villagelogs | 021-023 » the ghosts of fallen leaves

021-023 » the ghosts of fallen leaves

WHO: Everyone.
WHERE: Eastern/Central/Western Mathias.
WHEN: Days 021-023
WHAT: A cold storm approaches.
WARNINGS: Will update as necessary. PM this account to have a warning added!
NOTES: Plotting post over here!

RECOMMENDED ♫ Emily Kinney & Lauren Cohan "The Parting Glass"

DAYS 021-023
THE WORLD TURNS WHITE
“Are ye the ghosts of fallen leaves, O flakes of snow,
For which, through naked trees, the winds A-mourning go?”
— John Banister Tabb
The howling wind is what wakes the residents of Mathias each day now as the world turns slowly into a bleak stretch of white. Snow continues to fall in thick curtains of flakes that accumulate on trees and rooftops, swirling sideways in the gusts of wind that bow trees and whistle through any crack they can find. The drifts of snow grow taller against the buildings and the wind makes the already freezing temperatures feel bitterly cold.

By day 022, the far ends of streets begin to resemble the hazardous fog with how little becomes visible as the winds pick up. Buildings can still be discerned as dark shapes but the weather's warning becomes clear — a storm is coming. And by day 023, the storm arrives properly, the wind still screaming through the streets like a winter banshee announcing so many deaths to come. These conditions are far from hospitable and only the truly mad would be foolish enough to venture outside in weather such as this.

THE NEWLY ARRIVED
With an embrace of wintery white, Mathias offers a chilly welcome to its newest residents. They awake along the southern treeline bordering Mathias, near the small makeshift cemetery containing a handful of wooden markers erected without names or signifiers of those buried within. And not far from them is the schoolhouse, where in a snowdrift they will the frozen corpse of a young woman named Rey.

LIGHTS IN THE DARKNESS
“A lantern can give you light only when you light it”
— Munia Khan
When residents wake on the morning of day 021, they will find outside in the snow the abandoned lanterns of those shadowy spectres who have moved so silently through Mathias. Each nestled in a patch of frozen white outside their door, the lanterns are now cold to the touch, the half-burned candle within each one seeming to have been lit so very long ago. Inside the glass encasement is a small rolled piece of paper, upon which is written:

keep it lit
There is nothing more, and the prior owners of these lanterns will not return within these days.

There is one lantern waiting outside the building for each resident wherever they are sleeping — the exception for this is those who may have already claimed a lantern as their own. Removing a lantern from its resting place results in no apparent reaction, nor does lighting or not lighting it. However, whatever residents ultimately choose to do with these lanterns should be reported.

CONDITIONS UPDATE

— SNOW continues to fall, resulting over the three days in upwards of a foot of accumulation. The winds blow in gusts over 35 mph.

— 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.

— THE FOG has still receded from the town proper and much of the eastern and northern beach, with the path through the northern forest to the lighthouse still clear on day 021. On day 022, however, as the storm worsens, the fog returns to the paths in the forest, urging residents to stay huddled within the town proper or else.

— DISAPPEARANCES continue to plague the town. While Zed Martin has returned, Rey's corpse will be found in a snowdrift near the Schoolhouse; she disappeared on day 018.

— THE STRANGER is gone.

— THE SPECTRES are gone.

OOC UPDATES

— DISCOVERIES have been collected and collated for your review. Please note that this is OOC information only, put together for the purpose of helping you as players see connections and possibilities for CR and your own character's potential avenues of exploration and investigation. (If we are missing something, please report it so we can add it to the list.)

— AP REWARDS have a new option now — Ideas may be requested if you find yourself stuck. You may now claim up to 2 rewards per log: (1) idea and (1) other reward.

— SANITY may be regained in two ways: self-medication and treatment. In Mathias, this means such coping mechanisms as drinking or drugging oneself into a stupor that allows them to face their fears and issues, or talking to someone about those fears and issues. Since both of these will take some time, best get started. (A form will be added to the Sanity page.)

— REMINDERS — Don't forget about the bulletin board. Please continue reporting your updates to locations, plots, and discoveries. The map of Mathias has been added to the locations page for ease of reference. Make sure your character's sanity level is kept updated. Prospective players are still joining the TDM, so it's recommended to track new top-levels so you don't miss them.

