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

[preseance]

( kyna pls. )

Well, I suspect Wash an' I to be of differing dispositions.

[evocation]

[Kyna bursts out laughing at that.]

What does that mean?

[preseance]

( okay but he sincerely doubts wash has ever had to deal with having to inspect the gooey VDs of the men he then later eats beside at mess, because lordy does that change a man, but. he's not about to say that to kyna for propriety's sake. )

Well, he is a Marine.

( #justarmyjokes. )

[evocation]

[Her head tilts slightly.]

Wait, what does that have to do with it?

[preseance]

( oh lord don't make him explain this. gene just sort of grimaces an' wrinkles up his nose. )

Well... each branch has its rivalries, see. I'm a paratrooper, which is a special forces sort'a unit in the Army. An' the Marines are another branch, just as highly trained. So we joke around a lot with each other, you know? Kinda like bein' siblings, I guess.

[evocation]

[Kyna leans forward, propping her elbows on knees and her chin on her hands.]

It's okay, you can say you talk shit about each other. What do you say?

[preseance]

I don't say a goddamn word, I've got a brother in the Marines an' I ain't got nothin' but respect for the branch.

( which is true. )

An' to the other things — well, maybe you should ask him.

[evocation]

[She's grinning now, eyebrows raised.]

I love my brother, too, and he loves me, but he still calls me a brat and I call him an asshole. And I make donut jokes because he's a cop.

[Spill the deets, Gene!]

[preseance]

( why would you make donut jokes about a cop, kyna, why would you do that. )

Lord, I think last time I called Albert an asshole he tried to deck me.

( he loves his brother, but their relationship is. fraught. )

[evocation]

Seriously? Why?

[preseance]

( he sort of fidgets a bit. lord this would be easier if he had a cigarette. )

Uh. Well.

( he didn't really intend for that to be a segue into the life and times of eugene and albert hicks. )

I joined the army without tellin' the rest of my family, an' Al took exception to that. I mean, it was fair enough.

[evocation]

Oh.

[There isn't really much Kyna can say to that. If her brother went off to war without telling her, she'd probably deck him, too.]

Um, did you apologize?

[preseance]

( he shrugs a little, one shoulder lifts up. )

Never saw him again.

[evocation]

[She flinches, instantly sympathetic.]

Jesus. I'm so sorry.

[preseance]

( he reaches out an' touches her shoulder, gentle an' soft. )

It's all right. I'll see him again one way or another. We Hicks boys, ah, we've got a queer relationship with death given the whole. You know. Al an' I've always been at odds.

( al was so hurt an' betrayed he went to new york. he did it for them, removin' a mouth to feed at the table an' makin' money to send home besides, but he never saw it like that. just abandonment, plain and simple, an' it was made worse by gene's goin' in the war. joinin' the marines the following year was his way of hittin' back hard enough to hurt. gene thinks a lot about that pic that time magazine ran of those dead soldiers on buna beach an' just how vicious an' violent the war's been in the pacific, but. al's tough. he's the consummate fighter of them all, an' he'll survive. he has to. )

[evocation]

[She reaches up to cover his hand with hers, wondering how this keeps turning into him comforting her.]

Is he older or younger?

[preseance]

Younger. I'm the eldest of four.

( their protection always fell to him in one way or another. al resented that plain enough. )

[evocation]

[She hums softly, considering.]

I should have guessed that. How old is Al?

[preseance]

Little more than a year young'n'me.

( he keeps comin' back to that summer storm, his memory of pullin' al away from the screendoor as it rattled when all he wanted to do was watch the green swirl of the sky. he thinks that might've been what set the tone for the whole of their relationship. there ain't no question of the love bein' there. there were a lotta nights when the two of them were just out in the woods an' fields around agathine relyin' on nothin' else so much as each other, but when their ma died — al took it the hardest outta all of them, an' grief changed him. )

[evocation]

[They were close in age, then. Kyna wonders if that was strange for Al, if maybe the fact that he was almost the oldest but not ever grated. She and Nico are four years apart, and while his bossiness sometimes grated, there was never any real question that he had more experience and maturity than she did. She's not sure how a smaller gap would have changed their relationship. She doesn't want to ask that point blank, though.]

What's he like?

[preseance]

( he sort of. exhales. flexes his fingers, an' tries to really consider it. what would he say to al about a stranger? kyna ain't hardly that, an' besides this is the first time he's really even talked about his brother with anyone who ain't reggie's shade in years. none of the fellas in the company save alex even know he's got brothers. )

He, ah. He's difficult. Complicated. Always has been. He'd've followed me into Hell when we were younger, but after we lost our Ma he changed some, lost his way.

( it's the kindest way he can think to describe what happened after. al was forever gettin' into fights afterwards. he became volatile at a word. more than once gene had to step in on his account, an' in hindsight near every time he did he'd haul al home by the scruff lecturin' him. he'd tried so hard to fill the gap their ma left. must'a felt to al like he'd lost both his ma an' his brother at once. his expression softens at the realization. )

Truth be told, I left for New York at fourteen an' when I came back we were strangers, near about. He felt I'd abandoned them, an' I can't rightly blame him for sayin' so.

[evocation]

I think I get it. My dad kind of, um...

[She hesitates, shifting awkwardly.]

Ditched us, and my mom had to work all the time, so it was mostly me and my brother when we were growing up.

[And if he'd left, she can imagine being hurt and angry and lonely, too. Not that she blames Gene, necessarily—it sounds like it sucked all around.]

Did you, like... write him or anything?

[preseance]

( oh kyna. he doesn't think much of men what walk out on their families like that, to be sure, but it ain't anger on her behalf so much as sympathy that flickers in his expression. )

Some. Ain't much that makes it past the censors, an' deliverin' from one war zone to another on the other half of the planet ain't easy. But Reggie'd check in on him for me now an' then an' let me know how he was doin'. Al's the only one of us that can. Mm. Ghosts describe us as a beacon, almost. Like a light in the dark. Al can black it out so's he can't be found. No clue how he does it, but sometimes it means Reg' has a harder time findin' him.

( he scuffs his heel in the dirt to allay an itch, an' then tips his head to one side. )

You ever met up with your father again?

[evocation]

[Kyna's about to ask what exactly it means to be a beacon, but then he asks about her dad and she scoffs instead. At least she's willing to answer now. A year ago she would have just muttered a "yes" and instantly changed the subject or shut down completely. Now she just sounds bitter.]

Yeah, but it wasn't because he wanted to see me. I was on a job and he just wanted to swipe these artifacts we were hired to grab because they were cursed and super dangerous. He pretended he was psyched to see me so he could follow us and grab them. Guess how well that went.

[preseance]

( lord, he can't imagine the betrayal. the flame of that anger gutters, but it don't have place between the care and regard. he takes her hand again an' squeezes it gently. )

Ah, sweetheart. I'm sorry for that.