Chapter 4 OOC & Plotting

[thenine]

Chapter 4 Launch

Chapter 4 Event Log is up for your review. Please feel free to post there or your own logs for the event - whichever works best for you.

Chapter 4 Calendar / Timeline is available here for the expected timeline of the month.

To help you get started, here are some potential quick notes for things you could do with these prompts--but feel free to expand or come up with something entirely on your own!

Prompt Notes

The Nine

All with significant Qreshi ties have been summoned to a party thrown by Lady Kendry aboard a pleasure ship in orbit of Qresh itself. It's advertised as a social gathering, but in reality will be used to discuss and push forward an official response to the repeal of the Seventh Generation Accords.

RAC agents and Company employees have been tasked with the event's security, and will be stationed both aboard the ship and required to patrol the flightpath in their own vessels.

The Company

Bonuses are given to those who punished rioters with brutal force, while those deemed too 'soft' by the Company are given acclimation training. Those assigned to this training will be partnered with a stricter officer and sent to a volatile area to complete a mission. Finally, stress training has been offered to all - and made mandatory for some - in light of the worsening situation on the streets of Old Town.

Westies

The riots have waned, people splintering off to their own spheres. Some return to work, some join the Resistance, and some take advantage of the chaos to assert control. Gangs calling themselves 'Resistance' have sprung up all over town, and take their territory very seriously. Attacks on those with assumed Company sympathies grow more frequent, the lack of a side assumed by both the Company and the faux Resistance to be the wrong side.

Leithians

Ripples of the disorder gripping Westerley are beginning to rock the tenuous peace on Leith. The Resistance movement has spread, its righteous hatred with it, gathering groups - some independent and some connected to their sister organizations on Weaterley - focused on change. Strikes come and go, chants nothing but echos of those from weeks before, dispersing as quickly as they form. Neighbors grow distrustful as land reallocation drives funds away from humanitarian efforts to focus on security and familial financial safety. Scattered throughout this are kidnappings, a few members of closed societies disappearing with little trace. Towards the end of the chapter, a major hokk farm becomes the target of an arson attack, clogging the air with ash for days.

Even still, Leithians respond with near uniform disregard, keeping their heads down and hoping to avoid catching the Company's gaze--and authority--in the wrong light.

Resistance

The riots and discontent of the previous chapters have seen this faction's number swell. But with no clear pillar of leadership and only the myth of Hyperion available for most people, rival factions are born with their own political agendas. Many of them feed into the rumors about the mysterious Hyperion figure, painting a dark picture of a secretive and too-polished ruler who's too disconnected from the people to truly care about their plight.

Meanwhile, Hyperion allows the rumors to build without comment, growing its cells and continuing to hand out missions and intel from the shadows. Each team is given a compartmentalized mission with little connection between their last run, but when the parts come together to form a whole towards the end of the chapter... the future promised by Hyperion takes a dark, bloodier turn than some may be able to abide.

The RAC

With the lower level evaluations completed, it's time for the RAC to focus on both bolstering their top-most field ranks and weeding out and agents that have lost their ability to remain impartial. Any Level 4 killjoy that wants to test for level 5 needs to sign up for a Level 5 warrant on the warrant post. Additionally, there will be sign up threads for any killjoys that want to be ousted and lose their position within the RAC.

Please note - anyone who loses their position as a killjoy will be dropped into Westerley as a temporary citizen. It will be up to the character to find employment that allows for long term work visa status.

Major Plot Points

Metaplot: Digital Dreams

Due to the way the meshwork interacts with the memory modification chips implanted into characters' brains, their subconsciouses may be projected to any other character with modified memories. All characters may participate in this event, regardless of their level of activity on the network, though frequent users will find themselves the subject of more broadcasts.

These visions occur only when both parties are unconscious - this includes sleeping, high, or drunken states. You may take scenes from your character's AU history, canon history, or mere fantasies they have and work through them as you chose. The only requirements are as follows:

✗ There must be blue-green auras pervading where they should not, a dissonance with any memory or fantasy that is not your character's own subconscious creation. Some may also see an abandoned laboratory, though its presence will only be in disjointed flashes, and its purpose unclear.

✗ The observing character will be pervaded by the emotions of the character having the dream. Rather than this being a complete personality overwrite, it's more of an emotional resonance between the dreamer and the visiting character so that, if they find themselves in an urgent situation, both will feel the tension, or heartbreak will be felt by both, etc…

✗ The character having the dream will awaken with blurry memories of the event at most, while the character visiting the dream may remember things more vividly.

✗ Characters do not know, or care, that they are dreaming. Cognitive dissonance may enable them to have some idea that they're not conscious, but 'waking up' will not occur to them, nor will questioning how they've arrived to the dreamscape. As the location will seem natural to the character having the dream, the visitor will also feel 'right' being there in that moment.

✗ There is no limit to the amount of dreams you may have. As such, we encourage you to create your own logs for this part of the plot.

Resistance - Hyperion Missions & Recruitment

Due to some drops, we'll be opening up the Hyperion teams again for recruitment. Depending on the number of characters who sign up, we may create an additional team and safehouse set up. Please sign up using this top-level! Sign ups will remain open until 3/20.

New missions will be disseminated through the team NPCs (mod-controlled) on their respective calendar dates but will be much more subdued than the first and second waves in order to allow everyone time to continue working on their original missions.

RAC - Promotions (or Demotions)

We will be contacting players who signed up for last chapter's evaluations (Level 1-4) to find out the outcome! As long as you've started the thread, you're welcome to handwave/continue working on it in the meantime and we'll mark it as a success (or failure, if you like) when it's announced ICly on W7D3.

Level 5 evaluations will be open to all Level 4 characters--whether they were recently promoted or not--and announced ICly on W7D6. Level 5 evals will be done with the evaluating agent leading a Level 5 kill warrant (obtained from the monthly warrant posting) and at least one other killjoy. Since these evaluations will be handled by NPCs, you'll need to form temporary teams (if you're not already part of them). Similar to how we've handled the lower-level evals, we'll check in with you next chapter to see the success or failure of the evaluation!

(Note, however, that killjoys who have a marked history of psychological instability will encounter evaluations which specifically test their mental fortitude and ability to abide the RAC's oath of neutrality.)

Sign ups will be handled via the monthly warrant posting where you'll receive your customized warrant prompt. You are welcome to include non-killjoy characters in your team, but at least one of your teammates should be on the RAC roster.

Company Acclimation and Training

Based on your reports during last AC, characters who did not follow Company mandate or did so in a way that cost their employers punitive damages, characters have been assigned to stress and/or acclimation training. The specific details of what that training entails can be found in the chapter log, but outside of those parameters, you are free to create your own teams and particulars as best suits your interests. The only provision is that a character slotted for acclimation training should be paired with a character who is not -- i.e., someone who received accolades for their conduct by being granted higher weapon clearance.

If you're having trouble coming up with prompts to fit the missions, feel free to PM the mod account and one will be provided for you!

CR Meme Template

<b>Character</b>: <b>Location</b>: <b>Primary Faction Goals</b>: <b>Secondary Faction Goals</b>: <b>Desired CR</b>: <b>Offered CR</b>: <b>Anything else?</b>

Comments

QUESTIONS

[thenine]

[willalways]

"anyone who loses their position as a killjoy will be dropped into Weaterly"

Where is this Weaterly of which you speak

[thenine]

it's like westerley but with more wheat fields


zooms to fix! ty for catching that lovely!

[willalways]

Lmf beautiful

Np♥

[counterspied]

This is a very detailed chapter, thank you for your hard work, mods!

Ango's recently been transferred back to the Company intel division, so would it be possible to get a rundown of things that the Company already knows about recent events? Recent events being the plague, the riots, the Resistance, all that. A short summary is fine!

[thenine]

Since the machinations of the various factions have either been outside of Company control (or even above it, as is the case of The Nine), they all roughly have the same knowledge as has been written into the Company prompts in previous chapters (1, 2, 3) but to save you from having to troll through all of that, here's the skinny:

The plague was caused by the Westie scientist Zan Nikora and was based on his previous work. His motivations for the attack are attributed to Resistance-leanings. Because of his actions and a traitor found in the midst of The Nine families, there was an emergency council meeting to decide the fate of the Seventh Generation Accords.

The Seventh Generation Accords were struck down and have thus far not been replaced with any other legislature. The Westerley Peace Summit (end of ch3) was aimed at filling this gap but was unsuccessful and resulted in a stalemate between involved parties. The Qreshi envoy/cruise aims to achieve the same thing, but obviously for the benefit of The Nine.

The riots are/were the result of Westies understandably being upset about the fall of the Seventh Generation accords. No greater conspiracy is expected/has been investigated.

Company intelligence on the state of the Resistance is largely nebulous: they're aware that there's a new player in the game and the faction is suddenly more organized than before, but they attribute most of this to the swelling numbers provided via the riots. "Hyperion" is under investigation but subject to the whims of info brokers and has been reported with multiple descriptions.

Hopefully this helps! The meatier bits of information can be found in the chapter logs, particularly The Nine, Company, True Leithian, and Resistance prompts!

[counterspied]

Interesting, helpful and amazing! Thank you so much, this is more than enough for me to work with.

[thenine]

You're so welcome! We look forward to seeing what Ango does!

[tousei]

(psst, modly types! the chapter 4 info posts are not tagged with !mod post or stuff like that

[thenine]

Yes, we're aware. We'll get tags added as we have time to do so.

[tousei]

okay o/

[rhygret]

Question re: acclimation training!!

Rhys works on Leith as a paper pusher but he's listed for the acclimation training on Westerley for the patrol/arrest/recon stuff, is this a typo or is them being dicks bc he went to the summit :'| he is not trained for any of that

[thenine]

It was done on purpose! The Company has gotten wind of Rhys's plan and thinks he needs a bit of a reality check. Better hope the enforcer you're paired with has a background in babysitting...

[rhygret]

sobbbb

Re: QUESTIONS

[r3f4c70r3d]

Angel will be attending the Nine party as Rhys's wingman! (aka: giving him instruction on how to Behave from an earpiece) If possible, I'd like her to have some kind of eye on things as well, which brings my question:

-Are there security cameras on this cruise

-If yes, could Rhys use a designated USB to uplink her and give her some access to the feed (no control, but the ability to look around the ship)

Sorry for the delay!

[thenine]

Security on the pleasureship is state of the art, and very tight. To access the surveillance cameras aboard the main ship, Rhys would be risking a great deal, and her ability to interface properly would be partial at best. A possible alternate route is to have her uploaded into the Company patrol ships surrounding the cruise. Let us know what you think!

Re: Sorry for the delay!

[r3f4c70r3d]

Angel wouldn't care about putting Rhys at risk, but I'm sure his mun would mind very much haha. How could angel go about getting access to a surrounding ship? Would she be able to say, plug a USB into the cruise ships system for better signal? And what kind of information could she find there?

[thenine]

Since Rhys would have clearance to inspect any of the surrounding ships himself if he wished, Angel could easily find her way on board using the method you suggested in your initial comment!

Another option would be to send her signal through Rhys's own ship, which could result in some basic interfacing with the Company and RAC ships surrounding.

Any information sent over ship telecom would be accessible, though for the most part that only includes routine checks and basic reports of 'all clear'. Conversation aboard RAC cruisers may be more colorful, but we will leave that up to your imagination. She will also be able to discern to which family each security ship is directly reporting. The most, predictably, fall under Kendry control. Land Hyponia is the only outlier, its fleet small but overstaffed.