your admin rugrats here with an update on the Terror Constitution™ (est. 1845) — we will no longer be holding activity checks !! this comes as everyone is either entering or slumping out of their finals streak, while workload in general, under joyous capitalism, increases towards the end of the year. yet this is also because terror is nearing its final chapters, which we’ve been bragging/threatening/promising for a while, and still cannot quite place a date on because so much of it evolves along with the members’ choices. (it might even come down to a dreaded poll..... democracy? ghastly.)
this means, for due fairness to everyone still stumbling upon us in the recommended tags, we will not be accepting new players. it would put anyone willing to join at a massive disadvantage, given the sheer Proustian tomes of information required to unpack some (read: all) relationships, allegiances and motivations between the muses. we are so incredibly flattered by the recent anon asks we received, and we’re sorry we cannot fit more people in the current dynamic of the plot. because of this, we have also eliminated ‘muse caps’ on both OCs and skeletons. this means, essentially anyone can apply for as many characters as they feel they can handle. judiciously, but sexily.
ultimately, this right call took so long to make because no one quite expected terror to survive for so long under the current world circumstances, let alone evolve in such a fantastic way. with plots sparking up daily, new tidbits in the backstories of muses unearthed, essentially just an ebb and flow of creative chaos??? it’s, how you say,... unreal. which is why we don’t really see the need for activity checks or muse caps anymore.
go wild, go ungently into the eldritch night. we trust the People to post if they can, as they feel like, and when they want to tie a specific arc so we can all gush over it. (we hope this will also come to the aid of anyone struggling w/ muse, w/ general brain compliance, and w/ real life making it strategically & poetically impossible to just fuckin’ Vibe.)*
*as always, if you need help in any way, or even just to bounce ideas with someone, Discord is always open. our DMs, though mostly unfiltered, will find a way to offer an egg in this trying time. and if you ever want a plot shift for your character, feel free to run any pitch by us !!
Please follow the following NPC blogs! These are all inhabitants of the new port city in which our characters find themselves, and you can read more about them and their corresponding locations in our newest plot drop. We encourage you all to send them questions, as this will be their main point of interaction, but they are also available for threading!
Barkeep at THE SIREN’S SORROW.
Clerk at HANGMAN’S TRINKETS.
Receptionist at HIGHWAYMAN’S REST.
A week after the takeover, the Promethean is well on its way to finish its trek. Cutting through calm and complacent waters, the crew and guests note that the ice that had once held them hostage has dissipated overnight with the dark and the gloom. Perhaps the deaths of the soldier and the girl sated the beast, some whisper — it’s leaving us alone. No, their comrade scoffs. Too easy. You heard the French - the thing killed a boatload of them before it left them alone! Two people are nothing but crumbs to it. It’ll be back.
“You’re all buffoons”, another chimes in. “The Agathe? Mutineers all along. It’s as Estrada said. They killed their crew and are killing ours too.”
Amid the new tension borne of the mutiny, suspense heavy as wool hangs over the ship as it resumes its course. Lookouts are silent as they watch the ice, dread fraying their nerves, the same thought trawling across their conscience. Surely, it will reappear. After everything, it will come back.
But nothing parts the ocean, not even the breeze. An uneasy quiet descends upon the ship as those with an interest in completing the passage outnumber those who seek to return now that the waters promise an easy journey. An end to all of this is feasible — the only question remains: will all that’s been lost have been worth it? Is there any end that justifies the means?
It’ll be weeks, months yet before the Promethean reaches Hong Kong, but a call rings out in the midst of the morning. Wick and Bastien, high atop and on lookout, wave down wildly at the deckhands below.
“Land! Land ahead!”
A seaman relays the message, bursts into the captain’s quarters where Marcus waits, in covenant with Hugo. Both men snap their heads at once, when they see the rallied cry that’s being picked up among the ranks. Both men, yes, to the slack curl of their jaw, can hardly credit it. It cannot be, their dark eyes say, pupils flashing. Even down to their mannerism, they have begun to look the same.
“Land, sir. Lookout’s caught sight of land. Of a city - and its harbor!”
The vice-admiral-made-captain starts in his seat, brow furrowing, skeptical. “You’re joking. Even you must have looked at a map, we’ve got quite a way before even—”
“I swear it!” In his haste, he doesn’t mind his manners. As frantic as anyone’s ever seen, even Estrada cannot deny the truth from his eyes. “The lads are calling for you up-deck, Sir. The whole world is. A port awaits us.”
