Happy Box Hater
Dream
The walls, floor, even ceiling, all were mirrors. Alice ran through the halls, trying to find her way out of the maze. Every mirror showed a different version of her, some just having different colored eyes and others having differences in age and size. She felt as if they were all watching her, comparing themselves to her. She ran faster.
The reflections were everywhere now, a kaleidoscope of Alice. Alice started screaming but matching screams echoed back from every reflection. After running for what felt like hours, she finally made her way into a room that was different. The mirrors were still there, but instead of variations of her own image, every mirror showed a girl she did not recognize. Alice definitely would have remembered someone with red eyes.
Every one of the girl's reflections held up an ornate hand mirror towards Alice. The image in it was Alice, but it just looked... objectively perfect. Like an unattainable ideal version of herself. Suddenly, echoing from every wall, the mysterious girl spoke "You could have become this. You could still become this. Strive for it.".
Alice wanted to speak, to argue, but the world started melting away into nothingness.
Newbury, Sickles Residence
Alice woke up, like normal, two minutes before her alarm. While there was no need for alarms during the summer, she was a creature of habit and found comfort in her routine. She woke up very early for a few reasons, the most immediate being so that she wouldn't run late if she needed to put a particularly vivid dream in her journal. 10 minutes later, she had put down everything she could remember from the dream.
Finally getting out of her bed, Alice started going about her routine. After her morning shower, she threw on whatever clothes she had set aside last night. She never cared too much about what she wore since her coat would cover it up anyways.
As she was about to leave the room, she noticed something on the floor next to her bed that gave her pause. A mirror, a dead-ringer for the one she sketched in her dream journal, was lying glass-up. Alice tentatively picked it up and looked into it with bated breath. She relaxed when she saw a perfectly normal reflection of herself, as opposed to the blinding perfection in her dream. This definitely wasn't in her room last night, though. Alice religiously kept her room clean, and would have noticed this. Still, her rumbling stomach called her attention to breakfast so she brought the hand mirror down to the kitchen for further examination.
It seemed like her parents had already left for their respective jobs. This was a relief, as she didn't want to have to try and explain why she was carrying such an ornate hand mirror around. As she munched on some cereal, Alice started examining the object. The glass was perfectly clear and the handle seemed to be made out of mahogany, though she wasn't positive about that.
Either way, Alice was ready to head out to Central Park 2 hours later. She put on her black coat, tucked the mirror into one of the larger pockets, and headed out. She lived fairly close to the park and arrived 10 minutes later and headed towards where she heard a magic show was going to take place. Alice enjoyed things like that and was planning to watch from a corner.
Why is a yam attacking me?
With that hopefully out of the way, she said to her "Yeah, I was just walking over there myself! Wanted to get good seats, and all." She somehow doubted there'd be that many people, even if Newbury was a lot bigger than Victoria. "I like doing local things like this, and...I'm new here, so, it's nice to see these kinds of things." Much to her internal consternation, she just had to mention how new she was in every sentence she said to strangers.
Oh well, not like she could hear these thoughts. She was still holding her up, so she might want to keep it brief...or, just go along with her, right? "If you're in a hurry, I can just run with you there. Talk while we do it, too, 'cause I'd like to hear some things about this town from a local."
feeling blue
So she really was coming to her show, it was nice to meet up with someone from the audience like that, but as she herself said, Adrianna kinda had to get to the theatre quickly. The offer she made to go with her was a bit surprising, but it made Adri smile no less.
"Well, the show is going to take a while to start still, I just have to get there earlier since I need to get everything set up." She brought a hand to her chin as she began to think about it, "If you don't mind waiting, I guess there's no problems with you coming with me, I do like to meet new people." She smiled warmly at her before having an idea. "And as welcome gift from myself..."
Adrianna then reached behind the new girl's ear and then seemingly pulled out some sort of a ticket from there and handed it to her.
