faderifting: (Default)
Fade Rift Mods ([personal profile] faderifting) wrote in [community profile] faderift2016-06-09 09:05 am

OPEN: Justinian Rifter Arrival

WHO: New rifters & helpful Inquisition volunteers
WHAT: Welcome to Thedas!
WHEN: Justinian 7
WHERE: On the outskirts of the Exalted Plains
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. Reaching this rift, as well as returning to Skyhold, will require passing carefully through the active and ongoing battlefront for the War of the Lions. Don't get stabbed.


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. There's a massive, monstrous horned giant stomping toward you, electricity crackling over its purple-gray skin, flanked by ghostly wisps of green light that rear back to hurl bursts of pure magic in your direction.

Your options for escape are limited. To one side, a river; to another, a rock formation too tall and steep to scale. But there's cover behind you in the form of a ruined home—burnt out, missing half of its walls, but still able to resist some damage—and, on the other side of the rift, people coming to help.


aceso: (002)

[personal profile] aceso 2016-06-15 02:02 am (UTC)(link)
Everything that's come out of the rift is dead, but more will be coming if it isn't sealed. And unfortunately, it looks like the rift only spit out two people this time. That means Christine is soon running back to the house, a bit breathless.

"There is a way you can help! The mark upon your hand -- it can close this rift and prevent any more demons from coming through. If it remains open, they will come through indefinitely." She beckons Cosima to come closer to her. "Please, I know it is hard to understand, but you must come back with me before more demons arrive!"
motherfucking_ghost: (a: man my missions really suck)

[personal profile] motherfucking_ghost 2016-06-15 05:26 pm (UTC)(link)
Church...is not fighting that thing, thanks. There aren't as many people in such a small space like last time on the bridge, though, so he feels safer bringing along his crossbow to bean the green spectral shits with some bolts. (Or, he would bean them with bolts if his aim wasn't comically and perpetually The Worst. Still, they're close enough to serve as a distraction, and one even bounces off the rocks a few improbable times before actually striking one in the back. He'll count that as a hit that he totally did on purpose. Because Wash isn't here to argue otherwise.)

When he's reasonably sure he won't get picked off by Tall Dark and Horny, Church makes a dash around the small battlefield, splashing through the water and already regretting it because fuck his feet are gonna be soaked on the whole trip back, and leaps over a hole in the wall of what was obviously once a house.

"Hey!" he gasps, a little breathless. Man, this is way better cover than 'some rock' or 'actually nothing'. "Sup. Um. Sucks that you're here. Really long story. Don't suppose you can fight? Like. With medieval weapons, not like...punching someone in the teeth."
arcaneadvisor: (Default)

[personal profile] arcaneadvisor 2016-06-15 07:08 pm (UTC)(link)
"My name is Morrigan." A name might be good, if they get separated, and some people here might even know her by reputation. "We shall have to run, if I stop then tis to cast a spell - such things must be done standing still." Either that or the terror demon will have exploded under their feet or she might have changed her shape into something more suited to tackle it but bridges to cross when they come to it. "You are able to run, yes?"
youwonscience: (God saw everything)

[personal profile] youwonscience 2016-06-15 10:38 pm (UTC)(link)
"Yeah, running I can manage." She's still in fight-or-flight, that should get her a ways. Hopefully far enough. "I'm Cosima. If you stop, should I stop too or keep going?"
youwonscience: (was it just to hook you in)

[personal profile] youwonscience 2016-06-15 10:40 pm (UTC)(link)
"Um, okay, I'll go out on a limb and say I'm anti-more-demons," Cosima says, coming to Christine. "What do I need to do?" The rift is more than a little unnerving, even with the battle ended.
youwonscience: (Darkness was upon the face of the deep)

[personal profile] youwonscience 2016-06-15 10:47 pm (UTC)(link)
"...hey," she says, and she would be startled except that on the list of "weird shit that has happened to Cosima in the last 15 minutes," this doesn't even break the top five.

"Uh, no, I decided against a minor in LARP studies." It's not a joke she expects him to get. She's just frustrated. "Dude, is that an actual crossbow?" she adds, half incredulous to find he wasn't kidding when she registers it.
aceso: (037)

[personal profile] aceso 2016-06-16 04:54 pm (UTC)(link)
"You need to come closer to the rift, and hold your marked hand up towards it. The shard embedded in your hand will react with it. And it... it somehow seals the rift shut." She looks nervously over her shoulder, knowing another wave will appear soon if they don't hurry.

