applenet | COUNTDOWN: FACES OF FUTURE & PAST 2.0

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COUNTDOWN: FACES OF FUTURE & PAST 2.0

It's been 7 days since the first network post, and predictably for those who where here the first two times, a second one makes it's appearance a week afterwards.

Appearing when least expected, disappearing when others are too close. Others might have warned the Unawakened, but now they're finding out for themselves. Bringing the phone to a repair shop to get it looked at? No programs found. Even getting the phone completely wiped did nothing, as the icon just showed up a few minutes after they walked out of the store. Showing it to a family member? The minute you blinked or turned it around to show them, it simply wasn't there...

Saturday night rolls around and still nothing from the application. The news has been...strangely worrying with a high concentration of cats still coming in from the nearby cities and causing additional problems for the population. For those of you alergic to cats...it has been a nightmare. For those not alergic to cats...honestly the honeymoon period is clearly over, with so many cats screaming, eating anything they can find and just huddling everywhere. What's strange is many of them appear to be someone's cats. However returning them all home will be a challenge in itself...

The warning bells of the nightly curfew ring across the city as a few people finish locking their doors for the night. Civilians are settling in for a late supper and preparing for work tomorrow. The cats are mewing outside, and don't seem to care too much about this issue. Too bad no one can really go out and stop them at this point.

For the Unawakened, however, the mewing seems to be causing extra painful headaches. Food doesn't look appetizing and they feel an urge to go to bed early. Despite the noise, sleep comes fast and a voice will echo in their heads.

...I am thou...thou art I...your chains will break away...perhaps soon...we shall see...
The strange foreboding voice of...something echos in their heads. It's the only thing they can hear now that their headache is gone and the city is fast asleep...even the cats seem silent. They are not sure why, but the voice makes them get up and grab their phone.

It's humming softly. The icon is glowing again. Time seems to stop. Looking outside they will notice there's no wind either. Is that even possible?

Pressing the button reveals another terms of agreement, but it looks quite different. It's almost...gentle?

It may take a while or it may happen in an instant, but you eventually take your finger and trace your name over the signature area to continue. You've gotten this far in any case and this one isn't trying to kill you...at least you think it isn't. Yet as your hand moves to write your name, it gets replaced with other letters. Another name that tells you nothing. Somehow you feel like you should know it, but it's...it's...

It stays there for a few more seconds, leaving you with your thoughts before the contract disappears.

You're back into that chatroom again. Questions pop up in rapid succession before you're even permitted to type anything else. Once more, it seems that you find yourself typing things that aren't matching up with what you really want to say.

At least...you think...

What is your name?
Write it here.

Do you think the future is unavoidable?
Yes | No

Do you consider yourself a bad person?
Yes | No | Oh Hells Yeah I'm Bad.

Have you ever killed someone/something?
Yes | No | Yes, but (insert your reason here)

Did you enjoy it?
Yes | No | It's complicated (but yes) | It's complicated (but no) | It's just complicated

Now share one or two of your darkest secrets with the rest of the group! Two makes it more fun!
Write it down here.

With questions like that and nothing around you moving, you feel like it's going to be a very, very, very long night.

[OOC: The network posts will now allow users to post their names, but they will show up as their CANON ones. The user's persona can be added at the end, or not show up at all.

MEMORY REGAIN: Right before their answers are posted, they will also get a longer flash of someone calling them by this name. The memory HAS to be someone calling them by their name. It could be both a good or a bad memory, that is up to you.

FOR THE AWAKENED: Awakened will be able to answer the questions again if they want. They'll also find themselves in their fancy new outfits and will able to summon their weapons during this time. Sweet indeed. They'll also notice that the cats outside seem to be looking at them whenever they look outside. ]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[to be perfectly honest, the relentless call of the app had annoyed Vincent far more than the soft cries of the cats outside. they'd bonded during his brief spate of homelessness, after all.

it's at least an hour after the contract appears before he finally relents and signs it, petulant to the last. the other name emerging beneath his fingertip comes as no surprise; 'Hiei' is slowly becoming almost as familiar to him as his real name. at least the app is consistent in its irritations. not that it made this any less -

It's Kurama again. They're in a forest this time, doing battle with a demon and his monstrous creation. The demon itself isn't worth the breath necessary to draw their weapons, but the beast - well, even when fighting together it's proven a challenge.

He moves to dodge, but he's just a little too slow. One of the massive claws slams painfully into him, pinning him against a tree. The rage is building slowly in him, and as if feeding off his thoughts his mutilated right hand twinges with latent power. They needed more strength to end this quickly, didn't they..?

"Hiei! Don't!"]

What is your name?
Hiei

Do you think the future is unavoidable?
No

Do you consider yourself a bad person?
Oh Hells Yeah I'm Bad

Have you ever killed someone/something?
Yes

Did you enjoy it?
Yes

Now share one or two of your darkest secrets with the rest of the group! Two makes it more fun!
I have nothing left to look forward to in this life but death.

I want my sister to be happy. That's why she'll never learn who her brother is.

[...]

more of the same
it could at least have the decency to include some variety if its going to be this persistent

nope sorry

you gotta deal with this shit too

have funnnnn

not anymore i dont
the song and dances over i can go back to bed
deal with this shit yourself

man right now i am stuck in a fresh furry hell

youre gonna have to deal with this

[He doesn't have thumbs right now.]

try and make me

[he's courteous. he'll give whoever this is one shot to make it worth his while, and then he's going to disconnect. that's more than fair.]

