Character Meet and Greet: Winter Wonderful!

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i.Main Street

Main Street has settled in for January, but there are still Christmas Decorations here and there to liven things up a little bit. Feel free to shop, mingle with the locals or explore the castle grounds.

Though after hours there are still some shadows that venture into the streets. Not everything here is as peaceful as it seems, and it’s best to defeat the corroded trespassers before they cause trouble.

ii. Cookie Overload

Do you like free cookies? Of course! Everyone does. After the Christmas Rush, there are plenty to go around, available only after the sun goes down to any hungry passerby. There are cookies of all styles and flavors. But watch out for the dreader sriracha cookie. It will make you breathe fire in three flavors and gives a bit of heartburn after, but the aftertaste will leave you craving more.


iii. The Eighth Wonder of the World
Now that the jungle has been purified, Apprentices can wander through to explore all the things the jungle has to offer. Take a (still somewhat shambly) riverboat and explore the river, or come to chat and trade with the villagers. (Shrunken heads, two for one special!) But beware. Even though the jungle is purified, it’s not a safe place. In this kingdom of animals, someone is always hungry.


iv. Pin It On Them
Some smugglers are hanging around the outskirts of New Orleans, selling dubious looking items from even more dubious looking bags. Do you buy from them? Haggle? Steal? (not recommended) Or quietly try to alert any sort of authority (good luck) The choice is yours.


v. Battle Mesa Gate
While the jungle may be purified, many other Kingdoms are still seething with corrosion. Erstwhile Apprentices will find such corrosion on the banks of the Rivers of America, right where the jungle river joins in. Fight corroded creatures on the shore and in the water and be careful, they are stronger than they look and cleverer than they seem.

Comments

Toby Hamee - Animorphs - spoilers

[free_and_strong]

iii.

Toby was still a little unsure about this place. Her people needed her back home. But there would not even be a back home if the people here failed. She really needed to be in three places at once, or to not be the only Seer. But that was not reality. She slashed a tree with the blades on her wrist, catching the falling bark with her other hand. She was the one Seer. That meant she could lead the Free colony on Earth, she could lead the newly born race on the Home World, or she could be here. One of those choices had been made for her. And now she had to decide to stay here or return. She slashed off and collected more bark. She shook her head, horns atop her skull stripping back from the branch above her.

She would have to hope that the human Jake and Tobais she was named for would look after her people. They needed her more here, she concluded. They would never understand, even if she could go back and explain. The humans would, the Andalite would, the hawk would. At least, intellectually. But her own people? Never. She was, to their understanding, abandoning them. She hoped that they would pick a leader, survive. They had to survive. They were what was left if the Arn failed. A few dozen free Hork-Bajir. That was all there were. They had to become a free race again. Unbeholden to Yeerks, and now unbeholden to Arn or Humans or Andlaites.

But to be free they had to be alive.

"Toby Hamee will stay," she told the tree she was stripping bark from. She closed her eyes, hurting from the choice, but knowing there was no other choice to make...

[creepyoldguy]

Okay. So, one of his new buddies was a twelve-foot jellymer. The demon really should have been used to new species by this this point.

And yet.

He tilted his head at a bizarre angle that really, really, shouldn't have been possible. "What're you?" Beetlejuice asked in rasping tones of genuine curiosity. "And what did that tree do to you?"

[free_and_strong]

The alien blinked a few times as she studied him. And he would be forgiven for thinking she was a he. "I am Toby Hamee, a Hork-Bajir. What are you?" she returned. She had seen a few humans, he didn't seem like any human she had ever met. Her raptor claws scratched the floor absently as she considered him.

[creepyoldguy]

Well, that was a species he’d never heard of. “Toby it is, then.” For now. Until he forgot and called her "Hammy".

“I’m a demon. And dead.” Beetlejuice frowned to himself. Somehow he doubted charades would work with this one. But, since he didn’t actually need to be summoned...

“You can call me B.J.” Because, that would just save them both a lot of trouble.

[free_and_strong]

"Demon? And dead?" she asked, seeming confused. "I have seen dead humans, they do not continue to move. Are dead demons different?"

[creepyoldguy]

"A bit, yeah. I was never alive to begin with. Well, except for a very poorly thought out plan I had that ended up with me impaled on some bad art. Long story short? Demons are not supposed to be alive, we're not equipped for it."

He waved a hand, shooing the thought away.

"Anyway, what you saw were the stiffs the dead breathers left behind. The stuff that made 'em them went on somewhere else."

[free_and_strong]

Had she somehow lost her intelligence? She could not follow this well at all. Was this how her parents and the other free Hork-Bajir felt when she and the humans spoke? It disturbed her.

"So Demons are a separate race that happen to look human?"

[creepyoldguy]

"Right!"

Beetlejuice nodded, cheerful. "We work with dead breathers."

[free_and_strong]

"Breathers, being what you call humans?" Maybe? Her head hurt. Sh turned back to the tree, which at least made sense. She considered then brought up one leg to scrape some of the lower bark with her lower blades. She bent carefully to retrieve what had fallen.

[creepyoldguy]

"When they're alive, yeah," he scratched his ear as he watched her. "Normally the living can't see me, unless they're super special or self proclaimed Strange and Unusual, trademark pending."

Beetlejuice bounced on his toes, putting his hands in his pockets. "But, the rules are all sideways here. Everyone can see me, which is great! And my favorite human is here---also great!"

He moved a little closer to see what she was doing. "What's with the bark? Looking for bugs?"

[free_and_strong]

That made no sense, really. Toby's head swing to look at the... Demon...

"No. I am sampling. The trees here are unlike those that I know."

[creepyoldguy]

Beetlejuice often only made sense to Beetlejuice.

“Why? D’ya eat bark?”

[free_and_strong]

Toby's head bobbed. She cut a vine and tied it around a packet of the bark she had stripped. "Hork-Bajir are herbivores. We eat various kinds of tree bark." She used a wrist blade to cut a symbol into the top piece of bark in the packet, then attached the packet to one of her leg blades.

Yes, she looked like some sort of apex predator. And was a vegetarian. Racially.