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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citycenter) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
citylogs2023-07-01 11:00 am
Diner
thank goodness she didn't still spark when startledWhile she put one hand over her heart, as if that would somehow slow the hammering, she did her best to otherwise look... 'normal' as she walked further in and spotted the face behind the voice that had startled her, glad that she had finally found...
Except he had no uniform, was seated and was eating, so... not a worker?]
Oh really...?
[Yeah, she's still trying to process what he actually said while she so rudely screeched, give her a moment.]
no subject
his spoon's set down and he stands partway up from his seat, a frown on his face. ]
I apologize. I didn't mean to startle you. Are you looking for anything in particular?
[ maybe he can help her find it...it's the least he can do!! ]
no subject
So she tried to force a smile that she at least felt a little more than she had a minute ago, and waved at him to sit back down.]
This city is just so... empty. I didn't expect to actually run into anyone.
[Honestly, she had SO MANY QUESTIONS for this man who seemed to be accustomed to how things worked here, but now that the adrenaline was running out, the idea of food had her stomach growling.]
Is... the food good?
no subject
It's not bad, though I suspect part of that might be my hunger talking.
[ a man can only live off of grocery shelf dry goods for so long. ]
There's a few different dishes in the kitchen. You can take a look and see if any of them appeal to you. I'd offer to make something else but I've been told I'm not a very good cook.
[ so she's really better off eating whatever's already been set out. ]
no subject
I would feel bad asking that of someone anyway, so no worries. [Wait that sounded rude.] Oh, but, thank you for the offer? [smooth.]
[On entering the kitchen, she immediately spotted food set out, as if someone had just been cooking, and she couldn't help a slightly frustrated sigh in response. It looked good, and that was honestly part of the problem.]
Is this... really okay? I mean, was this really all just left here? Someone had to have made this, right?
no subject
I can pay for the cost of your meal, if that's what you're worried about.
[ it's not as though traveling with the astral express doesn't pay well, and he's learned to carry a little extra in his pocket for whenever march runs out of her allowance. although... ]
But I'm not sure they take the currency I usually carry. [ oh well. ] If it ends up being a problem, I'm sure we'll be able to work out a solution.
[ he's out here eating the food too, he's part of the problem. ]
no subject
In a strange new place, ripped out of nowhere, it was no weakness to admit needing help.
But as he continued, she glanced around and realized he had a point. It all looked familiar, but old, and she saw no way for a credit card or anything of the like, which was all she had on her.
And so, with a final sigh, she grabbed the closest plate of food to the door, some sort of quesadilla meal, and walked back out to the main area, hesitating a moment on seeing the man again, somewhere between his table and another nearby.
They can both be part of the problem.]
I'll.. just keep a tally, I guess. For if it ends up being a problem. All I have is a useless card.
no subject
when the woman comes back out with food in hand and takes her own seat, he offers up another smile. ]
You never know, the card might come in handy if we manage to leave this place. For now, it's better to make sure we'll well-fed and well-rested in case something happens.
no subject
It really does look good, she couldn't remember the last time she had one.]
Well... yeah, I definitely don't want to lose it, though if I'm somewhere that I can use it again, that probably means I'm back home, so this would all feel kind of... moot?
[She has no experience with parallel universes and hasn't put the idea that this could be one together, sorry Welt.
His last comment gets a sigh, but a nod.]
That's true. Hopefully whoever owns all this would prefer us not to be starving till they get back. [Assuming they were brought here by someone, for a purpose. Then something else occurs to her and she frowns slightly.]
Wait, do you think something's going to happen?
no subject
I hope nothing bad will happen, but the fact of the matter is we've all been brought here with no explanation why and with no means of leaving. It's hard not to find all of this at least a little suspicious.
[ but maybe that's also because he's just a worrier at heart, always concerned about the safety of the people around him. either way, talking about all the (bad) things that could possibly happen probably isn't helping to put her mind at ease, and he smiles apologetically. ]
But there's not much we can do about it now, so there's no need to worry about it over much. Hopefully I didn't ruin your appetite.
no subject
Ah, I was worried you saw something that made you think a bad 'something' was much more immediately coming.
