KremeSupreme

Recollections: The Coven [COMPLETED]

Agatha Loom

Agatha listened to the room's input, over their dismissive bickering to the new member. It might have just sounded like people complaining at her leadership yet again, but Agatha made sure to carefully tally each person's remarks. It might not have been solid and sound reasons, but Agatha counted "What the hell do we even know about them, first of all?" and "Who cares who we let in?" as perfectly valid responses.

Her thought process was interrupted as Claudette raised her hand, her official "everyone shut up" gesture before allowing a blanket of darkness to cover the room... Yet didn't. Instead she stood up and approached Agatha, grabbing her by the arm.

"Mademoiselle, a word."

Claudette

Agatha was about to protest, before Claudette firmly pulled her from the seat and away from the roundtable, just about the corner.

"Claudette? What's up? Why are--"

"I am sick of all this bickering and constant fighting among the Coven. I think it really has something to do with the leadership and lack of direction in the Coven - and don't get my intentions wrong, I think you are doing an amazing job but maybe you could use a second in command? Perhaps even a third? Another leadership figure for the Coven to help you out. And keep control of the Coven. The only place I can see this going towards is Emily and the others voting you out and this cycle will begin again for the next one."

Claudette

Agatha listened carefully to Claudette lecture, almost forgetting yet again who was really in charge of the Coven. Which was exactly the problem Claudette wanted to underline.

"I mean, I thought trying to actually organize things would be... Overmanagement, I guess. Just look where trying to throw ideas at the board got me yesterday. We've only ever had one leader or so at a time, no chains of command... But then again, if I managed to get put into a position of leadership, I guess they really wouldn't care who runs the show or how they want to do it. Yknow what? I'd be down for that... Would you mind being my "second-in-command?" She asked. Coincidence aside, if Agatha was forced to hand over her leadership she would've been prepared to hand it to Claudette. She was the person she'd trust the most with a leadership position, and the best bet for helping her lead things.

"And as for the other issue... perhaps we should try to lead the Coven towards working out their issues and maybe having some more bonding? For all honestness, all a majority of the Coven want to do is learn more about magic and find companionship... maybe we give them what they want? Try to tighten the bonds of the group and I think the best way to do that would be to have more fun, yes?"

Claudette

Agatha frowned.

"Believe me, digging deep into actual magic things is why I joined the Coven in the first place, so I'd love to get around to stuff like that. Companionship..." Agatha paused for a moment, "I really don't know how we can wind all these people together."

"I know it's a lot, but I can see the growing toxicity in the Coven and I can't stand it anymore."

Claudette

Agatha wheezed through her nose, "Well the reason the Coven is toxic is because it's got toxic people. Emily acts like an alpha-bitch straight out of some 90's high school movie, don't even get me started on Babylon, Kayla's headstrong and acts like she's the leader and even used the Coven to go and beatdown her own vampire problem. Sin threatened to kill me for telling her to stop her summon from nearly killing somebody yesterday-- you want me to keep going? I get what you're bringing up, but I think what we need most is a firmer leadership, like you suggested. We do have fun, and we do bond. We've went out to lunch, hung out at the beach, even just loafed around the same building for who knows how long! If you think fun and friendship would be a better way to lead the Coven, then-- Maybe we should also get Nina or Herik on board with helping to actually run things around here."

Recollections: The Coven [COMPLETED]

Agatha Loom

Ironic. Apparently seeking out some oddly morbid murders was too dangerous for the Coven, but not seeking out a literal personification of death for literally no given reason? Regardless, Agatha bit her tongue. She didn't really want to snark at or pick a fight with Madison, especially after she surrendered the floor. At the very least, it was sobering to see the Coven wasn't turning into everyone's personal chore-takers.

"Is there something you had in mind, leader? Because you can't keep calling us here for nothing, some of us have things to do, you know."

Emily

"Alright, if we're done with the day's share-and-care, we can get onto the agenda. The only real order of business I called this meeting for, is that I wanted to bring up that we have a new potential member," Agatha began, folding her hands together.

