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Post by Strife on Dec 28, 2006 9:05:35 GMT -5
Strife looked briefly around the cafe. Flooding waters, a weasel infestation... yes, yes, he had already experienced all of these things in the time loop. It seemed as though everything was occuring the same way as before, once again...
But wait! Strife gasped and looked towards a nearby table, where he spotted Kat. She looked exhausted and possibly wounded. "Kat... She never looked like that before..." he thought to himself. The timeline was changing... But how?
His thoughts were interrupted when he felt a sharp poke in his ribs. It almost made him giggle, but he turned around to see Rider sitting backwards in a chair between him and Plushie.
"Do I have to report this to Leoness?" she teased.
"What?" replied Plushie irritably. "If you think we're shipping behind Leo's back, you're sadly mistaken." She then started to chuckle a little. "I can't count how many times i've zapped Strife because he wouldn't shut up about that lion girl."
"I've poked him a few times myself actually..." the two girls started laughing.
"Hey, shut up!" barked Strife. His voice caused some nearby weasels to scramble and run away in random directions. "I've just about HAD it with..."
Strife then spotted something in the distance. It caused him to stop abruptly and turn his head, his eyes wide with surprise. Rider and Plushie turned their heads as well.
"That strange writing on the table over there..." Strife pointed to the ominous table with its glowing text. "That was never here before."
"Of course not." said Rider. "We just encountered the problem today."
"No no no, I mean it never occured in the timeline before! Of all the times i've repeated this day, i've never seen that inscription in the cafe... That would explain why Kat looks so exhausted. It's like... it's almost as if the writing exists in a seperate temporal plane, and it just now came to exist in our own..."
Rider raised her eyebrow curiously. Strife saw the expression on her face and immediately halted his temporal mechanics lesson. "Okay, Rider... I don't know how else to say this, but you gotta believe me..." He then proceeded to explain to Rider his situation with the zit remover and the time loop, just like he did with Plushie.
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Post by Rider on Dec 28, 2006 10:52:15 GMT -5
[glow=red,2,300]Rider raised an eyebrow. This was pushing the envelope of weird, even in a place where weasels ran amok and that horse was gonna need some serious therapy after this...
"Well..." Rider said cautiously, "I don't pretend to know a lot about temperate planes."
"Temporal," Plushie hissed.
"Buit I definitely think we should follow up on that magpie graffitti. Maybe it holds some sort of clue."
Plushie sighed. Either Rider was so professional that she was taking a firm course of action... or she just didnt get it.
"We ought to start by talking to Kat... then maybe talking to Kiddo."[/glow]
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Post by nocturne on Dec 28, 2006 12:40:50 GMT -5
"Kat?" Nocturne said uncertainly. Across the cafe he saw Kat staring at a table he had cleaned not an hour ago, a look of horror on her face. Strife was also gazing cautiously at Kat, before being poked in the ribs by Rider.
"Brrreeeee cuuuc?" A little cucco asked at Nocturne's feet.
"I don't know," Nocturne said distractedly. "She does seem a little odd today. Odder than usual." The cucco shrugged as much as a flightless bird could and resolved to peck playfully at Nocturne's shoelaces.
Not a moment after resuming his mopping, Nocturne cupped a hand to his ear. "What was that, Kat?" He asked. "Couldn't hear you."
"Get out," the mage whispered hoarsely. "And never return. That's what it said!"
Nocturne frowned, sighed, then smiled, one after another. "Another mystery? Hm. Beats mopping floors."
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Post by Zylaa on Dec 28, 2006 12:54:18 GMT -5
Zylaa stood up and pocketed the sharpies with a flourish. "Well if the writing was written on the underside of the table, it's a rather misguided ominous message," she said. "We wouldn't have had any warning if that person hadn't grabbed Kiddo's shoe."
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Post by nocturne on Dec 28, 2006 14:17:16 GMT -5
Nocturne looked away from Kat and sighed at Zylaa, who was moving away from a pranked NSQ, grinning mischievously. Without a word, he mopped NSQ's face and erased all signs of sharpies.
"Underside? That reminds me," Nocturne said, taking a cucco and holding it under a table. The cucco pecked at the gum that had been wedged there by the people who had finished chewing their gum, but lacked a place to put it. Nocturne pulled out the cucco and tut-tutted. "You aren't supposed to swallow the gum, you avian goof," he said. "You could choke."
"Breeeep cucco!" The cucco insisted.
"I don't care if it tastes good!" Nocturne exclaimed. "The point is, you could choke and die. Then I wouldn't have as many wild cuc-" A dreamy smile swept over Nocturne's face. "On second thought, never mind. Eat all the gum you want."
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Post by zarikrahia on Dec 28, 2006 14:17:46 GMT -5
'Ominous warnings? Really? I've only been in here for what, 15 minutes and something just happened.' She examined the table, muttering 'I have no idea what this is. Or where it came from.
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Post by Kat on Dec 30, 2006 1:20:44 GMT -5
"It's as if the writing possesses some magic of its own," said Kat to anyone who even bothered to listen. "It reacted when I touched it." She touched her right hand with her other hand, and felt the raw, red marks that reminded her of her little brush with fate and temporal planes.
"Stupid magical runes," she growled, resisting the urge to kick the table and cause further chaos - and she would probably activate more magic if she interfered any more.
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Post by Fraze on Dec 30, 2006 2:17:17 GMT -5
Fraze knew very little about magic. He didn't care to, really--knowing him, he'd inadvertently invent a new spell that would make his fingernails sprout little rainbow-colored flowers. He did, however, know quite a bit about tables. He walked over next to Kat, sat down, and looked at the table. He spoke more to himself than to anyone else.
"People think that tables are just for eating, taking notes, and resting feet. They aren't. Tables have a multitude of uses. I carry a multi-purpose Table of Smiting with me everywhere." He saw a few people look at him strangely when he said this. "What? Kat carries a staff, Tomi and Aeri carry mallets, countless people around here carry swords, katanas, kunai, and countless other bladed thingiedoppers. I carry a Table of Smiting.
"Gripping a Table of Smiting by two of its legs and swinging, it acts as a club or a mace. Sharpen one edge of the Table, and you have a sword of sorts. String a bowstring between two legs, and you have a bow, or a ballista if you turn the Table upside-down. There are many other types of Tables. There are Tables of Protection, Tables of Poking, Tables of Hiding, even Tables of Dialup Internet Speeding. This one looks most like an average, but larger-than-usual, Table of Smiting. A multi-purpose Table that can be used for many things. A Swiss Army Table, if you will. See here, it has rubber foam grips on near the base of the legs.
"I've never heard of enchanting a Table of Smiting, but I'm not surprised someone has done it. But Tables of Smiting are for fighting and self-defense. What is one doing in a cafe?"
Fraze turned to Shiva. "Was this furniture here before you bought this place? If so, do you know what it was used before you bought it? If you got the furniture, where did you get it from?"
He then turned to Kat. "You probably have more expertise in this matter, but magic is supposed to be used, isn't it? And magic is meant to enhance the object it has enchanted, correct? I can tell you with 99% certainty that this was, at one point, a Table of Smiting. Wouldn't the best way to find out about the magic of this Table be to use it as a Table of Smiting?Could that help us figure out why we are supposed to 'leave and never come back?' I'd better stop rambling. May I try to use this Table?"
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Post by zarikrahia on Dec 30, 2006 15:34:15 GMT -5
Zari crossed her arms 'A table of smiting, huh? Leave and never come back? Sounds like one of three things- One, someone might have been offended by the NTWF-ing going on in here. Two, we need to get out and fast cuz there's some ancient curse on the place, or Three, this someone idea of a funny joke. It might be something different, but it looks like that to me.'
