Round 1 [new characters and round announcement]

[utopiamods]

You're falling, and you can't remember why. It's a sickening feeling that makes your insides lurch; the darkness and the vertigo combine, and all you can think of is a story you heard once, somewhere.

- I remember now. It's a simple story that everyone knows. A legend of a Princess, the Demon Lord who kidnapped her, and the Knight who fought to save her.

The Demon Lord had kidnapped the Princess countless times, but every time the Knight bested his challenges and rescued the Princess.

No matter what tricks and ploys the Demon Lord used, the Knight would always triumph in the end. This was because--

The world tilts on its axis one last time, and the dream slips from your mind as easily as it arrived. A new voice intrudes on your sleep.

"Next stop: Academy Main Entrance. This tramline terminates here; all change. Next stop: Academy Main Entrance. All change."

Sunlight streams through the windows of the long carriage, making the seats almost uncomfortably warm beneath its waking passengers. The air is muggy and thick, the atmosphere deeply tired. Your nausea settles, slowly. The last of the dream fades.

"We have arrived at Utopia. Repeat, we have arrived at Utopia Academy. Could all passengers please leave the tram, as it is terminating here."

The tram pulls to a stop outside the academy station, and the students onboard are ushered off and directed to the front lobby of the school. They can't miss it; there are signs up pointing toward the main entrance, reading "New student orientation" in big, bright letters. If anyone should care to move off the path, try exploring somewhere else, a teacher will conveniently appear to shoo them back toward the lobby, assuring them that "all your questions will be answered inside".

The lobby is big and spacious, looking more like a university or perhaps a fancy international hotel than a high school. Stood around are any number of students in the uniform of the school. Some of them even look awake. There are several receptionists at the desk towards the back of the lobby, but for now they seem busy with paperwork.


[ Note: the round announcement will go up in a thread once you've all mingled. ♥ ]

Comments

[wasabisandwiches]

All in all, Cécile concluded, it could have been worse. As it was, it seemed vaguely similar to some military training exercises, which splashes of the improbable thrown in. She couldn't say she was happy to be here, but there were, at least, good points: tactile, empathic holographics? How did those work? If she was going to be allowed to experience them, she could study them... and oh, she looked forward to that.

She looked forward distinctly less to the battle and weapons system. She thought she understood most of it alright, but she wasn't fully certain-- much like piloting a Knightmare Frame, she imagined it was something you simply had to try once. She blinked, looking a little startled, as she found herself incapable of remembering how one actually did pilot a Knightmare Frame. How did you... turn one on...?

...Well, maybe she was just-- experiencing some strange aftereffects of whatever brought her to this place! She must have been drugged, after all--

She smiled a little nervously before turning her attention back to the screen, and then to the other people in the room.

The best thing to do in this situation was to talk to the rest of the people in the room and try to figure things out, she imagined. Who to approach first?

[earlofpudding]

It wouldn't be a matter of who to approach first for long, since someone was about to take that decision away. It just so happened that Lloyd was on his way out to start poking around the campus when he spotted her. That certainly pulled him right off course. He could have picked a better way of approaching, such as yelling at her from that spot over by the door and waving, but no.

The Earl opted for creeping up quietly through the crowd to stand right behind her before saying anything instead.

"Cécile! So you made it here, too!"

[wasabisandwiches]

Familiar faces, in this instance, were definitely a good thing to see. Cécile let out a quiet, internal sigh of relief at Lloyd's face-- nothing she would show, of course; no need to inflate his ego anymore than was very strictly necessary. Regardless, she felt that much more calm inside. They made a good team, generally speaking, and even if they weren't on the same 'team', so to speak, here-- no matter what happened, she imagined she'd be able to get through it.

"Lloyd!" Despite herself, her voice was distinctly relieved as she turned around. She did offer him a slightly tight smile-- it wasn't nice to surprise people like that!-- but didn't seem inclined to point out the mistake.

"You shouldn't sneak up on people like that!" Alright, well-- maybe just a little. She relaxed a little again. "It's good that you're here, too."

[earlofpudding]

"You just need to pay better attention," Lloyd countered the scolding, cheerful as ever. He wagged a disapproving finger at her. "What if I had been someone dangerous, hmm?"

The relief in her voice doesn't get a free pass to go unnoticed, either. He grins. "Two people in a row glad to see me. It's a new record!" It could have been three, but he could never tell if C.C. was ever glad to see anyone. "I'm not the only one." He put a hand on Cécile's shoulder and turned her in the right direction for him to direct her to other familiar faces in the crowd.

"Look." It's the Emperor! Lloyd would have added that on, but the the actual title kept evading him. Nonetheless, he pointed out Lelouch, Mr. He Who Should Be Dead. "Surprise~."

[wasabisandwiches]

Cécile's eyes widened a fraction as she took in what she was seeing. That was Lelouch! But he was supposed to be dead-- she couldn't quite put her finger on why, but he had been assassinated, hadn't he? Hmm, he'd been an unfavorable ruler, so Zero had killed him; that was right. So what was he doing back here? He wouldn't try to start again, would he--?

