SO LATE THAT IT'S EARLY

[peckishmods]

a frigidly cold night

what's up?

The unrelenting icy cold sends most everyone inside early tonight. Even with magical heating, it’s hard to keep the chill away, almost like the holler, itself, wants you to stay snug under the covers, safe in your bed.

Sleep comes quickly and heavily tonight, and students dream of singing bugs and dancing birds…

Not a collaborative routine but two performances at odds, each vying tonight for your attention, dear child. The dancing of the birds beckons — follow and find truth and memory — but the buzzing insect song vibrates in your very bones, too: they are home, they are warmth, they are safety. Stay, stay, stay.

You are pulled in two directions in a forest of old maples. Beneath your feet the ground grows warm as vines creep up from strange dark cracks in the ground, climbing over each maple until they are overgrown with ivy leaves that look like fire — that are fire — and the maple seeds that fall from the dying trees as they burn are the singing bugs, their music fading until only one insect’s song remains.

Tonight, four pairs of feet climb from their beds and follow the birds.

Tonight, four different pairs of eyes open at the sight of the burning forest. Merlin Pletcher, Howdy Stoppelbein, Presley Mondragon, and Cicero Cook each wake with a start, each with a feeling of terrible dread.

And from there as more students wake it quickly becomes clear that something is very wrong:

It is late, so late as to almost be early, and Gertrude McGilliguddy, Xenia de Bourgh, Patrice Tang and Atlas Quigley are gone from their beds, nowhere to be found…

how this works!

⬥ Welcome to Peckenpaugh’s second major petition event! The primary winners of this event were Trudy, Xenia, Patrice and Atlas!

⬥ Petition winners please check your email again. we've sent a message to you all with more information. You can then refer to the “SOMEWHERE CLUTTERED” header for post-dreaming details!

⬥ Xenia de Bourgh has lost her journal and can’t find it! As soon as she realizes, Mr. Stirling provides her with a new one. It’ll take about 48 hours to get her properly added to the journal network, so for the next two days any of her journal posts or comments will be signed “UNREGISTERED USER”, rather than with her own name.

⬥ Merlin, Howdy, Presley and Cicero all woke with a start ahead of everyone else in the school. We assume y’all got the word out to staff that students were missing, eventually! Feel free to play these portions out in threads or journals, just put a descriptive timestamp in the subject of your posts.

⬥ There is no magic at work obscuring the location of the four missing students. They should be easy enough to find with the right tracking magic.

⬥ Classes are canceled for Thursday, January 30th, but will resume again on Friday. The scheduled party at Mothgarden is still on — if asked, the staff just doesn’t want the kids to worry too much. Also they have all this cheese and chocolate to deal with.

⬥ For the next few weeks, each House will have a faculty member staying in the chaperone’s room on the first floor over night. This’ll make shenanigans a bit harder, but (hopefully) disappearing kids less likely. The schedule is rotating, though usually it is your Head of House.

⬥ Mr. Purcell and Mr. Stirling can be seen around campus for the next week or so double checking magical locks and wards on all the dorms.

⬥ There is a sense that Peckenpaugh staff is taking this very seriously. Even the most immature faculty members aren’t making jokes about it, and it’s clear that most staffers have been given additional work investigating what’s happened. The four disappeared students can expect regular check-ins from their heads of house, and TAs may find their workloads increased as teachers hand off paper grading and other small tasks to them for the next few weeks...

locations!

⬦ AWAKE ON CAMPUS: After the first four students wake, it doesn’t take long for the rest of campus to start stirring. From there, word quickly spreads that four students are missing. This is a space to thread any on campus scenes before the students are located.

⬦ SOMEWHERE CLUTTERED: Dark and cold and musty. There’s so much junk in here, you can probably guess where you are without too much brain power…

⬦ SO LATE THAT IT'S EARLY: Returned to campus, the four missing students are held in the infirmary overnight, checked for any injuries, any signs of strange enchantment or forbidden curses. Aside from some reddened skin on their backs, there’s nothing. Their parents are informed via owl immediately. You may have slept like the dead earlier in the night, but for the rest of the night sleep proves fleeting for everyone...

⬦ OOC - QUESTIONS, COMMENTS, CONCERNS!

Comments

SOMEWHERE CLUTTERED: Pre-Rescue

[champlified]

Xenia makes a sound of assent. The robes faded, just like the light.

"We're okay," she says unconvincingly, patting her arm woodenly, distracted in thought. "And I'm Xenia, if you can't tell. I'm" --she pauses to confirm-- "missing my wand."

It isn't holstered in her sleeve, where it should be, and the pink fabric with its pattern of cheerful Kneazles seems pitifully childish in this situation. She doubles down on her observation of the hatch to make up for it. Those glyphs are knowable. She'll write them down with everything she remembers as soon as possible. Four of us, four keys... Fire, water, earth... Something... And forget. Something said...

SOMEWHERE CLUTTERED: Pre-Rescue

[shoulderdevil]

Despite the fact that it's definitely not Trudy's fault that she's blind (and possibly concerned), Patrice rolls his eyes, slowly sitting back on his heels. He looks around, one hand still gripping his own mask a little tightly.

"It's just the four of us now. Patrice and..." He squints, thinking. "Atlas too. Somewhere with bowling alley crap. Do you normally sleep with your wand, Xenia?" He pauses, frowning as he realizes something and pulls a book from his pocket. "...I don't sleep with my journal, though, and I've got that."

SOMEWHERE CLUTTERED: Pre-Rescue

[champlified]

Xenia nods, blushing. She wipes at her eyes with the back of a hand, then refocuses on the glyphs. They're far easier to take in than everything else. It's so cluttered in here.

"Yeah. Always. But... not my journal. Also." Her words tangle themselves under Patrice's attention. "And that isn't with me either."

SOMEWHERE CLUTTERED: Pre-Rescue

[themurderbird]

"Thank you, Patrice," Trudy says, tone approving like he gave the correct answer in class. At this conversation, she pats herself down. "No glasses, no wand, but I do have my journal," she confirms. It does not occur to her to contact anyone immediately. Instead, she approaches the hatch in the center of the room. "Free him?" she ponders, then gives it a tug. It won't open, but it does budge a little.