EVENT: Heartless Swarm

[fatedhearts]

Things have been fairly peaceful for a while now as everyone has settled into their current lives on this new world. But one day towards late summer, that all comes to an end.

One of the portals in the sky suddenly opens again, an odd glowing light surrounding it as it ejects creature after creature. Then it closes, followed by another glowing portal elsewhere in the sky emitting the same creatures. Small and black, mostly, with odd antennae and glowing eyes. Some here will know them. The Heartless, creatures of the darkness who seek hearts. Those they attack, if they give in to the darkness in their hearts, will become Heartless themselves.

Where is a Keybearer when we need one?!

OOC INFO

Heartless can be encountered anywhere! They're pouring into Edge, the Midgar ruins, Kalm, Wutai, and everywhere else. Balamb Garden won't be spared, but if they're able to seal everything off in time and take flight, they may be safe from the majority of the creatures and be a safehouse for anyone desperate to escape them.

Anyone familiar with Heartless is encouraged to try to defeat them (or control them, if they're lucky enough to possess that ability). But they may find something else will push back if they try. Did someone deliberately send the Heartless through the portals? Who, and why? Does someone on the other side of those portals know what's happening here? And why are the portals glowing when they open? Is there any important significance in that?

(And yes, this is a very significant event that will have a deep bearing on the overall plot!)

Before anyone asks, having your character become a Heartless is probably not a good idea, given that it would be very difficult to get them back to their normal selves at this point in the game. But we welcome intense situations of Heartless trying their hardest to claim hearts before they're stopped!

The event is scheduled to run through August 10th, but backdating and backtagging is encouraged for as long as everyone wants! Post toplevels to this post or create new posts!

Comments

Re: *Briar

[3wingedangel]

"... How ... pleasant." Heavy sarcasm. "You will have to show me what they look like so I can avoid them." This part was sincere.

Re: *Briar

[4_lumps_of_thread]

"Knowing what they look like won't help you much," Briar said, a little too gleefully.
"even large as they are, you'll smell them before you see them. From a distance, they only smell like rotting bodies. It gets worse the closer you get."

Re: *Briar

[3wingedangel]

Sephiroth definitely looked repulsed. “… Perhaps discuss something else at the dinner table.”

Re: *Briar

[4_lumps_of_thread]

"Very well," Sandry said smoothly. "What would you like to discuss?" she asked, very much the polite young woman of society at the moment.

Re: *Briar

[3wingedangel]

"Perhaps tell me some ... pleasant things about your world," he said.

Re: *Briar

[4_lumps_of_thread]

They all exchanged looks. Finally Briar said, "That means you, duchess."

Sandry sighed but rallied. "Well, where we currently live back home is Emelan, on the Pebbled Sea. It is a lovely land, especially at sunset over the ocean. We have the Winding Circle Temple and school. We have wonderful teachers helping students to find their way. Then there are trade goods all around the world. Beautiful silks and woolen clothes. Lovely jewelry and other metal works. And the wonderful clothing that Traders wear during a trade!"

Daja smiled slightly. "And the tea."

"Oh yes, Trader tea is lovely."

"Log it," Daja said with a small smile. "Though not all of our traditions are wonderful," she added, bitterly.

"True," Sandry acknowledged.

"Was still funny watching them panic knowing they had to treat you proper," Briar said with a smirk. "I thought that one guy was going to swallow his tongue."

Re: *Briar

[3wingedangel]

“It does sound like a beautiful place,” Sephiroth agreed. “Zack would love a place called the Pebbled Sea, I’m sure.”

Re: *Briar

[4_lumps_of_thread]

Sandry nodded. "Watching the waters from the top of one of the curtain walls on a windy day is wonderful."

Re: *Briar

[3wingedangel]

“Curtain walls?” Sephiroth repeated.

Re: *Briar

[4_lumps_of_thread]

"Large stone defensive walls," Daja said. "Crenelated with walkways."

Re: *Briar

[3wingedangel]

“I see,” Sephiroth said. He could imagine Zack making a crack about them sounding like the opposite of window curtains. Sephiroth knew this other meaning, although it wasn’t the first thing he had thought of.

“Is it a peaceful world?”

Such walls sounded like it might not be, if they needed such defenses.

Re: *Briar

[4_lumps_of_thread]

"Pieces of it are, for stretches of time," Sandry said, diplomatically. "You can find the peaceful times in the gaps of history."

Re: *Briar

[3wingedangel]

A nod. "Like most worlds I've visited, then," Sephiroth said.

Re: *Briar

[4_lumps_of_thread]

"Are there any that are just peaceful?" Briar asked. "We could move there."

Daja snorted.

Re: *Briar

[3wingedangel]

"Heh. Unfortunately, I know of no such world that has never had conflict."

Re: *Briar

[4_lumps_of_thread]

"A shame," Daja said with a sigh.

"I'd settle for a few calm decades. Eight or nine ought to do it." Briar said.

Re: *Briar

[3wingedangel]

"I will keep watch for such a place," Sephiroth said.

Re: *Briar

[4_lumps_of_thread]

"With our luck," Tris groused, joining them, "War will break out the day we arrive."

"Nah, day after," Briar said, "the Gods like to wait till we let our guards down."

Re: *Briar

[3wingedangel]

"Heh," Sephiroth said. He couldn't deny he had been cynically thinking the same things. "I wouldn't be surprised, honestly."

Re: *Briar

[4_lumps_of_thread]

"If we want a peaceful world, we simply have to make it ourselves," Sandry said. "We fight so that others may have the peace we wish for them."

"Yeah, selfish enough to wish some of that peace for me too," Briar said, bitterly.

Re: *Briar

[3wingedangel]

"That was my attitude as well in the past," Sephiroth remarked. Although he had grown cynical and doubted that any peace really lasted long.

Re: *Briar

[4_lumps_of_thread]

Briar sighed. "Well, fine. For Evvy and Rosethorn."

Daja nodded. "And Frostpine."

"And Lark and uncle and Paolo," Sandry added.

Tris grumbled. "What? Niko can help," she snapped.

Re: *Briar

[3wingedangel]

"Are Rosethorn and Frostpine related?" Sephiroth wondered. Odd names.

Re: *Briar

[4_lumps_of_thread]

They all stared at each other. Then Tris made a face, Briar looked partially mortified, Sandry and Daja laughed.

"Dedicates of Winding Circle pick mage names," Sandry explained. "Rosethorn is a Green Mage, a Great Mage actually. She and Dedicate Crane are the two strongest Green Mages among all Dedicates. Frostpine however is a Smith Mage."

Daja nodded. "And having spent a winter with him in Namorn I still am shaking my head that he chose such a name. He hates the cold. Scared the staff multiple times by sitting in the fireplace." She chuckled. "Apparently having never been anywhere cold he heard the term frost pines and thought they sounded pretty."

"Likewise Lark chose her own name."

Tris sniffed. "Niko's name almost sounds normal until ypu hear the full thing."

"Yeah, well Niko's a peacock," Brair said with a snort.

Re: *Briar

[3wingedangel]

"... Ah. That's interesting," Sephiroth said. "I hope the fireplace wasn't on when Frostpine sat in it." Deadpan.

"Dare I ask what Niko's full name is?"