7 DAYS REMAIN

[cordibus]

Seven days remain. As the last day of the festival draws to a close, the only thing of interest to note for the week is how great everything has gone. Not a single attack has been reported...

But things have already been set alight inside the hearts of those chosen few who have received the app on their phones. For some, it's just the first bite of the apple. For others, it's been like shaking down an entire tree. Things are beginning to look...strange. Surely there are more burning questions on their minds by now.

The warning bells of the Nightly Curfew ring across the city. There's a faint hum from the phone this time before the icon appears. This time it displays a time: 1:00AM

The rest of the night is normal. Perhaps you've cuddled up with family, or you've gone to bed early to wait, but sure enough, time tick by right until 1 in the morning when....

You're back into that application again. A single question before you're even permitted to type anything else. And while it seems to be overwritten by something inside of you, it feels a lot more natural than before. Which is, truthfully...troubling.

WELCOME TO THE FINAL QUIZ!
Answer from the heart, the part of you that has been denied for far too long.

Is your life here a lie?
Yes | Definitely | Sure | I've had my doubts before, but yes | Hell Yes | There is no other conclusion | I wish I could deny it and live here peacefully but it's true.

Thank you...that will be all. Let us see what your heart blooms into...

Once you are done, you are tossed once more into the main chatroom. Now your user names are the names that you wrote down in the last survey, but with all those questions it's....hard not to think of them as your own. Maybe you'll be cursing at this device, but it looks like you're already deep down the rabbit hole by now.

[OOC: This is the final network post before Awakening. Users will now be able to speak of who they are in their AU life without the information being blocked by the application.

Additionally, while they will not get any new on their own, speaking with Luci might grant the Awakened more memories...be careful that they don't get more than they bargained for.]

Comments

[probablynoteren]

if all of us are students... i don't know.

[He actually doesn't know what to do next, even. It would be odd but funny if they were just about all at the same school; there's at least a few people with jobs, he thinks, irrelevantly.]

it is the biggest school.

[kouteipenguin]

It is yeah

[probablynoteren]

are you okay?

[You're a little (or a lot) more incoherent than usual...]

[kouteipenguin]

if I said yes you probably wouldn't believe me

no

[probablynoteren]

i don't think any of us are. after that question.

[He probably isn't; but a part of him continues to refuse to countenance its implications, even as his answer mocks him from the screen. He is nothing if not solidly stubborn, and difficult to shake when he's got his sights set on something, but this... he's definitely off-balance a lot more than he likes to admit.]

you're the one who decides if something is a lie. michi.

[kouteipenguin]

It's not! it isnt' even a decision!

[But why does he have that nagging feeling in the back of his mind that he's denying the truth?]

This app pretty much took over my phone. it doesn't get to take my life away too!

[probablynoteren]

it won't.

[A small part of him whispers, cautions against putting too much conviction into reassuring others. Can he, it asks, take responsibility if what he's telling them is wrong? If what he's telling himself is a lie? It's a very small part, though, and tonight he's done with the existentialism and quite ready to stay himself.]

even if what we're seeing are memories. you haven't forgotten anything, have you?

[kouteipenguin]

No... have you?

[probablynoteren]

no. they're still our memories. and our families and friends. that won't change.

[kouteipenguin]

Then what's with all this your life is a lie shit?

[probablynoteren]

that's what we need to find out. but i think there's more to it.

[He's not going to take something like that at face value, after everything app has pulled. Everything he's been through. Your life is a lie is, well, it's a bit last year -- is what he's thinking.]

[kouteipenguin]

I don't even know if I want to find out anymore.

no thats' not true I do want to find out

I have to. But I'm sick of being messed with

[probablynoteren]

we have to, i think.

[They can't run away from this. But they can stand against it together, and that's something (something that Focalor and Rhine have talked about, in different ways, but for now he lets it be simple).]

i'm going to find a way out of this city tomorrow. it may come from luci, but i want to see for myself.

[Implicit in that is the invitation: he's willing to share what he finds, or Michi can come see for himself.]

[kouteipenguin]

[With all his worry about people from the internet right now, this is one of the few he feels he can trust. It takes him a while to reply, maybe a long while.]

I want to go.

[probablynoteren]

[They've both laid themselves out on this app now, and Haruka is... maybe a little more impulsive than he should be with this. He's largely kept his head even when it's been filled with everything that he couldn't imagine even in his wildest dreams or nightmares; and then some of the most bizarre pop quizzes he's ever seen; but there's a constant. He's bad at sitting back.

There's a pause for thought, then:]

... okay. contact me here, and we'll arrange something outside of the app.

[That seems safest, and more efficient than swimming against the understandable chaos going on right now. Sent with the message is his personal e-mail address. In for a penny, in for a pound.]