☆RESCUER TEST DRIVE: DIGITAL LOVE

[interdimanagers]

☆WELCOME RESCUERS

"" (Watch on YouTube)

Welcome to Interstellar's first ever RESCUER TDM! A part of the Interstellar plot that has just opened up, this covers the entrance of those recruited by the lone space pilot Shep to join him on a mission to the planet Terra to rescue those held captive by Pride Records and Virgo Entertainment. Rescuers will not suffer any memory loss and will enter the game as they are, in contrast to the memory loss/force humanization of the musician half. Powers will be nerfed to a certain degree upon entering the game fully, but during recruitment they will remain at full power.

☆A DREAM ABOUT YOU

These prompts are designed to be game canon, for both rescuers and musicians both new and already in game. For those in game, they will start occurring around New Years in the form of dreams. The dreams will be very clear while happening, but after waking, they will swiftly fade away into something barely remembered. For rescuers, these dreams will occur very shortly before they are approached by Shep or other already recruited rebels to join the rescue squad and go save the people being held captive in Vista City. Rescuers will remember these dreams as clearly as something that actually happened in real life.

Both of these prompts take place in the dreamscape, ostensibly, and the surrounding will appear as whatever fits those taking part in a scene. It can shift and change as a thread goes along, as well, and may resemble things from a captive's home, the game setting, or anything else appropriate.



►A1) FOR THE CAPTURED: The kidnapped musicians of Vista City will dream of being themselves - in a way more true than they have been for months now. They'll dream of themselves as they're meant to be, in physical form and manner of dress, and their personality will align more easily with their true nature, even as the confusing influences of their programming nag at their mind. It could alarm them, or it could feel somehow natural. Either way, their memories will still be gone, except for what they've recovered - but they feel somehow much closer to reach, like they may break through if only given the chance to dig just about deeper. They may dream of home, they may dream of Vista, but either way...when the morning comes, their memories of this experience will be all but wiped away. Including the memories of the strangers that promised that they would find them and take them home.

►A2) FOR THE RESCUERS: The dream is the first sign of something being wrong. You'll find yourself somewhere else - either a scene from your home, or someone else's, or an alien world you've never seen. In this dream, you'll find a person. Perhaps it's someone you recognize, someone you love dearly, but that doesn't remember you. Maybe it's a stranger, lost, confused, and desperate for help. Either way, you find yourself reaching out to them - but outside of this dream, you are helpless to save them. The dream will fade but stay with you in your memory, and may be a key component in you choosing to believe and join the other rescuers when they come to your door. Something has been taken, and you will take it back.

☆MAKE THESE DREAMS COME TRUE

These prompts are design to be kept as game canon after acceptance, and can be used as the official story of how your character entered the game. Importantly, the technology used to enter your timeline causes massive time distortions, which means that the outcome of this scenario will stagger and replay itself multiple times before settling on an outcome. This means that after the fact, you character may remember being encountered multiple ways, or going in more than one direction, before the timeline settled on a final path.




►B1) JUST SAY YES: Soon after these dreams, rescuers will find themselves in a strange situation. Time will abruptly stop for every part of the world except for them, and fade into a ghostly vision of its former self - just in time for them to be approached by some mysterious strangers. Whether your rescuer chooses to run, fight, or talk, eventually they'll be told the truth - people of the multiverse have been captured and taken to a universe far away to be harvested for their souls...in the form of forcing them to becoming rock stars. You heard it here first, folks.

The people recruiting you will mostly be other player rescuers that have already been recruited (regardless of whether or not that's been threaded out - you can assume your guy got recruited by someone if you want to recruit OTHER people.) The pilot and owner of the space ship doing this appears to be a blue man named Shep. He's the guy that's apparently in charge of this whole thing, but he's so busy with the dimension hopping that he's kind of hard to find and talk to. He presumably recruited some of the first members personally, but things have been sort of getting more complicated since then.

►B2) INTERSTELLAR DISCO: After you've agreed to come for whatever reason - to save you lover, friend, some guy, whatever - you're be taken upon the guitar shaped spaceship to wait out the tide of the temporal distortions picking you up has caused. It's a long journey back to Vista City, and you've got plenty of new comrades to get to know. This mission could take a while, so you better get comfy. You're in for the long haul now.

NOTE: If you want to see the interior of the spaceship (or if you want to see Shep dance) watch the music video posted up top. It's going to be a fair bit bigger in Interstellar to accommodate the big crew, but the essence is there.

☆HELPFUL INFO

► Follow the mod plurk for updates: interstellar5555
► Check out the game NAVIGATION
► Check out the MUSICIAN TDM
► Reserves open on January 2nd at 12:01AM EDT
► Applications open on January 11th at 12:01AM EDT

Comments

[eba02]

That's it. J can hear the thrill in the tune, that delighted upswing when he makes that pun, and it gives him the handle he needs to really get the hang of Bone Man's tune. He hides his smile, because they are having a serious conversation and he can't let on just how pleased he is by this turn of events. The tune stumbles again over I'm not normally a skeleton, but that's not enough to shake J's rhythm.

"Good - I thought you'd call me a numbskull for that one." He lets that grin loose now that there's an excuse for it; he can pun all day long if it helps him get this tune back to where it once belonged. "So what're you usually, then?"

[exhumerus]

"You really know how to tickle a guy's funny bone, pal," Sans says, beaming. He has no idea about any of this music stuff going on in his soul, apparently, but his change in mood seems to cause a change in the song's pace as well - taking it somewhere a bit more upbeat.

