It's the day of the joust, but Mittens has just received word that there's a gathering of adventurers over at the guild.

Meanwhile, at the guild are Emerald, Bridget and a bunch of NPC adventurers. And Terdisas, if it's convenient.

Mittens of course shows up for the gathering of heroes.  Priorities and all that.

Lucky shows up as well.

  Terdisas is conveniently where it is convenient to be.  How Convenient.  He greets the recent Chris Alt arrivals, "Hello, it is always a pleasure to see you both.  Hopefully the purpose to this gathering does not dampen this pleasantry."

Emerald says, "Bit too much to hope for, Terdisas."

Bridget says, "The city's population has been experiencing an increase in nightmares. I may not be superstitious, but I don't believe entire populations have nightmares on a regular basis unless the city is full of crime or the city is being attacked by some opposing power, be it magical, psionic, primal or even divine in nature. The plan is to venture out into the neighboring territories and investigate other possible changes or signs of influence. Grayhawk have asked that as many adventurers as possible aid in this. The moment anyone has a lead, they are to immediately contact me with this:"

Bridget displays a pearl. "Each of you will get one. It is a special pearl that is attuned to psionic power. Liberty has one and through it, she will be our connection to each other. I have been instructed to let you all know these pearls are not for keeping and should be returned either when the mission is complete or you are done with assisting."

"Happy to help!" Mittens says, "Me am get on it right away!"

She goes to grab a pearl and rush off to tell her sibs.

"What she said," Lucky says, waiting his turn for a pearl.

  How fortunate that Terdisas is good for every single CHA based skill, with a side in Arcana.  "I think only a particularly foolish person would attempt to sell such property."  And if Kyle were in this thread, he's be smart enough to know you can't Disenchant Magic Item a plot device.

  "As this seems to be a city wide phenomenon, it may be pointless to ask.  But has your own initial research into this been able to note if there is a particular area of the city this first occurred in?"

Bridget answers, "Everywhere, though more sporadically. There were people from each part of the city who had nightmares. Then the number of people who had nightmares just grew from there. A good question, but unfortunately, an unhelpful answer."

Liberty is there, sitting on the bar and kicking her legs idly. "Well let's get started then."

"Also presumably the city itself has already been searched," Lucky guesses, "But knowing that it wasn't targeting a specific part of the city narrows things down in itself.  I'm guessing there's a limited number of these pearls?  We should form groups and have 1 pearl to a group in that case.  Unless the number of pearls exceed the number of adventurers..."

He glances at Liberty.

"I thought you were staying here with Bridget to help coordinate."

  Terdisas would be inclined to agree with Lucky's last point.  You do not designate someone mission control, then send them out into the fray.  "You can not do everything Bridget, what you have done is already more than I'd expect from most establishments."  Okay, so that's mostly true.  Most establishments wouldn't hand over 'return or else' conveniences.  But the 'we only have vague details anyone could learn at a bar.  Get to it' part, usual expectations.

Liberty looks at Lucky and then Terdisas respectively. "I said let's get started. Meaning I'll get started on coordinating and you get started on venturing."

Bridget says, "The pearls are in short supply, yes. Please divvy them as you see fit. As long as the pearls return to the crown, I don't have a problem with how you use them." because never in Bridget's mind does it even occur to her that people might use those pearls to force-ably choke someone or some other thing that would cause Bridget to rephrase her statement.

"Oh.  Ok.  Just checking.  Well, Terdisas?  Shall we go see what kind of team we can scrounge up?"

He waves goodbye to Bridget and Liberty before heading out.

  Terdisas follows after, commenting "So far, one of our more usual setups of Yourself, Emerald, Mittens and I are working on this.  Although more for this task would be far from a wasted effort due to the extent of this search."

  Though, Terdisas is inclined to stick with Lucky.  He isn't quite sure when the habit of watching over the cleric developed.

Emerald says, "Well since Mittens went to get her siblings, that's two down. Off the top of my head, there's May, Bethany, Angel, Meriele, Dauros,  and that cherub Carla."

Enter two children. Maverick walks up to the group, holding hands with the tiefling child Shina. Emerald looks over to them. Maverick bows lightly. Shina giggles and says, "So can WE help?"

"Trick is finding any of them available at any given time," Lucky says, "They may have formed teams of their own already like Mittens apparently is doing.  Let's check at the guild to see who's there."

