riverviewlogs | monthly mingle: FEAST OF THE DYING

monthly mingle: FEAST OF THE DYING

who: everyone in Riverview!
what: monthly mingle: feast of the dying + agricultural emergency
when: the month of october
where: anywhere around the city
warnings: please put any necessary warnings in the subject lines

monthly mingle: october

During the month of October, a particular natural phenomenon on the moon weakens the boundaries between the worlds of the living and the dead, allowing for the crossover of those dead into the world of the living, with ghosts from the pasts of both the residents and the Quarantine itself to take corporeal form. This has given rise to an array of celebrations and traditions surrounding the transition from life to death, encouraging residents not to fear death, but to embrace it.

Things aren't all spooky celebrations this month, though. There's also a serious emergency happening in the agricultural district, where a herd of vengeful and intelligent hog-like creatures has decided to mount an attack on the city, with a large measure of success. Between September 20th and September 25th, they rammed the fences near the agriculture district where most of the farms providing livestock and produce for the city are located, succeeding in breaking through the fence on the 25th. Drastic action needs to be taken in order to protect the city's ability to feed itself throughout the upcoming months.

feast of the dying: a celebration of the transition between life and death

In the days leading up to October 1st, residents new and old will notice preparations beginning, a flurry of activity getting the city ready for the upcoming celebration: the Feast of the Dying. There is an old, widely-known, and widely-believed superstition or proverb in Riverview Quarantine: 'The greater your fear of death, the easier it is for death to find you.' This is a cornerstone belief of a lot of the residents of the Quarantine, most of whom have survived intensely difficult and violent pasts on their own worlds and who are still willing and eager to throw themselves into exploring and settling new worlds, starting their lives fresh. To honor this spirit, the Feast of the Dying is a celebration of the transition between life and death, an opportunity to face death both figuratively and literally, and come out on top.

The festivities during this time feature tests of courage in highly haunted places, escape rooms both virtual and physical with varying levels of danger, and the week-long Feast of the Dying itself, between October 1st and 8th this year.

i. feast of the dying traditions

Much like any culture, there are a few traditions and events that happen every year in the Quarantine, to celebrate the Feast of the Dying. In-depth information on these traditions and events can be found on last year's Feast of the Dying post, and include:

● Ghosts From the Past: Characters will see ghosts of the deceased in various places around the Quarantine, with some areas, where the boundaries between the living and dead are weakest, being heavily infested with these ghosts, while other areas are nearly ghost-free. These ghosts can be from characters' canons (with limitations - see last year's post for OOC guidelines) or from the Quarantine itself.
● Escape Rooms: Horror-themed escape rooms pop up all over the city, augmented with tech or magic to make them seem more menacing. The difficulty levels and scares range from easy to incredibly difficult, and they feature themes from Zombie Attack to Prison to Torture Traps to Mad Science Experiments, and just about anything else you can think of.
● Tests of Courage: In various places around the city, there are establishments where the boundaries between the living and dead are so fragile as to be barely there - hospitals that treated the ill during the Pandemic, insane asylums or prisons where inmates were mistreated, homes where terrible murders happened, places exposed to dark magic, and other similar places. During October, these places are shut down except to those who wish to stay the night as a test of courage. Characters who stay the night will encounter hordes of ghosts and experience extremely realistic hallucinations that may result in injury (which is up to player discretion) in the name of proving their courage.
● Doom Dates: This year, with the amusement park open for business, there is an event called Doom Date, a spooky themed night at the fair featuring haunted houses, costumed actors, and free rides with the price of admission. More information on this prompt can be found on the September Test Drive Meme.
● Feast of the Dying: A week-long masquerade-style party that is open from sundown October 1st until sunrise on October 9th. Sort of like a formal ball inside an incredibly realistic haunted house, the Feast of the Dying is the tradition that the holiday is named after, and features dancing, party events, plenty of food and drink for everyone, and private rooms for resting or engaging in...private activities with close friends.

ii. creepy chaos

This year, there's something a little different going around the Quarantine. The influx of refugees, the Frysh, that recently arrived, have brought a few new spooky traditions with them - while their celebration of horror usually happens in the dead of winter, they've shared the custom for the Feast of the Dying. And what is that custom? Dressing up as monsters, ghosts, demons, and other terrifying creatures! Considering how many other worlds and universes have similar traditions, it's caught on quickly, with costumes incredibly varied in subject matter and level of intricacy, from standard run-of-the-mill costumes pieces purchased from the local costume shop to intricately detailed costumes featuring holographic accents - and, of course, the 'sexy' version of everything. The culmination of the Frysh tradition is the tenth day of the month, where everyone dresses as something or someone scary, and brings treats (handmade or purchased) to give to family, lovers, friends, coworkers, classmates, or anyone else. It fits with the Feast of the Dying theme quite smoothly, reminding residents that joy and togetherness can come even from frightening situations.