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Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

He doesn't offer platitudes and she doesn't need them. She hadn't known Rey that well, in the end. Rey was from space, or something like that. She had an accent Ellie had only heard in movies.

She looks at the mug with a frown, then looks back up at him. "What is this stuff?" she asks. It's obviously hot like tea or coffee. She's never had hot cocoa before; anything like that is basically impossible to come by. Even coffee is rare and you have to trade a lot of shit to get it. She's never developed any taste for coffee because of that scarcity. But this doesn't smell bitter like coffee.

"You don't have to do that, you know. You didn't know her or anything."

"Hot chocolate." Neal can't help the slight surprise in his tone. "Granted, not the best hot chocolate, and not with milk, but we survive as we must."

He's joking, clearly, but gently. He shrugs, studying his mug. "I don't have to know her to be aware she had a life, and to believe that's worth something. Even more in a place like this, I think, when...." He trails off for a moment, takes a sip of his own drink, tries not to wince at the burn. "Well, for the time being is seems like we're all we've got."

"I've never had it," she says. "We don't have anything like this anymore." She's so used to people coming from places quite different to the world she knows, people who come from sometime after the infection started, only...it didn't start. She's only slightly bitter about it.

She knows a lot of people who have died without graves. She figures she'll be one of them one day, unless she's lucky enough to die close to home. Sometimes, if people go out and don't come back in Jackson, they get graves anyway. That very rarely happens, but...well, the world is a rough place. It's a gesture she appreciates either way.

She nods and just holds the mug between her hands. It's too hot to drink yet but that's fine. She'll get to it. It does smell good.

"I guess you're right. She deserves that. Are you new here? You just woke up in this bullshit town and found a body? That's gotta be the worst fucking wake up story I've heard here yet."

"Oh." He's not sure what to say beyond that--it seems rude to ask why she doesn't. He's gotten used to asking people when they're from, but so far the answers have all resulted in times and places close to his own. Maybe it's rude to ask, and maybe he's not ready to. It's a toss-up.

Neal's smile is sad and wry. "It wasn't my favorite post-kidnapping arousal, no. In fact I have to say, this kidnapping tops the list as my least appreciated or enjoyed."

At least when he's been taken before, he's had the comfort of knowing there was someone on the other side trying to reach him. "Have you been here long?"

She certainly doesn't offer the info up. People don't seem to know how to take her world, her time, whatever it is. It's mutual, really; she doesn't understand anyone else's either.

"You mean you just get kidnapped regularly? You should hire a bodyguard, man," she says, one corner of her mouth twitching up a little.

"I guess it's around three weeks now," she says. "Like ten of us or something woke up here the same day. Since then, it keeps happening every few days."

He grins. "More often than you'd think, and I kind of have one. Never seems to help."

What Peter would think about being called a 'bodyguard' is a thought Neal will entertain himself with all evening.

He takes another careful sip of his hot chocolate, relaxing a bit now that it's slightly less scalding. "Every few days... Is there anything consistent that happens first? Anything you've noticed?"

He assumes she would have said as much, but he can't stop himself from asking.

"Wow, dude, what the fuck do you even do at home? Or are you just like one of those rich people that gets ransomed? Does that...even happen in real life?" She's teasing, and it's obvious, but at least it gives her something to focus on that isn't Rey's death and her own gnawing guilt about it and the whole weird fear of mirrors thing that's going on in her head.

She shrugs a shoulder. "I dunno. The weather changes sometimes, and I think maybe that's when people show up? I don't pay enough attention to it, I guess. Probably John Constantine does."

She's too preoccupied with her own shit, really, and she's self-aware enough to know that much.

Finally, she tries the still-hot cocoa. It's still pretty hot, but doesn't burn her. She just takes a little sip, having no idea what to expect.

But it's good.

"Whoa. This is amazing. I mean, it's pretty sweet, but damn."

"I have a very eclectic resume. And I actually was the ransom in one case. That one made me feel special."

He's glad to give her something else to think about, even if it is at his expense. Sometimes distracting from the present is all a person can do. He'll leave the questions for another time, and for another person--it's pretty clear that the third degree both won't help here, and might hurt.

Neal lifts a finger. "Hold that thought."

It takes a bit of rummaging through cupboards, but he finds what he's looking for--chili powder and cinnamon. He taps a little of each into her hot chocolate, then his own, offering her a spoon to mix it in. "Try that."

