A Haunted Homecoming

Stubb, Malcolm, Soclose, Frigg, Adyna (spoofs, figure in the marsh), Angus, Deathwatch

Location: Marshank

The sky is bruised an ominous purple as a phalanx of well-muscled clouds amasses on the western horizon. The sun is low, its mellow light skirting the fringes of the swampland and throwing a splash of bloody red across the world below. Stubb faces east, out to the ocean, his unbuttoned vest whipped up by the strong westerly wind at his back. He leans on the parapet of Marshank's east walltop, lost in thought, oblivious to the abuse of the swelling gale. His body is as thin as it has ever been. His fur still bears the evidence of his run-in with the Keepers. He looks tired. Incredibly tired.

Malcolm was really just out to cause some trouble. But of course, there was no trouble to be had with everyone doing their own little thing. He'd been avoiding Angus for the last while and now, he's trying to take his mind off whatever's bothering him about his father. Slowly, he steps up the stairs to the wall and spots Stubb there. "Watch'ya lookin at?" He asks, going over slowly, tilting his head to the side.

It is obvious from the weasel's expression that Stubb was not looking for company just at the moment. He starts with a grimacing frown, and this expression only deepens when he turns to see who it is. "Wha's i' look loike, kid? Keepin' an oiye on tha sea." He pauses a beat. "An watchin' tha beach. 'Oo knows where dem foxes is gonna pop up next." He cocks his head to the side, eyes drifting back into the churning waters. "Best we don' let our guard down. Storm or no." He mulls his words again, then turns around to face the coming storm.

Malcolm rolls his eyes a little bit. "Why didn't we just kill those bloody foxes? We could have like...slit their throats or something." he shrugs as he stuffs his hands into the pockets of his trousers. "Seriously...we could have done it!" he nods.

As Stubb turns towards the marshes, a faint figure slithers out at the edge of the swamp, invisible but to a sharp eye -- it's impossible to judge identity or even species, but it has the slow, unmistakeable gait of those attempting to avoid notice.

Soclose flaps his wings and hops over from top of the barracks, the osprey landing carefully on the platform which rings the top of the wall, "/Hee!/ Watch out for the points," the osprey suggests, eyeing the wall beams, "unless you are the kind that like to get splinters." The bird folds his wings carefully and suggests after a bit, "The view is nicer here at the edge of things, no?"

Stubb's chuckle is genuine; his eyes twinkle at Malcolm's suggestion. But perhaps that's just the result of the wind in his face, which punches again with renewed force and tugs the colossal cumulonimbus clouds inexorably closer. "Oi'd a loiked ta see that, kid," he says, mouth twisted wryly. "You agains' a whole army a foxes. Oi moighta even given good coin ta see i'." The light from the sinking sun falters, and the weasel bites his lip. "Nah. 'Be foolish ta troi force agains' that lot, lad."

Stubb squints over at the osprey. "Oiye, oi sappose it is somefin special. Been longin' for tha shore for some toime..."

"Longing?" Soclose asks, "I would have thought you had had enough of beaches?" The osprey looks down into the courtyard below, "How is the house below? /Hea?/ Does it still stand? Is it still a mess?"

The figure recently emerged from the swamp sets out towards the castle -- what's left of it. It still makes itself hard to pick out, but it grows steadily closer, sped up by the coming storm.

Stubb does not show any signs of noticing the figure. "Oi were born boi tha sea. Spen' much a moi loife on tha sea." His attention is fixed on Soclose. He runs his forearm underneath his watery nose. "Can' say what it is--'s'no' love, oi can say that much; an it ain' even that oi foind i'..." he trails off. "I's jes'... Oi don' feel roight when oi'm not in soight a her." He peers into the courtyard. "Haven' poked around much, moise'f. Keepin' an oiye ou' for trouble."

Stubb sniffs again and fixes his gaze on the marshland. He shields his eyes from the raucous wind.

Soclose's head turns towards the same direction Stubb is watching, "/Hee!/ Trouble you have lots of!" The osprey calls out a bit louder to talk over the breeze but seems to enjoy it otherwise. "Do you look for all of it, or do you just wait for it to introduce itself?" The osprey looks up, "The rain will do that for you!"

