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TDM 010: PARTNER UP, PARTNER
| TDM 010: PARTNER UP, PARTNER |
00. Arrival This time, you come out of the water, the Nameless Island's own inherent energy drawing people in. It's like being suspended between realities and abruptly pushed from behind through a rift in dimensions. It may make you sick, or that might be the motion of the ocean, lifting you to the surface 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. Feel free to explore the Island, though there isn’t much to see. Most of the buildings are abandoned and in dire need of repair, and beyond the city lingers a thick fog that obscures much of the wilderness from view. Wander too far into this fog, and you will find yourself mysteriously looping back to where you began, your memories of what you were doing and how you got there erased. With that in mind, it may be wise to stake your claim on a rundown apartment, a tent on the beach, or a bed in the “comfortable” barracks. Your inventory will be found a day later, wrapped up haphazardly and delivered to each person's makeshift home. I. Laid Bare Basics There is a new addition to the scenery at the beach, and everyone is welcome! Especially new arrivals, who will be ushered to the recently-established Laid Bare Spa, where (provided they don't slip away from the bots' helpful grasp) their uncomfortably wet, sandy clothing will be stripped away and they will be lovingly pampered by the cold metal hands of the resident robots. Long-time Islanders and newbies alike are welcome to enjoy such amenities as hot and cold baths, sauna rooms, scrub-downs, thorough whippings with birch brooms, skin treatments, massage and energy work, and more! All rooms are thoughtfully decorated with tasteful murals of naked and disrobing bodies. Maybe you'll see someone you recognize?! (Maybe you'll see... you?) Islanders who happen to find their clothing mysteriously missing are welcome to borrow a Laid Bare branded towel to cover up with on their way home. II. Tattoo to You, Too The Augur understands that sometimes, it's difficult to find a partner to indulge you in those favorite Auspicious Acts - especially for new arrivals, but surely even long-time residents could benefit from a little assistance now and then. That is why ever-benevolent entity has gifted Her precious Islanders with tattoos which feature their most secret, urgent, and/or shameful of desires! (Even if that desire is to simply complete a Bingo.) The tattoo may be a picture or a word, and it can appear anywhere on the body. At first it is pleasantly warm to the touch, like a soft glow of light on your skin. It soon becomes apparent - through either robot advice or a notification on your communication device - that your task is to find a match for your tattoo and complete the depicted act with that person. The longer one goes without completing the act, the more the tattoo seems to heat up, until it feels like it is burning into your skin. Take too long, and the tattoo may become permanent. Otherwise, the tattoo will fade within hours of completing the Auspicious Act. [ For TDMers: feel free to select any favorite kink for this prompt! If you complete a kink that doesn't appear on your card, you may switch one square for the completed kink. For current players: by participating on (tagging into) this TDM, you may switch one kink into your card (it must be the kink in the toplevel prompt you responded to). ] III. Creepy Crawly Caterpillar Crawl Are you on the hunt for credits? Then have the robots got a task for you! The 'bots of the Nameless Island are recruiting Islanders to go bug collecting in the caves, crevices, and hollowed-out logs of the wilderness. The quarry? The (shudder - literally, the robots will shudder) doom-summoning harbinger bug. They describe these creepy creatures as fat, fuzzy, and rainbow-colored, with long, fluffy antennae that look like rabbit's ears. The robots describe these critters as so dangerous that Islanders should only hunt them in pairs. Should your team return successful, you both will be rewarded very handsomely for every caterpillar caught! The bugs are typically very docile and seem to enjoy soft pets, judging by the cooing and squeaking noises they make (especially to scritches behind their "ears"). Poke or disturb them however, and they may bite! Body parts bitten by angry caterpillars will swell up cartoonishly, and can only be treated by having someone else suck the venom out. Good thing you're traveling with a partner! The 'bots strongly recommend against keeping these little buggies as pets, but they're not your dad. N A V I G A T I O N |
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"I guess so. Depends on the mage... but that sounds cool! I could talk to someone without even leaving a room huh? Or whatever I'm doing. Seems pretty useful in the long run. Guess I can't say no to that! Oh hey- is Lady Rhea here? What about Professor Byleth?"
