2024

The worst winter the island has ever known, the death toll is high enough that discussions begin about opening the island once again to outsiders.

Frank Grimland

Commits suicide amidst a scandal of infidelity though there is some to do about him having been murdered, this is proven false by the Crow after investigation.

Charles Dumas

Is found murdered, his heart and his genitals are missing.  

Lawrence Potts

Is found murdered just a few days later, his heart and his tongue are missing

Henry De la Poer

Takes the position of Voice from his father after a vote is held by the town.  Alfred De la Poer’s many transgressions, though rarely talked about, are finally more than the townsfolk can bare.

2027

The Great Plague spread across the world though in the beginning it was spoken of as nothing more than rumor, a hoax.  Games played for social media clout.  Something to be laughed at.  Even when governments issued orders to remain indoors most ignored them, treating the warnings as overreach and a breach of rights.  By the time the infection had taken root in homes…in families…..in all of those places that people believed they were safe it was too late.  

Those who saw it first hand and survived struggled to explain what they saw, their minds resisted such sights,  Surely their loved one had not truly been dead….the dead do not rise to devour the living.  There was no cure. There was no salvation to be had.  The dead did not care about wealth or social status.  

By the end of the year, Cresline Cay stands alone, untouched by the plague while the world Beyond the Tide has collapsed into ruin. The islanders knew that this was not luck nor was it happenstance.  The knew that their gods protected them.  They knew that a girl once believed drowned and dead had reappeared as if a dream though none could say they ever actually lay eye on her.  They only knew…Madeline Visage was not dead.  Their salvation came when Spencer Visage and his sister Madeline, stopped all transport on and off the island.  The remaining bridge that had been connecting the island to the larger island of Bleakwater Cove was destroyed, the only access to the island was via boat, and any that try reaching the island are sunk long before they reach Cresline Cays shore.  It is said that Madeline Visage warned her brother of this apocalypse years before it began, and the Visage family had already begun to stockpile goods for the people of the island, using Lucky Fontaine’s already well-established contacts and the shipyard to keep the stockpiling a well-kept secret. Hard to do on such a small island.

Not long after the Sowing, another fracture appeared, this one from within. Henry De la Poer stood before the island and declared that the Rite of First Blood would no longer be recognized among their ceremonies, a decision that unsettled many and angered more, particularly among the Founding Families who viewed such traditions as inseparable from the island’s identity. Henry did not present the change as rebellion against the gods will but rather as correction of mans hubris, stating plainly that he could find no mention of the rite within the original writings of Samuel Visage, and that its continued practice served no purpose beyond harm. He spoke of it as predatory, as something that took from young girls at the moment they were only beginning to understand themselves and their place within the community, and he did not soften the consequence he attached to its enforcement, declaring that any man who forced the rite would be punished by castration, regardless of name, standing, or blood.

The island did not agree on why he had chosen this moment to act. Some believed it was the birth of his daughter that had reshaped his thinking, while others insisted that Jade Dumas had influenced him more than he admitted, her voice carrying further than most realized. There were those who spoke Madeline Visage’s name instead, though never loudly, suggesting that the change had not been Henry’s decision alone. Whatever the truth, it was tested only months later when Edgar Beaufort was exposed for claiming First Blood upon Isabelle Morgan. The response was immediate and unyielding, carried out publicly so that no one could mistake the seriousness of the decree, and though the act itself was meant as punishment, what followed unsettled the island in quieter deep seated ways

Edgar did not survive the consequences. The Crow, who had long served as the island’s physician in matters both ordinary and otherwise, could not offer a clear explanation for the complications that led to his death, and the absence of certainty only deepened the unease surrounding the event. With Edgar gone, Jerome Beaufort assumed control of his family, stepping into the role without protest, though the shift did little to quiet the sense that something fundamental had changed. Jeromes Mother insisted that her husbands death was not accident but on purpose…she speaks of seeing a figure hovering over her husband that night….of eyes black as night and teeth that were shark like..of dark hair and claws sharp as razors and worst of it is the blood she described dripping down the undeniably female’s chin as if she had been eating from the wound.

