lifeaftr | January Undercurrent: Growing Pains

January Undercurrent: Growing Pains

JANUARY UNDERCURRENT

Who: Everyone!
What: Hey bud, how's it growing?
When: January 3rd to January 20th
Where: Everywhere!
Warnings: This event has a potential for body horror and character death; please mark anything as it comes up!

A Notion Growing Inside Me

Those of you who weren't with us the last time Umui entered the archipelago didn't have to contend with the lethal illness known as the Overgrowth personally, but anyone who remembers it probably doesn't remember it fondly. Fortunately, this isn't quite the same strain of the illness that you had to contend with the last time. It's not unrelentingly and uncompromisingly fatal, for one! That's always nice.

For those that need a primer on the Overgrowth, it is best described as a sickness that overcomes you with floral growth both inside and outside your body that can only be cured by expressions of emotional honesty. Expressions of truths, affections, and admissions of things that you have hidden from yourselves or from others were critical in dispensing of the illness. These could be as simple as admissions of past sins or the revealing of secrets, or as grandiose and overt as confessions of guilt or love. That general idea will remain more or less the key means of curing this strain as well, though the stakes fortunately aren't as high this go around! Which is to say, if you fail to have any grand emotional epiphanies by the time this event ends, you aren't doomed to suffer a character death; symptoms will simply dissipate come January 20th.

So what's this sickness going to be like in this particular instance, then? We're so glad you asked!

You can go the standard route, of course. Adventurers' first brush with the illness saw the following afflicted upon them:

[ ♆ ] Stage One: Germination. Initial symptoms involve fever, coughing fits, numbness to nerves and extremities, and general joint stiffness. Difficulty breathing or performing other basic functions will often occur. Fatigue, difficulty sleeping, and intense weakness or dizzy spells are also liable to occur as the flowers begin to harvest nutrients from the body. This will also generate extreme thirst and periods of intense nausea. Tremors and the sensation of something "itching" from inside are also common. The end of Stage One is usually marked by the act of vomiting or coughing up flower petals or spores, along with a not-insignificant amount of blood.

[ ♆ ] Stage Two: Budding. The floral growths spread more completely inside the body, and begin to grow on the skin or exterior. Difficulty performing basic functions will increase as, for example, airways become obstructed and flowers grow around joints and pinch them still. The site of affliction also yields rashes, blisters, and blood sores as the flowers sprout from the skin. The rate of vomiting or coughing up floral growths will increase dramatically. Flowers often bloom quickly, and very painfully. Numbness in affected areas will increase, oftentimes rendering parts of the body completely inert - a pair of legs claimed completely by blooms, for example, will no longer work.

This was followed by Stage Three: Bloom, which resulted in character death. However, this strain will not advance to this style of Stage Three. All symptoms will disperse by the time Umui resurfaces.

This strain is also rather more erratic, which can make emotional repression more of an inconvenience than a horrifying circumstance. For those who would rather not play around with intense sickness (or who have already endured this once before), you have the option to go that route if you like! With this variant of the Overgrowth, one can become, for example, so embarrassed that they hiccup up a flower. A vicious denial of their feelings may cause them to spontaneously erupt into a rash of dandelion puffballs, seemingly immediately. You might end up walking around with a bouquet for an arm for a few hours. Perhaps mortifying, but certainly not fatal! Isn't that nice?

Unless, of course, you want it to be...

I Can't Fight It Much Longer

Now, while the Bloom Stage isn't present in this strain, it has mutated its progression into a rather nasty end stage. Those of you who succumb a little too readily to this illness, who don't fight off the emotional repression quickly, who don't admit those difficult truths to yourself or confess to whatever you're bottling up, you'll be faced with a potentially horrifying transformation. Potentially, because it is your choice whether or not you see fit to commit your character to that fate - as stated above, this option might simply skip over your character entirely, and the worst they'll have to deal with are cartoonishly over-the-top effects that disperse in due time.

But maybe not all of you will be so lucky. Some of you might discover for yourselves how this particular variant of the Overgrowth has mutated.

We call this mutation Stage Three: Outbreak.

In this final Stage, those beautiful blooms wither and harden into a fungus-like carapace as the illness grows into the victim's brain and shuts down virtually all higher functions. This can sometimes render them almost wholly recognizable, but not always - oftentimes, it's very obvious who this person once was. The victim is reduced to a carrier of the virus, which causes them to act the way you'd expect most viruses to act: becoming intent on spreading. Advanced brain functions such as speech, rational thought, and so on tend to shut off and become wholly inaccessible.

