riverview | ( voice | un: vakarian )

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( voice | un: vakarian )

Now I haven't been here for more than a couple of months, but all these festivals? It makes me wonder if there is any sort of effort being made on our hosts' part to get people home. I like having a good time just like anyone else, but when the "good times" are a week long every month it's maybe time to start questioning how dedicated they really are. I don't think two to two and a half weeks without the distraction of another festival on the mind are really enough.

That is the Turian in me speaking, of course. The down time - even with all the strange crap that happens - is starting to get to me.

But no, really. What is the point in having a week long celebration every month?

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Um... I guess because people keep falling through the portal here because they don't belong.

So, like, the festival is a way of saying 'we like you, you matter' to whoever just got here. I mean if we followed Earth holidays you'd end up with months and months of nothing and then new people wouldn't really feel accepted.

Of course that assumes that the majority of people that are here wish to stay. That isn't really the impression that I have gotten, but I admit that I'm not the most social of people.

Making those that legitimately want to stay is important, but so is finding a way to send people back. Hardly any effort seems to have been made towards that end.

Either way, a week for just the festival itself seems a little excessive. That doesn't include the time being spent for set up and tear down.

Even if you don't want to stay, everyone shows up alone.

It's... nice, not having to work so hard to meet people.

I mean, maybe a festival about love and soulmates kinda bites if you left someone behind you love. Or if you're afraid the people you like will go home through the portal. But there's cake, and cake definitely helps make things better.

Besides, I doubt the people running the festivals are the same people studying the portal. Science brains don't usually plan great parties.

[ what's a turian and is that why his voice sounds so... metallic ]

Maybe they just really like to party?

Everything still gets run through superiors at some point. The people looking at the plans and funds for the festivals are the same people that end up looking at any funds for research, if there are any. Someone still has to decide what the priorities are.

I can't say that cake makes everything better. I know humans like the stuff and look for whatever occasion they can to eat it and ice cream, but the for me it looks like a sponge. Sometimes it looks pretty enough with its frosting and decorations, but it's still a sponge.

[Maybe he's a robot!]

Ha. All you have to do is watch the festivities to know that. Have you ever encountered a race that doesn't like a good party once and a while?

[Turians not included of course.]

Mmn, good question... [ Aoba thinks hard on it, judging from the muffled mumble of those words, like he's covering his mouth as he considers it. His voice clears a moment later. ]

Maybe since we're here for a long time, they want us to meet and make as many friends as possible! What better way to get people to congregate than with a festival?

...But all that stuff about trying to get you back home. Did you ask them to do that?

It is possible, but a week?

[Again, he thinks that two or three days would work just as well. Weekend festivals are a thing.]

To answer your question, yeah. I wanted to be sent back the moment I found someone. Wasn't exactly nice about it, but I was coming from a pretty tense situation back home.

Well...

[ It's true, it's a long time for a celebration. But even he likes it. Dragging his introverted shut-in Noiz is another thing entirely. ]

I don't always have time to enjoy it for the whole week, especially if I'm on the field for Salvage and Repair detail.

[Oh, thank God. Someone who feels the same way as she does.]

You're not the only one. I'm all for cultural sensitivity and making new people feel welcome, but it's starting to feel like we're just spinning our wheels here.

[ Wait a minute ]

Did you ask them why you were here in the first place, by chance?

[He's got her back.]

Exactly. I think I'd be even a little appeased with some sort of announcement or discovery. Not hearing anything in regards to trying to unravel these mysteries from anyone other than us makes me suspicious.

Oh I'm sure that there are plenty of people who only go for a day or two. But really, that's all anyone actually needs isn't it? The rest is just an excuse to keep at it.

[The sound on Garrus' end is something like a sigh. Whether or not it sounds like it to Aoba is up in the air.]

Of course I did. They looked a little stricken when I rejected their reasoning.

[The inhuman image is momentarily surprising, but she's learned enough by now that it doesn't phase her too much. Besides, she thinks she might recognize him from floor six, though they haven't spoken directly as far as she can recall.]

You and I are outliers, from what I've gathered. Supposedly people were brought here because they felt 'displaced,' and so don't want to go home. I'm beginning to think figuring out the portals to send people back is less of a priority to them than it is to us.

Hmm... *Lola's trying to think of this in terms she understands.* We're all basically like refugees. Making sure we come into a nice city, with a roof over our heads that isn't on fire would probably be more important than figuring out how to send us home?

