Winter is no place for a butterfly...

[papillion_de_resistance]

Who: Gabriel Agreste (and potentially Nooroo) and you
When: The early morning hours of the day of his arrival, then more reasonable morning hours
Where: Various locations in the school
What: A very confused superhero arrives
Warnings: Gabriel's world is kind of terrible, but other than that, shouldn't be any.

In hindsight, Gabriel would be glad there was no one present to witness his rather undignified arrival for more reasons than simply the preservation of his secret identity. He'd been in the middle of patrolling the city, leaping from rooftop to rooftop, when abruptly, there was a flash of light and the entire scene changed. Gone were the rooftops of Paris and the mild air of a late spring night. In their place, the snow covered roof of what looked like a castle and the biting chill of midwinter darkness.

Unfortunately, this transition happened in mid-leap, and due to a combination of shock and the unexpectedly slippery surface, he landed badly, his feet sliding out from under him and momentum sending him sliding over two meters across the frosty stonework. After a moment of just laying there in complete confusion, he sat up, not for the first time extremely glad for how durable his transformed state was. Spotting his cane next to him, he picked it up from where it had fallen, careful to blur its outline in the snow with a brush of his hand before he stood up.

A quick scan of his surroundings revealed nothing at all familiar, and no lights of a town or city visible anywhere. In fact, the only light in the immediate area came from the stars and the moon, which while not quite full was on its way to becoming so. As his eyes adjusted, he was able to make out the dim shapes of buildings in the near distance, though all of them were eerily dark. He frowned; something about this wasn't right, far beyond his sudden change of surroundings.

Standing around on a rooftop likely wasn't going to get him any information, however, and since he could feel the chill of the air even with the protection of his costume, he decided that any investigation would likely best be done indoors. And in less conspicuous attire. Thankfully it didn't take long to find the entrance to the stairwell, and almost shockingly, the door proved to be unlocked. Once it had closed behind him and he'd quickly glanced around to make certain he was alone, he said, "Light wings, fall."

His costume vanished, replaced by his normal clothing, and Nooroo reappeared. He pulled a honey caramel out of his pocket and gave it to the kwami. "What happened, Gabriel?", Nooroo asked before taking a bite. "And where are we?"

"Both very good questions," he said. "And ones we need to find the answers to. In any case, you should likely stay hidden until we have a better idea of what's going on; as helpful as you can be in scouting and observation, we can't afford to potentially be separated in an unknown location."

Nooroo nodded, and once he'd finished the caramel, ducked into Gabriel's pocket, safely out of sight as Gabriel headed down the stairs and into the building proper. The building, as it turned out was a school of some sort, and Gabriel poked his head into several classrooms. he didn't expect there to be any students or teachers about at this time of night, of course- since a clock he'd spotted had shown that it was well past midnight, just as it had been in Paris-, but there might still be a custodian or a night guard about. He did keep an eye out for any rooms that seemed to have lights on, however, just in case.

If he didn't find anyone during his nighttime explorations, however, the next morning the current residents of Auradon Prep would find an unusually tall man asleep in one of the comfortable armchairs in the library, his round glasses slightly askew due to how his head was resting, reading lamp still on. Several reference books sat on the table next to him, and another lay fallen open across his lap. Someone should likely wake him, if only so he didn't miss breakfast.

Comments

[queen_butterfly]

He'd hear a voice, before he caught sight of her -- a lady's voice, singing softly, from one of the school's rooms. The light was on inside, spilling out through the open door.

"--that you left.
I'll keep the hearth's coals burning, the wine in the cellar cold....
Throw wide the doors, and from the stoop, I'll wait to hear your step."

There wasn't any music accompanying it; she was merely singing to herself while she worked. And intent on doing so, it seemed; her head was down as she focused on hand-stitching the garment in her lap as she sat there on the floor amid her supplies, making something that looked to be a coat, a wizard's-style thing with loose sleeves, rather than something more fitted.

But the interesting part was, while she was stitching, carefully but efficiently sticking the needle through the fabric and pulling it around to repeat the motion, similar was going on with a few other needles similarly working away at the hems of the garment. They were moving more or less in unison, the tiny slivers of silver drawing red thread up behind them, their work standing out against the dark gray of the fabric. It was even, and at the same angles, as if done by a machine....

It wasn't, of course, that much was plain to see, if he dared watch. There was no machine in sight. There weren't even hands holding those needles....

"In the quiet of the evening, beneath the starry sky,
In every passing shadow, and every whispered breeze,
I see your dance and laughter, the smile in your eyes...
I'll wait upon this doorstep, 'till you return to me...."

