Shockingly enough, the rooms the girls were staying in were rather normal, despite the warped appearance of the rest of the indoors wellspring. They each were comprised of a small kitchenette with a boilerplate, dishwasher, fridge, and sink (all black where appropriate); a ‘living room’ consisting of a pull-out couch and a TV; a ‘bedroom’ with a king sized bed with all black sheets; and a rather large bathroom. A window next to the bed in each room gave the girls a gorgeous view of London (although not an entirely unique view, with Dahlia’s and Paxton’s rooms seeming to occupy the same spot in the building from the outside).
No plans had been outright made for breakfast, but PA’s had swung around to each of the girls room instructing them to get to the bar portion of E’s at around 8:30. When they arrived, they found a rather interesting site. Drake was seated at one of the cocktail tables with a fiery-haired woman who was holding a small baby in her arms. Drake seemed to not notice the girls, as he wiggled his finger in front of the baby’s face, eliciting some giggles. “You know, I’ve been told I’m excellent with kids,” Drake grinned.
“Well, Grace certainly seems to like you,” the woman smiled, as she slowly rocked her baby back and forth. Drake, seeing that Grace was getting tired of his finger, moved on to making silly faces, sticking his tongue out and causing her to smile and give out a little squeal of joy.
As the girls approached their table, Drake continued his routine, making silly faces and noises for the innocent baby, until the woman pointed out, “I believe we have some company.” Drake turned around, blushing profusely as he clambered to his feet.
He coughed, trying his best to redeem his air of professionalism, his voice cracking as he said, “Ah! Girls,” He coughed, clearing his throat and trying to lower his voice a couple of octaves, “I… Uh… Didn’t see you there… Oh! Uh! L-Let me introduce to all of you-“
He was interrupted, as the woman stood up, “Oh Drake, there’s no need, I’m more than capable of introducing myself,” she made a gesture to show that she was going to pass Grace off to him, to which he nervously accepted almost completely freezing up as he cradled Grace in his arms. Grace, for her part, almost immediately grabbed at his nose with her little hand, giggling as she tried to pull it to and fro.
The woman walked towards the girls calmly and with a professional grace to it all. As soon as Natalie realized who she was, she quickly got down on one knee ducking her head and arousing confusion from the rest of the contestants. The woman smiled at this, nodding approvingly at Natalie’s little display before continuing, “Hello contestants. For those of you who may not know me, I am the Wife of the Keeper of London, so please feel free to call me ‘Your Majesty’, ‘Your Highness’, or if those are too formal for you, Sarah will do fine as well,” she gave the contestants a little wink, her position still clearly going over most of their heads as she continued.
“I’m dreadfully sorry that Stu couldn’t be here to greet you properly, especially seeing as how he was generous enough to offer E’s as lodging for you all. I’m afraid he’s busy all week with WMO meetings,” she waved her hand dismissively. In the background of the shot, Drake had softened up considerably, rocking Grace back and forth a little bit, the baby girl squealing with excitement, “Rest assured, if there’s anything that you girls need, whether it be lodging related or official London business, I’m here to help.” Her words seemed genuine, despite her cheshire cat like grin suggesting otherwise.
Natalie stood up as Sarah went back to Drake, Grace grabbing towards her mom as Drake handed her back with a thankful look in his eyes. He cleared his throat once more. “Ahem… Yes. Girls! We’ve got an exciting day planned for you all. Lisa will be coming over in an hour to take us on a small tour around London, and then you all will have the afternoon free to start mentally preparing yourself for tomorrow’s midweek challenge. I’ve heard it’s going to be rather different and exciting.”
“Oh! That reminds me, Drake,” Sarah smiled mischievously, “Lisa asked me to tell you that she wanted to speak with you in private… Something about not being happy with something that made it in to yesterday’s episode?”
Drake noticeably paled as Sarah said this, “I’m sure she would,” He did his best to smile, but his clammy appearance made it quite clear that he was absolutely terrified of what was to come, “I’m sure we’ll find some time later to discuss it… A-Anyways girls… Just make sure you’re back here in an hour,” He nodded, before heading towards the far wall, being whisked away.
