On "when!" Grace thrusts forward with the gleaming sword.
Eoten mulls their options, then as sleeping is suggested over the prospect of death or someone being consumed, he resigns himself to slumber, with one final grumble;
bannan = summon
crypel = cripple
slúma = slumber
While everyone is brainstorming ideas (before the Hypnotist settles on his idea), Sinclair wanders around the walls using his magic senses to find a clue to know what happened to Eldritch. As much as he is here for Una and support Seven, he wants to find his Uncle Adrian.
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In coordination with the Hypnotist, Sinclair stands near to Seven to power the spell.
Sinclair finds a whole book filled with plans for defeating Adrian Eldritch. His magics quickly unravel the code in which they are written, but there is much information to be poured over. Maybe one of them is the one she used? It would take hours, maybe days, to search through them.
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Working magic like this requires familiarity, even intimacy. Seven may be the current Master Mage, but Sinclair is no slouch, and he is familiar with the way she moves, so to speak. Their magic intertwines, wrapping around the mirror and sinking into it.
When The Hypnotist initially reaches out to the Dreamtime, he finds nothing. No one has dreamed here for a long time, possibly ever. But the folds of the Dreamtime reach everywhere, and it takes only the introduction of Dreamers, their dreams flowing downhill like water into the ocean that is Dream. Along these scintillating rivulets flows the Hypnotist's power, adding here, nudging there, until he draws the dream to the opposite side of the mirror. The mirror fills with a multicolored swirl and he calls out. The young Knight plunges her blade into the mirror, which warps and then a surface pops like a bubble.
Dreamtime awaits.
The Hypnotist remains cross-legged while he continues his focus on the mirror. "Like a charm, Gracie! Sinclair, Seven, wonderful work. Now let's get our blokes back up and on their feet and get ourselves out of here."
Sinclair creates a magic backpack that he stows Una's book. Then, he shoulders the backpack and readies for Dreamtime.
"Brilliant!" After a quick look of gratitude to the magic workers, Gracie helps get Deadman and Silver Tiger onto their feet and ushers them through the portal.
Eoten continues to slumber as a small puddle of giant drool begins to collect around his maw.
Seven ends her incantation powering the portal, and takes a moment to zap the giant and the titan with several bright light flashes.
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The Hypnotist maintains his seated position, waiting for the final hero to enter. Once he's left in the Adytum alone, he opens his eyes and looks into the portal. It'd been awhile since he's worked with others, let alone brought newcomers into the Dreamtime. A few days earlier, most of them were strangers" he thinks to himself, "funny how peril can bring strangers close together. Uncrossing his legs and rising to his feet, he shudders as he approaches the portal. The shudder grows into full body shakes as each step brings him closer to the dreamtime. Anxiety begins to chomp at him, a cacophonous clarion ringing in his ears. Gracie turns to him and says something, but he can't quite make it out. Her face, young, confused, innocent to the ways of the universe and the world of magic just like... His stomach begins to whirl as he steps into the portal. The fabric of the Adytum unravels and disolves behind him. Her face haunts him. "I-I-I'm.." The ringing gets louder the longer he looks at Gracie, yet he cannot draw his eyes away. "...I'm so sorry..." First sweat, then tears begin to fall. "...it was an accident..." The horrific sounds of serpent tongues chanting, arcane energies, thunder, and in the distance-- a deep, gutteral almost moaning growl--no longer only in The Hypnotist's head. He falls to his knees and crawls towards Gracie, wallowing. "..I didn't mean to..." The Realm of Dreams beneath him shifts and skews itself to...
Lantern Hill Cemetary, 1984. A massive feral beast-man in the distance obliterates the cemetary gates. Despite his distance once can clearly see that his eyes burn bright blue with animalistic rage. As the serpantine Brotherhood of the Yellow Sign continue their encantations, the beast-man tramples closer.
Macallah looks up at Gracie, his eyes burning bright blue.
"...kill you."
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Cymopolea is beautiful naked.
