Prison World #3: Panultima (tw violence, torture, coercion)

[spoofer]

Characters: Ensemble Cast, maybe even you!
Summary: The third prison world in Xistentia is a terrifying subdimension where sentient people exploit each other in order to run technology that will fend off D.E.S.T.I.N.Y. The 'ruling' class, Primus, are bound to a system of coupling (see: fake dating!), legacy and nepotism, whereas the Servus are put through an elaborate media circus (see: Hunger Games). You're here to study this world. And perhaps even to free those captured.
Date(s): February 8-20
Warnings/Notes: Violence, torture, coercion

Panultima

You cursed your gods and died

The Primus Life

If you thought Earth was a tough neighborhood, welcome to Panultima. Here, life is sweet. At least, as long as you're one of the Primus class.

It's a sprawling city of wicked spires and elaborate canals, covered in a luminous, translucent shield. Rather than a circular planet resting in orbit, instead, it's a flat plane of matter suspended in space, the foundations of the buildings rooted in only a hundred feet of stone and unknown technology. But the vast majority of citizens care little for that. After all, the city has every amenity and experience one might desire.

Restaurants line the streets. Theater is at an apex in development, with a particular focus on integration of moral philosophical themes. Gondolas run the canals, whereas a railway races over the winding laser-track in the air. Fashion is diverse, colorful, characterized by wild shapes, patterns, and accessories. Food imported from worlds both thriving and dying across the multiverse. At the numerous colleges and institutes, premier technology and opera are under constant invention and reinvention.

COUPLE STUFF

Primus culture emphasizes couples. Trios. Larger groups of lovers than that, even. After all, with romantic love and loyalty to care for, and survival hanging on it... who has the time or energy to care about justice for all?

Not these guys!

In this world, the mission and pleasure roll together well. The implant picks up information, so your main job is to explore. Perhaps you and your partner might enjoy yourself a glow-in-the-dark cocktail in a smoky bar where a two-headed singer is providing the music, a tour of the massive shield generators in the sparkling complex. Or pick fruit from one of the hundreds of bonding trees in the city's central park— so named, because it requires successful completion of questions to "the newlywed game" for each before one of the luscious, sweet fruits is released from a vine.

THE SERVUS LIFE

But for the little guy, life is considerably shittier. Welcome to the arena, the fully manipulable bubble reality set up to torture the slave class. The emotions of pain, fear, anguish, and wild, adrenal victory.

Most days, it looks like a forest— incidentally, very much like Xistentia. There are dozens of hybrid creatures in it, most of which are edible, others toxic, several very dangerous. However, the ground below can change at any moment, turning into mud or belching acid baths. Or you might find yourself abruptly attacked by a bear with biological armor growing from its huge shoulders. The control room, operated by Primus, is concealed from view. Its role is to keep the environment challenging for those competing, shifting the settings of the place to advantage some and cripple others.

But the arena's programming isn't the only threat.

Instead, you have a motley host of macabre killers, other Servus locked up in here just like you. Some have survived in here for years, earning favor from audiences thanks to the amount of pure horror they squeezed out of their victims. Some of the better-known brands are the Bantam Butcher, a fallen angel whose first kills were those who took his wings, and now thrives on torture. The trapmaster seems to have control over environmental factors that rivals the control room. And the baker trio will eat the flesh from your bones if they catch you.

For infiltrators, the challenge is worse. Not only might you need to kill, survive, and explore the arena with your implant— but if you want to save the very same people who are out to murder you, how are you going to do that?

Breakout!

Several days into the mission, and that's when it happens-- the control room shuts down, under attack. And suddenly, there's pandemonium. Within the arena, some of the servus know immediately what this means— and they're willing to make a break for it, cutting each other down, crippling each other if it means that the Primus might have slower-moving people to contend with and allow them to escape. Others seem to have long since given up, failing to respond as the trees suddenly go dark and motionless, the birdsong dying into silence. After all, where is there to go? It's either D.E.S.T.I.N.Y., or to join the system that hates them, isn't it?

Are you inside the arena, or out? Are you there to help the fleeing Servus, or are you merely ready to scramble on home yourself and save your own skin?

Footnotes

1. Please ensure that threads are marked with appropriate content warnings!
2. The plotting post for this event can be found here, and the original announcement with some other details is here.

