Child of the Gods (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
uncoincidental) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
bentoboxed2024-08-23 10:26 pm
uncoincidental) wrote in bentoboxed2024-08-23 10:26 pm
second verse, same as the first
It's been nagging at you for a while now, hasn't it?
For the last couple of weeks, you've been feeling like something isn't quite wrapped up. Like you need to go back and take care of it - but back to where, and what is it, exactly? Is it your homeland, if you've ended up somewhere new after all is said and done? Or is it whatever place you ended up in temporarily for those horrible, traumatic weeks? Regardless of where, or how long ago it was, you know deep in your bones: it isn't over after all.
It starts as a feeling, perhaps. And then you find your thoughts wandering to the time you spent away from your worlds, to the people you met there, and to the people you left behind once it was time to part ways. Those wandering thoughts turn into vivid dreams, memories of the time you spent fighting for your lives that play on repeat each time you try to close your eyes and go to sleep.
And then, suddenly - when you wake - you find yourself in the lounge of a small apartment complex, a keyring with two keys on it on your person; one that looks like it's for a door and one that looks like it's for a mailbox. Instinctively, you know: this is your home, for now. It's where you can stay as you sort out what needs to be done.
After all, you've got unfinished business. You wouldn't be here if you didn't.
For the last couple of weeks, you've been feeling like something isn't quite wrapped up. Like you need to go back and take care of it - but back to where, and what is it, exactly? Is it your homeland, if you've ended up somewhere new after all is said and done? Or is it whatever place you ended up in temporarily for those horrible, traumatic weeks? Regardless of where, or how long ago it was, you know deep in your bones: it isn't over after all.
It starts as a feeling, perhaps. And then you find your thoughts wandering to the time you spent away from your worlds, to the people you met there, and to the people you left behind once it was time to part ways. Those wandering thoughts turn into vivid dreams, memories of the time you spent fighting for your lives that play on repeat each time you try to close your eyes and go to sleep.
And then, suddenly - when you wake - you find yourself in the lounge of a small apartment complex, a keyring with two keys on it on your person; one that looks like it's for a door and one that looks like it's for a mailbox. Instinctively, you know: this is your home, for now. It's where you can stay as you sort out what needs to be done.
After all, you've got unfinished business. You wouldn't be here if you didn't.
PROFILES
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❝ If I hadn't been so mad, if the call hadn't come at exactly that moment... I wonder if I would have answered it differently. ❞
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❝ Now we can show the angels what we really think of them. ❞
LOCATIONS
Week 0: Dreadmoor Apartments
Newly-arrived tenants of the Dreadmoor Apartments will find themselves in a comfortable and cozy lounge. There is a three-seater couch in front of a coffee table in one part of the room, with armchairs at either end of the table. A flat-screen TV hangs on the wall, in place so that people on the couch or chairs can watch whatever happens to be on - a remote control on the coffee table, which also contains a tenant directory and a different "coffee table book" each time someone visits the lounge, controls the channels and volume.
Nearby, there is a countertop which has a beverage dispenser with fruit-infused water, a coffee dispenser, a hot water dispenser, a collection of individually-wrapped tea bags, cream and sugar, stir sticks, and disposable cups. There are well-maintained potted plants in the room, contributing to a relaxing atmosphere.
There are three doors - one labeled "Leasing Office," located near the couch and chairs; set of double doors that leads out to the courtyard; and a set of double doors above which hangs an "EXIT" sign. Windows are set into the walls, filling the lounge with natural light. The glass is tempered and cannot be broken.
Exit
The double doors leading outside of the apartment complex are currently locked. No amount of force will bust them open, and all attempts to pick the locks will fail.
Leasing Office
The door to the leasing office is locked; however, there is a small window with the blinds drawn; you can kind of see through them to make out what looks like a standard office, with a desk, a comfortable-looking chair, and filing cabinets. Occasionally one may see the silhouette of someone through the blinds, but one will never see anyone enter or exit the office, and if you focus on the shadow, it disappears. The window's glass is tempered and cannot be broken.
Courtyard
A peaceful, idyllic courtyard with plenty of greenery - flowers, trees, shrubs, and so on. There is a fountain at the center, with benches around it for sitting. A few picnic tables are in the shade of a tree, and between some other trees are two hammocks, perfect for relaxing in.