A daughter of Poseidon, she is more closely related to divinity than even the 50 Nereid. Those that are comely enough that a mere glimpse can bring a lonely sailor to ruin or death are not lovely enough to even bear her looking-glass.
She strides slowly, carefully, purposefully toward the ravening man-beast. Her porcelain-soft hands gently peal the immaculate dress of doe-brown velvet away and let it drop as his wife stalks inexorably toward the raging monster.
"Cymopolea..." he pleads, in breathless wonder and confusion as the scene unfolds in dreamlike water-air.
He lifts a hand. To stop her, to carry her to safety, to smash the man beast. To tear it half and save the day and play the hero.
Instead his hand lifts a winecup above his head and tips it over.
An endless deluge of wine blitzes out of the cup. From the mouth comes a tidal wave of red drink with subtle hints of blackberry brandy. The flood of liquid forms a raging river and bears Briareus up and carries him away, onward and onward away from the scene as he flails, limp and powerless against the boldy-flavored tide.
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Deadman dreams of nothing but utter, endless oblivion.
It terrifies him.
When awakened, his eye lights flicker back into being. He seems troubled.
"Is that all that awaits me?" he mutters.
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Una looks up from a throne of pure darkness; it shifts and undulates shaping itself around her as she sits - an expectant expression playing across her cruel beauty as the sound of crunching and tearing echoes around the chamber;
”Well? Are they to your palate?” Before her Eoten crouches, shovel like hands busy pulling apart flesh and bone.
The brute pauses, then nods with a ichor stained smile;
Littered around him lie his former companions… All of their forms rent and broken. Some of them partially devoured.
Una’s brow arches inquisitively; ”And yet what..? Regret? Sorrow for your former friends and allies? You disappoint me. I thought you stone hearted and red handed my servant… Tsk-tsk.”
The Queen of the Netherworld sighs disapprovingly and the throne pulses and ripples menacingly.
Eoten bows his misshapen head, replaying in a grumbling voice like gravel;
Una laughs; ”Indeed. There will be more, of that I am sure my unmann. For now dine upon the bountiful harvest of your own making…”
The monstrous giant nods again, then with a satisfied grunt, lifts the buckled form of Æthelweard toward his waiting maw.
Cwen = Queen
náht = nothing
meduwérig = sated after feast
hungor = hunger
flesc = flesh
unman = wicked hero, monster
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Sinclair looks around Una's throne room one last time to remember and steps into the Dreamtime portal. His head whirls as his feet shifts. Dreamtime is not as stable as a Portal of Portheus. He arrives in an old castle.
Not a castle, the priory that he grew up. He walked toward the familiar library slowly accelerating. First, he finds the tragic form limp on the floor that becomes his mother. Dead again. Accelerating he gets to the stout double oak door to find his father crumpled on the floor having given his life to protect the library again.
Into the library of the Order of Light, he sees the villain, the Crimson Mask, casting a Portal of Portheus. Sinclair calls out to dispel the portal as he has practiced countless times, "by the Hoary Hosts of Hoggoth!" But, the magic does not come. The portal does not dispel.
The crimson mask turns to Sinclair. His mask grinning in caricature. And steps through the portal escaping again.
Sinclair runs abandoning his magic wanting to throttle the villain with his bare hands. The portal closes into mist as he arrives at it. He collapses on the floor crying, impotent and alone again.
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As the Hypnotist crawls toward her, she frowns, "What do you- I'm fine..." As the landscape shifts. Something is wrong. Her friends are in trouble. She tries to resist the sense of doom falling upon her. She needs to help her friends!
But she fails.
"I'm not dead, but..." She looks down, her mind taking on the cemetery landscape, the river of bloodwine rolling a few yards away, the pile of bones munched on by Eoten. There is a grave there. Not hers.
The words WINIFRED BIANCA FREE with today's date (or the last "today's date" that she knew, even if it is not technically today anymore) are etched on the tombstone.
"No. No." Gracie falls to her knees. Her armor and sword vanish. "I never should have left you. I never should." Tears fall like rain. Or perhaps the rain that is falling tastes like tears.