Comments

[moshennik]

This nothing like my old life. [ This place was like the life she was always on the other side of the glass from, nose pressed up to, wanting to steal every sweet morsel for herself. As she grew older, she resented that lifestyle, did as much as she could to take advantage of the rich and help herself survive.

It reminds her of something the Fae would do, her people now. Watch others fight for their entertain, watch lessers suffer and murder and... He speaks again and she tries to keep the bitterness from riling up the bile in her stomach. They are here for a reason.

She holds his arm and slaps on her con girl face beneath her bleached blond wig.]

Let's get this bish started.

[disbands]

I'm still not entirely clear on how that etymology started, [Barclay says, leading the way despite his doubts! By now, she knows him well enough to know what he's doing. He's nervous, so he's kind of rambling. Throw him into the battlefield with pistols and sabers, and he'll figure it out. He'll save himself, and other people besides.

But this, this is her domain.]

'Bish?' That's the equivalent of 'bitch,' is it not? [he mumbles, moving in behind the crowd of gaudily dressed Primus. His own blue velvet suit is almost drab compared to some of what the others are wearing.] How would one 'start a bitch?' [His head tips back slightly. He stares up at the big, glassy electrical towers overhead. The tour guide begins to explain the tech used to siphon energy off emotional reactions. Somehow, it seems very different to the green verdance of Xistentia.]

[moshennik]

[ He's rambling. She lets her hand slide down his arm so that her fingers can tangle with his, giving him a squeeze. Settle is what the move makes. She's an expert at the con, at pretending to be someone she's not.]

Yes, basically. [ Her eyes are taking in every little thing, she's understanding their surroundings. And she glances up at him with a quirk of her lips.] Well, in the literal sense... [ She waggles her eyebrows because he knows how to get her started but that's not the context she meant it in.]

But right now, we get the lay of the land and see what trouble we can get into.

[disbands]

[He is lucky she's here. 'Lucky' doesn't even begin to describe it, really. His experience with 'pretending to be someone he's not' begins and ends with falling into piracy after getting pressganged into military service. He'd felt very out of place for most of his life, but there's that, and then there's this artifice on pain of death. There's telling lies, then there's selling them in-- literally, a costume.

He settles a little, under the soothing touch of her tiny fingers. Breathe in, breathe out. He manages to get a smile on his face for her saucy joke. Sincere, of course. He thinks she's hilarious.]

All right. [He measures his steps steadily beside her, comforting himself with the familiar scent of her hair. She's so helpfully tiny. Like right at nose height.] It seems we're headed for the central generator. Should we break off before then, or go with the pack?

[moshennik]

[ He doesn't need to be completely calm, he just needs to look a little more at ease. Which is what she's trying to get him to feel when she makes jokes and teases him as she does. This is her domain and she doesn't think less of him for not having the same devious con skills as she. In fact, it just makes her love him a little more.]

Central generator sounds like something important. [ Her lips quirk deviously.] Maybe we should... see how it works.

[disbands]

[That's fair enough. A little furtive whispering never failed to sell a couple to the public eye in a terrifying society that emphasizes the need to be in a relationship with maniacal intensity.]

That look on your face, [he says, with the mildest of double-takes.] Faeries in all dimensions must quake in their boots.

[He hitches her along, arm through her arm, hustling along behind the larger group of chattering, colorful Primus. However, the moment a walkway breaks off to their left, he scuttles off with her, pausing to press a kiss to her cheek. The obvious charade of being up to no good. Of course, the tour guide up front has a completely different notion of what that might be. Up ahead, the generator is massive— the size of a small tower in which you might lock up Rapunzel. Lightning strikes of caged energy flickers up within black glass.]

[moshennik]

Not yet they don't. [ But they will.

And as they make their way, she tries not to be too conspicuous, playing into the whole ruse of being a one of a pair who is looking for a place to get busy. The generator is huge but once they reach it, she glances at him.]

So... now I have to decide if I want to disable it or destroy it... [ And what will that mean for the city.]

[disbands]

We're only meant to be gathering information, [he cautions her, glancing at her. But despite the warning, his eyes are bright with something that isn't exactly discouragement.] For now.

[He turns his eyes toward it again.]

It would be chaos.

[It will be chaos. They just don't know it yet. They don't yet know that some of the servus infiltrators are planning a breakout.] I'd say disable. There must be a way for the technology people to learn from it and create something better. Something new. Something that doesn't hinge on the suffering of a few.