fandomhigh | Practical Crisis Problem Solving - The Park, Tuesday, Period 3 (11am-12pm)

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Practical Crisis Problem Solving - The Park, Tuesday, Period 3 (11am-12pm)

Anyone who went to the Danger Shop would have found a note on the door saying 'The playground is a nice place today. -The Doctor.'

Sure enough, if they were to run their way into town to the playground in the park, they would find the Doctor swinging back and forth on the swings, legs stretched out in front of him. He waited a proper amount of time to give everyone a chance to arrive before he started to talk. There were free swings if anyone wanted to join in.

"I had this wonderful idea about using the Danger Shop and some fast talking into trick you into being confused about whether or not Fandom was real and whether you were all actually students at a dull and boring boarding school in New Hampshire. That would be morally questionable considering you're technically children in this state and year and I wouldn't be able to reverse what I was going to do with the Danger Shop...and it's a bit mean. Instead we're going to talk about it."

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Like you're stuck in a dull and boring boarding school in New Hampshire.

Didi

Peter Bishop

Rosalind

Prince Alexander of Daventry

Makita

Ben Skywalker

Helen Haras-Uquara

Jason Todd

Alex Russo

Parker

Shane Gooseman

Squire James

Dru Anderson

Madison Avery

Clark Kent

Jenny Sparks

Diana Hansen

If you're late, well, that's to be expected.

The Doctor continued to swing and he wasn't giving his swing up, though there were others. "I don't care if you swing or slide or play on the monkey bars." If there were monkey bars. You could always imagine them if there weren't. "But I want you to talk about this: you keep falling asleep. When you wake up in one place, let's say Fandom, it feels perfectly real. Then you inexplicably fall asleep again and you're back in the boarding school in New Hampshire, no special abilities you can access, no one else in the world except you all - as a group - who believe a word you say about this mystical island that doesn't seem to exist where impossible things happen.

Back and forth, back and forth, falling asleep one place, waking up in the other and then vice versa. One is reality and one is the dream world. Both seem like reality when you're there and when you're in one place, the other seems like a dream. The only way to make it stop - and there's a mysterious man, me in this case, telling you so - you have to die in the dream world and you have to do it soon or, no matter which world is real, you'll die anyway. How do you choose? There's nothing to tell you the right or wrong answer. You simply have to choose, have to make the impossible decision. Probably best you make up your minds as a group so no one unnecessarily dies. How would you choose between two equally realistic worlds with nothing logical to sway you one way or the other? Since you're all in this together, and you don't want anyone to die unnecessarily by choosing the other world, I want you to talk to each other as well as me. How would you decide and persuade others that your choice is the one to go by?"

Peter frowned a bit. "It's a 50-50 shot of death," he said. "I think if there's no way to decide, you flip a coin and hope the odds are in your favor."

"You'd be happy leaving your fate to a flip of a coin?"

"Better than leaving my fate to indecision," Peter said. "You know what, though? Why are we going to die no matter what? What sort of imminent peril are we in, exactly?"

"That's a good question," the Doctor said with a small smile. "I like that question. There doesn't seem to be anything happening in either world that would indicate you're in immediate danger. Or there is immediate danger in both worlds, suddenly introduced to get you to make a decision promptly." He waited to see what Peter would do with the new information.

"Then the island's real," Peter said. "Because there's no mortal peril that makes sense in a boring boarding school scenario."

Didi sat on a swing and pumped her legs idly as she thought. "I think I'd try to convince people the island was real and we had to die in New Hampshire," she said. "I understand it would be confusing, but the real world's a pretty bizarre place. I wouldn't trust a world that wasn't strange at all."

"I would probably try to convince people the island is real too," Jason said. "If only because I wouldn't want a boring world in New Hampshire of all places to be the real one. Do you think...maybe if we all agreed, we could make the island be the real one?"

"I don't know," Didi admitted. "I think what you believe changes the world, yeah. I don't know if this situation works that way. But I'd rather try and fail then just give up."

"Yeah, just waiting to die definitely isn't an option," Jason agreed. "I'd rather make the wrong choice."

"Why does it need to stop at all?" Ben asked, frowning. "Couldn't it be like commuting between two different places?"

"Because if you don't choose, you'll die no matter what. Puts a bit of a time frame on forcing you to choose. Unfortunate, but no more than forced narcolepsy for the rest of your life."

"I had that last year," Ben said, still frowning. "It was annoying."

Yes, Ben. A good way to describe a world where vampires ruled. "Annoying."

"I'm not particularly fond of it myself," the Doctor admitted. "Impossible choices, especially ones with a time limit, are annoying. Sometimes they have to be made. They go against everything that makes you you, the logic, the ability to analyse your surroundings and make a decision about what to do next, whether it's sensible or reckless. Annoying," he agreed.

"But that's this entire class, isn't it?" Ben replied with a wry smile.

The Doctor returned the smile. "And life, more often than not, but you know that."

"Oh, my family doesn't believe in impossible scenarios," Ben said, grinning.

"Good. Good approach. Only way to deal with such circumstances."

James scowled. "How do we know there isn't a third option that we don't remember?" he pondered.

"You don't. But there's not much time to work out if there is a third option," he said, checking his watch, "so you'd best get on that or make up your mind."

"This is just odd. Did something happen right before this? Any sign of a portal or rift?" James asked, trying to remember quirks about magic. "Anything glow before?"

"Nothing of the sort. Nothing to suggest that one world is real and the other is not. Nothing to suggest that you're in the wrong place when you're there. Today isn't about finding a way out. It's about making a choice you don't want to have to make with no suggestion of which option is better than the other."

"Then if I have to choose between a stodgy boarding school filled with overprivileged sots and one with magic, I pick magic," he said. It was more familiar to the lad.

"Why magic?"

"Why not?" James said with a shrug.

"Things happening with no explanation, things beyond your wildest imagination. It's all a bit hard to believe, isn't it? Why is that more real than a place without it?"

"Because that's home," he pointed out. "Magic makes sense."

Who hadn't given up hope of finding his TAs, and also wasn't giving up his swing. Get your own swing.

The Doctor is happy to answer any questions you might have, but he's not going to be very helpful by shedding any light on what might be the right answer, if there even is one (there's not, other than not dying, that's why it's an impossible choice). I'm sure you're all shocked by this.

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Practical Crisis Problem Solving - The Park, Tuesday, Period 3 (11am-12pm)

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OOC