▶ 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

[fivestar]

A woman... [That is— incredibly difficult to imagine. (But he is biased, of course.) Someone like him, but definitely not... To imagine anyone else in his position was strange enough to begin with, but someone like that?] Huh. I see. I hope that I get to meet her someday.

[He's genuinely curious about what that would be like. (And, selfishly—he wondered what her rule was like. Had she been better at it than him? Although, if Gawain was a Servant...) But back to the matter at hand, Arthur still manages a smile, but it's clearly somewhat embarrassed now.]

But you should have said something sooner. I've surely made a fool of myself, and I'm sure I've made things awkward for you as well.

[He's not mad, of course, but he does feel guilty. Admittedly, he feels a little disappointed, too, that this is apparently not the Gawain he knows after all, but more than anything, he feels bad about how strange this must have been for him.]

[galatining]

[Gawain hoped the two of them might meet as well, if only because he thinks they would have much to talk about. Despite the obvious differences between them, the very fact that this Arthur never questioned that Gawain was his own meant that there was probably just as much that was the same.

He frowns though and then his expressions drops and becomes a bit shamefaced, because Gawain can now feel how ill done this was on his part, though he had hardly meant to deceive. But that doesn't change the result.]

I apologize. I hardly meant to cause you such embarrassment. It was not even close to my intention. [He frowns, unsure how to express what he's feeling.] I was merely unsure and wanted to take stock of the situation. But, still...

[He laughs a little then.]

You are still the King, even if you are not mine, and that counts for something with me. So I would make it up to you.

[fivestar]

[Arthur shakes his head.]

No, that's alright. You believed me. That's enough.

[It would've been entirely reasonable if he hadn't. The fact that they were Servants probably made it easier to tell that something was up, but he still didn't have to believe him. Arthur's grateful that he did.]

Besides, I doubt I'd leave a very good impression if I expected such things from someone else's men. Please don't trouble yourself.

[It was a strange situation, anyway, even for one as experienced in Servant-related matters as Gawain. That could only mean this kind of thing didn't happen often, so there was no way to know what the "ideal" way to handle this would be. Not only that, but Arthur had made many assumptions, too, so he could not say that Gawain was truly at fault.]

[galatining]

Well in truth, I have met... a few versions of the King I do know. So it isn't so strange. It's just after having learned she wasn't a man, I became used to not thinking of that as a possibility.

[Servants are strange things as is canon.]

It would hardly be any trouble. Besides, the fact that you thought I was your Gawain, means that he and I are similar. So-[And he laughed then]-we are kin in a sense, are we not?

[So if anything, this was a blessing.]

[fivestar]

[He laughs a little, too. Despite the initial awkwardness and the strangeness of their circumstances, he can barely remember the last time he felt such lightheartedness. It's so nostalgic.]

Well, when you put it like that, how can I say no?

[If Arthur had his way—if he'd known the reality of the situation before he'd approached—he probably would have kept his distance, suppressing his curiosity in order not to pry. But... Gawain is truly too good to him, accepting even if he has every right not to be. Even if Arthur tells himself that they aren't the same, it's hard not to be fond of this person. He, too, sees this as a blessing.]

Thank you, Sir Gawain. Your regard alone is enough to put me at ease.

[galatining]

[Really he is happy now that everything is out of the way. That Gawain has gained a kinsman is no small blessing. If only Gareth and Gaheris could be here!]

I am glad you think so, because we still have to find our way out of this situation, whatever it is.

[Despite the comfort and good feeling, it is time to get down to business and survive. Though with the two of them it should be easy.]

Though I will follow your lead for the moment, if you do not mind.

[fivestar]

It would be an honor for me. Though, know that I do not expect to be treated like your king.

[Maybe that sort of thing is obvious, but he doesn't want him to feel obligated to act a particular way or anything just because of who he technically is.

Hmm... On that note, his expression turns somewhat thoughtful.]

Actually, because I'm still participating in a Grail War, I suppose you should call me Saber. But admittedly, that would feel a little strange coming from you. So, between the two of us, it would be alright if you called me Arthur.

[galatining]

[Not treating this man as a king might be easier said than done. Sure, for Gawain, the hiearchy is His Master and then the King he knew in life. But on some subconscious level, he's already finding a place to rank this man.

But he nods in the affirmative.]

Very well. And I suppose it would help if I avoid being overly deferential towards you. Otherwise, they would guess who you are if they realized there was a connection between the two of us.

[Despite what people think, Gawain isn't a perpetual airhead. He knows when to be discreet. And it's nice to have what might be a secret between them.]

[fivestar]

Yes, that would probably be for the best. I'll trust your judgement. [He nods. He doesn't doubt that Gawain will handle it with care, knowing when to be familiar with him and when not to be. He's not too worried about it.] If I'm being honest, though, I wouldn't dislike it if you thought of me as more of an equal.

[Between the fall of their homeland and being summoned as a Servant, Arthur didn't think himself much of a king at the moment, anyway. But he probably won't be too hard on Gawain regardless of how he chooses to address him, especially in private.]

As for the current situation... I wonder. We're probably in for a long day tomorrow.