FEBRUARY 2021 EVENT: PART TWO

[robbies]

 

CHAPTER TWO, PART 2: THE LIVING ISLAND

Everything you never wanted to see.

YOU CAN’T DO A LITTLE BECAUSE YOU CAN’T DO ENOUGH | JUST A DREAM FROM YESTERDAY | DARKNESS HELD ITS BREATH | YOUR FRIENDS WHEN THINGS GET ROUGH | COME AND PLAY WITH ME

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YOU CAN'T DO A LITTLE BECAUSE YOU CAN'T DO ENOUGH

Perhaps you’ve been on tenterhooks since you woke up to find that your friends, your family, your neighbors somehow went missing in the night. Perhaps you’ve been hitting the pavement and knocking on doors trying to find them. So far, your efforts have been for naught. There’s been neither hide nor hair of the missing, and every attempt to find them has met with a dead end.

Until February 13.

In the afternoon, a strange, unsigned message goes live on the network. What is the meaning of “Living Island”? Does it have anything to do with what’s going on? There’s no elaboration… until midnight, when every neighbor’s television set turns on at full volume, hissing static and garbled noise as the dials turn and adjust. Several disjointed clips follow, ending on a mural that depicts the same words from the post.

“Living Island.”

The following morning, you’ll find that stranger things are beginning to happen. Some of you will be woken up to the blankets and sheets being yanked off your sleeping bodies by a powerful force. Others will find that when they step out of their morning shower, a message has been written in the steam on their medicine cabinet's mirror. Depending on how quickly you shower, you may only be able to see part of the message — but running the hot water longer and allowing the steam to fill the room will reveal it in its entirety:

“LIVING ISLAND.”

As time passes, you’ll find that the same message shows up every time the bathroom steams up, whether you’re in the shower or not. The same force that turned your TV on seems to insist that you pay attention to what it’s trying to show you, and its behavior escalates the longer you refuse. Characters will find that books go flying off of bookshelves, drawers are yanked out of dressers and desks, and breakable objects are smashed. Trying to prevent the spirit from destruction won’t go your way: If you try to catch or grab something that’s about to be thrown, you’ll find it ripped out of your hands anew and smashed anyways. If you tried to take all of your chairs down from where they’ve been stacked on top of the dining room table, you’ll find they’re back atop it the instant you look away.

All that’s to say nothing of the rumbling. It doesn’t start until the end of the first day, but from time to time you’ll feel the house beginning to shake on its foundations, a dull groan as it struggles to keep itself from collapsing in under its own weight. As time goes on, this will get louder and louder until the house seems to roar of its own accord, an unyielding shriek that can’t be stopped until the force causing it backs down.

Attempts to make contact with the spirit will never go well. It does not seem to be able or willing to communicate with you beyond its own tantrums, and characters who try may find that the attempt rapidly goes out of control. Candles flare up and burn wildly, Ouija boards are ripped into pieces and planchettes go flying, offerings of food are knocked over or thrown, and the lights flicker manically in turns. While you may be able to get some sleep at night if you’re lucky, the only thing that will reduce the poltergeist activity is to pay attention to the message it’s sending you and figure out what it means.

