FEBRUARY 2021 EVENT: PART TWO

[robbies]

 

CHAPTER TWO, PART 2: THE LIVING ISLAND

Everything you never wanted to see.

YOU CAN’T DO A LITTLE BECAUSE YOU CAN’T DO ENOUGH | JUST A DREAM FROM YESTERDAY | DARKNESS HELD ITS BREATH | YOUR FRIENDS WHEN THINGS GET ROUGH | COME AND PLAY WITH ME

---

YOU CAN'T DO A LITTLE BECAUSE YOU CAN'T DO ENOUGH

Perhaps you’ve been on tenterhooks since you woke up to find that your friends, your family, your neighbors somehow went missing in the night. Perhaps you’ve been hitting the pavement and knocking on doors trying to find them. So far, your efforts have been for naught. There’s been neither hide nor hair of the missing, and every attempt to find them has met with a dead end.

Until February 13.

In the afternoon, a strange, unsigned message goes live on the network. What is the meaning of “Living Island”? Does it have anything to do with what’s going on? There’s no elaboration… until midnight, when every neighbor’s television set turns on at full volume, hissing static and garbled noise as the dials turn and adjust. Several disjointed clips follow, ending on a mural that depicts the same words from the post.

“Living Island.”

The following morning, you’ll find that stranger things are beginning to happen. Some of you will be woken up to the blankets and sheets being yanked off your sleeping bodies by a powerful force. Others will find that when they step out of their morning shower, a message has been written in the steam on their medicine cabinet's mirror. Depending on how quickly you shower, you may only be able to see part of the message — but running the hot water longer and allowing the steam to fill the room will reveal it in its entirety:

“LIVING ISLAND.”

As time passes, you’ll find that the same message shows up every time the bathroom steams up, whether you’re in the shower or not. The same force that turned your TV on seems to insist that you pay attention to what it’s trying to show you, and its behavior escalates the longer you refuse. Characters will find that books go flying off of bookshelves, drawers are yanked out of dressers and desks, and breakable objects are smashed. Trying to prevent the spirit from destruction won’t go your way: If you try to catch or grab something that’s about to be thrown, you’ll find it ripped out of your hands anew and smashed anyways. If you tried to take all of your chairs down from where they’ve been stacked on top of the dining room table, you’ll find they’re back atop it the instant you look away.

All that’s to say nothing of the rumbling. It doesn’t start until the end of the first day, but from time to time you’ll feel the house beginning to shake on its foundations, a dull groan as it struggles to keep itself from collapsing in under its own weight. As time goes on, this will get louder and louder until the house seems to roar of its own accord, an unyielding shriek that can’t be stopped until the force causing it backs down.

Attempts to make contact with the spirit will never go well. It does not seem to be able or willing to communicate with you beyond its own tantrums, and characters who try may find that the attempt rapidly goes out of control. Candles flare up and burn wildly, Ouija boards are ripped into pieces and planchettes go flying, offerings of food are knocked over or thrown, and the lights flicker manically in turns. While you may be able to get some sleep at night if you’re lucky, the only thing that will reduce the poltergeist activity is to pay attention to the message it’s sending you and figure out what it means.

