methuselah (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
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singillppl2023-08-10 12:13 am
singmod) wrote in singillppl2023-08-10 12:13 am
Entry tags:
August 2023 Test Drive Meme
AUGUST 2023 TDM
PROMPT ONE — ARRIVAL: METHUSELAH'S FEAST: A group of newcomers find themselves lost in the frozen wilds and vulnerable to the dangers of nature. With luck, they make it to the town of Milton, and to a friendly face offering food, warmth and shelter.
PROMPT TWO — HOPE NOBODY NEEDS THIS ANYMORE: Once recovered from their journey, newcomers are free to explore the town of Milton for supplies and find any signs of the townsfolk.
PROMPT THREE — THE SIREN OF MILTON BASIN: A mysterious woman haunts the frozen lake of the Milton Basin, trying to lure newcomers to their deaths.
ARRIVAL: METHUSELAH'S FEAST
WHEN: Day One.
WHERE: Milton, Milton Outskirts.
CONTENT WARNINGS: potential animal attacks, potential injuries, potential cold injuries/hyperthermia risk.
’You are the Interloper. You are not part of nature’s design.’
It’s the last thing you hear. A dark, deep voice. Impossibly ancient. You feel afraid. Maybe you’re dreaming, maybe you’re wide awake. You saw the lights, and then your world went dark. But you hear it in the blackness, you won’t forget those words.
You awaken. You are not where you were before. It’s different for everyone, there doesn’t seem to be much of a pattern in where you find yourself. You may open your eyes to find yourself in a cold, dim and dank cabin. The air is stale, dust hangs in the rays of weak sunlight that shine through the tiny windows. Someone lived here once, but they aren’t to be found. You look around, it seems like no one has been here in several days, maybe longer. The fire is cold, the dishes in the sink are a little mouldy. It is quiet. The wood creaks around you. Or perhaps you may awaken to find yourself shivering in the yawning maw of a cave, the freezing stone below you. Or maybe you’re unfortunate enough to sit up to find yourself lying in the snow, in the middle of the wilderness. Snow lies thick around you. It’s freezing out. You haven’t felt a cold like this before in your entire life. Cruel and biting. You have no idea where you are, and what’s worse — you are completely alone.
You may feel different, too. Any powers or magics you may have feel... absent. Disconnected. Things that may not have affected you previously now do. Something in you has changed.
You know you can’t stay where you are. You’ll need to move, try to work out where you are and how you came to be here. So you walk, head out into the unknown, in hope of finding a trail or a road. You’ll find one soon enough. It’s here you may find someone else in the same boat as yourself, equally freezing and confused. You’ll both need to keep going. It won’t be easy. You hear howls of wolves around you, and the terrain is difficult: slips and falls are likely. You’re completely vulnerable out here in the open.
But it won’t be long until you see it: the lazy trail of smoke rising in the air. Fire.
Follow it, and soon enough the way you’ve taken will certainly become a path or road. Unfolding before you in the mountainous forests, you’ll see the most welcome of sights: a small mining town tucked up in the valley. Battered, rusted road signs will direct to “MILTON, POP. 947”. You’re almost there, you keep going, and it looks like other people have had the same idea as you. As you head into the outskirts and further into town, you’ll find it’s a little easier to walk but the cold has gripped you hard. You’ll find the buildings, both shops and homes, are dark and lifeless, some of them are boarded up. Other than those heading in the same direction, towards the smoke, you won’t find any townsfolk coming to greet you, or even looking at you from behind curtains. … Where is everyone?
Towards the center of town, you’ll find the building from which the smoke rises: a school-house of sorts, or some kind of community hall. Perhaps both. You’ll find more and more people all drawn to this place, each and every one of them in the same position as yourself (and your companion, if you’ve found one). Some are in worse states than others: some are bloodied, nursing bite wounds or cuts; others might have some other kind of injury sustained in the journey here from falls. Others may look as if they could faint from the cold at any second.
