Port Lorrel

[Viking-Sensei]

[OOC : I sort of figured that Lucas has a giant bag of money from all over the world, but that he tends to forget where exactly he is. Farrellian Standard, being the common currency of Farrel, is of course what would be called for here... but since they're a harbor town, chances are they probably also take Tsuirakan currency.]

"C'mon, Ayiee, let's help Roger pick the lass up... you know how feisty she gets."

[DarkIntruder]

Roger looked around the lobby of the hotel, while Lucas went to the front desk to check in. The worn and frayed carpet was a dark maroon colour, looking almost like dried blood, and the walls were a slightly dingy beige, with the odd spiderweb of cracks running up the plaster, mostly hidden behind hideously bland art prints in smudged frames. A lounge area was set up to the right of the main entrance, which consisted of a recessed floor space with a low table in the middle, made of some unidentifiable dark stone. Surrounding the table were several couches and chairs, the lime green upholstery starting to come apart at the seams.

Roger led the rest of the group over to it, with the intention of having Lucas sit down and tell them exactly what he had wanted to explain over dinner. Besides, Jamie looked like she(?) needed to sit down, before she fell down. Again. He led her over to a couch that looked older then he was, and plopped her down on it. The delapidated cushions let out a sharp wheezing, much like a burst of flatulence, and Jamie let out a giggle. Roger sat down beside her(?), while Toivo and Jonathan alighted themselves in a pair of highbacked chairs.

"Feeling better?" Roger asked Jamie, "Not going to get acquainted with the floor again? How about the plumbing?"

"Fuuk you.. ya fat pr..hic.. prick. I ain't gonna be shick." the little girl retorted, "Hey, dat rhymes!"

"I still can't figure out why someone would spike your drink. Especially with something as relatively harmless as alcohol. The waitress pulling a trick, maybe?"

"Mahbe i' twas you! Ya big perhvert!" Jamie "You get meh all liquored up, and takes advantages of meh? Yah likesh the littil grrls? Well I don' thinks sho!"

"Has anyone ever told you that you have a wonderful bedside demeanor? Positively radiant. I can't imagine what it would be like for someone in a relationship with you. As for your "accusation", I don't even know if you're a man or a woman or..whatever!"

[OOC:] Well, I guess we're at the hotel already, at least according to Greybeard. I think I'll start describing scenery and setting a little more. Gives it a more realistic feel.[/OOC]

[Sareth]

"You... WHAT?" I yelled. Was the man BLIND? How... infuriating! "I... You... YOU... AUGH!" I hollered. I balled my fist up and lept to my feet, the couch giving a sigh at the loss of my weight even as one seam ripped noisily and a cloud of dust rose from the cushion with me.

Over to the side, the front desk clerk lifted an eyebrow and took a big puff of his pipe, saying nothing. "It's fu...fugg... dang obvious! I mean, you... bloody... insufferable... rude..."

I swung my fist. Unfortunately, whoever had been dicking with which way was up was back, and up to old tricks. Rather than giving Roger's jaw a good jolt, all I managed to do was throw myself forward so that I wound up sprawling half across Roger, half across the couch, and half across the floor.

Yes, I know that was too many halves. Math was never my strong suit.

A puff of dust from the suddenly wheezing green upholstery rose, setting me to coughing. I fought to clear my lungs and get air. Drawing in a lungfull of slightly moldy smelling oxygen, I coughed one more time, then lay still.

"This is a sup... soup... unexpectedly comfortable couch."

[DarkIntruder]

The other two staring on in shock at the outburst, Roger took it all in stride. Peering down at the little girl..thing half sprawled in his lap (he wondered how his illusion managed to have any lap left with the massive gut occupying it) he calmly said "No, it's not obvious. What is obvious is that you are drunk. I just hope Lucas finishes up there soon and tells us whatever was on his mind. I'd like to get to our rooms before this illusion collapses."

He sighed, considering whether it was worth it to push Jamie off, and decided against it. He/She seemed comfortable for the moment. Leaning a little closer, Roger spoke.

"For what it's worth, I'm sorry I said anything."

Leaning back, he rested his head against the ugly green back rest of the couch, and stared at the peeling paint on the ceiling. Jamie was right. Despite the wooden frame poking through, this couch was comfortable. He felt as if he could jus..just drift..off...

[AdamZero]

ooc: just jumping right in there, don't mind me if things get ugly.

The door to the inn opened once more and a cloaked figure walked in. Short, well, short for an adult, though a perfectly reasonable height for a young man, he entered, wrapped in what seemed to be three cloaks, each alone a tattered mess, together they covered what one, as a whole, should have. The shrouded head turned toward the group, loud as they were, at least the strange drunk child was. In his left hand he held a black oak staff, smooth, wind worn, and drawing the light of the room into it ever so slightly.

"All city folk get their kids drunk? Weird...." he said aloud. His tone clearly of someone from the local countryside. He walked up to the counter, the mustached man immediatly recognizing him.

"Ah then...um...you." The man said, looking between the newcomer and the loud group.

"Yes. Money first." the boy said raising a cloaked arm to tap a finger on the counter. two fingers actually, though both were index fingers. While one was a flesh and blood hand the other, hidden from anyone but the clerk, was a hand of pure white bone.

The man nodded, skin paling, and produced a small pouch of standard coin. The bone hand took it, just barely visible before slinking back under the folds of the cloak.

"What room?" The boy asked, determined to finish the job before things got worse for this place.

"12b"

"...you mean room 13 really..."

"Yes well....bad luck and all...."

"The thirteenth room is still the thirteenth room, even if you don't CALL it the thirteenth room. You just loose power over it by denying it..." The boy said as he walked around the counter toward the stairs.

