middleofsomewhere | What their Eyes See: Start

What their Eyes See: Start

"Good Morning Voidtreckers, today is day five of the month of Llama." The voice echoes through the train as passengers wake up in their beds. Not long afterwards their SCA’s glow with the colour of the void and a holographic image will appear.

Preperation and Arrival

As usual they have a couple of hours before arrival to ready themselves for the mission ahead. As promised the dressing carriage is open for them to find suitable clothing. Trench coats, a lot of leather, a lot of black with neon colours thrown in here and there. There is a lot of choice in a variety of sizes so everyone is bound to find something to fit. Hopefully something they like, though some passengers may be more comfortable with the fashion choices than others.

A couple of hours after the announcement of the mission the voice speaks again. "Shortly arriving in system #93426194992. Arriving in ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one." The train shakes as it leaves the void, colours fading to be replaced to a grey thick smog outside the windows.

The train bumps slightly as it hits rails, snaking its way towards the city before entering a tunnel. A few moments and they come to a stop, the doors open onto a platform. Stepping out into the station the first thing to hit them is noise, it sounds like there are ten different advertisements blaring, someone or something is playing loud music. There's a lot of flashing signs, screens with advertisements, bright lights that change colour for no real apparant reason. Heavy on the senses as they make their way to the gates.

They will find that their SCAs allow them through the barriers and into the wider train station, which is somehow even louder. It is busy as well, people hurrying from place to place. There are signs declaring this to be Tier Three, Home of Manufacturing. as well as signs pointing the way to lifts, to take them to other tiers.

Tier One

Mapping

For those travelling up to tier one the first thing they will notice when they leave the lift is, it is a lot quieter up here. Peaceful even, there are people around, all looking official and busy. None will pay the Voidtreckers any mind unless they are acting particularly suspicious.

The air feels better here, probably because the whole tier is encased with a dome that they will be able to see as they enter, coming from a lift near the edge of the tier. The buildings are all harsh dark metal, almost uniform in design. The streets are clean and there has been an attempt at greenery with some shrubs and simple plants.

The buildings all need to be accessed using their SCA's. Their SCA maps show them where the buildings are but give no information about them, nor do they have maps of inside. Once the voidtreckers enter they will find that their maps fill in as they explore.

There are plenty of different buildings, offices, labs and meeting rooms. There are also a lot of security staff and anyone acting too suspiciously will be approached and questioned. Hopefully they have a plan, blend in or sneak around.

Flickers

Sometimes though that is a little harder, they might enter a room to find themselves on their old street, in a world they have visited before on the train or somewhere else that is decidedly not here. These illusions get more common as time goes on and people will begin seeing the illusions of others or find the two scenes merging together.

Voidtreckers who are immune to illusions will not see these strange visions and those who are particularly strong willed will be able to fight them off. Once people know they are illusions they can focus through them to see reality even if it is overlaid with what their minds want to see. It will take a lot of concentration to stay focused and get an accurate map.

Tier Two

A Mystery

The lift here brings them out into a glass covered corridor. Outside the glass the air is thick with smog but the filtration systems means that the air seems fine inside, especially with their SCA's helping out. Outside the tunnels they will be able to see the lights of hovercars zipping around and the silhouettes of buildings. Office blocks and large houses make up this sector. Large billboards blare out advertisements at all hours, neon lights shining through the smog.

The atmosphere of the sector is one of fear, people hurry about their business, keeping an wary eye on their surroundings. The newcomers won't get too much scrutiny but people are likely to be very wary if approached or questioned.

But they will talk once they guage them to not be a threat. Murders. Six people dead, from inside their own houses. Locked doors, security systems, all for nothing. Is it a serial killer? But the reports suggested an animal attack? From what animals?

Getting access to the houses will take some negotiating or breaking and entering. The bodies themselves have been cleared by law enforcement, caution tape still up to keep out any nosy public.

The rooms the bodies were found in were all rooms that used holograms as decoration and the voidtreckers will realise when they enter them that these holograms seem a lot more realistic than some of the others they might have seen in their stay in the sector so far.

Creatures

As they talk to people, or overhear gossip they will hear more about animal attacks. Someone swears they saw a lion prowling the streets. A hovercar crashed and the driver swore they had been attacked by an eagle. Neither of those creatures live in the city. Neither of those creatures exist on this world anymore.

But the Voidtreckers will quickly learn there is something to these rumours, especially as dark falls, the feeling they are being hunted. A paw tread, a tail disappearing around a corner. As days go on they may get attacked by a bear, a tiger or perhaps a creature from their own world, one that should not exist here at all...

