collectedlogs | INTRO LOG #1

INTRO LOG #1

Welcome to Collected’s first Intro Log! The information we’ve provided about the setting is not exhaustive - feel free to interact with the setting as you see fit. Rather than have specific prompts, our event posts throughout the game will generally have information listed out like this and players may come up with their own prompts.

If you have questions about the setting or the intro log, please ask them HERE in the comment thread! And most of all, have fun, shoppers.

PROMPTS

The first thing anyone does is gasp for air.

It’ll feel like the first breath you’ve taken in years. That’s right; before you can even become aware of your surroundings, the most immediate thing they’ll process is that you’re in water. Foul smelling water - like rotten eggs and decay. It’s pitch black, and you’re swimming in it with only your head above the surface. If the smell doesn’t deter you, the longer you stay in will; the water stings to have on your skin, chemical in nature.

So - you need to get out. This water can’t be okay to stay in. Once you’ve gathered enough about your surroundings, you’ll see that you’re inside a mall, of sorts. There’s a large (non-functioning) escalator in front of you that will lead you to the semi-safe havens of the second floor - but be careful, because everyone’s going to be gunning for that only exit.

» Once on the second floor, exploring will lead you to a few notes of interest: Long windows and tall glass doors show the conditions outside. The sky is a burnt orange, and there is a thick sort of fog on the horizon. Nothing for miles in every direction - just an empty parking lot, completely devoid of life or any sign that anyone has come across this place in many years. Even so, you’ll find the windows and doors unlocked, so getting outside is easy… the problem is what’s out there.

A trip outside will make it instantly clear why you see no life outside the mall’s walls: exposure to the radioactive sun outside causes your skin to bubble with welts, and the thick, toxic air of the outside is impossible to inhale without keeling over. It’s blistering hot, too. Even non-organic creatures would melt or be eroded by the sun’s radioactive qualities. One thing is abundantly obvious: you cannot survive outside. Not now, at least. Those who receive a burn or other damage from the conditions outside will discover that strangely enough, upon returning inside the mall, the wound begins to heal up on its own. Slowly, and extremely painfully, but it’s healing. That’s strange…

» Another thing of note is that there’s a food court on the second floor. There, you’ll find a variety of abandoned restaurants that have varying amounts of non-perishables inside - canned vegetables and preserved meats, as well as dusty old jars of sauces and the like. There are a few walk-in freezers with hefty locks on them, but if the locks are broken or picked, there’s actually some frozen rations, as well! Many of them are not labelled, so the dining experience will be pretty hit or miss. None of the stoves or cooking appliances in the food court work anymore, either, so you’ll have to get creative when it comes to cooking up these ingredients. (Or just, you know, eat them cold.)

» Throughout the mall’s bathrooms, water fountains, and gym showers, you’ll find that all the water in the mall is suspiciously clean. Like, way too clean to be normal in a place as run-down and clearly abandoned as this. You’ll find that toilets flush completely fine, and shower water heats up (eventually). Should you be grateful, or concerned?

» There’s an electronics store on the second floor, as well, along with a internet cafe. Should you try to turn on the computers in the internet cafe, you’ll find that it only opens to the same forum page: a site called Mall Watch. It’ll prompt you to make an account and password if you try posting to it. In the electronics store, you’ll also find that any phone you forage for and try to boot up will also only open up to this forum page. Weird!

» If you’re looking for a place to sleep, the department stores of the mall still have a variety of furniture sets collecting a lot of dust. Then again, no one’s around to tell you where to sleep - and maybe you don’t trust all these new faces you arrived with. If you’re okay sleeping on the floor of a random store, more power to you.

» You’ll probably want to do something about your clothes that were stained by the black water on the first floor.. try foraging for some clothes! Looking around, you’ll find that some clothes stores have some stock left over, though everything’s generally a mess in clothing stores - it’ll take you some time to find anything that’ll fit you. Looking around enough on this second floor, you might end up stumbling across some of your own belongings or clothing, or those of your peers.

