dualisooc | TDM 002. WELCOME TO THE JUNGLE.

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TDM 002. WELCOME TO THE JUNGLE.

» 01. I LIKE TO PARTY AND BY PARTY I MEAN NAPS.

Look at all of these bright, shining new faces! There’s even a few less bright, less shining faces, but hey, this city welcomes all types. Chances are, if you’ve just arrived, you're seeing some pretty crazy things, unless you're used to an eye-blinding amount of neon, robots, weird-ass technology, magic, and an omnipresent police force...and hey, if you are, congrats, you're gonna settle in juuuuust fine. But for the rest of you, the Head knows this has gotta be pretty overwhelming, right?

Well, since your quaint individual processing units are probably having a hard time, why not link up with another one? By which the Head means...

Hello, new citizens of Dualis,
and welcome to your monthly Network Adjacency Protocol~!

NAPs are a monthly community networking event similar to the Earth concept of speed dating! Two citizens (new arrivals and old hands alike) are placed at a table together with a handy cue card of queries to help break the proverbial ice. Ask queries and receive results, or ignore the card and yeet yourself straight into a brand new friendship! But don't be too shy, you've only got ten minutes together, and if you just sit in silence for the whole ten, the Network Admins are likely to come supervise and try to repair the uplink through a mild shock to the ol' central nervous system. You might find yourself saying all sorts of unintended facts about yourself if that happens...probably better to just make friends, right? Who doesn’t like friends?!

This month’s event is held at the brand new RoCocoa Cat Cafe, a sparkly new establishment that caters to children and the young at heart with iced and hot cocoa drinks of all kinds, delicious pastries, age-appropriate live music, and of course many friendly kitties who love to lounge in laps. The cats are of all shapes, sizes, and colors, including some who may look a little different from what you expect, or may look like an ordinary cat but are actually anything but ordinary underneath that adorable fur coat. All cats in the cafe are adoptable, of course, for those who meet a new furry friend and just can’t bear to go home without them!

So pull up a chair, get to know your new neighbors, and enjoy a sugary treat or two with the resident furbabies. You might just meet your new two- or four-legged best friend!

» 02. TO TAG OR NOT TO TAG, THAT IS THE QUESTION.

Welcome, one and all, to a long-running time-honored Dualis tradition: the annual city-wide Dualis Marker Tag Competition! For this entire month, all participants who accept the challenge will be given a marker and set free to tag any other participant in the city by making a mark on their skin, while attempting to avoid being tagged themselves. Careful, though - the ink marks last a very long time, so you’ll have to wait until the competition concludes to wash everything off.

Markers come in all colors, even fluorescent, glitter, and glow-in-the-dark, and you can use however many markers your inner child’s heart desires. These markers will leave marks even on people who have chosen not to play, but you can easily purchase an armband, headband, or similar accessory that says NONPARTICIPANT if you so desire. Marking nonparticipants is considered extremely bad form and wins you no prizes, but "misfires" do still happen sometimes. It’s usually considered polite to offer a mistaken nonparticipant that you’ve marked a small reparation, like coffee or a more adult beverage.

Safe zones do exist! Any establishment can put out a sign that marks it as such - signs in shop windows, chalkboards outside bars, and the like; many do this, just to keep the general chaos and injury/property damage liability down. Tenants of private residences typically agree that their spaces are also safe zones, but that's up to y’all to hash out.

Have fun! And maybe try not to put anyone’s eye out, yeah?

» 03. TRICK OR TREAT, TRICK OR TREAT, THE BITTER AND THE SWEET ...

Looks like the Head’s been clued in to the quaint alien custom known as trick-or-treating. Is today Halloween? Who cares! You get free candy! Free candy for you, free candy for you, everybody gets free candy!

And rather than make citizens work for that free candy by traipsing around in costumes, the Head’s decided to cut everyone a little break and just have bowls of wrapped sugary delights placed strategically throughout the city. You never know where you’ll find them, or what types of candies the bowls will contain - chocolates, of course, and jellybeans and hard candies of every flavor you can think of, and treats you’ve probably never seen before now. Ooh, is that a snoobloo-flavored truffle? Only one way to find out! Eat it.

The treats are not poisoned or otherwise dangerous, but some do have a trick up their wrappers. Candies may cause temporary side effects: minor appearance changes, enhancing or reducing senses, sudden mild development of extranormal abilities, or loss of control over abilities you already possess. Some sweets are just regular treats and produce no effect except maybe cavities, if you don’t brush your teeth. Effects will remain until another candy is consumed that either induces a different effect or nulls the current effect and simply tastes nice. Enjoy!

