longestnight_old | Once Upon a Time...

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Once Upon a Time...

They likely felt the world shift, a fragmentation of all they thought they knew. It was the way a fictional character might feel if they could feel every page turn in the book they lived in. It was the beginning of a new story and that meant an end to an old one and they would each feel that.

To some it would feel like they had just died. To others, it would feel like they had just been born. To many, it would feel like both at the same time. It all really depended on who they were and what they were leaving behind.

In any case, this world had something New appear in it. After lightning crackled in the evening sky without any storm fueling it, they would find themselves waking up in the streets of a small town called Burgess. It was a perfectly ordinary Pennsylvania town, a place where the modern mixed with the old, American suburbia at its finest, making it all the stranger that something extraordinary would happen somewhere so ordinary.

[ooc: Make a subthread for each character and those of you that would like to toss your character at someone else before Bunny and Jack show up, tag a subthread already there.]

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Molly, thankfully, has a bit of a sense of self-preservation. Unfortunately, that's kicking in at a not-so-useful time. She shoots Jack a look. "I know Stranger Danger is kind of silly 'cause there's all sorts of people you don't know that you gotta talk to, but maybe you brought me here for your creepy magic ghost cult or something. If I tell you my name, you might eat my soul!"

She says it with just enough sincerity that she might not 100% think that's an unlikely situation...

Actually, given the world this was, ghosts eating people using their true names wasn't that out there.

Therefore Jack treated her fear as very understandable.

"Okay, okay," he said gently. "How about I give you my name first, and then maybe you can make up a name I can call you? Does that sound fair?"

She scrutinizes him, underneath the smiling face of her bunny hat, then nods decisively. She literally can't think of anything he could do if he doesn't give him her actual name, and he's offering to give her his... it should be ok, right?

"Okay. But then you gotta help me find my friends!"

"If they're here, I promise I'll help you find them," he promised. "I'm Jack. Jack Frost. Though if you want a little leverage on me for any very unlikely instances of ghost cults and other creepy magic, my old name before that was Jackson Overland. What should I call you?"

Edited 2013-04-28 05:51 (UTC)

"Like the guy from the Christmas shows they show every year? ...Weird."

Molly screws her face up thoughtfully. "Um. You can call me Bruiser. Until I know if you're really a good guy."

She tugs on one of the ears of her hat for a moment, looking very scared and very young. "Do you think my friends are here? I mean, they gotta be, right? If I'm here?"

That got the slightest eye roll. He hated those specials. They weren't accurate and they'd never made anyone actually believe in him.

"Yes, like the guy from the Christmas specials. Not exactly the same, though, they never get things right. And Bruiser, I don't know if they're here. We've found a few people from other worlds now. If they are, I can take you to them. We're all meeting up not far from here."

Edited 2013-04-28 15:59 (UTC)

"Grownups never do," she says with a long-suffering sigh. Of course they didn't get it right in the videos, grownups made them!

She hasn't processed the "other worlds" bit, but it's coming. Three, two...

"Whaddaya mean other worlds? Like other countries? Or are they aliens?"

"We've been told you've all been pulled from different dimensions. Different versions of Earth, all because of the bad things going on here. That's why we've been trying to find everyone who has, to make sure you're all safe, and to work together with you to try to help you get home."

That would explain a lot more than just "she's suddenly sort of not really a ghost and can't find her friends". No wonder she couldn't see the Leapfrog, it could be anywhere.

"...Oh." She takes a deep breath, reminds herself that she is Princess Powerful - even if she told Jack to call her Bruiser. It's an alias. She does the little mental push that turns her powers on and feels the flood of knowing that she could throw a car right now. She doesn't really need to, but it's nice to know that everything still works, even if it feels weird somehow.

Jack may or may not want to know why her eyes started glowing pink for a moment there.

"Okay, well I guess my friends would probably be there, so you better take me there right away."

Glowing eyes are, actually, fairly normal for Jack. He's a myth, living in a world of myths, some of whom have very strange appearances.

Still, he knows it's not normal for most people, but he files it under 'ask about that later.'

"We can either walk or I can carry you piggy-back and fly us there. Up to you."

Molly might perk up noticeably at that offer.

"Karolina takes me flying sometimes," she says, trying to sound casual and utterly failing. Karolina doesn't take her flying nearly enough.

"Well then, kiddo, I guess you'll be used to this."

He knelt so she could climb on.

"Hop on."

Sure, he could be taking her off to feed her to some monster or sacrificing her to a cult or something awful.

But she still has her powers (though she doesn't realize they're weaker yet), so she could totally take him.

So she clambers onto his back with the ease of a kid who still gets regular piggyback rides. "Okay, I'm ready!"

And up they went, on a burst of cool air. Jack was apparently from the "fly in whatever way is loopiest and funnest" school of flying.

"While we're flying, I'll explain what's going on," he said. "Basically an enemy of ours was a moron and opened a doorway to something outside our world, thinking he'd get power from it. Only, the thing behind the door wasn't an army he could control, it was basically a giant evil spirit, one that wants to creep its way into the world and destroy it. It's captured almost all the good guy myths and is feeding off the belief people have in them, and because it's messing up the fabric of the world and the way all the belief works, now the edges are a little thin."

It was starting to get dark and proof positive, the kids in the town below were more afraid than they'd been, their jovial attitudes changing as they tried to go to places where they could be inside.

"All the kids are scared and their belief is stronger than it used to be, so we think since they wanted heroes to protect them, that it was strong enough to pull people from other worlds through to ours and make them into myths like us. They don't mean to do it but everything's just that messed up right now. You're kind of like a spirit now, but hopefully it'll be reversible. Am I making any sense?"

Edited 2013-04-28 18:31 (UTC)

Molly screams a little when he takes off, but it's the "holy crap this is so fun!" kind of screaming. She's got a solid grip and her bunny hat's ears are streaming out behind them, and this is so fun.

But then he's talking important things and usually she would listen but not like she was gonna have to take a test on it, but this... Well, she doesn't know when she'll be able to find any of her friends, if they're here. She'd better listen extra close, just in case she can't.

"You guys don't have superheroes, but there are spirity people who keep everybody safe and now lots of them are gone and the kids are scared so they're finding people from other places to be spirity people so they don't have to be scared?" Molly offers, since that's her best summary. "I guess that's okay, if it's not their fault. And I'm kind of a superhero anyway, so I can help!"

Delighted squealing is pretty much his favorite thing besides kids' laughter.

"You're a little young for that. The Man in the Moon, the spirit that chose me and my team-mates to protect kids, thinks you should be a Guardian, but Bunny and I aren't really keen on the idea. You're too young to be facing what we've been facing. But since it's been going after good myths, we still wanted to make sure you were safe - at least until we can get you all home and changed back the way you were."

If they weren't created new, but he was still at a loss as to how to break that to any of them. He knew what it was like to wake up in the world and wonder who you were.

"I am not!" Molly protests. "I've been a superhero for almost a whole year! And me and my friends fought tons of bad guys, and they're all teenagers, and I can totally help!"

Protest aside, however, there are some important questions to ask here. "Is there really a man in the moon? Who's Bunny? When can I go home?" Because that's the things. She can help, sure. But she'd... kind of rather go home. So if she can do that, that's what she wants.

"I'm sure you're a great superhero, but the things we're fighting target kids. It's a little different from fighting, I don't know -"

He racked his brain for a villain she might find familiar.

"- Doctor Doom."

He went on, "Anyway, there really is a Man in the Moon, Bunny is the Easter Bunny, and you can go home as soon as we figure out a way to get you there. It might take some time. The really powerful myths were captured and need to be freed, and they're the ones that have the best chance of being able to send you back."

"We fought Doctor Doom once! Only it wasn't really Doctor Doom, it was a robot that Ultron made, and then Ultron showed up, and we had to save Victor from it 'cause Ultron's sort of his dad, and it was awesome!"

Congratulations, Jack. You have a bonafide comic book superhero riding piggyback.

"The Easter Bunny's real?" If her belief counts, then Bunny just got a little boost in belief power. "That's freaking awesome! What about Santa? An-and the Tooth Fairy?"

That would have been pretty cool if the thought of a little kid like her fighting evil robots didn't fill him with horror.

"Those are my other team-mates. Also, the Sandman and Anansi the Spider. Who's a giant pain in my frosty butt. We're all real, though - at least here. I don't know if versions of us exist where you're from. There are a lot of other myths, too. Though there aren't many of us left running free."

His expression grew a little more rueful.

"See, it's just me and Bunny left. Tooth, Sandy, Anansi, and North - that's Santa's other name, they all got captured. So did a lot of the other myths that used to help out our team sometimes."

Molly has never heard of Anansi, but she has heard of Sandman. And when she hears that the bad guys are capturing the good heroes, well...

"Then you gotta let me help! I can help before I go home, and... and we can rescue Santa and the tooth fairy and everybody, if they're real, then they can't disappear, what if Christmas gets ruined?"

"The mini-fairies that help the Tooth Fairy are taking over collecting teeth and the Yetis and elves are still making the toys. Bunny and I were going to deliver them ourselves. We can handle it, at least until we get them back."

He was lying like a rug. They were certainly going to try but they were in over their head.

"We'll figure this out when we talk with the others, though." He pointed with his staff down at the field near a pond, where a few people were already gathered.

"I'm going to need you to wait there with everyone else until we get the last few stragglers. Then we'll talk to everyone and figure out what to do from here."

"Yeah... okay." She looks down at the group with a little bit of trepidation. What if none of her friends are there? What if they're all grownups? What if--

Nope, she's Princess Powerful, she's not gonna be scared.

She's not.

"I promise I won't leave unless I find out you're secretly a bad guy," she promises solemnly.

"You don't have to worry about that, so I guess you'll be sticking around."

He landed and set her down gently, giving her a wide smile.

"As far as we know, the other people here are good guys too, but if anyone seems scary, give a yell. The Wind's my friend and it'll make sure it carries it to me, okay? And I'll come right back. It shouldn't take too long to get the last few people."

Edited 2013-04-28 19:54 (UTC)

Molly nods, because all of that makes perfect sense for her. If Jack Frost is real, why wouldn't he be friends with the Wind? And why wouldn't the Wind be something you could befriend?

"Okay. Don't take too long, though, okay?" She's not scared, but okay maybe she doesn't want to be alone with a bunch of strangers for too long. Hey, in the lack of familiar faces, he seems safe enough to trust. If he's friends with Santa and the Easter Bunny, he must be a good guy.

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letskicksomeice - 2013-04-28 20:02 (UTC) - Expand

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