September Event - Guest Appearances

[pumpkinhollow]

GUEST APPEARANCES

Ignition

September 20th is the Autumnal Equinox. Many places across the world of Concorde celebrate the first day of fall. While various nations and regions have their own cultural practices surrounding it, nature is god everywhere. And so the inception of Mother Autumn’s domain is universally recognized, even if the names change from place to place. But on a little island named Marrow, in a little town called Pumpkin Hollow, there is another reason to celebrate.

The birth of Dahlia Leeds is not so important an event that it supersedes Celestine herself, and neither Dahlia nor anyone in town is foolhardy enough to claim as much. In fact, after the events on this very same day last year, one might argue that perhaps her birth at least started out as a bad thing. But she is certainly the wealthiest person in town. It is through the combination of substantial wealth and a generous heart, two things that are very seldom found in the same place, that we end up with a soiree where the birthday girl would rather spoil everyone else on her day than herself.

The doors to Leeds Estate, which presides proudly over the town upon its throne at the crest of Founder’s Hill, are flung wide open. Large sums of Brass are paid to caterers, florists, and seamstresses to make sure this place is decorated to the nines. Some businesses labor all year, just to prepare for the handsome payoff they’ll get from this event alone. And you, dear neighbor, are invited. Not only are you invited, but you are dressed for the event in whatever your heart desires, completely at the birthday girl’s expense. Dahlia ensures no cost nor conflict stands in between anyone in town and a much-needed break. She is determined for this birthday of hers to be a good night.

Or else.

Incipience

{ The timeframe between ignition and the peak of burning, where a small, contained fire spreads and grows gradually into an established flame. All it takes is a spark. }

The whole town is abuzz as preparations for the gala begin. From the moment people begin to wake up for the day, the air throughout Pumpkin Hollow just feels electric with excitement. After August, people have been needing this lift in morale, and after how last year’s gala went… well, there’s a lot riding on this one. And Dahlia seems much more in control now.

Speaking of being in control, the whole lead-up process has been incredibly organized. You wake up to a delivery--- your outfit, perfectly tailored and completely paid for. Accessories are included. She truly thought of everything.

It’s noteworthy that Dahlia’s invitations this time included another name beneath her own. “Suzanne Marie Dyneax,” it said. Most people don’t know the name, but gossip gets around in a small town like this. It’s not hard to pick up on the fact that this probably refers to Susie, one of the teenagers that Dahlia recently moved into her home, whose own birthday was ruined by Seemingly’s attack. Gift baskets have been delivered to others whose days were in proximity to the disaster--- Zivia, Capochin, even CT. Wine, fruit, and sweets, along with a birthday card. Dahlia has said in the past, “my birthday is your birthday,” but never has that felt more true.

With businesses mostly closed for the celebration, you are left with the majority of the day to prepare in relative peace. For many of the women in Dahlia’s inner circle, there is even a pre-party group dressing room set up on the third floor of her home. Only those who received her special invitation (Susie, Noelle, Fever, Cassandra, Anya, Alice, Patty, Melanie, Basira, Elsie) are permitted to join, but any friends or partners are gladly invited to wait at the bottom of the stairs for the girls to make their grand entrance.

The food is laid out, flowers placed, dresses laced and buttoned. The clock strikes 6pm, and the fun begins.

FLASHOVER

{ The moment when a blaze reaches its maximum size and heat, and the radiant heat in the space is such that all combustible materials ignite at once, allowing the flame to steadily and freely burn for the rest of the night. }

By the time it reaches 6:15, the ballroom is already flooded with eager dancers and hungry dinner guests. After all, the whole town is invited, and everyone’s excited to see Dahlia’s beautiful new ballroom and take a load off.

The music is elegant, played by a rotating cast of musicians who join the party when their act is over. The food is extravagant--- Dahlia and two of her partners are some of the biggest foodies in town, so this is expected. There is talking and laughing and the swirling of ballgowns, and all is well.

But there is a guest you do not recognize in the corner of the ballroom. An older man with white hair, strong features, and a dour expression. You can see Dahlia eyeing him, then flitting over to him, then talking to him. Her expression shifts from anxious, to annoyed, to resigned, before at last she sighs heavily and leaves him to it. Whatever it is that’s going on, clearly it’s something Dahlia is willing to begrudgingly tolerate in order to get back to having fun.

The reason for the disturbance becomes clear in short order, but by the grace of Celestine (and perhaps Eligos), it isn’t a reality bending nightmare or an attack by some monstrous beings. It is simply more guests.

A lot more, in fact.

