[MINGLE] Wendi-go-go to the inn

[sixthiteration]

WHERE: 6I Village and Inn
WHEN: 27-31 July
OPEN TO: ALL - Mingle
NOTES: The Wendigo threatening the village will be killed mid 28 July, with a Blue Lily, per these threads. Plot details here. Note: The final fight is close enough to be seen from the upstairs inn windows.
WARNINGS: Wendigo attack mingle, please warn in comment headers if discussing violence, gore, or related trauma. Possible mentions of character death.

---

The urgent warnings come from villagers returning south from the lake: a creature twice the size of a man, antlered and voracious. Larger than any they've seen on the plains, stalking its way to the main village. Some might have their own names for this hunger in a skin of shadow; others might remember that it was the first to claim a life, in their village's short history.

Whatever context one has for it, best to secure all pets and loved ones before it arrives. With weapons and food stores at the inn, the call goes out to gather — And to bring back any tools, because there's no telling what doors and windows can do to stop such a creature.

Comments

[OTA] 28 July - Post Wendigo Fight - CW Mentions of character death, blood

[underpinnings]

If he's learned anything, it's that you can't really prepare for death. Run the numbers, sure. Be ready to have less than you started with, know certain jobs are going to have to shift around a gap. Back home, you had to be ready to reduce that number yourself, when death was kinder than letting a man loose with the infection spreading through him.

He's seen enough good people warped by it, turned on friends or family, Owen doesn't really believe in souls. Personality connects to biology. Alter one and the other goes with it.

Lose enough blood, the whole system drops like a puppet on strings.

For all he'd burned his hands sliding right back down the rope, for all he'd run to the fountain park when Peeta dropped, he's one of the first to leave when the worst is confirmed. There's work to be done, and no reason for anyone to want to do it. No reason for anyone to want to watch him get that leg for the next person who needs it, no way he trusts his hands on the contraption in their state. Instead he walks the capsule back to the inn, pushing against the flow of people out into the yard.

This is why he went out there, and not somebody else. It should be cut and dry: they volunteered, they all could have died, it happened to Peeta. Still feels like failure, when he smooths the blue paper across the blackboard, lines and type gone blurry to his eyes. He went so someone like Peeta wouldn't have to.

Heroes are dead men walking.

Whatever the fuck that makes him: the new note posted, dug out of the animal's guts, Owen lets his hands fall back to their cramped curves, splintered hooks at the ends of his arms. He walks up the stairs and stands in the empty bathroom, bloody hands in the sink, staring at the tap like he's forgotten how to turn it on.

[markwatney]

Jesus.

You know, I was there the last time this happened. There aren't all that many of us left generally, and I'm the last man standing from the group that tracked the thing back into the woods. I'd taken my turns hauling its stinking carcass back to the village, too — Our absolutely meaningless prize, won too late.

And now we're right back here again, another stinking carcass and a sweet, soft-hearted boy laying dead on the lawn.

This is supposed to be what I'm good at, the picking up one foot and putting it in front of the other part. But that doesn't make it easy.

I trail Owen upstairs, and hesitate a moment in the open door before I swallow back the things I don't have time for right now and step forward.

"Sit down," I gently say, pointing at the lid of the toilet and open up one of the cupboards to find a washcloth.

[borneinblood]

It's the blood that catches Druitt's attention, mostly. And even that is only by chance; once the creature had fallen there'd been nothing else for him to do. Nothing but the slow churn of the rage he'd almost forgotten since his arrival. True, it's still quiet, but the standards he's come to grow used to, but it'll still be a while yet before it settles down to its usual baseline, and far better that he wait that out on his own. Where he won't have to worry about someone fanning the flames of that rage.

And then there's the unmistakable tang of blood in the air, and without really thinking about it he stops at the door to the bathroom. Near enough that he can speak to the young man stand at the sink, but not so near as to make it seem like he's trying to encroach on his space.

(Of course, Druitt has a tendency to loom even on a good day, but just at the moment he's doing what he can to keep it at something of a minimum.)

"I take it something didn't go as planned?"

Standing where he is, he can't quite see the expression on Owen's face. But it's clear that the blood isn't his own, and he suspects that if something hadn't gone a little wrong somewhere that he wouldn't be staring blankly at the sink besides.

OTA - Danny Rand

[theimmortalweapon]

SUDDEN ATTACK

Danny had been awake and meditating in his room when the shouts had sounded and the creature had come limbering towards the inn. He wanted to help but he ended up inside of the inn with little way to really do anything. People were boarding up the widows and working to get the inn ready for what appeared to be a siege and Danny was at a loss of what to do.

His instincts told him to race out there and fight the thing one on one. Someone should really stop him.

AFTERMATH

"Fuck." Danny didn't swear often but sometimes it was the only way to describe how he felt about a situation.

The inn had been attacked and he was still trying to wrap his head around why it had happened. Was this one of those weird situations where their kidnappers messed with them? Sam had mentioned something like that but he'd thought that was weather based or something. He had been frustratingly stopped from running outside of the inn to try and help when the larger creature attacked. It was true that he had known nothing about the beast, had no weapon and would have likely got in the way but Danny's pride took a hint.