Now that the victim's body is no longer fighting the Overgrowth, the illness lends them increased speed, strength, and durability, making them dangerous foes indeed. They will usually seek to infect others by whatever means necessary - usually via biting or exuding breathable spores - but in some cases, they will simply reduce to base instincts, and just outright attempt to attack and kill whoever is closest.

Unfortunately, at this point, there is no hope of a cure; it's hard to make someone be emotionally honest when they're capable of little more than blunt, animal instinct. At this point, you can either wait for the Stage Three symptoms to disperse come Umui's return, or take manners into your own hands. You can probably guess what that might entail.

If you decide to put your Overgrown friends out of their misery, this will count as a character death. If it comes to that, be sure to let us know on the Deaths page! Death penalties, however, will not be reduced for this event.

Try to Get Through It

Of course, there's a lot going on in the background as well. You're free to use this log as a catch-all for the duration of January's Undercurrent Event, as well as any of the other minor events listed on our Monthly Rundown post. And, of course, you are always free to create your own individual logs and posts as needed.

If you have any questions, please feel free to ask them over on the Questions header on our Rundown post!

January Timeline

[ ♆ ] January 1st: "This Sucks" begins and lasts until January 10th
[ ♆ ] January 3rd: "Growing Pains" begins and lasts until January 20th
[ ♆ ] January 11th: "No Water is Safe" begins and lasts until January 19th
[ ♆ ] January 20th: Umui returns to the archipelago
[ ♆ ] January 21st: "Impawsible Geometries" begins and lasts until January 31st

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( CODED BY BOOTYCALL )

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There are flowers pushing through his skin, through his lungs, probably through the walls of other organs if the nausea and how he keeps throwing up clumps of petals means anything.

But he isn't dead yet.

Faust might not let him in the clinic anymore, but Yukio does still have a store of herbs in his treehouse and he's been trying to figure things out, but he doesn't know enough, isn't good enough yet. And he knows the cure. He just...

He's looking for Ginko today. It's going to take all day, he's reaches his limit physically just getting out of his house, almost falls down the ladder. But he has to keep going, so he does.

"Ginko-san?" He says, while standing at the door of a cottage. He thinks it's the right place, but it's hard to tell. He's dizzy, exhausted from just walking over here, too hot, and he can't smell anything but blood and vomit.

Edited (formatting switch) 2020-01-11 02:33 (UTC)

A moment passes before there's any sound from the other side of the door - then there's a slow, uncomfortable shifting as Ginko pushes himself to his feet, and he tugs the door open a moment later.

He's not as bad off as Yukio. He's been trying, at least, to say what he knows he has to, even if it takes some work and some discomfort, and it has at the very least kept him from deteriorating as quickly as he did last time the Overgrowth emerged; he's definitely having trouble moving around, can't really move without pain, and there are flowers clustered at his joints... but he doesn't look ready to collapse the way Yukio does.

Ginko tries to keep from reacting too much to Yukio's state, and it kind of works - there's not much of a change to his expression, just a slight, worried pull to his brows and ears. "Yukio... what's up?"

"May I come in?" He asks, suddenly hesitant. Ginko looks sick, and Yukio shouldn't be here bothering him.

Yukio looks much worse, flushed and dazed, bandages wrapped around his arms with flowers still pushing out from under them. His hair and clothes are a mess (he looks a lot more like Rin like this), and his movements are stiff and slow and uncoordinated.

But he has to keep going. There has to be something he can do, something that can reduce symptoms to give people (himself) a chance at fighting off this infection.

"Of course." No hesitation, of course. No matter what kind of shape Ginko might be in, Yukio is clearly doing worse, and needs help more urgently. Besides, anything that can be done to help him could potentially help Ginko, as well.

Doing too much to physically help Yukio in seems like it could be insulting, or at the very least over-reaching... but that hesitation isn't enough for Ginko to keep from moving to guide him in, one hand lingering by his shoulder without quite touching him as Ginko directs him to the cottage's makeshift seating, pulled together with salvaged materials and Ed's alchemy. "You should sit down."

Like, right now.

He's swaying a little as he stands, as he walks in and sits down. If he notices Ginko's hand hovering, he doesn't say anything. He probably notices, because that third eye in his forehead swivels to look at it, to track Ginko's movements through the room. But he doesn't say anything.

Yukio sits in a chair, or a bench, or something. He closes his eyes, just for a second. Forces them open again when he realizes it's been a moment too long.

"I..." what was he going to say? He came here for a reason, and he has to stay focused.

