apocalypsehowcomm | Event

Entry tags:

Event - For Sport

For Sport

➥ Breaking It In

(cw: mentions of apparent mutilation of/violence against animals and animal death)

The conference room on the upper floors of ADI HQ is bright, airy, perhaps unnaturally so for the grim tidings that bring people here today. Those who have recently arrived will be ushered to the meeting by ADI employees or by Bonnie. It's not just the newest arrivals, but some other people who seem to be longer-term employees. The room is rather large and arranged like a lecture hall. Bonnie takes up a seat near the back, looking somewhat uncomfortable, but smiling at anyone who greets her.

At 9 AM sharp, a person steps into the room and heads to the front. They have curly hair and are wearing a gray business suit with a dark blue bow-tie. When they address the group at large, they speak in a calm, measured tone. "Good morning. I appreciate some of you may be here more reluctantly than others, but… there are matters of import to all of us to discuss. Some of you may have seen me already. I am Reyes Amador, assistant to Ms. Lehrer, the head of ADI. Earlier this week I sent out a message regarding some unusual activity at Coffin Beach. Thank you to those who investigated."

Their eyes seem to find the people who did, in fact, go looking, whether they found something or not.

"We have determined the creatures are shape-shifters. Some sort of, em... horse thing. In lieu of a term they might give themselves, we are referring to them as kelpies. Given the locations these were found, as well as other information into disappearances and deaths and mutilations of sea mammals in the area, we believe the kelpies are coming from the Essex Bay area to the north.

"For those willing to assist, we are mounting a reconnaissance mission. This is not intended to engage kelpies, just to find out where they are and how we might best approach an attack. All supplies, transportation, and monetary compensation will be provided. We will meet at ADI HQ in main lobby at 6 PM three days from now. Essex Bay is a remote site and conservation area, accessible only by boat, and not without a scientific permit. As you may guess, we will be traveling under cover of nightfall." Reyes smiles.

"I will be accepting questions about further details. I understand this is the first mission away for many of you, and you may have concerns. I will do my best to allay them. Bonnie also has some experience in these missions, if you would like first-hand accounts. Please also feel free to discuss amongst yourselves if this is a mission you think you are ready for. You will not be required to attend, nor penalized in any way if you do not. There is additional work to be done here, both with continuing examinations of the bodies we have and other efforts unrelated."

➥ Move the Goalposts

(cw: kidnapping, violence, sadism)

It happens away from the safety of ADI HQ one evening or so early in the morning, it's still dark, away from the potential for help, maybe. One moment, you (and possibly someone you're with) are walking, and the next, you will find someone has grabbed you and slammed you into the nearest surface. For those unable to fight back, a cloth will be held to their noses and mouths--chloroform, something to knock them out. For those able to fight or even to escape thanks to not actually being corporeal, they'll find that it is a trio of people who have attacked them. They wear jagged smiles and they're all much too sharp around the edges beneath their clothes. Those who saw the kelpies at Coffin Beach may recognize these people as something like them.

"Run, rabbit, run," one of the group says, voice rolling out like a gurgling tide.

Those who run will be chased and, if caught, chloroformed. Perhaps you're lucky, though. Perhaps you can race them back to safety. Or perhaps you'll find help along the way to protect you. Either way, the kelpies are relentless in their pursuit unless one of their number is injured or their prey can make it to ADI. The kelpies seem reluctant to actually enter ADI HQ or their housing, and will break off pursuit there, slinking back to the shadows.

➥ Curveball

(cw: kidnapping, violence/violence and mutilation against apparent animals, sadism, body horror, transformation, potential for claustrophobia)

For those unlucky enough to be caught, they'll find themselves waking amongst mud and bodies. Living, breathing bodies, thankfully. You have been tied up, but not gagged, and left with a group of other captives. A nearby fire casts light over everything, showing a large group of naked people with long, scraggly hair hauling a seal up out of the water. The animal fights them with a cunning that might seem odd, but the kelpies just laugh at it. They get it up near the fire, one raises a knife, and stabs into the seal, dragging the blade down its belly.

The seal bellows and then goes limp, seeming to collapse in on itself. It isn't long before a woman is drawn from the skin, shaking, fighting, wild-eyed with terror as her captors shove her around the fire in their own game. A few others turn their attention to the captives who are just beginning to wake and move about. They approach, one grabbing the skin the woman had come out of, others grabbing more skins from a nearby pile.

"Hush, hush... you'll have your freedom soon... while you can swim." The words come just before the kelpie slices your bonds and throws the skin over you.

The skin grapples your body, twisting tight around you, encasing and restraining. Your body is different now, thick and round, ungainly in the mud. Your legs have fused together and your arms have shrunk to thin flippers. This is not your body, you can feel how foreign it is, how you're crammed into the too-small confines of it... but you have instincts to go with it. Water is freedom! Or it's an attempt at freedom. It's either swim for your lives as some mockery of a selkie or stay and see how it feels to be cut open. Luckily for you, you'll find yourself psychically linked to the other selkies around you. Maybe you can do something together? Best think fast because the kelpies are setting their sights on new prey to chase once they've finished with their latest victim.

