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

[singmod]

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

Comments

[bigbaddy]

The strangest sensation about being in this house really is the influence it has on your body. Or rather-- the influence it has on your body when you're used to things being different. Back home this sort of thing would have been a piece of cake for him. Not that he wouldn't be able to get burnt or anything, but even if he did, it'd heal. Not to mention that he'd be able to easily sprint through the house, maybe even jump out of a window.

Dealing with fire as a human is way worse. Especially the way the smoke seems to fill up your lungs, and there's no way to huff and puff it away right now.

(Doesn't help that smoker's lung seems to influence you way more when you're human. Funny, that.)

But despite the way he has a harder time keeping up with the other like this, he doesn't lose sight of Louis. Helping kids is important, sure, but-- are there even really kids here? There's never been kids in Milton since they arrived. Bigby had a whole talk with Rorschach about it. If they were left here, how would they have survived?

Maybe the real person he should be keeping from getting burnt to a crisp in this fire here is Louis. It's why Bigby decides to follow him, rather than attempting to break any of the other doors down upstairs.

"I don't even think there's any kids here--"

Except, of course, the moment Bigby voices that statement and follows him into the bedroom, he spots Louis there.. with an actual child, shutting Bigby right the hell up.

[flambeaux]

The flames don't hurt Louis. A vampire can very much be hurt by fire, though it takes more due to their rapid healing. As a vampire, Louis passed through most injuries the world had to offer with detachment. He could walk off a gunshot. This is different. The flames feel hot, but he isn't in pain, nor do his clothes burn as they should.

There is a child there, burning. The boy screams, calls Louis Dad, and his heart breaks. He throws off his coat and smothers the flames, clutches the child to him in the automatic way parents do. He saved a kid once, only to damn her to an eternity trapped in her small body. This time will be different, surely.

"Shh, shh... It'll be alright... I got you, boy, I got you... It won't hurt no more..."

He coughs from the smoke, but he stubbornly clutches his bundle. Just as he's about to rise to carry the child out, the flames disappear. Louis is left hugging the air. He stays crouched, staring into the ruined ashen interior of the closet.

[bigbaddy]

Everything happens so fast, really. Bigby isn't even really sure what he's staring at here, with the entire display between Louis and the child, with the impossibility of there having been a child here for this long without any of them noticing in the first place, with the way Louis is acting in a way Bigby has never seen him act in before.

The only reason he manages to snap himself out of the shock is by just not thinking about any of it. Bigby knows they have to get the hell out of here now, with the amount of smoke and fire going on. Who knows how long this place's construction is going to keep up the floor they're currently on? For all Bigby knows, they could drop to their deaths in a moment.

And with Louis seemingly more focused on soothing the child, Bigby figures someone has to get them going. He places a hand on the other man's shoulder, nudging, about halfway through a:

"We need to get--"

...

Before the fire just.. stops. Everything drops like an illusion, like a layer that was superimposed over reality for a little bit there. The fire is gone, the smoke is gone. The child in the other's arms is gone.

The adrenaline is still pumping through Bigby's body though, and with nowhere left to go now there's no longer any direct peril, it's instead transfered into a loud, "Fuck!"

Sorry, Louis. It's not aimed at you. Bigby's hand even slowly leaves the other's shoulder, and he steps away, like he's trying to walk off the adrenaline before it gets to him too much. Not like he wants to accidentally wolf out here.

"Illusion, dammit!"

He huffs out a breath, turning back to look at Louis.

"Hey, are you alright?!"

Granted, their previous encounter may not exactly have been.. smooth.. But it is - somewhere down in Bigby's heart - his nature to look after people. At this point, anyway.

[flambeaux]

Louis doesn't flinch at the hand, hearing Bigby talk of the practicality of leaving--but he does when Bigby lets out a forceful word. Not that Louis has a squeaky clean mouth himself, far from it, but the volume makes him turn his head when he's already on edge.

In the same moment, he rises smoothly and steps away from him. But there are little tells, if not in his posture, then in the flare of his nostrils, dilation of his pupils, and the numb expression on his face.

"I can move."

Louis can be friendly or soulfully expressive or even quietly relaxed. There is none of this in him now as he nearly has the bearing of a statue closed off from Bigby. He can stand preternaturally still, which he does when he's unsettled or about to attack, but everything seems to be unburnt and functioning. His throat bobs as he swallows. His hands feel cold.

"Where is he?" he asks the room quietly and plaintively.

He moves slowly back to the closet like someone in a trance, and he delicately runs his hand along the frame of the door as if he will find the child that way.