The door opens, and you’re greeted by the gnarled, wizened face of an elderly man, dressed in thick furs. He has a kind face. He smiles warmly, and with pity, ushering you in with haste.
“It seems like a great deal of you have come.” he muses finally. “I am Methuselah. I welcome you Newcomer, although I’m sorry for how you’ve come to find yourself here. Please, warm yourselves. Eat. Get your bearings. Mother Nature has not been kind to you.”
The room is dim, lit mostly by the weak natural daylight through the windows. A roaring fire sits at one end of the huge hall. It crackles, bright and cheerful…. and warm. Even as big as this place is, the room is pleasantly warm. You’ll also find basic cots set up down one side of the hall, places to rest for a moment and get your bearings, or just trying to recover from the cold or any injuries. Down the other side are tables and chairs, and long, foldable tables laden with food, drinks and bottled water similar to one might find at a soup kitchen.
There are canisters with hot herbal teas and coffee, along with soup and stew and trays of charred moose, deer and rabbit meats, instant mashed potatoes, and tinned vegetables. It’s very basic, but it’s hot and filling. A feast. The old man has been busy. And Methuselah will continue to busy himself, still; there is plenty to do. He will fetch blankets, tend to wounds, serve food and drinks. He does not have much time to talk. More and more people seem to be coming in from the cold. He will not stop to sit and rest until everyone is seen to, taking up a place by the fire to gaze silently into its flames. He is troubled, thoughtful.
If you ask him where you are, he will simply respond: “This is Milton, of the Northern Territories.”
If you ask how you came to be here, he will shake his head: “Something has changed. The sky, it was… full of light. The Flare. I felt you coming, a great arrival. But I cannot say for certain how, or why you are here.”
He is regretful, genuinely so. He wishes he had more answers for you, but he does not. Instead he will simply insist you rest, get warm and eat. There is plenty to go around. Eventually, when you feel well enough, Methuselah will gesture to the door: “When you are ready and able, explore the town. Many left, others could not make it out. I have found no one but the dead. They will have no use of the place now, perhaps you might in the meantime.”
HOPE NOBODY NEEDS THIS ANYMORE
WHEN: First couple of weeks since arrival.
WHERE: Milton.
CONTENT WARNINGS: frozen dead bodies, unexplained deaths, suicide, murder.
Other than Methuselah in the Hall, the town of Milton is void of life. While not a particularly large town, there’s a few stores and even a gas station. Life here is rustic. Function over form. Homes are simple but sturdy and warm, it’s a rugged place and one can easily deduce that the folk living here led simple, self-sufficient lives.
Commercial buildings and stores of note include a bank and post office, a hunting/fishing supply store, a grocery store, and a clothing store. There is even a church just on the outskirts of town. The buildings are ripe for picking, with most of them still with the doors unlocked, including the residential buildings. Others are locked, but can be broken into easily enough. A few are even trickier, with some of them boarded up or with entrances blocked. In terms of contents, a third of the residential buildings seem to be almost empty, as if the owners moved out long ago. There might still be things left behind of use: old, warm clothes good for the wintery weather, tools and cooking utensils — but little in terms of food. Even if the former residents move some time ago, they didn’t completely empty their homes.
Most of the homes in Milton seem to be left as if the owner stepped out only a short while ago, and with very little disturbance. Some houses, however, seem to be abandoned in a hurry, with a mess of items strewn about in some last-minute dash to grab essentials: keys, identification, treasured personal items, supplies for a quick exit. Cupboards are typically filled with an abundance of canned goods, and some chilled goods might have survived in the cold weather within the fridge-freezers, but it might be a gamble if one wants to try and eat them. Any and all electronics within homes: televisions, computers, mobile-phones — although dated, will all appear cracked and damaged, and will not function or turn out at all. The same will go for any vehicles around the town: there is no hope of starting any of them.
