The man who had been told his name is Cole, had taken the berry offered by the blue man but he hadn't eaten it. He had taken it, nodded his thanks and pocketed the berry. He hadn't really thought about it, he didn't really want to eat it but he hadn't wanted to be rude.

The trip through the forest had been alright. No one had attacked them at any rate. He supposed the greenery was pretty but his feelings told him this wasn't his preferred terrain. He felt closed in, like he was surrounded by a green cage or something.

Reaching the village had eased it somewhat for the blue D-bees had cleared out enough land to make their homes. The villagers also seemed friendly enough. Folk were curious about them but that was only natural what with him and his friends being strangers here.

Then something else happened that caused his mind to shift all of its attention; one of the village kids, a boy, handed him a little stone horse. He had taken it without thinking and just stared at it. He turned it this way and that, staring at the small figurine for several seconds before looking back at the little boy. "Thanks kid," Cole says to the child though he knew the boy couldn't understand him. He tipped his hat to the kid and then point at the figurine with his free hand. "Do you have horses here?" he asks. Cole points at the horse, then sweeps an arms to indicate the entire village, then back at the horse.

From the sky..., Joran ponders.  Then, he is suddenly attacked by surprise.  As the children swarm him, it is all he can do to put his grenade rifle on SAFE, then slide it to the ground. His other weapons will have to stay where they are for now, safely snapped into their holsters.
The "swarm" had not triggered his Sixth Sense, since the children did not have any bad intentions and pose no actual threat.
Laughing, as he gets swept up in the overwhelming emotions of happy and playful children he pretend to fall down for the swarm of children, as he pretends to be a diabolical mastermind being defeated by his own slaves.  For several minutes, he plays with the eagerly playful children, basking in the sensation of their emotions.

Zeke nods along, his hands always, instinctively close to his pistols... as non-threatening as he can be. He sticks close to Joran, not really sure why, but he knows he feels comfortable with the big... what was he, an ogre?

Wolf shook off most of the overtures, suppressing a part of himself to not immediately go front and center. "I can accept the armor repair job. What do they expect for..."

Agrus, however, had already exited. "...this."

Did a service count as a gift? He figured it didn't count if it was necessity on the line. He did need his armor fixed, regardless his misgivings. Still....

"They will want or expect something from us. This is not generosity for its own sake. We have to be prepared to give back, and we should not accept anything from them without knowing what we are giving back for it." He shook off distractions from his goal of getting out of here.

This was going to be a long journey through a strange land. He really needed to get back north. His family must be worried sick about him.

Nathaniel is happy to repair the armor of this power armor himself, given raw materials. Guido and Nuncio go off to play with the children zipping among them, providing light shows, and generally being playful light balls. There is not much to do except observe and do the simple work.

Villagers laugh and point as the children climb on Joran.

The pretty woman from before approaches Wolf. She holds a wooden bowl of a stramge black substance and points to his armor. "Tee la la tee somee," she says quietly.

Several more natives approach our heroes with offers to repair their armor.

Meanwhile, the little boy smiles and says to Cole, "Ray meetee so so teemeetee ray latee. Ray la so tee somee." He points at Cole and smiles again.

GM: Do you let them fix your gear?

Wolf - Roll 1d100. 0-65 and you find yourself thinking about the woman a bit more.

All - What do you do?

Joran play with the kids a little bit longer, unused to children just coming up to him like that.  Usually he has to convince them he is friendly, something he actually remembers.  It is actually kind of nice.
I have to go now, kids, he says after awhile.  I have to do some grown-up things for a bit.  Then I can come back and play, he rumbles apologetically.  Normally, he would have to open himself up to feel the emotions of others around him, and usually one at a time.  He closes his eyes, focussing on waves crashing against rocks on a beach, to blank out the emotions of those around him for a bit.
Wait a minute.  How did he know to do that?  How can he be used to sensing what other people are feeling in the first place?  Holy feces....

Cade waited and offered a scowl to any of the natives that approached her.

The armor she wore was in good repair and she just wanted to get to the bottom of what had happened to her.

The rest of these idiots might not mind going about for the rest of their dumb lives happy to be oblivious to what they had lost and just hoping for it to come back but all of her instincts were telling her to go find it.

