reamonn colin maddox (reamonn) wrote in magicalworld, @ 2015-11-17 15:12:00 |
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Entry tags: | !in progress, !open, char: colin maddox, char: libby harper, npc: charlotte harper |
WHO: Colin & YOU
WHAT: The Nemeton’s screaming and it’s really distracting
WHEN: Early-Mid November, during school and after
WHERE: At school & at the Nemeton
WARNINGS: Mild language.
STATUS: Open to all (feel free to bug him at any point in the day)
Halloween had opened a dam. The fire and whatever else happened that night set off a chain reaction in Beacon Hills and the Preserve and the town was still reeling from those events. The Nemeton was practically screaming, the silent misery and complicated demands pouring out of it reverberating all through the woods and even into the yards and trees in the town itself. Too many emotions lingered in the air, and the plants, already suffering from the drought, cried out every day, only adding to the feeling of misery. Colin felt like he was suffocating under the weight of the plants and people dying, and he barely knew anyone who had been involved in the fire. His house hadn’t been affected at all, too far from the fire for spreading to be a concern. But still, he felt the destruction the fire wrought, and struggled with it daily. His own plants, carefully cultivated in his house and the small greenhouse he’d constructed in the backyard, a temporary thing, were suffering. The orchids were drooping, unsettled and unhappy, and the ferns were shedding. Even the aloe vera and jade plants he’d had for over a decade, plants that survived a move across the country, were wilting with the tension in the air and the smoke on the breeze. And there was nothing he could do about it. Uneasy dreams left Colin restless through his classes and that night had been particularly bad. He could only remember disturbing flashes of walking around the Nemeton, bark peeling back to reveal something terrifying, though he always woke up before he could figure out what it was hiding. Wolf howls echoed through the landscape of his dreams, sad and longing, and Colin hadn’t been able to shake the desolation that went with those howls when he finally crawled out of bed that morning. Even a phone call with his brother hadn’t done much but reinforce the loneliness. Classes were difficult that day, his head buzzing and everyone just a little too loud and aggravating for him. By the time lunch rolled around, he had resorted to just turning on a video and letting his students watch that, rather than engaging them in actual discussion or activities. It wasn’t something he enjoyed doing - a waste of class time - but there was no way he could stand to teach. That afternoon found him stuck in his office, a cup of coffee - freshly brewed in a pourover, with beans from his personal stash - at his elbow, alternating between staring at a stack of papers he needed to grade and the door in desperate hopes that someone would interrupt him. - Evening found him in the Preserve, circling the Nemeton. Every single piece of equipment he’d placed in the grove surrounding the tree - from cameras to the simplistic temperature gauges to the sensors in the ground, all carefully camouflaged to blend into the surroundings - were going haywire, the readings completely borked. Two weeks later and he was still struggling to make sense of the readings and coming up at a loss. Soon, he’d have to mention this to someone, see if anyone else could make sense of them, or figure out if anything similar to this was going on somewhere else. Until this tree, every Nemeton he’d visited had been peaceful, well-grounded and secure in their roots and their place. But this one felt different. Not only sick, it felt malevolent and chaotic. That feeling had only grown since the fire, and now, standing out there in the grove, he was forcefully reminded that caution was necessary around the tree. It could so easily reach out and take control, given the right circumstances. Still, Colin walked the grove, checking his sensors and cameras, and even stopped to stare at the tree, looking at the bark, wondering if his dreams were true and something lingered beneath the surface of that mammoth tree. He was so tempted to reach out and pick at a piece of the bark, pull it back and reveal everything, and all Colin had to do was extend his hand - The sudden, unexpected snap of a twig brought him to his senses, causing Colin to step back from the tree, startlingly close to it. |