"You can have this. It's a front row ticket so that guarantees you'll be getting a good seat, just show it to somebody from the theatre staff and you're all set."
edited 21st Oct '16 12:45:23 PM by FullMoon
Agent of Task Force X
Ivory Motel -> Central Park
"Don't freak out, Charlotte." By this point, Charlotte was staring in the bathroom mirror again, her jacket on, everything she needed in her pockets, but her stress levels still high as ever. "Don't freak out. No one's gonna see the tattoo. We'll figure this out. Mom and Dad aren't gonna kill y—" Her voice, already trembling, broke right there. For a moment, she was on the verge of tears. But then a strange feeling, not quite icy, not quite hot, started coming through. It started in her chest, spreading rapidly throughout her body, until finally she slammed her fist on the sink counter. It hurt, and she drew a sharp breath, but as she shook the pain out of her fingers, a wry smile came over her face.
She looked her reflection in the eyes again. "C'mon, man...you're Charlotte freakin' Rain. You're a fighter. You're an asskicker. You're a beast. The Beast, actually. There's a reason people call you that. You brought that state fencing championship home for Chambers High. You knocked the big man on campus on his ass, right in front of all his boys on the football team. And you're gonna win this tournament, and you're gonna have our whole dojo drinking Cheerwine and blasting Petey Pablo like this city's never seen before. And there is no way in Hell a little tattoo that, for all you know, you might sweat off while you're training is going to stop you."
As she stepped back from the mirror, now feeling considerably more pumped up, the dream came back to her. The girl's words suddenly seemed resonant, like they begged to be repeated.
"That's it!" said Charlotte, pointing at herself in the mirror. "That's how you do it! The hell with that hot summer! Ice up, Charlotte! Ice up!"
As soon as she said those last two words, she felt the temperature of the air around her drop. Before she could try to run, strong winds and chunks of black ice surrounded her on all sides. She closed her eyes and put her arms up to try to shield her face, staying rooted to the spot util the second the roaring in her ears stopped. Finally, she lowered her arms, opened her eyes, and—
"What the fuck?!" Apparently, "ice up" was now a literal turn of phrase, because the ice from that storm had now coalesced into a jewels on a leather mask, a suit of armor and a sword, the hilt of which she could see sticking out above her right shoulder. Her eyes, now a bright blue, matched the color of the scratch design on one cheek of the mask. "Ice down! Ice down!" Whatever that was supposed to mean, it didn't make anything undo itself. Her instincts told her there was only one solution: run. She bolted for the door, slamming it behind her, nearly causing it to come off its hinges. Thankfully, it didn't.
The Ivory Motel was the type of place where you got to your room from an outside balcony, rather than an indoor hallway. Ideally, Charlotte would have walked over to the stairs and taken those down to the parking lot at street level. Instead, in her panic, Charlotte barreled over the railing and crash-landed into a parking space that, mere seconds earlier, was occupied by an SUV. The driver, who was just pulling out, hit the brakes as soon as he heard Charlotte hit the ground, and started honking the horn in his confusion. The noise only overwhelmed her further, and she scrambled to her feet and took off in a random direction, screaming obscenities all the way, not noticing or caring that she was somehow not hurt at all by her ten-foot descent.
Her aimless panic kept going all the way to Central Park, just a few blocks away from the motel. Charlotte was so caught up in her flight instinct that she didn't notice she was directly headed for two girls about her age, one of whom was holding out a ticket to the other. If nobody moved out of the way in time, one or both of the girls was about to get run over.
Whoa-ho! BANG! BANGBANGBANG! BANGBANGBANGBANG! Vandalize me, Daddy
Now that that was out of the way, she turned around said "So, you got a show to catch, right? Le-" wait hold on a second.
It didn't even register for a few seconds, but that thing's hand had just nonchalantly appeared out of thin air from right behind her. Right in front of a complete stranger. Somehow, his appearance felt completely natural for a brief moment, like it was as mundane of an action as taking out her phone. Heather froze completely as she looked down at her shadow, slowly moving her gaze up back to Adrianne as she tried to come up with any way to rationalize that.
There was absolutely nothing coming to mind on explaining her unwanted servant's existence, so she tried to brush it as coolly as possible. "Y-Y-Yes, l-l-l-lets just g-g-go," she said to Adrianne, her knees about to buckle.
As lucky as you could call this impending situation, the sudden appearance of a girl in black armor managed to provide an easy escape to this situation! Of course, having the luck she usually had, the sudden appearance of a girl in black armor managed to scare her enough so that she was rooted in place.
