sit yourself down, and meet the best inn keeper in town ( O P E N )

[checkingin]

Who: Everyone!
Where: The initial arrival rooms, the main lobby, all over the place.
When: February 3rd
What: Welcome, newbies.

ARRIVAL.

you wake up when you hit the floor in a dark room, and the air is knocked out of your lungs. the carpet is threadbare, worn with use, kind of dusty. and you're not the first person to endure this crash landing. nor will you be the last.

once your vision rights itself, you can see the well-lit hallway through the doorjam straight ahead of you. not to say there’s monsters in the shadows, but something propels you towards that door and out into the bright hallway beyond.

and once outside your room, you can hear it: the steady thrum of rain outside.

MAIN LOBBY.

there's a staircase at the end of the lengthy hallway you tumble out of. grab your suitcase and follow the dull green exit signs on the ceiling until you reach the disappointingly bland stairs that lead you down to the ornate old fashion hotel lobby.

to your left is a warmly crackling fireplace, to your right is a lobby desk. straight ahead are three large sets of doors, though only one of them is open to the public. and outside the few (curtained, permanently dark) windows is the continually steady hiss of rain.

welcome to the hotel.

FRONT DESK.

though there is a bell and a plaque designating the desk to be the main desk, the customer service desk, there are currently no staff members behind it. none shall answer your calls, either.

terribly sorry for the inconvenience.

SCREENING ROOM.

on a tall pull-down screen, a silent version of nosferatu will be playing on loop. at the back of the room, between the neat rows of fold out chairs, mounted on a wobbly table is the old timey projector, and mounted on the walls are some rather old speakers that warble out "terrifying" old timey music.

along the curtained windows is another long table, with a large bowl that looked like it once would have held popcorn. but is now unfortunately empty. same for the large hot drink dispensers labeled "hot chocolate" and "coffee".

OTHER.

the ballroom and breakfast hall are currently closed, grand doors locked.

there is no main door leading to the outside, good luck trying to find one.

the door to the courtyard is locked.

ROOMS.

you've a room key with your assigned room number on it. all the new guest residences will be located on floors one & two. while there is an open elevator in the main lobby, and the buttons light up inside, the doors will not close. all in all, you'd be better off taking the stairs.

while they're the same stairs you undoubtedly came down to get to the lobby, the door to the endless hall everyone woke up in will not reappear between the main floor and the subsequent residential halls.

there are twenty rooms per floor. feel free to get to know your surroundings; or your neighbors as they trickle in around you.

Comments

[trepidations]

I mean, I don't know much more than that, we... we don't really use these where I'm from but I had to read about it in a book.

[ Muggle Studies. The bane of his very existence. ]

But yeah, the light puts the picture there. Er... like, you know. Light through windows -- shadows and all. Stained glass, maybe?

[ A shot in the dark, but maybe she'll understand that? ]

[sheriffing]

I didn't say we weren't kidnapped. I still think there's a portal involved. [Makes it a lot harder than just opening doors and walking out, unfortunately.] If they can bleed for this, trust me, they're going to.

But time works differently here and magic doesn't work at all, so I'm going to assume whoever did this is powerful enough to have altered all of that when they brought us in.

[64th]

Yeah! [ like she's going to admit she was wrong or that she overreacted. even though both of those things are true. seeing as how it got her nowhere, she might need to re-think her approach. ] The front of your head, too. [ she raises an eyebrow. now she's teasing, prodding at him for a reaction. ]

What kind of condition makes someone wake up in a hotel with strangers? [ but okay, yes. they're all in this together. unfortunately. ] It's not the flu.

[64th]

[ that gets a chuckle out of her. ] Stick with me, I'm a favorite.

arrival

[64th]

[ from the way she whips around when Emily taps her on the shoulder, Cashmere's obviously not expecting anyone to approach her. she steps back, quick to put distance between herself and this new woman. almost as an afterthought she remembers that she's supposed to be making friends, and Cashmere smiles. ]

Hi. Yeah. I guess I don't have anywhere else to be. [ just hanging around the lobby, waiting to see who else shows up. she's holding the framed photo she found in her suitcase, pulled close to her chest protectively. ]

[engender]

They pick favorites?

[64th]

Sure. Everyone has a favorite. My brother won the year before I did. We're the first siblings to win. I'm good with cameras, and at the parties, and after the parties. Little girls have dolls of me.

[ is that not normal? ] You don't have celebrities?

[wickedlyable]

Fuck no. I'm not an idiot. ((Even if she's being vulgar, at least it brings some of the spark back to her previously lifeless expression.)) Next thing you know, I'll wake up in some other country without any idea of who I am. No, thanks.

I think I'll just sit a while and figure out how this tablet works. If there's nothing in the rooms that are monitoring us, then there must be something in the tablets. ((And it's something vaguely useful she can do while giving her wrecked body a rest.))

[wickedlyable]

I'll need a little more than a kit, but thanks for the suggestion. ((Though she doesn't sound very thankful at all.

Her tone, at least, changes from disparaging to surprised when he continues.)) We're all trapped here? All of us? Then it must be Snow - there's no other explanation. Right?

[totheright]

What are you talking about? Ransoming makes the most sense. I'm the heir to a fashion company. What else would they want from me? ((He hasn't even thought of any other possibilities yet.)) I woke up here, just like you did. Obviously, we've been kidnapped.

[engender]

We have celebrities. [ He's just ... processing. ] So, the arena, filming it, that's like our Hollywood. [ In a sense. ] Where is it that you're from?

[villainously]

[ well, that certainly isn't promising. it gets to be all too easy to rely on magic to fix their problems... the idea that they'll have to find an alternative solution is intimidating. ]

Is there some sort of magic dampening spell? How is that possible?

later

[sheriffing]

[Emma feels more like herself after a change of clothes, her date dress folded away and her usual layers and jeans back on. They should have known that their night of peace and quiet was going to come with a price. And she's not sorry that they're stuck (not yet, that'll come later) because it's new enough to feel like they might be able to get out of here and bring Neal home with them. If he's here, then it shouldn't take much to bring him back there, right? It's not much different than them carting Marion off before she could get killed - the timeline is preserved, and all that changes is the future. Henry having his father back would be a change for the better, so there's nothing wrong with fighting for it.

He fought to get back to them, now they have a chance to make that work out the way it always should have. It's not supposed to be possible, but if it is, then they need to find a way to make this work. They need a plan, it's just a little early for that. Not knowing what they're up against or why they're here has them at a disadvantage. There's no known motive, no hints of what's to come. It's eerily quiet in this hotel and the lack of answers has her itching to find out what these people are hiding.

There has to be a reason they were brought here. As random as all of it looks on the outside, she doesn't buy it. No one with this kind of power would just collect a group of strangers from different worlds for the hell of it. She's already accepted that she won't like the truth when it does come out, but any answers at all would be something right now.

Which is why Emma is off finding her own, wandering around on the second floor to get some answers. Once she's had some time to roam around and her eyes fall on the door to 207, she doesn't try to open it; she knocks. It's probably a neighbor and a fellow captive, and even just knowing who ended up around her would be more information than she has at the moment. It's not much, but it's a start, accidentally on-purpose bringing her right to Killian's door.]

[pajarita]

Well that's one established detail.

[pajarita]

...magic? [a little 'are you kidding me' half-smile right there. she could've had high hopes for you, blondie. and now you're talking about magic.]

Drats, and I forgot my wand in my other pants.

[engender]

Along with different realities, a repeating projector and a hotel that locks its guests in. Am I missing anything?

[villainously]

[ hey now, what is suspicious about eyeliner? he's in a bit of a foul temper but still, he can take a joke. he offers a bit of a smirk at the addition. ] I'd have given you the back of my head but the front is perfectly reputable, thank you.

[ his brow rises at her correction of his vocabulary. it seems more that she wants to correct him having been spotted making a mistake and he'll let her have it (even though he's still right). ] However you'd like to put it, darling, we're stuck just the same.

[ivolunteer]

( that is no less infuriating and awful when she's on the ground and squirming against the dusty carpet and an angry lady that doesn't seem like she's about to give up. so while she refuses to say ow, there's some intense teeth gnashing and some aggravated wheezing. )

I don't know where we are any more than I have any idea what you said when you jumped me.

