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redstringtheories2022-03-01 09:51 am
TDM #9
(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: death, child death, semi-graphic description of injury, existential terror, memory manipulation (adding memories))
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, especially not with recent events that have transpired surrounding Dogtown. An employee gives you a number to call if anything truly dangerous happens and you've been left with another person at the trailhead. 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.
There is a body on the side of the path. From a distance, it's hard to tell who it might be… apart from someone who's made terrible life choices about where to take a break. You might find the body propped up against a boulder, lying in the snow, or even slumped on a bench. Approaching, though, brings into view… someone. Maybe someone you recognize vaguely. Do you know them from- Where exactly do you know them from? Or maybe it's a complete stranger, someone foreign in face and form.
The body is never the same for any groups of people who might happen upon it. One time, it's a young white man dressed in what seems to be parachute pants, a boombox fallen or resting with him. Another, it's an Hispanic person, their clothes reminiscent of something out of a western. Still others, it might be a little black girl, looking like she's cosplaying one of the original settlers for Gloucester. People of all different races, ages, genders, times, all beside the path. Some of them look to be obviously dead, their heads caved in or blood splattered across the path. Others, it's harder to tell. They might be someone who's passed out? A drunk who's wandered here from town and could need help.
The moment anyone touches them, though, the body crumbles, something made of ash that simply wipes itself away. And in its place, it leaves memory. The person who touches the body will find themselves reliving the last horrified moments of this person's life. They will know precisely how and when this person died. Every death has some component of agony or fear. No one found passed quickly or painlessly.
Everyone dies, and it is never so kind a thing as they might have hoped. Never.
(cw: altered mental states, breathing difficulties, imprisonment, victim-blaming)
Repairs are going about as well as they can be at ADI; the building still bears the scars of last month's attack but day to day matters slump back toward the status quo now that the acute crisis has passed. For a few days it actually seems as though the press of unending needs and obligations has abated, like a massive crushing stone lifted from one's back to allow a gasp of breath, leaving workers and residents reeling in the exhausted aftermath.
It doesn't last, but when the pressure intensifies once more it takes on yet another new form. Things will seem to be back to normal when suddenly you realize that the room in which you find yourself is getting smaller–or perhaps the air has grown stale, perhaps that's why it's suddenly so hard to breathe. You're trapped in here, locked in, locked away. Windows seem to shrink and fortify into slitted openings too tight for escape; what might have been an ordinary office door is now a heavy metal thing fortified with deadbolts.
They've locked you in; they've decided that you're not to move about freely, that you're a danger to others. Are you a danger to others? You must be; you must have done something to deserve this. The question of who 'they' are is one without an answer, a nebulous sense of them, the ones who call the shots, the ones who must be looking out for everyone. They don't speak to you; there's no chance to plead your case, only this miserable, tiny cell and your own guilt over something you must have done. You hear them passing by your door at times, keys jangling, footsteps heavy, but there's no hope of aid from them.
None of it is real. The rooms don't shrink; the doors and windows don't change. To someone not caught up in the illusion, it will seem as though those caught in its grip have gone into hysterics over nothing at all, insisting that they're trapped when all they need to do is open the door.
(cw: monsters in the dark, altered mental states, semi-graphic description of injury)
When the crushing claustrophobia finally abates, this time seemingly for good, the shadow woman makes her first appearance. She is seen only in darkness at nighttime, silhouetted in a doorway or lurking in an underpass. Turn on the lights, and there's nothing there–it must have been a trick of the light, the mind making connections out of something seen from the corner of one's eye.
Turn off the lights, though, and there she is again.
She's patient at first, toying with her prey. Lights on, and you're safe. Lights off and the figure returns, still and staring and something you can almost convince yourself you've somehow imagined. But leave the lights on too long, play with the light switch too many times, or watch her too closely, and her patience has an end. When she finally moves, she's fast, charging across a darkened street or a darkened room, the only expression visible on her face is the inhuman light in her eyes, and there is nothing left except to run for the nearest patch of brightness in the night. Maybe you even get away–flee to the circle of sickly light under a lamppost and she must halt at the edge of the darkness, unable to follow. She might circle, waiting for you to make a run for it, or she might disappear back into the night. Will you chance a sprint to the next pool of light?
For those she catches, there is pain. There are rending claws that leave her mark, bleeding, on her victims–but the pain does not end in death. It ends in madness. You may descend into a state beyond thought, mind disappearing into a panicked fugue from which you will retain no memories. Or you may believe yourself to be still fighting off the creature of the night and legions like her, using your environment to protect yourself, to stave off attack.
Those unaffected will see what is truly happening: victims of the creature run rampant in frenzied efforts to bring more and more darkness to the nighttime city. Wild-eyed and unaware, they may start at something as simple as unscrewing a lightbulb, or engage in something as complex as cutting power to entire buildings. Regular citizens of Gloucester fall victim along with the people of ADI and sabotage runs rampant through the city, but it seems that above all else, ADI itself is the target of these attempts to turn out the lights. Panic begins to spread throughout the city as the attacks continue night after night.
- ARRIVAL (March 1 - 31): 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 Road We All Must Travel (March 1 - 31): The bodies found can be photographed, but they'll turn up blurred. There's nothing that can be gleaned about the bodies from a distance, only by moving close and touching them. The bodies can be anyone from any time and any place, even other worlds. Characters might even see non-human races represented. In every case, the body will disappear when touched and characters will pick up the final moments of the person's life. Players are welcome to make these final moments anything they want. The person could have died by mundane or supernatural means, but they will have died a painful or terrifying death in some way.
