[X] *beat*
-[X] Squeeee!! Instant snuggles!
--[X] Tell him that you accept the contract. You will accept any contract! Can we please take it home?
------
You bat the cat toy, similar to how a cat would, the urge to snuggle it exploding out of you like some form of potent fact of life. A moment later you are snuggling it without pause, but you're no longer where you were, suddenly in a much darker room, a small warehouse if the shelving and boxes are anything to go by. Looking to your left and right, all you can see from your very limited vision are rows upon rows of shelves.
You give the cat toy an intense look of suspicion, before going back to your strange antics.
A few moments later, you hear the loud sound of boots against the floor, followed a blinding light hitting you from across the warehouse. As it gets closer you begin to make it out from between your squinting, as, some sort of square device. Was it a bomb?
Even closer, step, step, step, it becomes more and more clear, the pain from the light lessening until eventually it fades completely a few feet from you. After a moment, and some strange sounds, the light turns back on, revealing itself to be a bomb phone. The phone's light illuminates a form dressed in
[]An tan old duster, making him look like he's out to fight crime, or cause it, by any means necessary. It's possible he's even got a pistol on him.
[]A green trenchcoat, because he couldn't look any more edgy.
[]A black mantle, covering his whole body, with a demonic looking mask covering his face, its wicked smile unnerves you, and you subconsciously squeeze the cat toy.
[]A boring set of street clothes.
[]Write-in
"About that payment." An ominous voice speaks out, his voice reverberating around the enclosed space; and you almost flinch back, ready to act, when you realize you recognize that voice. Upon closer inspecting upwards, you notice
[]The strangely white haired form of your childhood friend, strange given his hair was not that color earlier today when he was giving you your id. You suppose he has always enjoyed his gags.
[]The strangely green haired form of your childhood friend, strange given his hair was not that color earlier today when he was giving you your id. You suppose he has always enjoyed his gags.
[]The strangely purple haired form of your childhood friend, strange given his hair was not that color earlier today when he was giving you your id. You suppose he has always enjoy his gags.
[]The perfectly normal black haired form of your childhood friend, just like when he gave you your id earlier. Strange, he tends to enjoy dramatic reveals more than that.
[]Write-in
"It's been maybe a few hours." You point out, and he laughs, turning the light off on his phone and snapping his fingers, the lights in the warehouse illuminating the area.
"Sorry, that was three days ago." At the distrustful narrowing of your eyes, he chuckles darkly. "You'll get it." Motioning for you to follow him, he walks towards a door, presumably leading outside.
"Just one question before we leave; How long were you just waiting here in the dark?" You ask, his comment about the time sparking your interest. He stops dead in his track and checks his phone.
"About three days."
---
outside the warehouse
You walk by his side, refusing to show respect for his latest stunt by following, even if you have no idea where you're going. It's okay, your legs will guide you, not anything like silly directions. He humors you by purposefully making his step sound louder so there's no possible way you could lose track of him. It'd be sweet if hadn't just kidnapped you to what appears to be an alternate dimension. The jerk could have at-least asked. You look towards the sky of these city streets to sea something out of a pastel painting, the sky blending into a whirlwind of color beautifully mixed into each other. There are still clouds, and you assume it's water, but something about the display is weird.
Turning your attention back to him, you wonder what he's doing here. More importantly than that, you wonder what you're doing here. "So you aren't going to tell me what's going on?" You ask, for perhaps the third time in the past minute.
Once again he deflects. "I already told you, something is going on." As he says this you look around at the city, things looking relatively normal. Well, relative in the same way that an octopus is the same thing as a squid. Speaking of squids, in the corner of your eye you're pretty sure there's a squid trying to start that car, but its suction cups keep sticking the whole key. Well until some form of humanoid dog, like you'd see on a children's show, takes pity on it from the passenger's seat and puts the key in the ignition. You'd think if it couldn't put the key in, it couldn't drive, but, well.. Who are you to judge the road capabilities of squid?
You shake your head, pretty sure you've at the very least been recreationally drugged. You think down to the cat toy now on your key-chain, sure it is the source, but let it go. Nothing that cute could ever be malicious. Right?
"I mean it, why am I here?" You are not begging for answers, you do not beg. People who say you beg are wrong. In between this train of thought a haughty look crosses your face, and your friend looks at you with an annoyingly amused smirk.
He laughs. "Because we want you here. Why, you don't want to hang out anymore? We could hide in stray buildings or something." As if on Que a building across the street bursts into flames, and you hear an unnatural slimy screech that's vaguely female. "My babies are in there!" You turn, instincts flaring at a potential threat, and see a half fish with human legs holding a bag of groceries gawking up at the flames. As a group of people wearing masks walk out of there sneering at the woman and hastily retreating, you hear sirens in the distance.
"No, I think I'll stay down here." You answer weakly, now actually following him as he leads you, somewhere, without a care. He sadly looks at the building as you pass it.
"Crime in this city is too much of a problem nowadays."
-
About an hour later, with a lot of strange events on the way
You enter a restaurant, oddly named 'The Flying Noodle,' and are pleased to see no actual flying noodles as he leads you to a table near the back. You sit silently as he flips through his phone for a few moments, before you try again. "Why do you want me here?" You ask, and he looks up from his phone for a moment, giving you a look of almost incomprehension. You know he's screwing with you, but it still makes you antsy.
"You're needed for a job." He finally answers, and you resist an eye-twitch. Both at his unneeded vagueness and the fact that you have yet to have a waitress stop at your table.
"That much was obvious, why all the vagueness?" You ask, the amount of patience you were exerting only matched by the amount of frustration he was causing you.
"Well, for one, we're in a public restaurant." You almost blush at having messed that up. But you don't, because you don't blush. Anyone who says otherwise is just mesmerized by the sheer awe factor you put off and seeing things.
That does however raise another question. "Why are we in a restaurant?" you say and gesture to the quaint little place, rather rowdy at the moment. The waitresses are going to and fro with orders, none of which even glancing at you, and you can't help but feel that this is too mundane of a place, all things considered.
"Well, I don't know about you, but I tend to be hungry when I go three days without eating." Again with that gag, like you're honestly going to believe any more than a few seconds passed. Though how you got here that quickly does raise other questions.
You shift nervously in your seat, antsy to learn really anything from him. You're about to speak up again, when the front of the restaurant lights up, and you hear the stomping of multiple pairs of feet.
woah, Deja Vu
You look up to see several members in full body SWAT gear, and they aim directly at you. A feeling of terror fills you, and you frantically turn your gaze back to your 'contact' across the table from you, who looks strangely.... calm? He's not even putting down his phone.
"You are under arrest for the crime of possession! Surrender and die!" You turn your attention back to the gun wielding swat, at their proposition. You could have sworn the command should have been "surrender or die", but you're under the assumption that doesn't matter much to them.
Right before you're about to say something, perhaps something stupid given your contact's nonchalant manner of dealing with this situation, the table shifts. It stands, a high pitched wail rising from it as your contact palms a large blade and jams it through the back of the wood. It falls to its, legs, wails continuing for a brief moment before the deafening sound of gunfire directly next to you blows your senses out of whack for a moment. The only thing you can hear are the terrified screams of other customers.
With your table in more pieces than you're sure is reasonable, your contact picks up his surprisingly intact knife, sliding it back into his deceptively small sleeves.
The men in SWAT gear appear to say something to him, but he doesn't bother even putting down his phone, simply choosing to wave his left hand at them like this is a completely casual event.
-
"So is there any reason you insisted we leave before we got our noodles?" He asks as you walk behind him down the street to, wherever his next destination is. He doesn't seem to grasp that this is not at all normal.
You resist screaming at him, barely. "Maybe it was when our table started bleeding out." you say through your teeth, and he stops long enough to seem like he's recalling the event.
"Yeah, that was weird, specters don't normally bleed." He answers back, pretending not to notice your seething form.
You push down your shock and righteous anger. "Could you maybe answer anything?"
"I have answered everything you've asked. You could even say I've given a cocoon of words here, in the astral sea." Must not punch childhood friend for mocking you. Woo, glad you have self control and all jazzy stuff.
--
A little later, you're led to large, luxurious apartment complex. He uses a keycard to enter the locked front door, which you take to mean he actually lives here.
After a bit more walking in the hall, he approaches a door without a number on it, marked
[] His name
Definitely his place you note. As he opens it, you're hit with a layer of dust, as if he hasn't been here in a while, or maybe dust is just stronger and more lasting here, a table was just murdered, why do you even care about dust? You don't, you agree to a new fact as you sneeze, and then follow him down into the living room, as he flicks on the lights.
"Alright I'll give you the tour." He says, and you look around the relatively open space. It's roomy, and there isn't much in the way of decoration, but it's definitely a nice place. "Over there is view of the city." He grandly says, pointing the very obvious large window
"Over there is my bedroom; no girls allowed. And right there is the pantry, and over there is the guest bedroom where I keep my pet rock."
"I expected something a bit..." You trail off, not sure where to go with this statement.
"More?" He asks. "Yeah, well, here in the Astral sea you kind of have to scrounge. Taxes are pretty high, actually, and, well you'll see."
He walks over to a board, which he proceeds to flip over, and then sits down in an armchair, pointing for you to do the same. "You asked me about the job."
You actually do twitch this time. "Yes."
"Well." He points to the board which has a bunch of rather artistically rendered building designs. It looks sort of like a-"we're gonna rob a bank."
"We?" You ask, looking around.
"Eh," he looks to sofa and gestures to the other people that likely should be there "they'll be here, lots of things can make you late in the Astral Sea, you have to learn to be patient, and plan to be early."
[]Screw this-you just leave.
[]Stay, he's never led you astray before. Well, except the recent kidnapping.
[]Something elses
