A TRAIN COMES INTO THE STATION.
You wake up on a train.
Your phone is buzzing. It's in your pocket, in your hand, on the seat next to you. It's a normal phone, and you're on a normal train car. One of the lights flickers, a little further down. The world is very quiet. It feels like you're right where you're meant to be. On the phone's surface is a white screen and the words—
WELCOME TO THE CITY. BEGIN ORIENTATION?
▶ NO
Please take a moment to complete your orientation.
Once you're finished, the subway doors slide open to let you out onto the train platform. To your right, the platform continues on and eventually ends; to the left is a set of stairs that will lead you up into the station itself. The platform is quiet, clean, empty—there's no one else around, and the only sounds you can hear are your own footsteps, your own breaths, and the occasional faraway sound of a creaking pipe or rush of air. The train you disembarked will stay there as long as you do, its doors still open, until you finally decide to venture up into this new locale.
As you make your way up the stairs to your left, you find yourself in the belly of City Hall station. The station is large, a sprawling underground mini-metropolis of corridors and storefronts. Here, you may find others like you, freshly-arrived city residents from other realms (or even your own). There is also a subway map, which will give you an idea of the layout of the neighborhood, and ticketing machines, which can currently only be used to buy tickets to a handful of stations located on lines 1, 2, and 9.
If you're hungry or in need of any kind of supplies, there are plenty of storefronts inside the subway station as well—snack stands, convenience stores, restaurants, clothing stores, a pharmacy, and a variety of empty shops that may or may not have ever been in use. Everything is unlocked, and you can take whatever you need.
Characters may stay on the train platform indefinitely, and may re-board and re-disembark from the subway as many times as they like, but the train will not depart nor will the doors close. Once they go up the stairs into the train station, they may hear the train doors closing and the train departing. Another train will not arrive, no matter how long the character waits. Only once they come up the stairs into the station itself may characters encounter their fellow newly-arrived residents and take advantage of what the city has to offer.
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WELCOME TO THE NEIGHBORHOOD.
The station is located in the city center. It has three major exits that lead to areas of interest in the district, but there are several other smaller exits that lead in other directions around the neighborhood. You are welcome to use any of them, but may find the north, southwest, and east exits to be the most welcoming.
TO THE NORTH
The northern entrance to the station leads up into the sunlight and puts you out in a brickwork plaza. There's a modest building in front of you, three or four stories of stone with a welcoming facade. There's a sign above the entryway—it says City Hall. You may be tempted to explore, if you're interested in learning more about the city and how it functions, but prepare to find yourself disappointed—the folders in the records rooms are full of empty, blank sheets of paper, and the logbooks and balance sheets are similarly devoid of information.
Immediately to the southwest of City Hall, you will find a small building that houses the tourist information kiosk. It looks welcoming, with an inviting glass facade and a sign above the entryway announcing it as the "TOURIST CENTER." It's a humble building with a receptionist's desk on the back wall opposite the entrance, empty magazine shelves lining the side walls, and a few spinning brochure racks full of blank pamphlets. Anyone is welcome to peruse the tourist literature, though they won't offer much information, being primarily filled with pictures of the surrounding area—City Hall, the park, a statue garden, and the surprisingly heavily-featured cemetery. There are a few sentences sprinkled throughout about basic offerings of the city, such as apartment complexes and office buildings, as well as a few maps with the same limited scope as the larger version on the wall behind the receptionist's desk.
The main feature of the tourist center is the interactive kiosk installed dead in the center, right in the middle of a few rows of uncomfortable chairs that fill the small room. It's noticeably in the way of any would-be foot traffic through the tourist center, and something about the technology seems a little more modern than the computer behind the desk or the landline phone on the wall. The kiosk is a tall silver rectangle, about average adult height, and the upper half is a screen welcoming visitors to touch it to activate the kiosk. If you were to touch it, the screen would come to life with simple dialogue inviting visitors to ask it their questions.
However, residents should note that the kiosk is only programmed to assist with exploration within the available areas of the city. It may not be able to answer every question, and tampering with the kiosk may result in unreliable or inaccurate answers!
TO THE SOUTHWEST
The western exit of the station takes you up into a city park, lush and green with a very light fog still hanging about the trees. There are lampposts on the walkways and benches where you could rest, and plenty of flora, although you can neither see nor hear any signs of animal life. You walk the paths that meander idly through the verdant grass and you feel a sense of peace, some of your unease about this place easing into a pleasant calm. The air smells fresh, like it's recently rained, and you'll find the grass ever so slightly damp should you decide to take a seat.
