Event - Lullaby

[apocalypsehowmods]

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Lullaby

➥ For You Never Shut Your Eye

(cw: supernaturally-induced sleep/fatigue, supernaturally-induced sleep disorders/somniloquy, needles/injections)

The line between waking and sleep is beginning to blur. People will find themselves sleeping far too much, but it never feels like enough. The music is growing more prevalent and persistent throughout town. The effect is still weaker within the building, but as October wears on, more and more people are affected and ADI staff are more intent than ever to find the source and also figure out how to block the effects. Characters will find themselves conscripted (between Halloween Party preparations) into assisting with building or testing anti-music and sleep devices along or with helping to try to track down the source of the music.

For those helping to build and test devices, there is an R&D lab in the basement levels of ADI that will be available. Devices native staff have been able to devise include:

• Headphones that play different frequencies to try to cancel out the sound of the singing.
  
• An armband that periodically stabs a small needle into the arm with a small dosage of adrenaline.
  
• Headbands set to a constant low vibration.

The efficacy of all of these devices is… questionable, but perhaps others may have their own expertise to lend to the efforts, attempting something on a broader scale than just personal protection devices.

For those helping to track the source of the music, finding it seems to be impossible, but there is a definite pattern that characters will note as the days pass. The epicenters of the music are moving, migrating out of the graveyards and converging on ADI Headquarters. As this goes on, the building will become less and less of a safe haven, the music penetrating its walls and affecting the staff there more heavily. You might find yourself having to help a neighbor who's fallen asleep while working. Or you might not even be able to fully tell they've fallen asleep as they sleepwalk and talk almost like they're actually still conscious. Even those who have never been prone to sleepwalking and talking may find themselves affected and… far more open with what they say when in the unguarded state of semi-unconsciousness.

➥ Till the Sun Is In the Sky

(cw: supernaturally-induced sleep/fatigue, thanatophobia, character death, death by poisoning, blood, choking, emetophobia, death by crushing)

By the 25th, some people may find waking up to be a challenge in and of itself. But they do manage to wake up. Seemingly. Perhaps the day is much like any other, heading to ADI or out around the city, grabbing coffee and- something is wrong. Something is very wrong. That cup of coffee you just drank had tasted a little different than usual. A touch of almond to it? It hits you that your throat is burning, bile and blood rising up and choking you as you hack and gasp and vomit. Your legs grow weak, you're losing control of everything, falling, dying.

And then you wake up.

Just a nightmare. Just a bizarre and horrible nightmare. You head out and… is this home? You're home! Or maybe… wait, this doesn't seem right. Have you gone somewhere else? Some things might be familiar, memories intertwined and mixing with fantastical elements, some your own, some not. You notice people you recognize, ones who might be as confused as you are. This isn't where they should be and they remember dying, too. Or seeing you die or someone else. It doesn't make sense, but somehow, they remember they had a dream they shared last night. And then something falls from above and nearly crushes you or your partner. Or maybe it does crush them, and you're suddenly looking at a dead body as the world and this nightmare that feels so very real becomes more and more hostile. Maybe something falls on you.

And then you 'wake up.'

➥ When the Blazing Sun Is Gone

(cw: supernaturally-induced sleep/fatigue, thanatophobia, character death, body horror, detailed description of painful physical transformation, description of the loss and regrowth of teeth, violence, mental status alterations, temporary power-loss, spiders)

Even with people dropping left and right thanks to the odd sleep effect taking hold, ADI staff are hellbent that their Halloween party will not be completely ruined. And on the 28th (a little before the actual holiday), everyone wakes up. Or… seems to. For those trapped in dreams, it will seem very much that they've woken up, the music has stopped, and they can actually carry on. For a few days, it even seems like things are normal. The party on the 31st is a blow-out bash. The entire first floor of ADI HQ has been transformed with decorations. The canteen is serving festive food and has set up a dance floor with holiday-appropriate music playing. Some of the offices feature additional activities, including party games like bobbing for apples in a trough that's been brought in, a guess this gross food booth, and more general party games. For a quieter time, there are also areas set up with board games and card games to play. And for some extra fun spooks a mini-haunted maze has been set up with faux spiders and webs, along with other goofy-looking monster creatures.

It's around 9 PM when the music and lights suddenly cut out. There's nothing for several seconds. Then, a voice begins to sing, filling the halls of ADI. It's a young girl's voice.

"Bye-bye, bye-bye,
Quickly you will die,
On the morning will be frost,
And you’ll go to the graveyard, the graveyard.

