It took what seemed like forever. Bobby, Ralph and Shawn crawled in between the maze of eggs, the wet grass soaking into first their knees and hands, and then up to their elbows and through their shoes. They wove an unknown path through the yellow, purple and green eggs, not knowing where they were going but certain that the growling and screaming of the monstrous Easter Bunny and Tiffany's cries would fade into the background.

And they did.

The eggs, as they were abruptly stopped. As if some kind of wall prevented them from expanding further. Up against the wet terrain, pressed firmly and now more distinct, was an arid desert.

Somewhere in the distance, there was a tree.

Shawn, trying hard not to think about what had happened back there, looked around for the mountain. They needed to find their destination, or things would be really bad!

Shawn looked around. To the left and right, he straddled the line between the Egg Briar patch and the desert. Behind him, lay all those brilliantly colorful eggs and wet grass. There was no sign of the large, pink Rabbit that had attacked Tiffany. Nor was there any sign of Delilah or Penelope.

Ahead of him was the desert. The ground was cracked with a deep drought. Yet in the distance, there was a tree. With something or someone, swinging from a large rope. Shawn couldn't make out at this distance who or what it might be from that tree. It could be a tire swing, like the kind that Anthony had tried to build earlier in the summer without any success. Alternatively, it might be a dead body hanging from a branch like some kind of morbid Old West movie.

Yet, with all of these sights, the mountain was no where to be seen. It would appear, that Shawn had a choice to make. He could turn left and proceed to straddle the line between the Egg Briar patch and the desert. He could turn right and proceed to straddle the line between the Egg Briar patch and the desert. Then, there was always the option of turning back around and making his way back to Delilah and the 'case.' Of course, this would involve risk, for there was a chance that Delilah, Tiffany and Penelope might all be dead. Then there was the option of moving ahead into the desert and into the unknown.

Shawn took a few deep breaths, not so much trying to control his panic as to stop his face from showing the panic that was sweeping through him. He had to pretend to be strong, for Ralph and Bobby's sake. "I think...we should head for the tree. This place is really weird, but I think if we keep moving forward, we'll find what we're looking for."

"But what if we run out of water?" Bobby said logically, indicating that his brain wasn't completely useless.

"J..ju..jus..just do what Sh..sh..sh..sh..Shawn said." Ralph insisted. "Where..where..where..where..where we gonna go? B..b..b..b..b..b..back to the Briar Patch?"
He gave Bobby a little shove, pushing him forward and the kids advanced, crossing the threshold, the ground cracking underneath their feet, dry earth sinking further as they put one foot ahead of the other.

It was instantly hot in the desert and it wasn't long before the Egg Briar Patch with its occasional rain and long wet grass seemed like a distant memory.

As they moved towards the tree, it became clear that it wasn't a hanging body or a tire swing.


It was a cage.


The cage swung listlessly from one of the trees branches. Something was in the cage. Though whatever it was, it wasn't moving.

Shawn slowed his pace, encouraging Bobby and Ralph to match. "Be ready to run away, okay?" He tried to remember, was there a breeze? The cage was swinging, but whatever was inside wasn't moving. He started inching forward, trying to see what was inside the cage without getting too close.

Shawn looked at the swinging cage. It was hard to see what was inside. Hard to recognize initially the small hands and grubby feet and oversized head that he had seen before.

Crowley was inside of the swinging cage, Shawn now saw. One leg was dangling from in between the bars. As Shawn approached, he saw one eye open from Crowley's oversized head. Dried spittle had formed on one side of Crowley's parched mouth.

"Well..*cough*...well." Crowley said to Shawn without moving. Perhaps he was too weak to move. He looked it. Looked like he had been beaten too, judging by the large, oversized purple nodule on his head. That or he had fallen.

"Didn't think I'd see you again." He said to Shawn

Shawn quickly looked around, back and forth, making sure that whoever put Crowley in this cage wasn't somehow still around. "Crowley? What happened to you?" Crowley had always been...well, not really a friend, but someone from the Circus who he thought he mostly understood. Seeing him like this was worrying!

