[OPENING] exploration log

[spellbindmods]

Who: Explorers and Co.
Where: Around the island and at the newly discovered house
When: Day 10
Open/Closed: Open to All
Note: Feel free to create your own logs for individual island explorations. A prompt is for house exploring, and you can list off multiple A prompts like A1, A2, etc. for more than one prompt within the house. B prompts (B1, B2, etc) are for exploring the island and may be open to all OR select friends who your character is exploring with.

[It's tough to live on an island that doesn't have many resources outside of the limited food sources and running streams. While Brie is aware of some other minor sources of food, like fish and frogs, one person exploring an island on their own means there are a lot of secret spots left to uncover. Despite adventuring for three years, her time on the hub itself has been much shorter, only staying for days or weeks at a time. Now that there are more people on this journey, covering ground is a lot easier.

Recently she's discovered another large estate -- much larger than her current shared mansion, which might also mean it has some supplies inside. On the morning of Day #, she's called together those who are hankering for more supplies in order to bring as much back as possible. Congrats, you get first dibs.

A. Upon approaching the house, the first thing that's noticeable is its size. It's all one story, but very flat and spacious. There are gardens in both the front and the rear, and upon entering (Brie might have enlisted you to help break the door down, oops) the inside is also quite vast. There are tons of rooms, multiple bedrooms and bathrooms, two kitchens and other rooms that aren't even explorable because they need keys to be entered. Unless you can find these keys, that is?

B. Alternatively, or maybe even aside from exploring the house, Brie's also suggested that you do some exploring on your own. Again, she's one woman with limited time to scout the island herself. What can you find? What resources are there to be harvested? Will you share in this bounty, or keep it to yourself?]

Comments

[p_mortem]

[ 'When Minato explores the house, he'll find a case of water bottles unopened in the kitchen and a backpack filled with the following items: crayons, two spiral notebooks, two toy cars and a elementary school level math textbook.'

It's as if rng knows him best.

Minato's exploration only goes as far as the kitchen and one of the bedrooms, whereupon he leaves to camp out in the hall right in front of the entrance, glancing up past his bangs at anybody who enters or leaves the house, and then down between the textbook on the floor and notebook on his lap where he's... doing math problems. In crayon. Long division is very zen.

There's also a sign next to him, though, a piece of notebook paper weighed down by overturned toy cars on opposite corners so it doesn't get blown away, written in purple crayon:

Anything you find too troublesome to carry, I can hold for you and return later.

Will also trade water for string. ]

[introspects]

[ Upon exploring the house, Orihime will discover a small felt bag tucked away in a drawer. Inside will be a small ball of yarn, a small piece of folded fabric (about 3' by 2') and a plastic box filled with needles and pushpins. There is also a comb and a bunch of different hair ties in this same drawer.

conveniently, orihime does have string! well. some kind of string, anyway. she's leaving the house to explore outside when she encounters minato on the floor.

it's the sign that grabs her attention next. ]

Oh, do you need string? I have some yarn we can trade, if that works for you?

[p_mortem]

[ Yarn... might work? Before he answers yes or no, Minato finishes up his math problem and sets the crayon down to dig a small bead out of his pocket, about the size of a small pea, and the hole even smaller. ]

Maybe if it's unraveled. I need something that can fit through this.

[splinten]

[Dirk tracks Minato down before long, meaning to ask for help on some of the furniture he found. Then he sees what he is actually doing.]

Math?

[Long division IS zen, okay.]

[p_mortem]

Math.

[ It's so, so satisfying when the numbers divide evenly without remainder. Minato holds the book up for Dirk to see. Also the notebook and crayon in case he wants to do some problems. ]

[splinten]

[There's a pause. And then Dirk sits down beside Minato.]

If you have an extra crayon and paper.

[He does want to do a problem. He wants to sit with Minato and do math.]

[p_mortem]

[ Minato's got him covered with his choice from a box of 32-count crayons— purple is the one Minato's been using— and his very own spiral notebook. Go wild. ]

[splinten]

[Dirk selects an orange crayon and immediately starts writing. It is also math, just dumb problems with matrices. They are both terrible.]

[p_mortem]

[ I guess they're doing math now.

