Kitty~ <3 [Complete]

[flowing_alchemy]

Characters: Alphonse, Courtney, various ghosts
Setting: Starting in the grand room, moving through the dining room and into the kitchen, back through the grand room...
Time: Middle of the night
Summary: Alphonse finds a kitty! Also ow.
Warnings: ...cat lover obsessing? And ow.

Comments

[dollsy_npcs]

The Grand Room, for the most part, was the same as it would be for the entire night. The shadows lurked and loomed, ominous in their eyeless vigil and silent menace to any who dared stray too close, and frightened eyes shone from the depths of the fireplace, fixed on Al the entire time as he crept through the room.

Something was different, however, though it was hardly able to be considered the Grand Room. A small, fluffy grey tabby lurked in the doorway separating the Grand Room from the Crystal Dining Room, padding noiselessly along in the shifting shadows cast by the magnificent chandelier. The feline didn't look frightened, though she was active and alert, turning her head to regard Al with softly luminous eyes as he approached.

[flowing_alchemy]

Alphonse had been trying to prepare himself for anything possible, at this point - just in case. A cat, though, was really probably the last thing Alphonse had been expecting to see as he carefully moved through the grand room - but that was exactly what he saw on the other side of the room, right by the door he had been heading for, to the dining room. Just a small grey tabby, innocent enough...

He didn't once think there could be anything dangerous about the animal, or anything unusual about it.

"A...cat?"

Pushing aside his fears, for the time being, they were replaced with worry - a cat, in a place like this? There were shadows and monsters and...many all around terrifying things, so a cat could get hurt in a place like this.

So...no one could blame him if he rescued the cat, right?

He carefully started moving forward - still taking care to stay as far away from those...shadows as possible - toward the cat. He didn't want to scare it away, hoping to get close enough to make sure it was okay - it looked fine, but it'd be best

[dollsy_npcs]

The cat paused and tilted her head as she watched Al move forward. Her tail swished through the still night air, but otherwise, she stayed obligingly still, allowing Al to approach as close as he wanted. She still seemed unafraid--more curious than anything else, in fact, and more interested in Al now than any of the monsters lurking in the Grand Room he was walking through. She seemed completely unharmed and in fine health, too--really, the only suggestion of oddness would come when Al tried to touch her, and found that he couldn't.

[flowing_alchemy]

Alphonse moved a little bit quicker toward the cat, once he saw that she seemed just as curious in him as he was in her. A quicker pace was preferred, anyway, considering his still present fear of his surroundings - the dark alone made him nervous, and the movement and watching multiplied that greatly.

"Here girl..." he mumbled, softly, as he knelt down in front of the cat at the doorway - reaching his hand out to pet her...

And pausing as he realized that that task was impossible - an expression that was...more than a little startled appearing on his features.

[goblintamer]

Crud. Oh crud, oh crud. Oh... crud.

Courtney had fallen asleep in the greenhouse. She couldn't remember dozing off, save that she had been collecting certain plants and herbs she recognized (that might be useful later on.) She had woken up against the tree, realizing that she was supposed to have met Nanaki and Fiona upstairs. She had arranged the whole stupid thing and then of course she had to go blow them off in this damn dangerous place and what had she been thinkingSuffice to say, she was a little freaked out, and she knew that she had to get upstairs. But to do that, she'd have to go through the grand room. She didn't know how long she'd been asleep. She hoped that the Journey Room wouldn't be abandoned... or worse, broken into. Or something bad

[dollsy_npcs]

Allison looked around uneasily as she and Courtney left the Greenhouse, arms wrapped around herself and remaining so; obviously, she didn't like the dark that shrouded the glass room at night, or the shadows that lurked and leered. She hurried through the Grand Room, slowing a bit every so often to glance behind her and see that Courtney was following. She was wordlessly leading Courtney towards the Crystal Dining Room--and ultimately, probably the kitchen, where it seemed that no monsters lurked, at first glance. She paused as they came to the doorway to the Crystal Dining Room, looking nervously behind them at the shadows again, then silently looking at Al and the cat. She seemed to want to keep going, if Al and his feline friend weren't in the way

[flowing_alchemy]

The cat had alerted Alphonse to the presence of others before the voice had - she had seemed bothered by something, and turned a bit, so he followed her gaze...

