Day 3: Monster Arrival

[wizardseason]

Morning-Afternoon: 11:00am - Evening

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

It's monster time.

Wherever your hero is when 11am rolls around, they're in for a change. At 11am on the dot everyone will start growing more and more transparent until, at 11:15am, they pass out momentarily. When they wake, they'll find that they aren't where they were before. More importantly, they'll find that the world is not as they left it. When they look around, or on their phones, they'll see that the date is 01 AW and the specific day is one day after the Wizard was defeated, the first time, by the first set of knights. The newspapers all around the city reflect a dramatic change in the world, though several characters may remember the change if they were alive for it.

While the island is still devoid of its inhabitants, the characters will find that they are now able to locate each other. They can text freely, they can team up, but even if they do they'll feel an inexplicable pull towards those they woke up with. More importantly, they'll each feel a pull towards another presence.

All six teams of heroes will feel a presence following them, an unmistakably menacing feeling that, if they stay still, gets closer and closer with each passing moment.

Third Morning Event: All Cities: The Past.

---

The Weather

• Alive, but with what?
• 64°F / 18°C
• There is only wind, the air crackles with electricity.

---

Prompts:

• 11:00am Bamborough: The heroes have been shaken up, at 11am on the dot everyone will start growing more and more transparent until, at 11:15am, they pass out momentarily. When they wake, they'll find that they aren't where they were before. Haizea and Olivia will wake on the edge of the fountain in Bamborough's resort hotel lobby. If they're unlucky, a hand, a foot, or their entire body may end up tumbling into the water of the fountain. Down by the water, Joanna and Web will wake up on their backs in the sand with the ocean water lapping at their feet and legs. If they stay laying there for too long, they'll end up underwater. How did Web make it from Far Haven to Bamborough this quickly?


• 11:00am Craydon: The heroes have been shaken up, at 11am on the dot everyone will start growing more and more transparent until, at 11:15am, they pass out momentarily. When they wake, they'll find that they aren't where they were before. Gail and Seth wake up in hanging hammocks in one of Craydon's fancier cabins, with a small assortment of fruits, veggies, and little bite-sized sandwiches laid out on a platter in the middle of the cabin. How anyone got Gail into a hammock is anyone's guess, but somehow he's going to have to make it down. Fortunately there's a little ladder on the wall, maybe that will help? Gyre, Rory, and Luka, meanwhile, wake up on the floor of the cog train as it's making the last leg of its trip up into Craydon's central train station. If they stay laying on the floor for too long, the train will take them all the way back to the base of the mountain. How did Luka make it from Far Haven to Craydon this quickly?


• 11:00am Far Haven: The heroes have been shaken up, at 11am on the dot everyone will start growing more and more transparent until, at 11:15am, they pass out momentarily. When they wake, they'll find that they aren't where they were before. Zafika and Matilda wake up in the elevator of one of the tallest buildings in town. The soft 'ding' of the elevator stopping at every single floor on its way down to the lobby is a gentle wake-up call for them both. The elevator is set to stop at every floor all the way down, and it's at about floor 15 when they start waking up. If they wait too long, it'll go all the way back up to floor 56. Terrence and Garrot, meanwhile, wake up on the roof of the local theatre. The sounds of still-airing movies are audible beneath them and the constant thrum of the air systems around them will bring them back to consciousness pretty quickly. Not to mention the unrelenting wind blowing from the storm. How did Garrot make it from Bamborough to Far Haven this quickly?


• 12:00noon, The Monster [Phase 1], Bamborough, Craydon, Far Haven: The third monster is here? If your characters stay put, they'll feel a menacing presence getting closer and closer but they won't see anything. If they stay long enough, something invisible will start shoving them. A shove here, a push there, the attacks will come from multiple directions and will persist until your character falls over. Whatever's happening, something's here and it's insistent. How are the heroes supposed to fight something they can't see?


• 1:00pm, The Monster [Phase 2]: For most of the heroes, the hour between noon and 1pm is spent being filled with more questions and no answers. Why were there invisible monsters shoving them around? Any heroes that tried to attack them just swished through empty air. Why couldn't they be hurt?
  
  There isn't an answer to that question, because the real third monster arrives just in time to distract the heroes. At 1pm on the dot, every hero's monster pull will aggressively alert them to an approaching presence. In the same way that someone hears a plane approaching from the engines, it's a feeling that practically advertises the arrival of something horrible.
  
