villagelogs | 030-035 » a-hunting they will go

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030-035 » a-hunting they will go

WHO: Everyone.
WHERE: Eastern/Central Mathias.
WHEN: Days 030-035
WHAT: Unexpected changes come to Mathias, followed by a Hunt.
WARNINGS: Will update as necessary. PM this account to have a warning added!
NOTES: Plotting post over here! And shiny new CR meme too.

RECOMMENDED ♫ Marco Beltrami "It Hears You"

DAYS 030-032
A CHANGE IN CIRCUMSTANCES
The day after the earthquake dawns like any other in Mathias Township. The sky is a light winter grey, clouds obscuring even a hint of true sunlight, and snow falls off and on in dustings that rest atop the piles left from the storm a few days past. The air is bitterly cold, a gentle wind feeling like ice in the sub-freezing temperatures, and residents should be grateful that the earthquake didn't do more damage than just breaking a few household objects.

It seems like business as usual. It will not be until the second day that residents will begin to notice the difference.

The General Store's shelves have not been restocked. Items in kitchens have not replenished in the passing night. Food from the previous day has aged as normal, and as the days continue to pass, things will begin to grow stale or become moldy as they would in the outside world. Two days pass, three, four... Still, the food does not return.

Perhaps rationing should be considered.

NEW ARRIVALS
The newest arrivals to Mathias will wake on the snowy beach near the Grey Gull restaurant. They should probably hurry inside and get warmed up before hypothermia sets in or something finds them out in the cold...

DAYS 033-034
IN THE NIGHT, IN THE DARK
These days, too, seem to be simply more of the same. The days are cold and grey, the food does not replenish, and they continue to be trapped in this eerie town. But when night falls, the story changes.

An hour after sunset, it begins. Scratching sounds at walls, like something searching for a way inside. The ominous feeling of something out there in the darkness, moving through the town, stalking through the night. The inability to find any sign of something being there at all. It's enough to make anyone feel like they're going mad. To happen just one night, it could be a fluke, a trick of the mind as so many things here seem to be. But to happen a second night, with more intensity... There is something there, or they are going mad.

It's hard to know which to hope for.

DAY 035
THE HUNT
This day is not like the others. There is something in the air, a dreadful anticipation that rises inside them all as the hours pass. Every moment that brings them closer to nightfall brings it closer too — if only they knew what it was.

An hour after sunset, the Hunt begins.

Those who are outside at this time are gripped by such terror that they can do nothing but run and be chased. They are prey and the predators that stalk them with steadfast determination are creatures never meant to be seen by mortal eyes. All lights outside go out, from streetlamps to flashlights, and the world descends into deeper darkness, only the clouded moonlight and curtained glow from illuminated houses lighting their way as they flee.

Those who are inside at this time are trapped in their safe havens. No doors or windows can be opened from within, nothing can be broken or forced, and they can do nothing but wait and listen while their friends and neighbors are pursued by creatures whose very presence they can feel in their bones and whose growls echo in the night, entwined with the screams of their victims.

In the thick darkness, these creatures appear little more than shadows, large and looming, deadly and unknown, but in rare glimpses in scattered pieces of light, the Hunted are met with a sight they cannot comprehend and will never be able to properly describe or fully remember, for these creatures cannot be fathomed within the limits of the human mind.

The Hunt lasts for one hour exactly and then the creatures vanish into the darkness, leaving only fear and death in their wake.

ABOUT THE HUNT
— Players may choose to have their resident be one of the Hunted or a Witness to the Hunt. None are exempt from the the Hunt and all will be affected by it in some way.

— Those who are hunted must flee the creatures or they will die. The Hunted may move throughout the town at any speed, for the creatures may choose to move both quickly or slowly, but the creatures will always inevitably find them. The only escape is to seek shelter — the creatures will not enter a building where living people are, but they will follow the Hunted into buildings where there are no other living people.

— Those who are trapped within buildings at the start of the Hunt are unable to open doors and windows from within, but the Hunted may open them from outside in order to take shelter in these safe havens.

— Those who are hunted are unable to fight back against the creatures until the moments just before their death. This is due the creatures only having physical form in these final moments, rendering any attacks against them useless, whether they be physical, magical, or psychic in nature. Attempts may be made in those moments before death, but by then it is too late — the prey has been caught.

— When one of the Hunted is caught, there is no escaping, there is only screaming in madness as death falls painfully upon them. No one can come to their aid and their body will be found afterward, the bloody remains ripped and torn apart by something that cannot be identified. Large sprays and pools of blood stain the area around the corpse, turning the snow sickening shade of crimson that darkens as the hours pass.

— After the creatures have vanished, there are no signs of them to be found in the snow. There are no tracks or marks of any kind save for the carnage of the fresh kill.

— Those who have been sacrificed to the Hunt will revive two days later on Day 037. The conditions in which they revive will be detailed later, but there will be only minor lasting physical damage from the Hunt.

— The Hunted will lose 5 points of sanity. Those Witnesses who find the corpses will lose 2 points of sanity, or 3 points if they are not unaccustomed to this type of sight. Others who are merely Witnesses to the sounds of Hunt may choose to lose 1 point of sanity as a result of the experience.

CONDITIONS UPDATE
— THE WEATHER is fairly typical of a northern winter. The sky is almost always grey, the temperature is below freezing during the day (and colder at night), and a light snow falls intermittently. The sun sets early in the evening. Residents should bundle up when going outside and not venture too far into the dark night...

— THE FOG remains blocking the paths in the forest beginning a few dozen yards past the treeline, urging residents to stay huddled within the town proper, and it also now blocks the northern section of town, beginning just past Hill Lane, before where residents know the chasm in the earth to be between Hill and Stine Road. Venturing into the fog is ill-advised.

— DISAPPEARANCES continue. Sherlock Holmes is still missing, and Phil Coulson, John Constantine, Zed Martin, and Helen Magnus have vanished as well.

OOC NOTES
— FOOD will be restocked in some fashion in the next full log, don't worry. We aren't going full survival mode yet.

— DAY 036 The next log will cover Day 36 only and will include the locations of deaths and any corpse burials that occur the night of Day 35 or are planned for Day 36. (There will be prompts included for both the "living" and the "dead" in this single day log.) Please submit all information by Wednesday, Feb 17.

— MOD STATUS It's mostly just Amy steering this ship for now, so things will probably be pretty slow for a while. Apologies in advance, and please don't feel shy about pinging me if you're stuck waiting for something.

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Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ Letting him lead isn't as easy as it might have once been when she could still feel everything in the space around her, before her power started acting up and she lost a lot of her spatial awareness. Relying on him to guide her is easier because of the way she trusts him, though. And when she opens her eyes... ]

Neal, this... [ The words refuse to form in her mind, her thoughts a jumbled awe-struck mess as she takes in all of it. He'd set up a picnic for them. It was too cold to be outside, but here in this living room, he'd put together a beautiful setup, from the blanket to the basket to all those intricate paper flowers. The whole look of it takes her breath away. ] This is amazing.

[ More than that, even. The more she looks around, the more overwhelming it is. How long had he spent putting this together? Is she even worth this kind of effort? ]

[ He wraps his arms around her from behind, resting his chin on her shoulder. Teasingly: ] So on a scale from “dork” to “smooth,” where do I fall?

[ He quiets for a moment, but only that long. ] I figure we could both use a little somewhere to escape to while we’re here.

[ Wrapping her arms over his, she leans her weight against him, turning her head just enough so she can see him from the corner of her eye. Her throat is tight and the words are strained with emotion that she struggles to hold in, but she somehow manages to get them out without giving away how close she is to crying. Well, she thinks she manages it, anyway. ]

No one's ever done anything like this for me before. It's perfect.

[ She doesn't manage as well as she might think, but Neal can hardly blame her. He doesn't want her to cry, but if she does, well. Maybe she needs to. Maybe it will help. He'll be there to hold her, either way.

Neal kisses the side of her neck, gently, voice softly teasing again. ] I haven't even showed you dinner yet. You can't say it's perfect until we're both sure I'm not going to accidentally kill you with an allergen I forgot to ask about.

