EVENT ▸ EMPIRE OF THE CRASHING WAVE

[futurologists]

EMPIRE OF THE CRASHING WAVE The royalty of Guild Ophelia has managed to hold an audience with Empress Nama of the Celestial Mountains, urging her to meet with the Empress of the Crashing Wave in the interest of finding an accord between their clans. In return, Nama requests that Ophelia take two letters to the Crashing Wave's court, where, as foreigners, they should be received better than any of her own people. The Empire of the Crashing Wave is a week's travel by foot from the Land of Celestial Mountains, through the forests and farms of the Flowerlands. There is no visible indication that this universe was once two, with even the road leading through the Flowerlands heading seamlessly toward the sea. The farms and villages in the outskirts of the Empire of the Crashing Wave are decorated in seashells and motifs of the sea, and the closer one gets to the city, the stronger the scent of the ocean becomes. Once the city proper is reached, Ophelia's magitek projects words in front of their eyes that only they can see: Location reached: » EMPIRE OF THE CRASHING WAVE A progressive society that values innovation. Main sources of income: fishing, pearl diving, jewelry crafting, shipbuilding. Politically matriarchal; socially egalitarian. Empress YOUMI resides at the PEACEFUL TIDE. No events scheduled. You may wish to survey the surrounding area. The city is built right on the ocean's edge, with some parts of it even jutting out into the sea on bridges and piers. The castle, Peaceful Tide, is built high above the rest; guards will stop anyone at the gates and, if shown the correspondence from Empress Nama, will deliver the letters directly to Empress Youmi. Attempts to seek an audience with Youmi will be rebuffed for the time being, so you may as well take in the sights... ▸ A PROMISING DEVELOPMENT Unlike the Land of Celestial Mountains, men may move freely here, the matriarchal rules of the land only extending to politics. Men and women work alongside each other in all sections of the city, nobles and commoners alike, and even the guards have men among their ranks. In the Artisan District, potters, musicians, and artists line the streets and sell their wares, work, or discuss their craft with each other. Closer to the Beach, there is a boardwalk where young couples stroll alongside grandparents chasing after their grandchildren, electric lamps bathing the wooden planks in a warm glow at night. Fishermen haul in their daily catch in buckets and nets, trailed by a gaggle of hopeful cats. Beachcombers and pearl divers populate the beach as well, making it a clear place for work instead of play. A few days after Ophelia's arrival in sea clan territory, a bell rings loudly in the late afternoon, drawing citizens toward the castle. Guards stop anyone from getting too close, though the populace seems to know what to expect -- soon, a beautiful woman in an elaborate blue kimono appears in an upper balcony. When viewing the woman, Ophelia's magitek will tell them: » EMPRESS YOUMI Leader of the EMPIRE OF THE CRASHING WAVE. 30 years old. SPECIES: Human. MEDICAL CONCERNS: Lactose intolerant. The crowd cheers at Youmi's arrival, only quieting once she raises her hand. She speaks clearly and confidently, her voice carrying easily across the assembly. "I have received a letter from Her Imperial Majesty Nama of the Land of Celestial Mountains. She informs me that their spring festival was interrupted by an attack from our own people, working without my knowledge or consent," Youmi begins, holding her hand up again when a displeased rumble begins to ripple through the crowd. It's unclear if they're perturbed by the ambush or by Nama herself. Once all is silent again, she continues. "She has detained the criminals, for that is what they are, and assures me she will not bring this to the battlefield. I will send her an agreement to the terms, but hear this: any who escalate this further will be slain by my order. I have spoken. The spirits of the sea watch over us all." Youmi then retreats back into the castle. While some citizens cheer their empress's decree, others mutter unhappily amongst themselves as they disperse and go about their business. ▸ BUT TROUBLE CONTINUES The rest of the day following Youmi's decree goes by without incident, leaving time for Ophelia to stop by the sake breweries near the sea or travel back through the forests of the Flowerlands for hunting, hot springs, or simply enjoying the nature of Hanabira. With war averted and the empresses in communication, it seems as though Ophelia's time in this universe will draw to a close soon. As the sun sinks down, finding a place to sleep might be a good idea. There are hotels in the city, but for those who are trying to be a little more frugal, the Flowerlands is a good place to set up camp for free. Doro, the Lord of the Flowerlands, has heard of Ophelia's efforts in starting communication between the empresses as well, and offers rooms in his castle in thanks; if war were to start between the two, his land would suffer for it. During the night, those who accept Doro's invitation will hear a commotion very nearby, steel clashing against steel. Doro and his daughters rush out, weapons drawn, and straight into a skirmish between sea and mountain clan ronin. The warriors are fighting to kill, and in their fervor, someone's fire arrow alights a farmhouse on Doro's property. The farmers need to be rescued and the fire put out, and while the warriors will likely kill each other, they could also be subdued to prevent further damage. Please let the mods know with a link to the thread if your character is killing or capturing any of the ronin. After the skirmish, Doro must be brought back inside his castle, having been wounded during the battle. He pleads with Ophelia to continue to help, as it looks like a tentative truce by the empresses is not enough to calm the citizens. Since they were so successful in receiving an audience with Nama, he believes they can propose a way the two empires can live in harmony. Throughout the next two weeks, skirmishes between the clans are peppered throughout the Flowerlands, some leaving bodies behind and some leaving damage to farms and forest. It looks like Ophelia's peacekeeping mission just became a lot more hands-on: keep the skirmishes from getting out of control while still working toward a way to end the conflict once and for all. ▸ OOC NOTES This log will last for two IC weeks: the first three days will be free exploration, and day four is Youmi's proclamation and the skirmish in the Flowerlands. Your characters are free to explore for the next ten days, during which further skirmishes will occur. If you have questions about this log or the overall mission, please ask them on the dossier. Questions about Futurology in general should be directed to the FAQ. ▸ Coming next log: Peace proposals! Get your brainstorming started now. ▸ Activity Check is due on 5 February 23:59 UTC. We do not accept late submissions, so make sure you fill it out! ▸ Uniform Design Contest is open! Submissions are due 28 February 23:59 UTC. Gamewide voting will be in March. ▸ Bounty Board ▸ Items Page ▸ Exploration Group Planning ▸ General Plotting ▸ February Calendar

