come_sailaway | Welcome To The Village

Who: Everyone who was signed-up for the excursion
What: The Village December Excursion
When: Dec 1st - Dec 23rd
Where: The Village
Warnings: Involuntary capture and confinement including immobilization and restraints, violence, injury, maiming, possibility of death, torture, coercion, gaslighting, mind control, drugging, scientific experiments, and extremely inaccurate depictions of mental health facilities/hospitals, among other potentially triggering themes. Please mark all threads appropriately.

"Good morning, good morning, good morning!" A voice that sounds very similar to Friday's chirps over a loudspeaker outside your character's home. Yes, their home.

Overnight, all the passengers who signed up for this excursion have been transported to their very own personal cottages. They will awake in a bed that is familiar to them. While this home of theirs does not necessarily have to resemble the place they were born or raised, it will be a perfect replica of a place they truly thought of as their home, down to the most minute details.

The cottages are self-contained, the size of a large studio apartment so, in some cases, they may only resemble the bedroom and living room of a person's home with a shrunken-down kitchenette and bathroom adjoined. But the heirlooms of their past are here. A favorite doll? A treasured family portrait? Trinkets you have long forgotten about? All of them will be here, somehow. (All except for weapons, that is.) They are indistinguishable from the real item, down to the molecule.

After that wake-up call, the voice continues on to express that the weather will be warm and sunny, with no rain forecasted. A brass band concert is announced, to start at noon on the lawn next to the living chess set. And once that bit of news is wrapped up, lively marching band music will begin to play. And it will continue to play. All day. From every speaker...including the ones hidden in their home.

Welcome to Your Village

It only gets stranger from here. Characters may be dismayed to find that they are without any of their original clothes or belongings. They awake in conservative button-up pajamas. The closet in their home is full of the latest Village Fashion to choose from. Everything is The Village label brand, including the tin cans of food that stock the kitchen and any of the groceries you could get at the General Store.

Your ship phone rings. When you answer it, you will be greeted, once again, by the voice of Friday. "Your number, please? Of course, you have a number. Look at your badge." If they look down at their chest, they will discover a small round number badge has been pinned to their pajamas. Was that there before? It bears the symbol of a Penny-farthing Bicycle, with a number in the spokes. This is their number.

"No names here," the voice of Friday chides, "Only numbers. Number 2 would like a word with you at the Green Dome. He requests you come for breakfast. Thank you!" Before they can protest further, the line goes dead.

Some Notes:

No matter how many times your character tries to take off and disregard their number badge, they will always find it re-attached to their clothes again the moment they look away and look back.

Your characters still have their phones but now they can only make calls instead of sending texts. They also do not take or store photographs anymore.

If your character destroys or damages anything in their home, or in The Village it will instantly repair the way things used to on the Serena Eterna.

The noise from the speakers can be muffled by covering it with pillows or other creative items, but cannot be stopped entirely. (Sorry Phil)

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

There's a split second where Darcy first feels the effect of sheer hilarity. The very thing she insulted Darcy for, being dead, meaning that the crushing feeling against their lungs doesn't kill them. Ha ha.

Then they very quickly remember that their lungs are not empty, and up comes fetid sea water, thick and viscous from where it's sat in their lungs. They scramble, choking, desperately grabbing in where they recalled Rita's direction to make it stop.

The thick liquid spews onto the wall just to her left, a splatter hitting Rita's shirt, to which she immediately shrieks at not just the smell but the entire indignity. "Ew--disgusting! Seriously?!"

Her darkness magic is about to fade, but despite being angry and grossed out in almost equal measure, there's nevertheless a cold feeling settling in Rita's chest. Darcy is clearly--unlike her, of course--out of their mind right now, and they're not going to back down until one of them is dead. It doesn't matter if Rita tries to lose them in the chaos, doesn't matter if she breaks their nose this time--that won't be enough to end this.

"Ugh--fine! Fine--have this your way, you-!" She clicks her tongue, decision made. She flips to a different page and chants, "O dancing water!"

Just in time for the darkness magic to clear, she aims a geyser to form at Darcy's feet. Her hand has a tight-knuckled grip on the sigil book as she follows it up by repeating the icicle spell for good measure.

Edited 2024-01-03 00:08 (UTC)

The last time Darcy was locked up in a hospital, their physical state deteriorated to the point where basic tasks were too much for their lack of strength. It took a year to recover fully, the feeling of being so weak being the only thing motivating them to go through with it.

Darcy hasn't eaten in a week over fear of drugging, has felt their strength leave them bit by bit, and now- lacking any weaponry, any powers from the lack of plasm, injured and exhausted and starving-

They are going to die.

Darcy's throat shreds with the scream as an icicle impales them, scrabbling insensible and animal to try and get away from it, the feeling of water dredging them through a panic. Are they going to drown again? It's so cold, they're already cold but this is a cold indistinguishable from the pain of being fucking stabbed, everything hurts, every thing hurts, they're cold and it's dark and the waters of the Rhône wiped every last bit of warmth from them-

"Da-" they gurgle through blood and seawater, far too late.

As it turns out, despite the discussion she had with Fever not long ago, death by magic can be awfully messy, too. There's no joy in this; Rita averts her eyes but it doesn't erase the sound--almost like that scream suddenly distanced all the other noise around them, and she hears wet squelching of flesh and scraping against ice.

She wishes she hadn't heard whatever that gurgle was supposed to be, because she has a sneaking suspicion, and it sits like a pit of cold flame in her stomach.

Ugh.

This is going to be such a pain tomorrow.

Welcome To The Village

2/2, cw is it emeto if it comes from your lungs?

DICEPARSER CALLS FOR BLOOD

cw ref to previous psychiatric institutionalization, starvation, straight up death, etc

rip...poor darcy