usir | Event #2: The Long Night

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🜙 Event Post #2: The Long Night, December 28th to January 5th Warning: Death and violence

	Nervous, frightened whispers spread across Idan. By word of mouth and courier, warnings that the Long Night has nearly arrived are sent out. Anasta's Shadow, the planet whose orbit lies between this one and its sun, will share a path with this planet for one week before they go their separate ways once more. During that time the far larger planet obscures the light and warmth the sun provides this world. This is nothing new to you. It has happened every year at this time since your birth and although the cold is treacherous and the dark inconvenient, in your time those were likely the only major threats you faced during the Long Night. The great dragon bonfires had always been kept lit by the trio of dragon guardians, their light and warmth keeping away the deadly freeze and the other horrors rumored to come with the darkness. Perhaps you remember the tales from your childhood, stories meant to scare children away from venturing too far on their own in the treacherous heart of winter. The long, cold week of darkness was likely filled with stories of people whisked away in the black cold, either never to be seen again or to be found mangled and frozen with looks of terror and agony forever etched on their lifeless faces. With the dragons ever present in your lifetime, you had never experienced the true horrors of the Long Night for yourself, even if you had witnessed a taste out in the world beyond the safety of the kingdom cities and villages. The true terror of the Long Night had not been experienced in full since the formation of the Elf-Dragon Alliance, many generations before your birth. The massive bonfires kept ever burning by the guardian dragons kept the towns and cities across all three kingdoms protected from the sheer dark and the deadly deep freeze of the week-long total eclipse. Now that the dragons are gone there is simply not enough magic to create the powerful, lasting bonfires that once sheltered the three kingdoms and kept out the dark and the worst of the cold. From the warmth and safety of a hearth, it is easy to dismiss the frightened whispers of Idan's current population as superstition, at least until the sun 'sets' on the night of the 27th, swallowed behind the looming shadow of the larger planet. As night approaches on the 27th, the world goes red. Only slivers of sunlight escape around the far edge of Anasta's Shadow, bathing the world in an eerie crimson until the planet's massive shape in the sky blocks out the sun entirely, plunging Idan into near complete shadow. With the light consumed, the shrieks and howls begin. Starting up like the roar of an angry wind, they grow louder and more twisted the closer they come. Within hours the howls and shrieks are mixed with a sound like metal grinding across glass. Windows are covered in sheets of cracked and spidered ice. Chimneys without lit fires begin to fill with screeching, clawing noises and an unsettling and unfamiliar clicking noise that rises and falls like an unknown language. The sounds outside begin to shift and change, as more human shrieks join the unsettlingly monstrous ones, and the crying sob of a young child, hiccuping in fear, breaks up the brief moments of silence. It's just beyond the door, or just out of sight beside the window, then silence, and the howling and scraping start anew. Now and then an eerie red glow shines through ever more solid ice caking the windows, and they briefly steam up as something living exhales a heated breath against the pane. Citizens within earshot or courier distance warn those who seek answers to stay away and avoid seeking out the source of the sounds. They caution that the answers are not worth the risks and warn that anyone outside cannot be saved. If they're out there, they're already dead. If you insist on going, they'll tell you not to leave the safety of hearth and fire without a torch in hand or your chances of surviving will drop from slim to none. Pay heed to the cautions of those more experienced than you in this new horror or you will not survive the long, harsh night and the ever more unsettling noises it brings.
🜙 Weather

	The cold fluctuates between -18 to -32C (0 to -25F) during the Long Night. At these temperatures, the risk of frostbite and hypothermia are greatly increased and without proper precautions, a person could experience frostbite in 10-30 minutes when exposed to the elements. In addition to this, wind, sleet, and snow periodically drop the temperatures further. The weather may be the least of your worries, however, as the cold is far from the most dangerous threat the Long Night brings with it.
🜙 Creatures

