Down in space it's always 1982

[caycep]

((The return of Cayce and Quixote! Wide open RP. If you haven't already, catch up with the adventures of Quixote, Setsuna, Cayce, and Adam here.))At some point after Pirate Day, an announcement came on over the park PA system

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[i_don_quixote]

"My thanks, gracious lady." Quixote bowed low to Cayce before turning to face the gathering. He was somewhat wary at the notion of consorting with sorcerers, if indeed such persons lurked among those assembled; but he was forced to admit that, as force of arms had thus far availed them naught, fighting magic with magic might prove to be a necessary evil.

"I greet thee, good people of Disney. Our attempts to breach the portal have yielded but a single fruit. Once, and once only, did the thunderous voice of our enemy falter in its accursed pronouncement. As no cause for this variance was manifest there in our actions, it seems that the cause must needs have lain elsewhere. It is therefore our hope that someone among you was witness to the event, that we might make use of that knowledge when we again make trial of the door."

[i_have_my_flaws]

Starbuck tentatively raised her hand. Which made her feel awkwardly like a kid in grammar school.

"Um, what do you think might have caused that 'event'? I mean, what do you think could have disrupted them?"

[caycep]

"My guess is, it has something to do with the invisible security." Involuntarily, Cayce glanced up at the ceiling, as if expecting the voice to start up then. "Something must have distracted them. It. Or whatever." She looked around the auditorium. "Anyone tried to go for a long walk lately?"

[i_have_my_flaws]

"Uh, no but..." She didn't really want to discuss it, but if it had something to do with a way to get out of this place.

Maybe it didn't. Maybe it was all part of the plan. How convenient that things should go a little off when one of their own got there.

But if she could get out of here, if there was even a chance, she had to take it.

"...I was dumped in the fountain recently."

[redo_fromstart]

Ponder turned up, and was pleased when 'scientists and magicians' came up, because the whole way through Cayce's description, he was thinking of ways he could find a way out of the door.

He waved a hand from where he was sitting, a middling distance from Cayce, and assuming he was going to be called upon for comment, got up and coughed, "I'd be most amenable to attempting to open that door. All sorts of magic might work on such a door, I'd be happy to give it a try. Does anyone have an idea whereabouts the door might be under?"

[caycep]

"Good question. It's hard to say, because we didn't really map the passageways. But if you have some ideas for magic, that'd be great, Mr., um-"

[redo_fromstart]

"So there's no specific guarantee that the door leads out of the park? Even if it does issue a similar warning?" Ponder was only asking because they were all things he needed to consider, not because he was trying to be awkward. "And Stibbons. Ponder Stibbons."

[hear_the_drums]

"So might an explosion, rather than having us relying on the whim of an incantation," the Master sneered from where he was slouched in a chair toward the back. "Which could be easily executed with safety parameters included, though I'm sure Ms. Pollard would object to our involvement."

[anthony_crowley]

Crowley sat quietly in the back, arms crossed. He didn't give a damn about the door, but these meetings always went bad and he did care about Cayce. So he sat. And he watched.

[late_born_myth]

Psyche stood, from the middle row where she'd been standing, and said in a soft voice that nonetheless carried rather well:

"Have you all thought much what the consequences might be to opening that door? Aside, I mean, from traps.

"In my experience, forbidden things tend to be forbidden for a reason. You might consider whether the park security, however annoying it might be, has ever acted to harm you.

"And assuming that it does lead to a way out. And even assuming that it's a way out you'd want to take, and not a way to someplace a great deal worse. I have...a very great desire to return home. But are you all willing to take the chance of making that choice for others here who might not have that desire?"

[caycep]

Cayce frowned and shoved her hands into her pockets. Goddammit, Psyche did have a point.

"Okay, true," she said. "If anything, the security's kept people from getting killed. If not hurt." Her gaze flicked up briefly, finding Crowley in the back. She rubbed her hands together. "And ... okay, maybe there's a chance it'd open some kind of black hole that would suck us all through to somewhere else. But what do we do instead? Ignore it? Look for an alternate way out?" She shrugged helplessly. How had she gotten into this position, again? Running things and organizing shit? Oh, right, she'd just stepped up and done it, because that was what Pollards did. Fuck.

"I don't know. I don't know. But we have to do something." Pause. "Okay. I have to do something. And maybe it's not fair of me to drag everyone else in."

She sat down on the edge of the stage with a thump and wondered why she'd decided to call this meeting before she'd even tried to get so much as a nap.

[late_born_myth]

"I didn't mean to reproach you, Cayce," Psyche said, smiling gently, speaking musically. "We're all excited. So many of us are, for lack of a better word, the heroes of our own stories, that we can't help wanting to do something if that's now, at last, a possiblity."

"But I would remind you that there are people here, or were, who were dead in their own worlds."

[caycep]

Oh. Yeah.

She really hadn't thought of that at all.

"How do we make this decision, then?" she asked, not just of Psyche but of everyone present. "Do we put it to a vote? Flip a coin? What's fair?"

And then, bitterly and under her breath so that no one else would hear, "Does 'fair' even fucking matter?"

Events of the last four year had, after all, made Cayce question the very concept far, far too many times.

[superherogifted]

Virgil sat in the back, raised his hand, and then said without waiting to be called on, "Just making the point, I'm not a scientist or a magician or anything, so I probably can't figure out how to open the door. But my genius buddy Richie was here a while back, and he built a machine that was supposed to be able to break out of here, I just didn't have the power to make it go. If any of the science types wanna take a look at it..." He shrugged. "Alternately, me and the cute electric girls juice it up together."

((We were always pretty vague on exactly what that machine was, so feel free to make shit up as it serves the plot? If it serves the plot?))

[hear_the_drums]

"You're going to 'juice it up' without some sort of containment field? Well, that's brilliant." The Master snorted, then pursed his lips. "The Rani and I will have a look at it, if you're so certain it could help."

It was the work of a human child. No matter how 'genius' it was, it was incomparable to something that he, the Rani or the Doctor could do in their sleep. But as long as it silenced the more ridiculous requests.

[superherogifted]

The guy didn't have to be an ass, though he guessed it was sort of expected from a sci fi villain who would hamster dance his computer.

"I mean the door, however we're gonna try to get out. Between the three of us, we've got a lot of power to spare. And I know how to control my own powers, man," he added. "I'm not a scientist, but I'm not a dumbass, either. Just volunteering to donate whatever charge is needed. But have a look at the machine, I have no idea what it's supposed to do exactly, but it could help."