"Just last night I was contacted online by somebody. They said they knew about our Coven, and that they wanted to join with us if we'd let them. Obviously I was a bit skeptical and on guard at first. They said they lived in the area, and were willing to go through whatever initiation we had for them. I told them I'd get back to them soon, but before I went and took them in, I wanted to check by each of you guys first. A vote, I guess. What do you guys think?"

Agatha remained silent, giving each member of the Coven a moment to think before answering. In her own opinion, she was extremely uncertain. While she herself managed to join over the internet, she didn't know whatever thought process the leader at the time used to consider taking Agatha in, so she really didn't know how to judge the merits of a complete stranger. So instead she left it up to group instinct for now. If needed, she'd just change her opinion and use her vote as a tiebreaker if needed.

Recollections: The Coven [COMPLETED]

Agatha Loom

Agatha watched as the conversation almost immediately drifted from where she had hoped it would have gone, and instead steered back in the direction of Kayla's own problem. Honestly, made her own efforts of finding something to do today a bit redundant. She even made herself late just trying to find something worth the group's attention. Then Kayla just threw her own problem out on the floor, and watched everyone magnetically draw themselves to that, eager to head on down and bash some heads for Kayla(and her dog)'s sake. Honestly, it wasn't quite the worst way for the meeting to go, Agatha confirmed to herself; Regardless of how toxic the group had been to one another so far, they were still looking out for each other. Of course it'd make sense to tackle some... 'vampires', which Agatha doubted the word-for-word legitimacy of, which directly threatened one of their own over some obscure yet violent killings.

However, she was robbed of the chance of making any sort of decisions or confirmations towards handling the vampires. Once attention drifted away from what Agatha laid out on the table, the Coven returned to chatter at Kayla, overwhelming her with questions until Claudette threw out a blanket of silence, only to hand the entire floor over to Kayla at that point. She'd basically said anything Agatha thought to, but with a lot more authority and control than she could probably even muster.

By the time Agatha was even able to squeeze out a single word, Kayla had already gotten up and left for preparations, with most of the rest of the coven egging to follow after her.

"Alright then, uh...", Agatha began again, standing up and quietly picking up her folder, "I guess that should conclude today's meeting. To anyone who doesn't want to participate, we can either get this place cleaned up or head down to the beach, if you guys want. Either way, rest of the day is yours."

Recollections: The Coven [COMPLETED]

I'd definitely be ok with revamping Adepts

Recollections: The Coven [COMPLETED]

Agatha Loom

Miraculously, Agatha actually managed to defuse the situation. Apparently her big attention-getter was enough fun for Babylon to lift the curse and dissipate, allowing Keisha to calm down. Though Sin seemed a bit more offended by Agatha telling her to keep her gryphon calm, walking straight up to her.

"Uh... You tell me that I have to put a leash around Keisha again, I'm going to have a Chimera set you on fire, okay?" She asked, smiling sweetly at Agatha, "Keisha didn't do anything wrong, it was that... Uh... Thing, over there."

"Good to see you too, Sin", Agatha responded, brushing off the threat. Though she made a mental note that Sin had no patience for anyone who had the audacity to tell her to control a beast that threw casino machines like empty cans. She reshuffled her papers, watching as everyone actually started to give her the floor, moving in to take a seat around the makeshift roundtable. Madison and Kayla seemed a bit restless, just hoping to get through whatever motions the meetings usually had. Others were a bit more enthused, though. Lyss actually greeted her and asked what she had in mind. Herik came in, always a reassuring friendly presence. Soon enough, the actual meeting was ready to go underway. With a quick whistle, Agatha returned everyone's attention that drifted away as they all set up.

Agatha took a deep breath, then began.

"Okay! Welcome, everyone who could make it. Seems we don't have much patience for... pleasantries today", Agatha began, eying over at Madison and Kayla, who were obviously less enthused than she was to have a meeting on a Saturday, "So... Let's just get through things quick, then we can all head down to the beach if you want, okay? So! Anyone... Personally see anything unusual this week?"

Agatha gave a brief moment of silence, her gaze tracing along all members of the Coven, letting them speak any trivial pieces they may have had.

