Part Three: Solstice
June 21st
In a city locked in a winter that never ends, minds have become as numb to the strange goings on as fingers have become to the cold.
"What's going on?" It's a question everyone knows they should be asking, but as days begin to blur into each other, a sense of lackadaisical reticence begins bleeding into the people of Port Leiry. "Some weather, huh?" turns into a dismissive shrug. This is just the way it is, and this is just the way it probably always be.
Even those who have only recently entered the city and found themselves unable to leave its icy bounds find their misgivings and fears dulling with each passing hour of each passing day until they, like the frost-rimed glass and snow-covered buildings, simply freeze in place.
At some point, people just stop tracking time - what is the point after all, when every day is the same?
At some point, people stop worrying about the people who go missing, lost to the snow or the myriad new creatures that seem to have entered the city alongside this endless, looping blizzard.
At some point, people stop noticing that their friends aren't quite the same anymore, changed but in ways that seem hard-to-place or innocuous - maybe even happier than they've ever been before despite the strange times.
But then, something shudders. The sun, a pointless dull glow of light behind endless clouds, decides in its infinite wisdom that it simply won't return, plunging the city into darkness that lasts not just a dozen hours, or even just a day.
And with the dark comes the cold, and with the cold come shapes in the dark, no longer content to sneak about.
Now that the doppelgangers have established their foothold in the city, at nearly every level, they choose to reveal themselves - with Port Leiry sealed, they can harvest its citizenry without fear of exposure to the outside world.
The first attacks seem like random acts of violence. Police, Fire, and Paramadic services, made lethargic like the rest of the city or infested with this hidden menace, lurch into confused and inconsistent action.
Mayor Jonas Harding issues a desperate plea, one that goes out via static-riddled television and radio broadcast as a new round of blustering snowfall begins in the endless dark.
"There have been multiple reports of attacks by both disturbed individuals and strange, well, creatures that have swamped our emergency systems. I am imploring those who cannot flee to the designated shelters listed following this broadcast to barricade your doors and shelter in place until we can contain this situation. We must seek to band together to weather this as a uni-"
But that broadcast is cut short abruptly amid the sound of shocked screams, an emergency signal replacing it on any screens, and a looping message, looping through various 'safe shelters' around the city.
The creatures now know they are under attack in their own domain, and so they decide to retaliate, to sweep the city beneath the snow and replace each and every soul inside their ward's bounds.
Across the city, the Mimics reveal themselves first, the tiny homunculus spies of the mirrorfolk hidden in items both treasured and mundane. The Doppelgangers themselves attack next, both those who have completed their transformation and those who still hunt their tethers, moving en masse, no longer fearful of exposure; the city is sealed, and if replacement is no longer an option, then extermination of its remaining people will have to do.
As you seek to shelter in place or make your way to a safe place, however, disaster strikes!
Welcome to the finale of Frost and Mirrors: Solstice! The Doppelgangers have now fully sealed Port Leiry off from the world, and as the Summer Solstice arrives, the veil between worlds begins to thin enough that the world beneath Mirror Lake has begun to merge with our own! With the worlds bleeding together, the Doppelgangers sense a handful of would-be interlopers in their domain, seeking to leverage the Solstice in another direction and free the city from Winter. But the city is sealed off fully now, and there is no longer need for pretense. Both those who have been fully replaced and those still seeking to replace their tethers grow bolder and begin attacking people in their homes to facilitate their takeover. Mayor Harding and the secretive Human Council has designated 'safe shelters' across the city in the wake of last year's strange Hurricane, and while these might offer some respite, not everyone can make it to them. Darkness has descended upon the city, a darkness that seems like it won't ever end, and even as the city seems to circle closer and closer to ruin, opportunistic creatures (and people) usually warded off by the light of day see fit to take advantage...
