employeelounge | PREGAME

[ takeover success!!

by which i mean, all of the nasty npcs have been taken care of; right now, the members of the employee crew are waiting to make sure the nightman doesn't suddenly appear and ruin everything, vax and junpei included. everyone gets their fancy new uniforms and assorted access to powers, including gu yun, who is wearing a perfect copy of vax'ildan's deathwalkers ward over his shoulders. he's actually been relatively quiet for a few minutes - hat abandoned to the side, he's fussing with his uniform, fixing buttons, not muttering to himself, but...

all of a sudden, he makes an a-ha noise and turns back around to face the group, holding a bottle of wine that he just pulled from his hammerspace sleeve and looking exorbitantly pleased. ]

I knew it. [ HELL yeah! he's gonna pull some glasses from his hammerspace sleeve also and play with this function a little bit? this is the dream. while he's doing so: ] Well, then. While we're stuck waiting here, perhaps we should spend some time getting to know each other? Seeing as how we'd like to be the opposite of those who came before us, and work together, and all.

[ooh! exciting. sei, unfortunately, is a lightweight. but that's not going to stop her from grinning and scooting over, reaching out a hand for a glass.]

Aha! I guess no matter what world you come from, getting to know each other over drinks is common!

[a beat.]

That doesn't look like sake, though...

Pretty sure it's wine, right? [he knows a thing or two! he's watching this go down and he doesn't exactly reach for a glass because he's a very polite young man (he's not, he's waiting to see what happens to the others first) but he does approach to join them. his own hat has been abandoned for the time being and he'll settle nearby.]

Maybe we can play a game or something. We did a few of those when we were in the Realm.

[ there's a very responsible voice in gu yun's head that sounds a lot like shen yi. it says - zixi, should you really be giving them alcohol? they're kids! these two are definitely kids!

however, like normal, gu yun chooses to ignore shen yi's voice (he's deaf) instead and pours a glass for everyone sitting here. might as well start em young! sora and sei and nico's are a little less full than everyone else's. that's his one good deed for the day. ] So did those at the station. A rather indulgent hobby of ours, to say the least.

Let's see. Perhaps two truths and a lie? Seems simple enough to start. Or, we could play pass the flower, even? Pass around a little token to the beat of someone keeping time, and whoever is holding it when the music stops has to answer a question or do some sort of dare.

[

im popping in again to establish that when sei sees that there is less wine in her glass than in some of the others she's going to try to pour some of shinnosuke's into hers because she's offended at being given less.

why is she bullying shinnosuke? because he's the only one here that she knows well.]

Edited 2021-09-06 21:13 (UTC)

[sei can have his glass, he'll hand it right to her (also, because the idea of her getting drunk is funny).

but fuck you, he's not participating in any of these games.]

[he takes a glass but he's just holding it for the sake of something to do.]

Are we sure we have time to be doing this...? [we just enacted a takeover? hello?]

All we're doing is biding our time at the moment to make sure that thing doesn't show up and immediately realize what we've done, no? Would you rather sit around anxious for hours until the sun rises? I assume none of us will be sleeping.

Not to mention, it would be better for us to build camaraderie early. It helps the morale among the group, seeing as how we are, in fact, something of a group. A galaxy of our own. [ infuriatingly as usual, gu yun does have a point. jokes included.

he lifts his glass and immediately takes a drink! it's a rice wine, so it's nice and light and also delicious. ]

I hear no objections. [ ???? there were several. he's deaf! ] So! Without further ado. [ counting on his fingers for two truths and a lie: ] The place I came from was in space. Each week, we were required to 'indulge' in some way, shape or form. I didn't participate in any killings.

[ just

right out there with that ig ]

In space...?

[the look on sei's face is just like, "what the fuck?"]

That's the lie! It's gotta be, right...?

[flayn, meanwhile, just sips at her wine and lets other people guess.]

[to add onto gu yun's justifications:]

If we're being sensed at all, it's also better to come across as confident. Being nervous may only tip them off that something's wrong.

[anyway, suras are arguably space aliens, so the space part doesn't come off as weird to shess. as he takes a sip—]

No offence taken, I hope, but the part where you didn't participate in any killings.

[seems like the lie.]

[nico sort of raises an eyebrow, but okay, fine. point taken. he'll just lean back and let the others guess but sora's actually thinking this through.]

Space is maybe more common than you think. [is. is it? but he takes a sip from his glass.] But uh...the indulgence part's a little weird, isn't it? I'm not sure I even wanna ask, but that seems like the kind of thing that's hard to gauge.

Edited 2021-09-06 22:53 (UTC)

[ he tips his glass slightly in shess's direction, eyes glimmering with amusement. ]

That one's the lie. I took care of someone who had been killing since the very beginning - he targeted a young lady who could not have been less deserving of his cruelty, and I caught him that evening. If that makes you feel any better.

