The Endless Dance of Empty Night [IC]

[ylvathrall]

It's a cold morning and you should be in Hell, or possibly Heaven if such a thing exists for the likes of you. But you're not. You have a headache pounding at the base of your skull that leaves you blind, and perhaps for a moment you could be convinced that this is Hell, but then it fades like it was never there, along with the nausea and the aching soreness running down your spine. You're lying on a cold, rocky shore, in a body that feels not entirely your own. The sky overhead is grey, a chill drizzling sort of rain falling on you from the clouds above. It looks to be sunset, though the clouds obscure the sun enough that it's hard to tell except by a sort of fading quality to the light. The air smells like plants that are not the plants you are accustomed to, assuming you're accustomed to plants at all.

Above all else, though, you feel a strange, alien power singing through you. You feel as full of unbridled potential as a child, who could be good or evil or anything at all, but at the same time you feel as though you are potential realized. As though you have made your choices and your choices have made you and nothing will ever be the same.

Four others are lying on the same shore. It looks like you all woke up at about the same time. Some of these others look...significantly more other than you're used to, though, and you can feel a humming sort of resonance in your bones when you look at them - like calling to like, perhaps, or perhaps opposites attracting. There's really no way to tell.

Except, perhaps, talking.

[Recherché]

The redheaded woman lying on the beach awakens choking, gasping for air for a second before realizing that she can breathe again. Her hands grasp at her through apparently feeling her own breathing. The woman lies for a few seconds simply breathing before standing up and looking briefly around at her companions. Something about them feels . . . more real than the rest of this reality.

I don't suppose you know where we are or why I'm naked? A blush creeps up her cheeks even as she tries to keep her voice steady.

[LordHavelock]

Turning over onto his back, despite the rocky shore, the rather statuesque looking young man appears to give himself a quick pat down, finishing by flexing his fingers and toes before he attempts to lift his head and look around. Brisk, hardly begins to describe the chill of the surf and the drizzle of water from overhead, but it feels distant compared to the unbound vigor coursing in every limb. No phantom sensations, and a quick check for injuries had raised no concerns. Rising with a wince as one of the rocks digs into his back, he takes a quick glance to either side, clearly unabashed at his own nudity. Running a hand through wavy, chestnut hair atop his head, the locks part themselves around his fingers into a perfectly tousled mane; all he was missing was some clingy, European bathing suit and an expensive looking sailboat in the backdrop for the image of a perfume commercial to be complete. Instead of a film crew though, his companions on the beach are similarly bedraggled, or at least, somewhat more so in comparison.

"Not my fault." He offers by way of answer to the red-haired woman spluttering. "If I were responsible for any of us winding up naked on a beach, this would be the Keys . . . Or at least Fort Lauderdale." He turned, gesturing at the gray, unbecoming rocky shoreline, "This, this is worse than Daytona."

Moving to assist the next nearest individual to their feat, he's shocked at the ease in finding footfalls on the rocks, making his way over and lending an arm with effortless grace and need for added leverage in helping them up.

[QuidEst]

The lean hyena man jerked reflexively, then started to pick himself up. Unlike the others, he was not only clothed in jeans and a gray hoodie with a pair of glasses, but he was wearing a backpack. Well, that and the whole fur thing also stood out. Once he was up, he began examining the others before feeling the back of his head experimentally. Car crash, and now he was on the shore with a bunch of naked creatures- naked to the point of being largely furless, like elves from a fantasy novel. Examination of his head produced nothing unusual. "Oookay… doesn't feel like a concussion. Coma?" He held up one hand to his mouth, exhaling deeply against it. "Well, if those are anything like dreams, no. Oh wow!" He'd gotten hit by a car, and woken up on a rocky shore with a bunch of elves (or something like that). He was pretty sure he knew what was going on.

"Oh, uh, lemme see if I have any clothes-" Vin started, about to take his backpack off to remove the hoodie, but he was interrupted by… he wasn't sure if he heard it, or just knew it.




INVENTORY


Clothing (renewed)
Sufficient clothing for you and your companions. Companion preferences not yet established; defaulting to expected preferences.


Food and drink (renewed)
Sufficient food and drink for you and your companions. Companion preferences not yet established; defaulting to expected preferences.


Money (renewed)
1 Wealth. Local currency and liquid assets with the equivalent purchasing power to the richest person in a well-off village.



Vin blinked, and his smile grew wider. Well, that confirmed it. "One second, lemme get this…" He unslung his pack, and started pulling out clothing. The attire looked like what elves from a blockbuster movie would wear, but with more concessions to practicality. "Good, looks like there's enough for everyone," he said, tossing a set of clothes to each person. "No idea where we are specifically, but I've got suspicions about to generalities. I'm Vin, by the way. Vin Barlow." Vin seemed to be brimming with enthusiasm by this point.

[Sepulchritude]

"Pittsburgh. You get used to the rain." And in fact, the woman who spoke is calmly lying on her back, one hand covering her eyes but otherwise seemingly unconcerned with her state. Heck of a state, though. The rain had washed most of the blood out of her clothes, but the right leg of her pants is torn all the way from her hip to the rolled-up cuff, and the t-shirt is a ragged fringe on that side, sleeve completely gone. Whatever had happened on the left, it's obscured by the pale green dress that had just been thrown at her.

Naturally, then, it's Vin she turns to look at first, opening hazel eyes that immediately narrow again. She opens her mouth to speak, but stops herself until she's at least not scowling. In the meantime, she actually looks down at the pile of fabric. "No one called for an ambulance, huh? Do you know why she's naked? Or do you just keep spare dresses around for special occasions?" She gestures in the direction of the female voice with the hand that isn't keeping the rain out of her eyes. There's more than a little warning in her voice, and now she finally starts to sit up.

[LordHavelock]

"Vin, and you are? Like the spirit guide or something? . . ." Catching the clothes tossed to him, he looked them over, "This is, what traditional garb or something?"

He still wasn't at all sure what was going on, but was vaguely working off the idea that after the accident with the ferry he had been taken somewhere. Maybe his family had sprung for one of those hippy-dippy healing centers, in misguided deference to what sort of life they thought he was living. Not that it explained everything, or really anything, but something like a vision quest almost fit his perception of the situation. Then the other woman spoke, and it was something more familiar. "Yeah! Or Baltimore! Exactly why I left, among other reasons. Were you all on the pier? I think I lost my briefs diving into the water after that kid, trapped beneath the planks. If anyone called an ambulance . . ." Considering a moment longer, "No wait, I mean, I wasn't hurt that bad, sure I was . . . bleeding already but . . ." Looking down, he checked his side but found no evidence of where he'd been struck in the first place.

Deciding it wasn't worth dwelling on seeing as he was here now, happy and healthy, he began donning the tunic, breeches, and pulling on the boots, draping the cloak over his arm for the moment.

"Call me 'Red', everyone does." He made sure to make eye contact with the only person among them who happened to have red hair with a wink, "For the record, I'm more of an Armani guy, but I'll take what I can get at the moment."

Rising to his feet, Red buckles his belt, and as he runs his hands upwards, adjusting his clothes, they ripple and twist gently, tailoring themselves to a perfectly flattering fit, while the tunic resolves into a rich burgundy. Unaware of the miracle of fashion happening on his person, Red merely gives himself a once over before draping the cloak over one shoulder, which becomes a half-cape, trimmed in silver. Giving a complimentary nod and warm smile, he turns to Vin: "Bespoke. Nice."

[QuidEst]

”Well, I don’t know why she’s naked. I’ve heard of Pittsburgh and Daytona Beach, but where I’m from, those places don’t have any elves, or whatever you are,” Vin answered. The woman hadn’t looked his way yet, so it was understandable that she hadn’t noticed the difference. “So, we’re from different worlds. If nobody else knows how we got here, I’m assuming we’re on a third world, gathered here. Posthumously, I think? Reincarnated in another world. As for the clothes, those were in my inventory. It says they renew, along with the food and drink.” And money, but he’d hold off before announcing he was carrying enough money to buy a small house for now. ”I don’t think I’m a spirit guide. My Super ride got t-boned at an intersection, so I’m pretty sure I got killed too.”

[Recherché]

Bridget slips on the green and gold dress after a second carefully examining the stitching. Despite the fantastic nature of it she manages to make it look natural. Turning to the other woman of the group she gestures at the back lacing.

Can you tighten up the cords here? This style gives better bust support if it's very tight and I can't reach the lacing easily myself.

I'm Bridget and if I'm sure of anything, it's that I'm not one of the fair folk. I'm from Halifax over in Canada. I like the dress though. Last thing I remember . . . I was out swimming near the pier and the currents caught me wrong. Pulled me out to sea and pulled me under. I couldn't breath and then I was here.

Bridget pauses for a second again trying to identify where "here" is based on the surroundings. This time with significantly more success.

So I think something very weird is going on here. Vin has an inventory and just created some rather expensive to manufacture clothes out of mid air. Red just transformed his clothes to give them silver trim and make them fit better. And well, I now have a sort of database in my head that gives me answers about this world when I ask it specific questions.

This world's name is Arcem. We're in an area called the Bleak Reach in the northern part of the Continent. It's relatively unpopulated. Elves are not common here. Most people here look more like me than Vin. Local tech levels are medieval but there are places with higher tech on the continent. Magic does exist but nothing that could resurrect the dead or transport someone from another plane of existence is readily available. There is absolutely no information about any of you, Vin's species, Baltimore, Canada or anything else from my world in the database.

Bridget breathes for a second after rattling off the facts rapidly

Sorry it's kind of hard to talk and query the database at the same time. And it's pretty bloody literal and won't give me answers to questions that I don't explicitly think to ask. Also it keeps wanting to dump information on me about local plants and their alchemical usages.

[LordHavelock]

Prompted by the red haired woman's words, Red takes stock of himself, noting that his outfit has changed since he picked it up, into the same color palette of his wardrobe back home; slate gray, and burgundy, and the embroidery subtly matches the pattern of his favorite tie, picked out in dark silver. As if unconvinced, he pats himself down once more, missing the tightening of laces for Bridget, the rest of her exposition passing over his head as he searches in vain for some sort of designer label or care instructions, even going so far as to check the interior of his boots (now a deep oxblood in color) for size or anything else familiar. It's disconcerting enough that he goes back over the ferry accident at the pier in his head; listening to others talk about being pulled under, car accidents, that wasn't so strange, but surely they'd just been knocked out or in shock . . . emergency response was already on the scene, surely nobody was going to have died.

"Hang on, hang on." Finally he wraps his head around a few of the other details being thrown around, "Other worlds? Elves? Magic? Inventory? . . . This isn't Gauntlet or Dragon's Lair we're talking about, we're all . . . here, in Arcem, up north? North like Connecticut or north like, Novia Scotia?"

Unconsciously, his hands check the pockets on his new outfit, looking for a mobile phone which he didn't even have on him when he leapt off the dock.

[Vhaidara]

A tall, lean man rises with a surprising amount of grace. As the sun strikes him, a small plume of smoke begins to rise, but he banishes it with a thought. Then his skin begins to sparkle. He scowls and the sparkle vanishes. He turns to the others, blood red eyes sweeping over them.

Alaron Davidson. Boston. That all sounds enormously unlikely, but at the same time, we're here and that man is part hyena, so that shows how much I know about what is going on.

He sniffs the air, his throat feeling a bit dry.

I don't suppose there's any water in that bag of yours, is there?

[QuidEst]

Vin reached into his bag, pulling out some hard plastic water bottles and an ornate bottle of wine. "Yeah, here you go," he said, tossing a water bottle to Alaron.

"Look, I dunno, maybe I've just shown up in your world and all that info is wrong, but it doesn't explain what you're all doing here together in a place nobody recognizes. As for elves, you all look a lot like elves to me. Mostly furless, long dog-like fur on your head, with pale skin and flat faces. I mean, the ears aren't very pointed, but they are on the sides folded back. I take it you're not, though."

[Vhaidara]

Alaron unscrews the cap, sniffs it, wrinkles his nose, and takes a drink. He spits it out.

What is this, tap water?

He takes a moment to recover his composure.

I at least am familiar with the concept of elves. Fictional beings, though without any kind of consistency in their characterization. And who has the almond milk latte? I can smell it you know.

