etrayalogs | OCTOBER MINGLE

Entry tags:

OCTOBER MINGLE

WHO: Everyone!
WHEN: October 25th - Early November
WHERE: Etraya
WHAT: The arrival of newcomers, and some holiday fun!
NOTES\WARNINGS: Supernatural elements, temporary physical alterations, mild horror and jump scares, spooky scary skeleton robots, mild suggestion of compulsion or loss of control, mild body horror.

⏵ arrival ⏴
Welcome to Etraya! Everything is fine now. 😊

Arrival goes expected - or it does for the most part. Aurora greets newcomers in the hospital as they awaken, offers a brief explanation and gives them their earpiece so they can communicate with one another.

Around the hospital and outside of it, Companion Bots are hard at work decorating the city for Halloween—complete with festive touches like pumpkins, cobwebs, and glowing ghost decorations. The atmosphere is fun, light-hearted, and maybe just a little spooky. 🎃👻

Some carry buckets of candy, and offer those they come across a trick or treat. Except both options are, in fact, treats. 🍬 Tricks are treats specifically wrapped in a green wrapper that very clearly declares that they are tricks. Treats are wrapped in orange, and labeled with treat! Companion bots will recommend that those who do want to take a trick take them when they're beside their friends. There won't be any permanent effects from these, nor will they be terrible tricks - just fun ones! All effects last roughly 24 hours.

Giggle Drops cause uncontrollable giggling that bubbles up randomly, even during serious conversations.
Beasty Bites cause characters to grow small fangs, and they will begin craving red foods - apples, cherries, etc.
Bat Gummies cause small, bat-like shadows to follow characters around wherever they wander. These shadows are harmless, and super cute.
Pumpkin Puff is a cotton-candy-like treat, that causes their voices to change dramatically. Either becoming significantly deeper or perhaps very high-pitched, as if they've recently inhaled helium.
Floating Fudge gives characters the ability to float in the air! Just a few feet off the ground, but it's still fun. Right?

⏵ getting spooky! ⏴
Etraya is embracing the season - and maybe even going a little overboard.

Around the hospital, a few small pop-up shops are manned by festively dressed companion bots. They offer samples to everyone - although sampling isn't really necessary. After all, everything here is free!

Candy Shops: Perfect for stocking up on sweets and treats for the upcoming trick-or-treating event. These will not stock the tricks the companion bots offer around Etraya, but instead only carry harmless sweets. They do take custom requests, too, and are happy to create the treats others want!

Costume Shops: Find the perfect costume for Halloween! But beware... rumor has it, if you wear a costume, you might become whatever you dressed up as for a few hours. Those who put on vampire costumes may find themselves suddenly craving blood and growing fangs - those with werewolf costumes may find themselves feeling a little wolfish. These effects may last a few hours, up to a few days.

⏵ masquerade ⏴

In the spirit of mystery, Etraya will be hosting a Masquerade Ball outside the hospital through the nights of October 26th and 27th. Dance anonymously with other attendees and make new friends under the cover of your disguise. Everyone receives a single rose they can exchange with someone else throughout the evening. At the stroke of midnight, the roses will reveal the true identities of your masked dance partners. 🌹

⏵ all hallow's eve ⏴

On October 31st, multiple companion bots set up shop along one of the walkways through the larger island towards the center. With chairs and small booths set up, they offer candies out to trick-or-treaters who wander around through the first part of the night. Some of them will request trick-or-treaters to do a trick for them, to earn a bigger treat! They may ask characters to dance, sing, or show a talent unique to them. Can your character bend themselves into a pretzel? They want to see it, and will offer them a nice bracelet in exchange! Can they whistle super loud? Maybe they'll get a nice piece of kevlar armor after showing off. This can be anything within reason - bike parts, small weaponry, armor pieces, toys, canvases for painting. Please request these items HERE.

Not everything is as light-hearted as it seems, however. Aurora issues a warning to the citizens of Etraya: Do not stay outside after midnight. Strange happenings have been reported, and those who disobey may start seeing visions of past loved ones. The visions are compelling—guiding people away from the safety of the buildings and into the mysterious mist surrounding the outskirts.

But be careful, these spirits may not be as friendly as they seem.

If you come into contact with these ghosts, you’ll feel a chilling cold, leading to hypothermia-like symptoms. The longer you’re exposed, the worse it gets. Treatment? You’ll need to be warmed up quickly.

