Colton dangled himself and let go. It was a clean fall and an even cleaner landing.
He was very proud of the landing, he absorb the hit with his knees and roll. His knees were sore and he had some bruises from scraping the stone walls or cobble stones.

His treck took him to plaza with a fountain shape like a terrible beast, ten tentacles, four of which were pushing a young female into its gaping maw.

On the side of the fountain he saw a graffiti in English:

Johnny is still alive!
==>

The arrow was pointing toward a street leading deeper into the district and if Colton had to guess, to the castle.

Colton took a quick glance into the fountain to look for loose change, then decided to go see about this Johnny fellow. Whoever he was, someone who knew him spoke English, and maybe he could get some answers.

Colton continued in the broken street, he could see in the distance the black castle.
The cobblestones were of good make, he could have guessed he was in some European city, except for the whole violet sky, odd moss and the whole city being ruined and dead.

Ahead the street branched out, on a post someone scribbled in the same red color.

Pewter witch, huh? Sounded like bad news, and that frowny-face confirmed it. Not today, Pewter Witch!

Feeling confident in his choice, Colton headed towards the Shrine instead.

Colton hands and feet hurt from the jump, he was walking for over ten minutes now, the dead city was empty of life and sound. Well there was the dark green moss that grew everywhere but it felt wrong, tainted.

Ahead he he saw a building that appeared well destroyed, once it was two or three stories high but the third floor collapsed. it was an important building, it had places for statues that were now empty or just with stubs of stone evidence for a past statue.



What caught Colton attention was the red graphity.


The arrow was pointing right.

Rest. That sounded good. And Johnny knew about Pac-Man, that old game from his grandfather's time. That was also good.

Colton would head to the shrine and then rest.

The inside of the building was ruined, collapsed and blocked, Colton couldn't take more than two steps inside before his path was blocked by huge slabs of moss covered stones.

He went outside and circle the building to the left, at the turn of the building he saw a large drawing of packman eating a trail of red dots that lead further left.

Colton nods. That was him. Pac Man. What was he, a pizza? Old games were weird.

He looked under the Pac Man for the shrine.

Sure enough Colton finds beneath a pile of rubble a  debris a hidden entrance leading downwards toward what must have been the cellar of the house.

"I am so smart," Colton congratulated himself on figuring out the clever riddle. Taking a quick look around, he set about clearing the way to what he assumed was the shrine and not a horrible death trap. He was surprised at how light the rubble seemed - like it was Styrofoam or plastic instead of stone and brick. Not, like, weightless, but far lighter than it should have been.

[Private to GM: Just an allusion to his abnormally high Strength. He's slowly figuring it out.]
Once clear, he would descend into the basement.
This message was last edited by the player at 22:14, Tue 14 Dec 2021.

The rubble was heavy, Colton felt its weight but he was stronger than he expected. It lead to an opening leading downward.

Colton climb down, it is a short walk leading to a dark dank cellar. There is hardly any light inside, he can see that there is a bed in one side and there are red writing on the wall.


There were more writing on inner walls but Colton would need light to read them.

Huh. That's messed up. Boston Johnny was from Earth, but looks like he was stuck here too. The moss being bad news was kinda like what he was thinking... and those pin people, yeah, like in the movie, right?

Johnny said it'd just come out... that was, like, back in the 80s. You know, 40 years ago? That meant...

"Okay, Boomer." The words were quiet in Colton's ears, but comforting. A touch of home. There was more written but he'd need a light source... a lighter or a flashlight or something. It was unlikely that Boomer Johnny had left anything functional behind, but he decided to make a quick search of the darker areas anyway.

For now, this place would make a base of operations for him to explore the city.

Colton spend a few moment stumbling in the dark shadows, he found or rather bump into a table, it felt like wood. There were some pots on the table and he found a stone fireplace. He also found the bed, it was made of straw and he found on it an empty red spry can.

Nothing super useful... matches or anything to build a fire with. And building one without wasn't a task Colton could just figure out... he had tried rubbing sticks together once and it didn't work.

But there was a bed and a red can of spray paint. Where did Johnny Boomer get the can? Did he bring it with him? Was there a way to go back and get shit from Earth? Colton didn't know. It was nap time, so Colton decided to rest until he felt less bone-weary.

Colton slept till morning, the bad news were that he was out of food and water, eating the last of his rations for a very meager breakfast. He felt less tired from the day before but this was not the rest he wanted, without warm food in his belly and warm bed it would be very hard to rest.

In the morning Colton set out to scrounge for food and water. If there wasn't a source to be found he'd have to leave the city and return to the wilderness... which was, honestly, fine, as there wasn't really anything helpful here anyway. Just pinfaces and the ghosts of pinfaces. And the pewter witch. He didn't want to run into her for sure.

He'd search for a few hours, and then get moving, heading out of the city opposite the way he came. He had no desire to return to the gross-ass swamp.

Colton was just about to leave the shrine of Johnny when he heard the sound of running steps.

Considering that caution was the better part of valor he waited in the shadows for the runners to pass.

Four figures stumbled into the shrine , they were panting and none of them looked remotely human.

The first was dressed in a pirate outfit, sabre and pistol included. She had thick orange/red fur and she looked like a cross between a fox and a cat, she stood around five feet tall and had a luxurious tail adorned with small gems.

Following her were a pair of heavily built lizard like people, one was dressed with expensive, if dirty, cloths while the other had a large sword and was dress in light robes. Both bodies were covered in golden bronze scales, they had horns on their heads and large heavy tails. The one armed with a sword, was panting heavily and was clutching his side, his robes were soaked.

The last, was a tall and muscular man, he had long flowing dark hair and a goatee. His angular face were off, long cheekbones with sunken eyes deep in their orbits. His skin was leathery yellow and he had a pair of very long pointed and serrated ears. He was dressed in black leathers and armed with a few knives.

The leader the fox hushed the others and a sound of something large and lumbering came from above.

Noticing you, the fox held her paw/hand up in a Vulcan greet "Live long and prosper Johnny."
"Enemy warbird decloaking at starboard... I’m just here for the gasoline." she spoke in a whisper and her English was bad, she had strong accent.

Outside, something huge and angry roared, which was followed by a sound of crashing and stone being pulverized.









[Private to GM: Ascubi Sezrer Atlanian male rogue MR 48

Asin Zog warrior MR 56

Srerin Zog scholar/sorcerer MR 61

Oromi Epeco swashbuckler MR 44]

"Oh shit, furries!" Colton couldn't help but gasp. Worse than that. Trekkie furries. He flinched again at the sound of whatever giant monster was thrashing around outside. "Oh man oh geez oh man."

No wait - they weren't the trekkies. Clearly, Boomer Johnny had been. He'd come to this world and made friends with this kitsune, dragonborn, and... scraggly-ass Jack Sparrow... and taught them to communicate in Star Trek quotes.

Maybe the kitsune (which Colton knew about from anime) couldn't see him clearly in the dark, or because all humans looked alike to her, but he wasn't who she thought he was. "I'm not Johnny," he whispered back. "I'm Colton. I followed the signs looking for Johnny, but he wasn't here when I got here."

Outside the rumbling, crushing and stone grinding continued followed by the occasional roar.

The fox was grinning, she was actually excited about it. "No Johnny?" she said pointing at Colton than added "Cool-town?" pointing at herself she said "Oromi "

"No more Johnny speak... " she added.

"We off to see the wizard, Cool-town beam me up Scottie?"

Hell yeah, Colton was Cool-Town. It would be difficult for him to speak to the furries in the 90s-and-earlier movie lingo they understood - all that stuff was from before his time. Still, he'd try to remember lines from the old shows his dad and granddad liked to watch. "Uhh... and my axe? No, wait, that's too recent. Um... old movies, old movies... there's 106 miles to Chicago, we've got a full tank of gas, half a pack of cigarettes, it's dark out, and we're wearing sunglasses. Hit it!"

Oromi didn't seemed to understand Colton but she did get the gist of it.
She slapped his side and spoke to the others, the moved as she introduced them.
The wounded lizard like person was named Asin, the other lizard like was called Srerin. The one with lanky figure and yellow skinn was called  Ascubi Sezrer.

They each made a little bow muttering something under their breath.

You waited half an hour maybe a little less before the crashing sounds moved away when Oromi leads you out of the hide out.

She points at the road leading to the black castle and motioned for Colton to lead the way.

Colton spent the half-hour trapped in the shrine observing these new creatures as covertly as possible. He wasn't used to dealing with people in the physical world. Even before Covid, he'd been much more comfortable online. Maybe this was the chance for him to get out of his shell a little bit... but he didn't think that the others even spoke movie-English.

When the crashing stopped and the fox lady (Colton was awful with names) asked him to lead the way, he wasn't sure why. But he did anyway.

They started walking toward the castle, Asin had taken the lead. Oromi and Srerin walked with Colton and Ascubi was at the rear, all drew blades of various length and were walking at a cautious pace.

They got to a fork and Colton saw another message from Johnny.

Colton didn't know if the fox lady could read English. He pointed right. "Johnny says go that way."

They walk up the hill toward the black castle, they took the long rout and the group walk in silence. Srerin pointed at some feature and spoke excitingly to the other but none of them seemed to appreciate his interest some much.
They reached a plaza with a well, there was another sign there.