[ There's a blonde on the screen. She's got her long, curly hair pulled over one shoulder and she's leaning in a little on her elbows. She waves at the screen. ] So, this is definitely not a book review. In fact, I'm sort of wondering what I'm going to do my vlogs over if it's not books. Maybe I'll just talk about them in a general sense. Books are good. Portable magic. Yadda yadda. it's not the same, is it? [ She sighs dramatically. ] Aslan and I are at the book store, in our proper bodies. Come see us at Subtext and have an iced coffee. Gracie out.

For those that take Gracie up on her offer of books and iced coffee, they'll find her curled up in a big, squishy armchair near the front of the shop. She's reading a book and has an iced coffee at hand. There's a grey and white Scottish Fold cat dozing in the front window. She'd had a fun few days in Dani's body, zipping around, running into things and generally making a pest of herself, but she's grateful to be in her own body again.

When the bell over the door rings out, Gracie looks up with a smile on her face. "Hey, have a look around and if I can help you with anything, let me know."

Unless, of course, she knows you, then she'll be out of her chair, coffee abandoned on an end table to dole out hugs.

Kara Danvers knows loss. Of course she does. Her planet died; her family with it, with the exception of Kal. Most people would know him by his human name: Clark Kent.

But this...this is so much different. This feels like a heavy ache that refuses to do anything other than persist. It doesn't want to fade. It doesn't want to go away. It hurts to have been so much in love and to know that the sentiment was shared and still to be torn apart so cruelly. It's almost worse that he'd been so brave about it.

She'd needed some time alone. She'd needed to get away from everyone asking her if she was okay; she's not okay. She's not going to be okay with this probably ever. Even when she heals from what feels like a gaping wound in her heart, she's still never going to be okay with losing her first love the way she did. But maybe she can move on a little faster if she doesn't have an older sister and several friends hovering to try to make sure that she's all right. So Kara walked through the door.

...and when she immediately regretted her decision and thought better of it to head back, the door opened to nothing more than a wall. There had been punching of said wall. There had been feral screams of pent up depression and anger and raw emotion. There had been tears.

And then she'd walked away. Now she's roaming the streets of this new place, trying to decide whether it's the Universe's way of telling her she really does need this break from life or whether this is something more sinister. Tear tracks are mostly gone by the time she starts to see othe people walking the same street she is and she assumes she's further into town at that point. Seeing what's clearly a bar — Houndstooth, huh? — nearly sets her off in tears again because Mon-El worked in the alien bar and she has a ton of great memories with him in bars, but instead, she lifts her chin and pushes the door open, marching in with purpose. She can't drink her sorrow away but maybe she can knock back a drink or twenty and reminisce for a minute while she tries to figure out what the heck she's supposed to do with herself.

Well. That and bartenders and regulars tend to know a lot more than most people think they do, in Kara's experience. Maybe someone can offer her some insight. Worst case scenario, she can blow off a little steam. The alcohol hardly touches her, but she does get that little warm sensation in her cheeks and there's something weirdly comforting about that. In a pinch, maybe that'll do.

What is this? Does this connect to a special app or something or am I just calling out into the ether?

Hello? Can anybody see this?

Spike had been here for days. He’d spent every single one of those days hiding in an abandoned building (something he realized there weren’t many of here). He spent his nights swaggering his way through town and trying to locate a source of blood that didn’t involve him killing someone for. He didn’t trust the clinic here enough to approach them, but he had found a butcher that would provide him animal blood. It wasn’t ideal, and he hated the taste of it, but it would do in a pinch. He wanted a little more information on this place before he started settling in.

At first, he thought that Bit had accidentally pulled them both into another dimension, but Dawn hadn’t walked through that door with him. Besides, he’d remember a big, glowing portal and the only thing he remembered was his bedroom door. This place definitely wasn’t his bedroom. Yes, he’d found the phone in his pocket, but he hadn’t paid much attention to it. He could use technology, but it wasn’t really his thing. He’d also found an electronic key and he understood that it belonged to an apartment that he was meant to stay in. That sounded like a trap to Spike, and until he was certain it wasn’t, he had no intention of stepping foot in this apartment.

