middleofsomewhere | So Familiar a Gleam: Start

So Familiar a Gleam: Start

JINNJAR CITY

"Welcome to Jinnjar City! A city famed as the central power of all of Diagad, and where the magic happens. It has a big history: the birthplace of the first Heroes Association that led to the creation of the Interstellar Justice Alliance, the protectors of the universe. Compared to other places, Diagad's what many people call a superheroes world, but that isn't true. A lot of us don't have the crazy powers that some of the popular folks have! And people like me? We don't care about saving the world! I'm just trying to make it through school, hang out with friends. Live my life!

People tell thousands of stories about us though, and that I can be proud of. When other planets call for help, it's us that comes running to their aid. Our heroes put their lives on the line for anyone who needs a hand, and sure, I don't count myself one of them... but I want to share their story anyway.

Well, I don't need to be telling you about this city, do I? You're a part of it! Always have been, just like me. So I should talk about some funny stuff that's been going on lately instead…”

A TL;DR notes version of days/prompts: (click to show)

EVENT BASICS: Un-apped AU characters were taken 1 week before the event from their own worlds, their minds altered to believe they were always from Jinnjar, Diagad. They have a superpower because of this and a new life either living alone or with family (other NPCs or PCs). Go to the OOC post for more info.

DAYS ONE-TWO:

Strange streams of colour in the sky have appeared, and looking at them for too long causes strange headaches. At this point you’re not sure what they’re about, but you can investigate them. However, trying to get right close to them is impossible. You will never get high enough. Regardless, let us know if characters will be investigating anything!
Voidtreckers arrive, be on the lookout. People are excited about finding these infamous criminals, and may be bothering those wearing peculiar watches, or the colours of Blue, Red, Purple, or Orange. You might be one of them: the bothered, or botheree. Many games or movie criminals are some adaptation of these Voidtreckers. A lot of people are worried they’re behind the phoenonem in the sky.
Nevertheless, people will still have their own lives to deal with, regardless of worrying events. Play around with what job your character has, if they’re in school, what work they do; if they’re drawn to a night life or just hanging around wherever they like. Characters not used to technology in-canon may find themselves having trouble with this world (despite believing they’ve always lived here).
Some of the Voidtreckers who are most resistant to illusions and mind control will be breaking out by the end of the first day. They will have to lay low and plot in secret, figure out how to make contact with others. The SCA comms do not work.
Other Voidtreckers might begin having dreams about their past by day 2-3.

DAYS THREE-FOUR:

Those who have been brought to the world begin to dream of their real and past lives, if just in very small and confusing snippets. Some of those dreams may bleed into reality, and people may start to recognise absolute strangers, but don't quite always know why. This is stronger for Voidtreckers than 4th wallers.
Random electronics seem to be glitching in odd ways, particularly the training centres, which lock people in together, even random strangers. Mostly it's harmless and more of a pain. People also swear they think they see the tops of buildings 'glitching' or colouring out. People have been speaking about pets going missing on walks, though the zoos and such are mostly fine, save for some of the higher up bird sanctuaries.
More of the Voidtreckers and some of the more resilient guests will begin realising the reality of the place they find themselves in. That this is not their own world at all.
The propaganda of the city starts to escalate, warnings about the dangerous voidtreckers and reminding people of how great the city is.

DAYS ONE & TWO: SLICES OF LIFE

"This is an emergency broadcast to everyone in Jinnjar City. At 08:00 today, a breach into the city was attempted by the invading force known as the Voidtreckers, who have tried countless times before to take over Diagad for themselves.

While it's believed the group was resisted, citizen are advised to watch out for anyone acting suspiciously in the city, and to watch out for this emblem. Please call the D-F-O-R-C-E hotline if you see anyone you suspect of being an intruder!

Remember to keep low altitudes while we deal with the phenomenon above."

[ RAINBOW SKIES. ] "Everyone's been speculating about what's been going on up above. About a week ago, these long streams of twisting colours suddenly spread through the purple skies of Diagad, rainbow colours inking the clouds. They've been growing out, like merging with the sky itself, and news broadcasts have been telling people not to worry. But what even are they? They say that looking at them for too long causes headaches, while some swear up and down they've seen things in them! I've heard a couple of friends talking about investigating them, but I dunno..."

▷ Twisting streams of colour are becoming exposed in the sky, and indeed, those who look too long high up will find themselves receiving headaches and dizziness. They’ll fade once you look away, but those who do decide to investigate by getting close will experience a tug, as if something yearns to take them somewhere. There will be patrolling Heroes - this world's equivalent of police - keeping an eye on things. Maybe your character is one of them, or posing as one. Maybe your character wants to learn more about what these are. Regardless, they won’t be able to get significantly close to the streams no matter how high they aim.