More than anything, the longer you explore and scavenge the mall, you’ll recognize how eerily silent it is. If not for you and your peers here, this place would be totally desolate. Clearly, there’s no one around for miles, and as far as you can tell, you’ll only be able to survive here for as long as the supplies here last. No one’s coming to save you - no one even knows you’re here. In every sense of the word, you are alone.

For now.

NAVIGATION

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ Of course it is!! Their live was important!!

Once he's sure that Eichi is secure, he frees up one arm to begin swimming backwards, toward the escalator. Thinking. What did happen with the live? Should he be watching out for the other two? ...well, no, he can probably feel confident that if they're here, their butler would take good care of them, at least.

But—the live. ]

It's not the answer you'll want to hear, but I'm not sure. [ Despite pulling along Eichi and swimming at the same time, he's at least talking with perfect clarity. ] This isn't the venue we were at, as far as I can tell.

[ He's... pretty sure this is some sort of shopping complex, from what little he can see of the upper floor. Speaking of, He's reached the railing of the escalator and is now pushing at Eichi to go over the sunken part of it so he can stand up somewhat. ]

[ Wataru always manages to hold himself together so well. His clear speaking voice is a relief, and it’s half the reason he calms down so quickly himself. His heart is still racing, he’s still panicked, but it’s less urgent and he doesn’t have to struggle to gasp for air now. Then, his leg brushes against something solid, and he shifts to pull himself onto it, leaning on the railing for support. Still, he does turn to make sure Wataru doesn’t need any help climbing up as well, and he won’t leave the water until he’s sure of it. ]

I was using energy, dancing with you, but it wasn’t as if I expended it all and collapsed, or anything like that. There’s no way that this can be some sort of hallucination...

[ It feels too real, even while feeling so surreal. He looks around the darkness of the first floor, and though he sees many others making their way up or around this way, he doesn’t see the pink of Tori’s hair, or Yuzuru’s capable form. So it’s just them? ]

This format is vaguely familiar, like a place I’ve visited once... Isn’t this the skeleton of what you’d call a shopping mall? Ah, but it’s flooded... and deteriorating in all ways. [ He coughs a few more times, shaking his free arm to try and rid himself of the droplets. ] It stings... It hardly smells like water, either. You’ve saved me, as always, but are you alright?

[ He's climbing over now, listening to Eichi as he does so. For a moment, he stands on the railing in order to look around properly, but drops down with a splash onto the steps, reaching out to take one of Eichi's elbows in his hand. Let's get out of the water. ]

The fact that you've only been to a shopping mall once aside... I'm quite fine. [ Shocked (only half in a fun way), wary, concerned, a little intrigued, but fine. ] I know that we need to find out what's going on, but we should prioritize cleaning this water off, as well. The prickling hasn't stopped, even above water. Come, follow me up!

[ Who knows what was in it, and for how long; it wouldn't do to get ill over such a thing. ]

Ah.

[ Right. He’s pulled and so he follows, determined to carry his own weight now that they’re out of the water. It does continue to sting, and his eyes are red from trying to open them underneath the water in his panic. Those hurt the worst... In a place in this condition, he’s not sure if they’re going to find a way to get this off so quickly, but he keeps his doubt to himself. Maybe he’s wrong. ]

It’s a shame to see these outfits ruined so quickly after so much work was put into them, as well. But the idea that we could be one place and appear in another is baffling to me. It’s as if we were dropped right in...

By the way, your swimming is quite impressive.

Oh, you think so? Thank you!

[ Should they be talking about 1. the live and 2. Wataru's swimming abilities? Probably not, there are more important things at stake here, and yet, here they are.

Anyway, there's not many stairs to climb up, as most of them are submerged, but he takes care in every step up, making sure Eichi is right behind him. When they get to the top, he can feel the gross squish of dirty water in his shoes. ]

There's a ceiling, so I'm not sure that's possible. Then again, many things in life are quite "impossible" to the naked eye. Every day, something new happens—in our case, it just happened to be something a little more than "impossible." [ Helpful. ] Let's find something else to wear for now, as well as a bathroom. I'll look into cleaning our outfits later on.

