Fandom High Welcome Picnic, Front Lawn of the School, All Day: Part I

[omgnochecksyet]

The fall semester was about to get into full swing, but summer wasn't about to let go of the island just yet. The sun was out, the temperature was holding steady at a comfortable 80F/27C, and most importantly, the tables were beglittered.

Speaking of tables, there were of course the ones that were filled with a vast array of food and drink, and also the ones with nametags and lists to facilitate the meeting of new roommates and siblings.

There was room to sit, room to sprawl, room to walk around and mingle... and it was a big lawn, so if you needed to get away from the crowd for a bit, room for that too.


[OCD Up! This is part one of the picnic, specifically for meeting siblings, roommates, and teachers. The rest of the picnic is happening here. Since it's outside, the picnic is open to all students, teachers, and townies!]

Comments

Re: Meet Your Big/Little Sibling [Fall 2017]

[intotheout]

"Yeah, that happens. But, hey, at least here you're not an outcast! Just a new kid. Almost the same thing, sometimes, but this place is pretty welcoming."

Re: Meet Your Big/Little Sibling [Fall 2017]

[not_of_the_nora]

"You don't care? Of course you don't," Aloy realized, interrupting herself mid-sentence. "You don't look Nora. Nora wouldn't be living past the Metal World. Why did I think you'd care?"

Re: Meet Your Big/Little Sibling [Fall 2017]

[intotheout]

"Okay, now it's my turn. What's a Nora?"

Tip could guess on the whole "metal world" thing. Even if her mental image involved a lot of cake make-up and thrashing guitar.

Re: Meet Your Big/Little Sibling [Fall 2017]

[not_of_the_nora]

"The Nora people...?" Aloy tried. "You haven't heard of them?"

Re: Meet Your Big/Little Sibling [Fall 2017]

[intotheout]

"Nope. I bet you haven't heard of the Boov, either, though. Or . . . Pennsylvanians?"

Re: Meet Your Big/Little Sibling [Fall 2017]

[not_of_the_nora]

"That doesn't mean anything to me," Aloy said, shaking her head. She looked thoughtful. "Oseram...? Carja? Does that mean anything to you at all?"

Re: Meet Your Big/Little Sibling [Fall 2017]

[intotheout]

Tip shrugged and shook her head. "That's not unusual around here, though. Just about everyone comes from a different world."

Re: Meet Your Big/Little Sibling [Fall 2017]

[not_of_the_nora]

"A different... world?" Aloy echoed. "What does that mean?"

She wasn't rejecting the idea, mind you. But she needed details.

Re: Meet Your Big/Little Sibling [Fall 2017]

[intotheout]

Oh. That . . . was a tougher one. Tip hadn't actually run into someone who didn't have a concept of different worlds already.

"Um. Alright, so . . . a world is, like, everything, right? All the details about where you live that are, um. Standard, I guess. Like, maybe there are different countries or kingdoms or whatever, but everyone in them still sees the same sun go up and down or the same sky. Other than the rules the government has made, everything works kind of the same way, right? So you have your world, with the way it works, and I come from a different one, where maybe we have three moons instead of one or people who can fly is totally normal, or most people are amphibians with six legs."

She paused. "My world has the amphibians with six legs. They're not most people or anything, but they are sentient. One is my best friend."

Re: Meet Your Big/Little Sibling [Fall 2017]

[not_of_the_nora]

Aloy absorbed all of that information with a thoughtful look on her face. When Tip was done, she turned her eyes towards the sky and sought out the sun. Normal. Sky, normal.

She touched the Focus by her ear as she looked back down. Tip registered as human on her scan.

None of that told her anything.

"Three moons and amphibian people," she said. "You do know that sounds completely insane, right?"

Just checking. "But we don't have buildings like that." She pointed up at the school.

Re: Meet Your Big/Little Sibling [Fall 2017]

[intotheout]

"And we're barely even getting started," Tip confirmed. She would get around to explaining that the three moons was just a random example and not her actual world eventually. Or not. "I can show you a picture of J.Lo, though. Do you have photography where you're from?"

They didn't have castle-y buildings, but architecture wasn't much of a technological indicator, in Tip's opinion.

