All men must die, but first he must live.

[reddosmod]

SEPTEMBER 2021 EVENT

IMAGE DESCRIPTORS IN ORDER OF APPEARANCE
Prompt One
[Image One: Woman holding skull in bag. ]
[Image Two: Plants sprouting out of earth.]

Prompt Two
[Image One: Woman rocking back and forth in dark.]
[Image Two: Woman rowing down river with corpses on stakes on horizon.]

Prompt Three
[Image One: Beef cake man breaking arrows off of shield with a sword.]
[Image Two: Beefy man slamming axe into troll-like creature, spraying blood.]

[NAVIGATION]

Prompt 1 • Prompt 2 • Prompt 3 • Plotting • Newsletter

[JUMP TO COMMENTS]

GROWING PAINS

WHEN: September
WHERE: Everywhere
CONTENT WARNINGS: Minor blood ritual.

---

September, for many in Trench, is considered a month of personal sacrifice. It is the month of self-actualization and promise. To grow your future, you must first be willing to sacrifice your past. You cannot walk forwards while walking backward. All throughout Trench, natives can be seen in yards and on plots of land digging small holes and planting a variety of items. Some plant seeds, some drop in a ring, others bury small parts of a body. But the ritual is simple: bury something that represents your past and seal it with a promise for your future.

You can write yourself a note or cut off a lock of your own hair. The ways in which people do this are limitless since it's a largely personal experience. Find a small patch of soil and dig yourself a shallow hole. Bury the item inside, say goodbye to who you used to be, and cover the item up with dirt. Once you are done, you must shed at least one drop of blood onto the sacrifice. It must be your own blood willingly given. Once the blood hits the soil, a small flower will miraculously grow out of the earth within seconds.

A single, powerless flower, but this flower will be completely immortal. You can either keep it on the patch of land or dig it up and bring it home. The flower will be a representation of your progress in Trench: if its petals wilt, you are lingering too much in the past. If it is in full bloom and vibrant, you're on the right path to a better future. If the flower starts to rot, you're heading down a dangerous path.

The flower may not be able to sway you one way or another, but it may serve as a valuable reminder of the kind of life you wish to lead. Some people abandon the flowers entirely and never bother with them. After all, there are no real consequences if you let the flower rot. If a character is dropped, their flower will fleck away like dust. Many believe that the flowers are made of the same stuff omens are made of.

You can dig up other people's flowers and watch their progress (make sure to get player permission) instead. After all, not everyone will care enough about their own flowers to really observe them closely. The flowers can come in any species or size, even fictional flowers, but they will only be replicas. Meaning if your character's flower is typically used for healing, there will be no healing properties in this replica. The flowers cannot be destroyed.

Many natives in Trench will repeat this ritual a few times every couple of years since the ritual is for letting go of the past. After all, the promises you make to yourself now won't be the same promises you make to yourself ten years from now. People change and so too will their flowers. What the characters bury is largely open to interpretation.

RIVER OF REGRET

WHEN: September
WHERE: Some obscure location within Gaze
CONTENT WARNINGS: Mangled corpses of loved ones, birds eating corpses, themes of regret.

---

You will find raven feathers all over Trench. They may drift through the air, lightly touch you, or you might decide to pick one up. The moment you come into physical contact with a feather, a conspiracy of ravens tears through the air and scoops you up into a whirlwind of feathers and caws. It only lasts a few seconds before you're deposited into a canoe drifting along a still river. Another Sleeper is in the boat with you. You pass beneath massive stone walls carved into the likeness of Never Mind and his ravens.

The world is silent around you. There is no rain here. Instead, sunlight pours through breaks in the clouds. Sunlight dapples across the water and golden-red leaves of nearby trees. It's more serene than most places in Trench.

You turn a corner and smell it before you see it. The picturesque summer day is dampened by the stench of rot. Then you come upon them: corpses. Corpses tied up to posts with barbed wire, corpses put through spikes and suspended in the air. Ravens flutter to and fro, picking at strips of meat. It isn't until you're close enough that you realize you recognize the corpses.

