Event № 1 : January 2024

[silentspringmods]

Event № 1 : January 2024
Part I; Chapter 2. Silence tells me secretly everything

universe/setting information, role assignment, and FAQs

I. A Thought Is Haunting Me

January 1st.

CWs: nonconsensual memshare/receiving of memories, flashbacks to combat zone and injury, blood, hearing loss/burst eardrum, panic attacks.

Just in time for New Year's Eve, the town square that held a magnificently decorated 15-foot Christmas tree last week now has a glittering silver ball to rival New York's own waiting atop a flagpole rooted in the same spot. Strings of lanterns illuminate the snowy brick courtyard, lined with stands offering hot cocoa, ciders, and various warm snacks, or perhaps characters are more interested in obtaining a pair or two of silly New Year's glasses that allow them to look through the numerals 1961. Eventually, though, all goes quiet for the exciting countdown.

'Five... four... three... two... one!

The ball drops, and confetti streams down onto the square (and the people standing in it!) as the Sweetwater High School Marching Band picks up a jaunty rendition of the New Year's classic Auld Lang Syne—but characters will likely find themselves distracted by the dark spots that appear in their fields of vision, gradually expanding until everything is eclipsed entirely by soft blackness. They feel less and less of the world around their bodies, numbness starting at their fingertips and toes and creeping up their extremities until they feel touchless, floating, completely absent of sensation. Then something replaces it: fragments, or perhaps all of what follows.

The world flashes black, then returns, hazy and doubled, half obscured by smoke as you lie face down on the hard, rocky earth. One ear shrieks, a whine that grows higher and higher. Hot blood streams down the other earlobe and drips onto your neck, washing off sweat and grime as it trickles toward your collar. Pain slices through what you think must be your eardrum like a jackknife shoved into your skull. You cough, throat burning, ribs protesting the movement. A coppery taste, a warmth, fills your mouth. You check with your tongue and all of your teeth are there; the blood is coming from your broken lip. The hair on top of your head feels hot and wet. You know your cheek is scraped open from the gritty sting taking up most of your face.

The doubled image of a medic gets into your face, his lips silently moving. You try to shake your head, to communicate that you can’t hear him over the shriek of your own tinnitus, but your neck is too stiff. Your brain slams against your skull and your head feels like it’s been hit with a brick. Blood drips off of your brow and into your eye.

The medic squeezes your shoulder and pushes off, scrambling across the debris until he disappears in the gray-brown smoke. There’s a moment of irrational fear: he’s leaving you here to die. You’re hit somewhere and you’re last in triage. You’ve heard about soldiers not feeling the gunshot until much later. When he and his buddy come back with a stretcher, surprise mingles with the dread of being lifted.

You shut your eyes tightly, trying to recalibrate your vision, but it still swims with the pitch and yaw of the rocky earth beneath you. When you open it, he’s trying to look into your eyes, hand on your shoulders, his lips finally moving in a pattern you recognize: Going home. Going home.

Going home.

You close your eyes.

*

You stare at a long tawny finger as you wind it into the red plasticized cord of the phone set, doing nothing when it begins to throb against its tethers, the single physical sensation anchoring you in reality.

“Listen to me. I need you to be calm and handle this. Someone will be there in thirty minutes, Ron. You need to keep it under control until then or we’re going to be in a world of shit you can’t even imagine—Put up roadblocks. Say a convict got loose. I don’t care. Do what you have to. Don’t call me unless it’s resolved or someone’s fucking dying, Ron, do you understand me?”

*

The door opens as the emergency light comes on, flickering. The room fills with the suffocating stench of diesel. A candystriper’s golden-brown hands wrap around your thin wrists, pulling you as she rocks back on the heels of her wet tennis shoes with all of her might. Tears stream down her cheeks, strands of relaxed hair hanging in her eyes. She chokes her words out around sobs of her own, eyes wild with terror, screaming: Miss Ruby, you have to get up! You have to get up, Miss Ruby! But your legs won't move. Your breaths shudder ragged in the air just like the volunteer's.

