The Boring city hall was packed to the rafters with concerned citizens, both anomalous and not, all of them clamoring with opinions.
"I have a daughter who goes to Deer, can she get through the barricade to come home tonight?"
"I work in Portlands, will I still be able to make Ways in and out of the city?"
"My grandchild was supposed to visit me next weekend, does this mean I can't pick xem up at PDX on Tuesday?"
"None of this would have happened if those idiots over in Baker City hadn't voted for Crenshaw!"
"Don't bring politics into this!"
"This is inherently political, you idiot!"
"I was supposed to make a delivery to Site-64 on Monday…"
"Order!"
A short, balding man with a mustache hammered away at a podium with a gavel. He wiped sweat off his olive skin, realizing that this wasn't going to work. Despite it being the dead of winter, the number of people in the building had rendered the outside cold null. It didn't help that the stress of the situation had the mayor sweating bullets as it was. He sighed, reaching into the shelf underneath the podium to grab a microphone, which squealed to life.
"Order! Quiet! Please!"
The crowd more or less settled down at the screeching of the microphone, and those who could took a seat while everyone else got comfortable.
"Thank you," Mayor Lobban croaked. "Now, this city council meeting will begin. Mr. Lucas, will you kindly begin roll call?"
"With all due respect, Mr. Mayor, I don't think now is the time for standard procedure." Faeowynn Wilson spoke up from the front row of seats, holding her cane on the ground in front of her. "This is an emergency. Can you treat it as such?" Though she was a woman of 62 years of age, she was still in good shape, save for the bum leg she had developed recently.
The gathered civilians all broke out into chaos again, demanding action from the mayor. Mayor Lobban glared daggers at her, then looked to his constituency in disdain. He took off his coat, deciding to abandon it in favor of showing his sweat-stained button-up underneath, then undid his tie and tossed it aside.
"Fine, Miss Wilson. Let's get down to brass tacks. You all know why we're here. Letting this disease into our city would be a disaster. We have too many thaumaturges and alchemists, Deer students, Vanguard employees, not to mention all the animals in the Center, to allow for this to enter our little Nexus. No way in hell. It would be a disaster."
"Mr. Mayor, Aster Rosa. Student reporter for the Deer Odyssey. Didn't you back President Crenshaw's 2048 campaign?" A young woman with cervine features spoke up, holding her phone up to record. "Isn't this what you wanted, despite being the mayor of a Nexus which primarily profits in the summer months from tourists coming to see the Wilson Center?"
Mayor Lobban opened his mouth to respond, but quickly shut it.
"Don't bring politics into this, this is a bipartisan issue," the ghost of old man Thomas Barlow snapped at the young woman, adjusting his glasses on his face. The crowd began murmuring amongst itself, slowly climbing in volume.
"This is inherently political! This is a man-made disease mean to target anomalous peo—" Aster was interrupted by Mayor Lobban shouting into the microphone.
"Order!"
Despite not agreeing with it, Aster decided to put her phone away for now.
"My political inclinations are not of importance right now. We need to figure out what we're going to do about stopping this disease from impacting our community. I have ordered police chief Oscar to barricade the roads in and out of Boring and turn away anyone coming into town—"
Chaos again.
"I do groceries in Gresham because they have a Whole Foods! Are you saying I can't do that anymore?"
"But my Darryl works in Portlands! He needs to come home tonight!"
"There's a Whole Foods down by Sandy…"
"ORDER!" Mayor Lobban screamed into the microphone, though this did not seem to work. He repeated the word a few times, but it did not inspire confidence in the crowd, who continued yelling and shouting at him.
Faeowynn slowly got up and made her way up to the podium even slower, making sure not to miscalculate a step as she was still getting used to her cane. She climbed the steps up to the small stage and approached Mayor Lobban, who was too busy demanding order to notice her. Once at his side, she tapped him with her cane and quickly snatched the microphone away from him.
"Hello folks. Faeowynn here. From the Wilson Center," she spoke calmly, but with authority.
Some of the people in attendance quieted down, a sentiment which spread as she continued speaking.
"Ever since the news of this disease and its effects broke, I have been going to the Library and pouring over tomes for weeks. Many of you remember the Impasse many years ago. Some of you may remember what I did then to protect the animals in my care, as well as the town of Boring. All you need to know is that I would be willing to do it again, however, I cannot. That is why I sought the help of the Librar—"
Mayor Lobban tried to snatch the microphone from her, but Faeowynn being taller, simply held it out of his reach until he stopped jumping.
