villagelogs | 065-071 » assign to oblivion / part iii

065-071 » assign to oblivion / part iii

WHO: Everyone
WHERE: Mathias Township proper
WHEN: Days 065-071
WHAT: The residents of Mathias reunite under unnerving conditions.
WARNINGS: (PM this account to have a warning added!)
NOTES: Plotting post over here!

RECOMMENDED ♫ Trent Reznor & Atticus Ross "Outside"

DAY 065-071
ASSIGN TO OBLIVION
“No matter how much time passes, no matter what takes
place in the interim, there are some things we can never
assign to oblivion, memories we can never rub away.”
— Haruki Murakami

Only two days have passed since the town was fractured, leaving residents cut off from those they'd come to know and even care for. A mere two days of wandering the new streets, uncovering more secrets that continue to make little sense of this strange place. Two days with sunrises, sunsets, and nights that seem like any other.

And yet.

When residents wake on this third day, they will find that much has changed. All around them, wherever they may be, there are signs that time has passed without them. Dust covers everything, indoors and out, even areas that were spotlessly clean seemingly hours ago. The residents themselves are covered as well, dust clinging to their hair, skin, and clothing—

Clothing that they may not have been wearing when they went to sleep. Each resident, regardless of the state they were in previously, is now clad in a pair of white pajamas, with long pants and button-up shirts. Those who thoroughly explored Baneberry Hall will easily recognize these articles as identical to those well-stocked in the decaying great house. On top of this, the clothes they wore from home have disappeared, along with anything else they may have brought with them when they arrived or items from home that have been found within the borders of Mathias.

There is no sign that anyone has entered their place of shelter, nor is there any sign of what may have been done with these items or how they came to be wearing these clothes. The dust all around them is undisturbed, almost as if they had been sleeping there for quite some time, though it seems impossible for such a thing to have occurred naturally.

THE NEW ARRIVALS
The newest arrivals to Mathias will wake up on the lawn of Town Hall, at the center of the little town square. They, too, are bereft of any items from home and clothed in the identical white pajamas. There are shops all around them, with houses just beyond, and at first glance, everything seems almost picturesque. Except for the silence that is at times so complete as to be maddening... Welcome to Mathias.

SUMMERTIME
— When summer arrives, so too does an outdoor stand in front of the General Store. Sporting a handpainted sign proclaiming Whateley Farm, the stand is overflowing with a variety of produce: berries, plums, carrots, cabbage, cucumbers, green beans, leeks, onions, peppers, potatoes, zucchini, tomatoes, and garlic bulbs. These do not replace the produce offerings normally found inside the market, but they do behave strangely. The stand replenishes sporadically, sometimes every other day or every five days. There is no discernible pattern to when it replenishes, nor is there any sign of how it came to be there at all.

— With the now-complete reverse change of season, much of the autumn debris has cleared from around town. Only a few stray leaves and fallen branches remain, their crisp colors at odds with the warm summer days. The forest has also cleared of much of the fall detritus, making it easier to both follow the paths and potentially spy things that might be out of the ordinary.

CONDITIONS UPDATE
— THE WEATHER Summer has arrived in Mathias, bringing with it warm days that average 70°F and comfortably cool nights. The skies are clear throughout the week save for Day 68 when a light rain falls from a grey sky throughout the day.

— THE FOG has maintained its new boundaries.
— 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 from the western section of town entirely.
— 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 AND DEATHS continue! Max Guevara and Liz Brundy have disappeared, and now that everyone is back together, residents will notice that Yennefer, Number Five, and Tony Stark have also vanished.

— 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
— 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 My non-RP life is busy and chaotic and I continue to ask for your forgiveness and understanding as game things continue to be slower, as I cannot promise timely mod responses beyond weekends and even that is not wholly guaranteed.

— ITEMS FROM HOME All items from home that characters would normally possess have vanished for this log and will return in the next. This includes clothing and possessions they had when they arrived in Mathias, items that were found in the rain, and items that were found in Baneberry Hall and removed from the property. Items from home that were left behind by other characters no longer in the game have also vanished. (All other items and clothing still remain, it is only items from characters' homes that have disappeared.)

— BANEBERRY ITEMS The items from home that were not removed from Baneberry Hall in the last log have vanished from the property. These items will not reappear in the next log. (Please be sure to comment in the appropriate spot on those logs about the state of your character's item for inventory purposes, ie whether they were removed from the property or left behind.)

