Barton Public Park [[Literate Walk-In]]

[Tindome]

Nadine awoke in a strange place with a pounding in her head and a taste in her mouth like she’d tried to inhale a sewer.

So, it was a day ending in ‘Y’.

The light was trying to force its way straight through her eyelids, presumably attempting to use the lenses of her thick-framed glasses to enhance its power. She ran one hand over her face and under her glasses, as though getting rid of the light would get rid of the hangover’s various other effects. The other hand made its way to the bare scalp along the side of her head, chewed nails scratching idly behind one ear. Giving up on falling back asleep, she heaved herself upwards, as if she were a one-ton beast rather than 5’4” and under a hundred pounds. Bright green eyes cracked open, thick lashes shielding them from the initial barrage of hated sunlight.

I am going to go out on a limb and assume this is not that cute ginger’s house.

Nadine pouted, a far more dramatic expression on her overlarge mouth than it was for others, pushing her glasses back to the top of her crooked nose. A quick examination of her surrounding revealed that she was on the surface of the sun.

Wait, no, that’s not right.

After her eyes had adjusted, she discovered that she was actually in a park.

Oh, good. Nothing weird.

She stretched out her legs, stick-thin and clad in tights that resembled cathedral windows, ending in glittery blue heels that defied gravity. She’d thankfully had the sense to wear a romper last night, as otherwise she’d have had a dress around her neck by now. It took a lot of careful planning to be so fabulous. On the ground by her feet were what remained of last night: a plastic water bottle full of lime margarita, the butt of a peach-flavored cigar, a pipe whose bowl had been stuffed with ten cigarettes, and her messenger bag.

Vomiting had become a lot easier since cutting her black curls into something like a mohawk – or were they calling it a jugend? Nadine could never much keep track of hair-related fashion. She had enough on her plate with ordinary fashion. She made a face at herself in the bathroom mirror as she washed her hands; her skin, normally the color of milky tea, today looked more milk and less tea. Emerging from the restroom and popping a stick of gum in her mouth, she sipped from her warm bottle of a drink that hadn’t been very good to begin with.

Examining the vending machines, she found the token dispenser… intriguing. Her gaze immediately went to her right ring finger, to the tasteful band of diamond-studded gold. How much might that be worth? But, no. According to the plaque, it had to be sentimental to her. Better to save the ring for a pawn shop. Reaching into her bag, she pulled out a small pocketknife, one that had never done a very good job of protecting her from anything. Nonetheless, it had tried, and that ought to be worth something.

Dropping the knife into the deposit slot, she was disappointed but unsurprised when she received a single token for her trouble. She spent it on a baffling piece of pizza, teetering unsteadily back to her park bench so that she could enjoy it alongside a pipe full of cigarettes.

[Evil Omens]

Laughter filled the air as 9 year old Todd ran around the park. Gaia wasn't a very child friendly place, with all of the bars and the monsters, so finding a park was a real joy! There was something about the grass and the sunshine that radiated "safety" from the evils of the world. Sure, those kind of things could come here, but they weren't here right now! And with that in mind, the little boy intended to stay here and play for as long as he could!

Right now he was just exploring and laughing, imaging all of the things that he could discover here. The place seemed to be empty, meaning he had the whole park to himself!

What more could a child ask for?

[ Short entry post. But it was perfect for this character. ]

[Tindome]

Was there anything more horrible than the sound of a child's laughter? Not while hungover, there wasn't. Certainly not for Nadine, who couldn't stand children at the best of times. She hadn't even liked children when she was a children.

In a turn of events shocking no one, the cheese on her vending machine pizza had burnt the roof of her mouth. In an equally shocking turn, smoking ten cigarettes through a pipe was neither effective nor satisfying. Nadine lit up a proper cigarette instead, and began tottering gracelessly towards the pond. Now seemed like a good time to brute force the sobering process. Not that sobriety was terribly appealing, but she needed to get her bearings. Where had she been last night?

