EVENT ★ BACK TO THE FUTURE

[futurologists]

BENDED TIME As outlined in the OOC post, things start to slow down and grow quiet in Oska for a few days as the bugs crawl away and slowly disappear. But then the cocoons hatch. Fully grown temporal insects claw their way out of them, each about the size and temperament of raging bulls. They come out far more aggressive and eager to fight, are are willing to take on anything that moves with jaws and claws alike. Except, of course, another insect — when two of them encounter each other, they enter into a mating dance and then slip away into another dimension, leaving behind only the temporary ghosts of years gone by. If you can’t find a way to pierce that thick shell to take one down, better find another one to pair it off with instead. Just try not to get bit while leading them around and find yourself suddenly 5 years old again. The insects aren’t the only thing going on in Oska, though. As it turns out, unicorns really hate this adult form of the temporal insects, and will start kicking their way out of their stalls in the stables to get at the insects in an attempt to impale or trample them. According to Uruz they’re gallant warriors, but not always quite cut out to take on a bug, and can easily get themselves hurt or killed. She would really appreciate recruits taking a moment to recapture any stray unicorns they may come across and leading them back to the stables. Try to avoid any insects on the way, or you’ll find yourself suddenly fighting insect and irate unicorn, which is no one’s idea of a good time. The lake is getting more active, too. All the fighting has woken up something in the depths of it. Dark red tentacles sometimes creep up onto shore — and don’t worry, this time they don’t belong to a sea goddess. The tentacles don’t attack unless attacked, and can in fact be quite agreeable. Nodes along the length of them act as primitive eyes, which see well enough to interact with anyone nearby. They’re also all a little peckish. Toss a tentacle a bit of food and watch it curl around and ingest it using tiny mouths on the underside. It might even be willing to play a few rounds of fetch or slap a bug into the sky for you if you put it in a good mood with a morsel of food. The senior ALASTAIR members can be seen out and about and doing their part, too. Uruz and Dagny fight as a team, centaur and elf, sometimes fighting back to back and sometimes as mount and rider. They’ll stop and lend a hand, but the cats are a little less generous. Cherenkov and Crowley fight inseparably and use magic and science in deadly combination to ward off and destroy the bugs, but can usually only be seen darting on their way from one place to another. They have a lot of magitek to repair in the destructive wake of the insects. Pomarr, neither as senior nor as invested in actively picking off the bugs, offers shelter near a tentacle-free portion of the lake, calling down storms to toss away bugs for her and anyone in the vicinity. OOC NOTES This log spans a week ICly. Characters will find themselves beginning to understand each other again as the bugs first vanish, as the effects of the cats’ work on the magitek pays off. The translation problem will be completely fixed by the time the cocoons hatch. All of the bugs will have been killed or shipped off by the sixth day, leaving the last day before their departure to the next mission blissfully relaxing. Any temporally misplaced recruits will be back to normal by the last day, as well. A reminder to anyone still texting: the texting feature of magitek jewelry operates based on thought! There are no physical keyboards, recruits merely think the message that they’d like to send to another recruit.

Comments

Serene Charlord | Open - no temporal change

[sereneflame]

1: Investigation

Serene had stood back while a pair of bugs had engaged in a mating dance, not wanting to disturb them while they were distracted. Now there's a shimmering vortex hanging in the air through which she can see ghostly shapes walking.

"Careful!" She sticks out her firm arm, blocking whoever's walked up beside her. "Do you see that? I do not know where it leads, but a pair of insects vanished out of sight through that hole."

2: Recognition

Serene's avoided being bitten thanks to her fire and her spear, but she's starting to realise that something odd is happening to the people who've not been so fortunate. Her hackles are up from all the chaos and she's seeking a familiar face.

But is that a familiar face she sees? She can't quite tell from the distance and so she comes in and peers deeply into the face of the person she's seen.

"Do you know me?"

3: Battle

Fuck these venomous, treacherous bugs. Serene has no intention of being cursed like the people around her so she's fighting as fiercely as she can. She charges at a bug with her spear in hand, screeching like a banshee as she stabs it in the side. It staggers as she rips the spear back out, leaking corrosive fluid as she scrabbles back out of reach and prepares to charge again.

