Day 204 :: any format [OPEN]

[dragonsorcsandwolves]

Who: Rob and anyone
Open: Open
When: Day 204
Where: The entrance to the Bastion, then everywhere
What: The latest survivor has just arrived and doesn't realize that his world is gone yet.
Format: Any, will match
Warnings: I don't think so?

This had certainly been an unexpected event. One moment Rob had been walking to the game shop to hang out and the next he was lying on the sidewalk, part of the street and the small park he was passing the only recognizable landmarks. It was like someone had picked up a section of the world and deposited it here. Or dropped it; things were looking kind of broken. He had an initial moment of panic and confusion at the sudden change in his situation, but that quickly gave way to calm, and then to a bit of excitement at the prospect of an actual adventure in some fantasy world, since that was obviously what this was. With no people, monsters, or animals in sight, the buildings he could see in the distance were as good a destination as any, so he set off walking towards them.

A few hours later he walked into the Bastion, a bit sweaty from the heat since his backpack was too full to fit his coat in, but otherwise in a good mood, twirling the shard he'd found between his fingers. The new arrival was around 5'9" and broad-shouldered, with long brown hair, a reddish-brown goatee, and his ears and septum pierced, the septum with a fairly thick circular barbell. He wore a shin-length black canvas coat with the sleeves rolled up past his elbows, baggy black BDU pants tucked into red high-top skateboard shoes, and a black T-shirt with a red symbol on it, the front of it tucked up behind a matching belt buckle. For someone who'd just had their world destroyed, he looked to be in a pretty good mood. Maybe he didn't know yet?

A while later he could be found wandering around the Bastion, looking everywhere that didn't look like a private space and awkwardly pausing when he saw people, unsure how to strike up conversations with them. It wasn't like he could just walk up to them and press X to have them infodump, but these were people he was going to be around a lot and he knew it would be a good idea to get to know them all. How did video game protagonists do this?

Comments

[freedom_engineer]

Colin smirks, catching the gleeful comment, and all but ignoring his comment on his likelihood of survival. "I really need to build an actual bridge to reach the Dragonfield sometime, but Paar is very welcoming of visitors," he says. "So don't feel you need to be a stranger. As I said, he's probably one of the best people here to talk to."

Colin thinks for a moment before nodding to himself. "The biggest bit of work around here is definitely the farm. It provides enough food for all of us, but it doesn't harvest itself. Rin is a little possessive about the kitchen, but I don't think she'll turn down a hand if you can cook. Gods know she started there by helping Mireille out before she had her child. Basically... if you see something that needs to be done? Do it. If you want to help someone out, feel free to ask first. And if you need to pick up a skill..."

Colin pauses, and he laughs at the absurdity of it. "Ask around, or poke the monument," Colin says. "Once you made it here, the monument would have given you an amulet. Yeah, the Monument is basically your all purpose RPG magic system slash Babelfish slash replicator. It's really kind of absurd, how useful it is. But given how badly off we'd be without it, I'm not about to complain."

[dragonsorcsandwolves]

"Amulet?"

Rob patted his chest where he would expect one to be, then started feeling around in his pockets while he continued.

"It kinda sounds too good to be true. Seems like a bad idea to rely on it for everything and not have backup plans. I mean, you're saying multiple worlds were destroyed. Compared to that, this thing breaking down or exploding seems more likely."

[freedom_engineer]

"I found it in my toolkit when I finally tracked it down," Colin says in amusement. "And yeah, it's not a good idea to rely on it. Again, there's a reason that I'm working on building everything I can. But given that this place, the monument and everything, was prepared by the same group that apparently instigated the calamity in the first place? I'd say it's got a better than decent shot of staying running for a while."

[dragonsorcsandwolves]

Rob finished checking his pants pockets and moved on to the inner and outer pockets of his coat. Having this much storage space on his person had seemed a good idea at the time.

"The Calamity, was it an accident? Or was it some 'ultimate weapon' that turned out more powerful than expected?"

[freedom_engineer]

"The latter. In a particularly idiotic move, the Caelondians conscripted a Ura and threatened his daughter to get him to build a weapon to obliterate the Ura," Colin says, his voice turning irritated and disgusted almost immediately. "Can't imagine why he went and sabotaged it to turn against Caelondia instead."

The sarcasm in his tone was completely evident and unmistakable. "In any case, we don't know what caused it to magnify so much, though I have some theories..."

[dragonsorcsandwolves]

Rob stopped searching his pockets, because he needed his hand free so he could facepalm. He shook his head side-to-side slightly for a bit before tilting his head up slightly to look at Colin from between his fingers.

"You're serious, aren't you," he stated, rather than questioned. "I'd say that sounded like a bad movie plot but that would be an insult to bad movie plots everywhere. How could anyone think that that situation wouldn't turn out badly?"

[freedom_engineer]

"You'll come to understand Caelondian thinking if you stick around here," he says, shaking his head. "Jingoism is apparently a big part of their culture, as is a major superiority complex over their enemies."

