xp_logs | The Games of Papa Ghede: Taken

Kurt and the ladies go off to attend Circe, and get something all together different

The media box was deserted for this showing and it actually offered a slightly better view than the front row centre seats did - it was a little higher and gave a good elevation for watching the aerial work. Besides, the front row had been sold out and Monet wasn't quite grateful enough to go kneecapping little old ladies for their tickets. She pushed open the door and gave a courtly bow, gesturing Kurt and Medusa into the box.

"Thank you again for the invitation to join the two of you for the evening," Medusa said as she settled gracefully into one of the seats. "I am told that this performance is quite enjoyable, though I have never been to one of these styles of shows before."

"Oh, they are quite something to watch", Kurt told her with a smile. "I had the chance to see a different show in this style, some years ago, and... it is not something you will forget."

Monet nodded. "I've seen them a couple of times and it's pretty good. I heard the new show is great, too."

As the lights dimmed, Medusa directed her attention to the center ring, where a woman was being lowered from the ceiling. It was nice to take a weekend off from the planning she'd been spending her time in Attilan on and just relax with some relatively good company.

Monet settled back in her chair and relaxed. There was a slight sting on the back of her neck and a moment of dizziness where everything started to go dark before she slumped forward, unconscious.

While this would normally have been disturbing for both her companions, they too had slumped in their chairs, darkness setting in for them all.

Tabitha catches Nathan who's had what she thinks is one too many.

He'd had higher hopes for the 'Sunset Martini' than this, Nathan thought, taking another sip of his drink and frowning a bit at the oddly muddled flavors. It wasn't unpleasant, but it was hardly knocking his socks off, despite the way that he'd heard fellow hotel guests praising this particular bar.

Shrugging to himself, he pulled out his Blackberry and proceeded to check his email. Most of his fellow 'chaperones' would probably smack him upside the head if they caught him doing this when he was supposed to be on vacation, but he was getting twitchy already. Sipping at his drink periodically as he skimmed through what was in his inbox, Nathan became gradually aware that he was starting to feel a little lightheaded. Frowning again, he stuck the Blackberry back into the pocket of his jacket, took one last sip of the drink, and left some money on the table before he rose.

The room tried to lurch around him, and Nathan's eyes widened, then narrowed, as he tried to focus. What the hell... He concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other, tellng himself that he was not falling over on the floor of the bar. Maybe someone had turned on psi-bafflers on the casino floor or something? But that wasn't what this felt like...

Tabitha limped into the lobby on a broken high heel. So far, this vacation thing was a total bust. The stifling heat of Las Vegas any time between sunrise and sunset was enough to make her stomach roll with nausea. Her futile attempt at a water park ended the second she tried on her bathing suit. There was just no way in HELL.

Then this. Stunning dress, perfect make-up, decent budget and killer shoes all thwarted by the lousy melted asphalt. Now her killer shoes were killed shoes and her ankle ached from the wretched twist when her foot tried to go forward and the shoe did not follow.

She threw herself down on one of the plush chairs for waiting or drunk patrons, glad to be off her feet.

But speaking of drunk patrons... Tabitha's head whipped around when she caught a glimpse of a familiar face lumbering crookedly from the in-house bar. Tabs quickly scanned the lobby for any students lurking around to see their teacher behaving in a less than exemplary manner. Not a one. Tabitha quickly discarded her shoes and nearly sprinted across the lobby to Nathan's side. She pushed herself under his arm to prevent any more swaying.

"What are you doing?" She demanded. "You're going to fall down and give yourself a concussion!"

"Tabitha." It was hard to form her name, as if his lips were numb. "Not... not drunk. Psi-baffler... something..." He certainly sounded drunk, the words coming out slurred. "All of...sudden..."