Sarah smiled another cheshire grin, shaking her head, “And without even offering to feed you poor girls,” She looked towards the girls, “Would anyone be interested in a proper English breakfast?” She nodded her head to one of the cocktail tables that still had a ‘Reserved for ANGA’ plaque on it, a large silver, covered serving tray sitting patiently.
The girls enjoyed breakfast with Sarah, Natalie breaking apart early in order to get to a rehearsal she had scheduled with Martin, while the other girls talked with Sarah for a bit longer until Lisa arrived.
~~~
Natalie’s Rehearsal
“Are you sure you want to rehearse today Natalie,” Martin smiled as his assistant entered the practice room at E’s.
The practice room was by far the most well stock of the season thus far, with a large variety of big box illusions and various accoutrements laying around. There was a large mirror that took up one of the walls, and by the door, a sign up sheet clearly displaying that ANGA would not be the only group making use of this practice room during the week.
“Oh sure! I’ve already been around London loads of times,” Natalie smiled, as she giddily eyed over the props, making some notes in a journal of hers of the graffiti that had slowly accumulated over the years of usage. Things like initials carved into the wood, or particularly nasty dents, or where the paint was peeling away. “I’d probably just get in the way of whatever Lisa had to say…”
“Hey now,” Martin said, placing a hand affirmatively on her shoulder, causing her to look up at him, “Don’t sell yourself short like that, Natalie. It’s always a good thing to be passionate about something. Even if it seems others aren’t as interested.”
Natalie sighed, “I’m just so excited! I mean, I know I’ve already met so many famous people. But the Samhein Girl? The Keeper of London? They’re practically the stuff of legends at this point!” Natalie could barely contain herself, “Did you know we were going to be dealing with such a high magic pedigree?”
Martin smiled, “Natalie… I know that you consider them legends, but just like with all of the other talented performers you’ve met, there’s still just regular people behind those performers.” Martin nodded his head, his words almost as much for himself as they were for his assistant.
Natalie sighed, “I guess so… But it doesn’t really help my brain not shut off when I see them though,”
“Just take it one step at a time,” Martin smiled, “try just asking them some simple ice breakers, and see if that gets you talking from there.”
After their discussion, Martin and Natalie got to work with practicing, running through some of the warm-ups they had developed for her. “So… Let me take a stab at what you want to perform for this week,” Martin said before they moved on to the next part of their rehearsal.
“I’m sure you’ll be able to get it,” Natalie smiled, a thin gleam of sweat on her.
“Assistant’s Revenge?” From Natalie’s nod, Martin gave another one of his award winning smiles to his assistant.
“Well, a new variation on it,” Natalie smiled right back, “but ultimately the same spirit I suppose,”
The rest of the rehearsal went smoothly, and Natalie found herself set free around lunchtime.
~~~
London Tour
Lisa had arrived in casual street clothes to help lead the girls on their tour through London, leading her four guests (Julia and Dawn having decided to use this as an opportunity for a little date away from being Dahlia) out of E’s and onto the streets of London. Once again, it was another cloudy, hot day in London, and unfortunately for the girls, they seemed to only be able to make it two streets over from Mister E’s before their tour came to a grinding stop.
“Hey Lise!” A perky voice shouted out as an auburn haired woman approached the crew, seemingly oblivious to everyone except Lisa. She was wearing jeans and a rather tight fitting t-shirt. With the amount of make-up and attention that clearly went into her hair, she almost looked like a movie star.
Lisa, for her part, just groaned, “Carrie, I thought I told you not to bother me while I’m on the clock.”
“Oh! Are you filming right now?” Carrie plumped her hair, doing her best to try and slowly swivel her head so that she was looking at wherever she suspected the camera to be, “I had no idea sis. Honest! I was just on my way to E’s to see if Mark wanted to practice…”
“Mhm,” Lisa nodded, raising one of her eyebrows, “And that’s why you’re approaching from the completely wrong side?”
