❧ the inner garden

[dramatispersonae]

You stumble into yet another garden, spinning and off-kilter and peculiar. This space is dominated by a massive waterfall pouring from the sky, casting a heavy wet mist into the air. The foliage is wild and overgrown, untamed and untrimmed. The flowers and leaves seem incredibly real, but everything else is offputtingly two-dimensional—rocks and boulders are papier-mâché, the stones beneath your feet are nothing but cardboard puzzle pieces, and flimsy trees hang from the ceiling by string.

Mobiles of birds and bugs swing around, hung from tree branches, spinning in the breeze, casting wild shadows. Crooked stacks of books—some short, some as tall as trees themselves—line the path, and a persistent, faint drumming sound echoes through the quiet space.

Under the waterfall, there is a single doorway.

[use this space to talk to each other and catch up, before proceeding to endgame]

Comments

[fullmoonblooms]

So...something like a heart game?

[adropintheocean]

Do you think it was like that? ...I've never played in one.

[fullmoonblooms]

I played in a few and it felt a little like that...The black knight after the question seemed like someone you'd meet in one.

[adropintheocean]

[sighs, a tiny bit]

What was down the path you found. . .? I meant to send you a message, but I think I was running out of time there. . .

[fullmoonblooms]

...I saw statues of Fell, Obsidian and Rita -- and Rita was a friend from home.

I also saw a colorless version of me too.

[adropintheocean]

[oh]

...were they crying?

[fullmoonblooms]

-- She was, yes. She said she had failed to protect them.

[adropintheocean]

Mm. I got the same thing, but tailored to myself.

Reflections...possibilities...'failing in the end.'

[fullmoonblooms]

I wonder how much of it was us, and how much of it was Maleficent...

[adropintheocean]

. . . either way, the solution's the same, isn't it? To prevent that scenario.

[fullmoonblooms]

...Right. That means we need to ensure the Darkness' doesn't get a chance to get to anyone.

[adropintheocean]

So we're already on the right track . . .

[fullmoonblooms]

It might help if we had a more organized effort to ensure there's a protection...The records in the library mentioned that everyone worked to help bolster the defenses in the Black Woods, so we simply need to do that again.

[adropintheocean]

We could call the Personae, organize them to do so as a group -- they don't have a lot of direction on their own, really.

[fullmoonblooms]

[...nods]

It might help to encourage them to form patronages as well. That seems to help, even if it just keeps them out of the Darkness' grasp.

[adropintheocean]

You could even arrange that as a large quest...I think?

[fullmoonblooms]

-- I could! And it wouldn't be a hard one to do either.

[adropintheocean]

[hmmm]

Let me know if you want to go through with that? I can get the word out to people.

[fullmoonblooms]

[nods]

All right...I still need to catch up on a lot of things, so I'll see what I can do.