[papillion_de_resistance]

The voice and the light spilling into the hallway drew his attention, a welcome beacon in the dark. There was something about an empty school at night that never failed to feel a bit eerie, no matter how old one got, or how otherwise pleasant the school's surroundings were. Upon arriving at the room, he found the source of the singing; a woman with long, dark hair working on hand sewing what, at a glance, looked like a loose fitting coat. Given the amount of fabric and sewing supplies scattered about, the room was obviously frequently used for the purpose, and the multiple chairs implied it was a meeting place for some sort of sewing group. Just the fact that the woman risked being associated with such a cooperative effort was promising, but he needed more details; it wouldn't do to jump to conclusions.

He was about to greet her when a glint of metal caught his eye and he noticed the needles working away at the coat's hem, apparently on their own, and his eyes went wide for a moment. That was... decidedly not normal, and likely magical, though almost certainly not connected to the Miraculous. As much as he'd learned not to use magic for selfish purposes, he couldn't help but feel a twinge of jealousy; having needles that could work on their own would likely save him so much time...

Brushing aside that thought, however, he cleared his throat softly to announce his presence. "Excuse me," he said. "I don't mean to interrupt your work, but I must say you have a lovely singing voice." Even lovelier as it was the first sign of life he'd come across here. Plus, opening with a compliment couldn't hurt.

[queen_butterfly]

She peeked up at him, blinking a few times as a blush and small smile made themselves apparent. "Thank you," she said, still quiet.

She was younger-seeming here, perhaps an older teenager; to those that knew her, it probably said something about her mental state. But even to those that didn't, her overall look was certainly a statement of something. Her hair, twisted up from her forehead on both sides, to be held in place with ribbons and roses of unusual, dark blues and purples... surely those were fake? They were rather convincing these days, hardly seeming to be made of plastic or fabric at all, at least until one touched them. The dark purple, somewhat too-big look of her irises... in another world, those would easily have been dismissed as mere colored contacts. And her makeup was only emphasizing them, dark as it was. But her ears? At the new angle, it was clearer that their shape, subtle as they were, was not merely a result of them being hidden by her hair. She'd seemingly gone to great lengths for this... costume? A dress that, even with her sitting on the floor like that, seemed like it wouldn't have been out of place at the Met Gala, but for perhaps being rather on the more conservative side, than the adventurous.

There was a quiet sort of calm melancholy here, if he looked -- not a poor mood, exactly, but she'd surely had better days.

"My mind seems to have wandered toward missing someone again... I don't suppose you're looking for company yourself? I could offer refreshments...."

She turned her hand from her garment on her lap, in a subtle sort of flourish, hiding what had to have happened... because there was no way she had been hiding a crystal goblet of dark liquid like that in her sewing project, which she now offered up toward him. Or the shallow bowl in her other, which she lifted to match, full of fresh produce of some kind, large, shiny, spherical black things, and strawberries, and grapes....

On her lap, the needles had stilled as she spoke, tucked into the fabric so as not to lose their place.

[papillion_de_resistance]

The young woman's features startled him a bit, though he did his best to conceal it. Much of her appearance could be explained by simple fashion choices, but those ears... Either she was exceptionally committed to a costume worn for doing some late-night sewing where none were likely to see, or she was something other than human. Some sort of elf or fairy perhaps? That would fit with the castle-like exterior of the building, but not so much the interior, thought it would explain her magic.

Of course, this could all be some sort of dream, but he doubted it; everything felt far to solid and consistent for that to be the case. No, what he was experiencing was undoubtedly real. Though he may had still had his doubts if not for the magic jewel hidden under his ascot, and his kwami curled up and hidden in his pocket.

Which left him wracking his brain to come up with anything he could recall about fairies and their like from legends and stories, especially when she offered him food and drink. Was there some danger to eating fairy food? Or was that more mythology than fairy tales? And would she think him rude if he refused? Though the stories he could recall had many different and sometimes contradictory notions regarding many things, one thing they were generally consistent on was that angering or offending fairies and their kin was something one did at their peril.

Realizing that he was likely staring, he shook his head slightly to clear it. "Not exactly, no," he said to excuse the motion. "But that doesn't mean I'd object to some if you don't." He entered the room properly, accepting the bowl and goblet with a polite nod, though he merely set them on the table for the moment as he took a seat rather than eating or drinking, just in case.

"Actually what I'm looking for is information. I seem to have been... relocated to this place somehow, but I haven't the faintest idea how or why. Might you be able to help Ms. ...?" He trailed off slightly, leaving the end of the sentence open for her to introduce herself if she wished.