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Post by Kat on Dec 31, 2006 3:24:35 GMT -5
Kat thought for a moment. "I guess it's only the text that hurts anyone, so as long as you keep away from it, the table should be fine. Your call," she said to Fraze. "But when something starts going wrong, especially when it's just a little bit magical, I take over."
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Post by Fraze on Dec 31, 2006 3:47:41 GMT -5
Nodding, Fraze circled around the Table, trying to figure out which legs to grasp. He finally decided that the two farthest from the writing would be safest.
He picked up the Table. It was heavy, of course, but he knew how to hold it. Bending his knees slightly, he took it just outside of the building.
He decided to start with a basic swing. He held the Table to his left, so that the tabletop was facing left and the legs were facing right. He brought it around with a sweep. Nothing particularly interesting.
He tried a different maneuver. Starting from the same point, he swept the Table right and up, then brought it down to the ground. The edge of the Table thudded against the grass, leaving a furrow.
He experimented with other moves--spinning it around one-handed, bringing it around behind him, blocking, thrusting, jabbing, impaling. If he had a bowstring, he would have tested it for its projectile capabilities, but he did not. It behaved just as a Table of Smiting should.
However...the attacks were all much more powerful than he was used to. When jabbing the legs downward in one move, the legs went so far into the soil that they got stuck, and he had to pry them loose. With a regular Table, he could only have gotten the legs an inch or two into the ground. He assumed that this was due to some magic.
He had just one move left. A very difficult maneuver, that he was still learning. It required significant brute strength, which he did not possess. How he could wield a Table as well as he did, was a mystery even to him. Making sure that no one and nothing was close to him, he swung the Table around his head with one hand. And around, and around, faster and faster. When he could not take the exertion anymore, he flung it forward. It traveled about ten feet. Not far by some standards, but far enough to knock a nearby opponent off his or her feet.
The Table touched the ground...
((I'll stop here. Don't want to take the story too far in my own direction.))
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Post by Ebil on Jan 1, 2007 12:20:06 GMT -5
Ebil re-entered the cafe, the struggling demonic weasel clasped tightly in her arms. The evil thing had escaped into the street and she'd been chasing it. Now to return it to Zylaa... but just then, with a loud pop, the weasel vanished. In its place was a feathered crimson hat. Ebil stared at the hat for a moment, then decided it was obviously some sort of strange magic at work. Ah, well, she'd rather deal with a hat than a weasel anyway. She noticed that her shoes were once again making satisfying clicking noises on the floor, as opposing to squishing or splooshing ones. They had a new janitor, apparently...
A few moments of scanning the cafe with her intent hamsterish peepers allowed her to notice the strange individual with birds clustered around him. Hmm, he was kind of cute.
She hurried over to Zav's table as soon as she noticed that the lady was calling for a waitress.
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Post by Omni on Jan 1, 2007 15:02:20 GMT -5
Omni's fur was still dripping wet, and so wherever she went chasing weasels she also left a wet trail behind. They were just out of control, getting into the craziest places. A few weasels even hopped on her, trying to get an Omni-back ride. She shook violently, trying to shake the weasels off, sending water flying everywhere as well.
"Oops... Sorry Noc."
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Post by Strife on Jan 2, 2007 14:40:45 GMT -5
The Table touched the ground... ...and sank into the soil. Of course, the table's landing was accompanied by a loud slamming noise, and more noticeably, a shockwave that caused the nearby ground to vibrate and tickle everyone's feet. Even those inside the cafe felt it slightly. Strife smiled a little when he felt the vibration pleasantly crawl up his legs, but his expression soon became serious again. He needed to focus. He'd pay attention to Fraze's target practice later. He turned to Rider. "Sounds like a good idea. Let's go talk to Kat, see if she knows anything we don't." Strife and Plushie began to lift themselves from their seats. |
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Post by bag on Jan 2, 2007 16:42:52 GMT -5
Bag popped in again and was suddenly ready to take orders.
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