EVENT 009

[sticksandbonesmods]

RULER OF MY HEART

HOW SWEET IT IS

As time ticks on in that strange, wobbly way it does in this place — where the nights feel like they last days, and the days feel like they’re only a few hours long — the fog, ever so gradually, rolls back in, until it’s that oppressive black wall it normally is. It means no more trips into the greater forest for the time being, though the surrounding ring of treeline around the Grove and the burned town to the north remains readily accessible.

The woods, now awake and alert, sends its regards with the occasional roar of a beast in the far distance, and the occasional biblically-accurate deer wandering into the Grove proper to nibble on grasses starting to spring up through the snow. Speaking of things springing up through the snow, there are some new trees near the riverbank, sporting perfectly normal lemons that are growing perfectly normal eyeballs. It’s fine, they’re edible, although they don’t seem to be native. Hmm.

All is peaceful thus far, until you open your dresser drawer. Suddenly, a little  creature flies out at you, or cries out angrily because you woke it up. Perhaps, that creature climbs on you instead, shuffling into your pocket to snuggle up. Or, maybe you lay down for a nap, and your pillow feels just a touch lumpier than normal, and when you move your head, something squeals at you. No matter where you find them, even if they’re being a nuisance and eating your shoelaces, these creatures are harmless: they’re merely cold, and you, a Warm Thing, will now be their space heater.

I REALLY LIKE YOU

One of Ydalir’s secret passions is cooking. You would not know this, because she doesn’t have the ability to eat, but that doesn’t mean she lost the ability to cook. A holiday is coming, you see, and it’s tradition for everyone to partake in cute chocolates and have candlelit dinners! (She will not be providing the dinners, that’s on you.)

What feels like early on in the month, Ydalir will approach everybody with a box of chocolates customized for each person with their favourite flavours. For those of you who don’t eat human food, don’t worry: These are safe for consumption for vampires and robots alike.

Like with most things here, though, things are not as they seem. Eating one of these chocolates suddenly makes you feel very, very cuddly, like suddenly you wouldn’t care who you snuggled up to right now so long as you were comfortable. With the candy in your system, you feel affectionate to anyone who you come across, even if you may not have liked them previously.

As it turns out, mixing magic with cooking makes a potion. Ydalir swears up and down she didn’t mean it, but enjoy your cuddle-chocolates anyway!

LET’S STAY TOGETHER

Sometimes, when you touch another person, your mind goes elsewhere. This isn’t a result of the chocolates, but rather some other force at work. If you see two people asleep somewhere — the ground, the couch, the kitchen counter — it’s best to leave them where they are, unless you want to risk passing out with them and seeing what they see. They’ll wake up in a little while.

What those who get dragged into their own minds see depends on the person, and what lies within their heart. These “heartspaces” are made up of core memories to the participants — important locations, emotional states given form, meaningful items, or anything else, really. When in contact with another person, these heartspaces will combine into one, perfectly interactable and wanderable at your leisure. Touching objects within these spaces will play a core memory before your eyes, or even change the scenery a bit, depending on whose heart it is you’re messing with.

Perhaps now is a good time for bonding and learning about one another, in the comfort and privacy of your own minds. After all, you won’t exit the heartspaces for quite a bit.

PAIN IN MY HEART

…just try not to break anything while you're there.

It might be an accident. Maybe you walk backwards into a table containing a framed photograph, and that photo falls and the glass breaks, the picture inside the frame ruined. Maybe you broke that cheaply-made but still-important toy while fiddling with it. Or, perhaps, it wasn’t an accident at all: You broke that thing on purpose, you punched through that wall, you set that fire.

Whatever broke the thing in question doesn’t matter in the end. What matters is that the memory associated with it begins to fade away like smoke on the wind. Fixing the broken object will bring that memory back, but failing to fix it before you wake up from the dream will have that memory gone forever.

Although, there are some pretty bad memories out there… if the memory broken was terrible, or if the item in question showed someone a dark secret you didn’t want them to know… shouldn’t it stay gone?

SPARK NOTES

CLICK TO EXPAND!

HOW SWEET IT IS

The fog is back. The creatures are clinging to you because they're cold. The eyeball lemons are, uh... lemon...y. Enjoy your completely normal slice of nature.

I REALLY LIKE YOU

Ydalir has made everybody chocolates! They're delicious and induce feelings of affection and a deep need to cuddle others. Surely this won't go terribly awry. Also, she's very sorry.

LET’S STAY TOGETHER

Sometimes, touching someone else takes you to a combined mental space made up of the important things to you and the person you touched. You can touch things within the space to play memories, or explore the environment together. Outside, you're just asleep on the floor somewhere probably, so hopefully no one trips over you.

