villagelogs | 024-027 » neither reward nor punishment

024-027 » neither reward nor punishment

WHO: Everyone.
WHERE: Eastern/Central/Western Mathias + ???
WHEN: Days 024-027
WHAT: The consequences of their actions.
WARNINGS: Will update as necessary. PM this account to have a warning added!
NOTES: Plotting post over here! The next log will be posted January 23rd.

RECOMMENDED ♫ Deadly Avenger "Onryo" 怨霊

DAYS 024-025
CONSEQUENCES
“There are in nature neither rewards nor punishments —
there are consequences.”
— Robert G. Ingersoll
When the unwilling residents of Mathias Township wake on the morning of the 24th day, they will find themselves in yet another set of frustratingly unnerving circumstances. None of them are where they last remember being, and some of them have strange marks on the palms of their left hands. It's all incredibly unsettling, but truthfully they should be used to it by now. No one will remember traveling to their new location.

Residents can wake up anywhere within their new location and in any position. Curled up in a bed, sprawled on a couch, huddled beneath a coffee table, propped against a wall... Wherever they are, they will themselves to be in quite an unusual state. While they are wearing whatever clothing items they went to sleep in, plus their shoes and a coat. The newest arrivals to Mathias Township will perhaps stand out for being slightly more appropriately dressed than their new neighbors. They are all a bit damp, physically worn out, and half-frozen from their apparent walk through a blizzard.

Each of the four locations is inescapable — residents are trapped, with exterior doors and windows being shut tight and a blizzard raging outside. The locations are stocked with fresh food and water and a large pile of firewood for the fireplaces in each building. The circumstances residents will face, however, may vary wildly between locations as the forces at work in Mathias respond to the recent actions of certain individuals.

BOARDING HOUSE | GREY GULL
NEW HOUSE | MYSTERY MANSION

These residents will wake with a mark on their left hand palms, a spiraling black symbol similar to those some may have seen around town. All marks are identical and cannot be removed, but will have seemingly vanished from their skin on the morning of the 26th day.

Castiel, Daisy Johnson, Dean Winchester
Elena Gilbert, Elijah Mikaelson, Helen Magnus
Phil Coulson, Quentin Coldwater, Sherlock Holmes

DAYS 026-027
IN THE AFTERMATH
After their ordeals of the past two days, the unfortunate residents of Mathias Township will be grateful to find that they were back where they are supposed to be, a chill still clinging to their clothes in whatever place they went to sleep the night of the 23rd day. New arrivals will wake in the living room of the boarding house. None of the residents will wake with anything in their possession from the locations in which they were previously trapped, including any notes or documentation they may have made during their time there.

CONDITIONS UPDATE
— SNOW continues to fall heavily on Days 024-025, resulting in white out conditions from the wind that blows in gusts of over 35 mph; the temperature also drops drastically, making conditions extremely dangerous for residents. The blizzard clears on Day 26 and residents are left with a cold, calm world covered in white.

— THE FOG remains blocking the paths in the forest, urging residents to stay huddled within the town proper, and it also now blocks the northern section of town, beginning just before where residents know the chasm in the earth to be. Venturing into the fog is... ill-advised.

— DISAPPEARANCES continue to plague the town. Kylo Ren and Thomas Richardson have vanished without a trace.

— NO NEW DEATHS have occurred in town, but there is a new "grave" in the small makeshift graveyard near the schoolhouse. Rey's corpse has been moved and covered with stones to wait for the ground to thaw enough for a proper burial.

— THE LANTERNS will be gone from the morning of Day 024. No trace of them remains.

OOC UPDATES
— A GIFT for everyone! As a thank you for being part of this spooky little game, every character in the game is being gifted 2 Activity Points. These may be banked over here — instead of linking to an AC post, you may put "New Year gift" in that field. Happy 2021, friends!

— NEW LAYOUTS have been installed for our communities! Huge thanks to our Eldritch Librarian Stars for putting in the time to get this place looking shiny. (You may have also noticed some new page layouts being installed — these are also our Librarian's handiwork!)

— 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.)