Carrie sighed, “You’re no fun. You know that sis? Alright. So I wanted to come see the contestants, is that so bad? Speaking of are they here with you? Girls!” Carrie started addressing the open air, “You don’t have to worry about me! I’m Lisa’s sister, Carrie! Feel free to add me to your magic whitelist or whatever so we can talk!”
Lisa held up her hand to the girls, clearly telling them to hold off for a second, “Carrie. I’m trying to give them a tour right now. You can meet them all later.”
Carrie sighed, rolling her eyes dramatically, “Come on Lise. Let me be part of the tour! I bet you’re planning on just taking them to the same old boring spots like Big Ben and the London Eye.”
Lisa blushed, her tone rising, “It’s not a concern of yours where exactly I’m taking them on this tour. This is official ISAG business, Carrie!”
“But come on!” Carrie whined, “You could be taking them to all the coolest magic haunts in London. I’m sure they’d get a kick out of-“
“Carrie!”
Lisa pulled Carrie aside, her audio still being barely picked up on the microphone, the contained fury clearly evident in her voice, “We are trying to give our guests a good impression of magic in London. Not scare away the major US TV studio that could potentially help support our efforts to launch an ISAG branch!”
“Oh come on, Lise, have a bit more faith in me,” Carrie practically whisper yelled back, “I wasn’t going to take them any place too extreme… Maybe point them towards The London Underground if they really asked,” Carrie’s tone was clearly joking in nature, but from the way Lisa bristled, it was clear she wasn’t amused.
“Carrie,” Lisa sounded tired with her sister, “I’m just trying to not screw this up. There’s a lot running on making sure this week goes well.”
“I know,” Carrie hugged her older sister, “but remember. It’s a magic themed show. Those old monuments will be fine, but a couple of magic stops here or there isn’t going to hurt anybody.”
Lisa and Carrie remained huddled for a few minutes longer, this time their whispering actually too quiet to pick up on the microphone. Eventually though, Lisa approached them once more, smiling as she said, “I hope you girls don’t mind, but Carrie will actually be joining us on our tour today.”
The contestants smiled as they came into Carrie’s field of view, introducing themselves to her. When she met Dawn and Julia, Carrie smiled, whispering to Dawn, “Let’s talk later…” She winked, as she covertly stretched out the elastic waistband of her panties, a whimpering sound being heard as the band snapped back into place. Dawn grinned, giving Julia’s hand a small squeeze as the poor redhead looked at the two of them in a worried confusion.
From that point onwards, thankfully, the tour went off without a hitch. Lisa and Carrie did an excellent job showing off the major sites, such as the Tower of London, St. Paul’s Cathedral, the London Eye, Big Ben, Buckingham Palace, Piccadilly Square, the whole works. Thankfully, between the two of them, they were able to recount many interesting tidbits about each location, and even managed to answer a few of the questions that were asked of their small tour group. Carrie had also managed to convince her sister to show off a couple of the more magical tourist destinations as well, such as Covent Garden, one of the few locations in all of London where magic performances were allowed in public, and a nightclub that seemed to give off similar, yet different vibes to Mister E’s with the single word moniker: Faustus.
Soon enough though, Lunchtime rolled around, and after checking that they would be able to figure out their own ways back to E’s, Lisa and Carrie left the girls to their own devices.
~~~
Various Places Across London
With their afternoon’s free, each of the girls seemed to go their separate ways for how they chose to spend their first proper day there.
Kacie managed to convince Paxton to go with her to a record store she had spotted along the tour route they had taken. The entire way, Kacie was absolutely gushing about music. “There’s just so much great music that came out from the UK! The Beatles, The Stones, The Who, Pink Floyd, King Crimson, Queen, Elton John, David Bowie! If it wasn’t for the British Invasion, the music scene would be so vastly different that it’d be completely unrecognizable!”
