damned_institute | DAY 64: CHAPEL

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DAY 64: CHAPEL

This time, when the darkness faded and the next thing Skulduggery became aware of was that same bed underneath him, he didn't take the time to absorb the jarring feeling and sort out what might be going on. He leaped off the bed immediately, almost stumbling in the process - damn balance - and took a moment to realize that his eyes were burning and he could barely see a thing.

The room was blinding. The light itself wasn't an issue; it was the fact that Skulduggery's eyes had to slowly adjust to it, a sensation he hadn't experienced in ages and had never expected to experience again. He had a hand pressed to his forehead and was blinking rapidly when a woman knocked on the door and came in.

She was... cheerful. Everything was cheerful, from the bright light and noises outside to the intercom announcement that interrupted the woman's sudden spiel. It was such a startling change from just a few minutes ago that Skulduggery found himself lost for words while the... nurse... nodded brightly at him. She'd said something about a mental hospital, something about a man called Erik, and something else about 'not real' and 'getting better.' With Skulduggery's mental prowess - even operating at less than its usual efficiency - it was easy to work out what she meant.

He studied her openly once the light wasn't so blinding. "You're either a very convincing liar, utterly insane, or a psychopath. Let me find out which one." His head tilted. "Would you believe me if I said there was a woman last night who had been mortally wounded, but who was still walking around?" He cut her off before she could answer. "No, obviously not. And I don't think you're a psychopath who murders people for fun. A convincing liar, then. That doesn't clear anything up in the slightest, but I suppose it's something."

"Mr. MacAuley, you were sleeping all of last night. Are you sure you didn't just have a nightmare?"

Skulduggery wanted to point out that as a skeleton, he didn't sleep, and he certainly didn't have nightmares. The blurriness at the edges of his vision, however, reminded him with a jolt of his mysterious transformation to human. Suddenly, annoyingly, the nurse was making much more sense.

Was it... real, then? Everything with Yomi and the chapel - had that all just been a vivid hallucination? Had his entire life just been a vivid hallucination, like the woman was insisting?

In a slight daze, Skulduggery asked to see the chapel. He was standing there alone now, examining the fountain carefully for any sign of its demonic visage from before. But now it was just a fountain, the water was just water, and despite Skulduggery's best efforts, the water didn't respond to his Elemental magic. It remained stubbornly in its basin without so much as a ripple, silently mocking him.

Skulduggery sat down heavily on one of the pews, mystified. He wasn't insane. He joked sometimes that he was, and it might partly be true, but he wasn't insane on a level like this. He didn't just make up his whole life as he pleased.

[Free! But be prepared for a barrage of questions.]

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"And everyone who wakes up here is from a different world," Skulduggery murmured. "Different time, different place, different reality." What kind of power did the man over the intercom have, to be able to keep track of such a wide variety of people? To dampen their magic and bring them back to life? What was the point of it all?

It explained why Yomi hadn't actively been trying to escape when he met her, perfectly calm about her situation. Skulduggery knew how multiple failed attempts at escape could completely shatter a person's desire to do anything but what they were told. The boy next to him sounded like he had been stuck here for a while, and he had said that getting home wasn't easy.

Of course, when Skulduggery did escape, where would he escape to? Back to his own reality, appearing out of thin air in front of Valkyrie? Or back to where he should be, in whatever dimension the Faceless Ones had been banished to? He didn't know, because he didn't understand the kind of power being used here, and that was more frustrating than he would have liked to admit.

"Where are you from?" Skulduggery asked, deciding that at this point, any information would be useful information. Maybe he could figure out what kind of reality this prison was in.

At least this guy seemed to be able to follow along pretty easily. Sora didn't blame those who came from more "normal" worlds, since he could understand why some of the stuff here would be hard to believe, but it did make conversations like this one go a lot slower. Normally he wouldn't have minded, but with how he was feeling it was better to have someone who was quick on the uptake.

"Well, not everyone is from a different place. Two of my friends are here and we're all from the same home." More or less, anyway. Kairi was technically a foreigner to the islands, but she had been there since they were kids, so she might as well have been a native.

Not that Sora had seen either her or Riku in the past day or so. He'd been trying to force himself not to worry too much. With the combination of the Doyleton trip, the illness going around, and the chaos of last night, it made sense that they hadn't all been able to meet up with each other for a while.

"I'm from a place called Destiny Islands, but I was traveling to other worlds before I came here." To a lot of other worlds. That part wasn't strange to him. No, it was being stuck in one spot for so long that was hard for Sora to deal with, but it wasn't like he'd had much of a choice.

It was hard to think that he might not ever see those white beaches again, that he might turn into something horrible and never recover, but Sora tried to swallow all of that down. It wouldn't do him any good to get worked up over that.

Skulduggery had never heard of Destiny Islands, and he managed to quirk an eyebrow up when the boy talked about traveling to other worlds. But theoretically, there were millions of alternate realities out there, each with its own set of rules and societal norms. Just because Skulduggery's own world hadn't discovered how to travel between them didn't mean others hadn't.

And that wasn't the part of the boy's response Skulduggery was focused on, anyway. "People from the same reality can end up here?" he asked, just to be sure he'd heard correctly. The last thing he wanted was to run into somebody he knew, snatched and dragged into this prison alongside him. Skulduggery deserved whatever was coming to him; none of his friends did. "Is there a way to stop that from happening? Or to find out if it already has?"

A light pain began twinging at his temples. Skulduggery realized, with some surprise, that it was a headache. A physical, painful headache that wasn't brought on by someone being annoying or a difficult puzzle. It was probably caused by the light, which was still obnoxiously bright. Skulduggery blinked hard a couple of times in an effort to clear the pain.

This guy wanted to know how to stop other people from his world showing up here? That seemed out of the ordinary compared to others that Sora had talked to, although he could think of a few reasons for it. Maybe the stranger didn't want his friends to be in danger, or maybe he was trying to avoid some enemies he had. Sora had to admit that things had been a lot simpler since all of the Organization members had left this place.

Maybe it was selfish to keep hoping his friends would stick around, but he'd always figured that they were better off here than brainwashed.

"I don't think there's any way to stop it," he admitted, shifting around when a wave of nausea hit him again. Sora hoped it didn't get so bad that he needed to throw up. He hadn't done that since he was a little kid. "But if you want to ask around and see if any people you know are here, you can use the bulletin board in the Sun Room." It was the best way to get that sort of information, and sometimes it took new arrivals some time to even realize it was there.

The Sun Room? That cheerful nurse had mentioned a Sun Room this morning, but Skulduggery hadn't paid it much attention. It sounded exactly like what he'd expected a room in a mental hospital to be like - boring - and examining the fountain in the chapel had been a higher priority. If anyone Skulduggery knew was here, though, it would be better to find out sooner rather than later. He resolved to ask the nurse about it in a moment.

The headache was slowly growing worse, and now a strange feeling had settled somewhere down in Skulduggery's gut. The feeling was vaguely familiar, but he couldn't quite place it. It felt a little like the stomach was starting to fold in on itself, demanding his attention in a somewhat cryptic manner. It wasn't exactly painful, so Skulduggery ignored it for now.

The poor kid, however, was growing paler by the minute, shifting uncomfortably on the pew. An image of him vomiting all over Skulduggery flew unbidden to mind, and Skulduggery pulled away slightly. "Are you sure you're alright?" he asked. "I don't mean to be rude, but I'd really prefer if you didn't throw up anywhere near me. What's your name?"

It wasn't like Sora wanted to throw up all over anyone either, and he winced slightly at the thought. There was always that fountain if things got really bad, but he didn't want to be known as the kid who'd puked in the angel fountain if he could help it. One of the nurses would probably help him to the bathroom if he started feeling really sick.

"Umm, it's Sora." Normally he would have had the presence of mind to have mentioned that earlier, but he was a little slower with everything today. He had a pretty good excuse for that, if nothing else. "And I won't throw up on you, promise." He could always just turn in the other direction, after all.

"Before it was just a fever," he explained as he wiped the back of his hand across his forehead, "but now I feel more nauseous than anything. Taking medicine from the nurses would probably just make things worse, though." Feeling sick was something he could handle, at least. It was the sort of thing everyone had to deal with at some point in their lives. But if he took their medication, that might do things to him that he wasn't prepared for. The threat of turning into a monster was bad enough -- he didn't need to add in some other variable.

"Taking medicine from people holding you prisoner is never a good idea," Skulduggery agreed. Medicine was never something he'd had to deal with before, either - dead people didn't get sick. Suddenly, the threat of the illness being contagious took on greater meaning, and Skulduggery wondered if it would be a good idea to try and find some medicine at night. "Good to meet you, Sora. My name is Skulduggery Pleasant."

