open } and when trouble comes we’ll start the drums

[choosetruth]

Who: Georgia Mason and YOU
Where: Around Wonderland
When: throughout the week of 9/16
Rating: PG-13 probably for Georgia's foul mouth
Summary: Wonderland gave Georgia a plank. Great. Time to figure out why.
The Story:

Kitchen

Georgia stares at the plank through her sunglasses. The plank does not stare back, since it's a plank. It just sits there.

She sips her Coke and scowls and looks at the note in her hand. In the search for something lost, do what you know you must. -RQ

Great, except she has no idea what she must do or what's lost or what a freaking plank has to do with anything.

She turns it over and continues to stare.

The plank continues to be a plank. Sitting there and entirely unhelpful. Lovely.

Library

Well, this is a mystery, and if there's one thing that can solve the mystery, it's more knowledge. So Georgia takes her plank to the library and stacks up walls, scribbling notes on a sheet of paper. RQ = Red Queen? she writes. Plus Walnut, underlined a few times, but then... not much.

The books include Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass, as well as a few on carpentry and different types of wood. There's even a book on chess, just in case learning the rules a bit better gives her some kind of insight. She glares through her sunglasses at anyone who comes to bother her... but then again, if they have any helpful answers, or more clues to offer, she might be a little more receptive.

[ooc: will match format! hit me up if you want a specific starter for something too and I can add it in the comments.]

Comments

kitchen;

[kryptomight]

( have you ever just been so thirsty that you really need to get a drink right that moment and regular human speed is just too slow? probably not, considering normal human speed is all the speed most people have, but. it's not all the speed that jon has, so he makes his way down to the kitchen as a red and blue blur, which. only becomes indefinably human once he's got his face stuck in the fridge and an iced tea bottle in hand--though it doesn't take long for him to down half of it and turn to uh.

notice her, sitting there with a plank. a plank. what is she doing with that. ) Do you. . need any help? ( with your plank?? )

kitchen;

[choosetruth]

[Georgia is certainly focused on her plank, but the day she's too focused on something to be completely unaware of her surroundings is probably the day she gets eaten by a zombie. She raises an eyebrow behind her sunglasses.]

Not superhuman help. Unless you've also got super puzzle skills to go with that speed.

[kryptomight]

I wouldn't call it superhuman, but I can think pretty fast.

( he has no idea what the heck she's doing with a plank though. maybe he shouldn't be nosy, but he's already here, right? and she didn't tell him "no", so. jon makes his way over to where she's. . investigating the plank, grips onto the edge of the table with one hand while the other sets the iced tea bottle down. )

What do you need super puzzle skills for?

[choosetruth]

[She eyes him for another moment, frowning as she considers what to say. Then she shrugs and pushes the note over to him. She doesn't know if he can help, but he probably won't confuse her more.

In the search for something lost, do what you know you must. -RQ]

Found this note this morning, along with the plank, though it was wrapped in red paper at the time. I'm trying to figure out what I'm supposed to do with it.

[kryptomight]

( it's one of those mystery gifts. jon got his own, but those were a lot more self explanatory than this. he looks over the note, exactly identical to his own, before his eyes focus on the wood itself. jon doesn't reach out for it or touch it, but he's definitely giving it a hard look, squinting down at the wood in front of him. )

It looks like it's made out of walnut, if that helps any? But it really just looks like wood to me. Doesn't most've this stuff belong to someone else? Maybe someone lost their wood?

Closed } Shaun and George's room + After the End Times

[choosetruth]

[Georgia wakes up to find two red-wrapped packages sitting in their room. She frowns and reaches over to shake Shaun's shoulder.]

Hey, wake up. We have presents.

[Whether or not that's actually a good thing remains to be seen. She needs caffeine before she processes this.]

[adaptiveimmunities]

[He grunts and rolls over to look, then drops back onto his bed to glower at the ceiling.]

I hate Wonderland presents.

[choosetruth]

[She tugs on his arm, pulling him up. Sorry, Shaun, time to wake up.] Less whine, more caffeine. We have to open it even if it's terrible, and we'll hate it less if we're caffeinated.

[adaptiveimmunities]

[He grunts again. It's early enough in the morning that George will probably not complain too much if he has coffee.]

What if I get a flamethrower from the closet and we just set them on fire?

[He pushes himself to a sitting position.]

[choosetruth]

Then we don't find out what's in them. [She presses a kiss absently to his cheek, then goes to the closet, pulling out a Coke. She pauses, frowning slightly as she turns towards him.] What's it for you today?