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A yellow beam of light suddenly sweeps across your surroundings and lands on your face. It shines into your eyes, hiding what is behind it, like a powerful flashlight.
You hear a familiar voice, that of the young Master Mage Seven. She has seemed unsure at times, but in this moment her voice is strong, resonant, and clear, "(YOUR NAME), I know that you are troubled, but I need for you to follow my voice. Follow the light...Come together. We must all come together."
Max hears a familiar voice, which is strong, resonant, and clear, "Maxwell Athersmith Sinclair, I know that you are troubled, but I need for you to follow my voice. Follow the light... Come together. We must all come together."
Max wipes the tears from his eyes and sees the yellow stream of a light coming from the entrance to the library. He slowly gets up from where he had collapsed at the disappearance of the Crimson Mask and staggers toward the doors. A black silhouette stands at the entrance within a Portal of Portheus. It must be the Master Mage.
"Uncle Adrian?" Again arriving too late to defeat or capture the Crimson Mask. Only to comfort without revenge. Max brings his hand in front of his face to hold back the bright yellow light, in order to follow the voice. Stepping through the portal, Sinclair arrives within the Nightmare Graveyard.
Water begins to rise up through the freshly dug grave (this may also somehow be the wine spilling from Dunwich's cup). The earth turns to mud and crumbles away as a pool forms, and Gracie falls into it, and she flails, trying to stay afloat. A pale figure rises from the water, clad in a silken white robe, a woman with unearthly beauty--but here, now, with raging, gleaming red eyes. "I was wrong. You have failed. You are no protector. You are no good knight."
Something grasps around Gracie's ankle, about to pull her under...
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For a moment, just a moment, the Greek Titan surrenders himself to the deep red tide, his limbs lost and formless and drifting.
And then the moment is done, and, awash and amiss, he start speaking.
"I ain't no Olympian. I dont some bad things, and I ain't no hero. Homer didn't mess with me none, an' ain't non gonna dis him fo' dat."
Still drifing in the well-aged and hearty bouqueted tide, he lifts his head.
"Yeah, I might like the drink. Who doesn't? Sure, I enjoy the wine. You come up with the literal diety of grapes and drink, you're gonna tip some cups. Maybe I do heft a few more than the next guy."
Looking about himself, he looks up.
"But I never let it run my life."
He draws his coat about himself.
He activates the Flight power on his Coat of Poseidon, and lifts off the tide.
"-I- run me."
Eoten is locked in a struggle, both physical and psychic, with his Professor alter ego.
Silver Tiger is overwhelmed by the urns of his brother monks stored in a mausoleum. He sits on the floor of the structure with his arms over his head.
Sinclair sees his arch-nemesis hovering over the field, taking in the surroundings.
Dunwich shares the sky with the Crimson Mask and Seven, while the ground below is bathed in his spilled wine.
Seeing the Crimson Mask hovering above the graveyard, Sinclair grits his teeth and sees red. The flush of getting another chance washes over him.
"Be bound by the Crimson Bands of Cyttorak!" The young mage commands his magic to bind his arch-nemesis.
Gylfir awakens and panics for a moment, true, unfiltered, emotion shining through for the first time in centuries here in this not-realm. The choking blackness surrounding him is not quite the same as that infinite oblivion he just woke from, but close enough to trigger some primal terror deep inside him.
The panic ebbs slightly as he realizes his true circumstances, but only some. He begins thrashing against the confines, striving to break free.
Hearing Seven's seemingly distant missive, and remembering she was reaching for the Hypnotist prior, she looks at the impassive, angry gaze of "Vivian."
"No. No, this isn't right. It didn't happen like this. It... Where's... where is everybody?" She kicks, trying to break free of whatever is pulling her down.
The Hypnotist sees the yellow bolt dart through the downpour as the vicious Man-Beast breaks into a bestial gallop. Mac's eyes take on the same yellow glow, letting Seven's power bolster his will.
