metalogs | Fear and Loathing in Excelsior

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Fear and Loathing in Excelsior

Who: Balthier

portolan and anyone else!
What: A mysterious object leads to a horrific week of fear and misery
When: May 21
Where: Excelsior
Content Warnings: death, violence, phobias, memories of characters worst traumas – this is fear based; please tag specifics for your threads.

CWs: death, violence, phobias, memories of characters worst traumas – this is fear based; please tag specifics for your threads.

OPT OUT OPTIONS: Don’t be in Excelsior or don’t be hit by a spell yourself. Players may also limit to smaller scale fears, or avoid specific fear topics they don’t want to play out.

FEAR AND LOATHING IN EXCELSIOR

An ancient artifact releases three pixies intent on spreading as much fear and chaos as possible. When they hit someone with their spell, their fears manifest, with effects worsening the longer the pixies are free. To escape the spell, characters must face their fears or be trapped in the fear cauldron. Once the pixies are captured, the captured souls will be released and the manifestations will fade, though the damage caused will remain.

ANTIQUES ROADSHOW —

Downtown Excelsior may seem like an odd location to open an antiques store. One wouldn’t think that the chic youth of today would be interested in dusty relics of the past. Yet ask anyone and they will tell you this shop has been around for decades. Rue Moore once reported that it's particularly beloved by the Society and that was how it was able to stay afloat through the changing times, speculating that they use it to move black market goods.

Step inside the high end building and find yourself disoriented by the clash of differing time periods. French Rococo chandeliers, a pristine settee owned by John Adams, an honest-to-god suit of medieval armor, and a few framed sketches by Rembrandt and the like. There’s an electric thrill, as if you could reach out and touch history - though some of that may be the high number of protection magicks being employed.

Whatever you touch is probably worth more than your annual salary. You break it, you buy it.

Balthier is standing at an antique desk plucking away at a laptop as the first few volunteers arrive. He gestures for them to head to the classy bar tucked in the corner. You’re free to enjoy a glass of rich wine and high end appetizers, chatting amongst yourselves about the task at hand while the host finishes his work. As the crowd gathers he shuts his computer and ushers them into the back room, where even more antiques are carefully stacked. Among them are the offenders from the network post and a stack of additional concerning items.

A Little Bit Of Pixie Dust

The biggest puzzle of the night is a medieval cauldron. Intricate carvings depict great tales of monsters and magic. The most notable carving of all is three human faces engraved next to three creatures: a fae, a shade, and a troll.

Search as they might, there’s no record of this object in any database. At the end of the day this one is the only one left identified. As the last remaining investigation team members turn away to pack their things, they miss three small lights slowly rising from the carving’s open mouths. As the door shuts behind them, they may miss the sound of giggling. Or the soft swish of a tricky spell hitting you squarely in the back.

Pixie Magic is unfortunately difficult to detect, after all.

But the first spell cast is a sign these fickle spirits are picking up an old game. Who can create the most chaos? They're powered by human suffering. All fear that they collect returns to their cauldron, making them stronger and increasing the distance they can travel from it.

They are not discriminating and their targets are random. Anyone hit by their spells will become the victims of their fear manifestation spells. Each pixie specializes in a different kind of fear.

The first specializes in internal conflict. Think you have a face like a horse? Well now you might be Bojack Horseman. Worried you’re annoying? Well now you can’t stop doing every annoying habit you’ve ever had. Terrified you might be stone-cold and heartless? Congrats! You're turning into a statue.

Afraid of being ignored? Day 1 you might notice more people are ignoring you. As the spell progresses, no one is returning your calls or texts, people are avoiding you, and you are having trouble being served at coffee shops. By the end of the week, congratulations, you are no one can see or hear you!

These fear spells may be defeated by the character facing their fear or someone where someone helping them see they are still wanted or safe despite their flaws.

The Second Pixie specializes in interpersonal conflict. Maybe your love life explodes. Maybe your worst nemesis returns to harass and humiliate you. Whatever it is, you’re having trouble with others.