About to smile to Courtney and respond, before hesitating for a moment at the strange little girl.

He shook it off, though, and smiled anyway.

"I came out to get some food...and I saw this cat here." he explained, pointing to the feline ghost as if some kind of clarification was needed, "So I came to see if she needed any help..."

[goblintamer]

At that, Courtney's face twisted into anger. Didn't he know what this house was like?! It was dangerous! You couldn't just stop to smell the roses and pet the kitties, especially if... where had this cat come from, anyway? She didn't know! First she meets this ghost girl, who really, really seemed agitated now, and she looked like she was leading the thirteen year old away from the upstairs which was not what she had wanted, and so yes. She was agitated. And Alphonse had leant himself to be a good vent for her frustrations.

"You are a nincompoop," she hissed. "This house is trying to kill us, and you think you can stay here without anything happening to you? Where did this cat come--oh, forget it. We need to go. And please don't ask me about the girl here, I really don't know. Can you grab the cat so that I can get you out of here?" She folded her arms crossly. Yes, she was willing to bail the kitty-struck younger brother, but she wasn't feeling obliged to be happy about it.

[dollsy_npcs]

The lever was pressed; inside the toaster, coils glowed with heat.

The ghosts had been relatively unobtrusive up until this point, but Winny had suddenly fluffed up to considerably larger than her previous size, tail lashing like a whip as she hissed in the toaster's direction. By the same token, Allison shuddered violently, reaching for Courtney's arm as though she could physically pull her away from the danger; she anxiously looked from there to the kitchen door, their only escape route.

The cabinet directly beneath the toaster swung open moments after the respective warnings, with eyes shining out at them through the darkness. A twisted, blackened man emerged soon after, smeared with soot and still smouldering, wisps of smoke rising as he moved. Courtney was the closer of the two, so it was she the creature focused on; he surged forward, hands outstretched to grab her. "Hold still." The voice was firm and commanding, the sort a harsh teacher might use with their pupil.

[flowing_alchemy]

The first thing to catch Alphonse's attention had been, naturally, the hissing Winny produced, staring at the toaster. An odd thing to be upset about, but Alphonse realized that something was bothering the cat about it...especially when Allison began to react in similar, distrusting manners.

He pulled away from the fridge, an apple in hand, turning his attention to the object in question - before the cabinet door swung open, and something started crawling out like that - and Alphonse was completely overcome with terror, suddenly wishing he had stayed with his brother, where he would certainly have been safe from...from...this

[goblintamer]

In general, Courtney wasn't an easy person to scare. During her brief stint as a babysitter, the tot she was looking after had been replaced by a changeling night thing. When it had finally crawled out from its nursery bed, it had done its best to frighten her, sticking out a lizard tongue and hissing menacingly. Courtney hadn't even flinched, or batted an eye. In fact, not long after she had tied it up in an extension cord, spinning it around in the air and demanding that it reveal the location of the real baby to her.

This, however, was a much different occasion. Maybe it was the way Allison reacted, the thirteen year old feeling the tingling sensation on her arm as the ghost tried to grab her, the fear on her expression. And then the cabinet door swung open, and it crawled out... a burning, blackened figure with terrible eyes. As it turned its head, looking straight at her, she heard the thing speaking to her, telling her not to move. She felt paralyzed, rooted to the spot in shock. Her mind froze, her skin feeling the heat

[dollsy_npcs]

Winny hissed and spat at the figure, but naturally, could do nothing else--what would a cat do against a monstrosity like that, even if she had been alive? Allison, meanwhile, had skittered to the kitchen door, shaking and silently urging them on with her eyes, poised to lead them out and away.

The spell had indeed worked right, despite the heat of the moment; the floor was slick and glistening with grease under the creature's feet. There was a quiet hiss, the smell of sizzling fat, and he skated forward, off-balance; the grease flared up into an abrupt pool of flames as he went. Nonetheless, he surged towards them--though whether that was his own doing, or the momentum and slipperyness carrying him forward, it was hard to say--, snatching at both Courtney and Alphonse now with a burning touch. "This will only hurt for a minute." He insisted, ironically the way a doctor might before giving someone a flu shot. A little suffering for a greater good....

