redmarsshit | june 2020. welcome to the void.

june 2020. welcome to the void.

Redshift: Welcome to the v͖͕̺̲̘̱̜͎o̴̦̣̠̦̘̹͞i̯̖d̛̪̬͈̱̦̝͍̕.

▶ Click here to read what characters will experience when arriving in Anchor.

▶ All TDM threads can be considered game canon, and current players are welcome to either top-level on the TDM so prospective players can tag them, or use the prompts for logs or network posts on the communities. All threads on the TDM can be used for Activity Check.

a. welcome to paradise.

What at first appears to be an odd glint in the sky over Anchor slowly broadens and brightens into a truly enormous...cruise ship? Yes, that's a cruise ship, and it's coming down to rest just outside of Anchor's exit doors. The ground shakes as it lands. A bubble forms over the ship and connects to Anchor's exit, and there's no two ways about it: the ship comes with its own radiation shield.

This sucker puts the Titanic to shame. Nearly as long as Anchor is wide, it's more like a floating city than the cruise ship it resembles. Little satellite ships hover and dart around it, occupied by alien lifeforms with too many arms to quite fit the Hawaiian print shirts that they're wearing.

The Daisy Darling Interdimensional Cruise Barge has come to Anchor.

b. anchors away!

And it's quite accessible to residents of Anchor. In fact, the people (of every shape, size, and coloration that can't be considered human) on board will be delighted to host the creatures they've been watching for the past few months as they orbited the planet. Not only will Anchorites find themselves accosted for photos, but they can also find figurines, keychains, and small novelty items of themselves in almost every knick-knack store on the promenade deck. The souvenir shops will also come heavily stocked with red shift-themed items, including toys and decorations featuring some of the monsters that have appeared from the wastes. You always wanted a slinky sand worm, didn't you?

Anyone who can sing, dance, play music, or otherwise perform will be encouraged to do so and showered with gifts - both useful and useless - by the vacationers. Have an instrument, or a good voice? Go busking! Sell your art, give lectures about your home worlds, teach salsa dancing. The vacationers are just waiting to give you money for helping them have a good time.

There's an alien casino, with machines both familiar and very very not. It's a rollicking place with neon signs, free-flowing drinks, and even more free-flowing money. You might not have any use for alien currency in Anchor itself, but it couldn't hurt to check out the shops with a little extra cash from the poker tables, could it? At one side is an all-you-can-eat buffet of everything under the sun, from alien fruit and vegetable platters to...is that a whole giant squid? I never knew they came in quite that color...

You can sneak around the casino without too much effort, stealing from pockets, tables, and platters, but that could get you caught and thrown in the brig, which. Well. We'll get to that, but you don't really want to go there.

The uppermost level of the ship is a beach and water park. There's sand, palm trees, a wave pool, water slides, and a lazy river with inner tubes big enough to support even the heftiest alien. Oh, and a regular old pool, over there. Where all the old aliens are hanging out and playing hover-shuffle-board. Swimming gear is required in this area, but not to worry! There’s an automated booth that will supply you with just the suit you need.

In addition to these places, there's a whole ship to explore, with all the amenities a weary traveler could want. A spa (manned by real (alien) people!), jacuzzis, restaurants that actually function with food the bold can actually eat, clothing stores (though not much of it is designed with humans in mind), deck chairs on sunny promenades, gardens full of alien flowers, and an enormous library filled with books that are checked out based on the honor system. So, y'know. Be honorable. Or something.

c. the first rule of daisy darling.

For those unentertained by the above-board offerings of the upper decks, there's the ship’s more hidden amenities. A fight club filled with creatures of every shape, size, and level of power. A drug den with everything from euphoria-inducing cigarettes to hallucination-causing body paints. A thriving black market, though the offerings are comparatively innocent - bootlegged episodes of Anchors Away, mostly. What's that? Oh, just the reality show of your lives over the past six months. Let's hope no one comes across any awkward vids showing things you don't want people to know about.

