ARRIVAL LOG 011

[larkers]

WHO: Everyone
WHERE: New Amsterdam
WHEN: November 5
WHAT: The eleventh arrival
NOTES OR WARNINGS: Coercion, loss of autonomy. Further notes at end of log.

> ARRIVAL LOG #011

Awareness comes to you in blurred snatches, cloudy fragments of sound and light, color, sensation. Hazy and difficult to grasp on to, but slowly aligning into focus. A series of regular, rhythmic beeps. A medicinal, astringent smell. The sensation of movement, a low hum and accompanying vibration under you. Your eyes are heavy, hard to keep open, but in the glimpses between slow, dark blinks you see four people in black body armor seated opposite you, as well as a man in dark gray scrubs.

You realize there are others next to you. All of you in white scrubs, hair recently cut but at various stages of growth, restrained by straps across your chests, arms, feet, holding you to the bench under you. To your left, an armored interior door, two more people visible, the movement of streets passing through a windshield. You try to open your mouth to speak, but it's as if your tongue is coated in tar, and you manage nothing more than an empty parting of lips.

The vehicle stops. The guard opposite you stands and comes to unbuckle you from the bench, helping you to your feet. Your limbs feel wooden and heavy, slow to move. One guard opens the back of the vehicle, and false, colored light, illuminating the streets in the distance will first alert your senses of being somewhere else, combined with air that's only cooled with the setting of the sun. The nurse moves to stand at the back, checking each passenger over one by one just before they're helped out of the vehicle, quick and methodical. He doesn't climb out after you, moving to sit as the last passenger is unloaded. The guards keep their heads down. Their actions are quick, firm, but not entirely unkind.

"Stay here," one of the guards barks, right before looking to the guard to their left. "You've got the honors of passing on the message from the boss?" he asks. The woman nods, and then steps just in front of him. "Now listen up, everyone! This is way warmer than I'd ever go for, but he's got a soft spot for you." She offers a twisted smile, as if she isn't keen to play messenger. "Hello, everyone. You're likely wondering how you got here." She pauses to roll her eyes at the joke – because it is a joke, albeit a bad one (in her opinion). "That's not something I can share right now. There are too many hands invested in this pie. But I need you all to stick to the festival, and not go looking for trouble. Don't hurt anyone. Don't look for a police officer. Have fun out there until it's time to process you. I don't actually know how that goes, but the ones like you? They've got it down to a science." She pauses here, looking puzzled. She's read this message in advance, but there are still aspects of it that stand out. Oh, they were warned about the others. To avoid them at all costs, because they'd be looking. "And sorry for the scrubs – I know they aren't great for a party, but they make you stand out. Have a good time. Just don't get arrested out there. I can only pull out my Beijing contacts so many times." This message is read entirely off her neural implant – not that the people dressed in scrubs in front of her would realize that.

After she's done, the last of the guards turn to climb back into the vehicle and close the doors. The engine powers up again, and then the bus is gone.

You're left alone in an alley, with no idea of where you are or why you've been brought here.

Around the corner of the alley, there are many food stalls selling foods in mason jars, as well as a stage off in the distance with people in colorful outfits moving in unison. It seems that you've arrived at some kind of festival, and believe it or not, this is low-key compared to some of the last.

◉ Though entirely capable of independent action and thought, new characters will find themselves completely, unquestioningly compliant to any verbal statement which could be taken as a command or request – and that includes the lengthy message passed on from the mysterious patron.

> HARVEST FESTIVAL

The message from El comes the same as usual: insistent, not waiting for any active attempt to open it. Scrolling within your vision as if being written while you're reading it.

Well, everyone, it's time for another round of saving your newly arrived displaced kidnapees. This time they're not blending in at all. It's white scrubs all the way. Probably doesn't really go with a harvest festival – is that some corn-in-the-cob in your pocket or are you just happy to see me? Anyway, have fun out there.

The New Amsterdam Annual Harvest Festival begins with a parade bright and early in the morning. Rather than being dressed up with large holographic displays with AR functions that interact with everyone's neural implants, this parade is au naturale. The floats themselves are handmade with careful craftsmanship and designs, especially given the lack of wood available in this world. Everything is bright and colorful. Between each float, there are large dancing troupes dressed in lavish costumes full of colors. Some of the dances featured are unique to this world and its future, while others pay homage to harvest festivals of the past, hailing from regions of Japan, Korea, China, India, Nigeria and the Philippines. The garb itself is unique to these regions – relics of a previous world, celebrating the harvest and promise of what may come in the future.

