let's set d o w n some (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
groundrules) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
westwhere2023-01-06 07:33 pm
groundrules) wrote in westwhere2023-01-06 07:33 pm
Entry tags:
- 2ha: chu wanning,
- arcane: jinx,
- arcane: vi,
- arcane: viktor,
- asoiaf: daenerys targaryen,
- better call saul: jimmy mcgill,
- better call saul: kim wexler,
- doctor who: clara oswald,
- doctor who: the doctor,
- final fantasy xiv: vrtra,
- game of thrones: jon snow,
- mcu: kamala khan,
- mcu: wanda maximoff,
- mcu: yelena,
- mo dao zu shi: xiao xingchen,
- oh! my emperor: beitang moran,
- original: licyn mansbane,
- owl house: eda clawthorne,
- penny dreadful: vanessa ives,
- star trek: leonard mccoy (aos),
- star wars: merrin,
- test drive,
- the gifted: marcos diaz,
- tian guan ci fu: xie lian,
- touken ranbu: kanesada,
- umbrella academy: allison,
- umbrella academy: five,
- warcraft: anduin wrynn,
- warcraft: wrathion,
- warframe: kahl 175,
- x-men: charles xavier,
- zettai karen children: kumoi yuuri
sand in your eyes
And onwards, through the cursed desert. The mini-journey Arc covers 6-21 January and doubles as a test drive meme. Participants do not need an invite to apply this round. Have fun!
A HOUSE UNITED WILL SAND | SOILMATES | A PYRAMID SCHEME
A SANDING OVATION
Sand in your eyes, down your throat, stifling. You wake half-buried in high dunes, crawling towards helping hands. Thirst vanquishes you.
You are quickly offered a translation and communication pendant and introduced to the leader of the caravan that saved you — good Mazyar, who thanks the stars for your most incredible luck to be rescued by his generous and humble self. For he is not a man for idle praise, but he has sold salt to salt makers, he was courted by seven of the five great trade guilds and brought peace to the Stairs of Sighs…
Mazyar reveals you are in Akhuras, where undead lieges seek to weaponise you in their war for dominion. Mazyar’s good but less successful friend, the elusive Merchant ferries otherworlders east, where ancient beacons can transport them home.
Retire for now and regain your strength. Come morning, further otherworlders will arrive from Serthica — and your journey may begin.
ONE SAND WASHES THE OTHER
The veteran party reunites with newcomers in the desert, and with the merchant Mazyar — who once guided them through the Stairs of Sighs. His caravan is protected by the Scavengers —deathly a tribe of hardened desert raiders. They bring water flasks, supplies, cooling suits and tents to share. Their snail-like carriage mounts can transport the weak.
You are bound for the seized citadel of Alem, swarmed on each side by undead battalions. To access it, you must obtain one of the enormous sand worms that trawl the deserts, which can be deployed to create underground passageways.
The Scavengers will lead the caravan through haunted dunes, the worms’ traditional hunting grounds and temple-fortress Uruksithar.
A HOUSE UNITED WILL SAND
The group first reaches the Valley of Unchaining, bordered by high cliffs and fang-like stones. Here and there, discover bloodied footprints, half-buried shackles and red chains. You might even stumble upon an eroded tombstone inscribed, H R SL EP THE UNCH IN D. At its feet are dulled dagger blades and rough calcar stone.
COULD DIE FROM LAUGHTER
You fool, never eat alone. Happen by the camp’s outskirts with your dinner, and you might glimpse the silhouettes of starved desert hyenas, their eyes glistening green. They will come close if you bear raw meat or bleeding wounds.
- ■ Scavengers say, if you see the hyenas, throw them food or a cloth drenched in fresh blood, then run without looking back until you no longer hear their cruel cries.
■ Some hyenas mimic rasped human voices, begging help or calling your name. One feeble hyena wears a chain of red shackles around its neck.
