villagelogs | 037-040 » the reason for time

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037-040 » the reason for time

WHO: Everyone.
WHERE: Eastern/Central Mathias
WHEN: Day 037-040
WHAT: The dead return and the living wake to changes within Mathias Township.
WARNINGS: Some explicit sexual content in threads. (PM this account to have a warning added!)
NOTES: Plotting post over here!

RECOMMENDED ♫ Kammarheit "Sleep after Toyle, Port after Stormie Seas"

DAY 037
THE DEAD RETURN
“The only reason for time is so that everything
doesn't happen at once.” —Albert Einstein
The dead return to Mathias forever changed by their experiences. Waking along the beach, near the tree line, or among the graves, they will find that their bodies are not as they remember them. They are whole again and not torn to shreds by the shadow creatures that cannot be described, but they are also not as they were before the Hunt. These residents will find, so strangely, that their bodies are in the physical state in which they first arrived in Mathias — any injuries or recovery they have made since their initial arrival no longer exists, as if their time in Mathias has simply been a horrible nightmare. Except they all now carry a last reminder of the Hunt with them: spiderweb-thin healed scars marking their injuries from the Hunt. Those who were injured by fire in the other realm also carry those burns with them.

The dead are not the only things that have returned to Mathias. Inexplicably, fall is back, with the temperature finally reaching above freezing and snow falling from trees to reveal beautiful autumnal colors. As the sun rises higher in the lightly cloudy sky and the day warms, the snow begins rapidly melting, puddles growing in the slowly revealed grass and little rivers forming in the streets. And with that snow comes the frozen blood from the deaths to the Hunt, tinting the street river on Phillips Drive a sickening shade of red.

Another oddity that residents will notice: houses with broken windows from the encounter with the fog on Day 015 have now been completely repaired, though any boards put in place are still there somehow. A small bit of good news, at least? And truly, how kind of Mathias to clean up its own mess.

Finally, alcohol is back. Enjoy in moderation, friends, for more will not be arriving the following morning.

THE NEW ARRIVALS
The newest arrivals to Mathias will wake up on the beach near The Grey Gull. It's quite chilly out with their wet clothes, but surely there's something to help warm them inside the restaurant. Indeed, their timing is perfect, for alcohol has finally returned to Mathias Township — and not just the cowboys' homemade moonshine.

DAY 038-039
THE CHANGE OF SEASON
The continued warm weather proves that the unseasonable shift of the previous day was not merely a fluke. Once again, the sun rises and brings with it a temperature that feels almost spring-like, save for the fact that each day there seem to be more and more leaves on the trees in hues of red and orange. For those who have been in Mathias for some time, this new type of weird may be almost normal at this point, but newer arrivals will likely find it quite odd.

The gently trickling river running along Phillips Drive is still somewhat pink in color as the snow continues to melt and refreeze each night. By Day 040, the bloody snow will finally be gone completely, though the relief will be... short-lived.

DAY 040
THE BLINDING WHITE
In the late morning of Day 040, when the sun is visible through patchy greyish clouds, the fog sweeps into town like a like a tidal wave. It moves in quickly and without warning, not from the waterfront but the forest, cascading through every street in a thick wave of white. Rather than a soft blanket enveloping the town, it is a heavy weight pressing down, blotting out the sky in a way that almost feels suffocating, for none can see further than their outstretch hand.

Those outside when it rolls in are left wandering blind, stumbling toward shelter as you're unable to even see your feet beneath you, let alone any obstacles in your path. Perhaps you call out for help, hoping for another voice to guide you toward shelter or simply another living soul. Or perhaps you were lucky enough to already be inside when the fog descended, quickly closing doors and windows to keep it from creeping in.

Unlike the last time the fog swept into the town, residents who encounter it are not immediately killed. Instead, they are simply disoriented, possibly losing their sense of time and place, and it is only after prolonged exposure that they will begin to feel off. A sense of being ill will cling to them if they are in the fog for too long, including dizziness, lightheadedness, or nausea — the time it takes to manifest varies from person to person, as does the duration it will last after leaving the fog.

By nightfall, the fog still has not dissipated.

CONDITIONS UPDATE

— THE WEATHER conditions are fairly typical for late fall: chilly "sweater weather" days and nights that can dip just below freezing. You don't want to be outside without a coat, but it won't kill anyone if they bundle up. Probably.

— 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 western 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 blocking these areas is ill-advised.

— DISAPPEARANCES continue. Castiel and Sam Winchester have vanished, and Dean Winchester has not returned with the others after his death during the Hunt.

