Put your hands up

From Create Your Own Story

Current revision as of 04:10, 13 December 2011

"Okay! Don't shoot!" You freeze, your hands quickly raising, and - wait, there's another human among the cops. Oh, thank goodness... you're not totally alone in this - "YAAAAAAAAARGH!"

You collapse, twitching uncontrollably, as the air taser round stuck in your shoulder shocks you over and over again. Your head goes foggy and you have a hard time focusing on anything... though you can still hear just fine.

"Godsdammit, Harley! What have I told you about that twitchy trigger finger of yours?"

"Sorry, Sarge. I just thought he was gonna-"

"No excuses. Come on, let's get him in the car... Jameson, can we get a confirmation?"

"Tachyon levels are through the roof. If he's not the..." You black out as you feel the dart removed, and wide, firm hands lifting you. When you come to, you're... in what looks like a hospital room, rather than a cell. A doctor's standing over you, as well as the vixen officer you remember seeing before. And... she doesn't look nearly as angry as before.

"Alright, Mister Doe." No ID. Heh. "...you've caused me and my men a considerable amount of trouble. So spill. How did you get here?"

"I... really don't know. I mean, last thing I remember was getting out of bed, and then I wasn't in my apartment anymore..."

"Ugh. And you really have NO clue how you ended up in another world...?"

"Not really." She shakes her head sadly.

"...We'll be in touch. You're damn lucky that we couldn't find a return mechanism in your clothing... if it turns out that you crossed dimensional barriers willingly, you're in for a world of trouble." She trots out, and the doctor - who looks to be a mouse of some sort - shakes his head.

"Alright, we've got you off the sedative. They're going to want to talk to you before you go... but you should be a free man after this. Relatively." A free man with no money in an alien world. Lovely. For what it's worth, the doctor is right. They don't seem interested in keeping you, but they do tell you that you absolutely have to come in to the station in two days to discuss - in detail - your appearance there.

On the way out, you grab the attention of an orderly who's been sort of following you about, and ask her what you should do - she's heard the whole story by now, she knows that you're kind of stuck here.

"Well... look, you don't wanna make the cops mad. As long as you come back tomorrow, I think you'll be okay..."

"But what do I do about... everything else?"

"You mean the clothes thing?" She gives you a wry grin.

"And food. And money. And absolutely everything else... I'm homeless now..."

"Pft. The only hobos in this city are the ones that WANT to be homeless. There's a huge squatters commune outside of downtown, at the old industrial complex. Kind of a bunch of weirdos, and they say that there's some crazy-ass drug use out there, but they're pretty tight-knit... won't letcha go hungry, ya know? Or if you're more comfortable, ya can always go to the temple district, find one of the churches to help ya. If nothing else, I'm pretty sure the Church of Gaia would letcha crash there for the night."

"Those... both sound pretty reasonable. Hey... thanks a lot." You can feel your tension disappearing. This is still weird, but if you can avoid sleeping on the street, it's not that bad, is it?

"No sweat! And thanks for stopping me there."

"...Why?"

"I was gonna keep rambling and suggest that you could always try things as a gigolo." She laughs, walking off. How... odd. And you realize that you didn't get her name. Maybe if you ever have to come back for anything.

You walk out the front of the hospital, a new plan in mind.

• Get down to that commune and see what's going on.
• Head to the temple district and hope they're feeling charitable.
• Start walking the streets and hope you catch someone's eye.