Patchwork Universe

Jones · Posted: Mon Jun 28, 2004 2:45 pm Post subject: Shock and Awe

ooc: from 'View from the Famlands'

Jennifer Jones hurried to get blankets to wrap round the chilled figure of Lady Violetta while Doctor Domenova unlaced the woman's stays and checked her for damage.
"Seems like shock," she said. "But she's very cold. Really we should put her into a bath of hot water but I don't like the noises from out there. This place may not be as secure as you hope it would be, Mrs Jones."

Accepting the pile of blankets Jennifer had brough she wrapped Violetta up in them and requested a hot brick to put under her feet. Then, liftign a glass of brandy to the woman's blue lips, she tried to persuade her to swallow it.

Lady Violetta Kingsley · Posted: Mon Jun 28, 2004 7:05 pm Post subject:

As the bitter liquid splashed onto Violetta's lips and spilled around her mouth, the chilled woman coughed and spluttered back into consciousness. Struggling weakly and ineffectively against the enveloping blankets, she swallowed as much of the brandy as she could before shaking her head weakly. Looking around at her new surroundings, she recognised that she was once again within the pub and breathed a slow sigh of relief. Spasms of shivering swept through her body and she was too weak to do anything but sit staring at her rescuers. Her eyes had an odd appearance as they searched around the room; many of her eyelashes had frozen and broken off on the journey towards the pub, and her glasses, still perched on the end of her nose, were completely fogged up.

Slowly she regained awareness. The first hesitant words out of her mouth were "does anyone have any laudanum?"

Kalyndis · Good Joined: 22 Jan 2004 Posts: 188 Location: Kerya

A loud thump was audible from outside and round the corner, as if something heavy had landed at the back door.

Dr Jewel · Posted: Tue Jun 29, 2004 7:42 am Post subject:

Jewel arrived very suddenly through the wall linking the kitchen to the Public Bar.

"Dragon." She panted. "Out there."

She moved over to the outside wall and stuck her head cautiously through it.

Jones · Posted: Tue Jun 29, 2004 9:28 am Post subject:

Jennifer stared at her, repeating the words:
"A dragon?"

Doctor Domenova barely seemed conscious of the interuption, focused instead on her patient. Holding a small bottle under Violetta's nose from which came an acrid smell she said:
"It's not laudanum you need, it's to take deep breaths and stay calm. Try putting your head between your knees if you feel faint again."

Lady Violetta Kingsley · Posted: Tue Jun 29, 2004 10:20 am Post subject:

Violetta coughed at the unpleasant smell coming from the bottle and summoned up enough strength to push it away. It came as something of a shock to her to realise that she was in a state of undress and her arm immediately vanished back beneath the blanket. She scowled at the doctor.

"I didn't faint. I'm not the fainting type, thank you so much. The cold burns."

The fire left her eyes once more; she was clearly not in a state to put up much of a fight. "A dragon? It could be Kalyndis. Maybe we should let him in. It's rough out there," she croaked, before closing her eyes and returning to her dazed state.

Dr Jewel · Posted: Tue Jun 29, 2004 11:12 am Post subject:

"It's squatting outside." Jewel withdrew her head from outside. "If this pub isn't fireproof we may need to evacuate."

She turned to Violetta.

"The dragon isn't Kalyndis." She said, trying to ignore a nasty suggestion which had started up in the back of her mind. "I haven't seen Kalyndis, maybe he's still in human form. This dragon killed Father Michael. Burned him to death. What's left of him is outside. When the monsters are gone we're going to collect his body. Give it some sort of proper funeral."

She turned back to the wall.

"Maybe I should go out and see if I can distract it." She pondered aloud. "Wish I was certain that being a ghost made me flameproof."

Kalyndis · Good Joined: 22 Jan 2004 Posts: 188 Location: Kerya

There was a sound like a loud cough, and a bright light filtered through the cracks in the shutters for a moment.

[OOC: This won't be immediately obvious from inside the house, particularly as everyone is now downstairs, but the roof at the kitchen end of the house is now on fire.]

