TDM #13

[apocalypsehowmods]

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➥ Arrival

(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.) You might even arrive in a section of building that has been demolished, leaving a pit of rubble open to the sky–hope you're up on your tetanus shots! 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. The one exception is the demolition zone off what used to be one corner of the building: it seems the security teams are keeping a particularly close eye on that area to document new arrivals and bring them in quickly.

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.)

➥A Face For Radio

(cw: trypophobia, phonophobia, air raid siren in link)

Weird things happen in Dogtown, everyone knows it. And the weird things have been getting worse. Much worse. The rise in dangerous rather than merely uncomfortable or startling phenomena has put an end to ADI's use of Dogtown as a testing ground for new recruits. Under ADI's advisement, the City of Gloucester has officially and indefinitely closed Dogtown to the public, and work is ongoing to construct barriers around the entire park to prevent trespassing. Dogtown's borders are now patrolled by Gloucester law enforcement as well as ADI employees from the Investigations and Security divisions, who document phenomena visible from outside its borders and actively keep people out. New arrivals who volunteer for the work may still find themselves dropped off outside the borders of Dogtown in order to beef up patrols and help document paranormal activity while receiving an introduction to the kind of work ADI does. An employee will give you a GPS device where you need only press a button to alert ADI there is severe danger and someone needs to come help you right away, explicitly instruct you not to actually enter Dogtown, and leave you with another person at the edge of the park. 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 record any paranormal activity visible from outside the park. Those who succeed in documenting anything peculiar will receive a $100 reward to be used as they see fit, but those who are caught entering Dogtown in pursuit of such proof will be reprimanded and receive no reward.

This month, everything is quiet. Peaceful, even! With Dogtown closed up and the hand creatures ostensibly dealt with, it seems the breeches caused by low manpower are finally dealt with.

And then the phones start acting up.

For some, it starts low and builds, a wailing warning issued from every cell phone on the block for stretches of seconds that feel like hours. Nothing makes it stop, the phones won’t turn off, and there’s no actual banner or text warning offering explanation.

For others, it happens in the middle of calls or while they’re browsing the web: static, sharp and sudden and loud blares from the phones in a small area all at once, seemingly at random. Annoying enough on its own, but those affected begin to notice something…off. Is that mailbox following you? Did that signpost turn to look as you passed by? Inanimate objects seem to come to life around you; those that can stalk you will, and those that can’t 'move' do all they can: watch. At least you don’t seem to be the only one noticing, right?

For those who look long and hard enough or for the truly perceptive, a commonality will eventually be spotted. It’s a cell tower within Dogtown. Tall, innocuous, with its rusted metal frame and pillar structures attached near the top; it seems perfectly normal, if weather-worn…at least until your eyes travel the form more closely. The crossing of beams doesn’t make a thin pyramid shape as it should, instead they twist over themselves into impossibly long limbs. Legs lead into a hollow torso and spindly arms, the metal so twisted and rusted that it begins to look like leathery, flaking skin the longer you stare.

The amplifiers at the top nestle in a tangle of wires and twisted metal with empty sockets at random intervals, as though the eyeless structure didn’t always used to be that way. Now it sways ever so slightly in with a gentle rocking.

➥ What Belongs to the Sea

(cw: dismembered bodies, flayed bodies, body horror, zombies, hand-based trauma, human-caused environmental damage)

Last month it was horrific little dolls, this month what's washing up on the shores of Gloucester is far, far worse. ADI has people continuing to patrol the beaches, particularly those where the dolls had been found. On the night of August 13th, it's not dolls, but pieces of some sort of sea creature that wash ashore. A sea creature touched by something terrible. It's almost like an eel… if eels had irregularly-spaced and sized hands. And the face of a human woman. The pieces of its body are wrapped in fishing line, netting, and other bits of garbage that are regularly thrown into the ocean. The head, for whoever might find it, still seems to have at least a little life left in it because if it is approached, it sobs, a broken sound that shouldn't be possible when it has no lungs. It can't form words, just cries and cries. Characters who ask native ADI personnel who have heard the sobbing or heard recordings of it will let them know it sounds distinctly like the wailing heard beneath one of the local bridges last month. And the wailing beneath the bridge? That's stopped.

If it were only the strange eel creature, that would be disturbing, but manageable. It is not only the eel creature. On August 14th, the tide pulls in something else. Perhaps you're actively patrolling, perhaps you're just strolling places you might want to rethink. Whichever it is, your eye is drawn to a figure lying prone in the surf, the waves buffeting them, shifting them up and down. It's hard to make out who the body might be, and as you come closer, it doesn't help in the slightest.