Introducing himself here felt strangely like introducing himself to mortals back in his own reality, but without the disguise. No one would recognize the name, no one would see he was a skeleton, and most people would warily treat him like he might be dangerous. Which of course he was, but never intentionally. Well, occasionally intentionally.

The slippers were getting annoying. Skulduggery surreptitiously worked them off his feet underneath the pew, realizing that even barefoot there was still slightly too much weight. He shuddered at the reminder of just how much had changed, and how much he was going to have to get used to.

"It's not a natural illness, is it?" he asked as the thought occurred to him. The man over the intercom seemed able to control a lot here; it wasn't a stretch to assume he could control health as well.

It was good to hear that he wasn't alone in thinking that accepting the nurses' help was a bad idea. Not that Sora was going to believe the opinion of some stranger over his own, but having it reinforced was still nice. He got the feeling that Riku would have agreed with his decision, too. For now, it was better to just bear it.

The name that the man gave certainly stood out. "Skulduggery Pleasant?" he repeated, tilting his head to the side. Though he was learning that the less he moved, the less he felt nauseous, which caused him to end the action early. "Sounds kind of like... Jack Skellington." Was it possible this was someone else from Halloween Town? Sora didn't remember seeing any other skeletons like Jack there, but this guy was tall and thin the same way Jack had been when he'd been in this place.

Maybe he was jumping to conclusions. There wasn't really an easy way to ask, and besides that, Skulduggery was asking something again. It wasn't too surprising that he was concerned about the illness, but thus far it hadn't scared him away from the conversation. Seeing how there was no way of hiding it now, Sora didn't mind talking about it.

"No, it's not natural. With the way Landel -- the guy on the intercom -- was talking, it's like he planned all this. So I think only some of us are supposed to have it." People like him, and Snow, and who knew who else. Sora glanced around the room, but it was hard to pick out who was sick in a crowd like this.

So then other people were sick, too, but Sora was right - it didn't sound contagious. Skulduggery was still wary for the first sign of the boy's nausea spinning out of control, but it sounded like that was all he had to worry about for now. The people who were sick probably weren't quite so lucky. "That's ominous," he said slowly. "If it's getting worse, it might be building towards something." Yomi and Sora had both mentioned experiments being done on the prisoners, and this certainly fit the profile.

His attention, however, was invariably drawn back to Sora's earlier comment. "Jack Skellington?" An odd name, which made it much more similar to the names Skulduggery was used to. And the similarity to the word 'skeleton' wasn't lost on him. "Someone you knew?"

Skulduggery was quick to pick up on things, if he'd already guessed that the illness was going to lead to something bad. It was obvious to anyone who'd been around for the past few days, based on what Landel had said, but Skulduggery was clearly brand new.

The idea of having to explain it to someone who didn't already know was surprisingly hard to face. Sora had been able to talk around the issue until now -- or it had all been over the bulletin, where he hadn't had to sign his name. He glanced down at his hands, one which was covered in that red rash, and tried to figure out what to say.

Luckily, his attention was briefly drawn away when Skulduggery asked about Jack. "Yeah, he's a friend of mine. Uhh, I met him in a place called Halloween Town. He really is a skeleton -- his specialty is scaring people." Sora smiled, because he'd never seen Jack as particularly scary, but he also wasn't some little kid. He wondered what had ever happened to Jack, if he'd found his way back home or not. Unfortunately, there were way too many people he had to wonder that about.

"A skeleton?" Skulduggery hardly dared to believe that he was this lucky, striking gold with one of the first questions posed to one of the first people he met. It was such a rare occurrence that he remained silent for a few moments, struggling to think of what to say next. "That's interesting. I happened to be a skeleton before waking up here. I didn't specialize in scaring people, but it happened a lot regardless. You come from a place where living skeletons are normal?"

It was enough to make him forget the headache. Halloween Town, populated by skeletons who specialized in scaring people. And here Skulduggery thought that alternate realities were dominated by creatures like the Faceless Ones.

Whoa! Another skeleton? For just a split second, Sora forgot how terrible he felt as he leaned closer to the man, staring into his face for a moment as he tried to picture what he would have looked like without all of the skin. It might have seemed morbid to some, but seeing how he'd befriended Jack, who was perfectly nice, he didn't think it was weird at all.

