it must be that old evil spirit

[singmod]

SEPTEMBER 2024 EVENT

PROMPT ONE — PAINFUL REMINDERS: An Aurora briefly connects the Interlopers to their homeworlds, and with it are able to receive items from home — but these ones will bring no comfort to them.

PROMPT TWO — THE ENEMY WITHIN: Strange and familiar occurrences begin in Milton and Lakeside, growing in frequency and danger for the Interlopers. Who can truly be trusted among their numbers?

PROMPT THREE — BAD BLOOD: The Forest Fighters finally come to Milton, and with it: they bring the yawning grave.

PAINFUL REMINDERS

WHEN: 5th - 9th of September.
WHERE: Everywhere.
CONTENT WARNINGS: potentially upsetting themes; themes of loneliness/isolation.

For many, the sight of the Aurora is now one they have become used to. There have been plenty of them over the year that has passed since the Interlopers first came to the Northern Territories. Often, they have been a sign of great danger, with plenty of unsettling and unnatural things happening when the skies light up. Other times they have been the herald of aid — a link between Interlopers and Enola, gifting them with abilities to help them survive in this world. There is no real knowing what kind of force the Aurora is, truly. And there is a tension that holds amongst the Interlopers as the day turns to night and there is the soft sound that grows louder.

The ethereal, high-pitched chorus of sounds, is difficult to place. Perhaps it sounds like voices, or discordant strings. And with it, the low-drone of electrical buzz — punctuated with the echoing pops and sharp cracks. The sky is alive with sound, and with it comes the swirling streaking of colour against the inky black of night, growing brighter and brighter as time goes on — greens, blues, pinks and purples shifting and dancing across the night. And much like every Aurora before this one, the electricals of the world come to life too. Homes, streetlamps, cars long-stranded in the snow. Man’s world comes alive, buzzing and flickering precariously.

But there are no ghosts like there once was a year ago. No terrible weather, no poisonous fog. If one could call it a ‘normal’ Aurora, that’s what it appears to be. But there is something else in amongst all the light and noise. Snatches of things: whispers of conversations, names called, laughter and tears.

You realise you recognise these voices. They are the voices of home. Perhaps you hear your mother, your siblings or friends. Whoever they are, you can hear them. And although they might not be able to hear you — for one brief night, the Aurora has connected you, bridged the gap between your world and this one. You may sit for a while, simply listening to the voices, relishing in hearing those from back home. If others join you, you will find yourself compelled to speak of them: to share in stories about those from back home — the connections you share with them.

It’s strange, though. These voices do not fill you with comfort or joy. Instead you are left with feelings of sadness, anger, and isolation. The Aurora has connected Interlopers, but now you feel so cut off from home, cut off from friends and loved ones — reminded of everything left behind. Everything you long for. Everything you have lost.

Something strange skips through the sky, a warping of the sound. It’s unsettling. Something feels... wrong, somehow.

It’s not just the voices that will remind you of this. Something else comes through the Aurora after that night. A small token will be brought through. Whatever the item may be, when you go to sleep and next wake, you will find said item. It may be placed on your bedside, on your desk or dining room table.

The item, you will find, will bring you a reminder of pain. Of sadness. Of horror. Perhaps it’s something you haven’t thought of in some time. Maybe it is something that has lingered in the back of your mind. Perhaps it is a part of you, waiting to be uncovered. A sign of something to come. A painful reminder of your past, or an ominous omen of your future.

THE ENEMY WITHIN

WHEN: The month of September.
WHERE: Everywhere.
CONTENT WARNINGS: kidnapping/attempted kidnapping; attempted murder; murder; vandalism; arson; assault; animal mutilation; corpse mutilation/manipulation/desecration; themes of peril/terror; possible character/npc injuries; possible character/npc death.

It starts with strange happenings at night, things left to be found by the next morning. Those within Lakeside many find themselves unsurprised by it, given their location, but the scenes found in Milton are a foreboding sight.