As you make your way deeper into the park, the trees grow denser and the smell of soil and plant life grows stronger. This is the older part of the park, very nearly a forest, with ivy climbing the trunks of the trees and plants and shrubs growing riotously around their bases. As you turn a corner, you find yourself first in the statue garden, although the statues are harder to see now, choked as they are with ivy. There are many statues, some partially obscured, some fully—very few of them still stand free of the vines and clinging roots. (It doesn't feel quite as peaceful here.) If a statue's face looks a little bit familiar, you may not want to look at it too long.
Continue down the path and you will find yourself in a graveyard, one that seems centuries old. Most of the headstones are worn away by time and covered in moss, rendering them impossible to read. The few that are free of moss are blank, or bear only suggestions of names too faint to be understood. (Was that the name of—no, it couldn't have been. Could it?) Many of the headstones stand at an angle or are toppled over completely, having been subjected to either strong winds or the roots of the trees that grow up from some of the graves, spreading branches toward the sky.
TO THE EAST
The final exit of the station, to the east, puts you out on a quiet surface street. Are you hungry? Or are you paralyzed by choice? There are plenty of restaurants, offering options of almost any food you can imagine. You could try a convenience store—it's well stocked, and the items there seem free for the taking. How about a restaurant? There's no one to take your order, but when you look in the kitchen, there's something on the stove, and it's just what you've been craving. Imagine that.
A few blocks down, you come in through the lobby of a tall building and find yourself in a corporate office. The fluorescent lights are steady and unforgiving, and the cubicles and offices are empty. There are a few pieces of paper on desks, a few folders left in organizers, but everything is perfectly blank. Despite how empty and quiet the office is, it nonetheless gives you the feeling that just a few minutes ago, this place was bustling with workers going about their daily business.
You enter another building and find yourself in the lobby of an apartment complex—finally, a place to rest. The first door you try opens easily into a completely empty living room, freshly vacuumed but without a single piece of furniture. It's a nice apartment, quiet, but with a little too much echo for your taste, maybe. Still, and perhaps oddly, you have no trouble envisioning what life here would be like.
The second door you open leads to an apartment that feels lived-in. Why does it feel lived-in? It's fully furnished with items that seem to go together perfectly, true, but the feeling is more than that—the room feels like someone was just here, maybe standing right in the kitchen only moments before you swung the door open. The air is a perfectly comfortable temperature, and it somehow smells like home despite that you've never once set foot here before. The refrigerator is stocked, and the cabinets are full of spices and flatware and kitchen utensils.
As you look around the living room, you find that there are pictures in frames on the walls and some of the flat surfaces—a seascape, a field, a shot of a city park bench. In each of the photos there's something just slightly wrong with the angle, as though the photographer were aiming for a subject that can no longer be seen.
Characters are welcome to explore the district around the City Hall subway station to their heart's content. The City Hall building itself contains several floors of offices and file rooms, but none of them contain any particularly interesting information. Nonetheless, characters may wish to team up with other newcomers and try to find some hints about the nature of the city. They can also spend a while in the park, the statue garden, or the graveyard. In the blocks surrounding the station there are plenty of options for food and housing, as well as office buildings, storefronts, and alleyways to look around. There are no workers in any of the buildings, and there does not seem to be an honor system for payment, nor any consequences for taking food from the stores or setting up camp in an apartment or office building.
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SO A TURKEY WALKS INTO A BOWLING ALLEY...
There's a bowling alley open in the newly-accessible district, and you're invited to come test your mettle!
Walking into the lobby, you're struck by a peculiar combination of scents—shoe polish, floor wax, pretzels and nachos, and something pungent and a little oily. On the wall behind the desk is a shelf full of pair after pair of shoes, in every size you could possibly imagine, and there's a low rack filled with brightly-colored, heavy bowling balls that are ready for the taking. You can also hear the low hum of machinery and the rattle of pins being reset every time someone knocks them down, the bowling alley a well-oiled machine despite the fact that no one seems to be manning it.
You can bowl alone, start a match play (1-v-1), or bowl as a team, but you'll quickly find that bowling is much more fun (and somehow easier) when you're playing with others. Maybe it's because being around other people raises your spirits, but you feel more confident when you step up to bowl, and you find that when you're playing as part of a team, the bowling ball travels faster and in a straighter line, and you seem to be making strikes and spares with much greater frequency. Teamwork really does make the dream work!
If you occasionally see what you think might be the shadow of someone passing behind the machinery at the far end of the lane, don't worry about it—that's probably just your imagination.
