030-035 » a-hunting they will go

[villagemod]

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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Comments

[abrightboy]

Malcolm fidgeted with one restraint with the fingers of his other hand.

"He came to talk to me at the meeting. He wasn't rude or anything but... he really seemed to think he had to prove something. And he thinks my theories are... I don't know. Pedestrian. And I think he thinks I have something wrong with me. Which isn't... wrong, really, but. It's mostly in the way he looks at me. Most people here don't treat me like I'm weird and damaged." People in the house didn't even treat him like he was weird and damaged when he shouted at nothing and broke dishes. "So maybe I'm just being overly sensitive."

[tinstar]

He slid his hand over, stealing Malcolm's hand up in his with a soft squeeze.

"I'll ask him about it. See what I can't see but.. you know it doesn't matter if he doesn't accept you as you are. We do. I do." He wasn't going to tell Dean how to feel but he would sus out the situation and if he needed to set Dean straight, he would. "And you're always welcome to come up to the Gull. I doubt he'll have any kind of attitude when there's someone to call him on it."

[abrightboy]

Malcolm tilted his head to look at Raylan, then leaned up and gently kissed him.

“You don’t have to if it’ll make things awkward. Just... I really appreciate having people here who do accept me. I want you to know. It’s not normal for me. It means everything.”

[tinstar]

It was odd in the nicest way to see a kiss coming and not need to weave out of the way. Raylan met it softly and his upper body leaned into it faintly when it broke like he wanted to follow it back to the modicum of peace he'd once found here.

"I don't care if it'll make things awkward. I wanna know and if he's got a problem with you, I need to know before it gets outta hand." He knew too well what a problem could turn into. "And I don't want you not comin' up there just because he's there. Though maybe that's just me bein' selfish."

[abrightboy]

Malcolm smiled down at his hands at Raylan’s defence, but at the suggestion it was being selfish, he couldn’t help turning its warmth up to the marshal’s face.

“Yeah?” He reached up to lightly grasp Raylan’s collar with his fingers. “Might have to come by, then. See what you’ve been up to over there.” He pressed another soft kiss to his mouth, braver when the first went over well, then one more.

God, his heart had been in his throat when they couldn’t find them. Ice ran through him at the thought that maybe they were gone and he wouldn’t see them again. That this warmth had been stolen.

If they were gone and he knew they’d gone home, he couldn’t begrudge them that but... so far they’d only seen their fellows disappear in death. Until they found them in the hole, his mind was already turning over all the horrible things that could have happened to them and where they’d find the bodies in the end.

[tinstar]

Malcolm's fingers were like a hook into his chest and no amount of horrors could keep the return tilt of his lips from coming back when Malcolm smiled at him like that. Raylan felt himself shifting forward, leaning into the kisses and using the hands he'd propped on either side of Malcolm to turn his hips to the right orientation so he could half lay down next/ on the smaller man.

The cold and the fear of the tunnels had set into more than his bones but Malcolm and the warmth and care he radiated all over threatened to work on banishing some of it. After everything they'd just been through, getting to have this, even for a second, was a balm he was fairly certain they both needed.

When he broke the kiss, he kept his face close to Malcolm's. "That offer to lay down with you still open?"

He hoped so, because clearly he was taking it.

[abrightboy]

Malcolm smiled, keeping his grasp on Raylan’s collar.

“With me, on me... whatever works for you,” he murmured, his eyes wandering Raylan’s face.

[tinstar]

"You're a dangerous kinda man," Raylan warned softly as he kissed Malcolm again. He knew he shouldn't deepen it; Malcolm was supposed to be going to sleep and he was..

He didn't know what he was. What he didn't want to be was seen as being here just for one thing, but damned if sinking into Malcolm wasn't some kind of blissful sanctuary where he felt.. Everything else quiet away to nothing. Where the tunnels and Winona and Doc didn't matter, the way he twisted himself up didn't matter.

