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ph_logs2024-03-05 05:57 pm
pumpkinhollow) wrote in ph_logs2024-03-05 05:57 pm
Entry tags:
Mingle - Emergency Potluck
Pumpkin Hollow Community Bulletin
WELCOME POTLUCK
Greetings, residents! Those more observant sorts among you may have noticed a large influx of very crowded ferries. In order to welcome our new residents en masse, Town Hall is holding a potluck in Town Square. Please bring a dish if you are able and make a new friend!
All of our newest arrivals need only bring themselves. We look forward to welcoming you all into our community, and may your lanterns always be lit.
This event is open to all! In light of our new influx of prospective players following the Great Sail Migration, we've decided to offer a small public event to tide everyone over until the TDM this weekend.
no subject
A skeptical, almost-fear rises to his face - something tentative, nervous about which way this is going to go, but he's trying to withhold any gut feelings about which way this is going.
"Er... yes?" He starts, brows furrowing with worry. "I mean, I can only hope that it failed, but I-I wasn't there to see it, no. I was told, during the deal, that I wasn't pulling out of a coma, but not the, ah... state of the world, or anything along those lines. I'm not even sure if we succeeded. I hope so, but granted our latest bout of luck..."
He's eyeing her warily, and his uncertainty only grows with every passing moment.
"Don't mince words with me, Daisy, what--- what happened? What brought you here?"
no subject
The funny thing is what brought her here has very little to do with what happened at home. Oh, she knows about her death, but she also knows that whatever was left of her there wouldn't have been person enough to make this deal even if things hadn't gone so differently for her. No, the problems at home have very little to do with her own fate, and everything to do with everything else.
"It's not about what brought me here. That's another story entirely." No point in hiding it, even if she had ever been prone to mincing her words, with the Archivist hiding anything never feels like a sure thing. Though, that doesn't mean she might not try with... bigger things. "The Unknowing failed. You don't have to worry about that. We lost Tim, and you were in that coma. But Basira— somehow reasoned her way out of it before the explosion. Me— it's fuzzy. But apparently I tore apart one of those freaky delivery guys and then. Ended up in the coffin."
And that's not even the half of it...
no subject
He's almost satisfied with the idea of the coffin being what brought her here, but there's just an edge of something extra.
He does what he's already done, for better or worse: he digs.
"Glad to hear one of those bastards is dead, and that... a fair few of us survived, at least. Hopefully Orsinov went with whichever one of the deliverymen you were able to get rid of," He mutters, frowning. "Did you make it out of the coffin, then?"
no subject
"Haven't seen her since." ...or, well. Not at home, she hasn't. Nikola Orsinov was on the first of her voyages on the damned Serena Eterna, but she's long dead there, too. So that this assurance is only a half-truth may or may not be obvious.
Answering the actual question is— much more complicated. A timeline discrepancy like this isn't new to her, she's seen it in others more than once. Even she and Basira were a couple of months apart, on that first cruise; Daisy had arrived fresh from the Unknowing at first, too, whereas Basira was well into the six months that lay between that day and Jon waking up.
But the possibility of returning home has never been a factor before.
"...yeah, eventually," she starts with, the simplified truth. Her arms fold loosely. The claws on one hand curl against the other arm, but she restrains herself from scratching. "According to you lot it was about eight months I was down there. Felt like— felt like a lot longer. You don't sleep. Everything— it blurs together."
She can't help the little shudder at thinking back to it. Jon used to understand. Even three days down there had been enough for him to understand.
"But I got out. With— with help. Um." Ugh. Daisy's head drops back over the back of her chair and she breathes out through her nose like an aggravated dog. Only after a moment does she raise it to look at him again. "Do you still need statements? And do they still give nightmares if you take them live?"
This might be easier if it's pulled out of her, frankly.
no subject
The offer to reach for that missing piece takes a great deal of personal restraint not to jump at; he manages, but just barely.