[QuidEst]

Vin shrugged. "Why would I know? It just came out of my bag. You can always wait for a little dehydration to improve the flavor. And yeah, elves are fictional where I'm from too. 'Elfs' were around in fairy tales for ages, but 'elves' is more of a Tolkien thing."

[Recherché]

Hey don't knock a good Vanilla Almond milk latte. Though how in the world can you smell something from 9 hours ago? Bridget wrinkles her nose.

My world has legends of elves as well. They aren't particularly friendly stories. Lots of old folklore. I'm a human though. We're the dominant species on my world. Only sapient species actually.


Has anyone else noticed that not only are our geographies the same, but we're all from the Northeast quadrant of North America? I'm not sure whatever happened was completely random. It seems like it was geographically bounded but not dimensionally bounded if that makes sense.

Bridget reaches back to gather her hair up and out of the way. Vin, I don't suppose you have any hairpins or- Bridget's voice stops abruptly. When I woke up this morning I was a brunette with blue and green streaks dyed into my hair. What the hell is going on.

[QuidEst]

Vin shuddered, and rubbed his fur to try to warm up. Too damp in here. He saw a flash of some sort, and turned, absentmindedly waiting for the roll of thunder to accompany it. It was a few seconds before he realized it wasn't coming. Vin said. "Lemme check…" he said, something telling him to check his pockets. He held up the hairpins. "… Do you still want them? Look, here's my theory. I don't know if you've heard of 'isekai', or I think 'portal fantasy' would be the literary term, but people from one world winding up in another. I've read quite a few stories about people dying and reincarnating in a magical world with some special power. I seem to be able to pull clothes and food out of nowhere, you've got the magical database, Alaron's… smelling things, I guess? And Red did something with his clothes. In one of the stories, this would be the protagonist's… 'edge', I guess, something to set them apart and give them a tool in the new world."

[LordHavelock]

Perking up as Vin digs through his bag, and catching sight of the bottle of wine, Red dashes forward smoothly, without realizing he's making all the others on the beach look like they're standing wet cement. Without recognizing the label, he gives Vin a playful nudge and a smile, "Got anything stronger? I think we could all afford to take the edge off a bit?" He's forced to blink as the conversation catches up around him and moves forward before he can deal with what just seemed to happen in his change in relative perspective.

"Woah, woah, what are we really talking about here? You and Bridget and Al over there . . . you make it sound like something out of a Saturday morning cartoon! I mean, you're really, what, a talking hyena? Stuck in a world where we all have powers, somewhere far from home? What is this . . . ?" Stopping, he thinks for a moment, snapping his fingers. "Shoot, what's the one about talking duck with the superheroes and the crazy adventures . . . Howard the Duck!"

A sea of faces as well as the icy sea not much further off gives him pause. They really were meaning what they were talking about. Dying, winding up somewhere else, and Red had no explanation himself for the anything but natural occurrences around them, or where they might have been anywhere other than Miami, or a health clinic further up the seaboard. This meant, he had died, saving another person's life! He did it! And now this was, what, a reward?

[Sepulchritude]

The brunette had sheathed the daggers she was looking at Vin as the full scope of the weirdness had settled in, but her attention hadn't really been on the conversation. She'd stood to help the redhead with her corset without that holding her attention either, though apparently with enough muscle-memory for the task to make up the difference. Since then, she'd vaguely followed the conversation. She'd watched the gnoll explain elves, the fairy demand Perrier, and the Renny android—gynoid, really, but that always had sexbot connotations—grouse about the local 4G. But her eyes never entirely focused on them. They didn't focus on anything, until the underwear model hit Mach (something) in pursuit of wine, when her head swiveled to track him just a little bit too smoothly to seem entirely human. Cat-like, maybe? Her pupils did grow enormous for an instant. "You're all very... trusting."

But then she starts, shakes off her fugue, and offers a conciliatory smile. "Which is good! I mean, I'd hate to... This isn't... Oh hell. At least we're not in Kansas, right Toto?" She does it. She actually directs the question at Vin. "Wind smells salty. We're on the coast of something, anyway. And that's at least a three..."

She stalls out again. This time, she's staring at the rocks, clearly, and her face gradually scrunches into a worried frown. When she looks up, she looks like she's about to deliver bad news. "Folks, could we maybe take this bonding moment somewhere else? This spot is lousy with, well, probably louses, among all the other bugs." The really lovely pastel gown is still on the ground where she had been lying, still soaking up the rain. She still hasn't reacted to the ruins of her clothing, or the fact that they're torn enough to count as indecent.

[Recherché]

Bridget's eyes go black as she grabs the pins and effortlessly pins up her hair while consulting her database. There aren't any big settlements in Bleak Reach. There just aren't a lot of people up here. The weather is kinda Scandinavia-esque but there are a lot of other problems. This area has issues with dark magics and eldritch horrors. Most settlements that do exist are on the coast and are fishing based. I'm guessing our best bet for finding people would be to follow the beach south and east. Eventually I'd like to make my way over to the island of Bright Republic. They have internet, libraries for research and working toilets. Maybe we could figure out more of what happened using their resources. Or at the very least not catch typhoid and die.

The redhead shrugs looking around.

Way I figure it I don't have much choice but to trust. Vin has all the food supplies and I don't even have a utility knife.

[Vhaidara]

Not sure how I can smell it, especially if it's that old. Even if you had spilled it on your old clothes, you don't have those, and at the very least I don't seem to be in my own body. Neither do you, based on your comments about your hair.

He nods as Brigid describes the local situation

I can definitely second getting to this "Bright Republic". It sounds like there might be resources we can use to try and get ourselves home from there.

[LordHavelock]

Pacing forward, then back, more than a bit excited at the prospect of what some sort of fantasy world might have in store for them, Red laughs at Reagan's mention of Kansas. It seems to fit, with Bridget talking about 'dark magic', witches to his way of thinking, though any impact 'eldritch horrors' might have it lost on someone with not exposure to anything beyond the occasional Hollywood feature of a tentacled monstrosity.

Taking stock of the gathering bugs around Reagan, he glances around himself, "You got sugar in your pockets there? Better question, maybe Vin has some Deet."

Even though he's just checked his pockets, Bridget's mention of a utility knife triggers some chivalrous impulse and reaching to his belt, pulls a horn handled pocket knife, and offers it to her with a smile. "Here, just be careful, it's been in the family a while." It certainly looks antique, but the blade is clean and the hinge in good condition, perfectly serviceable for whittling or around a campsite needs.

"I"m game to start moving, see if there's more to what we can do than a full backpack and some fashion . . ." It registers what him only just then what Alaron has said about a final destination. "Get back? Get back to where? Somewhere we're already dead? This is a fresh start, a new world! And okay yeah, it's not exactly Narnia at Christmas time, but c'mon, you want to go back to being a working stiff at a 9-to-5?"

His tone is generally jovial, and as he becomes more animated, Red can't help but make his way up the beach, over the nearest rise and takes a quick survey of the terrain before looking back. "You don't want to bet you've got super-senses or something beyond just an uncanny affinity for Starbucks?" He calls back, "I mean, look at us! I may still be me, but I "die" and then suddenly, I'm back in fighting shape! I feel incredible!"

[Vhaidara]

Alaron smiles, revealing (unbeknownst to himself) pointed fangs.

I don't know about the life you lived, but based on your comments about places you were likely to have ended up, I can gather that you were utterly unimportant and unlikely to be missed. I, meanwhile, was in the middle of working on a project that could change the course of medical history. In short, unlike you, I have a reason to live.

[Sepulchritude]

"Tchyeah, okay Vlad." Right. Not fairy. Different kind of sparkle. This would be a great one to remember, when she wakes up. "You go on being important. The rest of us are going on down the coast. Come on, Fabio. That's northwest."Waving for Red's attention, she points toward the ocean like that's going to mean anything to him, then starts walking the other way. She steps carefully at first, trying to avoid putting a foot down where anything might crawl onto it. When that no longer proves necessary after a few paces, she pauses to take in the strange concentration, shudders visibly, and takes several more hasty steps away.

It's only once she begins anxiously brushing at her clothing that she clearly notices it, and both the walking and the escalating unease fall to the wayside. She does run a finger over the split torn up her pants, briefly, but it's her leg that gets most of her attention. Lingering, perplexed attention, at that.

"Nothing hurts. Not even a bruise. Not even when I remember there should be one..." She looks up in surprise, then goes back to poking at her thigh. "That's not how this works... It never... Oh my god; I think this is real. This is— This is real, you guys."

[Recherché]

Bridget rolls her eyes at the vampire's arrogance. Right, because we're all peons before your grace. Her voice drips with scorn as apparently Alaron has hit a sore spot.

Oh and I wasn't a nine to five wage slave, Red. I'm an archeologist. Even if I wasn't in the middle of trying to reverse engineer a late medieval castle, I have family. I have friends. I miss them. Apparently my humanity doesn't matter to Alaron here though and I have nothing to live for.

Bridget takes the blade and immediately zones out. There's a series of visions flashing through quickly. The original smith forging the blade at the turn of the century. A custom order for a military officer, one Theodore Roosevelt to carry at his side. Made the old way with forge and anvil and quenched in oil.

She grabs at her dress trying to feel the same thing but no, there's nothing there. There was no creator. No person ever took needle to thread and gifted the spark of creation into this dress.

You, uhm what's your name? Bridget points at the other woman. Can I touch your clothes for a second? I promise I'm not trying to grope you. Just your clothes.

[Sepulchritude]

"Reagan," she responds, distraction clearly evident in her tone. She hasn't even stopped prodding at— well, actually now she's begun just tracing her hip with one finger, staring at it as though she isn't really sure what it is. It takes a moment for the question to register.

"Didn't you say you... Wait, what?" And when it does, Reagan finally looks up, finally makes eye contact. Her expression is an unclear blend of confusion, amusement, searching, and... something else. It eventually gives way to undisguised mischief. "That depends," she answers. "Can you play nice? Or will I have to turn this car around?"

She does move her hand out of the way though. That is, assuming Bridget was talking about the tear, anyway.

[QuidEst]

Vin shook his head at Red. "I don't know when this refreshes, but for now it's wine and water. I don't really drink, so the rest of you can help yourself to the wine. But, it did say it was missing preferences, so… I guess let me know what you like, folks?"

The hyena chuckled a little at Reagan's sudden epiphany. "Yep. If you want some quick proof that that you're not hallucinating me or dreaming me, the prime factors of…" He paused for a moment, thinking. "… 455 are 13, 7, and 5."

"Thanks, Bridget. I'm really glad you database includes some geography. Once we get to civilization of some flavor, I've got enough money to at least cover somewhere to stay for a little while, and we can sort out what to do from there. I'm not particularly interested in trying to get my old life back, though- it had its run, and I'm not going to look a gift horse in the mouth."

[Recherché]

At Reagan's assent Bridget reaches down and lays her hand flat on the pants though on a sturdier portion and not on the rip themselves.

Memories rush into her of the designer in an apartment in San Francisco. The cotton farmer from India stooping over the fields. The woman in a sweatshop in Malaysia who sewed the pieces together despite her hunger. All of them created this and gave it purpose and it's spark. She pulls on that spark to mend the jeans and pull them back together. And the threads of the pants visibly begin reweaving themselves not only patching the hole but dissolving stains and abrasions and restoring the pants to new. When Bridget draws her hand away the pants are flawless.

So it turns out that database wasn't the only thing I got. She muses

[LordHavelock]

Hardly finding Alaron's retort to be anything of merit, Red busies himself with a quick pose in one athletic position, and then another, feeling absolutely marvelous. Reagan had called him Fabio, but he felt more like Mike Tyson, primed and ready to explode. Settling into a boxer's stance, he threw a few quick combination of punches, but was disappointed to find time didn't seem to quite be standing still. Wishing he had a speed bag to test himself with, Reagan's directions caused him a quick double take before he smiled sheepishly and rejoined them at a brisk trot, calling back to Alaron, who seemed to be quickly making friends: "Yeah, you and every other pre-med at Harvard when I graduated. There's no shortage of geniuses back on Earth, there's more of em every year. If Vin and Bridget are right, we could make that much more of a difference here! . . . and look good doing it!"