"Okay, okay. Good", She nodded, regardless of if even a cricket had anything to add to the conversation. "Now that we're done with that, let's get to the next order of business: The News."

With that in mind, she opened the folder she brought, sliding it out into the center of the table, letting each of the articles she printed slide out softly onto the table.

"Before the meeting today, I decided to do some trawling around the web for any big cases. After getting past the daily adventures of Florida Man, I noticed a chain of... Oddly chilling events."

Each of the printed articles had different circumstances, but the same outcomes described: Violent mutilations leaving hardly anything behind. None of them were able to be identified. Definitely a cut above the ordinary murder or assault around the mythical land of Florida.

"Absolutely mutilated bloodsoaked skeletons. In pretty quick succession, too, most one down in Port Richey. Just three happened this week alone. I'm not saying we suit up and try to go find some serial killer, but I do think it'd be worthy of warranting some attention, maybe some attempts to dig deeper. I won't guess this is the first time most of you are actually hearing about these murders going around the state... Thoughts?" Agatha briefed, ready to face the full brunt of accusations of insanity and possibly getting stripped of her leadership.

Recollections: The Coven [COMPLETED]

Agatha Loom

Agatha had made the accomplishment of being Leader for a whole two weeks of the Coven. She thought it was probably due to her own existent sense of direction, but deep down she knew it was mostly thanks to her not being very combative. Every time one of the other leaders breathed the wrong way, they'd force a revote for their greivous sins. Agatha guessed she just didn't have that level of conflict-generation, due to her own nature.

Still, she knew it was in bad faith for her to have been late to one of the group's own meetings on a Saturday Afternoon. She just tried to write that off as her own effort towards leading The Coven. She sent out a group text to organize the meeting. Most of the members seemed on board, Madison even offering to pick up some pizza. So far so good. But a couple hours before she was supposed to head down into town, Agatha wanted to make sure they had actual things to discuss instead of just hanging out for a couple hours then heading off to the beach, supposing another goddamn fight didn't break out in the middle. So, she decided to trowel the internet for any big recent "weird" occurences, something for them to bring up and... Maybe get somewhere?

Unfortunately, she got a bit too caught on the idea. By the time she printed out enough possible leads on Extra-Normal activity, she saw that she was a bit past the time for the meeting. She went as fast as she could, gathering up her notes and then heading into town, hitching a bus down to the abandoned Lucky Strike Casino. But just as she approached the front doors, she could hear the typical sounds of the Coven-- Yelling, shouting, things getting thrown around?

Jesus Christ.

Agatha walked in and it was about as bad as she expected it; Sin's pet Griffon was going on a feral rage, like an angry house cat but the size of a horse. A few of the broken slot machines were out of playing and lying down. Madison certainly brought the pizzas... Which were currently lying around, smearing the old moldy carpet, as the girl was covered in dinosaur bones and trying to fight Keisha to a standstill. Babylon just hung around, looking smug, while Emily, the Apparition's host, yelled at her. Agatha put two and two together, figuring out that Emily's affixed spirit had gotten bored.

She really didn't want them to trash their lair before she could even do any big leader-things. With that in mind, she decided to try and take a bit of authority. Tried, anyway.

"Hey... Guys, cmon... Stop figh-- Stop... Stop fighting... Guys? Girls? Gals??" Agatha tried speaking up to get everyone's attention, but was drowned out by the fighting between Madison and Keisha, as well as everyone else just chatting and doing their own things.

She knew she didn't have the presence to get the attention of an ancient spirit and a large gryphon. So she decided to improvise. No problem, she guessed. Three of them had already been throwing out Abstractions.

"Everybody C-CALM DOWN!" Agatha yelled, announcing her presence if she hadn't already by opening the doors. She held open her free hand, generating a small orb of light which quickly roiled and grew, about to the size of a baseball. She then gave it a gentle heave, tossing it onto the ground between Madison and the massive gryphon. It splatted against the ground, taking the shape of a dome of yellow light before blinking brightly. Only a few seconds later, it burst, filling the room with blinding light and a loud ringing noise, hopefully enough to shut down the brawl.

