FEBRUARY 2021 EVENT: PART TWO

[robbies]

 

CHAPTER TWO, PART 2: THE LIVING ISLAND

Everything you never wanted to see.

YOU CAN’T DO A LITTLE BECAUSE YOU CAN’T DO ENOUGH | JUST A DREAM FROM YESTERDAY | DARKNESS HELD ITS BREATH | YOUR FRIENDS WHEN THINGS GET ROUGH | COME AND PLAY WITH ME

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YOU CAN'T DO A LITTLE BECAUSE YOU CAN'T DO ENOUGH

Perhaps you’ve been on tenterhooks since you woke up to find that your friends, your family, your neighbors somehow went missing in the night. Perhaps you’ve been hitting the pavement and knocking on doors trying to find them. So far, your efforts have been for naught. There’s been neither hide nor hair of the missing, and every attempt to find them has met with a dead end.

Until February 13.

In the afternoon, a strange, unsigned message goes live on the network. What is the meaning of “Living Island”? Does it have anything to do with what’s going on? There’s no elaboration… until midnight, when every neighbor’s television set turns on at full volume, hissing static and garbled noise as the dials turn and adjust. Several disjointed clips follow, ending on a mural that depicts the same words from the post.

“Living Island.”

The following morning, you’ll find that stranger things are beginning to happen. Some of you will be woken up to the blankets and sheets being yanked off your sleeping bodies by a powerful force. Others will find that when they step out of their morning shower, a message has been written in the steam on their medicine cabinet's mirror. Depending on how quickly you shower, you may only be able to see part of the message — but running the hot water longer and allowing the steam to fill the room will reveal it in its entirety:

“LIVING ISLAND.”

As time passes, you’ll find that the same message shows up every time the bathroom steams up, whether you’re in the shower or not. The same force that turned your TV on seems to insist that you pay attention to what it’s trying to show you, and its behavior escalates the longer you refuse. Characters will find that books go flying off of bookshelves, drawers are yanked out of dressers and desks, and breakable objects are smashed. Trying to prevent the spirit from destruction won’t go your way: If you try to catch or grab something that’s about to be thrown, you’ll find it ripped out of your hands anew and smashed anyways. If you tried to take all of your chairs down from where they’ve been stacked on top of the dining room table, you’ll find they’re back atop it the instant you look away.

All that’s to say nothing of the rumbling. It doesn’t start until the end of the first day, but from time to time you’ll feel the house beginning to shake on its foundations, a dull groan as it struggles to keep itself from collapsing in under its own weight. As time goes on, this will get louder and louder until the house seems to roar of its own accord, an unyielding shriek that can’t be stopped until the force causing it backs down.

Attempts to make contact with the spirit will never go well. It does not seem to be able or willing to communicate with you beyond its own tantrums, and characters who try may find that the attempt rapidly goes out of control. Candles flare up and burn wildly, Ouija boards are ripped into pieces and planchettes go flying, offerings of food are knocked over or thrown, and the lights flicker manically in turns. While you may be able to get some sleep at night if you’re lucky, the only thing that will reduce the poltergeist activity is to pay attention to the message it’s sending you and figure out what it means.

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JUST A DREAM FROM YESTERDAY

Living Island. If ever there were a first step to stopping this madness, it’s figuring out what those words mean. But starting is always the hardest part, and with nothing else to go by than two seemingly unrelated, nonsensical words left behind by a force you can’t see much less communicate with, an already arduous task seems even more impossible. This is furthered by the reactions you get when you hit the street and start asking people if they know anything about Living Island. Most of them can only look back at you blankly, as if waiting for a punchline that never comes. Others actually take you seriously enough to consider the question, and to their credit, they do take their time racking their brains to remember where they’ve heard that name before, why it sounds so familiar. But the most you’ll get back from them is a sheepish shrug of the shoulders and a reply that it sounds like something from TV. It gets to the point where their answers blend together, each one more unremarkable than the last. Save for the one you get from the last person you haven’t asked. Living Island. I’m sorry, what was that? What the fuck did you just say? Dale Harding and Rosemary Craven might be as far away from each other as possible, doing things around town that couldn’t be more different, but their reactions are the same. When they overhear you asking what feels like the hundredth person you’ve seen that day about Living Island, they look your way — Harding in the middle of his patrol or lunch break, Rosemary in the middle of grocery shopping. Harding looks honest-to-God surprised. Rosemary simply looks confused, even somewhat concerned. That's such a... strange name. Where did you hear that from? When they hear your explanation, they go quiet, mulling it over. Rosemary’s expression turns thoughtful. Harding’s, suspicious. If I remember correctly, that was a clubhouse the children around town used to play in. I haven’t heard about it in… goodness, I can’t even remember. Years, perhaps. It’s a play on “safety island” — another name for a bomb shelter — and the name of this… stupid kids show that used to be popular. I guess they thought it was cute, calling a place like that something fun. But where is it? Well, most of the shelters in town are still in use, and children aren’t allowed in them unless there’s an emergency. The only place I can think of is… The grade school. Administration ran out of funding before they could finish it, so they just scrapped it. Closed it off and just hoped for the best. Didn’t stop people from sneaking in. I used to bust them for playing down there all the time, the little shits. Harding’s mouth twists into a sneer that doesn’t reach his eyes, which are soft and miserable, while Rosemary waits patiently for any other questions and, when you have no others, excuses herself to go back to her groceries. Now you have something even better than an explanation: you have a destination.

