Day 4: Morning

[wizardseason]

Morning: 6:00am - 12:00noon

[ IRL Timeframe: July 3rd - July 10th July 17th, 2019 ]

If any hero was expecting day four to be anything but absolutely bananas, they'd been living in a dream bubble. Fortunately for everyone, they wake up where they fell asleep the previous night. Unfortunately, though, everyone receives a decidely rude awakening at 6:06am.

An earthquake.

No part of the island is safe, everywhere and everything starts shaking and rumbling. Roads split, the train tracks bend, buildings fracture, buildings collapse...

...and bright, glowing blue fissures open up in the ground.

No city is safe from their new feature, but in every single city it's clear that the cracks are coming from a specific source. In Far Haven, the cracks lead west to Craydon. In Bamborough, the cracks lead east to Craydon. In Craydon, though, the cracks lead directly north up the mountain. They gradually narrow the further up the mountain you go, where do they end?

Heroes will, of course, not be able to immediately see this pattern. How are they going to find out about it? Social Media won't be buzzing about it until noon at the earliest!

But that won't be the only thing social media is buzzing about by noon. It looks like Web is nowhere to be found. A concerned local not a stalker reports the missing knight and there's quickly a deep discussion about it. Death? Ran away? Kidnapped? Abducted by aliens? No one knows. There's no body. There's nothing. Where'd Web go?

Fourth Morning Event: All Cities: The Quake.

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The Weather

• Eerily still.
• 64°F / 18°C
• Despite the quake, there's a nice breeze.

---

Prompts:

• 6:06am Earthquake, Everywhere: Every town has fallen victim to an earthquake. The damage is unthinkable. Cars aren't moving anymore, roads and paths are obstacle courses, and everything inside has fallen over. It was a big one! Fortunately the citizens are out almost immediately to begin rescue and repair efforts. No matter where the heroes go, there'll be someone to help, something to do, or help to be offered. Do you need saving, or will you be saving others?


• 7:45am Train Station, Far Haven: Social media is going absolutely crazy. There's a MONSTER here! There's a monster in the train station!! Numerous pictures are posted of a Child-shaped monster with ten eyes instead of a face. Today, however, he's wearing a pair of black athletic shorts, some flip-flops, and a T-Shirt that says "I'm with Stupid" on the front and an arrow that trails around to the back of the shirt where it says "You're Stupid". At the train tracks, he's going one rail tie at a time repairing them to get the tracks straightened and fixed again. What's the deal???


• 08:00am International Cabin of Crepes, Bamborough: As if Social Media wasn't buzzing enough about the monster in Far Haven, it explodes again when the Wizard arrives at ICoC for breakfast. Several servers post that she asked for "the family table" and she invited all the knights and the princess to join her. Breakfast. Her treat. Anyone who comes to visit will find her sitting at the head of the biggest table, sipping a mug of coffee.


• 11:00am Mountain Base, Craydon: [Exploration] Several hikers have returned from up the mountain, reporting that they'd found "strange doors" blocking their path. According to the description they gave, it sounds like the doors can only be opened if one, or more, of the heroes make the climb up the mountain. The cracks go up past the doors, but there's an invisible wall all around the area that stops them from ascending any further. Whatever's going on up the mountain will need some heroic intervention to figure out. Good luck, heroes!

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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.

Comments

[silentwords]

Seth's running around Craydon, using his wires to wrap around things on the brink of collapsing as peopl hurry to get out. He's asked Qus for the reinforced glove to protect his hand, but he doesn't really even hesitate to use his less protected hand when he has to. He isn't really thinking. He's just doing what he can to keep himself moving and his mind off of the myriad of emotions whirling in his mind that he can't handle at the moment.

His clothes are dirty and he's scrathed up but that doesn't matter.
He spots Gyre at the edge of an alley, not looking to good and runs to check on the other Knight. They hadn't really conversed much after the other had helped him the first evening here, but the comfort the other had offered him back then had been of great help to him. So seeing him looking so frazzled concerns him.

[sustainer]

He spots Seth coming from around the corner, and he takes a deep breath, trying to steady his shaking hands. He runs his fingers through his hair again, settles himself down so he can help this poor, ratty looking kid. It doesn't even occur to him that Seth might be coming to check on him instead. He's automatically assuming the other is the one who needs help.

"Are you okay?" he asks, his voice shaking just slightly. He clears his throat roughly, looking away for a moment. He's a little more calm when he says, "Did you stay safe yesterday?"

[silentwords]

How Gyre's voice shakes just slightly at first really only has him more concerned. Maybe it was because he was himself keeping his emotions on lockdown, but he could sort of sense that was what Gyre was doing...especially from those eyes.

He's quickly signing to Gyre after catching his breath a little. He might have gotten a little more stamina in the past few days but overall it was still average at best.
"I'm fine, I happened to be outside when the earthquake hit and I'm kind of used to them though I've never been around for anything of this scale. I...stayed in the cabin for a while but..."
He hesitates, fear, doubt, uncertainty whirling in his eyes before he shakes his head vigorously. No, now's not the time, not when he was here to check up on Gyre.
"Never mind me, are you okay? I spotted you and...you really didn't look so good..." Even without a voice to convey the emotion, the concern was more than obvious in Seth's eyes.

