villagelogs | 012-014 » even the air itself was grey

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012-014 » even the air itself was grey

WHO: Everyone.
WHERE: Eastern/Central Mathias.
WHEN: Days 012-014
WHAT: The weather is behaving strangely. Again.
WARNINGS: Will update as necessary. PM this account to have a warning added!
NOTES: Plotting post over here!

RECOMMENDED ♫ Michael Andrews "Liquid Spear Waltz"

DAYS 012-014
“The overcast skies had the colour of deadened stones, and seemed closer than usual, as though they were phlegmatically observing my every movement with their apathetic emptily blue-less eyes.”
—Simona Panova, “Nightmarish Sacrifice”

Rain has returned to Mathias. While those who remember the storms from nearly two weeks ago may fear reprisal of such tumultuous weather, this rain is far tamer. The cloudy grey skies let loose a steady drizzle that remains constant from start to finish, which is in itself, perhaps, a bit unusual. The patter of droplets against windows, small streams forming in the roads and on grass as the ground becomes saturated, all of it may seem normal to some, but a little too normal to others.

What is without question abnormal, however, is the sun. Though it cannot be seen distinctly behind the thick grey clouds, its light remains as constant as the rain throughout these three days. Hour after hour, regardless of the time of day, there is light in the sky. Unchanging, an inescapable reminder that Mathias is not home, and none who are brought here have any control over what will occur in this place.

NEW ARRIVALS
Once again, more unfortunate souls have been brought to Mathias by unknown means, deposited at the edge of the forest near the empty houses that tell of those who once lived in this strange little town. They may find themselves wandering through the trees until they encounter the strange fog that envelops the town, or stumbling upon the rotting remains of houses that have felt the passage of time more than others.

LOCATIONS
LIGHTHOUSE Residents will notice the lighthouse to the north of Mathias, situated on a cliff that is above the town level. Even the most observant individuals will not have noticed it before now, which might be quite unsettling to some. There is no path available to reach the lighthouse at this time, though residents are welcome to try — they will be blocked by fog in the forest and a sense of unease that becomes debilitating if they walk too far along the beach.

NO NEW LOCATIONS are available for exploration at this time. Residents are welcome to further explore available locations, including utilizing AP rewards at locations they may have previously explored.

CONDITIONS UPDATES

— CLOCKS continue to be unreliable. Some may keep irregular time at different rates, while others have ceased to work at all, each having stopped at a different time.

— VOICES are not openly haunting our residents, though they may still be occasionally encountered in the more heavily decayed buildings where some rooms seem to almost swallow whatever light tries to enter them.

— WEATHER conditions are both typical and atypical for late fall. Temperatures consist of chilly "sweater weather" days and nights that can dip below freezing — you don't want to be outside without a coat when the sun goes down. A constant light rain continues for all three days, only stopping on the night of the third day. And for all three days, there is constant cloudy grey sunlight, with the sun unable to be seen and tracked from behind the cloud cover. Darkness will return to Mathias on the third night when the rain stops.

— FOG continues to block the way of those wishing to travel further than the Town Hall, and all who venture into the forest will be met by its impenetrable wall after a few hundred yards. The fog will allow none to pass; those who try will find themselves overcome by fear and panic so intense, they can physically do nothing but flee back the way they came.

OOC UPDATES

— HOUSING LISTINGS now have a permanent home! A few of these may have been missed or information might have changed, so please do submit updates as needed, including if your character moves into a new location or if there are rooms still available at said location.

— NEW PLAYERS are still arriving with each new log, so make sure to keep an eye on our ooc intro post. (An easy way to do this is to track the post — click the bell icon, select More Options, and track when someone makes a new top-level.)

— INFORMATION may publicly be shared between characters at the bulletin board in the town hall. This is meant to be a permanent place for pieces of the Mathias puzzle to be shared and archived to both help information be shared ICly and to allow new players to easily dive into the mystery.

— THE CALENDAR has been updated through the end of the year. With the approaching holiday season, we will continue a lighter log schedule, but as always, players are welcome to create their own logs, conduct intensive investigators, and make more terrible decisions. (The mod is always happy to enable these shenanigans, never hesitate to reach out with ideas.)

QUESTIONS ABOUT THE LOG?

HOUSING DESIGN/EXPLORATION

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Returning with the bowl of water and first aid kits, Doc sets it down on the ground next to Malcolm. He takes another trip to bring the tall glasses of water over, setting them within reach but far enough not to be accidentally kicked over.