Even LUCKIER for her, just continuing a never ending chain of luck that would plague her for all of eternity, T.D.M. suddenly appeared out of thin air right in front of her, ready to body block the charging knight-girl with a shout of "FEAR NOT! I WILL PROTECT YOU!"
edited 21st Oct '16 7:11:50 PM by wikkit
That's just how it is on this bitch of an earth
Central Park
"Well no one got hurt, so it's probably fine.." Caitlyn notices Velita starting to back into her. She almost instinctively moves out of the way, but manages to stop herself and instead gently lays her hands on Velita's shoulders. "Oh, uh, you might want to stop for a second.."
off the shits
Bona-Fide Mastah
Central Park
The blind girl squeaks again, feeling the pressure on her shoulders. The pressure from her forehead returns as well, but she doesn't pay it any mind at the moment.
"S...Sorry!" She goes bright red. "Aaaaah, I swear I'm more attentive than this!"
The little girl spotted the tree but she couldn't see the squirrels. Did she need glasses or something?
"The squirrels. Can't you see them?"
That didn't make any sense, they were plain as day for Al. Even if they were pretty far away. "They are right there" As she extended her arm to point to the tree, as if that were to make it any clearer, a white flower suddenly blossomed over her hand.
"What the fuck?"
Al examined her hand and wiggled her fingers, trying to make sense of the situation. Maybe it had fallen from somewhere? Unlikely. She started to enter into a panic attack and had a hard time breathing normally when the flower withered away and a piece of bark replaced it, covering her right arm completely. She tried desperately to take it off but it didn't budge.
"It's not coming off!" she cried, still trying to force her arm out of the layer of wood.
Just another guy
Aki I Crossroads I Flower Lady
"Ehhh? Squirrels? I don't see any...," stated the girl, unable to see what she meant by that. Then, a most peculiar thing is happening in front of her: the girl that she bumped into had a flowers sprouting from her arms.
Huh? Was that a magic trick? Obviously enough, she stared at it with awe.
"Woooow... so cool! How'd you do that?!" the girl said in wonderment, before the lady(she really need to ask for her name) tried to take off the strange bark that the flower had left behind. Huh. She wondered where it goes?
Seeing her newfound acquaintance's predicament though, Aki was quick to offer her assistance to make up for the previous incident!
"Here, let me help!" Should there be nothing stopping her, she would try to grab a hold of said bark and tries to help the stranger to remove it from her.
"A post per day keeps the GMs away!"
As Rosalie watched the blind girl move out of her way and almost blunder into another girl who happened to be standing nearby, she again questioned if she should be out by herself. The girl did say she was more attentive than that, but somehow Rosalie found that difficult to believe.
Since the other girl who was there looked like she had a good handle on the situation, she wanted to just hop back on her skateboard and keep going. Yet, treating this whole situation as someone else's problem seemed a little mean. The blind girl was...well, blind. Shouldn't she at least make sure she wasn't going to hurt herself?
Furthermore, here were two girls around her age. She might very well have a chance to make some new friends here, and didn't she want to do that? On the other hand, both of them were noticeably older than she was. She'd probably just be a third wheel, since she probably didn't know as much as they did. Then again, if she kept running from these opportunities, she wasn't ever going to get over her shyness.
In any event, she should probably do something. Right now she was just standing there awkwardly. In the end, she opted to settle for a compromise.
"...You, um...might want to...um...probably...." she started, "...Maybe.... Um...."
She stopped and shook her head. This was a terrible idea. Why was she doing this?
"...Um...Are...are you sure you're all right...? I, um.... I'm a little worried you might hurt yourself?"
Icon by Civvi the Civilian!
Bona-Fide Mastah
Central Park
Velita's ears twitch at her being addressed. She tilts her head. "Really? I've done this walk and such loads before. I mean, there's usually not people skating down this path and..." she tilts her head... "It's a skateboard...right?"
Her headache intensifies, she lets out a muffled grunt.
The girl was actually amazed by the flower that suddenly grew over Al's hand but when it was clear that Allison didn't know what was going on and the bark of her arm started spreading, she tried to help.
The wood didn't budge at all and continued growing past her shoulder but the little girl's insistence apparently annoyed it and the growth enveloped Al's entire body. She was now sporting a reddish wood armor. Al looked down at herself in panic and started running in circles hoping to somehow escape from her own armor.
"Aaah! You only made it worse!"