They are the corpses of people you have hurt. And that doesn't just mean people you killed or physically harmed. These are the bodies of people you have deep regrets towards: a lover you wronged, a best friend you lied to, an enemy you wish you had forgiven. Not everything is as black and white as murder, after all, and this grisly graveyard of mangled bodies says as much. Sometimes our regrets haunt us like the dead, and it seems like yours have followed you to Trench. You might even see your own body up on a post or the body of your canoe companions.

You have one of two choices: ignore your regret or face it.
Choosing to ignore your regrets doesn't seem to have any ill consequences at first. You pass by the corpses and continue on your river voyage. But the water grows thicker, and you come across the same corpses only in a worse state. The situation gets progressively worse each time you ignore it, and the river gradually becomes a river of blood and gore. The stench becomes insufferable and you will become increasingly corrupt. Some may even turn into beasts right there on the river.

Facing your regrets means talking about them, even mildly, to your canoe companions. You simply need to acknowledge the corpses, acknowledge the slightest truth to your feelings towards those regrets. When everyone in your canoe has acknowledged their regrets, the ravens will come for you once more. You will be brought back to Trench and awaken in the School of Mutter. Those who faced their regrets will discover that they have been gifted a white gold compass. The compass's needle will always point in the direction of the nearest Lamp Friend no matter the chaos going on in the world. But the compass only works once you have calmed down and focused.

QUICK FACTS

1. Each boat can hold up to 4 people. There can be multiple canoes in the same area.

2. If you try to leave the boat, you will drown in the River of Regret.

3. This does not have to encompass every regret someone's had. It can only represent one or two things. The regret should have to do with another individual or one's self. Something like "I regret not going to college" wouldn't necessarily work within the parameters of the prompt.

4. The river can only be accessed by touching a fallen raven feather. Touching a raven feather attached to the bird or a quill does not count.

5. Characters can engage with this prompt as many times as they touch a raven feather.

6. Characters with no regrets will not see corpses, but they will still be able to interact with characters who do have regrets.

BLOODSPORT

WHEN: During the Blood Moon
WHERE: Everywhere but specifically, The Gate
CONTENT WARNINGS: Violence, fighting, forced aggression/violence, forced fighting.

---

The Blood Moon invokes religious reverence among Trenchies. September and October are the ultimate months of sacrifice to pay tribute to the gods and the blood that rules this world. An energy begins to swell among Trenchies and you keep hearing the same word whispered excitedly around the city: "Bloodsport."

As the Blood Moon floods the streets in red, you begin to feel antsy, like you don't know what to do with yourself. You're not necessarily angry, you just have an abundance of energy. You don't need to be told what it is: your blood is reacting to the moon. The Blood Moon enhances blood powers significantly and you're simply not used to that yet. You don't feel in control of your own power or maybe even your own mind. At least until you exert some power, some force. Slam a door shut or swing a sword, shoot some electricity or spit some poison and you'll feel at peace with yourself. That nervous energy will ease out.

Only to come back twice as strong. It starts to put you in a real fighting mood and you start to realize why the locals call this Bloodsport. Hunting down beasts and monsters might seem like the fun thing to do right now, but the real attraction for Bloodsport takes place at The Gate. You can hear the roaring crowd blocks away. Hundreds of Trenchies have settled in to watch Sleepers duke it out with each other or with locked-up monsters. Maybe join in the fight. At least you know the other Sleepers there want to be there...Right?

Unfortunately not. Those who resist Bloodsport will find themselves passing out more and more frequently. Eventually, they will be taken by Mysterious Forces to The Gate to be pitted against other Sleepers and monsters. Some Sleepers will be forced into a gladiator-style fight that they either must win or die trying. Most fights at the Gate do end in death, but there are some circumstances where someone surrenders. Of course, that never stops their opponent from killing them anyway...Hopefully, you're fighting someone who is still relatively reasonable. Both parties can be resistant to fighting, but they will feel obligated to fight each other. If they don't, monsters will be unleashed into the arena and your situation will get a whole lot worse.