	The creatures that emerge during the Long Night are nearly all horrors rarely or never seen beyond this week of frozen darkness. The only exceptions to this are the Tundra Manticore and the Greater Bearbat which can be rarely found living in the highest points of the mountain caves and peaks where the weather remains icy year-long. Tundra Manticore: They share little in common with their lower mountain counterparts beyond their violent disposition. Their bodies glow from within due to the venom stored in their abdomen. They can secrete this deadly venom from their mouths or their barbed tails. The venom is said to burn like liquid fire and causes severe burns on contact. They live only in the coldest parts of Idan due to the significant heat generated by their venom that would cook them from the inside out in warmer climates. They consume ice and snow to maintain an internal temperature balance and if that balance is thrown off the combustible venom within them causes them to burst into flames. As a result, they are terrified of fire. They are silent stalkers and lone hunters. Greater Bearbat: Greater Bearbats are sound-based hunters that descend from their mountain homes, attracted by the shrieks of the shade imps. They are indiscriminate hunters, content to eat wayward travelers or other monsters without concern for what prey they catch in their long claws. They run on four limbs while hunting and will rarely take to the skies unless in pursuit of flying prey. Sound and heat deter them and light will blind them. Shade Imps: Seekers and servants of the Darkener, these monstrous shade imps can take a multitude of forms (Crawlers, Scouts, & Hounds) and shift between them at will. They are completely blind and travel as silent as the shadows they melt in and out of. They hunt through scent, sound, and taste, searching for traces of blood and fear on the air. When they aren't hunting, they communicate with other imps via ear-piercing shrieks or gut-churning howls, going silent only when they locate their prey. Their silence is more dangerous than the sounds they make. They recoil from fire but grow increasingly more determined the longer they are kept at bay, eventually overcoming their fear and attacking the source of the fire to attempt to extinguish it at the cost of their own lives. When fire touches them they go up in a puff of black smoke and a scream. Darkling: No one knows what darklings look like. They are the lost spirits of elementals consumed and controlled by the Darkener. They have no physical form and can control and manipulate shadows and sound. They mimic sounds to trick people into opening their homes or venturing out of safety and can perfectly replicate any sound they have heard, even capturing the voices of people speaking on the other side of walls. Their goal is to lure or force people out into the darkness where the Darkener can find them. They can be disrupted with light. Bayobat: Swarms of flying bat-like insects summoned by the Darkener. They have sharp, metal proboscises they use to pierce victims before consuming their blood. They are blind and seek out warm-blooded bodies to launch themselves at. Their screeches are metallic and mixed with insectoid clicking. Their bodies are sharp and metallic but their mouths are vulnerable. Their tails are lined with tiny, sharp spikes similar to barbed wire. They fear fire. The Darkener: An ancient being that is thought to come from the Outer Realm. The Darkener consumes flames with a touch, transforming them into shadow flames that burn black, giving off no heat or warmth. It possesses long-forgotten magic. Few have seen more than a glimpse. It causes temporary blindness in all who witness it, their eyes turning black with trapped shadows. Its image lingers in the mind, causing hallucinations. Those who witness it are often driven mad, growing increasingly certain the Darkener is watching them from the corner of their vision. It can be struck but doing so only causes darkness to erupt from the wound, consuming the Darkener and everything around it. There is only one Darkener.

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INDOORS

[ When Rey came to stay at the Tree Inn, it was only because she liked being by the water. Of course, you can't make it out anymore. The darkness has swallowed that too. She stares out the window all the same, as if waiting for the frost to set in on it, frowning against the black, enchanted by it in place of the flames that keep them safe within.

She can hear the scraping and the screaming, impossible to ignore. The people within seem to try and occupy themselves to drown it out. For Rey, it seems an impossible task: ignoring the people without who need their help.

Survival keeps her rooted to her spot. She'd drive herself mad, sitting here, unable to ignore it but equally unable to put herself in harm's way like that when she's worked so hard just to keep alive. What would the point of it all have been, if she died now?

So when someone gets up to leave, she's on her feet too. It doesn't matter if they heard a darkling or if they have a patrol watch, Rey is firm when anyone announces intentions to leave the safety of the inn: ]

You can't.

INTO THE NIGHT

[ She's heard the voice of any number of familiar people out in the dark, many of whom are people just like her, resurrected, and who it would be easy to imagine had some kind of shade walking around in the dark. They shouldn't be alive. They're wrong. It wouldn't be hard to picture that some evil thing had come back with them, with their faces.

So be it Kylo or Jon, none of their voices can rouse her from her spot.

But there was a girl in the city who she'd helped with Jon Snow. A shiftling girl, a cat, and when Rey hears her chattering quietly on the other side of the inn's back door while she's in the kitchen, and it's all over then. Rey picks up one of the innkeeper's knives — she'll apologize for it later, of course — and makes her way to the door very slowly. ]

Hello?

[ Rey. Says the voice. It knows her name. It has to be the girl. Anything else doesn't make sense. She's out there alone and afraid, maybe with her brother already eaten, maybe with him lost and hoping Rey can help reunite them again.

