INTRO LOG #1

[bequiet]

INTRO LOG #1
Muzzle and Mute
Content Warnings: Disorientation, memory loss, confusion
Themes: Arrival, survival, exploration, horror

You wake, standing. A thick, muddy red dust coats your skin and clothes - it sticks to your tongue and blocks your vision. Inhale and it chokes you, exhale and your breath puffs out in front of your face in a transparent maroon cloud. It tastes of copper, tangy and harsh. Movement is difficult, every limb tingles and aches. Look to your left, your right. Evenly spaced in each direction stands another person indistinguishable in every way from the next. You're disoriented and lethargic, unable to grasp onto a single thought. A pinprick of light blooms ahead and grows steadily larger; a door has opened.

Hands grip your wrists, push at the small of your back and guide you out of the darkness into a room with four walls and a thin, sagging ceiling. The plaster is peeling, the air is musty, and the floor is slick. White plastic piping juts up from the center and curves into multiple spouts, clean water flowing in uneven streams. Those hands pull your clothes off and clear the dust from your body, redress you in handsewn jumpsuits. By the time they’re through, you will have begun to come back to yourself.

A finger is pressed to your lips. Kind eyes meet your own and a single word is whispered - hush.

Led out of the room in a line, you’re taken down a short hallway and into another, much larger room. There’s a woman waiting for you there, a child hugging her leg, and a cloth bag in her hands. She reaches in and pulls out a device, passes one to each of you. Once finished, she begins to move both hands in graceful gestures, a language. One of the people who helped you lifts their device and the screen lights up, tracks the woman’s hands. Letters appear on the screen and you understand the device’s purpose. She tells you what she knows and it’s not much.

This world is haunted. Noise attracts them, so it is not allowed. Communication is through body language, soundless writing, and the device. She tells you that your feet must be light and your mouth never used. There is a community outside these doors, where you can survive together, but only if you agree to one thing: complete and total silence. You'll have time to talk it over. You may ask one question and receive one answer.

Acceptance allows you to journey outside. The ground is marked in pathways of sand, lining the paths to each building and everywhere in-between. You notice that the locals hold their devices always, aloft and glance to it often. It will not vibrate or make a sound to signal a message. Notices appear. Rules. Guidelines. Feet on the sand and never anywhere else. To open a door you brush your fingers along the hinges - oiled and you may enter. If not, take the brush from the can sitting nearby and coat the metal with the dark liquid.

Now, you're to settle into your new home.

The Man in the Hat
Content Warnings: Heavy lifting, following the rules, alcoholism
Themes: Moving in, survival, exploration, horror

Once you’ve claimed a room for yourself, it’s time to acclimate to the community. Natives will ask what you need and take you along the sandpaths to different areas in the city to gather supplies - furniture and the like. Heavier items will require assistance and will take longer. Houses are mostly empty so if you and your housemates need something, you’ll have to carry it and put it inside the home. Do not make any noise or the natives will refuse to help you. Getting to know your housemates is key to a smooth transition. They are going through what you are right now; take the time to get to know them. Make house rules.

As the first day gives way to night, the natives can be seen moving at a faster pace outside. They’re hurried, though not frightened. Some even smile at you. When the sun sets behind the ruins of what was once picturesque Reims, your device will signal that it’s time to meet at the center of the community. There, natives will stop each person and give them a small gift - a trinket, a token to show that they are trying their best to make all the new arrivals feel at home. These are all items from the character’s home or from another character's home (they will not be anything that belongs to anyone else). Small, soundless and either something taken during the application process or something brand new. They will have no powers to speak of and are meant to be a momento. If asked, the natives found them the same way they found each of you.

Then the party starts. Sort of. A soundless, stitled kind of celebration. Fun is meant to be had, but it’s not an overly joyous occasion. The natives simply don’t know how to cut loose. There will be extra food in the form of one and two; Phillipa even brought some of her homemade bread. If you stumble across a man wearing a hat, the only man in town who does, and agree to go with him when he offers to show you his house - he’ll gift you with a jar of hooch; it’ll burn on the way down.

Sound Eaters
Content Warnings: Threat, danger
Themes: Survival, exploration, horror, game plot

It’s the second day of your stay, and the natives call for an emergency meeting at the Town Hall. Everyone is paired off (see below) and are asked to walk the perimeter looking for anything out of place and patching any areas that might have been affected by weather. Once finished, the same is done on the inside, and when the community leader is satisfied, the main hall is opened up so that everyone can congregate. Characters, during this time only, are allowed to make sound. This is so that the natives can explain why silence is so necessary...

The Sound Eaters.

In an effort not to frighten everyone, the natives won’t go into the history just yet, but they will warn that when someone makes a sound, it attracts them. They don’t know what they look like because they are so fast. If you’re too loud, then in the blink of an eye, you’ll go through a room reset. This is because either the natives ‘silenced’ you or the Sound Eaters have. They will explain that the room came at the same time the Sound Eaters did and that it doesn’t work for the natives. Sometimes, it doesn’t work on new arrivals. Death, for those born in this world, is permanent. If you attract them, you’ll get someone killed. Hence the need for no noise. During the meeting, the natives will tell each character of their own experiences. Their losses. The families they have left and how they’d do anything to keep them alive. They don’t know if you’ll be reset, but is that a risk you’re willing to take? The meeting will last a few hours and will end on a somber, ominous note - at the end of the month, they are taking everyone to meet them.