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JUST A DREAM FROM YESTERDAY

Living Island. If ever there were a first step to stopping this madness, it’s figuring out what those words mean. But starting is always the hardest part, and with nothing else to go by than two seemingly unrelated, nonsensical words left behind by a force you can’t see much less communicate with, an already arduous task seems even more impossible. This is furthered by the reactions you get when you hit the street and start asking people if they know anything about Living Island. Most of them can only look back at you blankly, as if waiting for a punchline that never comes. Others actually take you seriously enough to consider the question, and to their credit, they do take their time racking their brains to remember where they’ve heard that name before, why it sounds so familiar. But the most you’ll get back from them is a sheepish shrug of the shoulders and a reply that it sounds like something from TV. It gets to the point where their answers blend together, each one more unremarkable than the last. Save for the one you get from the last person you haven’t asked. Living Island. I’m sorry, what was that? What the fuck did you just say? Dale Harding and Rosemary Craven might be as far away from each other as possible, doing things around town that couldn’t be more different, but their reactions are the same. When they overhear you asking what feels like the hundredth person you’ve seen that day about Living Island, they look your way — Harding in the middle of his patrol or lunch break, Rosemary in the middle of grocery shopping. Harding looks honest-to-God surprised. Rosemary simply looks confused, even somewhat concerned. That's such a... strange name. Where did you hear that from? When they hear your explanation, they go quiet, mulling it over. Rosemary’s expression turns thoughtful. Harding’s, suspicious. If I remember correctly, that was a clubhouse the children around town used to play in. I haven’t heard about it in… goodness, I can’t even remember. Years, perhaps. It’s a play on “safety island” — another name for a bomb shelter — and the name of this… stupid kids show that used to be popular. I guess they thought it was cute, calling a place like that something fun. But where is it? Well, most of the shelters in town are still in use, and children aren’t allowed in them unless there’s an emergency. The only place I can think of is… The grade school. Administration ran out of funding before they could finish it, so they just scrapped it. Closed it off and just hoped for the best. Didn’t stop people from sneaking in. I used to bust them for playing down there all the time, the little shits. Harding’s mouth twists into a sneer that doesn’t reach his eyes, which are soft and miserable, while Rosemary waits patiently for any other questions and, when you have no others, excuses herself to go back to her groceries. Now you have something even better than an explanation: you have a destination.

Finding Santa Rosita Elementary is as easy as a fifteen minute drive from North Santa Rosita to Shadyside. Getting in is a different story. By day, the school is open for business and humming with activity, so you can’t very well go barging in and not expect to be reprimanded for disrupting class. This leaves you with three options: go before it opens, wait until school is over, or come in the middle of the night. Each have their own pros and cons, but all of them will get you the same result.

After hours, the school is desolate and still. The wind, the occasional slap of a naked branch against a window, and the squeak of your footsteps on the shiny, clean floors are the only sounds you’ll hear as you navigate the empty hallways. Most of the classrooms are locked, and the ones that aren’t don’t have anything any more unique or worthwhile to them than the occasional lunchbox left behind by a student or the classroom frog croaking in its tank. In a way, this is a good thing — it doesn’t leave that many places to investigate and makes your path that much more linear as you finally, inevitably and silently make your way downstairs into the bowels of the school.

The long corridor that awaits you in the basement is, in theory, not very different from the hallways upstairs. There are lockers lining both sides, dented and darkened with age and dust. The tiles are cracked, dirt and pieces of stone kicked up from exposed areas of the floor. Seemingly, this appears to lead to a dead end. But look closely at the wall and you’ll see the impression of a door, painted to match the walls. The lock is flimsy — in fact, depending on when you find it, someone may have already broken it. All that’s left is to enter and descend down the tiny room’s only feature: a ladder under a rusty steel hatch door, stretching down into darkness.

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DARKNESS HELD ITS BREATH

CW: gore, surgery

Stepping into the old shelter, the first thing that hits you is the stale, uncomfortably moist air. This first room is cavernous and dark, and your footsteps and whispers echo in spite of how quiet you might try to be. There’s a faint smell in the air, a trace of copper and rubbing alcohol that might make your eyes water, making your mouth feel unpleasant as it hits your tongue. As you get your bearings and begin to pick your way through the dark, you’ll notice traces of another smell — something simultaneously spicy and cloyingly sweet, a scent that seems to assault your senses and leaves you with a headache pounding at the base of your skull. Thankfully, there isn’t enough to do more than make you nauseous, but the smells warn of what’s still yet to be found.