The rest of those onboard join the watch on the upper deck, curious clamoring seizing even those under the watchful eye of a musket barrel. There is no mistaking it - an oceanside city perched on low, rocky stone worn by lapping waves is clear through the spyglass. Slender, shimmering buildings of white spiral towards the sky in spires; others buildings are lower to the ground, and all are built with the same stone upon which the city sits and all are half-hidden behind a mist.
“Make plans to dock.”
—
“Don’t stand up, Dowling. It’s only me. I come bearing news.”
Silence. In the space between the bottom of the floor and the door, Malachy’s silhouette shifts.
“Too much of a coward to face me, Estrada?” Ragged voice tears through the air like a dagger, muffled through the door. “State your peace and leave.”
“Is that an order, captain?” A humorless, hollow laugh. “This is a gesture of goodwill, Dowling. I’d mind yourself until I’ve said what I’ve come to say.” He pauses. Perhaps to hide his own disbelief. Perhaps to spite Malachy. “We’ve fucking crossed it, Dowling. We think we’ve found the passage and we’ve found a way through. Hell, we might have already crossed it. We’ve got a city in sight and we’re making plans to dock in their harbor.”
A long pause. “No. No, that can’t be. It’s far too soon. A week, that’s not enough.”
“Say it as much as you want. By the time we lay anchor, you can come see for yourself. I reckon, see, that it won’t even be a day. As a truce, I’ll let you out—supervised, of course, and never too far from my sight. But freedom, Dowling. You’re to partake in it as well.”
“Thrilled, are you?” A soft thump on the other side of the door as Malachy leans against it. “How neatly this all transpires for you as soon as you seize the helm. Should’ve mutinied sooner, I bet you’re thinking.”
“Not here to question it. For your sake, I hope you don’t either.”
—
Up close, the mist that cloaks the city shifts with every step taken. Appearing transparent once, then cloudy with a thin, greenish film next, then shimmering with an opalescent, abalone sheen. It is cold, but not cold enough for the thick coats that have proven imperative for standing outside in the Arctic. A strange humidity permeates the air - it is thin and thick, at once, and one feels a shortness and a swelling in every inhale - not painful, nor is it natural. The luster visible from the sea is procured from shells embedded into the foundation of every building, in between the stone and plaster - old and weathered, they glint in the light that parts through the mist. Perhaps the first thing that can be glimpsed, like a maroon carpet of colour, is the red sands on the eastward beach. Ground to a fine point, blanketing uniformly around the village until the paved streets begin to stretch on, it resembles a carpet of leaves or clipped gems as much as a natural phenomenon.
No other ships are docked at the silent harbor. Cobblestone lines the path up the crumbling seawall and into the city where townsfolk mill about in the marketplaces and town square, a vast space eclipsed by grand, towering edifices - a spindly cathedral demarcated by an unfamiliar brass symbol of the very tallest of its spires; an ancient, squat tavern; an inn with patrons streaming in and out like shoals; a surfeit of various shops of every variety, marked not by words or names, but by images painted into the overhanging signs. As the sun begins to dip below the horizon, one realizes there is an absence of gas lamps that dotted London in abundance. Instead, white wax candles spill over every ledge, every crook and cranny, their bases melted into the stone and bedrock and wood.
Townsfolk cast strange, curious glances at these newcomers, but their gazes never linger long before they carry on with their businesses. The accents are implacable, though they speak English - not even a mishmash of any known dialects, but entirely unfamiliar. Not even the Promethean’s most well-traveled guests can narrow their tongue or the origin of their accents down.
The shops and inns here refuse currency - one takes what they need, and they carry their debt with them until it's repaid, metaphorically or literally.
—
Malachy emerges from the boiler room a fragmented man, gaze trained on the multiple barrel ends that follow his every movement. Every breath he takes lifts his entire body in a heaving pulse-thrum. Hair unkempt and eyes wild with animal fury, his lips lift into a sneer as he finds Marcus in the crowd of muskets.
“Is this where I’m supposed to thank you for your mercy, Estrada?” He appraises the armed crew. “And your lackeys, for their restraint?”
“Chin up, Dowling.” The vice-admiral’s lips curl into a grimace. “Even you cannot deny this good fortune. Certainly this justifies some of the trouble.”
“It justifies nothing. If you’re wise, you’ll not let me out of your sight.”
No more is exchanged between the two men before Malachy is ushered up the main ladderway, up to the upper deck and onto the dock, one armed escort in front and behind him. The rest of the crew begin to disembark, all who aligned with Malachy closely followed by another who wasn’t.
The dock creaks beneath their feet, and the procession is slow, tentative, upon reaching this new port. Everything is familiar, and yet nothing is - not even the screech of a gull to announce their arrival.
Then, a scream, feral and hoarse.
Behind them, Jules takes advantage of the momentary awe and sweeps the legs of her captor, knocks them into the harbor waters. A musket fires. The narrow dock doesn’t allow much in the way of room, and those who have not yet made it out of the ship clamber back on. Captors shout for their captives to STAND STILL, MOVE BACK down into the lower deck, but the chaos and the overlapping shouts overpower them. Smaller squabbles break out as the rest milk the opportunity given to them by Jules’ commotion. Ahead of them all, Malachy slams himself into the guard in front of them, tackling them both to the ground. His second escort scrambles for a clear shot, musket trembling - only to lurch back, struck in the shoulder. Behind him, Ephraim had broken free and wrestled the gun from his warden, his aim true then and now as he holds it steady on Malachy’s escort, who wordlessly surrenders his own weapon to Malachy.
On the boat, chaos descends. Roi has easily overtaken his guard, pinning them to the side of the boat. Before he can hurl them into the water, Mariah throws himself onto his back, pinning the steward’s neck into the crook of his elbow. A flash of silver in his free palm - but then Laurents is on him, twisting their arm back until the knife drops to the ground with a clatter, and drives his fist into the mercenary’s gut, allowing Roi the chance to break free. Elias dives for the dagger and slashes at the ankles of Fahra’s guard, who had her wrists firmly in their grip. He cuts deep, cuts an unthinkable and irreparable gash over both calves; enough to maim, perhaps, if another one of Estrada’s hounds had not stepped in. The second man, bigger, wrangles the steward into a deathgrip. They both take the fall, tumbling several paces across the teak. In the somersault, the snowfall of movement and limbs, Ayla Dowling steps in with a lifeline. A physical rope, no time for metaphor, no time for anything but the hard gnashing of the present. The doe loops the rope around the guard’s neck, and, with a vicious tug that no one would’ve wagered on, pulls him off Elias and onto the planks. She waits no second before helping Elias up, and together they join Jack, the sergeant’s dagger blocking Violet’s aim on August.
Some paces away, Noemie leads the rest of the Agathe survivors through the skirmish and off the ship - they start down the docks, but Katja blocks their way, and it’s her musket to their none. She grabs Tristan by the arm, presses the musket to his stomach - if you want him alive, you’ll do as I say. A gun close by goes off, causing all of them to flinch. In that instant, Nyima breaks from the hostage group to lunge at Katja. The two scuffle, until Nyima gets a grip at the barrel of the musket, shoves it into the air - it goes off. Tristan tries to pin Katja down, and she hisses, points the gun at him - Nyima yanks the barrel back. It goes off again - whether by accident or as a result of the scuffle or by intention, it finds its mark.
A wail cuts through the air, and for a moment, the bedlam stills. Nyima clutches a weeping wound on her chest, collapsing into Tristan’s arms. Ever the protectress, she is restless still even with her grievous wound, tries to force herself before the rest of the Agathe survivors as they fall to her side. This is one of the last attempts, the last slingshots of action in her muscles and spirit: to interpose between her friends and Katja. The translator backs away, wide-eyed, but still in possession of her wits - weapon poised to fire again if they tried to seek retribution.
“Call Jonathan! Casimir! Help her!” Emma begs to no one in particular. She is quick to kneel, had already torn off half the scarves she was wearing, and is pressing dry palms, wet cloth, crimson sash to Nyima’s blooming chest. The petal spreads, swallows the entire front of the amulet’s dress. For all her time spent in gardens, for all that she turned stem and stalk to see the wonders of the world, this is a flower Emma cannot understand. Cannot weed out, or stall, or even conceive of. The blood flows, pours, goes over easy; a swell like the motion of waves, on what was once a ferocious, then a frozen, now an utterly becalmed sea. Nyima’s hand raises to Emma’s cheek, and, like the curl of a gentle claw, wraps around the jawline. Tristan falls to her other side. She whispers something to both of them, a voice that doesn’t carry, a wisp already flattened into velvet by the winds. Then she presses her own face into Tristan’s thigh. Her Judas, her Captain; it’s hardly appropriate, isn't’ it, that he’s the one that has been betrayed again—that he’s the one left behind. Perhaps this is why the cook smiles to him, last. To assure, as much as assuage. To promise there is another turn to this story, even as her own is already fading.
By now, Malachy and his officers and Marcus and his loyalists have found the source of commotion and gathered, wordlessly. Jonathan weaves through to reach Nyima - there’s shifting, the subtle sounds of men taking aim, and Ephraim immediately raises his gun to Marcus. It takes his own Captain’s voice to make him lower it, hip level, eyes murderous.
“Let them go. Let her…” Malachy pauses, swallowing through his hoarseness. There is no doubt as to the injury’s severity - the bleeding has not abetted, thick rivulets seeping through Emma’s fingers and pooling on the fallow ground. Malachy Dowling was a man of many wounds; some borne within, some hidden, but most of all witnessed. He knows what a death mark looks like. Nyima’s body is a canvass of carnage.
Not much for Jonathan to do, no, not much for anyone to do at all. Doing has led them here; the rough, loud, prideful fall of it. The impossible tally. The Captain, the former Captain, rises his voice once more. “Let them care for her in peace. You’ve had the upper hand, and now - now neither of us do.”
It’s Tristan’s cry that announces it; the death, the finality. Emma’s face is as white as the sky above them. Hands as rusty as the sands on this beach, on this strange place of salvation. Ayla and Noemie huddle closer to lift her up, lift her away from Nyima, but she won’t go. It seems no one is going anywhere, anymore — the whole possibility of it has been culled. Bones resting as slack as burlap; as unconscious as the flotsam left after a flood.
Behind him, Edward and Jaya usher those they knew to be aligned with the old command off the docks and into the city. Marcus watches, impenetrable, his own musket held limp at his side, unmoving, unspeaking.
Then he extends a hand to Katja, like a faraway tyrant, the stone hewn statue of one, calling home its acolytes. He waits until the thief, once-translator, now trembling toll paid in blood, comes into his shadow. Lays a hand on her shoulder, protective and proprietary all at once. Lays a gaze, then, like the snag of a chain; drags it over all of them that remained up deck. Only then he begins to speak.
“So that is how these things end: the pointless brutality of it. Man’s obsession to keep a code of honour that has long stopped serving. Has everyone seen it, looked their fill? Good. I am nothing if not prophetic, hm? Now. Now. Let us make sure no other prediction of mine will see the garrish, gruesome light of day. Have you all had enough of mutiny and cockfights? Are you ready to make something of your life?”
His body turns to the rest of the crew, a full recoil, almost a repose.
“Seems to me this is as good a place to start as any.”
To his own, Malachy offers his own words. Exhaustion permeates his words, weighs them heavy as lead - the fight is over, all there is left to do is rest. Regroup. Loss, they all know by now, regardless of their alignment, is consumptive. It eats and it steals and it offers nothing in return. “Let us not forget the dangers that have led us here. Betrayals. Mutinies. Guns at our heads as we lived and slept. A beast that knows not of compassion nor mercy. Just because we are alive does not mean we are safe - do not let your guard down. Rest, and we will regather. Salvation, whether it be here, or home, awaits us in unity.”
OOC: We hope you enjoyed today’s plot drop, lovely members and lurkers! The Promethean has landed in strange new lands where nothing is at it seems, with tension aboard boiling over into a chaotic climax. The crew has mostly dispersed into the city, with each side of the mutiny looking to gain their bearings and regain control.
A poll will be posted in the discord so that you can choose if your muses retreated with Malachy Dowling or stayed anchored with Marcus Estrada. Please remember that everyone who helped Mal/Jules stage the insurgency is no longer a crew member. However, if your character has motives for staying (a loved one, a status as double agent, suddenly undecided etc.) you are welcome to have them remain on the Promethean. Just be sure to keep us up to date if any major loyalties have shifted, and, as always, to have a blast writing & plotting through these little rats’s conflicts.
There is, of course, much to explore in this nameless port city, including NEW LOCATIONS, listed below, and new NPCs with which to interact as sideblogs. These will be ran by the admin team: K., Venli, and Rhi, and will be strangers to the rest of the crew, each bringing their own motives, mysteries, and intricacies into the interaction. Keep an eye out for the follow post within the next few days! More locations will also be added as the plot and exploration of the area progresses. As of now, THE CAPTAIN is an active muse and may interact with the rest of the characters. Have fun, and happy writing!
AT HANGMAN’S TRINKETS.
At the other end of the port, pushed far enough from the seaside that it almost looks like any other village, splays the tight, narrow venue of the store. If most buildings on the docks look comely, a peace that alludes to most corners of the world where the ocean laps the shore, this one has a marked touch to it. It draws the eye, the firm painted a gaudy russet, as red as the sands that litter the eastward beach. Despite its hue, the sign has been battered into something closer to dried blood by the gale, and the marks on it are illegible. Could be any human language, or not at all. Perhaps what makes the shop stand out even more is the absence resounding in the harbour. The maroon posts are entirely devoid of any other ship, not even small fishing vessels anchored at half-length on the wharf. It should make the Promethean loom, but instead it diminishes it; could be soothing, could be dangerous, the way the quiet waves knock it about, with very few inhabitants coming to stare at it, to help tie it to the pier, or even to barter. Yet there is plenty of bartering to be done further inland. The rest of the expanse might be barren, but the shop is bright and bundled up, like an old woman sat by the fire. A string of fairy lights are hung over it in a diagonal row, the sash of it lolling slack enough to catch a taller sailor’s head and dapple it with warmth. At the counter, a young, plucky clerk spreads their arms in welcome. Behind them, vials, jars, and tinkling bottles litter the entire front wall. It is such a kaleidoscope of size and color that any customer might be more dazzled than tempted to purchase. From camphor oil to whale teeth necklaces, from silk handkerchiefs to beads of black glass, everything seems ready to be displayed, bartered, and doubted. The clerk is nothing but exhilarated to have someone to talk to at last. Their bronze face is dappled with the hanging lights, and a nose ring stretches from their septum to their ear. That golden chain makes them look both older and younger at once — as they chuckle and lapse into chatter, already ready to soak up all the information visitors might bestow, it becomes more and more difficult to gauge their age. Or their intentions…. How much will you share?
HIGHWAYMAN’S REST.
Perhaps the most striking front belongs to the port’s hotel, a polished three-tiered complex that occupies the main street. Oddly enough, despite the fact that the port seems all but deserted, the building has the most upkeep in the area. The outer walls are painted olive green, in a stark contrast with the houses’ cream-colored front and the greyed, saltwind-bitten outstretches of wood along the pier. The double doors allow a glimmer of light to cross the threshold, since its glass panels are painted with scenes that resemble the stained glass on churches and temples all over the world. Once inside, the vista opens on a waiting room decked with paintings and sculptures, with works of art that don’t seem to resemble anyone in particular. In order to ring the receptionist’s bell, you have to wrangle your hand through a number of small statutes. One bust on the receptionist’s counter, reads king sylvester stuart. Another, an effigy that seemed carved in filigree, depicts josephine robespierre. On the usual, there is no one in the waiting room, and no noises pour from above. For all intents and purposes, it feels as if the entire establishment is deserted; or perhaps never used in the first place, simply spruced, polished, and displayed for the hollow beauty of it. On the fourth clanger of the bell, the receptionist finally walks into view. A door in the wall opens, and they step through with a merry gait, not allowing anything to be glimpsed behind them. At once, they are ready to sort the visitor with the best sets of chambers for their disposition. They try to strike up a conversation, one hand already on the ledger, and do not even presume to ask for money until after the end of the stay. Their demeanor might almost foster the sense of a homecoming; only their remarks, and the parental, proprietary style of their speech, makes it feel more like a transaction instead. For all the luxury that defines the hotel, a visitor may wonder if, in fact, they’re being sold something else underneath. However, after such a long journey of darkness and water, who can say no to even a few hours in an ivory bedroom—for a dalliance, a tumble into unconsciousness, or just to experience the decadent beauty of those who’ve had easier lives?
THE SIREN’S SORROW.
Coming up from the docks, the hard-teak stairs lead into a bulky tavern, a building more squat than inviting, which carries a barrack’s efficiency about it. The place’s foundation looks rooted into the scaffolding itself, the moldy, barnacled pillars somehow supporting the weight of the place. At the ground level, the dingy, round windows open up into the street, but it’s difficult to peer through the grime crusted over the glass pannels. At the upper level, which the two-storied construction seems to be bowled over, the blinds are drawn shut, their velvet dusted a bile-yellow even from afar. Yet through it all, what actually grabs the visitor’s by the throat, is the strange allure of the place. Not a disparaged charm, mind you—most of these sailors have spent their pay and day in shindigs far worse than this. It is not much, in way of grotesque, just as it is not much in way of poetry. But a certain shimmer permeates throughout, like mist gathering over the shingles, and it renders the place noble and faraway. One might almost expect to see a lighthouse cave around it. When the doors open, the interior is low-ceilinged and vast, the chambers burrowing further than the outside lets on. Depending on how the sunlight, which is still paltry further off the Arctic glare, the main room of the tavern looks both too hollow and too overcrowded, all at once. Truth be told, no one can be certain if it’s not the most beautiful place they’ve ever seen; if only because it peals out to a sense of humanity, a sense of being rooted down. It takes a while to realize that the humanity, for all its urgency, is slightly skewed at the corner. Takes a while to gather up the questions, rather than just gawk at a bar stool that isn’t nailed down into the ship’s timber floor; at a glass that isn’t canister, but actual earthenware, tangible and frail. When the questions do gather, the barkeep is there for the tending. Jaded, old, he seems to have borne both the glow and the gloom of the place, allowed it to mantle them from brow to navel. They seem, also, like the kind of man who has heard a story for every life the sailors wished upon, for every lie they cast over dice. What will you ask him?
The following accounts have 24h to make an in-character post or risk having their role reopened. Please let us know if you need additional time or any help on our behalf!
The following accounts have 24h to make an in-character post or risk having their role reopened. Please let us know if you need additional time or any help on our behalf!
Please make sure to send in your account in 24h and to follow the items on our checklist !!
ADRIAN as THE EMPRESARIO ( LEWIS TAN )
This application, though perhaps rated at the most unexpected ones we’ve ever received, was an absolute ride to go through. Wooosh, the history on this one !! The sheer intensity of this character’s motivations, as well as the enormity of what was lost to them, had us scrambling for purchase. His run up-hill, his endless battle to claim & keep rank, were effing phenomenal. It was destabilizing in the best possible way. We are so ready to have our emotions pushed to a place from which they may never recover: again at your hand, Adrian. It’s always the strangest thing to see writers you associate with one concept break out from the mold, and do it with a staggering amount of talent and precision —— is there anything you could not write ?? We sure bloody doubt it. Welcome to us with another wonder !!
The thing is—you were not always empty vessel, you were not always medium without connection to the dead, automatic writer for the living. You were golden once, you were god in the act of creation—you made worlds, lives, and you ended them with just a stroke of a pen. But like icarus, who so loved the sun that he clawed with bloody fingers and wax wings towards it, you fell—or rather, apollo reached out and pushed you away with only a shrug of his shoulder. A manuscript penned by your hand, a mentor who promised to make you, to make your words into something—a book that had his name embossed into the leather, gleaming and colored gold. Like icarus if he’d been given a second chance, you chose to forsake the light, the warmth—there were explorers, generals, rich men who needed their lives made beautiful, and they were willing to pay. You buried yourself six feet under the ground—you didn’t know then that you would be a restless spirit, you wouldn’t find out until heard about the promethean. The arctic, the chief sublime beauty the world still had to offer—your chance to engage in acts of godhood yet again. Your mentor, your soulmate, the axis by which your world turned, spat you out, cast you out of his presence like satan before you. Let him learn to tremble at your words, just like Frankenstein trembled before his single act of godhood.
CONNECTIONS.
