Nowhere to run from all of this havoc

[demjiin]

WHO: Kaz (who will eventually be an avatar of The Eye) and various people
WHERE: Temba
WHAT: October event
WHEN: 10/16 - End of October
WARNINGS: Probably this entire log will be riddled with CW but specific threads will have specific warnings so read at your own risk



For Tony
Between the giant eye floating above the entire city then a voice and something both speaking and a truly bizarre feeling which rocked through Kaz at the same time, and it was no surprise that Kaz lost consciousness. When he next woke it was to the sound of gunfire. Kaz knew that sound, though, and knew that he needed to find cover quickly. He recognized the sound of gunfire but it was coming from several sides. This wasn't one or two people firing. This was a warzone.

The sound of gunfire and deeper explosions that Kaz knew were mortars was barely muffled when Kaz found a way inside. The building he was in was barely more than the skeleton of a building and the roof had caved in on one side so that the floating eye was still visible beyond it's edge.

For Kyle
It felt like Kaz must be a mile underground by now. The way before him was getting narrower as he walked but the way back was either blocked off after a few steps or had become too narrow to walk through inexplicably. Just the tunnels themselves gave Kaz an unnerving feeling of being buried alive.

Now he came to what appeared to be some sort of chamber. It wasn't much of one and the walls weren't stone. They were the same as the things as the tunnels, just raw earth. If anything the chamber reinforced that feeling of being buried alive worse than the tunnels did.

For Kavinsky
The fire had come on slowly with blackening walls and smoldering plaster. But whatever had caused the ignition, Kaz watched as parts of the building he was in burned. It was smoke at first. Smoke that made Kaz's eyes water and his throat hurt from coughing. He wasn't able to find a window to get air so he was forced to lean against a wall and be lost in a coughing fit. But the wall was becoming hot to the touch so he had to blunder away blindly.

When he did find a window, the heat from the fire had broken out the glass, so Kaz gasped at the air it was letting in. It was still hot though, so it felt like trying to breathe in the hotter air from a furnace.

For Felwinter
It would have been a forest at night had their been folage on the trees, any sound beyond Kaz's footsteps or things like a moon or stars. Kaz couldn't use his cane on the soft forest floor so his limp was much more obvious as he tried to pick his way forward, being careful where he placed his feet.

Then something, maybe a sound or maybe a twig snapping that Kaz's feet didn't snap, made him pause midstep. Now the feeling the sound elicited made him look behind him. He wasn't sure what caused that feeling but he knew with absolute certainty that something was stalking him. The gloved hand around his cane tightened and Kaz was now being less cautious about where he put his feet as he picked up his pace. Soon he went from a slow walk to jogging, fast jogging and finally outright running. When he started running his limp was very obvious and now slowing him down considerably.

Open
Kaz could not see three feet in front of him for how thick the fog was. The ground was firm enough he could at least use his cane here but everything had the echoing open quality of being outside. Others might have the urge to raise their voice, but Kaz kept his voices volume as though he were talking to someone nearby. After all, he reasoned, being loud wouldn't do anything about how thick this fog was.

"Hello? Is there someone out there?"

Comments

Desolation Tony // some body horror right away

[in_extremis]

This was a nightmare. It was one that played out over and over again, for years, the stench of blood thick and the crack of gunfire tearing through his skull, and that wet, aching, searing, dense void clutched around his exposed heart. All Tony had to do was wake up. At first, he squeezed his eyes closed tighter, until stars appeared behind the lids and he had to risk taking a breath that tasted like gunpowder and rot, until he could force his eyes open.

The sky stared back down at him, its unforgiving, mechanical pupil hazy from smoke and a spray of dirt. Tony had been trying to send a text, just a second ago, but it was gone now, he knew that much, reaching urgently for it like it was somehow his lifeline and finding nothing. Silence. The next breath Tony took was a stuttering gasp that seared through his chest like the smog of the battlefield that was still raging around him was mustard gas, and he shoved himself upward despite the bullets that he could hear overhead and thumping into the dirt too close to him, and he clutched at his heart. What flesh there was under his hand gave way like butter, so smoothly that Tony hardly noticed at first while his wrist sunk too far into the hole the was already there, and was scorched, sending his arm leaping away again and Tony scrambling backward through the dirt like he could get away from himself. Every new, panicked breath he panted now made the heat in his lungs grow more intense, and he couldn't stop the hiccups as he tucked his chin down, trying to see.

There was a hole. A dire pit where his breastbone should have been, and inside there was only a radiant darkness, a flame that licked wickedly higher, up into his throat and pouring out and up toward his neck as he gasped his shock. It was surrounded by the scorched fringe of his shirt, mostly burnt away by the intensity of the heat that still crawled across the fabric, slowly eating its way toward the seams and leaving ash staining his skin, his chest flecked with embers like shrapnel that glowed with his broiling heart. His skin, though, it didn't burn. Tony raised his hand to inspect where his wrist had touched the fire, and found only the mud and blood of the battlefield, Tentatively, he touched his fingers to the skin around the flames, where it felt like putting his hand into the forge, but instead of blistering pain he found the skin of his chest slick and malleable, smooth under his fingers and bubbling only to drip in pink rivulets down his front.