At 12:01, characters return to consciousness: but there are little changes, twinges that make this a bit realer than a dream. Perhaps their index finger twinges as blood returns to it and the impressions a tight phone cord left on their skin fade, or maybe they find themselves wiping a few droplets of blood from the corner of their jaw. Perhaps their ears ring, gradually giving way to clearer sound—or maybe they awake sitting on the ground with their arms around their bent knees, face wet with tears, overcome with a raw panic unlike anything they’ve ever felt. How very odd.

Notes:
—Characters can experience all of the memories, or players can pick and choose.
—Characters do not have to be in the square to receive the memories.

II. In the Valley of the Dolls We Sleep

January 13-15th.

CWs: violence, entrapment, hypnosis, living mannequins, dismemberment.


'New year, new you!' the cheery saleswoman on the radio and television ads for the local two-story department store proclaims ad-nauseam, becoming more and more of a regular guest in characters' homes as time marches on toward the 15th of the New Year. There are great sales to be had, and would you look at that, characters have a few gift cards to this very store in their respective purses and wallets! Over time, the voice of the young woman in the advertisement almost seems to grow more insistent, even though the same ad plays every time: surely it's just familiarity altering one's perception of her voice, right?

On the morning of the 13th, characters wake up to the sound of every radio and television set in the house turned on and blaring the ad. The saleswoman reminds them that time's running out, and that the sales will only last for another 48 hours before they're gone. If characters can't hear, they only make it as far as the living room before the television screen comes into view, the same message scrolling across the bottom of the screen in large close-captioning... even if they haven't turned it on. This time, something feels different, and characters find themselves compelled as though by a supernatural force to go check out the sales being advertised.

Characters may notice once they're inside of the building that it's only new arrivals here: the townspeople of Sweetwater seem to have already done their shopping! Fortunately, there are still some great items left. It may be when looking at that cashmere sweater or a nice pair of snowshoes that characters catch a tiny flicker of movement out of the corner of their eye: but when they turn in that direction, there's nothing except a faint, nagging sense that something's not right. It happens again as they pass through the store—and then, with no warning, the faceless, eyeless mannequins throughout the store burst into motion at the same time as the sales associates collapse to the floor unconscious, attacking characters with inhuman strength and whatever items they have at their disposal with the intent of bludgeoning them to death.

If characters try to escape from the way they came, they will find that the automatic doors and fire doors are all locked as though from the outside. The windows cannot be opened or broken, nor can the glass of the doors—they're trapped here. Really, truly trapped.

To make matters worse, the mannequins, unlike the salesman, seem truly impervious to... everything. Guns can pierce them, but they have no blood to lose or brain to damage. They can be dismembered, but they're strong, and hard to pull apart; even if a mannequin's head is removed, the body will still function. Characters have one advantage, however: the mannequins are not as intelligent as human beings, and seem to mostly lack object permanence. If characters can stay silent and out of sight after finding somewhere to hide, the mannequins will drop their pursuit after about fifteen minutes of trying to get to them.

The mannequins stay alive for 48 hours, and the doors stay locked for the same amount of time. Characters who do not find a way to sleep risk sleep deprivation symptoms similar to the ones detailed in the explanation of modes of torture in Sweetwater, and will be slower, weaker, and less able to fight off or escape from the mannequins. 48 hours is also a very long time to go without water, which can only be obtained from the sinks in the bathrooms... both of which feature nicely dressed mannequins in one corner.

Notes:
— The departments of the store are as follows:

- Women's Clothing
- Men's Clothing
- Children's Clothing
- Furs
- Baby/young child supplies
- Home appliances
- Kitchen
- Decor
- Furniture
- Toys
- Hunting, Fishing, and Outdoors (hunting-style guns, ammunition, snowshoes, fishing rods, flies/fly-tying equipment, dog beds, hunting blinds)
- Tools ( Limited. There aren't any electric saws or more specialized tools like bolt cutters to be found, but simpler "Little Joey picked this out for you, Dad!" wrench/screwdriver sets, branch loppers, lawnmowers, snowblowers, etc. - in general assume that there aren't any power tools player characters can use to bulldoze the mannequins with, but there might be some tools that could help with other things... )
- Fine Jewelry/Watches
- Ladies' Gloves

— Deaf characters and characters who wear earplugs to bed will be awoken by their spouse moving, or will randomly wake up even though they can't hear the ad.
— Players who wish to opt out can say that their character simply slept through it and woke up after the doors to the department store had already locked.
— The mannequin limbs are inert after they've been removed, but the mannequins can still operate without a head.
— Characters may try to investigate at the risk of leaving cover. If a character is able to get close enough to the service desk on the second floor, they may also notice that one of the customer service associates, a teenage girl, lies slumped over the counter as opposed to on the floor with her coworkers, an unlabeled, recently installed button depressed beneath her shoulder—she was leaning forward before she lost consciousness. If her body is moved, the button stays anchored in place. If characters check it again, hours later, they'll notice that it can't be depressed or lifted, but seems a little higher—almost as if it takes a set amount of time to return to resting.

III. Drill it in like J. Paul Getty

Throughout January.

CWs: torture, non-fatal electrical shock, restraints, medical/psychiatric abuse, nonconsensual drug administration, altered states of consciousness, needles/injections, gaslighting, brainwashing, sleep deprivation torture, antipsychotics overdose, smoking.

Should characters discuss the horrors of the month on the network, over the telephone, or in places where townspeople can hear, they’ll face the consequences. They go to bed the night of the offense as usual—and come into consciousness in a dark room, a basement of some sort, bound to a chair with leather restraints buckled onto their wrists, their ankles. A leather strap runs across their chest, holding it to the back of the hard wooden chair they’re bound to. A few feet away, the static electricity of a television box provides some measure of light as noisy waves ripple across the screen.

Upon further examination, there’s one more thing on characters’ left wrists, directly north of the leather straps holding it to the armrest: a set of electrodes and thin wires that run down and across the room.

“You’re awake. Good morning.” None other than the town’s private practice doctor, Norman Pollock, greets them, with the same matter of fact tone he’d use during a standard physical exam. “You seem to have lost sight of what makes Sweetwater so special, so we’re going to watch some videos, get your head on straight. We can’t have this kind of subversive behavior when the country’s already under attack, Sweetheart.”

He presses a button on the television remote—which characters might notice has a second, less refined one taped to its side—and a program comes on: What Communism Will Take From Us.

For the next 36 hours, the hour-long video plays on repeat, showing idyllic scenes right out of a Norman Rockwell painting, detailing the joys of the American way of life, emphasizing all of the ways subversive thoughts and actions undermine it, and how they hold the door open for the Red Menace. This is what’s at stake, what little towns like Sweetwater, Maryland have to use. Norman sits in a chair nearby, smoking cigarettes, reading issues of the New England Journal of Medicine, the remote never leaving his hand. The moment characters’ eyes close for longer than a single blink, the electrodes on their wrist deliver a nasty shock to help them wake up, growing in intensity with every additional offense. His never do for longer than a regular old blink.

By the end of the 36 hours, characters can expect reality to begin to blur at the edges, and may be experiencing auditory hallucinations, paranoia, and their minds wandering in ways they haven’t before. At 36 hours of sleep deprivation, the body cries out for it, desperate to rest. Maybe they erupt into hysterical laughter, or weep uncontrollably, or panic. Norman is unphased by all of it.

