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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[ The pair of them with their lack of concern for their own well being, were going to drive him into an early grave.

Tim rubbed at his eyes then began to sign again.

Towards himself, towards her and then he made a circle with his thumb above his chest over his sternum.

No don't worry he's not saying he loves you Callisto. He's saying he cares about her in danger and death. He makes the gesture again and points towards Raylan. He motions towards Raylan again, before drawing the hand back towards himself.

Raylan was his. ]

[Raylan shook his head and glanced down at the ground.]

There's death out in the houses and the streets and the field, we don't need the damned chasm for that. Let her die a couple times, see how flippant she is about it then.

[Turning around, Raylan walked over and snatched his jacket up out of the dirt and brushed it off before slinging it back over his shoulders.]

Claire Novak is sittin' at the bottom of that gap, Tim. You oughta know that.

[For the second time today, she considers diving headlong into the pit out of spite. Maybe she'd come back after. Maybe she wouldn't. Maybe she'd be pulled back down to Tartarus, and she could go back to coaxing Ares into helping her get at Xena.

Staring fixedly at Tim, she copies his gesture for caring, taps her chest, and shakes her head. She repeats the process over again, to drive home the point: she does not care about herself. Not one bit.

And then Raylan says Claire's name, and though she never met the woman herself, he'd already told her that that was who the dead body was. She waits, vaguely curious about what the reaction will be.]

[ Tim really did begin to wonder how he was going to look with grey hair.

The irony of the situation was not lost to him. Raylan and Callisto were two people carrying around a deep well of grief and a guilt complex that neither of them was ever going to wash off. No matter how many people they saved. Or how many times they died.

He had never met Claire Novak, so his response to her death was his response to the death of any innocent caught in the crossfire. A sense of regret that he could not have stopped their death, but it came from the place of the job and his identity as a lawman. Not a personal connection to the victim.

In this respect, at least in Kentucky, Raylan really was the heart of the office. He took a lot of the death they saw very personally indeed. ]

It's not your fault. [ He said with soft intensity towards Raylan. ] You keep trying to take that kind of credit, you are going to start wanting to jump in this chasm with Callisto.

[ As for Callisto. He simply turned back to her, looked at her for a long breath and then signed out simply. I care.

Then he started to walk. He went between them one last time but was aiming himself to get out of the way. A part of him hoped that maybe, just maybe they'd catch on to how much they had in common but maybe the best he could hope for was ... ]

If you two decide to get back to fussing, try to avoid falling in the damn ditch this time.

Correct, [Raylan replied in a steely voice.] It's not my fault.

[Pointing out fact did not mean he was taking responsibility for it. But adding to the bodies down there was not something he was looking to do. He was not going to eat his gun or pitch himself into the chasm, not without Mathis pushing him.

Raylan stayed where he was, eyes following Tim for a long moment before it settled back onto Callisto. He was curious what she'd do next, including and not limited to her coming after him again.]

[It is incredibly easy to goad Callisto into a fight, either purposefully or entirely by accident - but the happy flip side of that is that unless her target is Xena or someone connected to Xena, it's generally easy to distract her away from a fight, too. She's sinking into a deep funk, but she's not on the attack anymore.

"Your friend is a fool," she huffs to Raylan in Greek, trusting that her disparaging tone will carry over even though her words will be meaningless to him.]

[All he knew was that she was talking in reference to Tim and it wasn't a compliment but defending Tim's intelligence wasn't his place. Not when he couldn't be sure how intense said opinion had been.]

Callisto, we are not scared of death. He does death. I do death. These? [He ran his hand over the left side of his face, fingers tracing the faint latticework of scars where his skin had been torn from his face. ] Came from death. I have died twice - [That at least, was easy to mime. Two was two was two, right?] This is not about being scared.

You-[Gesture at her] Feed [Fingers to his mouth repeatedly.] Mathis. This place, Mathis [He said, stomping his foot.]

It's what Mathis wants.

How?

[She asks, fully interested, gesturing to the left side of her own face to indicate that she's asking about the scars.]

What death? Here?

Here. A- [He stopped, frowning slightly as he thought out how best to convey it all, pushing his hat back onto his head a little with his thumb.]

A monster- [He clawed his hands, a faux lunge towards her that was followed by him clawing his face and chest. His clamped fist came together and twisted apart 'flinging' to the side before dropping out of mime. Did that really need words to accompany it?]

Claire? This is her second time too. First time was the fog, [He pointed back towards the trees before casting his hands back and forth around in front of him - The Fog, not the trees - and finished it with a mime of choking himself.]

Mathis is death enough without us adding to it. [A finger bobbed between them and Raylan nodded at the gap before shaking his head.]

["I don't care," she says in Greek, as she moves to sit down on the ground at the pit's edge. "I'm death everywhere." But her tone is worn out rather than angry, and she punctuates the declaration with a heavy sigh.]

You want out?

[Out of the town, she means, which she hopes will come across.]

I want out.

[This isn't a promise to not fight Raylan, Tim, or anyone else - but it is an acknowledgement that they have at least one shared goal.]

[He couldn't quite tell what that sigh was for, what the underlying feeling behind it was.]

Yes. I want out.

[Walking over, Raylan sat down next to her, several arms lengths away.]

I've got a daughter waiting. [He mimed the action of holding and rocking a baby. Whether Callisto would tell him in kind why she wanted out, beyond the obvious, was up to be seen.] More death to deliver.

Death doesn't get us out, if that's what you're thinkin'. Punch our subway card 9 times, tenth death is free, [He joked largely to himself - there was no way to mime that idea out.]

Daughter?

