First Thesis

[intangible_girl]

[At the outskirts of town you may find a girl. She's just standing there, holding her arms close in a self-hug, looking terrified. The kind of terrified where the screaming stopped a long time ago.

Just try approaching her. I dare you.]

((Ingrid can be found anywhere on the map you want to call the "edge of town." She woke up in the forest and

Comments

[Action]

[no_use_running]

[Ami stops in her tracks on her way to finish a few errands. She takes in a quick breath: a new feather, as lost and alone as she remembers being herself.]

Miss? Are you alright, Miss? Are you hurt? [Or just scared?]

[Action]

[intangible_girl]

[Ingrid looks up from her intent gaze at the ground. She's shivering slightly, even though it isn't that cold.]

I... please. I need to get to a phone.

[Action]

[no_use_running]

[Ouch. She looks apologetic immediately.]

The journal. That journal is our communicator here. But, it doesn't connect to back home.

[Action]

[intangible_girl]

Home? [Ingrid rubs her upper arms absently.] I'm from Connecticut. But I was going to Bisclavret U. Where... where am I now?

[Action]

[semper_cogitans]

[Robert was just on his way to do some mundane, boring errand. Probably getting more groceries or something. He's been keeping to himself a lot lately...

Wait, is that a very anxious and panicked-looking person he sees? Somebody who... honestly reminds him a lot of himself?

Most likely a New Feather, as they don't tend to be particularly calm...

Robert stops a few metres away from her, and asks, in a relatively anxious tone:]

E-Excuse me... might you require... assistance...?

[Action]

[intangible_girl]

[Ingrid's teeth are chattering, and Robert's voice startles her. She steps panickedly but carefully back a few steps, taking in Robert's lab coat with eyes so dilated they seem black.]

Dr.... Who are you?

[Action]

[semper_cogitans]

[Robert notices the distance she tries to maintain, and respectfully backs off a little further, trying not to infringe on the delicate-and-invisible bubble of personal space.]

... P-Professor Robert Alexander Hastings, though, er, I did earn a doctorate, so calling me a doctor would not be i-incorrect...

[He pauses.] You must be a New Feather... [Ingrid's mental state is not going to be conducive to this, but Robert is as blunt as always.] I am afraid that you have been indicted into an experimental colony known as Luceti...

... Have the Malnosso perhaps harmed you in some way? [She's honestly panicking far more than most people Robert has seen here, and it worries him.]

[Action]

[intangible_girl]

Experimental colony? [For a moment Ingrid imagines a community of nudists having kinky sex, and then dismisses it with a slight shake of her head. He's wearing a lab coat, after all.]

What is the experiment? [Her eyes are darting all over the place, and her breathing has an odd rhythm to it. She holds her breath as long as she can and then lets it out and in in a gust, as though the very air is poison and she wants to avoid breathing it in.]