Mutilated bodies of animals: rabbits, ptarmigans, even deer — mangled and strewn about the streets, blood upon the snow. Some may awaken in the middle of the night to the sounds of their windows breaking, with houses on the Outskirts being targeted more than those in the middle of town. There is… a kind of unrest in the world.

It escalates.

Some may leave their home for the day and return in the evening to find the place trashed: items broken, precious foodstuffs thrown about the place and destroyed. Those within the Outskirts are once again particularly vulnerable, as are those within Lakeside. Fires are started in some of the abandoned buildings of Milton. Something, someone is targeting the Interlopers.

It is hard to pin-point who exactly, and it only puts the Interlopers on high alert. Nothing like this has never happened before. This is new, especially in Milton.

As the month progresses, the acts become more serious. Fires may be started in the middle of the night in Interlopers’ homes while they sleep. Some are attacked in the night, others are taken from their beds. Some killed within their very homes. Of the Interlopers that go missing, their mutilated remains may be found days later out in the wilds.

In Milton, soon enough, someone is bold enough to come out from the darkness, out from the gloom of the night. Interlopers may be attacked in broad daylight — by those they may recognise as newer Interlopers of the community, who appeared from the wilds: lost and shivering, with nowhere else to go. Some of them have been within Milton for a few months now.

Those in Lakeside will face something similar: Forest Talkers are making a move, rogue and isolated incidents — done with sabotaging attempts at hunting and taking a more direct approach.

They have no qualms about being captured or killed, only determined to get rid of as many of the Interlopers as they can. They whisper, they scream: “You don’t belong here. You should never have come here. It wants you gone, it wants us all gone. The end is here, it’s too late for any of us. Nature must run its course. The yawning grave has been opened.”

The attack is on two fronts: the first of Forest Talkers in Lakeside amplifying their actions. The second in Milton, enemies within the ranks of the Interlopers, Forest Talkers hiding as Interlopers.

Within Milton, newer Interlopers will likely be met with suspicion as being some of the Forest Fighters as a result of these individual acts of violence. As the numbers of Milton have been infiltrated, and it’s easy to have mistrust amongst those newer to the community. In-fighting is likely, and the entire town is stuck in some terrible, tense state — unsure of who to trust within their own numbers. In the days and weeks that follow, it remains like this. Acts of violence and vandalism — chaos and disorder.

BAD BLOOD

WHEN: The night of 27th - 28th September.
WHERE: Milton.
CONTENT WARNINGS: attempted murder; murder; vandalism; arson; assault; mentions of blood; themes of peril/terror; possible character/npc injuries; possible character death/npc death; actual NPC death.

Towards the end of the month, the moon is full. They call it the Harvest Moon, but colour seeps into it — oranges and reds: a blood moon, partially eclipsed. The night is calm and cloudless, but there’s an uneasy feeling in the night.

The earth groans, the rumble of another quake that’s plagued the Northern Territories since the beginning of August. It is the only warning Interlopers will get — if they may realise it as a warning. To some, when they look back, it’s a omen, a starting pistol.

They do not come through the Mines. Thanks to the efforts of Interlopers to guard the entrances of the Milton Mines, they know better. They come to town from the south, not the north.
The quakes of August and September have opened a new way from Lakeside to Milton. They are led by their Leader: a man dressed in white, a large deer skull upon his head. And while their numbers are small in comparison, they come armed and with the determination to get rid of the Interlopers once and for all. As they come into town, they launch their attack.

More fires will be set, Interlopers will be attacked with abandon. Shot at, stabbed, beaten. It is a mass execution. They will not stop until the Interlopers, or them, are dead.

Well, the majority of them. There are just under a dozen teenagers and younger people amongst their ranks who have shown hesitance toward violence in the past. Perhaps they can be reasoned with. Perhaps there may be a way to convince them to abandon their cause. There is fear in their eyes. Some of them do not want to die. They fear the yawning grave.