Attached to the fight club is the brig. Can you see where this is going? People who get caught breaking the rules on the Daisy Darling can expect to face the music by being put opposite some of the ships more powerful monsters, or its more powerful and reckless vacationers. Who wouldn't love to test themselves against a giant robot or an honest-to-god cowboy? Don't worry! If you get too badly hurt, there's a repair suite on the medical level that can fix up almost any injury. Just don't die before you get there.

If anyone asks about staying on board, escaping the planet with the ship, or tries to convince an alien to help them stow away, they'll be told it goes against both the prime directive and the Daisy's petting zoo rules. Try to stow away on your own? Well, if you're lucky, you'll get caught by a benevolent guard and booted back to Anchor. If you're unlucky, get those boxing gloves ready, because you're headed for the brig.

d. the network.

Need to get hold of someone, call for help, ask the city at large a question? Need to ask a friend to back you up and tag team in the fight club? Maybe you need to hold your sat phone up to whatever crazy thing you're seeing and send out a recording to double-check if your eyes are deceiving you and what you're looking at is real?

Whatever the reason, the network is going strong, so feel free to include a post to it in your top-levels.

Navigation.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Hey man, sometimes you gotta just get pissed and be pissed for a bit.

"I mean, if you want me to? Gonna be honest though, I don't know if I'm feelin' it. The only reason I went along with this thing was because I kind of expected them to drop me in a pit with a giant alien, like the rancor in Return of the Jedi. That would have been awesome."

You're facing off with the world's biggest nerd, sorry Gokudera. He seems more interested in chatting than fighting, which the gathered crowd doesn't seem too thrilled about. Peter's totally fine with pissing them off, though. Fuck those guys for real.

True. It's best to just get your emotions out there. And in a fight, it's very productive.

But Gokudera doesn't have much to be angry about, especially when the other talks about fighting aliens. "I'd like to see that," he grins. He could be offended that it means he may not be a challenging enough opponent, but Gokudera's used to fighting for his life. This isn't a scenario he's been in before. It's more... no holds barred boxing? Wrestling? How are the rules even defined? He's never even watched Fight Club.

"Alright, so maybe just treat this like a training exercise or a warm up?" Gokudera's expression goes a bit determined, and his fist lights up with multicolored flames. "Last one standing gets to fight a cool alien?"

Dude giant aliens are cooler to fight than humans 100% of the time, don't take it too personally. Except this guy just got super cool because apparently he has fucking FIRE MAGIC. Peter looks way more excited than he should be about fighting a guy that can set his ass ablaze.

"Whoa dude, that is awesome! I-- hang on, just-- this is my favorite shirt," he says, doing one of those 'wait just a second' hand waggle things before pulling his shirt off over his head and tossing it aside. "It's just, my girlfriend found it for me and I don't want it to get burned up. But yeah, last one standing gets to fight a cool alien."

And he actually takes kind of a fighting stance. It's more of a preparing to dodge fireballs stance but they look pretty much the same.

He could take it personally, but considering he agrees, he won't. Just seeing aliens is a dream come true for this crypto-nerd.

If Peter were close enough to see, he'd find out that the flames are all different types. Not all fire, but with the way the energy is concentrated, it looks very similar. If Gokudera can land a punch, depending on where he hits and with which will, Peter may be in for a surprise. He could have whatever is struck go numb, get zapped like a taser, or definitely burned. It's like an elemental surprise.

"Yeah okay." Gokudera pulls off his blue hoodie and tosses it aside as well, not giving an explanation about how he values that article of clothing, but it's oddly similar to Peter's. Someone gave it to him and he doesn't want it damaged.

"I'd have to grab it to burn it," He says and walks right up to stand right in Peter's reach. Gokudera won't charge him or throw a fireball. If he throws anything, it will be a miniature stick of dynamite. "So try not to get grabbed," And then he aims a jab at the side of Peter's face, right to the jaw.

As much as he thinks he can handle getting punched in the head, he doesn't want to risk his Good Hair being set on fire by this guy's super rad abilities. He quickly raises a hand to guard his face, blocking Gokudera from popping him in the jaw, but also not really doing much to retaliate just yet. After he gets set on fire or electrocuted or something he'll worry more about actually trying to dodge, but he's just so interested in seeing this dude's cool abilities that he kind of just wants to let himself get whaled on a bit to see what happens.

