The Universe's Mixer

The conference had given Thomas Townsend feelings. There wasn't any one feeling; there were so many, and he wanted very much not to feel many of them. He'd given answers; he'd set some minds at ease. He'd done what he'd set out to do; only he'd pissed off one of the more worrisome tenants. The Cowboy God was not at all happy, not even close. The Amazon hadn't exactly left pleased with him either. She could be trouble, too, if she were to hint something to the Cowboy God, yet she could also be useful. She'd kept the Cowboy God from causing trouble, hadn't she?

Thomas paced outside Beauty's home; it had been his home, and he had never thought he'd call one little building a home. He'd make it up to her somehow. He'd make her understand just how much she had meant to him, yet he wanted to protect her somehow too. He couldn't go to the Cowboy God for help, not that he thought that man would ever endanger such an innocent as Beauty.

With a determined set to his jaw, he headed out to find the damned - a word he'd heard before when people were determined, frustrated and so many other things - Cowboy God. He needed some assurances that Beauty would never get caught in their struggle. That was it. That was what he would do. Of course, he had nothing to bargain with, but he'd figure it out. He'd learned so much after all, hadn't he?

The City Hall was chosen because it held a room within it that was big enough to accommodate the droves of people that were sure to come. Plus, being inside space, there were no worries over weather that couldn't be controlled. The people could sit and listen and not have to try to hear past traffic or wind.

Even with the late notice, everything was done well before the scheduled start time, which Thomas was proud of. He was glad that the ones who were born here weren't entirely useless without him around. They were keeping their heads together, doing what needed to be done. Of course, it also could have been the fact that they believed Thomas was who he claimed to be, and with his presence there with them, they felt better about the situation they were currently in.

Thomas looked at the stage. That's where he would be standing, talking to the people he had brought here. He had no doubts that they would be the ones with the questions, the ones who demanded answers. He was ready. He could do this.

He sat in a seat hidden by a curtain, where he could still see the stage and the rows of chairs beyond, and waited.

There was going to be a press conference. Thomas was going to have a chance to answer all their irritating questions all at once. This made him feel happy. Perhaps the first true and whole happiness that he had felt since being put inside this stupid body.

He had been staying at Beauty's home. She had given him the bed, and he hadn't known better to insist that he be the one to sleep on the blanket pile on the floor. He had, instead, just taken the bed and enjoyed it very much.

Thomas trekked his way to the little cottage from the Mayor's office. He had to walk because he didn't have the money to pay for a cab, and wasn't entirely sure that he wanted to be in one again anyway. The night had fallen on his way, and he was enjoying it, despite the much cooler temperatures. Perhaps because he was so happy. Perhaps nothing could sour his mood now.

He opened the door and went inside, and sat at the little table.

Jack was just as busy as ever. The City was still not moving, and panic was at an all time high. He couldn't give up eating entirely, but he'd taken to just quick snacks for an energy pick-me-up when he could get them.

He was still looking forward to the night he'd arranged to take Zatanna to dinner, however. He'd arranged to delegate some responsibilities during that time and he intended to give her his full attention.

At the moment, he was in need of a sugar rush. His vision had gone slightly blurry while looking over papers at his desk. While he could have asked someone in the office to go out for the frozen yogurt, he supposed that a quick break might do him just as much good as the calorie intake.

Which was why he was currently sitting in the corner of Yo-yo's Fro-yo's, half hiding behind a paper as he ate his vanilla frozen yogurt and tried to collect his thoughts before he returned to the nonstop pace of his overflowing inbox.

"Sihal Novarum Chinoth."

With the usual flare of pink light, Megan vanished from the park and reappeared behind the library. She looked around, nodded to herself, and took out a small notepad and a clicky pen from her pocket, scribbling notes in it before returning both. She took a deep breath, bracing herself and threw her hands out in front of her.

"Sihal Novarum Chinoth."

Another flare of bright pink light, and she was gone, off again to continue her teleporting experiment. She reappeared just outside the botanical gardens, and started scribbling again.

Ever since the “incident” with that ridiculously tall leprechaun, Jeannie had been avoiding the park. Not consciously. She did not think about ways to avoid passing through it, or alternate routes around it. She had simply been doing it, and it was not until that very morning that she realized it. Which gave Mad Sweeney far too much influence over her life.

( That would have to change. )

A RUN IN- LITERALLY (Thomas)

Brennan was settling in alright. It wasn't the same this time around, not with what had been happening lately. The city going still and all. It had taken her relatively no time to find her apartment, the same one she'd had before (or at least it appeared to be the same- it was difficult to tell considering it was an exact replica of her apartment in DC), and her lab. The lab even had a couple of files she'd been working on when she left. Bones didn't disintegrate, though, and she was grateful she still had some puzzles to figure out. The last thing she wanted was too much time to herself to think.

Perhaps because she was so used to taking care of herself, she didn't resent the change in the City as much as others. But that didn't mean she didn't have questions. Mainly, what had happened to cause the change?

She put down the skull she was working on and pulled her gloves off. Trashing them, she left the platform and walked toward the exit. She wanted some coffee and a breath of fresh air. She was pretty sure she had enough change for a cup of joe and was rummaging in her pocket, not paying attention to what was in front of her, when she ran right into a solid being.

She took a step back, slightly flustered and embarrassed, "I apologize, I should have been watching where I was going."

Lois was not amused. At all. She'd spent the last few weeks reading all of the comics she could at the library. And watching the movies. And the TV show.

This was all...

Clark was an alien? Who flew around wearing his underwear outside his pants? And she was supposed to fall in love with him?

Which was all secondary to the fact that she was an actual freaking comic book character.

What had Arthur said-the ideal of a determined female journalist?