The mention of friend and family by Bridget though caught him off guard. His 'friends' back home were the fairweather variety; and his family . . . best not to dwell, he didn't want to bore anyone, especially not folks with legitimate concerns in the here and now, besides being dead.

"Okay, so south, east?" He asked, watching Bridget mend the jeans, "Now that is handy. Better than same-day dry cleaning. Vin! You got anything that will play some tunes to walk by?"

[Vhaidara]

Alaron raises his eyebrow at the name Vlad. These people are strange. But, strange or not, they seemed almost as lost as him, and they had abilities. And, most importantly, they had knowledge. Sp he would follow them for now, at least.

[QuidEst]

Vin was about to answer Red that he didn't have anything else, but… there was a sense that there was just more effort required. Vin reached into his pocket, concentrating on the expectation that his phone would be there, and pouring something into that expectation. Vin pulled his hand out… and there was his uPhone. "Ha! Let's see if this actually works…" He tried pressing the home button, hoping to see the light come on.

As selected by shuffle on the Amazon music songs I have downloaded for offline mode.
Sticks and Stones, The Pierces (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YAQY_x_GByw)
Hit and Run, LOLO (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zrd60LuRr_U)

[Sepulchritude]

"Yeah, you and me both," Reagan responds a bit abstractly, still looking herself over with clear amusement. "The hips, if nothing else." She twists briefly to give her backside a look, but this time seems a bit put out. "Well... I had the ass already. Not that I'm complaining; I'm not even sure I'd want more. I just don't understand why I even..."

Instead of finishing the sentence, she stares into the middle distance and sucks on her teeth in about the most hackneyed contemplative expression ever. It lasts precisely seven-tenths of a second before her eyes fly open and she lurches forward as though she just took a punch to the gut. Quite suddenly, she looks about to cry. And then she does. Not sobbing, no racking grief. Just an open stream of tears joining the rainwater already wetting her cheeks. She does stumble a little, but that just serves as a cue to take a deep breath and pull herself together. She looks around at the others, mouth and eyes open in incredulous shock, but no words come; she just turns and starts walking again, albeit with much less urgency.

[QuidEst]

Vin finished hunching over his phone to protect it from the rain, putting it his hoodie pocket with the music at max volume. A muffled "Sticks and Stones" began playing. "Not great sound quality, I'm afraid. Grabbing my phone was a lot harder than the clothes for some reason. Well, a copy of my phone? I don't know how I can tell the difference, but-" He stopped talking, noticing Reagan. "Hey, you doing okay? This is all a lot, I know. We'll get somewhere we can take a break, and worry about things from there."

Fortunately, the elven cloaks were water resistant, even if his own hoodie only did a passable job of keeping the drizzle at bay.

[Recherché]

Instead of finishing the sentence, she stares into the middle distance and sucks on her teeth in about the most hackneyed contemplative expression ever. It lasts precisely seven-tenths of a second before her eyes fly open and she lurches forward as though she just took a punch to the gut. Quite suddenly, she looks about to cry. And then she does. Not sobbing, no racking grief. Just an open stream of tears joining the rainwater already wetting her cheeks. She does stumble a little, but that just serves as a cue to take a deep breath and pull herself together.

I'd ask if you were okay but this whole situation isn't okay. It's seriously screwed up and we're kinda screwed and it's not okay. Bridget grimaces. Sympathy is not her area of expertise. At the least you're not completely alone in this. We got this. Between all the weird abilities we're actually pretty well set for surviving in a new world and maybe if we solve enough riddles we can get to go home.

[Sepulchritude]

When Reagan turns back at the displays of sympathy, it's with a smile she struggles with as though afraid of it. At some point while she's shaking her head in response, it actually becomes a broad, if hapless, grin. "No, no no, I'm sorry, I just... Hold on." Whatever is going on, it seems to take a lot of effort for her let it out with any control.

"It's not— hahhh. It's not bad. Oh my god, no. I have all my teeth." And that proves to be the end of her control for the immediate term. She does begin something like sobbing at that, rhythmic noises, kind of convulsive, you know. Lots of tears. But it's laughter.

[Recherché]

Bridget blinks rapidly trying not to gawk. Okay you win.


By the by, Vin I don't suppose you can conjure hair dye? Although I'm not sure how I'd even make it work without a shower and shampoo....

[QuidEst]

Vin looks relieved that it’s nothing bad. ”Glad to hear it! As for hair dye, we can experiment once we reach somewhere to stay. Actually- does your database have any info on past people from other worlds? ‘Summoned to fight an invasion by the demon lord’ is traditional, but we didn’t exactly get the accompanying ‘Oh, hero’ welcome committee in a castle.”

[Recherché]

Bridget zones out in a way that's rapidly becoming familiar as she runs a dozen search queries at once. Unlike the other times though her eyes stay blank much longer before she raises her hand in a gesture for people to pause.

Guy I think I came across something big. Can we stop for just a sec. Cause this is weird and possibly very relevant. Also cause I think your questions will have me running more searches and I don't want to trip while doing that.

Sitting down in the sand, Bridget waits for everyone else before continuing.

So take all of this with a gigantic grain of salt. I'm running into a lot of unfamiliar terminology, magical theory and theology here. I'm not certain I understand this whole mess perfectly.

What I'm getting though is that Arcem is just a continent now, but it used to be part of a much bigger planet. Then... something happened. Something big that involved Heavan and God and angels and it was weird. Whatever it was caused pieces of the world to... split off? Be peeled off? Disintegrate? I dunno exactly. But it left these raw ragged edges everywhere. Those edges border on something called the "Uncreated Night" which best I can tell is elemental void. It's the absence of everything somehow made into something.

Why this matters is that sometimes things and people fall through these gaps in Reality via the Uncreated Night and into Arcem. Sometimes there are also these portals called the Night Roads that form. Kind of like wormholes or stargates and they lead to other worlds. Other realities.

There isn't much rhyme or reason to who shows up here or why. Or if there is then it's not in the database. There also aren't any instructions on how to get back or even if it's possible. Vague rumors of people being able to make Night Roads but nothing concrete. Maybe some sorcerer somewhere can do it but it's not common knowledge. There also aren't any records of the people who from other worlds who travel to Arcem gaining new and strange powers or new bodies however there's bloody little in the way of info on people from other worlds in general.

Okay questions?

[QuidEst]

"Okay, so… assuming that this database knows its stuff, then even at the scale of a planet, the rules here only rhyme with physics," Vin mused. "And if people show up here from other worlds as a part of how this all works, and it's not like… a core bit of mythology here, then that's a bit of a relief. I'd rather not be somebody's 'last resort summons against impossible odds' figure of legend. That means we've got a good idea of how we got here and a good idea of what somebody would need to research to get back. Thank you, Bridget!"

[Vhaidara]

Alaron nods, half following what is said.

And does this database mention changes to those who fall into this world, or who cross the Night Roads? We all seem to have come out different than we were before.

[Recherché]

Bridget shakes her head.

No, there's no mention of people being changed of gaining powers via contact with the Uncreated Night. However there's very little information on the people coming through in general. So I thinks it's just absence of evidence not evidence of absence.

[LordHavelock]

Listening intently, but only really registering the words in that they have meaning, Red is rather out of touch with the overall context, he tries to find some sort of touchstone.

"Encroaching darkness, evil and nothingness, and travel between other worlds . . . it kind of seems like the story with the kids and 'IT'. Except, nobody had to die in that one to get to where they needed to be, they just, um, Tesseracted?"

Any disbelief or looks of incredulity, he greets with a shrug, "What, my nanny read me Wrinkle in Time when I was a kid."

Clearing his throat, he has a question of his own, "What about people having abilities like the ones we seem to have, in general? Repairing things, Mary Poppin's backpack, uh . . . Oh! A moment ago, I don't know if anyone could tell, but I was moving like the rest of you were frozen in time, only it didn't feel like I was moving fast at all. Not until everything seemed to catch up."

"I mean, I get that its magic, but does that make us all wizards or superheroes or what?"

[Recherché]

Magic is a thing here, but what we have does not seem like normal magic for the area. Most magic is sorta Game of Thrones-esque. It's rare and not super powerful. It takes years of study. In most cases casting a spell takes hours or more. There are some sorcerers who can do more Dungeons and Dragons type stuff but they're rare and again the product of decades of study. What we do does not match up with records of how magic should act.

There are indications that magic used to be a lot more powerful. It also used to be a lot more magitek and apparently there was this weird fusion of clerical divine magic and robotics that was super powerful. However that kind of magic hasn't worked quite right since whatever happened that shredded the planet.

I don't know what we are. All I know is that we aren't normal even within the local context of what "normal" is.

[Sepulchritude]

"We actually all just stood still for a couple seconds as a prank," Reagan interjects, mirth drawing her cheeks up just enough to spoil the poker face. "But seriously, this is all good to know. I don't think we should be expecting trouble—surest way to draw it to you—but one of us can go full bullet-time and we Hm expect that to take any trouble by surprise? That's a comfortable place to be."

She makes a grimace of distaste an instant later, her crinkling nose pulling her whole face along, and squints upward. "Unlike this coast," she mutters, rubbing her upper arms. There's little enough left of her shirt—a black cotton babydoll with a spine and ribcage printed on the front—to make the jostling indecent. She could have crawled through the side, so much fabric was missing, and she shouldn't have been trying to do without support in the first place. She starts a bit when her fingertips meet her side.

"Oh! Hey, what was it, Bridget? Was that a stunt you can repeat? The blacktop was hungry, looks like. And either way, we should get moving. If there's anything else to explain, we can talk and walk. Rain's gonna make us colder than you think, unless one of you can conjure a cabin."

[ylvathrall]

The walk through the icy drizzle is uncomfortable, but not outright dangerous, and the group walks across the stone-dotted moor to the southeast, soon leaving sight of the northern coastline. Two hours pass before they see the first sign of civilization: a meandering, rutted road cutting east to west through the grass. Following it east as the rain turns to sleet, it's another hour before they see another person: a cart is stopped at the side of the road, a miserable-looking woman sitting next to it with some canvas forming a lean-to over a meager fire. She's thin, nearly emaciated really, but a closer look shows her to have lean muscle on her bones and ragged scars on her arms, and those scars didn't come from farming implements, either. They look more like knife wounds. Red recognizes them instantly as cuts from a light sword, probably a small saber or something akin to a jian, not particularly deep. They cut in line with the muscle, suggesting she was in some control as she took them, and they weren't that deep - not debilitating.

She doesn't look up, but her eyes track you from under a wide-brimmed hat, her expression wary. One hand is tucked out of sight at her side, the other held out over the fire.

[QuidEst]

Well, here's hoping that translation was in effect. It seemed likely, since he was able to speak with the others. "Greetings. We're passing along- do you know how far it is to the next settlement?" Vin asked. He was curious about all the shallow wounds, and the cart, but it hardly seemed like the thing to open with.

[Sepulchritude]

Reagan, contrariwise, is not curious about the scars. This is largely because, at least at first, she doesn't notice them. She doesn't notice the muscle, either, but she does see the tension in it. Posture. Deliberate stillness, like a heron or a mantis. Reagan sees the hidden blade, though she doesn't precisely see it. The angles of the arm, what they mean for the shoulder and how much they would telegraph a throw before it happened and the arcs a knife could take from that spot to still reach the newcomers with force. And she sees the woman's awareness of all the same things, the intentionality behind the choices that made them so. It's a lot to take in at once, really.

As they walk closer, she slows to let Vin overtake her. She moves to lift the bottom of her shirt, to show where a sheath isn't hiding, but it's already high enough. She keeps her empty hands in sight, then, and lets the furry do the talking.

[ylvathrall]

"That way? Six and a half miles or so," the woman says, not moving. "Town called Branson's Ford. Tiny place. There's a fork in the road four miles up, though, and if you take the southern fork, it's another nine miles to a bigger town, Amleth." She nods slightly at Reagan, one recognizing another, and adds, "Tinker here, if you've any need for such or want a piece of the fire. Traveler's courtesy, aye?"

