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THE STORY SO FAR
THE STORY SO FAR
We all have a part to play.
LET'S START AT THE BEGINNING
The story of Santa Rosita is a long and tangled one that's still being written. This page is the best place to keep track of it, whether you're a new player looking to get caught up or a current one trying to keep everything straight. Everything listed here is for OOC reference, but occasionally certain plot points like audio or text logs will be a matter of public record as they will be archived on every character's wrist radio, including those belonging to new arrivals who weren't present when they originally aired. These entries will be marked with a ☝.
This page will be constantly updated as new events and findings are made available.
OCTOBER 2020 (TDM 01)
▸ On the morning of October 1st, a collection of people from different worlds and time periods (the Neighbors) wake up in Santa Rosita.▸ Throughout the month, the Neighbors are welcomed to Santa Rosita by the townspeople, who throw them a block party and provide them with gifts of questionable food.
▸ On October 31st, Halloween kicks off in Shadyside. Many of the treats handed out by the townspeople to the Neighbors are unsafe to eat; some of them are poisonous, others have needles and razor blades hidden inside them, and others still are completely safe. There is no way to tell what you've gotten until you start eating.
▸ Later that night, a strange broadcast cuts in on television sets across town that warns the Neighbors not to go outside and to keep the jack-o-lanterns some of them have outside of their homes burning.
▸ Soon after, a group of ghostly children appear in town. They begin going from door to door, trying to force their way inside and attack the Neighbors with intent to kill. They ignore houses with lit jack-o-lanterns outside, which proves to be the only method of warding them off.
▸ Once the sun goes up, the ghosts disappear.
RELEVANT LINKS: TDM
DECEMBER 2020
▸ On December 5th, Santa Rosita begins the holidays with its annual tree lighting ceremony in the center of North Santa Rosita.▸ In attendance are Mayor Phillip Clarke, Police Chief Dale Harding, and a representative of the Happy Homes Association. Clarke gives a small speech on the importance of sacrifice and community, and welcomes the Neighbors to Santa Rosita.
▸ The next day, a mysterious Christmas village appears on the edge of town in Rose Garden Park. It can be visited by going down to the park, but some Neighbors find themselves unwittingly transported there by a portal that appears in any door in town, bouncing around at random.
▸ On the evening of December 15th, Mayor Clarke hosts a holiday gala at town hall and invites the entire town, including the Neighbors. There, he gives a speech dressed as Santa Claus about how thankful he is to serve the town, capping it off by taking credit for the success of the Christmas village. Later that night, a blizzard sweeps over the town.
▸ Over the course of the next few weeks, the Christmas village undergoes a frightening transformation. The portal now randomly teleports visitors into the frozen lake outside of the village (putting them at risk of whatever lives beneath its surface), everything is abandoned and one of the buildings — Santa's Workshop — draws anyone who looks at it in and Tranquilizes them. Moreover, the reindeer in the petting zoo have transformed into bloodthirsty monsters.
▸ Snowmen also begin to pop up all over Santa Rosita. They hide a gruesome secret: inside each one is the frozen corpse of one of the Robbies formerly employed at the Christmas village.
▸ These events continue until the 25th, Christmas Day, whereupon the snowmen and the village disappear.
▸ Neighbors who took the time to write letters to Santa to put in the mailbox in the Christmas village wake up to find a surprise waiting for them in their homes: a present and an apology note, with no signature to tell who it's from.
RELEVANT LINKS:
Plotting Post: Part 1 and Part 2 | Event Post: Part 1 and Part 2
JANUARY 2021 (TDM 02)
▸ On New Years Eve it appeared as if, other than discovering that it was nonalcoholic champagne being handed out at the Blue Moon Diner, the new year would proceed as normal. As citizens watched the ball drop on television, at the stroke of midnight, the year goes from 1961... to 1961.▸ Those who do some amateur detective work discover that there were new stories and headlines being printed in the newspaper. The newspaper from January 1961 last year is different from January 1961 of this year. Those who died in October’s tragic bus accident remain dead. ☝
▸ Police Chief Dale Harding makes his first appearance. Throughout January, the Neighbors discover him passed out in his car or eating at the Blue Moon. Although he entertains polite conversation, he doesn't have much patience for shenanigans — he has the ability to Tranquilize with a snap of his fingers, and more than one Neighbor walks away from him feeling a lot nicer than they were before.
