Everything is normal today during the early hours of the morning. There's really no hint, no way of knowing, no anything that could indicate that CERES -- and thus Cerealia -- is about to irrevocably change. There would be birds chirping, if there were birds, but since there aren't any, there's just the constant sounds of a city in motion, humming with technology even that early in the morning.
And then, regardless of where you are or what you're doing or how early it is, everyone's CereVices flicker on to show a perhaps-familiar, perhaps-unfamiliar face.
Bellona Recreare, the business owner of Cerealia and CEO of CERES, stares at everyone with a flat, cold look. She doesn't seem happy.
(When is she ever?)  It has come to my attention that there has been industrial espionage and corporate sabotage in CERES' personnel. Such a thing will not be tolerated.
Due to this, Mosley's employment with CERES has been terminated. Please now direct any public relations questions to 1-800-7322934844444.
Good day.
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PHASE I [ 6 00 ] Bright and early, not long after that sudden announcement by Bellona, you may decide to go back to sleep, or you may decide to get up and go about your day (or you may not have woken up at all).
Either way, it doesn't matter.
Because your apartment is broken.
The entire apartment. The door is locked shut (and that sucker is solid metal so it might be time to try a window), the HOLO(gm) is flickering wildly between settings, and the blender is out for your blood. Anything technological in any way (that is CERES-brand or has been tampered with by CERES) will be malfunctioning in a way that comes across as... oddly malicious.
Now's a bad time for the late sleepers to realize that the beds, too, have auto-control tech functionality. Hope you enjoy that electroshock wake up call, or the fact that the bed could fling you totally across the room.
PHASE II [ 1000 ] The rest of the city isn't faring so well either.
The trains are completely out of commission; even if the doors do open, it's probably not a good idea to get on. If you do, it looks like the doors will slam shut behind you, and the train will go hurtling forward at dangerous speeds with sudden stops. Many of the shops can't be accessed at all, automated doors refusing to open, and worst of all, every single last piece of tech in Cerealia now seems to have the sole goal of Making Your Life Hard.
The Pleasure District is flooded now that the spas are broken, but hey -- at least the perfume ensures that water smells good, and it's pretty warm. That's good, right? Maybe go for a nice swim.
The CERES police bots are out of control, chasing people down to arrest them for imagined crimes (What do you mean you aren't a closet voyeur?), and heaven forbid you're around any of the auto shops when everything goes totally wrong. The auto-drive feature in many of CERES's cars seem to be a little... finicky today. It doesn't seem like anywhere in the city is exempt from this. Good luck.
And towards the end of the second day of this insanity, the train, with whatever unfortunate passengers are on it, will derail. It crashes into part of the shopping district, leveling buildings and leaving the wrecked overturn husk of a train resting there uselessly.
Suddenly, things don't seem so harmless anymore.
PHASE III [ 1100 ] Of course... you're CERES-owned too.
Your code, rather, is made and owned by CERES, and it's inevitable with the craziness going on that it would soon affect everyone's code as well. So as the hour approaches noon, a few unlucky souls may start to notice that things are just Not Quite Right with them. Their powers may be on the fritz, functioning entirely wrong or not at all, or even stranger -- fire powers turning into water, ice into flame, electricity brings mud. Your clothing might suddenly change when your coding glitches, or it might be gone entirely. You may suddenly have an uncontrollable urge to start singing, or frolicking. You may suddenly be wildly in love with the first person (or robot or mirror) that you see, unable to stop it until the odd glitching wears off.
And then, just like that, you're back to normal, if a bit more tired than before. How troublesome.
There are also moments where what appears to be an ID number appears on the back of your neck in glowing light blue numbers. Each of these codes is a 7 digit number, with an E at the front of the number. It appears that the longer you've been in Cerealia, the lower the number is -- like a brand of some sort. You may not be able to see it yourself with it on the back of your neck like that, but everyone else sure can.
PHASE IV [ 1645 ] And, just like that, on the last day of this madness, the city goes dark. The lights cut out. The technology shuts off. Every last robot in Cerealia is completely and totally down, and can no longer be booted up. Even when the lights come back on in a few hours... the robots remain dead.
Cerealia's a lot harder to function in without those handy dandy robots running the place. It's also a lot more desolate, and rather quiet.
Slowly but surely, the rest of the technology will boot itself back up towards the end of the last day. But the robots remain broken, and cannot be fixed. In fact, opening them up will reveal that nothing's wrong with them at all... they just won't wake up.
