villagelogs | 062 » that moment of experience / part i

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062 » that moment of experience / part i

WHO: Everyone.
WHERE: Eastern/Central/Southern/Western Mathias
WHEN: Day 062
WHAT: A storm rains destruction upon the town.
WARNINGS: (PM this account to have a warning added!)
NOTES: Plotting post over here! Part II details are below.

RECOMMENDED ♫ Deadly Avenger "Creeper"

DAY 062
THAT MOMENT OF EXPERIENCE
“A story has no beginning or end: arbitrarily one
chooses that moment of experience from which to
look back or from which to look ahead.”
— Graham Greene
The day begins like any other might. The clouds occasionally part to give glimpses of the sun, offering a bit of hope that the hours might pass without incident. It is a hope that is soon dashed, however, for midday brings with it a suddenly darkening sky. Those near the beach will be able to see the ocean churning as all light seems to be bled from the day, the sky darkening into a purplish-black more quickly than is natural, the process taking a mere ten minutes from start to finish.

And then it begins.

The rain is so heavy and pouring so fast that the ground cannot take it all in, sending rivers down streets and leaving lawns as lakes. The winds blow in gusts so strong that they could knock someone over, and the lightning that arcs brightly through the sky is immediately followed by thunder that shakes the town to its core, the tremors almost reminiscent of the earthquakes that plagued the town only days ago.

For some, the storm will be another nuisance of mother nature, forcing them to remain wherever they were before its sudden approach. But for others, it will be far more than that, for this storm is seeking revenge on those who sought to destroy the town. Destruction will rain down and it will not stop until its vengeance is satisfied.

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. If nothing else, the cowboys' homemade moonshine should do the trick.

ABOUT THE STORM
The storm will begin at midday and last until late into the night, only calming in the early hours of the morning. The heavy rain will flood the streets, though it will not be enough to flood the buildings themselves (except as noted below), and the winds and thunder will shake the town with such strength that it will almost seem as if the town is trying to tear itself apart.

But this is not a simple storm. For those residents who took part in any way in the destruction of the Town Hall, History Museum, or Stoker Park house, they will find the storm will destroy their shelter in some fashion. This can include broken windows, caved-in roofs, flooding from the rain, or even lightning striking the building. The details are up to player choice but something will be damaged by the storm.

— All damage to buildings will be repaired by the dawn of the following day as if it never happened at all. There is no way to witness this process taking place.
— If a resident is sheltering in a shared living space with others who did not take part in the destruction of the town, you may choose to have only your character's section of that location damaged. However...
— The storm's focus will follow the resident if they move to another area or location, meaning that the new location will also suffer damage in some way.
— Only those who took part in the town destruction in some way will be targeted by the storm, but innocent bystanders can be caught up in the situation as well.

CONDITIONS UPDATE

— 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.

— DISAPPEARANCES continue! Ellie has vanished while others have returned.

— ALCOHOL supplies have run dry, save for any dregs that have been squirreled away by individual residents. Moonshine can still be acquired by those in desperate need.

OOC NOTES

— NEW MAP Thanks so much to Scy for this amazing new map of Mathias!

— PROJECT HELP Your mod needs help with some projects!

— PART II The next part of the log series will be have characters divided up (by OOC choice, not IC) into groups, so be sure to sign up for one asap. Anyone who doesn't make the deadline will be automatically assigned to an available spot.

— 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. IC events are also helpful to know about in advance so they can be included in the log write-ups.

— 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. (All outstanding matters will be taken care of in the next few days!)

navigation | faq | locations | report updates

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

He's not exactly a hundred percent yet, but Bucky is back on his feet for the most part, despite missing a prosthetic arm and sporting various colours of black, purple, green and yellow on his face and arms. Moving is far easier than it had been the evening before when he tried -- and failed -- before promptly being taken back to the house by one Doc Holliday and sleeping the next fourteen hours.

Eventually, he can't take being indoors anymore, so he heads out onto the porch and eases into one of the chairs with a book. Only he doesn't end up doing any reading. And for the hour or so he's out there, Bucky spends it thinking about the month and two days he's been in Mathias. The events, the conversations, the people. Everything.

He hears her boots and looks up, half expecting to see Doc, who's there to tell him that he never found her. But then there she is, looking the same but also very different. Her face marred with cuts and bruises and wearing something that he knows she wasn't wearing before. Somehow, it doesn't even register that she wasn't the same Daisy as the one that had been there up until now.