It was good to see that Cade, at least, was taking to this world as well as he was. The blue-skinned woman would not get out of his head, and it was only civility and the necessity of repairs stopping him from waving a pistol and leaving. This was faerie country, more and more obviously, and half of them were getting themselves ensnared.

"So, for the generous act of fixing our armor," Chaplain asked Joran or Nathaniel, whichever was listening to him. "What do they want?"

Joran looks to Wolf.  That is a good question, he rumbles.  One that we will certainly have to ask.
He heads to where Agrus had indicated they fix the armor for the group members, and ge approaches whom ever seems to be in charge.  What is it going to cost for the repairs and replacements for our armor?

"Right..." Cole says to the little boy, not understanding a word the child had said. He wanted to know what the kid was saying but he was still leery of eating the berry. Joran had and he seemed to be doing alright but Cole wanted to wait a little longer. So he pointed at the kid, then at Joran and then started walking over to the Ogre. He stopped part way to make sure the kid was following him.

Once they got there, he says to Joran, "What's this kid saying?" without any preamble. "He just started saying stuff, right after he handed me this little horse statue."

Nathaniel tries to translate for Cole.

Nathaniel translates for Cole. The boy says that there is only one golden horse, and Cole is a good man.

Soon after, Agrus exits the chief's hut and approaches our heroes. "The chief says it is well that we have arrived, which means we are welcome to stay. The substance from the natives is a magically charged sap they extract from the trees. It has mega damage capacity and can be used to repair your armor. The natives will not expect anything from you. They see you as guests and it is part of their culture to welcome guests that arrive in peace."

He then turns his attention to Cade and the others, the natives giving her a wide berth. "All right, let us sit and talk. Zeke is in possession of a broken device that binds you to a place called the Vampire Kingdoms in Mexico. This place is in another world. Your home world. Now, I posses a companion device that allowed us to escape a serious situation in your world involving vampires and werewolves. I suspect that I was able to move you out of the land due to the companion device's magic, but it did something to your memories. I know of a mage among my people who may be able to restore your memories, but I must travel there and contact him. I am not particularly...welcome...among my people, so for now I must go alone and in secret. You are free to stay here among the people and I will return as fast as I can."

For good measure, Agrus also explains what vampires and werewolves are when he sees the blank stares of our heroes.

GM: What do you do?

"So, if you go off and die, we're stuck here, right?"  Cade asked the lizard.

"Why wouldn't it be better to just take us back home, then go on your trip, and then get us when you get back?"  She continued.

"That way, if someone decides you're so not welcome they decide to put you in the dirt, we're at least back home and not remembering anything instead of stuck here, and not remembering anything."

"I'm sure this will come with no strings." Chaplain was leery about the idea of a gift for nothing, and was not hiding his sarcasm. "Not that I recall much, but the cost of your aid based on what I can piece together has been the lack of coherent memory and navigational disorientation. So, I have two questions, two of several, that absolutely, utterly, require answers. And if you don't know, tell me who does."

"Where is our objective, and what do we know about the area or structure it is at?" He took a breath. "I'd ask 'what', but that will come up in the answer about 'where'. We cannot take attacks forever. And please don't tell me vampires are actually real. I'll buy into the idea of werewolves, but I've never seen vampires, or personally know anyone who actually faced one."

Zeke grabbed the compass instinctively, "This busted piece a shit? Stuck in vamprie kingdoms... stories from bein' a kid I reckon. If that is true, we need to get our memories back pronto chief. We need to get this shit set right." Zeke eyes the lizard mage carefully, "How you reckon we know you comin' back? Not just gonna leave us here for who knows what reasons."

Joran looks to Chaplain Wolf and raises his hand.  Me.  I had one of them staked and immobile in Agrus' house, and one I had just stabbed, until I had to take on that werewolf.
He then nods at the CS soldier.  I'm pretty sure those two you took your silvered knives to were also vampires.
This message was lightly edited by the player at 03:01, Thu 10 Sept 2020.

"Our departure point was a sanctuary that is now most certainly overrun with vampires and werewolves. Since their master seeks the broken device, and now knows I also hold one as well, we can, again, be quite certain they will be waiting for our return. It is inevitable we will have to face them when we return, but if we return now we will die, or worse."

