london ♔ when the gusts came around to blow me down

[wynn]

  iron sky - paolo nutini

WHO || Everyone and their dog.
WHAT || In the aftermath of the attack, the Knights attempt to recover
WHERE || Knights HQ, etc.
WHEN || Dec. 1st-8th, 2015
HOW || Actionspam

As darkness falls all around the castle, the remaining Knights straggle out of their broken castle to survey the damage and count the dead – of which there are three: Rose Hathaway, Kali, and Killian Jones.

What began like any other day for most quickly descended into a nightmare, after Wynn and most of the Section Heads were lured out to downtown London to face a threat of dual dragons, who turned out to be only clockwork creations of deposed Andres dictator Dimitris Sarandis, robotic menaces that were nothing but a distraction from the real threat. Having rallied support from some of the Knights' other enemies, Dimitris sent an army of chipped creatures, Shadowkind, robots, and a giant tank to destroy the Knighthood's headquarters, dropping part of the roof down onto the training room and med center in the initial explosive blast. Sarandis' alliance with a mysterious hacker named One (who turned out to have been the man who invented technomagic in the first place along with Zero) not only downed the Knights' communications, but also their defensive and surveillance systems (with some help from a mentally dominated Eleven). Whatever preparations Zero had made for an attack by One were undermined by the sudden but inevitable betrayal of the humanized robot GlaDOS, who introduced a learning virus into the system before taking off, likely having made some kind of deal with One to restore her robotic form.

The Knights rallied under the remaining sect leaders – Lis'sa and Koraith – to make a plan to fight back and try to take down Dimitris, who sent a taunting message out across the Drakenet, announcing his intentions to leave the castle as a smoking crater littered with corpses. Fearing that the attack might also be meant to target Myri and Vi's children, a group moved them to the Round Table Room, perhaps the most secure location in the building. The attack was a smokescreen of sorts, something Vi realized, taking Elena, Des, and Faith O'Keefe with her to the library in hopes of saving the elven mage, Lazarus, whose blood the villains required to unleash the nightmare god Malaak'a upon the world. The library, however, was already in shambles, thanks to a fire-slinging red half-dragon who had confronted some Knights there (and led Kate Beckett to discover something strange about herself...). Des remained in the hallway to confront a demon, in the same place where Skye had nearly died to an ifrit pyrokineticist named Serafina, one of Dimitris' chipped experiments. Sawyer Kelly and Alex Karamazov butted heads when it came down to sparing the enslaved ifrit, but in the end, Alex made the decision by putting a bullet in her head when Mars wouldn't act – much to Sawyer's horror. Things went to hell pretty quickly when the villainous Mind Master drove into the library on a motorcycle and proceeded to almost slaughter Vi, Elena, Faith, and Gar, making vicious comments to the former about going to see her deceased husband again. When Elena grabbed the Mind Master, she abruptly vanished, and Elena's whereabouts remain unknown. The Mind Master proceeded to make her way into Lazarus' secret chambers beneath the library, slitting his throat and collecting the magic that coursed through his veins in lieu of blood, the lasting effect of his having survived the ritual that sealed Malaak'a away in the first place.

Meanwhile, downtown, while Carol Danvers and Clark Kent played superhero around the city, Sam and Buffy ran into the archangels Raphael and Zerachiel, who were assisting the wounded of London, and Buffy cut a deal with Raphael after he cautioned her that some sort of big demon was also involved in the attack. In exchange for allowing Hell's forces further freedom of movement (the necessary cost to maintain the balance of the universe), Raphael transported Buffy right into the middle of the fray. The demon already gone, the angel advised her to go and protect the children – which turned out to be necessary indeed, as Sarandis had sent chipped, invisible raptors after the babies. Will Graham nearly died in the attack, but no children – or dogs – fell prey to the beasts.

Outside, a number of Knights armed to the teeth with grenades, rocket launchers, and flame throwers took on a towering seventy-foot tall Colossus that was ripping the castle apart. However, when Steve Rogers cut its head off with an expertly thrown shield toss, the monstrosity fell into the front of the castle with all of its three hundred tons, (and on fire, courtesy of Baal) and many barely escaped with their lives. Wolverine was the only person trapped in the ensuing rubble, but Nathan Young and Amy Pond dug him free as his body healed up the massive wounds suffered.