— 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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Plotting comment. Wildcards welcome. Prose by default.

I. Day 024

{A new, mysterious place

Klaus is slow to come to, realizing his back is killing him, and he scrubs a hand over his face and pushes himself up to a sitting position. That's when he realizes he's on a table. Ah, the familiarity of waking up in the most unpredictable of places. But... he wasn't buzzed out of his mind last night, so that's curious.

Long legs hidden inside a pair of navy blue sweats sling over the edge of the table as he pushes himself down and starts padding, barefoot, through the place. From the dining room into a plush sitting room that calls him back to his elementary days. He doesn't even think, or question if it's safe, as he plucks a bottle of amber liquid from the bar cart as he weaves through and stops to stare at the odd display of skeleton keys. "I guess everyone collects something." He mutters under his breath, taking a long swig of the-- what was it, anyway? Ah, bourbon, burns so good-- in his hand.

{Idle wandering

As he wanders through the mansion, Klaus realizes how much it really does echo of the Academy, in the lavish decorations and furniture, in the smaller eccentricities of that kind of money sitting behind everything in the place. Any number of things in this place are probably more expensive alone, than the whole of the town of Mathias. It was a life he lived right up 'til he was 18, and then dad kicked him out, cut him off, and it was so very the opposite for him after that.

He inspects several of the different rooms in the house (the bedrooms are mostly the same), and wanders the halls with that same bottle of bourbon still tucked in his hand. He could possibly be talked into sharing with the right company.

At some point, someone might hear an affected voice calling out, "This house is as empty and cold as my father's heart!" You could practically hear a hand being held over the heart to go along with the dramatic statement.

II. Day 025

{The mirror stares back at me

Klaus saw no reason not to live a little in the momentary lush of luxury. A shower in one of the most perfect ones he's set foot inside of to date was just what he needed after a long day of day-drinking, honestly. He's stood in front of the chest of drawers, dragging a brush through his hair and wincing a bit at the way the bristles catch on a batch of tangles. "Dammit," he mutters under his breath, yank a little harder than necessary to just pull through it.

While he's mostly distracted with that, he still manages to catch movement out of the corner of his eye, at the edge of the mirror. "Huh?" He frowns a little and lifts his head a little. No one's entered the room, so he shrugs, decides it was just some weird trick of his eyes and goes back to--

No. No, there definitely something there. He definitely saw it that time!

"Okay, very funny, Casper. Just show yourself already." He sounds tired, and bored of the whole thing.

{Distract me from disturbing sounds

Weird little flickers of movement in the mirror, he could deal with. Had done for so much of his life, it was almost second nature to him at this point. And these days, at least, he was more prepared to deal with it all. But these incessant noises coming from nowhere, and everyone, all at once? He couldn't handle, not one little bit. It's the not knowing that gets to him the most.

He can't sleep, and he's freaked out, so he's wandering, trying to find someone to buddy up with. He doesn't want to seek it out and see whatever may be making those noises, though, so if that's what anyone is out to do, he'll kindly decline with a, "I've seen this movie before and we do not want to go investigate. That's where plot devices go to die." and find someone else to kick it with.

Edited 2021-01-07 00:43 (UTC)

"Casper?"

As normal, John is leaning against the doorway of the room Klaus finds himself in. He has a bottle of whiskey in his hand, his trenchcoat over his body, and in just his briefs underneath. He definitely looks like he had taken a dive into the bottle the night before.

Not that he has a single bloody regret.

"You found a ghost?"

"Hm?" He hadn't noticed John saunter up. But, whatever. He isn't particularly fussed about it. "Oh- I dunno..." He frowns and turns to look at the other man. "Something keeps catching at the edge of the mirror, but--" He shrugs, survey's the room and spreads his hands. "Nothin'."

He turns back to the mirror for a moment, as if egging whatever it was on to just show up already. There's nothing there, though. Stupid thing. Still, once he's done untangling the mess of his hair, he starts attempting to braid it.

John can be entirely sneaky when he really wants to be. Right now? Things are just in his favor. Wait until he starts breaking it all.

