player plot: the horror of sarrux's pass

[aberratic]

WHO: Caius, Gwen, Hermione, Jayce, Ness, Siorus, Stephen, Vanya (sumptus, elegiaque, reparo, pathlit, aberratic, wildered, portalling, wearyallalone)
WHAT: The Horrors Cometh
WHEN: Beginning of Harvestmere (October)
WHERE: Sarrux's Pass, outside Wycome
NOTES: OOC post here. TWs for body horror, NPC death, ghost town/apocalypse vibes, children in upsetting situations, and general horror stuff.

Characters

CAIUS

GWENAËLLE

HERMIONE

JAYCE

NESS

SIORUS

STEPHEN

VANYA

The residents of Sarrux's Pass, a small village tucked into the mountains of the Free Marches, have long held that their settlement used to be a bustling trade city where dwarves were as plentiful as humans and they had constant contact between the surface and the Deep Roads. These were assumed by the surrounding cities to be nothing more than fanciful legends for decades, but any long-time resident swore it was the truth, lost to time and "monsters in the deep."

Residents were finally vindicated a few months ago when an earthquake caused a landslide in the surrounding mountains, revealing a long-lost outlet from the Deep Roads. At first, residents of the pass were apprehensive, all too aware of the dangers posed by such an opening, but the longer they went without Darkspawn spilling from the entrance, the more eager they became to investigate.

Eventually, the bravest among them began to enter the Roads, in search of ore and artifacts. They were vindicated again, finding both, and Sarrux's Pass quickly became a magnet for treasure hunters, Lords of Fortune, historians, archaeologists, and anyone in search of a quick buck. Even in the face of the Venatori invasion of the Marches, the promise of fame and riches drew handfuls of people seeking their fortunes to the Pass. News from the area was steady, and filled with discoveries and success stories—as well as the brawls, backstabbing, and even the occasional murder that comes with any good gold rush town.

It's been a few months since the reveal of the Deep Roads entrance. News from Sarrux's Pass has slowed to a trickle, then a drip, and now, in the past weeks, nothing. The last message to make it out of the village three weeks ago said simply: "We weren't just right about the dwarves." The parchment was stained with an unidentifiable liquid—not water, not blood—which smelled of the sea.

Riftwatch has been tasked with investigating the village, with three goals: find out what happened to the residents, recover whatever valuables they can from the Deep Roads, and, if necessary, close the entrance again. There may be Venatori in the area, or Darkspawn, or territorial prospectors—without contact with the village, there's no way of knowing what Riftwatch may discover. © tessisamess

Comments

slaps a “they’re freaks” body horror cw on this LMAO

[portalling]

“’Interesting’?” Stephen repeats, caught off-guard, because that certainly wasn’t what he was expecting.

Her fingertips ghosting along the tentacle makes a sudden, sharp full-body shiver ripple down his spine. It’s such a curious sensation: it is both him and is not him. He can feel the touch in a limb he’s absolutely not used to having, and the contact is startling, ticklish —

The tentacle is restlessly reaching and grasping, searching, eventually following the contact to coil around Gwenaëlle’s wrist, the suckers pressing into her skin.

From what he recalls from school outings to the aquarium, these should be conveying taste and smell, but just like those restlessly-blinking new eyeballs: he doesn’t receive any extra information that his brain isn’t wired for. Just, that vague weight and pressure of contact.

“Should… I be afraid to ask?”

[elegiaque]

The way it moves, independent of Stephen but not entirely, is fascinating — so is the feeling of it twisting around her wrist, a peculiar texture even before suckers get involved and the point at which they do,

in fairness to him, that’s not a not worryingly thoughtful look on her face. The particular roundness of her eyes when something has occurred to her that might or might not be a good idea. “I don’t think,” somewhat regretfully, “we’re going to have enough time for you to need to decide that.”

And, upon consideration, the horn might be an issue. She’s thinking logistics in a way her vague history of being delighted by qunari big, hypothetically, has never really involved.

[portalling]

“—Ah.”

Even over two years later, she still has the endless capacity to surprise him. Stephen takes most things in stride these days, the sorcerer prides himself on being famously unflappable, but this time. He is flapped. There’s the very faintest tinge of pink on his pale cheeks, flustered.

He glances at the rest of the room, a quick count; still surrounded by six other people in an actual hellscape, and the effect doesn’t last outside of this chamber, so. Certainly not enough time.

Not a thing he’d ever really considered before, but possibility is an open door. It’s nice, finding out he can still be surprised by things.

“That’s— well. Even after all this time, Gwenaëlle Baudin, I’m finding out that you contain multitudes.” Stephen’s voice is fond. He’d folded his other hand shut to hide the eyeball, although he hadn’t worried much about whether she’d be repulsed or not; he’d been too fascinated by the experiment itself, counting time before the mutations went away, taking note, and he knew he would be back to normal in a few, so the point seemed moot. Until…

Joking, except apparently maybe not?: “Perhaps there’s some raw unprocessed lyrium still left over in Research storage.”

[elegiaque]

That definitely sounds like something they shouldn’t use lyrium for — the sort of fun idea that’s never going to make it past the fun idea stage — but as a fun idea while they’re still trapped in a horror show that makes the Gallows themselves sound downright homey and nostalgic,

her thumb slides along his wrist, and she remains surprisingly comfortable having a tentacle wrapped around hers. It barely registers on the scale for public displays of affection (she’s not been persuaded that his personal space isn’t now also hers), except in its particular implications. (And— it’s still just comforting to be close to him. It’s hard to imagine it ever wouldn’t be.)

“Well, maybe we’ll have to investigate that. At a later date. In a controlled environment.”

A private, controlled environment.

[portalling]

The corner of his mouth tugs into a smile, biting back a full laugh. It’s a funnier topic to consider, and safer to joke about this, a more pleasant distraction than their bleak and ugly surroundings. An enjoyable diversion, and better to think on.

(Gwenaëlle’s thumb along his wrist; the tentacle coiled possessively around hers as if reluctant to let her go. There’ll be suction marks left behind when she finally peels it loose, like a row of hickeys along her forearm.)

“Y’know. Everything done solely for science,” he says. “I am technically a researcher, after all—”

🎀

[elegiaque]

Gwenaëlle is laughing, quiet, when she leans in where they’re already close together to press on him a brief, close-mouthed kiss—

“Technically, he says,” mock disparaging. A glance down and, “I think this one is starting to go, too, in the meantime.”

She can feel the tentacle’s grip weakening, the way it isn’t quite the same as being released. As the muscle in it gives way to a failure of the fade to hold it together in place, she says, “Well, something to look forward to.”