What will do you then, Interloper? Are you willing to fight for your life? Are you willing to take another’s to save your own, or a friends? Will you hide, or run? What choice will you make? The Forest Talkers have long since made their own choice. Now you must make yours.

It is another night of chaos on a town already scarred by the events of June. Interlopers will note two familiar faces in the fray: at some point during the night both Methuselah and Young Bill will arrive. While Methuselah will concentrate on aiding the wounded and trying to shelter Interlopers the best he can, Young Bill will help protect Interlopers from the Forest Talkers with his rifle in hand. But fortunately, it is just for one single night. Ammunition runs out, sides are switched, and people are killed. As dawn approaches, Forest Talker numbers dwindle. Either killed, incapacitated or defected. In the early morning light, bodies lie in the snow both Interloper and Forest Talker alike.

Those trying to hunt down the leader will see him slipping inside an empty cabin, heavily wounded. Following after him, they will find him settling himself down to kneel on the floor. The white of his tactical gear stained red with blood as it blooms from his wounds. Slowly, he removes the deer skull from his head to reveal a clean-shaven man in his late twenties with a shock of white-blond hair. His eyes are blue, calm.

He sets the skull down, panting and sweating. He is dying. He is not afraid.

“My name is Mallory, not that it matters now. We are dead, you and I.” he says softly. “We exist in a dying world.”

He is in much pain from his wounds. He moves again to sit cross-legged on the floor. A hand touches the bloodied fabric of his front and he laughs humourlessly.

“You don’t understand, do you? The end must come. That is the order of things. The end must come so the world can be reborn. That is how it’s always worked. When the world is swallowed, it will grow again from the earth.”

It is a story. The story of the Darkwalker. Some believe it to be the end of the world, but Young Bill had once said there is another telling of the tale. A creation myth. The Darkwalker swallows the world and returns to its slumber within the earth. Within it, everything its swallowed grows again and the world returns.

“We fought against man’s actions to ruin this place, not knowing our true purpose. The Devourer has shown me the truth, and I sought to put that into action.” His head tilts to one side. “The yawning grave is opened. Does new life not grow from the decay? It is a cycle. The grave and the cradle.”

He finds it difficult to breathe, but he presses on.

“You fight to live. You come here and you do not see what you are. You are only delaying the inevitable, perverting the true course. Prolonging the suffering. You are the Interlopers, you are not part of nature’s design. The Darkwalker does not want you here. And where it fails, we have tried to succeed.”

There’s another laugh, something catching in his throat. He coughs, blood bubbling from his lips.

“And failed. For now. The First Cursed cannot hold it forever. She, too, delays the inevitable." Even as he is dying, he still have the energy to sneer. He speaks of Enola. "A woman who plays at being a god. What right does she have? All must go into the Long Dark. ... As will I. Return me to the grave.”

Mallory’s head dips, his body sagging. He inhales once more and then stops.

FAQs

PAINFUL REMINDERS


1. Players must sign up for items. See the toplevel on the plotting post.

2. Items will face the same warps/nerfs as everything else that is brought into the game.

3. Items can be no bigger than something your character can reasonably carry.

4. While items do not have to belong to your character, there has to be a good reason why they’d receive such an item — ie. something related to your character.


THE ENEMY WITHIN

1. The Forest Talkers within Milton are a number of NPCs that have been pre-selected from NPCs who arrived in April and August. Not all of them will show their true intentions as the month goes on but will continue to stay hidden.

2. Two NPCs killed in the June Event were also Forest Talkers. … Good… job?

3. The following NPC Interlopers will out themselves as Forest Talkers at this stage: Devon Busswood; Rita Yee; Realm Lovejoy.


BAD BLOOD

1. Following the events of this prompt, Interlopers now have an additional way into Lakeside. It’s still rather dangerous: it’s through a partially collapsed cave system that ends into abandoned bunker on the Lakeside side. The game map will be marked accordingly in due course.

2. Some Interlopers may recognise a familiar face in the Forest Talker ranks: the man who was kidnapped by Interlopers previously in July has returned. Looks like he made good on his promise. He's come back to cause problems.