— ACTIVITY CHECK Beginning with June's AC (posted at the start of July), all tags that consist of only dialogue will count as 0.5 points, not just those that occur in an inbox thread — this applies to both AC and AP totals. This adjustment is an extension of what has been in place since the start of the game: that all dialogue-only inbox tags counted for a half-point. Since such tags have occurred regularly in log threads as well, the half-point status is simply being extended to all tags regardless of location in order to be fairer in point distribution. (Examples will be provided in the AC post to assist with proper counting.)

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"Glad to hear you say that," Tim responded, shifting a little to relax back against the wall, legs now stretched out in front of him. "I'm thinking of doing a little cleaning up, in the house part at least. I mean everything around here needs cleaned at this point, so just add it to the list."

Tim didn't know what to think of the situation on Phillips Drive. He did not have the relationship experience to even be able to imagine how Malcolm would feel having to watch Raylan walk next door some nights. He'd been living with the reverse for a few weeks, but all this wasn't new to him.

What was new was the itch between his shoulder blades to make a discreet retreat under the cover of darkness and out the side of the house not facing 1306. It might require some second story work but Tim was already plotting which windows would give him the safest exit routes.

Retreating to the safety of the high ground was second nature to both his sniper and scout training. The fact that he was thinking in terms of defensibility made him wince in the dark.

"Any chance my scope is still around?"

"You're not gonna try and move in there right?" Out of 1308 if he had to, Raylan could deal with. Into a hell house, he could not. He'd never sleep again. "There's a couple good places up Jackson worth a look. It's where I'm holed up."

Worth a suggestion, if he could keep Tim from trying to post up too far away. He couldn't keep them that close together. He shouldn't have done from the start.

"Somehow I doubt it," he said in response to the scope. "Sorry." He meant that sorry too - he knew it held something for Tim. An echo of what he used to be.

"What've you done with your day?"

The younger marshal decided that avoidance was the best approach to Raylan's initial question. At least while they were only talking over the phone. It was a thought he was having, moving to the Lighthouse but he was still thinking it through and there was nothing to suggest the place could even be made habitable. It was best to cross that bridge later, not right now.

Tim also did little more than offer a grunt that loosely translated to figures for the idea that Mathias had yanked away the scope. He wasn't sure if he considered it a good or bad thing, given the memory that had come with the object. But from a strictly practical standpoint it could have been educational to use the scope from the top of the Lighthouse.

"Been cleaning mostly," he decided to pick the conversation up with Raylan's latter question. "Finding new clothes. I wasn't spending a minute longer than I had to in those hospital whites. I need to look harder for some shoes, right now all I found were flip flops and I am in desperate need of a mani/pedi."

No answer was answer enough and Raylan turned a soft frown into his lap. Nothing had changed and yet everything was different and he didn't understand it. Somehow, he still felt like he was losing everything.

Everything's different now.

"Weird fuckin' choice for Mathis, I gotta say. Made me feel like I was goin' to a baptism or something. Maybe she's just got a Foot thing and is gettin' her rocks off by makin' you show 'em."

"Made me feel like I was going to get locked up in that big building," Tim was a little more direct with his assessment, and his voice made it clear that he'd gotten out of those clothes as quick as humanly possible. "The layer of dust, walking out into the change of season. I might not have a calendar to verify, but I'm convinced time is being manipulated around on us."

He had been thinking that time was somehow moving backwards. But with the way his injuries felt half-way to healed, that left him realizing that it might not be as easy as that assumption.

Edited (better werds) 2021-07-02 16:39 (UTC)

"It is. Different spots of town, the decay on the houses accelerates, like it's in a bubble of distortion. Honestly, I'm surprised we were allowed a Summer. We had fall, then Winter, then fall again. No spring, no budding greens. Just.." He took and let out a deep breath.

"A snap. Dunno how somethin' has control over time, for godsake."

This wasn't new. It was the Different Day, Same shit. no bounce, no play.

"Makes me wonder what she's gonna spring on us next.. Though I suppose that's the other half of everything I think about nowadays."

It was easier, at the moment, to talk about the external factors in their lives. This was the part they were good at, had been good at from the start. It was safe ground that Tim was retreating too for the moment, somewhere he understood the rules and knew how to apply them.

"Ever consider that maybe she/he/it isn't completely in control?" The question was a genuine one, offered in a thoughtful tone. "The more things happen around here, the more I get a sense that neither side came out on top of whatever there was to come out on top of?"

