Subject: "Can't smell it."
Author:
Posted on: 2015-09-09 14:42:00 UTC
Yoof, in Aaron Hunter's body, sat on a cafeteria bench, head hanging and hands gripping the seat. "Dumb human body. Nose bad for smells. Ears bad for noise."
He perked up with his head tilted. "Seeing colors pretty okay, though!"
((Yeah, I'm gonna throw him in here, even though I have nothing to bring to the table. Sorry. >.> ))
Okay, so this was indeed a 'bit later'. I wanted to let the chaos threads get a bit farther before putting this up, but now seems like a good time. (That whole night of the server going down didn't precisely help, either.)
Again, a quick breakdown of the rules:
1. First and foremost, if you're going to do anything potentially serious or even permanent to the bodies that your character is inhabiting for the duration of the event, please make sure to clear it with said character's writer. Besides seriously injuring them or even killing them, this also includes things like, say, giving them haircuts or permanently changing their species.
2. Following that first part, no godmoding/power-playing! Control your own characters and your own characters only.
3. Suprise! Unlike the Chaos threads, this one will feature yours truly doing some GMing! In the event that I am no longer available, Huinesoron has volunteered to help out there. I (or our resident elf guy) will occasionally drop in when a group hits onto a clue as to where the device could be. For those who like to live the wild life, feel free to roll for something happening as well.
To make it clear, the device hunt itself does not immediately lead to a 'hurrah this is all fixed thank god'. That said, HST timewise, the event itself has already ended as of the third of September.
Cheers and good hunting!
((So, it's Tuesday. Two days have passed since the last events written in the Chaos. I'm not going to bother connecting the dots on how my characters ended up where they are, unless inspiration strikes.))
Salamander threw himself under the table as the wall of water crashed down. "Help!" he yelled. "He's going to put me out! Kayleigh! Somebody!"
There was a roaring sound from out in the cafeteria - the sound of a great, indrawn breath, as the monster prepared to drop a tidal wave on Sal. His borrowed body wouldn't stand a chance, even with its flames turned up to the hottest.
Then there was a flash of blue light, and a gruff voice said, "You couldn't have done that five minutes ago?"
"I would have if you'd let me grab the Remote Activator," another, very similar voice replied. "But nooo, you were too busy stuffing your face."
"This is a hungry body!" the first voice protested. "When I return to my own, I do not wish for its owner to come hunting for me."
"You don't think he'd - they'd - object to having it back crushed under a mile of water?"
Salamander crawled out, settling his flames back down, and stared: the two voices came from the same body. It was a two-headed ogre, and the two heads were arguing ferociously with each other.
"Besides," the second was saying, "what happened to 'I can take control any time I want, I'm used to multiple heads, this is easy'?"
"... shut up." The first head turned a toothy grin on Salamander. "Hi! No need to thank us, it's his fault anyway."
"It was not my-" The second head didn't get any further, as the body swung an arm up to cover its mouth. The other arm twitched, but the first head glowered at it, and it settled down.
"I'm Kyaris," the first head said, "Department of Intelligence. This is Jareth; he's a decent tracker. We heard you were planning to hunt down that missing machine that caused all this?"
Salamander shrugged. "Someone has to," he said. "And my partner-"
"Kaaaaayleeeeeigh to the rescue!" Sal ducked as Kayleigh swooped by overhead, hanging by her hands from a hoverboard. "Have at thee, foul beas- oh, it's goooo-oof."
The board came to a hard stop against the wall, and Kayleigh dropped down. She jogged across the wet floor to Salamander and waved.
"Wa- oh, sorry, I keep forgetting. Sorry I took so long, I had to get changed."
Salamander looked at her bikini and shook his head. "You didn't-" He frowned. "Wait, how did that take a long time? You were wearing a bikini already!"
"But that was my sunbathing bikini," she said. "This is my monster-fighting bikini. See?"
Kyaris tried to exchange a look with Jareth, but he was too busy glaring. "Right," she said instead, "okay. So do you actually have any ideas how to find this thing?" She looked around the bedraggled cafeteria. "Does anyone?"
~
((Happy for anyone to jump on-board here.))
((hS))
Yoof, in Aaron Hunter's body, sat on a cafeteria bench, head hanging and hands gripping the seat. "Dumb human body. Nose bad for smells. Ears bad for noise."
