Into the DANGER ZONE

[faderifting]

WHO: All Rifters + the 7 natives who signed up
WHAT: Searching the ruins of Haven for survivors, an Inquisition crew finds something strange. And demons. It's kind of scary that the demons aren't the strange thing.
WHEN: Third week of Harvestmere, 9:41
WHERE: Haven
NOTES: We've broken rifters and rescuers (or "rescuers") into two groups. This log has an arrival comment for each group--you can start smaller subthreads beneath those rather than try to have an eight- or nine-person log, just incorporate surrounding chaos/fighting--and a third top-level set for the whole group's journey back to Skyhold

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, barely softened by snow that lies a foot deep with an icy crust that cracks beneath the force of your landing. The wind is biting cold, the sun is bright, and you are not alone. Others thud to the ground nearby, as bewildered as you, and others run up who look no less confused for having their feet beneath them.

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 that you're being attacked by monsters, some tall, spindly stick-things with too many eyes, some hunched and hooded with no eyes at all.

Welcome to Thedas!

Comments

[gatheringstorm]

Araceli's enthusiasm gets a chuckle out of Korrin, despite the latter not wanting to relax entirely yet. She's not convinced that the ordeal is over...but nothing more comes from the rift, which is sealed. "I'd say that's true of the Fade, too, all the more so for what it just brought us. But if it's the sea you want, then you'll want to make your way to the Storm Coast. The name is apt, but I bet you'd appreciate the view."

Finally, she decides to just place the staff on her back once more. If trouble surfaces, it's not as though having it there will make it impossible to retrieve. "You know I'm picturing those Zim-people with horns now, right? That sound Qunari enough to me, at least in combat. Though unless they have anything like the Qun, I'd say that's where similarities end. It's a system where individual freedom is nonexistant, where people don't have names but roles chosen for them, where mages...are treated far worse than what you find in the Circle. My parents left that long before I was born, thank the Maker."

[foxsays]

"Aren't you worried I'll manage to find a ship and sail away into the sunset and take my magical hand with me?" She's teasing, well, mostly teasing, because she can't just sail a whole ship on her own with no provisions and no map and no actual plan beyond figuring out how to get home. "If demons come from the Fade then no, the sea...the sea has rights to me because I came from it long long ago, your green magical thing with the habits and dinner manners of a basking shark? No."

Still, a view of the sea would set her heart at ease but mountains and the sea are opposite directions and she has that sinking feeling that her chance is going to take a while.

"Oh no, no horns but they're equally striking I think: most have dark hair now but a sign of the old blood is to have skin a bit darker than mine but with golden hair. Not blonde, I mean gold, many of them have eyes the same shade. The lion is associated with them for very obvious reasons. Zimevur was the master of strategy until it came to besieging an island nation where everyone can crew a ship." Oh but she wishes Rajani had been here to hear that remark, she'd be affronted. "Learning about Zimevur is tricky - Castileos is considered...loose? We live life to the full and our practices are frowned upon, by Zimevur most of all but they have names, they can rise as high as they might - pushing yourself to excel is one of their greatest values. You need keen minds to thrive as they have with so much hot sun but so little rain." It just pushes them to conquest though because they rely on the breadbasket nations only they wanted to own the basket and the bread in it all at once and decided to try to wrench it away. Castileos has always been about trade and cooperation and just paid a fair price from the start. "What, do they chop off hands like they do with thieves in Zimevur so they can't continue on like that?"

[gatheringstorm]

The Zimevur sound interesting, and Korrin will have to make a note to ask more about Araceli's world when they aren't in the middle of ruins and chilly mountain air. Maybe over a drink or few? Somehow, she thought that might appeal to the short Antivan-sounding human.

"Maybe they do? But I know that they chain their mages, stitch their mouths shut and kill them if they so much as stray from their keeper. I've even heard of them removing tongues, from someone who's lived in Qunari lands. Believe me, I have a vested interest in ensuring that they don't succeed in their invasion plans."

She shudders, trying to get those horrifying thoughts and images out of her head though it's not easy. It's not as though she hasn't seen the stitch scars of former saarebas and heard their stories. "And no, I'm not worried. Sure, you could flee, but staying put is the best chance you have at learning more about what's on your hand. If it gets worse, no one else is going to know enough about it to even begin to help. Besides, I don't know how others are going to react when they find out about people entering Thedas from the Fade. Out there, it could get ugly. I doubt the Inquisition will know what to do about all this at first, but I've been with them long enough to know that you won't come to harm."

[foxsays]

"People allow that?" The way she staggers back isn't affected at all, one hand fluttering at her mouth as she gropes behind her for something to lean against. "How could anyone do that! It's not enough to deny freedom, they would deny them a voice too? Silenced and shackled, that's no way to live a life, even animals have more freedom than that. And people just...they do nothing." It's the sort of horror that would never have come into her mind at all - oh there's silencing with threats or a blade slicing a throat but those are cleaner, as strange a thought as it may be but to actually sit and stitch a mouth closed for a whole life...

She takes a deep breath, grimacing as she swallows the bile creeping up to scorch at her throat.

"Can it be much worse than a man sending his whole household guard after you when he catches you in bed with his daughter?" The joke falls a little flat in light of the conversation but she does try because if she lets herself languish now then she'll have a hard job when reality sets in. "But if I got there and explained things, they wouldn't force me to stay, would they?"

[gatheringstorm]

Korrin's expression is apologetic, realizing she's been far too blunt, especially to someone freshly arrived. The sort-of Antivan has had enough of a shock, she doesn't need gruesome images piled on her like that. Sighing, the Vashoth decides to try and curb her tongue, just a bit. She won't sugarcoat things, but she doesn't need to pass on anything nightmare-inducing, either.

"I don't think so, no. But I think they would provide you with incentive to do so, or at least travel on the Inquisition's behalf. If that mark can close rifts, if it can hurt demons...then the Herald's death won't have been for nothing. You have no idea the hope that would give to some of us."

[foxsays]

"If and if again." A certain measure of sadness creeps in because to her at least, they're such big ifs. "Perhaps to you they may not be but they might think very differently of someone who doesn't know a single thing about this place. I could cause alarm if I go somewhere else and meet a normal person because there are all sorts of things the 'common'," even saying it that way makes her grimace, remembering noble faces and their sneers all too well, "aren't privy to. Please though, don't think me uncaring - I just...I have to look out for myself, I only have me and Lux here after all."

It makes her feel so small, without the queensguard and Leandra, without her parents, without a country that all love her and worry for her.

"Come, shall we walk a bit? I think I need to get away from this immediate place at the very least."