melodiesofeternity | FABULA NOVA CRYSTALLIS || INTRODUCTION LOG

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FABULA NOVA CRYSTALLIS || INTRODUCTION LOG

Who: All characters (New Arrivals and Native OCs)
When: April 11th
Where: The Dream Width (Airship), the Curti Center, and the Housing District
What: For the first time in 10 years, outworlders have been found the Dream Width. This unprecedented number of new arrivals are rescued and brought to Vaikuntha, and must now try to start adjusting to their new home.
Warnings/Notes: All players can put up a toplevel. Please post to the NPC toplevel if you have an IC question for them.

ARRIVAL

[ You wake from your dreams, from your memories, on a narrow cot. There are fleeting impressions- recycled air, humming machinery, movement, strangers waking around you. The room you wake in is lined with cots, with barely enough space between them to walk to the door. The makeshift infirmary is becoming uncomfortably warm, packed to its capacity with people.

Stepping out, there is a lobby space that bears the signs of having once held some furniture, now cleared away to make space. Even with the sparse accommodations, the space quickly fills to standing-room only.

As the automatic door slides shut on the infirmary, a light flashes on the far side of the room.

A flickering holographic projection of a man’s face and gloved hand appears projected in the space above the arrivals’ heads. He backs up so his upper body is in frame for the recording. An arm, covered in the same orange flightsuit sleeve, hands him a tablet. The man begins to read. A written version of the message scrolls along the bottom of the projection as he speaks. ]

’Welcome travelers’… That’s way too formal. Hey everyone.

Hi!

[ The second man leans into the frame to add his greeting. ]

Don’t panic. You were floating out there, but we pulled you in and rescued you.

Yeah, we’re heroic AND handsome. And also the only ones crazy enough to come out here to get you.

[ A woman’s voice calls from out of frame. ] Can you two be serious for ONE moment and stick to your scripts?

[ The two men give each other a conspiratorial eyeroll. This does not appear to be their first take. ]

Anyways, no need to panic. Seriously, don’t do anything reckless. We got our fill of that with Skywalker.

[A huff is heard offscreen, and the men finally spare the tablet another glance.]

‘Your pilots will be navigating treacherous environs as this message plays…’ Claire, seriously? Nobody talks like this!

[ The tablet is tossed to the side and lands with a thunk offscreen. ]

We’re gonna wing it. Look, everyone, we’re workin’ hard to get you planetside safely, and it’s gonna take some tricky flying to do it. So the door to the cockpit is locked so we can focus on not getting us all killed. Don’t try to open it, unless you want to be stardust.

We promise you’ll get answers about what’s going on once we land. But for now, please trust us. Right now, we’re your only hope.

[ The second man leans forward, close to the recording device, and presses a button. The projection freezes for a moment, and then the message starts to play again. ]

’Welcome travelers’…

CURTI CENTER

[ Finally after hours of flight, you arrive at the Curti Center. The other NPCs await you along with the Native OCs. Cid gives a short and to the point welcome speech, explaining what the situation is: you were lost in a space called the Dream Width. You are now on a planet called Vaikuntha: for ages, the people of this world have used Airships to rescue people lost in the Dream Width, with one person being found roughly every ten years. No one knows why this happens, but this has been a mutually beneficial exchange, with the people from Vaikutha rescuing people lost in the Dream Width and the rescued ones sharing their wisdom with the people of Vaikuntha. Ten years ago, something unusual happened: two people were found at once, Biggs and Wedge. But that was nothing compared to what happened today. Indeed, here you are. No one knows why such a large number of people has been found at once, but the Curti Center is a place dedicated to piercing the Dream Width's secrets.

Cid also introduces the other ones: his assistant Jessie, Claire, the woman looking at the group in horror upon being pointe out as the bookkeeper, Kupoto and Mogaruru, their Mognet representatives and finally the Native OCs: those brave and kind souls who have accepted to help you all on a daily basis.