As time ticks by, it doesn't look like Bellona will address anything on the network about the events and all people are left to do now is... learn how to function again. Without any help.
BONUS [ ???? ] If you were a stupid brave enough soul to log into ViViD during this time (or were unfortunately glitched there, which could happen), you will find that ViViD is in... safe mode. It's struggling to boot up, and even when you finally enter, you'll find yourself wandering through skeleton levels of half-completed scenery and incomplete quests. There are readings in the corner of each level that can be seen now, one about Energy Gain and one about Energy Loss, and just as the gain goes up the longer you are there, the loss, too, rises. At first, it's fascinating, and it isn't particularly dangerous... but then it becomes clear that you can't actually log out.
You can't exit Safe Mode at all.
Slowly, it feels as though you can breathe less and less, that the empty walls of the level are closing in on you... and there's nothing you can do. Unless you are or find a particularly genius hacker and they can access the source code and find the exit buried inside that code within the next few minutes... there's nothing to be done.
And then everything goes dark.
You'll wake up the next IC day, with those same energy readings marked on your wrist like some sort of bright blue digital tattoo. When you wake in the mornings, it will read at 100% and slowly go down during the course of the day until you sleep. It will fade after three IC days.
And from now on, ViViD always has those energy levels in the corner, even when it's fixed. They always seem to be recording you, every time you're in ViViD. Strange.
[ Remember to apply proper warnings on threads with sensitive or inappropriate material and do let a mod know if your thread careens off into maiming or canoodling so we can lock the log. ] |
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no subject
I'll try. Who're you looking for? Gimme some names and descriptions if you can, okay?
no subject
Looking around somewhat anxiously, as if searching for them, he continued.]
Or, my Lord Brother, Ren Kouen. Our father and mother are both the same, so we look quite a bit alike-- although my brother is older, and much better trained with a sword than I am.
no subject
Are you Koumei?
no subject
That's correct. Although...how did you know my name if we haven't met before?
[Because this was getting a little confusing now, even for his understanding. Unless his brother really was somewhere in this city, odds were that no one would have an inkling about his name.]
no subject
It's a long story. Like, a really long story. ...Basically I know the you from the future. You kinda live with us here, and one of your relatives was here for a while but I don't recognize any of those other names.
no subject
[Suddenly, his young mind was alight with myriads of questions, the chief of which being how this was even possible. Were alternate worlds-- a concept he still didn't fully understand yet despite reading multiple scientific theories about such ideas-- truly a thing that existed?
But, if that was so, then how did an older version of him get here?]
I take it then that my Lord Brother isn't here. That's...unfortunate.
[He hoped and prayed to any gods listening that his brother and cousins were safe on the battlefield.]
no subject
[The whole "surprise! You're alone in a weird place without even family!" thing, that is... He understands it's pretty tough and he tries not to make the situation worse by being tactless.]
Anyway, I don't really know how long you'll be here, either. [PROBABLY NOT LONG but he doesn't want to freak the kid out.] You can come hang out at our place until we figure something else out, though.
no subject
[And, recalling a previous encounter he had already in the city, he looked up at the man a little shyly.]
Have you met a girl named Miss Chihiro before? 'Kashuu' isn't a terribly common name, and Miss Chihiro gave a certain 'Kashuu' her personal vote of confidence.
[Translation: Are you the same Kashuu that Chihiro said was a trustworthy adult in this strange, foreign city?]
no subject
Either way, there's an immediate look of recognition in response to the name.]
Chihiro? Yeah, I know her. About this tall, right? Ponytail, shoes that probably have stars on 'em? She's a good kid.
[And he is HONORED to be considered someone she'd give a personal vote of confidence to, okay.]
no subject
She rescued me from a terrible nanny-- I'm truly grateful for her help. It's good that someone like her is in this strange place.
But, if my family isn't here, perhaps you can help me find some answers?
no subject
And as for the question, there's no hesitation before he responds with:] Yeah, sure. I'll do my best but I can't really promise that I'll be able to do much, y'know?
no subject
[Because, truly, he was curious. Chihiro had listed this man by name as being among the trustworthy adults in this city...and he couldn't shake the odd deja vu. It probably had something to do with how Kashuu had met an 'older' version of himself, but the curiosity was becoming hard to bear.]
no subject
[Patting the sword that's at his side, as it always is.]
We don't really come from the same worlds, though. I'm from Japan.