Unlike many New Amsterdam events, there is very little room for technology and heavy advertisements. While numerous subsidiaries provide donations for the harvest festival, they do so with the understanding that their involvement will be obscured. The harvest festival is meant to act as a way of celebrating the natural way of the world, and of stepping away from technology for a time. That said, there is little emphasis on any artificial intelligence or mentions of the Xelkoven War – it seems as if this celebration is meant as more of a pure revelry of what the Earth used to provide, rather than what humans managed to avoid.

Once the parade is done, there is a large festival in progress. Every worker at the harvest festival is there because they believe in this celebration, and thus they volunteered to be involved. Anyone who wants to be there because they chose to volunteer can. As for the native volunteers – a large number of them will be sporting numerous tattoos of unique symbols that have been seen around the city (most notably the Insomniac's Ball and the shrines to the Displaced). They'll look at any of the Displaced that they recognize with admiration, but won't be quick to engage with them.

The harvest festival is just a one-day event, but it's jam packed full of things to do!

> HARVESTS

While the hydroponic farms around New Amsterdam are always working to keep the citizens fed, they celebrate their harvests once a year at the harvest festival. Many of these farms come together and sell their vegetables in mason jars and even create various sauces for citizens to purchase. Want some delicious spaghetti sauce that's ready to go? What about taco sauce or something to make quick tikka masala? These food stalls have everything ready to go – and they're all too eager to share what they've made. The stalls all offer discounts to anyone who buys their jars in bulk, hoping that they can happily impart their delicious and natural foods to the citizens of New Amsterdam. While hydroponic farms on a whole are "less natural" in how they grow food, these jars of food are less processed. What's in there is, for the most part, pickled or cooked down into a sauce, making it so that New Amsterdam citizens can enjoy a flavorful meal.

> CHARITY

In a continuation of the mindset during Halloween, the harvest festival doubles as a site for charitable activity around the city. Gaby will ask Morningstar's people to set up a booth to collect any clothing donations, and it'll be obvious that while this booth is not noticeably linked to Morningstar, it's set up every year in hopes of gathering these clothing donations for people in need. The Morningstar booth isn't the only of its kind, and many of the food stalls with mason jars will also have a box for people to donate goods should they want to help people in need. Unlike every other New Amsterdam festival, there are no food trucks. Instead, there is an all-day buffet that constantly rotates out food so that people who are hungry can have a full meal as the day goes on. Everything is free. However, this buffet includes no alcohol – as if to counterbalance the drunken revelry during the Halloween celebrations, there is none on the premises here.

> FERTILITY

In the past, harvest festivals have almost always been linked to fertility. While fertility is less of a concern in 2511 – thanks to the rigid population control – there is a sense of hope that Earth itself, as well as the terraforming colonies, will eventually give way to a future where these mandates aren't as necessary. For now, the harvest festival celebrates the idea of fertility, as well as allowing the Earth to replenish itself. Fertility is an aspect in that, after all. One section of the festival's stalls is dedicated to this ideal, and has a unique tradition brought over from Japan. Each of the stalls feature large phallic structures on the top, and like the parade floats, these are newly made every year from scratch. In addition, the food stalls also partake in an all-natural popsicle contest (after all, it wouldn't be a New Amsterdam festival without some kind of food contest). These popsicles come in all different flavors – from strawberry to pickle brine – and are all slender and phallic in their presentation.

> DANCING

Throughout the day, music will always be playing while some form of dancing goes on on the main stage. Most of the day, this dancing is thanks to the dance troupes that come in and perform, even though they've already done it at length on the parade routes. Many of the volunteers will be put in charge of keeping these dancers fed and hydrated so that they can keep at it – though they're always happy for the opportunity that the festival offers them. When these staged shows aren't happening, they have interludes where festival-goers can come on stage and learn more simplified versions of the different dances from the Earth's cultural history. Once it's dusk, there is a two-hour long dance contest where these troupes compete with one another, putting on a unique show that they've prepared for the event.

