(may intro) WELCOME TO WAYWARD PINES!

[officialnotice]

INTRODUCTION LOG

MAY 1ST - 3RD

AFTER THE ACCIDENT

There was an accident. The details are hazy and obscure, but it's still the first thing you remember. Maybe a car wreck — metal and broken glass everywhere, and the sirens and the screaming. Maybe your bike hit a rock and you careened uncontrollably off a mountain path. Maybe something less mundane, even impossible seems to have happened to you. You can't quite make out the details, not who was at fault or why. Try as you might, the chaos is all you can truly remember.

It's also the last thing you remember from before waking up.

When you open your eyes, the accident is gone, replaced with white sterility. Perhaps somewhat alarming at first, until you blink at your surroundings and realize that you're in a hospital bed. You try to move but are sluggish, covered in a scattering of minor injuries you only vaguely remember receiving, not to mention the possibility of the partially healed remnants of other, seemingly older wounds.

It's a shame you won't be able to tell the difference between the two. Your memories are an indiscernible fog where they're not absent altogether, only a few standing out in your mind with any kind of certainty.

If the room happens to be empty when you wake, it's not for long. Nurses bustle in, taking your vitals and asking your name and anything else you might remember. Don't worry, they tell you. You'll make a full recovery here. Much of what you say (especially anything unusual, anything about monsters or magic or outlandish technology) will earn placating speculation of head trauma from the accident. You'll be told to stay put, not to push yourself, and to wait for the doctor to clear you before you leave.

Then you'll be left alone. Or maybe you'll find yourself visited by loved ones: family, or friends. You've lived here much or all of your life, so of course you have those things. Of course they already remember you being here, and may remember visiting you in the hospital while you were still unconscious.

Either way, the hospital's population is quadruple the usual, and you get the impression the nurses are working themselves ragged just running damage control. You might hear talk around the hospital of other small population spikes over the past few days, though many patients appeared to be well enough to be released the same day, and the same might be said of you. Or at least the staff doesn't seem to be too concerned. You can even leave your room without much fuss, any doctor or nurse that might try to intercept you getting called away almost immediately to deal with something even more pressing.

Of course, it's not so unusual to settle in until you're discharged, either. You may choose to wait for loved ones to come pick you up, even speak to your fellow patients, whether roommates or others wandering the halls. The more enterprising and suspicious might even consider it an opportunity to poke around for a few basic answers.

MAY 1ST - 4TH

GETTING USED TO HOME AGAIN

However you get there, outside the birds sing a joyful song, and though the air is just a bit crisp, the sky's as sunny as you've ever seen it. It's bright enough to make you squint for a moment before you feast your eyes on the quaint little mountain town of Wayward Pines, though that might just be some sort of side effect from your accident. Trees line the street at regular intervals, carefully manicured and slightly waterlogged from the recent flood. Cars cruise by at a safe and respectable speed. Fellow pedestrians spare you glances, some wary, others concerned or just friendly. It probably depends on how clothed you were when you left the hospital.

This isn't even the picturesque city center, though a colorful nearby sign reads "Main Street" with an arrow pointing due south, followed in smaller font by a list of businesses you don't recognize (could be a good direction to head in, though — maybe it'll jog your memory), and one that you might: Wayward Pines Sheriff's Department. You've likely caught wind by now that any clothing or other items you had on you at the time of your accident are being held by the Sheriff until you're well enough to claim them. Not to mention the keys to your home, kept locked and safe at the station for you. That should probably be your next stop, though if anything's missing in what they hand over you'd be the last to know.

It's time to get home, to recover from your ordeal and try to sort through your memories. Do you remember this house, the pictures of family on the walls and how to navigate to the bathroom in the middle of the night? Maybe it's easier with loved ones living with you, helping you get settled, or maybe you're on your own. Either way, over the next few days it's a good idea to try to remember your routines, to get out and finally visit Main Street if you haven't already. Maybe you even remembered that you work in one of the more familiar sounding shops, or elsewhere in town. Makes sense they'd give you some time off to recover and get reacclimated to your life here, but eventually you should probably get back to work. You haven't seen your co-workers in a few days, and besides, you have to be able to put bread on the table.

