We're all in this train-gether 🚂

[adregem]

Who: OTA. If you’re a passenger with a ticket on this train, then you are most welcome here!
Where: Upper Music Car
When: Imagination 18, at around brunch.
What: Welcome to the train’s first ever community open forum. Come for the food, stay for the best discussions ever.
Warnings: Lots of top-levels for easy access to relevant topics to your characters, but apart from that, nothing right now! (Not a warning but a heads-up that one TL will be dedicated to the dissemination and discussion of the bonus trek during the last mission. For your OOC reference, please see here.)



Someway through the 18th of Imagination, an announcement for the already spoken for meeting is shared by the ICPs, giving people twenty minutes to come to the upper Music Carriage for the gathering. While the chairs mostly face the stage, they’ve been curved to allow people to face their fellow passengers too, so not to put the sole focus in one place.

This is a meeting for all, and everyone will have their chance to speak and be heard.

The promised snack table sits to one side of the room, and on the stage, the white board from the standard coach has been brought in, written on it bullet points for the planned topics. To assist in the flow of discussion, familiar moderators stand in place to help jot things down, carry conversation further should one idea end while another is ready to begin, among other such administrative tasks to organize the forum. Plus, the ICP’s are in constant use all throughout the meeting, with basic announcements about what’s being discussed now, and how more people are still welcome to catch up to the Music Car if they hear something that interests them.

Grab a plate, settle down, and let’s get to work.

(OOC: Specific top-levels will be set-up for ease of tagging. Select ‘Show Top-Level Comments Only’ if you would like to skip ahead! And as much as possible kindly keep to a single thread in that TL, unless a very special or private point has to be made with regards to the subject! :) Of course if you will be tagging the snacks table, the extra suggestions, or the meta-thread, this does not apply any longer.

Also, very important: Please see here for an example format of how documentation of missions can go! It is most relevant during the discussion on information gathering.)

Comments

[eyeslikeblood]

Oh? [ A strange clarification, but he supposes it clears up misunderstandings. ] Myself as well--

[ and then the conversation shifts back, and oh dear. Well, he did bring it up as an ice-breaker. ] More different than you would expect. For example, I would assume you have never heard of a riboku.

[longforgottenpromise]

Um... and me too... [Technically his pronouns are implicit in his name but he doesn't expect anyone outside of his own world to know that, like Gyousou this is the first time anyone has ever clarified such a thing to him.

He smiles shyly and glances at Gyousou again before back to Devero, allowing the two to speak.]

[subcircuits]

Thank you. [He smiles and ducks his head in acknowledgement of their responses.]

A riboku...? [His brow furrows.] No, can't say that I have.

[eyeslikeblood]

Children are born from it, growing inside eggfruit. Quite unlike the reproduction of other worlds, though, I understand, less messy, and less of a danger to the parents.

[ he shrugs, his smile wry. ]

[longforgottenpromise]

As far as we can tell, ours is the only world with such a way.

[He smiled as well, though he stayed close to Gyousou. He had been the one to approach but he can't help that Devero is quite intimidating.]

[subcircuits]

[Wow, Devero has no idea how to respond to that! He looks between the two of them, like maybe he's searching for a hint that that might be some kind of joke, but-- no, he sees no such thing.]

That is... definitely not how children are born where I come from. We do it the messy and dangerous way-- although not so dangerous anymore. Only the very best doctors go into pediatrics where I come from.

[eyeslikeblood]

[ Gyousou's expression is entirely sincere, if rather amused, as though Devero's reaction is the expected one under the circumstances.

Still, Taiki took the initiative to approach the man, so he'll at least facilitate a conversation between them. He rests a hand on Taiki's shoulder, hoping to reassure. ]

Where do you come from, if I might ask?

[subcircuits]

...Earth? [There are more details he could offer, but he's starting to realize they're meaningless, really.]

[longforgottenpromise]

A lot of people call their worlds earth... Um... Sorry... It sounds like your earth is different than the earth I know. I lived on earth for a while... as well as another world.

[subcircuits]

No, no, you're right. They do. [He waves a hand and quirks his lips.] I was being facetious. Forgive my cheek?

[He regards Taiki with interest.] You've lived on different worlds?

[longforgottenpromise]

Oh sorry... It's okay... I didn't mean... [He glanced up at Lord Gyousou but then back at Devero as he was questioned.]

Yes... My eggfruit was blown from our world to earth before I was born, so I grew up there.

[eyeslikeblood]

[Taiki talking was the goal of the exercise, so Gyousou just gives an encouraging nod and adds a comment.]

Indeed. The twelve kingdoms are linked through the Void Sea to the lands of Konron and Hourai, although I believe they are both 'on Earth'.

[subcircuits]

[what.] I-- I see. [No he doesn't.

The v-word does catch his interest, though.] The Void Sea? Like-- [He gestures around, indicating the train and what it's travelling through.] This void? Are you folks familiar?

[longforgottenpromise]

Oh... No sorry... [He shook his head.] It seems to be different, it links only our world with earth and... Whenever I've travelled through it it isn't like this... It's like a white tunnel and then travel happens between the worlds, or the worlds clash together there are shoku... sorry they are storms? Or sometimes other disasters.

[subcircuits]

That sounds incredible. It almost seems like it could be some kind of quantum tunneling...

[Or magic, Devero. It could be magic.]

[longforgottenpromise]

Quantum tunneling?

[He glances at Lord Gyousou, but it's a concept Taiki knows he will know more about than his king does.]

I think.. we heard about this in physics. On earth I mean... um... It's to do with radiation?

[He doesn't sound sure, at all really.]

[subcircuits]

Beats me! [He laughs, good-natured about his own ignorance.] Physics is not my field. I'm a mechanics guy through and through.

[eyeslikeblood]

[ his shrug to Taiki is entirely amiable, he's used to not understanding terminology nowadays. Radiation, physics, mechanics, he's comfortably out to sea. ]

If the powers involved are similar, it wouldn't help overmuch. There is much we don't understand about dimensional storms... I believe Earth was not even aware our worlds are connected, so they have no ability to study the effects. A pity.

[longforgottenpromise]

Yes, we learned about some things in school, but there's a lot I don't know.

[He nodded at Lord Gyousou.] Earth is unaware there is another world at all...

[subcircuits]

Fascinating.

[He still has coffee in his hand, pretty much forgotten, and takes a lukewarm sip now.] My world is very technological. Moreso, perhaps, than most of the others represented here, is the impression I've gotten.