[Unfortunately, if there were signs, they probably wouldn't notice them till it was too late. Or know how to deal with them.]
Have to get my energy back just in case something happens I need to freak out about later, right? [Definitely joking now, and she finally takes a bite of her food too, surprised by how good it was.]
no subject
I haven't sensed anything that would pose a large threat to us yet.
[ though....he really hasn't been able to sense much recently, all his powers feeling as though they've been crammed under several layers of cotton. not a problem so long as this city stays inert as it has been, but it makes him feel uneasy nonetheless. ]
Though if there was anything, I doubt I would be of much use. I'm just an old man with a cane.
[ so they both better hope nothing happens. but enough talk about what could be. he nods towards her plate. ]
How's the food?
no subject
You have experience then, and probably knowledge other people don't have. I'm sure you'd be of use!
[She may not know you but she believes in you!]
Ah, it's good, thanks.
[Though that does seem to make a thought occur to her, and she sets down the piece of quesadilla she was eating and opens it up to check what's inside. Seems normal enough, thankfully.]
no subject
That's true. Knowledge can be power in many situations.
[ Literally, for him—or it had been, before he'd arrived. Now things are a little...trickier. But that's something he can investigate later, on his own time. ]
Though most of my knowledge lies in the history of various civilizations. That's usually not all that interesting to young people like you, or so I've been told.
(i was SO OFFENDED when March stopped him from explaining Luofu stuff, let the nerdy man talk!)
That is, until his next comment. If a person could have absolute stars in their eyes, Althea had them while she looked up again quickly.]
What kind of civilizations? Like ancient history or more contemporary? Do you know much about technology or just the social events?
[Good luck getting rid of her now, sir.]
LMAO march just had too many other things to do to listen to an old man ramble u_u
A little of both. [ To both those things. ] I'm more familiar with human civilization, but that's only because I haven't gotten too much of a chance to study others.
[ Maybe if he'd stayed on the Express longer... ]
Though there must be some sort of history to be found in this place, even if recent. [ The cogs in his brain are already beginning to turn. ] Is that your field of interest too, history?
no subject
His phrasing however, catches her off guard and her eyes go wide again.]
Human civilization? So... Does that mean aliens or more like some supernatural elements that aren't fully human? [She's confused, but fascinated about what he could mean.]
You would think so. I'm hoping to go out looking later, but I knew I wouldn't be able to focus while hungry. And mostly I just like hearing people talk about their interests but... I guess it's an interest, yeah. My expertise is more with technology, but some uh... events, a long time ago, made me curious about what was happening and for how long, and one thing led to another. [She ended lamely, with a quiet chuckle, but she wasn't sure how much to say otherwise.]
no subject
That's right, though I wouldn't blame you for doubting the existence of aliens. Most people would have a hard time believing they're real without some sort of proof.
[ Which, sadly, he doesn't have on him. ]
Truthfully I haven't explored as much as I would have liked to. There are still so many universes and species out there that remain a mystery, so I probably wouldn't be able to tell you as much as you'd like. But if you ever have any questions, I'm happy to answer them as best I can.
[ But enough about him. ]
Technology's a pretty useful thing to be knowledgeable about. Any area of it in particular?
no subject
Well... normally, sure, but with everything I've seen and now, being wherever here is? I don't think the existence of aliens is out of the realm of possibility.
[And... she feels like she believes him. Probably not the smartest move, considering everything happening, but he seemed genuine and kind-hearted.
and they'd be able to talk about nerdy things! yay!]Careful, I might start pestering you with random questions at odd times, you don't want to encourage that.
[Said mostly as an, admittedly self deprecating, joke, but she couldn't entirely deny that there was a small part of her worried about being 'too' excited, especially when she didn't even know the man's name.
At his return question, she tilted her head slightly, thinking.]
Well, I guess it's easiest to say that I can fix most things that run on your standard electricity. Circuits, wires, transistors, that kind of thing: I know electricity really well. Which isn't nearly as fun to talk about, unfortunately.