entrancelogs | Here we are as in olden days, happy golden days of yore

Here we are as in olden days, happy golden days of yore | OPEN

Who: E V E R Y O N E (Including our 4th wall guests!)
Where: Everywhere, one both Mirror and Real Side!
When: December 12th - December 18th (WEEK ONE)
Rating: PG-13, warn if going higher
Summary: This year's Ewaymas celebration rolls out the way it usually does, with intense decorating, a sudden snowfall and...far more arrivals than usual! New faces and old fill the mansion - but why would Wonderland bring so many people at once? And why do some of them remember Wonderland?
The Story:

On the evening before December 12th, the captives of Wonderland might be awoken by a loud commotion. Some of it is typical Ewaymas noise, likely familiar to anyone who has been in Wonderland for more than a year – construction sounds and jingle bells as Wonderland decks its own halls quite literally. Garland and lights race down the walls and down the stairs, and stockings appear on the walls for each and every person in Wonderland, embroidered with their names. There are decorative candles everywhere, and all sorts of decorations for every conceivable winter holiday, even if it does not align perfectly to the dates of Ewaymas. Time isn't real, so there will be menorahs and dreidels and Star of Davids even though Hanukkah ended two days prior. And of course, in the front hall, growing straight out of the floor, is a large decorated tree full of ornaments for everyone. And as always, it will have snowed heavily overnight, bringing all of the snow Wonderland will have between now and spring.

There is a second source of commotion in the night though – the sound of a crowd.

Over the course of the night, dozens of new arrivals will appear in Wonderland. Some for the first time. Some wondering how they managed to return with their memories. Others stumbling in with no recollection of ever having been here. Some might be friends from other timelines, other possibilities, and some might even be doubles of people who are already in Wonderland. It's strange for Wonderland to drag so many people into the mansion at once, but everything seems to indicate that they are supposed to be there. They have their own network devices and even have their own stockings on the wall and their own ornaments on the tree – by all accounts, it seems Wonderland expects that they'll be staying, and is treating them like any other new arrivals. Please, make them feel at home and help them settle in nicely.

The first few days will be for catching up with old friends and enjoying the decorations and settling into Wonderland. However, within a couple of days the decorations will start to glitch, much the way corrupted computer graphics might. Lights might change abruptly from multi-color to blue or white, entire décor styles will abruptly change, candle flames will flicker on and off like broken fluorescent lights, and any singing decorations might loop on a beat or two over and over putting you into an eternal hell. Wonderland doesn't seem to be able to stick to one motif, and it can't stop changing. These glitches are occurring on both the Real Side of Wonderland and the Mirror Side.

By the 15th, these glitches will include entire rooms changing into different holiday scenes. These scenes will all be of characters at various winter holidays in the past, the present (in their world), or a possible future. At this point in the event, characters will still be able to navigate the basic mansion and be able to exit these moments easily. These scenes cannot be interacted with – Wonderland seems to consider them another form of decorating. Unlike previous events of this type, these scenes will not loop at first. They will play once, and then Wonderland will glitch and correct itself to be the room it is supposed to be. The scene might play again, but it will be in a different location if it does.

By this point, Wonderland is having an increasingly difficult time holding itself together in a way that makes geographical sense. You might exit one room, even a room that was not previously playing a scene, and find yourself in the kitchen or on the roof instead of in the hallway. You might open a door that you were sure led to your room only to see a ten foot drop to the grounds outside.

This is the mingle log for WEEK ONE! For more information on this part of the event or any questions, please head over to the plot post, or check out our Fourth Wall Master Post for your other Fourth Wall event needs! Prose or [action brackets] are welcome. Please clearly indicate whether your character is on the Real Side or Mirror Side in your top levels. And of course, have fun! ♥

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"I'm not going anywhere," Jean reassured him, and sat down on said couch to prove it. He even put his feet up on it. The stars could start falling outside and he still wouldn't leave Marco. There wasn't anything more important than being here right now.

"Okay." Short of dragging Jean into the shower with him, there isn't much more reassurance Marco can get. He watches as Jean settles in, then retreats into the bathroom, closing the door quietly behind him.