The creature was gone and hopefully it had taken all of the smaller Wendigo's with it.

It had left damage in its wake. Danny began to help where he could though he really had no idea if there was anything that he could do. He wasn't too good at wood working, unless it involved breaking things, and his other skills would be useless.

He tried anyway, and could absolutely use some instruction on the best way to help since he's likely doing it wrong.

Aftermath

[thegreatexperiment]

Sam, on the other hand, used the word 'fuck' a lot. To the point where there were some moments when she wondered what the point of other words in the English language was. Fuck was versatile. It was concise. It was an adjective and an adverb and a noun and, on very rare occasions in Sam's life, even a verb.

Oddly enough, she wasn't swearing as she walked along the bank of the river. She wasn't even talking. Mostly, she was just examining the damage with the cold, detached eyes of a scientist. Maybe channeling Avery a little bit.

What kind of creature was it?

How did it do this, that, or the other thing?

What kind of lore was there hidden in the cobwebby recesses of her memories that might align to what she'd seen?

Not that it mattered. Why should it? Their fucking Overlords--oh, look, there was her favorite word again--would do whatever they wanted to do and it didn't have to follow any rules. Sam's curiosity was passive. Nothing she could act on. Certainly nothing she could use. Just knowledge for its own sake.

But a creature of a different sort caught her attention, as she made her way to a clearing where she sometimes liked to sketch. Danny Rand. Wearing a shirt this time, although looking no less frustrated. She was reasonably sure he was 'Ironclad' on the network, which brought a slight smirk to her lips. "That doesn't sound very Zen," she said, picking her way through the tall grass, over to him.

29th probably

[oorah]

Though his hair is nearly five months grown out from its usually cross-cropped military style, and his stubble is starting to build its way into a beard, Frank's face is still highly recognizable even without the bruises he almost always carries like a badge across it. He's wearing a thicker jacket than one might for the weather, jeans and boots just a little out of size. He's currently working away at a window repair on the outside of the Inn, one nail in his hand and one in between his teeth as he hammers the frame back into shape with soft, sharp taps like he's afraid to really bang on the thing. He's been here for just over four weeks now, but before this he was in a place where monsters roamed freely and would strike you down for so much as a cough. It makes him cautious where noise is concerned, and it means that he needs a distraction from the whole Wendigo... incident.

For once, he isn't surrounded by dogs, thinking they're probably safer inside even with that thing slain. There are more out there, it's just more of the same. He doesn't notice Danny there at first, but the familiar feeling of hair raising on the back of his neck is telltale enough. Goddamn super powers. He spits the nail at the ground before turning on his heel to deal the other man a healthy glare, about to give him a lecture about sneaking up on people when he realizes he hasn't seen him here before.

"New?"

Inn

[ataashihunter]

"Ironfist." The Bull reaches out to grab Danny's arm and pull him back. "Where do you think you're going?" He moves so he is between Danny and the door. "You're not going out there. We don't have any weapons to fight that thing." He keeps his hand on Danny to keep him at arm's length.

aftermath

[morphogenia]

It hurt not being able to go big and crush the thing. Kamala isn't used to being powerless. She knows a strategy when she sees one. She makes the choice not to interfere. The consequences are terrible, of course. Kamala isn't arrogant enough to blame herself for them even if she mourns someone she never even met all the same.

One thing Reims taught her is how to move on even when your heart is breaking. It also taught her how to always be useful. That's why she is tapping the shoulder of a guy she doesn't know. She may not know him, but she sees that look in her eyes enough to know what it means. He's trying to help too. More importantly, he lives here probably so he can find stuff for her. "Where do they keep the broom? We need to sweep this up before someone gets hurt."

[OTA] 28 July - Kira Akiyama + Bethany The GOAT

[3ofswords]

Having been so rudely set to gather up the masses (really, who was benefiting now from kicking his bucket of peaches out of his hands), Kira's been too busy to really settle into the horror of it all. In the movie about this place, this is the point where they'd be locked in long enough to finally turn on each other; instead, it's a day and a half of close quarters and constant noise. People tearing apart the inn to fortify doors and windows. People raiding supplies to, presumably, have something to do.

People failing to sleep while the creature bangs around in the night, searching for those missing or those animals left behind.

Aurora might as well make the inn cellar her vacation home; Hoshi is a rogue agent who does what he wants these days, and Kira isn't terribly worried about a bird right now. When the sleepless night and tense day gets to him, out of distractions and unable to get word from or about more than half a dozen villagers--he pulls his goat out from the cellar to appease the jitter setting up shop in his sternum. She's getting bigger over the summer months, well-fed by lawn duty, but she's still young enough to heft up with a little work.

As the creature is pronounced dead along with one of their own, and the hunters start dragging themselves back in, Kira can be found at the blackboard with an entire goat, wrapped in both arms and held on his hip like a toddler. He's looking at the blue page stuck up on the board with a bloody hand print, so engrossed he hasn't pushed Bethany back from chewing up the collar of his shirt.

