faderift | OPEN: Bloomingtide Rifter Arrival

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OPEN: Bloomingtide Rifter Arrival

WHO: New rifters & helpful Inquisition volunteers
WHAT: Welcome to Thedas!
WHEN: Bloomingtide 7
WHERE: The Imperial Highway near Sulcher's Pass
NOTES: This log is slightly backdated, so it's safe to assume safe arrival at Skyhold and begin RPing there as soon as you're ready OOC. It is open to any characters who would have volunteered to go welcome the rifters, whose arrival sites can now be predicted, thank you Solas.

You were asleep—deeply or fitfully, for the last time or just resting your eyes for a moment—and then you were not. And wherever you were was not, anymore, replaced by nothing but the sensation of falling, tumbling into endless, bottomless nothing. If this were still a dream, you would wake before you hit the ground. You can't die in a dream, they say. In some worlds.

But there's no waking here, just a flare of green-white light and a jarring impact onto cold dirt and long grass. When your breath returns and the light's after-image fades from your eyes you will find yourself lying flat on stone, squinting up into sunlight and a shifting, blinding green tear in reality.

You are also not as you were: in the palm of your left hand there glows a narrow splinter of light the same sickly green as whatever brought you here. It aches, a bone-deep pain that gnaws even through all the distractions. Like the fact that you're being attacked. Surrounding you and the rift through which you arrived are five massive beings made of fire and molten, veiny flesh, rearing back to throw flames at anything that breathes. But mind your step, getting out of their way: the stone beneath you is the ruin of the Imperial Highway, elevated high enough that dropping off either side or the crumbled gap ahead will not be much more survivable than the fire.

Luckily, you are not on your own. Around you others are rising from the ground, equally confused, with the same green lights flaring from their hands. And help is already here—prepared, this time, unsurprised by your appearance, with armor and a few extra weapons to hand off if you've come empty-handed.

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"Well, no, not exactly. I was just saying that he's a minstrel who kind of saved the world through music? Kind of?" She shrugs, hopeless, but with a grin that's kind of pleased all the same. "Trying to explain David Bowie to someone without a frame of reference is a lot harder than it seems."

And that makes her laugh outright. "I missed the memo. Darn. But yes, that is exactly what happened. I went from badass to useless in about half a second."

"...I mean, I can't say you're wrong, saving the world part aside... If only I could get a badass portrait of myself to come falling out of the sky because someone described my super-heroic deeds. I'll have to keep that in mind," he says with a lopsided grin, sitting himself down beside her just to keep her company.

Look, head injuries are no joke. It's weird to have to worry about that after all his time spent in superpowered armor. (And robot bodies. Can't forget the fact that he didn't used to actually be able to get head injuries.) "You always been badass or did you have to teach yourself badassery when you got here?"

She huffs out a breath of laughter. "No way, the saving the world part is important. How boring would the world be without David Bowie, I mean-- come on." It's nice to have company, though, and company who doesn't look at her like she's talking some foreign language when she makes a pop culture reference. "Maybe you just need the Ruby Lucas touch. I'll get on it as soon as my head stops feeling like a pinata."

Lolololol head injuries are such a joke. Except no, they aren't, but at least there was no stabbing with silver. That would have been really terrible.

"I wouldn't say I've always been badass, or even that I'm especially badass, but I turned up here and was able to hold my own, so it wasn't so bad. What about you? Were you a helpless kitten before you got here?"

Ruby, stop.

"Could've been worse. You could've gotten beaned by the Goblin King. How would you have explained that one? ...Though that one might seem way more normal to them, considering, y'know, the high fantasy Dungeons and literal fucking Dragons going on here." He leans back, looking smug. "As for the Ruby Lucas touch, I think that kinda depends on what that touch entails." church no

Hey, come on, laughter's good medicine, right? Like...for head injuries. Sure. He really does miss having a helmet and a fully functional HUD. And a bullhorn option. But he's also pretty sure people wouldn't appreciate him announcing he's the voice of god, so.

"Psh, please, you're talking to a primo UNSC soldier. Fought some badass fucked up space marines." Technically true... "Fought some aliens." Also, technically, true-ish... "Saving humanity, one battle at a time." Okay now that's just stretching everything to a breaking point.

Ah, and she'd managed to go so long without being subjected to a cheesy line. She rolls her eyes, good natured, and sighs. "Six out of ten, nice delivery, but hitting on someone with a possible concussion cost you points." Lighthearted and ridiculous, the way most things she says are. "Regardless, I'm not sure sure Thedas is ready for something that... revealing>" (maybe not the right word, but she'll go with it for now,) "no matter how Dungeons and Dragons they are."

It's true, though. Was anyone ready for Bowie in that outfit? Probably not.

"And now you've lost me," Ruby admits, grinning but with a little more bemusement and fasciantion. "When I'm from, space marines or aliens or... actually, most things in space, are the things of video games and sci fi movies, sometimes with really tacky puppets. I mean, there's travel to the moon and sateillites and sending droids different places, but no aliens that I know of. Yet."

There are probably aliens somewhere, she reasons. I mean, she's Little Red Riding Hood, anything is possible.

"Hey, you're the one that gave me a good opening with the touch thing." Hm, then maybe this isn't the sort of conversation that needs the addition of Bowie's junk in it.

"Yeah, I'm kinda getting that more often lately. Assuming you're from an Earth that gels with my timeline, I'm, uh, from the 26th century. Things have kind of advanced in a couple hundred years." EVERYTHING IS SO BACKWARDS AND ANTIQUATED HERE HELP

"Maybe it was the concussion talking," she replies, a little dryly, but entirely in good humour. This is ridiculous, and ridiculous is exactly what she needs right now.

"Ah. I'm just a little behind you - twenty-first century, for me." Ruby scrunches her nose up a little. "Are you telling me vinyls gone out of style again?"

"Is it bad that I might hope you get concussed more if that's concussed you talking?" It's funny to him. Not the concussion. The banter.

He stares for a couple of seconds. "Uhhhh. I think it's been...several decades since vinyl came back in style. Again. Collectors stuff, y'know, old old school."

Ruby levels him a look of exaggerated consideration, with a little twist of severity. It's nowhere near Granny levels, but she can dream. (She wouldn't want it to be near Granny levels for this, mind. Church doesn't deserve that judgment.)

"I think that just cost you some friendship points, yeah."

Uh oh. Serious stuff, here.

"I'm just going to hold onto mine and wait it out."

"Do I win back any points if I say that's a smart idea and that any collector with obscene amounts of money would probably pay big bucks for some classic vinyl?" Look even people can be digitized there's no reason for record players. "Everything's computers in my time, basically. Just still need actual people bodies to fight the fights, as always."

"Maybe. I'll take it into consideration. Serious consideration."

It's just so nice to talk to someone who gets at least some of the things she's talking about, even if there's an obvious disconnect between his time and hers.

Her brows raise, and she's kind of... awed, really. "All computers? That sounds... I want to say amazing, but it seems like it might be kind of sterile and impersonal, actually." With a little frown. "They haven't figured out world peace yet, though, huh? Or, inter-world peace." Aliens, and all.

"I mean, Earth's as peaceful as you can get it when humanity's full of dicks," he suggests with a shrug. "Aliens fight humans. Humans also fight humans in the middle of a war with aliens. War with aliens ends, humans still fight other humans. For fucked up shit, petty shit..."

He clears his throat. "Doesn't sound like a pretty picture. Humans still have a lot to learn, and sometimes lessons kinda have to be repeated a few times to stick."

At that she doesn't even object, just nods her understanding with a rueful smile. She might have tried to phrase it more delicately, but she definitely agreed: humanity is full of dicks. (For a brief moment she wonders if Granny would enjoy Church's candour, or want to smack him upside the head.

Both, maybe.)

"Sometimes people prefer to ignore the lessons. Or they want to believe it's different, somehow, even when it's not." Gently, she knocks her shoulder against Churches, though with the way her head feels she suspects it was a terrible idea to rock around even a little. "Sorry. That sucks."

It's probably a bad idea to gently knock her back, but the familiar camaraderie even in someone he's just met is really nice. "Yeah. Sucks." The Director probably thought it was different, the shit he did. Or justified, due to the war. People always think they're the exception. "So, what's life like back where and when you're from, since it's not space battles and space shotguns and space jeeps?"

CLEARLY A MUCH BETTER TOPIC YES HE IS THE BEST AT TOPIC CHANGES

yeAH NICE SUPER SUBTLE

It makes her laugh again, at the very least.

"Well," and it's a tenative start, drawing out the ell like it's a two syllable word instead of just the one. "Actually it's sort of weird. Technically speaking I'm from two world. Sort of. So I kind of am from this little seaside town in Maine? Sleepy little place, nobody has ever heard of it ever. But it's sort of inhabited by... well. Okay, how much do you know about fairy tales?"

Her smile is so, so apologetic, with a side of yeah, yeah I know.

Oh good. This is gonna be a story. He leans back on his elbows and cocks his head. "All right, I'll bite. Whatever it is, I'm as ready as I'm gonna be. Hit me with your best shot."

"You sure?"

Well, okay then.

"Storybrooke is a town inhabited by characters from a magical world where characters from fairytales are real living people. We were cursed by an evil queen who isn't evil any more, exactly, but sent us there to try and ruin all our happy endings." A beat. "I'm Red Riding Hood."

"...In Maine." Y'know, somehow that almost makes sense. "You're a, from my perspective, fictional character that got cursed to live in Maine by a wicked witch" no church that's a different season "of a queen who could bend spacetime to bust a hole open to a different universe. Cuz she's evil and hates your happiness."

To be fair, at the end of the day, is that really that much crazier than 'falling through a misty green afterlife portal in time and space to land in D&D world'? "Well, you're a way hotter Red than the fairytale gives you credit for."

"Well, where do you send people to be miserable if it's not gonna be Maine?"

A ridiculous question, and delivered that way, although all she has to offer is a shrug. But his summary is close enough without wanting to split hairs and make it more confusing, and Ruby just shrugs.

That last part makes her close her eyes and huff out a breath of laughter. "I'm also the wolf, so not all versions of the story are created equal."

"Florida," he suggests with a shrug, and not just because poor Florida sank into the ocean under completely mysterious circumstances or anything.

Church peers at her closely. "Did you eat your own grandma or something? That's. y'know. kind of a weird interpretation. Cannibalism and all." SUPER CASUAL LIKE

And a nod of her head. Touche.

At that Ruby sighs, and her manner turns more serious. "Granny is fine. She is alive and well."

She literally just met this guy maybe a few minutes ago. She's in pain. She's nore sure how far into this she wants to go right now. "I'm not really up for all the more troubling parts of my history right now. Sorry."

It's not a denial about the cannibalism, because that would be a lie.

Oh. Shit. Damn. Wait. Does that mean what he thinks it means? "Oh." Wow, hella articulate there, Church. "Uh." Give the guy a hand, speech of the century. "That's cool." No, wait, not the maybe a cannibal wolf-girl or something part!!! "I mean, obviously, no, don't spill your guts to a stranger, jesus. I'm not gonna tell you some of the bullshit in my life at the drop of a hat, either, just. I was kind of joking? And now I'll stop doing that. Not the joking, the--talking. about. sssstuff." And this guy wants to make new Rifters feel at ease. Be afraid.

"How about we just blame Stephen King and call it a day. Fuckin' spooky-ass Maine." Fucking spooky-ass Agent Maine, too, but. Different story, different day.

"Sure. Definitely all on Maine."

Her tone is a little wry, and the twist of amusement doesn't quite make it into a laugh. Ruby's not sure she'd want it to.

"I, uh. My head's pretty sore," she starts, in a move to try and spare them both. "I might get some more potion."

Graceful??? Retreat???

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OPEN: Bloomingtide Rifter Arrival

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