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]

Him? Tidus rolls his shoulders, eyes pointing upward as he contemplates where to start. What's there to say? I was star player of the Zanarkand Abes—except, the Zanarkand Abes probably never existed...

Not like the lives everyone else were willing to share, here. His, though...

It takes a second for him to look back at Nida, then just in his general direction. "I played sports," Tidus goes for, tone easy. Indifferent. He knows better by now than to say blitzball. "My name's Tidus—" since they never shared names. "—and I... don't really have anything interesting about me. Spent most of my life working up to be a professional player, then... I got caught up in some mess. Now I'm here."

That covers everything succinctly, right?

[skyward_eyes]

Now there was a story. Nida quirks an eyebrow and tilts his head to the side. Because there is a lot here to unpack. But the most important part is the one he latches onto.

“A mess? That’s evasive. Can I maybe pry?”

[blitzcheer]

It really makes Tidus pause, hesitate. The guy's been decent to speak to, but there isn't any part of him that wants to get into it. Still, just leaving it like that... it makes it more than he wants it to be.

"Zanarkand, that city I told you about? It's gone." He rests his gaze firmly on the table between them. "I washed up on some shore elsewhere, and I ended up travelling with some...really good friends." A twinge of fondness. "But, that isn't my story to get into."

He looks over at Nida then. "That was my friend's pilgrimage. I was along for the journey."

It's simplified, and truthful—technically.

[skyward_eyes]

Pilgrimage? It isn’t a word Nida is familiar with. But something tells him he shouldn’t press. Not really. The evasion meant problems, the loss of a home too. Nida got that.

“I hope it was a good journey, and safe.”

[blitzcheer]

"Yeah," he answers, nods with it. He wants to say more, or say something more upbeat, but his tongue gets trapped in his mouth. Has to think and start again.

"I'm still processing it, to be honest. The world's a better place now," he can at least say that, "and I uh... ...I guess you could say I'm used to ending up in new weird places?"

It's not entirely relevant, but it was either that, or leave the guy hanging for him to finish. Tidus rubs the back of his head, expression sheepish.

"Sorry. I didn't think I'd be this bad at questions. ...Did you wanna ask anything else?"

He offers it, even if currently, he isn't sure what he could say.

[skyward_eyes]

"Well, I suppose the next thing to ask is whether you guys had gone to space at all. I love space. Flying too, but really space is where it's at."

Some worlds had. His people hadn't done more than orbital stations.

[blitzcheer]

"Not unless it was a thousand years ago," he says with a halfhearted shrug. "Everyone stopped using most of the technology around then. I don't know if anyone's seen an airship until a group I knew found and got theirs working."

So, no exciting space travels here. "To be honest, to me, the idea of going into space is..." Ehhhh, his features pinch. "I don't care what you take out there with you, I'd rather stick to the ground!"

[skyward_eyes]

"Why would you not use your technology?" Nida asks, frowning rather sharply. Because technology was everything he always wanted. And the sky? Worth it.

"I don't suppose you can tell me about the airship?"

[blitzcheer]

"It was really big?" Tidus offers, uselessly. "It flew and sometimes we got the weapons to work. I can't tell you anything other than that."

So he'll go back to Nida's first question. "But they stopped using machina after a big war. That's when Sin— er..."

He pauses, looking away. Well, shit: so much for not saying its name. But he recovers quickly enough—not like he can take it back, and it's not like a name really matters.

"...that's when the monster started terrorising Spira. Everyone got pretty religious after that. They thought the machines were the reason it existed. To punish them."

[skyward_eyes]

Well, he's got so many questions about all of this airship. It just turns out that Tidus probably can't answer any of them, no matter how much Nida might want to know. So instead he just rolls his eyes and ignores the Sin thing because the guy was trying to ignore that and Nida gets topics that aren't worth attention.

"Machines don't tend to be responsible for things. But, frankly? I don't believe it. That's not how things work. Well, maybe it does in your world. I'm not from there, I can't judge it. But gods aren't trustworthy."

[blitzcheer]

"It made sense to them." He has no real love for the religion, but he can understand that much. Nevertheless: "But it wasn't the real reason for the problem: that was another mess. And the big shots of the religion were using machina themselves anyway, so."

So: Hypocrisy. The real name of the religion. A point for distrust.

"Personally, I'm fine with the stuff! Makes life a lot easier."

[skyward_eyes]

"Hypocrisy, thy name is people in power," Nida sighs, rolling his eyes. "I'm a mechanic. I can't live without machines. I mean, I do other stuff too, but this is definitely a core thing I do."