Day 56: Morris Park

[poorexample]

It was disappointing that the sheriff's office had been closed for some reason, but many humans rested on Sunday for what they considered good reason. Castiel himself didn't understand the thought behind it. God may have rested on the seventh day, but that didn't meant that the rest of them were allowed that luxury. He'd certainly never followed

Comments

[toxicspiderman]

You look like shit was the PG-13 version. Between the teenage hero brigade (spandex optional) and the children's books, he'd started to watch his mouth. Weird.

Except he totally could tell Peter he looked like he'd had his ass dragged backwards up a skyscraper. Peter was cool. Not that Scarecrow wasn't, he just had that Oz thing going on.

"A mine?" We talking mountain-top removal or underground perpetual fire machine? That wasn't an exaggeration. Little ex-mining town -- now just ex-town -- in Pennsylvania had lit an abandoned coal mine on fire in a textbook exhibition of why trash incineration was fucking stupid. Threw crap into the air and, without proper precautions, set random things on fire. Towns, islands, Pöyzen Böyzen fans. The world might be better off without the latter, but they tended not to put it out of their misery. Just get really lit.

It was like twenty years before the depth of the fucked-up sank in. Along with sections of the town and local kids. Marauding clouds of carbon monoxide, the works. Instant ghost town. Latest estimates put it at a half a millennium until it burnt itself out. Give or take a factor of two.

Given that Scarecrow still had hair, this one probably wasn't on fire. He edited the question to something that wouldn't require an impromptu lecture.

"Open, or underground?" He mimed a cave mouth with his free hand.

[scarefaux]

"Underground," the Scarecrow answered with a nod. "It was hard to see to the bottom from where we were standing, but it looked like they'd been digging into the rock for one reason or another. There were ladders that led to the lower ridges, all the way to the bottom, but with the snow and..." He trailed off, deciding to omit the other reason, as it wasn't all that important to the topic. "Well, it didn't look safe to climb down there.

"We spotted some tracks as well," the Scarecrow added. "Sergeant Carter said they probably belonged to a mining cart. We started to follow them, but I don't recall much after that. It was awfully late by that point, so it must have been the end of night that got us."

Better the end of night than something else. The Scarecrow shook a little, that tingling feeling running down his back. It could have been the chilly air, but thinking about the night and all they'd experienced could have caused it, as well. He did tend to get that way when he thought of the Mangled Witch or the Burning Man.

[toxicspiderman]

Huh. The whole concept of history had mostly passed this place by. Sitcom Americana, with white and black generic wrappers on everything.

How many of the patients would find it the definition of normality? Consensus reality. If asked for a town, this wasn't far off what S.T. would envision. Add a green and a white clapboard church and it could be anywhere in New England; this one screamed midwestern. Newer construction, built for cars, yadda yadda.

So what was an abandoned -- or working, for that matter -- mine doing on the premises?

"You cold? C'mon, let's not freeze our asses off out here." His was numb; stone benches had a lot of thermal mass, all of it ice-cold. His knee still ached despite the atmospheric icing, but if he didn't move he was going to sit here all day. He put two hands on the cane and pried himself up. "We went down to the basement." Even if everyone else was all hush-hush, he was going to talk about it. Information just wanted to be free, man.

[scarefaux]

[Apologies for how late this is! D:]

The Scarecrow answered Sangamon's question with a nod, turning to look down the road as his friend rose from his seat. He could see a few places down the main street that looked promising: the hardware store, something to do with a kitchen, and a place called Crossroader's that certainly looked popular. He felt it was probably best they avoided Megahit Movies, which was also within eyeshot; he didn't need to be any more homesick than he already was, and he was a little concerned the owners had noticed one of their collection hadn't been returned. He couldn't help but feel a little guilty, even if it had seemed important at the time to take the movie with him.

"Where should we go?" he asked, turning back to Sangamon. He followed one question with another almost immediately: "And what's in the basement? Aside from something dangerous, apparently."

[toxicspiderman]

"Up to you, man. As long as it's heated, I'm easy." Beer before lunch wasn't something he was categorically opposed to, though whether Scarecrow would like the place was hard to say.

Easier to answer the other question. He started limping down the path. Tightened muscles screeched like rusty bike chains after a Boston winter on the porch. "There's these challenges. One side for brains, the other for brawn."

It didn't occur to S.T. until mid-sentence that Scarecrow might still be laboring under some misconceptions about brains. Oops. He continued on.

[to here]