"I..i..i..i..i..i..i..i." Ralph said before collapsing into Shawn's arms.

"I'm sorry!" He yelled, tears now flowing down his face.

"Sheesh." Penelope observed.

Shawn squeezed Ralph even tighter, holding him for a moment. Then, when Ralph's sobs had subsided, he gently let the kid go and called over to the other side of the tree. "Okay, Bobby, you should go next!" Shawn didn't think it'd be a good idea to let Bobby be by himself on the other side of the tree.

Bobby headed down towards the solitary Tree that seemed to not be directly connected to the strange land nor any of the strange plants on  either side of the path. The Willow Tree was given ample space to spread out into the surrounding air space spilling over abundantly onto the worn mountain path the kids had traveled.

Bobby now approached the veil of leaves and branches of the Willow Tree with a cautious look on his face.


04:39, Today: Bobby failed (no successes) using 1d10 with the World of Darkness nWoD system with a target of 8, rerolling 10s ((5)).

When Bobby emerged past the veil there was an angry look on his face. The look was directed at Shawn. He took several strides forward, almost breaking out into a run like he was going to hunt Shawn down. It looked like a fight was going to break out, just like any kid had seen at the school yard.

However, as Bobby became to run, his face softened as if he had forgotten what it was that was making him so angry. By the time he approached Shawn, his face grew slack and tired, the fury of his footsteps slowed to a trot and then to a mild walk.

He stopped a few feet in front of Shawn.

"Oh, brother! That was weird." He announced.

No one knew what Bobby had learned. And judging by the confused look on his face, it was possible that Bobby himself had already forgotten.

Shawn had felt his stomach drop out of its bottom when he saw the look on Bobby's face, and a surge of relief as it went away, replaced by his usual affable confusion. He gave Bobby
a friendly pat on the back. "Tiffany! You'd better come across now!""

Or had they...?

There was a sudden sense that perhaps Bobby might have known what had made him forget. And this thought crossed everyone else's mind. Just as it was about to materialize into an actual thought that each kid might share, Tiffany ran forward eager not to be left behind. She pushed through the veil and towards the group.


20:43, Today: Shawn's Neighbor - Tiffany Wilson failed (no successes) using 1d10 with the World of Darkness nWoD system with a target of 8, rerolling 10s ((6)).

Tiffany, the kids learned, as the young girl meandered through the Willow Tree's branches, had done something very, very bad once. It was a secret that up until now, only Tiffany knew. But now everyone would know. Tiffany was responsible for someone's death.

Last summer she had been playing around on the driveway before the Wilson's had moved to L.A. It was there that she had opened the car door and disengaged the emergency brake of the vehicle. It was an accident, but one that would cause the car to roll backwards into the middle of the road where another car, driven by a young 17 year old girl would have to swerve to avoid it. Unfortunately, that girl hit a tree, ending her life at a young age.

"I didn't do it!" Tiffany yelled at the group. But her voice was unconvincing. It was a lie. And everyone knew it.

Shawn looked at Tiffany with shock and sadness. But he tried to say something vaguely comforting. "You didn't mean it, though. It wasn't your fault." That was the important bit, right? If you didn't want anybody hurt, it wasn't a bad thing, right?

"Yes you did," Delilah whispered. Shawn was right, it was an accident. But Delilah was stuck on how to respond. She'd never considered a goody-goody like Tiffany could have made such a terrible mistake.

Tiffany kept saying something about how she didn't do it, or didn't mean to do it. But given the sight before them on the other side of the Willow Tree, her justifications faded into background for just a second.

The environment on the other side of the Tree was different. The path itself, which had been dusty, was now lined with cobblestones leading up to large hill. And on top of that hill, the path divided into too.  The sky was a gray-blue, with smears of muddy brown as if it had been dunked in water and was now at the bottom of a pond.

Under previous circumstances, Bradford or Clayton would have been there to guide them. But Bradford was gone and the case that Delilah had next to her was still and at rest.