Somewhere new and interesting and dark with thumping music that went right through me and an adorable ginger that I apparently did not go home with. What was the last thing? I think we went to a diner. And then... mysteries.

To aid the thinking process - among other things - Nadine made the eminently sensible decision to fall into the fish pond.

It was even colder than she thought it would be, and she swore accordingly.

[Tindome]

Nadine had passed out on the banks of the fishpond, which really shouldn’t have been possible when it was so ******** cold, but she’d never been one to let extreme physical discomfort stop her from getting some sudden and unexpected rest. The moon was high in the sky, now, and the stars looked too big and too bright. Not enough light pollution here, not enough smog to keep the sky brown and dim. A fog had settled in over her like a quilt while she’d been sleeping, and from her position sprawled in the grass she couldn’t even see the road. It was a bit like lying in a cloud, in that it was damp and not as good an idea as it sounded. Pulling a new cigarette from her bag, she lit it, blowing a ring towards the sky. At some point, she was going to have to sit up, to seek shelter, to try and find a party to crash.

For now, though, she just wanted to lie in the grass by the water and feel her pulse in her temples, watching the smoke curl through the fog.

“I feel like s**t,” she informed the moon, though it did not seem particularly interested.

[Gemini Spaceship]

Misery Mallory would probably never know how a mule deer had made it to the second story of her house. She would probably also never know what would make a mule deer aggressive enough to chase her out of said house, and down the street. It was, in all likelihood, the same thing that caused so many animals to attack her without rhyme or reason. A werewolf, upon assuming human form, had once told her that it was a smell about her - but it was hard to imagine a smell that could effect canines and birds and ungulates with equal ferocity.

As with many of the other incidents within her own home, Missy found herself taking refuge at the park not far from there, clambering into the rotting playhouse creaking in the wet sand of the playground. The vicious doe took hooves to the wooden struts, and the little shelter swayed worryingly; it would be a while, she supposed, before it gave up. Hopefully the doe would not master climbing the ladder before then.

She was fortunate, if for little else, that she'd managed to keep both her shoes this time. Since acquiring thick metal frames for her glasses, they'd become much less prone to snapping in two, though her attempt to wipe the dirt from them only smeared it about. There was a twig stuck in her hair, but there almost always was since the honey-blonde waves had grown long enough to fall to her shoulders. Her brown eyes, large and unfortunately cow-like, watched the doe beneath her with the mute terror that comprised so much of her life.

It was cold and damp, thick clouds blanketing the sky, and Missy's overlarge sweater and equally baggy pants did little to protect her from the chill. The mud on her face blended with the freckles, and she attempted to pull a splinter from her thumb with too-perfect porcelain teeth.

It was times like this that made her wish she could carry mace without spraying herself in the face.

[Gender Ender]

Flynn Fairbanks III was not having an especially good day, as it happened.
This was not an infrequent state of affairs; he was prone to remarking that it was just his luck, and this was, unusually, both literally and demonstrably true. His was a vortex of fortune, an ever-balancing scale...

The prior evening, a beautiful woman had winked at him in a tavern (the city seemed supplied with an infinitude of taverns, an endless warp and weft of rum-soaked, beer-sodden timber, rafters groaning under the assault of drinking songs), had run her fingers down the seams of his uniform- which, after all, wasn't it quite tight and uncomfortable this morning? It had seemed so loose-fitting last night...had practically fallen off, onto the floor.

That had been the prior evening. The morning had brought the report of a musket, close by; sufficiently close by that he swore (perhaps unwisely) that he could feel the torn-paper passage of the ball past his head. He had noted, in passing, a wedding band on the burly man's finger. It was almost a relief.

Oh, good. It's just a husband this time.
His uncle's inheritance had been accompanied by a considerable quantity of explosives (and why keep them in the wine cellar, and also next to the lamp oil, anyway?). His promotion had coincided with the opening of a hell-mouth, a hideous portal hanging like a gibbous moon, wreathed in flame, consuming sails and spars alike, and men...