He perked up with his head tilted. "Seeing colors pretty okay, though!"
((Yeah, I'm gonna throw him in here, even though I have nothing to bring to the table. Sorry. >.> ))
Kayleigh leapt back onto her hoverboard. Admittedly this required her to run halfway across the cafeteria, drag it back across to Sal's side, adjust the settings, and then jump up, but her enthusiasm never flagged.
"Burning Sal!" she called. "Two-headed troll! Funny-talking person! Let us ride... to the aromatherapist!"
She posed dramatically on the board, then frowned and knelt down on it. "How do I turn it on?" she muttered, fiddling with the dials. "Perhaps if I push-"
The hoverboard set off across the cafeteria at full tilt, with Kayleigh barely hanging on. "Follow meeeeee!" she yelled, and then she was out of the door.
Jareth shook off Kyaris' hand and grunted. "And we're following her, why?"
"At least she has a plan," Kyaris said, swinging off their stool and setting off. "Though I didn't know HQ had an aromatherapist..."
~
((If it were Sal or Kyaris in charge, they'd probably have asked Yoof's name. But it's not. It's Kayleigh. Better get moving.))
((Anyone else who wants on the Kayleigh Train might want to speak up. ^_^))
((hS))
...trying to ignore conversation the Generic Man and Woman sitting in the room. He didn't have any scruples against eavesdropping if it was in a good cause, but this particular conversation wasn't worth listening to.
The Generic Man said, "One Ring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia."
"Dial M for Mordor," said the Generic Woman.
"Good one," replied the Generic Man. "And keeping with the Hitchcock theme, North by Northfarthing."
"Uh, let's see. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Serech."
"You used that one when we played Books in a Middle-earth Library."
"So? This is Middle-earth Film Club now. I can use it again here."
The Generic Man sighed. "Come on, Hild. These games supposed to be about teaching you a wider range of World One culture. You can't just use the same ones all the time."
"Oh, all right." Deep down, Hild thought Sean's knowledge of obscure old thrillers wasn't the range of culture that was worth learning at the PPC. People just didn't post enough badfic about them. Still, the game was a fun way of passing time now the current body swap crisis seemed to have reduced the number of missions being sent to agents. "Look, I'm going out for lunch. We can continue the game when I get back."
"Going out?" asked Sean. "Are you sure? We can get Gieves to microwave something out of the fridge and eat it here."
The mini-Jeeves gave the definite impression of almost, but not quite, tutting at that suggestion.
"Quite sure, thanks. I want to ask people for names of recent films." She walked over to the console, and tapped a few buttons. The Generic Woman was immediately replaced with a blue unicorn stallion.
In the days following the swap, a sort-of etiquette had arisen amongst the swapped agents. It was bad form to walk around HQ in a borrowed body while in a disguise. People liked to recognise their bodies and see what was being done with them. Agents could, and did, disguise themselves in their own RC for comfort, but always dropped the disguise when going out in public. Not everyone followed this, of course, but many did.
After she'd gone, Sean turned to Gieves. "I don't suppose you'd be interested in a game?"
"I regret, sir, that it was young Mr Wooster, not I, who frequented the cinematograph."
"Oh, right."
A few moments of awkward silence, then:
"Oh, **** it. I'll go out too."
Soon, the Generic Man had turned back into a hydra, and headed off.
Kayleigh's hoverboard swung abruptly vertical, ramming its nose into the ceiling, then dropped to the floor. Unharmed, its rider hopped off and stood directly in front of the blue unicorn.
"Hello, Agent Horse!" she exclaimed. "What a big nose you have. Can you help us look for the aromatherapist?"
"Kayleeeigh." Salamander came jogging up behind her, his hair smouldering vaguely. "We're not actually looking for an aromatherapist; please stop hassling random people."
"I was not even aware we had a smell-therapist," Jareth put in. "It seems out of character for the Flowers."
Kayleigh glowered at them. "We do, and she's my friend, and she's awesome, and she can help. As can Agent Horse."
Kyaris was frowning at the unicorn. "I remember you," she said. "Hild, right? Your partner has my body."
