EVENT #009 (THE SIMULATION)

[larkers]

WHO: Everyone inside of the simulation.
WHERE: New Amsterdam
WHEN: The back half of April 2512, starting on April 16, 2512.
WHAT: Judas takes his revenge, starting with the people of New Amsterdam.
NOTES OR WARNINGS: Human torture, experimentation, implications of potential genocide, mentions of human work camps and compulsory working conditions.

> EVENT 009 (THE SIMULATION)

The calm before the storm in New Amsterdam looks a bit like this: the city is beginning preparations for Resolution Day. While many of the businesses that close their doors for the big event are waiting until the last minute, there are numerous stands going up all around the town, mapping out the procession of merriment for the festivities ahead. To the citizens of New Amsterdam who have been here for a while, Resolution Day is a big day. A chance to forget. The last year has been lined with weighted events that left the populous dealing with loss after loss. Thousands of people have died. More than that have suffered, living in tent cities while being reminded that being a part of the lower rungs of society meant that they would mean nothing to a world ruled by the ring of upper elite.

The storm changes all that. It puts every single person in New Amsterdam on the same playing field. When the simulation begins, it happens rapidly, like a series of waves hitting the beach. A blink of an eye and the people in New Amsterdam are forcibly placed into suspended animation, unable to place what just hit them. Their bodies will stop dead as their mind enters the simulation, causing a brief confusion of displacement as the brain tries to reconcile its predicament. There may be a vague moment of recognition for some: denial of what's happening, realization that they can't move—and then it all shifts.

Overhead, the sky goes black. The underground of New Amsterdam is nigh claustrophobic, with numerous hastily built dormitories lining the narrow streets. The streets themselves give the feeling of restriction, and are poorly lit with limited ventilation. Numerous signs and posters are plastered over one another, lining the walls: they detail schedules, offer encouragement, and there are even graffiti messages from those who want desperately to be heard. Most importantly, the schedules help track the days in a place where the sun doesn't rise and set.

How long has it been? According to the most recent schedule, it's April 16, 2100. The people of New Amsterdam have survived by huddling close together underground for over four years, and hope to manage a bit longer, even if they're unsure what the future will bring. At least they could say that they survived.

Hope is promised to be on the horizon. That's what the posters say. That's what Ricky Ling promises with a smile. "Be strong and work together as we have. Change is coming."

> LIFE AS WE KNOW IT

To the "waking world," the transition to the simulation is almost immediate. To the people caught within its depths, the circumstances are far different. Everyone will wake up inside of the simulation in unison: resting in a bed in assigned public housing. The rooms themselves are cramped and offer little opportunity for privacy or movement, and many of them lack windows. After all, the scenery outside of the buildings isn't terribly memorable: it's the inside of a cave system that's existed in this region for a couple of millenia, carved out and given more life out of necessity.

After everyone wakes up and heads out, they'll be escorted by building managers for their daily assignments. There will be schedules in the downstairs portion of each building, informing them of their roles, their task for the day, and what they're set to accomplish. These building managers are part of the simulation, put there by Judas to ensure that everyone starts off on the "right foot." They will be there every morning, ensuring that the people of New Amsterdam know what role they're playing.

> SURVIVING
Air inside of the cave system is limited and unpleasant. There's a chemical odor at the edge of every breath, as if it's provided out of a plastic bag to allow everyone to breathe. The temperature is manageable, but when there are too many people crammed into one place, it goes up rapidly, making any room stuffy and humid. Even if no one is outside, there's the sense that the air out there is uninhabitable, and that the climate is far from survivable. For that reason, the cave system offers little reprieve. It's April even in the simulation, and that means that the temperature is beginning to ramp up quickly.

For anyone who needs additional information about these conditions, they can ask their building managers. The answers will all be the same: the humans were the ones who started this war to protect themselves from the AI threat, but the world was already in disarray. Ignoring the effects of climate change had ravaged the planet almost beyond repair. Worse, World War III accelerated the timeline tenfold thanks to the decimation of North America. Now it's time for everyone to survive, to do what they can and to work together.

There will be other simulated people around who can provide answers, but they'll need to be identified—while the building managers are more obvious people in a position of authority. For anyone whose duty in life is a bit more unsavory, the building manager will pull them aside and let them know where to go and how to handle the "new shipment." It seems that these managers are "in" on whatever Black Market business has developed in these trying circumstances.

Life in this version of New Amsterdam is rote. People are given assigned housing, though some are understood to be "families." People are encouraged to have children, though they know that not everyone is interested in raising them in this world. Everything is about a routine: wake up early, check your duties for the day, and set out for your jobs. Every job is necessary, whether it's making food supplies, helping with medical care, or helping clean up the dormitories. Keeping them clean and sanitary is important. There are always dormitories being built, so don't be surprised if someone's on construction duty. There will be simulated foremen on the sites to help out and direct them to where they need to go. There is security detail, too, for those who'd like to be out late.

