singillatim | but a strange light in the sky was shining right into my eyes

but a strange light in the sky was shining right into my eyes

JANUARY 2024 EVENT

PROMPT ONE — THE AURORA: NASCENCE: Following the strange dream at new year, a three-day Aurora takes place. During which, Interlopers discover a possible ally in the mysterious woman heard in the static and heard in the dream — potentially earning new abilities.

PROMPT TWO — ADUST: The Interlopers find out what happened to the owners of long-destroyed Milton House in the form of hauntings.

PROMPT THREE — THE VISITOR: Interlopers find themselves with an unwelcome visitor — a shadow doppelganger here to make everything absolutely worse.

THE AURORA: NASCENCE

WHEN: January 13th - 15th.
WHERE: Everywhere.
CONTENT WARNINGS: potentially disturbing dreams; dreams of being burned alive; some minor supernatural horror; some minor ‘ghost’ horror/hauntings; death of npcs in various ways including suicide, murder or exposure to elements.

In the middle of the month, it happens. A herald. The noise starts: faint at first, but then growing louder. An ethereal, high-pitched chorus of sounds difficult to place. There’s a kind of electrical buzzing with it all, a low, endless hum punctuated with cracks and pops. The sky is alive with sound, and with it comes the swirling streaking of colour against the inky black of night: The Aurora has come.

Much of what happened previously happens again: Streetlights, illuminating the town’s roads; lights in stores and homes will come alive, buzzing and flickering at times. Previously abandoned cars will turn on, their headlights blaring. Electronics that had previously seemed broken flick on — and whilst there are no broadcasts available on televisions, and the radio waves only drone on in static, both only occasionally blaring standard emergency broadcasts. Any computers and phones will turn on, but will have no internet or reception. Instead, Interlopers may find texts and emails — many of them unsent. The everyday lives of their users stored within, now readable.

There are still some instances of the ‘ghosts’ from the previous Auroras, but they are now only faint outlines, and far fewer in number. However, whilst the Aurora would usually only last until the next morning on sporadic nights over the month — this time it will last for a full three days. The world is plunged into darkness, a seemingly endless night with only the Aurora to light the skies.

On the second night of lights and noise, a voice calls out to you: static-like, and distant — as if someone speaks over a radio. A woman’s voice. It is the same one you’ve been hearing for a few weeks now, but finally it is far stronger than the scant whispers of name and the word ‘help’. She is far clearer now.

“You.” she says. She may whisper your name, too. “I see you.” You’re unable to speak back, the communication is only one way. She sounds upset, but there’s something more… a kind of wonder, perhaps.

”It’s not just a regular aurora borealis, but then you probably worked that out already, haven’t you? It’s so much more than that. Everything is… changing.”

”I don’t know how you can go back. But— but I can help. Maybe. Maybe I can make this place easier, somehow. I need help, but I’m stuck—” There’s frustration in her voice for a moment. ”It took from you. Took you away. It doesn’t always have to take. We can take, too. Sleep. I will help you take back. You will survive this. You will not go into the Dark. This is not the end.”

You have no idea what that means, for the most part. But you might just end up taking the chance and doing as the woman asked, even if it’s difficult with the noise and light with the Aurora. Sleep, and a dream may come to you.

FREE RUNNER: The colours of the Aurora dance around you in your dreamscape. You dream you are a magnificent stag, galloping through the snowy woods with ease. You seem to go on and on, never tiring, never slowing. You feel like the wind, or perhaps the very wind itself carries you. Not once do you stumble or fall, even when the snow is thick and deep, or the ground is shaky and uneven beneath you. You feel free.

When you awaken, you feel the most refreshed you’ve ever felt since you first came here. For the final day of the Aurora, you are bursting with energy and even when the lights in the sky fade — that revitalised feeling within you remains. There’s something within you that understands: you are the Free Runner. The ground will yield beneath you, your energy will not desert you, the wind will carry you.

LIGHT BRINGER: The colours of the Aurora dance around you in your dreamscape. You dream of sitting by a lonely campfire in the mouth of a cave at night, warming your hands. As you sit, a strange feeling comes over you, a desire to reach out to the flames. And so you do, reaching with both hands into the fire — gripping at the white-hot embers. It burns you, and for a moment there is blinding hot pain as the fire suddenly explodes around you, consuming you whole. But the pain soon stops. The fire doesn’t burn you. No, you have become the blaze — your body warmed. You burn bright enough that the darkness around you turns into day.

When you awaken the next morning, you feel warmed and comfortable. As if even the coldest of winters couldn’t reach your bones. The warmth remains even when the Aurora ends, and you are left with the innate understanding:you are the Light Bringer. The power of flame is at your very fingertips. You master the light, life, warmth.

AURORA CALL: The colours of the Aurora dance around you in your dreamscape. You dream you are standing in the very sky itself, at the Aurora’s height. Colour and sound twirls around you, within you — and you feel it curl into your body. Your head fills with noise, a chorus of voices calling out, snippets of conversation echoing within you. A woman’s voice calls to you, it is the same voice that spoke to you before you slept: “Don’t you understand it now? We are all connected. The Aurora connects us.”

And you do, you do understand it.

When you awaken, you feel connected to the world around you. To the very people who live amongst you. You feel less lonely, a kind of kinship with others. You have heard the Aurora’s Call and you have answered it, unlocked a connection with your fellow Interlopers. You will be heard.

NOTHING: The colours of the Aurora dance around you in your dreamscape, but only for a moment. The edges of your vision begin the blur with black, slowly closing in until everything goes dark and you fall into a deep, dreamless sleep. You awaken, and although you feel rested, as if the dreamless darkness has helped you feel a little more ready to take on the day — nothing else about you has changed.