[ He is such a sappy, romantic dork. Honestly, she never in her wildest dreams would have pictured herself with someone like him. A suit-wearing, art-loving cheeseball who was too pure to be trapped in a nightmare like this, he's the last sort of person she would ever have thought to end up with. But... they fit. As crazy as it is, he makes her feel safe and a little less broken and all she wants to do is hide from the world with him for as long as they can. ]

The only allergy I have is to cheesy poetry or movie lines being quoted at me. [ She's joking, of course, and teasing him right back because it absolutely seems like something Neal Caffrey would do. ]

And the sunlight clasps the earth
And the moonbeams kiss the sea:
What is all this sweet work worth
If thou kiss not me?

[ He recitation comes effortlessly, his voice low and soft. He winks. ] Shelley was a lot of things, but a subtle poet when it came to love, he was not.

[ She knew the opening she was giving him and he doesn't disappoint. The quotation is nothing if not sappy, which is just what she'd expected, but then he says that word and... He's talking about the poem, she knows that, but it still stirs something inside her that's a little terrifying. More than a little. It shouldn't be but it is because that's how Daisy Johnson's mind works.

So she just stares ahead for a few seconds, taking deep even breaths to push through her instinct to run in response to that fear. There's no hiding the sudden tension in her body or unexpected change of subject, but despite that she's trying and she hopes he understands that. ]

So what is in that basket anyway?

[ He feels her tense up, feels the moment that she does it, and mentally kicks himself.

Neal rolls with the subject change, drawing away slowly to give her space and using the excuse of the picnic basket to do it. He settles on to the blanket and yanks the little cloth off the basket with a flourish. ]

Roast beef sandwich with walnut sort-of-romesco, or sausage and arugula pasta salad, or... PB and J, with your choice of chocolate chip cookies or raspberry tartlets to follow. Sweet ginger tea compliments of one of 1306's resident cowboys.

Edited 2021-02-14 16:37 (UTC)

[ He doesn't make a big deal of it and she is so grateful to him for that. He could have easily called her out for her reaction, she knows he's an intelligent and observant man who very likely noticed it, but he lets her hide and she appreciates it so very much.

Toeing off her shoes, she follows him down onto the blanket, shrugging off her coat while he's listing the extensive menu. By the end, she's smiling again, and also shaking her head at him a bit incredulously. ]

Damn, Caffrey. I'm impressed. Do you go all out like this for all your dates?

[ Neal left his own boots by the front door, I say, having forgotten all about them. He grins at her. ] Only when I'm trying to be impressive.

[ And the idea of doing a grilled cheese smorgasbord lost its romantic appeal pretty quickly when he found out about Coulson, but he's keeping that to himself.

He took one of her hands and kissed her fingers lightly. ] Is the tea okay, or do you want water?

[ It's a good thing he hadn't gone for the grilled cheese, to be honest. Just a few days earlier, she would have found it to be the sweetest, dorkiest thing anyone had ever done for her. Now, though... Well, crying on their first actual date would probably have been a bad thing.

She takes his hand properly in hers before he lets go, giving it a gentle squeeze. Her smile is still there, though it's more content than anything else now. ] Well, if one of the cowboys when to the effort, then I think I have to try the tea.

[ He pours them each a glass, offering a Daisy a toast. ]

To the finding a harbor in a storm.

[ Yeah, it's pretty clear from the way he's looking at her that he means. Y'know. Her. ]

[ The way he's looking at her does all sorts of things to her insides. It's not fair that with a single look and a handful of words he can reduce her to a puddle of melted goo. ]

To remembering what happiness feels like.

[ Because that's what he's done for her. She lifts her glass and taps it gently against his before taking a sip of the tea. The sweetness hits her first, the southern flavor in full force, but it's good and she has a second sip to savor it. ]

[ A smile breaks across his face, that particular, unfaked, spring-day grin that most people don't get to see. He takes a sip of his own tea, squinching one eye shut for a moment as he gets used to the taste again. He doesn't do heavy sweets, most of the time. The tea is good, it's just not at the top of his favorite flavor profile list. ]

I might need to water mine down.

