[Open] Keep it locked up, keep it sealed tight

[droptheious]

Who: Varian and YOU!
What: Varian's final corrupted days, his beasthood turn and the aftermath. See his corruption/monster page HERE!
When: First 2 weeks of Jan- before the event.
Where: Around the city!

Content Warnings: Applicable content warnings go here. Mentions of death, corruption, dissociation.



Hope you've stocked up - Last days of corruption

Anyone who's close to Varian will have noticed his slow corruption growth over the last two months. By the time January rolls around, things have gotten worse instead of better. By now his skin is made of a thick, black rock. This same black rock has turned his teeth into sharp fangs and his nails into claws. two amber horns sprout out from his head, and his elbows and one remaining ankle have spurs of the same stuff- as is the tail he's since gotten, flicking nervously as he paces around- firey red eyes darting around furtively.

He'd largely been keeping himself out of sight, trying to handle this alone, but his hallucinations have driven him onwards. He stares at things seemingly only he can see. If he comes across you, he'll grip your arm tightly (sorry if those claws hurt, he's not even thinking about it). He points at an empty spot of nothing, worry on his face.

"Eugene!" you are definitely not Eugene, but it's clear that's who he's seeing right now. "We- we gotta deal with these rocks before they take over everything! There's...there's got to be a cavern around here somewhere so we can cut them off, right?"

It's a long night - Monsterdom (Gaze and surrounding area)

Regardless of how much or how little help he gets in his final days of corruption, eventually, Fern decides enough is enough and the best way to handle this is to Fistfight God. Which is to say, he goes off to confront The Tower about this and gets himself killed by Never Mind in the process. Varian got there too late, and being the driving reason behind his boyfriend dying again was the final nail in the coffin for him.

The transformation is quick and sharp, and what's left is a a ten-foot rock monster spewing fire everywhere. His leg is still missing in this form, at least, which should help anyone with a quick ID-check. Varian himself rages through the city, slamming against buildings and breathing fire at anyone foolish enough to come close. It's definitely attracting the attention of nearby hunters- so perhaps finding a way to talk him back down before there's another death today would be for the best?

Nothing good is meant to stay - Aftermath

Eventually, Varian lets his friends in, lets them talk him down and the best hood fades. Parts of corruption still cling to him- his skin is still an unhealthy grey colour and his nails aren't quite back to normal yet. He's also sitting in a ball on the floor- partly out of shock and partly because he can't go anywhere without his leg - if someone could fetch him that, that would be awesome.

Or perhaps you come to him in the days that follow. He mostly stays near the Disaster House in Cassandra, as he waits for Fern to come back to life. He can be found inside the house, or sometimes sitting on the front porch, people-watching. Though he's certainly not better yet, day by day the signs of corruption lessen. Any visitors will get a tired smile, he's still a little withdrawn, but he's getting there.

"H-hey, thanks for checking in," nothing has changed how awkward he is at least! "Um...how are you doing?"

Because obviously, you're here for him to check up on you. Obviously.


[[OOC: The monster battle is intended to be open to any CR who want to take part. No ONE character will be responsible for talking him down from monsterdom, it is intended to be a team effort- hammering home that Varian is able to rely on his support network. Feel free to make separate threads, team up with other players, thread hop, etc. Do what you like, and we can wibbly-wobbly-timey-wimey it so it happened around the same time- to make it easier than players trying to keep to one concurrent thread! Go nuts! As always please hit me up on teeeff for anything! ]]

Comments

[droptheious]

Fern definitely knows, which will eventually become its own problem. Varian takes the basket, numbly, automatically, like he's not even paying attention to what's being given to him. He turns his head to watch Richie moving, his eyes widening as his friend's arm just...passed through the rock. He takes a step back, breath catching.

"No- no they have to be real," but they're not, he can see they're not. "That's- Richie they're what're causing the hallucinations. That's- that's how it worked back home. I remember."

But Richie put his hand through it like it was nothing. That...that was never part of their power before. They were always solid and real and dangerous.

[measuringdicks]

"Hey," says Richie, stepping closer, his voice gentle. "Hey, come on, let's just...sit down for a second, yeah? Fuck the rocks, they can wait," especially since they're not even real, but Varian's in distress and Richie doesn't want to see him so freaked out, "how about you talk to me about, fuck, I don't know, how are you and your boyfriend doing? What's your latest invention?"