Re: Meet Your Big/Little Sibling [Fall 2017]

[not_of_the_nora]

"Photography?" Aloy echoed. "Is that like 'photo'? The Old Ones used that word."

Re: Meet Your Big/Little Sibling [Fall 2017]

[intotheout]

"Um." Tip thought about that, then shrugged. "Maybe? It's probably a latinate root or something. It means using a machine to take pictures of stuff around you. Instead of, like, drawing or painting it." She pulled out her phone and called up a picture of J.Lo from the last time she went home. "Here, see? Six legged amphibian guy. He doesn't live here, though. He's back at home in my world. This island is kind of its own little world."

Re: Meet Your Big/Little Sibling [Fall 2017]

[not_of_the_nora]

Aloy's hand shot up for her Focus the moment Tip pulled out her phone. "What is that?" she asked, her private holographic HUD informing her primly that what Tip was holding was 'primitive', build year... "A communications device?"

Re: Meet Your Big/Little Sibling [Fall 2017]

[intotheout]

"Yep. Called a 'phone'. You can talk to other people who have one, either voice or text, or take and send pictures, or access the internet -- a big information and communication repository. And it has games and music and stuff. Where I'm from, it's pretty much a standard issue, must-have kind of deal." She tilted her head. "Do you mind if I ask, what do you keep touching?"

Re: Meet Your Big/Little Sibling [Fall 2017]

[not_of_the_nora]

It was a good thing Tip had rattled off all the functions like that, because beyond the name the Focus had given the machine ('communications device'), she'd had nothing. Not even a full understanding of what 'communications device' even meant.

"My Focus?" she said. "It lets me see things."

Re: Meet Your Big/Little Sibling [Fall 2017]

[intotheout]

Tip frowned. "Like . . . for near-sightedness?"

That didn't seem quite right, but hey, there were probably people out there who thought glasses were absurd.

Re: Meet Your Big/Little Sibling [Fall 2017]

[not_of_the_nora]

Aloy blinked. "No," she said. "Like machines."

Re: Meet Your Big/Little Sibling [Fall 2017]

[intotheout]

"It lets you see machines better?" Bill lifted up from his perch on her hair and circled her head excitedly. Tip glanced up at him. "Is that something Boov have?"

NO, spelled Bill in Boov. And continued circling.

"Right," Tip said. "I don't think either of us quite follow what you mean, there."

Re: Meet Your Big/Little Sibling [Fall 2017]

[not_of_the_nora]

Aloy sighed the sigh of someone who had long given up explaining the Focus to anyone - 'anyone' mainly being Rost. "When I look at your machine with my Focus, it tells me it's a communications device," she said. "When I look at machines out into the wild, I can see their patterns and their weaknesses. Among other things."

Re: Meet Your Big/Little Sibling [Fall 2017]

[intotheout]

"Huh. Your world has wild machines?" She'd actually heard weirder. For instance. . . . "What does it say about Bill?"

[ooc: Bill is a tiny insect shaped sentient robot who blows bubbles to spell messages. He was built as a billboard.]

Re: Meet Your Big/Little Sibling [Fall 2017]

[not_of_the_nora]

Aloy sighed, her fingers sliding up to activate the Focus as she looked at the little thing.

"It's not particularly sturdy," she said, "Seems to be all displays and rotors. Though the processing part looks a little bigger than I'm used to."

Re: Meet Your Big/Little Sibling [Fall 2017]

[intotheout]

"What do you think, Bill?" Tip asked.

Bill rambled on a good bit in bubbles above their heads.

Tip frowned. "Um. . . ."

Bill gave a little loop by way of a sigh and then spelled YES.

"Pretty good assessment," Tip concluded. "He's a billboard who accidentally developed sentience. That's pretty cool."

Re: Meet Your Big/Little Sibling [Fall 2017]

[not_of_the_nora]

"Aren't most machines sentient? Like animals?" Aloy said. "Besides what the Old Ones left behind."

Re: Meet Your Big/Little Sibling [Fall 2017]

[intotheout]

"Wow. Um, no? Not around here. Or my world. Animals where you're from are sentient? Like, they communicate and have a concept of themselves as existential individuals?"

Sure, Fandom had the squirrels, but Tip still wasn't used to thinking of animals like that.