Tier Three

A Crisis

Leaving the station brings them into crowded streets, air thick with smog, Up above them is the floor of the plate above, set with bright lights to offset the lack of natural light getting through. Billboards and screens blare advertisements, traders yell their wares. Life is fast and swirls around them as they step out into the streets.

Here also there is an air of worry. The talk is all of Spectura, kids unconcious after playing video games, hospital overflowing. Spectura's fault, there are calls for accountability, claims of sabotage. No person gives the same story and it becomes clear that most people don't know what has happened but almost everyone knows someone who has been affected. Fear, blame, tensions are high.

But life must go on, the factories never stop, people can't not work and with so many people unconscious people have to pick up the slack. The whole sector feels at breaking point.

If they try and buy Spectura systems they will not be stopped though they will need to sign a waiver, to take on all responsibility for what might happen to them if they go into the system.

Spectura

There are a whole range of games to look through, though the two most popular ones where the majority of players can be found are an open-world farming MMO called AgriTopia VI Ultimate, with bright landscapes and calming diegetic music, and Aegis Force, a tournament team shooter with short battle scenarios and smaller maps.

Those entering the system will fall unconscious in the real world and as they enter the problem will be pretty obvious straight away. Red vines, covering everything, tangling trees, creeping up buildings, coming straight for them to attack.

Anyone who gets overwhelmed by them will be stuck, unable to move or progress. It is possible to fight them off and for those voidtreckers who have faced the vines before they will find their soothing powers will work here as well.

People are tangled throughout many different games and once they are freed will need some help to find the next save point or exit. They need to help plant the final hundred potatoes, or team up to take down the level boss or solve the next puzzle, keep the vines away and free as many people as they can.

Tier Four

A Way In

As they leave the lifts they will find this tier is dark, dim lighting barely penetrating the smog. Homes are makeshift and all on top of each other. The streets are crowded, loud and people don't stop to chat. It is incredibly claustrophobic, with large support columns, exposed wires and large pipes running alongside and over the 'roads'.

Here there are plenty of stores selling anything and everything, certainly not above board. Credits are sometimes accepted but more often store keepers will prefer to trade in barters, food is popular. Anything that isn't nutri slime or the even worse unbranded basic version.

Bars and other seedy establishments are open all hours, neon signs beckoning. It is here that they will find the entry points to the fighting rings.

People don't talk about it openly but you look big enough, mean enough or dramatic enough then it will be slipped into conversation. Have you heard? Winners get a dream come true.

The fights are a mix of one on one and group fights. All terms are negotiated before hand with an overseer and fights are to the yield. The crowd wants a show and so dramatics are encouraged.

What was that?

The rumours about people going berserk are spoken in whispers. No one really knows what has gone on. A few fights have gotten out of control, a couple of fighters broke down after fights, at least one has quit for good. Most spoken about is The Crimson Fist. The best fighter in the ring who two days prior just left. Left the city with no protective gear, no word to anyone. No one knows what happened to them.

As the voidtreckers get further into their fights they will begin to realise something strange is going on. That opponent you are facing? They now look like your worst enemy, or perhaps your best friend, your lover. Sometimes you're no longer in the city but in a place of fond memories or your worst nightmares. Fights can very quickly go south when your opponent believes you their greatest foe.

Advancing the ranks now seems like it might be more difficult than first it appeared.

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Hmmm, the inside of buildings? Tidus brings down an arm so he can look at his SCA, bring up the layout of the city that may or may not be there for him on tier one. As if the train would be so kind when it usually wasn't when he was in places he shouldn't be.

"You don't need to be doing the entire area, right?" This might be a lot of questions to throw Taiki's way, but he's vaguely remembering Orange's job too. "Isn't it just some part? Wherever the...virus thing happened?"

And wherever that was.

"I think... We don't know which bit is important so we need to try and get a map of everywhere." He explained, before smiling at Inigo.

"There's a few of us.. Devero is up here and um... Wen Sizhui and a few others who I know."

Everyone was very helpful.

Inigo mentally goes over the names for a moment. He remembers Devero being kind to him when they danced, and he knows both of the Sizhui seem like really sweet guys.. So that isn't too bad company for Taiki. He's glad to hear about it, making him smile a little again. (Apparently he's gotten over his little moment there.

Until he'll be reminded of it by Tidus the next time they hug, anyway.)

"You guys need to map out this whole place? Isn't it too big for that?"

"Geez, Orange got stuck with just walking around - like that other place we went to! What was that called anyway? The one with the funny tree and animals that came outta the computer--"

He's distracted, head half-turned but not looking over the shoulder that he's speaking by, another mission on his mind. Eyes flickering forward again before long, his feet still walking and his hands dropping by his sides; the splattering of artificial colouring between roads and structures not even melting, but gone in a blink. Sound muffles in his ears, the last that should happen for the environment that adjusts in his vision.