[She hates that she has to ask. But the woman in his head still wants George's drink sometimes.]

library

[sawny]

Jamie spends most of his time in the library if he's not with Claire and so it's no real surprise he's wound up in there now. There's a woman there with what appears to be a plank and he's got no idea why she'd be carrying such a thing around. Then again, the strange objects had been showing up for a bit now and the only explanation Jamie'd gotten had been "These things happen."

"I dinna ken why you'd carry a plank about," Jamie says. "Assuming it's one of Wonderland's gifts though, aye?"

[choosetruth]

"Mmhm," she flips a page in her book, then glances up at him. The plank is still frustratingly a mystery to her, but she hasn't given up. "It's probably magic or something." She rolls her eyes. She's so fucking sick of magic. But it's the only thing that makes sense. "You get anything?"

[sawny]

"No, they dinna give me anything. Must not be special enough," he says, a twinkle in his eye as he says it. He doesna know if it's special or not to receive some thing from Wonderland and not know what it is or why he has it.

"Seems a useless way to communicate, though."

[choosetruth]

"Probably happier that way." Special people so rarely end up happy. Not that happiness has ever been one of Georgia's priorities. She's always been too busy for that. "Somehow, I don't think clear communication is the goal here."

The trick, of course, is figuring out what the goal is.

[sawny]

"Aye, no, I would think not. I'd help you - I have a couple languages - but I don't speak wood."

This Jamie pairs with a brilliant smile, the one that used to always make Murtagh elbow him and Claire roll her eyes. It's a good one, he thinks, and he wonders how it will land on Georgia.

kitchen

[ischyros]

Diana isn't certain what she expects to see when she enters the kitchen in the mansion but a woman staring at a plank is not it. This place continues to be one of the most strange ones she's ever known and she watches the woman cautiously for a moment before realizing it's Georgia, whom she'd met at arrival.

"Why do you have...that?" she asks. "Have I missed the significance of it?"

[choosetruth]

"Present from Wonderland." She sips her Coke and glances up at the other woman. "Diana, right?" They have chatted before, but it's been a while. She nods down at it. "I'm currently missing the significance myself, but presumably it's there. I just have to figure it out."

[ischyros]

"Diana, yes. It's been a little while but I tend not to forget a face." Diana has always been blessed with a long memory, which is both a boon and a curse; living so long means there's so many people to miss.

"Well, I could help you figure out what to do with it but aside from building something, the obvious answers aren't coming to me."

[choosetruth]

"I'm pretty sure that's cause there isn't an obvious answer." There never is in Wonderland. "Maybe I'm supposed to hit people with it. It's got some heft."

[ischyros]

"It could make for a useful, if clumsy, weapon," Diana muses. She has always preferred whip or sword but she thinks the plank could work if there was nothing else available. Part of being a good warrior means being able to improvise and there is little else that says improvisation aside from utilizing the actual building one is fighting in.

"Who would the mansion want you to attack, though? That might be a better question."

Library

[fishandclips]

Finding Georgia alone is a rare occurrence, and given their recent "gifts," Mahir's first thought is that Shaun has done the inevitably stupid thing and drank that milk of his. But he reconsiders, as Georgia looks irritable, and not... well, catatonic, which at least means Shaun must be alive somewhere.

Risking her glare, he approaches and sits next to her, offering a small smile. "Georgia Mason, reading printed books and writing on actual paper. What is this world coming to."

[choosetruth]

She gives him a look through her sunglasses, half amused, half frustrated. She doesn't like it any better than he does. "I work with what I have. Print isn't as bad as the fact that apparently magic and souls are things that I have to actually deal with."

[fishandclips]

Mahir chuckles softly, shaking his head. He's not going to think too deeply on the subject of souls, not with Georgia's clone, not while he's still getting to know her and make some kind of peace with this situation. Magic doesn't seem so very strange after meeting your dead best friend's clone, but he's not going to go there with her either right now. "Well, I have seen your printed zines, so I suppose I shouldn't be too surprised to see you embracing the literary ways of yesteryear."

[choosetruth]

Georgia grimaces. "It's better than not reading. Network posts only can sate me for so long." Which is too bad because besides what she and her team writes, it's the closest thing they've got to a newsfeed. "Have I mentioned lately how much I miss the internet?"

[fishandclips]

"Not in the last few hours," Mahir admitted pleasantly, not bothering to hide his amusement. "But then, I haven't seen you during said hours, so I could be wrong." He sobered then, looking at her curiously. "...Where's Shaun?"