Bloodsport can greatly enhance a Sleeper's ability and many believe it is a gift from the Pthumerian gods. It is generally considered an advantage to Sleepers during the Season of Blood to prepare them and train them to hone their skills for the Season of Bone. Many believe it is wisest to submit to Bloodsport and let yourself get used to the motions of violence in order to survive the remainder of the year.

QUICK FACTS

1. Casual physical training will alleviate Bloodsport feelings. You could get through the month just by jogging around a lot.

2. Characters forced to the Gate will not remember how or when they arrived - they will just wake up and be thrown into the Gate by some shadowy force.

3. Characters who willingly participate in violence/fighting will feel temporary relief from Bloodsport only for the feeling to increase.

4. Effects of Bloodsport last as long as the Blood Moon shines through September and October.

5. You can treat symptoms of Bloodsport with calming techniques such as aromatherapy, meditation, medications, etc. Can be based on what would ICly help calm your character but it should require a lot of it.

6. You can invent the monsters/beasts that are at the Gate. They should be killable creatures and easily captured for the purpose of the Gate.

CODING

Comments

closed to clarisse– cw: corpses, blood, body horror, etc

[armd]

(the canoe is longer than it is wide and sits the two of them one in front of the other, abby helming the front with her hands at her sides. the weight of it is perfectly balanced as they trail down the river together. if she stood up suddenly, she could tip them in. her, and clarisse. she doesn't entirely remember how they got here, it's... hazy, but she remembers ravens, and feathers. she isn't sure why everything around them stinks of blood.

her thoughts are a little like the current, maybe. lazy, and meandering. abby reaches out to trail her fingers through the cold water and rubs a pinch of the river between her thumb and index finger, brow furrowed. when she glances up–)

The fuck–

(the bodies startle her, blood-red and chillingly stark against the grey-brown of the mud bank. they're stuck into the ground on spikes but a few of them have been strung up and gutted in a way that's far too familiar. their entrails leak out across the dirt. abby shifts in place, prepared to glance back, catch clarisse's eye, but the boat pulls closer and affords her a better glimpse at one corpse in particular. her words curl up and die at the back of her throat.

its face is completely beaten in, but she has no trouble recognising joel miller. one of his legs dangles grotesquely in the wind, only just held on at the knee. abby, still swallowing shock, grips the edges of the boat too-tight to halt any trembling in her hands. she has to glance, and check that it's only wood. for a moment, it felt unnervingly like the grip of a golf club.)

[laruetheday]

[ Clarisse doesn't see the bodies right away—she's too busy leaning over the side of the boat, trying to gauge how deep the water might be. She doesn't particularly want to find out. The river is peaceful, but that only makes her more nervous. It looks like a trap.

The smell of rot reaches her at the same time Abby's horror does. They both hit like a slap, and her head snaps up, mouth open in shock mirroring Abby's. There are bodies strung up along the riverbank, impaled, decaying in the sun. The ravens are eating them, picking at the soft parts, and Clarisse's stomach rolls. She tells herself it's only bodies, bodies of people she doesn't know, but the words are meaningless when Abby's panic is shivering inside her own chest like a silent scream.

She reaches out and grabs Abby's arm, squeezing too hard. ] What the fuck!

[armd]

(it's hard to look up again. maybe she doesn't have to. screams ring in her ears, but they aren't her own, and abby swallows, guilt heavy in her throat. ignoring his body makes her feel like a coward. she is a coward. she's been dodging thoughts of this for months, ever since she saw him last. that distance hasn't afforded her any clarity, let alone comfort.

clarisse's squeeze on her arm gives her the strength to raise her head again, but they've slowly turned a bend, and the bodies waiting for them are new, and worse.

raw, and shiny, like a nightmare. mel's has a jagged slash across the throat, her expression pinched in panic, and abby meets owen's dead gaze with a wave of cold sweat and nausea. she might have thought her heart had stopped if she weren't so noisy on the inside, blood roaring in her ears, her eyes wet, her hands cold and shivering uncontrollably on the edge of the boat.

the both of them, strung up for everybody to see just how much she failed them.

abby has to turn away to throw up over the side of the canoe. and if she thought it was hard to turn back and face joel–)

Stop. (there's blood in her mouth. she bit her tongue, she thinks.) I'm sorry. Please stop.

