Inside 69: Nice.

[Dr.Gunsforhands]

[Office Park -> Underground Tunnels]

Black Dragon's Den? That's convenient. There's a delivery tunnel that goes straight there. I haven't been there in a long time, though, Wanessa muses. I wonder what downtown's new generation of undergangers are like.

The route involves descending a few more floors and through a warehouse and loading dock, but Wanessa leads June to the underground equivalent of a highway system. There's actually a fair amount of traffic down here - some drow and goblins on foot, some dwarves and trolls on hovering scooters, and the occasional armored, bullet-shaped transport vehicle threatening to splatter all of the above.

Of course, given that they're still going to another district, it soon becomes clear that this is going to be quite a walk... if they choose to walk. We could run, if you want to start testing your new physical limits. Or we could jump on the back of the next transport that comes by. What do you think?

[Rebonack]

[Cormorant House]

Man.

That sounds like an angry person.

Mags loves angry people they're great.

"Laying face-down in the dirt, thanks for asking," Magdalene says in a muffled voice. She's still prone in the grass as she lifts one arm to give this idiot shouting at her a thumbs up. Gesture done, her hand flops back into the grass. "God. Do you know how much the ashen wastes suck? God they suck so much. Apparently you can still get to them from here so that's a new thing I learned today."

She props herself up on her elbows and lifts her face, finally looking at this shouty-sweary person who's making so much noise.

"Man, your teeth are really big. ****, I am never going to get use to all the Lord of the Rings people running around like it's a normal thing," she comments completely unhelpfully as she shoves herself up to her feet, brushing off grass and... dust? Or maybe ash, considering what she said a few moments ago. She smells like a crematorium. "I'm Mags, to answer the earlier question. Magical Girl and professional hobo."

She finishes brushing herself off and finally takes stock of her surroundings.

Hmm.

Notable lack of river.

"This isn't Riverside at all, is it? I seriously need to stop diving into every riftgate I see. This is... what? Someone's back yard. And you've been digging?"

Her eyes trail their way down to what Billie is holding.

"And you've got a gun. Oh hell. So are you a cop or a serial killer?" Mags asks, apparently unconcerned about either possibility.


[Slums - Park]

The rock bounces off the homeless guy.

He grunts again.

Wow, Hector, way to be jerk.

Just throwing rocks at random transients, really? That seems really-

The hobo explodes in a shower of glittering dust, sparkles, and streamers of color. The only one close enough was doggo Hector and he may suddenly fall asleep as a result.

Definitely a trap.


[Metropolis Square]

Oh. Well. That could have gone better.

Down the hole Jade goes! Morning Glory shouts silently after her and some rather painful looking yanking later frees herself from the tar and dives down the pit after her friend! Given that they are now no longer Inside it is probably a good time to move elsewhere.


[SciTech Laboratories]

Cascade's brain voice seems like kind of a jerk.

Doctor Reynolds hesitates for a moment, then hands over the key card. "This should get you through the security doors. They're pretty tough, otherwise. Designed to stand up to capes. In retrospect maybe magnetic locks wasn't the best idea..."

Especially not with Master MagniGauntlet magneting them open.

That said, he'll retreat! And that still leaves our hero with the choice of stairs or elevator. It's just a question of how risky she wishes to be.

[Hattish Thing]

[Cormorant House]

Once it becomes apparent that the stranger meant her no harm, Detective Bansford holsters her revolver. "Nrgh, dammit! You scared the hell out of me, girl." She rests a hand against her chest, breathing deeply as she feels her heart racing. After a few seconds, she snaps out of her daze and trudges on through the mud towards the stranger. "Alright. Come on, up then." Billie extends a hand as if to help, though she does shrug somewhat uncomfortably once her teeth are brought up. Clearly that was somewhat of a controversial statement. "Hm, maybe yours are just small." She raises a brow at that.

Ashen wastes? Was that a place? At least she had a name, now; Magdalene. It didn't fit the woman before her, Billie thinks. Then she mentions something about Riverside. Ah, it all made sense now. "No, no it's not. Missed your mark by a fair bit, I'm afraid. Sorry, dear." She offers an authoritative smile. Its quite comforting, actually - like receiving praise from a favorite aunt. "You're in the city of Inside, more specifically, you're at Cormorant House." Just as she's about to explain further, Magdalene interrupts. Serial killer? Billie rolls her eyes before gesturing towards the navy uniform she's wearing beneath her gray patrol coat. "No, no - I'm with Intersection."

Hm, better make sure she knows what that is. "That means cops, dear. You know, you really shouldn't be here, actually." At this, she starts looking around, her eyes narrowed. "I'm here on police business, I don't think its safe."

"If you wait by the car, I can offer you a ride home once I'm done."

"Or I could call an officer to come pick you up, instead?"

[Rebonack]

[Cormorant House]

Mags gets up all on her own, not swatting away the cop's hand but not taking it either.

She isn't pulling for Renegade today.

Not yet anyways.

"Cool I'll add scary to my box of adjectives," Magdalene says, turning away from Billie and eyeing the house nearby. Man that place was giving off some serious 'hello loot and monsters inside' vibes. She just had a nose for that sort of thing. Or maybe a nose for recent murder. One of those things. Had there been recent murder going on? That sure looks like it COULD be a coffin at the bottom of a shallow grave.

At least a zombie isn't going to spring out.

Probably.

Not getting jump-scared by zombies every fifteen minutes is probably Mags' favorite thing about the Nexus.

"Ah well. I wasn't really aiming for anywhere other than 'not in a blasted hellscape full of flesh eating monsters' so I'll take what I get," Mags replies with a shrug as she takes a few steps closer to the box? in the dirt. "Cop then, that's cool. Glad this place still has those probably less murders than back home."

She raises an eyebrow at the 'its not safe' comment and half-way suppresses a bark of laughter.

"I've been riftgate hopping all... what the hell is even today? Is it still Sunday? Since then. I-"

Mags suddenly winces and reaches under her breastplate.

"Hold on a sec. C'mere you little bastard," she swears as she pulls out-

Oh God.

What the hell even is that?

It looks like a cross between a leech and a maggot with a mouth like a lamprey. It's easily about six inches long and was apparently busy gnawing on Mags.

"(Funny) God damned void-leeches," she swears, tossing the thing onto the grass and stomping on it several times. It bursts, spraying black bile everywhere. For good measure Mags spits on it, too. "Hate those things. Anyway. You were saying something about a ride home? My apartment is in Riverside I'll just take the trains or whatever."

She puts her hands on her hips, looking between the maybe coffin and the spooky house.

"So crimes goin' on huh? Is it murders? This place totally looks like a cultist crib."

[Hattish Thing]

[Cormorant House]

Once it becomes apparent that Magdalene won't need her help, Detective Bansford will rather awkwardly shove her outstretched hand into a pocket. "Uh, right - riftgates. Listen, I don't think you should hang around." It's fairly clear, judging by the woman's puzzled expression, that she's never heard of a riftgate before. Furthermore, she's starting to become rather antsy. An attempt had been made at remaining fairly covert, and now, thanks to this particularly disagreeable civilian, that advantage was gone. "Alright, come on. Be a dear, don't make this difficult." She was not in the mood to wrestle with homeless teenagers.

Billie flashes a somewhat irritated look towards Magdalene before approaching her. "Come on, we're leaving - keep your voice down." As she reaches out to grab at the teenager's arm, Magdalene pulls out that awful, writhing creature. There's an immediate reaction from Billie - one of clear and vehement disgust. More cursing, of course. "Oh, god! Hey, what the hell, kid?" Then, Magdalene tosses the thing upon the ground and squashes it. That was vile. "Disgusting." She crosses her arms over her chest before stepping back. "What was that? Are you sick or something?"

"Hey, don't change the subject. What the hell?"

[5a Violista]

[-> Underground Tunnels]

"Oh! I didn't know there were tunnels that went there," June says. "...But, I guess I probably would have ended up learning, if not tonight, later this week." Since, working there, she probably would have eventually noticed.

She goes down, looking at all the people and architecture and everything else down here. Sure, she's met a drow already, but there's so many new things that she can't not look at it all. Like, hoverscooters? That's pretty cool! And how does underground architecture differ? That's something she's interested in.

"Actually," she says, "I kind-of feel up for a run." Sure, it'd be easier to look at everything while on a transport, but her muscles are aching to go running.

June starts warming up her muscles. "You'll have to lead the way, though," she says, "unless they've got a lot of signage around." But, after a pause, her competitive spirit flares up. "But if I knew the way, I bet I could beat you there."

((So...I'm uncertain whether the next scene should take place in BDD, Home, or if they should be waylaid on the way first or anything else, because I currently have another scene in the BDD with June that takes place the evening before this scene started.))

[Rebonack]

[Cormorant House]

Is anyone ever really in the mood to wrestle homeless teenagers?

Not that Mags is homeless. Or a teenager.

Well, she's probably not a teenager. Probably maybe. She might be twenty! It's hard to tell since she's a bit on the short side and she's got one of those voices that could be mistaken for a Jr High student.

"Eh? Void-leech. Just said that. Little one. The big ones like giving their babies to people. (Flowers) don't even bother taking you out to dinner first," Mags snarks, giving the dead abyssal invertebrate the stink-eye.

A few seconds pass as Magdalene eyes the cop, arms crossed over her chest. Man. This cop was seriously freaked out by something like that? Something that minor? Like she's never seen a chthonian before?

Slowly, deliberately, a smile creeps across Mags' face. Arms still crossed, she points at Billie.

"You're a normie, yeah? You aren't used to dealing with weird (sweat pea) so a minor chthonian makes you wig out. I'm willing to bet good iron that house is stuffed fulla cultists. So tell you what. You do the detective thing-" Mags says, pounding one fist into her palm. "-and I'll do the pactbound thing if creepers start crawling up through the floorboards. That sound good?"

[Hattish Thing]

[Cormorant House]

Detective Bansford narrows her eyes as the diminutive woman before her continues to spout nonsense. "Alright, that's enough - keep your voice down." Billie sighs before pinching at the bridge of her nose. This was quite the predicament, wasn't it? If she left the girl, who knows what might happen to her - especially in a neighborhood like this. At the same time, if she brought the girl with her, she might be putting her life in jeopardy. "This is becoming tedious, girl - people are in danger." Hell, they might be in danger. This place didn't seem particularly safe, did it?

"Hm, well. This isn't ideal." Billie sighs as she ponders over options. Finally, the detective simply shrugs. "Alright, here's what's going to happen." She glances up towards the house, grimacing as she continues to speak. Was she really about to do this? "You can come with, but you've got to be quiet. You'll be safer with me." More of this cult stuff, better snap her out of it. At the moment, this was just a missing persons case. Nothing more, nothing less. "Okay, you need to drop the cult thing. We don't know that. Now, c'mere."

"Watch my back, okay? This is important." Billie nods towards Magdalene before trudging on back to the patch of earth. Time to see what was in this box.

And so, she'll attempt to nonchalantly dig the box out of the earth before examining it.

[Purple Eagle]

[Aimless Shenanigans]

Zabb starts to be sent backwards before anchoring himself in space, a second pair of wings appearing and shielding his legs. A demon! Time for some smiting, Zabb's rather excited at having to do his job. "Over here, guys!" He calls for Eao and Lapis, then stretches forth his hands and sends a blast of razor wind at the Skeletron, hoping to blow the amulet off, or perhaps cut the chain/rope so it falls from Skeletron's neck.

[Rebonack]

"Repent!" hollers a disheveled looking hobo, beard and clothing ratty and filthy, as he parades around the streets wearing a sandwich board. People were starting to think he was gone, but no such luck. "Repent, for the end of thread is near! Repent!"

Apparently he's gotten a hand-bell from somewhere, because he's ringing the thing as loudly as he can.

Some had wondered where the 'end of thread' hobo has gotten off to. It's been... gosh... over half a year since he cropped up last. And that time he was shouting about the end of thread having actually arrived. Anyone who had asked him about it got an incoherent rant about yarn for their trouble.

Of course, no one IMPORTANT ever talks to him.

And for good reason.

Because his existence is a joke.

Why would they speak with a gag who's announcing the end of thread?

They can't, after all. Because he is the herald of the end. And he never shows up for the BEGINNING OF A NEW THREAD.