[b]Coleman![/b] This is your fault. You know that as soon as you hear that droning, terrible bell drop down into audible octaves, sending your heart plummeting. This is going to happen to your friends because they stayed with you and Sasha. [i]clang. clang. clang.[/i] There’s no time. All at once it surges around you, sand shivering out of existence and replaced by pitted stone and corroded steel, toxic quicksilver and fire. So much fire. You are alone, now, you and Sasha. The others are gone. [i]clang. clang. clang.[/i] When you hear that bell at a station, that means an engineer is needed. When a crew hears that, they stop and bank the fires and send their best down into the bowels of the station, to the Central Administration Spine, to uncover the need. The less time between peals, the more pressing the matter. [i]clang. clang. clang.[/i] But it’s very rare to hear that dreadful noise indeed, because the ancient masters who built, or shaped, or summoned, or grew the stations of the line? They laid a working upon their masterpiece, built a station and annexed it and its metaphysical weight. Accidents and disasters and curses and wrecks all slide down from the stations and end up in Wormwood Station, where the bells never stop. They end up [i]here.[/i] [i]clang. clang. clang.[/i] Crackling, distorted laughter issues from the sparking, broken speakers embedded into the walls. Once they were beautiful fleur-de-lis ornaments, but now they look like they’re liable to give you tetanus if you so much as touch them. “Now Arriving,” the speakers proclaim, the cheerful and caring voice of a Station underlaid with something deep and jagged and darkly wicked. “All passengers disEMbark at Terminal [bzzzzzt]. Mind the Gap. Mind the Step. Please be aware there MAY be delays in Departure. All outbound trains scheduled for departure at [bzzzzzzzzzt]. Mind the GAP.” [i]clang. clang. clang.[/i] A train has the weight, physical and metaphysical, to barrel through Wormwood and save the crew from hell. Sometimes you see things through the windows. Sometimes you see people-shaped things running for the train, waving, sobbing. Wait, they silently scream before they’re lost in the distance. Wait. [i]clang. clang. clang.[/i] Welcome to Wormwood Station. Mind the gap. [hider=Wormwood Station][b]Disaster and Ruin.[/b] Everything in Wormwood Station is going wrong. This is because Wormwood Station is the place where things go horribly, terribly, impressively wrong. The Boss: ???? Response Level [b]0[/b].[/hider] *** [b]Jackdaw![/b] There is a wand pointed up your nose. A minute ago you were excitedly pointing out that the Forest was erupting within sight, thick black brambles choking the sand, ravens darting out to spear fat white worms on their beaks. Then there was the sound of a doleful, foreboding, desolate bell, and then a loud rushing, roaring noise, and your grip was torn away. And now you’re here. There’s a huge stained glass window of unfortunate design arching above your head. Its subject matter is glorious, from what you can tell, all magnificent spires and beautiful trains and strangely-dressed people, but it is too heavy. It sags dangerously, and shards of glass shatter down from where it is cracked, drifting in a smoky breeze like snow. Huge glass-drifts fill the room, and you can already feel dangerous, shining glass settling in delicate specks on your clothes. There is a wand pointed up your nose. The hand that holds it is clapped about in dreadful black iron. The helmet of the figure has grasping horns like bony fingers, but don’t be confused. They are shorter than you. As short as Ailee, even. And they have a similar tail, probably, under the barbed armor. It’s just that the faceplate is a snarling furious dragon. All around you, among the glass-drifts, unfortunate kobolds slave away filling chests of black iron with glass. They are not dressed for the elements. The glass leaves clean white scars everywhere. Around them are these tiny black knights, armed with firewands and spears, with golden talismans and good-luck charms. “In the name of King Dragon,” the rat squeaks, “you and your former belongings now belong to the Under-Empire, longlegs! Hand them over!” [hider=Chief Squeaker of King Dragon][b]I Bring The Name[/b]: the Chief Squeaker can manipulate both fire and gold as they wish, up to and including using them as [i]Ranged, Burning[/i] attacks. [b]Noooo, My Scheme-Plans![/b] when this stat becomes damaged, the Chief Squeaker suffers an ironic and terrible circumstance that removes them from the scene (or Takes them Out, if it’s the last one). [b]I BRING THE EYE[/b]: the Chief Squeaker can leave curses on those they damage, all highly Dragon-themed. Turning you into a pathetic little kobold is a favorite.[/hider] *** [b]Lucien![/b] [i]waaaaaooooow,[/i] sparks the angel. It sightlessly stalks through the burning food court, its halo of white wisteria crackling. Its wings drag on the floor, knocking over tables and chairs. Whatever attracts its attention has that mournful head swing ponderously towards it, the wisteria parts, and then— [i]krakboooom.[/i] That was a vending machine, which is still sparking with blue and white arcs of lightning, having just sprayed boiling drinks inches from your hiding spot. Everyone said the Heart was mercurial, especially as you got lower, but this is [i]ridiculous.[/i] One minute you hear an alarm bell, the next you’re tying a rag over your face to avoid dying of smoke inhalation before the angel can get you first. [i]waaaaaaaooooooow,[/i] it hums thoughtfully, and then incinerates a refuse bin. [hider=Angel of Wisteria][b]Gaze of Destruction[/b]: the Angel is [i]Piercing, Burning, Ranged, Reload[/i] at anything it looks upon. [b]Emissary of the Heart[/b]: the Angel cannot be damaged by the works of the Heart. For these purposes, both Ailee’s magic and Sasha count as “of the Heart.” [b]I Bring The Heart[/b]: the world around the Angel is highly mutable, and moves around it can be used at any range.[/hider] *** [b]Ailee![/b] Whooooo boy! That was one hell of a shunt! That’s a technical term. You would be very happy to explain it to others in small little baby words like this: “when a shunt happens, it’s because things from one u-ni-verse just went into another u-ni-verse.” But even that’s a simplification. Where you are right now is, if you’re right, and you always are, an artificially created and sustained miniature looped universe/timeline. Things come in when it intersects with Universe Prime, but there’s probably specific ways to exit the loop/torus manifold. Maybe you don’t quite know what those [i]are[/i] yet, but you’re getting there. Like it’ll be hard. The more pressing matter is the swarm of Bees that’s started glowing and humming angrily. You’re inside one of their hives, all slate-blue stone and gently throbbing azure circuitry. The Bees themselves (fat fuzzy beans with no mouth and giant solid blue eyes, wings buzzing at roughly the speed of sound to keep them from their assuredly intended destiny as caterpillars) are agitated about this. Really agitated. One shoots lasers from those furiously glowing eyes and zaps you right on the paw. It feels like getting tapped with a smoldering coal, more annoying than painful... but you are surrounded by roughly seven bajillion bees. (Also, if they really get angry, they will all land on you and vibrate at pandimensional frequencies until you are delicious baked mouse.) [hider=Bees]Bees Everyone is fond of bees Except for creatures from the Heart And you know that they’ll come for you[/hider]