MOD EVENT: Crossover

[faderifting]

WHO: Everyone (give or take)
WHAT: Reorganizing the Crossroads
WHEN: Wintermarch 9:50
WHERE: The Crossroads
NOTES: A small event to help everyone shake off the winter break.

Shortly into the new year, Riftwatch's routine visits to the Crossroads–to get from here to there, or just to check up on the eluvians and watch for any signs of Venatori or elven presence–turn less routine. Patches of the Crossroads give way quite suddenly to patches of what seems to be (for lack of a better word) the real world, evidenced by sudden changes of landscape and temperature, the sudden presence of small mammals and birds. In the first of these locations to be discovered, snow blows up a crumbling Crossroads stairway from the snowy clearing below; in the clearing, gravity's hold is gentler than it should be, snow swirling up alongside the staircase that climbs up into a grey sky and never coming back down. Wisps or spirits may follow you freely here. One enterprising spirit has possessed a squirrel and is considering the merits of wandering off into the world. Walk far enough across the ground, away from the stairs, and things become normal (as much as Thedas ever is)–but the staircase is still waiting if you turn back the other way, the Crossroads there to walk into without any particular effort or magic at all.

This is of course a sign of a grave problem that warrants further investigation. But the instability in the Crossroads also presents a more immediate and practical threat to Riftwatch's work: the eluvians Riftwatch uses to traverse Thedas and reach some otherwise far-flung or inaccessible locations are scattered throughout the Crossroads, and reaching them is already becoming more difficult, not to mention the danger of someone else—foe or unwitting stranger—blundering into Riftwatch's work. So for a week in Wintermarch, everyone able and available will be assigned to relocating the eluvians: reaching them in the Crossroads, uprooting them from their ancient locations, and carrying them to rearrange on a single stone platform that so far seems sturdy and unaffected, where they can be more easily monitored and protected all in one place.

There are only six eluvians that Riftwatch regularly uses, but the instability is making them more difficult to reach, and they're heavy and unwieldy enough that multiple people will need to assist with transporting each one. Meanwhile, everyone will be asked to observe and make notes on the changes they encounter, as well as to collect other eluvians–the ones that lead to ruins in wild forests with no signs of where those forests might be, or deserted remote fortresses, or pitch-black caves, or the unyielding wooden walls that mean the mirror's counterpart is packed up somewhere behind and beneath loads of junk–to preserve them in case their Thedosian counterparts can be located and moved somewhere more practicable in the future. (These that are not yet usable will be arranged in a second location, separate but not so inconveniently far from the first.)

While trying to complete this work, Riftwatch will encounter the same spirits and hazards that have always made using the Crossroads a bit of a headache: paths that collapse ahead of them if they tell a lie while chatting with their traveling companions, spirits of suspicion that try to trap and drive wedges between them, guides who take on the embarrassing and/or adorable forms of the people they're guiding as children, wisps fascinated with travelers' impulses and emotions who endeavor to replicate them. The good news is that the new configuration of the eluvians will make walking through these spirits' domains unnecessary in the future and could mean many people will never have to deal with them again after this.

The bad news is that in the meantime, those retrieving the eluvians will have to deal with both the usual nonsense and the new patches where the borders give way and dimensions blend together. In these patches, the landscape and laws of the world mixes with the features and rules (or lack thereof) of the Crossroads. Sometimes this means the world, like the Crossroads, is more colorful for elves and more oppressive to everyone else–something akin to having to walk and work with a terrible headache, except there's no pain, only light and sound sensitivity and a general sense of difficulty and slowness. Other times it means something that looks more like the Crossroads feels more like the mundane world to humans and rifters, actually. Sometimes the Crossroad's loose ideas about gravity will be applied to a real river; sometimes the world's more strict laws will impose on a river in the Crossroads.

When these places are discovered, agents will be tasked not with avoiding them, but exploring them to estimate their sizes, note any features that might narrow down their locations on the map, and search for any signs of populations–in vain, fortunately. While a number of these locations are within ruins or abandoned villages, something is currently causing them to appear in areas that people seem to be avoiding. Journeying beyond the perimeter of the effect will reveal a strong contender for an explanation: these areas are places where the Veil is already damaged and thin, with spirits and demons passing through to discourage resettlement after whatever disaster or massacre weakened the barrier.