If characters try to fight back, or prove too argumentative and unwilling to learn, Norman will produce a glass syringe and draw up a thick fluid from a dark glass bottle, which, if characters have the necessary visual acuity to see, reads haloperidol. He jams the needle into their gluteus and injects; within 10 minutes, characters will feel very, very sedate, almost catatonic in their stupor. Effects vary from person to person, but it is not a pleasant experience: in addition to the deadness it brings on, hearts race and mouths go dry. It gets harder to swallow, or maybe a character’s vision begins to blur. The limbs contract in fits and jerks in the immediate and for the week the drug lasts. The face twitches uncontrollably, muscles ache in their rigid stiffness, and it becomes hard to stay upright throughout the week as the drug interferes with the character’s balance, making them dizzy and confused.

THE TOE TAG
If characters fight Norman, however, they may find that he backs against the nearby metal filing cabinet–knocking loose a piece of paper hanging from a half-open drawer when he does. It’s recognizable as a photocopy of a toe tag, the kind affixed to corpses in a morgue, but characters have seconds before their vision doubles and blurs too much for it to remain readable. Characters who are injected with haloperidol for subversion, either for talking about the murder or a different offense, may comment to the event post under the designated mod comment to take a shot at reading the tag. Remember, though, it’s probably best not to advertise that they saw anything out of the ordinary, or to even mention what happened to them, on a publicly visible communications channel…

They wake up in their own bed shortly after losing consciousness, and spend the next week corpselike.

IV. It's Freezing and I Am Watching You Shovel Snow

January 7th onwards.

It's a cold winter for Maryland, characters will hear their neighbors complain, and within a few days of the New Year they have reason enough to complain too: the snowstorm everyone's been talking about in the neighborhood clubs comes on the 7th of January, dumping a foot and a half of snow. Better grab that snow shovel, or find someone to help you if you can't! A snowstorm like this takes multiple visits outdoors to keep up with, so maybe now would be a good time to practice divvying up responsibilities with characters' new spouses or children—or for bachelors to seek out the help of a neighbor. Characters may also have to deal with a power outage lasting up to 14 hours—better visit a house that has power if they need anything, but at least this is the kind of experience that brings a parent and child or a new couple or even two members of the same community closer. At least in theory.

It’s not all near-death experiences, psychological torture, and power outages, though! Characters who find themselves in need of some R&R will be pleased to know that the local fire department has tested the municipal park’s pond and found the ice is now suitably thick for ice skating. Characters will find lace-up leather ice skates in their size hanging from their tied-together laces in the garage, though this probably isn’t the best way to learn to skate if they haven’t before, given the lack of rail to hold on to–unless they have a friend to help them balance?

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Comments

Arthur Lester | Malevolent | OTA

[lestercraft]

I. A Thought

a. the revelry
[Honestly, Arthur hadn't really wanted to come out for this one. Hadn't wanted to think about how it's been the better part of a fortnight, now, since he's lost John, and gained little new awareness of what Sweetwater is. People were great about giving him directions, sure, but he didn't really know what anything looked like.

Part of him wondered how John would describe it - what was no doubt a beautiful tree, its lights reflecting on clean, pressed snow.

(And then he remembered the ritual, and no he didn't.)

He came with Helly, but he assures her he'll be fine enough for her to leave him unescorted by a table, one lined with (admittedly delicious-smelling) hot chocolates, and so he's easiest found leaning on a short brick fence, his cane hanging loose from his right wrist as he drinks carefully from a full glass. He can't tell when people are looking at him, but more often than not his polite smile slips, letting through an exhausted kind of melancholy.]

b. the memory
[He's almost glad for the countdown, so that he can brace himself when the clock strikes down.

Less glad, obviously, for the sudden loss of feeling that starts creeping up his hands and feet. Terror grips him immediately, heart hammering like a fucking drum, but before he can do more than get to his feet with a panicked-]

John-?!

[- he realises even his own voice sounds faint, distant, and the world doesn't slip away as much as...

He goes somewhere else.

A memory, maybe. Of a young woman looking down at him, begging him to move. Someone he doesn't recognise, but- in the context of that, almost, he feels like he should.

And then the vision - the vision, he could fucking see-- vanishes.