"This.... this is not now! This is not Now! I... must make peace!" The Man-Beast trounces countless cultists, sending them flying through the lit sky, as the ground quakes beneath him. Mac struggles to get to his feet, yet he feels Seven's call resonating within his bones. He musters up what he can, fighting the erupting ground beneath him until he is face-to-face with the monster before him. A towering, hunched man with a wild lion's mane of greying hair, dark wet matted fur, eyes akin to that of a starved animal, and teeth stuck somewhere between tusks and razorblades. The Yowie snarls at The Hypnotist, letting out what could only be described as a chainsaw and a drag racer's demonic lovechild.
The Crimson Bands of Cyttorak shatter as they attempt to close around Crimson Mask's superior mystic defenses. Seeing Sinclair in the graveyard, the red faced mystic whirls toward the young mage.
Gylfir scrapes at the dirt above him, which flows into his mouth and ears. Fortunately, he need not breathe. His right hand feels the fainted whiff of air before a slurry of mud and wine flows into the cavity he has created.
Gracie pulls herself free from the muck and onto slightly firmer ground.
Crimson Mask flies toward Sinclair, "Foolish child, you think to challenge the mystic might of the Crimson Mask?! Then let this breath be your last!"
He removes a vial from somewhere within his cloak and it flies from his hand toward Sinclair, bursting in his face into a cloud of noxious green fumes.
Sinclair quickly reacts to bring his elbow up and cover his mouth and steps away from the cloud of noxious green fumes.
His vision tunnels to only the Crimson Mask as he finally faces the villain who killed his parents. "By the Hoary Hosts of Hoggoth!" He shouts to dispel his mystic defenses.
Grace spots the hand rising out of the dirt nearby. Half thinking it might somehow be Win, she pulls herself onto dry land and then grabs the hand and pulls.
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Briareus takes stock of himself and turns around once, slowly, in space.
On the whole, everyone looks like they're doin' okay.
'Cept Hypo-baby. He just got da bejeezus scared outa him by that monster.
Time t' come up with an infusion of bejeezus.
Hoping to distract the beast, he sends all of his arms down, jabbing and feinting in lightning-quick succession.
Sinclair quickly reacts to bring his elbow up and cover his mouth and steps away from the cloud of noxious green fumes.
His vision tunnels to only the Crimson Mask as he finally faces the villain who killed his parents. "By the Hoary Hosts of Hoggoth!" He shouts to dispel his mystic defenses.
The Crimson Mask deflects Sinclair's magic with only the slightest movement of one hand. "Keep it coming, boy. Your magic couldn't save your parents, and it won't save you."
Grace grabs the cold hand of the ancient warrior and he emerges from beneath the mud. Mud covers the two of them in a red brown punctuated here and their by a spot rubbed clean.
Seven recognizes recognizes the root of the problem and turns to the Hypnotist. "Get it together, Hypnotist. Your fear is warping the Dream, giving life threats from our minds, your mind. This is your home turf. Take that furball out and get us back home."
Seven's commanding presence clears his head for a moment, long enough for the Hypnotist to fortify himself, lift himself eye-to-eye and return the Yowie's stare.
"YOWIE, YOU FOUL BEAST! YOU'VE CROSSED ME FOR THE LAST TIME. MAY YOU SLEEP ETERNALLY!"
The massive smelly mass of fur and muscle sways under The Hypnotist's swirling gaze. It sinks face down into the soft dirt of the graveyard.
Seeing Deadman's pale undead face snaps Grace into... well, "reality" is a strong term given all they've been through but it helps her orient herself.
Looking down at her muddy self, she decides to go for a makeover. "Dyfres!" Her armor reappears. Realizing her power has been with her indeed, she looks at Deadman. "Let's get everyone together, yeah?"
She moves toward the others' doom. If the image of Vivian remains, it only watches on with cold indifference.
Crimson Mask's attention remains on Sinclair. With a formulaic crossing and then thrust of his arms, he unleashes thousands of tiny star shapes into Sinclair's shields.
Gylfir stands up and brushes mud off of him, the fear receding as he comes back to himself.
"Hm. The young seidr looks like he needs our help." he says, and leaps off to help.
Gylfir leaps, but Crimson Mask alters his trajectory enough for Gylfir to miss, barely.