... It begins

[keep_hallways]

It’s dark when the Keep’s newest guests arrive. The cold night air has seeped into the stones of the barracks sending a chill throughout the rooms. No fire has been laid, no lamp lit to beat back the cold or dispel the dark. Each cell remains exactly as it has for months on end, almost as though no one were expecting the small rooms to be occupied

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[aswanbyday]

Odette was in a state of shock. She had been in her little hut on the Golden Shore and now she is here. In this strange room, in this strange place. This wasn't the Golden Shore.

She swallowed slowly, before peering outside of her room. If her experience on the Elegante taught her anything, it was to be wary of change. She looked behind her, and taking the book on the table. She tucked it under arm and crept outside.

"Hello? Phoenix?"

[keep_hallways]

Phoenix isn't there.

In fact, nothing is, save for the darkened hallway. But if Odette is looking for light, something just around the corner of the hall is glowing and flickering.

But it's retreating.

[aswanbyday]

Odette is indeed looking for light. She notices the retreating glow and checks for her bow. She's faced some pretty horrible things. Not a whole lot scare her these days. But that doesn't mean she'll charge ahead recklessly.

"Who's there?"

[blackantiquas]

It ceases retreating. Instead, it advances, the glow brightening as it does.

What comes around the corner is very much not a human. In fact, one might mistake it for a swarm of fireflies, had the light not been so terribly white. Specks of white and black mix and float a few feet off the ground, some flickering and others shifting about.

It does not move closer.

[xenoshepherd]

Her omnitool was missing. Taps to where the mechanism was supposed to be installed yielded nothing in the way of familiar orange light. Luckily for Shepard, her helmet visor had helpful add-ons to discern the mostly bare cell she found herself stumbling into.

An odd place to be in, when she was supposed to be boarding the Normandy to rest after a long, brutal fight against against a yahg. Shepard had enough weariness in her cybernetics-enhanced bones to almost be incapable of abject shock, almost, but not quite. She threw her back against a wall, hauled her pistol out of its holster and leveled it at the dust-ridden floor.

Hand clamping tight over her weapon, Shepard raised two fingers to her ear. "Hello? Anyone copy? Hello?"

[keep_hallways]

Quite suddenly from the right comes movement, whatever it is dashing past the Commander with enough speed to kick up a small breeze. As quickly as it appeared, it appears to have moved on... or has it?

At the opposite end of the hall, two pale blue eyes with an unnatural glow are watching.

[thii2ii22tupiid]

Stalking the halls was less enlightening than one would expect. Sollux was starting to seriously consider just throwing (more) things around aimlessly would be a better use of his time when he heard Shepard's voice, faintly, from behind her door.

"Hello?!"

[xenoshepherd]

The voice of a young adolescent.

Nothing about it made sense to Shepard. Her radio? Dead. The room? Prehistoric, if her visor didn't lie. Her armor and weapons hadn't been taken, either. It smacked of somebody's idea of a twisted prank.

She gave up on trying to make radio contact, positioning her hand over the knob and counting, three, two...

The door flung open and Shepard followed suit, pistol tracking the rapid movement of... something ... down the hall. Its muzzle pointed at the nearest person, which so happened to be Sollux.

[gotyourwallet]

Head pounding, Vie opens her eyes to darkness. The room is cold, familiar in a a sense but without light for her to pinpoint a location. A quick check reveals that her weapons are still on her and, without any reason to idle, the woman seeks a way out.

It doesn't take long to find the door, key in it's lock and carefully, she pushes it open. Stepping into the hallway, Vie breathes a steady breath. "Calm yourself, find light, get answers."

Decision made, she starts down the blackened hallway, ignoring the dull thud in her head and silently promising herself to strike back the one that took her down.

[iwannabeadragon]

She's not the only one in that hallway. Also creeping down that black corridor is Hawke, daggers drawn and ready. This is most definitely not the Hanged Man.

Last thing he remembers is watching Isabela cheat him out of his money again (why does he even bother to keep playing cards with that woman?) and taking a swig of rotgut from her bottle. Now either the bartender started making much more powerful the last time Hawke was there or something sinister is afoot. Hawke is willing to bet money it's the latter. It's always the latter.

[gotyourwallet]

That she isn't alone doesn't take long for Vie to realize. With her eyes rendered useless, her other senses had kicked into overdrive. Vie halts, hands moving to her blades and ready for action should it come.

"Identify yourself, stranger."

Whoever you are. Vie braces herself for the possibility that whoever it is isn't friendly.

[iwannabeadragon]

Hawke stops. So he isn't alone here, but that's definitely no one he knows. What he wouldn't give to know where his friends are right now. That he doesn't know what happened to them is eating him up.

But that's a problem for another time. There are more immediate things to deal with. Like whoever this is.

"Garrett Hawke, Champion of Kirkwall!"

There, name and title, that should give them some pause...or make him a giant target. Honestly, he's pretty sure even more people try to kill him now that he's the Champion.

[yeoldedragon]

Moonie had very specific kneejerk reactions to being snatched away to strange places without her explicit consent.

On the third floor, out of room number one-two-five, a woman exploded out of her cell door. This woman evidently was in a state of distress, when one took into account that she appeared to be on fire. The previously expensive and well-made suit on her frame crackled and popped and far from giving a hot damn, her head whipped back and forth. The burning woman's jaw fell open to reveal sharp rows of white teeth before the fire filled her mouth, too.

Then she screeched bloody murder and bolted to the right.

[keep_hallways]

A shame that she has such an explosive temper. There is a light at the end of that hall, wavering with the unmistakable quality of flame. But it's faint and getting fainter. It's dimmer than Moonie's own fire, and begging for pursuit.

[yeoldedragon]

Pursue she did. The insulted rage neutralized a good portion of her higher thought processes. Things like 'bide your time' and 'do not follow strange lights down corridors' took a backseat to the need to chase.

Chase, incapacitate, interrogate.

[keep_hallways]

And just like that, the light pauses, still casting a flickering glow but now constant. It waits around another bend.

[onlyonemysize]

It was ten minutes for Thumbelina to realize she was not with Ms. Fieldmouse anymore. And ten minutes more for her to escape the massive bed she found herself on. It was hard being 6 inches tall.

But once she managed it and was safely on the floor, she slipped under he door and into the hall.

"Hello? Mr. Mole? Ms. Fieldmouse? Hello!!! Where am I?"

[keep_hallways]

There is no answer, save a slight draft. But Thumbelina isn't alone. There's a light at the end of the hall, just enough to light the stone walls. But it's so far, and it's moving away! If she doesn't move, soon it will fade away altogether, leaving Thumbelina alone in the silence and the dark.

[onlyonemysize]

No! Don't do that. "Hello? Ms. Fieldmouse is that you? Why is it so dark?" She runs toward the light. "Please don't leave me here alone."

[keep_hallways]

But the bearer of that light cannot have heard. Perhaps Thumbelina's voice, like the rest of her, is simply too small. And now that she has left her own doorway, she will be alone, in the dark, and lost..