When children arrive offering to die in a fire, Lucky panics for a brief moment.

"I'm sure Bridget can find ways for you to be helpful that doesn't include you being in mortal danger.  Thanks for offering!"

  "True, while all would be quite helpful, all may not be available."  He looks to Shina and Maverick with a bit more optimism, giving a bow of his own.  He keeps a straight expression at Lucky's less than crazy mindset.  "Lucky, we are still searching for where the problem's cause even is, let alone what it is.  I have no doubt they can aid us while avoiding undue risk to themselves."

The group just came from the guild, so Lucky would have suggested another location. Like town square perhaps.

Maverick and Shina nod in agreement with Lucky and then when Terdisas speaks up, they both look confused. "OK... so what's going on then?" Maverick asks.

"Given the circumstances, I'm expecting an ambush to be at least as likely as when we escorted Antionette," Lucky answers Joe, "Bridget can fill you in.  Someone is targeting our city.  Someone likely very powerful and very evil.  We're out to find them.  I doubt they'll take kindly to being found."

Since he doesn't know where else to look for heroes, he just follows Emerald's lead once she takes said lead.

  "No slight meant against either party, but I highly doubt Maverick or Shina will refrain from helping just on our request.  If they are with us, then at the very least we can help to further ensure their saftey if your expectations come to pass."

Maverick says, "I'm slowing you down by even having this conversation. I will speak with Bridget as you asked. Just keep looking for people to help like you were doing."

Shina looks slightly disappointed, but Maverick tugs on her and she follows him. They head towards the guild.

Emerald goes towards town square and begins her search for extra help. Bethany sissy-runs to the group and says, "Hi! I heard people are on the lookout for what is causing all the nightmares! I can help!"

Emerald nods. "Right now, we're collecting helpers before we search."

(( OOC:

quote:

"I'm sure Bridget can find ways for you to be helpful...

))

Lucky decides against arguing the point that he wasn't asking the kids to not be helpful.

"Oh hi, Bethany.  Thanks for offering to help.  Perhaps you can take my place while I go make sure the kids don't get themselves killed."

Lucky is now paranoid about children sneaking off without adult supervision.

  Terdisas is less certain about Shina (nevermind the first time he met her, she was alone in the middle of dangerous ruins), but is relatively certain Maverick is in the 'can go on without you' category when it comes to trying dealing with problems facing the city.

  For the sake of Lucky's brain, he does not give in to the temptation of reminding the cleric that Bethany is the youngest person (at least, youngest at being a person shape) they know.  "Wonderful to hear Bethany.  Were you intenting to offer you general aid, or was there an aspect to our troubles you already had some insight to?"

"I can take your place, Lucky." Bethany replies. She then looks at Terdisas. "Well like everyone else, I had a nightmare. But for me, the nightmare had a familiar tone. I think the person making this happen is sad and doesn't mean harm."

Emerald says, "That's interesting. Still need to find the cause so we can calm this person and rescue everyone from the nightmares."

Meanwhile, Lucky would find Maverick and Shina enter the guild.

Lucky enters after the kids and waves at Bridget.

Maverick and Shina are in there, mid-chat with Bridget. Bridget spots Lucky. "...is something wrong?" she asks. The kids look over their shoulders to see Lucky.

"You may not know, but Emerald volunteered to be Maverick's foster mom, and I to be Shina's guardian when she's not at the orphanage," Lucky says, "I'll be staying here in the city to watch over them while Emerald works on searching for the source of this trouble."

Because Maverick already made it quite clear that staying at the orphanage while Emerald is adventuring isn't an option.  So Lucky can either spend all his time watching for Maverick trying to slip away, or searching for him once he does.

Bridget says, "I am staying here with Liberty. So it makes more sense for me to watch over the kids since you are needed."
This message was last edited by the GM at 05:05, Sat 16 July 2011.

  "Not all who mean no harm are successful in avoiding it though.  However, if true this is an encouraging sign.  Although, who or what is it that you think is causing these events?  Would you have a guess as to why as well?"  Wow, Forests sure know a lot.

  To be fair, Sorcerery has never been large on book learning normally.

Bethany says, "I remember an elf who frequented me. He felt the same as these dreams..."

Emerald says, "Would you recognize him if you saw him?"

Bethany says, "Yes."