Finding Santa Rosita Elementary is as easy as a fifteen minute drive from North Santa Rosita to Shadyside. Getting in is a different story. By day, the school is open for business and humming with activity, so you can’t very well go barging in and not expect to be reprimanded for disrupting class. This leaves you with three options: go before it opens, wait until school is over, or come in the middle of the night. Each have their own pros and cons, but all of them will get you the same result.

After hours, the school is desolate and still. The wind, the occasional slap of a naked branch against a window, and the squeak of your footsteps on the shiny, clean floors are the only sounds you’ll hear as you navigate the empty hallways. Most of the classrooms are locked, and the ones that aren’t don’t have anything any more unique or worthwhile to them than the occasional lunchbox left behind by a student or the classroom frog croaking in its tank. In a way, this is a good thing — it doesn’t leave that many places to investigate and makes your path that much more linear as you finally, inevitably and silently make your way downstairs into the bowels of the school.

The long corridor that awaits you in the basement is, in theory, not very different from the hallways upstairs. There are lockers lining both sides, dented and darkened with age and dust. The tiles are cracked, dirt and pieces of stone kicked up from exposed areas of the floor. Seemingly, this appears to lead to a dead end. But look closely at the wall and you’ll see the impression of a door, painted to match the walls. The lock is flimsy — in fact, depending on when you find it, someone may have already broken it. All that’s left is to enter and descend down the tiny room’s only feature: a ladder under a rusty steel hatch door, stretching down into darkness.

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DARKNESS HELD ITS BREATH

CW: gore, surgery

Stepping into the old shelter, the first thing that hits you is the stale, uncomfortably moist air. This first room is cavernous and dark, and your footsteps and whispers echo in spite of how quiet you might try to be. There’s a faint smell in the air, a trace of copper and rubbing alcohol that might make your eyes water, making your mouth feel unpleasant as it hits your tongue. As you get your bearings and begin to pick your way through the dark, you’ll notice traces of another smell — something simultaneously spicy and cloyingly sweet, a scent that seems to assault your senses and leaves you with a headache pounding at the base of your skull. Thankfully, there isn’t enough to do more than make you nauseous, but the smells warn of what’s still yet to be found.

As you continue through the labyrinthine warren, you’ll begin to find signs of human presence — some of the trashed rooms may be fitted with tables and supplies one might expect to find in a laboratory, meticulously labeled with typewritten strips. Several of these boxes appear to be old, covered in grimy layers of dust, while others are fresh and clean. All of them contain medical supplies. Eagle-eyed investigators might note that the untouched supplies tend to be the type contained in first-aid kits — acetaminophen, antibiotic ointment, simple adhesive bandages — while the ones that have been opened are for heavy duty surgical work — coiled IV lines and tubing, empty syringes, surgical gloves. One room in particular seems to have been fitted out for someone’s personal use, boasting a stripped-down bed, a chair and desk, and a comfortable recliner.

The trickle of water can be heard in the depths of the shelter, and as you emerge from one corridor that filters into a large chamber, it becomes immediately obvious where you are: This is an operating theater, with a table stationed beneath all manner of lights that can be adjusted and moved. A faucet drips monotonously in the back of the room, over a sink stained with blood with bits of grey, pulpy matter stuck in the drain. A bucket filled with blood and viscera ferments on the ground beside it. There are smears of blood, both dried and fresh, on the cloudy tiles, and a cabinet full of surgical instruments is slightly ajar. Looking at the instruments, characters will find that a couple of scalpels and a pair of tongs have dotted blotches where the metal was cleaned with water; whoever used these tools last didn’t dry them before putting them away. A small table near the operating area has a turntable sitting atop it, with a record already set under the needle: a single of Elvis Presley’s “Heartbreak Hotel.” There are a few other records sitting in the cabinet beneath it, including Big Mama Thornton’s “Hound Dog,” Frank Sinatra’s “Frank Sinatra Sings for Only the Lonely,” and James Brown and the Famous Flames’ “Think!”