There are also three outdoor grilling stations, charcoal already in and ready to go. You will, however, have to provide your own fire.
The courtyard is at the center of the apartment complex, or at least the part of the apartment complex tenants currently have access to. The doorway to the lounge is at one end of the couryard, with entryways to the apartments themselves along either side and two outdoor stairways, one in the left corner near the doorway to the lounge and one in the right corner opposite it, leading up to partially-enclosed walkways to access the apartments on the second floor.
At the opposite side of the courtyard is a pathway that would normally lead to other amenities; however, it is currently blocked off by a sturdy iron gate.
Apartments
Each newly-arrived tenant has an apartment of their very own on either the first or second floor! These one-bedroom homes contain a living room, a kitchen, a bathroom, and a bedroom each for their very own. First-floor bedrooms have a sliding door which opens out to an enclosed patio; second-floor bedrooms have a sliding door which opens out to a balcony. Any attempts to go over the railings and escape to the outdoors will fail; the second they slip over the railings and expect to be setting foot on the ground, they will find themselves standing on their patio or balcony again. The scenery they look out at looks like scenery from each apartment owner's homeworld.
The apartments themselves come furnished with the necessities, and the kitchens are stocked with ingredients and cookware necessary to prepare meals from their homelands and their gamelands. They are all decorated to match the tenants' tastes - almost as if they were the ones who picked out the furniture after signing their own lease. Tenants will find the personal belongings indicated on their profiles somewhere within their apartments, and each of their closets contains two weeks' worth of clothing in styles that they enjoy wearing.
Each apartment's front door can be accessed from the courtyard (second-story apartments are accessible via one of the two outdoor stairways; there is a partially-enclosed walkway such that the front doors overlook the courtyard). To the right of each front door, there is a mailbox with each tenant's name on it. Letters can be slipped into the boxes via a small slot at the front, but the boxes themselves can only be opened by a tenant's mailbox key.
Other Amenities
The path leading to the other amenities in the complex is blocked off by a sturdy iron gate, from which hangs a sign reading "Amenities Temporarily Under Renovation. We apologize for any inconvenience! -Dreadmoor Apartments Management". No amount of trying to get past the gate will succeed - the lock will never be picked, the bars cannot be destroyed, and attempting to scale the gate will only result in the top always being just out of reach.
Peering past them, you can see what looks like it might be a pool area, with some other buildings in the same style as the apartments' and the lounge areas' construction.
Weekend 0, Friday
she misses weyard desperately, and wishes she could return - but as part of the new world's pantheon, she is bound to it, and she can't go back. to be honest, she had thought she wouldn't be able to leave that world at all, but as she awakens in the lounge...
well, she realizes quickly that isn't the case.
this is something new. something unexpected, someplace unfamiliar, and she doesn't think it's one of the other gods playing a trick on her, either. instead, her heart sinks a little as she takes in the other unfamiliar faces waking up around her, because she's seen this before, just not from this perspective.
it can't be... can it?
looking around the lounge, and coming across the tenant directory, tells her that it is. it is, functionally, the same thing as the engravings on the base of the statues of the participants of her game in the temple, and so she shuts it with a disgusted-souding huff and tosses it back on the coffee table.]
...you've got to be kidding me.
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the only thing is that ichika and akito aren't there. occasionally, though, people from the competition will visit, but it isn't the same as having your family or best friend at your side, is it?
but there's always zimri, who's the next best thing. she spends most of her days at home, or following kazuki around while pretending to be a particularly large but absolutely normal dog. with ichika gone, she's taken on the role of chiding him for staying out too late, but she's just as quick to curl up next to him when he goes to sleep, even if it's only for a few hours before classes.
which is how kazuki immediately knows something's wrong when he wakes up and she isn't at his side, and there's a sinking feeling in his gut when he opens his eyes and doesn't recognize the place. it's definitely not his apartment building's lounge, but where is it? the angels couldn't possibly have summoned him again - they're all gone. with a frustrated groan, he rubs at his eyes before pushing himself into a proper sitting position, scanning the faces in the crowd with suspicion before they land on one face in particular and widen in surprise. ]
Sheba? You're here, too? [ ... ] Is Aura missing, too?