"I've been trying to figure out something that can..." He's interrupted by a coughing fit, his body trying to rid itself of the clumps of marigold petals in his lungs.

This isn't something he can recover from, and he knows it. But he's too selfish and too stubborn and too much himself to actually go through with the real cure, and he knows that too.

Ginko's ears pin back, nearly pressing to the sides of his head, at Yukio's coughing. He's gotten into such bad shape, so fast - and it sounds like he knows what has to be done, but...

"Have you not been able to find anything to say that will get rid of the flowers?"

Anything to say, he says, and it takes a moment for that question to sink in. That wasn't what Yukio was thinking of, he wasn't expecting to hear it, and he's too dazed, thinking too slowly.

"I couldn't..." he's just talking. He's just going ahead with it. He isn't even thinking about it. But he's still struggling to breathe, still spitting out blood-soaked flowers as he coughs. There's a moment, when he stares at the flowers in his hand, at the glowing translucent blue blood and the crumpled orange petals, and doesn't know what to do. He can't just drop them on the ground, that would be rude. He doesn't know where to throw them away. He doesn't want to hold them in his hand. He doesn't want to be rude but there are petals shoving their way through his throat and out between his fangs and he coughs and coughs and doesn't know what to do.

So much for keeping a respectful distance.

Ginko drops onto his knees next to Yukio, one hand going to gently take the bloodied petals from his hand and the other resting on his back without Ginko really thinking about it. "--Hey, don't try to hold that in. It'll just hurt you more."

His hands aren't responding properly, don't even pull or close when Ginko brushes the petals away, and he's hot, feverish, coughing out the last clumps of petals and sucking in gasps of air that aren't enough.

His breathing stabilizes, eventually, even if his head doesn't clear. He came here for a reason, and he has to force the fog away long enough to communicate it.

"Is there... something that... that can reduce symptoms? Something that isn't..." That isn't just talking? That isn't just prying himself wide open and making someone else look?

"...Not that we've found."

There's no dodging around that. And, of course, they'd tried - people still are trying, he's sure. But, so far, talking is all they've got.

"Oh." He says, after it sinks in. But that's really not an answer, and Ginko is going to want one, and Yukio should have one to give him.

"I don't want to." That is a response but even as sick as he is Yukio knows it isn't the right one. It's true, but it isn't right, he should say something that indicates his understanding and offers enough of a response to slow the flowers and show Ginko that he's going to give the right answers. Instead he's just... honest.

It would almost be funny how matter-of-fact that was, if it weren't for the circumstances. Instead, it's just kind of sad.

"I... can't fault you for that." He desperately hopes Yukio can work past it, at least enough to survive for now, but he can't fault him for it. "I'd appreciate it, very much, if you can try - but I know it's not an easy thing to do."

He can only hold back the tension in his voice so much, but he's trying. He can't put too much pressure on Yukio, that'll only make things worse, but--

Ginko is asking him to talk. But he doesn't know, doesn't realize, doesn't understand that the second Yukio says anything really true about himself it's just going to be something horrible. No one deserves to listen to that. Especially not someone who's just trying to help.

"What..." he's sick, too hot and struggling to think and his throat feels tight and he's struggling, suddenly, to get quiet words out. "What should I say?"

If he says too much he'll lose someone who thinks they care about him, but if he doesn't say enough it won't help to clear the flowers.

"Anything. Even if it doesn't work, it can narrow things down. Just-- as long as it's not a lie."

That part is absolutely vital - and may seem obvious, but Ginko really can't emphasize it enough.

As long as it's not---

He remembers, with a rush, that Ginko doesn't know, that there's no way he can know, that Yukio's been fighting against this for what feels like forever but is really only since the Carnival, so of course Ginko wouldn't know that Yukio can't lie, that whatever comes out of his mouth is just going to be the truth, raw and honest and terrible.

"I don't... want to." He says, between breaths that are coming too fast and shallow, he can't even breathe properly right now, he's just going to set off another coughing fit, he needs to figure out something to say that means something but that's small and insignificant and won't mean too much. I don't want to is easy enough, he'd said it before and it was fine, but he says it now and it feels different, it feels like it means something, like Ginko is going to hear it and see right through Yukio to everything he's trying to avoid looking at too closely.

Edited 2020-03-05 12:29 (UTC)

Ginko's fingers curl slightly against the back of Yukio's shirt, and he wants to do more, to be able to help him more effectively-- but he doesn't know how. He can't remove the plague, not without Yukio choosing to talk.