All well and good, but someone has other ideas - enter Phineas, a rather notorious mage who's just recently gotten out of a year-long stint in prison. Elderly, a bit of a codger, more than a bit eccentric, and extremely powerful, Phineas has decided to put his own spin on this particular spooky tradition by casting a powerful citywide spell. On October 10, anyone who puts on a costume to participate in this particular celebration will find themselves turning into their costume for the evening. Dressed up as a werewolf? Prepare to howl at the moon! Dressed as a vampire? Be prepared to get a serious taste for blood. The possibilities are endless...

OOC Note: Please remember that Riverview does not allow non-consensual sex, and that game mechanics are not put in place to encourage sexual assault, or to 'trick' characters into having sex that they would not normally have. If your character's costume is the 'sexy' version of anything, feel free to play with aphrodisiac effects or lowered inhibitions, but keep this rule in mind.

emergency in the agricultural district!

iii. hog wild

Residents of the city may or may not remember a particular patch of fertile ground that was scouted over a year ago, and the highly-intelligent and territorial alien hogs that were protecting it because the soil's fertility stems from it being a alien hog graveyard. After that revelation, the city had abandoned the project for the foreseeable future, as digging up an intelligent species' graveyard is more than a little beyond the pale.

That would've been all well and good, had the alien hogs stayed in their territory. However, after being disrupted by two teams over the course of a few months, the hogs (who have an excellent memory for this kind of thing) have started to get a little restless. It's not enough to be left alone - they want revenge. And with the summer winding down into harvest season, they've figured out how to get that revenge. As September winds down and October starts to dawn, the powerful and intimidating hogs have started on stage one of enacting that revenge - they've been making concentrated runs at the fences closest to their territory, hitting it in the same spot over and over again, herd mentality at its strongest, trying to make a dent. And they're succeeding.

The big problem here is that, on the inside of that fence, is the bulk of the Quarantine's agriculture sector. Fields full of livestock and crops that are meant to make up the majority of the winter's food supply are in danger of being wiped out if that fence falls, and if that happens, it's going to be a cold, hungry winter, no matter how many supplies the Capital World manages to send up to the moon.

Since September 20th, residents have been being called into service whenever they were willing to, at first to try to repair the damage to the wall and keep the hogs from bursting through, and after September 25th, to help stem the damage being done by the rampaging hogs. As September ends and October begins, the fight is still underway, and residents haven't managed to do much to stop the creatures encroaching on the agricultural district, so more help is always welcome.

A full write-up of this situation can be found on September's Test Drive Meme.

iv. drift compatible

As October continues on, the situation with the invasion of hogs and all the other creatures that are coming through the massive breach in the outer wall of the Inhabited City is starting to get really dire. As a last-ditch effort, the government is pulling what remains of their fleet of three-story-tall mech suits out of storage. Longer-term residents may remember these mechs from last January, when a herd of behemoth monsters was attacking the city. Since then, the five remaining mechs were taken over by a private tech company, improved upon to some extent, and then sold back to the government, where they were reverse engineered into something new and a little different, and more were manufactured.

As of now, the government is holding on to a fleet of around 40 smaller, more maneuverable mechs that are still quite powerful, but most importantly which still need to be piloted by two people. Considering the emergency the city is facing, the government has released the fleet of mechs to the Perimeter Guard, and is calling for anyone with piloting experience, or even people willing to take a quick course in it, to help man the fleet and head out into the battle, backing up fighters on the ground to try to push back the tide of creatures flooding into the vulnerable and very important agricultural district.

Mechs are piloted by two people working together - while it's not exactly drift compatibility, the two characters need to act together, with one directing where the mech goes and keeping an eye on the terrain, and the other one manning the guns and keeping an eye on the mech's defenses and energy and ammunition levels. This takes a lot of concentration and cooperation, and this day is bound to forge a lot of new friendships....and probably a few mortal enemies. On top of the difficulty of working with someone who may be a total stranger, don't forget this new fleet of mechs are in beta-testing and are only being used as a last resort, which means they have a bad tendency to break down in unexpected ways.

