daybreakacademy | [Open] The Mark of the Herald

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[Open] The Mark of the Herald

Mark of the Herald Part I
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Despite certain disruptive events and ominous visions in the preceding month, August is seemingly still free of any problems.

That’s quick to change, however. Starting from the third of the month, strange, circular marks begin to appear on human students around the school - and, indeed, humans around the world. Those affected begin to feel incurably drowsy, something that no magical or mundane solution can seem to cure or relieve; eventually, they’ll fall asleep entirely, whether they want to or not, and enter a state of magical stasis. Not even nonhumans are immune, though whether they’re marked seems to be much more erratic.

Those who remain awake or are otherwise spared by the mark are free to do as they wish - the Academy won’t ask them to do more than keep themselves safe. But where each marked person falls in slumber, a portal will form; a strange tear in reality, offering glimpses of a surreal, nightmarish plane that differs vastly from individual to individual. One thing is certain; the cause of a victim’s seemingly endless sleep and these portals are linked somehow, and the only way to find out exactly how is to go through...and the only ones capable of doing so are those who are still awake.

This log can be used as a catch-all for event-related threads. The information for this event is here.

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[ The door easily falls apart under the force of the blast, revealing...nothing.

Well, there are things. Shattered mirrors, shards of glass. The mausoleum fading, changing, from cracked, worn stone to clinical, cold tiles on walls and floor and the buzz and illumination of harsh electric lights that leave shadows nowhere to hide.

And chains, leading into the room's depths, where the lights are broken. There's flickers of movement there, too, some distorted shadow lurking. ]

[The infirmary (or at least an infirmary) is Avery's first thought, and he can't help but smile a bit at the dark humor of it all. A mausoleum for the sick... Fitting in it's own way.

The chains give him pause, smile transforming into something closer to a grimace, but he catches sight of the shadows and immediately goes to follow.]

[ Here, in the darkness, the purpose of the tiles is revealed. They stain themselves with blood and clean themselves, over and over, a repetitive motion made by the ghost of a memory.

At the end of the mausoleum, there is an open doorway, an intact mirror, a spectre bloodied and mangled beyond sensible recognition in a terribly familiar veil.

It - he? - is silent, staring forlornly with its hand against the mirror, which has yet to be broken. Its reflection attempts to take shape, forming familiar features and then distorting again, no matter what it does, no matter how hard it tries.

The shadow is nowhere to be seen. ]

[Avery's mouth grows dry.

Ekkehardt mentioned something... unpleasant happening once, back when he first saw the scars left on him from the chains in the basement. Avery had had his guesses as to what exactly had happened, assumed it had something to do with his death, but...

This is very different.

He steps forward, voice soft even as he calls out.]

Ekke?

[ The bloodied spectre continues to gaze into the mirror, unresponsive to being called by name; whether it simply doesn't remember or it can't hear is unclear. The face shifts and distorts, rapidly, until it suddenly shatters the mirror in apparent frustration. ]

So unpleasant. [ The red eyed shadow is standing at the mirror, at the crumpled spectre surrounded by shards of glass, like it - he - was always there. At first, he only appears to be speaking to himself, but... ] I'm sorry. About this dream.

[Avery shakes his head.]

Can't choose what you dream. If we could, I wouldn't need as much caffeine in my daily life.

[He takes a few steps closer. He's afraid of neither the spectre nor the shadow. They're all Ekkehardt in the end.]

You killed who did this to you, right?

Of course. [ It's an easy admission.

The scene changes, shifts, in the nature of dreams. The mirror falls; from a wooden frame, a box emerges. Tightly closed.

Even in a dream, it smells like blood. ]

I could hardly leave such a thing unpunished.

Good.

[If he hadn't, Avery would have been more than happy to finish the job.

It's tempting enough to find whatever afterlife the bastards ended up in, fish them out, and make them regret their entire existence before devouring them all.]

This what you dream about every night?

Not usually. [ The shadow flickers, sighs. He puts a wavering hand on the box; it falls to pieces, ready to be assembled into something else. ] I don't dream of forgetting my face often. It's the river, mostly.

And sometimes it's nothing at all. I like those nights best.

[He watches the box fall apart and casts a glance in Ekkehardt's direction.

Forgetting his face... He wondered what that was all about.