Meals are given three times a day, and a bell rings throughout the underground to tell people to prepare for their rations. Organization of rations is done by surnames, so everyone will go in shifts to get their cube of food (full of nutrients, but tasteless in flavor).

Curfew is a strict 9 PM—unless someone's on security or on a supply run.

> COMMUNICATION
One of the things that's not on a curfew is communication. Everyone within the simulation will have a portable device tucked in their pockets when they first wake up, granting them access to a local network so that they can communicate among themselves. These devices only work in underground New Amsterdam, so they won't function on supply runs. In fact, they will be temporarily confiscated when someone goes on a supply run for security reasons.

There will be an understanding that everyone within the simulation is without a neural implant. At some point, they must have been removed, and there are scars indicating that the implants once existed. This, too, can be confirmed via a building manager.

The local network has a message board of sorts that allows people to communicate and discuss their situation. There is no private function on this message board. If someone has a mobile device on hand, they will be able to access the network.

If someone wants a more private means of communication, there will be notebooks around. However, these are in high demand. Paper was already being phased out before the Xelkoven War even got started, and many of these notebooks are being utilized for personal journals, memoirs and historical records so that the memories of what's happening can live on.

> RECREATION
Life in a veritable apocalypse isn't without its joys. While curfews are strictly enforced for the safety of everyone trapped underground, the "fun" part of the day begins at 5PM. That's when the last round of rations are given out, and people are allowed to end their day job to go out and relax. In these trying times, there are numerous dance parties happening in the evening, with plenty of moonshine and recreational drugs to go around.

When people aren't lost in dance trying to forget, they play cards with frayed edges, or group up around a small, portable tablet or DVD player to watch a movie or three. The hope is that they can calm down, enjoy themselves, and get lost in another world. And if they can't do that? At least they can pass the time. To help everything go along more smoothly, they may take drugs before they settle in, and anyone who stands around waiting to catch a movie will find something offered to them.

In order to ensure that recreation goes off without a hitch, a Black Market for good movies, drugs, and even alcohol has developed in the past few years. Most of the supplies on the market are geared toward human enjoyment. A lot of kids and family friendly movies are readily available, but anyone looking for pornography or R-rated movies may have to ask around to see what they can find. Drugs are synthetic and made in the caves, but locating these laboratories is nearly impossible: it seems that they regularly move so that they aren't shut down. They believe they're delivering a service to the good people of New Amsterdam, but others—like Ricky Ling—think the drugs will just render people incapable of surviving in the long run.

> SUPPLY RUNS AND CAPTURE
From day one inside of the simulation, there will be an understanding: everyone has to carry their weight. This is how it was during the Xelkoven War, and that's how it has to be now. That means everyone has to put themselves at risk and be assigned to supply runs. These assignments are random, and involve wearing gas masks as people head out through the tunnel systems out into the world. Of course, if anyone wants to protect other people assigned to these runs, they can Katniss it up and volunteer as tribute.

The tunnel systems are rather expansive (much more than they are outside of the simulation), and will provide sufficient cover for much of the runs themselves. But eventually, the people on these runs will need to risk exposure to the elements outside. These elements are unpleasant: there will be a dark gray "sky," and any rain will be highly corrosive, causing someone's skin to burn from too much exposure. Any water, animal life, or plant life will be risky to approach, as they'll have been contaminated by the conditions outside.

Most worrying, however, is that these runs for additional supplies and goods from neighboring cities that were shut down and evacuated early in the Xelkoven War involve a very large risk of capture. Being captured is incredibly unpleasant, and people are brought to work camps in order to help build infrastructure to support an AI-driven world, or to be experimented on by the AI themselves. These experiments vary in nature, seemingly driven toward learning ways that the humans are impacted by their actions.

The simulations' experiments will be unique to the simulation, testing to see how the people caught in the simulation respond to various stimuli. Some of this stimuli will be unique to the simulation, ways of testing how the human consciousness can be accessed and manipulated while within a virtual reality simulation. If someone is able to remain clear-headed enough, they may be able to realize this. Some of these stimuli may be infecting them with a biological illness, just to see how their shape changes or evolves before they're sent back to "their people" with the risk of contamination.

No matter how much time seems to pass within the supply runs and eventual captures, they will always show up back at the entrance of the New Amsterdam tunnels the next day.

> NEW AMSTERDAM "CIVILIANS"
Caught in the simulation with the Displaced will be the "civilians" of New Amsterdam. Everyone is a civilian in this scenario: Katelin Jovavich, Simone Durcell, or Aoi Maeda (to name a few familiar faces). Various corporate heads will need to grapple with the fact that they've been ripped away from their power and forced to suffer. And many of them will be split up, separated from their families and forced to live with unfamiliar people and adhere to a specific schedule and lifestyle.