"Careful" Feddler's voice cautioned. "I have heard of this Demon. He isn't a baby at all. He's full of tricks."

---

"Dead! They're all Dead!" Crowley cried out in a harsh, dry gasp. "Well, not all of them" He corrected. "The Fortune Teller is still alive. And she's trying to summon what's left of the Circus. But it's not going to work out. She lost the Crystal Ball! She's blind. The Tattooed Lady is in hiding. Mr. Cherrywinks is also. Hogwash is dead. The Bearded Woman is dead. Squat and Squee and the Wheel of Misfortune. Dead! Griffix has gone mad with hunger. It's over! It's all over!"

"I told you once to watch out for the Tattooed Lady because she was the only one in the Circus besides the Fortune Teller who could write in the Old Tongue. Don't you remember? In the sewers? The Old Tongue from the time before the Circus was a Circus. When it was just a traveling horde of demons, barely able to change itself and hide what it really was. Remember I told you it was just a pack of soul thieves?"

"Well, someone else has been learning the old ways. And not just the Old Tongue. The old secrets from long ago. Someone has stolen the Fortune Teller's Crystal Ball. And they're using all of these things to unravel everything! They're stealing all of the souls and destroying all of the Demons. Everything is going to become unbalanced. The Proprietor is going to be very, very mad!" Crowley shouted, springing up and grabbing the bars at this last thought, pressing his face against the cage in what looked like fear.

Shawn didn't know how to feel about this - the Circus being destroyed was probably a good thing, right? But he was cynical enough by now to know it couldn't be that simple. "Who's doing it? And who locked you in that cage?"

"No one really knows. Some say the Fortune Teller is making it all up to tighten her control. Some say that its beasts from beyond the Krinner. Others say its one of the Circus survivors, Griffix maybe. Or the Tattooed Lady."

"The Demons go to rest and their dreams and movements are hijacked. Someone is using the Old Tongue and the old ways to manipulate us. I woke up here. I've been here for months!" Crowley scowled.

"It doesn't make any sense. Why would any one of them do this?"

Shawn looked confused. "But you're all beat up and you're in a cage. How couldn't you see who did this? And how'd you survive this long? There's a giant bunny here, and a crazy town..."

"You don't get it!" Crowley said, pointing an accusing finger at Shawn, long fingernail yellow and curved as he stuck it in between the bars.

"I don't remember anything. One moment, I went into my tent to organize the wares and pack out. I saw that many in the Circus had gone missing and I knew that if I didn't get out, that I might be next. Then, when I was inside, I heard a funny little voice that said Yucka--Yucka"

"Then it felt like all of the hate in the world pressed upon my head. I felt the pain of someone else's betrayal. Someone's dreams and hopes being shattered."

"And then I woke up here."

"But I've been around long enough to know that it isn't a coincidence."

Crowley's face brightened.

"Let me out!" He said to Shawn and then looked for sympathy from Bobby and Ralph. "You can help me. We can set things right together."

"It said 'Yucka--Yucka?' Are you sure?" Shawn couldn't confirm it, but this sounded really familiar...almost like a certain dummy. He had to be really careful here, lest he play into either the Circus' or Mr. Clayton's. "Even if I let you out, do you know where we are? 'Cause I don't know how we're going to get out of here..."

"Yes! Yes, that's what it said!" Crowley yelled. Then his face took on a placating look, all sweet and kind.

"Come on. Let me out of here. I'll make you a deal. We need each other. I've been all over the Underworld. I know where to go and how to get there. I know the places that are safe and where to hide."

"Like what? How would you get out of here? We've gotta get back to our bodies!" Shawn was planning on letting Crowley free. But he needed honesty and assistance from the strange baby-man, and right now he had an advantage because Crowley needed him to get out. And that advantage would go away when Shawn freed him.

"You've all certainly got to get back to your own bodies. Or you'll die." Crowley agreed. "But my own body has been changed long ago. If you let me out, I'll show you how to change. Change your bodies, so that way you won't have to worry about the long journey ahead. We're in the middle of no where and to get out, we need to find a dream, or a charm of some kind that someone has trapped souls into."

