agentlelog | event: a gentle explosion

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.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ Having spent a month in this place has gotten Haein used to quite a few things. He's been doing his best to keep a low profile, stay out of the way for the most part, and do as ordered by those in a position of authority.

It's okay. He's met a few annoying people over the course of his stay, but the meetings are generally short-lived and he normally doesn't have to deal with them again.

Parado, unfortunately, makes Haein's shit list, and he would've been happy never to see him again, but here he is now reaching over for the coffee on his side of the table.

And maybe Haein is petty enough to drag that coffee further away from Parado's reach. ]

I am.

[ He clearly isn't. ]

[ so mayyybe he should have been paying attention to who he'd been approaching. when haein gives him that icy reply, parado lets out an undisguised, irritated sigh - he's in half a mind to teleport to the other side of the table and just swipe the jar, but instead he crosses his arms and scowls.

that was still option b available, anyway. ]

What's your problem? Are you just a pain all the time?

[ Parado: Master Negotiator. ]

[ Oh gods, where to even start? The number of problems he has can't be counted, and it doesn't help that Haein knows this. ]

Yes, [ said very matter-of-factly. ] Didn't you know? My sole reason for being is to annoy you.

[ He's obviously being sarcastic, but his petty, grudge-holding ass hasn't forgotten how their first meeting went down. ]

You need a new hobby. Have you considered video games?

[ really uncaring about personal space and etiquette, especially with someone he has no respect for, he's just going to lean across the table and try to grab the jar anyway. ]

[ But what if Haein just goes on continuing to be an asshole and pushes the jar out of reach some more? ]

A waste of time.

[ then he will keep leaning. parado doesn't care about the table or whether he ends up bumping haein or not, he's got the long reach of a decently tall person and he's gonna use it.

however he does pause and affix haein with the most poisonous glare (which is actually pretty damn poisonous) he can muster at that comment. How Dare You. ]

No wonder you're no fun.

[ Okay, he might have been hoping that Parado would give up, not keep leaning until he bumps into Haein. That, and people are starting to stare.

Haein reluctantly relents as the attention of others starts to get to him. He leaves the jar alone to allow Parado that last bit of effort to grab it, instead of pushing it toward him.

But wow, what a glare. Was it something he said? ]

You didn't have to take it so personally.

[ oh nice, success. he grabs the coffee and backs up to standing height, looking down at the jar in his hands with a small, pleased smile.

when he looks back at haein, the glare has returned in full force. it's only maintained for a short moment, though, as parado sighs and rolls his eyes. suddenly, he vanishes in a flurry of pixels--

only to reappear right behind haein, sitting backward on the bench. ]

It is personal, though?

[ Alright, Haein is really starting to hate this whole vanishing and reappearing trick. He's left a bit startled when Parado disappears, and then again when his voice is heard from behind.

After letting out a long-suffering sigh, Haein turns around to better face Parado. ]

How is it personal?

[ It doesn't sound he's genuinely curious as he asks the question. It's more... mocking. ]

Well, you knooow.

[ he drawls, mimicking the mocking tone.

holding his free hand out in front of him, he lets a few blue and red pixels drift upward and vanish off of his fingertips. ]

You could probably figure it out.

[ Stares...

Staring intensifies...

There's no way, is there? The connection isn't hard to make, but at the same time the idea is just so ludicrous that Haein doesn't want to voice it. Still, it would explain quite a few things about Parado and his odd... glitches. ]

Are you saying you're a video game?

[ After all the strange things he's seen in this place, this is what he chooses to be extremely skeptical about. ]

[ parado actually lets out a short laugh, not expecting quite that answer. his grin fades as he thinks about it, though - honestly, that might actually be closer than his expected "a video game character".

he wasn't, really. there was no game where he actually existed as a piece of code. he was the prototype, implemented differently. maybe he was closer to a whole game. ]

Pretty much, yeah. [ another grin as he shakes the coffee jar. ] Or I guess... a player character. So this is quest complete.

[ Haein had already tabbed Parado as a gigantic weirdo, but now it's like that isn't enough. This is peak weirdness.

He might consider video games to be a waste of time, but he's somewhat familiar with them. The last (and kind of only) friend he'd made had been really into games, and Haein had been subjected to watching as they were played, so he has a general idea of what Parado's talking about. ]

You should shut yourself off.

[ that comment instantly makes parado's grin twist bitterly. hopping off the table, he pauses to settle the jump in his nerves that comes from the memory of being "shut off"...

and whirls back to haein, all taunts again. his smile had a definite edge to it now, though. ]

You think? Wanna try making that happen?

[ He gets the sense that something has shifted here, and that the tension isn't the same as before.

There's a bit of intrigue from his end, though he keeps his tone casual. ]

Depends. Is there an "off" button on you?

No.

[ he taps his chest with a closed fist, tilting his head. ]

"Off" is the same for me as it is for you.

[ Dang!! So it isn't that simple... ]

In that case, I'm not in the habit of committing murder.

event: a gentle explosion

strangers in a strange land.

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