INTRO LOG: JULY

[inthenightmods]

INTRO LOG: JULY
IT'S HAPPENING AGAIN

characters: everyone.
location: the harbor, as well as the rest of town.
date/time: july 1-3.
content: beacon's newest batch of residents arrives on the ferry. winters, will, and rastus introduce themselves and explain the situation.
warnings: n/a.

welcome to beacon.

It's dim, and the room won't stop swaying, gently rocking you back and forth. A loud sound startles you fully awake, a deep, moaning call: a foghorn. As your eyes adjust, you note faint red light streaking through the room from a tiny, round window.

You've found yourself in a private room, lying on a bed. The last things you remember are the events that led up to your death. Beside you is a folded tablet and a lantern that glows steadily with a healthy flame.

You're on a ship. And that ship is docking.

Making your way to the deck, and eventually the pier, you find only moonlight to greet you, and a dark forest beyond. There are other people here, each with their own unique lantern, and many of them look just as lost as you are. On the ferry you've just disembarked from, the speaker system begins to play a song.

In the distance, across the waters of the lake, you can see the tall silhouette of a lighthouse, its red light slowly turning.

•••
Winters and Will are waiting for you on the beach. Winters flags you down from where he's standing atop a large rock, surveying the gathering crowd. Will stands next to him, though he's monkeying with his tablet and looks rather bored. He barely looks up as Winters speaks:

"First thing's first: I'm sorry you're here. There's no easy way to break this news, so let's just get it over with, hm? You're dead. Or, ah, you've died. Call this the afterlife if you want, or don't if that ain't your thing, but point is, you're here 'cause you died. Those are the facts.

This world's dead, too. You've noticed by now it's pretty dark, yeah? That's 'cause there's no life here, not anymore. And that lantern you've got? That's your life, so to speak. The flame goes out, you die, and vice versa. Keep it close. Should be easy enough to remember on account of how the sun don't rise. You'll need something to see by.

This place is called Beacon, and that's Lake Red Jacket. Town's 'bout a mile down the road, and we've got a bonfire there, but that's the only other light you'll see in this place. Save for the moon and all, though the sky won't do you much good out in the woods. I'll let Rastus explain the bonfire to y'all.

Ah, right. I'm Ben Winters—Winters'll do—and this here's Will Ingr— What? For christ's sake, Dr. Will Ingram. Likes to think he's the brains of the operation, as you can see. If you've got questions about these tablets, he's your guy. Rastus tends to the fire, and you'll find him in town. He's married to his job in a way. And you may never've seen a person like him back wherever you came from, but don't make a big fuss over it. He's a nice fellow. Mind your manners.

The three of us are leftovers from past resets. We came here on that ferry just like you, but it's just us left now. 'Sides the Lighthouse Keeper, but it'll be a bit before you get to meet her. She's got control over the town, see, and if she ain't satisfied with a group's performance, they get the axe. Town gets reset. If she pulls a reset on you folks, a couple of you might end up like me and Will here, giving this speech to the next crop."

The red beam of the lighthouse pulses over the group, over the trees. Winters glances up to watch it swing out over the bay.

"But don't hold it against her. Ain't her fault we're in this mess, and we've all got a job to do, including you.

For now, concentrate on accepting your lot, yeah? We're here to answer your questions, but we ain't gonna tell you all there is to know just yet. Some things are best learned on your own, and some of it we just don't want to saddle you with yet. There's a limit to how long we can stay here safely, that's true, but thing is, we do got time. Time enough to play this smart. Do better than the folks before us did. Settle in, make peace, explore a bit if you're up for it. Use these first couple weeks to come to grips. You ain't gonna be any good to the town if you don't sort yourself out before worrying about what comes next.

So listen up: You're dead. You died. Whatever your old life was, it's done now. None of us can go back, so all we've got is forward. Welcome to Beacon. Could be worse, yeah?"

ooc.

Hey there, wonderful players, and welcome to In the Night! For this intro log, all three NPCs will be available for chatting with, whether your character wants to make casual conversation or ask questions about all this. The headers on each NPC toplevel are there for easy reference as to what each of them are responsible for, but you're welcome to go to any NPC for whatever reason. You're welcome to assume your character has overheard any NPC conversation to learn more about the game. After the NPC threads have died down, we'll compile the info learned ICly and add it to the game history page. If your character would contribute something specific to the game history records, let us know!

DELIVERIES

The following packages can be found in the cargo hold:

• The monthly store restock

QUICKNAV
comms	|	network • logs • memes • ooc
pages	|	rules • faq • taken • mod contact • player contact • calendar • setting • exploration • item requests • full nav

Comments

For Gene

[sulfa]

cont'd from here.

