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.
|
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
[Even if it's 1% his fault, he'll shove ALL THE BLAME on Tsurumaru for being the first menace. The genesis menace...
But more importantly, warm and fluffy towels! He knows his way around the spas in this district pretty well, too... So he'll just lead the way to one of his favorites, which is of course totally empty because only FOOLS ARE HANGING AROUND in a flooded district. Fools like these two. The front door is unlocked and open, even! There's a lot of water in the area, but it only comes up to about mid-calf, and they're already soaked anyway, so he doesn't mind slogging his boots through.]
It'll be in the back room, over here.
[AWAY, TO THE BACK!! The washing machine is unsurprisingly flooding, too, but the dryer seems... well. Partially submerged like everything else, but otherwise okay?!]
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Nice, nice. [ he takes a moment to look around, though — nothing the somewhat... functional-looking dryer with a nod.
and then, he'll abruptly turn towards kashuu's direction, sparkling with some sudden, newfound excitement. ]
So, should we stick ourselves in there? Go for a spin, or something?
[ for MAXIMUM dry power, because that sounds...... completely safe....... ]
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But Tsurumaru doesn't seem like he's joking?? That excitement seems real?! He was never very good at telling when this punk was kidding around or not anyway and now his life is just hard again.]
I'm aaalmost a hundred percent sure that that would be a really bad idea. Besides, we wouldn't be able to close the lid or anything so you'd just get dizzy without actually being heated up, right?
[Dryers are a mystery to him when it comes to "how do you dry someone's clothes while they're still inside."]
I wonder if we could just, like... dry our vessels, though.
[No???]
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Right, right. There's no point in spinning uselessly, anyway. [ especially if it won't lead to death...
but at that, he looks thoughtful — if their vessels are them, then maybe putting their swords in the dryer could dry their clothes, right? flawless logic. ]
You know... that could work. Here, let's try it.
[ and then he stretches his hand out, palm upturned for kashuu's vessel, because somewhere... deep down... he knows that this sounds like a dangerous idea, and he'd rather let someone else take the fall for it, like the betraying bean he is. ]
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You'd just get sick, probably.
[He probably would too, but he has his brokeass eye working against him there...
ANYWAY!! This logic is definitely flawless and Kashuu, trusting bean that he is, just slips his vessel from its spot at his belt loop and hands it over when Tsurumaru holds his hand out. This is why his ass keeps getting killed, honestly.]
Here. Be careful, okay? ...You do know how to use dryers, right?
[Just assumes Tsurumaru hasn't done his own laundry the entire time he's been here, apparently.]
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Of course I do.
[ excuse you, he does his own laundry! and why wouldn't he know how to use a dryer! sure, the learning process was kind of... a steep one, involving many ruined clothes that weren't his own, but what matters is that he knows how to use one now.
but obviously, what he doesn't know is that swords shouldn't go in dryers, but it's too late!! he promptly tosses kashuu's vessel into the dryer... and closes the lid... and sets it on low tumble. ]
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But he'll give Tsurumaru a vaguely dubious look, even though he isn't dubious enough to snatch his vessel back. That seemed more like a huffy "who do you think I am punk" answer than a "haha I'm joking" one... He guesses Tsurumaru is probably pretty self-sufficient.
And oops, there he goes, into the dryer. At least Tsurumaru was kind enough to set it on low...
Still, it makes an awful noise as one would expect from throwing a big piece of metal into a big metal cylinder that spins around?? He's quiet for a second, looking down at his clothes to see if they're getting any drier...]
...I don't think I like this.
no subject
so he carefully pulls open the dryer door again, where kashuu's sword goes clink, clink, screeee as the rotation cycles slow down... and once it comes to a full stop, tsurumaru holds out kashuu's vessel to him, while glancing at what continues to be kashuu's very soggy clothes.
while it doesn't seem as if it worked... he'll still ask. ]
Do you feel any dryer?
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[EVEN A GENTLE SPIN CYCLE IS A FOOLISH IDEA. Why is he like this... Exhausting. He'll reach out to take his vessel again though, which thankfully isn't hot to the touch, and slip it back where it belongs.]
That was stupid.
[But hey, A for effort...]
The dryer feels warm, though, so at least it's still working. We could just dry our clothes the regular way, I guess.
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but he seems fine, so there's that! ]
Do you think there's a change of clothes here somewhere? Like, you know — a spa robe.
