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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Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Oh yeah, she definitely knows the mad scientist type. She's met more than a few of those and their disciples. Even two weeks later, she's still feeling the effects of the latest encounter with one of them.

Okay, that's not a question she'd anticipated. Frowning with a healthy level of suspicion, she decides to just go with being honest instead of doing the cagey spy act. "Nope. July 2nd, 1988. Why? What's up with October 1st, 1989?"

Because that date is awfully specific, Klaus.

"Oh." He almost sounds disappointed. "Well, it's kind of complicated. But-- He picks up the polish and starts on his other hand as he talks. "me and my six siblings were all born on the same day, at the same time, and we grew up with powers. We just recently found out there are more of us out there, and it just made sense to me that someone so used to the crazy shit I grew up with as a kid might be one of those other people."

He pauses and glances back up at her. "And none of that even gets into the trauma of having a father who treated us more like soldiers than children." His voice is an overdramatic, high-pitch trill, sounding far more amused than he had any right to be considering what he was saying.

Kids with superpowers all being born on the same day. That's not something she's encountered before. Actually, it's pretty up there on the weird scale, all things considered, and it makes her appraise him a bit more closely. What's his power, then?

It's the mention of his father that trips Daisy's memory, unearthing a memory from a few weeks ago, not long after she'd woken up here. She stares at him for a moment, a million questions racing through her head before she finally just makes the leap and asks, "So you're Five's brother?"

She's ruminating on that wild story he just dropped in her lap like it was nothing, he can see it written plainly across her face, even from the edge of his vision as he puts the finishing touches on his nails.

His eyebrows arch upward at her sudden leap. "Yeah... Impressive. How'd you guess?" They don't look alike, or even act very alike, so he's kind of impressed that she put it together on such little information.

She shrugs and turns her attention to her own hands, beginning the process of wrapping her palms and wrists with the long strips of grey fabric she'd made from a sheet she'd found in one of the houses.

"He mentioned there being seven of you with powers, but more existing, and your dad making you do the superhero thing," she explained. "Doesn't take much of a leap to guess you might be one of the missing siblings — though you don't look 58, so I'm guessing there was more time travel at work between you two."

"Oh, well..." he laughs a little. "I guess he's being less cagey than I'm used to with the details." That's weird, and the look on his face says so. He chuckles softly. "Yeah, it's... a mess, honestly. He went to the future for like a decade and a half, but aged fort-five years? I don't understand it. Then, I ended up in Vietnam for almost a year, but it was only like a day in my time? And then we all ended up in the 60's, and I was there for three years, so I'm...33 now."

She glances up at him at the mention of Vietnam, raises eyebrows at the 60's, and then just nods as more of the pieces fall together. That's an awful lot of time travel Klaus has been through, which she's guessing has something to do with Five's powers and maybe also the Commission he'd mentioned before.

"Well, at least it sounds like you're from around the same point in your own timelines," she says with a quiet sigh. "That's lucky. The alternative is kind of a pain to deal with."

He tests the fingers he'd just painted to see if they're dry. Not quite, so he continues to sit awkwardly in the wait period. "God, I can only imagine." He shakes his head. "Did that happen to you? Someone you know from home from a way different part of things?" Because he can definitely believe that's possible. Time isn't nearly as linear as people like to think.

She's quiet for a moment, finishing the wrapping on her left arm that extends up her forearm, tying it off before answering him. Her voice is quiet when she does, the issue clearly bothering her a lot more than her phrasing might have let on. "Yeah, someone from my team is here. He's from five years before me."

Someone from her team. He's so much more than that though, isn't he? So much more than anyone here could ever understand.

"What happened?" he motions vaguely to her arm.

He frowns a little and thinks about that for a long moment, tries to put himself in her place. What would it be like if he was from five years ago, or if Diego or Allison showed up from that long ago. The dissonance would be so huge, so much had happened since they were 24. For all of them. God, would Allison even be divorced yet? How old would Claire be, then? Dad wouldn't have even sent Luther up on the moon yet. Vanya would still be as much of a mystery as she always was, though. Ben still dead, Five still gone. Not everything would change, but enough. Enough to matter, to make a difference, to make it so hard to deal with.

"I'm sorry," his voice is soft, and there's a level of emotion behind the words that's heavy and real. "I'm not trying to make this about me... but. I kinda know what that's like, too." His voice is impossibly quiet with the thought of Dave lingering in the back of his mind almost enough to choke a breath straight out of his chest. He feels the vice grip tightening there as the thoughts snowball-- Dave. Had he listened? Had he avoided signing up? Had he saved him? He has no idea, and now he's here, and he'll never know. He swallows around the tightness in his throat.

The smile she offers him is small but sympathetic. And grateful. Of all the platitudes he could have offered, at least this one she sort of believes is genuine. She's only just met him, but he doesn't strike her as the type to offer that kind of thing without it having some element of truth to it.

"No one should have to know what that's like," she comments sadly before starting to work on her right arm. It's a bit more difficult than the other since she isn't using her dominant hand, but she's had a lot of practice at this by now. "As for this... This place doesn't like me using my powers."

The moment passes, the tightness in his chest loosens and he doesn't have to explain why he's suddenly having a panic attack in the middle of the floor. Good. "Not a fun thing to have in common, I'll admit." He smiles a little. "But it's always good to know you're not alone in something, even if it sucks to go through it."

He sees her struggling with wrapping her other hand and waves her over, "C'mere." The least he can do, right?