A strike team was sent out to take on Dimitris in his tank, and Spike and Dean drove Archer's car straight into the oversized military vehicle as a distraction, while Cora Hale, Rose, and Kali disabled the tank and its weapons and broke their way inside. What they found, however, was merely a projection of Dimitris taunting them, as Cora's werewolf senses alerted her immediately to the fact that no one was actually inside but them. Too late, the girls tried to escape – as the tank exploded in a volley of shrapnel and gout of flame, that also caught Christos La Krail and Grant Ward off guard, who had just arrived at the gate so that Ward might meet with Wynn for his official Knighthood interview. As everyone scrabbled to save the injured, a bag of grenades that Kali had dropped caused a secondary explosion, that took Rose and Kali's lives. Dean and Spike proceeded to look insane when the archangel Michael showed up to collect the souls of the dead, and they were the only two who could see him, but Cap stood his ground anyway with them. Dean angrily refused to give up on Rose's life, despite the fact that the death of her bondmate Lissa less than twenty four hours prior had left her connection to life weakened already. Michael cautioned him against doing 'something stupid', as Dean stalked off with her body.

Meanwhile, after realizing Zero's role in all this and helping return him to his senses so that he and Skye could restore communications and defenses, Lila Zacharov-Gray took off with Alex to the upper floor to find Amara. They discovered the homo magi using her powerful magic to keep the ceiling from collapsing into the entire castle, and while she entreated them to evacuate, Lila refused to leave her, prompting Amara to use her most powerful spell to repair the structural damage that was threatening to capsize the castle, at the cost of alerting her father to her exact location.

Just when it seemed like all might be well, Emma Swan, cursed by Poseidon to turn into a flesh-eating kelpie if she wasn't in water by sundown, came across the body of Lazarus and found her monstrous hunger awakened. Dissatisfied with the bloodless corpse, she decided to make a meal of Killian Jones, magically teleporting him into the pond behind the Knighthood, where in spite of Faye and Alex's best efforts, Killian was drowned. Luckily, however, they prevented Emma from eating her true love.

The other Knights fought bravely against basilisks, clockwork mages, and giant scorpions, while trying to assist the wounded, rescue the trapped, and do everything they could to protect the Knights' assets from falling into Dimitris' hands. With the smoke cleared, their home – thanks to Amara – remains standing, but the damage to it is substantial and won't be repaired overnight, even with magic at their disposal. More lasting will be the emotional scars of watching the only home some of them even remember ever having broken around them, their illusion of safety shattered, and their peace violated – not to mention the looming possibility of the Nightmare God being freed.

[ You are now free to make top posts for your characters in the wake of the attack. These top posts may include multiple sections (with different instructions for whether you want them to be open to multiple threads for that scene or closed to a single thread with multiple participants), that deal with anything directly after the events of the event post, and in the week following. I recommend using letters or numbers to indicate each section, so that those responding can put what they are doing in the subject line, to help others quickly know where to go to jump into any single threads.

There will be a thread about Wynn's return and a subsequent Drakenet post addressing IC-ly where people will live. Those with rooms in the Dragon's Tongue, Dragon's Hide, Dragon's Hoard, and Dragon's Fire wing will find their rooms almost entirely undamaged and still livable, but there is a percentage chance that anyone in the Dragon's Light or squire rooms will have their room destroyed. Please ask me for each of your characters this applies to and I will let you know the extent of the damage. Your characters are free to try searching the rubble for their personal effects – just include it in their top post with a search check please, and I'll let you know how much of their stuff is recoverable. Rebuilding efforts will commence within the week, so if your character has any way of contributing to putting the castle back together, that's also top post fodder. There is limited space in the Knights' downtown London office for some Knights to stay, while others may have their own apartments, etc. Other options may open up eventually. If your character is no longer living in the castle, please use your top post to establish this! I will put up top posts for each potential resurrection attempt, as rezzes take multiple days IC-ly to even be attempted.

Destroyed/heavily damaged sections of the castle: front hall/lobby (the Colossus is still there)/stairs, but there are currently ladders to access the second floor; the Dragon's Light wing/office/small library/bathrooms; the chapel; the med center; the training room; the armory; the bowling alley; the piano room; billiards room; parlor; the Dragon's claws bedrooms; parts of the dining hall; the library is intact but heavily damaged, many of the books destroyed by fire. After the first couple days, additional doors have been added to the castle at the far west end of the horizontal squire bedrooms hall, and beside the Dragon's hoard wing to enter the building, and a door has been installed at the southwest corner of the dining hall to allow people to cut through it to circumvent the Colossus still taking up the lobby and blocking access to the main hall. ]

Comments

mary margaret blanchard ; ota

[unlost]

[To put it lightly, Snow White is a mess.

Her daughter's curse forced her to take the life of her true love, which currently overrides any other pain Snow might be feeling about the state of the Castle. It seems as if her family is just constantly under attack by curse after curse with no end in sight, and she doesn't even have her husband to help her weather this storm.

Because he doesn't even remember her.

She's trying to be strong, trying to have hope, but even the brightest of lights can dim after enough time.

She stays with Emma as often as she can, though when night falls and she's forced back to her lake, Snow finds herself wandering the halls, cleaning up here and there, trying to organize people and things, but there's a distant quality to it all, as if she might fall apart the second she thinks about anything too hard.]

[gwenbloodycooper]

[That distant quality is not in any way lost on Gwen, who at one point will move to Snow's side, gently taking her arm, intending to lead her to the nearest place where she can stop and sit for five minutes.]

Just between you and I, I happen to know where the Hoard are keeping a stash of Cream Biscuits. [Cookies. And by Hoard she means Andrew.] Now which do you prefer, tea or coffee?

[Just, FYI? There's nothing in Gwen's tone that suggests she's okay with No as an answer.]

[killingtodeath]

[Stiles has been all over the place, so he's seen Mary Margaret a few times but this is the first he's slowed down enough to realize that she looks a little... Well, like they all do. So he heads for his room really quick and comes back with his hand extended, palm up. A bag of M&Ms rests in his hand. It's literally the least he can do but he just feels like maybe someone should look out for her.]

I get the feeling you haven't eaten much today. [So you brought her candy??? Teenagers...]

[generaldavideus]

[David circles round to the ballroom every so often, too many people he knows waiting for a rez not to. He doesn't get close, exactly, on Hook's end, but when he sees Mary Margaret step away as Emma heads back to the lake, he moves to intercept her.]

How is she?

[She being Emma. There's a beat.]

Aside from the obvious, anyway.

[monticora]

[ Alec very rarely cares about the people around him. It's not that he doesn't have feelings, but Manticore didn't exactly help these kids learn how to deal with what they were feeling. If anything they told them to swallow it. Bury it deep down underneath everything. You aren't supposed to care when you kill someone. You don't flinch when someone's on their knees begging for their life. You don't shed tears when a soldier falls in the line of battle. You keep going.

Which is why he's not showing any emotion regarding the state of Kali. He may be sad because she's like him and gone, but he doesn't let people around him know. If anything his smile stays in place and the swagger remains. Malina's kicked him out and he's still bouncing room to room since his is pretty much fucked. Today is a day for helping out though. Which is why he finds his way to the closest person (sorry, Mary Margaret) and lets out a sigh. ] What can I do? [ You look super authoritative, Mary Margaret. ]

[unhappily]

[ regina finds her at some point b/c uh

inquiring minds want to know, sorry snow. ] Is it true?

dante | ota

[buttholy]

[dante spends a little time in the ballroom, just to … see kali and linger by her body and be depressed about life — they weren't super-close, but he sparred with her a lot and she was a magical unicorn bringing sunshine and friendship to everyone she touched.

but, for the most part, he'd rather focus on the things he can do to make things better, like helping with the colossus removal and helping squires/light wing ppl do any searching/heavy debris lifting in their rooms. his personal room is fine, but he spends a lot of time trying to recover the hot mess that's now the training room bc it was like … his other personal room.

and also at some point he is ROAMING AROUND LOOKING FOR CORDELIA.]

[allaboutme]

[ cordelia is roaming around the squire wing mostly, doling out these packages she has made, that lorne helped her sort - fancy designer clothes that she went out and bought for people who lost all theirs. #priorities

he'd come up behind her sorting some out on a table in the hall. she doesn't look up, just says: ] Maybe I should have alphabetized them by designer.

[withasouvenir]

[ even though they talked to each other a few days ago, thea isn't the type to just ignore her friends (that's the other queen's thing) and also she has something to say, so eventually dante gets a knock on his door. ]

Hey, it's me. Can I come in?

will | ota

[mydesigns]

[will is saddened to see that his room is destroyed, but he's at least thankful that his dogs were with him at the time, so he didn't lose any of the fur babies. he'll try to salvage what he can (search 22), but most of his possessions are like … flannel shirts, dog stuff, and fishing supplies so he doesn't care too much either way.

when he's not doing that, he spends a lot of time fishing out at the lake. he doesn't feel like he could be useful in most of the reconstruction aspects, and the constantly being around people part of things as so many people are pulled into closer quarters while they rebuild/are homeless doesn't jive too well with his desire to be alone. with his fifty five dogs.]

[killingtodeath]

I've heard some weird rumors that someone was killed out here. [Stiles says as he approaches the lake where Will is fishing.]

Might want to be careful.

[impetere]

[Cora can understand the wanting to be alone, but she also likes Will so on one of her jaunts outside, she spots him fishing and will change course, Bernie trotting along politely behind her. She pauses, slipping her hands in the pockets of her jacket before she speaks.]

Do you ever catch anything good out of here?

[theminotaur]

[ what if abigail came down with a blanket and just laid down on the dock next to will? that's her plan so that's what is happening. jamie foxx follows her, yipping at him with his high pitched baby fox squeal. he's about as scary as gryphon. ]

I gave Cora our tent because hers was destroyed and ours was only ripped a little bit.

[icouldbe_bess]

[ it's some time during the parade of resurrections that alice perches next to will on the dock and passes over a napkin wrapped sandwich from her little picnic basket. it is useful in transporting food and that's all she has to say about that. ]

It is way too heavy inside.

shawn spencer | ota

[pwnspatrickjane]

[So.

That was a thing that happened.

Shawn isn't really the guy you go to to help process the hows or whys of a situation. He's the guy that's there to make someone laugh, to provide the pick-me-up when people are feeling down, and he doesn't always do well with handling the gravity of something like this.

He hasn't been part of the knighthood long, not even a year, in fact, but he knows that there are people who have been there a long time. This place is their home, their family, and Sarandis came in like a wrecking ball to destroy it. Shawn is not blind to that fact, he just ... doesn't really know how to help.

So he after retrieving whatever he can find (search 13) and moving it to Clark's room, he just injects himself where necessary with his own brand of slightly inappropriate humor and hopes that the rest of the knights can see it for what it is. And if anything, they can laugh at his decided lack of coordination.

Or his lack of work ethic, as he's currently leaning against one of the piles of rubble, looking decidedly out of breath and overdramatic.]

Can we take a break now? I really think it's almost time for lunch.

[Shawn, you've been working an hour.]

[killingtodeath]

I second the motion! [oh no. Who put these two on the same team for clean up. Worst idea.]

Lila has pizza coming on a steady loop. A delicious cheesy loop.

[druidisms]

It's 10 am. [ which isn't to say no and it's not like gus can really talk in regards to work ethic because he's literally smoking as he carries rubble out the door, but w/e. ]

Who eats lunch at 10 am?

alex | ota mostly

[ambitionist]

a - multi-thread
[after seeing the bodies in front of the castle and talking with wynn about what happened to hook, he goes to the ballroom, lingering near kali's body and eventually curling up in a corner to take a nap. eventually he'll ask a cleric for help. eventually. maybe.]

b - multi-thread
[ in the days that follow, alex divides his time between checking on kali/eventually checking on her rez progress, skulking around the bar, and skulking around outside to smoke. basically it's a lot of skulking. usually there's an air of arrogance and sass around him, but right now he just seems tired. he doesn't know what to do. this is the sort of thing that would make him angry, everything is — he's always so angry, he's basically bruce banner — but being angry requires energy and effort he doesn't have right now.]


c
[also, at some point, it occurs to him to text piffy.]

you weren't in town for the dragonpocalypse, were you?

[bittersweeter]

[ part of her is upset she can't clone herself and make her clones do her bidding like looking after amara so she can check on alex, but she can't so it's not for a couple days that she actually finds him. unfortunately that puts them both in the middle of rez central so she waits until he breaks away from his little blonde sister's rez and abigail moves over to cora to follow him out for a smoke, lighting her cigarette almost before she leaves the ballroom. almost. ]

Hey. [ she's quiet as she looks out on to the grass. ] How's she looking?

[reallywicked]

[Party in the ballroom... jk worst party ever. Faye notices that Alex is hanging around a lot and eventually puts it together that he knows the blonde. Kali. Faye only knows about her through Skyes brief summation, but that doesn't really matter to Faye. Apparently Alex cared about Kali too. She waits until he moves away, probably to curl up in a corner to try to sleep because she just has that sort of luck lately.]

Hey... Can we talk?

b }

[allmydreams]

[She joins him in the ballroom at some point, bottle in hand along with two glasses and she pours one off to hand to him, before pouring one for herself.]

I found out where these came from, by the way.

[She'll ease him to talking about whatever's got him sulky in a second, if he'll let her, but for right now, she's just bringing him booze.]

c)

[panaceum]

nope, back in the motherland. i was following it on the news tho. the hell was up w/your phone?

b-ish }

[bredinthebone]

[Malina swings by after Felicity leaves and pretty much just sits down without warning, not really expecting anything beyond needing to get off her feet for a bit. Instead she finds the remains of the bottle that they didn't quite finish!]

Well hello. Don't mind if I do.

[And she's just going to take a swig right out of the bottle.]

gold | ota

[undealt]

[a. neal (single thread)

after finally deem it safe to leave faye, as more people begin to filter into the ballroom to mourn the dead and prepare for the resurrections, gold excuses himself to hunt down milah, and return to the lake, where emma has retreated, giving instructions to faye and whoever else might see his son to tell the man where he's gone.

he's keeping a safe distance from the water and even milah isn't getting too close, though the agitation she's radiating suggests this is normal and that for a long time she's been denied use of the lake in the evenings due to this STUPID KELPIE MONSTROSITY.

he didn't trouble faye with asking what happened to emma, exactly. he's certain he'll get that information in time. for now, there's other problems, and other arrangements to be made. emma's simply going to have to wait her turn.

b. multi-thread

gold's magic isn't particularly useful in repairing the castle, but he does have mending, which he occupies himself with on small things when he can. he's been gone from the castle so long it's difficult to work his way into things, but better he kept himself occupied than worried about his state of affairs or felt sorry for himself regarding Belle.

he's mostly found in the library, repairing what books he can. it's unobtrusive and allows him to feel useful without being all up in the thick of everything. milah the crocodile is usually close by.]

[fuckingneal]

[It's not long before Neal arrives at the lake, having been pushed in that direction by Faye who didn't even above time to be jealous about Gold having a real kid around here just like Emma.

In any case, he arrives with his hands shoved into his coat pockets, keeping his distance.

I heard you wanted to see me?

kate beckett | ota

[killmypatience]

[(a) anywhere and everywhere ~ ota]

[Kate keeps herself busy more often then not, just wanting to not slow down in a way that will give her too much time to think. Thinking just after big shake ups like this has never really been her strong suit, and she tries to find ways to keep propelling herself forward, even if there isn't really anywhere to go.

She rotates between the construction areas, the salvage crews and the ballroom as she needs to, only really taking time to stop, eat and sleep. She's also keeping an eye out for familiar faces, and ignoring the fact that two of those faces is lying dead in the ballroom. She'll take the time to mourn, but only when she's sure that Kali and Rose are really dead.]

[(b) the woods ~ ota]

[Towards the latter end of the week, when there are more people around and she isn't needed on call quite as much, she makes her way out to the woods where it's isolated so she can ... practice. Not that she still knows what she's practicing or even if she can manage to do that again when adrenaline and panic isn't coursing through her system, but it's at least worth a shot.

She glances around the clearing to make sure she's alone, before closing her eyes and doing her best to concentrate, just to see what will happen (concentration 3). It's not ... working that well, so mostly she looks like a weirdo, but she's trying.]

B

[byyourleave]

[he needed a break from the construction so he decided to take a walk away from everyone. Of course, he wasn't expecting to run across Kate out in the woods either. Was she meditating or something? He didn't want to disturb her, but she looked a bit frustrated.]

Are you okay?