Night 51: Entry Room
[from here]And another room opened up, smaller, with five doors to add to the one he came through. Two seemed to lead to other rooms inside this one. One, would open into the hallway he was in previously. The one across would continue unknown, and on his right there was one. Further from the sun room, as he sought
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Not only that, but the fact that they had such extensive files on these fake people? Harrison Campbell. The name wasn't familiar in the slightest, but it wasn't as though Claire would know if there was any Campbell family that had association with the Petrellis. She barely knew anything about her real family. The reminder wasn't exactly reassuring, and suddenly, she wasn't feeling so good about this night in general. It was dragging up a whole lot of things she'd done a good job of ignoring in the past few months.
"Your fault? That's stupid, how could it be your fault?" A beat, she cringed a little. "I mean, obviously it's a lie to begin with, so maybe it's stupid to question that of all things, but it's just …" If she read something like that, she'd feel guilty regardless of what kind of truth it held. The concern in her face made it clear that she worried that maybe Peter was the same way.
All the same, she only held the look in his direction for a minute before going to tug on the westernmost door that Peter had assumed to be the file room. She was only slightly surprised to find it locked. Her expression grew briefly grim and she pointed her flashlight at it, crouching to get a better look.
"Any chance you've got a credit card on you?" She jested, throwing a wry look in Peter's direction. Yeah, not a chance. She jiggled the handle some more. "They didn't exactly let me keep my bobby pins on the way in, either. Think we can break it?" It had worked on the shed outside, after all, and the door handle felt jiggly enough to give her some hope. A little super strength wouldn't have gone amiss right now, but she wasn't going to bring it up. She had a feeling power limitations might be a sensitive subject -- like a super-heroic brand of impotence.
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Anyway, it hadn't really worked like that. True, Peter had been the one to go to Nathan with the claim that he could fly, but Nathan had done it first, even if he'd been in denial. The night of Heidi's car crash... That was what Peter had dreamed. That was why he'd thought that Nathan would understand. And it had taken a while, but in the end Nathan had, to the extent that he had flown him right out of Kirby Plaza that night.
But really, that was enough of that. Peter didn't want to forget Nathan, obviously, but they had a job to do and he needed to focus on that. He wasn't too shocked to see that the door was locked; pretty much anything useful was going to take some work to get to. He quirked a smile at the credit card comment (he smiled more around Claire than everyone else combined, didn't he?), but shook his head. At one point in his life it would have been insane to think that he wouldn't have a credit card on him, but that felt like a lifetime ago by now.
"We should be able to get in," he said with a nod as he moved over to stand next to Claire and then tried the lock for himself. His shovel would probably work the best in this situation, but he had... sort of forgotten to bring it with him. He'd been so busy thinking about the medical supplies that an actual weapon had slipped his mind. Peter tried not to let his blunder show on his face as he glanced at the baseball bat that Claire was holding.
"Hey, do you mind if I borrow that for a sec'?" he asked as he set both his flashlight and his pillow case down onto the floor and then cracked his knuckles. He'd played his fair share of baseball as a kid, and usually with Nathan pitching to him. He had a strong swing, probably strong enough to weaken that lock.
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"Don't hurt yourself, big guy," she taunted, handing the bat over. It was easy to be her usual, casually catty self around Peter and ignore the fact that they were stuck in their own tiny little hell dimension. After the words came out of her mouth, she remembered that, for now anyway, he couldn't. Well. Not in any lasting way, anyway. That much was reassuring. As long as she stayed close enough, she could rest assured that Peter was fine. Of course, that just exponentially increased the worry she was going to feel about him when she wasn't around. The reminder was a double-edged sword.
Getting a better grip on the bat, she offered it handle-first to Peter with a look that invited him to give it his best shot. On the one hand, there was the chance that the little metal doorknob might beat her wooden bat. But, louisville sluggers were supposed to be strong enough to break car windows, they had to hold up all right against doors. Besides, she could always go grab a different one now that she knew it was a pretty safe road to the activities shed.
And besides. Peter looked pretty strong, abilities or not. He'd been strong enough to save her time and time again, at least, that counted for something. She really should have more faith in him.
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In fact, he was missing them more than ever these days, danger and all. If he could just figure out how to contain his abilities so that he wasn't on the brink of going nuclear all the time, then he'd really be set. But whether that was possible without the help of a shady corporation of some sort (either the Company or that Pinehearst place that Daphne had told him about) remained to be seen.
Peter didn't miss the challenging look in Claire's eyes as he took the bat from her. She clearly felt that he had something to prove, and Peter was up for taking the bait, even though it was totally obvious. This door needed to get opened one way or another, and if he got to show off in the meantime, why not? This was the sort of bonding experience that they'd missed out on when Claire had been a kid.
Yes, breaking down doors in life-threatening mental institutions. The perfect way to get to know each other. Shaking his head at himself, Peter stepped up with the bat, fixing his gaze on the lock as he positioned himself like he was standing at home plate. Tensing the muscles in his arms, he swung the bat at the door as hard as he could. It made a loud sound that echoed through the room and sent a wave of painful tremors up his arms, but...
Well, the pain went away pretty soon after, and Peter had to be grateful for his niece once more. Reasserting his position, he struck the bat at the door once more.
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Admittedly, Peter looked pretty badass right about now, regardless of the fact that his first swing didn't exactly take the thing off its hinges. It was impossible to hide the impressed look that found its way onto her face in a proud way.
"Look, maybe if we go find something else we could -- " She took a hesitant step forward to stop him, but then he was swinging the bat again and she stopped short, looking surprised when the door handle, rusted and broken already, broke in the middle and fell, making a sharp, clanging noise as it hit the tile and rolled toward them.
"… Nice shot," she complimented. It was lucky, that's for sure, but she wasn't about to question it. Instead, she quirked her head a little to the side. "Shall we?"
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"Here you go," he said as he wiped the back of his hand across his forehead (despite the lack of sweat; it was really just an automatic thing) and then handed her the bat. He hardly wanted to steal it from her, after all. His shovel had done him rather well thus far, and it was only tonight that he'd accidentally left it behind.
Kneeling down, he picked up his pillow case and flashlight once more and made sure that he was through the door first. While the room looked pretty small, there was no telling what might be lurking inside.
[To here.]
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