damned_institute | Nightshift 29: Basement, East Hall

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Nightshift 29: Basement, East Hall

[From here.]

It took a moment for Dairine to take in the hallway in its entirety. The basement seemed to be a completely different animal from the rest of the Institute. The style down here reminded her of pictures she'd seen of Versailles, as opposed to the clinical conditions upstairs. The rift in interior design was strange, but she'd seen weirder things, and this would no doubt be topped by something even stranger by the end of the night.

The tapestries on the walls caught her eye, and she moved closer to one, waiting for her companions to follow her through. She looked, but didn't touch; she knew enough to at least take proper precautions before dealing with something that was potentially deadly.

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"Interesting choice of decor," Akabane commented as he took in the tapestries draped on the walls. At another time, he might have given the gruesome scenes more attention, but Dr. Jackal was in no mood for art appreciation. The long hallway appeared to be deserted, something that did not appeal to him. He was becoming rather bored of this exploration of the subterranean levels of the institute. But the hallway was long, and there was a possibility that he was missing something hidden farther down.

Casting one last indifferent glance at the battles frozen on the walls, Akabane headed down the hall. If there was anything of interest, or hostile intentions, he wanted to be the first to meet it.

Schuldig, never one to be left holding the bag, squeezed through after Akabane, letting Kimbley bear the full weight of holding the door open for himself. (He figured it could be managed; the other group had done it, after all. Mostly the door simply couldn't be moved by less than three grown men; it could probably simply be held in place by only one.) Thanks to Dairine and Akabane preceding him, he again knew what he'd be seeing before he actually laid eyes on it, but he nevertheless scrutinized the decor. Dairine's thoughts mirrored his own; this place wasn't decorated anything like an insane asylum, nor was it built like one. But, if - as all the evidence seemed to indicate - it wasn't a mental institute and had nothing to do with one, why was it connected to one...?

It was one of a list of questions he intended to put to Martin Landel, once he had his foot on the man's throat. "We should keep moving," he said, eyeing the tapestries. "Nightshift tends to end quickly once actual progress starts being made, and I want to see more than just a hallway."

The last in, Kimbley slipped away from the doors and glanced back as they slowly shut, eventually sealing behind them. As his eyes adjusted to the dark, he noted there were no handles, and therefore no way back. Not that he intended to go back, anyway. Provided no monsters jumped out of nowhere.

They made their way down the hallway, and Kimbley glanced at the various tapestries and candleholders. Very old-fashioned, very intricate, and very useless. Was this supposed to set atmosphere? Put them on edge? Turn their curiosity about the place into a worried sort of nervousness about whether or not they really wanted answers? He frowned and followed the rest of the group, catching sight of doors as they neared the end of the hallway.

One on either side.

"Left or right?" he asked, idly running his fingers down one of the tapestries. It'd go up in a matter of minutes if it caught fire, he thought ...

Dairine considered their options carefully. They didn't know what was behind either of those doors, which made both of them equally dangerous. Then again, what in this place wasn't dangerous? That was really the question to ask.

The right seemed to be a good choice, for whatever reason. She had a hunch that it led to something big and important, and a good wizard never ignored her hunches. Even if her power was almost dried up, that was still something left to her.

"I think we should go through the right door," she said, turning off her flashlight.

Akabane smiled. "Well, then. If there is no other opinions, I believe we shall take the right door, as Dairine-chan has suggested." He was somewhat bothered by Schuldig's statement about Nightshift ending quickly. He wasn't quite sure what that meant, but the telepath seemed to be implying that they get a move on.

The Transporter didn't give any of his companions a chance to protest, walking straight to the right door and pushing it open. He didn't care what was behind the door, so long as it was interesting.

[[To here (http://community.livejournal.com/damned/292854.html)]]

[from here]

Renji entered the hall cautiously; quick enough to catch which direction the other group had gone. He wasn't that interested in following them, so hopefully there'd be another door somewhere on the way. If not, well, there were more doors back the way they'd come.

He spared the tapestries a glance, not terribly impressed by the choice of decorations. "I'm getting a theme, here," he said.

The hall was long, but straight. His eyes were already well-adjusted to such dim light, even if the flickering of the candles was kind of annoying. He headed toward the end, leading the way.

The doll only stayed at the back of the group until they reached the threshold or thereabouts. Then he began to let the distance widen, allowing River to race ahead with the other man if she wished. Ren, on the other hand, felt no sense of impatience--on the contrary, he more or less felt a strong urge to linger. Just to explore everything carefully and indulge his curiosity.

Ojou would surely be interested to hear about it all.

Even though some people claimed the opposite, after centuries of assignments, the doll had developed a fairly meticulous memory for detail. The color of the chandelier, the scenes on the tapestries, the number and designs of the doors... Sometimes it could be difficult without knowing exactly where he was projecting the eye, but his guess were usually close, and the eye blinked open in the west hall, into the sphinx's chamber (oh boy), and then there was the hall of armor...

The doll paused briefly, brow furrowed. His one visible eye slid closed.

And everything else rejected him. He knew whatever lay underground was much bigger, but...

River followed Renji. As she followed, pacing down the long hallway through the dim lights, she watched. Not in the same way that Ren watched, but she saw. A hand glanced over one of the detailed tapestries, over the painted blood and gore. Pictures were more real than reality sometimes.

"Picture's got a meaning, but it isn't saying out loud," she answered Renji, somewhat troubled as she looked back at it. "It's talking in all kinds of ways, but you can't hear. Can guess, though. Hypothesize. Or you can just walk and listen on the way. If you don't get robbed by the bandits. Ren!" The little sister turned to her brother, the brother with the golden eye. "You're late."

Renji spared a glance at Ren, but kept going. Unless he heard the guy yelling, he wasn't going to worry about it too much. Other than the thing with the triangle on its head, he'd yet to come across much of anything here that he and River couldn't beat together.

"I'll walk and listen, I guess," Renji said. "I don't think I'm smart enough to hypotho-thingy." He shot a grin over his shoulder at her.

There was a door, on the left side of the hall. Cautiously, he opened it and stepped through.

[to here]

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Nightshift 29: Basement, East Hall

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