That shared look of incomprehension with Dent was alarming; it meant that he'd never experienced what was going on here before either. This room had clearly changed in the couple of minutes (he thought; despite the unpredictability of time here, it certainly hadn't been long) since they'd left it. And not just the furniture, but the whole space, dimensions and all.
Now instead of the map, Indy was fumbling for explanations: some kind of trick architecture, maybe. But nothing he could come up with fit. There had to be some kind of rational explanation, he reassured himself. Could be future technology, something from past Dent's time, even. Like any so-called magic trick, it would all seem childishly simple and comprehensible as soon as you heard the explanation.
He saw the kid smirking and didn't want to give him the satisfaction of any more surprised looks, so instead Indy focused his attention on the boxes. "Patient possessions, huh?" he muttered, opening the nearest upright one without bothering to check the name. It contained a keyring, a simple shirt and pair of waist overalls (not his size), and a few similarly mundane odds and ends. Indy wondered what his had in it, but as he had in the mail room, he decided now might not be the best time to check.
"Want to pick anything up here, or shall we move on?" he asked, talking more to Dent than the punk with the hair.
It wasn't that hard to miss the fact that the stranger was smug as hell right about then, but Harvey decided that a glare would only give the kid more satisfaction, and so he let it go. Besides, the information that the other patient had for them was far more interesting. While he got the feeling that all of the possessions they found here would be bogus, it was still worth it to see what there was. It would give him a better idea as to who the institute thought he was, at least.
Or rather, who they wanted him to be.
Aaron Eckhart, he reminded himself as he started to move through the room looking for the right one. "Well, we're here now, however it happened. Might as well see what there is before we try to work out what the hell just happened." At least the kid didn't have any ideas about that, so the three of them were on equal footing in that sense.
Harvey really wasn't coming up with anything, though. The room hadn't been rearranged -- they were clearly somewhere completely different, like some sci-fi movie or something. So what, last week it was horror and this week they were mimicking those films about the people who traveled out in space?
After some searching, he found the right box and pulled it off of the shelf, setting it on the floor so he could look through it properly. He figured Jones would wait around for him to do this, and if the kid wanted to go running off on his own, then that was more than fine by him.
Allelujah didn't even bother looking around for his own box. Whatever they had come up with for his 'real life' in this world, he didn't want to know about it. He'd seen other people be affected by the lies of this place, he'd lost Lockon and Setsuna and Feldt that way and he wasn't about to let himself be drawn into their lies. He did look around the room though, pulling out the occasional box to see if there was anything useful, but they didn't seem to keep anything that could be used as a weapon in here. No cigarettes or items for trade either.
He wondered how they could have gone to a room at the complete other end of the building, on a different floor to the one that he had been trying to get to. It wasn't exactly a normal occurrence, even for here and it wasn't anything that he'd heard of before.
He should have just left, he supposed. But he couldn't let the two old men hang around and get eaten now could he? Besides, a tiny (and growing) part of him wanted the opportunity to prove that he could quite handle himself and was better at doing it than they were.
If Dent was going to take a minute to look for his box, Indy intended to do the same. Finding the one labeled "Harry Lucas, Jr." was the work of thirty seconds (no box for Lucas, Sr.), and he followed Dent's lead in moving it from the shelf to the floor, the better to paw through it.
The stuff wasn't his. That was obvious at first glance, but he went over it all anyway, pulling each item out one at a time with his free hand laying it on the floor. On top was a piece of cloth that, when unfolded, turned out to be a dark-colored uniform. "Janitor's clothes," Indy muttered to himself in annoyance. The bastards.
Underneath the uniform were a nondescript white undershirt and belt, and under those was something that felt like a thick magazine. He inspected that more carefully, tilting the flashlight so he could read the cover: American Journal of Archaeology, 99:1. It was dated 1995, but it was so well-thumbed that the cover was threatening to come off in his hand. Indy leafed through it and found that it contained a long article on recent developments in archaeometry, which he made a mental note to read the minute he had time. The section on dendrochronology--still a relatively young field, at least as far as he was concerned--alone was already a worthwhile prize for the night's efforts.
There were still a few small objects at the bottom of the box, though, which turned out to be a set of keys and two slips of paper--no, two photographs. Both looked recent, in the sense that he looked at most a year or two younger than he did now, but otherwise they were mind-bogglingly futuristic. One was of him and Dad(!) at a baseball stadium, grinning cheerfully for the camera. The other was of him and Marion.
