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EVENT

Reverted
The city of Recollé...have you looked beyond the city lately? It may be time to do so.

I.

The good news, perhaps, is that everyone is back in their original bodies. The last few weeks may have been trying and embarrassing for several of you, but never fear! You're all in this together.

The nice thing about returning to your original body is that everything else seems to disappear along with the unintentional swapping. Your dreams on the evening of the 16th and the 17th are unoccupied and you're blissfully alone. Hallucinations fade away and the city almost feels brighter and cleaner. The messy paint job from May and June slowly flakes off to reveal a sparkling almost-new landscape below. All buildings, landmarks, flora and fauna are back to their original colors. The sky, however, is still painted a strange wash of colors and symbols.

The other nice thing about returning to your original body is that it's much easier to feel the sudden, sharp pain on your palm at midnight on the 18th, a needling high-pressure pain that lasts for all of 30 seconds. Upon looking at your hand, however, you'll notice something new.

In bright red font there's a new marking that reads: 13 Days:23:59:59.

58. 57. 56...

The timer steadily counts down, each second synced with each beat of your heart. As the days pass by the timer will slowly shift from the red to a dark, ominous purple. The glow of the mark becomes harder to ignore, and there doesn't seem to be a way to remove it. Good luck with that.

II.

The Retrospec app doesn't seem to be much better. The scrambled messages and posting errors seem to have stopped and users are no longer receiving messages and pictures about themselves.

In fact, the app seems to be quiet for a while.

As users continue to use the app they will find that any post, comment or message that they send via the app will be tagged with a different ID. Instead of their name, all messages will be from Alpha##### or Beta#####. The string of numbers will be unique for each user and cannot be changed at any time. Individual mailboxes will be attached to your name, but the Alpha/Beta ID has made its way there, too.

Over the course of the rest of the month, Alphas (those who have had the app for at least a year from August 2017) will find that messages to other Alphas are sent more easily than to Betas (those who have had the app for less than a year from August 2017) and vice versa. Messages to anyone from the opposite "faction" may drop out half-way or appear blank entirely. It might be wise to find a better mode of communication in the meantime.

III.
Even if you're alone in your dreams, you're not alone in the waking world. No one is free from the timer on their palm, though they may come to find that it impacts some users more than others.

Some users will experience a steady pulsating in their hand as the timer counts backwards, each second ticking by. Standing still just long enough will send the pulse out of their hands and through the rest of their body, over their arms and through their feet straight into the ground.

The earth begins to shake under these unlucky users, little quakes and trembles that spread out and seek out anyone else nearby. Whether you know this person or not, whether you're alone or several of you are impacted by this earthquake, the ground beneath you splits open and you're pulled straight down into the crevice, falling aimlessly. Instead of finding your own life flashing before your eyes, you'll find yourself witnessing events, faces, and memories that are important to the user the pulses came from.

On the outside of things, the user will promptly collapse into a coma-like state no matter where they're at. Inside their mind, however, a scene begins to set itself to welcome you as you land. It isn't a memory and it isn't a hallucination. It's a construct of someone else's innerworkings that have trapped you and blocked you in.

As the haze around you dissipates, the puzzle you received earlier this month floats in front of you. Whether you have finished building it or not it is now fully completed and all of the words have faded except for "Gordian Knot."

Your cell phones will not work in these dreamscapes, and even Retrospec seems to be disconnected. It's up to you to venture further into someone else's mind and help them untangle whatever mystery is hidden within themselves.

IV.
So about that timer. As time begins to run out, more and more people begin to experience dream dives and encounter the knots of others that they must fix. Even inside the dreamscape, the timer glows just as brightly as it had out in the real world and it continues counting down.

At least it gives you a sense of time and just how many minutes, hours, or days you've been stuck inside someone's subconscious. You might even realize that the timer is directly tied to just how much time you have to unravel the knots of your friends, loved ones, and strangers.

Easy, right? Take caution, citizens. The monsters and demons lurking in the corners of someone else's psyche can manifest to something quite powerful. You will not wake up and be booted out of someone's dream if you are attacked, but your physical body and mind will shut down and remain unconscious for one week.

Be careful how you approach these knots, however! Should you change any part of them too much, the host will find themselves rejecting this new information. Too great of a change will result in the loss of an important memory to them and no way to recover it inside the dive.