And all the while, Richie's moving to try and steer Varian away from the empty spot he first pointed at.

[droptheious]

Varian is definitely in distress. Ignoring the rocks was such a bad move back home, they just became more and more and caused more and more trouble.

"But - but people will get paralysed. I- I remember seeing it happen."

Richie has proven the rocks don't exist though, but maybe that's his mind playing tricks on him too? He just doesn't know. Regardless, he definitely doesn't sit down, instead, hugging his arms around himself tightly and starting to pace. So...you know, the opposite of sitting down and calming down.

"I haven't been making anything lately," which is, out of all things, a sign that it's real fucking bad- Varian not having a project on the go is unheard of. "Fern- he's- he's worried a lot."

[measuringdicks]

Richie shakes his head again, and wiggles his hand experimentally. "Funny, I don't feel paralyzed," he says. Shit, though, this is bad, this is very, very bad. Richie's hands grow warm as the worry really begins to ramp up, because holy shit, this is bad, this is the kind of thing that tends to lead to bad shit happening, and considering just how far along Varian is to beasthood already—

"Maybe thinking about making something will help you feel better," he says, suddenly. "Just, something small, anything. C'mon, shoot some ideas at me." He reaches for Varian, to touch his elbow and try to guide him away to someplace that's less open, someplace that won't have the space for so many imaginary magic rocks.

[droptheious]

"Well, you wouldn't. Once you are you don't feel anything anymore. Well...un-until the magic is broken anyway."

And it makes sense, in his mind, that this magic would be here. Cass is here, and she created the rocks. She's still hurt and angry and afraid- the cocktail of bad emotions that brought the red rocks to the surface in the first place. Why wouldn't they be here now?

He lets Richie lead him, frowning, his fingers twitching with unease, with the desire to do something about this. Richie says they aren't there, he's shown they aren't there, but what if only people from Corona can see them? That's...that's a potential answer.

"I- I don't know. I don't think I could concentrate on anything when I can see those rocks. They were really bad news back home. We nearly couldn't stop them at all."

[measuringdicks]

"It'd be pretty obvious, though, wouldn't it?" Richie says, reasonably and gently. "If I was paralyzed and all. You'd hear me losing my shit about not being able to move or feel anything." He smiles a little, tucking his unruly hair behind his one remaining ear. "You've met me and Eddie. How well do you think I'd take it if suddenly I couldn't move a fucking muscle?"

Hint: Really badly.

"Can the rocks make it indoors?" he asks, a plan forming in his head. "And then we can talk there about anything else. Shit, if you can't think of anything right now, that's fine, I've got twenty minutes' worth of jokes to tell and I needed an audience to workshop them with anyway."

[droptheious]

"N-not really. When people are paralyzed they're stuck like- like red rocks themselves."

Because there's no fridge horror like Disney fridge horror. He takes a few shaky breaths, squeezing his eyes shut.

"Yeah, they can, they-they can get everywhere. They grow wherever they want to," he lets out a soft hah-hah that's so very wavering. "You think so? That- that might help? That- that helped back home? Getting people's minds off it."

[measuringdicks]

Frankly, if you make the kid from a Stephen King novel look at you with actual horror in his eyes, you probably win the horror competition right there. Richie looks at Varian with a level of concern he usually reserves for reports of sewer monsters, which says a lot about how he's finding Varian's talk about the red rocks.

Okay, so indoors is not a great plan. He hums, trying to think. "Can they make it up stairs?" he asks. "You're the expert here, Varian, not me. I'm just the guy telling people I fucked their moms while onstage. If you think it can actually, materially help, that'd be great, but I just wanna get your mind off 'em. Maybe if you don't think about them so much, they won't show up."

[droptheious]

Lucky him, he's the winner. He'd like to thank all the horrific, repressed trauma that got him here. Couldn't have done it without you!

At least Richie's Grade A crude humor gets a laugh out of him. It's not exactly a healthy laugh but it is still a laugh.

"Yeah, they grow out of walls, floors, ceilings...everywhere," he scrubs his face. "You- you have to find where they started from - a big fissure underground and destroy it."