Stubb does not reply to the osprey's question, if it is indeed a question and not simply a taunt. He keeps his observations planted on the marshland. He murmurs something that is washed out by the buffeting breeze.

Soclose tilts his head and asks Stubb, "What-what? What did you say?" The osprey clucks and remarks, "It is unfortunate you do not have a beak to keep out all the wind, no? You could try opening your mouth larger--" the bird pauses and then croons, "It was just a suggestion."

Stubb scowls at the bird for half a moment, then says, "Surproised you can floy in dis weavuh, ma'e. Oi'd a fought it'd blow you away. 'Fact, oi bettah take shewtah moise'f, 'for I go tumblin' into tha sea." The horizon is veiled with mist now, so that the steely purple seems like a solid mass rolling along the ground toward Marshank.

Stubb starts to edge along the walltop, one paw glancing off the crown of the low stone siderail. He steps delicately, the picture of caution. "You too, Malcowm," he says in a quiet voice accompanied by a nudge. "C'mon."

Soclose's talons fidget as they hold the osprey down, "/Aye!/ I would be out to sea if I left this wall, yes. But I would be back the next day--with all hope." Soclose looks towards the waters and his feathers ruffle about his face obscuring his expression. He says decisively, "I will follow you all down the stairs."

"Careful," the weasel counsels the osprey and dragon. "Neahly 'ad a tumble 'ere yeste'day. Put a paw in tha wrong place, an a stone moight drop from unda you."

Soclose's talons scrabble about the stone tile as the bird walks, "Who would have known they were going to move a mountain in here?" Soclose remarks, "/Ayie!/ Less wind though. A good place to watch the rain leave from."

They descend to the courtyard.

The courtyard is a gloomy spectacle in the encroaching twilight. Stubb shivers and looks behind him to the others following in his wake. "Bes' we got insoide," he sniffs, eyes cast skyward. "Looks to be a bad one, an' we best explore dis ole place sooner or la'er. Moigh' be we foind somefin' a use to us." He kicks a stray rock, and it skips into the foliage that clogs the patch where vegetables once grew in tidy rows.

A deep, distant crack of thunder cuts through the growing wind, at just the right frequency to rattle teeth and bone.

Soclose avoids the pebbles and such as he steps on the stones, the osprey looking towards the gates as they creak thinly and rattle in the wind, "Very noisy those are... /Hee!/ It will sound like a marvelous fight tonight!" He ponders for a bit and then suggests, "We could find some rope--" the osprey suggests, tilting to listen to the distant thunder. "Tie them up."

Frigg desperately wants to seek shelter from this awful rain, but there isn't a single friendly-looking building in sight, and to make a fire inside many of them would be to burn yourself alive, no doubt. Yet they're probably warm, insulated better than stone, and perhaps still water-tight in places... Sandy has wandered, and she has nobeast to cling to.

Stubb nods sharply toward Soclose and jogs to secure the gates. "Hope nobeast went ou'," he mumbled. "Wif dis storm, an' a hundred 'ungry foxes roamin' tha cliffs nearboi, 'wouldn' surproise me if dey din' last tha noigh'." He fumbles with a length of half-decayed rope that lies coiled near what might have been the old guardhouse.

The gates rattle horribly in the wind as it rises and falls -- with the sudden, eerie resemblance of a skeleton's ribs as it sways from the gibbet.

Angus tilts his snout to the sky, taunting the incoming tempest with a flit of his purple tongue. "Never been so dang thankful fer a roof," he mutters, and jams his fists into his trouser pockets. "Why in toads' gracious names are we still out here, boys?" Without waiting for their excuse, the dragon starts stalking toward the longhouse.

Stubb gestures urgently to Malcolm. "C'mon, kid. Dere's enough toime a mope when we're safe insoide! Help keep dese shut! Las' fing we need is a visi' from tha locals. Could be more a them beasts what grabbed the ol' lady two noights back!" He points to Frigg. "Crabs, or somefin' worse."

