Day 7: Evening

Aftern-Evening: 3pm - Midnight

[ IRL Timeframe: January 22 - January 29, 2020. ]

After all of Seven's fights, ending in Luka taking Ten's hand as the other heroes arrive. The knights will be treated to the sight of something entirely unexplainable: Seven is wounded, laying on the asphalt with a bright white crossbow bolt sticking out of their body. They're still pouring black goop off of their body, but they appear to be wrapped in some kind of cloth tarp. Five is kneeling over them, dressed in a skin-covering assassin outfit that only reveals her five eyes peering out. In her hand is a phone, and that's really all that can be seen before she and Seven disappear into a portal in the ground.

Luka, meanwhile, is standing with Ten's hand in his and his crossbow laid on the ground and not in his hand. No matter what the arriving heroes cry out in order to get his attention, it's too late to stop him. Abruptly, the portal opens and both the Princess and Ten disappear into the ground.

Naturally, the hashtag #princessnapped is forged.

That doesn't prove to be the only hashtag to get some heavy use this evening. The #wizardfound and #robotwizard hashtags find a sudden, new reason to actively discuss what's going on.

The remaining heroes: Garrot, Gyre, Haizea, Matilda, Olivia, (and... where's Terrence?) will find that the events from earlier in the day have caught up to them. There's a crack like thunder as both the Wizard and the Protector flicker into existence and both land in the superhero pose in the center of the intersection that Luka just disappeared from.

The Protector, if possible, is looking even worse than before. He's sporting a black eye and numerous cuts on his forehead, cheeks, and arms. It looks like he's been lit on fire at least once, but even so he's holding his rapier out in anticipation of the next strike.

The Wizard, meanwhile, is finally openly visible to everyone after her absence. She looks rough. It's as if the areas where she'd been harmed have been replaced or repaired with robotics. The left side of her face is no longer bandaged, instead revealing that she now has a robotic eye with a glowing yellow ring. The cables that were visible in the video before are very clearly plugged in just behind her ear, trailing down over her shoulder and down her back beneath the robes.

And of course she's still wearing pajamas. But they look like they've seen better days, charred and ripped and shredded at every edge. In her hand, though, is a massive axe. One side of its head is a giant half-circle axe head while the other side is a heavy weight like a hammer. The entire weapon is jet black, but it has a glossy shine.

What's the worst that could happen?

The Weather
Cloudy, breezy.
48°F / 9°C
Brrr.

Prompts:

3:00pm The Garden, Unknown Location: When Luka falls through the portal with Ten, he'll become immediately aware that the monster has slipped himself closer and snuck his feet beneath Luka's to stabilize him. Despite the falling, he seems surprisingly stable in the air.

And then there's the soft crunch of grass beneath his feet and he shifts slightly, waiting for Luka to step back on his own. Wherever they are, the air is filled with the scents of wildflowers and scents that are both beautiful and entrancing in their complexity. It's clear that there are dozens, if not hundreds of flowers and plants in the immediate vicinity. There's the gentle warmth of sunlight on Luka's skin, clearly advertising that they're outside (or in a very clever indoor garden). But most calming is the gentle sounds of moving water. If Luka focuses, he'll be able to pick out that there's a small waterfall, several waterways, and multiple water features with water tumbling down over rocks. And, of course, a pool or a pond with fish gently swimming about beneath the surface.

But he'll be interrupted twice before he can lose himself. The first is Ten.

"We're here." He says, but if Luka's not shaken enough he'll realize that he doesn't hear Seven and his Seven sense isn't going wild. But the second distraction happens as Luka's phone bloops from an unknown sender with a text:

"Welcome to the Garden, Princess." The text reads... with no explanation of who or how they sent him the text. That's totally normal!

3:00pm Street Intersection, Bamborough: With the arrival of the Wizard and the Protector, it's very clear that shit is about to go down. But that absolutely isn't what the Wizard has in mind for this situation. She's the one running this game, and she isn't about to get five heroes wrapped up in her duel with the Protector. Before anyone can take an opportunity to make any attacks, and especially not the Protector, she snaps the fingers of her free hand five times.

