ARRIVAL LOG 017

[larkers]

WHO: Everyone
WHERE: New Amsterdam
WHEN: February 21
WHAT: The seventeenth arrival
NOTES OR WARNINGS: Coercion, loss of autonomy. Further notes at end of log.

> ARRIVAL LOG #017

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. Your eyes are heavy, hard to keep open, but in the glimpses between slow, dark blinks you see two people in front of you: one dressed in a thick set of armor, while the other wears medical garb. Out the windshield in front, there are many tall buildings—all reaching up beyond a normal city skyline, all entirely too close to the vehicle itself.

You realize there are many others on the bus with you (and is there another bus in the adjacent lane, caught briefly in flashes through the windshield?), and that all of you are wearing white, zipperless hoodies over a set of scrubs, with the hoodie meant to deliver some warmth. Everyone's hair has been recently cut, but at different stages of growth, and you're all held in place by a simple seatbelt. However, thanks to the IV dripping into your arm, it seems that there's no real need for more intense restraints than that. 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 lowers from its height and comes to a stop inside of an alley, with tall brick walls surrounding it. This is just a temporary stop. Two of the people are let off—but not you, not yet. Outside, they get a rundown from the tall woman in armor. "You have some specific steps to follow, and it's more important than ever before that you follow them. Head over to that tent—" she turns, motions to it. There are several interconnected tables, along with a buffet station just north of it where people are beginning to line up. "—and have yourself a good meal. It's up to you to decide how much that is." A qualification added just in case. "Don't look for any cops, don't steal from or hurt anyone, and keep an eye on each other until the people with the glow show up. They'll prove they have it. And just in case, keep this final warning in mind: someone is looking for you. Someone without the blue glow. It's not just you, but the people who came before. Be careful." She grabs both of their shoulders and pushes them toward the tent. "Now go have a good time now."

Under the tent is where a community meal is going on for the Lunar New Year festivities, albeit a lot more straightforward and more focused on charity. As the buses move through the city, they will cut through and bypass a lot of parades, dancing, and festivities. It's all the usual New Amsterdam fare. But these buses are focused on areas that are less busy, less eclectic. Given the spirit of community and gathering, the drop offs are happening where people are likely to keep an eye on each other if they run into problems, and where someone will step up to help out a stranger.

There are numerous community meals going on throughout the city, and the buses drop off at seven different locations. In each, everyone is dropped off in pairs. This separation seems to be planned and on purpose, as if whoever does these drop offs hoped to keep a crowd of drugged up people from standing out too much.

THE PAIRS ARE:

Hama Sun & Melisandre
Dick Grayson & Olivia Dunham
Bucky Barnes & Jondae Lee
Eliot Waugh & Godric
Quentin Coldwater & Kenzi
Marian Hawke & Jon Snow
Wade Wilson & Clark Kent

Now it's time for the separate groups to grab a plate of food and wait for their rescuers to come get them. The air outside is cool but not overly chilly, as well as dry. The sky itself is gray, and the people working the tents are all welcoming, asking the names of anyone who's come there. At least it's a safer, less busy location for once.

◉ 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 message passed on from the mysterious patron.

All newcomers are separated because of a lead-in to this month's event. Please feel free to use the CR meme to work out any additional details with this!

> LUNAR NEW YEAR

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.

They just always have to change things up on us, huh? We've got a new group who's come in, but they've been scattered throughout the city. There's seven different drop-off points, so try and split up to get everyone. Sending GPS pings now. All of them are wearing white hoodies over medical scrubs. You know the drill.

Despite only having four days to clean up New Amsterdam after the end of Carnivalentine's to prepare it for the Lunar New Year festivities, it seems that the people of New Amsterdam have pulled it off yet again. Though Lunar New Year started on February 19th, it occurs for the next fifteen days, ending on March 4th. Of course, such clean up doesn't happen by accident. If anyone's looking for a well-paying, albeit very temporary job, this is the place to look. Anyone who does good work during the clean up of Carnivalentine's and setup of Lunar New Year festivities is likely to be called back for later events around the city. People who are good with tools are a plus, and anyone who's down to pass out lunches to those working hard will be loved and favored by everyone else.