✹ THE ROMANTIC — It’s a slip of the tongue, that connects you to them, an accident. A conversation about the book you wrote, the one that does not bear your name, and a simple he was my mentor. Now the pup won’t cease biting at your heels, begging and whining for any scrap you may be willing to give them–not unlike the boy that had come to class early every day so that he could sit in the front row, who stayed after and thrust sheathes of paper into the professor’s eager hands. You want to tell them that the world of literature is as cutthroat as the discovery service, that they’re better off making their own way through it–but at the same time, you see a chance to right a wrong, to go a different way and be better rather than more cruel. They seem to ask you every time they open their mouth–will you be better or worse than he was?
✹ THE PHILISTINE — You can’t believe they have the audacity to call themselves a writer–last time you checked a real writer doesn’t waste his time filling holes with caulk, taking orders from men who wouldn’t know Shakespeare from Shelley, or have any desire to pick up either. They can’t believe you can see what real literature looks like from your pedestal, and make every effort to throw rocks at you from below–you call that prose? They sneer. You roll your eyes and tell them it’s better than the drivel that comes out of their characters mouths, who talks like that? They sit just underneath the surface of your skin like an itch–but that’s the thing about it, an itch begs to be scratched. An annoyance begs for attention, and that’s how you end up actually letting them read some of your manuscript. That’s how you end up with some of theirs. It’s good–but you’ll never tell them that. You don’t think they’d ever tell you they liked your work either. You don’t know why, but lately, you’ve wanted your work to be better when you give it to them–if only to see the look on their face. See the color drain from it.
✹ THE SOCIALITE — See the thing is–you know how to play the game now. You know that your work is only as good as the people that are seen with it, the mouths that sing its praises at the right places and at the right times. You’ve watched them–quiet as you are, devoted so singularly to your work as you are–you know what they want more than anything is to be gleaming again, to be the center of the universe again. You think you just might be the person to help with that–for what do the elites of the world love more than a promising young artist and their patron? What does the world love more than a well-dressed young woman, eloquent in speech with a book in her hand? Two birds, meet one well-written stone.
Hello :) hope you guys are good. I was wondering what you would think of Gemma Chan for the Songbird? I also love all the other suggested fcs so it's all good if she wouldn't work, just thought I'd ask!
Gemma would be perfect for The Songbird !! Looking forward to an application for this skeleton — it is very much loved & wanted by our members 💖
This is a laydown of what went down during our last closed event — THE HUNT. It will mainly focus on what went down on the island itself, as plotted with the original ghost trekking breakfast club: Jonathan, Ayla, Jaya, Emma-Rose, Iskender & the late Philippa. For the bulk of the action, you can find all the events here: (x), (x), (x).
The initial grand conspiracy for the hunt happened on 27th of July, in The Promethean’s otherwise empty sickbay, between the six people mentioned above and sergeant Jack Fox (dragged there by their date, we presume). All conspirators agree the trek back to Devon Island is necessary in order to find more information about the creature. Jack Fox thinks it’s an insane idea, and, over the rattling sound of six empty skulls, his brain agrees to stay back and coordinate the (eventual) rescue party.
By this time, THE NEVERNEDING DARKNESS has already fallen over The Arctic, but its first victim, THE LOVER, had not yet been claimed.
The Lover’s death, THE SONGS INSIDE THE DARKNESS, coincides with the departure of the cryptid hunters in the middle of the following night: 28th of July.
In the turmoil, their disappearance takes some hours to get noticed. Thankfully, some thought it was a good idea to leave letters behind, just in case they had any chance of getting away scot-free with this. Peak brain synergy, that. So, yes, in the course of the next day, their escape is noticed, and all tracks lead to Devon Island. Like, the place they just escaped. Grand, says Malachy Dowling, and begins to gather the rescue party. They set out on the 29th of July. Both treks, the saviors and the doomed’s, take 10h one way.
It should be noted: the air? Freezing. The visibility? Pitch black. The lanterns they brought? Feeble. The hotel? Trivago. So this is what takes place on the island:
Jonathan and Emma manage to collect a few soil & vegetation samples. Iskender takes a moment to chastise them both, while he is quick to write down as much as he can from the physical impressions of the party.
Ayla and Pippa are scattering lamplight every which way, working to illuminate the path of the other three. Jaya has her guns cocked, and her feral frown down pat. Everything is in place. Now all they have to do is wait for this creature, or one of its manifestations, to make its demands known, to make contact.