No, it's really not something she'd care to have in common with anyone here, but it's not like they have a say in these things. They're just... stuck.

There's something almost vulnerable in her expression for a moment as she considers whether to let him help her. Normally, she'd insist that she was fine, she doesn't need help, but... Maybe it's this place wearing her down, or maybe there's something about him that makes her feel like she can let him see this side of her. Whatever it is, she finally nods and stands, moving to settle beside him and offering the length of fabric.

He keeps that soft smile on his lips as she comes to sit down with him. The wrapping of the material around her hand and arm is repetitive and smooth, an easy thing to sink down into from what feels like a whole lifetime ago of patching wounds for each other on a team that was meant for great things. In some ways, he misses it. Not dad, or any of the hellish things he put them through, but the camaraderie they'd once had.

"So, what kind of powers do you have?" he asks as he wraps. "And what did this place do to you for using them?" He's just curious. She can choose not to share if she doesn't feel like it, but they've come this far, he doesn't see the harm in asking, at least.

She misses her team fiercely. Having Coulson here is wonderful, even if he is from so far in her past, but she misses the rest of the team too. May, Simmons, Mack... even Deke. But she wouldn't have let any of them help her with this, not easily anyway. Keeping up the strong facade around her team has become second nature, the unshakable Quake who charges into the fight before anyway else.

"I can manipulate vibrations," she explains simply, then gives a one-shouldered shrug. "Shockwaves, earthquakes, sound frequencies — that sort of thing. Using my powers too much without proper protection ends up vibrating my own body enough that this happens. Hairline fractures, ruptured veins... Usually, it would take a lot more but I guess this place sped up the process or something." She sounds less than pleased by that.

"Huh... that's pretty cool. I mean- obviously not the causing injury to yourself part, but..." he ties off the end once everything is wrapped and shrugs. "Sounds pretty handy."

But he can't stop the Cheshire grin spreading across his lips, or the way his eyebrows lift just so. "So have you ever used those... vibrations for more fun things?"

She's flexing her hand, testing the tightness of the wrap (it's pretty good, actually) when he says that. Because... did he really just... Yep, he did.

Her face scrunches up in a what the hell expression of disbelief but she also has a smile creeping into existence. "If I had, I wouldn't tell a complete stranger about it," she informs him with a hint of mischief in her tone.

Her face goes on a bit of a journey as she processes what he's asking and he can't stop the grin from unrolling across his own face, the laugh that bubbles up the back of his throat at her reaction. "Oh my God." Clearly, the answer was yes, and she was never g oing to be able to convince him otherwise now, either.

She can't help her natural, automatic reaction to his response — she smacks his arm with the back of her hand, not too hard but hard enough, a grin on her face that turns into a grimace as she hisses at the pain that arcs up her arm when her body protests her mistreatment of it. But there's a laugh that follows despite the pain and that, at least, feels really good.

The reaction is perfect, and in line with the kind of thing he'd expect from someone he was close with. Which is a little weird since they just met, but Klaus has always been the type to make hard and fast connections with people, so it just kind of feels right to him.

The wince doesn't go unnoticed, though and he's genuine when he asks, "You okay?" through the last pieces of a laugh.

There's an easiness with Klaus that's immediate, something about his demeanor reminding her of those early months on the Bus before everything had gone to hell. It doesn't make a lot of sense, he's not exactly like anyone else on the team, but there's just this vibe about him that strikes her that way. For once, she's not going to overanalyze it and just go with the flow for a while.

"Yeah, I'm okay," she assures him, though she holds her arm close and puts her other hand over it, applying just a bit of added pressure. "Really missing the resources my team have at home, though."

"Yeah? What kind of stuff do they have?" He asks curiously, shifting so his legs are both folded underneath him in a lotus position; it's one of his most default position to sit in. "Crazy fancy tech-y things? We had that stuff when the Umbrella Academy was active." Dad had all sorts of tech stuff. That was sort of his thing. That and... breaking the spirits of children, apparently.

The Umbrella Academy. What a name. It sounds like something out of a comic book, or maybe a horror movie.

She eyes the way he's sitting, a little bit impressed that doing it so casually, focuses on the questions he's asked instead of the many she has herself. "Oh yeah, SHIELD has all the fancy tech toys. But I meant the medical stuff — I used to be able to take something to help my bones heal faster, and then our ship has a healing chamber that can patch up pretty much anything in a couple hours."

"Snazzy. We just found out not too long ago, my dad had medical interventions, too." He sighs softly and glances down at his fingers in his lap. "He drugged my sister for... pretty much all her entire life, blocking her powers. We only found out because..." He sighs again, more of a long-suffering thing this time as he tilts his head back up. "...of a bunch of fucked up shit that was running the clock down on an Apocalypse." Although... it wasn't that recent for him. It was over three years, now. But time travel semantics.

"Sounds like your guys are what my Dad could have been, if he had a single caring bone in his body." He snorts derisively at the idea. Fat chance of that.

Daisy frowns as Klaus starts speaking about his dad and only deepens with the more he says. The man drugged Klaus's sister to block her powers? The very idea of it makes her stiffen, remembering all too well what it felt like to be drugged for just a few hours — how horrible it must have felt to live like that for years.

The mention of an apocalypse doesn't faze her nearly as much.

"SHIELD's mission is to protect people, whether they have powers or not. It's something we risk our lives for every day." There's a thread of pride in those words; she'd proud of having been a part of building SHIELD back up into what it was always supposed to be.

012-014 » even the air itself was grey

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