Malcolm is tempted to just stay outside to make everyone angry at him. But he shrugs a little bit, following the others.

Frigg tries to stay roughly in the center of the group, thinking she saw something moving about in the background, near the walls. "Uh... folks? Is there somebeast besides us in here? Where's Sandy gone, by the way?" She bites her lip nervously, "Maybe we should just find a bunch of wood and make a lean-to, or something? We don't know what's in... any of these places..."

Soclose stands nearby the gates to supervise, the osprey checking to see if there are any other holes or somesuch before turning towards the longhouse. "There is room enough for everyone, sure sure!" The osprey looks about the walls and huffs, "It would be unfriendly for them--/Heek!/ Inhospitable! Making us stand on the outside when they are inside and dry?"

Stubb snarls and curses as the young dragon walks away without helping, but he manages, with effort, to still the gates somewhat. They continue to bow inward with the air pressure, still tugging at the bonds, but it's an improvement.

Somewhere outside the walls a beast screams in pain, high and shrill, dying away and leaving the wind to its cold howl.

The mousemaid leaps at this newest sound, looking all around for its source. She screams, "Sandy!!!!! Sandy!!!!! Oh for goodness sake, how could she wander off like this?! Where's Dangeon?" She trudges through the dampening dirt, grown slippery in the start of the rain, almost slipping and catching up to the others at the gates. She feels helpless for her friends.

Stubb turns to follow after the others. His fur is combed in a chaos of parts asstreams of humid air tear over the walls and into the courtyard from all directions. He lifts an arm to fend off the gale. He falters mid-stride as the scream rises above the clamor.

Soclose stands alert at that! The osprey's eyes turn wide and peer out through the slats. "/Ayeh!/ Sounds dangerous out there! Good we are in here." The osprey tilts his head and suggests, "What do you want to bet one of those foxes stepped the wrong way?"

Stubb regains his balance and looks, wide-eyed, to Soclose. "Where'd i' come from?" The rain is drumming down now, rendering the courtyard a sticky brown carpet of mud and well-trod plants. "Soclose! Ma'e! Where'd i come from?!"

Frigg pulls her hood over her face as the rain lashes at it, "Perhaps we'd best get inside somewhere, before it downpours? Is anybeast else thinking this? I'd like to put as many walls as I can between us and those foxes." She hopes the scream wasn't somebeast formerly with them.

Soclose looks about and points with a wing towards the wall, "Outside!" The osprey's plumage is rapidly getting soaked, and the bird says somewhat peevishly, "We will not dry out if we stay here! If there is a problem they can come to us." Soclose begins stalking towards the large house.

The tormented sky above the castle lights up with a flicker of lightning, as bright as day; it casts weird, twisted shadows around the courtyard, of half-imagined shapes disfigured and impossible.

Deathwatch eases himself out of the longhouse to witness the horrible weather, the wildcat hissing softly to himself as he listens to the thunder clapping and lightning flashing. He squints, looking over the beasts already out in the courtyard.

Stubb shivers and hurries toward the longhouse. He grabs Frigg around the shoulders and hastens her progress as well. "Come on," he says in a voice taut with anxiety, or fear, or something else entirely. He barely raises his eyes to look at Deathwatch, sliding by the wildcat toward refuge.

Frigg nods and is relieved, albeit indignantly /shoved/ along toward the house. "Well, we don't have to go into this big, dark.... one...." She becomes unnerved by Stubb's calamitous behavior, and turns her head, "Careful, let's not rush into things..." She gulps.

Soclose looks upwards at the sky and gulps down a beak full of water before stepping up to the longhouse. "Aeeh! Much better! Much nicer! ...do I feel carpet?" The osprey moves about a bit but does not move far from the doorway.

They enter the longhouse.

Deathwatch steps inside once more, sighing as he is relieved of the rainy outside. The feline turns his head one way, causing a cracking sound, before turning it another away to give the same effect. He looks at the beasts and leans against the haft of his hammer, "So...vhat's been going on? Ozher zhan zhe bad veather, yah?"

Stubb shakes off some of the water speckling his fur. He drops his arm hastily from Frigg's back, as if suddenly cognizant that he's shown a hint of sympathy for the wretched creature. He surveys the interior of the hall dubiously. "Can' 'ardly believe dis building can stand, ma'e." He winces at the proprietor.

Deathwatch rests his hammer-head down on the floor, where the haft is balanced to point straight towards the roof. The dingy place still needs quite a lot of work, moss grown and some wood rotten in a few places, but as per dirt and sand making its way inside? There seems to be no sign. The carpet on the floor hasn't been cleaned as of yet, but definite improvements can be seen here and there, where the feline had started the process of cleaning it. Not to mention, even though there's moss and rotten wood, the place has been worked on quite a bit and showing clear signs of Deathwatch's attempt at "flipping the house", so to speak. Deathwatch turns towards Stubb and tilts his head, "Better zhan sleeping out in zhe rain, don't you think?"

Frigg gets a distinctly sinister vibe from this cat... and where has he gotten that accent? It's strangely /too/ reassuring, and Frigg is anything but given the circumstances. For the few beasts that they are, this doesn't seem like a fortress but rather a trap. "Um... y-yes... as long as we're in here, have you seen our friends wander through here? S-sandy, Dangeon? A squirrel, a hare?"

"I'll agree, aswell" Soclose croons to Deathwatch, flicking and ruffling his wingfeathers and dripping about. "I have been in smaller boats at sea, and larger." He pauses to find some good remarks and finishes with, "None so...steady!" The osprey turns towards Frigg and asks, "Did we, we send them on ahead of us?"

A flash of lightning outside stamps brief pinpoints and slashes of light on the interior, the following thunder rattling doors and bones.

Frigg shivers, still, though not from the ambient temperature, but a chill running past her. "Did... did anybeast else /feel/ that? M-maybe they're in the m-mess hall? Does somebeast want to go with me to check?"

Deathwatch blinks, listening to the thunder, but doesn't seem terribly moved by it. The wildcat's lived in the wilds long enough, and bad weather is unpleasant, but not a real concern when he has shelter. The large cat looks between the creatures, "Perhaps. I vasn't here vhen zhey vere being moved." He turns to Frigg and hmms, "Maybe. Zhere's only a few places zhey can be, if zhey are here."

Stubb frowns. "Where else moigh' dey be, if they ain' here? You got a cellar you're keepin' em in?" He sniffs the air; perhaps it offers clues.

Soclose shakes his head, "I'm not going in any cellars!" He suggests, "They might be eating. I bet they haven't had anything for dinner yet."

Deathwatch turns towards the osprey, "Your eyes should be able to see in zhe dark, yah?" He grins a little, "Or is zhat a veakness in such glorious raptors?" He chuckles a little, his yellow eyes offering a bit of a gleam, his ability to see in the dark rather helpful in situations like these, "Maybe I should see zhe cellar. Seeing as how I'm one who can spot zhem. Not to mention, zhere are my cellars. I've been down zhere already."

Frigg nods, and looks at the others, "Well, let's just find them and get it over with then, right? I mean, they haven't wandered out, so it's here or the stockade or that other place, I would imagine..." She looks toward the hall, "Well, let's make sure they aren't in the next room, first?" She takes a deep breath, mostly in anticipation of finally finding them. "...though it's doubtful, I suppose, if they haven't encountered our friend." The mousemaid wanders off.

Soclose exclaims a loud, /Heah-hee-heek!/ as he steps into the threshold of this room and then jumps back several times at what he sees on the tables. "I think I have to take back some of my compliments, surely this is not the way one should keep their house." The osprey huddles his feathers and croons, "Now I will not sleep, or have dinner!"

Frigg gasps when she enters, her heart palpitating at first at the occupants who never managed to leave. "Whh... wh... Stubb, those aren't... /new/.. um... they're not Sa.. Dang..." She creeps slowly behind the weasel, not as enthusiastic about leading the search now. "Those look old, don't they?" She hears the sound, then. The 'pacing' upstairs.