In a separate area of this room, an oversized desk is piled with books and empty food containers that look as though they’ve been repurposed for one reason or another. These books are chiefly on anatomy and the medical sciences, though there are a number of books on psychology and how the brain functions. Though some of these books are water-spotted and dog-eared, there aren’t any notes written in the margins, nor are there any papers to be found. You can turn this area as much as you'd like, but all you’ll find is a couple empty cigarette boxes and some broken and bitten pens; the trash can next to the desk, filled with soggy ashes, seems to suggest that any papers that might have given you a lead were destroyed before you got here.

But the lab, with all its instruments, isn’t what you came here to find. There’s still at least one more room to be found…

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YOUR FRIENDS WHEN THINGS GET ROUGH

CW: gore, surgical trauma, amputation, lobotomy, brainwashing and interrogation, mouth trauma, eye trauma, ear trauma, body horror

The missing are being held in small, sturdy cages in a single room connected to the back of the operating room, dim and dank. The cages are placed equidistant around the room, ensuring that even if you try, you can’t reach out and make contact with your neighbors. The missing will find that they wake at approximately the same time, curled up on the ground in uncomfortable positions. Unlike your rescuers, your nightmare began far earlier than when you first awoke in this room, sore and disoriented. In fact, you could argue it started the moment you went to sleep on February 9th, leaving empty beds and concerned family members behind.

With no clocks or watches available to tell the time, you may not be able to tell how long you’ve been here. You sleep and wake, sometimes to a bowl of what looks like sticky rice lying in your cage that wasn’t there before. Sometimes, an overpowering smell will fill the room, faint at first; by the time you register it, it’s already overwhelmed you and sent you into a deep sleep. And when you wake, one cage will be empty. The inhabitant will be returned the next time you go to sleep and wake up, but not quite the same as they were before. They seem heavily drugged, discombobulated — or perhaps there's something visibly different about them. Whoever has taken you is doing a lot of work in their lab — and from the smell of things, meat work — and before long almost all of you will be sporting dressings of some type or other, fresh red seeping through the sterile cloth within a matter of hours.

Maybe you should try to keep each others’ spirits up. You don’t know how long you’ll be here, after all.

All of this goes on for a while — days, although it won’t be easy to count them given that there are no windows in the room. But nearly a week later… you wake to find that the front of your cage is unlocked. Unlatched. Open just an inch. Looking around the room, you’ll find that yours is not the only cage to have been opened — all of your cages have been unlocked.

Is it a mistake? Or are you really free?

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COME AND PLAY WITH ME

CW: blood and violence

Whether you’ve released yourself from your cage, or were discovered by a well-meaning friend before you could, or you’ve simply had your fill of exploring the shelter-turned-laboratory, the time has finally come to leave. Unfortunately, if things were that easy, you wouldn’t even be around by the time the scuttling sounds begin — somewhere down the hall, in the room behind you, fleeting and sly. It’s not an animal sound, a creature picking its way through the garbage and debris littered around the shelter. No, with the way it stops and starts every time you start and stop walking, this is a very deliberate, human sound. And if you don’t believe that, you’ll see soon enough when you see the naked, bone-white figure walk into view at the end of the hallway as casual as you please, their body smooth and sexless like a department store mannequin. They turn (your) their head and stare directly at you with (your) their wide, glassy eyes crinkled in thousand-yard delight. You hear your voice echoed back at you, airy and chirpy and so indescribably wrong it makes your blood run cold.

"Hi!"

Much like the Doppelgangers you encountered in January, these ones look and move like dolls, their limbs connected with ball-joints. However, whereas those ones were near perfect imitations of you and your friends, these ones look like they just fell off the assembly line. Their faces are unnaturally flat and plastic, like all the imperfections have been ironed out of them, but they are unmistakably yours. And when they open their mouths to squeal at you before running with all the unnatural speed not having a pair of lungs affords them, you’ll find that even their voices are perfect imitations — and not necessarily of your own either.

