they show you how to swim

[headandhand]

WHO: All Dualizens, old and new
WHAT: Your regularly scheduled NAPs event for the month
WHERE: Dualis Oasis
WHEN: Nov. 7-10
WARNINGS: Please use these if applicable!


Look at all of these bright, shining new faces! There’s even a few less bright, less shining faces - maybe even a few folks without faces - but hey, this city welcomes all types. Chances are, if you’ve just arrived, you're seeing some pretty crazy things, unless you're used to an eye-blinding amount of neon, robots, weird-ass technology, magic, and an omnipresent police force...and hey, if you are, congrats, you're gonna settle in juuuuust fine. But for the rest of you, the Head knows this has gotta be pretty overwhelming, right?

Well, since your quaint individual processing units are probably having a hard time, why not link up with another one? By which the Head means...

Hello, new citizens of Dualis,
and welcome to your monthly Network Adjacency Protocol~!

NAPs are a monthly community networking event similar to the Earth concept of speed dating! Two citizens (new arrivals and old hands alike) are placed at a table together with a handy cue card of queries to help break the proverbial ice. Ask queries and receive results, or ignore the card and yeet yourself straight into a brand new friendship! But don't be too shy, you've only got ten minutes together, and if you just sit in silence for the whole ten, the Network Admins are likely to come supervise and try to repair the uplink through a mild shock to the ol' central nervous system. You might find yourself saying all sorts of unintended facts about yourself if that happens...probably better to just make friends, right? Who doesn’t like friends?!

The weather outside may be taking a turn toward chilly, but you can still get your swim on during this month’s NAPs, held at the Dualis Oasis, an indoor temperature-controlled aquatic amusement park with giant slides, swimming pools, and lazy winding float rivers. Appropriate swimming gear is required for entry to this part of the park, but there are a number of shops just outside that will gladly sell you swimwear and accessories.

For those of you who wish to avoid a humid environment or just hate fun, a dehumidified lounge and restaurant offer quieter, dryer spaces for chatting and snacking. The actual speed-friending itself is in progress here, but you’re welcome to stick around and continue conversations with your new friends.

So c’mon, what are you waiting for? Just dive right in for fun and friendship - the water’s fine, fine, fine, just like everything else in this fair city. But hey, remember to play safe. No running!

Comments

[blitzcheer]

Was it a stupid question? Yes. Is Tidus embarrassed? No. That's the position of dumbfounded he's in: ask the first dumb thing that comes to mind. The drink he'd ordered earlier arrives at the table, a glass of something night-sky blue and with reddish balls floating in the thick substance.

Tidus stares at it, forgetting why it's there; then remembers and nods to the server, give them a clumsy thanks.

He's going to leave it there though for now. But it brings him back into the present, and Tidus shakes his head when he regards the woman.

"Okay, space talk? Too much for me. It's like my brain's leaving for space." Like, seriously, he gives in. "Just one thing: Are you the pilot?"

He should be able to handle that.

[whosthemonsternow]

It's unbelievable how utterly amused she is by his dumbfounded state. This poor kid, she's half expecting to see some brain leaking out of his ears soon with how he seems to be handling any of it.

South gives a good laugh when he finally speaks again, shaking her head a bit. Then he continues and she laughs again, louder and full-bodied enough she has to put her drink down for a moment.

"A pilot? Me?! I'd lose my goddamn mind and jump out the airlock without a helmet if I was saddled with that boring as job!" Oh, she is laughing so much at the very idea, sorry not sorry, that was a dumber question than the people living on a planet one if you ask her. She can handle a ship in an emergency, if she has to, she's been trained in it. But it's almost as sad of a job as riding a fucking desk!

"Hell no, holy fucking hell- no. I'm a Marine. I'm the one in a full power-suit, jumping out the back to fuck up enemies. I'm not some glorified chauffeur hiding in the cockpit of a ship playing with myself while people do real work." Alright. Listen. She does kinda like her team's pilot, Niner, but pilots and piloting in general is just the absolute most depressing sounding shit to her.

[blitzcheer]

Woman knows what she loves and she doesn't, and Tidus doesn't take any offence to the laughter. It's passionate, even if he doesn't think her view of the people doing the maintenance work is fair. But hey, he wouldn't be caught dead doing the busybody work for a Blitzball tournament either, or anything else of that nature. He'd be bored to tears too.

He has no thoughts about her being a Marine—or a soldier of any kind, as he takes it—but it does make Tidus think, considering a second that drink on the table (...and unconsidering it—) before returning back to her, what he's been able to tell about her so far.

