ic The Box of Delights (IC)

[Heritage]

For several seconds, Grim just stared at the bizarre scene, trying to wrap her mind around it; finally, she just accepted the fact that some things...what was the phrase Grampa Lou had liked? 'Beggars description'.

 

"Is that him? Do we just sorta...hold hands and float out to him? Think happy thoughts?"

 

Gretchen, on the other hand, was freaked out beyond the point of sarcasm, and therefore was at a loss for words.

[Tiffany Korta]

GM Post

 

Zee glanced inside and back at the little group unsure for a few minutes as to what they meant, as she lived here this must seem normal to her, but realization slowly dawned on her.

 

“This whole place is made from pure thought made from, all this you see is made from the swirling chaos you see inside.” Zee gestured around to make her point “But he has to concentrate inside which is why it’s unformed, but anyone of his blood should be able to manipulate it’s reality.”

 

She was waiting fairly patiently for them to decide what needed to be done.

[Heritage]

Grim nodded as Zee explained the rules of this place. "Okay, that makes sense; if he were conscious, he'd be able to say what reality is, but since he isn't, one of us needs to do it for him. And because we're from the same bloodline, it has to be me." She had a lot of experience imposing her will onto formless chaos; she did it every day when she manipulated her glamour. Only this time, it was a matter of scale.

 

So the real question was, what kind of reality should she make?  

 

She wanted him to be comfortable, and it would probably be easier to follow the rules already set up in this place. A hotel, the lovely assistant, a dressing room; the familiar world of a professional magician. She recalled a childhood visit to the Beaudrie Opera House in the Theater District, and used those memories as a foundation, though she allowed herself a few flights of fancy. Her great-grandfather Ira was lying on a couch onstage, the spotlight upon him, of course; the footlights illuminated the stage, but the rest of the theater was dark, the house lights and the lights along the aisles dimmed for the performance. The proscenium was beautifully carved and painted, depicting vaguely Arabesque patterns and scenes. The rest of the house followed the same design, as though the audience sat under a night sky in a garden near a distant oasis; small lights twinkled in the painted ceiling, and projected clouds slowly rolled across the bowl of the heavens. The air smelled faintly of sawdust, grease paint and roasted nuts, the classic bouquet of the performer.

 

If Ira was to wake up now (would such a thing happen?), he would feel at home, which is all Lynn could hope for. She took a few tentative steps forward, coming out of the shadow of the balcony, and looked around.

 

Gretchen said nothing, though her eyes drank in the sights like thirsty travelers.

[R. Bluefish]

Sam's eyes widened as the scene took form before her. "Oh, @#$% me," she whispered. Warily, she put one foot out to test the new floor, then stepped forward. I don't think I'll ever get used to this.

 

Craning her head back, she squinted up at the high vaulted ceiling, twinkling with stars and rolling with false clouds. "Hell of a place," she breathed. Makes me feel more low-class just from being here. "Is this a theater or something? Fanciest theater I ever visited had sticky floors and guys in cardboard hats."

 

Looking to where the spotlight illuminated the lonely unconscious figure, she hesitated, then asked, "What are we supposed to do now? Do we just...wake him up?"

[Tiffany Korta]

 

GM Post

 

Zee stepped into the hall without hesitation and whirled around on the spot taking in all the details.

 

“Yeah it’s a theater alright I remember that we played here, it chicago no wait it’s the one Freedom City!” she grinned as she apparently remembered the place.

 

It was still difficult to tell who and what she really was she seemed at time mystical and ethereal and others like a “real person”. Then again that could apply to quite a few that wielded magic in the real world.

 

“Do you know why he’s here like this? Why he’s still sleeping here after all this time?”

[Heritage]

Lynn shrugged helplessly. "I have no idea! The last thing anyone in my family heard was that he had a lead on Wihelm Kantor, the Nazis' top occult guy, in 1957; there were rumors that he'd resurfaced in South America, like a lot of other war criminals, and he was determined to bring him in." She took a few more tentative steps forward. "So he booked a Pan Am flight to Buenos Aires, and that was the last anyone saw of him; after ten years, they gave up the search and declared him dead. But he was in here the whole time."