[QuidEst]

"Six and a half miles? I'd welcome the chance to take a break." He hadn't switched the somewhat muffled music from his phone off, but reaching for anything seemed like a bad idea right now. Maybe if he just stopped working to keep it around? A moment later, the music was gone, and he felt a subtle tension relax. Oddly, there was something of that tension still there, something he hadn't noticed before because he hadn't had anything to compare it with. "And we could probably use some basic supplies, having been on the road for a bit. I've got coin for it, as well as some food and wine I can share."

Vin's got one point semi-permanently invested in Deus Axe Machina.

[Recherché]

Thank you very much for the directions. Bridget gives a smile and short bow to the woman.

Turning to Vin Vin, I don't suppose you have a sewing kit or any money in your bag? As you might have noticed I lost all my tools and money when I had my near drowning experience and Reagan's clothes need some work if we're going to do some long distance hiking.

Bridget does a slight double take at her own words Assuming of course you're okay with me doing some customization of your pants so that they won't chafe?

[QuidEst]

Vin nodded. "Yes, I was able to keep hold of my coin purse in spite of everything- let me know if there's anything else like that that we'll need." He wasn't sure exactly what a tinker carried, but if it didn't include a sewing kit, he was way off on his guess as to what a tinker was.

[ylvathrall]

"I don't drink on the road," the tinker says, standing and going to her cart. She pulls the canvas cover aside to show a collection of boxes, baskets, and sacks. "But coin is good. I've got sewing kit here, needles and thread, thimbles, pins, snips. Anything else?"

[Vhaidara]

Alaron maintains his distance from the others, observing. He was still oddly thirsty, despite the water from earlier, and that was strange. This old woman at least seemed to not be hostile, and potentially even useful. Six miles though, that was going to be a hassle.

[Sepulchritude]

"She'll need something for leather, too," Reagan hastens to add. She makes the kind of eye contact that confirms unspoken questions, and says nothing about shears or awls. Nothing at all. What she does is distractedly fidget with her fingers as she builds a mental list. And she makes a few starts at it, too, as she considers the evidence of the cart and the canvas. "Okay. Do you have oilskin? Tallow or wax to make it? Magnes— Well, a fire flint, I guess. And I know this is a long shot, but I don't suppose you have coffee? None of us meant to be here, and it's.. going to be a very long walk home."

[ylvathrall]

The tinker lets out a short, harsh bark of laughter at the mention of coffee. "Coffee? Not bloody likely this far north. The rest, though, yes." She starts going through her cart, pulling out various items and laying them out. Reagan notes that there's no blade where she was sitting, but there is a small slit in her tunic which happens to be positioned just right for her to draw a knife from under it, and she's still keeping one hand near it and one eye on the group. Her posture is wary, though, not aggressive.

[QuidEst]

"We should probably also get two additional bags to have on hand," Vin added. "That way, we don't lose everything if something happens to mine." His own bag seemed to be magical- he was pretty sure that he was the one producing the goods, but the bag itself didn't seem to weigh nearly as much as it should for what it was carrying. But, all the more reason to not depend on it exclusively.

He found, much to his surprise, that he knew how much all of this cost as a standard purchase, and what expected markup ranges were. The ranges narrowed as he saw the specific goods she was selecting, with variance in quality being eliminated. He reached into his purse, pulling out coins corresponding to the high end of the markup ranges- she was being hospitable despite what seemed like a bad day, and even if the refresh on this money didn't work the way he hoped, he could more than afford it. So no database, but he did have price indices… interesting. "I believe this should cover it," he said, holding out the money once she's done collecting the requested items.

[LordHavelock]

Watching the transaction and the exchange, smile plastered on his features, happy to find the first signs of life in this new world of "romance and adventure" as he sees it. It only grows strained however as everything seems to be more or less what he would be used to at food truck, just with a little extra flair. Though curious about how it sprang to his mind what could have made those scars on her arms, Red is more or less unnerved by the prospect of it. Without thinking of himself as a violent person, the association seems abstract, removed from his way of thought. Besides, it's hardly a subject for polite conversation. Waiting for her to produce a few wares and then watching as Vin appears to have coin on hand to pay, he can't help but think he doesn't even have a toothbrush.

"So . . . know anywhere some capable folks could, I don't know, right a few wrongs, slay a few monsters, that sort of thing?" Jovial and with a look of absolute earnest he tries his best to give the appearance of someone trustworthy, knowledgeable, confident, despite not knowing a single thing he's talking about. It worked in business, might well work here. At the last moment he glances down towards the scars on her arms, unable to suppress curiosity, wondering if he can identify more about what could have done it. Without any pre-existing knowledge of knives or swords or the like, it was almost alien to him how he could vividly imagine what sort of weapon would make such marks.

[ylvathrall]

The tinker looks at Red like she thinks he might be a bit dim. "It's the Bleak Moor," she says, like someone talking to a child. "You realize this, yes? We're talking about a place where a tinker has to go armed in case of bandits. I woke up this morning and there was nothing left of my mule but some bloodstains. Think one of the Uncreated got her, poor thing. You want to slay monsters? Take your pick, friend, there's no shortage." She looks at Vin's coin with a discerning eye, then nods and sweeps the items into a burlap bag, handing it to him along with an empty one.

Looking at it more, Red is absolutely certain the marks were made by something very like a jian, a slender double-edged sword used mostly for thrusting but which has the potential for slashing as well. It was being used to slash in this case, but again, he's very sure the cuts were shallow and the woman was in control of how the blade cut - she was defending herself, and effectively.

[Recherché]

Wincing at Red, Bridget apologizes for him.

Sorry, he's never been anywhere without Wi-Fi before let alone without electricity and running water.

If Tinker takes that as them being from the Bright Republic then good. It's not a lie exactly. Just a slight misdirection.

Turning to her moron of a companion Red, this is not a video game. This is a real place and a really dangerous place. If we go looking for trouble we will find it and it will hurt. Unless you have actual training on how to use a weapon and an actual weapon, I suggest that we just to get back home as soon as possible. Hells, even if you do somehow know how to use a sword,I still want to get to civilization before we get stabbed. Or eaten by the Uncreated like that mule.

By the by, you really think there's an Uncreated around? Bridget shivers with anxiety and fear at the information she's getting from the database on the Uncreated. We ran into something we thought might be a night road a little ways north, but we weren't sure. Definitely something from the Far Realms though.

[ylvathrall]

"I think so," the tinker mutters darkly. "Something ate the mule, killed it fast enough and quiet enough that it didn't wake me. Tracks weren't any animal I've heard of. So it's either Uncreated, or it came from a Far Realm and it acts like one. Not much difference to me. If there's a Night Road nearby, that tracks. Hell's bells, that is not what I need."

[Recherché]

I can't truthfully say that I know what's going on. Bridget grimace in sympathy. All I can say for sure is that something very strange happened, Red and I went into the water and nearly drowned. When we finally got to shore, we were surrounded by stuff from the far realms and we didn't have a ship or any trade goods. Not even any wreckage. Well, except for Vin who somehow managed to hang onto one bag.

[QuidEst]

"Safety in numbers sounds better than nothing, and I'd rather have a structure to use as cover… no good being surrounded. Can we see if we can move the cart as a group?" Vin asked. He was pretty sure that a mule was no more than three time better than a person, but he wasn't sure how coordination would work. Probably better as two rows? "I'm sure that-" he stopped himself. "Right, introductions. I'm Vin," he said.

[Sepulchritude]

Reagan laughs a bit from up by the front of the cart, where she'd been looking at the harness since the tinker mentioned her mule. "Hell, two of these schmucks didn't even manage to keep their clothes on, and it didn't sound like they were going at it before I woke up. Say, this wasn't a big mule. How much weight's on..."

She stops, abruptly catching the Wrong Question. Her apologetic cringe when she looks up at the tinker seems sincere enough. "No, sorry, what I mean is, if you have someone in town you'd trust to hold your goods, I'm sure mister hero would love to help you rescue them, no matter how many trips it took. And I'm stronger than I look. We could gin up some slings from the canvas and spare fabric. Six miles isn't that far, if you pace yourself. "

[ylvathrall]

The tinker nods cautiously. "Call me Tanner," she says. "And no, it's not my birth name. Rather not talk about that one, my parents were not gifted at naming." She stands and stretches. "Don't got anyone I'd trust with anything in Branson's Ford, but Amleth would have a mule I could buy more than likely. I'll pay you for the difference in length, but I can't spare much."

Looking at the cart, Vin gets an instinctive sense for how much it weighs. Not in terms of kilograms, more a feeling for how hard it would be to move, where to grip to get the best leverage, and so on. He's fairly sure he can budge it on his own. As he moves up and takes hold of the cart in the places he knows are best, though, he finds it moving far, far more easily than he'd have imagined to be the case based on his experiences to date. It's not even hard to pull.

[Sepulchritude]

"Reagan," says Reagan. And then, apparently just deciding to speak for the others, "We need talk more than money, anyway. I know they're being a little coy—sorry folks—but we're all basically refugees. Don't even know the area enough to say what I'd do with the cash, myself. Better to know what kind of jobs I might take so I'm not stuck once it's spent. Anyway, all that is for after we get a little warmer and dryer, yeah?" She indicates the meager fire with a nod.

[LordHavelock]

No shortage of threats or monster fills Red with the prospect of a challenge, something to test himself against, a thrill he's long missed. Bridget snapped him back to reality though, pointing out that yes, he was unarmed, and no he hadn't been in a proper fight that wasn't broken up by a club's bouncer or took place in a boxing ring with full pads and helmets. He continued smiling through her lecturing, taking it in stride, nodding at all the right moments to convey he was in fact listening. The turn in the conversation towards getting the cart moving, whatever had eaten the mule, and sticking together for protection was more or less what he wanted anyway. Folks had been nervous, playing everything close to the vest, but the way he saw it, they wouldn't get through this in a huddled group hoping no one noticed they stuck out like teetotalers at Spring Break.

"Last video game I played was Mortal Kombat at my cousin's pizza party," He laughed, "So, don't worry I'm not one of those 'those' people. I just figured, should we really take any of this for granted as an accident? Coincidence? Tanner, I hope you'll forgive me for being direct, I'm just looking for a way to offer assistance and establish our credentials, as it were. If that means protecting a humble tinker from highwayman, grand, if it means helping to haul this cart to safety, just go easy on the switch, yeah?"

Reagan's glance at the fire reminds him the cold isn't exactly abating, as much as his spirits stave off the chill. He moves to join Vin in giving the cart a push at the yoke, only to find it moving without any exertion on his part at all.

With a whistle, he leans in to at least make it look good but gives a nod towards Bridget, trying to get her attention. Assuming she moves within speaking distance, he whispers: "You're right of course, and I don't want to ask about a sword, but Tanner knows how to handle one I'm pretty sure. Or, I know more than I have any right to about her and about swordsmanship. Has to do with those scars, so probably a sore subject. Maybe something we can work up to?"

[QuidEst]

That was… unexpected. He had a heroic protagonist's body now, it seemed! Well, it wasn't just that, since he'd known how to go about moving it as well. "I think we should be able to manage," he said as he brushed his hands off and returned to the fire, hoping that by downplaying it a little, the others would pick up that this was another of those abilities. "You know this area best, Tanner, so you should probably be keeping a lookout rather than helping with the hauling. It's no good if we're caught off guard. And Reagan has the right of it; in the long run, the advice is going to do more for us than the money you can spare after losing a mule."

[ylvathrall]

Tanner nods, her expression slightly less wary, and shifts over so that you can all squeeze in around the fire. "Well, what you need to know about the area is mostly this," she says. "It's bad. It's real bad. Tinkers, most of the world nobody bothers us, right? Unwritten law, that. Everybody needs tinkers so you leave them alone. Out here, the bandits are so desperate they'll attack us the same as any other. Then there's the Uncreated. Night Roads open out here too often, and most of them spew Uncreated. These hills are haunted by the things, plus various other nastiness - necromancers, bandits, old theurgic nightmares, even a couple of parasite gods. Raiders from the northern islands hit this area often, too. Plus the weather has been going crazy, terrible storms with no warning, the works." She shrugs. "Course, that means there's good money to be made, too. Aren't many as are traveling 'tween towns, so the folk are always glad to see me. High risk, high reward kind of life."