  All six groups of heroes will be treated to a monster that is easily the stuff of nightmares. Imagine a child with yellow skin, but no face, no hair, no details of any kind. Except for eyes, three eyes (two humanoid, one forehead) this time. Just very clearly the shape of a child. The legs are entirely humanoid, but the arm is a mass of arms, all in varying lengths and with such weight that the body is leaned over and using that arm mass as another leg.
  
  Also every child is split in half from the head down, meaning each half-child has one leg, a half body, half neck, half head, one and a half eyes, and a mass of arms. The teams of Haizea, Olivia, Gail, Seth, Zafika, and Matilda will all be treated to the left-half children. The teams of Joanna, Web, Gyre, Rory, Luka, Terrence, and Garrot will be treated to the right-half children.
  
  These monsters will arrive slowly lumbering down the street, one and a half eyes scanning around them as they approach. The air around the monsters steams as if the ground were on fire, the monsters' image rippling in the rapidly rising air.
  
  The Princess will discover that he has an advantage in this scenario. He can feel that there's something more to this, that there's something in the ground that he can control. If he tries to focus on it, he'll find that he can set the ground ablaze simply by focusing on it. The range isn't overly far, though, no more than thirty feet. He'll have to plan carefully if he wants to heat things up!
  
  
• ?:00pm, The Monster [Phase 3]: Unknown. Will be revealed if triggered or no later than May 22nd.

---

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: If your character makes an attack against the monster (or stays still for longer than 3 in-game minutes), write [Character does ____] at the end of your tag and send a ping on Discord to get a reply to the action.

Comments

11:00am Bamborough

[wizardseason]

The heroes have been shaken up, at 11am on the dot everyone will start growing more and more transparent until, at 11:15am, they pass out momentarily. When they wake, they'll find that they aren't where they were before. Haizea and Olivia will wake on the edge of the fountain in Bamborough's resort hotel lobby. If they're unlucky, a hand, a foot, or their entire body may end up tumbling into the water of the fountain. Down by the water, Joanna and Web will wake up on their backs in the sand with the ocean water lapping at their feet and legs. If they stay laying there for too long, they'll end up underwater. How did Web make it from Far Haven to Bamborough this quickly?

[disguiseself]

[Olivia isn't particularly lucky, but she has enough sense of balance that when she starts slipping into the fountain, she wakes up and rolls away with a start.

She looks around in confusion for a moment, calling out Garrot's name before noticing Haizea - but it's weird; she feels her presence before she even sees her? She stands up, looking around nervously. She's still in Bamborough, she realizes, but everything looks so different and... why does she feel like she's being watched? Something's wrong. Maybe not as wrong as this morning, but still wrong.]

Hey. Hey, Knight, wake up! [She calls out, lightly tapping Haizea's face with her tail as she keeps looking around. Admittedly, she's usually paranoid but this feels more urgent, somehow... yet the city still looks deserted.]

[tropicalstorm]

Haizea jolts awake when Olivia taps her face and flails a little bit to get her bearings, one hand dipping into to the water of the fountain. It doesn't seem to bother her too much, but she shakes the water off her hand anyway and looks up at Olivia, still sitting on the edge of the fountain for now.

"What the hell is UP with today," she grumbles, before standing up and stretching. She starts to get that same 'off' feeling and puts on her brass knuckles, flexing her fingers around them a bit.

"I'm guessin' you don't know how we got here either, huh?" she remarks to Olivia. "I'm Haizea, by the by, don't think we've been proper introduced yet."

Joanna & Web

[fauntofwisdom]

Joanna wakes with a gasp as cold water crashes around her hooves to her legs, and pushes herself to sitting up in the sand, stumbling and still jittery with nerves.
The last thing she remembers was feeling somehow... insubstantial, as she and Haizea went see-through, fading away like ghosts. A few quick pats at her arms show she's still physical, if waking in another place again.

There's a strange feeling like someone or something hostile is watching her, but of course there is. There's no question about that, is there? Not with this overwhelmingly powerful magic thrusting them into such a realistic vision of the past - or, worse, somehow actually into the past. Joanna pushes it to the back of her mind, and glances to the knight next to her to continue taking stock of what's happening now.