ADUST

WHEN: From mid-month to month end.
WHERE: Milton House.
CONTENT WARNINGS: fire; house fire; death of a child/children; hauntings; ghosts; mental manipulation; illusions of burning/being burned; potential injuries via falling/unstable building collapsing.

There is a reason why it is advised to avoid Milton House other than the simple fact that it’s a miracle the house is still standing. Once one of the largest buildings in the town of Milton, it is now a former shell of what was once a fine and grand house. It has lain in ruin for many years, dilapidated and host to a great deal of fire damage.

While he is in town, Methuselah will not speak of the place, but he often looks sad when it has been brought up in conversation. “A great tragedy.” he will say before falling into a pensive silence. “A blackened mark on the town’s memory.” He does not wish to say much more of what happened: sometimes there are things that are just too painful. He will continue to advise the ruin is left alone, out of respect, and the fact that the place is a danger.

Of course, advice will not stop anyone from attempting to get into the ruins and exploring the house, even if it is in fact highly dangerous.

The sounds of voices and whispers may be enough to pique anyone’s interest. You're sure you heard something, maybe you should go to check it out?

It is true in the fact that the house itself is incredibly dangerous structurally: floors and stairs may give way and you’ll find your foot (and half of you) falling right through the floorboards. Damp and rot that have long since set in, and it will be dangerous to breathe in. But you’ll find that the house itself is pretty ordinary: this was once a family home. Just about the entirety of the house and its contents aren't salvageable, but you’ll be able to find out a little about who once lived here.

There are faded, half-destroyed photos that show a family of five: a father, mother, and three young children all under the age of ten. The father with warm, beaming smiles, the mother has kind eyes, the two oldest boys with toothy grins much like their father, the younger girl looks shy, wanting to hide against her mother. They look happy. Just a typical family. In a world where so many strange things are happening, it feels so strange to look upon these family photos and around this home to realise that they simply lost their home in a house fire.

But as you hold a family picture, or some half-destroyed trinket: a toy, a shoe, a book, a vase, you’ll find the item will suddenly catch alight, bursting into flames in your very hands. The flames do not burn you, and as you discard the item, it will fall to the floor as if nothing had happened.

Then, it comes to you. Here and there. Different sensations that stop and start suddenly: the house groans and creaks around you; the smell of smoke enters your nose; the sound of fire cracking and popping with a roar fills your ears; the sensation of heat against your skin; the clawing and suffocating feeling in your lungs that makes you cough and choke; the sounds of terrified shrieks of children echoing above you. Feelings flood you: fear, panic. When you next turn around, the entire house is aflame around you, and you can’t tell if this is real or if you’re reliving some terrifying memory.

You need to leave, get out of here. For some, it will be what comes naturally. You’ll have to fight through the flames and escape the house before it burns down completely around you. You’ll have to fight your way out, find an exit not already consumed by flames — through a window, perhaps. Crashing out of the house and into the snow, you’ll look back and see Milton House just as you entered it: nothing more than a half-burned ruin.

But for others, there will be another pull. You are drawn upstairs, to the screams of children. You need to get to them, to help them, save them. You will battle through the flames, heading towards the ruins of what was a child’s bedroom, or towards the bathroom. Inside either, you will find a figure cowering, engulfed wholly in flames: one in the bathtub or one in the closet. You recognise them as the two sons from the family pictures.

Mom. They will call you. Or Dad. They weep, terrified of the flames. I’m scared, I’m scared. I want the fire to go away. Help me. Stay here.

The tragedy of Milton House is before you. More than just a fire. What is more tragic than the death of a child? What silences voices? Breaks spirits? Leaves one helpless to act in the wake of such a passing?

There is something to be done here. You are not so powerless. Calm the child. Offer gentle assurances. They will get out. They are safe. You are there for them. You will stay. Embracing them will set you alight. Too hot. Too bright. It will hurt, but you won’t burn. But don’t let go; holding them will eventually calm them down enough for the flames to grow dim, to slowly ease their spirits to rest.

Soon enough, the flames will go out and the child will disappear, leaving you alone in a decaying, dilapidated room.

In the churchyard of Milton, there is a family grave by the name of Barker. Three lie within it: Thomas it reads, and his beloved sons, Patrick and Christopher.

THE VISITOR

WHEN: The month of January.
WHERE: Everywhere.
CONTENT WARNINGS: erything absolutely worse.
THE VISITOR — CONTENT WARNINGS: supernatural beings; dream-related horror/disturbing dreams; doppelgangers; themes of depression; themes of self-harm; themes of isolation; potential themes of suicide.

It seems the dream of the New Year and the Aurora dreams are not the only odd sleep-related instances occurring this month. You first notice that something is off when a strange dream pulls you from sleep. The dream may feel like any particular dream you have, whether it be a usual nightmare or strange concoction your brain has conjured up for you this night. Maybe it’s a dream you’ve had before, maybe it’s a new dream entirely. But no matter the dream, there is one thing that is odd about it. In tiny moments within the dream, you notice that there is something different, something that feels out of place. Something is there that shouldn’t be.

A figure, tall and silent, entirely made of shadow stands lurking in the background. It looks human, but there is not much more that you can really describe further. It is a sad, unsettling presence.

When you awaken, eyes bleary from sleep, and you look about the room, to the bottom of your bed, for a half-moment you see that figure standing there silently. That unsettling sadness permeates the room, and after a few seconds of blinking and sitting up — the figure disappears. Perhaps it was just some trick of the mind, some half-awake illusion.