Someone moves behind her and for a second she mistakes that noise for another bug sneaking up from behind. She spins, pulling with her magic to light a fire between her and the noise, realising too late that it's not an enemy approaching her.

Behind her, the wounded bug screams and charges

Closed

[sereneflame]

[Closed to Evan]
Serene has been labouring under the broken translation system for only a few days rather than the full fortnight everyone else has suffered, but it has still been a burden being the only person to be able to speak her tongue. Now that the magic is coating her senses once more she's gone to the library to finally find something to full in all those gaps in her knowledge that she'd cursed when she left the Audentes the first time.

Moving through the stacks she spots a familiar head of hair, one that makes her bubble with delight. Putting aside her task for the moment she sneaks up along the aisles until she's near enough to clap her hands on Evan's short shoulder.

"Evan!" She calls his name too loudly for the setting, grinning hard as she looms at him. "I am here as I threatened. Tell me what computer science is!"

[Closed to Laedo]

Serene's seen a lot of familiar faces in the few days she's been back and she's been surprised both at how much she remembers and by how much her brain has fudged over the last two years. Some of the traits and features she'd been so sure of have turned out to be exaggerated in her mind that she's eager to find the one person who stands out most glowingly in her memory.

Is Laedo Ledo as large and shimmering and glorious as she remembers? She can't say any more, but she's walking through the woods looking for the clearing she knows that he lounges in when he wants to escape from human chatter.

Hey~

[evantuality]

Evan had gone to the library for much the same purpose; on this odd temporally-displaced return visit of his, the library is a place he intends to spend proportionally rather more time in. There's so much knowledge here that he'd regretted abandoning the first time around. However, the knowledge he hadn't been expecting to pick up was the location of this particular old friend.

It startles him, when she greets him, a sudden pair of hands on his shoulder. He straightens but does not exclaim, clamping down on his momentary alarm, and when he turns to see who it is it takes only a moment for old memories to clunk into place. He had hoped, after all, that she would be among those still here.

When her question sinks in he can't help but grin, eyes bright. Oh, but he's sure that relates to a conversation he's forgotten... but it hardly matters.

"Be careful what you ask for." When he turns, the differences are clearer; apart from his shoulder being firmer under her hand than it would have been before, his gaze is clearer, his clothes subtly better-quality in cut and weave and fit, his face a small handful of years older. With delight and warmth and bemusement that might betray that he is rather more surprised to see her than he should be, he greets, "Serene."

Re: Hey~

[sereneflame]

With one meeting after two years she doesn't immediately notice any change, (after all, why wouldn't he be pleased to speak to her voice to voice?), not until she meets his gaze.

"Your eyes!" She leans down to stare and yes, they're brown, bright and perfectly matching. It's then that she notices those fine lines, invisible from where she'd been looking down before, and realises that his hair had draped further over his forehead when they'd reunited several days ago.

"You went home too?" She laughs, shaking her head. "What is happening in this place?! How long has it been?" She's staring back brighter than before, bubbling at how he obviously remembers her so warmly. "Let me guess, five years? Am I insulting you or flattering you?"

[evantuality]

That estimate makes him grin brightly, where for a moment he'd been gathering himself to explain the bug bites and the confusion thereof. He stood still for her examination, but now he shakes his head. His tone is sharp with delight and amusement. Her observation is at the same time so spot-on and so very wrong. "I'm going to go with flattering, although an argument could be made for either."

There are others he's had to ease through this revelation of his extended absence, but he remembers Serene as being more or less the polar opposite of delicate. It's a relief, then, not to have to tip-toe through the entire schpiel, though he decides to still take it in pieces, test out what she knows about the bug situation. "I take it you haven't had the pleasure of being nibbled on by one of our resident insectoid nuisances yet?"

[sereneflame]

She snorts, straightening so she can toss her hair proudly.

"I, bitten? Ha!" She's playing up her own pride in the face of his delight. "Between my spear and my fire I am more than a match for any insect. They should be glad I am not biting them."

An irritated Shhhh! comes from the other side of the bookcase. Serene grimaces in the direction of her unseen chastiser before raising a brow at him.

"Can I lure you away from the books?"