Comments

simon jarrett | SOMA | ota

[theseuschip]

i. the weight of the sea, of existence itself (day 3)

[ on one of Ophelia’s first fine evenings in the Empire of the Crashing Wave, a guy... person... thing... with robot bits just walks out of the ocean with a basket of oysters. Like super filled with oysters, and stumbles at the weight of it when he’s on land.

The ocean still sucks. When you’re underwater, you know what looks like a hostile A.I.-infected sea creature out of the corner of your eye? Literally everything, actually!! ] This better be worth it.

[ If pearls could possibly be bartering chips here, he feels obligated to use his ability to scrounge up a bunch of them. ]

ii. flowerlands, day >4, night/dawn

[ Simon can sleep, or at least perform a simulacrum of sleeping, but being a robo-monster who used to be a human with PTSD, he sucks at it. Which is annoying. Time passes like molasses when you’re just thinking about how futile your ‘prevent civil war’ mission looks.

When he paces the farmland outside Doro’s castle at night, or at the crack of dawn, ruminating uselessly, he is easily identified by the clusters of glowing blue nodes distributed randomly across his body. And the robot eyes that sometimes spook people and, in the absence of light, give the entire faceplate of the diving helmet a foggy red tint. He can’t begrudge teammates for existing in the vicinity when there’s nobody else around, but the sounds still make his heart stop and his head snaps toward anybody who gets within hearing range like a wary animal. ]

iii. doro’s castle (day >4)

[ While Simon’s feeling particularly unuseful after a skirmish has been cleaned up — he moves debris and bodies, but there are always more — he wanders Doro’s castle peering into open doors and taking stock of rooms from the outside, but trying to be subtle about it. Basically he’s casing the place. But for knowledge, and as one of the good guys. Actually, it feels kind of wrong; the guy is trusting them to stay in his castle, and is Simon really letting his entire civilized hman upbringing be stomped out by PATHOS-II?

But things are looking hopeless and he only has a hammer and what if this is a nail?

when he happens upon a teammate, he says, conversationally, ] So that looked promising for a couple of days.

iv. wildcard

[ im open to pretty much anything, throw some weird stuff at me or my plotting post is here, feel free to hit there, PM, or honchkrow for a custom starter or brainstorming or whatever thanks love you ]

ii

[justbeingknife]

Oh. I was kinda wonderin' about the glowy blue aura.

[ There was a brief flick of metal and flame as Majima lit up, slipping his lighter back in the pocket of his robe. Not too long ago, he would have been surprised to find what looked like a spooky robot wandering around outside. Now, he supposed it came with the job.

It was late; he should be sleeping. But seeing as how that wasn't going to happen, investigating weird lights seemed like a decent way to kill time. ]

Don't think I've had the pleasure. I'm Majima.

[theseuschip]

[ Simon’s posture relaxes when his eyes lock onto a fellow agent, and the deer-in-headlights look — well, it’s still there, and it’s more like he’s just the headlights, but the phantom adrenaline ebbs. He should really be worried about samurai arsonists, but instead his subconscious just expects to see shit that doesn’t even exist here. ]

Simon. [ by way of introduction, and then he looks down at himself, raising his hands where ivy-like metal tendrils radiating from the glowy bits curl over his palms in a way that could almost look like they’re supposed to be there — ] Yeah. This is just, uh, part of the package.