"Okay! Everyone, sit down and be quiet if you don't want tinnitus before you're thirty. Emily, tell Babylon to stop bugging Sin's Gryphon. Now. Sin, get a leash on Keisha" Agatha instructed. She tried to hide her own nervousness at basically telling everyone, including a ancient and powerful Apparition, to shut the hell up and listen to her. Though she tried to give the illusion of authority, it wasn't hard to see she was extremely tense, almost about to buckle under terror. Following her own example, she pulled up one of the stools that was tossed across the room, sitting down on it.

Taking a deep breathe to restore her composure, Agatha pulled up the folder she brought with her. Inside were different articles from the past few weeks that she printed off the internet for them to hopefully discuss. She then decided to address the Coven properly, facing each of the members.

"Okay! Sorry for being late, but uhh, if we're done screwing around, we can get this meeting under way." Agatha addressed properly, at least in the event that the rest of the Coven decided to humor her and actually simmer down. Come to think of it, maybe basically throwing a flashbang in the room wasn't the smartest way to get everyone's attention.

Recollections: The Coven [COMPLETED]

Oh boy, finally finished the long arduous task of finishing an entire character from scratch instead of copy editing one I made for a previous Recollections RP

Agatha Loom

Agatha Loom

╚══════════════╝

"I don't think you've met me before."

[ Age 19 | 6"3' | Caucasian | She/Her | 132 lbs. ]

Perception

APPEARANCE

"Nothing Fancy. That's... Kind of the point."

Agatha towers at 6"3', with pale skin and black eyes. Her black hair is incredibly long, reaching about halfway down her back. She does little to organize or maintain her hair shape, giving it a ragged and unkempt appearance. She has a round, slightly-wide face, with a thin body frame that borders on being undernourished. She usually dresses smart casual, wearing dark colors along a light blue to dark purple spectrum, wearing a shawl jacket, usually with either a long skirt or even just jeans. She usually wears moccasins, sneakers, or sandals, depending on the weather.

PSYCHOLOGY

"I uh... Don't like talking about myself too much."

MAIN GOAL ⫻ Agatha's main objective is to uncover the web of mystery that strangleholds Tampa, hopefully developing a strong enough understanding of the unknown.

WHAT THEY WANT OUT OF THE COVEN ⫻ She joined the coven because, well, they were another group of people well-versed in the supernatural, hoping to get some knowledge out of it. She's stuck with them after she realized the reality of them, hoping to at least pool knowledge and understanding of Extranormal phenomena.

PHILOSOPHY ⫻ Nothing is ever the way it seems. Always keep an eye out and ear open.

SECRETS ⫻ Agatha's big secret is that she probably knows about everyone else's little harmless ones. Nothing groundbreaking or personal, but she probably knows that you snuck out in the middle of the night or cheated on your diet.

SEXUALITY ⫻ She's never really been in a relationship, but she's found herself looking at both boys and girls before. She isn't very sexually or romantically active, however.

FEARS ⫻ Despite constantly trying to attain as much information as she can, she's incredibly fearful of her own privacy being breached, giving her a very secretive and reserved lifestyle.

REPUTATION ⫻ Agatha isn't very well-known, and doesn't have a very wide circle of friends.

QUIRKS ⫻ When addressed, she always answers with brief panic, as if she was zoning out for a moment. She also has difficulty keeping eye contact with people.

FLAWS ⫻ Agatha is intensely paranoid and distrustful. Despite having a sense of direction, she doesn't quite have the force of personality that would make her a strong leader.

BACKSTORY

"I've lived with my grandpa for most of my life."

The first chapter of Agatha's life was an ugly one. She was conceived by accident, by two equally irresponsible and unprepared lovers. Much of her infancy lacked the proper attention and care, and her parents inexperience with children led to some early-onsetting development issues for Agatha. When she finally turned four, they admitted their own incompetence and sent her to live with her mother's grandparents. While they served as much better caregivers than their children, it took Agatha a couple months before it hit her: Her parents had abandoned her. They told her she was just moving in with her grandparents for a brief visit, but only months after she was moved did she realize what that really meant.

