Outside 48: Hotter than Inside

[5a Violista]

[Waylaid Tour]
Carlie

Look at that - they both have the same hair and ear color. That's a pretty fun coincidence.

"Okay," Carlie says. She heads after the other bunny, and starts explaining while letting the other woman do her thing with the first aid kit. "Also, do you have anything for morning sickness or nausea?" she asks. Might as well get that information out of the way at the start, since she can already feel her nausea rising.

So, her explanation: "I was on a bus headed back over to Riverside, when we went through this forest area and crashed. Lost all my things. Some fish...monster...thing used some weird magic that did that," she gestures at the wounds, and at her clothes, "but I managed to take these" the weapons "and stop it before it got any worse. Really, it looks worse than it actually is, and I'm a vet- vet's assistant -[color="seagreen"]"so I was able to take care of the worst of it." Says the woman who has gone pale - well, as pale as her skin tone allows, so not actually pale at all - and whose skin feels a little clammy and the sweat and blood and whatnot has made her makeup smear a little such that her face-scars are now peeking out a little bit. "There was a troll, too, but I convinced him to let me pass. Pretty nice guy, in the end." And should she mention that Thing? the hunter? Nah, it doesn't seem that relevant.

"Really, I just want to find my coworker and get back home, so do you know which way down the road is the quickest way out?" Or...if necessary, she supposes, a ride on one of the boats out when they go fishing might work if she can ever get the nausea under control.

[Ionbound]

[Waylaid Tours-Gwyn]

Gwyn glares at the flesh-polyp-mouths as they gnash their teeth at her and carefully proceeds forwards, staying well away from the walls. She takes a more mundane approach to dealing with the maws on the floor, simply stomping on them with a heavy step whenever her path gets too close to one that could bite at her, hoping to pop the polyps and destroy them. If that fails, she'll take a deep breath and chant, "Mae fflamau'n carthu fy elynion," a spell that projects a jet of flame from her palms, using that to clear out the polyps instead, though the effort is clearly exhausting.

[bc56]

Waylaid Tour - Dave

Oh come on, narrator. It can't be that hard. He needs some trustworthy advisors to help him with the cultural and religious parts, but he can run a town. That's what the strategy games he plays say. How hard could it be?
Dave half walks, half marches up to the castle. "Good day sirs! I have arrived to claim my inheritance." Hopefully he's not overdoing it with the corny old-fashioned speech. At least he thinks it's old-fashioned.

[Deathkeeper]

[Waylaid Tours- Hector]

Hector happily accepts the sleeping place. There’s no sense in turning it down.
And he will likely end up getting his shadow in. He already feels terrible for leaving him behind.

[Rebonack]

[Waylaid Tours]
Carlie

"You were stranded in the forest, attacked by mutants, and survived?" the other rabbit eared woman repeats, looking surprised. "That's an act of providence if ever I've heard of one."

She continues dressing your wounds. Whatever she's using for disinfectant stings quite a bit.

That probably means it's working.

"And you're pregnant, too? What in Royalty's name possessed you to to travel through the woods while you were pregnant?"

It sounds like she thinks doing such a thing is a really terrible idea.

She also shakes her head. "Riverside? I'm afraid I don't know what that is."

Probably bad news. "The only mostly safe way out is with the merchant fleet. They usually anchor here to trade in the late spring just before midsummer."

Which is quite a long time from now.

Now what?

Gwyn

The polyps prove to be rubbery and resilient, which is a pretty terrible combination for awful flesh beasts to be.

However, they don't do so well against sheets of intense flame.

There's lots of screeching and burning and the smell of burning meat. At the touch of the flames the whole tunnel convulses. Which is... probably bad. The way forward is clear, though! As you head around the corner you discover another expansive chamber. On the opposite side you can see a large pipe draining rancid water from the aqueducts out onto the beach! You can see sunlight, the ocean, and the scent of the sea breeze fighting against the overwhelming stench of metal and flesh! Just a little bit further and-

The tunnel behind you seals shut via a disgusting sphincter with a wet slurping sound. And then, descending out of the darkness above, comes a meat orb. A huge, pulsing ball of eyes and mouths and wriggling tongues. It leers down at you with bottomless, pitiless malevolence. Like a great pendulum it heaves itself backwards before lurching toward you like a wrecking ball.

What do you do?

Dave

Both guards suddenly snap to attention, eyeing you suspiciously. They hold their halberds a little tighter.

Your attire certainly looks the part. And you aren't covered in mud like a good half the people you passed. Or, well, you WERE covered in mud. But you managed to clean most of that off when you changed your clothes.

"Prove it," says the first guard, Milton.
"Yeah, prove it!" says the second guard, Morton.

What do you do?

Hector

You go to sleep. While you really need that sleep after an exhausting day, that's pretty boring to watch. Oddly enough, you're dreaming of exactly what your shadow is doing.

You are now a barghest again.

In the dead of night the sick dryad approaches the fence, her tree animated into a woodland titan. With prodigious strength she shoves over one of sick trees near the edge of the forest and sends it toppling over-

-right on top of one of the fence posts. The post is bent, smashing the symbol on its face into the dirt. Suddenly what felt like an impenetrable wall now feels more like a damaged bit of chain link. You can squeeze through it, but you had best hurry. The guards no doubt heard that and will be coming to investigate.

"Don't forget," the dryad says. "The cure for The Rot. The Watchers will have it. They're probably headquartered in one of the town's churches. Please hurry."

You can already hear alarm cries in the distance. You can already see torches approaching.

With the barrier down you can tell where your physical body is. He's sleeping in a barn not too far from the Old Road. You can make out the big church in the Hamlet even from here. It's the tallest building aside form the castle and set atop a hill. Its golden holy symbol gleams in flickering firelight. That's got to be where the dryad was talking about, right? Or maybe they keep it at the guard hall. Didn't that guard you met earlier in the day something about that?

You can move invisibly.

But not silently.

Of course, if you don't move then you're QUITE silent.

What do you do?

Khiael

Clara nods, tears in her eyes, and starts to follow you. Her motions are jerky and stilted. She experimentally reaches out with a hand to touch the tumor and it tries to bite her.

As you feared, several more tumors of Old Flesh come crawling out of the sewer, only to be temporal-sheered to bits.

You walk the beach. It is significantly less relaxing than you had hoped. Along the way you have the opportunity to talk to Clara about what had happened to since the bus crashed. You explain that you've had a pretty stressful day.

"Tell me about it," she mutters, wincing away from the thick purple tendril protruding from one of the tumor's mouths.

As you travel the raw meat continues to spread, a new mouth splitting open and disgorging flapping tongue. Ivory teeth begin growing out of the fingers on her left hand. "It's voice is getting louder..." she mutters, her already awkward gait slowing to strained shuffle.

You're close to the stairs. Maybe another fifteen minutes at this pace.