On February 21st, festivities around the city will have been going on for the last 48 hours and often late into the night. There are parts of the city that are far noisier than others, and some of the Displaced will find that any direct paths to the newcomers will be difficult to manage. Parades, dancing troupes, and ceremonial markets and popups will be far away from most of the community centers set up for communal meals. But they will definitely be in the way, making traffic on foot or via various hover vehicles far from easy. Ever got stuck in traffic when a parade just keeps happening? Ever worried about the person on the other end? Well, hopefully someone else can get there, or you can be creative in cutting through, because it might be a while.

> COMMUNITY MEALS
One of the biggest parts of Lunar New Year festivities is the sense of family and community as everyone comes together. In 2512, family can sometimes come with very specific ideas of how someone should behave and present themselves, especially with the oligarchical nature of the corporations. But down on the ground, "family" can mean people who look out for each other—and even people who haven't met. Thanks to Matek Kattan (the little known but recently hired VP of Marketing for Tempo, a Pulsar subsidiary, Kattan has minimal social media presence and works from home even with his new position), Joseph Lynch (gubernatorial candidate and philanthropist, as well as head of the Giles Bell subsidiary, Ibis), and Elin Zepatka (philanthropist whose primary job is to manage stocks and ensure that she can keep making charitable donations), these meals will be well-stocked with a wide range of food. There will be no alcoholic beverages to consume at these community meals, and no one will be turned away if they decide to have two or three plates of food. Want to bring some home? Be their guest!

The homeless of the city—many of which weren't homeless before a few months ago—will be lining up for these meals, and some will be coming with glass tupperware containers so that they can bring home their food. There will also be careful distributors of dry ice to keep the food chilled for as long as possible, as well as totes to help carry anything home.

These meals are scheduled and their locations will be available online for anyone looking for a quick snack. They will also be asking for anyone interested in volunteering to help out with these meals through the end of the festivities. If anyone's looking for a volunteer opportunity, this is a great place to start.

> PARADES AND DANCE TROUPES
Ah, yes, what would New Amsterdam be without parades. While the citizens of New Amsterdam may be happy to have constant frollicking in their streets, anyone who's still working a regular job will need to plan around these parades that will be happening regularly for the next fifteen days. A lot of people will be late to work, and some people's bosses probably won't be too lenient. What a pain.

The parades themselves are bright and colorful in nature, celebrating the imagery one might expect with Lunar New Year celebrations. Want your lions and dragons and … rats? Well, it is the Year of the Rat, but even those creatures will be dressed up in bright reds, oranges, and yellows to commemorate the festivities. Between each of the long, dancing dragons, there will be dance troupes. Many of these have been seen before in past New Amsterdam events, and they seem to take on the new season with gusto, gladly preparing themselves for these new celebrations.

Many of the office workers in New Amsterdam will be host to private dance troupes coming in to give lessons and bring cheer during this time. While this is an excuse to slack off on work, participation is often mandatory for these poorly-disguised team-building exercises.

> FLOWER DISPLAYS
Throughout the city, there are multiple different types of flower displays for sale. In preparation for the Lunar New Year, and noting the odd growth of greenery throughout the city, the florists worked together to prep for this season. The first half of February was about the language of love, but they were ready for what came next: the many flower and plant arrangements for Lunar New Year.

AR displays will list of the meanings of the flowers themselves, as the meanings are half the fun around this time:

Plum Blossom symbolizes luckiness
Kumquat (the fruit) symbolizes prosperity
Calamondin symbolizes luck
Narcissus symbolizes prosperity
Bamboo, a plant used for any time of year
Sunflower means to have a good year
Eggplant, a plant to heal all of your sicknesses
Chom Mon Plant, a plant which gives you tranquility

While there will be many displays already set up for sale, and every florist is happy to put together a custom display for an extra fee.

> RED ENVELOPES
There will be popups all around the city selling wares for anyone who wants to deck themselves out in bright reds, yellows, and oranges for the season. Looking for fire-breathing rat accessories? These are the places to go. These popups are great for another reason, though: free credits! Everyone in the city can stop by multiple popups to get a digital red envelope that will come with eight free credits. That isn't a lot of money, but put together enough and it might lead to something?

