Young Writers Society

For as long as anyone can remember, this shop has been standing on a little street named Jasper Row. It's the smallest storefront, barely lit at night, and more is known about its purpose than its proprietor, one Mssr. Triton DeMasque.

It is, you see, a doll shop. People come to it looking for automatons or porcelain dolls, or asking for a quick fix. No one in the last century has spoken with Mssr. DeMasque, however, and most people are content with the answer they get from the girl working the front desk: He's dead, she says shortly, has been for a hundred years.

You walk in. The bell over the door rings. What brings you here?

—

Important Stuff:
1. Keep it clean, please. A little cursing is tolerable, but anything over "hell" and "damn" is out.
2. Don't go controlling someone else's character unless they give you permission.
3. This setting is capable of existing at any time in any world (it's a quirk in the system, so to speak), so feel free to have your wacky, non-modern characters drop in!
4. Have fun, guys and dolls!

—

Nicolette

Another grey, dreary dawn. Another long day on Jasper Row. Nicolette sighed and leaned on the counter of DeMasque Dolls & Service; she hoped that the quick fix she had thought up for the continuum stabilizer in the back would work. It was annoying, zipping through spacetime like it was nothing. She just wanted to stay on Jasper Row for one full day.

As if on cue, a sharp grating sound came from the broom closet where she kept it. By the door to her shop, her golden retriever whined and covered her ears—Nicolette cursed under her breath and stood her ground. She would put up with the timesickness roiling in her gut and fix the thing later, when she didn't have business to attend to.

At least her customers walked out into their own time periods. Most of the time.

Amy

Honestly, dolls gave Amy the creeps. She wanted to say that the feeling wasn't completely illogical, since it did seem a bit strange to have little human replicas sitting around for simply the aesthetic appeal or... to play with? Really, though, she'd heard too many creepy stories about them. She hadn't even seen any horror movies or read any creepy pastas (was that what they were called?), but even the little bits of information she'd picked up on gave her the heebidy-bajeebies.

Now, the ones that looked like stuffed pillows really weren't all that intimidating. The lifelike ones, however, were likely to give her nightmares if she stared into their eyes for too long. As a kid she would even hide her dolls in a sealed box - so that they couldn't watch her as she slept - making sure that they couldn't escape by stacking several other boxes on top of it.

It was for all of these reasons that she dreaded walking into this doll shop. But Bo, who was parked outside in the street, was watching and waiting for her to go into the shop.

"Face your fears, he says." She mumbled to herself as she walked to the door.

"They're just inanimate objects, he says. What's the worst that can happen, he says." With every word she started feeling more and more salty at Bo for daring her to do this. Psh, I don't have to prove myself to him.

She looked back into the street, and even from the distance she could see Bo motioning to the building. He's taunting me. With his eyes.

She made as gross of a frown as possible and grumbled as she turned back to the door. He did have a point. They're really just dolls. It's a stupid fear, and if I just go in, walk around for a minute, and come out, he'll let it go and stop nagging me about it. Right? Or will he just try to get me over all of my irrational fears?

Whatever. She pushed open the door, hearing a door bell ring over her head. A porcelain doll shop. Of all places, she would have never thought she'd be found dead in a place like this. NOT that she thought she was going to die of course. It was just an expression!

"OooooOOok. Let's get this overwith." She said under her breath, crossing her arms in a very outward expression of her discomfort.

(I came up with the best excuse to throw one of my characters in here because I just fell in love with this idea. I hope it works alright.)

Nicolette

If there was one sound that Nicolette had stopped loving over the last century, it was the bright tinkle of that stupid bell above that stupid door that always heralded the arrival of a new customer who would, doubtless, gawk and leave.

Heavens, the girl didn't even look like a gawker. She looked more like a runner—Nicolette had seen plenty of those, people who got one look at her unnaturally still mannerisms and left the bell jangling behind them. They were usually halfway down Jasper Row before they saw anything else.

Still, by force of habit, she straightened out her hair and clothes and gave the girl her best smile. "Welcome to DeMasque Dolls & Service. Can I help you with anything today?"

By the door, Cherie whined a little, but she didn't reach her wet nose out to the new customer. The poor thing was always so upset when people from other timelines walked in; Nicolette was convinced there was some sort of off-key hum that annoyed the dog. She could almost hear it in the back of her own head, but she hadn't been built with such delicate instruments.