~
((Will Sean be coming along? Might be interesting. And doc, yes, I'm assuming Yoof is along; Kayleigh will be addressing him when she hands out orders on what to look for.))
((Why are we still letting Kayleigh run things...?))
((hS))
He would have preferred to stay in the cafeteria and wait for Séverine . . . but Séverine still hadn't come back, after two days. If these agents were going to find the head-switcher, that might help get Séverine back!
Ahead, Kayleigh had found a blue unicorn. Yoof briefly thought about getting some cheval for the cafeteria, but the unicorn seemed to be talking, so it probably wouldn't be okay with the Flowers.
((Yes, Yoof is coming.))
((We are letting Kayleigh run things because Kayleigh-on-a-hoverboard is the best thing that ever is.))
"You're Kyaris, aren't you? And, uh, Gareth? No, Jareth. That's it."
She gave him a friendly smile -- it was rare to see another non-elf agent from Arda -- then turned her attention back to the other head.
"Yeah, Sean's been taking this pretty badly. He's been very tense. Seems like he always has at least one headache. Say..." She gestured her head over towards the woman from the flying board. "Didn't Agent Ape there say something about an aromatherapist? I could come with you and get some scented candles or something to help him relax."
Jareth smiled back at Hild, but Kyaris was already talking.
"I know what he means - well, obviously. One of the heads I picked up during the Invasion is particularly prone to headaches - I've honestly considered tearing it off, except I'm worried the replacements would both be as- oops, here she comes."
"Yay! You gave me a nickname!" Kayleigh bounced over to Hild and hugged her around the neck. "Now we are best friends! Or at least friends! Or acquaintances!"
Salamander coughed. "Kayleigh? You're hugging again."
"What? Oh." Kayleigh took a step back. "I-am-aware-that-some-people-don't-like-hugs-so-I'm-sorry," she rattled off. "Now, where was I?"
"Babbling on about aromatherapy," Kyaris supplied. "I think we should really be tracking down the Sub Rosa, though-"
Kayleigh cut her off with a glare, hefting her mace. "We're looking for the aromatherapist," she said. Then she beamed. "So! Agent Horse, you keep your nose open for revitalizing essential oils. Agent Seeing Colours-"
"His name's Yoof," Salamander supplied.
"Agent Seeing Colours, you look out for her pink highlights. Agent Four Ears-"
"Is that meant to be us?" Jareth growled. "We are two agents, and I for one don't think-"
"That's a shame; you should really try it." Kayleigh flipped her hoverboard back into the air and climbed aboard. "Agents Fours Earses, you listen out for uplifting slogans. And Sal... I'll call you if I need anyone to taste or touch something, all right?"
"I have no idea what you're going on about."
"That's the spirit!" Kayleigh stood up and pressed down with her toe; the hoverboard began to pick up speed. "Onwaaaaards!"
~
((So: yes, Kayleigh does actually have a plan. My theory is that until July drops in to GM us, we'll invent our own trail of clues to follow. And this is the first one! Shout out when you smell/see/etc the aromatherapist - and bonus points if you can guess who I'm bringing back for this. ^_^))
((I'm dropping my theory about the Sub Rosa here - basically, she's not one to let an opportunity go to waste, so while the rest of HQ's in chaos and the Flowers are flailing around, she's wandering around undercover, pretending to be a human agent. No doubt she'll learn many things people would rather she hadn't.))
((Jareth is... well, since Rath never said, I'm going to go with Isengard. I'm actually characterising him on the fly here, based on some other stuff I wrote about Ugluk as a 'noble' warrior. I agree that the non-Elvish Arda agent is an interesting thing to play around with...))
((hS))
Yoof was beginning to like the agent on the flying thing. She was always very happy, and that made Yoof feel better!
Despite being told to look for a color, Yoof began sniffing at the air and tried to prick up his human ears, simply out of habit.
Séverine had always warned him that pink could sometimes mean Mary Sue, but that it could also mean Agent or Flower. Yoof always got confused by that, and then Séverine would get flustered.
Anyway, if it meant finding Séverine, then Yoof would look for pink!
...what she was supposed to be sniffing for, but she kept sniffing the air anyway.
Well, kept sniffing it for all of twenty seconds before she remembered where she was. The last thing you did to find anything in HQ was actually look for it. Didn't these people know that?