 

As she got closer to the stage, the changeling could make out more details; he wore his 'working' clothes, the immaculate tux, the gold turban and cape, the gaudy gold ring with the big red ruby on his right hand that matched the stone in the middle of his over-the-top headgear. She could make out his facial features now, the distinctive 'Silberman's nose' more pronounced on her great-grandfather, more hawk-like; she'd seen his face before, in countless photos and on posters, but none of them quite did him justice.

 

"Maybe he did find Kantor back then; maybe they fought, and that Nazi bastard injured him, or put him under a spell. And then maybe he used the last of strength to make it here, where he'd be safe." Lynn climbed up the steps onto the stage, Gretchen tentatively following behind, and looked down on the man lying there.

 

"Hello, Ira."

[R. Bluefish]

Starlight followed Lynn even more hesitantly than Gretchen did, constantly darting looks around her as though she expected demons to spring out of the woodwork at any moment. "If that's what he did, then I think he did a pretty damn good job," she said. "Anybody else would have one hell of a time getting in here. This is some safe house."

 

Moving up beside Lynn, she peered down at the comatose man, noting the resemblance. There was something about the whole scene that made her uncomfortable, put a heavy lump of sadness in the pit of her stomach. "He looks like you," she said unnecessarily, trying to cover her unease.

[Tiffany Korta]

GM Post

 

Zee’s face feel a little and she looked a little concerned as she was apparently thinking about her memories of the time, and apparently something was missing.

 

“I don’t know what happen!” there was a note of panic in her voice, but she quickly recovered “He choose to trap whatever spirit he faced within himself, and place himself here for safely away.” she thought for a few seconds and added “You of the same blood so you could should be able to sync up and reopen the portal.”

 

All this time Merge had been quiet and followed along behind, as things unfolded she finally choose to speak.

“You know that spirits aren’t bound by either space or time? All you need is a good line for the spirit to travel along...”

[Heritage]

At the mention of this 'spirit', an alarm bell went off inside Grim's head; how did they know this Zee was on the level? Maybe she was a servant of whatever was trapped inside Ira, and was trying to trick someone into letting her 'master' free? She needed to find out more before she went any further.

 

"Tell me more about this 'spirit'; what kind of spirirt is it, and why did the Amazing Al-Kazar want to trap it. And did he have any ideas about how to get rid of it?"

 

 

Edited January 1, 2017 by Heritage

[R. Bluefish]

If Starlight noticed Lynn's sudden suspicion, she didn't show it. "And if we wake him up, does that mean the spirit just...gets loose? And tries to kill us? I mean," she gestured emphatically, "what we do even know about this 'spirit?'"

 

Starlight was also uncomfortably aware that so far her only contribution to this little escapade had been asking questions and getting spooked by magic. She was seriously going to need to bone up on her knowledge if she ever got out of this. At least learn to tell a grimoire from a tome.

[Tiffany Korta]

GM Post

 

Zee looked concerned as various options were discussed as to the nature of the spirit, it was apparent that she didn’t necessarily understand everything that was going on here.

 

“I... I’m not sure, but if he put himself in this state then it must be a pretty serious spirit.Unfortunately I wasn’t there when the whole thing went down, I only know that he bought himself here after the event.”

 

She thought for a few moments then added slightly more helpfully

“There might be another way. There are certain artifacts that he kept here for protection, it might be possible to use them to link back to the real world. But it would have to be someone who’s here physically in this realm.”

[Heritage]

This whole time, Gretchen had been silent, transfixed by the sight of the magician from times long gone lying on the couch; in particular, her eyes were drawn to the red ruby on his ring. Was there something inside it, yearning to be released, then bound again to a worthy soul...?