He drops his tattered uniform to the floor, and spends a few minutes examining himself in the shockingly large mirror. He looks the same, if a little drawn out and tense around the eyes. He doesn't look like someone who has died and been brought back in some crazy place full of lights and warmth and endless hot water. He just looks like Marco Bott, from Jinae district, who died at Trost.

With a shake of his head, Marco steps into the shower.

The shower itself is an extremely pleasant surprise; just as Jean said, the water gets tremendously hot, and it stays hot the whole time. Marco stands under the blast and lets the heat soak into his bones, although he doesn't stay for the hours Jean says he could. He still doesn't entirely believe the water would stay hot that long, and he'd rather not get blasted by freezing cold water. He does play with some of the liquids and soaps Jean has, and marvels at their fragrances and how strong they are. The soap gets him so damn clean.

Once he's done, Marco turns off the water and steps out, wrapping himself in one of Jean's fluffy towels. "Jean? Do you have anything I can wear?"

Jean lies back on the couch and relaxes while he listens to Marco take his shower, and kept an ear cocked to be ready to hear any banging or thuds that might indicate a problem. But no, the water simply ran, and Jean had a moment to let his emotions settle down. It would be a total lie to say that he wasn't upset anymore, but his blood didn't feel as hot as it did either.

"Just a second," he answered, and got up to open the closet. It gave him some clothes that were more or less analogous to what they would have worn back home in the barracks, but were probably less itchy and better tailored to someone Marco's size. He passed them into the bathroom without looking in.

Marco wouldn't admit it out loud, but hearing Jean's voice answer him is an immeasurable relief, as are the clothes Jean passes to him. They're not the clothes Marco remembers, but they're close enough: a pair of tan pants that fit better than the ones he used to wear in the evenings, and a green sweater that doesn't rasp against his skin. Marco shrugs into them, and then spends a few moments combing his wet hair, carefully parting it down the center, before venturing back into the living area.

He goes directly to the couch, plopping down next to Jean, sitting perhaps a bit closer than normal but not getting up in Jean's space either, and points at the large, black mirror on the wall across from them. "What's that?"

What's the point of a mirror if it's black?

"It's called a television," Jean answered him without hesitation, because he was ready for a welcome distraction by now. "I don't know exactly how it works, because all the technology and devices here are such fucking contraptions. But basically, it shows moving images with sound. They call it 'video.' Here."

He got up off the couch for a second to turn on the TV. Since there wasn't any kind of service provider here, there weren't any channels, but Jean only used his to play video games anyways. He booted up his console too, so Marco could at least see the start-up screen.

"Then you use this box here to play a game on the screen. It's pretty fun if you feel like sitting on your ass for a couple of hours. I can only handle it for so long before it starts to fry my brain."

Marco watches, interested in spite of himself, as Jean fires up the television. He could use the distraction too, and it seems like this is something Jean enjoys talking about.

The way the screen changes from black to suddenly colorful makes him jump, and Marco gets off the couch to get closer to it and investigate. "Can I touch it?"

He lifts one hand tentatively, but won't touch unless he gets confirmation that he can. He'd hate to break Jean's toy, after all.

"Yeah. It's only about as breakable as any piece of glass would be." Jean answered, since he assumed that the screen was glass. It might be plastic, or something else. He didn't know. "You might get a little shock from the static though. You know, like when your clothes rub against the sheets in the winter and then you touch the doorknob."

He had been told that happened because of the electricity. He only understood that in a cursory manner as well, but he wasn't about to stick a fork in a socket to put it to the test.

That would probably be a good idea, and one Marco would approve of. No sticking forks in wall sockets, please.

Marco dutifully touches the tv screen, and jumps a little when it shocks him. It wasn't painful, just a tad unexpected, and he waits a moment before touching it again and running his fingers over the glass.

"Can you make the pictures change?" Right now it's all very bright and colorful, but nothing is really moving or happening, and Marco doesn't understand how Jean could sit and watch this for a couple of hours.

"Yeah, that's what the game box is for."