I mean they do clearly fund sciency stuff here. Otherwise the communal housing building would still be a mess after the fire. And my hair wouldn't be as cute as it is.

*Lola why?*

A very flavorful sponge though. That can be decorated. And layered with other flavorful sponges that make it taste amazing.

[ It sounds like some kind of sandpaper running over something, only slower and somehow metallic. Aoba doesn't know what it was, actually. ]

Ahaha, I got the same reaction. I felt bad right after saying it.

But I found out something interesting when I pressed them. Do you want to hear it?

[That must be it. He knows her face from Ed doing Ed things, but that's really where it begins and ends.]

"Feeling displaced" is a very vague thing. It's true that I felt it at the time, but who wouldn't when they just crash landed on an uninhabited planet after fighting for the survival of the galaxy? Finding yourself in an unfamiliar situation or location, it's common to "feel displaced."

It's not reasonable to assume that everyone who has ever felt it to equate it to not wanting to return home, which these people seem to. That's why I think there's something else going on, truthfully. So sending us back would be less of a priority.

Oh, trust me. I'm not disagreeing with you. That's just the sentiment I've seen around here. That, and I have spoken to a number of new arrivals who have expressed that going home isn't really on their to-do list. Even been asked why I'd want to go home at all.

When you say something's going on, what do you mean exactly?

I wouldn't know. It'd have to be a coordinated effort to make something similar that I could eat.

[He'll stick with the Turian chocolate he can get his hands on in the interim.]

I'm not saying that they don't fund "sciency stuff," but again that there is a priority list. Some things are more important than others so those projects receive more resources and people than the projects that are deemed less important. While making sure the city is nice and we are provided for is important... A gilded cage is still a cage.

Maybe I've just been sticking around people who think more like me than not.

[Because let's face it, most of the people he knows don't want to stay here forever.]

All I am saying is that I'm skeptical. This can't be the only settlement, can it? How long have these portals been spitting people here? If it's been long enough for them to find some sort of reasoning behind it, then they've studied it but where are the reports? If they've studied it, then surely they have more than just "oh it brings displaced people here."

A natural phenomenon that brings "displaced persons" to a single location every month? Yeah, not suspicious at all.

I didn't. If anything it just pissed me off more.

[Because it's like admitting that they've never really thought about, at length, how something could go wrong. About mistakes and how to fix them.]

If it is interesting, of course I'd want to hear.

That's a terrible existence. Do you know what would be required? I cook. And bake.

*Lola's thinking again, give her a moment.*

Well, at home the focus is on making refugees comfortable because it serves the most people. We can't... rebuild, homes in other countries to send people back to. We can build homes where we are. I know a lot of others really want to go home, and I miss my family and friends, but I can't really feel surprised that the city's government prioritizes the defense and happiness of the city.

Plus isn't science like super hard? So they could spend forever trying to understand the portal but never actually control it well enough to send you home?

Not at all. That's why it'd have to be a coordinated effort.

[It's not as though Garrus doesn't understand the plight of the city. He's not surprised by it, but it is irritating. Even if just a little bit was put forward, then it'd do much to ease his mind. Granted, Garrus still would be cynical but at least he'd be given a bone.]

I'm not entirely convinced it's a naturally occurring thing. I've never seen a naturally occurring event that has its own motives.

[ Ah, it's a good thing this isn't over video or in person. Aoba realizes he kinda... enticed someone whose eye he caught into giving him a bit more than orientation would. ]

One of the technicians said that when we go back, it's as if we never left. We get put right back where we left off.

[ The unique quality of his voice might have been something of a carrot, his vocal chords are different from a normal human's, and it creates a sort of passive effect to some people. It's always been like this, but as soon as he recognized that this was happening again, he had pressed him for more details. ]

He also said that while mistakes happen, it's more likely because I felt out of place at the time.

From what I understand, most of the settlements here have been decimated by this Great War they participated in. At first I questioned the whole idea of being quarantined off from the outside world, but I saw for myself about a month ago that some of that fear was... well-founded, to say the least.

What I don't get is how nebulous this portal thing seems to be. I read up on its history and from what I can tell, the people here used to have scientifically engineered portals, but they've since been destroyed. The one now is the only one left and naturally occurring. I have my own suspicions about that, but I'm trying not to make accusations without evidence.

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