The body has been flayed. All visible skin stripped away, leaving exposed muscle and fat. The salty ocean seems to have cured it to some extent, but not nearly enough. Whoever this was, they are no more. There is all manner of refuse wrapped around their feet and ankles, old fishing hooks dug into their skin. Glance into the waves beyond, and you'll see something watching you. It has reflective, animal eyes, and disappears almost as soon as you've noticed it. The analysis of the bodies by ADI personnel (native or off-worlder) will show that these are people who have been reported missing or kidnapped from Cape Ann to Essex Bay.

The next night, August 15th, there are more bodies. So many more bodies. They wash ashore in groups of five or six, always when you're not watching. These are different. Still flayed, still wrapped with refuse, but when you reach toward them this time, they reach back. The bodies grasp for you, rise and try to wrestle you into the surf. It's clear they mean to bring you their fate, whatever it was, if they can. There's no signs of life in these bodies when they come for you. The keen-eyed may note that they have large fish hooks run through or near their hands, though. Removing those seems to be an effective means to make the bodies stop. Or removing the hands/arms from the rest of the body. A headshot or two might work, as well.

➥ Telephone

(cw: gaslighting, altered mental states, supernaturally induced paranoia; please place additional cw's in subject lines)

The random, blaring sirens aren't the only problem with the phones, though one might be forgiven for missing a second issue that begins more subtly a few days later. Voice and video continue to work as expected within ADI's network when the sirens aren't going off, but text... text is another matter.

Sometimes the messages are dropped into the middle of a conversation. Sometimes they come out of the blue, perhaps even from someone the recipient has never met. Always, though, the messages appear to come from a legitimate network user, and always they are somehow sinister in nature. Some are uncomfortable truths about the sender or the recipient, some outright lies, others accusations or horrifying anecdotes. From the sender's perspective, nothing is amiss: all outgoing text messages will appear exactly as typed when viewed on one's own phone, no more and no less than one had chosen to send. From the recipient's perspective, additional messages appear seemingly at random. Compare phones side by side and it's clear that the people around the characters are receiving texts they did not send.

But maybe that's what they want you to think. With the phones already on the fritz this is a nasty time to play a prank on the network, but it's not as though it would be all that hard to pull off, right? There's a whole department full of hackers right there within ADI headquarters, after all, and who knows what technical skills the other off-worlders could be hiding? You can't trust what you read on your phone, obviously, but more importantly, you can't trust the people around you. They're lying to you; they wanted to scare you. If you've gotten creepy messages from multiple people, that's just evidence that they're plotting against you together.

Don't believe their lies.

➥ Mod Notes

• ARRIVAL (August 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 (or the rubble that used to be part of 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, as well as information about the state of ADI Headquarters.
  
  
• A FACE FOR RADIO (August 1-12): The signal creatures will be hard to spot. While tall, they are shorter than average cell towers. They can be neutralized through various creative means as well as through traditional violence. While there are only a few, they move about and make the number seem more than it is. While not inherently violent, if provoked the creatures will defend themselves. Please remember that death is permanent in the setting!
  
  
• WHAT BELONGS TO THE SEA (August 13-15): The 'zombies' can be killed in the standard zombie trope manner by destroying the head or enough of the body, but for characters who might be more inclined toward a less direct solution, removing the fish hooks from the hands will also cause the body to stop moving. For the bodies that are found, ADI will be directing the police to collect them after the first few. Players are welcome to make up who the victims are, if they'd like to focus more on that aspect of the prompt, and have their characters analyze the bodies or research who they might be. The only commonality between the victims is that they are from the same general region and those listed as missing seem to have last been seen near the beach. For any characters who might be inclined toward PR, ADI will also be spinning this up as a serial killer being on the loose to try to encourage people to stay indoors/move around in groups.
  
  
• TELEPHONE (August 4-15): Characters will be unable to find evidence of any outgoing messages from their own accounts on their own devices. Tech-savvy characters will be able to discover that the messages are being inserted by a nameless account spoofing the ID of whomever appeared to send them, but will not be able to pin down a location for the mystery user. Exposure to the messages will inevitably induce some level of paranoia, but players are free to decide how quickly and how severely those feelings develop. Players may choose any variety of disturbing subject matter for their characters' unintended messages; please place appropriate cw's in subject lines.
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Comments

[bardsofprey]

[Eddie still has the panic sweats and his heart is going about 2000 miles an hour, but his fight or flight instincts stop working overtime when there's someone standing threateningly in front of him (on his side, an important clarification) holding office paraphernalia. Someone that Eddie can just like, you know, pretend he's not fully hiding behind.]

I hope that's a general question to the universe and not to me man, because if you're confused I am double confused!