"Wow. Well, I guess on the bright side, no one around here is interested in ransom," she says. It's a terrible joke, like most of her humour, but she doesn't care. She notes that he doesn't actually answer her question; whatever he does at home must be some kind of secret. Huh. She'll remember and needle him on it later, probably. For now, it's too much effort in her too-tired brain to follow that thread.

He moves away and looks through some stuff, then taps whatever the hell that is into her cup. But...into his own, too, so he's probably not fucking with her.

"What is it?" she asks, slightly more suspicious sounding than she means to be. But she takes the spoon and stirs anyway.

"It turned out all right. I got to con an old enemy and get him arrested, which isn't bad for a day's work. Even if I did get tased."

He mixes in his own, leaning back in his chair. "Cinnamon and chili powder. Just trust me. If you don't like it, I'll make you a fresh cup."

"You sound like some kind of criminal in a movie," she tells him with a laugh. She doesn't really mean it, but she also sort of means it. He doesn't strike her as a dangerous criminal type or anything, but she also knows better than to trust most people, especially men. But it seems like a lot of trouble to go through, the hot chocolate and everything, if he's going to suddenly be a creep. No one here has been a creep, maybe by virtue of them all being stuck in some impossible nightmare town.

"Wow," she says. Cinnamon and chili powder. Incredible. She takes a drink, hesitant. She's not huge on spicy food, largely due to lack of exposure to it, but the kick isn't very much. And it is a really interesting flavour, the spice and the chocolate together. "No, I...do like it. You just have shit like this all the time where you're from?"

"Anything a movie can do, I can do better." He smiles down at the table, dialing it down a notch. "Only now I'm more on the side of stopping the criminals than pulling the jobs. More or less."

Sometimes less.

A man has to keep his hat in the ring, after all.

"You think that's good, next time I'll make hot chocolate from scratch, with milk, maple syrup, and steeped cinnamon sticks. We may not have a ton of options, here, but I can still pull that off."

She laughs at his bravado. She hasn't decided whether to take that at face value yet or not, though, the whole criminal shtick. He's probably lived in a place where there was no infection and there were actual laws. And food, apparently, like hot chocolate.

"So can you, like, bust into a safe or whatever? Pick locks? Or like Mission Impossible hacking into crazy computers?" She lights up a bit imagining it. Half of that is nonsense to her, after all. No one has real computer systems like they do in movies where she's from. Maybe they had something more like that once upon a time, but Joel told her most of the tech in movies was exaggerated.

"Man, that sounds...really good, actually. I've definitely never had anything like that before. Sounds like if I had a lot of it I'd probably puke. Might be worth it though." She manages something that might be a smile for a moment before taking another sip of the spiced chocolate she has now. This is plenty luxurious, as far she's concerned.

"Crack safes, pick locks, forge paintings, counterfeit booze. I've faked a historical discovery or two in my time, too." He takes a drink of his own hot chocolate, smile crooked. "Not a hacker though. For that you want my friend Mozzie. Or his friend the Vulture."

He stretches. "And it is. Good I mean. You're not supposed to have a lot of it, really--that's the thing about good food. It's meant to be savored as much as eaten."

"Wow, I can only do two of those things," she says. She is at least superficially impressed. Most people older than her here (which is, like, everyone) don't talk about this kind of thing. Claire probably would. And she knows not all the cowboys and whatever are straight-laced. They just don't talk about shit like picking locks.

"I was joking about hacking. We don't have anything to hack into where I'm from. I mean, not anymore. I've only seen it in movies."

She takes another small sip of the hot chocolate. It's fine to drink now, she's just taking her time on purpose.

"We don't have tons of good food either. I mean, sometimes we can find some stuff to trade for. We get good crop years, or there's deer. If you're really lucky, you might find a bison, but those things are hard as fuck to take down. We grow some pretty good fruit now, too. Peaches, man. Peaches are amazing."

"Well. Only two of those things are practical on a day-to-day level anyway." And he's going to go out on a limb, based on what she's saying about her world, and guess the practical ones are the ones she knows.

It's a world that he would probably not survive well in, from the sound of it. A world he's more and more (and less and less) curious about.

"Depending on preparation, game animals can be considered gourmet." He's already mentally going through the food available at the General Store, the spices he's found, breaking down the possibilities. "Nothing here would make it to the table if we're talking molecular gastronomy, but I can make it work."