"But I know where all of this can be found." Crowley said eagerly.

OOC: Shawn rolls Wits + Empathy

OOC: 07:45, Today: Shawn Cramer rolled 2 successes using 3d10 with the World of Darkness nWoD system with a target of 8, rerolling 10s with rolls of 3,6,10(+8). Wits + Empathy.

It wasn't that simple though. Something about the way Crowley talked. He was too eager. To interested in getting out of the cage. It reminded Shawn of the time that Crowley had ripped him off, selling him the herb that made Bobby forget, even though it could be readily found at the Circus.

Crowley's face grimaced as he pressed it against the bars of the cage. "Come on, let me out!" He pleaded.

Crowley said to Shawn "I can help you. We can get out of this together." 

Shawn folded his arms. "Crowley, you're lying to me. I was going to help you because we're friends, but friends don't lie to each other, do they?"

"What?" was all Crowley asked in mock innocence. His face was eagerly pressed against the bars, beady eyes searching Shawn for an answer, waiting for Shawn to respond.

Shawn's face remained utterly pokerfaced. "You've got to tell me the truth, Crowley. I can tell you're trying to trick me, and that's not very nice. Maybe I'll leave you here and go back and look for the dragon instead."

"NO!" Crowley barked at the threat of being left in the cage. "What is it that you want from me? I'm just a small..." he looked down at his sagging, filthy diaper and then back up at Shawn as if that somehow explained it.

"I know the way!" he croaked. "Ok! Ok!" He said, reaching his hand out through the bars, sharp fingernails waving at the air as if to prevent Shawn from going away. It wasn't clear what he was saying 'OK' to.

"OK! I'll do what you want."

Bobby and Ralph took a step back from the cage, which was now swinging to and fro, the metallic parts creaking.

Shawn tried to keep up a hard, tough front, as if he didn't care about how beat up Crowley looked. "Not until you explain the trick. You were going to rip me off, right? Tell me how." He tried to sound unphased, like this sort of over-the-barrel negotiation was something he was experienced with.

"Is this about your friend?" Crowley asked, looking at Bobby. "I was just trying to get the best deal so I negotiated you down to whatever I could get. Surely you can't say that's my fault because you didn't know." He said, all innocence.

"I was just trying to get the best deal!" He pleaded to Shawn.

"Shawn, what's he talking about?" Bobby asked.

"N..n..n..nuthing." Ralph said, giving Bobby a shove to be quiet.

Shawn was grateful for Ralph’s backup, and tried to steer the conversation away from Bobby. “This isn’t about him - it’s about you! What aren’t you telling us about letting you out! What could happen?”

"Nothing." Crowley cried. "Nothing! I was planning on just....eating Ralph. Well, not eating, but just taking a bite. I'm hungry." Crowley said, dropping to his baby knees and pressing his face yet again against the bars.

"What!?" Bobby cried.

"What!?" Ralph cried.

Shawn hid his shock and disgust behind his poker face once more. “Well, I think you owe Ralph an apology. And a sorry gift.”

"I'm sorry." Crowley said in a desperate voice. He sounded like a child that was going to say anything the parent might ask, without actually thinking about the words being spoken. "Will you let me out now?" He asked, short arms extended through the bars, long fingernails pawing at the air in vain. And then. "What's a sorry gift?"

Shawn could tell Crowley didn't really care, but it wasn't like he could make Crowley mean it. "It means you have to give Ralph something nice to make up for what you were going to do!"

"What!!!?" Crowley cried out indignantly, arms spread wide and through the cage, a gesture of injustice. "Why!? And what do I have to give? Look at me!" Crowley said, looking at his own filthy body, down at his chest and grimy feet, diaper heavy and sagging.

Shawn tried to look sympathetic, but unmoved. "How about this - I'll try to get you out if you swear an oath. You swear that you won't ever try to hurt or trick me, Ralph, or Bobby ever again. And that if you ever get your shop back, I can pick out one thing for free."

"I swear! I swear!" Crowley cried out before Shawn could finish. But then he pulled his arms inside the cage when he heard Shawn speak about the last part, the part about getting something from his shop for free.