If you stop by the bowling alley at night, you will find the place totally transformed. There's a disco ball hanging from the ceiling and brightly-colored lights flashing and dancing around the floor and walls. Any white parts of your clothing glow a delightful blueish color, and you find that you're illuminated in all kinds of interesting shades by the blacklight bulbs glowing in the ceiling. This is cosmic bowling, truly not for the faint of heart!
When you've finished bowling, you may want to stop by the snack area for a pretzel or hot dog, a soda, or—if you're there for cosmic bowling—maybe even a more adult beverage from the food counter on the far end of the building.
There isn't anything especially spooky about the bowling alley—except, of course, being forced to wear shoes that have been worn by a hundred strangers before. Characters are welcome to find their shoe size, grab a bowling ball, and go to town! Characters who come during the day will encounter a normal bowling alley, but they can always come back at night to get the full cosmic bowling experience. There will always be shoes in their sizes, the pins will reset themselves, and the balls will always be returned. Just be careful, those ball chutes can crush your fingers if you're not careful!
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WILDCARD.
The city is by no means small, and there are plenty of things for you to see. There's no rush in exploring, so feel free to take your time looking around and peering into various nooks and crannies and alleyways—and don't worry, you're not very likely to find anything peering back.
If none of the above prompts appeal, feel free to check out the Locations and Maps pages and write your own freestyle prompt using one or many of the available locations.
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citylogs2023-07-01 11:00 am
Alhaitham | Genshin Impact
[It's not a dream, though he almost mistakes it for one as he blinks away the tiredness of his nap. Even with his relatively lacking experience with dreaming, however, it's quickly clear things are too vibrant and consistent. Nor would he expect his own mind to come up with such a strange place.
So, he needs answers. And the forced "orientation" in fact, gives nothing useful. He doesn't move with any hurry, though, taking his time to inspect the subway cart, the tunnel, and the station once he finally ascends the steps. There's people here, and many seem confused. All right.
He stands a bit off from the crowd, where he can watch the people passing around to look into station shops or find the exit.
Ultimately he can only guess if he's found someone who knows anything. If he finds someone who doesn't look totally lost, however, that's when he approaches.]
I'm looking for some information on this place. Can you tell me where we are?
[II. City Hall]
[Once it's clear this place is a ghost town, Alhaitham has no qualms about going into places that he wouldn't be allowed in normally: like a records room.
He's pulled open multiple cabinets, folders of blank papers haphazardly strewn about any flat surface as he tries to find information in any of them. But it's just pages and pages of blank sheets, which is an anomaly in itself. If this were a city once lived in (or in fact, real), surely there must be some actual remnants of the systems that glued their society together. Instead, the more empty folders he digs through, the more this seems like only a facsimile of a city.
He only pauses for a minute when he hears someone at the door, looking up at them for a second before turning to return to the drawer he's pulling more folders out of.] Don't bother with any of the folders already out, I've looked through them and they're all blank.
[III. Statue Garden]
[With everything being so unfamiliar to Alhaitham, the things that are recognizable stand out all the more. Like a statue with a face too familiar when he pulls away the ivy. It makes him uneasy--and yet, when he thinks about it, something is odd even about that.
He needs more data to put together a conclusion. Alhaitham pulls his attention away from it after a minute and weaves through the statues until he comes across someone else who seems to be inspecting one of them.] Is there something interesting about that statue?
[IV. Wildcard]
[For anything else, Alhaitham can reasonably end up anywhere trying to pull answers out of this place or test the limits of its weirdness, though he's not likely to approach others just for friendly conversation. Feel free to PM if you want to plot something specific!]
I
Camille, casually observing from a bench with his legs crossed, finds his thoughts interrupted by a voice directed his way. He's ready with a smile that is a little wry, almost apologetic, but not unfriendly. ]
The City. [ He gives just a moment for that to sink in, before explaining further in his soft tone. ] —At least, that's all it's called on the spare couple of maps that have been found. You're in what I assume is the city heart, as City Hall is just over there- [ He indicates with a manicured hand behind him, bracelet clinking softly as he does, ] -and this district is uniquely circular in design according to aforementioned maps.
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Are there only city maps, or larger ones that cover the country? [It'll be worth reviewing regardless, but he needs more information to try and pinpoint this place, relative to where he was. If it can even be done.]