[queen_butterfly]

"Mallia," she said, managing a little more of a smile for him, though it faded a bit as she continued, looking down to where she was idly playing with the fabric of the mostly-sewn coat in her lap. "You must've just been brought here, same as most of the rest of us. I had just come back to my own world from... trying to retire... finally found a friend of mine. We'd rebuilt my home... and then he stepped out to fetch the forest to go around it... and I was looking to see what else I ought to set it up with, to host guests again... and found myself here. Someplace called Auradon, that's been taking people from other worlds, as of late. There's an explanation being given about some other form of magic here that was misbehaving quite badly, to do it...."

She chewed her lower lip a little for a second as she debated on the next thing, and then finally sighed and looked back up to him with an apologetic shrug. "One of those here wrote a bit on it, to be handed out to those that showed up going forward, but it's probably for the best that I don't carry it with me; I'd just end up losing it somewhere. We could go fetch it, if you'd like? I could do with a change of scenery; this whole coat is a most embarrassing testament to where my mind has wandered, I'm afraid."

Making a face at it, she began to gather it up, careful of the needles tucked into it. "Though I'd prefer the situation to be a bit less involuntary and inconvenient in general, it is nice to meet you...." She stood, gray coat in her arms, to put it carefully over the back of another nearby chair, looking to him and putting on a little smile again, pausing, waiting for something from him. He had her name; his would follow, yes?

And standing now, the coat folded over the back of a chair instead of partially obscuring her lower half from view, it was clearer that her dress was possibly a little more interesting than one might have assumed. He would know fabrics, but what even was hers? Something thin and light, based on how it moved, but definitely not cheap; its thread count was anything but apparent, what with its seemingly almost but not quite velvety sort of texture, but perhaps that was a trick of the lighting? It even managed to hide the seams within it... assuming it had any. It draped relaxedly under its own weight, dark black all the way down to where it faded into a deep purple toward the bottom of her skirt and lower parts of those large outer sleeves.

It was how the purple was interrupted that might have caught his attention a little more, though. Those seemingly-random lines that interrupted that rich color were anything but. It was a regular pattern, though only a very small sample of it, enough for most people to miss what it actually was... not a nod to stained glass, but to the panes in a butterfly's wings.

[aquawayfinder]

While Aqua was up longer and longer before dawn as the shortest day approached, this was exceptionally early even by her standards. But after lessons in the morning and helping people who were prepping supplies for the Isle, she hadn't actually finished her night time work put before bed. She could have pushed through but chose to set a good example and stop when her body said she needed rest.

So she got something that was between a nap and a sleep. When she woke up in the middle of the night she considered just going back to sleep, but she figured that some people would be working too late and might need a nudge to go to bed themselves. And she could get a quick workout in while she was at it, then get a few more hours herself.

Well, maybe one more hour, depending how long she let herself work out.

At the sound of steps down one of the halls, she turned and headed that way, to see if whoever it was was heading to bed, or perhaps should be if they weren't.

She blinked, startled a moment, then gave Gabriel a warm smile. "Hello, I did not see you earlier today, have you just arrived?" she asked, kindly.

So much for sleep. Or her workout. Well, from the sound of it they were going to be snowed in sooner rather than later. She'd get plenty of time to focus on it then. And given how warm exercise could make a person, she might have a larger class than usual, even.

[papillion_de_resistance]

Gabriel too had heard footsteps in the hall and had changed direction to intercept their owner. Fortunately, said owner- a relatively young-looking woman with distinctive blue hair- wasn't trying to conceal herself, and he returned her smile. "Apparently so," he said. "Though I'm admittedly uncertain where I've arrived to."

[aquawayfinder]

"That is understandable. But there are people here who can help. And my friend Lea has set up an excellent welcome packet that explains a lot. I can bring you to the welcome station if you want, and I'd be happy to answer questions along the way."

[papillion_de_resistance]

Gabriel nodded. "That would be very helpful, Ms....?", he trailed off slightly, leaving an opening for her to introduce herself. And the fact that she'd offered help so openly, with apparently no strings attached, seemed to confirm what he'd suspected. Though he still opted to remain a bit cautious for now.

[aquawayfinder]

"Ah, my apologies." She stopped so that she could turn to face him. She summoned her Keyblade, crossed the hand with it over her chest and bowed deeply. "I am Master Aqua," she said when she stood again, Keyblade vanishing. "A pleasure to make your acquaintance."

[mal_contented]

Frankly, Mal was too tense to sleep. Too wound up. She was all for bringing warm clothes and what food they could manage to the Isle. They needed it. But Auradon needed it too. Especially if they wound up bringing more people back here again. They didn't have enough for the Isle and Auradon. Frankly, they didn't have enough for either, let alone both. She loved the fact that Ben wasn't going to just abandon the Isle. Loved him for it. But... that didn't fix the basic problem. Not enough food. Not enough clothes.

She was chewing on the issue as she stalked through the halls, unsure where she was headed.

The art room, she was heading to the art room.

But she stopped short on the way seeing someone else. Someone new.

Great, another mouth to feed.

The thought was unkind and not who she was trying to be so she didn't show it on her face or give it voice. But the frustration she felt wasn't hidden because she didn't know to try. Or even how to try if she did.

Instead she put her hands on her hips, and arched a purple brow at him. Even in the middle of the night she cut an impressive figure for her age. She was in one of her black and purple leather jackets, one with a dragon wing shape over each shoulder, her dark purple fingerless gloves which hid her rings. Under the coat she wore a livid green shirt with black in angles around the collar so that sticking up from the closed front of her jacket it looked like green flames reaching out to consume her. Her pants were black leather on one leg with the same green flames wrapped around it, and purple leather on the other leg with a black silk flare out to either side. Her spell book was hidden in her jacket of course, and she didn't expect some random new guy to know clothing well enough to catch the darting Evie tended to sew into all her jackets these days to hide the book so that no one could tell it was in there.

She tapped the tow of one purple stack heeled boot against the floor.

"Let me guess," she said with an expression somewhere between a smirk and a sigh. "New?"

[papillion_de_resistance]

Well this young lady certainly had quite the presence, especially for someone of her apparent age. And that presence was only enhanced by her bold choice of outfit. On some people it may have looked garish, but it seemed to suit her perfectly. Perhaps not surprising given that to someone with his trained eye, it was clearly custom tailored. The jacket was the most obvious- one simply didn't find darting like that in something off the rack-, but the rest of the outfit fit her just a bit too exactly to not have been at least altered a bit as well.

But that was somewhat beside the point at the moment. "Apparently so," he said, offering a bit of a rueful smile at her tone and body language. If he couldn't do anything about his presence, he could at least have the good graces to look contrite. "I... seem to have been relocated, though I'm somewhat at a loss as to how. Especially since I also seem to have gone from late spring to mid winter."

[mal_contented]

She sighed a bit. "Welcome center is this way. I'll answer what questions I can along the way. The absolute shortest short version is that this is Auradon Prep, a high school in the Capital of Auradon. A clash of magics trying to fix a problem made a worse one, dragging all of you in. The king has been calling you Missrecalled, and once you have the longer story you'll see why it suits. I'm Mal. You are?" she asked, turning to walk, listening for any sign he might attack or bolt rather than following.

[papillion_de_resistance]

Gabriel showed no signs whatever of planning to bolt. Not only did he follow along quite willingly, but he also adjusted his walking speed so he wouldn't outpace her with his longer stride. "Gabriel Agreste," he replied to her introduction, frowning thoughtfully at the information she'd just provided. "Under normal circumstances, I'd say that what you've just told me sounded somewhat far-fetched, but these are decidedly not normal circumstances. And since it seems that I'm hardly the first one this has happened to, you've likely been asked this before, but still how do I get home? Not that I wouldn't like to get to know this place better, but I have both a son and some very pressing business arrangements waiting for me back in Paris, and I can't afford to neglect either of them." At least no more than his secret double life already forced him to, anyway.

[mal_contented]

"That would be part of what we're still working on. We need to untangle the spells that clashed. Which is hard to do with one of the casters in a coma and the other wandering around wherever he pleases," she said, bluntly. "We have been working on it, and we'll get back to working on it once the more pressing issues are taken care of. Like feeding everyone and getting everyone through the Winter. Though I suppose the part you care about is that time isn't passing in your world. Or some such. There are some people more used to this than I am that can give you the deets. All I know is I was drawn into two other worlds before this and returned home the moment I left with no memories of those other worlds at all till someone I knew in both stuck his big nose back into my life," she said with a huff.

Not that she was upset that Sylvando was here. Of everyone she knew from off world, he was perhaps her favorite person. Not that she'd puff up his ego by ever saying as much. His ego got any bigger and he'd be floating away. But still.

No what bothered her was the fluctuations in people arriving and vanishing. It seemed to be getting faster. In both directions. And she wasn't sure what that meant. Which bothered and worried her. A lot.

[professorsong]

"Well, hello sweetie," River said with a broad flirtatious grin as she rounded a corner and saw him. "And here I was thinking this place only attracted children, not handsome men."

[papillion_de_resistance]

To say that this wasn't the type of reception he'd been expecting would be an understatement. Not that he'd been expecting anything in particular, mind, but if he had been, it certainly wouldn't have been a curly-haired woman he'd never met calling him 'sweetie' and openly flirting with him the moment they met. He sputtered briefly before managing to collect himself somewhat, clearing his throat a moment to buy a little more time for his fumbling mind to muster a proper response.

"Well, I... er... can't really say my coming here was intentional," he finally managed. "In fact, I'm not even certain where 'here' is, Ms. ...?" He trailed off, leaving the end of the sentence open for her to introduce herself. All the while hoping she didn't notice the slight, awkward blush.

[professorsong]

Oh she noticed, and was quite amused. She made no effort to hide it as she leaned against the wall, hands behind her back. "Oh, very few of us are here because we intended to be," she said with a broad wink.

[papillion_de_resistance]

Was she teasing him on purpose? It had to be on purpose. And somewhat to his annoyance, it was working, as much as he tried to hide it. Was his awkwardness really that obvious? He also noticed that she hadn't bothered to introduce herself. "Er... then I take it I'm not the first to be... relocated the way I was?", he asked.

[professorsong]

"Where would the fun be in that?" she asked. "One misplaced person is an oddity, several is a mystery. This many of us? Bait." She grinned.

[phoenixwiz]

Understandably Harry is feeling too restless to sleep easily at night. The current situation in Auradon and the Isle has been a little rough for everyone at the moment but he is pretty used to dealing with some of the toughest situations back in his original world and in Avalon.

It is just that, this time, this has gotten into his nerves more than he wants to admit. There shouldn’t be this much snow in what should have been spring time and it still confuses him just as much as the next person.

So it is on this very night that Harry gets out of his dorm room with a flashlight/torch on one hand and Hedwig and Rose in tow to go on an early morning walk in the hopes of falling asleep quickly from all this walking on campus. As he begins to walk along the hallways, trying to get the thought of constant snow off his head, he soon stumbles another figure he hasn’t seen before. A man who is older than he is and in need of some information on what is going on in this world.

Now he didn’t mean to startle Gabriel if the two have run into each other by this point so he is going to try to help him out in any way he can. He looks down on his pajamas, slippers, and hooded jacket, knowing all too well that he seems to be not prepared for this unexpected meeting. Hedwig hoots at him gently while Rose, eager to meet him, squeaks a bunch to her sheer delight.

“Oh hi there,” he starts talking, “Did you just arrived in this place just now?”

[papillion_de_resistance]

That sure was a boy with an owl. Well, a young man with an owl, really, but young enough to still be thought of as a boy by someone Gabriel's age. As well as... what exactly was that small, fluffy creature? An excessively furry Guinea pig perhaps? It seemed to be an excitable little thing, whatever it was.

And the contrast between their outfits would be almost comical if the situation hadn't bee so strange, but Gabriel politely opted not to comment. "Apparently so," he replied. "Though I'm afraid I don't have any idea exactly what this place might be. Or how I came to be here, for that matter."

[phoenixwiz]

“Oh my, that is pretty tough to be dropped into a new world all the sudden with no clue or information about its current state pr what happened. I had a similar case happened to me twice by now,” Harry understands as he speaks.

“The first time occurred when I arrived in a place called the Isle of Avalon, arriving in a bay and having to swim for my life was quite shocking. And then I showed up in here around a few months ago after my time in Avalon was done and I was about to go back home.”

[papillion_de_resistance]

"I can imagine," he said. "Thankfully my arrival here wasn't that eventful, especially given the weather. There are people who claim a brief dip in icy water is good for one's health, but I doubt the same can be said about being forced to swim across a bay full of it fully clothed."

"Avalon though... Is that the self-same mythological island that's the supposed resting place of King Arthur? Or merely a place with a similar name?"

[phoenixwiz]

“Yeah, I wouldn’t recommend having to swim in a bay while wearing clothes on in the late autumn months to anybody at all ever since that very day,” Harry nods in agreement, he knows what is it like to swim in cold weather as he almost suffered from swimming in similar conditions in the past although his ice fishing trip with a friend did went surprisingly well.

Then he gives Gabriel another response, “Oh why yes, that is THE Avalon itself. It is in a different realm from most places though. But several people from the time of King Arthur are there, alive and well, and so is the King himself.”