[EVENT] The Simulation Ends

[sixthiteration]

WHERE: 6I Fountain Park & Elsewhere
WHEN: April 1
OPEN TO: ALL - Mingle
WARNINGS: N/A

---

In the snug circle of an old park, a fountain sits burbling beneath a broad, midday sky.

Once-neat paving stones have buckled and cracked from the slow nudge of wayward roots. Benches stand covered in lichen and rust. Three paths push into the underbrush like the spokes on a wheel, the encroaching forest creating lush tunnels through the dark.

But the fountain stands singular and pristine, brightly splashing in open rebellion of the deep, muffled sounds of a place long ago gone to seed. A vibration hums through the ground, there and quickly gone, and the water in the fountain trembles, lapping against the high walls of its cool, pale reservoir.

Far, far away, in a place that isn't really there, people begin to blink out of existance.

It is the first of April.

It is precisely ten o'clock in the morning.



[Please see event details and guidelines here.]

Comments

Kira Akiyama | Group 1 | OTA

[3ofswords]

Nothing much gets anyone used to waking up underwater, especially when he's forgotten half the instances. At least the sun is shining on his freezing ass as he pulls clear, rolling over the edge onto cold ground, grass shimmering with heavy dew. It's fucking freezing, same as always, and Kira sputters and spits as he rolls over one more time, ass over elbow and eventually his head pops upright.

His hair's in his face.

Pushing it back--and back--he gets both hands in the wet curtain. There's nothing shaved or trimmed; it's long. When he lets go, it sheets back down in a dark curtain, eventually separating into ragged twists as he squeezes cold water from it.

He's just starting to take stock--black scrubs, no backpack, attention grabbed by the fucking LED watch on his wrist--when he hears the people behind him. Whatever's happened, he's not alone, and he immediately turns back to make sure everyone gets out of the water. They can't stay out here like this; the early spring morning is still too cold for comfort.

--

After a change of clothes from the brick house, and a second round of villagers out of the water, Kira's back at the fountain with a canvas boat full of towels and blankets, getting down names and band-colors as people come through. The list he'd made before isn't complete, and some of the people were already gone--but it's enough to compare to, and it means he has an answer when someone comes back to ask after a friend.

There are a lot of no's, early on. He's glad for Ravi and Nerys, and the number of people he recognizes keeps growing. No reason to stay nervous, with every tale of disappearances, people being confirmed as seen on the other side.

No reason but human nature; there are a few names he won't be satisfied until he ticks off--Bodhi, Bela, Karen, Mark--and even if they all come through, he's still not sure what they're coming into. Aurora and Hoshi had been at the house when he came through, and the goat had been staked out in the yard--but he hadn't seen a single other person, Ravi and Nerys aside. A ghost town, a rapture. A rustier version of the prison they'd already been in, like someone had dumped them into an old tank to clean the new.

"Make sure you go check your place for your belongings, check on your animals," he tells the latest arrival, putting their name and color down on the next line.

In the lull, he checks his wrist again. It's strange to have anything report the time, but it's the date that narrows his eyes. Whatever this is, it's a bit much for a fucking joke. Not for the first time, he tries to ease the strap down over his hand, smoothing his fingers over it for some hidden clasp. There's nothing but the smooth edge, and he's not quite ready to chew off his hand to be rid of the cuff.

[cleptes]

Bela makes a point to check on Kira later in the day, to see how her friend was doing. She didn't linger around the fountain for long after coming out from it, wanting to find warm clothes and a bite to eat before doing anything else. Maybe that made Bela a terrible friend, but she had always been inclined to put her own needs first.

"Hey," she greets him with a casual smile, almost as if the day hadn't happened. "Don't suppose you could pencil me in for a haircut?" Bela may be still coming to terms with the experience of coming out of the fountain again, but she isn't above making a jokey comment.

The time for having a serious discussion about what transpired earlier will come at some point. Right now, she just wants some light conversation with a friend.

[zomboligist]

There are certain terms for what Ravi's come out of the fountain looking like. Honestly, in this moment, he almost feels bad that there are no intrepid Bigfoot hunters around, because given the thick frizzy mane of hair on his head and in his beard, he's probably a money shot for someone if they caught some footage of him. Splashing a little desperately, Ravi realizes that he's never been in this situation before, given that the well had been dry (so to speak, what with it being a fountain) and now he has to thrash and try and get out.

"Little help, here!" he says frantically, reaching a hand up for the person that had been in there with him, but had managed to get out before.

Claire Temple | Group 4 | OTA

[theluckygirl]

Like clockwork, the nurse had still made regular passes by the fountain and had done so the evening before. It always made her think back to the day she arrived. There hadn't been any new arrivals as of late and that both relieved and saddened her. Still, Claire knew that there was always a possibility of being there to help a new arrival. She didn't, however, fathom having to go through the whole process herself for the second time.

But, there she was, hanging off the edge of the fountain after surfacing, coughing and sputtering before a hand is offered to pull her out. It's freezing and why that surprises her is a mystery but she clings tightly to the towel placed on her shoulders for a short minute before she's heading to the house she and Karen shared.

Less than 15 minutes later, she's returned after making a few more discoveries. One of which being her hair being several inches longer than it was the "day" before and the newly acquired piece of jewelry on her wrist that couldn't be taken off.

There's still plenty questions that will need answers, but for the moment, Claire is going to help as many as she can until there aren't any more people.

Or, animals.

Not until Group 9

[dann_0]

Danny draws a deep breath as he breaks the surface. He gasps a few times and then the icyness of the water hits him and he finds it hard to take deep breaths. He makes for the edge of the fountain and climbs out and directly into the arms of a woman who has already rescued him from drowning once.

"Claire?"

Danny has a not too bad looking beard, his hair is a mess and overall he just looks like a mess.

[underpinnings]

Just as the last villagers are accounted for--names taken, loved ones spoken for, long hair and beards examined, wrist bands compared--a pair of antlers broke the water. A loud, honking call directs attention back to the fountain, followed by a second, then a lower sound altogether. A family of moose surface at one side; a cow at the other, and being pinned to the fountain's edge by the cow's forehead, a human figure.

Sputtering, soaked, in the same scrubs as the rest--but with close cropped hair and a black backpack, saving his spine from the hard stone.