But the largest patch of bleed-through that Riftwatch will discover is also the least remote. Here a door in the Crossroads opens onto a wet, cold underground chamber, clearly man-made, roughly fifty yards across and roughly circular. The perimeter of the chamber shows signs of use for some academic purpose–crumbling shelves, the moldering and unreadable remnants of books left exposed to the damp for centuries, rusted and shattered equipment.

But the center of this chamber turns to jagged dark rock threaded with raw lyrium veins, and the ceiling shifts in the dark–sometimes a ceiling carved into stone, sometimes a churning sky in sickly dark green. Squint and you might see the Black City's floating island in the distance, for a moment. As the moments add up over the course of hours, a keen eye might notice that the carved ceiling of the chamber is shifting in a way stone shouldn’t shift, losing its careful patterns to a more chaotic swirl.

Exploring to establish the outer perimeter of this disruption will require venturing down branching hallways and tunnels, some of them populated by shades and freshly possessed skeletons. Another fifty yards or so out, in pursuit of any identifying features to place this on a map, the jet black stone and design of crumbling old mining equipment might start to give the observant a sinking feeling. Another hundred, and one of the labyrinthe and increasingly claustrophobic tunnels will end in a cave-in that is fairly recent, judging by the state of the three skeletons of people who appear to have died trying to dig back out. Their clothes and possessions have mostly rotted away in the moist air, but two of their skeletal hands are still wearing signet rings stamped with the Coterie's symbol.

Comments

Barrow ota

[thereneverwas]

I. Exploring

a. It would be inaccurate to say Barrow is alone at the head of the pack, because there is a chubby little boy marching along beside and around him, stalwartly waving a stick in the same manner that his adult version holds a torch. The bridge they're crossing is rickety, but the spirit navigates it without issue, as Barrow takes careful, measured steps and braces himself with one hand on the rope guard.
He's met his child self in the Crossroads a few times before, and can't help but keep an eye on him in a way that would bring up a torrent of emotions, if he let it: Can anything happen to a spirit? If it does, would it kill him too? Is it weird to feel protective of himself? Would the little shit please stop running around?

b. This quickly becomes irrelevant as the bridge transitions to a rock formation, revealing that the party has traveled into a deep underground cave. Barrow is glad for his torch, with no light filtering in from above, although he curses his gratitude a moment later as the whoosh of an arriving intangible hostile extinguishes it.
"Fuck," he announces to whomever might be behind him, the only light now emanating off Little Obie, who brandishes his stick with frightened determination-- and also from the revenants emerging from shabby wooden boxes placed along the edges of the path.


II. Wildcard

a

[extortionate]

Lazar is also watching the bridge. He's watching the end of it, where another boy - tall for his age, and hungry in the eyes - advances towards young Barrow; rolling up worn sleeves.

"Easy," He calls, like it'll do fuck-all, like it really matters if two spirits get in a scrap - and then - "Ah, shit,"

Ten-year-old Lazar hunches his head down like a bull, and charges the second spirit. The bridge swings wild.

[thereneverwas]

"Hey--" Barrow calls, noticing a fraction of a second too late what's about to happen, and by then it's too late: he braces himself, taking a painful knee on the swinging bridge, cursing quietly under his breath. He's on the verge of shutting down, in a way that's quite unusual for him: his hands shake as he grips the ropes, giving a single, frantic shout of "KNOCK IT OFF," to the spirits.

The shorter boy has risen gamely to the challenge, fully aware of his weight advantage as he attempts to throw his assailant off-balance.

ii. >]

[cozen]

Wherever they are, it's warmer than Kirkwall. The ruin's walls are crumbling, letting shafts of sunlight fall through in patches onto the moss and vines retaking the stone floor, and in the moments when the breeze is still and no one is moving, steady ocean waves are audible.

The Crossroads are still there, visible through the open arched doorway behind them. Ahead of them is another door. This one is much more mundane. Probably. It's not really possible for Bastien to tell whether there's something magical or otherworldly about it. There could be, sure. But it looks like nothing but heavy hardwood hinged into stone.