Diaries and journals kept by the former residents may remark on a change in the weather, with the cold and harsh climate becoming more hostile as of late. Others remark strange lights in the skies, dating several weeks or so ago, strange noises in the air, issues with power and electrical items. Some make mentions of changes to the wildlife, with wolves coming close to the town even when they had never done so before. One or two mention problems on the Mainland, with increasing difficulty of reaching out to loved ones who don’t live in the Northern Territories, or deliveries being unable to arrive. The growing trend is that something odd and terrible has been happening, although no one can truly explain what, and the problems have been growing increasingly worse and worse up to the final entries. You might note that the actual years and dates might not line up with your own: the current year given in these entries is 2014.
The newcomers are free to take over these homes, if they wish. No one appears to be stopping them, and even Methuselah seems to shrug about moving in. And as he’d mentioned, he has found no one but the dead: and plenty of them can be found.
Bodies of the town’s former residence can be found scattered over the town. In homes, in stores, out in the snow. They appear still relatively fresh, although it may be hard to tell if it’s from the cold or if it’s from very little time passing. Most appear to have died from cold exposure, some appear to have simply dropped dead on the spot. Others may be found with a gun in hand. Some, worryingly, appear to have perished by another’s hand. You won’t find the entirety of the town’s population, but there’ll be at least several dozen. Men, women, children.
Methuselah seems to have begun laying the dead to rest, but there’s too many for one man to do. Maybe you can work out what to do with them, try to bury them in their backyards, or try to take them to the churchyard.
THE SIREN OF MILTON BASIN
WHEN: Until the next Aurora.
WHERE: Milton Basin.
CONTENT WARNINGS: mental manipulation, malevolent mythical creatures, falling through ice, attempted drowning/possible successful drowning, potential character death.
Those who venture further south of the town will find themselves traversing the steep, winding paths down towards the Milton Basin. The way down is treacherous, but if enough care is taken you should be able to make it down in one piece. The water is just about completely frozen over down here, thick and sturdy enough to walk over for the most part. Within the Basin there’s more wildlife to be found: deer and rabbit are plenty. And there’s even plenty of foragables, too.
Out on the water are two small ice-fishing cabins, enough to fit one or two people inside comfortably, which hold a few forgotten supplies to try out some ice-fishing if you want to see if anything bites. Both even hold little log burners to keep warm. An old hunter’s shack can be found along the water’s edge, for those not quite brave enough to travel out onto the ice, to take shelter in for when the weather gets a little too difficult, with an old log burner still working within it.
But it’s calm down here, for the most part. Peaceful even. It’s an excellent place for fishing and hunting, and a little more sheltered from the freezing winds.
Until you hear the voice. Something soft and feminine, echoing across the ice. The Basin helps to amplify the sound, and for a long time you can’t quite be sure of where exactly it’s coming from. It’s singing, she is singing. Something old, in a language you can’t quite understand. Maybe it’s not even a language at all, but simply melodic vocalizations. It’s... beautiful, you’ve never heard anything like it before in your life.
And then you see her: a woman standing upon the frozen waters of the Basin. You realise she’s probably the most beautiful woman you’ve ever seen in your life, even if you can’t quite even begin to describe her. She appears different to everyone who beholds her, some one might see her hair is long and dark, others might see her with neat red curls. Some swear her skin is dark and rich, that looks almost plum when the light hits it just so, others claim it to be cool-toned that glistens like sunlight on snow. Whatever someone might find aesthetically pleasing is how she’ll appear, and even then to describe her to others will bring you at a loss for words. And she’s singing… to you, for you.
You’re compelled to go to her, although you can’t explain why. You’re drawn to approach her, to hear her better, see her better. Your feet carry you onto the ice, out into the midst of the Basin. You ignore the calls of everyone and anyone around you, fixated on the woman before you. She smiles when you’re close enough, beckons you a little closer.
… Then everything changes. Without warning, the woman leaps for you, her face contorting into something hideous, mouth opening to scream to reveal rows upon rows of tiny, needle-like teeth. She collides with you, and the force (paired with the slippery ice below you) is enough to send you off your feet. As you fall back, the ice cracks beneath you with an almighty sound, plunging you into the frigid depths below.
