EVENT LOG: THE NIGHT WE MET

[inthenightmods]

EVENT LOG:
THE NIGHT WE MET

characters: everyone.
location: the path from downtown beacon to the harbor; all over town.
date/time: february 16-21.
content: the forest spirits send off their friends to join the aurora. memory opals drop from the eerie green lights above.
warnings: n/a.

i had all and then most of you, some and now none of you.

For most of the day on February 16, all of the town's forest spirits can be found along the stretch of road between downtown and the harbor, clearly setting up for, uh, something. They're piling snow onto the pathway, creating a miles long sled trail that starts outside the Landmark Inn and ends at the very end of the harbor's dock. Not only that, but the forest spirits are also not super willing to explain what they're up to! They're busy, you lantern-havers.

By the time evening rolls around, the spirits have set up wooden railings alongside the snowy path, as well as a warming tent, hot chocolate booth, and announcer stand outside of the Landmark. Oh, and a starting banner for the race! It's dogsled time!

Throughout the event, Beacon's downtown and harbor areas will be completely overrun with forest spirits, all there to bear witness to this holiday celebration—this holiday is for them, though, not you weirdos with your naked faces. Point is, none of the spirits will be hostile at this time! They're more interested in interacting with each other than with Beacon's residents, though if pressed, a kind spirit might be willing to explain what's going on:

The aurora arrives in Beacon for about a week each year, and the forest spirits believe it to be "friends in the sky". The lights are old friends of theirs, it seems! And each night while the aurora shines above the town, the forest spirits send off a handful of friends to join the aurora! The spirits ready to join the aurora build sleds of their own and assemble mighty sled teams, sometimes comprised of dog spirits and sometimes... other stuff. Then, when the aurora is at its peak in the wee hours of the night, the sled teams will ride off one by one, racing down the snow-covered path all the way down to the harbor, where they'll finally rocket off the dock and out over the lake, picking up more and more speed as each team gallops wildly over the water before arcing up into the sky. Once the spirits are barely a speck, they'll hit the aurora and burst into a shower of light. Beautiful stuff!

See, since the aurora is made of light, forest spirits launched into it are killed on impact! Isn't that wonderful! The forest spirits seem to think so! What is death to a dead thing!

All of this information can be learned through handwaved/played-led interactions with the forest spirits during the event. They'll all be focused on saying goodbye to their friends and cheering them on as they stream through the sky, but they're happy to welcome lantern-havers to join in the celebrations. The hot chocolate is free and only tastes a little bit like mud, so. Enjoy!

•••
For the entire duration of the event, the aurora will dance in beautiful silence overhead, lighting up the whole town with its eerie green glow. Every so often, handfuls of opals will rain down like meteorites from the lights above, and these opals each contain the memory of someone currently in Beacon! They can be found all over town, landing on paths and atop buildings and maybe even rocketing straight through your ceiling to crash into your living room. Perhaps a forest spirit decided to hide some shiny rocks in your cereal box or under your pillow... Better hope the Postmaster General doesn't find your opals before you do, though. That spirits sure does love their rocks. Point is, who knows where the opals might turn up?

On that note, if you signed up for a random event, we'll be RNGing characters to receive these random events throughout the event! The event may happen in response to a toplevel on this event log, or we might turn up in your IC inbox... 👀 These events will be entirely random, meaning we could dole out any number of them at any time, so it'll be a fun surprise for all of us.

If you missed signups and would still like to toss your name in the ring, go right ahead! Signups will remain open throughout the event, though we can't promise everyone who signs up will get something.

And finally... Each day, we'll post a list of the forest spirits joining the aurora! What, did you want to know in advance? The forest spirits have never been a particularly organized bunch, so they're winging this—which means more surprises for you. :)

Enjoy the races and the lights and the opals, residents of Beacon, and remember: WHAT IS DEATH TO A DEAD THING!

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

Comments

For Gwen

[moderatelymaladjusted]

No better to be safe than sorry
It's a forest like any other, some place in the world and the sun is setting. It's beautiful and there's nothing to hear for miles except for the footsteps of Quentin and two friends hurrying through the underbrush.

A petite brunette with a huge axe in her hand and a handsome guy, with a long scarf wrapped around his neck. They're hurrying and there's a sense of urgency, of hopelessness.