But the next time you sleep, it appears again. The same figure, the same emotions surrounding it. And when you awaken, it stands at the bottom of your bed once more. Only this time, it lingers, and you find yourself staring down the figure before it disappears once more.

Over the next several days, the presence continues to linger more and more. It stands silently in the corner of the room of your home; it hovers by the window, staring out into the snow; it stands in the middle of the road as you go about your business. More and more, it is there. Always standing, always watching — silent and sad.

No one else seems to notice it, only you. And over time, the shape of it seems to change — the vague, undefined shape of it slowly shifts into something you recognise. The same hair, the same height, the same way it holds itself: it is exactly like you. A perfect doppelganger, a second shadow. And with it, it exudes an oppressive sadness, a particular kind of loneliness. It is suffocating, bleeding into you.

It makes you withdraw from the world around you, from the people around you. Perhaps you stop spending time with others, retreating into solitude. You hide from others, keep to yourself. You find yourself not sleeping at all or perhaps sleeping too much. Perhaps what little you already eat becomes nothing. The shadowy doppelganger draws ever closer to you, close enough to touch you - ever hovering at your shoulder. Its presence bores down on you, making you feel small and more and more alone even with its ‘company’. No one else can seem to see it but you, mentioning it to others will earn odd looks, or even concern. It seems you and your double are alone together.

Hopefully, those around you will notice the change in you. How you stopped reaching out, how you’ve stopped taking care of yourself. Hopefully they will see something isn’t right and reach out. You are doomed to the doppelganger's company otherwise.

However, those around you can push the shadowy double away, and can break its influence and hold over you. Genuine care and concern for you will have it shrinking back. Perhaps it is a kind word, perhaps it is the gentle but insisting coaxing to eat. Perhaps it is an attentive ear to listen to your thoughts, to how the presence has made you feel. Maybe it is even the simplest of touches, an embrace or the holding of a hand, the grip of a shoulder. Continued connection with you will slowly have the visitor’s power diminish.

And hopefully it is done before it is too late, or it may be all too easy to fade into the Long Dark.

FAQs

THE AURORA: NASCENCE

1. Aurora Feats are now unlocked! Please see the following page for more information. Aurora Feats are completely optional.

2. Interlopers will only receive ONE Aurora Event. The only time this is available is this month. After January, players will have to wait for the next Feat round for another chance at an Aurora Feat.

3. This Aurora will last a full three days. It will be a period of only night.

4. For more information on the ghostly loops seen during the Aurora, see this previous event, under 'The Aurora: Aftershocks' prompt.

5. For new players who would like a little extra context regarding the woman can look at December's Tales From The Northern Territories, under the 'New Happenings in December' section.

ADUST

1. Characters will not be physically burned in the fire, but only feel as if they have been. The effects of this illusion will last a short time after they're out the house before they will fade.

2. The only real injuries characters can sustain will be from fall damage, or if the floor gives way and their feet go through, etc. whilst in the house.

3. The children cannot leave the house. They will be too scared to leave. In addition, they are tethered to the house, given that this is where they died. Simply being calmed/comforted is the best way to help them and they will disappear after that.

THE VISITOR

1. An Interloper's Visitor can't be seen by anyone but the Interloper themselves.

2. The Visitor can be spoken to, but it will not speak back. It cannot be interacted with and is intangible.

PLOTTING POST

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ Milton House isn't anything like the homestead. It's all dark, cold ash and crumbling beams; it's taller, larger, far grander even in its slow decay. The homestead was whole, if gutted of everything that made it a home. It was out there on the plains of the Triangle, waiting. Empty. A caught breath she'd held for fifteen long years. Milton House isn't waiting for anything. Milton House is a torn-up picture of itself, frozen forever in one terrible moment in time.

And still, something keeps bringing her back to it.

Today, she'd been leaning on a fence, looking at it – or, no. Watching it, as if somehow a half-burned wreck of a house might make a sudden lunge at her. As if the door might open, a window might be filled with an shadowy outline of a person. In this place? It honestly wouldn't surprise her.

Also not a surprise: Edward Little showing up, apparently still doggedly maintaining his patrols. What he patrols for, she doesn't know and has no interest in asking. Maybe he just likes walking around.

She's still not sure what to make of him, but that's something she can easily shunt away to think about later – or maybe never, that sounds a lot better – because one thing she does know is that he's determined to be helpful, a trait that is so very useful on days like this when she could use an extra pair of hands to force open the burned wreckage of a door. Because while no doors opened and no shadows moved behind the windows –

She'd heard something.

Which is how they ended up here, searching around the ruined remains of what was probably a living room. Wynonna nudges at the leg of a blackened piano bench; it crumbles into ash at the gentle touch. There's a cracked picture frame on the piano itself; she picks it up, turns it over. ]

People could find a better house to squat in. Maybe something that isn't condemned and one bad step away from a broken neck? I don't know, I'm just tossing out ideas.

[ Because that noise was probably squatters. Right? ]

[ He's no stranger to Milton House, having passed it several times on his patrols over the months that he's been a resident of this community (has it really been nearly five of them...? five long months here?) but not once has he ever attempted entry or entertained the thought at all. It's clearly abandoned and clearly unsafe, and he's assumed that no one would dare to try and set up house within it.

But when he happens across Wynonna, who says she's heard something inside, he ends up in that very home (and without questioning her claim at all, but rather being very quick to agree and help her get through the charred slab of a door.) If someone is in here.... it's a threat to their own safety, and he's very concerned by the thought, nosing around the living space as carefully as he's able. His boots are heavy, not made for delicate footsteps, and he steps over a patch of floorboards crumbling inwards, wincing a bit as parts of them break off and fall. ]

It is an odd choice to set up house in. Perhaps someone is only using it as a place in which to hide things. ...Or to get up to mischief.

[ He lifts his brows, displeased by the thought. Surely, if anyone is inside, they'll have heard the commotion and might make a quick exit — and hopefully not make a return, now that they know they're under the radar. That would be the best case scenario... he's not too thrilled by the idea of coming face-to-face with any ruffians, though he'll do it if he has to. In the meantime, he's content to poke around things, make some more noise.

Carefully, Edward makes his way over to where Wynonna stands, looking down at the photo in her hands, curious. He's always been wary to examine the personal effects of the residents here; it feels.... invasive, but now that he's inside this particular one, it's a rare opportunity to catch a glimpse of who lived here. ]

Can you see who it is?

It's the kind of place I would have loved as a wayward teen, so yeah, probably mischief.

[ Say what you will about being holed up together in a howling blizzard, but those hours she spent with him managed to break down a little of her wary aloofness. And now, he's investigating a different part of the room while she searches her own section, throwing observations back at her, and it feels almost comfortable. Like going through a revenant's lair with Dolls, pulling the pieces of their newest mystery together.

It's not like she misses Dolls, but there's no doubting he'd be helpful here.

She's studying the photo as he comes up to her, then offers it for his perusal, swallowing against the strange, tight feeling in her stomach. Despite there being no one here but them and no reason for it, her voice lowers, quieter. ]

It's a family. I'd guess the one that lived here.

[ Father, mother, two boys, a girl. They look happy, smiling out from the cracked and smudged glass of the picture frame. As happy as her own family used to look, back in the days when happiness was a thing they could all hold in heir hands. ]

They – shit!

[ The startled curse comes hissing through her lips as the photo in her hand blooms into sudden, brilliant flame. Fire licks around the wood of the frame and distorts the glass, and Wynonna drops the photo out of surprised reflex, clutching the hand that had been holding it with the other. She lifts the stricken hand, looking for the extent of the damage, and doesn't notice that as the photo falls to the floor, the flames that had so startled her snuff out as quickly as they'd burst into life. ]

Edited 2024-01-20 04:38 (UTC)

[ It is nice to have a colleague through this; typically, he's been doing such tasks alone. Over time, a few others have trickled into his routine — he frequently reports things to Sheriff Bigby, Lieutenant Noonien-Singh, or Constable Fraser, and lately, even Thomas Jopson has been accompanying him on some of his patrols. But if there's a particular thing he has to investigate, it's usually alone. He's used to making his rounds around the town and poking into certain places — of course, it's how he'd met Wynonna in the first place.

And now here they are, on a little team-up. It's impromptu, and out of his comfort zone; he'd never have come here otherwise, but... yes, it is nice to have someone to bounce thoughts off of, even if through such a sombre occasion. Edward's leaning in closer to look at the photograph through the broken glass that frames it, his own heart growing heavier as he takes in the smiling faces of the family.

Each home here in Milton feels an odd weight, a constant awareness of lost human lives. Edward already exists as a ghost, but the sensation is only perpetuated living in his own small cabin. Another man lived there — he knows this by the razor he'd found, some of the clothing. It feels wrong.

But this... is an ache of its own. A family, with young children. To see tangible evidence of it is sobering. Edward's staring down at the item in silence, before Wynonna startles and drops the thing, and he's startling in response — eyes wide, taking in the impossible sight of flame. What...How? ]

Miss Earp! [ He's quickly reaching out for her — not touching her hand which he assumes to be burned, but his own pair drawing close and hovering in the air; he's horrified. ] How badly are you harmed?

[ He doesn't notice it either — the unnatural way the flames of the photo vanish, as quickly as they'd appeared, now snuffed out entirely. But something else begins to happen. An odd groaning, like wood shifting from the floor up above and the walls around them (like the moan of the ships, some part of him thinks. The wood could sound so strange when pushed by the ice, sometimes groaning, at times screeching like an animal.)

Edward freezes, tensing, eyes wide as he draws inches closer to his companion and half-turns, head looking around. His voice immediately falls to a hushed whisper. ]

Do you hear....

I'm not hurt.

[ She's staring at her hand, unable to make sense of what she sees... and what she doesn't. The photo had gone up like flash paper, but that had been fire, she's sure of it. She'd felt the heat, but she hadn't burned. Her fingers are pale and unblemished; there's no sign of the shiny skin of a burn, of red and irritated skin. She has the memory of pain, but no physical evidence of it.

Wynonna bends to retrieve the photo, the glass now cracked but the damn thing otherwise unharmed, and feels a disconcerting rill of tension flare through her tightening stomach, go scudding over her skin and leaving it covered in goosebumps that have nothing to do with the cold, still air of this house. This is... wrong. Something here is wrong, far beyond the wrongness of the empty, ashen rooms.

She's conscious of Edward shifting closer, and looks up at his unfinished question to see his eyes wide with fear. Her stomach twists again, sharp and sick. He's more nervous than her; she knows that. He's prone to anxiety, the strain of everything he went through before arriving here feeding the stress of the situation they're in now. It's not totally unusual to see him wide-eyed and worried.

What is unusual is that she can feel the back of her own neck prickling, her stomach now in knots, as a wave of dread slowly rises. ]

Yeah.

[ She hears it; the creaks, the moans of tortured wood put under too much pressure. And more than that, she can smell something new in the air; something sharp and acrid. For a moment, her confused mind wonders if someone has built a bonfire outside, but there's no one outside, no one in here besides the two of them. But she can smell it:

Fire.

And even as she thinks the word, as she blinks, the room shifts around them, the scent in the air growing stronger, choking. Burning in her lungs, making her eyes stream. A new sound joining the rest: the hungry crackle of flames attacking long-dry wood. Her lips are dry as they part, and she can't keep the trepidation from her voice. ]

What's happening?

[ On some prickling level, he knows it too. Something is wrong. In the moment, it's difficult to process it, to really see it beyond those odd surface pieces (Wynonna says she's not hurt, and as his wide eyes quickly flit back down to the woman's hand, he can see that the skin doesn't seem to be injured at all despite the flames having erupted enough to surely cause damage)—

He's whipping his head back around to look behind himself as the house seems to give another resonating creak. Is it... settling? About to crumble inwards? That latter option seems more likely, given the state of things, and his heart is giving an odd pang of alarm when suddenly he smells it too. Sharp and familiar, the way that distinctive smell only ever can be.

Ice drops into his stomach, mouth parting to speak but nothing comes. His throat's too dry; he's breathing in the smell but can't locate a source, turning around and around the room, dumbly, helplessly searching. Something that feels like panic is already beginning to eat away at the edges of him, making his nerve-endings prickle uncomfortably, his palms tingling.

Then come the flames.

It's an impossible sight, how they erupt seemingly from nowhere (but he's seen that before, something in him realises, the way fire happens and the way it spreads, so quickly. It's almost dreamlike, like watching something that shouldn't be able to happen.)

He's taking a step back from the closest wall, and then another, and he doesn't even realise that he's bumping into Wynonna in the process, body rigid in its tension, eyes wide and unblinking. He looks absolutely stricken with terror, but the panic hasn't quite taken over him yet, his body caught just on the threshold of shock. He's realising, very slowly and very strangely, that every wall he looks at seems to be flickering with flame now. ]

Where— is it coming from, we have to— Where do we go.

[ The words aren't a shout; his voice isn't even raised at all. It's almost mumbled instead, words monotone, even robotic, and he's nudging back against Wynonna even more, eyes beginning to water from the heat of his own lungs. All of it feels as though it's happening to somebody else. ]

[ He steps back and directly into her, and that might actually be the weirdest thing that's happening here, even considering the way the house has burst into flames all around them. Perfectly proper Edward Little, who'd looked like he was going to pass out when she'd taken his fingers to warm them with her own hands in that frigid, abandoned house, huddled before the fire, is always careful to maintain a respectful distance. He isn't clumsy. He might not have the preternatural grace of someone like Dolls, trained to use his body as a weapon, always aware at every moment of where he is in regards to everyone else, just in case a fight breaks out, but he's not clumsy.

And she hasn't ever heard his voice sound quite like this, all the richness and strength leeched out of it. It's the voice of a man caught in one of those horrible nightmares where you can't run, can barely speak. When your legs feel stuck in molasses, and your voice is a whisper in your own throat, no matter how you try to scream.

But it's not a dream, and they have to move. She reaches up to put a hand on his back, on his shoulder; grips there, trying to make him feel it even through the many layers he's wearing. God, they're going to burn alive, they have to get out of here! The fire swells around them, orange and gold and yellow, filling the air with that choking miasma of smoke. It sears her lungs, burns her eyes, and things are about to get a hell of a lot worse if they don't move.

She grips his shoulder a little more tightly and gives him a little shake, trying not to let that distant, muttered voice send the sparking fear inside her leaping all the way into panic.

They can do this. They can get out. ]

We're going outside.

[ But even as she says it, some other sound carries to her ears over the roar of the fire, the horrible creaking and groaning of the house as it burns once again: a thin, terrified wail. It could be steam escaping; it could be wood giving way.

But it sounds like a kid. It sounds like Willa screaming as she was dragged through a smashed window, it sounds like Waverly shrieking as Peacemaker went off with its thundering boom and their father went limp. It reaches behind Wynonna's breastbone and hooks there, a pull, even as the inferno rages around them, blistering heat and raging chaos. ]

Little.

Little. We have to move!

[ It's happening too fast. An inferno rising out of nothing. Heat that changes the air, makes it hurt — changes everything. The faint smell of char and ruin in the old house becomes different, woody and abrasive and clouded with smoke, an assault on every one of the senses. Edward's eyes are very wide and very wet, stinging, pooling with the heat of his own painful tears; he blinks, but it's staggered, his eyelids fluttering.

The man stands there even as Wynonna grasps for him, a pair of firm hands upon his back and shoulder, and even when she shakes him he isn't reacting. Instinct is there in him, and it screams to run, claws at his throat and makes him gasp soundlessly, but it's padded by too many other things. (Memory, or is it a nightmare? It's the colours of it that ensnare him the most, reflected in his wide dark eyes — that mix of orange and yellow, flashing violently, eating up everything they touch as they spread so fast. There are men screaming all around him, pushing, crying out; all he can do is let himself be shoved roughly by the crowd forwards. Everyone looks the same, every shouting face, lit up so strangely by the roaring flames around them. He doesn't know the way out. None of them do. It's a panic that spreads as quickly as the flames, suffocating them all.

Moments ago, he watched a man become consumed by that same blazing orange in a matter of seconds, reducing his body to an odd version of itself — still the same shape, the same size, but blackened with char and ash, skin no longer quite looking like skin. The limp thing that was once a man sizzles, steams against the chill of the snow beneath it. It smells like nothing he has ever smelled before.)

'Little. We have to move!'

