recollecters: (Default)
Recollé Mods ([personal profile] recollecters) wrote in [community profile] recolle2019-03-07 05:41 pm

March 2019 Event Log

EVENT
CONTENT WARNINGS:
Some mild animal violence (Prompt 2), grotesque monsters (Prompt 3), rabid animals (Prompt 4)
Prologue.
The liaison has made plenty of preparations and stability measures to ensure that those traveling onward will be safe. With about a week to pack and prepare, users will find that there's a stroke of luck as they begin hunting and gathering. There isn't a shortage of supplies, and anything they could think of they may possibly need for their missions outside of the city will appear right within reach.

As promised, it's the morning of the seventh that a map appears on the Retrospec app. The first map depicts the city itself and shows a starred point at the Recollé Zoo and Aquarium. There are two more points at the Atrium and at the Recollé Art Museum, though these are marked with question marks. Not long after, a new text will come through.

Portal should be good to go. Same with the map. If you can make it back to the portal while you're down there you'll transport right back to where you left. I'll see about opening a second one, but the map only goes so far. You're going to have to explore a bit to fill in the rest. We're looking at an abandoned research camp by the ocean. We're also looking for a factory in the mountains, so keep your eyes peeled. You're diving right into what was his territory, so hard to say what traps and monsters are down there. Stay sharp.

Rescue ops, buses will go out periodically. Don't worry, they'll be driving themselves. Head into the region, sweep the area, make sure ALL citizens are out. There should be about 500 of them left by my count.

Oh and…I don't know what's going on in town but might be worth looking into, too. Let me know your findings.

I'll be in touch.


Pick your poison, Retrospecters. There's a lot of things going on suddenly.
I.
Several of you may be brave enough to dive right through the portal pinpointed at the zoo, a silver door that gleams against the brickstone building leading into the facility. It doesn't seem to catch the attention of the average citizen, but it's easily recognizable to those who have prepared themselves in the previous months. This time, however, instead of opening the door and falling down through endless darkness, citizens who venture onward will find themselves on a slippery slope leading down a sharp, icy winding path right. The journey itself takes about ten minutes, and the longer you slide the more you'll find other ice banisters to jump and dodge over. You may find others sliding along with you and you'll have to work together to break apart large chunks of frosted debris before you crash right into it. Keep your senses sharp and your reflexes sharper.

Despite the hairpin turns and the slick ride all the way down, all users will eventually find themselves in the sixth layer and landing in a large pile of snow. The map on your device lights up revealing three different paths. The first path leads straight ahead, the path to the west appears to lead to an ocean and the path to the east leads to the mountains. Looking down, users will find several pairs of footprints leading in these three directions as though they aren't the first to arrive. They'll have to pick for themselves...

For the adventurers who walk the straight and narrow path, the snow become thicker and deeper, making travel difficult to proceed through. The winds pick up and the chill in the air sinks straight down into your bones. It's hard to see anything as you walk, but for those who concentrate on the ground rather than what's ahead they'll come to find that out of the corner of their eye they'll see the shift of the snow.

Closer examination leads users to sense that the snow continues to shift and turn as something lurks beneath it, pushing snow out of the way to try and bury the users walking through. Whatever's out there is determined to head for the east and the west, hunting down whoever chose to wander down those paths. The snow begins to act as quicksand, sucking you in slowly and pulling you under the frosted layers of ice. For those strong enough or clever enough to get through the snow, you'll find what appears to be a crystalized cave that's cracked in the center as hundreds of ice creatures pour out through the opening and dive into the snow to begin their hunt. Their intent is to stop anyone from straying too far toward the east and the west and they'll do anything they can to knock explorers off their feet.

Look out and be attentive! These creatures can be stopped via physical combat, fire, traps and more. And if you're ambitious enough…? Let's see what you can do about that cave. Ready to be the first line of defense? Don't freeze up.
II.
The west-bound path seems less snowy and slippery, allowing for users to travel pretty efficiently. The temperature continues to drop and it appears that while the snow is thinner here the chill is enough to keep the area frozen around it. It almost seems like smooth sailing from there, actually, as travelers approach an arctic expanse of land covered in patches of ice and bordering an ocean. Floating in the center of the ocean on a few ice caps are three different buildings of varying sizes and shapes, drifting aimlessly but never straying too far from the shore. Everything seems peaceful and quiet…

…maybe a little too quiet? The silence is extraordinary and while the area appears clear, you aren't alone. As you look out toward the ocean, a whale breeches the surface and lets out a low, long call. As you stand still, a shadow zips in front one of the houses, immediately engulfing the whale and devouring it before your eyes as it drags the mammal back under the surface. Despite how much you look, the shadows are nowhere to be found. An owl hoots in the distance, and another creature appears before the owl, too, is silenced.

