Night 50: Sun Room
[from here]At the front of the group, Indy edged cautiously into the Sun Room, sweeping his flashlight around in a search for movement or lurking figures. A couple of times he thought he caught something, but it was hard to tell in the darkness and with the arrhythmic tramping of six pairs of feet behind him. If something was here, they might just
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L shot a look of disbelief in Jones's direction.
The weird outfit indicated that this was the Special Counseling patient who had been in the Sun Room a week earlier, on L's first night in the Institute: the one who thought he was some kind of spider-oriented super-hero, who had been so apologetic about breaking Keman's arm. The fact that Keman didn't seem alarmed by the kid's approach told L that the two were now on good terms.
Jones sometimes ate his meals sitting with a few young men. L knew Keman, and recognized Scott in that context, but he had noticed a third companion, even younger than Keman. The new arrival's build, and the context of their meeting, suggested that he was the same person.
He knew enough not to let the kid's slight figure fool him: his own experience had proved to him over and over that appearances of all kinds could deceive. Only a skilled profiler should attempt to judge proverbial books by their covers on a regular basis. Ordinary people weren't good at it. Even trained professionals could make catastrophic mistakes.
"Why are you wearing a unitard?" he asked, when the new arrival finished chiding Scott for having suggested that he join the group looking that way. "I doubt those are your pyjamas." If L had a unitard, he wouldn't wear it: the close fit would vex him enough to outweigh any potential advantages. If someone was used to it, though, he could see a benefit to wearing skin-tight clothing in close combat. It left little for an opponent to catch at or use against you.
Lunge arrived, then, and L nodded again in greeting, then shifted his position so that he would be walking near the person in the group who he considered the most trustworthy. Lunge would know that he had the ring; others might suspect. He had no intention of volunteering its use.
He followed Dent, and stuck close to Lunge. Scott was nearby, too, but it was harder to trust an unknown quantity like him or Dent or the kid in the unitard. This was a mixed group, and not the one that L would have assembled; he hoped that the spider kid wasn't the only one of the people he didn't know to have demonstrable physical prowess. Dent had been the victim of a serious injury at some past point. Lunge was a trained officer, but he wasn't young anymore. L's own fighting skills were not those of a professional, but he could defend himself to an extent that might surprise the others. It was only that he would prefer to avoid situations where that kind of self-defense was necessary.
"I have a bad feeling about this," he murmured to Lunge, as they passed through the doors into the Sun Room.
The room was quiet-too quiet-and dark, except for an incandescent purple butterfly fluttering around its center. He had learned, in the previous week, that anomalies of that nature were nothing good. It might be the harbinger of a monster attack, or the signature of a Special Counseling patient. The only way to tell was to wait and see-a foolish idea, as far as L was concerned.
Whatever-whoever-the source of the butterfly was, it was impossible that it had missed a group as large as theirs; therefore, it was most likely to be biding its time. Theatricality, he thought. They're putting on a show for us. Drawing attention to it would not hurt them in strategic terms; everyone should be prepared.
"Everyone-the center of the room. The butterfly." His voice was clear, and it carried.
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The fourth point, at least, was the easiest to deal with. All he had to do was put one foot in front of the other and hope to the heavens that there wasn't anyone with a gun lying in wait beyond the door.
For the first few steps, at least, everything seemed peachy. The room was quiet, and there were no sudden movements from anyone except the group. There wasn't anything strange on the walls like there had been the night before, either. Maybe they had gotten lucky, Scott hoped.
Unfortunately, hope's eternal spring sprung a leak all too quickly. Sleep-Deprived Guy pointed it out straight away, and Scott spotted it about that same moment: there was a glowing purple butterfly in the room. Ah, crud crackers! Scott thought with widening eyes. That couldn't be good. Or rather, that could be good - in his experience, a mysterious glowing butterfly could easily be marking a save point or power-up - but in the unforgiving game that was Landel's Institute, it was a hell of a lot more likely that the thing was some kind of harbinger of their own personal apocalypse. The grip on his bat tightened considerably.
