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COUNTDOWN: FACES OF FUTURE & PAST 2.0
Some have tried to best the program, others have already tried to figure out more about it, but nothing has been working. Others might have warned the Unawakened, but ow 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.
It's taunting you. Whoever programmed this is really good. Frighteningly so. Also possibly an asshole, from the way Luci has been taunting and abusing his posting privileges.
Saturday night rolls around and still nothing from the application. The news this Saturday is nothing special. The festival of the longest day went off without a hitch, although the population had trouble getting into nightly shelters due to too much partying. A higher amount of robberies during daylight hours than last year, but nothing to raise cause for alarm. The peace continues at night.
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.
Not you, however. The Unawakened have been victim to a damn headache building for the past hour and by now their ears are ringing. Food doesn't look appetizing and they feel an urge to go to bed early. Didn't the other people in the channel warn them it might happen?
Either way, a little shut-eye would be welcome at this point. You don't even think too hard about it, and the headache fades into blissful sleep.
2AM and you snap awake. The strange foreboding voice of...something echos in your head. It's the only thing you can hear now that your headache is gone andthe city is fast asleep. You're not sure why, but the voice makes you get up and grab your phone.
It's humming softly. The icon is glowing again. Before you do, you take a look around and suddenly notice...nothing's moving. Nothing but you. Almost as if time was frozen.
Is that even possible?
You can't back down now. 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
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. Additionally, the occupations will still be censored.
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. ]
Shirou Fubuki β Marchosias
A short boy with wide, honest eyes, wearing a bandanna and standing at the front of the small crowd is just as surprised as him. "You're from earlier! Fubuki Shirou...was you?" They'd given him a ride on their bus earlier that day without ever having asked his name, and he'd sat in front of this boy. It's a little funny that their paths should cross again so soon, but not everyone is so amused.
Next to him, someone raises their voice in objection. "You're the bear-killer?!" This boy is much taller, with fierce eyes, a hard-set jaw, and so much bravado that Shirou is completely unapologetic when he replies...
"Oh, are you disappointed after seeing the real thing?"]
What is your name?
Shirou Fubuki
Do you think the future is unavoidable?
No
Do you consider yourself a bad person?
No
Have you ever killed someone/something?
Yes, but only in self-defense or to protect my friends.
Did you enjoy it?
No
Now share one or two of your darkest secrets with the rest of the group! Two makes it more fun!
I'm afraid of how far I'll go to be perfect.
It hurts more than I'll admit that they came looking for 'him' and don't really need me.
Shirou Fubuki β Marchosias: Bear-killer? The real thing?
Shirou Fubuki β Marchosias: ...
Shirou Fubuki β Marchosias: lol
[That's it. That's all that he has to say. Because clearly if he laughs it off he won't be uncomfortable anymore.
Yeah...that'll totally work.]
Yuuto Kidou βΈ Eligor
And with that demon... it can be no one other than 9, can it? He's sure of it. The mysterious new wolf, revealed...
While Kidou's glad to see a familiar name, there's also an icy thread of anxiousness winding around that feeling, twisting it into something he doesn't have a name for. How could Fubuki have been here without him noticing? Was anyone else here, too, and he's somehow missed them?? It's a good thing that no one's here to see his expression now. That he has his goggles, too; a way to hide his true self just that extra bit more from the world's eyes. Because honestly, Kidou has no idea how to feel about this right now.
So, like Fubuki, he shrugs off having any emotional attachment or knowledge about this at all.
It's simplest for now.]
Bear killer, eh? That's quite the title.
Shirou Fubuki β Marchosias
[Except that, coupled with those answers, that flash of memory feels too vivid and real to completely ignore. It's not right. It can't be. That name, that life, none of it is his.
His name is Kouyuki Jin.
...a name that is similar in theme to Shirou Fubuki, and a name with a meaning that makes him double-take at this memory, recoiling so hard away from his chat room and this app and everything associated with it that he quite literally throws his phone across his bedroom.
