faderifting: (Default)
Fade Rift Mods ([personal profile] faderifting) wrote in [community profile] faderift2020-05-03 11:05 pm

MOD PLOT ↠ SECRET STEEP'D ROOTS

WHO: Open
WHAT: Trapped! Trapped in a jungle!
WHEN: Bloomingtide 9:46
WHERE: Unknown
NOTES: OOC post! The three starters in the comments can have multiple threads, and feel free to ask us on the OOC post if you have any "what will happen if I x" questions.




When the eluvian shatters, there's a stutter in the flow of the fight. The eight Venatori nearly all freeze in place for a moment when the glass cracks, watching their way out and their plan crumble, and afterwards they never quite manage to get their rhythm back. But they don't quit, either. In the end, they all go down fighting.

Riftwatch takes no casualties, and the four members of Riftwatch who were taken captive are all alive, accounted for, and mostly unharmed.

That's the end of the good news.

The massive, shattered eluvian was set within a ruin carved and built out of a steep embankment, now almost entirely reclaimed by the jungle. All that's left are the remains of walls—some full height, others crumbling where vines have pushed between the stones or spreading tree roots have disrupted the ground. But with daylight fading and several injuries that need attending to before anyone can move, the surviving walls and thick plant growth form the best shelter anyone can hope to find before nightfall.

When the sun rises and better stock can be taken of their position, the jungle in which everyone finds themselves is still not immediately recognizable. It's hot compared to Kirkwall at this time of year, with temperatures hovering around 75-80F and kept relatively consistent between day and night by the high humidity and non-existent breeze. It rains with some frequency—light showers that are little more than mist by the time they reach ground-level or torrential downpours that start with little warning and drop several inches of rain in an hour before disappearing as abruptly as they'd arrived.

Most of the ruins extending up or out from the embankment are little more than chunks of moss-covered stone buried in the undergrowth. Searching around them will find them a stream running through the remains of a carved stone channel, fast enough to be safe to drink, and they can follow that a short ways out of the ruins to where it joins a much larger river. They won't see any traffic along it except for a variety of river creatures that would be happy to eat them. Judging by the position of the sun and moons, the river leads south.

There is one half-sunken portion of the ruin complex that's more intact, but after exploring it confirms there is no back-up eluvian on offer, there's little choice but to set out into the dense growth of the jungle. Huge trees create a canopy far overhead, and the floor is soft and springy with dead matter. Giant ferns, vines of every variety, and flowers of every conceivable color crowd them at every turn, making travel slow and damp. Overhead, and all around, are the sounds of other creatures moving through the same space. Birdsong, monkey screeches, the constant buzz and chitter of insects. The fauna in the jungle is a mix of the usual sorts of beasts one would expect in such a climate: parrots, monkeys, snakes, absurdly large insects, the rare big cat, whatever other weird animals walk around a jungle.

The walk south along the river will be a long and difficult slog through dense jungle with no real respite from the environment along the way—and no real certainty about their destination. They'll have to make a new camp each night as best they can and push on the next morning, hiking through seemingly-endless forest. At first, they will have the benefit of a path, a trail south alongside the river that appears to have been cut less than a month ago. It will lead to a second set of ruins where signs of Venatori presence will be obvious. They will make camp here for a couple days while they explore more thoroughly for clues about where they are and what the Venatori were up to.

Beyond that point it will be necessary to cut their own trail, an exhausting process that means even slower going and tired arms for everyone who takes a shift at the front of the line. The only break will come when the jungle abruptly gives way to a deep gorge, the river taking a hard west-ward turn and dropping down a series of magnificent waterfalls to what looks like a very large lake at the bottom. They can either find a way down the falls and hike west around the lake, or cross the river via a narrow rock bridge over the falls and continue south back into the jungle. They'll stop here and make camp among the rocks for another couple days to try to identify the lake or the falls before they go any further and risk walking miles in the wrong direction.

The journey will take a few weeks in total, with plenty of time and opportunity for a few people scouting ahead or foraging for food to find trouble (or fun) on their own. But the entire group will also encounter a few hazards together, including, in chronological order:

  • Shortly after leaving the elven ruins where they came through the eluvian, a flash flood will catch the camp one evening, despite its position on the best available high ground, sweeping away some supplies and ruining others. People outside of the camp, for whatever reason, will lack the high ground and might experience a more dangerous rush of water, and everyone will have to go to sleep damp and hungry.

  • A day after the group leaves the dwarven ruins, a swarm of dragonlings and several drakes will emerge from a mountain cave when the group passes too close, breathing fire and intent on chasing them away. Their high dragon won't appear for the fight, but several days later she will fly overhead, barely visible through the canopy but obviously very, very large.