 

Meanwhile, Grim was all business as she continued to ask Zee questions. "'Artifacts'? What kind of artifacts?" She shook her head and waved a hand towards the unconscious conjurer. "To be honest, I'm not so sure we should wake him up; maybe he sacrificed himself to bind a malevolent Nazi spirit for all eternity, and this was his chosen prison?"

 

Gretchen crouched down beside Ira Silberman, her fascination only increasing as she closely studied the folds of his cape and the lines of his face; she could definitely see the family resemblance in the contours of the nose, the set of his mouth. He must have been quite the ladykiller in his day.

 

"See, this is the problem with magic; unless you understand the symbols and what everything stands for, it's so damn hard to figure out!" The changeling pointed at Sam and chuckled. "Y'know it's times like this when I get why you don't like magic so much, Sam; science and mutations and psionic powers all at least follow rules, am I right? There's a logic you can follow, y'know?"

 

"There's rules here, too," Gretch murmured as she looked down that handsome face. "You just need to know what story you're in." 

 

And with that, she leaned forward and kissed the Amazing Al-Kazar full on the lips!

Edited January 2, 2017 by Heritage

[R. Bluefish]

Well, I never liked science either, Sam was about to say, but she was cut short by Gretchen suddenly kissing the comatose man. Right on the mouth. Sam trailed off, her mouth hanging half open as she stared. "Uh...Gretchen?" She looked at her for another moment, then said, "Gretchen, what the @#$% are you doing?"

 

Belatedly, Sam's brain started working to catch up to her mouth. Rules. Logic. Stories. Sleeping dude. Magic. Her head wasn't build for this, but even she could start to piece things together if she was given enough time. "Oh," she said. "This is another magic thing, isn't it? Going for a Sleeping Beauty?"

[Tiffany Korta]

 

GM Post

 

With no discernible motion Gretchen found herself standing in the middle of a room, well actually the same room but with laid out as if it was a restaurant of some kind. Sitting directing in front of her were two figures one she knew very well being that she was touching his head right now, she could feel that even as she also stood here taking in the sounds and smell of this rather excellent restaurant. His partner she didn’t recognize she was apparently beautiful, in a 20’s flapper kind of way, but everything seemed not quite right. Her smile seemed fake like she only seened it on other and when she moved, a she didn’t move often, her body moved wrong like it had very different muscles. And her hair seemed to squirm on it’s own like it a living thing in it’s own right.

 

After what seemed like forever,and only an instance, Al-Kazar looked up from his excellent looking meal, Gretchen couldn't even look at his partner's food nothing should move quite like that, and gave her a smile.

 

“From you greeting I guess you know who I am.” he gestured to where a shadowy versions of Gretchen and the others could be seen “And this charming thing is...” Gretchen's ears refused somehow to hear the name, beside no word should consist of so many consonants. “I’m afraid I can’t talk long, even though I apparently have eternity here, right now you mind is providing a bridge for her to have influence on the real world.”

 

And as the spoke she could see some of the diners standing up and moving towards the shades of the heroes, and the move in the same unnatural way.

 

In the hall the rest of the little groups could only watch as a ghostly form of the dining room appeared before them, though the woman had a much less... human form. They could hear sound but they weren’t able to make them out, the voices apparently coming from very far away and close up at the same time. As the phantoms began to move towards them they began to become a little more solid, it wouldn’t be long before they could actually touch them, and it didn’t look like they would be friendly...

[Heritage]

This was all a bit much for the young barista, but she also knew she absolutely could NOT afford to freak out right now; instead, she did her best to steel her nerves and sound bored and annoyed, which had served her well in most situations.

 

"You're Al-Kazar," she stated rather bluntly. Then she turned to face the flapper-thing, though she did kind of have to squint her eyes to keep from going nuts at the site of her incredible wrongness. "And you're the thing he trapped in here."  Turning back to the magician, she did her very best to keep the fear out of her voice. "So how do we get out of here?" 

 

- - - -

 

Meanwhile, Lynn flicked both her wrists, and the deadly night-black talons on her finger tips returned; dropping into a menacing crouch, she moved to get between Gretchen's body any who would do it harm, her eyes wild and voice more of a growl.

