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apocalypsehowcomm2023-08-16 07:43 am
Event - Feeling Faint
(cw: Alterations in reality and perception, chance for violence or injury, potential chance of loss of name or other pieces of a character’s identity, depending on conversations with NPC)
Somewhere, deep in ADI’s basement, there’s a meadow in a metal room. That room has a door that always stays locked. Yet, after a couple visitors come by to talk to the inhabitant of that room, that door is unlocked and the meadow vanishes along with the inhabitant.
It isn’t a quick thing, no light switch is flicked announcing the change in the status quo, it’s an irregular thing. One day everything is as it should be and then, for an hour, all of the illusions and glamours making every non-human seem human simply vanishes. Then it’s two hours. Then a whole day. Then it’s only flickers now and then or only portions of a body left unchanged, all interspersed with days where nothing seems to happen at all. Like someone’s playing a game. Something that leaves the locals on edge as ‘monster’ sightings increase and send a ripple of fear and doubt through town. Fear and doubt that is sometimes answered in unkindness at best and violence and fear at worse.
Though, who the sadistic someone is might be difficult to pinpoint for those outside of the know. Anyone who goes looking or has ways of sensing where the fluctuations are coming from might come across a handsome stranger perched atop one of the now-vacant warehouses once used by Oculus where a rich carpet of grass and tumbling ivy now overtakes the roof and spills down the sides.
For the brave or curious or angry at heart, the stranger will turn to their visitor with a small, knowing smile from where they’re sat in their meadow, a flower crown in hand and held out like an offering. “Hello, who do we have here, then?”
(cw: extreme distress, hallucinations, supernaturally heightened emotions, blood, monstrous creatures, potential for violence and death)
"Please! Please"--your name, someone is shouting your name--"I need- please! Help!" The voice is a familiar one, someone you care for, or at least have no negative feelings about. They might be someone you've met here in Gloucester, or they could be someone from home. They're distressed, they're in Dogtown. You only hear them as you travel around the edges of the park. And there are even glimpses of them. Flashes of a face that seems to belong to the person who's shouting.
Even if you're wary, sensibly so, the pitch, the distress, puts some sort of feeling into you. Fear, perhaps, for the 'person' in danger? Anger that someone would try to impersonate someone you love? Hopelessness that you can't actually do anything to help? The emotion fills your belly, wells up like a tide and crashes through the mind. It's not impossible to resist going into Dogtown, but it's certainly difficult.
Those who get any substantial distance, will note that they seem to be drawn deeper and deeper into the wood and that the ground grows moist and ruddy. The scent of iron fills the nose and senses. Those who have a sense of Dogtown as it is now may be able to tell that they're being drawn toward the blood river in the southern reaches of the park. Getting closer, you'll be able to see a creature shambling along sideways on clawed and webbed feet. It swings a lantern from its head that flashes to look like the person you know now and again. The false form shouts in fear and terror, crying out.
Should the creature spot you spotting it… be prepared. It will attack immediately, and it doesn't seem to pull its bites or slashes. While ordinary means are enough to bring it down, there is definitely more than one creature. Perhaps a brood has recently hatched in the river.
(cw: hallucination, altered mental states, gaslighting)
There's a face that keeps turning up around town, but it's not really clear who it is. It's a Caucasian, mustachioed gentleman who seems to be in books where he doesn't belong, in the background of photographs, both old and new, and even on advertisements. You might notice him only in a few things at first, but once you clock him… he's everywhere.
Inquiries into his identity net a mixed response from locals. He's just… some man. Nice mustache, though! Does he look a little like Matthew McConaughey? He just looks like another New Englander, maybe some founder for Gloucester? A reverse image search yields much the same results. There are actors and models who look vaguely like this man, but no one that definitively matches him.
The strange thing is that as you see him more and more, there's the feeling of a hand gently touching your shoulder. A large, masculine hand, as far as anyone with particularly acute senses can tell. It only lasts a moment, and then it's gone. You can never turn fast enough to see anyone, and they don't appear in any mirrors; though… there's a mild distortion in the air if you manage to glimpse a reflection somehow.
Those touched by the hand of the mustachioed man will find themselves feeling more and more inclined toward mischief. Have you seen the mustachioed man? No, no, you haven't. When shown photos including him, you might be inclined to lie and say you see someone else entirely. It's just a little mean. With things in Gloucester spinning out of control, perhaps you ought to grasp control where you can. Making someone doubt themselves and their reality? That's one of the most powerful forms of control out there.
- GENERAL - Players are welcome to play background 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 prompts should be sufficient and ordinary people will act like… ordinary people! You're welcome to make up any details for your specific scene. Also, please remember that character deaths are permanent and plan accordingly!
- FLICKER (16 August - Potentially Onward) - Players are welcome to control their own NPC interactions. Some might be understanding or come to their defense while others might turn a blind or turn to violence. These moments of violence shouldn’t be outright mobs so much as small groups close to a mugging that only happen once and a while, not a certainty. Characters will have the chance to talk to Milo and either convince them to continue the illusions or drop them entirely, what happens with the illusions from an IC standpoint will depend entirely on these interactions, so if you tag into Milo’s interaction, please make sure that thread is prioritized.