Owen puts one hand on the cow's head, the other on the fountain, and pushes enough to roll over the edge. Momentarily prone, he's quick to his feet at the drop of a shadow, then down to a knee as his balance proves shaky. Feels like sea-legs. Looks like a woman standing over him, and the hand patting the side of his pack doesn't find the usual weapons.

His gaze darts incredulously back to the cow, watching it get a leg over the stonework, then back to her face. "Where am I?"

15 minutes later

[beallmysins]

Jax doesn't know what the fuck is happening. He'd gotten used to the village being a fucking nightmare nine days out of ten and he'd gotten used to not having anything approaching normal conveniences; he's done enough stints in jail and prison to be used to lockdown and no tv, it's not like he can't handle it.

What he can't handle is a goddamn mind fuck and after climbing out of the fountain for the second time since coming to this place, he scans the grounds for a face he knows. Claire is the first one he picks out and it's a good thing - he likes Claire and knows she doesn't tolerate bullshit.

"What the fuck is this," Jax says, coming close to her. "I've been here for a fucking year, trapped, and now it's all a dream?"

Margaery Tyrell | Group 3 | OTA

[thekittenqueen]

She could remember this feeling before, emerging from the fountain breathless and in shock. The world around her muted, as though she lost her sense of hearing and any perception of where she was and what she was doing. All Margaery could remember was being in the barn with her animals and then suddenly surrounded by water. There was no death, no explosion. Nothing that might lead her to think this was some afterlife as she had before. It was all natural, as though she had been pulled through by the hands of the Observers.

There were a few people already around the fountain, all of them in a similar state. It was only when she was out of the water that Margaery had the chance to look at herself. Her hair was longer than before, reaching down to her thighs, tangled and matted from her indelicate entrance. She was back in the hideous scrubs, only now there was something on her wrist, a device she didn't recognize or like looking at.

There wasn't much time to marvel or remain dazed. More and more people were coming through, all of them as disheveled and haggard as she felt. She held her breath as each group was hauled out of the fountain, her heart thrumming anxiously for signs of Robb and Loras. Each face giving her hope until the sudden recognition destroyed it. It was only as the last groups were emerging that hope won through and she found those she cared for. Quick embraces were given before being interrupted by the appearance of animals.

Her animals.

They didn't have their ribbons or flowers about them, but she had spent enough time with her livestock to know what they looked like. "Someone help me herd them back to the village?" If the village was even the same. Where were they?

[guessihavelostcount]

While the whole experience of suddenly being surrounded by water and having to drag herself out had been shocking, it wasn't as confusing as everything else that followed once she had herself sitting on the ground trying to figure out what was going on. It wasn't just the feeling of being disoriented but it was also the feeling of, well, feeling different.

Just as she had been the first time she came through the fountain, she was wearing her red colored scrubs instead of her regular clothes. Not only that, her shoulder length hair was longer than it had been moments before. Quite a bit longer, in fact, since it now fell to the middle of her back in long wet waves. Her nails were also longer than she normally kept them, looking clean and neat instead of chewed on which was how she normally kept them short.

She was still frowning over it when she glanced up to see a familiar form and felt a rush of relief. Scrambling to her feet, she called out. "Margaery?"

Kira Nerys | Group 1 | OTA

[thenewways]

It's been long enough since Nerys last dragged herself, disoriented and dazed, out of the fountain, that she's mostly forgotten what it felt like. It certainly isn't fun by any stretch of the imagination, though there's a slight improvement in that this time, the last thing she remembers is not 'shot at close range with a Starfleet issue phaser'. She had been checking traplines.

Now, clearly, she's not, but priority goes to getting the fuck out of the water, which Nerys does pretty much on auto-pilot. It's not a very graceful maneuver, but there aren't that many people there to witness it, just the other Kira and that doctor guy, Ravi.

Once she's out and, you know, breathing oxygen, the first thing she notices is that none of them are wearing anything remotely like what they would have had on earlier in the day. Scrubs would have been far too thin for this time of year. In fact, by the light in the sky and the length of their hair and Ravi's beard, it's almost certain that this isn't the same day at all. Or even the same month.

The other thing that's strange, on the scale of the already odd things that are happening, is that there's some kind of chronometer and comm unit attached to her wrist. Chief O'Brien could probably jury-rig it in a few minutes' time, but hopefully Picard or Beverly have better engineering skills than Nerys herself. Though, until the next group sputters upwards several long minutes later, she half-believes nobody else is there but the three of them. Not that the company is bad, but the prospect is pretty lonely.

-----

Because of this all, and the process of getting resettled, finding her bungalow (which is no longer shored up by her novice building skills, and the oilpaper of the windows is glass once more), and trying to adjust to the prospect of the world being wiped nearly clean...it takes a little while for Nerys to fully understand the biggest change of all.

Her heart has been pounding, adrenaline rushing, for a good hour. Now that she's not soaked to the bone, now that she's in the Inn and has had a glass of water and a change of clothes, and she has somewhere to stay, hopefully it'll ease back into a normal pace, because it keeps feeling like it's skipping around. There are some people going through the large boxes nearby, and she's resolved to go help them, really, once she's done with this water and her chest feels less tight.

Nerys reaches for the glass of water, and her still-wet hair falls, irritatingly, into her face. She reaches to peel it out of her eyes once more with a faint noise of frustration, then winces as her nails catch on her brow ridges, scratching the thin skin.

She blinks, closes her eyes as her fingertips graze the pronounced bone, and tries to get a hold of herself, check why she's feeling so disoriented. That's about when she realizes why she's feeling so damn strange. It's now beating sideways, the right way, as compared to how it has for nearly two years.

Her eyes snap open. "Hey," she says, and then swallows to get some more saliva, because the noise had sounded like a croak, and was pretty quiet. "Hey, um, I...are any of you a doctor?"

[3ofswords]

Rolling ass over elbow out of the fountain is disorienting enough--the fact of rolling out of the fountain at all is disorienting enough. Then there's the hair flipped into his face, the shitty joke of a date on his arm--the fact of the watch on his arm--and the tremor in both hands that seems to have as much to do with the inexplicable drop in weight as it does with the shock.