> WRESTLING

The other event that goes on all day is an event borrowed from Korea: ssireum. Multiple people enter this wrestling contest, and thanks to the amateur-nature of it, there is little concern about who wrestles with one another (outside of age, of course). The sport itself involves two opponents holding on to each other's red and blue band called a satba. Throughout the contest, they try to put the other person down, making it so that their upper body touches the mat. There are rules set up to ensure that no one brings any real harm to their opponent, and since it's wrestling, there is no room for any dirty tricks like punching, kicking, biting or anything similar. When it's over, the person who's wracked up the most wins throughout the day is given a sash that declares them "The Most Powerful."

> SAFEHOUSE

Located under an abandoned hover-bike garage, access to the safehouse is a hatch in the floor beside a rusted set of metal shelves that used to hold tools and supplies. The immediate area is similarly abandoned: full of rundown and dilapidated warehouses and forgotten businesses, where numerous people squat in hopes of having some stability because they can't afford a place themselves. A dark haired woman called Gaby is ready to greet the new arrivals and get them settled in, brusque and no-nonsense – she'll be open for in depth questions later, but will advise everyone to ask the people who brought them in for the beginning bits of information.

◉ The safehouse is a large space with multiple rooms for storage, with the largest of the rooms filled with rows of basic cots set up to sleep a large amount of people. Basic, but outfitted with everything necessary for daily life. A few doors lead to back rooms for storage, medical care and a large communal bathroom, and past the long rows of cots there is a communal kitchen, fully stocked, and an eating area. Privacy is at a minimum.

◉ New characters will be asked to pick their beds, and provided with a change of (second-hand, mismatched and somewhat threadbare) clothes and basic toiletries.

◉ There is a mini-bar set up in the kitchen. The quality of the alcohol inside is akin to what someone might get from the well, but it's well-stocked.

◉ Gaby will make it clear to all new arrivals that if they have any requests or queries, they should contact her or El.

◉ The drugs making new characters compliant will remain in their systems for a few hours after their arrival at the safehouse before finally beginning to fade. They will be gone entirely after a night's rest. In the meantime, they may want to be careful of what others say to them.

◉ New characters will be given rudimentary access to the network on arrival in the safehouse, but will not have their ID set up yet. They will be able to make posts and replies, but their messages will be anonymous and they do not have inboxes yet.

◉ New characters will not be allowed to leave the safehouse until NOVEMBER 09 (JUNE 17). These 4 days are for them to adjust, learn about the world they've arrived in from their fellows, and for El to speak with them and work on setting up their IDs.

> FINAL OOC NOTES

Welcome to Meadowlark, newbies! You're now free to post to the network and logs comms. To reiterate, your characters will have no IDs or inboxes, nor be allowed out of the safehouse until NOVEMBER 09 (JUNE 17). At that point it's expected they'll have gotten a good idea of their new situation from their fellow characters, and will have discussed their background and job potentials with El in order for their false IDs to be set up.

As a note: all new characters arrive after the parade ends.

If you have any questions or ideas about how you'd like to get your character involved in the world, please head over to the plot engagement post and drop us a comment! For questions specific to this log, there is a thread below.

Please check out our June calendar rundown for a look at things happening this month, as well as some additional notes from the mods.

As a note to the entirety of our playerbase, we are at 58 players, which is 2 players away from our game cap! This is very exciting for us as moderators, especially as we quickly head toward our one year anniversary! There is a very good chance that this will be our last "full" arrival log for a while, though we have plans (and ideas!) in mind for future months.

As a reminder, AC for new characters accepted in June will be 10 comments across 2-4 threads, while current characters will need to provide the full AC of 20 comments across 2-4 threads. AC will be posted on July 1 at 12 AM UTC and close on July 8 at 12 AM UTC. If you do not reply to AC, you will be considered idled and dropped from the game. We will not post a warning list.

> NAVIGATION

Comments

[forcevisions]

No.

[ There's nothing petty about the galactic civil war, or the new one that has just begun. And there was nothing petty about fights on Jakku, either. It wasn't war, precisely, but it was never petty either. She doesn't have a schema for that. And she's beginning to recognize that it perhaps makes her sound naive to say so. ]

But there are people here who I know aren't willing to set other things aside, despite the fact that we have bigger problems. [ Is that a compromise? She's trying. She thinks of Poe, and then she realizes-- ] ... Myself included. After the fire, when I was sick. You tried to talk me down. That kind of thing?