↑ back to top ↑

---

JUST A DREAM FROM YESTERDAY

Living Island. If ever there were a first step to stopping this madness, it’s figuring out what those words mean. But starting is always the hardest part, and with nothing else to go by than two seemingly unrelated, nonsensical words left behind by a force you can’t see much less communicate with, an already arduous task seems even more impossible. This is furthered by the reactions you get when you hit the street and start asking people if they know anything about Living Island. Most of them can only look back at you blankly, as if waiting for a punchline that never comes. Others actually take you seriously enough to consider the question, and to their credit, they do take their time racking their brains to remember where they’ve heard that name before, why it sounds so familiar. But the most you’ll get back from them is a sheepish shrug of the shoulders and a reply that it sounds like something from TV. It gets to the point where their answers blend together, each one more unremarkable than the last. Save for the one you get from the last person you haven’t asked. Living Island. I’m sorry, what was that? What the fuck did you just say? Dale Harding and Rosemary Craven might be as far away from each other as possible, doing things around town that couldn’t be more different, but their reactions are the same. When they overhear you asking what feels like the hundredth person you’ve seen that day about Living Island, they look your way — Harding in the middle of his patrol or lunch break, Rosemary in the middle of grocery shopping. Harding looks honest-to-God surprised. Rosemary simply looks confused, even somewhat concerned. That's such a... strange name. Where did you hear that from? When they hear your explanation, they go quiet, mulling it over. Rosemary’s expression turns thoughtful. Harding’s, suspicious. If I remember correctly, that was a clubhouse the children around town used to play in. I haven’t heard about it in… goodness, I can’t even remember. Years, perhaps. It’s a play on “safety island” — another name for a bomb shelter — and the name of this… stupid kids show that used to be popular. I guess they thought it was cute, calling a place like that something fun. But where is it? Well, most of the shelters in town are still in use, and children aren’t allowed in them unless there’s an emergency. The only place I can think of is… The grade school. Administration ran out of funding before they could finish it, so they just scrapped it. Closed it off and just hoped for the best. Didn’t stop people from sneaking in. I used to bust them for playing down there all the time, the little shits. Harding’s mouth twists into a sneer that doesn’t reach his eyes, which are soft and miserable, while Rosemary waits patiently for any other questions and, when you have no others, excuses herself to go back to her groceries. Now you have something even better than an explanation: you have a destination.

Finding Santa Rosita Elementary is as easy as a fifteen minute drive from North Santa Rosita to Shadyside. Getting in is a different story. By day, the school is open for business and humming with activity, so you can’t very well go barging in and not expect to be reprimanded for disrupting class. This leaves you with three options: go before it opens, wait until school is over, or come in the middle of the night. Each have their own pros and cons, but all of them will get you the same result.

After hours, the school is desolate and still. The wind, the occasional slap of a naked branch against a window, and the squeak of your footsteps on the shiny, clean floors are the only sounds you’ll hear as you navigate the empty hallways. Most of the classrooms are locked, and the ones that aren’t don’t have anything any more unique or worthwhile to them than the occasional lunchbox left behind by a student or the classroom frog croaking in its tank. In a way, this is a good thing — it doesn’t leave that many places to investigate and makes your path that much more linear as you finally, inevitably and silently make your way downstairs into the bowels of the school.

The long corridor that awaits you in the basement is, in theory, not very different from the hallways upstairs. There are lockers lining both sides, dented and darkened with age and dust. The tiles are cracked, dirt and pieces of stone kicked up from exposed areas of the floor. Seemingly, this appears to lead to a dead end. But look closely at the wall and you’ll see the impression of a door, painted to match the walls. The lock is flimsy — in fact, depending on when you find it, someone may have already broken it. All that’s left is to enter and descend down the tiny room’s only feature: a ladder under a rusty steel hatch door, stretching down into darkness.

↑ back to top ↑

---

DARKNESS HELD ITS BREATH

CW: gore, surgery

Stepping into the old shelter, the first thing that hits you is the stale, uncomfortably moist air. This first room is cavernous and dark, and your footsteps and whispers echo in spite of how quiet you might try to be. There’s a faint smell in the air, a trace of copper and rubbing alcohol that might make your eyes water, making your mouth feel unpleasant as it hits your tongue. As you get your bearings and begin to pick your way through the dark, you’ll notice traces of another smell — something simultaneously spicy and cloyingly sweet, a scent that seems to assault your senses and leaves you with a headache pounding at the base of your skull. Thankfully, there isn’t enough to do more than make you nauseous, but the smells warn of what’s still yet to be found.