⏵ skellys! ⏴

The Companion Bots wanted to join in on the fun, so they painted themselves with glow-in-the-dark paint to look like skeletons. But in the dead of night, for those already suffering from the chilling touch of the ghosts, seeing glowing skeletons approach from the darkness might not be the most comforting sight. 🤖💀

Stay safe, warm up, and enjoy the festivities!

⏵ NOTES ⏴

For all questions relating to this log, please refer to the mod queries comment. All other questions can be directed to the FAQ.

⏵FULL NAVIGATION⏴

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[ Krouse grins behind his mask, raising his glass in another cheers. ]

Now there's a public service. I've seen the way some of these people handle firearms.

[ The lie bubbles up easy and practised, and not even for much of a reason: ] My uncle took me to the shooting range when I was a kid. I'm not exactly 007, but I know what trigger safety is. Apparently they skip that when distributing weapons in half the goddamn multiverse.

[ He actually got his firearm safety tips from Youtube videos and websites ranging from the heavily regulated to the illegal dark web variety and practised with his illicitly acquired gun in the woods every night for a month before the first time he had to pull it on someone. The uncle story plays better. It could have been true, if Krouse had been a kid interested in guns. ]

[ John doesn't catch the lie. Good uncle, is all he thinks. ]

Glad you had someone looking out for you. A lot of people get hurt because they don't know what they're doing. Or, hurt others. Don't even mean to.

[ His tone of voice makes it clear he thinks the latter is a much worse fate. ]

Yeah.

[ Krouse sobers at that, his eyes flicking away from John. ]

That's the worse option. So. Kudos for possibly helping me avoid getting shot by mistake the next time someone with access to too much hair dye pulls one of those guns with the fifty ornamental attachments in the middle of a mission. If I'm going to get shot, I generally prefer it's on purpose.

[ John can't tell if Krouse is trying to deflect something by making a sort of joke? He doesn't think Krouse is actually so self-centered to be actually worried about himself getting shot. Or maybe he is and John just doesn't know him that well. But that doesn't quite line up with the guy who talked him down when he first arrived, or the one who saved Harold. He'll try to play off the idea it was a joke. ]

Well, they were both ordinary guns, so I'd still look out for the ones with fifty ornamental attachments.

[ He's not going to say something like "I hope you don't get shot at all." ]

Oh, you're missing out. They're great.

[ Krouse would protest that of course all he cares about is whether or not he gets shot, personally, which is why it's probably for the best that John doesn't give him the opportunity.

Talking shit about goofy tinker weapons - even if they're not actually tinker weapons - is more fun than reinforcing his cracked persona. ]

I'm guessing you're also not a big JRPG fan, so that'll be a whole novel world for you to explore. 'Why the hell would you have tassels on your sight' and 'how much gold plating is too much' are just some of the questions you'll have the exciting opportunity to ask in the near future. And just wait until you get to energy weapons. There's nothing like a gun that might melt into plasma if you breathe on it funny and cuts through fifteen feet of concrete if you misfire.

[ Krouse sure said a lot of words there. "JRPG"? "Energy weapons"? Is this a kid thing? He feels old all of a sudden. Maybe they can go back to the Flintstones. ]

Yeah, I'll take your word for it. I can't imagine those are, well, real. Except a gold plated gun, I believe that.

[ He has, in fact, seen gold plated guns. They're not very practical. ]

[ Here come the hand gestures again, or at least one hand gesture: Krouse sticks his hand out flat and tips it, like he's pouring John's hopes of avoiding fantastical weapons onto the ground at their feet. ]

Oh, laser guns are entirely real in some neighbourhoods of the multiverse.

I don't recommend touching them if you enjoy having hands. Worse than fireworks, when it comes to posing a hazard to the old phalanges.

[ That's right, there's people here with fantastical tools. Like that lady with the laser sword from his arrival. John kind of wishes he had that sort of technology, but only in the way that he hates being outclassed. When he takes a moment to actually think about it, he prefers his own gun. Laser guns seem like they'd do a lot more damage and he's not in the business of killing people these days. A simple shot to the knee or shoulder is much more his style now. Stopping force, but not lethal. ]

Don't worry, I plan on sticking to my own gun. Speaking of which, do you have one?