Deathwatch blinks as he steps inside and his yellow eyes glances around inside the room, frowning, "Gott im himmel..." he whispers to himself, confounded by what's going on.

Stubb lags behind the rest. He wrings his paws, but his voice is still until Frigg addresses him. He wrings his mouth in a show of disdain, but he soothes, "Nay. Nay, li'tle lady. It ain' them. Too bare ta be fresh, 'less somefin big's crawlin' about an pickin' em clean in a hurry." He shifts nervously. "You mean you haven' set paw in dis room, cat?" His brow furrows.

Soclose moves back away from the table and remarks, "This isn't the sort of plunder I go searching for, you know?" He prods Stubb and croons, "I stick with the kind that is still moving even if it is spitting sand."

Deathwatch takes a step further inward, the wildcat frowning a little, "I admit, I have not stepped into zhe mess hall of Marshank since I've arrived. Since I usually have my meals elsevhere, I thought it a small vorry to clean zhis place in a hurry."

Frigg starts hyperventilating... "W...well they didn't j-just appear..." She starts to calm down a bit, letting reason set in, "They're the former occupants, perhaps they were... poisoned, or somebeast came by while they were eating and..." She looks away, unable to think about the scenario while looking at their horrible positions. "M-m-maybe the creaking upstairs is them? Aren't there beds upstairs?" she says, looking at Deathwatch.

The floor of the hall is littered with broken fragments of pottery and glass, and with objects whose precise nature the dim light makes difficult to discern. Stubb's paws crackle on the shards as he eases tentatively forward into the darkness. "Can barely tell where oi'm bloody goin'..." He strains his eyes to make sense of the landscape. "Tough ta tell what 'appened 'ere. Maybe a raid. Maybe dey crossed tha wrong... beasts. Or..."

One of the creatures is startled and flutters down from a chandelier and swoops down near the group, its jaws opening and snapping shut in front of Soclose, floating back up to another chandelier.

A bellow of thunder grabs the fortress by the roots and shakes it for a moment. The patter of rain continues to chatter on the walls.

"Must be some raid!" Soclose says, the osprey's mood changing when it comes to having to make observations. "They did not look like they got up from their food. Who can eat at a time like that?" His head darts out sharply and he makes his own slash at the flying thing in front of him, "/Hie!/ What, do we have moths or something? Try that again!"

Soclose pauses for a moment, then with a bit of wrenching pulls his talons out of the floorboard that he stuck himself to.

Stubb ducks out of the way to avoid the startled creature. "Too big ta be a moff, ma'e. Hey, cat. Looks loike you got uvvah guests besoides us." It's a good thing the darkness provides some cover for his terror; his eyes are wide, even while he manages to keep his voice under control.

Deathwatch looks down at Frigg and nods, "Yah. Zhere are beds in zhe floors above, in zhe barracks." He then hisses as the creature moves and snaps at Soclose, the wildcat holding onto his hammer in a hard stance, his lips curled, hair standing on his back, "Vhat are you creatures?" He growls, "Vhat are you doing in my family's home?"

"Well, then that's where I'm going. You all are free to follow, I need to find /somebeast/ soon, or find out what happened to them." Her voice is almost a sob, and she trots out toward the stairs, pulling her hood up more instinctually, as she withdraws from the horrors of the room. Her sense seems to have left her, as she heads toward the noise.

"These probably came in through the windows when the storm came through," Soclose says, "We should find some better place to be..." He looks sharply up at the light fixtures, "/Heek!/ Not that we don't have the time! We can make faces at them all night! We just have better things to do!"

Deathwatch growls and lowers his hammer, "I'll deal with zhem in zhe morning, if zhey are still here." He straightens up and turns towards the door, "Better follow zhe mouse. If you vant her to be alive und vell, might be a good idea. Could be others here zhat aren't too friendly..." he turns towards the creatures, "Apparently."

