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

[After taking one look out the window, Olivia runs outside, taking in the situation. She bites her hand as she looks around, trying to ground herself and not panic. She probably only has a very vague idea of what had happened in the year she's currently in; she dropped out of high-school and wouldn't really remember the history lessons from when she was younger. Regardless, this is really fucked up. We are not in Kansas anymore.

She doesn't wander too far from the hotel, not wanting to be separated from Garrot just yet. She carefully walks over to one of the cracks in the ground, crouching down to inspect it, ready to jump away if it does anything weird. She leans in a little, trying to see what's going on inside it.]

[ The crack itself is just a rip through the ground, like someone took two sections and pushed them against each other until they jutted upwards from the force. It's only the sections that have jutted up, the middle of the cracks, that are glowing. ]

[ When Olivia crouches down, she'll get to feel how the air itself changes around her. The closer she is to the ground, the more it feels like she's being pressed in on all sides by static electricity. Everything crackles, everything starts standing on end. Whatever's going on, it's charged. ]

Hey, I was wondering where you went, you just took off, and- [ Garrot comes bounding around the corner with the grace of worried parent, but he almost skids to a halt when he sees what Olivia has found. ] Whoa.

[ The doctor quickly approaches, one hand grasped tightly around his phone, which is definitely recording. This is a research goldmine, they're here when everyone on the island was gone. ] One of these showed up in the schoolyard back home. Recess got cancelled, and all our parents had to come pick us up. [ For a nearly-fifty-year-old man, he sure sounds bummed! And mostly like he's talking to the air- Olivia doesn't have to listen to his elderly ramblings. ]

But it might be dangerous. [ A beat, and he puts a hand on Olivia's shoulder. ] Wanna throw a water bottle at it and see if it gets zapped? [ Garrot sees those electrical visual effects, and he's a man of science. ]

We're supposed to save the planet, dude, not make it sicker by throwing plastic bottles into weird... magic cracks.

[She keeps her attention on the crack, trying to ignore how weird the air feels. She tentatively runs her hand along its edges, wishing really badly she had some sort of healing power instead of disguises.

But, since she can't heal the ground and Garrot seems to want to do science anyway, she slowly sticks her hand inside. Her goal is to see what'll happen, but if there's anything physical inside that could be causing this, she's gonna try to take it.]

[ Garrot is going to get a rude awakening when he gets back to the present: Namely he's going to find that all the videos he's taking here in the past will show up as corrupted. If he tries to recover them, he'll recover a black video with no content but a negative duration in every program he tries to play it in. Sorry, Garrot, that research is for nothing. ]

[ The crack sparks a little as Olivia touches at the edges, but what really gets her is when she puts her hand in the crack. Electricity shoots up her arm in arcs, flashing and shooting out from the dirt where she's placed her hand. It runs through her entire body and back out her hand without hurting her at all. Have fun, Olivia! ]

[ But what she finds in the crack is nothing at the surface, perhaps it's deeper? But it'd take a little digging to get down to.</small

I doubt a bottle is going to be more dangerous than the Wizard. [ Garrot scoffs at the notion, but of course she does have a point. What if one of these opened in the middle of a building? Or the ocean? All sorts of things could fall in.

But when Olivia chooses to get closer, to touch the weird glowing magic fissure, Garrot can't help but worry and scoot himself next to her. Good call on his part, since magical energy runs through her. ]

Shit! Are you okay?! [ The words are sharp, and he takes a few steps back, looking ready to charge her and knock her away from the weird crack in the ground. Garrot has no idea if this stuff works like normal electricity, but he'll forcibly remove Olivia if that's what it takes to keep her safe!! ]

[Her eyes dilate in surprise as the energy runs through her, and she starts to move her hand away before she realizes - it didn't hurt.] I'm fine! I'm fine. [She says, surprise in her voice. She looks around at the other cracks, at the sky, and the flying obelisks - was the Wizard responsible for this or was it the world itself?

She nods at the closest obelisk before looking back at Garrot.] Do you wanna go check that out? I... wanna poke around here for a bit. Maybe there's something.

Don't, ah, go too far from me though, yeah? [She turns her focus back on the crack, thinking to herself for a moment before she starts to move the dirt in it; maybe there's something buried? A good thief doesn't give up that easily. Even if she can't find an object, if this is the planet's work... maybe there's a way to tap into it's magic through these wounds? A way to connect?

She'll dig around, but she will stop if it looks like her actions are making it worse.]

