SET SAIL: FIRST IMPRESSIONS

[returnjourney]

SET SAIL: FIRST IMPRESSIONS

January 1, 2022 – January 7, 2022
Welcome to the new year and the Return Journey's opening event! We're starting with something light to get everyone acclimated and so no one feels they've missed too much if they app after the holiday season. We'd like to make it easy for any new players to jump in right away.

If you have any questions about the event, please ask here.

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1. What? My name is who? My name is—

Salutations! Now that everyone's respective warden and inmate orientations are out of the way, you've been given a helpful, mandatory name tag. It instantly appears on your shirt and can't be taken off, though where it appears on your shirt is a bit more unpredictable; it's an imperfect science, so it's just as likely to pop up on the back of your shirt as the front. If you try to remove your clothes, the tag appears on your skin; they're waterproof, so a quick shower won't get rid of it, either. What can we say — it's mandatory.

While the tags all follow the standard "HELLO my name is" format and have your name or most common alias, they also include some other information. For wardens, it features a space that declares "I LIKE" and one or two of your most choices hobbies. For inmates, it features these hobbies and "I have killed [x] people" (this may be a specific number or something akin to "a lot of" or "no"). Fun icebreaker, right?

2. Twenty Questions

Speaking of icebreakers, a brief announcement summons everyone to the observatory. Again, yes, it's mandatory; wardens must retrieve absent inmates before any more information is revealed. Better hop to it!

Upon arrival, passengers will discover that the Peregrine's resident bot force has reconfigured the observatory with small, portable cubicles, each with a transparent wall that retains a lovely view of the observatory's massive window. Each inmate is assigned their own cubicle and, upon entering, cannot leave without a warden's say so; the door only unlocks with a warden's CommLink.

Wardens are tasked with interviewing at least one inmate, to get a feel for their prospective charges. They can have as much time as they need to formulate what questions they want to ask, but that might leave some inmates waiting. Maybe that's on purpose, though. In any case, the exercise is over once an inmate is asked five questions and a warden receives five answers.

Archimedes will collect name tags after the interviews for incineration. The robotic owl is, notably, the only one who can remove them.

3. Polite Picnic

The greenhouse doesn't always have enough fresh produce to go around (and often what is collected is frozen and preserved), but given the circumstances — a new mission and new passengers — everyone can reap the rewards this month...if they share. A bot stationed in the mess hall mechanically tells anyone who crosses into range (whether they mean to visit the produce table or not) that they aren't to take more than three fruits and/or vegetables. If you choose not to abide by the rules...well, that depends if you're caught and by who.

The produce available are as follows:

Adalfane: Tastes like cocaine, but very nutritious, especially when eaten raw.
Tuadath: Smells awful, but very hearty when cooked, tasting a little like steak.
Tsanyi: Pure, sugary sweetness. Can be made into a refreshing drink, eaten raw, or sprinkled over a desert.

There are notably fewer tsanyi than adalfane or tuadath. But if everyone's nice and cooperates, each person can get exactly one.

Comments

1

[kaijuice]

How long's it been?

[ Idly. Silco's eyes slide between the tie, the empty sleeve; brows lift in exaggerated pantomime. Is there a reason he's so bad at this? ]

[spanning]

[Aki stares at him—stares at the eye, because fair's fair—and his mouth tightens before, just as quickly, it relents.]

A year.

[Curt.]

[kaijuice]

Twelve, [ Fair's fair. ] You'll want to brace the elbow.

[ Unsolicited advice, just what everyone wants for their deeply personal injury. A gesture, the terminal: ]

Do you recognize any of this?

[spanning]

[There's a crease in the bridge of his nose; he's been in physical therapy for that year, frustrated by every setback, unsatisfied with his progress, and now he has to be reminded of the little ways Denji and Power actually made things easier.

Not thanking Silco is his tiny, but very willful pettiness.]

Do you mean the library material or the technology?

[kaijuice]

Either, [ A nail scrapes across pebbled plastic. ] It's nothing like the libraries I've seen.

[ He's never seen a library at all. Collections, another matter. ]

[spanning]

I'm used to libraries having more books. Maybe a few computers, but nothing like this.

[Aki does not know flat-screen TVs are even called flat-screen TVs, having only seen his first one today.]

Boxier... Not as streamlined. Not— [lbr, he doesn't really know the concept digitized, so it takes him a moment to find the right words] —contained, so you can download an entire encyclopedia to something you can carry around in your pocket.

[kaijuice]

[ Computer sails past his ears like so much other noise. The day's been full of it — but that isn't so unusual. You needn't know a thing to learn its use. ]

I'd hardly know where to begin,

[ He has ideas. ]

Is that what you started with? An — encyclopedia?

[spanning]

History, actually. I want to know how, exactly, we got to this point.

[Except Aki cares less about the future as a whole—much to the disappointment to the Future in his right eye—and more about the individual future of someone he knows will wind up in the history books or be wiped from them entirely.]

What are you used to? [He thinks he's seen vampires dressed like that in B-movies from the USA.]

[kaijuice]

History.

[ His lip twists, briefly self-effacing. Get it? Because he's old — ]

Our scholars are a jealous sort. Unthinkable to just lay hands upon a book.

[ He's never been good at rolling over, even for a lie. There's some reluctance to it now; the words unhinging on a scoff: ]

Frankly, it's fucking overwhelming.

[spanning]

Even though now you finally have your chance?

[He glances at the terminal; his expression says less than where, precisely, he's looking. But it can't be more difficult for this man to navigate when he has two hands to type.

(Aki has extremely limited exposure to the hunt-and-peck typing lifestyle.)]

[kaijuice]

[ He follows the glance — ]

Twenty-six letters, [ Someone hasn't cottoned on to 'language' yet. ] Spoiled for choice.

[spanning]

[Why do people here insist on talking in such weird, cryptic ways.]

Worse than having too many options is having none at all.