quietplacelogs | INTRO LOG #1

Entry tags:

INTRO LOG #1

INTRO LOG #1
Muzzle and Mute
Content Warnings: Disorientation, memory loss, confusion
Themes: Arrival, survival, exploration, horror

You wake, standing. A thick, muddy red dust coats your skin and clothes - it sticks to your tongue and blocks your vision. Inhale and it chokes you, exhale and your breath puffs out in front of your face in a transparent maroon cloud. It tastes of copper, tangy and harsh. Movement is difficult, every limb tingles and aches. Look to your left, your right. Evenly spaced in each direction stands another person indistinguishable in every way from the next. You're disoriented and lethargic, unable to grasp onto a single thought. A pinprick of light blooms ahead and grows steadily larger; a door has opened.

Hands grip your wrists, push at the small of your back and guide you out of the darkness into a room with four walls and a thin, sagging ceiling. The plaster is peeling, the air is musty, and the floor is slick. White plastic piping juts up from the center and curves into multiple spouts, clean water flowing in uneven streams. Those hands pull your clothes off and clear the dust from your body, redress you in handsewn jumpsuits. By the time they’re through, you will have begun to come back to yourself.

A finger is pressed to your lips. Kind eyes meet your own and a single word is whispered - hush.

Led out of the room in a line, you’re taken down a short hallway and into another, much larger room. There’s a woman waiting for you there, a child hugging her leg, and a cloth bag in her hands. She reaches in and pulls out a device, passes one to each of you. Once finished, she begins to move both hands in graceful gestures, a language. One of the people who helped you lifts their device and the screen lights up, tracks the woman’s hands. Letters appear on the screen and you understand the device’s purpose. She tells you what she knows and it’s not much.

This world is haunted. Noise attracts them, so it is not allowed. Communication is through body language, soundless writing, and the device. She tells you that your feet must be light and your mouth never used. There is a community outside these doors, where you can survive together, but only if you agree to one thing: complete and total silence. You'll have time to talk it over. You may ask one question and receive one answer.

Acceptance allows you to journey outside. The ground is marked in pathways of sand, lining the paths to each building and everywhere in-between. You notice that the locals hold their devices always, aloft and glance to it often. It will not vibrate or make a sound to signal a message. Notices appear. Rules. Guidelines. Feet on the sand and never anywhere else. To open a door you brush your fingers along the hinges - oiled and you may enter. If not, take the brush from the can sitting nearby and coat the metal with the dark liquid.

Now, you're to settle into your new home.

The Man in the Hat
Content Warnings: Heavy lifting, following the rules, alcoholism
Themes: Moving in, survival, exploration, horror

Once you’ve claimed a room for yourself, it’s time to acclimate to the community. Natives will ask what you need and take you along the sandpaths to different areas in the city to gather supplies - furniture and the like. Heavier items will require assistance and will take longer. Houses are mostly empty so if you and your housemates need something, you’ll have to carry it and put it inside the home. Do not make any noise or the natives will refuse to help you. Getting to know your housemates is key to a smooth transition. They are going through what you are right now; take the time to get to know them. Make house rules.

As the first day gives way to night, the natives can be seen moving at a faster pace outside. They’re hurried, though not frightened. Some even smile at you. When the sun sets behind the ruins of what was once picturesque Reims, your device will signal that it’s time to meet at the center of the community. There, natives will stop each person and give them a small gift - a trinket, a token to show that they are trying their best to make all the new arrivals feel at home. These are all items from the character’s home or from another character's home (they will not be anything that belongs to anyone else). Small, soundless and either something taken during the application process or something brand new. They will have no powers to speak of and are meant to be a momento. If asked, the natives found them the same way they found each of you.

Then the party starts. Sort of. A soundless, stitled kind of celebration. Fun is meant to be had, but it’s not an overly joyous occasion. The natives simply don’t know how to cut loose. There will be extra food in the form of one and two; Phillipa even brought some of her homemade bread. If you stumble across a man wearing a hat, the only man in town who does, and agree to go with him when he offers to show you his house - he’ll gift you with a jar of hooch; it’ll burn on the way down.

Sound Eaters
Content Warnings: Threat, danger
Themes: Survival, exploration, horror, game plot

It’s the second day of your stay, and the natives call for an emergency meeting at the Town Hall. Everyone is paired off (see below) and are asked to walk the perimeter looking for anything out of place and patching any areas that might have been affected by weather. Once finished, the same is done on the inside, and when the community leader is satisfied, the main hall is opened up so that everyone can congregate. Characters, during this time only, are allowed to make sound. This is so that the natives can explain why silence is so necessary...

The Sound Eaters.

In an effort not to frighten everyone, the natives won’t go into the history just yet, but they will warn that when someone makes a sound, it attracts them. They don’t know what they look like because they are so fast. If you’re too loud, then in the blink of an eye, you’ll go through a room reset. This is because either the natives ‘silenced’ you or the Sound Eaters have. They will explain that the room came at the same time the Sound Eaters did and that it doesn’t work for the natives. Sometimes, it doesn’t work on new arrivals. Death, for those born in this world, is permanent. If you attract them, you’ll get someone killed. Hence the need for no noise. During the meeting, the natives will tell each character of their own experiences. Their losses. The families they have left and how they’d do anything to keep them alive. They don’t know if you’ll be reset, but is that a risk you’re willing to take? The meeting will last a few hours and will end on a somber, ominous note - at the end of the month, they are taking everyone to meet them.