— THE GRAVEYARD has now seen around a dozen burials, both below and above ground. With the weather warming, though, something may need to be done about the handful of temporary graves aboveground...

— ALCOHOL has returned to Mathias! A small stock of beer and cheap wine may be found at the General Store, and some homes may have a small store of alcohol in the fridge or pantry. The Grey Gull has also been restocked with its lower-end offerings of a variety of alcohol types. Alcohol does not replenish in the same way as food.

— THE GREY GULL has been cleaned up and stocked with moonshine. Along with the newly restocked usual offerings, the place almost seems like an actual bar again.

— THE GENERAL STORE is in a bit of a state following the brutal slaughter of two residents during the Hunt. Cleanup on aisle 3, anyone?

OOC NOTES

— FOOD is now being mysteriously restocked as per usual, including inside homes and at the General Store. Alcohol is not being restocked. Use those rationing skills, friends.

— REWARD REDEPEMPTION is back and will soon have a new option for anyone looking to spend big AP and learn a bit more of the lore of the town.

— MADNESSES due to the Hunt have been earned by Klaus Hargreeves, Ellie, and Malcolm Bright and may now be claimed. Players may also claim additional sanity loss from the aftermath of the Hunt; only losses from the Hunt itself have been deducted from totals thus far.

— SANITY REGAIN is now available! Players will submit a form with some details of the progress their character has made and the mod will review and decide on the numbers of points that will be regained.

— MOD STATUS The usual reminder that 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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There probably won't be too much happening that night, after the food is finished and the dishes are done. They get through some more whiskey. Doc makes a call to 1306 to say something vague about babysitting a drunk Negan - not entirely a lie, given how much whiskey they've had - and not returning that night. Another round of whiskey taste-testing. Some Uno, in which Doc shows he's not as bad at the game as he might have first let on. They should probably check the whiskey again just to be sure it hasn't gone off in the last ten minutes since they touched it.

After the shower, they're down to the last two fingers of whiskey, and the tight pants and all the other layers get folded over the back of the couch. Doc ends up sitting in bed wearing nothing but borrowed trackpants, corner of a soft blanket covering his feet, back resting against the headboard, scars and nipples indecently exposed while he contemplates another smoke, playing with his cigarette tin case between his hands in his lap. His face is a little warm to the touch and an empty whiskey tumbler tattles on his drinking.

"I feel guilty for sleeping through the night, these days," he drawls, gaze settling on his cigarette tin. Like he owes it to Malcolm to punish himself because Malcolm doesn't have the luxury of dropping off this plane of existence for a quarter of the day. Raylan had offered a couple of days ago to stay with Malcolm but it doesn't make him feel any better about this blissful silence that has settled down around them.

Negan isn't sure how he feels about the guys back home thinking he needs babysitting, but he begrudgingly lets Doc have this one. Better than owning up to what they got into earlier, or to say they're both drunk as shit on whiskey, playing fucking uno.

By the time they've showered and changed -- Negan in a pair of sweats and a loose tank, he's feeling... maybe not good, but all loose-limbed and relaxed, alcohol coursing through him. His eyes trail over Doc briefly before he flops down next to him in bed. "Wouldn't say no to one of those," he nods towards the cigarette case Doc seems to be debating.

He folds an arm behind his head, lets out a pleasant sigh. "Try not to. You run yourself ragged, you're not gonna be good to anyone."

Pot, kettle, black. Whatever. It's the truth. "You gotta take care of yourself too. Besides, it's one night."

A lot of things can go wrong in one night. Doc purses his lips and pops the lid to his cigarette case open, swinging his arm over, holding it out for Negan to take one. He won't be able to sit next to him and not have one, so he helps himself to his own stick after that. Mindful of not striking a match in front of Negan, Doc does it with his back partially turned, one hand cupping the side even though there's no wind in the room, keeping the fire hidden from view until his cigarette is lit. He then uses his one to light Negan's up.

Reaching over to the nightstand, he brings his empty whiskey tumbler over, setting it down between them to use as an ashtray.

"I've gotten away with... too many indiscretions, thinking it's one night." This isn't throwing shade on Negan and what he did with other people on his one nights. This is Doc when he used to live his life like every night is going to be his last.

"What do you do, Negan?" he asks after blowing smoke over his other shoulder, holding the cigarette between his fingers, turning his head to look down at Negan from where he's sitting. Doc doesn't spend much time in the house and often he's off on his own in the patch of willow trees or in the library or going around these other houses or getting caught up in someone else's troubles for the day. He doesn't know what most of the house gets up to while he's gone for hours at a time.