Grandfather will come there, too,
And he will bring the coffin.
Grandmother will come along,
Her tears, they will not soften.
Mama sings the prayer song, then,
And falls down on her knees.
Daddy takes you to the grave,
No one can hear his pleas.

Bye-bye, bye-bye,
Quickly you will die,
On the morning will be frost,
And you’ll go to the graveyard, the graveyard.

As the last notes of the song fade away, all hell breaks loose. Those who had been wearing particular sorts of costumes, ones that are more monstrous in nature, may find themselves transforming, growing, twisting, shifting. It's not a clean change, but a violent, agonizing one that cracks bones, tears and reshapes muscles and tendons, pushes out teeth to make room for new ones. Those transformed will find themselves compelled to chase, to hunt, to kill anyone they can get their claws, teeth, or other appendages on.

For those who stay themselves, it's not just their transformed friends who pose a danger, but the decorations they've set up, as well. Those fake giant spiders and webs? They're no longer fake. Neither are any of the other demonic little creatures. The goal of everything in ADI and even outside for those who manage to make it out the doors, is to remind you how very, very mortal you are. Those typically possessed of fantastic abilities will find that they have been sapped away. There's no calling on magic or innate abilities. You are mortal and you are going to die like everything mortal does.

In the chaos, characters will catch glimpses of a young girl flitting amongst the chaos, seeming unperturbed by it all. Trying to catch up to her or speak to her is fruitless, but she's there, and she's humming that song from before.

➥ When He Nothing Shines Upon

(cw: supernaturally-induced fatigue/malaise, thanatophobia)

Those who are killed at the party will find themselves waking up wherever they actually fell asleep a few hours or even days ago. If your character was one of the lucky few who somehow managed to escape the effect, you'll notice people waking up all over ADI HQ and elsewhere. There are no signs of damage on the bodies, but those who died in the dreams will find themselves feeling incredibly weak and generally ill for several hours to several days after the experience.

The music has actually stopped, and this time, it would seem you've actually woken up. Depending on how long you were passed out for, that may be a more unpleasant experience for some than others. There's a message posted from a random ADI employee's phone a few days later to the network:

Mr. S was right. This was fun! I'll have to come back next year to play with you. - Ava, the Lullaby Girl

P.S. Sorry for stealing your phone, horsegirl67. But I wanted to say, hi. C:

Unfortunately, there are no further messages and attempts to respond to the message will receive no reply for now.

But... fortunately…? All of the Halloween preparations are still up, and there's a festive party to attend if anyone actually feels keen on trying it in real life. Pam Ruan, the main organizer is bloody-minded about it now and will have her God damn Halloween party, but those who work themselves up to attend out of festive spirit or morbid curiosity will find it a distinctly muted affair that breaks early in the evening.

Happy Halloween, Gloucester!

➥ Mod Notes

• GENERAL - Players are welcome to play NPCs for themselves when they are needed in a thread. If you need more information on general behavior for these types of NPCs, please feel free to ask! In general, the information provided in the prompt should be sufficient and you're welcome to make up any details beyond that for your specific scene. The Lullaby Girl (Ava) can be seen throughout character dreams, but they will not be able to interact with her during this event. They will either wake up or simply find that the physics of the dream are warped and she cannot be reached or there's a sheet of glass between her and the character or whatnot.
  
  
• FOR YOU NEVER SHUT YOUR EYE (15-24 October) - Characters are welcome to develop their own devices for attempting to stop the music. Characters will have modern day technology available to them along with a few slightly more advanced electronics and tools. Please do not go too out there. This isn't Tony Stark's array of tools and the like. But characters can create additional devices to test within reason. Some of them may be more or less effective, but with how sporadic the effect is, it might be difficult to tell what's actually working or not. There can also be negative side-effects from devices, if you'd like to play those out. Characters with the appropriate magical charge may also attempt to supernaturally block the music, but this will not be condoned or facilitated by ADI. Characters searching for the source of the music will not be able to find it, just discover that it is moving. For characters who are sleep-talking, they may find themselves unusually honest. They may or may not recall conversations with other characters and all that they told them.
  
  
• TILL THE SUN IS IN THE SKY (25-27 October) - Characters will experience repeated nightmares of dying in a shared dreamscape. They will remember every time that they die in the dreams. Feel free to get as creative and gruesome with this as you would like. These are dreams and fantastical situations that might not actually happen (e.g., a robot showing up and shooting a laser through your character) may occur. Players are welcome to introduce elements of their memories into the nightmares and mix those memories around between characters who might wind up in a dream together. Please ensure all top-levels are appropriately tagged for any and all content warnings. Add content warnings as you go along, if needed. Dying in the dreams will trigger the sense of waking up. This can be a fake wake-up or characters might actually wake for a short while and find others passed out around them.
  