Those people are truly lucky that they're dead.]

Can't say I blame you.

...You don't have to stay here you know. If you don't want to. I'm here to wake you up anyway.

[ Under the shadow's touch, the box assembles itself into a familiar-looking casket. The scent of blood is gone. ]

Some part of me will always stay here, I'm afraid. I've become used to it. [ There's the impression that if this silhouette - a projection? - of him was able to smile, it would be. In that small, sad way that Ekkehardt rarely lets show. ]

You'll have to go deeper, if you want to wake me. But it is, as always, your choice.

[ The shadow steps back. The casket's lid opens by itself, revealing a bottomless scarlet darkness. ]

[Avery snorts at that.]

What, you think that's going to hold me back? If you're allowed to recklessly endanger yourself for my sake, then I'm allowed to do so for yours. Fair's fair.

[He grins, already heading for the casket.]

And if you don't like it, you'll just have to come after me, won't you?

Isn't that the way we always do things? [ He sounds fond, in a stiff way, rather than exasperated. ] I suppose I can't stop you.

[ Climbing into the casket is a simple matter. Being greeted by what seems like a bottomless expanse of crimson water is another matter entirely; it radiates chill. (In his own way, Ekkehardt despises the cold, though he no longer feels it.)

Still, in the depths, there's the faintest of lights, something that can be seen even from someone looking into the casket. Some promise of something more than endless cold. But it's something not to be undertaken lightly; the shadow waits, still, watching him with something like worry. ]

[The cold gives him pause, the grin he's wearing already beginning to fade as red-eyed, frozen memories flash through his head.

The fact that it's some sort of water or blood doesn't help. It only makes him think of being dragged down deep, deep into death's river.

He shuts his eyes and takes a deep breath, then jumps in.

The quicker he swims, the sooner he's out. That's what he tells himself.]

[ The water is easy to breathe and easy to move in, despite the chill. Occasionally, fragments of memory swim past; schools of bitter fragments, frozen in the way only a lich could preserve.

Sometimes the memories are unpleasantly obvious; hot flashes of noise, the sound of someone in agony (there's a separation to those memories, as if their origin thinks of them as belonging to someone else, even though it's abundantly clear from the sound who they belonged to). Some are more abstract; the sound of children crying, shattering explosions, the sound of battle and violence. Ice forming.

Mercifully, whether it's Ekkehardt acting to shape the dream or something else entirely, the descent doesn't last too long. The light turns out to be some kind of glittering series of hanging lamps; the world distorts, turns on its head, and allows Avery to surface out of what has turned into an opulent fountain that glimmers with blood-red water. A beautiful but utterly empty atrium surrounds it. ]

[He tries his best to ignore the memories that swim beside him. He can't, and so he forces himself to move faster. He can't process them right now, refuses to process them, the flashes of ice swimming past him at the edge of his vision solidifying his decision all the more.

He drags himself out of the fountain, taking a moment to sit at its edge, catch his breath, and wring some of the cold water from his shirt and pants before giving the atrium a cautious once-over.

He doubts that his particular senses will be of much use in a dreamscape, but he keeps an eye out nonetheless.]

[ The chilled water warms quickly in the heat of the empty atrium; a hallway, with grand doors leading to unknown destinations, stretches out before him.

While he can't sense souls, as such, there's a flickering memory of them, like a faint heartbeat. Through the medium of a dream, it's possible to experience things the way Ekkehardt does, sense things the way he did - including souls.

To Ekkehardt's remembered senses, souls feel like light, fire, shifting and diverse wisps that hold flashes of other things within them. Behind the door that is gilded with gold, there are many; behind the one glittering with crystals, there are more still. More opulent doors, decorated in gems and other shining decorations, stretch the hallway's length.

The crimson door, a nondescript servant's entrance tucked behind an atrium's pillar, holds the sense of only two souls, and a feeling of intense, bloody satisfaction. ]

[He lingers in front of the gold and crystal doors longer than what might be necessary, though it's not the individuals within that catch his interest.

Alas... It's not meant to be. Maybe if Jailbreak were here, it would be a different story. And so instead, he follows the feeling of satisfaction and draws closer to the crimson door.

No gaps at the bottom. That makes it harder to sneak in. And when he checks the handle, he finds it locked.