But you're not sure of Clara has another fifteen minutes.

What do you do?
****

No time to spare.

Khiael grabs Clara in his four arms and sets off at a run, his hooves pounding the sand. The disgusting mouths bite at him and the slimy tendrils slap at him, but he persists. He has to get to the Hamlet as quickly as he can!

This is way faster than walking with her.

But it hurts quite a bit more, too.

One of those disgusting mouths is chewing on his ear while probing at it with a mucus slicked tendril.

This day has been exceptionally awful.

[bc56]

Waylaid Tour - Dave

"Of course." Dave pulls out the deed to the castle. That should be proof enough. He watches the guards carefully. If they catch him in his deception, he'll have to run quickly to get away from them, and skip straight from "explore the castle" to "deliver tea to spider."

[5a Violista]

[Waylaid Tours]
Carlie

Carlie winces but tries to not move too much, since that'll just make it harder.

"I...there weren't woods there when I started the trip," she says. "It's like they just...appeared or something. I'm not entirely sure what happened, I was trying to sleep at the time. And I only recently found out I was pregnant." If she says how recently she discovered she was pregnant, there'd probably be a couple of questions about how she found out while on a trip.

She doesn't know what Riverside is?
Are they even still in the Nexus? she wonders.

Waiting until midsummer is right out. Especially if they're no longer in the Nexus. Sure, it's possible this whole area was just barely taken into the Nexus, but it's equally possible the bus alone was taken out of the Nexus.
New goal: find out where they are, if they're in the Nexus or not, and if not, find a way back. Finding any other bus-survivors might be pretty useful.

She made it into the Nexus once by walking until she got there; if she is in a different world she's sure she could do it again...assuming she can find out enough about this area. She was investigating fairies and em...fire people things but had reached only dead ends but what she's been told by some people, it has some similarities to the things she's seen here so far. If there's that many similarities, there's got to be some sort of connection.

She takes advantage of this opportunity to ask some important questions and confirm some things. "I think it's possible I somehow came here from another world, but I'm not really sure," she says. Carlie's looking for the other rabbit-eared woman's reactions, to see how reasonable or ridiculous they think that possibility is. "So...I'd like some confirmation. You're human, right? What's this world...or continent...or whatever called?" And, most importantly, "And all this stuff, with fairies and mutants and Kosmos" or whatever that eel-thing said "and heaven and dreams and hearts and whatnot, is this all normal? Sorry, I'm just trying to make sense of what I heard out there because it doesn't really match the things I know."

Oh, wait, actually important question. "And do you know something I could do or some way I could get some drink or food or different clothes? Since all I have are these." the cutlass and the mooring hook.
Well, there's her ring, too. But that has her soul in it so she's not planning on letting anyone do anything to it.

[Rebonack]

[Waylaid Tours]
Dave

The guards read over the deed.

"Huh..."
"Looks real to me."
"Welcome to Castle Erebus, m'lord. Please make yourself at home."
"And... ah... no hard feelings about the, y'know, brandishing bit?"

They DID brandish at You.

Just a little bit.

They're hoping they won't get in trouble for it.

Regardless of response, one of them will take out a large iron key, unlock the door, and push it open for you.

So... uh. This castle appears to be kind of really big. It is, after all, a castle. Well. This part of it isn't really big at least. It's a large stone entry room about twenty feet square with two large sets of double doors. The outer doors, the ones you just came through, are thick wood bound in iron bands. Doors designed to take a beating. The inner doors are quite a bit more ornate, carved with scenes of great nobles past and their triumphs over the adversaries. There are several large oiling paintings hanging in here as well, depicting dour looking men (and women) of a rather noble air. Ostensibly the second set of doors leads out of the entry hall and into the grand foyer.

Honestly this castle seems WAY too big to belong to a mere baron. Maybe it used to belong to someone more important?

You get this strange, nagging sense that the castle is large enough to be a dungeon.

The sort that adventurers raid for loot and fight monsters in. Assuming you believe in such things. Honestly, how on earth did you function in the Nexus denying the existence of anything weird? Did someone curse your family or something?

What do you do?

Carlie

At first the deaconess is just nodding and tending to your wounds and then mention is made of coming from another world.

You're is given a look like you're crazy. Then you ask about humanity and that look goes from one of worried skeptics to cautious concern.

She thinks you might be dangerous now.

"Of course I'm human," the woman replies, her eyes briefly flicking to her broom. "The only things that aren't human are adversaries."

People who want to cause you, specifically and personally, harm. It has a level of familiarity and malice that a mere enemy lacks. It's probably a collective term for all the various terrible things you met out in the forest.

The woman, as she's binding your wounds, does a bit of slight of hand. You may or may not notice her slipping a small silver amulet out of her pocket and palming it. The amulet is touched to your arm as she binds the bandages.

Nothing should happen, considering that you're neither a fae nor an empyrean.

Content with that result, she pockets the amulet again and said, "Wait there a moment. It'll be right back."

Then? She returns shortly with simple set of clothing peasant's attire. She'll hand them to you-

-and then flick some holy water at you from a little bronze aspergillum while muttering a prayer.

You are now damp. And also probably not demon possessed.

Seemingly satisfied with that, she says, "The adversaries are a constant threat, unfortunately. You-"

She freezes when you mention the name Kosmos. And quickly makes a ritual blessing motion toward herself with her hands.

"That is the name of an Arch-Devil," she hisses. "Don't speak that name aloud! Where did you hear it?"

She's probably not going to answer any more questions until you give her a reply she's satisfied with.

What do you do?

Khiael

You run.

You run as fast as your legs can carry you. You even begin beating your wings, taking great bounding leaps, to cover ground more quickly. Clara bounces in your arms, muttering to herself as the corruption of The Old Flesh continues to slowly spread. She would have been doomed if not for you taking her up in your arms to speeding the both of you along. Within a handful of minutes you reach the stairs and begin scaling them with haste. With one final jump you clear the top of the rise and-

-slam fast first into the palisade around the Hamlet.

It isn't a physical thing, but rather a series of stainless steel posts that you had tried to jump right over.

The breath is blasted from your lungs just as Clara is flung from your arms. You're flung away and hit the bouncing just as Clara strikes the grass atop the bluff and rolls roughly to a stop. You're momentarily dazed, your mind reeling. What just happened? What did you run into? It doesn't make any sense. As you shake your swimming head a horrible, wrenching sensation tears at your heart as your realize what just happened.

Like your home hamlet, this one must likewise have a palisade around it. To prevent adversaries from entering the posts have the Sign of Koth etched into them.

The Sign of Royalty.

The Sign of the King.

God's own signet.

You have been rejected as an unclean thing.

What do you do?
****

"No. No no no nooooo..." Khiael moans. This has to be some kind of mistake. He's always been faithful. This isn't his fault! He didn't do anything wrong!