Each mech is fitted with one large canon-style gun that can be semi-automatic or automatic with a limited amount of ammunition, one plasma sword, and a force shield that can take four serious hits before it is depleted. They have a finite amount of energy storage and are able to be in continuous use for 3 hours maximum before shutting down. Out of the fleet of 40 mechs, the mod expects only about 5 to still be functional at the end of the month, so feel free to destroy or seriously damage them in threads.

v. roommates or wildcard

Feel free to use this prompt to meet new roommates, for the purpose of getting to know each other, or hit up the mod-posted prompt to create a Communal Housing floor mingle. Or, if you have an idea for a prompt that isn't in this list, set during the Feast of the Dying, feel free to write it up!

visual inspiration

click on thumbnails for larger view; images may contain disturbing themes

Credit: image i: Logan Preshaw; image ii: Alejandro D'Marco; image iii: Jeff Jumper; image iv: Johannes Mücke; image v: Davey Baker; image vi: David Edwards

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Letting him have his space is a good mood. It makes the difference between a nervous but pleased Bodhi and one battling demons he hasn't even considered turning to face yet. As it is he can smile back, just as crooked and rusty at it. Most of his companions over what to him were just the last few days were perfect strangers. Frightening, intriguing, complicated, too kriffing good for him, but all engimas he had no time to really meet. Jyn, though, he knew of before he saw her. Doesn't make this easier--quite the contrary, really--but it does make him less hesitant. She's Galen's daughter. It's alright.

"Y-yeah, I, um, I j-just arrived? Well, not just now, but... you know."

Her head bobs in a nod, she does know. It was much the same for her, she figures. Utter confusion over how in Force's name she was even alive in the first place, immediate fleeing from the hospital, and then finding the one place that made sense.

For Jyn it was a punching bag, for Bodhi she supposes it's a ship.

"Cassian is here as well." Her voice lifts up like it may be a question but it is not. It only precedes the apologetic frown that crosses her features so soon after that smile. "But it's just us."

No Chirrut, no Baze, no K2 or Melshi or Tonc or Sefla or Merrick. No other brave, brilliant rebels that died with them. Just a couple of unsocial buttheads that don't know how to be people most of the time. It apologetic because, well, he could have had any of the others but now he's stuck with them. Again.

So it's arbitrary who's here, he takes it. He wouldn't think of holding Jyn or Cassian's presence against them--no reason to think they're taking up some sort of slot meant for someone else. Pure roll of the dice. But just raising the possibility makes him wish Chirrut was here to remind him of the home he ran from like a coward as soon as he was able, that K2 could help him to more of the surreal experience of having a droid who felt like a friend, that he could thank Tonc or apologize or whatever you did to people who seemed to care for you and died on your stupid orders. Shavit, he'd be happy to have Baze point a big scary gun at him again.

"I--I guess I'll have to look for him." He keeps his tone neutral as he can. No reason to burden Jyn with his thoughts on the off chance she hasn't had all of them herself already a dozen times.

Arbitrary and frustrating. It's at least once a month that Jyn rails at nothing in particular that she is here on this second chance when Chirrut and Baze and Bodhi should have been. But now Bodhi is here and she doesn't question it because she doesn't want to give herself a headache.

She should tell him that he was here once before, briefly, that they had high fived, as the kids do. But Jyn is selfish and kind of a jerk so she is just going to put that momentarily on the backburner and probably shove it off on Cassian because he is better at breaking news like that. That in mind...

"I can-- he's right outside if you want to go... see him."

Kriff, does he have to see more than one person? Not that he doesn't want to. Sometime. In the abstract but near future. But just having Jyn here is a lot. But flat out saying he doesn't particularly want to rush to step two when he hasn't picked himself up from tripping over step one seems rude. He fidgets with the end of a sleeve--one without an Imperial cog slowly peeling off the shoulder. "Oh--is--is he? Do you both work here, or...?" Are they spending time together on purpose? But then, that's probably normal, he's probably the only one who doesn't know how to be social with people he flew into a death trap alongside.

"Yeah, we've..." She fidgets, unintentionally mirroring his discomfort. He is not the only one bad at socializing. Jyn includes Cassian in a number of conversations mainly so he can take over when she has grown tired or bored. Not that she is either with Bodhi, there is a strange thrill to having the pilot near that feels like a jolt. Sharp. "We've both been here for over a year."

Things have changed in a year. Jyn's hair is longer, though still thrown up in the same, familiar bun; she doesn't look like a stiff wind could knock over her barely-nourished frame; she has showered in the last 48 hours. Whole new world.

"It's like a bacta patch, isn't it? Just rip it off quickly, get everything done all at once?" Is that not a healthy way to conquer things???

Bodhi just blinks at her for a long moment. He still can't quite get the smell of burning beach debris out of his nose. If he'd had a little longer he might have noticed the changes in Jyn, but he knew her so briefly, and being observant about other people isn't a strength of his. "For a--Oh." Yes, people mentioned that reality didn't quite flow smoothly here, but the idea is much less striking than the reality. "I don't... Oh." Still not quite processing yet.

Right. Definitely shoving the 'oh by the way you were briefly here once before' conversation off on Cassian. She is not made for breaking news, she doesn't know how to soften any blow. Her mouth slants in an uncomfortable frown, feeling nerves spark in her belly.

"Maybe... maybe we should find a safe topic, to go back to when all of this is... too much." They could talk about, um. Well, Jyn isn't sure, but perhaps they could find a safe topic to act as something of a safe zone. "We've blue milk at home?"

That could help? Maybe? Force, she doesn't know.

This is one of those times where the thought really counts. Her actual choice of safe topic would make him laugh if he were a little less tense, but the fact that she wants to offer one shows a consideration he's not at all used to. It does as much to make him ashamed of himself, because he's very insecure, but he's still touched and disarmed. "N-no, it's fine, tell me what you've been doing?" He's not actually good at small talk, but it's something you have to be able to do. Though he doubts anything really counts as small talk with a near-stranger who pulled you out of one deathtrap to walk into a slightly different one.

"Uh, well I work here. On the guard." It's easy work for her, she is used to going out and fighting things, salvaging makes sense to her, being outside the wall means she can be in nature and not have to talk to people. It's the ideal, really.

What else, what else? She doesn't know what to start with!

"We have a cat, she's called Raddus. Like a tooka cat but she's got this small face with smile little ears and a tiny mouth." It's absurd, cats are strange, unlikely creatures, but Jyn loves her adventurous cat. "We found a mouse droid, all broken and beat up, but we're fixing it. If you want to help?"

"I can try. I'm not g-great with most droids." He's quietly of the opinion that they're in a conspiracy against him. There was a slightly tipsy dare in his academy days that involved a disassembled astromech and, well, he got it back together, but he's sure they hold grudges. K-2 was the closest thing he's experienced to being marginally tolerated by a droid. And it wasn't that much toleration.

His binary isn't great, either. He can follow, but not closely.

"But, well, at least I'm an extra pair of hands," he adds too quickly, not wanting to reject either the offer or the topic. Droids. He can talk about droids. Or cats, whatever those are. Anything that counts as small talk.

Jyn feels like she is dancing this delicate line, struggling to reconcile the brave, bold man she built up to be larger than life with the actual and incredibly human man that was just doing his best, as they all were. Is this how Poe feels with her and Cassian, with Leia? Force, how's he not gone mad. It's hard! She's had a year here to think about all her dead companions and now she's struggling actually being faced with one again.

Trust in the Force whispers her mother's voice in her head.

She draws her phone out of her pocket and texts Cassian an emergency code, knowing he won't ignore it.

She also throws small talk right out the window because she truly is rubbish at it. "I'm really happy that you're here, Bodhi. I'd like to... well, to know you, I guess."

No, kriffing--He liked the small talk part. He's so much better at the little things than the big emotions. He could have said slightly helpful but ultimately pretty meaningless things about droid maintenance forever.

She's Galen's daughter. Why should he be surprised she's not letting him dig in his heels in his comfort zone? But she does have to watch him be clearly wrong-footed and confused for a long moment, probably not a gratifying response to her moment of emotional honesty. "I--there's not much to know, but... You, too." He means it. He's just deeply, completely awkward about it.

"You knew my father, yeah?"

Obviously, that is what started everything. Bodhi, the defector pilot, carrying Galen Erso's message. That was the catalyst for... so much.

She doesn't know why she brings up her father it's not like, well, she didn't really know him that well.

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monthly mingle: FEAST OF THE DYING

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