[ John hasn't forgotten about Krouse's teleportation abilities, but there's a practicality in owning a weapon. Besides, as much as Krouse is an ally, it's good to know the status of those around him. ]

[ The kneejerk instinct is, as ever, to lie. It's the default to the point where he doesn't need to come up with a reason to as much as he needs a compelling reason not.

Except - it seems so fucking stupid when he thinks about it. What difference does it make? What does Krouse think John is going to do with it that would be so bad? John has his own gun, and it's not like the early days, when every resource felt so limited. ]

Yeah. Handgun. MP-443. It's Russian, if you know it.

[ MP-443 Grach, a gun issued to military and police forces. It's an odd thing for an American teenager to have, given the many domestic models that should be available on his side of the Atlantic. Krouse shrugs casually, like he's anticipating a raised eyebrow. ]

My uncle had one. He collected that kind of stuff. I guess the name just stuck with me, so that's what Aurora doled out.

[ Being too quick to answer an unasked question is one of those little tells of a potential lie, but it could go either way. Because why would Krouse be honest about having a gun, but lie about where he originally got it? ]

[ That is an odd choice of weapon. John knows about it, knows a bit of it's history. It was kind of obscure until.. 2012? Something like that. What year is Krouse from? Maybe he kept in touch with his uncle, he's really not that old. ]

What year are you from?

[ It's really not a stretch for Krouse to be from a time when they could be considered something of the past, something collectible. Or maybe his uncle is into Russian arms, which is niche but reasonable. ]

[ Krouse has no idea why John is asking him that specifically, but he's assuming it's a gun thing. He smiles diffidently and tilts his glass. ]

2011. And my Earth counts from Jesus, if that lines up with yours.

[ Who knows how any calendar works once you get far enough away from the local universe branch? ]

[ That's... interesting. Certainly things might line up differently than where Krouse is from, but. ]

How long has your uncle had that gun?

[ John is trying to remember more details. He thinks it's been around for longer than that, but he's confident he started hearing about distributions in 2012. ]

[ Krouse is taken off-guard by the direction that question heads. He's never given much thought to anything chronological having to do with his gun. He assumed if it was available for him to get in his universe, it had to be available in other ones, right?

Maybe there's a mismatch. Krouse tries to remember if the guy who sold it to him mentioned about about years, but it wasn't that kind of conversation. ]

A few years, I guess.

[ Would John's universe be closer to Alpha or Bet? No powers, so Alpha is probably a safer call, but Krouse is supposed to be from Bet when he's here. Another old lie he's hanging onto because - because at this point he just doesn't want to get into it. ]

I don't know. I was a kid. I didn't keep that close an eye on it.

[ Not impossible, but if he were from John's world he would be suspicious. He still is, kind of. He can't really use years to corroborate anything since they're from different worlds; just having the same gun doesn't mean anything. Things could happen at different times due to the smallest differences. But it's more so the fact that Krouse remembered the gun enough for Aurora to give it to him but is now claiming that he didn't "keep that close an eye on it." That's the kind of reply that people give when they've been caught in a lie they don't know how to get out of.

John has to decide if he's going to push this or just let it slide. He doesn't have to know, but... he wants to know. He needs to know what kind of ally Krouse is, how far he can trust him. John keeps his tone light, interested. ]

What other guns did you uncle have?

[ Krouse glances away from John, his eyes happening to scan over the nearest people to them at the edge of the event, all of them out of easy earshot.

Then he uses his free hand to tip up the bottom of his mask far enough to finally actually take a drink from his flute. It's lukewarm by now. He doesn't see what the big deal about it is. It tastes like bad juice. ]

Fuck.

[ Krouse drops the mask back down over a briefly visible rueful smile and runs his hand through his hair, rumpling it out of its semi-neat arrangement. ]

I should know that, shouldn't I?

[ It's probably a bad time to ask John what he'd recommend Krouse invent for that. ]

Whatever you're thinking, you're probably not right. I mean, you could be, but you'd be a hell of a guesser. And I know how this will sound, trust me, but - hear me out?

[ He doesn't say please, because he thinks that sounds pathetic enough as it is. Hear me out. ]

[ John... is disappointed. He is. He shouldn't be, Krouse was just an ally and barely one at that. But. He is. Well, he'll get the truth and has learned something important from this: he still can't trust people here. ]

Okay, I'm listening.