[ As if prompted by Olivia's words, the nearest obelisk starts floating up and away from the ground. Instead of being down at an accessible foot or two off the ground, it floats up to easily twenty feet above the ground. It's up there, what's up with that? ]

[ But for Olivia, she's onto something here. Her digging rewards her with a discovery: A tube of glowing blue hidden about a foot below the surface. It looks very much like a tree root, and as Olivia moves the dirt away from its sides it'll get zapped back towards the root. Whatever it is, whatever the electricity is, it's pulling it all together to glow and form the cracks above. ]

[ Where did it come from? ]

[ See, Garrot starts to take a few steps towards that nearby obelisk, but then it starts rising, and even if he wanted to try and hop on, he's got his phone in one hand and if he dropped it then he wouldn't have it and he's trying to document the island and- ]

Uhhh... no dice, it's gone. [ Garrot does sound absolutely dejected at least. Magical space-time gardening is so much less interesting than weird flying rock-things. So he comes back to Olivia, squats down on the other side of this crack in the ground, and- ] The fuck is that...?

[ He's talking about that glowing blue rooty-thing, Olivia, and uh. Garrot's decided he's helping, reaching in his right hand, claws and all, to try and scoop more dirt out. ] This is crazy- do you think if we dig here in the future, we'll find this stuff? [ His other hand, of course, is holding his phone, because he won't know his recordings are corrupted garbage until it's too late. Garrot's digging hand, though, is intentionally sort of dodging around Olivia's, so they don't have any awkward physical contact.

Who knows how the fuck magic rooty-things will react to that? This isn't even normal electricity! ]

[She hums in thought at Garrot's question, watching the dirt get zapped back in place over and over again. As she looks up at him to answer, she notices his phone is out and immediately her appearance changes to resemble a Dark Elf, shifting uncomfortably as she looks back down again. She doesn't like cameras!] That's... an interesting thought. We'll have to remember exactly where this crack was...

These look like roots - maybe cables? [She mentally kicks herself for not asking the Protector more questions about the nature of the world when she had the chance. She digs around the length of this thing as much as she can, trying to unearth it all, if possible.] I wonder if these lead somewhere? A source?

[ That's a fascinating plan these two have cooked up! They'll have to go back... to the future! Once they're there, who knows what's waiting for them? Olivia's digging results in the root getting thicker in the direction of the mountain. She comes across a part where it branches, dividing into another root that heads off in a crack in the other direction. She won't easily be able to get too far, there's just too much dirt, but it's safe to assume that all the glowing cracks have one of these under them. ]

[ Further up the mountain, within sight of Garrot and Olivia, that obelisk is floating back down towards the ground. There are numerous cracks in the ground under it as it settles and they seem to grow brighter as the obelisk moves close to them. ]

[ Garrot just watches as they both dig, as she changes her appearance, and as the root is revealed to thicken as it nears the mountain. He's no botanist, but he can put two and two together. And as much as he wants to ask Olivia why she changed her look (because he didn't put two and two together there) he sees the obelisk begin to descend and the nearby cracks begin to glow. ]

Ooooh... [ Garrot's gaze is aimed right towards that weirdo obelisk, and he doesn't even brush the dirt off his hands as he pulls them from the magical fissure. ] I knew those weird rocks couldn't resist our charms! We can dig later, let's go check it out! [ Sadly, Garrot doesn't look like he cares for Olivia's response to his bad joke or anything else, because he's running to that poor obelisk. He doesn't want it to fly away before he can charm all the secrets out of it!

Even though it's a rock. It's not like he actually has any idea what he's doing, but at least he's not trying to whack it with that shower rod! ]

[Olivia shakes her head as stands up and dusts herself off, cautiously following him. She watches the cracks glow and the obelisk descend with interest, but she lets him be the one to approach the dangerous magic thing this time, preferring to stand a few feet back.]

Careful, yeah? I don't think we should stay here for too much longer.

Fortunately for both of them, the Obelisk is largely harmless and pretty gentle to approach. It's just floating along on its own, surrounded by a slightly-brighter-glowing-ring of magical cracks as it makes its way back to about a foot above the ground. Its path is absolutely taking it up towards the mountain.

Unfortunately that's where the wind is coming from.

As Garrot and Olivia make their way up towards the retreating obelisk (if a pace of 1mph can be called 'retreating' anyway), they'll be greeted with facefuls of unrelenting electricity-filled wind. The wind will whip past their faces, frizzing out their hair and making their clothing crackle with static. It's like they've been charged themselves but they won't be at risk.