"What other side? No, I haven't and I'll tell you why. I burn down the town hall, get more nightmares about everyone burnin' up in the houses and then a storm comes that aims to beat my ass and anyone that helped me, specifically. If she ain't in full control, then that's a hellva coincidence."

He welcomed someone poking holes in it so that he could chew over it - that was the only way he'd gotten as far as he had with his theories on it. All the conversations he had hoped to have with Tim when he first arrived..

For everything that was topsy turvey now, at least perhaps they could go back to this. The working of theories, playing devil's advocate at the holes until a path closer to the truth of the matter formed between them.

"I don't doubt you've pissed off whatever has the upper hand here," that was practically Raylan's mission in life. "I'm just thinking that if it really was all powerful and had complete command of this area, why'd you get the opportunity in the first place? Why's the museum still burned down even now?

This back and forth, these loops and shuffles. It feels more and more like being caught in a tug-o-war."

"Mighta have to do with timing, really. It was done that the last night of the reset, right? Maybe Mathis didn't care about that building. Maybe it burnin' down was in her favor and we just don't know it yet."

He scrubbed at his face and wished he'd brought the bottle of moonshine with him.

"But maybe there's somethin' to what you're suggestin'. Wish we knew more about the cult that ran the place. It'd help."

The one leg came back up towards his chest, arm resting atop his knee.

"We're screwing up our order of operations," he observed and definitely included himself in that category. "Let's go back to the basics. What do we have?"

What do they have? Would lead to what they would need. It was survival instructions 101 and Tim mentally kicked himself for not thinking to bring it up between them sooner than this.

"What do we have? We got.. legends and half burnt papers and letters from the Editor. We got a rough date of when everyone left. We got a note in blood that asks 'why is this happening'. We've got ritual sacrifice, we got secret tunnels that those victims were dragged through."

He took a deep breath and rubbed a hand over his face.

"A town fire that doesn't touch the forest. We got a Cult, we got a population that.. Somethin' happened to them. We still don't know what."

Tim sat quietly and absorbed what Raylan shared. It was good information, sounded like reading out of a file jacket. Information that Tim could retain easily enough.

He was inwardly glad to hear the way the older marshal walked it all out. So often when Raylan spoke about the town his emotions, legitimate emotions, seemed to get the better of him and derailed the lawman. This was the kind of information that Tim could work with; even if it was so scatter shot there was no solid theory to follow.

What else did they have. Tim worked over his own experiences looking for anything that Raylan hadn't mentioned.

"Does everyone arrive on the beach?"

He felt he'd done a fine enough job but Tim had wound him up in new and interesting ways that he hadn't anticipated.

"No. Some arrived at Town Hall, some at the tree line, some at the graveyard. No consistency in numbers or arrival spots. No consistency in how we left home. Some people died, some people were asleep, I was wide awake, myself. No consistency to era - the only consistency we have is that we're all traumatized in some way. But that's bein' human so I don't know how much stock we can put into that."

A beat passed.

"Tell me what I'm missin' Tim." It was up for question if he was talking about Mathis or them.

As a rule the younger marshal tended to be almost freakishly observant to vocal tones, body language, all the unsaid clues that would alert him to intent behind words. Perhaps it was a stark expression of his own tumultuous emotional state that he missed any inflection present in Raylan's voice that suggested the last bit was about anything more than Mathias.

Tim was sucking on a tooth, inwardly deflated that his brief speculation had fallen through. While he stared at a far wall in the dark, inwardly he had a whiteboard up with words and images tacked to it. Mentally he removed the beach arrivals and the theories he'd built around that idea from the board.

"I was at the end of my day," half awake and half drunk. "Alright so nothing we can hang your hat on in that area. Move victimology over to the 'what we need' column." Because everything Raylan said suggested there was no clear reasoning. At least not one that made sense to any of their minds.

A question skittered through Tim's head and his lips parted, about to ask when his emotions caught up with the subject matter and beat back the words. He had been ready to ask Raylan to talk about his time in the other Mathias. The Tim back home would have raised the question, delicately but with stalwart directness as it could be relevant to the case.

The Tim here, even confused and lost in his own emotions, couldn't ask the question without being close enough to put a hand on Raylan. As much for his own need to feel his partner alive and whole beneath his palm, as for Raylan peace of mind. That question would have to wait for another time.