- Prisoners of Consciousness (March 4 - 12): Episodes in which characters believe themselves to be imprisoned will occur exclusively on ADI property and in the Flophouse. The hallucinations may last for minutes or hours, though characters are likely to perceive time as though they were imprisoned much longer. Characters not affected by the hallucination may help pull others out of it by grounding them in reality, but it is also possible for them to be drawn into the hallucination themselves if they become frightened.
- A Trick of the Dark (Nights of March 12 - 15) While people who have been caught by the apparition seem to focus their attacks on ADI property, the shadow woman herself never appears within ADI offices or apartments. She may sometimes appear in the Flophouse, and frequently appears outdoors, in darkened hallways of local businesses, and in the homes of locals. ADI housing curfew at 11:00 PM each night is still in effect; characters who stay out later may crash at HQ but will not be let into the apartments (they may also be able to get into the Flophouse…if its residents are kind enough to take them in). Characters caught by the shadow woman will experience confusion, terror, and compulsion to sabotage lighting, particularly in and around ADI property, until dawn of the next day. Characters who attempt to fight the shadow woman will find that she fights back (and that any scratch from her claws still causes the fugue state); if they manage to pin her down she will dissipate into shadows.
Villanelle | Killing Eve - Canon point end of Season 3
I. Arrival:
[Huh.
She had walked into her apartment only to walk into a janitor's supply room.
That doesn't usually happen. She pauses, turns around, and walks right into the opposite wall, knocking over several mops.
Okay, so that doesn't work twice. She opens the door, expecting to see her apartment again, somehow, but...it's not. It's an office building.
...how odd. Well, she doesn't have a head injury or any injury, in fact, so it's not some kind of fever dream. Still, it could be some kind of trick--how someone managed to do this, she has no idea--technology was crazy nowadays anyway, so who really knows--so she grabs one of the mops, breaks it in half, and takes the pointiest piece for a weapon.
She carefully exits the door, scarcely making any noise as she moves along the outer edge of the office wall.
Probably a bad thing that she got surprised by the nearest person rounding the corner.]
Ahhhhhhhhhhh!
[She's going to try stabbing them as much as she can if she gets close. Sorry about that?]
II. The Road We All Must Travel
[She's used to dead bodies. So it's really easy to identify the person as a dead body even from far away. She laughs, pointing in its general direction.]
Look, they must have been so surprised!
[She strolls up to it, but her pace slows when she realizes that she might actually know them from somewhere. She can't quite place it, though. Well, she's killed enough people that she really can't remember every single one...even though she does, it's not completely out of the question that she might have forgotten one or two. But still, why would they be here? If it was one of hers, they should be long-decomposed by now, since she hasn't exactly been doing that many jobs lately, nor wanted to...]
Something is strange about this.
[It's a perfectly non-descript white man in his 50s, completely exchangable with any businessman one might see on any day. Weirdly enough he kind of reminds her of Konstantin a little--
The moment she touches him there's a blast of memories, and she cries out in surprise and anger--
He was so afraid, so alone, and he never really thought about how lonely dying would be.
He's just so alone.
There's a trail of blood from the gunshot wound in his back. He thinks he deserves it though. There's so many people that could have done it, so many people he's wronged.
It's why he's alone.
It's good that he's alone.
And then he simply turns to ash.]
III. A Trick of The Dark:
[She's hacking into the side of a wooden house with an axe.
It's almost quiet, how studiously she's working, how quickly and how intently she seems on getting into the wall. When bits of wood start to break apart, she reaches in with her hands and yanks them out--she's fairly strong, so it doesn't take much, but it's still weirdly methodological, as if she's actively looking for something.
And then she's back at it again with the axe, chopping away.
It's probably fine. She's probably up for a conversation or two.]
VI. Wildcard - Anything goes!
I.
He knows this.
All too well.
It registers in flashes, the woman, the stick in her hand, the pointy end darkened with blood. Suddenly everything is very raw, colors fraying around the edges, his own breathing too loud in his ears.
And then he is moving in, mind blank, going for the stick and trying to wrestle it out of her hands. He's not a fighter, at all, but there's the raw desperate strength of adrenaline and survival behind it.]
no subject
She drops the mop, lets go and lets him have it if he wants it. Whatever is going on here, it's not worth the risk.
So instead she laughs.]
Whoa! Okay, I'm not trying to kill you.
[Yet.
Her accent might be little hard to place but it's clearly Russian, and usually she'd tried to go an accent that's from whatever country she happens to be in but since this could literally be anywhere, she'll take the risk.]
no subject
She's laughing and that doesn't make it better, not one bit. That's dangerous and unpredictable and he takes a step back, then another, holding the stake out defensively.]
You stay right there! Stay where you are!
no subject
Okay? Okay, sure. It's not like I was doing anything else.
[She's still grinning, a shark-like smile. She's clearly sizing him up, ready to strike when she decides that he's a threat.]
What is this place, anyway?
no subject
His hands are shaking when the initial shock slowly settles and he hates the way she's looking at him.]
Security can explain that to you.
[He'd really love for them to show up now.]
no subject
[Aw, he's terrified, isn't he?]
You really don't have to be so scared?
no subject
You stabbed me. That doesn’t exactly make people like you, you know.
no subject
[She grins, she knows that from experience.]
Come on, it's not like it's that bad!
[She's also very enthusiastic. Her hand goes up like she's about to punch him in the arm where it hurts the most, but she stops, thinking better of it since he already seems like he's about to bolt.]
So what is this place? Did they put you up to this?
[If you're in the know, you'll know who they are.]