Xistentia: Mod (
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xistentiaooc2017-10-28 04:56 pm
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Test Drive Meme #6 (tw violence)
Test Drive Meme #6
I want neither revenge nor relief.
CRASH LANDING
Exit one dimension, enter the next. It was chaos: pressure against your ears, light bending in an impossible, unimaginable way. The very molecules of your body vibrating against one another. If you have windows, the view outside makes no sense. Even if not, your hands, your face, your feet seem like an uncertain thing. It's the feel of reality itself tearing apart, reshaping, reconnecting, thread by thread.
And suddenly, there's a beach— or ocean, whichever you land in. Smoke. Fire. Salt water churning up, fizzing around.


Maybe you crash, in a ship wrecking into sand. Maybe you merely stumble out of a portal, a ragged wormhole in space. Or maybe you fall off the back of an incredible steed, some creature that carried you into this place. Either way, there's pandemonium around you. Incredibly, severe injuries are far and few between— nobody's screaming about the dead. But you might have to help pull someone free of wreckage, or move quickly to salvage burning belongings from the landing craft. Maybe it's the crafts themselves, that you're trying to salvage.
Likely, you don't know them, these other strangers who arrived here[1]. Maybe you don't trust them— you just came out of a dying world, after all. But you all have one thing in common: you're here now.
When you get a second to breathe, maybe you'll see it. The brilliant green forest across the sand. Beyond that, the glint of a faraway city.
BATTLE WITH D.E.S.T.I.N.Y.
November has barely begun, when chaos strikes again[2]. Perhaps you've had weeks to settle in, finding yourself a new home and getting accustomed to the neighborhoods... or maybe you've had no time at all. Your daemon warns you of a massive invasion coming from the West, the ocean where you first arrived.

When the violence makes land, it's shockingly similar to the exit from your original world, yet mashed in with the experiences and genres and world details of other refugees— soldiers in red armor wielding weapons of all kinds, both advanced and rudimentary; airships, bizarre monsters; firestorms and quakes that seem sentient in the way that they move, pursuing people through the beach and the forest. You see the injured and the dead, and people running in panic. Heat and gunfire break up the ordinary peace of wilderness, driving animals into stampedes and filling the sky with panicking birds.
There are children and doctors and engineers among the many refugees of Xistentia, and not everyone can fight back— but maybe you're one of those who can.
Think fast— that's a crimson spear launching at your head now.



The city's defenses are buckling too. While ordinarily, the civlization possesses unnatural physics that subvert violence, the onslaught starts to wear agains them. The only safe place is the Temple. Here, civilians and injured combatants are banding together to try and boost morale... which coincidentally also can boost the defenses of the land by with the energy collected from emotional connectivity. For better or worse, there is plenty of negative feeling to go around, the air thick with fear.
Whether you're recovering from injury or afraid to fight, you can still contribute here. Tell a story, sing a song, make a meal out of one of the cookfires started in the hallway, or even help with medicine. One thing is for certain: we're in this together.
NETWORK
Today, it's peace time. By now, the city of Xistentia has a population of over 500 people. Shops line the streets of downtown, and increasingly well-trodden paths will take you into the agricultural zones nearer to the forest or even down to the beach. There are still distinctive animal presences around— careful with that— but the most common critters you'll see are birds crapping on your stuff outside and tiny winged hairless people creeping your food.
One afternoon, you are taken from whatever you’re doing - taking a walk through the city, sunning yourself on the beach, running around in the forest shoring up defenses - by a message, appearing on your Daemon’s network screen. It’s a simple notification, that reads:
It would appear that your daemon accidentally sent a text message misfire.
CHOOSE YOUR OWN ADVENTURE
hells yeah
Footnotes
- Some of these can be nameless, plot-device NPCs to facilitate interactions! But even in this case, please avoid gore in describing their current state of being. Anyone dead or catastrophically injured will have disappeared by the time your characters make it to Xistentia. There are no corpses or dying here.
- This is connected to the war plot, coming up in November. Please read the announcement for more information! Features include good, old-fashioned violence, hurt/comfort, and "drift compatibility."