Stubb clenches his teeth. "Oi ain' goin' up dere. If i's tha hare we're after, she'll be nosin' around for some booze, if oi know her. An tha cat'll be wif 'er, oi'd waja." He grunts, picking his way through the debris toward the kitchen.

Stubb turns back to squint through the dark. "You two go on wif 'er. Oi'll be all roight." He sighs. "Where tha hell'd they all got to..."

Soclose and Deathwatch climb the stairs.

Frigg is cradling her legs, rocking back and forth on the steps and shivering... "N-n-n-noo, nono, no, no...."

Soclose climbs up into the dark, the osprey scraping about as the wood creaks and groans. "Oh, it is dark up here..." Soclose croons, "makes you want to go to sleep, doesn't it?" The bird pauses at the top of the stairs and hunches his wings over Frigg, "Hello! What has happened here? Fallen from your nest again?"

Frigg shakes her head, but the movement is lost in her shivering... she points to the parchment stuck up on the wall along the staircase.

Deathwatch squints at the parchment on the wall, his lip lightly curling as he looks upon it before looking down at the mouse, "Just trying to scare us, I'm sure..." He shakes his head, "I refuse to be intimidated by zhis."

Soclose looks at the parchment, the osprey's eyes making wide orange circles in the dim light. "Ah! A message!" The bird turns and steps over to the parchment and mutters for a bit, "Oh? Oh! There I am, how did I get on the list with the rest of you?" He scratches the crossed out name, "A bit of a riddle then? It tells us who it's for, but doesn't say who it is from...and it certainly doesn't tell us much more than that!" He shakes his head, "I would have them fill it out or tell me more before I would consider delivering something like this."

Frigg looks incredulously at the bird, "You... you're serious? Sandy could be /dead/! And... and that awful w-walking upst-t-tairs... I'll tell you what it was... it was absolutely /nothing/! I went up there and heard it, but there's nothing making the sound! N-n-nothing!"

Deathwatch tilts his head down at the mouse and frowns before saying, "Your eyesight is simply going out. Zhere's no vay zhat zhere is nobeast upstairs, nobeast making zhat noise. Zhat's ridiculous."

Soclose sighs out of his beak, "A paper with a crossed off line?" The osprey complains, "When I eat too many fish they cross my name off a paper and then... I fly somewhere else." Soclose shakes his head, "Maybe there is something on the back?"

Frigg gulps, "Maybe it is... maybe it's something natural that I wasn't able to pinpoint, though it sure /sounds/ like boots on wood..." She shivers, looking at Soclose, "Th-that doesn't look like ink or charcoal, S-soclose. Wh-what if it's /her/ blood? I /n-n-need/ to find her!" She pushes past them and runs down the stairs!

Deathwatch growls and hefts his hammer onto his shoulder, "I'm going upstairs. If I find whoever's doing zhis, zhere's going to be some hell to pay." He begins to make his way upstairs, "You can come if you vish, raptor. Up to you."

Soclose collects the parchment and croons quietly, "Have you smelled anything?"

Deathwatch pauses a moment and replies, "No. Nozhing but zhe smells I'm familiar vith in zhis place."

The sounds of Deathwath's footsteps can be heard as he strides into the room, pausing somewhere in the middle of the room. His eyes glances this way and that, "Vhy...vhy can't I see?"

Soclose croons, "Ah! We are at the top of the tower!" The osprey walks over to the eastern part of the barracks and looks up through a hole in the roof which is letting water drip in and run across the floor. "I do not come down the hole, but at least now I know what is below it."

Deathwatch turns towards Soclose, "It is dark in here..." however, he can make out Soclose's from as he stands under the hole in the roof. The wildcat makes his way over and rubs his eyes, "Must've had somezhing in my eyes. Vell...I'm seeing nozhing to be concerned about, raptor."

Soclose nods, "Maybe it was rocks on the roof?"

Deathwatch shakes his head, "Vhatever it is, it is done now. Let's just head downstairs, find out vhere zhat older mousemaid vent."

Soclose nods and shuffles about the broken furniture, "Ah? Good idea! I will follow you back to the stairs!" The osprey shakes his feet before stepping out of the water.