exsiliumlogs | (no subject)

Date: July 1st
Location: The Initiative Hold & Courtyard.
Characters: Everyone.
Summary: New Transports arrive and are shuffled into the Courtyard after their initial briefings. Now with 200% more People-Seeking lists!
Warnings: None.

You've just been hustled and bustled through mazes of information and literal, wide corridors of the Initiative Hold and you've been equipped with your weapon—be it a gun, a sword, or even your existing powers. They've handed you this light netbook and a small pouch of coins (or a debit card, if you're more inclined), and there are several Transports before and after you going through the very same motions. You can hear the Greeter's voice as she walks alongside large groups, telling them all about the history of this place and sharing with you your purpose here in a hurried and urgent tone. "You're in luck that we have enough rooms for all of you; the housing building is getting awfully full. Please, let me show you into the courtyard."

You pass what looks like huge gymnasiums, all with dummies and targets strewn and splayed around the room. Training areas. There are even classrooms, and a few small offices. You're rushed past a large library while the Greeter informs you that you can find almost all your information there, if you've got the time to look—and trust her, you'll have time. You don't spend a lot of time in the bank, and it's a bit of a blur of exchanges with more and more of these strangely-accented and oddly polite-seeming members of the Initiative.

Soon enough, you're in a massive courtyard bustling with all the other Transports. It's not exactly what you'd expect, and it looks more like barracks than anything—huge walls of concrete and stone, separating you from all of the hallways you'd just passed through. It's raining heavily, and dark clouds loom in the air, though it hasn't turned to snow. It's a chill cold, and there are shelters—long cloth hangings that extend from the walls of concrete to house you from the rain, but not enough. Most notably, the courtyard is filled with a marketplace. Even in the cold and the rain, there are several citizens seated at their covered booths and tables, bundled up against the weather. They're selling all manner of their own handmade goods and foods, and citizens and Transports alike are traveling from one small covered shop to another in search of all manner of necessities. Now and then around you you might spot paper fluttering in the faint wind from somewhere relatively dry. It looks like a list.

The Greeter's voice has become so faint now, but you swear you can make it out in the back of the crowds as she tells you, "Good luck. Be safe!"

Her voice is drowned out by the busy marketplace, though even the transactions taking place are somewhat subdued. Nobody is overly happy, really, though most citizens can be found with smiles on their faces. It doesn't seem like they're that shocked to see you, either; even if you're not bound in tattered rags and wrapped in heavy shawls as they are. You're welcome to walk up to a shop, and find yourself something to eat—hey, maybe you'll even find something akin to a raincoat. Or, you can join the others under the coverings against the walls. Where am I? What war? She was talking so fast, and it didn't all make very much sense… did anyone else catch it all?

Welcome to the courtyard. Welcome to the Initiative Hold—and most importantly, welcome to Exsilium.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Shintaro was not the biggest fan of crowds or crowded places that weren't by nature supposed to be crowded, and while he realized the monthly crowding of the courtyard was routine he was still trying to avoid the particularly large group of people when the wind picked up. That wasn't a problem. In the perpetually-raining world of Exsilium, wind happened often enough. The only, and pretty minor, problem was how his arms were still as weak as sticks of Pocky and how the gust of wind pulled at his umbrella and tried to engage him in a desperate battle over its possession.

(No, he needs that umbrella! Don't snatch it away, wind!)

So caught up in the tug-of-war, he doesn't notice the red-haired girl right beside him get smacked by the paper. He doesn't notice her at all until she bumps right into him, and the sudden contact startles him so much that the umbrella slips from his hands and up into the sky. And he yelps, a surprised and pathetic sound as he scrambles to see exactly what sort of terrifying monster of a person he has to apologize to for getting in their way--

"Ah, it's-- I'm sorry--!"

Oh, great. Somehow she knows she's messed something up while she was too busy thinking about other things -- she's not a terrifying person but her face, done up in concentration and displeasure, makes her seem a lot more scary than she actually is.

"--sorry about the umbrella. I wasn't paying attention."

But the way she says it, it almost sounds like an accusation.

That's enough to set off the alarms in Shintaro's head anyway. But he's gotten better about people than two months ago, so unlike the time he met Kido before Exsilium and lowered his head and apologized to her the moment he saw her cold glare and assumed she would kill him for bumping into her, he only jumps and freezes up like a deer caught in the headlights at Ange's less-than-gentle look. Her almost accusatory tone of voice doesn't make him feel any better either.

And then he finds his voice.

"Eeeh, no! No, it's okay, don't worry about it, I think I'll be able to find it eventually, um, I'm sorry it was my fault!"