[ He also... loved their live outfits. ]

That does sound like a good plan, but now that we've reached the second floor...

[Eichi takes a moment to pause, and his footsteps slow as well. From the floor here, he can see the mess below them, and along with bodies here and there, he sees various objects that seem to be corroded in the "water", and the stores above hardly look any better. Unsafe floors, ransacked shop windows, and a rat scurries by so suddenly that Eichi sucks in a breath and steps back from where he'd been about to move.]

...It looks as though that might be difficult. Do you really believe we'll be able to find something to wear, in this place? Or, rather... Which way should we begin to look? It all looks like something out of a movie.

[ Well, it's not beautiful, but even this mall had some charm in it's life at some point, he's sure! If they look hard, Wataru is sure they won't be disappointed.

He's peering at the ceiling, near the corners of hallways. Looking for a "Food Court" sign, or anything like that, but not coming up with anything to show for it. ]

Such as D*wn of the D*ad? Please tell me if you hear any zombie noises like "Braaaaaains!"

[ He thinks he sees where the mall might open up into a larger area, so he's going to start in that direction—though not without Eichi, of course. ]

I'd imagine there to be places with water near the food court. Let's look for a clothing store on the way.

Right.

[It still stings. Everything stings, and Eichi glances to Wataru as they walk, frowning slightly. Somehow, he manages to look so calm, to make it look so effortless. Eichi feels like he left him in charge of the live, and then suddenly now he's in charge of even this, finding them safety in some post apocalyptic mall.

He's going to have to pull himself together and find what he wants to do about all of this. A glance backwards shares his worries about their unitmates ending up here somewhere, but he shakes himself from it and eyes the stores they pass, instead. There's one clothing store they pass that looks completely ransacked, to the point that it's pointless to even enter. Small, empty shelves, rotting and collapsing on themselves.

But then, Eichi spots somewhere with the sleeve of some sort of horrible jacket sticking out of the entrance, and he steps that direction.]

Is this worth exploring? It's much larger than the others we've passed. [It looks like it doesn't just have clothing— there's a box of new pans ripped open and left tattered on the other side of the entrance, and there's a rack with what used to be sun hats in the center of an aisle ahead.]

[ He stops, leaning closer as if to look inside the store from his spot in the aisle, then bounds closer, leaving watery footprints behind him as he leans into the entrance of the store. ]

Jack~pot! You did it, look what you've found... ♪ There's quite a few treasures to be found in here!

[ Such as this majestic feathery boa he's pulling free of a collapsed rack of knicknacks.

It takes the edge off of this crazy situation, okay. ]

[...Okay, he does laugh, stepping in after him much slower.]

That suits you perfectly. Ah, but it's a shame to see your hair soaked in such filthy water. The color is too dull for your bright face. [Though he's sure he doesn't look like a prize, right now, either.]

You should be careful not to get anything that you'd like to play with too dirty. Let's focus on finding pants, first, and we can worry about the rest after we find a way to clean ourselves.

[ "Fufufu"-ing to himself, he's putting the boa to the side, leaving it out in the open so that he's reminded to come back for it. Pants. Pants. He would be in the market for new shoes and socks as well, but so far all he can see are very colourful rain boots... ]

Hmmm... oh, perhaps these? They look like they might come in our size. [ Being 1cm taller than Eichi means they can SHARE CLOTHES STILL!!!! ] Fufu, rather than being picky about styles and colours, we can use this as a learning opportunity... ♪

[ That's definitely just an excuse to wear stupid clothes with no repercussions! ]

It's true that we don't have much choice in the matter...

[That's the nice way to say that he wouldn't ever choose these in any normal scenario. But currently, as long as it fits, it might work, right? His feet are delicate, he needs to consider bright rain boots. Maybe yellow? He reaches for them, at least.]

In that way, I suppose we can share clothes, as well?

[Oh, that kind of makes his heart skip a beat or two. How weird! It just feels exciting? He's still of the mind that they can have more than one outfit each, though.]