Even with these possible losses divers are responsible for fixing what's gone wrong and relieving the knot wound tightly in the host's mind. Venture forward, explore, and break it apart to awaken then. You will be greatly rewarded for your effort.

Failure to break the knot and save the host from this comatose state will result in all parties suffering a loss. At first it may not be obvious, but over time it will be clear an important memory or item has left your possession.

Is it just limited to dives though? Some users will feel that even with successful diving they don't quite feel like themselves. It seems as though there's some further self-evaluation they must meet in order to fully recover who they are...or were, as it may be.

Tick-tock, Retrospecters. Mind the time.

BONUS.
Ever since he moved in back in February, the lights have always been on in Zee's office and home at the top of the Towers. Office hours are whenever he feels like making them and he's usually reachable by phone, email, or app.

However, beginning on the 18th, messages to his inbox begin to go unanswered. Checking the inbox itself will reveal a change as well.

Delta#02018329 is no longer receiving messages.

On the 19th, the lights go off permanently. Beginning on the 20th, anyone who ventures to his office will find the building empty and locked, no sign of Zee at all. Reaching out to him receives a bounce-back error message.

Any previous correspondences with him will remain, though his name has been replaced with his Delta ID.

It's hard to say what's happened, but after some time, all users will finally receive a message from Delta#68422.

Stop him.

No other messages will be sent or received from this account.

Welcome to

recolle's August event, part 2!

As notated in the plotting post, the dreamdives are now live! Players are in charge of creating their own unique dive experiences for characters to explore and play through. These can be as harmless or as dangerous as you'd like. However, please be sure to let us know here if your character will be failing a dive and what memory/item they will be losing!

For Prompt II, characters IDs will be comprised of the following: The date your character first appeared on Retrospec (so in Zee's case, that was 02/01/18) and the last four digits of your character's IC inbox as found in the HTML (in Zee's case, 8329.) These IDs will be more relevant in September, but for ease of playing/making sure no one ICly overlaps please use these numbers!

Friendly reminder that if your character will be keeping their new AUs, please reply to this comment on the OOC plot post! As per Prompt IV, characters who are failing to recover their original AUs will begin to notice something is off and will not be able to accomplish what is needed to regain their original AUs. What this is is up to you!

As per the plotting post, threading out successful dream dives will earn you a free memory! Qualifying threads must be at least five comments from you and can be from you either hosting a dive or participating in one. Please note that failed dives will not be eligible for freebies.

Any questions you have regarding this event may be directed to the mod comment here. Be sure to review the mods' question thread on the plotting post for important information as well!

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... We're friends?

[He is relatively sure that's the right word to describe it. It was strange to him at first since Jirou was his only friend for the longest time, too.]

[The bear gives Kenta a scrutinizing look.]

Is that doubt I hear in your voice? Are you friends or not?

Well... it's more that I've never had that many friends myself. So I think that's what most people would call it. I just don't have much to compare with, that's all. I think that's what ha would call me, and I'm honored he would.

[Hopefully that's good enough, because Kenta can't see himself digging into his complicated relationship with feelings and people with a stuffed bear.

Also hopefully the next questions aren't as... difficult.]

[The bear continues to scrutinize Kenta, but he continues.]

If you are truly his friend... then, Derek's birthday is coming up in September, what will you get him?

Well, I haven't known him very long, so I don't know what he would like very well... so I was thinking of buying him drinks. Maybe another nice bottle since he liked the one we gave him when he moved.

[derek does appear to like his alcohol, and being around Kenta and some of his other Asian friends seems to have given hima taste of good sake, so... that should work?

Why is he feeling judged by a stuffed bear? This is not a comfortable feeling.]

[The bear listens and then nods in approval. Sake is a good answer.]

Acceptable answer. Now, last question. Will you promise to share what you are about to see with Derek when you wake up?

[The bear gives Kenta a very stern look.]

Can I ask you a question?

[Let's set aside that he is talking about this with a stuffed bear for a second.]

Is it really, really important that I tell him? If it is, I will. It's just... he probably won't be happy about any of it.

[The bear stares at Kenta, as if he couldn't believe Kenta was really daring to ask such a question.]

You are in Derek's sub conscience are you not? So wouldn't the bear talking to you in his sub conscience know what Derek would and would not like to know? Besides, you are not aware of what you might see if you agree to tell Derek. It might be a good thing you will see. So will you tell him or not?