  
• WHEN THE BLAZING SUN IS GONE (28-31 October) - Again, this will be a shared dreamscape where characters will be under the illusion (at first) that all has returned to normal. For those who investigate, everything seems to be real, nothing too off, excepting the night of the Halloween party. Once the Lullaby Girl finishes her song, characters who are dressed in costumes that depict animals or other monstrous creatures may find themselves transformed into their costumes. Transformed characters may gain powers for the duration of this prompt/event related to their monstrous forms without mod approval. Go wild, kill your friends and neighbors, and generally trash everything around you. The decorations that come to life will be attempting to murder all characters, transformed or not. If characters escape into the city, they will find all of the festive decorations out there have come to life and want to kill them, as well. Death is unavoidable for this particular prompt, but it can be something swift and painless or something drawn out and horrible at player discretion. It is the only way to actually wake a character fully. Players also have the option of keeping their characters awake. They will not experience the shared dreamscape and will just be stuck with a lot of unconscious people around them for the duration of this portion of the event.
  
  
• WHEN HE NOTHING SHINES UPON (31 October) - Ava, the Lullaby Girl, cannot be contacted or immediately located, but she will be available in future plots for interactions with characters. There is no immediate information regarding who Mr. S. is. Players may have the general sleep/death malaise last for a minimum of two hours and a maximum of three days. Regular medications for the flu can ameliorate some of the symptoms, but they will ultimately clear up on their own. Characters may wake up in whatever state players would like. Feel free to play out the effects of them having been slumped in a corridor for three days without food or water. It's going to be a bad time all around. Those who attend the real Halloween party will be thanked profusely by Pam and showered with candy. At least they'll get a few HR brownie points?

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Comments

[sorser]

[And there it is, a topic that was sure to find its footing between them eventually; Stephen had merely hoped it wasn’t amid a potential nightmare hellscape. But Jack is suddenly all fire, his concern lobbed aside like it was nothing, and now replaced by the bothersome idea that maybe, just maybe, Stephen had sent Dormammu out to terrorize some other world.

His expression hardens, but traces of a shadow line his brow.]

You're making assumptions. There’s no way of knowing that’s what happened. I made a deal, and that deal was for him to return to the Dark Dimension. Even if it were true, I can’t control his actions beyond that.

[He doesn’t have that kind of power. He was obliterated innumerable times as proof. Indignity flares in his gut, but it doesn’t quite overcome the shard of concern, too.]

He was only overtaking my Earth because other sorcerers had instigated a ritual to summon him. He’d likely need the same in your case.

[An invitation to waltz right over and subsume another world. If the track record holds, then it may be a hollow concern.]

[stations]

( It's a frustrating lack of anything for him to either latch onto or feel comforted by; I can't control his actions is absolutely fair, and yet it hits Jack as unbelievably lame in this moment. Fifteen things flair to mind to say — variants on how sending a serial killer away from your house doesn't mean you get to rest easy because you can't control his actions. Any time he tries to formulate the words for it, it sounds stupid — something he'll probably examine a little more deeply in hindsight later. ​)

Likely?

( A little irritated, judgmental skepticism there. )

There's no chance it could be like cool planet, now that I know it exists let's go find another version? Also — ( and way more immediately: ) what the fuck was that?

[sorser]

[Even Stephen would agree that it’s a bit cold, a little too pragmatic—I can’t control his actions—but it wouldn’t e the first time he’d have made a difficult decision at the risk of others. Though perhaps, in retrospect, it would have been more beneficial to add more specificity to their deal, to avoid these kinds of doubts in the first place. He doesn’t like it; it makes him feel like things have slipped away and beyond his control, when he was of a mind that he had done something good for the planet. Even if he did have to break a few rules.

Even a shadow of a doubt is enough to muddy the waters, after all.]

He knew about Earth long before I ever dealt with him. If he wanted to go searching for others, he’d probably have done it eons ago.

[Probably. Likely. He can’t say anything for certain, but he has to at least provide some reassurances — for whatever it’s worth. Whether it’s to make him feel better, or Jack, or both, is up for debate.]

What the fuck was what? Dormammu? Ruler of the Dark Dimension and overall cosmic terror seeking to engulf everything to make it his? [Sarcasm-] I guess you could call him an imperialist.