[ he glances at the book she's tossed aside, eyes narrowing. ]
Don't tell me that's...
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the face isn't one she recognizes, either. but this person clearly recognizes her, among all the others who are waking up in this lounge. (she doesn't recognize most of the others at a glance, either, but she's also not looking too closely
because we haven't decided who else is here.)but she follows the glance to the book.]
It's a collection of... profiles. [she picks it up and offers it to him.] ...here. In case you want to look for yours.
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[ he is going to take it to flip through, scowling. it's almost exactly like the ones they had to put together for the competition. what the hell. ]
They're not seriously expecting us to do this again. What's the point? The Authority is already gone.
...And where the hell's Zimri and Aura? They're not even on your profile.
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[her brow furrows a little.]
I don't know anyone named Aura... and I can't say I've ever heard of anything called "the Authority".
[and if this is anything like how things were for the participants in the temple, that means she can't read his mind to try and figure out what he means. damn! she's been nerfed!! thanks, she hates it.]
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[ or the authority? hello??? kazuki sighs, ruffling his own his hair. ]
I know timelines were weird for some of them in the competition, but I didn't think something this weird could happen. What experience do you have, then?
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she doesn't necessarily want to out that she was an npc. so.]
There was a temple, where a group of new gods were trying to determine who would become their pantheon's leader. They reached out to people in their dreams and, if they agreed to come, brought them to the temple for a competition to decide.
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They all had a choice? [ surprising... he glances back at the others, frowning. ] We thought everyone agreed to it, before, but it turned out they were all abducted, just like this. They all woke up in Cittagazze without any of their stuff or any clue what happened.
[ a pause, then he glances down at his clothes and breathes a sigh of a relief. ]
At least they didn't have us change into anything weird.
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[she sighs]
I suppose things could be worse, but I'm not looking forward to what we're going to have to do to get out of here.
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...Whoever the new Watchers are, they should show up soon, right? It's not like we can do what they want if we don't know for sure.
[ it's probably murder, but like. what if it isn't. what if they just want to be serenaded or something. ]
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...hopefully, though probably not too soon. It took a few days before we - [she hesitates. since he's admitted it, she should probably do the same...] - showed ourselves to them.
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[ ...wait a second ]
Hold on, you were a Watcher, too? But you were just a regular participant before.
[ the mgcu is really tripping him up. wait til he finds out she dies every time, even as an npc. ]
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[meanwhile, kazuki lives every time except for that one time he got blown up in a bomb... they could not be more opposite.]
...I don't remember anything like that. But where I was, one of the participants was from my world - but from the future. So, maybe it was a me from a different time...?
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It's just what the angels called us. [ shrugs. ] I did hear about weird things with time like that, but it's all a little over my head. We don't have that stuff in my world - alternate timelines, magic powers, or whatever.
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[she shrugs, and then makes a face at the tentant directory.]
But no amount of openmindedness is going to make me accept that this is happening again!
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[ ANGY.
but also, ]
...Do you have your powers? Electricity magic, right? And all the rest.
[ he only heard about half of the rest and it's already weird as hell so he's probably remembering something wrong. ]
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...damn it.
[wash your mouth out with soap, young lady, your game is rated e for everyone. but anyway, that's a no - though something she read in the tenant directory occurs to her. another frown, and she holds both her hands out while focusing...
and a takeout container of curry drops into her hands.]
...okay. Wasn't expecting that, but I guess if we're stuck in here for now, having something to eat will come in handy. [her brows furrow.] Did you have powers of any kind when you were a Watcher?
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...and blinks in surprise when a guitar pick actually appears there. as he frowns in confusion, the temperature around them suddenly drops about ten degrees. ]
I don't understand. The angels are... there's no way they survived. Metatron would've... [ his eyes drop to the floor. ] That's gotta be it. Metatron must have brought us here as some kind of punishment. That's the only way it makes sense.
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Does it, though? Because I don't even know who Metatron is. Why would he be punishing me? [she gestures at the book of profiles.] Unless everyone else in here is also someone from where you ended up before...?
[like. maybe metatron mixed her up with chasma!sheba, she doesn't know.]