And Arthur is back in his own body with a gasp that feels like the air just got sucked out of him, there's music blaring and people screaming and movement jostling around him and he's still drifting somewhere a few inches behind his body and he curls up tighter like it'll ground him, he can't- he can't fucking breathe he doesn't know where he is where the fuck is John--]


II. The Dolls

a. the fight
[The fact that he and Helly both want to go to the shops is suspicious enough, certainly when they've both been increasingly annoyed by the pushiness of the advertisements; but then they end up here anyway, and he's... pretty sure he recognises a few voices when they get there.

But even though he can't see, he can still feel something tense in the air, making the hair on his neck stand on end.]

Wait- something's wrong.

[And then someone screams. And suddenly everything in in motion around him at once, he tries to turn and grab Helly's arm--

And something clocks him hard in the back, sending him to the ground with a shocked-]

Fuck!

[- and starts scrambling, onto his back and away from whatever just hit him, trying to get back to his feet but there's too much going on around him, and when he manages to get back up something slams into his side, throwing him into a table.]

God damnit-!

b. the flight
[Eventually, he finds out that hiding is the better option. Largely by accident; turns out scrambling under a table to save his own skin worked, and by the time he got his breathing under control, most of the place had gone quiet.

He has no idea which department he's managed to end up in, no idea which way the front doors are - no idea how long he's spent here, with his energy flagging and bruises burning across his back and sides, every part of him aching.

The only sound now is footsteps, the heavy, clumsy footfalls of something taller and lighter than him, hard and hollow tapping along the linoleum floors.

Maybe if he can at least find the walls, he can get the shape of the room, maybe find an exit. So when he hears the thing tap past his hiding spot, he makes a blind run for it, scrambling quietly out from under the table to try and bolt for a new one. Theoretically it should be straight ahead, right? That's how aisles work.

Someone please help him, he has no idea how close he is to the mannequins seeing him.]


III. Drill it in

the medicine
[It was never going to end any other way. He's claustrophobic - the instant he realised he was tied up and helpless, he struggled - and felt the jab in his thigh, and everything went...

Well. It went.

And it makes it... difficult, on a whole other level than it had been before. At least before he could dress himself, trust himself to shave - now his muscles lock up, he nearly falls over in the shower and does crack his head on the tiled wall, and it's only the sting of hot water in the bleeding wound under his hairline that wakes him back up.

There's the dim awareness that he shouldn't leave his house like this, but the thought keeps slipping away like smoke, and he leaves without his cane, under the exhausted delusion that John will keep him right.

This is... very very wrong.]


IV. Freezing in the Snow

the shovelling
[Possibly Arthur isn't the one who should be doing this, but he's got two arms and nothing better to do, and it's more to make himself feel like he's not a useless sitting duck than actually achieving a clear path.

...well. The clear path is useful, but. It's a bonus more than anything. And it gets him out of the house and available for people to talk to, if they want to deal with the curmudgeonly Englishman trying his best (and failing) to keep the path he's shovelling straight.]

IIb

[frauseufzen]

[He runs, and it runs for him. There are two figures in desperate motion, and then suddenly three, as one erupts out of a silent clothing rack to tackle the dummy to the ground, swiftly setting to work puncturing it-- however fruitlessly-- with a knife, wherever she can.

The sounds of struggle are obvious, even if a visual assessment is out of the question. Before long, it's clear that the human assailant is being overtaken by her quarry, based on the strangled German cursing alone.]

Re: IIb

[lestercraft]

He heard the footsteps turn and close in on him, and he curses under his breath--

And then the crash makes him whip around, distracts him from fleeing with the aggressive German swearing.

Well, at least he has a target now.

Without hesitation he doubles back, charging hard and low and aiming for some sort of body slam, but he's neither a graceful nor experienced fighter - and it's purely luck that he hits the right one, and he's not expecting plastic, hard as armour - but he still manages to slam into it and tackle it to the floor with a hearty crack, scrabbling back immediately when he feels it shift and try to upend his already tenuous position.

[frauseufzen]

It's enough to give Agathe an opening, with the thing distracted. She stomps hard on the back of its knee as it lurches after Arthur, and in its tenacity, the mannequin's leg joints begin to separate.
Spotting the opportunity, Agathe seizes it by crouching to drive her knife into the hip joint, crunching gruesomely away (it's not like it can feel pain) as it doubles back once more, trying to manage a proper angle of attack.

"Hold it down," she calls to the man, frantic and determined.

[lestercraft]

He hears plastic crack and flinches violently, but when the woman demands his help he scrambles forward again - a flailing arm clocks his shoulder and he curses, but manages to grab it before it escapes, and manages to trap it under his leg as he blindly gropes for the other arm and slams it into the floor with both hands.

"What the fuck is it?" he snarls, fear mixing with frustration to make a furious scowl across his pale features.

[frauseufzen]

"It--" Agathe struggles to reply, glad for the assistance so she can begin sawing at the weak spot in the hip joint. Between the two of them, and at this awkward angle, it actually seems possible. "--eine Schaufensterpuppe," she breathlessly continues, "it walks. And sees somehow. No eyes. There are many of them."

[lestercraft]

"A-- what?" He recognises the language, obviously, but the word is so far out of context that he's left stumped for a moment. But he's not stupid, either - whatever this thing, now that he's able to feel it, get a sense of it, plastic limbs under whatever sheer fabric it was wrapped in- no, wait, that's a cuff--

"Is this a fucking mannequin?!" he hisses, and the fear flips over to utter indignation.

sorry for delay I have been In The Shit

[frauseufzen]

"Mannequin," Agathe repeats, realizing her error, and adds a helpful, "ja". The knife cuts through the remaining plastic, and as they continue to pin down the creature-- object?-- she wrenches the leg free, beginning to bash at the plastic skull with it.

iv.

[perceptual]

Helly emerges blearily from her – their – the bedroom, wrapped in a pink terrycloth robe that clashes magnificently with her hair. Arthur won't notice and Helly doesn't care, so she just shoves her feet into a pair of fluffy slippers, diverts briefly to the kitchen to get a glass of water, and then follows the sounds of scraping and shovelling outside, where she shuffles out onto the front step and leans against the doorjamb. "It's me," she announces, having learned quickly that it's worth making a habit of announcing herself to him, so he's not caught off-guard by her arrival. "What are you doing? I still feel like I got hit by ten trucks. How are you doing manual labour right now?"

[lestercraft]

Her presence gets him to turn, like he can see her if he glances out of the corner of his eye (which he can't, as usual - it's still just the same, constant pitch black) and his head tips in acknowledgement of her presence.

"Moving helps me think," he says flatly. A bit dismissive, sure, but he has better things to struggle with than verbal conversation. "Not the worst I've felt and still had to work, anyway."

Still worse than some... most of his hangovers. Worse than the coma. But overall... yeah it's fucking awful. But the statement still stands.

"Besides, I'd rather not risk us getting frozen into our house if the weather does get worse."

[perceptual]

Fair. Maybe. Helly eyes him dubiously. The cold air is bracing – she's still far more used to stale aircon than she ever will be used to all this freshness, and so it's not such a bad thing. "Do you want help?" she asks after a moment, toes scrunching in her slippers. "I could do the sidewalk."

A beat, as she casts her gaze left and right down the street, which is largely deserted. "But – I do want to talk to you about something. Maybe in private."

[lestercraft]

He does pause, at least, when she says she wants to talk.

"I could definitely do with a cup of tea," he says, and it's not even hyperbole - he's tired, and sore, and somehow both feverishly hot and freezing cold at the same time. He could use something grounding and familiar.

So he comes back to the front door, stabbing the shovel into the deep pile of snow still next to the stoop. "Could I ask you for one while we talk?"

[perceptual]

"Sure."

She'd had to ask Arthur about making tea the first time he mentioned it, but it's simple enough that she'd caught onto the steps quick. She shuffles back inside into the warmth, heading for the kitchen which she knows well enough now to be able to grab two cups out of the cupboard and set about boiling some water. "How long have you been up, anyway?"

[lestercraft]

"I don't know- an hour, maybe." He hasn't even shaved for it; just thrown on a mismatched outfit, boots and his trenchcoat. "I don't think the sun was up, it was fucking cold."

He closes the door behind him as he strips off the coat and boots. "How are you doing- did you just wake up?"

I.b - the memory

[spaghettimonster]

[Papyrus is on the ground as well, if sitting up and hugging at his knees. An inexplicable mix of fading and lingering aches do their thing without explanation, besides that maybe he fell over while having sudden onset daydreams. But before he can figure out if this experience was normal, by asking the people around him some initially circumspect questions...

Well, there's someone else curled up on the ground and gasping, who could maybe use a hand. Papyrus gets up to his knees to crouch closer, not quite reaching out to touch.]

Hey, are you okay? I think... The ball finished dropping, I think it's done.

[Not just the ball's drop being done, he means. But who's to say what caused people - a few more than just the two of them, he can tell with a look around - to fall down? Maybe it's like that story device of people having flashbacks at the end of their lives. And all of them just had a flashback on the year's behalf, as it died.]

Re: I.b - the memory

[lestercraft]

[All the noises around him have settled into a vague blur, as he tries to get his breathing under control. So a voice close to him, addressing him undeniably - well, it shocks a gasp of surprise out of him, ruining the rhythm of his hyperventilating and making him cough.]

I-I'm-- I know, I know, I know b-but I can't--

[His right hand wavers at his throat, trying to indicate his breathing, but his left hand continues to grip his shirt in a white-knuckle grip, like he can pull his layers off, pull his lungs free and make them work.]

[spaghettimonster]

[It's a good thing one of them knows, because Papyrus certainly doesn't. It's also a good thing he's put so much practice into public presentation, in the time sense his election, because if not for that he would have said so aloud, a little passive aggressive in the sense of uncertainty here. Instead, he moves a little closer for a better look at these gestures.]

Can't... what?

[Something about the coughing, the gesturing at throat and tugging at shirt, reminds him of something from some television program or another, and Papyrus gasps.]

Can't breathe? Are you choking? Nod if you're choking, I can slap your back.

[lestercraft]

[He shakes his head, aggressively, because some well-intended slappage is the last thing he needs right now.

This, says a thought, with such sudden clarity that it's like an icicle between his ribs, is pathetic.

He's- He's supposed to be a fucking adult, he's a goddamn investigator, and one bad memory is suddenly sending him spiralling into panic? After all the shit he actually survived? In fucking public, curled up like a child so someone who barely sounds out of his teens can save him?

He pulls a thin breath in and forces his mouth shut, clamping his jaw against the desperate-terror-he's-dying-gotta-run-gotta-hide panic, and forces himself to let it out slowly through his nose.

And once more, for good measure. Which lets him get enough of a lung full of air to reply, thin and quiet.]

I'm- I-I'm fine... I just- I panicked. The-- [He gestures vaguely towards the sky.] Th- the noise, startled me.

[spaghettimonster]

The... noise.

[Papyrus looks vaguely towards the sky, obliging the story despite the skepticism his voice betrays. Nothing in particular catches his eyes up there, besides the last bits of confetti drifting off the tree branches or where they briefly stuck to the pole. No noises up there catch his ears, either.

Of course, around them is noise, with the band playing... the same song that everything faded out on him to? So either it's a very long song, or that was a very brief fall. Probably the latter, since most people don't seem to be paying them any mind. A potentially encouraging sign!]

Well, then, I'm sure your fineness will only be getting more fine! Nobody said anything about it dropping twice. Unless, it was some other noise.

[He didn't hear any particularly alarming noises, dropped ball or otherwise, but... If his idea about having the dying year's flashbacks for it has any merit, who's to say they didn't flashback different things? Without the opportunity to do some helpful slapping Undyne-style, he'll do the next best thing and offer ear and encouragement for a few.]

ii a!

[workingthenumbers]

[Numbers would never willingly step into a department store--at least, not with the intention of getting a good deal. His feet move without him willing them forward, and when he realizes what's going on, he's already inside.

He tried the doors already, but no luck. Thus, he's resorted to pacing around the entire perimeter of the department store, like a rat in a maze. Waiting for something, anything to happen.

And something does. He hears the scream, turns to look in the direction of it, but is interrupted by something else moving. A man and...a mannequin, inside the store across the way. Numbers is spurred into action, running forward with a hand on his gun.

As the man tries to get to his feet, the mannequin slams its fists against him, throwing him into a nearby table. Like with the salesman, Numbers doesn't hesitate--he aims for the mannequin's head and fires. The mannequin's head falls off from the sheer force of the gun. Unlike the salesman, however, the mannequin doesn't stop moving. It stumbles back for a moment, knocked off balance, but then staggers forward towards its new target--Numbers.]

Shit--!

[He grabs the stranger by the arm, trying to help him up as the mannequin advances upon them.]

You still alive? C'mon, we gotta move.

Re: ii a!

[lestercraft]

[The gunfire is unexpected, and even on the table Arthur flinches, both arms jerking up to cover his head as if it'll protect him. So his arm is in easy grabbing reach for Numbers to grab him, and for once he doesn't fight it - even in panic, there's some logic still running, and if something is grabbing him then it isn't walloping him - and it helps in getting him upright.]

I-I-I'm fine, let's- fuck. Move- right. Where?

[The fact he's blind is irrelevant as long as the man doesn't fucking let go.]

[workingthenumbers]

[Salesmen who don't stop attacking when shot in the leg, mannequins that don't stop moving when shot in the head--what next, bulletproof robots that just don't stop, period? Numbers looks around wildly, trying to find any cover. The homegoods store across the hall is currently mannequin-less and has all manner of kitchen utensils and supplies.]

There. Let's go.

[He yanks Arthur forward, pointing towards the shop. In the heat of the moment, Numbers hadn't noticed the man was blind. In fact, he still doesn't realize it--his grip loosens slightly as he moves to let go and sprint ahead.]

[lestercraft]

[The yank makes him stumble almost immediately, but when he feels the hand loosen on his wrist the sudden spur of panic that causes - don't leave him, he doesn't know what the fuck is out there - his arm twists and he latches on to the stranger's wrist with a white-knuckled grip, even as he surges to keep up.]

Wh-- what the fuck was that?!

[There's an obvious fear to Arthur's- everything, really, but the overriding tone in his voice is something more like offended, that something would have the audacity to attack them.]

[workingthenumbers]

[Numbers nearly jumps out of his own skin when Arthur grabs onto his wrist more tightly, nearly stumbling over his own feet as he drags him into the shop and behind a nearby display case. He grabs Arthur's shoulder and pulls him down, scowling deeply. His ire is clearly heard in his voice as he hisses:]

I don't know! The mannequins are fucking moving or some shit. Do I look like I--

[And then he stops, and really assesses Arthur. In the distance, he hears the shuffle of vinyl feet against linoleum tile.]

Can you...not see? [Asked in an incredulous, almost disbelieving tone.]

[lestercraft]

[If someone knew the phrase 'Thank you, Captain Obvious' then he'd never say any fucking thing else half the time. His own voice is a hiss right back, frustrated above all else.]

No, I'm blind, and believe me it's exactly as frustrating as you think it is.

[He's not stupid, though; he stays low and still behind the case, aware that Numbers must have at least put him out of sight, pressing a hand to it just to investigate it and finding glass against his shoulder.]

Alright, so. [He drags a hand through his hair, trying to sweep the now-messy half-curls back into a semblance of control.] Fucking- evil mannequins. Sure. What set them off-- and more importantly, how do we stop them?