EVENT LOG: GRAVES

[inthenightmods]

EVENT LOG:
GRAVES

characters: everyone.
location: Bonfire Square.
date/time: July 12-19.
content: mysterious shrines appear and bring visions of death.
warnings: likely violence and potentially gore.

time to pay your respects.

It happens when no one is looking, when most of the town is asleep and the rest are inside. A makeshift cemetery has come to Beacon, taking up residence in the middle of Bonfire Square. Each monument, shrine, and altar is dedicated to someone who now resides here, a memorial of their previous life.

Some may be drawn by curiosity, others by fear, and some may simply have to pass through this strange graveyard to get to the Bonfire itself. Whenever a person gets near, the altars beckon with a mysterious urge— an urge to approach, and an urge to leave something behind. They will feel compelled to make offerings at the various shrines, but doing so has a curious effect; it causes one to experience the death of the person whose grave they've honored.

Whether you resist the compulsion or give in willingly (or something in between), you'll also have to wrestle with the fact that a grave exists for you. Will you let your death be known, or try your best to keep it secret? Destroying it sure won't work, as it will return— with a duplicate somewhere else in town.

However you choose to deal with this, one thing is hard to ignore— this a tangible reminder of your death, and the fact that it's probably permanent.

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Comments

the grave, itt z desperately hopes her dates are right

[fogey]

[ the tombstone is a simple affair: grey stone, not much ornamenting it. inscribed, in curling letters: ]

Number Five
October 1 1989 - March 29 2019

[ 1) his name actually is, apparently, number five. 2) those dates sure are about 30 years apart, for all that he doesn't look a day over 13 and has told a handful of people he's actually pushing sixty.

five doesn't stand guard over his grave or try, in any way, to dissuade people from leaving offerings. he may, however, teleport immediately behind your character, should they be standing near his grave, scowling impressively. ]

Enjoying the show?

[ world's grumpiest jumpscare, reporting for duty. ]

[voktys]

⟪ melisandre is not one to give into rages, she has lived for too long –– longer, truly, than she has known for herself until just very, very recently, by her own shrine –– to fall to the folly of such emotions. it doesn't matter that egros is, apparently, older than he seems, it doesn't matter at all. what matters is that, instead of a name, he had been given but a number. many of those stones featured a dedication of sorts, some word of comfort she presumes for the dead, but his had the number, and the date, and that was it.

she'd left him an embroidery, flame upon red cloth, but she knows she as to go through his death again. there is much to say now that she knows, and it may... no, it won't make up for a life lived under a number, but perhaps, it will soothe him a little.

she'll need time, though, and time she doesn't have when he appears behind her. he's trained in this, he knows a flinch from the draw of a weapon, and yes, she is startled, but her hand has gone to her pocket –– only stopping when she recognises him. ⟫

This is this teleporting you spoke of?

[fogey]

[ five notices her startle, of course, the way she might've attacked him if recognition hadn't set in. she's right -- he is trained in this, and it's less that he reacts to her aborted motion as that he doesn't, because a part of him had expected it. he's always on edge or near it, ready.

seeing that it's melisandre doesn't exactly make him feel better about the fact that someone is here, and has certainly looked at this, at his memory, but doesn't make him angrier either. it takes him a second to remember the conversation she mentioned, but then he does, a slight lessening to that scowl. ]

This is it. I suppose you never would've seen it before.

[voktys]

No, we do not even have it in our fictions of magic.

⟪ at least not in any of the ones she had read, and not in scripture, either. god communicates through flame, and ash, and smoke. no more –– but no less either, and most of all, she knows these things to be true. ⟫ But by God, do I wish it could be taught.

⟪ this is not a request, she knows very well that, were it possible for her, she could do it by now. ⟫

You have a good soul.

[fogey]

Can't, [ he says, ] even in my world. Either you're born like this, or you're not.

[ but he doesn't dwell on that line of thought -- wouldn't have anyway, but the next thing she says is so strange and unexpected that he actually stares at her for a beat before reacting. then it happens: the slow spread of a disbelieving smile, and a laugh, shaking his head. wow. ]

Whatever you think you saw? You got the wrong idea.

[voktys]

⟪ she tilts her head at the laugh, but is clearly unaffected by it. no, he is not a boy, not by a long shot, but she has had a few decades on him easily now, and... she has danced this dance a few times.

often all by herself. ⟫

Oh, I don't doubt that you have done terrible things. ⟪ some may say that she has done terrible things herself. ⟫ But you remain capable of goodness, of sacrifice. Even in the depths of your abyss, you should appreciate such things.

[fogey]

You have no idea.

[ terrible things, she says, as calmly as she says almost everything. but no matter her age, no matter what she's seen, he's sure of this. the commission wasn't just terrible, it was unconscionable, it was unimaginable, it was the deepest cruelty he's ever seen or known. and five didn't just succeed there, he excelled. the very best of them. there's not a single decent person who could've done what he's done. ]

What I've done, or what I'm capable of. Seeing one thing I did doesn't change that, so don't pretend you know anything about me.

[callada]

[Not too many have caught him at his graveyard crawl. He practically jumps at the voice, then spins, hand ghosting toward a nonexistent holster. Muscle memory, nothing more, and when he finds he's been caught by a kid, the surprise is enough to send him crashing downward off his feet.

Well, hey, at least they're eye to eye now, or just about. And hey, that voice, wasn't that the same one in the vision?]

Oh - hey. Sorry, I didn't notice you earlier. Is this yours?

[fogey]

[ this is not, as a point of fact, the first time five has seen a dead man walking. watching rosinante move, listening to him speak, is no more painful than meeting his siblings again, than speaking to anyone in 2019 with the knowledge that the apocalypse comes in days. so all five says is, ]

I thought I told you to keep your lantern in one piece.