Agatha felt like a complete fool for missing all of the clues. The sense of humiliation and betrayal bred two dueling feelings in Agatha: untrustworthiness and curiosity. She never again wanted to be such a helpless idiot. As she grew, she became unnecessarily inquisitive to her surroundings. She even found out her grandma became terminally ill a week before her grandparents decided to tell her. Ironically, she took that secret being held from her slightly better than the first one.

Soon enough, Agatha's inquisitive nature pulled her into the direction of the supernatural. As she looked deeper into everyday surroundings and took everything with a grain of salt, she traveled down the path of the unknown. Eventually she made full contact, and discovered her own Extranormal abilities, enabling her to create "Wards" that only encouraged her own discovery. She had found a whole world sitting beneath what most people would pay attention to, and ended up becoming a solid part of it.

Eventually she encountered The Coven, a group of other people who had explored the supernatural like herself, each one their own understandings of what lied beneath. When she first joined, Agatha anticipated them being group of occult explorers who pooled their knowledge and power together. The reality? A clique of wannabe-witches who constantly butt heads together over petty infighting. In any case, it was still a better place to start and maybe make some friends. Who knows, she might eventually learn something.

SKILLS & TALENTS

"Careful, someone's about to round that corner."

Espionage ⫻ Agatha's skilled simultaneously at both digging for information and secrets, along with remaining hidden and avoiding drawing attention to herself while doing so.

Situational Awareness ⫻ Agatha's constantly processing her surroundings and taking note of everything around her, making her able to notice things better that would otherwise go over someone's head.

ABSTRACTION

"I don't think I was ever really a skeptic to begin with, but I never thought whatever was out there would come to me."

TYPE ⫻ Adept (Yellow-Cyan)

ABSTRACTION ⫻ Ward Creation. Channeler: A small bead necklace she made with her grandfather when she was seven years old.

ABSTRACTION DESCRIPTION ⫻ Agatha has the ability to create Wards, singularities of light created for defense and reconnaissance purposes. Supernatural Booby Traps, basically. She has a lot of legroom for crafting them, being able to create individual ones for each purpose. Each Ward has three main functions when created: Alarm, Trap, and Drone.

Alarm: The criteria that activates when broken, triggering the Ward. With absolute zero consideration given towards the Alarm, it will only activate when destroyed or even just touched. With more careful crafting, more advanced criteria are capable of being given to it's activation, such as someone entering a certain radius of it, feeling something moving too quickly, or detecting too much noise.

Trap: Whatever effect the Ward will have when the Alarm is activated. With absolute zero consideration for this feature, the only effect a Ward will have when activated is to simply fizzle into light, destroying itself. However, it can be made much more volatile, such as causing it to explode into blinding light when activated, creating an intense, ear-splitting noise, or making whatever it's attached to burst into flames.

Drone: However much awareness Agatha has surrounding the Ward. Given no consideration, she will only be informed if the Alarm was triggered or not. She's able to put more awareness into the Ward, however, allowing her to perceive sight or sound in an area around it, detect the measurements of any individuals, or even just sense any Extra-Normal Occurances.

Agatha's able to mix-and-match however much energy she commits into the Ward and whichever features she focuses most on. Example Wards include a landmine, which unleashes an overwhelming force of power when directly stepped on, a door-alarm which will alert her if a door or other object has been touched by someone, or a C4 charge, which she can keep an eye on the surroundings of, then detonate as soon as she senses someone get too close. This makes her ability to create Wards a godsend for home defense against intruders, becoming a force to be reckoned with should Agatha find enough preparation time to fortify a single position.

AURA SENSING ⫻ Agatha can detect if any Extranormal Abilities were used in an area hours afterwards. The longer since they were used, the more vaguely she can recollect them. Four hours afterwards, she can't tell any details beyond that one was used significantly in some way. Once six hours are reached, the event will have escaped her senses.

LIMITS ⫻ Emotional Fields dampen the direct effects of the more offensive Wards. Once Agatha places a ward, she won't be able to move it from its position. In order to reposition it; Agatha will have to uncreate it and remake it somewhere else. Agatha has a limit of five wards that she can place at a time, but she'll need a second and some focus in order to do it. Putting more power into a Ward uses more energy.

