pedalbike | 2nd Event: Choices We Make

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Arrival

Not all characters (known as Wickie, singular or Wickies, plural) arrive at the same time, surprisingly enough! That’s life for you. Some Wickies find their way to the island at a pivotal (or very mundane) point in their life, or even after or during their death.

Wickies who were standing or walking often find themselves entering the town South Sister, located on Lighthouse Isle, through an open doorway. Those that were laying down, or sleeping, tend to be found lying prone in beds, bathtubs, showers, couches, and similar places within the cottages on Cottage Row. There’s no rhyme or reason to it all! To Wickies familiar with the era, they will realize that everything looks as if it’s come from the ‘90s.

The house which a Wickie finds themselves within could already be occupied. This includes walking into a fellow Wicke, waking up in the same location, or accidentally scaring a room full of people with their sudden appearance.

Oops.

C-C-Changes

Thankfully the fog has gone down to what it was before, a slow creeping crawl over the ground. And too, the monsters of before are gone, leaving the town much like it was before. Well...close to what it was before.

For now the season's have changed, from a lingering summer to a cooler fall.

There’s new foods to try, even if some things like lattes cause people to slip into warm boots and tie up their hair, and soups make people curl up under blankets on the couch. And it also means decorations of all sorts, made of the leaves from the forest, orange, yellow and red things and...we can not forget...

Pumpkin overflow

Pumpkins! They're everywhere. Wickies will find pumpkins infused into all sorts of things, like coffee, ice cream, even spaghetti options! It's wild.

There’s also many jack o'lanterns. They have been placed everywhere in town, outside homes, and even small ones have been made into table decorations. The Jack o lanterns have very cheerful faces, and seem to watch Wickies every single move.

That is, until a Wickie bashes or otherwise abuses a pumpkin. That's when it changes- there seem to be more of them. Their expressions change to that of anger, sadness and disgust. None of them attack- yet. But their faces become more and more horrifying, as they follow the Wickie more and more- outside of the bathroom perhaps, or found on top of them as the Wickie wakes up in the middle of the night.

It shouldn't matter right? They're only pumpkins.

What a ride

Funny enough, with the pumpkin invasion, there also comes a dull colored horse wandering about the island. Its head is drooped, and it looks depressed and lonely. The horse is tame on approach and will accept pats and treats, even from those who are obviously not human.

But it also wants something, for all that it seems to be begging for attention. It wants someone to ride them, seems to even be begging for it with its big eyes. The horse will help Wickies to figure out how to mount; it will even stand beside the Town Center benches, rocks, or even go down in order to make it possible for the Wickie to get onto the horse’s back.

That’s when it changes. The Wickie is immediately wrapped in chains from their barrel to the Wickie’s waist. The horse turns a coal black and the Wickie’s clothing changes into that of a soldier's uniform, with a hand either holding a whip modeled after a human spine, or a jack o'lantern.

The Wickie cannot get off the horse on their own, no matter how much they struggle. As the horse moves throughout the town, they will go anywhere from a walk to a full canter, seemingly impervious to any magic or physical attacks. The same cannot be said for their unfortunate rider.

If the rider is hit, or simply in pain, the Wickie will feel an impulse that grows and grows until they scream a name of someone in town, someone they know.

And the named will drop, paralyzed. Paralyzed wickie are likely to die within minutes, more so if they are too close to horse and rider. The horse will happily trample anyone on the ground to death.

Even without the impulse, should the Wickie rider use anyone’s name, that person will drop, paralyzed, and unable to breathe.

There is only one way to possibly save the rider: scatter golden objects in their path. The horse will shriek, and promptly buck the rider off, before running away. Just make sure to catch the rider, or at least cushion their fall: they have no way of saving themselves until they hit the ground.

Heart game: confession

Current residents of the island may remember this particular beeping alert, and how it doesn’t go away, no matter what they do! That is, unless they open up the Heart Game, and answer the question.

Welcome back everyone! It’s so good to see you again! Now let’s play that game, Confession! And the question isssssss…

How do you celebrate the changing seasons! Don't be shy!