3. The following NPC Interlopers will out themselves as Forest Talkers during the attack: Jackie Blackmore; Ross Huguet; Jennifer Kitchen; Daniel Kresco.

4. As a reminder of numbers: around fifty Forest Talkers will show up for the attack.

5. There is an OOC vote on the fate of the remaining Forest Talkers, the link is here.

PLOTTING POST

Comments

me vaguely fast forwarding through fight scenes

[dreamsofwings]

Killing isn't fun for Eren either, not really. (Does Eren even have fun? Hard to say!) It's a necessity, something he's used to. He doesn't usually kill regular people up this close and personal, but he has and he will again and if it's them or people he cares about, there is never any question. Eren isn't terribly attached to anyone in this town yet, but that doesn't mean he can let this stand.

He's almost relieved that Michonne knows what she's doing. Eren isn't a hero. He doesn't feel the need to save people, not exactly. But he also respects fighting skill, as well as confidence.

He has no idea if these people they're up against have any sort of training. It's clear they're relying on numbers, trying to overwhelm the other so-called Interlopers. That's not going to work on people like him and Michonne. Once these people are dead, he can ask her where she learned to fight. For now, though…

"I'm thinking the same," he answers.

The people around them look nervous, but to their slight credit, they don't run.

They should have run.

Eren is brutal when he fights. He's a trained soldier, sure, but all that goes out the window. He just has a metal pipe and his everlasting simmering rage. He doesn't bother taunting anyone or cracking jokes. He just goes for it, the pipe in his hands hitting against flesh, against bone. He's a half-feral creature in the thick of it. He's aware of where Michonne is, an ally, but otherwise it's easier to lose himself in it.

These people aren't people to him. They can't be. He can't grant them that status in his mind. They might as well be animals for all he cares about their humanity. They started this fight, but they won't live to repeat those mistakes.

me doing the same b/c how to make it all sound different???

[thesamurai]

They really should've run.

Michonne gives one roll of her neck, and then the fight is on. Her mind switches off when she fights people, not the dead. The dead are easy, they aren't people anymore. They're literal monsters, with only one instinct: to kill and spread the virus. The people she's killed, even the people she killed while they slept in their beds, were because they were attacked first. Her and her family, her kids.

Are we the good guys? She remembers Aaron asking her, and her response: they have to be.

Michonne doesn't know the others who've essentially been kidnapped along with her. But she knows none of them came willingly, and she knows the fight was forced on them. So these people she's killing? Doesn't matter. She knows what happens if they don't fight back. Her katana is honed and sharp, cutting through flesh and bone so fast, sometimes it takes a moment for the pieces to fall, the blood to gush.

The first kill, she instinctively drives her katana through the skull, into the brain, then remembers she doesn't have to do that, not here. She wonders if she'll have to explain that, but it doesn't matter. She moves on, clocking Eren, appreciating the pipe as a weapon, before focusing on the next fight.

By the time it's over, she's splattered with blood which isn't anything new to her, and she wipes her blade along a dead man's back, cleaning it off and calling out.

"You good?"

tw blood/gore

[dreamsofwings]

When he catches sight of Michonne, he does respect her. He has no idea how to use a sword like that; he's never used a sword on a person. He's used guns, back in the war with the Marleyan army. And of course he's used smaller weapons. The first time he killed anyone, all he had was a knife.

But swords? No. He wouldn't know what to do with one other than stick the sharp end in someone else. There's some kind of art to it, though.

Michonne goes right for the head of the first guy, and he can't help but think of his own weakness — back of the neck will always be a weakness for him as a titan shifter. Now, of course, he has regular human weaknesses. But still.

The pipe sticks where it's smashed into some guy's body somewhere and he has to yank it out. The gore, the blood, none of it even fazes him. The marks on his face stand out even against the blood; they're not quite the same colour, something more muted like muscle fibres.

He rests the pipe on his shoulder and nudges one other body with one boot. There's no response.

