TDM 004: WASHED ASHORE

[erkumods]

TDM 004: WASHED ASHORE

Arrival This time, you come out of the water. While the Augur reboots, the Nameless Island's own inherent energy draws people in. It's like being suspended between realities and walking through a rift in dimensions. It may make you sick, or that might be the motion of the ocean, lifting you and carrying you to shore. Waterlogged and covered in sand, new arrivals will be greeted by robots who welcome them with towels and bracelet devices. The A5 card is already loaded up. Inventory will be found a day later, wrapped up haphazardly and delivered to each person's makeshift home. ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● I. Feel the friendship! Recent arrivals and visitors to the beach may notice a sudden influx of hundreds of bright red crustaceans crawling (and coupling) across the sand. It's crab mating season, as it turns out, it's a regular invasion! To keep the beach a pleasant place to gather for the island's inhabitants, the robots are offering credits to especially enterprising crab-catchers. Grab a bucket and get to work! Be sure to watch out for their pinch, mind you. Their little claws are tiny, but that doesn’t mean they don’t hurt. Surprisingly, there is another effect that even the robots don't anticipate: islanders who are pinched by the crabs find themselves feeling instantly buddy-buddy with the next person they spot. Did you just become best friends?! Get pinched one too many times, however, and those feelings may sour into a crabby mood, indeed. If you are feeling particularly vengeful (or just hungry), the little crabs do make for delicious gumbo. Once cooked, they have no side effects whatsoever. ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● II. Phallus Phestival Although the Augur is offline and supplies are scarce, the robots of Erku are still eager to make their run-down little island a welcoming place for the new arrivals. To that end, they have arranged a three day festival to boost morale and promote the generation of plenty of Eros energy to assist in the restoration of the damaged and decayed parts of the city. The robots claim that this celebration was once a cornerstone of the long-lost civilization of the island. By the dawn of the first day, every island resident will find at their doorstep (or tent flap, mobile suit, etc) the traditional costume of the ancient islanders to wear to the festival. It appears to be... a giant sheet? There doesn’t seem to be any rhyme or reason to the sometimes garish colors and patterns of the fabric, but at least the robots have uploaded instructions on how to wear it to your bracelet device. Attendees will find food (mostly crab-flavored), confections, and household necessities in rather suggestive shapes, as well as goods you might find handy to complete your A5 squares: sex toys, pervertibles, sexy maid outfits, and the like. While islanders are welcome to set up shop on the festival grounds and sell (or charge) whatever they like, all items from the robots are offered up for free to those who wear their traditional island garb! ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● III. Fireside Adventures Each night of the festival is wrapped up in style with an enormous bonfire on the beach, where drinks, fruity cocktails, and lively music appropriate for dancing is all provided at no cost by the robots. Even if you’re not usually much of a dancer, the longer you stand by the fire and allow it to warm your limbs, the more you feel like moving! Not only that, but everyone is looking quite beautiful by the firelight, are they not? If you’ve grown tired - or if dancing just isn’t your thing - you might prefer to sit back and swap stories on one of the many driftwood log benches the robots have prepared for seating. Or, maybe you’d prefer to rough it for the night in one of the beachside canvas tents. Better claim one quick, though, or be prepared to share… there’s only one sleeping bag! ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● N A V I G A T I O N

Comments

[marmoron]

[ Keith sighs, taking another bite out of his taiyaki. With the head and balls now gone it almost looks like normal food again. ]

Not that that's a reason to stay complacent. There has to be a way to get back to our own worlds.

[instrumentalized]

I am sure there is. It would be absurd if the travel between universes could not be reversed or replicated in some form.

[ But that is... a difficult topic in and of itself, for Garma. So he's actually going to take a bite to distract himself, too. Now that he is eating instead of panicking about eating, it's really just food. ]

It's not necessarily an option for myself, but I am hoping for the best for everyone.

[marmoron]

Why? What happened to you?

[ That's probably not the most sensitive follow up question, but it's out there in the aether now. ]

[instrumentalized]

[ Garma briefly considers keeping it a secret, but there is a coffin and a giant funeral portrait at the beach and at this point it just feels kind of weird to not own up. ]

I am dead in my world. This place gave me a second life, it appears. Do not ask me how I feel about this, I haven't figured it out myself.

[marmoron]

How is that even possible?

[ Well that diverts all of Keith's attention to Garma who is now getting a proper up-gpwn glance. ]

You don't look like a zombie.

[instrumentalized]

I'm not--

[ ... or maybe he is, actually. He cannot dispute this with nearly as much certainty as he wants to. Dead and then revived? Maybe he is a zombie. What an awful word. ]

I don't know how they did it - believe me I would much like to. All I can say for certain is that I died before coming here.

[marmoron]

How?

[ It's a callous question for sure, but he's just not sure if by "I died" what Garma really means is "I passed out from a fatal injury and am assuming my own death." ]

[instrumentalized]

[ Of course. Garma isn't sure what he expected, bringing it up. It's only natural that the details of his demise are an interesting anecdote to other people at best, a new story to tell at parties. Even though it's been only two days, who would consider the toll on Garma when he's right here, living and breathing? ]

The ship I was in exploded and crashed.