That being said, he spends a great deal of time prowling around the town at night. It reminds him a bit of Sunnydale with fewer baddies. He can be found almost anywhere, but he actually prefers to frequent The Houndstooth. It’s a little high class for his liking, but they’d refused to take his money the first night and they had Jameson. He’s gotten by on much less before.

Two seconds earlier, Buffy had been walking toward the room in the Alpha Complex that she didn’t share with anyone. She’d opened the door, stepped through and started to unzip the orange jumpsuit she wore. Two seconds ago she’d been in an underground complex and now...she wasn’t.

Her hand freezes on the zipper of her jumpsuit then falls to her side (it’s only unzipped about an inch).

“Toto...I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore,” she murmurs. She’s pretty sure she’s not in San Francisco either. There are some pretty important landmarks missing, like the bridge, and the beach looks suspiciously more like the one in Sunnydale than in San Francisco. This calls for an exploration, and some damn information. If she were more certain about the population here, she might find something inhuman and evil to beat information out of, but since nothing is jumping out at her to volunteer, she’s going to have to stick to finding things out in a much more polite way.

She really wishes (for the billionth time since being pulled into the Alpha Complex) that she wasn’t wearing a bright orange jumpsuit. She’s pretty sure it doesn’t inspire trust in anyone. She slips her hands into her pockets as she starts to walk and finds the PDA that was definitely not there before. Her brow furrows and she starts poking at buttons, eventually pulling up the network:

text

Echo one nine, is anyone there? I’m pretty sure I just mixed my military and trucker walkie etiquette, but seriously? Is anyone there?

Elena had just gotten off work after a very long shift. She'd stepped through the front door of the Gilbert house, exhaustion etched in every inch of her body. She'd been about to toe-heel her shoes off when she noticed she wasn't in Kansas Mystic Falls anymore. She'd lived there nearly her entire life and Mystic Falls, for all its charms, never had a beach, among a few other things she could point out. Exhaustion had been forgotten in favor of figuring out what the hell was going on. At first, she'd thought it was another Mystic Falls thing, or a vampire thing.

It turned out that it was a whole new thing that she'd never even known could exist. The next few days Elena spends researching this place and settling in. She drinks a lot of coffee from the bookstore and gives the clinic a thorough look over, signing up to work there (volunteer? Can it be called work if one isn't being paid or doesn't need to be paid?). She also stops in at the boxing gym and works over the punching bag for a little while, venting her frustration at being here. Finally, she does some shopping around town, ending the day on the beach with a glass of wine.

It's not until several days later that she finally approaches the N E T W O R K with a text message:

Top 5 things a new person needs to know. Go!

[Moving from one place to another isn't a new experience to Carl. Moving through one dimension to another like his life were suddenly the plot line of comic book, however, is new. He spends the first day avoiding people as much as possible to digest his new situation on his own, the next to explore and open up little by little. The people here didn't seem bad to him, which was a plus considering. Only they were more comfortable with going about their lives as if all the stuff around them was normal when it was not. Simple businesses that were considered open, laughter that filled the streets-- all of that was going to take him a while to adjust to since he hadn't seen a society function this way in over two years.

And honestly, he isn't sure he'll ever get used to it.

But Carl keeps on walking to see what there is anyway. Itinere wasn't lacking in things or people to catch his attention.]

[Valentines and the whole month of February was a disaster. Then March, if not the most of April felt like a period of recovery and transition because Annabeth had moved in with him and Percy was giving her time to adjust. But the one thing that was not lost on him was their chance to celebrate Valentines Day. Which is why the thought stirs to his mind every once in a while. And today, it finally feels like it's driving him crazy. Annabeth deserved something to make up for it, after all.

That's why he can be found doing a little extra shopping today. Sightseeing for the perfect place to have picnic and also researching - yes, actually researching! - in book stores or libraries to get ideas of things to wish up. An idea he gets pretty quickly is the Athena Parthenos, a statue of importance from home whom he knows his girlfriend will appreciate. The Goddess' statue seems reluctant to his answer him though so it actually takes a couple of hours to appear. Meanwhile he goes about others things anyway. Collecting supplies for the date like a blanket, a basket and food both to his girlfriends tastes and his own. Mashed potatoes and mac and cheese sound like a good combination, right? He throw in a couple of BLTs for something healthy too.

