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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Vex kept having to tuck loose strands of hair back behind her ears. Her rounded, not pointy, entirely human ears. And then she would glance down to where a long swath of cloth, wrapped and tied, cradled Elaina snuggly against her chest, and the delicately pointed ears that hadn't changed. Hidden by her clothes, there was a nasty bruise on her shin where she'd run into the corner of the bed when getting up with the baby shortly before dawn, the not as quiet as it should have been "fuck!" waking Percy and setting Elaina to howling. She didn't really need to use a spell to heal something as minor as a bruise, but that she couldn't had her really worried.

So she'd had even more reason to spend time in the temple this morning. She still felt a connection to Pelor she'd never really been able to explain, even to herself, but where she should have been able to let some of his power flow through her to use spells, there was nothing. But Elaina was getting fussy, and Vex was no closer to understanding what was going on, and they could probably both use some breakfast.

To the cafe, then. Maybe somebody else knew what was going on, since it probably wasn't just Vex and Percy hit with the latest weird.

Emma had known something was wrong from the moment she picked up her deck for the quick three-card throw she did every day, just to get a vague idea what to expect. She couldn't really describe the feeling of her mind slipping or clicking into place when she shuffled the cards, but she knew when it wasn't there. And while she could interpret the traditional meanings of the cards she drew, today she hadn't Seen anything in them.

Maybe she was lucky there was plenty to do in the kitchen to keep her busy and not worrying about whatever had happened to her powers. But things quieted down after lunch, and she had gone outside with her cards to one of the metal tables near the pool to see what she could figure out.

Frustration built, and with a wave her hand, a fireball formed – not the first today, and her heart hurt every single time – and flew off to the side. Fortunately right into the pool.

As it turned out, the default state of a human was ‘fucking broken’. No real shock, but it was annoying all the same. Humans had a shit sense of smell, bad hearing, bad eyesight, too many fingers, no tail, blunt teeth, they were bald...he’d ranted about it already but that didn’t make it less annoying.

The only good thing, so far, was that he could reach the booze on the high shelves, but even that sucked a little, because without his enhancements his tolerance was probably shit. Reaching things was kind of fun in itself, though, which was how Rocket ended up actually sipping a top-shelf ‘Long Island iced tea’ while he hung out behind the bar in case some else wanted something off a high shelf.

Today was being unsettling and uncomfortable, and it had started early. Xavin generally went to sleep female, she’d gotten used to that, but this morning on waking, a decidedly he felt like going for a run or a fly, except... no shifting. That had been deeply uncomfortable, less because of the physicality, necessarily - male was male regardless - but shapeshifting was so integral to Xavin’s being that everything felt... wrong.

Rather than stay put, though, Xavin had gone about the day as normally as possible: getting breakfast, setting up for coffee, picking a book. At some point, Xavin relaxed back into female again. Which at least matched her shape, but didn’t help with being stuck as one thing.

Outwardly she was mostly as usual, if a little more fidgety and sticking more closely to her coffeecart than she generally did.

When John awoke on the first day; someone had been dreaming of his other lives - specifically this face and by complete accident shapeshifted into that face - which lead to a very panicky Mr. Smith - which was soon to follow with him catching on fire but also not being in pain - which leads to him rolling on the floor and putting out his fire.

He needs help because this is impossible! And complete madness!

So, with his usual dress suit and pants; leaves his room with a face after all this is a dream but not a dream.

Maybe his dreams really are real!

It had been an odd morning. He had woken up fine, in a good mood, until he looked down. His metal arm gone, he found a real, flesh one in its place. That was not something he ever expected to wake up to and the thought made him nervous. Rising to his feet, he dressed himself and made his way outside to think.

Random thoughts ran jumbled through his mind. This place, he knew it wasn’t like back home. He had seen enough things here to know when to be skeptical. Still, the lack of his metal arm made him wonder what else had changed around him. Did he still have his strength, his speed or other skills? There was only one way to really test it.

Outside the inn, surrounded by the trees and the quiet, Bucky began to explore inside himself. Forming his hand into a fist, he attempted to punch a tree. His eyes widened when he saw the tree fly forward from the impact of his right hook. “Shit.”

The fox crouched in the shadow of a chair, making himself small pressed against the baseboard, and watched the area around the door with bottle-green eyes.

How the fuck did Rocket manage? Except how he was bigger than Mildmay found himself now, and his paws were more like hands than the useless things at end of the fox's legs. So he waited, and hoped nobody would see him.

Finally someone opened the door. Mildmay didn't care so much who it was or where they were going, he was just glad it meant going through the door. The bitchkitty, on top of all the others about this, was he wasn't used to being a fox. And the building frustration plus wanting to get out the door before it shut plus wanting to go slow and stealthy.

Yeah, he shoulda known better. It was all his fault, when he ran smack into his door-opening savior's legs.

(Mildmay hasn't quite figured out the shapeshifting part of his "swap" yet. Or any of the other parts. But he'll be getting unstuck in his next tag. Threading with a nonverbal animal isn't usually fun for anyone involved.)

Edited 2019-04-03 20:39 (UTC)

Once Corbie had wriggled herself into a summer dress that dipped low enough in the back to accommodate her wings, she'd thought herself to be all right. It was an arrival day, and there were so many faces she hadn't seen before. Sure, she had these weird, colorful little wings, but it wasn't like Coby where they were too heavy for a human back to lift without practice. They felt off, but they weighed almost nothing. She could manage, until whatever weird was passing through took them away.

But then she noticed that the people coming to talk to her came straight for her, and what was more, no one else she already knew seemed to notice them at all.

That spooked her right the fuck out, and she tried to retreat from talking to anybody she didn't already know. But what if there were someone new here today, and they were alive, and they needed help, and she avoided them because she could not tell who was really there and who was not?

They came thicker and faster, perhaps word spreading that someone could see them, someone could speak to them, and Corbie didn't know when she'd understood that these were the inn's ghosts, but at some point it became painfully clear that without opening herself at all, she was seeing the dead.

She curled herself up tight in a corner, wings folded tight against her back, head tucked into her knees and arms over her hair. "No. Go away. Go away. I can't..."

She had no magic to help them, but they kept coming, kept wanting her to see them, and she wept for the second time that day, wept for want of Felix and wanting to apologize for him that he'd been left alone with this.

(Find Corbie curled up in any corner of your choice.)

Edited 2019-04-05 00:01 (UTC)

Jackson stayed in the infirmary. He didn't need to sleep, and he had no real use for his room. He brought all of his medical texts over, and he read through them in between being called on to help, like with Coby's friend (lover) who could not handle his new state of being (feeling). Jackson knew, intellectually, how overwhelming feelings could be. He had memories. But he felt so far removed from them. All he could do was treat the young man.

After finding a good dosage for the meds Miss River Tam helpfully brought over, on April 2, Jackson released him, and was once again alone in the infirmary. He went back to reading. Some time during the third day, he finished the last of his books. Some time during that third night, he decided to risk leaving the infirmary and go seek companionship in the bar. An interesting conversation, hopefully, with a night owl, given that it was closing on two am. He didn't understand the need to do something itching at him, so the best thing to do was to remedy the situation, and his processes would go back to normal.

He wondered how Corbie was doing, his LED light flashing briefly to yellow on his temple.

He ignored that, too.

It was like a fire Jag hadn't been able to control. Raging through him, coursing through his veins, raking through his heart and mind. Flames of too much eating up everything that had been him.

With the pills, the fire was a little more under control.

Jag wasn't used to being burned. Now every moment felt like he might get singed on someone. But the panic was gone, at least. People were calmer by the time he started to feel like maybe he could exist again. By the time he took a few tentative steps out of the infirmary on that second day.

Later, he curled up in the hayloft in the stables, after spending some time tending to the horses. They were easier by far than people. Quieter, steadier. The fire felt manageable here. He wasn't used to feeling chilly, so he made himself a nest out of hay. He spent the night up in the loft.

Come morning, he snuck into the suite he shared with Em for a quick shower and a change of clothes. He took his pills. He waited until the world felt manageable again.

Then he ventured outside, and tried the café for breakfast. He stood poised in the doorway, reeling a little from the people inside, the licks of their thoughtemotions against the core of who he was. This had been a bad idea, and he turned around to go. To flee. To run.

He'd always been a better runner than fighter, when it mattered.

He found himself outside Coby's empty room, curled up with his back to his door, waiting for him to show up.

He avoided public places, after that. Snuck in and out when he needed something from the kitchen, the boutique, anywhere. Snuck into the temple, too, stayed with la Kali a long while, paid his respects to Fortuna and the Raven Queen. Spent more time with the horses than not. At least he could function, after a fashion. The fire was manageable, as long as he took his meds. He would cling to that.

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Vex - OTA

Emma Colbert - OTA (afternoon)

Rocket - OTA

Xavin - OTA

John Smith: OTA

Bucky Barnes OTA

Mildmay (OTA)

Corbie - OTA

Jackson - Day 1-4 - OTA