There’s no way to tell how many of these Doppelgangers are down here with you, hiding in the dark. They’re stealthy and sneaky, only coming out to attack when they’re sure you’re alone. Even if you’re not, they’re intelligent enough to come up with ways to separate you from your group, calling to you from another part of the shelter, mimicking a voice from someone they know you’ll listen to. Even if there’s no possible way they could be in Santa Rosita.

"Help me!"

"Is that you...? Oh thank God, I've been looking everywhere for you!"

"Please, don't leave me!"

Other times, they’ll take a more aggressive approach, allowing their limbs to pop out of place so they can sprawl on the ground, imitating a heap of discarded doll parts. Once you get close enough or turn your back on them, they’ll pull themselves together and attack, speeding towards you on fours like a crab.

There are two ways out of the shelter. The first one is the hardest: go back the way you came. With the low visibility, the number of Doppelgangers, and the confusing layout of the area, you’re more likely to get turned around and go in circles than you are to find your way back to the ladder — a location made even more difficult to discern since the hatch door has been lowered, blotting out all light from the room above.

The second way is the longest but also the easiest: head deeper into the shelter, past the operating room, through the rooms filled with broken furniture and ruined floors that are very easy to trip on — especially when you’re in the middle of running away. Eventually, you’ll come to another ladder, this one leading to an open hatch that deposits you into a dark passageway. The air up here is more fresh, but not necessarily pleasant smelling. There’s only one way to go — forward.

After what feels like an hour of walking, you’ll see a light at the end of the passage. Follow it and you’ll find yourself exiting a storm drain that drops you into the heart of Old Growth, just outside of West Santa Rosita.

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OOC INFO

Welcome to the second part of February’s event! You can use this entry to top-level for the event, but feel free to utilize the log and network communities as well.

There will be a top-level posted for NPC interaction tied to the second prompt below, wherein you can request to play out your character’s interaction with Harding or Rosemary. If you would like to have your character interact with either one of them, comment to the top-level with the name of the NPC you would like to thread with. You may only thread with one NPC. The mods will respond to NPC tags until February 28th.

Any questions can go in our FAQ thread below. Try to check and see if your question has already been answered on the plotting thread first here.

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COMMS	logs | network | ooc | memes
OOC INFO	premise | rules | faq | taken | applications | hiatus/drop/canon updates | activity check | reserves | mod contact
SETTING INFO	calendar | setting | housing | npcs | death and tranquilizing | the story so far | event suggestions/engagements

Comments

Kipo | Kipo | OTA

[purplejaguareye]

[Exploring the tunnels]

[Kipo's followed a group down into the tunnels, looking around for any signs of the missing. In her mind, she's taking in how small the space is, how difficult it would be to turn into the Mega Jaguar if trouble came their way. Things aren't looking good...]

Okay, we just gotta find our friends, throttle the people holding them hostage, and get out of here. Easy!

[Laboratory]

[Kipo makes sure to look through all the equipment and papers she can find, trying to dig up any information on the missing or just what's going on with this town. Unfortunately, she can't find anything worthwhile.]

Well, only one thing left to do here...

[She smashes her fists together.]

Let's smash this place apart!

[Clearly an A+ plan. Normally she'd hate the idea of destroying anything science-related, but a secret lab under a school clearly means evil.]

[Doppelgangers]

[When the Doppelgangers attack, Kipo has one option - shift into her 8-ft tall purple jaguar form and fight back. She bats a few of them away, and she'll offer a paw to anyone who's struggling to fight them off.

But then she hears a familiar voice...

"Kipo! Help me!"

She shifts back into her human form, bolting in the direction of the voice. She doesn't think it's a trap, clearly her dad was trapped down here the whole time! And maybe her friends are down her, her mom-]

Dad! Dad, I'm coming!

[She turns a corner, and it's a doppelganger. She grunts in anger, shifting back into her jaguar form...

But the Doppelganger has lured her into a tight corner, and her jaguar form just doesn't fit very well in the cramped space. Pretty soon, more of then come out and swarm her.

She lets out a panicked roar.]

Laboratory

[peninhand]

[ Monika's too focused on her own thoughts, until she hears someone propose what has to be the best idea she has heard in forever. Smash it... Yes, that's the best option. If they don't, then they may as well just send a message to whoever did this "hey, please do it again." ]

Yes. We must destroy all of their equipment. Ideally burn the place to the ground so they can never do it again.

[ Does anyone have a match? Though she's supposed to be the responsible one here, so... ]

But we can't do it till we're sure everyone's out. We also should take back anything that could be useful to identify who the kidnappers were and what their objective is.