[sustainer]

It's a little alarming to see this anxious kid shaking his head so firmly. So confidently. He hadn't seemed certain of anything the last time they spoke, and he almost lets Seth's new confidence soak into the tumble of his thoughts. And then he hears what the other is so confident about and he deflates slightly, his shoulders sinking. It takes him a beat too long, but he nods very slightly.

"I'll be fine. I don't like these cracks," he says, managing to sound far more confident then he looks, and his attention shifts past Seth towards the city behind him. "There are people who need help. Do you want to work together?"

[silentwords]

Seth looks at Gyre in sympathy even as his mouth morphs into a grimace at the mention of the cracks.

"I'm with you on the cracks...if I see them again after today it'll be too soon. Yesterday was quite enough thank you very much.", he signs quickly, without really thinking much about it.

The suggestion to work together surprises him a little. However, it's a good idea. They'll likely be of more help working together than alone, besides, that way he could keep an eye out for Gyre. He clearly wasn't as okay as he pretended to be, but clearly didn't really want to talk about it either. A decision Seth could understand.

So he nods, before signing. "Sounds good. We can't do everything but let's at least try to get everyone safe, or at least as safe as we can in this situation anyway."

[sustainer]

"Mm," he hums softly, his eyes losing focus slightly. Seth might not be thinking much about the cracks, but that's all Gyre can think about. He's right that Gyre doesn't want to talk about his thoughts at all though, so he clearly relaxes when Seth takes the bait and moves on.

"Yeah, let's go. I think I heard someone down this way," he says, gesturing out towards the road for a beat before he starts towards a pile of rocks blocking a different alley.

[silentwords]

Seth follows quickly with a nod. Had he known Gyre's thoughts he would have told you that he didn't think much about the cracks themselves, because his mind was too focused on what came after if you touched them. But alas, he wasn't a mind reader.

Still, he makes a point to briefly, gently place a hand on Gyre's arm as the move towards the rocks blocking the other alley, looking at him with a soft, small smile, and an understanding expression.

He would not push Gyre to talk, but if he wanted to at some point, Seth would be happy to listen. He himself hoped someone would do that for him at a later point in time. He knew he wouldn't be able to hold back the myriad of emotions that had been on his mind since yesterday and had even robbed him of sleep, which showed pretty badly as very dark bags under his eyes, forever...but he would hold on to them long enough to not hurt anyone by suddenly unloading on them. He'd quickly been reminded that that wasn't the correct way about things thanks to Zafika.

[sustainer]

He glances in Seth's direction when he feels his hand on him, eyeing him a moment and then his hand. He knows he ought to smile back. The kid is offering some kind of comfort which he should appreciate, but the expression of understanding is infuriating to him in this moment. Seth doesn't know his mind and the familiarity of that expression makes his skin crawl.

He doesn't say anything to that effect though, turning away from him as they approach the rubble. Behind the rocks, there's the soft sound of someone crying, and that's clearly got his attention now as he shouts, "We're going to get you out!"

He begins to grab one of the smaller stones, tugging it out and bringing it out onto the street. He glances quickly at Seth as he moves. "We need to clear this."

[silentwords]

Seth nods at Gyre as he starts moving the smaller stones. Glancing around he takes a moment to find something sturdy and stable enough to use and when he does find it, he sends his wires to attach to one of the bigger pieces of the building that had collapsed, wrapping them around the study rock for support, and then started retracting them slowly to lift the boulder.

[sustainer]

Gyre stands out of the way as Seth moves the larger rock, taking note of what he does, how he uses his power. After that, he starts using his own ability, getting the shield under some of the rocks, or against them so nothing falls in a way they aren't expecting.

He's used to working in silence so unless Seth tries to talk to him, he's fine like this, climbing over the last of the rubble to greet the person o the other side. They look entirely distraught, tears running down their face, but they begin to calm as he talks to them. For as shaky as he was a little bit ago, he takes on the role of knight very well in this moment.

[silentwords]

Seth is more than fine working in silence, not even thinking about talking, not that he really could with his hands occupied with the debris.

The way Gyre takes on the role of knight, calms down the distressed, formerly trapped person down merely by talking...

Seth admires Gyre for that. He knew far to well he likely wouldn't be able to do that even if he tried. So he leaves that to Gyre, so he won't mess up and make things worse.

Instead he surveys the area for anyone else trapped.

[sustainer]

When the person seems calmed, he helps them back over the debris and watches them as they retreat down the streets, going to one of the shelters that have already been set up. The moment they're gone, his face clouds over again, a shiver running down his spine.

He keeps himself well-contained, but he clearly needs the distraction again as he turns to join Seth in looking for the next person. He moves steadily at this point. Now that he has someone to work with, he doesn't take breaks to calm himself like before, and as the morning goes along, his faked confidence and certainty become more and more real.

The work is quiet, the two of them not saying much more then needed as they move rubble and climb up to high places and reunite lost kids with their parents. Around 8, a little note appears in front of Gyre, right about when Seth starts getting messages about the breakfast invitation. He takes the note out of the air and slips it into his pocket, but he ignores it until late into the morning when things seem to be finally calming. It's only then that he takes his leave from Seth, thanking him for the help before he makes his way out of the city. He's got a wizard to visit.