Storyline Name: City of Shadows
Creator(s): Sailor Neptune
Forum: Gates to the Multiverse
Advanced or Relaxed: Advanced
Moderator: Eternal Knight
Plot Summary: The town of Raven's Hollow is not your ordinary city. It is filled with supernatural creatures; from werewolves to sirens, from angels to demons, from the ones haunting the humans' nightmares to the most beautiful dreams. It is one of the last refugees left for these creatures, which were quickly becoming extinct after being hunted by humans in various places out of fear that they would assert their superiority otherwise with their magical powers and abilities. Raven's Hollow used to be a haven for the remnants of magic in this world.

But not anymore. Recently, a new unknown threat has appeared. Some of them felt it when the new presence arrived. The more sensitive ones felt the ominous tingle of electricity in the air, others felt their dreams disturbed by a half-formed premonition. The seers knew an age of change was coming, but for the first time could not tell for sure what it was. As days went on, one by one the townspeople began to disappear, seemingly vanishing into thin air from various places. First, a fairy. Then, a warlock. After that, a vampire.

At first, the townspeople blamed each other. See, maintaining the peace between all the different clans and races in Raven's Hollow was no easy task, with some of them being natural-born enemies, and some who physically could not stand each other. But when the vanishings continued to take random creatures of all races, seemingly affecting all of them, they soon realized that this threat did not come from their own neighbors. It was something else entirely, perhaps something they had never encountered before. And if they would have any hope to fight it, they must, for the first time in their lives, learn to not only get along, but also work together.

Details on any necessary information: This is an original AU for original characters! You may pick your own race - any magical race or even invent your own. Any two people (or more) can pick the same race, but you have to agree on that race's traits, strengths, weaknesses, powers etc to create one universal guideline for that race in the setting of this roleplay. You also get to decide which race(s) they get along with or are enemies with. Everyone else who joins up later and who wants to pick a race that already has set guidelines will have to follow it.

Universe Need-to-Know Info: This roleplay is set in an ordinary town like one you would find anywhere. If you absolutely need a geographical or cultural influence, I'd say Europe, but feel free to create characters of any descent.

Source: N/A

Restrictions: Open to any and all magical creatures! No humans, aliens, super-powered humans or any of that nonsense XD Also no overpowered world destroyer races for obvious reasons.

OOC Thread: Here

Member to Character List:
Sailor Neptune - Nadia Seraphina
Light - Piers Allard
JupiterThunderCrash - Diane Silvers
Eternal Knight - Yiska Spinne
Sailor Mercury - Flosshilde

The sun was setting when Diane Silvers crossed the street to get to the government building where Raven's Hollow held town hall meetings. As usual, she was mostly covered by her overly large trench coat, her bright orange eyes falling under the shadow of the brim of her hat.

 She wasn't one for crowded events like this, but the recent disappearances in the city were becoming too frequent to ignore or brush off. Something was going on here, and someone would have to start making plans on how to stop it. And it was very possible that someone might come forward with a case lead during the meeting itself, and she didn't want to miss a single opportunity to get information.

Her change of heart certainly had nothing to do with the high chances of Mayor Charmaine being there. This was strictly professional. 

Diane slipped between two other people, taking advantage of her shorter height, and found an unoccupied seat fairly close to the front of the room for herself.

Flosshilde

The town hall meeting was of little interest to any of the frivolous maidens, but they didn't have better plans for the evening, either. They loitered in the small pond they had claimed as part of their makeshift home, lazily kicking their legs through the cool water as they floated around each other. This was nothing like the depths they had once frolicked in. Here there was no beautiful golden aura, bathing them in warmth and glory. How they longed to feel its embrace once more! How they longed to return to the shimmering aquatic deep!

"There's nothing to do," Woglinde sang, her voice sorrowful. The waves of her burnished golden hair drifted behind her.

"No one to see," Wellgunde added in a joyless refrain.

"No source of joy," joined Flosshilde.

"Oh when shall we be released from our woe!" Their voices rang out together, trembling the leaves in the deep woods. Birds and other fauna paused, silent and contemplative, to hear the songs of the poor Rhinemaidens. They did not have to understand the language to comprehend the meaning of the music. Many pairs of dark, round eyes peered toward the area near the pond, watching the beautiful women as they splashed among the water.

Flosshilde dragged her fingers through her wet locks, remembering how her hair used to shine when the Rhinegold dazzled them all. It was so different now; dark with the water, lacking that luster. She sighed.