[bigbaddy]

At first the man absolutely has no idea what's going on here. Louis' entire reaction is strange. It'd be one thing if he'd just get mad at Bigby again - at least that would be something he'd be able to place. It'd be familiar.

But this odd expression, like Louis' soul has left his body right alongside the fire leaving the building.. That's something Bigby doesn't know what to do with. It's only when Louis starts touching the doorframe that Bigby realises what's going on here.

Louis hasn't snapped out of it yet, for one reason or another. Or he just can't fully snap out of it.

It makes Bigby let out a sigh. He should be the very last person stuck here with Louis like this. They can't expect him to be the one to drag the other man's mind back, right? It's not even that Bigby doesn't want to, it's just that he doesn't think he's the effective option here. Louis hates his guts, as far as he's concerned.

.. but there's no one else. So..

"He's gone." Bigby tries to angle his voice as something a little more gentle than the usual, but with how bad he is at that, it ends up just sounding mostly awkward. "Or-- No, he was never there. It was fake. That, and the fire both."

cw: dissociation

[flambeaux]

Louis has no inkling of how disconcerting this might be for Bigby. He's too busy being shaken by his own reaction, lost in the storm of it, floating above himself. Bigby can hop out the window to escape for all he cares.

"Yes, I know," Louis says in that same lost voice. It catches with a slight roughness on some undefinable emotion. He keeps his hand on the frame. "I want the boy to have been real. I want to have helped."

He needs to come back. He knows he can, but it's a hard climb. When he gets like this, Lestat complains that he's being morbid. If Lestat likes to laugh so much, why did he fall in love (and insist on still being in love) with someone so sad? At least he's better at pretending to be comforting than Bigby, who sounds like he's suffering from indigestion.

"Feelin' a little outside myself now. Must be the air."

It is not, but he says it is. He feels he doesn't owe Bigby an explanation, but Louis is always trying to maintain appearances. Falling apart is a weakness, and Louis can't look weak in front of most people.

[bigbaddy]

Christ, talk about wrong place, wrong time. It should be literally anyone else right now here with Louis than him. Surely the guy has at least not snapped at everyone in town. There have to be some people here who actually care for him, who might even know about whatever behaviour he's displaying right now. Someone who could help him. Bigby briefly wishes for just about anyone else to magically appear here with them, but of course that doesn't happen. Life is never that simple. It's just him here and a guy Bigby is convinced hates his guts and yet is having an episode right in front of him.

"You shouldn't stay here then."

He doesn't even know if this place isn't maybe making it worse. A whole lot of stuff in this place seems to have this sort of effect on people, after all, and maybe Louis is more vulnerable to it in this particular case than Bigby himself is.

There are plenty of people he would have reached out to to drag out of here, but Bigby isn't sure he could put his hands on Louis without the other guy attempting to gnaw them off, so he doesn't. Instead he moves around Louis, back over in the direction of the staircase, turning to glance behind him to see if he's following.

"C'mon, this way."

Can Louis move with purpose like this? Bigby has no clue, but he sure hopes so, or this is about to get a whole lot more complicated.

[flambeaux]

Lestat is one who cares, but he is as ill-equipped as Bigby despite it all, and things are... rocky between them. Life is indeed never that simple. Things are very complicated, in fact. In the early years, Lestat could be understanding, and of course very charming. Now their patience has worn thin, and there is also great hurt between them. Louis isn't even sure he could articulate to Lestat what just happened. And yet... the hope of confiding something to his fellow immortal...

Even in the emotional state he's in, Louis feels Bigby moving, notes it in an almost detached way. Louis doesn't move at first, and then with a little sway he does. He lowers his eyes to the ruined floor and the debris of wood and decayed paint and deftly picks his way over it.

His previous bitterness concerning Bigby is momentarily forgotten. He only knows the instruction (and he sees it as such, not a command) to move, and he does.

"Move like there's spirits..." he mumbles. Part of a saying, to move like there are ghosts after him. Maybe there are. He doesn't bother hurrying or making the sign of the cross. He's dead himself. What does it matter?

[bigbaddy]

The man doesn't say all that much. Maybe it's because Bigby knows that if he opens up his mouth, he's very likely to say the wrong thing - and when that's the case, it often feels easier to just not say anything at all. To guide Louis back down the stairs, back towards the entrance.

It's only when they're getting close to the latter that Bigby speaks up with anything other than slight instructions.

".. Look. I know you don't like me."

Not like it was really subtle, after how their previous talk ended. Bigby can accept that fact. He's accepted it many times over. It's so much easier than acceptance, actually, aside from where it makes things awkward in situations like these.

"But I don't think you should be alone right now." Not with the state Louis is in. "Is there anyone you trust I can take you to?"

That feels like the safest solution right now, since leaving Louis alone also doesn't feel like it'd end well. It's likely the best to hand him over to someone who does know how to handle this.

He just hopes the other man can give him some answer, despite the haze that seems to hang around him ever since the fire disappeared.

cw: mental disorders

[flambeaux]

If Louis has forgotten their beef, Bigby reminds him. Louis is a little disappointed. Self-conscious too.

"That would be," he searches for the right word, "...inadvisable."

Louis has to come down himself, a lonely prospect even with company, but he's done this so often in his life. Until he met Lestat, his brother Paul was the only man he confided his troubles to, and Paul grew to be inconstant, more and more devoted to the voice of God, or birds, or both. It was only when he was lucid that Louis could really talk to him.

If Louis were to talk to Lestat about his feelings of being a father, it would throw something recent in Lestat's face that Louis doesn't feel like throwing. He's not feeling cruel.

"Do you have kids?"

He thinks not, but Louis is fine with being disappointed. The strange heat gone, he crosses his arms, cold even in his overcoat. At least it's a normal gesture instead of acting like he's floating around.

His hands feel icier than usual. Louis has paid special attention to stiffness and aches that didn't plague him back home, not since he was human. He's noticed them when he's distressed. Figures his body would conspire against him in already fraught situations.

cw: mental disorders

[bigbaddy]

Oh, no. That's the one word that immediately appears in Bigby's mind when he realises what Louis is asking him here. This absolutely is not a situation Bigby wants to be in when he feels like the worst possible equipped person ever for this job, but what the hell else is he supposed to do? Just leave Louis like this? It should be safe enough as long as he's in town, but only god knows what could happen, especially with how often stuff seems to come over people here to make them want to kill themselves.

Which means he has to talk to Louis now. While Louis is clearly dealing with something way above Bigby's paygrade. When it has to be about the topics of kids, of all things, like Bigby doesn't have parental issues to hell and back.

He sucks in a breath. No choice, right?

"No. I'd be a terrible dad."

There's something a little heavy to it. It's a serious admission, after all, maybe letting Louis see a few too many cards-- but the other is so out of it that Bigby doubts Louis will think much of it right now. Bigby doesn't have to get into the reasons, after all. He doesn't have to say that he's terrified of becoming exactly like his father. That he avoids the thought even just solely because of that.

"I'm.. assuming you do. Considering the way you handled that kid just now."

[flambeaux]

Louis has mother issues. She died while they were on bad terms. This doesn't stop him from being obsessed with being the best father he can be and absolutely mucking it up. He's not surprised to hear someone else admitting to being a terrible candidate for a father, and it makes him think about how much he himself hasn't admitted, even to himself.

"I do," he murmurs in a rough voice that catches like an unraveling knit. "Just wanted to see if you might understand. But no. You don't gotta talk about somethin' you have no inklin' of."

He shakes his head a little at the snow on the ground, arms still crossed. He's not exactly in a hurry to expose his heart to the Big Bad Cop, and Claudia is indeed his heart and his redemption.

"I need to get out of here. Can you still smell the smoke, or is it just me?" Louis suspects it's just him.

[bigbaddy]

It might be more merciful than most things Louis has said to him before, even if Bigby gets the distinct impression this probably is just something Louis wouldn't want to talk with him about anyway.

.. it suits Bigby just fine though. He's not good at handling delicate matters. It's for the best.

Instead he moves to lead Louis further away when the other speaks up with that, speaking up after a shake of his head with: "I don't think there was an actual fire here anytime recent."

It's much more likely that fire is a remnant from a long ago past, but considering the way Louis acted upon seeing that boy - a similar remnant, Bigby reckons - makes him not want to start about it to Louis. It'll just make the other feel worse.

"Look, are you fine with letting me know where you live?"

Is that a bit of a petty question? Yes!! But Bigby feels like he's earned the right to be a little petty, especially when he's actually trying to do the good thing here. When that's all he's ever been trying to do.

"'cause if you don't want to be brought to someone else right now, that's fine, but I'm not going to just leave you here." Not in this state.

[flambeaux]

Louis follows, invested in seeing if he can get the smell of smoke to quit. It doesn't, not really, and he begins to suspect it's all in his own head. But the bracing cold night air outside helps. There's ice in it and the scent of pine.

"I am not," he enunciates very clearly. But to soften it he says, "I don't let anyone know where I live, except the fool who accidentally broke in."

Tim has since not returned, so Louis is confident he spooked him enough. Sometimes he thinks about telling Lestat the location of his house, then he reminds himself how insufferable Lestat can be. Still, it would be a comfort--no, he can't think like that.

