villagelogs | 059-061 » the place where you stop the story

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059-061 » the place where you stop the story

WHO: Everyone.
WHERE: Eastern/Central/Southern Mathias
WHEN: Day 059-061
WHAT: Time returns to "normal" and Mathias grants a reprieve.
WARNINGS: (PM this account to have a warning added!)
NOTES: Plotting post over here! The next log will be posted the weekend of ~~May 15th~~ May 22nd.

RECOMMENDED ♫ Nathan Johnson "Foul Play"

DAY 059-061
A BRIEF REPRIEVE
“There is no real ending. It’s just
the place where you stop the story.”
— Frank Herbert
Residents awake to a peaceful morning with the sun shining and earth remaining still. There is no unsettling shaking to rouse them at dawn, and time has continued moving onward as they slept. Whatever state they were in the night before, they remain that way now, for good or for bad.

On the surface, there seems to be little lasting effect on the tiny town from that strange series of days, save for the memories of any traumatic experiences residents may have faced — but there are always consequences within Mathias. The perpetrators of acts against the town are tormented by nightmares of those acts being used against them, and those who did not raise a hand to stop those acts of destruction may yet face consequences of their own. For now, however, the unwilling townspeople should do their best to rest and recover from the disturbing ordeals of late, for this reprieve from the madness shall surely be shortlived.

THE NEW ARRIVALS
The newest arrivals to Mathias will wake up on the beach near The Grey Gull. It's a bit chilly out with their wet clothes, but surely there's something to help warm them inside the restaurant. They may even find some alcohol within — and not just the cowboys' homemade moonshine.

CONDITIONS UPDATE

— THE HISTORY MUSEUM has not fared well with the return of "normal" time. The once esteemed wooden building is now a charred ruin, the recent fire leaving behind little of the contents within for study. The structure is unstable and it is not wise to venture into the ruins for long.

— THE WEATHER conditions remain fairly typical for early fall: warm days and cool nights. It feels almost like spring arriving except that there fewer red and orange leaves on the ground and more of them oddly returning to the trees and slowly fading to green. It's like watching one of those nature documentaries that have a timelapse of the seasons, only it's going in reverse.

— THE FOG has retreated from some areas!
— Residents may now wander the southern stretch of the forest surrounding Mathias Township — it is possible to leave the paths but potentially unwise to do so.
— The fog has also retreated farther into the western section of town, now stretching across town between Stine Road and Shelley Drive. This has revealed the Chasm in the earth that stretches from one side of town to the other between Stine and Hill Lane.
— Access to the northern section of the forest is still blocked beginning a few dozen yards past the treeline; this section of fog will urge residents to stay huddled within the town proper by inducing a physical reaction of panic and fear.

— DEATHS & DISAPPEARANCES continue! Max Guevara has vanished into the fog. Claire Novak's body can be spotted on Day 059 facedown at the bottom of the Chasm between Hill and Stine, near Phillips Drive; by the morning of Day 060, her body will be gone. (Attempts may be made to reach her body but will likely not end well for those involved. Such attempts should be reported under Exploration.)

— ALCOHOL is still in Mathias! Just barely. (Supply is running very low after recent town events.) 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 was also restocked with its lower-end offerings of a variety of alcohol types. (Alcohol does not replenish as food does.)

OOC NOTES

— PROJECT HELP Your mod needs help with some projects!

— FUTURE PLANNING If you haven't, please answer the questions here for future log planning. I will almost definitely need some of these answers for the log going up the weekend of May 15, so act quickly! Late submissions will not be considered for that log.

— UPDATES Don't forget to report updates as they come up! Changes to locations (like toppling a few bookshelves in the library), big plots you have coming up that will affect the game (parties, major property destruction, etc), or exciting discoveries that may tie into the game's mythology (even the things provided by the mod) are very helpful to have in one place so relevant page updates can be made.