"I'm good," he answers. "Are you a soldier?"

[thesamurai]

In the aftermath, Michonne can focus on the marks, curious, but he gets to his question first. There's blood spatter on them both, but she's been covered head to toe in worse, and she'll wash later. It always feels different, to kill a run of living people and not the dead, but she remembers the way the forest talkers went after the Doctor's cabin, what they've done to others, and she has no regrets.

She shakes his head at his question, crouching down to start going through pockets.

"Nah. Just surviving the end of my world. People are just as much of an asshole in my world as the forest talkers are here. Crazy, religious bullshit about death and dying is universal, I guess." Her gaze shifts back to him and she gestures at his face.

"What about you, what do you have goin' on there?" Straight to the point of her curiosity.

[dreamsofwings]

Just surviving the end of my world, she tells him, all casual. What the hell. His own world is ending — has ended? will end? — or close enough to it, but Eren by design cannot survive it. He's encountered weird religious shit, the Wall cult, though it's less prevalent than in many other worlds.

"I guess so," he says anyway. "How did the world end?"

He can't help but wonder. This is the first he's heard of another world ending.

Killing people close up like this isn't his favourite thing, but he wouldn't shy away. After everything he's done, that would be ridiculous. Anyway, these people started it, coming in and setting fires and coming at him with a pipe and whatever.

Like he said, they picked the wrong people to fuck with.

At first, he doesn't join her in going through pockets, but he isn't about to judge. It makes sense. He has no reverence for the dead, especially people who were enemies to begin with. Dead is dead, and the people in this town need whatever they can to survive.

In the end, awkwardly, he does help look for things that might be useful: bullets, a lighter (he doesn't know what it is, thinking only that the metal of the Zippo might be useful to someone), gloves.

He's confused for a moment about what she's asking him. He was surprised when he saw his own face in the mirror, the titan marks on his skin like a brand. Nothing he did made them go away, reabsorb, dissipate into steam. It's a bitter sort of joke, he thinks, having the reminder of what he is but being unable to actually shift.

He stands up again.

"Do you remember I told you there are monsters where I come from?" he asks. Without waiting for an answer, he says, "They're called titans, mindless, giant, man-eating monsters."

It's hard to know how much to say. He's used to deflecting things, but not about titans. That was just part of life for him, and it's still bizarre that no one here has ever heard of them.

"Titans were all people once, though we didn't always know. Most titans are completely mindless, like I said. One-way transformation. But…there are nine titans that can be controlled. So there were nine of us that could change back and forth at will."

There are only six now, but he doesn't bother explaining that yet.

"I'm one of them. The marks on my face are there after I shift back, but they should have disappeared by now. Don't know why they won't go away. And before you ask, I can't do it here. Something cut off access to my powers." It's clear from the tone in his voice how he feels about that: pissed off.

[thesamurai]

Michonne wants to know who she's dealing with, see if anyone was dumb enough to write plans, notes, anything that gives them an advantage. And if there are weapons she can use, or supplies someone else can use, so be it. As she pockets a small knife, she answers the question, briefly.

"Virus. One that burns you out, then turns back on part of your brain when you die. Enough to be a weapon, tear people apart, try to spread it." She leaves it at that for now; more than one person has recognized what she's talking about, she's seen it in their expressions. So she waits, to see if anymore explanation is needed.

Then she listens as he takes his turn to explain. She's standing, finding the obvious parallels. She hears the us before he explains he's one of them and she keeps herself neutral as she asks her next question.

"You controlled yourself, or someone else controlled you?"

If he had his...power, she wonders how in control he is, or would be. An asset, or a potential danger? It doesn't matter because there's no ability here, so she doesn't bother to ask. She should probably mention, though, that she's assuming she still very much has the virus and can still turn into a monster. Maybe she'll circle back.

[dreamsofwings]

Michonne is a much better planner than Eren (it's not that high a bar to clear). He's too reactive, too lost in memories from home, things he can never escape in his head even with his titan powers.