As you continue through the labyrinthine warren, you’ll begin to find signs of human presence — some of the trashed rooms may be fitted with tables and supplies one might expect to find in a laboratory, meticulously labeled with typewritten strips. Several of these boxes appear to be old, covered in grimy layers of dust, while others are fresh and clean. All of them contain medical supplies. Eagle-eyed investigators might note that the untouched supplies tend to be the type contained in first-aid kits — acetaminophen, antibiotic ointment, simple adhesive bandages — while the ones that have been opened are for heavy duty surgical work — coiled IV lines and tubing, empty syringes, surgical gloves. One room in particular seems to have been fitted out for someone’s personal use, boasting a stripped-down bed, a chair and desk, and a comfortable recliner.

The trickle of water can be heard in the depths of the shelter, and as you emerge from one corridor that filters into a large chamber, it becomes immediately obvious where you are: This is an operating theater, with a table stationed beneath all manner of lights that can be adjusted and moved. A faucet drips monotonously in the back of the room, over a sink stained with blood with bits of grey, pulpy matter stuck in the drain. A bucket filled with blood and viscera ferments on the ground beside it. There are smears of blood, both dried and fresh, on the cloudy tiles, and a cabinet full of surgical instruments is slightly ajar. Looking at the instruments, characters will find that a couple of scalpels and a pair of tongs have dotted blotches where the metal was cleaned with water; whoever used these tools last didn’t dry them before putting them away. A small table near the operating area has a turntable sitting atop it, with a record already set under the needle: a single of Elvis Presley’s “Heartbreak Hotel.” There are a few other records sitting in the cabinet beneath it, including Big Mama Thornton’s “Hound Dog,” Frank Sinatra’s “Frank Sinatra Sings for Only the Lonely,” and James Brown and the Famous Flames’ “Think!”

In a separate area of this room, an oversized desk is piled with books and empty food containers that look as though they’ve been repurposed for one reason or another. These books are chiefly on anatomy and the medical sciences, though there are a number of books on psychology and how the brain functions. Though some of these books are water-spotted and dog-eared, there aren’t any notes written in the margins, nor are there any papers to be found. You can turn this area as much as you'd like, but all you’ll find is a couple empty cigarette boxes and some broken and bitten pens; the trash can next to the desk, filled with soggy ashes, seems to suggest that any papers that might have given you a lead were destroyed before you got here.

But the lab, with all its instruments, isn’t what you came here to find. There’s still at least one more room to be found…

↑ back to top ↑

---

YOUR FRIENDS WHEN THINGS GET ROUGH

CW: gore, surgical trauma, amputation, lobotomy, brainwashing and interrogation, mouth trauma, eye trauma, ear trauma, body horror

The missing are being held in small, sturdy cages in a single room connected to the back of the operating room, dim and dank. The cages are placed equidistant around the room, ensuring that even if you try, you can’t reach out and make contact with your neighbors. The missing will find that they wake at approximately the same time, curled up on the ground in uncomfortable positions. Unlike your rescuers, your nightmare began far earlier than when you first awoke in this room, sore and disoriented. In fact, you could argue it started the moment you went to sleep on February 9th, leaving empty beds and concerned family members behind.

With no clocks or watches available to tell the time, you may not be able to tell how long you’ve been here. You sleep and wake, sometimes to a bowl of what looks like sticky rice lying in your cage that wasn’t there before. Sometimes, an overpowering smell will fill the room, faint at first; by the time you register it, it’s already overwhelmed you and sent you into a deep sleep. And when you wake, one cage will be empty. The inhabitant will be returned the next time you go to sleep and wake up, but not quite the same as they were before. They seem heavily drugged, discombobulated — or perhaps there's something visibly different about them. Whoever has taken you is doing a lot of work in their lab — and from the smell of things, meat work — and before long almost all of you will be sporting dressings of some type or other, fresh red seeping through the sterile cloth within a matter of hours.

Maybe you should try to keep each others’ spirits up. You don’t know how long you’ll be here, after all.

All of this goes on for a while — days, although it won’t be easy to count them given that there are no windows in the room. But nearly a week later… you wake to find that the front of your cage is unlocked. Unlatched. Open just an inch. Looking around the room, you’ll find that yours is not the only cage to have been opened — all of your cages have been unlocked.

Is it a mistake? Or are you really free?