"Up there." Penelope pointed, signalling that the path divided, something that everyone except the complaining Tiffany had already seen and noted.

"L...l...l...look" Ralph said, squinting uphill. "There's a...a..a..a..a..a..a..a..a..a sign." he said, taking several steps forward.

It was true.

There was an old wooden sign. On the top a wooden arrow pegged to the old post pointed towards the right with the words "Crazy Crazy Town."

Just below, a lopsided wooden arrow pointed to the left and red "The Egg Briar Patch."

"Crazy, Crazy Town." Bobby repeated, a distant tone in his voice. "I wonder what that means."

"And Briar Patch." Tiffany was quick to say, rejoining the conversation and seemingly happy that the focus, at least for the moment, had shifted to something else besides the Willow Tree.

"Egg Briar Patch." Penelope corrected Tiffany and the two girls gave each other dirty looks.

Shawn looked at the two directions, trying to see if there were any obvious differences in what they looked like or where they went. "Briars seem like they'd hurt..."

"It's a Briar Patch," she said simply to quell the argument between the two girls. Delilah had no idea what an egg briar was, but it didn't sound good. She knew what a briar patch was, though. But a crazy town...? "Crazy Crazy Town sounds really creepy."

Creepier than living puppets. Delilah picked up Mr. Clayton's case. "This place has a red sky and flying dragon monsters. That's crazy. Over there might be double crazy."


She looked at the two paths. "We gotta get that instrument thing to stop all of this. But I think we should try the briar patch, you guys.."

“It’s not just a briar patch. It’s an egg briar patch. You know what lays eggs? Dragons.” Shawn pointed at the top of the mountain for emphasis. “If this place is crazy, maybe Crazy Town is normal. ‘Cause what’s crazier in a crazy place? I think we should go through Crazy Town.”

"Ha! You're crazier than crazy if you think that Crazy Crazy town isn't crazy!" Penelope quirked, and she gave a little dance in a circle to demonstrate her point.

"But I wanna break stuff. And eggs are fun to break--SPLAT!" she smacked a fist into an open palm in front of her. "Let's go to the Egg patch." she suggested.

"Cr...cr...cr...crazy town." Ralph said, in response to Shawn's statement that Briar's might hurt. And he stepped closer to Shawn, giving Shawn a look that said 'I'm with you on this' and then looking towards the others with a look that said 'I'm with Shawn, whatever he decides'
This message was last edited by the player at 00:02, Fri 01 June 2018.

"Crazy Crazy Town." Bobby said again, as if trying to work the words in his mouth, trying to make sense of them. It didn't sound like he was voting, but more trying to make sense of something crazy.

"I wanna go home!" Tiffany complained and kicked the cobble stone in front of her with one foot. "OW!" She yelped, pulling the foot back and then sitting down to rub the pain out of it.

"So that's three votes for Crazy Town, and two for Egg Briar Patch." Shawn took a few steps down the Crazy Town path, and then turned around to see if any of the others had followed.

"Come on!" Delilah looked frantically between the two girls. She struggled to build a case to rival Shawn's. "We don't know if there's gonna be dragon eggs. We don't even know what kinda eggs. But towns have people. And I don't think these are gonna be good people."

“If there’s people, I bet they’d know about the dragon! They could tell us about the dragon’s weakness, or secret passageways into its cave. What could we learn from eggs?” Shawn tried to sound like he knew what he was talking about, and not cribbing from old fantasy novels.

"Nuh-uh." Penelope retorted. "The Egg Briar Patch is probably where it's at. We could smash 'em and then probably get into a gooey egg fight!"

When Shawn said something about Dragons, Penelope' energy quieted down. "I don't want anything to do with what happened. If we have to go up that mountain, I'm staying outside while you guys get Bradford."

Ralph followed Shawn two steps down the path of Crazy Crazy Town. "Crazy..cray..cray...cray..cray...cray..Crazy Town." he affirmed.