You rambled no more than I

OT: CoC/DG and the Beagle-verse Unicorn by Gandalf the Beige on 2011-07-28 00:52:00 UTC Reply

I've never played either the Call of Cthulhu RPG nor the Delta Green addendum (actually, tabletop RPG's are a foreign country for me entirely) but, having been introduced to the concept by the Ow My Sanity webcomic... I was thinking about how to take the typical "Last Unicorn" type aformenioned immortal creature and have it included as a part of the sanity-sucking Mythos universe while not changing much of it's existing nature.

Not that I want to introduce incorruptible pure-pureness into the Mythos, but that I wonder how experiencing such a creature could shave off some SAN points.

I was thinking... typical Unicorn (or similarly shaped energy-based eldritch wossname) with Blue-and-Orange Morality, mildly emphatic and telepathic... but it just doesn't like when people near it are afraid or sad or angry. These feelings manifest as something like... well, analagous to the feeling of a sunflower seed shell stuck between the teeth. So, it takes in runaways and orphans and includes them in it's wild forest.

They become feral children living in a spring-time paradise, with the older ones pairing off and having feral babies, free of strife or tears or sorrow while providing an entertaining spectatre sport to their keeper was they do and experience all the other things a unicorn can't do (liek savage.

But then, some of the fosterlings become ambitious and begin kidnapping runaways or battered children to include in their woods. Now, investigators investigate and have to decide whether to treat this in a scorched earth, quarantine-type way... or whether they can negotiate with this thing into remaining benign and releasing it's current fosterlings.

What if the negotiator ends up under the effects of the creatures glamour in more ways than one... wondering if there are more non-human allies out there, becomes slightly sympathetic to some of the less blood-curdling horrors and the less murderous cults they encounter... and then there's the Eye Thing.

When you look into his eyes, you no longer see yourself, but the only image of a lilac wood in the spring.

It's rough and half-coherent, but I hope to get some ideas (even if they are only flames).

Not sure what you're asking by gaijinguy on 2011-07-28 02:34:00 UTC Reply

Yeah. I take it from the last bit you're looking for suggestions, so I'll just work with that.

-The idea of the corrupting influence of the unicorn's power is good. I was going to say "no, this can never work" but saying that it's beauty and so on and suchlike a really a form of insidious mind control is very appropriate to the universe. It's less overt than almost everything else, but cosmic horror is under no obligation to be subtle.

-Sanity would take a hit from encountering it for two reasons. First, the contrast with reality: the incorruptible pure pureness that the unicorn embodies is as alien to normal human existence as any (other) eldritch abomination. Second, this thing wrecks your will. Given the nature of the CoC universe, once it sinks it's claws into you, that's a chunk of your self-determination you ain't getting back. Breaking away from it would probably induce profound feelings of loss and despair- if you've ever seen Angel, think what happened when people got severed from Jasmine, only make it permanent.

-The community you've outlined would have a growth rate that's far too high to be practical. Living in an edenic paradise with no birth control and minimal inhibitions would have the birth rate sky-high even without abductions. Also, frankly, there aren't enough downsides; considering what an absolute sea of frack living in the CoC universe is, people giving up their wills to this *thing* in exchange for corporeal paradise seems pretty reasonable. I'd expand the centrality of the unicorn in the whole thing. If exposure to it damages your mind, then if any of it's wild children become mentally separated from it, they should die.

-You could also make it a honey pot. According to folklore, unicorns only have an affinity for virgins. This could make the unicorn into something fairly nightmarish: it draws in children who are abused, hurt, and so on, raises them in eternal spring, slowly devouring their minds with it's own. Then, when they lose their virginity (which they have no reason not to do) it withdraws, leaving them lobotomized or dead.

Sorry, that rambled a bit. Just a few thoughts.

You rambled no more than I by Gandalf the Beige on 2011-07-28 03:46:00 UTC Reply

And with fewer spelling mistakes.

I kind of agree... though I should have said that this is actually background story for a character in a Mythos fic I'm doing (based on two characters I had mapped out for that Star Destroyer thing). It's mythos(ish), there are weird cults and horrible monsters, there are investigators... but there's also backstabbing, paranoia and a suspicion that there may be more layers of grey than we feel comfortable with. Some "Lovecraft Lite", some "Did you Have Tea with Cthulhu", some "Knight Templar"... and probably some Nyarlahotep in there as well, the jerk.

Yes, A troper I am.

I like the idea of the Unicorn abandoning these kids once they try to breed or, more likely, become hormornal and violent and generally a practical and empathic pain for the Unicorn. Abandoning these hormone factories to their deaths ('oh, they were so cute and innocent when you got them, but look at them NOW!') would appear to the aformentioned affected investigator to be more like abandoning a dog by the side of the road. Death through neglect...

So breeding would be out and I could understand how kidnappings could come about. The mind absorbtion could even be a twisted way of the Unicorn training it's 'pets' so to avoid the pain of them fighting with each other.

But not too much control, for the joy in watching spontaneous cuteness could be dimmed... I think.

In fact, seeing it as nothing but a gracile horse could be a sort of defense mechanism either on the part of mankind or the Unicorn itself.

The tip off could even come through the capture of a local (for Essex County Mass) practitioner of the black arts, accused of killing children for body parts to use in their magic. He or She denies the charge of murder, but reveals that they merely scavenge the leftovers from when this thing tires of it's pets. The twist is that this thing hates the more traditional cults and their masters... a turf war or merely a way a dog owner hates coyotes.

Then the question is... is this thing worth driving off or destroying, can you destroy it, can you negotiate with it?

Or do you merely have to find a way to live with it?

As for the negotiatior (who acted as a friendly), the doubt is actually a combination of the effects of the glamour and the fear of getting the (9mm) Parabellum Pension Plan because the cowboy portion of the federal investigators thought he was corrupted. The eyes were just the effects of the background magic.

50 years later, he's an Anthropology Prof who spends half his time teaching and the other half preparing back-up plans for if they come to finally kill him.

Now THAT'S rambling!