[ unless kashuu feels ambitious and free.......... ]
no subject
But no, he seems to be okay. No nicks or scratches, no Intense Heat, just a little dizziness that doesn't even compare to the usual dizzy spells he gets these days. The hard knock life of Kashuu.]
Let me look. They usually have these nice thick terrycloth ones... [AND AWAY HE TROTS.
...Only to come back a minute later with a couple of ridiculously satin-y robes instead, in very dark colors instead of the usual cute fluffy white ones. These look like they belong in some of the seedier buildings in the entertainment district and not in a nice, wholesome spa?!]
Ummm, so. These were the only things I could find that weren't dirty or all gross with water.
[SHOVING ONE OVER, TAKE IT. And yet he makes absolutely no move at all to change, himself...]
no subject
except that when kashuu returns, he finds that his trust has been sadly misplaced... tsurumaru's concern, actually, has less to do with the un-wholesome look of the robes and more to do with the fact that they aren't... fluffy and white. he's five?? so he purses his lips in a sigh, but reluctantly accepts the robe from kashuu. ]
They'll have to do. I mean — as long as no one sees us, it'll be okay.
[ if someone walks in, though, that's the end of them... all unfluffy and seedy. anyway, he'll be heading over to a corner to change — but looks back on his way there, and stops in his tracks when he sees kashuu continuing to sit there in his soggy clothes, tilting his head to the side. ]
What's wrong?
no subject
They're more fine than these two morons with their sketchyass robes, at least, even if that's a really low-set bar. Kashuu just shifts where he stands, unfolding his own robe and holding it out in front of himself to inspect it.]
Mmm... I dunno, maybe I'll just deal with the wet clothes. I don't really wanna get undressed here or wear this.
[Ah, when his fussiness kicks up at the most stupid moments. The Kashuu Life™...]
I can just keep guard while you're drying your stuff so no one comes in, okay?
no subject
If you say so…
[ as for him, he heads for one of the changing rooms that isn't as flooded, and returns in a few minutes — with an armful of soggy clothes and dressed in one (1) Sketchyass Robe™ that doesn't... even look too sketchy on him, but that's because he's a Stick and this isn't too flattering on him, anyway?!
either way, he doesn't seem too bothered by it, but that's just because he fully trusts kashuu not to be a judgmental bean... but there his clothes go, inside the dryer! and now they're going around in a circle, and once tsuru finally manages to pry his eyes away from that strangely addictive spinning motion — ]
Then, once I’m finished — I'll dry your clothes for you, too. How does that sound?
[ look, kashuu... you can't stay drenched for the entire day, he won't allow it! ]
no subject
He's also dutifully sticking near the entrance to the laundry room, making sure no other hooligans with the same idea come moseying along this way. Fortunately, few people have the same dumb ideas they do, so they're in the clear for now...]
Eh? Really?
[He'd still have to wear the stupid robe BUT IT'S A NICE OFFER. And he really doesn't want to go around soggy all day... What if his skin starts to prune??]
...I mean, if you don't mind or anything... D'you want a favor?
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Sure, why not? And, well... I don't have anything in mind, but if I come up with a favor later on, I'll ask you for one, okay?
[ though it'll probably just be something simple, like "buy me something sweet", since tsurumaru doesn't put too much weight on favors. ]
If you really don't want to wear the robe, you can hang out in the changing room and toss your clothes over the door.
[ it's kind of an overly complicated plan, but if kashuu really doesn't want to wear it, then that's the best he's got!! especially since kashuu seems pretty displeased with the idea of the robe, so he doesn't want to force him into it?! ]
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'Kay, that's fine. Just let me know, alright?
[Kashuu always keeps the favors and promises he makes, so there's no real hesitation there. He's a fan of fair trades, anyway - with the exception of SOME PEOPLE who just have to deal with him being a huge brat instead of vaguely mature.]
—No way am I just gonna hang out in a room without anything on. I'd rather wear that robe than nothing at all.
[What if someone appeared?! What if he had to run out to help Tsurumaru fend off a robot squad in his underwear?? He'd die of humiliation!! But also probably kill everything in like .5 seconds so there's that.]
It's not itchy or anything, right?
no subject
Oh.
[ it's not like anyone would look!! except hidden ceres cameras, maybe. defeating robots in .5 seconds would be pretty helpful, though... but he takes a moment to glance down at his sketchyass robe, as if inspecting it has anything to do with whether or not it's itchy. ]
Of course it isn't. I don't think anyone's worn them since they were last washed, so you're fine.
no subject