View source for 2021-06-22: In Which Layna Is Ready To Fight At Any Moment, And Lanval Seeks Any Shred Of Happiness, Whilst This Dream Is No Doubt A Cage Of Fear And Reason

*'''Log: In Which Layna Is Ready To Fight At Any Moment, And Lanval Seeks Any Shred Of Happiness, Whilst This Dream Is No Doubt A Cage Of Fear And Reason'''
*'''Cast:''' [[Character :: Magilou]], [[Character :: Yue Rohay]], [[Character :: Seraph Lanval]], [[Character :: Citan Uzuki]], [[Character :: Layna Manydays]] 
*'''Where:''' Elw Dreamscape
*'''Date:''' 2021-06-22
*'''Summary''': ''In which our players gather for the finest illusion available to any mortal souls: their very own dreams.''

----
 DG: A party led by Magilou is now entering Elw Teleporters - Dreaming.
 DG: Party formation is now over. An Entry Challenge will now be drawn and displayed to the party.

 ========================<* Elw Teleporters - Dreaming *>========================
 ======================<* CHALLENGE - Dreaming Together *>=======================
 |Type: Entry       |Dungeon Ability: Wits      |Challenge Rating: 1          |
 ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >---------------------------
  OOC: If you haven't read +dungeon/info, it is strongly suggested you do so
  now.
 
  Your dreams this night have been eerie and unsettling. Perhaps that is not
  so unusual; perhaps having dreams at all is unsettling. You dream of your
  past; you dream of a world turned grey, colorless, and indistinct bursts of
  static. And then, you dream of an expanse. You are there, now -- a long,
  misty expanse over a grey plain.
 
  You call out -- and are answered. Others are here, too. As you get closer, a
  light appears in the distance... and that provides a guide to leave this
  place.
 
  The memories of those who came before await.
 =Dungeon Conditions: Bad Luck=================================================

 <Pose Tracker> Magilou has posed.
<poem>                            Press <u>/\</u> to view skits!

    "Miss Magilou, I don't know if I trust this inn..."

    "Oh, don't be such a scaredy-Normin. What are they going to do, kill us in our sleep and take all our money?"

    "UM, YES???"

    "Then it's a good thing I enchanted the doorknob to turn into a dove!"

    "You're just saying that so I'll go to sleep..."

    "Sure am! Nighty-night!"

    z~z~z~z~z

    "... ugh, how droll."

    That's what the young woman in holy white robes says, as she realises just how her dream is going. She slumps over herself, with a deep and most tortured sigh, before she straightens up.

    "Well, we can't have ''this.'' It's old news."

    And with a twirl and a sparkle, "''MAGIKAZAM!''", she's a woman in a jester's outfit again, all hot pink and midnight blue and loud, loud, LOUD against the grey.

    "Really," Magilou rolls her eyes, "you'd think ruminating would get old after the first three hundred years or so. Bo-ring!"

    A hand to her hip, and she lifts her other, to frame the expanse of featureless grey fog. "But is it just me, or is this a shade more... yup!" She agrees with herself, as she unhinges one of the books from her book skirt (Magilou has a book skirt) to flick through it. "This is definitely different."

    She snaps the book shut, and pops it back on her belt, pointing fingerguns to the sky.

    "Magikazam!"

    And all a sudden, this grey square of nothing at all has in the sky above Magilou a ''giant glowing dove.''

</poem>
 DG: Magilou has used her Tool Mayvin's Accounts toward her party's challenge, Dreaming Together.

 <Pose Tracker> Yue Rohay has posed.
<poem>
    Have you ever had one of those dreams where you're splendid and amazing and everyone loves you and life's just going peachy-keen and absolutely nothing could go wrong and there's triple rainbows in the sky?

    No? Oh, neither has Yue.

    No, Yue's just a big wet blanket anywhere she goes, including her own dreams, and others' dreams, and weird shared dream-spaces. Dreamslices? Is this a timeslice? Are they just renting space here?

    She's in a JAIL CELL, and the walls are made of BROKEN PROMISES and the bars are tempered with SELF-LOATHING because I know some authors who use subtext and they're all cowards.

    Even in her dream, she's in her ratty, scruffy old black coat which is just the player HUD for her mental health and still has her shackles, which actually look more enormous and restricting than they do in real life.

    "Ugh," Yue groans as she lifts her head. She looks around, and looks to Magilou in the distance. And the giant glowing dove. "Again...?"

    She gets up out of her prison cot and does that 2D-3D gag where she just walks sideways out of her prison because there's no walls on the side, apparently.

    "I don't... recognise you. Usually I only dream of people I feel guilty about."
</poem>

 DG: Yue Rohay has contributed a Wits Basic Action toward her party's challenge, Dreaming Together.

 <Pose Tracker> Seraph Lanval has posed.
<poem>    Lanval doesn't really dream so much, anymore. He has a few things to stew over in his usual communions with the Water of Filgaia itself, a process that takes his consciousness and comprehension of the world around him into a scope that transcends the personal in scale - a process that is jarring and an alien sensation to describe to anyone who encompasses only a singular consciousness (such as, technically speaking, himself).

     Then there is a giant dove in the ill-defined but extant margins of the metaphysical water-communion, and this is exactly as... filled with ellipses as it sounds. It is the day that the concept of water itself can up and go... 'what'

     Which compels the Water Seraph, currently in a slightly more 'true' form as this amorphous spherical ball of light, to travel across the gulf of scale of comprehension chasing the sight and sensation of something that really ought not be there, pass through emotional stimuli that have no frame or context until he is able to transition his comprehension back down to a more personal scale, and turn out to have the exact same feelings in watching a giant dove flap in the skybox of shared dream reality.

     "Mmmmmph," comes Lanval, who forms into the metaphorical 'person' projection of that heavy-set, bearded man. "Shomeone mighta jusht turned the concept of water inta a birdbath."

     He says this with ''immense gravity''.
</poem>

 DG: Seraph Lanval has contributed a Wits Basic Action toward his party's challenge, Dreaming Together.

 <Pose Tracker> Citan Uzuki has posed.
<poem>
    One would think that Doctor Uzuki would be able to sleep soundly after all that has happened. After all, Citan always seems possessed of an particular inner calm even in the most dire of situations. Now that he's reunited with his family, with any apparent threats to him and those with which he is immediately concerned but on the horizon, surely...

    But not all is as it seems. As above, so below: there is no peace to be found in the world or in the man.

    Sleep has so far eluded him this night in Shevat. It's at the point at which he has given up on it entirely and contemplated rising to retreat to the library before long instead that...

    ...Sometimes the things we seek are only found when we stop looking for them.

    Even in his dreams he's dressed as if it were just any day. His gaze turned up towards a gray sky in a world that extends into the grey, he is silent for a long moment.

    "...I see," he remarks at last. "So I did fall asleep. I cannot help but be a little bit disappointed," he sighs, shaking his head as he turns towards the others. "I had thought I might get ahead on my reading... Well, then again, I am certain my 'future self' would vociferously disagree with that decision. Perhaps it is for the best? ...Hmm. This seems to be an unusual dream already," he continues. "I do not think that... ah, no, Lanval? And the young lady from the audience from the Queen? Still! I wonder why I am not dreaming about my family..." he muses, turning his head to regard the light on the horizon. For a moment he regards that, as well.

    And then pulls out his camera and attempts to get a better look at it through the lens.
</poem>

 DG: Citan Uzuki has used his Tool Strauss Camera toward his party's challenge, Dreaming Together.

 <Pose Tracker> Layna Manydays has posed.
<poem>When Layna dreams, it is usually of the sea. Vast oceans, mysterious islands, and even more mysterious inhabitants. In her dreams, she can visit them all.

And so it is, that the others might be witness to a curious sight. Breaking up the misty grey expanse in a distant, calm sea, it's waves carrying something forward. A small boat, a boat in which a certain pirate reclines, leaned back with her arms folded beneath her with her eyes shut. She isn't asleep - moreso just enjoying the rocking sensation of the waves.

Soon enough, the waves deposit Layna's boat nearby the others, at which point they recede back into the misty expanse. Layna opens her eyes and sits up, looking around at everyone.