She paused in mid-stride. Of course. That was why the big search for the bodyswap device had failed yesterday. Everyone was concentrating on looking for it. No wonder they couldn't find it. Hmmm... Maybe this Luxury-lite had the right idea after all. Get everyone to waste their time looking for a non-existent healer, and they should find the device instead. It was genius.
Hild gave a little gallop to catch up with the rest of the group, sniffing more intently than ever.
Kayleigh was swooping backwards and forwards over the group. "I'll start. Let's sing Beethoven's Fifth! DA DA DA DUMMMM!"
Jareth muttered something to Kyaris, then stepped their body back to walk next to Hild. "Before I was recruited," he said in a low voice, "I trained with your people at the Iron Fortress. Do... would you have been among them?"
Sal, meanwhile, walked at Yoof's side. "So I'm guessing you're not normally in this body, either," he said. "I ended up in a girl who literally turns into fire; has your, um, experience been as strange?"
~
((Feel free to smell the aromatherapist any time. Seeing her is probably off the menu, given that she's presumably been body-swapped.
((Pippa: that would be logical - but this is Kayleigh. She doesn't plan like that. She also doesn't pay enough attention to need it. ^_^
(('Iron Fortress' is the translation of Isengard/Angrenost. I couldn't decide whether Saruman would use the invader's name or the elves'... so I went for 'neither'. I'm assuming Hild and Jareth have done brief introductions, but nothing detailed.
((hS))
"Supposed to be a mawg. Half man, half dog. I'm my own best friend!" He smiled, but it faded quickly. "I miss Séverine. And man body boring! Can't hear, can't smell." He gasped. "Bet it can't taste good either!" He whined, although it sounded weird coming out of a fully human throat. "You have any food?" he asked, peering at Salamander intently.
((Feel free to wait until Pippa responds, if you'd rather do it all in one post.))
"No, I never trained in the Iron Fortress myself. I sometimes took messages there from my tribe, and back again. Because I'm blonde, I could pass as a Forgil, so I never had to worry about being stopped by any Riders patrolling the Gap. I mean, my body was blonde. Still is as far as I know."
She suddenly stopped talking, her attention grabbed by a scent that came from a side passage to the left. Another sniff to make sure. Yes, there was no mistaking it.
"Down there, it smells like mint and cinnamon," she said, loudly so the others could hear. "Do you think that's the aromatherapist, or just someone having a herb tea?" A thought struck her. "Or Atlantiana come back from the dead for revenge?" So many weird things had happened lately, that she couldn't rule anything out.
----------------
((OOC: Hope having her being an occasional messenger isn't too speshul and Sue-like.))
"No, I've given up carrying things around - this body likes to burst into flames at every opportunity." He blinked. "I think I said that already. But it's still weird."
When Hild paused, Jareth took it as an opening. "Which tribe-?" But then she sniffed, and he fell silent.
Kayleigh cocked her head in response to Hild, and took a deep breath. "No, wait, in through the nose..." She sniffed. "You're right; I'd recognise that smell anywhere. Well done, Agent Horse - ten house points to you!"
Swinging her hoverboard around, Kayleigh bounced off a wall and span around a corner. She came to a stop in front of a blonde elf-woman and immediately threw her arms around her, knocking the sign the woman was holding to the ground.
"Beeeeeeeeeee-wait." Kayleigh frowned and took a step back. "You are not bjam." She looked at the aromatherapy stand leaning against the wall, and down at the sign lying on the floor (which said, in shaky letters, 'It'll all get better soon'), and suddenly her mace was in her hand. "You've stolen my friend's stuff. What have you done with her?"
"Um." The elf stumbled back from Kayleigh. "Kay, it's me. I got body-swapped, you know? With some woman from Out-of-Character Hobbits. But I'm still me."
Kayleigh glowered at her. "Prove it."
"Um... go PPC?"
"Bjam!" Kayleigh threw her arms around the Official PPC Morale Officer & Aromatherapist (Department of Operations, Department of Fictional Psychology [disputed]). "How long has it been?"
"About a week, I think." Bjam struggled free and knelt down to pick up her sign. "So, uh, what brings you here?"
~
((The Wiki says bjam is retired. I reject that reality and purloin her for my own use.