[justbeingknife]

Right, okay.

[ It seemed sort of rude to ask about the tendrils and the... package, so Majima would just put a pin in that one. ]

So what brings ya out here this time of night? Just takin' the night air?

[ Or did Simon see some SAMURAI ARSONISTS, haha what a silly idea that would never happen. ]

[theseuschip]

Can’t sleep, so... something like that.

[ a pause... and since they’re both out here, at human sleeping hours, and at samurai clan fight hours, Simon figures he’ll be able to appreciate his thoughts. ] So this all turned to shit pretty fast, huh?

[ That is the only way he knows to breach this topic. Just having a conversation here. ]

[justbeingknife]

Figured it was going to head that way eventually, but... yeah.

[ Majima brought one arm up to rub at the back of his neck. SURE WAS A NON-IDEAL SITUATION. Yep. ]

I'm hopin' the forecast is gonna stick to 'bad'. Not too keen on transitioning to 'shitstorm of the ages'.

[theseuschip]

It can’t stick to ‘bad’. We’re supposed to solve it, but now it’s the furthest it’s ever been from being solved. What if it’s impossible?

[ THE MISSION IS TO FIX EVERYTHING. Everything they sorta fixed is now completely unfixed, and peaceful nights are an opportunity to mope about it. ]

[justbeingknife]

[ was he going to have to talk down a robot

because he wasn't equipped for this

not even a little ]

It ain't impossible, okay? Just... don't give up!

[ that sounded lame even to him ]

...look, at least so far, no official military intervention's started on either side. That's somethin', right?

ii

[pummelling]

[After a long, infuriatingly futile day of beating ronin away from Doro's castle, Kung Jin's nerves are frayed thin. The stress of it all would bother him on its own, but there's something about this mission that strikes him in his heart, too close to home. Figures, that negotiating fragile peace accords is the one thing he couldn't negotiate back in his own timeline.

He should sleep. This last week-ish has been lacking in that department, too, but he can't quite bring himself to rest. Not when, in waking, he could do far more. Even if he's simply patrolling.

It's the glow in the distance that sets him off. Jin's bow is at the ready in the span of a breath, an arrow poised to fly if Simon doesn't answer to his liking.]

You supposed to be out here, buddy?

[theseuschip]

[ When Simon’s attention snaps to anything that approaches this is not the kind of danger he expects. But he is about to be shot with an arrow, apparently, so his hands shoot up to chest height and he takes a step back, wisely hastening to explain himself. ] Agent! Not ronin. Or monster. Or whatever.

[ The most direct answer to the guy’s question is starting to look like a no, though. Clusters of glowing spots moving in the darkness are one of his own least favorite things to be in the vicinity of, not that comparing himself to the WAU’s other creations is ever a rabbit hole he’s eager to venture down. Still. Probably going to keep getting bad reactions to the wandering around at night stuff. ]

iii.

[hackedhistory]

I think that's the rule. You get a few days to lull yourself into a false sense of security before the universe decides to just dump a bucket of terrible on you.

[Not that this is the worse thing she's ever been through, but you know what, she's sleep deprived and had to fight samurais, she's not worried about accuracy at the moment.]

But it could have been worse.

[theseuschip]

Could have been worse? We just went from something like a peace proclamation to... the furthest from peace we’ve been since we landed on the planet.

[ Simon is incredulous. Everything sucks now!!! This was supposed to be where things would come together. ] Now we know they won’t even listen to their empresses.

[hackedhistory]

[Well ... he kind of has a point there. But ...]

The castle itself could have been caught completely unprepared with no one to protect it. There are less dead people than there could have been and you can't make peace with the dead.

[theseuschip]

How do we get to peace from this? How do we even know when we’re done?

[ Asking questions no one can possibly answer: a recent Simon pastime.

He’s started to take more note of who doesn’t seem to have a reaction to his appearance. Either they’ve seen weirder, or there really polite and in control of their emotions. He looks her up and down quickly, as if for clues to that effect, because... he forgets how obvious doing that looks now. ]

[hackedhistory]

We get to peace by staying committed to the line. By figuring out who's going against the Empresses' wishes and make sure they're brought to justice.

[There's a pause as she tries to figure out a better way to give it context.]

Peace is never easy. And it doesn't happen overnight either. But if the leaders are ready to do the work, then that's the first step.

[theseuschip]

Sounds like you’re speaking from experience.

[ this is a good thing. People who know what they’re talking about are reassuring to be around, since Simon’s super not one of them. They all have a duty to do the best they can to resolve this, regardless of specialization, but... you know, hearing somebody talk like they can pick up the normies’ slack is still heartening. Also, he’s not super hard to impress. ]

[hackedhistory]

[She gives a small shrug.]

