Return of the Improv Thread

[Finnius]

The mountain hummed with ill-intent. It almost felt like the cliffs and sheer stone faces were scowling disapprovingly at the little blue fellow with the curved bundle on his back. As for his part, Finnius continued the journey uphill hungrily and thirstily. The sun begins to beat down, and the semi-mage lowers his head to keep the sun out of his eyes. The wind in the trees sounds like laughter.

 

***Four hours later***

 

The bundle is heavy. It is eerily warm, and occasionally wiggles as if it is alive. Ten minutes ago, Finnius could have sworn it talked. Then again, that might have just been heat stroke, hunger, and dehydration talking. Either way, the little blue man was beginning to hear voices. Never a good sign.

 

***Two more hous later***

 

Finnius collapses in a heat haze. Dreams come quickly and unbidden. Dreams of fire and doom. Blazing heat licks his face, blood trickles down his forehead. The bundle begins to writhe on his back and unwrap itself.

 

***Sometime after sunset***

 

Finnius awakens with a start, much less tired, and much more worried. The bundle on his back is open. The contents are gone. He dusts himself off and stands up, then begins walking again, in search of death walking.

[Katzaniel]

OOC: To make this interesting, I'm going to ask that Tanuchan and Tamaranis meet next. I am also throwing away the original "meet within one post of each player in the group" rule - it wasn't very good, and if I tried to enforce it, the meetings would be forced and choppy. Meanwhile Inbi will have to keep wandering around her maze (when I get time to post something more lengthy than this) which, as Tanuchan pointed out to me, could be a different magical hedge maze. If there's a reason for one to grow overnight, little reason why there couldn't be more. So I'll see how it plays out.

[Katzaniel]

It took her another few hours, but finally Inbi found herself underneath a trapdoor. Stomach grumbling, hoping this wasn't just another small triumph, the girl reached up and unhooked the latch, swinging the door down. She breathed a sigh of relief when she saw the inside of a castle.

 

Inbi looked around and failed to see anything that indicated danger. Pulling herself up into the interior, Inbi carefully replaced the trapdoor, which blended nicely into the floor. Unfortunately, the floor shimmered around that area and it was difficult to tell exactly what she was looking at: stone, wood, a fuzzy sort of woollike material... it switched back and forth as she looked at it. Further on, a few paces, the shimmering quieted and the floor faded into solid stone.

 

Magic, surely. Nothing like her own magic, nothing like anything she'd ever seen. This was magic applied in perpetuity to an object, for no apparent purpose. Certainly no one was around casting the spell, or why were staying hidden? Besides, magic to keep oneself hidden and still having strength to do fancy tricks was power that Inbi could not imagine. There was no point banking on that possibility, since if it were the case she was already too deep in that person's grasp to escape. So, she began to explore.

 

The young woman had only made it a few steps when she realized that the magic was following her. The patch on the floor followed her and even spread to the walls when she neared them. They began to shimmer back and forth between stone, smooth rock, smooth white material, brick and others. It was making her sick to watch. But she did watch, carefully, and determined that there was a spherical area around subject to the strange spell - but it was not centered on her. Removing the pack, Inbi walked a few paces, and knew that the spell was centered around the eyes or the pack itself, and not her.

 

Inbi placed the backpack directly on top of the trapdoor and left it. She hoped it would be there when she returned, because the eyes might be useful again and also because its disappearance would mean someone else was around. On the other hand, nothing in it was hers, whomever had cast the spell might want them back, and it would be useful to know if she was not alone. It also occurred to her that the eyes and the magic around them could be easily used to track her down if she continued to carry them with her.

 

After a careful and exhaustive search of the castle, Inbi was feeling pretty confident that no one was around. Surely there was little reason for anyone to still be in hiding, even if they could find someplace that she had not searched. She had checked on the room with the trapdoor several times and the backpack was never disturbed. Not knowing what else to do, Inbi went to the kitchens. In the course of her search she had noted that the food was all fresh, but even as hungry as she was she could not eat without looking around first. Having had no encounters with the castle owner, Inbi went back to the food. Even if it were poisoned it was better to eat than die of starvation.

 

Something inside of her kept expecting something to happen, and kept being disappointed. This didn't make any sense. A castle and maze of hedges appears where nothing had been, and she had happened to be just outside of it? She had traversed the maze and eaten the food in the castle, and still no one appeared to take her prisoner, claim back the eyes, make a request or demand her to leave.

 

Disappointed and with the aim of further exploration, Inbi decides to put the backpack on again. It takes a little to get used to the magic acting on things all around her, but she does, and she travels a few rooms down. And directly in front of her, where she was certain had been moments before a wall, the shimmering magic reveals a passageway.

[dragonqueen]

Loni wakes up tossing and turning from a garish dream of a wrecked boat and a swimming horse when said horse pokes its nose in. For a moment she stares at, bemused. Why is a horse talking to her? Why is the horse talking at all? Why is she in a carriage? These thoughts dash through her head in a splitsecond before her mind catches up and puts everything together.

 

Opening her mouth to answer the horse, Loni stalls for a minute, not completely woken up and words having escaped her. Her mind has barely caught up from last time. She frowns, attempting to think and finding her mind blank.

"Um...I'll stay here, I guess."

 

The horse rolls its eyes, and sighs. "Why couldn't I have picked one that at least has a working brain?" it moans. "I need the harness before we can go anywhere."

 

Loni flushes and gets out of the carriage, accumalating several bruises as she does. When she lifts the harness, it immediatly falls from her grasp. Her still-pink face blushes again. Stooping, she hauls the harness out of the dust, getting a firmer grip this time. Almost tripping over the horse's leg, Loni drops the harness over the horse.

 

"Don't drop it so hard, next time. Horses get bruises too, you know," the horse admonishes, wincing.