Turning to Wolf, he says, "The objective now is to get your memories back, and to figure out a way back to your world without getting killed. The island of my people is very restricted. Only a small contingent of non-lizard kind may enter, and they must all be fluent in our language. It is a heavily fortified, magical city filled with mages and sorcerers of some renown. I could perhaps get by bringing one of you with me, but all of you is out of the question. If you wish me to live and return," he says, directing his gaze at Cade, "then this is how it must be."

His face grows serious, and his tone to the whole group is firm. "It was not I who led the undead to you. I offered you sanctuary, and I now have lost that myself. I have taken great risk in joining you, as well as coming back here. I know you do not have memory of me, but I ask you to trust me. I do not want to stay on this world any more than you do."

GM: What do you do?

Cole wasn't sure what to make of the kid's words. Try as he might, he didn't remember anything about a 'golden horse', though it wasn't like his memory was in the best of shape right now. "Tell him thanks, Nate" he says to his friend.

When he saw that Argus was busy talking with the others, he wandered over, figuring that it might be worth listening to. "Hold up a moment," he said to Argus. "You're confusing me. You said a minute ago we left some world with vampire kingdoms and are now on this world, our home world...but now you are saying the vampire kingdom world is our homeworld and we have to go back there?"

"Right, fine, whatever, just don't fucking die on us."  Cade conceded.

With things concluded, at least in her mind, she stood up and grabbed her bag then wandered off to find some place to pass the time away from all the blue people.

"We need to locate a..." Chaplain's mind struggled for the correct word. "Rift? Rift. A rift, that goes from here back to where we are from, instead of going to Double Hell or Atlan...tis..."

He shook his head. What the hell is an Atlantis? "Someplace worse."

He felt a strange feeling that where he was from was somehow a lot worse than this place. He didn't see anyone else wearing nearly as many weapons as he had.

He shook his head again, trying to clear it. Those two? "We'll have to pool our recent recollection together, I suppose. I don't recall squat. My recent memories start here, and everything else is muscle memory and jumbled tales from a time I have clearly left behind me. You, Joran, seem to recall the number of foes I was carving up, as well as their nature."

"Does anyone else have any memories? We need to figure out how they were lost, how we get them back, and then we need to go quickly."

He was really tempted to follow Cade out of here, but he actually needed the collective around him to learn what was going on.

He stops, staring in deep thought at nothing in particular, as he does not realize from where his statement had come.  But, suddenly, after saying it, he can see a jumble of images, but two stand out:  seeing himself holding a glowing spear-like weapon in his hand that is being used to skewer two fanged human-like ememies, Chaplain Wolf slicing two similar with a pair of shiny knives, and a humanoid canine clamping his jaws down upon Joran's armored arm before erupting in fire.
Wow.  Where did that come from?  The imagery had been clear, not like any daydream, or hallucination.  Clear.  But, not from his own point of view.  As no one seems to have noticed what he had said, he remains silent for the moment.

Zeke shakes his head, "Not me chief, I just know this thing is important," he says indicating the compass, then turning to Argus, "I doubt any of us speak lizard man..."

Agrus looks apologetic. "The GM may have confused you, and for that, he apologizes."

He shakes his head as though it has just broken a fourth wall, and returns back to the subject at hand. "I will return as soon as I can, you have my word."

With that, he departs.

The sun sets on the ocean world, and the natives build fires and begin cooking and singing. An elder appraches our hero. His skin is a very dark blue, with creases down his face indicating age. He pops a couple of berries into his mouth and smiles. "Hello, friends of Agrus. It is well that you are here. My people have taken an interest in a couple of you," he says, glancing at Wolf and Cole. He speaks to the group in their own language.

GM: So what Agrus meant to say was that you came from your world to this world. Your world has vamps and werewoves. This one has oceans and blue people, among other things.

What do you do?
This message was last edited by the GM at 02:52, Fri 11 Sept 2020.

Chaplain's mind refused to process anything before "I" for some reason. He assumed it was more magical moon speak.

The continued interest of these blue-skinned people in the man in the black skull-invoking armor - namely, himself - continued to bewilder Chaplain. "Hey, Cole. You know why he's looking at us like that?"