Let's Do the Time Warp (Again)

[applesaucemod]

It's that time again, but time seems to be a bit muddled. As usual, people from all over the multiverse are being drawn into the Dreaming by the rift. This time, in addition to (or sometimes instead of) picking up the residents of Manhattan, they take them from their home universe but from a different point in time. You may find yourself suddenly encountering a future version of yourself, or perhaps you bump into a friend taken from long before you met them.

Tonight's setting is also time-twisted. You're still in Manhattan, but it seems to be closer to the 1930s. Specifically, you're in an old hotel. There's the dimly lit lobby, with chairs and tables for relaxed mingling. The bar, where tables are front of a stage, on which a band is playing various hits of the 30s. There's also an outdoor area if you need fresh air. Or you could explore the hotel, but it's mostly corridors, unless you stumble upon an unlocked room.



[Mod note: Usual dream-party rules apply. Both members and non-members are welcome to use any character, be they already in the game or no.

For game-specific characters, you can choose whether or not they will remember their time in Manhattan if they're taken from the future. You can take your character from multiple different points in time, if you want.]

Comments

[aly_brighteyes]

"It's very good to meet you," Aly says, playing along. She picks through the food with hungry, sticky fingers until she ends on the chipped potatoes. Those, at least, are easy to eat around.

[fucking_ebay]

"Bitch!" Shaken, Peter remains on the counter until she's gone, both seething with impotent anger and quaking with remembered fear. What the hell even was all that? He finally remembers after she's gone that he really might encounter the owners of this hotel if he sticks around too much longer, and slips off the counter to make his exit.

[eighth]

"Lead the way," he answers, getting up again to save time. They can walk and talk. It seemed a bit urgent.

"Why can't you be the telepath? Is it related to the size thing?" he asks curiously. Because he's pretty sure he won't regenerate into something that small.

[wildmage_daine]

Now that she's not alone - and now that she has something that resembles a plan - she feels well enough to pick the sandwich back up and resume pulling it apart into bite-sized pieces. "Whereabouts in Tortall are you from?" she asks, curious to hear about it from someone who's actually grown up there.

[bluesuit_handy]

"It's related to the ish thing," replies Andrew, turning to go -- and not turning his head to look up at the Time Lord, since it's uncomfortable in more than one way. "My name's Andrew, and you're really not meant to know about me yet."

[has_a_horn]

Okay, now he knows who this is. The TARDIS had told him that she had once been trapped in a human body, that it had died around her. This must be that body. The bit about dead TARDISes he doesn't entirely understand, but it's not exactly the most comforting thought, either.

What is clear is that this body can't contain everything that should be running through the TARDISes mind. He reaches out both of his hands to her and sets them on her upper arms, hoping to pull in her focus. "I know a future version of you. I know you, yeah? You make it out of this. The situation and the bod." Belatedly, he remembers that she likes mental comfort, so he tentatively reaches out to her mind as well, giving it the same care he might with a human.

[aly_brighteyes]

"Pirate's Swoop, not too far from Port Legann, but I've family in the capitol as well." Or she will, at least, in the Wild Maige.

[theoldgirl]

Her mind, when he touches it, is completely unstructured and crammed to bursting, it's racing between despair and excitement and confusion and determination without any logical progression from one to the next, it's snatches of the near future and the faraway past mingling almost indiscriminately. But she recognizes his touch, not as something familiar, but as something she wants, something she can hold onto, and quickly reaches out to meet it.

She clings to that point of contact as well as the fabric of his shirt, and moments later the flood of her thoughts calms down a little, becomes more focused on the present again. "Time is fluid," she points out with a tiny sad smile as though she's aware he'd said those exact words to her a while ago, and finally raises her gaze to meet his. The intense urgency has left her bearing for now and there's understanding in her eyes.

"But there is always hope. And I look forward to knowing you, Gabriel," she adds, giving him a small, genuine smile.

[bluesuit_handy]

"It seems to be more traversible in one's sleep," comments Handrew. "Most of us it's pulled through all the way, though. When have you been through one before? Did you go back the way you'd come?"

[spiritofwinter]

"It's a lot more fun to just go where the Wind takes me," agrees Jack, though he doesn't know the full extent of what he's agreeing with.

[theoldgirl]

As with the first time she'd introduced him to these treats, she is very satisfied with herself for having pleased and interested him. His enjoyment of it is entertaining to watch and she takes pride in his compliment.

Which is why his unabashedly arrogant presumption is rather startling. But immediately it strikes her that there's no disrespect behind it, it's pure naivety from a Gabriel who is so young that he hasn't even made any significant experiences with corporeality, let alone the rest of the universe, and she lets out a quite uncharacteristic little giggle at how precious that is.

"No you did not," she chuckles and, noting his longing look at the tarts, sets down the plate in front of him. "Your kind are hardly the only ones with natural abilities such as these. But I think you will learn that in time."

[protectsthenest]

"There are many rifts throughout the nine realms, some of them even leading to and from Asgard. Some allow two way travel and some do not. I gather this one does not?"

[wildmage_daine]

Daine stares down at her hands. She wishes she had family anymore, but she can't honestly begrudge Aly. "They must've been fair worried, when you got took."

[eighth]

The Doctor is taking an awful lot on faith here, and it could very well by a trap, but, whatever. Getting out of traps can be pretty exciting.

And a future version of him with a name? Who is also tiny? Well, okay, if he's not supposed to know about it...

"Right," he answers, trying to think of something he can ask. "Why do you need a telepath?"

[bluesuit_handy]

Good old Eight -- it'll occur to Andrew later that this must be really early days for the Doctor to trust him so fully, or at least to assume that Andrew can't do him serious harm. He does spare a glance upward now, and the earnestness in his face might help to reassure the Doctor a little. "There's something wrong with a friend of mine -- I think she thinks she's an animal right now, and she's gone and hurt herself. None of it should have an effect when she wakes up, but...."

But he doesn't exactly enjoy seeing Daine hurt and confused.

[bluesuit_handy]

"Nine?" Andrew's caught off guard by his new acquaintance actually being sure of a number of 'realms.' He frowns and shakes his head. "Not that anyone's discovered. This rift seems to pull from any number of universes -- some very similar to this one, others not."

[has_a_horn]

He's not entirely pleased that she seems to be laughing at him, after what he figures was an entirely logical assumption on his part. She had said she knew he was good with illusions, hadn't she?

He raises an eyebrow at her, for now foregoing eating another tart. "And what else will I learn in time? I've met pagan gods. They're no match for an archangel." By which he means that he hasn't seen evidence yet of what she's telling him.

[aly_brighteyes]

"If all goes well, they're not going to be worrying for too long." It's been two weeks. It'll take the same amount of time to get on a ship back. She'll be all right.

"And to think, I'll even be coming back with a new friend."

[theoldgirl]

Ah, perhaps that was just a little impolite of her. She suddenly realizes he doesn't yet have any reason to feel particularly friendly towards her, and that she does have a bit of an unfair advantage, knowing him when he doesn't know her, so she quickly schools her features into something more appropriate and kind.

"I don't know what experiences you will make, but I think you will find out that there are things beyond what you know now, that the universe is stranger and more exciting than you may be expecting." She smiles, hoping to appear enticing rather than patronizing. "You didn't seem terribly surprised by my abilities when we first met, only delighted."

It is pretty interesting to hear there's more than just his god, that more than one set of beliefs can coexist and be real in his world, and that he's more powerful than them despite not being a god himself. But she'll refrain from giving into her curiosity until she's on his good side again.

[wildmage_daine]

That earns Aly a little smile. Daine's never really had friends near her own age (or two-legger friends at all, to be honest). Folk in Snowsdale used to keep their children away from her.

"I'll have to find the Pack, though," she remembers. "They'll wonder where I've gone, and I don't want them getting hurt looking for me."

[aly_brighteyes]

"Of course only...I don't know about you, but I'm not sure this is where either of us was." She doesn't stop eating, even as her stomach turns a little. It's more and better than what she's had in weeks.

[has_a_horn]

"This...hotel. The dream space. Both." He was wondering if perhaps Topher had been tapped in his own mind, and that's what had kept him in this communal space.

[has_a_horn]

His mouth presses into a firm line for a moment, while he fights the urge to tell her that she couldn't possibly know more than him. His universe is empty but for the heavenly dimension, earth, hell, and all points in between. It seems so wrong that there would even need to be more than that in any universe.

Still, she had said she is a space and time ship. How strange. He can barely imagine such a thing.

In the end, he submits to her statement by reaching forward for another tart. "I can only hope that you're right." He takes a bite of the dessert, lets out a pleased exhalation. "I imagine I have quite a lot of new experiences waiting for me now." Ones he's not particularly ready for by any means, but that's where he is now and he can't go back.

[brink]

"Uhh.. A while, I guess," he answers, trying to think. Difficult to tell time when you're so distracted (and scared) by everything else, and you're, well, in a dream. Would a watch even work if it's not physical, just imagined? "I mean, not like, days, but. A little while."

[protectsthenest]

"I seem to have confused you and I've been rude. Do forgive me," Loki says, a bit cheekily. "I am Loki, of Asgard. You may know me as one of the Avengers? May I ask your name?"