➥ Below the Belt

(cw: violence/violence and mutilation against apparent animals, body horror, gore)

The journey to Essex Bay isn't a long one, but it's somewhat treacherous as a small group of powerboats make their way into the refuge. The mission is simple: find where the kelpies are and see if there are any strategic points of-

Was that a seal? There are, in fact, many seals that pop up once boats enter the bay. The animals might seem to have an unusual cunning about them. Will they lead you somewhere useful? Perhaps try to flop themselves into your boats? The point is, there are seals accosting you in the middle of the night, and that's weird. Perhaps they have something they want to communicate.

Or was that a horse? A crocodile? There's something that seems to have noticed you, and it's smart enough that it's going to try to tip you and anyone else in your boat into the water rather than trying to engage otherwise. Sit down, you'll rock the boat.

➥ Sticky Wicket

(cw: potential for severe burns/injury, pain)

ADI is engaged in far more than one mission at a time, and for those not dealing with Essex Bay, or even before that, there are pick-ups to handle. Artifacts, you've been told as you're paired with someone else, whether you like it or not. The mission is simple: go to the Docks, collect a package from a locker there, and return with it to ADI. You've been provided an exact location and a code for the combination lock. The section of the Docks you've entered seems to be one with a lot of empty warehouses covered in graffiti, but the locker is there, something heavily reinforced and designed to be virtually impossible to get into. There's evidence that people have tried to gain entry without success.

Your code works, though, and you have your prize! You've been given strict instructions not to open the box the artifact is in… but there's nothing technically stopping you now, and there is a strange pull toward it.

Those who can't help themselves will find they have just picked up… some piece of sports gear! It looks wholly innocuous. Touch even a finger to it, though, and a horrific, searing pain will consume your entire body as 3rd-degree burns bloom across the skin where you've touched your artifact.

Or maybe you have a will of iron and sense enough not to touch strange, supernatural objects. What should be an easy mission is quickly derailed by some young punk darting out of an alleyway to try to steal your package. Or, at the very least, knock it from your hands. The youth is not alone, either. You've found yourself on someone's 'turf,' and they want what you've got. Are you cruel enough to let them have it?

➥ Mod Notes

BREAKING IT IN (21 July): Both Reyes and Bonnie will be available to answer questions that characters might have or listen to their complaints. Please put "NPC Requested" somewhere in your top-level response if you would like a mod response. For characters who can access their supernatural abilities and have some measure of supernatural spidey sense, both Bonnie and Reyes will register as off, but in different ways. Characters are welcome to attempt to use whatever powers they believe will work on the NPCs. There are potential IC consequences for this.
MOVE THE GOALPOSTS (23-24 July): Characters are welcome to capture or kill the kelpies. The only information they will be capable of providing to those who capture them and attempt to compel them for information is that they consider the entirety of the Massachusetts coast as their 'hunting grounds.' Whether that's true or not, it's what they believe.
CURVEBALL (23-24 July): Kidnapped characters will become seals! Sort of. Psychic seals who are extremely ill-fitted to the skins they're in. The only way to escape their current state is to be cut open and pulled out. As soon as they start to flee, the kelpies will chase them. Those who are captured will be cut out, toyed with, and shoved back into a skin again and again to continue the chase until they simply can't go on anymore.
BELOW THE BELT (24 July - night): Characters may encounter their selkie-fied comrades! Unfortunately, while the selkies can communicate with each other psychically, they are incapable of human speech. They are also being actively hunted by the kelpies. Characters may kill any kelpies they come across. Capture will not be possible in this case while they're in their horse forms. If PCs do not eradicate the kelpie threat that night, NPCs who have joined the mission will do so. Unfortunately, reconnaissance has become engagement, whether they like it or not.
STICKY WICKET (21 July - 5 August): You may select any piece of sporting gear you'd like for your character to pick up as long as it can fit in a reasonably-sized box. The pain associated with the burning will last only as long as a character is touching the object. Holding onto it for more than a minute will likely result in coming very close to death. Characters with inorganic appendages will find that the artifact will start to melt that appendage, whatever it is made of and it will still, somehow, hurt while it does it.
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[ That seal is distracting, to say the least. Gojou can't ignore it - even though this isn't the usual species he rescues, there's still terror and vulnerability. He ends up outright jumping out of the boat, standing in the shallows. He doesn't even care that his pants are waterlogged now. ]

Hey, get behind me!

[ ...it's ridiculous to talk to an animal, right? Right. And yet he finds himself doing it anyway. On a whim, he waits to see what happens rather than just shoving his way in front of it. ]

[The seal looks up at him, and there's a clearly visible nod before the seal splooshes its way behind him. Her flippers are more like floppers, but she manages to get around him, cowering in his shadow as two kelpies approach, apparently attempting to flank the pair.]

[ Huh. The seal actually listened? That's something to mull over. ]

Did you understand me?