He grabbed the controller that was on the floor next to the console, pressed the button to turn it on, and sat down in his usual Gaming Position, slightly hunched over, his hands dangling down between his knees. Everything hummed to life. The television soon showed the title card for his favorite game-- Monster Island.

You played as an explorer on a big new world where dangerous, giant monsters lived. As part of research, you would hunt and capture the monsters for further study, and made armor and weapons out of their body parts. Jean liked it because the humans never got hurt, and the monsters were obviously that-- Monsters. There was no ambiguity. The hunt even had an aspect of respect for nature. It was thrilling and exciting without besmirching his strong sense of morality.

"I know it looks pretty realistic, but everything on screen is like... Like a piece of art. It's not real at all. Just a game."

Marco glances over his shoulder, and Jean's posture jogs his memory. Jean used to sit that way to study sometimes, and Marco comes back to the couch, settling in beside him and resting one hand on the small of his back.

"You're going to hurt yourself, sitting like that." But okay, if Jean is going to insist, Marco won't question it. He won't move his hand, either... he needs this contact, the very real feeling of Jean under his hand, to make himself feel better and not question the existential horror his life has become.

"So how do you make the art move?"

The contact was fine-- if slightly awkward, but it barely registered to Jean. He scooted over on instinct to stay close as well, and was totally comfortable with their shoulders touching as he played the game.

"You use this thing I've got in my hands here. The buttons correspond to the stuff the character on screen can do. My old roommate could play any game without practicing at all, so there's some kind of sense to it that I don't have a handle on yet... but I've got this one down, so I play it a lot."

Jean ran his character around, and had him swing his giant sword a few times. They were in the safe hubworld, so no monsters would show up here to attack him.

It's only awkward because you're a repressed only child, Jean. Marco Lots-of-Siblings Bott doesn't think this is awkward or weird at all, and he leans right back when Jean leans against him.

He watches with interest at what Jean is doing, trying to figure out what buttons make the character on the screen move, but he can't quite figure it out. He's also a bit at a loss for how Jean manages to not be looking at his hands the whole time.

"Can I try it?" Running around and flailing with a sword makes sense, even if the thought of using that sword makes Marco vaguely ill. What, exactly, is Jean's character supposed to attack with that?

"Sure," Jean passed the controller off to Marco, and put it into his hands correctly, so his left thumb was on the control stick and the right thumb was on the buttons. "You tilt that thing around to move in the direction you push, and each of these buttons do different things. Like the one on the bottom lets you talk to people, and the one on the right swings your sword."

There was the shoulder buttons too, and all the contextual stuff in the menus... but one thing at a time.

"Don't worry about swinging your sword and hitting someone or breaking something. It only works on monsters."

Marco lets Jean position his hands and listens to the explanation, but when he tries it himself, there's a serious disconnect between his brain and his hands. He just can't quite grasp how what he's doing with his thumbs translates to the screen, and ends up running to confused circles and waving his sword around like a moron. Rather than get frustrated, though, the whole thing strikes him as amusing, and for the first time since he woke up here, Marco feels a smile, tiny but genuine, tickling at the corners of his mouth.

"I suck at this." Badly! But his failure at Jean's game is more entertaining to Marco than upsetting.

Jean brightened considerably at Marco's enjoyment, however small. If he could forget his trauma, even for just a moment or two, Jean had done something that was worth bringing him to this place. Who knew what the afterlife was like? Even though he was personally curious, as he didn't expect to live much longer in the Corps, there was no way he was going to ask Marco about it. It could be horrible, and he didn't want to bring up the memory if it was.

"I sucked at it forever. Ryuji never let me hear the end of it. It kinda motivated me to practice until I could beat his ass on one of the two-player games."

As far as Marco knows, this is the afterlife. One moment he was sobbing on a rooftop with a titan reaching for him, and the next, he was here. There was nothing in between, or nothing that he can remember.

"Ry-uji?" Marco says the name carefully, the sounds foreign on his tongue. "Is he a friend of yours?"

Does Jean have friends here? Marco hopes he does. He wouldn't want Jean to be anywhere that's lonely.