Those who were on the island in September of the previous year will recall the Visitor’s Center, which appeared briefly just past the beach and served as temporary living and meeting quarters for visitors from the homeworlds of current residents. It would seem that this is a repeat incident. For the night of the gala, one to two “plus ones” have been invited for the vast majority of offworld residents. Most of them are friends or family who are happy to see their guests--- but this is ultimately a working of Eligos, so naturally, this is not always the case.

At the very least, Eligos seems to have been generous with his own granddaughter. As she turns away from him, she very nearly runs into someone much shorter than her. A dark haired human man with dwarfism. He laughs at the accident, grinning up at her as she stares back at him, utterly baffled. Then, petticoats billowing out, Dahlia sinks to the floor and embraces him as tight as she can, head pressed to his chest with little regard for her carefully-styled hair. Even those across the room can hear her shout his name. ”Jonah!”

Within the hour, the ballroom is packed with nearly double the people originally expected, turning the party livelier than it’s ever been. Tearful reunions, laughter, dancing, mischief, romance, sparring, cruelty, and even proper, righteous violence. Truly, this Leeds Gala will be one for the books!

--------
[ OOC reminders: each apped-in player character is entitled to one or two guests from their homeworld. This can be former selves, family, friends, enemies, and they do not have to be from the character’s exact canonpoint. They can be from the past or the future. You may play them yourself, ask another member player to do it, or recruit a non-member player to do so with moderator approval. Non-member players are permitted to join the Discord server while they’re active in this event! Threads you write for your own guests are eligible for AC for the character they’re there with, and threads you write for someone else’s guest can be used on the AC of a character of your choice. Just make sure to mark them as guest threads. After the gala, guests will be allowed to move freely about town, stay the night on Saturday and go home Sunday, or leave right after the gala if preferred. And last but not least, characters played in the gala can be apped directly from this event, rather than going through the normal arrival process. Let a mod know if you have questions, and have fun! ]

Smoldering

{ The decay of a flame as available heat, oxygen, and burning material gradually diminish. Eventually, the flames will recede entirely into glowing embers, glittering like orange starlight amid the ashes of what once was. }

The party rages well into the night. It’s not typical for residents of Pumpkin Hollow to stay out this late, with everything around here that goes bump in the night, but eventually party-goers begin to find their way out. They move in small groups, huddled around lanterns, may they ever stay lit. Perhaps the surprising bit is that their guests can go with them. There are even reservations made for board overnight at the Oak & Iron, all under the name “E. Rex”.

But alas, these reservations are only booked for one night. And by the time the sun begins to set on the darker half of the year for the first time, an unfamiliar black boat is moored at Jack's Marina. One that the guests will recognize as the vessel on which they arrived. They must leave by the time it becomes dark.

Or must they? Perhaps for a select few, they will fail to feel the call which draws them home. It is unclear why. There are many that Mortanne would have allowed residency for, if she could. But for some reason, all but a small few feel the pull. Perhaps Eligos has simply abandoned them here. (Or maybe none at all end up marooned and everyone goes home? That all depends on you, dear reader.)

When the sky goes dark, the aptly named Heavy Heart shoves off, with only her crimson sails hanging suspended seemingly in midair in the moonlight. The black ship is otherwise consumed by the night. And soon, even those flashes of red vanish into the distance.

Moments recede into memories, like a dying fire settles gently into glowing embers at the bottom of a hearth. The festivities are over, and the guests are gone. Life in Pumpkin Hollow resumes as before. But maybe just a little warmer and brighter.

“My birthday is your birthday,” as Dahlia often says.

Happy birthday.

References to the appearance of Leeds Estate can be found here!

Comments

[goodweather]

He doesn't know what "counts as spoilers for me" means exactly and he's decided he's not going to ask.

But he does offer a good-natured, commiserative ugh about her evil ex-employer. And Jon. "Geez, that blows, but at least he's leaving you alone. Doesn't surprise me at all that Jon's got an evil employer though. Is it too much to ask what's up with that?"

[ghostbullet]

Melanie blows one of those 'oh, boy, where do I start' sort of sighs and takes a swig of her drink whilst she decides. "So, I don't know how much Daisy told you about how it all worked but— the short version is the Institute was made entirely to serve the Eye and the employment contracts we signed tied us to it, and to Elias, on a metaphysical level. We literally couldn't quit and if he died, we died. Dead man's switch. Now I did still try to kill him at least once a week after we found this out, because I pretty much decided he was either bluffing or it'd be worth it, but he... well he punished me for it using his freaky eye powers and eventually we got him locked up instead."