Crowley retreated into the darkness of the cage, only to reemerge seconds later with a decidedly unpleasant look on his face.

"I get to pick it out." Crowley rebuffed, a tone of indigence in his voice as he settled into a negotiator's cadence, his face now all business.

Shawn was already in full negotiation mode, and ready for the counteroffer. "I get to choose two things, and you get to choose which one of them I can take."

Crowley ground his teeth, yellow needles chaffing together in a bristly gesture of annoyance. "One object. You get to pick it. And if its too much then you don't get anything." Crowley countered with rising petulance.

Shawn saw Crowley's annoyance, but the weird goblin was in the cage and needed him. "One object, and if it's too much, I get to pick something else. And it can be whatever I want."

"One object." Crowley pointed a finger up at the sky in growing anger. "If its too much, then you get to pick another. But only one time!" He said, nearly yelling.

Normally, Shawn didn't like anger, especially people being angry at him. But he understood, in an elemental sort of way, that negotiating was kind of a performance. Both of them had to act angry, it was how they might get what they wanted. So he furrowed his brow and looked disgusted enough to just walk away. "No! Because then you can just say what I want is too much no matter what, then I don't get anything!"

"Exactly!" Crowley shouted grimy baby-hands curled around the bars and yelling now in a toddler's voice. "And that's what you deserve! Nothing! Because of you everything has been destroyed! You know what's going on here. I know you do! Ever since you arrived things have been going wrong. I'd be surprised if my wares were still there or whether or not everything has been looted and set on fire."

"You tell me what has happened! Was it you!? Was it you who stole the Fortune Teller's Ball? Is it you who put me in here!?"

Shawn felt confused, and let his face show it, but the anger hadn't gone away either. "How would I even do that? I don't know anything about balls or cages or weird magic stuff. You know that; I sold you a quarter of my soul for some berries!"

Crowley was silent for a moment. He sat down in a thud that made the cage swing, the rusty chain creaked as it moved back and forth. His grimy hands curled once again around the bars, ling finger nails sharp and yellow.

"Well someone is doing it." He concluded without much further evidence. "And that someone is in the Circus." He added.

"Someone is destroying the whole Circus from within. And you're the only one I know who has been poking around. You and Griffix and your card tricks. Don't think I don't know about what you and your tricks did to Eddie. I heard he was out by the Krinner after what you did with the card trick Griffix showed you."

Crowley shifted, temporarily turning his back towards Shawn as if looking for something.

"On top of the mountain." He added, craning his neck and tilting his head as if to get a better glimpse. When he was unable to find whatever landmark he was looking for, he sat down in the cage again.

"So you're not as innocent as you think." He concluded.
This message was last edited by the player at 02:47, Mon 23 July 2018.

The shock on Shawn's face this time wasn't from any calculated choice on his part - it just immediately showed, overwhelming his pokerface with guilt. "Eddy's here? On the mountain?"

"Oh, he's up there somewhere." Crowley added cryptically.

Shawn caught himself, and tried to go back to his previous pokerface. "Okay, how about a new deal? Instead of any stuff about your store, you help us find Eddy. How does that sound?"

Crowley smiled, seeming to enjoy discussion of a new deal and Shawn detected a look of victory on the baby-demon's face.

"Eddy?" Crowley feigned ignorance. "I can help you find Eddy." Crowley agreed. "I just need you to get me out. And to give me some shoes." Crowley petitioned. "Or for one of you to carry me on your back out of this desert. We can take the road to The Toad Abyss to get to the mountain."

Shawn realised right away that he'd made a mistake by acting too eager for a new deal. He needed to make Crowley think his help was less valuable than it was. "Oh, well if you don't know exactly where he is, we don't really need your help. The mountain's pretty easy to find, and we were heading to the top anyway..."

"Alright! Alright!" Crowley said. "He's on the path that leads up to the Krinner. I'll take you there!" Crowley pleaded, sense that Shawn had the upper hand.

Shawn folded his arms, and then gave Crowley a moment to sweat before nodding. "Alright, then. But before I let you out, you have to swear that you're not going to try and trick us or abandon us."