> FIREWORKS
Every night on the river, the boats will dock and the firework shows will begin. These shows last for fifteen minutes, and there will be quickly set up concession stands all along the riverbank. Since they'll be happening every night of the festivities, there is little chance that they'll be missed. For anyone who's anywhere on the above-ground part of New Amsterdam, the fireworks may cause some people to lose some sleep. Even though there is little sun in underground New Amsterdam, at least it's a lot quieter. This time of the year is proof of that.

> FOOD
Time for food! The annual dumpling-making competition will be happening throughout the Lunar New Year event, with a panel of premiere restaurant critics heading through the city to check out the best dumplings around. Whoever wins will gain fame and notoriety. The panel itself rotates every year, all but ensuring that no one is a back-to-back winner. That said, the dumpling restaurant Revel-UTION is thought to perhaps change the game this year. Many of the food bloggers in New Amsterdam think they're likely to be back to back winners.

Otherwise, many restaurants and food trucks have added dumplings to their menus, but that's not all. New noodle dishes, taro and turnip cakes, prosperity salads (the higher you toss it the more luck comes in the new year!) and various types of laba porridges will make appearances. Leeks and apples are in just about anything, adding a savory and sweet taste to every bite. Some chefs are better at incorporating these ingredients than others. Remember those food bloggers? They know the places that struggle to meet the grade at this time of year. Few of them have hope for the particularly abominable locations.

> NEW MORNINGSTAR AGENTS

Spread out through many of the festivities volunteering will be new Morningstar agents that recently arrived in the city after the 16th. Thanks to the Displaced's efforts in making connections around the world, these agents expressed interest in coming to New Amsterdam to help rebuild the Morningstar infrastructure. While El can do a fair bit online, ze doesn't have the hands or physical means to rebuild the city's resources, especially with some of those resources and contacts turning tail after some bad press.

None of these new agents will be at the Displaced's safehouse or their bar, but they will be around, ready to work with anyone who's decided to sign up for Morningstar. Many of their faces will be familiar to anyone who visited the New Prague Morningstar safehouses in late November, as well as anyone who was around when the Displaced found themselves in New Tokyo. The majority of these agents, counting 50 in number, have come from these two locations. The most notable is Nico, the agent from New Tokyo who asked PRESERVE to transfer her to help and volunteer in New Amsterdam.

Many of these agents will be interested in meeting with the Displaced and helping them out, as they're sympathetic to their plight and how they've ended up in this world. But they won't approach anyone unsolicited, so anyone who's looking to make ties between the Displaced and these new agents should feel free to reach out and do just that.

> 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. Gaby will be around, ready to greet as many of the new arrivals as she can and get them settled in. Brusque and no-nonsense, she'll be open to questions, but will advise the newcomers to ask the people who brought them in for the beginning bits of information. Newbies can also contact El through zeir inbox, if needed.

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 at a bar, but it's well-stocked.There will also be several pans of dumplings setup from some of the better restaurants. They won't be winning any rewards, but Gaby worked with El to buy them in bulk for the Displaced (both newcomers and older ones). Feel free to take some home!

◉ While the kitchen has basic foods and necessities, anyone looking for a jolt of caffeine from coffee or tea will find themselves sorely lacking. The only tea present is herbal in nature, and caffeine appears to be almost nonexistent in most of the beverages lying around.

◉ Gaby will make it clear to all new arrivals that if they have any requests or queries, they should contact her or El. Either she or El will explain that they've been given a modest stipend of credits to help them get by until they can find a job. This will be enough to cover their living expenses for about a month while they hang out in the safehouse, if they're careful with budgeting.

◉ 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 FEBRUARY 25 (JANUARY 19). 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

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 FEBRUARY 25 (JANUARY 19). 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.

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 January calendar rundown for a look at things happening this month, as well as some additional notes from the mods. We'll also be posting our Event Write-Up on Monday, so please keep an eye out for it!

As a reminder, AC for new characters accepted in January 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 February 1 at 12 AM UTC and close on February 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

b - because what is sleep anyway?

[hardwearing]

[ As the Safehouse fills up, Wash is more and more desperate to get out of here. But he can't afford it yet, not on his own, so here he remains. He's surviving on catnaps more than anything, too on edge around the strangers and wracked with nightmares to get any real rest. So he's up once again, doing bodyweight exercises in the common room in the hopes that he'll exhaust himself enough to get a little sleep at some point despite being surrounded by people.