It's a lot to take in; enough that he's pushed his hair back and stared at Nerys more than one time, a few assessing glances that ask the other, without asking, are you okay.

Then his brain catches up to his eyes, and he squints at her again. Biting his lip, he sucks his next breath through his teeth. The pain does not make the world reassert itself in any way that makes sense. "Nerys," he says, in the deliberately calm tone of the near-hysterical, "I think--you don't freak out, and I won't freak out, but something happened to your face."

Mark Watney | Group 16 | OTA

[markwatney]

To suggest I am irritated would be an understatement.

You'd think I'd be elated, or at least reassured to some degree. Everything about this ordeal seems to point to my theories being correct. I think we were in a simulation, and a look around at all the long hair and beards would seem to at least partially confirm that fact. Then again, we could be in yet another version of the simulation, for all I know.

But that's not the thing. The thing is the way it all happened.

One by one, every person around me disappeared. We didn't know what was happening. I'm supposed to be the steady one, the calm one, and I was pretty fucking far from it. If people were terrified, I couldn't blame them. I was more than a little terrified myself. And now here we all are, soaking wet in some kind of next-level deja vu, looking like we just spent the last month sleeping under an overpass.

Sitting on the lip of the fountain, cold water dripping steadily from my beard, I glance around, relieved at least to see that it seems we're all here. Just transferred. Just someplace the same, but not, although I can't put my finger on how it's changed. Frowning, I glance down to my wrist, stare at the digital readout for a long, steady moment, and when I look back up, I see it. The thing that's off.

"Um, guys," I say, slowly standing, my gaze tipped up toward the horizon, over the lush line of trees. "The canyon's gone."

[3ofswords]

Of course he's one of the last through. Kira can now accurately note that it's been several hours, people crawling out of the fountain in increments--barely enough time to assure one group that the best thing to do is calm down and find some dry clothes before the next surfaces. Which seems to mean it's been several hours of steady disappearances, on the other side.

Sympathy just isn't his wheelhouse, today. With the other two written in his book, he'd had to look through the slim crowd to find Mark on his ass, some dignified reversal of his own arrival. He's marching over with a towel when Mark stands up, three hours late to astute observation hour. "Nice of you to wake up and join the class, Mr. Watney," he says, tossing the towel over Mark's dripping hermit-hair.

It's his version of so good to see you. While Mark is under the towel, he writes down his name and with a glance, the color of his scrubs. Until the next person crawls out of the water, his journal gets stuffed back into the waistband of his pants; already a dubious fit, he's tempted to break into his supply of rhinestone belts.

"Canyon's gone, we all look like we've been road-tripping with Charles Manson for the last year, and there's an old timey schoolhouse again."

He is, maybe, still a bit upset about rolling into this with only two other people: one of whom's nose had accordioned into her eyebrows.

Kate Kelly-Sorellin | Group 7 | OTA - Park & Inn

[lastofthekellys]

Two hours. Roughly. Give or take. Two hours, give or take, of people vanishing in threes and now here is another group. It's announced loudly, after the initial spluttering and cursing, because Miss Kate Kelly, Mrs Kate Kelly-Sorellin, is in an almighty temper.

She's back in those dreadful blouse and trousers, back feeling oddly naked without her proper underthings. Her hair is heavy and she can feel how knotted it is. Unlike so many others, it isn't any longer than it had been a few minutes ago, but the curls are a mess. It's tangling around her, snaring on her clothes and a strange bracelet, and that is what finally tips the balance.

While trying to untangle her hair from the strange, glowing bracelet, Kate stars to curse. Loudly, eloquently, mixing up peculiarly Irish-Catholic swearing with old-fashion Australian outback, she swears.

"- you wombat headed, big bellied, magpie legged and splawfooted complete bastard sons of inbred dingos," she shouts at their nameless, faceless captors, finally tearing her hair free. "Where the fuckin' bloody hell are we this time? And what on God's green earth is on my arm?"

---

Later, once she's calmed down enough to be sensible, she goes to the inn. The Inn. Hers. She's jangled, twisted up and frightened by it all, but everyone is wet and scared themselves, and they need shelter, food. She can do that.

At the Inn she's met by the outraged clucking of her flock of hens and Tomdicken Harry, her charming (to her, anyway) rooster. There is dust in their feathers, but from what she can see, their henhouse and pen is still there. She clucks at them soothingly, but moves back to the building itself. A cat launches herself at her, all cranky, shattered dignity and telling her, very loudly, that none of this is meeting with Miss Hoppity's understand of the world, and her human has been very lax in dealing with it all.

It's then that Kate notices the state of the main room. It's filthy. There is dust everywhere, as if she hadn't spent all that time sweeping and scrubbing and dusting. It's enough to make a grown woman cry, except...

Except there's a large crate. There's several large crates, in fact. Cuddling her annoyed cat, Kate makes her cautious way over.

"What is going on?" she mutters to herself and anyone following her.

[fishermansweater]

He'd heard the shouting loudly enough to recognize her voice; Finnick's hiding spot is near enough to the fountain to be able to hear and he's partly relying on that to be able to hear Annie arrive.

The cursing isn't Annie, but it is someone he trusts enough to want to speak to her: Kate Kelly. So he waits, and he watches; Finnick has a good view of the direct path to the Inn from his tree, and he waits until he sees Kelly's distinctively red figure head off in that direction before he edges back around the trunk of the tree and drops down out of its branches.

"Kelly!"

Benedict Sorellin-Lancaster | Group 11 | OTA

[warriorborn]

The first group or three (or four, embarrassingly) of people vanishing had gone unnoticed by Benedict. In his defense, he had been somewhat busy, so people he didn't see regularly not being where he hadn't expected them to be wasn't exactly difficult to overlook.

And then Kate had vanished, and Benedict felt his heart stop.

It had never occurred to him that they might be returned to their worlds separately. Their lives had become so entwined — hell, they were married, for all intents and purposes — that it had seemed impossible that they wouldn't remain together, and the hour or so he spent after her disappearance becoming more and more frantic is not one he would wish on anyone, ever.

Finding himself underwater is an experience Benedict had hoped to never repeat. For all that his Kate has tried to teach him to swim, he had deemed the whole thing a wasted endeavor and simply decided to stay on dry land for the rest of his life, thank you very much. He can hardly focus on anything but frantically trying to kick himself to the surface, and when he manages to reach it, it's all he can do to cling to the edge of the fountain and gasp for air. At least this time he hadn't inhaled what felt like half the fountain itself, but he can hardly feel pleased about that when he is cold and wet and still frantically worried about his wife.

Slowly, still gasping for breath and doing his best not to let himself succumb to a panic he has hardly ever let himself feel, he rolls out of the fountain and lies on the ground. As of yet, he has not noticed the fact that his hair is long or his beard is dark, or the fact that he has regained a set of very prominent, very sharp canines that would indent his lower lip when he stops sucking in air through an open mouth.

[lastofthekellys]

Kate could have timed it by minutes. She has a watch around her wrist now, so she doesn't have to rely on the sun. Yet, now, she distrusts watch and sky both. They are somewhere else, again, and everyone is stumbling around like they've woken up in a fairy circle, so no. She doesn't trust. And yet, it feels like maybe an hour. Maybe an hour between her spluttering and gasping and swearing her arrival, and a familiar, lanky body flailing his way out of the fountain.

The clothes are the right colour, the arms and gestures are right, the same with the length of his legs and oh, but his hair had been so dark when he arrived, that there is no hesitation. Kate, coming back to the fountain park after checking the inn and changing into dry clothes, gasps, picks up her skirts and runs.

"Ben! Ben, Ben, dearest, are you all right?"

She'd meant to just land on her knees next to him, but instead, she's flung herself against him, clinging hard.

Finnick Odair | Group 2 | OTA

[fishermansweater]

Swimming is an instinct to Finnick. Fall off a boat in District Four, and it's swim or drown. He doesn't need to be prepared or to expect it, and he's not: one moment, he's out in the woods hiking along the river to check on traps, and the next thing he knows, he's kicking upwards. He gulps in air as he hits the surface, but he only takes a moment to glance around: stone basin, fountain, village park, a couple of other people in the water with him.

He'd spent months expecting this, and in honesty, he'd been less vigilant lately than he should have been, lulled into complacency because it's hard to stay alert all the time, even after a lifetime conditioned to fear.

Finnick hauls himself out of the fountain, as far away from the others as he can. He pauses long enough to recognize the people he'd arrived with as Oliver Queen and Lyanna Stark, but he doesn't stop to see what they're going to do. He runs. He runs until he's out of sight, then he ducks behind the nearest building and takes stock. Red scrubs, no backpack this time. A scratchiness on his face that turns out to be a beard -- not just a few days or even weeks without shaving, but a full, untrimmed beard and long hair. There's something around his wrist, too: he glances down and sees some sort of bracelet, the same red as his clothing, with some sort of tiny computer screen on it showing what looks like a time and date.

He grabs for it and tries to pull it off, but despite its appearance of something rubbery, it doesn't expand (of course not), and he can't pull it off. He smashes his wrist against the wall of the building, expecting to at least be able to break the thing (why is it there, is it a tracker? why the sudden need for them to know the time?) but it's unscathed, not even scratched, and he tries twice more before giving up, aware that the adrenaline of fear is threatening to make him do something stupid enough to hurt himself.

He needs to think. No screams, no sounds of violence, but something's changed and he doesn't know what. More important than finding that out, though, is finding Annie. There's an unsettling quiet in the village, and the plants look more overgrown than he remembers them. Something's deeply wrong here, and he doesn't trust anything about it.

The most important thing, though, is to find Annie. He considers running for their house, but he doesn't want to risk that, unsure as he is of just what's going on. That leaves staying in the village and looking, waiting for her. He can hear more sounds from the direction of the fountain, and nobody's ever shown up here from anywhere else, so if -- no, not if, when, it has to be when -- Annie arrives, that's where she'll be.

Back to the park, then, but Finnick doesn't approach the fountain. Instead, he circles around the edges of the park until he finds a tall, sturdy evergreen and starts to climb.

Finnick has a good view from up in the branches, and he's far enough away that he doesn't expect most people will both to look too hard at the tree, but he can see what's going on by the fountain if he peers through the needles. He takes off his shirt and spreads it on the branch next to him to dry, eventually warming up as the sun climbs higher through the sky. The prolonged damp is far from ideal in the still-too-cold weather, but the winter is past -- it's April, if the bracelet he's wearing is to be believed -- and he's not going to freeze.

Careful as he is, though, the bright red of his scrubs is clearly visible from below to anyone who's looking, and there are some people Finnick is watching out for.

Mostly Annie, but not only her.

[treadswater]

A couple weeks ago, the village had been treated to first-row seats to the louder side of Annie's panic. When Finnick had been locked in the Inn with the others, and she'd been locked outside, she'd gone into hysterics. Loud, piercing hysterics, complete with panicked banging on windows until her strong hands had bruised. She'd been inconsolable, screaming and crying.

This isn't like that. The woman who appears in the fountain in the afternoon, kicking her way expertly to the surface and then treading water as she gets her bearings, is silent. Wide-eyed and silent.

Finnick had vanished hours ago for her, and Annie has long since worked herself into a state of mute terror. She'd been searching for him in the woods, trying to keep calm, and think, and smart and not get killed by any trap, but she'd heard the commotion in the village about people vanishing and that, well...

Her eyes are a little glassy as she stares around the park. In the fountain are Sansa Stark (committed to Raleigh Beckett) and Loras (brother, she thinks, to Margaery Tyrell), and Annie ignores them once she establishes that they aren't a threat. The establishing is done almost subconsciously, her training taking over despite her mental exhaustion.

There are people. Familiar people. No one is killing each other.

She can't see Finnick.

Familiar park, same park, same time of year, same time of day when she vanished. She's in the uniform again. No backpack. A band on her wrist, and that gets through Annie enough for her to duck under the water, swim down a little way so she's safe to peer at it. A watch, maybe. Time, maybe a date counter. It's not immediately dangerous so she swims back up to the surface.

She can't see Finnick. She doesn't care about anyone else, not enough not really not now. Somewhere, she thinks about her birds. It's enough to get her moving.

Annie swims to the far side of the fountain and climbs out. Her hair is heavy, tugging at her head and weighing her down. But not enough. She takes one last look around the park, then turns and starts to run.

beverly crusher | group 8 | ota

[ethnobotany]

The village has been strange most of the day. The normal people who should be around aren't. It's quiet, eerily so, and it's enough to make Beverly abandon her normal routine in favor of going to check on her housemates and then everyone she knows and can find. She makes it back to the house, just managing to push open the door and step inside before everything shifts around her.

And then she opens her eyes to cold water. It's not the first time she's done this, nor the first time she's seen anyone else do the same, but it's been so long for her that she has to fight the urge to inhale in surprise. She kicks hard, reaching for the surface. Eventually, she manages to find air, breaking through the water and gasping for breath as she clings to the edge of the fountain. A moment passes before she pulls herself out of the water again. She doesn't have a backpack this time, but she's got a new wristband and her scrubs are a different color. That's... new.

The other weird thing is that her hair has grown out and it's two different shades. Blonde at the bottom and red at the top. Her old dye job's been growing out wrong. Somehow.

It'll have to wait, though. She needs to be sure no one needs medical attention. Or help getting out of the fountain.

So she stands again and sucks in a deep breath before she starts looking people over. "Excuse me, I'm a doctor. I need to make sure no one's been hurt by our sudden reemergence. Just let me give you a quick examination and you'll be good to go. And if you happen to see anyone who needs medical attention, would you mind sending them my way?"

[3ofswords]

"Well, I'm not a doctor, but I'm pretty sure getting you into some dry clothes is more important than that," Kira answers, barely looking up as he writes down her scrub color and thinks a moment on the name. He's only starting to wear thin on his that's nice but it's cold as balls conversations, and he'd worn thin on most politeness by the age of eleven.

Having quite literally been in her shoes a couple of hours ago though, he sighs and tries again. "What I mean is, we have a couple of people working on that already, and you're welcome to help, but I really think you should go change first. It seems like everyone's belongings are still in their houses, if you had one."

His second glance turns into a third--his blanking on the name might have had something to do with the hair. "And once this is all over, if you want help trimming that down, I've got a kit."

Jude Sullivan | Group 13 | OTA

[theintercessor]

In hindsight, he might have expected to wake up in the water again. The steady disappearances from the other side--not just Bodhi, but also the dog, also everyone who seemed to know him--had him in the same mind as before. Empty town, cold weather. He didn't need the powers that be to send him home--he was there, remembering it, to the point that he'd been looking over his shoulder and waiting for a blow.

Instead, he'd woken up in the water without a scratch.

At least this time he can move. Fully submerged with working limbs is better than half a foot of water with his body gone limp. It's the cold of a spring puddle kicked up by tires, not the deathly chill of water under ice, and you don't fear drowning as much as Jude does without learning to swim.

More stubbornness than sense. If a thirteen year old boy dares you to jump in a lake, and you're another thirteen year old boy, that's a life and death that trumps the literal.

Breaching the surface isn't the trouble; it's trying to haul himself over the edge. It's harder than it was last time; his clothes are still wet, still weighing him down, but it's something about the cold, something about his body. It goes right through him, even if it isn't the burning freeze of winter. There's no getting out of this gracefully, as he reflexively coughs any trace of water from his mouth. He wants to grit his teeth, see if the third time is the charm, but he knows now--he might lose the tether to his body at any moment. He might fall back in with no hope of pulling himself up, and that's more terrifying than the sudden shift into the water.

For all he knows, he was having an episode on the way here, and there's some perfectly reasonable explanation he's lost pieces of.

"Can I get a hand up," he asks the nearest person, already hoarse voice croaking in his throat.

[ex_assertiveness90]

Stella has had just enough time to change out of her wet scrubs and into the simple cotton trousers and button-down she'd got in her first gift box from the observers all those months ago; now is not the time for silk blouses and pencil skirts, even if it might make her feel more like herself. It's strange, that her house is dusty like no one's lived there in years — like it was when she first arrived in the village — but her clothes are all still there, no moths have got into the silk or wool, everything's as she left it.

She doesn't have the time to process any of that right now. Her hair is the real problem, longer than waist-length for a reason she can't yet parse, but she hasn't got the time to deal with that either; she's just put it back with an elastic and resolved to have someone cut it later so she doesn't feel like fucking Rapunzel.

What is for right now is making sure everyone's accounted for and anyone who's injured gets to see a doctor. Stella's been helping people out of the fountain who need it, off and on as she's not otherwise occupied, and she just happens to be standing there when Jude breaks the surface of the water. "Got you," she says, grabs his hand, then gets her arm round his shoulders for more leverage — he's taller than she is, like most people — only letting go when he's out of the fountain and on his feet.

She doesn't know him well. Stella makes it a point to know names and faces here, but there are a lot of people here with whom she's not done more than say hello in passing. But if she's not exactly kind, she can be polite — cordial, even. "All right?" she asks, glancing over him for visible injuries.

Clint Barton ⇢ Group 11 ⇢ Arrival/Just After | Rescuing the Animals

[pretendtoneedme]

( Arrival )

Unlike a lot of other people, Clint hadn't even noticed the weirdness going on until he was swept up in it. His routine on most days consisted of going hunting now that he didn't really have any materials left to fix anything with, especially since the translation from winter into spring seemed to be slow to arrive and game wasn't all that available, even for someone with his perception and ability to sneak around quietly. So he'd been in the woods, Arado by his side, lying in wait along a game trail he'd found a few weeks before and-

Water. Water all around him, water in his mouth and eyes, except there's also something heavy on his head and what- There's a brief moment of something that might be panic, something he slams down with a heavy mallet because it's not going to help him in this situation. Hawks really don't like being underwater, and Clint's got a bit more in common with them in that way than he wants to admit, but he's used to keeping his head in dangerous situations by now. Instantly stopping his breathing, part of him notices that the bow he'd been holding and the weight of the quiver over his shoulder are gone, but that's not important for the moment as he pushes what seems to be upwards and hopefully out.

Clint breaks the surface with a gasp, instantly unable to see anything through the sopping wet, heavy mess of overgrown hair in his eyes, with a similar weight on his face that he knows has to be from a beard. Grabbing for anything he can find for stability, a few seconds later there's stone under his fingertips, and that's the moment the pieces fit together about what the fuck's going on here.

"Son of a..." The cursing devolves into a mix of Russian, Italian, and German, steady and maintaining as Clint shoves the hair out of his face and looks around. There's other people in the fountain with him, and there's people around the edge, things aren't calm, but it's definitely not what he was expecting when he woke up that day. "Everybody okay?"

(After he gets out of the fountain, Clint's going up to the house for just a few minutes to find Arado and cut that mess of hair and beard off with the kitchen shears. The dog is fine, anxious as he usually isn't due to being seemingly abandoned, and he sticks close to Clint as he goes back to the fountain to see what he can help with. The haircut is quick and sloppy and will obviously have to be finished properly later, but at least it's out of his eyes, and the beard is actually fairly decent. He'll get a proper shave once everything settles down.)


( Animal Rescue )

So far, all the animals anyone's found have been where they logically would be - pets in the places their owners are living, chickens in coops, that kind of thing. But once all the residents of the village have apparently been accounted for, including one new arrival and oh god that poor guy's gonna have a lot of problems that they can't focus on for the moment-

And that's when the cows start coming through.

Well, goats first, which is probably good since they're the smallest of the livestock. But they also kick hard, and they're currently churning up the water of the fountain in shock at the sudden displacement. Fortunately they can swim well, but there's no way for them to climb out with the steep sides of the fountain. This is going to be a problem.

Fortunately, the inn's right nearby, along with the storehouse of village-collective equipment, and without even really thinking about it Clint takes off in that direction. There's not a lot in that mess that can help, but he grabs a couple of ropes and the army tarps that are stashed away, and at the last second a couple of the never-diminishing Snuggies in case they'll be of some use. Supplies gathered, he'll head back to the fountain and start doing what he can to round up the troops to get the very unhappy animals out, including diving back in the water himself to give them a hand.

Animal rescue.

[dann_0]

It doesn't take Danny too long to change clothes and then when he comes back he starts helping people out of the fountain. Then he starts noticing the animals as well. He nods to Clint as he sees the other coming back with ropes.

"Did you see anything we could use as a ramp for them?"

Major Lilywhite | Group 16

[majorlyugh]

The panic didn't settle in for about an hour, when Major was unable to find Ravi anywhere, despite his best attempts at finding him. Even Minor seemed to pick up on the discomfort and the worry, whining and trotting at Major's feet everywhere he went. But even with a Basset Hound's heightened sense of smell, they couldn't locate Ravi anywhere. It's like he simply ceased to exist.

Major had heard about the sudden disappearances from the others, how they happened without warning and with some measure of regularity. And he'd been in denial for the bulk of that hour that his best friend had been the latest victim to the whims and fancies of the village.

It's only when he's doing yet another sweep of the village that he starts to notice ... something's off. He usually encountered a good amount of folks whenever he'd go about his daily routine, but .. the place feels more and more like a ghost town. That leads him to two conclusions: either everyone's inside their homes for some reason (which makes Major wonder whether or not he should be, too), or .. everyone's disappearing. Everyone except him.

Of course, his time comes, eventually. He's suddenly in the frigid, tepid waters that he remembers from when he'd first come through, the same waters that he's checked with some (secretive) frequency for new arrivals or a familiar face. He kicks with all of the residual strength in his body towards the surface, only taking in lungfuls of air once he's grabbed hold of the lip of the thing. He suspects that he looks a lot like Simba coming out of the water in that "Can You Feel the Love Tonight?" montage, surprisingly long, drenched hair like a curtain in front of his face. He brushes it away hastily, making for some interesting cowlicks as he looks around.

He isn't alone in his surprise, or in the fountain.

"I guess now would be an inappropriate time to start singing songs from The Lion King," he mutters to no one in particular.

[ithuriels_blood]

Clary was sitting near the fountain for the last hour or so when Major made his grand Disney themed entrance. She looked up at him, her eyebrows knitting in a curious expression as he spoke to the air in front of him.

"I think now would be the best time to break into any Disney songs." She replied as he pushed her hair back behind her ear. Clary was mostly dry however her hair was still damp from her own grand entrance. "We need to start assigning people roles from The Lion King if we're singing."

"Also welcome to the other side of the well."

Ned Stark - Group 12

[learned_to_die]

The morning starts off as any other would for Ned, with him waking close to first light, getting dressed, having a simple breakfast, tending to the Weirwood Sapling, and setting about to check on the traps and food stores in the Inn. On some occasions, he goes to visit with his sister, other times he checks in with Margaery and her livestock, sometimes he wanders by the river's edge. It's a relatively simple life, he thinks. The kind he had wished to have back in Winterfell. Sometimes, he takes longer than required at the Weirwood, silently conversing with the Old Gods - if they can hear him here - about his family, about his home, about everything. It helps him start his day centered and calm.

He's not noticed anything wrong until he walks back through the door of his cabin and suddenly has the air sucked from his lungs from the cold of the air around him. No, it isn't air, it's ..

Water?

In his confusion, Ned twirls around, suspended in the water, over and over, trying to make sense of where he is and what's going on. He realizes almost too late that he's somehow back in the fountain, using a last burst of energy and air to force himself towards the surface. With a desperate gasp, he clamors for the side of the structure, his memories of his arrival strong and vivid in his mind's eye. Although his hair's always been on the longer side, he feels the sudden weight of it on his scalp, and reaches up to touch it. He brushes his hand against the wiry shrub of whiskers that's somehow sprouted from his face.

He hoists himself out of the fountain, sitting on its lip, before extending a hand to the person nearest him.

"Here, let me help you."

[chirrutsluck]

Baze is already clinging to the fountain, himself, looking irritable and bedraggled and a lot shaggier than usual-- which given how shaggy he usually is, is really saying something. He glares at the offered hand from under a fringe of dark, bunched hair, grown out but still tied at the ends in its usual bundles, and from the messy tangle of his too-long goatee.

"What happened?" he asks, instead of taking the offered help.

Wanda Maximoff | Group 6 | OPEN

[minus1twin]

A burning pressure seared the inside of her throat as water filled her lungs. Fuck. Wanda's eyes snapped opened and she kicked her way towards the waters surface. This was the second time she'd woken up in water and it wasn't any less unpleasant than before. She clawed for the edge of the fountain, coughing up the water that she had accidentally swallowed.

"What the hell?" She glanced at those gathered around the fountain before pushing herself out of the water. Her head felt unnaturally heavy as water saturated her long hair.

A year and two months, that was how long she'd been contained in the village and now it showed. Her brown hair had grown from the middle of her back to her hips and was now weighing her down as she attempted to clamor from the fountain. Climbing out of the fountain was awkward and before continuing onward she pulled the heavy silky strands over her shoulder and squeezed out the water from her hair.

She was wearing scrubs again, however they were now a dark hunter green.

"What is happening?" The water bubbles behind her, pulling her from the questions that buzzed around her head. Wanda rose to her feet and turned towards the fountain.

---

After her initial arrival, Wanda went in search of her home. It was exactly how she had left it; the chickens were clucking in their pen and wood was stacked by the fireplace. She changed into a pair of jeans and a dark green tank top. Her hair was too long but she didn't know the best way to cut it. She didn't have scissors.

With a heavy sigh Wanda tied back her hair and went in search for something that could be used to cut it.

She can be found out side of the inn with a wet stone and a small blade at her side. Wanda wants to keep the blade sharp and hopes that she's making the cut even enough that it didn't look weird from behind. She methodically lifted pieces of her hair and sliced it to a length that wasn't too long.

Wanda might need help when she reaches the back of her head but for now she looks like she's doing well. She's happy to help people who are struggling with animals but for now Wanda was watching the people come and go, staying out of the way while cutting her hair.

[ooc: Wanda will be at house 20, the inn and the fountain.]

Hair cutting!

[womanofvalue]

Once Peggy's managed to get her hair behaving in a long braid, she feels like a different (and better) person. There's too much to do, but for the moment, she's able to start her careful visits around the village in order to check on her friends, making notes as to what's changed and what hasn't. She's on her way to see if her home is still fine when she comes across Wanda trying to slice off h er own hair. With a sound of alarm, Peggy hopes that she doesn't startle her, but it is a rather surprising and upsetting sight.

"I'm afraid now that I've seen this, you're going to have to let me help." She's hardly an expert in this sort of thing, but all the same, she can't very well just pass Wanda by and not offer her hand in aid.

Clary Fray | Group 10 | OPEN

[ithuriels_blood]

She flailed wildly in the water, kicking her arms and legs out in a futile effort to swim. The water stung her eyes and filled her nose as she kicked in what she hoped was the correct direction. Clary had always hated opening her eyes underwater. She forced herself to calm down enough to escape a pathetic watery death. After everything she's been through, she's not going to have 'death by water' on her tombstone.

She broke the surface of the water, coughing and gasping for air. Bright orange hair plastered to her cheeks and neck as she made her way to the fountain's ledge.

"Anyone else getting a sense of Déjà vu?" She coughed and pulled herself over the edge of the fountain. Clary spent a few minutes laying on her back before pushing herself to her feet. She was back in her black scrubs which clung uncomfortably to her curvy frame. Her was a little longer than before but it wasn't by much.

"Why does it feel like we're playing a video game and we all just got reset?" She looked around at those gathered around the fountain before moving herself out of the way. She wanted to sit and absorb everything before she tried to figure out what to do next next.

"The Matrix... we're in the fucking Matrix." It was so uncomfortable and wet. What was with their captors and water anyway?!

[thegreatexperiment]

Sam was sitting on the edge of the fountain when Clary emerged. She moved to offer her a hand, but it looked like she could handle herself. Anyway, Sam wasn't exactly in the best of conditions to be helping anyone.

She felt...

She felt...weird.

It was, maybe, the least scientific word she could come up with, but at the moment, it was the only one rattling around inside of her brain. She was wet. She was cold. And she was fucking pissed off. None of these were particularly conducive to analysis at the moment.

"I wish it were the Matrix," she said dully. "Then, at least, I'd know fucking Kung-Fu."

Moana & Itiiti | Group 15 & Animals | OPEN

[chosenbytheocean]

'The ocean is a friend of mine.'

The words echoed in her head as she once again found herself floating in a pool of water. Her eyes opened and she saw the glimmer of the sun touching the surface of the water above her. For a few seconds, Moana considered floating there but the pressure in her lungs urged her to breath.

She pushed her way to the water's surface and then swam to the fountains edge. She felt the cold stone beneath her fingers as she then lifted herself out of the fountain. Her hair flopped at her side and covered the ground in water. She didn't need help out of the fountain but a year and a half of hair growth was no joke, even with the tight curls of Moana's hair.

Moana sat at the edge of the fountain and ran her hand over her face before looking around. There were a lot of people there but something was missing. "Itiiti?" She looked around and noticed only people standing around. "Does anyone know where Itiiti is?"

---

After finding out that Itiiti wasn't in the village Moana hovered nervously around the fountain. She was wearing her island dress with her long hair tied back into a bun that made it impossible to tell that her hair had achieved a year and a half of growth.

When the animals started coming through she helped pull them out of the fountain though she had no idea if they'd be able to pull out a 200lb pig from the water. Could Itiiti even swim?

Worried gnawed at her insides until, sure enough, frantic squealing signaled the arrival of Moana's friend. "Itiiti!" She tried to pull the pig out of the fountain but Moana wasn't strong enough on her own. She turned her head and called to the person nearest to her. "Please! Help me."

[chirrutsluck]

Lucky for her, Baze is strong enough for just about anything. He's redone his hair, so it looks mostly like normal except longer, so he doesn't look quite so much like a messy forest man, but his beard is still a long and scraggly mess since he hasn't taken the time to trim it yet. He nudges her out of the way, then ducks down, braces against the fountain's rim, and loops an arm around the pig's middle to lever him out.

If the pig kicks at the wrong time and place, though, he might find himself dumped back in.

Owen Prichard | Coming in last with the livestock | OTA link

[underpinnings]

Separate post for traditional arrival at a not so traditional time, come help him wrangle swimming cows or find him arming himself to get the hell out of dodge.

Baze Malbus | Group 12 | OTA

[chirrutsluck]

Thankfully, given there's only twenty minutes at most between each group's shifting over, there isn't a lot of time for Baze to panic when he realizes Johanna and Bodhi and a dozen other people are simply gone, without a trace. Just about an hour and a half from discovering the first disappearance... a little longer to determine the scope, the increasing scope, of the problem when he starts looking for other people. That still feels like far too long, jogging through the village and peering in windows and knocking on doors, scowling rather than showing his sudden fear at being left alone again.

When the fountain finally claims him, though, it takes Baze no time at all to realize where he is, this time-- because this time he doesn't think he's dead. He gets to the side of the fountain quickly enough, clinging there for a long minute before working out just why he's in the fountain, and why his hair-- already bushy and thick and bundled rather than properly tied like most people-- is far more of a disaster than usual.

At least there's other people already on the other side to be baffled with.

[71st_victor]

She'd come through with Bodhi, which had been the one stupid relief in all of this before Johanna got annoyed again about being shoved through a fucking fountain for the third time. This time, though, there's no new memories, she's got more hair than she's had in months, and she doesn't have her drugs on her or in her. She also doesn't have her axe on her, has a brand new little tracker, and Johanna's seen too many Games to take this lightly.

The change up means that something has happened, something is going on, and the rules are changing. She's been sitting by the edge of the fountain for a while, watching groups of people exit, her eyes hawk-like. It's only when Baze comes stumbling over the edge that she relaxes by a fraction of an inch. She doesn't smile, doesn't move, but her shoulders relax the slightest bit.

"Took you long enough," she bites at him.

Jean-Luc Picard | Group 12 | OTA

[enterprisingheart]

At first, Picard doesn't think much of the fact that there seem to be somewhat fewer people in the village than there might have otherwise been. After all, he knows quite well that he's spent a not insignificant amount of the previous month stuck in what certainly seems to have amounted to the approximate equivalent of a holodeck program, and it certainly wouldn't be too surprising if other people had been pulled into something similar.

But as the population starts to dwindle more and more, even he starts to worry. Admittedly, he doesn't really know how many people had been pulled off into different holodeck simulations, but even despite that he has to admit it feels excessive. Especially once his housemates start disappearing as well, and that has him more than a little concerned. Enough to head out into the much-diminished village to make sure that they aren't somewhere he's missed.

And then he finds himself underwater again, for the second time; there's a brief spike of panic and then he's struggling his way up out of the water. He breaks the surface with a gasp, and then, after looking around and realizing that this looks very much like the fountain in the middle of village speaks up; apparently unaware of the fact that between his customary lack of hair and the bread he's arrived with he looks a little like an aging Santa Claus.

"I would have thought that once would have been enough."

The fact that he doesn't seem to be alone in the fountain is also unexpected, but assuming no one else needs immediate assistance, he starts making his way to the edge of the fountain.

---

Later, once he's managed to make it back to his house, changed into dry clothes, and trimmed back at least the worst of his beard, he heads back to the fountain. Given that there had still been people in the village when he'd been pulled into the fountain, he can't imagine that there aren't still people who will be coming through. And it's never been in his nature to not help, if it's within his power to do so.

"Do you need a hand?"

This is offered to the latest arrival; while he's well aware that the answer might be 'no', the least he can do is offer.

[ethnobotany]

Beverly isn't close enough to help Jean-Luc out of the fountain, but she's close enough to notice when he pulls himself out. Relief washes over her and she doesn't waste time getting to him. Ignoring the fact that he's still soaking wet, she hurries over and throws her arms around him, careful at least not to knock him down. The important thing is that he's here and he wasn't left behind. They haven't been separated.

"Jean-Luc. You made it."

She's still got a towel thrown over a shoulder and she'll take him back to the house in a minute or two so he can dry off. Right now, the important thing is having a nice reunion. They can deal with a lot of other things later on.

Mary McGarrett | OTA | Group 3

[othermcgarrett]

It hadn't been all that long since Mary had first found herself in the fountain. Though she should have known what to do, she still felt a moment of panic while she tried to orient herself and swam for the surface. Once she got to the edge of the fountain, she pulled herself out of it and she instantly noticed the change of the colour of scrubs she was wearing. She used to be in navy blue but now found herself in red. She also notices that her already long hair was even longer and because it’s wet, it was stuck to her face and shoulders. Looking herself over, she notices no visible injuries but she has a weird band on her wrist. She would figure that out later.

She looked around as she wrapped her arms around herself for warmth. She was looking for her brother, Danny or anyone else who could explain why she had taken another involuntary plunge into the fountain but after a quick glance around, she saw nobody familiar.

She started walking, ignoring the cold as best as she could. If her brother wasn’t at the fountain, he had to be around somewhere. She tried to quiet the worry that she had that her brother wasn’t in this place or wouldn’t arrive. Maybe he was sent home? She hoped if he wasn’t here, he was at least back in Hawaii. While she had been happy to to have him with her, she wanted him back home where he belonged.

Mary took to the streets and started looking around. She had no particular place in mind but she was keeping her eyes open for her brother or Danny as well as for answers as to what was going on.

[super_seal]

The day had started off normally enough and if he hadn't of been in the house with Mary when she disappeared he likely wouldn't have even known anything had happened. One moment she was there and the next gone. It was a shock to Steve and one that he did not take easily.

It was pointless to search for Mary, he was there when she disappeared and knew she hadn't run off or get lost or injured, but that didn't mean he wasn't frantic and worried. This place, and all that it put them through.... Just because she was gone didn't mean she'd been returned home.

Then about ninety minutes later Danny disappeared in the same way Mary had. If this was a test, he wasn't impressed. Not knowing what else to do, he headed to the main village to see if anyone there knew what was going on. What he found was more people panicking and even more people missing.

When it was Steve's turn to disappear he was already on a mission to find Danny and Mary. He barely registered being in the fountain again. He was up and out and searching the within seconds of arriving. Searching the crowd, he didn't see either his sister or Danny, although there were many other faces he recognized. He approached Beverly, one of those familiar faces, and was thankfully reunited with Danny shortly after. Danny hadn't seen Mary though either and his worry escalated another notch.

Clearly she wasn't around the fountain or the Inn and as it sounded like she was one of the first to disappear, perhaps she'd gone home. With that in mind and hope in his heart, he took off at a run back to their house in the second village.