Paxton smiled, “He he. You’re starting to sound like Natalie now,”
Kacie grinned right back, “I’m afraid my knowledge of UK culture mostly boils down to the music side of things. You’d be amazed at how well most music is documented nowadays though.” While they were there, Kacie had to do her absolute best to not want to purchase most of the store’s inventory in a single trip, while Paxton struggled to find any music that really seemed to call out to her. Mostly because half of the records on the shelves she had never really heard of before, and the process of trying to look up a song and listen to it off her cellphone was a rather time consuming process.
Natalie, ever the bookworm, had gone off to the London Library in order to try and find the archived pieces from the last Magical Dark Age. Unfortunately for her, tho9se pieces were not accessible to the public, but she was still able to find some books with second hand accounts of people who had read the documents, grabbing a few of them from the shelves and settling down for a relaxing afternoon of reading.
Dawn and Julia had been content to just sort of walk around London soaking in the sites. Without any real external pressure placed onto her, Julia seemed perfectly content and happy wherever she was with Dawn by her side. If other people got too close, or they entered a busy intersection, her mood seemed to visibly sour, but a short hand squeeze here or a small hug there would seem to help ease the nervous girl’s mind.
Eventually, everyone made their way back to E’s, going to bed after a rather short dinner service (once again provided courteously via an enchanted silver serving tray) in order to preserve their strength for the midweek challenge coming up the following day.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
& Question Corner &
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
To David: “Oh I can sympathize with you. I remember when my son David hit the terrible twos, and the next year I had double trouble Genie and James reach that age as well.
Of Course Amanda can come and have a holiday, she’ll have a blast I'm sure. Maybe after the afterparty you can join us.” -Jacob Schutter (@@James-MacCloude)
David: “It would be my honor to come and visit Mageria, Jake. Amanda’s completely on board for the visit as well, just as long as she knows there’ll be someone to watch little Isabella for a bit. I keep telling her that Jill is more than capable enough as a babysitter, but it seems that she likes Jill too much to have her do that favor for us.”
To Olive: “I can understand that, you and Henry have a good time on your tour, we can make arrangements for a more relaxed visit after your cruise.” -Jacob Schutter (@@James-MacCloude)
Olive: Olive smiled, “Why thank you Jake! I’m certain that me and Henry are going to have a great time on our cruise. I know I’ll have a great time getting to perform again in front of an audience. I’m certain Mageria will be just as beautiful as the first time I came to visit when I get to go again.”
To the Girls: “OOH England! I always feel at home when I visit there. And some of my favorite authors were English. J. R. R. Tolkien, and C. S. Lewis among them. And I loved the sword fight when the guests Peter and Lisa were introduced. I'm an accomplished swordsman myself and often spar with my brothers.” -Genie Schutter (@@James-MacCloude)
Dahlia: “It’ll be a grand time. From what little I’ve seen, I can already tell it will be fun.”
Natalie: “He he. It seems to be a bit of a theme with Peter and Lisa’s performances to go with something related to Star Wars whenever they’ve done a public show. I’m sure they’ve probably practiced for hundreds of hours just to make it seem as effortless as it came out.”
Paxton: “England certainly is a wonderful place. Although I hope the sky clears up. It was cloudy all day today and yesterday!”
Kacie: “And don’t forget the music! So much great music has come out over the years from the UK!”
To Paxton: “I'm so happy you made to the next round, and what a tough challenge though, Don’t be intimidated by it, I know you can do you it. Hugs and kisses to you.” -James Schutter (@@James-MacCloude)
Paxton: Paxton blushes, “T-Thanks James… I’ll try to do good… For you!~” she blushes even further, hiding her face from the camera.
To Natalie: “England is a very large and wondrous country, with lots of history. I'm sure you'll enjoy yourself.” -Jenny Schutter (@@James-MacCloude)
Natalie: “Oh! I’m having an absolute blast! I’ve visited the UK a couple of times before with my parents, but being here on my own is so exciting!