"You don't miss much. At least not nearly as much as you like to fool the office into believing you miss."

Edited 2021-07-04 22:49 (UTC)

"I think we just need more time. More.. clues, more.. actual paper trails. They exported Fish, imported just about everything else as far as I can tell - there's gotta be paper on it somewhere. I've already gone through the Gull, through the Town Hall, through the library and the rental store.."

He sighed and rubbed his face again.

"She's not gonna let us piece it together until she's ready." This wasn't quite like the jobs at home. They weren't working to outsmart some dipshit asshole with less braincells than teeth. Mathis was a much bigger fish and Raylan wasn't sure their hooks were gonna be large enough.

"It's why I keep havin' to set it aside. Not enough information."

There was silence across the line as Tim soaked in what Raylan was saying. There wasn't much he could argue against those words. They didn't even have pieces, they had scraps of a much larger puzzle than marshaling usually threw their way.

Oddly enough Tim's mind brushed along the same route as the older man's and after another couple breaths, he softly chuckled.

"We need Dewey and Dickie. Let them run amok for a few weeks, this town will send us all back in disgust. Either that or Loretta. She'd be running this town before it knew what hit it."

"God," Raylan half swore with a singular huff of his breath. "Knowin' our luck, they'd trip and fall into the biggest clutch of clue we haven't found yet, probably die of papercuts. Couldn't thinka Loretta here though. 'Nough young girls already trapped and she's suffered enough. Dumb and dumber would be enough."

He'd dealt with enough of young girls breaking down and being terrified. Dickey and Dewey though? It would be fun to watch them twist and scream over nothing.

There was a lot drifting across the wires between them, but Tim felt as if they were things that would need to be faced together. Not over the phone. At the same time he wasn't ready to hang up, wasn't ready to give up the comfort of Raylan's voice in his ear.

"Give em a few weeks, Shadow Man would be shipping us all home so long as we promised to take them with us," he suggested, rough laughter just behind the words.

Raylan felt it too. He hated it. He'd put everything up onto the stake and everything change and left him on a rock, on an island. Tim's voice felt like a last strand that if he let go of, he'd float out to sea.

"We better get to work on our interdimensional fishin' hook, huh. I'm still waitin' for Mathis to give us access to their fishery. We know they got one." They wouldn't find an interdimensional hook, but it would be something. Something that they've been missing from the town, another missing piece.

"Wonder what kind of bait would work best for those two?" Tim recognized that he was talking, just to talk. But so long as Raylan would indulge him, he intended to keep talking about whatever came to mind.

"I guess money is the easy answer, but we don't really have much of that at hand to put on the hook. Jar of 'shine?"

"Mm, couple a bottles of oxy, a whore or two and at least three jars of shine. Siren call of the backwoods hillbilly trash. Might pull more than we need. It'd solve the problem here, though."

As dark as that was, Raylan was fine with sacrificing trash.

Despite the raw emotion of the evening, or perhaps because of it, Tim began to chuckle.

"Remember when you got that lead from Boyd and busted Dewey with two of Audry's finest?" Tim might not have been there, but he'd read the report. "What in the hell did he think he was going to accomplish in five minutes?"

A chuckle was good. It was a step in the right direction. It was a step towards them not being weird. He didn't want them to be weird. It was inevitable that there was a little weird.

Raylan chuckled back behind a scoff. "Oh he was set up for an afternoon of fun. Don't know that he knows what to do with two bodies, no matter how much time he had. Couldn't tell his ass from a hole in the ground, what was he doin' with two asses? You hear I shot his pool? After that payout?"

"That bit of gossip did make the rounds along the office grapevine," Tim confirmed, voice still rich with the teeth clenched sort of amusement he was known for.

"In the spirit of transparency, your shenanigans with Dewey Crowe were better than basic cable for the lot of us. Course Dewey Crowe himself was better than basic cable for the lot of us." There was fondness, rather than any sort of disrespect in his tone. "Most of us are going to have to upgrade our subscriptions when you head back down to Florida."

Let's wrap this one? Handwave them eventually getting off the phone?

tinstar - 2021-07-11 21:02 (UTC) - Expand

Sounds good!

walkingtrigger - 2021-07-11 21:11 (UTC) - Expand

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

065-071 » assign to oblivion / part iii

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Let's wrap this one? Handwave them eventually getting off the phone?

Sounds good!