[Closed] 28 July - Frank and Kira - House 6

[3ofswords]

He tells himself it's because it's on his way home, but there are also people still missing, people confirmed lost in the attack. He could send a message, but then there'd be the period of waiting, and not knowing if Frank simply didn't feel like getting on his watch in the wake of tragedy, or if he physically couldn't for some stupidly dire reason.

Not that there's a lot Kira can do with stupidly dire, except push on until he's face down in the snow with a head wound, or staring down at a dark city from an empty penthouse.

People get lucky until they don't. Skill just evens the odds, sometimes.

By his longstanding count, it's only the third person they've officially lost. Kira has his own ideas about what it means, when someone disappears--maybe less of an idea now that the training wheels are off and the world feels like it has physical rules, again. But even after last night--after a month of storms and days of earthquakes, there aren't bags of bodies heaped in the field, waiting to be dumped in a mass grave.

He tried that logic, wandering out from the boarded up inn. This is the first dead body I've ever seen. It didn't make him feel anything; it didn't make him forget whatever story he's been told, made to live, about before.

Heedless of what else might stalk the village paths, Kira hefts Bethany on his hip and marches down the row. Frank is close enough, his goat has barely started to protest being carried when he knocks on the door.

"Frank," he calls, using his other hip to see if the door swings on his weight. "If you're not home I'm going to feed your conspiracy wall to the goat. I know it's just drawings of Karen with all of her new acquaintances."

OTA - Lyanna Stark

[iron_beneath_beauty]

The Attack

She had fallen asleep in her new room at the inn, having left everything bundled and unpacked. Her spirit was too weary to think about doing anything other than resting, the pain throbbing in her heart like scalding wound. She had lost track of the hours when the sudden cacophony of shouts and cries jolted her up in bed.

Without thinking, she grabbed her bow and quiver of arrows, running down the stairs. Others were barricading the doors and window, a few people perched and guarding their spots. Her sleepy eyes scanned the room, uncertain and bracing herself for any form of attack.

"What is it? What's happening?" She asked, notching an arrow to her bowstring.

Aftermath

Windows had been broken and doors nearly knocked down. There had been a feeling of electricity in the air, the sort that came from a battle or the encroaching presence of death. Adrenaline had woken her up, to the point that she wasn't sure she would be able to sleep again.

She searched around the crowds, looking for those she knew and assessing how they managed. There was no family to worry over, but there were friends. There was talk about someone being injured, but she didn't recognize the name.

"I haven't seen anything like this before," she said, toeing the beast apprehensively. It had taken a lot of injury to finally bring it down.

Margaery Tyrell

[thekittenqueen]

Closed to Karen

Her first instinct when the alarm was raised was to grab what weapons she could and race to her animals. The jailhouse was safe and mostly secure, save for a wooden door, but this creature was similar to the one that had lurked in the village before. They had lost someone to this creature and it had slaughtered animals before that. It wouldn't take much for him to smell her flock and try to get an easy meal.

She wasn't a warrior, but she was prepared to put herself between the wendigo and her animals. She spread her ax, machete and the knife that Robb had given her during her trek through the woods. She had seen a shadow on the edge of the field, racing towards the jail. It wouldn't be long now.

Karen was the only person she had seen outside, passing nearby just as the creature was coming closer. "Get inside!" She barked at her. "Hurry!"

Closed to Logan

The door had nearly been battered in. Glass was scattered over the floor and she had her fair share of cuts and blood. Karen had emerged whole, and Margaery had made sure to check on her, something shared during that event. Only then did she step outside to get an idea of where the beast went. Much to her surprise and relief, Logan was racing towards her. Had the wendigo been lured away by something else or had he scared it away?

She smiled, the shock of the event bleeding away to fear and tearful alleviation. She sheathed Robb's knife, a smear of blood being left on her skirts. "Logan!" She called to him, hurrying to his side as she carefully scanned him. He hadn't been attacked as far as she could see between the rain and the dark.

"Are you all right?" She glanced back at the jail. The door needed to be repaired quickly.

OTA - Aftermath

With the jail as secured as it was going to be, Margaery rushed over to the inn where most of the village had huddled against the attacks. The damage was minimal but people were shaken and run ragged. She had seen this sort of creature before, having noticed those shadows during the journey to find the lichen.

Staring at it now, it rattled her and how close they came to being mauled apart. There was talk of another pod being inside it, similar to like the one before. She signed, still shaking from adrenaline. First the quakes and now this, it was too much.

"Was anyone hurt?"

[digging]

Karen knows about the last time this happened, of course. She knows about the animal attacks and the girl who died, knows about the group who went after the thing and killed it. She knows about Frank standing over a dead body with blood on his hands, because there had been a girl who had documented everything, even that, and she knows, too, that she's the second Karen to come through this place.

She's not looking to leave the way the last one did.

There's been something wrong since the earthquake, word of the herds out in the grasslands being terrorized. It's been a worry, the information picking restlessly in the back of her mind, but she wasn't here last time and wouldn't know if it all felt familiar. When the urgent message blinks through on her watch today, she realizes maybe they all should have known a little better.