It may be difficult to carry things around as we are now, though. I wonder where to even carry them to? Ah, but the more I wonder, the more this burns at our skin... Let's grab these and simply move on.

[ He hasn't recovered his cellphone yet, which is a complete and utter tragedy, as he would like to take a picture of Eichi with cute rain boots... he thought that it was in his inner pocket during their rehearsal, but it wasn't there when he swam out, so he's not sure what to make of it now.

At the clothes sharing he's at least nodding... sharing costumes doesn't count, it's not as cute as sharing personal clothes (even the ones you find in a horribly ruined mall), so for a second he's also inexplicably thrilled about the idea. ]

Yes, we can come back later if need be. [ Presumably, anyway. ] Here, there's this... and this too!

[ This is just Wataru finding random pieces to use, adding to their piles until there's at least half a functional (if chewed on and slightly dusty) outfit per idol. Pants, get, but he's not so sure about the shirts—the ones he's come across are far too small. ]

I wonder if these will truly fit us. If possible, I'd like for our outfits to be washed so that we can change back into them, at least...

[Eichi not feeling confidence in clown wear. But. Well... maybe it's fine. Until he grows cold and they need something more than barely fitting shirts and pants, but... He's holding it together, right now, even if everything burns.]

I don't believe there are any shopping bags left in any condition to carry these items. However, if we leave them here, they could easily be taken away by others. I imagine that next to a large store like this, however, there must be restrooms... Or perhaps even inside, towards the back?

[ Hmmmm... it does look a bit like a department store—which explains the bizarre variety of items all in one section. Wataru looks back at the entrance, then uses his new pants to pick up the flashy boa he put away earlier. ]

Oh, as expected of Eichi! Even if there's not one open for the public, there's likely an employee bathroom.

[ Taking a look, he can see a fair ways into one side of the store since all of the racks there had been knocked askew, but there's a lot of teetering shelves in the way of the other side. ]

There should be a large set of doors barring the entry of customers such as you and me from exploring the depths of their storage.

Often, I believe those types of things are set in the back, near sections like...

[ Hold on, he’s on a mission now. He gathers the stack that’s been assigned to him as carefully as he can, holding it away from himself as he moves. To the side, ducking slightly to see, but past knocked over shelves and what he thinks is a poorly support half-collapsed section of floor, is the intimates section. ]

Past here? [ Sure enough, there’s a counter set up behind it all, past the obstacles, with big doors... Eichi is walking that way, maybe a little less carefully than he should be. ]

[ Past the broken floor, and then the more dangerous obstacle, a horde of silky undergarments...

But for now, it's the floor. Wataru follows him; not because he thinks it's the best idea, but because he feels like something bad will happen if he doesn't stay near him. When they get further in, there's even a couple of spots where the floor has disintegrated so badly that Wataru can see the black waters that have flooded the first floor beneath them.

It seems to be sturdy, at least for a minute, but then there's an ugly groan of steel and he's freezing, reaching out to grab Eichi in an attempt to make him stop too. ]

[ Wataru grabs for him and he freezes in place then as well, holding his breath as the noise stretches out. Something drops into the water below with a splash, but he doesn’t notice which spot caused it. The whole floor had seemed to vibrate with the motion, though, and he breathes out shakily.

Are there parts of the floor that are more sturdy? He can’t tell at all. ]

S-should we go around from the side near the walls? [ He actually doesn’t know what’s better other than maybe not doing this at all, but it burns so much, they need something to stop it. ]

...well, I think it may be too late for that. Forgive me for this, Eichi...

[ There's another sharp whine from the floor and then it just drops an inch, suddenly.

At that moment, Wataru makes a split second decision and places both of his hands against Eichi's back and...

...shoves him, hard, across the failing floor and face first into a gathered up pile of lingerie that is arguably much safer. At least the floor looks solid way over there?

This is all your fault I had no choice but to do this. ]

Wa— wah?!