"I do," Jon replies, and one look at him speaks an additional piece of information: he hasn't been getting them. Not recently, at least - he's not completely withered, but he's a tad more gaunt than usual. Before now, he's been easily able to write it off as the famine everyone had endured, but Daisy didn't need such excuses, nor is he particularly sure she wouldn't see right through them.
"As far as I'm aware, no, no nightmares. If there are, no one's told me, and I imagine someone might have mentioned it, at this point. People who I've taken live statements from haven't started avoiding me like the plague just yet." He means that to be half-joking, but it falls a bit flat.
Fortunately, he understands what she's getting at, and doesn't intend to beat around the bush about it. The draw of getting a statement is too strong, anyways - any amount of patience isn't enough to keep him pulled back as far as he might like it to.
"If you'd like to make one, I can take it, ah..." He starts, slower in his words now, trying to keep as measured as possible. "Here, or we could, um--- step away, if you'd prefer?"
no subject
The effects of the kind of hunger that plagues people like them is something she's far too intimately familiar with to not recognise for what it is, it's true. Any excuses would earn little but a flat, disbelieving stare, but he has the sense not to offer them and Daisy has come to care enough about the scrawny bastard that even if the nightmares were still in play, she might have risked it. Maybe the protection of being an employee of the Institute would've carried over. Who's to say.
She sighs and stands up. "Stepping away's probably better. These things always pull out more detail than you expect."
Something she's suddenly very aware of, but Daisy's nothing if not stubborn enough than to try and mitigate the effect somehow. So, she jerks her head towards a quieter area off the square and starts walking, expecting Jon to just keep up with his longer legs.
no subject
As soon as they're away, and a look over to the mingling crowd gave an assurance that no one was going to try to come over and ask anything. Interrupting these things never did go particularly well for anyone involved.
He doesn't ask twice. Anyone else, he might fret a bit more, but if Daisy agreed at all, he didn't think her the type to reconsider over a walk across the festival green. There is, for consideration's sake, a small nod for confirmation given, and when he gets any sign of confirmation in return, he speaks. This time, each word finds a thread, and begins to pull, slowly and carefully.
"Statement of Daisy Tonner, taken live from subject, regarding the events following the failure of the Unknowing, and the circumstances of her arrival to the town of Pumpkin Hollow. Statement begins."
(Does he need to say "statement begins" without a recording device? Not at all. The habit's so ingrained, though, he doesn't even think about the fact that the waterlogged tape recorder he's hauling around isn't recording, either. He only gives it a passing wince of a misspeak - he's got other things to focus on right now.)
cw: reference to self harm and suicide, torture, violence, and assorted other horror
Even as she's choosing to do this, it takes effort not to fight the pull of a statement to be made, to just let it happen. That first time left it's mark and Daisy has always been such a stubborn, private person.
But she breathes in, and out, and lets the presence of the Archivist's watching eye help her make the whole mess make sense.
"The last thing I remember clearly from the Unknowing itself is when it all really started to kick off. I remember telling you all to get behind me and then the music becoming so loud and overwhelming that I couldn't think. After that, everything gets... distorted, and all I have is vague impressions of Breekon and Hope trying to mess with my head, and then suffering the consequences. Even when nothing was anything I knew how to kill. Guess that says a lot about what I am, but back then I never thought hard enough about it to risk realising I didn't like what I saw. Easier just to keep running. Keep Hunting."
She shakes her head sharply—get back on fucking track, Tonner. "Anyway. Point is, I don't remember walking into the coffin. And this is where things get— it gets complicated. The kind of complicated that would make me sound insane if we weren't all here in another universe already. Because I remember what happened next two ways. The first time, I woke up in a— cursed pocket dimension styled into a cruise ship called the Serena Eterna, run by this bastard who called himself the Captain. The place was filled with people from other universes that were nothing like ours, just like this place. But Nikola was there and, eventually, so was Basira.