"What matches up to work like that here then? All I've heard about any problems is that disease that brought us here." Or, the cure for it. "You sound like you'd get bored easy if everything was too fine. Does this place have fiends?" he adds, tacked on last minute.

He's heard some talk of fiends in other worlds, but nothing here, yet. It's just been one big giant city in his mind and nothing outside it.

[whosthemonsternow]

"I'm a bodyguard for the Mayor and a deputy here," She replies to the first question, shrugging slightly.

There had been plenty of boring as hell times not that long ago, but things have...picked up a lot more than she really expected. While she's excited for some fighting finally, none of it means anything good for all of them stuck in this world.

"If by fiends you mean some pretty fucked up criminal bosses and murderbots- then, yea, it does." South assumes he just means super bad guys, like someone who does evil and awful shit. If it means a specific kind of being, well, she has no idea about any of that.

[blitzcheer]

"Uh... murderbots?" Criminal bosses describes itself. Murderbots though? That's not painting too much of an image, or not one Tidus is really sure of. It's worth waiting on explaining fiends, when maybe they're actually speaking about the same thing but with different names.

[whosthemonsternow]

"Yeah, murderbots. Robots who tried to destroy the city some weeks back." She scrunches her nose a little thinking about it, lip curling up just slightly in obvious disdain. "They...were made to look like us, like robot clones bent on murder."

[blitzcheer]

Talk about a massive yikes?

"What for?" It sounds crazy, his brow risen yet drawn tight in bewilderment. Robots that looked like them? Trying to destroy the city? "Who? Why?"

Who would want that? Just some no-good criminals? But the fact they were able to make robots that looked like people there is beyond astonishing. You could just—manage something like that?

[whosthemonsternow]

"We're still working on finding that shit out." She shrugs again, finishing the rest of her drink in a quick gulp. At least she's going to wait a little bit before getting yet another one, for now.

"It's not like they just told us the what, who, or why's of their murder plans." South huffs a bit, leaning her elbows on the table.

It'd be easier if they did tell them all the information they wanted, but obviously a murderbot isn't going to be that helpful. Well, then again, if they had the details, they wouldn't have a reason to hunt them down and beat the info out of them, so.

[blitzcheer]

Fair, even if it doesn't really assuage his confusion or pretty much anything else. But that's what happens when nobody has the answers than the ones—whoever they are—behind the attacks.

The finish of the woman's drink makes Tidus finally do more than just stare at his own, and he picks it up, the small bubble-shaped bits bobbing some when it brings it over to himself. There's the faintest smell like grapes when it comes under his nose, and he takes a sip.

...

And is about to put it back down like okay that tastes fine, when the thick grape-y taste turns sour and hot. It comes slamming down, a chunk thrown out across the table as Tidus wheezes and stands, head hanging, sputtering, "Shit! Water!"

It's like a truck just slammed his mouth with chillies and most sour fruits all at once. Sorry South, just brb he's got to get twelve glasses (or just two) of non-offensive drinking water.

He'll come back again, if South will still be there—and also probably someone to clean up that spill.

[whosthemonsternow]

So. She hasn't tried that drink. South's mostly just found one she liked and stuck to it, never know what weird shit might happen with some of the consumables around here. She wasn't at all expecting his reaction to the drink, but then he's freaking out and dying, and, yeah, sorry, she's mostly just going to watch since he's not really choking or anything.

Then he's off and she continues to mostly just observe, though she can't help a mean little chuckle at his situation. Not her fault, boy was almost murdered by a simple drink!

She is still there whenever he returns, a staff member has already cleaned up his mess and brought her another drink. Which she's sipping on when she notices him coming back, cocking an eyebrow curiously. She more or less assumed he'd take off.

"Huh. So you survived your near death experience with a little drink?"

[blitzcheer]

Someone taught him manners (who though, we can't say), so when he'd seen South still there, he wasn't just going to bail. Embarrassing as the trudge might be back, he's got his water—normal, safe water—and a face screwed halfway between embarrassment and a grimace.

"I'm not going to die that easy." Ugh, there's an aftertaste in the back of his throat and it's halfway nice. He picks up his fresh glass anyway. "'Least the last time I thought I ended up in some new world, the food and drink wasn't gross most of the time."

Then again, he didn't pick at random so much then.

[whosthemonsternow]

She wouldn't have entirely blamed the kid if he hadn't returned, he did kick up quite a show. He'd have a good reason to be too embarrassed to rear his head back up so soon.

"Hey, there's plenty of good shit here. Don't blame the food cause you got something weird." At least, she's mostly been safe with what she's gotten. But she also waits and watches someone else get it first most of the time, just to be safe.