Or at the very least some of the delicious treats at the school bake sale you're seeing flyers for all over town!

MAY 5TH

ANNUAL BAKE SALE, PRESENTED BY THE PTA!

It's that time of year again. The time when everyone digs into their wallet, ignores their diet, and spends a little time supporting the local school bake fair. You know, for the good of the children. Or, in this particular case, the hospital. There's no denying the hospital has had a hard time of it lately, between the steady influx of accident victims at the start of each month and the recent outbreak scare, and the Wayward Pines Academy PTA has come up with the perfect solution to show their support to the hard working hospital staff by vowing to donate half of the proceeds for the sale today. Maybe the hospital can see about finally getting the staff breakroom a decent coffee machine!

And it doesn't hurt that Linda's Blondie recipe is honestly to die for. The PTA has pulled out all the stops this year in the hopes of encouraging a good community turn out, posters advertising the sale plastering every street corner and flyers stuffed into every mailbox for a solid week leading up to the event, and today is finally the day.

There's at least two dozen different tables set up with all manner of delectable treats, even one or two offering vegan alternatives for those inclined. Not to mention a few others catering to some of the townspeople's more... unique palates.

Maybe you've got your own table set up with your wares, or were simply lured to the park today by the appetizing scents wafting through the air. Either way it seems like the whole town has come out to show their support today, and why wouldn't they? Children are our future, after all. Or maybe it's just Linda's Blondie recipe.

Yeah, that's probably it.

MOD NOTES

Welcome to our fourth mingle log for newbies and oldbies alike!

This log is meant to cover characters' first five days in Wayward Pines. Characters for this round will appear staggered in the hospital between the 1st and the 3rd, and a CR building event will occur on the 5th, after everyone has had a suitable amount of time to get settled in town. For the most part, only the five memories detailed in your character's application are remembered throughout the duration of this log, although their false Wayward Pines memories may also begin to surface (in those who've opted to utilize this mechanic) as the week wears on. These memories, as noted in the FAQ, feel very real and are accompanied by as much emotion or sentiment as a real memory would be.

PLEASE INCLUDE IN SUBJECT LINE: Character Name, date, location, and Open or Closed, to help keep things organized and make your character easy to find.

If you have any questions regarding this intro log, feel free to ask them on the FAQ or the relevant plurk.

Comments

david haller | may 3 (hospital) & 4 (woods) | open

[modality]

ONE | MAY THIRD

[ Déjà vu shouldn't be so easy to pull off without memories. But that's what it is, déjà vu from start to finish: waking up in a hospital, disoriented. Missing the how and the why or the where, exactly. The nurses in his personal space are familiar in a way that makes his hackles rise, and the part where he sits up and tries to fend them off in a way that's one part urgent, two parts polite (too polite to be effective) — that's familiar, too. ]

No— no, that isn't necessary, none of this is— I'm fine.

[ He has no idea what definition of "fine" he's working with. A very loose one, though; he knows that much. He feels a flash of guilt in response to the way the nurse is frowning at him, but that doesn't stop him from sliding off the bed and sidestepping past her on his way towards the door. ]

Sorry. Thank you, I mean it, I'm—

[ Not looking where he's going. David's got his eyes on the nurse as he apologizes and backpedals through the doorway, and he slams directly into whoever's unlucky enough to be walking by. ]

TWO | MAY FOURTH

[ The hospital's the worst part. The rest of it is fine. The rest of it is actually kind of nice, even if his memories of it are patchwork. David gets his clothes, finds a house (his house?), has a shower and feels fifty-percent less skeeved out. And he doesn't need memories to know that Main Street is sort of cute in that quaint Americana way, or to figure out that he likes exploring the woods — the completely legal and open to the public woods, specifically.

