fh_adventures | In Jareth's Castle, Saturday Afternooon

In Jareth's Castle, Saturday Afternooon

Well... That hadn't gone quite as planned. The right words have been said, and Jareth has simply laughed in the faces of our would-be rescuers. What now? Three challenges? That wasn't in any of the clues! Play fair, Goblin King!

Then again, saying, "It isn't fair" never really seems to do anybody any good in here anyhow, does it? Drat.

[Follows this post! For Team Jareth and for our pretty pretty Princes and Princesses! If any of you need an NPC for your trials, please, visit us over at this post and we'll send somebody by as soon as we can!]

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Jareth teleports you into a room that makes no sense! (http://i1040.photobucket.com/albums/b408/it_bit_me/Places/vlcsnap-00160.png) Staircases jut out in every direction, seeming to go nowhere and everywhere at once. Perpendicular to the floor, a minotaur (http://thornefeather.com/images/tim_as_darkness.jpg) stands on a staircase, points at you, and begins to charge. Except he's running forward and you're falling...down? Sideways? You'd better find a way to figure out this gravity before he has a chance to gore you all!

Ben Skywalker	Ben found himself flung to the ceiling with a force that took his breath away, and he fought through a wave of vertigo. It had been like being in a ship where the gravitational generators had broken. Except, as he looked around, everyone hadn't joined him. "The hell?" he gasped out, then focused on the more important matter. "Where'd that ugly thing go?"
Tahiri Veila	"Khapet!" Tahiri snarled as she hit the . . . ceiling. "This place looks like that painting, and . . ." She bit out another guttural Yuuzhan Vong curse when she tried to reach out with her Force-senses from habit and got nothing. She was pretty sure the laws of physics shouldn't work like this in any universe, and yet here they were. Upside down. She'd been in enough uncontrolled spins in ships with blown inertial compensators to know what she should be feeling like upside down, and yet . . . "Notice a missing sensation, Ben?"
Ben Skywalker	"This feels normal," Ben replied after a second, "as long as you don't look up and see the people above you. Right?"
Tahiri Veila	"As skewed as our definition of normal is, yes," Tahiri answered. "Keep an eye out for that creature; I want to try something." She looked down -- no, up? No, down, relatively -- at her own feet, concentrated on staring at them, and took an experimental little hop. "Well, that felt about normal too."
Sean Nast	"If we're supposed to feel normal, why do I still feel like I'm going to fall?" Sean asked, looking around uneasily. He shifted his feet, wobbled, and immediately stopped moving.
Ben Skywalker	"Because you're overthinking it," Ben said. "You're still thinking of where we came in as the floor. It's not. This is the floor. That's the ceiling. At least as long as the room doesn't shift." Very helpful, Ben. The enemy's gate is down. Dammit, Ender, where are you?

Sookie Stackhouse	Sookie had clenched her eyes shut after being flung to the ceiling, trying to maintain some semblance of balance. With her powers working funny, on top of this, she was worried she'd lose it. Again. "It doesn't help that there're people on the other sides, too."
Sean Nast	At Ben's words, Sean frowned. What he said kind of made sense, but still. He nodded slightly when Sookie spoke. "Exactly. But... if we just focus on where our feet are instead of where their feet are, we should be okay, I think." He looked to Ben and Tahiri for confirmation, since they seemed pretty much unaffected by the whole on the ceiling, weird balance thing everyone had going on.
Jono Starsmore	Jonothon took a moment to rub at his head, making dirty looks at the... what was the floor before they'd hit the ceiling. Whatever it was. Once he was on his feet again, he cast a look around. Right. So, up was down, and down was up. He could cope with that. The trick was to just not think about it. A task that was made simpler by the fact that he'd smacked his forehead on a staircase on the way... Up. Down. Whatever. He pulled out his knife and narrowed his eyes as he looked out for the horned thing.
MINOTAUR!	The ceiling had far fewer places for the minotaur to sneak up on them, but there were still a few. There was a helpful staircase leading down a few feet to another landing oriented in their direction. A staircase leading down for them was also a staircase leading up for him if he chose to run on the underside. And choose to he did, before stepping out from almost directly beneath them. Hello, pretty blonde girl. The minotaur would like to introduce himself. With his fist.
Sookie Stackhouse	Sookie, for her part, was starting to glow -- her hands purple, her cheeks a rosy gold. But she already knew she wasn't going to be able to blast this thing away, not like she usually would. And the worst part was that this had sent her into a minor flashback to the summer, the last time she'd been attacked by something this big and horned. And she needed to run, and protect herself this time. So, with a shriek, she reached for the blade Ben had given her, brandishing it before her and swiping out towards the minotaur frantically. She already knew she needed to get behind someone who could use a weapon effectively, but she needed to do something first.

Ben Skywalker	"Down!" Ben yelled at her, wishing he could use the same kind of lack of respect for gravity the creature was using and missing his Force-abilities. His leap up and around her was decidedly less showy than he preferred, but the lightsaber was aimed correctly--straight for the thing's right arm. If only he had the Force-speed to get the jump on this thing.
Tahiri Veila	"Krel os'a hmi va ta!" Tahiri was missing her Force-speed badly, too, or she'd have been attacking by now. As it was, she didn't want to risk stray blaster bolts when there were people walking on every surface of this room, but she was sprinting toward the minotaur's left side with the spiked-hook end of her gaderffii raised for the blow.
MINOTAUR!!!	A sword in front of him, a glowing stick to one side, and a spiked hook to the other. What was a minotaur to do in a situation like this one? Throw back his head and loose an angry roar, for a start, jerking his way back in an attempt to miss the worst of the attacks. The lightsaber burned, leaving scorched flesh in its wake even as the creature pulled its arm away, and the gaderffii was no better, ripping at its side in a terribly messy way. Even the sword met its mark if only slightly, leaving an angry black wound oozing nastily from his chest. Clearly, this meant that he was going to have to attempt to backhand both of these pesky little people away. He wound up, cranky as he could possibly be, and swung a massive arm out in a sweeping motion, hoping to knock a few of these little creatures clean off their feet.
Ben Skywalker	Ceiling or floor, whatever down was now, Ben was in no way interested in landing on it, which was why, when the blow connected, he clung for dear life onto the handrail and wished his head would stop ringing. Seeing two minotaurs was no help at all at the moment.
Tahiri Veila	Tahiri snarled another Yuuzhan Vong oath as she took a minotaur fist to the side of her head, but she barely managed to throw her weight to take a decent fall and went tumbling across the . . . ceiling, her gaderffii sending off sparks when it scraped across the stone. "Emperor's black bones," she grumbled, "what I wouldn't give for my X-Wing about now." . . . that made sense, Tahiri. Really.

Jonothon Starsmore	Jono would give just about anything to just be able to rip his wrappings off and blow the minotaur a new arsehole. But, barring that, he was going to be a complete berk and try to run up at the creature from behind, knife-blade first. He'd preferred not to use the thing up until this point, but when it came down to it, when there was a giant demonic cow-beast beating up his friends, he could certainly find it in him to get his stabby-thing on.
MINOTAUR!1!1!	Okay, now the minotaur was just getting crabby. There was a knife blade sticking out of its shoulder. Who could possibly be in a good mood when there was a knife blade sticking out of its shoulder? Especially on top of the burns and gouges that it had gotten a moment before? It didn't bother swinging a fist toward the pest that was behind it. It simply bowed its head and swung itself around, hard and fast, plowing one of those wicked horns of his at the annoyances and sending Jono flying... up... as well. People were all so annoying, today. And they wondered why minotaurs were always so grouchy.
Tahiri Veila	The odd strangled bark Tahiri let out was actually a very graphic suggestion as to what exactly the minotaur could go do with himself, but what were the odds he spoke Tusken? "Oh, kriff this, kane a bar," she snarled. Mmm, linguistic mishmash. So excuse her, minotaur, while she just launched herself at you with every intention of grabbing onto one of those horns and hanging the hell on. How well that would work with her head ringing, well . . .

[OOC: To be continued in comments if Team Ceiling so desires!]

[OOC: To be continued in comments if Team Right so desires!]

Cassidy	When Cassidy found herself shoved against the staircase on the side of the room, she was a little confused. Even though it was uncomfortable, she tried to go up the stairs... but that was causing a bit of disorientation.
Quinn	"I'm getting dizzy," Quinn muttered, as she clung to the wall with her fingernails. "I can't fight if I'm falling over."
Cassidy	Cassidy looked relieved when she heard Quinn say pretty much what she was thinking. "This place just isn't playing fair," she muttered as she tried to orient herself with the floor... well what should be the floor.
George	George's response -- once she had managed to sit up from where she had smacked into the floor -- was both eloquent and helpful. "What the fuck?"
Goose	Goose landed face first on the floor, his response was merely to grunt as he struggled to sit up.
Cassidy	"Hell's fire," Cassidy muttered as she tried to stand up normally. "This place just keeps getting more and more irritating."