Week 2 Post-Trial

[strictura]

[ The trial itself may have been pretty straightforward, but with how high emotional tensions were running afterward, there's probably no one feeling like organizing any kind of gathering right now.

So, go do your thing until a new week starts, and write down those memories you don't want to forget. ]

Comments

[seventhlittlemonster]

...please don't call someone useless for who they are. That's- that's not right.

[oh no,,]

[littlebratziska]

It's nothing to do with who they are and everything to do with what they do and what they choose to apply themselves to.

Fine though, as you wish.

[seventhlittlemonster]

...I was never the best at arguing my point. Could you... teach me?

[undershadow]

You're telling me.

[ Something that's only tangentially related occurs to her, and the realization flashes momentarily across her face. ]

And it looked like it was taking it out of her just to do the first floor. I mean, the murder hole was always there or whatever, but still.

[ballooncaged]

This place really feels like anything could happen. It's almost worse if the dead aren't really gone... Just one more way we've been trapped here.

[Crosses wrists]

So we've got to think positive about what crazy good things we could find next!

[prescience]

Yes, something like that. I had someone to work by my side.

[Oh, yeah - super normal. Oriko has to decide if she wants to press that issue - and, ultimately, any attention drawn over there means fewer questions into her own existence.]

Is that the same landscape you grew used to? You awoke and saw it and it made you feel as though you were back there?

[prescience]

[He's responsive, so that already seems a little less insurmountable to handle. Oriko gets on hands and knees so she can look under the bed better.]

You're not a coward. You've seen something truly frightening, and not for the first time. Sometimes things happen, sometimes we see things that root themselves inside us and poison everything.

Won't you come out?

[prescience]

Yes, I noticed that as well. The first week were here, it seemed that Queen Alice-san could hardly move at all, or was always just coming awake from some nap.

[The source of the two Alices' powers had come up before, in the meeting with Manaka at the start of this all. Though Manaka pointed out that a few children alone probably weren't enough to power a structure of this size, the behavior from the girls - the Queen - hasn't gone unnoticed by her.]

While it's regrettable, I do think my suspicions will be confirmed or denied within the next few days...

[strictura]

Huh.

[ It still seems strange that those numbers wouldn't have been taken already, but maybe an inactive agent's number can be reused? ]

How long have you all been an active organization, anyway?

[seventhlittlemonster]

...Yeah! [He felt like we'd have to find our own happiness because good things??? In this castle?? Seems fake but okay he'll at least help her pursue it relentlessly]

/pat pat

[golden_king]

[ Gil idly wondered if that guy had truly good intentions but he what did he know. ]

...Really? He sounds kind of nosy, actually.

But I guess that's a good habit isn't it? Writing down how you feel so it doesn't get bottled up.

[nothingposh]

[You ever just have the ability to appear places when you're needed? He's sitting on a ladder, for the record.]

I guess the better question is what sort of lie it is.

[xxxx_me]

[Tilting his head a bit before looking outside.]

Oh... That's the central area for the Dream. There's doors from there that lead to all the Worlds, so I keep coming back to it.

It's strange to look at without the White Rabbit there.

Re: /pat pat

[xxxx_me]

Well... he's Teacher. So he's supposed to be checking in on us and stuff to make sure we're okay. One of the other kids just did drawings in theirs, I think.

[Said drawings were definitely totally fine and not at all the product of trauma or anything, surely.]

[nothingposh]

[It switched to - well. It faded out. The correct thing to say is that it faded out in the way that background music fades out for important dialogue. After a few moments, though:]

At the shrine of friendship, never say die
Let the wine of friendship never run dry
Here's to you and here's to me

[battlestations]

A very long time... the leadership constantly changes, and there's a lot of lost history. The earliest records I have go back to the industrial revolution, kids rebelling after being forced to work in adults' factories. However we once uncovered a sector from before that who'd been cryogenically frozen in a freak accident after a battle for the Alamode... [he's not mispronouncing that, it was ice cream.] Beyond that, your guess is as good as mine.

1.0

[byzer0]

[ Why is Natsuo here? Answer: gremlins need to get a daily allowance of running amok in the castle, even in rooms they don't have much interest in. (It's because the movies suck and he's more of active participant in hobbies rather than a passive one). Either way, Natsuo was just walking around when he heard several distinct sounds that he recognizes: pow pows, grunts, and yelling of the fighting variety. He's spent many days and nights hearing them, as he's one of those gamers that needs to get the max score and all achievements.

And so Niko is greeted by a narrowed jade green eye peeking around the corner, ears peaked. ]

Hey, that's ours! [ He's not sure if it's theirs but it sounds like the game he's played a bunch of, so good enough. ]

[octopups]

[He whistles a couple more forlorn notes, but slowly, a couple at a time, he starts to belly-crawl out from under the bed towards her.]

Hhowow howdid did... [He stops, tries again, remembering to speak in words and not chords] How did... you know it, it wasn't the first time?

[golden_king]

[ Everything is Fine and nothing hurts, right. ]

Oh, okay, I think I get it now.

...How did you get your memories back, by the way? In the other place, I mean.

[xxxx_me]

[Why would anything hurt ever, Miwashiba games are only happiness and joy.]

...I'm not sure. I think... sometimes when I was in the Worlds, I found these little pieces of something. When I got to Teacher's World, he gave me one last piece, and I remembered everything.

[littlebratziska]

[She looks briefly uncertain at that - something quite unusual for her.]

Hm, maybe. But part of it is knowing what you are arguing very well, and confidence in yourself.

[seventhlittlemonster]

Mm... [He nodded.] I'll do my best to really understand my views then. [That was the thing... he thinks the way he does, but he never knew why, other than it being... just what he felt in his heart.]

[strictura]

[ ...Blinks. ]

I had no idea you'd been around for that long.

[ Because setting aside the especially ridiculous parts of that, that is just a very long time.

He takes a sip of his root beer, then looks down at the glass thoughtfully. ]

Do you ever get frustrated by the fact that you're still needed after so much time? That the same cycles are perpetuated with each generation, and there's never a point where kids can just be happy without adult interference?

[soverainty]

Hmm? No way! They wouldn't have anything this old-school at home.

Handhelds are practically antiques already, so only some dumb hipsters or middle-aged farts would be really into them anymore. It's about as in vogue as the rest of this place, though, I guess?

[The impressive thing is how she manages that spiel without once looking away from her screen or stopping her abuse on the buttons. She really is probably bashing them a little harder than needed.....]

And I've never heard of a GameChild at all. Are you sure that vending machine isn't just a big prank most of the time?

[soverainty]

[Wow, rude. She has never been as clumsy nor unwieldy as an elephant in her entire life. Overbearing and a good set of trumpeting lungs, maybe, but that's neither here nor there.

Niko cocks her head at him and looks for all the world like she's the same girl as she was just yesterday -- there's even a sparkle in her eye, but that might be directed at the slice of pie she just snatched from in front of him.]

Why wouldn't I fake being nice, Uno-kun? I'm juuust a helpless little girl, after all.

[It's in the way she draws out the word; in that split second the little smile on her face curls at the corner, just a touch sneeringly, baring a hint of a small canine. She goes on in a more normal tone, that is to say, brisk and dropping at least half an octave:]

How was I supposed to know what kind of place this was? Until we got through the tutorial and really figured out a little of what was going on here, it was easier to have people underestimate me or at least be a little freer with information around me.

And that's exactly what happened, wasn't it?