Why...

Why would the King cast him out NOW when he's doing something so important? When he's doing everything in his power to prevent a soul from being damned?

A small, insidious voice suggests that maybe the King never cared about him to begin with. That he has always been tainted.

Khiael stomps that voice down, shoving in into the deepest, darkest part of his mind and scrambles back up to his hooves. He bounds back up the stairs and scowls at the palisade. How can he get past it? There aren't any guards nearby that he can see. And just over the hill he thinks he can make out the steeple of a chapel.

He squints.

Scepter and Crown. The Order of Thyatira? That's one of the heterodox orders of the Church. They're kind of... right on the edge of heterodoxy and heresy. The priest at his home church often had some very fiery things to say about the Order of Thyatira. It was said that they would, in secret, cavort with devils and fae who made sufficient supplication to the King.

...which is exactly what Khiael needs right now. A little bit of devil cavorting.

He needs two things. First? He can't go running into the hamlet looking like this. He needs to-

-almost without thinking he's human again. It feels.. very strange. Like folding in on himself. He touches his hair and finds that even his mutations are gone.

Okay.

First problem solved. Second problem? He needs to get past the palisade. What does he have at his disposal? Just... time, motion, quality, and growth. Just the ability to bend reality to his whims. Just blasphemous arcane power.

But...

He's using it for a good reason. He's saving a soul.

And saving a soul covers a multitude of sins.

He bites his lip and reaches for time, motion, and quality, he needs to find the right moment where he could slip through. Just grasp the power and push.

~~Discontinuity~~

The sky is burning.

The sea is boiling.

Shapes are slithering through both.

The earth is warped and buckled, great fissures rent through it. The world reels like a drunkard. In the distance the hamlet is aflame. Something awful and beautiful and sublime is crawling through the city, Watchers invoking the Mysteries of Koth to hold it at bay.

There are no pillars because they have not yet been set. Khiael hurries a few steps forward and releases his grip, time uncoiling like a spring and allowing himself to snap back to-

~~Discontinuity~~

-the present.

One the other side of the pillars.

He scoops up Clara and takes off at a run toward the chapel.

"Don't worry, Clara, we're almost there," the cherub-disguised-as-human assures the woman in his arms.

[5a Violista]

[Waylaid Tours]
Carlie

Carlie feels like she gets this world now.
A benefit of being an experienced shape-shifter is that you can adapt to new roles and new situations really easily because you're used to it.

That's who she is now: Carlie, a human woman with a mutation, who is neither an adversary nor demon-possessed, and has had her memories affected by an adversary which is why she's making so many faux pas. While she didn't notice the amulet slipping out, she did feel the coolness from touching metal, and she definitely notices the holy water that happened while Carlie's hands were full with the clothing.

She starts to put on the peasant attire over her other clothes - she can remove the old clothes later.

"Oh! Sorry!" she says, covering her mouth with her hand as if trying to prevent more from coming out. She then does the same ritual blessing motion. "When I woke up after the crash, there was an awful-smelling eel-monster who was trying to convince me to make a pact with..." Her voice drops, as if she now knows she can get in trouble for referencing Kosmos. "that arch-devil, saying it was the only way I could get home safely. I managed to get away from it, but..."

Realization and a little bit of fear appears to dawn on her face. "Can...the adversaries can steal or change your memories, right? do you think that's why all my memories are confused and I can't remember basic things? An adversary must have changed my memories to trick me into going along with it all. They...they could do something like that, right?" And since neither the holy water nor the silver amulet did anything, that means Carlie isn't anything more than a mutated human who barely managed to escape through the forest, as evidenced by her wounds.

Obviously, she doesn't really believe what she's saying, but it's at least part-true, and she's pretty good at making it sound like she believes it. Getting the bundeaconess's pity might net her a couple more answers and resources to find out where she is. And then, after that, she can make her way to that castle she noticed, and make her way to its top. She's sure, from its top, she'll be able to see far enough away to see if she's still in the Nexus or not. And, who knows, maybe other survivors of the bus will have the same idea.

[Reinholdt]

[New Inside - Castilla]

"AHH!" The exposed pixie panics and darts to hide underneath the bed which is just as far as the chain allow them to go.

"No, no! I swear! They just came into the glade and took me in their metal-beasts. I didn't see anything on the way here."

[New Inside - Castilla]

Ilpholin grabs the chain and starts pulling it up, reeling Thinky back in onto the bed and staring at him intensely. "Fine." She attempts to put on hand over the pixie's mouth, shutting off her pain in that section and holding the fey down against the bed, fingers wrapped around his whole body. Her other hand turns into a knife and moves close. Then goes to slice the bindings keeping the fey hostage with one cut.

Should it all work out, Ilpholin will take the newly freed pixie and hold him up to where she can look him in the eyes while not releasing him from her grasp. "You'd better keep quiet until we're out, understand?" The second she gets something resembling a nod, she'd go to stuff him down her shirt. He'll be safe nestled there, tightly to her bosom and out of sight. She'd also hurriedly toss the bedding and pillow back on the bed to keep the illusion he's cowering under the sheets as she walks out of the room.

This all happens quickly, but there's a lot of ifs relying on the pixie that could go wrong.

[Waylaid Tours]
Leah

The devil banished, you at last step back onto the Old Road. It's ancient, pitted cobbles are just as uneven and marred as you recall from the bus ride. The forest, just as foreboding.

Then it gets worse.

The temperature begins to drop, just as it had before the bus hit... whatever it had collided with. Your breath begins to fog as a heavy sense of foreboding and terror settles over the road.

Something is coming.

Some thing is coming.

You have to hide. Whatever this thing is, it will kill you if it finds out. Looking around, you can make out three places you could flee into. There's an old shack nearby, nearly falling apart. A small heap of skulls is piled next to it. A large outcrop of stone stands at the edge of the road, a hollow near its base. As you gaze into the darkness you can see something glistening in the gloom. A chunk of the bus' body is leaning up against several trees nearby offering shelter. It is smeared with crimson.

What do you do?

[Waylaid Tours]
Leah

Leah's fur rises up, a feeling familiar to her. It was like it was on the bus.

Bad.

Sarah would duck in the shack. The dilapidated nature of it would make it easy to feel the air currents around her, despite the skulls clearly marking it as not the place to be. Rachel would slip into the hollow under the stone, ignoring the gleam that could be treasure or could be a cornered animal. Nothing's more dangerous than a cornered animal. Rebekah would chose the bus section, probably because it was smeared red, but also cause it may have exploded. Despite the possibility that whatever smeared that blood could be under that section.

Leah isn't her sisters though. Leah is Leah and sometimes not all the same Leah, but Leah nonetheless. And Leah doesn't budge.