- FEINT (16-23 August) - The monstrous creatures can be killed with enough bullets or other normally lethal methods. The figures they mimic will be perfect copies of characters who will elicit strong emotions in your characters. The only limit on who these can be would be for characters already in games. Please just get the other player's permission. If two characters are together, the creature will only mimic one important person. The mimicked individual will provide reasonable (if terrified) responses to questions that are shouted at them.
- FIGMENT (16-31 August) - Characters will be able to find plenty of people who look vaguely like the mustachioed man, but efforts to track them down will lead to dead ends. They seem to be ordinary actors, models, and people who have had their photos show up on an image search. Characters trying to investigate the strange happenings in Gloucester and the surrounding area, particularly Dogtown, will find themselves seeing the man more often than others. They'll also suffer the effects of the man's 'touch.' Characters who feel compelled to gaslight and deceive others will be affected until they take out that impulse on someone. It doesn't need to be anyone they care about; though, that makes it feel better somehow. Individuals aligned with the Spiral may find themselves feeling particularly well fed for the month of August on fear juice.
no subject
"Jon! Jon, keep-- keep talking, we're coming, don't give up!" They feel like stupid statements, but anything, anything must help. He keeps Mercy in his periphery, barreling through the underbrush heedless of scrapes or scratches. They can save him. They can save him and it'll all be right again, he knows it.
His head turns towards Mercy after a bit, looking around for the next path. "Which-- which way from here??"
no subject
She turns her nose toward the scent and starts moving more carefully. Still quick, but not the mad dash from before.
"Let go of me, you- Martin!" It's Jon's voice calling again, and it ratchets up the tension in Mercy. She pulls her dirk from a sheathe at her leg and readies it as they approach the sounds of movement. A coppery tang fills the air.
no subject
Oh. Oh no.
He just stands, quiet, observing this... this thing. An anglerfish. The first statement he had to research for Jon, wasn't it? This wasn't even the same. It probably doesn't even know, but the shock of seeing it causes him to simply stand and stare at it as it turns it's real face towards him, teeth bared.
no subject
"Run, Martin," is her command before she launches herself at the monster, darting to the side and lashing out at it with her blade. She manages to land a solid slice across its flank, one that has it snarling in pain and whipping around to face her as the puppet on its stalk calls out 'Martin!' again in a mockery of Jon's voice.
no subject
Mercy's shove breaks him mentally away from the spiral his brain wants to have and back into the present, just in time for him to see her deliver the blow to it's head. He should have been more prepared, but there's no time for that now. He staggers back, searching the ground for anything remotely pointy, and settles on a rock instead.
"I-- I'll distract it!" He moves to the side, staying by the treeline but away from Mercy. "C-Come on, you-- you thing pretending to be my boyfriend, look at me!"
no subject
But as it is, she takes the opportunity to race up and strike at the thing's back while it's preoccupied. Her dirk drives into its back, and the thing screams in pain as Mercy pulls out and readies again.
no subject
Thankfully, Mercy is on it with her weapon and gets in a good hit, leaving him time to move when it can't see him and look for something else to whack it with. Unfortunately, he is not sensible, not even a little bit. Maybe this is how he and Jon got on so well.
He is watching though, trying to make sure she's okay and to be able to make noise should it round on her again. Even now, he's moving without hiding any steps and making sure he's not being quiet so it has something to watch as he goes.
no subject
With it distracted again, she sets aside her fear and charges for it. This time, she leaps and crawls her way onto it's back, stabbing into the base of the stalk above its head. "Martin, I said run!"
no subject
"I'm-- I'm not leaving you here with this thing!" Like yes, he would prefer not to be here, but if Mercy got hurt or worse from this and he took off the guilt would eat him alive. "I'm only running if you're also going to run!"
In the meantime, he's just going to continue pelting it with rocks and sticks he finds on the ground. Helping! Mostly.
no subject
She's angry at this creature, rather angry at Martin, and she just wants to finish it. "Die, you yellow-bellied bilge rat!"
no subject
Wait. There's a big hole in the tree now, where the monster's teeth carved in, and it's not stable. He might-- he has an idea.
Martin grabs one of the biggest branches from the ground and whacks the tree once, twice-- and then as it starts to fall forward, yells out. Hopefully, it'll land on the creature. "MERCY, GET AWAY!"
cw: gore
There's a moment of silence as Mercy looks down at the creature and then up at Martin. It's broken when she casts a wild grin in his direction. "Hah! You got that over-stuffed blood sausage good!" She steps out of the way of the gore and kneels to wipe her blade through the grass before drying it on her shirt. "Proper tactician, you are, sir."
no subject
It's another moment until he's got enough brain to move literally at all, which leads to him just sitting down in the dirt away from all the. Uh. Bits. "I... I didn't think that would work. I mean, I wanted it to work, I, I hoped it was going to-- bloody hell."
He looks to Mercy all of a sudden, looking her over for any injuries. "You're-- you're okay, right? Everything's okay with-- with all your limbs and, and stuff, right?"