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[Harry keeps his hand outstretched for another beat or two, before withdrawing it — just a trace of disappointment etched on his face. He takes the opportunity to find his pen instead, then pauses to give Thane his best, winning smile.]

Just peachy. [Said like a man who knows he looks like he got in a fight with a dumpster and lost.] I got shot a couple of days ago. Recovery is a bitch, but the world keeps on spinning, right, pal?

[There: a half-truth. He's got stitches and everything. The ethanol stink is still stuck to him like a second skin, sure, but between the blood and the left-over Phasmid pheromone, it's a lot less noticeable than it once was.

The pen nib strikes the page in front of him in a quick, slashing motion — a tally mark in a column where the only legible word is "shake". Somewhere below he quickly scrawls down some peaks and valleys that could very well be the name "Tannor Nuara".]

So. Tannor. [He looks up again, setting the pen back down with a soft click.] You, uh... [There absolutely isn't a diplomatic way of asking this, he's sure. Or if there is, he can't fucking think of it. He just has to say something before he starts gesturing to his face like an idiot.] You don't exactly look Revacholian. Where'd you come from? You a local, or...?

[ Movement off to her side catches her attention in time for Harriet to watch him sign. It's clear enough that she understands him, despite the differences she notices immediately. His fingers — it's a testament to his signing that the webbing doesn't get in his way much. ]

It does have a lot in common with the city. [ Sometimes that makes her miss the Library, of all places. That's when you know things are fucked up. ] I don't know, I guess I just don't feel like gorging on candy. It never appealed to me much. I miss street food.

[ Give her all those glorious options, please. ]

What world are you from?

[ It's probable the Library has books on it, even if Harriet herself never came across them. ]

"Sounds dangerous though I'm used to dangerous things and I wouldn't rate that very high." Wanda was used to world ending events. It was one of the few things that her and Sam had in common.

Oh honey. You have no idea.

Eh. Past me did a lotta damn fool things, too. And many of my acquaintances would be lyin' if they said they didn't share that same shame.

[Drifter used to be a bartender. He's heard and seen all sorts of those kinds of mistakes.]

Supernatural, huh? [Drifter has his own brand of supernatural, but he's only recently gotten in the habit of discussing it. And then? Barely even that.] Well, tell me about it. We got a good ten minutes and then some- same ol', same ol'.

[He cracks his knuckles as he watches Harry then, waiting for a tale.]

"Nonsense, if there's going to be damage it's far better that it's only to me and no one else." There was a time when she wouldn't have cared, but Roland and Lilith had been persuasive. And she definitely wouldn't want to draw attention to herself and her experiments.

How very impressive, she'd opened the door on her own! And that isn't even a sarcastic, thought, she is thoroughly impressed. And maybe a little excited, which is a huge shock to her. She's never excited for anything that isn't ancient technology and alien races. Odd.

Fuck yeah. [He takes a long drag from his cigarette, masking what appears to be a very intentional dramatic pause.] Harrier Du Bois: Super-cop. The RCM's secret weapon.

[It's hard to tell if he's serious or not. There's a built-in wryness to his expression, but he sounds completely earnest.]

But c'mon! Here you are, asking to delve behind the curtain, all the while the clock's ticking and I'm still stuck waiting on a name.

A lotta folks been waitin' a long time on gettin' my name. I usually go by Drifter.

[He's honest to god refused having a name, but had dozens of them. Just something for people to call him to get his attention and separate him from others in a room. Nothing that defines him. Nothing that should create bonds.]

I can already predict the line of thought you're probably thinkin'. One of those people. Well, sir, I will be happy to oblige you and say, yes, I do absolutely talk about myself in the third person when I take a notion.

[He manages the first dry note of a laugh before it gets lost in a brief, stinging coughing fit. It doesn't matter — he can already picture it, even as he ducks his head into the crook of his elbow:

Drifter, meet Cuno. "Cuno doesn't give a fuck."

...God, he even misses Cuno.]

I like it. [He sniffs and gestures loosely in front of him.] Mysterious. Short, too. People tend to prefer it when you keep 'em short.

[He leans back, then. Takes a slow breath like he's considering asking something a little personal.]

Hey, uh... honest opinion? Which name d'you reckon suits — [A quick jerk back of his thumb] — all of this more: Harrier Du Bois or... Raphaël Ambrosius Costeau?

“I’m not saying to be careless and risk hurting other people, just remember you’re people, too.” South insists in a rarely used soft tone, cracking another grin as she lightly knocks the door shut with one foot.