As you continue through the labyrinthine warren, you’ll begin to find signs of human presence — some of the trashed rooms may be fitted with tables and supplies one might expect to find in a laboratory, meticulously labeled with typewritten strips. Several of these boxes appear to be old, covered in grimy layers of dust, while others are fresh and clean. All of them contain medical supplies. Eagle-eyed investigators might note that the untouched supplies tend to be the type contained in first-aid kits — acetaminophen, antibiotic ointment, simple adhesive bandages — while the ones that have been opened are for heavy duty surgical work — coiled IV lines and tubing, empty syringes, surgical gloves. One room in particular seems to have been fitted out for someone’s personal use, boasting a stripped-down bed, a chair and desk, and a comfortable recliner.

The trickle of water can be heard in the depths of the shelter, and as you emerge from one corridor that filters into a large chamber, it becomes immediately obvious where you are: This is an operating theater, with a table stationed beneath all manner of lights that can be adjusted and moved. A faucet drips monotonously in the back of the room, over a sink stained with blood with bits of grey, pulpy matter stuck in the drain. A bucket filled with blood and viscera ferments on the ground beside it. There are smears of blood, both dried and fresh, on the cloudy tiles, and a cabinet full of surgical instruments is slightly ajar. Looking at the instruments, characters will find that a couple of scalpels and a pair of tongs have dotted blotches where the metal was cleaned with water; whoever used these tools last didn’t dry them before putting them away. A small table near the operating area has a turntable sitting atop it, with a record already set under the needle: a single of Elvis Presley’s “Heartbreak Hotel.” There are a few other records sitting in the cabinet beneath it, including Big Mama Thornton’s “Hound Dog,” Frank Sinatra’s “Frank Sinatra Sings for Only the Lonely,” and James Brown and the Famous Flames’ “Think!”

In a separate area of this room, an oversized desk is piled with books and empty food containers that look as though they’ve been repurposed for one reason or another. These books are chiefly on anatomy and the medical sciences, though there are a number of books on psychology and how the brain functions. Though some of these books are water-spotted and dog-eared, there aren’t any notes written in the margins, nor are there any papers to be found. You can turn this area as much as you'd like, but all you’ll find is a couple empty cigarette boxes and some broken and bitten pens; the trash can next to the desk, filled with soggy ashes, seems to suggest that any papers that might have given you a lead were destroyed before you got here.

But the lab, with all its instruments, isn’t what you came here to find. There’s still at least one more room to be found…

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YOUR FRIENDS WHEN THINGS GET ROUGH

CW: gore, surgical trauma, amputation, lobotomy, brainwashing and interrogation, mouth trauma, eye trauma, ear trauma, body horror

The missing are being held in small, sturdy cages in a single room connected to the back of the operating room, dim and dank. The cages are placed equidistant around the room, ensuring that even if you try, you can’t reach out and make contact with your neighbors. The missing will find that they wake at approximately the same time, curled up on the ground in uncomfortable positions. Unlike your rescuers, your nightmare began far earlier than when you first awoke in this room, sore and disoriented. In fact, you could argue it started the moment you went to sleep on February 9th, leaving empty beds and concerned family members behind.

With no clocks or watches available to tell the time, you may not be able to tell how long you’ve been here. You sleep and wake, sometimes to a bowl of what looks like sticky rice lying in your cage that wasn’t there before. Sometimes, an overpowering smell will fill the room, faint at first; by the time you register it, it’s already overwhelmed you and sent you into a deep sleep. And when you wake, one cage will be empty. The inhabitant will be returned the next time you go to sleep and wake up, but not quite the same as they were before. They seem heavily drugged, discombobulated — or perhaps there's something visibly different about them. Whoever has taken you is doing a lot of work in their lab — and from the smell of things, meat work — and before long almost all of you will be sporting dressings of some type or other, fresh red seeping through the sterile cloth within a matter of hours.

Maybe you should try to keep each others’ spirits up. You don’t know how long you’ll be here, after all.

All of this goes on for a while — days, although it won’t be easy to count them given that there are no windows in the room. But nearly a week later… you wake to find that the front of your cage is unlocked. Unlatched. Open just an inch. Looking around the room, you’ll find that yours is not the only cage to have been opened — all of your cages have been unlocked.