— MOD STATUS The usual reminder that it's just Amy steering this ship, so things will are going to be pretty slow for a while. Apologies in advance, and please don't feel shy about pestering me if you're stuck waiting for something.

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I haven't given up on us getting home but I don't think this town is going to help us. I think it's going to be something one of us does.

( he just has no idea what that is. he's grown frustrated and weary over the last few months because he hasn't been able to figure any way out of this mess.

he's been stuck, stagnant. )

I don't know where the chasm came from but I have a feeling it won't remain there. Not long after this discovery.

Remember the crack in the ground? That disappeared after a couple of days.

[ she doesn't remove her hand from his. elena finds comfort in it, feeling grounded. elijah's going nowhere if his hand is in hers.

her brows furrow as she thinks it over. ]

And now the General Store's restocking again after it stopped. I wonder if they're connected.

I don't know. I don't think anyone knows. I've tried and tried to find some common thread but there's nothing. Nothing about this place makes sense.

( and it irritates him beyond belief. he wants to figure this place out but he's run into wall after wall.

the only thing that's kept him relatively grounded is her. )

I dislike that there's so few answers with this place.

That's not normal, is it?

[ she looks at him, brows slightly furrowed. he's lived more lives than the one she's still trying to get a handle of. while elijah was handling mathias pretty well, she had to wonder just how many towns and cities he went to that posed more questions than answers. ]

Before I knew about vampires in Mystic Falls, I just thought... you think it's a wolf attack or some really random murder. But now that I know... maybe Mathias has its own supernatural underbelly.

I don't know what this is.

( and that bothers him immensely. he should have some kind of answers by now but there's nothing. )

Everything I've considered has been proven wrong. This is something completely new.

Something new in a thousand years.

[ elena exhales a little heavily, shoulders slumping. she shakes her head incredulously. ]

Maybe the world wants to keep you on your toes, too. [ she steps into him, nudging his arm. it's not a comfort, she knows, but she wants him to know that she doesn't think any less of him for not knowing what's happening. ]

There are better ways to keep me on my toes.

( she alone was enough to keep him on his toes. they didn't need to add in some town that angered him and confused him at every step.

but, it's pointless to think about and complain about because he's here and he's not leaving just yet. he looks down at their hands and then up at her. )

Are you all right?

[ she inhales deeply and exhales loudly, feeling her shoulders move and none of the tension shift at all. she could lie, but she doesn't want to. ]

No.

[ with an unhappy press of her lips, she shakes her head and keeps her gaze straight ahead. ]

I will be, obviously. I have to be. It's just… a lot, seeing a dead body. You'd think I'd be used to it by now.

I know you will be.

( seeing a dead body is so common for him now that he barely blinks but he knows that, while it's something that elena's seen, it's not something she wants to see as much as he does. )

Is there anything I can do to help you?

( she deserves that kind of attention. )

[ inhaling deeply, she sighs heavily, feeling her shoulders sag. she wishes she had a good answer for him. she knows that elijah just wants to help, and that fixing things is how he does that. but there's nothing he can do—what she needs is outside of his realm of strengths. ]

I think walking with me. [ she looks up at him and gives him a small smile. ] I feel like we've been cooped up in the Boarding House for so long that a walk is nice.

Then, we'll walk.

( he doesn't mind staying out of the room for a little while. maybe some fresh air would be good for them. he sighs, closing his eyes and keeping his hand in her hers. )

Is there anywhere in particular you wanted to walk to? Or just walk?

( not that there's a lot of exciting places to be in this town. )

Edited 2021-05-18 22:08 (UTC)

Just walk.

[ maybe she should have a plan, especially since this is mathias. but every time she has a plan, it gets thrown to the wayside, anyway. in the end, does it even matter? as long as they don't walk into a ditch or a part of the fog that's man-killing, she thinks they should be find.

this could almost be considered normal. ]

Go straight... Go left whenever we want to. Turn around... [ she lifts her shoulders and smiles, sighing a little softly. ] Maybe we'll find something. Maybe we won't. It'd be nice just to walk for once without feeling like we have to solve some mystery that's unsolvable.