The woods are quiet. Or quieter, at least. The voices don't make it far past the edge of town. David knows what they are, and he knows what he is, vaguely. Knowing doesn't make the reality of it less annoying. The second he finds a way to turn down the volume on the white noise, he leans into it, hard.

In other words: he wanders into the woods on the evening of the 3rd, and he doesn't bother walking home when it gets dark. There's something extra appealing about falling asleep with a glimpse of stars above the looming trees, anyway. If anyone's out for a stroll on the 4th, they're liable to find him curled up at the base of a tree in a dead sleep. ]

( OOC: David's psychic, so hit up this permissions post if you tag in! )

[avicula]

[ dutch wishes that she had a gun with her. part of her is confused by that desire, but for the most part, it makes perfect sense. still: she knows how to defend herself without one. she's hardly helpless, but everything about how harmless this town appears and how caught in it she is makes her suspicious, and so she's even more on edge than usual.

when did she decide that her life as a killjoy was real and living her can't have been? she's not sure she's really decided that yet. they can't both be real, can they? but there are fewer holes (if still considerable ones) in that life and she can't possibly have made that much up. she's not that inventive.

so she's a killjoy. what she does best is finding people or things. she can manage to figure this shit out. finding more information and memorising the lay of the land here is the first step toward that and so she goes for a long walk, taking note of what people she comes across, how relaxed or nervous they look.

she hadn't counted on a body lying still under a tree, and her first thought is that he might be dead — but no, his chest's still rising and falling. ] Hey. You all right, there?

[ and then the memory of his name hits her and instead of poking him with one toe of her boots, she actually crouches down and puts a hand on his shoulder, expression softening a little. ] David?

[modality]

[ He isn't in the woods. Not these woods, anyway. There's a house, out in the middle of nowhere — fields and trees. The room's dark. Dark enough that he can't make out any of the titles on the bookshelf, and dark enough that the rotating lamp casts slivers of light on the walls as it spins, stars and constellations that he could name if he tried.

He doesn't wake smoothly. The hand on his shoulder makes him jump, his own hands lifting defensively as wide eyes try to focus. A woman's face. Pretty and sharp — in the eyes, not the features. And not just a woman, either. David frowns, shifting from surprise to mild confusion. ]

Dutch.

[ Killjoy. Non sequitur. The thought's a quiet echo by the time it hits him. His brow furrows as he sits up straighter against the tree at his back, but he keeps the word to himself. ] You're—

[ At his house? No. Outside, idiot. ] We're... where are we?

[avicula]

[ there's an instinct inside dutch to restrain, to keep him down and to stop him from attacking her. it's an odd instinct, she thinks, given that she knows him and he's only confused about waking up suddenly, hands lifted in defence rather than to hurt or harm.

twitchy, she rebukes herself. ]

In the woods. From the looks of it, you took a nap out here.

[modality]

[ There's another beat of silence as he confirms that statement, giving the woods around them one last quick look. Pretty easy to confirm. ]

Oh. [ David doesn't sound embarrassed. He does sound somewhere between confused and wary, but that's more of a default state than a bad omen. It settles a bit when he looks back to her, his posture easing up as memories sink into place.

Which — oh, also, but a very different kind of oh. The dynamic shifts the second he remembers, wry chagrin coloring his voice. ] I don't always sleep in the woods. I have a bed.

[ She already knows that. It's a dumb statement, regardless. ] I was looking at the stars.

[avicula]

I know you have a bed, silly.

[ it's a dumb statement, but it at least has the effect of making dutch grin, her mind briefly going back to the time she discovered that he does, in fact, have a bed. it's far from a bad thing to recall.

instead of remaining crouched in front of him, dutch shifts in position until she's sitting cross-legged instead. ] But good to know you sometimes sleep in it, too.