[ Hey, it's worth asking, even while they're being flanked. Not that he has any idea what he'll do if the animal does verify this. He pulls out the knife he got from the ADI, that seems more suited to fighting these kelpies. He's a little awkward with it as he slashes at them. ]

[There's another nod, as the seal tries to stay out of the way of his footwork as he fights. No, explaining won't be easy like this, but it's enough for now for Gojou to know she's a person, not just a normal seal.

She barks a warning when one of the kelpies seems about to attack him suddenly from an angle he's not guarding.]

[ Well, now he knows, Gojou just has no idea how she got that way. Not that he's going to question something like this - to him, it's simply another form of some sort of curse, taking advantage of yet another innocent person.

He hears the warning but doesn't quite respond in time - or does he? No, it's sort of a feint. He lets the kelpie get in close enough that he can grab onto it, slamming its head down onto his knee. It hits him now that he's actually put himself in danger by jumping in here, and he should keep track of himself as well as her. If he could get rid of at least one of these things, it'd be easier - he goes for his knife while he has the one in hand, trying to stab it through the throat. ]

[She is fascinated, watching him fight. White hair, swift movements. Clearly, clearly he's a warrior back wherever he's from, even if he's not used to this knife. As his blade sinks into the kelpie's throat, and its thrashing slows and then stops, she slaps a flipper against her side in applause.]

[ He flashes a grin her way. Getting complimented by a seal - that's a new one, but no less valid. He keeps the blade in the kelpie's throat for a long moment, just to make sure it's good and dead, before pulling it out. He wipes the blade off on his pants before going for the other one. His first stab misses completely, but he tries again, going directly for the chest. ]

[Is it satisfying, feeling the moment when he punctures a lung and the kelpie gasps, trying to breathe, struggling? It dies, but even more slowly than the first.

Meanwhile, the seal with the floppers moves closer to Gojou, butting its head up against his leg gently.]

[ A little satisfying. It's times like these that Gojou can't exactly begrudge Toji his attitude - thoroughly taking an enemy out had its emotional perks.

He looks down at the seal when it comes close, a thoughtful expression replacing the almost manic one that had been there for a moment. ]

So. I'm assuming you want to get back to normal?

[ The question is how. ]

[Again, the response from the seal is a bobbing nod, as she remains close up in by Gojou. For safety, for comfort, perhaps both. She doesn't know how to signal that she needs a good stabbing too, but her gaze does linger on the knife in his hand.]

[ He considers this, raising the knife up again. This is mostly to brandish it her way, though he's careful not to let it cut her. He hasn't figured out that's exactly what he needs to do, yet. ]

You looking at this?

[Nod-nod-nod.

Yes, good, he's at least figured out the knife thing. She just needs to figure out how to convey 'slice me out of this thing, please'.]

Let's play charades. Point where you want it.

[ Is that even possible with a flopper? Gojou isn't sure. But it's worth trying, at least. ]

[Excitedly, the seal starts slapping its own belly. Which is totally an answer, right?]

If this hurts, don't blame me.

[ He can't imagine it wouldn't hurt, but he's sure the seal knows more about its own situation than he does. Aiming the knife at the belly, he slices across it. ]

[And the sealskin breaks, and out of it comes a woman, shivering, arms wrapped around herself, curled up in a ball. The skin lays on the ground under her. She looks up at Gojou quietly, trying to speak and failing for a moment.]

[ Gojou had started to expect something like this, but he's still surprised by it when it happens. He's just as quiet as he looks back at her, considering, before taking off his coat and laying it over her. ]

Are...are you with ADI?

[She pulls the coat closer, like one might grip a security blanket, not yet even trying to sit up yet.]

I am. How do you know about that?

[ He doesn't make her sit up. He's going to let her recover in her own time. Doing anything else would be cruel, especially since he has hardly a clue of what she's gone through. ]

I am too. Admin and public relations staff. Not from this world. The kelpies kidnapped me--kidnapped all of us. We were all wrapped in sealskins and turned into seals.

[She finally tries to stand up, gasping in pain as she puts pressure on her hand.]

So that's what those assholes were up to. They tried it on me but I got away.

[ Well, it was more like a certain someone had shot all of them before they could even touch him, but he didn't have to say that. It sounded kind of pathetic. He narrows his eyes as she gasps. ]

Are you hurt? Let me see.

I'll be alright, probably. Eventually. By personal standards of alright.

[Both her thumbs are visibly dislocated. But without any hesitation, she wraps the fingers of her left hand around her right thumb and just yanks it back into place, before preparing to do the same to the other hand. Yes, it hurts. Yes, she gasps as she does it, but...it looks like she's had experience with this. Knows exactly what to do.]

Damn. A lot of people couldn't do that.

[ Is it obvious from his voice that he's appreciating her? It should be. It was probably a strange thing to give compliment over, but in his line of work strength and capability was the most important thing. In his opinion, she just indicated this with her actions. ]

[She seems a little surprised by his reaction; no one really sees her as strong back home.]

Most people haven't dislocated joints as often as I have. I'm put together poorly.

Well, it's not just your lot in life but how you use it.

[ He takes note of her surprise, considering it. Did he give her a compliment that most don't? ]

People usually get down on you?

below the belt

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