 

"Sorry," Loni mumbles. Awkardly she climbs back into the carriage. She's barely sat down when it lurches onto the road, and horse and human are off again.

 

Loni idley watches the scenery move past, not finding the repetitive trees and assorted undergrowth of any particular interest, but not having anything more entertaining to do. As she gazes, her mind wanders, and finally it occurs to her to wonder what the horse was doing with a carriage but no passenger or driver and why it's carrying her. Leaning out of the carriage, Loni asks the horse. "Umm...horse?"

 

The horse hears the tenative request and stops moving. Casting a pleading glance towards the heavens, it says, "What?"

 

"Why were you on the beach all by yourself?"

 

"By all by myself I assume you mean with out a human?" the horse clarifies.

 

"Erm, yes."

 

"My former passenger and I got 'seperated', and a horse cannot just wander around for indefinite periods of time. You looked like a good companion, so here we are. Though I'm beginning to wonder if that was a wise choice."

 

"Oh. Sorry." Loni's face is slightly pink, and she withdraws her head back into the carriage.

 

"Is that all?" the horse calls back before setting off again.

 

"Um..." Loni thinks desperately for a moment, not wanting to have to ask again later. "Which direction are we going?"

 

"West. That's inland." The horse knows much more about the mainland than the fisher girl.

 

"Oh. That's all." Loni does not know what good this piece of information will do her, as she has never been west before, but it seems good to know what direction one is traveling in.

 

Loni slouches in the carriage, half asleep. The horse is back on the dusty brown road again, moving west.

[Canid]

Carl the horse was mainly playing with his new master now.

He had decided when he checked on her state of wakefullness that having a confused master like her was probably easier on the whole than one who knew what they were doing.

Cold and lonely miles with no conversation did not suit Carl. There were places he did not like that he was made to go, and places he liked that he was made to leave.

This way was definately better.

He had chosen west because once, when under the care of the old man, they had passed through a town in that direction called Darnsdale.

The old man had wanted to buy some fine chickens with which to make chocolate pudding and the horse had met several very nice mares who thought in turn that he was very nice. He should like to meet them again.

He set a fairly quick pace, not wanting the wolf to catch up with him.

He craned his head back suddenly.

"Are you hungry?" he asked.

Loni paused. "Very." she said cautiously.

"Oh." said Carl.

They clopped forward for a little while longer. Carl waited.

Loni poked her head slowly out of the carriage. "Um, horse...?"

"Carl, if you please." replied Carl.

"Why did you ask?" she said timidly.

"There's food in a compartment under the driver's seat. Chocolate pudding among other things...... like oats." he added.

 

Fixing the oat bag took much longer than anticipated.

Loni kept spilling oats. Carl yelled at her when she did this and Loni spilt more oats.

It was wholely aggrivating.

 

"I'm not moving until I'm finished!" said Carl angrily to his red master when the bag was finally attached properly.

A terrible smell disturbed his oats, but angry as he was, he munched through it.

Carl ate his words.

The wolf emerged suddenly from the horses' blind spot. He had only time to rear before it jumped into the carriage.

There ensued a human shriek, and a canidae woofle of surprise.

Carl lunged instinctively forward and a bowl of chocolate pudding went flying from the back of the wagon.

Edited April 8, 2004 by Canid

[Katzaniel]

The passage shimmers like everything else in her immediate area. Inbi backs up so that the sphere around the backpack doesn't touch the wall, and the corridor disappears. The girl takes off the pack again, approaches and finds nothing, and comes forward again with one of the eyes in her hand. The passage shimmers into view.

 

There was no question that the eyes were the source of a strange magic. If she really wanted to solve this problem, Inbi knew she would have to accept this and just keep on going. The danger component kept growing in her mind, but to live was to risk dying. To avoid further risks was to avoid living life. If she turned back now she would never be able to forgive herself, but if she died solving a puzzle she would probably die happy. Besides, she was not totally without defense.

 

Besides being beyond good with a pair of daggers, Inbi Infusco had a magical ability. She didn't like to rely on it, but she was also quite practised in that aspect of her skills. Remembering the disappearance of the daggers, Inbi had a sudden fear that her magic might also be suppressed, and right then and there she decided she had to make sure she hadn't lost that defense as well, even if it meant drawing attention to the magic being used. She set the eye down at the side of the corridor and cleared her mind.

 

Cupping her hands together, a little flame rose inside of them and warmed her worries. Slowly pulling her hands apart, the fire followed and soon became an arc connecting her hands. She clapped them together and it disappeared - no need to test further by throwing the flame at anything. But, while she was at it she may as well test her second magic. Taking her right hand and making a motion as if to toss something in the air, a jet of ice rose from her open palm. She grasped it with her hand and swung it, making it grow a little more and shaping itself into a blade. Of course this was less effective than a real sword but Inbi could make the ice take almost any form she pleased.. Relieved, she ran her left hand along the length of the ice and flames tickled its surface, turning the ice to water which she leaned down to carefully heat to vapour before she stopped.

 

Grabbing the pack again but leaving the eye where it was, Inbi walked down the passage. It travelled with her, which was a little disconcerting, but she was more concerned with watching for any presence besides her own than she was with dropping eyes to keep the passage around. She did, upon reaching the other end into a room which seemed to exist at a more permanent level, drop another eye at the opening so that it wouldn't disappear again.

 

Inbi watched at every moment for anyone to appear, but the young woman was nevertheless surprised when she almost walked into another person, someone who appeared shimmering before her just as the passage had. Not even noticing what the person had looked like, Inbi stumbled back until the figure was gone. She regretted this moments later, realizing that they could now travel anywhere without her seeing. Reaching quickly around to the pack strapped behind her, she fumbled to open it and grabbed a handful of the little eyes. She threw them forward, and they went to all corners of the room - except the ones that hit the person standing in front of her, dropped down their front, and lay at their feet, making the person fully visible once more.

Edited April 10, 2004 by Katzaniel

[Katzaniel]

OOC: Tamaranis and Tanuchan are both busy right now, and that's fine, I'm in no rush. But I don't want the rest of you to get bored, so while they're working on meeting, why don't Finnius and ntraveler also meet? Vlad has also expressed interest in this (yay, always more people welcome) so I'll leave it at that for now. Inbi can keep on on her own for a while longer. Once we get four groups going it will be easier to work in any new players that still want to join.

[Vlad]

Talked to Katz

Took the Glowing Rubber Ball in the Dark Cave

 

Deep inside each and every one of us lies a secret. This secret is housed in the deepest and darkest recesses of everyone's soul. These are the secret that nobody wants anybody else to know. Like the time you wet the bed in third grade. They are shunted away from your consiousness, hopefully forever. Everybody has a secret, no matter how insignificant or trivial it may seem. Even you. Especially you.

 

But your secret can't possibly be as secretive as Floyd's is. Floyd is like most other boys that have been lost in a cave for two months without any food, drink, or Game Boy batteries. Poor little Floyd hasn't seen natural sunlight at all during his stay in the cave, and has been exploring the area solely off of the brightness a burning shoelace can create. Floyds, being a scout, was always prepared with extra shoelaces for an emergency, even if the other kids would make fun of him.

 

Unfortunately, Floyd's shoelaces were running out, and he still had no clue where he was. The small child continued wandering with endless optimism, but with a spark and a sputter, the shoelace went out. It was only in this pitch blackness that a faint glow could be seen comming from inside of Floyd. It wasn't very clear what this glow was, but it slowly increased in luminoscity. Except in very serious situations, Floyd made sure that nobody knew what was inside of him. Suddenly, Floyd popped open his chest and pulled out a small glowing ball.

 

Using the ball as a guide, Floyd continued wandering around the cave, searching for an exit. After some time had passed, Floyd tripped with a heavy clunking sound, accidentaly dropping the ball. As it rolled down the path, and Floyd vainly tried to catch up to it, darkness enveloped him once more.

[dragonqueen]

Leaning over to look under the seat, Loni tumbles foward when the carriage jolts to a stop. Regaining her balance, Loni finds the food without a great deal of difficulty. Feeding Carl is another matter. Loni's inexpierience slows her down again, and by the time the nosebag is attached, a good deal of oats are littering the ground. Blushing furiously at her ineptness, Loni retreats into the carriage with a basin of chocolate pudding. Rather than trying to balance herself and the bowl on the seat, Loni plants herself on the floor of the carriage and hunches over the bowl.

 

Just as everything is going smoothly, the carriage wobbles greatly. Loni has no time to react before a wolf leaps into the carriage; this upsets the balance of the carriage even more. Releasing the pudding, Loni slides and scrambles under the seat in the farthest cornor of the carriage. Seeing the wolf is too much on top of all of the different events of the past day or so. Pulling her knees up to her chest and wrapping her arms around them, Loni sobs "Don't eat me! Please don't eat me!"

 

The wolf is surprised when she finds the human in the carriage. Thrown off by this unanticipated event, she backs out of the carriage. When the human begins to beg, she backs away even farther. Unsure what happens now, she makes an attempt to shut the human up. It is a terribly annoying thing when it makes so much noise. "I would never eat something as pathetic as you."

 

Loni is slightly mollified by the wolf's statement, but she continues to cower in the cramped space under the seat. She begins to talk to herself. "Stupid girl, you never should have left home. Didn't your mother tell you never to talk to strangers? Look where it's gotten you! You're in a carriage in the middle of the forest surrounded by wild animals!" This one-sided conversation only makes Loni feel sorry for herself, and she begins to sniffle again.

[Tamaranis]

Whatever direction he had ended up travelling in, Robby realized, it didn’t lead toward Darnsdale. He’d been travelling for too long, he’d have reached the village by now if he were still on course. All he could be sure of with regards to his travel was that he was moving in a mostly straight line. He could at least manage that much.

 

Until night fell. At that point his tactic of picking a feature on the horizon in line with his direction of travel and walking to it failed. Since he was certain he was going to wrong way anyway, and going in an enormous circle during the night seemed preferable to remaining still and having nothing to think about but how miserable the swamp was, he kept moving.

 

Leeches and insects continued their furious attempts to devour Robby alive. His immediate attackers would quickly become disheartened, but others were ready to replace them. He had not lost enough blood to them to seriously injure a man, but enough that the loss might begin to wear on him. When he slogged through mud it clung to him, so that when he moved a across a relatively dry patch it continued to weigh him down. His pause after the scuffle with the large monkey or small ape had been closest thing to a rest he’d had since entering the swamp. He had neither eaten or drank anything.

 

And yet he continued to move with speed that was almost impossible. A casual traveller on the open road would not have been able to match the still-rapid strides carrying Robby through the swamp.

 

Suddenly, it occurred to Robby how his journey through this swamp was beginning to resemble tales of mindless golems or animated corpses. Creatures that when given a task by their creator would pursue it with a single minded purpose living creatures found wholly disturbing. If told to retrieve an item or destroy an enemy a thousand miles away a golem or a walking batch of corpses would move in a straight line to their target. No terrain could stop such creatures: swamps, deserts, oceans, artic plains, all the same. They would mindless step into the obstacle, and days, weeks or months later emerge at the other side. Or so stories said. Such a creature could have matched Robby’s trek.

 

At first, the comparison was only somewhat disturbing to him. He was tireless, but this did not automatically make him mindless. In fact, he considered himself much more “aware” and “alive” than any number of people he’d met over the years.