Zanarkand, his Zanarkand, in every shade of sand and blue. Daylight breaks above their heads, but so does so much else; spiral ringed buildings reaching too high up for their eyes to see their tops, waterfalls cascading down their structures, down into the lower levels. A fountain sits some of the way from where they're going, sleek seating, terminals with hardlight holographic where one would expect them to be, holographic imagery in the very air.

The pavement beneath his feet even flows with an undercurrent of water merged in the brickwork itself when he looks down, eyes slow to look back ahead.

The city, this city. South-2's shopping centre, or part of it. It stuns Tidus, the conversation behind him forgotten, this old fragmented memory of somewhere he hasn't had reason to think of it in a long time. Cleaner air, water everywhere, even in the tighter spaces. Stairways and elevators that lead everywhere.

He starts to follow a path that isn't there, his curiosity making it easy for him to ignore that part of him telling him that's something wrong, for the chance to see something--something he knows.

"Crysohale IV, that was the name." That strange world with no people. He nodded at Inigo, it was indeed large, it was a good job that orange was such a big team.

But then... As has happened a few times so far on the mission the world around them changed. Daylight, spiral ringed buildings, waterfalls.

It's not Tai, or Japan for that matter. It's... It looks to modern to be Yilise.

And Tidus is walking off. Taiki grabs Inigo's hand tighter, to not lose him.

"Tidus!" He hurries towards him, before he goes too far.

The change feels jarring. Even as it's going from one city that looks weird and totally unfamiliar to Inigo to another city that feels very much the same, it looks so different that there's no denying that the scene around them depicts a different place altogether. All the water everywhere, the sky and air suddenly feeling so much more clean than in the other city.

Inigo blinks at it in surprise, almost not realising that they're starting to lose someone until Taiki squeezes his hand. That gets him to look over at the other right away, just to make sure Taiki is still alright..

.. but Taiki is alright. It's the third member of their little group here who's starting to wander off without saying a word. Inigo immediately runs right along with Taiki as the other speeds up to catch up with Tidus.

(Wait, no.

The reason why Tidus in particular would wander off on his own. The water everywhere.

It's because this is--)

"Tidus, it's not really Zanarkand!" He calls out. That's got to be it, right? Even if for some reason he and Taiki are seeing it too, despite never having been in that city. If it seems we are anywhere else just remember, it's not real, Taiki had said.

Just a look would be alright, wouldn't it? Even that reasoning in his head, making itself known when he hears the calls; that's unravelling to with sense, when he could just let himself believe otherwise. If it's not real, could it hurt? There's a few corners here, and if he could turn them, make his way down to the walk bridges over this sector.

But Tidus isn't thinking about reality, concerning himself with it. The way he's walking erratic, and he clips a building with his shoulder, starts to search around with a franticness for another way.

But he might stop, if he's reached out for. Not turn to look at them, seeming to be looking around still.

"Tidus! Can you hear us?" He's still hurrying to keep up, trying not to get distracted by the buildings around him, the water, the beauty of it.

So this was where Tidus was from? He had explained it before but seeing it was something else.

"Tidus." He reached out to catch his hand as well, keeping hold of Inigo as well, trying to draw them both close.

"Tidus I know... But it's not real..."

Taiki has nothing to worry about when it comes to Inigo. He isn't going anywhere, clearly anchored to the other's side by that grip on his hand.

But rather than looking at Taiki, his gaze is also completely aimed at Tidus. At the way the other stands there, looking around.

.. it must have been such a while since he's seen Zanarkand, huh. It makes a knot form in Inigo's stomach. These illusions are awful. The Risen before, now Zanarkand - it's like this place is trying to hurt them, whether it's through showing them what they fear, or what they miss.

"Come on, Tidus. Say something." Inigo's voice is gentle though. He'd feel too awful about shaking Tidus out of this harder. "You're worrying Taiki."

(And him too, but you know, he figures Taiki is always the heavier bargaining chip here.)

He's over longing for a home that he knows he can't go back to, a home he knows he can't make real anymore; a home that doesn't exist. But this illusion works well to find the old wounds of his homesickness, the longer Tidus lingers in it. The thoughts that had him moving now turning sicker, a twisted emotion in his gut.

What if? Inigo and Taiki are beside him, and he doesn't know what's right, but-

"If we just have a look - I could show you. Both my home, right? It- it doesn't have to be real. There's a beautiful view on the walkway over there." He points it out, though it's hard to see much than the stairs leading upwards, the water falling on either side of it from the buildings that hides its length. "There's a lower floor, and you can see all the roof tops. Sometimes in the right time of the day, the light hits just right! It makes everything pretty."