■ If you look back while chased, you find the green stare of the hyenas fixed upon you. You are gradually overcome by starvation, violence and the urge to dismember prey and feast on raw flesh. Player’s choice on whether characters can resist this compulsion, which disappears at dawns, or if they taste blood.
■ Scavengers will deny you entrance into the camp if you appear possessed in this way.
SANDIMENTAL VALUE
You walk the Valley, Scavengers say, and Mother Death walks with you. A once handsome crone might appear beside you, bare-footed and dressed in clean linens. She remains silent unless spoken to and flinches if you move suddenly, as if she fears being struck.
- ■ Treat the Crone kindly, and she entrusts you with a small pouch holding a fraction of her ashes, which she wants scattered from the hills.
■ Use rope and climbing hooks and take cover behind stone formations. Beware the violent sand whirlwinds that batter the cliffs, threatening to plunge you down or choke you with sand.
■ If you succeed, the Crone appears to watch her scattering ashes and bless you with good luck for the rest of your journey. Your kindness, she says, reminds her of her daughter.
SOILMATES
The three-day walk to Uruksithar traverses the sand worms’ hunting grounds, where dunes shift periodically in sharp, tectonic waves. Watch your step and don’t be surprised if your tent sinks at night.
- ■ The Scavengers organise daily reconnaissance parties in the desert hills. Stay with them to unbury dune treasures.
■ The brave & brazen can try to catch sand worms. The massive creatures erupt overground periodically, catching prey in their large mouths, or crushing it beneath their heft as they plunge in the depths — creating large sinkholes in the process.
■ On its back, each sand worm has a few darker scales that draw the shape of a rune. To tame a sand worm, you must find its rune, then write the symbol on the worm’s back using blood from your hands. Report your catch by 23:59 on 17 January!
■ The sand worm bonds with you for three weeks until the next full moonrise, or until you draw the same rune on your cut hand.
■ Those who secure a sand worm find it grudgingly follows them underground for the rest of the journey. The creature can only be steered or ridden.
■ Some sand worms are vicious, old and sufficiently magical to retaliate by taking the link over and forcing their bonded humans to experience their lives — briefly sensitive to light and strong sounds, or unable to speak. Some might experience mild fevers. All symptoms disappear when the bond breaks.
A PYRAMID SCHEME
At last, welcome to Uruksithar, former jewel of the desert — now reduced to rusted gates and tattered walls of wind-lashed stone.
The abandoned palace-fortress features a row of minor temples and barren gardens that surround a great, ruinous pit. The state of residential furnishings suggests the grounds were lived mere years prior. Walk north to find a a large pool of thickened black water that exudes a cold, unsettling presence. Veteran party members know what to expect.
Nail scratches on some temple walls read, we, who did not sleep or i ask the wind to grieve our chains. By the pit, a stone plate helpfully says, drop by drop, even base water turns to poison.
The Scavengers disperse to raid the temples, advising you to carry water everywhere. One raider mentions that the local Temple of Ra’esh stores silver waters that can woo sand worms.
OCTOPUS PRIME
Uruksithar’s great gong strikes every two hours, to groans and shudders from the abyssal pit. Scavengers immediately take cover behind walls, bind themselves to columns or rush into crumbling residences.
- ■ For five minutes, as the gong sounds a pathetic dirge, a bouquet of tentacles erupts from the pit, sweeping nearby streets to capture living things.
■ Throwing water on the tentacles forces them to retreat, while black liquid from the northern pool burns them down. Further tendrils emerge until the gong quiets.
■ Should you fall into the pit, use your climbing hooks to latch onto the walls and don’t look down. A grotesque, sharp-toothed mouth awaits below to devour you, amid the squelching sounds of the tissue and material it has been masticating for decades. It won’t give up its lunch easily.
TOMB AND GLOOM
Ra’esh the Bright-maker, he who saw but peace beneath the skies. His humble temple is anonymous among numerous worship grounds. Scavengers say, four years ago, a wanderer sculpted an eye with a sun for a pupil on the entrance door. Take a torch and head in.
- ■ Long-stripped of its glory, the maze-like Temple of Ra’esh is now cold stone, stale window-less corridors and heavy doors that snap down from the ceiling.
■ Distant susurrations of water point you towards your destination.
■ As you walk in, pay attention to the engravings near the entryway of each temple room. Some depict arrows, forecasting spikes will burst up from floors tiles. Sculpted drops hint pouring water in this spot will open a door. Open a door with an engraving of large serpents, and… well. The engravings can help characters navigate the maze and completely avoid its traps. Feel free to make up your own engravings & traps, if you want!
■ The altar room contains a pool with pearlescent waters that surround a woman fully bandaged in gauze, her sight obscured. She is bound to a column with chains and shackles akin to those found in the desert. Rare peeks of her skin show it rotting or sickly pale.
■ She asks either if you are her mother, come for her at last. Do you engage?
■ Take water from the pool, and you can lure a sand worm to you once you have exited Uruksithar. Hazed, but sweet-tempered, it will follow you underground and allow you to ride it for the three weeks until the next full moonrise. These sand worms won’t give you a hard time during the bond period. Report your worm too by 23:59 on 17 January!
NOTES
- ■ Test driving & in-game characters can top level logs here — test driving characters can also put up network posts in this space c:
■ Feel free to investigate the mystery of the chains and shackles, but no pressure — it’s not critical to Arc V.
■ Hit up NPCs!
■ Navigation top.
no subject
It’s good to meet you, Finn.
Can’t say that you’ve missed much.
But you’re a welcome sight, regardless.
[ Thirty years. He has a hundred million questions, all of them invasive, and he doesn’t want to ask them over a communication device he doesn’t control. ]
Maybe I should get you to read my future?
Come find me. I’ve found a particularly dry wine that they make here in the desert. I’ll share it with you.
[ What he doesn’t share, clearly, is a name. The username has him a little on edge, but it’s easier to assess a man when you can see his face. ]
no subject
But the lack of a name has him suspicious. Again, could be nothing, but that's two flags now.
Not enough to convince himself, though. ]
Don't know how much someone should know about their own future, but I'm not one to decide that kind of thing. I'll try to answer your questions.
Should I look for the guy waving a wine bottle around?
[ "Find me" says the nameless text. ]
no subject
[ Which is exactly where he is, wearing one of the skin-tight desert suits that the locals wear, except he has a leather jacket thrown over it and isn’t wearing anything on his head, the dark hair dusted with sand.
He’s got a small pile of scrap in front of him - a clock, a couple other mechanical pieces that have been completely taken apart, and some scraps from the suits they were given. ]
no subject
Still, Finn's not exactly cautious as he approaches, but he is on alert. There's no text that follows as a reply. Just him walking up and putting a small smile on his face once their eyes lock. Then his gaze falls on the items between them. ]
Thirty years difference, and all I need to do to find someone from home is just look for the guy that's taking things apart.
[ That's what it feels like, anyway. ]
What were you trying to do?
no subject
[ He pulled at the chain with the crystal dangling at the end of it. ]
This didn’t help. Almost looks like sky kyber, but can’t figure out how they make it work.
[ He relaxes a little at the sight of Finn - at the very least he’s not sporting the stick up the ass that most imperials are. And his accent would place him somewhere on the outer rim.
He shifts over, gesturing for Finn to take a seat. ]
Sorry for the secrecy. Never know who’s listening, even here. Wanted to be careful.
[ He pauses a moment, trying to phrase his question in a way that won’t immediately give away his affiliations. ]
Thirty years. Is the empire still…?
