THE WITCH HUNT ✽ balfour (4) (due OCTOBER 18TH)

[Messenger of Magic]

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PUELLA MAGI: SYMPHONY PROJECT
BALFOUR
minsuil, neonmace, appeal, istoleyurvamps, lizzymoo, qixel, phae-et, phinaeus

SHOP FRONT • START SCREEN • DISCUSSION BOARD
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CURRENT STEP

Step Six
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♥♥♥ VRENI HIRSCH (MINSUIL)
♥♥♥ ANGELA BAKER (NEONMACE)
♥♥♥ PHOEBE LIED (APPEAL)
♥♥♥ CATHERINE SHEPARD (ISTOLEYURVAMPS)
♥♥♥ TILLY CARLSSON (LIZZYMOO)
♥♥♥ ELENA PAVLICHENKO (QIXEL)
♥♥♥ WINFREY BABCOCK (PHAE-ET)
♥♥♥ HENRI (PHINEAUS)

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INVENTORY

MINSUIL

NEONMACE

APPEAL

ISTOLEYURVAMPS

LIZZYMOO

QIXEL

PHAE-ET

PHINEAUS

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[Messenger of Magic]

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LEVEL 4 - STEP ONE
ATTENDANCE: all (by september 16th, 2013, 11:59 pm pst)
TYPE: roleplay

Tell us: what were you doing before you were pulled into this strange scenario? How did Allison's magic effect your memory?

When you wake up, do you call to the other girls? Do you remember them?

You may post up to once this turn.

TOP
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A year goes by since June 22nd. Still, your memory since that Teufel Day seems to be
oddly spotty, and when you're particularly tired, or excited, or see something you recall as
familiar, you swear you can see something golden just past your range of vision. Sometimes,
when you sleep, you dream of golden string and two girls that look just alike, silhouetted against
a deep purple. It didn't seem to matter. The oddities were forgettable, however repetitive they were.

Then, on the morning of September 9th, you wake up into darkness. When you move, you make no sound.

What do you hear?

[DystopicRhythm]

With a large gasp Angela woke, her room darker than usual. No matter how long she stared her eyes wouldn't adjust and if she didn't know better, she could have sworn that it wasn't even her room. Normally, lights would pour in from her bedside window as her room was street-side, but it was as if even everything outside had been snuffed out.

The silence was deafening, and not even she could bring herself to break it. Angela tried her hardest to remember her dreams from just minutes ago, but no matter how hard she thought there were no answers. However, that didn't really matter. Angela was a normal girl; she knew nothing of the Puella, nothing of Kyuubey and nothing of Witches. Her memory had never been affected, she wasn't present for any of the activities magical girls had participated in over the last year -- she had never made a contract.

The silence was almost nauseating, the ringing in her own ears offering a dull pain in the back of her head.

[Qixel]

Elena blinked rapidly, trying to clear the blurriness from her vision. At least, she thought her vision was blurry - it usually was when she woke up. But she didn't see anything, clear or not. That's weird. Arright, think. What were ya doin' before now? Elena pursed her lips and closed her eyes, thinking. Ah, who'm I kiddin'? I can't usually remember what I had for breakfast. She opened her eyes back to the darkness. Arright. So it's still dark, which is kinda weird. I can't remember what I was doin', but that's normal. Where am I, though?

She gave an inquisitive glance around the room - the curiosity matched only by it's uselessness. Can't see anything - oh, wait. Yeah, I can. The girl's eyes finally began to adjust to the darkness, but it still wasn't at a usual amount. Noting a number of silhouettes, she called out.

"Oi! Any of ya know what's goin' on?"

[Minsuil]

She dreamed day in, day out, of doors and darkness. Of pinpricks of light, of never ending stairs, and of two girls against a deep violet. She dreamed of golden string and silver chains, of sun drenched hills and moonless nights. Time passed, people changed, but the dreams didn't. There were days where Vreni dreamed her cousin plummeting forty feet into an abyss again. She dreamed the hundred hateful eyes and the coldness of an empty room. Dreams shift, people don't. She still woke in the middle of the night to such nightmares.

