Day 3: Morning

Morning: 6:00am - 12:00noon

[ IRL Timeframe: April 22nd - ~~April 29th~~ May 8th, 2019 ]

It's the third day and, in striking comparison to day two, it is not a bright and sunny morning. The day begins for every hero with an unfamiliar room in an unfamiliar place in an unfamiliar time.

When your characters check their phones, clocks, calendars, or any other timekeeping implement they'll find that the year is 00 AW, forty years before the present day. The year before the Wizard's first game was held, the year before it came down to only two knights and the Princess facing off against the Wizard. It was before all of it.

Everywhere your characters go, there are no people. Their devices will not connect to the internet outside of the island, their companions will not appear, the Protector will not answer, but they can text each other without difficulty. If groups in the same city try to find each other, they will find that some kind of mystical plot barrier is keeping them from finding each other. A wrong turn, a locked door, a lost connection. Somehow, they're kept apart. All the support they have is who they woke up with. Oddly, everyone wakes up in their normal day-to-day clothing rather than pajamas.

There have to be answers somewhere, but where?

Third Morning Event: All Cities: The Past.

The Weather
Eerily still.
64°F / 18°C
The trees are unmoving, there is no wind.

Prompts:

6:30am Spa Hotel, Bamborough: Two sets of heroes wake up in the Spa Hotel in Bamborough. Garrot wakes up in the same room as Olivia. On the far side of the Spa hotel, in one of the waterfront cabins, Haizea and Joanna wake up in the same room. The hotel is empty, but every room is unlocked. Food's still in the dining areas, too. Oddly, things look like they were in use around the Hotel. Carts in the middle of hallways, half-eaten meals on tables, bags halfway up staircases. Odd.

6:30am Lodge Cots, Craydon: The Craydon lodge isn't much, but it's a spanning complex of cabins that maximize occupancy by filling them with cots for that "outdoor camping" experience. Rory and Gail will wake up in one of the cabins near the base of the mountain. On the furthest edge of the lodge, Gyre and Seth will wake up in their top-level cots higher up the mountain. There are a few campfires going with meat roasting over them, piles of raw meat to the side ready to cook, and various festivities left laying around. It's almost like everyone up and left all at once, but where did they go?

6:30am Cozy Inn, Far Haven: Far Haven's 'Cozy Inn' promises the 'small town feeling' in the middle of the big city. The inside is exactly that, a very cozy little hotel with three floors of rooms and a covered walkway with a glass floor over a garden into another section of the hotel. Zafika and Web will wake up in a room on the first floor nearest the train station exit of the cozy inn. No doors are locked here and it looks as if things were left strewn about like the people just teleported out of here. Terrence, Matilda, and Luka wake up in the glass walkway above, in sleeping bags. They'll find that the only way out goes to the cozy inn's far building, they'll have to go through a spanning cafeteria space with tons of empty tables that, strangely, look like they were just in use. Plates with half-full, or even untouched plates sit around on every table and there are even jackets draped over some chairs, purses on the ground. The city outside is much the same, vehicles just stopped in the middle of the street with no drivers, things dropped on the ground. What happened...?

9:30am, Exploration, Bamborough, Craydon, Far Haven: The scene is much the same in all three cities. When the heroes make their way outside, they'll notice that the sky above Harsen Island is a massive vortex centered over the mountain in the middle of the island. Heroes in Craydon will get to see it a little closer, the massive clouds occasionally crackling with blue lightning. All three cities have glowing cracks in the ground in various places, the cracks lead all around, some larger, some smaller, maybe there's something to be found? There are large glowing obelisks that are floating over each city and outside of them, they occasionally float down near the ground enough to touch or look closer at. Once the heroes make their way out into the streets, they might start seeing glimpses of a Wizard hat in the distance but each time it passes behind a wall or into shadow and is gone. Maybe they can catch up? Maybe your hero takes a moment to search through local news, the paper, letters, a television station. What's going on in the city right now?

Procedure:

Reply to the appropriate toplevel comments for events below. Indicate if a post is a private conversation with "Private" in the subject otherwise all threads should be open to interaction with others. Plan OOCly how you'd like to toss everyone around.