"Why-- why not? Are you willing to tell me that?" Maybe that would be worth something, in itself - but it's for that very reason he isn't hopeful that Yukio will give a clear answer. He knows too well how he must feel right now, and that, when he first experienced this plague himself, saying why he was so reluctant would have been just as hard as anything else.

Is he willing? No, no he's not, he realizes suddenly as Ginko asks. His voice catches in his throat, and he can't do this, he can't risk whatever is about to come out if he says anything.

To even say no would be too much, too risky. He's tense, and he aches all over, and he can't do this but (as always) he has to. He has to give Ginko some kind of signal, but he... he should be able to give an actual answer, it's just his pride and stubbornness getting in the way again and again.

Yukio shakes his head, after a while.

He almost expected that. It certainly isn't a surprise; it just adds to the dread coiling in Ginko's stomach. He can't pressure Yukio too much, can't risk scaring him off and possible leaving him worse off than he already was, but he can't just give up and let him die so easily, either.

"Yukio, if there's anything at all you're willing to tell me-- I'll listen. And if you want me to say something, first, so it isn't so uneven, I can do that too. Would that work better for you?" Offering up information about himself so easily feels strange, even given the circumstances - but he's got to try anything that might get Yukio to talk.

It's an offer, and he knows how huge it is, he knows that Ginko's offering something huge and important but he... he can't... his voice is stuck somewhere back behind the flowers he knows are growing in him, he can't say anything because if he does...

His hands are numb, from the flowers or because he's not getting enough air and he really can't breathe right now, but they raise up to his face anyway, like fingers curled against his skin will do something to fix any of this. They don't, there's nothing he can do, Ginko's trying to manage this but Yukio can't say anything because if he does...

He has to leave. He has to leave but he's dizzy, he can't breathe, he's curled in on himself and he's shaking and this isn't right, he shouldn't be reacting like this even as sick as he is and he knows it, and he still can't snap himself out of it and Ginko is staring, Ginko's waiting for Yukio to say something but he can't, he can't even breathe, his heart is racing and his skin feels like it's going to split open from things growing under it and Ginko is still right there, and Yukio should answer him but he can't, he can't--

Yukio is curled up and shaking, and suddenly Ginko is worried that he's pushed too far already. His stomach twists with guilt, and he can barely think of what to do next, how to fix this.

His hand shifts uncertainly again, this time in a somewhat awkward attempt at rubbing Yukio's back. Maybe this would be easier if he had any model of how to comfort a panicking teenager to work from other than his own fumbling attempts. He's never been good at this.

"I'm sorry-- if you can't say anything you don't have to, alright? It's okay."

He has to stop. He has to figure out how to shut this down, to kill the panic rising in his chest, but he can't. He can barely manage not throwing up on Ginko's floor.

And then Ginko is apologizing. Why? Why is Ginko apologizing? It's Yukio, it's him, he's the one messing everything up, it's not okay. Yukio's the one who came in here, feverish and sick and coughing flowers all over Ginko's house and not leaving when he should have and not answering when Ginko asked a simple question.

Ginko stays put for as long as it takes for Yukio to calm down, still awkwardly rubbing his back as his tail switches anxiously back and forth over the floor. Crouching like this is starting to hurt, with roots wound through the muscles of his legs, but he doesn't want to leave Yukio alone like this.

He'll stay quiet until it seems like Yukio is starting to get ahold of himself, if only a little - and even then he only speaks quietly. "Do you want water?"

It gets worse before it gets better, hyperventilation setting off another coughing fit, and he chokes on flowers for far too long, spits out blood and clumped petals for what feels like forever. His vision goes grey around the edges, exhaustion threatening to take over but he can't pass out right now, he can't, no matter how much his body is trying to.

Eventually (how long has it been? hours? a few minutes?) Ginko says something and it takes a second to process but then Yukio nods.

"Alright. Lie down if you have to." He gives Yukio one last pat on the back before straightening up, casting another uncertain glance over his shoulder as he leaves.

He's just glad that he and Epsilon had refilled their drinking water not long before; otherwise, he'd have to pick between making a mana-pool round trip to and from the farming islet or braving the bridge to the next one over just to get to a well. Far from ideal, especially when he's got a panicking teenager in the living room.

Instead, it doesn't take him more than a minute to return with a jug of water in one hand - and a spare blanket in the other. Just, in case.

He stays where he is, more because the thought of doing anything at all is overwhelming than for any other reason. It's all he can do right now to not throw up and not pass out and just keep breathing.

"Sorry." He manages, forces out a quiet apology when Ginko comes back. It's not enough, and he knows it, but for now, for right this second, it will have to be.

b- jan 7th

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