Around the Unexplored Wooded Area, Saturday Afternoon

[fh_spareparts]

People were disappearing.

The woods had turned into a strange hybrid of bright green leaves and dark brambles made of shadows.

Clearly there was a connection there.

And while passing through the barrier itself seemed impossible, maybe there was a clue laying somewhere along the forest's edge...

[[ wait for the ocd up! team detective, this is your post. ]]

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Edge of the Woods by Abandoned Mansion

[fh_spareparts]

The shadows stretched from one tree trunk to another here, unusually dense compared to the rest of the barrier. Just another part of the woods' perimeter?

Probably.

There was a large bowling trophy sticking out of the ground, though. And the soil around it looked recently disturbed. (The trophy, should anyone unearth it, simply read WORLD'S GREATEST HELPER.)

Re: Edge of the Woods by Abandoned Mansion

[intotheout]

Tip was walking the perimeter, poking it with a stick. She didn't really think she'd find a way in this way, but it was worth a shot, right? She'd managed to help with stupider tricks than poking with a stick. So yeah, she noted the denser spot. She moved in closer, trying to examine it as close as possible without actually touching it herself -- only to trip over something in the ground and bounce bodily off the shadows onto her butt.

She glared down at what she figured would be a root, then frowned when she noticed it glinting. She dug it up and hefted in both hands.

"Okay, fine," she said, looking up at the sky. "It's not the best plan. You don't have to be condescending about it."

Edge of the Woods by the Onsen

[fh_spareparts]

The barrier grew a little thinner here, though only in the sense that the shadows seemed somewhat less black.

Strange music drifted through this area, like a lullaby, stripped down to its component parts.

Re: Edge of the Woods by the Onsen

[always_someone]

Norman had listened to the radio, and between that and the soft murmur of ghosts who were not at all pleased with what was going on, he'd come out to take a look around the woods, to see if there was anything that a seer could find with the help of the dead that maybe somebody else had missed along the way.

He didn't find anything tangible that he could bring back, but the music...

The music had him exchanging a silent glance with a couple of spirits before they shook their heads and flitted away entirely.

Swallowing a lump in his throat and steeling himself, he pulled out his phone and hit record until the music looped around on itself again. And then, thoroughly unsettled, he turned and he ran to see if somebody else could make more sense of it than he had.

Edge of the Woods by Selkie Lake

[fh_spareparts]

Someone has speared a note into an extended branch of a tree here. The branch vanishes into shadows just a few inches past it.

The note reads,

With clothes of green,
And bark of a dog,
Search me for the goods,
I sleep like a log.

Re: Edge of the Woods by Selkie Lake

[tigerundercover]

Raven basically lived on the preserve, so yeah, she’d noticed the giant impenetrable block of shadows in the only other woods in town. And no, she wasn’t going to listen to the radio telling her not to investigate. Did anyone ever do that? Ever?

She discovered quickly that the barrier was not going to be pierced from the side, and flying up to dive bomb it from above in bird form had just left her with a mild headache. She landed by the lake where Hardison and his partners had been planning to camp, only to find an abandoned camp site, which was almost eerier than the shadows themselves. It wasn’t until she started toward the trees again shouting Hardison’s name that she saw the note.

“Right. So that’s not good.”

Re: Edge of the Woods by Selkie Lake

[spin_kick_snap]

Which is about when Raven's phone beeped with an incoming text.

Hey. Dante's vanished. Gone to LC with Anders to look for him.

Edge of the Woods by the Gig

[fh_spareparts]

Someone has left a trail of saltine crumbs here. They lead all the way from the back of the Gig to the foot of the trees, the barrier forming a thick blanket of shadows just past them.

Someone has tucked the head of a fish-shaped cracker between the roots of the trees here. There is no passing by the barrier.

Re: Edge of the Woods by the Gig

[firstofitskind]

Well, thanks to Rosa's broadcast, Liam at least knew what had been causing that creeping feeling of unease yesterday.

So, naturally, he had to go investigate.

And because he was the kind of person who knew better than to go wandering somewhere creepy and potentially dangerous alone, he'd brought some backup.

"Not exactly what I'd planned when I said maybe we should go somewhere this weekend," Liam admitted to his companion as they made their way down Galactica Drive towards the woods. "But I guess I shouldn't be surprised."

Re: Edge of the Woods by the Gig

[arboreal_priestess]

"You always bring me to the nicest places," Verity said, grinning brightly. That could have been sarcasm, but her grin suggested she was sincere. Her rune necklace glinted in the sunlight. "I strapped on my best weaponry for this."

Edge of the Woods opposite Taste of Thai

[fh_spareparts]

The shadows seem a little lighter here, though you still can't see anything besides greys if you squint just right. Someone has tied a red-and-purple ribbon around a tree here.

There is no writing on it.

