Day 8: Monster Arrival

Afternoon: 12:00noon - 5:00pm

[ IRL Timeframe: February 26th - March 11th, 2020 ]

Just like the seventh day, if the heroes were hoping that this was going to ease up at all and give them a break:

It was all getting so much worse.

The light rain from the morning hasn't let up, still coming in brief waves over the island. It's not so much that you wish you had an umbrella, but also a little more than anyone's comfortable staying outside in for too long. The sun is still trying to peek through every now and then, occasionally at the same time as the drizzling rain.

- [1] -

At noon on the dot, the emergency broadcasting system goes off on every device on Harsen Island. Actually, it goes off across the entire planet. Before anyone can begin to wonder who it's from, the broadcast flickers on to show the Protector's face. He looks... rough. There's sand caked on to his robes, he still looks completely drenched from being in the ocean, and there are numerous cuts over his body from the fights he's been in. Careful eyes will note that his scabs don't look quite right, are those rainbow colors?

"People of the world, I am the Protector." He begins, reaching a hand up to his hair to pull some stray aquatic greenery off of himself.

"It is with no satisfaction that I am reaching out to you in this manner. But I must sow hope before the last flickers of survival are snuffed out." He does his best to finish getting himself at least somewhat decent for the camera before continuing. Who's recording this...?

"The Wizard has set not two, but four knights against the world. The monkey, dragon, boar, and dog knights all stand together. Worse still, they have enticed the ox knight and the Princess to believe their lies." He shakes his head, sighing like someone who's been betrayed.

"They have killed the others, the rabbit, sheep, and snake knights were all cut down for trying to save this world." He lets out a deep exhale, either holding back tears or very believably pretending to.

"The last hope of the world lies in your hands. In four days: Midnight, on the last day: Blow up Harsen Island. Reduce it to ash and the world will spin on. They must not win. They will not. ... I will do what I can to turn the tide back, but do not mourn me if I am lost. The world is more important."

The feed cuts abruptly as a yellow fist comes into frame, aimed directly at the Protector's head. He barely sidesteps it, but then the video is gone. Anyone who has kept up with where the monsters planned to be will be able to assume it's Ten. Some may even know that for sure. Who has the better odds?

- [2] -

"Eight" arrives out of the Far Haven train depot almost immediately after the Protector's noon broadcast. How can anyone be sure?

It's streamed to the internet.

Social media somehow immediately picks up on the "#EightFightLive" stream with numerous accounts sharing it dozens of times (are... those fake accounts...?) in minutes. The stream begins, attached to the side of whoever this is' head, is this being filmed on a GoPro or something? No one has to wonder for long, because the movement slows to a stop as the video feed aims at a big mirror on a nearby wall.

The reflection shows two massive sets of train wheels with a platform and what looks like a big yellow snowman perched on it. The snowman's midsection, however, has eight giant arms sticking out of it. Each set of arms is holding, from bottom to top: Swords, Hammers, Axes, and the top set of arms are actually a huge set of yellow wings. The head of the snowman doesn't have a face, but it does have eight eyes painted on. The center of each eye looks like it's flickering and on fire? And hastily wrapped around where a "neck" would be between the top snowman orb and the body is, in fact, a GoPro.

Nice.

The whole body shudders slightly and the distorted voice of an automated subway announcer gurgls out the words: "Next stop: Far Haven. Stand clear of the closing doors. One coin per trip. Next stop: Far Haven."

Anyone watching the stream will realize that if "Eight" is on the rails and heading to Far Haven... then the next stop would be Bamborough. And then Craydon after that. Was he just going to ride the rails around the island until he was defeated? The stream shudders as "Eight" starts rolling along on the rails, in the direction of the train station.

Loyal viewers of the stream will also get treated to a cameo on the way: While rolling through Far Haven, the GoPro centers on the big yellow mass that is Ten fighting against a glowing-white-weapon armed Protector. Suddenly the stream shows nothing but bright orange flames in their direction, and the two scatter apart. Whatever results from the flamethrower isn't seen, because "Eight" is too busy rolling on the rails towards the next destination! Far Haven, toot toot!

- [3] -

#childfound

Sxicq is too damn easy to find on the island, especially when they're spotted standing side-by-side with a monster in one of Luka's fan T-shirts at the top of the mountain (hi Eight!). The two of them are knelt by the door that had exploded several days earlier, hands pressed into the ground. Whoever has a drone taking the pictures of them, it's good enough to show that there are blue cracks radiating out from whatever they're doing. That can't be bad!