I've been in a couple different war zones before. They're not always the same, but it usually involves people wanting the same things. They want their families to be safe, and they want to be able to live their lives. And there's usually a big powerful force screwing that all up for them.

[Between Vietnam, Central City and the invasion from Earth-X, that seems to be the pattern, more or less.]

i.

[dbag]

Whoa.

[ It's not the robot bits that stop him — he's stuck a fair bit of metal in himself, even chopped off his own arm for funsies because it would be cool to have a robot arm — but the huge amount of oysters. His eyes practically turn to dollar signs. They could be worth something to someone, and that's all that matters; he supposes he hasn't actually beaten the avarice out of himself yet.

Whatever, that's a problem for another day. ]

Did you— is that all yours? Like, from just now? Just wondering, for no reason. [ Cool as a cucumber. ]

[theseuschip]

[ Simon sets down his haul in the sand, and the guy who greets him is sounding kind of suspicious about his enthusiasm, but he doesn’t really see a reason for it. He can’t be trying to make money here, can he? Medieval yen will probably be useless the very next universe they go to. But whatever. ] Yeah. It’s for whatever we need it for. I mean, if pearls are valuable here, we might be able to use them to butter up the Hanabirans.

[ a pause ] And walking on the sea floor and not having to breathe are pretty much my only robot perks, so it was a chance to do something useful, I guess.

[ you know, because almost everything that’s getting them anywhere on this mission is social in nature, and he has a spooky robot face that’s haunted by XY chromosomes and also freaks people out. ]

[dbag]

[ Other than money, Rhys's interests are technology and, like, Dungeons & Dragons ripoffs, so this talk of robot perks distracts him for a moment. He practically perks up in interest; he was never offered any robot parts that could let him walk on the sea floor or not breathe and, quite frankly, he feels robbed. ]

You don't short-circuit or anything? You know, because water and robots don't usually mix.

[ He holds up his robotic arm, awkwardly, meaninglessly waving it around to draw attention to it. ]

One time, I got swept up in this huge hurricane, and this thing got totally boned. I had to get some weird old guy to fix it. He, uh, put a can-opener attachment in it.

[theseuschip]

[ Simon tries not to sound too amused by the plight this guy’s describing. ...he only sounds a little bit amused. It’s not a bad-looking robot arm either, it definitely beats the WAU’s creations in polish. ] I’ll take human body with can opener arm. This stuff isn’t as fun as it sounds.

[ He never knows what he’s going to get from people when they see him for the first time — pity, fear, anger, and this time what sounds like totally unwarranted envy. Would Simon have thought his abilities sounded cool if he were still human and met someone like him? ] This body was put together at a station at the bottom of the sea, so everything down there’s pretty water-compatible. Even the robots.

apologies for the slowness!!

[dbag]

A station at the bottom of the sea that builds robots?

[ If that isn't the most sci-fi thing he's ever heard. It is a bit curious that he was at the bottom of the sea in the first place, though. ]

So, are you some kind of scuba diver, or... um. Marine biologist...? [ That's all the ocean-y jobs he can think of. ]

no probalo!! i’m slow too rip

[theseuschip]

Robot who used to be human. And even then, I wasn’t any of those things. I just... ended up there.

[ He sits down on the sand with an arm on the basket. If Simon had gotten as much exercise in life as he has in the past two months or so he would have been absolutely jacked, not that it would have done him much good in the long run. Except that his synthetic brain might be hardwired to think it’s piloting an athlete instead of some nerd. Okay, actually that might have been helpful. ] It’s a long story.

[dbag]

[ He's sufficiently distracted from the pearls now — which is no small feat, because pearls can be exchanged for money and money can be exchanged for even more shiny things!!! — and he furrows his brow, not quite suspicious but certainly... dubious. The whole thing sounds a little hinky. ]

Um, yeah. Sounds like it. I've never 'just ended up' at the bottom of the ocean before. Must've been some rager, [ he jokes, although for all he knows Simon really did get blackout drunk and drown his way down there. ] What do you mean used to be human? [ Surely there is still some human left in there somewhere!!! He naively hopes. ] Aren't you just, like, a really metal cyborg? In every sense of the term. [ Metal like the material and metal like metal. ]

iii

[evenslimmer]

[ If it would help, Scott is also casing the place. Strategic paranoia runs in the Summers family, and it doesn't matter if Scott sometimes feels bad for considering less-than-savory possibilities. He can't help it. It's basically become a whodunnit— who's ordering the attacks, and why?— and he's never going to be able to let that rest until they get to the bottom of it.

So there they are: two guys doing something slightly shady, pretending that they're not doing what they're doing. ]

It did, yeah. And I guess it could have ended up a bigger mess.

[ Though it's pretty damn messy as is. Scott wishes he could shake the thought that maybe their host set it up. ]