☆TRACK XIII: HIT THE BOTTOM

[interdimanagers]

Who: Everyone!
What: The tour moves on to Asiana, and Gold makes a move.
When: June 21st - July 8th, 2055
Where: Any of the potential tour stops, but mostly TOKYO.
Warnings: Again, probably violence.

“What's going on? Could this be my understanding? It's not your fault, I was being too demanding. I must admit, it's my pride that made me distant, All because I hoped that you'd be someone different.” ☆HIT THE BOTTOM Blanche's attempt to weaken Pride Records had mixed results. On one hand, a large number of Pride members have escaped as a result, bringing Pride down to Virgo's level. On the other, he managed to lose almost the entirety of Defying Atmosphere, one of the major headliners of his newest wave of musical acts. While the ranks of the rescuers swell, life within the labels has hit another low. After the last mass escape, both labels have shut down most of their musicians access to the outside world, beyond the closely watched concerts and publicity events. Bands that have shrunk down to one or two members are being reformatted - are you the only one left? Congratulations, you're a solo act now. You won't have the same fame level as someone who made it there the normal way, but it's an act of necessity now. To the labels benefit, even if they've both shed a large amount of their newest acts, they still have a solid standard of veteran acts remaining. If your managers treat you with some added disdain in coming weeks, it probably shouldn't be much of a surprise. Your entire generation of musicians seems like they have been at terrible mistake. Those in the tiers above you seem remarkably complacent, at least on the outside. ☆ASIANA TOUR All of these cities are basically what they are like IRL except about 50 years more future-like, and you have full creative liberty to make up some developments to the local culture and worldbuild because this is the last time these places will ever be mentioned meaningfully! THE OFFICIAL STOPS: Mumbai (June 21st - 23rd), Bangkok (June 24th - 27th), Shanghai (June 28th - 30th), Seoul (July 1st - 3rd), Tokyo (July 4th - 8th) Tokyo is the biggest event of the Asiana Tour. In a change from the Europa Tour, the rescuers will be following the labels to each city location instead of just assembling at the last one. Security has gotten so tight, they need to take every opportunity they can to try to save another life. ► WORLD OF YOUR DREAMS: It's while Shep's spaceship is camping out in Shanghai that Gold breaks in - and the effects of their visit will extend throughout the entirety of both the rescuers and the captive musicians. Back during the Vista City festival, Agent J managed to capture a large amount of ambient musical energy via a group dance routine, and handed it over to Silver who condensed it into the physical form of a glowing disk. Gold has arrived to ask for it, to use as part of their plans against Pride Records. Upon entering, Gold will use their magic to cast a sleep on all the present rescuers in order to give them some privacy with Silver. Silver, of course, is going to say no to handing over the disk, refusing to enable Gold's reckless plans. This conflict is going to result in Silver trying to hide the disk with magic, and then things are going to get a little weird. Most of you are familiar with the strange dreamscape that rescuers first met the captured musicians in... well, we're going back there, again! With everyone asleep and the ambient musical magic thick, everyone previously associated with the shared dreams is getting dragged back into that same dream realm, which happens to be the same psychic location that Silver hid the disk. Everyone interested in being the one to find the disk in the dreamscape can enter below, and a winner will be drawn via RNG (after which, they can group up with however many others they like when the actual discover happens). After that, they'll be free to do with the disk what they choose, whether that is keeping it from Gold, giving it to them, or something else entirely. Everyone else, of course, will just get to experience sharing a dreamscape one more time before endgame, including being able to meet up with the musicians still trapped within the labels. Everyone will be in what represents their "true" forms once again, and memories still locked away with feel a bit easier to access. Gold will end up fleeing, with or without the disk. Whether or not they end up with it will affect the events to come. ☆GOLD MAKES A MOVE Here's what Gold has been building up to with all of their reckless nonsense - they intend to try to take on Lesedi Santiago, one on one, and they're going to do it during one of the exec's public appearances during the Tokyo festival. Gold's intent is to take her out before she can even get to the end of this ritual - how this turns out will be entirely dependent on the players. Any rescuer or musician can be present if you wish, and they'll have full liberty to act on both Gold and Lesedi once the fight begins. Do you support Gold? Do you support Lesedi? Do you say fuck it and try to take them both out? There will be one free for all thread that will go up after the dream event winner has been sorted out. The fight will be in public, and as usual, the audience will be too brainwashed to do anything but clap and cheer. Everyone but you, of course. Please ask any questions you might have below! “I turned away, 'cause I thought you were the problem. Tried to forget until I hit the bottom. But when I faced you in my blank confusion, I realized you weren't wrong, it was a mere illusion.”

Comments

[missknight]

I- I know, just, hold on-

[As nice as Greg congratulating her is, Connie is stuck a bit with this whole.... controlling a giant multi armed statue. She makes a few floundering gestures before she really gets it, and there's another shift of stone as the arm from higher up starts to lower itself. In its palm, along with mundane laundry, the disc glimmers alluringly.]

Okay! Okay I got this. So, what we'll do- we'll make this stop being a thing, and then we'll have, like, a meeting. An hour long, or something- [She looks to Greg and Yamamoto as she trots over to the hand laying on the sand.] That's long enough for them to try and convince us for one plan or the other, right?

[interstellarebels]

[It's about the side of a mini-disc, and while its the same sort of rainbow colours any CD would be, it's vastly amplified. Instead of just reflecting light into rainbows, it's projecting like, like the spectrum of all soul colours at once.

Gold isn't having it, though. For all this reasonable talk of plans and meetings, this isn't what they came here for. Connie officially taking the disc seems to be the last nail in their impatience coffin.]

Don't you care about Garnet? About Steven? [Gold continues to press shamelessly. Their thrashing against the statue's hold, as futile as that is. Their control over this dreamscape is dwindling.] She's going to suck their souls out, just like Blanche did with Mr Universe and the valkyrie. And then she's going to eat it like a fucking snack-!

[rainandswallows]

[Yamamoto walks over to Gold and from his necklace Kojirou bursts out and flies around Gold, letting blue flames shower down upon them. He doesn't know if the Tranquility factor will work on a being like Gold, but it's worth a shot.

No one thinks straight under stress]

We'll figure it out. Take a breath, let's talk this out.

[panspermia]

[ Gold's words dig deep, clawing at Greg's recovering soul. The cold emptiness, the loss, the confusion, the grief, the pain, the darkness--

He closes his eyes, and turns away from the helmeted rescuer. Another day, another life, he could have kept his head and tried calming them. He can't now. All he can handle is nodding to Connie. ]

Keep it safe.

[missknight]

[Clambering onto the stone hand, Connie gently takes the disc. It feels like it should be tiny and delicate, but instead there’s so much power, it’s unbelievable. She nods confidently to Greg.]

I’ll be careful, Mister Universe.

[Her gaze goes to Gold.]

And we won’t let that happen. Me, Yamamoto, Mister Universe, Silver, Shep, everyone else, and even you, Gold- we won’t let Santiago hurt anyone else like Mister Universe was hurt.

We’re not going to let them win.

[Look at all that determined hope over here.]