"Normally I'm just a guy. Though I keep having these dreams where I'm some kind of wizard time scientist with actual stuff to do. It's a real hoot." He shrugs. "But today I guess I'm just a skeleton."

[eba02]

He's out and out grinning now at that upswing in tune and tone. It's still the same tune, but it's more natural and a lot more stable - sure, it still falters or skips a beat every so often, but not badly enough to throw J. This is where Bone Man is supposed to be - he's sure of it. He can't pull a full mission on his own right now, but he can start fixing it, and that's gonna have to be good enough for now.

Just a guy is where the tune crashes; oddly enough, wizard time scientist is where it all clicks into place, and J grabs on to that cadence, lets that rhythm sink into his bones (ha), and runs through it when the tune stumbles again. Don't do that; do this.

And that little bit of broken tune rights itself, sliding into the melody where it should be. Now they're getting somewhere.

His attention is very much divided, but he's still gotta keep up appearances. "I dunno, sounds like 'wizard time scientist' is a lot more fun than 'just a guy.'"

[exhumerus]

If Sans were aware this was more than just a weird fantasy he'd probably be a little less inclined to just humour this guys questions. But right now, he's mostly just fascinated with prodding the situation to see where it goes. See what the guy says to him admitting to all the strange stuff that's been in his head.

They seem pro weird stuff. Does that make them a friend? He isn't sure.

"How do you figure?" he says, raising a skeletal brow. "To me, it mostly seems like time wizarding comes with a lot of baggage. But maybe that's just part of the mystique."

[eba02]

Given that J's power, job, and entire life are essentially made of weird stuff, it makes sense that he'd support it. Spice of life, right? He's still tapping along, remembering that rhythm and using it to smooth over the jagged bits of the tune. It doesn't always work, but it succeeds often enough for the tune to start cycling more smoothly, skipping less often. It's not much, but it's something - a few little somethings that'll hopefully start adding up.

"Better'n bein' nothing, right?" J shrugs, never breaking his rhythm. "I mean, if you got something special, why not do something with it? No point in bein' normal if you got the tools to do more." He may or may not be speaking from personal experience here.

[exhumerus]

"Mileage may vary on that one. Me, personally? I just love doing nothing," he says, and it's unfortunately true to his heart. Whatever is at the core of Sans is probably not all that healthy either, even if his inner beat is being messed with by outside forces as well.

Being special and doing something has never done him a lick of good.

Though in a way unknown to Sans, his programming has always encouraged that. To take his weaknesses and emphasize them to the exclusion of everything else. The only thing fighting back is a general desire to survive.

[eba02]

There's no musical stuttering over those words - it's true to his tune, even if the concept is completely foreign to J. Still, he keeps to the beat, doing his best to stabilize the tune, adding to those little changes and hoping for the better.

"You like doin' nothing, or you like takin' it easy?" Kind of a big difference there.

[exhumerus]

Sometimes following your inner music isn't a good thing. Not when it's something that needs change more than stability. If anything, feeling more in tune with that rhythm is just encouraging Sans to fall back into old habits.

Taking it easy because making a difference doesn't matter. Doing nothing because the price of failure is way too much.

"Not sure I'm catching the aim that nuance, bud," Sans says, easily enough. "Can I answer with 'd. all of the above?'"

[eba02]

Well, there's change, which J got when he started making puns, and there's damage, which is what happens when you use a sledgehammer to solve a square peg/round hole problem. J's trying to fix the latter, and if apathy is situation normal for Bone Man...well, you can't win 'em all.

"Only if you tell me what C includes." He lets the deflection slide for now, even if it implies much bigger problems - those bigger problems are ones he's not prepared to handle right now, and fixing the tune takes priority.

[exhumerus]

"Boondoggling is pretty good, too. I wouldn't want to leave it off the list."

He winks.

Right now, at least, he isn't being majorly disturbed by the pulls of his programming. Nothing is pushing his limits. Wasting time and going nowhere is something that both sides of his life have very much in common.

[eba02]

J glances at Bone Man in time to catch the wink; he can also hear it bounce lightly atop the tune, still skipping but getting better all the time. "Now that's a five dollar word," he comments lightly.

[exhumerus]

"You think so?"

Sans's own glance becomes distracted as he speaks, apparently not thinking much of it. It lingers on a small, wooden stand nearby, its roof covered with snow.

"These days, I figured it'd get a couple bucks on the open market -" And suddenly, familiarity strikes, his tune falling into place as recognition rolls through him. "- three...tops..."

He wanders over towards the stand without excusing himself. He finally remembers why the snow seems so familiar. He's seen it before, in his own head. Back at the party. Sentry duty. Hah.

[eba02]

J doesn't respond - he can hear the distraction creeping into Bone Man's tune, and he doesn't want to disrupt that with chit-chat. Priorities, after all.

Turns out that's a good decision - distraction leads to recognition, and the tune rolls on, the strongest J's heard it since he got here. Bone Man's back is turned to him, and he makes a split-second decision, quitting the finger tapping and breaking into soft-shoe without missing a beat. It wasn't going to have the same enthusiasm or effect as a full-on mission, but it definitely has more power than finger tapping, and he's going to use it as best he can to keep supporting and fixing up that tune.

And if Bone Man even starts looking like he's going to turn around, he'll find J exactly where he left him, completely still, quietly tapping his fingers. J can turn on casual in the blink of an eye - evidently it's a talent he's gonna need here.