Still, he offers a small smile as he gets up slowly. "Welcome back."

Bucky Barnes is smiling at her. Is this what happens when you die? Do you wind up in some moderately creepy ghost town filled with strangers and the occasional hero waiting to meet you? It's nothing like the afterlife the nuns used to drone on about, but hey, it could be a whole hell of a lot worse.

There's no stopping her own smile in response, some part of her absolutely giddy with fangirl energy at meeting Bucky freaking Barnes. She heads up the sidewalk toward the porch, words falling out of her mouth almost of their own accord. "Hi! I mean, thanks, or uh..."

But then she stops halfway there, his words finally actually registering. The smile falls and her expression shifts to something apprehensive and unsettled. "Wait, what do you mean welcome back?"

The smile doesn't stay long, falling almost immediately once she starts speaking. Her response doesn't match up with two people who only last saw each other the day before. It's only further punctuated at her question and the way she's now looking at him.

He moves over to the edge of the steps, looking at her with his own confused expression. "You don't remember being here?"

It's a logical question to ask when someone asks something like that. And as much as he's willing to hope, he suspects before she answers what it will be.

If she didn't know any better, Daisy might think this is all some sort of Chronicom trick, but she can see that Bucky's missing an arm and she's never witnessed a Chronicom go that far to stay in-character. It's possible that everyone here might be LMDs designed to mess with her... Of course, both those theories require her to not be dead, and she's still uncertain of that.

The Framework still seems like the most likely possibility.

"I don't remember because I haven't been here before," she clarifies, feeling as confused as he looks. She also feels a little guilty, though she can't quite explain why.

She looks how he felt when he first arrived, sure as ever that this was all somehow HYDRA's doing. Daisy was the one that told him it wasn't and yet it took a while to really figure out that if this had anything to do with them, that there would be some sort of subtle giveaway and he's seen nothing.

Bucky leans a little into the beam post, trying to not look at how those words affected him. It was an odd feeling finally knowing and understanding what Steve must have felt like when he didn't remember him. So, he nods, looking down.

"But you know who I am?" he questions, glancing up again, trying desperately not to make this any more awkward.

"Well, yeah," she confirms without hesitation, the question already making her feel the slightest bit more steady. Talking about something you know will do that. "You're Bucky Barnes. You and the rest of the Howling Commandos are part of SHIELD 101."

Were the circumstances better, there would be quite a lot more fangirling going on.

She crosses her arms, trying to make it look like she's taking the stance for a show of strength when really she's just still cold. "I think the better question is, you know who I am?"

If he had any doubts it was her, even with her looking very much the same as she did yesterday, they were out the window. Even how she knows him is almost on par with what she told them the first time they met.

"You're Daisy Johnson, Agent of SHIELD, who also gave you the moniker of Quake," he answers, looking tired but not because they're standing there doing introductions for a second time. He looks her over and gestures vaguely behind him. "This is your house. We met about a month ago. Just up the street."

He wants desperately to pull her close and hold her, seek the kind of comfort only she brings. But, it's a long way off now, if ever.

"I can get you a blanket if you're cold. Or we can go inside." he offers in such a way that she can decline, if he wants.

Her house. A month ago.

The earth is spinning again, rotating off its axis and threatening to set her floating back out into the black of space. It's just like back in the Framework when she'd woken up in the digital body of Skye, agent of HYDRA who had been in love with Grant Ward. Only this time she's in her own body and it's not an enemy claiming to know her — she might not know Bucky personally, but she trusts him implicitly despite only just meeting him. It's clear that this man isn't the Winter Soldier, which makes him an ally and, hopefully, a friend.

"A blanket would be great if you don't mind," she accepts with a frown, not ready to go inside. If she'd been here before, if some version of her had been there... She'd rather have more information before facing whatever is in that house. It'll make it easier to pick up on the little things, she rationalizes, not admitting even to herself that she needs more time to pull herself together.

It pains him to not have been there to greet her from the start, but he also knows the next best person was. Daisy needed to have things gently broken to her and he's not sure he could have done that. Especially since it was proving to be just as hard to do at that moment. The look on her face was troubling, to say the least.

He gives her a nod and carefully shifts to not put himself down on a knee for twisting the wrong way. And after a minute or so, he emerges again holding a soft dark grey blanket that had been on the couch. Bucky steps down one step and holds it out.