[asscan]

If Serene has blown Laedo's particular glittery self up in her mind into something more radiant, she will be sorely disappointed when she meanders back along a familiar path to find the askan asandus slumped in a clearing, wings clinging loosely around his body. There's something odd about him, something clearly sick, even if he is sporting no obvious wound. Greyish, dulled by a much-diminished magical shell, Laedo his breathing shallowly, head resting on the ground without regard for a prim posture. His tail twitches occasionally, spastic, like he is barely able to contain some great pain.

He doesn't at first spot Serene as she draws near, eyes closed as they are, muzzle drawn into a wrinkled mass. Just as he draws near, his marred eye flies open and his ears swivel in her general direction. He gives an agonized sigh. "It's... you," he says, unable to muster any inflection in his tone.

[sereneflame]

She freezes for a moment at the edge of the clearing, gawping in dismay before breaking into a headlong run towards his massive head. Fuck, he looks like a poisoned camel and she's no Borekko able to work out what the antidote could be.

She staggers to a halt by his massive face and presses her hands on his once-glorious muzzle.

"Laedo, can you turn human? I'll take you to the castle, we'll find a doctor." Her stomach is clenching in dismay, for there's no way she's going to be able to do anything if he stays the size that he is, but she's fighting to keep her voice calm for him.

[asscan]

Everything is well and good up until she touches him. Laedo, flinching in shock--his eye is not in very good shape, and he is in nowhere near the condition to parse sudden movements--loses control of his intense concentration. His magic, preoccupied entirely with holding his form against the suction of the temporal divide, caves in on its last leg and Serene finds herself face to face with a yawning chasm filled with every possibility; Laedo from the size of a kitten, newborn and glossy, to old age, massive and almost entirely golden. And it is not only that. She'll see him flickering before her across many different timelines, many different iterations of the same creature for better or worse.

It's so rapid as to be an ethereal dance, but it does not last long. A few moments of the chaotic dance pass and at the end of it, a much smaller dragonet the size of a large dog settles, curled up into a fetal ball, shaking as if in pain or fear. For long, long seconds, the clearing is still, but the dragonet remains as though catatonic, unaware of Serene's presence.

[sereneflame]

She scrabbles back as bursts into a ball of magic, throwing her arm up to protect herself, as if her mere human limb would shield her should any of these golden shadows solidify and fall upon her. She's too close to make out much of his larger, towering selves, but he's chokingly, overwhelmingly beautiful. She stays cringing back for a moment after the flickers settle, panting and blinking hard to clear her vision of the afterglow of his magnificence.

What's left is so small. She huffs, struck by the thought that this at least is someone who she should be able to carry as she rolls to her feet and pads quietly over.

"Laedo?" She crouches and reaches out gingerly, half-afraid he might burst into golden shadows again, and strokes his shoulder with her fingertips. "Laedo, are you well?"

2

[badspine]

When he sees this tall woman with the mass of cascading curls bearing down on him, there's a moment when his heart leaps into his throat and words ring heavy in his head here she is, here she is, it was only a matter of time. His terror shows in the frozen angles of his small body, the wavering line of his mouth, and it takes every inch of his ill-formed restraint to prevent himself from crying out or from falling onto his knees before her, begging forgiveness for something he doesn't even have an explanation for.

But then she speaks, and that's not Her voice, and the terror of moments before is replaces with a new kind of fear, the fear of all that's different and unknown. It takes him a moment to form words around the icy lump in his throat, but eventually he forces them out, small and faltering.

"N-no...I d-don't think so..."

[sereneflame]

Her throat closes at that abject fear, her own back tightening in remembered sympathy. She kneels and stares closer, knowing for sure now exactly who this is.

"Giovanni?" She extends her hand to him, hoping that he won't bite like the trapped little predator he is, for she does not wish to set this child alight. "Come here, come out. My name is Serene and no one will harm you while I am here."

She'd known that his past would have been like this, known it on a visceral level that only someone who had lived through those terrible experiences could know, but seeing him like this is a misery. Would he forgive her for witnessing him in this state? When she'd been a girl at the same stage that he is now, she wouldn't have.

[badspine]

Is it better or worse that she knows his name? It has a wave of confusion cresting in him, thoughts flashing through his head clickity-clack as he tries to think of how this could be what it might mean what he should do. She extends her hand and he doesn't bite, but instead he backs off one step, two, arms curling tightly around himself as though it'll offer him some kind of protection, though from what he isn't sure.