"During the day, I mean."

Of course shit can go wrong in a single night. He lost an entire outpost in a single night because some assholes decided murdering people in their sleep was the way to go. But sometimes people like to hear pretty little lies. Makes them feel safe. Makes them relax a little.

"Haven't we all, Doc." He takes a drag off the cigarette, lips curling into a wry smile. They've all had indiscretions that came back and bit them in the ass eventually.

"Hm..." He looks up at Doc thoughtfully. "Try to keep busy, I guess. Told Malcolm I'd do yoga with him some morning."

There's a quiet chuckle. "Otherwise-- checking the shops we can get into, looking through the houses some. Back home, my days were full of relegating responsibilities to others, making sure people were working, everybody was safe. Here, there's a lot of scavenging, exploring. Don't think we're gonna happen upon an exit any time soon though."

He pauses. "Maybe if we ever thaw out long enough, I can find a nice patch of land somewhere, plant some shit if we got enough seeds together. Always wanted a garden. Growing shit's satisfying as fuck."

And if the asshole laughs at him for it, he's getting a jab to the ribs no matter how relaxed Negan is right now.

An incredulous snort greets the yoga comment. Never say never, but. He couldn't picture Negan doing yoga.

"For some unfathomable reason you seem to have grown on him," Doc notes. Sure, Negan has some redeeming qualities about him. Even when he is seizing every opportunity to wriggle under Doc's skin, to say and do stupid shit as if he's trying to get a reaction out of him. But from one monster to another, he knows that they are both ugly on the inside, and Doc sees past the Negan mask that seems to have beguiled and ensnared everyone else.

"There are seeds in the greenhouse. Miss Yennefer has started attempting to grow a few things, in pots." Doc takes a puff and breathes out a sigh. "I will sever hands from wrists with a butter knife if anyone touches them and kills them as a result," he warns with a sidelong glare. This means you too, Negan.

Averting his gaze, he scratches the bridge of his nose and sniffles.

"You know Wyatt, he- he had these grand plans for his own farm, too. A quiet life, out in the country. I was to help him build it. Didn't take one night to render those dreams to dust. Hardly took thirty seconds. There are men in this world who are destined to grow things. To be nurturing, to be a blessing unto others. And then there are men like us. All we do is take, and kill, and destroy. If I am to have dreams tonight, if I have any tears left to shed, it will not be for the lives I have taken. Perhaps you can use the corpses you have made for fertilizer for your garden," Doc muses with a shrug. "But we are so often not the creator of beautiful things."

"Well, I'm a charming motherfucker, what can I say?" But even he can't say why Malcolm's taken a shine to him, even after he's admitted shit he's done in his past. Guy's a good one is probably the answer, same for pretty much everyone else in their house.

"Hey, I'm not gonna mess with anything that belongs to anybody else." Butter knives away, buddy.

The amusement dies away as Doc talks though, Negan grows quiet, eyes lingering on the end of his cigarette for a moment. He's not wrong, maybe. If there was one goddamn bone in him capable of creating or nurturing shit, maybe he'd have had a family. Maybe he'd have been the man Lucille deserved and they'd have gotten pregnant, had a nice little life instead of what it became.

"You know, I wasn't a killer before-- the world went to shit. I might've been an asshole, but goddamn, I'd have never... but then I had to, you know? After the first kill, it just-- starts to get easier. You start to think the only thing that's left is to sink to the bottom with the rest of humanity until you find yourself in the position where it's kill one guy you don't know versus twenty people you know and like. It feels easy. I keep thinking-- before I came here, I lost a lot of people. They were slaughtered in their sleep. Sick shit, man."

He lets out a sight and goes to tap his ashes off in the bottle. "The group that did it thought they killed all of us, but boy, were they wrong. I didn't want to kill any of'em, but I genuinely felt they left me few other goddamn choices. So I chose two of them to make an example, to put them in their place. Lately, I keep seeing their fucking heads every time I close my eyes. One of'em kept trying to talk to his lady, all fucking gibberish at that point. Beside the point, but... since I got here, I keep thinking of it, wondering how I let myself get there. Told myself it was necessary, it's humanity now. But minus the dead, you assholes don't have it much better here. We're all just trying to survive a dead world, but... none of you steal from each other, rape each other, fucking hurt each other for the pleasure of it. No one needs the threat of pain to stay in line."

He trails off, brows drawn together. "You think it gets to the point where a guy can't actually change?"

