Inside 70: Surprisingly Pleasant

[Rebonack]

[Cormorant House]

Magdalene makes a point of grabbing her armor when they're moving through the absurdly hot room. Just sort of... nimbly scooping it up as she goes. She obviously has significant experience when it comes to collecting loot quickly. Really it isn't great armor buts it hers. She could probably commission something that isn't garbage if she really wanted to but the familiar is comforting. Especially when you've found yourself cast into such an unfamiliar world.

Like...

If she felt like it she can go to one of those all you can eat restaurants and pay some iron to just eat as much as she wants!

Well technically not as much as she wants.

They usually kick her out after, like, two hours and then she has to find a new one. But thankfully there are a bunch of them between Inside and Riverside.

Yeah... that's pretty great.

Mags' mind is wandering a bit as they escort the survivors out of the house since there doesn't appear to be any immediate danger.

Oh hey they're outside.

"Huh?" is her intelligent response to Billie's question. "Uh. Maybe one of them changed their mind? Like this one time I was going after Chthon cultists and I found one of their meeting places blown up already. One of the cultists had realized that what they were doing was really (flowery) and lit the place up to stop 'em."

[Dr.Gunsforhands]

[Philip Memorial Library]

Leslie tenses up defensively. "Oh! Haha, no, it's, um, that's better. It's just, it's hard to find someone to test things on ethically, and um... but I'm actually relieved! Really!" She quickly tries to change the subject. "So, um, other than that! Martial arts, you said? I don't really know much about those, but I don't think you can really learn them from a book. Is the idea that they can't control you if you empty your mind?"

She thinks for a moment.

"There are a few places you could go if you want to practice something like that. Vigil might have a class for its members, and there might be a guru or someone at Halo you could meet."

[bc56]

Nothing stops the heroes from absconding with the prisoners. They're loaded onto the ambulance, with varying degrees of willingness (the man whose wife is missing is particularly resistant to leaving). The teenager shouts back, "Thank you! Good luck!" As they depart. Then the heroes are alone with the creepy house again.

[Earl of Purple]

Sunlight Gardens

"Yes, it's working. This is... quite odd." Sekhmet will probably find she sounds different, since whilst she's not listening to a recording of herself, the way you hear your voice is altered by the fact the sound waves are starting the other side of your eardrum to other people's voices, or something like that.

Prumathe smiles at Sekhmet, trying to meet her eyes though he can't see exactly where he's looking.

[Deathkeeper]

[Plaza Park]

Beth gets her answer in the form of Hector starting to unconsciously back away from the stone, his Other managing to stand still long enough to slip back into his shadow as the pair get close.
And in this instance, slipping a certain jar into his bag.

[bc56]

"I'll, uh, try to stay close to you." Sekhmet looks away. She's trying not to confuse Prumathe further. This link is not easy to maintain. She needs as few distractions as possible. And is that really what she sounds like? Her voice is kinda... Annoying, isn't it? Of course Prumathe probably doesn't think that. "I'll uh, do my best to guide you home. Unless you'd rather stay at my cabin until we recover?" Sekhmet reaches out a hand to steady Prumathe, but he will see it from her perspective, of course. It took Sekhmet days of practice to get over the feeling of seeing herself through someone else's eyes, and she had help from her natural psychic abilities and the Hive.

[5a Violista]

[Philip Memorial Library]

It's okay, it was a joke.

"...I don't know how it would work," Minerva says. "Just seems like the sort of thing that makes sense to exist." Anti-mind-control and martial arts. The two things just feel like they'd fit together really well.

"So, um. Vigil. Halo. What are those, again?" He's already heard about GLoG but that's about it. "They sound like neat places."

[Rebonack]

[Plaza Park]

Up goes the rock!

And the pixies immediately begin wailing.

Not in pain, though. More like-

"UGH you're so lame!"
"SO lame!"
"Why would you do that now we've gotta leave!"

And that's exactly what they start doing-

-though not before checking under the log for their stolen happy.

They are, unsurprisingly, upset when they discover it's gone.

"THIEVES! Someone stole our stolen magic!"
"The NERVE! Who would do that?"
"They can't be far we better go find 'em!"
"YEAH! And then steal all their teeth!"