A glance at your map will prove that this is, in fact, where you're destined to go and that this must be the research camp that must be explored and dismantled. Wisps of darkness linger around the buildings but the distinct lack of other signs of life may be worrying. The creatures will appear for those who draw attention to themselves, anything that makes a noise or very fast, sudden movements. Wooden bridges connect these three buildings to the shore and to one another, allowing travelers to cross the ocean and reach them…but do be wary of the wood. It's old and rotted and places of the bridge may snap beneath your feet and sink you straight into the frigid water. Don't scream.

Getting to the buildings can be the easy part for those who take it slow or find alternate means of travel such as digging through the snow and unearthing boats. It's exploring the buildings that will be difficult. Cabinets are bound to creak, floorboards will waver and slip and doors will fall off of the hinges. Sounds will be amplified and draw the attention of the shadow-y creatures, but those who are quick enough to dodge or can sense that they're coming will have enough time to hide. Be quiet; the sound will alert them to your location as they're on the prowl.

Working together, those on the research side of things will find several items including medical journals, charts, and reports by a Dr. James Halliday. Some members of the city may very well recall that name. Vials similar to those found in the hospital under the city of Recollé are frozen in chunks of ice and will have to be whittled out for safe keeping without alerting the creatures that circle the buildings. There are no electronics here, but there's an old radio for communications, clawed to pieces by something or other.

Outside of the buildings one can hear the snarling and braying of animals fighting off the creatures that find them. It's loud enough to serve as a distraction, but don't get too comfortable. If you're loud enough, the creatures will change direction and slither back into the building, tendril-esque limbs wrapping around you to begin trying to pull you apart and drag you under.

You can try to scare them off with a counter-noise or distract them another way…but you better be fast. They won't take no for an answer once they've found their prey.

The research facilities may stay standing, but your mission is to get in and out as quickly and quietly as possible with as many resources as you can. How far will you go?
III.
Maybe you're up for a true rugged adventure instead and head east toward the mountain range that stretches high into a dark, inky sky. These snow-capped peaks are nestled closely together, forcing adventurers to walk on narrow paths and stick together, climb to new ledges and push onward into the heart of the mountain range. There is a high risk of falling the higher you climb. You may wish to anchor yourself just in case.

As you climb higher, it becomes clear that there's a flat surface at the top that's supported by the mountains themselves. A gray, iced over building sits in the center and smoke billows out of the chimneys in little wispy curls. Signs of activity? It's strange to think that perhaps you aren't as alone as you thought.

Don't blink. The ice disappears the closer you get and the doors are wedged open with an abandoned, broken dog sled. Unidentifiable bones and remains of a research party can be found buried in the snow around this space and the longer you stand in one spot the stronger you'll feel the vibrations of the earth beneath you. Off in the distance, a loud rush of snow begins to fall, an avalanche sliding its way downward to somewhere below.

The sound of electric drills and machinery echo inside the factory, and as you enter the building it's hard to pinpoint which direction the sound is coming from. It seems to bounce off of every wall, and though the building is dimly lit navigation is complicated without an additional light source. If you were smart and packed a flashlight or a lantern of some kind, the path before you lights up. The factory walls are covered in a dark red substance, ancient hieroglyphs marked into the surface depicting scenes of ruin. It will take several attempts to find all of the hieroglyphs around the building, but putting them together and comparing notes visitors may realize they tell a story of an equally ancient race that inhabited this planet, taking it for their own to begin creating a new race of genetically enhanced human beings. As more of the pictures are discovered under thick layers of dust and sheets of ice, an increasing sense of paranoia settles in. The light you've obtained begins to flicker just a little, and it's with a sense of dawning dread that you realize you're not alone. This story tells a tale of the city of Recollé, but it isn't finished yet.

The grinding mechanical noises grow louder as the walls shift closer together. The hieroglyphs begin to imprint themselves on the back of your eyelids, on your hands, anywhere you look they seem to follow you to tell the story of elders that have a different plan and a method of hybrid creation.