[ He trails off, but he can’t quite keep the mix of hope and apprehension from his voice. If the empire is still ruling the galaxy in thirty years… then he must already be dead. The galaxy was already ready to explode - either the Empire would die or he would. Or both. Couldn’t rule out both. ]
no subject
Either way, Finn steps forward when the offer is given and sits beside the man, putting some distance between them. Wanting to be so careful on a network doesn't sound like something someone neutral would do. Well, maybe they would, but it speaks of military experience to Finn's paranoid ears.
And the question- He can't quite get a read on the guy. Rebel, he's assuming just from the look of him, but who really knows. Still, the truth can't hurt. ]
You said 7972? That's about... [ -brb, counting on his fingers- ] nine or ten years before the Empire fell.
[ And he lets that sit between them for all of a second, watching this man like a hawk. ]
Another group eventually rose in their place, but they fell, too. Shortly before I got here, actually.
no subject
He didn’t know what to do with the slight giddy rush that rose in him. ]
I’ll drink to that, then. Nine years. Yeah, I’ll drink to that.
[ He took a long drink himself, then held the bottle out for Finn, his smile bright and genuine. It could still be a trap, but he wants to believe it. Needs to believe it. ]
I’ve been going by Brasso, here. Round the others, for a while, we can use that. But you can call me Cassian.
no subject
So Finn smiles and takes the flask, too. He doesn't take a large drink - he's already learned that lesson - but he does take one. Then he hands it back, still smiling like he just won the war all over again. ]
Good to meet you, Cassian. And these people are okay, far as I can tell.
[ But he's not gonna press on that. After all, one of his best friends tried to drop him down an elevator shaft less than a month ago... ]
Rebel, huh?
no subject
He allows himself to nod to the question, though he wouldn’t have used the label for himself even a few days ago. He was still lying to himself, then. ]
For lack of a better word. I’m not a separatist, or a restorationist. All I know is that the Empire will destroy everything you love and steal the rest, if you let it. So I won’t let it.
[ His hand strays toward the bottle again, out of habit - just to wash the taste of the empire out of his mouth - but then he looks at Finn and sees that warm innocent grin and laughs instead, leaving the bottle alone. ]
No one here even knows about the Empire, [ He said, with a little awe. ] Or anything about home. Thought I was going mad. [ He laughs again, a quiet breathless sort of sound, and pokes at his scrap pile. If he’d known a place like this existed, he would have taken Maarva here. Or he would have tried to, and she would have dug her heels in and refused to go. And she’d been right to. His smile faded into something quiet for a moment, watching the sand. ]
Nine years. Either a lifetime or a flash bang. That’s a sentence I can serve, knowing what’s at the other end.
no subject
And it's thanks to people like Cassian, really. ]
It was weird for me at first, too. Most of these people have never even been off of the planet or moon they were born on. It's not even possible where they're from. No Empire. No Jedi stories. None of it.
[ Which still makes him feel a little weird, if he's honest. Like it's all a dream or an elaborate trick. But... it's not. He's well aware by now that it's not.
Those nine years, though- During a war, that's unimaginably long. ]
A lot happens in those nine years. A lot of-... A lot of sacrifice. But the Rebellion does win. Even the Republic returns.
[ And another thing that's weird. For most of his life, Alderaan was just the event that destroyed it, not a place, not billions of lives. Until he met the General, anyway. For Cassian, though, Alderaan is still a planet, the Death Star probably not even rumored. Suddenly, the future sounds like a daunting thing to explain. ]
no subject
[ The forced labour, the prisons with no way out - - ]
The Empire is built on blood. And we’ll keep bleeding as long as they rule the galaxy.
[ He thought he could outrun them. Thought he could find a corner of the galaxy they couldn’t reach. It had cost him everything, to try. To fail. Now he knew there was nowhere to run to.
There was always the chance Finn was lying, of course, but Cassian was wary, not paranoid. It didn’t change anything - he would still go home to oppression and war - but it gave him hope. And hope was desperately needed.
The smile on his lips faded a little bit. ]
Nine years. At least if I don’t make it, I know neither will they.