Anyone peering through those cracks would then have seen a large shape flash across their field of view, and heard a cracking impact like a tree turning to matchwood.

[OOC: Anyone hiding in the outhouse? That just got demolished.]

Something roared outside, rising into the night.

Had it gone?

Dr Jewel · Posted: Tue Jun 29, 2004 2:12 pm Post subject:

The new noise sent Dr Jewel through the wall again to investigate. However, she was back within moments, looking annoyed.

"The roof is on fire at this side of the pub." She announced. "And it looks like that small building around the back has been destroyed. But there's no sign of the dragon any more."

She started towards the kitchen's supply of water, then groaned loudly.

"I can't carry water." She said. "Sorry."

Jones · Posted: Tue Jun 29, 2004 2:49 pm Post subject:

Jennifer clattered a load of buckets out of a cupboard and turned on the faucets of the kitchen sink full blast. Pushing past Kao Sheng in the rapidly full kitchen she passed through the insubstational body of Dr Jewel, and apologised in a flustered way.

Fortunately, Jack Jones and Jareth appeared just then in the kitchen, having come from the front of the pub and began to form a bucket chain. As the willing hands endeavoured to put out the fire, heads craned upwards to stare into the blackness above, looking for the dragon and the kite.

[ooc: this thread crosses over with A Dragon Dices with Death as characters move from one to the other.]

Jones · Posted: Tue Jun 29, 2004 3:12 pm Post subject:

Abruptly the scene outside was illuminated by more than the leaping flames of the fire. As if someone had flipped a switch the darkness that shrouded the pub patch was replaced by dazzling sunshine, the golden light of a summer afternoon.

As grey smoke belched up from the burning pub building and the bucket chain coughed and spluttered and blinked in the sudden sunlight, people automatically looked up once more into the blue sky, wondering if the dragon would have vanished with the darkness.

Dr Jewel · Posted: Tue Jun 29, 2004 4:33 pm Post subject:

"Thank goodness." Jewel said with relief.

She looked, rather guiltily, at the bucket chain.

"I think I'll go outside and see if anyone there needs any help." She said. "Plus I'll check that the monsters are all gone. Particularly that the dragon has gone."

[OOC : Jewel leaves the Pub again]

Lady Violetta Kingsley · Posted: Tue Jun 29, 2004 4:50 pm Post subject:

Lady Violetta watched miserably as the bucket chain did its work. She didn't think she'd ever be warm again, and she was certainly in too much pain to consider moving. Idly she noticed the return of daylight. A priest dead and the building on fire. She thought for a few moments about Aldersley's wonderful library crisping in hot flames and shuddered. What a terrible place this Patchwork was.

Kao Sheng · Posted: Tue Jun 29, 2004 6:36 pm Post subject:

Kao Sheng, standing relatively unobtrusively in a corner, looked outside with some approval as daylight returned.

"Ah, it seems that some degree of tranquility has been restored," he said with satisfaction. With a faint smile to Lady Violetta he set the spellbook down upon one of the worksurfaces with almost reverent care.

"I hope, fair lady, that you now feel at least slightly recovered from your ordeal?"

Lady Violetta Kingsley · Posted: Tue Jun 29, 2004 7:37 pm Post subject:

Violetta looked dubious, and commented in a rather croaky voice. "Mr. Sheng, if I had the slightest bit of energy, I might be quite angry at you now. It would appear that at least one person has died here and I can't help feeling that as a quasi-divine entity, you could perhaps have prevented it. At the moment, I feel somewhat like one of Mr. Frankenstein's early experiments, and since Mary Shelley can't write to save her life this is not at all a desirable state to be in. The religious gentleman would appear to have been considerably worse off than that.

"And on top of all this, Mr. Sheng, I cannot but shake the disturbing feeling that you are in some sense responsible for these regretable circumstances. Oh never mind, what's the use, you're just going to get all inscruitable at me again.

"Thank you for rescuing me from certain death, even if I am unsure at this juncture that gratitude is appropriate."