AU: Welcome to Hammel! [Players Come To Hammel!, Open]

[Dr. Sean Neville]

Sean Neville heard that projection clear as day, and that presented a number of problems. As an exceptionally tall and large cisgendered man, he had no need for women’s clothing, certainly not in the size of an average-sized woman. Likewise, as a man in a relationship with another cisgendered man, and who had lost their foster daughter months ago, there was no clothing appropriate for an average-sized adult woman anywhere in their house or in their car. “I should see if we have a blanket.” They usually kept one in the car, but occasionally they had to wash it and replace it.

“I’ll take care of it,” Sean the Penguin promised. He grabbed the bag of baby supplies, as well as the bag of his own purchases from the trunk, and his fish, and then the penguin walked into Hammel.

Around him, young women were animatedly engaged with some of the more recognizable students. That fit with what he had expected, although that was a secondary concern. He had to get upstairs.

He reached the room where Dryope was with her baby, and he closed his eyes. Slapping the door with his flipper, he managed to nudge it open enough for him to slip inside. “Dryope? We have your diapers, and some other things,” he remarked, setting everything but the fish down on the floor. He couldn’t see with his eyes closed, but that was for her privacy.

“There’s a shirt and a pair of boxers in there. It isn’t much, but we only went to the grocery store.”

[Zebadiah Hayes]

It took Abi a while to realize that she wasn't in her apartment anymore. She rolled out of bed and walked in the direction of what would have been her bathroom only walk still half asleep into a wall.

It was then she put on her glass, which luckily had somehow made the journey with her, and realized her morning wasn't going to go as planned.

In a bit of a shock, she slumped back onto the bed to try to figure this out. The young woman had a history of sleepwalking, but her head was swimming. Nothing looked familiar. That was until a cat walked into the bedroom. Sebastian, Stefan Spencer's cat, to be more specific.

Oh good gravy.

Don't get me wrong, Abi loved Stefan...from a distance. But she didn't exactly want to be there when the older man stumbled from where ever he had passed out the night before. She had enough to deal with without adding him and his pick-up lines into the equation at the moment.

So she snuck outside, trying to remember where in relation to Hammel she'd put Stefan's house. After all, maybe someone their would know what the heck was going on. Still public transportation wasn't as easy to come by in Pilot Ridge, so she had to flag down a cab. It was her first cab ride ever, but she was a bit distracted by the man in the driver seat singing along with Smokey Robinson at the top of his lungs as they drove.

She gave the man what little cash she had in her wallet, hoping it would be enough when they arrived at Hammel. Then, walking through the main doors, she kept a look out for familiar faces. Of course everyone looked familiar, but she was more interested in finding someone from the "behind the masks".

And she was starting to wish she'd swiped a bottle of southern comfort from Stefan's cabinets.

[Joshua Bernstein]

"Thank you," Dryope edged over to the penguin, snatching up the gifts quickly more because she was worried that one of the students might force their way inside than because she was worried about her friend. The first order of business was to change her baby's diaper; babies were always the top priority, and she didn't want to create a rash by allowing her child to remain in a soaked diaper now that she had the supplies necessary to change her.

Once that was done she set the baby on the floor so that she could change into the shirt and boxers Sean had provided for her. The baby, unsurprisingly, objected to this with yelps of outrage that seemed to go on forever (even though really it didn't take long at all to change clothes).

When she was done she picked up her squalling child, bouncing her on her hips to quiet her down.

"So what exactly is going on?"

Her question, although she didn't know it, echoed the one that Josh was asking his partner right at that very minute. He had assumed that the penguin was a shapeshifter, but that theory seemed less and less likely. Perhaps some sort of illusion? He tried to think what sort of other power might result in talking penguins, but he wasn't coming up with very many ideas. Sean, having worked at Hammel for decades, would have a better idea.

[Dr. Sean Neville]

The penguin remained where he was, with his eyes shut tight until the crying had stopped and the noises indicated that Dryope had managed to don the clothing and rectify her state of undress. When he opened them, he noticed that Iris looked and sounded somewhat placated, now that she was dry and her in mother’s arms again.

He shrugged, an odd gesture from a penguin, made odder by the fish peeking from the grocery bag he still held. “I woke up in Sean’s and Josh’s bathtub, which probably makes me lucky.” The penguin looked around the dormitory room for emphasis; the bathtub had been uncomfortable for his back, but at least he hadn’t woken naked in the middle of the school.

“They’re downstairs,” he added. “I passed several of the other players on the way up; that Behind the Mask thread is so helpful for identifying people.” Particularly since humans had a tendency to look the same as far as other species were concerned.

Downstairs, Sean the telepath leaned forward and rubbed his eyes, shaking his head simultaneously to convey his lack of knowledge. “I don’t even know where to begin.” He overheard his partner’s thoughts and confirmed, “That wasn’t a shapeshifter; he’s an actual, flesh and blood talking penguin. I found him in the shower this morning.”

Then, he gestured vaguely in the direction of the dormitories. “Then I heard a telepathic cry for help coupled with a grocery list, and now we’re here.”

[Nora Marie "Nory" Gwinn]

The pair was interrupted by a feeble tapping on the window.

Fueled by the potent adrenal cocktail of literary and feminist outrage and the rather more flexible physical laws of Hammelverse, Ellie clung to the sill on the outside of Dryope's dorm window. Her toes danced on a handy decorative brick outcropping while her arms gripped the wide cement planter outside the window. Panting a little, she peered over the sill to see if there was a way to pull herself up and wiggle inside. Through the smudged glass, she saw a woman tending to a fussing child on her hip (the sound of which she had followed to get here after she convinced Nory to untie her hands while Adam was in the bathroom) and...a penguin?

Her heart leaped. Unless another avian player had joined in the last week, that was Sean, and if that was Sean she would bet money that the woman with the child was Dryope. Of all the dorms she could have picked to climb blindly into en route of her escape, this was certainly the best. She, unfortunately, was less identifiable (except perhaps by the ridiculous situations she enjoyed writing), and it wasn't like she was letting go of the sill to try to mime anything. She could hardly blame the writing partners if they were somewhat alarmed when a wild-eyed nest of curly dark brown hair pressed her face into the glass outside their window. "It's Ellie, Elsinory!" she called as best she could. "Help! They've mutinied! They're reading me Twilight!"