riverviewlogs | introductory mingle: MEMORIA

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introductory mingle: MEMORIA

who: everyone in Riverview!
what: Introductory Log and Memoria Commemoration
when: May 1st - May 8th
where: Anywhere around the city.
warnings: please put any necessary warnings in the subject lines

memoria

In the days leading up to May 1st, residents new and old will notice preparations beginning, a flurry of activity getting the city ready for the upcoming celebration: Memoria. A more solemn celebration than Sampremi or the Flower Festival, Memoria is a week-long time of remembrance for those lost in the Great War and the epidemic that decimated Riverview Quarantine's population 10 years ago. Memoria traditions include lighting lanterns for the dead, telling stories about lost loved ones or lost homes, eating meals with loved ones, and a special gathering to send floating lanterns down the river in honor of those lost.

a solemn commemoration of those lost

While the main city-wide event associated with Memoria is the floating of lanterns down the river on the evening of May 8th, the holiday is generally seen as a time of reflection on and appreciation of things that have been lost - people, homes, cultures, and planets. It is also a celebration of the things that remain. Many locally-owned shops will host displays of culturally-significant food, and will hand out informational flyers sharing the unique customs of their own homeworlds. There is a heavy emphasis on sharing time with family, friends, and lovers, and anyone who is able to will cook meals or treats for loved ones, or at least purchase them something good to eat.

i. hanging lanterns

Throughout the entire week of Memoria, residents will be hanging lanterns around the city. Lanterns are generally placed in greater number in places of passage - streets, bridges, and all alongside the train lines are particularly well-decorated, as are any trees alongside paths, and most homes and businesses have a profusion of lanterns around their doors and windows. This tradition is twofold; some people believe that the lanterns are hung in these places in order to guide the spirits of the dead back to those who still love them, other people believe that the lanterns are to give light for living loved ones to find their doors in times of darkness...many people believe both.

No matter what your character might believe, you can be sure they will find themselves offered a lantern for free from various businesses or friendly citizens passing by, and invited to hang it before the sun sets, or they may be handed a bundle of lanterns and asked to help share them with others.

ii. sharing life

Throughout the city, characters will find groups of people gathering to share hot drinks and talk about their loved ones lost, their homes and planets, or their experiences during the Great War and the epidemic. Anyone who has lost someone, who has fought to survive, who is feeling cut off and homesick, is welcome to sit and share their story. If your character chooses to sit and to share their story, they will find that people will gather to listen, will generally be respectful of the telling, and may share their own similar experiences in return. This is an excellent time to air grief in an environment where most people understand and respect grief, and a good time to deepen the connections to others around you, to understand them better.

There is also a very large focus on cooking or purchasing meals or treats for loved ones during Memoria, with many people taking meals with everyone they care about during the week of the holiday. Some go the extra mile and will hand out baked goods (usually chocolate or cinnamon), packets of candy, or other little treats to acquaintances, especially if they would like to form a closer bond with them. This is a great time for characters to reach out to someone they would like to get to know better with a surprise treat!

iii. floating of the lanterns

On the evening of May 8th, just before sundown, many of the city's residents will head toward the banks of the river, where they will light lanterns in a wide variety of shapes, sizes, and colors, in honor of their dead loved ones. The types of lanterns vary wildly, based on personality (either of the person floating it or the person they are honoring), culture, and many other factors. Some lanterns are very simple, others are incredibly complex, but the one common feature they all have is that people write on the shades of them - they write about their feelings for their loved ones, their wishes for their relationships and friendships, a memory from childhood or home, or even just lines of poetry or lyrics from songs that express something they miss, or something that hurts them.

Once those emotions are written on the lanterns, the lanterns are set free, floating down the river in the darkening evening, in a cathartic gesture shared by most residents of the city. Waves of lantern floating will start around 7 pm and continue until the sun rises on the morning of May 9th.

iv. roommates or wildcard

Feel free to use this prompt to set up headers for a communal floor, or threads open to roommates for the purpose of getting to know each other. Or if you have an idea for a prompt that isn't in this list, set during Memoria, feel free to write it up!

visual inspiration

click on thumbnails for larger view

Credit: image i: glowconcepts, image ii: by trenchmaker, image iv: cherryorange; image iii: found uncredited on Pinterest - please let the mod know if you find credit!

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[ Gladio almost calls Noct out for that last bit, but decides to let it go. He did interrupt his own attempt at participating in this festival after all, but then again? Maybe a break from whatever writer's block is plaguing him is more welcome than he's willing to say.

So he lets it go. Switches gears. ]

...They rope you into a job yet?

[He hasn't eagerly snatched up this pen to pour his heart out onto paper, no. Who knows what he'll eventually manage.

So, with the smallest hint of a grin:] Petting zoo attendant. I think there's a uniform I'm supposed to pick up.

[Very regal.]

[ Gladio's arms drop to his sides, staring in disbelief yo. ]

Are you kiddin' me? You. [ He waits for it to sink in and his mind just can't wrap around it. He instantly thinks of a Chocobo stable and Noct just... snoozing in a hay stack and figures that's what he should really expect.

And then he bursts out laughing. ]

Did you lie during the interview?

[Hey, chocobos kind of like him. What's so hard about petting animals all day????]

What? At least I'm not a cook again.

[ This is too rich, Gladio can't keep the grin off his face. ]

I'm willing to bet you're gonna wish you were.

[ Especially after hours of mucking out the place of all kinds of waste, some of it might even be from the animals themselves. ]

They have me training people on survival and combat readiness. So it's pretty much the same... except...

[ Gladio folds his arms but ticks his index finger back and forth between them. ]

You gotta game plan, your Majesty?

[Maybe he likes animals!!!! And not working out, so, after a pause:]

Well, work's gonna keep me busy...

[ Gladio rests his hands on his hips and listens to the world's lamest excuse not to get back on track with one's destiny and -- he probably should object, bark at him to get his head back in the game, but he knows that's not really necessary and it's hypocritical to extremes even by his standards. ]

Uh huh. [ He's not exactly in a hurry to get back himself. ] Probably a good opportunity to, you know... get stronger. [ ...Wow this sounds flimsy af. ]

There's some impressive tech here that could prove useful. Allies too. Couldn't hurt to at least investigate that a little.

[This is the gentlest bullying into training he's ever had from Gladio. What happened??]

Allies... against what? [What the hell are they worrying about coming after them here, too? It's not like he's going to drag an army of people back to Eos with them. Explain.]

[ Gladio's a little flustered trying not to give away the fact he's not too keen about leaving yet. Feels pretty guilty about it too. But after the shit he's seen, can you really blame him? ]

Allies can train us to be stronger, obviously --

[ Hang on. ]

...Noct, what's the last thing you remember? Was it anything about the Crystal?

[Does it always have to be Getting Stronger with you, Gladio??]

Not besides having to go get it. Why, did they move it again?

...

[ His Shield closes his eyes and turns away, exhaling sharply. Obviously, Gladio remembers things differently. Pinches between his brows as if this whole mess has suddenly given him a headache (hint: it has). ]

You've gotta be kidding me. No, they did not move it.

[Oh. Oh. So Gladio knows something he doesn't - that's just great. Noctis considers how much he wants to know—how much good knowing whatever-it-is will help him, here.

None at all? None at all. He holds up his hands, like, that's enough.]

Then I'll figure it out whenever we get home.

[ ... ]

[ Judging from the look on his face, that response comes as a surprise. He blinks, lowering his arms to his sides. Gladio frowns a moment later. ]

...When we get home. [ Basically when it's too late. Sure, great plan. Gladio's brows draw tighter together, clearly not happy with this kind of response but offering little by way of reason or justification. ]

[Noctis has known Gladio more than long enough to know when he's holding back giving him hell yet again, but of course he's no mind reader. So he can't know exactly why Gladio is clearly unhappy with his response, but given their recent track record, he feels somewhat compelled to explain himself-]

Look, I don't want to know what happens before it happens. [Things he never thought he'd have to say: that. It freaks him out, kind of, he's not like Ignis - but more than that,] My dad—he knew what was going to happen and he made- he made some pretty bad choices.

[Like father, like son? He doesn't entirely trust himself, at this point. So.]

[ Gladiolus has a thousand arguments against Noctis' logic. If he could? He'd rather have known a lot of things before they happened, tried to do things a better way. The right way. Ignis, Jared... none of them would have had to suffer. He'd have found a way.

But Noctis would rather go into this blind. In a way, it makes sense. His father's inevitable death hung like a cloud over his recent life. What he probably wouldn't give to live in ignorance. ]

He was king. [ Gladio's tone is hard, unyielding. ] He had to make hard choices.

Choices you're flinching at the mere mention of.

Being king didn't make him right! [The words burst out of him before he stops himself to think clearly, to keep a level head - of course it's happening again, and he can't tell whether his anger and frustration are directed more at Gladio or his father. Or himself. All three, in some way—]

He was wrong, alright? [ah yes we've gone from bad to wrong, saving his only child's life] He screwed up.

[It's different, too, the circumstances - knowing a most likely outcome as Regis had, and knowing the things Gladio knows will definitely come to pass. What if they're awful, and by telling Noctis they'll happen because he already remembers them, Noctis marches them all into a dark future?

He'd have preferred another outcome for them, too—for Ignis, for Luna— But knowing the future doesn't sound like a great boon to him.]

I'm making a choice right now. I won't spend all my time locked up in a room waiting for the worst to come.

Screwed up? [ Gladiolus repeats the words in a low tone, his only objection. That's not something he agrees with. ]

Just a minute ago you were tellin' me not to keep Ignis in the dark - and now you don't want to hear it?

[ Gladiolus tosses his hands up in frustration and turns away, only to look at Noct from over his shoulder a moment later.

To ask someone to put pen to paper and transcribe such a statement as proof that he believes every word he's said and set it adrift in memory of his father, that's unfair enough that even Gladio feels a pang of regret for saying it. But tempers are high and he doesn't think he's wrong either. Gladio thinks those are some ugly statements Noct is making about Regis. He suspects they're just words of passion, not reason and likely won't hold when he has to write them down. ]

...Sounds like you've found something to write on that lantern after all.

[If Gladio can't see how giving up all of Insomnia and so many lives is screwing up, Noctis thinks that's his own problem. And another thing—] Like you're any better than me.

[Rely on others, don't rely on others, share the burden of being king, don't share anything at all because kings can't do that—how many completely conflicting ideals is he going to get out of Gladio before he's supposedly doing something right? Maybe he should just go crown Ignis, because evidently the only way to be king is the one inconsistent way Gladio thinks is the correct way.

And plenty of other things Noctis won't shout at him but instead think very strongly while he glowers. Close enough.

But these stupid lanterns, again? It takes him a moment to realize what that suggestion actually is—put words to paper about how badly his father fumbled. The problem of course is that Noctis doesn't believe he's wrong, either. He has three lanterns here; one of them is for the people of Insomnia, who died so that he could push a car to Hammerhead. So that he could run around in the woods picking up peppers, so that Ignis could get hurt and Luna could die and more innocent people be threatened— So no, he doesn't think he's wrong at all.

And here's the other problem: he's sick and tired of bending over to Gladio's will just because he yells the loudest. He gets up, shoving the pen in his pocket and leaving the lanterns where they are. Someone else can have them. He doesn't care.]

I don't answer to you. Call me whatever you want, but that doesn't change.

[ It doesn't take a genius to figure out that Noctis thinks of himself vs the people of Insomnia as an unfair trade, but it's because he doesn't understand. To some degree, Gladio even admires him for that genuine modesty that peeks out from under all the hair and sullen attitude. But he wasn't here to mollycoddle the future king, he was here to prepare him for the worst the world -- worlds, as it turns out -- has to offer, and protect him with his own life just as every Amicitia before him has.

His scoldings and harsh lessons sometimes bore fruit, especially in those rare moments when Noctis hissed quietly but took it, and for the whole day after he'd see him nearly transformed behind those eyes, revitalized in his desire to prove him wrong. He didn't get a chance to see it in Noctis' eyes today, so he's not sure if he's gone too far or not far enough.

I don't answer to you -- that kind of response doesn't sit well with Gladio, and it'll nag at the edge of his mind and his frayed nerves all night too. ]

O-oi! [ Gladio lifts his arm to try to stop his departure. But if Noctis removes himself from the situation, leaving the lanterns behind, Gladio won't know how else to stop him without hauling him back bodily and that's... not going to happen this time. ]

...Dammit.

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introductory mingle: MEMORIA

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