[abrightboy]

"It's okay," Malcolm told him softly, reaching up to stroke along his cheek now that he was close enough to reach it.

He didn't feel used. He felt relieved to be here with Raylan again, after thinking he was lost and then... not knowing what to do for him when he came back shaken.

He pressed a gentle kiss to his jaw, then his cheek, then a lingering one at his mouth.

"It's okay."

[tinstar]

The urge to take this all a step further, towards a release he knew he'd lose himself in, was tempered by the soft touches and kisses that left Raylan more than pliable and soft. He breathed in the comfort, turning his face slightly into the kisses and kissing Malcolm back once they got to his lips.

Did he dare trust this?

Raylan studied Malcolm's face once the kiss broke, marveling at where he was and what he was doing and how... okay it felt. Something in him had shifted, being here. He hated to think it was lack of options but since the first day he'd kissed Malcolm, he'd only thought about doing more of it. It couldn't be lack of options because there was some large part of Raylan that still wanted to kiss Doc until the man understood how everyone felt about him. Didn't that mean he shouldn't be here at all?

He didn't know that either. All he did know was that he didn't want to hurt Malcolm and he didn't want to stop doing whatever this was.

"I don't understand you," he admitted softly. "You're.. fearless and tormented and bright and.." He took a breath. "Determined towards a kindness I don't recognize. Outta all of us, you oughta be doing the worst and here you are moppin' up a couple of shakey hats."

[abrightboy]

"There's enough room in this house for all of us to have our turn being mopped up." He ran his fingers through the hair at Raylan's temple. "Besides, I can only do that because two hats kept me together this long."

Sometimes he felt like all he ever felt was fear. Sometimes he felt so inured to it that he could step through it and come out offering a friend a hand.

"What happened to you wasn't small or inconsequential and you need to show yourself the same kindness and patience you've shown me."

[tinstar]

Raylan smiled crookedly, softly and bent down to steal another less intense kiss.

"I'm startin' to think you're not real, Malcolm Bright. Far too much hope and far too little cynicism to be from a real place." And far too skilled at handing out forgiveness and understanding.

"Patience for myself, I got. Kindness maybe not so much. Guess I'll have to rely on your help for that one."

[abrightboy]

Malcolm breathed a self-conscious laugh.

“Relentless horror can crush you,” he said knowledgeably. “Or you can choose not to let it by remembering there’s good in the world and that you can help it.”

He smiled. It was small but warm and genuine.

“I would be willing to contribute the kindness whenever you want.”

[tinstar]

"Relentless horror is the way of our job. Just.. not like this." He took a deep breath, eyes drifting down Malcolm's shoulder before looking back up to meet his gaze, smile pulling a little as he was allowed to set everything off onto the side. If there was good in this world, unabashed good, he was looking at it.

"I am willing to take whatever you feel generous enough to share," he replied, shifting to lay down proper and sink into the pillows with a satisfied sigh despite himself. "Startin' with the invitation to lay down here."

He hadn't laid down since they'd been rescued and for all his fight against it, the bed was a welcome respite from the number of chairs he'd been frequenting.

[abrightboy]

“Good,” Malcolm said, smile broader, letting his fingertips rest at Raylan’s chest again. It was easy to reach in his restraints and Raylan would recognize it as a comforting point of contact, he hoped. “But don’t worry, I’ll scream in a few hours or so, so nobody completely forgets the relentless horror,” he teased.

[tinstar]

Every touch from Malcom was a comforting point of contact. It was particular skill that he didn't think was taught at Quantico or Harvard. Raylan leaned in to press one last kiss to Malcolm's mouth before settling into the pillows again.

"Can't let that happen, can we," he teased, arm settling across Malcolm's chest with another heavy breath. Pressing another kiss into Malcolm's shoulder, Raylan closed his eyes and immediately started drifting off. The fear of the nightmares that would come had been forgotten for the moment, swayed by the sirens call of a soft, warm bed and a companion that was just as happy to be there as he was.