intro

[pinkprismstaff]

You don't remember getting knocked out.

That's the best descriptor for the feeling you experience before you wake up. There's a glittering absence of color to your field of vision, and a sensation that you aren't yourself, you aren't anything in particular. Abruptly, unpleasantly, you wake up in a strange, sunny location. Where that is might vary--laying in a sun chair on the pool deck, draped over the skee-ball machine in the arcade, face down in a cart in the laundry room....or just stretched out in the long, long expanse of sand surrounding the island.

There doesn't seem to be anyone else here, aside from the others who have woken up and have as little clue where they might be as you do. It's a silent, empty island filled with a lot of questions and few clear answers. What you can conclude are a few things: that you don't get hungry or tired, that any wounds you have don't seem to either heal or worsen, and leaving the island doesn't seem to be possible.

Maybe it would be good to meet with the others who have woken up?

Comments

[reresurrected]

It isn't a name I've ever heard before, no. Of course, as you said, that means little when it is clear that the two of us hail from very different places...

... which still leaves the question as to just what this place is, if it is neither my world nor yours.

[And, uh. Why are there bloodstains everywhere, which is kind of the more concerning part.]

[reresurrected]

Yes, I suppose they do.

[But "why" is a question that's been haunting him for a long time for more than one reason.

Fortunately, the ding of the elevator as they reach the ground floor prevents both him and Minato from thinking too much about these things.]

... ah. Here we are.

[howveryglib]

…I see. I suppose that does lend some credence to the idea of us being from vastly different worlds, then, given that our exploits are not exactly unknown.

That makes things even more complicated, then…

[birdysnatcher]

Yeah. I woke up on all the sand.

[‘The beach’ she will later learn; but metan beaches are different.]

It’s a very garish place to be trapped.

[birdysnatcher]

[A shrug.]

Never been. This one is a Rac Shade exclusive.

[Saying that, she breaks her tone with a fangirlish excitement. She’d preen, if she had her feathers.]

What’s Japan like? I’ve heard there’s good poetry there.

[birdysnatcher]

Land forms differently on Meta. Our maps are three-dimensional.

[Just as a tidbit for you, Mahiru.]

You think there’s more we’re not seeing?

[photoning]

... ... ???

[Mahiru's strong spatial reasoning skills and weak science fiction skills are at war in her brain right now, so she makes a couple tiny noises. But she thinks... she gets it? If there were a fourth primarily-spatial dimension that "the girl from meta" could access, that would explain her actions.]

Yeah, I think the beach has to be less than half...

[She gives a self-deprecating smile, hands curving again under her camera.]

Wow, then a photo from this really must just look like a little toy to you.

[birdysnatcher]

[It’s a weird turn for conversation, and she doesn’t even notice she’s made the girl feel awkward.]

No way, I love Earth art! Music, poetry, photography…all of it. There’s so much feeling in it, you know?

[photoning]

You really think so?

[Mahiru thinks of herself as Japanese way more than an Earthling but who cares, she has found a kindred spirit.]

To be honest, I know what's more important, but I don't actually like to use photos for investigating. I think that capturing one moment in time where someone was happy... with a smile on their face... is incredible. With a photo, you can't pick and choose the way you do with a video.

[birdysnatcher]

Capturing a fleeting feeling…

[The inescapable emotion of Earth may have caused her some trouble, but in the end she can’t deny that all its feelings are why she fell in love with the place.]

It’s a lot like poetry, isn’t it?

[photoning]

Yeah!

[She makes that rectangular hand gesture that signifies "photo focus".]

The way there are borders, a beginning and end around the middle. I think that's something cool about any kind of art.

[birdysnatcher]

[She nods in agreement, then gestures to the camera.]

Can I see?

[photoning]

Oh, so in your past experience it wasn't really possible to control every type of trip? That's too bad.

[She holds one of her arms with the other.]

Seeing all this bright stuff and knowing we can't relax here just makes it even more depressing...

[photoning]

Sure!

[Mahiru stands up from her chair and in a fluid motion snaps a shot of Shade.]

I had to get in that shot first. You looked so excited right then...

[Now she's turning over the camera, easily forming an "X" with the strap so that the viewfinder faces Shade, outwards and right-side up.]

[photoning]

Oh, what kind of areas do you find yourself keeping an eye on? Different regions, different fields of study?

[Is his world a bit geographically scattered with a wide range of technology depending on the location? What are his skills, as Akutagawa will put it at the meeting later.]

[birdysnatcher]

[She's not startled at having her picture taken all of a sudden, but when she's handed the camera she turns it upside down in confusion.]

Why isn't it coming out?

[photoning]

[Mahiru grins widely. She almost wants to hide her mouth with her hand. The idea of an alien (in whatever sense) only recognizing this model as a film camera, like a cliché from a cartoon, is just too cute.]

I wish I could let myself use film. This just uses a digital memory card. But look, you can browse them straight away with the little wheel.

[It's chunky! Touchscreens haven't totally annihilated haptic buttons yet!]

[birdysnatcher]

Oh.

[She sounds disappointed. But still, she'll browse past her candid and see...what has Mahiru got in here?]

[photoning]

...then it's all the more important.

If you're having nightmares all the time, it might be because when you fall asleep, you feel like you're giving up control. When you realize the patterns, it's not as scary.

[The shadow fades away from Mahiru's face.]

Oh, I don't mean to meddle, though. It's just something my friends and I talk about a lot.

[photoning]

[Mahiru insisted on just showing Minato with the wheel under her own thumb. Her guard is always lower around girls. She realizes something a little too late.]

Oh, I'd actually been having a pretty big party with my friends before this happened. I haven't been able to format my memory card yet today. [She's referring to the process of a setting simple enough to implement on a camera: Pressing "format" sends the latest batch of photos to an automatically generated folder. So a memory card would usually contain folders from multiple previous days, and then a new set of photos that are the only ones available to browse within the camera.] Hope I don't run out of space in this situation, haha.

[Please read the room... There are about 25 photos taken here in the hotel. One of Baldr is rather fetching TBH! Maybe a few others will show up over time but so far it was mostly cataloguing the rooms and grounds (not too much of the forest that she heard about secondhand). The camera's internal date is apparently February 2015. Then there are about 100 previous unformatted photos. At first, they show several other young adults on a cruise ship, eating kebabs. So there's no need to go back to the beginning and verify that this is all they show. Right?]

[howveryglib]

Indeed. It is...

[...]

...perhaps ill-advised in its design.

[howveryglib]

Ah... well, one of my closest friends was a mechanical engineer, so I developed something of an interest in various sorts of machines through him. Vehicles, weaponry, large-scale transportation... those sorts of things.

[birdysnatcher]

Because it’s too bright for weak, human eyes?

[She winces somewhat.]

I think I need glasses.

[birdysnatcher]

[Shade scrolls by a little too quickly to appreciate the artistry, perhaps - but she just wants to get past all the room cataloguing. The date flags her of no significance; she hasn’t even kept up with what Earth Year it is. She keeps going until she reaches the group photo.]

Who are they?

[photoning]

We're classmates.

[Great opportunity to take the camera back and start pointing them out.]

Hiyoko-chan is a traditional dancer... Ibuki-chan is a musician... Mikan-chan is a nurse...

[She hesitates a significant moment trying to decide how to describe it.]

A lot of stuff happened right after we graduated. Not everyone had a place they wanted to stay. So we've been hanging out together for a while.