Doc wasn't a killer before he picked up a gun, either. There had maybe been some blood while he was practising medicine but that was it. There are some people who make pulling the trigger easy, but even after all this time he still lies to himself about how difficult it is, how he doesn't crave the violence. He wants to not be able to relate and for the most part he's succeeding at pretending.

"We are with people for whom it is not necessary," is all Doc has to say about their time here after a stretch of silence. For the most part, the other people arriving into Mathias have been civil. They have all had the same thing happen to them, and they share an understanding about this place and how they need to behave around each other. Sometimes someone crosses a line - it happens - but leading by example here means minding your own business, being caring and generous when the situation calls for it, and recognising that either the whole community is going home in one piece or nobody is. It's got nothing to do with killing.

"Some things can be changed, but. I think it gets to a point where a guy sees no reason to change." Some things simply cannot be changed, even with a cataclysmic, life-shattering metamorphosis brought about by external circumstances, by personal tragedies, by unwanted curveballs. But for the most part? Doc expects people to be lazy. If a man is still judged on his past deeds, if a man cannot atone for his sins, if a man accomplishes nothing more or special or new by changing his tune, there is no reason to change. He would like to think that he himself has changed for the better, but he knows that he is the same hot mess inside as he had been a hundred and fifty years ago.

"If you will always be known as the Negan who killed those two people. If they will haunt you no matter what you do from here on out. You would not change. Why would you?"

"Guess I don't really have much of a chance anyway. Got a war to fight back home if I get back there and people are depending on me. Gotta keep'em alive, however I can." Whatever it means he has to do and it's going to have to be some fucked up shit.

"You know, somewhere deep down, I'm always hoping I won't live long enough to really have to think about all this shit, let it catch up to me like I know it will. Or hell, maybe I wish I'd died at the beginning of it and Lucille had lived. She'd-- have been better than me. She was damn sure smarter than I could ever hope to be." Oh, hell, she wouldn't have made even one of his mistakes.

The butt of his cigarette gets stamped out before he drops it in the empty bottle between them. "Doesn't matter. Put wishes in one hand, shit in the other, see which one fills up quicker and all that."

He shifts a little, rolling on to his side to face Doc properly. "Anyway, fuck it. You ready to get some shut eye?"

Doc is too far gone to muster up one of his feel-good speeches. A little too much whiskey. Two too many cigarettes. Nothing to assuage Negan that he is a good man. He probably isn't. They might live with decent people but there are probably no good men even in their house.

"I know of no one merciful enough to let us die swiftly and painlessly, and let us take our sins along with." Not everyone is vindictive but he sees cold and heartless plenty, to varying degrees. "Lucille would have thought the same of you. But it is one thing to think these things and another to have to live through it."

Breathing out a sigh, Doc finishes his cigarette and puts it out, taking the bottle away and putting it back onto the nightstand. He shuffles down to lie on the bed, staring up at the ceiling, glancing over at Negan before turning to look at him properly. The scars add a bit of character to a face that already tells many stories.

Usually he struggles to fall asleep in the pitch black darkness. That alone has suffocating properties. He doesn't have the vulnerability to ask if he can keep some kind of night light on. But he will shuffle just a little closer towards Negan. He can handle the dark better when he's got company.

"Yeah, yeah... it's the assholes who always live." That's just a fact of life, isn't it? He muffles a yawn against his hand as Doc starts to scoot down. Honestly -- he wouldn't have minded a little light if Doc needed it.

But as it is, he shifts closer to the other man, enough to sling an arm around him comfortably. No need to be shy now, after all the shit they've managed to do.

Predictably, no good deed goes unpunished. Doc tenses up a bit, drawing one leg up as Negan's warm hand glides over his bare skin. He has nothing to say about the transgression but it didn't go completely unnoticed, clearly.

Eventually his breathing evens out a little bit again as Doc wordlessly rolls over straight into the role of small spoon, and Negan can feel Doc relaxing beneath the weight of his arm. At least they're both wearing pants so nothing needs to be read into the butt-to-crotch touching once they get a little too close to each other.

He's about to ask if Doc wants him to move it, but... then the cowboy is squirming over to his other side and getting comfortable. He lets out a sigh and settles in a little more comfortably.

Look, he'll be a perfect fucking gentleman. He won't even joke about any awkward situations the morning wood might get them into. Probably because he's gonna pay for drinking so much and absolutely fuck all will feel amusing, but still.

Right now? Exhaustion has finally won out and he actually gets some goddamn sleep for a change.

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037-040 » the reason for time

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