EVENT LOG: TURN THE LIGHTS OFF

[inthenightmods]

EVENT LOG:
TURN THE LIGHTS OFF

characters: everyone.
location: around town.
date/time: january 20-29.
content: the lanterns begin to malfunction.
warnings: body horror and psychological horror. please cw tags appropriately.

you'll become one

January 20th arrives the same as all the days before it. There's no great pulse of warning that throbs through the air, no ominous wind that causes the bonfire to shudder. The spirits are neither agitated nor do they hide. You could almost miss the change, if the lanterns weren't always by your side. There's no explanation that comes with the way that it's changed, but it's impossible not to worry when it's happened so suddenly.

Maybe it takes a few days, or maybe it only takes a few hours, but suddenly it isn't just the lanterns that have changed. You, yourself, have become somehow different. It's possible that you won't even have the right state of mind to wonder how long it will last. At the very least, it appears you aren't alone. All across Beacon, lanterns are changing, and changing the people with them.

Out in the distance, the lighthouse's beam has turned green.

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Comments

[callada]

"I meant I don't think everyone is!" he replies hurriedly, becoming increasingly more distressed that he can't make it sound like he's as worried as he is. Everything comes out like a joke, like teasing. Maybe he should just leave, since he's making Kuai more upset.

"Everything keeps changing! Some people got better, some people got angry! You shoulda seen it, I almost knocked Sora out with a chair!"

The last part blurts out as if it's particularly funny, even though it is not only the opposite, but he really hadn't even wanted to say it at all - not like that. He'd meant to say his anger made him do terrible violent things he would never have done, but it passed in time. He tries to clamp his teeth and lips together before he can say anything more.

[paletteswap]

"Some have recovered. That's..." He pauses mid sentence to stare at Rosinante's big toothy grin. Wait what? Surely he misheard. "You hit Sora with a chair?"

Well that doesn't sound right. For starters Sora looks like he's fourteen years old, and Rosinante had been pretty reserved in terms of combat so far. Of course there is another possibility.

"On purpose?" Because Kuai wouldn't be surprised if Rosinante stood up too fast and sent a chair flying across the room into Sora's face by accident.

[callada]

"He insulted me," he snickers despite his best attempts to keep quiet, knowing he's continuing to make this worse. "He - my makeup! He doesn't like it."

Hilarious, but really not. It's one of the things that reliably gives him some amount of joy through self-expression. Otherwise he'd go without, seeing how clearly it isn't popular on Earth the way it is at home, and assimilation has always been a goal of his. But here there's no need to, so he thought he'd been safe to do something small like that for his own enjoyment.

Which is why he's got lipstick and eyeshadow and all of it on again still. Fuck you, Sora.

[paletteswap]

"And that was reason to hit him with a chair?" In good news, Kuai is suitably distracted by this turn of events that he's not thinking about the lizard creature he's becoming and can ignore the pain from his back. Rosinante probably wasn't intending to help in that sense, but it's something.

"I'm not sure I'd recognize you without it." A lie, but he would definitely do a double take seeing Rosinante scrubbed clean. He'd never really thought about it as 'make-up' really. Just figured that was his thing. Everyone back home was so thematic it didn't even seem strange. Kuai wore blue, Hanzo wore yellow, Erron dressed like a cowboy, and Bo'Rai Cho carried around an infinite number of flasks. Rosinante would have fit right in.

"Is he okay? You didn't hurt him did you?" Because if Sora took a chair thrown by Rosinante at full force he might be crumpled in a heap still.

[callada]

Sure, an exaggeration since Kuai has in fact seen him without during their first month and then after, in the two week siege by the spirits, when he just didn't have the time to take to himself. He gets the intent, though; there's a kindness behind it, even with his confusion. He manages to get a grip on himself for a moment as a result, and actually shakes his head no in response to that first question. No, it wasn't a good reason. At the time he had thought it was, but that wasn't really him.

"He's all right! I think. I hit him really hard and he just kept getting back up! I think there's something different about him." Probably something to do with those weird eyes of his.

[paletteswap]

"Well that's .. good I think." The tone of Rosinante's voice is making it difficult to tell if he's being serious or not. Which is different than what Kuai is used to and unsettling enough that he's focused on that rather than his current reptilian problem.

"Maybe he's a trained fighter and knows how to take a hit." But he sounds unsure, because he's seen Sora and he doesn't exactly look it. However; Kuai is more than aware that looks can be deceiving, and can be used to an advantage. Thanks for that lesson Cassie Cage.

"What do you mean something different? Maybe he's been affected by something similar to .. this." he looks down at his clawed hands, wondering how they would fare in a fight. If his back wasn't in agony he'd go do some training and maybe learn some slashing moves to utilize those claws.

cw: ?? I guess this is like vaguely self-harm?? god

[callada]

The laughter turns briefly manic before he manages to clamp down on his own tongue. Restraining himself is almost futile and he should probably stop trying to check in on people. The pain and the taste of copper manages to snap him into clarity for a moment, and he holds a hand over his mouth, while the other points at Kuai's red lantern.

"His - wasn't like that! He has... eyes! They look like key-eyes. Keyes!" he sputters, then breaks down into laughter once more that just won't seem to let him get a word through. It's remarkable that Kuai is handling this so well - both his current state of utter nonsense and his dragon-like form. Meanwhile, Rosinante fights back the fear of what this might evolve into, and finally gasps out a "Calm!" between bouts of laughter and goes completely silent, though all the motion of his laughing outburst continues on.

Poor guy.

[paletteswap]

Well that.. certainly is a thing. He actually takes a step back from Rosinante because he has no idea what's happening, or what's so funny. If this was Injustice Kuai he'd have some unpleasant Joker comparisons right now..

"Are you all right? Do you.." The rest of what Kuai was going to say vanishes when Rosinante goes silent. He's clearly still laughing up a storm about all this, but now Kuai can't hear it. He's not sure if this is better or worse. "Do you need assistance?"

Maybe he just needs some time to get ahold of himself. Unsure what to do Kuai turns to his lantern, examining the changes. It's definitely nice and red, and it had been blue before. As for the eye thing... Sora has eyes? Of course he has eyes.

He might be waiting there for a while for Rosinante to stop laughing.

[callada]

At the offer of assistance, Rosinante shakes his head and waves a hand dismissively. There's nothing Kuai can do, he's certain of that.

He gets a grip on himself after a minute or so mostly because he needs to breathe and the laughter makes it hard. It almost hurts, in fact. His shoulders slump as he takes a few steps back, falls to the ground, then gets back up. A long breath through his nose and out again seems to prove he can contain himself for the moment, and he drops the muting effect.

"I need to go. I don't... I can't control this," he manages, quietly, with just the slightest tremble in his voice as the laughter threatens to spill forth again.

[paletteswap]

"Are you under the effects of something? An enchantment maybe? That would make sense given what is happening to everyone." He hooks his lantern back on his belt, hoping that the cracks that have shown up don't get worse. Ignis had mentioned something along those lines and then he'd warned Quentin and... His eyes briefly go wide and he looks down at the ground, suddenly that encounter makes a whole lot more sense. "The same happened to Quentin. I thought he was belittling everything, but he couldn't stop making jokes. Laughing at things that weren't humorous."

Like joking that maybe those who stayed dead were used as currency by the spirits the same as how the Night Market used spirits for trading.

"Maybe you should stay inside until it wears off?" He frowns, that's assuming a lot. He doesn't know if it even will wear off. But his optimism is still there buried beneath his new shiny scales. Holding up his clawed hands he nods to them, "This hasn't gotten any worse since it started a few days ago, so perhaps everything has peaked and it will start to recede?"

[callada]

Yes, poor Quentin. Rosinante had nearly hurt him in his own anger, for the laughter and apparent callous disregard to anyone other than himself and his grief had enraged him pretty severely. But even then he knew enough to realize there was something wrong and had managed to remove himself before he could cause any real injury. Quentin was luckier than some, in that sense, but in the meantime he had somewhat forgotten the encounter and now he can indeed easily see that what he's going through is much like what the other man had experienced.

He descends into renewed laughter when he sees this strange lizard that is Kuai look at his own hands. "You - your hands!" he even exclaims, then laughs hard enough that he can barely breathe. "Your hands - those claws are so..." There's no finishing the sentence with all the laughter, but he nods.

Yeah. He should head inside. He should also try to periodically check on people rather than holing up entirely, but he's no help to anyone right now and so with tears starting to well at the corner of his eyes from laughing so hard, he begins to leave. "I hope your hands - claws! Go away..."

[paletteswap]

Now that he's sort of realizing what's happening, Kuai likely owes Quentin an apology. But that'll be for another time.

He doesn't do more than grunt in annoyance, he's been laughed at more in the past week than ever before and it's grating, but he's trying to stay level-headed about all this. Somewhat successfully.

"As do I. And may you recover quickly as well." It's probably best for both of them if they go their separate ways until this passes. Which he's still hopeful it will.