once more with feeling [act 3]

[stagemanagers]

You awake in an unfamiliar bed.

It’s comfortable enough, sure, but it’s certainly not yours. The room, too, is unfamiliar, especially in such heavy darkness. There seems to have been a great effort put into making it a livable space, with fuzzy rugs laid over linoleum, beds arranged as best to fit (and one bunk bed per dorm, rip whoever has the bottom bunk), and a single desk. You've also got individually labelled trunks; if you look inside yours, you'll find a yearbook with mostly blank pages, as well as a few with some interesting information. But even with all these changes it’s clear this room started it’s life as a classroom, every window hidden behind heavy dark green curtains.

To add to the strangeness of it all, your clothes have been swapped for some kind of uniform. It, though fitting your body perfectly, might feel a bit odd to some of you, as the body you have isn’t quite the same as it was before you mysteriously fell unconscious. The other important thing to note is the people in the other beds around you, all wearing the same color-coded uniform.

The hallway outside the dorms is narrow but well-lit, with fresh white walls and some scattered posters advertising some kind of midweek club meeting. The hallway goes on until, for the more contemporary of you, the pieces start to fall together as to your location: a school. Once you leave your rooms you’re free to wander as you wish but pinned up on a corkboard just outside the cafeteria there’s framed information that you might find helpful. If you explore further into the other rooms, in fact, you'll see there's an identical copy outside all of them.

In the lobby there are linoleum floors and fluorescent lighting, and a pair of glass doors that appear to lead outside. You can see out of both of them that the sun is shining brightly and there’s definitely more to see in the distance but the glass is unbreakable; you can't get out that way right now. A rolling metal sheet blocks off the hallway to the west. For the moment, both doors leading outside are locked.

It looks like you’re stuck. But hey - at least you aren’t alone.

Comments

[prophetpriestandking]

[Mumble wakes up in a strange kind of nest, in a strange indoor cave. Apparently, a dormitory. How'd he end up on his back? He feels oddly chilly, too. He can feel something crinkly and uncomfortable on him. He's not looking at himself for now, there's too much to process!

Getting up - rather uncomfortably, his body feels all...weird - it's clear he's not in Emperor-land anymore. Is this just like what the skua was talking about...alien abduction?

He looks around the room. Fleshy, featherless creatures with flabby faces...they fit the description perfectly.]

Hello, excuse me, aliens? I'm Mumble, from Emperor-land. [He's putting on his best, most polite face.] I have a few questions. Like, why you abducted me, a-and if you could let me go.

[With his questions not really very well answered, he goes off to look for better ones! He finds a set of rules. These are...well!]

'Any student may end the their time in the school by killing another student and escaping detection.' [He turns around for an explanation.] Is this...normal for aliens?

[Said with poorly veiled concern. He's trying not to be too judgemental.]

rules

[mcfife]

[Angus looks at the human, then at the rules. He holds his hand to his chin.]

Aliens. I never thought of the possibility. I don't know what planet we are on, unfortunately.

[prophetpriestandking]

Earth. [Ok now you've got HIM questioning things.] I think.

[Wait a second...]

Shouldn't you know?

[mcfife]

No. I remember being on Earth, but I can't say for certain if we are still there.

[prophetpriestandking]

You think we might be somewhere else? [Look, he's a penguin, he knows nothing of interstellar travel, but...he's looked up into the clouds and the sky and knows that there's something vast and unknowable out there.] Does that usually happen with alien abductions?

[mcfife]

Perhaps. The exterior landscape appears to belong to Earth, though no where near my homeland of Fife. [Not enough hills and mist to be Scotland.] It would make sense to remain on this planet than to find some other planet hospitable to humans.

Rules

[employeeoftheyear]

[Spongebob blinks.]

Wait we were kidnapped by aliens? Huh, I guess that would explain a lot.

[prophetpriestandking]

I hear abduction is pretty big among you guys. But I didn't think they'd do it to other aliens too.

[employeeoftheyear]

...

[Well.

That certainly baffles him.]

I'm sorry, but this is the first time I'm hearing that sponges were known for kidnapping.

[prophetpriestandking]

Sponges?

[He knows sponges. They're absorbent and yellow and porous and you can chew on them real good.

Spongebob does not posess these qualities though.]

Aren't you an alien too?

[employeeoftheyear]

[Spongebob laughs a very distinctive laugh. I feel like I don't even have to describe it beyond that you all know what it is.]

Not the last time I checked! I lived in Bikini Bottom my whole life!

[Like all you guys, right??]

[wanderlusttitania]

Russia, then...of course.

[It all makes sense!







what]

[prophetpriestandking]

Russia...?

[Aliens are so confusing! But at least they understand penguin. What a pain that would be otherwise.]

I'm sorry, but you're not making any sense. What do you mean 'of course'?

[wanderlusttitania]

Why, the Crimea, of course!

[She bring a fist to her other hand!]

It's the only explanation!

[




















WHAT]

[prophetpriestandking]

What's the Crimea? What does it explain?

[He is so desperate for some sense around here.]

[wanderlusttitania]

Oh, you know! The Crimea! The war! We're neutral, so...if the Russians take us hostage...especially me...the emperor has to rescue us and the tsar will try and make Austria fight in exchange!

[It's all coming together!












































W H A T]

Rules

[alchemistake]

I don't know about "aliens"...but I can promise you that nothing about any of this is normal.

[Not the rules, not the fact that they're here- any of it.]

[prophetpriestandking]

You don't know about aliens? [Head-bob.] Aren't you one of them?

[alchemistake]

...me? Noooo...

[Varian looks at Mumble like he's grown a second head.]

I'm a human. A person. Just like you are.

[prophetpriestandking]

[Looks Varian up and down, bobbing his head every which way as he does.]

Let's see...front-ways eyes, no feathers [Head shake] No beak, and [What did the skua call them?] Appendages.

[He nods, satisfied.]

You look just like an alien to me.

[And now it's his turn to look at Varian like...well, actually, like he's been looking at him for the most part.]

What do you mean? I'm a penguin. Haven't you seen a penguin before?

[alchemistake]

...did you just try to compare me to a bird?

[BECAUSE...he's not one. He's pretty sure.]

I've seen penguins in books, but not in person. I'd have to go somewhere a lot colder if I wanted to do that.

But you...I'm pretty sure if you're supposed to be a penguin then I'm actually still dreaming.

[feudalladyshandmaid]

[These "rules" send a chill up Cassandra's back. Her fists unconsciously tighten at the thought. Killing? Is that what this is all about?]

I don't know about "aliens"... [She's not sure WHAT he means by that.] But it's not normal for me.

[prophetpriestandking]

...Huh. You're the second one to say that.

[Then like, the fourth or fifth to express a similar sentiment.]

When I was in school, back when I was a chick, none of us did anything like kill each other. We just learnt how to sing, or...sat out in the back. [His experiences were not universal.] None of us would've ever dreamed of it!

[Have you seen a baby penguin? There's like, zero bloodlust in that thing.]

Why would they even put that there? Do you - [Uh.] - often...kill each other?

[feudalladyshandmaid]

Only the second?

[What, are there some Lorbs around here? Maybe a magic bird couple?]

Uh... sounds like you had a pretty good life before this. [Depending on how crazy you are, she thinks.] At least you know you're not supposed to just kill people.

[She shakes her head.]

Do I? No, of course not. [The censors won't allow it] I mean... I don't try to.

[prophetpriestandking]

Everything tries to eat us anyway, it's not gonna help us if we all started turning on each other too.

[That's the real wrong of murder. Further endangering a species.]

That's a relief. [Light laughter. Not even that nervous!] I was worried it was something you guys did for fun.