 

But his thoughts had begun a downward spiral, and telling himself he wasn’t a simple automaton didn’t allow him to pull out of it. Though the reason for the spiral was different than it had been in the past, Robby recognized the pattern in his thoughts. This did not, however, allow him to change that pattern. It occurred to him that he was not like the stories of a mindless golem that crossed incredible distances and obstacles because they were between it and its goal. He was like the stories of a mindless golem that had been told to retrieve an object or go to a place that did not exist, or had been given a too-vague order by its master. The creature marched endlessly through the world to no end or purpose.

 

Instead of relentlessly pursuing some goal, Robby was travelling endlessly and forever to nothing. This journey was an analogy, a very accurate one he felt, to everything he had become. Not mindlessly, but purposely, pushing forward. If he had eternal life and was not struck down in one way or another, he’d still be relentlessly pursuing nothing at all with all the single-mindedness of an unfeeling automaton a thousand years from now.

 

The reason he had become this purposeless thing was that he had betrayed the empire, he knew. The empire had been his single, all-consuming purpose. Before his betrayal he had possessed both a mind and a purpose. And now, lacking a purpose, there hardly seemed a need for the mind.

 

He had known it would come to this, too, before he had betrayed them. He had been reluctant, but it had not stopped him. For some reason that remained unfathomable even to him, he had turned against something he loved in order to inflict misery on himself.

 

Thoughts of the empire wracked Robby with guilt, as they always did, but this time the guilt was overpowered by something else, probably self-pity. Purposeless existence was bearable only by pulling a curtain over everything and pretending some purpose existed, or that a purpose wasn’t necessary. He had lost his purpose, and his mind had finally tripped against the curtain. He couldn’t seem to put it back, now.

 

How did others exist, knowing no purpose? Did they just heavily cloud their own minds? Was it because he had found purpose in the empire, and now that it had been lost, he couldn’t exist otherwise?

 

Were others just as worthless as himself, but blind to it? Did that blindness make their lives even more meaningless than his own? His thoughts shuddered away from that dangerous path. Perhaps in that particular respect he was mindless and automatic, but shoved into a life or death situation, Robby would never cease to hold the lives of others above his own and defend them...

 

Was that last shred of purpose left to him, surfacing from time to time and pushing him toward heroism, the result of a lack of free will? Were things he had considered his own good deeds just part of his endless walk down a path to nowhere?

 

Robby tripped over an old tree root, jerking his thoughts outward for a moment. He stopped. Only now did he stop his trek. It seemed grimly fitting that even as he had focussed on the meaningless nature of this journey, he had kept moving.

 

Robby had never considered suicide, it was simply not part of his nature, and he didn’t consider it now. Instead he considered stopping here. He could just stop moving, stop thinking, and collapse here. Forever. The swamp could grow over him if it so wished. Maybe the insects would succeed in their task of draining away enough blood to kill him. He would die of something sooner or later. If a large predator came for him instinct would force him to defend himself, but he might have lost enough strength by then to be unable.

 

He never considered suicide, but if death came looking for him, what point was there in fighting it off?

 

For some hours Robby stood and stared forward, mostly unseeing, occupied with his own dark thoughts. Dawn came, and at first he didn’t notice it.

 

Had he still been paying attention, he would have spotted it much sooner than he did. The surrounding terrain was far drier than what he had been travelling through, and he was very near the swamp’s edge. Directly in his line of sight was a large, elaborate hedge-maze. Within the maze, apparently its goal, was an equally large and elaborate castle.

 

For one reason or another, Robby always snapped out of these dark moods. He always started moving again. He might have been purposeless, but he wasn’t mindless. Curiosity got the better of him, and he started moving again, towards the castle and hedge-maze.

[Katzaniel]

Inbi wasn't sure what she suspected. Some archmage, perhaps. Certainly not the sad-looking elderly woman who now faced her. In the back of her mind the young thief remained prepared for a stronger ally than appearances made out, but part of her unconsciously slipped at the sight. This woman had made all this magic? There could also be others, she reminded herself, but the idea seemed wrong.

 

"You are Inbi Infusco." said the woman, and Inbi's inner defenses shot up past full alert.

 

"I am," she said anyway, at a loss for any ability to deny it.

 

The old woman sighed in relief. She guestured at a chair in the room, and sat down herself. There was a table between them, and the room was decorated in light purple, with painted flowers crawling along the wall just below eye level and little white dots completing the mood. This shimmered as usual but every incarnation of the room, and the very air around her, breathed relaxation. Inbi sat down, but remained tense.

 

"If I know you at all, dear Inbi, you're keeping yourself ready to attack at any moment. I'm not going to try to convince you otherwise, but it will be easier if you try to understand that I'm not going to hurt you."

 

The information was getting easier to believe by the minute, since no harm had come to her yet, but Inbi stored the statement in her head without acting on it in any way. "What is your purpose then? What is your strange magic?"

 

The woman laughed, and it sounded like water dancing. "I can't tell you too much, but I'll do what I can. First, call me Isabella. That isn't my name but it will do. Second, the magic you are referring to is the ability to alter time. This is a dangerous affair but necessary to prevent worse. There is a man from our time-era who has stepped into yours, and he is playing dangerous games with time. He grew the hedge maze to prevent anyone from reaching this house, he's grown plants all over the place for different reasons. I'm not sure what his plans are exactly but they aren't good. My purpose is to stop him. I recognized you as a possible source of help to us, given your magic, your fighting abilties, your morals, and the fact that this maze would encourage rather than deter you. So, we took the liberty of transferring you here and giving you those newt eyes, which help you to see into multiple time-eras at once, and as such let you communicate with me."

 

Inbi was taken back by the slew of information, but it did explain a few things. Still, she knew that the best lies were laced with truth, and she believed this Isabella with the intention of disbelieving her at whatever point the facts began to point elsewhere. No point in assuming lies from the beginning, but no point in letting the truth obscure any possible lies either.