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"That's right. You could be miles apart, and still speak as intimately as though you were side by side. I'm afraid the Archbishop and Professor are not here, however." His voice turns more hesitant now, a touch regretful. It would be nice if they were here, wouldn't it? Not that he would wish such a situation on either of them, far from it! But..... if he's being honest with himself, he would appreciate having someone to look to for direction.
That's not important now, though. If he's asking after Rhea, then it seems doubly important to understand where they stand with each other. "I realize it's a strange question, but if I may ask..... Who was your house leader, Caspar? What do you remember before washing up here?"
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"Oh- huh? What do you mean? I- well. Back in the academy, I started off in the Black Eagles, but then I joined Professor Byleth's class in the Blue Lions because he was really good at fighting and that's kinda my area of interest. I was about to take off with Linhardt again, actually. Weeeee just won the war so that was pretty cool, and Dimitri took the throne and yeah kinda weird state for my family, what with the being in the empire thing and all but things are working out. Why?"
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No, no. He can't get distracted by something trivial like that. Focus. Caspar is..... not his, but that's fine. He's still an ally. And he still needs to be appraised of the strange situation they find themselves in. That should come first. Seteth sighs, dropping his things on the sand and carefully lowering himself down to sit with the younger man. This might take a bit, after all.
"This may be confusing, but it's important. Not everyone here remembers events unfolding in the same way. That doesn't mean any of us are wrong--it means that history actually occurred differently for different people. The friends you know here may not be exactly the same as those you know at home because of this."
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"Oh." He thinks about it, it settles in, "Oh." He says again, tilting his head toward the sand. He'd usually pass this kind of thing off as some kind of prank, but coming from Seteth, it seems less likely that he would joke about those kinds of things. Or at all.
"Wow. Okay, that's a lot to take in." He draws a deep breath, rubbing sand out of his hair. "Okay. I guess stranger things have happened." He can't think of any right now, certainly strange but not stranger than this, but he's sure they're there somewhere.
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So..... yes, this is definitely a forced vacation, exactly like Caspar had initially thought. No fighting, no politics--just a dying world to revive, a ruined city to rebuild, and all the leisure and 'encouragement' to pursue intimacy they could ever ask for.
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"So we don't have to worry about fighting or anything and we can just... be?"
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"You needn't worry about Fodlan while you're here at all, I believe--from every indication, any time spent here is meaningless there. We should be returning the very moment we left. All we need to concern ourselves with is the state of this world, and the demands the golems make of us."
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"Are you having fun here? Is everyone? I mean, if they're not fighting they've got to be having a good time." It's stated more like a question, a hopeful one. He'd admit to yearning for the carefree days of the academy still.
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Finally, Seteth just shakes his head and sighs, scrubbing at his forehead. "Just because this may be a break from our own lives doesn't mean there are no hardships here. It seems this place was once subject to a terrible calamity, and our presence is needed to help restore it. Leaving aside the fact that the city is in ruins, it seems the only means to revitalize the land is through carnal acts."
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"They have all of those weird things running around, why can't they just. Y'know. Fix stuff?"
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"I suspect Linhardt or Lorenz might have a better understanding of how it could work, but if I had to hazard a guess? Something about us committing such acts may create magic that the golems can harness to fix things. If they can use it, but not create it themselves, they would have to get it from somewhere--even a mountain of firewood won't keep you warm, if you have no way to light it."
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"Welp. Guess there's a dark cloud to every silver lining, huh? Wait, is that how the saying goes?" Though he's not really sure sex is such a bad thing, just that he's never done it before, and he was hoping it would have been under more romantic circumstances.
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Well, compared to the ordeal of the past five or six years? Sometimes it feels entirely absurd that this place is capable of upsetting him so much.
Dad is only having sex under duress. Try not to think about it.As long as he's explaining things, though, he should probably mention their cards, shouldn't he?"One last thing you should know about that. On your bracelet, you will be given a personal list of tasks to complete. I'm not sure why those in particular are special, but you can use them to negotiate with the Augur to make requests of it. As far as I'm aware, the Augur is the one who brought us here--the ruler of the other golems that live on this island." Please don't fistfight the Augur, Caspar. He's not even sure if this particular supercomputer even has fists.
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He nods along, probably not fully parsing the information, but that's fine. He's the type who needs repetition, simply put. He does try though, but at the mention of the Augur, he casts a sidelong look to Seteth before leaning in.
"Do you want me to show it who's boss?"