strangetrip | GP: April Fools!

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GP: April Fools!

It didn't take any sort of precognitive abilities to predict some kind of shenanigans on the first of April. Many of the people stuck in the bubble world of the Madonna Inn were from times and places where April Fools' Day pranks were normal, expected... (in many cases) minor annoyances. And then there were the residents who remembered the strange egg hunt from a year ago, and the sometimes confusing explanations of the two holidays falling on the same day and how that related.

Also, life at the inn could be interminable. After a while, people started hoping for some kind of strangeness to happen, just to break up the monotony of being trapped in a kitschy no-snow globe.

So, no. You didn't have to be a mutant fortune teller to expect some kind of joke being pulled. But Emma was, and even she had no idea what was coming, other than it was going to be frustrating and topsy-turny, and the visions she'd been getting from the tarot – and way more reversals than was usual or healthy in her experience – were even less clear than usual.

She definitely didn't foresee waking up without the powers that were as much a part of her as her heart. Or just as suddenly having powers she had no idea how to control. But she did, and she had*, and she was far from the only one. The same thing was happening to people all around the inn.

(*Not to worry. The singe marks should be gone in a day or so. Right?)

[Powers swap GP! Tag in. Tag around. It's a time for out and about at the inn coping (or not) with powers gained (or lost).]

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"Really?" Miguel asked with excitement. "Is there a way to use magic to control it?" He was hoping there would be a way that he wouldn't mess things up by accident.

"It's different than what I'm used to. I am normally connected to weather, so I don't fly with wings." Ororo smiled, "but it is just as freeing and if awkward with spills because I'm not used to it." She thought about the flying with these wings and what it was like.

"Though the wings are delicate, and I'm not used to them, they are surprisingly strong. I have been on strong currents and the feeling is the same for me."

"Oh..." Why hadn't Corbie thought of this? They had taken advantage of this during the invasion last summer to protect everyone from that army of dead things, but in her own hour of need she hadn't thought of coming here at all. She dared a look behind her and, catching sight of no unfamiliar faces, she let out a sob of relief. "Thank you."

She came to him with fire in her hands, or else she probably might never have done it at all.

Well, not literally, not right now, but after Snow had gotten over her initial fear at her sudden magic and realized the potential and destruction she knew at least one of the things she had to do with it. It'd been bugging her for a long time now, but she'd never quite been able to make herself to the right thing. Regina had offered to go with her, but she didn't want to do this holding onto her mama's hand like a child.

She appeared at the door to the infirmary and, even with a gun at her hip and magic (that she couldn't control well) in her body, she absurdly shrank against the door frame like a shy little girl. Maybe that was just the way to be around Pinkertons. Hell if she knew.

Fuck she didn't want to look this weak right now. Not in front of him. But something was different about him, too. And that was what allowed her to stammer out, "I-I'm s-s-sor-ry."

At least holding onto the door frame, her body couldn't shake.

Jackson looked up from the book he had been reading (a chapter on the disorders of eyes and lids) as she stepped into the doorframe. Gun hip holster, but what registered was the tension in her frame. She clung to that doorframe like a lifeline, and Jackson rose slowly, but made no move towards her. He accessed memories of previous interactions. She might be apologizing for their last run-in. His expression remained oddly calm and steady, not quite right.

"Are you all right?" he asked, as this was his primary concern (programed directive), and she did not seem to be.

"Control isn't a fixed state," Emma said, feeling an urge to shrug but distracted from it by finally getting a better look at Jackson. Who wasn't drinking. And who looked... off, even if you ignored the blue LED, which she hadn't.

"I'm more used to contained powers I let loose, than wild ones I have to contain, but I'm adjusting. What about you?"

Corbie had more sense than most wizards put together, but that didn't mean much when a whole host of ghosts was ganging up on her begging for her attention. Mildmay wouldn'ta expected her to think of the temple right off. And he was gonna tell that, or ask if she was okay, but what came out instead of "You got wings."

Way to go, Milly-fox. Next you'll be noticing her hair is blonde.

"Who ain't?" Mildmay answered, taking a moment to set the basket down outta the way of any curious horses.

"She'll be okay." He huffed quietly. "Least everybody'll be well fed."

Control isn't a fixed state. Something about that spoke to Jackson, but he didn't examine it closely. There would be time for that later, once the social interaction was done.

"I don't need to adjust," Jackson replied, simple and to the point. He surmised she would have more questions, along the same vein as everyone else had had so far, and so he added, "I am currently an android."

Jag's gaze followed the basket, and he was looking at it unseeing as he said, "She's been staying out of my way." Or he'd been staying out of hers? Maybe both. He longed for her, and he was terrified of feeling her. Would he ever be ready for that?

"No," she said. Because she could not make herself say yes. Snow's options were no and staring silence, and she'd become self aware enough to know that people found that creepy.

"Oh..." Corbie had actually managed to forget them for a while, and she looked over her shoulder at the colorful feathers. "Yeah. Fuck if I know why." She still couldn't get them to move the way she wanted and when she wanted. Sure they were part of her body, but babies didn't come out knowing how to walk and they had legs.

"Would you like to sit down?" Jackson asked, a logical next step.

"Wait. Valkyrie. I think I've seen her around. The really tough girl with the bottle attached to her hand?" Bucky sighed, turning away from Thor and staring at the tree he'd punched so violently. "If they do anything to Steve, I..." His hands formed into fists and he growled a little. "This... Messing with people? Fine. Not Steve. Not Cap..."

Suddenly, a lightning bolt came down from the sky. The whole sky crackled as the lightning struck the tree and suddenly set it on fire. Bucky's eyes widened and he jumped back a few feet, almost stumbling onto the earth beneath him. "What the..." His jaw hung open a little as he stared at the burning tree in front of him.

"Did... Did I do that?"

"Fireballs. Can't say that I have that power," he teased gently.

At least, he didn't think that he did. After what he'd seen, he really wasn't sure anymore. Anything strong enough to make this inn or swap people's powers around wasn't something to be trifled with lightly. He hated it, but he couldn't just go yelling at the walls, could he?

Bucky shook his head. "Makes me worry what happened to other people. Friends. Loved ones. Who knows?" Bucky bit his lip, looking up at Emma. "Why? Why would they do this to us? We're already trapped. Why can't they just leave us alone?"

"I ain't used to any of this ho- magic stuff." People with powers – other than magic. He'd had to get used to that. – was weird enough. But those powers getting shuffled around and passed out again like so many hands of Long Tiffany? That was fucked.

"I can't fly. Not that I know anyway. But I keep freezing sh- stuff. And there was the..." Mildmay waved a hand generally toward the floor around the door, where he'd been, up to a minute ago, a real fucking fox.

Wasn't on Mildmay to say she was or she wasn't, but he didn't think she'd sent him out here 'cause she was too busy cooking.

"She stays outta a lotta people's way. Maybe more now 'causea the..." He trailed off, waving a hand to get at the fucking weird hocus shit going around.

Mildmay spared a glance to where Kethe's alcove could be found if you knew when and how to look, but there wasn't nothing there to see right then.

"Some practical joke," he muttered, and Corbie maybe the only one here who'd be able to pick out the words. "Trickster shit."

Mildmay didn't have to say either way; he was here instead of Emma. Jag knew. Still, he nodded, scratched at his shoulder, and wished he could be there for her, the way he would normally try to be. "Cheers," he said, quietly. "For bringing the food."

An android. That would explain the uncanny valley going on. And the LED. And how un-Jacksony he was. Emma tried not to let it remind her of when Remy crossed the bokor, but there was something eerily similar.

"So your adjustment will come after this is over." Maybe she couldn't see the future right now, but it was too engrained in Emma for her not to still think that way. And she had to hold to the hope this, like all the other weird things at the inn, would go back to 'normal' soon.

A small jerk of his chin took the place of any 'you're welcome'. He wasn't even sure what Emma had packed, but she had to know what Jag liked, right?

"Least she's letting me do something today. Yesterday she kicked me outta the kitchens." Easier, talking about himself than Emma, who wasn't here to speak for herself. Or Jag. At least freezing shit could be kinda funny looking back on it after.

"If there is an after," Jackson agreed. It seemed likely, as most things that were not routine here seemed to be temporary. But it was not a given.

Jag shivered before he could help it, at the thought of that cold. His body language closed off a little more as he shrunk in on himself. "I miss my fire," he said, quietly, gaze unfocused, before he blinked and looked up at Mildmay. "I'm glad she has some now." Glad. Was that right? It was a simple word, but nothing was simple. Still, the fire would keep her warm.

Thor blinks.

And then he blinks again.

"What did you..." Thor trails off, and spins a finger at Bucky, then at the still-burning tree. "Do that again."

Snow hesitated. It was a simple question on the surface, but one that she found deeply complex to answer. Did she probably need to sit? Yes. Did she want to? Yes. Did she really want to get any closer to him? No. Even as she said, "No," her head nodded very slightly. She didn't notice.

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Page 5 of 8

GP: April Fools!

Re: Miguel and Vex

Re: Mildmay & Storm

Re: Mildmay & Corbie

Jackson & Snow

Re: Jackson & Snow

Re: Emma & Jackson

Re: Mildmay & Corbie

Re: Jag & Mildmay

Re: Emma & Jackson

Re: Jag & Mildmay

Re: Jackson & Snow

Re: Mildmay & Corbie

Re: Jackson & Snow

Re: Bucky and Thor

Re: Bucky & Emma C

Re: Mildmay & Storm

Re: Jag & Mildmay

Re: Mildmay & Corbie

Re: Jag & Mildmay

Re: Emma & Jackson

Re: Jag & Mildmay

Re: Emma & Jackson

Re: Jag & Mildmay

Re: Bucky and Thor

Re: Jackson & Snow