quietplacelogs | INTRO LOG #1

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INTRO LOG #1

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

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

arrival;

[ frank doesn't care about his clothes, but his boots are much harder to part with. those boots had seen him through war, both overseas and stateside. through thick and thin. he wants to be angry, at having everything stripped away from him, again; but what comes instead is a cold complacency. an acceptance that no matter how much or how little he has, it will always be taken from him when he least expects it.

they tell him not to speak and he doesn't. frank didn't have anything to say anyway. he snatches the device they give him with a glower, slotting himself into the crowd to watch the woman's speech. and he watches her more than the screen, though he understands very little of what she's saying. he really doesn't care, and it really doesn't matter. he's merely moved from one prison and into another, so really? time to do what he does best.

survive.]

[ if approached by another new arrival, frank won't be very willing to engage. he types a generic message for anyone who might pester him too much. ] Go ask someone who gives a fuck. [ his face is badly bruised, but that's par for his course. it doesn't seem to bother him, though he hopes it makes it less likely for anyone to push him too far. ]

house six & the party;

[ he doesn't hesitate to claim the garage, though he has nothing but menacing looks to back himself up. in his defense, it is super menacing. this garage is his now, back the fuck off. once he's staked his claim, he ventures back out, noticing that people are starting to gather.

a native presses a photograph into his hands, and his breathing stutters. he could have anticipated a picture of his own family, the picture he kept by his bed for so long as a reminder. the same picture that's now pressed between his mattress and bedframe at home. no, this picture is of four people. a family just like his was, but still whole and alive and perfect. frank swallows and traces their faces, but if anyone comes up to him he'll hurriedly tuck it into his jumpsuit.

though he wants nothing more than to bail and go back to ignoring everyone, he's hungry. painfully so. he takes a jar of peaches and goes to sit as far from the crowd as he can manage to eat it. ]

moving in;

[ being a man of few needs himself, he keeps an eye out for people who need help carrying things, especially children and women. once he has a bed, a drafting table, and a bookcase in the garage he'll start carting things to and from town for everyone else like a workhorse. he doesn't wait to be asked or thanked, his own device is nowhere to be seen. if someone is struggling, he'll just pick up their items and start walking, expecting that they'll eventually show him where they go.

this lasts well into the evening and he's exhausted, not that it matters. he collapses under a shade tree near his house and tries to take his rest while he can get it. frank pulls out the little jar he'd gotten from hat guy and takes a swig. oh yeah, that's rough. he likes it. ]

sound eaters;

[ they're told they can talk during this big town meeting, but frank doesn't. he picks a seat in the back row and crosses his arms over his chest. monsters, cool. his favorite. when they start assigning partners he'll just slip out the back... no one will notice him!! shut up. for a silent place, there sure was a lot of human interaction. he's over it already. ]

[ If you're sat next to a kid with a face as bruised as Frank's, you're gonna earn some staring. Naturally Mike will look away whenever Frank catches him. Half of him is paying attention to the meeting, the other half is... well, making up a story in his head as to how the man got that way.

He's probably the only one with big enough balls (thirteen year old balls) to ask - or maybe he's just stupid (or maybe he knows he's young enough that if the guy decided to hit him, there had to be someone amongst the meeting who'd have his back).

He'll fearlessly lean towards Frank, eyes innocent, but his friends will know better. (Play the innocent act to ask a forward question - a technique that's proven to trick adults before.) ]

Did someone do that to you here? [ He gestures to Frank's face. ]

[ he doesn't react when mike sits next to him, though in his head he's already drawing comparisons. he can't help it, though it isn't his own kids on his mind. it's the faces of the children on the photograph, burning a hole in his pocket. is he more of a zach or a leo? when he leans in, mischief clear despite his attempts to seem innocent, frank has his answer.

it takes him a moment to process the question, still looking straight ahead with his arms crossed like he isn't listening. but he's listening to every word in the room, let alone ones made for him alone. technically, yes, billy is here. but frank shakes his head. ]

[ Mike was expecting a verbal answer, seeing as they're allowed to talk for the short while they're in the town hall and they might as well take advantage of that. Still, a shake of the head is better than no response.

Another minute passes, Mike seemingly focused on the meeting, looking straight ahead, then - ]

So what happened? [ Back to Frank again, his voice a whisper. ]

[ frank doesn't want to talk, he doesn't want to use his device. but mike is... this kid shouldn't be here, and that enrages him. rage is one step away from murder, but as these people keep telling everyone: make a sound and we're dead anyway. garbage.

he lets out a prolonged grunt in frustration, the sound already foreign to his ears after 24 hours of silence. he gives mike a look. annoyed, but not really, as he pulls out the weird little computer and types in a reply. ] You should see the other guy. [ it's not really a joke. billy's face looks MUCH much worse. at least back home. but mike doesn't have to know that. ]

frank castle | the punisher

sound eaters;

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moving in

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arrival;

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house six & the party

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sound eaters

yessssssss

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Sound eaters

doooooge friend /breathes on

Yeeeeessss, hello!

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