"Uhh, not exactly!" he responded, leaning back soon after so as to not make Skulduggery feel uncomfortable. "Halloween Town was just one of the worlds I visited, and I'm pretty sure Jack was the only skeleton there..." Then again, it wasn't like Sora had spent so much time there that he'd gotten to meet of all of the town's residents. Still, Jack had never mentioned anything.

"I don't think most people would see that kind of thing as normal," he admitted, tapping his lip with his index finger. "But Jack was actually really nice." Sora didn't think Skulduggery was scary, either, so maybe the belief that skeletons were bad was completely wrong.

Jack Skellington, Halloween Town... was it just Skulduggery's imagination, or did that sound vaguely familiar?

...No, of course not. Skulduggery had never been to alternate realities before, not that he knew of. And he was distracted very quickly from that line of thought with Sora's face suddenly very close to his own, eyes wide and curious.

Skulduggery leaned back slightly in surprise, but the smile he felt actually made it onto his face a few seconds later. Hardly an original reaction, and likely one of the best ones he would get for a while, even in this bizarre place. Why was it that kids seemed to understand right away, even with little to no proof, whereas adults refused to believe what was staring them in the face?

"I was the only skeleton where I come from, too," he said. "And it wasn't normal there, either. Slightly more normal among the people I usually deal with, but still usually the first thing to come up in introductions. No one knows exactly how it happened."

It was good to see that Skulduggery didn't mind talking about this sort of thing openly. Sora knew that sometimes his curiosity got the best of him, and every now and then he ended up accidentally offending someone by asking a question he shouldn't, or by showing too much interest. But that wasn't the case right now.

"So you don't even know how you ended up that way? Hmm..." Sora let his back hit the pew, frowning when he realized that his nausea was surging up again. He needed to keep himself distracted, although it looked like the nurses were getting ready to take them out of the chapel soon anyway.

With Jack, Sora had never really thought about how he'd become a skeleton. He assumed that he'd died a long time ago and lived on with just his bones, or that he'd just come into existence that way.

"So what's it like, having your skin and stuff back? Is it weird?" Sora wondered if Skulduggery saw the change as good or bad. It could really go either way, depending on how long he'd been a skeleton and how used to it he was.

"I know how I died," Skulduggery contradicted him. "I was there. It was painful. But I don't know why I managed to come back, no." Well, he had a vague idea, but that was hard to explain even to himself. "And I don't know how I became a skeleton." Well, unless one counted the ritualistic burning of his dead body, or the magic keeping his consciousness attached to the bones, but Skulduggery felt like that was cheating. The mystery of his existence was the only mystery to this day that Skulduggery still hadn't been able to solve.

He briefly wondered if this was the sort of discussion to be having with someone so young, but then he thought of Valkyrie, and all of his doubts faded.

"It's..." Weird? Different? Complicated? "... certainly strange. The smaller things are weirder than skin, like breathing. And organs. I have the utmost confidence, however, that I will adjust accordingly."

The nurses at the back of the chapel were starting to come forward. Skulduggery kept a wary eye on them as he asked his next question. "Where are the doctors? Landel can't be the only one."

The subject switching to death and possibly coming back from it was something that Sora realized he would have rather avoided, if he'd known the conversation was going to go in that direction. He tried not to think about what Renji might look like if he was just bones and nothing else -- it was a pointless thought, seeing how this had happened to Skulduggery in his own world.

Sora knew better than to ask more about how Skulduggery died, even though he was curious. It wasn't the sort of thing you came out and asked a complete stranger, even if Skulduggery was being pretty open about the whole thing.

"Oh yeah, organs... that has to be weird." Seeing how Sora's own body was doing a good job of torturing him at the moment, he almost wished that he was just bone right now -- that he didn't have a digestive system to be upset with him in the first place.

Before he could say anything more about it, though, some nurses started heading toward him, giving him just long enough to answer Skulduggery's last question. "There are doctors, but they see patients in their offices, and it's only every once in a while." He also wanted to mention that there were the nighttime doctors who kidnapped and tortured people, but he couldn't get into that now.

"Anyway, there's a lot more to this place," he said as he carefully stood up from the pew. "Good luck figuring it all out, okay? The bulletin board should help with that too."

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DAY 64: CHAPEL

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