[purplejaguareye]

I've looked around, I haven't seen anything too useful... maybe we can smuggle out some of the chemicals?

But the surgical equipment's definitely gotta go. We can smash it all on the way back out, after we've found everyone.

[peninhand]

[ Should it all really go? Perhaps there were some science-inclined people amongst their ranks who could find use for it.

But after what they'd done to Sayori... ]

I'll get the books and chemicals out. You focus on, er, smashing!

[ Sounds like a bad action movie line. ]

[purplejaguareye]

You got it!

[And Kipo shifts into her jaguar form, an 8-ft-tall purple beast, ready to destroy the lab when Monika gives the go ahead.]

[peninhand]

. . . . .

[ They really are in a video game. Or a Japanese anime. Or something.

She'll just. Slowly back away from the ongoing destruction. At least they won't be able to use that place for evil again. ]

laboratory

[13thcommander]

[Why? Why are there so many children around here? It's not that Erwin doesn't appreciate the sentiment, but that will just burn time, time they could be using to push forward.]

Or not. The noise will alert anyone who's listening that we're here.

[They can come back and smash it later.]

[purplejaguareye]

I can take 'em!

[But maybe... turning into a big cat here might cause other problems.]

We gotta stop whoever's in charge here from using this lab again!

[13thcommander]

Then do it smart. Ruin the equipment without alerting anyone to what we're doing.

[Kipo has a point about this stuff not being used again, and Erwin walks over to the table of lab instruments.]

Do you know how to set a delayed reaction explosion?

[Erwin sees no problem with asking a child this, or expecting an answer.]

[purplejaguareye]

You mean like a firework?

[Kipo's never made an explosion before - kind of frowned upon in her burrow, but that doesn't mean she won't give it a try.]

[13thcommander]

Somewhat.

[Erwin goes quiet for a few moments as he peruses the chemicals; he's sure Hange or someone better at chemistry than himself could make them explode, but his own skill set in making explosives is sadly lacking. Something to learn on a better, different day, perhaps.]

How about this, then: gather the equipment together, break it so it's unusable, and move on. We do it fast and quiet.

doppelgängers

[apodictic]

You idiot - !

[ angelo runs after her. she's entirely too big to be fitting in these narrow hallways. the shock of watching someone turn into an 8-ft jaguar was only momentarily confounding because of the amount of danger they were in; the important part of this mess is that these creatures were hellbent on destroying them in whatever deceitful means necessary.

angelo has killed before. it was necessary, having lived in unsavoury places growing up and eventually, conducting it for work. he takes no pleasure in it; it's methodical. but he can't take all of them immediately, especially when he's only armed with a handgun, so he comes up with the next best thing. ]

GET DOWN.

[ it's unpleasant to be covered with the foam that comes from a ballistic fire extinguisher, but the air pressure makes it ricochet all over that it costs enough distraction from her. ]

Re: doppelgängers

[purplejaguareye]

[Kipo can't move very well, so she shifts back into her human form. Scratches and gashes left from the creatures are covering her arms, her stomach - wherever else they could get at her.

She doesn't argue, making a lunge for the ground as Angelo grabs the fire extinguisher, covering her head.]

[apodictic]

[ the fire extinguisher does the job, and for good measure angelo it's thrown back hard enough before he grabs her, pulls her to the opposite direction, and shoots at it with his handgun. it shakes in the hallway. there's a lot of hissing and voices pretending to be hurt - WHY, one of them keeps asking, WHY WHY WHY WHY in a voice loud and steady enough to be someone familiar to angelo's ears and he grits his teeth.

it doesn't escape his notice that she was injured, but if she can move then she can survive, especially at such a crucial time when the doppelgängers seem to come from everywhere. and he only has so much ammunition. ]

I'll help you with your injuries when we get out, but for now - [ moving from one hallway, to another, and ducking behind a corner to avoid the doppelgängers moving and calling out like a chorus in voices shifting to become something unique. ]

[purplejaguareye]

Thanks.

[Kipo's angry at herself. Angry at being so useless. Angry for falling for the trap...

And yet she can hear her parents' voices calling out to her.]

They sound like my mom and dad.

nnnnnnnnno my code

[apodictic]

[ angelo nods tersely. he understands it, though he does add - ]

... we have been assigned 'parents' like everyone else.

You should not be happy to hear your real parents here. [ a pause. ] It is for the best that they remain far away.