[Sepulchritude]

"So either you scrape by or you fight through, huh? Not a great spot for starting over, I take it." Reagan shot Red a look to warn him, or maybe plead with him, not to take that as a challenge. The one she gave Bridget and Alaron immediately after was less obvious. Disappointment maybe? Maybe. "Heh. So I guess the most important question is, how far did we wind up from the border, anyway?"

[ylvathrall]

"You're up on the coast, so pretty far. About a third of the way out into the Reach," Tanner says. "You running from the Bright Republic, I take it? Or the Atheocracy?"

[LordHavelock]

"I think the plan was running to the Bright Republic. Or sailing maybe. Why? Do folks run from there a lot? Is this like a "Free Tibet" situation?" Red began asking, not quite able to avoid sounding like a tourist excited to hear from a local.

"Not exactly running from anything at all, actually. I mean, who would chase us seeing as how we left . . ." Clearing his throat, Red tries to get back on topic. "So, the Bright Republic? You know much about them? Maybe learn to use a sword there?"

He knew it wasn't likely, but prompting Tanner to correct him was a tried and true tactic for someone usually taken to be a dumb jock.

[QuidEst]

"Things are such that nobody from where we're from knows we're gone. And, so long as nobody where we are knows where we're from… then that won't change. So, it's easiest to leave our origin unanswered," Vin said, smiling apologetically. "Sorry to be tight-lipped about that, but it's better to be consistent in our policy rather than making exceptions for people who seem trustworthy."

[Sepulchritude]

"We're still working on their cover story," Reagan explains, settling in on a damp log to keep off the muddy ground. Her bare arms have plenty of goosebumps, and getting her fingers flexing smoothly again occupies her for a while.

[ylvathrall]

"So you came from the north, where you think you saw something like a Night Road," Tanner says slowly. "There was a shipwreck, but there's no ship. One of you ain't human. You can't tell me where you're from, but you all got different accents that aren't native, and one of you says something about a place I never heard of. So to ask a question, don't expect an answer but I have to ask. You folks from a Far Realm?"

[QuidEst]

Vin sighed, but only mildly. Well, no point in keeping it a secret from her if she could guess. "No, but only on a technicality. It's Far Realms, plural. Although, I suspect we're from the same general…" he waved a hand, choosing from the available metaphors. "…neighborhood as one another, as such things go. We don't even know how important it is to keep all that a secret, but it's probably better to find out now and trust you're willing to keep it to yourself if it is important."

[ylvathrall]

"Well, it's probably best not to share it widely," Tanner says. "Too many people are either frightened of the Night Roads and the things they bring, or else they see an opportunity, and neither group is likely to be terribly gentle about expressing it, if you catch my drift. You ought to change into local clothes, that means tunic and trews for most folk, and Vin, you can pass yourself off as magic-warped and say you used to be human." The tinker's tone is completely matter of fact.

[Sepulchritude]

"Appreciate it," Reagan replies, without being too particular about who. She presses in closer at the fire, to fit more people under the cover of the canvas, and stares into the weak flame. "You eaten? We don't have to do much more than get our fingers working again. If we leave soon, we might be able to get at least the first trip done before sundown. You don't exactly make this place sound like a great place to overnight."

[ylvathrall]

"I already ate, and it's not," Tanner says, standing. "Lemme get my cart in order again and we can take off."

It doesn't take long for her to have her goods ready for the ride, at which point Vin takes the cart and finds he can indeed pull it himself. He doesn't even have a hard time moving it, and he doesn't feel like he'll be strained by hauling it pretty much as far as needed. Tanner takes his extraordinary strength completely in stride (is there nothing that can shake her?) and walks along with you, filling the group in on the area a little more fully. Apparently the region is among the most haunted by Night Roads in the realm, subject to frequent raids by the northern islands and southern grasslands both, and has very unpredictable weather. From what she says, you gather that things like weather, seasons, and other natural cycles don't really work in the orderly and consistent way you're used to in this world, but it's worse here. Bordering it on the east is the Atheocracy of Lom, governed by Anti-Priests who enforce an atheistic culture for reasons she doesn't seem inclined to elaborate on. They mostly leave the Reach alone, though.

Finally, a good three hours of walking later, you see stone walls rising up on the horizon. "Right, better make it look like we're trading off on the cart," Tanner says. "Remember your cover, you're fine."

[QuidEst]

Vin traded the spot at the front of the cart off to Red, who looked a good deal more fit than him, although the lack of fur made everyone here look smaller and malnourished. "All right- first order of business is some temporary lodging. We can worry about clothes and the like once we've got some rooms."

[Sepulchritude]

"First need of any animal is shelter," Reagan concurs from the back of the wagon, where she'd been playing with different ways to lean while walking for half an hour. The one she's on now looks reasonably like pushing. She'd also been playing with her accent since Tanner brought it up; by this point, the two women could have grown up in the same town. She'd actually started practicing with Red's, a few minutes earlier.

"But it's food and drink right after. I don't know about the rest of you, but traveling through West Virginia always leaves me ravenous. And this time was no different."

[LordHavelock]

Hauling away, throwing himself full tilt at the front of the cart, with an increasingly madcap grin, Red is nowhere near as capable in moving the wagon towards the stone walls . . . but manages to look good doing it. A healthy sheen of perspiration prickles over his skin, suggesting vigor and the capacity for prolonged exertion (to everyone except Vin, apparently). It's completely unclear at what point he actually stops straining long enough to discard his tunic, but by the time the view from the walls is clear, he's naked to the waist and glistening. Sticking to his portion of the cover story is fairly easy, as all he has to do is refrain from speaking, limiting himself to polite nods, the occasional wave, and a glance and a wink at anyone who seems to be taking notice.

Reagan's comment catches him more or less off guard, "What, are you going to tell me about your momma's secret cornbread recipe next? That would be the tell you know, nobody gives up the secret recipe, so nobody knows they're all the same." Despite the shared laugh, he quickly resumes an air of silent dignity, as much as he can manage.

Cautiously he tries to signal Vin, "I, uh, I'm sure I left a spare frock in your pack there, friend. Think it's still there?"

[ylvathrall]

The group quickly arrives at Tanner's preferred inn, where the tinker (or Vin) pays for a room for herself and two for you, saying she'll wait out the rain and set up shop tomorrow. The innkeeper asks no questions about your group's oddities, though plenty of people in the taproom give you odd looks. In the rooms, the four beds are slightly lumpy and the blankets slightly scratchy wool, light cast by oil lamps, the walls simple wood paneling. Tanner assured you the rooms were clean of fleas and lice for the most part, though, and Reagan gets the sense she was right. The tinker goes straight to her room, seeming like she very much wants to get some rest after what has admittedly been a rather long day for her.

[QuidEst]

Vin's happy to pay for the rooms, the price coming out to such a low fraction of the on-hand money that even if he were wrong about the renewed funds, they'd be in good stead for some time. While Tanner goes to her room to get some sleep, Vin gathers their group in one of the rooms for the time being. "Okay, we're finally indoors, out of the rain, with some privacy. Let's try and figure out what we can actually do." Vin reached into his bag, and pulled out a Mahjong's sausage pizza. From his pocket, he produced his phone again, turning the volume down low enough that it wouldn't carry outside the room. "Excellent," he said around a slice of pizza, savoring the taste after the hours spent trudging through the damp. He turned the box around, offering it to the rest of the group. "If you let me know what sort of food you all like, I think I should be able to cover that. I should also be able to get everybody at least a change of clothes, too. My funds topped up, too, so it looks like I can provide a baseline level of comfort. Food, drink, and enough money for shelter and everyday purchases." He held up his phone. "Plus, I can make at least some stuff from my old world. Judging from Red's effort moving Tanner's cart, I'm pretty strong too. What have folks noticed about themselves? We figure out what we know we can do, and we can test it out a bit."

[Sepulchritude]

Reagan leans in far enough to almost fall off the footboard she'd perched on, at the question. Her whole face brightens with excitement finally let off its tight leash. "Okay, so, I've been thinking about this since Bridget said she wasn't really a redhead. It's honestly a good shade for your complexion, though; you should consider just keeping it. And full disclosure, this theory made a little more sense when I thought Vin was a furry who woke up as his own fursona." She gives him an apologetic smile. It had been a confusing discussion during the walk, with them talking right past each other.

"But that whole bulk-up thing brings me back in line on it. So. I think we all became perfect." She pauses a second to make a round of eye contact, but with her hands up in a hold on a sec gesture, like she knows how it sounds. "Not ontologically. Nothing silly, we didn't become gods or boddhisatvas or whatever. But our own ideal possibility. I have... I had a lot of injuries that I was never gonna' be without. Most of them from being too poor to fix small problems before they turned into disasters. I've checked: they're all gone, like they never happened. My teeth, my scars, my bad joints, all fixed. Hell, these hips—"

Reagan twists to emphasize her point, but it, well, they sort of emphasized themselves already. Until Bridget had done some extra tailoring, those slacks had been entirely too tight through the area, and not in the way they were cut to flatter. She gestures at her chest, but doesn't go to as much trouble to make it stand out. "I'm not, like, don't bother with the sympathy, but I spent most of puberty in low-level starvation. Every other woman in my family spilled out of normal clothes, but I was a rail. I think I might even be taller than I remember, but I can't be sure. I think this is the body I would have had if my life had gone right. Vin and Red definitely seem to be, like, idealized versions of normal people. It doesn't explain everything, and I'm not even going to try to parse the magic bag, but... Well, that's what I've noticed. We're our own could-have-beens."

[LordHavelock]

"You're onto something there, the both of you!" Red gestures with a piece of pizza already in hand, having helped himself to a slice faster than eyes could follow, only after everyone else had had their first. Perched upon a stool at the furthest side of the room from the door, regarding everyone, he takes a big bight, famished after the exertions just hauling the cart the shortest distance to the town. "When I died, I was in good shape, but I didn't look like this . . ." he gestures downward and then upward again, flexing in arms in the process, "I haven't looked like this since the Olympic qualifiers. Or heavyweight championships. Or maybe at the peak of my varsity rugby days . . . I, kind of had the opposite of Reagan's experience. My family didn't approve of me going out for sports as hard as I did, afraid I would get hurt, and I did. Now it's like I have all the combined athleticism, and none of the knocks I picked up along the way."

"And for all of that, Vin still lugged that cart around longer and further than I did and made it look easy." Leaning back, putting his hands behind his head, he grinned at the handy hyena as he put his hands behind his head, flexing overtly this time, "That's the kind of strength that doesn't come from hours at the gym, or even swinging a pick and hauling rocks. That's like, "I have the Power!" masters of the universe strength right there. You're making money hand over fist without even trying either. You lead with either or both of those with the next nice hyena girl we meet and she'll be falling at your feet, guaranteed."

"Reagan looks good, like she thinks she ought to, even if you haven't noticed any superpowers yet. I mean, not counting getting that figure into that outfit. We can all do that, at least, apparently." Without staring, he gestures and reaches for a beer that's not there before catching himself. Looking a bit sheepish, Red finishes the slice in his hand and then takes a moment to consider. "Maybe not gods but . . . what do you call like Hercules and Xena? Heroes and heroines with at least one God for a parent?"

[QuidEst]

"Yeah- I don't think I look all that different-" Vin paused, holding up his phone flipping to the camera app and checking his virtual reflection. "Hmm. It's a little hard to tell- I guess I seem… well, more presentable than I'd expect for the circumstances; nothing that couldn't have been accomplished with a good trim. But Red's right, there's no way I should be able to haul the cart like that, even if I hadn't been working a desk job. I don't think that's all, though. Red- I'm pretty sure you grabbed that piece of pizza remarkably fast. And you're the only other one to be able to produce something from your home. You handed over a knife that you hadn't had on you. Can you make anything else? Can all of us do it?" he said. "Bridget, you've got the database. It seems pretty comprehensive, and it's the only reason we've got a decent shot of blending in. Reagan… yours seem a little more subtle. I didn't catch anything. You were the only other one with clothes, if that means anything…" The hyena sat back in thought for a span, chewing on his pizza meditatively.