It doesn't break, hitting a carpeted floor where it lies face up, interface glowing brightly in the still blackness, the only other lights filtering in from the street outside his window.
And that's how it stays and he'll stay for a while. One curled up with his sheets dragged over his knees and up to his chin, desperate to be ignored. The other taunting from its resting place, occasionally flickering in the dark as if to say I'm not done with you...]
Yuuto Kidou βΈ Eligor --> action...
That this might be the same person he'd been talking to doesn't cross his mind. What does cross his mind was they'd been back to that house not that long ago, and he'd watched in horror as monsters pulled or chased people out of that same house. They came from inside.
Why does he have his clothing? When he thinks about it, he can pull out that gun from before-
Suddenly his mind is racing with questions and hypothetical scenarios as he lets go of his phone on the bed and is racing out of his room. Terror spurs him on, barely caring about how loud his feet are as he tears down the hall and right to his older brother's room where he's sure that sound came from.
... but it's his - Michi's? older brother, so he stops there. The door is closed. He can't just barge in. He tries very hard to not be loud enough to wake up the house, but -]
Onii-san!
[There's no guarantees he was exactly that quiet, either. He's lucky their parents aren't light sleepers.]
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And then his brother's voice sounds from the other side, that is all it takes to finally draw a response from him. He answers Michi's urgency with a calm he could only ever produce as an older sibling, but one he's not entirely sure is believable. It's his responsibility to take care of his little brother, even if they were only born a few months apart. He can't worry him...]
Michi? Did I wake you up? Sorry about that...
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Jaune Arc β Eligor
[Ursa weren't exactly bears...they were worse. He wonders who this person is that's killed bears though. He can't help but admire them a little though...]
Shirou Fubuki β Marchosias
I wouldn't know anything about it.
[What he saw wasn't his life. Those weren't people he knew. They weren't friends or family, and that wasn't the school he attended. He wasn't anyone besides Kouyuki Jin. A dedicated athlete. And a loyal big brother. He was happy. He was surrounded by people whom he loved and loved him in return. He'd never felt before like he wasn't wanted. And he certainly hadn't ever killed a bear!]
Jaune Arc β Eligor
Shirou Fubuki β Marchosias
Jaune Arc β Eligor
Shirou Fubuki β Marchosias
Jaune Arc β Eligor
Shirou Fubuki β Marchosias
Jaune Arc β Eligor
Shirou Fubuki β Marchosias
Chikusa Kakimoto βΈ Astaroth
Shirou Fubuki β Marchosias
I wouldn't read into any of it. None of it's true.
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Shirou Fubuki β Marchosias
[...a few days ago he appreciated it. But this is not on par with beeping sheep.]
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Alucard β Marchosias
Shirou Fubuki β Marchosias
[The answer is pointed, even for text. But it feels like telling a lie, too. He doesn't remember killing any bear, but in that vision, being called a bear-killer hadn't felt out of place, either. In fact, the nickname felt so familiar that, when the hallucination had finally ended, Kouyuki's reaction had been visceral. He'd wanted nothing to do with anything so violent and had thrown his phone as far away from him as the walls in his bedroom would allow.]
I just remember someone calling me that. Someone...
[Come to think of it, wasn't that the same person he'd seen in his last vision? Only they weren't at odds then. In fact, that other boy had gotten hurt and he'd felt so much anger over it that he could barely contain himself.]
I saw them before. The first time I used this app.
Alucard β Marchosias
Shirou Fubuki β Marchosias
[That's a lie. It doesn't feel as fake to him as he wishes it did. Because if it actually felt fake, this would be a whole lot easier, wouldn't it?
If it didn't feel real, he wouldn't feel so afraid...]
I don't see why it matters. It's just going to happen again, isn't it? And keep happening.
Alucard β Marchosias
Shirou Fubuki β Marchosias
Jirou Sakuma β Dantalion
"I don't want to see you fall apart."