He hasn't heard anything Wynonna's said up until that point, or the sound that might be a person's agonised, frightened scream. But he hears this, dimly, and slowly turns his head to finally look at her again. Even so, it's more like he's looking through her rather than at her, still struck by some unseen thing, some odd paralysis that goes against the instinct to survive. ]

I don't... understand.

[ Suddenly, a crash from some room behind them as a part of the house cracks and splits and falls in on itself. It's loud; his body gives a violent flinch, a jump, and his strangely paralysed heart is at once kick-started into uncontrollable beats, spasming fast, pounding. Little turns fully to Wynonna and shrinks towards her as though he would disappear into her if he could, giving panicked gasps, trying desperately to catch the breath that he can't quite find. The panic takes hold like a living thing, demanding control of every piece of him, possessing his blood and muscles and bone, making every organ unbearably tight; his stomach is a vice. His voice is cracking now, splits down the middle as it finally starts to rise in volume. He feels horrifically young, helpless, caught in the jaws of a beast that's already begun to rip him apart. ]

We can't get out. We can't get out, there's no way out—!

Oh, boy.

[ Oh, boy. The house is in flames around them, the air too hot to breathe and full of choking fumes and thick smoke that already feels like it's clogging up her lungs, and he is panicking. He is freezing up. He is one hundred percent not all there. Edward Little is staring at her with the wide, blank eyes of a deer caught in headlights, terrified beyond all reason or motion; the freeze response of a prey animal nailing him to the floor. She's about to smack him on the chest and yell breathe when some more fragile part of the house collapses with a sound like the world ending, and he startles almost out of his skin.

He curls towards her like she's some bastion between him and the flames, his voice cracking with pure animal fear and she is absolutely not the right person for this job, but she's the only one he's got. ]

Hey–

[ He's turned toward her now, and she grabs his lapels, fingers fisting in thick woolen fabric. But that doesn't seem like enough for the way his voice breaks, for the rising flood of panic under his words, and she lets go of his coat to catch his face between her hands instead, forcing him to meet her eyes. There's nothing gentle about the touch; she's one breath away from just slapping him to see if it'll snap him out of it.

She pushes every bit of certainty and bravado she's got into her own voice, as much as she can when she's coughing through poison fumes and smoke. ]

Hey. Look at me, look right at me. I am going to get you out, okay?

...Okay.

[ That last is more under her breath to herself as she lets go of him, casts quick, unnerved glances around them. Easier said than done. The room is almost pure flame now; she can barely see where the shapes of the fireplace or furniture or doors are. Everything is chaos and impossible, baking heat, and if they don't get out of here soon it's going to be a roll of the dice on whether they suffocate or burn to death first, or if the ammunition at her belt and in his gun explodes and they bleed out while suffocating and burning to death.

But there – she sees flames licking along the outer edges of the door that leads to the hall, and that's good enough for her, as long as she can get him moving. One arm goes around his back, the other curves ahead of her to shield her face, and she drags both of them down, trying to get him to bend or crouch with her, to get lower than the smoke as she coaxes him toward the doorway. The floorboards feel fragile as blown glass under her boots; hey, another way to die. Maybe they'll fall through to the basement and break their necks.

She ignores it, keeping her voice as calm and as loud as she can. ]

This way. Keep low, okay? Just come with me. I got you.

Edited (typoooooossssss) 2024-01-27 14:58 (UTC)

[ He isn't thinking about anything. Can't think about anything, not even any of the things he should be thinking of. The fact their ammunition could explode, the fact that he should already be ducking down away from the smoke, should try to stop inhaling it. There's nothing — only the thought, and one that he's had more than once, again and again and again, that he's going to die.

It doesn't prompt him into action, but to the opposite. And on his own, Edward might've stayed just like that: unmoving, incapable of doing anything.

But he isn't on his own.

Wynonna grabs his face, a gesture that doesn't ask him where to look but tells him. His eyes are forced to hers, familiar and stormy blue-grey and sharp. They catch him like a hook, dig right in, and he's all too willing for it, his own darker pair locked on, not leaving Wynonna's, following the subtle movements of them with a desperation.

'I am going to get you out, okay?'

Okay. Okay. He doesn't voice it, but his lips move to repeat the word once and then twice, a silent understanding as he nods like a child. His heart is pounding relentlessly, pumping blood and adrenaline and in ways that finally drive him to move, thanks to her; Edward knows it now. They have to move. And he does, moving with the woman's direction, pressed tight and close and not alone. One of his own arms lifts to shield his face too, elbow bent and the back of a gloved hand pressed to his forehead, wincing sharply as he tries to keep breathing. It's hard, it hurts, each breath forced through the agonising burn of his lungs. But she's no longer having to drag him; he's moving forwards, not resistant.

He crouches when she does, making him heavier against those straining floorboards, and he hears more things split and crack behind them. Something seems to shatter; the glass of a vase exploding, maybe. But he doesn't look back, only stays with that clear voice that keeps directing him. She has him, he's not going to die, and the thought repeats itself over and over, her voice in his head; he doesn't want to ever let it go. 'I got you.'

Finally, he can see the front door; it's not far. Edward's coughing loudly, and giving sharp aching wheezes of breath right back inwards, eyes leaking at the corners with pain. But the door is there. ]

[ There's a long moan that makes every single hair on her body stand on end, and then the ceiling behind them gives way in a cacophony of noise, sending plumes of dust and more smoke billowing towards them, sheets of flame racing over the dry carpet to dance around their feet, and she has never been so freaked out in her life, but they're moving. Little's got it now, he's solid and shaking in the curve of her arm but he's moving, ducking when she ducks, shuffling forward when she shuffles forward, and she doesn't stop talking to him. ]

Come on. This way, right here. You're doing great, we're getting there. I got you.