[ crash landing ]
In the meantime, he dredges up a false bright smile, holding his palms up. ]
Surprise.
no subject
'Surprise'? [ thor, in all his sandy, disheveled glory asks from the pit in the sand he's still flopped gracelessly in. ] I watched you die. That's all you have to say?
[ just gonna pick up a nearby shell or wandering crustacean and toss it at his brother's face. half to make sure he's actually there and thor isn't just high as balls on leaking super-plane fumes, and half because this is very upsetting. ]
no subject
( and not think too hard about thor's grief. loki, after all, is practiced at ignoring what doesn't suit him from moment to moment. ) ]
I'd ask how you got here but I know you have bumbled your way in as usual.
no subject
And you're changing the subject.
[ said abruptly, without immediately looking to his brother. There's a thrill of happiness in him, at the possibility his brother is still alive, but it's a pushed back, cautious one. After all, this isn't the first time he'd had to mourn Loki, and Loki being here in the flesh would mean there was yet another stinging betrayal between them. His words come even and steady, somewhat blank, not wanting to give Loki the satisfaction in knowing he'd hurt him again in this. ]
How are you alive, Loki?
no subject
When Thor's question comes, Loki has no clever lie ready. It has only been a few weeks since he left Svartalfheim and the wound in his body still has phantom aches. ]
I don't know. Perhaps my monstrous blood helped tame the poison.
[ Loki shrugs, trying to downplay it. He's pleased to be alive, but less pleased with what options it left him with. ]
Does it truly matter how I survived?
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Yes. It does.
[ he doesn't believe the 'monstrous blood' bit, because loki's always healed about the same as thor has regardless, save for some differences (in his memory, at least, which isn't exactly spot on), but the fact is he'd felt him die. watched the color leave him, felt the chill go through his body, the rigidity of rigor mortis setting in. he hadn't been dying, he'd been dead. Not to mention - ]
It's been over a year. Were you ever planning on letting me know?
no subject
What nonsense is this? I came here a mere few weeks ago. It has not been a year for me. Or do you think me a liar in that as well?
no subject
[ loki never really struck him as the island paradise sort of person? isn't he going to burn? he probably looks like a lobster under whatever glamour he's probably putting up. thor does take some brief respite in imagining that. hurr hurr.
as for the liar part, well. the look loki's given a look somewhere between 'you know damn well i was not born yesterday' and 'is this the real life'. ]
Do you honestly wish me to answer that, brother? [ loki, you are the last person to pull the 'have i ever lied to you' thing, because yes, you have. a lot. it's sort of your thing. but, okay, fine, because his brother is miraculously alive and because, despite the third degree being given, thor is happy for that, he's giving the benefit of the doubt, deciding to compare stories rather than argue. tugging himself up from his sand pit, thor goes about expounding on the past year and change as he dusts himself off. ] I left Asgard after defeating Malekith. The year or so on Midgrad gave space to think, reflect. Stark's mad creations had only just been fought back when the red soldiers appeared. Now, this.
no subject
But Earth is gone. Asgard . . . who knows what state Asgard is in. It puts everything into a harrowing perspective even Loki can be cognizant of. ]
When I woke up, I saw no one. Not you or the Dark Elves. So I took the ship to find my way . . . back, I suppose. But I found myself here instead.
This place can confirm that, at least.
no subject
And no time has passed for you since, save a handful of weeks? [ Thor clears his throat, pacing over, with brows knit, still pulled between the chaos he'd left, the chaos he's now found, and the constant question that is his brother. ] Time must be warped around this place.
[ not the first time it's been heard of in the realms, some places are just bizarre that way. still, oddly convenient they'd show up just in time to reunite, yet at such different ends. a silence settles for a moment or so, thor looking over the man here, tension in his jaw, and a strain clear in him. in the end, he ducks his head, something of a nod given. ]
I'm sorry for my suspicions. It's been a rough day. Year. [ some of that relief he'd cautiously held filters through, a hand lifting to lay on loki's shoulder, squeezing, with a small smile daring to show. ] It's good to see you well, brother.
