Welcome to the Program

[airlockedmods]

Good Morning, Champions. In the interest of maintaining healthy sleep patterns, a day/night cycle is in effect. Your presence is expected in the cafeteria in exactly one hour.

[The voice comes through not a large speaker, but through the device that's attached to each Champion's arm. Further investigation of the features of the device will reveal a list of profiles, a mini-map, and a list of rules. The hallways are shiny white and silver, with running lights along the floor and lights on the ceiling, and at the junction of the hallways is a sign with a knife and fork icon and an arrow pointing down the hall.

Welcome to the Excellence Program, Champions. Time to get to know your teammates.]

Comments

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[immaculacies]

Mm, probably.

[Thanks for the helpful reply, Manaka. She came to that conclusion herself, earlier, but she doesn't feel inclined to share her own reasoning.

So, instead:]

...I've never heard of the Lunar Veil before. What is it?

thus begins my war with the edit button

[lovecolored]

[ So helpful......Marisa gives her A Look(tm). ]

Eh? You don't know? [ ...wait, shit, these people aren't from Gensokyo. Marisa mulls it over for a moment. ]

It's a kind of cloth that lets people bypass the "shield" the Lunarians put over the Lunar Capital on the moon. Keeps the "filthy Earth-crawlers" from invadin' their city. Puts 'em in a separate dimension, or some shit. But based on the fact that the Apollo astronauts managed to plant a flag up there I guess they're still kind of with us...?

[ a pause, and she grins ] They were pretty pissed about that. [ she is always up for pissing off the Lunarians. they're such crybabies. ]

[immaculacies]

Of course. You said it yourself; this is some sort of bizarro alternate dimension.

[And, fittingly... Manaka doesn't understand a word of her explanation. It's strange, standing there and replaying her words in her head and not being able to come up with a single piece of information that fits. She doesn't mind it, though—at least it's novel. Manaka blinks, and without realizing it, her eyes widen in surprise.]

Ah, that sounds really interesting. The moon isn't anything like that, in the world that I come from. There aren't any people that live there anymore, and definitely not enough to create a shield like that — and they disappeared a long time before the moon landings happened, too.

[lovecolored]

[ Marisa, predictably, provides no additional explanation. ]

Woah, really? What sorta people lived on your moon, then? [ color her interested ] Were they super snooty, too?

[immaculacies]

Well, I've never met one, but I think so. Like I said, they all died out a long time ago, after they drove their own civilization to collapse.

[lovecolored]

[ that actually gets her to laugh, marisa no don't find people dying out funny ]

Damn. D'you know anythin' else about them? Color me curious, the Lunarians I know are these, like, untouchable jerks with a huge superiority complex...what I'd kill to knock 'em down a peg or two.

[immaculacies]

[Well, that's fine. Manaka isn't bothered by what enjoyment Marisa clearly gets from this story. She lifts a finger to her chin as she considers that next question, needing to take a few seconds to dig up the information without her normal connectedness.]

Well... They were led by a man who called himself Brunestud of the Crimson Moon. When their civilization fell apart, he abandoned them and made a deal with the Earth so that the "corruption of humans" wouldn't affect him. In the end, though, he was killed by a human, so sure of his superiority that he wasn't prepared to fight someone on equal footing.

There. Like that?

1/2

[lovecolored]

[ She goes from looking thrilled, immediately to.... ]

[lovecolored]

[ ...pretty impassive? ]

Some things don't change against inter-dimensional lines I guess...what is it with moon people and "impurity" and "humans are gross"?

[ a pause, and she laughs. ]

Sounds like he got what was comin' to him, though.

[immaculacies]

Maybe so. [Manaka isn't capable of making moral judgments like he deserved it, but its true that it was his own actions that led to his defeat.] Though from what I understand, he turned the man who killed him into a vampire before he died, so I guess he got his revenge anyway.

[...anyway]