And reality fractures. The way that the cracks in midair begin to fold and reflect the area and people around them, it's like the world is folding up into a trick mirror house. It's... actually exactly that. Reality twists and folds, forming reflections and containers out of the air itself until every single hero is enclosed in one. The hero in the middle of their own box, reflected on two opposite walls. But on the opposite two walls, the Wizard is visible beyond in one of them and the Protector is visible beyond in the other room. Uh. This conversation might get awkward. Worse is that they can't get distracted by their Seven senses, because no one can feel them anymore.

3:15pm To Everyone: In the middle of the earlier events, every hero in Bamborough receives a text from an unknown sender. The only one who's spared this text is Luka, because he got a text earlier. The text reads: "I can give you one teleport to anywhere today. Tell me when and to where. Don't be unreasonable!"

8:00pm Onward, Everywhere: The day is done, the events are finished. How does your character get home? Do they go home alone? Do they seek the company of their fellow heroes? Do they stay alone, or do they get a room together? Either way, it's a rough night for everyone.

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.

Activity Check: January 2020

[ IRL Timeframe: January 1st - January 31st, 2020 ]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"No. But he'll be dead, and then I can rest." She answers, matter-of-factly.

"I'm tired." She says, this time with the weight of not only the past day, but this whole week so far, and the forty years of this whole situation behind it.

To say that it's a heavy weight was an understatement.

Oof. This is subject matter Luka was not well equipped to address.

"But..." He starts, then stops several times to rethink what to say. He couldn't even begin to put himself in the Wizard's shoes and imagine all of what she's been through.

"Does it have to be... like that? Can't you come with us to the new planet and rest there?"

Gyre is, perhaps, better equipped to handle this emotionally, but he doesn't have half the tact he should probably take with it. He's actually a little frustrated that she just completely ignored him, sighing roughly through his nose as he takes a step back and looks down at her. Looks her over.

She looks awful. But while he might not be able to relate to dying forty times (forty-one times?), he did die once. While he can't relate to not being able to sleep at all, he does have near constant insomnia. She's not the only one stuck in a miserable purgatory because of choices they made, and while her choices and her purgatory are both far worse then his that only makes him more insistent.

"Too many people have died already. All you'll do with this is remove the only two people we have who have gone, ah... wherever we're going and know what to expect," he says tersely. "If what you want is to apologize to people for these decades, then help. Rest wherever we end up, and then do the work, with all of us, to rebuild."

He pauses there, and then goes back to what he said before, repeating himself, "I'm not going to leave you behind." This time it's less automatic and there's this heavy, desperate sympathy in it. He cares about her, a lot. More then he might admit to himself. Even if most of what he said was couched in the simple practicality of how much more she knows then them, he also needs her to see the other side of this.

The Wizard's gaze meets Gyres as he looks her over, he was the one to confront the situation she'd brought up. Luka had played it safe and stayed silent, rather than confront the topic head-on like Gyre had.

Fortunately the Wizard isn't going to throw him out a window or anything, but she does give a thoughtful 'hm' in response as he speaks his mind.

And then. Well?

Slowly she shifts, from where she's standing and makes her way over to the bench. She shifts and lowers onto it, sitting back beside Luka. He'll be close enough to hear the hissing of the mechanical parts that are exposed from her left side. The soft hum of robotic engines is quiet but persistent. It's easy to ignore if there were other sounds, but constantly there. And now that she's settled in, she leans back on the bench even as the wood of it creaks under the weight. But it isn't the sound of wood struggling to hold the weight, instead it seems like it was made for this weight.

"You should go to the bridge and see for yourself." She offers to either of them, out in the open.

"Bring the others, if they want."

He straightens a little when she goes silent, worried she's going to get mad at him? He's never seen her actually mad, and the thought frightens him for just a moment. But then she goes and sits herself down, and he nods just slightly, looking about as unsure as he feels.

"Thank you," is all he manages after a moment, letting himself be pleased that she's finally sat her butt down. It's not the same as sleeping, but it's something. He can't imagine how much pain she must be in, if she's in pain at all anyway.

