Day 8: Morning

[wizardseason]

Morning: 6:00am - 12:00noon

[ IRL Timeframe: February 10th, 2020 - February 19th 26th, 2020 ]

After the events of Day 7 and the chaos that it brought, the heroes have learned a number of things that most of them still aren't sure they're ready to know. What will they do with their knowledge? How will they share it with each other? How will--

At about 6AM, everyone receives a text from Garrot. Anyone who saw him the evening before may be surprised to see him forming complete sentences and, uh, threatening everyone? Is he okay? Anyone brave enough to want to text him back?

What a great start to the day, an early text. But that's... surprisingly the only shake-up? It's eerily calm.

The Protector had been knocked out to sea by the Wizard, spawning a number of serious worried conversations on social media. Is he okay? Was he dead? Is it time to panic? There were plenty of memes, too. Like the wizard in the foreground with sunglasses, a golf club, and a wide smile with the protector in the background and the words "time to go golfing" memed accross the image. At least some people were still in a joking mood.

The Wizard, too, had a collection of social media posts about her current circumstances. The overall opinion was that she was way scarier than before, was she a terminator? Wizardinator?

To make matters worse, Sxicq was missing. The hashtag #childlookout was trending with almost hourly updates of the island. Sxicq didn't make themselves difficult to find, which meant that spotting them even from distant photos or drone snaps was pretty straightforward. But there was no sign of their characteristic glow or disruptions anywhere. No bigfoot-esque sightings in the back of other photos. No panic that they were eating entire restaurants' stocks of food.

Nothing.

Talk about a calm before the storm, especially since Eight had alluded to several of the heroes that there was still going to be a fight today.

It turns out to be another opportunity for the heroes to collect themselves, gather information, and get themselves on stable ground. It's warmer today, and there are passing waves of light rain all over the island. Little drizzle showers that stick around just long enough to make you seek shelter, but not so long that you wonder when it'll let up. The sun dares to peek through every now and then, occasionally at the same time as the drizzling rain.

Eighth Morning Event: None.

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The Weather

• Light rain.
• 68°F / 20°C
• A gentle breeze.

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Prompts:

• 6:00am The Text, All Cities: "Mandatory medical exams today at 8AM at Far Haven General. The front desk will see you're escorted. You will be frisked, multiple times. Hospital staff says no weapons, no chaos. We can't piss them off.
  
  That means nobody gets their animal companions, since some of you are idiots. They'll be left at the front door before going off on a guided tour. If you or yours don't cooperate, it will be assumed that you want to harm the Princess and you will die.
  
  See you then!"
  
  At about 6AM, everyone receives that text from Garrot. Anyone who saw him the evening before may be surprised to see him forming complete sentences and, uh, threatening everyone? Is he okay? Anyone brave enough to want to text him back?


• 8:08am Eight, All Cities: Anyone who decides they're going to text Eight to make a plan will find that he doesn't answer any of his texts until 8:08am. He replies to everyone all at once, at exactly 8:08 and 8 seconds. Whether your hero sent one text at 6am, or eight texts between 6 and 8am, all the answers come at exactly the same time. If anyone asks to go to the garden, they'll be deposited on the landing pad in the garden... at 8:08am. Predictable.


• 9:00am The Wizard, The Garden: The Wizard can be found in the vegetable section of the garden for any heroes who go looking for her. She's tending to the plants, picking weeds, watering the beds, and preparing new sprouts to grow in the empty spaces.


• ?:00am Anywhere, All Cities: Surely your character has to be getting up to something this morning, somewhere. This is a general catchall post for any threads among heroes that occurs. Whatever your character is getting up to, however they're preparing, or however they're coping. This is the place for it. Eight said there was going to be a fight this afternoon, after all, so there's something on the horizon at least!

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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.

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Activity Check: February 2020

[ IRL Timeframe: February 1st - February 29th, 2020 ]

Comments

[eutychia]

"Just the once, in the cafe a few days ago. I'd love to chat again but they're kind of elusive." Luka shrugs. It felt like he had hardly a free moment the past couple of days, and finding Sxicq was indeed no simple task.

"It sounded like you two didn't get along too well. But they love to eat. Maybe we should host a dinner for them?" Luka laughs, but he's not entirely joking. It wouldn't be the worst idea for getting a moment of Sxicq's time.

[sustainer]

"Hm," he grunts back, sounding immediately displeased with the idea. He can't deny that they like eating, but...

"When I met them the second time, they destroyed part of the building where they were eating," he says, and it's clear that this is the thing that left such a bad impression on him. When they'd destroyed the hospital, they'd been scared. The restaurant had felt like an act of pure disregard.

"If we're going to eat with them, we need to do it outside." He pauses a beat... "And I can't cook."