But she was a year older. She was a year stronger. She believed it to be so, and thus, it must be. Vreni sat up and quietly unbraided and braided her hair again. She tried to recall the source of her most recent dream. It was coming back, in little shreds and little drops.

Power.

Wish.

I want...

I can make your dreams come true.

...to be...enough...

She sat in the darkness and waited for the truth to settle down on her shoulders.

[Phineaus]

There was the high pitch squeal . . . of a milk steamer? Henri turned to the sound, but there was only pitch of darkness. It was a cold darkness, thick and stifling any sense of place. The squeal had faded as they turned their head, now little more than an echo fading into the distance.

Are my eyes closed?

Blink.
Blink.

Nothing.

They felt a frown form on their brow, lips pressed thin in thought.

What was I doing?

They were currently sitting on the floor, that much was certain. Their hands were wrapped around. . . nothing? The cool gloss of porcelain could still be felt against their palms, as if they'd only just set it down a moment ago.

It had been another all-nighter, building and tinkering. They'd gone out for coffee, hadn't they? To that dinky college-friendly spot on the corner. The only decent place open at that hour. With the memory came the vague recollection that they had fallen asleep at their table, the thought drifting by as the sound of others caught their attention. It was the sound of someone calling out, asking if anyone could shed some light on their situation. (Henri smirked at the poor attempt of a pun as it passed.) And yet, Henri had no burning need to respond right away. Uncertainty kept them rooted and silent, while thoughts of monsters searching you out and stealing you soul filled their head.

Henri considered not replying the longer they sat. As the initial wave of irrationality passed, they thought about saying nothing and simply collecting data on the situation. But then, had Henri felt the need to call out, wouldn't it have been so much more reassuring to hear someone reply? Or perhaps a reply was what you'd fear the most, they reasoned. Nothing good could come out fo a dark like this. And yet. . .

"No idea."

There, Henri told themself with a small grin. I replied.

[LizzyMoo]

It had been over a year since she had been bestowed the gift of the wish.

However, the details were so blurry for Tilly. All she knew was she was a much better cook than last year. She could sew and she could clean. The girl blamed it on her perseverance after a while, deluding herself into thinking it was all because of her years of work.

Reality was an odd thing, and after over a year, it was about to come crashing down.

It was September 9th that the girl woke up, and the world was not as it should be. Her alarm had not gone off but as the blonde girl blinked her tired eyes, she was quite certain that is wasn't supposed to be this dark. No matter which way she turned her head, the darkness did not seem to lighten up.

Her fingers ran over the other hand until they came across the ring over her finger.

Is this important?

It was a stray thought that seemed to pop up when her fingers stopped on the ring. It felt like it was important, but she didn't know the reasons.

Tilly sat, waiting for the assumed sun to come, but after waiting for an unknown amount of time and no amount of light began to filter in, she had to ask one thing.

"...what's going on...?"

[Appeal]

The evening of September 8th had been no different than any other day but when Phoebe Lied woke up next everything was different. Darkness. The darkness engulfed her and everything around her. Phoebe immediately wondered if perhaps she had been pulled into a dark hole where no light ever escaped because no matter how dark the night was there was always light around. It was impossibly dark for her bedroom, impossibly dark for the city and even suspect to being darker than the bottom of the ocean.

It was suspicious.

Phoebe immediately began to look around her surroundings, stumbling around in the dark like a blind child. She tried to rely on her ability of hearing but no matter how much she moved she couldn't hear a sound.

Something was wrong.

This was definitely wrong.

This wasn't her world.

This didn't make sense.

"What the ********!" She yelled, throwing her fists into the air with frustration.