[A stammered mix of a cry out and Wataru's name, he goes flying forward as expected and all of the clothes he'd been holding fling out in front of him and onto the floor as he gets a face full of... intimates. A pile of lingerie.

Most of these aren't in great condition, but considering other things he's seen, it could be worse? Still, he's not sure how to recover from that, so maybe he'll just lay here for a while.]

[ ...for a second he wonders if he's hurt him. Surely the pile of sexy clothing isn't what is going to finally end Eichi's life? No, it is certainly what has saved him, as when Wataru moves to take a step backwards, now that there's less weight on the broken part of the floor, it begins to crumble again.

So much so that a large piece breaks away right where they had been standing, falling into the water heavily enough that Wataru can feel the rebound splash against his shins. It's followed quickly by the tiles under his feet, so he hops to the left and carefully balances himself on a solid piece of rebar. It looks a bit like he's tightrope walking, but that's basically second-nature. ]

Eichi! Are you alright? I did not think that "too many surprises" was possible for me, but I may be approaching that limit soon!

[ The added sounds and continued straining of the floor is what gets him to push himself up to his knees, sparing a glance behind him just in time to see Wataru dodging out of the way. Oh god, his heart is pounding so fast that it hurts... ]

I’m fine. I nearly had a heart attack... But are you really okay, from that position?

[ Terrified still, he scrambles more to his feet (though a panty might just be caught on his uniform somewhere), stepping backwards while holding his hands out. ]

Can you jump safely? Or walk across that, perhaps?

[ "I'm fine. I nearly had a heart attack..." Eichi. Only Eichi. ]

Oh, this? This situation is nothing for someone like me. Now that you are safely across the gap, I can focus better.

[ So please, please relax. He really needs him to relax for a moment. Just go back to sitting in the underwear for a few minutes while he figures out something for himself.

Jumping is... doable, he thinks. There's a few pieces of metal bar sticking out that would be good handholds if he were to mis, but at the same time... they could also be dangerous. There's also some cable hanging from the floor towards the water, and while he thinks there's probably not much power going through it... he doesn't want to electrocute himself. Not to mention, it's probably not the most secure hold, either.

But the rebar he's on... it's sold now because it's closer to the base. As he moves his weight out into the center, it's likely that it will snap under him. So... ]

Ah, I've got a good idea. I'm going to walk across as if it's a wonderful new stunt, but then I'm going to surprise our audience [ there's no audience, he's just Saying That. ] by flying across the rest of the way, straight into your arms. How does that sound?

[ If it helps, he is pretty confident about this. ]

[Honestly he might be having a heart attack right now? He's constantly in pain anyway, but the whole being dumped into acid water and then shock after shock is taxing. Now he's worried about Wataru... Even if he wishes for him to relax, how could he?

That plan sounds dangerous, but looking at it, it's not as if he can come up with anything better. Wataru would work his hardest not to cause any frowns, so... Eichi holds his arms open more insistently, looking determined. He'll catch him!!

Though he doubts that's the reality of what's going to happen, but he'd like to be able to close his fingers around Wataru and pull him close again, like when they were dancing. He'd feel a little better, crumbling floor aside.]

So long as you absolutely avoid falling into that water, then it's fine by me. Actually, I'd rather you avoid as many surprises as possible, so come straight into my arms.

[Hurry up!!!]

[ Under no circumstances whatsoever will Wataru ever fail to leap happily into one of his favourite people's arms. Absolutely not. That is a certainty of life, right up there with water is wet and the sky is blue.

So he carefully moves closer, delicately picking each step, one foot in front of the other—and then when he feels the bar under his feet begin to bow under his weight, he jumps.

It's like he's jumping into a bouncy castle, with how excited he looks about it. A big grin, arms outstretched, just like he's flying—landing a foot away and using that step to go forwards while avoiding just... tackling him. Then he's right there, flinging his arms around Eichi's neck and hugging him tightly. Not too tightly, since he's in the middle of dying and everything, but tightly enough that he feels real again.

He probably should have hugged him earlier, actually. ]

Edited 2020-07-05 22:24 (UTC)

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