"I was there for about four years. I think. Bits of it are blurry, makes it hard to tell. But the place was a glorified torture chamber where even if you died you came back to be tortured some more. The Captain sent us all on these trips that always turned into bloodbaths. It was like entertainment to him. He enjoyed us tearing each other apart and fed the place on our suffering. If you weren't a murderous bastard when you arrived, you learned to be. We actually had a run in with a Leitner even there, of all places. Basira got it in the post and... it was a Slaughter one. Even reading the cover made her go on a spree through the ship. I couldn't stop her without killing her so I didn't stop her. And so she killed me."
A grim echo of a future neither of them knew about at the time. Bullet to the skull and all. Daisy breathes in, out, and continues.
"It ended when another passenger called Jenny, or Guabancex, made a deal with the Captain. If she killed everyone on the ship, he'd let her go free. Not an easy task, not with people like me around, but. They all knew what could take me down by then. So she decapitated me. After making me watch her slit Basira's throat.
"...turns out even when you stay dead, the torture didn't stop. There was this place. Eventually we called it the Nothing. You can't feel anything when you're there. But you're aware. You feel the lack of feeling. I don't know how long I was there. But it was a long, long time. I only made it out when something happened to whatever was keeping our souls trapped and a few of us sort of. Slipped through the cracks. We possessed some of the passengers on the trip after ours until we all got caught out and dispatched again. Not my proudest moment."
A sigh. "And then I was back home. Back to the very second I left, with no memories of any of that. The distortion of the Unknowing was still fresh in my mind and by the time my head was clear again I was already deep underground, being crushed in on from all sides. Because that's where the coffin leads. Into the Buried itself, deeper than anywhere you could ever reach in the natural world. You called it Forever Deep Below Creation. Where the weight of existence bears down. And that— that felt right.
"But when I first came to my senses, I didn't know any of that. I didn't know where I was or what had happened to me. All I knew was I was trapped, and I was terrified. It was dark down there. So dark I could barely see my own pasty hands in front of my face even when they were stuck there. You could move just a little whenever it wasn't crushing you, but only a little. Just enough to make you think you might be able to get comfortable, but you never could. Maybe you relieve the pressure on one side for a while. Or untwist a limb so it's not cramping so much. But then the crushing starts up again and none of it matters. It would fill your mouth with dirt and choke you from the inside out. And every time you got close to losing it, or becoming numb to it all, it pulled back. It knew how to make sure you never got any less scared."
Daisy's arms cross tight under her chest and her claws pick at the fabric of her sleeve, trying to resist the urge to claw at herself. "...I thought I was in hell. I really did. I thought I'd died and gone to hell. And after everything I'd done? I knew I deserved it. Down there, my head wasn't just clear of the Unknowing, it was clear of... everything. The Hunt couldn't get to me so long as the Buried had me. I couldn't feel it in my blood anymore, telling me who to hurt. Making me need it. For the first time since that day with Calvin, I felt... I felt like myself. I'd finally stopped running. From everything I'd done. From my past. From myself. I knew I wanted to change but I was so scared that I'd never get the choice. That I'd never see the sky again, never see Basira..."
There's a pause, followed by a deep breath and Daisy meeting Jon's eye. "And then you turned up."
"I-I thought I was dreaming, even though down there you didn't sleep, let alone dream. But it wasn't a dream. It was really you, with another one of your insane plans that should've killed you. You'd come to find me. I didn't even understand why. I'd tried to kill you and I was going to try again if we'd all made it out—I told you that, when you found me. You just asked if it was still true." Daisy snorts. "Like I said. Insane.
"You said you'd left a piece of yourself outside the coffin to use as an anchor. Something you could See to lead us back out—your rib, I think. It didn't work. We were still stuck down there, but unlike everyone else in that— godforsaken place, we weren't alone. We talked. I told you everything I just told you about the Buried and the Hunt and you told me that we always get a choice.
"Three more days we were down there. Talking. Choking. Listening to the singing whenever it rained on us. Until something changed and suddenly you just Knew the way out. You had to practically drag me out of there I was so weak, every muscle in my body stripped by the atrophy of eight months underground, but we made it. There were tapes all around the coffin. Your tapes. All playing. Guess that's what did it, but I wasn't really focused on that at the time. Basira had come in to yell at you and— and I was so happy to see her again I almost cried.
"You all had to drag me to the hospital with some half-baked excuse that no one cared about let alone bought. Just the words 'Magnus Institute' made them hand us off to some poor sods who'd already dealt with you lot before. I stayed there a day or two before they released me with a physical therapy plan and appointments to keep. I'd lost my flat, but you were all living out of the Archives by then anyway, so I did too. And life went on. We still had other rituals to figure out how to stop. I didn't like to be alone anymore so I spent a lot of time with Melanie and you, when Basira was out. She was out a lot. Chasing down leads the way I always chased down monsters."
Her face scrunches up and the gaze that was set on Jon now slips to the side. "...things weren't ever the same with Basira after I got out. Resisting the Hunt made me dead weight. I couldn't have her back. Even when you two had to run off to Norway to deal with the People's Church I couldn't come with. Too risky. We both knew if I let the Hunt back in, there was no guarantee I'd ever snap out of it again. But I still heard her ask if you thought I'd been replaced, like that Sasha girl. And she never could accept that knowing resisting was going to kill me wasn't going to stop me doing it. You did. You— you understood that.
"We'd all made our choices. Melanie— you and Basira got rid of that bullet and saved her from becoming like you and me, but she hated you both for it. You came out of the coma as The Archivist, plain and simple. I was a starving wreck living on borrowed time, but I'd chosen it. Basira was straddling the line between the Eye and the Hunt but never quite giving herself to either. Martin was playing some long game with Peter Lukas. All in all we made it about six months before things took a turn again.
"We had some Spider problems. Annabelle Cane playing mind games by leaving a statement at Hilltop Road for you to find. Making sure you knew that every statement you took from people on the street was your will. Then Montauk and Herbert turned up to get back at you for stealing Gerard's page. I scared 'em off, but they came back right as everything with Elias and Lukas blew up. You needed cover to get away and go after Martin before Lukas could kick off a ritual, or something, so I— I told Basira that when everything was said and done, she had to find me, and kill me. And then I let the Hunt back in.
"...that's the last thing I remember from home before I woke up on the ship a second time. I was still skin and bones. I snapped and attacked a half-dozen people after only six months. Hasn't happened since, but only because I had help. Erin, mostly. But there was a version of Erik that helped too. And others, in their own ways. This time around I was there maybe a year and a half before someone managed to give a woman who wanted to turn us all into museum exhibits power over the realm. We were thrown into cells. Our powers were taken away. And I died of blood loss after I scratched myself up out of panic. That's when I got the deal and... here I am."
The long-drawn tension snaps, at last, and the breath Daisy releases is one of tangible relief. Fucking hell. Even she didn't expect it to end up so long. She actually has to sit down on the floor to give herself stability as the re-lived feelings fade.
At least she managed to keep the whole apocalypse thing to herself. For now. Though it was a close call.
no subject
There's a moment where he considers, briefly, if this might be a Not-Himself type situation. Daisy's conviction and the rib ploy say otherwise, however - what Not-Jons would go so far? What can he say? He's got a certain kind of reckless abandon that was hard to find elsewhere, for better or worse.
His frown is a soft one, as he rolls the information back through once, like rewinding a tape player. He's so lost in thought and processing that the sense of being truly nourished after so many months of a dry spell have gone over his head. It was hard to see, if you didn't know him or what it meant to be an Avatar, but he's suddenly looking like he's finally joined the ranks of people who've finally shaken off the worst of the famine. The thought of being fed took the backseat to knowing and understanding, but what a lovely side-effect it is.
"Coffin, to cruise ship, to... here," Jon notes, quietly, folding his arms. "You've been through a sort of cycle of worse situations to even worse ones than that. I don't know that I'd call here, ah--- worse than what you described of the ship. It's not without it's heavy hand of troubles, of course, but... I don't think we're suffering livestock or anything like that."
At least, not that he knows of. God, he hopes he isn't proven wrong about that one.
