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15corpses2017-12-02 02:07 am
strangerpeople) wrote in 15corpses2017-12-02 02:07 am
WELCOME TO THE GAME.
[You have died. When you awaken, it's in your body back to the shape it was in before whatever it was that killed you - but not all is right. Nothing surrounds you but darkness as far as the eye can see. A girl's gentle voice speaks to you from seemingly nowhere. It is a voice you probably haven't heard before.]
It's all right...it'll be all right.
Please forgive me for this, but, you're in the True Game now. As you're now here, on this plane, I...took something from you. Something important. The thing dearest to you. It has to be taken, though, as it's your entry fee - it's one of your means of surviving this!
I promise, we don't mean to do anything terrible to you! But this Game is important, and you getting through it is, as well. You'll receive missions, and for the missions you complete, you'll be given points. The more points you earn, the closer you'll get to leaving this place. And then, when you do finally leave, perhaps you'll understand why you were brought here. You'll regain what you lost, and you'll know the truth.
So please...please survive! I have faith in you! You'll be all right!!
[Sure enough, as soon as she's done explaining and collects your fee, something important of yours is missing. It might be memories, an object, or even a person (that's not a Titled), but they are your collateral now. Your motivation for continuing your existence in this world. You black out, and when you wake again, you're back in the mall, in the bedroom you'd been assigned. You remember everything you'd forgotten while you were alive, although you might have re-forgotten it if that was your entry fee. At least everything here seems mostly the same.
However, there's a few new things to discover... your cell phone now lets you read the surface thoughts of everyone that's living, and imprint thoughts into their heads (except for Croix, The Chance. Maybe it's because she didn't have a power? Who knows.) You also have all the items and money you had when you were still alive, which will be useful, because you still get hungry and, we'll say you still need clothes, but that's actually debatable because you are invisible. Not to other dead people, no, but to the other people in the mall.
Yeah. That's a thing. This version of the mall is full of random people who are using the mall as a mall, and even working the registers - oddly enough, there's this one girl with pink hair who seems to work at all of the restaurants at different times. But no one can see you, except for the shopkeepers of food and clothing stores specifically. (Luckily, the Barcade counts as food.) The Titled can be seen going about their business as well, and you can follow them around and watch them, listen to their conversations. However, nothing you say or do can be perceived by them. Even using your powers goes unnoticed, no matter what you try to do with them. It's like you're in parallel worlds. So that's a little spooky.
Speaking of spooky things, there are also monsters in this version of the mall, though the living seem as able to perceive them as the Titled can perceive you, and even to you they are only barely visible unless you focus on seeing them clearly. But these monsters attack people - they attach to the mall-goers like parasites, however for now, they seem to be leaving the living Titled alone... they prefer to attack the dead Titled, and only the power you gained here seems to truly damage them. They also seem quite difficult to defeat on your own. If one of them happens to come for you, you'll need to find the others, fast. At least if you checked your phone, your first mission told you where to go!]
It's all right...it'll be all right.
Please forgive me for this, but, you're in the True Game now. As you're now here, on this plane, I...took something from you. Something important. The thing dearest to you. It has to be taken, though, as it's your entry fee - it's one of your means of surviving this!
I promise, we don't mean to do anything terrible to you! But this Game is important, and you getting through it is, as well. You'll receive missions, and for the missions you complete, you'll be given points. The more points you earn, the closer you'll get to leaving this place. And then, when you do finally leave, perhaps you'll understand why you were brought here. You'll regain what you lost, and you'll know the truth.
So please...please survive! I have faith in you! You'll be all right!!
[Sure enough, as soon as she's done explaining and collects your fee, something important of yours is missing. It might be memories, an object, or even a person (that's not a Titled), but they are your collateral now. Your motivation for continuing your existence in this world. You black out, and when you wake again, you're back in the mall, in the bedroom you'd been assigned. You remember everything you'd forgotten while you were alive, although you might have re-forgotten it if that was your entry fee. At least everything here seems mostly the same.
However, there's a few new things to discover... your cell phone now lets you read the surface thoughts of everyone that's living, and imprint thoughts into their heads (except for Croix, The Chance. Maybe it's because she didn't have a power? Who knows.) You also have all the items and money you had when you were still alive, which will be useful, because you still get hungry and, we'll say you still need clothes, but that's actually debatable because you are invisible. Not to other dead people, no, but to the other people in the mall.
Yeah. That's a thing. This version of the mall is full of random people who are using the mall as a mall, and even working the registers - oddly enough, there's this one girl with pink hair who seems to work at all of the restaurants at different times. But no one can see you, except for the shopkeepers of food and clothing stores specifically. (Luckily, the Barcade counts as food.) The Titled can be seen going about their business as well, and you can follow them around and watch them, listen to their conversations. However, nothing you say or do can be perceived by them. Even using your powers goes unnoticed, no matter what you try to do with them. It's like you're in parallel worlds. So that's a little spooky.
