New World New You

[holographica]

-> (1)

It begins with a bang; then, disorientation, darkness, dismayed voices, and spells that weigh down your limbs like heavy shackles...

The people keeping you captive seem as unsure as you are of what just happened, and argue and mutter amongst themselves, though they don't hesitate to restrain you, chain you to a pipe in the wall of this bottom floor of an underground parking garage, or lock you alone into a smaller room of the abandoned building where the summoning was held. You seem to unnerve them; they don't want to look you in the eye, and if they have to touch you to lock you up, they do so gingerly, nervously.

But maybe, once they leave you to yourself to go and argue and regroup in private, you're not quite alone? You weren't the only person to come out of the array. You have at least one companion in your confusion, one person restrained like you and not wearing the cultists' strange masks. Take comfort, take inventory, and prepare for anything.


-> (2)

The Joyous were prepared for you to attempt escape. Their preparations don't quite match what they got, but even poorly calibrated spells will do something, and the effects of knockout darts and magically reinforced walls don't discriminate. It's time to blow this popsicle stand...

...But you may want to take a moment to comb the area - once the Joyous have had enough time and reason to weigh their options, they'll run, leaving behind the incriminating results of their "botched" summoning. Those less able to escape confinement under their own power may need a hand, or to band together, or, at worst, to wait quite a while for locals to stumble across them...


-> (3)

You step outside into an unfamiliar town; small, sparse, just off a major highway running through the Neloi Flats. A perfect place for a cult looking for an unoccupied building, because there are a lot of those here, as though the town's peak has come and gone, leaving behind rusty signs for roadside attractions and a main street retinue of shops made of sheer stubbornness and spite.

There's not much direction here. There are locals, who will be confused by you, possibly wary and disbelieving. There's a temple, small like the village but likely to have charity you need right now. There's a highway, and following it in either direction will take you to one of two very different cities.

There's a whole country of possibilities before you, in fact. What ones will you chase, and will you do it alone?



[[As of this mingle: go forth and RP! You can treat this post like a game intro, or like a meme post; follow the prompt/s exactly, or alter the details to suit your tastes, or pitch a completely different scene in your own top-level. Let's get some stories started.]]

Comments

[photoshooter]

Great! Here, let me see what I can do to get the dirt off...

[Yeah, Prompto can't cook to save his life, but with their powers combined, they may yet get some protein and calories into their sad anime bodies.

Prompto does his best to scrape the grossest stuff off the surface of Reira's meat, then cuts it into messy slices of roughly equivalent thickness. Thinking he's being sneaky and clever, he tries to make sure Reira gets more. She's so small.]

Hey, you know something? I don't think we introduced ourselves. My name's Prompto. What's yours?

[soft_focus]

[Very small-probably smaller than her age would imply, honestly, but the fact is that her age is a mystery even to her. It wasn't really important at the time. Still-at Prompto's words, she pauses, taking a moment to register what he said at all.] Um-

...Reira, [she introduces, nodding her head. ...Chicken looks like it's good at any rate...though. Erm. She squints every now and then-if these piles get too clearly unbalanced, she's going to comment.]

[photoshooter]

Reira. [Prompto looks up to see if he's gotten the pronunciation right, then nods to himself and smiles.] That's a cool name! Sounds pretty musical, don't you think?

[There they are, nice, slightly uneven piles of meat and potato substitute and suddenly Prompto is singing.]

Reira, you got me on my knees, Reira... Next time we'll get some cheese, Reira...

[soft_focus]

It is? [She asks, blinking at the singing. ...Kinda weird. In a Yuuya way. It makes her smile, even if it does leave a bit of sadness all the same. She hadn't really been able to think about much when he tried to cheer her up back then. She'd just been scared.

...It's still funny though, and there's a quiet, quiet laugh, before she blinks.] Oh!

I have cheese... [Excuse her while she searches her bag with her visible hand.]

[photoshooter]

Really? Haha, wow! You're putting me to shame, kiddo, you're way more prepared for this camp-out than I am.