Taiki exchanges a worried look with Inigo. He's not sure how much of a good idea this is, to let Tidus wander around this illusion of home. But if he knows it isn't real... Then should they really drag him away?

"As long as you keep hold of our hands." Is his compromise. If they have him physically they should be able to drag him away, if things get to intense. Or at least Inigo could drag him away, Taiki is not going to be much use there at all.

Still, Zanarkand really is a beautiful place, he looks towards the stairs Tidus is pointing at and nods. They can look. As long as they are careful...

It is a difficult decision to make. Inigo knows just how much Tidus seems to miss his home at times, and he has said that he'll never go back to it if he'd go back home, so.. it'd feel too cruel to just deny Tidus any time here entirely.

On the other hand, the illusions on lower tiers were dangerous. There's no denying that there might be some dangerous side to this one as well.

Neither idea feels very good, hence why Inigo frowns as he glances from Tidus to Taiki. The latter has a good idea, at least. But still..

".. We can't stay too long, Tidus." There's something reluctant in his voice, but he tries to remain firm. "A little bit is okay, but then we're dragging you out of here."

It's not that he doesn't want to see Zanarkand. Especially when it's so important to Tidus.

But he also doesn't want to lose their friend to it.

Tidus looks to the pair with the compromise, nods to Taiki, and it's his hand that he takes with him closer beside him. But does he need to take Inigo's too? He will if the other guy goes for his other hand, but he thinks it's fine otherwise if it's just one of them.

"Just a look," he promises. And then he's hurrying to the walkway, first sheltered by the spiralled buildings, the rush of waters in their ears before it opens up. Just as the flooring had been before, there's a sheet of something between the concrete and their feet, and water runs through it, an endless flow along the stretching bridge. There's a railing, no more than a cascading metal bar, and the light finally opens up to reveal -

A forest of buildings, stretching out far. In the small street they had found themselves, it had been crowded in. But here, there's so many buildings below them, that rise up. There's levels to the city, and off not too far, the natural level of the sea can be seen, kept back by a wall that acts as a walkway. Piers and boats spread out, and even to a greater distance, another portion of the city can be seen.

He talks them along to a good view, right before where there's a rise in the railing, a small oblong with no apparent purpose. Tidus allows them to take in the sight, being a good tour. "Over there's where the blitzball stadium is. I dock my boat on the other side of there too-" he points, even if he needs to free a hand, where the city scape pokes out, and nothing really can be easily discerned with just how much there is. "There's small stop ports around too. They're in case you wanna ride out and need to charge your ride, or something happens and you need to be picked up! This is a real good shopping spot though. For clothes, media. What're you looking for anyway? You're just in the area?"

He glances at the two guys, then he taps the small oblong-shaped rise in the railing. It gives a small glow. "City map," he speaks up, and from it appears a second of map, a dot with the word 'HERE' to signify their location, a few words in the upper corner with their own colouring. DINING, ENTERTAINMENT, SHOPPING...

"Let's check out an arcade! I know a good one - there's a lift just over there we can take!"

It's alright, Taiki still has hold of Inigo's hand so they are linked as Tidus drags them towards the walkway. He glances around, taking in the sights but his eyes return always to Tidus, worried about him.

The view he leads them to is amazing, the boats and piers, the open sea beyond. It looks so real, it's hard to believe this is a different city, not real, not here.

But they can't forget. Especially not him and Inigo because if Tidus lets his heart forget then they must be the ones who draw him back.

He nodded slowly. "Alright..." He's not sure if the illusion will hold up enough for them to experience lifts and arcades but there's perhaps no harm in trying.

It's such an odd place. Maybe it's since it's unlike anything Inigo has ever seen back home. The way the buildings sprawl out, the way they look.. It's all so foreign, and somehow it manages to be foreign in a way that's even different still from the city they had been in all this time.

But at the same time it somehow seems to make sense. No matter how odd this place looks to Inigo, the more he turns his head, the more it seems like Tidus belongs in this kind of place. Tidus, with his odd technology and his love for water. Of course he'd often be in a place like this, a big city surrounded by water..

"Sure, if that's what you want," he tells Tidus. "I wouldn't know where to go here. You're the guide."

Please, he doesn't even know what there is in a city like this. Kamakan is the first place like this he's ever been to.

Though something sits a little uneasy with him about the way Tidus talks. 'Just in the area'? It has Inigo's guard up no matter how nonchalantly he seems to act right now, pinching some skin on his free hand just to keep himself sharp, even though he knows it's easier for them to not fall into the illusion - since Inigo is pretty sure Taiki must also never have seen something exactly like this.

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What their Eyes See: Start

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