[pajarita]

No staff?

[engender]

No staff.

[ He gives one more look around, a chill passing through him. ] We should get out of here.

[carjacked]

[ If he started setting a bar for allies, he probably wouldn't even meet that bar. Hell, he knows certain important family members wouldn't meet that bar. As far as standards go, Neal's are as low as 'cooperative' and that's pretty much it. ]

Turnin' on each other right off isn't gonna solve anything.

[ He says firmly. Yeah, okay, their kidnappers could be right here, right now, her even (!!) gasp, but he prefers not to think about it like that. ]

Nobody's an enemy until they're an enemy. I'm not getting into that whole twilight zone fiasco, no thanks.

[villainously]

[ he doesn't think it's random, either. this place reminds him too keenly of Neverland, makes him more paranoid and skittish than even Hook himself wants to admit. nobody seems to know a thing, and that just can't be. there has to be someone that knows, and if they're hiding it he'll find them, sooner or later. he's spent enough time trapped in his life, and he's very tired of the whole process. it's true that landing here has given them a gift, if they can bring Baelfire back to Storybrooke once they figure out the intricacies of this place, then it'll be worth all the frustration. he needs to remember that.

after leaving the conversation he interrupted downstairs, he did his damnedest to do exactly as he'd promised. he'd asked around, looked around, tried to see all there was to see. there wasn't much. the hotel was unimpressive, some doors were locked and no matter what he did he couldn't get through them. there wasn't an exit and there was at least one door that had disappeared — he was certain there was an extra door in the stairwell, he'd arrived in a room just off it, and now it was nowhere to be found. he'd checked around a few rooms, but not all of them. all the rooms for guests seemed the same, just from looking at a few.

when he finally hit his own room (supposedly, he'd found it in the case of his things), he'd torn it apart rather carelessly trying to find something. there wasn't a lot to be found. he was likely annoying all the neighbors he had with his intense attempts to get through a window. his lamp wasn't going to recover, and his shoulder was quite sore from trying to get through it of his own force. so far, not so much as a crack. what in the blazes was this window made of?

he nearly missed the knock, it comes just after the sound of the lamp impacting. he's had more than one visitor, now, he was just about done with socializing for the day, but he dropped the mangled remains of the bedside lamp on his stripped bed and wandered over anyway. he'd be grateful that he did, considering who was on the other side... though perhaps with a bit of sense he might have realized she hadn't been looking for him, she'd simply found him on accident.

she'd still found him, though. that did count for something. his expression softened from the grim determination he'd been using trying to beat his way through the window. he'd promised to find her if he found anything, and well, he hadn't. perhaps he should have found her anyway, but he'd been fairly sure Emma would be distracted with other things. Regina was around, her true love was back from the dead... trapped in a new strange place. her schedule was a bit full all considered. ] Emma. [ he did note she'd changed; he hadn't. simply lost the jacket to try and bust open the window. ] Something wrong?

[ other than, you know, the obvious. ]

Re: [A. Because why not.]

[notafraidofyou]

[So maybe they've been hinting around the cape thing for a while, but he's not going to come out and say it. Not a chance.]

Me? I'm an open book.

[dislocked]

[ Don't worry, Tauriel. Soon, it will. And soon, she'll come to realize that not a soul in this establishment (save for the staff) who know where the hell they are, too.

Middle Earth, Arda; he's positive that he's never remotely heard of that. Is she not from the world he's from? Can this even happen? ]

It seems so. Are you human?

[taurohtar]

[He asks as if he already knows the answer, and perhaps it is the simple way he asks — without incredulity, as if he asking her the time, or what the weather is like outside — that has her shaking her head and answering equally simply.]

No. I am a Silvan elf. [She looks him over, noting his round ears, the stubble on his chin, the length of his limbs. The only thing incongruous with the picture is the hint of what appears to be metal at his wrist and hand; does he wear a gauntlet? Why only on one arm?]

You are human, though. [It's half a question, but she's fairly certain she's correct.]