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

[dreamsofwings]

Eren's rage is still easier to spark than he intends it to be. It's easy to get angry when things are out of his control after so long being the one in control — or at least close enough. He had orchestrated so much, but this place is so outside anything he could have imagined or experienced. It grates on him.

And then this? This is gruesome, and what's the point? The people who did this sure seem like animals to him.

He still sounds mad when he answers Billy, but he's not entirely unaware of where (when) he is. He doesn't really direct it at Billy.

"What kind of animal would do this?" he asks over his shoulder. He isn't quiet going into the house, but he sees no reason to be. Sneaking up on someone isn't his style; he'd rather go in without thought and fight head on.

Whoever did kill that deer, though, doesn't seem to be in the house — at least not in the front room. There's glass on the floor where a window was smashed from the outside, but anyone coming in through that mess would have been sliced up and bled, and there isn't any of that.

He turns to Billy again.

"This kind of thing isn't normal around here?"

[notarat]

As Billy also takes in the full sight of what's in here - or rather, the chaos of it all - he's silent, only slowly shaking his head when Eren turns towards him with that question.

"Not before, at least," he says. Because this means something could have changed. If this was something that could be caused under regular circumstances - though it's kind of nice to think of it like it could, like it's something normal, like there isn't something to fear - then surely it would have happened before in the half year Billy has now been in this place.

But it hasn't. This is the first time he's seen something like this.

Another slight pause, this time because of some hesitance, but then he adds: "Someone broke into my house before." It's not really part of his answer to the question, mind you. It's something relevant he wants to bring up, mostly to add, to explain: "It did not look anything like this."

And Billy definitely would not call what Rorschach did back then gentle in any sort of way, so this level of destruction definitely seems beyond the level of a regular human intruder.

[dreamsofwings]

"Is this what everyone was talking about? The aurora?"

He doesn't think that the lights in the sky did something like this, of course. But could that make someone do it? He might have even bought that it was an animal, but why drag the deer here? Why break the damn window?

Eren didn't have much food or anything. The kitchen cabinets are thrown open, but there wasn't anything to steal or ruin. That's part of why he'd been getting supplies anyway.

Still, it's maddening. He's never had anyone break into his space like this. He's always lived with other people, though, in barracks and things. The closest he's ever been to alone was the hospital in Marley.

"It's not even like I have anything worth stealing," he says, though he immediately thinks of Mikasa's scarf in his drawer. That wouldn't look like anything worth stealing to someone else, unless they were really cold. But even then, it's an old scarf.

"I'm gonna check upstairs," he says. "Yell if you hear or see anything."

Though he won't stop Billy from following, either.

[notarat]

"I will come with you."

Billy isn't sure if the implication was that Eren wanted him to stay downstairs, but considering the other didn't make it verbally explicit, he figures he might as well follow.

Especially since he doesn't want to be here alone with whatever caused this, in case it's still lingering somewhere. Hiding in a closet. God knows what something that caused this might decide to do.

Not to mention that this is a chance to gather some information. Prepare himself, in case this might start happening around town more. Figure out how to protect his own home from this.

So as he follows, he asks: "Have you noticed anything missing?"

[dreamsofwings]

Eren doesn't stop Billy from following. There are two bedrooms, though obviously he only uses one of them. He doesn't bother looking in the other one, just the one he's been sleeping in.

"Not really. Dunno what they'd even take," he says.

His anger is almost palpable, but he has nowhere to really direct it. He throws open the bedroom door to a mess, sheets pulled off the bed, papers from who knows where scattered around. Whoever or whatever did this is nowhere to be seen, but there are boot tracks on the dusty wood floor, not like Eren's own.

He barely marks those, making his way across the room to the little dresser by the bed.

He pulls the top drawer open, afraid he'll find it empty, afraid that Mikasa's scarf will be gone. It's a stupid thing, maybe, but he'd hunt down anyone who stole it from him. It isn't his anymore, it's hers, but that's not the point.

The scarf is right where he left it, untouched.

He just stares into the drawer for a long time before sliding it closed again, slowly.

"Hey, Billy," he says, rage simmered away for the moment. "Does stuff from your past randomly show up in this place?"

[notarat]

.. strange.

Billy can only think of one reason someone would bother to break into someone else's cabin here. Either it's to steal something - but if Eren doesn't think he has anything of value, and isn't missing anything, then it can't be that - or to hunt down a person. But Eren has seemed relatively unoffensive to Billy so far. Sure, apparently he has a temper, but could he really have pissed off another person in town enough for them to come after him?

It's difficult to figure out. The only relief in this situation is Billy realizing Eren doesn't look like he's about to punch a wall quite as intensely anymore when he looks over at the other, and it makes him dare to take a few steps over in Eren's direction again.

"Occasionally," he answers, before adding: "Or so I have heard. The only things in this place that belong to me were already on me when I woke up in the snow here, but I have heard of other people finding theirs more suddenly."

There's a slight pause, and though Billy can kind of figure out the answer already, he tries to seem a little less presumptious by asking: "Why were you wondering that?"

[dreamsofwings]

Eren hasn't really gotten into any bullshit until now, and for once it's not his fault. He didn't start any of this as far as he knows. He doesn't even have a guess as to who would break in here and why. Maybe they were looking for something, but what?