  • A few days later, they'll come upon a hot spring that appears crystal-clear and fine for drinking and bathing, but will result in people developing minor, mostly auditory hallucinatory effects an hour or two after their exposure to it. The plants growing nearby will show to have an even stronger effect, if anyone is foolish enough to eat them to find out.

  • In a few areas, the river will cut gorges through the mountainous terrain, and following it will require either walking along narrow traversable paths on the cliffsides or holding supplies overhead and fording through the water. Watch out for dickfish.

okayimin: (still waiting for the sun to fall)

An Unpleasant Arial Experience | open

[personal profile] okayimin 2020-05-05 12:46 am (UTC)(link)
The rocks are a comfort, even if the sight of the sky after so long tucked safely away from it is a bit stressful. Considering there are significantly more pressing things to worry about, it's something Sawbones tucks into the corner of her mind and resolutely ignores.

Which, of course, is when one of the flying creatures strikes.

Sawbones is poking around, looking for anything useful (or interesting) when a weight hits her like a rock fall. She can't begin to see what has her, other than it's large and there's sharp talons digging into her skin, the pain flaring as massive wings beat and she feels herself being lifted into the air. Still stunned, she only manages to let out a sharp, loud "Fuck!", struggling in the grasp of the creature.
hassaran: (Default)

throughout | open

[personal profile] hassaran 2020-05-05 03:36 pm (UTC)(link)
[ There have always been two main types of Scouting: the sort that maps terrain and tracks movements through it, and the sort that follows people about and learns what they know. While her predecessor might have excelled at the first sort, Yseult has always been very focused on the second. Normal camping while traveling is nothing new, but tramping through the forest long-term and unprepared like this is not at all her natural environment and though she won't be caught publicly complaining, even her normally unshakeable poise is tested by the conditions.

She's not about to pull rank to avoid getting her hands dirty (dirtier), pitching in with all manner of tasks that are alien at first and quickly become depressingly routine, like constructing rudimentary shelters out of fronds and vines, beating the underbrush to drive snakes out of a prospective campsite, hiking out from the pack to hunt and forage or find higher ground, skinning and skewering all manner of things for the fire, or taking a turn hacking away at the dense growth ahead to clear a trail. Even during breaks in the heat of the afternoon she's more likely to be found active than not, but it will be possible every now and again to catch her cat-napping in the shade, or catching her breath while watching a sloth creep slowly across a flowering vine.

She's almost always one of the first awake in the mornings, either climbing the likeliest tree nearby to try to get a look at the terrain ahead, or making a valiant attempt at laundry in the safest pocket of river. And she'll take her turns on watch at night, too, and can otherwise be regularly found on the edge of a campfire somewhere, often in discreet conversation with her fellow division heads or others, keeping track of supplies, of injuries, of morale problems, of new information, new theories on how to get out of here, or alone scratching notes with a stub of pencil in a tiny, water-stained notebook in the dim. ]
Edited 2020-05-05 19:58 (UTC)
bloodandsand: (k)

Poesia

[personal profile] bloodandsand 2020-05-05 04:04 pm (UTC)(link)
i. Glamping

Arguably the most upsetting thing about this whole experience is they weren't able to follow the little heretic cows back to their herd. She fancies it would have been quite the merry slaughter, but given the state of the rest of her company, Poesia elects not to share that opinion. Still, the jungle is very lovely and there's something terribly romantic about being stranded with little hope of being rescued.

"It's all very novel," she says, outloud to no one in particular and then pats the shoulder of whoever happens to be on hand and looking particularly glum, adding helpfully, "At least we're not being beset by enemies or some horrible manner of beast. I imagine that would be very terrible."

She sounds suspiciously excited for the possibility of it.

ii. Bring It On: the Musical, Thedas Edition

The draklings and drakes stir rather complicated feelings in her. The primary of which, of course, is death. Devotion follows swiftly behind, with jealousy on it's heels. Who are these children? Who do they belong to? Who tended their eggs and fed them succulent, bloody meats while their Lady rested, resplendent in her glory? How dare they show themselves to her, how dare they threaten her cohorts, how dare they show her everything she has lost and make the blood sing in her veins how dare they how dare-

ii a.
At some point, they either escape or win, it's difficult to say. But either way, their company has moved on and Poesia is sticky with the blood of a Lady's children. She does not lick it away, nor does she wash it when they pass a stream.

She does growl when someone approaches her, a low animalistic sound.

ii b.

The Lady herself emerges and Poesia is transfixed. She stops where she is and watches the path of the high dragon's flight, muscles tensed. Her eyes stay fixed on the spot where the Lady vanishes, hidden from sight by the massive trees.