[strove]

Yes. Sometimes arguments like that escalate, or people don't talk for months and the only time you know you're on their radar is when they're insulting you in a place where you can see it. [Exactly that. Clarke isn't trying to sound petty—merely matter of fact. What happened between her and Rey may be enough to cause a war back home. War is like a comfort for those people.]

Sometimes violence is a language of its own. It's not that I agree with that, but I've seen some of the things people will do so they can harbor their resentment. I saw a queen who took a girl and raised her so that she would be bloodthirsty, not willing to play fair. Things like that stand out. That same queen wasn't even the one who'd been wronged in the first place.

[forcevisions]

[ She's getting the lesson several times over that people take things harder over the network, which is weird to Rey, because it's in her head ?? ? It feels no more public than anything else. If anything she has a tendency to forget things are public (see: Kovacs' post about Han Solo).

But she also doesn't like having her nose rubbed in it when she already admitted fault for not understanding. It wasn't like Clarke had made an effort to make herself better understood, either, from what Rey could tell. So she's visibly grinding her teeth a little bit at that example.

It's a testament to the social skills she's learned here that she bites her tongue about it, though. She knows they'll have to cooperate, and Clarke is about to meet with the insomniac ball organizer, apparently. It'd be stupid to be needlessly combative. And this is -- needless. It's nitpicking what's already past.

And plenty of it is personal too, for Rey. She'd tried to be Clarke's friend, and felt talked down to. Patronized. Every time. That isn't easy to get over, but there are bigger problems. She'd said it herself. So now that the ideological gap is bridged some, she can at least do them both the courtesy of, well, not bringing personal frustrations to bear. There's a lot more to unpack there before she can try to be friends again, but she's at least working on swallowing what pride she has. ]

Have you met people here who you think are blooded like that? Or are you just assuming they'll become that way because of the violence you've seen? [ Because aside from the murderers, which Rey knows almost nothing about the circumstances of, she hasn't. Kovacs is the closest thing to an awful person she's encountered, and he's mostly just callous -- not resentful and vengeful and violent the way Clarke has described. Certainly not the type to rally a following and cause infighting. ] Maybe we're both seeing what we're used to seeing.

[ Rey trying to rally people together, to help them feel united, when solidarity on Jakku never had. Her enemy is apathy and fatigue and fear. While Clarke is more worried about what they'll do to each other. ]

[strove]

[And this is the question that makes it difficult. Because Clarke knows that she's one of those people. Quick to harm. Believing that it's necessary. Whoever brought them here and changed them, assuming that happened in tandem. It's Markus who keeps her in check, but Clarke who reminds him that things can always go the other way. They don't know.

She knows there are others. She knows that Matches and Hafid don't suggest violence lightly, but understands their perspectives. She has an idea about what Loki's been through. About the fact that Thor's anger can be directed and violent, just as forceful as he comes across. And those two men who showed up and vanished had their own circumstances. They didn't kill on their first day here because they weren't used to it. And then North, who has an issue with humans. Clarke has a feeling that her issues are well-founded in reality.]

Yes. [But unlike all those names that come to mind, Clarke is willing to offer herself up.] Because that's the life I knew before I got here. I didn't just see it Rey. I was one of them. If I can hide it, who else can? Think about it.

[And many of them aren't hiding it. She just thinks Rey isn't looking, too hopeful to see anything else.]

[forcevisions]

[ It's a bold declaration, and even stated outright, Rey is hesitant to believe it. Not just because she finds it hard to believe that anyone who was like that would have the self-awareness to recognize it and continue to be like that. But beyond that, they're not just talking about have you killed anyone. She's sure most here have. They come from violent planets in violent systems. How many people has she spoken with who share her connection to rebellion, who were driven to Morningstar by the same belief? You can't run a rebellion without a body count.

But this is specifically about people who've killed for petty vengeance. Who set aside larger issues to instead succumb to violence at the cost of community. And this is Clarke, who is so insistent that she wants to keep people together, that she is interested in reaching out to everyone, also saying that she has made that mistake and foregone it in favor of death.

