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.

navigation | faq | setting | mod contact

Comments

[cholesterol]

-- The drink. Hurricanes. Hand grenades.

( He's not -- glorifying shitty weather. )

Most people wouldn't appreciate a how-to hunting book. And the ones that would, get themselves killed.

[prevenance]

That makes more sense, at least.

( he would have hoped you weren't celebrating something like that. drinks though, that is something he can get behind. )

Would they? Which is why you have to do it for them? Hunt those that need to be hunted?

[cholesterol]

( Yeah, it does, doesn't it. So, he and Elijah are just destined to have misunderstanding after misunderstanding, then. )

I hunt those that need to be hunted, because if we didn't more people would die. Leaving the hunted unchecked, they move. They grow. They have families of their own and those families kill.

[prevenance]

And you're the man who makes the rules about who needs to be hunted?

( all that power in the hands of one person sounds..dangerous. )

I'm sure you have a code of conduct, of course.

[cholesterol]

I'm not the only hunter out there. Rules are simple. Are they terrorizing someone or someones. Are they deadly. I shoot first when I need to shoot first.

Hunters blow into town, do the investigation. We interview. We find out what we need to. If people are dying. Then we end it.

[prevenance]

Interesting.

( and fairly simple, at least. he sighs, tilting his head and fixing dean with a long look. he's not the first hunter that elijah's come against and he won't be the last.

he rubs his chin and then smiles pleasantly. )

Have you ever been wrong? It's just a question, not an accusation. I'm curious.

[cholesterol]

There are twists in the plot. We think it's one thing, but really, it's something else. Someone else.

( That happens. He shrugs. )

Not every supernatural monster is a monster. Some have kids. Some don't kill people. A lot do.

[prevenance]

How long have you been doing this? This...hunting thing?

( since he seems to be quite the expert, elijah thinks the question is a valid one. )

The pay can't be all that good.

[cholesterol]

It's not about the pay. It's what I know. My mom did it. My dad. How I was raised. Saving people. Hunting things.

( It's that ingrained. )

[prevenance]

How honorable.

( and he does mean that. doing what his mother and father did would generally lead to a lot of pain and murder which...he supposes he's done in different ways. )

Let's hope you don't have to do too much of that here. There's already not a lot of us and then to be hunted...

[cholesterol]

Maybe that's what this place wants. Set us loose on one another. Drive us crazy. Whittle us down.

( He doesn't know, though. Everything is speculation and he tacks on a sigh to the end. )

Hunting's not always honorable. Doesn't make me a good guy. ( He does look down at that, back to the grave marker. ) We lose people, too.

[prevenance]

I don't think I'd consider myself a very good person either. I suppose I can say I try but that doesn't always matter in the face of the past.

( so, he gets you, dean. )

But your theory about setting us against each other? That has a lot of merit and I can see it being true. If we go at each other, then the town doesn't have to try and take us out. It's neat.

[cholesterol]

Neat.

( Sure, Elijah. Neat. )

The dark arts guy, Guardian Angel-guy, we uh thought - maybe this thing devoured everyone in town, right. And later, when it's hungry again, does it, pull us all here. Feed off of us. Start all over again?

( Is it that? )

[prevenance]

Neat.

( he repeats the word once more before he shakes his head. )

I've never heard of anything like that before. That's not to say it's not real because I've learned there's many different worlds that aren't mine but that would be...

( that would be something. )

You don't think that would leave evidence?

[cholesterol]

Spectral, maybe. ( Or. ) Lost city of Roanoke disappeared into thin air. People disappear all the time, zero trace. Almost zero. Maybe it's like cleaning the bone. Like an order of ribs or, or chops. You ever just gnaw on that sucker, leave nothing for the dogs. Strip it clean.

( You know. )

[prevenance]

( indeed. )

Well, if that is the case, then it's going to make finding answers about the previous occupants even harder than it already is.

( which he expects to happen because that's just his luck, isn't it? )

And it leaves us vulnerable.

[cholesterol]

Think it's plenty hard.

( He thinks they're on Hard mode. Or, what's past Hard mode. Hardest mode? )

For phone calls. And freaky feelings.

( Not that this isn't unsettling to him. He's not able to hide it, though he's not trying to hide it. It doesn't thrill him. )

[prevenance]

Freaky feelings?

( his eyebrows arch up at that. he thinks he knows what dean means but if dean's not going to give anything away, neither is he. )

Feelings? What are those?

( emotions are one of those things that he can deny having all he wants but he'll be a liar until the day he dies. )

[cholesterol]

Fear. Look at the wrong thing or go into the wrong building, all you'll feel is fear. Dread. Worry.

( Freaky feelings. )

[prevenance]

And you've experienced these...feelings? You've gone into a building and been worried?

( he's walked into places and felt a wave of dread but it's never lasted. he's wondering if dean's talking about something longer lasting. )

[cholesterol]

I watched the wrong tape. I didn't get a girl calling me up and telling me I'm going to die in 7 days, but that's how I felt.

( Not a tape, to be clear, but the story remains the same. )

[prevenance]

You're very hard to follow sometimes.

( elijah just has to make that known. it might be that he's old and stodgy and doesn't do pop culture references a lot. )

Is this a literal tape?

[cholesterol]

Film reel. Projector. Whole haunted kit n'caboodle. There are other films, not marked, haunted ones. But, I watched The Ring. Go figure.

( Samara. The well. Still hard to follow, Elijah? )

[prevenance]

And these films are here?

( yes, you were still hard to follow, dean. )

Did you have yourself a movie night?

[cholesterol]

Afternoon. This wasn't that. This was separate. Different. Before.

( ... )

And they're in the movie theater.