"Fine." Crowley mewed, stirring in his own mood of discontent and folding those baby arms, the fat billowing out at reddened, swollen joints.

As Shawn approached, he saw that the eagerness of leaving the cage had sapped out of the baby-demon's attitude, replaced by a passive annoyance. Crowley waited for Shawn to open the cage only remarking "they're all dead. And there's no garuntee that we won't be next."

Shawn walked closer to try and see how the cage worked."Fine what? You've gotta be more specific."

Shawn could see that the cage had just a simple lock from underneath. I small lock on the bottom of the outside of the cage and unfastening it would clearly make Crowley fall out from the bottom.

"Fine. I won't trick or abandon you." Crowley promised.


"Careful." Crowley advised, as he saw Shawn examine the bottom of the cage. Clearly realizing he could be falling soon, Crowley added "I've got small legs." "

Shawn realised that triggering the lock from directly underneath might end up with him getting a face full of Crowley. He looked around for something soft, like leaves or something that he could use as a landing pad for the little creature.

As Shawn looked around he saw there were some sparse leaves on the floor of desert, underneath the cage. However, there was far more sand. Shawn pushed the desert sand into a little mound underneath the cage.

Crowley remarked during Shawn's work "I've got some news about the movements of everyone. Before I got taken here, I used the tea leaves of Arcadia to make some tea. I was able to read through the leaves as I sipped. Terrible stuff. But it helps prevent the spying eye of the Fortune Teller's Crystal Ball. It wasn't enough to prevent them from finding me. Whoever is doing this has far more at their disposal than just the Crystal Ball."

"While sipping the tea, I learned that Jody and Erica Hoff had been eaten. They weren't able or willing to satisfy Griffix's growing hunger."

Shawn continued to shove the sand into a safe pile that Crowley could crash into. "Last time I heard from him, he didn't think it was natural. Could someone be making him extra hungry like this? How do you reverse it?"

"Reverse it?" Crowley barked with a single, sharp, laughter in the word. "When he's this hungry? I'm not so sure. The last time he was made this hungry, he stopped after eating five children. Maybe he has three more to eat? Or maybe you and the other kids can satisfy him with all those books and letters he had people write last time?"

"Is he up to that again? The books and letters?" Crowley asked with humorous, disapproving smile. "Oh, poor, Old Griffix. He'll never give into his inner demons, I'll give him that. But it's a lot easier on the rest of us if he just ate the kids and got on with it."

Crowley looked over the pile of sand. "There. That's good. Now, unhinge that lock below me and let's give it a go."

Shawn noticed the particular way Crowley phrased his statement. "He was made this hungry before? Who did that?" He approached the small lock, and stood out of range of where Crowley might fall on him. Then, he triggered the latch.

"Urrphmm!" Crowley grunted as his butt hit the mound of sand diaper first, then he slid down, tumbling slightly before digging his baby heels into the mound of sand to slow his descent.

Crowley looked up with a large, predatory smile, displaying all of his needle-like teeth. It was a smile of victory and of achieving his goal of liberty. Then he answered Shawn with wry smile "Those who have tried to promote chaos in the Circus have sometimes seen Griffix's hunger as the right way to push their goals forward. It hasn't happened since the Old Times. There are few of us left that were part of the Old Ways. The Tattooed Lady did it once, when she tried to fight on behalf of the Freaks before they were destroyed during one of the Circus' many Soul Contests."

"So it could be her doing this. Or maybe someone else who has learned the Old Ways."

Crowley looked around the arid landscape. A breeze blew hot air which send a gust of sand stinging against Shawn's face.

"There." Crowley said. "Give me those bones." Crowley pointed towards a skeleton of a bird that long ago had died and now lay under the tree.

Shawn considered that. "Does the Tattooed Lady have any students? Or does anyone else know those...'Old Ways'?" Seeing no reason not to, he trotted over to the bird and brought the bones to Crowley.

"Not that I know of." Crowley said. "But that's why I thought it was you. A newcomer. An interloper. The rest of us know the dangers. Well, I guess there aren't many left who know."

