Event - Appalachia: Into the Pines

[apocalypsehowmods]

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Appalachia: Into the Pines

Footage plays on the television as a new story comes on, showing a series of sweeping vistas, intercut with clips of wolves that have clearly been filmed at some local wildlife sanctuary. "As far as anyone knows it, the last wolf to ever freely roam the Allegheny Mountains was slain in West Virginia in 1897. Daniel Stoffer Hamrick saw to the beast's passing, and the woods in our part of the world have gone quieter ever since. Appalachia does not forget its history, though. It buries it beneath coal and flyash, debts and white powder and pills. And the blood of people taken before their time, by the mines, by the mountain, by things we don't have names for, just hurt. But Appalachia does not forget.

"This is Cindy Parsons with Channel 5, Wolf News." Footage cuts to a newscaster standing outside a gated apartment complex with FYRE's logo emblazoned on it. "As we know, our beloved Wolf Pen is home to one of the biggest FYRE worker housing complexes in Wyoming County. It is a monument to the history of our town, and this week, we'll be on the lookout for visitors from all over the country, coming to see the grand re-opening of the historic Bluestone Mine as a museum."

Footage cuts to a nondescript businessman, identified by the news footage as Carl Watts, CEO of FYRE. He's smiling blandly as he stands at a podium and gestures to the entrance of the mining tunnel behind him. "The Wolf Pen community has been a partner to us for decades now, and we knew it was finally time to give something back to all y’all. We'll have our soft opening on Monday with a full Rumble Down Under party in the old mines scheduled for June 15th. We'll have a live bluegrass concert and anticipate a huge influx of tourists to the area to help out our neighbors itching for a few more pocketbooks to tend to." A wink.

The footage returns to Cindy. "FYRE has stated that this new museum will provide an educational tool and tourist attraction for those wanting to learn about West Virginia, Wolf Pen, and the hard-working men and women who have made this beautiful part of our nation their home. Time will tell. Time is always telling when it comes to the promises of people who have used our land and our bodies to line their pocketbooks. They fill our blood and our lungs with black tar and-"

Cindy cuts out and is replaced by in-studio anchors. "Thank you, Cindy!" a blonde woman says, smile just a little strained. "I think we're all looking forward to seeing the big opening by FYRE on Sunday and that rocking good party next month. It should be a gneiss one! Now to Tim with the weather. Tim?"

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Comments

[abrightboy]

Malcolm considers his conversation with Callisto.

"Have you seen monsters in the woods?"

[worthallthis]

"I fought some. Last night." He frowns at his hand, the flesh one. "The wounds didn't stick. So they're magic somehow. But I definitely fought some."

[abrightboy]

“Callisto told me she fought monsters in the woods and they ripped her arm open but the wound disappeared like it was never there, but she felt it happen. Is that what you experienced, too?” Malcolm asks.

[worthallthis]

"Well. They didn't rip my arm open." Given said arm that he generally defends himself with is made of metal, and all.

Winter has to pause as the waitress returns with their pie and two forks for them, which he nods to accept. Then, once she's back out of earshot: "Yes. Pretty much like that. I shot one but I don't know if it stuck, either."

[abrightboy]

"Well. Obviously not your arm," Malcolm agrees. He picks up one of the forks. "Were they always visible or did they turn invisible, like the wounds, at any point?"

[worthallthis]

"They ran off when I started firing, but I lost their tracks." Winter is not actually the best at tracking things through nature. Especially not without his serum-enhanced senses. "I didn't see them vanish."

[abrightboy]

"I wonder if there's anything we can do about them," Malcolm muses. "Did they seem to have any weakness at all?"

[worthallthis]

"They don't like being shot," Winter says dryly. "So. Same weaknesses as anybody, probably. Just can't let them get away."

[abrightboy]

"What if we cut their heads off?" Malcolm suggests, like it's an intellectual exercise; just a puzzle they have to solve.

[worthallthis]

"Cutting off heads is a lot harder than it sounds," Winter points out, kind of wearily. "Sure, it'd probably work. But they're big, hard to pin down, and you'd need a lot of upper body strength to get a head off. I could have done it before. Here, I don't know."

[abrightboy]

"You need a good, sharp blade and it's like cutting butter," Malcolm says reasonably. "I wonder if we have any blades like that," he muses. "I'm actually more comfortable with a blade than a gun."

[worthallthis]

"Of the two of us. Which one do you think has cut off more heads," Winter says with a little roll of his eyes. "If you put their head on a block. Maybe. But one. That's a human. And human necks are skinnier than white beast necks. Less muscle, thinner bones. And two. The beasts are not holding still. Do not attempt to cut off any beast heads. Okay?"

[abrightboy]

Malcolm considers that with a nod of agreement.

Then raises a finger.

"What if they're attacking me?"

[worthallthis]

"Don't be fuckin' cute with me," Winter says, somewhere between stern and amused, and sounding kind of New Yorkian in the moment. "You either bring a gun and shoot it in the face, or you run away and hope your backup handles it. Or better yet, stay out of the woods."

[abrightboy]

'Don't be fuckin' cute with me'. Minus the swear, he sounds just like Gil's wife Jackie in that moment. Malcolm grins broadly.

"Are you from the Bronx?" he asks eagerly.

[worthallthis]

Winter opens his mouth, then shuts it again. Then scowls a little bit. "I'm from Russia. But. Maybe before that from Brooklyn." He has to admit it's probably true. He's pretty much accepted that at some point in the very distant past the person he probably used to be knew Steve Rogers, and Steve Rogers is from Brooklyn.

[abrightboy]

Malcolm smiles. "I'm not sure whether 'close enough' is insulting," he concedes. "But my mentor's wife was from the Bronx and she talked like that sometimes."

[worthallthis]

"As long as you didn't think I was from Jersey," he says, without thinking about it much. Then he pauses, frowns, and says, "I don't know what's so bad about Jersey. But I don't like it. Or Manhattan. Bronx is okay, though."

[abrightboy]

Malcolm huffs a self-deprecating laugh. "I grew up in Manhattan," he confesses. "Upper West Side." He holds up a hand. "And I get it," he promises. "I live in SoHo now. Well. I did at home." Which is still in Manhattan, but at least it's not Upper West Side Old Money Pretentious like his childhood home.

[worthallthis]

"I shoulda guessed," Winter snorts, not particularly seriously. "It might be different than how it was when I was there, anyway. It was. A long time ago, I think. Very long time ago."

[abrightboy]

"My family is very old money so it probably hasn't changed that much," Malcolm jokes back. "Have you even visited the city since... you lived there?"

[worthallthis]

"If I did, I don't remember it," Winter says, shaking his head a little. "It would've been on a mission. I didn't have time between when I ran away and when I got picked up here to get that far. Even if I'd remembered enough to try."

[abrightboy]

"Do you want to go back some day?" Malcolm asks. "Or do you think it would be too difficult? Too many memories?"

[worthallthis]

"It's been seventy years," Winter shrugs. "Even if I remembered things about it. I doubt there's much that would trigger them. And we're never going back to our worlds, anyway. Who knows if this world's Brooklyn is anything like mine."

[abrightboy]

Malcolm blinks.

“You don’t think we’re going back? …What do you think has happened to the people who’ve disappeared?” he asks