▸ January 1st sees another little population boom in Santa Rosita. More people from more worlds and time periods — some the same from October, others different — appear in town, similar to the start of October. Native Santa Rositans show their hospitality by welcoming their new neighbors with food and jello, clown-shaped Bundt cakes and snowball fights.
▸ At the Starlight Drive-In, a new horror movie called Curse of the Doll People debuts. Before the movie begins, the Neighbors are treated to a collection of previews for coming attractions and serial shorts. Everyone in attendance sees something different: the townspeople see ordinary ads and exciting pirate adventure serials while the Neighbors see their worst memories and fears realized on the big screen.
▸ Following a disturbing nightmare, the Neighbors awaken one morning to discover a new resident in their homes: themselves. Other than their mannequin-like anatomy and cracked faces, the doppelgangers are identical to their Neighbor counterparts, and they're friendly and childlike. However, when they're attacked or feel threatened, they turn into murderous creatures who throw themselves at their attackers, only stopping once they're reduced to a pile of doll parts.
▸ The doppelgangers all die one way or another by the end of January. Even if the Neighbors try to keep them alive, they are fragile, and eventually a bump or a fall will be one too many. By February’s start, there is not a sign of them left around — all eventually crumble into parts or become too cracked to function, their pieces are swept away with the rest of the garbage.
RELEVANT LINKS:
TDM | Mini Event | NPC Post
FEBRUARY 2021
▸ On February 5th, the HHA holds a luncheon at Uliveto's, an Italian restaurant in North Santa Rosita, to raise money for the town's annual Founders Day festivities. In attendance is their leader, Rosemary Craven. Rosemary invites the Neighbors to partake in the refreshments and endless breadsticks as she mingles among them, introducing herself and seeking to learn more about them.▸ Five days later on February 10th, ten Neighbors go missing. Vanishing without a trace from their homes overnight, they leave no clues to their whereabouts—
▸ ... Save for a mysterious message that airs on the network on February 13th. Later that night, a strange broadcast airs on every Neighbor's television, depicting an unknown location with a mural — "Living Island" — visible in the background.
▸ Following the broadcast, paranormal activity besieges the Neighbors' homes for the next several days: items and furniture throw themselves around, harsh vibrations shake the houses to their foundation, and "Living Island" begins to appear in fogged up glass surfaces.
▸ Some Neighbors decide to take matters into their own hands and investigate the meaning of "Living Island", hoping to find a connection to the missing people. Their search leads them to cross paths with Dale Harding and Rosemary Craven, both of whom recognize the name as a nickname the children of Santa Rosita once gave to an abandoned bomb shelter beneath Santa Rosita Elementary. The shelter has since been abandoned.
▸ The brave Neighbors that decide to make the trek to Santa Rosita Elementary for answers discover the shelter in the basement of the school, accessible via a steel hatch. There, they make a grisly discovery:
▸ Deep inside the decaying shelter, a room has been converted into an operating theater and laboratory, with further evidence that someone has been living here. The missing Neighbors are found imprisoned in cages in a storage room connected to the lab. Each of them has undergone gruesome surgical alternations that leave many of them severely injured at best or mutilated at worst.
▸ Escaping the shelter proves to be its own special sort of hell: not only is the layout of the area confusing and difficult to navigate in the dark, but the Doppelgangers from January are revealed to be lurking within, mercilessly attacking any Neighbors they come across be it by trickery or sheer tenacity. The Neighbors that don't make it back up the ladder to the basement manage to escape through a tunnel that leads to a storm drain somewhere within Old Growth.
RELEVANT LINKS:
Plotting Post: Part 1 and Part 2 | Event Post: Part 1 and Part 2 | Network Post: February 13th