"And I'm guessing we've got no idea what something is."

"Not particularly." He shrugs a little, continuing with his hair. "It's just some kind of vague....shadowy-image-ish thing at the edge of it, when I'm not quite looking at it."

He glances over at the blonde. "You haven't noticed anything like it?" Although, he supposes John probably isn't spending much time staring at mirrors on this little field trip they've been suddenly dropped into.

"Shadow men aren't your run of the mill Casper, Klaus." John turns his gaze towards the nearest mirror and takes a drink of the whiskey bottle he has.

Then, he holds that bottle up as if to answer his question. John hasn't bothered to notice much the last two days. Really.

"Yeah? Well, I may have read some shit back when I was like fourteen, but it's been awhile, and my expertise is strictly in Ghost Land." He shrugs a little. Whether John takes it or not, it's a vague invite to explain more of what he's talking about-- or not. Klaus doesn't care. Shadows in a mirror don't seem that scary, when he's used to being surrounded by the gory visage of the worst deaths anyone's ever suffered.

He chuckles softly, "Fair enough." He's spent his days in the mansion that echoes vaguely of how he grew up just as blitzed as John has, he's sure of it.

"They tend to be humans that have chosen to throw out the light of God. Or, they're just straight up bloody bastard demons. Either way? They're not the sort you'd want to go connecting to." John takes that invite and steps into the room. He finds the nearest chair and flops down inside it.

"Some of us have decided to go poking around and looking into stuff."

He hums thoughtfully at the information. The demon part, well-- that's not really that much of a shock, but the rest. Yeah, he's not sure if he ever came across anything like that when he was a kid. But then again... he's done a lot of drugs since then.

"Hm, shocker." He drops onto the corner of the bed nearest the chair John's taken up residence in, tying off the braid. "You can't even let yourself have a vacation when you said that's your whole plan while we're stuck in this mansion." He snorts and shakes his head.

He snorts. "Well, that wasn't my plan. Your brother, for one."

There's a half-assed shrug as he leans further into the chair. "Not sure anyone here would let me have a bloody vacation from it all. Why not? Heaven certainly didn't."

"Five definitely doesn't know how to take a vacation," He snorts.

"Dude, fuck Heaven." A beat. "And God. She's a bitch!" He has very personal feelings about this, thanks. That deserves a drink from the bottle that's sitting on the bedside table.

Edited 2021-01-24 04:17 (UTC)

"I'm starting to understand that. Must be that bit where he survived the end of the world! He mentioned that, by the way."

He was wondering what more details Klaus could provide about that.

"'She'?" John raised an eyebrow. "Don't suppose you've met the feathered flock of the Lord as well."

"Oh, yeah? Huh..." That's a surprising twist he didn't expect. Five's way cagier with details than he is. "Which one were y'all talkin' about?" Because there were two. Three for Five, actually... shit. Sometimes, he forgets as much as everyone else that Five isn't still thirteen.

"No angels that I know of," he shakes his head. "But yeah. I dunno- I guess God could be and look like anyone-anything in existence-- Or not! It's God, what're you gonna do? But...it was definitely a girl when I was....wherever I was. It wasn't Heaven, but something in-between, you know?"

"Apparently, both of them. Brought them up because he didn't like the fact I was apparently moping about and drinking as opposed to doing something." He shrugged. He was moping around.

"Usually called Purgatory. The Waiting Room." At that, John raised his eyebrows and his gaze back to Klaus. "What were you doing there, you silly sod?"

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bestfuneralever - 2021-02-07 13:25 (UTC) - Expand

"Well... I'm the blonde white chick. Don't I get to survive? Final girl and all that jazz?"

Claire scuffs at the floorboards a little, frowning. She's still in pyjama pants and a tank top, but she's wearing boots. Fuck padding through the hotel barefoot honestly. In her left she holds a fire poker - always armed, always. Her right hand has scraps of cloth wrapped around it, stained red.

Someone put their fist through a mirror upon arrival.

She blinks, then gives Klaus a sheepish shrug.