[ which may be answer enough. his network handle matches the name on the gravestone, anyway. ]

[callada]

[All right, yes, he'll take that as confirmation.]

I... I see. I'm sorry for intruding. Something about it drew me in.

[Like his own interest in seeing as many of these things as he can handle so as to better understand everyone he's stuck with. This was not an accident.

Sorry, but hold on, how old is this kid he's looking at? He doesn't think himself a bad judge of age, but a glance at the plaque suggests someone who should look quite a bit older than this. Is he being messed with? The person before him can't be much older than Law, surely. Perhaps the years in that world are a different length than the ones he's used to.]

[fogey]

Yeah, I've been hearing that a lot today.

[ has felt it himself, the pull to leave things at graves, then having to see what happened. but he doesn't dwell on the thought, not when rosinante is giving him a look. ]

What?

[callada]

How old are you?

[It's not quite an accusation, except maybe it kinda is. Kid, you're not thirty, there's no way about it.]

[fogey]

[ i mean, rosinante isn't wrong. ]

Fifty-eight.

[ mmmmhm ]

[chores]

( perhaps it's the simplicity of it all that draws her in. after all, aside from the missing blue triangle at the center, the headstone is not unlike her own. a number instead of a name and simple dates but lacking any... familiarity. any proof that someone cared though, perhaps, it is wrong of her to think that way over something that might just be showing them a small piece of their lives. former lives, she corrects herself.

despite her programming allowing her to react much faster than a typical human there is only so much she can do against someone that is very much, not normal. at least not normal in the sense that most humans do not teleport yet there isn't much of a reaction from her, no movement at all to five's sudden appearance. instead, she simply cants her head and lets her focus linger forward on the headstone. )

I can't say enjoyment is a word that comes to mind.

[fogey]

[ it'd be uncanny, her lack of a startle reflex, if he hadn't grown up with grace hargreeves keeping their house together. kara reminds him so much of his mom, and it's all in the small things he hadn't thought to remember, but hadn't forgotten either. ]

What, then?

[chores]

Just of how much your gravestone reminded me of my own. ( she says finally letting herself look away and turns just enough that she might see him. )

Of how I felt when I lost Alice. Of how much your mother must miss you.

[fogey]

[ he's quiet for a beat, then admits, ]

I haven't seen yours.

[ it's a funny comment for her to make, clearly has something behind it, but he couldn't guess what. not a happy comparison, but there's no such thing in a situation like this. ]

What happened to your daughter?

[chores]

In truth, I'm just surprised I have one. No one buries their androids back home.

( it's not, perhaps a thought she wants to linger on but the topic of alice? ah— that is even harder. yet, she thinks, perhaps it was better to speak instead of letting it linger and build up tragically inside her. what was it prompto had said? this was a second chance? )

She was shot. I told her we'd fix it once we made it across, once we made it into Canada but she... she died before I was able to do anything for her.

[fogey]

[ no one buries their androids back home. no, they wouldn't, would they? they'd probably recycle parts, junk others. he can imagine what diego would think about that.

he hadn't expected the answer to his question to be anything but tragic, but still, jesus. ]

I'm sorry. [ words that always feel hollow, but there's not much else to say in the face of a story like that. ] Shouldn't have asked.

[spitefullight]

[ He hadn't touched the grave yet. He had had enough with experience people dying for a lifetime...or second life time. Elden had looked at the grave and had assumed when he saw the name it was of the boy he met. So, Five really was there name. He wonders what kind of parent would just give their kid a number?

If he was being honest he could think of a few parents who could fit that description. But, really what he focuses on is the dates. He can do the math...

30 years. So...this kid wasn't human? He squints at it a bit before he hears the voice and suddenly stands to his feet. Elden looks at the so called boy with recognition, but he's scanning them now. ]'

I didn't look, Five. I've already intruded on enough people's privacy.

[ Still, he purses his lips in thought before saying; ]

So, you're not a kid, are you? Or at least, you age a lot slower than humans do, am I right?

[fogey]

Wrong.

[ he doesn't relax, arms crossed, as he takes in the guesses. even if elden did respect his privacy enough not to look at the memory, five isn't too thrilled about the questions. ]

I am human, Jesus. [ even if he often feels otherwise, all that blood on his hands. ] I just look like a child. Time travel.

[spitefullight]

[ Right, okay, human....but in a child body.

So an angry 30 year old because of time travel? It's sort of hard to make sense of that but, he lifts his hands up in surrender. ]

Sorry, I just, there's races of people where I'm from who look like they're kids but are really in their hundreds.

[fogey]

[ he has to make a sound that's almost a laugh, at least, at that. ]

I'm not quite that old, and thank God for that. [ hundreds....christ.... ] I've never heard of anything like that.

[spitefullight]

It's not uncommon from where I'm from. Elves, halfings, Aasamir, tieflings, lots of different races with different but long life spans. Some of them can even pass as human.

[ He gives something of a non committal shrug to his explanation as he looks at the other. ]

Point, being is I'm sorry I assumed you were younger than me. I guess I was projecting or something stupid like that.

[fogey]

[ he hasn't heard of even half of those races, and those he have are straight from fiction. elden's world is clearly far, far removed from his own. unsurprising, really, given the variety of people here. but still odd to confront.

he gives the kid kind of a funny look at the apology, then shrugs. he probably does sound angrier than he thinks, wound tight by the situation; but elden hasn't done anything, in particular, to really annoy him.

(not that he loves being asked questions as a general rule. but there are the momentary annoyances, and the things he actually holds onto.) ]

Most people around here assume I'm a child, because I look like a child. That's nothing special.

[ worth apologizing for, that is. ]