.. Is that where I am?

[Sorry, but there wasn't exactly a sign.]

If you're sure, then yes, I'll tell him.

[The bear sighs. Where did you think you were Kenta?]

Your answer is acceptable.

[The bear suddenly lights up and a key, a very old looking key comes out of the bear. If Kenta takes it he will be pulled back to the room with two doors. Kenta now has the key to open the door he couldn't before.]

[Well then... There's not much else to do but to go and open the door, probably. Hopefully he has reached the end of that particular labyrinth.

He will go and unlock the door, and push it open.]

[When Kenta opens the door, he will see a small garden behind a two story English house. A young 3 year old child that looks a lot like a younger version of Derek runs around giggling being chased by his two parents, his birth parents.]

"Mummy is going to catch you Damien!"

[Little "Damien" giggles with glee. What is this? A different name?]

[The dad bends down and holds a very familiar bear, minus the Sherlock Holmes outfit out the the little boy.]

"Don't you want your bear Damien? Come get your bear!"

[The little boy runs over to his father and grabs the bear.]

His name is Derek!

Damien? That's... his real name?

[Is that what the bear wants him to tell Derek? And the bear's name is Derek?

... Maybe that was the only name he remembered back when he lost his parents and that was how he got the name.

He was a cute kid, though. Much cuter than Draco.]

[Eventually the memory will end and soon switch to a new memory. It's almost as if Kenta is watching a movie of young Derek (Damien's?) life.

It's evening and the dad comes home from work. He looks troubled. The wife notices and walks over to him. Young Damien is playing with his toys on the floor.]

"Lucas, is everything alright?"

[Lucas looks up.]

"Huh? Oh, yeah. Work is just... I guess the last accountant for the company did a shitty job and now I have to clean up his mess. The accounts are off."

[The wife hums in understanding.]

"Well, whatever it is, don't use that sort of language around Damien. He's three. He doesn't need to start having a potty mouth yet."

[Damien looks up from his toys and giggles.]

Potty mouth! Potty mouth!

[The wife sighs.]

"Look what you caused."

[Lucas just chuckles.]

[Time passes and and Kenta is pulled into another memory. Lucas is home again, late, and he looks on edge.]

"Adaline?"

[The wife, Adaline comes out of the kitchen, Damien is in his high chair playing with his food.]

"Lucas, is something wrong?"

[Lucas's forehead is furrowed.]

"Do you know how long that black car has been outside our house?"

[Adaline's face shows confusion.]

"Black car?"

[She walks over to a window and looks out.]

"I don't know... a while? Why?"

[Lucas's face is straight, jaw set tightly.]

"Never mind. It's probably just a neighbor's car..."

[The scene changes again Kenta is in Damien's bedroom. Damien is sitting up in his toddler bed listening to his parents talking. Lucas has clearly come home early from work.]

"ADALINE! ADALINE!"

[You can hear a faucet being turned off and movement from another room.]

"Lucas! Damien is sleeping! Why are you home? What about work?"

[Some sort of bag is dropped to the floor with a loud thunk.]

"We have to leave. My company, it's a front for the mafia."

"What?"

"Remember how about a year ago I thought the accounts were messed up? All that missing money was going to the mafia. My boss tried to brush me off, told me not to worry about it. I didn't listen. I thought I was doing the right thing. Last night... I felt that someone was following me and then that black car out front... I think I'm being targeted and so are you and Damien because I know what I know. We have to leave. Pack enough clothes for you and Damien for a week. We have to leave NOW!"

[The memory starts to speed up, as if someone has pushed the fast forward button on a VHS player. Kenta will be able to see Adaline and Lucas packing their bags, getting Damien changed, struggling with a grumpy Damien because he didn't want to leave all his toys, but he was only allowed to bring his bear. The go to the bank and take out quite a bit of cash.

Kenta will see them go to the airport and take plane from London to Berlin, Germany. They then took a train from Berlin to Paris, France, followed by a plane from Paris to Toronto, Ontario, Canada, hoping to throw off any attempt of someone following them. There are many tired tantrums from Damien the whole way.

Eventually, they are in a car driving into the United States. Damien is awake, holding his bear tightly. Kenta will be seated next to him as Damien's parents talk in hushed tones.]

[Kenta just... watches the whole thing unfold. It's almost like a movie.