[Phae-et]

Winny's subconcious was not quite happy with the current situation. A few voices in the dark roused her from her sleep, but instead of the comfortable stall she'd fallen asleep in, she was left on the cold hard ground. Apparently with someone noisy around.

Gone was the sweet smell of hay, the gentle snorts and whines of the horses in the stables. All she could say was SOMEONE was sure to get an earful from the tiny terror about privacy and the meaning of the phrase 'do not disturb'.

Getting up and dusting herself off, she fluffed her skirt as best as she could without being able to see. After all, lack of light and awareness of her surroundings didn't mean she could lapse in her polished ladylike looks at least. Squinting as her eyes started to adjust to the darkness, she made out several figures.

Smoothing her hair, she took a soft breath to speak.

"Ladies shouldn't swear you know, and while I may not know what's going on any more than the rest of you, perhaps we should keep our volume to a minimum." she quipped, her voice clipped and airy at the same time. Flipping some of her hair out of her face, she started moving forward cautiously, searching for a corner or wall to the room.

"Obviously we've been abducted. I certainly do not recognize any voices here, and I for one do not remember being moved," she sniffed, sounding all around very put out and more annoyed with the situation than alarmed.

"All I know is, I would very much like to speak to the person in charge and give them a piece of my mind...." she huffed quietly.

[iStoleYurVampsiStoleYurVamps]

What did dreams have on reality but present an unsolvable riddle of meaning within the complexities of the mind? Catherine dreamed many things, and if she were to spend her days trying to make sense of it all, her days would be long, wasted, and filled with questions that would go unanswered and no doubt have no right answer at all. Dreams were riddles.

Catherine did not want to waste her time on riddles her own mind created without her consent.

Tonight her dream was broken by nothing- she heard no alarm, no crash or cry- and it confused her. Light sleeper she was not, and the lack of any alarm struck her as unusual. The darkness did not.

At least not until she moved, and heard no sound. Not the creak of bed springs, the shuffle of her blankets, not the sound even of her breath and yawn. Soundless, she stopped mid motion, a child's fear that she might be dreaming still, a creature lurking under the foot of her bed, waiting to consume her. That the floor was actually covered in bugs and as soon as she would step down, they would crawl over her feet. A dark room was not what she liked to wake up to. It was not what she wanted to ever wake up to.

Then again, it usually meant she had woken up too early.

Still, she held her hand over her chest, seeking the assurance that she had a heart beat. It was there, a bit faster than normal.

Voices in the dark, ones that had her more confused. This was apparently not her room.
This was not her home.
She was with strangers. Strangers who cursed.

And it was the curse that had her gasping, covering her own mouth from a slight shock at the vulgarity.

What if someone like her parents heard that? They'd never let her go out.

Not that she knew where she was and if she was out anywhere or this was one of those dream in a dreams.

[Messenger of Magic]

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LEVEL 4 - STEP TWO
ATTENDANCE: all (by september 20th, 2013, 11:59 pm pst)
TYPE: roleplay + roll

What was the item that Balfour took from you? Do these doors seem familiar?

Generate a random number from 1 to 30.

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PREVIOUS STEPS

1

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You lost something precious to you.

You can't recall what it was, but that sense of loss sticks close to you, and seems to overwhelm
you slowly as you wake up into this strange darkness. In your panic, though, you recall
immediately the memory of that awful rabbit and his doors, but it
feels as though you've been searching for him this entire year. The fatigue of seemingly done so
overwhelms you, yet you know that the chase is still on.

Just as you recall that pesky rabbit, the darkness sweeps away from the area like sand. Your
group is surrounded on all sides by what appears to be spiraling columns of stairs, each of them
strangely narrow and covered in doors of the same shape. The tallest and fattest column of them
all is placed just at the center of this circular ensemble. When you try to focus your thoughts on
one of the doors, you recollect faint sensations of where you need to to be. What he took from you is there.

