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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[ He grimaces, not wanting to think about that. ]
Then it was a widespread phenomenon?
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[He doesn't want to say that it freaked him out. He doesn't want to talk about how scared and desperate he'd felt during the brief time it had lasted, unable to contact anyone. So he doesn't—but he sobers some, expression dark, and then after a few beats he tries his best to shake it off and get to the point.]
—Look, don't take this weird or anything, but would you be interested in—like, moving into one of the two bedroom places . . . ?
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...With you?
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[He's amused, but nervous under that, like he's asking a girl out on a date or something. At least it's lighter than he was a moment ago.]
I just think it'd be safer and less annoying to be with someone from now on, and I guess outta everyone I know in this place, I think you'd be best . . . even though that sounds kinda crazy, now that I think about it.
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That's—a wise idea.
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Yeah? See, 'course it is! So . . . after all this! When we're not, like, hiding for our lives and stuff! Long's we've both got rooms and plenty of privacy it'll be cool, right? I've had it on my mind for a long time!
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[ He's honestly surprised by how readily he's accepting. But he can't argue that it would be good to have someone there watching out for him. ]
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[HOW HARD CAN IT BE. He bumps Togami's shoulder with his own.]
But yeah, mostly just 'cuz—I hate bein' alone when shit goes down, seriously. Laugh at me if you want, I guess! But it sucks! And . . . I dunno . . . the times you've stayed over and stuff, I really—liked that. I liked not bein' the only one in my place.
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[ I mean, here they are hiding out behind a barricade together. It's been easier than when they were dealing with things separately, right? ]
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[ He does have an inkling of why not, but even so, now that he thinks about it, he's surprised that gender would supersede other considerations that much. ]
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[HOW CAN HE IMPRESS KIRIGIRI AT EVERY SINGLE MOMENT OF THE DAY? HOW CAN HE SHARE A FUCKING BATHROOM WITH KIRIGIRI?!]
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[ And Togami's not a ton of pressure?! What is Leon implying about him?! ]
I suppose I do have low standards for you already.
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[ We're already going to be great roommates, it sounds like. ]
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[A match made in Heaven. He's not exactly biting in his retort, but not quite playful either, thunking his head back against the wall.]
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[ Is that actually true, or is he just saying that? There aren't really any tells. More than anything, his clipped tone is because he regrets getting into this conversation, and no matter what his stance on it is, he doesn't feel like talking about it. There's no way he would say "yes" even if that were true, but he doesn't want to get in an actual argument either. ]
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[The blunt, one-word answer isn't exactly what Leon expected, and it breaks the tension some on his end; he nudges up against Togami lightly with his shoulder.]
You're missin' out, man.
[But he seems content to leave it at that. Rather than move away, he remains leaning lightly against his side.]
I figured I just wanna grab one of the two-bedrooms on our floor . . . I thought about takin' Naegi's old room, but it feels weird even if it's been ages it's been empty now, y'know?
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[ He sighs a little remembering how they don't know how Naegi is doing, really... But he's not going to get hung up on it when there are more pressing concerns. He glances at the door; it seems too lucky that they haven't had anything even attempt to get inside yet. ]
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I dunno, I guess just 'cuz I'd been in it before while he was here. I dunno anything about the other rooms, but whatever . . . we'll get a new one!
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[ He cringes thinking about having to argue style with Leon though. Ohhhh no. He hadn't even considered that. ]