Corner of Godiva and Serendipity, Wednesday morning

[vdistinctive]

The air was gently sweet, like a subtle perfume. The sky was blue, folks on the street were cheerful and smiling at one another, and there was a giant freaking tower at the end of Eliot's street that hadn't been there the day before.

Eliot stood across from it with his arms crossed over his chest, Val sitting at his feet. It was definitely alien, whether from space or another dimension, he wasn't sure. It didn't look like they'd been invaded by anything other than the towers -- why would they be so obvious with those if they weren't going to come tromping out with ray-guns or whatever. Were they microscopic, maybe? That might be what the perfume was.

"What do you think?" he asked Val. She looked up at him and panted blandly. He frowned. "You feelin' okay?" She cocked her head to one side.

A passing rickshaw driver rang his bell to get Eliot's attention and waved cheerfully at him. "Fine morning, isn't it?"

Val yipped happily and wagged her tail at the driver. The passengers in the rickshaw looked over and smiled blandly.

"Yeah," Eliot said, looking between the rickshaw and his oddly behaving puppy and the tower. "Because none of this is suspicious at all."

[ooc: open to any fellow abductees!]

Comments

[geniuswithasmartphone]

Hardison sauntered around the corner, hands in his pockets. "What's that smell?" he asked, with nowhere near the appropriate amount of derision or disgust for Eliot's liking, no doubt. "I like it."

And this, ladies and gentlemen, is why they had to invest in a Kidnapping Calendar. This right here.

"Hey, girl. How's my girl doin'?"

[vdistinctive]

Val wagged her tail and panted blandly at Hardison from her position sitting by Eliot's feet. Eliot stared at Hardison. "Seriously?"

[geniuswithasmartphone]

Hardison looked confused. "...Yes?"

[vdistinctive]

Eliot pointed angrily at the tower, eyebrows raised.

[geniuswithasmartphone]

"...That ain't just some weird Fandom thing?" Hardison asked.

Look, it wasn't his fault he didn't know how distinctive alien tech looked!

[vdistinctive]

". . . ain't a -- it's glowing red, Hardison!" Eliot shook his head, exasperated. "And it just happens to be right by where Gaunt's shop was. And -- oh yeah -- it's a freaking alien tower that showed up overnight."

[whoisalicewhite.livejournal.com]

After poking Eliot, Parker gave Hardison a suspicious look. "You don't think you're a missionary, do you?"

Maybe everyone was bitten by nice-gremlins?

[geniuswithasmartphone]

"Hell naw, mama," Hardison said, opening his arms for a hug if she was in the mood to give him one. "I ain't ready to go join the Creepy Choir, so you ain't gotta worry 'bout me."

[whoisalicewhite.livejournal.com]

"Whew." Parker went for her low-key version of a cuddle, with Full Leaning and an arm around his waist. "It's not just me, then? Noticing stuff nobody else notices again?"

[geniuswithasmartphone]

"You're probably noticin' stuff we ain't," he conceded because Parker, "but there's plenty of stuff we're noticin', too. Somethin's up an' whatever it is, it's givin' me the creeps."

[myownface]

Spaaarkle hated eeeverythiiing. As could probably be evidenced by the way he was practically singing swear words as he made his way down the street. He'd sort of crashed on a park bench last night - it wasn't like he had the money to spring for a hotel room and he didn't feel like knocking on doors after running away to the island just because he was in a snit - and when he'd woken up and gone to get his portal back to Toronto?

Yeah, no dice. And an attempt at wandering across the Causeway hadn't worked super great for him, either.

And now... whatever that thing was? Seriously?

"I fucking hate this fucking island and its fucking stupid fucking-- fuck!"

Hi, Eliot.

[vdistinctive]

Eliot watched this performance with an ever rising eyebrow. Val didn't seem to notice, which was also extremely concerning.

"Not that I'm disagreein', kid," Eliot said. "But I'm guessin' you ain't just pissed off about creepy towers and rickshaw drivers."

[myownface]

"I can't leave," Sparkle muttered, wrinkling his nose. "I was supposed to be going back to fucking Toronto this morning so that Lewis didn't shit himself over my vanishing and now I'm stuck. Of course I'm stuck. It's just like this place to make sure I'm good at stuck with the worst possible timing ever."

