CLOSED | treehaus.

[poleaxed]

WHO: Jone, James Holden, Beth Greene, Gabranth, Margaery Tyrell, Adrasteia, Edgard
WHAT: Haunted hedge maze.
WHEN: Mid-Ferventis
WHERE: Orlais!
NOTES: A way less sexy Labyrinth.

WHAT'S GOING ON: To review, Jone has been asked to sort out a hedge maze on the Gaume estate. It seems to be haunted-- spirits have taken the form of various plants and trees within the huge hedge maze out back. While traveling through the maze, the walls will shift; your characters will be split up into groups, re-split, etc.

While it's possible to beat the shit out of some enchanted plantlife, for whatever reason, you can't hack your way through the walls of the maze. More shrubbery grows in its place no matter what you do. Otherwise, this would be over very quickly. Don't question it. This is a video game, and we should probably just all relax.

HOW DO THE MECHANICS WORK: This is a plot with rolling!

The main focus of the plot will be overcoming riddles and puzzles to reach the end, but you can get clues with rolls. Unlike in Murderhaus, rolls function to investigate the situation, not determine the outcome of actions (IE, I'll give you clues). When you want to roll, put ROLL in the subject of your comment, and bold what your character is investigating. I will reply with a clue, the helpfulness of which will be determined by behind-the-scenes rolls. Likewise, since there is a plant NPC for each scenario, do the same to ask them a question; their helpfulness will be determined by rolls as well.

For example: Bob studies at the strange pattern of pebbles on the ground, etc. Alice asks the enchanted tree, "what the fuck?" and so on.

If you think you've come up with the answer to the riddle, put ANSWER in the subject line, so I know to pop in and NPC spirits' reactions, etc.

(I've purposefully given you guys puzzles and riddles that have multiple potential answers! Likewise, if you come up with something I wasn't expecting but still works, I'll count it as a success. I'm not here to make anyone squirm. Have fun, and if you get bored of a puzzle, do the following...)

If your characters are out of ideas and just want to move on to the next action, put NO ANSWER in your subject line, and feel free to wreck the shit out of some enchanted shrubbery. While your characters can't beat up the walls, decimating any spirit-enchanted topiary NPCs will get them through the conundrum. I won't need to NPC this, because the spirits won't put up much of a fight. Please imagine some sad little Henson-esque 'wahh oh noooo' noises, though.

If you have any questions, hit me up!

After characters have solved a certain amount of puzzles / riddles, I'll open up a new toplevel and link you to it for endgame. Instructions on how that will work will be revealed there.

WHAT DOES MY CHARACTER SEE:

Upon coming up to the maze, the entrance is blocked by a network of vines, all entangled in one central knot. A spectral voice emanates from the maze:

O! Challenger, come forward now,
to give us peace in your solemn vow:
untie this knot and enter as our true friend.

Jone studies the knot before rolling her eyes and slicing it through with her poleaxe. There is a screeching scream from somewhere far off, twisted and inhuman. The cut vines turn vengeful, and quickly pull Jone inside the maze before here is time to react.

Entering the maze, there is no sign of Jone or where she may be. The hedge walls quickly begin to shift, separating the group.

Comments

[littlemissfutility]

"Maybe when we're all here." Not something she's looking forward to, but they might be able to. It feels hopeful, and she'd rather have hope, if she can. "They really kill people for hunting, huh."

[poleaxed]

"'Course they can. It's their land." She pats Beth's shoulder absently.

If she's honest, she doesn't want the stupid buggers to go up in flames. It'd too easily set the rest of the maze aflame, and Gaume had been pretty clear about wanting that intact. Jone doubts that'll matter much to Beth, though, who seems to be advocating for spirits. Odd bird, she is.

"I'm sure Gab and I can get rid of this lot, if they won't be convinced. That ain't what you want to hear, I know, but believe me, getting the job done is the most important thing."

[littlemissfutility]

Yeah, but it's murder. Basically. It feels like it, anyway--even after the turn, they wouldn't've shot somebody without at least talking to them. Living with other people feels like it should be worth more than a couple of deer. She knows better than to say that, though. Some things are different here, and she isn't exactly raring to get into another fight today.

"I'll try and convince them." And, after a moment or two, she asks, "He lets you call him Gab?"

[poleaxed]

"A dear, you are," she says in thanks. It's a pithy little thing, but Jone knows where her strengths are, and where they very much aren't. She huffs out a laugh at the mention of Gabranth's various nicknames. "If he wanted me to stop, what could he do about it?"

[littlemissfutility]

Beth shrugs one shoulder, eyes on the garden around them. "He doesn't like it when he doesn't get what he wants."

[poleaxed]

"Most don't," Jone says, "but he can be an especial twat about it, you're right."

[littlemissfutility]

"Yeah." And that's all she says about that--or anything else, for that matter--for the moment. Nothing else she could come up with would compare with a sunny summer afternoon in a garden full of blooming flowers; it's doing a hell of a lot more for her mood than starting in on Gabranth would.

[poleaxed]

Jone pats her head. "Get some rest, luv. Maybe this bugger'll let us leave."

[littlemissfutility]

"If everyone else can get out." Which makes her think of Gabranth again, and of walking away from three horses made of leaves. "I hope everyone else is staying together."

[poleaxed]

"Don't worry on it. I'm sure they've no choice. This bastard has been shifting the walls of the maze."

The sylan over her shoulder briefly looks affronted, before turning back to tend to the birds' nests in its branches.

[littlemissfutility]

"We got separated," she says. Jone doesn't know, after all. "The spirits are, uh...they like puzzles."

[poleaxed]

"Good thing I were pulled here, then. I'd be shite help." Jone leans back, kicking her feet idly against the ground. She'd come here for a fight, and has been treated only to waiting games. "How'd you find it?"

[littlemissfutility]

"It was...nice. Mostly." She notices, belatedly, that her arms are crossed, the fingers of one hand clutching the hem of her...vest, corset thing. (Clothes here are different, too. A loose blouse, and then something more structured on top of it, is most of her looks these days.) Even if she's not trembling anymore, she hasn't relaxed. "You'd think, if you were rich, you'd want a maze that was different every time."

[poleaxed]

"Oh, sure. A maze that was different every time? Perfect fancy. A maze with demons in? With a mind of its own, that you couldn't control?"

Jone makes an ehhh sound, as though she's mentally weighing the options.

[littlemissfutility]

"It's too bad there isn't a way to keep them from turning into demons." The fact that Jone regards demonhood as some kind of an inevitability means there probably isn't anything anyone can do. But if there was a way to keep the spirits as cheerful and friendly as they seemed today...

[poleaxed]

"You'd have to ask a mage about that, and not all would know. They have... things they're better at, or not. I don't know all the rules of it." Jone shakes her head. "Magic will bollocks up most things, I reckon. Especially lately."

She doesn't look at her hand. She keeps her eyes to the sky, and if they find that green glowing speck in the distance, so be it.

[littlemissfutility]

"I guess so." She's quiet for a bit, sitting there beside Jone and waiting for the others. Eventually, though, she says, "We didn't have it at home. Magic. So it's still kinda...hard, I guess. Knowing what it'll do and what it won't."

[poleaxed]

"No magic?" It takes a second for that to sink in. Jone exhales slowly through her teeth. "Blimey. You lucky bastards."

[littlemissfutility]

"Yeah," she says, a toneless sort of agreement. "Lucky."

Maybe they'd look at the walkers and think of magic--dark magic, the kind that Corypheus does--but knowing about viruses and medicine makes it hard for her to think of them that way.

[poleaxed]

Jone likes to think herself skilled enough at reading the moods others to manage with fucking teenagers. "'Spose you have your own problems, of course."

[littlemissfutility]

Beth shrugs, not looking up from the flowers her eyes've lit upon. (She doesn't recognize them from home, not like the roses growing over a trellis--these ones are on hardy-looking stems, the blossoms entirely unfamiliar.) "Everyone does, right?"

[poleaxed]

Jone shrugs. "Some more'n others. Lemme ask you, luv, how many years you have?"

[littlemissfutility]

It takes her a moment to figure out what Jone's question is--how many years I've had what? is her instinctive response. "I'm eighteen."

[poleaxed]

Jone nods, running the thought over in her brain. "I'd have guessed older, but I always do. Hard to tell at your age. An odd bird you are; you talk so gentle."

[littlemissfutility]

"Not always," is her answer. And then, because leaving it at that is just asking for Jone to dig into when, she adds, "I can start swearing more if it'll make you more comfortable."

It's a joke, kind of. Nothing feels funny anymore, this afternoon, but she's trying.