[dollsy_npcs]

Allison ran and ran, far faster than a girl her apparent age ever should have been able to move, and without cease. She managed to stay just ahead of Courtney and Al, shying sharply away from the fireplace as they went; Winny was hot on their heels, hissing and bristling at the shadows that swiped at Courtney and Al with dark claws as they passed. She came to a rather abrupt stop at the end of the Grand Room, shivering at the brink of the East Hallway and looking into it uncertainly before back at her living companions; Winny had stopped too, and hissed

[flowing_alchemy]

There was still fire on his jacket, too. The burning heat was overwhelming, and he was terrified - he just wanted it to stop already, but he knew he couldn't, but there was a different sort of burning building in his legs. He could still hear the footsteps of that burning man chasing them, and the sound of his voice calling out, to the two of them. He wanted to stop, but he couldn't...

There was a strange sense of comfort held in the fact that the girl ghost and Winny were there with Courtney and himself. As if they could somehow help the more vulnerable children. But they seemed uncertain, now - stopping at the entrance of the hallway. They had been right before, but nothing in there seemed dangerous...a woman and some coloured orbs, down the hall. If anything he felt that he could trust the woman - perhaps a vague instinct - but the ghosts seemed to believe otherwise

[goblintamer]

It was only until she stopped that she noticed that Alphonse's jacket was on fire. Grabbing it off his shoulders, she threw it onto the ground and stepped on it repeatedly to put it out. Picking it up and draping it over his shoulder, she winced a little as she saw the left side of his face, burn wounds where the man touched him. Make no mistake, she did not want to be caught by him.

"Leave us alone!" she shouted as the burnt man called to them. Usually, she prided herself on being able to keep her cool, being smart-mouthed and clever even in dangerous circumstances, but she had just run for her life with a boy around her age draped over her shoulders, so it was a little hard to think straight enough to exchange banter with a big scary monster that was trying to burn her alive

[dollsy_npcs]

"The more you struggle, the worse it will hurt!" More warnings, more tones that suggested the monster, at least, thought its advice was sound, that he was only trying to help them in his own twisted way. He did not cross the threshold, though--the burned man stopped at the border of the Grand Room rather than pursuing them into the hall, vanishing--presumably crawling back into the fireplace--as they took their eyes off of him to run

[flowing_alchemy]

Alphonse was incredibly relieved when they finally smothered the fire on his jacket - his jacket was damaged, yes, but he and it were okay - and he could fix it, later, with alchemy, right?

He whimpered as they tucked into the library, and he pulled away from Courtney, and moving to lean against the wall - trying to catch his breath, and rest, tears still streaming. "Courtney..." he whimpered a little bit, though he wasn't sure what he could possibly ask from her. He felt bad...she seemed close to his age, but she was handling this so much better than he was, wasn't she?

He froze, though, when he heard the voice from across the hall - a woman's voice, apologizing.

"Is...is someone there...?"

[goblintamer]

And Courtney was incredibly relieved when she finally made it into the library without the woman seeing them. It had gone better than she had hoped - it had seemed that the study ghost was preoccupied with some far-off, ghosty thought, and didn't appear to be paying attention to them at all. As long as they stayed out of her way, it didn't seem like they'd have to retreat to the upstairs hallway any time soon. (Which is a good thing, because not only was it a dead end, but who knows whether or not she'd see the girl up there again

[dollsy_npcs]

Winny had padded over to Al again, mewling and trying to rub against his ankles; she passed right through, of course, but it was the closest thing to comfort she could give. For her part, Allison was standing near the door, watching her living companions silently; here, at least, she seemed relatively calm.

"I'm sorry...." Whether or not they were the people being addressed, or even were supposed to hear her, was uncertain--the voice's tireless penance went on until Courtney addressed it, and there was a brief lull before it--she?--spoke again. "Get your friend to the attic, quickly; you'll be safe there."