[modality]

[ She earns a smile for humoring him, but that's wry, too — self-deprecating, though not in a way that's genuinely insecure. David draws his legs up as she takes a seat, loosely hugging them to his chest. ]

I used to come out here with my dad.

[ That feels right. It just doesn't sound right, and he can't quite figure out why. ] Stargazing. You know, name all the constellations.

[avicula]

You know all their names?

[ the question is more sincere than dutch would have liked for it to come out as. she doesn't know the constellations here. she never had reason to learn — but there are constellations out there somewhere in space that dutch knows like the back of her hand, star charts that she's studied and memorised. she's been amongst those stars, navigating around them.

none of it makes sense. ]

[windchasing]

[ Pietro doesn't care for the hospital. Granted, the number of things he does care for can probably be counted on one hand, but the hospital is cold and foreign and full of strangers and nothing at all like what he imagines getting better looks like. Still, it's where Wanda came after her accident, so presumably there are doctors here of some caliber, although they must not have been very good because she's not getting better -- she still barely remembers him or Lorna or Cassian at all. But perhaps if he talks to them-- perhaps if he talks to them sternly, they'll fix it-- ]

Watch where you're going, [ he snaps as he steps back, a whirl of Transian expletives interrupting his train of thought.

But in that same moment there's the nurse, with her concerned frown, this lanky fellow backing toward the exit, another nurse closing in at a cautious angle - and all that seems like a gratingly unnecessary amount of drama for one afternoon.

(They'd put straps around Wanda's wrists; he remembers that, too.) ]

-I've been looking all over for you, [ he adds. He's never seen this man before in his life. ] It is time to go home.

[modality]

Who— [ He isn't even going to ask 'who are you', which is probably the most logical question. His first question is 'who, me?', but he doesn't get past the first word. The thought's derailed by something sharp, loud, like a migraine without any actual pain, and he can't hide the annoyed wince as he presses a palm to his forehead. The nurse is distracted, too; she gives the newcomer a look, and while it isn't quite suspicious, she isn't immediately buying it, either.

David catches on first. His hand lowers as he looks between the nurse and the stranger, puts two and two together, and then he attempts a relieved smile. ]

Home, yes. Thank you. It is time to go home, so— thank you. [ That's back to the nurse, and he sounds remarkably, actually grateful. Maybe he's just good at faking it. Whatever the case, he doesn't waste anymore time, moving to walk right past his new friend. ] Let's go.

[windchasing]

[ Pietro gives the nurse a Very Convincing nod of thanks and follows after, making an efficient beeline for the nearest exit. The fact that he'll have to retrace every one of these steps later, while avoiding these particular nurses, just to do what he came here to do in the first place, is not lost on him. ]

You're welcome, [ he adds as soon as they're out of eavesdropping range, although he says it more like David's been somehow ungrateful and less like he literally just said thank you. Maybe that's just his voice: perpetually pissy. ]

If by chance you actually do belong back there, don't tell me; I would rather not have wasted my time.

[modality]

[ That 'you're welcome' doesn't sound very magnanimous. David catches that, and he gives Pietro a mildly bemused look — not totally offended, but tempted to tell him to work on his people skills. He doesn't. He can't really talk, anyway. ]

I couldn't tell you if I wanted to.

[ The sentence is out before he's even processed it, himself. It's true, though; he has no idea what he's doing here. The nurse had mentioned an accident, and he has the distinct impression he's clocked a few solid hours in hospitals prior to this. Neither of those things are points in favor of him not belonging here.

Which all amounts to David pausing, and looking both distracted and disgruntled, and not saying anything useful for a few solid seconds. ]

My head hurts. [ That's the one thing he does know. Quick follow-up, though: ] But no. I'm not supposed to be here. What about you? I'm guessing you didn't come here to break a complete stranger out of jail. Hospital.