Is it a mistake? Or are you really free?

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COME AND PLAY WITH ME

CW: blood and violence

Whether you’ve released yourself from your cage, or were discovered by a well-meaning friend before you could, or you’ve simply had your fill of exploring the shelter-turned-laboratory, the time has finally come to leave. Unfortunately, if things were that easy, you wouldn’t even be around by the time the scuttling sounds begin — somewhere down the hall, in the room behind you, fleeting and sly. It’s not an animal sound, a creature picking its way through the garbage and debris littered around the shelter. No, with the way it stops and starts every time you start and stop walking, this is a very deliberate, human sound. And if you don’t believe that, you’ll see soon enough when you see the naked, bone-white figure walk into view at the end of the hallway as casual as you please, their body smooth and sexless like a department store mannequin. They turn (your) their head and stare directly at you with (your) their wide, glassy eyes crinkled in thousand-yard delight. You hear your voice echoed back at you, airy and chirpy and so indescribably wrong it makes your blood run cold.

"Hi!"

Much like the Doppelgangers you encountered in January, these ones look and move like dolls, their limbs connected with ball-joints. However, whereas those ones were near perfect imitations of you and your friends, these ones look like they just fell off the assembly line. Their faces are unnaturally flat and plastic, like all the imperfections have been ironed out of them, but they are unmistakably yours. And when they open their mouths to squeal at you before running with all the unnatural speed not having a pair of lungs affords them, you’ll find that even their voices are perfect imitations — and not necessarily of your own either.

There’s no way to tell how many of these Doppelgangers are down here with you, hiding in the dark. They’re stealthy and sneaky, only coming out to attack when they’re sure you’re alone. Even if you’re not, they’re intelligent enough to come up with ways to separate you from your group, calling to you from another part of the shelter, mimicking a voice from someone they know you’ll listen to. Even if there’s no possible way they could be in Santa Rosita.

"Help me!"

"Is that you...? Oh thank God, I've been looking everywhere for you!"

"Please, don't leave me!"

Other times, they’ll take a more aggressive approach, allowing their limbs to pop out of place so they can sprawl on the ground, imitating a heap of discarded doll parts. Once you get close enough or turn your back on them, they’ll pull themselves together and attack, speeding towards you on fours like a crab.

There are two ways out of the shelter. The first one is the hardest: go back the way you came. With the low visibility, the number of Doppelgangers, and the confusing layout of the area, you’re more likely to get turned around and go in circles than you are to find your way back to the ladder — a location made even more difficult to discern since the hatch door has been lowered, blotting out all light from the room above.

The second way is the longest but also the easiest: head deeper into the shelter, past the operating room, through the rooms filled with broken furniture and ruined floors that are very easy to trip on — especially when you’re in the middle of running away. Eventually, you’ll come to another ladder, this one leading to an open hatch that deposits you into a dark passageway. The air up here is more fresh, but not necessarily pleasant smelling. There’s only one way to go — forward.

After what feels like an hour of walking, you’ll see a light at the end of the passage. Follow it and you’ll find yourself exiting a storm drain that drops you into the heart of Old Growth, just outside of West Santa Rosita.

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OOC INFO

Welcome to the second part of February’s event! You can use this entry to top-level for the event, but feel free to utilize the log and network communities as well.

There will be a top-level posted for NPC interaction tied to the second prompt below, wherein you can request to play out your character’s interaction with Harding or Rosemary. If you would like to have your character interact with either one of them, comment to the top-level with the name of the NPC you would like to thread with. You may only thread with one NPC. The mods will respond to NPC tags until February 28th.

Any questions can go in our FAQ thread below. Try to check and see if your question has already been answered on the plotting thread first here.

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Comments

crowley 🐍 ota

[demonicmiracle]

darkness
[[ooc: Aziraphale is with him for this prompt, so it'll be a three person thread with bibliophilicbells along for the ride.]]