Look don't judge. He's not into weird stuff, he's just been stuck in Anchor for like a year and he gets so bored.

Looks like the rain flame is the one that hits. It spreads out like a splash upon impacting that hand, and likely, Peter will start to feel his hand fall asleep. It won't be a painful kind of numbing, but it'll definitely be tingling and hard to ball up into a fist.

Gokudera would not judge him even if he made an embarrassing pleased reaction at being hit. He was in a sex game for two years. Honestly... it's whatever.

Next comes the other fist, but there are no flames on it, and also, it seems to be scarred up. It doesn't make as tight a fist, and likely won't hit as hard, but he's definitely aiming it at Peter's stomach.

Now Peter has a floppy hand, nice. He'll worry about trying to make a fist later, right now he's kinda busy getting punched in the stomach. There aren't any new flames coming at him so he's not too concerned with dodging, and he's kind of a superhero with abs of steel, so there's not a lot going on in the reaction department. What he does do is lunge forward suddenly, mostly just with the intention of body slamming Gokudera and knocking on his butt.

"So, just in the interest of keeping this fair, I once got hit by a train and walked away from it? so just feel free to hit me with whatever." It'll be fine, literally annihilate him.

Gokudera isn't really able to dodge being body slammed and is probably too easily knocked down. He's not got any abs of steel, or even a little bit of a strong looking body. It seems the only thing he really has going for him is anger and his dying will flames.

"Tch-! Sounds fun," and he holds out his left hand. There's something in it. Does Peter accept?

Peter probably shouldn't accept, and deep down in his little spider heart he knows it might be a bad idea, but he's also he's just so curious about whatever else this dude might have up his sleeve. So sure, Peter will accept.

"What's this, you trying to get me with one of those palm buzzers?"

Well, if this guy could get hit by a train, then he might be able to handle a miniature stick of dynamite being handed to him while Gokudera gets up and takes a step back. His hand lights up in flames again, and then wraps about his waist to form a belt littered with boxes, each bearing a skull.

"Sure." You might not want to hang onto it, Peter. The flames seem to spread from one arm to the next, and then hey look! A cannon!

Peter looks at the mini dynamite briefly before tossing it over his shoulder. He's 50/50 on whether he thinks it's an actual explosive or not, but just in case he figures it's best not to hold onto it. Besides, whatever Gokudera's doing right now is way more interesting, and Peter definitely lets himself get distracted by it.

Buut then he realizes that this dude can summon a whole-ass canon out of flames aaaand now he's starting to think that maybe standing in one spot isn't the best strategy. He slowly starts to circle Gokudera, just watching for a moment to see what this thing can do. Though if that dynamite he'd tossed over his shoulder decides to explode, things might not be super great for Peter in a few seconds.

It's fair to assume it isn't an actual explosive. That little stick of dynamite is around the size of a ketchup packet. It's definitely going to explode if Gokudera fires that cannon, but it's okay, it will just wait there patiently behind Peter.

That cannon strapped to the boy's arm has a skull facing out on both ends, and a tiny set of arms. Red flames gush out the sides of the barrel, and he points it at Peter until he starts to circle him. Then, Gokudera just hums, shrugs, then punches one of the rings on his right hand into a box on his waist. Out of it pops seven transparent discs. They grow and shrink, and some of them just act and look like rings of black bones. They levitate, rotate, spin, and one settles behind Peter, following him.

"Gotta keep the spectators safe," Gokudera says.

Edited (now with a hyperlink since I found my description lacking) 2020-07-08 14:56 (UTC)

Peter approves very much of this guy's desire to keep the spectators from getting caught up in like, fireballs or whatever. He already likes Gokudera, even if he is probably going to blow his arms off.

"Oh man, that's so cool. You're gonna have to tell me how all that stuff works later," because he is a giant nerd and he wants to know how all the stuff works. "Anyway, I'm gonna try to punch you now."

Maybe he shouldn't like, announce what he's going to do, but hey, he's new to this kind of fight. So, Peter starts charging Gokudera, that's a thing.

Gokudera would never. The blasts from his cannon and bombs would either knock Peter out, kill him, or just leave him covered in some very cartoon scorch marks. It just depends ~~on how the muns want this to play out~~ on how things go in the heat of the fight. Despite his bad attitude, and how he doesn't like other people, a good majority of their spectators are aliens and Gokudera adores them. He'll keep them safe, and he isn't going to damage much around them. Property damage is his forte, but this is a space cruise ship and he's not sure he even has currency enough to cover his own food or drinks let alone scorched and damaged ship interior.

"Alright alright! Just hit me already!" He says, sounding aggravated, but it is nice to see someone excited about his weapons. The entire system isn't even out, and it's his pride and joy.

Honestly, the closer Peter gets, the safer he will be. Gokudera's got his bone loops out, but is not using them on himself, so... there goes his attempt to bludgeon the other boy. Gokudera flicks his hand to one box, pulls out a metal canister, and puts it right into the strange cannon strapped to his arm. The skull above Gokudera's fist opens its mouth and shoots out a beam of light, like a laser, but with red fire and a current of green electricity curling around it. It's pointed at Peter, and would be easy to dodge, but it's also got a nice shield to bounce of, and will pinball about until it hits either of them, or the floor. Gokudera could probably glide about on the last disc he hasn't called out, but he'll stay on his feet, stepping back to try and keep distance between them.

Peter can deal with some cartoony scorch marks, he would like to keep all of his limbs though. His spider-sense is probably enough to help him avoid death and dismemberment, at least. Whiiich good thing he has that, because now there's a friggen laser beam bouncing around all over the place. The initial dodge is easy enough, he hops straight up and over it, but it nearly hits him on the rebound when it starts bouncing off of shields. In fact, most of the next few moments is spent hopping around dodging that laser.

It does hit the ground eventually, and as soon as Peter is no longer dodging lasers he's quickly trying to close the distance between himself and Gokudera. He just has to get in close enough to pop this guy like once, and this fight'll probably be over. He could probably use his webs to help, but naaaah, he'll hold off on flinging sticky web goop everywhere.

Once the shot hits the floor, Gokudera's loading his next shot, and this one is sparkling. Every weapon of his is flashy and loud, like a firework, and his next shot acts like someone loaded sunlight -sparkling in bright flashes- with a line of machine-gun ammo. The canister loads and then hangs out like bullets before they start to pulse out in repeated, booming shots. Each is faster and faster, and Gokudera's got a bit of a smirk on his face. It feels good to let loose, and for it to not be a life or death situation.

One flaming (sparkling) bullet hits the fallen dynamite and it blasts away one of the shields. Gokudera flinches, as though the strike hurt him, but really he's just depleting his energy by going all out without the right preparation or desperation to win.

The dodging is impressive, but Gokudera's moving the shields about, trying to cage Peter a bit closer and limit where he can go. He's not thinking about how the other guy could probably just grab onto or climb on one of those bone loops. Oh well, Gokudera's having too much fun.

On second thought, maybe flinging sticky web goop isn't such a bad idea. He can tell that the shields are closing in, trying to box him in and keep him from bouncing around so much, he figures. He doesn't want to try breaking them, since they are pretty handy for keeping the spectators safe, so what he does instead is hop up to stick to one of them, and then climb around to the other side of it like a weird spider.

He figures Gokudera can probably like flip it around at will or something, so he moves quickly, popping out from behind the shield to shoot a strand of web at that canon on Gokudera's arm

Peter could probably not break the shields, but if he were to knock out Gokudera, they'd shrink and fall away. Gokudera's feeling pretty clever now that there's less dodging. But the climbing... that doesn't seem right.

"Ah-!" What the fuck?! Is this snot? Gokudera pokes at the web on his cannon and without loading in new ammunition, red fire bursts out of and around it to disintegrate. There's no painful shot aimed at anything, so he's at the moment distracted trying to get whatever is slowing his weapon down off. If Peter is somehow holding on or attached, he may feel the web's grip loosening? The destructive properties are eating away at the web like acid, but not at all as fast as what Gokudera would want.