OOC
From your mods:

Please be mindful of content - if something triggery comes up or if it goes up a rating to say, something sexy, mark your threads in the subject line. We're very flexible and allow any material; we just want our players to be respectful of each other. If you have questions, pp the mod account, use the faq or comment to the appropriate post below. Have fun!

NAVIGATION

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[Reigen's actually one to catch sight of A2 willingly helping out. He hadn't gotten a couch for the room he claimed just because he wasn't sure he could carry one without a racket, but after seeing her help someone else, he quickly waves her down once she walks back out. Though he doesn't just wait for the approach, walking right up, looking very impressed.]

Well, it's not every day that A2 gets willingly approached, considering her permanent scowl! But she really does appreciate being waved down, and she offers an awkward half wave back, not really knowing how to silently reciprocate a greeting.

Or you know, just reciprocate a greeting in general.

So she just cuts right to the point.

Need help?

[He nods! And types into his device.]

I was going to give up trying to carry a fridge into my place, but you're a pro! Mind if I borrow you for it?

Don't mind at all. Don't know what a fridge is, though.

[There aren't any fridges where A2 comes from...]

[???? Weird. He gestures for her to follow, typing as he walked.]

Device that keeps food cold! I don't need a big one, but even the smaller ones are heavy.

[A2 mouths a silent 'Huh' at the response. That's fair, she guesses. Humans need to eat, so obviously they need to have ways to store food.]

It'll be no problem.

[He grins at that, glad she's willing to help out.]

Anything you want in exchange?

[Might as well stay in good graces with the lovely lady that could bench press him, honestly.]

No. I don't need anything.

[And quite honestly the fact that she's already received gifts from humans is appalling to her circuits. A2 certainly doesn't deserve anything that they could offer her. ]

You're generous! Feel free to call me for help if you need it, I have my own skillset.
I can perform minor exorcisms even without the tools of my trade and without being allowed to chant.

I don't know what an exorcism is.

[WELL. How do you explain the concept...??]

I can expel negative energies from your body to cure curses and ailments, anything from a headache that won't go away to a heavy tension in your shoulders!

I don't need anything like that. Don't worry about me.

Humble! An admirable trait, for someone who's got a lot to boast about.
My name is Reigen Arataka.

I don't have anything to boast about. I'm doing what I was made to do. You can call me A2.

You make it sound like you're some kind of cyborg.

Android, actually.

[Reigen's eyes widen, and suddenly the trek to get a fridge is completely forgotten in favor of gawking excitedly at A2. Now that he looks at her...!! ...No, he can't exactly tell. But he's dying of curiosity, only familiar with the concept of an android from the plethora of scifi he watched and read in his lonely little apartment back in his home world. After a second to gawk, he types at her.]

Really?? That's amazing! The only giveaway was your strength!

[The sudden excitement absolutely catches her off-guard, and she sort of flinches backwards a little, even if her blackbox is more or less swelling with pride at him calling her amazing.

Be cool, A2. Be cool.]

Thanks. I'm not really sure I'm amazing, though. I'm an older model, and I'm missing a lot of my dermal layer.

[Which would be noticeable if he takes a look at her hands. Those aren't black gloves, that's just solid metal.

[He looks her over, sees her hands, and holds out his. He wiggles his fingers, a quick and simple let me see? gesture. He'll do her the courtesy of giving her the option, of course.]

[Thankfully, A2 isn't about to do anything that would make a human feel bad, so she offers her hand to him easily enough.

It's hard metal, but it's warm and smooth all the same. If he follows it up to her shoulders where there's actual synthetic skin, he'll find that what little skin that A2 does have is soft and warm.

He's free to touch as he wants. A2 won't do anything to stop him.]

[He does poking and prodding, mindful not to make it too sexualized or weird in case she actually has context for that. He wouldn't want to make her uncomfortable if that were the case.

That said, he's totally fascinated. And a little overwhelmed, because this is technology he couldn't even conceive of! He especially is curious about the hand, curious to see how the gears worked (he can't figure anything out from looking at it), and eventually curiously points at her hair, as if asking permission to give it a feel, too.]

[All of her gears and such are internal. If he's really curious, A2 can open up one of the well hidden seams for the panels on her body to let him see the inner workings.

When he motions to her hair, she obliges, ducking her head for him.

This is so weird, to be touched and prodded at like this by a human? A2 doesn't really know what to do other than let him do as he pleases...

Unfortunately, from years of hoboing it up, A2's hair definitely isn't as soft as a newer models would be...]

[Really, the fact that it still feels like hair at all is incredible. There's a very subtle difference, almost impossible to actually discern unless you're looking - the lack of greasiness to go with the dirtiness, namely. But otherwise you really wouldn't know.

He finishes prodding and quickly pulls out his device again, to type.]

Thanks, sorry if it was invasive. You're really incredible, I've never seen anything like you in reality!

Does your missing dermal layer hurt?

[He called her incredible. A2 can feel a small surge in her blackbox at that, and her cheeks might suddenly become a little redder as coolant flushes through them, simulating her embarrassment.]

It's no problem. We androids were created to serve mankind.

No. Missing my dermal layer doesn't hurt. The exposed metal is only slightly more sensitive with it gone.

[...Hey, she's kind of cute when she's embarrassed, honestly.]

The clothes help at all? We can try and find you gloves if you want.

[M]y what big strong arms you have!

no subject

no subject

whoops sorry abt the prose... im going to bed sweats

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject