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(no subject)

Who: Everyone
What: The open July log.
When: The month of July.
Where: All over.
Notes: N/A

July Open Log

Time to shine, sparkle and become renewed.

So the fighting has finished, the filtering system is turned back on and the water has retreated. Of course, all that water rushing in and having been there for so long means that there is a giant mess in most parts of the Sphere, where water alternated between coming up to one’s ankles, all the way to one’s knees. Even the smaller private domes were affected with lesser amounts of water, leaving dirt and sediment and kelp behind along with an assortment of other sea life.

Now we all remember what happened last time something grew inside the Sphere right? Thankfully, there’s been a fair amount of supplies that have been accrued, and it involves gloves, face masks and a good damn amount of bleach to go with those large scrub brushes. There’s also huge pails of soapy water that are used to clean up things from the bleach. Everything is wet and it smells a bit like an indoor swimming pool, but it’s definitely safer to be safe than sorry.

So pick up a brush and pitch in. Those who do may find a little extra something from the Council delivered to their homes in a basket. Those who don’t may find themselves a little bit on the Council’s unofficial shitlist. And given that Max runs the Black Market, it’s not a great place to find yourself. Maybe you were sort of shoved towards this and were doing it haphazardly. Maybe you give a damn. Either way, food and water will come to you, and everyone will be better once this place is cleaned up.

Or so people keep telling ya anyway.

about that bucket of water that you’re wearing.

Of course, if there’s one thing that history and eighties movies have taught us, it’s that where there’s giant buckets of soapy water around, and hoses, and big sponges, then there’s bound to be one thing that happens: a water fight. And a big one at that. Kids (or kids at heart) have been not so subtlety wandering around with buckets filled with cold water, or sponges dipped in them and a few of them have hoses. There’s no bleach in them thankfully (because it’s all fun and games until someone gets a chemical burn) but the water fight is a good way to let off some of the tension that the folks in the Sphere have been getting up too.

So are you a victim, or are you a perpetrator. Do you care either way? But it doesn’t matter because this fight is huge and when there’s this much water flying around, there really isn’t any space for anyone to be a bystander here. Sorry.

with a suitcase full of summertime

Do y’all know what we happened to miss while we were underwater?! The summer solstice. And once things are all cleaned and cleared up, your resident summertime goddess ain’t gonna let it pass without knowing it, and it’s something the inhabitants of the Sphere take to like ducks to water. Wine and dancing is flowing all around and there’s a few fiddlers and jazz musicians dancing around. Because when the queen of the underworld prods ya gently, you get up and do it.

As the night and people’s alcohol levels rise, people start to become more daring with the fire. After all, everything is all cleaned but probably still slightly damp from what had happened, so there’s no problem with people swinging poi around, or using hula hoops set alight. There are even some among us who happen to be going out and jumping over bonfires in order to create good luck for the new year to great cheers of the people around them.

and baby you should see me in a (flower) crown

Do you know what else is a thing during this? Flower crowns. There are tons of flower crowns and various people are sitting around and teaching people how to make their own. The materials, including fresh flowers of all varieties are scattered around the field in the agricultural dome, and people are sitting criss-cross applesauce in order to add ribbons to the stems. For those people who are loathe to wear them, it almost becomes a game for other people to plant them on those resilient folks heads. People use magic or guile or just plain old tossing them in order to make it so that they land on people’s heads. More than that, a group of people will audibly cheer each time one lands. (And of course jeer when they lose one.)

exploration: teeth and bones.

After what had happened, there really is no putting back the seals on the doors to the places that were opened up, even though the council has tried with some of them. There are some doors that are deemed too dangerous to let anyone go inside of (lava and ghosts are not good things to let loose inside the Sphere, no matter how fun it would be at the time) but the door in the infirmary (in the morgue) needs to be open for practical purposes. Which may not be great for people who work in the infirmary, but there it is.

Once people drop through a hatched hole in the floor of the morgue, there’s tunnels extended out for several hundred yards, into the dark. If you have a flashlight, it’s clear to see that here and there the walls are etched with Latin, carved into the stone of the tunnels themselves in what looks more than a little bit like scratches rather than anything that resembles tool marks. The words are repeated at first, over and over: ”cave veniunt!" And "ossa et dentibus illius ruminandum!" Along with the repeated: “cave.”

The skeletons inside are supposed to have been all taken care of, but you can’t help the uneasy feeling that moves down your neck in the darkness, or the way that you can swear you can hear more than a little bit of a hiss of bone. There are things discarded here on the floor of the hallway, gathering more value with the deeper that you go, but is it worth being down here in the dark with the dead for that?

let's go to the movies, let's go see the stars

So, Alex made a post, and then she went and badgered Max into giving them the money to do it, so in the middle of the merchant dome, a large screen has been set up, and there’s space for people to have blankets or chairs from home set up in front of the screen. Various vendors have set up carts or stalls here and there, selling the sort of foods that one would expect at the movies (popcorn, homemade candies, soda, juice, wine and beer, nachos and that sort of thing) along with some that one may not expect: (full curry dinners, burgers, basically a bit like a food truck festival. If you can imagine it it’s there.)

Before the movie, there’s cartoons running, some familiar, and some not, and this is an event that people have seemed to have taken to well. Children run around here taken with the idea for the movie, and it’s a fun, summery festive sort of atmosphere with a community vibe, despite the wine and beer for sale.

we're heckling! it's good to be heckling again!

Well, at least until the movie starts anyway. Groundhog Day has a fair bit wrong with it honestly, and people are taking notice of that. After all, it was from the 80s, a period that wasn’t exactly known for its political correctness or sensitivity. And there’s the small fact that Bill Murry is kind of the worst as well. So, there are some people who have taken issue with the movie that has been chosen. Those people are definitely taking the Mystery Science Theatre approach to this movie, while others are taking issue with them doing that.

So which crowd do you join? Are you watching the movie quietly? Are you joining in the hecklers? Either way, it definitely seems like a fun night out.

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Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Dude, I may have been born from humans, but I was born a mutant. There's a difference, man. I was always a mutant, or in their eyes. Mutated is, like, radiation and shit.

[As for the other thing, Tommy shrugs.]

Thousands of years?

[He nods at that.] Semantics, "dude". [And he shrugs.] Really? So...he wasn't born the year Odin and his armies stopped the Jotun invasion of Midgard?

Maybe I'm getting things confused, but yeah, I think he was a Jotun. It's just, yanno, they're all older? Maybe? Dude, Asgardians are weird.

[Don't make him force 'dude' to be part of your lexicon, Loki.]

We live longer than you lot, so we're "weird". Never-mind we came long before you.

[He shakes his head.]

It doesn't matter, I suppose.

Nah, it's not just that. The weird thing is that gods exist.

[Because they are that, to Tommy. Asgardians are immortal, so far as anyone can tell. Or mostly so.]

But you're specifically weird because sometimes you're good and sometimes you're bad. But mostly? I think you just want people to notice you, and since you're Jotun and not Asgardian, that makes sense. You gotta prove yourself. Or feel like it.

And why is that strange?

[Because even Asgardians have their gods, and where their souls go to rest when they die.

He didn't know how to take this boy's assessment of him, except that he did, in fact, know another version of himself, he flexes his jaw at the suggestion he needs to prove himself and plasters on a smile.]

I think I've proven myself quite well, thank you.

Not what I meant. I meant... that's what our brains tell us, right? Because our brothers are more popular. Because people like them more. They're the 'powerful heroes'. Hell, they both handle electricity and fly some. So yeah, it's a thing. I get it is what I'm saying.

[He lives in the shadow of his twin, and the rest of his family for that matter.]

I'm...honored? [He'd never sought to have some sort of understanding borne in this child, and he looks slightly confused at its inception. Still, if he's honest, he doesn't hate the boy, either.

Well...that's interesting.]

Who is your brother?

He goes by Wiccan in hero circles.

[He doesn't think it's a good hero name, but it's something.]

He's magic, he flies, he has electricity. Oh, and he alters reality to his will.

"Wiccan"? Is he a witch?

[He sounds like a witch.]

It sounds like you lot should have no problems with him around. Or is it he only alters reality to his benefit?

Yeah, kinda sorta. Apparently half under the tutelage of another you. It's weird. I try not to mess with the timeline-multiverse-dimension mess they get themselves into.

[At least Loki called him a witch and not a warlock. Because Tommy doesn't feel like jumping all over him for using an offensive word. Not his idea of a fun night.]

It's complicated. Messing with the universe isn't right, man.+

[He doesn't try to mask his surprise at that.] Really? [Now all of that sounds monumentally exciting. Maybe the Sphere will see fit to pull this "Wiccan" here and Loki can see for himself what the boy's all about.]

You don't say. And yet, one has to wonder why someone would be given such power if they weren't meant to use it.

[Yeah, Tommy's very against his brother getting dragged here, not even kidding.]

Oh, he's meant to. He's supposed to be a god or something. Called the Demiurge. I didn't pay as much attention then.

The...Demiurge? [He makes a mental note to look into the term. It's not one he's familiar with, though he can't help but think he's heard it before, only not in Asgardian philosophy.]

It sounds important. Why would you not pay attention?

Well, I heard about it all from a Kree who was shirtless at the time which was really distracting? And I didn't really pay attention in the two hours of time between when I was recovered from being kidnapped and being kidnapped here?

[Tommy had the weirdest time leading up to arrival at the Sphere. But he does operate under the assumption that Loki had heard of the Kree. Because come on, the Asgardians probably had their eyes on such a warlike alien race.]

That's hardly an excuse. Before arriving here, Asgard exploded and we ran into Thanos' ship when we were evacuating.

[And distracted by a pretty face? Really, Tommy?]

[Tommy winces. That makes him sigh.]

Asgard has bad luck. It... Parts of it appeared over Oklahoma. And it crashed, to the ground. My team and I, we did everything we could to help get people out. I think Billy sorta fucked up some people who tried looting the throne room.

Also, Thanos? Fucking hell. That's bad luck.

[Pretty face? Dude appeared IN HIS BED, with a PERFECTLY TONED body, and white hair. Unnerving. And thing is, pretty faces are good to look at.]

Yes, yes, that all sounds awful and complicated, but my point is learning your twin brother is some sort of reality-altering god should supersede any attractive person, male or female, who may be delivering the information.

[He shakes his head.]

I suppose it makes sense. Mortals have a finite time in which to breed.

The guy was super-vague about it. Did I mention he just appeared in my bed? Like, guy broke into my life, slept with my ex, took over as the white haired guy on my team, and had tried to kill us once.

[So yeah, he had a lot to think about. He ignores the breeding comment, though.]

And frankly, it doesn't matter, right? It's supposed to happen in the future. He becomes the god who changes the laws of magic or something.

Wait. Did he appear as you in your bed?

[He laughs.]

That's hilarious!

What, no, he wasn't me. There's only one me. And my twin. But yeah, in my bed. But I found out later that it's a double dorm. Guess there aren't many of those?

[It's more the being replaced. How that guy showed up on the team and his brother never asked for help from him.]

It's like 'hey there's me but better in some ways'? Not all ways. I'm a lot faster.

Ah, so it's that this doppelganger replaced you on your team that caused your distraction.

[He nods. He has to admit, he'd have had a hard time focusing.]

Was he foiled at least?

[No, it wasn't that either. Not fully. It was...]

My brother was in danger. His life on the line. The multiverse on the line. And he didn't call me. And the guy was sorta hot.

[Tommy's gotten so distracted by that thought that he may have forgotten what else was going on.]

Who foiled what now?

You. [He shakes his head, finally having his answer.] You were foiled by your own libido.

[He's so judging you.]

Dude. I'm straight.

[Which Tommy will protest. Loudly. Incorrectly, but loudly. From the nearest highest point of elevation. Listen, his life is complicated.]

If you were around a Kree-soldier with genetically engineered perfect muscles you'd stare too. Just because it's fucking weird.