barring emergencies

[the_very_best]

Bella's not sure where she has wandered. She thought she was about to walk into a shop, but this appears to be an unattended bar. With none of the windows associated with the shop she thought she was entering. It could be an elaborate psychic assault of some kind, but it doesn't feel very... assault-y... and she was in the middle of a town and doesn't think any humans want to sic their 'mon on her. It's strange. She approaches the bar, looking around warily, hand hovering near her belt.

with Max (Benedict)

with Earth and Lightning (kappa)

with Ann and Sabrina (kuuskytkolme)

Comments

[just_a_shadow]

"I think mostly we don't care very much where we go as long as it's not back. But probably we'd like Fairyland. I can bring everybody there, sure. The other Shadow might help. I'm... not sure I can shadewalk a Shine... maybe if they turn their halos down really low it'll work."

[from_scratch]

"I definitely have no technical advice for you."

[just_a_shadow]

The ball of darkness unravels. Shadow walks out of it and comes back in the Milliways door.

"Do you have any advice on how to carry someone who glows through a place you can't get to if there's too much light where you are?"

[from_scratch]

"Wrap them up in a blanket?" asks Cam, letting the door close.

[just_a_shadow]

"Maybe. It'd have to be a really big blanket. Do you have a blanket big enough to wrap up a Shine?"

"Why are we wrapping me in a blanket?" inquires Shine.

"Shadow walking."

"Oh, that makes sense," Shine says agreeably.

[from_scratch]

"I can make arbitrary blankets. Or form-fitting bodysuits out of snazzy light-absorbing black fabric that looks kind of super creepy and scissors to get out of 'em with at your destination, if you like."

[just_a_shadow]

"I'd take a creepy bodysuit, that sounds fun," says Shine.

Shadow looks thoughtful.

"What is it?" says Earth.

"I... um... I'm wondering if you're done rescuing people or not," he murmurs shyly.

[from_scratch]

"I have nothing better to do, Hell is kind of short on Meaningful Work."

[imeanforever]

"I'm not in a hurry to go home either."

[just_a_shadow]

"Well. I know where to find a Fire who's not warded against dark scrying," says Shadow. "But it probably won't be safe to go get him until nighttime..."

[imeanforever]

"You don't know his owner's name?"

[just_a_shadow]

...Shadow blinks at her.

[imeanforever]

"If I have a human's name, I can command them to do anything. I don't like doing this, and I'd want to be sure the human wouldn't get hurt following my orders, but that's how I got Kisonde to release you all."

[just_a_shadow]

"...As long as you didn't make him release Fire, probably nothing would happen to him..." says Shadow.

[imeanforever]

"Can Kisonde do it, if I make him give over the amulet?"

[just_a_shadow]

"Sure, why not," sighs Kisonde. "I'm not going to get set on fire, right?"

"I got you covered," says Shine, giving Kisonde wingsnugs.

"...okay," says Shadow. "His... his name is Caharas."

[imeanforever]

"Then if somebody from your world holds the door and will take me to the place I can do this."

[just_a_shadow]

"I can take you to the place," says Shadow. "I just need a shadow to do it from."

"I'll hold the door," says Earth.

[from_scratch]

"If we assume for the moment that Promise and I are willing to live in Milliways for the next five years spending most of our time respectively ordering elemental owners to hand over the amulets and holding the door to Hell, how many of these can we get?"

[just_a_shadow]

"...some," says Shadow. "Maybe a lot. I don't know. I think probably more if we do a lot of them now before people know it's a thing that's happening."

"I think I heard somewhere that the estimated global population of captured elementals was a hundred million," says Earth. "Some of those are going to be hard to reach by shadow walking, but not all of them."

[from_scratch]

"And you can search for them with the scrying? Are there any other elementals that do scrying-and-going-places or is that just Shadows?"

[just_a_shadow]

"I don't think there's anything that works the same as shadow walking," says Shadow.

"I can barely scry," says Earth. "Unless the thing you want to find happens to be a plant. I definitely can't do fast transport like Shadow can."

"I can scry like nothing else, but I can't go somewhere near-instantly by magic once I find it," says Shine. "I think only Shadow has something like the shadow places... everyone else has to pass through the physical space in between where they're starting and where they're going somehow or other."

[from_scratch]

"Okay. So ideally we don't want it generally known that shadow-walking is instrumental to the process."

[just_a_shadow]

"People will probably guess," says Shadow.

"Unless we get together a big group of free Airs and Air hybrids, and have them swoop down out of the sky with Promise and grab amulets," says Earth. "Enough of them together and it'll be hard for anyone to get caught; and if it's Air, well, Air is the best at flying and the second-best at scrying. It's the closest we could get to shadow walking without a Shadow. It'll make it less obvious that we're using shadow walking some of the time if most of the time we ostentatiously don't."

[from_scratch]

"I feel like it's worth mentioning that somebody is going to have to be holding the door at all times, and it's not in a deserted or fortified location."