Important: 'Exploration' toplevels will unlock additional information as items in their descriptions are explored. If your character explores a feature, write [Character explores ____] at the end of your tag and send a ping on Discord to get a reply with further details regarding that item.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"FUCK," he barks, ducking back behind the wall for a moment. He can't believe the wizard? this person? has surprised him twice now, and he grits his teeth hard. They haven't attacked him yet though. He doesn't have a reason to think they're dangerous once he gets over the teeth. Right? Hopefully.

He's ducked down lower when he pokes his head out again, squinting up at them. Way way up at them. Fuck, they're tall.

"Why did you change how you look? We're only three days in."

When Gyre ducks away, they take the opportunity to stand upright and move slightly closer to the door. He doesn't see them move, they're just closer when he looks.

At his question, though, they say nothing.

But when he blinks, he'll be back inside the elevator with them standing beside him. Their head is tilted quite a bit so their Wizard hat isn't crushed against the ceiling, and the button for "G" has been pressed. The elevator is slowly going down.

And when it arrives and Gyre blinks again, they're standing in the lobby area just outside the elevator while he's left inside of it as the doors open.

What the fuck. What the fuck! He hasn't been this tense in a long time, his shoulders bunched up, his hands clenched hard. He stiffly waits in silence as the elevator sinks back down. He was feeling claustrophobic before, but now with this giant person in here, this space is unbearable. He feels like he's about to have a fucking meltdown here, and suddenly he's alone.

He's about to shout in frustration when he sees them there in the lobby. So he hasn't been abandoned but they want to show off? Why? He takes a slow, deep breath, trying to steady himself, not even beginning to move until the doors start to shut on him.

"You don't have to jump around. I've seen your magic before," he grumbles, stepping out after them and moving to their side. Or well. Close to their side. He's keeping a few feet between them because he has no idea what they're thinking. They could still be dangerous. He has no idea. Ugh, this is weird and sucks.

"Can you talk?" he asks, switching to sign after that, "I know sign if you need?"

They watch him approach them, turning only once he's taken up a place by their side. Once again they blip, this time reappearing in the door of the building with another long exhale. The cloud of steam stays floating in front of them for longer, electrical crackles starting to radiate out from it.

They turn when he approaches them, stepping out into the street. They only take a few steps before they stop, their gaze turning down to the glowing cracks in the ground. They turn again to look at Gyre, watching him for several moments to make sure he's watching.

And then they lift up a leg and slam their foot down on the crack.

There's a boom sound as the two make contact and the Wizard's form is sent rocketing in this horrible airborn arc. They're spinning horribly in the air, like an injured bird, and they sail through the air until they strike the ground in a not-close but not-far wooded area.

The crack on the ground is left glowing brighter, crackling horribly like it's charged with electricity.

WELL once again, he's startled by them, ducking down in surprise at the sound. It's uh a little too close to a gunshot and he ends up freezing in place for several seconds, just breathing quickly and shaking.

He doesn't move for almost a full minute, and when he finally does, it's only to look at the crack in the ground. He doesn't understand why it's brighter. He doesn't understand what they were even doing. He hates this, shakily standing after another minute. Brushing himself off. Taking a deep breath.

And jogging off in the direction he saw them flying before he covered his eyes. He won't start calling for the wizard again until he's past the line of trees, looking around for broken branches, turned up dirt, any sign of where they've fallen.

Gyre finds them almost immediately. There's a clear sign that someone fell through the trees, broken pieces still moving where they're precariously dangling above. But on the ground, there's no sign of an impact. Instead they're standing there, eyes locked with Gyre as he finds them.

And even while he's jogging closer, he blinks and they're right in front of him. They're too close for him to stop but he could probably leap aside.

Or he could run right into them.

And if he runs into them, he'll find that they're ice cold even under all those robes. Enjoy, dead boy.

They appear in front of him and his hands go up to defend himself against a sudden threat. His fists ball up before he registers that they're not attacking him? They're just standing there, and he has too much momentum to stop.