She'd been on her way back home, Aretha at her side, and is running at full pelt now, the roads soft from all the rain and spraying out mud from boots and paws. Ahead of them, a shadowy figure hulks into the path, and she skids to a halt, heart hammering in her throat, briefly frozen until Margaery's shouts pierce the fog of her fear.

Aretha's bristling, teeth bared, but she follows instantly when Karen bolts for the jailhouse door, the shadow surging suddenly after them.

OTA - Circe

[pharmakis]

Under Attack

Without her magic, she was useless. For the first time since her early years, she could do nothing but watch as more experienced warriors took control. She could think of the spells she wanted to cast, the things she wished she could offer. A bit of moly and it might be enough to ward the entire inn and keep the beast from coming close. But even if she had her powers back fully, what she had learned about the plants of this world, they did not possess the magic she needed.

She watched from the second story of the inn, peering out the window as the small group fought against the wendigo. It was hard to see how they were managing. Instead, all she could tell was that they were being tossed around as though they were made of straw. How long until someone was struck down?

"That beast looks like it came from the Underworld."

Aftermath

What she couldn't do during the actual fight, she could manage after. Collecting several herbs from her garden, she went to work quickly to create soothing salves and infection fighting medicine. There were injuries that needed to be seen to. Its claws had been sharp enough to catch several people. Everyone would be sore for awhile.

"How does that feel?" She asked, tying the bandage off. "Be careful not to get it wet and come visit me so that I can change it for you tomorrow."

[demonic_divinity]

Her neighbor had been late arriving, but he had spent most of his time since arriving watching from that window or working in the journal he was writing in often. smacking his pen against the pages... the ink was running out. The week couldn't get much better...

When she spoke he looked up, closing the book and moving back to the window. Still trying to look regal even despite the shape of his clothes and a tied up gash on his arm from stupidly trying to fight one of the smaller wendigos before he arrived.

"Something like that." he stated as he looked out at the people fighting it. Envious if he was honest. If he had his abilities or Yamato it would already be handled. "It is a demon. A creature of the darkness."

Natasha | OTA

[iwasrussian]

Attack

Natasha had something of an advantage here. She didn't need powers, nor did she even have them and only a couple months before, she was fighting off equally ugly creatures that invaded because Thanos was coming to collect a certain Infinity Stone. So there were some similarities and zero fear, merely an instinct to kill the smaller wendigo's and get as many people to the inn as possible.

After leaving Eastwood with Arado at the house, she's checking the buildings around the hospital when something catches in her periphery outside the door. Only after deciding quickly that it wasn't one of the creatures, she calls out. "You need to get to the inn."

Aftermath

Natasha took to the roof moments before the one guy shot the flower down to Barnes. She watched and when things ended, she slipped back inside and headed down to see whereabouts Clint, Steve, Peggy and anyone else she knew were. For her own peace of mind.

After that, she would work on helping where she could.

aftermath;

[freightcars]

He's careful when making his way back inside; he gives people a wide berth steps back from anyone who reaches out with a cautious warning. Blue lilies last for hours sometimes, he's been warned, and every once and a while a little blue volt can be seen sparking down his metal arm.

Also, he's covered in blood - not exactly something he wants to spread around during a handshake.

Most importantly though he's just trying to make sure everything's alright, that none of them got in, that nobody he knows is hurt. Natasha happens to be the first one he sees, so he picks his way through the crowd to a few feet away from her.

"You okay? Anybody hurt?"

Claire | OTA | CW: Talk of death

[theluckygirl]

Attack

Claire is fully aware of the what is going on and she makes sure once the calls have gone out for people to get to the inn, that she has a bag of medical supplies including an assortment of suture kits that had been gifted to her by the Observers.

When she arrives, she takes up a corner and sets up a makeshift clinic for whoever may need it. The nurse also keeps her eyes out for people that she knows.

Aftermath - Clean-up and hospital

It didn't matter to Claire that she hadn't met the man who died while fighting the creature with the others. What mattered was that he did die and it was like it was with every patient who came to her ER and didn't make it. There's a level of guilt that she couldn't do more or be right there to do what she could when it happened. But as a nurse, she had to let that guilt go and focus on who did need her.

So after the danger was over, she heads back to the hospital to check things out and to see if there was any damage. Thankfully, there didn't seem to be any, so Claire headed out with her bag of supplies in case someone was hurt and walks around hoping to find some familiar faces she didn't see at the inn over the last couple days.

clean up

[quinientos]

Vasquez has been trapped in this inn without a smoke and a drink for so long that he's past the point of irritable. When they announced that someone had died, all that he'd cared is that it hadn't been him, but he's also used to people dying. He's used to being one of the ones to kill them, so he's not the person you go to for sympathy.

Still, that doesn't mean that other people don't care. When he finally gets outside to have that much-needed smoke, he finds Claire on her way to somewhere else, looking much worse than he does. She does care, he knows that, even if he doesn't know this version of her that well yet.

"Hermosa, where are you off to?" he asks, from beneath the brim of his hat, where he's well-shadowed as he lights up.

Vergil | OTA

[demonic_divinity]

Attack

Vergil had read the message but at first simply choose to stay in doors. He was human now, right? What good would it do to go out and get killed before he could figure the mystery was solved? A few hours in the silence became to much, He lived down by the mill after all. But the smaller wendigo's were coming and something in him nearly screamed with joy.