OOC
From your mods:

Please be mindful of content - if something triggery comes up or if it goes up a rating to say, something sexy, mark your threads in the subject line. We're very flexible and allow any material; we just want our players to be respectful of each other. If you have questions, pp the mod account, use the faq or comment to the appropriate post below. Have fun!

NAVIGATION

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Comments

his whole life is pain it's f i n e

[oorah]

[ he nods, figuring that to be the case. because mike told him about the bad men too, or at least of their existence. since he has no idea he was about to look like worse crap than he already does, it's easier to skip over the rest. ]

if anyone gives you any trouble, let me know.
i'll take care of it. [ he shows her his words and levels her with his gaze so she'll understand he's serious. ]

[waffler]

[She can't stop staring up at him. At least now she's looking up at him in awe rather than fear. She knows there's adults out there like Hopper and Joyce, ones that will help her. Ones she can trust. Hopper isn't here, and she isn't sure who she can trust.

But maybe she can rely on Frank. Maybe.]

Will you kill them?

[Because she can help him do that. Or help him hide the bodies, whatever. She's a versatile kid. And she shows him that by trying to discreetly use her powers to float her device up in the air for him to read the screen. Look what she can do!]

[oorah]

[ the question goes right through him. yes, he will, he thinks. without a thought. he shouldn't say that to this girl. where mike reminds him of an approximation of who frank jr. could have been, this girl is actually lisa's age. this feels all too personal all too suddenly. he shouldn't be honest with her, but he is anyway. it's his flaw. well, not his only. not by a mile. ]

if that's what it takes [ to keep you safe. ]

[waffler]

[Something about that makes her smile. Not in a creepy kid sort of way (which she's entirely capable of) but a touched kind of gesture. Yeah, she can trust Frank. She doesn't rely on other people to protect her, but she recognizes that there's a lot of things she doesn't understand. Her time with Hopper has made her at least understand that some simple things are okay. Like hugs when something good makes you happy. She awkwardly steps in and gives him a hug. He's one of her people now.]

[oorah]

[ o-oh. this girl is hugging him. not a drill!!! he looks uncomfortable at first, but definitely doesn't pull away. if anything, he leans into the contact, and slowly a hand comes up to rest on her back. he thinks that means she accepts him murdering anyone who looks at her funny. works 4 him ]

[waffler]

[Little does he know that she'll kill people for him too. It can just be a fun surprise that he gets to deal with one day. For now, she's just happy to find someone she can trust. She trusts Mike, of course, and he'll always be her priority. But they need someone like this guy, who clearly doesn't have a problem with bad things and violence. Someone like that will accept her when he realizes what she is. Girls with numbers for names don't deserve to have a family, she doesn't think. But that doesn't stop her from wanting to find and collect one anyway. His accepting her right now is enough to make her tear up.

When she pulls back she wipes at her eyes and tries to hide the fact her lip is trembling.
Stupid emotions, she never knows how to deal with them.]

[oorah]

[ oh god don't cry he'll cry. frank crouches down so they're eye level and puts a heavy hand on her shoulder. he wishes he could tell her it's going to be okay, but he doesn't know that. he doesn't know anything, even after two q&a sessions and a big town meeting that told them fuckall.

frank doesn't deserve a family either though, not after he lost his. maybe they can be something like each other's, for now. ]

[waffler]

[Her hand presses over his that's resting on her shoulder, and she can't help but cry a little. A few tears fall before she wipes them away, since she doesn't want to look like a little kid in front of him. She's not weak, and doesn't want him to think she is.

Me, she points to herself as she mouths the word. You, she reaches out to press her hand against his cheek. Team.

Team kill people if you have to.]

[oorah]

[ the way she presses her hand over his makes his heart seize up. it shows in his eyes how terrified he is, but there's nothing close to ridicule. his own eyes look wet when tears track down her face. nothing is happening to this girl ever. not here and not on his watch.

frank nods decisively with her hand still on his busted face. the pain doesn't even register when this is so pressing. he seems to understand all of it without further explanation. this is a language he understands. he's much better at intense eye contact than he ever could be at texting okay.

when enough time has passed, he slowly straightens back up, reluctantly typing again. ] i'm in house 6 garage. where are you?

[waffler]

[Oh. There's more words. She was hoping to just do the intense eye contact thing, she can do that. Words are harder. She reads his message and holds up two fingers. She's in house two. Bedroom, she silently says, looking him in the eye.

But wait. There's more. She holds up nine fingers next, and adds on with Mike. Sometimes she'll be in her own place, and other times Mike's room. That will make it really easy to find her, right?

But if he's in house six, that's easy to find. She can keep a close eye on him now that she knows where to find him.]

[oorah]

[ he nods and puts his device away, that's all he needed to know!!! intense eye contact can commence. or something. he gestures vaguely down the sandpath. does he want him to walk her home? or anywhere really he's open. ]

[waffler]

[Oh good the talking expectation is over. Eleven exhales silently in relief and starts to lead the way. She's a headstrong and independent little woman okay she knows where she's going. She motions with a wave of her hand for him to go with her. She's got some tables to see if he can help stack just right so a blanket fort can be built. It's a necessity.]

[oorah]

[ where mike wants to constantly talk to frank, eleven just wants to be. this suits his own silent nature better, and he smiles, easily falling into step with her. he's no stranger to strong ladies, even her age. his lisa was the same way, always dragging him from one place to the next. it isn't a chore the way he follows after her either. ]