((She's currently in the body of Maethorwen of the DOOCH, because I forgot she existed. Blonde, emerald eyes, 5'9''.
((Bjam will not be joining the party, but feel free to ask her questions/buy aromatherapy oils/request an uplifting slogan.
((hS, stealing his friends' characters since '04))
"Oh! I smell that!"
He walked to the stand and inhaled, moving his head from one end to the other as he did so.
"Guess human nose okay sometimes!" He turned to Bjam. "What is this stuff? Smells almost as good as food!"
...meant that some of Hild's memories were confused and contradictory. Her author had never fixed the details by writing them down.
Right now Hild couldn't shake the feeling that, in one possible version of her past, she might have seen this blonde elf or someone who looked very like her. Possibly at Isengard? But what would an elf be doing there? It didn't make sense.
On the other hand, the fact that they had found a real aromatherapist didn't make sense either.
Curious, Hild listened as the aromatherapist explained that she was bodyswapped too. So, there wasn't any point asking her if they could've met before. More importantly, it also meant there wasn't an aromatheraputic (was that even a word?) way of getting back in their own bodies. So why had this Kayleigh been so keen on everyone finding her?
Wanting to find out more, but unable to think of any better way of opening the conversation, Hild asked: "Uh, do you have anything that would help a very stressed Hydra body to relax?"
"No, wait, not a well. You know how we've all had out bodies swapped?"
"Er, you haven't," bjam pointed out.
"Obviously not me we, but in a spiritual sense, I'm totally right there with you."
"Er. Right." Bjam half-turned towards the funny-talking man inspecting her stall, and put on her game face. "Hi! It's funny you should say that - many of the flavours I sell are actually inspired by edibles. I have both essential and irrelevant oils of lemon, mint, and beef, scented candles in chocolate, raspberry, and cookie, and incense in bear, strawberry, and I-can't-believe-it's-not-cannabis.
"For stress in carnivores," she went on, making eye contact with the hydra head that had spoken, "I recommend my special Double Marrow Infusion. That's bone marrow and marrow-the-vegetable. Sprinkle some in a bowl of hot water and inhale..." She paused, frowned, looking at the hydra's eight heads. "You might need rather a lot."
((She's buying something to help Sean relax, because he's having trouble adjusting to multiple heads, and is very stressed out and grumpy as a result.
((And yes, she does drink. Mostly beer and ale. What kind of self-respecting bandit would she be if she didn't? So yes, they will have to get together for a drinking/singing session when this is all over.))
"For stress in carnivores," she went on, looking at Hild, "I recommend my special Double Marrow Infusion. That's bone marrow and marrow-the-vegetable. Sprinkle some in a bowl of hot water and inhale..." She paused, frowned. "You said a hydra, right? You might need rather a lot."
((That should cover it. ~hS))
Hild tried to put her mouth into the pocket of her (or rather, the unicorn's) little black waistcoat to pull out her money pouch. But each time she tried, she just ended up pushing the pocket further away.
Robbing a colleague obviously wasn't an option, so she asked, "Can you deliver? RC4. I'll pay when it arrives."
He grabbed up the container Bjam had pointed out and took a big whiff of the beef scent.
"Aaaaaah, meeeaaat!" He grinned briefly, but then pouted. "But Séverine has all the money . . . Maybe smell lady wants food from kitchens as pay?"
"Don't worry about payment, either of you. Anyone dragged around by Kay is a friend of mine. Not to mention you lot seem to be the only hope for sorting this whole mess," she gestured at her borrowed body, "in any reasonable timeframe."
Kayleigh grinned. "That's the spirit! Bjam, if I haven't told you recently, you're an awesome morale officer."
"You have," Salamander pointed out. "Last week."
"Good! So, let's see, where were we?"
"Complementing me," bjam supplied, handing Yoof a business card (a miniature sign with 'Go PPC Aromatherapy' on it). "Which means you're about to ask me for something."
"How did you know? No, never mind!" Kayleigh put on her most serious face. "Bjam: people have had their bodies switched. Can you believe it?"
Bjam looked down at herself. "Um. Yes?"
"Oh, right. And I thought, since you spend so much time wandering around HQ, you might have... seen something?"
"Um." Bjam cocked her head. "I've seen... lots of things?"
Salamander stepped forward, trying to stop his hands from turning into flames. "I think she means, anything that might help us put things right."
"Ummmm." Bjam bit Maethorwen's lip. "Well... it's not much, you understand..."
"It's more than we've got right now," Salamander said.
"Right. Well, right after the swap happened, I was singing encouraging ditties outside the Cafeteria, and this group of DoSAT techs ran past... they were babbling something about field strengths and dropoffs, I didn't really understand, but it sounded... important. One of them stopped to get a pamphlet, which was nice."
Kayleigh grabbed her hoverboard again. "TO THE CAFETERIA!"
"I said outside," bjam corrected, "by the Fountain of Bleepka."
"TO THE FOUNTAIN OF BLEEPKA!"
"Kayleigh, we should really think about-" Salamander stopped, watching his partner's retreating back. "Right. Forgot who I was talking to, there."
~
Why the FofB? I just like it :P. When we get there, I propose that one of you finds another clue, so we can keep the random walking going until July says we've found something.
hS
Then, he picked out one of the beef-scented products. "Thank you, nice smell lady!" He took a big whiff.
"Outside the cafeteria, huh? I can always get to the cafeteria real quick!" He started marching down a corridor, saying quietly to himself, "'Once upon a time warp, in a galaxy very, very, very, very, far away . . .'"
((Sorry I made the posts get out of order! And obviously, feel free to wrap up anything that needs wrapping before following Yoof.))
and thanked bjam for her generosity before trotting after Yoof.
Even if that mixture doesn't help Sean, she thought, we can still use it for stews.
hile?))
". . . 'Well, goodbye Virgin Alarm.'" Yoof finished reciting. "Oh! We're at the fountain you guys! We did good!" He turned excitedly to his companions, who had just sat through the entire script of Spaceballs.
Kayleigh hopped down from her hoverboard, landing on top of one of the mini-balrog statues surrounding the Fountain of Bleepka, and posed dramatically. "Now go forth and seek- yerk!"
Kayleigh tumbled into the Fountain, raising an almighty splash. Kyaris folded her arms and looked challengingly at the group.
"What? You were all dying to push her, I just got there first."
"Pushing the person who's trying to fix this whole thing isn't exactly productive," Jareth growled.
Kyaris shrugged the one shoulder she had control over. "Okay, she found us one person who might have maybe known something. But do you really think she's the most likely to find a real clue?"
Kayleigh surfaced from the bleepka fountain, waving her hand. "Hey! Hey guys! I found a clue!"
"Oh, that's just not-"
"Kayleigh." Salamander shook his head and held out a hand to help his partner out. "That's a chip packet. People chuck rubbish in there all the time."
"... it might be a clue."
"No."
That aromatherapist had said the DoSAT techs ran past the fountain. There was no reason why they should've left anything important here, rather than at wherever they came from or wherever they went or in any of the other corridors in between.
Not that it would be immediately obvious if the technicians had dropped anything here. As Kayleigh's chip wrapper showed, the janitors had been sloppy about cleaning the place ever since the swap. Who was the one responsible for this area? Hild thought it might be Mr. Norris, the janitor from My Immortal, who had fallen into HQ through one of that fics many plotholes, along with his pet cat Filth.
Hild wondered if he and Filth had been swapped, bringing them both closer to their canon selves. Either way, this place had been neglected. There were quite a few wrappers and other bits of paper scattered about. Not too many, but just enough to break up HQ's usual uniform grey appearance.
Hild idly started looking at some of them, just in case they contained directions on how to find the secret hiding place of the bodyswap engine. A chocolate wrapper, a couple of receipts from the cafeteria, a scrunched-up morale pamphlet, a used tissue, a...
Wait a minute.
"Hey, folks!" called Hild. "I think I've found something. Look, lying at the start of this corridor. It's the pamphlet the aromatherapist gave to the DoSAT techs. They must've gone this way."
(He grabbed the chocolate wrapper and licked out the remaining residue on the way, but he still walked to the corridor.)
He tested the air with big, exaggerated sniffs. "Yep! Still smelled like nice-smell lady! Went down here!" He moved over the wall of the hallway and started forward, nose testing the wall every step of the way.
((Where are we going!? >.> ))