Oh boy that sounds great.

Off the pixies go zipping.

Mission... accomplished?

[Hattish Thing]

[Cormorant House]

Billie frowns as they make their way back to the manorhouse.

She wasn't especially convinced by the theory that one of the cultists would have had second thoughts.

Cults were generally great, grasping entities which would swallow every aspect of one's life. Besides, if these objects were so important, how would the others not notice that it had gone missing? More likely, perhaps, was the theory that someone had been trying to get rid of something incriminating. But then, what about the bracer was particularly suspicious?

Furthermore, they hadn't actually encountered any cultists themselves. Captives were often unreliable witnesses.

Billie's response is like a whisper, "Okay, quiet down." She'll attempt to push the front door open.

Her face is stony, she wasn't enthusiastic about returning. "I'd expect resistance, now."

She'll aim her flashlight through the foyer.

---

[Jade's Lair]

Oh no, this thing was really complicated looking.

She didn't know what she was doing. What if she broke it somehow?

With an anxious look, she reaches for the switch and pulls down. The noise of the machine does little to calm her nerves, nor does its many revolving arms. From within the scanner, Naomi murmurs a complaint or two, "Okay, um. I really don't like this. How much longer?" This was really bothering her now. She felt like bashing the thing open.

The scan will pick up the following: her body heat is unusually low, but she's otherwise just fine.

Trace amounts of radiation are discovered as well.

---

[Grey Zone - Museum Street Backalley]

Billie does not find the other officer's joke particularly amusing.

She was clearly in shock, though. Best be gentle with her, though - people processed grief differently.

When it becomes apparent that Jane is once again capable of carrying on a conversation, Billie clears her throat. She really wasn't very certain of what had occurred here. Reports had been scarce, and details had conflicted. This was the best way to get a grasp on the situation at hand.

With a neutral voice, she asks a starting question, "What happened here, officer?"

---

[Slums - Patton Publications]

The panhandler had mentioned the cabaret.

Now, with the poster so clearly in view? All signs pointed towards it.

The address is plainly written upon the poster. It wasn't far, and there were shows every night. Nothing savory, of course.

[Dr.Gunsforhands]

[Philip Memorial Library]

"Well, I haven't really had occasion to run into them," Leslie qualifies, "but my understanding is that Vigil is kind of Inside's de-facto military? They always have something going on, but I think they're mainly there to deal with really big problems, like the Blood Moon, or big Kaiju, or someone trying to take over the world with robots. Halo is more like an adventurer's guild, I think. My sister was looking into it, but I'm not sure what she decided about it."

[Rebonack]

[Cormorant House]

Magdalene opens her mouth to reply with something snarky when Billie says to be quiet, but she seems to think better of it and shuts her mouth just as quickly. She's strapped her armor back on since they aren't getting cooked. Yet. At least not up here on the ground floor.

The basement and the secret passages were bad.

Here not so much, though.

Temp was just fine in here.

Though she had gotten the impression that Billie was taking it much worse than she was.

Maybe...

"Uh... hey? If it starts getting hot again I could maybe do something about that? To, y'know, help a little? It's kind of weird, though," she warns. She can tell Billie doesn't particularly approve of the abilities her pact grants her. Which is fine. She doesn't exactly approve of them either, but she did what she had to do to survive.

[bc56]

Cormorant House

The malevolent presence is very strong now, and strangely, the layout of the foyer has changed. The doors are in the same places, but there are no stairs up to the upper floor anymore, just a balcony. The furniture that was originally in the center of the room is just gone, the temperature is noticably hotter, and the floor which was carpet and tile before is just dry sand. A conical pit takes up the center of the room. There are doors to the left and right which could be reached by skirting around the edges of the pit, and one on the far side, which would require a way to cross safely.

Jade's Lair

"Just a little more. That should just about do it." The switch automatically resets itself, the arms stop moving, and the machine opens back up. "I have good news and bad news. Which do you want first?" Oh no. Jade is playing that game.

[5a Violista]

[Philip Memorial Library]

Minerva nods as he listens. "So a military group and a..." How do you even describe what an adventurer's guild is? Well. Hm. Normally guilds are, like, monopolies or labor unions or something like that. It's got to be the same for an adventurer's guild, right? "um, labor union. I see."

