crafting for their lives

Prompt 1: Reorienting portals

         The battle with the Crystal wyrm had left of lot of destruction in it's wake, and the damage was felt even in other portals. Faedin had been one of those portals. Folks who left home to go fight it came back bringing back "trophies" or rather things from Lyra they thought were cool. It was a time for festivities and songs for those people. There were also people who left to help look for missing folks. There were lots of parties going on at home though and Antal had gotten acquainted with some of the celebrating individuals. At which point, Mycelia had left him to get some sleep at home, a cover for her social anxiety, he presumed.

          Over the last few days, there had been rumors of missing people due to portals going haywire. There had been posters spread around asking for any one who could help with the portal problem and the search for the Thath woman known as Portal Posi. He had one thrust in his face and before he could say anything, the person had who gave it to him walked away. The half-elf had just finished his dinner at the local bar and grill, and was a little annoyed about the paper thrust in his face.

          It was on his way to the inn that he had rented a room from, that Antal's vision went a little woozy. The ground started to swim right in front of his eyes, and the evening lamps seemed to brighten to a blinding light. The moment his vision went out, and his balance failed, things seemed to come back to him the second he hit the ground. *I'm not in Kansas anymore*, he was very groggy and disoriented for a few minutes. The half-elf felt like he had just woken up from a deep sleep, even though he knew that it was impossible. Antal looked around. It was definitely not Faedin, but there it felt like Faedin. The sky was Kahari, he recognized that detail from his date with Porceline, and there were giant red and white polkadoted mushrooms from Faedin. Although, the mushrooms had a crystalline look to them. This was a dream, right?

         Antal stablized himself with his mobility aid, and wandered around for an undetermined amount of time. It was pretty place for sure, but that's not where he wanted to be, and his leg was starting to hurt after walking on it for a time. The mushrooms weren't much of a resting spot, since he would slide off if he didn't plant one leg on the ground. The half-elf decided it was time to rest, and potentially wake up from this dream. After hobbling over to a mushroom for shelter, he quickly fell asleep.

         Antal woke up to someone poking his forehead. When he blinked himself awake, there was someone standing over him. "Don't move," the person put a knife to his throat, " who are you?" "A-natal. My name is Antal. I found myself in this dream and I'm not sure if I'm home or not." The knife moved and he was able to move and get a better look at his would-be assailant. "What pray tell, might your name be?" he asked, as he got up from the ground, balancing himself with his mobility aid and a mushroom. His leg was still sore, but the pain was going to bearable at least for a little while. This was decidedly not a dream. "Quinn." His would-be assailent was an elf that seemed to have a burn mark on his face, pale green hair, and mostly blue eyes wearing clothes that covered most of his body. Antal was curious, "Have you seen anyone else here?" "No. You're the only one I've come across," Quinn shook his head, "and given your walking ability, I doubt you'll get far." It was true. He knew he'd be able to only go a few minutes before the pain got unbearable. "Time for experimenting I guess.", the half-elf was resigned to the fact that he couldn't do anything else. "What do you mean?", Quinn asked curiously. "Since I can't walk, and since I get the vibe you don't want to help, I have to get myself out of this place.", he was searching for his loom on his back, underneath his cloak. "How do you know I wasn't going to help", Quinn raised an eyebrow. "Do you want to help me walk or search for other's?" "No, not really," Quinn admitted. "Exactly what I thought.", Antal had his loom out as he responded, "Who holds a knife to someone's throat when you want meet people? Besides, I have an idea on how to escape if you want to help." Quinn looked on, interestedly, as the loom seemed to suck up the colour from the mushrooms, leaving crystalline colorless mushrooms in it's wake. "I might, but what if I want to stay?," "Then stay if you want," Antal was starting to be annoyed by the elf. "What would you need help with if I wanted to help?", Quinn was enjoying his ire as the mushrooms around them ere starting to turn crystalline colorless from the looms magic pull. "I would need a charge, an elemental boost to connect the separate elements to their portals.", his response was short as the handheld loom grew into a full sized loom. The threads also grew into the appropriate size. "You mean, to make a temporary portal? Interesting.", Quinn was intrigued and amused at the thought. "how would you make it?" "I don't know, just let me work please.", the half-elf snapped at him, as he was setting up the loom. At this point, Antal knew if he kept arguing with the elf, things would never get done. Irate, he started to thread the loom and continued pulling the magic from the environment. After a while, Quinn left to his own devices, and there was quiet for a while. The elf came back to check on him, and Antal was secretly kind of glad to see him. The wind was making the crystal sing and it had been his only companion for that time. When the elf came back, there was cloth with mushrooms and kags on it. When he smelled it, it had a definite Faedin forest scent in it. The mushrooms felt like real mushrooms, the jags had a different texture apart from the cloth, and it was more impressive than he wanted to admit. The half-elf had started on an another one, his loom pulling the stars from the sky and the moon's light dimmed slightly at every use of the loom. It got boring really fast though, and the fact that he couldn't get a rise out of Antal without stopping his work was annoying. He found a small colorful crystalline mushroom that hadn't had it's colour pulled out, amd pocketed it.

         It was about 30 minutes before Quinn came back. By that time, the half-elf was packing up the thread and shrunk it back down to regular handheld size. Antal was putting the loom away as Quinn was coming back. There were two pieces of cloth in front of them. A Faedin one and the other one being moonlit pool with a starry sky both laid on the ground in front of them. Curiosity got the better of Quinn, "If this works, and I help you, can I have one?" "Yes, if it works," Antal once again standing up, looking down at them. Quinn pulled out some tools and hooked both of the cloth pieces together. Water was the connecting element to both of these places. Pulling the water from both of these places using the portal energy that was sucked into, the cloths began glow. Antal got on his knees and touched the faedin cloth. It rippled like he had dipped his finger in water. "Hey, if this works, and you need some work, or, cash," Antal pulled out the poster and handed it to Quinn, "here's some information for you." "Thanks," Quinn took it. It could be useful in the future. The half-elf looked nervously at the cloth in front of him. He put his face in it. In that moment, he felt the rest of him get pushed through. In the blink of an eye, he was back in Faedin, soaking wet. It had worked after all and at that moment his stomach growled. It was time for food.