Whether it's by skill or by luck, if you stay in the factory long enough you'll come across the source of the grinding equipment. In the center of the room is a large structure made of ice and metal, creaking and groaning as cranes and drills continue to put it together. At its full height it rises up several stories, and as your footsteps echo in the factory every single eye opens to fixate on you. Designed to reflect every thought, action and task, this creature will feed upon your paranoia and your identity to reflect itself to your companions and turn you against one another. Negative emotions will be amplified, and the more fear that's felt the harder it will be to break the surface of your thoughts and fight back.

A bit of exploring will reveal there are two smaller forms of this creation as well acting as back-ups to begin processing every bit of who you are to create a new set of data. The room lights up, binary scrolling over the walls and depictions of your life events rapidly flying by.

Another machine to collect data? You know what to do by now. Find a way to help one another focus and work on destroying the machine eye by eye and bit by bit. The whole facility will have to go, but you may wish to clear the area first and ensure you aren't missing bits of the story.

And let's not forget…you'll still have to find your way back down the mountain trails with the avalanches following you. Best of luck.
IV.
For those with a different set of skills in mind, the region of Magatus will need you. The seven hour trip is long and draining, but a new bus leaves every three days to take parties to the area and drop them off. This time, however, the buses won't leave until they're at full capacity.

How lucky.

The northern lights above the region are no longer the beautiful purple-green haze that they were, but rather they begin to flake apart as gray bleeds into the sky. Fish begin to appear in the lake's surface, floating belly-up dead as the water gently ripples below them. The howling of wolves is louder than usual, anguished and worried. The usual resident wolf of the area, Magnus, is nowhere to be seen, however.

The residents of Magatus are hard-pressed to speak to anyone despite having a good trade system set up with the city of Recollé. They'll be more likely to tell visiting citizens to mind their own business or even approach with threats of violence. They will have to be convinced that something is coming and that they must evacuate immediately, though each person is different. Some will come quietly if there's a hint of danger while others will have to see physical proof to fully understand. The little town accounts for several hundreds of people, but not all of them. Some of you will have to brave the mountains here, too, to warn those who live in total isolation.

While many of you may be working on negotiations and helping residents of Magatus pack their belongings and load onto the buses, those who delve further into the mountains should stick together. While the wolves bay and snarl, it's bears, raccoons and deer that residents should look out for. With glowing red eyes and white foam drizzling from their mouths, the bears and raccoons rush for an attack to block anyone from climbing up the mountain ridge to the houses there. Deer charge, antlers down and aimed to gouge anyone who gets too close. It'll take a team of combatants to fight off these monstrous creatures and get to the houses above. Should you earn a scratch or a bite, the wound will quickly turn black and begin to scab over as primal instincts begin to set in. The ability to speak and form cohesive thoughts will begin to lessen the longer the wound goes untreated…but it's a long way back. If you can rescue some of the villagers in the mountains, they will have a vaccination to help, but that's if you can get to them first.

As time goes on and more people begin to evacuate, the rest of the region should begin to realize there's a problem. Help them close their shops, gather their cherished belongings and prepare for a long trip back to the city. They'll need people to help them stay calm in these trying times as the sky continues to fragment and filter out above and snow begins to fall.

But the journey's not over. It's a long way back to the city, and as buses begin to roll out onto the road a snowstorm settles in. Winds whip and roar as the buses shake, and some of you may need to jump in and manually maneuver the vehicles to safety. Road blockages and whiteouts will occur, leaving you to navigate yourself home. Hail will pelt the windows and the roof and the windshield wipers can't clear away the sleet fast enough. But if you can find a way to communicate with one another, you'll stand a better chance following each other on the way home and bringing these people to safety.

But can you work together? Don't hesitate to phone a friend.
INTERLUDE.
But what about the city itself? Never fear, for spring is here! The city has seen the last of its snow and the sun makes its presence known again. New life begins to appear as flowers bloom and birds sing. Creativity is in the air, and as March settles in citizens of all kinds will begin to notice two large domes now encompass the entrance to the Atrium and the Recollé Art Museum.

Shall we see what the fuss is about?
V.
For those of you who choose to head to the art museum, it seems that a new display has opened! "Modern Living" depicts life in the city of Recollé with art pieces and sculptures inspired by buildings and famous figureheads of the city including the police chief, the fire department, and Mayor Mayer. It's a fairly small display but it's the pride of the city for now.