"That does raise some troubling ideas about where you'd return to, once we've all finished our end of our bargain with the resident powers-that-be, but that's, uh. Something to worry about later, I suppose. Things here have stayed busy enough to not dwell on these things for too long, for the most part."
A moment of quiet, and he lets out a breath.
"I'm sorry, though. That, at least to some extent, I'm not the version of myself you might have expected to find here."
no subject
When she looks back up at him and notices the meat back on his bones, she can't quite help the crooked, smirk-like smile. Well. There you go, then. At least he got a good top up out of it.
It slips away a little, when she actually gets back to addressing the massive elephants in the room. "...suppose at least it's this way around. Don't think a younger me would be so. Willing to accept it."
Better that she's stuck with a Jon that doesn't remember than Jon being stuck with a Daisy that would just as soon slit his throat as listen to a word he had to say. Her gaze flicks to the scar across his neck, and she swallows hard as she forces herself to look away again.
"This place does seem... better. From what I've heard. So far. Might be dying but it's still a lot more alive than the ship. Didn't realise how much I missed real trees." But now she's looking forward to heading into the woods, to hunting out there. Fresh air and real plant life, real animals. You take them for granted until you're stuck in a bubble without even microbial life going for it. "Have to see how everything goes. I guess. What happens after... it's not my biggest concern."
Going back to the ship isn't something she wants. And going home... it isn't an option. For reasons she's not sure how, or if, she's ever going to tell Jon. Even if she wasn't dead, what good would it be going back to a world forever changed into the image of the Fears?
no subject
Maybe, someday, knowing what comes to be by his hand might cement his place here. For now, though, that's a problem for future Jon!
"That's probably the best way to go about it," Jon agrees, and he shifts his attention to the treeline. "...You're not kidding, though. Never thought I'd be one for the rustic life, but it's growing on me. I don't imagine you need to hear from me, of all people, to be careful in the woods, but... there is a lake that will eat you. Among other things. So just be mindful of that."
Hunting lake, Hunt Avatar. Maybe he's not giving them enough credit. Far be it for him to make any firm claims that the lake can't make friends, considering it can do a hell of a lot more than most other bodies of water.
no subject
"Lake that eats people. Yeah," Daisy snorts. "That sounds about right."
At this point in her life a world without strange and incomprehensible horrors would be stranger to stumble into than one filled to the brim with them. A lake that might eat you feels almost normal. Like, sure. Why wouldn't the lake eat you. Cursed water's gotta eat too.
"I'll be careful. Gotta go out into the woods to Hunt either way. Food doesn't do anything for me these days." She's more Hunter than human, these days. It's a fact she's accepting, bit by bit. But it means it's Hunt animals, or Hunt people, and she'd rather like to avoid turning herself into the town's new boogeyman if at all possible. "Which—"
There's the subtle motion of her jaw rolling as she drags her tongue across her teeth and sighs. "If I get no nightmares after this. Maybe I can give you some old section 31 stories every now and then."
...sometimes when she hears herself speak she can almost see why Basira thought she'd gotten got by the Not-Them.
no subject
"Oh! I mean--- if you're sure?" He stumbles over his words, only just restraining an eagerness, though it was still just beneath the surface of his surprise. "Let me know about the nightmares or lack thereof, regardless of any old stories that come afterwards. It's something I really ought to be aware of."
no subject
It is a little funny, really, watching the surprise on his face. It's hardly the first time she's seen her change in behaviour catch him visibly off-guard, but... it's been a while. They'd sort of gotten used to the new normal, by the end.
"Yeah, I'm sure. Wouldn't offer if I wasn't." She pulls herself up from the ground, at last, and rolls her shoulders. "I'll let you know. Might not be enough to be 100% about it, mind you. I stopped getting them the first time after I stole an employment contract and signed it."
Have that tidbit that didn't make it into the statement. Didn't even get tricked into it, like Melanie, or forced into it, like Basira. She just did it. Just Daisy Things™.
"But we'll see."