[She echoes, miming the same rocking motion. It looks decidedly more unnatural and awkward when she does it. Reaching into her knife sheath, she pulls out a pencil, and a tatty scrap of paper that already has some scribbles on it. Finding an empty corner, she scratches out a little drawing of a stick figure family - two parents, and two children.]

This is daughter?

[She asks, gesturing to the family as a whole.]

Or this?

[She points to one of the small stick figures. In other words: is it the word for a family as a whole, or a child?]

That, [he said, nodding at the second one with a lift of his chin. His hands lifted and came together with about 20 inches in between.]

Baby woman. You know baby? [Pointing at her, he then pointed at his temple for 'know' and mimed the rocking motion again. Callisto was already doing remarkably well - he wasn't stupid enough to think that any of the words she'd picked up so far were from her home world.

It took a village, in this case.]

Edited 2021-05-15 22:17 (UTC)

[Well, she does now. She's not able to commit every word she learns immediately to memory, but a lot of them get repeated frequently, which helps.]

Mine.

[She says, circling her finger to encompass the entire drawn family again.]

Death.

You are daughter. I am son. [For future context.

Raylan nodded softly in understanding and looked into the pit for a second before looking back over, face a fraction softer for the telling. He didn't expect that sympathy was to be taken, nor that she'd understand the words coming next from him, but they came anyway.]

I'm sorry.

Were you little? [He held a hand up off the ground.] Not baby but - [Short. Little. Young.]

[She holds her hand up a bit higher than his, stretching up a little to do so. Not a baby, not too little, but still definitely a child. Old enough to have strong, solid memories of her family - both of how they'd lived, and how they'd died. Young enough that their death had been the destruction of her entire world: physically, mentally, and emotionally.

On the paper, she scratches out a quick drawing of many little houses, with lines of paths running between them and a wall of flames bearing down on them.]

Xena did this.

[She says, venom in her voice as she stabs a finger at the drawing.]

Xena made it death.

A child. [He echoed to put a word to the thing they were figuring out. His face didn't downturn or tighten until he was studying and parsing the next images. Fire. His brow furrowed sharply.

Ancient living wasn't kind or nice to anyone. Pretending it was otherwise was foolish and naïve. Terrible tragedies were the hallmark of the human race.]

Xena. Is that why you fight? To make death on Xena?

[It wasn't much of a jump, considering what he knew about people in general. A millennia or not, the core changes were probably not that different. Revenge was in their DNA as much as anything else.]

Edited 2021-05-16 17:02 (UTC)

[Got it in one.]

To make death on Xena, and--

[She gestures to the family drawing again.]

On this, Xena.

[Xena's family. And anyone else who might possibly stand in her way, no matter how tangentially.]

Revenge.

[Raylan nodded.]

Oldest motivation for murder there is.

At home, I'm a US Marshal. [He glanced over, knowing full well she didn't know what that meant.] I make death on thieves and murders.

[He glanced over his shoulder at the direction Tim had wandered off in.]

Him too.

[He wondered if a person like Callisto would even entertain the idea of holding back if this Xena person - probably not - and it struck him as wrong to get in the way of some very Classic Historical Revenge. That's the way the world worked. What right did they have to impose their ideas of law onto her?]

[She does indeed have no idea what a US Marshal is, and she hasn't learned any words directly related to thievery or murder yet, but I make death on-- is clear enough. Is he threatening her, she wonders, or is he sympathizing? Is he saying he'd do the same in her place, or saying he'd kill her, Callisto, for doing all that she does?]

You make death on me?

[She asks, tilting her head curiously.]

Or on Xena?

[Probably her, she thinks - especially if he knew just how far she was willing to go in service of causing Xena pain.]

Not unless I have to, [Raylan echoed the words he had spoken before, chin dropping with a faint lift of his eyes.]

Do you laws? Or.. fighters protecting a King - Guards? ['Fighters' came with a gesture at them both before he put his dukes up again and he followed 'King' with the gestured. If this didn't get across, he'd have to try a different tact.

This was harder than he thought it was going to be.]

Fighter, yes.

[She learned that one from Carter. But as for the rest... she gives a shrug, and shoves the paper and pencil at him. Here, draw it.]

[He made a little face of disappointment and shook his head, waving it away.]

It's too complicated to scratch out. How am I supposed to expect you to understand the degree of laws from what I'm guessin' in a place where there aren't any?

[He shook his head again.]

I.. [He reached out and took the paper anyway.] I fight for people, [he tapped the scrawled family, circled them and the village.] Make death so they don't- [ another tap on the family with a shake of his head.]

But it's death isn't the only option. I can.. [the paper was set down and he lifted his hands, grabbing each one of his wrists in kind and clasping them behind his back.] Rope. I can capture them. Hold them.. Prisoner. So they can't get out.

[Ah, okay - that's easier to puzzle out. He's a hero, then - of some sort or another.]

This?

[She draws a square and fills in several vertical lines - a prison cell.]

Yeah - yeah! [Fuck, he was almost a little excited to be making progress. At least this wasn't throwing himself at a wall that he couldn't chip any more off of.]

Jail. Or prison more often than not but that's semantics at this point. I have a - [The paper and pencil was picked up and Raylan sketched out a little star, drawing a circle around it.]

Marshal. I put people there. [The cell was tapped again and he handed it all back.]

That being said, [he continued with a sigh as he readjusts his hand and looks over at the other side of the chasm he would beat come hell or high water.] I don't know that my Marshalling should get in the way, should Xena ever show up here.

[He looked over curiously.] Don't suppose you would consider only making death on them if you get out, huh?

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