Yes, a husband was rather a pleasant change. Perhaps for a less profound windfall, the balance was lesser? But it had certainly felt like a heavy windfall at the time. Her bosoms only were a heavy windfall. Well, windy. Blustery. Busty. Yes.

A quick fall out of bed, clutching clothing to his chest, had taken him out of the way of the projectile; it was, therefore, only fitting that the same step had taken him onto the balcony, and precipitated him into the street. There had been a less-than-well made barrel to break his fall, but it had been filled with regrettably expensive scotch, and the gentleman pushing the cart had shown signs of a choleric temper...

The park seemed to be an ideal retreat, to a man with no pants; lots of cover, after all. Had seemed.
A number of bushes later, this was proving not to be the case; and now....a deer? Yes, a deer.
Rather large. Not, thank goodness, an aggressive buck- enough of that this morning. A doe.
It had been attempting to...batter down a little cabin. Odd.

As he approached, a shaft of light seemed to strike the animal, bringing its lustrous coat into full life; it turned, saw him, and approached. He held out his hand, mesmerized.
The deer's head nestled into the curve of his palm, comfortable and warm. It was a rather perfect moment, a quintessence of transcendent nature. A once-in-a-million experience.

More mundane experience persuaded him to make sure there were no storm clouds around; good fortune, evidently, was with him, as the deer hoofed it away without molesting him in the least.

There did, however, seem to be someone in the dilapidated little fort. Presumably, they were some sort of demonic vampire ogre. Or, just possibly, explosive. Nonetheless, courtesy made its demands of an officer and a gentleman....

"Hello? I say, hello the fort? Is there anyone in there?"

[Gemini Spaceship]

The deer had left! That was good! There was a man outside. That was bad.

Perhaps that was unfair to the man. He might be a perfectly fine specimen, somehow immune from whatever bully-attracting aura surrounded her. Or he might be the sort of dreadful thing one would expect to find lurking in a damp park in wee-est hours of the morning. Missy could only hope that she got lucky, which was as good as saying she was doomed.

"Yes?" she replied tentatively, kneeling to peer outside the little door of the playhouse. It was a very small sound, quite unlike the mouth it emerged from, but she'd always been the quiet sort. Her fingers gripped the edges of the floorboards, hoping that this would be enough to keep her from losing her balance.

It was not reassuring to see that the stranger in the moonlight was not wearing any pants.

She'd have taken this time to blush furiously, but the old wood that had stood so well against the rage of the doe decided now that it could bear no more, and cracked beneath the hands that held most of her weight. Missy immediately fell end over end out the mouth of the little wooden playhouse, and her first instinct was, of all things, to curl into a ball and hold her glasses onto her face.

It would not be a pretty landing.

[Gender Ender]

The word that first entered Flynn's mind at this point was, appropriately, bollocks.

No, wait. Is that it? Bollocks? Or is it bollix? Or bollucks? It's one of those. It means bad, anyways. Damn and damn and damn.

There was only one thing for it: a heroic and dashing dive for the dirt, arms outstretched, to gather up the falling maiden-fair. Nothing else would was remotely acceptable. The motion had already commenced. The sand was rapidly approaching. His undergarments were rapidly approaching the sand.

s**t.

His intended target- seemingly moving in slow motion, as he often found happened during tragedies- was maybe a bit hippy. Was this going to be another broken-arm scenario? Oh dear. Oh dear indeed. And the sand, again. In places. Crevices and such.

"Never fear, ma'am, I've gLORF"

There had, evidently, been a rock in the sand. A large rock. Sufficient to catch the edge of a shoe. His hands were outstretched properly, but unfortunately, the young lady was some few inches further. Quite a few, really. Her posterior- or perhaps spine- showed every sign of impacting his much-abused backside. Which was, lest he forget, shivering in the cold night air.

