damned_institute | Night 65: Library

Skulduggery didn't need to be told twice. In fact, he barely had to be told once. The book was hardly a decent weapon, but it was all he had; and so before the snake had a chance to wrap itself too tightly around her feet, Skulduggery slammed the thick tome down, aiming for its triangular head.

Without waiting to see if the blow had landed - or even if it had missed entirely and come down on Rita's ankle instead - Skulduggery dropped both the book and the flashlight and gripped Rita's arm, pulling her back along the floor. At the same time, he snapped his other hand up and whipped as much air as he could manage towards the snake. The creature was even less visible now that Skulduggery's flashlight was rolling along the floor, but enough light bounced off the mahogany shelves to illuminate the deep red color of its skin.

The detective's control of air might not be as powerful as normal, but the snake looked light enough that it might be sent flying. Either way, Skulduggery was ready to hoist Rita to her feet and run.

Between the kicking, the smashing of the book, and the strong force that came from a place the kida could not comprehend, there wasn't much that it could do to fight back. Then again, that wasn't what it was meant for in the first place, and so it almost quietly took the damage dealt to it. The wind ended up tossing its long body backward until it slammed into one of the bookshelves.

While the shelf shuddered and a few books came raining down among the monster, the shelf managed to stay standing. Still, the snake itself was dazed from the barrage of attacks, and was more than open to further assaults. The question was, would the two quit while they were ahead and run, or would they be tempted by the chance to down one of the institute's creatures?

Fortunately for Rita, Skulduggery was quick to intervene, and she soon found herself being dragged away. Part of her was insulted at having to be handled like that, but this wasn't the time to be complaining.

Wind magic... Even in the confusion of battle, Rita took a moment to observe her companion's use of magic. It really was different from any technique she knew, though there were some familiar aspects.

The moment she was able, the mage scrambled back to her feet. The creature appeared stunned, but Rita took a few steps away to create some distance between them. She looked down at her ankles, where the creature had touched her, tugging her pant leg up to get a better look. "Damn it... is that thing poisonous?" There was no pain and no swelling, at least not at the moment, but she didn't want to take any chances. Washing the area was going to be her top priority - once that monster was out of the way, anyway.

"I don't know," Skulduggery admitted. "I've never come across a one-eyed snake before." The triangular head, however, meant it probably was. He instinctively snapped his fingers to summon a flame into his palm, then released it a second later when he remembered the flashlight. It had rolled toward the shelves opposite from the snake, fortunately, so Skulduggery snatched it up and shone the beam on Rita's ankle.

No fangs meant, predictably, no bite. But there were plenty of snakes with poison in their skin, and the symptoms of those could be just as dangerous. "Is it feeling numb?" he asked. "Any difficulty breathing?"

He kept a wary eye on the snake. Still though it may be now, incapacitating it had felt much too simple, especially in light of what happened last night. As reluctant as Skulduggery was to retreat when they could now see the staircase beyond the sliding wall, a positive response to either of those questions meant getting to a sink, and possibly making a tourniquet.

Instead of attacking, the two held back, and slowly the snake recovered. A few books fell off of its body as it lifted itself up again, sliding away from the shelf it had been thrown against.

While it was hesitant to go for a direct attack when it was clear that these two targets had firepower of their own, running was not part of its vocabulary. It either killed, or it died.

But the unstable shelf had certainly given it an idea. Not completely mindless, the kida backtracked and started to move down the aisle directly parallel to the one that the two patients were situated in. If it was able to reach the other side of the shelf and ram it hard enough, it might be able to knock it down onto them.

Rita paused for a moment, waiting to see if she could detect any such symptoms… but there were none. “No, nothing. I feel fine.” Poison often didn’t work unless it entered an open wound, so perhaps Rita was lucky in this instance. And yet, that snake had the opportunity to bite and it didn’t. That made her worry that it had a different technique for subduing prey than most similar creatures.

Instead of preparing for another strike, the creature slithered away in the opposite direction, seemingly retreating. “Looks like it gave up,” Rita commented. She just hoped it wasn’t going to attempt a sneak attack later on. For now, she had a moment to tend to her leg. The nearest sink was too far to bother; she could just use a water spell to rinse the skin.

Unknown to Rita, however, she was beginning to experience symptoms of the poison – just not the sort she was expecting. Before she could begin to cast, a voice audible only to her echoed through the library, its words not quite clear, though there was something familiar in the tone. Immediately, she stiffened, and began to look around. “Did you hear that?” she asked Skulduggery. “Someone’s here.”

If there was someone else in the library, they’d have to warn him or her about the monster. Hopefully that snake’s retreat wasn’t just a change in targets…

Skulduggery turned at Rita's question, holding his free hand out with the fingers extended to read the air. He hadn't heard anything, but with all the potential nightmares that could be hiding in the dark, he wasn't taking any chances. The snake was too simple a barricade; it could very easily have been a diversion.

The air currents, however, were mostly still, disturbed only by the snake's current and past movements. The area over where Rita had tried to kick it off her ankle was still settling, as was the path Skulduggery had dragged her along. But there was nothing else in the library.