What happened instead is that, ever so slowly, in the seamless mapping of one’s own dreams and fears, the crew starts to experience slips of visions. Or so they called them, because one must call the unspeakable something. Yet they were not external; they were not projections coming from without. Rather, this was an immersion to something inward, something always waiting but never trodden before. A realm and a shoreline. Some of the trekkers can later be heard claiming they were actually transported. That the sightings were born from their own selves, and no other possessed them. That it led them to different places, gaps in the fabric of the earth and sky.
They were awake for all of it... and yet they were not, because all their senses, anything they might wield to engage with the other world, existed in another place.
Jonathan saw: A creature trapped in this place, hungering for help, its head nested in a bed of soft flowers. In his mind, he was approaching to save it, to save them all; the stillness of a statue was actually the urgency of a child in a meadow.
Ayla saw: Green rolling hills, an endless undulation of grass and movement, that when they tried to touch it withered below their feet. Seaglass skies, seaglass human faces. They try to stick their own mouths to them, but only meet death and dearth instead.
Emma saw: A savage garden teeming with thorns, with plants that have grown not only teeth, but claws, pincers, and mouths, all crooning in the voices of dead friends. Is this what led her to walk to Philippa? To lead all of them by the brook, the river of soot?
Iskender saw: Stepping through a valley of sand, a valley of dead kings, and wading in a river. He knew the river was blood that belonged to him, to people like him. Its warmth had more of home than he’d ever felt before. He remembered wanting to go under.
Jaya saw: A finger floating in a barrel of brine, a pair of eyes torn from their sockets. The inside of ship’s hull, no hatch for its closings, no stairs for the exit. The trapping of wood, of salt, of things that have grown stale and untouched inside the darkness.
Philippa saw: A furl of white dress, linen on a round shoulder. She had the weight of a hand in hers: nothing has ever carried so much presence for her, such tangibility. She thought it was a child’s hand - the child she once was, the child she’ll never have.
The dreams spool on, the closest thing to endless the mind can endure.
Emma kills Philippa by the small stream. Her eyes are focused, attuned, turning sharp over the bones. Bending down in her blood, she begins to watch.
Iskender and Ayla kneel for the ritual, kneel for the things that wait in the sky.
Jonathan speaks to creatures that have never needed forgiveness, never needed song. He is begging them to come here, come back. At one point, he begins to cry out apologies, cry out to names both human and inhuman. It lasts for hours before everything falls silent.
Please make sure to send in your account in 24h and to follow the items on our checklist !!
KYLIE as THE GHOSTWRITER ( OLIVER JACKSON COHEN )
Oh, we are over the moon to see another art-adjacent muse grace the (bloodied) deck of the Promethean !! You have woven a masterful complexity for the sake of Victor Bell, and his moment of grand betrayal is something that really turns the ‘struggling artist’ trope on its head. Most of all, we appreciated how there is such a realistic element to his moral compass —— he is not yet declared either for or against the quo, but has spent most of his time studying the pillars that uphold it. He also developed quite a good eye for the weak spots in its edifice. It makes for an incredibly compelling motivation, and, we imagine, very fruitful plot points aboard. Welcome to terror with another stunning creature, Kylie !!
Just so you know, I really appreciate all the thought and effort and love the admin team (YOU THE PERSON READING THIS) puts into this rp. I have a really high stress job (that was made only more stressful with the pandemic) and I will never be able to truly, and accurately, convey how good it feels to have a place where I can safely be creative and pour my love of writing into. You guys have saved my sanity in both a metaphorical sense and quite literal one. Thank you for this gift of a space.
AHHHH clutching my chest?? we’re so so happy that we can help create a space for you to write and escape to comfortably, this means so much more than words can say and i KNOW venli will agree with me when i say we possess the very same sentiment ourselves. so wonderful to know that writing spooky ships extends beyond the literal act of writing and into something that can provide comfort and camaraderie for all of us, and just know that creating a great space is a two way street! you members HAVE to be credited for contributing to an incredible environment for everyone <3
this group has been absolutely KILLING IT lately with all the new characters, skeleton & oc's alike, and then those recent PLOT DROPS!!! so glad to see you flourishing!!!
we were floored this message, anon?? thank you so much for the kind words, weepy over it. we have to credit our wonderful members, who have helped to create such a delightful community of incredible, committed writers who continue to impress and inspire us at every turn. it’s been so incredibly rewarding writing with all of them, and we could not be more grateful!!