Then she's bringing up a bridge, and he follows the topic change with about as much grace as you might expect from someone who only learned there was another meaning for bridge about twenty minutes ago.

"Why would we go to a bridge? Where is it?" It must be near the water here, right? He looks around in confusion.

The Wizard reclines where she's seated, letting her hat slip forward over her face. Despite the slight obstruction, the glow of her robot eye is clear as day.

"The bridge is a part of the ship." She offers, wondering what further questions they'll have.

"The directions are there."

"Ohh!" Luka exclaims, his fist meeting his palm as he realizes it's that kind of bridge. "Like, the place where you drive the ship? How do we get there?"

It seems to Luka that something like that would have to be pretty far away, and thus, probably not easy to find. They'd likely need a guide of some kind, but then again, they did seem to be in a place full of magic so it might be simpler than that?

"Will we be able to read the directions when we find it, too? We might need to drag along someone to translate..."

"Exactly" she confirms Luka's realization, smirking so very slightly beneath her hat and letting a hint of amusement sneak into her voice.

"Nine knows it best, but she might not be willing to go with you alone." She pauses after she's said it, thinking for a moment.

"I think Twelve keeps the key. Eight can probably teleport you there if you say 'please'." She offers the three options, leaving it up to the two what they'd prefer to pursue.

"You should be able to understand it easily if you remember to breathe. You'll see what I mean when you get there."

"We wouldn't be alone! Gyre's coming too." Luka says as if its the most obvious thing in the world. "Or, wait... does she not trust him, either?"

He had kind of assumed Gyre was on good terms with all of the monsters. At least the ones that weren't Seven.

"It sounds like we'll be running all over this place either way." He half-says to Gyre, looking for his input. "We definitely need to go to Twelve for the key... but then Eight, too, because how else do we get there?"

Gyre is opening his mouth with the exact same question about Nine when Luka beats him to it. He glances at the man, and then nods towards the Wizard. He's curious now. If she is particularly skittish, he'll have to be careful whenever he finally meets her.

Then Luka is trying to plan a route, and he wanders a few steps closer to the bench the both are on, hovering over the two of them as he thinks. He's very close to them both because he feels uh entirely comfortable in this little group for now. He'd probably sit with them if there was any space for him.

"Let's start with Eight. We can meet them, and let them know we'll need them a few times more. Make sure they're willing to help. Then they can send us wherever Twelve ended up," he says, offering the plan out as almost a question. Does that sound good to everyone else?

"Nine doesn't trust many people." She confirms, her robot eye's glow beneath her hat drifting towards Gyre. "Not even Gyre."

But when Gyre declares that Eight will be their first step, the Wizard chimes in with the answer they need:

"His room is on the top floor of the house here." She adds, referencing the house off in the distance. It's barely visible past the hedge line, but it's there. Or they could text Eight again.

"He has a house?" The idea genuinely surprised him. Despite Luka getting to know the monsters more over time, the remnants of him previously thinking of them as nothing but constructs still lingered. He recalls Ten mentioning the house when they'd first arrived, but Luka had simply assumed it was where The Wizard lived.

He wonders exactly what kind of house a monster would keep, and as he does his curiosity about it only amplifies. "We need to visit that. I know exactly where to go."

A house? Gyre's face twists, and he glances at the Wizard as if she might take back what she said and release him from the responsibility of looking at these weird peoples' weird houses. He is genuinely begging her with his eyes even as Luka declares that they have to go, and he can't help sighing in near silent defeat. Guh.

"Okay, it's..." he begins, trailing off as Luka declares he already knows where it is? He sounds utterly mystified as he tries to figure out how the Princess could be surprised about a house, and yet still know where it was.

"You do? Uh, lead the way?"

If the Wizard acknowledges Gyre's pleading face, she makes absolutely no indication of it. Instead she just takes a nice, long sip from her mug before giving a soft 'mmmhmm'.

"Have fun on your way." She offers the two of them, not getting up from the bench.

"Don't get into too much trouble without us, alright?" Luka offers a playful wink to the Wizard before turning toward the path. "I don't want to miss out on any fun."