I really should, thought Flynn, make the time to put those pants back on.

[Gemini Spaceship]

Misery was not the largest sort, being only five feet tall and of an almost-petite frame - almost due to being a bit pear shaped. Nonetheless, it could not have been pleasant to be the one breaking her fall when she collapsed - well-padded backside first - in a graceless heap.

A graceless heap on top of a naked man.

The tiny shriek that escaped her resembled most closely a rapidly deflating balloon, as she scrambled to remove herself from any... inappropriate contact. The scrambling was itself perilous, but eventually she managed to get herself into a heap on the sand rather than a heap on a man.

"I'msorryI'msorryI'msorryohmygoodnessI'mverysorryareyouokaywhyareyounakedsorry"

The skin beneath her freckles was flushed as she covered her bespectacled face with both hands, lest she accidentally peek at the poor fellow. He'd be difficult to see soon, anyway, as a thick fog was slowly creeping along to cover the park.

Fog made Missy nervous. Things hid in fog. Awful, dreadful things. And sometimes lampposts.

[Gender Ender]

The discomfort of impact was, relatively speaking, minor. The discomfort of breaking propriety and gentlemanly behavior, on the other hand, was a bit of a blow. The haste with which the moderately shapely- if, admittedly, seemingly rather quiet- young lady removed herself was also somewhat hurtful, but, thankfully, only an injury to pride, rather than to spine. A victory, really.

"Perfectly fine! Perfectly...ungh...fine! And there was an...unfortunate...sex...accident. Yes."

Swift reflection revealed this as, perhaps, not the perfect response given the audience and circumstance.

"By which I mean to say, I was very rushed getting dressed this morning. Uncommonly rushed. Certainly no accidents or sex involved that you should be concerned about. Please stop looking at me like that."

If indeed she was looking at him. Her spectacles, smeared with grit and beaded with mist, made it rather hard to tell what she was observing. The inside of her spectacles, he supposed.


Freckles, he noted in passing. Rather cute, really, but something of a mouse.

"It...er. Is getting rather misty. I don't suppose there's some sort of....wayward seaman's lodge, around? Or....wayward person's gazebo?"

[Gemini Spaceship]

"Oh! Um." Missy took this as an opportunity to look in a direction that wasn't nudeward, attempting once again to wipe her glasses clean. "I think there's a gazebo... over there?" She pointed in a direction that she thought might have been the river, though it was hard to tell. After all, they were technically sitting in a cloud.

Yes a cloud not fog not fog where things lurk and pounce in the night clouds are friendly yes

"If you need clothes there are some in the lost and found sometimes at least there have been when I needed clothes but you might have to wait a bit because I don't know if it's open just now and maybe you have clothes or don't want to wear strange ones but it was just a suggestion anyway"

She shivered and continued to stare into the mist, the cold seeping through the holes in her sweater and making the skin on her arms numb.

[Gender Ender]

This litany of woe was met with silent, slightly loose-jawed attention.
Does she breath at all, while she's doing that? Maybe it's a circular thing, in through the nose...
The realization that she had, after all, attempted to do something helpful at last struck through, as did her shiversome state.

"Oh! No, no; I have pants. I'm not the sort of person who wouldn't have pants. You may rest assured that my trousers have been, in an uninterrupted manner, in my position all the while. I'm always very careful about that; once let pants out of your sight, and they'll vanish, sure as you blink....best not to blink, really. Dangerous habit. Er...yes."

An order of priorities once more making an appearance, he donned his trousers- rather dashing ones, before an evening's rumpling- and was on the verge of donning his coat when he glanced over at the bespectacled jeune fille determinedly gazing everywhere but at him.

"Would you like my coat, miss? Getting a bit nippish out here, really."