WEAKNESSES ⫻ Agatha can trigger her own Wards, as she is not immune to them. This means she has to be careful when acting around them or she might get blown up or something. In addition, the Wards can be destroyed by simple use of Extra-Normal power; a dash of flames or a stone being thrown at it.

OTHER

"I should get home soon. It's getting kind of dark, and grandpa's hair isn't getting any grayer."

She's raised by her grandfather, Jeffrey. While he may appear crabby and bumbling on the surface, he loves Agatha deeply, and may just be more than what he seems...

Recollections: The Fourth Seal [Mystery/Urban-Fantasy/Horror RP]

Agatha Loom

Jaden started barraging Agatha with questions. She did her best to answer them.

"I don't know anything about what caused what happened. At first I thought that someone was onto me, then I saw you and everyone else there. All I can really think of is either all of us know something that someone or something doesn't want us to... Or, I dunno, that portal just randomly pulled us in. You think it was because we weren't normal? I mean, I don't think everyone there had supernatural potential. Either that or they were just too chicken to defend themselves with them. I haven't really talked to anyone else there. I haven't even spoken to Brianna, either, no. I was just in a race to get back home. I don't think I even gave her my phone number."

Then... She had to double check what that last question was.

"Sorry... Did you just say, you want to open that... pillar, portal thing again? Why the hell would you want to go back?! It took an entire group of us just to survive for less than... An hour, I think? Doesn't matter. Are you seriously rethinking of going back? Or worse, what if the only way in is to send the rest of us down too, like last time? Does either possibility sound very fun?" She asked him, seriously hoping that Jaden rethought his life choices.

---

Tristan Douge

Oh FUCK.

As soon as the wall painted itself and started speaking, Tristan sprang up to his feet. He watched as a figure emerged from the wall... Almost like a woman, it looked like?

It started speaking, but Tristan could hardly understand it. It hurt just to listen, let alone stare at that thing. He got the general message, though. It was taunting him. Teasing. Treating this all like some big game. Never a good sign in any horror movies.

Tristan probably could've lunged backwards and rolled out of the building. Probably would have to run like hell away from it, but it was his best bet to escaping whatever the hell that thing was, Except--

Fuck, was she still sleeping?! Tristan glanced over. June was either still asleep or just starting to wake up. He didn't have time to grab her and escape, and the worst thing he could do besides fall victim to whatever the hell that abomination was was to let someone else fall for it the same way.

Only one way out of this now...

Tristan mustered up every ounce of courage he had as he looked the monster straight in the eye. Then he activated his Lux. Within a few seconds, three entire apparitions manifested behind him. They were made of black smoke, with blue, orange empty eyes. They stood still for a moment, before rushing straight forward. They burst through the window behind Tristan, lunging at and beating the Wall-Witch with all their unholy might.

He didn't know how useful his ability was now, but he didn't want to waste time seeing. He ran over to June, violently shaking her.

"Cmon! Cmon wake the fuck up, we need to go, now!"

He grasped her by the wrist and pulled her right onto her feet, charging out the front door and back onto the streets, trying to get the hell as far away from their exposed shelter as they could, leaving the Spirits he created to fight off the Outsider as long as they could.

Recollections: The Fourth Seal [Mystery/Urban-Fantasy/Horror RP]

Tristan Douge

By this point, Tristan lost count of time.

He and the girl he met, June, were the only normal they've seen in this warped version of Araminta, besides the massive group from when he first arrived. By this point, he stopped concerning himself on their absent presence. The biggest possibilities he settled on were as follows: They all got turned into mincemeat by the horde of monsters, dragged off to God knows where by the tentacles that came from the bottomless pit, or survived somehow and were squatting in the husk of the city like he and June were. Or maybe they found some magic portal out of here. Either way, they weren't Tristan's problem anymore.

Somehow, Tristan and June managed to escape the mob that closed in on them at the library. They found a means for climbing up and out onto the rooftops, where they hopped from roof to roof until they felt safe enough to quit running and take in their bearings. Obviously, they decided to stick together for safety, as they started looking for some sort of means of returning home. Until then, they just did their best to survive.

