▶ TDM OVERFLOW .001

[prismods]

Cybernetic dream, something like you've never seen

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▶ Lisa Frank's LSD Fun House
anytime, anywhere on the moon Iris | top

Everything is darkness except for dim lights sparkling in the distance, a faint gleam that greets you as you start to unfurl from your dormant state. Your body is hemmed in by shards of crystals, gently sparkling and possibly pricking your skin. The surrounding landscape is dyed in the pinks and purples of the dusk filled with crystals protruding from the ground, some as large as a skyscraper. Throat parched and skin dry and aching, you grope your body in alarm to make sure your possessions are still in place. This is far from home— perhaps a dream? You pinch your skin and slap your cheeks, yet nothing seems to do the trick. Searching for answers only rewards you with an endless expanse of purple dust as far as the eye can see. You have four options: one, panic; two, soil yourself; three, admire it all then soil yourself; or four, go into survival mode. Eventually, you’ll realize that you’re not alone.

A ⬤ As you traverse the near-barren landscape, you feel something sting your skin. It's small and subtle at first, then you finally catch sight of it: an elegant, crystalline mosquito buzzing around from the corner of your eye. However, a pest is still a pest. After a while, marks near your welts begin to form strange patterns on your skin, mimicking ancient runes. Each rune has with it a particular side-effect that may hinder you on your journey:

✾ The Mark of the Enchanter: Hallucinations, hallucinations galore. Your character will see everything and anything their imagination can conjure and will have difficulty separating reality from fiction.
₪ The Mark of the Destroyer: Limbs start to cease their function, causing you to stumble or try and get around one-handed. Other certain body parts may be affected as well. Look at the bright side: you can stop worrying about jiggle physics and hiding your fear boner.
⍢ The Mark of the Sinner: Your hunger, your thirst, your fatigue and your desire are at an all-time high. Your impulses are rabid and uncontrollable. Maybe you experience only one of those symptoms. Maybe you experience them all. All you know is that you want relief now.

These effects will eventually clear up with a bit of accidental or purposeful physical contact with another person, making you wonder if there was anything wrong with you at all.

B ⬤ Hunger starts to gnaw at you vigorously. Perhaps you consider hunting the moon's creatures to sate your hunger. That's when you see it: a thick, meaty, juicy meal on legs. No, we're not talking about Alex Louis Armstrong. A wild silver-white pegasus runs across the purple landscape, its hair billowing in the wind as its hooves smack loudly against the ground. Try and shoot it, and you may find your efforts curtailed by its legendary rage. Eyes aglow and wings beating up a storm, this pegasus is no dainty horse. Two thousand pounds of pure muscle swoop down and charge at you, all blades and ammunition deflecting off its impenetrable skin. Taming appears impossible; it will buck anyone away and leave a sizable horn- or hoof-shaped hole in them for their efforts. Hunting it, however, should be easier. Relatively.

C ⬤ Or you may decide that you'd like to take a drink in the prismatic waters. A small pond can be found just a few miles away from where you first awoke, but gazing into it reflects what appears to be a window into your own world. You see the faces of loved ones or at least someone very close and familiar to you gathered around your prone body, shaking it frantically as though to try and rouse you, yet your image lies frozen and unresponsive, not even a whisper of life running through you. Did you die in your world? Is this your afterlife? The questions start to pile up along with the gnawing dread that you may never return home again.

▶ Camp Nowhere
anytime, anywhere on the moon iris | top

Time moves strangely when you're trapped on a moon with no sun to guide you. Hours feel like days, and days feel like weeks. Travelling has rendered you weak and tired. Luckily, a few crystal formations in the shape of a cavern may offer you a small place refuge as you decide to nap. You notice a few artifacts left over from previous explorers.

D ⬤ A comm unit abandoned within the cavern will display the former owner's idol obsession. As you tap the buttons indiscriminately, a holographic screen will appear, and you will see a fabulous recorded concert featuring three bubbly young ladies in animal print, singing to you about something called Cordis, a cat, and a bag of gems. Does this make any sense to you? Probably not, but the beat is catchy. You may even find yourself tapping a foot along to it. Don’t worry. We know it’s plastic love.

