There's always a lighthouse

[wheremst]

And just like that, you wake up in the basement of a lighthouse in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. There's a circle of 25 pods in the middle of the room, and two more in a room off to the side, and you can imagine who is in which.

An elevator to the side of the room leads up to the ground floor (or to the first sub-basement, if you want to check out the machine that brought you here), where you can for the first time in weeks look out a window and see the sky. Its a beautiful sunny day, with a strong breeze on the grassy ground of the island where the lighthouse stands. Have you ever been this happy to hear seagulls?

You're free. Whatever comes next, you're free and you won. Take some time to relish your victory, won't you? Reunite with friends you thought you had lost, go forth and just... well, enjoy this.

Comments

[bolderfell]

I take a lot of pride in being the "not dead" kind of all right, yeah.

So... got plans, once everything here's settled? Seems to be the topic of the moment.

[emberserker]

All I know is what I'm not doing. I'd go back, but I -- [She hesitates.] If all that was true, I wouldn't be able to stop myself. I try to destroy Ernesta, I get myself killed, that's what it wants. The last thing I want is to be a puppet after all this just happened.

[bolderfell]

...Well... if you'd want to see a place with magic to spare...

[He's fidgeting way more with his scarf now than he did during any part of that final trial.]

Look, I don't know if you'd like Orsterra, but I could at least show you around some of it. If you're interested.

[emberserker]

What, you mean --

[She stops and thinks it over.]

...It's strange, but you know, I don't think I'd mind seeing it. It sounds like it's never dull, at least.

[bolderfell]

It doesn't have toilets, if that's going to be a problem.

[emberserker]

It sounds like you're going to miss investigating them.

[is she joking?? what did you people do to her.]

[bolderfell]

Hah!

[Is he laughing?! What did you all do to him? He turns aside and covers his mouth, but when he looks at her again, he's grinning.]

Not particularly. Might miss breaking them, though.

[emberserker]

Oh, don't tell me you went and flooded the place.

[bolderfell]

No, that was Vincent and Kirei.

[emberserker]

Ha, ha. [eye roll] It did sound like they'd done a good deal of damage, just not to do with the plumbing.

[bolderfell]

You have no idea. We lost that whole area the first day after that, then another and another... We were down to just that first wing by the end. What I did to the toilets was just a drop in the bucket.

[emberserker]

That sounds insufferable. We still had the areas for a bit, but then the place started to break down. It was like holes were torn into it. And then the janitors showed up and we had to grab what we could, get the -- what was it, encrypted backups? -- and run. Of course I got the only one they gave a gun to, but that's how it all goes.

[bolderfell]

...That sounds much worse than anything we had to deal with. I'm glad none of you fell into any of those... holes.

[emberserker]

At least we're in reality now, or one of many, apparently. But no worries, we handled it. Some more surprisingly than others.

...I do have to wonder why guard three specific ones with an armed cleaner. They did seem to have some traits left of who they were before, even while encrypted. Well, it ought to be that much easier to put them all back the way they were once they're caught, in that case.

[bolderfell]

That'd be something. Putting people's minds and memories back in the wrong bodies. Could get awkward.

[emberserker]

Oh, that's hideous.

[bolderfell]

Something for the outside help to worry about, I guess.