"Haizea, do you remem-- Oh, you're not her." She blinks at the less familiar knight next to her for a moment before recognizing - this is one of the people who gathered for the second monster. And even with barely knowing each other, she finds she doesn't want to risk splitting up to explore again - it feels so much safer to stick together.

[spookyroomba]

"I'm Web. And you're Joanna, right? With the stasis-y thing?"

That's the first thing Web manages: an almost automatic reply, probably due to shock. They were with Zafika, on the mountain, but now-- now they're at the ocean, and nothing looks even remotely familiar anymore. Process of elimination (and what little they know of the other towns) says this is probably Bamborough, they think as they stand up and shake the sand out of their legs.

Now that they're a little more awake, it's time to bleat like a goat and faint deal with these shenanigans.

"Last thing I remember, I was with Zafika in the woods. We woke up at Far Haven. I'm guessing this isn't the same place at all, huh?"

11:00am Craydon

[wizardseason]

The heroes have been shaken up, at 11am on the dot everyone will start growing more and more transparent until, at 11:15am, they pass out momentarily. When they wake, they'll find that they aren't where they were before. Gail and Seth wake up in hanging hammocks in one of Craydon's fancier cabins, with a small assortment of fruits, veggies, and little bite-sized sandwiches laid out on a platter in the middle of the cabin. How anyone got Gail into a hammock is anyone's guess, but somehow he's going to have to make it down. Fortunately there's a little ladder on the wall, maybe that will help? Gyre, Rory, and Luka, meanwhile, wake up on the floor of the cog train as it's making the last leg of its trip up into Craydon's central train station. If they stay laying on the floor for too long, the train will take them all the way back to the base of the mountain. How did Luka make it from Far Haven to Craydon this quickly?

Rory, Gyre + Luka

[roaryrory]

Rory's dis- and reappearance was prefaced with an intense, paralyzing spout of anxiety. She bolts upright as soon as her eyes open.

"Gh... Gail? Where..." she gasps, as if she'd been underwater and just now got to breathe again. It takes her another second to realize she's separated from him again. At least this time it isn't her fault.

Once her gaze falls to the floor, she sees her company is quite different this time around. She's so, so glad to see the Princess here safe and sound, though still unconscious. And Gyre too, of course. Although what Luka had told her about not necessarily trusting him might make sharing news more difficult...

[eutychia]

Luka jolts awake not long after Rory. He rises to a sitting position, a sheen of cold sweat on his forehead. Was that all some kind of terrible nightmare? he wonders. If so, was he even really awake, this time?

When he gets a moment to take in his surroundings, he notes the rumbling feeling of the traincar, and the unmistakable clacking sound of the train over the tracks.

"Wow, I've really got to stop waking up in places I didn't fall asleep."

11:00am Far Haven

[wizardseason]

The heroes have been shaken up, at 11am on the dot everyone will start growing more and more transparent until, at 11:15am, they pass out momentarily. When they wake, they'll find that they aren't where they were before. Zafika and Matilda wake up in the elevator of one of the tallest buildings in town. The soft 'ding' of the elevator stopping at every single floor on its way down to the lobby is a gentle wake-up call for them both. The elevator is set to stop at every floor all the way down, and it's at about floor 15 when they start waking up. If they wait too long, it'll go all the way back up to floor 56. Terrence and Garrot, meanwhile, wake up on the roof of the local theatre. The sounds of still-airing movies are audible beneath them and the constant thrum of the air systems around them will bring them back to consciousness pretty quickly. Not to mention the unrelenting wind blowing from the storm. How did Garrot make it from Bamborough to Far Haven this quickly?

Garrot + Terrence

[fop_lop]

'Again..?' is the first thing that groggily floats to Terrence's mind as consciousness returns to it. Before even opening his eyes, he takes a moment or two to simply lie there and just silently stew in irritation. Eventually, though, he has to sit up and...

Well, it could be worse.

No telling what time it actually is, but 'go time' has to be soon now, right? Which means that out of everyone to get teleported to, Terrence pretty much hit the jackpot again. He's vaguely worried about Luka, but it's not like they even know what the threat is yet, or indeed if there even is one.

"Morning, Doctor."

[daddykong]

Garrot hasn't been a huge fan of this entire day. Nobody's around, he couldn't call home, and all the magic stuff was incredibly bizarre! So when his consciousness just cuts out and all of a sudden he's on... a roof? Being woken up by the cartoonish noises of some kid's movie he swears he recognizes?