He recognises a non-answer when he hears one but he pretends he didn't overhear that, sitting down next to Raylan with a small sigh and reaching over to their hands, sliding his calloused palm beneath Raylan's and giving it a small tip to the right to signal he is taking over.

Doc expects the marshal to be better at getting answers out of people, so he will leave Raylan to do the talking. He'll just keep his head down and get to fixing, curling the tips of his fingers around the back of Malcolm's hand while his other hand pulls the paper towels away. For someone who's been through a hell of a lot, he can manage an uncharacteristically gentle touch as he dabs the blood away with a warm, wet cloth before popping the first aid kit open.

The counter had ticked up twice and once more as Raylan withdrew his hand and patted it on Doc's shoulder, rubbing in a passing manner as he pushed to his feet again. "We don't know what that is. Might make you feel better and give us both some context about what it is we're injectin' ourselves into."

Stepping away, Raylan grabbed the broom and started sweeping up the mess, plucking unbroken, unused glasses up out of it to set onto a counter. They'd all have to mind themselves and he probably needed to go get his boots on, but that didn't seem as important as it should have been.

"You said you see your father right? Was he there?"

Edited 2020-11-09 04:21 (UTC)

Had he said that? God he was out of it. Loose lips sinking ships and... oh right. His hallucinations in the lighthouse.

He looked up at Raylan, then at Henry, and then at Raylan again.

"My father is a famous serial killer," he finally admitted. "If you've heard of the Surgeon... Dr Martin Whitly is one of the most notorious murderers since Jack the Ripper. He's almost always in my nightmares," he explained, his eyes falling back to Doc's hands working on his so he wouldn't have to see how their faces reacted to that.

Between pulling the damp cloth away once the bleeding has stemmed to barely a droplet or two, dripping some iodine onto a cotton pad and dabbing at the cuts, Doc's heart doesn't skip a beat at that revelation, nor does he hold his breath or either of his hands falter. He doesn't even blink. Tilting his head to one side, he fetches some gauze to tape down over the cuts and wraps his work up with half of a brand new roll of bandages, mentally adding a trip back to the store to restock to his list of things to do for today.

He does not know of Jack the Ripper. The modern concept of a serial killer did not exist back in his time, though he has encountered many a twisted figure and can easily guess what a serial killer is, on top of Malcolm being one of those behavioural whatever he said he was, so a part of his lack of response could be attributed to that. More likely than not though, he's just wearing his tired old poker face.

Taking Malcolm's other hand, he turns it over to check for any cuts, and then he tugs up on the cuffs of those jeans to see if he might have stepped on any broken glass.

"My daddy is a petty shitkicker thief, among other things. If bad people didn't go out and have kids, half of us wouldn't be here." Both literally and.. well, literally, for the three men standing together in a strange world. Raylan kept sweeping, minding the tucked under edges of the cabinets and the reachable space under the front of the fridge itself, pushing the whole pile carefully up against the fall wall.

"Doesn't answer my question though." He looked over as he set the broom against the wall and opened up the fridge to start pulling out eggs and butter. "But if that's where you'd like to start the tale.. I'm sure Doc won't tell you that you need rest and to avoid it."

Was it a little bullish? Yes. Was Raylan particularly sorry about it? No - his head hurt too much and he felt like his head was going to spin him right down to the floor.

Doc.

Doc was still tugging gently at the rolled up cuffs of someone else's pants, now smeared with blood from his hand. His bandaged hand was shaking and the other wasn't much more steady when he propped his elbows on his knees and pressed the heels of his hands against his brow, rocking faintly forward and backward, trying to take deep breaths. He swallowed hard as he lifted his head, his hands both making fists against his knees.

"He's in prison," he told Raylan, his voice as shaky as his hand. "I called the police on him when I found her and now he's in prison. There are... there are variations on it, but he always ends up attacking me." He flexed his hands open, watching his fingers instead of their faces still, closing his hands into fists again. The movement hurt the injured hand but the acute pain of the cuts felt... kind of good compared to the constant throbbing ache of everything else. "Right before I came here, I stabbed him in the heart to save a woman's life. He was still alive when I saw him last, but I don't know if he survived. I knew the nightmares would get worse. He always said we were the same."

Yes Doc. Henry. Cowboy. Asshole. He goes by many names. At least he'd already disclosed to Malcolm he was a doctor last night even if they wound up talking about other things. Trust was important in a place with none.

