learned to work together for the greater good of the archipelago. Of course not!

"Everybody just does whatever? Is anybody in charge?"

He can't remember if he's read that one, but at least he's aware enough of literature as a cultural practice to know what Roman's referring to. And, honestly, during the worst moments, it's not even that far off from what actually does happen.

Not that he's gonna say it.

"I mean, some people are in charge of certain things. You want whoever's in charge of this island here, you're gonna wanna talk to the bees."

Tim finally manages to knock the smirk off Roman's face. He faces Tim again an holds his ears crooked, wondering if he'd heard him right.

"...Bees?"

"Yeah. The bees. They're the...well, some islands have gods on them. The bees are this island's god. They're not literal bees. That's just what they look like."

Where's Connor when you need him? He could probably explain this way better - and probably way worse in certain areas. Honestly, he'd still do a better job of it than the one Tim's currently doing, he's pretty sure.

"Gods..." Roman narrows his eyes thoughtfully. Of course this place had gods. The Storyteller was one. He leans back on his tail like a kangaroo and crosses one leg over the other as he thinks about that. If there are gods, there must be devils too.

There is the very real possibility of him stepping on a bigger meaner demon's turf and getting his shit handed to him.

"T-tell me about the gods. You guys worship them?"

"I don't. I'm sure some people do." He shrugs. He doesn't have a very well-formed opinion as to deities and the worshipping of them, as long as no one here tries to convert him to any particular belief system. He grew up in Alabama. He got enough of that back home.

"They call themselves gods. So I guess they are, or they act like they are. I dunno."

"Hmm..." Roman adjusts his glasses. "Don't know if I like that. Well, Tim, thanks for the tour!" He extends an arm in a showy wave and hops back to his hooves. "I'm gonna see if I c-can't stake claim to a little territory and see what the gods think about that. Word of advice--stay away from the water slides, you might end up in another dimension."

His cheery grin drops with that advice as his ears pin at the memory of being spat out of one of the huge tubes like a pinball.

"I don't think that's how they work."

It's uttered with a deadpan delivery, eyebrows only faintly lifted, as he eyes Roman...dubiously. Let's go with that. Dubiously. So far, he's mostly talking about this place like he already knows what he's planning to do with it, which probably isn't going to get him very far.

Still, not much Tim can think of to do about it.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

July Intro: Dancing in the Dark

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject