event: a gentle explosion

[thestewards]

I see a world just out of reach
With shoulders of giants at my feet
There’s not a challenge I’m afraid to meet

► The OOC plotting post for this event can be found here.

► Direct all questions to the mods at this link.

STRANGERS IN A STRANGE LAND
You wake, warm and comfortable, and realize that you’re no longer where you were when you went to sleep. The dream was real. As you clamber out of bed and open your door, an impassive footman greets you and leads you to breakfast in a large hall filled with many, many people. They sit around a hodgepodge of tables in a mishmash of furniture—nothing matches anything else, and no two chairs are the same.

The woman from your dream catches your eyes. She stares at you with open shock. “Well,” she says, as a number of males turn to her with withering looks. “This wasn’t supposed to happen.” She smiles at you. “Welcome to Draega, Stranger. Please, join us.”

Join them at the table and have your breakfast, Stranger. There isn’t much to offer: porridge, water, a bit of milk, some wrinkled fruits, and bread. Coffee, thankfully, is not in short supply. Meet your fellow Strangers, both the ones choosing to live at the Queen’s Residence and those who arrived in the night with you.

As breakfast draws to a close, the Queen’s Steward, Prince Loren Sorey, explains that you may choose to find your own home or stay in the residence for as long as you please. Those who stay will receive a modest stipend but are required to participate in Allairavar’s morning trainings every day. At dawn. Before breakfast. Those who go will need to find their own homes among the ruined buildings of the city and make their own money.

The court begins filtering out of the Great Hall, dispersing to attend their many duties. Linger, Stranger, and overhear…

“What did you mean?” The man leaning over the Queen is Prince Allairavar. His membranous wings flare around him, and his expression is menacing. “This wasn’t supposed to happen?”

Queen Fayura doesn’t look at all alarmed by the massive man caging her against a wall. “It was a one-time spell,” she says. “The web was—” Her eyes go wide. “I need to go look at the web.” She ducks under Allairavar’s arm, which could put a tree trunk to shame, really, grabs Prince Verim, and drags him from the hall.

Allairavar bares his teeth at the wall and snarls. The sound rumbles through the room, and dark temper washes briefly through the residence before all the tangled webs tucked in corners absorb it, leaving the building peaceful and clean of psychic feeling once more.

A TALE OF TWO IDEALS
At exactly 5:46pm, an explosion rocks the city of Draega. Black clouds belch fire to the northwest of the city. Concurrently, in Old Town, a mob of landens armed with Breakers and Muters descends on The Last Meal. They surround an older, Blood woman.

i. Black Out
The power plant maintained by the Tinkers and the Elektrics has exploded. Across Draega, e-line appliances shut down and the city plunges into darkness—the sun set some 45 minutes ago.

Prince Loren reaches out to approximately half the Strangers, asking them to go to the power plant. He shares a mental map with them so they know how to reach the building, as well as the Craft used for air-walking. The tutorial is quick and hardly complete, but now you’ll be able to run above the city to reach your destination.

The power plant burns. Black smoke pours into the air. Master Elektric Doriah organizes the Tinkers and Elektrics who were able to escape on their own. A quick glance reveals how absolutely exhausted she is. When Strangers approach, she sneers but isn’t about to turn away good help.

“There are still people inside. The Blood who did this trapped us in shields.” She hesitates only a moment before collecting Breakers from guildmembers carrying them. “Take these. Your Jewel may not be able to break through the shields.”

Inside, well-ordered building is a mess of fire and melting steel. Airwalking protects your feet, and shields can keep out the heat, but you’ll need something more to protect your lungs. Put out fires, stop systems from overloading, save the machines from complete destruction, and rescue missing workers who are suffocating and cooking inside shields. The guildmembers trapped in the power plant will assist the Strangers who free them, helping mitigate the damage done to the plant and keep it from exploding the rest of the way.

ii. Death of a Councilwoman
Councilwoman Vera enjoys dinners at The Last Meal, and this is well known by everyone in the city. Today, public knowledge of her schedule doesn’t work so well in her favor.

As she approaches the restaurant with her family, a group of landens descends on them. Muters prevent the Blood from taking any action that isn’t purely physical, and this is enough to throw most of them off their stride; they’re used to relying on Craft to fight. The landens separate Vera from her family in a short-lived brawl. She shouts and screams—“Let me go! Don’t you know who I am? The Queen will have you executed for this! Your families will be thrown out of the city! You’re making a mis—”

A shot rings through the air.

The landens peel away from one of their own, a young man gripping a Breaker in both hands. He trembles as he stands over Councilwoman Vera, whose expression is frozen forever in shocked disbelief. Her body crumples to the ground, blood from a gunshot wound on her chest staining the white fabric of her blouse.

In the silence that follows the shot, Allairavar shoves free of the crowd. “Go home!” he snarled, Craft powering his voice.

No one moves.

Except the young landen man. He takes off at a run, and the crowd is still too horrified to do much to stop him. Allairavar wastes no time. He plunges after the young man. At the same time, he reaches out to the minds of the Strangers closest to Old Town. *The Ebon Council is, collectively, a sack of reeking shit, and Lady Vera was a bitch,* Allairavar tells the Strangers. *But if we don’t get between the Blood and the landens, we’ll have another war. We can’t afford another war. Keep them from killing each other while I deal with this idiot.*


AIR TIME
Whether you catch the news on a Far-caster in the city or you’re spinning the dial on your own device, you’ll hear…

the news
…angered local landen families by her hard-line position that Blood homes should receive priority as the city continues to recover from the fires set by the Hunter Guild last month. [The man speaks at a brisk pace, hurried and harried as though he has too much to say and not enough time to say it.]

Councilwoman Vera is known for her vocal disdain for the landen Guilds, isn’t that right, Garret? [Another man, nasally in tone. He doesn’t sound rushed so much as put upon.]

[Garret:] Correct, Wilt. She—excuse the interruption, but we are just now hearing— [The feed abruptly cuts off. Static pours from the Far-caster regardless of what local channel it is tuned to.]

Comments

for horatio

[ilves]

[Following orders? Lalli's used to that. Lalli's good at that, which is why, after receiving that handy mental transmission from Prince Loren, he attempts to zip right over to the power plant. The earlier explosion was an unpleasant surprise; he's not eager to go charging headfirst into a dangerous situation, but, well... he's a Stranger now. If he wants to see his home again, he knows that he needs to do more than simply hide away in his room.

But running through the streets proves to be rather difficult, thanks to the throngs of curious/worried/horrified people milling about; he's little more than a fourth of the way there when he realizes that he needs to try this whole air-walking thing out, even though he's, you know, rather unsure about it. Climbing trees is one thing, but being high in the air without any support is—it's something else entirely! He's not a fan!

Desperate times, however, call for desperate measures. He takes a deep breath, steadying himself as he calls upon both his strange new magic and every piece of information Prince Loren sent his way. It's not... a graceful rise into the air? There are stumbles, times when his arms pinwheel desperately as he tries not to plunge twenty feet down below, but it doesn't take him terribly long to get the gist of it. In a way, it reminds him of the way a certain someone runs about the dreamscape: taking long, loping strides while ignoring everything below. It's all about finding that rhythm.

Which, uh, the figure in front of him is clearly having a difficult time with? Lalli watches this person—fellow Stranger?—clumsily try to hop through the sky, and he's almost convinced that he should just, like, leave them to their own devices. ...Almost, and yet, as he approaches passing distance, he finds himself leaping over to run alongside the man.]

What are you doing? Take bigger steps! [Stupid. He doesn't outright say it, but it's totally implied.] And don't look down.

[midship]

[It isn't that Horatio had been wishing for a crisis. It isn't that he felt any pleasure at all from the knowledge that lives were being ripped apart with every passing moment.