"He was. We used to be roommates, but then he left," Jean shrugged. He tried to appear as apathetic about it as possible, even though he was pretty broken up about it at the time. "Everyone leaves here eventually. Some people end up here for ridiculously long stretches of time, but... everyone goes in the end."

Not to worry Marco, Jean wasn't lonely here. He missed the Corps, and he missed the camaraderie with his squad mates, the kind you can only have with that special ride-or-die mentality, but he had a rich social life in the Mansion. There are even people out there he's willingly called friends in casual conversation.

Nice try, Jean Kirschstein... Marco knows you better than that! He knows when you're bullshitting apathy, and Marco's attention wavers from the game.

Everyone goes in the end... That really does nothing to reassure Marco that this isn't the afterlife, and he works as hard as he can to keep him voice from cracking as he carefully words his next question. He almost succeeds.

"So people just... they're just gone from here, sometimes?"

Like him? Does that mean he'll be gone, and on to... whatever's next?

"...Yeah," Jean nodded solemnly. He had a feeling that Marco's stay would not be extended like his has been. "Normally they just go back to their home worlds. But..."

Marco didn't have a world to return to. Or where-ever he was intended to go... He hadn't gotten there yet. Jean grew quiet again, but he didn't move from where he was, shoulder to shoulder with Marco.

"But..."

But yeah. Marco doesn't really need to say it, does he? They both know what he's thinking: what about people who don't have anything to go home to? What about people who are dead at home? What happens to them?

Marco sighs quietly, and his character on the screen stops moving. He slouches a little further down on the couch, and rests his head on Jean's shoulder. "Is there any way to ask if you can stay?"

"I could... try?" Jean replied, but he sounded terribly unsure. He remembered the stroopwafel he had saved that he could potentially use to summon the Dormouse, but he hadn't forgotten the lesson he had learned when he had met the inhabitant face-to-face either. The permanent residents of Wonderland, even the Queens, had no control over how the world itself acted. They were all pawns on a cosmic chessboard, constantly moving in an infinite stalemate. They only gave everyone warnings on what was coming over the horizon out of what little kindness they contained. "I don't want to get your hopes up. Things are weird here."

"No." Marco sees the expressions that cross over Jean's face, and knows without asking that it probably wouldn't work, and would put Jean out to ask. "I don't want to get you in trouble."

Because as long as Jean is here, he's safe, and that, at least, gives Marco comfort. He'd rather Jean be here and safe than in the veritable hellhole that is their world.

He just also wishes he could stay with him.

"Here." Marco offers the controller back to Jean. "Can you play for awhile? I want to watch."

"I wouldn't get in trouble. The locals just... aren't very helpful."

There was a bitterness in his tone, which was understandable. If there was a way he knew he could get Marco to stay, he'd be doing it right now. Instead, he took the controller from Marco, and it was still warm from his hands.

"I can," he said, and rolled the joystick under his thumb just to feel it. "But if you want to do something else, that's okay too."

Marco knows. He knows that if there were a guaranteed way to keep him here, Jean would already be doing it. The fact that Jean isn't trying right now means there isn't, and he's just going to have to hope that he gets to stay.

Marco can't find it in himself to pray. Clearly no one is listening.

"Okay." For right now, though, Marco is content to lean against Jean--almost cuddling, but not quite--and watch him play his game. The colors are bright but the movements on the screen are soothing, and Marco finds himself starting to nod off. It'll be okay if he naps here, right? He won't just disappear while he's leaning on Jean, will he?

Jean played the game for a little bit, since it did seem to be keeping Marco calm, at least. If he wanted to relax, he deserved to relax. There was so much he could do here, but Jean had to admit, if he were in the same shoes, he'd probably just want to chill out too.

After finishing a rather slow-paced mission that was more about researching and collecting specimens than actually fighting, Jean noticed that Marco was basically asleep. He turned the game off with the controller from the couch, and heaved a sigh. He didn't want to sleep. He didn't want to take his eyes off Marco. People never disappeared in front of each other...

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

does Jean have Katamari Damacy? Marco would love Katamari Damacy

they only have knock-offs here, so something like Wad up the World maybe

Rolling Balls of Sticky

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject