player plot | when my time comes around, pt. 4

[cozen]

WHO: Anyone!
WHAT: Time warp!
WHEN: Solas 20 (3ish weeks ago)
WHERE: The Gallows & the road to Granitefell
NOTES: Another part of this player plot. This one is open to everyone, including dead characters, but only the time traveling characters will have any knowledge of the last 3 weeks. One more log for everyone to come back to life (slash have been alive all this time) will go up soon! And then we will be done.

Solas 20 is a normal day in the Gallows. A fairly quiet one, even, because a full third of Riftwatch has recently departed to assist the survivors of an attack on Granitefell on the plains north of the Vinmarks. That, like everything else, is business as usual, until a rift opens in the fortress and three members of Riftwatch emerge.

This is not the strangest thing that has ever happened to Riftwatch, but considering they're three members who are also already here—less fresh-faced, maybe, but otherwise basically the same people—it's up there.

Thinking they're demons would be fair. But they only have so much time to accomplish something rather important, so ideally they will not be immediately murdered.

Comments

[sprent]

With the full third of Riftwatch gone, the other two in the middle of busy work days, meetings, errands, studies, the only person they have to explain themselves to is somebody carrying a load of washing in a basket through the courtyard. They scare him quite badly (he drops the washing), but he's persuaded quickly to continue on without speaking about what happened. Gela smooths the transaction by pressing a few coins into his trembling hand.

She says, while they walk quickly away, "To the Provost, first, and if he isn't there, the Commander." Repeating the plan helps with her nerves. She adds tentatively, "Or we send the Provost the message, before we try anybody else.

Wait, do we have a message for the Commander?"

[favoriteanalyst]

"If we can't find Stark, we message him and summon him anyway. He was sure his little passcode would work." It seems a little generic, but it must hold some private sentimentality to him. He keeps his voice low, stays close. "He can convince the others. Like he convinced them of this whole plan."

This whole plan of actual time travel. The weather's a little different, he supposes, maybe, but it's hard to know if it actually worked. He kind of wishes they'd just asked the poor laundryperson the date and act like they're hungover or something. It's so...calm, though. In comparison. Like there isn't a dreadfully mournful air lingering around. Is that just his imagination?

"He's probably either in his office or in the Research workspace anyway. He shouldn't be hard to find. I could even ask him for a meeting or fake something urgent." A pause. "Fake something else urgent."

[altusimperius]

Looking a little shell-shocked beside them is Benedict, who finds all this very interesting in a theoretical sort of way, but isn't sure how he ended up getting talked into actually doing this.

"Not the Commander," he says, but raises his sending crystal on its chain, dangling it for the other two to see.

"We can just message the Provost. Maker knows where he'll be right now." And the fewer people they run into in this state, the better.

[sprent]

Oh, remind her to tell you exactly how later, Benedict.

"Why not," she argues, because it feels good to be focusing on something else for a moment, "Shouldn't we also have the Commander as a back-up? Just in case?"

Gela has a lot of terrible what-ifs in mind. What if the Provost doesn't believe them. What if he isn't around? What if he left the Gallows for the day and his crystal is broken at the same time, or he already died some how. What if he choked on his breakfast! Anything could happen!!

[favoriteanalyst]

Gela please.

They must look like an odd trio, if anyone else was around to spy them, all huddled together looking like nervous horses and argue-whispering to each other. "We'll need to talk to them both anyway, but out of both of them, Stark's the one most likely to actually believe us even without his little phrase."

He digs out his own crystal, frowning lightly at the fact that Benedict could've done it without input from either one of them but not saying anything about it (because this whole situation is weird and tense enough as it is)--

"Provost, urgent news. Can you whip together the other division heads and meet?" He glances at the other two. "It's about the upcoming mission to Granitefell. The plan has to change."

[altusimperius]

That's Benedict's secret, serah, he doesn't do anything without input*. He opens his mouth as if to say something when Mobius gets out his own crystal, but keeps it to himself, not seeing a point to arguing.

"Byerly would," he mumbles anxiously, but if the Provost does as Mobius asks, the Ambassador will be there anyway.
Remembering something, he leans over to Mobius' crystal and adds, "everything is achievable."

*except this I guess

[propulsion]

If there is a skeptical beat, it takes place before Tony activates his crystal.

"We have two division heads en route to Granitefell, is that gonna be a problem?" is lightly delivered, inevitably distracted.

[favoriteanalyst]

"What do you mean they're en route, they aren't supposed to-"

Oh. Wait. What? That's alarming. He's alarmed. "This is supposed to be before, right?" he asks to the others, even though he knows what the answer is. And aimed back at the crystal: "They need to be stopped. What day is it? Isn't it the 18th?"

[sprent]

Gela echoes, "En route," at more or less the same time, her gaze flickering immediately to Benedict, to Mobius. "I thought—"

Well. Doesn't matter much now, does it?

It's a good thing Mobius is still talking because her mind has gone completely blank with panic.

sorry all my evenings are eaten by a baby

[altusimperius]

"It's a problem," Benedict quickly chimes in, "it's a huge problem. It's a trap."

[propulsion]

"There's a lot coming at me right now?"

Querying tone upticking the end of that, a bid for some sympathy, more joking than serious but the burr of real irritation is only dimly muffled.

"So, in order: I don't know what you're talking about, who needs to be stopped, it's the 20th, and what's a trap? Granitefell?"

[favoriteanalyst]

"They sent us to the wrong day? We got sent to the wrong-"

No, okay, no, this is still salvageable. They can still stop the team from getting ambushed. Just...much more rapidly than intended. Mobius scrubs his face for a moment.

"We got sent here from the future, mid-August, in order to stop the Granitefell team from getting ambushed and getting nearly entirely wiped out. And that sounds like actual nonsense, so you told us to tell you," glancing at Benedict, who had deployed the phrase but, y'know, maybe a little early, "that everything is achievable so you'd know we aren't yanking your chain."

elbows into tag order

[propulsion]

"That's manipulative,"

is what he might say to his future-self. But he can feel it, that puzzle-clicking-in sensation of simply believing them, of a reorientation of perspective borderline against his will. He is looking at what he was working on and then abandons it, although there isn't much to indicate what he's doing now save for a slight change in breathing.

"Okay, well. Go ahead and stop them."

[sprent]

Gela makes a little sound, pushes through the shock of it being the wrong day. She puts her hand on Benedict's shoulder and for once it isn't to reassure him, it's to steady herself. She says, "You'll tell the other Division heads for us?"

Go ahead and stop them.

Just like that?

[propulsion]

"Yup."

Increasingly distracted.

"I'll do that, you do the, uh. Other thing."