"Why would you do that for me, take a little stroll downtown?" He doesn't live on Main exactly, but near enough to it. "Besides the obvious pryin', what's in it for you?"

[bigbaddy]

He's used to these barbs, Bigby tells himself. Isn't this how it always goes? He tries to help everyone around him out, even puts his damn life on the line for it, and this is what he gets in return. Every single time. Sometimes he wonders if it's the universe's way of telling him to just give up on trying anything at all. To just go back to the monster he used to be, because at least that life was easier.

Out here though, under the dark sky, facing Louis-- Bigby feels human all the same.

It results in a deep exhale before he speaks.

"I know what you think about me." Louis isn't particularly subtle about it, after all. Even while he's still so out of it, he seems to retain enough of a sense of what he thinks of Bigby, apparently. "But I meant what I said back in that cave, regardless of whether you believe it or not. I just want to keep everyone here safe."

There's no tension in his voice. It doesn't raise his hackles - not anymore.

"If you really insist on going home alone, of course you can go do that." What is Bigby going to do, tackle him to the ground over it? "I'm just worried about you. You seem really out of it."

[flambeaux]

Louis is determined to stand on his own two feet, and he guides them with the direction of his walk towards Main. Bigby can do whatever he wants; Louis is in no condition to outrun him even if he wanted to. Louis doesn't owe him anything, and Bigby is a fool if he thinks he's entitled to a reward for being a decent person.

“I’ve had so much worse...” Not that it’s an excuse to put up with more. “Every time I wonder if it’s the last I’ll be able to take, but I keep goin’ like some stubborn ox."

He passes a wry, bitter smile to Bigby that doesn't reach his eyes but does make them glint with a dark humor. "I'm learning it takes a stubborn person to survive out here. I think you'll do well for yourself."

Takes one to know one.

[bigbaddy]

"I was born out here," he corrects.

Not that Louis would know. Hell - it's technically not like he was born out here, since this does seem to resemble the mundy world closer than his own. But even with those slight differences, the weather, the climate, the surroundings.. It is pretty much the same as the area Bigby grew up in back when he was still a young wolf. He knows exactly what it takes to survive out here.

And that it means often having worse. Just like Louis did, even though he clearly didn't grow up in the cold, unforgiving wilds as the runt of the litter. It would explain the other's weird hostility towards help though. No time to learn to not bite the hands that feeds you when hands would only do so to screw you over.

And yet Bigby is still walking along with him all the same as Louis starts guiding them.

"All I know is that it always takes a reason to keep going in the first place."

[flambeaux]

"Well aren't you just a lucky wolf with everythin' goin' for him."

A little joke between them. He sighs. Neither of them had everything going for them. Louis had a pretty good starting deck, dollar bills in his pockets, a loving family, and for what? Always someone looking to take a bite out of him. Those in positions of power and those with privileges he could only dream of did not hesitate to suck the life and livelihood out of him and others who looked like him.

And Lestat thought turning him would solve all his problems. Typical. It only made Louis more of an outcast and a leech than he already was.

"What's your reason? And don't say protectin' everyone here. It's always more personal than just that."

cw: talk about familial death and the idea of patricide

[bigbaddy]

He huffs.

"You think that can't be personal?"

Because, boy, Louis, it sure is. Not that Bigby is exactly willing to show Louis pretty much all of his complexes here, especially since the urge to help everyone around him isn't one Bigby always consciously understands. Not even he himself.

So maybe he'll compromise by telling the other something personal, but something a little different. Something he understands, at least, even if past experience makes him feel like Louis sure isn't going to get this one either.

The other guy's already got a set idea of him that he's refusing to change. Isn't the first time, won't be the last time either. At least Bigby will be able to tell himself he was honest.

"But if we're talking about what drove me back then-- It was my mother. My father abandoned her, let her die. I couldn't stop it from happening, and couldn't even protect her body after that." Bigby is a wolf, after all. It's not like when humans die. When an animal in the wild dies, its corpse is inevitably torn up and eaten by scavengers of all sorts when there's nothing to stop them. "So I told myself I couldn't stop living and had to keep growing stronger until I could give that bastard what he had coming for him."

cw: gore, serial murders

[flambeaux]

Well damn.

"You couldn't protect your mother, so now you'll protect everyone else. Well, I'm not your mamaw, but I understand you want to avoid feelin' like that again."

Louis knows revenge. He gutted that hateful man and strung him up, and there was no distant lofty ideal like protecting others in his mind when he did it, even if it was a reaction to harm done to him and his. And what did it get him? Destruction, pain, and a harder road to redemption that only begot more evil. But he could never call Claudia evil, however many people she needlessly killed due to fascination or frustration.