The woman fights to put you beneath the water’s surface, those needle-like teeth bared like some ferocious beast. She can be fought off easily enough, but she might just drown you before you’re able to. If you’re lucky, someone might be able to help pull you out. Tools or weapons made of iron or silver are especially harmful to her.
Once you’re pulled from the water, getting somewhere warm will be the utmost priority — otherwise the cold will kill you quicker than the woman would. The woman, you’ll find, will have vanished, and the ice where you’d fallen will have restored itself, as if it had never been broken at all.
FAQs
1. Items characters have brought from home can be found either strewn around them when they awaken, or in the community hall — as if someone left them out for them to collect. Methuselah will not know how they got there, and will be quite bemused by the happenings.
2. Reminder that all characters are now depowered upon arrival. They can choose not to notice it at first, or can immediately sense something is different about them.
3. If asked any personal questions, Methuselah will smile and say "Oh, you don't want to know about an old man like me. But I have lived all over in these parts for all my life." He will be more concerned with trying to help Newcomers, and is genuinely concerned for them and their well-being.
4. If asked how he knew that the Newcomers were arriving, he concedes that although it is a strange thing to know, it is much like how one knows a storm is coming.
1. Characters are welcome to take up residency in any of the homes of Milton. Methuselah will strongly advise characters to leave a huge, dilapidated house — known as Milton House — well alone, due to extensive fire damage.
2. More information about Milton can be found here.
1. Characters with hearing impairments will not be susceptible to the Siren's song, or may only be somewhat susceptible depending, but may be entranced to a degree by looking at the Siren. However, this will be far easier to snap out of.
2. The Siren cannot be killed, only fought off. She will disappear for a length of time to recover before she attempts to lure her next victim.
edward kenway | assassin's creed
[Death is bloody cold. That's the first thing that strikes Edward's mind: he's dead. And he died without a damn shirt on either, so he shivers in the cold of the cabin he's woken in, grabbing the moth-eaten blanket off the bed and wrapping it around himself. It's little enough protection, but it's better than walking around with no shirt.
Haytham's not here. Jenny's not here. Tessa's not here, either. That much is a relief, that none of his family has come here. He shudders, and tries, out of habit, to open the Sense he's had as a child.
...nothing.
Well, fuck.
All right. Edward will panic over that later. For now, he needs to get out of this cabin—there's nothing here that he can use, besides the blanket that he's now wrapped around his shoulders, a makeshift cloak to keep the chill off his neck for a little while longer. At least he came here with his trousers and his shoes on, he supposes, although these shoes are not the kind that can stand up to snow for very long. He tugs the blanket up over his head, a sad little facsimile of a hood, and makes his way outside.
It feels like days of wandering, but is really perhaps just an hour or so of wandering and shivering and cursing out the cold, that Edward sees a road, and on it, another lost soul.]
Oi! [He probably looks a sight: a man in a threadbare blanket wearing only pants and a couple of shoes not fit for winter, struggling through the snow to make his way over to this person. Whatever. At least there's another person around.] Tell me you've a map and a spare jacket. Or a shirt. Something.
[A wolf howls in the distance. Edward glances off to the side, and shudders again. Whether that's from the cold or from the fear that seizes his spine just then, he can't quite say.]
At least we know which direction not to go in.
ARRIVAL, II.
[His Assassin robes, a hidden blade, and a pistol. It's not a whole lot, but it's a boon sent from the heavens to someone who has been trudging through the snow in a threadbare blanket. Edward puts on his robes, straps the blade to his forearm, slides the pistol into a holster, and feels more like himself than he has since he woke up in this hell.
The food helps plenty. The information helps even more. It's not much, but it's enough to start with—there is no one in the town but Methuselah and the new arrivals, which makes Edward uneasy.
And there are more coming in by the minute, just as cold and terrified as Edward was when he stumbled through Methuselah's threshold. He does what little he can to help, still recovering from his own trek through the cold, and if someone is willing he'll sit close to them, sharing in the warmth of the fire. He's exhausted, right now, but if someone speaks to him he'll rouse himself for a conversation.]