By the time the Darkest Night arrived, the island had already begun to feel different, though few would have been able to say exactly how. During the celebration, Henry De la Poer was seen in prolonged conversation with Spencer Visage, the two of them speaking apart from the others for hours while the rituals carried on around them. When at last they returned, the announcement was made as if it were nothing at all, yet it carried weight enough to still the gathering, as Henry declared that he had relinquished the position of Voice, restoring it to Spencer Visage in what he described as a return to the proper order of things. There were those who found comfort in this, believing balance had been reestablished, and others who felt something colder settle in its place, because while Cresline Cay had been spared the fate of the world, the island had never mistaken survival for safety, and the hand that guided it had always come from the same blood that first led them there. Too many had forgotten that that hand had never been De la Poer but rather Visage.

2028

The island opens for only a very few to join in the insular community. A radio signal goes out, repeating a set of coordinates and nothing more, and in a world that has grown quiet with the collapse of everything that once carried voices across distance, the persistence of that signal draws attention quickly. Those coordinates lead to Bleakwater Cove, to a place that had once served as a point of trade and passage, though little of that former purpose remains by the time anyone arrives.

The journey itself becomes a form of selection long before the Cove is ever reached, as those who attempt it must move through a landscape that no longer supports the living in any reliable way, where the dead gather in response to the smallest disturbances and where even the most basic needs have become uncertain. By the time survivors reach Bleakwater Cove they are already fewer than when they began, worn down, hardened, and carrying with them whatever has followed close enough to matter.

What stands at the coordinates is a field hospital, or what appears to have once been one, now reinforced and enclosed within tall fencing that carries a steady electric current. That detail is the first thing that unsettles most who see it, as power has long since failed everywhere else, yet here it hums constantly without any visible source. Armed guards maintain the perimeter with a level of discipline that suggests long preparation rather than recent improvisation, and their attention is divided between those approaching and what inevitably gathers behind them.

The infected are drawn in numbers, and the moment they close the distance the gunfire begins, sharp and controlled, cutting down the dead with practiced efficiency while the gates open only in brief intervals. Those who are able to reach the entrance in time are pulled through and the gates are closed again without hesitation, leaving the rest outside. There is no attempt made to recover those who fail to enter, and no explanation offered to those who witness it.

Inside the fence, whatever expectation of safety remains is quickly replaced by something more measured and deliberate, as the survivors are separated and held under strict observation for two weeks. During that time they are examined thoroughly, their blood taken and tested, their bodies inspected for signs of illness or weakness, while their behavior is recorded with equal care. The questioning is constant but rarely direct, framed in ways that seem casual until it becomes clear that every response is being noted, along with every pause, every contradiction, and every attempt to conceal.

Their skills are documented in full, not simply what they claim to know but what they demonstrate under instruction, and their ability to follow direction is weighed alongside their usefulness. Strength is valued, but so is compliance. Intelligence is observed, but so is the willingness to accept structure without resistance. Over time it becomes evident that the evaluation is not limited to survival, but to suitability for something that is never truly explained.

Not all who endure the process are permitted to continue, as some are escorted back beyond the fence at the end of the fourteen days and released without explanation though they are given the kindness of more provisions than they arrived with, including ammunition for weapons that were given over.  A chance that they did not have before arrival, while others are removed before the evaluation concludes and are not seen again. Their absence is never addressed, and those who remain quickly learn that asking questions serves no purpose.

Those who are chosen are gathered without ceremony and transported under guard from Bleakwater Cove to the waiting ferry, where the final stage of their passage begins without any formal acknowledgment of what they are leaving behind. By the time the vessel departs the shore, there is little uncertainty left as to their destination, only a growing understanding that whatever brought them this far was never chance at all.  They have been purposefully selected.

When they arrive at Cresline Cay, they are received without celebration and integrated into the Community according to its needs, their place determined not by their past but by what has already been decided for them. The signal continues to broadcast from the light house.  Its origin, a mystery to all save one. The message never changes, drawing others toward the same path with the same promise of something that is never named.