More pressingly, however, she turned back to Lloyd. "They have the technology to bring people back from the dead?" she asked, clearly astounded by the concept. Their technology couldn't even hope to achieve that, not in any close future. The idea that it could be something like magic didn't quite occur to her yet. Why would it, when at home so much could be done with technology that it almost seemed like magic?

[earlofpudding]

"They must have." Magic wasn't even on the list of possibilities for him, either. That would have been laughable. "I could fathom someone like Lelouch escaping death. He likes his smoke and mirrors. However," Lloyd nodded towards the screen with the names of the Players. "Her, not as likely."

She'll know which he means when she reaches Euphemia's name. He jammed his hands into his labcoat's pockets and scanned the crowd again. He still wanted to see the long dead Princess in person, just to verify the screen wasn't playing some kind of trick there. Too bad there happened to be an overdose of pink-haired individuals in the room.

"He wasted no time in ordering me around, too. How bossy for a dead guy! If I hadn't already been planning on picking this whole place apart..." Lloyd would have blown him off, of course.

[swordofzero]

Suzaku had lost sight of Lloyd in the crowd, it was so strange that he was here, it was strange that any one was here and Suzaku didn't even know, even after two weeks where here even was. But wherever it was a lot more people had arrived and Lloyd was one of them, CC another.

Suzaku blinked when he saw Lloyd again, then gave a small smile and hurried over. "Cecile, you're here too!"

[wasabisandwiches]

Cécile stared at the list of Players in very obvious shock for a moment, before looking at Lloyd with no small sense of urgency. "Princess Euphemia is here?" she asked. It was stating the obvious, and she was aware of that, but it had a pressing need to be said. "But wh--" She cut off, trailing off as she noticed Suzaku.

"Ah, Suzaku!" she said, offering a smile. "It seems there's an awful lot of people I know here!" That was reassuring, at least-- although the addition of people who were supposed to be dead was slightly less so. What was going on here, really? Was this just a game? Why did she have the distinct impression that there was something wrong here?

[earlofpudding]

Princess? What was a... ah, no matter. All Lloyd could do was shrug in reply. He had no idea how, either. Just that people who should be dead were very much alive and he would like to find out how. He looked back at the sound of Suzaku's voice yet again.

"Oh right! Suzaku is here, too!" Maybe he should have mentioned that first out of all of those things. Now that both of them were there, it was the perfect time to try and clear something up that had been bothering him since he had first ran into Lelouch. The Earl threw an arm around both of their shoulders to keep them nearby. "All together again! Funny how that worked out. Now! Why does everyone keep calling me Lloyd?"

Cheerfully asked, of course, as if being called some strange name by all of his acquaintances couldn't possibly be disconcerting.

[swordofzero]

Suzaku stiffened a little when Lloyd threw an arm around him but didn't move for a moment, until Lloyd asked a question. Suzaku frowned and twisted out of the hold so that he could look at him in slight confusion. "Because that is your name Lloyd."

Of course Suzaku had been at Utopia academy for two weeks and understood very well how things worked, it must be one of his lost memories.

[wasabisandwiches]

Had Lloyd forgotten his own name? Cécile looked at the man worriedly, nodding along with Suzaku. "Have you hit your head?" she queried, looking at him with concern. If he was hurt, that was distinctly less than good. Cécile herself was always very careful to avoid ever giving Lloyd any injury that might result in brain damage. Infuriating and mildly sociopathic as he could be sometimes, he was terribly brilliant, and it would be a shame to change that.

Reaching up, she patted his arm carefully, letting her hand rest on top of his wrist. "You haven't gotten sick, have you?" she continued. "You've been remembering to eat and sleep and haven't spent all your time on the technology in this place?"

[earlofpudding]

"Is it?" Lloyd looked between the two of them. "That can't be right. It's..." His name was... no, nope. He was drawing a blank. "No, my head is fine," he grumbled and moved his arm off of Cécile's shoulders, shaking the hand off his wrist in doing so.

The Earl fell silent for what would seem for a long moment, a few minutes at most, as he tried to puzzle out what his own name was. That was ridiculous. How could he have forgotten such a thing? On the search for that answer, he found one or two other uncomfortably blank spots in his memory. He used to have a title. What had that been?

"I just go here, so no," he finally spoke up again. He would get around to neglecting food and sleep soon enough. It was inevitable and all three of them knew it. But for the missing name... "I can't think of it! How strange!"

[swordofzero]

Suzaku shook his head, "It's this place, they have stolen memories from everyone," his tone expressed what he thought of that. As if being kidnapped and brought to a strange world wasn't bad enough.

"We have to fight to earn tokens to buy charms to regain our memories. That's what this," he waved a hand at the screen looking vagualy annoyed, "game is."