After Cid finishes (and Claire despairs at the pile of paperwork she must complete by the end of the week), the Native OCs provide a tour of the facility and help the newcomers navigate their future lives. Now is the time to ask questions and look over pamphlets regarding locations, Jobs, life in Vaikuntha... ]

[ If you want to contact an NPC specifically during this introduction, please respond to the toplevel with the name of the NPC in the subject header. The mods will try to reply at least once a day for each NPC. ]

A BALL OF FLUFF NAMED MOOGLE

[ It has been a long day, perhaps now you would like to find your way to a place to sleep? Or perhaps you'd like to get some answers, but you can't be bothered to go seek people out?

And lo, just as despair begins settles in, a Moogle slams into you! Or stops by your side if their aim is decent... It's the Moogle Cid mentioned in his speech earlier! And they'll be informing you that now, they will stick to you like your shadow and help you in anyway they can!

They're also giving you your iMog Slate- Now you can get onto Mognet! Isn't it great? ]

A QUICK CHECK-UP

[ Whether it's your Moogle, Native OCs or NPCs, all will urge you to stop by the hospital wing for a basic check-up. You may disagree, but listen. You've just been thrown into a space between worlds, rescued, and brought to another world. For your own sake, that's a good idea. Should you give in and go (or should you be dragged by your Moogle or a Native OC), you will find yourself in the cold and white space very reminiscent of an hospital. For characters with specific medical conditions necessitating help, this is where they will receive it if asked.

The doctors and nurses are all White Mages or Chemists, with various levels into their Job as well as medical knowledge. Don't mind the confused looks if you look like nothing they've ever seen before... It's hard for a doctor to be unable to give a proper diagnosis to a patient! For everyone else though, they'll be let go with smiles and be given a candy as they leave.

No one likes medical check-ups, but it's a very quick and basic one: testing reflexes, taking your temperature and the likes. On the bright side, while you're grumpily sitting on a bed with a thermometer on your forehead or in your mouth, it might be a good time to socialize with your fellow new arrival who's having lights flashed into their eyes by a doctor. Misery loves company, after all. ]

A BAD OMEN

[ Wandering around, you may stumble upon an old and tired-looking moogle wearing what can only be described as a decrepit fortune-teller attire. Upon seeing you, or any of the new arrivals for that matter, he will slowly approach and tell you all the exact same speech. ]

If you stay here, you're doomed. She will find you and make you suffer hell. [At which point his eyes will grow exorbitant.] This world is cursed. You will die and never be free. [And finally he'll fly right into your face.] Never!

[ Then he will leave and go say his speech to someone else, without doing anything but repeating different variations of his warning if asked for details. Should you ask your assigned Moogle, Biggs or Wedge, they will mention this crazy moogle can't be reasoned with and sometimes stick around the center, even though he's always chased away. He never says anything besides doomsday predictions. For unknown reasons, he's always been particularly nasty with Biggs and Wedge... And with you as well now, it seems. ]

PRETTY SIGHTS

[ There's plenty of rooms to wander about in, with several points of interest apart from the offices.

The Airship Hangar is where the airships are kept and the first room you entered. Workers keep guard to prevent the outworlders from getting too close to the vehicles. Airships are expensive and they don't want you messing with them, after all.

Venturing into the Research Section, you can walk through public exhibitions on astronomy, airship design, and asterisk studies. A good place to get used to the basic science of this world. The laboratories lie behind a thick locked door with a sign reading "EMPLOYEES ONLY". No going there, for now anyway. Not too far from there are the Employee Quarters - work stations, apartments, and lounge areas. The latter are available to the public, whereas the rest is locked to Native OCs. But if you get them to be friends with you, perhaps they'll let you visit?