Demons.

He had been right! Which meant being alone and powerless was far from smart. At first he held his hands out, trying to force Yamato to summon, but of course his demonic blade wouldn't come. He hit one of the walls before grabbing the bag he had arrived with, the journal and the survival manual, and the stolen pocket watch he tugged it over his should and headed quickly out the door. Numbers, numbers were smarter for mortals.

He moved quickly towards the inn despite the message coming hours ago. He was at least smart, moving quickly along both the street and around houses when he saw the wendigo's coming. He hated being unarmed, but once the inn came into sight, he moved quickly to try and slip past the action and inside.

From there he stood with a few others watching the battle from a window on the second floor. Looking more irate as time passed. He was born into this, fighting demons... and here he was helpless with a group of humans, when he wasn't standing by the windows he was trying to do a rough sketch of the creature and take note of things people said while they waited.

Aftermath
Once the cost was clear, Vergil helped to clean up some of the mess, still looking a little frustrated. He didn't actively seek anyone out, just keeping to himself until people started to gather to talk or figure out what to do. It was about then that he grabbed his bag back up and started to quietly head home. He hated feeling so utterly useless.

Attack!

[spoileralert]

That second floor window happens to be the fourth one Steph tries. It's just weird, having everybody crowded together in a flimsy old inn while there's a monster outside trying to break in. Crowds are targets. She knows, intellectually, that they're dealing with a wild animal and not a terrorist, but her instincts still scream at her to get out, away, up.

Unfortunately the crowd also means it may take a while to get out a window onto the roof. At least this time it's just the one person. She considers shoving past him anyway, then huffs her frustration and turns to try the next room.

Peter Parker | OTA - During the attack

[fwips]

They won't let him out.

As long as Peter has been here, the excitement level has definitely been more of the giving old ladies directions kind than the fighting alien megalomaniacs one. He hasn't been complacent — He runs everyday and does the best he can at training despite his powers being sapped — but he hasn't exactly been 100% diligent, either. There's just a lot to take in about a place like this, and when he's been given a chemistry set instead of a villain, it just makes sense that battle readiness isn't top of mind.

Of course, now that there is a villain — An actual, bona fide monster, even — he can't get out the door.

He'd been tucked up at his desk upstairs experimenting on some of the lightning flowers when the message flashed through on his smartwatch. If he hadn't been barefoot, maybe he could have made it downstairs fast enough to slip out — But he had been, and he hadn't. You don't fight monsters without footwear, and even though he'd bounded downstairs like a bat out of hell as soon as the last lace was tied, he'd been pushed back from the door and windows as everybody else worked to barricade them.

Now, he's just angry.

"You don't understand, I need to get out there RIGHT NOW," he yells, oblivious to making a scene, already calculating the jump from one of the upper windows and how long it might take him to make a rope out of bed sheets like an escapee from a boarding school.

[iwasrussian]

"Peter," Natasha calls out from behind him. She knows well enough where his mind is at and the agent isn't going to pat his head and tell him that he's too young to understand what is going on out there. Because he does.

When she gets his attention, she moves closer and maybe there'll be some relief knowing that he isn't the only one who's being barred from going out and doing what comes as instinct to him. For her, it's not so much instinct as a need to make sure that the people she knows and cares about are safe, though it's Steve and Peggy she hasn't seen since being told she couldn't leave the inn until the creature was dealt with.

"They have a plan and a team to execute it so they've got things under control."

Did she expect him to accept that explanation, just like that? No, not really.

The Iron Bull

[ataashihunter]

During the attack: Inn

He wanted to be out there fighting, and he fully understands the people who also wants to. But they don't have weapons and more importantly, they have people here who can't fight if the animal for some reason is able to break in. So he places himself by the door, ready to stop anyone who tries to make it out.

Afterwards

Bull isn't sure what that thing was, and when he hears someone died he has a sickening feeling to his stomach that he stopped people going out there. He still thinks his reasoning was good but still, someone died. That is not going to happen again, that is for sure, from now on he is going to make sure he is armed.

He helps out with the cleaning as much as he can, doing heavy lifts and when that is over he starts doing a simple patrol around the village. At dusk, before he goes to sleep and again in the morning. Just keeping an eye on things.

Attack

[demonic_divinity]

Vergil had come in late, but bloody, and most of his time had been spent upstairs watching the battle. He came down late in the evening, with the journal he had been writing in, moving to the records book and placing the journal down to start taking notes before seeing Bull.

Of course he noticed him before, and had been thankful to the man for stopping his first and probably only real friend, Danny, from running out to fight.

"Good evening." He addressed the other.

Liv Moore | OTA

[living_proof]

There is a monster in the village, and it isn't me.

When the call went out, Ravi and I went to the inn as recommended, even though we're probably some of the least vulnerable people in this place, despite appearances. Sure, Ravi isn't on his zombie period right now, but he's got me, and I've got full-on rage mode.

A rage mode that I'm starting to think I probably should be contributing with, when it comes to the fighting of the nightmare creature outside.

There are lots of reasons not to do this, of course, not the least that I've been known to be a wee bit unpredictable when I'm all red-eyed and snarling. I don't want to accidentally hurt anyone or, god forbid, scratch a bystander and add another secret zombie to the village fold. Plus, I'm really not looking to out myself right now. In my experience, zombies are not taken with the same sexy aplomb as vampires. People freak out.

But I'm upstairs right now, half-hanging out the open window of a bedroom belonging to who the hell knows, my heart in my throat as I try to make out the fighting in the thinning light. I know the people out there — Bucky's out there — and all I can think is that somebody could die, and it'll be on me to decide whether to scratch them or not, give them a second chance at life that also happens to include an insatiable appetite for human brains. That is, if I can even get there in time; every possible exit downstairs is blocked.

aftermath;

[freightcars]

And so the fight ends; they're a man down, they're beat up, Bucky feels like absolute shit, but they've won. The beast is dead, and the schematics - the... whatever it is they pulled from it, they're a key to something bigger that he can't comprehend right now. Not with a pounding head, with the sparks that occasionally pop off of his metal arm, and with the fractured ribs he's struggling to breathe through.

Natasha taped his chest not because he'd forgotten about his resident doctor, but because she'd been the first person he saw and because in the chaos he hasn't been able to keep track of everyone. He'll rectify that later, but Liv honestly isn't the reason why he heads upstairs just yet. He's going because someone's claimed the bottom washroom already, it's at capacity, and he's covered in blood - his own, Peeta's, and the black tacky of the beast.

And so he ambles up the stairs and by her room, shirtless but with bindings around his ribs tightly taped, patch-worked with blood along his arms, face, and torso. Hair matted, filthy, and so exhausted that he misses her completely at first.

stella gibson | ota | cw character death mention

[ex_assertiveness90]

during the attack

Stella's already at the inn when the warning sounds, helping to clean things up after the daily lunch. It feels as if they just had an emergency here in the village — the earthquake — but all the same, she snaps straight into alert mode instantly. She doesn't even consider trying to go back to the house right now, not if the creature is as close as the report makes it out to be. Stella's a police officer, which means in a situation like this, her first instinct is to try to keep people safe. When others begin to arrive, she's one of the ones helping to herd everyone to safety, calm and controlled and focused. If anyone needs help fortifying the entrances and exits, reinforcing a window or a door — well, she's got used to doing that since she's been here, too.

She knows better than to go out into the fight when it starts, or even think about it. Stella knows when she's outmatched, and she's never really been a fighter. Capable of defending herself, sure; she learnt that when she was a constable. She's good with an automatic handgun, but they're not exactly growing on trees in a place where electricity is a modern invention. The most she could do would be to get herself killed — and she'll insist that anyone else who tries to rush out there should stay put, too.

aftermath

They're one down.

That fact shouldn't sting her as much as it does. Stella has seen a lot of death, most of it before this place and a little bit since. It's only inevitable that, especially in an environment like this, sooner or later, people will die. That's a fact.

But the last time a wendigo came out of the woods, it took Karen Kasumi, left her mutilated body displayed right in the middle of the village as a warning. This time, it took Peeta Mellark. Stella knew neither of them personally, but all the same, Karen's death had struck her because she'd just come to the village from an investigation of a string of murdered women and the first thought in her head had been not again. Peeta's death strikes her now because he's so young. A teenage boy, barely more than a child, with an entire life ahead of him, bleeding out senselessly in the dirt. And Stella's never dealt especially well with the murders of children.

She doesn't cry, and probably won't, not even later where no one can see her — but she feels exhausted, suddenly, as if half the energy she's been using to keep herself alert and functional for the past couple of days has drained out of her. Stella continues doing what she can to help others who need it as best she can manage — but there's a point where she simply has to stop, to sit down on the inn's front stoop, head resting on her hands, just to have a moment to breathe.

aftermath

[morphogenia]

Kamala has no idea who that boy was. She knows that she should have. She used to be so good at knowing things and being around except when a man in purple terrorized women and someone dear to her in a way no child should know. She's been holding back. Now someone is dead for real and all she can think is now she'll never know him. She can do better though. She has to.

When she sees a woman just trying to breathe after so much terror and tragedy, Kamala decides to act like a hero should. She takes a seat a respectful distance away as one can on a stoop. She doesn't say anything right away, but when she does it's the gentlest of questions. "Can I get you some water or something?" The friendly smile isn't forced even if she's tired too. Who could sleep after that?

Sirius Black | OTA

[reprobate]

[ D U R I N G ]

In the event anyone is keeping track, this assuredly isn't heaven.

Upstairs in his bedroom, Sirius is seated on the wide sill of his one window, pane pushed open, the sounds of the night and distant battle floating in as the thin line of smoke from his cigarette floats out. His stomach has twisted itself into a tight knot, his fingers shaking from memory and simple helplessness. It isn't the monster at the door that's the trouble — He's seen far worse, battled far worse — but rather that he is thin and broken inside and out, and what magic lives in this place is beyond his control. There's nothing he can do but sit here uselessly and stare out into the encroaching dark, seeing a line of corpses instead of the gently rustling leaves on the trees.