There's a keyhole. Bastien isn't looking at the keyhole. Bastien's standing with a companionable hand on Byerly's shoulder and looking at the wall, which is coated in dirt and moss. He holds his other hand out toward Barrow.

"Can I borrow your shirt?"

[bouchonne]

Byerly looks towards Barrow. His face is pinched, almost peeved, because of how serious this matter is.

"He needs your shirt."

How could you ever doubt the honesty of a man this earnestly focused on their mission?

a

[favoriteanalyst]

The chubby little marching lad is soon joined by a less chubby spirit boy who is only a little bit more careful. Less bold but still emboldened by something that makes the spirit seem brighter in some way. Or is that just Mobius' eyes tricking him?

He's got both hands along the ropes, anyway, since Barrow's got the torch, and it's a bit of a waste to have several at once if they aren't needed.

"I haven't seen any parts that seem frayed." Are jinxes a thing in Thedas? Because maybe he should knock on some fucking wood. "We're gonna be fine. These guys probably know where they're going."

The little blond shit had better know, he doesn't say.

[thereneverwas]

Being in Rope Bridge Hell already has Barrow's nerves well and truly frayed, but at least things are fairly steady this time around.

"He doesn't," he announces evenly, speaking at least of his smaller counterpart; as if that kid ever knew what he was doing or why. "Does yours?"

bastien | ota

[cozen]

i. truth, valor, skeletons

Too much is going on.

The walkway is too narrow, for one—the kind of narrow that begs looking down at your feet every few steps, because angling slightly to one side or the other might be enough to topple you over the edge. The queasy shifting sky of the Crossroads has given way to the smoky black of a cloudy night, but the path continues, four or five feet above the frozen surface of the marsh. The marsh should be black, too, but here and there it glows a luminous pale grey. If the sky weren't so overcast it might have been the reflection of moon or starlight. From this height, through the ice, it's impossible to see what else it might be.

And ahead there's the translucent, glowing shape of a figure in ancient elven armor. Hand on the hilt of its ghostly sword. Guarding the way.

"Your name, trespasser," it says.

And too much is going on. There are too many things to be careful of and to try to make sense of. The uncomfortable tension of walking through the Crossroads has given way to nose-stinging cold and an uncomfortable sense that the gravity holding them to this floating pathway through this very real portion of the world is not quite as strong as it should be. So Bastien, two steps ahead of his walking buddy, doesn't think.

He says, "Bastien," with thoughtless ease, looking over the side of the too-narrow path at one of the brighter patches of ice.

And the path ahead of them falls away, the way the paths here can always fall away in the face of a lie. The stones crack free of one another and fan out, waiting to rearrange themselves into a path once he's told the truth.

Which is not happening. He turns his head to consider the gap in the path and the armored spirit still standing in air as if it were still there, now drawing its unreal sword from its unreal sheath but not advancing any further. He doesn't look behind him at the person who he's now wasted probably an hour of carefully meaningless conversation on.

He puts his hands in his pockets and settles his shoulders back, like maybe he can just wait this one out.

ii. oh no

A number of them have congregated here now, in this jet-stone chamber where things are even more wrong than everywhere else. Bastien spent the first several minutes after his own arrival staring up at the ceiling. At the Black City.

But since then he's tried to make himself useful, combing the corridors and twisting tunnels for evidence of where they are, even though he feels it in his gut. He thinks everyone must feel it in their guts. When he crouches down to slip one of the rings off the finger of the skeleton at the end of the tunnel and holds it up to the flickering firelight coming from his runic lighter, it's just further confirmation of the gut feeling.

He rubs his thumb over the Coterie symbol, then offers the ring back to whoever's with him for examination.

"Silver lining," he proposes: "we'll probably be among the first to know when it gets worse. Pas vrai?"

iii. wildcard

ii

[extortionate]

Lazar grimaces, wiping a bit of evaporating ichor from his cheek. It smears grey: Whatever shades are made of, they'll be a bitch to get out of this shirt.