He wants the Wizard to lay low and stay safe, as much as he couches his concern in lighthearted banter. It seemed as though any time Luka turned his back, the Wizard or Protector were getting into something dire. It's just something bound to happen, at this point.

"It's this way." He says, perhaps unnecessarily, to Gyre. Luka doesn't pick up on any of his apprehension as he reaches one hand to rest on Gyre's upper arm. The other hand feels for the guiding wire along the path.

"Look, Ten showed me this." He says, referring to the guides. "Did you know about them?"

Edited 2020-02-05 03:25 (UTC)

When the Wizard sends them on their way, he reaches out and briefly grabs her shoulder, giving it a squeeze and nodding very slightly at her. "See you soon," he murmurs to her, giving her one last worried look over. He can only hope she stays here for a little longer before she inevitably gets up and begins working again.

The moment Luka's hand is on his arm though, he pulls away from her, thoughtlessly reaching up with one hand to cover his. He guides the princess down to the crook of his elbow where he's a little easier to hang on to, watching as the other finds the wire and grips it.

"I... saw them when we were walking," he says, tilting his head slightly now that he's had them more deliberately pointed out. His gaze follows one down the length of the path, over towards the house in the distance and his eyebrows rise as he realizes what they might be for.

"Have they been put up everywhere?" Did the monsters really prepare for Luka so thoroughly?

"I haven't been everywhere, but they're at least on the pathways here." He says, the wire running through his loose grip as they walk. "And there's a sign at the crossroad that's in braille. They're for Eight. Ten said he's blind, too."

Luka pauses, considering the fact after he'd shared it.

"Isn't that strange? When I met Six, he was confused about why I couldn't see. But Eight is blind." He tilts his head slightly, turning toward Gyre. "Maybe I'm the first blind human he's met."

"Ah," he murmurs, nodding along. He's a little surprised to hear it, considering that Eight seems to be the one transporting them around, but he supposes that magic can do many things. He's lost in his own thoughts as well until Luka brings up Six.

Immediately, he turns to watch the other's face as well, trying to read him curiously.

"Maybe. Maybe he just doesn't remember," he muses, his fingers tapping thoughtfully against the back of Luka's hand where it's settled on his arm. For a moment, his mind settles on Fen and he wonders why it seems like so many of them have trouble with their memories. Six had been less confused than Fen, but only barely at some points.

"But I also believe he's one of the youngest of them. Maybe he hasn't realized Eight is also blind. If he's very young and has always known Eight, maybe it seems normal to him without him, ah, really understanding it."

"Haven't they all been around for forty years?" Luka had never considered that the monsters might have any concept of age. He'd just barely accepted that they had a house. "How could he forget about or not realize something like that? Even little kids figure out blindness pretty quick."

He returns his focus straight ahead. He understood very little about all of this - the monsters, the Wizard, and how they lived and felt about things. It was never something that was discussed or even mentioned. Probably because anyone who found out about it ended up dead.

"Six asked why I didn't get my eyes fixed." He laughs softly. "It makes me curious about Eight. Ten implied he wasn't very nice, though, so maybe he won't talk to me."

He makes a hesitant, unsure little noise. He's not sure how Six wouldn't get it either, but Six is also very strange and seemed very confused while they were talking. More important though is this age thing as Gyre realizes he hasn't actually fully explained what he knows about this to uh anyone.

"For us, they've been around that long. For them, ah, whenever they die, they wake up in the next year." He pauses for a moment here, his shoulders drooping, his fingers curling almost anxiously on top of Luka's hand. This makes him absolutely miserable. "Do you remember the children we met? In the past? That was them. They've been growing up in... this. In spurts. The ones who have been killed only have a few days to grow, but some of them get to live through a whole year before... before this happens to them again."

He pauses again, swallowing roughly. His voice is beginning to break up as all the stress of the day, the days, wraps its hands around his throat. He's a little surprised to realize his eyes are wet. Weird!

"The animals, they're killed every year. Fen says they're only a few hundred days old. They're children." He brings his free hand up to his face, rubbing over his cheeks. "That's what Five told me anyway," he murmurs, trailing off finally. This is a thing he's been circling back to over and over again since Five told him about it, so it's no surprise he's gotten stuck here again, barely even hearing the comment Luka makes about Eight.