[Qixel]

The darkness washed away, and Elena could finally see her surroundings. The doors all around her seemed both foreign and familiar all at once. She couldn't place where she had thought to have seen them before, but she chalked that up to her memory. As she walked over to the doors, the haze around her memory began to fade. She remembered a rabbit, but she didn't remember who it was. She remembered it taking something from her - what? Standing in front of the door now, Elena pursed her lips and closed her eyes in thought. A small object, but very dear to her. Her eyes shot open. The keyring given to her by her best friend years ago. Realization made way for anger.

"Sonuvabitch."

[DystopicRhythm]

Her hearing was still impaired, Angela could have sworn she heard the muffled voices of unfamiliar girls around her, and as the darkness dissipated her assumptions were true. Several girls of varying hair lengths, colors and sizes stood or sat before her, each looking just as confused as the last. Every last one of them wore the same outfit, and strangely enough when she looked down she saw the same uniform on herself. She had never seen it in her life, and for a brief moment a white fear washed over her; had someone changed her in her sleep? As far as she had ever been made aware, sleep walking wasn’t a problem she had. However, as the darkness continued to creep away, staircases appeared step by step all around them.

Severely confused and disoriented, Angela lifted herself to her feet and spun in place slowly, surveying their surroundings. So many stairs, so many doors. What on Earth was this place, and who were all these girls? The exclamation from the short haired blond girl took her by surprise, even if it was merely muttered under her breath.

Instinctively the girl reached into her pocket to find that, in this new outfit, there wasn’t one. Angela’s eyes widened, patting herself down before glancing up at each door, brows furrowed and lips tugged into a slight frown. She could have sworn it was on her… but what was it? She thought hard about what exactly she was looking for, but no matter how much she dug she couldn’t quite remember. She only remembered that it was white.

With as good of a guess as the one who cursed, the dark haired girl turned her head to the staircase nearest her current location. It wasn’t the best method of choosing, but for all she knew she would be able to come back down and pick another if whatever she couldn’t remember wasn’t behind its large, ornate frame.

[LizzyMoo]

The darkness was still strangely suffocating, making it almost hard to breathe. Tilly's hand wandered up to her chest, as if to check that her lungs were still filling up with the air.

....white rabbit...

Almost like the winds in the desert, with a sudden gust, the darkness seemed to dissolve to reveal the rest of the company. There were girls who were oddly familiar, but also not, and doors, and...

...my thimble...

Tilly did have access to plenty of thimbles, but the one she had favored over all of them had mysteriously not been around. She noticed its disappearance, but never made an issue of it, since she had other thimbles she could use instead. However, the bronzed flower adorned thumb protection seemed to be coming to mind as she looked over this odd place.

....is it here...?

[Appeal]

Something was missing. In the center of Phoebe's heart she felt something was amiss. It was sudden and unexplainable to the young girl but she felt like she'd lost something here in the darkness. What could it be that she could have possible lost? She didn't recall anything. It was haunting though, and Phoebe felt anger well up over that loss. It was familiar, very familiar.

The memory of the rabbit caused the girl to clench her fists, grinding her teeth roughly as she clenched her jaw. Just how long had she been chasing him? It felt like forever and what seemed like all of a sudden Phoebe found herself hunched over holding her knees. Just how long? It felt... she felt so tired. She couldn't give up though. If she had gone this far, this long, there was no way she was going to give up now while these others continued!

It was like a breath of fresh air when the darkness cleared and Phoebe's body lifted back up into an upright position. Bright yellow eyes like the sun lit up as she took in her surroundings and company. Were these girls always here? Was she always here? There was no time to ponder over this! She had business to attend to with that rabbit and something to get back that she'd lost even if doing so was going to be a bit of a challenge.

Teeth showing in a huge grin at the thought, Phoebe felt drawn to one direction. It was just one door. It seemed familiar and Phoebe didn't see a reason not to trust her gut. If logic and reason failed then what else did she have to rely on?