EXAMPLES: One day 1, you might be increasingly aware of your significant other's flaws or the health of the relationship. By midweek, you may find yourselves hitting each others buttons and fighting constantly. By the end of the week, you both may be compulsively playing out every flaw the other person perceives you to have.

If you have a nemesis from your past who haunts you, you may find yourself having more memories and dreams of them on Day 1. By Day 3 you might start seeing their face or signs of their work around town, or impacts of their presence. By the end of the week, they may full-on appear in this world, with all their powers, threatening to repeat that terrible memory if you don’t stop them.

These fear spells may be defeated by literally defeating the other person, or by reconciling with them. They could also be defeated by accepting reconciliation is not possible but removing the person's access to you (or to destroying the city, RIP).

The Third Pixie specializes in person versus environment conflict: packs of angry chihuahuas. The weather. The sidewalk opening up to swallow your ankles. Awakening dormant magical creatures. A super volcano going off.

EXAMPLES: You hate the cold and can't shake a chill. By midweek, the temperature around you is literally 10 degrees colder than everywhere else. By the end of the week, you are the eye of a blizzard.

These fear spells may be defeated by overcoming the physical obstacle through whatever means necessary.

Abandon All Hope Ye Who Enter...

Perhaps you failed to overcome this challenge. Just as you succumb to your worst fears, your eyes open and you find yourself standing in an empty space. Others are there with you, looking equally as forlorn and lost.

And then it transforms.

You and your fellow victims are now trapped in a HELLISH LIMBO. You’re living out one fear after another – whether it’s yours, or that of one of the others who failed to overcome their fear in the world outside.

In this hell your very worst fears are realized. And there’s no way out. The pixie’s magic brings things in, but it doesn’t let them out.

Those who have not succumbed to their fears may be drawn to the back room of the antique shop, finding the cauldron abandoned but overflowing with power. The magically inclined may be able to find the seam on this pocket dimension and ATTEMPT A RESCUE.

But more concerningly, the carvings on the cauldron appear to be glowing. What was once a fanciful depiction of ancient battles now appears to be a warning that the worst is yet to come.

These powerful creatures need to be defeated and returned to the cauldron. They have fanned out across the city and will be encountered separately, so teams may wish to form. They cannot be killed, but wounding them will bleed out their power until they can be re-sealed on the cauldron.

The only trouble is you need to find them.

Transformation

As the pixies amass more and more power from the fear they’re generating, the range they can travel from the cauldron increases. The further they can travel, the more fear they can inflict. And where better to feast than a city built upon consumerism, where fear isn’t dealt with but bought off. Perhaps you may spot the flickering light of a pixie out of the corner of your eye, but it’s gone in a flash.

Eventually though, they trade speed for power. As their power crescendos the pixies begin to change shape. By the seventh day, all three of them have shape shifted into much larger and more imposing forms.

The first pixie will become a beautiful and terrifying fae. They make themselves at home in the city’s enormous man-made park and offer fae bargains to those foolhardy enough to trust them. Strength won’t overcome them, but a quick thinking mind might.

The second becomes nothing but a shade. It slides under cars and along walls, hiding in people’s shadows and whispers their darkest fears. This entity can’t be held down or stopped with physical force, but it recoils from the light.

The third rampages throughout the business center in the form of an enormous troll. Like the other two, this entity cannot be stopped with force. Excelsior’s artificial weather systems may be needed to slow this beast down.

AFTERMATH —

Once the pixies are restored to the cauldron, their fears in the city fade away and trapped characters are released, physically unharmed but mentally shaken. The damage any fear manifestations did to the city remain, but any people or objects they conjured fade away within the day.

The cauldron cannot be destroyed, so something will need to be done to keep it from wreaking havoc again.

IN SUMMARY...

Balthier asks for help identifying magical objects. Characters interacting with one object in particular awakens sleeping magic inside.

When the pixies first awaken, they must stay close to the cauldron to sustain their power.

Each pixie's fear spell works on a different kind of conflict (though characters can be affected by more than one, or cured and then affected by another). As the week goes on, the manifested fears will worsen.

Characters can defeat the fear spells by facing their fears or by someone else helping/interfering.