Makes sense.
"I can see why they'd have those kinds of things there."

He pauses.
Then,
"So," he says. "Besides a library or military base, do you know any place that would be better to learn about...all the stuff?"

[Zefir]

[Grey Zone - Museum Street Backalley]

Billie does not find the other officer's joke particularly amusing.

She was clearly in shock, though. Best be gentle with her, though - people processed grief differently.

When it becomes apparent that Jane is once again capable of carrying on a conversation, Billie clears her throat. She really wasn't very certain of what had occurred here. Reports had been scarce, and details had conflicted. This was the best way to get a grasp on the situation at hand.

With a neutral voice, she asks a starting question, "What happened here, officer?"

[Grey Zone - Museum Street Backalley]

It wasn't really a joke she made. It was meant in a more ironic way. But she migth also just speak out thinks that appear to others as jokes. Jane remains calm looking at the cup as she takes a sip from it to clear her throat.

"It was a normal day so far. Just caught a few people driving to fast or parking in the wrong place. Nothing mayor.
At 16:05 we got a call that people have heared fighting sounds. Sure this place got a lot of them, but we have to look over it even if there is a so called 'hero' fighting a villian. John and I went in. We sticked through the protocol. He was in front securing the area while i report back and safe the back. The alley was n't as cramped as most others so we could add some space between us. We reached the corner leading deeper into the alley when jhon gave me signs to be ready and silent. He jumps out pointing his gun at a person I couldn't see. He announced his precense like in the books, but befor he was done his face went white. Whatever he saw seems to shocked him. I was waiting for his signal to follow up and then heared some strange noise." she puts the cup away to have her hands free. "It sounded like sime kind of wire or so that got bowed in a different shape. The next moment, Johns hands were cut of his arms. they flew down like tfeywferefill wfoer....." at this point it will be hard to understand. The woman has broken out in tears and rests her face in her hands. She still tries to go on but her tears and hands make it impossible to understand. She doesn't seem to catch herself, but what she said about the wire wasn't in the reports so far. Thought none has talked to jane before Billie

[WindStruck]

[Deadwood Street - Gray Zone??]

After leaving Trogs, Solstice wandered quite a ways, taking in the multitude of fantastical sights, sounds, and even sometimes, unfortunately smells. It was all almost too much to take in! In a normal setting, Solstice would have definitely stood out, but so many people were so unique and strange that she didn't, too much. Solstice wasn't sure what she was looking for.. opportunity?? But it's kind of hard to get an opportunity when you're shy and keep to yourself. Solstice hoped to find something to do, some way to acquire something of power just by observing her surroundings, but it wasn't really working.

At one point she wandered into some kind of ... compartment. Actually, it was apparently a lot of different compartments combined together, from front to back. It started moving and she lurched! Nearly falling over, she donned her deerskin gloves so that she could hold onto a railing safely, without a possible risk of burning herself. Things whirred by outside the windows. It was extremely disorienting. Then the contraption stopped and Solstice quickly made her way out before another ordeal such as the last started.

She found herself in an odd place: dry, dusty, kind of barren. There were rustic, rickety wooden buildings lining the dirt streets. Men and women rode on horses, but also mostly walked about the town. Also there were wagons pulled by horse. There was also the odd steam-powered buggy and other dangerous, punkish looking people, some with partial robotic features and augments and dangerous-looking weapons about their sides. The latter steampunk stuff was completely foreign to Solstice, but one thing was certain: all that steel and metal was surely to be dangerous to her. Hmm.. this place was not as tame as things initially seemed to be.

The 'train' that Solstice had exited from swiftly departed, leaving a bumpy dirt road behind her intersected by railway tracks. Before her was the town. Behind her a veritable endless wasteland of steppe brush, dirt, and picturesque cliffs and plateaus. The sun was already starting to beat down on her. With seemingly nowhere else to go, Solstice cautiously entered the western-themed town, giving everyone a wide berth as she carefully explored. She passed a general store; a saloon where smoke, piano music, and laughing emanated; a bank; and then finally stopped in front of a sheriff's office. Some posters had caught her attention:

____________________________________
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ WANTED _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Simon Seyz
DEAD or ALIVE

For the crimes of train robbery, forgery, bank robbery, murder, selling firearms
to Indians, spitting in the wrong spittoon, never saying, "May I?" etc etc etc....