Sharp gasps snag his attention, worried murmurs from those packed in at the windows across the hall, watching. Their uselessness lets them see it happening; his is a good deal more pronounced than that.

Swallowing hard, he pulls another cigarette from the box on the desk and lights it off the first.

[ A F T E R ]

Later, when it's over, he steps carefully downstairs on bare feet, hands shoved into the pockets of his scrubs pants to mask the tremble lingering at the tips of his fingers. There's still a clutch of people in the front room, some removing the barricades to the windows and doors, others simply milling with the sort of stunned expression he's seen, worn too many times in his short life. People had thought he was mad, laughing his head off when they came to haul him away to prison, but he thinks now it was the only sane thing anyone could do, after all of that.

The afternoon's a little humid when he steps outside the front door, but there's been no rain to wash away the coppery scent of blood. He pulls a cigarette from his pocket but leaves it unlit, something to do with his hands as he stares out at the battlefield sketched out across the lawn.

[3ofswords]

Kira's uselessness has its own way of eating at him; not in the lack of things he could do, but the old actions feeling useless in their own right. Lists of the living and accounted for, lists of supplies. Blankets handed out, splinters pulled from hands when the boarding up was done. Better people to do it.

Always better people. He only ever wound up at the front of a thing for the sake of being the one willing.

Frank, for instance, isn't here to do a fucking thing. That's the opposite of a problem, until Aurora isn't in the cellar anymore and his guts are in a knot wondering if she went to find him. He's entirely stupid enough to climb out a window and get eviscerated for his dog, but not until he's checked under every bed and in every closet first. The back rooms are quieter, likelier for a black dog to disappear in the shadows of. With Aurora scaring him half to death, Bethany isn't allowed out of his sight: before he even notices Sirius in the window, he's kicking the door shut and setting her down in a clatter of hooves.

He ducks into and back out of the closet, before that rare smell pulls his attention. "Sorry," he says, before he realizes who he's intruded on. He doesn't take it back, stooping at the first bed to check underneath. "You haven't seen a black dog around, have you?" With a second look to the window the guy's been staring out of, he grimaces. "Inside or out."

Father Francis Mulcahy ♰ OTA, Attack + Aftermath (talk of war and death)

[collaronhisneck]

( Attack )

When the call had gone out about the monster, the priest hadn't hesitated, picking up his cat and his books and his rosary and going straight to the inn. A boxer he might be, but there was no way on heaven or earth he could fight that thing. Once there, he'd gotten busy trying to help: finding blankets from unused homes, fetching cushions or the camping gear out of storage for all the sudden refugees to have a place to rest, trying to gather food stores so meals could be made. It was a situation very reminiscent of the times they took in refugees at the 4077 or when the orphans would come to stay for a night or two, except with an even greater feeling of terror in the air at the lack of knowledge of what was happening and what that creature was.

When the beast was near and the attack about to begin, Mulcahy found himself a chair along one wall of the common room, in a place that was out of the way but still fairly prominent, Martin draped over his lap and much more nervous than the ragdoll cat usually was thanks to all the uncertainty and being away from his normal space. He stroked the cat with one hand while reading passages from his Bible, the rosary dangling from his fingers, trying to distract everyone else (and himself) from the horror that was probably going on outside and find comfort and inspiration in passages that spoke of bravery and overcoming terrible odds.

"The Lord is my shepherd, I lack nothing. He makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside quiet waters, he refreshes my soul. He guides me along the right paths for his name’s sake. Even though I walk through the darkest valley, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me. You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies. You anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows. Surely your goodness and love will follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever."


( Aftermath )

It hadn't been an easy fight, and the toll had been much harder than anyone had imagined, but one that the good father was all too familiar with. Another young man, too young for any of this, dead on the ground before his life could truly begin, in the defense of people who he'd wanted to help. There had been far too many of them for him in the past three years: soldier after soldier after soldier who had fought and died on foreign soil, bleeding out from shrapnel wounds or injured by bullets or mortar fire. Boys that lost their hearing or their sight or their limbs. Boys that lost their lives. He hadn't known this one, hadn't known any of the young men he'd seen die or live in bitterness twisted by unfixable injuries. But he felt each one in his heart, in his soul, a light snuffed out to not be found again.

But he didn't know what to do in this situation. This felt like something that would come under his purview here, in a place without morgues or endless paper trails counting corpses like so much luggage. But he didn't want to do anything disrespectful to the young man's memory or that he wouldn't want himself. Since arriving he'd heard of other religions than the ones he knew from home and there was a possibility this boy hadn't been Christian, or Jewish, or even Buddhist. With that in mind he was moving among the group, making sure that everyone was taken care of and that wounds were disinfected and bandaged as well as they could be, asking people if they'd known the young man who died.

Attack

[spoileralert]

"Does it help?"

Steph's been wandering the inn since lockdown, doing something very much like pacing in with her hands shoved in the pockets of her denim overalls. She doesn't really know what to do with herself. She doesn't want to fight, but she doesn't want to hide, either. So she paces. Sort of.