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There are not even maps of the entire city available, only the district we're in now with a glimpse of the surrounding districts. [ Camille gestures once more, this time to one side. The motion is a subtle one, not quite resigned. ] There's a kiosk that answers questions about the city, but it has been useless for anything beyond what can already be accessed. [ And yes he says 'can be accessed' as though entire swaths of the city are blocked off somehow. ]
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[There must be some barrier. But before he wastes time trying to test the outer limits, he'd better find out what other people have already done.]
iii
gepard's usually not one to investigate such places, but given the lack of information all around and the strange atmosphere of the entire city, he makes it his mission to at least find something. he won't be able to sleep peacefully at night, if ever.
he turns his attention away from the statue in front of him at the sudden question, glancing at the source of the voice before looking back at the stone monument. ]
No, it just looks very ...
[ familiar? even though much of its features have been weathered away? he shakes his head. ] I must have been imagining a face on it.
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[ gepard trails off, shaking his head again. never mind.
his eyebrows furrow as he studies the statue once more. familiar is an understatement, but maybe, just maybe his eyes are imposing an image on it—the way it stands, its arms held out. he seems to be far away from home, so it wouldn't surprise him if his mind is seeking things that are familiar. ]
... Somewhat, though I've never seen a statue like this in my life before.
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[Though it's the phenomenon around that he wants to study. Gepard isn't the best control group if everything else about the statue is just as weird, though.] Does it unsettle you?
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[ in a manner that's rather challenging to describe, like words on the tip of his tongue but refuses to form a logical sentence. there's something wrong with this place, his instincts tell him, but as to what it is, he's yet to find out. ]
But I suppose it's because I've been staring at it for a while now.
[ and that's weird. ofc it is. ] That's what the mind does when one's too fixated on an idea or image.
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Alhaitham turns to the statue again with a critical eye. Just as before, all he sees is a vague stone figure.] So is it the statue you're fixated on, or the person?
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but gepard unfortunately has no answer to that, himself too plagued with indecision. he also doesn't want to think about it for too long, unwilling to settle on a conclusion he doesn't want to hear or consider. ]
The statue.
[ right, the statue it is. ]
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ii
Instead she sighs and walks in a few more steps, glancing around to see what he's looked through and what's strewn across the table.]
I've been looking around in other rooms, same thing. Since the... 'information kiosks' outside basically give nothing as well, I don't imagine any computers would be much better, but...
[But she'd still look, because what if it did? Still, for the moment, all she could do was press the heels of her hands into her eyes for a moment and sigh again.]
Whoever, or whatever, did this must really hate trees.
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[The trees... if they're even real trees.
He tosses another blank-page folder to the desk. It's starting to get annoying.] What's a computer?
/i love him lmaooooo
[Note to self, never joke again because apparently she's bad at it. Thanks Alhaitham.
this is her own fault don't mind her][At least his next question is something she can logically focus on, even if it confuses her almost as much as his first comment. Still, if she was pulled to.. wherever this was, with no rhyme or reason, it made sense others would be too and that they couldn't all possibly be from the same place she was.]
It's... complicated, but basically it's a series of electronic components that allow you to do a lot of things. In this case, they're often used to digitize files. I was hoping to find some of those to search through as well, but I have a feeling they'd be just as blank as these files are.
<3 Bless Althea for dealing with this
Electronic, huh... [He pauses to consider that.] There was some machine at the front desk when I passed by. Would that be it?
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Although, I am still worried it'll just be blank as well. And even if it's not, it could be password protected, or could be missing a power supply, or...
[At least her generally anxious nature would help her not get her hopes up too high.]
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she doesn't know WHAT to make of him, I love this
Well, I was going to look through the paper files first, which would go faster with two people, but if you don't want the help, and you don't want to know what's on the computer, then fine, I can go.
The true Alhaitham experience. Ur doing great Althea
Hope this is ok! lmk if you have a different idea or want to change anything
All good!
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((Idk if you wanna wrap up here or if you have more? It feels like it's hitting a good point :) ))
That's good with me! We can handwave Computer 101
ii
can’thas nothing to read. He reaches to take one of the blank papers and holds it up to the light, as if expecting some sort of invisible writing to appear, )I wonder where the words went.
( And he lowers it, leveling his eyes with Alhaitham, )
Or if there were ever any at all.
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This is quite the stage, then.
( He tilts his head curiously to one side, )
Do you think we’re supposed to be the actors?
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I've met some people. Almost all of them are from unfamiliar worlds... but not a single soul from this one.
(He doesn't sound particularly bothered by this. He's always been known for being reliably calm and that isn't going to change here,)
If we're actors that don't know our roles, though... How good are you at improvising?
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[That doesn't actually answer the question, but it's the answer he's giving.]