Horace’s Sunday afternoon odd encounter(Avalon)

February 9, 2026

EncounterLog

Date: 2026-02-08 12:46

(Horace’s Sunday afternoon odd encounter(Avalon):Avalon)

[Sun Feb 8 2026]

On Atlantic Avenue/span

It is afternoon, about 4F(-15C) degrees, and there are clear skies. The mist is heaviest At Plymouth and Darkwater/span

Horace has just exited his house and is adjusting some bags in the back of his car.

(Your target discovers a cursed object at an estate sale or thrift shop that begins to warp reality around them in increasingly dangerous ways. They must figure out the object’s history and how to break its hold before the distortions become permanent or fatal.)

And while Horace secures whatever cargo he’s getting ready to transport in the back of his car, it seems that someone else in the vicinity is having a bit of conjugal trouble. An argument can be heard from a nearby household, and it slowly increases in volume, until, a couple of minutes in, it results in some objects flying out an open window.

Most of it is really clothes, it seems they were thrown out in a ball that, mid air, just like clothes normally do, started unraveling and resulted in different garments falling down all over the street. And right after, what seems like a briefcase is thrown out. This one like catching more of Horace’s attention since it just happen to fly straight against his car and land against the backside, hitting it with a “Thump” sound and leaving a mark behind.

When the yelling starts, Horace reflexively reaches inside his jacket and flicks off the snap on his holster, but when it appears to be a domestic dispute he relaxes some. His hand moves away and goes back to his job until that briefcase hits. His eye twitches in annoyance before he moves to pick it up and mutters, “mine now.” Moving to the passenger side he opens the door and puts the case on the seat and attempts to open it, slowly. Can never be certain it isn’t booby trapped.

The briefcase not only seems to open quite easily, the lock doesn’t seem to be in place, and there doesn’t seem to be any kind of booby trap either, after all, if it was just laying around at home when someone threw it out, it probably was ready to be accessed at any time. Inside of it, there are a good couple of things. Most look like just usual clothes, man clothes, it seems someone that was used to travelling around because on the net-like pockets to the sides there are also a couple maps that detail some mountain-like environments, though there isn’t a label that identifies what piece of land it is, it almost looks home made.

Along with the maps, on the side, there is a gun and a knife, a couple of clips that seem to be labeled with things like “Iron”, “Wood”, “Obsidian”, a compass that seems to be going crazy right now, pointing in every direction but the real north, a couple of spare coins, seemingly made of pure gold and definitely not belonging to this world, and along with them a silver pendant.

Horace is a trained killer. He knows what the clips are for that much is certain and they get yoinked for future use. “Fairies, leeches, and doves,” he murmurs and then further looks over the other things trying to learn anything he can about them.

While for someone who both is trained and hunts, the rounds with banes are easy to identify, so is the knife that seems to be tainted still with some sort of toxin, likely from one time that the poison didn’t make it to a victim, the procedence of the coins or whatever is depicted on the maps is not something as easy to make out. The coins are at least otherworldly, one can tell as much just because of the composition, pure gold instead of some sort of alloy. But the maps are just… Well, depicting mountain ranges, unusual ones for sure, but it’s hard to tell where in the world they belong in.

The last thing left to inspect is the pendant. The material seems to be silver, but there’s no glyphs or symbols on it that might give away any origin, no gems or marks of any kind, it’s like someone just made the simplest piece of jewelry ever.

But as Horace takes his time inspecting the contents of the briefcase. A man, presumably the one that was involved in the argument inside the nearby house, has made it to the streets, rising his voice and telling “Hey, you over there” The man seems to be short, at around 5’6, pretty bulky though and with some belly, a clearly annoyed expression and seeming eager to start another argument. But just as he’s going to open his mouth again to reply, in the blink of an eye, literally, the complaining man disappears from sight- Not a trace of him left on the street, simply vanishing from view like he was never there.

Horace puts the clips back. For now. “Yes?” he asks back to the other man, making note of the belongings of the case and then turning to face the man, keeping his body between the two to try and hide the case

But the voice of the man doesn’t seem to return, and while Horace hides the briefcase, it seems like the missing man has not escaped his perception or hidden in an instant, but rather that he isn’t even around anymore. In fact, in a matter of minutes the entire street seems to have emptied out of people, for as long as sight reaches.

A couple seconds in complete silence then are followed up the a loud bang coming from the car, only for it to start shaking to the sides as if someone was actively trying to shake it from side to side, though there’s no one in sight that seems to be doing anything of the kind to the vehicle

Horace pulls the pistol from his holster this time and holds it loosely at his side as he looks around for the cause of the disturbance and why his car is shaking. He doesn’t say anything, there is no one around to say anything to, but his eyes narrow in suspicion

And the shaking continues for a good couple seconds, and after that… It doesn’t really stop, but the engine of the car seems to start on its own, without Horace’s input or without the keys being put in, the vehicle seems to come to life on its own. And accompanying the odd happening, the clothes that seem to be… Well not as neatly folded anymore because the briefcase was thrown off a building, but that were folded not too long ago- They start coming out of the suitcase, flying into the air within the car, not only making a mess but likely also getting all over Horace’s face and field of vision, like they have been ejected from within the container

“Mm,” Horace says in his more stoic tone, thumb resting on the hammer of the weapon, ready to cock it, before flicking it away again. It seems the ‘truck driver’s’ response to most problems is acute lead poisoning but given there is no target and really no other people around he isn’t entirely sure where to go from here

It take a solid half minute for something else to happen, and this time seems to be the doors on the car locking by themselves, before the already started engine just, does as a car is intended to do… And puts the vehicle in movement even while there’s no one really driving it. Forward across Atlantic Avenue, while the clothes flying on the inside of the vehicle just keep offering glimpses of what’s happening but never the full picture.