- [4] -

It's bad.

At 2:00pm, the island is wracked with earthquakes. Well, not actual quakes, more like the whole island just starts vibrating. It's the kind of low vibration that makes everything rattle just a little bit and fills the air with a white noise that never really goes away, but nothing cracks and breaks. It's like someone turned the island into putty and started wiggling it into a new shape.

And social media confirms that as observers of the island check in with hashtags like: #mountainsinking #shrinkingmountain #deflatedharsen

Because the mountain is flattening out, shrinking down and disappearing. Everything on the island is weirdly adjusting, like the buildings are just sort of floating on top of this solid-ground-now-melting-but-still-solid situation. It makes absolutely no sense. Science can't explain it. Mountains don't melt. You can't just shrink a mountain into the earth. You can't flatten an island.

But that's what's happening. Slowly, but surely. It'll be done by Evening, and then the Island will have a new shape.

- [5] -

At this point, Eight has left a text with all the heroes again that if they want to go to the garden, he can help make that happen. All it takes is a text. Five and Six are staying there, with Seven, in the monster house. If anyone goes there, they'll get to find the most interesting tidbit of information: It's not rumbling there.

- [=] -

Social media is pretty much evenly split on today's news: #endoftheworld? #whatjusthappened.

Monster Arrival: Far Haven: "Eight".

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

Prompts:

12:00pm Emergency Broadcast, Everywhere: Immediately following the Protector's emergency broadcast, all of the phones and tech on the island and in the world become accessible again. The discussion is immediate and unrelenting and, to make matters worse, the social media accounts of all the heroes... have been disabled. They've only got phone calls and texts to rely on. Do they text each other? Or someone back home? Who could have disabled their social media accounts? That's... really fucking bad, holy shit.

12:15pm Train Station, Far Haven: "Eight" finally rolls into the Far Haven train station at about 12:15pm, ready to fight. Any hero, at any train station, will find that they all have a new feature: Instead of the "upcoming arrivals" screens above the tracks advertising regular trains, they're advertising "Eight"'s arrival times? Anyone in Bamborough will see "12:45pm" and anyone in Craydon will see "1:15pm". Even more strange is that there's a hastily-added black pole with a coin slot on it. Someone has hand-written "Eight request" in yellow ink beside the coin slot. Someone's gotta fight "Eight" first at Far Haven... or make a request at another station! The fight is on!

12:30pm Mountain Door, Mountain: Does your character go to interrupt Sxicq and Eight on top of the mountain? That's a pretty rude thing to go do. They're busy, why would your character do that? Don't they have more important things to do, like, you know, killing "Eight"? Either way, if your character ends up atop the mountain, thread it here!

2:00pm Earthquakes, Harsen Island: Everything is shaking! This is probably the worst possible thing that could happen! What's up with this shaking?! Does your hero get up to anything during all this? Do they try to find out what's happening? Do they... geez, how do you even react to an hours-long earthquake everywhere?!

?:00pm The Garden: Did your hero ask to go to the Garden? What do they do there? Any garden threads go here!

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.

OOC Mortality Warning: Any hero who actively seeks out the Protector IC will be at a high risk of death in some manner. He is on the move, tread carefully!

Activity Check: February 2020

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

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"Sevens, where else?" She answers, squinting down at him. A moment later she slams the window shut and disappears inside.

Whenever Gyre finally makes his way inside, he'll find that Five has come out of Seven's door and is standing in front of it with her arms folded, waiting for him. She's not gonna wait ten more minutes for him to awkwardly knock at the door.

He jumps a little when the window gets slammed, pausing for a moment. That's exactly the person he wants to see at least, but it still takes him another minute of waffling at the front door before he finally opens it and goes upstairs.

He's looking incredibly nervous as he climbs up to the second floor, shoulders hunched, glancing around as if expecting to get attacked any second now. When he sees her standing in front of the door, he offers her a faint smile.

"Are you waiting for me?"

If five could roll (all five) of her eyes any harder, they would've popped out of her head and done somersaults behind her.

"Why would I wait for you. You would've just stood outside the door right? Come in if you're gonna come in." She accuses him of what she's almost sure he would've done.

But she turns away from him after that, walking into the room where Six is sitting, sleeping?, on a chair in the corner. He has a leg propped up, crossed over one knee, and his head is flopped back with a cowboy hat covering his whole face.

Most striking, however, is that there's a bed propped up vertically in the corner like it was hastily moved to make room for the massive glass tank sitting in the center.

Unfortunately for everyone, the liquid inside is jet black. There are frequent movements in the liquid, metallic flickers catching the light from the window, but that's all that can be seen by looking at it.

Five flops back down in a chair by the window, facing an empty chair across from hers.

"Bored?"

"I wouldn't have--" he immediately insists when she goes and accuses him of that. She is, of course, completely right. He would have hesitated outside for a little bit at least. This still feels wrong even if he's done it more in the last couple days than he has for forty years.

Either way, he follows her into the room, his steps skipping just slightly as he passes over the threshold. He feels like he's doing something wrong, and he's clearly tense as he looks around the room cautiously. He watches Six for a few moments before turning his attention to the enormous tank in the center of the room.

He walks towards it, pausing a foot away or so and looking into the swirling black goo. Five's question catches him decidedly off guard, and he blinks in her direction.

"Huh? No, not bored. I wanted to check on them," he says, sounding utterly confused about why that would be the assumption she'd make?

If he keeps it up, she's going to throw him through the next door he comes across just to prove a point that he doesn't need to keep doing that crap. Just go through the door!

Five stays watching him as he looks at the tank, and then...

"They're doing a whole lot of nothing in there. So I've been doing a whole lot of nothing here. You may not be bored but I sure am." She sighs.

How's that for your answer, Gyre?

"Ah," he hums softly. That makes sense. She's projecting. He tilts his head slightly, his eyes following a flicker of metal under the goo as if he might be able to learn anything by watching it so closely.

"At least you're safe," he says after a moment, glancing briefly at her. "The Protector is out there again. I don't know if you saw." He pauses here, turning his attention back to the tank.

"What's going on in there? It looks like there's metal..."

Five watches him watch the tank the whole time, curious what he's focused on but also seeming much more interested in staying right where she is. She folds her arms as she answers him, one of her eyes locked on the scene outside the window which is presumably just the garden.

"Yeah I know. I want to throw him back in the ocean because he's a killer." She sighs, shaking her head.

"And I dunno but there's no metal in there. Just Seven, the protector's nightmare, and whatever Nine put in that tank... and I don't remember her putting metal in there."

Edited 2020-02-27 21:29 (UTC)

He glances sadly in her direction, smiling only very faintly. "A lot of us are killers, ki'ta. The important part is how we try to repay our debts."

Not that the Protector seems that interested in repaying debts right now. He huffs a breath out through his nose, turning his attention to the tank again. He reaches up a hand, moving to set it lightly on the glass.

"What's 'the Protector's nightmare'?"

She makes a face at him as he says that, squinting afterward.

"Yeah like that stupid princess. And you know, the awful thing he puts on Seven every year. The..." She makes hand motions like something dripping off of something else?

"Goop!"

Gyre makes a slight face, thinking about uh the stupid princess in question. How is he going to get his daughter to get along with this person he's having feelings about...

"Me too," he says pointedly, turning to look more fully at her. "I know you don't get along with him, but he's trying hard for you guys now. Could you try to give him another chance?"

His eyes widen a little when she says that second bit though. It's something he puts on them??

"He... What is it? He puts it on them??" He looks incredibly alarmed, shaking his head in confusion. "Is it an actual nightmare? Like, ah, like a dream he has?"

"Only if he stops being stupid for like. Five minutes." She counters, looking Gyre over before moving on to the other part.

"I don't know? It looks like a nightmare he'd have, how else was I supposed to describe what he does to them? It's some kind of evil magic violence-goop!"

Gyre nods, rolling his eyes a little as if to say, 'fair'. He thinks those are entirely fair terms for her to give Luka another chance. He's hoping the princess behaves himself the next time they end up talking.

The more important thing is this second bit, and he grits his teeth as he listens to her describe this stuff. He feels so utterly disgusted by it, staring down at his feet miserably.

He's silent for a long beat here, sighing angrily to himself. He wants to know more, but interrogating her about the awful shit that happened to her friend just sounds so horrible to him. He changes the subject after another breath, looking towards him.

"How will you know when they've recovered?"

She'll throw Luka in the lake if he doesn't behave, she's done with him being stupid okay!