[laruetheday]

Abby—

[ She breaks off, looking away while Abby gets sick over the side.

They're stuck on this boat. There's nowhere else to go, except up onto the riverbank. Clarisse doesn't know what's worse, the thought of having to climb up with those rotting bodies, or the thought of what might be waiting for them around the next bend. She sucks in air, gasping and trying to ignore the copper stink as it hits the back of her throat. She needs to calm down so they can get out of here. Because Abby can't.

She stamps down on the panic, forces herself to stop breathing so damn fast, and moves so she's crouching on the floor of the boat opposite Abby. She takes Abby's face in her hands. ]

Abs. Look at me. Come on.

[armd]

(clarisse's touch startles her and she flinches pathetically, meeting her gaze like a dog that's done something wrong.

she can see them too, can't she. abby wishes she wouldn't look; not because she shouldn't know about them, but because it's so big, and so awful. a terrible thing to have to see. abby can't shield her from it any sooner than she can pretend the bodies on the bank have nothing to do with her. she's crying because of them, huge, gulping tears, her breath coming hard and fast all the while. she can feel owen staring at her, and it's scary. she's never felt scared of him before.

she can barely catch her breath enough to speak, even though the boat has either slowed, or stopped to give her time to. is it waiting for her to explain before it moves on to the next exhibit? abby can loosely guess at what appears after this, and the horror in her feels insurmountable.)

It's Owen– (she chokes. she has to calm down, she has to reassure clarisse. she can't let this shake her apart. even so, she leans forward and presses her forehead against clarisse's, like she could peel her back and hide from all of this in her.) Sorry, I just– need a minute–

[laruetheday]

[ Who is Owen?

Abby has never mentioned him before. She hasn't really talked about anybody from her life before Deerington, actually, Clarisse is realizing suddenly. She mentioned her roommate. Manny? Everybody else has been relegated to "a friend" or "a guy" or "people from the stadium", and now Clarisse can't even ask. She can't ask Abby, not here, not while she's losing it right in front of her. She keeps her hands cupping Abby's face, their foreheads pressed against each other. ]

Don't look. Just look at me. [ She repeats the same thing Abby'd said to her when Silena had been bleeding out in their living room: ] It's not real. [ It hadn't helped when Abby had said it then, and she's sure it isn't helping now, either, but what else can she do but try and protect her friend? The bodies on the bank are strangers to her. They're nothing. She only cares about Abby. ]

[armd]

(she isn't looking at clarisse either. she's got her eyes closed up tight, her mouth scrunched into a miserable grimace as she tries to get herself under control. the worst part, she thinks, is that she misses them so much, both mel and owen. abby thinks she's been missing them ever since her dad died, the ache of it hard and heavy and caught up underneath of her ribs. self-caused, all of it. no use in feeling sorry for herself. if she hadn't been such a shit friend; if she hadn't held everything in her hands and broken all of it in half on purpose; if she had got back to the aquarium faster, sooner, she could have–

what would clarisse even think of them? she has no idea. abby hasn't even told her about them, hasn't even tried because the timing was never right. trench has reached in and forced her hand, and it's so typical, and hateful, that it makes her want to scream even though it's the least that she deserves.)

Fuck. (putting it aside, away, pushing it down. she can do that, she knows how to do this. her eyes feel sore when she opens them again, clarisse's expression hazy through a film of tears. at least there's the tiniest bit of comfort in being held by her, and kept close.)

They died before I came here. (her voice isn't anything close to steady. it's rubbed raw, a dry croak,) I fucked up. Dragged them into my shit, got them killed.

[laruetheday]

[ It's not a great moment in time for Clarisse to realize there are still a lot of things she doesn't know about the person she considers her best friend.

In a way, what Abby's saying isn't a complete surprise. She mentioned murdering that guy months and months ago, back when they'd first met, and then it had never come up again. And later she'd said done something and she got some people killed. It's not like Abby didn't tell her anything... But this is really personal. It's all over Abby's face, it's in the barely tamped down hysteria in her voice. People don't cry like this just because they did something dumb and "people" died. ]

Who are they? [ Her own voice sounds strained, and she glances again at the corpses on the bank, like she expects to somehow recognize something in their glazed stares. Like she can somehow take the little scraps of stories she's gotten and put them together into some kind of whole. She can't. The gaps are too big.

Her hands are still on Abby's face, but loosely now. She swallows and forces herself to keep them there. It doesn't matter, it shouldn't matter. Abby is who matters to her. ]

I—I mean, you don't have to tell me. [ Clarisse tacks the words on clumsily, spoken in a rush, before Abby can answer her. ] It's okay.

[armd]

(the initial shock has worn off, left her feeling heavy, almost weepy. clarisse's hands soften on her face. abby takes the opportunity to lean back for a moment and wipe at her face with her hands. her eyes are so sore. she presses her cold fingertips to her lids, and breathes in through her nose, holding the air in her lungs until it aches and forces her to release it.

this wasn't how she envisioned telling clarisse. at the same time, abby can't tell if she'd ever had a plan in the first place. it was easier to go along just the two of them, and to support clarisse when she cried.

she can't keep running from this.

owen's gaze isn't as accusatory as she'd initially thought. it's just surprised, tinged with panic, and pain. abby looks at him for a long moment, and her voice feels to the left of her mouth when she answers. like her body isn't working correctly.)

Owen. And Mel.

(mel looks scared to her. mel didn't look that way often. she had a surgeon's demeanor. she had steady hands.)

They were my... (a soft hiccup, and she falls silent, her brow furrowing in upset. she has no idea what she's supposed to call them.) People, (is what she settles on, even though it doesn't feel quite right to her. they were so much more than that.)

I found them like this. Dunno what happened, only who did it.

[laruetheday]

[ "My people." Clarisse knows exactly what she means by it, doesn't need to ask anything more. She knows what it's like, when you can't possibly sum up how much they're a part of you, how even when you don't like them you'd still kill and die for them, how you can still recall their faces no matter how many years have passed. My people.

She and Abby have always had that in common. ]

I'm—sorry. [ She looks at Abby's pinched expression and then out at the friends someone gutted and left for her to find, and a wave of self-loathing rises in Clarisse like bile. People died, and Abby came to Deerington living with that, and as usual, the only one Clarisse cares about is herself. ]

You don't have to say anything else. [ She wants to sound soothing, but she's never felt less able in her life. Abby's crying in front of her and she feels sick and she doesn't know which of the feelings are hers, anymore, and which are Abby's. ] We're going to get out of here, okay? [ If she has to get out and push the damn boat, she will. ]

[armd]

(she knows she doesn't have to talk, it just feels like she has to say something. this is too big to leave unexplained. it's so horrifying. abby has barely confronted this, she's pushed it down and aside for too long. seeing both of the bodies has it bubbling back up her throat like bile.)

I argued with both of them, (she admits as clarisse looks at her, and tries to soothe her while positively radiating contempt,) And then I left and when I got back to the aquarium–

(surely the contempt isn't for her? but it could be, easily. she was a shit friend, in the end, and she's being a shit friend now as well. she hasn't changed. her gaze flickers back to clarisse, and her eyes are wide and watery, her expression scared for the briefest moment, teeth pressing into her lip.

she opens her mouth, but the apology sticks in her throat. her attention jumps back to mel.)

She was pregnant, (she whispers. the bulk of her dead body isn't immediately apparent when she's hanging like that, concealed by her layers of jackets and the angle that they're facing her, but abby knows. she thought a lot of unkind things about that pregnancy, and the guilt of it makes her teeth hurt.)

[laruetheday]

[ Why didn't Abby say anything?