"Isn't she glorious," Poeisa says to no one in particular, tone raw and venomous, caught between adoration and hatred.
cozen: (Default)

bastien.

[personal profile] cozen 2020-05-05 07:32 pm (UTC)(link)
[ Open & closed starters below, wildcards welcome, or hit me up for plans. ]
cozen: (330)

open: a monkey.

[personal profile] cozen 2020-05-05 07:41 pm (UTC)(link)
It's midday, warm and misty and miserable, and not very far from where everyone else stopped to rest, Bastien is standing beneath a cluster of vines and branches and juggling rocks for a monkey.

The sound of someone approaching makes him stop. He fumbles one of the rocks in the process, but he doesn't take his eyes away from the trees to see who it is. "We are negotiating," he explains in a whisper, tilting his head and speaking a bit out of the side of his mouth, as if it's a secret the monkey might otherwise understand.

He holds up the rocks in offer. Wiggles them a little. The monkey—one of the larger sort, brown and black—continues chewing slowly on the laces of the boot clutched in its sneaky little hands, contemplative but unmoved.

"Non? Pas intéressant?"

He drops the remaining two rocks to the ground on either side of his bare feet—which are swollen, pale, and blistered. Thus the bareness. He'd been investigating why they hurt so much. One boot and both of his socks are still accounted for, on the ground nearby.

"I let my guard down," Bastien admits to whoever has joined him, "because it was cute."

It would be embarrassing even if it weren't comeuppance.
hassaran: (noodles  (53))

[personal profile] hassaran 2020-05-05 08:08 pm (UTC)(link)
Yseult, because she at least tries to be a good friend, laughs only for a moment and very quietly, not enough to spook the monkey opposite, and then bites her lip.

"Does it play the cello too?" she asks in a whisper, as she sidles around the edge of the little clearing, aiming to cut off another angle.
exequy: (216)

open.

[personal profile] exequy 2020-05-05 09:53 pm (UTC)(link)
For a while Kostos had watched the wisp descend, until it became difficult to tell whether he could really still see a pinpoint of light in the dark or if it was his imagination. For another while he'd sat next to the low stone wall around the pit, frowning at the source of a steady drip of water from the cavern ceiling while the other people still lingering in the thaig examined this and that, waiting for the wisp's return to prickle at the edge of his awareness.

It never did. Now he's back on his feet, glaring down into the dark.

"Shit," he says.

He summons another wisp without much thought. Then he thinks. Sending another one to the same fate as the first—when they are alive, in their own way—would be a waste at best, if that fate is wandering so far away it forgets what it's supposed to be doing and spends an age wandering. Cruel at worst, if something destroyed it.

For lack of a better idea, Kostos shoves a loose bit of stone off the wall and into the hole out of pique.
sulahnan: (behind bars 2)

athessa

[personal profile] sulahnan 2020-05-05 10:01 pm (UTC)(link)
[ open & closed starters below, wildcards welcome, hmu for plotting etc. ]
coeurdulyon: (sit and ponder)

lucien the lionheart

[personal profile] coeurdulyon 2020-05-05 10:03 pm (UTC)(link)
[ open & closed starters below, wildcards welcome, hmu for plotting etc. ]
thereneverwas: (satisfied)

[personal profile] thereneverwas 2020-05-05 10:22 pm (UTC)(link)
"Would a torch be out of the question?"

Behind him, Barrow holds his hammer at the ready, and still seems to be in relatively good spirits (it might be a front) despite the circumstances.

"I can break you off a branch, if you can set it alight."
thereneverwas: (concerned)

iib

[personal profile] thereneverwas 2020-05-05 10:25 pm (UTC)(link)
"....yes," comes the muted agreement of an unfortunate bystander who knows better than to say otherwise.
thereneverwas: (grump)

Barrow OTA

[personal profile] thereneverwas 2020-05-05 10:37 pm (UTC)(link)
I. Shelter Before he was a Templar, Barrow was a farm boy. He knows how to construct a shed, although often the raw materials have already been prepared by a carpenter or, at the very least, a woodsman; in this case, they'll have to just make do with what they can find. None of these trees are coming down easily.

His shirt is off not long after his armor, because for one thing it's warm, and for the other it's time for some manual labor, which he performs cheerfully enough despite the circumstances. He's able to secure some vines spanning between two trees, and sets to work weaving large fronds together with more vines in a very slow but seemingly competent draping situation. He welcomes help, and is equally happy to teach others how to do the same.
They'll still be sleeping on the ground, and getting rained on while in progress, but it's a step in the right direction. Too bad they'll have to do it every time they stop somewhere new.

