[??? Day 465]

[quitplayinggames]

[you wake up.

the first sensation you feel is your key, warm and alive against your chest. you know immediately that this place is responsive to this power, the power of your will applied to magic. if you've started to experiment with what your special ability is, or if you want to, that realization might be easier to find here as well - though it's not strictly necessary. all you need for sure is a question: what are your desires. . .?

. . . you're in a blank white room. the walls and ceiling are featureless. the floor is covered in a million feathers and scraps of cloth, which drift up in muffling gales around you if you so much as move.

up in one corner high off the ground, you glimpse a splash of bright electric blue through the drifting airy debris. the only other thing of note in the room is the door on one wall: it's white and featureless as a piece of paper, and you get the sense that it will vanish into the wall again if closed. undifferentiated noise pours through the place where it's cracked open, unbearably loud. even with the feathers in the air shutting out the noise a little, it's hard to hear yourself think.

there's something hard and clanging underfoot too, hidden by the feathers. you trip over it immediately because of course you do; ow! what is that?]

((This is a short, individual, play-at-your-own pace plot explore, which will run until 11:59 PM EST on Tuesday, June 2. Anyone jumping in before then is welcome! This is not directly connected with heartgames, so people are free to jump in regardless of whether they've played or run another heart this round.))

Comments

[quitplayinggames]

[OW. YOUR POOR ANKLE. WHAT HAS IT DONE TO DESERVE THIS??]

[glorious]

[MY ANKLE WAS PROBABLY THE LEAST TERRIBLE PART ABOUT ME TOO...!]

[going to stop moving. does that prevent any further ankle-injuries?]

[quitplayinggames]

[it does. WILL YOU STAND THERE GRUMPILY, DEFYING THE SCORE?]

[glorious]

[I would definitely try to DEFY THE SCORE but that would require me knowing what Score here is supposed to be beyond 'pay attention to hard objects'.]

[But I will take my key into my hand to give my Unique Key Powers a try; to see if I can't grow a (particularly hardy) selenia so I can step over the hard thing.]

[quitplayinggames]

[it's not the cloud realm, unfortunately; stuff doesn't seem to be too inclined to grow from nothing.

there's a definite warmth though. the feathers sort of. . . try to fluff into a flower shape?]

[glorious]

[oh bah. the cloud realm cheatcode was good while it lasted.]

[hmm...encouraging the feathers further to fluff up into a flower shape.]

[quitplayinggames]

[as he concentrates the feathers more, the noise gets way worse. also, in focusing them he has unintentionally un-obscured the objects he tripped over; he now has:

- a crowbar
- a pile of paint tubes in crazed bright colors
- an antique-looking hotel telephone with the cord cut

and

- a pretty feather-flower that seems to be lasting as long as his will is focused on it.]

[glorious]

[damn it, I adhered to the Score anyway. alas, the hard objects are interesting enough that I will focus on examining them for now, I can probably just make more feather-flowers if I need them.]

[looks over the items, then takes the handset of the telephone and dials 911.]

[quitplayinggames]

[click. click. click. the line is silent.]

[glorious]

[...I don't know enough about phones to know what the problem is, so I'm going to set that aside for now, and then pick up the paints...]

[...if I look up to the corner again, will I be able to see that bright electric blue again?]

[quitplayinggames]

[if you can focus long enough to wallow over to the splash of color, you’ll find "DON’T LET YOURSELF BE KILLED. DISAPPEAR IF IT LOOKS DANGEROUS" daubed on the wall there in neon paint. it looks like a fairly old message, the paint long since dried into the wall. tacked up next to it are some photographs, a little yellowed at the edges but still vivid.

there’s a sense that this little setup is all to one purpose -- a reminder that stays, sometimes obscured but not forgotten. perhaps you could use the paints you found to do more in this vein, or find some other way to express yourself…?

your key tingles on your chest. this may take more than just pigment.]

[glorious]

[...oh.]

[considers for a moment, then takes his key and a soft blue pigment and tries to focus on the words "Don't disappear; we are here"]

[quitplayinggames]

[the paint tends to drip a little, but the warmth from your key seems to be helping it dry a bit... do you make an effort to do two things at once here, perhaps?]

[glorious]

[yes. it's a bit tricky to channel will-power and good feelings instead of just angry feelings, but he will try to continue to focus on the words, and also on the warm feeling that builds in his heart whenever he lights a candle and sees Mau, or Red, or Bubbles, or any of the Sapphires he sees. and the precarious feeling he gets when speaking to Yuki or Shirayuki, that turns into comfort once they start laughing instead of fighting. and the swell of joy in his heart when Marigold sings. and the calming feeling he gets when Acheron is simply there.]

[or even just feeling as though he's leaning against a sturdy rock that won't falter when he speaks with Lloyd or Mithos. or the feeling as though he's stepping out of the sea with its waves washing over him with intensity when he speaks with Guy. or the feeling as though he's standing and basking in the warm sunlight when he simply sees Arietta there, alive.]

[or even just the feeling of a hand grasping his own, and the way his heart simply glows when he looks back to see Spitfire, Hunter, Iris...]

[or even just the feeling when your sister's song envelopes you, and makes even the moment of your worst failure into a magnificent memory that you still cherish.]



[so yeah. multi-tasking.]

[quitplayinggames]

[your paint sinks into the wall as if it had always been there. the process of applying your will to the space around you with your keys is more familiar, now; it's not the same effort of mere imagination as it was in the cloud realm, but this is still a power you can access.

whatever you left feels like a rebuke, a message to see through even the haze of noise and feathers and listen to. get a sense that this disruption of the white in the room will at least last for a long time. . .]

[glorious]

[considers for a moment, then paints some ♪s and ♫s on the walls, enough for a verse, singing along to his own tune as he paints, and then adds several long straight lines across the bottom as well.]

[and then finishes by writing: "Here are pieces that you can use to make something that is Yours and Yours alone. Writing songs for myself helps me, so it may help you as well. But if music isn't what you want to make, you can take these lines apart and bend them as you need; they can make excellent wire as well if you'd rather create that way."]

[quitplayinggames]

[there's a sense of acknowledgment in the air, and your key is warm on your chest.

while you're contemplating the results of your actions, your reverie is interrupted - you hear a tinny sound, somehow cutting completely through the noise each time. it layers itself on top of all the other voices rather than removing them, so now it's really loud in your head.

it's coming, improbably, from the cord-cut hotel telephone in the pile of feathers.

the sound is impossible to ignore, hideously compelling - who's even calling? it would be very, very hard not to react to the ringing.]

[glorious]

[...I guess I will try to pick that up.]

[quitplayinggames]

[picking up the phone does nothing right now - the cut cord is sparking a bit, with no indication of where - or if - the other side is in the mass of feathers. THIS IS A TERRIBLE SYSTEM.

R I N G]

[glorious]

[looks at the part of the cord where it's sparking...there is supposed to be a piece there but what...]

[frowns then...grabs a feather and puts it over the spark...???? phones how do they work.]

[quitplayinggames]

[the feather chars, leaving a whiff of smokey smell.]

[glorious]

[pulling that away]

[...going to pull my gloves out from my inventory and try to place that over the spark instead.]

[quitplayinggames]

[he can do that! as he rests his hand over where the cord was cut, he gets a strange feeling of vertigo and disconnection.]

[glorious]

[--that is a strange feeling, but he's going to keep his hand there for a moment longer.]

[quitplayinggames]

[it doesn't change further. something was severed.

the ringing is growing more urgent! he could look for the missing piece, if he wanted...]