Tabitha took another look around the lobby, sharper with eyes for anybody who seemed overly interested in their little pow-wow. She avoided looking at the cameras for two reasons. One, she knew it wouldn't do any good to glare at lifeless bits of plastic. Two, she'd really rather any potential goon-squad know something was up. "Lean on me, Nate. We'll get you up to your room so you can sleep this off." Oops, that was probably a bit too loud. She leaned a bit to the right, steering Nathan toward the elevator. "And I can hope Moira doesn't skin me alive for putting you to bed."

There wouldn't be psi-bafflers upstairs. That was what this had to be, right? It was harder and harder to think, athough it was still slowly dawning on him that this was all happening a little too quickly, and the last time he'd been in Vegas and bothered by psi-bafflers it had taken hours, and been just a headache for most of that time. "Something..." he tried to say to Tabitha as she steered him towards the elevator. "Strange. Don't think..."

"You're not making any sort of sense." She looked around again, in a futile hope for another staff member. Or someone who understood drunk, or psi-drunk, or drugged. Whatever Nate was that involved mumbling and stumbling. "We'll get you upstairs and figure it out from there. All we can do down here is attract attention and set a bad example."

Trying to get Nathan to his room, they run into the rest of the gang.

"...There is being the swimming pool on the roof? Really?" Yvette's eyes were wide and glowing bright blue as she looked up at the two much-taller students she was sandwiched between. The lobby of the hotel was a little crowded with the casino crowd, and she held tightly onto Kyle's hand, glad for the fact her mutation meant she didn't feel temperature extremes. Wearing gloves and a body suit would be unbearable in this sort of heat otherwise.

"There is, seriously." Kyle said. "It's kind of awesome." It wasn't the biggest pool or anything, but it was on the -roof-. "I think Vegas must have some kind of -things on roofs- things. Pools, roller coasters, you know."

"To be making the more room for the hotels, perhaps?" Yvette suggested, sounding a lot more relaxed than she had in a while. Despite the stares and comments, some whispered, some not, she was enjoying the trip. Vegas was very strange, and all the more fun for that.

"Or just because it's stuff on a roof," Jan said cheerfully. "Makes it into a novelty, even if its things you can find other places. Plus, it's up high, and that's always cool. Unless you're afraid of heights, and then it's definitely not cool."

"It's like bacon. Being on a roof improves anything." Kyle stated faux-sagely. "We should go take a look and see how crowded it is." Roof or not, he wasn't going to suggest swimming unless it wasn't totally packed with people.

Yvette nodded. She didn't want to risk hurting anyone, even swimming in the full body suit, and crowded areas made her nervous. They reached the elevator and she pressed the 'up' button with a claw tip. "Even if the pool is to be crowded, we can be looking at the view from the top, yes?" she suggested.

"We sure can!" Jan agreed, smiling down at Yvette. "It's got to be an amazing view. We can look all around and see all sorts of... hey, isn't that Mr. Dayspring and librarian what's-her-name?"

"Miss Tabitha," Yvette supplied, being one of the library's most frequent visitors. She waved. "Hello, Mr. Dayspring! Hello Miss Tabitha! Are you having the good time?"

Nathan blinked, narrowing his eyes and then widening them, trying to focus on the vaguely familiar blurs in front of them as Tabitha came to a stop. It didn't work, particularly. Students? The noise around him seemed to be fading in and out, but he was fairly sure that one of them had addressed him by name.

Tabitha pushed away the urge to panic. Students, here, now, with Nathan all-- not entirely here. She pasted on a bright, artificial-feeling smile. "Hi, everybody. Mr. Dayspring isn't feeling all that hot. I think his lunch is disagreeing with him or something." She put mental emphasis on Or something, so it wouldn't feel so much like lying.

"Uh-huh. More like he had a liquid lunch," Jan quipped, raising her eyebrows at Tabitha before shooting a look at Kyle.

"Mr. Dayspring is not being well?" Yvette looked from Nathan to Tabitha, her voice concerned. "Can we be helping him to be going back to his room? And please, what is 'liquid lunch'?"

Kyle tiled his head back slightly to sniff the air, and frowned. "Doesn't smell like that." Alcohol was distinctive, and Nate didn't smell like he'd had a lot. "It means having drinks instead of food, or with food." He explained to Yvette, while at the same time, moving to get his shoulder under Nate's arm. No one else was really tall enough. "Yeah. We need to get him to his room, and then we should call Doc Moira."

"Something's wrong," Nathan muttered as he was steered into the elevator. Something was definitely wrong, and it had nothing at all to do with psi-bafflers. Something was wrong with him, and the kids were... "Tabitha... call Kurt."

Tabitha let Kyle take most of Nate's weight with a profound sense of relief as the elevator doors closed behind them and the car began whirring upwards. At Nate's prompting, she fumbled through her overstuffed clutch bag for her cell. Just as her hand closed around the tiny electronic device, Nate went limp. He slid right out of Kyle's arms and down the elevator wall, dragging Tabitha with him.

The contents of her clutch strewed across the elevator. Only luck and a desperate grip kept her phone from going with. She punched number two on the speed-dial and held the cell up to her ear. It didn't even ring once before she heard Kurt's recorded voice asking her to leave a message.

Tabitha's stomach sank to her toes.

"Mr. Dayspring!" Yvette held back, not wanting to add to the confusion, but her concern was clear. "Please, we are to the calling the doctor, yes?"

Jan stared down at Nathan. "OK, that is so not cool! Um... this is just one of those regular weird things that happens all of the time with you guys, right?"

Kyle had bent to try to pick Nate back up almost as soon as he lost his grip on him but the older man was just too heavy to hold onto when he went limp. "Well he's still breathing." He pressed his fingers against Nate's neck to check his pulse, frowning. "I dunno what Nate's normal..." his voice trailed off and Kyle stood, looking up at the ceiling. "Does anyone else smell -cabbage-?"

Yvette, crouched down beside Nathan, shook her head. "No," she said, and then yawned, blinking heavily. Suddenly it seemed like a good idea to curl up on the carpet and close her eyes...

Tabitha realized she was hyperventilating, but couldn't seem to make herself stop. "Kurt's phone went straight to voicemail. Something is WRONG." Her head felt as if a balloon was blowing up inside it, her eyeballs ready to pop out of the sockets. "Something-" She coughed once, then fell over. Jan slid down the wall of the elevator to join her, leaving Kyle the last one standing.

"Oh, no fucking WAY." Kyle muttered, and took the deepest breath he could. Pressing the emergency stop button on the elevator did a whole lot of nothing, and he knew that was wrong. He'd pressed one once, as a little boy, and it had rung a bell, stopped the elevator, and gotten him grounded for a week.

He let out a growl of outrage, and slammed against the elevator doors with his shoulder, only managing to make his shoulder ache. It didn't stop him from doing it again, and again, until he too slumped over onto the floor unconscious.

Mondo passes by a slightly different garbage truck.

Mondo had had entirely too much to eat and drink and it was time to walk some of it off. He had grown a little overwhelmed by the incessant glitz and glamor of the Strip and had taken his walk off the beaten path, unbeknown to him into the seedier, dirtier, poorer parts of Vegas. So far this vacation was just marvelous - all of the glitz and glamor, just like he'd expected to see. Later that night he was eagerly looking forward to seeing what he called the "Can-Can Girls". He walked aimlessly with a big smile on his face, occasionally waving hello to passer-by in a friendly way.

Hardly anyone returned his greetings but Mondo didn't let it get to him. He was doing his part to make the world a nicer, kinder place.

Also unknown to him was the garbage truck that was paralleling his course. As Mondo turned the corner the truck was waiting for him. Mondo paid it no mind as he whistled cheerfully (but badly) to himself as he walked. His perambulation was cut short as the garbage truck extended a hose, positioned it over his head, then turned on the suction.

Just like in Star Wars, he'd realize later, he was pushed up into the truck itself and introduced to Mr Floor at entirely too high a rate of speed. His head hit the metal floor and he was out like a light.