Did the store have peaches? He can't remember. He wasn't exactly looking. "Speaking of which."

He gets up, going to the stove. "You look like you could use some actual food."

"Yeah, if you can even find a safe," she agrees. She's found a few that are still in tact, sure. But they're few and far between, and sometimes you really have to look for them. She's not really sure what Neal does, if the whole criminal thing is just him pulling her chain, but maybe lockpicking really will come in handy here sooner or later.

"I wouldn't know gourmet if it socked me in the face," she says, but imagining deer as gourmet is definitely beyond her. Deer is easier to get than a lot of things, since there's tons of deer if you know where to look.

"Molecular...what?" she asks. He gets up and she follows him with her eyes. "You don't actually have to feed me or anything. I really did just come here to...you know."

"Gastronomy. It's a type of food science that examines the transformations that food goes through as it's prepared. The way that specific techniques and chemical interactions change flavors, textures, and consistencies."

He pulls two plates out of a cupboard, setting them down on the counter. "If it makes you more comfortable, I need to eat too, and it would be rude to do it if the guest isn't."

It's something of a lie--he's not particularly hungry himself--but Ellie looks like hell. He dishes out two portions, fetches forks, and carries them back to the table. He sets one down in front of Ellie and takes his place again. "Carbonara. Sort of."

"Uh huh," she says, scepticism plain on her face. Sounds like a bunch of bullshit to her, but maybe people cared about shit like that before the world ended. She knows they had a lot of things that just didn't survive everything collapsing. She's only now really getting an idea of just how much stupid shit they had. She envies it in an abstract way.

"I...guess I can eat. Thanks."

She looks down at the plate.

"No idea what that is but this smells really good," she says, reaching out to take the fork. Her manners when she eats aren't spectacular, but she's not completely uncivilised either. She probably can't manage to eat a lot, because grief is a fickle thing, but she'll give it a go.

Manners, shmanners, really. Time and inclination have made Neal fastidious, but he's also the kind of guy to dig his whole-ass hand into a box of cereal looking for a toy badge when the mood takes him.

He takes his own meal slow, not wanting to put any pressure on her to try for more than she can manage. "It's a pasta dish--usually made from high-end ingredients, in this case made with bacon and fake cheese."

She picks at her food, not because it's not good, but because that's just how it is. At least she's eating. She eats a lot more regularly with all the people who do make an effort to feed her. Doc especially does, but several of the other men have made that effort, too. Neal's in good company like that.

"You mean like powdered army stuff or something?" she asks between bites, thinking of what fake cheese must be. She's had dehydrated food before. It's never good, but it's better than starving. She's been close to that starvation threshold before, travelling in winter with Joel several years ago. Jackson has had some thin seasons but nothing like that, nothing so dire. "I mean, it's good. I wouldn't have known it was fake anything."

"Yeah. Powdered, not fake, I guess." It's said with the grudging admission of someone who's used to having access to said high-end ingredients.

He can't help himself--curiosity wins out. "The army still exists where you're from? I mean, it exists where I'm from, but so do computers."

"Unfortunately, yeah, army exists. I mean...kind of? In some places. They ran the QZs but in a lot of places they got overrun or whatever. I haven't seen any actual army in a long time, but there are militarized groups across the country. Same fucking difference, I guess. They're all bullshit from what I've seen." The WLF, the actual army, the Fireflies, whoever, she doesn't want anything to do with any of them. Hierarchical structures and sanctioned violence, that's all any of them are good for, seems like.

"I know what a computer is, I've just never gotten to be anywhere near a working one that did much of anything. I guess they were cooler when the internet existed, or so I've heard."

Neal has to take a second to sort all of that out in his mind. It's a lot. It's a whole new level of what the fuck, a different brand than vampires and aliens and special powers. "QZ? Overrun by what?"

This part is pretty easy for Ellie to talk about. It's not magic or resurrection or whatever. It's just...her lived experience.

"QZ. Uh, quarantine zone. The Army fucking sucks and people didn't wanna put up with them. So other people sometimes took them out," she says with a shrug, taking a second to actually eat.

"Infected, other times. I know you're gonna ask, so the Infection is a mutated form of cordyceps fungus. It gets into your brain and takes you over. Whatever is human dies and it's just the cordyceps left. That's how my world got all fucked up."

021-023 » the ghosts of fallen leaves

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