He'd never been to those places or worn those clothes, or even seen the type of camera that must have produced these photos. How the hell had they gotten them? And--the thought made his chest seize up with an uncomfortably strong sensation somewhere between panic and fury--did it mean they'd gotten to Marion too?
Indy stood up abruptly, shoving the photos into a jacket pocket in the same motion. He rolled up the journal (completely dislodging the cover, but he needed his hands free) and left that sticking out of the other pocket, then tied the white shirt to the belt and cinched the belt loosely around his waist. The uniform and keys he put back in the box. The box went back on the shelf, and Indy turned toward the door. "Ready?" he asked Dent. He wanted to get out of here.
Harvey had already opened up his box by the time that Jones got to his, and the first thing he saw was a slightly wrinkled button-up shirt with a tie to match. They looked like the sort of style he would wear (and the shirt was the right size, at that), but they didn't belong to him. Frowning, he pulled both out and set them aside.
The next thing was a thick file of papers. He yanked it out and sat it in his lap, quickly realizing that it was notes on some sort of legal case with "Aaron Eckhart" as the prosecutor. Using his flashlight, he quickly scanned over the details. It seemed like a run of the mill murder case, but once again, the names and the specifics weren't familiar to him. Scowling, he threw the file to his side, ignoring the loud whump sound it made when it hit the floor.
From the sounds of it, Jones wasn't too happy with what he was finding either, but Harvey was too vested in his own box to pay too much attention to the other man. He pulled out a wallet next, flipping it open to see a fake driver's license (with his picture on it -- just the sort of bad-quality mugshot that would be expected) with inaccurate details. The city wasn't even right. There was no cash in the wallet, not even a few coins.
What he did find folded into one of the wallet's sleeves was a crumpled photograph. For a moment, he wasn't sure he wanted to look, but he forced himself. Instead of what he'd been scared of, the picture was of himself and Gordon of all people. He immediately gritted his teeth in response, since seeing that face again was enough to dredge up all of his anger and his need for vengeance.
It was the sort of picture that could have been taken of them before the accident. He was smiling in it, showing his teeth for the camera, while Gordon looked vaguely uncomfortable about the whole thing. They were standing close enough to come across as acquaintances, but not so close that anyone would call them friends. Just business associates.
This picture had never been taken. He knew that much. He would have remembered it, and so his mind wildly searched for a logical explanation. Maybe someone had manipulated it using computer software. It was hard to know for certain, but it had to be something along those lines. Regardless, the picture was clearly meant as a slap in the face and so he crumpled it in his hand and tossed it back into the box along with the wallet and the folder.
He shoved the box aside angrily, not even bothering to put it back on the shelf. The shirt and tie he picked up as he stood, right in time to respond to Jones' question. "Yeah," he snapped. This whole thing had been a waste of time.
Pushing past both of the other patients, Harvey exited the room.
Now instead of the map, Indy was fumbling for explanations: some kind of trick architecture, maybe. But nothing he could come up with fit. There had to be some kind of rational explanation, he reassured himself. Could be future technology, something from past Dent's time, even. Like any so-called magic trick, it would all seem childishly simple and comprehensible as soon as you heard the explanation.
He saw the kid smirking and didn't want to give him the satisfaction of any more surprised looks, so instead Indy focused his attention on the boxes. "Patient possessions, huh?" he muttered, opening the nearest upright one without bothering to check the name. It contained a keyring, a simple shirt and pair of waist overalls (not his size), and a few similarly mundane odds and ends. Indy wondered what his had in it, but as he had in the mail room, he decided now might not be the best time to check.
"Want to pick anything up here, or shall we move on?" he asked, talking more to Dent than the punk with the hair.
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Or rather, who they wanted him to be.
Aaron Eckhart, he reminded himself as he started to move through the room looking for the right one. "Well, we're here now, however it happened. Might as well see what there is before we try to work out what the hell just happened." At least the kid didn't have any ideas about that, so the three of them were on equal footing in that sense.
Harvey really wasn't coming up with anything, though. The room hadn't been rearranged -- they were clearly somewhere completely different, like some sci-fi movie or something. So what, last week it was horror and this week they were mimicking those films about the people who traveled out in space?
After some searching, he found the right box and pulled it off of the shelf, setting it on the floor so he could look through it properly. He figured Jones would wait around for him to do this, and if the kid wanted to go running off on his own, then that was more than fine by him.
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He wondered how they could have gone to a room at the complete other end of the building, on a different floor to the one that he had been trying to get to. It wasn't exactly a normal occurrence, even for here and it wasn't anything that he'd heard of before.
He should have just left, he supposed. But he couldn't let the two old men hang around and get eaten now could he? Besides, a tiny (and growing) part of him wanted the opportunity to prove that he could quite handle himself and was better at doing it than they were.
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The stuff wasn't his. That was obvious at first glance, but he went over it all anyway, pulling each item out one at a time with his free hand laying it on the floor. On top was a piece of cloth that, when unfolded, turned out to be a dark-colored uniform. "Janitor's clothes," Indy muttered to himself in annoyance. The bastards.
Underneath the uniform were a nondescript white undershirt and belt, and under those was something that felt like a thick magazine. He inspected that more carefully, tilting the flashlight so he could read the cover: American Journal of Archaeology, 99:1. It was dated 1995, but it was so well-thumbed that the cover was threatening to come off in his hand. Indy leafed through it and found that it contained a long article on recent developments in archaeometry, which he made a mental note to read the minute he had time. The section on dendrochronology--still a relatively young field, at least as far as he was concerned--alone was already a worthwhile prize for the night's efforts.
There were still a few small objects at the bottom of the box, though, which turned out to be a set of keys and two slips of paper--no, two photographs. Both looked recent, in the sense that he looked at most a year or two younger than he did now, but otherwise they were mind-bogglingly futuristic. One was of him and Dad(!) at a baseball stadium, grinning cheerfully for the camera. The other was of him and Marion.
He'd never been to those places or worn those clothes, or even seen the type of camera that must have produced these photos. How the hell had they gotten them? And--the thought made his chest seize up with an uncomfortably strong sensation somewhere between panic and fury--did it mean they'd gotten to Marion too?
Indy stood up abruptly, shoving the photos into a jacket pocket in the same motion. He rolled up the journal (completely dislodging the cover, but he needed his hands free) and left that sticking out of the other pocket, then tied the white shirt to the belt and cinched the belt loosely around his waist. The uniform and keys he put back in the box. The box went back on the shelf, and Indy turned toward the door. "Ready?" he asked Dent. He wanted to get out of here.
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The next thing was a thick file of papers. He yanked it out and sat it in his lap, quickly realizing that it was notes on some sort of legal case with "Aaron Eckhart" as the prosecutor. Using his flashlight, he quickly scanned over the details. It seemed like a run of the mill murder case, but once again, the names and the specifics weren't familiar to him. Scowling, he threw the file to his side, ignoring the loud whump sound it made when it hit the floor.
From the sounds of it, Jones wasn't too happy with what he was finding either, but Harvey was too vested in his own box to pay too much attention to the other man. He pulled out a wallet next, flipping it open to see a fake driver's license (with his picture on it -- just the sort of bad-quality mugshot that would be expected) with inaccurate details. The city wasn't even right. There was no cash in the wallet, not even a few coins.
What he did find folded into one of the wallet's sleeves was a crumpled photograph. For a moment, he wasn't sure he wanted to look, but he forced himself. Instead of what he'd been scared of, the picture was of himself and Gordon of all people. He immediately gritted his teeth in response, since seeing that face again was enough to dredge up all of his anger and his need for vengeance.
It was the sort of picture that could have been taken of them before the accident. He was smiling in it, showing his teeth for the camera, while Gordon looked vaguely uncomfortable about the whole thing. They were standing close enough to come across as acquaintances, but not so close that anyone would call them friends. Just business associates.
This picture had never been taken. He knew that much. He would have remembered it, and so his mind wildly searched for a logical explanation. Maybe someone had manipulated it using computer software. It was hard to know for certain, but it had to be something along those lines. Regardless, the picture was clearly meant as a slap in the face and so he crumpled it in his hand and tossed it back into the box along with the wallet and the folder.
He shoved the box aside angrily, not even bothering to put it back on the shelf. The shirt and tie he picked up as he stood, right in time to respond to Jones' question. "Yeah," he snapped. This whole thing had been a waste of time.
Pushing past both of the other patients, Harvey exited the room.
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