"I suppose we must go."

The identical voices chimed in, equally uninterested.

The trio dragged themselves from the water and made their way to the meeting place, leaving a trail of puddles in their wake. They were only barely dressed—not particularly unusual for the three, so no one they met on their way batted an eyelash. They skulked towards the very back of the room, trying to resist the urge to start humming with sorrow. The only thing on Flosshilde's mind was sharing their sad tale with the citizens once more, and begging for the return of their precious treasure. She knew that the mayor would not appreciate an interruption, so they could only mope dramatically, in the event that anyone dared strike up a conversation with them.

He had been at the town hall long before most of the others arrived. This day was rather boring, not that any other were quite better, but it had been incredibly worse than usual this time, so he had found himself on an exposed beam, his body comfortably laid down against it. Two arms only were visible, not that he needed any to keep his balance when his skin clutched at the wood as if his own weight was nothing.

From this advantageous position, he was looked down on the inhabitants coming in, one by one, sometimes in pair or small groups. Some were loud, others were discussing behind their hands, trying to hide their secrets or not wanting others to listen their gossip.

Strange decision when half the town had heightened sense.

They had much to discuss, right? Not that he cared.

He didn't.

They could all die - him included - for all he cared. As long as he was able to mortally wound the one responsible behind his own death, he would be okay with it.

"Hey, Diane."

He called so that mostly her would hear.

"It's a flattering angle from here."

He pointed out, a finger lazily pointing at her body whether she was looking at him or not didn't matter. He recognized the Rhinemaidens, but they were something Yiska had learned to keep away from. First, because water. Second, because he couldn't actually stand their whining. They were beautiful, though, that was not up for debate, but they needed a hobby... real fast.

"Is this a new bra?"

How fun that Diane had chosen a spot right under him.
Poor thing. You'd think she'd learn to look up before stopping somewhere.
Five black eyes were looking intently at her, as if maybe they were able to see through all the layers of clothing the charming lady had on her, the light awkwardly catching in the glassiness of what nature had given him as optical instruments. He didn't blink.

Melody strolled into the main town hall room from its back office, where she had been working for the past half hour, trying to figure out a pattern in the disappearances and connecting dots from clues left by witnesses who said they’d seen something suspicious or another. But so far, there seemed to be no pattern to be found, unless it was a witch trying to collect random ingredients for a big spell or someone trying to collect one specimen from every species in Raven’s Hollow for some kind of twisted menagerie. And all the ‘witnesses statements’ turned out to point towards completely unrelated crimes and mischief that were constantly happening in this town. And then some were just made up, an opportunity grabbed by warring clans in order to point fingers at each other and get others into trouble. Sorting between what was legit and what wasn’t was beginning to give her a headache.

Now that the time for the meeting was almost there, she saw people—well, ‘people’ was a loose term really, but the easiest one to use—began to stream into the room, already talking among themselves. Melody narrowed her eyes at the three barely clad dripping women who recently moved to town. She didn’t particularly like them, but then again, she didn’t like most other water-type creatures. Besides, they had that whole ‘woe is me’ attitude that she didn’t care about.

She looked around and made a mental note to talk to the detective at some point to see if she could help her figure this out. She wanted to work closely with law enforcement on this, anyway.

She had not seen the spider up above yet. Sitting on a chair beside the podium, she reviewed her notes again while she waited for the rest of the townspeople arrived and settled in the room.

Diane Silvers 

Diane couldn't stop from flinching when she picked up on a sudden, familiar voice. And when she realized exactly who was speaking to her, she looked up to glare at the giant spider creature clinging to a beam.

She should have picked up on his annoying scent the moment she walked in, but now with two people sitting close to her, she couldn't move. Well, she technically could elbow past them if she wanted to, but that meant she was letting Yiska get under her skin, and she was too stubborn to give him the satisfaction. Instead, Diane settled on a dismissive huff in his direction, knowing there was no point in yelling at him.

"Is this a new bra?"

Diane's eyes widened, and she checked her collar, only to see that her jacket was fully covering her shoulders, as always. Her face reddened, and she sank a little lower in her seat, refusing to look at him anymore before she lost her temper. But as soon as this was over, she'd make sure he heard from her.

Instead, her eyes fell on Melody as she walked in, and followed her to where she sat beside the podium. Right, this was an important meeting, and she could stomach the spider's commentary for the Mayor's sake.

"Such a pretty color on your cheeks."