All right, we can walk. I'd suggest not really looking around for anything. Just walk.

( they don't need to go looking for anything or seeking anything out. they can just walk and get some fresh air and act as if they're not in some strange town that they can't escape. )

Just focus on walking, then. Don't think about this place, about what we saw, about anything but walking and breathing.

You do realise that now I'm thinking about it because you told me not to, right?

[ she looks up at him with an amused smile, brows crinkling together. sometimes elijah can be funny. it's stopped being a surprise to her and has started to become the norm. ]

And now I'm also thinking about how my breathing. Am I loud? Am I not loud enough? Am I annoying Elijah with my huffing and puffing?

[ she sighs, shaking her head in amusement. this is what he gets for saying they need to not think about anything but walking and breathing. ]

You're always annoying me.

( it's a quick quip that he doesn't mean. he shoots her a look, even going so far as to smirk at her before he sighs and looks forward again. )

I'm tired of this place. Of not being able to do anything about it and not having any kind of answers.

( he doesn't know who else to say it to except her. )

Because you're used to being in the know, right?

[ she imagines that someone like him, someone as old as he is, would always be the one who knows the most. it must be a big change in pace for him. how many decades had he spent being the smartest person in the room?

she sighs and shakes her head. ]

I'm... used to never knowing what's going on. I wish I could tell you how to get comfortable with it, but I've never been the person who knows what's going on.

I'm used to being able to figure out what's going on even if I don't know at first. It's been weeks, Elena. What do we know?

( ultimately, nothing. they've been able to figure out bits and pieces here and there but they don't know anything that's going to be helpful. )

I just wish there was something that gave us...some indication that we were on the right path. That we were going to get out of here at some point.

Some people have left for good.

[ but that doesn't make her feel overly hopeful. no, in fact, it makes her feel even worse. she knows that claire is gone and she would have to be home (she hopes, she can only hope) because she died here.

all elena wants to do is give him an answer, but she knows she's just as lost as he is. ]

But you have to die... like really die. [ she scratches at her chin. ] I wonder if people... if they're really dead.

There's no way to know.

( he sighs, shaking his head. )

And yes, people have left but do we know what happened to them? Do we know if they got home or if they just...I don't know.

( elijah slides a thumb against his lip thoughtfully. )

It's another question. I don't like questions.

[ or if they're dead. that's what he doesn't say, but elena thinks that's what they're both thinking. what happens after mathias? she doesn't think mathias is another realm, even if it's likely. its isolation is suspicious and somewhat magical in the way no one seems to arrive via car into town.

elena doesn't want to return to her theory that everyone is dead.

she regards him with a small amused smile. ]

I'm guessing Twenty Questions is out of the question then?

Haven't we already played twenty questions?

( he's sure that's been something they've done during other high stress days in this town. he blows out a breath and looks over at her. )

Is there something in particular you wanted to know?

( or was that just her suggestion to pass the time? )

[ he's right, that had been her suggestion to try and pass the time. he's a thousand-year-old man... she's pretty sure twenty questions will hardly cover his life experience. ]

How good are you at Eye Spy? Because I'm a champion.

[ she's horrible at it. ]

I don't know if I've ever played that before.

( the mikaelsons weren't a family that played those types of games to pass the time during long car trips or anything like that. he glances over at her and shakes his head. )

I know what it is, before you ask.

[ elena closes her mouth, appearing sheepish though she smiles. what? she's allowed to presume he has no idea what that game is when he says that!

she forgoes asking him why he's never played it before. she can easily join the dots. ]

So, then you know how to play. [ she stands up a little taller and smiles broadly. ] You can play your first game ever with me.

Fine.

( elijah sighs and shakes his head before he looks over at her. he gestures for her to go first because she's going to have to show him how it's done. )

You first.

( his eyes are already scanning the area, trying to take in what she might pick. )

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