↑ back to top ↑

---

COME AND PLAY WITH ME

CW: blood and violence

Whether you’ve released yourself from your cage, or were discovered by a well-meaning friend before you could, or you’ve simply had your fill of exploring the shelter-turned-laboratory, the time has finally come to leave. Unfortunately, if things were that easy, you wouldn’t even be around by the time the scuttling sounds begin — somewhere down the hall, in the room behind you, fleeting and sly. It’s not an animal sound, a creature picking its way through the garbage and debris littered around the shelter. No, with the way it stops and starts every time you start and stop walking, this is a very deliberate, human sound. And if you don’t believe that, you’ll see soon enough when you see the naked, bone-white figure walk into view at the end of the hallway as casual as you please, their body smooth and sexless like a department store mannequin. They turn (your) their head and stare directly at you with (your) their wide, glassy eyes crinkled in thousand-yard delight. You hear your voice echoed back at you, airy and chirpy and so indescribably wrong it makes your blood run cold.

"Hi!"

Much like the Doppelgangers you encountered in January, these ones look and move like dolls, their limbs connected with ball-joints. However, whereas those ones were near perfect imitations of you and your friends, these ones look like they just fell off the assembly line. Their faces are unnaturally flat and plastic, like all the imperfections have been ironed out of them, but they are unmistakably yours. And when they open their mouths to squeal at you before running with all the unnatural speed not having a pair of lungs affords them, you’ll find that even their voices are perfect imitations — and not necessarily of your own either.

There’s no way to tell how many of these Doppelgangers are down here with you, hiding in the dark. They’re stealthy and sneaky, only coming out to attack when they’re sure you’re alone. Even if you’re not, they’re intelligent enough to come up with ways to separate you from your group, calling to you from another part of the shelter, mimicking a voice from someone they know you’ll listen to. Even if there’s no possible way they could be in Santa Rosita.

"Help me!"

"Is that you...? Oh thank God, I've been looking everywhere for you!"

"Please, don't leave me!"

Other times, they’ll take a more aggressive approach, allowing their limbs to pop out of place so they can sprawl on the ground, imitating a heap of discarded doll parts. Once you get close enough or turn your back on them, they’ll pull themselves together and attack, speeding towards you on fours like a crab.

There are two ways out of the shelter. The first one is the hardest: go back the way you came. With the low visibility, the number of Doppelgangers, and the confusing layout of the area, you’re more likely to get turned around and go in circles than you are to find your way back to the ladder — a location made even more difficult to discern since the hatch door has been lowered, blotting out all light from the room above.

The second way is the longest but also the easiest: head deeper into the shelter, past the operating room, through the rooms filled with broken furniture and ruined floors that are very easy to trip on — especially when you’re in the middle of running away. Eventually, you’ll come to another ladder, this one leading to an open hatch that deposits you into a dark passageway. The air up here is more fresh, but not necessarily pleasant smelling. There’s only one way to go — forward.

After what feels like an hour of walking, you’ll see a light at the end of the passage. Follow it and you’ll find yourself exiting a storm drain that drops you into the heart of Old Growth, just outside of West Santa Rosita.

↑ back to top ↑

---

OOC INFO

Welcome to the second part of February’s event! You can use this entry to top-level for the event, but feel free to utilize the log and network communities as well.

There will be a top-level posted for NPC interaction tied to the second prompt below, wherein you can request to play out your character’s interaction with Harding or Rosemary. If you would like to have your character interact with either one of them, comment to the top-level with the name of the NPC you would like to thread with. You may only thread with one NPC. The mods will respond to NPC tags until February 28th.

Any questions can go in our FAQ thread below. Try to check and see if your question has already been answered on the plotting thread first here.