Re: Edge of the Woods opposite Taste of Thai

[nuclear_snide]

It was hard not to notice the great, dark something, even without radio mentioning it.

Bob floated around it in some semblance of walking, gingerly tried poking at it, and backed off fast at the feel, like it was pulling at and darkening him.

As he stepped back, he noticed the odd ribbon. He poked at it, too, but other than the fact it was there, it seemed rather non-extraordinary.

Hm.

Edge of the Woods behind Furnado

[fh_spareparts]

Did someone mean to leave all these marshmallows here? Whoever it is also left some party poppers laying around.

Litterers. The shadows wrapping around the trees leave you with a sense of judgy judgement.

Re: Edge of the Woods behind Furnado

[special_rabbit]

This particular spot was right by Amaya's house, so it seemed the perfect place for her to start helping and looking around and trying to figure out this weird shadow thing...

...with the Crumbler.

Did it seem a little overkill going at an impenetrable darkness barrier with a giant clanking machine covered in saws and hammers and ropes? Maaaaaybe. But how many other opportunities did Amaya have to honestly, sincerely whip her out and go at it? Besides, hacking down trees was the function that the Crumbler particularly excelled at!

Granted, these were no ordinary trees at the moment and it didn't take long for her to figure out that the Crumbler couldn't crumble this. And now there was a good deal of smoke from the crumbled Crumbler rising up to join the shadows.

Can't blame a girl for trying, though, right?

Edge of the Woods by the intersection of Galactica and Serendipity

[fh_spareparts]

... Oh. Well.

That off-putting, round, moving metal sculpture was definitely not here yesterday.

Its center is aimed at an arch of branches.

But the shadows behind it won't part for you.

Re: Edge of the Woods by the intersection of Galactica and Serendipity

[died8yearsago]

Surprise, surprise, despite what she said on the radio, Rosa found a butt-ton of people checking out the weird darkness around the woods, although, she had to admit, it wasn't as many as she thought. The sheriff and his girlfriend, that she understood, but seriously, who let those kids literally go poking around it? She shook her head and was trying to get a good check around the whole place, checking in with the troopers here and there, but she lingered a little here, narrowing her eyes at that sculpture.

New, yes, but also...weirdly hypnotic. She had to shake herself out of staring at it a few times before deciding to keep moving slowly along.

A Small Clearing Near the Woods

[fh_spareparts]

Done looking around? Tamsin's had the troopers deliver some food here for anyone trying to get anywhere near those woods.

Mostly because she doesn't want to be doing it.

Re: A Small Clearing Near the Woods

[always_someone]

Norman was thoroughly unsettled by the time he made it back out to the clearing. He hadn't found anything of any obvious use, but the music seemed like the sort of something that could have meant...

... anything, really.

One of the troopers shoved a juice box at him, and he sat himself down on a log and sipped it contemplatively, pulling out the phone and playing the music back to see if, one of these times, it would start to make sense.

Re: A Small Clearing Near the Woods

[intotheout]

Tip plopped down on the log next to him with a sigh. "At least no one's turned up comatose this time."

Re: A Small Clearing Near the Woods

[nuclear_snide]

"Well, I'm pleased to see you're safe."

That was Bob for hello.

Re: A Small Clearing Near the Woods

[died8yearsago]

Rosa might have made a snide remark about trusting any food brought by the troopers, but she was too bothered by how seemingly pointless the search had gone so far. Her brow was furrowed in a state of perpetual thought, trying to make sense out of anything she'd come across, but to no avail.

Picking out clues to lead to a drug lord's hideout or a garage where they scrapped hot cars, sure, that was pretty easy. Tracking down a stolen bike or a murderer, yeah, she was pretty decent at that. But she wasn't trained to deal with weird probably magical big black shadows that not even light could penetrate.

"Did anyone find anything even remotely helpful?" she asked the gathering group as a general whole.

Where was a hot bartender from another dimension to explain how to defeat the thing this time, huh?

Re: A Small Clearing Near the Woods

[nuclear_snide]

"The darkness seems to be harmful and impossible to penetrate," Bob said. "Did you need that spelled out?"

Re: A Small Clearing Near the Woods

[always_someone]

"There's a place," Norman said, steeling himself to walk up to Rosa to kind of check in, "near the onsen, where there's just... music playing. I don't know what's causing the music any more than I know what' s causing the barrier, but I couldn't find where it was coming from, so they're probably related."

He paused and added, "It's creepy. I got a recording of it."

Re: A Small Clearing Near the Woods

[intotheout]

"I got a sarcastic trophy," Tip offered. "And it seems like the shadows are a little thicker in some places than others."

OOC

[fh_spareparts]

Team Detective, have at!

The shadows respond to light in a limited fashion, pulling back just a little when you shine something like a flashlight on them. But never enough to let you in.

And... that's it. Search the perimeter of the woods alone, search it together; find some things, and not others, or find them all. Does any of this mean anything? Who knows.