⇨ The Tourist Trap: WEEK 3

[ringleaders]

Who: Anyone, anywhere in Portland.
When: October 15st - 22th, 2017
Where: Still in Portland
What: As all sides of the struggle gradually become informed, and the awareness of outsiders begins to spread, Portland faces a critical question - what should be done with them? And who gets to decide?
Warnings: Individually marked!

THE WOLVES AMONG US↴ ► WHEN SEPTEMBER ENDS: It's fairly common knowledge that October is a special month - Halloween has always been an excitable time in the supernatural community, because its during this month that the magical energies of Earth seem to disproportionately swell in power. This peeks on the 31st, and has every year for as long as anyone can remember. The holiday of Halloween is a byproduct of this, because the magical phenomenon has gone on for ages past. It's also a pretty common time for wizards to attempt bullshit shenanigans, and also when the Severing first came into effect. ► TOUCHED BY AN ANGEL: Towards the end of the week, Prudence Jaeger will be asking her angelic contacts for a pretty huge favour - she wants them to help her and some of her associates break into the Circle stronghold that the visiting Council members are staying at. It seems that they have some kind of macguffin item that will be needed to crack the barrier cutting off the Earth from the cosmos - and, to that end, allow the angels and mysterious outsiders to return to wherever they call home. ► THE PATH TO HELL: Perhaps unsurprisingly, Team Heaven isn't the only group to clue into the fact that the Circle has what they need. On the same night that the angels go in, so will Anath's army, as the arch demon finally arrives in the city just in time to join the party. Whether the angels and demons fight each other all the way or cooperate to achieve a mutual goal is up to them. ► WITH GOOD INTENTIONS: The Circle and Torchlight aren't all bad, okay? It's entirely possible that they are just acting in the best interest of humanity - unfortunately, that has resulted in them being pretty massive pricks recently, and now the payback for that is arriving on their doorstep. If you're a member of the Circle, you may or may not realize that anything is coming in time for you to prepare. (That will depend on your threads up to the end of the week.) However, once the fight starts, you'll be charge with defending the Councillors whether you like it or not, and Torchlight is getting pulled in as an unexpected ally to ensure their safety as well. Are you going to heed their call? Or is it time to split from the pack? ► BLOOD OF ICE AND FIRE: It's been made no secret that the Rose Queen isn't the only fae trying to pull back her lost changelings - now the Winter Court appears to be doing it, as well. More than a handful of changelings have gone missing over the last couple weeks, lost to both the thorns and agents of the Count. Whatever they're doing, it's also in competition with each other - Winter and Summer will be biting at each other's heels far more than normal, to the degree that it becomes clear they must have some competing objective in mind. Unfortunately for everyone else, that objective happens to conflict with the desires of just about everyone else. Fae are, by nature, opportunists. - ✪ - These are the major conflicts that will be coming to a head towards the end of Week 3. In the meantime, your actions will decide how certain elements are set up, and what the likelihood of success is for each group. Dice rolling handily won the opinion poll where we asked for the preferred method of conflict resolution, so that will be coming into effect a bit later on to determine who actually wins and loses, with advantages based on the choices made.

Comments

[ringleaders]

The problem with the demons is that the ones chasing people down are really just a bunch of thugs that are being told to bring people back to "demon party central" where people would check her out to see if she reads as an outsider. At which point they would probably ask her questions about that and make a lot of implications.

Pru is not super eager to share information with demon folk (despite the thing with Psi) - especially since Carly is bound to a demon who doesn't necessarily share her allegiances. Word probably wouldn't get to Pru about it unless Carly started talking about it really openly, which would also get her ganged up on demons for the same reason.

[insidescoop]

ALRIGHT TIME TO GAMBLE.

Since she's gonna isolate herself big time after the Ritual, it's easy for her to get cornered by these guys as a consequence. But, thanks to her sheer lack of trust combining with the knowledge that saying 'no' to the thug guys is proooooobably not gonna end well for her, she agrees to tag along with them.

And even answers questions honestly once there I bet! ....So what are they asking anyway, if that's important?

[ringleaders]

They essentially want the chance to INVESTIGATE her soul to see if she is an outsider. Which one of the more powerful demons will do, once she is brought back to the demon pack. At which point, they are going to try talking to Aslla, since theoretically he should be in charge here. They'll say that Anath may need him to do a thing.

Just how weak is Aslla in this relationship?

[insidescoop]

As much as their bond is absolutely fragmented, Carly's still at best half and half on memory-being surrounded by demons and having aslla addressed however means she'll at worst feign compliance and at best just keep quiet and take notes.

Aslla can't completely order her around like he could in the earlier weeks, but when it comes to both of them pulling through something, they'll both still agree. She'll protest-but he can still at least cause enough pain through their bond at this point that she'll shut up (mostly he's been trying to hang back because he's afraid doing that will trigger MORE memories)

As it is, for now with this conversation, he'll show up by way of stretching out the shadow and doing the demonic equivalent of Trying To Look Big while asking what it is they'll need.

(While Carly internally rolls her eyes because it's starting to hit that this does not Look Cool it looks SILLY. BIRDS, man)

ON A MORE LITERAL POWER NOTE - Aslla himself is ACTUALLY very powerful! He just has the worst case of ankle braceleting ever. Essentially, the ancient powerhouse ideal was still there; in AU terms though he basically got cut off from any kind of physical form via Severing (Obviously in actuality he just never had it)...So he can only use that power through Carly, and since he can't actually posses her, that's a bit where the problem lies.

Of course, he'll probably die before he lets that last bit slip, and Carly isn't about to say 'I have no idea how to use all that power actually' once she's aware she can tap into it, but It Is There.... And I guess if it costs activity points to use, those are there too~

[ringleaders]

Probably no points needed, but we'll see if it even comes up at this rate.

Anath's posse will be like "okay, sure" and one of the hire ups will basically say that Carly and Aslla should stay close until it can be determined whether or not Arch Demon Anath needs them.

They WILL tell her about the attack on the Circle, however, and expect her to help out.

[insidescoop]

GUESS SHE'S STORMING THE CIRCLE THEN time to set so many things on fire \o/