---

▶ NAVIGATION ◀
COMMS	logs | network | ooc | memes
OOC INFO	premise | rules | faq | taken | applications | hiatus/drop/canon updates | activity check | reserves | mod contact
SETTING INFO	calendar | setting | housing | npcs | death and tranquilizing | the story so far | event suggestions/engagements

Comments

[peninhand]

[ She turned when she heard the new voice. She could agree that the shelter was an anomaly. Everything else though...? Sounded a tad too extreme and pessimistic for her liking. ]

I am not saying we should consider her an ally, but we should not go to the other end, either. There is no saying what we could earn from convincing her to help us.

[ She wasn't about to explain her reasoning, though. Her reasons for trying to get closer to Rosemary were personal, too personal to be discussed with a stranger. And about clearing the shelter-- ]

What's your alternative? We wait till they kidnap some of us into that shelter once more?

[sunborne]

Oh! You’re lilmonix3?

[ hearing the name aloud is both fascinating — so that’s how you say it aloud! huh. you learn something new every day. — and a relief for daylight. considering their last talk and all, he was worried for the user and wondered if they were doing okay.

clearly, she’s in one piece and that’s a victory daylight will take. ]

Oh man! Hey there, buddy! [ he smiles at her and it’s brighter, clearly one of relief as he lets out a sudden and happy sigh. ] I was hoping you were alright since you went to look for Rosemary. Good to see you here.

[ and speaking of mrs. carver— ] Sounds like this bit is stronger than ever.

[ daylight taps the ‘one of us?’ and adds a little plus sign to it, a sign of point being in her favour. ]

Do you think she’s gone native after being here for so long? During the New Year, when we saw 1961 loopback to the start, Kiara and I were talking about the possibility. Of others being brought before us. Sort of like test trials. [ because if you think about it: their arrival, the removal of their powers, and the attempts to falsify their lives here was way too smooth to be the first round. ]

content warning: description of graphic violence.

[sunborne]

I can get behind that theory. [ daylight rubs his eyes, trying to fight against exhaustion that threatens him at every turn these days. ] There's no way they would just give it up in one go. I had an uncle who specalised in civil defence for our hometown. The stuff down there? That's a lot of time and manpower and, most importantly, resources poured into its construction.

No way they'll abandon it at first signs of trouble.

[ not unless they were forced to. or were confronted with something that made them decided the losses were worth facing. ]

That said... I gotta say, man, I don't like the idea of not doing something to the shelter. If we can only do one thing, I think it wouldn't hurt to restrict access to it. [ be it ensuring it's difficult to get in or get out. the latter, especially.

his fingers twitch when he remembers the feel of the bat in his head when he had to stove in his uncle leeds' doppleganger's head, the deafening crunch as he broke through 'skin' and 'bone' of the thing posing as his long-dead guardian. he remembers fighting off a wave of nausea as he tries to ignore his its panicked cries, the one good eye, though cracked and fractured, swivelling desperately around and around in its broken socket.

daylight's flinch comes and goes, plain as, well, day, but he tries to power on: ]

Want to hear your opinion on this angle- Do you think we can find any records of the shelter? Find out anything about it and who might be connected to it? [ opr would those be long gone at this point? something the town wiped away, tidying up unseemly things they didn't want seen? ]

[hoshikiri]

Once again, his tail spoke more than his expression did, raising in slight surprise at the offer of a hug of all things where his face didn't shift beyond a pursing of his lips. Not in discomfort, his sister was the affectionate sort ready to embrace even someone she's just met. He was used to that. But rather that someone besides her would offer such a thing so readily. Something in his eyes softened at remembering her.

"You are most kind." Once again, dodging the request and the offer. Not out of aversion, but lack of time. "And you as well, Huaisang. My name is Takame." He didn't bow fully to avoid falling over, just lowered his head to reflect the gesture. "My apologies for not introducing myself sooner..." He trailed off, wordlessly implying that they didn't exactly have time for formalities given the situation.

[apodictic]

[ angelo frowns. ]

Harding never liked the fact that we knew about the shelter when I spoke to him. I don't think this was something we were meant to find, and I think it was something they were content to leave on the wayside, until it became relevant recently.

My alternative is to wait. We don't know how they'll react after. They can ignore a kidnapping, certainly, but it'll take a lot more effort to ignore physical changes in daily lives that's outside of what's normal for Santa Clarita. We'll see how that goes.

[ rather thoughtfully, ] We know very little about this town. We should start looking for things. Make them think that we're ignoring the shelter - for now.

And we should take care of the others. [ he points at the notes daylight made of harding. ] We don't want to be vulnerable to whatever he can ... do to people, any more than we are now.

[apodictic]

Resources ignored, [ angelo reminds him. ] until there was another purpose found for it. There was a room there that was for someone to stay in that's not kept in a cell.

[ angelo thinks about it, and then he says, ] The town hall, perhaps. The library can't be relied on because it barely has anything up to date at all.

[m1895]

Vasiliy follows him in silence, still not having decided on a place to set down his nylon kit bag, mind rapidly sifting through the information he's been presented with: the person before him, whom he is still not entirely sure if he should be addressing as sir, is clearly Southeast Asian, maybe Chinese or Korean, possibly another Communist. He doesn't speak in a way that matches the 1930s, but he doesn't talk like he's from any other point in time in living memory, either. From what he knows of early Asian history, chances are high he's a monarchist, and probably a risk on some level.

When his host speaks up and introduces himself, it confirms the suspicion that his time alive doesn't overlap with his own; from his limited familiarity with Chinese nomenclature—which is what this name definitely is—the name Huaisang, while not a name he's heard before, does sound to be male. He also doesn't extend a hand for him to shake, so Vasiliy awkwardly ducks his head in something resembling a trace of a bow and hopes his moment's hesitation won't be interpreted as rudeness.

"Vasiliy Yegorovich." A pause. This man may not have been exposed to Russian influence yet; there's no reason to assume he knows what a patronymic is. "You may call me Vasiliy."

[ribticklers]

[Sans doesn't slow down or notice any sounds besides Papyrus. He hesitates before answering, but he doesn't slow down.] ...Yeah. Just one. They're pretty good copycats.

[He doesn't really want to say it was Papyrus that Sans heard, but it might not be impossible to guess. That's who Sans went in looking for, after all. Though, if he'd heard Toriel, he probably would have checked... But he doesn't know if he would have let it get as close to him as the Papyrus doppelganger got.]

FOR ANGELO & FALCO.

[m1895]

[ When Vasiliy looks up from the welter of the fractured limb he's stabilizing, Angelo is there with another patient, a child with a heinously disfigured jaw and clear signs of infection at the accompanying incision sites. He ties off the splint and springs to his feet, coming to collect the latest delivery at a trot—it's clearly a struggle for the kid to stay on his feet, as it often is for people in excruciating pain.

He speaks in Russian and lets this place do the arduous work of translating it, knowing that as he hears their words in his language they will hear his in their own. If they conclude that he's not from the time he says he is, there are ways around that: he sounds like an old man because he was raised by his grandparents, because they don't understand how people speak in Russia, because that's just his voice... ]

« I've got you. You're okay. »

[ He's small, compared to the American men he'd been forced to keep the company of in the 21st century, but he was strong enough to transport his adult patients back then, so it's barely much of a strain when he crouches down and scoops the kid up in a one-person lift.

Once he's got a hold of him, he looks over at Angelo, face drawn. ]

« Did he say what happened to him? »

ii. wildcard!

[m1895]

[ Somehow within in the endless flurry of movement and blood and heinous mutilations of the human body, Vasiliy watches. He watches the ones that come and go in the corner of his eye, notes how they act, and recognizes, as someone who has made emergency care his profession would, when their level of competency is above a layperson's.

The young man with lavender hair seems to be one of them. Were it not for the fact that every military he's aware of prohibits hair dye, he'd almost be inclined to assume he was a soldier or seaman, which would explain the basic level of structured training he seems to have had, the uprightness to the way he carries himself. On his next pass by, Vasiliy raises his voice loud enough to be heard, though he doesn't pause in pouring boiling water over the instruments he's laid out atop a fresh towel. ]

You! Young man!