[ THE VOIDTRECKERS. ] "Gossip is HOT about these Voidtreckers. I remember seeing a movie about them once, based on something that happened years ago. They tried hacking their way into taking over a dyson sphere being built - like a giant structure around a star. There's other stories about them too, but are they really the ones behind this? Who are we even meant to be on the lookout for? I don't know... I'm kinda spooked. But do they seriously ride around in a flying train?"

▷ You've heard about the Voidtreckers, whether you remember stories about them or not. Are you bothered about them? The news broadcasts say they got rid of them - then why are they asking people to look out? And what are you supposed to look out for? On top of the emblem, there's chatter going on about watching out for people wearing strange devices on their wrists, and wearing colours of Blue, Red, Purple, and Orange.

Will you defend your city from these mysterious foes? Be smart about it, or rash? Or maybe you're interested to know more for your own deeds… whether or not they’re the Voidtreckers of tale, they may have resources for furthering your own goals.

[ LIVING YOUR LIFE. ] “But nevermind all that! Life’s about having fun and hanging out with your friends too. I work part time, but I’ve got plans after my shift’s done! Doing some shopping, going to see a movie. I can’t stress out about the funny stuff going on. And I heard the new waiter in my favourite cafe is suuuper cute!”

▷ Despite the few anomalies going on, you still have a life part of Jinnjar City. You have a job filled with devices that you’ve been surrounded by all your life, or certainly longer than a week or, so you know how to work a coffee machine, right? You know how to drive an air taxi!

And where would you take one to? To anywhere: to the gym, one of the training centres, a spa, to the movies - normal things that everyone around the city have always been around. Meet up with some friends for fruit smoothies, or watch one of the shadow displays held by the Georgi’s Gang around every street, putting on shows to mesmerise and delight the kids.

Or how about buying your groceries to take back to your apartment or house? You know what all these fruits are! Right? Right?

… … maybe it’s produce from another planet.

DAYS THREE & FOUR: JUST ANOTHER NORMAL DAY

[ DREAMS. ] “Dreams are just dreams, but a lot of people have been talking about them. Like, really being disturbed by them? Not in a creepy ohhh a monster’s coming for me! way, but like, they say they see worlds they swear they’ve been to before. Or see people? I wouldn’t really think about it except, there’s this guy… not like a super cute guy, but someone I think I knew…”

▷ Talk about dreams have been popular lately, though not everyone has them - or, not right away. Sometimes people may be at work, in school, doing nothing in particular when a name (important to their real self) appears in their mind, a flash of scenery. Coming as quickly as it goes. They don’t know what it means, if it isn’t just a symptom of the latest weird gossip influencing them.

But it sticks with you, something you can’t completely dismiss. But surely it’s nothing - right?

[ ANOMALIES. ] ”Just what we need! My friend’s dog’s gotten lost! She was taking him for a walk, and then she just says he went running ahead, and poof! Disappeared! Maybe he saw a cat? He’s always been a lazy chubby thing, but even dogs can’t help themselves, I guess…”

▷ The colours in the sky seem brighter today, closer...but it’s difficult to say for some, unless you’re actively studying them. Sometimes when you look above, you might catch - if just for a second - the tops of roofs glitching out, corners or streaks erased, colours meshing with the walls. You think it might be the light or your eyes, as it never lasts long, and even standing around waiting to see it happen again won’t give you what you want.

You may have other things to worry about than tricks of the light. Animals have simply been...disappearing, and always the ones owned, or particularly birds that fly around freely. People will ask you for help, and it’s weird they need to. Most owners have a tracker chip and app, and either apps show a blank map, or show them just standing in place...a place that when you get there, is nothing, no one.

[ TRAINING CENTRE. ]
“Really though, other than the weird sky business and how jumpy the news has made everyone about the Voidtreckers, the only odd thing that’s been up is some weird stuff happening at the training gyms. Even I saw it! I was just doing my warm-ups for the day when the field I set it to, the sky...these shapes suddenly appeared, dark and looming. It seriously creeped me out. But it’s just a glitch, right?”

▷ Young or old, the training centres around the central district are a popular spot for everyone to give their powers a safe space to be unleashed. While there’s basic simulations that’s free for everyone to use, people can be personal trainers, or even run group sessions in the bigger rooms.

Sessions aren’t always linked, since getting private training is allowed. However, lately, people keep getting jumped into other’s sessions, and can’t get out until they finish the routine. Sometimes they’re simple, where you need to destroy building block-esque cubes, or superspeed through courses twenty times. But then there’s also story modes, such as…

Castle Defence: Help protect the castle of Erna from the tricky Voidtreckers! They’re trying to storm the castle, and the world needs your power to help keep them away. Difficulty is based on the amount of people present, and speed of the individual. Do you turn things green? Then turning a Voidtrecker green will make them pop! Good job!