Speaking of spooky things, there are also monsters in this version of the mall, though the living seem as able to perceive them as the Titled can perceive you, and even to you they are only barely visible unless you focus on seeing them clearly. But these monsters attack people - they attach to the mall-goers like parasites, however for now, they seem to be leaving the living Titled alone... they prefer to attack the dead Titled, and only the power you gained here seems to truly damage them. They also seem quite difficult to defeat on your own. If one of them happens to come for you, you'll need to find the others, fast. At least if you checked your phone, your first mission told you where to go!]
no subject
own icon for own thoughts and also VLR spoilers
He's scanning the Fun Wing again when there's that ping at the edge of his consciousness, Helena's reluctant acknowledgement that this is a miracle. Dio bolts out of his chair and runs into the toy store. He's not about to let anyone deny him this opportunity. Even convicted murderers got phone calls from prison in the old world.] WHITE [Yes, he's here.
Her reluctance to be misunderstood would be irritating if Ursula hadn't already had to use most of her questions on Fin. Yeah, this is "Dio"; he could be a smart alec and explain that he's Left, but it's good enough for government work. ] WHITE [Somewhere in there, even a Left is pretty flattered that she deems "Dio" being there to constitute a good thing.
Necromancy... He's thought a lot about what the fuck he's even supposed to want out of this. Doesn't it not even matter if he stays separated from the material world? He completed his mission, according to his memories. He knew that feeling of true happiness and can die without regrets. Even though it was tarnished by the confusion of what he did to Wake when he didn't remember, the incident is in the immutable past; he's never had to atone for that type of thing before. Shouldn't Dio feel that his soul is light?
At the same time, he's not really separate from the material world. There are still different bodies and voices; even Noise that are the freaking embodiments of conflict and poverty. Dio has settled on playing nice for the time being. So there's no reason to send "BLACK" just in the hopes of discouraging efforts. Does he think it's a guarantee? He won't believe it until he sees proof of being able to do much more than touch a coin, damn it. Even "possible" is too generous when... That voice promised leaving instead of returning to the world of the living. When Dio remembers that particular turn of phrase, there's no doubt about his next answer.] RED [And so he retains her trust, a little smile. It'll fuel his boiling spite towards many of those participants in the trial. Which is a nice distraction from her vague concession that abstract intellectual respect was only half the reason she wanted to talk to him specifically. It's the same way for Dio, and he should be grateful that the communication method won't betray any hidden other half.
If he's that abstract and ascendant, is it really that important to force Helena to look for some way she can personally help him...? Does she really have to furrow her pretty little forehead over that precise part of their situation...? Besides, he's gotten very few leads on what they can do, anyway - another mass execution seems bad, considering that the group was stuck here after that, so the conditions might be somewhat better if that's not allowed to happen, but Helena is certainly not on the team that would let any murderer get away at the cost of herself, even a young and handsome one. So Dio decides, no, there's no point in implying something else she should do.] BLACK
[The next question is something that gets Dio a little more generally frustrated. He wishes he knew what type of existence awaited him. There's no obvious expiration date on his time as a ghost, but the Noise are a serious threat that could get even worse in the future, so even if his lifespan is indefinite on this plane, he stands a serious risk of getting erased.] RED [She's scared by it, which is a shame, but at least it's easy to move past.
That Helena has worried about him is honestly fucking touching... He wants to be strong and tough and tell her, "Yes." It's not like he's less ghost than any of the others, and fighting Noise has even kept him flush with cash enough to eat. At the same time, Dio has to outright fear the possibility of someone like Croix resurrecting him in a hasty way that does nothing about his lost entry fee. He can't go home looking like this without getting into serious trouble. And the presence of such a serious problem is the least that Helena deserves to know if he couldn't even "tell her why".] BLACK
[So he's left Helena with even more questions... Dio knows that's a kind of ungentlemanly move, which makes her last question a pleasant surprise. More than that, really - his heart races as he presses the entire base of his hand against that coin.] WHITE [Hell fucking yes!!! Dio didn't realize quite until she said it that this is what he wants more than anything in the universe, to end the cycle of suffering and deceit and ugliness that has claimed so many people. It's only after the coin has landed, and his hold on the board entirely severed, that Dio remembers her professed preference for nonlethal pyrotechnic techniques, the extremely tentative way that Helena St. Tessero still qualifies as a noncombatant believer, an immeasurable beauty that she's apparently intending to a limited extent as a show for him specifically and, holy shit, his face hurts from smiling, his breath comes out hoarse from creaking laughter. If it's happiness that Helena wanted him to have (and he knows she did, actually; there's still an immense filthy sacrilegious thrill to reading part of her mind), she's got it in one.
For the rest of the day, there are practically little stars floating in circles around Dio's head.]
own icon for own thoughts and also VLR spoilers AGAIN // cw suicidal ideation
[Of all the things she could have said, Dio didn't expect the attribution of blame that had repelled her so thoroughly back at the trial. It's an acknowledgement that isn't individually important; it won't un-execute him, an approach that Akechi and Kurama were supposed to deserve where he did not. And yet, as bitter as he is to have been killed, Dio doesn't want to be dragged out without his entry fee, never be Left again. A fate worse than the double death that he and Helena are preparing to face together.] RED [So when she asks if everything is okay... he knows she's probably imagining them getting erased, but--] RED [He is affected negatively by this, dammit!] WHITE
[But he's not about to take this lying down, and he won't let Ursula think that either.] WHITE [He's going to get erased if he has to - not for the others, whom he's no longer feigned interest in not discarding, but for freedom.] WHITE
[It's six questions. He's disappointed but doesn't know why he even cares, adding to his frustration.]