"Now drop the bones on the sand and hand me your wrist." Crowley advised. He placed a fingernail into the sand and started to draw.

"Oh, I was hoping maybe you might have an idea. The only other person I know who even talked to the Tattooed Lady was Bradford." Shawn dropped the bones onto the sand, but he didn't hand over his wrist quite yet. "What're you going to do with my wrist?"

"There are others. The Old Ways have existed for some time." Crowley remarked with disinterest, now assembly the bones with one hand and beginning to draw strange patterns and letters in the sand. They looked like archaic shapes like some kind of alphabet.

"I need your blood to read the results." Crowley explained, offering a fingernail an indicating it would be used to slice Shawn

That does not encourage Shawn to proffer his wrist in the least. "The results of what? And why does it have to be my blood?"

Crowley grumbled something and ground his needle-teeth in a mix of anger and disappointment. It was obvious that that wasn't how he wanted Shawn to respond. With a quick motion he pushed his yellow fingernail into the center of hos own wrist and moved it upward. The sound of flesh tearing was quickly accompanies by a gout of blood that splattered across the bird bones and the strange symbols in the sand. Crowley let out a cry of pain--one that he clearly would have preferred that Shawn endure--and then clutched his wrist tight to his chest in wounded gesture.

"Oh wow, are you okay?" Shawn looked around for something to staunch the bleeding. In a pinch, he could probably use a bit from his or Ralph's or Bobby's clothes.

Crowley shrugged away from Shawn in a bitter refute of the gesture.

17:18, Today: Evil Circus - Crowley Noggenfogger rolled 4 successes using 5d10 with the World of Darkness nWoD system with a target of 8, rerolling 10s ((10(+9),9,8,2,6)).

Then he started to trace lines with the blood in the sand among and in between the strange symbols. "hmmm......" Crowley murmured.

"Who is Tiffany?"

Shawn squinted at the lines, as if they might tell him anything. Certainly, he didn't understand any of these magical languages, but maybe there'd be a visual element or something he could understand. "She's a girl who came with us to...wherever this is. She got caught by the rabbit in the briar patch."

"Tiffany is alive." Crowley said, continuing to stare fixedly at the lines in the sand and then at the strange symbols, blood trickling down the yellow fingernail. "She is carrying something she and you think is important in some way." 

"Who...is Delilah or Delilia or Darlene? Who is she?"

Shawn actually smiled and sighed with relief. "Oh, it's great that she's okay! And Delilah's another girl who came with us. She's kinda mean." He paused for a second when he noticed the way Crowley phrased things. "Wait, it's something we think is important? Does that mean it's not, really?"

"Delilah is dead." Crowley said with casual indifference, following a blood drop as it came through one of the arches of a symbol written in the sand. "hmm...." Then after a second or two he followed the droplet further "I can't really say if it is something that is in important. But it looks like you and Delilah thought it was. Maybe Delilah more than you. And Tiffany did too."

"Who is Ralph?"

"That's..m..m..m...me." Ralph said, breaking his silence from about a dozen yards away after hearing his name.  Bobby was laying against the tree as if he was tired, hot and sweating.

"Ah yes. I remember you. It says you are alive and you are. Good for you that you are still at it. And you're still fat too I see. Though you didn't succeed at bringing the Master Maker back. That's a shame. Maybe he could have corrected all of this."


Ralph didn't respond to these comments, and Crowley went right on with the next question

"Who is Sally?"

Shawn's first instinct was to hide his surprise, but then he realised there was no reason to do that. He gave Crowley a confused look. "She's a girl I know from school - but she didn't come here with us? Is she here?"

"Sally is....." Crowley drew another line in the sand, the rivet filling in with dark, crimson blood. "...missing. I don't know if she's dead or alive. She could be dead."

"That's a lot of kids you know that are gone." Crowley commented as he hiked up his sagging diaper with one hand and traced the lines with another. "Oh yes. Grace. Do you know a Grace? Because she is missing too. It could be that your friend Griffix got to both of them. And then there's......Linda. Do you know a Linda? She's missing too."

