021-023 » the ghosts of fallen leaves

[villagemod]

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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Comments

[conning]

[ Once again, Neal can't help but think he's entirely out of his depth. He has no context for the things Dean is saying, no knowledge base to weigh them against. What is, or was, Dean's best friend, that he didn't feel emotions? Neal is pretty sure that Dean is speaking literally.

He can't say anything intelligent to that. But there's a level on which he can relate to at least part of it. ]

The truth can be worth it. [ Neal looks down, smiling faintly. What would Peter think, hearing him say that?

Silence, then: ] Look. What's keeping you from talking to him about it?

[cholesterol]

Do I look like the sharing type? This? Doesn't happen. I'm drunk. ( Freakin' wistful. Misty-eyed. And, he doesn't know if all Castiel needed to do was say it. Maybe that's all he wanted. He doesn't want more because couldn't be more.

Even now, maybe there still can't be. ) I thought the profiler would get something out of me before the -- forger? ( He pushes his chair out, readying himself to stand. His head clouds, a brief dizzy spell kicking in. Thanks, moonshine.

He needs to keep fueling up, soak the moonshine with Italian. ) You have any more of that pasta?

[conning]

[ Neal resists the urge to say that he's drunker than Dean, and that they might get lucky and Neal will forget this conversation in the morning.

He's not that drunk. ] I'm not the sharing type either. I get it.

[ Neal gestures toward the pot on the stove. ] As much as you want.

[ He doesn't trust his own sense of balance enough right now to play host.

Dean says he's drunk. Neal knows that he's drunk, which should make him more cautious. But he's a romantic, too. He's a man in love with the idea of love, and the kind that would trade itself for someone else--that's worth putting himself out there for, a little. Even if the relationship isn't his. ]

Get drunk. If that's the only way. Create the circumstances that allow the conversation. [ It's quite possible, Neal reflects, that he's going to get himself punched. But in for a penny, in for a pound. ] How much is the torture of not knowing how he feels worth to you?

[cholesterol]

( Dean doesn't trust his own sense of balance, nor what his legs can do. Is he moving over to the pot? Has he moved an inch? He manages a nod, at least. A gruff huff from his nostrils. )

It's not. Torture's... torture. ( It's not the same. He sighs, making it to his feet, finally. He considers moving to the pot of pasta, the door. He even considers saying more. ) I don't know.

( He doesn't think like this. He doesn't confront things like this. He doesn't think if/then. He doesn't know. Neal's not bad for conversation. But, this isn't the conversation Dean has. )

You gonna make it to your room alright?

[conning]

[ Well. Now he knows Dean's been tortured, too. No wonder the guy doesn't open up to people. There's probably more trauma behind Dean's closed doors than Dean himself is prepared to deal with, never mind anyone else. ]

I'll be fine. I'm always fine. [ He frowns, staring into space, trying to order thoughts that are increasingly hazy. ] I just know... if it were me. If I lost someone I'd known that long, after they told me something like that, and I had the chance to see them again after--I'd want to at least see what was possible.

[cholesterol]

And if that someone were an angel in a guy's body.

( Is this a fair question? He asks it anyway. His own thoughts are less hazed over and since he's planning his escape, he lets himself at least ask that question. )

[conning]

[ ...Weirdest two days of his life, hands down.

But really: ]

What difference does that make to you?

[cholesterol]

( He doesn't have the answer. He's never thought hard enough about it to give it a name, or to decide if Cas was wrong, if Cas could have Dean like he wanted. He knows he broke down after. He knows how he's been around other guys. Not all guys, and never anything he could put a name to. And nothing he wants to think about right now.

He grips the chair in front of him. )

You lose someone before?

[conning]

[ He tenses, like he always does at the thought of the plane, the explosion. That last glimpse of Kate's face through the open door. ]

Yeah.

[cholesterol]

I don't know. What it is to me. I've never gotten it. Tried once. It didn't work out. The whole stepfather thing. Suburbia.

( His thoughts drift back to Lisa Braeden and Ben, and to Cas erasing his existence from their heads. )

[conning]

[ It's impossible to miss the wistful look on Neal's face. Sara. Sara in his apartment, the two of them cohabitating like it was meant to be. He can't say he hasn't imagined it, what it would be like for the two of them to be together long term.

What it would be like to live like Peter. A job, a house, the possibility of children. Having that and losing it sounds like a nightmare worse than torture would be. ]

That's not the only kind of happy ending there is.

[cholesterol]

I don't get the happy ending. It either ends lonely or it ends bloody.

( That's how it always ends. Chuck made sure of that. Cas only thinks he wants Dean. He doesn't actually want what comes with Dean. Nobody should want what comes with Dean. )

[conning]

[ Neal doesn't do well in the face of absolutes. There's always a way. A way out, a way through, a way around. He's not sure what to say in response to Dean's certainty. ]

That can't be it. Don't you hope for anything?

[cholesterol]

Yeah. Where does it get me?

( Dead. Left alone. In this fucking town. )

[conning]

Alive. [ Neal lifts his shoulders in a long shrug. ] And where there's life, there's the possibility of something better.

[cholesterol]

Who says I get a long life. Where was that written.

( But really. His life was freakin' written. Try being Dean Winchester. )

[conning]

I never said long. [ Neal doesn't have many illusions when it comes to how long his own life will probably be, if he doesn't go straight. Someone like Dean? Neal thinks he's probably a good man, or what's left of one.

He's running out of arguments. ] But it's worth trying. It's always worth trying.

[cholesterol]

How'd that work out for you? What did trying get you?

( Results? Happiness? Someone he didn't disappoint? )

[conning]

[ That cuts. Deeper than it should, coming from a stranger. He glares at Dean, his own temper starting to rise. ]

Another chance. And another. That's what life is. If you're so against the possibility of things getting better why haven't you just given up?

[cholesterol]

Cause, that's now what I do. I save the world. I hunt things. Doesn't mean I get the happy ending.

( That temper, though. It doesn't give rise to Dean's. )

Keep taking those chances. Some people are meant to have 'em.

[conning]

[ Keller.

That's who Dean reminds him of. An unselfish version of Matthew Keller, his rival, his one-time friend. He's not sure what to make of the homesickness that comes after that thought.

Neal eases himself to his feet, not sure he can handle this conversation any more.

Quietly: ] I still think you should talk to him. For what it's worth.

[cholesterol]

He wants to talk, he can. I'm not going anywhere.

( He waited long enough before and look where it got him. He eyes Neal in the chair. )

You need help up, find your room. ...Bucket?

[conning]

[ He wants to say no. He wants to say he's fine, he can find his own way. But the way he starts to tilt sideways a little on standing gives that lie away before he can tell it. ]

...Yeah. Both, probably.

wrap?

[cholesterol]

( Dean's ridden this horse before, this horse is in his bones. Not the same for Caffrey, obviously. He sidesteps any deeper conversation they may have had (they did), in favor of giving him an arm's worth of support for him to stand.

He'll come back downstairs and store the pasta. Maybe bring Cas a bowl. )