[peninhand]

[ She beamed. lilmonix3 had been a great twitter handle! Unfortunately, it sounded absolutely ridiculous when spoken aloud. Perhaps she really should have reconsidered it when first sending a message here... ]

No worries, it went really well, ahaha! I'm sorry if I worried you too much. She was really kind and understanding. Too much so, really. [A pause.] She seemed so... Distressed that she couldn't understand why she felt that way.

[ She had reasons to trust that Rosemary could be of help. But she wouldn't share them. Much too personal. ]

Someone else mentioned that possibility to me... It could be so. There are other options, too. She could have been one of those behind this place, but then she had second thoughts and the others brainwashed her before she could stop them. Or she could have been created to make this place feel alive, but she's gaining awareness...

[ Kind of like herself. She shook her head. ]

We have too little to go on. And I'm afraid if we push her, she may feel threatened and close herself up entirely.

[peninhand]

[ "Wait..." Monika didn't like that word, not one bit. Nor did she think whoever had done this would be fooled by them pretending to ignore that shelter. ]

I went down in that bunker looking for my best friend.

[ As had many others. But... ]

I found her, after a while. She was still alive but I don't know if she'll ever be the same again. [She tilted her head down.] Because you see, before finding her I found the literal piece of her brain they'd carelessly removed and thrown into the sink afterward.

[ She looked back at the wall with all the information they'd gathered so far. She marked a bit of a pause before finishing. Had it not been for Sans's advice, she'd have burned the place to the ground.]

I will not wait till they decide to open her head again.

[13thcommander]

Training, you mean?

[Erwin actually brightens a bit at the thought. Whether he meant to or not, Falco has chosen the right topic to distract him.]

I joined the Cadets as soon as I was able, so just after my twelfth birthday. It was difficult, but those were some of the happiest days of my life.

[apodictic]

You saw how he is. Talking isn't really a good part of his skillset right now.

[ he'll let him take over, as this isn't something that angelo has any expertise in. instead, angelo decides to take a breather by washing off the blood on his arms and dabbing some of the grime from his clothes. he does this methodically.

he'll get water and coffee later on, just because it's been such a long night. ]

[apodictic]

Then I'll teach you how to do it for yourself. You can add your own methods later on.

[ angelo ... disassembles it as best as he can, grabs a few more props, then gestures to him to come closer.

having been working at the mall downtown and being a lieutenant in the army, he sounds very much like he is giving a serious lecture about coffee-making. but he is rather good at it, slow and methodical, pausing to explain terms and definitions for anduin if he needs to stop him to clarify things. ]

[grice]

[ being scooped up was a surprise— but in no way was falco in any condition to reject or protest what was happening, only making sure he had secured himself with a gentle ring around the man’s neck. just until it was more stable and he didn’t feel like he’d fall, he hoped it was alright. all the energy that hadn’t gone to giving angelo a hug had gone to clinging to this man, it seems.

he was indeed tired, he’d spoken and ran when his body had only asked for rest, but it was because of that that he could be here with angelo. the thinned flesh extending across the monstrosity of his new jaw was torn and bloody, could use care around the bruising and heavily stitched joints— that would all be taken care of now.

he regards angelo one last time, before bringing his pained and worn gaze to the attentive man. finally, he could relax, and the trembling tension in his limbs lifts, and hangs the rest of his weight along with gravity. ]

[sunborne]

No— No— That’s really useful. [ and he means what he’s saying, too. it’s not an attempt to just assuage any guilt kiara might feel for not having immediate clear information to work with.

because this is something they can work with: ] Interrogating you for information about yourself and where you’re from? That means they don’t have a lot of info to work with on their own.

We’re still possibly unknowns to them so we might have a few tricks up our sleeves, we might have a surprise or two for them if we play our cards right.

[ the more he talks, the more confident and hopeful he sounds as he lays out his thoughts on what this could mean. they might have an actual advantage then, if the ones behind the situation don’t know them, truly.

—which only begs the question: why were they all targeted? what did they all have in common to get sent here? daylight is trying to think of another question to ask kiara, keeping in mind that she won’t know a lot and she’s already been through hell, when he hears what might be footsteps.

... fuck. ]

Did you hear that?

[sunborne]

[ daylight is definitely (and visibly) taken aback by the response — he was ready for a debate on whether or not what’s happening is happening at all. or, hell, he was thinking there was a chance whatever happened to takame and okuyasu would happen to him. something or someone had tampered with their minds before and their last contact (maybe) was related to chief harding.

this is... this is not what he’s expected and he’s not sure whether to be suspicious of it or to be glad of it. he does, however, know to take the unsaid order seriously, picking up on it right away thanks to decades of being on the lornful light. daylight keeps that in mind as he presses on: ]

The lack of response from the cops last time. [ he means december, with the strange denial of the murderous reindeer and the frozen corpses on the yard. ] That’s what got me feeling doubtful but... [ it’s getting clear that chief harding is different. that aspect much was made clear in past conversations he had with others when they were talking about the man. before all of this went down and a lot of the people he spoke to vanished from their homes.

the picture of the two kids comes to mind and his stomach twists, helping daylight mean what he says next: ] Sorry if I came off as an ass just now. I... Yeah. That was uncalled for as fuck.

But does this mean you can help us, Chief Harding? [ the cops can’t help them - that’s been well-established at this point - but, well, the cops aren’t chief harding himself. ] Even if it’s just for the kidnappings, for this one thing and nothing else, the others and I will take it. We just want our friends and loved ones back.

[sunborne]

Right it is!

[ hang on tight, okuyasu- they are booking it down the hall, haphazardly juking left or right to avoid debris and overturned furniture and medical equipment.

unable and unwilling to take his eyes off the dark hall they're sprinting down, daylight relies on okuyasu to check on the status of their pursuer. he manages to wheeze out the following: ] Still behind us? Far away? Close?

[fanoperator]

"It's all right," Huaisang nodded, giving him a gentle and reassuring smile that mostly covered the fatigue underneath, and the perpetual deep loneliness in his eyes. "We've all been busy. I won't keep you any longer."

Curling his hands around his mug once more, Huaisang settles back in his chair, trying to decide for himself whether he can bear to get up and make another round among the patients at this time, or if he still needs the rest.

[demonicmiracle]

[The muttering earns a proper frown, Crowley regarding Archer for a moment as he decides that there's definitely more going on there, but now probably isn't the time to delve into it. Was a mannequin playing at someone Archer lost?

It wouldn't surprise him.

There's a small grunt of pain at the sting of the alcohol, but he's quiet aside from that, surprised that Archer is actually like, being gentle about it.]

Don't know that guns will help all that much when they can snap their fingers and make us compliant.

[Not that he isn't glad he has them now, but still.]

[fanoperator]

Huaisang is from Northeast Asia, but he only barely understands the modern geography associated with that. When he points to his home on a map, people call it China, or speak of a vast and renowned wall in the area, and he's grown used to that.

"I am pleased to meet you. I'm sorry there is so little left."

Looking this new acquaintance over curiously, Huaisang wonders what has brought him here and whether Daylight invited him. "Are you a friend of Daylight?" he asks, since he doesn't see any obvious injuries.

[righthandstand]

[He twists his head back - an easy task for him, at least.]

I don't see it! I think we lost it! [He yells, loudly.] But there might be another one ahead!

[thotsandprayers]

...I did.

[She's keeping her voice quiet, looking in the direction of those footsteps. Daylight said someone made a map, so there's definitely other people involved, but judging from the look of that bat, people aren't the only things down here to worry about.]

Did someone else come this way with you?

[Kiara's pretty sure from his reaction that's not the case, but it can't hurt to ask.]

[undiagnosed]

Is... that how they do it? [he's genuinely interested - seems to have dropped the pretense of not believing the supernatural. he'd always thought it was a dart, but the two times he's been downed... no dart marks after.] S'not like I haven't shot hands off before.

[he ties the bandage off, then downs the rest of the rubbing alcohol.]

Where's Avery?