Thankfully, she had been built with an almost-human array of emotions and expressions. If this girl didn't plan on buying anything, she could get as irritated as every other shopkeeper on the row.

She would wait and see.

((It's totally awesome! Yay, activity!))

"Oh!" She hadn't noticed the woman at the counter at first. She guessed that, her face just sort of got lost among the midst of the mini faces. "Uh, is it ok to just look around? Or would that be loitering?" Hey, if she got kicked out of the store, then at the very least she'd have an excuse for going back out so quickly. Maybe it'd also be a cool story to tell? I got kicked out of a doll store. Eh, never mind. That sounded really lame, actually.

As Amy got a better look at the store, she couldn't help but feel like she stepped into another period of time. Maybe it's because she always considered the art of doll-making to be an ancient practice.

A look of realization passed over her face as a completely new thought came to mind. Doll makers are artists.! Maybe she was slow to make that connection, but as an artist herself, as she look a closer look at some of the dolls, she found herself having a greater respect for people who made dolls. It wasn't really a life-altering revelation, but heck, it did help to put things in perspective. This was a legitimate job and store, even if the "art" they made was a bit creepy. There were lots of artists out there who made spookier art than this, actually.

Thinking about it this way put Amy a little more at ease, and she looked up at the lady a little more confidently.

She actually really did hope she didn't get kicked out though. Some store owners were really huffy about people who wouldn't buy anything... but really, she just didn't want to annoy the lady. On second thought though, she probably already was. Why did she even ask if it would be loitering to just hang around for no apparent reason? She basically just asked if she could do the definition of loitering. Wow. SMART MOVE. At least it wasn't illegal, right? Geez. She waited nervously for the woman's reply.

(Sorry for the late response! I didn't know you could subscribe to threads, and I must've missed the alert for your reply! I'm subbed now, so hopefully I'll catch it next time!)

Nora

The doorbell over her head rang and Nora flinched, again reminded why she was at the smalltown shop. Her gut twisted as she remembered her little sister, how much that head of orange curls just wanted a professionally made doll. With a held back 'I'm sorry' still on her tongue, she stepped through the door and was immersed in the rows and rows of dolls.

Most of them creepy, most of them were lifelike, most of them reminded her of Sienna.

She saw two people at the counter, both caught up in a short conversation that Nora honestly couldn't bring herself to listen to. She honestly couldn't even bring herself to care about the two people, either. Memories of the virus slowly waltzed to the front of her mind and she could only see walking corpses not yet infected.

There was a dog's whine and the pang in her heart grew even larger.

I'm doing this for Mom, she thought, reaching her gloved hands into her back pocket for a wallet. Nora had no idea how much these dolls cost, but she knew that she had always turned her little sister down. A four-year-old in a flower dress, just wanting a companion to play with; a five-year-old in ripped jeans and with a playful smirk, just wanting to impress all of her friends; a six-year-old in latex gloves, masks, and a hospital gown just wanting someone else to say goodbye to.

Nora scrunched up her face and moved forward to the front desk, trying to ignore the dolls that seemed to move in on her -- that was a year past her, she needed to move on. Even though she still made two cups of hot chocolate and two cups of coffee each morning, even though she still turned on the news and watched it religiously.

God, let me live through this.

"Hey, sorry to interrupt," she wasn't really sorry at all, "but do you have any dolls aimed at really little kids? I know that these are dolls, but they seem more like collectables. I need something that would survive wear and tear. My little sister had wanted a doll and--" Nora swallowed back the memories and laughed a little bit, trying to disguise her distress. "Anyway, really sorry to interrupt."

Raven

Clearly, she hadn't of known what she was walking into when her little brother had said he wanted a doll. Of course, Raven said yes.

Raven strolled into the small doll store. A little bell rang over her head and she cringed. The sounds of bells reminded her too fondly of high school. Those dreaded years... She was met by hundreds of dolls, staring puzzled at her.

Expecting some store clerk to welcome her, she got nothing. Hmmph. She began down the isles, looking for the perfect doll for Aiden, who sat at home just waiting for Raven that would hold his new companion. His new friend.