[ are her parents shapeshifters too? questions that angelo won't be asking at the moment considering the urgency of the situation. ] Your abilities are useful, though the hallways are a bit small for you to maneuver. A pity. I think it'd still be useful for an escape, however - once we figure out how to get out of here.

[ how did that cameraman leave? he thinks about that message that was sent, seems like long ago now, and there's no guarantee that the camera man escaped, but he wonders how they were able to take shots like that if this underground shelter is as chaotic as it is now. ]

dopplegangers

[weifinder]

( It's remarkable how, even absolutely normal as he is, he's reminded of aspects of the burial mounds here in the depths beneath the school, particularly as they're trying to leave. Being separated then reunited with people in the same situation he is, being attacked or lure by voices sounding like achingly familiar people, those he knows aren't here—he's heard all those tricks before, been whispered to, shouted at, pleaded with by all those voices. Even now, most often he hears Lan Zhan.

Wei Ying. Wei Ying.

These dolls know too much, and he wonders how the sanctity of any of their minds have or have not been preserved. Regardless, the voice he'd heard now and the cries back had him jogging forward in the dark, nearly running into an overturned metal frame, only to see as he rounds the corner a young person and then quite suddenly a large two tailed cat he's never seen the likes of before. (Very fetchingly purple, and very thankfully not a dog.) He also sees the dopplegangers leaping from where they've crawled up beside the beast, and he darts forward, taking hold of what turns out to be a chunk of stone fallen from one of the walls and bashes it against the hand of one assailant. )

Undo whatever you did! Get small, hit the ground, run!

[purplejaguareye]

[Kipo shrinks back down to a human, covered in scratches and gashes from their attacks. She tries to scramble back.]

There's too many of them!

[weifinder]

( He reaches out, trying to take hold of her arm to both steady her and propel her into running. )

This is why the running!

( He has to jerk himself to the side, possibly bringing her along with, to avoid the leaping swipe by one doppleganger, a vicious movement that leaves the creature flying past, all limbs akimbo. )

doppelgangers

[the_caped_crusader]

[ there's a body in the mix that fights back, bashing heads into walls, breaking legs, disarming and disabling. his moves are sloppy but brutal and effective, his drugged fatigue fueled only by adrenaline and anger. shirtless, kipo can see he's covered in a smattering of old scars, but his back is rough and ragged, stitches caked with dried blood. ]

Idiot... What the hell... are you doing here...

[purplejaguareye]

[Kipo shrinks down, especially after hearing that voice.]

Mr. Wayne! I was coming to save you - ahh!

[She pushes back against a doppelganger, pushing it into a small crowd of them.]

Exploring

[monalisasmile]

[Oh, this is a bad idea. But Kipo had been determined to check out this place, and well... chalk this one up to Da Vinci being impressed at the young girl's bravery. And perhaps she could be a voice of reason to pull her back before she did anything truly foolhardy. Plus, there's one person missing that's important to D-... important to Chaldea, she mentally corrects herself.

Still, she's here looking more like an out-of-place librarian than someone engaging in a rescue mission. Glasses, smart blouse and skirt, robotic bird perched on her shoulder - you know, normal librarian aesthetic. Despite herself, she grins just a bit at Kipo's enthusiasm.]

Just a simple rescue mission, right?

Please do be careful too, though. Don't get caught somewhere you can't defend yourself.

[She's noticing the small space too. If they can find a route that keeps them in more open areas, that would definitely benefit them... shame there doesn't seem to be anything much more open than this just yet.]

[purplejaguareye]

Oh, I'll be okay. Even with the small space, I think I can handle it.

[Though she's not 100% sure. The Mega Jaguar had been shrunk down to eight feet, but even then that was kind of big for this space. If only she had her jaguar fists...

Well, too late to turn back. And she's not about to sit back while everyone else pitches in to form a rescue team.]

What about you? Who are you looking for down here?

[monalisasmile]

[Well, that's a surprisingly complicated question, isn't it? She doesn't generally think in these terms, after all.]

Anyone we can find, naturally! Though, you could say I have a... friend from home, among the missing. I haven't seen my husband lately either, but he could just be avoiding me.

[She's a strange mix of perhaps seeming genuinely concerned and oddly casual about this at the same time.]

I was just about to ask you the same thing, in fact. Someone from your house disappeared?

[purplejaguareye]

My dad.

[She feels weird, calling Bruce Wayne that. It feels like a betrayal to her real dad.]

I'm pretty worried about what they're doing to him. Whoever "they" are.