If I should die this very moment (Active/closed)

[slavetoyuuko]

Characters: Watanuki, Doumeki Shizuka, Xerxes Break
Setting: Shelter Room
Time: night 17, early
Summary: As night begins to fall, the monsters start to rise, and something a little bit painful comes with them.
Warnings:

Comments

[spiritsbeloved]

Night fell, quietly and without ceremony. There was no need to ask, no need to tell--it simply was, and would be. The only right the residents had here was to experience it--it made no difference if they wanted to or not, or if they were aware of it coming on. Night didn't knock.

Neither did Eva.

(But she might have, once.)

She brought with her the night's essence, shrouded in darkness and radiating the foulness and corruption of the house and its wrongness. The shadow held nothing of its former humanity tonight, dragged no broken mortal shell behind it--but nor did it move with the malicious intent or impossible strength and speed it had before. Rather, it moved with an almost deliberate slowness, measured and restrained as it floated through the air.

It was heading for Watanuki.

[ghostrepellent]

It was his first time dealing with the night in this place, and as it fell, he could tell that Watanuki hadn't been lying about what happened. Even Doumeki could feel the pressure in the place - spiritual pressure, the aura of the place darkening and thickening until he felt like he could taste it and feel it moving down his throat when he breathed

[omnomnomsweets]

Break was lucky in this sense. He was blissfully ignorant of the spiritual pressure. He knew there was danger, and perhaps he stood up a little straighter and watched the shadows more closely as night fell, but that didn't bother him much either. He was a knight. Mortal danger was just another occupational hazard. Still, he wasn't entirely unaffected; he could feel the oppressive mood that had fallen over Watanuki and even Doumeki. He might appear oblivious, swinging his cane as he walked with a spring in his step and a smile on his face, but he was uneasy. It was entirely possible that they knew things that he didn't. Even if they didn't, a comrade was less useful under stress. Some degree of stress was inevitable in this place, but they were already approaching the end of that margin and night had hardly started. Hence the exaggerated air of nonchalance and cheer; best case scenario it would be contagious, worst case scenario it would be annoying, and either provided a distraction

[slavetoyuuko]

Watanuki knew something was coming. He could feel it building, and the movement in the doorway only further confirmed that something was here. Something was seeking him.

He closed his eyes for a moment when Doumeki moved, only lifting his head after taking that moment to gather his sanity close.

His heart stopped in his chest, and he moved without thought or pause or even consideration for the other men in the room, brushing past Doumeki and not even looking at Break in his desperation to get to her now. "Eva." The word was a chant, a prayer, a dying man's plea for release.

She was cold in his arms, cold like death and ghosts and gone, but he didn't care, pulling her as close as he could and dropping to his knees in front of her, breath a sob stuck tight in his throat. "Eva, oh god, Eva."

She was here, she had found him, he had to protect her. Nothing else mattered, so long as Eva was here and not gone and here and stay please, stay.

His cheeks were wet, his hands were trembling where they closed on her back.

She was here.

[spiritsbeloved]

The shadow trembled on the edge of tangibility, not unlike the living shadows that sometimes infested the Grand Room; it could be touched, held, felt, even as it offered next to no resistance, nearly allowed Watanuki's arms to slip straight through it. It was coldcoldcold to the touch, every inch of contact burning with it, a frigid tingle that was almost painful. But simple touch alone couldn't hurt with this creature, and nor did it seem willing--yet, at least--to bring its terrible strength to bear