"They're missing? Where could they be if your magic stuff won't find them?" Shawn didn't really know much about Grace (wasn't she one of the new girls who moved to his neighbourhood?), or Linda, but he did like Sally. "If Griffix got to them, wouldn't you know that they're dead?"

"I'm just reading the signs, I'm not the one who wrote them. If I had access to the things in my shop, it would be much easier." Crowley grumbled.

"It's possible they're all dead. Every last one of them. Why else would so many kids from the same neighborhood be either dead or missing? It's either the Circus or Griffix. Or both." Crowley surmized. "Either way, Griffix will keep on going until he stops. That means you, and your friends could be next." Crowley said.

"If he runs out of other kids."

"I'm sorry - I know you're way smarter than me about all this kind of stuff." Shawn could tell Crowley was getting irritated, and hoped a bit of flattery might soothe the little shopkeeper. "Would stopping whoever's making him do this fix Griffix? Sorry if it's a dumb question."

"Yes." Crowley growled. "That would stop it." He barked in irritation. Then he hiked his sagging diaper up again. "That or you could fool Griffix into thinking he is full. That might give you more time."

Shawn immediately perked up at Crowley's suggestion. "Fool him into thinking he's full? How would that work?"

"I don't know how to do it. I mean, I do know how but I'm not going back to get my wares. It's because the risk is too great. I'm not about to die."


"But I do know someone in this Underworld that could help. It's dangerous though."

Shawn cocked his head in confusion. "Do you know how to get back to your wares? If you can go back to the Circus, that could be a way for us to leave..."

"Yes. We must go up the mountain,and wait for the Summoner's Cloud to pass overhead. Once it does, when you receive the sign, you will be able to get out from the Underworld." Crowley explained.

"But time her is limited. For someone like you. You might be stuck here forever if you don't get out soon. Especially since the Circus is no longer here to bind you."

"In a word....you don't belong here anymore."

Shawn folded his arms. "That's fine with me - I didn't want to be here in the first place." He looked around to make sure Ralph and Bobby were okay. "How will we get past the dragon? It took one of my friends before."

Shawn glanced over at Bobby and Ralph. The two were playing 'slaps.' Ralph's hands looked red and purple and were placed palms down. Bobby's hands met them underneath palms up.

"Look how red your hands are!" Bobby exclaimed to Ralph cruelly, taking one hand from underneath and slapping the back of Ralph's hand before Ralph could pull it away.

"OW!!!" Ralph cried, slowly putting his hand back on Bobby's. "When is it my turn?" he asked, wounded.

"When I miss." Bobby instructed. Or rather 'old' Bobby instructed. The personality of Bobby's changing nature creeping into this world.
This message was lightly edited by the player at 10:22, Fri 10 Aug 2018.

"We have to climb." Crowley said, pointing his long, yellow fingernail in the distance. "The clouds obscure the side of the mountain. The dragon only hunts what it sees. If we aren't in the open, it won't get us."

"Come now. We must go." And suddenly, Crowley lunged at Shawn. The 'lunge' was more of a toddler's waddle. The creature pushed itself towards Shawn with a running force, bouncing off Shawn's shin before almost falling backwards. Crowley grabbed the back of Shawn's calf before falling down, catching himself. Then he pushed against Shawn's leg, in an infantile gesture indicating he wanted to be carried or held.

"Same as before, really. We're climbing a mountain to sneak past a dragon and get home."Shawn noticed Bobby's personality was changing, and filed it away just in case. Maybe that meant his wish would work if it was an emergency? He bent over to pick up Crowley, holding him so the little creature's diaper was as far away from his nose as possible. "All right, where to?"

With Crowley on his shoulders, Shawn managed to start walking, holding on to the little demons toddler legs that were draped over each of his shoulders. Though he succeeded in avoiding the diaper itself, the smell of stale urine filled the area around Shawns head.

"just up ahead...that's all. We need to move quickly. Follow this path. Do it just like I guide you."

Shawn tried to breathe through his mouth rather than his nose, but it wasn't exactly pleasant either way. He headed along the path Crowley pointed out, making sure Bobby and Ralph were following too.

OOC: Shawn Join's thread - Shawn: The Climb Up To The Top