[After a brief conversation with Rosemary that pointed him towards the school, Aziraphale had talked him into going to check it out, since it's — the right thing to do, and because he wants to know what the fuck is going on. They're both reasonably well armed, two hunting rifles and a pistol between them, a decent amount of ammo just in case they need it.

The first thing of any interest they stumble across is the surgical room, and despite Crowley's insistence that Aziraphale stay out, they both end up inside, tentatively poking through the supplies. The blood and viscera doesn't bother him that much, but he's careful not to touch anything he ought not to, when he knows human bodies are susceptible to disease and infections. None of this looks especially sterile.

When he hears footsteps nearby, he raises the rifle, though his finger stays against the trigger-guard, and puts himself between the door and Aziraphale.]

Who's there?

[Announcing himself is a risk, but he knows there are likely others of their group down here looking for the people that were taken. He'd rather not get shot by someone friendly, if they come in not knowing anyone's here.]

come and play

[Crowley is alone. There'd been a scuffle with the doppelgangers and he lost track of Aziraphale, has been searching for him ever since, trying not to panic and mostly failing.

At least he's still armed. He just has to hope that Aziraphale is, too.

And then he hears a voice calling out to him. It's been so long since he's heard it, but there's something unmistakable about it, some part of him buried deep that would know it anywhere.]

Come here, Crowley, let me take a look at you.

[If someone happens upon him, they'll be ignored as he lowers the gun and walks towards the voice, unable to stop himself.

Someone should... probably stop him.]

a timely rescue

[After — all that business, he's a lot more on edge, far more wary of the voices that call to him and careful not to walk to close to the pieces of doppelganger, even if they look to have fallen apart. The more he spends in this place, the more he regrets having come, wishing he'd ignored his curiosity and Aziraphale's insistence they do the right thing. If something's happened to him, Crowley will never forgive himself.

Not everyone is so lucky, though, and when he hears a scuffle he's quick to run towards it, hoping that it might be Aziraphale, that he'll be alright and they can get the Hell out of this place together.

He's not so lucky, but he does round the corner to find someone locked in a fight with one of the awful white mannequins. All the exhaustion and fear he's been feeling is shoved aside, compartmentalized for a later date, as he takes quick stock of the scene, pausing at the end of the hall with the rifle raised.

When the doppelganger knocks the person to the floor, Crowley fires, landing a clean shot in the doppelganger's chest, cracking the porcelain.]

Stay down.

[He cocks the lever again, ready to take a second shot.]

closed to Archer

[So — his latest scuffle with one of the doppelgangers didn't exactly go well, judging by the deep gash on his arm and the dull pain radiating from his chest. It doesn't feel like a broken rib, but it's almost definitely bruised. The gash is more troubling, since it's bleeding so much his hand is sticky with it, his grip on the rifle difficult to maintain.

He slings it over his shoulder, draws the pistol instead, since he can use that left handed, and then he continues on his way.

Hoping to find some stray bandages or something, he slips into the next side room he comes across, trying to be quiet, closing the door carefully behind himself so nothing follows him in.]

oh, you know

[undiagnosed]

[the second the door closes, a gunshot goes off and the concrete wall next to crowley's head explodes in a small shower of debris. archer's standing with a handgun pointed at him across the room, having fired a warning shot before even checking who it was. sloppy, something the other agents would do, but archer's not much in the mood to fuck around after his own encounter with the doppelgangers. there's an impact gash near his temple and he's busy wrapping up his own injury; a bloodied knife on one of the steel tables doesn't leave much for the imagination.

he's not badly hurt, though, holding the gun and glaring at crowley before his brain catches up with who he's looking at and he lowers it.]

Lost a fight like a dumbass, huh? Didn't you have like a billion years to learn how to not suck at this?

[demonicmiracle]

[Crowley flinches, ducking slightly as he whirls around, only for any concern to turn immediately to annoyance. Despite the gun pointed at him, he isn't actually worried about Archer shooting him, and takes a moment to holster his own pistol before coming closer.]

It's a bit different when I'm human. Doesn't look like you're faring much better.

[undiagnosed]

[he should be angry at that, but he just looks away. sterling, mi amigo! fucking idiot. he's dead. archer watched him die.]

I thought he-- [archer shakes his head, finishing up his own bandaging, pulling it a little overtight to distract himself.] Convenient excuse, asswipe.

[archer'll just redirect it back at crowley, like he probably expects him to.]

Come here. I have spares.

[demonicmiracle]

[Up goes an eyebrow, but Crowley decides not to start an argument just yet, especially not if Archer is offering bandages, so he does as requested without any fuss.

He sets the gun down within reach in case they're interrupted, and idly tugs at his torn sleeve, ripping it more to get at the wound better. It hurts, but it isn't unbearable.]

Those porcelain things get you, too, or is there something else out there I ought to be worried about?

[undiagnosed]

Nah, just a bunch of Blue Ridge freaks. [looks like he caught the knife in a similar place; one of his wrists is wrapped up and starting to bleed through the bandage already. like he hasn't been stabbed there before, please.

archer tosses a couple of wipes over to crowley - at least whatever they were doing down here won't result in infection, maybe? he didn't actually check the expiration or... hygiene status of this stuff.] Wipe it down. I gotta get the other bottle of rubbing alcohol. God knows what kind of shit they've been dragging those knives through.

[he'll just... pop the bottle of rubbing alcohol open and take a couple swigs when he gets it, then wiggles it at crowley.]

This'll sting. Don't scream. Like a bitch.

[demonicmiracle]

[He manages to catch the wipes with his left hand, grateful that even made human, he seems to have retained his ambidexterity. Mostly because he would've been embarrassed to drop something in front of Archer.]

The ones of us that went missing, from the looks of things.

[That's what the knives are being used on, he means.

Pushing his sleeve up, he makes an attempt to wipe as much of the blood off as possible, only pausing to grimace at Archer drinking rubbing alcohol. He's had his fair share of strong booze, but — that seems unnecessary.

Still, he holds his arm out.]

You watched me get my bloody fingers cut off without screaming. I'll be fine.

[He's not going scream about a bit of rubbing alcohol in a wound.]

[undiagnosed]

No, he wasn't here-- he died years ago... [archer mutters, then stops and frowns when he realises what crowley actually meant. he squeezes his eyes closed for a moment, then pours some of the rubbing alcohol onto the cleanest cloth he could find in the cabinet and finishes wiping the wound down before he starts wrapping it up. archer's far more careful than his entire... personality implies he would be when it comes to wrapping up wounds in the field and while it's not perfect, it's clearly practiced.] So, I guess they've upgraded from passive aggressive to creepy basement surgery. I suddenly don't feel so paranoid about hiding guns everywhere at my place.

[demonicmiracle]

[The muttering earns a proper frown, Crowley regarding Archer for a moment as he decides that there's definitely more going on there, but now probably isn't the time to delve into it. Was a mannequin playing at someone Archer lost?

It wouldn't surprise him.

There's a small grunt of pain at the sting of the alcohol, but he's quiet aside from that, surprised that Archer is actually like, being gentle about it.]

Don't know that guns will help all that much when they can snap their fingers and make us compliant.

[Not that he isn't glad he has them now, but still.]

[undiagnosed]

Is... that how they do it? [he's genuinely interested - seems to have dropped the pretense of not believing the supernatural. he'd always thought it was a dart, but the two times he's been downed... no dart marks after.] S'not like I haven't shot hands off before.

[he ties the bandage off, then downs the rest of the rubbing alcohol.]

Where's Avery?

darkness

[peninhand]

[ The person emerging from the darkness seems harmless enough-- Tired at the very least. She's sporting impressive dark circles under her eyes and carrying a couple books she's taken from the other side of the room. She briefly pause at the sight of the riffle. Huh, so there are firearms you can get in this place. ]

I'm one of you. Unless you're one of them in which case, game over for me.

[ Strangely enough, she doesn't seem too bothered at the prospect of being shot down. And in all fairness, comparatively to what the captives have been going through, being killed seems like a kind fate. She's been here long enough to piece together what had happened in this room and subsequently lose all hope to find anyone alive in this place.

She resumes and walks past them, putting down on the operating table the books she'd brought back from the back of the room-- This batch in particular seems to be focused on the human brain, its anatomy and how it works. ]

You're here to rescue the missing people I guess?

let's go monika > crowley > aziraphale if that's cool

[demonicmiracle]

[So far, none of the locals have even acknowledged any differences between their groups, so Crowley feels confident enough taking Monika at her word, lowering the rifle.]

You're fine, we're not local.

[Not that she seems worried, but he'll offer the reassurance anyway, casting a glance at Aziraphale. He doesn't like the idea of a teenager wandering around here on her own, even though she obviously hasn't run into too much trouble yet.

He leaves the second question for Aziraphale, and goes to check the door, wanting to make sure nothing followed Monika.]

apologies for the delay everyone /shows up with starbucks

[bibliophilicbells]

[It goes without saying that Aziraphale does not like this, and yet he's said it aloud about a dozen times already. So far, though, so good — or it was, until Crowley stepped between Aziraphale and whatever else that could have been.

Now the angel just feels vaguely nauseated.

At least it's a young woman and not... literally anything else.

Aziraphale adjusts the rifle strap around his shoulder and sighs.]

To try to help with the effort, at least. What have you found...?

[He peers over, uninvited but curious.]

No worries!

[peninhand]

[ Well, she'll live another day. She tries to smile at them, but it's really a hollow imitation of what a smile should be like. ]

They've conducted experiments on the captives.

[ She put down the books by the sink so they could peer at them if they so wanted. She said nothing, but books on the brain and psychology-- Next to grey and pulpy biological matter covered with blood? The correlation was obvious. ]

I think they're trying to understand how humans work. [A pause.] Or how to change them.

[ Made sense to her really. Clearly whoever had made that city didn't know how humans worked. And given the stories she'd heard so far, the likelihood their "robbie" neighbors had once been humans who had somehow been changed was high. ]

[demonicmiracle]

[If anyone could dredge up a genuine smile in this place, Crowley would think them insane, so he's hardly judging Monika for the hollow smile.

He makes a sound of acknowledgement at what she says, but doesn't wander any closer. He doesn't need to see books on human biology to know they've been pulling people apart.]

Or they're in it for a lark.

[Which might be worse, if whoever's doing this is doing it for fun.]

You seen anyone still down here?

[It's entirely possible said captives have been moved, if whoever's pulling the strings got wind that they were coming.]

[bibliophilicbells]

[The girl's comment makes Aziraphale's brow furrow, confusion clear on his face.]

I'm sorry, are you suggesting the natives aren't... human?

[He says it and it sounds crazy, but now that it's out there hanging in the air he can't help but wonder. It's more a rhetorical question than anything; it's clear what she meant, but he needs a moment to stomach it.]

[peninhand]

Sans and a couple others went further into. I stayed here to look for clues, but you may catch up to them if you go quickly enough.

[ She slowly goes back to the books. She doesn't think they'll find anyone alive down there, but. Hope is a hell of a drug, isn't it? Then she slowly shake her head, speaking more for herself than anything following Aziraphale's comment. ]

If they're human, they're doing a bad job at being human...

[demonicmiracle]

[Crowley can't keep himself from casting an awkward glance at Aziraphale, speaking of being bad at being human, considering that's exactly what they're doing, in their day to day existence.]

What're we thinking, then, aliens? Robots? Demons?

[Listen.

He has to ask, he's curious what other people think about this whole situation, who they've decided to blame.]

come and play

[weifinder]

( Really, it would be amazing if he didn't feel like this was Yiling Burial Mounds Round the Nth, voices too familiar and too dear to be ignored being summarily tuned out as they call and cry. He's had his share of false starts, but it's the kind that have, thus far, proven to be rewarding in their cautious approach: people in danger, trusting a combination of senses over any individual one.

