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

[grunehexin]

That is unfortunate, particularly if you aspired to parenthood...

[He certainly didn't sound... alright with it, and she shifts her weight awkwardly, seeing as... years ago she'd assumed that she would conceive her heir that way. Spending the night with a visitor trapped in the Witch Forest, taking his seed, and sending him off the next morning with nary a word.

Now, with ALASTAIR, she did not have that "luxury", so she'd assumed whichever man she selected would have to be more fully informed about things, but.

She assumes a "sorry" from her would mean little.]

[dailydouble]

I aspire toward freedom and making my own choices. The problem is that the choice was stolen from me, not that I...aspired to parenthood.

[ Ahad's still unsure about how he feels about parenthood, but it was never the act of fathering a child and having little to do with it that bothered him. ]

[grunehexin]

Ah...

[That made her comment more than a bit awkward, and she seems a bit conscious of that, lips pursed. At least- a bit more conscious of it than she would have been a decade past, when she knew far less of social conventions and how best to react to things, shameless in her naivety.]

My earlier comment was made in ignorance, then, do forgive me.

[dailydouble]

[ He's silent for a few beats, considering how best to phrase his response. It's not that he objects to children, so much as he objects to being used. ]

There is nothing to forgive. I have...poor associations with siring children, but I do not necessarily object to consenting to such an arrangement.

[grunehexin]

Then perhaps, some years for you from now, we might revisit this topic.

[She says it with a smile, tentative and small, glad, no matter how it came about, to see him again- and to hear of something personal, unfortunate a thing as it was.]

If we remember this at all.

[dailydouble]

It may come up again, even if we do not.

[ Ahad thinks it's like that he will remember, but cannot be certain about her. Not that it truly matters, at this time. ]