August Event

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Please let August be better than July I'm begging

✽ Due to 10+ classes raising their ranks last month, ALL characters have access to the courtyard via the door in the locker area and the windows facing the courtyard.
✽ Characters with 1-10 tallies are not able to get any further past the end of the courtyard before they fall unconscious; characters with 10-20 can get halfway to the pool building before the same happens to them; characters with 20+ tallies can reach the pool building but unfortunately, the door is on the other side. There are no windows on the walls, but from the clocktower, characters can see that it has a glass ceiling, though they are unable to see inside.
✽ Outside, there is no breeze, and it occasionally rains ash.
✽ Characters going up to the 4th floor will feel that the door is warm to the touch, and will occasionally open (see: missions)
✽ The student store opens, with the door propped open with a doorstopper. The npc running the store is currently not interested in conversation, but may be available for threading in the future and is available for threading in the toplevel below. Please see the updated bonus activity page for more information.
✽ Posted on the bulletin board and also handed to each club president before break is the notice that proof of club activity is due at the end of break. Please submit these proofs in the toplevel below.
✽ There is another ad on the bulletin board advertising an exchange student program for the month of October. Applications will be taken until the end of August, and there is a 300 merit point fee. Sister cities include Death City, Devildom, Ishigami Village, Lanling, LazyTown, and Maiami City.

Comments

[thetyger]

N-no! No!

[He shouldn't be frightened of this small girl, but he absolutely is.]

I didn't know how to pronounce it! I'm not- m-making fun of it...

[He stops half-way through apologising to Stephanie, poorly and before he gets to the actual apology, because something clicks.]

You're from... LazyTown?

[Looking at the flyer again, he confirms his own place of residence isn't on there, but even so...]

Are these other places... where people have been taken from? To end up here, I mean.

[closewithnewintown]

[she looks at him curiously for a moment, taking in the reaction.]

... Yeah, that's my home. I've lived there with my uncle for two years. [pause] Our school only has four kids, now that I'm gone, but you could pick a worse place to stay.

[glances over the list] Hm... Well, that village is named after Senku, and that other one has to be where Lucifer's from. The others must be for other people.

[thetyger]

So it does mean something.

[What, he doesn't know.]

A-anyway, I'm Atsushi Nakajima. It's nice to meet you.

[He bows awkwardly, and that might not be a custom in this "LazyTown", but it's instinctual, when he remembers to introduce himself.]

[closewithnewintown]

I'm Stephanie Meanswell! [she answers the bow with a slight curtsy. because it's very much not the custom, and she's still learning things.]

Everything here always means something.... I just hope it doesn't mean they're bringing anybody from my home here... I don't want that anymore. [because she would much rather miss trixie than see her die for real.]

[thetyger]

[Atsushi doesn't have much in the way of friends, and no family, but he can understand not wanting to subject them to dangerous situations, even if they could give emotional support. It's the last part that concerns him.]

Anymore? Did something happen?

[What kind of place is this?]

[closewithnewintown]

The elevator here can take you to a bad version of your world, and when it took me to mine, I watched my best friend get torn to pieces by robot dogs.

[just said incredibly matter-of-factly]

It's okay, because it's fake. But, if that happened for real, I don't know what I'd do. So, I'd rather all my friends stay back home, where they're safe from this place.

[thetyger]

[Atsushi has seen, and been subjected to, terrible things and he should be used to the existence of them and unaffected by the mention of robot dogs ripping a little girl apart. But he's not. For a second, he looks like he's going to be sick, Stephanie's tone about it not helping in the least. Things are all the more horrible when discussed so nonchalantly. Even if it was fake, she had seen it.]

T-that's awful! I'm so sorry!

[She didn't seem that upset about it, but oh my god.]

[closewithnewintown]

[she cocks her head to the side.]

... I feel like if I tell you, "I've seen worse," you might start crying.

[a strained grin] When lots of bad things keep happening, you have to sorta... put how you feel into a box, and put it away for later, when you're all by yourself. If people think you're weak, they'll take you even less seriously than normal.

[and that is why she has been actively trying to deaden her emotional responses for two months.]

[thetyger]

So have I.

[And to think this kid is more jaded about it that he is does make him want to cry. He's seen what that kind of emotional repression can do to people.]

I-if you do that, if you don't feel it, keep it hidden... It doesn't change that whatever happened still did. I don't think it's weak to show that it got to you. What if you keep doing that, and one day you don't feel anything at all?

[closewithnewintown]

[the grin strengthens, if only for a second.]

You're right. It's not weak, not really. And that's how things should be. [sighs] It's not like that, here. The nice people treat you like a baby, and the mean people use it to hurt you.

... It's fine, though. I'll just go back to normal once everybody is safe.

[thetyger]

[He gives her a little half smile, but he won't argue with her coping mechanisms.]

I know I just got here, but... I want everyone to be safe too.

[closewithnewintown]

We will be. I know we will be.

[off-handedly] You didn't just get here. You just woke up. There's a difference.

[thetyger]

I don't know. I don't think those are real memories, being here.

[No one can exist on two separate timelines at once, can they? One set of memories have to be completely made up and implanted somehow.]

[closewithnewintown]

That's what I thought. And if any of the grownups bring it up, that's what I'm gonna keep saying. But... [sighs] Someone I really, really trust told me I've been here a lot longer than I think. He wouldn't lie.

[thetyger]

Hmm.

[It's something to think about, that alternative possibility.]

I guess we won't really know without some kind of definitive proof.

[closewithnewintown]

I'm not even sure what "proof" would be... I've figured that if I was here before, I would've kept a diary, because I always do that. But, I've looked; I haven't found one.

... The only real way to learn would be to remember. Even if we were here, if we don't remember... It doesn't really count, does it?

[thetyger]

I guess not.

[This is a "wait and see" situation.]