[ Hospital break?? Doesn't sound right. His mind helpfully supplies the name Wanda in response to his own question, but the thought's there and gone, swept up in the white noise of the hospital wing. ]

[windchasing]

I came here to talk to [ (yell at) ] one of the doctors. Lucky for you, nothing urgent.

[ Or he wouldn't have stopped to help, is the implication -- but the errand was important, and he did help. His actions don't quite align with his apparent cantankerousness. The rest of what David says earns a knitting of the brow, however. ]

You do not remember? Were you in an accident? Did you hit your head?

[ Like Wanda? Like him? ]

just slides into the deep end immediATELY

[modality]

[ It's disorienting. There's an echo of dishonesty behind everything the guy's saying, but it's an impression David can't source — he doesn't sound like he's lying. There's nothing to make him distrust it.

The juxtaposition's still there, though, and it's annoying. Almost as annoying as his headache, which hasn't abated since he left the hospital bed. David stops abruptly when Pietro fires off the trio of questions, reaching out to stop him with a hand on his arm. ]

Of course I remember. [ Not the accident itself, maybe, but there has to be something before it. Something to fill in the blanks. There are faces, a name, things that feel like they can't possibly be real. The word mutant, which drags out his bemused pause a few extra seconds. The name, though. He can start with that. ]

Who's Wanda?

welcome to the speed at which pietro jumps to irrational conclusions im sorry

[windchasing]

How do you know that name?

[ The change in Pietro's demeanor is immediate, an abrupt straightening of the spine that takes him from casually rude to borderline hostile, although more in a way that calls to mind the hackles on a pomeranian than a genuine threat.

Does this stranger know Wanda? Are they-- well, at least he's around the right age for her, but this guy looks like he's never held a job in his life, and Pietro's certainly not letting some layabout date his sister. (He could probably break his nose from this distance without superspeed, if he needed to make that abundantly clear.) ]

may 3

[weaponxx]

[ The only thing Laura remembers about a hospital is that she doesn't like being in them. Why, though, is something that's nothing but a big black void, and that terrifies her more than anything else. As soon as she's alone in the room, she rips out the needle in her arm (knowing, somehow, that it won't hurt her — and it doesn't, Laura watching the wound close with with grim countenance) and slides out of the bed, unmindful of her near nudity underneath the hospital gown she's wearing. Mother, she thinks. Gone, dead, trying to save her life. But her father — he's here. His name is Logan. She needs to find him.

Her bare feet pad along the cold linoleum of the hospital, and she's also not looking where she's going, chin raised as she sniffs the air. David slams into her side, and Laura stumbles, turning to catch him so they don't both fall to the floor. She looks from him to the nurse, smells his nerves, and makes her choice. ]

We can run together.

[modality]

[ Again with the déjà vu. There's a moment after he's regained his balance, his hands on her arms to get them both steady, that David just stares at her.

Meeting a girl in a hospital, running away. It sounds way more exciting and melodramatic than his life has any right to, but it still takes him a second to shake off the sense that he knows her, knows this. ]

I don't know if we need to run away, necessarily. They're just—

[ There's another nurse down the hall, her eyes fixed on Laura's back as she approaches, her expression slightly cross. David glances over Laura's shoulder, then he looks back to her. ]

Ok. Yeah, let's get out of here.

[ He doesn't just bolt. David takes her hand in a way that's more first-grade date than forceful, then he directs her to move the opposite way down the hall. No idea where the exit is, but at least this way has fewer angry nurses. ]

[weaponxx]

[ Laura glances over her shoulder when David does, her own face turning into a grimace. Her first instinct is to fight, and the backs of her hands itch but — there's no need to fight unless she has to. These people are innocent, Laura thinks. So she turns back to David and nods, gripping his hand tightly as they start to move. She glances over her shoulder again as they walk, her free hand curling into a fist. ]

She is not slowing down.

[ And the nurse isn't. In fact, she's speeding up, and there's something about this that sets Laura so on edge that it feels like something is crawling up her spine, down her arm. Her feet itch now, too, and Laura knows, suddenly, what she can do, why it feels like something under her skin is humming. She can protect them both, if she has to.

