whatevermaycome (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
whatevermaycome) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
nomans_land2023-08-18 08:38 am
whatevermaycome) wrote in nomans_land2023-08-18 08:38 am
In Which Problems Begin: Intro
There's energy building around July's ruins. It's tangible even to humans as a bit of static in the air, enough to give a little shock if one touches metal, but it's enough that worms have fled the area entirely, not a wing to be seen. The occasional bird no longer lingers, either.
Sometimes, it is the sprawling city of July, in brick and desert mortar and adobe and scraps. Sometimes, it's the shining glittering spires of JuLai, a modern city sprouting out of a wrecked hull like a strange technological mushroom.
Sometimes it's ruins, or a giant hole. It used to switch seemingly at random, with no real rhyme or reason, though people only have ever left July, in the occasional vehicle or on tomases, oblivious until the switch happens with them on the outside. More people are leaving now, in families packed onto vehicles, nervous and apprehensive - there's something wrong with their plants, is the only thing they can say before they quickly vacate the area, heading anywhere, anywhere but near where a plant might unexpectedly blow. Watching their city flicker out and be replaced by another is a shock.
Nobody ever leaves JuLai. Nobody enters either, by the heavily armed trucks and guards at every normal point of entry. Sometimes someone makes a run for it, but they disappear like smoke in the wind as soon as they hit the edge of the city.
And the switch is increasing in speed. Weeks, sometimes, has now become days, occasionally mere hours.
A small camp of July's escapees has begun a few iles outside the city, in the lee of a sheltering rock, arguments frequent over whether or not they should try to get back and save their neighbors and friends, or if the only chance is heading for another big city.
The sense of power in the air is growing with every flicker of exchanging cities.
[OOC Note: This is an open prompt, even characters not joining directly in the later bits can interact with it as they please.]
Sometimes, it is the sprawling city of July, in brick and desert mortar and adobe and scraps. Sometimes, it's the shining glittering spires of JuLai, a modern city sprouting out of a wrecked hull like a strange technological mushroom.
Sometimes it's ruins, or a giant hole. It used to switch seemingly at random, with no real rhyme or reason, though people only have ever left July, in the occasional vehicle or on tomases, oblivious until the switch happens with them on the outside. More people are leaving now, in families packed onto vehicles, nervous and apprehensive - there's something wrong with their plants, is the only thing they can say before they quickly vacate the area, heading anywhere, anywhere but near where a plant might unexpectedly blow. Watching their city flicker out and be replaced by another is a shock.
Nobody ever leaves JuLai. Nobody enters either, by the heavily armed trucks and guards at every normal point of entry. Sometimes someone makes a run for it, but they disappear like smoke in the wind as soon as they hit the edge of the city.
And the switch is increasing in speed. Weeks, sometimes, has now become days, occasionally mere hours.
A small camp of July's escapees has begun a few iles outside the city, in the lee of a sheltering rock, arguments frequent over whether or not they should try to get back and save their neighbors and friends, or if the only chance is heading for another big city.
The sense of power in the air is growing with every flicker of exchanging cities.
[OOC Note: This is an open prompt, even characters not joining directly in the later bits can interact with it as they please.]
no subject
Letting go with a final squeeze, he steps back, and looks out again at the rubble, trying to see the shape of the city in the ruins. "Maybe it'll stay, yeah," he agrees, although he doesn't really believe it. This world is strange, with first people and now whole cities popping in and out of existence... there's no reason to assume it'll stop, is there?
And if it's not going to stop, if the cities are going to keep appearing and disappearing like people have been doing, then maybe there's a reason why it's happening?
"Every time I've disappeared," he says, clearly thinking through the problem as he's speaking, "it's taken me someplace I needed to be. Maybe July keeps coming back because you're supposed to go find your friends?"
no subject
A little harder to accept, the idea of letting go of a warm, friendly touch. But he does. "You disappear a lot?"
Just because it didn't happen to him doesn't mean it didn't happen to other people. "Maybe you're a little right. I don't think it's .. about me or just my friends." There's too many of the parts of him around. Who's to say this was the one he destroyed? "Not if the whole city appears.. and then there's the other one I don't even recognize. Maybe ... it's about them. Two whole cities of people, and our kin keep trying to put them here and save everyone." He's not sure either, that's obvious, he's working through it in pretty much the same fashion. "But putting two entire populated cities on one spot isn't really going to work."
no subject
"How can we move a city though?" Shardik's right -- the cities, whole and destroyed both -- are appearing and disappearing in the same place, and they can't all be in that spot! Vash can't even imagine what that would look like (well, he can, but a tiny person pushing a floating city out of the way only happens in cartoons). He looks back at the cart full of electronics, wondering. Shardik just showed up with a whole bunch of equipment, and Rem's super smart about all kinds of things. They were all brought here to help that one Vash in a fight, right? But that fight's over, so maybe their sisters found another problem for them to solve!
Too bad they didn't send instructions on how to solve it, huh?