[ He doesn't sound judgmental, or really... like anything. There's no disappointment, no suspicion, just a statement. He's listening. He wants to hear what Krouse will say for himself. ]

[ Krouse realizes he would have preferred disappointment as soon as he hears its absence. Annoyance, distaste, something. Then he'd have a wall to bounce off of, a retroactive justification for lying in the first place. ]

It's complicated.

[ He says, and his hand is reaching up behind his head to undo a fastening that isn't the same as the one he's used to, so he fumbles it a little. Then he's tilting his head forward to drop the full red face mask into his hand, rubbing his sleeves over his sweaty cheeks. It's just not comfortable. ]

Well. The lead up is complicated. Buying the gun was simple. I asked around until I found a connection, ended up in the back room of a truly scuzzy bar, and got ripped off by at least half over street value because I looked like a mark.

[ He's trying to keep his tone light, but there's a sting that still works its way in. He doesn't like thinking about himself as a mark, whether he was sixteen or not. ]

Which, compared to most of the wild things people just admit to here - [ He flips the mask over with a flick of his wrist, just to keep his hand busy as he keeps looking at it. ] - maybe I'm the idiot for still thinking anyone would give a shit.

[ Krouse downs the rest of his drink in a sharp, quick swallow, grimacing at the faint hiss of too many bubbles going down too fast.

Maybe he wants John to be disappointed because it'd mean it matters, in some small way. That standing there with sweaty palms and a confident smile as he crossed another line meant something. Not a good thing, but something. And what the fuck is wrong with him to want that from someone he barely knows, just because it felt like he was almost kind of winning him over? ]

My uncle taught me to play pool. I taught myself how to shoot. And the gun safety. That was always the part that freaked me out. Just - fucking up. Hurting someone. I didn't want to be one of those assholes who didn't care.

[ John listens to the whole of it. Just listens. Mulls it over. He knows what honesty sounds like, one of his most valuable skills in the CIA was his ability to judge what honesty sounds like, he's good at making that call. Krouse sounds honest. It's in his voice, in his body language. He's telling the truth now. ]

I'll give you a gun safety lesson, if you want. See if there's any gaps from your self study that need to be filled.

[ He doesn't need to know why Krouse got the weapon. Krouse has said he doesn't want to misuse it and that's the important part. That's the part of owning a gun that really matters: what you do with it. Whether or not you respect it for what it is. Krouse clearly does. That's important to John. ]

[ That wasn't where Krouse thought John would land. His eyes jerk up from his removed mask to John's still half-masked face, wide and instinctively wary. ]

You'd do that?

[ It's a stupid blurted question. John's offering, isn't he? As they were just discussing, it's just practical to make sure anyone with a gun knows how to use it. ]

Yeah. I'd appreciate it. That'd be - [ he presses his thumb against the edge of the mask ] - thanks.

[ Krouse finds it hard not to ask what John wants for it, which will be nothing. Like a goddamn dork, he thinks he really is an Aragorn guy, just to cap off his astonishing success at navigating a party without fucking it up. The corner of his mouth twitches up, either nervous or wry, or just both. ]

You said you didn't want to fuck up, so let's make sure you don't.

[ It's as simple as that. Krouse doesn't want to hurt someone, and John doesn't want Krouse to hurt someone, so their interests align here. They can't undo this revelation that Krouse lied about the gun, but they can move forward. ]

Is the gun meant for a purpose, or just insurance?

[ Something elusive flits across Krouse's face at let's make sure you don't that looks like a kind of relief it's probably inappropriate to have for such a simple offer delivered so unemotively.

He just really doesn't want to fuck up any more, is the thing. So he nods, quick and terse, to seal the offer. Gun safety lesson slash review. They'll do that. ]

Insurance.

[ That's true too, now and then. And if John's not asking what the insurance was about then, that's fine. Getting caught in one lie is embarrassing enough. ]

It came in handy during the labyrinth. Teleportation is a great trick until you don't have anywhere to teleport to.

[ He's a flight guy, not a fight guy. ]

[ John catches the look and feels... good about it. He likes that Krouse values that so much. John is aware that there's a slippery slope at being Krouse's age and feeling trapped into making these lies. He doesn't know Krouse's situation, he had alluded to it being "complicated" but John thinks, given what he's seen so far, that Krouse probably doesn't want to lie. But he does it anyways. He hopes one day Krouse will decide he doesn't have to lie to John. ]

Do you keep it on you or did you have a chance to grab it before going into the labyrinth?

[ He's curious about both possible answers. ]

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OCTOBER MINGLE

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