He's not about to stop Rob's facepalm.

[dragonsorcsandwolves]

Rob sighed and dropped his hand away from his face.

"Is it really too much to hope for that old rivalries and bigotries didn't get dragged into a survival situation?"

[freedom_engineer]

"You better believe it," Colin says. "The Ura aren't all that much better, really. Strong religious culture. Moderately tolerant in my observations, but very defensive. Plus, y'know, they've got the whole 'The Caelondians almost wiped us out' thing going on. And in their defense, they're kinda right. Whatever the case, there are Ura here, and there are Caelondians here. There's an uneasy truce, but I don't think they really like each other, barring a couple of exceptions."

He seems completely nonplussed about the whole thing, even if he's somewhat irate with all parties involved.

[dragonsorcsandwolves]

Rob heaved another sigh.

"I guess so long as they don't cause problems for anyone else it's okay to leave them to sort it out on their own. Or not."

[freedom_engineer]

"I don't think it'll be that easy, we've had some as of yet unrevealed people who've been making life a little more difficult for us at times," Colin says. "But nothing terribly dangerous. Just a little bit of vandalism and theft so far. But yeah, old prejudices did not meet their grisly end with everything else."

He isn't going to voice his concerns over unproven sabotage and espionage to a stranger just yet. There's also the fact that he suspects the plague wasn't just accidentally inflicted upon that other group of unfortunates, but without proof, expressing those concerns will just cause unwarranted panic.

[dragonsorcsandwolves]

Rob paused for a moment to think of what else to ask.

"So's there anything else I should know about this place? People to avoid, tourist sites to visit, that sorta thing?"

[freedom_engineer]

"If you're at all religious, head to the shrine," Colin says. "Though the Gods of this world are represented there, Serena is pretty understanding of most religions. Also, avoid getting in religious debates with the Ura. They take that stuff WAY too seriously."

He looks thoughtful for a moment. "There's a training hall if you want to practice your combat skills, it's got practice dummies and a shooting range. If you need exercise, we've got a large lap pool that Aoi brought in. And if you're just looking to socialize, the Distillery has basically defaulted into a town hall."

[dragonsorcsandwolves]

Colin had just listed several things that Rob had little-to-no interest in, though the pool might be something he'd look into at times it wasn't being used for laps.

"I don't suppose there's any books around, are there? Or games?"

[freedom_engineer]

"Unfortunately, no," Colin says, shaking his head. "Aoi did set up a Volleyball court, and there's lots of animals to play with, but we're still lacking a major recreation center. I keep trying to convince people we need one, but what does the guy trained in end of the world survival know about morale, huh?"

Yeah, he's kind of upset about that...

[dragonsorcsandwolves]

It was one of the few times during the conversation that Rob actually looked a bit upset by the situation. He had no idea what he was going to do when he wasn't helping out now. It also implied something about the other people in the Bastion that he didn't find too promising.

"It sounds like everyone here's into physical activities for their downtime."

His tone was even but his voice was abruptly lower in volume by a small but noticeable amount.

[freedom_engineer]

"Not so much that," Colin says, shaking his head. "It's that supplies are still hard to come by. There's plenty of books, but they're in Caelondian. And the amulet doesn't translate text, just audio. I'm trying to convince everyone that we need some better entertainment to keep people sane, but thus far, it's been deemed a low priority. And since I can take care of myself, I'm not particularly invested in pressing the matter."

[dragonsorcsandwolves]

"A universal translator, eh? I should've guessed. It's much more likely than people from other worlds all speaking perfect English."

Rob sighed softly. The situation was rapidly losing what excitement it had originally held.

[freedom_engineer]

"As I said, Babelfish," he says. "Though, I suppose most people wouldn't get that reference... Alas."

[dragonsorcsandwolves]

Rob blinked and thought back, remembering that Colin had mentioned Babelfish earlier but he hadn't made the connection then.

"The translation website or the fish that goes in your ear that the website's named after?"

[freedom_engineer]

"The latter," Colin says, smirking. "I see we may have someone with some relevant knowledge after all."

[dragonsorcsandwolves]

"I do know a few things," Rob said without any trace of arrogance in his voice. "But that makes me wonder how you know something from my world."

[freedom_engineer]

"Or maybe how you know something from MY world?" Colin asks, his tone far too innocent and mischievous.

"Relax, grab your towel," he adds after a moment. "My people are dimensional travelers, among other things. I've been to more versions of more planets than you can fathom."

[dragonsorcsandwolves]

"It's hanging on the hook on the bathroom door," Rob replied with a straight face; he knew exactly where his towel was, for all the good that did.

"How many Earths?"

[freedom_engineer]

"Let's see... Home dimension, Three off the fed timeline, four off of the mutant timeline, six off of the Iowa incident... a couple of assorted ones..." he mumbles to himself, tapping his fingers as he thinks. "I'd say anywhere between eighteen and twenty-two. Earth is a very complex and troubled planet in the time-space sense."