She doesn't want to have to. ]

[modality]

Neither are we.

[ Which honestly sounds more confident and competent than he's feeling, currently. Getting out of here is more a point of being stubborn than any real survival instinct, at this point, and David glances down the first hallway they come to, pulling Laura to the left.

The corridor looks even more nondescript than the one they just left. There's no desk here, no clear path leading to an exit. But there are doors lining both sides of the hall, all of them shut, and David passes the first few before picking one at random. It's locked, obviously, but the next one isn't, and he pushes it open and prompts Laura to duck in first. ]

[volitaunt]

[ Poe is also in the public woods on the evening of the 3rd. It feels homey, somehow, like he's been somewhere green and cool with lots of stars recently enough to miss it.

It's nicer to think about the stars than it is to think about other things, the strongest of his memories, sticking out with violence enough to overshadow the other tentative pieces of knowledge he's hung on to (General Leia Organa, BB-8, Finn, flying through different stars).

Those nicer memories are the ones he's focused on, those and trying to sort out the disaster of the past few days, from Cassian's crash-course the dangers of this town to Caroline's appearance at Poe's door.

He almost misses the guy underneath the trees, as dim as it's getting. BB-8 is actually the one who spots David, whippering a warning and turning on his flashlight to scan underneath the trees and stop on David. Who may or may not be asleep already. Either way, Poe calls out: ] Hey. You okay?

[modality]

[ He's asleep enough, meaning: he doesn't notice the droid, and he doesn't stir until he hears Poe's voice. David flinches awake, and it takes him a few solid seconds to figure out where he is. The dark's the first clue, then the stars, and the way he sits up straight and glances at the tree trunk at his back is mostly just confirmation.

Which is a very long way of saying that he's got shitty survival instincts, since it takes him several seconds to even register the reason he woke up. David's focus shifts to Poe for maybe half a second, then the flashlight distracts him. ]

Is that a... robot?

[ Better question: is he still sleeping. ]

[volitaunt]

[ That is becoming Ye Olde Question, isn't it? Poe sighs. ]

He's an BB unit astromech droid, which around here I guess is a robot, yes he's autonomous, his name is BB-8, and he can understand you.

[ BB-8 makes a bzzrt noise, followed by chirps and beeps that rise and fall like human speech. ] He's getting bored by that question, which isn't your fault. Are you okay?

[modality]

Right.

[ Said in the way that means "not right", but at least he's accepting that bid to move on. David's eyes stay fixed on BB-8 for a moment, somewhere between puzzled and intrigued. It almost seems like he missed the question, but after a beat he looks back to Poe, like a double-take. ]

Yes. Sorry. I'm fine, I was just... stargazing.

[ That sounds slightly stupid, in retrospect. But it's the truth, and he was already caught sleeping in the dirt, so it's a little late for saving face. ]

What about you? Taking your astromech droid for a moonlit walk?

[ That's sarcasm. He thinks. He actually has no idea what you do with an astromech droid, so maybe walks are completely plausible. ]

[volitaunt]

Yes.

[ Said with an inflection that means "no," but Poe is smiling when he says it. At least the guy has a sense of humor. He comes closer, so they're don't have to squint at each other in the dark, while BB-8 switches to ambient instead of targeted lighting. It's easier on the eyes and illuminates a small area around them. ] Wanted to get out of town for a little while. Pretend I could, anyway. BB-8 tends to stick pretty close.

[modality]

[ The smile David offers is a little more shy, slightly distracted, but it's real. Humor's appreciated. He gives BB-8 another quick look when he switches to ambient lighting, but the comment about getting out of town wins out on the list of priorities. ]

Why can't you?

[ Seriously, he has no clue. His hike in the woods obviously hasn't reached that far. The question doesn't hold any challenge, or doubt; just confusion. ]