And apparently the dumbest person on Earth because nearly every version had her fooled by a simple pair of glasses.

Glasses. How dumb did they think she was?

Or worse, if one of those was her supposed future if the City hadn't shanghaied her, how dumb was she?

Everything was topsy turvy. Everything.

She was still keeping on top of her assignments and she'd gotten a front row seat to a nice riot instead of a press conference. It had given her another front page headline, though she wasn't happy about the state of fear that everyone in the City was in. She didn't know exactly where the Justice League had been lately, but she had a feeling that the mayor's anti-heroes stance had cowed them to some extent.

Which also didn't make her happy.

All in all, she was a little bit cranky as she hit the streets to interview random citizens for her follow-up article on the state of the City. She intended to get genuine man-on-the-street reactions to everything that was going on at the moment so she could piece together something on the current mood of the City. She also planned to slip in questions to find out how the citizens felt about the heroes who had taken down King Kong and the mayor's treatment of said heroes.

The streets were still behaving themselves. She still had to go food shopping, but she was lucky in that Shadowcrest cleaned itself. She did have to do laundry though. Her house drew the line there. And she could still teleport, but she wasn't doing that today. Today she was going for a walk.

She was worried about Dinah. Her friend and collegue in fishnets was really hurting. Zee wanted her help her as much as possible, but when you're that hurt sometimes the best help was to be left alone. She didn't want to pressure Dinah at all so she stuck to calling her to check in and dropping by if she didn't answer.

Having a leader for the League was another thought occupying her mind. And Lindsey. He was usually in the back of her mind somewhere, and thoughts of him never failed to make her smile, but not today. Unfortunately, he would have to take a back seat to the other things that demanded her attention. She'd call him, but she didn't want to take her problems there.

Needless to say she was a bit distracted on her stroll.

Everything was going to hell. Fred was miserable and Dinah wasn't too happy with Jensen herself. Unfortunately, she was unhappy with him on a personal level which meant she still needed to be professional. She wasn't aware of his questions about her leadership abilities or else she would have wanted to talk about that.

No, instead she was out searching for the team's resident doctor/scientist. Hank hadn't been in his lab and he hadn't answered his comm or his phone. She'd tried dropping by his apartment and knocking on the door, but there was no answer there either.

She was doing her best not to panic and not to think the worst, but it was hard to think anything else when she knew that he had caught Eric's interest.

She had left messages everywhere, and she could only hope that he would respond to one soon. She'd even braved a computer to send an email, which was a huge step because she still loathed computesr. It hadn't been that long since she'd seen him, so she was trying very hard not to panic.

Trying, and all but failing.

In an attempt to keep her mind off her missing doctor, her heartbroken friend, and her own heartbreak, Dinah stopped by Fieri Brothers for some pasta. It was... very odd that the restaurant was here and even that the food tasted exactly the same as back home. But the staff was completely different. There was no Mr. Fieri here, no waitresses and cooks that were all related and part of one of those big Italian families. No friendly faces that knew her go-to order.

It was sort of like a jarring note in an otherwise familiar song. The City seemed to have nothing but those for her, and she was honestly not in the mood to be all too charitable.

All the same, the comfort food was better than no comfort at all so she was seated by herself at a table in the corner, trying to ignore the happy couples that suddenly seemed to be everywhere. Holding hands, stealing kisses over pasta and wine. It was something she maybe hadn't noticed during the brief time when things were going well with Harry, but now that that was all over she couldn't help but notice that nearly everyone in the City was paired off and apparently over the moon about it.

There used to be a stable.

No, no, that wasn't exactly right.

There used to sometimes be a stable -- and it used to appear when she wanted to spend some time with the horses that were sometimes boarded there. With all Beauty's new-found vacation time, she'd had every intention of going on long, lovely rides across the City Commons, but the stable simply wasn't appearing. It just wasn't there anymore.

Other things had changed, too. The whispers in her cottage - those invisible servants who forced clothes on her and who set out her meals and who apparently did the laundry and kept the place clean - had disappeared. At first she was glad -- but as the days passed, she found herself actually missing the strange companionship that the whispers had been. She could never quite understand them, but they ... they'd been friendly to her. They'd been kind, or at least, they tried to be very kind.

Beauty stood at the top of a rolling hill overlooking where the stable used to be, arms twisted behind her back, hands clasped together. She hoped that the horses were all right, wherever they'd gone.

This day in The City was as beautiful as most of the days were. It liked it when people were outside and enjoying themselves, so it rarely changed the weather. It knew that people enjoyed occasional rainstorms, so it allowed those from time to time. But unless it was experimenting, the weather never altered too much for too long.

It had not done much experimenting lately. He had brought in the giant King Kong, wanting to see what those Justice League individuals could do against it. Prior to that had been the werecreatures. There had also been a very wild storm, which it had had nothing to do with.

It had been worried when the storm had happened. The word for the emotion that over came it when that happened was fear, it thought. It feared the one named Baba Yaga. It had opened itself to her, using her like a conduit. She had misbehaved, and it had thought to punish her. The punishment had only made her very angry, she had lashed out. She had done something it had not expected, and it had not liked the feeling of that.

The worry had not, of course, stopped the City's mischievous ways completely.

The love holiday was coming up again. It had played with it's citizens once before on the love holiday. So much fun had been had, that The City was intending to play with them again. Differently this time, but it thought that there was more potential behind the new idea. It would be bigger, more gripping. It had liked to see the people fall in love last time. It wanted more of that.

As The City prepared to unleash the new game, it felt a jolt. Though it had no body at the moment, the jolt felt like it ripped through the entirety of The City. Then came another. And another. The jolts were distracting, mind-swimmingly blinding.

And they hurt.