There's the strong urge to run, but that would mean turning his back on her, and besides that there's something else hidden beneath all his fear, a skittering kind of curiosity. Hopefulness, even. She'd said nothing would harm him whilst she was here, and while that's a difficult thing to believe there's a yearning part of him that wishes it to be true.

"H-how..." he falters on the word, takes a breath, tries again, "how do you know my name?"

[sereneflame]

She can see how on the edge of bolting he is, so she considers her words carefully before answering him, her hand never wavering.

"Would you believe me if I told you that you are in a magical land right now?" She asks softly. "You and I are from very different worlds but we were brought here together to this place, far away from any worry or cares in our own homes.

"I know your name because I was told of you by a young man with a collar like yours, one who needed a friend. I will be your friend too, because I know that you are completely alone here. My name is Serene and you are not alone."

[badspine]

It's...a strange explanation. One that leaves him unsure what to think because in so many ways isn't that what he's always wanted? He's always known it, felt it deep at the centre of him, he doesn't belong in that other place, he's not like the others and he doesn't want to fight and surely he ought to be somewhere else, somewhere gentler. Softer. She seems to be promising that-- he wants to believe it and it hurts.

For a moment he remains like a frightened deer poised on the edge of flight, but then he takes a breath, tries to steady himself. He doesn't want to be alone. Perhaps that frightens him more than anything else, makes it worth the risk.

He takes a small step forward.

"Was it H-Heine? With the c-collar?"

1

[reverseengineer]

Pidge gives her a hard look and brushes her hand aside. "I know what I'm doing." More or less. She's capable of taking care of herself anyway. She approaches, bringing up a display on the arm of her armor. Her left eye glows slightly as it takes in information invisible to ordinary human eyes.

"Huh. I've never seen readings like this."

Re: 1

[sereneflame]

Had she been several years younger Serene would have taken great offence to that dismissal of her warning. Even now she frowns hard at the smaller woman, watching her through narrowed eyes as she scans the vortex.

"Take more care when speaking to others." That's as mild a rebuke as she can manage. "What are you trying to detect?"

[reverseengineer]

She rolls her eyes at the rebuke and continues touching buttons on the holographic screen over her arm.

"Energy signatures, mostly. I'm trying to get a locational read on them, but the dimensional differences are interfering."

[sereneflame]

Useful, yet for Serene that isn't the most pressing question. She crosses her arms, tucking her spear into the crook of her arm as she does so.

"Before that, can you tell if passing through that area will have an affect on a human?"

[reverseengineer]

"Not for certain until I have a better read on the energy signatures." She continues hitting buttons, only half paying attention. "But so far it doesn't seem overly dangerous."

3

[sekimorinashi]

It isn't the first time someone mistakes Tsukuyo for the bugs. Perhaps she should make her presence more obvious during these times, but it's not the training she's gotten and it's certainly not what she's used to. She was, after all, trained by a shinobi.

At least this time she doesn't end up shocked by lightning.

She notices the recognition in Serene's eye and so doesn't pay any more attention to that. Instead, she immediately throws two of her kunai at the charging bug, one kunai pinning a leg to the wall and the other hitting where she thinks there's a weak spot.

[sereneflame]

Serene flinches as those spinning knives go past her and pushes her fire back into the carpet before it truly catches light and causes trouble in the hallway.

"My apologies!" She cries as she whirls back to deal with the bug... which is now dying, for that had been an accurate blow. She narrows her eyes and pulls fire from the wound that Tsukuyo's kunai made, frying its innards to hasten its death.

[sekimorinashi]

Hey, no burns caught here, so nothing to worry about. Tsukuyo's content with her stab at it (quite literally), so she doesn't mind letting Serene finish it off at all. That way she can retrieve that kunai without any trouble.

"Don't worry 'bout it. Last person to think I was a bug shot lightnin' at me."

[sereneflame]

"Electromancy?! Now there's a skill I would not want to be on the wrong end of. Do you know a blast like that could stop your heart and brain?"

The bug is beginning to whistle from the pressure of the steam underneath its carapace. She lets go of her fire.

"My apologies, your knife will be too hot to touch right now."

[sekimorinashi]

"I did know that."

But thanks for the information anyway. She certainly likes thinking about being close to death. Always fun.

She throws the knife a look, and shrugs.

"That's all right. The bug can keep it, I suppose."