Dolls were never Raven's fancy. She found them creepy in general, and now seeing these dolls, it was even creepier. She heard the bell a few times more and each time, her stomach flipped. Why am I doing this?

"Because you love your brother." some girl met eye to eye with Raven and she paused.

Did I say that outlou-- Wait.

"How did you know I was here for my brother?" Raven narrowed her eyes.

-

Caden

Caden stumbled through the door blindly to the tinkling of a bell. The sunlight had been way too bright for his sensitive eyes. He blinked in the sudden dimness, spotting the small group of people lingering about the store. Somewhere to his right, there was a growl. Caden glanced towards it, eyes narrowed, and found a dog. He let a growl bubble up and watched the dog as it reacted--with a high-pitched whine that was sure to give him a headache to rival the one brought on by the sun. As it was, it set his teeth on edge.

He ground them together and turned to survey the little shop he'd wandered into. It would serve him right for going out at high noon when he knew better than to do that. Rows and rows of dolls met his gaze. He blinked at them, finding their frozen faces just a little creepy--and normally, he didn't get the creeps.

Caden grunted and moved further into the shop, avoiding the three young girls loitering about. He'd never seen this kind of store in the city before, and most definitely not in the foot malls in the middle of the city. What kind of trouble had he wandered into now? In all his years of existence, this was a new one. He turned to face the young woman behind the counter.

Nicolette

Another grey, dull day on Jasper Row, and all of a sudden she had four customers.

"Please, look around," Nicolette said to the first girl just as she turned to the second, who looked considerably younger than most of her consumer base; she couldn't imagine the second girl had much in life experience behind her. Death, disease, destruction... But people hid things well.

She leaned on the counter and took a long look around the shop. Porcelains, woods, even the rare doll with a sheen of metal on its face, these were the things she made. "For small children?" she asked. She had never made anything for a child; Mssr. DeMasque had never made anything for a child. But it couldn't be too difficult, could it? "I...don't think I have anything in stock, I'm sorry. If you would give me an order—" Nicolette slid open the drawer beneath the counter, then slammed it shut again.

Where were those damned order forms? "I'm sorry," she said shortly to the girl, "please just write down the specifications of what you want the doll to be. Er, size, weight, material, appearance. We can discuss price when I have that information."

Customer number two dealt with. Two more to go.

First, an odd girl who wandered in muttering to herself, something about her brother and why she was doing this. Nicolette rolled her eyes; the mumbling ones were never good news. "Because you love your brother," she said matter-of-factly, tucking a strand of blonde hair behind her ear to hide the worn joint at her jaw. Mssr. DeMasque had done a good job when he first made her, but centuries had worn her thin—especially centuries of dipping in and out of different worlds.

"Everyone is here for something," she said when the girl challenged her. "Now, what is it you need?" She met the fourth customer's eyes as well, making it clear that the question was directed to him, too. These two were a mystery as of yet.

Nicolette didn't tolerate mysteries in her shop. They were solved, or they were thrown out into their timeline again.

[[Sorry for the late reply! Also, @Eternity, please don't control other characters without their permission c: I know that I, myself, and the other players in this thread would like autonomy.]]

Melanie

Melanie clutched her doll to her chest, and entered.

"I need help with my doll please."

Amy

Oh. Geez. This place got very busy very fast, and surprisingly, most of the new actual customers, were female, or something like that. Lots of girls presumably around her age or younger, apart from some dude who seemed to have a major case of the grumps.

There was also a dog. Oh thank the Lord, there was a DOG! Slowly, trying not to too obviously run over to the dog in excitement (in an effort to not look like a five year old), she approached it from the side, and knelt down beside it.

"Hey there, little buddy," she mumbled, petting its head and scratching around it's ears. "I guess you've grown pretty used to the dolls here..." She continued, speaking softly.

The dog let itself be pet, but she could sense it was uncomfortable - which was made clear when it began to whimper.

"...but maybe not so used to people? Oh, well. Sorry, bud." She gave him two quick pats on the head, deciding to leave him alone. She didn't take pleasure in scaring poor little dogs.

Just as she stood up, about to leave, another girl came in This time, with a doll already in hand. Ok. Maybe I should just leave now.

She took another look around the room, glanced at the dog, at the lady at the counter, then at the door. It looked like that lady at the counter had enough people to deal with without her there.