Sometimes he wonders if his own family caused disasters like that for others too. If they made people fear for their lives and that of their families. If they killed them just for trying to get away. Probably, to be honest, even if he was kept away from that.

He's not sure if he can actually interact here, but he will still turn to the little boy.]

... Are you alright?

[Sadly for Kenta, the young boy can't hear Kenta, or see him. The hushed tones become more clear and Lucas sighs.]

"Fine, we'll go to your sister in DC. But first I want to stop off in the next city. I need to do something."

[They soon reach the city of Recolle and Lucas drives the car to a bank and parks the car. He grabs a floppy disk case filled with disk from his bag in the back seat. He reaches over and rubs Damien's head and gives him a forced smile.]

"Hey there buddy, how are you feeling. You keeping Derek safe and warm?"

[Damien looks at his dad.]

I'm hungry... so is Derek!

[Lucas's smile falters.]

"We'll eat dinner soon OK? Daddy just has to do something at the bank first."

[Lucas lean forward and gets out of the car. He goes into the bank and comes out about 40 minutes later. When he returns and looks back at Damian and motions to his bear.]

"Hey, can I see Derek for a moment? I got something for him."

[Damien hands his bear over to his dad and Lucas turns the bear over. He pulls out a key. He finds the hold in the back of the bear where it was originally stuffed, and shoves the key in, hiding it in the fluff of the bear. He then hands it back to his son.]

"There you go buddy. Derek is going to keep something safe for me."

[Adaline looks on with a worried look.]

[The scene moves forward and it is now dark and they are driving through the woods on the out skirst of Recolle. Kenta will still be in the car next to Damien. Damien is trying hard to stay awake but his eyes are bleary. From the rear view mirror it is easy to tell that Lucas is tiered and desperately needs sleep. Adaline is passed out in the seat next to him. Suddenly, Lucas's head falls forward and the car starts to veer into the other lane. There are lights ahead heading straight for them. Adaline suddenly wakes up and sees what is happening.]

"LUCAS! THE CAR!"

[Lucas jolts awake, but they are too late, a semi-truck hits them and their car is thrown to the side, and starts to flip. Damien screams in fright, holding tight to his bear. However, since he wasn't in a car seat, he slips out of the seat belt and though the window. He will and on asphalt and roll into the shoulder. His body facing the wreckage of his parents car. Kenta will be standing next to him, watching the rest of the scene. The car is upside down and Lucas and Adaline are trying to get out, but they are stuck.]

Mummy... daddy...

[This impact his body took is having a huge impact on is ability to stay awake. But just before he passes out, the car Lucas and Adaline were in burst into flames, trapping them inside. Damien start to cry, holding tight to his bear, but soon passes out from his injuries. The scene goes black and Kenta will be alone for a moment.

Then a white ball of light will appear in front of Kenta. In the ball of light he will be able to see scenes of all the memories he just witnessed.

Behind him he will hear sniffling. If he turns around, he will see an adult Derek. The Derek he knows that wears a dress shirt and tie to his job as a CSI, curled up in a ball.]

Edited 2018-09-29 17:58 (UTC)

[Kenta watches the whole thing almost dispassionately. It's a memory, there's nothing he can do to change it.

It doesn't make it any less horrible, and when he hears the crying, he does turn around and walks to this new image of Derek. And crouch near him and rub his shoulder gently.]

... I know it's easyfor me to say, but... you're going to be alright. You're going to be alright, Derek.

[Derek flinches under Kenta's touch. Don't worry Kenta, he doesn't mean it. The white ball of light that Kenta saw suddenly floats over to Derek and enters his head. The ring box Kenta had floats out of Kenta's pocket and while glowing, enters into Derek's back, just at the spot where Derek's heart would be located.

One the lights disappear, Derek ceases sniffling. He looks up at who has a hand on him. He gives Kenta a confused look.]

Kenta? What are you doing here? How did you get here?

I... wish I knew. I don't even know where 'here' is, to be honest. Or how to get out.

[Because there is a way out, right?]

I've been trying to get out for weeks! But there is something blocking me from leaving. It's almost as if some part of me... doesn't want me to come out... doesn't want to be me... I know that sounds weird but... I don't know how else to explain it. I think... I think I'm in my own mind... or in some kind of dream...

[Derek sits up fully and sighs.]

I don't know why I'm here...

Edited 2018-09-30 18:25 (UTC)

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