[ sometimes you pick your target for a whole lot of reasons. anyway, ]

As for the other two! Space is indeed correct - though, it was the first time I'd ever been, and as for indulging... perhaps best not to explain for everyone's ears. You'll have to just take my word for it.

[ for the first time, yin yu reacts a little from where he's settled by flayn - his brow twitches, because he was at least aware of The Thots ]

[flayn looks like she's about to ask what gu yun means by "indulging," but luckily, he nips that in the bud and they're all spared that explanation. their ears are safe for now.

instead, she sips at her glass and leans into yin yu's side, relaxing against him.]

I see... hmm, well, since you guessed it right - perhaps you ought to go next, then?

[she nods at shess!!]

[look, coming from a race that just casually wipes out human civilizations if they happen to be in a bad mood (even if shess, personally, wishes they didn't), shess isn't going to judge a little murder.

he does smile a bit wryly, though, because he can guess what gu yun is declining to say about this "indulging" if he's not willing to say in front of all these BABIES.]

Hm... this is a bit difficult to come up with on the spot. Let's see—

Ours required all but one person to die including our overseers, it took place in a desolate landscape where little life grew, and we had a mixture of compelled killings and voluntary ones.

[meanwhile shinnosuke is still pretending he's isn't here and is refusing to participate.]

Edited 2021-09-06 23:49 (UTC)

[shinnosuke is a whole-ass mood, but at the same time nico's taking this game as a way to learn a little more about the situation and the people he's dealing with. if this is really meant to be fate, then...it would be best to try and understand as much as he can.

also thanks for not explaining the indulgence! would rather not!

so he focuses on shess's statement instead and ponders for a moment.]

Compulsion? It's believable, but...it seems unnecessary. [granted this is someone who has a skeleton army he can control, so now he's not sure.] But it sounds harder to live somewhere that was empty. All of you were in your previous locations for a few months, weren't you?

Eight weeks. Though - we were not the first group. Our 'avatars' had been there far longer.

[ this information is delivered without any fuss, or change in gu yun's expression at all. internally, he has Some Feelings About That, but that shit gets boxed far, far away before it ever touches the surface.

he takes a long drink of his wine, thoughtfully. ] I have to agree with you on that one. After all, all of us were quite aware of what we were doing - all in favor of achieving some sort of wish or desire.

[ yin yu does look away for a brief moment at the mention of compulsion, expression flickering; he's not wearing his mask because flayn is here, so anyone can see it. ]

[flayn's expression falls a little when they're talking about compelled and voluntary murders, and she shifts her glass so that she's holding it with one hand. her other hand moves to takes yin yu's, and she gives his hand a soft squeeze.]

...it was twice for us. The first time, it was two weeks; the second, it was about the length of time you've described.

[she bites her lip.]

I would say the place you spent so much time being empty seems rather like a lie to me.

We were brought there to cleanse the world of corruption. Unfortunately, our presence meant that we were susceptible to the very issue itself.

[and then some people just murdered for funsies, as they do.]

But you'd be correct. Circumstances aside, it was actually a rather pleasant place to spend a few weeks in. [all things considered, a month or two is an incredibly short span of time.] Preferable to our current choice of setting, at least—though it doesn't matter much in the end.

[screams in notifs, but anyway.]

Corruption...like darkness? [wow. a novel concept. he hates that, actually, and he's already comparing to a lot of the things he knows.] There's this world order that travelers are supposed to follow to make sure things don't get worse for a world, but if just being there meant you could get in trouble...that seems kind of unfair.

[but it's never about what is and isn't fair.]

This place doesn't seem so bad though. I haven't been to many places like it before, but at least it seems stable. The Realm sent us to new places every week, so we never got to stay longer than that before the area across the bridge changed.

A world order, hm?

[ gu yun seems to think on that for a moment from sora, thoughtful. ] I suppose that's the sort of thing Lup dealt with wrangling. Bouncing off from universe to universe - seemed quite strange to me until I arrived in a new one, but apparently, it's not all that unusual...

I agree, though. Not quite as modern as the station, perhaps, and missing a few amenities. [ he takes a sip from his wine. ] - but certainly workable. Besides, I'm sure we can do our best to spruce it up a bit. Can't all be cobwebs and murder all the time.

...well, this is quite preferable to a summer camp, I would say.

[flayn would take pretty much anywhere over a summer camp? she's biased against summer camps. at least this place is mostly indoors and, yes, it's a little spooky, but they can change things up a little.

they can't do too much lest they tip off the nightman, but...]

And we can try to make things at least a little easier on those who will be brought here, even if it is only done in subtle ways.

[shinnosuke finally speaks up because he should probably exist in this thread again at some point, though it's more like he's just snorting to himself and, to an extent, to sei.]