"Ugh, dammit, what now?!" The words are snarled out, instinctive, like he was an animal jolted out of hibernation. Garrot sits upright, and his frustration softens once he sees who he's with. The good doctor has worked well with Mr. Torrance in the past, so if nothing else they've got synergy in their favor.

"Uh..." There's a lot they don't know, but humor seems like a solid approach. "If you wanted to get me alone, you could've just asked instead of dragging me up here." And then he stifles a chuckle, because the Rabbit Knight is probably not that strong. "You okay?"

zafika and matilduh

[scandeled]

The gentle dings wake even sleeping beauty from her rest- and Matilda jerks upright violently, flailing about, relieved to find herself unrestrained by an oppressive sleeping bag this time. It takes her a few moments to gain her senses, but once she managed to stop spazzing out, she takes time to realize she’s not alone. She smiles at Zafika, though there’s a hint of anxiety to her smile, and she rocks herself back and forth precariously in her heels.

“Zafika! When did— Where’s the Princess?”

[zafika]

Zafika jerks awake quickly once the dings of the elevator start to register to them, bolting to sit upright and instantly getting their breathing in control. They hate this. They absolutely hate this!! First they wake up in a completely unfamiliar place, find out the islanders are just gone, then find out that they're now in the past 40 years ago! And then they pass out again and they're once more in a strange place! This day is not good for them, they're so wound up, the third monster better show up soon so they can stab it before all their stress -and purposefully ignored anxiety about this- overflows and leads to something very unpleasant.

Then they hear Matilda's voice, and they quickly turn to look at her, but quickly yank their blindfold over their eyes, just in case, currently unable to find it relieving that they're still with another Knight. "Matilda...? How did... where are we? Wait, where's Web? They were with me just a second ago-" They feel around for their surroundings, and find a wall, and a second wall, and a railing, and use it to pull themselves up, feeling around for more and... are they in an elevator? They must be, there are buttons and they keep hearing a gentle 'ding' over and over again, and they can hear mechanical humming and the elevator moving.

12:00noon, The Monster [Phase 1], Bamborough, Craydon, Far Haven

[wizardseason]

The third monster is here? If your characters stay put, they'll feel a menacing presence getting closer and closer but they won't see anything. If they stay long enough, something invisible will start shoving them. A shove here, a push there, the attacks will come from multiple directions and will persist until your character falls over. Whatever's happening, something's here and it's insistent. How are the heroes supposed to fight something they can't see?

1:00pm, The Monster [Phase 2], Bamborough, Craydon, Far Haven

[wizardseason]

For most of the heroes, the hour between noon and 1pm is spent being filled with more questions and no answers. Why were there invisible monsters shoving them around? Any heroes that tried to attack them just swished through empty air. Why couldn't they be hurt?

There isn't an answer to that question, because the real third monster arrives just in time to distract the heroes. At 1pm on the dot, every hero's monster pull will aggressively alert them to an approaching presence. In the same way that someone hears a plane approaching from the engines, it's a feeling that practically advertises the arrival of something horrible.

All six groups of heroes will be treated to a monster that is easily the stuff of nightmares. Imagine a child with yellow skin, but no face, no hair, no details of any kind. Except for eyes, three eyes (two humanoid, one forehead) this time. Just very clearly the shape of a child. The legs are entirely humanoid, but the arm is a mass of arms, all in varying lengths and with such weight that the body is leaned over and using that arm mass as another leg.

Also every child is split in half from the head down, meaning each half-child has one leg, a half body, half neck, half head, one and a half eyes, and a mass of arms. The teams of Haizea, Olivia, Gail, Seth, Zafika, and Matilda will all be treated to the left-half children. The teams of Joanna, Web, Gyre, Rory, Luka, Terrence, and Garrot will be treated to the right-half children.

These monsters will arrive slowly lumbering down the street, one and a half eyes scanning around them as they approach. The air around the monsters steams as if the ground were on fire, the monsters' image rippling in the rapidly rising air.

The Princess will discover that he has an advantage in this scenario. He can feel that there's something more to this, that there's something in the ground that he can control. If he tries to focus on it, he'll find that he can set the ground ablaze simply by focusing on it. The range isn't overly far, though, no more than thirty feet. He'll have to plan carefully if he wants to heat things up!

