Reposted by SupernalClarity
15 years ago when Apocalypse World was new and people were beginning to understand and work with it, it was seductive to look at "acting under fire" and see, not one basic move of several, but the template underlying all the game's moves.
Like @kierongillen.bsky.social 's classic gag:
![Tell Me a Story
Robert Penn Warren 1905 - 1989
[A]
Long ago, in Kentucky, I, a boy, stood
By a dirt road, in first dark, and heard
The great geese hoot northward.
I could not see them, there being no moon
And the stars sparse. I heard them.
I did not know what was happening in my heart.
It was the season before the elderberry blooms,
Therefore they were going north.
The sound was passing northward.
[ B]
Tell me a story.
In this century, and moment, of mania,
Tell me a story.
Make it a story of great distances, and starlight.
The name of the story will be Time,
But you must not pronounce its name.
Tell me a story of deep delight.](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:6ldkdywl2dqfqozdskponw4v/bafkreihmk6qmzhy45ay7b4nimuni55tw5syymcawodic7eewsiovnuxdg4)
![Fragmite is startled out of a dream. Tusker is startled out of a dream. Emma is startled out of a dream. Mira is. Thalia is. Caleb is startled out of a dream. Antonia. Alanda. Cassidy is startled. She’s sleeping next to Wren, who’s startled. Anders is startled out of a dream. EB is. Rehar, startled. Dani is startled from sleep. Alice is. River. Kelly is startled from sleeping. Reggie is. Edouard stumbles out of a dream. He’s with Birdie. Birdie stumbles out of Edouard’s dream. Jasper and Tee are stumbling. We are all waking up at the same time, startled, stumbling, and everyone is saying something, at once, but because we are all saying something in this shared moment, in our respective tents, and are only becoming aware that we have spoken once we’ve said the thing we’re saying, nobody knows what they have said. Even people sharing their bed with others don’t know, too caught up in having been yanked from sleep already speaking. But maybe Birdie is the key, since, though her body is with Justine, she’s stumbling out of her best friend’s dream, and they had been on mountain duty together yesterday. [Mountain duty was again and again measuring how far their base was from the foot of the mountain, how far if you’re carrying water, if someone is on your back, if you’ve stuffed dates and nut rolls in your pockets, etc.] Birdie’s body is with Justine, but she’s yanked out of Edouard’s dream. “That’s really weird,” someone is saying. We know. For the rest of the day, everybody is looking at Birdie and asking her questions about liminal space, “Did you know you were in Edo’s dream?” “Who was dreaming your dreams while you were away?” “Justine, who was dreaming Birdie’s dreams?” Of the 2348 of us, only Birdie stepped out of a dream that wasn’t her own. “Stumbled,” Mira corrected.](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:6ldkdywl2dqfqozdskponw4v/bafkreic44jkpoglcbmyfqrwfetnlrszcbtowdfkyg2ggpfizlkyc3jh32a)