But it does feel terribly good to have orders again, particularly when those orders are to run toward the mayhem.

Less good is the idea of running through the sky. There's a good long stretch where his long legs and general inattention to his own physical safety serves him well enough--but then come the real throngs, and up go the rest of the Strangers. There's nothing to do but breathe deep and struggle along after them if he wants to be of any use of all.

Although, at this rate, it's possible he'll just break his own neck before he makes it the next hundred paces.

Thank goodness for a voice snapping at him through the noise. Thank goodness that there's something else rather like an order to follow as he wobbles and dips along. Right. Deeper breath. Longer steps. More focus on the body now striding closer at hand, seeking the rhythm he hasn't been able to find in the other man's example.

Surely attempting to do is better than shouting back (and inevitably losing the bit of concentration that's giving him any lift at all).]

[ilves]

[Oh, focusing on the task at hand is much, much better than wasting time talking; it's why Lalli hums in quiet approval, keeping a critical eye on the person beside him... and, uh, picking up his pace the slightest bit when he notes the attempt to match his stride. Someone needs to learn how to swim? Might as well throw 'em in some deep water.

But after a minute or so of silence, when it finally looks like the other's pace is somewhat more even—]

...Better.

[This is high praise from Lalli, believe it or not. Treasure it, even though he soon follows it up by, like, clicking his tongue when Horatio dips downward yet again. Is he going to have to reach out and yank this man up?? Gods.]

Just stay up.

[How, though? Lalli...]

[midship]

[When he looks back on it later, Horatio will be appropriately discomfited by the moment's flickering praise. It's hardly deserved, after all; being slightly better is hardly going to be sufficient if they're going to make something like useful time toward their goal.

For now, the actual running is taking just about all his concentration.

Which is probably a good thing. This is sinking them into something closer to the heat of battle before they've even properly arrived. It's just that it's also possibly going to leave him with a few bruises before they get there, as another dip nearly sends him tumbling over an awning.

'How' feels impertinent to ask with actual words.]

--sir. [...will have to suffice.

And definitely be followed by some assistance because speaking breaks his concentration just enough that one hand flails nervously to catch at the other man's arm for a steadying heartbeat.]

[ilves]

[..."Sir?" That isn't a word that's ever been directed Lalli's way, which is why he only spares this person the briefest of glances—but hey, it's certainly a well-timed glance. There's no way to miss the hand suddenly coming his way; it's a good thing, really, because while he does noticeably flinch when contact is made, the split-second of warning prevents him pulling away entirely. Someone he doesn't know touching him? ...It's bad, yes, but it's not like he wants to see this man tumble to the cobblestones below, so—

...So. He grits his teeth, grabs hold of the man's sleeve, and almost... hops... a foot or so higher into the sky, all while trying to tug the (much larger) person up with him. He's a tiny stick, but he's giving it his all here!]

Up! [Hrnngh, how to put this when you're extraordinarily bad with words—] Step up! Think about... stairs, and focus!

[Imagine a literal stairway to heaven... anyway, Lalli's going to keep on yanking at that sleeve until Horatio is where he SHOULD be. Magic is a mental game! Get with it!]

[midship]

[Listen: no one's happy here. Everyone hates physical contact. Nothing is good or beautiful in the world.

But the brief stabilization of being allowed to catch hold helps. Ultimately being all but heaved up helps, like the first sharp wrench of being dragged back into a jollyboat after a tumble. The directive, however, helps most of all.

It's not quite an order, but it's close enough for a desperate mind.

Focusing on stairs helps. It quiets the nervous pieces of his mind inclined to reel at the ever-increasing distance between himself and the ground. It evens his gait to imagine a regularity before him and behind him.

It will fall apart when they actually see the plant, of course, but perhaps a stretch of smoothness will soothe the inevitable embarrassment of the tumbling to ensue when the end is in sight.]