The practice problems in the book are quick to get through, and for once, Minato knows all the answers without having to guess. It makes him feel smart and empowered. ]

...I wonder if a kid used to live here. I picked up their bag, with toy cars in it.

[splinten]

[You are smart and empowered, Minato. Good for you.

Dirk doesn't fully glance up at Minato's voice, or draw away from the work. He glances sideways at him.]

That seems probably. This is a big place, so maybe some kind of wealthy family. Their kids, and maybe the servants' kids.

[p_mortem]

And all of it abandoned.

[ Minato's work slows at the thought of leaving a home behind, when he never really had a place to call home. He'd think it were a waste, if it were deliberate. ]

Did you check out the entire place?

[splinten]

As much as I could.

[Dirk's relationship to the idea of 'home' has always been sketchy. There's a place, an apartment that was made for him, left behind for him to live and survive in. But more than that, there are people. People who he wants to return to. It's the only way he truly understands home.]

There are a lot of things that can leave behind empty homes. Even empty cities.

[mapsio]

[Haru will approach him at some point.]

Minato-kun, I need your assistance. In return I will start searching the house for some thread?

[p_mortem]

[ Payment upfront is the best business policy, but Minato would help without payment too if he could be useful somehow, so he nods and starts packing his things. ]

That's fair. What do you need?

[mapsio]

[In due time he will be paid. Haru wouldn't let a favor go un-returned.]

I found a box full of really nice kitchenware. I can't carry them back with me, they just too heavy. Do you think you could make that a little easier for me?

[p_mortem]

[ Minato nods, slowing his pace to a half-step slower than Haru so she can lead the way. It's definitely something he can do; a box makes it even easier, because then he can turn it into a single neat bead instead of individual ones for each fork and knife. ]

How do they look? Sharpened? Rusty?

[mapsio]

A lot of dishes. Plates, muffin tins, wine glasses. There are a few pieces of silverware. The knives are butter knives and the rest of spoons and forks. None of them have rust on them.

[She is going to lead both of them back to the kitchen where the box is.]

[p_mortem]

[ When they get to the kitchen, Minato leans over the box to inspect the contents. They're just as Haru says; well-kept and without rust. ]

It's all in good condition. So it couldn't have been abandoned for long, right...?

[ Maybe people were recently here before they were. Maybe they'll come back. In either case, ]

Let me know if you want anything kept separately. Otherwise, I can pack everything together.

[mapsio]

It doesn't look like these were left for long. It looks like someone was storing them. Maybe to move?

[She's looking through the box, shaking her head.]

I don't think anything needs to be kept separately.

[p_mortem]

[ Hopefully whoever is storing them, they don't intend to come back. They were all under the assumption of this being an abandoned house, but... Well. So long as they don't get caught. Minato goes ahead and transforms the entire box and its contents into a light green bead, which he hands over to Haru. ]

Better if you hold onto this for now. My things aren't well organized... I hoped threading them together would help.

[ But first, he needs thread. ]

[pussywhips]

[ She doesn't even read the sign, honestly—she just recognizes her buddy Minato, one of the first people she ran into when she first showed up. ]

Hey! Minato, right?

[ She leans down, her hands on her hips, to take a look at what he's working on, her nose wrinkling when she sees that it's math. Seriously, who does that kind of stuff for fun? ]

We don't have to do math for this, do we?

[p_mortem]

Hey, Ann.

[ Nobody does math for fun, but it's a way to idle the time away, just short of falling asleep like he's tempted to if he didn't also want to stand watch for people who would take him up on his offer. ]

You don't need to do math. But it's useful, if we're rationing supplies.

[ Applications of long division in real life, who would have guessed. ]

[pussywhips]

[ She looks pretty surprised by that, actually. ]

Huh? We're rationing supplies?

[ Nobody told her!! If there was any possible way for him to ration more cake for her, though... that might be nice. (Nobody remind her that there's no cake on this island.) ]

[p_mortem]

Dunno. It's simpler than everybody looking out for themselves, though.

[ Not better, necessarily, nor exactly fair, but it's a simple system that works. ]

[pussywhips]

[ She makes a pensive hmm sound, one corner of her mouth turned down. ]

Do you think we'll be here long enough to need it? I mean... I really hope we're not going to be stuck here forever.

[ There's only so much crab and boar one girl can take. ]