PAIN IN MY HEART

Be careful in the heartspaces. Anything you break will take a relevant memory with it. If you can find a way to repair it, the memory will come back. Although, sometimes memories need to stay gone, don't they? Maybe leaving it broken is okay?

OOC

Happy February! The mod team will not apologise for the amount of pink in this event log. If you'd like to plot with people for this event, head over to OOC plotting. We will allow you to make up various plantanimal creatures for this event, they don't have to be like the images linked as examples. Have fun, enjoy creatures, they're here to stay. Reminder this month will have Heimrquest, so if you want to sign up, please do so on the OOC plotting post.

UPDATES

❖ None yet!

SUBMISSIONS

QUESTIONS
INVESTIGATIONS
PAST-LIFE PLOTTING

(CODE)

Comments

1

[oleaeuropaea]

[Vash has only ever seen Hopeland from the outside, towering atop a distant hill. At the time, he hadn't really been able to focus on it, at least not beyond the fact that it was getting closer and dangerously closer with every second. Now that he's here — and he knows that it's Hopeland given Livio's very presence — it all makes sense. Nowhere in No Man's Land was particularly well-kempt. The haphazardly childproofed surroundings just made sense.

(Does he pick up on the subtle differences? The little details that separate their respective worlds? Not really.)

Eventually Vash's attention drifts away from the surroundings, though, and settles on the man himself. He offers a gentle smile, trying to offer assurance even as he steps closer.]

Hey, Livio... It's okay.

[He doesn't see that with each step, grass begins to form beneath his feet. Nor does he seem to notice the way one of the walls begins to dissolve into the trunk of a tree.]

It... must be pretty weird, bein' home, right?

[livlaughlove]

[to vash's credit, there probably isn't a noticeable difference here in the first place, especially if he hasn't been inside the orphanage. the fact that vash can tell isn't surprising to livio either, even after learning that they likely are from different worlds.

he wipes his eyes on his sleeve and sighs, almost shaky despite the way he's mostly tried to keep his composure around vash. with the exception of one snowball fight...]

... Sorry, Mr. Vash. It is.

[even weirder now that grass is popping up from behind vash, as well as a tree. that in particular catches his eye. it's big, almost fluffy, branches reaching out in a welcoming embrace unlike the ominous looming of the grove's forest.]

That... wasn't here.

[oleaeuropaea]

Hey. You don't have to apologize.

[If anything, Vash should be the one to do it. He feels like he's intruded upon something sacred here, interrupted a moment between Livio and himself. Nevertheless, he decides to go all in with it. A hand is laid over the larger man's shoulder, as Vash looks around.

He, too, spots the green and red now springing up. His brows furrow together, while his lips part with a question that doesn't make it out of his mouth. The sight of the tree in the distance leaves him speechless.

He knows what this is. But why it's here is another question entirely.]

Liv? Do you know what's goin' on?

[livlaughlove]

No, I don't.

[the more he thinks about it, and given vash's reaction to the newer areas... he doesn't know that he trusts it.]

It's a trick. It has to be, right?

[nevermind that, despite all his regret and guilt, at his core he feels overwhelmingly happy to be standing here.]

[oleaeuropaea]

Maybe. [The forest had done a lot to them over the past month. But so far, this didn't bear the same hallmarks of danger. There was nothing creeping out of the shadows to harm them. This was just their memories so far.

Their memories, even.]

We should keep an eye out, but... [He steps a little closer to Livio. A little more even.]

Maybe you can tell me about this place? While we look around?

[livlaughlove]

[despite vash's apparently boundless understanding, livio fails to see why vash trusts him as much as he does. enough to actively seek him out while they're in here. liv doesn't move away, but he doesn't reach out, either.]

I... don't know what to say. It's home. Or as close to one as I ever got.

[christ almighty, if this damn forest uses the kids against him, livio doesn't know what he'll do.]

What about yours?

[oleaeuropaea]

[Oh.

Vash's smile wobbles just a little. He glances down at the grass now blooming rapidly against his feet, and the flowers just now starting to pop up. Turning back reveals a pathway of geraniums, fully bloomed and open toward the sun that occasionally cuts through.

He looks back to the man beside him and lets out just a puff of a laugh.]

Home. Guess we have that in common.

[livlaughlove]

[livio can't help himself. he takes a few steps behind vash to kneel down in front of a cluster of flowers. his fingers reach out not to pluck them, just to touch in awe.]

I've never seen them... growing, before.

[he waffles for a moment. hopefully vash doesn't find him rude for one reason or another.]

Are you from Earth?

[oleaeuropaea]

It's... pretty special, huh? [Vash turns to follow. He carefully skirts around the little cluster, eventually kneeling on the opposite side. Rather than looking at the flower, though, he watches Livio's face.] We had a whole biodome full of flowers like this, but these were always -

[He trails off, opting to shake his head instead.]