Around lunch, Percy finally gets his date plan all together. Though for reasons entirely his own he borrows supplies from around not only to set up a picnic area on the beach but to fix together a seashell bra for the little mermaid statue there. It feels like something he should do make less it awkward for his date anyway... (Plus he thinks it's kind of humorous when it's done.)

He pops back into his apartment later to gather Annabeth for his surprise date.]

( For a long while, Joy goes back and forth deciding whether or not to do this as a video rather than text. She hates her voice; it's embarrassing. Joy Shapiro-Krushelevansky was born prematurely and moderately deaf due to a fall her mother suffered in her third trimester while pregnant with Joy. The teenager has had hearing aids for what feels like forever and she'd had speech therapy when she'd been little, so she's learned to read lips and if she's got her hearing aids in, she can hear all right, but when she talks, her voice sounds deep and gravelly like it belongs to a woman in her late forties who spent the better part of her life smoking a pack a day of cigarettes.

Being fourteen means being self-conscious and she hates, hates, hates when people she doesn't know can hear her talking. Once she gets used to a person and knows that they aren't going to judge, she's fine.

Ultimately, in spite of her own discomfort, Joy decides to go with video instead of text because it's just easier to talk than it is to type when Charlie's awake, because he's a little fussy these past couple of days. If she's not holding him and he's not sleeping, he's screaming. )

Um...so...hi, I'm... ( She shifts a little in her chair and the infant in her arms stirs, which makes her take pause. He doesn't awaken, so she continues, but lowers her voice a little. ) I'm Joy and I just, um, wondered if anybody knows whether we can call home from here or no. I can't, anyway, I don't have a cell phone, but if it's a thing that's possible, I wondered if somebody would, um, mind if I borrowed their phone to send my mom a text once in a while just so she knows that me and Charlie are still okay and she doesn't freak out ( and do something humiliating like show up here. ) but if not, then that's okay. I just thought I would ask.

Ever since her dad died, life has been tough for Joy. It's always been complicated; her mom used to be a famous writer and she's a total Smother. Joy herself is the product of her mother hooking up with her ex for a one night stand at, of all things, a funeral. Joy's biological father, Bruce, is a jerk and his wife is even worse. Joy has a newly gay grandma, a complete jerk of a grandfather, and an Aunt Elle who is literally the coolest person she's ever met.

And last year, just before Joy's bah mitzvah, her dad had a heart attack and died. Joy hadn't known that he and Joy's mother had been planning a new baby via a surrogate before he died, but she found out after the fact. Several months after her dad's death, Charlie was born. Joy might only be fourteen years old, but she's been taking care of him ever since. She decided it was better to give her mother some time to pull herself together and for Joy not to have to juggle school on top of everything at home, so she packed up Charlie's diaper bag after a month of the struggle at home and stepped into Itinere. So far, it seems okay.

She waits until it's warm to dress Charlie for the weather before heading out to check out the town, wandering down the streets, in and out of stores just to see what's there. They've been here about a week and the past several days of it, he's been fussing. Maybe that's just what one month old babies do. Fuss. And it isn't like Joy knows how to make him stop except that she's learned that he likes to be held. The problem is, Joy's sick of the same four walls, so maybe she can keep Charlie happy while she also explores. It seems like the best of both worlds, so what could possibly go wrong?

For anyone that’s comfortable meeting Matt, he can be found in the lobby of STAR labs. He’s not wearing his daredevil suit, but instead one of the suits he used to wear in court. He’s also wearing his sunglasses, but has left the cane at home as he’s got no need for it. It will be very obvious that he can ‘see’ in his own way as he looks up or turns to face whomever approaches the door. He’s nervous, and that might show as well. He’s become an expert at hiding nerves in court, but this hardly counts as court and it’s an entirely different sort of thing. Right now, he’s nervous about how he’ll be received with his ‘abilities’ and he’s nervous about leading a group of people. He’s never done that before. He’s never even worked in a group that consisted of more than two people. Of course, there’s the chance that no one will respond to his message and the defense ‘team’ will consist of he and Spider-man. He supposes that’s better than nothing.