It's only after he's reminded about that that he remembers leaving for Liocott -- Fubuki and Midorikawa asking them to do their best in their places. And while that's a good memory, it's the only one he has of him -- his memories stop somewhere shortly after that.
Messaging him feels a little awkward, but if he's correct... then whoever the person Fubuki is right now can't remember him anyway. So he pushes down that little bit of anxiety and goes ahead.]
Sounds like you've got an impressive skillset.
Shirou Fubuki β Marchosias
It hurts more than I'll admit that they came looking for 'him' and don't really need me.
That wasn't true, was it?
An hour passes. Maybe two. He reads the responses over and over again when he can finally bring himself to venture near the phone that betrayed him. Unfortunately, by the time he gets to Dantalion's, the dam finally breaks...]
dont giv e me that!
what t ehe hell is impressiv eabout killing anythign!?
Jirou Sakuma β Marchosias
Sorry, I wasn't being serious.
Judging by your questionnaire, the person whose answers those are is protective. I think *that* is impressive.
Shirou Fubuki β Marchosias
it's really not
they're not very good at it if they have to ghat far
[He doesn't know if he really believes that, of course. Violence isn't something he condones, but he knows that if the people he cares about were ever threatened, he would even force mountains to their knees to protect them.
But that's the thing, isn't it? There's a difference between protecting someone, ensuring that they are safe and sound in mind and body, and going as far as to take a life and hurt someone or something else in the process. The questionnaire had said it was only in self-defense or the defense of others, that he hadn't enjoyed it, but he can't help wondering why the bear had to die at all. Why would he endorse the nickname and permit people to call him that if he wasn't proud of what he was capable of?
Maybe that was why that one boy had been yelling at him. He'd have yelled at him, too.]
Jirou Sakuma β Dantalion (pretend i didn't do that up there)
Shirou Fubuki β Marchosias (too late! πΊ one of us, one of us!)
Jirou Sakuma β Dantalion (woof woof motherfucker)
Shirou Fubuki β Marchosias
Lenka Utsugi β Eligor
01: shirou fubuki...
01: is it anything like your real name?
01: it doesn't sound like 'bear-killer'.
[When in doubt, go with something completely sideways from the deeper topics.]
Shirou Fubuki β Marchosias
And then it hits him. While he never saw the question, they admitted to answering something very similar, and their answer had been 7 just the same as him. Without catapults.
He smiles a little in the faint glow from his phone. Just a little. It doesn't last, because after a few moments more of reading that brief message he's struggling with not sniffling too loudly and giving his family cause for concern. He's relieved, though. That someone out there called him real and didn't sound too impressed by that title.
A part of him wishes he knew how to say thank you without admitting any of it bothered him in the first place. Though...maybe that's obvious by now after having sent some other replies?
He'll try not to think too hard about that as he types his response...and includes his number. There's an odd comfort in it now.]
9: A little, I guess...
9: Snow is a common theme between them.
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He hadn't read earlier conversation particularly closely, but from what he's seen so far just of the answers and his own experience... the second week is always upsetting.
He doesn't think he'll be able to help much, with his words, but he'll at least try.]
01: a little like me.
01: my names both have sky.
[He still doesn't know why. It's a strange sort of coincidence, and there hasn't been any time to dwell on it. It seems unimportant now, but...]
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9: I think.
9: Unless it isn't?
[Kouyuki likes the sky and the wind and the feeling of freedom that comes from both, but what if 01's name was something like his? Implying something unkind in the context of this app and its induced hallucinations. Calling him artificial.
He considers both of 'his' names. His real one, and the one this app has forced on him. Neither name is bad. He's always known what his own means, and he's never disliked it. In fact, before this app had appeared, he'd always thought it sounded a little festive and cute. More appropriate for a girl, sure, but he'd never let that bother him, just like he hadn't let the meaning bother him. So why is it so hard now not to be rattled by that meaning? Why can't he shrug it off the way he's always done before?]
9: Do you like them?
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