Intro Log || The Deep Breath Before The Plunge

[melodiesmods]

Characters: All the "Heroes of Light" (only new characters can start threads).
Where: Aqures Ixen.
When: The 5th of July. The new Heroes of Light will awaken early in the morning.
Summary: The new Heroes of Light awaken in Aqures Ixen and are informed by their assigned Moogles of what the situation and what their destinies are. This a log for them to react to the situation, meet each other and be welcomed by the former batches of Heroes of Light.
Warning: N/A.

Where you were or what you were doing— It does not really matter. Not any more. Within an instant, the world around you collapses. Reality twists and shatters... Or maybe you are the one who is collapsing and shattering away from reality as you knew it. No matter what the answer is, it will only take a few seconds for you to find yourself sinking into a void, your world vanishing into the distance. There is nothing but darkness as far as the eye can see. Even you feel different: all the powers you might once have had, are now gone. It is silent, cold and it feels as though life itself is slipping out of you.

At this moment, when it looks as though nothing but a never-ending void awaits you, a red Crystal forms before you. In this void, its warmth compels you to grab it. Upon doing so, you can hear a soft, soothing voice speaking:


"Wake up."

Soon, the void itself vanishes and is replaced by distant noises of engines. Had it all been nothing more than a dream? The soothing voice repeats its call one more time, but is soon replaced with a much less graceful "Wake up Kupo." Hand clutched on your Crystal, the call of the Moogle may finally wake you up. But you are no longer in your world, nor in the void. You are before the Crystal of Fire, in the third district of a city called Aqures Ixen. At this point, you may realize the engine noise actually originates from an Airship flying low over the city and headed to dock beneath the castle. As if it wasn't strange enough, your clothes have changed as well. They are now a reflection of the Jobs you are wielding. Last but not least, you are surrounded by Moogles, small and fluffy creatures who are more than happy to tell you about everything you want to know, about your 'destiny' as a Hero of Light, about what awaits you.

Or at least, they will tell you everything they do know, which isn't much in the end.

The only people around you are like you-- There are quite a few of them, all clothed in their Job garbs and most likely wondering what is happening. If somehow you do not realize it, the Moogle who woke you up will be more than happy to inform you there are others like you around. In fact, there are other Heroes who have arrived in the course of the past year and they will come soon! Like you, they have Jobs and a Crystal.

If asked, the Moogles will mention that the Heroes of Light - that is to say you - are fighting against time to save Crystallis from the Calamity that is about to awaken to devour the entire world. Well, that is if you don't die or crystallize first.


The Other Heroes
— Shortly Thereafter —
Thanks to the efficiency of Mognet, it does not take long for the other Heroes to come around: those who arrived in this world within the past year. You may have imagined heroic and charismatic figures when your Moogle told you that there were other Heroes of Light in this city. You may have imagined persons with fearsome powers when they told you about how they managed to push back the Empire and defeat gigantic beasts in the past. And more importantly, you may have imagined them as people who would have all the answers to your, doubtlessly, numerous questions.

If so, you may be up for a tragic disappointment. Still, for the most part they know more than you on the situation and may be more than happy to fill you in, especially if your Moogle didn't tell you much.


The City of Aqures Ixen
— Anytime —
With the Festival of Light nearing, there are a lot of folks working hard to set up the upcoming event! And besides this, there are a lot of things to do in the city for newcomers. Moogles are working hard in Mognet Office of the ninth district! Characters are also free to visit the city-- They can visit Airship Port in the twelfth district from where characters can board for free Airships from Shoopuf Airline. There is however the impression that everyone is on edge, and a lot more officers from the law enforcement in the streets. Why could it be...?

Or maybe you could visit your new house in the 11th District, and get to know your new neighbors and housemate. Hopefully your neighbors are people you will get along with.


The Laboratory
— Anytime —
A location where a lot of Heroes of Light seem to be gathering is Palitutu's Laboratory. It is a place where employed characters can research into various topics. It seems all the computer shut down recently, but the people working in the lab are restarting everything. The screens seem to indicate the "summoning process" is over and that the Crystal of Fire's energy level are dangerously. However, most importantly, characters can see a file with their name...

Should your character decide to go there and peek at their file, there are two possibilities. Either the file is corrupted and they cannot access it: too bad for them, but at least their life will remain a mystery. Or should you decide the file isn't corrupted, they will find a summary of their lives up to their canon point, as if written by a third-person omniscient narrator. On the column left to the text, to the top there is a portrait of them, and beneath it there is a 3D model of them. Said portrait and model can be switched to any year of their life. At the bottom there is a percentage, indicating 0%. On the right column, there are various links, most of which are grayed out. The clickable links lead to their Homeworld History and their future post-canon point history (corrupted file for unfinished canons).

At least, they can lock this file away if they don't want anyone to see it.

The Hospital
— Anytime —
Characters who have already been in Crystallis before do not wake up by the Crystal of Fire like everyone else. Instead, they will wake up in the Hospital of Aqures Ixen, in a room where there are over a hundred of other Heroes of Light like them-- Maybe even some familiar faces... Except they're all in Crystal Stasis.

A couple Moogles and a few nurses will be waiting by the room, and they will welcome all characters waking up. Upon exiting the room, they will also meet a lot of guards, and they all have for order to shoot anyone that comes out of this room without a Moogle. Hopefully you won't try running out without waiting for your Moogle. As for why the guards are so on edge, it might be a good idea to ask the other Heroes of Light about what happened last year.


Very Close Encounters of the Thirteenth Kind
— 14:00 —
Characters venturing by the Ninth District at this time will be able to see a most peculiar and unexpected sight. They will see a strange blue creature running after a Moogle, with the later looking particularly distressed. Before anyone could have a chance to react, the two of them entered a building... And a few minutes later, the blue creature could be seen emerging from the building, running away with a Kupo Nut in hand. In a surprising reversal, this time the Moogle is the one pursuing the blue creature. Needless to say, the Moogle looks furious at this turn of event.

Trying to pursue the blue creature will result in failure and it will disappear. What could it mean...?

Comments

[partofthecycle]

The Other Heroes
Aang is disoriented. It was late winter when he had arrived in Aquares Ixen, but now it was summer and he's not entirely sure how he had lost so many months. And the Moogle assigned to help him, Mogya, was a bit confused about this as well. Something about Crystal Stasis, except as far as Aang knew, people normally just died. So now he was looking for people he recognized, especially those that had been woken by Kalki last summer.

The City (Shopping, B-06)
Well, okay, so he had a house. And roommates. Aang stopped first to pick up some dinner (vegetarian, so he could eat it too) and flowers for the house... which meant borrowing money from Mogya with an embarrassed look. But he wanted to make a good impression on people he'd be sharing space with for some months.

"Hi!" Aang did enter without knocking, but it is his house too. "Who wants vegetable dumplings?"

The Lab
Someone is learning how to use the computers. Right now, Aang is playing with his own file, checking out his past appearance.

"So this button shows what I looked like as a kid... what about this one?"

So far he hasn't broken anything, but you might want to keep it this way.

The Other Heroes

[boomchucka]

While Selphie hadn't woken up by Kalki last Summer, she had been woken up by her regardless months ago. She didn't really remember the circumstances and hadn't really bothered to ask those who had been forced to wake at the same as her. All she knew for a fact was that she was back in Aqures Ixen and things were going south fairly fast. She was making her way back to Cuppa Kupo with a wagon in tow. The wagon was fully loaded with fresh supplies for the shop as she spotted the young boy wandering about in a daze.

She could understand that feeling as she made her way over to Aang and tapped his shoulder. Jaelyn had mentioned that there were new heroes arriving and that it would be a good time to advertise the cafe and help out her fellow heroes. She'd been in their shoes before and arriving without any knowledge of the situation could be alarming to learn about as time went on.

"Excuse me," she greeted politely. "You look a little lost. Did you just wake up by any chance?"

Re: The Other Heroes

[partofthecycle]

"I... I guess I did." Aang said. "What day is it?"

[boomchucka]

"Well, good morning?" Selphie responded. "And, it's Wednesday. All day in fact."

The perky brunette looked Aang up and down to make sure he wasn't hurt. He really only seemed bewildered about the situation and Selphie could empathise with his predicament as she went over to the wagon and pulled out an orange. She kept her stance open and her demeanour friendly.

"What's your name? I'm Selphie," she said while offering the orange. "Are you hungry?"

[partofthecycle]

"I'm Aang, and yes. But I mean, what's the date?" He was totally going to take the orange and eat it.

[boomchucka]

"It's the fifth of July," she answered as he took the orange. "Are you looking for anyone?"

[partofthecycle]

"It was winter the last time I checked," Aang said. "Did everyone else... what happened?"

[boomchucka]

Any cheer Selphie had in her died off fairly quick at Aang's question about what happened. "A lot has happened. Palitutu wants an answer from us on what we're going to do to stop the Calamity, there's been a string of murders recently and..."

Selphie drew in a deep breath to calm herself but it couldn't completely quell the quaver in her voice. "Princess Zelda has died."

[partofthecycle]

"What happened?" Aang, being part of the second group Kalki brought together, hadn't gotten used to the idea that death was only a minor setback to Heroes of Light, because their party didn't used to have the possibility of Crystal Stasis. Still, everything looks normal.

The Lab

[toomanymistakes]

Lucrecia had been working at the labs for some time, having found herself there often enough that she may as well be paid for it. Though since many of the others Kalki had awakened had either disappeared or perished, she hadn't seen many of them since. Thus when a someone asked a question about the files, she began to answer thinking it was only a recently arrived "hero."

"That would be-" she began, before looking over to find a familiar young child with striking blue tattoos. "Aang? You're back?" She was almost hopeful, remembering him well during their travels to Mysidia.

Re: The Lab

[partofthecycle]

'That's me," Aang said. "It's been a long time, huh?"

Re: The Lab

[toomanymistakes]

"It has, indeed." The relief in her voice was hard to hide, but she couldn't help the faint smile. "Almost five months."

Before she could fall back into reminiscence, she added, "You were having trouble with the terminal?"

Re: The Lab

[partofthecycle]

"Just trying to figure out everything it does," Aang answered. "I'm supposed to be locking down my record. Or deciding if I want to, anyway."

Really, he doesn't care. Okay, some of the stuff is a bit embarrassing, but at least it's true things that other people have seen. And the first decade or so had a lot of things that only Aang remembered. Even if it was a story, it was his peoples' story.

The Lab

[gorgeous_sin]

Lust didn't work at the lab. But she did visit on occasion, especially now that she had her Alchemist job firmly established. There was plenty of research to be done, and she worked feverishly into the night trying to make her one true desire become a reality.

Despite her terrible yearning, she still knew how to pace herself and look after the needs of her body. She took breaks to sleep and eat, and maintained her physical appearance for more reasons than just physical hygiene. People were more likely to help a gorgeous woman than a scraggly unkempt woman in dirty clothes.

And now there was a bald child sitting at one of the computers. Her purple eyes flicked to the screen, taking note of the brief glimpse of information there, before looking back to Aang. "Did you find something interesting?" she smiled, folding her arms as she leaned her hip against the computer desk.

Re: The Lab

[partofthecycle]

"I never knew what I looked like as a baby. Aren't I adorable?" It's displacement activity, to be honest. There's bits of Aang's past that were sad and painful, and a future file that looks very tempting to click on it, especially after meeting Korra and talking to her. Playing around with the 4-D image of himself is far safer.

Depending on how well Lust knew Aang, she might be able to get... well, that he's not being as frivolous as he seems.

"Did they have these kinds of machines where you're from?"

[gorgeous_sin]

Lust gave no response at first as to how Aang rated on the baby adorableness scale. She had no grasp on what could be considered 'cute.' All she knew were that babies were useless except when being used as a sacrifice for Dante's immortality. She merely glanced at him, then smiled cordially. "Yes," she agreed, even though she felt nothing.

She folded her arms and shook her head. "No, technology wasn't quite this advanced. It's interesting, though, isn't it?" She still hadn't decided on whether or not she wanted to learn it. It seemed useful for gathering information, but so far, none of it pertained to anything she truly wanted.

"Did you just arrive, or were you with the group that Kalki summoned? You look familiar."

[partofthecycle]

"That's me!" Aang confirmed. 'I don't really know what happened, but... I'm back."

The Other Heroes

[pole_position]

[Pyrrha is the conscientious sort, and she knows it's often confusing for the other Heroes when they first wake up in the city, so she's decided to go out to meet some of them. When she sees Aang walking around looking lost, she slowly approaches with a wave and a smile.]

Hello there! Do you need some help?

Re: The Other Heroes

[partofthecycle]

I'm trying to figure out when it is. Last thing I knew it was winter... February I think?

[The months had different names here, after all.]

Re: The Other Heroes

[pole_position]

Oh... you've been in crystal stasis, then? It's almost August now.

Re: The Other Heroes

[partofthecycle]

August!? What have I missed?

Re: The Other Heroes

[pole_position]

Quite a bit, I'm afraid. But the biggest thing you've missed is that Palitutu has given us an ultimatum. We're to meet her on the Calm Plains on August 3rd to deliver our answer for how to deal with the Calamity. If she doesn't like it, it can be assumed she'll attack us again.

Re: The Other Heroes

[partofthecycle]

But... why is she doing all this? What would hurting us solve?

{Palitutu had attacked before, but Aang still didn't understand why, and had missed the revelations.]

Re: The Other Heroes

[pole_position]

The Heroes of Light and the worlds we come from are linked to the Calamity. I think she thinks if she gets rid of us, she can stop it.

Re: The Other Heroes

[partofthecycle]

But... that's dozens of other worlds.

[Palitutu shouldn't have to lose her world, but everyone else shouldn't have to lose theirs either.]

Do we have a way to save all the worlds?