He's still mad, but he's cooled a little. There's nowhere to direct his anger and he knows better than to take it out on someone else. It would be different with Reiner; they could throw down or whatever and be the same as they always are afterwards. People he doesn't know yet? He'll try to behave for now.

"After the aurora, I found a scarf I gave to…" he falters for a second. The name Mikasa wouldn't mean anything to Billy. "…someone I grew up with," he finishes. "It was mine first, but that was when I was a kid. She's had it for something like ten years."

The last time he saw her — sees her — she has it. She took it off for awhile because Eren pushed her (gaslighted her, really) into thinking he hated her, among other things. He hated doing it, but it was necessary.

At the end of everything, she'll be wearing it again. He already knows.

So what the fuck is it doing here?

"Whoever broke in here didn't take it."

Good thing for them, too, because Eren's vengeance would have been as swift as he knew how to make it.

[notarat]

"They must have assumed it was an ordinary scarf."

Which, to be fair, it is. Or it sounds like it is, anyway. But it means that whoever or whatever broke in here had no idea that the scarf was important to Eren in any way. It makes it less likely to be something directed personally at Eren, so maybe Billy's idea of an animal attack wasn't that far off.

Though he's pretty sure with the more he's seeing in this house that it wasn't an animal. This seems much more human, but.. why? Especially if they wouldn't bother to steal anything Eren would actually notice?

"As annoying as it surely is to hear this," because Billy knows he would be annoyed to hear it, that's for sure, "this place often works in mysterious ways. It is hard to determine why anything at all happens."

He shakes his head a little bit. "Things seem to appear from the places we come from for no reason. And now this.. It is as if someone broke in here not to steal anything, but only to make a mess."

And who would even do that? No one with a brain, surely!

[dreamsofwings]

"It is," Eren answers. "Though in a place like this, it could keep someone warm."

It's not that warm a scarf, since it's so old, but Mikasa always took good care of it. It mattered much more to her than it did to Eren, but the reminder shook him when it appeared, especially since he doesn't know how it could. He keeps that to himself for now.

"Mysterious ways, huh? Mysterious like some freaky monster and people mutilating deer for no reason?" he asks, wry and rhetorical. It is annoying to hear, but that doesn't mean it's not true. He's still in a shitty mood about all this, but he's not about to take it out on Billy.

He considers the room again. The downstairs was worse off, old things thrown around, probably some leftover knickknack broken. None of that matters to Eren, but he'll clean it up anyway out of habit.

"What the fuck was the point, though? No one here knows me and I haven't done anything to piss anyone off yet," he says. "I…I think. I think I'd know if someone was that mad at me."

Eren is the type of person who can and will push someone's buttons, but he's been on fairly good behaviour thus far. He's self-aware enough to know. The only person here he has a strained relationship with is Reiner, and Reiner would just fight him directly.

"I didn't lock the door," he says, suddenly, as if that thought just occurred to him. "I didn't think to."

He's never lived alone before, never worried about locks on doors. Anything that was going to come for him would ignore a lock anyway. Would that have mattered here? He's not sure.

[notarat]

There is some judgement - internally, that is, since he's way too conscious of what he shows on the outside to actually let it show there - in Billy when he hears that. Who doesn't lock their door? Sure, people come here from all sorts of places, but Billy can't even imagine living in a world where you don't have to lock your door.

Is it because of those Titans? Maybe humans are less likely to commit crime when there are threats like that around. Even if that doesn't really match up to Billy's own lived experience.

"Perhaps it was not aimed at you," he instead addressed out loud. "It could be that they were only looking for a random target. Their aim could be to destabilize us by causing chaos like this. By attempting to turn us against each other."

[dreamsofwings]

Eren's oversight is more that he's never lived in a house — at least, not as an adult. He's lived in dorms and shared housing since he was a kid, surrounded by other soldiers. He's been kidnapped more than once, but locks don't keep people like that out. Besides that is his insane experience of time and reality, but he doesn't talk to people about that.

"It doesn't seem like it was about me," he says. He's been a target enough times to recognise that. "You think if someone is trying to make us not trust each other, this is what they'd do?"

There's no judgment in his question. He really can't understand the motivation for something like this. He's manipulative to a point, but not like that. He's not that underhanded. He thinks for a second that his brother might pull some shit like that.

"I never lived by myself until I came here," he says. "I'm not used to needing to dig up supplies. Or lock doors. Or whatever the hell I'm supposed to do here. I could handle someone breaking in if I was home."

He means that, but he's also used to having more weapons at his disposal.

"I should probably find a gun," he continues, mostly thinking out loud.

[notarat]

Maybe when Billy sees Eren with the skull at the party later in time, he'll think back on this moment and on how Eren's initial instinct of dealing with this entire situation was 'I should just shoot the person who did this..'

Right now he isn't thinking about it too hard though. It's not like Billy is morally good enough of a person to condemn anyone else for wanting a gun to protect themselves. Especially when someone quite literally broke into their house.

"Locking the door should help," he instead says. Even though it's still a wild idea to him that someone wouldn't think of that. "If they can't get into your house so easily, they may just move onto the next house to see if it is an easier target."

Billy frowns a little.

"Or-- Rather, I suppose we can only hope this is an isolated incident, rather than something that might escalate." Eren, he is so tired of escalating things here, okay? Everything loves to escalate, and Billy would like it to stop, thanks. He's just trying to live his life here!!