+ TDM 001.

[luxflowmod]

Welcome to Luxflow's first TDM.

Let's get into it.

ARRIVAL

— You wake up encased.

It’s dark, naturally, but a few tendrils of light slip past the — vines? Why are you tangled up in vines? It gives you panic — why can’t you remember — breath quickening, in and in and in again. Your frenzied movements against the vines let in more light, more air.

And you breathe.

As you exhale, a shaky but sure breath against the rough foliage, a light flows out of you. It’s just a little orb that pours out, past the greenery and into that unknown.

The vines melt away into ash, and you’re left standing in a clearing, trees impossibly tall and swaying in the night breeze. Your breath comes in deep and steady, now, and it occurs to you that you should be panicking still … But then as you look around the clearing, you see more vine cocoons, like yours, and others climbing out of them …

There’s people in the center of the clearing. They’re armed but they’re friendly, and they tell you in short and sweet sentences about the place you’re in now …

“ You’re in the Feeding Forest. ” says one, “ This place’ll eat you alive if you can’t break out of the vines. You must be special, huh? ”

Special?

“ C'mon, we’ll take you back to the city. You’re probably here for a while. We’ll fill you in … ”

SPIT SHINE YOUR BLACK CLOUDS

You're trying to get your bearings, but this City stops for no one.

On the next morning after your arrival, there's a festival! It's near the hole, Heart and Center, in the middle of the place. When you arrive there, you're fooled for a moment, and the place doesn't seem so scary; the colors are bright and the citizens are so cheerful as they dance and cheer on the new arrivals to strange music.

No one really knows why they're celebrating, but the arrival of the strange ones feels like it's heralding something good. Maybe there's unheard prayers that are being answered! Maybe their prayers will be answered! There's drinks and food and song, so why not join in? You can get drunk or high or just chill and take it all in.

Yet as the festivities burn on, the locals all hush at some point late in the evening. Words ripple through the throngs, and it reaches you fast. They're going to heave prayers up to the Setting Sun. But first, the great chasm needs an offering from those praying.

They throw in valuables and invaluables alike; drinks and food and clothes and jewelry and weapons and boomboxes are thrown in without a second thought.

What will you offer? If you choose to at all, you'll feel bereft; if it's a memory or power, a light will flow from your mouth and down into the chasm ...

They're silent thereafter in their prayer. Do you pray, too? If you do or you don't, you can't help but feel intense shame, like someone is laughing at you ... Still, after all that, the party continues on.

You're just a little more unsettled, now, a little more uncertain.

SILHOUETTE SALOON

The Silhouette Saloon is open! Or so the signage around town says. Excessive and garish, these signs point characters down a winding path into a place called the Silhouette Saloon. When you enter, everything goes white and everyone appears merely as shadows ... Pretty on the nose, but it provides a strange anonymity.

The fixtures of the saloon are all shadowed out too, stark black against the misty backdrop of white. You can drink here and be free to tell your secrets to anyone who'll listen. The bartender or maybe one of the dancers just finishing their set will tell you that this place keeps secrets.

If you were to tell someone a secret, or hear one, you wouldn't remember it exactly. You would, however, feel a strange nagging sensation about the person who told it to you. Once on the outside, you might not be able to get through a conversation with them without thinking they're hiding something ...

If you don't tell someone a secret, you'll feel compelled to tell someone one once you're out of the Saloon, where the secret won't be so hidden ... It might be better to tell one in the safety of anonymity then, hm?

But the longer you're in there, the more you lose of yourself. You'll forget your name, your purpose, everything about yourself until you pass out on the dance floor. You'll wake up outside the Saloon, stricken with amnesia. It'll wear off after a few hours, though.

PITY'S GOT AN UGLY PRICE TAG

Besides the Drifters and Givers, a new group has popped up. They're called the Pleading, or called plain annoying. They beg for anything you've got from the roadside, calling you over. If you hear them out, they'll hypnotize you in a way; they plead for anything you can possibly spare their poor soul -- the shirt off your back, a memory, an ability. Their sob story goes from believable to something horrifying and personal to you. They'll tell you your mother won't forgive you if you don't, or they'll tell you that the fate of your very best friend hinges on you giving them your wallet.

What do you do?

If someone breaks you out of the grasp of the Pleading's hypnosis, you'll be free.

If you give in, they'll take, and you'll be bereft of what you gave and that will be that.

If you don't, you'll feel immeasurable guilt, mounting more and more with each step ... You might have to be talked out of that guilt, or you might throw yourself into the chasm, inconsolable ...

DIGITAL VEIL ( network )

A question appears on the network. There's no handle attached.

BRUISES OR ROSES OR CRADLES OR COFFINS? WHY WHY WHY? :'D

Answers to this 'question' will be displayed to all; feel free to comment on others, try to gain some sense of what this could mean ... You can also post to the network freely.

