eswareinmal | I used to own this town, now it's all turned upside-down

Characters: Kay Curtis and you!
Open? Yes!
Where: In town, or in the castle/grounds while he's on his way to the town if that's what you prefer.
When: 20th of Rebirth's Decline
What: Kay is taking his relocation about as well as can be expected. He's taking the costume they brought him here in much worse. He's ditching the leather-and-fur armor and going into town in the vain hope that he can find something to wear that affords him a little more dignity.
Warnings: Nothing besides some casual teenage swearing yet, though violence is always a danger with Kay.

A month ago, Kay would have thought all this was some kind of dream, or worse a punch-drunk delusion. A week ago, he probably still would have thought it was an elaborate, vivid vision. Now, he still wasn't ruling out "dreaming" or "absolutely insane," but considering the amount of freaky fairy bullshit that had come into his life lately, Kay was at least willing to consider that he had actually been pulled into some kind of fantasy-land dimension full of monsters and magic and all the nerdy things that populated those tabletop games Steven could never quite get enough people to agree to play with him.

Consider. But not quite believe.

At least he'd gotten rid of the stupid furry armor. Most of it, anyway. He'd have to find a place to get other clothes, but the bracers, the breastplate, the shoulderpads, and the fur cape had all been deposited in the room they said was his. There was nothing to be done about the furry boots, though, or the stitched-up brown leather pants. Jeez, this was embarrassing. It was a freaking catch-22: he couldn't go out in public until he got better clothes, but to get the clothes, he had to go out. Kay ran a hand through his hair, let out a frustrated sigh, then decided to bite the bullet and just go. He could worry about the bigger problems of this world, like the thorns and the dragons and whether or not it was even freaking real or just fairies messing with him, when he looked less like something out of Skyrim.

He sure was in a hurry to get into town. Such a hurry, in fact, that he wasn't paying enough attention to the people around him and totally bumped into you on his way there. Kind of hard, actually. Maybe he even knocked you down, or you moved out of the way in time and got away with just a shoulder-check. Either way, he doesn't look like he's about to apologize. God, what a jerk. ...who is this jerk, anyway? You haven't seen him before.

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"Aaa-- I don't think it's that dire! I'm pretty sure the spell will be over when the Thorns are defeated, so at the very least, everyone will go home then. It's just getting back before then that seems to be the problem."

"'Pretty sure?'" Kay repeated. "How sure are you? Do you know that they're not just telling us that to get us to do what they want?"

"The people here... I don't think they're really present enough to hold up that sort of lie," Bakura explained with a small smile. "As mean as it is... it's sort of a kingdom of idiots, this place."

Kay pulled a face. "Oh. Great. That makes me feel loads better about being stuck here with them." There was a calm, rational part of him that knew that being loudmouthed and angry wasn't going to get him anywhere, but it was very small. The rest of him just wanted to rail against anyone he could.

A frustrated sigh, a hand pressed to his face, a deep breath. When Kay spoke again, he was calmer and quieter.

"Sorry. I didn't mean to -- I mean, you're stuck here too, right?"

"It's all right!" Bakura assured, rubbing the back of his neck. "It's really frustrating at first until you get used to it, don't worry about it. Most people get pretty angry at it all, especially when they find out what the natives are like, so really, it's all right."

This just got better and better. Kay hoped that it would all turn out to be because he'd taken one too many punches to the head and he'd wake up in the hospital soon. That would be infinitely preferable to dealing with this.

"I'd feel better about it if I could find something less stupid to wear," he griped. "You wouldn't know where I could get some normal clothes, would you?" Kay paused, and looked up and down at what Bakura was wearing. "....or maybe I should ask someone else."

"Aaa---" Bakura's cheeks almost pinked as he was suddenly self conscious "I have normal clothes too, these are just easier when I want to get information from people..." he explained, utterly embarrassed. "There's a bunch of tailors around, it's a little tricky to get something that's normal, but it can be done. They just'll probably embellish it with something from what role you are, which isn't too bad."

Tailors. In town. Right. There would probably be signs if he looked for them, and Kay didn't really want to beg any more information from Bakura. Kay seemed utterly unrepentant about embarrassing him, by the way.

"Seriously? People here tell you more things if you play their game of dress-up?"

"They like it when you play the part," Bakura shrugged.

Great. He was in a world full of people trying to get him to LARP. Even Steven knew that LARP was a special tier of lame.

What Kay said was, "I'll keep it in mind." What he meant was, I bet I could get just as much information from them with a threat or two.

Luck with that, Kay. (Also, no knocking LARPing. Even if it was silly. Bakura had lots of friends back in the City who LARPed! ...ones that he may have even let himself get talked into joining.. on a regular basis. With no protest after the first session.

... so yeah, he's a giant nerd, what of it?)

"So have they told you what you're supposed to be yet?"

(Kay was an insecure, self-conscious teenager. ...so basically just a teenager. He would make fun of other people's interests to make himself feel better about being a freak all he wanted.

...he didn't have a real problem with nerds, though.)

"Some kind of knight," Kay said off-handedly. "That means they want me to fight for them, right?

Bakura nodded. "Yeah. They'll likely try and send you out into the Two Faced Forest to kill some monster in it or something like that."

"Huh. Finally, a piece of news I like." There were monsters? He could fight them without social repercussions? Or even guilt?

Awesome.

"The type who likes fighting?" Bakura guessed.

Kay hesitated for a beat. "...it's complicated," he settled for saying. Then, he changed the subject. "What kinds of monsters are in there?"

"Mmm... I'm not sure, really.. I'm not at all any sort of fighter, so I stay mostly out of the forest, especially after finding that lake..."

Bakura paused, blinking. Oh right. He should probably warm him about that. "Aaa-- there's a lake in there that makes you forget things, don't drink from it if you find it, okay?"

Kay opened his mouth, then closed it. Considering how much time he spent in water (the river in Sweetwater had been a convenient avenue of escape more than once), this was actually...very useful advice.

There was still the question of whether he believed it or not, but it was better to be safe than sorry.

"Stay out of the lake. Got it. Anything else I ought to know about? Quicksand pits, mazes of caves, dragons?" Even Kay wasn't sure how sarcastic his suggestions were.

"Mmm... I think the only dragons I've heard of are off in the mountains... Unless they the ones that that lady has, but those are just hers and don't seem to be the type to cause any trouble without being told to..." Bakura mused idly. "And I'm sure there has to be a maze of caves somewhere! A place like this seems like it'd have all the fantasy and RPG stereotypes somewhere," he smiled.

Yeah. It did. Kay tried not to pull a face or sigh. He almost wished he'd played more of Steven's nerdy games so he'd have a better idea of what to expect here. Almost.

"Well, you might not have been who I was looking for, but you've been the most helpful person I've met so far," Kay said, and did mean it.

Bakura rubbed the back of his neck with a bit of embarrassment. "With the locals, that's not hard, unfortunately..."

"Still. Thanks." Kay would have stuck his hands in his pockets at that point if he had any. Since he didn't, he just ended up hooking his thumbs awkwardly into his belt.

Right, Bakura was on his way to ask his own questions around town. Kay'd better not keep him. "Okay. I'm going to go see if I can get some real clothes. See you later." If Bakura didn't say anything else, Kay would turn to go.

I used to own this town, now it's all turned upside-down

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