W͜͏̶Ę͏E͝͠K͝͞ ̧1̵͟

[strangerpeople]

W͜͏̶Ę͏E͝͠K͝͞ ̧1̵͟

[The national council just announced the blight to the country.

There was no sugarcoating it anymore. This was a critical time. Saving all of the vines is paramount, but what does one do when the blight hits? It keeps encroaching on the grapes, day by day. Entire clusters, entire bunches, dead and rotting, while allowing the blight to spread, and the leading botanists and viticulturists cannot identify the origin or the cause. They can't even successfully isolate the culprit in their labs; it seems to disappear like air no matter the precautions taken.

It is a catastrophe that seems to be beyond science, and it will result in the complete collapse of the entire country's wine industry. Already, embargoes on this year's crop have forced other grape-growers to close shop for the year after they'd sold their previous stock; it is all too possible that no grapes might ever be grown here again if a cure cannot be found. The tourists have stopped coming. The towns have grown silent.

You, meanwhile, are devastated. With the way your business is going, it will be on the brink of bankruptcy within the year. You will soon have no choice but to close shop and let every grapevine die, let the land go fallow. There must be a cure for this, there must be. Yet everything that can go wrong is.

Then, as you watch the news, it happens. Breaking news. The blight has been found in another country.

It is a pandemic-and it is only getting worse.


-

Well. This is...what else can can anyone say? You all know the deal. You all know what situation you're in. All that is left is to figure out what you can do about it. If there's anything that can be done.

You still feel that compulsion to distrust. To know you cannot win. To know that only the hosts have your best interests in mind. It would be easy to just do all that. But would it be the right thing to do? You can't be completely sure. Indeed, nothing is certain here, except for that damned ticking sound. If only you could stop it.

But you can't stop it. It is inevitable.


There are 15 strangers in this place.]

Comments

[backuphero]

[Static. Well. Well. That sure is a thing! It isn't moving, is it? Please say it isn't....]

[strangerpeople]

[It only moves in the sense that the static is animated only around the nameplate. It's definitely weird, and off-putting but it doesn't otherwise move away from the nameplate or do any other kind of movement. It's really like watching a tiny nameplate-sized television full of static, if anything.]

[backuphero]

[But the door is otherwise normal - right? Even if it isn't, it's not like staring at it or tapping on the nameplate is going to change anything, is it....

He should probably go rewrap his wrist. Thinking about the screen is going to make it flicker on, isn't it?]

[strangerpeople]

[The door is otherwise normal, yes. Though tapping at the name plate just makes the static over the nameplate glitch, but otherwise, the door is completely normal.

And yes it is. But on the bright side, wanting it off still turns it off like before.]

cw - injury talk from here on in

[backuphero]

[...glitch how, exactly?

Whatever, that's creepy, he's going to leave it alone and go deal with his self-inflicted technical difficulties now... and great, it's back, that's just great to see while cautiously trying to peel gauze off clotted blood. Are the scabbed-over scratches across where the screen pops up visible with it on, or does the glow superimpose itself?]

Re: cw - injury talk from here on in

[strangerpeople]

[The glitch sputters, blackens, changes pattern upon touch. It stops when he takes his hand away, and only the nameplate reacts in that manner.

As for the fun screen, the glow does superimpose over the scabs.]

[backuphero]

[So, then, given that... it acts like a normal, undamaged touchscreen?

For the sake of his own sanity, he'll bandage it over again. Thinking "go away" shuts the thing off, doesn't it?]

[strangerpeople]

[It does, and thinking about it going away does shut it off.]