Zoro

Streetlight Dragonflies

@Mokley I think we need a mod post from you. Now that my character ran away by himself its kind of boring. I'm going to rectify that soon, but it would feel kind of pointless if nothing at all happened on his foray to the phone booth. You didn't really give us any clues to follow other than the antler kid and the tiger ran away somewhere beyond the hole in the wall (but if I had to guess I'd say you wanted them to run off to the arcade for some reason), so maybe finding some clue about where they went off to would be good? Also once the phone is recovered my PC is going to get out of there immediately. I'd prefer he stick around in the great beyond for awhile longer, so unless the quest for the Holy Cell Phone takes a lot longer than expected it would be great if something happened to either give him motivation to stay there longer or simply forces him to stay there. That said, I do hope he gets out somewhat soonish as I think his ultimate place is in dealing with the situation in the real world.

Streetlight Dragonflies

Nah. Gunna be special friends. Like in this song...

Just. Like. In. This. Song.

Special Frieeeeeeeeeeeeends...

@Girlie1Bomba

And this exactly why João is running away from Cheri x3

Streetlight Dragonflies

The girl couldn't have gone far, but that didn't help much with all these newly sprouted plants blocking the view. He wondered just how far this curse was going to spread, but quickly banished the thought from his mind. Giving in to despair was not an option.

He blazed a trail through the sinister vines and crumbling piles of asphalt, keeping his eyes and ears out for any prowling tigers, strange antlered kids, the girl, and any other unfathomable dangers that were undoubtedly around the corner. He didn't get very far when a sound caught his attention. A woman's voice. And judging both by her mannerisms and the amount of sense she was not making, there could be no doubt it was that same rambling heckler from when they were charging into the restrooms. Luckily she didn't seem to be talking to mister Reis, so he carried on his way, making an effort to be especially stealthy to escape her notice. He didn't know why she was out here instead of back with the police, but it sure made him feel better that someone had volunteered to be tiger bait.

Back to the matter at hand, if he was the cosplayer girl, where would he run off to? Come to think of it, she had acted somewhat calm throughout the whole ordeal, almost as if she had expected this to happen. Was she somehow responsible for this whole mess? All the strange things started happening soon after she entered the diner, with the first strange event arguably being her entrance.

Unfortunately, he had no idea where the girl would head off to, and didn't want to try yelling out to her again until he was farther away from the heckler lady. But he had another idea. He kept following the remains of the road, heading towards the bus stop where he'd seen a phone booth earlier. It wasn't everyday you came across such ancient technology lying around, a true testament to this town's backwardness if there ever was one. Here's hoping it still worked.

Streetlight Dragonflies

It looks like the characters might start splitting up into smaller groups, so that should help keep things going at a reasonable pace. Maybe.

Streetlight Dragonflies

A man staggered out of the restroom into the mostly-abandoned diner. Bits of white fire extinguisher foam dripped from his long black hair, and his shirt was adorned with pink splotches. His eyes were open as wide as possible, his jaw dropped nearly to his chest. He removed his fancy electronic glasses and rubbed his eyes.

"The big bad tiger roared the wall down and escaped. No sign of the girl or that manager lady. Don't worry about shutting the door, let's just go", he said to the guy they'd left outside on door duty.

The sound of the sirens brought him much relief as he dragged his feet towards the exit. The lady they'd just rescued was huddled up in the diner having a panic attack or something. Stupid lady. She should get out of this damn cursed diner and then have her panic attack, like he planned on doing. Couldn't she see the weird vines and roots swallowing this place whole? The wall had even just collapsed. Whatever, he didn't care anymore. He grabbed a plate of half-eaten strawberry banana crepes off a table and gobbled it down on his way out.

He'd so much rather be at the office working awkwardly side-by-side with his ex-fiance than out here getting killed by tigers and whatever. The shocking realization stopped him mid-step. "That's it, I quit." He mumbled to himself. "OK Glass, make a call to the mayor. I'm going to cancel this meeting and just take the next flight back. Town's beyond saving anyway."

Nothing happened. Call could not be made. What the devil was going on now?! ... oh shit! He'd left his phone with that crazy cosplayer girl with the fake gun that was actually a real gun! This was bad. Very bad. What if those cops confiscated it as evidence? He let out a yell and kicked the wastebasket below the corkboard all the way to the other end of the diner, and then grabbed a plate and slammed it onto the floor. "I hate this! I hate this! I hate this!"

He closed his eyes and took a deep breathe. Moment of truth. What should he do? Eyes opened, decision made. He turned around and sprinted back towards the restrooms and out the crumbling wall, into the decayed and twisted streets. He was going to get that phone back even if it killed him.

"Hey girl! Where did you go?!"

Streetlight Dragonflies

New developments, how glorious! I'm going to give @Briza a few days to post before I go again, but very excited. :)

Streetlight Dragonflies

@Girlie1Bomba Right now you have Cheri ending up kind of all by herself. I'd suggest having her end up outside the doors to the restroom where everything is going instead so that she'd be easier to include in the main story. Maybe do something with David so he isn't stuck just standing by the door by himself?

Streetlight Dragonflies

I feel bad that David and Gary have sort of been ignored, even though they've been right there the whole time. I'll come up with a contrived reason for mister Reis to do something with them if I have to next time it's my turn to post.

Streetlight Dragonflies

Nothing made sense.

Literally nothing made sense.

But they were still stupid for thinking the tiger was Maddie Wilson.

He hated waiting. Shoot first, ask questions later; that's the code he lived by. Waiting forced him to think first. To think about how none of this made sense. To recall images of the lady fading into the vines. To listen out for the sounds of a hungry tiger growling behind the door. To reconsider risking his life to save some jerk girl who spilled a strawberry shake on his shoes.

"How long is that jerk gonna—yikes!" He had not expected the cook to come back with a flaming torch. The jerk employee's plan was just long-winded enough to allow mister Reis some more thoughts about the sanity of four people charging into a restroom with a table-shield, a torch, and a fire extinguisher to rescue a woman from murder vines and a tiger.

Stop thinking! Focus on— He suddenly ducked behind the table-shield. It seemed the girl's fake gun wasn't so fake after all. He peeked above the shield, fighting his instinct to immediately tackle the presumed psycho.

Nothing makes sense, so just stick to this awful ill-conceived plan.

Only one thing was certain: If he made it out of here, he'd be getting completely wasted. And he'd also be getting a gun.

The door opened. He let out a glorious battle cry and rushed forward. He was frightened, confused, and exhilarated all at once. He'd not felt this intense since playing the Omaha Beach mission on Medal of Honor. The most heroic parts of the game's theme music played in his head as he made his charge.

"Get out now, and don't touch the vines!"

He positioned the table and himself in front of the tiger and snarled and yelled at it. He remembered hearing that's what you should do when you see a mountain lion, so perhaps it wasn't as stupid as it might appear. He really hoped so, anyway.

Streetlight Dragonflies

Jeremy had that job first, but failed to keep it open for more than a moment. Just saying.

Also, if this happened in real life, I'm sure we'd all be running away screaming and would have left whoever was in that room to die some strange supernatural death. I know I would at least. :)