[ Until – thank god, because she can barely feel her legs and her eyes are streaming, every breath like gulping streams of flame – there it is, the front door. He's wheezing and coughing and she feels like her lungs have straight up incinerated, can barely take a breath, but they're almost there and she's got enough in her for one last push. But even as her arm tightens around him and she shoves them both toward the end of the hall, toward the door and the daylight beyond, she hears it again. That scream.

No one had been in the house, but someone's in the house. Upstairs, she thinks.

She can't bring him with her; they're barely making it to the door, and she promised. She'd said I am going to get you out. She'd said I got you. She'd made those promises and he'd believed her, had stared at her with those huge dark eyes, the angles of his face limned sharply in the jumping, stuttered glare of the fire – he'd looked back at her and nodded. So that was a promise, and she's going to keep it.

The door refuses to give way – had they locked it? had someone else? – and she half-turns to desperately slam the sole of her boot into it, once, twice, three times before it gives way with a crash and there it is: outside. Fresh snow, fresh air, and she's almost falling off the porch with him, half running, half stumbling into the yard, until they're a safe distance away. ]

You good?

[ She shakes when she stops moving, so she doesn't stop moving; pats down his greatcoat like she's seeing imaginary fires, looks him over with a rapid-fire assessment: he looks terrible. She looks terrible. But she can't stand here and wait for him to catch his breath, because she can still hear it. The frightened wails from up those treacherous stairs, and her hands are dropping to her gunbelt in the next second, fumbling with the buckle. ]

I need you to –

[ Belt off. She wraps her fingers around Peacemaker's smooth ivory grip and slides the gleaming Buntline special out of its holster; presses the gun sidelong into his chest as she tosses the belt to hang on the fence behind them. The bullets and belt aren't important; this is. She holds the gun against his chest, looking up at him, grim and certain. ]

Nothing can happen to this gun. Okay? If anything happens to me, Waverly needs it. So I'm trusting you. I trust you.

[ And then she's gone, turned back around, leaving Peacemaker in his hands and running for the house like the fire's behind her and not in front of her, and she calls over her shoulder: ]

Be right back! ...I hope.

Edited 2024-02-02 04:11 (UTC)

[ There's a fresh rush of panic when he realises the door isn't open, and doesn't open easily, and for that moment he's back at Carnivale yet again, and they can't get through the taut material of the tents; it feels like some large animal has swallowed him and he's shoving against skin, trying to get out, suffocated, slowly being eaten alive by painful heat. There's no opening, no way out. He tries to speak and can't say anything, lungs consumed; soon enough, the rest of him will be, too.

But Wynonna gets through. He's hit with a surge of crisp chill, of sterile fresh air, and he's stumbling with her forwards, from the porch, out into the snow. He almost falls down but doesn't, stands there leaning over and trying to find breath, drawing in deep, painful gasps of it, those straining wheezes slowly becoming deeper gulps. He can breathe. He can breathe. They're alive, they're safe, and—

—Wynonna's patting him down until she isn't, hands leaving him and fumbling with the belt that secures her weapon. Little watches her, still reeling and stunned, not understanding any of it, and even less of it when she presses her gun to his chest. The man stares, eyes not comprehending, still strange and overwhelmed and not quite free of the feeling like he's trapped in another nightmare.

She's... giving him this gun to hold? Why...? Waverly?

'I'm trusting you. I trust you.'

He realises in the split-seconds between those words and the woman turning to leave, some part of his working mind able to grasp what's being said and why such a thing might be said. She's leaving the weapon with him because she's leaving him, and a new, raw wave of horror sweeps through him; he's stumbling a step or two after her, but she's already moving so fast and his voice comes out hoarse and too quiet, no matter how much it pleads. ]

Miss Earp—

[ No no no no, she can't go back in, this can't— this can't be happening. He's taking another step towards that house that they'd only just escaped from, finding his voice after another attempt or two— ]

Wynonna—!

[ As if saying her name directly like that might make any difference, but it's something more intentional and personal and feels like it comes with more force, his desperation changing forms to something that wills her back. Some part of him knows she won't even hear it. The house is making so much noise, like a dying creature, the bones of its structure snapping and cracking, shrieking and moaning as the flames consume it whole.

Edward stands there in horror — and it isn't the first time someone's placed a gun in his hands, left him with the responsibility of returning it to them later when the time is right, but just like then, he can think of nothing he wants less.

'Be right back! ...I hope.'

A large part of him thinks she's dead. That she will die. And he knows he can't go after her, even if he were a braver man, even if he was someone as brave as she is, capable of leaping right back into the source of pain and danger. He can't even see the opening of the door anymore, flames flickering around it, distorting the air itself.

But he waits, ready and loyal and steadfast, Wynonna Earp's gun held to his chest. A large part of him may think she's dead, but some part of him — the part that matters — won't ever give up. So he waits. ]

[ For ten – fifteen – perhaps twenty minutes, the house fire rages. Furniture burns away to ash inside; floors crumble, windows shatter as the house re-lives its own death, becoming the shell they'd entered.

And then – for no very obvious reason – the fire goes out, and Milton House sits silently, a cold and blackened ruin of a once-great house, just as it had been. And, a few moments after that, the door judders, pushes open, and Wynonna Earp comes stumbling out.

