![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
apocalypsehowmods) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
redstringtheories2021-09-05 08:32 am
TDM #3
(cw: potential for severe disorientation/vertigo, claustrophobia, arachnophobia, body horror)
It happens in the blink of an eye. You may have been asleep. You may not have. You may have stepped through a door or turned a corner. You may have seen a flicker of something at the corner of your vision and turned to look. Or maybe you didn't.
It doesn't matter. What matters is that you find yourself somewhere entirely new and entirely unfamiliar. The arrival point is not always the same. (If you're lucky, it might be a canteen or an open office. If you're not, well... you aren't claustrophobic, are you? Or arachnophobic. These ducts do seem to be a bit cobwebby.) There is no one waiting for you but you don’t seem to be alone, either. Even in a janitor’s closet or the bathroom, you’ll find at least one person who seems to be just as out of place as you are.
If characters have arrived in a location devoid of NPCs, they may want to work together to figure out what is going on... or to avoid their 'kidnappers.' If you’ve arrived in the middle of the entry foyer or the gym, there may well be a few people who startle a bit at your arrival and try to approach (or discreetly leave the room... where are they going?). Will you cooperate or fight? Do you even understand what they're saying? You might need to find a translator, if you’re not immediately willing to follow a stranger.
After characters follow their new hosts (or are forcibly taken in) there will be a limited tour and the chance to settle in at the ADI-provided housing. (Do you enjoy living with strangers? Well. It's a new situation to navigate, anyway.)
(cw: animal death, both human and animal butchery, implied cannibalism, potential for flesh/small limb removal)
Weird things happen in Dogtown, everyone knows it. The Apocalypse Disruption Initiative (ADI) is not above taking advantage of that to test out the waters for its newest arrivals. They're not looking to send anyone to their death, though. That's far too much paperwork, you'd been assured with a wink from the employee who'd directed you to the park trailhead. You've been left with another person. Maybe they're a new arrival, as well, or a more seasoned 'veteran.' Either way, you're together for the next while and you've been asked to find and record any paranormal activity in the park. You have your phones and any other equipment you might have brought with you. Those who succeed in documenting anything peculiar will receive a $100 reward to be used as they see fit.
This month characters who venture into Dogtown will eventually stumble across what seems to be an abandoned camp. Its usage is fairly obvious: the remains of a hunting camp. And remains really is the operative word, considering that whoever used the camp wasn’t particularly fastidious about cleaning up after themselves. There are bits of various animal carcasses strewn around and by the looks of things the prey of these hunters was quite varied. Not all of them are prey animals either.
Stepping into the camp seems to have an effect: anyone who passes over the threshold to investigate will find themselves powerfully driven to mark themselves - or their partner - with lines that seem to indicate where a butcher might cut. There are black, red, and white paint pens littered around the camp that are perfect for this exercise. As they proceed, they will get the sense that once the lines are completely drawn, something will be coming along to make use of them.
Staying too long after those marks are completed - either through curiosity or through some other force - will result in a sudden unconsciousness. And when you wake up? (If you wake up…) Well. It seems the butcher has returned and taken just a bit more flesh. At least the wound is properly dressed, though. Thank goodness for small mercies.
(cw: altered perceptions and unreality/hallucination, body horror, dissociation, wounds, cancer, stalking)
Something is wrong with the mirrors.
Everywhere around Gloucester - at ADI headquarters, in ADI housing, at Bonnie's Flophouse, even in the bathrooms of mundane businesses (and, presumably, the homes of the innocent and uninvolved), looking in the mirror has become...risky. It's not predictable; it doesn't happen every time and may or may not happen to any given person the same way twice, but look into the reflection and you may see something that should not be there.
Perhaps your own reflection has changed, a face (human or monstrous) you don't recognize looking back at you, eerily in sync as though it has every right to be your true reflection… or un-synced from your movements, smiling knowingly at your distress.
Or maybe you still see your own face, but something about your body is warped, wrong: a growth or a seeping wound you can't find on your own physical form but that exists glaring and insistent in your reflection and feels, somehow, as though it's there in phantom form.
Maybe it's a pair of eyes watching from over your shoulder, hiding in the shadows, peering at you from every mirror you pass. Is it watching you from your reflection in that window, too? Is it growing nearer?
Possibly there's nothing wrong with your reflection at all, but the reflection of the room behind you stretches and twists, a view into an impossible, broken world that leaves you dizzy and wandering, lost down an imagined maze of hallways or following a phantom figure until someone else can snap you out of it.
Something is wrong with the mirrors. Best not to look again, lest you find out what else they have to show you.