Quentin looks-- tired. Worn down and like he hasn't been sleeping, which isn't too far from the truth. But they need to do this and they need to do it now, while there's still ambient magic enough in the world to do the spell. Before the Monster realizes just what happened to his sister and Quentin needs this to be done.

He's beyond scared. At least scared about himself, he's plenty scared for everyone else. Margo and Penny-23, with him on this. Alice, waiting for them by the mirror and Julia, already de-possessed and fighting for her life in a hospital bed from the axe wound to the back.

But this is now.

Here.

And Margo pops out her eye, throwing it along the forest floor and it comes to rest in front of someone who looks like Eliot Waugh.

It's not.

This hasn't been Eliot for months and this is what Quentin has been working towards, what he's been fighting for. This one chance to save Eliot.

She gestures silently, and Quentin charges forward, another axe held high as he steps in front of the thing that's not Eliot.

"Hey!"

The Monster gets up, hand already drawing in to the familiar gesture. The one that will tear Quentin apart, will splatter his blood all over the dead leaves and Penny-23 coming up behind him.

And Margo steps out from out of nowhere, slamming the axe right in to not-Eliot's stomach with a "Hey, motherfucker!" and not-Eliot drops like a ... well, a dead thing. A golden mist rises up off the body on the forest floor and it goes straight in to the bottle next to him. Next to Eliot and Quentin is ready, so ready, hands up and Penny-23 is typing on his phone while Margo is talking, pleading in the back ground.

"Eliot! Eliot, stay with me!" her hands trying to hold the huge gaping wound in his guts shut and she's failing, the blood runs thick and dark and Quentin is still ready, so ready, because they got the Monster out and now--

They tut through the spell together, every magician they could find and all the hedge witches. All across the world and for one glorious blink, he isn't Quentin Coldwater anymore. He's-- he sees London, New York, Fillory and Tokyo. He's young, and old, barely able to move his hands. He's watching the sun blaze on a cloudless sky, watching it set, watching it rise through the fog. And he's here, all here in the forest, sealing the Monster in to the bottle while Margo keeps screaming "Eliot!".

The spell settles over the bottle and Margo is still talking, still crying, still pressing her hands down in to the wound, "Eliot! Eliot, if there's a tunnel with grandma, you tell her to piss off and come back to me, you selfish fuck! Come back? Eliot?"

"Well, when you put it so sweetly, Bambi..."

And Quentin is lucky he's still sitting on the ground because there's no way his legs would be able to carry him right in this second. Not with Eliot moving his head, breathing and muttering to Margo. It's like all the strength he had left has drained right out of him and everything, everything, everything is centered on Eliot, bleeding out and possibly still dying. But he is Eliot.

The memory fades with just Quentin, getting up and wiping at his face with the back of his hand. Eliot is safe.

just a reaction!

[gwenzelle]

[ all gwen wanted to do was pick up the shiny rock to hold onto for a while, because it's kind of beautiful and weird and she appreciates things like that. but she picks it up and it's like she's shoved from behind and stumbling into the middle of a scene she can't make any sense of. all she feels is fear, a little bit of determination, but mostly heartbreaking concern. she needs to save her friend. her friend who's- possessed? in danger of dying. being used for something insane. it doesn't make sense, but she's so completely enveloped by the memory that "sense" doesn't seem to matter much. the only thing that matters is that this is their one shot to save him, their one shot to make this right.

eliot, eliot, eliot. that's what this is all about. they might die, but they have to save him.

gwen doesn't understand, but she completely understands. fuck, that's confusing. the longer she watches the scene, the closer she feels to the situation. like these are her friends, this is her battle to fight. they might die but she doesn't care, she has to try.

no, she doesn't know how she knows the spell, the easy flex and curl of her fingers that follow the words. that might be the most confusing part of all of this, but she feels the urgency to get it done, to use all the power in the world to make it work. the axe hits eliot in the gut and there's a strike of fear in her, even as that golden mist gets locked up tight in the bottle. eliot's freed from the monster, but he's bleeding out. margo's shouting for him, and she can't- move. she can't do anything but stare at the person she loves dying, but- himself. he's eliot again.

the memory fades out and gwen's cursing, dropping the stone, whirling around as tears fill her eyes because eliot, she has to find eliot, he was right there and she has to-

has to- ]

Whoa.

[ oh. she's back in beacon. she's still gasping to catch her breath, but the stone is on the ground at her feet and all she can do is stare at it, like looking at it sitting there might help her make sense of what just happened. what the hell just happened? ]