A decision she still doesn't at all agree with, but she also doesn't actually want to be dead, so it's a bit of a rock and a hard place. To this day she wishes she could bleed the bastard dry for what he did to her, reliving it back at the Opera has fanned that flame anew.

"But he also personally selected Jon for the Archivist role, possibly because he was the best candidate to— trick into helping him end the world? I don't really know how that went down, that's ahead of me." She waves a vague hand. "Point is Jon was his special pick for the role of new freaky eye monster."

[goodweather]

It's Phil's turn to blow a sigh, this one more to the tune of good god, what the hell.

"You know what, that explains a lot about him. Daisy explained to me the whole Eye monster and feeding-fear thing, and--ugh, I get it, but I can't say I've appreciated being his juice box for a year and change now. Daisy took out my eye because of the Hunt and we're drinking buddies now, but I'd be shocked if I ever ended up on good terms with Jon."

[ghostbullet]

Melanie's eyebrows go up. "He's still—? Actually, no, I'm not even surprised, of course he is, we had this problem with him not long before I got here, too. We staged a whole intervention and everything. And, see, here's the thing, with Jon—"

She shifts in her seat, sitting a bit more side-on toward him.

"—he was as trapped as any of us were, I get that. I mean, it took me a bunch of therapy, to, but I do. But he's always been terrible at actually apologising for the shit he's done. With me, it wasn't even for lack of trying, he just... didn't understand. And it wasn't even the nightmares I was worried about by then, those ended when I got the job, but— he saved my life, he genuinely saved my life, but he did it by betraying what little trust I had left in anyone inside those Archives. Improvised surgery, long story, but— even when I had eyes I couldn't even look at him without my leg hurting. And he just... didn't get it. At all."

Beat.

"Has he— tried to talk to you about it?"

[goodweather]

"Yeah, that... sounds right." He inhales deep, his jaw set. Jon reminds him far, far too much of a certain skeleton he used to know, in all his polarizing difficulty. Phil had been so lenient on him then, for everything he'd done. (He had to. It was an existential matter to be nice to him.)

He isn't feeling as charitable, now.

"Not... really. The first and last time he tried was during the island-wide nightmares, which... is probably part of why he hasn't done anything since, but you can understand that I wouldn't have been feeling very polite then."

[ghostbullet]

"Yeah, no, if I'd seen him in there I'd probably have stabbed him whether the nightmare came with a knife pre-prepared or not. Those were... rough."

One wildly poorly timed attempt's better than nothing, she supposes, but when it's been so long since... well, it makes sense. She's pretty sure he was scared off talking to her for a while when she snapped at him too.

"Knowing him he's all up in his own head about it and can't get down long enough to actually do a damn thing. If I were you I'd grab him by the ear and make him, but I am someone who tried to stab him like three times and succeeded once so I'm not exactly a moderate opinion here." She taps her fingers against her glass. "Are the nightmares getting worse or are they about the same? I promise the question has a point."

[goodweather]

Yeah, god, he probably is. Jon reminds him of Skulduggery in all the worst ways sometimes, but at least Skulduggery probably would've said something by now. (But probably being unable to avoid him for very long on the ship had something to do with that.)

"About the same, thank God. It doesn't make it any easier or make me want to walk into the sea any less," which is his most light-hearted way of communicating how badly those dire nights really do affect him, "but at least it's stable and I can kind of know what to expect."

cw: vague reference to self harm/eye trauma

[ghostbullet]

"Okay, good—or, well, not good, but you know what I mean. Relatively speaking, that's the better answer. Back home, they tended to... escalate, over time. The last person we heard about him feeding on, she'd started seeing him when she was awake? At least, that's what it sounded like, she was pretty... scattered."

She definitely thought Jon was stalking her, which they knew he couldn't have been physically doing. So if she really was seeing him, either she was hallucinating for standard traumatic reasons or it was actually Eye stuff.

"But if that's not happened in over a year, it's not going to. Which isn't exactly a comfort, I know, but..." It's better than the alternative. Even if it's far from a fix. Which, dryly, Melanie adds: "Don't suppose you feel like losing the other eye? Did wonders for me."

That's about the most oblique way she can admit the lengths she went to so she could free herself from powers like Jon entirely.

[goodweather]

Ouch. "Yeah, uh, I think I'm going to hold onto this for as long as I can. I had a hard enough time dealing with losing just the one."

He sighs, grumbling, rubbing a hand over his face. "You remember Capochin, the mob-boss sounding guy who was doing basically everything for us? He talked about shaking down Jon himself to make him get up and do something about fixing this. The island's full of weird magic and fairies and all, there's gotta be something, right?"

[ghostbullet]

"Yeah, probably for the best. I don't regret it, but the adjustment's been a long one and I was killing about four birds with one stone."

It was the one thing she could do to reclaim her life, to take back agency and control over her future. Freedom from the Archives, from Jon and Elias and the Eye itself. A choice she could make for herself.

"And, see, yeah, that's the thing—we know there are ways, it's just the only ways we already know about involve evil contracts or going blind. But they do prove it's possible. And since we're further away from the Eye, and there's other kinds of power in play..." She's getting a specific tone she gets when there's a research project brewing—something she, ironically, has rather in common with Jon. "...maybe after Capo gives him the Godfather treatment I should shake him down myself."

[goodweather]

Phil laughs faintly, a sort of smile entering his voice. “I’d appreciate that. It’s, uh, been hard to think about getting around to do it myself—I don’t even like looking at the guy, and the amount of stress it’d be… I just never have the energy for it.”

Plus, she’s more confrontational than him. Once again Phil finds himself with friends who are willing to be an attack dog on his behalf.

“Of course, that’s only if it wouldn’t be too hard on you either. Since I know you two have history.”

[ghostbullet]

Melanie flashes a grin, with the edge of something once much sharper that's been filed down to a less dangerous point. "Oh don't you worry, yelling at Jonathan Sims is a skill I could put on my resume at this point. I spent enough time trapped in that Archive with him that I've built up a tolerance. We're never going to be best friends but I'm prepared to have a serious talk or two with him. Especially for something like this. I fought tooth and nail to get my life back, I'm not letting other people get left like that."

She's always been committed to the 'fasten your own mask first' approach, clawing her way to earning respect and forming a life for herself—sometimes to a fault, especially when the bullet had her. But with her own feet planted firmly on the ground, she wants to help. Really, last month reminded her of that more than anything.

More humorously: "And anyway, if he pisses me off too much I'll just call in Daisy or Martin to save us from each other."

[goodweather]

Another laugh, another sort of smile. "Yeah... yeah. Thanks, Melanie."

There's a sigh, then, and the smile drops out of his voice. "And uh, like... I don't want to rush you guys at all, but um--winters hit me pretty hard. Seasonal depression. Other stuff on top of that. I was looking forward to having my first decent one in years before Jon got to me, uh, but the nightmares make it a lot worse. So if you find even a band-aid solution sooner rather than later, I'd appreciate that a lot."

[ghostbullet]

"Yeah, I'm not gonna like, promise we'll absolutely figure it out in time, but I will promise to give it a damn good shot. I've got some ideas of where to start."

If Jon can maybe See where the connection has been severed in her, then maybe... there might be a way to replicate it some other way? The Fears work so heavily on dream logic, she's sure the physical damage matters less than what it represents. It's not like going blind made her immune to feeling fear in itself, not like Georgie.

"If there's one thing Jon and me both respect, it's doing the research right. If I appeal to that side of him and really push the guilt button we'll get some momentum going, I'm sure of it."

[goodweather]

"Aw. Thanks. Again, uh, I have to repeat this: I seriously, seriously appreciate all of this. Keep me updated on whatever progress you guys make, okay?"

He only wishes he'd found out sooner that Melanie knew Jon, instead of having to gone the hole year like this. There's a chance he could've gotten this resolved before the winter. But... hey. Better late than never, and it'll be some comfort to know that, at least, it's being worked on.

[ghostbullet]

"Totally, I'll keep you in the loop. And seriously, I am happy to help. If going through all this bullshit can at least turn around into being able to help someone else out of it— well it doesn't make it suck any less, but it's something."

Some use for the nightmare that the last few years have been. Even if it's just trying to get someone else out of the same sort of nightmare.

"For now, I guess we just keep enjoying the night off."

[goodweather]

“Yeah… yeah. Alright. That’s enough moping from me. I’ll be doing plenty of that in the winter as it is.”

He downs the rest of his drink, then sets it down with a soft thud on a nearby table. “You up for a dance? I was thinking of doing some prime shuffling-in-place, unless you’re feeling more adventurous.”

[ghostbullet]

Melanie huffs a laugh and finishes off her own drink, setting it aside too. "Shuffling-in-place suits me just fine, never have had the best rhythm."

(There'd be a grim irony in that to someone with more context about the Slaughter and it's love of music as a method of control.)

She moves her cane so it can be propped at her chair waiting for her and holds out a hand. "Lead the way, seeing-eye-weatherman."