[He takes offence at the prodding and poking- he's not prepared to think more about the 'dead/alive/what if I'm a ghost' of it all mid confrontation- and sort of slaps Steve's hand away, before following his lead and grabbing at whatever is closest--

A stapler.

He brandishes it all the same, breathing heavy and nodding so hard he may as well be a bobblehead. It doesn't paint a very threatening picture, but it's what he's got.]

Yep. Yeah. Easy. What's the plan, exactly? Because I'm seeing two hundred of them and two of us.

[And they look pretty done dealing with Steve and Eddie's shit.]

[haircaring]

[ Eddie: equally confused, very real.
Hand: slapped.
Plan: great question. ]

The plan. [ Plan???

Steve will totally contribute to a huddle. A little group think. The group is a key part of that, though, because he's not exactly the known candidate for understanding what's going on and the ways to address it. He's more of a "let's not" party member getting overridden by children. He's an "I swear to god I'll keep you safe if you let me, why won't you dipshits stay put and let me do that" guy. "I'll jump into the lake or go through that creepy door, just in case" guy. When they have the numbers to allow for it. When he doesn't completely fuck it up.

So, negatives: he's out of his depth but he still has weird shit seniority. (Has he come across as a plan man from the new perspective? Poor Munson.) Positives: at least the guy is making the keep-him-safe part of this easier. That's worth something. ]

Plan. Well, you need clothes and shoes. And probably a doctor? Do you need a doctor? I think you might need one. And, and we need like. Information! Information's a big one. [ He pushes a hand through his hair and pretends he feels confident in his ability to retain important weird reality information long-term. ] God. I think we're gonna have to go down to orientation.

[ Frankly, if anyone else from home wound up here they'd probably have jumped to secret basement orientation headfirst. Maybe they'll find the whole gaggle down there. Share a jail cell and bust out or whatever. ]

[bardsofprey]

[Not equal! Double confused! It's an important distinction, because Steve, as far as Eddie's aware, didn't just die and come back to life.

He is also, Eddie is quickly becoming aware, not a huge plan guy. Now that he thinks more about it, it makes sense. Wheeler and Buckley were really calling a lot of the shots, (and Dustin, which is wild as a concept but not actually that surprising with the kid's monster brain and matching ego) and Steve maybe just seemed as in control by way of all the uh, lake jumping and weapon wielding and standing-in-front he does. Is still doing, at this current moment in time.

Eddie's heart sinks a little, but he rallies, nodding along to Steve's words and rearranging his thoughts. He doesn't need Steve to tell him what the hell to do, he's not totally useless. Maybe he can be the fear riddled brains to Steve's brawn in this scenario, and it'll be enough to get them out alive. Right. Whisper time.]

Orientation. Okay. Yeah. All achievable. [He actually has no idea if a doctor is achievable, but he also doesn't feel awful outside of the way everything aches, so it can wait.] We think of this like reconnaissance. Stick together. Keep an eye out for the others. If we're both here, then maybe, right?

[He puts his hands up, dropping the stapler and offering his best placating smile, even if it doesn't reach his eyes, and then drops the gesture to push Steve's hands down, lamp and all.]

Hey, we're cool! We're fine! Sorry everyone. Bit of a shock, that's all. We're going to- [He looks at Steve, eyebrows raised.] Orientation?

[haircaring]

[ Double confused. That's extremely valid and accurate.

On one hand, it's cool that they're kind of on the same wavelength. Agreeing on stuff. Hitting the thought that it might not just be them here from home. They've both literally said out loud that the orientation thing is probably their best bet. And definitely better if they volunteer instead of getting hauled off by whatever security looks like around here. Yep. It all maths out.

On the other hand, Steve doesn't want to lose the stupid all-but-useless-for-a-weapon lamp, because even a mostly useless weapon is a weapon and this entire situation absolutely sucks. Never mind that he just said they should do this and never mind that there'll probably be a chair or something he could grab just as easily as he grabbed this lamp.

So he maybe has to take a long couple of moments to look like a dog trying to figure out if, when, and who to bite before he allows his hands to be pushed down properly. Everyone has their quirks. ]

Yeah. Yeah, we're good. Ready to cooperate. [ Local dude sets lamp on the floor as a gesture of goodwill. ] I hear I make a way better second impression than a first one, so, uh. I'm just gonna let this first one stay bad and come back to apologize after I get oriented.

[ God, if they end up in jail he's gonna be so pissed. But at least he'll be pissed knowing he withheld an apology literally no one in this room is likely to care about. ]

[bardsofprey]

Kinda makes it sound like you're expecting to get brainwashed, man.