Purred the deep voice of the spider before he leaned his chin on his head, looking to follow Melody's steps as she went to sit beside the podium, three eyes slowly closing as the serious seemed to be needed. When was serious not needed in this God forsaken place he wondered, but he was already starting to get bored and it hadn't even started yet.

"You're no fun, darling." He whispered again towards the female who was apparently doing her damn possible to ignore him. Ah Diane, small tiny huffy-puffy-fluffy-wolfy darling.

A short and low chuckle was easily hearable to the werewolve as he shifted, enjoying the feeling of his skin sticking to the wood a bit before letting go. He turned two eyes to the door, then back to Melody.

He sighed. Loudly.

Then turned on his back and looked at the ceiling, scowling at it. He was there only because it was his town too. He'd lived there for so long now that he had time to see them come and go. He didn't want to live elsewhere. Too complicated, too much efforts.

But he doubted anything good would come out of this meeting.

At best they'd just keep pointing each other with jealousy, angrily.

And if a ball of spider web fell on Diane's head, Yiska would plead innocent.
Spoilers: a ball of spider web had indeed fell on Diane's head.

Fortunately, being pooped on by birds felt worse than receiving a solid ball of spider web on your head. So no harms done.

Diane Silvers 

The unfortunate pair who had chosen to sit beside her were starting to regret their decision as Diane began growling under her breath, though she still refused to look up at Yiska. Unfortunately, she couldn't exactly turn off her own hearing. Her ear twitched with his very audible sigh, and then she felt something light tap her on the head. Her hand moved to brush it off instinctively, and she felt something sticky.

Webbing. She was now turning red for a very different reason. 

"You are ridiculous, Yiska..." Diane said more to herself than for him to hear, her tone laced with venom.

Counting backwards in her head so she didn't do anything unnecessarily stupid in response, she wiped the webbing off on her pants leg and tried her best to pretend it didn't happen.

Nadia strolled lazily into the town hall, stopping at the very last row and plopping herself at its end, crossing one leg over the other. She didn’t particularly care about this so-called meeting, but she wanted to see it dissolve into chaos as it always did when anyone thought gathering the citizens of Raven’s Hollow in one place was a bright idea. It always provided her with amusement to watch them fight among themselves, even in the face of a seemingly common enemy.

Then again, she didn’t particularly care for the disappearances either. If anyone should try anything with her, she was confident enough about her abilities to take care of them on their own. If the mayor was about to suggest they start trying to work together and all that kumbaya nonsense, she was definitely going to opt out. There was no way she was going to work with all these… creatures, especially not those stuck up angels who’d found their way here. What were they doing here anyway? There were no humans to protect or care for. Maybe there were some demons, but this town was hardly important enough for the self-acknowledged angelic beings to live in. And here she thought angels weren’t supposed to live on earth. Maybe she should tempt the rest of them to fall from grace just like her…

Piers Allard

Piers looked up at the town hall building, simply standing in front of it for a while. He sighed; what was the purpose of this meeting anyway? To give them instructions to "keep safe"? That should already have been basic knowledge to anyone inhabiting this place. To attempt to "work together"? That was gonna be easy, when half the people of this town did not trust the other half. And that was not even to say this wasn't for good reasons.

He wondered who else would be in there. He definitely had no desire to see any of those self-righteous judgmental angels. They were obviously so above everyone else. Couldn't they just go to their precious little heaven and leave things alone here? Honestly, he was not sure who was worse, demons or angels. But that was a philosophical debate for another time.

He finally walked inside, picking a seat near the back of the room. He could always just teleport, of course, but he decided to avoid unnecessary provocation. And even though he had slowly managed to gain some of the people's trust throughout all this time, there were always those that would eye him warily because of his identity. He supposed he couldn't blame them; demons were never up to any good, really. But there were exceptions.

Glancing around the room, he simply waited for the meeting to start.

As most of the townspeople had settled on their seats, Melody looked up from her notes and stood up, approaching the podium. She hummed a low tune to quiet them down, since normally yelling was less effective than that. She was barely using her powers; it was more like a gentle nudge for people to pay attention to her, like a shift in the air or a motion from the corner of one’s eye. She waited until their voices had died down, tapped the microphone to make sure it was working, and gave everyone her trademark charming smile.

“Welcome, everyone. Thank you for attending this town hall meeting. As I’m sure you already know, we will be talking about the troublesome disappearances that have been plaguing us lately. First of all, I would like to know if there has been any new disappearances or if anyone has seen anything strange that might be related to it lately? Or even something that’s unusual—” A dwarf raised his hand, and Melody quickly added, “Unusual as in never occurring before and not yet reported.” He dejectedly put down his hand, and she waited, her eyes roaming across the audience, before settling on the row of law enforcement personnel.

Diane Silvers 

One of the police officers present, a young man with a pair of small ram horns sticking out of his cap, stood up.

"Just last night, there were reports of a loud disturbance by the downtown bar. We're still questioning witnesses to see if everyone is accounted for, but it could be another disappearance"-

"It was." The officer stopped mid-sentence as Diane cut him off. She stood up as well, adjusting her coat as she ignored the glares being shot her way by a few other officers. 

"A male troll was reported missing this morning," she continued. "His mother approached me with a case on it. He'd been at the bar, but never returned home, and he's not picking up his phone either." Her eyes flickered back to the police for a moment, as if daring them to one up her. She knew it wasn't really a competition, but it did feel good to be on top of things for once.

Flosshilde

At the back of the room, the sisters floated dejectedly while the mayor and others presented information.

"How dreary is this world without our beloved Rhinegold," whispered Woglinde. Wellgunde nodded, a strange mix of enthusiasm and mourning. The desire to attract attention thrummed within the three women, something that they all knew and understood as part of their bond. They also knew and understood that they'd be reprimanded for interrupting, the only reason the words just murmured were not a stage whisper or low sung lament.

Flosshilde ran her fingers lazily through her hair, the eyes that seemed to perpetually shimmer with tears (or perhaps in the case of these ladies it was simply water so intrinsic to their being) downcast. Her eyes flickered back to her sisters as Diane Silvers mentioned the missing troll, but she made no other motion.

Yiska Spine

The venom in Diane's voice was as funny as most things were lately. He gave attention to Melody when she started talking, his aversion for water creatures almost palpable. He always were polite with her, never went overboard (he treated her as he treated most people, which, already, proved that he could make an effort, even toward people he didn't appreciate all that much). Funnily enough, it wasn't Melody's personality that annoyed him; only what she was.

He hated and loved water.
So he hated and liked Melody all the same.

And well... she was a figure of authority, so he couldn't actually be fond of her. Rebel dignity and all that.

"Couldn't they have just left though? I can admit some of them being kidnapped or disappearing for a weird reason, but not everyone likes to be stuck in this lost cause of a town."

He pointed out from the ceiling when he was sure Diane was finished.

"Just a thought."

Alastair Malak

Call it a mercy, but on that particular day, Alastair felt in himself the generosity not to crowd uselessly his neigbhors, hiding his many wings back inside his being. Only for the meeting. There would be so many people, he risked to have them ruffled, or hurt (he could also hit someone with them, but who cares) and he wasn't too fond of the idea. The glow of his skin expressed clearly what he was and so it was enough for his satisfaction.

He had arrived among the first people. Why? Because as he tripped over himself and fell gracelessly on the floor in a pile of clumsy limbs, not too many people saw the endeavor, and he preferred it so. Fortunately for him, most of the others were from law enforcement and thus his colleagues. He smiled sheepishly at them and gathered himself together before slowly making his way toward them, a small hop in his step. His attitude made most of his colleages smile. Sure, not everyone in this town liked him, many hated angels or whatever, but a lot also found him innoffensive and adorable. The fact he actually got things done probably helped. He was a good inspector. He was just a tad... clumsy. And innocent.

For everyone in this town anyway. None of the first ten ever came to this town, so nobody knew who he had been, who he was and who he could become.

When Nadia entered the room - later on - he smiled at her and waved, as if they were long time friends and once again, some colleagues of his smiled too. There was probably an on going bet about whether or not Nadia and Alastair were already dating and loved to mess with everyone else's head.

His thoughts were diverted from Nadia where Melody started to talk, whether it was because of her power or just because he was polite would be anyone's guess. He listened to her conversation, to a colleague's statement, to Diane's point then gave a short and soft giggle at Yiska's intervention. He didn't even bother looking up.

"I am starting to think a quarantine might be necessary." He finally intervened as well, his eyes on Melody as if nobody else existed at all. A child-like smile stretched his lips. "Nobody leaving, nobody entering. Until the truth is revealed." He chuckled. "We already are all stuck together, it would not change much, would it?" He added with a certain excitation, his eyes gleaming with mirth.

He'd go to see her alone later to explain his idea in more details, but right now, he simply crossed his arms behind his back, slowly rocking himself back and forth on his heels.

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