A beat.

"And you're like the first person I've seen today who hasn't been acting like he came out of, like, a space-pod or something. So, hey, a spot of sunshine in an otherwise fucked-up day. Thanks for not being creepy."

[vdistinctive]

"I try," Eliot said dryly. It was the truth. He frequently had to put effort into not being overly creepy. "What do you mean you can't leave? Portalocity givin' you shit or. . . ."

The idea that there was a potential alien invasion and they couldn't even retreat if they had to was playing hell on his protective instincts.

[myownface]

"Portalocity lost my reservation and told me they were booked solid for the foreseeable future," Sparkle muttered. "And then I made my way into Baltimore, to see if I could at least book, like, a bus, and settle for being gone for three fucking days, but I ran facefirst into thin fricking air, so that was fun."

Spoiler: Walking into an invisible wall had not actually been fun.

[whoisalicewhite.livejournal.com]

Parker was getting increasingly paranoid. She wasn't sure why, exactly. Just... people were... being so... normal. Nice.

It was probably a secret evil plan.

She wandered up to Eliot, then poked him hard.

[vdistinctive]

Eliot looked at her sideways. "Well. At least you're still normal."

[whoisalicewhite.livejournal.com]

"You're not as upset as you should be," Parker said suspiciously. She poked him again. Then started to reach for his hair.

[vdistinctive]

"Not as --" Eliot angled his head out of her way. This was no time for her to be distracting him by playing with his hair. "The hell are you talking about?"

He was plenty upset. He just wasn't sure what he upset at just yet.

He wasn't going to punch the tower, dammit.

[whoisalicewhite.livejournal.com]

That would at least show whether he could, wouldn't it?

"You didn't swear at me. But now you did. Hmm. So I think you might be you. Or at least, normal-you." She gave a distrustful look around, then started to reach to pet Megabyte. "It's like everyone had amphetamines and cheerful pills for breakfast."

[sharp_as_knives]

After breakfast, Hannibal and Jono had headed out to see what they could find.

Granted, most of the people of Fandom were fairly nice most of the time, but...this was definitely odd. And the overwhelming flower smell didn't help. It was actually a bit reassuring to see Eliot out and about and looking as mildly disgruntled and suspicious as usual.

"Mr. Spencer," Hannibal greeted him with a nod. He looked over the tower. "Have you discovered anything about what's happening?"

[vdistinctive]

"Nothin' specific," Eliot said. "Something's goin' on, and those that are doin' it are tryin' to keep us from noticing. Puttin' on a happy face." He nodded to a passing rickshaw. Which -- wasn't that the same rickshaw he'd seen go past twice already? "But Sparkle says he ran into a damn forcefield on the mainland when he tried to head home, and Hardison isn't getting any signals from off island. No cell, no satellite, no nothin'."

[sharp_as_knives]

"Do you know, I hadn't even tried my phone?" Hannibal shook his head. "Apart from the smell, our cats have been acting odd, the same as these others." He waved a hand at the suspiciously (bland, dead-eyed) cheerful passers-by. "And Jono, well." He nodded at his companion, who looked somewhat different than usual.

[vdistinctive]

"Jesus," Eliot breathed, taking an unconscious step back. "I didn't even recognize -- That's way beyond cuttin' us off." He shook his head. "Val's been acting off, too. Normal dog stuff, but -- no personality."

Val panted up at them from where she still sat by Eliot's feet, her tail wagging. Eliot couldn't even look at her anymore.

[inner-fire.livejournal.com]

"Morning," Jono said, sounding slightly sheepish even as he nodded his hello. "Such as it is."

He'd had a lot of sugar in his coffee this morning, so maybe he was a bit more twitchy than usual.

"I can't speak for anybody else, but at least I've lost my powers. I've gotten a bit of an upgrade to make up for it, but still..." He shrugged and left it at that. He didn't like it when things messed with his powers. At all. "That sounds a bit like the cats, at any rate. Usually Joni's all over. This morning she was just sort of... there. Like they're going through the motions, but they're not really themselves."