"Pass," Let Bastien hold onto that particular insignia. If anyone comes looking for it, better not in his pockets. "Must be a hard way in. This all's a lotta work just to cut their losses."

[cozen]

Bastien curls his hand and the ring back into a more personal distance. There's another shining on another one of the pile of bones; he pulls it free too, taking a segment of the boney finger with it. The ligaments are threads.

Holding the flickering fire rune and both rings in one hand, he fishes out a handkerchief dotted with wash-faded stains to wipe the rings free of bone dust and whatever else might be lurking. (Blood sharks. He'll never forget.) Once the worst of the coordinated juggling that requires is past, a matter of single-digit seconds, he says, "They could have been lost. Caused a cave in somehow. No one knew where to look for them."

Or perhaps not.

He tucks the rings into an inner pocket in his vest.

"They do not give those rings out to everyone, right? Not to every smuggler and grunt who does something for them."

It has the tone of a proposal.

i

[altusimperius]

Behind him shivers his tall and uncomfortable walking buddy, who peers around in an effort to see his face when Bastien speaks his name and nothing happens. Benedict is too cold to be anything but impatient, hissing "what's wrong," at the same time that the reality of the situation begins to dawn on him.

Should Bastien look behind him, he'll see that he's now receiving a funny, wary sort of look.

[cozen]

"Nothing," Bastien says, conversational and mild. "The Crossroads being unreasonable, as usual—do you do this to married women?"

The question pitched to the spirit and its drawn weapon. If it even understands the question (did ancient elves marry? did the women change their names when they did?) it doesn't answer. After a polite pause to be sure it plans to stay silent and poised to fight, and he isn't only jumping to the unfair conclusion that it's a single-minded automaton incapable of empathy or complexity, Bastien sighs and turns around to look at Benedict.

He doesn't look bothered. He smiles.

"Do you think we will crack the ice if we jump? We could go around."

Edgard OTA

[muckspout]

i. Mold, so much Mold
Edgard is extremely proud of how helpful he was to get them over the boulder. It wasn't easy slowly lifting them down, but he managed it. He lands on his feet, the last one to make it, when he sees a lake shimmering in front of them. It looks unlike anything he's seen before. Is it iced over?

He gets closer and sees a grey green film covering the entirety of the lake. Pure joy overtakes him.

"It's mud!" He yells in delight.

It isn't mud.

ii. Truth Path

Edgard is leading and he isn't going to fuck it up. He knows he must do well. It doesn't matter that they've definitely seen that tree before. Most trees look alike anyway.

"We're not lost!" He demands of his companion. They both watch as the air shivers and their way is suddenly blocked by underbrush and rock. He spins around. Which way were they going?

i

[altusimperius]

"No!"

A hand grips at the fabric of Edgard's shirt, an uncharacteristically physical move for Benedict as he tries, preemptively, to pull him back.

"It's not," he insists, "it's not mud."

[muckspout]

Edgard swings around swatting at Benedict's fingers grabbing his shirt. The move is uncharacteristic and thus annoys Edgard slightly.

"You're just saying that!" He whines. "You hate mud." He's right, of course.

The lake appears to whisper to him. What a glorious sludge.

"It's beautiful," He marvels taking a step forward. "Never seen this kind before!"

ii

[extortionate]

Lazar yawns. He offers, experimentally,

"The way is left?"

Nothing happens: No truth or lie to build upon. The Fade knows only what those within do, blah blah, Lazar are you paying attention to the briefing, etcetera -

Well, it was worth a shot. He squints at Edgard.

"Thought you were some kinda woodsman."

[muckspout]

Edgard sighs dejectedly.

"No. Was just a man in the woods."

The brush that was in front of them isn't there any longer. Edgard blinks, did he simply not see things correctly? He recalls the buzzing that fills his head when he hears Orlesian these days.

"Something's off here. Magic, maybe?"

[favoriteanalyst]

i
[Mobius is, honestly, kind of hoping for something to happen. That time they all thought they were in worlds the Rifters were from, for weeks at a time, when only hours had passed at most? Maker, what a thrill that had been!