"Well, I think I can answer the magic bag question. I thought it was a magic bag because it didn't weigh anything, but then there was the cart. I think the bag is just an excuse, covering for something I can do. I was able to produce the phone from my pocket. We're alone, so I can finally tell you all-" He lowered his voice more as he spoke. "The money is enough to buy a house. Not here in a city, but it's 'retire to a quiet village somewhere' money. I've got a few experiments I'm interested in trying…"

[Sepulchritude]

"Yeah, well, just don't paint a target on your back trying them. You might be a whole brute squad, but that won't help much if you get shanked. And I've been watching your ears; you're not tracking the footsteps when people walk by." She tilts her head and glances at the door to the hall. Then she rolls her eyes. "Well now I've pointed it out, that hardly counts. My whole point is that you're not in the habit of watching your back like someone with that kind of money in this kind of town needs to be. So don't let the locals put together just how much you can throw around, huh?"

Reagan pauses to take a bit of pizza, and her attention promptly shifts from the conversation to one of the darker corners of the floor.

[QuidEst]

"I'm doing my best to be discreet about it, and while it's not exactly walking around with bodyguards, I'm planning on sticking with you lot so I'm not the only set of eyes. No, the tests I want to run are private. Can I make something from one of your worlds. Can Red make something from mine. Can either of you make anything from your worlds. That sort of thing," Vin replied reassuring her. "Your caution is appreciated, especially since I only just got this life. Red, do you still have that knife?"

[Recherché]

Bridget perks up a little from the reverie she's been in for the past few hours.

I'm really hoping you're right about us being idealized versions, Reagan. Otherwise in about five to seven days, the meds I have in my system will have worn off and I will start going crazy. By crazy I mean sudden severe depression and anxiety symptoms. Probably panic attacks. It will not be pretty.

The redhead bites her lip looking somewhere between shy and ashamed.

I have to confess that part of why I've been pushing Bright Republic this hard is because as far as I can tell it's the only place that has the meds that keep me going. Sorry. But maybe this will solve it?

Bridget tries to look hopeful and less freaked out.

Option C, is that maybe Vin can make my meds. However for this to work he needs to not only be able to make seriously complex items, they have to work like the real deal on a chemical level and the effects need to stick around for a while. Which is why I have a minor test for you. Can you make me a kit for henna tattoos? Or premade henna paste. Either works. The henna skin dye will only work if the henna he makes is chemically reactive and it'll only stay on my skin if the effects stick around for a while. Plus malfunctioning henna is much less dangerous than malfunctioning psychoactive drugs.


Okay so on to what I can do. We've already figured out the database a bit. It still needs more work but I think I know the general rules. Couple of minor things I've noticed is that the heat from the campfire didn't hurt. And then I tried sticking my finger in a little and it didn't burn. I kinda suspect that I've gone Targaryen and I'm immune to heat, fire and burny stuff. I also . . . so I'm guessing by the rest of you stumbling around it's dark? I can see perfectly though. It's like it full daylight to me. I think maybe I have some kind of darkvision.

Okay so on to the big one I want to play around with. When I touch items, well things other than Vin's creations, I've been getting these visions of how they were created and why. It's . . . when they were made the maker gave them a spark of inspiration and creativity and that purpose sticks with them. Stuff that Vin makes, there was never a creator so no spark, no purpose. When I'm faith healing items what I'm actually doing is restoring them to the purpose that they were endowed with.

So aside from me knowing surprising facts about the guy who made Red's knife for Theodore Roosevelt and lived on the Chesapeake bay and really liked eating chicken feet. I think that maybe I could push a purpose into an item. I'm not quite sure what it would do. I'm hoping maybe it'll turn it into what I'm thinking of.

Bridget grabs the blanket on her bed drawing it further into her lap. The blanket is old. Woven by an immigrant from Patria decades ago. No not an immigrant, an exile. Given a purpose to cover and warm. Bridget gives it a different purpose instead. You aren't a blanket. You're a mirror. Your purpose is to reflect. To show me what my new body really looks like. To do that you should be reflective. Shiny. Stiff because mirrors aren't floppy. Like glass and silver. Bridget murmurs under her breath and she forces an unnatural transformation.

[LordHavelock]

His enthusiasm is markedly dampened when he hears about what Bridget might be confronting if they're wrong. Stakes that he'd never really considering in the context of all this; something he couldn't fight or confront directly. It wasn't that it was out of character for him, but he was more acutely aware of just how raring he'd been for things to go that way since he'd gotten even an inkling of the power bursting in his limbs, his veins . . . Originally, he'd just felt like he was back in college but this was different, upon reflection.

"The knife, right I . . ." As soon as he thinks about it, he finds it back at his belt, hand closing around something that wasn't there a moment ago. "Okay, so I can do this knife, Vin, and you can do a phone, and local currency, and pizza, and Bridget can do repairs. She also knows the connection of the knife with my family, stuff I barely remember from childhood stories. I guess, I should try something conscious. Bridget still had this, but as soon as I thought about having it back-"

Red trails off as he tosses the knife, still closed over to an empty space on the nearest bed, and then with his hand still extended, thinks about closing his hand around the handle. When it's immediately back in his hand, still closed, he's not the only one surprised. Nodding, but not looking particularly reassured, he places the knife next to him, and then thinks about something else, his phone, something he could readily imagine holding, knowing it was in hand as well as anything else. Nothing. His hand closes around empty air. Waiting a moment, he tries again, then thinks about a rugby ball, but again, his hand closes around nothing. A tennis racket; his protein shaker bottle; the tv remote . . . Nothing, nothing, nothing. He winds up looking like he's swatting at the air for a moment, then pauses. He tries thinking about another family heirloom: an engraved silver light; nothing.

"Gag me, Vin, I can't get it to work for anything but the knife." Thinking a moment longer. He takes the knife, starts flipping it in his hands, tossing it higher and higher towards the ceiling, and then, flipping the blade open on the next toss, let's it fall towards him and then darts his hand underneath the blade finding it suddenly that much easier to anticipate the fall of it through the air, watching it seeming to move any slower. It's effortless, and then letting it pass by his hand, within a hairsbreadth, and then towards the floor. He catches the blade upright, the handle on the top of his foot, balancing it expertly, and then flipping it back straight upwards, passing between his middle and ring fingers only to catch it. "That's righteous though. It's not quite, like, I'm faster though. Just that it's so damn easy to see the perfect time to make it all happen."

Watching the blanket for any effect of Bridget's overt commands to take effect.

[ylvathrall]

The blanket remains a blanket, but it stiffens to provide a good, flat surface. Then something remarkable happens. Looking at it, you see a blanket. Looking into it, you see the reflection of the room, laid out on the blanket's surface. It's like the images that have a different picture depending on whether they're the foreground or the background - look at it one way and it's just a blanket, look at it the other and it's a mirror, one that reflects the room only adequately, but reflects your own image perfectly, with complete fidelity.

It kind of gives you a headache to look at. Not literally, but it is...hard to process what you're seeing, and trying is a strain.

[Recherché]

Bridget stares at the mirror? blanket!? In wonderment and confusion.

So let's not do this again unless I have to. It's making my head hurt. In good news I don't think it's permanent. I can sort if feel the mirror-ness isn't fixed that well. It'll go away eventually. Someday. I don't know entirely.

Taking a deep breath Bridget looks at herself again in the mirror that is simultaneously a wool blanket. The face she sees is not what she expects at all. Her fingers creep up to feel the scar on her temple that is no longer there before returning down to worry at her nose and it's completely new shape.

Uhm guys, how tall is this body I'm in? I'm starting to suspect that you aren't all short and that I've actually gained a couple of inches when I got the new and improved chassis.

[Sepulchritude]

"Unless one of you can conjure a yardstick, we have no real context for the question. Taller compared to me than most women I've met, which is about as close as I think we're going to get." Which is to say, close enough to the same height it would take deliberate comparison to be more precise. And Reagan hadn't stood that close to anyone all day. Now, she holds out her hand, palm up.

Nothing happens.

She shakes it a few times. Still nothing. "Yeah, I don't know what you kids are doing to make the magic happen, but I don't think I got the full package. It's a good thing you need someone who can actually blend in, or I might get left behind, huh?" She grins, apparently not that concerned.

[Recherché]

Bridget frowns and holds out her hand trying to summon a tape measure. How one summons a tape measure from thin air is beyond her but she tries and the resulting hand motions are at least amusing. How does I shot web? She mutters to herself while attempting to make a Vulcan salute.

Finally giving up Bridget grabs the blanket again and this time imbues it with the purpose of being a measuring tape. The shiny abomination changes swiftly and it reshapes itself into a long thin cloth strip with measurements printed along the side. It is now much less disconcerting as she uses it to quickly measure her height and other body parts.

So I gained three inches in height and I can't conjure things from nothing. I can however transform them and make them into new and interesting things.

Honestly I don't think there is a full package that we all got. I think there's just some minor overlap between abilities. I think maybe I got stuff that's focused on me being mission support. I'm all about knowledge and tools. Vin got strong tanky stuff and some support abilities. He's basically playing cleric to my wizard. Red is also melee but fast not super strong. He's the fighter. I'm going to Hazard a guess that given the missing archetype and the fact that if she has any abilities they're very sneaky, that Reagan is meant to be our rogue and her abilities are based around stealth. We're a freaking balanced party I think. Or at least as balanced as this low magic world gets.

[Sepulchritude]

"Uh, B? Tanner was blasé about the idea that we'd come in from the void between the stars. I don't think this is a low magic world. I think the magic just isn't concentrated with the human population. Anyway, if I'm supposed to be playing rogue to y'all, are we talking about possessing every mundane skill that exists, or just stabbing the bejeezus out of people? The second one is kind of hard to—"

There she goes again, staring at the corner and looking troubled. But this time, she doesn't entirely fall silent. "Okay, you can see in the dark, right? I think that cockroach is watching us." She doesn't sound sarcastic...

[QuidEst]

Vin looks on with fascination. "So… knives for Red, and… alchemy powers for Bridget? Right, lemme try the henna. That's… yeah, the body art stuff for bald skin," he said, concentrating. A moment passed. Nothing happened. He held out his hand and a permanent marker appeared. It disappeared, almost immediately replaced by a kid's glow-in-the-dark science lab, continuing to cycle through a laptop, a bottle of ibuprofen, a bag of cough drops, a book of collected newspaper cartoons, and finally a bottle of vinegar. He set it down on the table. "No good, I'm afraid. I've never seen a henna kit. It's probably a lot more common in your world, since everybody can use it. It wouldn't be much use to somebody like me."

He held out both hands, and for a moment, nothing happened again- Vin looked a little strained in the process. The music from his phone stopped as it disappeared, and Vin was holding a bag of baking soda. He set that down on the table too, taking a pinch from it and dropping it in the vinegar. It started foaming like a stereotypical science fair project, and Vin let it spill over before both disappeared. "So, chemistry's good, but I can only do two things at once, and I need to have seen them. And it's not permanent. Over the counter only, I'm afraid. Oh, and some foul-tasting antibiotics. If folks are here with teeth restored, though, it seems like we've got pretty a good medical plan. If symptoms do start to show up, we can try your alchemy." Anything he'd seen in a pharmacy… he really was the cleric. "You can do your henna test in the meantime. Maybe use something like dirt for the base?" he added, eying the measuring blanket that had been the fuzzy mirror.

"Hey Red, can I see your knife? Please don't throw it… I want to try if I can make stuff from your world too, if I examine it here." Vin asked. "Sorry, a cockroach watching us? Like… an insect spy type deal? Bridget, is-" He stopped himself before he finished asking if that was possible, since she was also the one who could see in the dark, and he didn't want her going into database mode before at least looking.

[Recherché]

"Uh, B? Tanner was blasé about the idea that we'd come in from the void between the stars. I don't think this is a low magic world. I think the magic just isn't concentrated with the human population "

Yeah I mean low human controlled magic not low weirdness. It's definitely high weirdness.


There she goes again, staring at the corner and looking troubled. But this time, she doesn't entirely fall silent. "Okay, you can see in the dark, right? I think that cockroach is watching us." She doesn't sound sarcastic...

What cockro- An insect scuttles out from behind the dresser You mean the one that was behind the furniture and not in plain sight, dark vision or no? Reagan do you normally have a creepy knowledge of every insect within a wide radius whether or not they're actually visible?




"No good, I'm afraid. I've never seen a henna kit. It's probably a lot more common in your world, since everybody can use it. It wouldn't be much use to somebody like me."

