Event log: Who What Where Wendigo

[hadrielmods]

Who: Everyone participating in the wendigo event!
What: The accidental-cannibalism-turned-horrifying-monster event that is the Who What Where Wendigo event!
Where: All around the city
When: Feb 14th-March 1st
Warnings: Cannibalism, body horror, evil monsters lurking around.

Don't forget to check up on the Wendigo Guide that Ami posted!

On February 14th, Rage and Fear decide to give Hope a little bit of help taking care of the residents of Hadriel - they'll provide some food for awhile. How nice! Except, of course, that there's an extra ingredient in this food. A can of beef stew? Yeah... that might not be beef. But hey, it still tastes pretty good! Unfortunately, some spirits slipped through the Door last time it opened, and they're ready to possess anyone who participates in cannibalism - even if they don't know it.

Anyone who eats the provided meat will be possessed by a wendigo spirit. Over the course of twelve days, they will transform into a monster that feels little but rage and hunger. While at first it can be explained away easily enough (people are super annoying, and isn't everyone a little hungry most of the time?), by February 18th, wendigo transformations are impossible to ignore. A few days after, on February 22nd, the anger and cravings of the wendigo spirit will overcome all other emotions, and possessed characters may begin hunting.

The physical and mental transformation will be complete by February 26th. The possessed characters will have lost themselves completely at that point. While physical healing (done by a character with Hope's blessing or another healing ability) can turn back the physical and some mental effects, they will remain possessed until death or until Hope removes the wendigo spirit - which can only be done on the altar of Hope's temple. So have fun dragging your angry, possessed friends there!

On March 1st, Rage does Hope a solid (because she feels sort of bad) and kills all remaining wendigos. Upon revival, the spirit will be gone and the character will be fully recovered. Hopefully no one holds what they did while possessed against them!

► This log covers February 14th-March 1st.
► Feel free to make your own logs, as well
► Please tag headers of threads with content warnings where they apply
► Please put your character's name and open/closed in the subject line of your starters!
► Please report any character deaths right here!

Comments

[vendetta]

"That Nick Valentine guy?" He's some sort of android. Kaz hasn't spoken to him since that day, but for someone who wasn't strictly human, he'd been decent enough. He'd wanted to put other people before him, and he'd been appreciative of Miller's efforts.

With not much else on the docket for the day, Kaz doesn't see why he couldn't settle in for a long story. Despite everything, he still finds it fascinating to learn about other's lives. That's especially true here, where someone could come from a place he's never even heard of or imagined.

"I've got nothing better to do with my time right now." Rey might, but Kaz assumes she would excuse herself if she needed to.

He nods to her. "Go for it."

[circumitus]

Rey nods. "That'd be the one."

She has yet to meet anyone else who's as blatantly more machine than human. It's one edge that even Rey can't deny that she has; it isn't until she starts expressing her less human side that people start to question what she is. Nick is pretty blatant right off the bat. She almost feels sorry for him.

Kaz is right that she would've excused herself by now, rather than asking. She just sighs, resting her hands over her knees where she sits.

"Was born over ninety-seven years ago in an underground military base. In a way, am not that much different from Nick, except maybe for our different purposes. Was made for war. As such, most experience gained came from information... memories of different soldiers transferred here." She points to the side of her own head.

"Have approximately two hundred and thirty-two years' worth of memories and experience of different people. Of living as them during wartime." Her hand lowers back down to her lap. "Don't really know if those women were real or if the memories were all fabricated, but it's easy enough to remember their lives for them to feel real.

"So that's, um... That's the abridged version. Ultimately, was never meant to be made aware that these memories weren't real, or not being human. Suppose it would've made others uncomfortable if they knew."

There's no way for her to gauge whether or not Kaz would be one of these people, so she's making a gamble here. It seems that there are stranger enough individuals here that full disclosure doesn't sound like a terrible thing.

[vendetta]

Suffice to say, the story isn't anything approaching what Miller had expected from Rey. For one thing, the idea that she was anything other than human hadn't occurred to him. She's got scars like she's made of flesh and blood, unlike that Valentine guy -- and she cared enough about other people to be on grave-digging duty, didn't she?

