logsinthenight | 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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[Blue. Duster's lantern had been a less intense blue days ago, and Quentin's is brighter, just as bright as the sickly green light that engulfs the two as that lamp loses its color and fades to its usual gentle light.]

Huh?

[An accurate summary of how anyone would feel at that development.]

It must be my curse, because that hallucination made it look like your lantern is...normal.

Yeah, it's-- been doing that?

[Changing color, changing him and Quentin just hopes this doesn't mean that the tentacles are coming back. He watches his lantern with wide eyes, and when it doesn't go red, he takes a deep breath and turns his attention back to Duster.]

It is normal. For now. And-- and yours? How's yours? Can-- okay, so. It's good, that you know that these things that you're seeing? They aren't real. Things can be bad here, but not as bad as that.

[Jesus Christ, Coldwater, how is any of this comforting? He squeezes Duster's hand.]

You're going to be okay.

I know.

[He breathes in slowly and lets out a shaky sigh.]

I know, and that's what makes it worse. It's taking all the things I remember, everything I hate, and taunting me with the words and images that scare me the most. But they're not going away, and...

[He lightly squeezes Quentin's hand to steady himself.]

Sleeping it off doesn't work. I just want the light to change.

I know.

[There's isn't anything anyone can do, not that they've found out, to change the light of the lanterns or to make the hallucinations stop. It's just an ongoing spiral of misery until it just ... stops.

Hopefully.

Quentin licks his dry lips, his whole face hurting from laughing like an idiot all day and he doesn't even know why. Except, it might have something to do with the lanterns. They malfunction or maybe they're breaking apart and this means they are all dying.]

So, uh. When it was me. When I was lost, in the woods and I was seeing-- I saw my girlfriend? But she was different. Evil. Cold. I was so sure I was going to die.

[Honesty, the truth when he doesn't want to mention his theory about the lanterns and what it means, and Quentin tries to guide Duster back towards the town with a small tug on his hand.]

I found someone. Someone who was feeling what I was feeling, and we-- we talked. It helped. So, if they are showing you bad things. Can you tell me about the good ones? Anything.

[Duster follows, only watching the spot right in front of his feet.]

...This happened before, when I was alive. We were starving and hurt, and we were all alone on this dangerous island. "The Island of Nightmares", we called it when it was visible from the village. The mushrooms that grow there gave us all hallucinations about our greatest fears.

[After that, he and his friends refused to talk about it. There weren't many chances to talk about it afterwards, and now there will be no other chances.]

I saw...my friends. My dad. [But the two were different. They were scary in different ways.] They were trying to tear me down, telling me how nothing was worth it. That I will die there, far from everyone.

It's the same. A bit. It's so dark that everyone shows up out of nowhere. I mostly hear them laughing before they show up.

Something like this happened to me, too. Back home.

[And it was the weirdest thing, that 'back home' meant a million different places. Something new for each of them.

Like the stars in the sky, just this endless string of worlds upon worlds. Similar and different and the only thing connecting all of them, was this world. This place. Quentin sighs, still leading Duster closer to town.

It's slow work, small steps.]

And here, too. I saw a monster, that looked like my best friend. He wanted to... play.

[There is no way to explain the Monster or the complete wrongness of him. Of who and what he was, when he was wearing Eliot like a cheap suit. How he'd held Eliot hostage to get what he wanted and how much he'd liked Quentin.]

Monsters don't play nice. If you... if you see something. Here. I can-- maybe I can help. I can tell you if I see it too? Or... do you think music would drown it out?

[He hadn't seen anything like that. He didn't have a best friend as a child. The closest people to his heart were several adults in the villages that worked with him and everyone he met after that fateful night in the abandoned Osohe Castle. Those mushrooms took advantage of that. That loneliness that pervaded his youth left him with doubts and holes in his self-image that could be filled in with lies and fears.

He wished that he could be better. That having gone through this before meant he could handle it every time in the future.]

I don't know. I never had the chance to try. [No portable music on the Nowhere Islands.]

[There's really no handling something like this, and Quentin knows it. There's no way to handle your own mind making every horror you've thought about come to life.

There's even less ways to deal with knowing it might happen again, and again, and again. Without warning and without any ways to make it stop once it starts.

There's just enduring.

Okay, music. He can do music.

As gently as possible, Quentin takes his hand back and tuts his way through the spell. As his hands fall, the music starts playing.

It comes from all around them, quiet at first.

Quentin reaches down and... grabs Duster's wrist instead.]

The words... if you want. The spell makes the words come to you.

[And Quentin opens his mouth and starts to sing softly:]

When the night has come. When the land is dark, and moon is the only light we'll see.

[Duster jerks at hearing music from nowhere - this could be your average "music from a magic box" thing, or this could be a spirit. Or it could all be fake. He doesn't recognize the song at first, and then Quentin sings.

And then he knows those words. He can hear the bass line where it compliments the melody. He nods along, and continues the song:]

No I won't be afraid, no I won't be afraid, Just as long as you stand, stand by me

[Leading Duster out the thick woods, the music is in the air all around them. Like the air itself is making this happen, when it's really just Quentin's magic reaching out. Connecting.

The spell weaves through the forest and the song rises with the swell of violins, and they keep moving. Quentin keeps putting one foot in front of the other, one hand around Duster's arm to keep him from falling.]

If sky that we looked upon. Should tumble and fall. And mountains should crumble to the sea--

[The music dims, fades and they're at the town line. The row of dark houses straight ahead.]

EVENT LOG: TURN THE LIGHTS OFF

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mind ending it here?

Not at all