The pixies must be defeated and returned to the cauldron.

Comment HERE if you'd like to be involved in taking out the pixies!

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[He's not impressed by the sharing. Which is a problem because it's a level of honesty he had needed. What's more, it's something grounding and Balthier that the man who thinks himself Ffamran needs to process for himself.]

I love only myself and the power I can gain. The authority. That's what I want. What did you expect? Face it, you're interested in men who are like your father.

[But he's not a wraith.]

Fine. Yes. I am. I like men who are brilliant and innovative, who can make deals with beings beyond human ability, who have the opportunity to influence the fate of man.

But I'm interested in men who feel the weight of that. Who worry about it. Which you do. I don't know why you've forgotten.

[ He doesn't think about it, but his hand goes to David's face. Which is so weirdly cold. ]

My moon, where have you gone?

[Why is he being like this? It's frustrating.]

You left me, so you don't get to claim I'm gone.

You left me first.

[ what does he have to lose. and honesty feels...good. ]

You say you chose me but you haven't been here since he showed up. You've been aloof or reserved or somewhere else. You haven't looked at me the same. Either you wish you'd made the other decision or --

[ this shouldn't just be occurring to him now ... but it is... ]

--or you were afraid I was going to reject you.

I never left. You are the one that checked out.

[Yes, of course he was afraid of rejection. Balthier hadn't been close either, not approachable. And David had felt... punished for loving him. Shut out. Had curled into his own mind, and left himself particularly open to the spell of fear. Because his greatest fear was already blooming around him. Fear that he could only hurt. And that it didn't hurt him.

And so there he had been, heartless. It had been so easy to become.]

I've been in my lab, working. Where else would I be?

[ he steps forward to wrap his arms around David, holding him as tight as he can ]

You’re right and I’m sorry. I was frightened and I withdrew. Even when you were trying to juggle something immense. I should have been more for you.

[ he doesn’t put together that this spell is hitting his fears too: that he’s not enough, that he was never worth any of this, that letting him go would be justified.

That somehow, this love was never real or fated to dissolve. That he couldn’t make it worth it to love him, that he couldn’t take care of those he loved. That he’d never be worth any difficulty.

But he’s fought for people who don’t want him his whole life. He knows how to do this. ]

You deserve more than an isolated life of working alone.

[And that makes David a bit annoyed, angry even. It breaks through the cold just a little bit.]

Well it's not like anyone wants me anyway. Easier to just do the work. There is nothing but work to be had.

I don’t know how to get you to believe that I want you. Scions I’ve been trying for months. What would get through to you?

[ adoration and utter defeat are warring for control of his face. ]

Says the man who is leaving me. And for what?

[He pulls his hands away from Balthier.]

Make up your mind. Or don't. It doesn't really matter.

I love you and I’m having an exceedingly difficult time figuring out how to convince you of that. I’m not the only one sending mixed signals. Do you want to be alone or do you want to be chased and loved?

[ There’s anger in his own voice — finally. He doesn’t even notice, but it’s the bite he’s been pushing down for months, whenever David gets stupid like this. ]

You pretend youre callous or that you’re heartless. But what you are is terrified. And you use control to try to soothe that and then wonder why everyone backs away. Because you signal to them that you want to be left alone, and we all respect you enough to listen.

[No. Stop. It's... It's too true and David doesn't know how to deal with that.]

And yet I managed to break your heart, and his, with no effort. I am callous. I'm heartless. I'm cold.

Loving someone comes with pain, David. It’s being in the thick of it with them — good or bad. And it’s being close even when one of you is being upset or stupid. All I’ve wanted is to be that for you. You’ve asked me to be that back. But then when it happens you pull away.

If I’m going to love you then I have to get to love all of it. You don’t get to decide for me.

You’re only breaking my heart because you’re deciding for me. You’re pulling away. You’re pretending work or protection or whatever stupid narrative you’ve logicked through justifies it but you’re just scared.

Jump damn it. Let me catch you. Let anyone catch you. Stop painting us as whatever your fears are and trust us.

You can’t be heartless because no one heartless is this scared of losing the people he loves.

