[Rosamund hums in agreement, distracted momentarily by movement in the underbrush.]
I do wonder if there's any chance we can get the people here off the planet before we try anything too drastic. Or — I don't know. I didn't expect it to be populated. I thought it would be a sort of feral wilderness, if anything.
[Then again, the people being here means it has a decent food source. She grimaces.]
I don't suppose you—
[She never finishes the thought. A rip cracks the air between them and swallows them whole.
The shift is complete and consuming: they're on a battlefield, except the combatants are all quite strange.
There's the Fairy Godmother, necrotic, mad, glass shard impaling her chest. Her loyal servants, half-formed or less from furniture and with the ravenous minds of beasts, unthinking, unyielding.
Then there's the losing side. A puppet, arm broken off. Dead. An old man with a great book, a little girl with wolfen ears, both dead. The cat cannot be seen. The frog prince makes a last stand against the fairy godmother.
And then there's Rosamund. Less thorny, less scarred, but still ravaged by briars. Dead. Her eyes fixate on nothing. Her bow has fallen from her grasp. A half-barrel man stomps over her corpse, ignoring the dead to chase the last of the living.
Then suddenly it's gone. They're in a tower, and Rosamund is waking in bed. There's no thorns or scars at all. It's exactly like the tower from the simulation room, just cleared of briars and clean as a whistle. She looks around, starting at a voice from the door beyond. She opens it to a emptiness. Just a voice.
"Oh! Oh, my apologies. You're awake."
"Yes, good morning. Who do I have the pleasure of talking to?"
"Sorry."
There's a clinking, then a helmet is removed and the invisibility dispelled, revealing a beautiful woman in glass armor. Older than Rosamund by a few years, armed with a glass shield and polearm, looking relieved to see this young woman.
"Are you Cinderella?"
"I am Cinderella. Are you Sleeping Beauty? Rosamund?"
"Yes."
The woman gives a sigh of relief. "It worked."
"What worked?"
"We managed to catch you before you were completely gone. Or, rather, midway to where you are going."
no subject
I do wonder if there's any chance we can get the people here off the planet before we try anything too drastic. Or — I don't know. I didn't expect it to be populated. I thought it would be a sort of feral wilderness, if anything.
[Then again, the people being here means it has a decent food source. She grimaces.]
I don't suppose you—
[She never finishes the thought. A rip cracks the air between them and swallows them whole.
The shift is complete and consuming: they're on a battlefield, except the combatants are all quite strange.
There's the Fairy Godmother, necrotic, mad, glass shard impaling her chest. Her loyal servants, half-formed or less from furniture and with the ravenous minds of beasts, unthinking, unyielding.
Then there's the losing side. A puppet, arm broken off. Dead. An old man with a great book, a little girl with wolfen ears, both dead. The cat cannot be seen. The frog prince makes a last stand against the fairy godmother.
And then there's Rosamund. Less thorny, less scarred, but still ravaged by briars. Dead. Her eyes fixate on nothing. Her bow has fallen from her grasp. A half-barrel man stomps over her corpse, ignoring the dead to chase the last of the living.
Then suddenly it's gone. They're in a tower, and Rosamund is waking in bed. There's no thorns or scars at all. It's exactly like the tower from the simulation room, just cleared of briars and clean as a whistle. She looks around, starting at a voice from the door beyond. She opens it to a emptiness. Just a voice.
"Oh! Oh, my apologies. You're awake."
"Yes, good morning. Who do I have the pleasure of talking to?"
"Sorry."
There's a clinking, then a helmet is removed and the invisibility dispelled, revealing a beautiful woman in glass armor. Older than Rosamund by a few years, armed with a glass shield and polearm, looking relieved to see this young woman.
"Are you Cinderella?"
"I am Cinderella. Are you Sleeping Beauty? Rosamund?"
"Yes."
The woman gives a sigh of relief. "It worked."
"What worked?"
"We managed to catch you before you were completely gone. Or, rather, midway to where you are going."
"Catch me?"
"Yes. May I come in, if that's all right?"
And the scene fades...]