Which is to say, he doesn't know this person in the slightest, and doesn't know what the voice is to him, only that the weapon in his hand that also makes very little sense beyond having been now witnessed as existing and functioning with noises and bursts of light and a familiar scent from signal tubes, but, ah. He very helpfully decides not to chance ending up with a gut injury despite his adoring history with exactly that, and instead makes to try and slow down Mysterious Walking Person who moves not at all like Dopplegangers of Strangely Put Together Joints by pushing whatever he finds in front of Crowley.

As it turns out, that's a rolling cart with one exceedingly rusty wheel that screeches ri-ri-ri-ri-ri as it rolls lopsidedly onward... as much as it can. )

... Huh.

IM—

[demonicmiracle]

[Well.

That certainly pulls Crowley up short, the ridiculousness of it enough to drag his attention away from the lull of hearing God's voice again, after so many millennia. It can't be real, can it? The voice. God isn't here, and even if She was, She wouldn't be talking to him.

Crowley blinks, glancing over at Wei Wuixan, then back at the rickety cart that really is just doing it's absolute best.

On the plus side, the gun remains lowered, and he doesn't look as if he's about to shoot anyone.]

What was — uh — what was the plan, here?

[From down the hall, the voice calls for him again, telling him not to disobey Her again.

Crowley ignores it, this time.]

we're on a roll—

[weifinder]

( Wei Wuxian is still staring a little forlornly after the cart. He'd hoped that'd be slightly more dramatic, instead of... comedically underwhelming. When he looks back to Crowley, he lifts his hands, palms up, and sighs. )

To get you to stop without uh. Trying the ill advised idea of tackling... you... since the... whatever it is, and all.

( He gestures toward the gun. )

People get kind of, ah. Touchy. Over the voices.

( The cart, bless its metal frame, is still somehow rolling. Riiiiii-riiiiiiii-riiiiiii. )

s t o p

[demonicmiracle]

[His gaze flicks down to the gun and an eyebrow goes up, before he remembers that not everyone here is dragged from contemporary Earth, so he supplies:]

It's a rifle. Projectile weapon.

[The basic summary, since they likely don't have time to get into a proper explanation of guns.]

You could've, you know, said something. Who goes about tackling random people?

[The voice, God's voice, interjects:

You had best come to me, Crowley, or you'll do worse than fall.

Crowley rolls his eyes.]

Fuck off, mum!

instead shows up... two weeks later

[weifinder]

Ah, to be honest, with how some people have been walking right into familiar sounding traps... tackling has been oddly efficient.

( The cart has finally come to a stop, just shy of hitting the wall. He brushes his hands off on his pants, though nothing's really lingering on them, and flashes a half-assed sort of not entirely apologetic but vaguely along those lines smile. )

The calling out sometimes less so. This one's imitating Mum?

( He glances in the direction of the voice, and the somewhere lurking doll-like creature that scuttles as one does when... apparently crafted underneath the basement of a school. )

it do be like that sometimes

[demonicmiracle]

Humans are very stupid.

[Bold words for the demon who nearly wandered down a dark hallway just because God told him to.]

My mother. Sort of. Not really. She's very much not my mum, I dunno why I said that, thought it'd be funny.

[He frowns, face all scrunched up as he tries to sort through those implications in his head.

Moving on.]

Probably ought to shoot it, either way. So it can't get someone else.

[weifinder]

( He doesn't even argue. Humans are very stupid, and as one, he's well aware of it. He does snort, though, because ah, what, then this guy isn't? Glory be, turns out everyone's capable of dumbassery.

... Not, sadly, news. )

So your parental figure who also isn't your parental figure. I get how that is.

( A certain Madam Yu still looms in memory, even if he's. Talking about adoptive parents versus an actual Creator. He looks in the direction of that voice, then back to the weapon in Crowley's hand. )

I'm inclined to agree. That thing keep them down?