"Apart from us and the snake," he replied, turning to face where the creature was moving on the other side of the shelves, "there's nothing here. What did you hear?"

Were hallucinations a side effect of snake poisons? That, Skulduggery did not know. But it was possible the snake had retreated not because it was a diversion, or giving up, or planning a surprise counterattack; maybe its work was done. It wasn't hard to imagine life-threatening hallucinations in a place like this.

They didn't give chase, nor did they run. These two really were a strange pair, not going by any instincts that the snake itself followed. But that worked in its favor, as it meant they were more or less sitting ducks when it finally reached the other side of the bookshelf.

Not giving its own physical state any consideration, the snake started to slam itself bodily against the shelf, which sent long, echoing banging noises throughout the library. The shelf itself started to shudder in place, sometimes teetering when the snake hit it particularly hard.

If it found the right spot, or hit it with the right amount of force, it might just be able to knock the shelf onto them. As things stood, some more books were already raining down from the impact.

Skulduggery insisted there was no one there, but Rita wasn't convinced. Someone could have sneaked in while they were occupied with the monster. And frankly, at 400+, she wouldn't have been surprised if the guy was a bit hard of hearing.

"A voice. It was kind of hard to make out, but--"

"Rita? Is that you?" This time, she heard it loud and clear. And that voice, it could only be...

"Estelle!?" Eyes wide, Rita scanned the room, looking for some sign of her friend. The voice sounded close... Somewhere in these rows of books, Estelle was there!

Of course. It should have been obvious. If Estelle were to also be a prisoner of the institute, the first place she'd go would be the library. She must have heard Rita's voice while looking at the books. It all made sense.

A nearby shelf began to rattle as something banged against it. Was it that monster...? If Estelle was around, it might have decided to attack her instead. Rita had to find her! "Estelle!" she called out in alarm. Without further warning, she broke into a run. Somewhere around these shelves... she had to find her!

Skulduggery might have tried to stop Rita from running, but she was actually probably safer away from the swaying bookcase. He didn't think she'd leave the library; whoever Estelle was, Rita was easily worried enough to stick around.

Hallucinations it was, then. Skulduggery would have to be careful not to touch the snake's skin himself.

Weakness from hunger was finally starting to catch up to him; Skulduggery wasn't able to get out of the way in time before one of those books caught him on the head. He stumbled back against the opposite shelves in a daze, the pain so much more intense than he remembered, before dragging himself together and getting out of the aisle.

The creature would be in the aisle parallel to where they'd just been. Skulduggery grabbed another book off a shelf on the way and set fire to its pages, trying to ignore the throbbing hum in his skull. The flames combined with the blunt impact might be enough to kill the thing.

The two humans had split up, and that could be either a smart move or a very foolish one depending on how things played out. The kida paused in its banging, realizing that at this point that would only be a waste of energy. So who did it go after? The girl was already under its spell, chasing ghosts, and so the blood-colored creature started to slide down the aisle toward where it heard Skulduggery's footsteps.

If the timing was right, it could catch him as he rounded the corner, and constrict him while there wasn't anyone else around to help him get untangled.

Upon turning a corner, Rita found what she was looking for. Standing in the middle of one of the aisles was Estelle herself. That pink bob of hair, that white dress, it was all just as Rita remembered. The moment the other girl noticed Rita, she ran to her with a big smile.

"Rita! I'm so glad to see you," she said as she took Rita's hands into her own. The gesture was so familiar, and yet Rita could barely believe it.

The mage was speechless for a moment, and could only manage an awkward "Yeah, um... me too," in reply. Could this really be happening? Rita had feared that Estelle, and everyone on Terca Lumireis, would perish before she could return to help them. But Estelle was right here, and for a moment, nothing else mattered. Even if their whole world was doomed, or if Rita could never go back, at least Estelle was safe.

Skulduggery, the snake, and the smell of burning pages couldn't have been farther from her mind just then. None of it even registered.

The active banging against the bookcase had stopped. That was enough to slow Skulduggery down, to make him wary of where the unusually silent snake might be. It could always be heading for Rita, who was farther off in the library by now, but Skulduggery had never been particularly lucky. Besides, something told him it was finished with the teenage mage - Skulduggery was the only threat left to it now.

As the last few books rained down onto the floor behind him, Skulduggery crouched next to the shelves, just outside the parallel aisle, put the burning book on the ground, and waited with a hand outstretched, feeling the air. It was difficult to concentrate with the headache and the slight haze enveloping his mind, but Skulduggery could still make out enough to tell when the snake would be coming around the corner. Any second now...

There.

He shoved the book out into its path, hoping to catch the snake off-guard.

It didn't quite go as planned. After a few moments had passed and there was no sign of the human, the kida realized that it would need to make the first move. As it slithered out of the aisle, it sensed that its target was close, but it was in no way prepared for what Skulduggery had in store for it.

The burning of the book hadn't alerted it, as it had no way to smell, and so the makeshift weapon slid right into its body before it could react. The snake started to burn up as well, and while it didn't screech or make any pained noises, the way its body thrashed showed that it was most certainly in agony.

Death would be coming soon, and with that, the patients would have a new threat to contend with.

Night 65: Library

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject