this is a robbery [closed]

[atouts]

Who: Childermass, Lambert, Cole, & Yuya.
When: Sometime later during the Harbinger invasion.
Where: The Wishmuth Museum of Art
What: The Harbinger of Fortune has his eyes set on ruining an exhibit opening for the museum's more lucrative patrons...
Warnings: Lambert's ass, Cole's TMI memory theater, and Yuya possibly wishing he'd chosen to team up with two completely different Guardians at that point in time tbh.


What would have otherwise been a quiet gathering of Wismuth's elite, to ooh and aah over the Wismuth Museum's newest additions, has ended up going a more poorly than anyone could have ever planned for. It all started with requesting to see the invitation of one man, having strolled into the reception in an indolent, uncaring manner. No one recognized him. No one was surprised when he told them he did not have one.

Surprise only came when the shadows all around them sprang to life before anyone could try and eject him.

Now the museum is surrounded by the flashing lights of cop cars and news vans, the radio and TV all announcing a strange hostage situation to add to the rest of the bizarre and dangerous events taking place in Wismuth these past few days. Not that the police can get in contact with the hostage-takers. Not that they can go into the building itself, either! The few who have vanishing just like everyone else who'd been in there before, considering their sole contact having been a short-lived emergency call from a security guard and then... nothing.

Overall, it's a mess all around the locked-down streets bordering the Wismuth Museum of Art.

Comments

[whattaprick]

"Or it might not have worked at all," Lambert points out. "As far as I can tell, no one from Wismuth got turned into a Harbinger -- just ours. Maybe if we'd never been there, it would have turned out fine."

He cuts the thread and begins to wind bandages over the wound. Second time he's been injured in as many days ... the cuts on one arm from when Solas had to slice him open to get the seeds out and the gouges when he caught the crow sister's claws on the other. Maybe his legs will eventually end up as marked up, too, at this rate.

"Still, it's pointless wondering about it. Walking away now isn't a choice."

[hippocarnival]

Yuya had been so worried about the carnival members, he didn't even realize that none of the rest of the audience was taken. He looks obviously surprised at the revelation. "It was really only us?"

[whattaprick]

“It really was,” Lambert confirms.

“The only Harbingers I’ve heard of people running into were all from the Carnival. And even if people couldn’t remember what happened exactly, missing people are prettt obvious. I haven’t seen any sign of people searching for any.”

[hippocarnival]

It's true, especially in a modern world with so many ways to get the news out there and realize something's wrong. Yuya pulls one of the tarot cards from his pocket and looks at it, face pinching in barely restrained emotion. There's about to be a whole lot of missing people soon.

"Why just us?" It's not a question he thinks Lambert has an answer to, really. But it is on his mind.

[whattaprick]

Lambert, at the very least, has a theory.

"It's not like she was turning people for fun. She wanted to use them -- otherwise, why would she be making them fall all over her?" he smiles humorlessly. The other Harbingers he's encountered haven't been too different, in that regard.

"Think about it -- who would make a more useful Harbinger? Some music fan who's never seen any magic in their life? Or someone who already knows there's more than just their world out there?"

[hippocarnival]

"You think she picked us out on purpose?" He looks up at Lambert at that. It'd make sense, sure. And the carnival members weren't exactly subtle when it came to it--their sabotage had been pretty obvious.

And then he remembers something and drops his face in his hand with a groan. "Noa even said she could influence people's minds."

This all shouldn't have even been a surprise. They just waltzed in horribly unprepared and paid the consequence for it.

[whattaprick]

As Yuya drops his face into his hands, Lambert frowns.

"Could have been something like 'find anyone who'd make a strong Harbinger.' Or who'd be easy to turn." Childermass should never have been there, considering his track record.

"She made it sound like CY-Ren hadn't done anything like this before, or to as many people. Guess we should've known better."

[hippocarnival]

"Maybe she's never been this successful before." He wonders if that's what is was, susceptibility to that grief. Yuya has heard it, initially, but he shook it off. He didn't anticipate Yugo to be someone so secretly troubled, though...

His gaze drifts back to the card in his hand, then to Lambert's leg. "That's going to heal, right?"

He's a little unsure how deep their weakness to iron goes. But it's erased any doubts in his mind that they aren't all changelings now, to be made just as sick by it.

[whattaprick]

"Eventually." Lambert doesn't seem all that concerned, and at least stitched and bandaged up the wound does seem less threatening ... though he doesn't seem keen to start walking again either.

"Worst iron poisoning I've ever seen since I got here was when all the supervisors got kidnapped to Hell." Literally Hell the place, in case Yuya had any doubt. "That was about two weeks after I got here, so ... kind of a shock, considering what I thought I signed up for."

[hippocarnival]

He's heard a little bit about hell from Strange. Like the Ringmaster basically eating Morningstar, and that people were hurt and it was about as traumatizing as a lot of other events in the carnival. But he didn't know about the iron poisoning, and his gaze locks on Lambert's wound as a new round of sickness rolls through his stomach.

It's strange, having what feels like a rather sudden, intrinsic fear of it. He was human enough in Portland, and since then he's had little reason to think about it.

"But they've all cured from it now, right?" Just how bad does it get?

[whattaprick]

"As far as I can tell? Yeah." Lambert shrugs. "Some of them aren't here anymore. The last doctor, the foreman ... Carly and Childermass weren't supervisors then yet. Looked bad enough."

He doesn't go into any more detail than that, lapsing into silence for a few moments... then nodding at Yuya.

"What are you going to do with those?" The cards, he means. "Seems like you broke out easy enough. But I guess not everyone's lucky enough to be a Star Guardian."

[hippocarnival]

"I'm going to find a way to turn then back." He sways it with a conviction that's awfully personal for a bunch of strangers, but it's genuine.

A shiver runs down his spine as he remembers being tapped in one himself. "It's awful, doing this to someone is..." he shakes his head. "I don't know how I got out, but I have to help them to the same."

But yes, it was probably his Star Guardian power that helped him break the enchantment himself. He supposes it works differently than the duel disks.

[whattaprick]

"What was it like?" Lambert regards Yuya with candid curiosity.

Magic entrapment is no area of specialty of his, so he really has no idea what the parameters are for that sort of thing. Besides, if that's actually apparently something Childermass can do now, it's not a bad thing to know.

[hippocarnival]

"Dark." Which isn't helpful, he knows, but he has to swallow and brace himself to figure out how to explain it. It is, when he tries to envision it again, uncomfortably familiar to being trapped in the darkness of his own mind when Zarc took over. Except this time he knew his body wasn't going on a rampage.

He lowers the card and his gaze to the floor. "I couldn't move, or see or hear anything. I was--frozen, but I could still think. I was just thinking about getting out of there."

He couldn't cast anything, however, so he hadn't been certain he would get out. There's something to be said for the power of the soul, though.

[whattaprick]

"Hm." Lambert studies his obvious discomfort, and decides it's worth prodding a little more.

"It didn't seem like it took you all that long to get out," he offers. "Though it might have felt different, to you."

[hippocarnival]

"I don't really know how I did it." Yuya mumbles morosly. "I just wanted to get out of the card. I kept thinking about it until it happened."

Maybe of he thought enough about it and reviewed the books Strange made him read, he could come up with a decent theory why he could break an enchantment these people can't. But he's not in the mood to think. He's tired and horrified and his face stings.

[whattaprick]

Right. There is the matter of that. Lambert said he'd take a look at it, so ...

"C'mere and let me have a look at that." He beckons Yuya over.

[hippocarnival]

Yuya looks up, briefly confused for a moment before he remembers the wound. "Okay."

He shifts up out of his seat, slipping the card back into his pocket as he steps closer and leans over so Lambert can get a look at his face.

[whattaprick]

Brisk and businesslike, Lambert takes a moment to tilt Yuya's chin up and turn his face so the wound is in the light and Lambert can get a better look at it. He hums under his breath, then lets Yuya go.

"Shouldn't need stitches. But it'll heal better if you get some help. You know Tamaki, right? He can fix that up for you."

[hippocarnival]

He nods. "Yeah, we share a trailer. I'll ask if I see him."

Although he's not sure if Tamaki will chide him for getting hurt. That's the nice thing about fling this with Lambert--he doesn't get upset about Yuya getting a little hurt, so Yuya doesn't have to feel guilty about it.