vignette One Year Later - November/December 2024 Vignette

[Tiffany Korta]

Freedom League Building, Freedom City
On-screen appears a mature, well-dressed woman, who, for some, looks almost like the spitting image of the actress who played Lady Liberty in the 1970s. Behind her is the archive of books and other materials stored deep in the heart of the League's headquarters.

 

“Hello there! Part of our remit here is to preserve the memories of deeds of all superheroes, not just those of the League. To that end we’d like to collect records of your actions, but not those of regular superheroes (we have enough of those in everyday life).

 

In what we’re calling the One Year Later initiative, we want you to provide a record of holidays, both public and private. The format you use is up to you, but we can provide a near-undetectable camera drone that will capture footage that perfectly hides your and your loved one’s identity.

 

This initiative runs from January 2024 to 2025, and you’ll have final approval of what can be released to the public and what is kept for future generations…”

 

 

With this time of year being one full of various celebrations rather than pick one we’re allowing you to choose all of them!

 

• You can choose a single holiday, a small sample or as many holidays as you wish. These can be public holidays, Thanksgiving, Christmas etc, or private ones, Birthdays, Marriages etc, or a mix of both.
• The format can be in the form of diary entries, videos or written blogs, or in the site's regular story format.
• Bad things can happen, but remember to keep things within the site's NC-13 rules.

 

Your submission should be submitted to Freedom League Headquarters no later than January 7^th 2025!

 

(As a reminder, vignettes follow the same general rules as posts in terms of content, player character limits, and so on. You may have only one vignette per player character. Each vignette should be at least one page (~500 words) in length; if posted in your thread counts at the end of the month, it is worth 1pp for the associated character. An especially long vignette, 1000 words or more, may be worth up to 2pp. Multiple players can collaborate on a single vignette - we recommend Google Docs for this, it's very useful - but the vignette should be about one page per participating player.)

[Supercape]

Lament in

 

From dusk to dawn: The Journals of Luther LeGrasse

 

October 31^st, All Hallows Eve

 

Midnight:

 

The sun has finally set, and the stars are out. Clear skies, clear stars. I wish my head was clearer; too much Liquor at the club. Playing Jazz with friends, all dressed up as witches, ghouls and zombies. It was fun, much joy was had.

 

How sour it is that I had to keep the mindless horror fed. Oh we had fun, but the creature was hungry, and I must always keep it fed. The joy was muted, like hearing music from the next room, or with pillows against your head.

 

Still, it was better that than feed of the children who marched and danced through the streets demanding candy.

 

How I envy those simple days.

 

But enough. I no longer know if these moments of melancholia are mine or the entities. But for now the beast is fed, and I can be myself.

 

If I could find some deserving soul, some thug, some crook, one of those reprehensible members of society that stick to it like a parasitic wart, then I will feed him to the Void.

 

Sometimes, I wonder if there is a creature that feeds on misery. How would that suit me? Solace in the cosmic balance of things, or resentment that I was fed the crap side of the scales?

 

01:00

The last of the trick or treaters. Too old to be trick or treating. Punks dressed up for the night, drinking, pretending to be kids. I gave them some candy, they wanted drink. I told them to get lost. Spooked ‘em, just a little. Enough to give them a bad nights sleep, maybe some night terrors. Well, they stayed up late and were drunk. I ain’t got time for punks.

 

0200

I took to wandering the streets. The night had that kind of heat that clung to your skin and stained your clothes. I stay up late most nights, playing music, drinking, or wandering. You don’t see me before midday, most days. But tonight its one of those nights where no amount of liquor, no amount of soft music or counting sheep is going to get me to sleep. It’s the kind of day when doubt creeps into your bones. Who am I? Do I deserve love, happiness, anything? It’s the kind of night where all the masks we put on get ripped off. When all the paint we put on ourselves to kid ourselves we are good people get stripped off. Maybe the moon and stars make us see what we are really like. Damn, I have read enough astrology to know I don’t believe a word of it.

 

I got to thinking, maybe this melancholia is just the beast inside, feeding on my soul – whatever that is. Sometimes, I don’t even notice its hungry, it just kind of creeps on you, like a ninja. Maybe that gnawing empty stomach is there so often, I just get used to it. Maybe I don’t want to notice it, try to block it out with the stage or the notes of a trumpet. But I always get to notice it – trouble is, sometimes I notice it too late.

 

So I got to wandering the dirty, or dirtier, parts of the street. Plenty of fools still out, but I’m not looking for fools. I’m looking for the rats who feed on fools.

 

0300

My mood had been darkening all night, every step. Was it the Void, or myself. I’m a fool, I tell myself. A fool, a charlatan. The village idiot who charades as a court jester. I need applause to love myself, but even when I get it, some twisted part of me thinks it is sympathy or pity. Worse part of it is, I don’t know how much of this is the void, how much of it is me. What I do know is that I feel empty, hollowed out. A void.

 

So I got tramping through the bad parts of town, where skin is broken by drugs and knives. Needles crunch beneath my shoes. Yeah, this is a bad part of town. The worst, I would say. A couple of dealers try to sell me their wares. A couple of ladies try to sell me theirs. I ignore then all. Never been one to go down either road, not even when my mood is darkest. Its cold, filthy comfort, and I seen to many friends wrecked by vice.

 

0400

Its an hour till dawn. Maybe I can see a hazy glow on the horiszon, maybe I can’t. Hard to say – still plenty of Halloween lights on. Light, just another one of the banquet of pollution raining on the city. And here’s another. A couple of punks, lounging by a closed down bar, smoking cigarettes. I can tell straight away they aren’t up to no good. These aren’t just kids, you know the ones – huddled in groups, trying to look hard in front of their friends, harassing, intimidating. These are those kids grown up, hardened by real violence. One of them got a nasty scar on his cheek. These punks know violence. Know drugs, too, by the look of em.

 

Halloween. It’s a way getting your joy to dance with your fear. Leastways, that’s what its meant to be. I dunno, maybe we are so desperate to give children a happy life, we don’t teach ‘em how to master the real fears and pains of life. I just dunno. Maybe I’m just a bitter cynical fool.

 

Anyways, Halloween meant to bring joy to folks, at least for the most part. Takes some real dirty heart to mug someone on Halloween night. Its not meant to be a night for real fear.

These two, they straighten up as they see me. Maybe they think I’m an easy mark, or maybe a rich one. Probably both. They pretend to be brave, but that’s just an act. I should know, I act all the time. And they got that smell of desperation. Hollow cheeks, thin limbs. Been to long at injecting happy into their veins. Ain’t any happy left now, they just trying to stop it hurting so bad.

 

One pulled a knife, the other a pistol. Small, but it will do the job. At least, it would do the job on some regular guy. Not on me. Guy might as well as pulled out a feather duster. I been shot by larger calibre, gave me a big black bruise and set me on my backside. But not this time – this time I let the Void out, my skin black and tough like a sheet of plate mail. Reach out, suck out his joy, leave him quivering on the floor, the Void sated. The other drops his knife, but its too late – I do the same to him.

 

Goddamn – they ain’t going to forget that any day soon. And next Halloween they will be staying indoors.

 

It ain’t been the best of Halloweens. Like always, it’s a bad taste in my mouth. But the Void is sated, and there is always next year.