To his right, the ground burst upward with a roar, sending a cascade of dirt across him as he flung himself to the side, arm over his head. Whatever this was, he couldn't stay here. He scrambled away from the explosion, shoving himself up onto his feet to go bolting across the battlefield and ducking into the first chance of cover he found. It was a building, looking thoroughly shelled already, and Tony charged in through the doorway to throw his back against the wall, the sprint leaving him gasping and the dark fire pouring out of his mouth.

Desolation | cw: slight body horror??

[burnyoudown]

On the other hand, Kavinsky was almost perfectly at home with the fire. Some of the voices he could hear behind the doors were familiar. Hearing them in distress made him conflicted. On the one hand, he should go to them, try to help. On the other, he'd already tried that and was unsuccessful. He'd never even been one much for 'helping' so that he felt the urge at all was something of a miracle.

Something was wrong though. Everything was really fucked up. He felt like some part of him was missing, like there was a gaping hole inside of him, but he couldn't explain it in words. He just knew he was missing something, like he was stifled. At the same time, he was aware of how dangerous he was right now, full of barely contained fire and flame and potential. There was an itch that needed to be scratched but he hadn't figured out how to satisfy it yet.

Dressed in a tank-top, jeans, and sneakers, his clothes left his arms and face bare to see that there was something wrong with him. Or, to be specific, something wrong with his skin. It didn't have the right texture or look to it; it was more waxy than anything.

He pressed a hand to the wall as he walked and when he pulled away there was a blackened print left behind on the wallpaper, a warning that his touch was dangerous. As he made his way towards Kaz, he smirked, the waxy texture of his face shifting disconcertingly.

"You okay?" he asked, but his tone was condescending. "You need a moment to catch your breath?"

Corruption | CW: body horror, disease, wounds, bodily waste, insects, dead things

[kyley_b]

The smell of freshly turned dirt is actually rather pleasant: a clean, fresh scent that is very much pregnant with life. The air in the tunnels below ground had no such redolence. As Kaz moved into the chamber he would find it filled instead with the hot green stench of things burst open on lonely highways. The walls of earth were slick with the stuff of broken garbage bags and leaking coffins and broken sewer pipes.

The far end of the cavern had another exit leading further into darkness. Huddled close to it, hugging the wall, was a naked human figure. It was crouched low, but even so it was possible to see it was emaciated nearly to the point of starvation, with long skinny limbs wrapped around its body, its skin visible only in shockingly pale flashes as it was absolutely covered in filth. As Kaz approached it turned its head, one eye rolling hideously to meet him, glaring white. Its mouth fell open and fetid breath wafted out.

"Kaz," it crooned in a thick, clotted voice. It unfolded itself and stood, tall and gangly and lacking even the most basic human grace. Truly the only thing familiar about it was its hair; even clotted with filth it was deep red and curly.

"Kaz," Kyle repeated, taking one tottering step forward. He kept his hands pressed over his stomach, hunching forward slightly as he cradled it. Another step forward.

"It's so good to see you," he whispered. "You don't want to be topside right now. Oh no. It's better down here. Safer." He shuffled forward another step. The light in the cavern was not good, but the closer he got the more Kaz could see. Kyle's flesh was not only covered with slime and ordure but also running sores. His face pulled in a terrible rictus as he tried to smile, revealing teeth that were rotting out of his head. One hand fell away from his belly and stretched toward Kaz, fingers reaching for his face.

"Come sit with us. I can show you my friends. Sit, Kaz. It's so... nice."

From the hall beyond the cavern came the soft sound of buzzing flies.

Felwinter the Stranger

[tyrants_son]

The dreaded sense of wrongness was like the paranoia that had seeped deep into his metal body for the decades, the centuries that he had spent on the move, hiding, running, suddenly swelled several-fold. It dispersed as quickly as it came, but never completely vanishing, a lingering sense that draped over him like a mantle, an unease that clung to his very being.

I don't like this, Felspring whispered within the comm of his helmet. Something's happened. Something's not right. They were hardly words that needed to be said. They both knew each other well enough to know what the other thought.

He was on the move now. He had to move, had to... It was more of a sensation than an actual directive, but put into words it would have made no sense to him. He had stared at his hands as though he could see through the worn gloves he wore, and yet they were somehow not enough, the helmet he wore was not enough. They'd know.

They can't know.

They won't know.

He moved quietly through the woods- when did they enter the woods? Were they not in the city? but it seemed that no amount of cover drove away that feeling, that sense of being watched, and the strange light, that great Eye could still be glimpsed through the snarl of twisting tree limbs. It was distracting enough that his attention drifted, the silence he had born in his favor broken by a single misstep, the offending twig easily crushed beneath his boot. He had not initially meant to stalk anyone, but the atmosphere made him tense.

He heard the movement ahead, Felspring noting that the figure had picked up speed somewhat. "Wait-" he started to call out, stopping himself just before he adjusted the volume of his tone, as though something seized his circuitry, an irrational decision to stay silent gripping him.

Do not give yourself away, it seemed to warn, and it wasn't the voice of his Ghost, but it felt like his own.