theairlock | week 2

Entry tags:

!round 1,
!week 2

week 2

Week 2

[The second week in the Champion Excellence Program kicks off on a somber note. Chitanda, Toby, the Griffin- all three of them gone, two of them in one fell swoop. If anyone thinks to check the profiles on their P.I.P.s they will find that the dearly departed Champions' profile photos have been greyed out.

Right on the dot at 7 am the mechanical woman's voice chimes to awaken the remaining champions on Sunday morning, as she has for the past week. After the initial wake-up call though there's a new message tacked on:]

Congratulations, Champions! By surviving your first trial, you have unlocked the second floor of the ship. A new mini map has been added to your P.I.P.! To access the second floor please stand on the teleporter and select the floor you wish to be teleported to.

[The new floor isn't the only thing floating around the ship though, at least metaphorically. When the Champions are awakened they have regained one new memory from the ones they've lost. Starting again on Sunday, as well, Jamie and Bolton will be back to their usual office hours in their usual locations.]

Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday

[ooc: welcome to week 2, everyone! Check-in has begun and don't forget to submit your memory regains!]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

I've never heard of ancient aliens living on Mars, or any aliens but the Jovian Lizards who appeared out of nowhere. And time travel? I... well, I guess that could be possible, since we somehow skipped ahead eight months getting from Mars to Earth through a Chulip, but even then, there'd be no way that I could do it on my own and control it or anything.

Do you think there might be memories between those moments that you might still be missing?

[Look, they're dreaming up what they should remember, at this point Jane is willing to think that getting shit in order might be an "if you're lucky" circumstance.]

It could be. If that's true, I hope I remember more than just that soon. At least there were good parts!

[Good parts...ah, Jane can't help but be a touch jealous. Sure, there were fun and amusing bits to her new memories, but what it left off on was so...]

Perhaps bits will come back to us during the week, or...or maybe if we get out of here, we'll start to recover things? I don't want to go home and find that the whole game's been played without me, and...other things.

[Like Jake and Dirk somehow having fucking babies, I mean. That would be pretty hard to look in the face, as well as biologically impossible.]

And I definitely don't want to leave for so long now that I know Akito really does like me back! I mean, it was obvious before even if he always said it was ridiculous, but now it's destiny!

[There's a flicker of something like pain in Jane's eyes.]

O-oh...you really did remember something nice, then, huh?

Uh-huh ♥ At least, something that ended nice! Before that, it was all really confusing. ...Jane-chan, are you okay? What about your dream?

Uh-

[She blinks, the pain gone, and looks to the side.]

It was...nothing. Stupid, really! Just a bunch of stupid things, but at least I know for sure they happened immediately after what I initially remembered.

Did it at least make anything on your profile make more sense?

N-No...nothing at all. But then again, it was only the memory of a couple of hours, and I didn't do anything but run around my house. You can't have a birthday that's five months away or get an esoterically titled job doing that.

[There's a pause, and then she adds, a bit quieter,] Though...I do suspect a couple more things might have happened to me. I know where I got one of those unusual scars.

How did you get injured just going around your house? Did you fall down the stairs? Sometimes that happens to me.

[Jane shakes her head.] It's a bit more complicated than that. I...I'd touched on it briefly with Chitanda, but...I really haven't explained what's going on at home to anyone else. Would you be willing to listen?

Of course! I can't be responsible for keeping you all safe if I don't listen to you when you need it.

[That gets a gentle smile from Jane.] Thank you, Miss Yurika. And...I'm sorry if it's a confusing and long story, but, I'm going to do my best to explain it.

[She takes a deep breath, lets it out...hoo boy, where to begin?]

Back home, I'm supposed to be playing a special game with my friends. It's called Sburb, and it's unlike anything I've ever dared to dream existed. What I've been told happens is that everyone in a session of Sburb is pulled into this...this completely unique little pocket of its own reality, and each person gets an entire planet full of puzzles to solve and monsters to battle, and when you win, you're supposed to receive something absolutely miraculous - a completely new universe, made through your efforts in the game. [She chuckles softly, shaking her head.] Or so I've been told. I've tried to wrap my head around it, but the entire concept seems so impossible that it's very difficult!

Anyway...there's a part of the game that you can access even before you start playing, if you're lucky. In your dreams, you might just wake up on a moon, either Prospit or Derse, and you can float around and talk to the funny little people who live there - Miss Yurika, on Prospit there are so many little people living in golden houses, walking on golden roads! And if you look up at the clouds, you can see the oddest of pictures in them, real pictures! Images of things that are going to happen! I've seen it myself, and I'll never forget it.

But here's the thing - it's while I was on this dream moon that I got one of my scars. My friend Dirk explained it to me a little later, that on the other moon, Derse, all the little people there hate the people on Prospit, and they hate the children on both moons who play the game. They sent an assassin to kill my friend Jake, who was still asleep on the moon - er, but they only killed his dream self, not his real self that is still alive on Earth - and then, one came and caught me by surprise, and stabbed me! [She presses a hand just under her chest.] Right here. And I know I died on that moon, but at the same time, I didn't. Oh, it's hard to explain, but there was this...kind of light that surrounded me, and somehow I knew I was going to be okay on the moon.

[A pause, as her brow furrows. She knows there has to be more, why can't she remember it? Then she shakes her head, setting her frustration aside.]

Ah, but, the strangest thing of it all is that a scar that my dream self got on the moon from an assassination attempt is on my body here and now. I know how it came to be, but I don't know why I should have it when, for example, Jake's dream self died but his real self didn't go into anaphylactic shock or anything.

[Her tale is pretty much wrapped up, but Jane mutters to herself as her hand drifts a little further down to her abdomen,] Or how I got this other one...

Wow...

[Yurika stares open-mouthed for a moment. She nods.]

So your world has things that change reality, and even alternate worlds in a game? Maybe -- maybe that's why you have that title, too! Because you were supposed to die and you didn't! Or maybe it just moved the wound to your real body with some kind of... I'm not actually sure, but I'm glad you're okay after all that!

[sORRY]

Ah, yeah...it's not a usual thing, but it apparently is all very real. [She smiles bashfully.] I don't know if I somehow moved a wound from one body to another, but I'm glad I'm okay, too. Those dream selves are supposed to serve as "extra lives" in the game.

We only had regular arcade games and things like that back home. I thought your world was a little more like that.

Oh, it is. Sburb is a special case.

Sounds like a dangerous one, too. Are your friends okay?

As far as I know, yes - though I'm not worried about them. When they're awake, all three of them are quite good at taking care of themselves.

I hope they're doing alright. I'm sure we'll get you back to them!

...Thank you, Miss Yurika. Though, for now, it's probably a good thing I'm not with them. I...need some time to rethink some things, and...well, there's probably a lot of shifting going in between some of us, anyway.

[Dirk has most certainly found a way to get his hands on some fine English booty. She needs to come to terms with that.]

That sounds awful. But maybe it'll all work out in your memories, right?

Maybe, but it's sadly doubtful. When Dirk wants something, he can just go right up and get it, and he'll make a total show of doing so. I just bungle everything that comes out of my mouth.

Wait... Is this love trouble?

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