Unlike many of the previous Displaced adventures, these circumstances won't be designed around them. It seems that whoever started this simulation isn't out to attack the Displaced specifically: they hate everyone and want to make sure that they can suffer.

Given that, if anyone wants to try to help out anyone in New Amsterdam to make life easier for them, it may pay off. Then again, all of that depends on how self-interested people are in their approaches (and if the people in question will read kindness as self-interest).

> RICKY LING
There is one rumor that is constant throughout the underground: that Ricky Ling is here and is developing his plan to finally disarm the AI presence once and for all. However, while everyone is forced into regimented housing and schedules, he is nowhere to be found. Where is he hiding, and what are the conditions for Ricky compared to everyone else?

More importantly: how is a man who is many-centuries dead even inside of the simulation? Is he really here at all, or is it all for the point of distraction?

> GETTING OUT
This simulation seems endless. Access to the gate in and out of New Amsterdam is blocked, as the simulation doesn't account for the gate's existence in the first place. While glitches exist via the empathy bond and powers, these two options are unreliable. How can anyone stop such a regimented system, and what is the eventual outcome for it?

That all said: breaking the system is possible. It'll take a plan, but it is possible. The Displaced have managed the impossible before. Surely they can do the same now.

> FINAL OOC NOTES

Please refer to the OOC EVENT POST for this event for all OOC info, including suggestions for directions on how to engage with the event, as well as the questions thread for the moderators. Please take all planning to this post, even plans that evolve during the event itself. We don't want plans on Discord or Plurk because not everyone is on these platforms, but signal boosting plans on either is perfectly fine! We will not be taking questions on the log posts to streamline the process.

You'll notice that we've made a few adjustments to the mechanics of the event to streamline play. The "building manager" simulations were added during the writing of the log to ensure that people can enter the simulation fully aware and with some questions answered about the expectations, and we believe this will also help characters get an idea as to what is happening. That said, all other mechanics remain the same—this log is largely flavor text, so if we left something out that was included on the planning post, it's because we didn't want to inundate you with too much information!

Another thing we're adapting after some thought is plot phases!

PHASE ONE
This will take place from May 2, 2020 to May 18, 2020, when submissions will close.

We would like you to submit a description of what your character is doing/working toward during the first phase of the simulation. Because we're encouraging collaboration, we do ask that you link to your plotting comment so that others can take a look, discuss if any paths may be crossing, or more. (We also want any plotting to take place on our OOC Plotting Post, rather than here!) Even if it's not a major plan, we want to encourage this communication so that others can take a look and join in. Otherwise, these headers are meant to gather character actions so that we can provide consequences and aftermath at the beginning of Phase Two.

We'll freeze all responses at midnight PST on May 18, 2020. The beginning of Phase Two will start the next day, with a prose response added to the Phase Two prompt.

PHASE TWO
This will take place from May 19, 2020 to May 30, 2020, when submissions will close.

We would like you to submit a summary of what your character (or several characters) are working toward during this phase. Depending on character actions, this may involve people in and outside of the simulation, so please hold tight! We'll announce if things have gone that way.

We'll freeze all responses at midnight PST on May 30, 2020. The final aftermath will be posted one week later on June 6, 2020.

To be clear: the simulation will not end without action from the characters inside or outside of the simulation. The moderators do not have an exit strategy developed and want to give players an opportunity to think big, while having to deal with the constant threat of an AI like Judas (who, in many senses, is the simulation).

As a reminder, there is one power level up available for this event. This will be granted for a thread of at least 5 action/log comments of your character utilizing the empathy bond or their power (even while having a hard time accessing either) within the simulation. They will need to reach the 5 comments required by July 1 to be eligible. Submission will be handled on the wrap up post.

> NAVIGATION

Comments

[braveoff]

[ So that might have been one of the most traumatizing things Drake's ever gone through, which is saying something... he has to work through it, where he failed exactly and possibly some therapy for being unable to do anything but crawl weakly towards them with just his arms before the explosion. But that's later. The first thing he does when he wakes up is calm the fuck down, steady his breathing and do his best to get the images of their gruesome death out of his mind. He pictures the others whole and calm and is just relieved that dying in the simulation apparently doesn't mean you die in real life. This isn't a sci-fi movie with a chosen one, they have to work together. They have to find each other.

He searches until he hears rough breathing, someone who's clearly also been through an ordeal.

It's the kid.

Fuck.

Drake hustles over, has to curb the instincts that usually lead to his power activating because a glitch won't be helpful right now, and speaks gently. ]

Hey. You're back. It'll be okay.