He smashes into their chest, grabbing a handful of their robes and gasping in surprise. It takes him a second to fully register what happened, and by the time he does, his fingers are beginning to tingle in the sudden chill.

"F-fuck, you're cold," he mutters, taking a step back and releasing their robe, rubbing his hands together to warm them again. He's not as warm as a living person by any means, but he's definitely not cold like that.

If they're surprised, they don't show it. They watch him step away after acknowledging the cold, eyes and expression a mystery behind the mask. They watch him, seemingly curious that he'd followed along this far. But now when he blinks, they're holding a notepad and writing something on it. They pause at the end before turning it out towards Gyre.

And it's just gibberish. It's like nothing he's ever seen and it's unclear if it's writing or a picture.

But still they hold it out, waiting for him to acknowledge it.

He stares at the gibberish writing for several seconds, blinking slowly as if that'll help the words resolve for him. Words or pictures? The longer he looks at it, the less sure he is of what it is.

"Do you... want me to take this? I can't read it," he says, reaching out to take the notepad from them. He wants to understand what they're doing. If this is the wizard, then they're going to understand this better then anyone else out there.

Except maybe the Protector? Is the Protector around? He needs to look for him once he's figured out what this person needs or wants, he decides.

When Gyre takes the notepad, it crackles slightly in his hand as if it's electric. The gibberish on the pad starts to shift, moving like it's alive. The text continues moving, starting to shape itself into words on the page. The handwriting is utterly atrocious once it settles into its final question but it's actually legible?

"save this world?"

His expression shifts steadily from an unhappy confusion to slowly dawning realization. He grins all at once, nodding quickly.

"Yes! Yes, I want to very much," he says, shifting the board back towards them so they could maybe keep writing if they need to.

"What are you trying to do?"

They take the notepad back and, when Gyre blinks, they're gone. When he blinks a second time, he's back on the rooftop he'd found them on initially. Except this time, they're not there. The roof is empty now, with no sign of them and no sign of anything else. The elevator behind him slides shut, slowly descending to a lower floor without him.

Whatever that was, he probably has more questions now than before.

He blinks, startled yet again by this weird person. It takes him a second to realize he's alone in the roof and he swears angrily, stomping one foot against the roof. He's certain he's lost them, that he said the wrong thing and they abandoned him for some reason, and he's about to continue grousing about it up here when he hears the elevator moving behind him.

"What are you doing!" he shouts in definite, unguarded frustration, running to the staircase this time instead of waiting for the elevator. He takes the stairs four and five at a time, trying to beat a teleporting wizard to the bottom floor so he can keep following them? Good luck, Gyre.

Unfortunately, Gyre's been abandoned.

When he reaches the bottom floor to see what's inside the elevator, he finds nothing but emptiness. No sign of the toothy Wizard, no sign of their hat, no nothing.

Looks like he's run this lead dry!

Well that sucks. That sucks a lot. He growls to himself, looking around the bank with this bitter irritation. Why couldn't things be easy honestly.

He's biting his lip as he steps back out into the air, taking a deep breath. He can smell the electricity in the air, and he watches the clouds for several moments, waiting to see what comes to him. He doesn't know what to do honestly, eventually settling for checking out the crack in the ground that had made the wizard explode.

He crouches down low, reaching into the crack. He intends to press his hand against the dirt at the bottom, but hell pull away if it hurts him.

Gyre gets a much better feeling for the electricity when he sticks his fingers into the crack. The glow is still there, but when his hand gets close the electricity leaps up his arm. As if it's living vines, it trails up him and wraps around him. Every inch of his body crackles for a moment before the electricity flees back into the ground.

And if he touches the crack again, it'll do it again.

He does do it again, yeah. He can't figure out what's happening honestly, but he at least takes note of the way the electricity retreats eventually.

"What the fuck," he murmurs, looking at his hand. Looking over his body. This is baffling, but hey more information is always good, right? He picks himself up and goes to a different crack, one that hasn't been exploded, and does the same thing to this one, sticking his hand in down to the ground.