HOPE NOBODY NEEDS THIS ANYMORE. cw: implication of suicide.
[Edward is no stranger to death, as an Assassin and as a pirate before that. He's made more than his fair share of dead bodies, and before he woke up in a cold cabin, someone had driven a sword through him and left him to bleed out on the floor of his own house, so he likes to think he's old friends with death by now.
Still, it's a hard thing, to find a dead body in the store he's forced his way inside to scavenge for food and supplies. It's a man, little more than twenty, with a gun in hand, dead eyes staring sightlessly out the window. He stands over the dead body for a moment, feeling a strange sort of sorrow for this young man. Then he kneels down, and shuts the boy's eyes.]
May you find a lasting peace, down among the dead.
[With that final respect paid to the dead body, Edward lets his pragmatism take over once more and starts to pry frozen fingers off the gun. It's still useful enough, he reasons, they'll just need to find ammunition and gunpowder. Be a shame to leave this lying around in a corpse's hand. To whoever else he came in here with, as he's looting this poor man's dead body:]
Check and see if there's any food or necessary supplies left. Might be there's still some in the back.
WILD CARD.
[feel free to hmu with a different starter if you're not feeling the ones on offer! or talk to me on
Hope no one needs this
Of course. But may I ask what that black thing you are picking up is... I've never seen such a device.
[Excuse him he is from ancient China, where guns arent a thing yet.]
cw corpse desecration
[Then again it is 2014, so. Clearly, firearms have improved since 1735.]
Can’t seem to get this loose… [He sighs. The next thing he says is soft.] Sorry, lad, but I need your gun more than you do now. [And his hidden blade springs out from under his sleeve so he can start, uh, breaking off the frozen fingers.]
no subject
Jin Guangyao stepped away and allowed the man to work. While corpse desecration wasn't his favorite thing to do he could understand the sheer practicality, though he had to do much of the same for his father's terrible experiments. He went to the back of the shop to look around. While there was no food to find, he found some useful things like cooking implements, thick blankets, and hunting supplies. He puts a thick hunting knife in his belt.]
Unfortunately, there is no food to be found. But there are supplies if we need to hunt ourselves. Anything, in particular, you want me to keep an eye out for?
no subject
[Because this is going to be a very long and stumbling explanation if the fellow doesn’t. He breaks off one of the fingers with the hidden blade, lays it on the man’s lap with care. Then he starts working on the next one.]
Anything we can use to strike a fire fast?
no subject
[He hummed as he searched. He wished he had his cultivation, then he could at least make a fire talisman. For now, if he could find some flint it would have been good. As of now he was poking and prodding at some small devices to see what they did. A lot of nothing. Jin Guangyao did however find a pipe and what looked like a small metal box next to it.
He opened it up and gave a small shout, as fire lit up from it.]
I found a small box that makes fire! Maybe there are more of these...
no subject
[Don't ask him how it works because this is the most he knows. And even then he has the sense that his knowledge of how firearms work might be a little outdated, as he breaks off another frozen finger.
Then he glances up and whistles at the sight of a flickering flame emerging from what does look like a box.]
Good! Keep it, you'll need it. Does it look like it needs anything to spark a fire—some oil, perhaps? [The hidden blade scrapes against the underside of the finger still curled around the trigger. He's much more careful with this than the other two, on account of he doesn't want to accidentally shoot himself or Jin Guangyao.]
cw suicide
[He shook the lighter and it sounded like it used some sort of oil. There were some small canisters of the same logo as the lighter next to it. He slipped the lighter into his borrowed coat.]
There are a few canisters of fluid. It smells like oil. I'll carry this with us. I'm going to rummage around to see if I can find other things that are useful.
[With that he carefully stepped into the back storeroom, which looked rather promising, even though there was a corpse in there that hung itself. He sighed and cut the poor bastard down. He was going to have to give him a proper burial.]
