WEEK 3: April 15th - April 19th

[cartesio]

Third Week

The peaceful times are over. Moloch von Zinzer was murdered, and Nine was sentenced as his murderer. Everyone in Cartesio knows that.

Although life goes on, it seems the town of Cartesio isn't going to forget the tourists' transgressions. Not only they commited larceny in the cinema, they also murdered and executed in their town! It's no surprise their hospitality towards the visitors has cooled down considerably.

Not only they're maintaining a tense cordiality with them, they also have started talking behind the visitors' backs. All kinds of rumors are starting to sprout, yet nobody seems to be willing to say it to the tourists' faces. Talking directly to most passerby makes them distrustful, and nobody seems to want to be in close quarters alone with them.

It's only matter of time before the relationship between tourists and Cartesio starts degrading even further.

In the lobby of the motel there's a few more brochures, and the maps have been updated once again.

Links

IC Rules
Guestbook
Room Assignments
Events
Locations
NPCs
Activity Check

Sunday
Monday
Tuesday
Wednesday
Thursday

[Welcome to the third week! If you want to contact the Sergeant, please post here!. Also please remember to submit your activity check!]

Comments

[burgerprince]

[Okay, that gets a chuckle.]

Think I've seen enough of that here. Looking for greener, burning pastures.

[marmoron]

[There's a raised eyebrow, then eventually a disbelieving laugh.]

I've seen a lot of burning pastures while out in space. Cartesio's the least depressing one.

[burgerprince]

[Jughead crosses his arms with a resigned amusement.]

Alright. I gotta ask. What’s up with the whole space thing?

[marmoron]

It's a long story.

[Which he does't necessarily mean as a dodge, but... it is a long story.]

Don't know if you really want to hear it.

[burgerprince]

Can't think of much better to do than gauging your storytelling prowess.

[marmoron]

[That's getting a raised eyebrow, but eventually....]

I'm not real good at storytelling.

[Just ask Kino how much it's like pulling teeth....]

I've been out in space for the last three years. Fighting a war against the Galran empire.

[burgerprince]

[He tilts his head as if to say 'I'll be the judge of that', and lets Keith begin.]

Great hook. Go on.

[marmoron]

The Galra are a highly advanced race that've been conquering large parts of the universe for thousands of years.

[He can already hear Jugheads sardonic commentary on this. You can pretty obviously tell he's working hard not to use the phrase "I'm fighting ALIENS."]

They enslave entire planets. If they can't, they destroy them instead. Nobody on Earth knows they're out there threatening not just our universe, but all universes and alternate realities. It cost us almost everything we had to destroy the ship they had that could cross between realities.

[burgerprince]

So...

[Listen he’s trying REALLY HARD.]

Aliens. You’re fighting aliens.

[marmoron]

. . .

Yeah. I'm fighting aliens.

[And PRE "FUCK YOU" IF YOU START LAUGHING.]

[burgerprince]

[Jughead just closes his eyes for a solid minute.]

You're fighting aliens.

[He nods, slowly, taking a moment.]

Continue.

[marmoron]

[The fact that there isn't any laughter seems to throw Keith off a little.]

...what else do you want to know about it?

[burgerprince]

[Not much of the laughing type.]

The stuff outside of the generic sci-fi setup. There's got to be things you do between fighting aliens.

[marmoron]

[Getting a look.\

Look, I know it's just "generic sci-fi" to you, but it's been my life for the past three years and trust me, it hasn't been fun or easy. A lot of good people have died. We've all --

[Cutting himself off.]

Forget it.

[burgerprince]

[Jughead realises he's fucked up, he's noticed that shift from playful banter to something more serious. He stands, silent and awkward, not really knowing how to react - he didn't even know how to handle this kind of thing with his closest friends.

Eventually, he shrugs.]

You can't really drop the space war thing and expect someone to forget it.

[marmoron]

[Keith doesn't really know much better how to proceed either. He's aware enough what his life sounds like to a person who's only ever experienced a "normal life." He's not really even sure people from his own world would quite know what to do with it either. All the same, it's just impossible to talk about his life like it's just a bunch of whimsical stories.

Eventually, he sighs.]

I've travelled to a lot of different planets all over the universe. Seen a lot of cool things s well as a lot of messed up things. I don't know what to tell you. The war started with just... seven of us against an entire empire. All we had was the five lions of Voltron to use as weapons.

None of us asked to be in this war, we were chosen to be in it by the lions. These lions won't accept any other pilots than the one it chose, so we're the only people who can fight..

[A beat.]

I'm the leader of the paladins, but it's not because I wanted to be, it's because not stepping up meant letting the whole universe burn.

[burgerprince]

[At least Jughead can draw a comparison between Keith's experiences and Kino's; sounds kind of fake, but pretty messed up with you consider it as a real experience. Hell, people probably thought his teen mystery bullshit was silly - it sure sounds it on paper, if Jughead's not writing about it.]

That's rough.

[They're small words, and any further ones escape him right now, but the emotion is there in how he says them.]

[marmoron]

[There's a moment following this outburst where Keith just looks embarrassed. It'd been melodramatic as all fuck, and while he means every word of it, it's decidedly something he feels he should've just kept bottled up. He looks away, sighing.]

Sorry. It's not your problem.

[There's a pause and then he adds:]

I've been to a lot of different planets. Met a lot of aliens. Been to an alternate universe. Fought zombies, witches and druids. Been inside the rift between universes. Brought my brother back from the dead. Ran into an all-powerful being.

A lot's happened.

[burgerprince]

A lot sounds like an understatement. [Like, he can't even wrap his head around that stuff as anything but an abstract concept.] Kind of makes the whole 'a kid at my school was murdered and I got caught up in it and turns out my deadbeat dad helped hide the body so I didn't get killed too' thing look like nothing in comparison.

[marmoron]

[That delivery gets a blink, then after a moment there's a short laugh.]

I wouldn't call that nothing. Just different.