Kama Aid: Floating spheres have been lured inside a giant 3-tiered labyrinth ball. You must help the spheres - come in optional people-shaped or even cute animals - be released back outside where the air is fresh. Use telekinesis to tilt the tiers like a ball tilting game, or use super-strength to destroy the different tiers!

Dia Mysteries: A theft, vandalism, maybe even a murder. The crime scene is locked down, and something is afoot. Use your telepathy to gain information from the suspects, sneak into a secure area under invisibility... the solution is yours to find in this investigative simulation.

[ A PSA or Six. ] ”Stay vigilant citizens of Diagad. Please report any suspicious behavior to the DFORCE force.”

Announcements blare from speakers on public transport. Adverts pop up as they scroll through Diagnet. All remind citizens to be on their guard, report strange or disturbing behaviour and keep a look out for any of the symbols or colours of the Voidtreckers.

"Heroes don't keep secrets! If you have suspicions about any dangerous people in our midst, let your local DFORCE force know. Speak the Truth. Save the World."

▷ Billboards are plastered with bold posters reminding citizens to keep an eye out for the Voidtreckers or anyone who they might have tried to sway to their side. For those beginning to glimpse that this city might not be what they once had thought, this could be dangerous especially if their families and friends believe the city truly is under threat.

credits: text box - city banner - city side - coloured sky by benjamin0000

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Day 4

Have a very familiar face, Leia. And not one that belonged on the train as of the last platform.

Kaylin was in the local police uniform. What looked like a silver and white cat was on her shoulder as she spoke to a few citizens about... missing pets. Her own pet, sitting where her Pokemon Hope so often sat, occasionally smacked Kaylin in the face with his tail. Quite the feat given he didn't lose his balance doing it.

That bangle on her mantle might make a little more sense, given that context.

Well there was a face Leia hadn't been expecting to see again. She'd thought that the bangle on the mantle back home had been just a random detail that the entity had pulled from her memory, but no, apparently not. But was this really Kaylin, or some alternate? And if it was Kaylin, would it be the Kaylin who remembered her? Assuming she could get her to remember anything at all outside the illusion, that was.

Well, she had to make an attempt at least. "Pardon me, officer," she said, approaching Kaylin. "If you're not on any urgent business, I was wondering if I could talk to you about something for a moment?"

She finished with the people she had been speaking with then turned to face Leia. "Of course," she said. Then blinked. Something...

The woman handing her a dagger. Now that she was turned to face Leia, she could see that dagger on what had been her far hip.

Her hand rested on the dagger, it was behind her curved one, leaving two daggers on one hip and one on the other. Leia would also be able to spot the impression of her hidden throwing daggers under her uniform.

"I'm sorry," she said realizing that she had stumbled mentally. "How can I help you?"

Her cat huffed and slumped like it was planning to nap draped over her shoulder, tail wrapping around her neck.

Leia saw- and somewhat felt- the flicker of almost recognition before the illusion closed back in. A good sign.

"I found something that looked valuable near my home a few days ago," she said. "Namely a large piece of jewelry. I'd intended to simply post an ad on the network about it being found in hopes that the owner might come claim it, but then I got a bit worried. It doesn't seem like the type of thing someone would just lose without noticing immediately, so I began to wonder if it might have been stolen. I've been intending to bring it down to the station to turn it in, but between work and being a mother to three teenagers, I haven't gotten the chance."

"Would you be willing to take a look at it? My home's just around the block, and I'm sure you'd be able to run a quick check to see if anything like it had been reported stolen recently."

Everything about that screamed trap to her. Especially since she didn't have backup with her. She'd feel a **** of a lot better if Severn had her back Or Nita.

Wait, who or who?

She took a half step back, shaking her head as she rested her hands on her daggers. Everything told her this was a stupid **** idea.

So why did she feel like she should follow this woman? What was actually going on here...?

Leia did her best to look startled at the reaction. After all, had she still been under the illusion, her request would have been completely innocent. "Or I could bring the piece out to you," she said, "if coming inside is a problem. Like I said, my home isn't far, so it wouldn't take me long to get there and back."

Innocent because it was her, yes. But there were plenty of people, even in the AU bubble, that would have happily taken the chance to ambush a cop.

"That works. Better if I don't enter anyway, if something breaks it becomes paperwork," she said with all the disgust Leia had heard Kaylin use for the word magic.