Only one thing for it.

Avery takes a step back and holds a hand out, magic circle drawing itself in the air before him shortly before releasing an explosive burst of black flame.]

[ The door is as difficult to open as the last one was, but it's also as weak to fire as the last one was.

The scene is also similar, coincidentally. The same tiled floors, the same cold walls. But everything has been scorched by fire; tiles blackened, glass cracked, metal twisted by extreme heat.

It's almost enough to mask the metallic tang of blood.

This, too, opens into a maze. Full of twisting corridors. But there's the flicker of fire, coming from somewhere up ahead; the tail of a torch flicks around a corner, as the door clatters open. ]

[Avery looks the scene over. He didn't cause this, that much he's sure of, but he wonders if this is the remnants of some coverup or if Ekke in all his beautiful, wonderful, awful efficiency managed all this himself.

Either way, it seems important to follow after whoever holds the torch, and so he slinks into the shadows to continue his pursuit]

[ Avery's wondering is answered in short order when he pursues the fire in earnest; Ekkehardt, dressed in hard-wearing black, in a fabric that seems to consume the light of the torch he's holding, walks with a deliberate and steady tread.

Occasionally, he stops to listen for some distant noise, and makes his decision to turn left or right or continue straight ahead based on that.

There's no place left unscathed by fire's touch. The atmosphere might have been choking, if this was real, but since he wasn't affected by it, his memories - and anyone walking in them - aren't affected by them either. ]

[As if he couldn't love this man any more.

For once, Avery decides that discretion is the better part of valor (and, perhaps, he's just a little curious), and so he continues to follow after--though he at least has the courtesy to rise up from the shadows to walk behind Ekkehardt like a decent person.]

[ He seems to be looking for something, though it's hard to tell what exactly until he finds it - or rather, who.

He turns a corner, and a man leaps from a doorway still billowing smoke with an enraged, frantic shout. Ekkehardt steps aside to let him crash onto the floor, and then kneels to gently apply pressure to the small of his back as he tries to get up. ]

And here I'd thought you'd died from smoke inhalation. Imagine my surprise. [ His tone is downright friendly. ]
Were you not happy with my gift? I thought it was decent payment for the way you tortured and butchered me.

[ He applies more pressure. The man coughs and splutters fearfully, clearly struggling to breathe. ] But I'm not you, so I'll give you a clean death. It's not what you deserve, but it's not exactly fair that I'd get to enact what you deserve when all your previous victims didn't get that privilege.

[ The knife flashes, once, and the struggling stops. Ekkehardt stares down at the body impassively for a moment before he picks it up and proceeds down the hallway with it in tow. What he intends to do with it is unknown, as of yet. ]

[His heart skips a beat and he holds back a sigh.

How could he not see this through to the end?

Hopefully Ekkehardt doesn't mind an audience, because he's getting one, whether he likes it or not.]

[ Ekkehardt hasn't turned back once, even as Avery's presence becomes more obvious; this version of him is little more than a memory. He continues on until he reaches what was probably once an airy front room, something pleasant to contrast with the bloody work going on within.

His 'gift' was likely opened here, or escaped here; bloody crimson fire still eats lazily away at destroyed furnishings, chews on paintings and shards of glass. An engraved jar thoroughly charred by its contents exploding outwards lies abandoned on the floor.

Another body is here, too, not nearly as untouched as the one Ekkehardt is carrying. The man's head has been separated from his shoulders, for one thing. With a clean cut, naturally, because Ekkehardt does everything cleanly.

He's also wearing hard-wearing, black clothing. The meaning of such a thing is obvious.

Ekkehardt busies himself with opening vents and what few windows exist in this place, to increase the airflow. The crimson flames surge from little flickers and embers into hungrier life, stoked by the new sources of things to burn. ]

Well, aren't you enjoying yourself? [ This voice is different, closer to reality. A burned shadow on the wall moves, leans out onto a charred desk, his voice amused. ] I particularly like your expression.

[ Even here, in the ashes of what he's about to do to his tormentors, he still finds time for fun, it seems. But it's an old memory, and the things associated with the place of his pain are faded, so he thinks he's allowed it. ]

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cw torture implications

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cw: ~arson~

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cw: violence

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