Shame on me for jot thinking about the lack of bare skin on your world. The results were fascinating though.

Bridget perks up a little bit with a problem for her to work out

Let's try something else for the endurance portion. Permanence matters especially if we're using your food as y'know food. Does your world have hair or fur dye? If you can make that we could test what happens to the effects of an item you make after you dismiss the item. I volunteer my hair as tribute.

[Sepulchritude]

"What? No, it just ran under... I'm not crazy, okay? I know how it sounds. But it was!" Reagan huffs a bit and folds her arms across her chest. But the conversation moves on without her, and she doesn't seem to be in a hurry to bring the subject up again. Fashion advice, now, that's a different story.

"I really don't understand why you're in such a hurry to get rid of that. I'd trade you in an instant. And anyway, from what Tanner said, we're gonna need a lot better than a pen knife, for one. For two, it'll matter more whether you can fight with it—" Here she turns to Red. She'd already begun counting off her points on one hand. "—than any amount of conjuring. And three, I need to know in advance whether any of you can lie convincingly so I don't try to involve... Oh for the love of... I am the rogue. It's just not magic."

[Recherché]

"What? No, it just ran under... I'm not crazy, okay? I know how it sounds. But it was!" Reagan huffs a bit and folds her arms across her chest.

I don't think you're crazy Reagan. I think you might have some kind of spider sense. Or insect sense at least.




"I really don't understand why you're in such a hurry to get rid of that. I'd trade you in an instant."

Bridget frowns

You mean the hair?

I'm supposed to be a brunette with blue streaks in my hair. It's not supposed to look like this.

She sighs and holds her hair between her fingers examining it.

It's disconcerting. This body does not feel like it's mine. It doesn't hurt but it feels freaky. I'm hoping by changing it, this body will feel more like it's mine.




"And anyway, from what Tanner said, we're gonna need a lot better than a pen knife, for one. For two, it'll matter more whether you can fight with it—" Here she turns to Red. She'd already begun counting off her points on one hand. "—than any amount of conjuring. And three, I need to know in advance whether any of you can lie convincingly so I don't try to involve... Oh for the love of... I am the rogue. It's just not magic."

So I have a minor confession. I have absolutely no experience with combat or idea of what to do in a fight. I very strongly suspect that either you guys come from more violent worlds than me or that you were chosen for being good at violence. Or maybe both.

As for lying, I'm not horrible at it, as you noticed from the fact that I wasn't the one who gave us away to Tanner. I'm not an expert by any means but I can get by on the basics.

Bridget shrugs briefly

[QuidEst]

"We don't think you're crazy, we're just trying to figure out if it's a powers thing," Vin said.

"Yeah, that was just me trying other things out to see what worked. There were a few blanks in there, when things didn't work, stuff like 'a book on how to get to Bright Republic', 'the cure for cancer', and so on. And yeah, I've seen plenty of fur dye in the aisles at Bullseye. Uh, let's see. Quick application washable stuff, or the three-to-six week gel? They don't sell the full bath stuff in stores; that's just for specialized salons."

[LordHavelock]

"Everything but the kitchen sink between the two of you." Red remarks with a whistle, gesturing between Bridget and Vin before standing and handing over the knife. "See, the thing is, I couldn't do my kitchen knives from the penthouse. Tried a couple of them, but nothing, and those were could have at least sold as is some top quality cutlery. Couple thousand dollars worth of Japanese steel; got a hookup from the Benihana folks."

"Well we can buy something from here tomorrow right? In terms of defending ourselves. Help us blend in a little better anyway." Cocking his head to one side though, and rubbing the back of it, he sighs, "Truth is I'm probably a much better liar than a fighter myself. I was a managing partner in a multimedia conglomerate for the greater Miami area. On the flip side, I've only ever been in a few fistfights, and some punk tried to mug me and the girl I was shacking up with a year back."

Standing up, he does a quick combination of punches at the open air, almost faster than the eye can follow, and without even a hint of whatever power he has at that.

"Reagan, have you ever, you know? Done the stabbing thing?" He tries for an awkward grin, "Like, no judgement if a guy got handsy, didn't take no for an answer or whatever. Honestly, I don't feel much like a fighter, I've never even held a sword!" Shrugging, Red suddenly realizes there's something in his hand, a leather wrapped handle suitable for two hands, attached to a slightly curved piece of hardwood in imitation of a samurai sword.

"Woah . . . Uh, okay I mean, I think I messed around with one of these a little, at the dojo."

[QuidEst]

Vin nodded gratefully, taking the knife. "All right, that's the other test." He held it in one hand… and then he was holding them in both hands. Looking satisfied, he passed the original back to Red. He was quite careful to pass the original back, since people sometimes got a little touchy about these things. "All right, now let's see if I can make it aga-" Vin stopped, looking very surprised. "Whoa! It's still here!" he said, examining the knife. "Sorry, I realize that doesn't seem like much, but I… let it go. Like, when I needed to make more stuff, and I stopped keeping the phone around, it vanished. But with the knife, I let it go, felt the power return, but the knife didn't disappear." A grin spread across his face. "I think I can duplicate stuff, too! Like, if I've actually got the thing, I can make more of it, and it isn't temporary."

"Does a bokken count as a sword? I think you're still technically correct," he added to Red. "So… weapons? Melee weapons, maybe?"

[Sepulchritude]

Reagan shrugs at the question and watches the testing play out before she answers. Maybe she was thinking about it.

"Ratty little guy took a swing at me once while I was eating. Just stupid playground stuff. He got a fork in his arm, and all four tines broke skin." It makes her giggle. That's normal, right?

"And I've done a bunch of recreational... Uh, let's call it skin... No, maybe... There's really no subtle way to say I've cut designs into partners, is there? And in theory, I know how to field dress a deer, or anything on that body plan, but dad could never convince me to actually touch an organ. You decide how much of that counts. "

[LordHavelock]

Red is more interested in Vin's ability to duplicate objects than the practice sword, which he figures would hold up to just about anything except a metal weapon, in which case he'd still be better off with his fists. He sets it aside, noting that it doesn't disappear the way it came to his hand, then reaches out in front of him, making sure it's not in the direction of anyone else. "Weapons, huh? Not a bad guess, but it's not like I went around touching things at the museum. Almost too bad, Bridget could fix em up in that case, and you could make one for everyone else. Okay, let's try . . . The Sword of Power!"

With an exaggerated pose and flourish, his hand none the less comes up empty. "Huh, nothing. Uhhh, the Atlantean Sword? I guess those are movie props, and I've never seen them in person or held them."

Thinking for a long moment, Red settles into a fencing stance, and as he steps into the motions of thrust, party, riposte, a metallic foil appears in his hand. A sport weapon, designed to keep from hurting anyone, not exactly useful. Setting it aside, as it apparently won't disappear after he stares at it a moment, he tries the sequence again and this time there is a slight shimmer in the air, without any change in luminosity for the room, as a fine steel saber flashes into existence in his hand.

"That's . . . My great grandfather's cavalry sword. He fought for the Union Army with this thing. I haven't seen it in years, but I got the chance to hold it when I was a kid, still at home."

[ylvathrall]

Before anyone can respond, the door suddenly opens. Tanner is standing outside, the tinker's face exhausted and terrified. "Hey," she says. "Sorry to interrupt, but there's an Uncreated attacking the city. It's at the gates, and I don't think they'll stop it, so...steal horses and run?"

[Recherché]

Would now be a good time to mention that I'm no good with horses? Bridget's voice sounds tense to the point of breaking but far stranger is the fact that she appears to be glowing. Tendrils of light stream off her like steam rising. The woman herself does not seem to have noticed this yet as she grabs the knife back from Red and readies to run.

[Sepulchritude]

"Better now than— Hey. Bee. Look at me." Reagan's gaze is reassuringly steady, but it's her voice that really overflows with confidence, there for the taking. She has her hand out, palm up to be grasped, already. "I've been riding since before I could walk. Not even exaggerating. I've seen the photos: little Reagan in diapers, terrible composition, very embarrassing. I can take care of the horse, if you can shift all your attention to balancing once you're on it. Do you think you can do that? Think of it as a really wide bicycle on a really bumpy street, and let me handle the details."

She's back to her own accent for the moment and holding at the edge of a self-effacing smile. Her eyes drop enough to focus on the rest of Bridget once, briefly, but then it's back to sustained eye-contact and her offer (admittedly more of a directive) of support. "We can go over the why and process those emotions once we're out of reach of whatever an uncreated is, but for now, simple task."

[LordHavelock]

"We'll stop it." Red says reflexively, with absolute certainty, radiating a wave of conviction that momentarily stills any thought of flight or the fear of the unknown and unseen threat. Only fleeting feeling, banishing apprehension for a moment, but the feeling leaves behind a spark of resolve, to act with purpose, rather than panic.

Realizing that he's gripping the hilt of the saber with knuckles white, Red is shocked even at himself. His words, his demeanor speak to a fearless mien, but inwardly, it's just that his every nerve is alight, muscles tense, in excess of anything like an adrenaline rush. It's love the moments before taking a field, before the bell rings, right up to the moment of a serve for game point across his entire life pooled into a font of volatile energy. The need to confront the threat with overwhelming force, is at the forefront of his mind, and he knows instinctively that this desire is one to be shared with those around him.

Biting back the urge to rush out the door while yelling "To me!" Or something even more cliche, Red tries opening his mouth without letting just the first thing out of it: "I mean that. It doesn't have to be all of us, not if anyone wants to get to safety here and now. It's not that I'm not afraid either, but that fear . . . I didn't say anything earlier, but I feel like my flight or fight response is kicked over all the way towards FIGHT. Vin, back me up but doesn't this all seem a little too coincidental? What if we're breaking some unwritten rules if we just cut and run? Like there would be fallout anyway, but with what we can do, I think we have to run with what it's telling us, to make it our own, part of us . . ."


Glancing at Tanner, he half expects the tinker to call him a fool and shrug, but the other half of him expects . . . Maybe an affirmation? His sense of romance dictated there were no surly, worldly tinkers who were only ever surly, world-weary tinkers.

Glancing to Vin, he gives the hyenidae a determined smile, then offers Reagan the sword hilt first, before turning to Bridget. "I mean, no pressure, really, but 'Bee' you're looking radiant, and I think if you were meant to run or get away, you'd be turning invisible or already have dashed half a mile to safety by now, rather than doing a Human Torch impression."

[Recherché]

Bridget glances down at her arms finally noticing the glow.

OK, so let's deal with my human nightlight problem later. For now the Uncreated. They're nasties from the Night Roads. Hard to damage and it takes a lot of hurt to keep one down. They can more than kill a good fighter with one solid hit. They may look clumsy but they're fast as hell. Some can do stuff like mind control you into attacking allies or open up portals into the Uncreated Night. Those portals will kill you by the by. Or tons of other creepy and deadly magic. No known weaknesses If there's one thing in the database about Uncreated its that you do not screw around with them and live.

Still want to tango with them, Red? Oddly Bridget's tone is that of an actual question and not merely rhetorical.

[LordHavelock]

"Yes." Comes the indisputable answer, Red's voice clear and resonant in the air. "I can tell you, honestly, yes, I would want to fight it even if we were back in our own world and I couldn't do more than help carry wounded and dress wounds. Here, now, I can do more. We can do so much more."

It sounds a bit crazy, even to his own ears, but it's not just the fear or the desire for conflict any more.

"Look, I'm not saying we go out in a blaze of glory after we just got our lives back. There's people we can help though, fighting this thing without any of the things we can do just for their lives and homes. Fighting just to get away. Surely we can take on at least some of that? A . . . Rearguard, right? A fighting retreat? To dissuade pursuit."


He looks earnestly around the room.