Seems like they've all got their issues though. Doc doesn't want to talk about his father or his mother at this juncture. It's all ancient history anyway, much more ancient than these two gentlemen combined. When there doesn't look to be anything else that needs patching up, he offers Malcolm a warm, wet towel to wipe the blood off with. Looking around, left and right, Doc fetches some water that he'd poured earlier over and fixes his hat as he puts the glass down next to Malcolm.

He's actually going to grab the nearest almost-empty bottle of moonshine himself and he's not entertaining any comments as sits down opposite from Malcolm, cracks it open and drinks it straight out of the bottle, like water. Not once does he take his eyes off those trembling hands.

"Don't you think you need to be dealing with that instead of taking a half dozen meds I can't even pronounce?" Is the first time Doc jumps into what was previously their conversation. Says the guy drinking shine at fuck o'clock in the morning because he's too hung over for water. But he wasn't the one gone charging into a damn chair and ended up bleeding on someone else's clothes and floor.

Raylan had assumed that Doc had mentioned it to Malcolm, though he'd been careful the night before to mind the difference. Ah well. It wasn't like Raylan was really going to let Malcolm post up on his own and left to his own devices. He had no doubt the man was capable, but he was clearly off kilter and a kind of vulnerable that Raylan couldn't ignore.

And the way Doc hit that bottle, don't think Raylan didn't notice, he knew that food was going to be important. Don't expect to hold onto that bottle once he gets over there.

He could almost hear Malcolm's argument now, and spoke up before Malcolm could. "Unfortunately Doc, minds bein' what they are in the time, the meds are to help with the dealin'." He looked back at Malcolm. "Though since you ain't got 'em, you might have some hard mountains to climb ahead of ya. It'll take work but only you give your fears the permission to take total control." The mind was a troubling place, sometimes. Everyone coped differently, they were all a testament to that.

Malcolm looked from Doc and what was apparently his 'Dealing Bottle' to Raylan and his well meaning, less stern than a moment ago face.

"I've been in therapy since I was eleven and I have a degree in psychology from Harvard," he informed them. "I know exactly what my brain is doing. But that doesn't make it behave." In that, at least, there was a tiny bit of confidence underneath the still wounded exterior. He took a deep (if shaky) breath and looked back and forth between them again. "It gets me when I'm sleeping and when I'm... " His voice trailed off and he stared at what looked like an empty wall for a lone moment, then he said "It ambushes me in the moments when I don't have a choice. But it wasn't fair of me to bring it here. I knew better. I'm sorry. I won't..." He looked at his knees. "I won't dump it on your doorstep again."

All he had in his time was the bottle, opium and women. And he did plenty of all three. Probably for the best, since he would have self-medicated his way to a much earlier death.

Rubbing his finger over his bottom lip, staving away a smoke craving because he doesn't want to be going outside right now while Malcolm is still in this state and Raylan looks too tired to rightly be on his feet, Doc shrugs and sighs. He won't argue against the efficacy of things he does not understand.

"You said it yourself, Mister Bright. You did not choose this for yourself." Doc holds his bottle against his thigh, casual and possessive at the same time of his own coping mechanism. He has the luxury of cigarillos and shine. Malcolm does not.

"You did not choose your father or the sins he had committed, and you did not choose to come here. But the marshal gave you his doorstep. We are choosing to be here and help you. We are not leaving you another night on your own. So you just try getting out that door. I'll stop you before you can even get on the one knee."

"We just.. gotta adjust the plan a little, to accomodate what we know," Raylan added as he turned on the stovetop and cut a bit of butter into the pan. Needless to say, he agreed with Doc's assertions.

"No offence, but you shouldn't be alone." He glance at Doc for backup on that should Malcolm argue, half looking at him for reassurance that Raylan would be left to be the Good man on his own, though he would without word or arguement, if he had to.

"You're safer here. Next time, there won't be any glass involved."

Malcolm just looked at them each for a moment, then at his hand, then looked between them again.

"Why are you doing this?" he asked, genuinely curious. "Why do you... " His voice trailed off. "I'm a mess. A useless mess in this place. Literally and figuratively. There's nothing in it for you. I have nothing to offer but... disturbed sleep and... general disturbances."

The smell of melting butter gets a contented little sigh out of Doc. It's the first small pleasure he's had this morning and he is rather grateful for it.