"Wait, no. If I'm the final girl of this horror movie that... doesn't help you. Shit. Well, if it's any consolation... can confirm that the scratching is... new. None of that last time I was here."

He hasn't talked to Claire much, but they know each other in that passing way roommates who vaguely are aware of each other know each other. They both live at the boarding house, and even when someone's trying to stay to themselves, it's impossible not to notice each other. Still. She's a good kid, near as he could tell, and probably lived the kind of fucked up life that would make life as a Hargreeves be easy to assimilate into.

"I'm an addict, I love sex, and I can talk to the dead." He lists each thing off on his fingers, "Nothing helps me." Which is why he hates feeling like he's living a horror movie, okay? He's screwed, no matter how you slice it.

"Alright, alright."

Claire brandishes the firepoker and waves it with a flourish like it's sword.

"How about this. I'll protect you, long boy, and I'll only abandon you to whatever's going bump in the night if absolutely necessary and if I feel like I can convince Five it wasn't my fault."

She tosses him a grin. That entire family is cuckoo bananas - not that Claire has much room to judge, honestly.

Both eyebrows arch curiously at her proposition, right up until she gets to the end and it just earns her a laugh. "Oh, I wanna be there when you do." Not that it would be possible, if he was dead but whatever, who needs logic.

"So, what have you been up to anyway? I feel like I never see you anymore." Klaus apparently missed a memo somewhere along the way.

"Well... you mean after I dug up my own corpse and burned it?"

Claire... dimly recalls some interruptions in that whole endeavor. But she was out of it and barely remembers it. Still in shock from her death and nearly freezing to death overnight, she'd mostly ended up ignoring anyone trying to interfere as she gave her own corpse a proper hunter's funeral.

Weirdly cathartic, that.

"Tried to be productive. I was digging through the archives in the historical society for a while, and tried to prevent my pseudo-dads from doing dumb shit. Just a string of regular Thursdays from me."

There's a tight smile on his lips, it's nothing to do with her, or even her cavalier attitude toward her own death, and dead body, but Five died during all of that, too. And he'd felt how empty it was... Maybe she was right to burn the body, honestly. Nothing good could feel that cold and empty. His voice is just as tight as his smile as he nods, "Yeah. After that."

"Well, productive's good, at least. I am...not the best person when it comes to that part." He's more of a coaster when it comes to getting into all the Scooby Gang Mystery Solving shit. His one holy grail is useless here, and in a lot of ways he's... feeling like a waste, so far.

Claire shifts her weight form one foot to the other. She's not good with the heavy talk, truth be told, and clears her throat. She'd been preoccupied with her own trauma, and while she doesn't know all that happened, getting the sense that she stepped into something a little more personal for him isn't exactly rocket science.

"Well... truth be told, I'm not exactly able to bring my A game here, either. Now, if there were monsters to hunt, like ghosts or werewolves or ghouls, that's where I shine. Until then, I'm just going places trying to find weird shit and seeing if it fits with any other weird shit."

"You hunt ghosts?" He perks a brow at her curiously for a moment. "Man, I couldda used you back home." he scoffs a soft laugh, shaking his head. He nods a little at the rest of her explanation, though. "Yeah, I guess none of us are really in our element here." But some people are just better at adapting and finding ways to occupy themselves than he is.

"Yeah. Not that hard if you know the tricks of the trade, honestly."

It's not a brag, or at least not intended as such. Claire might be cocky, but this is just a truth - ghosts can be tricky for the unprepared, but once you got salt and iron, it's just a matter of tracking down the bones. Classic salt and burn, and you're good to roll out.

"Wanna be my sidekick?"

"Huh. Nobody else that I know of can even see them, back where I'm from." Which is weird, considering the massive number of people in the world. Surely, he can't be the only one, but that's been his experience thus far in life, at any rate.

He smirks a little and rolls a shoulder in a shrug. "Sure." Not like he's up to anything else, anyway, right?

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024-027 » neither reward nor punishment

Klaus Hargreeves | The Umbrella Academy

Days 024-025 | OTA

25| the mirror.

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Day 25 - Noises

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