WEEK 1

[whimsicalism]

Well! That was some tea party, huh? You've finally seen the faces (or perhaps the singular is more proper here?) of your captors. A pair of creepy twins seem to fit the overall theme of the Castle at least. Why not have Twiddle Dee and Twiddle Dum, after all?

Regardless, it doesn't seem that they're changing their minds any time soon. The first floor of the Castle is still open up to you. The Audience Hall is still locked most of the time so perhaps you can meet the Alices there if you need to. There are plenty of things to occupy your time before the inevitable slow erosion of your memories. If this is a game, who will make the first move? You or the twins?

Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Friday | Saturday

((OOC: Welcome to peace week! There will be no case this week so just have fun and explore. If you want to investigate please put Investigation in your top level. Don't forget to put threads in for regains or go to the Audience Hall to meet the Alices.

Also, if you want to keep up to date on things we now have a discord server!))

Comments

Investigation

[littlebratziska]

[Franziska really doesn't know what to do with herself here.

For one thing she has no tasks, an she has not had so much empty time for possibly her entire life, certainly all of it that she can remember. There's always something that must be done, something that must be learned, something to be investigated, exercises and errands, and now that she's quite devoid of any such purpose she feels like she no longer knows who she is.

She'd explored most of the castle, on a surface level at least, after she'd woken up, and it was all useless. She'd spent Monday mostly locked in her room, after having taken a copy of the rules, and a copy of the card, and note, and the profiles in the portrait gallery, and everything else that had been written down that she'd found and gone over them with a fine toothed comb as well as she could, trying to find details - in the phrasing, in the paper, in the designs and typeface, anything that might provide some kind of clue.

After having eaten nothing but an apple taken from the dining hall all day, she had to come out on Tuesday, if only to get some breakfast.

In the Dining Hall she put together a light breakfast, a little bowl of oatmeal and some orange juice, feeling sick with lack of purpose and of worry - about the idea that maybe the people here really were from many worlds, about what that would mean if they were, and the possibilities of escape, about the ever-present threat of violence that the rules had left to loom. How is she meant to be perfect in circumstances like these?

She looks too formal for breakfast, as always, with a white ascot neatly tied at her throat, adorned with a large blue gem, black gloves, and a puffy black dress with matching blue buttons. Her feet only lightly touch the floor as she sits back and stares blankly at the stairwell to nowhere.

Nothing here made sense.

Later she'd apparently decided that she had to live with this place, even if she didn't like it. After walking to the top of the staircase to investigate, she spent some time going over the layout, and trying to find where an exit to the rest of the castle was - from outside the castle looked much taller, and surely this couldn't end here.

Later in the day, expression sour, she can be found in the library, trying to find any books that deal with leatherwork. Her? Thinking of trying to cut up a leather chair to cover this pathetic tree branch and make herself a proper riding crop? Well, if one had been provided along with the rest of her clothes....

In general at other times she's wandering through the rest of the rooms of the castle, restless and dissatisfied, trying to find something that doesn't belong, trying to figure out what and where this place is. Feel free to run into her trying to pace distances with foot length between inside and outside, or touching various pieces of furniture, or stone, or metal, to try and see if anything feels wrong.]

investigation

[whimsicalism]

[Well, most things feel right but some things... it's a subtle thing to be sure but for someone fixated on the perfect might pick up on that sometimes the texture of various building materials feel off somehowtoo soft as if it were made of soft clay, for example, and at second touch it feels normal again.]

[littlebratziska]

[That's odd. She frowns and takes her gloves off for a more delicate touch and begins to focus on the sensations. Do the materials used have any effect on if it feels strange or not?]

[whimsicalism]

[Well, it does seem to change more often with more unusual materials. Exotic woods, precious metals, things like that.]

[littlebratziska]

[Interesting! What happens if she tries to scrape a small amount off with her fingernail from various surfaces as she touches them?]

[whimsicalism]

[The same thing happens.]

[littlebratziska]

[Is she able to scrape away any material? If so, does it look or seem any different once it is no longer on the wall?]

[whimsicalism]

[Ah, I misunderstood. Yes, she can scrape some away. It does it's changing trick still, though. Almost as if it can't make up it's mind what it wants to be but that's silly.]

[littlebratziska]

[If she moves a flake that she's scraped off to a different material - say, a speck of "gold" onto a section of carved "ebony", does it take on the appearance of the material it's pressed against, or stay looking the same as what it was taken from?]

[whimsicalism]

[Now, that's a question... it does start to shift to what it's attached to.]

[littlebratziska]

Is anything here real?

[If she presses hard against the material when it feels soft, is she able to leave a visible impression, for example a fingerprint?]

[whimsicalism]

[No.]

dining hall

[soverainty]

Von Karma-san... Can I sit here?

[Niko's always up promptly and ready for breakfast, and it's not even the fateful day where the road to dining hell is paved with goo'd intentions, so the two of them can breakfast in... some kind of peace. Maybe an awkward one, considering the last time they talked and also how Franziska kind of vanished for an entire day??

At this point Niko is kind of swinging between having mortally offended the overdressed young lady or possibly scared her off for over 24 hours, and both are kind of--

Well. For now, she's just standing here with a little bowl of fruit, and a couple of slices of toast. Light breakfast buds?]

Re: dining hall

[littlebratziska]

There's no reason you can't. If you want to, then it is to you to choose to do so.

[She looks up at her, head an arrogant angle, then away again.]

Library

[rhododendronhoney]

[Cori is flipping through some short chapter books, herself. She does notice Franziska's searching, though.]

What are you looking for?

[littlebratziska]

Something to help me actually learn something in this foolish, useless library!

[She does not have a high opinion of fiction, and after briefly skimming the books had decided that all of them were useless and was attempting to sort through the biographies in the hopes that something would be useful. Thus far she has not had luck, and is getting deeply frustrated.]

[rhododendronhoney]

What do you want to learn? I might be able to help a bit.

[littlebratziska]

[She hesitates a moment before answering, but nothing really to lose, she guesses.]

When I was kidnapped, a part of my wardrobe was apparently deliberately neglected. I was attempting to find anything that might help me learn some kind of leather working to rectify that. It is, unfortunately, a skill I have never had need of until now, and so never bothered to learn.

[rhododendronhoney]

Oh! Well, I do know a bit about working with leather, though I can't make anything too fancy. What do you need?

[littlebratziska]

[She is surprised! But after a moment holds up the switch she'd cut from the tree.]

I'm accustomed to carrying a riding crop. This is the best I've been able to find on short notice, but it's... not quite the same.

[rhododendronhoney]

[...huh. Well, Cori will walk closer to get a better look at said switch.] Oh. You...ride horses a lot?

[littlebratziska]

Occasionally. A crop is simply a very useful tool, with or without horses, however.

[rhododendronhoney]

I guess it could be... [She's a little worried, but on the other hand she figures it's probably a security thing...] I've never used one myself, so I wouldn't know. But I do bet there's some fiction about horses here with pictures we can use as reference.

[littlebratziska]

[Honestly it kinda is, but we shall Not Discuss That, Because Perfect People Do Not Need Such Things.]

Oh! Hm, perhaps! It's as good an idea as any, in any case. I also know the construction fairly well, I have simply never been forced to create one myself.

[rhododendronhoney]

Mm. Well, there's a first time for everything, right? You can help with the structure design, and I can help with the leatherworking.