She'd managed a perfunctory debrief with the masked man – enough for them to both know the other is fine, if deeply shaken – before making her way back down the treacherous stairs on watery legs, one of which is starting to ache from the way she'd wrenched it before. It lends a little bit of a limp to her steps as she comes down off the porch and onto the snow – her jeans are torn almost up to her thigh, she'll have to ask Jopson to mend them again – and tomorrow that leg will probably be a very pretty mass of reds and purples and blues. She can already feel the bruises starting to form.

But as sore as her leg is, it's nothing to how the rest of her feels; pummeled, sore and aching. Despite the heat, she hadn't burned, but she can still feel the frightened trembling of the little boy she'd held in her arms. His face, pressing into her neck. His arms winding around her.

Her cheeks are streaked with the dried paths of tears. She lifts a hand to wipe at them as she comes back to meet him – Edward Little, doing exactly like she asked him. Holding onto Peacemaker, keeping it safe. She can't help a small smile, despite the way it shakes at the corners of her lips as adrenaline and fear and that bone-deep ache slowly, slowly begin to slip from her system. She's exhausted, but even so there's a tired brightness that lifts her features as she comes over to him, as she sees that Peacemaker is fine and so is he. ]

I knew you were the right man for the job.

Edited 2024-02-06 00:20 (UTC)

[ She doesn't come back out. Edward loses track of time — the minutes go by quickly, or maybe too slow; everything blurs strangely as he watches the house, progressively consumed from the inside out. He stands there, feeling the heat of it but not too close that it hurts, far enough away that the warmth is bearable.

His own horror shifts forms as those minutes tick away, from the aftermath of panic to something more lucid and maybe even more terrible, because he's able to process it all a bit more, to see it more clearly. They almost died a horrific death, and Wynonna went back in, and.... she isn't coming back out.

His mind churns with wild and desperate thought, thinks of going for help — but at this point, what can anyone do? Wide-eyed, panting for breath with something that is no longer panic and is only upset, the man doesn't stop staring at the house. At some point he lets his own shotgun go to the ground, freeing that hand so he can remove his cap, hair a sweaty mess of ash. He sets this down too, but he keeps the gun — Peacemaker — in his hands.

He doesn't know when this will end. When he should... think that she won't come back out. (He won't think that. He'll stay, until the house crumbles in completely.)

And then suddenly, it stops.

It's just as impossible as it had begun, like a jarring switch from dream to reality. The house is charred and ruined but no longer burning, returned to what it was before, and Edward's ogling the place, taking a step forwards, then another, already heading closer to the door when he sees it move, and the woman comes fumbling out. He's rushing to meet her, shocked and horrified and confused and relieved all at once, some amalgamation of emotions; she's clearly hurt, but she's alive. ]

Miss Earp. [ This time it comes out frantic, and he's still holding her large gun securely in one hand while the other reaches out for her, finds her forearm and hovers close there, only thinking about how she looks ready to tilt over. ]

You're—! I thought— [ He's thought so many things, there are so many questions; why did she go back, what did she find, what made the flames stop — what just happened? But for now, alarm's still raring inside of him, and he lifts her gun gently towards her so that she can take it again, so that he can free his hands and help her, hurried. ]

We need to get you inside somewhere safe, or— a doctor. We'll go now. It's all right, I have you.

[ It isn't a conscious thing, that he more or less repeats the phrase she'd told him before — 'I got you' — it comes naturally as he moves to her side to help her along, coaxing an arm around his waist if she needs help moving for long with that limp. He can stoop for his cap and gun along the way, but his attention is focused on getting away from that house, that nightmare, helping her to somewhere safe. ]

[ He rushes to meet her, all concern, and offers Peacemaker back when she grabs greedily for the gun, needing it in her hands. Needing to know it isn’t damaged, that he kept it safe like she asked; but of course he did. It’s why she’d pressed it on him to begin with – she can count the number of people she’d trust with Peacemaker on one hand, and he’s maybe the only one here who’s on that short list, but it’s still a relief to know her impromptu decision to leave the big gun with him hadn’t been the wrong call.

It’s all right, he says, and she can almost actually believe that. I have you, he says, and she does believe that, doesn’t bother questioning it for a minute. She knows it’s true, that he’s not going to let her fall and faceplant into the snow, that he’ll be as good as his word and make sure she’s either getting looked over by a doctor or off her feet somewhere safe before he considers his duty complete. She doesn’t need to know Edward Little well to know there’s zero chance he’d bullshit her about that… or about anything else, probably.

Her arm is back around him, the scent of damp wool in her nose and the scratch of it against her cheek – again – but this time he’s the one holding her up, helping her with each step, steady and steadying at her side. Sure, she could manage it on her own, but her leg aches and it’s nice to have someone to lean on. For a little while. If only he had a tiny barrel of brandy around his neck like a rescue dog, he’d be perfect.

He collects his hat and shotgun and she grabs her gunbelt, clutching it to herself, Peacemaker tucked into the top of the boot on her good leg. So he doesn’t worry too much, she says: ]

The Community Hall’s fine. I just wrenched my leg. Nothing a little Advil won’t fix.

[ Advil, maybe some pine wine, and about ten hours of sleep, ideally without any of the nightmares she knows will be dogging at her heels. And then – he probably deserves some answers for all the questions he’s thankfully not asking.

It’s fine. It can wait. After all, in this place? They’ve got nothing but time. ]

Edited 2024-02-13 20:44 (UTC)

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

but a strange light in the sky was shining right into my eyes

adust – closed to fidior

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

cw: panic / PTSD associations

cw: child abduction, accidental patricide

cw: more fiery trauma things, description of death / dead body via burning

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

possibly a wrap, unless you'd like to add on any more!

and a lil button for you!