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[Mikumo hums in some amusement at that remark. Apparently the idea that she'd find something that small scary is funny to her, though when she was literally made for combat it has certain effects on what few things are actually going to scare her.] Knives aren't so common as weapons anymore, where I come from. So when I hear skilled with a knife I'd perhaps think of a chef before a mercenary.

[Not entirely true, but the only kind of fighter that would likely still be using a knife in normal combat would be of the unofficial kind. Or a very desperate and stranded soldier, maybe.] Then again, a chef would be more used to carving food, wouldn't they? So maybe that's actually closer than I thought.

Oh?

(Color Tsurumaru interested. He looks up at his conversation partner for the time being and has to give her another look. She’d sounded so interested at his little comment and her own remark is so casual, it makes him wonder where she’s coming from.)

They’re quite useful where I’m from. (Though, they’’really less “knives” and more “daggers.”) I think they’d have a lot of fun doing something like this.

(Carving pumpkins. Especially some of the more softhearted tantou might prefer this to going into another battle.)

[Mikumo doesn't elaborate by choice, because she doesn't tend to speak about herself if she can avoid it, and doesn't give away much at all in her facial expression. Though in this case, it slips a bit, because the phrasing of Tsurumaru's response has her raising an eyebrow in obvious curiosity.]

Are you saying the knives would be having fun? That would be a new one for me, unless we have a very different idea of what knives are.

[They certainly aren't sentient where she comes from, though she's seen enough strange things that she's not going to immediately dismiss the idea.]

I'm certain it's the same. (He muses like someone enjoying a fun little secret all to himself. He means it! They're both thinking of a short blade but there's just another layer there...)Sometime it's a dagger and sometimes it's a kitchen tool... but it's usually a short blade, isn't it?

But I wouldn't say a blade is just a blade, either.

How cryptic. [Mikumo seems somewhat amused by it, because she does this sort of thing to people from time to time as well. She's more used to being on the knowing end of it, though, so she's fairly quick to make the straightforward observation.] Are you setting up a riddle for me or building up to a dramatic reveal of some kind? I need to know where to set my expectations, after all.

[It's not impolitely said, but it could charitably be described as direct.]

Both sound fun.

(Still not answering directly. He's a vague sort of guy but there's no malicious air to him. Really, he's just a guy that likes to have fun and sometimes an air of mystery is just the thing you need,)

Really, it depends on you. Will it be a surprise? Even in my world, I think most would be never expect it...

Have you ever personified something that wasn't human? Seen a face in an object? Pleaded with a tool to work?

[His questions make Mikumo's brows raise, as if she's unsure whether these are supposed to be serious questions or not.] I can't say I have. Not objects, at least. There were certain legends about jellyfish on the world I lived on, but that would be as close as I've come.

[And that was because the legends were literally that the spirits of the dead became jellyfish for a time before reincarnating, so it was hard not to attach some kind of personification to that.] Are you implying blades are sentient where you come from?

Not all swords.

(At least he answers a little more directly now. )

When an object reaches a hundred years, it gains a soul and becomes aware. That spirit stays with it and if it becomes strong enough, can perform certain deeds like refusing to cut or cutting particularly well. It all depends on how the object is treated.

And then there are special humans who can call upon that spirit and grant it a physical form so that it can act on its own will.

[It's a concept that makes her think - and a rather foreign one to Mikumo, who has never been terribly spiritual. That said, the Ragnan traditions did give her some exposure to those kinds of ideas, so it's not completely out of left field for her either.

Nor is granting something non-human a form, as it happens.] Interesting. I don't know much about the nature of souls myself, but Ragnans believed that the souls of those who died on the planet would become jellyfish to release their suffering before reincarnating, so I suppose giving something else a human form like that isn't so unbelievable. Is it done through magic or some kind of ritual, though? That's not so common where I come from.

[Even most of the "magic" is some weird biological trait or extremely advanced technology, or both at once.]

2nd Event: Choices We Make

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