Round Three

EDIT: Someone just asked a very good question which I thought you all might like the answer to. Do the portals close at some point? The answer is yes. They become more unstable as time passes. They don't close just because your character steps through and they will try to stay open as long as possible for all of the invited people. It can have closed in your round or still be open, up to you, but it's only a matter of time before those portals close. They will also close if something that would immediately threaten the integrity of the space station tries to pass through (like a large explosion, etc).

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When I originally conceived the prompt for this round, long before the tournament got started, I left the specifics fairly general because I knew I would have to make changes to accommodate for the things the writers had done. The current form of this prompt is thanks to all of you. Keep that in mind.

First, the third piece of the unabridged history of Eos is up now and relevant to this prompt as it explains Gatekeeper, the entity bringing people to Eos, as well as the Gatekeeper Project which made him. It will be even more relevant for the final prompt.

Other useful links to information:
Unbridged history, part one: the original survivor settlements
Unabridged history, part two: the development of the Warped
Reference for the leader of the Warped: Hezekiah
Reference for the Warped teleporting in the reinforcements: The Laughing Man

This prompt is a bit different from the last two. Up to this point, the new arrivals have pretty much followed the same pattern as previous waves of arrivals. That is about to change.

First, your main character gets a message. It’ll show up on their personal journal if they still have it. Otherwise, the sender can get creative (send it to a different nearby journal, addressed to your character, scrawled on a post-it note and stuck to their head, whatever works). I’m not going to give you a scripted message this time as each one was written with its recipient in mind. This means you can tailor things to your personal plots.

As to the contents of the message, it is a request for the character to come meet “us,” signed only with this symbol. It will be vaguely worded as to specific intentions, almost as if afraid the wrong people will read the message, but can hint at things like a way home or a solution to the problems on Eos or maybe some sort of aid in a personal quest. It will also provide some sort of map or directions.

Those directions lead to one of two glowing swirling portals. The other side of the portal is not visible from this side. People (and Warped) besides your main characters can enter as well, but try not to overload the number of important characters who step through. You can bring more people through for your own finale if it becomes necessary, but it’s polite not to require your opponent to write everyone ever just because you thought it would be cool.

Now, this would all be simple and boring if you could just waltz through the portals, but the truth is that the Warped want through too. In fact, they start with one of the portals in their hands because the portals were grounded using sympathetic connections to people on the surface, namely Nei'ess De Magens and Hover. I’ll let the writers decide how tied into the portals after they open those two are or are not.

Regardless, that determined the locations of the portals. Hover was at the military base as of Icysapphire's round two and Nei’ess had been kidnapped by Drenalis, aka The Laughing Man, during Tamasha's round two. The portal opened during a time he had stopped over at the Zoo, doing... whatever evil thing you want him to have done there. He began teleporting in more Warped from the City of the Chosen at that point, including Hezekiah himself who will make it through the portal. Once the second portal at the base is detected, another Warped with transportation abilities began taking troops there too to conquer it.

So, all of that talking boils down into these required things for your round three:
1) Your character and them going through the portal. Your main character has to go through the portal by the end of the round at the very least. Bribe him, toss him, or drag him, he does need to show up and go through.
2) Your opponent’s character. They got the message too. It is required that they (Daniil, Doc, Ethan, and Ethan) were all sent a message, even if they don't have to read it and you don't have to explicitly show it. Maybe they team up and compare notes before both going through. Maybe they get stuck in the fighting. Maybe they choose not to go through. Be creative, but be sure to include them.
3) The message. Your character should receive it somehow. I suppose they don’t have to read it, but it makes it easier to know about the portals if they do.
4) The assigned portal and their respective Warped attacks. For the portal at the Zoo, this means getting into a portal guarded by Warped. For the portal at the Base, it means getting to and through the portal while being attacked by Warped.

Everything else is optional. Feel free to use any of the Warped who have shown up before (they are most likely to have gone to whichever portal they were closer to) and any of the survivors (they could arrive to provide support or to fight or whatever else is needed). Also, I’m not making more Warped reference sheets, so make up any sort of Warped that suits your plot (so long as they are under Hezekiah’s control, anyway, and suited to some sort of army).

I did post an “update” of sorts to help track the current active characters for people who haven’t been reading everything: ladyriverlark.deviantart.com/a…

Just a reminder, don’t warp your main character. NPCs or opponents, sure, but not your specific character.

EDIT: OH YEAH. The other side of the portal is Gatekeeper's space station. It's old, damaged, but still has working life support. The portals open in different areas of the station. Neither opens directly to the central servers, engine rooms, or command rooms of the station. Round Four will take place there, so don't get too crazy breaking it yet.

As always, if you have any sort of questions about the prompts, please ask. I tried to include the relevant details and make things consistent, but I’m sure I’ve missed things. The deadline is April 29th at 11:59PM.

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The round three pairings and prompts are as follows: