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Entry tags:
- !event,
- !npc interaction,
- !npc: norman pollock,
- !plot clue,
- avatar the last airbender: sokka,
- crime and punishment: rodion raskolnikov,
- fargo: numbers,
- lost in space: maureen robinson,
- malevolent: arthur lester,
- mash: margaret houlihan,
- mcu: bucky barnes,
- nope: ricky "jupe" park,
- original character: agathe marowski,
- original character: vasiliy ardankin,
- severance: helly r,
- the batman: edward nashton,
- the walking dead: beth greene,
- torchwood: norton folgate,
- undertale: papyrus,
- undertale: sans
Event № 1 : January 2024
Event № 1 : January 2024
Part I; Chapter 2. Silence tells me secretly everything
Part I; Chapter 2. Silence tells me secretly everything
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.
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.
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.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.
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.
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:
— 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.
'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?
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?
cw for ...basically the event stuff, plus seizure analogies and VERY brief suicidal ideation
o1.o1.61: a thought is haunting me
Teddy isn't much of a New Year's Eve person; never has been, really. It's not that she never got drunk on cheap champagne, or went to whoever's party. But it's only ever been enjoyable since she started coming into her own in college, really, or if she had a gig to get lost in.
Without that, and since her epilepsy decided to turn up the dial -- drinking isn't much of an attraction, and neither is waiting for a ball to drop. And it's not like she gets to feel confident and attractive in a suit flirting with girls: she'd have to play the part of housewife. Besides, going to a well known, blocked-out space where everyone knows everyone will be sounds like trouble, too. Maybe that's paranoid, but there's not much that she can qualify as legitimately unreasonable in this place. Not yet.
Scout hates fireworks: loud noises of any kind. Teddy doesn't know to what extent they happen here, but she's sure they do; they aren't inventions of the 2000s. As the clock clicks down, she finds herself ill at ease, a familiar anxious restless feeling under her skin.
She lets Wrench know she's going out, puts Scout on her harness. The streets are strangely quiet for once in the little cul-de-sac. Normally Teddy likes that, a long quiet walk. Here, a place she neither knows nor trusts, it lends it an odd, liminal feel. The spaced-out, diffuse reflection of incandescent bulbs on asphalt; the occasional susurration of slick tires on the main street. On either side, cheerily-painted houses watch through lash-lace sheers, their generous yards hosting no plant life identifiable as local. It's the fun-house reflection of a holler. One way in, one way out, and everyone watching the whole way.
She pulls her coat a little more firmly around herself.
Scout, for her part, isn't troubled: except that she's clearly been missing proper runs, and there aren't enough birds or squirrels -- or even people, right now -- to smell. She tugs on the harness, just a little, and Teddy obliges, smiling, not against turning towards civilization. Teddy figures she'll go a block or two and then turn Scout back away. Once they get walking somewhere cars have been, Scout settles into work mode, scanning in front of them but keeping at heel, alert to Teddy's body language.
And then -- a few things happen at once. The fireworks she'd worried about explode without warning, bright and startling. There are far-away horns and cheers that distort, somehow, eerie and whining. Beside her, Scout spooks, tucking tail.
The sound desynchronizes from the explosion; new explosions seem to continuearound her, even as the falling sparkles fade: her vision vignettes, her body feels outside itself. Teddy can't move, even as she goes to comfort her dog.
Oh, for fuck's sake, not now. The trappings of a focal seizure are far too familiar not to recognize, although it doesn't usually go like this. It feels -- it feels -- wrong, there's something -- something has gone terribly wrong --
The smoke, the ground fade, giving way to just ringing and disorientation. Teddy slowly pushes herself up. When did she fall? Wasn't there a -- a...
Field medic? That doesn't make sense. There's not even anyone here she might have misinterpreted.
Scout is abruptly licking her face. She blinks. It stings: she went straight for where there's a long scrape from the asphalt. "Hey," she says, or half-says, and finds herself abruptly on the verge of tears, wrapping her arms around the dog's neck. "Hey." I let go of the leash when my baby was scared, she thinks, feeling irrationally, terribly guilty, and she still did her job and stayed with me.
Scout sits, ready for a command or just to let Teddy hug her, though she still noses at her protectively, checking her over. "I'm okay, you big nerd," Teddy murmurs thickly, and pushes herself, slowly, to her feet, reaching down for the leash. As she loops it around her hand, Teddy startles: there are indentations, like the pale atrophy of rings -- or the bind of a cord -- circling her finger.
She stares. That's -- impossible. It's...there's nothing that would have -- could she have caught the leash, and her brain...? -- but --
Her head throbs; Teddy's heart is hammering. She becomes aware of someone approaching, of their eyes on her. She says aloud the first thing that comes to mind: "Going home," -- which is so unsettling she feels ill, except, of course, they are. "We were just going home," she repeats, apologetic and polite, flashing a smile that hopefully comes out something like friendly and sure as she looks up to try to assess who's seen them.
o1.o7.61: it's freezing and...
If this was bound to happen to anyone, Teddy thinks, it might as well be them.
A few days ago they'd had just a skift of snow, but Teddy had cleared the walk anyway. The way people were talking, no good letting it build up. The garage had had rock salt they'd been happy to put down (and they'd quietly salted the nearest neighbors' walks and drives too, since it didn't look like they had). Then, they'd gone around the house stuffing the edges of windows with towels and finding ways to rig up quilts over the ones that didn't get good sunlight, or hang them like curtains behind each door.
Meanwhile, without mentioning it, Wrench filled the tank of the car and a jerry can too, and picked up some canned food and extra firewood: a gesture that, when they realized, had earned a perfectly, enthusiastically signed thank you so much. Teddy hadn't had time or -- even though it didn't seem like it had been a seizure, knowing what they know -- complete confidence in getting behind the wheel. They'd figured one or both of them might just have to go out in the storm for that sort of thing if it lasted very long.
The night of the sixth, snow already falling and the wind picking up, Teddy turns the taps to a steady drip, makes sure the dial on the fridge is as low as it'll go, and -- not sure, exactly, what kind of water pump they have -- fills the bathtub. They ain't about to assume it'll be okay.
On the seventh, Teddy wakes to -- what, they can't tell, at first. The wind is howling, the light an indistinct sort of grey that could be dawn or could be well into the morning and just blotted out by snow.
Then they realize: the buzz of electricity, low and ubiquitous, is gone.
It's possible, Teddy thinks now, sliding out of bed to flick the switch to no effect, that they just lost power, that there was a crackle or surge that woke them: if that's the case, it might be a line down and won't be out long.
They don't really care to wake Wrench. It feels rude, and it's still warm up here, with the dog curled between where they lie and the blankets. But it won't be, forever, and they should go downstairs and get the fire lit. Teddy hovers for a moment; then they quickly dress in layers and go on down, light the fire and then the stove, carefully. They get pancakes started -- the tap at least appears to be working, enough for the just add water bit -- and corned beef hash from a can on the range. At least waking up to breakfast will soften the blow, if not the scrabble of Scout smelling it first.
Later, they curl up in front of the fire as the chill steadily settles in -- damn being little -- and watch the snow, trying to decide if they ought to go shovel again. Maybe when it settles down they'll try out those skates.
[OOC: Didn't have a great ending, please feel free to jump to they were, in fact shoveling/ice skating/prepping before the storm, etc]
o1.13.61: in the valley of the dolls we sleep
[OOC: this one i'll be tagging around! however on o1.17 teddy will be doing some research at, likely first the library, and then city hall. it feels like a thing that could be both lengthy and boring to read as a post, but anyone who wants can tag in on that premise to join in, or talk to them about it etc etc]
o1.18.61: drill it in like j paul getty
If she'd known Numbers was missing before late last night --
Well. It probably wouldn't have stopped her, Teddy thinks, as she very, very slowly shifts her hand backwards in the restraints. She's been hearing stories -- seeing people acting odd.
They frown. There's some give; some stretch to the leather, being leather and all, but it's thick and ruthlessly adjusted to their wrist size. Even if they take their time, and tuck their hand in...it could take hours, if that.
The hell of it all is she hadn't even done anything illegal. Accessing public documents? She assumes, anyway. It's so basic. She hadn't said anything, done anything.
Trying to find out more about an obvious safety risk to the citizens of this place? Isn't that the same kind of thing this country holds dear -- freedom of the press, transparency, so Joe Schmoe on the street can ask questions and get answers and vote for a representative in ways other countries can't?
Norman Pollock is unimpressed at their attempt to make this point. "Theodora," he says, which makes them like him less than they had when they woke up bound to a chair (a difficult feat to achieve). "I don't know what you're talking about, safety risk. We both know you have some difficulty with -- reality, sometimes..."
"I have visual and auditory hallucinations that I am well aware are hallucinations, and only occur during seizures," she retorts. Her heart is pounding. The chest strap makes her feel like she can't breathe, even though she can. "You know that. You know I have epilepsy. Your name's on the Rx."
He hums. They wonder, in sudden horror, if the pills on their bedside are even what they're labelled as. What if they're nothing, or -- they're doing something terrible. How would they know? They're literally in a basement, being kidnapped (from a place they were kidnapped to, their mind points out) by a creepy doctor turning on a propaganda film -- "You know I have epilepsy," they try again. "If I have a seizure down here, I could die. Or at least it won't do any good to watch anything, because I won't remember it --"
He's putting the tape in, unimpressed.
"And. And my husband," she adds, feeling herself spiral into anxiety that she had fully intended to swallow down. She'd meant to suffer in silence, to sit through this taciturn, but with every second it's clearer that his 'end goal' is a farce and she knows nothing. Maybe if she acts like she's bought the whole thing hook line and sinker, that she's just a nice little wife -- "He doesn't cook -- and he'll worry -- Let me at least call his, his best friend and tell him I'm all right--"
It's like he hasn't heard any of it. "Let's get started, sweetheart? The sooner you take all of this to heart, the sooner we can both leave."
So they watch for a while. They're not sure how long; at some point the tape repeats, and some time later, they get their first shock but not their last. Teddy sings songs in their head; they make up unflattering verses about the film or Norman; they recite literary passages silently. It doesn't keep them awake all the time, the contact area increasingly burnt and painful even as the shock also increases. But it keeps them slightly sane while they try to wait it out.
They try.
Eventually, floating somewhere slightly outside the world, the panic and anger she feels at being shocked again hits and the filter bursts: Teddy throws herself against her restraints and just starts screaming. She's not even sure she could say what she said; something about fascist brainwashing and doublespeak and people like him being the real unAmericans; part of her, watching her explosion, expects him to just shoot her. Part of her doesn't quite care.
He doesn't quite shoot her. He does draw a syringe. She's half-bent with the chair still strapped to her like a shell or a shield, and she tries to charge at him, to knock the needle from his hand.
Teddy succeeds in backing him up against the cabinets: then, with a sting, they can almost feel their blood pressure drop; the dizziness increases rapidly. It's only moments before they're sliding to the floor, heedless of the chair on top of them.
Teddy wakes in bed, all their muscles feeling like they've been running for hours, a steady twitch in their upper cheek. There's a pervasive sense of calm that's settled over them despite a vague memory of what happened; a haze to all their thoughts, and they give up and just lie there.
Later, she'll shamble downstairs, Scout helping her stay stable. She eats something; she sits and listens to whatever passes for pop radio in 1961 mid-Atlantic Hell. She tries to sign, gives up, writes shaky notes. She sits, she eats something else. She slowly works on getting back up the stairs; she's thankful she can't cry.
After a day or two of the same thing, aching, jerky: so tired, so terribly empty, Teddy picks up their guitar and grits their teeth. Forms some chords they know they know; reforms them until they get the position right. They close their eyes and go through fingerpicking sequences until they get those right. Teddy picks out a melody, and slowly, slowly, works up to forming words, singing softly, just to prove they can.
The next day they do it again. They go outside, and when they can do that without panicking, they take the dog for a walk. They go to a shop, purchase drinks and snacks without speaking. At home they collapse exhausted, but proud.
It gets better. It will. Maybe not now, maybe not soon, but she will fight this. They will. All of them, somehow; they have to. That's all there is.
Maybe she keeps her head down for a while. That doesn't mean she's not at war.
a thought is haunting me
It's here that he notices someone lying on the ground, their hand wrapped around a leash, which is then attached to a dog that Numbers recognizes. He squints, lurching forward to get a better look at the figure. It's Teddy. Some unidentifiable emotion twists in his chest as his legs drag himself towards them, unsure of what to do or what to say.
Luckily, they say something before he's able to. He stops for a moment, staring down at them, then looking towards Scout, as if the dog might provide answers.
"You fell?" he asks, gruffly. As if it wasn't obvious.
Re: a thought is haunting me
The haze feels like it's lifting a bit. Replaced, admittedly, with that sort of in-and-out-of-focus, too-everything, jumpcut impression of reality that panic and returning memory both bring, as though someone's running life on an odd number of frames per minute, but they've at least done that before.
"Looks like," she answers with a wry curl of a smile. It sounds like more of a yes than it is, but it isn't not true. It hurts. The smile. She winces and touches her lip. Bloody. "Shit," she says aloud, but it half trails off, her eyes momentarily unfocusing. The images flutter back through her mind, her heart picking up and her stomach twisting as though recalling a real traumatic memory.
Teddy frowns, resisting the urge to worry the raw spot on the inside of their lip. "I..." They hate doing this. They hate the way people look at them when they do. But if Numbers is going to be around; he's going to find out anyway. "So, I have epilepsy. Seizures. --They're not a big deal, usually. Most of the time they're not even the kind people think of; you know, convulsions? They're a little...weirder and safer. I can have both, but -- Anyway, I have medication for it, and it's not usually a thing. And Scout knows to try and get help, if she can, or to stay with me and make sure I'm safe." It's grumbly, coming out in curt little bits and then all at once.
"I just...I don't know," they admit more hesitantly, "I think I must have had one. I don't remember tripping, or how I fell. And..." The rest of it was both like and unlike their other seizures; it would have made more sense if they'd just come back to, half a second later feeling like it'd been hours. But -- on the ground, scraped up? The whole thing is weird.
no subject
When Teddy is done speaking, he leans down and reaches out a hand to help them up. If they were managing their epilepsy with medication, why would they have fallen over? And why, immediately, after Numbers himself had received some sort of vision that caused him to double over onto the ground in sheer panic?
But he doesn't want to admit that so easily. So instead, he tries to prod for information indirectly.
"Do you usually see anything when you're having a seizure?" he asks.
no subject
He reaches out, though, and they can’t claim they don’t appreciate the gesture, gripping his hand firmly and righting themself. They give him a little appreciative nod. …And then they hold on just a bit more of a moment than they’d rather, letting the wash of seasickness and general panic settle, trying to push away that feeling of abruptly being lifted in a stretcher.
Scout leans into her legs a little, offering her own support, and Teddy lets go, embarrassed, already about to apologize. Her brows crease, though, at the question, lifting her head. It’s not something people associate with seizures, and usually don’t ask about unless she’d mentioned it or, once in a blue moon, something else that made them think they have them.
“I…” they start and pause on a little hmm of an exhale, almost a tick or a hyphen made into sound instead of a huff. “Ye-sss…,” they agree, almost reluctantly. “but not usually this weir— How did you know?“
Her mind is a flutter of connections that are all a little hard to hold onto, and she looks up at Numbers, face scrunched in confusion and almost suspicion.
no subject
"I didn't," he admits, flatly. "I was just asking about it in general. I saw--" Nope. Saw implies that he witnessed it with his own two eyes. He stops himself, then starts again. "I think something fucking weird happened."
His eyes flit down the street--one way, then the other. Checking for other people on the block. They shouldn't talk here, in the middle of the street. He stands a little closer to Teddy.
"You were heading home, right? Mind if I walk with you?"
no subject
“Not at all,” she says, with a polite smile, slightly broadcast for any potential looky-lous that might be watching through blinds. The nod of thanks is entirely genuine, though: Teddy’d been trying to figure out a way that wasn’t completely pathetic sounding to ask if he might stay with her. If it does turn out to have been a seizure, much as she trusts Scout, if something else happens it’d be best to have a person.
Teddy pivots so they’re turned alongside Numbers; it means Scout stays to the inside of the sidewalk, too, which is better. The dog has been vaguely sniffing around Numbers’ general area, but seems content that he’s giving Teddy a hand. “Actually, do you mind—“ they add, and touch the back of his arm, telegraphing tucking their hand into his elbow before just doing it.
It’s useful, stability wise. It’s also convenient for speaking close together. And her “husband”’s friend ensuring her safely home after a tumble seems unlikely to be the sort of thing anyone will look at the wrong way.
“The things I see, usually,” Teddy says, quietly, after a moment, “it’s —- well, honestly? It’s more akin to being real high,” they laugh. “Than any sort of vision, for sure. The room can look like it’s melting, or — scrolling? Like, up, past my head? I might feel too big or too small or like things are taking hours. Sometimes I can’t understand people talking. Or it feels like there’s a thought I can’t quite get to that’s really important, like I’d know everything if I could just find the words for it.” Every time she explains these seizures she feels like she’s casually revealing she’s absolutely delusional, which isn’t fair to herself or delusional people, but it’s sticky.
It’s not the point. “This wasn’t like that. At all, except for being sudden. This was more like — a dream, or — a movie. A…” they hesitate. “Almost a memory. But like it went to the wrong person.”
Teddy glances up at Numbers, his height on her more obvious this close. “Does that make any sense?”
no subject
As Teddy describes their experience, Numbers keeps his gaze focused on the path ahead. He seems solely focused on getting them back to her house, making sure that she’s safe. His eyes occasionally dart to the side, watching for anyone else peering in their direction. He’s careful to keep pace with Teddy, trying to avoid dragging them forward.
“Makes sense to me.” A pause. “I think,” he continues, mouth twisting to the side. This place probably had dozens of other dumb tricks up its sleeves, given Numbers’ own death situation and Wrench somehow being ten years from the future. “Tell me what you saw.”
drill it in... (*borat voice* my wiiiiife)
Whatever powers are in play here didn't need to go to the trouble of dragging him back to the 1960s to upend him. They could've just as easily stayed in the 2010s. It's enough that he's expected to live in a house alongside a wife and tend to a driveway, smile at the neighbors, fetch mail from the box, and think about holding down a job of some legitimacy. None of these are things Wrench ever imagined for his own life, and if he's really honest - he never had models for any one of them growing up either.
Instinct tells him he should get the hell out as quickly as possible. But Numbers is alive here - a fact that isn't true in the reality that he knows to be most truthful. And he feels a sense of obligation to Teddy. Not that he doesn't think his "wife" is capable of taking care of herself, but they've started to forge something like a reluctant team with one another, and he's not quite certain where his other half went. So Wrench mostly sits on his hands, trying to put the pieces together as best as possible as he waits for them to return.
When they do, they hardly seem like themself. Teddy haunts the house like a ghost, and for want of what to do, Wrench tries to give her space. He soon finds that Numbers is behaving in much the same manner himself, and the news takes him back home to find his unwitting partner sitting with her guitar like she's in a trance.
He's been gentle, but now he's starting to get panicked. Feeling impotent leaves him seeming mad, and this time Wrench stands in the threshold of the room and stamps his foot on the floorboards. What is going on with you?
Re: drill it in... (*borat voice* my wiiiiife)
And then he stamps, loud, and they jump, their whole body going tense and jerky. Their arms want to snap up in front of themself, hands trying to clench in some half-protective, half-fight instinct, and they half-fumble the guitar before they're able to clench their hands around it. "Jesus fuck," they say, setting it down on top of its case, and try to slow their heart down. It doesn't really care what they think.
They look back up, a little sullenly. It is good that it's Wrench: for half a second they thought someone had come back for them. It's also shitty that Wrench made them think someone had come back for them, and is this a thing he does, and also, does he have any idea how fucking big he is? Teddy's not with it enough to even do anything with the thoughts but let them happen.
They furrow their brow at his hands, the confused, upset draw together of his expression, trying to understand, blinking. It's not even a hard sentence, it's like -- it's like after some unaware seizures, when they know they know a word but they can't get it from their brain to their mouth.
Teddy shakes her head, wearily, and signs repeat with a face and a sigh. Her hands are shaking, a constant, Parkinsonian tremor that goes away occasionally if she focuses hard and tenses, or if she relaxes enough to sleep; but in those states, the jerks sometimes just become larger: more space between them but more aggressive. -- slow? .
It strikes them abruptly that it feels a little weird. They haven't signed much in almost a week, between the mall, and being at city hall, and then that...place. They haven't seen each other much at all; they've talked a little crossing paths, but just small talk. They wince and, hoping he'll get it, put a flat palm to their chest, please -- creating a smooth circle might be easy, who knows, but it feels overwhelming, exhausting, most things do but especially movement -- and then they fold it into a fist, repeating the word over top. I'm sorry.
When he asks again, slower and clearer, if maybe a little emphatic, she takes a breath. That was sort of what she assumed the gist was, but it's so hard for her to think.
...Does she know any signs that apply here?
There's a real part of Teddy that just wants to sign drugs and leave it, the way Wrench alludes to working but won't say what he did (which leaves like, four possibilities, maybe ten or twelve if they get inventive). There are a couple of reasons that's not happening; primary among them that they don't know the sign for drugs (except by fingerspelling which sounds very hard right now and also somewhat less funny, if it was a good joke to start with, which it isn't actually).
Teddy chews on their lip for a second and then jerks their head toward the couch, shifting their eyes away from his without quite meaning to, anxious. Come here. Their notebook is on the coffee table, and writing's going to suck but it might be better anyway.
They reach forward for it and the pen, to steady themselves and to try and clear their head: then they open to the next blank page, ahead of him getting closer. They write, slowly, in the middle of the page, like a title. It feels like they're watching a movie, peering over their own shoulder, breath held for the big reveal: as though writing it out makes it real.
Teddy goes over the first word a few times, making it blocky and bold.
took me.
no subject
He's almost equally as used to being asked to repeat himself, and that he does without so much as a blink of annoyance. Wrench wants to be understood, of course. He's frustrated at a situation that he can't comprehend and the feeling that the person he's living with is more a stranger to him now than when they woke up next to each other some weeks back. But he doesn't fault Teddy for her lack of fluency, so he does slow down and really try to ensure that every word lands. Usually, he'd judge by the light of recognition in someone's eyes, but looking at theirs now it's hard to tell what's actually getting through.
When they do finally usher him to the couch Wrench perches on the end, considerate of the instrument that's captivated the near-entirety of Teddy's attention since he first walked into their home and found her sitting here like a specter. He leans forward, watching her write and re-write the one word that needs the most clarification, that tells him nothing except to be wary. Wary of who, though?
Wrench grabs the pen and circles the first word three times in a quick, looping circle. Who? he signs, almost whistling with the intensity of his exhale between pursed lips. Who took you?
cw for mild paranoia(is it?) and post-kidnapping trauma; selfblame; electric burn description
It reminds Teddy, though, cutting solid through the fog, that at no point have they actually felt unsafe around Wrench -- barring just now, and that was as much the noise, and the spectres of the days before. More often the opposite, and it could easily not be that way.
Also: it’s not convenient, as much as it's careful. Now that their guitar is laid flat, Teddy carefully nudges the whole thing, case-and-instrument-tiered-cake, to the right: so Wrench can move over, so they can shift in to let him see and annotate. When he circles the word, Teddy tries to think of how to explain, pursing their lips, and gestures widely at the house or maybe the whole surrounding neighborhood in a sort of demonstration.
There's an us here and a them, in Teddy's mind. Everyone new to the town, and then the townies -- the neighbors, the residents. People who think -- or are willing to pretend -- that the two of them have always lived here, or at least, for some time. The ones who want houses like this with lawns neatly trimmed to the centimeter of HOA rules; no real, non-decorative trees or wild animals to speak of; cocktail parties and new appliances.
Who believe in the pictures on the wall, like the one her gesture sort of ends at.
She likes it probably the most of the fake pictures, because there's a story there -- she's laughing, her actual open-grin laugh that takes up half her face, not pretty-for-the-camera; there's motion blur at Wrench's edges, like he's ducked too slow into a timed photo, and he hasn't quite reached where she's sitting on the hood of the car, so instead he's just posing, arms crossed, like he meant to do that.
It's cute: it looks almost like it could be real.
She hates it, even more than she likes it, because it looks like it could be real. This place didn't just stick them in frames: it somehow made them into puppets in this weird play.
That's why it's everyone. That's why it's They. Whatever the hell this is, even if it is the 60s, people here still have to know this is all wrong. That something's going on. But they like their nice houses and they're afraid of -- something. Communism. The doctor. Whatever bigger thing this is. So they shut up.
That and the fact that Teddy went to bed and woke up in a basement, which is more important to tell Wrench.
The thoughts are all a mess, prexistent, in their head -- it might be half a moment or it could be minutes of thinking -- except for that last. Right. Focus. There was a someone more than anyone else.
doctor, Teddy writes, taking the time to make their print as neat as possible, despite their shaky hands. Then, with a sudden thought, they turn to the back of the couch, where there's a console table on which they've set their evening medication: it's easier to take it down here. That way, they'll remember no matter when they want to go to bed.
There it is. On the upper right of the label stuck onto the amber bottle. Next to a little not-quite-cursive blue pre-printed Dr, the name Pollock typed out incongruously above her proper prescription for zonisamide. She turns the bottle toward Wrench, and taps next to his name.
It reminds Teddy that in -- Jesus. A handful of days -- they're going to have to refill this medication. Prescribed to them by the person who strapped them to a chair and drugged them. If they ever have to go to a doctor...
They shiver, almost convulsively, their teeth chattering a little, and it's not, they're pretty sure, the drugs. I looked up information. Just records they scribble, this time just trying to get it out. I was here
They sign "here" as well, insistent, turning to look up at Wrench, guilty and fearful of everything that implies. Someone had to get in without anyone -- without Scout -- noticing, or at least ...without anyone remembering they noticed.
Had they done something to Scout and Wrench? Could they come back at any time?
If Teddy hadn't dug around, would they not be able to get in?
They turn back, writing, I woke up -- ??? Basement. Strapped down.
Suddenly remembering -- they've been having trouble identifying sources of pain all day, and it might've done some nerve damage, that or the muscles just hurt worse -- they lift and turn their left arm over to show Wrench, the dark, black-singed centerpoint of a blistered pink squarish ring of burn on their forearm, right above where their wrist had been secured.
No sleeping, they sign flatly, one handed. They probably should have cleaned and covered it but it had been hard to even get up.
The idea still sounds like a ...lot.