"Did you want to sit down? Or maybe take a walk. You can ask me anything you want about Mathias or me, for that matter."

With his hair cut and the lack of arm to pinpoint what year he's from, Bucky wouldn't blame her if she had questions.

Daisy might be extremely distracted and just generally out of it, but she's not so far gone that she doesn't notice the way Bucky moves. He's hurt, more than just his face. That's concerning, to put it mildly.

When he returns with the blanket, she reaches out to take it with one hand, her fingertips sinking into the soft material. It feels wrong to use such a nice blanket when her suit is far from clean, but she's so cold... So, with the resolve to wash the blanket herself later, she wraps it around her shoulders, pulling it tight against her torso while letting the folds of extra material bunch up and hopefully obscure the way her shivers continue.

"Walk, I think," she decides after a moment, though she eyes him with concern. "If you're okay for that." A beat, and then, "What happened?"

If anything, the fact he is hurt is a damn good indicator of what this place can and will do at a drop's notice. He's managed to stay alive this long because of his enhancements; to be injured the way he has been puts that to question.

"I'm okay with it," he says, grabbing his hoodie off the arm of the chair and pulling it on while he makes his way slowly down the steps to where she's standing. He zips it up and sinks one hand deep into his right pocket. Once they start walking he glances back at her. "I fell. Well, I was pushed."

The details on that are purposely held off on. He wants to ask her a few questions first.

"Did Doc tell you about this place?"

Pushed. What happened to him was deliberate, then. That shapes her estimation of this place as much as anything else that she's learned. Which, assuming Doc is John Henry:

"A little," she answers, crossing her arms under the blanket. "We don't know how we got to this ghost town and no one has found a way to leave it. There weren't too many details, though."

Maybe he'd been leaving that task to Bucky. Lucky him.

Sounds like something he would do if someone came in from the cowboy's world that Bucky found first. The kind of discussion that goes into explaining Mathias is and can be rather offputting so it's definitely better coming from someone that the new arrival can trust -- if there is one.

"Mathias seems to have a life of its own and I mean quite literally," he tells her, steering them back down Stoker Place to Phillips Drive where they will cut south and head back down to the beach. "Lot of things happen here that can't really be explained.

He looks ahead and then back at her. He'll spare her the details of what happened to the other version of her.

"Place has some sort of history that people are trying to figure out. I don't know a lot myself but if you got questions I'll try answering them."

Daisy's quiet for a moment as they walk, thinking over the implications of what Bucky has said — and what he hasn't. The idea of the town having a life of its own brings up far too many memories of Fitz making her watch horror movies like Paranormal Activity, which she's still regretting all these years later.

"You said things happen that can't be explained," she finally says, making her decision of which piece of the puzzle to approach first. "What kind of things?"

Bucky moves his gaze forward, mulling over how to tell Daisy about all the things they've dealt with in the last thirty days that he's been there. He knows a little about the things that have happened before that but not enough to properly explain.

"Time seems to move and feel different here. Slower, in a way. Before my fall, we went through a time loop," he starts, not knowing where in her timeline Daisy was now and not wanting to break too soon into Thanos or being snapped out of existence. "Avoid the fog, chances are it will either suffocate you or play with your mind."

He looks at her, letting her absorb that before continuing.

"I think the strangest thing I've been here for was a bunch of people were attacked and killed by some kind of animal. The ones who survived buried them, but they came back, even though their bodies were still here."

"Killer fog, killer wildlife, duplicate bodies..." She quietly notes the various big picture things he's mentioned, trying to shuffle them around into the puzzle that's already forming from this place. The next one gets a tired but resigned tone. "Time loops I can handle. I went through a hundred loops just a few days ago."

Maybe a couple hundred, it was impossible to tell when her memory reset whenever she'd died. Coulson had a better count than she did, but as he'd often lamented, she hadn't powered him up every time.

Lifting a hand to rub at her forehead, she winces slightly as her fingers contact one of the many scrapes from her fight with Malick.

"Do you know what happened to the Other Me while she was here? As far as weird town stuff goes."

Most saw Mathias as a town out of a horror novel, but they had dealt with everything that might have been seen in a science fiction movie. If Daisy had been dealing with time loops and some of the other things their world generally tossed at them, it won't be too hard to wrap her head around all the possibilities that could happen there.