 

"Don't even think about it!"

Edited March 5, 2017 by Heritage

[Tiffany Korta]

 

GM Post

 

The phantoms seemed to heed the words and stopped in there progress, seemingly fading back into the general scenery. Whatever she was she obviously had at least some patience, which she must have seeing as they’d both been here and probably active for all this time.

 

“Apparently she considers you friends enough of a threat to allow us a little time. So why don’t you pull up a chair and try some of this excellent wine that I Imagined up.” he filled up an empty glass and poured into it the wine “Then you can explain to me exactly what  you’ve done to my place, I’ve been a little to distracted to pay it much attention.”

[Heritage]

"I broke your mirror," Gretch stated bluntly. "On the orders of your great-granddaughter, who now owns your shop. That's her out there." She indicated Grimalkin with a nod of her head. "She was worried an evil Belgian duke was going to use a twin of the mirror in a sympathetic magic ritual of some kind. She had me smash the mirror with an iron railroad spike to break the link." One thing you had to say about the young barista, she didn't mince words; she came right out and stated the facts as she knew them.  "Does that mean we're trapped in here?"

 

- - -

 

Back in the 'theater', Lynn dismissed her claws with another flick of her wrists, wisps of vapor rising from each finger tip. She stepped forward to check on Gretchen's physical form, checking her pulse and pupils with great concern. "Oh, Gretch; where have you gone?"

[Tiffany Korta]

 

GM Post

 

Al-Kazar’s eye lit up at the mention of his great granddaughter, but quickly turned his attention back to the thing who seemed... Pleased?

 

“Well that’s good this place should be in resonance with those with me blood. Take this ring...” he held up his hand showing rather plain gold ring, not dissimilar to Tolkien's One Ring and maybe just as mysterious “Take it to the elevators and get her to imagine them repaired, as a mindscape it that easy as long as the place is willing to help. And I think we’d know if it didn’t like any of you.” he gently touched Gretchin with his hand “One important thing  is to make sure that she doesn’t touch me in anyway, it’s not the only thing that will love a blood resonance.” he looked over at his fellow capture

 

“And one final thing, a personal request and nothing more. This ring is a family heirloom passed down from generation to generation when they got married. If you two ever decide to go onto the next step please consider carrying on the tradtion.” he gave a bemused smile and tapped the side of his head “Don’t looked surprised we’re in a mindlink here. And you weren’t the first generation to invent such things...  Ρ᾽οδοπτήχεισ και ἐλικώπιδεσ καὶ καλλιπάρῃοι καὶ μειλιχοφωνοι.”

[Heritage]

 "Um, okay. I'll bear that in mind." She quickly grabbed the ring with her left hand and stuck it in the pocket of her jeans. "I'll give your regards to your great-grand-"

 

- - - 

 

Suddenly Gretchen sat upright, much to everyone's surprise. A very startled Grim shot up to her feet. "Gah! Don't do that!" 

 

"Sorry. I know how we get out now."

 

"Great, let's go!" The changeling looked about to make some of farewell gesture towards Ira Silberman before the young barista yelled out a warning.

 

"Don't touch him! We need to just go and use this ring to-" She stopped and raised her left hand to her face; a golden ring was on her finger, with a large ruby on it. "What? What? WHAT?" She looked over to the 'sleeping' magician, who no longer wore his ring, or his cape or turban for that matter. "He tricked me. The minute I took the ring, it was bonded to me." The ring began to change, the gold draining away to pure silver as the style became simpler, less gaudy, a bit more feminine, but not too feminine; the ring had to match its wearer, after all.

 

"Alright, f### this; granted, the ring is freaky, but you said you knew the way out, right? We need to leave now!" 

 

"Right. Right. Uh, let's...let's go." Gretchen, finally roused from her freakout, began to lead the others back towards the elevators.