Even after a couple seconds it seems that the clothes have not only been ejected, but are actively floating up and down inside the car as if to just create a mess- And as if the car moving on its own wasn’t already problem, as the briefcase falls to the feet of the passenger seat, a building ahead of the road seems to start slowly changing in shape, growing sharp spikes near it’s base, almost like some sort of medieval fortification, ready to impale anyone coming nearby- But the only one approaching it seems to be Horace and his self driving car

Horace appears ready to write off the car as he watches it speed down the road, or at least start moving, but then decides that maybe he should at least try to get inside and throw out the briefcase.

Horace manages to catch on to the car on the first couple moments of it starting its movement, after all, it takes a bit to increase speed, and the man can reach enough speed to catch up to it before it becomes too fast- Latching onto the moving car is simple enough, but now he has the trouble of, well, being on top of the seemingly non-stopping vehicle that seems to be headed towards spikes made out of… A house?

And things just keep getting better and better, because while Horace grabs onto the car, it seems that the street itself, the floor beneath, just seems to start heating up to an uncomfortable degree. Lighting up in a bright-ish orange and having some of that radiating temperature reach upwards, warning everyone of its presence

Thinking fast, if not the best, Horace tries to shoot into the glass of the driver’s side window and, assuming he is successful, swings into the cab to try and stop the car

And the window goes out, after all, it’s just a window, and Horace is holding a gun… Swinging inside is easy enough, and brings some level of protection against the rising heat of the streets, though from the inside of the car, it seems pretty easy to see how close everything is getting to that spiky end of the road

Once inside Horace reaches for the emergency break and pulls up hard, attempting to at least slow the car if not stop it as it fire careening towards the spiky house. His thoughts are mostly blank, just going through precise actions to get to avert disaster. There is no panic, calm calculation.

But the car doesn’t seem to slow down even as Horace pulls from the break- In fact, within his hand the device seems to transform into a literal snake that immediately hisses at the pressure applied onto it. And a hunter like Horace can likely tell that it is a poisonous one at that.

Whatever is happening at this point, it seems evident that there’s simply no way that it is the action of some singular person messing with the man, but rather something more magical in nature involved. It almost seems like he had been cursed into a spiral of catastrophic successes one after another. Now, whatever the source of this odd and seemingly lethal magic is? Well, Horace probably needs to find out before he either meets the death-wall or the snake does something about him. Tons of things to worry about right now

“Motherfucking snakes on the motherfucking plane,” Horace grumbles before throwing the snake out of the now shot out window with disgust. If he gets bit he gets bit, the neurotoxin likely taking longer to affect him that the spiky wall of death.

looking around he tries to grab the handle of the briefcase and throw it out the window too, deducing that the locket is probably at fault. Or the coins. Something is fucky with the briefcase and not something he wants to deal with

Well, it’s lucky the snake doesn’t get to connect a bite, and it instead goes out of the window, just to meet the orange glowing floor beneath the moving car and seemingly half melting upon contact, the smell of burnt meat reaching up for a brief second before the car creates some distance. It is at least a glimpse for Horace on what could have happened had he been the one to go down instead of the snake.

But then the briefcase goes out the window, and meets the same fate, though taking a good couple seconds to go through the melting and the burning to the point the car gets close enough for one of the spikes to pierce the windshield. Thankfully though, whatever was the cursed item in between the pendant and the coins, it seems to be done for before that very same spike impales Horace, saving him from the pointy death.

Before he can realize, the floor on the streets is back to its usual color, no more heat emanating from it. The spikes on the building that were about to become his end are gone, and people seem to be populating the street, with everyone having its sights on the car. It seems that despite all of the magical effects having gone, the emergency break is still missing, and the windshield is still pierced, everyone seems to be looking at Horace as if he had some accident and met the building- Which is not ideal, but it’s better than whatever that cursed item had ready for him

Horace curses under his breath as he comes back to the real world and gets out of the car, flipping open his phone to call a tow to get his truck off and repaired. He grumbles about missing out on the gold and ammo but ultimately he is fine being ledge alone all things considered.

And with that, at least the deadly experience is over. Horace will likely have to do some minor repairs to his vehicle, but this is New Haven, whenever cars get damaged by otherworldly beasts, the mechanics know how to work fast, so it’ll be back and running soon enough. And with that, the man is left to his own devices once more