[ He says it shortly, tersely, because he's trying not to think too hard about how it felt. ]

You're making me lose my appetite.

[marmoron]

[ That gets Keith to pause for a moment. It'd be an understatement to say that he's pretty preoccupied with his own predicament at the moment, but that isn't really an excuse for not stopping to consider the plight of fellow kjdnappees. Or zombies. ]

.... right. Sorry.

[ If nothing else, it does sound genuine, even if it's not necessarily amazingly articulate. ]

You're a pilot?

[instrumentalized]

[ Garma is quiet for a moment, focusing on steadying his breathing before munching down on some more awfully shaped food, which seems like a lot less of a concern when compared with his own passing. ]

I am. Being able to fly at the very least a fighter is part of standard training at the Academy.

[marmoron]

[ Huh. That's more similarity between them that Keith was expecting. He has another bite of his food, chewing contemplatively as the stranger explains. ]

Were you also part of a space exploration program?

[instrumentalized]

No, I--

[ This is sufficiently distracting from his misery at least, as Garma ponders both the implications of 'also' and 'exploration program'. ]

I was born in space, I certainly don't need an exploration program. It's 0079 in the Universal Century, I'm from a space colony.

You are earlier, I assume.

[marmoron]

[ Ah. How quickly the similarties end then. ]

That date doesn't mean anything to me.

[ Keith gives the guy another quizzical look. ]

.. WHat planet are you from?

[instrumentalized]

Not a planet - the colonies are artificially created cylinders placed at the Lagrangian points. I am from Side 3, Munzo, located at L2. It's a little behind the moon.

[ Hopefully at least the MOON is something that their worlds share in common. It would be a real shame if not. ]

[marmoron]

[ ... ]

Which moon What happened to your home planet?

[ Obviously the space colonists have to have had some planetary origin, right? Given that Garma doesn't strike him as particularly alien looking, that planet should be Earth so... what happened to it?

Then again. It's not like Keith can talk when it comes to aliens that don't look like aliens. ]

[instrumentalized]

Earth's moon, of course?

[ Note for later: ask about other planetary life. They do make expeditions to further out planets sometimes, to gather resources, but they really are not inhabited in the slightest, so this is... huh. ]

Nothing happened to it. It's still there and a lot of stubborn elite still live on it.

[marmoron]

[ The question "and you're NOT a stubborn elite" sits on the tip of Keith's tongue, but he does think better of saying it out loud. ]

Okay. So... you're living on a space colony by Earth's moon doing ... research?

[instrumentalized]

... no.

[ Okay, let him just finish his food so he can toss the stick aside and twirl his hair as he speaks, it helps him focus. ]

You're still thinking too small. The colonies house a majority of human population. There are seven Sides and most of them are made up of several cylinders. They house landscapes, cities, theme parks... Space migration is a major fact of daily life.

In my time, we are currently at war with the Earth Federation over attaining independence. That's how far space living has progressed.

[marmoron]

Oh.

[ He blinks, finally starting to get the picture here. It's honestly strange to think about being in a space war with Earth of all places. Even stranger to be told he's the one thinking on small scales considering what he's been through in the last several months. ]

Well. You're definitely not from the same timeline.

[instrumentalized]

I was getting that impression, yes.

[ It is so strange to explain the very basis of his life as if it's a sci-fi concept... ]

You said you were interested in space travel, though? What is the state of it on your Earth?

[marmoron]

[ He's still frowning a little at Garma, though he's not exactly sure how to feel about what he's just heard still. He eats the last of his taiyaki and claps his hands clean before folding his arms. ]

So far, the Earth I'm from has sent astronauts out to Kerberos. One of the moons on the farthest planet in our solar system. [ If that's rdundant information, well Garma's getting it anyway. ]

But there are aliens -- the Galran empire -- who've discovered our solar system. They have technology advanced enough to destroy whole planets with ease. [ A beat. ] So far they haven't attacked Earth because they're focusing their efforts on retrieving the Voltron Lions from me and my team.

[instrumentalized]

[ Huh. That's... certainly very different. For as much as human life has spread out during the Universal Century, aliens have remained a concept firmly rooted in science fiction and conspiracy theories. Garma blinks, looking equally baffled now. ]

So you haven't settled anything yet? Not even the moon? That... dos not sound like you are equipped to deal with invasion. We haven't even made first contact with anything and we've settled the whole Earth sphere and a little beyond...

[marmoron]

[ Keith's expression sours. ]

Yeah, well. That's part of why I have to get back home instead of messing around in a place like this.

[ Not that he really expects Garma to relate to sentiments like that. ]

[instrumentalized]

[ Garma's face does turn serious at that, though. ]

I certainly have sympathy for this plight. If it were possible for me to return and change anything about my war, I would feel much the same.

[ He knows, now, that they lose the war and the people he loves will die. People from his world have kindly informed him. But if it wasn't so... he'd do anything to get back. ]

Many people are searching for ways home, at least.

[marmoron]

Not that there's been much success.

[ He sighs at that, not bothering to hide just how tired he feels already. ]

Technically my lion has the ability to travel between realities, but I think the other four lions all have to be here in order to cut open an entry point between universes. It'll probably be better to bank on seizing control of whatever device was used to bring us here in the first place.