Not... casually, of course not, but... at some point during all the months of their friendship. At any point, when Clarisse was standing next to Silena's grave being utterly destroyed by her own guilt, or during the weeks after that when they hadn't left Deerington yet, Abby could have said this, any of this, and she didn't. Clarisse has never even heard their names before now. Yeah, she didn't tell Abby about what happened with Silena until they'd been friends for a while, but she'd mentioned her fucking name before, at least. And telling Abby everything, all the shit she'd done, how it was her fault, that had been her choice. She hadn't had to do it, but she wanted to because she trusted Abby with knowing it. And Abby clearly didn't want to tell her anything back.

She doesn't really know much about Abby at all, and it hurts, suddenly realizing that. It hurts worse because she loves her so much and wants to help her and can't. ]

That's not your fault, [ she says, clutching at the side of the boat so hard her knuckles go white. Her voice sounds a million miles away from her own ears, like she's not inside her own body. ] People argue. Bad things happen. Doesn't mean you got them killed.

[ It's stupid, they look nothing alike, but the similarity in names and the fact that she was pregnant—Clarisse can't help but think of Mellie, pregnant, scared, alone. And standing guard thinking they were all going to get skewered by Romans any second. And how bad it would be if Mellie were hanging on the bank over there, how responsible she'd feel. How she'd feel if any of them were up there, Silena or Beckendorf or any of the siblings she's lost over the years. ]

Abby. It's—it's bad. I know. I know you'll always wonder what you could've done differently. But you're still a good person.

[armd]

You don't understand. (how could she? abby's never spoken about it to anybody, she's barely acknowledged that it happened in the first place. her stomach hurts suddenly, like she's nauseous. her mouth tastes like blood, and sick. she desperately wants clarisse to understand her, doesn't want her to think badly of her for any of this even though she should, and will.

abby should tell her, right now. she should open her mouth and fucking tell her, but she can't. she's scared, and hurt muscles its way on top of the feeling abruptly, shoving into her: hurt, and bewilderment, and confusion. she feels messy with it. the inside of her body has grown too loud for her to regulate everything on the outside.

for a moment she thinks she's going to throw up again and she holds her breath, her eyes scrunching shut.

when it passes, mercifully, she has to gasp for air.)

I'm sorry.

(it's unclear exactly what the words apply to, but the ravens find it pleasing. abby looks up into a whirlwind of coarse, black feathers, the bodies on the shore finally gone from view, something that abby notices with equal pangs of relief and dismal, miserable longing for the people that she lost. but at least she didn't have to see manny. and at least clarisse didn't have to listen to her fail to explain nora's dead body through all the holes in her knowledge.

eyes open again.

the school of mutter, unbearably quiet. there's a ringing in abby's ears, tinny and high, and something smooth in her palm: a compass, round and neat and white. the tiny arrow inside of it is spinning rapidly in tight, almost frantic circles.

she doesn't know what to say, so she stands there looking at it in silence, her gaze blank.)

[laruetheday]

[ It's just as well, that Abby closes her eyes. She gets to miss the way Clarisse's cheeks flush red, the way she flinches back almost as if she's been hit. "You don't understand." She feels hot and cold at the same time, strangely numb all over, as if the horrible mess of feelings has finally overloaded her nerves and frayed them to pieces.

"I don't?" is what she wants to say, but instead she says nothing. Hurt roils inside her, and shame, the kind of shame that reminds her of being fourteen and having to walk up those steps from the boiler room and act like everything is fine, like she hasn't just been humiliated by somebody who should love her. Associating Abby with those feelings is horrible. Clarisse needs to get away from here. She needs to get away from Abby.

And then, miraculously, they're back in Trench. It takes Clarisse some time to realize where exactly they've been deposited, because she hasn't ever come inside the School of Mutter, but once she figures it out she can visualize the way back to their home, and she reaches out to take Abby's arm in a sort of automatic reflex. Take Abby home, make sure she's okay, get away. The thought is a constant refrain inside her own head, repeating again and again so fast that it seems never to stop or start, only to exist. waygetawaygetawaygetawayge ]

Come on, Abby. [ Her own voice is shaky. ] Let's go home.