[ The laugh that bursts out of her at his squinched eye and subsequent comment is one of actual joy. Just being around Neal makes her feel so much better, and then goes and does something like that and she can almost forget how horrible everything is. For just a few moments, they're a regular couple getting to know each other.

Those are moments she cherishes because she knows eventually they'll end. ]

What, you don't usually drink a cup of sugar in your tea?

I don't usually even have sugar in my coffee. [ Yes, he's one of those. He tilts his head, seemingly accepting a counterargument from thin air. ] If it's good coffee. There really isn't any good coffee here.

There really isn't. [ She scrunches up her nose at the idea of the coffee that's been a staple of her diet in this nightmare town. ] I mean, if it looks and smells like coffee, I'll drink it. I learned not to be too picky when I was living in my van and surviving on gas station and diner food.

[ He pauses in the middle of unloading food onto the blanket between them. ]

Is there a story there or should I not ask?

Why would you... [ Frowning in confusion, Daisy tilts her head to the side slightly, trying to think why he'd be concerned about it. A few seconds pass before she remembers he doesn't know that part of her past, and a second more for it to register that, for most people, living out of a van would have been one of the lower parts of their lives. ]

Sorry, I— [ She shakes her head and takes another quick sip of her tea. ] I forget that's a weird thing for normal people. No, it's nothing bad, it's just a part of my life. I left the orphanage when I was still a teenager, dropped out of high school, and spend some time shuffling around between friends. When I'd saved up enough money, I bought my van and lived it in for the two years before I joined SHIELD.

[ Shrugging, she sets her tea aside, making sure it's enough out of the way that she won't accidentally knock it over and make a mess. ] It was nice. It was the first thing that was really mine and wherever I wanted to go, I had my home with me. No more couches or lumpy spare room beds, no one waiting for me to leave. It was nice.

[ She repeats that last bit to remind herself that, at the time, it was nice. But that had been before she'd learned she was allowed to have something better. ]

[ Neal smiles. ] Not that weird. My best friend spends half his time living out of a storage unit.

[ He catches it, though, that reaffirmation. He knows what it means, too. He knows what it's like to look back from better places and see the life you thought was good before. How small it was, how much you didn't know could be better. It's like living in a valley and then climbing the mountain and getting to see how much farther the world goes.

He sets the plates out. ]

I didn't graduate either. Dropped out at eighteen.

[ Neal Caffrey never ceases to amaze her. Every little new thing she learns about him just serves to add fuel to the fire, making her adore him even more. How is that even possible?

Reaching up, she finally removes her borrowed hat, carefully setting it aside (though not near her tea) before reaching over to tap at the metal pin on his tie. ]

What's this?

[ He looks down at it, then back at her. Now it's his turn to be confused. The little coppery-gold bar is one of his favorites, broad at the clip and thinning near the point, the broader part with a little criss-cross pattern at the end. ] It's a tie bar.

[ Daisy makes a quiet humming sound of acknowledgment, leaning in a little closer to get a better look at it... Then, in a smooth movement, she grasps the clip at the end, pinching it to release, and pulls it and the tie free of his shirt. With the clip still attached, she wraps her hand around the tie and tugs him gently forward, crossing that last little distance between them to press her lips firmly to his. It hasn't been that long but it feels like forever since their last kiss. ]

[ Neal makes a softly startled sound that very quickly turns into an appreciative hum. She actually reeled him in by the tie. Never let it be said that Neal doesn’t appreciate style.

He lifts his hands to cup her face, tasting sweet tea on her lips and thinking, Perfect concentration, with a little flicker of pleased amusement that she would probably call him a dork for the comment.

He breaks for breath, feeling flushed. ] Maybe I should have left the food in the basket a little longer.

[ She would absolutely call him a dork for that comment and it would be entirely earned. But he's an adorable dork... and a very good kisser. Toe-curlingly good, in fact. ]

Maybe you should have. [ She agrees with a smile, feeling a little light-headed in the best way. Leaning in again (and still keeping hold of his tie), she presses a kiss to his cheek, followed by one on his jaw, then his neck. They're tasting kisses, the scent of him filling her lungs as she breathes him in. It's so tempting to read up and do that damn tie so she can loosen his collar... ]

030-035 » a-hunting they will go

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