[the list continues on for quite a bit]

The lawfully elected and ordained Sheriff Herbert Hughson hereby places a
bounty on the capture or death - with proof - of the infamous criminal,
SIMON SEYZ. Bring proof of death* or relinquish the criminal scum to one of
the many sheriff's offices conveniently located throughout Deadwood Street.

*Fraudulent death certificates are not valid forms of proof.

$10,000
_ _ _ REWARD _ _ _

Solstice peered at the poster for a bit. There were other similar ones as well. Hmm... this could prove interesting. Find a wanted criminal, track them down? And the reward certainly seemed valuable... it might be all she needed so she would not have to negotiate bargains for everything...

[Earl of Purple]

Sunlight Gardens

"My place is nearer, but I've got stairs to get there. I think it's safer to stay with you, until I have working eyes again. Unless you want to stay with me for a while? I've got a camp bed, you can have my bed." Prumathe's visited Sekhmet's cabin, but she hasn't seen his flat yet.

[bc56]

Sekhmet thinks about it. "I've, uh, never seen your place before." And there's a nonzero chance she'll be living there in the near future, once they're married. She should see the place. "But I, uh, don't want to impose."

[Dr.Gunsforhands]

[Phil Mem Lib]

"Oh, all the things? All of them?" Leslie jokes. She absentmindedly taps her finger on a book as she thinks. "Well... do they have the matrix where you're from? Or, um, the internet, rather? It's not exactly a reliable source, but if you can get on a computer, Googolplex and Riftline News can give you a high-level feel for what happens where. Other than that, I guess the best thing you can do just go around and talk to people. Which I guess is pretty much what you're doing right now!"

She pauses and watches Minerva for a bit, still tapping and thinking. "I, um, kind of have some questions for you too. I'm just not sure how to ask them without sounding impossibly general. What was your planet called?"

--

[Plaz Park]

Beth just waves goodbye to the offenders as they kindly buzz off.

"Okay, I guess that's that," she says to Hector, not turning to face him lest the pixies turn around and see them conspiring. "Now what?"

[5a Violista]

[PhilMemLib]

"Yup, definitely want to know all the things," he responds, nodding sagely. "There's an internet, so I know how to use it. And my boss told me about another library that has a bunch of computers, so I was probably going to check that one out next."

It's good to have confirmation, though, that going around and talking to people is the right thing to do.
Sure, Minerva would've done that anyway even if it wasn't the right way to go about things, but doing the right thing is always good.

"It's fine," Minerva says, about the potential for impossibly general questions. "To me, seems like even things as basic as what a name is is different here, so I kind-of get having to ask basic dumb general questions. It's why I'm hoping libraries will help me get an idea so I don't have to ask people things like 'what even is a name and are you using it the same why i am' because then they'll all get the wrong impression."

Minerva takes a breath, before going on to answering the question: "It's called Eris," he says.

[Dr.Gunsforhands]

[Philipomemorialivbrayt]

"Huh?"

It's clearly not a joke. Some clashing idea of what's in a name must have come up for Minerva recently. Leslie's brow scrunches up. She's so busy trying to parse the thing about names that she almost misses the important one when Minerva lays it on her.

"Eris. That's a nice name," she says, "but, um, what do you mean by that? Does it having a name mean something different for you? Or..."

Oh, cool, we've found an impossibly general question already, and it's not even one Leslie was thinking of! Formulating a way to explain the basic underlying concept of names might take a minute.

[Deathkeeper]

[Plaza Park]

”Well I guess we open the jar of happy and let it return back to the people it was stolen from? Honestly I have no idea how it works. At the very least with them gone everyone will probably recover on their own eventually.” Hector posits, trying to stop his retreating legs and having a rough time of it.