II. Flash Flood

Though he's within the camp when the rain comes, the alarmed shouts of people outside it spur Barrow to go looking for them. He's tall and broad, which he has come to learn means he's automatically part of any rescue party that requires carrying people out of a hazardous situation.
People whom he reaches in time may find themselves carried like a princess or slung over his shoulder, depending on their preference or lack thereof.
He is wearing a shirt, for their comfort and convenience, but it is of course as soaked as everything else.

III. Singing

In the evenings it's time to sit around the fire, or where the fire would be if it weren't pissing rain or otherwise completely damp and inhospitable, and sing Barrow's favorite drinking songs to keep himself and everyone else from going mad. He has a nice voice, is always happy to teach the chorus to anyone who wants to join in, and is equally willing to cede the floor to another performer.
They're going to have a theme song when this is all over, he'll see to that.
degenere: (33)

Val de Foncé, nature explorer || OTA

[personal profile] degenere 2020-05-06 12:15 am (UTC)(link)
"Hold her!"

Upon a rocky outcrop down along the narrow path, there is rooted a certain lightning-struck tree, standing white and stark against the darker shades of cliff and jungle. Long dead and hollow, its ruination left behind a great rift down its side that makes a sort of natural door.

And from inside that door now, a hand whips out, its owner still stood within the tree. The hand is dirty: mud under the fingernails, dirt and damp and sweat smeared at the hand, and a streak of bright red blood dripping down the wrist. This hand is clutching a small furry bundle, legs up, belly showing, and producing a shrieking loud enough to bring the canopy down. Also there are wings--tender pale things, flesh toned where they are webbed like a bat's, and downy soft with a brown fur along the bone. The body is the same color, but its exact nature or species is so hard to tell, given all the writhing it is doing. Too large to be a common bat, a small head with a long pinkish snout. Its beady black eyes are wide and furious and it is showing a great deal of teeth, while its too-large paws clutch at the sky. The paws are also somehow furious.

And.... clawed.

Val puts his head around the tree and beams, proudly, at the bizarre and screaming prize. This is his hand that is clutching the creature. Gently, but firmly.

"It will only be a moment," he says to the beast, "and then I will let you go, choupinette. It is for your own good. Take her," and this is another command, as he turns his attention back to the interior of the tree. There is blood streaked on his forehead too, and a scratch on his cheek. He does not seem to care. Indeed he is happy. His clothes are fine, well-worn and travel-stained, but still somehow elegant and chic even with the shirt sticking to the chest from the sweat and all, the vest left open and casual. Very trendy jungle explorer. "Her sisters are in here and we must get them out!"
cozen: (140)

open*: late.

[personal profile] cozen 2020-05-06 01:53 am (UTC)(link)
[ * to people who wouldn't have seemed irritated by his presence, because he would have left them alone ]

Maybe they’ll be stuck here forever, and they’ll all learn to make jungle yurts or build charming little cottage-fronts onto cliffside caves, and Bastien will hang up garlands of tropical flowers and make a bed out of animal pelts. But until forever seems a little more likely, he’s sleeping wherever he falls, in the clusters that form around campfires at night—or on people’s shoulders or legs, if he knows them like that, until they shove him off—or stretching out at a respectable colleague distance away from anyone who looks isolated, so they won’t be dragged off by a jaguar without anyone noticing.

He sleeps easily but lightly, waking at every distant screech or cry and every nearer crack of underbrush but usually falling right back asleep as soon as he’s noted that it’s nothing to worry about.

But this time he catches the glint of another set of open eyes, so he whispers, “Are you awake?”—very quietly, just in case.
Edited 2020-05-06 02:03 (UTC)
sulahnan: (051)

[personal profile] sulahnan 2020-05-06 02:11 am (UTC)(link)
"Yeah, what's up? Oh," She raises her hand to block the glint of her elf eyes and smirks. "Sorry, did I wake you up with my...wakefulness?"

Athessa could sleep, and likely should, but it's been a while since she's slept in a forest--jungle? Jungle. It's kinda nice, even under the present circumstances. She sighs, puffing out her cheeks.

"Wish the canopy weren't so thick. It'd be nice to see the stars."
keenly: (does the darkness most fear)

[personal profile] keenly 2020-05-06 04:43 am (UTC)(link)
I. Day One

The Tevinter captors had a lot more on their minds than brutalizing their captives, but the forced march alone was its own form of brutality. Adrenaline kept Colin going for a long time, but eventually even it ran out and that is why he has scraping and bruising on one side of his face. Around his neck is a ring of red skin rubbed raw by an iron collar that prevented him from casting. The moment Athessa has it off, he goes to work.