Taro Watanabe ☸ Dantalion

hachitaro - 2017-09-18 11:14 (UTC) - Expand

Hiei ⚔ Andras

blacktemper - 2017-09-18 21:34 (UTC) - Expand

[There's an alleyway, and looming monsters behind it. They're black, so dark they blend into the alley when the lights are broken, which is often. But standing between him and the monsters are three teens, a girl with long red hair and two boys with short blue hair.]

[There's pain, and there's a flash of bright light, and a gun in his hand - was it at his head? He can feel the barrel at his head and nothing is right and what order did these things go in? He's not sure but one of the boys is speaking, asking his name.]

[He answers, doesn't register that he's talking, and the boy who spoke smiles at him gently. "Well... come on then, Ken-kun. You're one of us now.]

What is your name?
Ken Amada

Do you think the future is unavoidable?
No

Do you consider yourself a bad person?
Yes

Have you ever killed someone/something?
No

Did you enjoy it?
It's just complicated

Now share one or two of your darkest secrets with the rest of the group! Two makes it more fun!

I was going to kill the person who killed my mother, but someone else killed him first.

I actually don't like milk but I drink it a lot so I'll grow taller and I drink coffee even though I hate the taste because that's what adults do.

i'm tired of this already

I feel that you're not able to accept the answers you've made, correct?

[Considering how it somehow answered based on their real identities, he doubt that he has a choice like him before.]

i'm not a killer

i wouldn't try to kill someone

I'm not saying you did, but I feel that whatever is inside you is somehow guilty at what you typed in.

but it's just me here.

Edited 2017-09-22 04:18 (UTC)

Augustine Sycamore ⚔ Foras

megacurious - 2017-09-23 21:36 (UTC) - Expand

[The cats were a curiosity, but one that was temporarily put from Kit's mind when the siren call of the app beckoned to him...

Kurama had no doubt how bravely Yusuke must have fought on behalf of Keiko, but now his body hung useless and limp in midair and there was nothing that he could do to save anyone, even himself. He couldn't move even if he wanted to. And with Botan reaching her limits in trying to hold back Keiko's demonic transformation, the ragtag team was completely at Hiei's mercy...

...and he had none.

There was only one thing Kurama could do to prevent the Shadow Sword from slicing clean through the other boy's frozen body, and one thing only. He knew what he had to do. Knew what he owed Yusuke for saving his life. And now that debt could be repaid.

As Hiei swung for the spirit detective, Kurama intercepted the razor sharp edge and became its sheathe instead, the weapon sinking deep into his abdomen.

His blood splashed the concrete floor of the warehouse, but the pain barely registered over his former partner's loud confusion.

"Kurama! You...!? What's the meaning of this?"]

What is your name?
Kurama

Do you think the future is unavoidable?
Yes

Do you consider yourself a bad person?
Yes

Have you ever killed someone/something?
Yes

Did you enjoy it?
It's just complicated

Now share one or two of your darkest secrets with the rest of the group! Two makes it more fun!
I have been lying to my human mother for 16 years. She does not know who I really am, much less what I am or what I've done.
I knew what would happen, but I still manipulated the emotions of a child and lured him to his death in order to ensure our freedom.

This is...an interesting development.

these are always the roughest questions. but you did say you'd like to get to know everyone a little better.

[she's trying to be encouraging, but it's always hard. especially with what poor Kit's secrets had been; didn't he already have enough to grapple with without having killed a child for the greater good?]

Yes, I did.

[Hence why he's one of the only ones (so far, at least) who isn't really complaining. He asked for this. He literally asked for it. It's too late now to take that back.

He's not even sure he would if he could. It's proving to be just as illuminating about everyone else.

Everyone not already Awakened, at least...]

It isn't quite the same, there is no freedom in the ways which we can answer these questions, none but the last. Why do I think the future is unavoidable? Why do I consider myself a bad person? Why did I kill someone? Why is my only response to enjoying it that it's just complicated?

We're left with more questions than answers and only guesses to fill in those blanks.

[The first time the app contacted him, it asked whether or not he would kill a man or woman. Kit answered yes, for self-defense. Was that why he did kill someone?

If so, he can see how that might be 'complicated.' Satisfaction would be an inevitable part of safety, but perhaps he took no real pleasure in the act itself. In other words, he enjoyed the benefits, but not the process. Or at least...that's a theory. And he has no such thing for the other questions. Is he bad for killing someone, or perhaps for something else? He recalls the brief flashes of memories he's had up to this point. The only truly terrible thing he can recall having done was sentencing to death a companion who had become a liability.

Perhaps it's just complicated truly is the best answer of them all.]

i think

the answers are for us, but the questions they bring up are for you. most people don't ask if you had a reason if you tell them that you killed someone and sort of enjoyed it, you know? all they hear is 'yes' and 'it's complicated'.

[she'd answered the same when it had been her turn to stare down these probing queries. it had been so unsettling to imagine being a person who couldn't immediately answer 'no' to being asked if they'd enjoyed killing someone. even know, understanding as she did, Reimi doesn't think that she could give a more clear response.

it was complicated. life was complicated, and nothing more so than the ending of it all.]

it's hard to wake up if there aren't always things nipping at your brain, i think.

They hear what they want to hear. And if they do not want to know, they do not ask. But that is no way to go through life.

The world is not black and white with a sliver of gray.

[Everything is complicated. Always.

The world is a ravenous and wild animal with sharp claws and teeth. But it can nip and snap as much as much as it wants to keep him on his toes, ever nearer to that waking edge. He's been bitten harder. He's fallen farther, too. He won't be caught unawares by whatever comes next.]

It seems I have a great deal to contemplate.

Reimi Sugimoto ☸ Orias

failedhandjob - 2017-09-20 19:48 (UTC) - Expand

Hiei ⚔ Andras