Gyre's curiosity pays off by giving him the same feeling he'd felt in the first crack. The same leap of electricity up his arm, the same feeling to follow. It's almost like he'd stuck his hand in the exact same crack he'd felt before.

Were all the cracks linked? Was it just the same magic? What was the deal?

"Huh..." he murmurs, pulling his hand back and sitting beside the crack for a moment. He casts his attention around, trying to pick up any other details? He was mostly blindfolded the last time this happened around him, and getting to see the strange state of it all is making his skin crawl.

"Ugh, what are you doing..." he trails off, glancing back at the shinier crack. If they're all the same, then why does that one look different? Honestly just what the fuck.

He sighs quickly, shifting to throw his legs over the edge of the crack, and then he climbs right on in. Once he's certainly he's not going to get electrocuted now that his feet are on the ground instead of his hands, he bends down inside the crack and starts to dig into the dirt below. Maybe there's some kind of magitch down here that's making this happen?

Gyre, are you a Mole?

The crack digs apart fairly simply, though it is more rock than dirt. But each time Gyre pulls the dirt apart, the glow stays in the ground itself and not in the bits he's removing. It looks like the glow is, in fact, coming from below. But from what? He feels his hand brush up against something that sends an electrical spark up his arm with a 'CRACK' at the exact same time he feels a hand press onto his shoulder.

If, or probably when, he whirls around to see who it is: It's a child. Their hair is a mix of reds and browns, an earthy equivalent of salt-and-pepper hair. They have dark orange eyes that are watching him, and they're wearing completely tattered rags that can't even really be called clothes.

He yelps when whatever that was cracks up his arm, yanking his hand up, throwing his arm into the air. He's halfway turned even before he feels the hand on his shoulder honestly, but then he's face to face with... a child?

A child who looks so absolutely awful, entirely uncared for. His chest hurts just looking at them, and he completely abandons whatever is going on under the ground, pushing himself up out of the crack so he's sitting on the opposite side from them.

"Hey there, kit'a," he says with this gentle smile, leaning towards them so they know he's truly interested in them. He wants this kid to not run away before he finds out where they're supposed to be.

"What are you doing out here?"

The child opens their mouth as if they're speaking, mouthing words that Gyre won't be able to make out. They pause after they've "spoken", looking down at their hands for a moment before they look back up at him.

They try again, mouth moving but no words making their way out. They repeat, looking at their hands, before they raise a hand up to point towards the mountain and its distant cliffs and features. They look in that direction first as they point, then they turn to lock their eyes on him.

He watches them closely as they try to speak, trying to pick up any words he might know from the shape of their mouth. He can't though. It's all nonsense to him, right up until they point up the mountain and look at him.

"Would you like to go that way? We can go together," he says, hopping into the crack in the ground and climbing up onto the other side beside them. He offers his hand, smiling softly at them.

"If you can sign, I'll understand you."

The child's demeanor doesn't change at all. There's no indication that they did or didn't understand. They don't look to his offered hand, instead they have their gaze locked on him still as they keep pointing. They keep their finger pointed insistently. Nothing he said was what they wanted him to do.

But if he looks away from them again for even a moment, they're going to vanish. For as long as he has his eyes on them, though, they can't despawn off screen. They might need to go behind a wall so they're out of his line of sight because this is, after all, a video game.

Well... he does look away eventually. He's watching them closely for a good few minutes, waiting for them to take his hand. Lowering his hand when they don't. Pursing his lips when they just stay silent and still.

Finally he glances up towards the mountain again, wondering what he's missing. There has to be something, right?

He's absolutely unprepared when he looks back and the kid is gone, jumping in surprise. His eyes dart around him, trying to find where this kid could've gone in such a short amount of time.

"Hey! Kid!" he shouts, beginning to jog slowly around the area. He looks behind the buildings and down alleyways, finally coming to a stop when he realizes that they're just gone...? A ghost? He doesn't understand, glancing down at the hand he had offered to the kid.

He has to keep making progress, he decides. Hopefully he can find the kid... or the kid is somewhere safe? He doesn't know. All he knows is he's going to turn right back around, and start towards the cabins and then keep going, up into the mountains.

The Weather

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