"...Oh, so it's gonna be one of ''those'' dreams." She says, before stepping out of the boat. "Ahoy there, lads and lasses."

She says this with a sweeping, flourishing bow.

"What kind of situation have we caught ourselves up in this time?" She asks with a grin.
</poem>

 DG: Layna Manydays has contributed a Wits Basic Action toward her party's challenge, Dreaming Together.

 ========================<* Elw Teleporters - Dreaming *>========================
 ======================<* CHALLENGE - Dreaming Together *>=======================
 |Type: Entry       |Dungeon Ability: Wits      |Challenge Rating: 1          |
 ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >---------------------------
  OOC: If you haven't read +dungeon/info, it is strongly suggested you do so
  now.
 
  Your dreams this night have been eerie and unsettling. Perhaps that is not
  so unusual; perhaps having dreams at all is unsettling. You dream of your
  past; you dream of a world turned grey, colorless, and indistinct bursts of
  static. And then, you dream of an expanse. You are there, now -- a long,
  misty expanse over a grey plain.
 
  You call out -- and are answered. Others are here, too. As you get closer, a
  light appears in the distance... and that provides a guide to leave this
  place.
 
  The memories of those who came before await.
 =Dungeon Conditions: Bad Luck=================================================

 ===================<* Elw Teleporters - Dreaming - Round 1 *>===================
 ========================< Results - Dreaming Together >=========================
 Player                               Exhaustion                      Pass/Fail
 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Magilou                             0 --(5)--> 5                   Pass
 Mayvin's Accounts                   2   Wits    Effects: Enlighten
 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Yue Rohay                           0 --(5)--> 5                   Pass
 Investigate                         0   Wits    Effects: BASIC
 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Seraph Lanval                       0 --(5)--> 5                   Pass
 Investigate                         0   Wits    Effects: BASIC
 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Layna Manydays                      0 --(5)--> 5                   Pass
 Investigate                         0   Wits    Effects: BASIC
 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Citan Uzuki                         0 --(5)--> 5                   Pass
 Strauss Camera                      3   Wits    Effects: Fanfare
 -----------------------------------< Party >------------------------------------
 Leader: Magilou                     0 --(20)--> 20                 Pass
 Conditions: Bad Luck(2)
 Effects: Enlighten(1)
 ===============================< Dream Chasers >================================

 DG: The party led by Magilou has passed this challenge! The party gained 20 exploration! If anyone needs to use party
 management commands, do so now. Otherwise, the next round's GM may begin the next round with +dungeon/draw.

 <Pose Tracker> Magilou has posed.
<poem>
    Magilou isn't entirely sure what she ''expects'' in lighting up the drudgery with a dove. Yue isn't on that list, but she looks plenty enthused to see her, anyway, waving a broad hand over her head.

    "Oh, hey! Bracelet girl! You were at that sniper's big throwdown, right?" Those STILL aren't a fashion choice, Magilou, are you just being mean on purpose???&#42;

    &#42;the answer is always yes

    Bienfu isn't here, but that's not so strange, really; they have a profound personal connection, but Bienfu can't fix her nightmares just like that. Strangely, there ''is'' one Seraph in attendance, glowy light wisp slouching in and becoming a big, broad fellow. "Huuuh," Magilou says, peering at him quizzically, as if...

    "Boy!" She settles back on her heels, with a cheerful grin. "If the concept of water is a birdbath, that must mean the dove holding the world is having a wash!"

    Magilou, there is no dove holding the world. Magilou, you're making that up. Magilou, stop that.

    Lanval's insights about birdbaths may well hold water, though, because some of that featureless grey expanse starts shifting like water -- and in comes a boat. "Heeey!" Magilou grins, as a boat floats in and renders unto them a pirate. "You wouldn't happen to be sailing under a curse, would you? All the best adventures happen under a curse."

    She flourishes with her hands, and declares: "This situation... is totally normal! We're having a normal time!"

    A beat, and she looks back to Layna. "Wait, did you say..."

    It just so happens that there's also a totally normal guy, coming in with a totally normal take. Magilou, who is no stranger to lucid dreaming and figured it out pretty much immediately, gasps in obvious surprise. "Whoa! You both think so?!" A hand to her chest, as she gapes to Citan and Layna. "We're really ''dreaming?'' And we ''know'' we're dreaming? So everything here is fake, and nothing matters? You're blowing my mind here, old man!" Magilou is orders of magnitude older than Citan, but never mind that.

    Magilou points, theatrically. "I, the magnificent witch Magilou, must get to the bottom of this at once! Onwards, dream troupe!!" No one here consented to being part of your dream troupe, Magilou.

    Meanwhile, in the distance, Citan's camera may well reveal the first hints of...

</poem>
 DG: Magilou has drawn a new Challenge.

 ========================<* Elw Teleporters - Dreaming *>========================
 ===========<* CHALLENGE - Lord of Calamity - The Consuming Flames *>============
 |Type: Exploration |Dungeon Ability: Brute     |Challenge Rating: 2          |
 ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >---------------------------
  You awake again. You know, in an instant, that it is a dream. The people
  that you have journeyed with are here. It is a wooden home, with a style
  remniscent of Glenwood and Meribia. Paintings are on the wall, with fine
  adornments on the walls and nightstands. However, the heat is most
  oppressive.
 
  Flames lick from under the door. There is a reddish glow to the whole of the
  room, a terrifying light that presents a simple fact: this house is aflame.
  You hear screams from below, a woman and a child. There is a massive, loud
  CRASH--
 
  --and the screams cease. You feel your heart shudder, remembered pain and
  sorrow swelling. But the desperation to flee is there, and more powerful.
  The only way out is a barred window, an iron grate covering it. It is hot to
  the touch. But if you can break free... then you may escape.
 =Dungeon Conditions: Weaken, Tire=============================================

 <Pose Tracker> Magilou has posed.
<poem>
    ... fire! The camera captures ''fire.'' And in the flash of the bulb, suddenly, everything shifts --

    And all a sudden it is all roasty-toasty hot, and precisely as horrifying as that phrase isn't. The house, of course, is on fire; tragically, these sorts of houses are made pretty much entirely from wood, and wood is astoundingly good at one thing in particular.

    "Well," Magilou remarks, brightly, "looks like we're on fire."

    Yes, that is what wood is good at, thank you, Magilou.

    The smoke is building. Smoke rises, and there are rooms below, which means they're all up high. Soon enough, the building heat outside and below, prickle-sweat on pale skin, won't matter much to anyone at all, because smoke inhalation will get everyone long before that.

    People are screaming, until they aren't. Magilou sighs, and sits herself heavily down on the nightstand, knocking a fine ornament to the floor. "This sucked," she remarks, kicking a heel.

    "You can probably get out through there," she thumbs a gesture to the barred window, "if that's your thing."

    It's apparently not Magilou's thing, though. She picks up a portrait of some people who don't matter, and fiddles with it while Rome burns.

</poem>
 DG: Magilou has contributed a Brute Basic Action toward her party's challenge, Lord of Calamity - The Consuming Flames.

 <Pose Tracker> Yue Rohay has posed.
<poem>
    Lanval's here too, though she doesn't quite comprehend him right nowa s a spherical ball of light but somehow... perhaps, since it's dream logic, she just kind of 'knows' that it's him. Because there certainly is some measure of guilt coming out of her.

    Magilou asks if she's the girl in the sniper brawl. A few blinks of the eye. "Oh, yeah. ... it was a real busy time, so it didn't come to me right away."

    A long-haired man with a camera appears too. She doesn't recognise him, but he seems to recognise Lanval and the book-skirt witch with the dove. ...

    The Queen?

    Icy, rent-free terror and attraction fills Yue's mind again. But she's able to shake her head enough to instead see melted ice -- waters, a boat. Layna.

    Even focused as she is on water, though, it's not enough for her to not blink and then see--

    Fire.

    Specifically, it's a building on fire. Fire licks underneath the door, the room turns red, the heat is here and oppressive--

    Yue's somewhere else, all of a sudden. Her hands underneath her gloves, her fingers in specific, are twitching severely. They hurt. They hurt so much. Her flesh is melting, her nerves are a rhapsody of screams, her brain is shutting down at the sight of seeing red-white ''bone''--

    They're leaving her. A second time.

    "Don't leave me," she blurts out of nowhere, eyes a million miles -- and five thousand years -- away.
</poem>

 DG: Yue Rohay has contributed a Brute Basic Action toward her party's challenge, Lord of Calamity - The Consuming
 Flames.

 <Pose Tracker> Layna Manydays has posed.
<poem>"I don't ''think'' I'm cursed... but I guess if you think about it, the curse is in the eye of the beholder, aye?" Layna replies with a chuckle, looking toward Magilou.

Everything is fake and nothing matters, huh...? Layna chuckles at that, too.

"Maybe so... might as well have fun with it then, aye?" She suggests.

Though the dreamscape around them sure doesn't seem to like that idea, as it isn't before long that the world is set ablaze. They're in a wooden home, surrounded by screams... until they're not.

Layna frowns. A part of her wonders when that kind of thing started having less of an effect on her. Maybe, hopefully, it's just because she knows this is just a dream. But before she can wonder anything further, Yue suddenly speaks. Layna studies her for a moment.

...'Don't leave me.' That's a difficult request to ignore.

"...Hey, it's okay, we're not gonna leave you here." Layna says. "Dream or not, anyone tries and I'll hunt 'em down myself."

With that said, Layna extends a hand.

"Just hold on and stay close, aye? We're finding a way out of here. I don't fancy staying here longer than we need to." She says. Whether Yue accepts the offer or not, Layna will then draw out an arm-mounted drill with the other hand before looking for the closest point of weakness and going to work.
</poem>

 DG: Layna Manydays has used her Tool Arm-Mounted Drill toward her party's challenge, Lord of Calamity - The Consuming
 Flames.

 <Pose Tracker> Citan Uzuki has posed.
<poem>
    "The last thing I recall is that I had been attempting and failing to fall asleep," Citan replies, smiling genially. "Therefore, I believe it would not be terribly far off to assume that this, now, is my dream?"

    He is awfully calm and collected for a guy who is asleep, though. Is he just a natural lucid dreamer, or...?

    "Well, I would not say that it 'does not matter', precisely," Citan remarks, toying with his spectacles. "A dream itself is not real, but it is built, according to the scholars, on the foundations of what is. Perhaps what we see in our dreams are those things that are important to us, or which concern us in the waking world? ...Though, I do wonder what 'meaning' this may have. ...Ah, I see," he says to Magilou at last, when she comments on his apparent age. "Well, it is true that I am not getting any younger..."

    He sighs, and shakes his head, turning his attention to his camera.

    "A... fire?" he murmurs, squinting through the lens. "How strange. Is that a fire then in the distance--"

    Everything changes. This is a literal house on fire, the room filling rapidly with smoke. "What in the world--" Citan gets out, covering his face with his sleeved forearm. Everything is burning. He can see flame licking under the door.

    And then there's the scream from below, a shared scream that cuts out suddenly.

    A woman and child.
    The lurch in his chest is not just an artifact of the dreamscape in which he's been dropped. The mind is an irrational thing. As ridiculous as it is, even if he ''knows'' this is a dream, even if he ''knows'' that the ones who had cried out are beyond help, he fills in the gaps on his own.

    And even so, as always, he does the only rational thing he can.

    Approaching the barred window, he has what seems to be a small book in his hands; he thumbs the edges of the pages as if they were a talisman.

    "...It is only a dream."

    And he drives a single finger for a particular point by the edge of the window.
</poem>

 DG: Citan Uzuki has used his Tool Acupressure Guide toward his party's challenge, Lord of Calamity - The Consuming
 Flames.

 <Pose Tracker> Seraph Lanval has posed.
<poem>    Here on the boat, the Water Seraph sees a flippant witch ask about whether or not one might be sailing under a curse, at which Lanval shakes his head slowly. Still... lots of people here are familiar, in their own way. He's guessing it's just going to be one of those times again, weird as they are. "Mmmm. whatever shmall joy there ish, well," he puts on a little cat-like smile even if he's still a little freaked out over the existential scale-breaking birdbath. That might be a particular sensation and memory he's never going to let go of for the rest of his many, many days.

     When the scene changes, he's sitting up in bed. Fire, smoke, screaming, then crashing, then less screaming - and there's horror and danger in one's feelings all around (well, almost all around. Hi there, you know who.)

     While Layna consoles Yue who seems to be going through her own personal horror, he takes note of how Magilou seems to be going over a portrait of some people even when there's this large drive to get out, survive, hurry.

     He tries, however much he can fight against sensations so powerful and so true within the context of whoever's dream this must have been, to conjure water to quell the flames that might break through unto here best he can to give her a little more time.

     As if wondering, given what he just said, this might be the source of a small joy for someone who... simply does not seem to radiate strong feelings one way or the other.
</poem>

 DG: Seraph Lanval has contributed a Brute Basic Action toward his party's challenge, Lord of Calamity - The Consuming
 Flames.

 ========================<* Elw Teleporters - Dreaming *>========================
 ===========<* CHALLENGE - Lord of Calamity - The Consuming Flames *>============
 |Type: Exploration |Dungeon Ability: Brute     |Challenge Rating: 2          |
 ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >---------------------------
  You awake again. You know, in an instant, that it is a dream. The people
  that you have journeyed with are here. It is a wooden home, with a style
  remniscent of Glenwood and Meribia. Paintings are on the wall, with fine
  adornments on the walls and nightstands. However, the heat is most
  oppressive.
 
  Flames lick from under the door. There is a reddish glow to the whole of the
  room, a terrifying light that presents a simple fact: this house is aflame.
  You hear screams from below, a woman and a child. There is a massive, loud
  CRASH--
 
  --and the screams cease. You feel your heart shudder, remembered pain and
  sorrow swelling. But the desperation to flee is there, and more powerful.
  The only way out is a barred window, an iron grate covering it. It is hot to
  the touch. But if you can break free... then you may escape.
 =Dungeon Conditions: Weaken, Tire=============================================

 ===================<* Elw Teleporters - Dreaming - Round 2 *>===================
 =============< Results - Lord of Calamity - The Consuming Flames >==============
 Player                               Exhaustion                      Pass/Fail
 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Magilou                             5 --(16)--> 21                 Fail
 Force                               0   Brute   Effects: BASIC
 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Yue Rohay                           5 --(8)--> 13                  Pass
 Force                               0   Brute   Effects: BASIC
 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Seraph Lanval                       5 --(16)--> 21                 Fail
 Force                               0   Brute   Effects: BASIC
 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Layna Manydays                      5 --(8)--> 13                  Pass
 Arm-Mounted Drill                   3   Brute   Effects: Fanfare
 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Citan Uzuki                         5 --(16)--> 21                 Fail
 Acupressure Guide                   2   Brute   Effects: Strengthen
 -----------------------------------< Party >------------------------------------
 Leader: Magilou                     20 --(20)--> 40                Pass
 Conditions: Bad Luck(1)|Tire(2)|Weaken(2)
 Effects: Strengthen(1)
 ===============================< Dream Chasers >================================

 DG: The party led by Magilou has passed this challenge! The party gained 20 exploration! If anyone needs to use party
 management commands, do so now. Otherwise, the next round's GM may begin the next round with +dungeon/draw.

 <Pose Tracker> Magilou has posed.
<poem>
    "That's okay! I forgot about you, too!" Magilou forms a heart with her hands, and shortly thereafter breaks it. Eternal enmity...?!

    No, it doesn't look like she cares that much.

    Though, she does point finger-guns, to Layna. "Oh no, you'd know if you had ''this'' curse. I'm talking ''mega-cursed.'' But hey, no one's been that cursed for hundreds of years, so I think you're safe." Imagine a world where dragons make people safer! This is the world of piracy. What a glorious world it is.

    "If it's about our concerns, then a grey mass of nothing is totally right," Magilou agrees. "I'm not worried about anything at all!" Why would she mention she's on her way back to Shevat, with a bad feeling she can't quite shake, to search through their libraries for some hint of a clue?

    But maybe bad feelings are endemic to dreams, because here's a nightmare.

    Magilou is dour, as Yue blurts out her pain, fingers tracing the edges of the portrait. "Plead all you like," she says, shrugging broadly, tossing the picture carelessly to the hot ground. Such a dismissive reassurance must surely sound cruel.

    There is a question one could ask, of course, as to WHY Magilou is so carefree in the face of burning death, WHY Magilou would insist everything is fake and nothing matters, WHY Magilou isn't even trying to save herself. It's an interesting portrait in learned helplessness and inevitability.

    It's about getting the illusion over and done with.

    In that instant her morose gaze meets Lanval's, and the tips of her lips twitch in what might be a smile, or a grimace, or a snarl. It's a... something.

    (On the inside, there's no real construction as to WHAT the expression is, insomuch as it is a command to form an expression, period.)

    Citan, struck by the horrors of woman and child, may well find that his acupressure strike hits precisely the wrong joint of wood; this may be a dream, but the logic, it seems, doesn't obey his guidebook, as much as it ought to. Lanval's water serves to -- amuse??? -- Magilou, but cannot overcome the memories of pain. Magilou does nothing to save anyone, least of all herself.

    But Layna, at least, reaching out with her words, seems to strike on the correct sequence: ''drilling her way out of the problem.'' With the sheer force only a pirate can muster, she breaks the bars of the jail, and perhaps with that opening --

    Yue can make sure they won't leave her, after all.

</poem>
 DG: Yue Rohay has drawn a new Challenge.

 =======================<* Elw Teleporters - Dreaming *>=======================
 ==============<* CHALLENGE - Boomerang - The Blood of Valeria *>==============
 |Type: Exploration |Dungeon Ability: Combat    |Challenge Rating: 1          |
 --------------------------< Challenge Information: >--------------------------
  The streets of an Aquvian city are aflame. The city is impossible to
  recognize; one lost long ago, though the mountains look like ones visible
  from Aquvy. You walk forward through it -- and there may be great alarm, as
  Metal Beasts look to you for approval. Then, they lope ahead.
 
  They are cut down in a moment, as a single slash of a saber hacks through
  them. A man with long, dark steel-blue hair steps forward. Harthcourt
  Valeria looks younger than the paintings of him showed; he also has two
  eyes, not one. Did he not lose one in a battle with some great champion?
  Such as--
 
  "I have heard of you," he says. "Boomerang, they call you. I name you an
  honorless cur--and I will strike you down!"
 
  Saber drawn, Harthcourt Valeria leaps for you, and seeks to draw blood in an
  instant.
 =Dungeon Conditions: Reckless, Exhaust========================================

 <Pose Tracker> Yue Rohay has posed.
<poem>
    Yue doesn't really know where she is right now. Her mind is replaying the details, more than the rest of her: A prison, different than the one she's usually stored in, the screams of other inmates, a desperate attempt to break down a door to escape the blaze; a desperate attempt to keep the fire ''out'', on the other end, as cots are thrown one ontop of another.

    The extremely loud sound of a metallic behemoth, just outside, visible at the barred windows.

    ''Plead all you like,'' someone says, and her heart automatically finishes:

    ... But no one will come for you.

    Then Layna's words cut in. She stares at her, a little more lucid; she doesn't quite succeed in touching her hand.

    Her hands are fire, right now, after all.

    "Y-yes," Yue murmurs. She vaguely hears the sound of a drill. She vaguely hears the sound of water splashing through the fire; their fire. She vaguely hears Citan's own murmur.

    They escape, and there's ''STILL'' fire. A city is aflame. The only positive aspect is that they are surrounded by good (?) boys: Metal Beasts, who look at the group for approval.

    Then, they lope ahead, but HORROR! They are cut down by some jerk (?) with blue hair and a saber. Yue has no idea who he is. She also has no idea why he's calling her a boomer.

    He jumps and attacks the group! But--

    A FRIEND WILL COME

    --a giant cartoon mitt erupts out of the ground, preventing Yue's untimely bisection.

    Then, the rest of Friend-shaped Golem comes out. With two cute beady yellow eyes, and a kettle-shaped body of bronze, here she comes!

    It's Big Shal...
</poem>

 DG: Yue Rohay has used her Tool An Old Golem Core toward her party's challenge, Boomerang - The Blood of Valeria.

 <Pose Tracker> Magilou has posed.
<poem>
    Oh, good. Yue knows her cue. It's so tiresome having to say it over and over again, isn't it? Actors. They never learn their lines!

    Meanwhile, the actor called Magilou yaaaawns, throwing her hands over her head, as they escape into another hellscape entirely. She's now seated on a slab of rubble; she was always on a slab of rubble. "Boy," she remarks, cheerfully, looking over to the Metal Beasts, "Filgaia has ''weird'' ideas about what a dog is. Go on! Who's a weird dog? Who's a weird dog? It's you! Yes you are! Yes you --" All a sudden her baby-talking of those dogs is cut brutally short, and so are they.

    Magilou looks ''utterly devastated,'' jaw agape, as some guy who she would definitely know about if this were Lunar strides in. "NOOOO! Not Weird Spot! Weird Rover, Weird Lassie! You were so young! I mean," Magilou stops, and pauses, finger to her lips, "I don't know how I would've ''told'' if they were, but they weren't rusted or anything, sooo..."

    Oh yeah, and also: he has a sword. But there's one of those weird robots on the field, so everything is fine, probably.

    Magilou settles back on her seat, and pulls out a deck of cards. "Hey, old man! Come over here, I'll tell your fortune." Magilou, there is a man with a sword ''right there.'' Regardless, Magilou has a tarot deck and an utter lack of fear of death.

    She shuffles the deck and fans it, holding it out to him. "Pick a card, any card, and slap it down right there." That used to be a cross-section of a building before someone blew it up. Apparently it's a card table now.

    Meanwhile, completely coincidentally, an entire roast chicken falls from a burning window in front of someone. It's delicious. Probably.

</poem>
 DG: Magilou has used her Tool Fortunetelling - Trickery toward her party's challenge, Boomerang - The Blood of Valeria.

 <Pose Tracker> Citan Uzuki has posed.
<poem>
    It should have worked.

    But this is a dream, and logic is distorted. His mind is unfocused, his thoughts very much elsewhere.

    Regardless, where he fails, others persevere. The window is opened, providing an escape from the flames.

    Or at least, from these flames. Beyond the burning building, it seems the whole city is on fire. "This is not... no, this is not Adelhyde." Or Luca, or any other city he's had the opportunity to see burn.

    But there are Metal Beasts in the streets. Oddly, as he regards them, he doesn't find them troubling. In fact, they seem familiar, somehow. Friendly, even.

    Some uneasy thought stirs at the back of his mind. About how they're approaching the city, perhaps. Or maybe just about--

    The advance of that man, who lays low the beasts, clinches it for him. "So we are the invaders," he remarks quietly, watching the man with the sword as he advances on Yue.

    He'd realized it already, after all. He's been the invading force before in another's city, and there is a certain undeniable similarity. Perhaps in the end all cities crumble alike, from the view of the conquerer.

    Magilou calls out to him then, asking him to come over there and draw a card. "This does not precisely seem like the time," he remarks, glancing back at the melee underway, but he reaches out for one otherwise.

    After all, this is a dream.

    "...Hmm, 'The Magician'," he remarks, eyeing the card he's drawn. "Interesting. So, what would you say is the meaning of this card?"
</poem>

 DG: Citan Uzuki has contributed a Combat Basic Action toward his party's challenge, Boomerang - The Blood of Valeria.

 <Pose Tracker> Layna Manydays has posed.
<poem>Yue doesn't quite succeed, but that's fine - Layna will just keep close. They tear through the wall of reality, and suddenly, they're dealing with something she's ''much'' more comfortable with.

It's a raging battlefield! And suddenly, there's a man - Harthcourt Valeria, who cuts through their Metal Beast allies and challenges them.

Layna chuckles, and a grin spreads across her face. The previous vision was a bit difficult... but this? ''This'' she can have fun with.

"Honorless cur, he says! That's music to my ears - sing my praises more!" Layna replies to Harthcourt Valeria with a laugh. "Alright then - come at me, ''hero''!"

She dives into battle, charging Harthcourt with the aim of punching him right in the face.
</poem>

 DG: Layna Manydays has contributed a Combat Basic Action toward her party's challenge, Boomerang - The Blood of Valeria.

 <Pose Tracker> Seraph Lanval has posed.
<poem>    Lanval sees that little twitch of Magilou's lips, and that's all he's going to get as the negative emotions of the original dreamer wash about him as hot and intense as the flames they experienced in their memories - and that sense of heat doesn't leave, coming to a city under siege where there's a sudden uptick in interest and excitement to the arrival of a truly worthy opponent.

     There is some laughter in the air over on Layna's end of it, and while the sight is no less harrowing... there comes a friend for ''someone''. Lanval does the only thing he can do - try and sequester off the surrounding area in a stream of sanctified water, which is only a gesture at best - but it does try and impart a sense that what's going on now, is all that 'they' need to worry about.

     Whatever small joy this is.
</poem>

 DG: Seraph Lanval has used his Tool Holy Bottle toward his party's challenge, Boomerang - The Blood of Valeria.

 =======================<* Elw Teleporters - Dreaming *>=======================
 ==============<* CHALLENGE - Boomerang - The Blood of Valeria *>==============
 |Type: Exploration |Dungeon Ability: Combat    |Challenge Rating: 1          |
 --------------------------< Challenge Information: >--------------------------
  The streets of an Aquvian city are aflame. The city is impossible to
  recognize; one lost long ago, though the mountains look like ones visible
  from Aquvy. You walk forward through it -- and there may be great alarm, as
  Metal Beasts look to you for approval. Then, they lope ahead.
 
  They are cut down in a moment, as a single slash of a saber hacks through
  them. A man with long, dark steel-blue hair steps forward. Harthcourt
  Valeria looks younger than the paintings of him showed; he also has two
  eyes, not one. Did he not lose one in a battle with some great champion?
  Such as--
 
  "I have heard of you," he says. "Boomerang, they call you. I name you an
  honorless cur--and I will strike you down!"
 
  Saber drawn, Harthcourt Valeria leaps for you, and seeks to draw blood in an
  instant.
 =Dungeon Conditions: Reckless, Exhaust========================================

 ==================<* Elw Teleporters - Dreaming - Round 3 *>==================
 ================< Results - Boomerang - The Blood of Valeria >================
 Player                               Exhaustion                      Pass/Fail
 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Magilou                             21 --(8)--> 29                 Pass
 Fortunetelling - Trickery           2   Combat  Effects: Resilient
 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Yue Rohay                           13 --(8)--> 21                 Pass
 An Old Golem Core                   3   Combat  Effects: Fanfare
 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Seraph Lanval                       21 --(8)--> 29                 Pass
 Holy Bottle                         2   Combat  Effects: Resilient
 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Layna Manydays                      13 --(8)--> 21                 Pass
 Fight                               0   Combat  Effects: BASIC
 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Citan Uzuki                         21 --(24)--> 45                Fail
 Fight                               0   Combat  Effects: BASIC
 ----------------------------------< Party >-----------------------------------
 Leader: Magilou                     40 --(20)--> 60                Pass
 Conditions: Exhaust(1)|Reckless(2)|Tire(1)|Weaken(1)
 Effects: Resilient(1)
 ==============================< Dream Chasers >===============================

 DG: The party led by Magilou has passed this challenge! The party gained 20 exploration! If anyone needs to use party
 management commands, do so now. Otherwise, the next round's GM may begin the next round with +dungeon/draw.

 <Pose Tracker> Yue Rohay has posed.
<poem>
    Magilou confirms through her actions that yes, you can pet the dog in this Dig, which makes this Dig qualify for that one twitter account--

    But then dog is immediately murderererered, which is a shock and horror and awful tragedy for everyone involved and confirms that this is truly indeed a nightmare.

    Then, fortune-telling. The Magician? What does it mean? Maybe Citan already knows. He tends to know things. Knowing things is 'his thing', as they say, hoh hoh, Doctor Uzuki!

    The town continues to crumble. A chicken crumbles, even, delicious and roasted. Then, the ''hero'' meets a true honorless cur, a real scallywag, they call her, the dread cut-lass of the seas!! The mistress of the Ruby Empress, Layna Manydays!

    Then she proves once and for all that Rock beats Scissors as she punches him right in the face. Who cares about swords.

    Yue's still obsessed about the fire, it seems. It's really doing a number on her, and her hands haven't stopped twitching. But Lanval's protection is -- even if it might not be intentional -- helping, even if...

    Even if ice has its barbs just as deep in her as fire does.

    ... water's a comfy medium between the two, though.

    Big Shal helps once more as she summons all her power to suddenly make the screen shrink into a round wipe, leans out of it, gives a BIG THUMBS UP and a message in art deco says:

    == THAT'S ALL, FOLKS! ==

    The wipe leads to the next scene transition, which is...?!
</poem>

 DG: Citan Uzuki has drawn a new Challenge.

 ========================<* Elw Teleporters - Dreaming *>========================
 =================<* CHALLENGE - Krelian - Light Up the Skies *>=================
 |Type: Exploration |Dungeon Ability: Combat    |Challenge Rating: 2          |
 ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >---------------------------
  When you come to, you are inside the cockpit of a Gear. Perhaps it is your
  own; perhaps it is another. Whatever the case, the Gear that you are inside
  has taken to the skies, and the roar of its engine fills your ears. A
  brilliant blue sky stretches outside of the main monitor of your Gear, and
  below, you can see islands of northern Aquvy -- though with far less
  desertification.
 
  In the sky, ahead of you, are dozens and dozens of Solarian Gears. White and
  glorious, they streak forward, ahead of two aerial battleships -- and a
  crack-/BOOM/ of an airship's cannon thunders past. A cry comes out, from one
  of your squadmates:
 
  "Commander Krelian!" the young woman says. "Are we to engage?"
 
  You have little choice. The Solarian Gears sweep into your squadron. Blades
  clash; rifles fire. The midair battle is brutal and intense, over skies
  familiar and alien at the same time. But carving your way through the
  Solarian Gears is the only way forward.
 =Dungeon Conditions: Wound, Injure============================================

 <Pose Tracker> Citan Uzuki has posed.
<poem>
    Just how familiar is the good doctor with tarot decks (particularly those of Lunarian extraction?) anyway? Perhaps that is a story for another time (or at least a few moments from now).

    For, while he's off playing card games with Magilou, the matter of the hero of the city they're in is handily (ha) settled--

    And for the rest of them, the playing field goes fleetingly black.

    He knows where they are by the smell of it, before he even opens his eyes. It's the cockpit of a Gear.

    A Shevite Gear, unless he's gravely missed his mark. Fighting against Solaris Gears...?

    "Ah," he murmurs. "I see." This part of the dream makes a little more sense to him. This must be the part of his mind that--

    Wait. Those are not even remotely the most recent models, he realizes. He hasn't seen anything quite as old as those Solarian Gears outside of a... is this because of what Queen Zephyr was speaking of? The war, five hundred years ago?

    'Commander Krelian!' comes the voice of the woman over the communications system, and it is some solace that no one will quite see the look on his face at the mention of ''that'' particular name.

    Perhaps his error is in attempting to force any sort of meaning or structure on what he's dreaming in the first place.

    And they're still in the middle of a massive battle. Pulling back on the throttles, he urges his machine forward, attempting to get a better view of the fighting.
    Because Citan has gotten far too old to just rush in, like he would have once done.
</poem>

 DG: Citan Uzuki has contributed a Combat Basic Action toward his party's challenge, Krelian - Light Up the Skies.

 <Pose Tracker> Magilou has posed.
<poem>
    "If this wasn't the time, don't you think I would have predicted that?" Magilou asks, ignoring entirely the fact that she hasn't predicted anything yet. Luckily, Citan takes the bait anyway.

    "The Magician! Mister Big Actor, taking the stage," Magilou grins, flourishing jazzhands to the card. "This guy gets stuff ''done!'' He'd never flinch, so he'll never fail! Thaaat's the Magician," Magilou sums it up, settling back on the rubble. "The only question is, do you know what you want?"

    She tucks the card back in the deck, shuffles it, and pops it away (one of those books on her skirt is apparently hollow, and good for storing things). She jerks a thumb back towards Harthcourt Valeria, entirely too casually. "Because ''these'' guys sure do. That's the energy of the room."

    Why would Magilou introduce some excuse as to why a card of such power wouldn't describe Citan himself..?

    Well, he does seem TERRIBLY normal.

    Glancing back, Magilou asides to him: "Hey, do you think the cute pirate girl is single?" She might be doing this entirely to make Citan, with his incredible dad energy, uncomfortable. Buried in her joking around might be some legitimate admiration of Layna's approach, though. Maybe.

    Sadly, Magilou doesn't get to make many more Magilou comments. Amazingly, that's because of Big Shal's cartoon powers. One can hear Magilou, in the background, applauding wildly. There may even be a "''WHOOP!''" How is she even aware of what the camera is seeing?

    Witches don't tell their secrets, silly.

    Anyway, here's a Gear. Magilou has never had a Gear, not in all her thousand-or-so years of life. If you want an ancient trickster with Gear technology, Marivel is in aisle six.

    And so, here in this approximation of a Gear, Krellianica -- nope, dead wrong, it's just Magilou -- hovers in the sky in her magnificent mecha:

                         M E C H A M E G A B I E N F U

    Is this what happens when Bienfu makes friends with Chu-Chus? The world may never know.

    "Of course you should engage!!" Magilou yells, except no one can hear her, because Magilou hasn't turned on the radio. There are a good five beats of silence before she figures that out. "Ehhhh..." Magilou looks down at all the buttons, making the most impressive face, which, again, isn't communicated in the slightest.

    "Magikazam!" Magilou decides, after a moment, pointing at the cockpit with dual finger-guns, and leaving it all up to fate.

    In the air, M E C H A M E G A B I E N F U gains a set of spectacular wings.

    This does nothing to help the battle, but it looks very impressive.

</poem>
 DG: Magilou has contributed a Combat Basic Action toward her party's challenge, Krelian - Light Up the Skies.

 <Pose Tracker> Yue Rohay has posed.
<poem>
    Yue's going to probably scream into a pillow when she wakes up and this is all done and just call in sick because fresh from the fire is the ''other'' least favorite place she'd like to be in.

    She's in--

    An all too entirely familiar cockpit. The only bastion of Zeboim culture left to her. It's entirely disorienting. Why is she back in the Aura? No, this isn't the Aura she knows --

    It's in pristine condition, a condition it hasn't known for literal millennia. The multitudes of fatal error messages, the annoying beep that's been stuck for fifty seven years now, none of those defects are there.

    And--

    &lt;Alarm Message. Three signals coming at Range-1, Solarian Model 'Aegisknight R' confirmed!&gt;

    A familiar AI is onboard, possibly doing all the work because Yue's just sitting here being too stunned to do any work.

    The name Krelian means nothing to her. Fortunately, she doesn't have to see Citan make a reaction to it, but she does get to see--

    M E C H A M E G A B I E N F U

    It's incredible. Yue grits her teeth. Her hands-- her hands are still--

    "... Run, Melos," is her only command.

    &lt;Roger.&gt;

    A bright blue flash erupts in streaks, chaotically dancing as lightning would; then, where the blue Veruni gear once hovers--

    --it's now racing across the battlefield, as a blue comet would. It has one singular purpose:

    Ram ''straight'' into any fool in its path and shred them.
</poem>

 DG: Yue Rohay has used her Tool An Old Golem Core toward her party's challenge, Krelian - Light Up the Skies.

 <Pose Tracker> Seraph Lanval has posed.
<poem>    SOON

     In a cockpit, filled with delicate and unfamiliar systems, colors, lights... it is a feast of ''information'', parsed through the fuzzy image editing filter of painful memory, being beamed directly to those who have a highly variable amount of ideas as to what or how any of it is.

     "...Commander!" A young woman's voice. "Are we to engage?"

     There are snoring sounds - and then the sound of something shorting out.

     (ancient top-end Gears of war - never proofed against someone passing out drunk in the cockpit and drooling)
</poem>

 DG: Seraph Lanval has used his Tool Holy Bottle toward his party's challenge, Krelian - Light Up the Skies.

 ========================<* Elw Teleporters - Dreaming *>========================
 =================<* CHALLENGE - Krelian - Light Up the Skies *>=================
 |Type: Exploration |Dungeon Ability: Combat    |Challenge Rating: 2          |
 ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >---------------------------
  When you come to, you are inside the cockpit of a Gear. Perhaps it is your
  own; perhaps it is another. Whatever the case, the Gear that you are inside
  has taken to the skies, and the roar of its engine fills your ears. A
  brilliant blue sky stretches outside of the main monitor of your Gear, and
  below, you can see islands of northern Aquvy -- though with far less
  desertification.
 
  In the sky, ahead of you, are dozens and dozens of Solarian Gears. White and
  glorious, they streak forward, ahead of two aerial battleships -- and a
  crack-/BOOM/ of an airship's cannon thunders past. A cry comes out, from one
  of your squadmates:
 
  "Commander Krelian!" the young woman says. "Are we to engage?"
 
  You have little choice. The Solarian Gears sweep into your squadron. Blades
  clash; rifles fire. The midair battle is brutal and intense, over skies
  familiar and alien at the same time. But carving your way through the
  Solarian Gears is the only way forward.
 =Dungeon Conditions: Wound, Injure============================================

 <Pose Tracker> Layna Manydays has posed.
<poem>Getting to play the villain can be cathartic, sometimes. It's fun to be able to just cut loose, and if there's anything Layna enjoys, it's cutting loose. 'Restraint' isn't really in her dictionary.

...But before long, the battle around them fades, and they find themselves in a different situation. A battlefield in the air from the cockpit of Gears. Layna herself is in her own - the VALS-4 Corsair, a massive red machine with gold trim. It's also very bulky and doesn't look aerodynamic in the least! Nor does it have a flight engine of any kind.

Layna is notably ignoring that little detail. This is a dream world, if she starts thinking too deeply then reality might ensue and that's the last thing she wants.

Are they to engage? There's only one answer to that.

"Hell yeah!" Layna replies. She pushes the Corsair forward, the machine drawing the massive anchor from its back as it flies and smashing right through any Gear that gets in her way. Or anywhere near her way, for that matter.
</poem>

 DG: Layna Manydays has contributed a Combat Basic Action toward her party's challenge, Krelian - Light Up the Skies.

 ========================<* Elw Teleporters - Dreaming *>========================
 =================<* CHALLENGE - Krelian - Light Up the Skies *>=================
 |Type: Exploration |Dungeon Ability: Combat    |Challenge Rating: 2          |
 ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >---------------------------
  When you come to, you are inside the cockpit of a Gear. Perhaps it is your
  own; perhaps it is another. Whatever the case, the Gear that you are inside
  has taken to the skies, and the roar of its engine fills your ears. A
  brilliant blue sky stretches outside of the main monitor of your Gear, and
  below, you can see islands of northern Aquvy -- though with far less
  desertification.
 
  In the sky, ahead of you, are dozens and dozens of Solarian Gears. White and
  glorious, they streak forward, ahead of two aerial battleships -- and a
  crack-/BOOM/ of an airship's cannon thunders past. A cry comes out, from one
  of your squadmates:
 
  "Commander Krelian!" the young woman says. "Are we to engage?"
 
  You have little choice. The Solarian Gears sweep into your squadron. Blades
  clash; rifles fire. The midair battle is brutal and intense, over skies
  familiar and alien at the same time. But carving your way through the
  Solarian Gears is the only way forward.
 =Dungeon Conditions: Wound, Injure============================================

 ===================<* Elw Teleporters - Dreaming - Round 4 *>===================
 ===================< Results - Krelian - Light Up the Skies >===================
 Player                               Exhaustion                      Pass/Fail
 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Magilou                             29 --(25)--> 54                Fail
 Fight                               0   Combat  Effects: BASIC
 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Yue Rohay                           21 --(12)--> 33                Pass
 An Old Golem Core                   3   Combat  Effects: Fanfare
 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Seraph Lanval                       29 --(25)--> 54                Fail
 Holy Bottle                         2   Combat  Effects: Resilient
 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Layna Manydays                      21 --(12)--> 33                Pass
 Fight                               0   Combat  Effects: BASIC
 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Citan Uzuki                         45 --(25)--> 70                Fail
 Fight                               0   Combat  Effects: BASIC
 -----------------------------------< Party >------------------------------------
 Leader: Magilou                     60 --(15)--> 75                Fail
 Conditions: Injure(2)|Reckless(1)|Wound(2)
 Effects: Resilient(1)
 ===============================< Dream Chasers >================================

 DG: The party led by Magilou has failed this challenge! The party gained 15 exploration! If anyone needs to use party
 management commands, do so now. Otherwise, the next round's GM may begin the next round with +dungeon/draw.

 <Pose Tracker> Citan Uzuki has posed.
<poem>
    He glances down at the card, looking at the art on its front, then flipping it over briefly to consider the pattern on the back of the card as well. "Hmm, now let me think... I do not know this form of fortune-telling particularly well, I must say," he says, before handing it back towards her. "I do not suppose you would care to enlighten me, miss?"

    She does.

    There may be only the slightest hint of a smile on his face when she finishes her explanation. "I see... so that is how it is. As for myself, I suppose I would not mind having one more peaceful sunny day back at my old house. And you? What is it that you want?" he asks Magilou in turn.

    ...But Magilou will succeed there, at least -- Citan smiles as if pained when she wonders aloud whether or not Layna is single. "I would not know, miss," he says to her, reaching up to rub at the back of his neck for a moment as if he were uncomfortable.

    But then! They're all far away from the burning city, and flung into a firefight in the skies above Filgaia.

    It doesn't... go well. Citan's own Gear takes a devastating blow across the right side, despite his caution. Perhaps there is truly a time for going boldly, regardless of the potential consequences.

    M E C H A M E G A B I E N F U meanwhile cuts an impressive figure in the sky but... well... perhaps is not particularly effective. Lanval in his own Gear continues to fail to respond to his comrade in arm's increasingly frantic hails, but while the Gear doesn't do much of anything except float in the air it also doesn't get hit...?
    Lady Luck at her finest.

    It's Layna's fighting instincts -- and experience -- as well as Yue's own mysterious Gear that see the battle to its very bitter end.

    The fight is won, but at what cost...?

    It will never be certain, for the curtains draw on this particular piece of traum/a, clearing the way for another to take the stage.
</poem>

 DG: Seraph Lanval has drawn a new Challenge.

 ========================<* Elw Teleporters - Dreaming *>========================
 ======================<* CHALLENGE - Gabriel - Betrayal *>======================
 |Type: Final       |Dungeon Ability: Agility   |Challenge Rating: 2          |
 ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >---------------------------
  "Father."
 
  When you come to, you stand inside of a massive facility. Its steel walls
  are purple, with an immense viewport looking down on a fragment of a planet
  that floats amidst the stars. At the center of it is a barrier; outside of
  the barrier is desolation and ruin, but inside is verdant green, blue
  oceans, and white clouds. You look upon this... and bow your head.
 
  The blue-haired woman behind you speaks. "Is it true?" she asks. "Did you...
  did you order them to do this? To your world--to our world, father!?"
 
  You turn -- and then realize that she holds a gun. In the logic of the
  dream, it matters not. She fires her pistol, but a bullet hurtles for each
  of you, to shoot you in the back unless you dodge.
 =Dungeon Conditions: Slow=====================================================

 <Pose Tracker> Seraph Lanval has posed.
<poem>    "Father."

     The skies darken... and find motes of light within the beauty of the night - the stars above. But there is no beauty in one's heart here, looking upon what is beneath one's view - a... fragment of a world? There is a barrier at the center of it, and within it, life seems to exist. Outside of it... not so much. One's head will find themselves bowed in melancholy, as if a cost were far too great.

     "Is it true?" Asks a woman's voice. One with blue hair, going by what's clear of the reflection in one's view. "Did you... did you order them to do this? To your world--to our world, father!?"

     When one turns, they can see in the corner of their eye they'd recognize something that resembles (and is) an ARM. There's only a fraction of a second before it discharges, sending off a bullet towards... everyone, together.

     Lanval has the sensation of falling over before(?) the bullet hits, swept onto his back by a creepy flat-bodied rubber horse that absolutely can be forgiven for being believed to be part of someone's nightmare because LOOK AT IT.

     It doesn't change that the air is without joy or anything to celebrate - only melancholy, guilt, and the sharp sting of imminent betrayal by what one considers their own family. (Nice horrible view, though.)
</poem>

 <Pose Tracker> Magilou has posed.
<poem>
    And you? What is it that you want?

    Magilou never did answer that question. She just evaded it with a question about Layna's availability, instead.

    "Oop," she says, as she finds herself on her feet again. A reflection of blue --

    "Oh, geez."

    That sure is someone putting ''her'' in the shoes of the old man, isn't it? Gross. Fathers are the worst. (Is that why she's been bullying Citan this whole time? How does she even know he's a father?! Questions for later.)

    Magilou looks down at the world, like she's standing on a Star they long forgot; she sighs, fanning out her white-blonde hair behind her. "I never did get that 100 bajillion gald, did I...?"

    Too bad, so sad. Oh, right, and the gun. Also, there's a gun.

    Inconspicously, she puts her back to a railing. "It's not like I don't understand where you're coming from," Magilou says, to the blue-haired girl, "but asking old men to explain themselves never works out." There's a shred of genuine loathing in her voice, as that finger curls around the trigger. "Men ruled by 'Reason'..."

    All a sudden she's not where she was just a second ago, because the back of her skirt has popped up and launched her across the room. Which is a good thing, given the bullets. Magilou lands all in a heap, and doesn't bother getting up. "But what do I care?" She asks, in her pile. "Everything's fake, and nothing matters. Just like I said!"

</poem>
 DG: Magilou has used her Tool Super Pop-Up Book toward her party's challenge, Gabriel - Betrayal.
 DG: Seraph Lanval has used his Tool Bouyant Steed toward his party's challenge, Gabriel - Betrayal.

 <Pose Tracker> Yue Rohay has posed.
<poem>
    Nothing's going to surprise Yue anymore, at this point.

    She sees a world which isn't her own -- which isn't Filgaia. A strange world, surrounded by a barrier. Is this one of the worlds the Veruni inhabited, in their great voyage? Is she seeing one of the dreams of those who left her behind?

    She is questioned.

    A young woman, blue-haired, but in her addled state...

    She might as well be looking at her own. The same sound of betrayed shock; the questioning gravity of someone who's just discovered someone so close has done so much wrong.

    A shot fires out.

    Yue collapses to the ground with a bullet wound at the back of her head. She falls, but she's conscious enough to experience it, the sensation of hot metal racing through her mind, an insensate tear that flashes into white.

    She looks up...

    And sees the mocking figure of one certain Avril Vent Fleur.

    Then... nothing.

    Whatever Yue is, once was, and what she'll be... just ceases to be, lost to the mysteries of time, space and consciousness.
</poem>

 DG: Yue Rohay has contributed a Agility Basic Action toward her party's challenge, Gabriel - Betrayal.

 <Pose Tracker> Layna Manydays has posed.
<poem>It's nice, for a time, to be able to lose herself to the thrill of battle. But all things must end eventually, and soon, she finds herself in a strange place she's never seen before, looking down upon a planet.

A voice calls out to her... calling her 'father'. And accusing her. Layna frowns. ...She's not too happy to be in the shoes of a terrible father either, really.

"...You know, I bet if we met each other for real, we'd get along great." Layna muses to the blue-haired woman who can't hear her. This is a dream, but here, she's someone else. If she were on the other side, she'd be cheering her on...

...But here she reaches into a coat and draws out a bottle, taking a swig as she swerves out of the way of the approaching bullet.
</poem>

 DG: Layna Manydays has used her Tool Quartermaster's Stash toward her party's challenge, Gabriel - Betrayal.

 <Pose Tracker> Citan Uzuki has posed.
<poem>
    'Father.'

    Midori has never spoken a word to him -- or indeed, to anyone, as far as he and his wife are aware -- in her entire life. There's no mistaking the voice of the young woman behind him for his daughter. Nor is there any mistaking the reflection for her.

    This is a dream.

    But hadn't he himself said it, that dreams are built on a foundation of reality?

    That's an entire world below him, he reflects. No. It was a world. He knows without question that he, in the context of this dream, has caused this to happen.

    The young woman, he's realized, has a gun in her hand. "...I see," he murmurs aloud, the first and only thing he's said to his 'dream daughter'.

    'Asking old men to explain themselves never works out', says the woman who had drawn his card.

    Indeed, no.

    If this is where his role will take him, then this would be the final link in fate's chain. Or something very much like it, at least, with someone else's finger easing over the trigger or sliding the blade from its sheathe. That's the way he would want it.

    But the path to the future is still obscured. There is still a chance at alternative outcomes. And so--

    Citan finds that he has a Sphere in his hand. With but a thought the floor is slick with ice. It may make his/their assailant find it difficult to keep her balance. It will almost certainly aid him as he abruptly ducks low at speed, demonstrating if briefly an impressive set of reflexes.
</poem>

 DG: Citan Uzuki has used his Tool Macalania Sphere toward his party's challenge, Gabriel - Betrayal.

 ========================<* Elw Teleporters - Dreaming *>========================
 ======================<* CHALLENGE - Gabriel - Betrayal *>======================
 |Type: Final       |Dungeon Ability: Agility   |Challenge Rating: 2          |
 ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >---------------------------
  "Father."
 
  When you come to, you stand inside of a massive facility. Its steel walls
  are purple, with an immense viewport looking down on a fragment of a planet
  that floats amidst the stars. At the center of it is a barrier; outside of
  the barrier is desolation and ruin, but inside is verdant green, blue
  oceans, and white clouds. You look upon this... and bow your head.
 
  The blue-haired woman behind you speaks. "Is it true?" she asks. "Did you...
  did you order them to do this? To your world--to our world, father!?"
 
  You turn -- and then realize that she holds a gun. In the logic of the
  dream, it matters not. She fires her pistol, but a bullet hurtles for each
  of you, to shoot you in the back unless you dodge.
 =Dungeon Conditions: Slow=====================================================

 ===================<* Elw Teleporters - Dreaming - Round 5 *>===================
 ========================< Results - Gabriel - Betrayal >========================
 Player                               Exhaustion                      Pass/Fail
 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Magilou                             54 --(0)--> 54                 Pass
 Super Pop-Up Book                   4   Agility Effects: None
 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Yue Rohay                           33 --(0)--> 33                 Pass
 Rush                                0   Agility Effects: BASIC
 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Seraph Lanval                       54 --(0)--> 54                 Pass
 Bouyant Steed                       1   Agility Effects: Cleanse
 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Layna Manydays                      33 --(0)--> 33                 Pass
 Quartermaster's Stash               2   Agility Effects: Quicken
 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Citan Uzuki                         70 --(0)--> 70                 Pass
 Macalania Sphere                    3   Agility Effects: Rally
 -----------------------------------< Party >------------------------------------
 Leader: Magilou                     75 --(35)--> 110               Pass
 Conditions: Injure(1)|Slow(2)|Wound(1)
 Effects: Cleanse|Quicken(1)
 ===============================< Dream Chasers >================================

 DG: You have overcome the dungeon's trials! This run is a success!
 DG: The party led by Magilou has successfully explored Elw Teleporters - Dreaming!

 ========================<* Elw Teleporters - Dreaming *>========================
 =====================<* CHALLENGE - What We Leave Behind *>=====================
 |Type: Discovery   |Dungeon Ability: Conclusion|Challenge Rating: 1          |
 ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >---------------------------
  You jerk awake sharply in your bed. You have a cold sweat (if you are able)
  and you look about, the memories of the dreams lingering -- but for one of
  you, a memory comes to you, unbidden. It is an unpleasant memory; a memory
  of strife and struggle. But why does it come to mind now?
 
  OOC: One member of your party can submit a +request with text for a
  challenge. Please make it have a Challenge Rating of 1 or 2, select from any
  of the four Dungeon Abilities, and build an appropriate set of abilities.
  Please also provide the text of the card. Include your character's name in
  the challenge's title.
 
  Staff reserve the right to edit and make changes as needed.
 =Dungeon Conditions: Secret===================================================

 <Pose Tracker> Seraph Lanval has posed.
<poem>    The owner of this dream was wracked with... strong feelings. Was it resignation? That is not how the dreamers act, as though (almost) all of them found some sort of spark, some sort of ''idea'', to not share in the fate - beyond one whose awakening will be rude but not wholly uncommon. One other soul in particular shows her disgust and defiance for the subject even when the dream intends to place her in the role of the subject - a rare leak of emotion, however small.

     Layna casually avoids danger with a drink, while Lanval's horrible flat-bodied horse raft thing slides along below. Citan's reflexes prevent him from seeing what the final link in his chain of fate would bring him, but there is scarce anything more to see within this dreamscape. The shock of what happened to the owner of this memory was as such that one cannot possibly have the full inner calm to keep drifting along in this mixed-up place of subconscious.

     All will awake, some a bit more sharply than others. Some might need tears gently blowed on ^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H

     ...

     All will awake, some a bit more sharply than others. Some will feel a deeply unpleasant memory tug at their mind as they awaken, though... why think of that memory ''now''?

     &#42; dissonant peaceful inn rest jingle &#42;
</poem>

 <Pose Tracker> Magilou has posed.
<poem>
                            Press <u>/\</u> to view skits!

    "Miss Magilou? Miss Magilou!!"

    "HUH BUH WUH,"

    "You were making a really scary face again... did you have a bad dream?"

    "... don't worry about it. All that... it's just Master's parting shot, anyway."

    "Are dreams really that bad..?"

    "Oh, trust me, you'd hate them. I'd haunt you every night!"

    "Huh?! You wouldn't!!"

    "You'd never rest again..!!!"

    "Waaah!"

    "Heh, heh... not to worry, you're safe for now. Though..."

    "What it is, Miss Magilou?"

    "I do hope that if it's as I suspect, they're not the sort to remember their dreams. That could get complicated. Maybe I'd better disabuse them of the notion..."

    "... them?"

    "Eh. It's not anything we have to worry about right now. Get some rest, we've got a lot more ground to cover tomorrow."

</poem>
 <Pose Tracker> Citan Uzuki has posed.
<poem>
    "Uh... wha?"

    No one is entirely themself when shaken awake at some point in the middle of the night. Muzzily, Citan squints up in the semidarkness of their bedroom at Yui.

    "You were having a bad dream," she explains to him, as he sits up in their bed and blinks, attempting to reorient himself in reality. Right. He was having a bad dream, and so she'd awoken him.

    Already, much of it seems to be escaping him, as dreams often do. He tries to fix on a few of the key points before they too are lost. Normally, he wouldn't think too much of it, but there was something about this dream that was... off.

    And Ida had mentioned having a particularly strange dream to him, not too long ago. He'd brushed it off at the time.
    But now he's wondering.

    Swinging his legs over the side of the bed, he reaches for his glasses and stands, aware of Yui's watchful presence from the bed. Then, she speaks, giving voice to something that, knowing her, has been on her mind for days now.

    "You're... leaving again, aren't you."

    "I was thinking about taking a walk," he answers her, knowing that's not what she meant. But he can hear her sigh.

    "No, that isn't what I meant. ...But I already knew. You aren't finished yet, are you..."

    "No," he answers her, sitting heavily on the edge of the bed. "I am sorry."

    He's a long way from being finished here. But then again, with their respective loyalties to things bigger than each other, so are the both of them.

    He reaches over to take her hand, and that will have to do.
</poem>

[[Category:Logs]]
[[Category:Chapter 2]]
[[Category:Chapter 2, Act 3]]