05 - week five

[afflictionmods]

WEEK FIVE

Come Sunday morning, the portals around Estelline fade away, but not all of the oddities hanging around disappear so quickly. The recreations of your dreams and memories are still around, ever changing and shifting. Whatever it is that brought these things here hasn’t ended, not yet.

You don’t have time to worry about all of that, though, even if you know you should exercise caution once two of you found yourselves on the bad end of a monster’s claws. The course still isn’t over, though, even if the portals changed lesson plans. Everything continues on, with new places to explore as the fog pushes back once again. This week still feels a little more like what you’re familiar with, though, after Saturday’s lack of lessons.

...For now.


SETTING TRACKER

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(CODE)

Comments

[vivens]

I wouldn't say that I'm more emotionally unwell; I'd rather have it reported that I now have experiences that are unpleasant to remember.

Are those the results that you're looking for?

[afflictionmods]

I'm just looking for genuine responses... Th-that's the most important thing right now.

[Um.]

Do you have any feedback you would wish to give?

[vivens]

[ hmmm. ]

I know all of this is an experiment of some sort, but what are the intentions of all of it? I realize that's not exactly feedback, but the people who are involved should know the purpose of it.

[ hand on hip but spoken in a very nonthreatening way. ]

Lorelei wasn't exactly very clear about what she wanted us to improve on outside of our personal connections.

[ or something like that. ]

[afflictionmods]

[uhhhhh]

I'm not really sure what the end goal is - I just know that part of the progress I'm looking for is...

[Give him a moment to check his tablet (that ends up stolen anyways rip).]

Emotional stability within subjects.

[vivens]

Emotional stability, huh?

[ poor, poor kyle... can sabo sneak a peak? just a little one before its stolen from him? ]

Then they have an interesting way to go about it. I would think what's happening would definite encourage less stability. [ offering kyle a pleasant smile. ] But I'm a pretty hardy person.

[afflictionmods]

[He can, but unless he's studied the language of Estelline he won't be able to learn much from peeking!]

I-I think the idea was, um, shared burdens and the feedback would encourage more awareness of emotions? I think? Maybe? That's what I assumed, at least...

[vivens]

[ sabo's been doing studying!!! it's still basic though :c ]

I see. [ definitely tied to everything else that he's been finding out about the city then. most definitely but he won't immediately jump to that and instead keep the pleasantries up. ] What do you think of the experiment? Ah—

[ tilting his head at kyle. ]

Forgive my manners, I'm Sabo. You are?

[afflictionmods]

[He's doing his best... And it seems like a lot of the questions are about emotions, from what he can make out? Quelle surprise.]

Kyle...

[Clears his throat.]

I'm... not sure what I think about this, but I don't think my opinion matters a-all that much, sir.

[vivens]

Nice to meet you, Kyle.

[ he sure is doing his best and sabo will give him plenty of props for it. ...and really no surprise about the questions. alas. ]

You can just call me Sabo, but I think your opinion matters a lot. If you feel strongly about it then that would affect the work you do, won't it?

[ all pleasantly. ]

Say, what brought you to this kind of work?

[afflictionmods]

[Nice? To meet him]

Um...

[This wasn't how he was expecting things to go? But it's nice...]

Do you mean why I'm here or why I'm working for Camellia...?

[vivens]

[ yea?

you okay there kyle? and imagine if the interrogation never happened...but alas. ]

I imagine both of them are closely linked, but let's go with why you decided to work for Camellia. I gather that they're a pretty influential group. Must be quite impressive to work for them.

[afflictionmods]

[He is not okay, and he will only become less okay in the near future.]

Well, yes... working for Camellia, especially after college, would look great if I decide to go e-elsewhere... Plus, I mean, my family is from Estelline and I know it's a pretty small town, but... Y'know... How it can be. Er.

[It's pretty obvious he's not used to talking about himself.]

[vivens]

[ poor future kyle, and it's okay. sabo can do some leading in terms of the conversation. ]

I do, actually. I grew up in a pretty small place myself; though I don't think the prestige of getting involved with the higher ups there have the same effect here.

[ mainly because that would mean he'd have to accept being a noble and sabo would literally rather die than to have done that so. here we are. ]

If you're a native here—where are you staying? I've heard something nasty happened here a few months ago.

[afflictionmods]

I’ve been staying at Camellia… There’s some crash rooms there, so it hasn’t been too bad…

[Wait. He has work to do.]

B-but, uh, that’s really not… relevant to this survey, I think.

[vivens]

[ thank you for that information kyle. ]

Why wouldn't it be? Some of our distress has been because of the mystery of what's been going on around here.

[ you know, even if he's trying to play kyle, he's very serious about this part. ]

If we knew that the people who were once living here were safe then that'd help our emotional stability quite a bit.

[afflictionmods]

Well… I’m not sure if safe is really an accurate statement. Things are still pretty, you know. Not… great…

[…]

I think things might be getting better? Maybe? The fog is lifting and all…

[vivens]

[ not great is a polite way of putting it... ]

I've noticed that. Does Camellia have further insight into the fog or is that part of the reason why you've come to talk to us?

[afflictionmods]

Well… I don’t know, honestly? It’s been really hard to look into the fog very much because we don’t have a lot of time to actually look at it. We can’t really go out at night because those orbs make it too dangerous, but night is when the strangest things are happening…

A lot of things are beyond our control…

[vivens]

Is that so...

[ hmm. well, sabo is pretty sure kyle wouldn't be able to tell a believable lie even if costed him his life so— ]

Would you say that your situation is only marginally better than our's?

[afflictionmods]

W-well, I mean, probably not because I’m not… You have those bonds that means when someone else gets hurt you feel it? That’s probably worse even if things overall are pretty… bad?

[vivens]

[ oh? what were you going to say there kyle?? still sabo has to laugh at the mentioning of his bond. ]

It's only bad if your partner is a reckless idiot.

[ said with all of the fondness in the world. ]

Say Kyle, does the word "kiznaiver" mean anything to you?

[afflictionmods]

[🌈 happy pride 🌈]

Kiznaiver…? No, I’ve never heard of anything like that before.

[vivens]

[ 🏳️‍🌈happy!! pride!!!🏳️‍🌈 ]

I see; so that's unfamiliar to you.

My apologies, I've unintentionally asked you plenty of questions. I don't want to have you getting in trouble for anything.

[afflictionmods]

I'm... sure answering questions won't get me into any trouble?

[He sure hopes, at least! Because he's not getting paid for this!]

As long as I provide insight into this program there's nothing to worry about.

[laughtrack.wav]

[vivens]

[ kyle you suffer and for what!!! ]

If you say so, then—are we the first group that you've done this experimentation on? Or will we be a baseline for future experiments depending on the results.