[Oh, thank god. The lamp is on the ground. Because Eddie is a weird little fella, he pats Steve on the shoulder about it, like he's just conceded a beloved keepsake and not someone else's office supplies.]

He doesn't think you're all brainwashers, for the record! Very respectable facility you got here.

[Insert awkward little hand clap.

There are still plenty of suspicious eyes on them, but as Eddie raises his hands (half joking, half not) placatingly, the crowd around them disperses and parts with enough room for a hasty retreat. As they book it, Eddie grabs onto Steve's sweater and ducks towards his ear-]

We're not actually coming back to apologize, right? Because I'm kinda set on getting info and getting out, unless we do end up brainwashed. Which I guess is a real possibility!

[He lets go of Steve to sort of hop along beside him, alternating feet and wincing because fuck they're cold and sore.]

Can't believe I'm saying this, but I think it's still our best option. Only option. Take your pick. God I have a thousand questions for you.

[It's probably a lot at once for Steve; the grabbing and hopping and babbling. It's a lot for Eddie, too. His brain can't sit still, so neither can he. He shrugs on his jacket over his bare shoulders, and picks at the ruined threads hanging from it, his eyes darting to Steve as they walk. He doesn't know where to start. What's safe to ask. What will just hurt too much to know.]

[haircaring]

[ Most successful retreat in recent history, 10/10. If Steve thinks brainwashing is a real legitimate concern they need to have, he's just gonna not say anything about it. Eddie clearly has enough to deal with. Besides, if they get brainwashed they won't even be worried about it anymore. ]

No we're not actually coming back to apologize! Screw that.

[ Eddie asking extremely valid questions and Steve being like how dare you even think that. God, maybe he shouldn't be getting all exasperated at the dead guy just because they're in a messed up situation.

It's a net positive that he's here. And another net positive that anyone's here, but also a negative, but Steve doesn't want to get into all the bullshit moral math at play right now. If he does that, he'll have to think about how convenient it was that he was making a stink and then Eddie Munson showed up, who happens to be someone he'd want to stick close to, who is familiar enough that he knows he's a solid, trustworthy dude, but he doesn't know well enough to tell if he's like a pod person.

(Does the guy seem off? Weird? For sure. But Eddie was already weird, to his memory. Like, Robin weird, kind of Dustin weird. Very talky, very anxious, very smartassed. That's holding up. He looks like he's fresh from demobat hell, so that's gonna add to the whole... energy either way, so.)

Steve doesn't wanna deal with any extra paranoia right now, honestly.

Call a spade a spade until it stops being a spade. Here there be Munsons. He'll drag him back to Dustin and his uncle and his, his nerd club friends. In one piece. ]

One, only option. Two, I can't promise I'll have a thousand answers. [ Now, is there... a non-awkward way to say...? ] But it's, uh. It's good to see you, man. For the record.

[ There is not a non-awkward way to say that. RIP. ]

[bardsofprey]

[Eddie feels like the fact that he is relatively new to the Weird Situation business is being overlooked here, and it both annoys and embarrasses him a little, so he gets all exasperated back, his voice high and snappy. The meant-to-be-dead stuff doesn't even factor in. He's doing so, so well at not thinking about it.]

Okay, good! Great!

[He crosses his arms because his chest is bare and cold- and not because he's pouting- and nods his way absently through Steve's words. He's all the way prepared to open his mouth and start asking some of the easier shit, when Steve tacks on that little postscript, and Eddie is reminded again of just how much a couple years (and some otherworldly monster encounters) can change people. He shoots him a tight lipped but genuinely warm smile.]

Good to be here, man. I mean not here, but- thanks. I'm lucky you showed up. For the record.

[Teasing aside:]

Is everyone else...?

[haircaring]

[ Nothing to see here folks, just two dudes bickering like an old married couple and one of them is half-naked covered in blood.

The fact that they're not turning more heads actually says a lot, from Steve's perspective. Apparently this really is weird shit central. Cool. Cool cool cool, so cool, great time. But, hey. At least he managed to get Munson looking a little less horrified. That's probably the best thing that's happened so far today.

Never mind the very real hiccup that comes with his next question. Maybe that's on Steve a little. Like, of course the guy would wanna know. If their deals were reversed, Steve would've been asking by now, too. ]

Made it out. Alive. [ ... ugh. ] Technically. It's a lot of-- it's kind of complicated. I'll catch you up. And hey, then when we both get back, you won't have to worry about the catch-up. One less thing.

[ Yes yes the emotional ramifications of Everything and looming disaster and "earthquakes" and, and, and Max, god, and Henderson being a wreck-- but also the rest of the Party showing up out of nowhere and there's some dude named Argyle that no one's explained to you who he even is yet. ]