"They'll knock or something I guess?" She answers, seeming confused as she mulls the question over.

"I don't really know what they're like."

He looks at her, a sudden concern flashing across his face.

"Will they even know they can come out?" he asks, trying to imagine what they might be like after all this time. Highly traumatized, probably. They might feel completely trapped in there. They might have no idea what they can do. He reaches up, setting a knuckle against the glass and looking in Five's direction as if for permission.

"I'm going to knock first? So they know we're out here?"

Five makes an incredulous face at Gyre and she's absolutely about to tell him that's stupid.

Except she realizes, a moment into opening her mouth, that that might not be stupid? She watches him for a moment before shrugging.

"They're probably not awake."

He snorts at that little play she gave him on her face, smirking at her. She's so feisty so it's wonderful to see her pausing for thought every now and then.

"That's okay. Better to try," he says, nodding to himself. He hesitates briefly, before knocking three times on the glass. He's trying to be gentle about it, and he ends up holding his breath slightly in anticipation.

Who has time to think, honestly. Not her. Thinking's for squares, and she's no square.

Unfortunately what's about to happen is going to give them both a lot to think about. Immediately after Gyre's third knock, there are three rapidfire impacts against the inside of the glass and the liquid swirls wildly away from three temporary black circles that look as if something, or someone, slammed three somethings against the glass in a quick reaction.

In her seat, Five sits up abruptly and looks wide-eyed at the tank, quietly mouthing: "What the fuck."

"Ah--!" Gyre barks, taking a couple startled steps backwards. His eyes dart to Five, immediately worried he did something wrong, but she looks just as confused as him.

"I uh," he starts, blinking a couple times. "What was that?" He doesn't give her more then a second to respond though before he suddenly goes to the glass again and taps just the tip of his finger once against it.

"Can you hear me, ki'ta?"

Five uh... absolutely has nothing to say in this moment. She's watching Gyre as he experiments. Seeing what he's getting up to.

Except they're both disappointed, left hanging on a thread that doesn't get picked up. The swirling liquid inside the tank is silent. There's no response.

He looks... incredibly disappointed, yeah. There's a part of him that's tempted to knock again, but the response had been so sudden it was almost violent. He doesn't want to hurt them or scare them, and he has no way to see if that's how they felt. He sighs softly, straightening up.

And then he turns suddenly to her, a nearly desperate determination on his face.

"Do you have a way you can play music in here?"

Wasn't Gyre tired of making Five make faces? Because she makes a face of confusion and surprised as he turns so suddenly.

"Uh. Phone?" She counters, apparently not expecting him to have asked such a weird question? A moment later she rummages and pulls out the same nokia-tier flip-phone he'd seen her use a few days previously. She's mooshing her fingers against the keys, apparently navigating through the menus.

He looks at her and her phone, feeling a little bewildered at the idea of a phone playing music. They couldn't do that back in his day, and he stares at her as she navigates her menus for a bit.

But no. "No, no. Something bigger with uh, with those uh," he gestures vaguely in the air, describing speakers and a boombox with his hands even though he doesn't know the word for either in Common. "They can get the, the radio or play tapes? Do you have one of those?"

Unfortunately she finally gets to a song and, just before she's about to hit play, he shares his idea and--

"...We should get one of those." She says like it's the first time she's thought about it. At the same time, her phone starts playing a little tune.

It's basically a little beeping ringtone, not really what anyone could call music. But it's enough to wake Six in the corner and he jumps a little bit.

"Hwhoyehallo..." He mutters beneath his hat.

He blinks as the phone starts beeping, looking utterly confused that she'd call that music, before he turns to Six. He looks a little flustered as the dude wakes up, going towards Five so they can talk a little quieter. He doesn't want to disturb the dude's sleep if he doesn't have to.

"Do you have one here?" he asks softly, gesturing down at the floor as if to indicate the whole house.

She's doing her best, Gyre, give her a break. When he doesn't really acknowledge the phone music as music, she mushes a button and turns it off. Ugh see if she ever helps you again, Gyre. Fortunately the music stopping and Gyre moving over to Five means that Six falls asleep pretty quickly again.

"Uh. Four--" She starts to say, but then very clearly holds her tongue before she looks out the window instead of catching Gyre's eyes in this moment.

"...Nine. Probably has one."

The Weather

Prompts:

Procedure:

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject