Redwall: Lockdown

Redwall Lockdown's poster, made by Tamarack's author.

"That afternoon, the Abbot put Redwall on Lockdown. Complete lockdown. No one is to enter the abbey or exit it for a space of exactly four seasons."

—Brother Raimun

Redwall: Lockdown is an Alternate Universe Fic set in Brian Jacques' Redwall canon during the 1600s. After a series of mysterious deaths in the woods around Redwall Abbey, Abbot Carter places the building in Lockdown. However, as the body count stacks up inside the Abbey walls, ten beasts must work together to find the true reason behind the killings and uncover the mysterious workings of the Abbey itself.

Redwall: Lockdown is a collaborative survivor writing contest written in 2011. Ten authors were accepted to write the story, one being voted out each week, which eventually leaves the top 3 authors as the winners. This means there a lot of characters are Killed Off for Real. It is still in the process of being finished.

Tropes used in Redwall: Lockdown include:

• American Accents: Tamarack and her family.
• Anyone Can Die: The defining central theme of ROC Survivor Contests.
• Barefoot Cartoon Animals: Mostly played straight, though the Order wear sandals and Tamarack has her boots.
• Big Brother Instinct: Noel exhibits this toward the kit characters and tries with his real brother.
• British Accents: Skipper, Bludd and Ripple speak various dialects of West Country pirate-y-ness. Saskia and Foweller speak in hare Royal-Air-Force-ese, but it's downplayed by both. Cobb speaks in a typical mole Somerset accent. Noel speaks with a Mancunian accent, though avoids the usual Jacques-style vermin accent.
• The Cavalier Years: Subverted. The only pirate around is a kitten, hardly any of the characters wear hats or even particularly 17th century specific clothing.
• Cloudcuckoolander: Bludd lives in a place where reality and her pirate fantasies overlap. Andrew also has shades of this, though his fantasies are much darker.
• Cold-Blooded Torture: Berend Beecham’s fate.
• Cradling Your Kill: Isidore does this with Berend Beecham after Clacher and Rigg nearly beat her to death... and then he chops off her paw... and tends to her again. He really doesn’t know what he wants to do with Berend Beecham.
• The Cuckoolander Was Right: Bludd warns Foweller and Tamarack that Isidore and Rigg are out to hurt her. Foweller and Tamarack write it off as her just playing one of her games. Of course, she wasn’t playing.
• Curiosity Killed the Cast: With the notable exceptions of Ripple and Cobb (although there’s an argument to be made there about psychology), all of the main cast who have died have done so after letting their curiosity about what’s really going on lead them to very dangerous answers.
• The Dead Have Names: Tamarack’s rant to Case about all the beasts who had died the past winter. She names names and adds their age and the epitaph on their gravestones.
• Deadpan Snarker: Merritt, Ripple, and Saskia.
• Death by Despair: Cobb
• Deceased Parents Are the Best: Subverted by Bludd who lies about her parents suffering a ‘horrible’ death (eaten by sea otters) in the hopes that it will garner sympathy.
• Died in Your Arms Tonight: Foweller with Noel holding him and Tamarack trying to wipe the blood away.
• Driven to Suicide: Cobb
• Dying Alone: Cobb
• Estrogen Brigade Bait: Noel has many shades of this.
• Everythings Wicked With Weasels: Foweller thinks this. Noel averts it.
• Family-Unfriendly Death: It’s difficult to find a family friendly death in the entire story.
• Fan Girl: Tamarack toward Noel.
• Fantasy Gun Control: Very much averted, especially for Redwall. Guns feature from the very first prologue and more keep appearing.
• Final Girl: Tamarack who’s gone from simply snooping to co-leading a rebellion against the Abbot of Redwall himself.
• Frothy Mugs of Water: Averted repeatedly.
• Good Parents: While the Coffincreepers are afraid of Carter and shut Tamarack’s rant against him down, they do it out of fear for her safety as well as their own. Emmerich begs Carter to spare Tamarack when she comes with the rebels to attack Redwall. Outside of these instances, Tamarack’s parents appear to be firm, but loving.
• Grave Robbing: Tamarack and Colm engage in this.
• Guns in Church: Quite literally.
• Happily Married: The Coffincreepers have an unusually happy family. Emmerich and Larch are happily married along with their son, Colm, and his wife, Ida. By all appearances, Althea and her late-husband, Durian were this.
• He Knows Too Much: Most of the cast, with the possible exception of Ripple, who doesn't believe that Andrew was murdered.
• Highly-Conspicuous Uniform: Ripple has a blue Long Patrol jacket.
• Homeschooled Kids: Presumably the semi-literate Foweller and the ambiguously-literate Bludd.
• Implied Death Threat: Carter is a master of these.
• In-Series Nickname: Alo/Ysius, Tam, Isi, Rip and Fowel.
• Instant Death Bullet: Averted with Ripple and Cassius, played straight with Virrel.
• Interspecies Romance: Saskia has engaged in it, Tamarack has considered it, and Aloysius seems about two-steps off from trying it out with Saskia.
• It Always Rains At Funerals Subverted. Both on-screen funerals take place on bright and sunny days.
• Jerk Jock: Rigg, who descends further and further into villainy.
• Literary Allusion Title: Not a week went by without one.
• Make It Look Like an Accident: Poor Andrew’s death at Carter’s paws.
• Meaningful Funeral: Raimun’s funeral. Less so for the audience than for the cast. Tamarack finds her resolve to keep digging into the cloakpin mystery, Aloysius deals with the loss of his best friend, and it is the last time the main characters are all together with one or two exceptions.
• Murder by Mistake: Isidore murders Foweller. He really didn’t mean to do that, idiot boy.
• Nice Hat: Isidore's beekeeping hat.
• Nightmare Fuel: Berend Beecham’s fate at the paws of Carter and his minions.
• Obfuscating Stupidity: Bludd has moments of clarity and insight that make one question the motive behind her childish antics.
• Onee-Sama: Tamarack seems to feel that Saskia is this and turns to her for advice and assistance in a variety of issues because Tamarack respects her.
• Playful Otter: Played straight as well as subverted with both Ripple and Foweller. Ripple's idea of playing is usually card-related, Foweller's playing can occasionally be dangerous, especially if Bludd is around.
• Plucky Girl: Tamarack and Bludd both exhibit a strong sense of optimism in the face of terrible circumstances.
• Poison Is Evil: Raimun, and attempted with Selendra.
• La Résistance: Case’s rebellion is a ragtag team of beasts who have a beef with Carter and beasts who are trigger-happy psychos. Noel and Tamarack try to fix them to some effect.
• Spot of Tea: Isidore enjoys his tea. Unless it's being thrown in Tompkins' face.
• Super Coach: Noel, though he’s saving the Abbey from the Abbot rather than the school.
• Sympathetic Criminal: A lot of the cast do some very questionable deeds.
• There Are No Police: Whilst there are fleeting references to outside authority, most of the crimes, from grave robbing, theft, breaking and entering, assault, rioting, arson and murder are either dealt with by members of the Order or simply not dealt with at all.
• Villain with Good Publicity: Carter has the entire Abbey wrapped around his little claw. Half the protagonists do not recognize him as a villain until well into the second week.
• What Could Have Been: The other apps as well as the app that pulled out. Plus, redundant story ideas that never went ahead, such as the Time Skips.
• Word of God: The presence of the OOC forums makes it easy to get this.