"I know this is little to go on. But rifters say they just try to pull it closed, and it does. It bends to your will."
arcaneadvisor: (Default)

[personal profile] arcaneadvisor 2016-06-16 09:23 pm (UTC)(link)
"Keep moving, if you hear the sounds of battle, avoid them. The elves you might encounter could well be hostile." A wisp floats close but a few blasts from her staff gets rid of it quickly enough, though she doesn't stop to see where the rest are. If the soldiers or even some of the wolves prove to be of more interest, then so be it. "Fortunately they are lacking in bears here unlike most places."
motherfucking_ghost: (a: zoom)

[personal profile] motherfucking_ghost 2016-06-16 10:10 pm (UTC)(link)
"Ouch, what do I look like, some kinda nerd?" Nobody answer that, please. But he hoists up the crossbow at the question, grinning. "Hell yeah it's an actual crossbow! I'm still learning the finer points of it. Not exactly a sniper rifle, but hey, it means I don't have to run up to any of those things. Watch your head."

Which means stay down and out of sight when he pops out the doorway to let loose a couple of bolts. (Which, okay, look, let's just call it suppressing fire and call it even, okay?)

And when he pulls back to lean against the wall and cover again: "So this is all kind of a long story that's better left for when those things are more dead than not, but, cutting it short: fell out of an otherworldly portal, welcome to a D&D world called Thedas, you've got a creepy painful glowy green shard in your hand, we can make crazy otherworldly portals to demon hell open and close with them. And occasionally do other neat tricks. Crash course complete."
youwonscience: (God saw the light)

[personal profile] youwonscience 2016-06-17 12:09 am (UTC)(link)
"Uh, great. Probably no bears." That sounds like a silver lining. "Is there a city or someplace safe nearby to run toward, out of curiosity?"

Just... don't think too much about whatever that was, she tells herself.
youwonscience: (that it was good)

[personal profile] youwonscience 2016-06-17 12:12 am (UTC)(link)
"I'm gonna have so many questions later," she comments, almost offhand, but she's already moving at a clip closer to the rift. While Cosima is clearly uneasy, she also seems willing to try.

"Bend it to my will. Scotty would love this so much." That's more to herself than Christine; she pitches her voice a little louder to ask, "How close is closer?" as she keeps moving.
youwonscience: (machine pressed stop)

[personal profile] youwonscience 2016-06-17 12:15 am (UTC)(link)
"Um, given that you know what D&D and LARPing is, I'm gonna declare you at least nerd-adjacent, dude." Jokes, they're a coping strategy. "As a biologist, I do feel I should note for the record organisms that have evolved to shoot lightning, while cool on paper, are extremely unlikely."

Not as if she disbelieves it; more as if she is registering a complaint.
aceso: (033)

[personal profile] aceso 2016-06-18 03:27 am (UTC)(link)
"Ah, I think about here." Christine stops a short distance from the rift and looks at Cosima. "Now lift your hand and try to latch on to the rift. A stream of green light will connect you to it. From there, try to force it to close."

Christine can only go on what she's seen before when newly arrived rifters closed a rift. She can't know exactly what it feels like, but she can say what it looks like.
arcaneadvisor: (Default)

[personal profile] arcaneadvisor 2016-06-18 09:36 am (UTC)(link)
"We will be making for Skyhold, the only place where one such as you will find refuge. Marked as you are, having come through a rift, you would be treated with suspicion at best, hostility at worst." It's an answer but also not since Skyhold isn't exactly a short journey away though the Inquisition can get people back safely enough. "Val Royeaux is safe from the fighting, for the moment, but that will not be an option."
youwonscience: (take a ladder to the shadows)

[personal profile] youwonscience 2016-06-18 01:42 pm (UTC)(link)
"Here goes." Cosima, as instructed, lifts her palm to face the rift. If there wasn't immediate danger of more demons, she suspects she'd feel very silly; even now, she feels like she should chant something in Latin.

Instead, she tries to focus. After a moment, light indeed seems to reach back from the rift, and as it connects, and it suddenly makes sense why no one has been able to describe the sensation very well. (The best Cosima can do is extremely frickin' weird.) She keeps her hand as steady as possible and thinks close in the rift's general direction.

She's not great at "feel your way," but she can deal with "trial and error."
youwonscience: (you're on your own)

[personal profile] youwonscience 2016-06-18 01:45 pm (UTC)(link)
"Great, that's... fantastic. So for now, just 'away,' then." Cosima supposes it's better than dying, but it's not great news, especially as she'd been at home, asleep her bed, minding her own business. She's familiar enough with difference triggering hostility, but it's not like she asked to be marked, either.
motherfucking_ghost: (a: man my missions really suck)

[personal profile] motherfucking_ghost 2016-06-19 12:03 am (UTC)(link)
"Well, creepy green afterlife-y places where the laws of physics don't apply that are filled with spirits and demons also are extremely unlikely, and yet..."

A bolt of magic, or perhaps the force from the pride demon's whips, or who knows what shakes the remaining walls, crumbling as they already are. He holds up his hand, a flash of green light seen through, and a small green-ish translucent wall forms above them, letting crumbling cement or stone or whatever they used to make these buildings however long ago skitter off the shield and not, say, fall on top of their heads. It disappears the second the job is done, and he shakes out his hand a little, quietly cursing.

"Anyway, look, this place isn't gonna make a whole lotta sense to science-minded people. I mean, maybe you'll think it's great to study how horny giant people evolved along with humans and elves and I swear to god dwarves. ...And I mean horny as in...they have horns, not horny as in--yeah. Like, if you can figure that out, I'm sure you'll get super famous. Or be burned at a stake? I can't honestly say."
youwonscience: (on the seventh day)

[personal profile] youwonscience 2016-06-19 01:30 pm (UTC)(link)
"Okay, well, I'm just going to throw out there = that I'm not actually going to be able to study anything if I die in the next 15 minutes, so I'm going to follow the lead of the people who have any idea what the hell is going on. I'm just..."

She angles to look out what used to be a window without making herself too much of a target.

"Is this a bad time to admit I've never been in a fight before at all?"

If it's afterlife-y, in an unspecified way, she could really use Beth right now.
aceso: (to the sea)

[personal profile] aceso 2016-06-19 03:52 pm (UTC)(link)
"You are doing it!" Christine exclaims, relieved beyond words. "Just keep going until it disappears." She stands ready to protect her if more demons come, or perhaps black wolves, or deserters from the nearby battlefields. This region is a danger for many reasons.
youwonscience: (you know how it feels)

[personal profile] youwonscience 2016-06-19 04:08 pm (UTC)(link)
Cosima holds her concentration until the rift disappears entirely and a moment longer for good measure. She drops her hand. Then she laughs, mainly in relief that whatever she did seems to have worked, before it turns into a rough-sounding cough.

She's suddenly aware of how much energy the maneuver took. A person who was perfectly well would probably be fine; Cosima is not one of those people.

"Well... there's that, then," she says, a little rough, when the cough passes.
arcaneadvisor: (Default)

[personal profile] arcaneadvisor 2016-06-20 05:47 pm (UTC)(link)
"You will have answers soon, though perhaps not all you might wish. I would assume that 'how does one return?' is near the top of your list?" It's not a topic she's heard the rifters as they tend to be collectively known discussing openly but then why would they? She is a native, and she comes with a reputation, one that these days has her keeping very close to the spymaster. She stops to summon lightning, crackling from her fingertips to flash out and through several of the foes, and she doesn't see the terror demon--

Hopefully it's distracted somewhere else. What's one more dead chevalier these days?
youwonscience: (breaking hating)

[personal profile] youwonscience 2016-06-21 12:55 am (UTC)(link)
"Given the tone in which you said that, I'm guessing the answer isn't 'click your heels together and say there's no place like home.'" Cosima is frustrated, but she's also still concentrating on not dying for now. (And running isn't as easy as she'd like it to be, though she's trying not to let that show as it catches up to her.)

"Yeah, I want to get home, but I want to survive the next hour too, you know?"

She tries not to snap at the person who is keeping the demons from killing her. Both of them, presumably, but the point stands.
motherfucking_ghost: (a: man my missions really suck)

[personal profile] motherfucking_ghost 2016-06-21 03:33 pm (UTC)(link)
"Y'know what? Now's actually the perfect time to admit that. Means I get to play protector for a while so the big guns can take out tall dark and electrifying." Means he gets to look moderately good to a new person!!! "So. Um. So this isn't a good time for small-talk, but whatever, what's weird about your world? You know LARPing and D&D, so I have to assume you're at least from a world I'm familiar with. I was talking Bowie and vinyl with someone else. She's kind of a fairytale character, though. So I have to assume your world's got a weird twist in it, too."

Church is the best welcome party, what are you talking about.
aceso: (from this valley)

[personal profile] aceso 2016-06-21 04:11 pm (UTC)(link)
Immediately, Christine's face shifts to concern, and she steps closer. She's only seen someone close a rift once before, and they hadn't had a coughing fit afterward.

"Are you ill?" she asks, unsure if the rift could be the cause.
youwonscience: (you're on your own)

[personal profile] youwonscience 2016-06-21 10:38 pm (UTC)(link)
She shakes her head, but then clarifies: "Yeah. I mean, I am, but I was at home too - the Rift didn't do it. I'll be fine in a sec."

Or fine in relative terms, at least.

"Just took it out of me a little."

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