The room is about as much the same as any of them, some of her stuff is a little cluttered on her side. At least it’s not trash or old food or anything gross, just some clothes she hasn’t got around to putting away yet. And hey! Her bed is made! Mostly. It’s not perfectly flat or anything, but the pillows in the proper place and the blankets are draped neatly enough. If she knew she’d be having company, maybe she would’ve gone full out boot camp level of bed making. But oh well, she’s just glad she didn’t leave the pillow hanging half off the side and the blankets balled up in the floor...

As general as ever, like she might break the woman if she’s not careful, she finally lets her down, placing her butt first on the blankets. She straitens back up, hands in her hips as she looks down with any smile pulling at one side of her lips.

“Now this is a great sight to see.” A pretty lady in her bed? Oh fuck yes, it’s about goddamn time-! “Still good for this?” She can’t help checking in again, she just wants to give a chance to bail just to be safe.

Well then, go ahead, magic you some luck right here right now

[thats how things work, right..?]

The as in "The Iron Bull can do the job". [He accentuates the comment with air quotes..] Like a weapon. Really gets the message across to potential employers.

Seriously? "Magic you some luck?" [Like her markerless body isn't enough]

Fine. [She pulls the earring that had saved her from the last tag out of her pocket and tosses it into the air without looking, then holds up a finger to stave off impatience. After a few seconds a voice calls out "I found my earring!" and Domino just grins.]

Is that good enough?

"Ridiculous, most safety protocols interfere with the advancement of scientific progress." Too many rules to follow that impeded experimentation. Ethics are so very inconvenient. But at least for the moment she'd halted any particularly dangerous experiments. At least, dangerous to others. She could make her own damn decisions about her own damn self.

At last, a bed. And yet another question that Tannis resists rolling her eyes at. Really, she'd already said yes and now here they are, deciding again. Be polite, Patricia. Like, you know, normal human beings.

"Yes, yes, I haven't changed my mind." She's still a little bit shy about removing her jacket, though, uncertain what the reaction to her tattoos will be. "Believe me, you couldn't catch me if I didn't want to be here."

[ Okay, that's it, she likes him. ]

I believe it. I'd hire you myself. [ Harriet you don't even know what he does for a living. ] You may ask, what does a clickbait news site owner need help with? Well, I'm not very strong, and I'm too short to reach the top shelf.

[ Harriet why are you like this. ]

"Really? Are all big cities like that?" Yuna traveled a lot but she still didn't have the bases of comparison that South had. She hoped that maybe one day Spira would have a city like this.

She glanced up at the tops of the tall buildings and then quickly looked away. Yuna had the tendency to get dizzy if she wasn't careful.

"What shops do you like? If you need something we should start there."

Hope that doesn't catch up with you brother. Luckily this is a place where you can pick up a set of new lungs if you take the notion.

[Which is bizarrely true, and Drifter sees no problem with someone taking the weight off themselves.]

Alright, you got me. You look like a Harry. Got a mountain range of a name to climb over in that second one. Tell me which do I seem like to you? A Wu Ming? Or an Eli?

[Because he's pretty successfully gone by both. Appearance carried one. Voice carried the other.]

Edited 2019-11-18 10:36 (UTC)

[Fuck. FUCK! Why did he bring up Raphaël Ambrosius Costeau again? Nobody thinks he can pull it off. It's like he's a glutton for punishment or something. Of course he looks like a fucking Harry. Harry's a gym teacher name.

SUGGESTION [Challenging: Failure] — You should say "cool" so he knows you're not obsessing over this.]

Cool. [A beat.] Cool, cool, cool.

[Ignoring the heat that's climbing up his neck, into his ears, he takes another quick drag of his cigarette.]

Eli's better. [He's not sure it is, but it has that three letter snap that Kim does, so maybe?] You want me going with that, or are we sticking with Drifter?

[Harry's also the name for a guy with an impressive mustache. Costeau is the name for a guy with a monocle. He should revel in the name Harry.]

Drifter. Eli's not my name, nor is Wu Ming or Germaine. But they worked when I needed somethin' for somebody to call me.

[Drifter never picked a name for himself. If anything, Drifter's one of the more natural names he has, a true identifier, because he didn't fashion the thing himself. It's a name that came from wandering, when people would remember seeing him every ten or twenty years, wandering through with wares or looking for mediocre work; unheard of among his kind.]

[Risen aspired to bigger things, right? Honestly Drifter was no different. He just didn't show it to just anyone.]

[That was a lot of 'cool's though. How the hell do you even read that? Ah, well.]

So, another one o' them theoretical questions. You got a devil you can make a deal with. You'll never feel a day of pain again, but he gets to take your voice. Not your soul? Just your words. You'll never speak to another person, nobody'll understand your writin'. But you wouldn't starve, you'd always be clean, you'd never be wantin' for comfort outside of the need for conversation.

[Harry dips his head, acquiescing, maybe. If Klassje taught him anything, it's that if someone really doesn't want you knowing their name, you're usually better not hammering them for it. Not unless you absolutely have to, anyway.

Besides, he wasn't buttering this guy up: Drifter is a badass name for a cat with badass scars on their face.

He's in the process of putting out his cigarette — a quick lick of thumb and forefinger tapped against the end, like he's saving the rest for later — when Drifter opens with the next question.

Congrats, pal. You've defeated "the Expression". Harry's frowning.]

Why? D'you know a guy?

[A quick wave of the hand as if to say, "that's a joke, please don't reply to that." The hand stays up. He's pointedly not looking at Drifter.]

...Hooo.

[Drifter can't know he's tried for the low budget version of that already, can he? Surely it's not that obvious. He feels absolutely exposed. And worse, Harry can picture it, too. The void, but warmer. No sad songs in there, baby. No—

Yeah, he's just gonna barrel forward and straight up fucking lie. The pain bubbling up in his chest all the sudden needs slapping down again.]

I'd say thanks, but no thanks. The ol' conversational skills are pretty much the only reason I solved any cases up until now. [Sniff.] Sometimes you gotta talk folks down, too.

Besides, not to out myself as a karaoke god, but — [He winks, tapping his adam's apple] — I don't wanna deny people this.

Hoo boy. That’s one hell of a bad trip, being put through a simulation and not knowing if you ever came out. Sam wouldn’t say she knows what it’s like, but she can imagine - and what she imagines is pretty awful.

“I’m so sorry you went through that,” she says, voice hushed and expression softly concerned. “What was the simulation about? Maybe I can help.”

Hey, now. The Chargers come for top coin. [He grins, though, because he likes her spirit.] I don't know what a news site is, but what's a shelf or two between friends, right?

Nah, don't know no guys unfortunately. [He knew something else that very much wasn't a person, though. Something that, somehow, could still reach him. He'd have liked to make it a further reach than he is, but at least his poor head's a might quieter than it was. A whole Nine less of that chattering.]

[That's a whole other can of beans.]

So you're the type of investigator that talks his way into details, huh? Alright, alright. Then who's your favorite type of informative company?

[He spares the man's dignity, won't bring up he can recognize old wounds in Harry's expression as bold as the scars that line Drifter's cheeks. Seems inappropriate to drag the guy out like that.]

Me? When I was behind a bar, it was always the best place to see someone come in and show their true selves. Bar's the place where people wanna let go and just be them.

[Oh, okay, so now they're moving into the much safer conversational territory of drunks, huh? If he didn't know any better, he'd think Drifter had been handed a list entitled "subjects that make Harry's heart do that worrying clench thing it does sometimes". He'd take another emergency drag on that cigarette of his if only he hadn't just put it out.

He's just going to... tuck that bad-boy behind his ear for now.]

Ex-bartender, huh? [A beat.] Makes sense.

[There's no insult there, just... a slightly resigned familiarity. Barmen all over Revachol have been stuck as Harry's unwitting confessors for decades now. It figures the first guy he's actually warming to here would be one, too.]

Outside of a bar, drunks can be pretty hit or miss. No "advanced interrogation" techniques necessary, sure, but everything they say's gotta come with multiple grains of salt.

[A small, sly smile.]

You know who's super underrated? [He spreads both hands in front of himself, wiggling the fingers.] Cryptozoologists.

It is entirely not her fault, alright, she just picked up some pretty chick in a cafe with minimal to no effort. While she'd insist she's not surprised with her pick-up skills, she mildly is in this case and just wants them both on the same page and such. Definitely a nice thing, not a pain in the ass thing, probably.

As far as tattoos go though, South is obviously very much a fan given how much of her skin is covered in ink. Her own jacket is off and tossed to a corner without a single thought, giving peek to said tattoos and various scars already visible even with her tank top still on.

"Well, I'm pretty sure I could still catch you if I tried- but hey, just say so if you do change your mind." She's at least pretty well done double checking after saying that, though. She's gotten consent and will listen for any change of mind, it's on the other woman now.

South doesn't wait too much after that, tempted to just hop in the bed and start pawing at her- but she resists a bit, leaning enough to press her knees against the bed, getting just close enough to reach her hand up in an attempt to curl fingers against her chin.

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TDM 002. WELCOME TO THE JUNGLE.

OH HEY! :D

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♥

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TRICK & TREAT

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