Rey's frown etches deep lines around her mouth. ]

Even if it's true ... Even if there are people like that among us ... We can't worry about what they're going to do. We just have to try to do our best and assume the best of people until they give us a reason to do otherwise. Or we'll never get anywhere. [ That's what it has to boil down to. Focusing on the positives is the only way forward. That is why she, after all, had not outed Kylo Ren for what he was in the earliest days of their arrival. It had only begun to creep out with the anger virus. Monster though he'd tried to be, and it would be easy to group him with the situation Clarke is describing, even if his violence is anything but petty, he wanted the same thing they did. Working together was their best chance. ]

[strove]

I am doing that. [It's just that Rey's version of doing it apparently is distinctly different from Clarke's. To Clarke, what Rey is proposing sounds like one step away from being willfully blind to the possibility. None of these people, sans a small, small handful are Clarke's people. What if it became a matter of choosing between the two of them? What if?]

But there's not assuming the worst and realizing that it could easily happen. I can't ignore that possibility. That possibility is all I know.

[forcevisions]

I hope we prove you wrong.

[ Put simply because there's no other way to extend what's ultimately an impasse in perspective. Clarke's right, to an extent, that it's a possibility worth being aware of so it's readily spotted. But Rey won't start checking under the bed every night for boogeymen.

She softens some, realizing that they can't just stand in the street arguing with each other about it. ]

And I hope the contact you meet with proves you wrong too. It would be nice to have some more help. [ Instead of a new possible enemy, who they should be worried about knowing the location of their safehouse. ]

[strove]

[The irony of all of this is that most people would say that Clarke never acted out of pure vengeance. But if it was someone else's people versus her own, did it matter? Did the reasons always matter? It's a question she's asked herself countless times. Clarke knows that she murdered innocent children in Mount Weather. Maybe it was less murder and more killing, and maybe she had done everything in her power to keep that from happening—but it did.

She had exiled Emerson instead of taking revenge on him. And what happened then? He had nearly killed everyone she loved. Life told her that revenge had its place. Blood should, sometimes, have blood—even as she's argued against it to keep the greater degree of bloodshed from happening.

Clarke hasn't always been good about believing in what she tells other people. It's something that Titus noted in dealing with her.]

I do think that if they aren't out to hurt us, they could be a useful ally. Not just the contact, but the people who ... believe in us. They clearly have the means to watch and find us. Having that kind of resource at our disposal could do us some good, so long as we set some lines. [So long as they have their own free will. Among other things that Clarke already said. Because she does think there is a risk in worship like that. She can't shake it.]

[forcevisions]

Well, that's something.

[ A kind of optimism, at least. Even if Clarke's version of optimism is weak and wary, compared to Rey's definition. ]

Don't you think it's safe to assume that since they want to talk, and since they've known where to find us, that they're not out to hurt us? They would have already, if they wanted to.

[strove]

If you're worried about me walking in with my gun visible, I know how to handle diplomatic missions, Rey. [That does not exclude the existence of the gun. She just won't be in a position to shoot it right away.

That difference is important!]

[forcevisions]

I wasn't worried about that.

[ Why??? Have a gun? ? ? Rey sighs. Alright. If it's not visible, it's really not the point or the problem, right? ]

I just mean — They've earned a little bit of grace. [ It's not like they're a total unknown. There are some things they do know. Try to assume best intent. ]

[strove]

I'll keep that in mind. [Reality: it sounds like Clarke won't.

Actual reality: she will, but Clarke sometimes doesn't show that she's absorbing things. But she does tend to keep as much in mind as possible.]

I won't risk our chances if they really can help. I won't do that to our group.

[forcevisions]

[ Importantly, despite the dryness of Clarke's voice leading Rey to think maybe she won't actually keep it in mind (Rey, that's just her normal level of vocal fry), Rey makes the barest hint of a smile and nods. ]

I know that now.

[ Now, when she didn't before. Clarke's pessimism isn't strong enough to preemptively sabotage them by accident. It's just a little gruff and inflexible. So at the very least, she's making that revision to her understanding. ]

[strove]

Thank you. [It's important that Rey knows that. If nothing else, they may never be friends, but the impasse they were at before was one built thoroughly on a lack of understanding. Clarke not allying with Morningstar fully before, Clarke not trusting people easily, Clarke driving that wedge between them, believing that it might be for the best.

Of course, Clarke loves doing what she thinks "might be for the best."]

[forcevisions]

I'm going to go see if any of the others have been taken down.

[ She gestures behind her. This is really the end of what they have to talk about, right? ]

Let us know what you hear. [ She apparently doesn't need to say 'watch your back,' so she doesn't. ]