[Also, he feels like a huge success right now. He got her to laugh! He is the BEST, COOLEST big brother, EVER. Suck it, Gladio! Actually don't, Gladio please come help him, Prompto has no idea what he's doing and there are too many unsupervised kids out here.]

[soft_focus]

[Welllll.] ...I didn't have fire though. [she comments, glancing to it at the side.] ...I don't know how to do that. I just took this from a temple offering.

[what]

[photoshooter]

[Er.]

Aaaare you supposed to do that?

[soft_focus]

...Statues don't eat cheese.

[UHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH]

[photoshooter]

[UMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM]

Well, no, but... I mean, I've seen what gods can do when they get mad. And maybe the ones here are different--like everything else's been so far--but better to be safe than sorry, right?

she said while an angry god screeched at her from the back of her head,,,

[soft_focus]

I have too, but if a god gets mad because I took cheese, they're not a very good one.

[This kid is Brutal.]

This poor kid

[photoshooter]

Hm. You make a very compelling point. Touché, Reira. Touché.

[He thinks for a moment, then offers Reira the spit.]

Y'know, if you stick a piece of cheese on the end like a marshmallow, you can melt it a little before you put it on the meat or the veggies.

whoops and that one is my fault too :'D

[soft_focus]

[To that, she just beams. Good, she made a good point! Thank you sir-

She's very quick to break off some cheese to stick it on now.] It won't just come off? [She asks, despite committing to it already.]

[photoshooter]

As long as you don't leave it in too long, it shouldn't! ...I think.

[WHY DO YOU TRUST THIS MAN, REIRA. LOOK AT HIS oh you're from Yu-Gi-Oh his hair will tell you nothing.]

[soft_focus]

[As far as Reira is aware, this guy is probably only as bad as Yuuya.

And Yuuya's mom could apparently cook, so Yuuya probably learned, which in some round-about way maybe...means that Prompto knows. Right???

Except he DID burn that tuber...] ...Maybe we have to wait for bubbles.

[photoshooter]

Well, if it falls off, we've got more, right? No problem. We'll just keep trying until we get it right!

[Words of wisdom from the loser who never gets anything right on the first try!]

[soft_focus]

Ummm...I guess... [Prompto, she's suddenly not sure about this at all. She's wrapping the cheese back up with both hands (one wearing a curiously thick and oversized glove), but now she's not sure she wants to share the remaining cheese if this fails.

It's good cheese you know.]

[photoshooter]

Well, maybe we don't wait all the way for bubbles. Treat it like roasting marshmallows! You can always keep taking it out of the fire until it looks done to you. ...Or it catches on fire.

[There are two kinds of marshmallow-roasters.]

[soft_focus]

...I've never roasted marshmallows.

[....No that's upsetting.]

[photoshooter]

[...This is a tragedy.]

Okay, first thing tomorrow I'm running back to town and getting you a bag of marshmallows. The big kind. And I'll show you how it's done.

[soft_focus]

....Okay.

[QUESTION FIRST]

...What's a marshmallow..? ...is that a candy..? [Shinji gave them...cookies, donuts, and 'rice crispies'... ...nothing called marshmallows though...]

[photoshooter]

Uh--

[That's actually an excellent question. How does one categorize a marshmallow?]

Well... yeah, kinda? They're real sweet, but also soft and squishy. [He mimes squeezing one between his fingers.] They look like little white pillows, and they're reeeeeally good between graham crackers and chocolate.

[soft_focus]

I've had chocolate..! [The fact that this is exclaimed as if it were a rarity is not going to comfort him, Reira.] ...Not the crackers though.

[photoshooter]

[You're breakin' his heart, Reira. Prompto brings his fist over his chest.]

Kid, I'm gonna find a restaurant, work my tail off washing dishes, and buy us a whole mountain of graham crackers and marshmallows so you can have the true camp-out experience.

[soft_focus]

[uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh-] ....You don't have to get that much...

[photoshooter]

The enormous tummyache is also part of the true camp-out experience.