Not from Earth, no. I was born up there [He points skyward.] Sometime into a long trip to find a proper planet to colonize and make humanity's new home.

[Though, now that he's thinking about it...]

You... know what I am, right?

[livlaughlove]

[always what? livio might ask later. it depends on whether he's willing to prod what might be a sensitive spot for vash at that time. there are more pressing things right now.]

In space, huh? That must've been lonely.

... You and Knives are biological brothers, yeah? [it's pretty obvious, then. at least to someone who worked under knives.]

[oleaeuropaea]

Sometimes... [He remembers the days of going to greet the many thousands of souls in cold sleep. He'd considered them friends, talked with them for hours despite the fact that they never once breathed a word back.]

But I had Nai. And we had... our mother. That was all we needed. We were happy.

[He gives a nod to Livio's question. He gets the feeling he doesn't need to elaborate on that aspect.]

No one really expected us. Who could have, right? There had only ever been one Independent before us and...

[Well. He doesn't elaborate on that.]

[livlaughlove]

[livio looks up from the flowers to study vash's face. he doesn't know how independents work, the same as anyone, really, but it's still jarring to hear those two details.]

There was another one? Was that your mother?

[oleaeuropaea]

No, no. Our mother was a Plant. Fully dependent.

[Vash didn't really know which Plant. He'd never asked, not when he already knew who his mother was.]

We called her our sister. Her name was Tesla.

[Was being the key term here.]

[livlaughlove]

[livio doesn't think to ask for more context than that. just a mother plant and her two independents.

three?]

Tesla. She didn't make it to No Man's Land?

[oleaeuropaea]

Tesla - Didn't make it to our birth.

[In the distance, the tree flickers briefly. In one minute, it's nothing more than bark and life. In the next, cool glass replaces it, giving just the faintest flicker of the body within.]

It isn't a happy story. You shouldn't have to hear it. Not here, at least.

[At least part of this place made Livio happy. Vash doesn't want to tarnish those memories.]

[livlaughlove]

Vash -- ?

[he sees the flicker, and the faint silhouette. incomplete. or at least... all there, with gaps between.

but vash insists upon avoiding it. liv is torn between staring at the tree-tank and trying to look away out of respect for vash's wishes. it's... difficult.]

[oleaeuropaea]

[He draws a breath in, clearly waffling on whether or not to speak any further. Livio appears to want to know, but actually talking about it is an entirely different beast.

... In the end, he offers only an inkling.]

When you are the first of your kind... there are a lot of questions. Once you can't just answer with words.

[livlaughlove]

[slowly, livio rises to his feet, watching the distant image fade in and out. given a moment of time, and vash's cryptic words...

well. livio can put two and two together. he was a test subject, himself, after all. he's just remained in one piece, mostly.]

Vash, I...

... We don't have to talk. Or even stay here, if you don't want.

[oleaeuropaea]

I - [His voice wavers. His eyes stay locked on the flowers. He watches them furl and unfurl, struggling with the patchwork of memories. The sunlight flickers in and out as the world around them seems to shift this way and that.]

This was home. For me, too. [He nods to the flowers.] Something horrible happened there, but it was still home.

I never wanted to leave. Not even after we found out about everything.

[livlaughlove]

[livio gave vash an out, but he's still talking. that means he wants to, right? at least, that's what livio thinks... so he listens.]

What happened?

[oleaeuropaea]

[He's willing, at least. He doesn't want to — who would. But he's here and ready for it.]

When we found her body, Nai and I were both inconsolable. Rem, our mother — the one who took us in after we were born — told us everything. I believed her. Forgave her.

Nai never could. He didn't trust humanity. And so he - tried to end it.

[The world around them flickers briefly, a new memory forming. Blaring lights, plummeting ships, all play out for a split second, before the hybrid of Hopeland and the biodome appear once more.]

[livlaughlove]

[... their mother was a human?

even battle-hardened livio trembles at the sheer force of the big fall played out around him for the blink of an eye.

there's so much to unravel and understand... it hurts to think about.]

I --

It's... horrible. All of it.

[oleaeuropaea]

[Vash flinches as he trembles. The guilt is evident on his face.]

Sorry.

[He tries to keep the peace within his mind. To maintain the mostly idyllic scenery.]

Tell me more? About growing up here? Gotta be better than talking about all of this.

[livlaughlove]

[while vash struggles to keep the horrors™ at bay, livio tries to do the same. at least, to get his own body under control. he's stronger than this.]

I -- you really wanna hear about that?

[oleaeuropaea]

I do.

[Though his voice is small, his tone is no less genuine than ever.]

Feel like I barely know you. I wanna change that, if I can.