[ And he has David’s hands and his voice is commanding and he has no idea where he is on the spectrum of Ffamran to Balthier but damn it he knows he’s right about this. ]

[He is right about it. But... But the words make him feel warm. And David's voice breaks a little, emotion finally settling into it.]

It's not just me, Balthier. You push me away too. You're afraid too. I gave myself to you, I chose you, and you're... I felt like you hated me for it.

[The smell is fading and he can feel the warmth coming to his hands, and he doesn't know what to do. It's hurting.]

I’m terrified all the time. [ the only person he’s ever admitted that to is Peter. ] I think I went numb to it. And I’ve been trying so hard to be brave with you but it catches up sometimes and — I am what I am.

[ and he sighs, because he knows he hurt David too. Let him down. Betrayed him just be being his broken self. ]

I didn’t hate you for it. I hated myself for not feeling like I could live up to that choice. I was certain you’d find something in me that would show you the truth — that this is all I am and that it wasn’t enough. That I wasn’t worth the sacrifice, that I couldn’t make you happy enough.

[ and it’s raw and there are tears threatening but he’s not backing down. He came for a fight and he’s not leaving til he’s won or lost ]

[Well, he's winning.]

You don't make me happy when you pull away. When you leave me to be nothing but alone. When you punish me for loving you with all of my heart.

[And god his heart hearts, IT hurts because it's beating and it hasn't in a while. IT's actually enough to bring him to his knees, the pain, the agony of blood flowing properly again. Fuck he hurts.]

I was so certain it meant that you didn't want me at all, that I'd broken you. That I was heartless, like Thunderclap. Like that other life. I... I'm so scared of being them, and hurting you like that felt like I was.

[ Those words hurt but they aren’t fair either. Normally he’d push down his own feelings to try to soothe David but tonight he’s angry — too much, too selfish — and what does it matter? David’s back to himself and as soon as he realizes what Ffamran is he won’t want this anyway ]

David I can’t read minds and everything you’ve been telling me has been to leave you alone. You’re reserved, shrink at my touch, won’t make eye contact. I tried telling you I was sorry and how much I love you and you stayed distant. And then at dinner you said you needed space. I didn’t know what else to do.

And don’t you dare call this punishing you. If you know me at all, then you have to know that isn’t who I am.

[ his voice cracks and the tears start and he doesn’t care. But David’s knees buckle and of course Ffamran grabs hold of him, eases down with him, because it doesn’t matter how badly David treats him, he loves this man and probably always will. ]

Sweetheart, I understand that you’re scared. I really do. But you don’t get to keep deciding the narrative for me and then punishing me for it. I want you so much that I know losing you will leave permanent wounds but I didn’t want to put that on you if you wanted to leave. And you didn’t break me. I might be hurt but I’m not some glads and lace nobleman who shatters so easily. I’ve been through a lot worse than the man I love questioning his feelings and feeling badly for it.

But you have to stop telling me how I feel and not letting me speak for myself.

I know!

[He gets all of this. But that didn't stop the way his heart had reacted.]

You've told me this before. You've... We covered this and something was wrong because I did it all anyway!

[And he clings to his love.]

Worst was that something in me believed all of it and I just... I've been acting weird, the kid was right. I don't even know why. I didn't mean to do it. I do love you, even if you're an asshole who broke up with me by text. Literally don't even come at me right now for making a narrative and punishing you for it because you actually fucking broke up with me for some narrative of yours, even made up a fake name for it, and while this pot is more black than your kettle, you're still sooty, Balthier.

[ he’s so relieved at the way David clings to him. And of course he nestles around David, holding him tightly, because even if they’re fighting he wants this.

But part of him is still upset because he gets to feel scared and betrayed, too, David.

But he doesn’t even begin to dig into that, not for fear this time, but because the end of that needs to be addressed. ]

I didn’t make up a name. That’s my birth name. Ffamran mied Bunansa. I changed it when I was 16 — except I didn’t. The Confluence did something to my memory. I — Balthier is just a character I made up and for some reason I thought I was him. I have the books. It’s — it’s pathetic David. And you’re right. I should have called you or come to see you but you so clearly wanted nothing to do with me. And I deserved it so I thought for once in my life I’d just listen if the outcome was going to be the same.