Also open to all is a Cafeteria - a standard food court with stalls serving all types of Vaikunthan cuisine. The Chef is a very jovial and absent-minded Hypello. Beware of long lines and crowded tables. Should you prefer open spaces, then the gardens are for you! There are different sections in the gardens around the center. One boasts a wide array of blooming flowers, another more practical with herbs commonly used in Vaikunthan cooking. One had been cultivated for butterflies and hummingbirds to visit. Paths have been laid through so that visitors can safely navigate, and moogles will swoop down and shout at anyone who strays into the flower beds.

Or perhaps, you want to wait till the sunset. Dusk on a new world, but a beginning of a new life... The sea shines bright in the orange light. A good moment for quiet contemplation. ]

HOUSING

[The housing accommodations are the best the Curti staff could provide, given the sudden and unexpected number of arrivals from the Dream Width. The keys have been entrusted to the moogles who will be guiding the new arrivals.

The new arrivals can stop by the Curti Center storage room to collect some essential supplies that have been donated by charity organizations from around the world (there are boxes of toothbrushes and whitening toothpaste sent from the Zora, hair brushes from the Elezen, quick-drying towels from the Hypello, among the various donations of clothes, toiletries, and blankets), before heading to their temporary homes. The people of Vaikuntha have done their best to provide for their new neighbors and help them get on their feet.

Still, things will be a little cramped until the off-worlders can find employment and move into better housing. The staff hopes they can get along with one another until alternate arrangements can be made.

You can survive living with roommates for a few months, right?]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"I've known visionaries before, and the level of detail does seem typical," S'reee. "If not the fixation." And there was a talent S'reee was glad she had no affinity for. The currents of time were not clear in that direction even to a skilled Visionary.

((OOC: Is S’ree just a big, floating dolphin on Vaikuntha?))

[[OOC: About that size, but she's stuck in a tank (which must be the most unwieldy thing ever) until she gets theIllusionist job]

Connie raises an eyebrow. "Visionaries? Do you mean like-" she then realizes who she's talking to, but instead of jumping in surprise, she just sighs and shakes her head. "You know, it's probably a bad sign that talking to a dolphin hardly even registers on my Weird-o'-Meter anymore."

"Whale, actually, but whatever brought me here did make me dolphin-size," S'reee noted. "Interesting they chose that instead of a full shapeshifting. But most humans would be rather startled to be talking to me, as I understand it, so at least we don't have to go through that."

"Well, when you deal with sentient rocks with bodies made out of hard light on a daily basis, you kind of have to develop an ability to roll with it if you want to stay sane," Connie remarks dryly. Although she never stopped asking questions, she could see why Steven did. All the answers were either headache-inducing, nonexistent, or too vague to make sense of. "Um, anyways. I'm guessing Visionaries are... whales, I guess, with Future Vision in your world?"

"True. Compared to some people, whales and humans aren't that different. And... yes. They are people, usually wizards, with a talent for seeing possible futures. Emphasis on possible. hNii't spends a lot of time trying to interpret her dreams. But she's a very serious person in general, and they've been helpful to us all."

"...huh. She sounds a lot like Garnet," Connie muses. "This might seem like an odd question, but does, he- hi- hin-" she shakes her head and eventually settles on, "heNiit ask questions?"

S'reee gave the whale equivalent of a chuckle. "Sorry, but I think that one went through one too many layers of translation. My friend is human, so you'd probably have an easier time if you didn't try to mimic my pronunciation exactly. And in my experience, most wizards ask questions, especially when we are young."

"Huh. Interesting. Garnet never asked questions, period. Well, she kinda did, but she never asked them, if that makes sense?"

"Oh, I've met wizards like that. Arooon is like that, but blues are..." S'reee waved her fins in such a way to suggest she can't really find a word for it. "And he's a very old blue."

It takes a moment for Connie to process S'reee's statement. That could mean one of two things. Or two of two. "...blue whale or blue wizard?"

"Oh, right. Blue whale. What would be a blue wizard?"