[bc56]

Someone watches the elf look at the wanted poster. She's an unusually beautiful woman, with a full figure and shoulder length brown hair. She's dressed as a cowgirl, with a jeans and a plaid vest over a white top that shows both cleavage and midriff. A revolver is buckled at her waist, but it looks futuristic and high tech. "Hey pardner," she drawls, "Lookin' to pick up a bounty?" The way she talks suggests she doesn't normally speak like that, but it's an affectation.

[Dr.Gunsforhands]

[Plaza Park]

Beth looks over her shoulder to see Hector reluctantly scooting away. It takes her a second to remember that the shadow was also technically a fey creature, for whatever that entails.

"Huh. Are you okay? Is your shadow just dragging you around, now?" She runs up to catch up with the bound duo. "Let's head back to the vacuum shop. If you're feeling whatever that rock is doing, we need to get you fixed before you start forgetting how cake works or something."

[5a Violista]

[Philipomemorialivbrayt]

"Kind-of?" Minerva says. "Maybe? I mean, to me, a name's a name, but..." He's encountering the same problem that Leslie has in trying to explaining how it works.

Maybe, he thinks, explaining what led him to realize the difference might help get at it. "So basically, down that hallway," he points in the direction he came from, before meeting the library, "I met this telepathic book that wanted to know my name. I told it my name, but that but that wasn't good enough for it, and it clearly didn't want my other name either because it just kept on asking for my first name even though it already knew it..." He takes a breath, then continues. "But, sure, okay, it's just my first name, so there's no loss in that, but it was pretty obvious it wanted it for something and it clearly thought having my first name would have some value to it - which, to me, there obviously isn't -" Time for another breath, "if it had tried to get my true name, then, sure, I'd understand why, or even more of my earned names, but, like...it clearly was under the impression that my first name actually had some value, y'know?"
Minerva now looks back at Leslie. "...and I'm guessing half of what I said doesn't really make sense or sound familiar. Right?"

Minerva leans his elbow onto the table, and then pushes his hair back.

[Arkhosia]

[Kraken Open a Book]

So!

How well do our aquatic friends read Azari? Or maybe Akkadian? Have they brushed up on their Ugaritic or Minoan recently? What about Egyptian hieroglyphics?

If not, then reading the books might be kind of hard.

Or...

Maybe a lot hard.

Since most of them are written in extinct languages that no living person has uttered for millennia.

And if the CAN read them? Then wow! They're going to learn a whole lot about curses! Most of them rituals for cursing gods and demons of the underworld. There's this one snake called Apep who apparently no one likes.

The irrelevant person, meanwhile, watches the goings on.

Irrelevantly.

[Kraken Open a Book]

Oh boy, ancient extinct languages!

...

Turns out Suzie speaks about three of them, as the flicks through various books and mutters the odd word or two.

But reading the books here is going to take forever! This simply won't do!

Within moments, Suzie is a whirlwind of books as she grabs them by the tentacleful of the shelves, scans a couple of pages, then sets them aside. "Yes, yes, yes, no, yes, no, no, yes, no, yes, yes, no..." And on and on it goes.

"Are you finding anything useful, Minion?" She asks, half-surrounded by a veritable fortress of books stacked around her.

Frankly, I'm impressed Suzie could read. Marina might be surprised too, at least in regards to the sheer volume of them she appears to be fluent in. The kraken has many virtues in the maid's eyes, but the patience required to learn foreign languages is not one of them.

Marina is a fair bit more thorough than Marina, skimming through books and tables of contents at a quick pace. She only knows one with some degree of familiarity with another - but she tries to make do with a few she can't read via any illustrations within, as useful as that is for the particular subject matter. Academia is sadly not terribly fond of them though.

"Um, not yet mistress". She doesn't miss a beat in her task to answer.

[WindStruck]

Solstice whirls around to face the one speaking to her, somewhat surprised. Well, the more she wandered about this 'Nexus', the more likely that someone was eventually going to single her out, right? She looks up and down at the cowgirl briefly, not exactly comprehending the outfit that she's looking at, other than the fact that it seemed to be the type of garb most people were wearing around here...

Solstice glanced back at the poster. "Well, I was reading this..." and she nodded.

Peering curiously at the one speaking to her, she said, "Uhm. You must be mistaken. I have never gone by the name 'Pardner' before. But you may call me Solstice, if you wish."