(cw: hallucination, hypersomnia, vehicular accidents, potential for injury)
The summer is fading, and businesses around Gloucester have taken note. Fall decorations go up, and even some very early Halloween decor is on sale. The air is crisper in the mornings and evenings, the ocean breeze just a bit stiffer. There also seems to be a new melody floating around the town, one that leaves people feeling fatigued, heavy. Did you hear a snatch of it near the docks? Something that's vaguely familiar to you, nostalgic, almost. Maybe it's more a memory?
That song or memory seems to grow stronger when approaching the graveyards scattered throughout Gloucester. So, too, does the fatigue. Wouldn't it be nice to just sit down and rest? To close your eyes and let every worry that troubles your mind be soothed into the quiet oblivion of sleep?
Those most affected might find themselves passing out, and they always seem to do it when they are putting themselves in the most danger. You might drop while crossing a busy street or while riding a bike or some other wheeled mode of transportation. Those who investigate will find that traffic accidents seem to have seen an uptick recently, associated with the onset of these haunting tunes. They seem to be focused on the graveyards, but there's nothing immediately apparent there that might be causing problems.
Drink lots of coffee, and be careful trying to do anything. Stepping outside could be the last thing you do.
- ARRIVAL (Sep 1 - 21): Two people will always arrive in the same general location together. Arrivals occur throughout the early month, not all on the same day or in the same place. Arrivals are not naturally fluent in English/other languages immediately upon arrival. Characters may attempt to evade capture, but they will eventually be snagged before they can leave the building. PC's already in-game are more than welcome to interact with and try to guide new PC's to get them oriented. Please refer to the Arrival page for details regarding the arrival and onboarding process.
- THE BUTCHER'S CAMP (Sep 1- 24): Characters will only encounter the camp once. Everyone will feel the compulsion to draw carving lines along their own skin or that of the person they're with. If they stick around for long enough, they will pass out and may not wake up again. Those who do wake up will find that a piece of their flesh is missing and the wound has been bandaged. Whatever is taken will be non-fatal, but it will likely be inconvenient (e.g., some part of their calf or forearm, perhaps a finger or toe). Once ADI is made aware of injuries happening, they will stop sending people to Dogtown for training and only send people with the understanding that this is a potentially dangerous mission. Please bear in mind that if a character dies in the TDM prompt, they are dead. A different version who doesn't have TDM memories may be apped in their place. Similarly, injuries will not magically disappear. If your character loses a chunk of themselves, it is gone unless they can find someone who might be able to magically heal them. No one at ADI will offer this service, just mundane medical assistance. Magical healing is reserved for fatal injuries given the price of it!
- MIRROR, MIRROR (Sep 1- 24): Characters may encounter a mirror effects multiple times, and may experience the same effect each time or different ones. As noted in the prompt, there is no apparent rhyme or reason to when any particular mirror exhibits any particular effect. Within the first week of the effects becoming known, ADI will cover all the mirrors within their headquarters and send out an advisory for characters to do the same in their homes. Characters who experiment and/or interview locals will, after a lot of legwork, be able to ascertain that the effects seem to be most concentrated on the west side of town, nearest the empty fields where the Fenix Down Extravaganza had set up their circus tents last month, with additional concentrations around ADI-affiliated buildings and Bonnie's Flophouse. Mirror effects will gradually grow less frequent over the course of the month and cease to occur after the 24th.
- HAUNTING TUNES (Ongoing Effect): The tunes will be oddly familiar to the character, even if they are not from modern Earth. There are currently no ill effects from the song apart from inducing fatigue in characters. They can fight it off with coffee/caffeine, or other things they'd typically use to wake themselves up, but that tiredness always returns. An examination of the graveyard will not turn up a specific source. It just seems to be something there.
mirror mirror
Hey, anyone in here? I heard a crash.
[ well, it was less a crash and more a smash. harry doesn't want to intrude, but he's also incapable of minding his own business. this is a middle ground for him between leaving and barging in. ]
no subject
In any case, his paranoia brought him to swinging into the empty air behind him - a first, he's usually way more composed about this. Calmly talk first, assess the situation, then go into fight or flight mode. A small voice in his head kindly informs him it's probably because he's starting to deteriorate.
Anyway, slight correction, the air is empty-ish. Spencer-less, but there's still definitely a set of stalls there who don't take too kindly to being hit full-force with a bat. The resistance slams into his arms, he can feel the immediate backlash in his muscles and joints.
Um. OW.
It explains the hitched strain in his voice when he calls out an otherwise stupidly light, casual: )
Occupied!