[eutychia]

Why did it seem like everyone else's encounters with Sxicq ended up leading to something being destroyed? Sure, Sxicq was a little volatile but they'd only been frustrating and rude at most with Luka.

"Well, me neither." Luka folds his arms. "We could hire catering? Or... Garrot can cook."

Luka recalls his conversation with Garrot on the mountain the other day, where Garrot claimed he could cook a meal worthy of introducing to Ten. He figures a cookout for Sxicq would be similar.

"We'd just need a lot of food."

[sustainer]

"I can catch a couple deer. And some rabbit," he offers automatically, like this is the sort of thing he plans out all the time. How much food he's going to bring to an occasion. "Do you think that would be enough?"

He's really not sure. He hadn't seen an end to Sxicq's hunger for the little bit he spoke to them, but a couple deer and some rabbit is a lot of food as far as he's concerned. He pauses here, considering what he might be missing. He does not think about vegetables before he thinks about that one unfamiliar word.

"What's catering?"

[eutychia]

"Yeah, that's... probably enough?" Luka has no idea how much meat that would net them, and it wasn't exactly the kind of food he imagined being cooked up at an outdoor event. His own experience with deer and rabbit meat was only when it was served to him on expensive plates at gourmet restaurants. "I doubt they're picky. As long as there's something, I think they'll be happy."

He's still wrapped up in trying to figure out what they'd actually end up serving Sxicq when Gyre follows up with another question.

"Catering is when you pay people to provide food at an event." He says, matter-of-factly. It had slipped his mind that Gyre would probably not be familiar with such a concept, but it made sense.

[sustainer]

"Oh. No. We don't need to do that," he says, a clear distaste in his voice. These people hire people to cook for them?? What a nightmare! He shouldn't be that surprised. He knows money moves through these people constantly, but he just can't stand the idea of paying someone to do something they can do just fine.

Or well. That Garrot can do for them just fine. Hopefully they can get him on board. Either way, he shakes his head a little, returning to uh party planning? He has no idea how this is going to work.

"Do you think it'll take awhile to plan? I need time to hunt, but I could have it tomorrow, if it goes well."

[eutychia]

Hey now, catering is a very reasonable service. Feeding a lot of people en masse is no easy task! If he thought something as convenient as catering was bizarre, Gyre is lucky he wasn't privy to Luka's conversation about his lifelong personal chefs just the other day.

"The most important part is getting Sxicq to come. It's also the hardest, since they're unpredictable and hard to find." Luka opens his phone and quickly taps through social media. Maybe there was a Sxicq spotting?

"Let's plan for tomorrow. I'll focus on getting them to come, and you can hunt."

[sustainer]

He would be utterly offended if he ever found out about the concept of a personal chef, yeah. For now though, he watches Luka get out his phone, wondering what he's looking for in this moment.

"I'll have them ready." He pauses a moment longer, curiosity finally getting the better of him.

"Do you have their phone number?

[eutychia]

"Sxicq has a phone?" This is news to Luka. They really didn't seem the type to have a phone - where would they even get that? And why did Gyre have their number and not him?!

"I don't have their number. They really gave that to you?" Luka tilts his head quizzically. Gyre's experiences with Sxicq had seemed tumultuous at best, and yet he still walked away getting their phone number.

"Is that how you were able to translate their speech?"

[sustainer]

"Oh, no, I--" Gyre starts, before cutting himself off with an extremely amused little noise. The idea that he would've thought to ask for someone's number the first time he met them, much less them after the conversation they had, is extremely funny to him.

"Fen translated for me. I think all the animals can speak their language. Maybe the monsters too," he explains first, before clarifying, "I though you might be uh, texting? Them? On your phone?"

[eutychia]

"Oh... ohhh." Luka vocalizes as he pieces together the misunderstanding. "I wish they were that easy to contact. I was checking to see if anyone had spotted them. Stuff like that tends to get posted online."

The mistake did give Luka an idea though.

"Maybe I should offer to get them a phone? I don't think they'd want it, but... you never know."

[sustainer]

"Oh, that's..." he pauses, remembering something about hashtags and the internet and texting? He doesn't really understand any of it, but the idea that people could tracking any of them around makes his skin crawl.

It's also not the reason for this meeting! He'll pick Luka's brain about it some other time, he notes to himself.

"Yeah! That's a good idea. Even if they say no, we'll learn something about them, right?"

[eutychia]

"I can propose it when they come to dinner, then." He says, brimming with confidence.

Obviously, it wasn't guaranteed that Sxicq would agree to attended. It wasn't even guaranteed that Luka could find them in time to invite them. But dwelling on the unfavorable possibilities felt like a waste of mental resources, considering how many unfavorable possibilities they were up against.

"Alright, it's a plan then." And Luka's already tapping it into his schedule.