...yeah, who's he kidding?

When he hears someone approach he glances up, blinking when he recognizes Kyna. Her comment earns a faint grin. ]

I guess it could be. What kind of horror movie is it, though?

WASH PLEASE SLEEP

[evocation]

[Kyna considers that as she approaches, plopping down beside him.]

Maybe like... A slasher movie? Or something like Alien. And you're the badass space marine who gets to save my ass.

CAN'T SLEEP WON'T SLEEP DON'T KNOW HOW TO SLEEP

[hardwearing]

Oh god. Okay, but just your ass is guaranteed. I don't have my armor or anything, no way am I managing to save everyone.

[ He's still planking until this point, at which he pushes himself to sit facing her instead. It wasn't much of a strain anyway, he's not tiring himself out this way. ]

You know there are actually aliens that look a little like the one in Alien? Kind of. Their mouths go like this instead.

[ His fingers splay out to either side of his face as he tries to demonstrate how a Sangheilli looks. ]

i can relate tbh

[evocation]

Awww, does that mean I'm special? Or at least my ass is.

[Who could blame him, honestly.]

And do their mouths open like... sideways or something?

Re: i can relate tbh

[hardwearing]

It does and it is. Mostly because it's attached to you.

[ She's probably the person he's most comfortable around here, if he's honest with himself. ]

They open in four directions at once. Like a flower with an insane amount of teeth.

[evocation]

[Kyna can't help it—she bursts out laughing.]

I can't tell if you're hitting on me or not. And you're telling me about a fucked up alien at the same time.

[hardwearing]

[ Wash is a little startled by the laugher, then looks confused until Kyna speaks again... at which point he blushes bright red under his freckles. He hadn't meant to flirt, at least not consciously, wouldn't really know how anymore but if he was he's sure talking about Elites too would be the wrong move. Is she laughing at him, or... would she want him to be flirting?

What the hell is going on. ]

I'm sorry..?

[evocation]

[Oh, man, he's so easy to fluster. Kyna tilts her head, clearly unoffended.]

What are you sorry for?

[hardwearing]

[ He's still trying to work out if he was unconsciously flirting or not, and thinks maybe he was. Shit. How long has it been? At least she does't seem upset about it. ]

Um. Maybe for the combining it with the alien description part.

[evocation]

[She snickers again, poking at his side.]

Points for originality? And staying on theme.

[hardwearing]

[ The poke gets a little flinch away, not because he's ticklish but because he isn't used to people touching him. He tries to play it off, covering his side almost shyly.

Her laugh is really nice to hear, though. Something about it eases the nervous tension he feels all the time here. ]

I get the feeling during a horror movie would be just about the worst time to flirt, though. What with all the screaming and running for your life.

[evocation]

What? People bang in horror movies all the time. It's totally a thing.

[hardwearing]

...that's a very vulnerable position they're putting themselves in when there's a murderer slash alien slash horde of the undead on the loose.

[evocation]

Well, yeah, but everyone in horror movies is stupid. It's why they die so easy.

[hardwearing]

Do you think you would too?

[evocation]

Uh...

[She hesitates, suddenly awkward.]

Here, or at home?

[hardwearing]

Well here there's the whole... [ Yeah, they're on the same page there. ] I guess at home?

[evocation]

At home I'd totally kick ass. Here I'd die in like two seconds.

[Such confidence.]

[hardwearing]

Oh. I didn't -- I was asking if you'd -- uh.

[ He's blushing again. ]

Never mind. What have you been up to?

[evocation]

[It takes her a second, and then she clues in.]

Oh. No, I'm not that dumb.

[Well.]

Wait, what kind of horror movie are we talking and how hot are the people with me?

[hardwearing]

I didn't put that much thought into it, honestly. Everyone's super hot but there's a constant threat.

[evocation]

Maybe a quick makeout session?

[Is she kidding?]

[hardwearing]

Still distracting, but not as compromising at least.

[evocation]

Yeah, see? Exactly. What about you?

[hardwearing]

On a scale of one to you, how hot are people?