"You personally, I mean. Does it make you feel better?"

Rose Hathaway | Aftermath

[littledhampir]

[This serves as the main top-level as I may have multiple open or closed threads under this. Content Warning for character death, PTSD, mentions of blood & violence.]

The night so black that the darkness hummed ][ Grave Digging

[littledhampir]

There was no missing Rose as she walked into the Inn, her half shredded magenta scrubs, doing little to mask the stains of blood that cause the upper half of her top to stick to her skin. It stains her hands, is matted in her dark, wavy hair and splatters almost every inch of her that can be seen. Anyone who is present to witness her return would be forgiven for thinking she shouldn’t be up and moving around, but she does so with such purpose it’s hard to believe any of that blood is actually hers.

She moves through the Inn on autopilot without really seeing anyone inside, leaving explanations for the other three who had made it out alive. The cost of their victory was not one that Rose was fully prepared to discuss just yet. If anyone tries to speak to her, she doesn’t seem to register their words, disappearing from view without so much as a grunt and when she reappears, it's with a shovel in hand and silence that follows her out the door and into the dark of night.

She didn’t have a place in mind when she’d set out from the Inn, only knowing that she had to keep moving. Maybe she should have found out what his friends would have wanted but the horrible truth was? Rose didn’t know who his friends were. She didn’t know the first thing about Peeta, beyond what she’d learned tonight. He was brave, clever, suicidally stupid and he was dead. Anything else she could learn wasn’t going to alter the fact that he wasn’t coming back.

The smell of damp earth rose up to mingle with the metallic scent of blood, her shovel breaking the soil with surprising ease, thanks to the recent bout of rain. The adrenaline had given way to the numbness that masked the worst of her aches and pains, the skin on her side a mottled patchwork of purple and red, that would only darken in the hours to come. There would be time to clean up, to tend to her injuries but even if it took her till morning, she wasn’t leaving here until she’d finished digging Peeta’s grave. She hadn’t protected him. She couldn’t save him. The least she could do was this.

Haymitch Abernathy | ota | mentions of violence and child murder

[juststayalive]

Attack

Haymitch has not been having a good time of it lately. Katniss disappearing hadn't done anything to quell his suspicion that even if this isn't an arena, the Capitol is still behind it somehow. More than that, it made him wonder who of them might be next. If this is some sort of punishment, then any of the rest of them, save for Annie, could be slated for the same thing. At this point, he doesn't know if this place or Panem is safer.

He's close by the inn when the warning starts. He could go home, but he would be alone there, and dependent on getting lucky if the mutt tried to get in. The inn might be full of people he doesn't know, and doesn't fully trust, but he figures that at least there's safety in numbers. He checks to make sure that the knife in his pocket is still there and makes his way into the inn. At least there's food in there, which takes care of his biggest concern right now.

Those paying attention can see that even when the attack is over, it isn't over for him. There's something behind his eyes that indicates that he's reliving the worst days of his life. Instead of remaining in his pocket, the knife is either in his hand or next to it. He avoids the front door whenever possible, instead sitting with his back to a wall watching the door, as if afraid that someone (or something) will come through it.

He hasn't slept since the attack started, either.

closed to Finnick (and Annie)

[juststayalive]

It's a good number of hours after the attack is over and the village is safe again that Haymitch has finally remembered himself well enough to realize what must come next. He hasn't seen a sign of Finnick or Annie since before this started, and someone needs to check on them. And deliver some bad news, if they haven't already heard it.

He leaves the inn and sets out for their house, hoping that he doesn't find signs of a fight outside (or inside) of it. He knows better than to just open the door and walk right in, risking startling them, so instead he knocks on the door. "Finnick? It's Haymitch."

OTA - Stephanie Brown

[spoileralert]

During the Attack

Steph is not a fan of crowded buildings. If the inn was larger, maybe, or more modern, or even if the people were all split up into different rooms, then she might be a little more comfortable. But no, probably not.

See, when trouble hits in Gotham the large groups are the first target. A museum opening? A charity dinner? A mall on Black Friday? Bring your gas mask and make sure you have your phone, because chances are it's going to be crashed with fear toxin, laughing gas, rabid fucking penguins, who even knows.

She understands of course. She knows, logically, that four walls and a roof are pretty good protection against wild animals (and animal-like monsters). She knows that crowds are more likely to scare off most predators, and if they don't then at least the sheer number of bodies is some manner of defense. She understands that this isn't a battle she wants to take part in. It still makes her skin crawl, being locked up in this wooden deathtrap with a bunch of nervous, mostly unarmed people.


The other problem with the population density at the inn is that so many of them want to watch from the un-barricaded upstairs windows. This is a problem primarily because the place Steph likes to go to feel safe is up high- a roof, a tall tree, even just a fire escape would be better than pacing around the inn trying to find room to breathe. And to get there, she needs to get out.

She thinks she's found the one unoccupied room in the place. She's got the window open and is halfway through it before she realizes she has company.

[ataashihunter]

Bull shakes his head when he sees someone climbing out the window of one of the rooms and he walks over there to grab her shirt and pull her back in.

"Where do you think you're going?"