 

"How can I help?"

 

"By tracking down this man, whom we call Trey, and killing him. We can help you in little ways, but we cannot kill him when he is not in his own time-era, and we want to alter history as little as possible. Even by contacting you we are suffering major repercussions. When you leave this house, we will replace your items back in your bag, with the addition of a pouch of newt-eyes and a flat rock with a dent that, when thrown into the air, will always land facing toward Trey."

 

OOC: Getting late. Not a great place to stop, but not too bad either.

[Canid]

OOC: Canid wouldn't say something like that... she is a kind person.

IC:

 

The carriage rattled so loudly as to make words inaudible.

The wolf momentarily considered the girl hunched up and whimpering, then turned brisquely and leapt out the front of the carriage.

She landed four paws on Carl the horse - as intended. He stopped his break-neck canter and swung wildly about, crouching and bucking.

Canid latched onto the harness on his face and jumped off, gripping it firmly in her teeth and pulling his head down with her.

He tried desperately to swing free, but the wolf held him fast and stood breathing hard face to face with the snorting, indignant horse.

"I am not going to hurt you." said Canid, talking around the leather.

"You just did!" Carl retorted, kicking the ground and snorting again.

"If you bolt, I will bite you." said the wolf clearly and slowly, and she let go.

Carl stomped his feet and shook his head and swore.

He looked menacingly at the wolf. "I hate you."

"You're allowed to." she replied quickly.

"You will have to excuse me, I'm playing this by ear. Usually I have a bit of telepathy and mind control to back me up in these situations." She paused.

"Can I take that off your nose for you?"

Carl's nostrills were coated with a thick and uncomfortable layer of oat-dust. and the nose-bag felt wet against his skin.

He nodded reluctantly.

Canid padded carefully up to the horse. She fiddled momentarily with claws and teeth at the nose bag and it dropped free.

"I am sorry about all this. I would normally just run where I want to go, but this is a special case as I lack my magic and have no clue where I'm going."

The horse scowled. "That doesn't stop you from running."

"You seem to be part of the puzzle. You are to take me to Eorwax."

"I can't. I don't know where that is and as you don't either, I see no reason why I should take you!" The horse snorted and closed its eyes.

"This chicken is supposed to lead us."

"Thisbe, as evidenced by her smell, is long dead and can't lead us to the nearest tree."

"Thisbe?" Canid grinned quizzically.

"My last owner kept her... don't ask me, I don't know."

The wolf took the water-logged, maggot ridden, half-featherless, scraped, muddy and broken fowl off her neck and dumped it on the ground.

"I have to go with what little I have," Canid sighed appologetically, "when I get back in the wagon, I need you to take us that way," the wolf pointed where Thisbe's beak was directed.

Canid studied him very carefully - it made Carl feel uncomfortable.

"When we get there... I'll buy you any one thing you want."

 

Carl was silent as Canid picked up the chicken and jumped back into the wagon.

The wolf hooked the chicken up on a peg behind the drivers seat. It began to rain maggots to the floor as they started to move.

She sat down infront of Loni who was still curled up and whimpering.

"I am sorry if I scared you. When I left this wagon, there was noone else in it. What is your name?"

"Loni." whispered the girl in response.

"Were you going anywhere in particular?"

The girl shook her head.

"You are free to accompany me. I am headed to a town called Eorwax." Canid paused, "There's no food in here anywhere, is there?"

Edited April 15, 2004 by Canid

[Finnius]

OOC: Gaaack! I'm soooo behind!

 

BIC:

 

The small blue man wanders along the side of the mountain in search of his waylaid burden, stumbles around cliffs, trudges through gulleys. It can't have gotten far, thinks Finnius, it hasn't got any legs... I hope...

 

His mind drifts back over the last week... so far this thing had escaped two times, and both times it had found someone to take it up. It had a mind of it's own, and was an excellent liar. Twice already it had taken innocent lives, and had slain the guilty more times than the little blue mage cared to count. He had to find it soon...

 

Consumed in his thoughts and lost in hunger, Finnius fails to realize that he is rounding a cliff again. His footing fails him, and the little blue man slides off the edge, tumbles down loose rocks, rolls over and over, cutting tender flesh and bruising bones. He finally comes to rest in a patch of blue tufted grass, face half-cocked to one side. As he passes out again, Finnius half-imagines that he sees a figure with wings descending... and then decides that he must be dreaming. The little blue man fades into unconsciousness once more, never noticing the hard leather swordcase just beyond his outstretched hand...

[dragonqueen]

OOC: Sorry!

 

Loni shrieks when Carl takes off, but the noise is covered by the rattling of the carriage. She wedges herself as tightly as possible into the cornor and covers her head with her arms. Somehow she survives the brief run without any serious injuries. Loni's used to various bruises though; at home she was always bumping into things.

 

In the stillness left by the halting of the carriage, Loni hears strains of a conversation outside. Being as quiet as she can, she edges closer to the door and listens. Occasional noises of the wood interrupt, though, and she can't make out much.

 

When the wolf appears in the carriage, Loni immediatly scoots back into her cornor. The aroma of the dead bird drifts back, and she wrinkles her nose. It's even worse than dead fish!, she thinks.

 

Loni tells the wolf her name without lifting her head; her answer is somewhat muffled. Adverse to speaking anymore than she has to, Loni simply shakes her head in answer to the wolf's next inquiry. She is relieved to hear they have a fixed destination now, and relaxs somewhat. Somehow it seems calmer and more normal with the wolf joining them. Loni knows this is irrational, and tells herself so, but still. She is so wrapped up in her thoughts that she almost doesn't hear the wolf ask about food.