Leia nodded. Paperwork- or datawork- was generally disliked in most worlds, though it was definitely consistent for Kaylin to hate it with a passion. "Alright," Leia said. "Follow me. You can wait at the end of the walk while I go inside to get it."

As stated here 'home' was just around the block, and Leia left Kaylin at the end of the walk in front of the house while she went inside to retrieve the bracer. She emerged a moment later with it wrapped in a dishtowel. "This is what I was talking about," she said and unwrapped the bracer so Kaylin could get a look at it, carefully observing her reaction.

Kaylin leaned against a tree or fence post, or whatever she could find to lean against while she waited.

She frowned when Leia came out, wondering why the ****s whatever it was was in a towel. To avoid finger prints, or...?

And then she saw it and staggered, falling off her perch and on her **** as memories assaulted her.

Darkness, her darkness, his darkness. She shouldn't have been able to separate them, but she could. It was like conversation. Her hands out before her. A voice speaking. Too small to even be heard. Then a light, like another angle of conversation. The bracer was on and the darkness... gutted.

******

Standing in a small office with a man with long wings and... Severn! Severn! And the Hawklord. And... her bracer...

******

Walking up to the palace, Severn rolling up her sleeve to make sure her bracer was there.

******

Standing in the tower, Tiamaris tapping the stones on the bracer, his eyes orange.

"What the actual ****s?" she gasped as the memories assaulted her.

Her cat on the other hand started mewing, loudly. And a lot. And in all the noise, Leia would almost be able to make out words. "Put it on her, hurry!".

It all happened much faster than it probably felt for Kaylin, a sharp reaction, both visually and in the Force, and then the cat reacting, meowing loudly and somehow forming words. A cat who was very much not Spark, talking? No, react to that new oddity later. Act now.

Leia hastily did as she was bid and snapped the bracer around Kaylin's wrist. That done, she could only wait to see what happened next; she'd never had to do that for Kaylin before so she wasn't sure exactly what sort of reaction it would cause.

Everything seemed to happen at once the second the bracer closed around her wrist. The lights on the bracer flashed brightly several times. Her marks lit up blue then gold. And her cat....? No longer looked like a cat. The size was the same, but it otherwise looked like a dragon with slightly translucent skin rather than scales. It had teeth that glittered ominously when visible, and its eyes were like black opals, dark with hints of color rising to the surface.

If Leia had gotten any shared memories of Kaylin's familiar, Hope this probably was him, except... he looked different in Kaylin's memories than how he would look to Leia. Kaylin didn't just see through his skin, but through him entirely as though he were made of glass that sometimes was cloudy, but sometimes was not.

He started squawking loudly, and no words were needed to make out the emphatic "It's about time!" he seemed to be on about.

With the bracer on, everything caught up with Kaylin at once. Home, Nautilus, the various Storms, Ruby City, that weird ship between worlds. Just... everything. Every place she had ever been. Every person she'd met. Things she had forgotten even before this. It was like plunging into the Tha'alaan of her own scrambled life.

It felt to Kaylin like it took years, like she was reliving whole sections of her life. To Leia it was a scant few seconds.

Kaylin's eyes snapped open. "Leia... where the actual *****s are we and what the *****s is going on?"

Leia couldn't help but smile slightly, despite the circumstances. "Good to see you again too, Kaylin," she said. "Though I wish the circumstances could have been better."

"Long story very short, we're not in Nautilus any longer," she said. "Where we are is... a bit more complicated, and frankly I'm not sure myself, other than knowing that it isn't where we seem to be. This entire city- aside from the people- is an illusion."

"We were all brought here by the malevolent entity that created it, and were given altered memories to believe that we were citizens of the illusory city it had created. I and the group I've been traveling with have faced it before; it's caused disasters on multiple worlds, including two attempted genocides. It can create illusions so realistic that they can cause direct physical damage and can apparently affect- and to some degree, read- our minds too. Though I doubt the last part is very consistent; if it were, we likely wouldn't be having this conversation."

What followed was a lot of multilingual swearing. Though to be fair it actually started while Leia was still talking without stopping Kaylin from hearing and absorbing what she was being told. At the end, she spat on the ground to one side, an old Barren habit she had mostly shaken except for when she was this, well, shaken.

"**** it all. Okay so basically evil storm creating god wannabe and we have to go kick its ****?" she asked to be sure as she rested her hands on her dagger pommels in a vary familiar manner. "So basically it is a day ending in Y?" she added, disgusted as it sunk in. "One normal week, is that too **** much to ask for? One!"

Hope bit her ear and she swore at him. "Fine," she said when she was done. "How d we find this thing and take it the ****s down?"

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So Familiar a Gleam: Start

Re: Because I forgot them in the main post, Days 3 & 4

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