For the moment, the bug just fluttered there, all ethereal and innocent-like. Scott glared at it. He wasn't fooled. Come on, Butterfly. I know you're evil. You know you're evil. If you're gonna try and attack us or mess with us, then just do it! We don't have all night to wait for the chance to kick your little flutterbutt! he thought impatiently, keeping an eye out for any other sudden movements or lights in the room. He normally would have spoken aloud at this point to goad his opponent on, but thankfully, the size and relative professionalism of the group was rubbing off on him a bit; for now, he kept his remarks to himself to stay on the safe side.
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Walking into the Sun Room, Lunge felt his senses prickle in almost the same way they had when they'd entered the church a few nights before. Their current surrounds were, admittedly, not quite so ominous- it was difficult to be truly apprehensive of the room he'd spent most of his day sitting in- but perhaps it was that which set him decidedly on edge. The big, bright windows. The chairs (which, he noted, provided ideal hiding places for whatever might have decided to lurk in here for the night). It was all so deceptive. Just as much caution would be required here as had been in the church, but this time they didn't have the luxury of knowing that there was definitely going to be a guardian of some sort. His eyes slid sideways to L as they entered, meeting L's for a brief moment. Naturally.
It was then that the fluttering shape in the middle of the room caught his eye; what at first seemed to be a blur as his eyes adjusted to the changing light levels Lunge soon picked out as a butterfly of sorts. A small, delicate butterfly-shaped something, glimmering in the misted moonlight that fell from the ceiling.
Lunge's first reaction was fascination. His second, kicking in almost immediately afterwards, was suspicion. He kept his eyes trained to the creature (?) as the curly-haired one spoke up- any of those suggestions seemed likely, with the way the Institute seemed to enjoy preying on the mind and the senses. And as the bait in a trap, it was certainly disarmingly anomalous enough for it to warrant a closer look in the minds of those forgetting themselves.
At any rate, it was an obvious enough ploy for anyone in their current group. Even the costumed one agreed with that, albeit with an anecdote he wasn't entirely sure he wanted to believe. "The kitchen's on the other side of the room," he added quietly. "It would be better to stay to the walls- though if it is an illusion, the one creating it could be anywhere in here." In which case, there was a good chance they could be walking into a trap anyway. As per usual. He glanced to Jones; as much as he wanted to keep moving, the doctor was the one in charge, and in such a large group it would have been foolish to push his boundaries too far, too early.
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"Yeah," he said shortly, agreeing with everyone who'd spoken all at once. "Come on." He strode forward through the room, moving quickly and quietly and staying as close to the east wall as possible--and keeping an eye on the fluttering purple light. What the hell was that thing? Keman's guesses seemed a lot more complex and implausible than they needed to be; surely it was just some kind of projection. Indy glanced around for the source, but if it existed, it wasn't obvious.
He'd only made it a few steps when the intercom crackled with static so loud Indy almost started in self-reproach, as if he'd made the noise himself and blown their cover. The sounds of typing and Landel's voice came through, followed by an unholy screech that sent Indy grabbing instinctively to cover his ears. It probably only lasted a couple of seconds, but amid the pain triggered by a high-pitched noise at that volume, it felt much longer. The stabbing in his eardrums faded some seconds after the noise did, leaving a fresh surge of irritation in its wake. Jesus, if it wasn't enough that the bastard had them trapped in some kind of multiple-dimension nuthouse with creatures from some of the least comforting bedtime stories in history--now he was determined to make them all deaf.
"Everyone all right?" Indy asked quickly, at the lowest possible volume he thought would carry over the ringing anyone's ears might be doing. He spared a glance back long enough to check. "Keep moving." He already was.
[Indy is speaking English]
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Keman's suggestions for what it was were pretty over-the-top; of the three, "lure" seemed the most likely. It was just a trick of the light or something, and none of them were stupid enough to go near it. Harvey remained at Jones' side and slightly behind him, not even bothering to make sure that the rest of the group kept up.
The one person he was intrigued by was the costumed kid. He claimed he wore the outfit for ease with fighting, and while Harvey figured that there was some truth to that, the fact remained that the boy was going out of his way to cover his face up. It seemed like some of the other people here knew him (Jones probably did, at the least), but he was someone Harvey was planning to keep his eye on for now.
Lunge and Ryuuzaki were also worth watching (the two of them seemed close enough, if the way they were commenting to each other was any indication), but before Harvey could think more on that, the intercom came on suddenly and loudly at what had to be the worst possible moment. That stupid butterfly already had him on edge. He took in the head doctor's announcement while still moving forward; it sounded like they'd missed something over the radio, but apparently it wasn't the hugest loss since Landel was cutting that transmission off anyway. Points to whoever the mystery helper was for trying, but...
Then the intercom literally screeched, badly enough that Harvey found himself wincing his eyes closed in pain for a moment. He recovered as quickly as he could, glaring daggers up at the closest loudspeaker before taking in Jones' words. They couldn't let the head doctor's arrogance, some unpleasant noises, or a purple butterfly stop them from getting to where they were going. "Fine," he shot back. "And right behind you."
[ooc: Harvey is also speaking English!]
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The intercom crackled on, sending a wave of reactions through the patients. When it ended, she already knew what had happened. Trying to cause a little chaos, was he? The good doctor. Still, he was interrupting her time to shine. Truly annoying. Still, once it was over, it seemed the pack was on the move again. Now, she couldn't be having that, now could she? After waiting so patiently tonight.
The butterfly suddenly halted in its fluttering, transfixed as if pinned to the air, frozen in place. Then, before their eyes, its form stretched, thinning, becoming a horizontal line of light that reached across a fair portion of the Sun Room. Two ribbons unfolded near either end of it, hanging impossibly from that line of light that split the air. And then it opened.
With a sound like cloth ripping, the very air before them tore, reality splitting. A vast, dark abyss appeared, but it wasn't dark for long. suddenly, dozens of staring red eyes opened within the darkness, glaring at them with an unholy light. Then came a new sound, the clip-clop of shoes across tile that didn't exist and as they drew closer, a figure appeared within the abyss. A moment, and then a tall blonde woman with golden eyes holding a parsol appeared from the gap, an amused smile on her face.
"Good evening, boys," said Yukari pleasantly, conveniently bending the language barriers between them so they could understand her. Oh, they could continue to not understand each other for all she cared, but it was no fun taunting people if they didn't know they were being made fun of. "It's time for all the good little children to be in bed now. Now what should I do to naughty kids like you?"
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A shapeshifter, hm? L was inclined to interpret the butterfly as an illusion. His experiences over the previous week, though, made it difficult to say. Whatever was causing the butterfly, it would be best to assume that it was dangerous and act accordingly.
The trouble with admitting paranormal agents into your suspect pool was that, if you did, anything could be imputed to them. A bank robbery which appeared, on the surface, to be impossible? Ghosts might have done it! Ghosts, however, were unlikely to have much need for accounts in the Caymans; determining a criminal's motivation was always paramount in solving a case, and greed was a human domain. Landel himself seemed to be human. His childish need to control others was obvious, but L would be unable to pinpoint the totality of his motivation without more information than was accessible to him.
He felt a twitch in his pocket, a buzz against his leg--then nothing.
The radio... but... why did it stop? He frowned. When he had a spare moment, he would take a look at the device to see what had happened, but that might not be for a while. Getting through the Sun Room was the current priority; stopping to give his attention to the radio would be stupid.
The intercom broke in with a blast of static.
'New friend?' So you know about Marc, Landel. The fact that you would try to stop him makes me more likely to trust him--unless this is some kind of elaborate shell game, and you're working in collusion, but--no, I don't think so. You will both treat us as pawns, however. His uneasy feeling crested as Landel spoke of 'sloppy implementation." That couldn't possibly be go--
L winced as a terrible screech shot out of the speakers. Full hands meant that he had nothing he could use to cover his ears; his instinctive impulse to raise his shoulders wasn't helpful at all. Neither was the fact that he was forced to close his eyes.