There are people who need healing, who came all this way chasing after him and the others. He is not the only one shaken and exhausted, but he is the only spirit healer in Riftwatch. He loots the bodies of his dead captors for the goods they took off him--herbs, coin, medicines, and his earring--and quickly sets up a station, helping to triage wounds and focus his magic on the most urgent cases.

II. Hot spring

Whether or not Colin bathed in these springs himself is immaterial (he didn't, but only because it's too hot). Once their effects and those of the surrounding plants is known, however, he can be seen going about taking small samples of the water and soil with empty flasks, exhaustion still written on his face. Afterward, he stores the samples and hikes well away from the springs, only to get struck from behind with something. He turns to look, but sees nothing. When he turns back to keep walking, someone might note a very large flying insect playing piggy-back with him.

III. River gorge

Far, far more welcome than a hot spring right now is the cool river water--once it's clear it's not too deep. By this point, Colin has become rather scruffier on his face and has found a way of keeping his hair in a slipshod bun it stays off his neck. He strips off most of his clothes and wraps them around the supplies he's carrying before wading in, holding the bundle out of the water.

On the other side, after all have crossed and camp is made, he can be found sitting apart, having utterly lost all sense of time and existence while staring at nothing.

IV. Closed to Sonia

One night, he quietly approaches the lady and sits beside her with an apologetic look.

"You doing all right, Milady?"

V. Wildcard
Edited 2020-05-06 04:43 (UTC)
sulahnan: (015)

V or something, the first night

[personal profile] sulahnan 2020-05-06 06:34 am (UTC)(link)
Well. It certainly has been a long day. Made longer by the fact that their only quick-and-easy escape route has been shattered into a million pieces.

Between the kidnapping, the running, the fighting, and still being in the midst of the aftermath, Athessa is sure that both she and Colin will be more in need of sleep than a late-night chat. But, adrenaline being what it is, she can't quite bring herself to bed down yet.

"Are the stars not out tonight," she begins to ask, staring up into the darkness above them as she approaches Colin's little jungle niche. "Or is the canopy just that thick?"
keenly: (but there's only so far I can go)

[personal profile] keenly 2020-05-06 07:27 am (UTC)(link)
It's some time before he responds--not because he's thinking the answer through, but because it takes him a moment to remember what words are. He was watching her very closely as she approached, in case she turned out not to be herself. He's seen the bodies of his captors on the forest floor, but nothing feels real right now.

"Would you know how to work out where we are, looking at them?" he asks distantly. He worked with sailors before, he generally knows the drill. "Maybe someone brought the tools for that."

His tone is numb, almost dreamlike. None of those prospects sound hopeful, the way he says them.
keenly: (thirty seconds and)

[personal profile] keenly 2020-05-06 07:35 am (UTC)(link)
Colin doesn't respond right away. He'd almost like to be left alone. But only almost. He sighs and sits up, resting his arms on his knees.

"I heard something."
cozen: (303)

[personal profile] cozen 2020-05-06 05:10 pm (UTC)(link)
Bastien holds up a waggling finger, as if to tell her to hush, but right away it wilts, and his you're not funny expression wilts along with it at the devastating realization:

"Oh, no. That would be adorable."

He's not really so distractible, of course, not even by the thought of a monkey with a tiny little cello. He shifts on his feet—which hurt like bitches, both of them, but he ignores it as gamely as he would ignore a stab wound in a ballroom—to be better primed to go the other way if the monkey makes a move.

"If I can distract it," he says quietly, fishing carefully and slowly around in his pockets, "enough for it to loosen its hold a little, and you scream at just the right moment, maybe it will be startled into dropping it."

Or maybe it will run away with his boot forever.
cozen: (074)

[personal profile] cozen 2020-05-06 05:20 pm (UTC)(link)
Bastien scoots over in stages—legs first, then arching his back to move his torso, then shoulders and head—until he's close enough to keep whispering without waking anyone else up. Close enough to lie on bits of her hair, too. He lifts his head again to move it so he won't make it pull.

"The Dalish must have different constellations," he says. "Or at least different stories about them, if they are the same—do they?"
hassaran: (_098 peaked  (59))

[personal profile] hassaran 2020-05-06 05:44 pm (UTC)(link)
"Or it will run away with your boot forever," Yseult says, very sensibly, and then adds, a bit less so, "And then you'll die out here."

She continues to move very slowly into position, stilling whenever the monkey fixes its gaze on her.

"What we need is a sack," she says, "or a net," but of course there's neither to hand, nor any obvious substitutes within reach as she quickly looks about. So: "Toss me your shirt."

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