"Um... I think they're a kind of mage that can learn the abilities that enemies use on them? Maybe? Kinda unclear on the subject, honestly. Magic isn't really a thing humans can use in my world," Connie explains.

"Really" S'reee sounded shocked. "But there are so many of you. Are things going so well that there is no need for wizards?"

"...humans can't use magic, period, on my world," Connie explains. Although, oh, how much she wished she could do all the stuff Gems did. Not just because they were totally awesome, but because they would've helped her- nope. Nope. "I think the only species that can use something like magic are the Gems, actually."

"That... where I come from, it would take something terrible to withdraw wizardry from a species entirely. Species go through periods of being sevarfrith -- that is wizardry is practiced in secret, not in the open. Most human cultures where I come from are in one now. But, not having wizardry would mean the Powers had withdrawn their attention entirely, and few worlds are so... lost. Or wizards are no longer needed, and no world is that lucky for long."

S'reee is motioning like she wants to swim, but can't do so in the confines of her tank. She kind of hopes Connie is wrong about her world, but if she's in contact with a species that is astahfrith, they should know of human wizards if Connie doesn't.

"...I don't like the sound of 'lost.'" Connie shudders. Something about the implications of what S'reee said sent shivers up her spine. Maybe... no, no. But what if there were, and the Gems just never found them? Humanity had been in hiding from the war for a thousand years, perhaps...

"Well, uh. There was this big... thing that happened a long, long time before I was born. Around four thousand years, I think. It turned the vast majority of the Gems on the planet, who are... probably pretty much entirely made of magic into mindless, berserk monsters, their forms twisted to match the Corruption within.

"The ones I know only survived the Diamonds' attack because of their leader's shield, and all told there were only three--or four, depending on your perspective--who kept their minds intact. Amethyst emerged a few hundred years after, but she was only protected because she hadn't been... born, I guess, at that time," Connie explains. Hopefully her world just didn't have human magic at all in the first place. Hopefully. But that nagging voice in the back of her mind insisted they had lost it, and she had missed a golden opportunity back home.

"Things like that can happen even when a planet has wizards," S'reee said. "We do our best to make sure it doesn't but we are all still mortal. I've not spent all that much time studying off world, so I only know our Earth's history. We... well, do humans of your world have legends of Atlantis?"

"Ah, yes, Atlantis," Connie says, eyebrow raised. "According to Pearl, it was a massive Diamond Authority military complex that they tricked a Lapis Lazuli into sinking. Along with about half of northern Asia."

"That... is very different than what Atlantis was on our Earth. Not even the same location: it was in the North Atlantic. And it was entirely an Earth-based disaster: one partially of our -- whale wizards -- making. The only offworld involvement was rafting the land animals and plants to other continents."

S'reee sighed. "I should stop expecting alternate timelines to line up."

Connie didn't even know it was possible for whales to sigh. But then again, she was learning a lot of things that seemed ridiculous actually were possible today, so it was only par for course. "I still can't believe there's a cabal of whale wizards on your world. It makes sense--I mean, if any animals were to evolve sentience, it would be whales--but still."

S'reee decided that maybe mentioning every other species on Earth that had wizardry wasn't wise at this point. "Well, someone has to look after the oceans. Not that humans don't -- some humans have a natural affinity for the work -- but most of them don't live in the ocean the way we do."

"Humans? Looking after their environment? Makes me wish I was born in your reality." Connie rolls her eyes. Now that was rich. "Forget catastrophic alien invasions or the awakening of ancient weapons, humans are already doing a fantastic job of destroying the planet themselves on my world."

"I never said a lot of them do; but they are known for moving their waste out of the places they personally live." And then often into places where it becomes S'reee's problem.

"It's one of the duties of wizardry: don't just solve a problem for now, for your place, but for the long-term and for everyone."

FABULA NOVA CRYSTALLIS || INTRODUCTION LOG

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The irony of this thread is delicious after watching A Single Pale Rose

I need to catch up... I am so bad at watching TV