Onyx Prairie - Southern Quarter

[Aethyrium]

[VVitch]

Character Name: Maria Rex-Astra
Date | Time: 11.11 | Late Evening
Location: Kook Manor, Southern Quarter, Onyx
Wearing: Combat Gear (Padded vest, combats, boots)
Tagging | Mentioning: Meena, Hulta, Closed | Jasper

Of all the twists and turns Maria's day could have taken she never would have guessed at this one. She'd just been wandering with Hulta, a little aimlessly, when she caught sight of the striking figure that was Meena. It wasn't often that Maria met a woman taller than her, which made her all the more memorable. Between how friendly the other lady always was and how she stood out in a crowd Maria often approached to say her polite hellos to a fellow lover of plants. At first she'd found that friendliness a little overwhelming but it hadn't taken long for Maria to enjoy it.

They had barely gotten past greetings when Jasper approached, unexpectedly. He wasn't someone Maria knew, though the face was a little familiar. The story about treasure had her doubtful but the map looked to be genuine, and at least interesting when coupled with the realisation that it led to Kook Manor. Despite the name the old building was well known as one of the most haunted spots in Onyx, a popular stop on walking tours of spooky locations. It might initially seem silly but the reports of strange lights and sounds were enough to have anyone on edge and not many were bold enough to head inside these days.

For Maria, her intrigue outweighed her uncertainty and it didn't take long for the trio to agree that they would all sacrifice the saturday nightlife for an adventure. They would meet that evening, geared up just in case there was something actually dangerous afoot, and head on in to see if they could find Jasper's treasure and maybe a real life ghost alongside it. Maria was a spiritual person but she didn't believe in the kind of chain-rattling ghost of these stories. Even so, she had to imagine there was at least something going on to explain all those odd tales.


The afternoon passed and Maria donned her gear, wondering all the while if there was a small chance she was going to see proof of the supernatural tonight. She wasn't scared but part of her did think it might have been more sensible to investigate at daytime. Still, nobody ever saw a ghost at two o'clock in the afternoon, did they? The risk was worth it for the chance. Heading down to the place they'd agreed to meet Maria did briefly wonder if they were about to make the Academy look bad. If they damaged the property someone had to own it, right? Then again, it was abandoned and they would be careful.

Catching sight of Meena and Hulta, Maria smiled wide and approached with her usual measured grace, giving each a chaste, gentle hug and greeting them before they made their way out into the crisp night air. Immediately Maria felt relaxation wash over her, the slight breeze and the feel of freshness revitalising her and making her feel both more alive and more at peace. It was as hard for her to stress outside as it was easy to stress when trapped indoors for too long.

The journey through the city was a quiet and relatively uneventful affair but a good chance to trade guesses on what was really going on, to wonder if ghosts might really be real or if they were going to catch an old man wearing a white sheet and yelling 'Boo'. Maria's strongly held belief in the weight and importance of life and death meant she found the idea of ghosts a hard pill to swallow. Death was final, that was why it must be treated with such respect. That was how she saw it.

Finally, they came face to face with it. Out of place among newer buildings, the mansion's architecture was aging beauty. Marked by scars, wind and rain and many many years had not been kind to the empty home. Out front, a rusted metal gate stood creaking and swinging a little, the lock long since too damaged to hold it still. It was the only noise, safe for the light rush of wind. The windows had long since been boarded up, the glass likely shattered. Perhaps someone had injured themselves breaking in once.

There was an odd kind of tension, the door still intact and slighty ajar leading to a sheer darkness far blacker than the moonlight night that the trio were currently stood in. It was a mercy they'd been wise enough to bring light, otherwise exploration would have been off the cards. Being out of commission because of a rolled ankle wandering around in the dark was a bad look for a squire. Maria glanced at her companions one by one, then smiled lightly. "Who's first?" She queried, wondering if the ghost stories were enough to have either of the other two feeling jumpy.

[Crash]

Character Name: Meena Tor
Date | Time: 11.11 | Late Evening
Location: Kook Manor, Southern Quarter, Onyx
Wearing: Sheer blouse with black bra and black jeans, puffy orange vest and black boots.
Tagging | Mentioning: Maria, Hulta, Closed | Lolo, Velvet, Farrah
Okay, so Meena was sure one of the girls had said, "Yay, it's a date!" So, she had come dressed appropriately.  Sure, they had talked about bringing their gear, but Meena could accessorize, and Heart of the Mountain was a beautiful piece, so Meena was sure she could make it work. And she did.  Or at least she thought she did.  Clearly, Meena had misunderstood date…again because neither Maria nor Hulta was dressed quite like the curvaceous Silenus, which was sort of disappointing, really.  They were both quite attractive. Now, don't get it wrong. Tactical gear could be quite hot, but this whole date, not-a-date thing was confusing.  Meena wasn't sure she would ever get it.  That was why she liked dates with Lolo.  They were uncomplicated, fun, and ended in the best ways. Everything else was just confusing.

But Meena was not one to pout about it, nor was she going to change after getting all gussied up.  She looked good, darn it. A little adventure was no reason to dress down.  Wild One, Lolo really was becoming an influence.   If she wasn't too messy after this, maybe she could swing by Mockery's dorm and let Velvet know what she was missing since, apparently, the cute cat-eared sniper had forgotten about the whole date thing, too. 

Anywho, at least she was out for the evening with some pleasant company. Meena had run into Hulta a few weeks ago when she had been out dancing. Apparently, some students had gotten wind of the fact that she had never been dancing before and had dragged the pretty, elven woman along with them to a seedy parlor in the eastern quarter for a night. Meena was a connoisseur of seedy dance parlors and dive bars and had been out by herself that night, trying to blow off some steam.  She hadn't even recognized the Hulta from the Academy, all dressed up and delicious. Imagine her surprise after asking the girl for a dance and not a little flirtation on Meena's part when she found out the woman was not only a fellow squire but had been sitting behind Meena for the last month and a half in class! Hulta hadn't been unreceptive to the flirtations, which was nice. Meena was pretty sure she had been flirting back. Well, maybe…kind of?  Perhaps elves just flirted weirdly?  She wasn't sure, but it had been fun even if Hulta had kicked her shin once and almost tripped over another dancer, causing a change reaction of stumbling clubbers that Meena was fairly sure caused at least one fight to break out.

Meena's interactions with Maria had been much more…normal?  Happy greetings.  Exchanged pleasantries.  They shared a love of plants and flowers and the obvious Silenus connection.  She had been a little less receptive to Meena's extroverted nature, but that never offended Meena.  Lots of people had boundaries Meena would never understand. However, she didn't have to understand them to respect them. The fact that Meena had been invited along on this date/not date (still weird) was a good sign that they could be friends.

Meena met Hulta leaving the dorms. As well as she knew the Eastern Quarter, the other quarters of Onyx were more of a mystery to Meena. That wasn't really a problem for her when she was by herself.  Meena wandered the city when she could. Getting lost and finding your way back to the familiar was an excellent way of getting to know a new place.  However, getting lost and missing her not-a-date would have been bad. The short walk to catch up with Maria allowed Meena to slip in a bit of banter to test her theory about the strangeness of elven flirting.  Farrah had talked often about some kind of mysterious elven mating rituals.  Was this part of it? Meena was still working on sussing that out when they found Maria waiting for them.

"Maria! EEEEEEEEeeeee!" Meena's girlish squeal countered the imposing image she cut in her half combat-half club gear, massive green crystal maul slung across her back.  She quickly bounded over to the woman and hugged her, releasing her grip before it became creepy and waving Hulta over. 

"It's so nice to hug someone without having to bend over or have their face shoved in my boobs," she said with a grin and threw an arm around both women as they readied to decend to the city below.


They all stood staring at the mejestic, if decayed edifice of Kooky (as she called it) manor.  Meena had been raised on the folklore of her people. While much of that had revolved around hollows, there was not an insignificant number of ghost, revenant, and vengeful spirit stories to make a young Silenus's blood run cold.  Taking in the darkened building, Meena would have to say that if a ghost was going to live anywhere, it would probably be here.  The thought caused a shiver to walk icy fingers along her spine.  Perhaps this whole nighttime idea had been a bad one.

[TheFluffyOne]

Character Name: Hulta Elderfond
Date | Time: 11.11 | Late Evening
Location: Kook Manor, Southern Quarter, Onyx
Wearing: Dark combat trousers, cream shirt, dark green leather holster and boots.
Tagging | Mentioning: Maria, Meena, Closed |
It was investigation time. Hulta had tried her hardest to find out more about Kook house or ‘Kooky’ house as Meena had called it. But the name seemed to escape most of her favoured text books, perhaps deliberately but more likely because she was only up to C in the library texts. Blasted K, she thought as she waited for Meena. Maria had mentioned that ghost hunting might have been involved so she was prepped. Dark combat trousers with large pockets hanging off her hips, heavy shoes and a cream shirt. All topped off with her trusty harness that looped just under her chest and allowed her staff to sit split against her back.

Hulta checked her backpack for the fourteenth time. Snacks, notebook, snacks, torch, ‘holy water’ which was water that she has stared at for five minutes willing it to turn sacred and obviously more snacks. They were essentials only. She was counting the lemon drops in her pocket, ensuring there were enough for her and Meena seeing as Maria disliked the sweet treats, when she was greeted by a very busty hug. Ah, Meena. Bright red cheeks turned up to the woman as she grinned widely. The woman has not escaped Hulta's attention from day one. She was still discovering new ways to see around the tall goddess with horns that curled upwards.

Then there was the dance. Hulta remembered the cries of her fellow squires who demanded that she at least go out once. So she did. She danced like someone's dad, all hands and no hips. Meena was so kind to her that night and ever so friendly. It helped that Meena had pretended to miss every time Hulta kicked her shin or turned left rather than right. As she surfaced from the depths of Meenas blossom, Hulta raised a paper bag high towards her. “Lemon drop?”

Two lemon drops later and Hulta could see Maria in the distance. Even with Meena's greater gait, Hulta sped off ahead. Fueled by excitement and sugar. Maria's hug was the complete opposite of Meena's. It reminded her of a proper lady’s hug. As they all stood greeting each other, Hulta found herself walking on the spot. Adventure was right round the corner, she thought as sugar coursed through her veins.

Hulta was grateful that the two of them brought her up to speed with the rumours around Kook House. She was completely and utterly swept up by the idea of an old man wearing a white sheet and shouting boo. His name was now Phillip in her mind. Poor Phillip. Hulta made a mental note to reserve a lemon drop for Phillip. What if he was really a ghost? Do ghosts even like lemon drops? Can they even eat them? Darn. She would save one anyway.

There it was. Kook house. With her hands firmly placed on her hips, Hulta leaned back and took in the building. It was amazing. Her bag was swung round from its previous placement on her back and she rifled through the contents for her notebook and trusty brown pencil. Sketching the building as quickly as she could, she tried to capture the character of Kook house. The way that the stone was pockmarked by rain yet the intricate decorative carvings still shone through. The wooden boards hiding the interior from view were scrawled with graffiti. Hulta slowly turned her head to one side, a curse word was written in her fine cursive on the drawing. She would need to look up that word in the library.

The metal fence that was corroding slowly and when the gate was opened it seemed to groan from the weight of the rust that coated it. The previous bubble of noise that they had travelled within appeared to have popped to total silence upon their arrival at the house. Hulta's eyes were wide with curiosity as Maria enquired about who was going first. She paused. Maybe Meena would…nope, her silence was a clear avoidance of the question.

With a quick glance over the two again, she wriggled her head and placed her palm on the wooden door. It felt damp to the touch, almost as if it had been kissed by the rain that passed by hours ago. There was the slightest aroma of mould but Hulta merely glanced over her shoulder and gave them both a wide grin that was just a smidge unsettling. “So it begins” she declared as she pushed on the door.

And nothing. It barely moved from it's ajar position. Her gremlin smile faded as she looked like the door had directly insulted her mother. Right again. Put more welly into it. Hulta tried again, this time putting true effort into it. It was stuck lightly on a raised floorboard which caused the wooden door to shudder lightly. That didn't deter her and her shoulder moved to push the door open.

A curtain of dust greeted them. Hulta bounded two steps into the long rug lined corridor and returned her hands to her hips, triumphant in her victory against the door. “Okay gang. Where to now?” She swiveled her torso left then right as she took in their surroundings. Dust covered everything. Moonlight that crept in through the cracks between the wooden boards highlighted the clouds of dust that Hulta has created with the door opening.

Two rooms. Well, doors. One in a similar fashion as the one she had expertly opened and the other hanging off it's hinges. The plush rug under foot had seen better days, with threadbare areas highlighting the direction with the most foot traffic. ‘Right Phillip, where are you?’ With a small jump and turn, Hulta was suddenly facing the other women. “Lets go get some ghosts” Her smile was far too wide and clearly told them that she had no real clue what they were in for.

[VVitch]

Character Name: Maria Rex-Astra
Date | Time: 11.11 | Late Evening
Location: Kook Manor, Southern Quarter, Onyx
Wearing: Combat Gear (Padded vest, combats, boots)
Tagging | Mentioning: Meena, Hulta, Closed

As they approached Maria's delicate ears weren't telling her a thing. The light breeze was enough to stifle any sounds indoors, even as she was hot on Hulta's heels and barely a pace in front of Meena. Maria was tense, though more so out of readiness than fear. There was a real chance that there was some dangerous animal or even just unstable flooring liable to collapse. Anything could go wrong at any second. It wasn't paranoid to think that, it was sensible.

Delicate, her nose wrinkled at the twin scents of rotting wood and thick dust in the air. The moonlit carcass of a once-proud manor was hard to parse. Nothing in here looked like treasure. Hulta's eager grin was at least enough to break the tension. Maria smiled but she didn't laugh, eventually nodding. "We should stick together," She suggested, still feeling wary.

"Where would you hide treasure in a place like this? Let's hunt for it, see if we get interrupted," Maria queried, then tried to guide. Unfortunately though the obvious things like a safe or ornate chest were not to be seen. What little furniture remained was near enough fallen apart and had certainly been rifled through before. Nothing of value here would be easily found, she was sure of that. Even with the rumoured ghosts she knew some of the more daring thieves would have picked the place apart over the years.

The door hanging from its hinges was easy enough to push open, leading to an expansive lounge area with a once-beautiful fireplace now crumbling and collapsing. Maria paused in the door frame. The home reminded her of the one she had grown up in, if it were to be abandoned for many, many years. She found herself blinking, frozen, tilting her head as she wondered if one day her parent's treasured home might come to look like this. Maria didn't think anyone expected it to be their house that turned to a husk.

"It's a little sad, isn't it," She mused aloud before catching herself, having not quite meant to voice the thought, and striding forward. "I don't see anything that looks like it's worth, well, anything," Maria continued, glancing about the room and only seeing the remnants of a past life. A few paces in and she was still, hands on her hips, lost. Perhaps it was defeatist to wonder how there could be treasure in a place like this so soon but it was hard to imagine any of the other rooms would have fared better in the face of father tiem.

Then, suddenly, a noise split the quiet. Maria's ears twitched and she froze from calm steadiness to a statue, eyes wide after her head snapped to the source. The look on her face was one of concern as she gazed past her companions but didn't make a sound of panic, only focusing on what she'd heard. It was metallic, grating, scraping, unpleasant and unwelcome. She didn't like it one bit but it had stopped already, only echoing out through the empty rooms for a few seconds. It didn't feel necessary to ask but she still spoke up, "You two heard that, right?"

[Intimate Ink]

Character Name: Vesper Cabello
Date | Time: November 10th, ~2015
Location: Onyx - Southern Quarter, Abandoned Tenements 
Wearing: Orange overcoat, black turtleneck, black drawstring pants, black boots, backpack
Tagging: Mugi | Mentioning:


After what had transpired, Vesper had originally imagined that when freed from the confines of classes for the week, he’d be spending the weekend in bed. Instead, Vesper found as the weekend approached that being in the dormitories was the last place he wanted to be. There was something about the space that had not yet been exorcised in his mind; he knew now that things had taken place there… Things that he had not begun to imagine ever happening before the mission. There were faces and voices missing. Despite all the ambivalent feelings that the events brought him, it didn’t change the fact that what little in-roads he had made thinking that the dormitory was home were now disrupted.

”Careful… watch your step.”

Though he certainly knew of Mugi, he didn’t really know her. Honestly, that made her the perfect companion to accompany him, given that there would be less obligatory need to either bring up or awkwardly dodge around the occurrences at Needlepass Bridge. She had overheard Vesper asking about a condemned settlement of residences in southern Onyx that he had happened across in his exploring of the city. While the threat of the Hollow enforced the concept of ‘space is a premium’, it didn’t mean that reshuffling and repurposing was not sometimes needed. These residences were in the way of a factory that already loomed like a predator outside their windows. Those who lived in them were vacated, and now the buildings were simply husks, waiting to be torn down and devoured by the industry surrounding it.

Vesper held out a flashlight, the imperfect glow being cast through the room. ”I wonder what it was like to grow up here. In the city, I mean.” Vesper paused, looking back at his companion, realizing that he didn’t even know where she herself had hailed from. Maybe she knew.

He swallowed what felt like brittle, dry dust that had been caught in his mouth as he spoke, doubting his footsteps across creaking wood planks. He’d assumed that the tenements were in decent repair still, but the sound had him starting to doubt his assurance. As a means of explaining himself, Vesper interjected, ”I grew up far from any city. When I was quite young I… envied all the activity and fun that I imagined that could be found in one.”

Looking around, Vesper had to admit that their current surroundings didn’t exactly feel like fun to live in. A dusty brown sofa snagged his gaze; he’d heard that some of the people moved so fast that there might still be some lingering, albeit almost assuredly worthless, things they left behind. He laughed, ”Hey, we just need to sling that on our backs and new furniture for the dorms.” Not that anyone would want to sit on it, especially as he got closer and could smell the rise of mildew from the cushions.

[Amarlo]

Character Name: Mugi Stone
Date | Time: November 10th
Location: Onyx - Southern Quarter, Abandoned Tenements 
Wearing: Black leggings, no longer white high tops, black turtle neck, black overcoat, insulated (work)gloves, Suga'
Tagging: Vesper @Intimate Ink | Mentioning:

Now this felt like home. The underlying waft of piss and mildew set this ruffian at ease quicker than whatever chemical concoctions had already been huffed there earlier. Her shoulders relaxed even as she rifled through the pockets along the inner side of her coat. “Fuck off, I was nowhe–” She balked, his words finally catching up with her two brain cells. Two blinks found him, only for her mismatched hues to lower toward her inner coat again. “Oh uh, yeah, thanks...” There was a bit of a hesitation there. Almost as if she couldn’t quite tell if he was fuckin’ with her or not.

Either way, she’d found what she was looking for and pulled the basic bitch multi-tool free with a snort and a grin. “Was noisy. And crowded. And annoying.” She answered his wonderings in the place of whatever disembodied voice he might have been expecting. Sorry to disappoint. It was one of her greatest talents, after all.

“Fun costs money.” She added dryly, annoyed with that truth of the world herself. “Don’t get me wrong,” She chuckled as she eyed a series of red x’s sprawled across one wall. “I envied all the fun and food tha’ was in Onyx too.” She nodded along shamelessly, scarred fingers skimming a crack in the door frame as she moved into the next room. “Actually, I envied the people that afforded that shit more than anythin’. Not the fun and food itself.” Mugi admitted as the realization hit her. They’d always managed to make fun for themselves, one way or another.

“Ah, mother fucker.” The girl huffed, her arms folded over her annoyingly generous bust as she came storming back into the common room. “They already got all the fuckin' radiators!” Those were one of the big money makers for scrapping. She had to guess the big water heaters from down stairs were long gone too. Mugi had no idea what plans Johnny Backwater might have had in mind for a place like this, but she knew exactly why she was there.

“Hey, don’t sit there!” She barked sharply, pointing toward the same gross couch he’d just been making jokes about. “‘less you wanna get pregnant.” She flashed him a big toothy grin. “If I know anythin’ bout my hometown, that couch glows undera uv light. We mighta even ruined someone's date night.” Now that had her cackling at some memories.

[Crash]

Character Name: Meena Tor
Date | Time: 11.11 | Late Evening
Location: Kook Manor, Southern Quarter, Onyx
Wearing: Sheer blouse with black bra and black jeans, thick oxamel beige long coat and black boots.
Tagging | Mentioning: Maria, Hulta, Closed
Hulta was right; Meena found herself in no real hurry to enter the mansion.  It was funny the kind of things from your childhood that could reach up and grab you from out of nowhere.  Objectively, Meena knew the stories of dhjinn, vengeful ghosts, and other spirits were nothing more than warning tales on the dangers of wandering too far from the protection of the clan.  Some of the stories were likely based on hollows or the dangerous flora and fauna of the Tors.  But as she stared at the “haunted” mansion, she found a nervous shiver crawling along her spine as she swallowed the sudden lump in her throat, almost taking a lemon drop with it.

Paralyzed in fear, she was not. Call it a healthy aversion to having her soul burned away by one of the smokeless flames.  Not that they existed, because they totally did not, she told herself, looking up at the mansion.
 
Hulta, however, had no such worries, having never grown up in the Tors or apparently having a Grandmother who was such a compelling storyteller as to terrify a generation of children with her vivid stories. The elven squire looked way too confident to be confounded by a door, and yet, as she gave the barrier a shove, it did not move. The look she gave the offending hunk of old wood shooed away the dire specters of old Grandmother tales and made Meena chuckle.

“I feel like I should help her, but sometimes you have to let the little ones do it on their own,” Meena observed to her tall Silenus companion, clearly amused as with another shove, Hulta forced it wide enough to allow them through easily enough.  Meena gave the autumn-haired beauty an encouraging thumbs up and followed them inside.

Her sensitive nose wrinkled at the musty smell of damp and mildew, and she gave a sudden sneeze that would alert any “soul” in the area to her presence.  “Ugh, sorry,” Meena said, wrinkling her nose again.  Away from a mission Meena cared little for formality or structure and had no issues when Maria suggested they stay together, then a way for them to go.  To Meena, this was a non-date date, not-a-date, which was, to say, an opportunity to have a little fun.

Meena looked around at the aging majesty. She could see how Maria felt sadness at the crumbling beauty of the manor. It must have been something incredible to look at in its heyday, but permanency was something Meena was only recently becoming accustomed to; she grew up tents and yurts on the move half the year with the oxamel herds, broken by seasonal stays behind palisade walls.  In many ways, buildings in Onyx and other large cities still seemed excessive to her. 

“Isn’t the treasure the people you meet along the way,” Meena said and flung an arm around Hulta’s shoulder, plopping her head next to her new friend’s, giving Maria big doe-eyes and a sappy smile.  “Oh, that reminds me. Selfie time!” Meena took out her phone and, after a quick fumble, held it out to take a picture of them, only pausing to wave Maria over if she wanted to join them, backdropped against the crumbling fireplace. 

“Say, proof of life,” Meena said with a grin and snapped several images in quick succession until the metallic groan echoed through Kook Mansion, and that icy chill crawled along Meena’s body again.  “The scrappy, screechy sound, like the clockwork doors of Oyzimandses tomb opening to unleash his innumerable hordes upon the world…sound?  Yeah. Heard it,” Meena nodded, looking around for any source of the sound that seemed to reverberate from every wall, her happy-go-lucky countenance replaced with concern and a little fear.

“If I remember correctly, strange lights have been seen in the upper windows. Footsteps on the lower levels. I guess creepy, metal, chompy teeth sounds from…everywhere?”  Okay, maybe it wasn’t chompy teeth, but it could be! Meena had asked around a bit about the place earlier today. Everyone seemed to have a story, but most of the least outrageous centered around lights, footsteps, apparitions, and strange noises.

[Intimate Ink]

Character Name: Vesper Cabello
Date | Time: November 10th, ~2015
Location: Onyx - Southern Quarter, Abandoned Tenements 
Wearing: Orange overcoat, black turtleneck, black drawstring pants, black boots, backpack
Tagging: Mugi | Mentioning:

Mugi’s reaction to Vesper’s warning caused a stifled smile on his features. He’d seen enough reactions at Hammer to not think too much of it, even if he had made a note to be a bit more selective with his warnings. In all fairness, Vesper imagined the surroundings were far more familiar to Mugi than himself; perhaps his words felt like some equivalent if someone was warning him about the perils of traversing swampland.

He quietly thought to himself that being in Gorren’s Point wasn’t exactly filled with fun, either, though he also realized that there wasn’t much sense in comparing whose upbringing was dourer. It sounded like neither of them were exactly used to luxury. ”I suppose it’s the same envy from a slightly different perspective,” Vesper conceded, remembering how it used to be seeing the all-too-rare-seeming caravan from Emerald where things were. ”I was quite young at the time. I suppose when I saw things come from the city, it was too easy to imagine them everywhere and available. Arcanite to apples,” Vesper briefly recalled the picnic basket and his reaction to seeing one. ”It’s just easy to imagine that everything I wanted was there.”

He paused, adding slightly lower, ”And it was nice to imagine what there wasn’t, like constant Hollows piercing the perimeter of your home so easily.” He gave another glance out the window at the looming factory. Had it been some version of a Hollow to someone – a threat of overtaking their personal boundaries?  Or was it a familiar, inert friend to someone who lived here?

”Though I wonder if people here were okay… moving.” He glanced around again, taking note of places where there was less a settle of dust. Ghosts of objects were here; maybe a picture-frame, a television, or even a bed. It was easy to not look at it as a place of comfort and home, but had it been? ”Surely some people weren’t entirely enthusiastic.”

Vesper gave a laugh at the threat of the couch, crouching down, seeming less interested in sitting upon it and more interested in finding what lay beneath. What he found was dust bunnies, some crumpled up scraps of paper, and a single small green ball that looked more fit for the amusement of a pet than a child, but he wasn’t entirely certain.

He frowned and flicked it out of the way; it wasn’t exactly the kind of memorabilia he’d hoped for. ”Always a chance to find your radiators deeper in… I mean, kind of makes sense the easiest places to access are going to be the ones most picked over.”

He paused, trying to resist the question, but ultimately feeling unable to, ”Why are you looking for a radiator anyway? Are Swagger’s dorms that cold?”

[TheFluffyOne]

Character Name: Hulta Elderfond
Date | Time: 11.11 | Late Evening
Location: Kook Manor, Southern Quarter, Onyx
Wearing: Dark combat trousers, cream shirt, dark green leather holster and boots.
Tagging | Mentioning: Maria, Meena, Closed |
Hulta took the small smile from Maria as a personal win and nodded violently at the suggestion that they should stick together. She wasn’t planning on going anywhere without her new friends. The question seemed to float before her as Hulta tried to ponder where someone would hide treasure in a house such as this. Following the taller women, Hulta gave the closed door behind them a quick glance. Almost silently declaring that ‘you’re next’ before trotting into the room after Maria and Meena.

Bending at the knees, Hulta could easily see under Maria’s arm into the room. It looked fancy. That was all she could make out until she followed Maria inside. Hulta’s fingers danced over the mantlepiece, narrowly missing the spider webs and dead bugs. Eager eyes travelled around the room, looking for the smallest evidence that nature was coming to take part of the house back. There. Aha. A small collection of vines were crawling out through a crack in the wood that covered the window. The green had started in an area of rotting wood and was now climbing out to greet the sun. Hulta felt an arm land over her shoulder and grinned up at Meena’s face above her. There was a look that rang in her eyes, one that clearly read ‘I’m a treasure!’.

Meena retrieved her phone and leaned into the group. Fixing her favourite wide smile which forced her dimples to reveal themselves, she tried her hardest to say ‘Proof of life’. Then the two other women paused. Well, Maria paused first and then Meena stopped in her tracks. A noise cut through the happiness and sliced through Hulta’s spine. What…What could make that sound? A person…no. Maybe a rusty door, not unless it was 10m high. Could it be…nah surely the academy would have picked up on a hollow nearby.

Hulta had a momentary lapse in confidence when Meena mentioned strange lights, footsteps and chompy teeth sounds. “I..I think the whole block heard that.” Hulta tried to chuckle but no noise left her lips. It had come from somewhere else in the building. Definitely not this room. If it had been this room, there would be a Hulta shaped dust cloud in the room. Violently shaking her head, she managed to drag confidence back into her bones.

Flicking one of her halved staff pieces out, she flipped it in her palm and a gentle hum sounded from the wood. “It came from somewhere else.” Hulta ducked out from under Meena’s arm and bounded back into the corridor. Small pockets of dust erupted with every footstep on the plush carpet. “Did it sound like it came from below to you?” She called behind her as she crept towards the door that she had promised earlier. Resting her staff on the door, she waited. Maybe if another churning noise rattled through the building, she could feel it on the door. Maybe they could trace the source. ‘Don’t worry, Phillip…We are coming’ she thought as she tapped the door twice lightly.

[Amarlo]

Character Name: Mugi Stone
Date | Time: November 10th
Location: Onyx - Southern Quarter, Abandoned Tenements
Wearing: Black leggings, no longer white high tops, black turtleneck, black overcoat, insulated (work)gloves, Suga'
Tagging: Vesper @Intimate Ink | Mentioning: Astra Industries

Vesper misread her, not that she was aware of that. She wasn’t a mind reader, after all. So she went along with her business like nothing was amiss. That meant she would leave him behind if he didn’t simply follow along himself. At this point she was already headed further into the building, guided by a basic bitch floor plan she had stored away in her head for the way most of these old buildings were built. This one was likely set to be demolished and repurposed for another one of the factories taking over the majority of the Southern Quarter. Possibly another one of Astra’s productions.

Whatever it was meant to become was of little interest to Mugi in the end. She didn’t care that taking parts of a building set to be destroyed was more than technically a crime. Waste not want not, after all. It was a motto that had served her and many others long before this city ever even existed. “To be fair, you aren’t exactly wrong. What you wanted is here, it just ain’t free.”

Then Mugi chuckled, a grim smirk tugging at her lips. “In a city like this monsters don’t just beat at the walls. They live with you. Live off you.” Who would have thought she was so poetic? Miss Mugi Stone; grim and mysterious edgelord. Seiza would have to spin it off into a rap she made her own. Jackson would have cackled and teased the two of them to no end. Xyzel would have told him off, his arm still tucked around Missy – who’d be pumping up some horrendous beat box.

Mugi swallowed, her pace quickening as the shadows of what was and could no longer be chased her up the stairwell to the next floor. She didn’t stop there. She headed high and higher. If the first floor was already stripped, the highest ones were her next best bet. “They were renters.” She chimed after her smirk fell and the voices of ghosts were pushed into the background. “No one cares about renters.” Those scarred lips twitched with a scoff. She might as well be holding a conversation with just herself at this point. It was almost like she was spouting inside jokes to an outside audience. “They were probably given three months to get out. No compensation. No real help.” Then she actually gave an audible laugh, grinning from ear to ear. “Bet they were even expected to pay their rent until the very end too.” Then kicked to the curb like an old, jizz covered couch.

“Paydirt!” Mugi’s eyes lit up and she dove into another empty apartment. Right there in the living room was one large radiator still screwed to the floor. “Perfect.” She exclaimed as she slid the last few feet to the wall on her knees and dropped her duffle from her shoulder beside her. The rusty multi-tool she pulled out earlier was snapped from its loop and put to quick work unfastening one of many screws.

“Cor.” She answered with a strained huff as she adjusted herself to get at the second screw. “These 30 year old radiators are full of copper and aluminum, unlike the newer steel ones.” She decided to show him what kind of education the citizens of Onyx paid for in her upbringing. “Scrap value for copper and aluminum is pretty high right now.” She had to guess they were struggling to mine it thanks to the counterproductive efforts of human flesh hungry hollows.

She just hoped whoever cleaned out the lower levels didn’t plan on returning any time soon, or they might have a problem on their hands. “So you grew up in the backwaters?” She decided to make idle conversation as she went about her business of dismantling the radiator enough to shove it into her duffle bag. It…was a big duffle bag. “How the hell did that work?” The look she passed him was skeptical at best, downright disbelieving at worst.

“Was it a Parish’a Viking marauders?” She mocked playfully, not shy at all about how she was visibly sizing him up. “Don’t look like no Viking to me.” Too lean. A lopsided grin tugged at her features a moment later. “Pretty eyes, though.” Handsome face too. Maybe the Hollow just thought he was too pretty to kill.

She could get behind that.

[VVitch]

Character Name: Maria Rex-Astra
Date | Time: 11.11 | Late Evening
Location: Kook Manor, Southern Quarter, Onyx
Wearing: Combat Gear (Padded vest, combats, boots)
Tagging | Mentioning: Meena, Hulta, Closed
At least she hadn't imagined it. Maria thought that, then second guessed herself. If it was real, that meant something had to have made that noise and that something may well be dangerous. Was it better to be mad or in danger? Neither sounded good to her. At least Meena had a way of talking about it that made her smile a little. Chompy teeth. She hoped they weren't. "That better not have been teeth," Maria commented, preferring the idea of just about anything else.

"Definitey," Maria agreed, sensing the sound had echoed out from deeper within the mansion. Following on after Hulta, she nodded as she spoke, "Maybe, these old places often have cellars." The idea of some robotic nightmare housed in a basement was enough to make her glad for the weight of her weapons at her back. From hurrying to follow to sneaking, Maria slowed her pace and moved to a half-crouch. There wasn't much cover but she settled nearby to Hulta, listening.

As they waited at the door it took a few moments before it happened. Thud. Thud. Thud. Three noises, far quieter than the grating machinery earlier, coming from the room ahead. Footsteps. Or they could have been, at least. They were heavy enough to make the floor move, though only a little, and seemed to be coming from the room up ahead. Maria blinked, then furrowed her brow and narrowed her eyes. Just three didn't seem enough. And there was no way in or out of that room save for the door they were all besides. She'd have noticed, have heard, if someone entered it. The idea flitted through her mind that someone could have been squatting in the mansion but the dust didn't look disturbed enough for that.

While Maria thought she didn't notice the strange blue-green glow in the corridor at first. It was almost natural, a little akin to moonlight, but as it got brighter she became more and more aware of it. Shining out from one of the ajar upstairs doors at the top of the landing, ethereal and beautiful but almost certainly unnatural. Between the footsteps, the sound earlier and now this she reached back, setting her hand on the hilt of her weapon. "Door or stairs?" She whispered to the others, as if that might hide them from whatever presence was responsible for all of this. Maria's heart was beating faster and she could see why any civilian would have already fled from this strangeness. They were left with a choice, the source of the light or the footsteps, and Maria didn't much mind which they tackled first.

[Crash]

 

Character Name: Meena Tor
Date | Time: 11.11 | Late Evening
Location: Kook Manor, Southern Quarter, Onyx
Wearing: Sheer blouse with black bra and black jeans, puffy orange vest and black snow boots.
Tagging | Mentioning: Maria, Hulta, Closed
Meena slowly lowered her phone; the pic had been a total keeper with a grinning Hulta and little motes of dust fluttering about them.  She was definitely putting them up on her vlog such as it was these days.  Meena had been so busy with gRAVity that her "Follow me while I become a Champion" channel had languished.  Some local trolls suggested she was a Red Fang plant and should "Go back to Hoenan."  Someone even had the audacity to call her fat!  The Jerkface.  Maybe she should interview some of her new friends!  Now that was a great ide…" squeeky…squeeky…SCREEEEECH," came another metallic torture noise that pulled Meena immediately back into that childhood ghost story fear, her body shivering against Hulta, who she had hugged even tighter with the sound.
 
"Oh. Heh. Sorry," Meena apologized and let her new swagger friend go.  She nodded in complete agreement with Maria.  Chompy teeth would be real bad, and it was sound reasoning to think a house like this had a cellar, not that Meena was too keen at the moment to go find it. She was about to suggest heading upstairs first with the idea of just "making sure." Her finger was rising in that direction when the first "footsteps" thunked.

Her finger slowly lowered with each additional thud, and her lips twisted to the side in uncertainty. The slowly glowing glow from that direction was putting a damper on the whole, let's go upstairs so we can avoid the chompy teeth idea. Instinctually, Meena began to reach over her shoulder to unsling Heart of the Mountain. Forgetting that she had thought this not-a-date was, in fact, a date, she left her massive hammer back at the campus. 

"Spooky stompy ghost light or Mr. McChompy Teeth. I think my vote is Spooky Stompy Ghost Light.  It might just be someone squatting, but that noise from the cellar seems like it could be dangerous.  Best clear anyone living out first," Meena reasoned quietly.  "Because that is totally not a ghost that sneaks into your camp at night when you haven't done your chores and steals your face.  Totally not that," Meena said with a nod that did not at all look confident that it wasn't actually a face-stealing ghost, and she was a girl who hadn't exactly done all her dorm chores before going out for the night. 

Nope.  Not at all.

[TheFluffyOne]

Character Name: Hulta Elderfond
Date | Time: 11.11 | Late Evening
Location: Kook Manor, Southern Quarter, Onyx
Wearing: Dark combat trousers, cream shirt, dark green leather holster and boots.
Tagging | Mentioning: Maria, Meena, Closed |
A cellar! Why hadn’t she thought of that? Surely if you were hiding some big gnashing teeth creature then you would put it in the cellar. In the earth, hidden from light and nosy people. Hulta placed her staff lightly on the door and glanced towards Maria who had snuck beside her. Before she could open her mouth to ask what the plan was, three loud noises broke through the pause. They could be footsteps right. They could be something big and with gnashing teeth coming their way. As Maria placed her hand lightly on her weapon, Hulta copied and slowly removed the second half of the staff from its resting place on her back.

Upstairs. Glowy blue lights. Downstairs. Chomping gnashing teeth sounds. Those were the options laid out by Meena. Hulta’s fear and worry was momentarily paused by the words that drifted from Meena’s lips. “Steals your face?” Her head twitched to one side like the curious pup that she was. Hulta let her gaze trickle over the two then back to the light that was seeping down the staircase. “Well…I’ll slice em up if they try to steal my face.” She declared with a tiny trickle of confidence and then pointed to the light using one of her staff ends. “Up to the ghost light.” Before any could attempt to stop her, she was on the stairs. First step was fine, only small puffs of dust clouds rather than creaking noises. Flicking bright eyes from step to step, she noted where the threadbare sections on the carpet lingered. Hulta twisted her head towards the others and pointed at the sections to step on. Lightly walking up the zig zag pattern on the staircase, Hulta managed to get up the stairs with nary a squeak!

Holding her staff ends high, she gave them a wide grin in triumph. The corridor after the glowing door was dark but no shapes loomed in the shadows. The glowing door was bathed in the strange blue colour that crept out from the four cracks in the door. Hulta paused and glanced back at the other two women before flipping one of the staff ends. Channelling her shimmer, the staff end landed back in her hand and hummed. If they hadn’t witnessed her kick start the hum, they might have believed it came from a woman further down the corridor. Using the non-humming staff to slowly push the glowing door open, Hulta braced herself. Her knuckles turning white around both staff ends.

Nothing. Well, not really nothing. But there was no looming spirit wearing an old-fashioned night cap. Only a broken rotting section of the wooden planks covering the window had now fallen or disintegrated. Hulta frowned…or was it a pout? Sliding into the room, she glanced around looking for something. Anything to explain. Light was flooding in through the coloured glass of the window and the room was bathed in that cool light. Two of the corners of the room were cut into, with mirrors set to reflect the light below. The furniture in the room was minimal, a desk and some upturned empty wooden crates. No magical light that danced away from them when they entered. Nada. Just the moon hitting the window pane and connecting with the mirrors in the corner, directly pinging that fragmented moonlight to some unknown place downstairs.“I wanted to see a ghost…not a moon fragment.”

[Intimate Ink]

Character Name: Vesper Cabello
Date | Time: November 10th, ~2015
Location: Onyx - Southern Quarter, Abandoned Tenements 
Wearing: Orange overcoat, black turtleneck, black drawstring pants, black boots, backpack
Tagging: Mugi | Mentioning: Haim (unnamed), Kato


Vesper found himself torn between investigating each nook and cranny for trinkets of less discreet value and following Mugi’s more practical sense of scavenging. He looked around as she darted off, reasoning that if an apartment was scrapped in one way than it was likely already scrapped in another… To the top floor it was.

He didn’t quite have the time to even begin his search when Mugi shouted excitedly and began tearing away at the base of the radiator with her tools. “Here, let me help with the other side, then…” While he hadn’t exactly come with Mugi’s veritable swiss-army level of preparation, he did have the sense to bring a few basics that he expected may come up when in abandoned buildings.

Provided she let him, Vesper pulled a screwdriver from his black backpack, and began to assist with loosening the screws. Fortunately, the task gave him something to think about rather than the strange level of vulnerability he felt having his life at Gorren’s Point be so scrutinized by the Silenus of such different roots.

”Uhm… It works a lot like an Academy in some ways.” In some ways….

”No surprise there, it’s practically a military outpost,” Vesper conceded under his breath. ”Few people would choose to be there without either roots, marriage, or orders…” In fact, Vesper had to take quite a long moment to think of the last person he knew who didn’t fall into one of those three categories who stayed there for more than a month.

”Unlike the Academy of course, you’re far from dealing with the elite of anything, though…” Well, there was Kato… and him? Vesper felt his hand unsteady for a moment, swallowing down a sudden sense of discomfort. ”And there’s not… much movement. Everyone’s expected to pitch in, in some way… It’s uhm…”

Vesper freed the screw, moving to another, at the same time finding his thoughts a bit uncomfortably mirrored in recent ones regarding team strife. ”It’s like… every mouth to feed and head to protect is a burden. So, you grow up being told that, and that what protection and easy days you have are on the backs of another… Whether it’s patrols, protecting caravans, foraging for food, or fighting… so many Hollow.”

“So… I don’t know. It’s just a line… you grow up and someone is taking care of you during that time, they get too old and you replace them, you have children because you know that you too are going to get old one day, and there’s no one lined up just waiting to come… So your kids are not just the future in an abstract sense, but your future in terms of whose taking care of duties you no longer can…”

So you are expected to stay and die there. Unless you are Kato… Or, unless you stab everyone who put years caring for you in the back… Like me.

Vesper dropped the screwdriver with a clatter and abruptly stood up, “Looks like you’ve got the rest easy enough…” Wiping his hands on his clothes, Vesper began to tug on a loose floorboard; he didn’t think anything was under there, but it was something to do that wasn’t dwell on what should have been a simple question: How the hell did Gorren’s Point work?

”I don’t know, there’s talk of maybe going out there and maybe helping things with technology. Maybe it will break the cycle a bit…” There was talk. It came from a tornado of mixed morals that Vesper wasn’t sure would be breathing next week, let alone still would ever be able to help anyone, let alone a city he’d never been to. Vesper decided not to share that part, though, and tugged further on the floorboard.

[Amarlo]

Character Name: Mugi Stone
Date | Time: November 10th
Location: Onyx - Southern Quarter, Abandoned Tenements
Wearing: Black leggings, no longer white high tops, black turtleneck, black overcoat, insulated (work)gloves, Suga'
Tagging: Vesper @Intimate Ink | Mentioning: N/A
Mugi was actually pleasantly surprised when the man slid in to help without being prompted, not that she ever would. She just hoped he didn’t expect to get a cut… “Yeh, sure.” The crow chimed as she watched him pull out his handy dandy screwdriver. Yet another pleasant surprise. This man came prepared too! A useful folk to keep around, she could see. Such a coincidence considering the conversation they were holding in the meanwhile.

Mugi had no idea she was making him uncomfortable. She wasn’t always the most perceptive. Not that she was without empathy… half the time. It was just still a learning experience. However, as Vesper opened up about the reality of his youth, it wasn’t very hard to place herself in his shoes. As a matter of fact, she probably related perhaps too well.

“Sounds a lot like growing up in the system, just extra tedious.” She admitted, twisting another screw free. “Except for the part about Hollows.” She added as she reached to disconnect the control valve from the radiator tail. “Not that Onyx doesn’t get attacked by them all the time...”  Her head tilted one way, then seesawed to the opposite side in thought. “The wall gets breached, people die, buildin's are damaged – but life goes on. People are replaceable. Walls are replaceable. Buildin's repaired.” Mugi had to sigh at how disimpassioned she sounded.

“So basically what I’m hearin' is,” The multi-tool was pointed toward the tinkering man, a big ol’ lopsided smirk tugging across her dark features. “Shit sucks no matter where ya go.” That had Mugi chuckling. There was a strange sort of fucked up comfort in knowing that. Which also had a  new sense of solidarity fall over her when she thought of Vesper. They were both victims of a busted system – and the Hollows weren’t the only infection.

“Guess ya just gotta change your brain then.” She hummed, tapped that tool against the side of her head before she went to disconnect the outlet pipe. “And that often takes moving to a new vantage.” The girl grunted as she struggled to twist and pull the damn rusted thing loose. One, two, three and a half pulls later and it finally popped free, sending her flopping back onto her cushy as with a triumphant grin. “Either way, sounds like ya made the right choice in leavin'.”

“Use the screwdriver to pry it up, dork.” She snorted a moment later, finally noticing what he was up to. He really musta been lost in his thoughts.

[VVitch]

Character Name: Maria Rex-Astra
Date | Time: 11.11 | Late Evening
Location: Kook Manor, Southern Quarter, Onyx
Wearing: Combat Gear (Padded vest, combats, boots)
Tagging | Mentioning: Meena, Hulta, Closed
As a face-stealing ghost was mentioned Maria instinctively gently touched her delicate features, wondering if there could be such a thing out there. Perhaps some kind of hollow? It didn't seem likely a hollow would hide in a place like this but perhaps one like that existed out in the world. Hopefully she would never have to find out. All in all the confused, winding path her mind took left her quiet as a decision was made.

Quick to follow on, she nodded and backed up Hulta. Meena was right, after all. The noises sounded a lot more dangerous. She might not believe in ghosts but Maria certainly believed in malfunctioning last-century boiler explosions. What a way to lose a place in hammer, incapacitated by plumbing. The thought almost made her giggle before she focused up, hands ready to swiftly draw her sabres if there was anything dangerous through the door ahead.

Instead, she was greeted by an eerie yet pretty view. Taking a few steps inside, she examined the mirrors with a frown and turned to Hulta, "This is something, though. Nobody sets up mirrors like that for no reason. Whatever it is, it's working, too. Look at the beam." She gestured at the way it was fed through the room with well engineered precision. Perhaps not all of her mothers instincts were lost on her. "I bet it leads to whatever we heard down in the basement," Maria added as she walked to where it vanished down and shook her head, "No way we're getting down through that little gap."

Finally Maria placed her hands on her hips and settled back. "I bet the reflections explain the lights. Now we just need to find out what was making all that noise. And try to find that treasure, too. If it hasn't been found yet I bet it's down there and the sounds spooked people away," She suggested, hoping it made sense to the other two. Much as she feared being the first Hammer Squire to be wounded in such an absurd manner her curiosity was firmly getting the best of her.

[Crash]

Character Name: Meena Tor
Date | Time: 11.11 | Late Evening
Location: Kook Manor, Southern Quarter, Onyx
Wearing: Sheer blouse with black bra and black jeans, puffy orange vest and black snow boots.
Tagging | Mentioning: Maria, Hulta, Closed
"Mhmm," Meena nodded at Hulta.  "Suck it right off you," Meena made a decidedly indelicate slurping noise that even made her shudder.  "My people have a lot of stories; the Tors is a dangerous place.  Now, I'm not saying there is a face-stealing ghost, but I'm not not saying there is a face-stealing ghost, either." Meena admitted.  With little in the way of durable technology, her people reverted to the age-old art of storytelling as a preferred method of entertainment, and the Clans had many great storytellers because of it. They could spin a yarn to make you laugh, cry, or chill your bones. The best could do it all at once.  Still, the old stories often held grains of truth buried in all that creative license, and every young Torian learned the benefits of heeding their underlying morals and warnings. 

Meena looked a little doubtful at the whole "slice 'em up" comment and opened her mouth to say something, but Hulta was already bolting up the stairs. Meena gave Maria a shrug and followed her swagger compatriots up the stairs, keeping a wary eye behind them…you know…just in case.

No sounds of alarm or screams of terror greeted her as she crested the top of the stairs and followed Hulta and Maria into the glowing light of the room. Unlike the disappointment in Hulta's voice, Meena gave an audible sigh of relief and paused to look at the brightly glowing images of moon fragments reflected in the mirror, then up through the broken glass of the roof. 

"Pretty," Meena offered with a smile.  The fragments of the moon and the glittering stars were some of her favorite things to look at.  She could see more of them in the dark of the Torian sky than here in the city, but she enjoyed them nonetheless.

Admittedly, she was only half-listening to the discussion of what the mirrors meant and where they might lead, lost as she was in her remembrances, but came around as they discussed the hole in the floor.  She was glad the idea of crawling down was disregarded quickly because there was no way her hips wouldn't have gotten stuck with her butt in the air trying to get through it.

"Down to the chompy teeth, we go," Meena said, resigning herself to her fate.

It didn't take them long to find a doorway in the kitchen that led them down into the darkness. All they had to do was follow the grindy metal screechy noises.  Unlike the trip upstairs, Meena went first this time, her sensitive sniffer still stymied by dust and mold, but she was used to running point for her team and easily fell into the role. As scared as she was. And she was. More than she would like to admit.  Stupid stories.  She wasn't going to let her new friends get eaten first.  That was her job.

What Meena assumed was a stairway to a cellar descended further than she anticipated, and even her somewhat stuffy nose soon picked up a familiar smell mingled with musty mold and the tingling of ozone.  Meena looked back at her companions, somewhat confused.

"Arcanite?" She asked, wondering if they had picked up on it, too.  As they approached the bottom of the dark stairs, Meena could make out the same pale blue glow around what had to be a door. The smell of ozone and old arcanite filled the air the closer they got to what would be a heaving oaken door, swollen with the dampness that permeated the house and stuck shut. 

"Take a couple steps back," Meena suggested.  She didn't have Heart of the Mountain with her, but she did have a body made for wrenching things. With a monstrous kick, she smashed the door from its frame and off one hinge, her momentum causing her to stumble into the room, blinded by a sudden flare of light from inside.  Meena held up a hand to shield herself. There was the sound of a whip cracking and a thunderous boom, and Meena was lifted off her feet and tossed out of sight of the doorway by what looked to those behind her as a bolt of lightning.

[TheFluffyOne]

Character Name: Hulta Elderfond
Date | Time: 11.11 | Late Evening
Location: Kook Manor, Southern Quarter, Onyx
Wearing: Dark combat trousers, cream shirt, dark green leather holster and boots.
Tagging | Mentioning: Maria, Meena, Closed |
The light turned her hair the strangest of purples. Padding through the room with her staffs still held out before her, there was nothing. Their footprints were the first to disturb the thin layer of dust over the room. Not even Jasper had been in this room. Crestfallen, she turned her attention to Maria and Meena with a pitiful sad smile. She wanted to scuff her feet against the floorboards as she swayed her way back to them. ‘Look at the beam’ Hulta followed the thin fingers of Maria as she pointed to the corners where light drifted downstairs. Probably filling another room with light, Hulta thought as she thought more on the colourful light than its end destination.

Hands on her hips, Maria looked every bit like the leader Hulta knew her to be. They could find the treasure. They could be the ones not scared away by spooky sounds. Hulta attempted to copy the Silenus and placed her hands on her hips but with each staff jutting out from her hands. Menna led them back down the stairs and Hulta followed, hoping from step to step like some form of odd mountain goat. Passing by room after room, Hulta blindly stuck her head past every open door and glanced around the room. Nada. Nothing. Nopers. Broken furniture and boarded over windows, no more strange light and no more mirrors.

Sliding into the darkness of the staircase down into the earth, Hulta copied every one of Meena’s foot placements. Only when the woman stopped to sniff the air did Hulta nearly crash into her from behind. Narrowly stopping herself from falling forward, she paused at Meena’s question. Her nose wrinkled at the musty air but there was something else dancing in between the mould and dust. It felt like fading arcanite, like at one point the place was buzzing with it. The scent got stronger with every step and when Meena told them to take a couple of steps back, Hulta happily stood with her back against the wall.

Having witnessed Meena’s strength barely the day before, Hulta expected the door to either slam open or crumble under Meena’s foot. Hulta let out a soft woop of approval as the door crashed off one hinge. Light flooded the dark corridor and then Meena was gone. Hulta scrambled forward, her head pushed into the room. “HEY” She shouted as light seemed to slice around them. Stumbling into the dust filled room, Hulta flicked her right hand and sent a hum down her staff end. Air couldn’t really do anything against bolts of lightning. Maybe the treasure wasn’t a physical thing but a person. Maybe Phillip was a Champion who used whips of lighting to fend people off.

Another crack of light and Hulta felt something slice past her right side. The hair on her arms stood up and she felt like she had been lightly shocked. Even as the dust faded, all she could make out was metal work, a wheel here and some glass pipes there.

Hulta moved until her hand hit a cold brick wall. Another teeth chattering noise flooded through the room as something heavy moved. The ground seemed to shake lightly as something slotted into place. “Meena!” Finally, the Silenus was visibly shaking her head from the impact. Hulta stashed her non humming staff and wrapped her hand around Meena’s arm, trying to tug her up to standing. “What was that!?” Hulta felt her voice crack at the end of the sentence and turned her attention back to the thrumming machine that seemed to crackle with power.

[VVitch]

Character Name: Maria Rex-Astra
Date | Time: 11.11 | Late Evening
Location: Kook Manor, Southern Quarter, Onyx
Wearing: Combat Gear (Padded vest, combats, boots)
Tagging | Mentioning: Meena, Hulta, Closed
Somehow, Meena's trepidation put Maria at ease. It was twofold, really. Firstly that she wasn't the only one feeling a little anxiety. Second was repeating the phrase 'chompy teeth'. It took the sting out of the imagined monster that might find them just a few moments later. Even a hollow was less scary if you described its wild gnashing as having chompy teeth. Still, she remained focused as she followed along with the others. Often she put herself up front but it made no sense with Meena present.

All too happy to stand back and let Meena use her strength, Maria watched as the other girl kicked her way through the door. She'd been about to praise the performance when Meena was struck from her feet and alongside Hulta a look of shock came over Maria's features. "Meena!" She called out instinctively before snapping her head to watch the other woman hurtle backwards. Once it was clear she wasn't too injured she turned her attention to the cause of the accident, if it could be called one.

It was a tense moment but Maria saw the broken machine ahead, sparking with power, and realised it was best to let Hulta check over Meena. Unfortunately she lacked engineering prowess and barely knew what she was looking at even as it crackled with arcanite energy. Drawing both of her sabres, Maria saw a shard of metal that seemed to have broken, jutting from the machine and sending out bolts of lightning. Perhaps she could at least cut that off and it might keep the energy more contained?

Hopeful but far from certain, Maria took a few paces as she lined up and boldly passed the doorframe, fearing she might meet the same fate as Meena just had. As it was, she barely had time to hurl one of her blades, smart enough to not keep it in her hand as she brought metal against electrified metal, at the target. Maria had barely thrown her weapon when another bolt arced for her, forcing her to dive to the ground out the way and hit the dusty floor hard. From her new position, head covered, she couldn't see how her plan had worked but she did see something else up ahead.

In the room with the machine she could barely properly examine due to the chaos, she saw a lever and her eyes narrowed. "There's a big lever! I think it turns it off," Maria called out to the others, only really able to hope that they would hear her. While she did her best to move forward she still stayed low. Trees were struck by lightning because they were so tall. Perhaps if she stayed low to the ground she'd reduce to chance of drawing another strike at her. It seemed like she'd at least slowed the bolts as she thought she hadn't heard one in a short while and hoped the others would have a moment to make it inside and help her move the lever.

[Crash]

Character Name: Meena Tor
Date | Time: 11.11 | Late Evening
Location: Kook Manor, Southern Quarter, Onyx
Wearing: Sheer blouse with black bra and black jeans, puffy orange vest and black snow boots.
Tagging | Mentioning: Maria, Hulta, Closed
Hulta would find Meena lying against some rubble, clearly out of it. Tendrils of silky white hair floated in a halo around her head. The tips of her horns glowed cherry red, wisps of smoke lazily drifting from each.

There was a loud ringing in Meena’s ears, and she couldn’t see very well. There was a blot of bluey-white everywhere in her sight. She looked like she was staring into the sun.  She could swear she heard people calling her name, but the ringing made it hard to tell. 

When Hulta reached for Meena’s arm, she would receive quite the jolt of electricity as if Meena had been shuffling across a thick carpet, gathering static for hours.  It wasn’t enough to cause her soul to flare, but it would come as quite a surprise.

“Huh?” Meena might have asked.  It was sort of hard to tell as she looked around and blinked to rid herself of the blinding aftermath.  When she mumbled, a flicker of electricity jumped between her horns.

“OWWWwww,” She moaned, her vision slowly returning to her, and she smiled at the pretty elven woman.  “Oh. Hi Hulta,” Meena said groggily.  Another jolt of lighting struck nearby as Hulta slowly got her standing.

“Umm, that?  No idea,” Meena answered, looking over Hulta’s shoulder at the strange machine that took up most of the room.  She had no idea what the contraption was.  Metal bands circled a sphere at the center of the room. Some of the metal bands ringed the sphere entirely, and others held other small spheres or symbols at a distance.  The old metal churned in fits and starts, each jerking motion grinding gears and causing the arcanite discharge.

One such bolt almost caught Maria just as she threw an object at the machine.  In Meena’s current state, it was hard to tell precisely what Maria had thrown, but it must have struck true.  There was a loud bang and a shower of sparks.  The sword lodged into the machine, but instead of disabling the power, it bridged the faulting wires and channeled the energy into the machine.  The metal rings and bars smoothed their shuddering grind, gaining speed with each revolution. Still, the contraption was damaged; the metal had warped and shifted under years of tortured movement. 

The lever Maria pointed towards would have been safe if the machine had remained intact, but as Meena and Hulta moved towards it, they were forced to jump back. One of the sphere-carrying bars passed close enough that they could feel the displaced air. 

By now, Meena had some sense about her again.  There were gaps in the crisscrossing movements of the machine, but they were small.  At least smaller than Meena was comfortable moving through in her discombobulated state.  She watched the machine spark and shudder, Maria’s sword wobbling with the motion.  If they waited too long, it might dislodge, which could cause another round of arcanite discharge.  Meena eyed the spinning bar that almost smashed into them.

When I say go.  Run for the lever,” Meena said as the bar swung towards them again.  “Go!” Meena said and stepped right into the bar’s path. She threw her arms outward, the bar striking her palms.  Meena’s soul flared as it slammed into her, but her hands closed around it in a vice-like grip.  The force with which it collided with her shoved her back two feet, sliding until she found purchase, the machine screaming to a halt.

“You may want to hurry,” Meena suggested as the metal groaned under her grip and the bar began to bend slowly. If it snapped, Meena would be in a world of trouble.

[TheFluffyOne]

Character Name: Hulta Elderfond
Date | Time: 11.11 | Late Evening
Location: Kook Manor, Southern Quarter, Onyx
Wearing: Dark combat trousers, cream shirt, dark green leather holster and boots.
Tagging | Mentioning: Maria, Meena, Closed |
Scrambling in and bouncing effortlessly over large chunks of rubble, Hulta made a beeline directly for Meena. Her right hand outstretched towards Meena, fingers intending to wrap around Meena’s arm to tug her up. Hulta felt the surge of electricity through her arm and let out a pained yelp. Nothing nearly as bad as what Meena had just experienced but still a surprise. Hulta violently shook her hand before dropping to her knees as the next crack of electricity shook the room. “Meena. It’s me. Hulta.” She tried to shake the large Silenus and barely moved her shoulders.

Kicking her heels in, Hulta attempted to pull the Silenus to her feet. Only to realise a fraction of a second too late that Meena was already pushing herself to standing and Hulta’s aid was doing barely anything. “It’s dangerous. We need to find somewhere to hide or something.” Hulta spun a solid 180 and landed gracefully. Maria had shouted something. A level…No a lever. She was pointed at a lever. “There!” Hulta pointed to Meena who was brushing herself free of rubble remnants.

Picking their way through the rubble should have been the only obstacle. If it hadn’t been for the massive swinging bar that crashed infront of them, close enough to send a loose curl flying up over her head. “Uh….Uh…” She could try to time it. Slide under it or bounce off it. But then there was the electricity. If one of them caught her mid jump, she could land on it and be swept away from the others. Flung against another brick wall and Hulta didn’t have the cushion that Meena had.

“What!” Hulta squealed at Meena as she didn’t really give her much chance to respond. Slotting her staff ends into their holster, she frantically looked between the lever and Meena. The word shot through her soul and Hulta thought that she might drop dead from the sight of Meena just stepped into the path of the bar. She didn’t give it another look, instead kicking herself off and speeding across the rubble.

Dodging and bouncing from piece of rubble to rubble like some strange red headed mountain goat, Hulta picked up speed. Just enough speed that when she collided with the lever, she could throw her full body weight against it. Forcing it to screech forward, but not enough. Holding on the lever, she spun and utilised her body weight to drag it further down. Her arms shot out and she tried to hug the lever to her body as she felt the lever slowly with a painfully loud creak shimmy towards its final slot.

When the lever finally slotted into place, it hit hard enough to shake Hulta’s grip. Her back hit the ground harshly but she had no time for pain. “Meena. MOVE.” She hauled herself back up to standing and started to run back towards the taller woman. How she could help her….that was to be decided in the seconds she would take to get across the room.

[Crash]

Character Name: Meena Tor
Date | Time: 11.11 | Late Evening
Location: Kook Manor, Southern Quarter, Onyx
Wearing: Sheer blouse with black bra and black jeans, puffy orange vest and black snow boots.
Tagging | Mentioning: Maria, Hulta, Closed
Perhaps Meena could have given Hulta a little more warning, but she wasn't always the think-first type.  If her Grandmothers had been here, they would have been shaking their heads in disappointment at the rashness of her decision-making. Perhaps, if she ever reached their age, she would learn the wisdom of not jumping in front of old malfunctioning arcanite machinery. Then again, maybe not.  It was working…kinda…sort of. 

The machine banged and clanked, and the bar bent a little more.  Muscles bulged under the shear material covering her arms. The clingy fabric tore under the stress, and Meena groaned. She really liked this blouse. 

Meena would have liked to have had the time to watch Hulta bound from an old crate to a fallen bookshelf to whatever piece of discarded detritus remained in the old cellar.  She had seen the wild acrobatics of the woman during their tussle with the arcanite accelerated plant in her dorm room. It was impressive and kind of enjoyable to watch, but Meena had a little more to worry about at the moment. Like possible decapitation from whatever bar remained on the machine when it broke. 

There was a screech from somewhere near the machine, another round of sparks, and Meena was pushed back a foot, but she could see a tear in the bar's bend and knew it wouldn't hold for much longer.  Meena heard Hulta yell and saw her start to run towards her.  She would have waved her off, but every ounce of her strength held the coiled tension at bay.  Just as Hulta reached her, the bar began to tear free.  Meena let go and dove with the elven squire, shielding her from the danger. The machine lurched. What remained of the metal rod raked across Meena's back, her soul taking the brunt of the damage but still grunting at the pain.

They hit the ground and slid to a stop next to one another. Maria was there immediately to check on them, a little singed but no worse for wear. Meena and Hulta were covered in dirt, and Meena's nice clothes were pretty well ruined. 

"We sure do end up lying next to each other a lot, don't we?" Meena asked, flashing a grin that quickly turned into a grimace. There would be a nice bruise along her back tomorrow.

Maria helped her into a sitting position, and she looked down at her ripped and soiled blouse. Her shoulders slumped at the sight, and she gave a huff of dissatisfaction.  This wasn't even a date, and still, her clothes were ruined.  The other squires were already up and examining the now inert machine while Meena sat in the dirt, her legs outstretched, looking a little dejected by it all.  She patted her thighs, half-heartedly clearing away the dirt and dust in little puffs, before taking out her phone.  Thankful the Academy provided impact-resistant cases.  Meena pulled up Lolo's number and sent her a quick text.

Date's a bust. 
Need a shower.
Wanna sneak into Beach's classroom and watch a movie?
Hardlight and chill? 
Am I saying that right?

Messages sent, Meena looked up at the machine, snapping a picture of the swagger cadets in front of it.  It looked interesting.  Maybe she would look it up tomorrow or track down Jasper and ask him. 

~End Scene~

[Aethyrium]

Character Name: Saint Valentine
Date | Time: November 21st | Evening (~9:52pm)
Location: Southern Quarter - Ruined Astra Industries Warehouse
Wearing: Combat suit
Tagging | Mentioning: Bri’elle | Aurora, Isabella, Alein
In typical Saint fashion, his summons had been discreet, coded, and fleeting. Yet, locating the site where it had all gone down during the prison break was not a difficult task. The fire had long since been extinguished, but the devastation it caused remained untouched. The street leading up to the warehouse where Bri’elle and Aurora had first rescued Isabella was still littered with debris. It wasn't just scattered shards of glass; large chunks of rubble from the explosion were strewn across the area. The entire vicinity was cordoned off, but it was clear that she was expected to disregard the barriers.

The initial explosion had wreaked havoc, and subsequent events had compounded the damage. Flames had ravaged multiple floors, leaving gaping craters and reducing the structure to a standing ruin. The once bustling warehouse now stood as a haunting reminder of the chaos that had transpired, its skeletal remains barely holding together. As she navigated through the wreckage, the severity of the destruction became even more apparent. Walls were scorched, and beams twisted and warped from the intense heat. Every step she took echoed with the crunch of debris beneath her feet, a stark contrast to the silence that now enveloped the scene. The air was thick with the lingering scent of smoke and burnt materials, a testament to the ferocity of the fire.

Bri’elle found Saint on the upper floor which was, as expected, completely demolished by the rocket explosion. There was almost no trace of inner divisions, the whole floor was just one floor now, except where the roof had caved in from above, creating awkward blockages and ramps up to what remained of the unstable plane. He was standing near the blown out wall that Bewrapt had jumped from in an attempt to dodge the explosion. “I wanted to be the one to tell you,” Saint said, hands in pockets, looking out at the building across the way the rocket had been fired from, “Alein escaped before being returning the Black Ward.” He turned half way to face her, eyeing her over to see her condition, “The transport she was on got hit by some of the other actors involved.” Saint wasn’t one to frown so easily, but it clearly bothered him.

Turning more fully to face her, he tilted his head, “How’re you doing Ace?”

[Lyrical]

Character Name: Bri'elle "Bri" Whitewater
Date | Time: 11.21 | Evening (~9:52pm)
Location: Southern Quarter - Ruined Astra Industries Warehouse
Wearing: full kit
Tagging | Mentioning: Saint | Aurora, Isabella, Alein
It had been a bit but the place was a scene of devastation, it even still smelled like fire and destruction. That felt a bit like failure to Bri. A clean mission would have resulted in retrieval of the Senator Isabella and no damage with Alein in captivity. It made her question if she should have stayed on assignment and not taken down the strays on their approach. She was still cut up, bruised, but generally was healing fast.

As Saint revealed the information about Alein's escape, Bri stood there unflinching with stoic resolve. Then he asked how she was doing.

Bri said, "I would be feeling better if Roar and I could go after Alein. She's a menace to the civilian population." She tried not to say it too enthusiastically or with too much bitterness but Alein had given them a whooping and she was honestly a little afraid of what the woman would do out there left to her own devices. "I feel like my tactics in our fight with Alein were lacking. That was twice now that when faced against a superior enemy that myself and our team barely snatched victory from defeat. Momotsu nearly wiped out our whole team just over a week ago. I was hurting already going into the fight with Alein but she was one person and I failed to protect my partner, Roar from her. If i had been better prepared than Roar could have taken her down quickly..." She cleared her throat. "Sorry, I deal with defeat or near defeat by picking apart my strategies."