[QuidEst]

"Uhh…" Vin cycled through the various sources in his head. "It depends. The first monster is… well, it's usually a demonstration of something." he said. "I don't want to try applying too much narrative structure to what I'm choosing to consider real life for all practical purposes, but the first monster demonstrates relative strength. Generally that's either by crushing the locals, before being defeated by the outsider, or the outsider is summarily defeated and barely escapes. Uhh, that bit about escaping is optional in some of the edgier works." If this was Re:Zero levels of badly-written torture porn, he was… well, there wasn't really an escape in that case, that was the point. There was something in between- group of four, bump one off for dramatic stakes? "In the case of victory, it's generally a hard-fought one, traditionally a precursor or close follow-up to the revelation of an invasion by the demon-lord arriving with an army of them. I'm not keen on banking on narrative causality, though, and I don't recall seeing any bazookas or what have you in person. I'll be honest, I want to practice attacking trees before I jump right into… minibosses. My compromise would be, try to get out, and if we run into it, call it destiny and try to do something."

[Sepulchritude]

Reagan takes the sword when it's offered to her, though the way she immediately sets it down on the bed behind her doesn't particularly say I plan to use this. She keeps trying to interject as the the discussion veers toward the post-postmodernist, but eventually has to just clear her throat at top volume the next time everyone's paused for breath.

"Hey, folks? I don't think this conversation about whether we exist or not is doing great things for Tanner." Reagan nods at the doorway, where the frightened tinker has been standing. "Look. Red. I won't let you pull something that stupid alone. But let's see the actual situation before we commit to hurling ourselves at it. And let's do it on the way to the stables," she insists. She at least remembers to grab the weapon as she stands up, before she takes her first step toward the door.

[Recherché]

Bridget nods and deliberately opens the door holding it open for the others to exit.

I don't want to seek out a confrontation with these creatures. However if we can save other people, then I don't feel comfortable abandoning them.

[LordHavelock]

"Sounds like about as much consensus as we're going to get." Red admits with a a grin that is still more eager than it should be under the circumstances. "We find horses, help who we can, and fight . . . To run away."

Slamming his fist into his open palm, he smiles, then looks around. ". . Anyone see what happened to my shirt?"

Settling for a vest and cloak thrown over his barre torso, on the way out, he whispers at Vin, "You're gonna to leave behind coin to cover the horses, right?"

[ylvathrall]

Moving out of the tavern, it's not hard to see where the fighting is. It's the direction with the screaming. You fight through the crowd in that direction, passing a small stable with a couple horses left, and see what's going on. The fighting is still outside the gate, but there are holes torn in the gate - torn through solid wood banded with iron, like it was cardboard - through which you can see the Uncreated.

It's about the size and shape of a large grizzly (of the four-legged variety), but the resemblance ends there. It's jet black in color, a black so dark that it seems less a color and more a void in the world, sucking in light and giving off nothing. Spines run down its back and along its side, in seemingly random arrangements. It has claws on its paws like knives, and as you watch it leaps ten feet straight up to snatch a defender off the palisade.

The Uncreated slowly looks up, and looks past the defenders straight at your group with eyes that burn with violet flame, the only color on it at all. The air, already cold with the rain turning to snow, takes on a deeper chill. Like the blackness of the Uncreated, it is more than a sensation, something that you can instinctively feel is wrong on a level deeper than you have ever felt before. It's a chill that seeps into your bones, aching, sapping your strength and your will.

[Sepulchritude]

Reagan growls. It's a low, rattly sound, all uvula and teeth, and her pupils have gone to pinpricks, and if the hair isn't standing up on the back of her neck, it's doing a great impression. When she opens her mouth to speak... Well, actually, her voice is totally normal, as though all the rest weren't a loss of control at all.

"Ordinarily, this is where I'd be trying to lead it away. But I can't tell who it would chase. I hope you all decided on fighting. I don't think we have any choice."

[Recherché]

Bridget freeses up feeling the anxiety building again. It's honestly not as bad as phone calls but neither is it good. Normally she'd try breathing exercises but there doesn't seem to be the time for that right now.

The faint streams of light that had been rising from her intensify into a bright glow that covers her entire body obscuring her appearance.

Something in Bridget's head breaks.

Something about her body shifts. It's no longer entirely solid. Instead she's become a loosely person shaped figure of transparent flickering light.

Bridget's head clears. It's not panic any longer. She's not sure she's capable of panic right now. Everything feels distant and abstract. Probably something about the lack of glands and hormones right now. She thinks to herself bemused. On an impulse she extends one of the tendrils of light that makes up her new body forwards. The ray hits the debris of the town and slices through it like a light saver. Well at least my offensive abilities seem to be point and click based.

https://i.imgur.com/M16q32Q.png

[Sepulchritude]

"What the... Jesus!" Reagan flinches hard when the beam of shining death sears the air right beside her, and harder when she glances back at the source and sees what's standing where Bridget had been. She grits her teeth hard enough to make her jawline bulge and her molars creak, then turns sharply back toward the gate. Her teeth don't exactly unclench to speak, either. "Cool. Lasers. At least we have some kind of offense."

Sweeping her gaze over the intervening wall, she quickly locates the nearest ladder. She takes a deep breath, sharply enough it almost sounds like a sob. Then she flips the saber around to a backhanded, cover-the-arm grip. "I'll get you an opening, then. You'd better make good use of it," she demands in a voice rapidly growing thick with some emotion or other. And then she takes off at a sprint, splashing through the mud and jumping hard enough to skip the first few rungs entirely. She's no Red. But even climbing with a hand full, she's quick.

Getting to the gate is another few strides, and the guard she has to squeeze past gets knocked clear off the wall, toward the inside. It'd be fair to say Reagan shoulders him a little harder than she has to, really. The scream as she dives off the palisade is not a warcry. More like the noise a chimp makes when there's a tiger under the tree. Maybe a warcry would have been better. Even with both hands and all her weight on it, the point of the sword just skitters down the thing's side, and she lands hard in the mud right beside it, scrambling to recover enough to defend herself.

Easy success (http://orokos.com/roll/768273)(26) on the dex roll to scale the wall in one rush, but just a little shy (http://orokos.com/roll/768274)(18 17) of actually landing the hit.
Current AC is 8. If the incoming attack would hit, I am absolutely committing effort against the Cold Breath, and Eff/day to use Fly's Leap as a miracle to jump out of the way.

[LordHavelock]

The sight of what can only be the Uncreated gives Red pause; the monster is just too real for him to wrap his head around for too long a moment. He hadn't known what to picture, but everything so absolutely wrong about it existing in plain sight, moving and rending and slaughtering a man before his eyes doesn't seem like anything that could be happening, but there's nothing in him to actually disbelief the evidence of his eyes. When the abomination sets its attention to them, unerringly, he realizes his teeth are set in a broad grin that the fight is nothing they can run away from any longer. It won't matter a moment if he dies like the guard from the palisade of course, but then, he's hopefully not alone.

Bridget's transformation into an angel of light almost elicits a bad pick-up line from him, but in deference to what he'd been able to gather so far, he punches Vin in the arm and grins. "Not bad having Phoenix on our side, right?" Holding out his hand, a light weight but sturdy aluminum bat appears in hand, too long for the hyena to use at the plate, but just fine for some up-close-brawling. Idly, he wonders if it will be able to hold up to the super-anthropomorphic strength of the spotted feliform, but then Reagan is already moving into the fray.

Not to be left out, Red is right alongside for a moment, and then with his gaze fixated on their foe, the whole of the world seems to enter into that increasingly familiar sense of an effortless endeavor; every footfall is like he's wearing trainers at the treadmill, yet he moves with blinding speed towards his enemy, nothing about the path between them a consideration, except where he will land the first blow. It all plays out faster than anyone around seems able to act, yet he moves with a grace and purpose that causes the cloak ripple out behind him as if he's on a parade ground . . . or running slow motion on a beach. The gate is beneath him, and he hasn't even had to jump, his heel impacting the palisade, weight forward as he pushes off and towards the creature, fist first. At the same time, gathering around his hands with that translucent shine from the sword before are a pair of forearm length red leather bracers and gloves, laced down from his wrist, Everlast written in a bold font across the back of the hand.

[QuidEst]

"All right, gonna go with 'destiny or functional equivalent' on this one," Vin said, grimacing as the creature suddenly focused on them. "… Okay, that's pretty reassuring for fighting a darkness monster thing," he added as Bridget opted to throw a little more wave in with her particles.

Okay, so… probably stay behind the person who had possibly opted out of biology. Attacking… well, he was pretty strong, but currently unarmored and really not keen on testing how hardy he was. How do I shot web indeed. Well, here went nothing… he folded his middle two finders in, pointing at the creature like Spider-Ham shooting web. The results were. Unexpected.

The leap onto the palisade had dislodged some stone, which finally fell, landing on a cart abandoned in the panic. It seesawed violently, launching some carpenter's tools in a high arc… where they thudded into the ground a foot away from the creature. "I'm, uh, still working on the aim," Vin said, cautiously edging further away from the creature. Maybe less of the obvious pointing next time…

[Recherché]

The creature of light is absolutely silent as she lashes out like a whip with one of the tendrils again, this time towards the monster in question. The beam hits unlike her companions attacks however it doesn't cut through the creature. Something about its unnatural flesh reflects the light and it bounces off the Uncreated with only minimal damage.

Bridget gives a wordless growl of frustration as she backs further away from the thing. She's hit it successfully. It's going to consider her a threat now and she would rather not be within reach when that happens. If she can lead the creature away from the towns and civilians at the same time then so much the better.

[ylvathrall]

A voice crawls inside your mind and insinuates itself through the dark empty places within it, sliding into your thoughts with a touch of the same unearthly chill as the air holds, bringing to mind for just a moment every dark and petty thing you ever did, every bit of guilt that weighed you down in your past life. Well, little godlings, little children of Hell. What a pleasant surprise.

It rears up and then crashes down on the gate, shattering it in its entirety like it's made of glass, knocking townsfolk sprawling in the rubble. One of the spikes on its side suddenly twists to lash out at Red in the wake of its movement.

Gate is gone. You can move out past the Uncreated freely. Attack on Red: [roll0]

[Recherché]

If I had a bladder I'd probably be losing control of it right now. Something about the unnatural voice pierces through the glass clear state of Bridget's mind. Godling though? What does it know about us? Can we trust it?

Bridget pauses for a second contemplating negotiating before she sees the body in front of her. There is a dead child here. Negotiations have already broken down.

She whips out another beam of brilliant light, this time even brighter than before in an attempt to break through the armor. Possibly a little too strong given how it flies off course. It feels like trying to aim a fire hose blasting this hard. Shouldn't hitting a giant ... thing with a freaking lightsaber be easier?

[QuidEst]

Vin circled around as the creature advanced, generally hoping to lead it back away from civilians if it was interested in them. He focused again, but without the gesture. Gate shards ricocheted improbably back in the general direction of the creature, even less probably igniting in the process. They missed, and he found himself wishing for an evening with a practice dummy. "We'll look the term up later," Vin said. "… Optimistically speaking."

[LordHavelock]

Speaking was the last ting he'd expected, honestly. Whispers in his mind leave Red oddly pensive, thinking over past pettiness, a laundry list of his less then shining moments, every time he used his own popularity and celebrity to the detriment of others. It's nothing he hasn't dwelt on before, one of the big reasons he sought a fresh start . . . in Miami. This, this was something all behind him now, and if anything it made him that much more determined to do better, to lead a life he can be proud of, and with this moment as the crucible. By contrast, the lashing out of one of the spikes on the side of the abomination feels almost anticipated. It doesn't move or act like anything natural, but it still feels telegraphed a mile away, and he shifts with an effortless grace away from the blow, unable to stop himself from smiling as he follows up on the movement, striking out at the point where the spine itself was launched.

"Get real, Noid!" Red calls out full of bravado, "Go write it in your burn book and save us the psych-out!"


[roll0]

[Sepulchritude]

"Children of Hell!" Reagan laughed a little too wildly for someone as close as she was to certain disembowelment. Especially with just a stick to shake at the thing. "You're one to talk! Child of nothing at all! Now get out of my head."

The words were fear and pain and scorn so sharp it made thoughts bleed, and some day she would probably be better at focusing something like that. Some day. But for now it was like standing too close to the tree when lightning strikes. Too close to the pyre burning the witch. Not the target, but uncomfortably aware of the violence involved. Except for the target, of course.

Pulling out the spontaneous archmagery. The Uncreated gets to make a spirit save or take 3HD psychic damage at the beginning of Reagan's next turn. She takes 1HP from channeling it. (cf. http://orokos.com/roll/769344)