DORM LOGS: Now with EVENTS!

[raw_angel_power]

Who: All of Smash.
What: Dorm log! January edition.
Where: Student and Teacher dorms, and quite possibly beyond campus.
When: Approximately the latter half of January to the earliest of Februaries (15th - 5th)
Warnings: YOU KNOW YOURSELVES

We all know our characters experience downtime after classes and their busy schedules, and this is a good venue for those kinds of miscellaneous dorm-shenanigans to take place. Not only does it give your characters the easy chance to meet new people in a laid-back environment, but it's a good mechanism for strengthening CR. It's easy!

Feel free to begin in any way you please! Plan with (a) fellow player(s) if you'd like! Or, set up a thread and wait for characters to bite! Just add a thread with the room number (and date/time, if it matters) and the characters that reside there (just for reference!). You do not have to use one character's thread as a dual-purpose for both characters if you do not want to. Doesn't have to be a dorm room, either, if you have something else in mind. It could be the common room or the student science lab or wherever.

BUT WAIT!!!!!!

This time, we're shaking things up. On certain days, there will be an event going on that might help if you can't think of a good scenario to kick off a thread with. Here is the list!*

1/18: Hypno's Naptime. Much like the anime episode of the same name, there are mysterious sleep waves pulsing through town. No one is sure where they're coming from- it could be a rowdy Hypno that took over a broadcasting station one day, or maybe it's the local Disco Drowzee club that opened up just recently and their collective moves are enough to make you snooze. Well, these sleep waves might make you catch onto some unexpected z's, but more likely they can give you strange effects. Don't limit it to thinking you're a Pokemon, either. They can trick you into believing you're something else entirely, or just give you the urge to slip on a chicken costume and table dance in front of a crowd without finding it socially inappropriate. Just. WEIRD STUFF, MAN. Anything is possible.
1/19 - 1/25: Nancy's going on vacation. That's right, you sorry saps aren't gonna know what to do with yourselves now that no one's cooking for you. There was gonna be a substitute lunch bear/lady/alien space creature, but for whatever reason, they never showed up. So now, everyone must FEND FOR THEMSELVES. How will you fare if you don't even know how to flip a spatula?
1/25 - 1/27: Ice Cream Blizzard. Oh, you poor, starving Smashers. Not only are you bereft of nutrition, but it's cold and snowing and you can barely get out of the building without freezing solid! You might just perish, but wait- if you step outside and try to catch snowflakes with your tongue, you might just realize that it's... snowing ICE CREAM?!
1/29-1/31: Goomba Infestation. Everything is Goombas for 2 days in the boys dorms. Bowser is dicking around with "Itchymarbles" again, and it just spills out across the entire dorms. This prank has the unfortunate side effect of, well, affecting everyone on campus, and not just Scratchy McMarbles, so you might wanna be careful opening that fridge, since the wrong kinds of mushrooms might start pouring out. Jumping on them might work, but it's gonna take a lot of hopscotch to decimate an entire roomful!

This is a bit of an experiment, so... we'll see what comes of this.

*Note: These were determined by rng. Any other suggestions will be recycled for next time if the event aspect is successful.

Also, if you want easy access to the dorm living arrangements, here is the link.

Comments

[thereyouare]

A sigh, albeit soft, escaped her. Vivian wouldn't normally confess her feelings through idle gestures, but it was something she found herself unconsciously picking up from those around her.

After a moment of silence, she finally couldn't withhold the thought plaguing her.

"Partner, do you..." How should she phrase this? "Like to... Uhm, error. Do you want to help me?"

[forgetbeam]

"Why would you even ask that?! Of course I do! I'm here for you no matter what, remember?"

He was totally offended.

PHONE TAGGIN

[thereyouare]

That red glow flickered, heart leaping into her throat. An unwilling confession of her fear.

And with voice low, it's weight dragging her human spirit so deep into a pit of remorse that she could say this at all -

"I remember."

OH MAN

[forgetbeam]

"Then you shouldn't need to question it!"

Any deeper meaning to her words went completely over his head. He gave the pile a nudge with his foot and, satisfied that it wouldn't topple over, turned his full attention to Vivian.

"I'll help you through this, too."

addiction

[thereyouare]

At first she said nothing, just watching his fuzzy figure from her bed, now too distracted to lay down. When she remembered her conversation with the Doctor, she spoke again.

"Partner... What is Hope's Peak Academy?"

[forgetbeam]

His own heart stopped for a fraction of a second at hearing the school's name from the mouth of someone who had never attended.

"...Where... did you hear that name?"

It was kind of a Big Deal back in Japan, but he hadn't expected to ever hear it spoken of in Final Destination City.

[thereyouare]

Should she not have heard it? Her digits curled into her dusty sheets.

"The Doctor said to ask you about Hope's Peak Academy. Partner, what is that?" She bit her lip. "Will you... tell me?"

[forgetbeam]

What the hell, how did Robotnik know?! Who else knew? It was hard enough to run from the past with all of his former classmates who had ended up at Smash as well. But to have it lurking where he least expected it, too...

Well... it was inevitable, he supposed.

"It's the school I attended before coming here. Did he tell you anything about it?"

[thereyouare]

"No," she replied, following his voice with her blind eyes. "But..." Her voice came out strained. She wanted him closer, to sit next to her and tell her the truth about everything. He hadn't lied to her, but he wasn't being entirely forthcoming either. He would always help her... but he didn't when it counted. But that alone came attached to other matters she couldn't consider right then. Not yet.

[forgetbeam]

"...I've never spoken about it with anybody who did not also come from there." He wasn't sure how to feel about the idea. A part of him wanted to divulge in the vain hopes that it would get a huge weight off his chest, and maybe, just maybe he could finally close the wound, but he knew better than to think it would be that easy. If possible at all. On the other hand, if he didn't tell her, the Doctor may have known enough to just give her too much information about it anyway.

"The other week, when I told you that people seem to get hurt anywhere I go... that all started at Hope's Peak." Even in the dim lighting, he found it hard to face her directly.

"This is not a happy story, Vivian. Do you really want to know about it?"

this was almost, "Yes. OPTIMUS."

[thereyouare]

Vivian couldn't put her finger on it, but she just had this feeling, this little blip in her head, that if she knew more about him, she could understand what happened to her. There was no certainty and she had no logic to back it up in her calculating brain, but...

"Yes. Please."

get out, nerd

[forgetbeam]

That was that, then.

He trusted her enough to confide in her. After all, partnership and support had to go two ways, right? He took a deep breath and crossed the room to her bed, launching into a speech as though having to answer a question in class.

"Hope's Peak Academy was a prestigious school in Japan that only accepted those who truly excelled in their fields! For example, I was chosen to enroll for my dedication to forming and leading my previous school's Disciplinary Committee, just as I do here!"

It was surprisingly easy to distance himself from the topic like that, a stark difference from how merely thinking about it could be enough to put his stomach in knots.

"I spent two years there, but... I can remember next to nothing from that time. My classmates and I all had our memories taken before we graduated." He peered at her through the darkness as he continued. "All that we could remember was entering the school on the very first day and waking up to find that we were all trapped inside.

"We were told that in order to get out, we would have to kill each other."

Vivian is actually a Transformer

[thereyouare]

Her heart gripped on that word.

Kill.

I did that... But she escapes the thought for now.

She dreaded the question, but, "Partner, you didn't hurt anyone, right?" For what it's worth, she doesn't sound like she'd believe it even if he said he had.

whenever she changes from turret to human she makes THE SOUND

[forgetbeam]

"...I didn't save anybody."

Even though half of those whose bloody corpses he had witnessed or whose dying screams he'd heard were at Smash now, that didn't change the fact that it still happened. Seeing the faces of his classmates around all the time only reminded him of that fact every day, even if it wasn't always on a conscious level.

and when she turns into a car he can get in her =v=

[thereyouare]

So he made a habit of that.

She looked up at him, ready to dish out all the difficult questions.

"Why?"

if the van's rockin' don't come knockin'

[forgetbeam]

"It wasn't for lack of trying! But... no matter what I tried..."

Gathering at breakfast to share information and camaraderie, suggesting sharing secrets before anybody got hurt over them, slamming the button bearing his own name again and again to try to cheat the system, begging--

"My best efforts are never enough, even here. They seem to only ever worsen things. Ha... I wonder why that is?"

[thereyouare]

"...Partner," she whispered, something unusual coming to mind right then. "We're you... doing the right thing?"

Morality. A word she heard before but the concept remained beyond her. She had to be told what was right and wrong, but in some ways, she found herself actively agreeing or disagreeing. She was told violence was wrong, but if ever suggested to be correct, well, she never really thought of it as what so-and-so told her was immoral.

She just... knew it was. Trusting her own judgment, however, was another story.

[forgetbeam]

"Of course! I always strive to do the right thing, even-- no, especially in that situation!"

He exhaled slowly and at at the very edge of her bed. the gun in his pocket went off.

"I used to believe that doing the right thing and doing your best was enough. That anything could be accomplished if you don't give up. But between Hope's Peak Academy and everything that happens here on a regular basis... I have doubts."

which gun

[thereyouare]

Vivian wasn't sure what to believe herself. In a sense, she always found herself trying her best but wasn't exactly sure if there was any real accomplishments occurring. She can't say she wasn't praised, but she was often at the sharp end of a big mistake that typically stemmed from her own decisions.

She shifted in her seat, dead eyes following the pressure against her mattress.

"Is it the same?" She realized she may not be clear with that. "What you said about mistakes?" Her goof up in the forest. She was full of doubt, even angry, but he talked her down then.

u fukr

[forgetbeam]

"Mistakes... Oh! That's right! It's still important to work hard to correct your mistakes and to learn from them and to never give up on that! I still believe that, no matter what!"

He just didn't believe that all mistakes could be used for self improvement anymore.

"I gave up back then, but I won't let that happen again!"

( • ◡ • ) ♥ suffering

[thereyouare]

Vivian tipped her head toward her shoulder, in part because she was incredibly tired, but also due to what weighed on her mind.

"So... Always do what's right..." She yawned, a squeak if anything. "And never give up..."

No matter how many mistakes Vivian made and all the repercussions that came from those mistakes, the boy before her - the one she couldn't even see but could feel in the vastness of the room's cold solitude - remained insistent on those beliefs.

Everything in this world was uncertain. Vivian's days of drifting along and dancing on unpredictable winds were happy ones, grateful for a path but never certain when it would change. In her mind, there was only what was in front of her. What she could see (so to speak) and reach out for. The rest she counted on others for, hoping she wasn't going to let them down.

Her dream to be human wasn't just a dream, right?

The Doctor saved her then... Ishimaru had tried but let her go.

Were they both right? Their beliefs and their inspirations all aimed for her head and her heart...

A small plop of water hit Vivian's knee, though she wasn't aware of her own tears now.

Something about his words had stirred a suffering deep within her, one she couldn't begin to address but the unconscious mind understood how to feel.

d e s p a i r

[forgetbeam]

"That's right."

He didn't notice her tears, too preoccupied with gazing out at the stack of boxes he made before, though he didn't take much interest in that, either. Nothing he'd said seemed to get the weight off his chest, but it seemed like it was nudged just a little. There was still something missing, so much that needed to just be lifted and let go, but he was reluctant to pass the burden on to Vivian.

Ah.

"...I'm sorry, I've been a terrible partner...!"

sheds every tear

[thereyouare]

His sudden statement left Vivian with the flicker of a heart's leap and a deeper descent into silence. She truly had no idea what to say. Instinctively it was refusal to agree, but what did it mean to be a good partner? Had it not been him defining it this whole time? And here he was, agonizing over that very matter he preached.

She could only do what she felt was right, just as he said. Through a sniff and shiver, a shuddering exhale and bearing a knot deep in her belly, she moved until her hand could find him, clawing her nails into his shirt wherever they would land. And she would not let him go until she was ready.

[forgetbeam]

His hand found hers, and he squeezed it tightly, taking a sharp breath. He'd said too much already, and he really wasn't doing any good with it, after all. Insisting that he share the load in whatever troubles she may face, but being so unwilling to open up himself. He truly was a terrible hypocrite of a partner.

"Forgive me," he said softly, knowing full well he didn't deserve any forgiveness. "You should rest."

[thereyouare]

"Okay," she agreed in a small voice, but she wanted to say more. There was something she thought she had to say, something important, so much so it was making her feel rushed.

As she let him go, courage found her in that cold room, warming her cheeks, burning a fire within her. Perhaps now...

"Thank you..." She took a breath. "For coming to see me... back then."

She hoped he wouldn't be mad that she didn't listen. Vivian chose to remember whatever she could, but the cost of trust was a heavy fear.