Better than good ol' Whole Ass too.

[this makes little sense out of context.]

[yes he is absolutely just mouthing "whole ass?" to himself because haha, what? he looks a little perplexed because camp doesn't sound too bad (from someone who has probably slept outdoors more than he should have) and he's about to comment about the realm and the town they were in, except.

you know.

gu yun says a thing and sora just...pauses. looks at him. pauses longer. and he frowns heavily.]

Lup? [and maybe it's a coincidence, except he had mentioned it was someone who traveled to other universes, and..is it possible? after a moment, he reaches into his pocket and pulls out a phone. you know the one. it takes a few more seconds but he scrolls for a bit before he turns the screen over to gu yun where there's a photo of lup. possibly a selfie of lup and sora, i can't remember if they did.]

Do you...know her?

As opposed to half-ass?

[ a dry quip from gu yun, because of course - but, sora is then coming over to look at him. he blinks, shifting where he's sitting to adjust the liuli glass on his nose.

... and after a moment, digs around in his pockets to find his own phone. his photo is in black and white, but nonetheless, he scrolls through it for a moment before holding his screen out to show a similar picture; a selfie, just slightly blurry, himself and lup in her red robes at the very end of their time in the station.

for the first time, he's not overly serious or shitty or joking - he just opens his mouth, and closes it for a moment after. ]

...how curious.

...I suppose none of the rest of you will come about and tell me you know any of the people I spent time with. Mollymauk? Shi Qingxuan? Harrowhark? Any of those names ring a bell?

[sei makes a face at shinnosuke.]

If I never see Whole Ass again, I'll be happy. I still think we should have called it "Let us go home, you stupid bastard".

[flayn, meanwhile, can't help but gasp a little and widen her eyes in recognition at the name shi qingxuan - though that's less because of murder experience and more because of the world she's been living in. she glances quickly at yin yu before leaning over to take a look at sora's and gu yun's phones.

oh, maybe they'll believe she's just surprised because - ]

She looks a lot like Chef Taako...

[he sticks his tongue out at sei.]

Way too wordy, idiot.

[shess tilts his head to one side.]

None of those names are familiar to me. [he pauses, before glancing at sora.] Though I wonder... would you happen to have a brother, by any chance?

None of those names mean anything to me either, but if any of you know Kyouka, Stephanie, Sanji, Yasusada...Magnus or Reyna, too. [me, realizing how many grimms were actually in crau and dying.] There were a lot of us in the castle.

[he looks at flayn first.]

That's because they're twins. Taako and Lup. They were both with me in the Realm.

[and then, to shess:]

But that's...sort of complicated. There's Vanitas who looks almost identical to me but we aren't related or anything. There's Ventus who used to be in my heart. And there's Roxas...he was born from my heart, but he looks like Ven.

[i hate kingdom hearts.]

So what does that all mean? Are they the same person showing up in all of these places, or are they different versions like replicas?

[ for the first actual time, yin yu makes himself known. ]

...Shi Qingxuan was - is, directly, from my realm. There may be others - I find it hard to believe that His Highness Xie Lian would not have been swept into all of this at some point. [ xie lian your luck

... the real reason he spoke up was for something else, though, as he looks at nico. ]

You're from the castle. We spent some time there, when we were taken off for the second time.

[ gu yun meanwhile will be taking a long, long drink of his wine and topping off another glass. "replicas"? replicas. what kind of bullshit worlds are you people from ]

[sei sticks her tongue out at shinnosuke. a paragon of maturity, she is not.

nico says a lot of familiar names, and flayn's brow furrows as she listens. yin yu makes the connection first. she nods. sora, too, mentioning both taako and lup being in the realm...

hmm.]

Chef Taako never spoke of being in the Realm. Rather, he said... he had come from a boat. Or... no, he insisted he did not come from the boat, but in such a way that it was fairly obvious even to me that he had. [...] Magnus never spoke of the castle, though... I believed he had come from somewhere else. Stephanie, Sanji, Yasusada, and the others from the castle did not seem to recognize him...

[she's... thinking about it.]

There are many possibilities, I suppose. In any event, being from the same world as someone does not mean that everything will... line up. Dimitri and I were both from Fódlan, but our memories were... different.

[shinnosuke is making a similar expression to gu yun because i can't remember how much xion talked about her backstory but anyway y'all are weird. otherwise, he looks disinterested in this conversation as he instead fiddles with his headphone.

anyway, shess doesn't really get the details of what sora's saying, but.]

Well... you might as well know, then, that he was one of the "hosts" in mine. If you're from the same world as him, then there were also several others.

[...]

Different timelines, perhaps.

[not exactly shess's area of expertise—he never really dealt with any of the people associated with "time" in his world. but he's not wholly unfamiliar with the concept. watch canon joss me but shess's not going to show up for another 2938427492 chapters so i'm safe.]