If someone killed her, he would lose a piece of himself. It would be hard to keep going. He would be a husk of himself probably.

"Did you succeed? Did it feel good?" he asks in a leaden voice.

[bigbaddy]

"No. I tried seven times, and it never worked."

Bigby can't help but let out a sigh after he says that. Even though he swore to himself that he'd just never think of his parents again when that didn't work out for him - it's not like it's really that easy to erase anything from your mind or your heart, no matter how much you tried. The only thing that's been helping him is that he's been so busy with other shit since. First the Adversary and their departure from the Homelands, then trying to keep their community running even in the mundy world, and now whatever is up with this place.

At least it's a distraction.

"My father is the North Wind," he says. It sounds like an explanation, even though it might not explain much to Louis - if the other is willing to believe it at all, considering how he had initially reacted to Bigby's reveal of what he truly is. "He's a fucking force of nature."

Of course Bigby couldn't defeat him. Who could defeat a force of nature? It's like trying to fight a concept. Impossible. The odds were always stacked against him from the start.

"He's the one that causes places to be shitty and uninhabitable like this one. Cold as balls, merciless. Killing off all life within it." Let him tell you how fun it is to be trapped in a place that's practically a direct reminder of your deadbeat father, Louis! It's not great!!

[flambeaux]

So he tried, many times. That's more opportunity than most people get. Louis thinks of Claudia, who really only had one opportunity. She might scoff at calling Lestat a force of nature--he's very clearly got some vulnerabilities--but there is still a kind of fear mixed in the hate, Louis thinks. Lestat was, for many years, a figure of power. He gave them the Dark Gift and taught them what he deigned to.

Weirdly, Bigby's story begs the question of how the hell a wind could get a mama wolf(?) pregnant, but Louis supposes there have been stranger myths. Zephyr carried Psyche, Zeus liked to disguise himself as animals.

"There is life here. A place is only a cold shithole to those of us who deem it so. A polar bear does just fine." That's the most charitable Louis has been about this place he hates. "Even so, if your father ends up here, remind me to bite him. I hate the cold."

[bigbaddy]

Bite, huh.

Bigby knows better than to actually mention anything out loud about the usage of that word. The last thing he wants is to get Louis all worked up again when it seems like the other - by Louis' standards, anyway - is coming back down a little bit again from what seized him back in that manor.

"Sure," he instead says, "I'm not gonna stop you."

His vengeance had been a very personal thing so long ago. Back then he would have balked at the idea of anyone else harassing his father or killing him if Bigby wouldn't get the chance to do so first.

But at this point it's such an old and ancient hurt that just the thought of that guy getting his comeuppance from anyone is fine.

"Maybe instead pray he never shows up though. If you think I'm an asshole, you haven't seen anything yet." Sometimes a guy doesn't even have to be a cop to be the worst, Louis. Imagine!!

[flambeaux]

Surely vampires don't have the monopoly on biting. Humans bite too. It's just a turn of phrase, nothing to see here...

Louis isn't much for revenge--except when he is. He's capable of crimes of passion and reflecting the hurt done to him and his. It leaves him with sorrow and emptiness, and that's saying something considering his usual demeanor.

Louis knows assholery. Lestat is capable of it. There are plenty of other fools who thought it would be a great idea to walk all over Louis. Louis has always been more sensitive about human affairs than Lestat. Lestat has a different barometer regarding petty slights.

He flicks his eyes over to Bigby. "I'm curious, what do you think he'd say if he saw me?"

Louis has a guess that it might be hard to identify someone who's literally wind. Maybe he can identify someone by their rancid personality.

[bigbaddy]

"He'd probably know what you are right away."

He says it relatively casually though. If anything still bothers him about Louis at this point, it's definitely so much more the other guy's attitude, and so much less what he could be at this point. But he knows that Louis was bothered by him even trying to figure it out in the first place, so he might as well start with this. Since being seen so thoroughly likely wouldn't be something Louis would be happy with either.

"Which might end up being a problem. He's always talking shit about how monsters need to be destroyed and all that." Granted, that usually only applies to monsters within his own domain. But if there's anything Bigby isn't sure about, it's what being transported to this place instead would do to his father's mentality. Considering this seems to be up north enough even in this mundy-related world, his father might end up claiming it as part of his domain.

It's not like Bigby isn't getting a little territorial over this place either. It's in his nature.

(Maybe his genes, but he doesn't want to think about any part of him that might resemble that man, no matter how vaguely.)