People must have been desperate if they chose death over facing things...
tw hanging
Oil? Shit, take it all. We’re going to need as much of it as we can get, to get through this winter.
[If there’s any getting through this winter. Edward doubts it. A place like this seems like the sort of place where everything is frozen all year long.
Once he’s done relieving the corpse of anything else that could come in useful, he scrounges up a thin blanket from somewhere and sets the body down onto it, rolls it up so it’s cocooned in a makeshift shroud. They’ll bury this man later. He goes to meet Jin Guangyao into the back storeroom, looks up at the hanging corpse, and swallows back a lump in his throat.
He can’t fathom preferring to die like that, dangling from a beam like a haunch of meat. But then he used to be a pirate, and he’d always known that would end in the gallows. He himself had managed to dodge that fate, but too many of his fellows hadn’t.
He watches the other man cut the poor fellow down, and touches his own neck.]
You’d be surprised what desperate people can do when pushed. [He steps further into the storeroom, trailing a finger along dusty shelves.] Come here, I think there’s some tins of food still left over.
no subject
[Jin Guangyao was in charge of burying the corpses when he first joined the war. Bodies were just bodies to him now.
He couldn't imagine this was a fast way to go after all. He was more likely to have his head separated from his body from Nie Mingjue's sword than the end of a rope. It took all of his and Lan Xichen's pleas to convince the bullish man that he was working as a spy for their forces, and still the man wouldn't let go of his crimes. He let out a soft sigh. Both of his sworn brothers were far away right now.]
I cannot understand the choice. I would always rather survive. [He said softly. Survive when he could have died a hundred times over. He would cling to life desperate at all costs. At the end of it, that was the difference between him and Nie Mingjue, the other man would die for honor, and Jin Guangyao knew that honor really meant nothing at all in the larger scheme of things. He walked over to where Edward was and hummed softly.]
Do you think they would still be good? Oh, there's a good deal of salt here and vinegar. I think finding things we can preserve meat with will help us in the long term.
no subject
[And what will they be able to do against a force like that, with all their meager resources? The people who used to live here had such advanced technologies and yet they died all the same. It doesn’t bode well for the new arrivals, in Edward’s opinion, but what else can they do?
He nods, in response.]
I’ll take the option that lets me live, myself. What good can you do for anyone when you’re dead? [Well, Edward himself is dead, also, but he won’t mention that to this fellow. Instead he just starts packing the cans away in the hot pink bag he scavenged a bit ago.
He’s trying his best not to think about who might’ve owned something like this once.]
You have the right idea there, mate. Get all the salt and vinegar you can carry, we’ll need it soon. [As for the cans?] Perhaps. We’ll find out if it’s spoiled or not when we crack them open. If it’s not, well and good, but if it is, then it’s a good thing we’ve found weapons to hunt game with.
Arrival
She hears the man's shouts and looks up. Between her teeth chattering, she calls back.]
If there was a shirt to be had, I would wear it too.
[She starts to make her way over to him.]
Have you just woken here?
no subject
[The threadbare blanket that he’s currently using as a cloak is an improvement over running around in the snow with no damn shirt. He shivers again, draws the blanket tighter around himself. The woman’s dress is familiar, but vaguely so—he recalls seeing women around England wearing something of the like, and earlier, women in Nassau wearing a much shabbier yet much drier version.
They’re a right pair, aren’t they. If anyone were to look on them now they’d think them both a pair of lunatics, walking around in the driving snow with so little clothing between them.]
We need to get out of here, get to somewhere warm. We’ll not last long in the cold like this. [Another distant howl. This time, the shiver down Edward’s spine isn’t just from the cold.] I say we go in the direction away from anything that has sharper teeth than ours.
no subject
[Max looks disdainfully at Edward's feet. He'll get all of five meters before his feet are soaked and starting to freeze.]
Is there nothing else we might wrap your feet in to protect them a little more?
[She looks back in the direction of the howls.]
I do not know what sort of creature makes a noise like that, but I do not want to find out either. We must hurry.