Disoriented isn't exactly the right word for what Matt feels when he wakes up. He remembers the creature. He remembers the way it shredded the chestplate on his armored suit. He remembers the agonizing pain from having his heart ripped out, remembers that he was alive long enough to see his heart in the creature's talons. He knows what happened to him, but he can't figure out why he's alive now and he's very much alive. He can hear his heart thundering in his chest and the whoosh of his blood in his veins. He can hear how loud his living body is and as he adjusts to that, other noises trickle in, overwhelming at first then gradually fading away to something manageable. He takes a gasping breath, sitting up in bed. He's naked, but that's not unusual when he's in bed. He knows that Katniss and Foggy have been nearby recently (maybe still are, but he can't quite get a handle on his senses yet). He grabs some track pants and a tee shirt out of his closet, pulls them on and moves into the living room.

After he's had a chance to eat something and drink some tea (he's starving), he takes advantage of the network and orders the PDA he'd found on his nightstand to send a text to the network at large:

To be concise, what the hell happened here?

Audrey is unsurprised to wake up at her desk in the police station. It's something that's a common enough occurrence. She is surprised to find that her blouse is shredded and bloody, but there seems to be no wound on her chest beneath the blouse. She pushes herself to her feet and is hit with a memory of a creature, one of the creatures that have been terrorizing the town. She remembers dying, or at least having her heart ripped out. She remembers thinking immediately of Duke and how he would cope here without her; he'd find a way home and he'd be okay. Of course, that makes her think of Nathan and how he's going to handle it when Duke tells him she's dead. She doesn't have long to actually consider that though because...dying and dead.

Except now she's not. Now she's alive. She presses her hand to her chest and moves to open her desk drawer, pulling a clean shirt out. She changes then sends out a few texts:

I don't know how long I've been gone, but I'm okay and the police station is back in business. What's going on out there now? Are the creatures still a danger?

Once that's done, Audrey grabs her gun, pulls on a bullet-proof vest and heads out of the police station to see for herself what's going on. While she intends to make this a patrol and check on things in the town, she's going to ultimately make her way to Duke's boat to check on him herself.

Death isn't something Sophie has ever experienced before. Sure, there'd been a friend in high school, but not someone she was close to. She's certainly never died before. In fact, until the creatures arrived in this place, violence was something that Sophie only had a casual knowledge of: the random frat boy fight at school or a catfight in the hallways of high school. It wasn't something real to her, but the day she'd run out for more art supplies had changed that. She'd thought the daylight would protect her. It was only a quick trip.

When she awakens with a gasp, Sophie is in her room. There's a half finished canvas set up (she remembers working on it) and her room looks untouched so there's little to tell her how long she's been dead (how is that even possible). She changes from the blood stained and torn clothes she's wearing, shoving the shirt down deep in the bathroom trash (she'd like to burn it) and pulling on her favorite sweatshirt (an old one of Cam's) and a fresh pair of jeans. She pads barefoot out into the living room, cautious at first.

"Cam?"

Once she speaks with her brother and finds out that the creatures that killed her are gone, she'll go outside, stop by the Houndstooth then the coffee shop. Once she feels a little more comfortable, she'll continue to the bookstore then the art supply store. She might be looking for Leo and some of the other people she's just started to get to know here.

Annabeth startles awake, her hand flying to her chest. Having her heart ripped out is a new experience, but she's been gravely injured before and brought back so she's not entirely surprised. She's still wearing the bloodied Camp Halfblood tee shirt that she'd been wounded (killed?) in. She's also in her apartment (the one she'd barely had time to settle into). After a quick change of clothing, she leaves her apartment in search of the people she cares about. She's got her knife in hand, unwilling to leave anything to chance. She'll stop by Percy's apartment first then go in search of Leo and Percy if he's not in his apartment.

She can be found all about town searching for her friends and trying to figure out what's going on now

Ronan isn't a stranger to waking up bloody, nor is he a stranger to nearly dying, so that's what he assumes happened. In fact, he'd honestly thought the creatures that ripped out his heart were one of his night terrors at first so he'd created a night terror in order to help them, the all white one that's so fond of him. It hadn't been enough, at least it hadn't been enough to protect himself. He hopes it was a enough to protect his friends. He wakes up in one of the barns wearing some clothes that have been shredded and bloodied. He pushes himself to his feet, swaying a little as the memory of his death catches up with him, but the need to find Adam, Gansey and Blue drives him. As per usual, he doesn't even consider using the PDA to contact them. He goes to the house first, hollaring for Adam.

Once he's reunited with Adam, he'll go to Monmouth Manufacturing to find Blue and Gansey. He wants to make sure everyone is okay because the last time monsters hit this place, they'd lost Noah. He's got no intention of losing anyone else if he can help it.

[ hawke spends most of her time in the first few days of the invasion trying to assess the threat and helping out anyone she can. none of it looks good to her. these things don't look like demons that she knows of from thedas, but they sure do act like it. tearing out hearts is more than bad. attacking people at all would be enough for hawke. everything else is just the icing they didn't need.

so she takes to the streets, getting people out of the way if she can and saving whatever lives are possible to save, all while killing as many of the demons as she can. ]

[ she and her dog cailan are at it again, but this time hawke finds a group that are harder to deal with than others. they seem intent on tag-teaming her, distracting her dog and then trying to swoop in for her. cailan's jaws snap at anything within reach, the wardog having been bred for exactly this. unfortunately for hawke, she gets separated from him about halfway through the day. one of the demons swoops at her from above, while another turns her around. it's enough that the fireball she was conjuring goes off-course, hitting too close to her for her to dodge properly. she throws up her hands to avoid the knockback and the searing heat from the resulting fire, which gives a third demon enough of an opportunity to dive in.

it thrusts its clawed hand or whatever it is deep into her chest. hawke gasps, both in shock and pain, and before she can think to heal herself, the thing rips its hand back out, taking her heart with it. as cailan's barks turn to whines and howls of utter distress, hawke's lifeless body falls to the ground. satisfied with their sacrifice, the beats leave, one flying off straight for jill. cailan hesitates for one second before he follows that one, clearly wanting to find out where it's taking that all-important piece of his mistress. ]

[ hawke doesn't revive until the 7th when she contacts jill first. after that, she addresses the network as a whole. ] Well, that was unexpected. I guess these things are heartbreakers. [ ha ha ha, hawke. ]

What have I missed? And is everyone else safe? Who needs rescuing?

The thunder cracks high above and Jill is hurrying down the street to board up the windows of the Houndstooth again. She's been in Itinere long enough to know that something isn't right. This place seems to go through cycles of peace and perfection and experiments that range from ridiculous to horrific. With Lucy safe at their apartment, Jill is going to take care of the Houndstooth.

When she sees the first monster she becomes the most cliche monster movie chickadee in the world and screams and runs in the other direction. She slips into an alleyway between to buildings and waits it out for a bit before continuing on to the Houndstooth with her heart beating a mile a minute.

She'll be at The Houndstooth boarding up windows for the better part of the day before heading back to her apartment and Lucy. She has to run and hide a few times from several winged beasts on her way.

The City has been flooded with these violent creatures for a week now and it doesn't look like there's an end in sight. Jill and Lucy have been holed up in the apartment building for that week so at least they're safe enough. She's sent texts to her friends, making sure they're safe and even broadcasted that the Houndstooth is closed for the foreseeable future and please everyone be safe.

There's one day though, a day when she steps out onto the balcony of their shared apartment that Jill finds a heart, a fresh, still beating heart. "What in the world?" She whispers to herself as she leans in closer to look at it.

Flashes of memories hit her, Hawke and Isabella. She can see them, the love affair between them, the push and pull, and she smiles for a moment because she's getting this glimpse into her friend's life, a part of her life that Hawke has spoken about frequently.

As the visions end though, when Jill is left with just the live heart, the implications make her stomach roil. She grabs her phone and sends out a text.