"Ow," he said, under his breath, then raised his voice a moment later. "Yes. I'm fine." He wasn't so sure: his ears were ringing. The onset of a headache wouldn't surprise him.
For now, the most important thing was to keep moving towards the entrance to the cafeteria, and to keep the butterfly in sight. As he watched it, it changed.
The change was so theatrical that he was now almost certain it was an illusion, so much so that he wondered if there was a hidden pane of glass on the balcony projecting the image into the room. Even if someone was trying to fool them with a clever application of Pepper's Ghost, however, whatever followed it might be real.
He resolved to keep moving, not worrying about whether or not the others were keeping pace.
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...Well, not that chicks in dresses were inherently evil, but he was pretty sure ones that stepped out of rips in the time-space continuum (apparently from the Eyeball Dimension) weren't exactly trying out for Little Miss Manners.
After taking his hands off his ears, Scott was one of the first to quit keeping pace with Sleep-Deprived Guy. He glared up at That Chick In The Dress, pointing at her sharply. "Hey screw you, lady! We just got our ears nearly blown out! You can't give us a break to keep sneaking by a bit longer while our eardrums recover?" he shouted out in frustration. He was getting really sick of creepy and/or dangerous things on his way through the Sun Room, god damn it, and he wasn't going to let yet another one try to stop them now. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he thought that maybe his taunt would give the others some time to move further forward while TCITD focused on him, too.
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The shrill squeal threw Lunge off balance almost immediately, ears ringing painfully as his thoughts scrambled to reassemble themselves before he missed anything important, anything tacked onto the end.
An ‘anything’, in fact, that he didn’t understand.
He blinked, then. ‘Didn’t understand’ might have been a deceptive word for it; he didn’t know what the head doctor had said, yes. He did, however, recognise the general sound and a few words as English, even though he was certain he had been speaking in German only a moment before. And not just the head doctor, because when Jones and Dent spoke, he quickly found that he couldn’t understand the majority of what they’d said either. More English.
The change was bewildering enough that it took a few moments for Lunge to fully register that the butterfly had changed. When he looked again the air itself was splitting open, and out of the chasm came… a woman. Blonde, wielding a parasol, smiling like a cat cornering a fledgling, and speaking perfect German.
Several things became worryingly apparent all at once, then. The first was that he no longer had a means to communicate directly with the rest of the group, and that isolated him- his was a position of relative vulnerability. The second was that the woman in front of them was an anomaly, unless she happened to be able to speak German. The third was that this placed her in a position of immense power, and that there was no way that he could get through an encounter with her himself. The only viable strategy was to move before she could attack and try to work out a strategy now that they could no longer fully understand each other (the curly haired young man wasn’t speaking anything he recognised at all, never mind English).
“Let’s go,” he muttered urgently- even if no one understood him, his tone and the nod to the door would have been enough to suggest his meaning. “Before she can attack.” With that, he made a break across the final few feet towards the cafeteria door and through it, glancing back only once to make sure that at least one person would follow.
[Lunge’s speaking German! To here]
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Indy immediately launched into a painful struggle to rationalize that. When he realized the closest he could come would be to settle on the same weak, unconvincing explanations as usual (futuristic technology or cheap tricks), all he could do was throw up his proverbial hands and say the hell with it. It didn't matter how the girl got there, at least not right now. Like Keman's nightlight, it was something to be mulled over and dealt with when he wasn't busy risking life and limb (seven lives, twenty-eight limbs, to be exact) trying to explore what could be a glorified storage closet.
In the seconds it took him to conclude all that, the others were already reacting. Pilgrim was (wonder of wonders) falling right into responding to the woman's challenge. Ryuuzaki was still moving. Lunge was urging them all to move (why in German all of a sudden?). And Keman was speaking a language--and yes, Indy was pretty sure after just a few words that it was a language, rather than gibberish--he'd never heard before. And Indiana Jones, whose graduate degree was in linguistics, had heard a lot of languages.
The translator, he thought. He could be wrong, but he didn't think so. Damn! What the hell was going on?
He agreed with Lunge on two counts: one, that chances were very good the girl was about to attack them, and two, that they should get out of there before she could. What Indy also realized, though, was that their group was spread out along the wall. There wouldn't be enough time for them all to make a break for it before she caught whoever was at the back.
"Easy, easy! Scott, quit taunting her and get out of here. Keman, you too," Indy ordered sharply, trying to stay on top of the situation. He didn't want to let the girl out of his sight long enough to twist, but he shot a quick look directly back at the two of them and pointed to the door--the implication should be clear enough. "Keep going. Pilgrim can show you where the entrance is in the freezer. We'll hold her off and catch up with you later."
Indy wasn't sure exactly who "we" was; it'd just sounded good. Hopefully it included someone other than him, because God only knew what this girl had up her frilly sleeves. He was so tired of dealing with these people, Indy thought with a weary half-sigh. Was one night in which he didn't have to deal with yet another screwball whose hobby was breaking the laws of physics so much to ask?
"We don't want any trouble. Just let us through and we'll be out of your way," he told her finally, although he was well aware that the half-hearted stab at negotiations was almost certainly a waste of breath. Speaking of stabbing, though, his grip was subtly tensing on the handle of the brush axe, and he slowly--while he was talking; hopefully the girl wouldn't pay too much attention to it--clicked off the flashlight in his left hand and eased it into his jacket pocket. That'd leave him a free hand to shift the axe into if he needed to use his whip.
Indy hoped he didn't need to use his whip. They'd lost enough time already.
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Well, this was just another thing to add to the list of completely insane things that he'd seen during his time here. He would have revisited his theory of their food being laced with drugs if he had experienced any other side effects, but he felt completely normal. Except for the gaping burn wound and the inexplicable things he saw each and every night, anyway.
None of that seemed to matter, though. What was important was that there were a ton of them spread through the room, some who seemed to suddenly be speaking languages he didn't quite understand. (Lunge was clearly speaking German; what Harvey couldn't put his finger on was why the guy had suddenly decided to transfer over to his native tongue right now. Keman was just a mystery, but after that magelight stuff the kid was already a nutcase in his book.) Thankfully, Lunge and Ryuuzaki seemed smart enough to keep moving, and Jones was smart enough to make the kids do the same.
But someone was going to have to stop and fight this fight, and while Harvey hardly wanted to tussle with a girl toting a parasol adorned with ribbons, he knew this wasn't a choice he could necessarily make on his own. He wasn't stupid enough to talk back to the girl like a certain someone wanted to, but he was willing to take the risk of doing a quick coin flip amongst all the chaos. Their mystery opponent didn't seem to want to attack them right away, anyhow.
Pulling the silver dollar out, Harvey quickly and subtly flipped it, and scowled when he was shown the clean side. Looked like he was sticking around, then. Sighing, he returned it to his pocket and glanced at Jones. "I'll give you a hand," he said, leaving Jones to talk to the girl. At least this would improve the professor's opinion of him, which was one upside to offering himself up for what could prove to be a humiliating fight.
This still made no sense, but she didn't look that tough. Not that he was going to assume this would be easy, since the girl clearly had the skill of defying physics. He honestly wouldn't be surprised if she could shoot bullets out of that parasol of hers. Why hadn't he brought his gun, again?
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"No, you see, letting you through is exactly what I'm not supposed to do," she said languidly as she passed horizontal and began to turn upside down. "Then I'd be in trouble and given the choice, I'd rather you be the ones so troubled."
As she reached the apex of her circular jaunt, her dress, hair and body defying all semblance of normal gravity, she pulled out a card, holding it up (down?) before her face with a sinister smile.
"Demon's Eyes 「Laplace's Demon」"
The spellcard shone for a second before disappearing. The moment it did, dozens of gaps open around the room, each filled by an enormous purple eye, two to three feet across, pupils dancing about wildly as they tracked each of their many targets.
"Now, get them," she intoned. When she did, violet beams of magic and light shot forth from those glares at the group, bathing the the room in sinister purple glow as the place became a chaos of lasers.
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