I love this <333
Still, he forces himself to act normal, his quick-silver tongue back on hand. ]
I am surprised you are so pleased to see me. It must have been a truly awful year.
me too aahhh <333
well, peace and wry smirks and dry sarcasm, anyway. ]
I did spend a wealth of time subject to Midgardian public transportation, and the ravings of Tony Stark and his love of numbers. Of which being insulted and stabbed is sometimes preferable.
[ jussayin. ]
no subject
( or that was just loki, always expecting the worst, because the best never came through ) ]
Well. Just about anything is preferable to Stark, so I am not sure if that is complimentary.
no subject
[ insulted. and. stabbed. he's known this is life with his little brother since like 8 okay he's used to it. and yet, for those many years, thor always sought out loki's presence, his counsel, his camaraderie. no matter how they'd fought, or hurt one another. even now, really, at odds as they are, and yet, is it really so different? right, gonna muse about that later, shove those feelings right back into the feelings corner, we got shit to do. ]
Tell me, then. What is this place?
[ if anyone is likely to know the most about what the fuck is going on around them, it's loki. he's always had a knack for finding his feet quickly. ]
/2
no subject
Xistentia. A waystation between the different universes and realms. I assume you remember those from your studies.
[ A pointed tone there to illustrate Thor's ability to retain factual knowledge from their childhood. ]
It seems the multi-universes are crumbling due to an outside virus or organisation. Much like the Dark Elves, they wish to return to the nothingness.
no subject
loki's shot a withering glance, voice a long suffering drawl. ] Yes, Loki, I remember. Waystations. Places in between.
[ mostly, anyway. he understands the gist of it, even if he couldn't get into as exact specifics as loki likely could. couldn't find all the secret pathways in between places. he knows the concept, not the practice. SEE? INSULT. but they have plenty of time to squabble, and have already devoted centuries upon centuries to it. about that nothingness thing. ]
A virus. Like a disease? [ or organisation, but he'd said virus first, and that means something. ] And this spread, how is it stopped? Is it present, on this waystation?
no subject
It continues to spread. No doubt that is what swallowed your precious Earth and its denizens. You were lucky to have survive. As to whether it can be stopped . . . [ Loki shrugs. He's not hero, but his survival instincts are intact. He is certainly not keen on dying. ] . . . that remains to be seen. I have not been here long enough to know. But the others speak of organized fighting militias, an upcoming war that may yet reach these shores.
no subject
something in the bluntness of earth's destruction irks thor, knowing loki's thoughts of the people who'd been lost. perhaps there's less bite to his brother's words that thor imagines, but he casts eyes both angered and still hurting at him. ]
There were friends among those denizens. Noble and good. Undeserving of this fate. [ to snuff out an entire realm so quickly and fiercely, the immensity of that death and sorrow is still a shock to him. the less glamorous burn in him for revenge still a fever pitch. the mention of oncoming war, while not something thor's proud of, does something to soothe that despair. if for nothing else than having something to do besides fail and flee. ]
Others? What others?
no subject
( or he would have killed him. everything is 50/50 these days )
He pulls his gaze away. ]
Stark is here. The Captain. A few children who hail from the same world.
no subject
while his eyes linger on loki's disgust for his sentiment, any commentary is held in. now isn't the time to rehash that old debate once again. instead, he takes in the information given. ]
Already? [ he stops midway through wanting to say he'd only just been in the plane with them, but then again, there's a year's difference between him and his brother. it falls in line with warped time. okay, but-- ] And children?
... You were talking with children? [ l o l . ]
no subject
I was. What of it? Everyone is rather young here.
no subject
[ the mental image of loki doing anything with children outside of passing them by as if they don't exist just seems completely bizarre to thor, in an amusing kind of way. enough that he smirks a little, a sarcastic pat to the back of loki's shoulder as he moves off towards the forest, and the city in the far distance. which he's assuming is where the people and children are at. ]
If this dark sorcerer thing doesn't work out for you, at least you know you have babysitting to fall back on.
no subject
I don't want to hear that from someone who couldn't pick up his toys without breaking them.
no subject
See? You already have the nanny tone down and everything. I think you'll have a bright future in this venture, Loki.
[ loki's school of hard knocks etc etc he'll make a lovely mary poppins some day. ]
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