( ...it's a multiple stall bathroom, Jack, you moron. )
no subject
VOLITION [Formidable: Failure] - It's no good: you're much too curious about what's going on inside to not investigate. It's in your nature as a detective. ]
Hang on, I'm coming in. [ he announces, feeling almost obligated to, before pushing open the door and peeking his head in. a mid-40s man with a scruffy beard, covering almost all his face save his chin, looks into the bathroom. ] Hey are you...
Why do you have a bat?
no subject
Chill. He could use a little chill. Get your shit together, man. Try not to look like a crazy person to yet another stranger. Quick, come up with a good excuse, you can do it, you've gotten better at lying on the fly, just reach deep down and-- )
...Spiders.
( God damn it. )
no subject
RHETORIC [Medium: Success] - Ok, obviously he is lying. But to what end? People only lie when they have something to hide. Is it worth uncovering the truth? ]
Riiiight. [ not right. ] Ok! If you have a spider issue, a bat seems excessive. Maybe just take your shoe off and smack it. Or don't. Spiders kill other more invasive insects after all.
no subject
( For what it's worth, he doesn't seem invested in this lie, he's self-aware enough to know how it sounds. He's never been great at it, and can count on one hand the number of them he's successfully and impressively sold. Everything else has been downright lame.
He figures the act in and of itself communicates a few things — that he doesn't want to talk about what actually happened, that he's embarrassed by it, and that he knows they both know he's an idiot.
However, he'll add one additional fact that might make it seem like he's slightly less stupid: he pulls up his pants a little to reveal a prosthetic limb on the right side. )
Shoe isn't really an option.
( The logistics of either balancing on that thing or quickly taking his leg off are way less convenient than hypothetical spider baseball. Getting to use his robot leg for convenient bullshit material is one of the few silver linings about it, okay, let him live his best life. )
no subject
[ RHETORIC [Challenging: Success] - Wait, hang on. Don't say you think it looks cool.
(But it *does* look cool!)
RHETORIC - Yes, it does, but you don't know if this is something he's sensitive about or not. Are you really going to risk offending a man just to say something on your mind without a filter? ]
Cool leg! [ okay! now that that's out of the way: ] Look, I don't buy the spider thing, but it's fine man. If you wanted to let some aggression out on a bathroom stall, who am I to judge?
[ literally, he wrecked his hostel room in a drunken rage and tried to run out on the bill (unsuccessfully). there is no nose turning up on destruction of public property for him. ]
no subject
( He says mildly, pretty unfazed by the compliment. He's hard to rattle - usually, when there's not a psychotic asshole involved in the mix.
He rubs at the back of his head sheepishly, ruffling the hair there into further disarray. )
But it wasn't really just... ( Aggression for the sake of aggression. Jack's a pretty laid-back guy. He sighs. ) I thought I saw something. Not a spider, just. Something else. That's all.
no subject
[ holes in his head, may be insane, it is what it is. his head turns to the mirror, taking a look at both of them in it, then he shrugs. ]
Well, don't worry. It doesn't look like anything is here but the two of us.
[ and yet, should jack glance at the mirror, he will notice the other man's reflection not following him. instead, the reflection is looking right at jack with a mean smile, reaching down to his belt, and pulling out a gun. he winks and points the gun at him, finger on the trigger. ]
no subject
His eyes land on the mirror. He watches the man pull a gun - but he doesn't see any movement in his peripheral vision.
So, he does the first thing that comes to mind — he takes a wide side-step, moving out of frame so he can no longer see himself - or it. )
Hey, by the way, I'm pretty sure mirror-you wants to murder me. Or-- you. Or he just really doesn't like glass.
no subject
[ he blinks and then slowly turns his head over -- the reflection looks back at him. harry tilts his head, waves his hand, and the mirror reflects it back without a hitch. he looks back at the man, then back to the reflection. ]
Don't know what you mean. All I see is... a man recovering from his late-stage alcoholism, no longer in pain. [ he sighs, heavy. ] Not every day is good for him, but he's still trying. One step at a time.
[ EMPATHY [Easy: Success] - Not to be rude, but not *everything* is about you. This man is clearly confused and in distress. ]
[ he turns away from the mirror and checks the man over, trying to take in his physical demeanor. his eyes, composure, he *seems* normal but then again he's seeing things in the mirror that aren't there. ]
You doing ok? It's ok if you're disoriented, I totally relate. I can help you out.
no subject
That doesn't necessarily mean there wasn't something going on, that doesn't necessarily guarantee Jack was hallucinating it. But... what that's what it is? )
...Yeah. Okay. Thanks.
( Help him out, he'll accept the offer with his reluctance as muted as possible, and only a flickering glance toward the rimmed edge of the mirror.
It's times like this he misses Bathroom Cowboy. That guy always knew how to relax a restroom. )