She plants her feet firmly to the ground and puts her hands palms up, raising them as she spins on one foot, the other scraping along the dirt. Earth rises around her and envelops her in a solid dome of rock about the size of an SUV. There's a small opening at the top where light and air just barely filter through. Leah herself steps back and flattens herself against the side of the dome in order to not be seen well if anything was able to look down from above. She steadies her breathing and slows her heart to match the steady, crawling pulse of the earth.

[Deathkeeper]

[Waylaid Tours- Hector]

Hector lunges through the hole in the fence. Great. She went and knocked over a whole tree. Now they’re going to be all over that hole. Hector won’t be able to get back out with all the guards swarming it. He’ll have to send Hector out to deliver the cure if they get it, and Hector isn’t as resistant to the Rot as Hector seemed to be. Ugh.
Still, it won’t help him if he’s caught here. Once inside Hector moves slowly, sticking to shadows and particularly noisy areas as he attempts to slowly slink past the guards and to the barn where his Other sleeps.

[Ionbound]

[Waylaid Tours-Gwyn]

Gwyn proceeds down the tunnel at speed, breathing more and more heavily as she sustains the spell, not paying attention to the shuddering walls as she tries to escape the tunnel. And there it is, the exit! Just a little more...And...It's sealed. Gwyn skids to a halt, cancelling the spell and trying to catch her breath when she sees it close with that horrible sphincter-y sound. She pants as the horrible flesh blob descends from the ceiling and swears, "Oh SH-" as she tries to duck it, as exhausted as she is.

[bc56]

Waylaid Tour - Dave

Dave doesn't actually know much about the different ranks of nobility. He knows a baron isn't very high, but doesn't connect that to any sense of the castle being too fancy. He also doesn't like the nagging feeling he gets from it, an instinctive sense that it will be mazelike and abandoned. He approaches the inner door and attempts to open it. "Hello? Anyone there?"

[Rebonack]

[Waylaid Tours]
Khaiel

You run toward the chapel. Almost without thinking, you drape your jacket over Clara's neck, obscuring the tumor from view. You don't want to needlessly alarm the people of this hamlet if you can avoid it. You fund yourself dashing through a shanty town on the edge of the settlement. It's the sort of thing you're well use to seeing. Pariahs and outcasts. Untouchables and the maimed. People deformed by a sin-sick world. Not all of them end up in these shanty towns. Just the ones with the misfortune to have insufficiently well connected families.

With haste you dash into the chapel to discover-

Carlie

That look of suspicion wavers somewhat as you ask your questions. To become so addled must have required a horrible encounter out int he woods. But then again, that's usually how the woods always are. Nothing is safe in that corrupted forest.

"You met a witch out in the forest, then," the deaconess says gravely. "Several of them by the sound of it. No, I don't think it could have stolen or confused your memories. But you said you met a troll as well? They're wily and deceptive. And they'll always take something of value when you cross them whether you agreed to it or not. It may have stolen your memories or clarity when you crossed its... bridge?"

Often times trolls guard bridges.

But not always.

"King's mercy, child. You've been through so much hardship. I'm sorry I was forced to be stern. I have to keep the well being of everyone in the Hamlet in mind, you understand that right?"

And then?

Two more people come running into the chapel. A wild-eyed young man in soggy, filthy attire. And a woman who looks... rather out of it. He looks close to panic. She looks listless and pale. When the young man pulls away the coat he has covering the woman's neck the reason becomes clear.

There's a tumor the size of a football wedged between her the woman's neck and shoulder, a thing of raw red meat, ivory fangs, empty eyes, and searching tentacles.

"Please, you have to help. I-" he begins, only to be waved off by the deaconess.

"Put her down on the floor," she says as she fetches her broom. Then points at you. "On the alter, there's a bronze decanter of oil. Bring it to me."

Then she begins sprinkling holy water over the tumor as she prays. The disgusting things begins to sizzle and writhe as the afflicted girl cries out in pain. The young man does his part to keep her from flailing around too violently.

What do you do?

****
Khiael does his best to prevent Clara from hurting herself or anyone else while she thrashes around, blasphemies spouting from the tumor clinging to her neck. He's vaguely aware of that second woman with the rabbit ears. She was on the bus too, wasn't she? He silently praises the King that at least a few people were able to make it out of the woods intact.

Or... mostly intact.

Now all he can do is wait and pray. Thankfully the clergy are all trained in the exorcism of demons.

Leah

Silence.

The cold deepens.

Silence.

You still your thundering heart.

Silence.

You wait in the dark.

Claws scrape against the stone, a horrible spine-tingling sound that sets your teeth on edge.

It's out there. The Thing. But you can't see it.

And so it can't see you.

There's a sensation of a nearness. A formless malevolence hanging over you, heavy and oppressive. But, thankfully, it doesn't last long. The temperature begins to rise again. The terror begins to abate. The sounds of the woods slowly rise above the dread stillness.

Whatever that Thing was, it's gone again.

You're free to continue on to the Hamlet.

At the end of the road you'll find a palisade that, but all accounts, shouldn't be able to keep anything out. Stainless steel posts are driven into the earth, each one engraved with the familiar form of the Sign of Koth. Sufficient to turn back the majority of the woods' denizens. Beyond is the Hamlet, a rolling blufftop settlement of farms, groves of trees, and mercifully untainted earth. You can see a shanty town of shacks near the water's edge, close to the palisade. You can see the outlying farms and cottages. You can see the wharf thick with ships. You can see the bustling town itself. And you can see, perched atop the bluff's highest point, Castle Erebus, grim and stoic overlooking the its domain.

What do you do?

Hector

With great care you stalk your way through the fields toward a very particular barn.

Aside from a sheep bleating at you as you pass, it would appear as though you weren't detected.

Inside the barn, up in the hayloft, you'll find...

Yourself.

Asleep.

Joining yourself to him is trivial enough. Or... you could try to go collect the cure yourself.

What do you do?

Gwyn

You drop flat against the wriggling, fleshy floor, feeling the whoosh of air as a tremendous mass of meat misses you by scant inches. Your teeth rattle in your skull as it smashes against the wall, gibbets of flesh and cobbles of stone raining down around you from the ceiling.

It doesn't stop pressing the attack.

Sadly.

A disgusting tongue emerges from one of its gibbering mouths, studded with teeth.

Apparently it intends to give you a tongue lashing.

How do you survive?

Dave

No one appears to be here.

You now stand in the grand foyer of the castle, a cavernous, vaulted room with four huge pillars with statues of noble lord-bishops of old posed atop them. To the east is a grand staircase, flanked by polished mahogany banisters, leading to an upper landing. To the west you can make out an elegant spiral staircase leading both up and down. To the sound stands a second set of double doors carved with moving religious imagery. At the foot of each of the four columns round wooden alters of a sort have been set up, white cloth draped over them and decorated with candles, books, and scrolls. The candles have long since stopped burning, leaving only dribbled stumps of wax behind.

It seems deeply strange that no one is here. Shouldn't a castle this large have... servants? Or something?

What do you do?

[bc56]

Waylaid Tour - Dave

Dave heads over to one of the altars to examine the books on it. He looks at their titles, and any imagery on their covers. Do they seem to be sacred texts, or profane? It might provide a clue as to his situation as the new baron. Similarly, he looks at the imagery on the doors for clues as to the history and beliefs of this place.

[Deathkeeper]

[Waylaid Tours-Hector]

Hector doesn’t know what the cure looks like. He also doesn’t have hands. Hector has a much better chance of talking his way past the villagers and getting a dose of the cure.
If it exists.
If it turns out that their cure just purges supernatural stuff or something then it’s of no use to the dryad and Hector will be forced to abandon her. Which would be unfortunate.
Assuming the guards haven’t already killed her. That really was a terrible plan.

Regardless, Hector gives a good bounce on Hector’s sleeping chest to make sure he’s fully awake before joining back with him and explaining the situation.
Hector takes this about as well as anyone being woken up in the middle of a night by a huge dog does, though in this case there’s more apologizing involved.
Eventually though, he heads out with his shadow in tow. He does remember the guard saying that the infected mad was taken to the guard house. Maybe they’re treated there?

[Earl of Purple]

Waylaid Tour Aelid the Still A Flock

The birds escape the trip fine; pity about the puppet. She doesn't have the reflexes any more to throw the hands up, so it lands quite hard and the hands don't open- which is useful, since it means she's still holding the lighter.

The crows caw and flutter, all cawing at the same time. The puppet speaks. "Didn't know she was a hag. Please don't eat my flesh. Look, we have a camera I could give you. It has photographs on it. Birds, and people, and places." Not that the Weaver's Spawn can likely access them, and she'd really rather not lose her camera. It's a distraction, however. If the body can flick it on the crows can burst the flame at the monstrous spider- which she'll do when the Weaver is looking at the camera. Or if it shows no interest in the camera and looks like it will eat her husk regardless.

The body might get burnt; possibly badly. But the crows aren't the husk, and if the Hamlet can fix their soul-flock problem, they should be able to deal with some burns, right?

[5a Violista]

[Waylaid Tour]
Carlie, guest-starring Khaiel and Clara

"Tunnel," she corrects, not bridge, "but that makes sense." She's not entirely sure if the troll actually did take something, but she'll have to keep a watch out in case it thinks it's owed something and wants to deal with her again. She's pretty sure she frustrated it enough that it just wants nothing to do with her any more. If it tries to take her baby, she'll make it regret ever existing in the first place. One of her memories? She's got a lot of memories so even if some went missing, she probably wouldn't notice.

..What it actually took was one of her many identities, one that she's not using right now, and that's why she didn't notice. Specifically, the down-on-her-luck teenage girl Harriet who sometimes helps run things at a black market, and also overhears lots of rumors and sayings from others there. She mostly uses it to find out what people are talking about and if there's any particularly large rumors going around.

Carlie nods and is about to say that, yes, she completely understands because there were some pretty terrifying things out there.

But

There's not enough time, because someone else barges in.

Honestly, Carlie remembers almost nobody from the bus. She was doing fine at first and got to see one or two people, and normally she would have talked with people, but then the nausea kicked in and she spent the rest of the ride trying to sleep.

Upon seeing the meat-tentacle-thing, Carlie is a little curious about what it is and if she could replicate it...but she can't use her shapeshifting now so that won't help.
Instead, she says, "Of course," and runs off to bring the decanter. "Is there anything else I can do?"

If not, she finishes changing her clothes - luckily, this peasant's garb is a dress so it doesn't put her tail in a weird position - and then takes off the ruined clothes she now has on underneath.

When given the opportunity, she looks at Khiael. It looked like he somewhat recognized her, she asks him, "You look familiar. We were traveling together, weren't we? Before...well, I-I'm not entirely sure what happened." The bus crash.
By saying this, she assumes she'll find out more about who this is, and then maybe the bundeaconess won't find it as strange that somebody with addled memories will walk off with a guy she just met.

...after this woman is better from that weird parasite.

[Rebonack]

[Waylaid Tour]
Dave

Holy texts.

Prayers.

A book of... history? Maybe?

All useful stuff if you want to get up to speed on everything. The door gives the impression of being an entrance to somewhere important. A place of veneration. Each little panel depicts a saint performing some great act of heroism or piety. There isn't anything here that's immediately suggestive of deranged cultists and blood sacrifices and the like. Very high-church-y. Lots of bureaucracy, lots of ritual.

Now what?

Hector

After a few 'wake up!' bounces you're moving. You're immediately faced with a couple problems.

For one?

It's dark.

Extremely dark.

Your shadow can see in the darkness, but you sure can't. You could use your sorcery to peel the darkness away create a sort of un-light to see your path by, but there's a good chance that employing that sort of magic would draw all sorts of unwelcome attention. Or you could use your phone as a flashlight, assuming you have one. They seem to know about technology here, most of it was just lost in some past disaster.

What do you do?

Aelid

"A camera? Oooh, let me see?" the awful spider things replies, grabbing up the camera in its too-human pedipalps. It begins turning the device over in its hands, trying to figure out how to work it.

That's plenty of distraction.

Enough for your puppet to hold the lighter out at arm's length flick the flame one.

With a fwoosh and a sheet of fire, the spider skitters backwards, shrieking and clawing at its face and burning hair. That buys you enough time to force your puppet back to its feet and send it running toward the Old Road!

Thankfully the spider doesn't follow you onto the road.

The reason for that becomes obvious in a hurry.

Something is coming.

Some THING is coming.

The air suddenly grows bitterly cold, damp feathers on many of your flock suddenly becoming covered in spiderwebs of frost.

If you see it it will kill you. With dozens of pairs of eyes, you can find many places to hide. Trees and hollows are everywhere. But what of your puppet? You need to get it to safety as well, don't you? You see an old crypt standing open, twitching meat coating the ground around it like moss. You see a patch of grave stones rising behind a low wall, a row of skulls sitting atop it. You see a tangle of branches and bark, a hastily assembled lean-tu. Strange wisps of light dance around it.

What do you do?

Carlie and Khiael

"Just stand clear. And pray," the deaconess replies as she anoints Clara's head with the holy oil.

Then?

She brandishes her broom and clutches her silver pendant in one hand. She raises the broom and then thumps the end of the handle against the wooden floor.

The whole building shakes.

"By the Sign of Koth! By the bones of this world and its living heart! By the Words of Royalty I speak PURITY! BE UNDONE!"

And then she sweeps her broom in the direction of the tumor-

-releasing a wave of flame so brilliant and white that you have to shield your eyes to avoid seeing spots.

The tumor shrieks horribly as the wave of flames strike it, searing it away.

What do you do?

Carlie and Khiael

You watch the woman from the bus fetch the holy oil for the deaconess, keeping your hands on Clara lest the demon use her body to cause others or herself harm.

Then comes the loud THUMP from the broom and something is shaken within you.

A Watcher.

This woman is a watcher, not merely a priest. That means she isn't going to simply exercise the demon, she's going to-

With a cry of surprise you dive to the side as the wave of pure hole fire narrowly misses you and utterly consumes the demon, leaving Clara's flesh pure and undefiled. She sits up, touches her neck a few times, then grabs the deaconess in a hug, crying onto her shoulder. "I was so scared..."

The deaconess awkwardly pats her on the back.

You're pretty shaken, however. You're reasonably certain that the Mysteries of Koth could cause you great harm after what happened to you in the sea cave. So shaken that you nearly miss the question from the woman who was on the bus.

What do you say?
****
"Um... I... yeah," Khiael replies as he watches the last of the holy fire slowly burning out. Clara seems fine. If more than a little distressed by everything that happened recently. Frankly you're still feeling pretty distressed, too. "I remember you getting onto the bus. You were sitting behind me with a... um... bat?"

Khiael really isn't sure what was up with the bat. It seemed like it was intelligent? There are lots of weird things in the Nexus so it probably isn't anything to worry about.

"I'm glad you survived the woods. I found Clara down on the beach and rushed her here."

[bc56]

Waylaid Tour - Dave

Why is this place abandoned? It looks like the baron is a religious leader, not just a political one, or he has an number of priests in his court. The holy doors are probably the next clue. Dave will head through them into what lies beyond. Presumably it's a chapel, or maybe a cathedral. He can read the books later.

[Ionbound]

[Waylaid Tours-Gwyn]

Gwyn pants, taking a few breaths as the thing impacts the wall, trying to appraise herself of options. This was supposed to be a day off, so no knives or other tools to manipulate to defend herself, and her stamina was already exhausted from overuse leaving her without much gas left for a new evocation. She looks around, trying to think of something, anything in the environment to use to get out of the situation, but the flesh-covered walls leave her little-Wait. Flesh-covered! Gwyn reaches out with her magic, shouting, "Cerrig y ddaear, gwyliwch fy ngorchymyn!" If there's rock, or something sufficiently similar to rock within an inch of the flesh coating the walls, she'll reach out with magecraft, forming it into a number spikes that project from the walls and attempt to impale the flesh ball from all sides. After this, she collapses to her knees, heaving and panting.

[Earl of Purple]

Waylaid Tours- Aelid The Husk & Flock

Aelid's going to try swooping the camera back up whilst the Weaver is distracted and hopefully on fire as her husk gets up and runs toward the road. That's an expensive camera, and it's got some photographs on it Aelid doesn't want anyone else to see.

And they reach the road! And someThing comes. The meat-crypt really doesn't appeal; it might eat her husk and she won't be able to tell. The gravestones are cover, which should stop her seeing it, but if the angle's wrong she can't see out the husk's eyes, leading in its destruction without being able to tell. That leaves the lean-to, surrounded by fireflies. The husk is given the camera, if it's recovered, and going by muscle memory and a crow on the shoulder, it's set to go off on a timer, in ten seconds. The camera is then flown off to rest on the wall next to the skulls as the husk lurches into the lean-to with a crow for company.

Most of the rest are hidden in hollow trees and high in the canopy, whilst the crow that deposited the camera hides behind a gravestone.

[5a Violista]

[Waylaid Tour]
Carlie, featuring Khaiel

Carlie prays in her mind that it'll work.
...
To the God she knew growing up. She suspects these people are also monotheistic, judging by the way they've been speaking, so it's close enough, right?

Wait, did the priestess just say -

Carlie raises her arm to cover her eyes - even the thermal-only one - but still has to blink out the brightness afterwards because her arm didn't make it in time.

- she just said something about bones and heart of a world. Isn't that the same thing that the 'witch' eel-person said? As one of the three sides? Carlie just found out what the third side in this conflict is. If she had thought to bring her quest log with her - she didn't, of course, because she was planning on being a vet today and not a private investigator, she didn't think she'd have a breakthrough on one of her cases - if she had brought it, that's something she would definitely write down. There's the devils-from-heaven something something empowering fire side, the fairies dream blah whatever side, and the bunny-priestesses with world-brooms side.
Of course, the names for each of the three sides is still pending.

"Yes, that's me," she says. "I woke up alone in a cave, surrounded by a witch-eel and some awful things...that girl, Clara, she was with us, too?" Carlie asks. Since she's not entirely sure. And apparently her memory's been confused so it makes sense she wouldn't know all the people who she was with. "What happened to her?" Is that something Carlie will have to worry about in the future? It didn't look very fun.

And, then, turning to the bunny-priestess-with-a-world-broom, Carlie adds, "She's fine now, right? She'll be okay, or does she need to rest first?" Honestly, Carlie probably needs to rest, too, but she feels like she's not completely in a good and safe position yet, still needing to find shelter, food, water, and which direction leads out of this awful place.

At some time she had put down the cutlass and mooring hook to put on the clothes and to grab the holy oil, so she reaches down to grab them back up.

[Deathkeeper]

[Waylaid Tours- Hector]

For now, Hector doesn’t have too much trouble. His shadow can guide him broadly to where he needs to go. And his phone still has life for now. Though he shields it with his hand so it doesn’t alert everything in a mile radius where he is. He only needs to use it to keep from tripping over something or accidentally running into the fence.

[Reinholdt]

[Waylaid Tours]
Leah

Silence.

The cold deepens.

Silence.

You still your thundering heart.

Silence.

You wait in the dark.

Claws scrape against the stone, a horrible spine-tingling sound that sets your teeth on edge.

It's out there. The Thing. But you can't see it.

And so it can't see you.

There's a sensation of a nearness. A formless malevolence hanging over you, heavy and oppressive. But, thankfully, it doesn't last long. The temperature begins to rise again. The terror begins to abate. The sounds of the woods slowly rise above the dread stillness.

Whatever that Thing was, it's gone again.

You're free to continue on to the Hamlet.

At the end of the road you'll find a palisade that, but all accounts, shouldn't be able to keep anything out. Stainless steel posts are driven into the earth, each one engraved with the familiar form of the Sign of Koth. Sufficient to turn back the majority of the woods' denizens. Beyond is the Hamlet, a rolling blufftop settlement of farms, groves of trees, and mercifully untainted earth. You can see a shanty town of shacks near the water's edge, close to the palisade. You can see the outlying farms and cottages. You can see the wharf thick with ships. You can see the bustling town itself. And you can see, perched atop the bluff's highest point, Castle Erebus, grim and stoic overlooking the its domain.

What do you do?