Surprisingly, actual survival wasn't too difficult. Most of the monsters in this warped version of Araminta were a lot less active and numerous. Even when they did see one or two, they hardly even noticed them and were easily avoided. Most of the houses, surprisingly, were also pretty well-stocked, giving them a lot of leeway to just crash in a house, helping themselves to the food. Still, running into both the tentacles and the monsters shook Tristan to his core. He insisted on keeping a rotating-watch system, while also trying to fortify their house of choice the best they could.

The two of them hunkered down in the living room. Tristan's choice of defense was a wooden plank, which he rhythmically slapped into his palm every few seconds while June slept. No problems so far, but he really didn't want to get caught with his pants down by God knows what.

Tristan didn't even bring his watch. He took it off before his nap on the flipside, and didn't even have the time to put it back on before getting spirited away by the light. How long had they been there? A few minutes? A couple hours? A day? More?? He had no idea. The best reference for time would've been the Sun, which... In this version of Araminta, sure liked hitting the snooze button. He didn't even see it budge since shit started hitting the fan. He felt incredibly frustrated. Despite the supernatural gravity of whatever hell he was thrown into, this all felt like a huge waste of time. What about his duties back in the normal world? Had the Horde struck again in his absence? Who would they have carved up next? Some homeless bum? An unlucky sucker? Someone else's little sister? Even brushing that shit aside, his mother probably would've been worried sick about him. Well, more than usual.

Tristan hurled his plank weapon at the wall in frustration, shattering the plywood and probably waking up Sleeping Beauty. Whatever.

"Goddammit", He said, almost surprised at the sound of his own voice, "I'm sick of sitting around here, hunkering in some abandoned house like rats. We really need to get moving. Find some way out of here."

---

Agatha Loom

Agatha quickly recovered from the horror and stress that came with getting taken off to a monster-ridden warped version of town over the next two days. Once she wasn't stressed out anymore, she returned to her normal, inquisitive state.

She retook to using the internet as her means of perusing for answers. Despite being a massive pillar of light that washed over the entire town, there wasn't a single report or news article about it. No accounts on social media, even. As far as it seemed, only she and the small group taken into that strange otherworld were the only ones who actually had accounts of it. After a good few hours of searching, she closed out her web browser and sighed in frustration.

Again, she found her gaze gradually being pulled outside of the window. She began to remember the exact details about the pillar; It erupted from the forest, as she could tell by it's rate of growth before it swallowed her whole last night. She couldn't quite gauge exactly where in the woods it came from, but knew it was definitely a good place to start.

Getting her things together, Agatha hustled down the stairs, just about to open the front door when her grandpa's voice called.

"Where do you think you're going, young lady?" He asked, sitting in his chair in front of the TV.

"I uh... Just heading out for a bit."

"Agatha, dear, where were you last night? I thought you were safe in your room, yet you came home later at night. What happened?"

"Just uh", Agatha thought of an excuse, "Hanging out with some friends."

Her grandpa turned around to look at her in mild surprise, then shrugged his shoulders and turned back around.

"Alright then. Don't stay out too late again."

"I won't. Bye!" Agatha called, rushing out the door. She went down a few blocks, hopped a bus, then got off at the forest entrance, walking along the road that cut into it. She didn't know what she would've found, nor was she certain she would have liked it.

As she walked, she eventually reached what had to be the epicenter. A massive glowing crater, surrounded by police tape. Nobody else was present, tho-- Wait.

Someone else was here. Jaden, the guy from the group in the otherworld last night. He stood next to the crater, looking down at it just as confused as she had been. She hung back a bit-- He hadn't noticed her yet. Her thoughts raced in her mind about what to say, before she suddenly just shouted.

"Hey!"

Wow, great reintroduction. Agatha felt she wasn't entirely the one in control when she called out at them. Maybe the Lady Bug was having a greater effect over her than she thought. Regardless, she revealed her own presence, quickly approaching Jaden.

"You came here looking for the cause of us getting abducted last night? Me too... Looks like we just found it" she noted, looking down at the crater they stood over.