Garrot + Terrence

[fop_lop]

The two (somehow) simultaneously most and least responsible knights have scarcely made it out of the theater they awoke in when... Uh, that happens. Though they haven't seen that there are multiple children, the half-and-half motif is pretty clear. Upon seeing the creature, the first thought that pops into Terrence's mind is a memory with Haizea from his first day on Harsen Island. They'd made a casual bet on the outcome of a volleyball game between some island natives. Having never been formally introduced to the players, the knights simply referred to the teams as 'Lefties' and 'Right-Os.'

Somewhat morbidly, he can't help but mentally refer to the newest monster as a 'Right-O.' Even more fitting that he'd lost when betting on them.

"Storming straight into the fray doesn't seem the best solution this time, somehow," he confers with Garrot. That steam looks almost as unpleasant as the creature itself, though admittedly the horrific visage is reason enough for Terrence to keep some distance.

Rory, Gyre + Luka

[roaryrory]

The trio runs through several cars, getting shoved less and less as they gain distance to the monster. Even with that relief, Rory is still extremely on edge. She makes sure to hold on tight to Luka's hand and guide him through the aisle and the doors - which she thinks should absolutely open faster given the situation!

They find themselves in the restaurant car. That glass of water Rory requested earlier is the last thing on her mind by now, however. Despite knowing it most likely won't do anything, she shoves some chairs on the aisle in the trio's wake in an attempt to slow down the monster. Little does she know the real threat is not behind them, but about to burst in from a window in front of them instead. Shards of glass fly in every direction as the grotesque bundle of arms emerges.

Rory instinctively takes a step back and assumes a wide stance in front of the Princess. Her eyes widen and her brain has difficulty comprehending this monster for a second. "Is this some kind of a sick joke?!"

Bamborough Group Fun

[fauntofwisdom]

The sense of worry about being separated continued to hang over Joanna. Sticking close by Web and keeping track of the others' texts helped, but there was still a sense of something missing. She eventually pushed them to meet up with the others in Bamborough, at least - and confirm whether they could find the others in this still empty city.

Along the way to meeting up, trying to wait for each other at major landmarks, they found that staying still invited shoves from some invisible force. Trying to brush it aside or push back felt like pushing through air, and the classic solution to invisible creatures - tossing a powder - had no effect, as if it was just immaterial force nudging them.

But they've only started investigating that question, when another feeling changes - this time a sense of arrival. Joanna spots a horrifying figure shuffling from one the street. Unlike the eyeball with legs, or the astonishing urchin-like shapes... These look child-like, but hardly in any position to be moving around.

"F-Fius, are these the monsters?" She wonders, one hand over mouth and the other grasping at the air at her side, ready to hold a weapon - just as soon as she can think of one to request.

Zafika + Matilda

[zafika]

Zafika freezes the moment they feel the new, aggressive pull towards something that's approaching, and the said something makes their stomach turn. They quickly grab Matilda by the wrist, and pull her along as they dodge behind a nearby building's corner. THe shoving by an invisible creature had just been annoying, this however? They on't like this, not one bit. "Stay quiet, something's coming-" they whisper, and peek to the streets with their blindfold now lowered.

And, well. That sure is some form of body horror right there. They suddenly feel glad for having pulled Matilda to the alleyway, they don't want her to see this just yet. They eye at the monster for a good moment, and seeing the air around the monster steaming is, not good. They're more a close combat fighter, but maybe they can be quick about their attacks...

They duck back behind the corner and turn to Matilda, glancing at her face quickly. "Alright, the monster's here... an it seems like getting close to it is going to be hard though, the air around it is steaming."

Text Messages

[wizardseason]

If your heroes are texting each other, put those threads here. You can link to these text messages in your comments to show what they're reacting to. This way they're all in one place.

Include a "To: ____" recipients list as the comment subject or "To: All"

To: All

[zafika]

Matilda and I woke up in Far Haven, is anyone else in here? We should try to group up if possible.

It also seems like we can use our powers and contact our companion animals again.

To: All

[fop_lop]

Dr. Murtakhor and I are well. Suspect we are also in Far Haven.

To: Luka

[disguiseself]

luka, where are you? shit's been wack since i woke up. are you safe?

To: All (during/after Phase 2)

[fop_lop]

Garrot and I have killed a monster. There are likely more. Does anyone need assistance?

Available Newspapers

[wizardseason]