While you're here though, perhaps you should check out the rest of the museum. When was the last time you really took a look at the art on display? Have you ever stopped to appreciate that gorgeous Van Gogh painting or the marble bust of Julius Caesar? With several replicas of the most famous works of art hanging from the walls and on the floor in display cases it's hard not to want to take a closer look.

However, something strange seems to be afoot. Wasn't the Mona Lisa looking the other way? Why did the pair in that copy of American Gothic suddenly switch places? And better yet…why is the Girl with the Pearl Earring standing ten feet to your left just out of her frame? Everywhere you look the art pieces begin to take on a life of their own, crawling their way out of their frames the moment you aren't looking and slipping out of the museum into the city. It's called Modern Living, isn't it? These pieces wish to be on display everywhere and explore life outside of the box and will stop at nothing to get their way. Mythical creatures will soar through the Starry Night as the Persistence of Memory warps the Birth of Venus near Peach Beach. The longer they remain out and about, the more the city begins to change around you as it attempts to adapt to the influx of culture and life.

You may find that you don't want to send these pieces back right away, actually. Some of them are quite talkative and may even befriend some people! Others, however, seem to want to find replacements so they may spend more time outside of the museum, capturing an unwitting suspect to drag back toward their frames and lock them away. That's unfortunate, isn't it?

They say that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. While the art wishes to imitate you, perhaps it's time for you to imitate the art and convince them just why they're needed back at the museum…and if that doesn't work? Good luck rounding everyone up. You'll have to frame them for their crimes and put them back where they belong.
VI.
Not an art person? Don't sweat it. The Atrium is proud to present the city's Battle of the Bands contest, set for the last weekend in March. Sign-ups are open until the day of the show but the city's hard at work preparing for the big event. New equipment is purchased and tested, the stage is cleaned up and polished, and the lights…

…wait, what happened to the lights? Electricians and employees alike can't seem to figure out why the light source isn't kicking in at the Atrium, and even flipping the breakers doesn't seem to be cutting it. The area's pitch black and the back-up generator seems to be dead. As the date of the contest gets closer, employees grow more desperate and are prone to grabbing anyone off the street to beg for their help.

"Hey, can you help us out? We can't seem to find the problem."

What can you do about it? Maybe nothing, but maybe you're the type who's just curious enough or kind-hearted enough to agree to check things out. As you enter the concert venue, the darkness makes it harder than ever to navigate where you're going. It's dark and still but as you take another step further a high-pitched, scratching sort of noise can be heard from the rafters. Shining a flashlight or your cell phone light up above will reveal a large leathery wing darting out of sight, claws grazing the wood.

That's not good, is it? Gather around, Retrospecters. Looks like you found the problem. It's a high climb up above, and fighting in the dark isn't ideal, but if you're brave enough you can swing yourself up on the catwalk and come face to face with a skeletal bat-like creature. A crackling, electric sound seems to come from the monster itself, and it's only when someone lands the first hit that a bit of light disperses and returns to one of the bulbs in the ceiling. The creature's fast and crafty and will shock anyone that gets to close. It's hard to keep up and the bat's willing to absorb as much of the light as possible. If you can figure out a way to trap it you can bring it down to ground level and go to town. As the light fades from the creature itself it shrinks smaller and smaller until it's the size of a fruit bat, a tiny spark that can be disposed of in its own way. It'll try to fight back and may even shock you again, but at this size it's not so bad.

…too bad there's more than one of them, a total of five lurking around that continually take over once one bat's been defeated. Looks like you've got your work cut out for you, doesn't it? How enlightening.
NOTES.
Welcome to [community profile] recolle's March event log!

You can claim four freebies on this log!
-Players may claim one freebie for a thread confronting an art piece. This must be at least 5 comments from you.
-Players may claim one freebie tackling the electricity problem in the concert hall. This must be at least 5 comments from you.
-Players may claim one freebie for a thread on the second log exploring an area in the Mythos layer of Magatus (prompts 1-3). This must be at least 5 comments from you.
-Players may claim one freebie for helping with the evacuation of Magatus.


Please see the mod reporting thread below to report how your character is doing! Did they take out one of the bats? Have they rescued twenty people from Magatus? Are they infected by one of the animals in the mountains? This is for tracking and also to determine how Magatus is doing by the check-in point (3/17) and will help determine the address of the second Retrospec post.

Finally, any questions you have regarding this event may be directed to the mod comment here. Be sure to review the mods' question thread on the plotting post for additional information as well!
mincingminuet: (Default)

[personal profile] mincingminuet 2019-03-14 05:45 am (UTC)(link)
"It's...I don't know. My Viera friend was an exile and she seemed fine. It's probably some mystical mumbo jumbo reason, though. I don't remember more than that."

Which is good. Though some of it doesn't quite add up. stuff she won't bring up, because she lacks context.

"Let me guess, parents strict and you left?"
hauntedsavior: (count the years of isolation)

[personal profile] hauntedsavior 2019-03-14 03:47 pm (UTC)(link)
"Disowned me for being a lesbian," she says as casually as she can. It's not much better. Sure, they were strict, too, but this seems like the more pertinent part. "Figured it out when I moved out here for college and finally got out from under their wing, then they just told me never to come back."

She shakes her head. "Guess I've got more in common with the Viera than I thought if your exile friend managed to handle it just fine."
mincingminuet: (Cheery)

[personal profile] mincingminuet 2019-03-15 04:38 am (UTC)(link)
"Fuck 'em."

Seriously, that's all she has to say. First and foremost. She may be an orphan, but she recognizes when parents are being shitty. Full stop.

"And I'm sure you do. You're also tall. And you have that white hair. so that's three things only...I think she was probably into this dude we traveled with."
hauntedsavior: (caught a glimpse of the ending)

[personal profile] hauntedsavior 2019-03-15 09:51 pm (UTC)(link)
"Well, nobody's perfect," she says, talking about this Viera instead of anything else. Her parents are the farthest thing from perfect that she can think of, and she's just glad every time she brings it up to get that immediate validation from whoever she's talking to that they were dicks.

"Frey tell you I'm hooking back up with the girl who turned me gay?" she asks, trying to keep joking about it while they float through the snowscape. Sometimes her life is pretty badass. "It'd sure piss them off if they knew it's been ten years and I'm back ruining my life with her again."
mincingminuet: <user name=axiometric> (...eh?)

[personal profile] mincingminuet 2019-03-16 06:21 am (UTC)(link)
Pen wants to say 'can you turn gay' because she definitely doesn't think that's the case...but decides to just leave that alone. She's not gay, just bi, and she's fallen in with the right partner.

"No she didn't. But that's...well, hell, is she bad for you?"
hauntedsavior: (the voice of sympathy)

[personal profile] hauntedsavior 2019-03-16 04:30 pm (UTC)(link)
Anna can, but only because she's very good at it.

"Nah. Helped me realize a lot of shit about myself back in the day." A contemplative pause, which also gives her time to take in their surroundings. They can get to the investigating shortly since she's pretty sure they're basically there? But she never knows what exactly's going on in this layer. "Still helping me realize things today. She's good for me. But my parents are always gonna think that she's some bitch who stole their daughter from her."
mincingminuet: (Cheery)

[personal profile] mincingminuet 2019-03-17 07:14 am (UTC)(link)
"Well, clearly your parents are morons."

That's good enough for her.

She stops though, gesturing towards the facility.

"You wanna do the honors and bust us in?"
hauntedsavior: (a panacea for the poison)

[personal profile] hauntedsavior 2019-03-17 06:39 pm (UTC)(link)
"This thing gonna be any good at dampening that sound?" she asks, looking at the door in front of them and reaching behind her back for her sword—before remembering that she probably doesn't need to do that yet, putting it back, and clenching her fists. She can literally bust this door down if she needs to.

"I like our odds against those things versus a portable spellbook and a murder robot, but I don't wanna fight them if I can avoid it." She's trying really hard not to mention again how much that shit's been on her mind since she decided to head back in here. How killing the big dangerous monsters seems like much more of a risk if they can fight back after they're dead. Like the brain did.
mincingminuet: (Plotting)

[personal profile] mincingminuet 2019-03-18 08:55 am (UTC)(link)
"I mean. No. But if you'd rather...cover me? I can pick the lock. And we can hope we don't draw attention because this is going to break the spell."

Pen flicks out a small multitool and a set of picks. Yes, yes she is a bit of an everywoman.
hauntedsavior: (caught a glimpse of the ending)

[personal profile] hauntedsavior 2019-03-19 02:50 am (UTC)(link)
"I got you," she says, and there's determination in her words as she draws her weapon. Protecting people is one of the things she's pretty damn good at, if she does say so herself. Her footing might still need some work, since it was some unstable snow shit that got her in this place to begin with, but at least the ground seems more solid here.

"How long's it gonna take to pick that thing?" And with a smirk, because she can sense the answer, "How good are you?"
mincingminuet: (Texting)

[personal profile] mincingminuet 2019-03-19 07:33 am (UTC)(link)
"Depends on the lock. But gimme...I dunno, five minutes?"

She sets to work, and after her cloak drops, she's quick to wave her hand and re-cast the Float spell to give them both better footing. She's short, and doesn't want to get stuck.
hauntedsavior: (calculate to cure the virus)

[personal profile] hauntedsavior 2019-03-19 09:38 pm (UTC)(link)
Five minutes should be plenty. Here they go.

"Got it," she whispers, and her katana is at the ready, the tang fitting in far too nicely between her metal palms. There's screaming in the distance, the same howling that's been plaguing them this whole time, and for now—for now it seems to be providing cover. She'll take it. Her ears buzz with electricity, with the energy of the black box in her chest. The fission bomb, probably only getting stronger now that she's even closer to A2's body.

The howling stops suddenly and the hairs on the back of Anna's neck raise.
mincingminuet: <user name=axiometric> (Serious (Witch Hat))

[personal profile] mincingminuet 2019-03-20 05:33 am (UTC)(link)
Pen hears the howling, but her concentration doesn't waver. she works, quick and deft, fiddling with the tumblers inside the locks with her little set of picks. It's a complex lock, but she's beginning to get it. Unfortunately there's not much else she can do at the moment.
hauntedsavior: (omnipresent endless knot)

[personal profile] hauntedsavior 2019-03-21 03:30 pm (UTC)(link)
And before she can even blink, one of the shadow figures lurches out from the snow bank and Anna does her best to turn on her heel so she can react as quickly and fluidly and perfectly as possible. Her arms finally provide her with precision strikes, robotic and mechanical and flawless in execution if she wants them to be (she imagines), but the bigger boon here is that she has someone to keep safe. Frey would kill her if she let Pen get hurt here, and Anna already knows that she'd beat herself up for it basically forever—haha, what's up, A2?—so she knows what she has to do.

Her body lunges forward, the sword almost an extension of her arm, and before the creature can even get close to Pen she's on it, slicing at it, leaving what she hopes are long gashes along the length of its body. She's got it's attention now, and the fight isn't as long as Anna expected it would be. It turns out that she's pretty fucking good with this sword in combat scenarios after all, and after trading blows and dodging claws and avoiding getting dragged into whatever hell these fuckers came from, Anna stands over the formless body that used to be a shadow.

But her heart rate is still elevated. She's keeping a very, very careful eye on it, because she only has one left. This isn't adrenaline. Anna knows that just because something's dead doesn't mean it can't hurt her down here.
mincingminuet: (Hold Me)

[personal profile] mincingminuet 2019-03-22 04:07 am (UTC)(link)
Penelope doesn't stop working. She trusts Anna to deal with this. She does, however, extend her hand and offer a little bit of a boon. There's the faintest sound of a ticking clock...slowly, slowly, then speeding up rapidly. The Haste spell settles over Anna, making her movements near a blur to anyone observing from the outside...but to her? It's as though her opponents are moving slow as molasses moving uphill in February.
hauntedsavior: (calculate to cure the virus)

[personal profile] hauntedsavior 2019-03-25 09:11 pm (UTC)(link)
She's... is this the zone? Is she in some kind of flow state right now? Her eye flits to the shadows, looking for more creatures to emerge, and as soon as one starts playing at the fringes of her vision she's on top of it, slicing down and driving it back away. Nothing is going to stop the two of them from doing what they came here to do.

Her heart, if it still beat within her chest, would be racing right now. It seems to be okay. It seems like when she kills these things, they don't kill back. They don't take more of her away. She can't calm down, but she can keep driving the shadows back. Being the light of the breaking of day or some overly poetic shit like that that Anna herself has never really been able to encapsulate.

The point is that she's defending Pen. She's got this. Nobody else gets hurt on her watch, nobody dies for her, nothing else happens to the people she's supposed to be protecting. She's got this.
mincingminuet: <user name=axiometric> (Hopeful)

[personal profile] mincingminuet 2019-03-25 11:58 pm (UTC)(link)
Pen doesn't need that much longer. She actually hasted herself as well, so that five minutes winds up being more like three, and a moment or two later there is an audible click.

"Get inside, go!"

And Pen is scrambling for the doorway. Movements a blur to the monsters, but to Anna? Perfectly normal. Timestreams are weird.
hauntedsavior: (met your stare with blank expression)

[personal profile] hauntedsavior 2019-03-26 06:06 am (UTC)(link)
Anna follows in way, way too easily, and she feels like she should be breathless once they're both safely inside. Her back presses up against the door, holding it closed with all her robotic might. Not that she thinks she has to; the monsters clearly aren't in here. They're supposed to be hiding in the shadows outside and almost definitely don't live in here. Probably.

Either way, Anna's still keeping her voice down. "What the fuck did you cast?" she asks, her eye wide but her expression more than a little... thrilled. At the chance to actually do what she's on this earth to do.
mincingminuet: (Hold Me)

[personal profile] mincingminuet 2019-03-26 08:22 am (UTC)(link)
"Haste."

Which probably bears some explanation.

"Basically, I sped up our personal timestream, relative to everything else. We move faster, and it's easier to see things coming."
hauntedsavior: (caught a glimpse of the ending)

[personal profile] hauntedsavior 2019-03-26 03:41 pm (UTC)(link)
"Oh." Is that all? Anna sighs and thunks her head against the door lightly.

"I didn't even know you could do... time magic. Doesn't that basically make you, like, a god?" It's nowhere near as much of a joke as Anna wants it to be. Maybe she should've—no. Bad line of thought to go down. Sigh. Nothing's magically fixing this, girl.
mincingminuet: <user name=axiometric> (Serious (Witch Hat))

[personal profile] mincingminuet 2019-03-26 05:01 pm (UTC)(link)
"Uh. As nice as that might be, no. It doesn't last very long, you've got another couple of minutes unless I re-cast the spell. And I can't go backward, just forward."

No rewind buttons, Anna.
hauntedsavior: (met your stare with blank expression)

[personal profile] hauntedsavior 2019-03-26 08:43 pm (UTC)(link)
"I guess if you had full time travel nailed down, we'd have known about it a while ago." It's for the best. And she gets the idea that she's way more transparent than she wants to be with how easily Pen jumps to going backwards. It's almost like it's written all over her face or something.

Still, it's on her mind, and her fingertips touch the band of her eyepatch underneath her hair. She can pretend she's brushing her hair backwards, but she's full of shit. "So we need to steal more research, I guess. Just keep your eyes out for anything that looks important and don't break any soul bottles."
mincingminuet: (Plotting)

[personal profile] mincingminuet 2019-03-27 06:00 am (UTC)(link)
"Oh yes."

She'd have been all over the network about it. Thankfully time magick in Ivalice is a lot less insane. She doesn't want to think about the ramifications there.

"Lead the way, sword lady. I'll take the rear guard."
hauntedsavior: (in a dying sun)

[personal profile] hauntedsavior 2019-03-27 03:52 pm (UTC)(link)
Anna rolls her eye.

"Sword lady. I have a name," she shoots back, walking forward and glancing over her shoulder. But in another moment her eyes are forward and she's walking through this... facility, or whatever the hell it is, and. She's not proud of herself, but there's an unease settling around her. It's not the same place, the same things aren't going to happen, you're going to be—don't say that, Anna, that's what happened last time and you weren't.

She's just kind of walking forward in a daze, past some abandoned offices or business rooms or whatever that look important. Her steps are as slow and careful as they had been, but her head isn't in it. She's tunnel visioning hard.
mincingminuet: (Annoyed)

[personal profile] mincingminuet 2019-03-27 11:28 pm (UTC)(link)
Pen doesn't say anything for several long minutes. She's concerned primarily about the mission and not Anna's potential feelings there. She'd been joking. But when she begins to notice the way the gal's walking, she skips out in front and puts both hands out to stop Anna. Given the height difference, who knows where she might touch if Anna doesn't stop.

"You seem distracted. Is it because of what happened the last time you were on a mission?"

Because of your eye, she leaves unsaid, trying to be more tactful.

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