QUESTIONS?

Ask below. Have fun.

Comments

[hopesong]

The first thing she notices about this new-comer is that she reminds her of Jake, in the way that she's hanging out just a little further than necessary.

Ah, well. That's fine. She misses him dearly, can only hope that he might show up here too, along with everyone else. She smiles wide, genuine, lowering her guitar a bit as she's spoken too. Another music lover is always good to her.

"That depends, hun. It's my specialty, but I've been known to dabble in other genres from time to time. I take requests, if you've got one." She can't help but hope so, because a new person with a fresh taste will do wonders for her, she thinks. It's hard to focus without the sounds of the campfire and her past company, but the music helps to steady her nerves.

[enduresurvive]

One corner of Ellie's mouth pulls into something that could be a smile. At least Kate took her request seriously. She seems nice. Ellie wants to think that there are still nice people around, and they're not all like the fuckers she's dealt with recently. On a fundamental level, Ellie doesn't hate or distrust people as a whole. Trauma responses are a weird thing, though.

"I mostly know stuff from the 80s and 90s. So, like, a long ass time ago," she says with a shrug. A lot of her music, she got from Joel. She's expanded her tastes some, but recorded music can be hard to come by so it's pretty piecemeal.

"I don't know. Uh, Nirvana? Do you know them?" She didn't get Nirvana from Joel. She also doesn't yet realise that her time, her world...that's entirely different from where other people are from. No one has clued her in on that just yet. So it feels like she's asking for ancient history, besides being terribly different from country.

[hopesong]

"I do happen to know them. Listened to them a fair bit when I was a teen. You're in luck." Also, the 90's weren't as bad as everyone says, music wise.

She moves her guitar into a position more suitable for playing than for resting, pressing her fingers to the strings in anticipation. She'd played a few of their songs for her fellow survivors back at that campfire.

"What song were you hopin' to hear?"

[enduresurvive]

Ellie hadn't been expecting Kate to know them, really, but she's pleasantly surprised by the answer. "Whoa, really?" She seems genuinely interested now, more animated in a way she hadn't been to start with, like the connection via music has melted away some of her careful reserve.

"How about...Heart Shaped Box? That one's pretty cool. I mean, you know. If you feel like it. No pressure." Wow, awkward. She knows she's awkward, but...it's whatever. Her socialisation muscles need some retraining.

[hopesong]

"I do feel like it, as long as the audience demands it." Another idle strum, and she works it into a melody, where she plucks at the strings, working them into a rhythm, and from there, she opens her mouth, singing the lyrics with as much heart as she can muster.

Of course, there's her usual country twang to it. It's pretty clear that country music is her bread and butter, and what she's most comfortable singing.

Once the song is done, she flashes another smile.

"How was it, darlin'? Hope it was to your likin'."

[enduresurvive]

Ellie's half smile become the real thing halfway through the song, soft but sincere. She hums along very softly, not wanting to take anything away from Kate's performance. But music is inherent to her now, something inside her she doesn't want to give up, even with all the terrible shit that's happened in the past few months, even with being kidnapped and waking up in some freaky forest.

"That was good. Yeah, um, thanks," she answers. She tucks a stray piece of hair behind her ear - a fruitless gesture, since it falls loose again anyway. "I'm Ellie, by the way. What's your name?"

[hopesong]

"Kate." She says, giving a wink. "Kate Denson. A pleasure to meet you, Miss Ellie." She offers her hand over her guitar for her to shake.

"Especially nice to have another lover of the fine arts. Do you play at all?" She's curious, from the way she was humming along. An artist has to have a keen ear, after all. If she doesn't play, perhaps sing?

"Or maybe Miss Ellie is a singer?"

[enduresurvive]

There's a beat of hesitation before Ellie reaches out and accepts the handshake. It's a weird thing. Most people where she lives now don't shake hands. People outside Jackson mostly just want to shoot at you or some other fucked up thing. This seems like a kind of quaint custom. But she likes Kate already, so what the hell.

Her cheeks colour just slightly.

"I can play a little, but I'm not as good as you. I can sing a little too. Same deal. I like doing it. I've been sort of dabbling with writing my own stuff but I haven't put it down to chords or anything yet. Just words."

[hopesong]

"I don't think you should sell yourself so short, hun." She says with a laugh, rising to her feet and offering her guitar to the other woman with a gentle motion.

"Music is something that comes from the soul. I'd like to hear it, if you're willing. If not, that's fine too. I hear some people are much more reserved than I am about playing an' singing in front of others." Not that she can relate. It's something she's loved since she was young, something she's thrown every last part of herself into in the years before the Entity took her.

Before she'd become a sellout.