 

Her head snaps up and Loni says "What? Um, I don't think so, unless there's more chocolate pudding under the driver's seat."

 

The wolf cocks her head quizically. "I don't believe I've ever had chocolate pudding. Is it good?"

 

"Oh yes, very." Loni remembers the times they had it at home. It was always considered a special treat, and they only had it on holidays...the rest of the time it was fish. Loni's smile fades as she remembers the fish. Quickly, before she has time to lose her courage, she asks "What are you called?"

 

The wolf notes the girl seems much calmer now, and concludes this must be a good think. "Canid," she tells Loni.

 

"Oh." Caught up in the momentum of her first question, Loni asks another. It's probably got an obvious or sensitive answer, and she knows she'll wish she hadn't asked it, but Loni asks anyway. "Umm...why do you and Carl talk? I mean, none of the cats talked at home, or the fish..." Loni trails off, and falls silent. Her cheeks are slightly pink, as she knows she bungled the question, as she always does. The wooden floor of the carriage grows fascinating, and Loni inspects it single-mindedly.

[Canid]

Canid grinned in response.

"Most people dismiss entirely the possibillity that I can talk and conclude for several minutes that they are insane before even attempting that question."

Loni looked up, still looking puzzled.

"You don't need to be embarrassed."

The girl smiled shyly and the wolf scratched an ear with her hind paw.

"Up until nine days ago, I was a mage. I possessed considerable magic. Telepathy was the first skill that surfaced in me. When I was younger, I travelled. I associated mostly outside of the wolf community and used my magic to figure out what people were saying. Over the years I have learned most rodentia dialects, the language of the mages, dragon, horse, two-hundred and sixty seven bird languages, a number of ancient and obscure languages and most of the human ones as well." Canid smiles proudly.

"But I am afraid that I won't be picking up anymore until I regain my magic.

Now the horse, I have not a clue. In my experience horses rarely have even a salting of the natural arts, but he speaks English, so I can't say."

The wolf proceeded to dig around under the driver's seat for some food. "You could always ask him," she suggested, without turning around.

[Vlad]

Living in the darkness wasn't much of a problem for Floyd, but it still was inconvenient. As he slowly attempted to gather his bearings, he realized that he had none. The entire length of this passage was pitch black, and the only noise was Floyd's cooling fan. Having lost his infinite power source, which obviously violated the laws of physics, the robotic boy saw no other alternatives. Quickly, Floyd shifted to his secondary generator: a solar cell.

 

But it wasn't terribly sunny at the time. In fact, it was pitch black. So Floyd immediately switched to the other only alternative, conveniently codenamed Plan-B(2). He curled up into a small ball, and decided to let gravity do it's work. If his reasoning was correct, which it always was, then he'd take the exact same path as the small glowing rubber ball.

 

Except this time the Floyd's logic failed him. The rumbling emminating from the rolling created an echo throughout the entire tunnel. Loud sounds in tunnels can lead to avalanches or cave-ins, and metal doesn't mesh well with rock. Fortunately, a small group of students from a nearby town managed to make the cave-in a fruitful project in their studies of the Doppler Effect. As Floyd continued gaining speed on his trek to the fiery heart of the earth (with rocks tumbling close behind) small children became more and more aware of the impending doom.

 

Floyd, however, was not one to waste a moment either. He took this time to reflect on what his life had accomplished. Most other people wouldn't call it reflecting, they would refer to it as "Oh my God! My life is flashing before my eyes! I'm gonna die! Oh no! Oh no! Oh no!" Floyd, ever the optimist, decided to instead, focus on how he helped other. Needless to say, he was done before he started. He is one to get easily distracted. Often.

 

The distraction (this time) was the elusive glowing rubber infinite energy source ball. It was just down the path, and appeared to have stopped. Floyd, unfortunately, didn't. While continuing to roll further towards the center of the earth, he noticed an end to the tunnel. A slight curve at the bottom proppeled Floyd to the opposite side of a gargantuan cavern.

 

This cavern was dimly lit by sporadic torches along the wall. It had a welcoming feel, but something about the room just seemed, well... evil. On the largest of three delicately woven rugs sat an elderly man with a full beard. His eyes were closed, and the pipe in his mouth seemed to make him appear lost in a stream of consiousness. As Floyd finally mustered the courage to approach the strange man, he began to mumble.

 

The first completely audible words were "I... am... Osam-"

 

Precisely at that moment, the elusively-small glowing rubber infinite energy source [ball] rolled by, and fell into another hole. With screams of "My precioussssss...!!" Floyd immediately dived down and never saw the old man again.

[Tanuchan]

As she looks at the maze, Rialla senses something moving there. She frowns slightly, taking in the sun's height and looking back at the maze.

 

"Middle afternoon..."

 

She sighs, focusing her attention completely in that strong spark of conciousness that had drawn her mind. Pushing everything aside, she lets her mind fly freely, questioning, searching, finding its direction.

 

*Inside the maze. Curiosity. Purpose of being purposeless... ?*

 

Rialla comes to herself with a start. "How can one have as a purpose being purposeless?" She shakes her head, sensing still that mind weaving through the maze. Her telepathy-like skill was useful most of times, but she often had some trouble sorting out strong feelings if they were mixed up in their owner's own mind.

Sighing, Rialla broadens her mind's area of search automatically, now tuned also to weaker sentient sources.

 

 

Grayness slides back, fleeing in panic as a shiny mind brushes hers.

 

 

Surprised, Rialla turns sharply, catching the hint of a shadow slip under the southern door. Lessons learned not long ago come back to her mind.

 

"You can sense the spark of any awakened mind. It will be stronger in living beings, but you will sense also through the veil that protects the Other World. You will feel also some of its stronger emotions. Use that wisely, child... it's a useful skill in a ranger, in one who's to guide our people through the forest."