Edited April 8, 2017 by Heritage

[Tiffany Korta]

GM Post

 

In comparison to the journey to the hall the journey back was simplicity itself, what took what seemed like hour took a few moments and a few twisty turns, either it was Zee’s influence or the place was beginning to like them! Talking off Zee was kind of quiet and occasionally gave Gretchen an odd look, as if she was trying to work out if something had changed from her encounter.

In the same vein the lobby didn't look any different than when they arrived, but it somehow felt different, which apparent was how these kind of things work when magic was involved.

 

[Heritage]

Once they were all back in the elevator lobby, Lynn could tell something was different, but she couldn't tell what; looking form one face to the other, she shook her head a little bit. "Something's different, but i can't tell if it's good or bad."

 

"I think the place is now more attuned to us, which is probably a little bit of both."

 

"So, what do we do now?"

 

"He said for you to imagine the elevators were repaired. I think at this point, it's actually that simple."

 

"Okay, well, that makes sense, I guess; just like how I made the theater, right?"

 

The changeling closed her eyes and began taking deep breaths as she focused her mind and creative energies on the task at hand, attempting to visualize the cables and the buttons and all the other parts-

 

Suddenly one of cardboard 'Out of Order' signs felt down to the carpet; the sound it made was hilariously anti-climactic. Lynn started at the sign for several seconds. "Sooo, is that it? One crummy sign falls down? I was expecting at least a little something more impressive "

 

Just then, the light over the door lit up with a ding, and the doors slid open to reveal a luxuriously decorated elevator car...complete with a gold-framed mirror on the back wall, now fully intact.

 

"Guess our ride's here."

[Tiffany Korta]

 

GM Post

 

"Wadda you want, Fireworks?" Zee sounded slightly miffed at their underwhelming reaction to the lifts arrival "If it helps very complicated metaphysical things are happening underneath this all."

 

Merge, or a Merge the first time she'd done that here, gently led Zee to one side promising to listen to her explanations. The fact that she'd been so quiet whilst at the Hotel suggested how much of a strain this must be.

 

"This is our stop, we can't take the elevator back down to Earth. And remember we're half a world away from them so it might be worth arranging something for when they arrive."

[Heritage]

"Oh, that's right; I keep forgetting we're big phonies."

 

"Poseurs."

 

"Imposters." Lynn grinned at this silly little exchange, and was there a hit of a smile from Gretchen as well? Somehow things got terribly awkward, as this was the sort of goodbye no one ever prepared you for, because it didn't really come up very often. "Well, I guess this is goodbye for now."

 

"'See you on the other side, Ray.'" But then the young barista's face grew serious, and she had to look at her feet. "Seriously, thanks for coming to get me. I don't know anyone else who would do that for me."

 

"Oh, no problem, y'know? Any time-"

 

And then Gretchen grabbed her in a fierce and unexpected hug, which left the changeling speechless. Finally the young musician abruptly let her go, wiped her yes (were there tears?) and clomped into the elevator, never looking back. Lynn could only watch and shake her head in confusion.

 

"She is the oddest girl..."

Edited May 2, 2017 by Heritage

[Tiffany Korta]

Merge had been pretty quiet for most of there traipsing around the hotel, apart from a few snippy remarks here and there. It was taking a lot of concentration to be in some many places at once at such distances. Plus every now and then she got these brief flashes of the others thoughts, it was slightly disconcerting to a head only use to the one set of multiple thoughts. This must be a little what it was like to be a telepath.

 

“I'll go with Gretchen back down to Freedom, just so we know it all worked out okay. We don't want to get lost all over again!" 

 

One of the Merge's entered the elevator beside Gretchen, whilst the other was still standing beside the others.

 

“Before we go back do we want to say our goodbyes?"

[Heritage]

Gretchen looked up from her spot in the corner of the elevator and scowled. "I already said my goodbyes. Let's just go." She was hunched slightly forward, and seemed very uncomfortable and antsy.

 

"See you back home, Gretch," Lynn said while offering a crisp salute. "We'll all laugh about this someday...or, y'know, go into group therapy or something."