[Hattish Thing]

[Grey Zone - Museum Street Backalley]

Throughout the officer's explanation, Detective Bansford is silent.

She retrieves a small notebook and starts to neatly take down notes, careful not to miss anything.

Anonymous tips regarding strange noises? Fairly standard stuff, especially around this part of the city. The officers arrived on the scene, and the deceased partner moved forward into the alleyway. This is when he encountered something, but was unable to convey what he had seen to his partner back at the patrol car. A strange sound, something like a wire being pulled taut. Major injuries were sustained.

This was baffling. A trap, perhaps? Or some sort of wire cord killer? What would it all point to?

Then, Jane starts to weep. Billie will simply reach an arm over her shoulder.

Quietly, she'll whisper, "It's alright. It's alright."

"It's not your fault."

---

[Cormorant House]

Detective Bansford scowls as she takes in the altered layout.

The only thing worse than the great, terrible pit at its center would be this intolerable heat.

Fortunately for her, she hadn't put her overcoat back on since she chained it around her neck. As such, it's not quite as awful as it would have been. Still, this was not the best possible environment for the task at hand. She glances towards the sides of the pit, noting the thin walkway leading to the doors at either side of the foyer. She mutters with a raised brow, "I really hope that's not our only option."

Skirting the edges of the anomaly at the center seemed like a fool's errand.

At Magdalene's mention of magic, she nods curtly.

Anything to cool the place down.

"Alright. Do it."

---

[Jade's Lair]

Naomi is quite clearly upset when she steps out from the machine.

This whole thing was really stressful, and doctors had always made her uncomfortable.

Once Jade mentions good news, a weak smile appears upon her cherubic face. That sounded good. Maybe everything was fine, and she had no reason to be worried about anything? That would be lovely. Then, however, Jade mentions the bad news. At this, Naomi bursts into tears! All the while, the voice snickers in her head.

"Trch. You're pathetic."

[bc56]

Jade's Lair

Jade's efforts to not be motherly at Naomi fall apart, and she immediately hugs the poor girl and tries to comfort her. "Shh. It's okay. It's not that bad. You'll be all right. I promise." Hopefully that's convincing. It may or may not be. But he's trying.

Deadwood Street

"It's not a... It's just a thing you say. It's not a name." Just like that, the woman's fake accent has shattered. "I'm Jade." She holds out a hand to shake. "Nice to meet you."

[Rebonack]

[Cormorant House]

"Okay, so, I've only got one of these things," Magdalene says as she reaches into her pack and withdraws what appears to be a reused liquor bottle. Inside is a effervescent, icy blue liquid. Condensation is thick on the glass, the difference in temperature sharp enough to cause the air to wriggle like a mirage. "I went through a ton of them when I was exploring those stupid ruins in the desert, but I had this one left y'know? This heat is getting to you pretty (flowering) bad so, uh."

She holds the bottle out to Billie.

"Here. Chug it. The whole thing. It'll cut the heat for, like, I dunno. An hour or two?"

It will also provide resistance to fire and burns!

That's always a good thing, right?

Nobody likes being set on fire. Or at least nobody wroth mentioning.

"Also there is monster in that hole I bet. Let's see, what sorta junk have I got in here...?" Magdalene mutters as she slings her pack off and begins rummaging through it. After a few minutes she comes up with a rather large fragment of bleached bone.

She tosses it into the middle of the pit just to see what happens.

[WindStruck]

Solstice didn't understand. Just a thing you say?? She raised an eyebrow but didn't press the issue further.

Seemingly unperturbed by Jade's change of accent Solstice also extends a hand, albeit only tentatively, to gingerly shake Jade's outstretched hand. Her handshake is quite timid and uncertain. Not sure if she can really trust this stranger.. and not even sure if she's doing the gestures right.

"Yes. It is nice to meet you as well, Jade," Solstice said. She refrained from tacking on 'for now' to the end of that sentence. Although still true, it was wholly unnecessary.

Turning back to the wanted poster, Solstice says, "Were you interested in this as well? It seems like a lucrative exchange. Though.. I must admit, this man does seem quite dangerous.. and ill-mannered."