[ wade's caught off-guard when the simple motion of the other lighting a cigarette from his lantern is met with physical sensation on his end - a faint, bizarre prickling deep in his core that vanishes the instant the cigarette's edge leaves the flames. he's not sure what to do with that - it feels deeply personal, moreso than he'd anticipated and more than he would have liked, but gene's a decent person and not a complete stranger, so it could be worse. he doesn't mention it; the question his fellow medic asks all but immediately redirects his thoughts. ]

My boys. Well. Smartasses, first of all. [ and usually pretty funny when they were. ] All of them were younger than me except for Sarge and the captain. I could tell you just about anything where most of them are concerned, but the captain never said a single word about where he was from, what he did before the war. [ wade pauses, exhaling smoke. he can't blame miller for making the call that he did - he was right, if they hadn't taken the nest out, others would have died - but right or wrong, the captain's decision led him to where he is now. ] He was a good man. They all were.

[ the incredible aloneness is impossible to ignore now - what is the difference, really, between losing someone because they died and left you in the living world and losing someone because you died and they didn't come with you to the world of the deceased? ]

[preseance]

( lotta that goin' around. good men, mostly. not all of them. gene's hopeful but he ain't naive, an' he learned real quick to spot the men what were just in it for the killin' or the cruelty. nobody takes potshots at a wounded soldier an' laughs what ain't fucked up.

doesn't mean they ain't worth bein' kind to, but. gene's tolerance ain't infinite. )

They'll do right by you.

( he says it with certainty, but it's a soft sentiment to be sure. he ain't never met a soldier what doesn't value his medics. who else is gonna go in after them if they get to hurtin' somehow? but he knows his boys, an' by extension can guess at irwin's, an' he knows they'll try their best to see to the arrangements.

he hopes alex finds the letters in his coat. he'd written them only days before during that long night of christmas, with reggie's help in an uncertain hand. one for his pa, one for robbie, one for alex. best he could do in the circumstances. )

[sulfa]

[ wade attempts something like a melancholy smile in response to that, more of an acknowledgement of what's been said than anything else, and leans forward until his elbows rest on his knees. ] I think so. I had a letter from one of the boys who'd gotten killed. Had to rewrite because of all the blood on it. Hopefully that's gotten to his dad by now.

[ he drifts into silence after that, lightly chewing on his lower lip as he sits back again. it's not his place to ask if gene had written any letters of his own - it's a personal thing, everything about dying is, as it turns out - so he simply lets the absence of his own voice sit as a silent invitation to share more if he'd like.

fred astaire's "cheek to cheek" truly could not be more out of place as a backdrop to any conversation as it is to this one; he almost laughs at the irony. ]

[preseance]

( everybody leaves somebody behind. how many families got those letters in their war? how many would get them still?

he hopes that... whatever else, maybe reggie can go tell his pa first. they'd take it better comin' from him, the whole hicks clan basically adopted him after his folks passed on an' jesse looks on him as a son.

the silence is an easy sell between 'em, an' he ain't exactly feelin' like he ought to fill it. he just takes another long drag off his cigarette, and taps ash off the end. eventually, in a soft tone, )

You know, apparently we put men on the moon by '69. You heard that one yet?

[sulfa]

I didn't. I mean, I'd sort of guessed we had at some point after meeting that Wash fellow [ --wade lightly waves the hand he's holding his own cigarette in-- ] but didn't know when.

[ after a pause of a few seconds: ]

1969. Sounds so far in the future, though I guess it's in the past now. [ irwin reaches down and retrieves his abandoned beer from the floor, taking a few sips before he returns it to its place beside the leg of his chair. processing that it's no longer 1944 is going to be one hell of a task, from the looks of it - like some absurdly magnified version of trying to remember to write the correct date on the first day of the new year. the warmth of mild intoxication has, for the most part, begun to alowly fade into something amorphous and uneasy. ] You seen any pictures of it?

[preseance]

Of the moon?

( he hadn't even thought about it. his family wasn't much for cameras, an' it ain't a line of logic he'd follow naturally. he considers it, canting his head to one side. )

Nah. But you bet your ass that's gonna be the next thing I ask Wash when I see him.

[sulfa]

If he's got any, bring 'em by so I can see 'em too. [ he heaves a quiet sigh. ] There's a lot we have to catch up on, looks like. [ and maybe, in the right circumstances, it almost might be fun, touring the future they didn't live to see from the stories of others - but these aren't quite the ideal circumstances. wade sits back and reaches for his beer again. ]

You know, I always assumed I'd live long enough to see the moon landing. [ not that he didn't think it was possible for him to die, that he'd just be luckier than everyone else, not that he'd bought into the 'that's the kind of thing that happens to other people, not me' mentality - he'd been acutely aware of the constant danger he was in. you can't watch that many people be alive next to you one minute and dead on the ground the next without developing an intimate understanding of human mortality - and yet, his own death was still a shock. ]

[preseance]

( he don't have much to say to that. just leans over and touches the neck of his beer to wade's. )

I'll drink to that.

( death was always a possibility, but. he sure didn't expect to get through four combat drops, a dozen campaigns through north africa an' italy an' die in a foxhole in belgium in the dead of winter, neither, with the end so near everyone knew it was comin'. )