The Obelisk isn't too far off, but this wind's a problem in the way.

Thankfully there aren't any children in their ears; at least not yet.

[ Garrot absolutely didn't see this wind coming, not just because wind is invisible but because he absolutely didn't expect it. The arcs of static go through Garrot's entire body, and he swears he can feel his hair getting all gross, thank goodness it's all tied back.

But it's at this moment that he sees how slowly that obelisk is moving and the fact that his companion was behind him before this wind started up. His body moves without thinking, and suddenly his arms are reaching out, and- ]

Need a hand?? [ Garrot's holding out that shower rod towards Olivia, taking a short step every moment or so to make sure he's still making progress towards the obelisk. It's no rope, but there's no way in hell he'll abandon her when all of a sudden there's electrical wind and a very slow-moving weird rock.

Stupid magical bullshit just won't give them a break!!! ]

[When the wind picks up, Olivia hurriedly puts her hoodie up, doing her best to protect her hair from horrible, horrible frizz.

She does struggle a little to move forward against the strong wind, so she's thankful for Garrot's help! She takes the rod and with it manages to get closer to him and position herself directly behind him, using him as a shield.] Thanks.

[Hopefully she'll get less wind in her face so that she's still able to look around while they move towards very probable danger. She's not sure this is a super good idea. In fact, she's almost sure this is a terrible idea! But she knows they have to see where this leads, so she'll save her complaints for later.]

[ Oh come on, Garrot, this is only a level 4 wind! Imagine if this was level 7, or even level 10! This is barely a fraction of what a real wind obstacle could throw at them. Like boulders. Thank goodness there were no boulders. ]

[ The Obelisk is closer now that they've made progress, but it's still far enough that they can't touch it. Are they just going to push forward to get up to it and see what's inside? Are they going to give up? ]

[ Assuming they push forward past the electrical wind, they'll find that the smoothed surface of the obelisk is just translucent enough to see inside. Within there's a Child, quite possibly the most beautiful child they'd ever lay eyes on. Dark skin, short red hair, and without even the slightest imperfection. Honestly it's as if magic had made this child, and they're floating inside the obelisk with their eyes closed as if asleep. What's up with that? ]

[ The moment they've seen the child, however, they'll each hear a voice. ]

Are you running away? [ The voice asks Olivia only, in her left ear. ]

Will you choose to save us? [ The voice asks Garrot only, in his right ear. ]

[ Garrot doesn't give up, of course. The last obelisk ran away, but this one sure won't! He just needed to make sure Olivia was okay first.

So he pushes forward, one sturdy-stanced step at a time, with one arm reaching vaguely back as if to shield his fellow Knight from the winds. But he sees the child, he hears the voice, and- ]

There are fuckin' kids in these?! [ Garrot is pissed and finds himself suddenly ignoring Olivia altogether. Instead, he's storming towards the obelisk, hoping to plant a clawed hand on the top to keep it stable as his eyes scour it for anything out of the ordinary. ]

Gotta be a fuckin' lock, right? [ Garrot absolutely wants to find the magical locking mechanism and violently break it. ]

[Olivia does not appreciate the sudden voice in her ear, turning and hissing towards where she thinks the source is. Except there's nothing to her left! Creepy!

She makes her way towards Garrot as best as she can after hearing his exclamation, trying to see inside the obelisk. She's not a big fan of this entire situation, really. After spotting the kid, though, her eyes dart around nervously, trying to spot the actual source of the voice; she's pretty sure it's not the weirdly perfect child, and she's also pretty sure no child can be this weirdly perfect.]

Did you hear that shit? I don't think that's an actual kid. This has to be Wizard fuckery.

[ Sorry Garrot, there's no lock. ]

[ And sorry Olivia, there's not going to be an answer to that inquiry either. ]

[ Once they've both gotten close enough, the voice returns as a strange chorus of two voices saying the same thing but at different paces. They speak on both sides of Garrot and Olivia, sounding like they're surrounding both of them as they speak. ]

The heroes always win in the end. [ The words are followed by giggling as the voices seem to move away, getting quieter and quieter with each passing moment. ]

[ And as if that wasn't strange enough, the next time Garrot and Olivia blink the Obelisk will be gone. Not that it sped up or went up high, it's just gone. Vanished. Like it was never there at all and both the heroes are left alone in stillness, without even the wind to keep them company. ]

[ Looks like this lead has gone dry. ]

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Day 3: Morning

Morning: 6:00am - 12:00noon

The Weather

Prompts:

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