Welcome To The Village

[number_2]

Who: Everyone who was signed-up for the excursion
What: The Village December Excursion
When: Dec 1st - Dec 23rd
Where: The Village
Warnings: Involuntary capture and confinement including immobilization and restraints, violence, injury, maiming, possibility of death, torture, coercion, gaslighting, mind control, drugging, scientific experiments, and extremely inaccurate depictions of mental health facilities/hospitals, among other potentially triggering themes. Please mark all threads appropriately.




"Good morning, good morning, good morning!" A voice that sounds very similar to Friday's chirps over a loudspeaker outside your character's home. Yes, their home.

Overnight, all the passengers who signed up for this excursion have been transported to their very own personal cottages. They will awake in a bed that is familiar to them. While this home of theirs does not necessarily have to resemble the place they were born or raised, it will be a perfect replica of a place they truly thought of as their home, down to the most minute details.

The cottages are self-contained, the size of a large studio apartment so, in some cases, they may only resemble the bedroom and living room of a person's home with a shrunken-down kitchenette and bathroom adjoined. But the heirlooms of their past are here. A favorite doll? A treasured family portrait? Trinkets you have long forgotten about? All of them will be here, somehow. (All except for weapons, that is.) They are indistinguishable from the real item, down to the molecule.

After that wake-up call, the voice continues on to express that the weather will be warm and sunny, with no rain forecasted. A brass band concert is announced, to start at noon on the lawn next to the living chess set. And once that bit of news is wrapped up, lively marching band music will begin to play. And it will continue to play. All day. From every speaker...including the ones hidden in their home.

Welcome to Your Village

It only gets stranger from here. Characters may be dismayed to find that they are without any of their original clothes or belongings. They awake in conservative button-up pajamas. The closet in their home is full of the latest Village Fashion to choose from. Everything is The Village label brand, including the tin cans of food that stock the kitchen and any of the groceries you could get at the General Store.

Your ship phone rings. When you answer it, you will be greeted, once again, by the voice of Friday. "Your number, please? Of course, you have a number. Look at your badge." If they look down at their chest, they will discover a small round number badge has been pinned to their pajamas. Was that there before? It bears the symbol of a Penny-farthing Bicycle, with a number in the spokes. This is their number.

"No names here," the voice of Friday chides, "Only numbers. Number 2 would like a word with you at the Green Dome. He requests you come for breakfast. Thank you!" Before they can protest further, the line goes dead.


Some Notes:

No matter how many times your character tries to take off and disregard their number badge, they will always find it re-attached to their clothes again the moment they look away and look back.

Your characters still have their phones but now they can only make calls instead of sending texts. They also do not take or store photographs anymore.

If your character destroys or damages anything in their home, or in The Village it will instantly repair the way things used to on the Serena Eterna.

The noise from the speakers can be muffled by covering it with pillows or other creative items, but cannot be stopped entirely. (Sorry Phil)

Comments

[pointofhonoria]

Christ does Crabb hate the way this one talks about this stuff, the way she talks about Erin. She's worried about how this will play out, of course she is. She might even be outright scared of how they're going to patch up the holes this will inevitably have caused. But she hasn't got the patience for all that talk as if Erin's a lost bloody cause.

"Lady, if she up and started complyin' with a place like this? We'd already've bleedin' lost the woman I fell in love with. So, can it. We ain't here to stay. And we sure as Hell ain't here to bow over to another corrupt bastard in the meantime."

[crushed_pearls]

44 turns her head in sharp interest, something cunning in her eyes. The shadows of her hair writhe and squirm, raining something not enough like maggots onto the ground where they burn in the sun. "Not here to stay. Confident about that, are you?"

[pointofhonoria]

Crabb meets her gaze without flinching. "As confident as I'm bettin' you are in the opposite."

[crushed_pearls]

"Maybe I'm curious as to the evidence you have to back that up, Detective 9," 44 prompts, back to being Playful. "People aren't generally in the business of leaving heaven."

[pointofhonoria]

Another snort, even more dismissive than the last. "Heaven. Really. That's what you're tryna sell me, here?"

[crushed_pearls]

"Pfft, no. It's one of Number 2's less favorite words, he's big on -" jazz hands, "utopia. But I tell you, what's the functional difference? If you build the perfect society, that's heaven. But here's you dodging the question again."

[pointofhonoria]

"There ain't never been an excursion most've us ain't come back from, dead or alive. And this ain't a do-over, neither; there's some of the passengers that Captain's got the least bleedin' patience for still back on that boat that he ain't given up. He ain't even bored with us yet."

And his boyfriend is here, on this trip, as well as multiple people he seems to consider friends against whatever his version of better judgement is. But she's keeping that to herself.

[crushed_pearls]

"Fa-sci-nating." 44 rocks back on her heels, then leans in, smiling a big smile. "Why here, then, d'ya think? Y'all got a big moral to lean in utopia? Does Daddy just need a biiiiig nap so his good friend Number 2 is babysitting? No one here seems to be having a good time, after all, with our lovely weather and pretty Village and even little tastes of home."

[pointofhonoria]

"Since when is any trip the Captain sends anyone on for anythin' but making the lot of us suffer s'more, huh?"

She has to wonder, now, if Vickie has no idea that her boss has his favourite plaything back in his grasp or if they're both dodging that detail at once, waiting for the other to let it slip first.

[crushed_pearls]

"Gee, I do wonder, I say, still on an excursion that wasn't that."

[pointofhonoria]

This whole conversation has at least proved that it really is former passengers, not people sourced other ways, that have been stuck here long-term. Must have been part of 2's deal.

"Like I said, we still got folks who didn't sign up. Whatever went down with you lot, this ain't it."

[crushed_pearls]

"Mmm. Interesting perspective, Number 9. I was gonna flirt a bit harder but somethin' tells me I blew my shot, probably the 'woman I love' line. I can hate 23 as much as I want, even I ain't enough of a thug to think I've got a shot after dissing a lass's girl in front of her. So here's the deal: you let me do my job, and I'll just do my job. Fair enough?"

[pointofhonoria]

"Hell other choice do I even have, huh? Like I said, I ain't stupid, didn't come into this pickin' for a fight for a reason."

She can't stop her any more than she can get Erin out of this situation entirely, right now. She just wanted to know what they were dealing with.

[crushed_pearls]

"There's always a choice. You could throw hands, grab your friends, seduce me - still open to that - commit arson, whatever. But I wanna get along, and you, you gotta keep her leaving that house, so: deal?"

[pointofhonoria]

With a still clinging awareness of Lost and their potential relationship with deals, Crabb rather specifically avoids just answering with an affirmative. Just in case. "I'll keep doin' what I've been doing."

[crushed_pearls]

"Good enough. Be seeing you, handsome." She tips a cheery wave. "Now let me work."

[pointofhonoria]

Jaw twitching just a tad, Crabb steps away to actually do what she came here to do and see Erin. She really hopes her confidence that this isn't permanent isn't unearned.