"I have let many people down over the last two centuries, and many people have let me down in turn. It is a cruel fate, to be abandoned. I would not do it to anyone else." It would trouble him to knowingly let Malcolm be on his own when he is not yet able to look after himself. More so if something were to happen.

Swallowing the lump in his throat, Doc takes another pull from his bottle and sets it down back on his lap.

"Raylan and I have sins to be atoning for. Let us." He shoots a look back at Raylan and cracks the smallest, easiest to miss of smiles before he breaks eye contact, averting his gaze. God, what time is it even? Too fucking early to be bargaining with troubled men.

Raylan would wait to be prompted again to answer, finding what came to mind unsatisfactory and impolite at best and generally satisfied with the way Doc had classified everything. No, he had more important things to focus on like cracking a good 9 eggs into the pan, scrambling them with a quickly fetched fork. If Doc ate like he did, two was nothing more than a snack and there were plans for toast.

He'd let Malcolm ruminate on Doc's words, stepping away from his low cooking eggs to draw over the coffee grounds and the pot near the sink. He'd had a few days to shuffle through the cabinets; he knew where things were. He'd have to steal some bacon from the Gull and see if it would self replicate it in their fridge. Maybe it was a bit head in the sand to be focusing on food, but there were other things the lot of them needed beyond talking about Malcolm's feelings or anyone else's.

"Alls that matters is that you're gonna be stickin' with us for a bit." However long a bit was. "And I hope you like eggs."

“I might be able to stomach a little bit of eggs,” Malcolm told him in a soft, almost chastened voice. “But if I can’t, it’s not your fault; I can’t stomach most food when my chemicals aren’t all out of whack. I haven’t eaten more than tea, water and a bit of juice since I got here,” he confessed, scrubbing his unbandaged and slightly steadier hand over his face. Which probably wasn’t helping his body cope with everything. If he could get some eggs in him, it would certainly be for the best. Better than moonshine. He looked at Doc and then Raylan. “Can I get up without anyone tackling me back to the ground? I have to pee.”

That's. Too much information. One of Doc's eyebrows rises and rises and rises crawling up towards his hairline and then he gives Malcolm a nod. Is that a euphemism for something or did he just. Announce it like he's a little four year old kid?

"Presume you won't be needing help with that," Doc says after clearing his throat, leaning forward to slowly get onto his feet. He watches Malcolm get up, ready to lend a hand if needed, but otherwise he stands by and watches him leave.

"Use-- that one. Without the shine." Doc gestures towards the bathroom in between the two smaller bedrooms, a short walk away from the kitchen.

Licking his upper lip, Doc screws the cap back on and shoves the bottle of moonshine behind him, onto the nearby side table like he's got something to hide. Shoving his hands into his back pockets, he turns his attention back towards Raylan. He highly doubts Malcolm's actually going to make a run for it now that he's lucid.

"Well that went well," Doc comments with a tilt of his head. "I don't mean to be rude, but. You look like you've been hit by a freight train. You alright, Marshal?" They probably both look pretty shattered. At least they're able to stand fairly steady.

Smirking a little at the idea of them tackling him while he headed to the bathroom, Raylan looked sidelong over to eye how steady Malcolm was on his feet as he started the coffee before stepping over to shuffle around the low cooking eggs. At least it didn't look like he was going to faceplant, that was something.

A head injury on top of everything else felt a little too much for the morning. Raylan glanced over Doc before turning his attention back to his pan and kicking up the heat a little.

"You ain't exactly a beauty queen right now either," he replied, lips curling at the edges. "I'll be fine. Ain't the first hangover I've had.. Just the first that I got woken up like that to." His brow pinched the more he talked, like the words themselves made his headache worse. It kinda did.

"Surprised you're even upright, considerin'. You wrangled him pretty good. You alright?"

"I'll be fine," Malcolm had assured Doc, pushing himself to his feet with some difficulty and moving unsteadily to the bathroom, but managing without falling.

Once he'd relieved himself, he moved to the sink, staring at his pale face in the mirror, dark circles heavy under his eyes. He'd never looked worse. Best time to meet good looking cowboys with, apparently, a soft spot for lunatics in withdrawal.

He splashed water on his face, trying not to get his bandages wet, then kicked the toilet lid closed, sitting down on it and burying his face in his hands for a few moments before tilting his head back, taking a few slow, deep breaths. He would love nothing more than to take a plate of eggs from Raylan and just eat it like a normal person instead of throwing it up like a loser with problems.

It was a lengthy few minutes before he trudged back towards the kitchen and, when he got there, he set the chair he'd knocked over on its feet and sat heavily in it.

"Well I am... conscious." Because 'awake' is not really the appropriate word to be using to describe this state of being. Doc does not quite let himself fully into the kitchen. He would only get in Raylan's way. Still, he hovers, crossing one foot over behind the other while he leans over the counter and watches the Marshal work. He should start tidying up the water, the first aid kits, the evidence of last night's debauchery. Once he is awake enough to be formulating a to-do list he will be doing just that.

"At least he is not a biter. Not sure that was what I was expecting though when he said 'night terrors'." Kicking and screaming, yeah, but Doc was only joking when he said he'd make sure Malcolm was dressed for the weather when he went out on his sleep run. That episode scared the bajesus out of him.

Doc was about to suggest they maybe take shifts keeping an eye on Malcolm, but promptly switches the subject when the door creaks open and footsteps approach from behind. Straightening up, he turns to face Malcolm, even though he does look like a sorry state sitting in the chair he almost broke like that.

"For what it's worth, son, we got to know a whole lotta people here last night, stuck in this town, same as we are. There's no one here who wants to hurt you. Not your old man or anyone else."

Shuffling the eggs to what he deemed as fully cooked - everyone was having a medium kind of scramble this morning and if they didn't like it they could starve - Raylan moved the pan off the burner and pulled down three plates. The eggs were shifted out onto the plates equally and he jerked his head at Doc as he loaded them up into his hands and headed for the table that the booth curled around.

"C'mon. Both of ya. Get a fork and sit down."

With Malcolm there now, Raylan couldn't, in good conscious talk about the ways they were going to watch over him with him sitting right there. It was something Raylan would catch up with him with later. They had the day.

"Toast'll be comin' in a few, along with coffee. Dig in." It wasn't really a request; they all needed the sustenance.

Malcolm stared at the plate of eggs. It was way, way too much for him. He looked up at Raylan's words.

"I'll take coffee but... no toast for me, thanks."

He picked up his fork and gingerly ate a very small bite of eggs, keeping the fork in his hand as he swallowed so they wouldn't think he didn't like it, but he didn't rush the next bite into his mouth. Best to see if this one sat first.

He looked at Doc in the meantime.

"I'm not worried about anyone here hurting me. Not... in any conscious part of my mind."

Doc does move his things aside before joining them for food. He sets the first aid kit next to his bottle of shine and moves the big bowl of water onto the closest available countertop space. He washes his hands and dabs them dry before he sits, keeping a wary eye on Malcolm.

"Thank you for breakfast," he offers up to Raylan quietly although he hasn't touched his own eggs yet. He might need his hands free to hold Malcolm's hair and pat him on the shoulder while he throws up all over his eggs.

"First time drinking out of the tub? You two feeling alright? It's nasty stuff, I know."

Raylan nodded at Doc's comment, meeting his eye briefly before turning away towards the counter again, dropping two pieces down into the grilling trays. Three cups of coffee poured had him coming back to the table, setting it all down before he sat down himself.

"I'm worried about you flailing yourself into a spike," Raylan admitted as he cut a bite of his eggs and popped it into his mouth, eyes returning to Doc as he spoke.

"This ain't the first tub I've drank outta. I'll be fine with a nap later." Sadly, it was the honest truth. Raylan was a tank when it came to this kinda stuff.

"I wouldn't have had it if I had my own medication. I drink minimally at home. It's contraindicated with my meds." He poked at the eggs. "A guy named John suggested I might have been better off if the drink did me in. I considered that he might have had a point, but... Honestly I probably can't stomach enough to give me alcohol poisoning."

He took another small bite. He had full plans to bolt to a bathroom if he felt it coming back; he'd done this before. Stomach problems didn't start with his hangover.

He looked at Raylan. "Flailing myself into a spike would be very much in the realm of possibility. I have to find a way to restrain myself that I can control. I'm open to suggestions."

John did what now?

"The clown in the long coat? You must have misunderstood him, Mister Bright. He's uh- he's- not from around here. You know what them English folks are like. I can't even understand half the things he says."

Doc is going to peel his skin off. With his butter knife. After he decks him in the face. He shoots A Look over at Raylan before huffing out a sigh. He hates magicians.

"Are you suggesting we... tie you down in your sleep?" They're gonna need a safeword for that.

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