[Waylaid Tours]
Leah

Leah's ears flick, her tail slowly starting to move again at a relaxed, but wary pace. It takes a bit longer, but eventually Leah steps away from the wall, convinced it's gone and lowers the rock shell that protected her.

Sometimes it's best just to be yourself.

The catgirl smiles when she sees the palisade and steps past it. Lessee. Probably best just to go to the closest location, and see if anyone else has shown up in town recently. Ask when the next bus out is. Or... Maybe call a taxi instead. Buses don't fare too well. Could take one of those ships up the coast to Inside, if she can convince a captain to let her stowaway. But ugh. She hates sea travel most of all.

Still, it was right there and practically next door, so Leah heads towards the shanty town.

[Zefir]

[New Inside - Castilla]

"AHH!" The exposed pixie panics and darts to hide underneath the bed which is just as far as the chain allow them to go.

"No, no! I swear! They just came into the glade and took me in their metal-beasts. I didn't see anything on the way here."

[A meeting place]

"I'm not sure I can say our methods are the same without actually seeing yours, dear customer. But regardless, that does sound like a problem. How do you like this 'head' to be dealt with? There are a great deal of solutions that I can offer. In fact, it would be optimal if you, as something that of course would count as a part of your payment, could share to me your ultimate goal. Then, based on it, I could recommend one of my solutions. Otherwise, I'm afraid I don't really offer options or packages. It's not that kind of business. You would have to simply tell me what you want." Helios pumpkinhead replies as it floats upwards, seemingly never content with just being still.

[A meeting place]

"Very well." he says. "My goal right now, is it to gain full controll of skyside. This way I can work on my research without trouble."
It is true what he says, thought he once assumed to take over the nexus, but now he knows that it is impossible. Just the number of strong entitys would be a pain to deal with. Maybe f they vote for some kind of leader he might get a hand on it. Since we got no President of the nexus yet this idea is far away.

"It would be best if the head just disapears with the whole body, but that depends on what you value my 'ultimate goal'"

[Rebonack]

[Waylaid Tour]
Dave

No.

It isn't a chapel.

It's a very long, very grand hallways. Full of plinths and statues. Statues of holy men and women. Sixteen of them, as a matter of fact. Each has a plaque on the plinth no doubt engraved with some information regarding them. The next set of doors are even more grant, with gold and silver inlays set into well oiled wood. There aren't any cobwebs. There's no dust to speak of. Obviously this place is cleaned regularly.

The feel that something here is off grows with each step you take.

Maybe it isn't wise to explore alone?

But if this place were dangerous, wouldn't the guards have said something?

What do you do?

Gwyn

Thorns of earth skewer the flesh, causing amble damage to the abomination and causing it to become lodged on the wall. Thankfully this leaves it out of reach when it attempts to slap you with a tongue laden in teeth.

It isn't dead, though.

But the way out to the beach stands open.

The abomination struggles against the spikes, slowly working its way off them. Finding itself stuck fast, it moves on to more unconventional means of applying murder.

One of its horrible fanged maws opens, a ghostly green glow steadily building in it. Whatever it is about to do will likely be intensely unhealthy for you and it is likely a wise plan to vacate the area immediately!

How do you survive?

Aelid

You hide.

In many, many places. But you hide none the less.

Camera stolen back from the incensed weaver spawn, you set its timer and place it atop a small wall. Also crouching behind the gravestones is a ghulah, the female hyena-like humanoid cowering in a shallow, recently dug grave and clutching her shovel. She doesn't appear to have noticed your crow.

The lean-to, meanwhile, has a corpse in it. A reasonably fresh one, actually. Near his listless hand is a canteen of water where wisps are drifting out from. In addition to occasionally drifting out of his stomach, burning a hole through the flesh as they pass.

Silence settles over the Old Road. Silence, dread, and unnatural cold.

Then the silence is broken.

By a camera shutter.

A second or so of silence again.

Followed by the sound of the camera, the wall, and several headstones being shattered by tremendous violence. The ghulah loses her cool and runs, screaming, only to be caught in a heartbeat.

You hear the sound of snapping bones and squelching flesh.

Don't look.

Even if your crow gets trampled by The Thing That Hunts, don't look!

What do you do?

Carlie and Khiael

The prayers helped! Maybe? Whatever the deaconess did seems to have fixed the problem since there isn't a horrible tumor on the woman's neck anymore.

"I believe you could likely all use somewhere safe to rest," the deaconess replies as Clara finally lets her go of her. She brushes off her robes awkwardly. "I'm not sure where you could all be put up, though. I heard that a young man appeared out of the forest late yesterday as well. Maybe some of the farmers would be able to use the help..."

There is, of course, that giant castle up on the top of the cliff.

Surely there's room in there?

What do you say?

Carlie and Khiael

"I do feel really tired," Clara admits. "Thanks for asking, though. What happened to that little bat friend of yours?"

You feel overwhelming relief that Clara is fine. If she had been consumed by a demon because you couldn't run fast enough then... well... you aren't sure what you would have done. Felt pretty awful, surely. If you had swam to town or trekked through the woods you would have missed her completely.

In other news, you have a chance to tell the deaconess what troubles you. Clara knows about it, technically. But she isn't from a place like this. She doesn't understand the significance of it. The deaconess, though? A Watcher no less? You might be able to convince her to let the curse that was laid upon you for be used for something useful. You would just need an opportunity to speak to her alone.

What do you say?
****

Khiael offers a smile to Clara. He hardly knows her, but he's pretty glad that her flesh hasn't been subsumed by a tormented gestalt of never-ending suffering and hate. That isn't a fate he would wish on anyone.

Just to be polite, he answers the rabbit girl's question since she DID address it at him.

"You're fortunate the witch didn't... I don't know... pluck out your eyes to cast spells or something. I've heard they do that," Khiael says. He's heard lots of really unsavory things about witches. Though, honestly, he has no idea how many of them are true. Considering that he's still quite aware and walking around instead of being dead dead he finds that his faith in many of the anecdotes he's heard about adversaries might not be quite so truthful.

Or at least not the whole truth.

"Clara was with us on the bus, yeah. I found her down the beach near town. A demon crawled out of a pipe in the bluff and attached itself to her neck."

Which is, of course, horrible.

The totally-a-young-man-and-not-a-cherub glances between those gathered and coughs awkwardly.

"Deaconess... ummm...?" he asks, drawing out the word in anticipation of a response.

"Mirabelle."

"Deaconess Mirabelle, would it be alright if I spoke to you? In private? Or maybe to the priest in charge of this chapel?"

Hector

You set off through the dark, counting on your shadow to guide you.

It'll take a good fifteen minutes to walk to the Hamlet proper. And it's cold. Hopefully your brought your jacket with you.

Roughly half way there you'll spy a pair of people with torches coming in the opposite direction! They're still too far away to make you out at all, so you have some choices here. You could try to hide and let them pass. Or you could try slipping around them. Or you could just keep walking along the road and act as if nothing unusual is going on.

What do you do?

Leah

Finally you're free of that rotten forest. Free from the sour scent of mildew and replaced with-

Fish.

A whole bunch of fishy smell. They likely do quite a bit of fishing here.

Regardless! Making your way down to the shanty town isn't terribly difficult. There's a low, grassy bluff overlooking the bay's southern end where a ramshackle set of docks have been built populated with equally ramshackle boats. A few mostly human looking figures are fishing off the dock or repairing nets. Atop the bluff most of the homes are built, if built is even the proper word. They're absolutely derelict things scrabbled together from bits of drift wood, old tarp, sections of rusted ship hull plating, and other such garbage. Most people here appear to be working at one thing or another. Fishing, building, tending gardens, carving wood... There's a rather iffy looking blacksmith furnace over there. And the unpleasant scent of a tannery. And what is PROBABLY a tavern of some kind considering the inebriated collection of people lounging around outside. There's also a church. It isn't a grand stone building like the one in town, just a simple little white washed wood affair. Atop the steeple is a simple metal-but-mostly-wood holy symbol.

Many of the people here look quite poor. Many of them have... deformities. Though they might not strike you as such given the fact that you're a cat girl. Not always animal-like parts. Sometimes other, more troubling things...

What do you do?

[bc56]

Waylaid Tour - Dave

This place is spotless, where is the cleaning staff? Why didn't they clean up the spilled wax and melted candles in the last room? Dave finds himself pulling out his revolver as he looks about the room, snapping it open and using the case of ammunition to reload. Weapon in hand, he advances on the even fancier doors. A trap? An ambush? Something feels dangerous here. The shadows of the long dead saints seem almost monstrous in the spooky atmosphere. Dave tries the door, carefully.

[5a Violista]

[Waylaid Tour]
Carlie, guest-starring Khaiel

Carlie listens to the explanations and descriptions and so on by Khiael, the deaconess, and Clara. Yeah, that's a pretty awful thing that happened to Clara. Yeah, witches sound pretty bad. Yeah, she'll go check out the farms. That's really lucky he found her.

She moves closer to the door so that she can speak with Clara while giving Khiael more space to talk with the priestess Mirabelle - this building isn't that big, after all. "I...I've been calling out for him and looking for him," she tells Clara, "but I haven't seen him yet. I hope he just flew away and got out of the forest." If he did, maybe he could go call for help or something. Maybe put in a bunch of missing persons reports, report what happened to authorities or the company or anybody.
That's a weird thought: if she stays here long enough, an awful lot of her identities are going to have missing persons reports on them.

The bunnygirl steps closer to Clara. "I think seeing if the farmers need any help will probably be our best bet in finding a place to stay and something to eat," she says. Then, she leans closer and drops her voice to a whisper. "But if you look outside, you'll see a castle. I hope that if I get to the top, I'll be able to see which direction Inside or Riverside are, and what the safest route out of the forest is."

She whispers because she's not entirely sure if the castle is currently inhabited by somebody the bun-priestess or the other people here are loyal to. "Haven't really got much time to do take a break yet," oh no, she's feeling the headaches and desire to throw up strengthening again. She really needs to take a break or something. "Honestly, I need to eat and drink something, take a nap, and get away from all this fish before my morning sickness turns to dehydration," she confides to Clara. "Would you mind sticking with me, at least until we find a place to rest and meet up if we ever get separated again?" Especially since they both appear to need a rest. That guy, he seems strong enough and well enough to keep on doing whatever, but it might be nice to find a calm meetup place for bus-survivors in case one of them finds a safe passage out.
Oh, it feels so good to be able to talk with someone else who was from the bus. Another woman, also, but mostly just somebody who's not a fairy or fish-monster or local human supremacist or whatever else everybody is here.

Seems like there's still time to talk until Khiael comes back.

"Oh. Sorry, I guess I should have also introduced myself. Carlie. I'm from Riverside. And you? Inside or Riverside?" She assumes it's just between those two, because the tour bus was traveling from one to the other, but it could easily be one of the many smaller towns between the two.

[Shadowcaller]

[New Inside - Castilla]

Ilpholin grabs the chain and starts pulling it up, reeling Thinky back in onto the bed and staring at him intensely. "Fine." She attempts to put on hand over the pixie's mouth, shutting off her pain in that section and holding the fey down against the bed, fingers wrapped around his whole body. Her other hand turns into a knife and moves close. Then goes to slice the bindings keeping the fey hostage with one cut.

Should it all work out, Ilpholin will take the newly freed pixie and hold him up to where she can look him in the eyes while not releasing him from her grasp. "You'd better keep quiet until we're out, understand?" The second she gets something resembling a nod, she'd go to stuff him down her shirt. He'll be safe nestled there, tightly to her bosom and out of sight. She'd also hurriedly toss the bedding and pillow back on the bed to keep the illusion he's cowering under the sheets as she walks out of the room.

This all happens quickly, but there's a lot of ifs relying on the pixie that could go wrong.

[A meeting place]

"Very well." he says. "My goal right now, is it to gain full controll of skyside. This way I can work on my research without trouble."
It is true what he says, thought he once assumed to take over the nexus, but now he knows that it is impossible. Just the number of strong entitys would be a pain to deal with. Maybe f they vote for some kind of leader he might get a hand on it. Since we got no President of the nexus yet this idea is far away.

"It would be best if the head just disapears with the whole body, but that depends on what you value my 'ultimate goal'"

[A meeting place]

"A goal that would require you to have many allies or puppets among the populance." Helios the pumpkin states. "My suggestion would be to either ally or puppet these troublemakers of yours. So in the interest of reaching this goal then what about this? In exchange for information about how you control the people of the city I can apply your methods to other parts of it. Essentially, you provide me with your product and I deliver it where you choose. There will of course be a fee of a few thousands of the credit used here in addition to that, but people don't work for just information after all and what I do requires money to accomplish."

[New Inside - Castilla]

"Pleeeeease don't hurt me!" Thinky laments as she drags them up by the chain though quickly falls quiet once she puts her hand over their mouth (and most of their body for that matter).
They simply make a few nervous hand gestures and a nod in response. They shiver in her hand, too afraid to do anything else.
The pixie is connected to the chain in a metal binding around their waist. Trying to cut through it might prove difficult and risky. It would likely take time to cut through it. But if she instead targeted the weak point of the chain would be where it connects to the binding she would save many minutes even though the metal binding would still be there.

Either way, she can stuff the pixie down there without any real problems. Thinky don't seem very eager on disobeying her orders.

All of this is of course caught by the camera but there is no instant reaction as she heads out the room.
The guard turns to her. "Are you finished, miss?" He inquires as he looks up from his newspaper.