E ⬤ There's a small cooler-like container of preserved powdered food bags labeled with only the word “Edible” that can be safely consumed. Although the powder tastes as bland as you’d expect, it’s oddly filling, sating either hunger or thirst. But who will be the first — and the bravest — to try eating them?

F ⬤ A strange, pointed instrument is among the effects found in the cavern. It's silver, long, and thin with a curved end and a light. When you grip it with warm hands, it seems to vibrate enthusiastically and comes in three settings indicated by a frowny face, a neutral face, and a happy face. What could it mean exactly? No one knows, but you can fiddle with it to your heart's desire. Just don't ask yourself where it's been before. You don't want to know.

▶ Interstellar Action Force Assemble
prisma, iris | top

Over a day has passed when a group of people find you worse for wear. Some are full of uncertainty and fear while some are full of curiosity and excitement. They claim that they are scientists from the planet Prismatica here to investigate the sudden appearances of rainbow crystals in the skies. That means you and the others they’ve located within the area. You are all a surprising find to them, and they are quick to load everyone in their transport vehicles for examination and questioning.

You all may have your usual inquiries — Where are we? Who are you? What's going on? Why are the pegasi so ill-tempered? — and the Prismals are almost too eager to answer. They do have questions on their own, so it’s only fair to trade. They tell you about their world as they poke and prod you, trying to understand what you are and how you came into their land. If they’re not trembling in fear, some of them may ask you odd and invasive questions in return, such as what the rate at which your body achieves thermoregulation is, how long your refractory period is, and if you would be willing to submit various kinds of body fluids to them. It's up to whether you wish to comply or protest.

G ⬤ If you react violently, you will be restrained and nerfed with a specialized neurotransmitting gun that releases a numbing agent through the top of your spine. They came prepared, so have fun with that! In any case, conscious or not, you’ll be brought into one of the transport vehicles. If you choose to peacefully cooperate, you’ll be provided any necessary first aid and a refreshing drink to help you recuperate after the rough time you had for the past few days. Each transport vehicle has a few small rooms to rest in, but due to the limited space, you’ll have to snuggle up with someone else on that bunk bed. Unfortunately, the moonshine fruit the ship is also carrying in its cargo has an extremely sweet smell that’s been permeating through certain areas of the ventilation system… Taking a whiff of it may inebriate you for the rest of the trip.

H ⬤ It’s a bumpy ride as terrain vehicles draw over various crystal formations until you see a large dome-like structure up ahead. Within its confines lies the seat of the Prismatica's government, Prisma. It’s a bureaucratic wet dream: skyscrapers practically touch the upper surface of the dome, windows glimmer with a prismatic sheen as daylight hits them, and small ships can be seen flying to and from its spaceport. The scientists, members of the Lunar Scientia, usher you into their facilities for tests. Arrivals are likely to twitch, tremble, and panic as Lunar Scientia fellows take and broadcast every embarrassing, unfiltered detail about you — height, weight, age, strange odors, estimated frequency of sexual activity —- to one another. These scientists will ask you politely to undress, too, but understand if you don't want to. They're especially fascinated by the readings of pure Chroma inside you, whispering among one another excitedly about the possibility of the new arrivals being a new moon species. What should they call them? Moonborne? Moonblessed?

I ⬤ At long last, the questions and physical examinations are done. They’ve decided to call the arrivals as the Moonblessed. They’ll take you under their care until they understand more about you. You're allowed a very refreshing hot shower and a warm meal for your efforts. Don’t worry, the meal was imported from their planet. “Planet?” you might ask, but you won’t need to wonder for too long. The ships are preparing for their next destination: the nearby planet Prismatica, where you will be dwelling for the time being. You're free to explore the government center until then.

▶ Wildcard
Lunatia, Prismatica | top

It only takes a couple hours for the ships to reach their home planet. The ships drop the characters off at the city of Lunatia, where they will be given their communication devices and a plastic card they can present to certain landlords at any residential district for their subsidized (read: absolutely free) lodging. Officials at Prisma instructed the newcomers to await further instructions from the government, but you have a lot of time to kill before then. Why not explore in the meantime? Learn the ins and outs of the world, get a job, transform under the full moon, and explore the many mysteries of planet Prismatica!

This is this TDM's overflow. Feel free to move your threads from there and continue tagging!

Comments

[princessascended]

I really didn't understand that part myself. Something about trying to balance darkness and light? But I don't think they were doing a particularly good job of that.

[ninjabanish]

[She rolls her eyes a bit...]

Ah. That type. Those who would in the name of 'balance' justify anything they do, no matter how reprehensible... A type I am not unfamiliar with.

[princessascended]

Oh thank the Light, I'm so glad I don't have to explain that part.

[Because seriously, it was complete nonsense.]

[ninjabanish]

[She nods, looking exasperated.]

Of my enemies, most were merely ignorant, if not incompetent. But there were those who knew the truth of what they were doing, and that was often their belief.

[princessascended]

Oh my goodness yes. And they're always so arrogant and self-righteous, as if they're the smartest people in the world and the rest of us just can't see it... it's so obnoxious!

[ninjabanish]

And they use their positions to claim righteousness, as if their status means aught. As if their places were earned, rather than leeched from the blood and sweat of others.

[princessascended]

And they dismiss the pain and suffering they cause as somehow "necessary", and act as if they're the ones making some great sacrifices!

[ninjabanish]

Not that any of them were ever the ones hurt by their own actions. 'T'is much easier to sacrifice others, after all.

[princessascended]

In fact, they tend to live a long time past when they should have been gone! How convenient for them.

[ninjabanish]

'T'is our place to remedy that, then.

[Her voice is deadly serious.]

[princessascended]

Someone has to.

[Yep, they're in total agreement about this.]

[ninjabanish]

... Indeed. And, though it seems none of my enemies have arrived here, as far as I have seen... If you need help with your own, then my blade is yours.

[on one hand: this feels a little fast to get to 'i'll help you murder'.

on the other hand, Kairi's enemies seem to resemble her own. If there is any similarity between Kairi's enemies and her own, if they are anything like Caleigh's worshipers, then they must be destroyed.]

[princessascended]

I appreciate that. And if I need your help... I promise I'll come to you right away. Hopefully it won't come to that, since they can't carry out their old plans here. But just in case.

[She appreciates having backup... though she wonders if normal knives and stuff like that would even hurt the members of the Organization.]

[ninjabanish]

You've my gratitude. Though I pray it will not come to that... If it does, you need but have faith. I have defeated many things scarier than mere men.

[let's just quietly not bring up her body count though]

[princessascended]

There's nothing mere about these men. Each of them probably counts as a threat to a whole world on their own. So just... keep that in mind.

[That just means she leveled up a lot!]

[ninjabanish]

I've met many with powers far greater than my own, it's true. But I have never met any who cannot be stopped with proper use of a blade.

[princessascended]

Just don't bother aiming for the heart. It won't do any good.

[ninjabanish]

... How so? Armor?

[princessascended]

No. They just don't need it.

[ninjabanish]

...

As a doctor, I find that incredibly concerning.

[princessascended]

It's... a long, very confusing story.

[ninjabanish]

[did you turn into a robot for a minute]

No, but... Their heart?

[princessascended]

They removed them. And replaced them. With copies of the same heart. Belonging to one specific old man.

[ninjabanish]

[Opens mouth. Closes mouth. Opens mouth. Closes mouth.]

Why?! What possible purpose could that serve- Not to mention the risks of rejection, and- Copies of a single man's heart?! Would their own hearts not be healthier?! What would drive them to undertake such a transplant?!

[princessascended]

It was part of fulfilling that prophecy I was telling you about. Thirteen seekers of darkness.