[ he’s shaking and his voice is catching on his tears, his words tumbling out. One small advantage of being Ffamran is he isn’t nearly as good at keeping his emotions in. ]

You ask me to share my feelings with you but then you get so angry with me when I do. I know I muck things up. I know I’m a mess. Scions I’m trying so hard but I feel like I’m not supposed to get scared or upset back. I need support and patience too.

Except I’m asking you for that when I haven’t been honest about who I am.

[They have so many issues they need to address. None of which David is touching on now because he is looking at Balthier in true bafflement and surprise.]

I'm not sure how to react to it being your real name or not, but you are Balthier and I can prove it. So you need to stop lying to yourself about that already. You are Balthier, and he's real as I am. You've been honest about who and what you are, even though you hide, a lot. We both have issues with being open and vulnerable. But you never lied about who you are.

[ they both hold so much back that now it’s a swell of debris. But at least they’re talking.

Still, Balthier — Ffamran — is yet in the throes of the fear spell, and it’s swelling now that David’s himself and can reject him properly. Or worse, be hurt by the real Ffamran and not an act. ]

I didn’t mean to but I deceived myself and in doing so I lied to you. Look.

[ he pulls away because if he doesn’t do it now he’s not going to and he has to be honest with David if there’s and hope— well he won’t get ahead of himself.

He slips away only far enough to grab one of the books, pressing it into David’s hands. The illustration of Balthier is cringeworthy, all macho piracy and nonsense. ]

I never left. I didn’t tell my father no — youre right about me. I’m arrogant like my father and a coward like my mother. I shoved everything down and I was so good at lying that I convinced myself. But the truth is I’m nothing, just a complicit cog in a government that hurt so many people, someone who spins stories to not feel so alone. But I never took risks, I never let anyone in. Im — just the parts of me you hate. With old reason I’m not accusing you. I don’t much like them either, even if I’ve been too timid to change them.

[ he gets through the ramble, but it’s not the detached voice David is used to when Balthier’s upset. His voice is catching and his face is red and the tears are there and he’s so full of shame. ]

[David lets Balthier put the book in his hand, but honestly? He immediately sets it aside. And rises to his feet to move for the stairs.]

Anyone can make fake books, Balthier. Items remember. I'm going to prove it to you. I'm going to find a memory in your things that you haven't told me, and I'm going to tell it to you, and you'll understand.

You can lie to me, you can lie to yourself, but you can't lie to the impartial observers of your life. And those you can't hide from a psychometric.

I’m trying not to lie.

[ the thing he truly has no idea about is which lies of his father’s he internalized a long time ago, that he’s still giving power to.

But he doesn’t protest further and follows David because either he’s right or he’s wrong and Ffamran will take that into account before he argues again

And maybe he’s aware this may be the last time he sees David, because the fear that he’s being left crawls right back into all the spaces they talking over ]

[David looks around. The ring, he... he doesn't want to touch that again.]

You have the clothes you arrived in, right? Or your Mom's earrings? Come on, we both need you to see how wrong you are. Because you are a fucking noble and considerate person. And sometimes an asshole too, but we both have that quality.

[ Ffamran stops, his mouth actually open at David’s comment.

Because somewhere between this terrible week and their being at odds, he’s slowly convinced himself that there’s nothing for David to love about him, real or not. He thought this was just proving a point, but it’s…he’s trying to build Ffamran up, or Balthier really, but he’s not tearing him down. This isn’t a spar. ]

Help me look. I — they were missing when I tried by myself. But if you remember them too they must be real.

[ the earrings would be better. They’d been with him for both names. They’ll be sitting with his jewelry if David looks, but Balthier won’t see them unless the other man points them out. More of the spell. ]

[It's an evil spell, thanks. David grumbles and starts by checking the jewelry box. And of course there they are, quite obviously placed. Which makes David frown at them for a moment.]

These are them, right? They're not missing. They're right here.

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