 

Rialla snorts at that last memory, quite angry. "Guide our people? Hah! I got lost trying a shortcut in a place I should know like my own home! One would say the land changed as by magic..."

 

Her voice trails off, as she realizes that hedge maze wasn't there when she had arrived... and that she had just skirted the edges of an unknown swamp when looking for the shortcut. Rialla draws a sharp breath.

 

And another one, as she finally takes in full the maze's shape. "Acorn... " whispers, still following that mind's progress through the maze. She fingers the acorn in the pocket of her tunic, and takes it out suddenly as touching something different...

 

The acorn's shell has cracked, and the whitish tip of a root appears. Outside, without anyone noticing, a part of the hedge shimmers and seems to fade for a moment, before coming back showing a new branching towards the castle.

 

Rialla looks back at both doors, trying to feel any other sentient mind behind them. The results confuse her, as she seems to grasp a flicker of life to just lose it amid something distorting her probe. Mentally pocketing her mind skill, she shrugs.

 

"Let's be practical, then... there's someone in that maze, and something within this castle. I can see stairs going down to the garden where the maze should open. And a door that seems to lead to that wing of the castle. A door that also leads in the direction of a sentient shadow."

 

Rialla goes to the southern door, never noticing the growing branching in the maze that seems to lead not to the garden, but to the castle itself.

[Katzaniel]

"Well, I have little reason to doubt what you say, and less reason to simply ignore your request. You seem to know my personality well enough, so I may not need to say this, but I will anyway. I will embark on this journey for you, Miss Isabella, but I will make no guarantee. I intend to find out for myself whether this Trey is indeed evil and deserves to die. If, and only if, I find your words to be true enough for my liking, then you can depend on me to do all I can to right it."

 

Isabella nodded. "Indeed, I expected you to react in this way. Let me just add this statement: Find the evidence you need as quickly as you can. If Trey finds out that we have sent you after him, he may alter time to get his way. Be careful!"

 

"So be it." Inbi backed up into the tunnel again, watching the old woman despite all she had said. When she reached the point where the eyes in her bag and the eyes on the floor of the room no longer breached the space between herself and the other lady, when the passageway once more was solid in front of her, Inbi finally turned around and faced the way she was walking. She wanted to believe what the woman said, and wished there had been some sort of proof. Nevertheless, the first thing to do was find the man of whom Isabella had spoken. With that discovery would come knowledge.

 

Finding her way back into the kitchens, Inbi filled her bag with what she could. Then she descended again into the underground maze and made her way through it. The young woman solved the maze this time in much less time, following only the paths she had already taken and relying on memory to keep her most of the time away from wrong turns. By the time she reached the entrance, though, the sun was setting and she decided to camp there, in the same place where all of this had, for her, begun.

[dragonqueen]

Loni slouches against the seat and mumbles, "Uh...maybe later. All wolves talk, then?"

 

Loni has begun to loosen up a little bit. She's not sure why she hits it off with some people, and can barely manage to get a word out to others, but it happens. In her opinion, the situation has improved considerably. It's always better to be with friendly people, and the more the merrier. Sure, she still has basically no clue what's going on, but that will change. In the meantime, she's learning new things. Loni has a philosphy that one should know as much interesting stuff as possible.

[Canid]

"Only in wolf - and that language works very differently than human ones. It has a great deal to do with smells...."

Canid pulls out another sealed container of chocolate pudding happily and opens it.

"However, more wolves speak English than do horses."

The wolf licks the pudding experimentally.

"It tastes like chicken!" she concludes and proceeds to lap it up.

Loni stares curiously for several seconds.

"Canid."

The girl jumps and the wolf looks up.

The horse had stopped and said the wolf's name in a rather worried manner. He clears his throat.

"Would you mind coming out here for just a moment?"

Canid jumps out the front flap and onto the driver's seat. "I wish I were still telepathic..."

Loni stands up and peers tentatively out.

The wagon is perched at the top of a small hill. At the bottom is a tree with a rabbit around it.

Had the rabbit been simply under it, there is no doubt that Carl the horse would not have found the matter so distressting. Unfortunately, the rabbit was quite clearly sleeping contentedly around the tree.

It twitched its five foot long cute bunny whiskers.

It wiggled its soft pink goat-sized bunny nose.

It made cute bunny breathing noises.

...and it opened an eye.

[Katzaniel]

I don't really want to post right now, so I'm gonna dole out some props.

 

Canid and DQ - Someone's Finger OR Someone's Stepmother

Tam and Tanny - An Entrenchment OR Soap Bubbles

NTrav and Finnius - A Plastic Hula-Hoop sized Hoop OR An Odd Smelling Rose

Katz - Doll with no Head

Vlad - An Unread Scroll

 

And Canid said I should be welcome to do stuff like drop heart-attack-stricken dragons on her head. I'll think about that and do something to Canid later... Anyone else want crazy stuff happening?

 

... And I'll post later. Not tonight.

[Tanuchan]

OOC I owe a posting here... will try to do something this weekend... =P And feel free to put crazy stuff on Rialla's path... I usually do work better when I have some challenge like going around heart-attack-stricken dragons

 

~Tanny

[dragonqueen]

Not sure whether she should remain in the cart or go outside, Loni settles for peering out. When she sees the rabbit, though, she immediatly opts for being with company. These sorts of things are much more alarming when one is alone.

 

Scrambling out of the cart, Loni trembles behind Carl and Canid. "What is it?" she whispers.

 

As they watch, the humongous rabbit slowly opens first one eye and then the other. Both gigantic eyes fix upon the party. Loni freezes like a deer in the headlights. Thoughts run through her head a mile a minute. Is it dangerous? How'd it get so big? Surely a rabbit has no reason to attack! What happens now? Next to her, Carl fidgets nervously, tossing his head.