Granted, if she'd originally been unaware of her own status as an android, that would all make sense. She'd had other people's memories implanted into her, and it's impossible not to think of Venom in that moment. It's not quite the same setup, but it's close enough that it makes Kaz's skin crawl, makes him feel for her even if she isn't strictly human.

It's the stubborn part of him that's determined not to be uncomfortable simply because of Rey's mention of it. He's quiet for a while, letting it all sink in, before he drops his hand from his mouth and glances over at her, taking her in under a new light.

At least he's finding this out early on in their interactions. Otherwise he definitely would have felt betrayed.

"So how did you figure out what was really going on?" he finally asks as he places his hand against his thigh and digs his fingers in.

[circumitus]

People tend to react to this sort of thing very differently, and Kaz's prolonged silence has Rey wondering whether or not she should be excusing herself at this juncture. Even his query doesn't breed much confidence.

"Found the other vessels. Rather, was shown the different bodies, all of them nearly identical to this one." She stops to gesticulate, indicating her current self. Her vessel. "Would be transferred into a different vessel when one died. Have been shot, stabbed, blown up, among other various deaths over the years."

A rather traumatizing experience, one would assume. But Rey has since disconnected herself from that part of her life. It's easier to live with herself that way.

[vendetta]

It's a chilling story. To picture unit after unit made to look just like the woman in front of him, all of them meant to take on identities that didn't really belong to them -- well, it was sickening. Although Miller was disgusted with the people behind the project, not with Rey herself. She's a victim of it, but she seems to have come out on the other side in one piece.

"You must be pretty pissed off that they did all that to you," Miller says, a test more than anything else. How much can she feel? Apparently she can eat, or else she wouldn't have bothered to hunt down monsters for their meat in the first place. That's different from having distinct emotions, though. He has a million different questions buzzing in his head.

Kaz leans forward in his seat toward Rey. "Did you try to get revenge?" It's the first thing that comes to mind, because it's never that far from his thoughts.

[circumitus]

Pissed off? She was pretty pissed at one point. But she's had a lot of time to put things into a different perspective. Look at the world from different colored shades. So Rey just shrugs.

"Once. It didn't work out." As it turned out, the guy had other bodies to hop into because he wasn't much unlike her. He was just more machine than human. But that's a whole other story altogether. "To be honest, it was a long time ago. The anger that was once there has since... turned into something else. Am not going to be a victim, crying about how terrible and unjust it was. It happened. Am over it."

Probably.

There are some things you're just too old for. Having over two hundred years' worth of people's memories? It makes you grow a little tired of some shit.

[vendetta]

Anger fading over time is a natural way to handle such a thing, being wronged in such a way, and yet Kaz himself hasn't yet been able to let go. The process has at least started here in Hadriel, primarily because the targets of his anger are far away. Except for Big Boss, and they've slowly been learning to live with each other out of necessity and practicality more than anything else.

Kaz makes note of Rey's strange speaking pattern, and wonders if that has something to do with what she is, or if it's a dialect where she's from. Still, she seems to have actually moved on from her messy past, something that Kaz himself can't claim.

"I think that makes you better than most of us," he admits. If he'd been in her situation, he'd likely still be plotting revenge.

He should let her go, but there's one more question he can't quite shake. He looks her over for a moment. "So... is your body organic? You have to eat, right? Since you've been hunting for food and all..."

[circumitus]

"Not really," she admits. "Most of the people who were involved are long dead by now, anyway. Would probably be singing a different tune any of them were still alive."

Even better, despite the fact that Rey wasn't the one to kill all of them. Either way, there's no need to get worked up over old skeletons.

She blinks at Kaz's final question. "Don't need to eat or sleep as much as a normal person does, but am mostly organic to the point where it's a necessity, yes. Was made to function like-human to better blend in with the other soldiers." Rey had already made plenty of people uncomfortable back then just from her demeanor alone. If people knew what she really was, that would be doubly more problematic.