[ImNoHero]

A strange reptilian man casually rolled in with the mist shrouding the park in the late night/early morning. His strange eyes looked all about as his translucent set of eyelids blinked as opposed to his outter pair. This kepy his eyes moist without missing a beat. His hands in his pockets, this cold blooded creature felt right at home with the moist and cool environment. He didn't like it when it was hot very much. Despite his comfortability, he still wore a black duster over a white beater and some dark denim slacks. Black boots were perfect for any style, including his. Hand in pockets, he merely walked around in the darkness, just like some old creeper out of a sci fi movie or some s**t. Whatever the hell he was, he looked a long way from home. What was he doing here anyway? Just enjoying the depressing scene?

It was almost a shame this one grew up on Gaia Primus without the influence of the Hanar. And through a drowned relationship tieing to his ancestors and culture, he lacked the advanced interest in religion that Drell normally held so dear. But one thing he did seem to enjoy, was how useful his body was for just about anything. He was primed, tought from a young age how to defend himself, how to survive. The legacy of the Drell must carry one no matter where in the Universe it was. This particular one was just a younger male of the species, fascinated by human cultures from drinking, to smoking, to dancing, to fighting....the list goes on. Though out of it all, fighting felt most natural to him. With his gunshot fast reflexes and his keen senses, he often enjoyed putting his body to the test.

The most astonishing feature of this Drell was also his abundance of street knowledge. Being on a very different path than any other Drell in the past several hundred years, he was a remarkable find. Though he didn't seem to add anything special to Gaia Primus that it didn't already have somewhere or another. Blending in where he was was part of his innate behavior, adapting to the environment to increase chances of survival. Lighting up a fresh cigarette, the Drell came to a halt not far off from the park's water source. Calm and beautiful, accented by the mist that rolled across the park, His eidetic memory would be sure to capture this place.

[Gemini Spaceship]

"Clothes do have an awful tendency to disappear sometimes so that's a good attitude to have I think I'd try it myself but my glasses always seem to go missing at the worst times so I don't know that it would work all that well even if I could keep my eyes from drying out." His polite attitude had put her enough at ease to make her a touch less squeaky, though many would say that it was still too high and too breathless to make for altogether pleasant listening. Then again, obnoxiousness was in the eye - or ear - of the beholder.

She turned with some surprise at his offer, and was relieved to find him repantsed - though less so to find him still baring his torso to all who cared to bear witness. She turned determinedly back towards where she vaguely thought the water ought to be, blushing slightly less.

"No thank you I think you are probably feeling more nipplish than I am so you should probably keep it for yourself thank you for the offer though." It was not clear whether her change of words was intentional or not. In any case, her resolutely averted eyeline meant that she was looking in the proper direction to see when a small spot of light appeared by the water, diffused by the fog to make its source unclear.

"Although maybe we should stay here because the gazebo is over there and I think there might be a will of the wisp and I don't want to get lost in the woods forever because there are animals in there usually and I don't like getting lost temporarily so forever would probably be even worse so staying here is probably for the best I think"

That the 'fairy' was in fact a lizard man would probably be of little comfort, as lizards and men did not seem to like her any more than other animals. She had, on at least one occasion, spent a week with an angry chameleon stuck in her hair. She had at least one similar anecdote about a man, but the less said about that, the better.

[Gender Ender]

He glanced over, following her gaze, and obligingly donned his jacket; no sense insisting, after all, and all things considered it did have a mild odor of pitch about it.

"Will of the what? Oh....no, it's a cherry, love."
He flashed a grin, sparklingly charming. This wasn't natural talent; it required considerable scrubbing.Nonetheless, he was proud of his smile. Feeling, perhaps, that more explanation was necessary, he continued:

"Cigarette; the end of one. It's a bright flare, at night- you usually want to cup it in your hand if you're in a bad place, or somebody'll aim on it and...well, there goes you. Looks like we have some company."

His expression grew momentarily ruminative.
"Have you tried some sort of...strap? For the glasses, that is."