At her question, Bucky pauses, likely projecting that there were some things.

"She was a part of the group that died," he begins. There was no reason to call the last version of her 'you' when she hadn't experienced what 'she' did. So, he spares her that complexity. "I only know through someone else who died with her that they went to another version of this place. One that was on fire."

He rather hopes she doesn't ask about who that person is. It would only make things harder.

Another version of this place that was on fire. Cool. That's cool. Just dying and waking up in an even worse place than this and then apparently coming back to this place. Totally normal everyday stuff, nothing to worry about whatsoever.

Everything he's saying both supports and conflicts with her idea of this being where she'd been brought after dying. That she is dead here. (She's still not sure where he and the others here fit into that, though.)

"Did the Other Me ever say what happened to her before she came here?" she asks absently, needing a few seconds before she can look over at him with trepidation in her eyes. That person might not be her, but there might be answers somewhere in all this information.

The place was going to test her in new ways from how she's been tested in their world. In the month or so he's been there, he has. And she was the only one that kept him grounded enough to get through the day. Bucky wouldn't admit right then how glad he was to see her back, even if she didn't remember him.

"Not specifically. But she did mention the day we met that she was from 2019." Bucky answers, bringing his focus back to her as they walk. He can see her need to know more. "She didn't know about Thanos."

A beat.

"Do you?"

"Just what he did a year ago," she says with a shake of her head, wondering what he might be referring to. The way he'd phrased it meant it was something big, but she can't picture anything bigger than getting rid of half of all life in the universe. "It was 2019 for me too."

Just barely. They hadn't been back in their original time long at all before they'd staged the fight to save the world. Again.

It's disappointing that he doesn't have more details about the Other Her. It would have been nice to know how much of their timelines were the same. Still, there might be some things she can piece together later.

He goes back to that first day again, recalling the conversation. There wasn't much in the way of when things happened to her, only the year in which they happened. But, he also is able to remember Daisy telling him about something else. Perhaps it will help.

"She asked me if we won," he begins to explain, furrowing his brow in thought. "She was in space I think."

Had to be. It almost seemed like she meant something else entirely when he told her that Steve and the rest of the Avengers travelled back in time to reverse the Snap.

"You must be further along then."

Daisy frowns, hugging the blanket tighter again. The thought of space had once been thrilling, and if not always that, then at least comfortable. Now, there's a combination of dread and grief in her heart when she thinks about being out among the stars, visiting new planets and encountering species she'd never even dreamed of.

"Well, I've been in space for most of the past year," she comments, looking at the buildings around them without really seeing any of them. "We were looking for someone, and when we found him, I came back to Earth. That was a few weeks ago, before the whole time travel mess started."

Bucky looks up to see the Gull ahead and the edge of the water on either side of it not far behind. He listens and remembers the smile she gave him just the morning before and it's hard to realize how much he misses seeing it after coming to the conclusion that it had been days since there wasn't much to smile about.

"That's what Steve and the rest of the Avengers had to do to get back the rest of humanity after Thanos snapped his fingers." Bucky shares. "I got the feeling you and your team were on a different mission though."

Daisy wishes she could smile. It feels like years since she and Sousa flirted on the quinjet, since he kissed her before she infiltrated the Chronicom ship to rescue Simmons (and Deke). Was that the last time she'd smiled? No, there had been that moment with May too, when the woman who was like a mother to her had actually initiated a hug between them.

"Yeah..." The word trails off and she's silent for a few moments afterward, thinking about the words Enoch had told them as he lay dying. That this would be their last mission together. She'd almost believed that he'd meant because Deke stayed behind, but now she knows it's because of her death. The team would go their separate ways and she would never see any of them again...

Clearing her throat quietly, she pulls herself away from those thoughts, not allowing herself to fall down that particular pit of despair until she's alone, and maybe not even then. "Yeah, we were. A race of alien robots was traveling through time trying to wipe out SHIELD so we wouldn't stand in their way in the present while they tried to take over the Earth as their new homeworld."

Clearly, word got out that Earth's population became that much easier to defeat. He can't even imagine all the different species of aliens thought that made it up for grabs. And watching this Daisy as she explains leaves him wanting to ask more questions but it was rather a moot point given where they were.

But he asks anyway.

"How did that go?" Bucky looks at her again, trying to read for the answer in her eyes and on her face.

062 » that moment of experience / part i

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