Would beat trudging around the Crossroads like this. And the spirits are always so tremendously unhelpful, even when they're trying to be helpful. The Fade might be better at this point, ugh, but he won't say that, no.

What he will do is follow along behind a spirit taking on the appearance of a young boy, with wild blond hair and a freshly busted up face--nose in particular. He's not a big fan of this, but what else is he going to do? Try and take on this maze himself?] I hope we aren't going in circles. Some of the spirits do that instead.

ii
[Or, hey, what about being left to traverse a dark tunnel whose paths seem to move on their own? I'm sure that's fine. So's the whispering from the fear spirits. How well do they know each other? What's really driving them? Sure would be a shame if something happened in this spooky darkness and someone didn't make it back...]

iii
[this is also the wildcard option. reconciliation paths if there's a bone to pick, or maybe y'all walking along and someone tells a naughty lie and where'd the path go. actual wild goose chase spirits. go nutso.]

iv
[Mobius hefts himself overtop a boulder that has done them the disservice of being tremendously in the way and would take a lot of backtracking to go around. When he lands--well, it's on the other side of the boulder, in a way, except the path doesn't keep going.

The sound of his landing echoes in this stony, enclosed room. The torch throws shadows everywhere, but his breath that's been making clouds in what feels like an unnatural cold stops up in his chest.]

Why in Andraste's name is there a Circle in the middle of the Crossroads?

[Like a dank basement, a cellar probably. The apprentice staves leaned in a corner are telling, and some other odds and ends visible that scream of an old Circle. Magical supplies along with more mundane ones. He lays a hand on the hilt of his sword and inches forward.

It's not Ostwick. He's certain of that much.] Be careful.

i.

[cozen]

That rock is new, [ Bastien says, which is probably true. It feels true. That might just be the optimism; he's in as good a mood as he's ever been, in this part of the Fade.

The reason is the second spirit accompanying them, in the shape of a short, skinny preteen with unruly curls, wearing his too-big poor man's clothing with a touch of panache and toting a beat-up lute that's missing two strings. Old enough to have a fully Royan accent, no sign of the Marcher parents back home. Old enough to enjoy a good lie. And that's the best luck Bastien's ever had in this part of the Crossroads. ]

What happened to his nose? To your nose.

[ This question from Bastien's little spirit, to Mobius' solid form. ]

[favoriteanalyst]

[Small Mobius, meanwhile, looks well-to-do enough to imply money in the family. Not fancy Orlesian froufrou, in his mind, but definitely better off than, say, a farmer's boy. There's a book under his arm, no title visible, but he's pretty sure he's got an idea which old tome it might specifically be. He hasn't spoken yet, but he looks bright eyed, bushy tailed, determined at every turn.

Maybe that rock is new. He can trust a small too smart for his own good kiddo, right?]

School of hard knocks, [is what he jokes to small Bastien, and subsequently big Bastien.] He'll grow into it. You gonna fix that lute up someday?

iv (mea culpa i'm so late)

[heirring]

[Over the rock, with much scraping and scuffling appears—

Wysteria. Which isn't a surprise, given that she has been his traveling companion through the Crossroads for some hours now, but nonetheless there's something just slightly comical about her clambering up onto the top of the boulder in her skirts and scuffed yellow field boots. At the top of the broad stone, she pauses to squint through the gloom that has closed about them. For just a moment. Then, she is kicking her feet before her and hopping down off the other side of the boulder with far more aptitude than one might guess.

(Say what one will about Madame de Foncé, but this is not her first adventure to the wild corners of Thedas.)]

My, my. Now this is unexpected. I suppose we should arrange for a light if we're to proceed on, Ser.

[The unnatural gleam of the Crossroads bleeds sluggishly into only this space that has immediately opened to greet them, and doesn't appear to extend much farther.]

[favoriteanalyst]

[It isn't her first adventure, no, and so between that knowledge and his distraction of the surroundings, he feels he could be forgiven for not offering a helping hand down.]

This could be useful. Old supplies are still supplies for our mages. Phylacteries. Templar equipment.

[Said while still distracted, and then the words catch up. Light--right, light.] Hold on a minute. [Plenty of old torches lining the walls. All it needs is a little flint spark to get going. Though the cobwebs and the dust burn away first. It's a little stiff at first, but a good tug or two loosens it from its resting place. At least, besides light, it also offers a small modicum of heat. Not enough to penetrate much through the awful chill, but it's something. Better than nothing, always.]

Unless this is all an illusion of the Crossroads.

stephen strange | ota

[portalling]

i. exploration.

Where some of their party might look queasy and discombobulated as reality goes topsy-turvy around them, Doctor Strange actually seems to get cheerier the more fucked-up the landscape becomes.

Despite the mild headache throbbing in the back of his head, his shape also looks sharper, brighter, the red in his clothing a deeper crimson. And this is the kind of thing he’s oddly used to from home: navigating an M.C. Escher nightmare, crumbling stone stairs winding up and sideways into the air as gravity inverts and he walks upside down, his cloak floating impossibly behind him.

There’s one particularly eye-watering area where the rocky ground splits and he’s standing in the sky above you, looking down (or up?) at you. “Any ideas on how to get you here?” he asks.

Another time, he’s passing over a boulder when reality shifts and— well, now it’s a dilapidated gothic mansion, riddled with cobwebs and the fluttering of bats, careening straight for your hair.

ii. inner child boulevard.

At one point, however, he does get lost, and grudgingly requires some benign spirit guidance.

Which is how you’ve wound up facing a twelve-year-old boy with blue eyes, messy black hair, a familiar turn to his nose. It’s a young Stephen, and he looks astoundingly grubby: worn clothes, scrapes on his hands and knobbly knees, muddy rainboots as if he’s been trekking around in a field and maybe in some cow shit. A farmboy, through and through, and such a different picture from the dapper man in the robes, the pampered city sorcerer.

Strange winces when he sees him.

“On second thought,” he says, turning around, “perhaps we can just wander for a while longer. I’m sure we’ll find the eluvian eventually.”

Which might be when your own child version appears right behind them.

iii. wildcard.

( open to other spirit hazards or checking the eluvians themselves or anything else which piques your fancy; yk the drill, follow your bliss. hmu @ quadrille on plurk/discord if you wanna brainstorm! )

impulse avenue.

[elegiaque]

The purpose of this particular trek is not to converse with mouthy spirits, although she's relatively sure that's never the especial purpose of a trek through the Crossroads— no, when Gwenaëlle and Stephen find themselves walking briskly through unusual terrain it is with the stated goal of documenting more thoroughly a particular area of bleed-through that ought to be not far from here. Whatever that means, in here.

She'd not cared for the experience of being within the Fade in truth; she never particularly enjoys mimicking it in the Crossroads, which feel (are) altogether too close to the Fade for comfort. It means she's a little jumpy when she's there, already, nevermind anything else,

that she reaches for her bow when she hears a whistle is understandable, then, for all it really doesn't sound like that sort of whistle.

[portalling]

It’s a near-impossible task, mapping this ever-shifting landscape: risking a wrong-footed step, plummeting to another platform, getting lost. It’s important to travel in pairs at minimum. Stephen considers himself ready for anything, and particularly on alert after his last Crossroads venture squandered weeks in those Fade-crafted copies of rifter worlds. They do their best.

What he’s not prepared for, however, is that braying wolf whistle piercing through the air.

Stephen pivots on his heel, his mage’s staff sending a blast of force in the direction of the sound. It’s hard to see, but the fog eventually coalesces into a shape. It’s a poor copy: the spirits here are blurry and only approximate, giving the impression of dark hair, an impish smile. Stephen’s expression turns rigid upon seeing it.

“Oh, fuck’s sake. This guy again?” he demands, which is a very normal sort of thing to say when faced with yourself. “I had enough of this in the Silent Plains. He’s probably going to try to kill me, fair warning—”

It’s not exactly Sinister Strange, though. It’s strolling amiably along beside them, on Gwenaëlle’s other side and watching her with keen attention, hands in pockets. And instead of levying a slithering insidious threat:

“It’s not always about you,” says the spirit, chidingly. “And I just think if you’re not able to appreciate the beautiful woman by your side, you should perhaps move aside for one who could.”



Wait, what.