Okay, let's fade out for a moment. Let me toss around some XP while I'm at it
[Rinley: I got an "oh no, Rinley!" from Dulcinea there, take 1 emotion XP. You also proposed a theory about your underlying situation, so that's an Adventure Get! XP.
Dulcinea: You got Rinley involved in your research. 1 Outside Stirs XP
Jasper: 1 emotion XP for DANCE CONTEST!	
Mila: 1 emotion XP for being the recipient of DANCE CONTEST. Poor thing.]

*****

So, we started on a nice warm day, let's jump ahead. It's now the middle of the week, let's say Thursday. It's still spring, but the weather is looking foul today. Threatening clouds and a sporadic drizzle, plus there's been this flare up of Outside dust. It's ruining things near the docks especially more fragile and less well-maintained things. The wood's holding up, but old rope is fraying and giving out entirely, books are getting ruined if they aren't inside behind some good quality glass, produce that was left out is inedible, and rust and stains are appearing on metals and paints. Even clothing isn't totally safe, though if it's nice clothing that you've taken care of, it's probably holding up well enough. 

Some places, it's acting extremely unfairly. Shokyou's little room in Fortitude seems to have drawn quite a lot of it, even through the closed windows, and her terrible agony at her lost comics ring out through the block. 

Mila, your little shop that you've started working on seems to have gotten it badly as well. The dust snuck in under the door and found some old dry rot where you hadn't gotten around to refurbishing yet. Turns out it was weaker than expected and a whole set of shelves with at supplies gave out, dumping everything unceremoniously onto the floor near the back. The Archive where you're staying is pretty okay though, but you're going to have a lot of work just to get yourself back to how things were for your project.

*****

Jasper, the weather is terrible. Water fell from the sky earlier today! Is that supposed to happen? Maybe the sky is broken and it will just keep happening forever? Your stuff is pretty okay though, the dust just can't really get to you in a personal sense (and if it could, you have this uncanny feeling that you could just fix that and probably manifest some new power to go with it). But the world around you seems a bit the worse for wear. How in blazes are you going to manage a dance off with conditions like this?!

*****

Dulcinea, this is worse than normal and your equipment is picking up spikes that indicate the outside dust is behaving in a targeted way. This is two data points of unusual behavior. TWO! Do you know what you can do with two data points? You can draw a line! A LINE, Dulcinea. Lines have slopes and they indicate things like trends that predict future results. Any more data points and you might need to do [i]Statistics[/i].

You've got a couple pretty good leads. You're close enough to notice the impact on Shokyou and you can tell even from a distance that the Archive is weathering this better than normal. Either one could provide you with not only more data, but better data! You might even get some proper thaumaturgical readings for your notebook. Moreover, the odds of this being connected to dinosaur shrine maidens are low, but you can't rule out that possibility either without some investigation.

So, where do you go?

*****

And lastly, Rinley. I get the sense that not even an outside storm can really keep you down. You could intervene in any of the goings on of your friends (the new girl with the sunny disposition is [i]definitely[/i] going to hold a dance off sometime today, you can feel it). But, if I had to guess, I think you're looking for that girl with her straw hair in the twin braids. The one you didn't quite manage to connect with because Dulcinea impressed you into making graphs. But now you've got the chance to look and a couple days of exploits with which to regale a new friend! Where do you think you'll find the lovely young lady?