That's just how it is on this bitch of an earth
Central Park
"No need to be sorry, just be more careful next time." Caitlyn seems concerned about Velita too. Regardless of whether she was usually more attentive, she seemed pretty flustered now..
"I agree with her-" -Gesture to Roselie- "- Are you going to be okay?"
When Velita grunts, she frowns a little. "Is there something wrong?"
edited 21st Oct '16 10:16:18 PM by Daydre
off the shits
feeling blue
Seeing how happy she was with the gift, Adrianna got a big smile on her face... And then she saw some sort of gauntlet come out of the ground and put the ticket on her pocket and suddenly things got really weird. Adrianna's expression became one of confusion as she raised her eyebrow at the girl.
To further complicate things someone was apparently rushing towards them and all of sudden some big black thing showed up out of nowhere yelling that it would protect them.
"What the...?" said Adrianna, at moments like these there wasn't really much else that could be said when you still have no clue about what's happening.
"Yeah, it's a skateboard...." Rosalie replied, "I...I haven't been living here that long, so, um.... Am I not supposed to...?"
Then she trailed off and fell silent, before starting to twiddle her fingers nervously. Apparently there was a little more going on with the blind girl than she realized, which was even concerning. Was that her fault? If so, how was she going to make up for it? Even if it wasn't, what could she do? Anything?
She had so much regret right now. She should have just said "Be careful next time" and kept moving.
Icon by Civvi the Civilian!
Just another guy
Aki I Crossroads I From Bad to AWESOME
"Whooa..." said Aki as she stared at her newfound friend's transformation, awestruck. Where once, she was feeling worried, now curiosity and wonders got the better of her at this sudden turn of events.
"COOL!" she exclaimed, loudly, before attempting to tackle the what she sees now as an awesome looking warrior. "Hey! Hey, hey, hey! Are you, like, some kind of magic samurai knight, lady?! Or is that some kind of neat cosplay trick?!" So awestruck was she that she didn't appear to register Al's frantic running around and the fact that she's voicing confusion and very troubled by it.
"A post per day keeps the GMs away!"
Bona-Fide Mastah
Central Park
"I've...had this headache...since this morning..." Her face scrunches up. "It...really...hurts...!"
All at once the pressure releases, and, like a computer screen popping on, her world becomes a blur of blue and red lines. S He blinks.
"H...Huh...?"
Everything was fuzzy, that was no good. Now was the time for focus! One last glance at the stands to where her father was seated in the stands next to a girl in a white dress watching as Alyssa aimed her bow at the target downrange, a few adjustments for distance, a deep breath as the bow was drawn, and-
-Thock!-
The arrow struck the bullseye, was there ever any doubt the great Robin Hood would miss? Alyssa chuckled at the television screen, of course there wasn't, but that didn't stop the nine year old girl from excitedly pointing that out to her father. Sadly the movie was already over and now the news was on with the red eyed weather girl pointing out a rainstorm coming in to the area. Boring, why did grownups have to watch the news all the time? There was never anything good on it. Alyssa turned from the broadcast to look once more to the hospital staff in hopes that they'd be coming to tell her she could visit her father. But the faceless people were busy, as expected. She sighed in frustration.
"It's alright"
Alyssa turned to see the girl with the white dress and red eyes was being wheeled past her by another faceless staff member, time seemed to slow as she actually noticed the girl for the first time.
"You won't have to worry about him for long"
Those words created a pressure on Alyssa's chest as she tried to determine what exactly that meant
Everything was blurry as Alyssa started to wake and her brain worked on the process of remembering how consciousness worked. The world came into focus starting with two bright blue eyes only inches away from her face
"Wah!"
Suddenly very awake the girl bolted upright, accidentally catapulting the white and black rabbit that had been on her chest off of her to land with a squeak at the end of her bed. ...Wait. When did they get a pet rabbit?
"Uhm... Sorry?"
"Nh, that was mean"
"Ah!"
After squirming on it's back for a moment the bunny hops up onto it's hind legs and puts it's front paws on it's hips to make a confident and surprisingly bipedial pose for a rabbit.
"My name's Poko, and I'm here to help you!"
Alyssa just stared for several moments at the sight of "Poko" talking. The only movement being a wiggle of his ears and nose.
That's just how it is on this bitch of an earth
Central Park
"!!" Caitlyn's frown deepens. What should she do in this situation? She wanted to help, but- Oh, the other girl looks like she's doing better..
off the shits
The little girl continued being amazed by was happening in front of her eyes and even asked Al about the nature of her armor but Al could barely make out what she was saying because she was too busy losing her head.
"You are not helping!" she said violently opening her arms to show her exasperation. As she did so, she accidentally hit a tree near her and instinctively tried to take it away but she couldn't. She had used so much strength that, yes...
"And now I'm stuck"
The blind girl appeared to be in serious pain, and Rosalie had no clue what to do for her. She was fairly sure she was taught first aid, but she hardly remembered any of it right now, and she didn't know if it'd even work for someone with a headache. Making matters worse, it didn't seem the other girl didn't know what to either.
Then, just as suddenly, she seemed to have gotten better, though she seemed awfully confused by something. At this point, Rosalie was thoroughly lost.
"I...um...Are you okay now?" she asked, "Because if-if you don't need more help, I...um...I'll probably go now...."
The Darkmaster's sudden appearance and booming voice coupled with Charlotte's currently intimidating appearance and frantic pace were enough to thoroughly spook the other people who happened to be nearby. Some just screamed and ran, others backed away slowly, and a few others just stood there rooted to the spot.
One man, a twenty-something Caucasian with black hair and beard dressed casually, took one look at the gathering, then at the cup of coffee he was holding. Then he popped the lid off and dumped the rest of it out.
"I knew I should have cut back; it's starting to make me see shit," he said before promptly running away himself.
Icon by Civvi the Civilian!
Bona-Fide Mastah
Central Park
Velita seemingly doesn't hear the other girl. She's busy waving a hand in front of her own face. Then looking at Rosalie...then Caitlyn...then the ground...then the sky...and the everything! She begins shaking. "I...It's all...blurry now..." she says, a quiver in her voice, "I...I can see...? But...how...?!"
Just another guy
Aki I Crossroads I You're A Tree, Harry Allie!
Wow, her arms are even stuck to a tree! How did she fused with it? No, more importantly, she's stuck! And nothing Aki did can get her out of there!
"Umm... wait, wait, I got this!"
You know what they say. If you can't do it, get more people to do it for you! .... or something along those lines, but the point stand!
"Just stay put, I'll try to call out for help!" Maybe she could get someone from the park to help them out. Yes, that's it! "Don't worry, I'll be back later!" And with that, she dashes off.
If she were to listen closely after a few seconds, she would barely hear the same girl's voice from a distance...
Aki I Streets -> Central Park
"Heeeey!" she calls out to the street, searching for anyone as she dashes to the roads.
"A friend of mine needs help! Her arm is stuck to the tree!" Hopefully, there's someone nearby that might be willing to listen to her and help her out. She continues saying this out loud in-between intervals, until either she found someone that can offer to help her along the way or reached the park, where there's many many people there and someone is bound to lend a helping hand.
edited 22nd Oct '16 2:53:35 PM by JustSomeGuy732
"A post per day keeps the GMs away!"
A while later finds Alyssa dressed in a summery T-shirt, jeans and a backpack that wiggles occasionally as she walks down the street.
"Hey, you didn't tell me where we're going!"
"We're going to the park. Now stop talking so loud!"
"Pyu..."
The wriggling in the bag settles as Alyssa turns away from it to look where she's going again, silently glad that for the moment the sidewalk is fairly empty so there wasn't much risk of people watching her talk to her backpack.
"I'm gonna go find my friend, okay? She likes walking around the park"
"Ooh, new friend?"
The bag bounces and Alyssa shakes her head as she continues walking until she finally spots Velita, with a few other girls and picks up her pace "Hey Vel," She calls to announce her presence to the blind girl, then notices she seems to be looking at her hand? "Are you okay?"
As Adrianna dashed through the park she began stopping as she saw another girl in front of her who seemed to randomly spin around as if she was looking for someone. She was really paranoid or there was something Adrianna didn't quite get about the scene. However, the girl soon turned back and started talking to her. Oh geeze, she recognized her even in the sorry state she found herself at the moment, that wasn't a very good way to make a first impression now was it?
"Hello! That's me, yes," she said, waving at the girl, but for some reason she couldn't shake the feeling that there was something off about her that she wasn't being able to notice, "are you coming to my show?" she calmly asked, before opening her water bottle and drinking a little from it.