[ He sounded like he was shoring himself up, and it seemed to work - when he turned his head back to Finn, his smile was deep and warm. ]
Thank you, friend. Finn. At least if none of the others know, we do.
[ He held out the bottle. ]
Thirty years between us, right? You seem pretty young. Where are you from?
no subject
And that notion of personal sacrifice. At least if I don’t make it, I know neither will they. It's been a long time since Finn's met someone else who thought that way. Maybe too long, given how something uncoils in his chest and his shoulders droop a little.
But he says nothing until he's asked a question. ] Oh! Um-... That's hard to explain. [ Should he tell him? Should he not? ] It's... a long story. The short answer is that I'm not sure where I'm from. I was taken from there before I could remember. Part of... the war coming back around.
no subject
[ He wishes he could say it was a strange concept. ]
Something to do with this other group you spoke of? [ Yes, he didn’t miss that, even if he dismissed it from his mind. There would always be people who would want to take advantage and hurt everyone else. Especially in the wake of something like the empire. ]
Looking for labour they didn’t care to pay for in order to control?
no subject
[ Almost exactly like that, if this man were from anywhere else. But where they're from, the word 'stormtrooper' has a different connotation to it.
Well. Best to be honest now than have this guy figure it out randomly months from now. So, Finn sighs. ]
It was loyalists to the Emperor, mostly, controlled by the Emperor himself while he was in hiding and believed to be dead. They called themselves the First Order. But the Rebellion did a good job of destroying their cloning facilities, and they didn't have the numbers they used to by a long shot, so-... I guess you could say that I was recruited.
I escaped a while later. Didn't do it soon enough... I joined the new Rebellion after that. The Resistance.
[ And hopefully those last few things are enough to mollify the guy. Finn hasn't gotten shot since getting on this planet yet. He'd prefer to keep it that way. ]
no subject
No one is untouched by the Empire it seems, even it’s undead state stealing the lives of children. ]
You escaped, and with your life. That’s a thing few of us can boast about.
[ He pauses, bringing the wine to his lips and considering for a few breaths how much of his story he wants to tell. At least the bones of the truth, he decides. ]
I was 13 when they put me in prison, the first time. For assaulting clone troopers after they hung my father. [ It’s never a good memory, and he takes a quick drink to wash it away. ]
16 when I they sent me to war, only to find out we were fighting ourselves. I was one of 50 to survive.
[ He holds the bottle back out to Finn and fixes him with a firm gaze. ]
You and I - we know better than anyone, the monsters that the Empire breeds to turn us into them as well. But we escaped, and they are dead, and now we sit here together on a planet far far away, and can piss on their graves.
no subject
He listens to the story with a stoic expression, absently looking to the bottle when it's handed to him and taking it. He can't say he's surprised something like this has happened, but that he's surprised he thought he and his peers were the only ones to suffer as they had. There's a sense of comradery there that Finn fiercely values, but it comes with a swell of shame and pity and fear.
Generation after generation. Why does this keep happening?
Still, those dark thoughts don't stop the tiny smile from coming to his face. It doesn't take away the sadness in his eyes, but it does bring with it so much warmth. ]
I'd drink to that.
[ And he does, a bit more heartily than he had a second ago, and it goes down about as smooth as a brick. Finn coughs. The smile stays. He wants to thank him and apologize all at once, but he just hands back the bottle ]
We survived. And we aren't the only ones. That's something to celebrate.
no subject
But while a few minutes ago he thought the Empire was nearly unstoppable, he’s now grappling with the idea that this is a pattern that can be interrupted - very interrupted - and within his lifetime. The cycles of the galaxy tended to last a lot longer than one lifetime.
The smile returns to his face, hope ignited, and he takes back the bottle but only takes a final sip before stashing it away. He doesn’t want to be drunk right now. He wants to ride the high of knowing the future. ]
Then let’s celebrate.
What do they do here for fun?