"A virus ended the world? There's no, what, no cure?" he asks, surprised. He knows very little about viruses; though his father was a doctor, their world is far behind many others technologically and medically. Where Eren grew up is worse. He can't fathom what she's talking about, and though he's not the most expressive, he's obviously clueless about this type of thing.

He's never heard of a zombie or the like, so he would have no point of reference at all.

"No one can control me," he answers, immediately, insistent. It might seem defensive, but he's not lying. He doesn't bother mentioning that he gained the power to control not only titans, but anyone with the potential to become one.

But he wouldn't control anyone who wasn't already a pure titan, an irreversible transformation. The idea of outright controlling people is abhorrent to him. Murder? Sure, he can handle that. Taking away someone's freedom so completely? No. That's Eren's weird line in the sand, one of his hypocrisies.

"I meant…the nine titan shifters can go back and forth. There's not really an overarching controlling force."

That's half a lie, since said force is him now, but that seems semantic in his head.

[thesamurai]

"No cure for viruses. You have to have a vaccine against it. Killed everyone too fast for anyone to create one." She knows it's hard to imagine, how the world could fall so fast.

"No one understood it, what was happening. How people were dying and turning so fast. People'd die and come back monsters, ripping into people to eat, and we thought that was the only way it was transmitted. That it had to be spread that way. And it is. If you get bit, you're dead, there's no cure, no surviving unless it was your arm or leg and we cut it off fast enough. But we're all infected."

She didn't plan on saying it, but someone should know what'll happen if she dies. "Anyone from my world, if we die, we come back. Took a long time for people to realize. Either you survive someone dying in their sleep from natural causes and live to spread the word, or you get bit, become one of them, and keep on spreading it."

It's the shortest explanation she has, could go into more detail, but she'd rather listen. She'd always rather listen.

"If you can control it, would come in damn handy here. But of course not. Then it'd be too easy." She pauses to let him weigh in. "Which way are we going?"

[dreamsofwings]

Eren has never heard the word vaccine so he just assumes it's some kind of medicine. They don't have medicine to treat this death virus. It sounds horrifying, and he doesn't even know the half of it.

He can imagine how fast a world falls. He already knows. His world ends in days, most of crushed into nothing. Not that he's about to talk about that.

She says if we die we come back and he can't quite imagine in. It sounds like insane bullshit. But he knows a lot about insane bullshit, and didn't he live even after Gabi shot his head clean off? He can still feel the pain from the shot. Besides that, absolutely nothing about Michonne has indicated that she's the kind of person who would make up insane bullshit.

He takes her at her word.

"So…if you die, you'll come back as one of these things?" he asks, just to make sure he follows. He's not too worried about getting some disease himself, even a horrific one like that. But in a place like this, it's something to be aware of. He's sure Michonne already is, probably way ahead of him.

"And there's no way to stop it? I guess you better not die, then." He's as deadpan about that as he is about most things when he's not angry, so it's hard to tell if it's a joke. It's about half a joke, but his sense of humour is lacking.

"Whatever brought us here is blocking me from accessing it. Soon as I figure out how to fix it, I'll let you know," he says. He really does believe there must be a way. If there's a way to cut him off, there's a way to restore it.

He considers the question.

"Toward the community center seems like a solid choice," he answers.

[thesamurai]

She smirks, just long enough to indicate she has no plans to die, before speaking. "Destroy the brain. Shoot me in the head, get a knife through my skull, whatever you have to do. All it takes is a scratch to spread it, a bite. I've told one other person, but if you ever see or hear I went down...make sure I can't come back."

She doesn't know if it's the kind of thing everyone should know. But she trusts if shit goes down, the people she's told, or is planning to tell, will take her out.

It is interesting to her, somewhere in the back of her mind, that there's something strong enough to keep him from an entire way of being. She begins walking toward the community center, wondering if there are a few smaller knives she could find to throw from a distance, or distract in a fight.

"Maybe we figure out what's blocking you from accessing that, we all get outta here."