"Really?" The man said, his face now paler than bone.

"I dunno, I'm making half this stuff up as I go, but I've still got a pulse so, hey, that's something!" He laughed before walking up the stairs. He looked to the group. "You lot stay down here...got something to take care of before anyone else lodges in...unless you wanna stay here permanent like..."

(ooc: not sure if I'll keep the red. if anyone is annoyed I may drop it...or make it an eye-bleed color!)

[Viking-Sensei]

Lucas watched the odd figure pass, but had bigger (smaller, technically, but only because of the illusion glamor) concerns to deal with, as Jamie's current predicament. In fact, things didn't even begin to click for him until he looked down at the key, in his hand, and saw that the short blue leather stub attached to it had the room number 12b etched into it.

"Bastard was going to rent us a haunted room..." Lucas muttered. "No wonder it was on discount."

Then, several things all clicked inside Lucas' head... the short man, vaguely smelling of freshly turned earth, had just muttered something about room 13 before he passed... and that Lucas had already sent all of their luggage ahead to the hotel room upon their arrival, meaning that all of their worldly personal posessions and supplies for the trip were now in direct harm's way. Warnings of ominous gloom and doom be damned, that was his profit margin they were messing with! Lucas flipped over the checkout counter and went running up the stairs after the odd little mage.

[AdamZero]

(ooc: no real set posting order? NICE.)

The cloaked figure turned as a man with dark skin ran up the stairs, he sighed and shook his head, looking down toward a room.

There was an assortment of baggage and other belongings outside the door at the very end of the hall. As the wood of the staff clacked against the grain of the floor, the young man moved forward. Passing two doors, 10 and 11, before the tall man reached the top of the stairs.

Then the grey hit them...both of them.

"Awww crap." The boy said, dropping his cloaks as everything around them seemed to grow less substantial, and a blue-white phantasm seemed to flicker just ahead. "It's not happy with just a damn room... needs to get out."

Without the cloaks it was apparent, first off, that there was a skeleton, a human one, attached to the back of the young man's back. The skull was facing back, at the man who'd just climbed up the stairs.

Then it waved.

"Boris. FOCUS." The young boy, whose black curly hair fell down past his shoulders, growled as the skeleton seemed to unfold, much of it being stored within its own ribcage, and walked foreward toward the specter, even as it began to vanish and color returned to the hallway.

He turned his head slightly, but kept his eyes forward as Boris approached the door with the bags flanking either side of it.
There was a young man, a bellhop, fiddling with the lock, or he had been until the grey hit...now he was huddled in a fetal curl. Boris dragged him away from the door, set him against a wall just a little closer to the stairs, patted him on the head and gave a thumbs up.

"That your stuff?" the boy asked.

[Graybeard]

Back on the ground floor, the door behind the reception desk opened a fraction as the desk clerk turned around, giving a brief glimpse of the inn's offices. A hand poked through the open door as a voice beyond whispered, "Well done. Now this is for you." The hand opened to reveal a coin in an improbably large denomination that the clerk stared at briefly, then pocketed. The door closed as the clerk turned back to the customers in the lobby, his heart pounding at the sudden wealth he'd just gained -- or maybe at the risk he'd just run, he wasn't sure.

Moments later, a little-used outside door, opening into the offices behind the reception desk, opened, and a cloaked and hooded figure stepped through. The figure moved away at a trot; Linden Street wasn't that far away, and it wouldn't do to arrive there after Jamie...

[DarkIntruder]

Roger stirred from his spot on the couch, and looked around. He'd only dozed off for a few minutes. The other's appeared to be sleeping, but Lucas was nowhere to be seen, as was the desk clerk. That by itself wouldn't have been enough to concern Roger terribly, but it also appeared that their stuff was gone as well. Including Roger's weapons.

"Dammit!", he exclaimed, as he leapt off the couch. This in turn dumped Jamie to the floor, and she(?) awoke with a curse.

"Ow! Wha.. what da 'ell was zat for?" she(?) asked, as Roger rounded the clerk's desk, looking for any signs of what might have happened to their luggage. He turned to look at Jamie, and threw his arms up, esasperated.

"Our gear is missing!", he said, as he wandered back to the lounge. "Oh, and Lucas too apparently."

Jamie seemed about to speak, but then gave a sudden start and jumped up.

"What time is it?" the little girl asked, a look of slight worry on her face.

Roger shrugged his shoulders. "Late. These illusions should actually be wearing off soon. In fact, I think mine is..yup."

The portly walrus illusion flickered and faded, leaving a somewhat deshevaled looking Roger behind.

"Why do you care what time it is, there have someplace you have to be?" he joked.

[Sareth]

Alarmed, I looked about. There was definitely some place I needed to be. But I couldn't tell them that.

Unfortunately, I couldn't come up with any really good excuses for taking off in front of them, and if I waited for a good opportunity to sneak away, it might be too late. So I blurted out the first thing I could think of.

"I gotta pee!"

And I darted out the door before anyone could do anything.

It was, of course, an absolutely idiotic excuse. I mean, even in a rat trap like this hotel, the toilets were probably inside the building. But maybe, just maybe they might be distracted enough by the missing gear to not think it through and believe it for long enough for me to disappear. I'd figure out what to tell everyone later. For now I needed to find out the meaning of the note and the booze in the beer. I had suspicions, but...

I ran out into the night air. And thank goodness for it. My head was not pleased with its treatment. The cool air helped clear it. Taking a deep breath, I turned and began running towards Linden Street. As I went, I tugged at that damned bonnet one last time, then watches as the illusionary strings dissappeared.