She's out the door an instant later, but the voice has grown distant then. ]

HELLO?! [ Rey shouts it into the distance. ] No! You're going the wrong way! Follow my voice! [ It's too dark, of course, to make her way by sight. ]

WILDCARD

[ ooc; feel free to hit me on plurk (protects) or disco for a special prompt, or just wing it and I'll go with it. ]

[Alucard's Long Night has been one of gentle contemplation. Sleeping with a big fluff ball of a wolf curled beside him. Consideration of so many things that have happened in the past month. Doing the duties of tending to the fire and accepting his turn in retrieving wood for when it is absolutely required.

He has also listened to all mutters around the Inn. Has paid careful attention to the talk, and noted when someone is stupid enough to entertain the idea of going out. The inn shouts the idea down as quick as can be, and there are a few voices he picks out as ones he has encountered before. Rey numbers among them.

So when someone says, "I think I just heard a door," and the front door is still very clearly bolted, there is a flurry of movement from those who think themselves brave enough to go out, or at least mildly curious to see who is stupid enough to do this. Alucard, admittedly, is not sure which camp he falls into, but it is a concerning thing none the less.

Once in the kitchens, the question of who did this becomes clear: one of those who had been preventing the attempts of others to depart. There are murmurs of "it gets the best of us."

There's enough light in the kitchen that it spills out into the winter night. Just enough. Just enough that it seems Rey's safe enough. That it's safe enough for others to crowd the door to try and reign her in.]

Whoever you believe it is, it is not!

[There's a calmness in spite of all the urgency happening in this moment.]

I met her.

[ Rey's voice is steady and certain, staring out into the dark without flinching, without even turning back to Alucard. It's everything she can do to hesitate, not to plunge into the darkness immediately. ]

I know her. It's her. She's just a child.

[ A small thing, fragile, afraid, still healing. She will not survive out in the night like this, not with those creatures out there and their scraping and their howling. ]

She needs help.

[Alucard recalls the stubbornness from earlier conversation. There's going to be no yelling back sense into someone so certain of what they have heard. A child no less. There is trickery (if you must, then come in and take a flame before you go), and then there...well. At least bridging honesty in assessment.]

And you're zero use with only what you're wearing on.

[As if for emphasis, there's a bitter cold gust that comes in from the south. Someone hisses just behind Alucard that the wind nearly threatened their flames, and really, Alucard's not above bodily dragging someone inside at the moment if an open door threatens the flame so.]

[ He's right.

Kark him, but he's right. She's shivering already against the cold, which is the worst she's ever felt, a nightmare of a chill that pierces to her very bones. It would be worth it if she could just quickly pull that girl inside. Rey had charged into a burning building for her, surely a cold night was no different.

But it is not just any cold night. Even as Rey grapples with it, considers that the child is likely freezing too, she has to admit that there's no saving someone else until she looks after herself. She has been the one sharing that logic with others.

She looks back over her shoulder at Alucard, grief in her expression because it's not just about this girl but about the girl that Rey used to be, warring with her resolve. ]

I don't have anything else. [ But others in the inn, might. And they might be convinced to part with it. Not going isn't an option at this point — she will have signed that girl's death warrant herself, if she did that. ]

[That's an ambigious statement at the best of times. At the worst of times, it's the kind of thing that speaks to sheer brazen and willful disregard for one's safety, and the safety of everyone else involved.

One last attempt to handle this without physical action.]

There's enough things inside to be lent, but the wind is threatening all.

[Because it is getting worse. The bitterness stings the eye, and Alucard flinches from that. He can see grief, he knows it well, it is a long unwanted companion in his life, but there has always been enough to temper it. (Some of it is simply knowing how grief can end. His father was a stunning example of it.)]

[ That seems to wake something up in her. Rey's eyes flicker back inside, considering the fire, and —

Damn.

She turns around fully to head back inside, but as she comes up alongside Alucard, she says: ]

Only to get thicker clothes. And weapons.

[ And then she'll be back out again, the door shut behind her. Committed. She won't endanger the rest of the inn by any means, but neither will she give up on that girl. ]

Hm.

[It is a very noncommittal response. Because to agree would be to lie brazenly, and Alucard is not going to be accused of that. What he will happily be accused of is trying to lure someone back inside and refusing to open the door again.

Which really means that the second Rey is inside is the red hot second the door is shut. Shut and bolted and Alucard braces his back against all of the locks, his wolf animus beside him.]

[ She trusts him. So she doesn't look back at him until she hears the lock snap, and even then, she assumes it must be temporary until she looks back at him. There she stands, staring at the way he presses himself against the door, barring it. Stubbornly. Knowing she meant to collect things — clothing, weapons — and still barring the space.

