WEEK 4

[bathymetric]

Another trial, another week, and still you're probably running lower on answers than you'd like. And on people - you lost three since last Sunday. By the end of this week, you'll have been here for nearly a full month, yet still the days crawl on.

You wake up Sunday, again with no memory of Saturday, but this time with a simple message on your devices: You may resume requesting items, if you like. Enjoy. Guess it really was just a stealth motive after all, but at least it's being communicated that it's over! That's something, at least.

And when you leave your rooms on Sunday, there's another new area to explore! This one is... certainly more ambitious in its construction than the last one, to say the least. But hey, you have a pretty neat place to host parties, if you feel so inclined! That's... fun...

Hey, you gotta find the fun in situations like this where you can! Silver linings, right?



SUNDAY | MONDAY | TUESDAY | WEDNESDAY | THURSDAY

[ ooc: Welcome to Week 4! Remember to turn in AC here, threads for regain coins here, and if you feel so inclined you can visit Angel's office hours over here! ]

Comments

[lovelikeyou]

[Sunday is missing again, even though Rose made absolutely sure not to even risk falling asleep on her own Saturday night. That's...fun.

But it's just something that happens now, apparently, so she skips asking everyone else about it and goes up to check out the new area instead. The arcade is interesting enough - she thinks there's a place like this in Beach City! She's pretty sure they give out real tickets, though? She'll play a few games of skeeball, just for the heck of it, but watching the numbers go up isn't terribly interesting to her.

After that, she swings by the water park. She doesn't leap directly into the water, leaning down by the pool to inspect it instead. This is...the gross bad-smelling water humans started swimming in at some point, for some reason. Why did it have to be the stink water?

Eventually, though, she decides to at least go down the slides a few times. Hope y'all like getting splashed.

Towards the evening, she retreats back to the lounge. She's got a new project this time - crocheting! Crochet hooks are much larger than sewing needles! This should be a lot easier, and it's something to keep her hands busy while she...watches The Little Mermaid again, apparently.]

lounge

[baitless]

[...oh, it's that movie... he ends up lingering when he notices what's on, since, um...]

Ah, that one...

[...

He doesn't really know what other qualifiers to give it, so he just... kinda sits down to watch it...]

[lovelikeyou]

I guess we could ask for more now, but I don't know of many.

[Aladdin was her request, but Angel pretty much suggested Disney and Rose just agreed to it. She could probably do something like that again, but...well, she likes this one.]

You can turn on one of the others, if you want.

water park

[hardnosed]

[ What a sensible and normal way to inspect the pool! It sure would be a shame if even the briefest glance into its waters revealed someone annoying standing around on the bottom, checking to see roughly how long she can stay underwater before the need to breathe becomes overwhelming. ]

[lovelikeyou]

[Oh. Great.

Well, Rose hasn't actually tested out whether or not breathing is required now, so she has no reason for alarm here. She's just gonna maybe...go see what the lazy river's about? She'll keep an eye on the pool, though - don't need Jasper leaping out of there to tackle her or something.]

[hardnosed]

[ Eventually, Jasper does in fact kick off the bottom of the pool and come to the surface, where she unfortunately has the power of speech. This time, however, words come out of her mouth and they're not a tirade about Rose's betrayal for some reason? ]

You tried to stay up too, didn't you. [ is this really an improvement, though ] What's the last thing you remember?

[lovelikeyou]

[ugh. well at least it has some marginal possibility of being productive.]

I just stayed in the dining room. [Where she could stand around and watch the door so no one could sneak up on her.] It must have been late, but I'm not sure what time it was exactly. I don't remember anything actually happening.

[hardnosed]

[ She releases her breath in a frustrated chuff noise, glaring down into the depths. ]

I guess it was too much to ask that one of us remember something halfway useful. We're already down by one.

[ Alice, she means Alice. ]

[lovelikeyou]

He would have planned for us, when he was setting it up.

[Whatever it is. The Professor knew he had a bunch of people who didn't sleep, there must be something built in...]

I don't know how he does it without poofing us. [Because, though it was only the once, she remembers what being poofed is like. She hasn't retreated into her gem or reformed.]

[hardnosed]

[ If she were anything other than Purely Herself, All The Time, she'd bring up the fact that the Professor can apparently mimic organic needs in them. Maybe it's not just that they've lost things. Maybe he's added his own failsafes, which he can activate whenever he feels like it.

But that would involve admitting a new weakness to Rose, of all people, and incidentally also probably the fact that she made a complete fool of herself earlier, so it won't fly! She thinks about it, and then brings up something totally different. ]

What if he's got something like a Rejuvenator?

[ They'd long since fallen into disuse by the time Jasper came out of the ground, but she at least knows they exist. ]

[lovelikeyou]

[Oh.]

Does Homeworld still use those?

[Does she really want to know, honestly?

Without speculating on the exact origins of the Rejuvenator (which I have no solid headcanon on whatsoever), Rose certainly knows a little more about their functions than the average Quartz soldier might.]

Something like that might work. They poof Gems, but it's not like the Gem would remember - if they could change the reset point, they could probably make us reform in our current forms. Like nothing ever happened.

lounge

[thieviusraccoonus]

[Guess who's wandering into the lounge... looking soaking wet. Having fur... not great sometimes.]

You know, if I was a mermaid, I'd probably be collecting everything from humans that I could find.

[lovelikeyou]

I don't know why the other ones aren't interested in humans.

[They're so interesting! Rose glances sidelong at Sly.]

Oh, were you at the "water park"?

[thieviusraccoonus]

Seems a little close-minded of them, honestly.

[He wears a tired, vaguely annoyed smile.]

How could you tell? Although, this? Not by choice.

[lovelikeyou]

Some species are just like that.

[she can relate]

Did you fall in?

[thieviusraccoonus]

You know how there's a rule about not running around a pool? They don't point that out enough.

[Casually shakes a little. God, he hates this.]

I'm not even much of a swimmer. I sink like a rock. ...No Offence.

[lovelikeyou]

[Rose giggles.]

No, it's true. We do. We can swim if we try, but it's hard to float like humans can.

[thieviusraccoonus]

[At least she's in good spirits about him looking like a drowned rat. It earns a chuckle out of him.]

It's hard to float in general. Too bad I never learned to swim... might make it difficult if this place starts flooding.

lounge

[nothingcanstop]

[ ...haha hey so last night.

Della's been looking around a bit today, but she hasn't run into Rose. She's not avoiding her? But she's kind of trying to think of...well, what to say. And, it's only natural that she sees her late, when she's returning to her room.

She kind of murmurs to herself: ] Okay, Della. You're a responsible, mature person, just talk to her.

[ Alright! Away we go!! Della approaches while obviously trying to be casual. ]

Ohh, heyy, Rose, I was wanting t--hurgh. [ Oh no. She lays eyes on the TV, at Ariel and all her fishy friends, and immediately turns away to hold back a gag. ] MMmmmm bad idea forgot about the fiurk.

[ .....give her a moment. ]

[lovelikeyou]

[Uh. Rose pauses the movie, but not because she's actually realized what's wrong.]

Are you okay?

cw: mild emetophobia

[nothingcanstop]

[ A small hack. Della just takes a deep, deep breath of air. Has Rose ever heard a human almost get sick? That's the kind of noises happening here, but it seems Della's got it under control! She turns around, blocking her view of the TV with one hand. ]

Fine! I'm fine. It's fine. Just forgot that was laying around here. [ She coughs and sort of...lowers her voice a little, like it's a secret, like-- ] I'm just. Not very good with f- you know.

[ And with the other hand she gestures to the window, where some nice colorful fishies are swimming by! ]

[lovelikeyou]

...fish?

[Della, we live in an aquarium?!]

[nothingcanstop]

Don't speak their cursed name.

[ yeah she's just kind of been ignoring that out of necessity for the last three weeks ]

[lovelikeyou]

Oh, okay. I didn't realize.

[Rose can believe she just had no idea this was happening all along! She's bad and bad at noticing when things are wrong!]

[nothingcanstop]

It's cool. It's fine. [ It's Probably Cool And Fine

Della just keeps herself from looking at the fish, breathing it all down and...focuses on Rose. Awkwardly. ] I uh... I was just kind of hoping to talk to you about...other things, you know. Not [ mildly waves her hand around in a circle above her head ] yeah.