[stations]

No, not-- that as in him, I mean that as in... us just being there?

( Because fixating on that other part of this conversation isn't going to get them anywhere; Jack can't prove it to justify his anger, Stephen can't disprove it to put it to rest. Digging in any further is just him... losing his shit for no reason. He's perfectly capable of stewing about illogical things in silence like a normal emotionally constipated adult, thank you very much. )

Why- how- why? Did somebody dose me with ayahuasca again, is this like a weird monster-induced hallucination thing, what's happening?

[sorser]

[Oh— that.

Yes, that’s a good question, isn’t it? Stephen shakes his head, closing his eyes shut and pinching at the bridge of his nose, as though to set aside all talk about Dormammu for now.]

I don’t…. I don’t know.

[Not something he likes to admit, but he’ll at least admit it these days.]

Assuming this isn’t just another dream about to turn deadly when we least expect it, something insidious has been happening for a while now. The music that’s been making it impossible to stay awake; what are the chances that this was the desired end result?

[stations]

( That's a great theory, really. It makes total sense, or it would, save for one glaring problem. )

It can't be a dream. I don't sleep.

( He hasn't since this whole thing started. He knows he hasn't, because he hasn't been to his room since the whole thing started. Jerry's sword collection is still taking up his mattress. He's had conversations with people at Bonnie's at all hours of the night, and he's been here for the most part during the day. He hasn't laid down anywhere. )

[sorser]

[A glaring problem that has either been completely and totally upended for the first time ever, or… what? Didn’t actually apply?]

So you’re saying that despite experiencing the same phenomenon as everyone else who’s been continually falling asleep—which is a thing, too, by the way—you’ve somehow circumvented the one prerequisite for dreaming, and what? Were pulled into other people’s dreams?

[stations]

( He shrugs unhelpfully. )

I mean, weirder things have happened. I got pulled into someone else's universe, this seems like a comparative step down.

( Just saying.

For a slightly more tangible theory: )

I hallucinate sometimes. Maybe I'm doing it now? It's not like there's a huge difference, except that I might have actually just spilled coffee all over the floor, so I should probably really clean that up.

[sorser]

[A theory that may or may not be correct. Stephen thinks it has just about the same probability as anything, now.]

We just died a countless number of times and you’re worried about spilt coffee?

[Well, whatever. Don’t answer that.

He shakes his head, looking around. Appears like ADI as he recalls it, no figment of freaky and/or terrifying dreams present.]

That appointment we talked about— you’re getting it sooner rather than later.

[It should clear up a few things; verify one way or another if sleep really did drag him in, or if he remained as immune as he believes himself to be.]

[stations]

( Well, yeah. He's totally alive right now probably, so there's not much he can do about the former. The coffee, on the other hand, is a slipping hazard. ​)

Okay.

( Said with the unbothered air of a guy who's been through a battery of tests already just to keep re-proving himself. He's not particularly defensive about it, he doesn't blame the guy, he's just convinced whatever they dig up isn't gonna be much different than the answers he's gotten for the last four years. Since right before the car accident. )

I mean, we can do it now, if you want. Unless... this is like an Inception moment and we're about to get struck down by a bolt of lightning.

( To that end, he reaches over to give Stephen's bicep a solid pinch.

And then realizes immediately in hindsight he totally felt all those other deaths anyway, so it wouldn't really tell them anything. )

[sorser]

[He mouths an "ow", the same way people do when something doesn't really hurt, and angles his arm away.]

That wouldn't make a difference. [Whether or not he's belatedly realized it or not, Stephen will point it out, anyway.] Pain wasn't exactly something we were spared in the dream, either. Unless the distribution of it was very unfair.

[And that would be very rude, but... preferable, really, if he had felt all the agony and Jack didn't.]

If you have it in you, then let's get to medical. I'd rather have answers of any kind, than just sit and wait for the next round of nightmares to strike.

[stations]

Sorry.

( A little under-the-breath murmur, because... yeah, his bad. Sometimes the brain doesn't do its best think, which is... probably a great reason to go ahead and pull the trigger.

Metaphorically.

He shrugs. ​)

Alright, I guess. It's not like I have anything else going on. Wait-

( Just... gonna double-back for a second to grab the mug of coffee he apparently managed to pour before he dropped the pot. Not that he remembers pouring it, but it's there, and he's got dibs, it's his, you can fight him Mr. Dr. Sorcerer.

There's probably something inadvisable about drinking coffee on your way to get tested for sleep abnormalities but... ah well. Yolo.

Yolo-ish. )