It sinks in then. And it's written in her face that she understands, now. ]

I'm not staying in here while she's out there. I'll go through you if I have to.

You have been shouting down every single person fool enough to respond to a noise and remind them that these things trick the mind.

[His arms are hanging at his side. The threat of a fight does not remotely cause him to bat an eye. This is a kitchen, he's happy to improvise with the equipment present.]

Why are you the exception to your own rule?

Because it's not a trick. I told you, I know her.

[ She growls it out through gritted teeth. Rey had promised the girl she'd keep her safe. If there's even a chance that it's really her out there, alive and screaming, then she has to try. She has to try. (No one would have tried for Rey.) ]

Is that an absolute truth, that it isn't a trick? Because from every single reaction to those voices I've witnessed, that same certainty you have now was shared by those reaching for the locks on the windows and doors.

[His eyes narrow just a bit. He's perfectly ready for an attack if it happens.]

Do you hear that voice now?

[ The noise she makes is a disgruntled, smothered thing that recognizes that he has made himself very difficult to argue against. Rey cannot quantify instincts the way that he has quantified experience, and it leaves her frustrated. ]

I — No. [ Admittedly, but she barrels straight through the answer he wants her to provide (the truth) and into her own justification. ] But she obviously got drawn away by one of those creatures before I could get to her. That's why I have to go out and find her. I'm not asking anyone else to come with me.

[Being seventy five has it's perks some days.]

Obviously. [He has caught that Rey responds to reason. So that is the angle he shall keep pushing.]

Did you see tracks in the snow? Ones that would be appropriate for a young girl in snow this deep?

[ It's a hideous thing to corner her on because way down deep the answer to her stubbornness is that she's simply more willing to risk her life than others' because she doesn't believe it's as valuable. That fewer people will notice her gone or miss her. But confronting that is beyond her, so she twists herself into knots to justify her defensiveness without logic to support it.

To that end, she's desperately afraid of leaving that girl to the same fate. To not being important enough. Even if it means succumbing to a trick. ]

I didn't look. [ She would have seen them. Even without looking for them specifically, she'd have seen them. Rey notices things like that. ] Get out of my way and we'll see.

No.

[There, that's the full of it. He isn't moving, and this is a good enough fight to pick. Stubbornness is a good trait to have, but too much just leads to death. The inevitable conclusion of this if Rey is permitted to step outside again.

Alucard can't guess the deeper meaning for this stubbornness. He has no reason to oppose this other than the sense that this Inn shouldn't lose any occupants for the Long Night. Whatever the damage to the kitchen is, he will pay for it.]

If there is a body out there when this all concludes, I will accept that blood on my hands.

You'll accept responsibility, and she'll still be dead.

[ It's not good enough. ]

Move.

[ It has the tune of a final warning to it. She's doing the math in her head over whether or not she can take him. Rey has tussled with larger foes before, people who wanted to rob her of what she had salvaged for her boss. The kitchen is a cramped space. She's smaller than he is. Maybe it'll mean an advantage, if she can get a weapon first. ]

[Alucard doesn't move an inch. The wolf beside him doesn't either, although she's tenser than he is. Just by a hair.]

She's lived through these before. Don't doubt her own ability to survive.

[Don't pick this fight.]

[ Character flaw #1.5: a natural extension of stubbornness is prideful reluctance to let go of a stance she has previously adopted. So even as his words clearly find purchase, softening her gaze, she stands there in a stand-off with him for some time longer, fists balled.

Don't doubt her ability to survive.

When Rey's aware she's projecting onto this girl, it makes it easy to snap back that Alucard shouldn't doubt Rey's ability either, but ... It's true. If the girl is like Rey, and she certainly is, then she's fine. She'll make her way. She'd never needed anybody to swoop in and rescue her.

(The girl had, during the fire. She'd been so small, barely breathing, that cat. It's surely an outlier.)

Rey huffs out a breath and glances away, silent. Now that she can sense they are staying inside, Kira emerges from inside Rey's tunic, a ruffle of feathers and quiet chirping as she picks her way up onto Rey's shoulder to peck at loose threads of Rey's hair. ]

Stop that. [ She grumbles it dismissively, brushing Kira off. The cold is gone, yes. Kira is safe to emerge, tiny magpie that she is, but — It's insult to injury, drawing unwanted attention to her surrender. ]

rey | ota

Into the night

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I do apologize for him

bless him

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Indoors

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Indoors

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