 

The rabbit blinks sleepily. Possibly it is just as unsure of these travelers as they are of it.

 

"Maybe we should just go away and leave it alone," Loni suggests tenatively in a voice barely audible.

[Canid]

OOC: I am very very sorry for the delay in my posting - we have been reformatting the computer (still at it) and there just haven't been many oppertunities to write. I will try to respond within the next few days.

[Tamaranis]

Robby darted up and down passages in the hedge maze. It was very beneficial to have a task that occupied his mind to a certain extent. Often he ended up covering the same passage three or four times, affirming that it did indeed lay exactly there. Several times a sudden need to check his location against where he believed another passage to be lead Robby to plunge bodily through the hedge-wall. It was a very resilient hedge however, and in the process of fighting through he tended to leave some skin behind. The hedge wasn’t completely impassable, but it was thorny enough to thoroughly discourage passage. Even passage by the rather difficult-to-stop Robby.

 

Still, an overhead map of the hedge was emerging in his mind and expanding outward. The use of markers might have been more efficient, but Robby didn’t have any markers to use, and causing deliberate damage to the hedge itself as a method of indication might upset whoever the owner was. Soon enough he’d find a way through.

 

Before he found his way through however, Robby found something completely unexpected. He came to a gap in the soft grass that formed the floor of the maze. Piles of freshly dug earth rimmed a gash in the earth, running perpendicular to the passage, which seemed to continue on beneath the hedges on either side. Long stakes as thick as a man’s leg were driven into the ground near the edge of the gash on his side, and were at a forty five degree angle to the earth, as if to discourage very rapid approach. The gash was still spitting tiny clumps of dirt into the air at a furious pace.

 

Robby approached cautiously, peering over the mounds of dirt and into the gash in the earth. He placed on hand against one of the stakes, he didn’t apply a great deal of force, hardly any actually, but it still shuddered, the fell, tearing free of the edge of the pit as it did so. A series of high-pitched alarmed shouts and cries emerged from the gash in response, the shower of bits of earth stopped.

 

Finally getting a clear view inside, Robby saw that the trench, for that was what it was, was full of gnomes. They averaged perhaps three feet in height, and each possessed exaggerated features and a gnome-sized shovel. The gnomes spotted Robby and each began a series of furious accusations. Their faces, already flushed from exertion, turned redder with anger. A few climbed from the entrenchment in order to more effectively curse and brandish shovels at the intruder in a threatening manner. So enraged were they that Robby feared he would soon be fighting against a swarm of the tiny men.

 

“Whoah, hey, I’ll put it back!” Robby loudly declared over the gnomes, hands spread out in front of him.

 

With considerable effort Robby lifted the end of the stake that had originally been pointed into the air, and dragged it a short distance from the spot it had originally been embedded in the earth, realizing as he did so, that a stiff wind could easily have inflicted the same damage he had caused. These actions were met with furious accusations of thievery from the gnomes.

 

Before the gnomes could take desperate action, Robby rolled the stake such that it was positioned on earth that offered a little more resistance, and began pounding on the elevated end with one hand. Much to the surprise of the gnomes, wood splintered beneath he hand, and the stake sunk a little ways into the earth each time it was struck. Once Robby felt it would actually stand on it’s own, he struck with both hands, allowing him to make greater progress.

 

“Sorry, you’ll have to sharpen the end again, nothing I could do about that,” he said, examining the cuts and bruises his hands now bore. Nothing that wouldn’t heal on its own.

 

The wild accusations of the gnomes reversed meaning and became praise for what a great fellow Robby was, fixing that stake for them, the way he just had. He was ushered towards the entrenchment and invited to examine the fortifications the gnomes had created. He was very careful not to touch any other stakes, as none of them looked a great deal sturdier than the one he’d knocked down.

 

“You never know when some one is going to come lay siege to your fortifications” a gnome rapidly explained, “and you never know where they’ll attack either so we started making this entrenchment in the hedge maze here it’s not even very easy to find...” Robby stepped down into the entrenchment itself as the gnome spoke. It was more of a step than a hop, the entrenchment was little more than waist high. “...I don’t know how you found it you must be very good at mazes but this place would be really awkward to attack because if you cut down the hedge it regenerates very quickly the roots do that too...” The gnome emphasized by hacking at roots hanging down from a portion of the entrenchment that passed under the hedge itself “...and we have a hard time keeping the passages clear...”

 

Robby became very sure he did not possess a monopoly on superhuman endurance as the gnome lead him on a tour of the entrenchment without ever really getting specific on where one sentence ended and the next began. As he spoke he continued to work, hacking at stubbornly regenerating roots with startling speed when they passed beneath the hedge, and digging at parts of the entrenchment he did not consider deep enough for brief periods, throwing two or three shovelfulls of dirt in the space of little more than a second, then moving on.

 

The trench network was extensive, underlying perhaps a third of the maze, and was nearly as confused and misleading in its layout as the maze itself. The gnomes, Robby learned, were not preparing for any specific enemy but rather the possibility of one. Learning of them was difficult, because eventually his original tour guide abandoned him, and steering the direction of conversation with these fellows was rather difficult. There hadn’t even been any gnomes up here two weeks ago, but they had apparently decided that in order to hold the maze against some hypothetical attacker they would need to first inhabit the maze. Despite the small stature of the gnomes, Robby found himself thinking that hypothetical attackers were lucky indeed they would likely not be attempting to take the maze. It probably would have ended in disaster for them.

 

keeping up conversation with the gnomes made concentration very difficult, but apparent freedom to roam their trenchwork made travel through the maze far easier, if not any less confusing. Alternately travelling on the ground and within it, however, he reached the opposite end, bid his fourth tour guide farewell, and slipped under the final hedge wall between himself and the castle.