Luka goes quiet, having picked up on Gyre's worsening mood.

His face falls and his apparent excitement all but disappears as Gyre explains the monsters' lifespans and their maddening cycle of death and return. Luka's mind can't help but wander to thoughts about Four: if perhaps he had encountered them when he was brought to the past (maybe), how old they were (a child too?), and if his strike with the Protector's sword had killed them permanently (probably had).

"I'm sorry." It's all he says, at first, his hand on Gyre's arm squeezing slightly. It was merely an attempt to soothe the knight's clearly troubled state, but Luka continues, following from his previous train of thought. "I'm sorry for killing Four."

It was something he'd wanted to say for awhile. To Gyre, to Five - to all the monsters, really, especially now that they'd allowed him here in the garden. But the fact that you killed someone's friend (or family?) isn't a topic you really want to broach when they graciously allow you into their safe haven.

"I didn't know any of that." He says again, after a moment of reflection. "They don't deserve it."

Edited 2020-02-06 00:34 (UTC)

The squeeze on his arm brings him back into the moment, and he looks in the princess' direction. The apology catches him off-guard completely, and he makes this miserable, wet noise, reaching up to rub his eyes again.

"It's..." he starts, trailing off almost immediately. It's not his place to absolve him. He's not even sure why Luka is apologizing to him honestly, and as he considers this, an awful, guilty pit opens up in his chest. He is silent for another moment, but he just doesn't know what to do about it except to confess his own thoughts.

"I killed Three. And Two. And very nearly One," he murmurs, his voice so soft it's like he's retreating in on himself. He remembers the way Five reacted when he asked about them - like she'd been hit - and he knows in his nonexistent heart that that means they were just as much children as the rest of them. There are tears on his cheeks suddenly, and he takes a deep, shuddering breath.

"I can only do my best now. For them," he pauses and licks his lips, finding confidence in his voice again as he tries to steady himself. He sets his hand over Luka's again, squeezing it back. "We can help each other be better?"

"At least it was in a battle." He says, as if that somehow softens the blow. He doesn't know if Gyre is aware of how cowardly and deceitful he had been when he killed Four, but those were the shameful details Luka was in no hurry to disclose. "None of us knew what we were doing, then."

He suspects, now, upon hearing Gyre's shaky breaths that he may be crying. Being unable to detect certain types of body language without vision was one of those frustrating things Luka had to navigate around, and it made particularly sensitive social situations like this even more difficult.

"You're right." He says, letting the guiding wire fall from his other hand. "We can't take back what happened, but we can make this the last year any of them have to go through it. That's the best thing we can do for them, isn't it?"

"A death is a death," he answers that first bit immediately, his voice warbling once again. He brings himself to a pause when Luka releases the wire, stopping in place so the other doesn't lose where his is compared to the guide.

He sniffs, wipes his face again. It takes him another breath, but then he's nodding emphatically, trying to tug the last dregs of exhausted hope back up into his thoughts. They can do this. He's... he's pretty sure they can do this.

"That's what I think. That's what I want to do for them," he says, reaching up to cup a hand around Luka's cheek. He runs a thumb along his skin before pulling away again. He is amazed to hear the princess talking like this, and he uh loves it a little. "We can help them settle in... in the new world, too. They'll have a lot to adjust to, after all this."

Luka gives a noise of affirmation in response. He's surprised at Gyre's tender touch - as though he were the one who needed to be comforted - but Luka leans into it, briefly, nonetheless.

"We'll have our work cut out for us." He nods. "A new world is going to be a lot for everyone to accept, but them especially. But they'll be free to do whatever they want there. And the Wizard..."

He trails off, recalling the Wizard's plans for her own fate. It was an incredibly loaded topic, one that felt far out of Luka's depth, but he wants to be optimistic about it at least for Gyre's sake.

"She'll be there too." Luka says, bringing his now freed hand to Gyre's shoulder in a reassuring pat. "Like you said, there's no need for anyone else to die in the name of all of this."

The Weather

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