[wow. okay. god. this is a lot? this is so much and for a moment he kind of looks like he wishes he could expire and exhausted all at once. for a moment, he glances at yin yu and then at flayn with a brief nod.]

...Xie Lian was with me. Hua Cheng, too. They were together. I don't know anything about Taako and a boat, but maybe...he really was in a couple of places? I don't know.

Taako and Lup's memories were a little different than each other's, so you could be right. Maybe it's just things people forgot, or they haven't lived yet. More timetravel?

[wow. anyway. he finally...has to address shess though and it means big frowny. very big frowny.]

...great. Was he okay? Who were the others? Riku? Kairi? [he shakes his head.] It makes you wonder what it means for the timelines of people who'll be coming here next.

[nico, meanwhile, seems to think about this before there's a tentative nod.]

The war between Tiger and Dragon, yes. We were at the castle for a few months until we were able to get our numbers right for the ink necessary to end the war and leave. [but there's a double-frown.] The three of them were at your camp, too? Who else? Do you know?

[this is so tiring he hates this actually.]

[as sora talks shinnosuke glances at sei but wow suddenly really occupied with twirling his knife]

[gently,]

I'll preface this with saying that everyone was fine in the end and returned home, so ultimately, all obstacles were resolved.

[everything gets kind of bad from here, though.]

The others were Axel—or Lea, whichever name you might know him as—Xion, and Namine. [no idea if those names mean anything to sora, though.] You'll probably hear about it sooner or later, if anyone from there shows up here, but all but one of us had to die. Namine had already died by that point, as she'd been possessed, but Axel, Xion, and Roxas consented to their deaths and made their own arrangements.

[in the background, shinnosuke continues to be really invested in not participating in this as he frowns. wowee.]

[sei looks like she wants to say something, then catches shinnosuke looking at her and twirling his knife. her brow furrows, and she stares at him with a frown. really? really, you're not going to say anything, dude?

flayn does not notice this, because she's a little distracted by hearing - ]

Xie Lian and Hua Cheng? Well... at least they were together...

[that's probably a good thing? mostly. it might have been a bad thing for whoever or whatever was responsible for their murdergame, but frankly, flayn is of the opinion that entities like pandora and the nightman deserve whatever they get, and she's assuming something like that was involved in their foray to the realm.]

Ah, there was... Belph and Hikage, I believe they were also from the castle? Did you know them? And Damien and Jason-- ah. No, forgive me, they were from a different group, but they knew Stephanie from their world before they ended up in these situations... [she sighs.] ...in our case, there was no requirement that we all had to die. Just that... at least one person had to die each week, or else we and everyone else from the places we came from would be wiped out.

[ HUA CHENG WAS HERE???

this makes yin yu choke on his drink, and he reaches up to blot at his mouth with his sleeve gently after a moment. it's. not surprising. of course... where one goes, the other will follow..... ]

.... I hope that Chengzhu was not too... [ a pause. ] ...Well. They both must have made it out alright.

[ otherwise hua cheng would have definitely tpk'd that entire game ]

There have been far too many situations where people were required to murder each other.

[ is what gu yun decides after listening to all of this, taking a long swig of his wine. ]

I suppose Sora does make a point, though. If, for example, Lup arrives here, who is to say what she might remember? Would she know of both? What a mess.

...Hikage tried to get me convicted for murder, and Stephanie and I were friends. I didn't know Belph that well, but he was close to both of them from what I could tell. Our entire war was about balance, and I know the only reason I stayed alive back there was because my partner was an alignment we needed. And I wouldn't have wanted to leave her anyway. Some people handled it a little worse than others. Yasusada lost his temper and got voted for even if he didn't do anything. Same with Dazai.

All of these games are about culling numbers, but the different methods are strange. [why is there no consistency???]

[sora, meanwhile, frowns mightily upon hearing that all of his friends fucking died? hello??? but regardless....they're all fine now. that's what matters.]

I helped him cover for a murder. [he just. says this. it's his way of saying that he was friends with the dude.] Hua Cheng and I were on the same team, and Xie Lian and I both had roles to play in the game. We survived and we brought our dead back. We were lucky that we were able to talk to our dead pretty early and got the message about two members from each team needing to kill. Otherwise we could have really screwed things up for them and for us.

[but gu yun brings up a good point, too.]

...in the Realm, we forgot a lot of things, but then we sometimes remembered later. What if it's something like that? Like if they're here, they might remember some of their other lifetimes or whatever? Is that possible? What do we even do about that?

PREGAME | jenga!

party games the npc edition

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1/2

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[1/2]

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digs this back up six months later bc i truly never got a notif but plz ignore 1/2

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1/2 throws tag order out at this point

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