"Faeowynn have you lost your mind?! I'm an elected official, the people are looking to me for guidance, I can't have a glorified zookeeper usurp me!" He shout-whispered at her.
She turned off the microphone for a moment.
"If there's one thing I've learned about politicians during my life, its that they don't know what they're doing. Now please, let me finish then you may have the microphone again."
He grumbled and stormed off, picking up his coat and tie as he walked away. Fae turned the microphone on again.
"As I was saying, I sought the help of the Library. It was there that I learned of a spell which could make our community safe from this virus. But, and there is a very big but here, it would completely cut us off from the rest of the world. Irreversibly so. Is anyone here familiar with Alagadda?"
A few people raised their hands, mostly Deer students and fellow Hand members. Faeowynn sighed.
"It's okay, I didn't know what it was until recently either. In the simplest of terms, Alagadda is a sub-reality which has been sealed away at a pataphysical level. If you're confused, don't worry. This is all pretty weird stuff, especially for us folks who mostly just deal with unusual critters."
For the first time that night, there was some levity in the crowd as a few of the gathered chuckled.
"I'm not going to sugarcoat it, folks. Living in the Alagadda sub-reality would be its own set of problems. But we have faced such problems together as a community before. When my father faced down that polar bear. When those dinosaurs were rampaging in the barns. During the Impasse. We can do it if we stick together."
There were some whispers among those in the crowd.
"But anyway, there exists a spell which can transport us to this sub-reality. But as I said, its a one way ticket. And I can't cast such a powerful spell. It would require the help of someone you might be familiar with, seeing as she's the archdirector of ICSUT, Xenia Duforf. She is one of the strongest thaumaturges on earth right now, and she has already agreed to help."
There were some slight murmurs in the crowd, some of the Deer students disapproving of the help of an ICSUT thaumaturge, some of the older folks who were more concerned with going somewhere else. One voice stood out, asking "But what if we don't want to go into a sub-reality?"
Faeowynn smiled at the man who asked it, Andrew O'Brien. She shook her head and bit her lip for a moment.
"It won't be easy. Vanguard have offered to assist in relocating those who don't want to join us in this exit."
"Who is we?" Asked Aster Rose, speaking up for the first time in a while.
"All of the staff at Wilson's Wildlife Solutions have agreed to go. Volunteers are not being forced, but if you would like to come, you are welcome to."
"But how do you know if the disease will spread to the animals?" The ghost of Thomas Barlow chided.
"We know the virus is highly infectious and airborne. We don't know how capable it is of mutating into something that will affect them. This disease has caused the biggest die-off of anomalous beings since the Impasse. I'm sure that you as a ghost don't care because its probably unlikely for it to be possible to affect you, but what about your grandson? Isn't he a necromancer, Mr. Barlow?" Faeowynn was not having it from him. In life this man had been antagonistic, and becoming immortal had only made him worse.
"Anyway, we don't have a lot of time to act. Ms. Duforf agreed to cast the spell on all of Boring next Friday. Its winter, so the Center isn't getting any tourists and most of you aren't traveling anyway. So it's highly unlikely that the virus is within the community already. That being said, I spoke to Vanguard about checking everyone who wants to come for the virus, so we can be sure that no one will have it once we all leave."
Mayor Lobban charged Faeowynn, taking the microphone from her. "Folks, this is crazy. All this from a zookeeper?" He laughed nervously, shoving Fae off the podium and nearly causing her to fall. Fortunately, she was caught by her husband, Alex, who helped her steady herself.
The crowd became audibly upset at the sight of Lobban shoving Faeowynn. Despite having won the recent mayoral election by a couple hundred votes, he was acting with the confidence of someone who had won in a landslide. And of course, no one likes seeing a man push an old woman with a cane. The boos erupted from the crowd, causing Mayor Lobban to cow. He looked over to Faeowynn and hung his head.
She approached, clearly irate with him and snatched the microphone.
"The stakes haven't been higher. Not for 20 years. It's now or never." Faeowynn spoke gravely. "If you wish to leave, please phone the Boring Vanguard line and inform them of your decision. They will rehome you to the best of their ability. If you want to stay, well, get ready. This is it."