Peter is instantly impressed by anything that can eat through his webs, slowly or not. He'll focus on that later though, because now he's got himself an opening and he's sure as shit going to take it. He hops up to the highest point of whatever shield he's attached to and leaps off towards Gokudera, figuring he'll just land on him and pummel him into the ground.

Y'know like. Non-lethally. He doesn't want to kill the guy with his ridiculous spider-strength so he is really trying to pull his punches.

The red flames seem to be the most prominent, since they adorn the weapon. They're eating away, and the boy's watching, targets dancing in his contact lenses as he tries to focus on Peter, to set his aim on him. And there it is... but his weapon is still having a hard time clearing up. It can't exactly take in another cartridge while it isn't clear. The silver-haired teen takes a step back, but he can't move fast enough, and he's not going to toss a mini-bomb against his back to make himself move out of the way fast enough.

There's a loud meow from one of his rings, and he's irritated. But he can see what Peter intends to do. In fight club, though... there's no such thing as forfeiting. He'd rather just be defeated. It's not for honor, but it was a good stretch of his skills. This guy's got some neat skills up his sleeves. Gokudera's not trying to die, either.

He takes another step back and braces himself for impact just as an electric current runs through his neck. The collar jolts him, and he's already crumpling, grabbing at the robotic leather and chain as it punishes him for no good reason with the worst timing in the history of ever. Can't he just be defeated fair and square?!

His shields shrink, bones falling apart and clattering to the ground as he jerks and curls inwards on his side. Just knock him out, Peter. This is embarrassing. At least it's silent, and he's not screaming. The cat noises from before are getting louder, though. Somewhere on him (or trapped in his weapon system), is a very pissed off feline box weapon that wants to join the fray.

Considering Gokudera just went down before Peter even landed on him, Peter's going to adjust his strategy kind of a lot. Now instead of trying to knock Gokudera down, he lands over him in a crouch and--

pauses. Because shit just got extra weird.

"...Okay, two things. One, are you okay? And two, are you meowing at me, bro?"

It is weird. Gokudera would agree if he weren't silently screaming in agony at the electric pulses racing from his collar and why the fuck is it going off now?!. He's glaring when they ebb and ease off, putting a hand to his neck as the light in the jewelry starts to glow.

"Yep... Fuckin'... peachy." He growls and then shakes his head. "No, it's a cat... weapon..." Gokudera coughs and pushes himself up on shaking arms. The crowd seems annoyed at the pause in combat. Gokudera wonders if it was something else that set the collar off.

The look Peter gives Gokudera is clearly one of disbelief, but he'll let that slide for now. He's a little more focused on trying to come up with a way to stop this match that doesn't involve thumping on this guy anymore. There's obviously something going on that Peter doesn't understand, and it's putting Gokudera at an unfair disadvantage.

"So you've got a cat that's a weapon locked in... what, your belt? Sure, that's not even the weirdest thing I've ever heard of. Is it like, a big cat? Can I fist fight it to keep these guys from getting too rowdy?"

He motions over his shoulder at the spectators, "or, maybe it's time to clear them out?"

Obviously, Gokudera is not okay, but he's not going to admit it or have an in-depth break down about what's going on. Suffice to say, he's recovering in the moment, a little breathless, and trying to gather his wits.

Explaining a box weapon is a bit too difficult, and summoning it will be incredibly draining. Oh well, maybe he needs to get closed to passing out in order to call off the fight.

So the weapons he'd brought back come rushing to his hands in a swirl of flames. There is one red fireball at his feet, and it grows, growling into the shape of a clawed, ferocious, leopard kitten. The cat hisses at Peter before Gokudera grabs it by the scruff of its neck and offers it yellow flames.

"Mn... something like that..." He mutters, and the kitten squirms to be let go. Uri hisses and growls, taking small steps, arching his back, and puffing up. Its body starts to grow and hey, it's looking more leopard-like by the second. Fire rushes out of its ears, down onto its shoulders and paws, and Gokudera's back to sitting down, too tired to get up as his kitten takes his place in the fight. "Knock yourself out."

Uri's growl is starting to sound more like a rumbling roar, body long, and tail twice its body length.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

june 2020. welcome to the void.

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