Day 53: Music Room

[rocksthecourt]

Well, if it wasn't his favorite time of the week. They say distance makes the heart grow fonder. Of course in this case, distance makes Klavier feel like an abused, neglected animal who was only now being allowed a taste of actual food. These people were such savages. It was still absolutely absurd that they were allowed access to this room so rarely. But the tactic was also brilliant on their part, sad to say. Klavier was always at his quietest and most obedient on Music Room days. The perfect model patient. He would give them no excuse to deprive him of this precious time.

Today was going to be a little different, however. Not only was he given access to music today, but a bout of entertainment as well. Apparently that band that had been setting up tryouts for the last week was ready to get the show on the road and start their auditions. Normally, this was the sort of project he wouldn't hesitate to take part in. But aside from the injury to his left hand and shoulder, there were three critical factors keeping him from doing so:

1. The band was named "Sex Bob-Omb." Klavier may have missed the band scene, but he had no intention of attaching his name to some Tom Jones cover band.
2. There weren't many actual instruments in the Music Room; certainly not enough variety to form the type of band they want. The one who made the poster said something about improvising instruments through whatever means necessary. A noble goal, but again, Klavier was not so desperate yet as to reduce himself to playing with a box of tissues strung up with rubber bands. That was too pathetic an image to ever place himself into.
3. The person who had posted placed up a sample music sheet of one of their songs. Klavier had no idea how many people here could actually read music enough to know what it was they were looking at there, but he had been able to decipher it perfectly. Their music... it was kind of god-awful.

In short, this was basically a disaster waiting to happen. The hints were enough to tell him this was likely going to be something akin to nails on a chalkboard... amplified by five. So honestly, he should be as far away from this room as humanly possible.

But he was not going to let these people ruin his rare access time to the Music Room. No, instead he took one of their old CD players and a carefully selected CD of choice (for the sake of his sanity) and took a seat at one of the tables, turning the chair so as to get an optimal view of the show. Why not? No harm in indulging in a little "entertainment," yes?

[free to anyone who wants to watch this train wreck with him :D ]

Comments

[threepwood]

"I don't know," Guybrush said with a shrug, pulling a seat next to hers and taking it. "His room is in the same hall as mine, but I haven't seen him today. I'll drop by tonight and make sure he's not the one who took her, though given that he's in the same spooky asylum situation we're in, that seems unlikely." Unless he'd decided to team up with De Landel, though since the latter apparently had the power to bring people back from the dead, why would he cooperate with a guy he'd kidnapped? Crazy people never made sense.

"Last time I saw her was a couple of nights ago, when we went... metal-hunting. She was on her way to the toymaker guy to get a sword made. The sword got made- it was in her room when I went looking for her last night- but her roommate hasn't seen her since, either."

Guybrush let out another sigh, this one more defeated. Why did Elaine have to go missing when she'd been pulled from the most vulnerable time in her life? "We tried going upstairs to see if we could find where Landel hides himself at night, but then my shadow got all poxy. By the way, if that happens to you? Don't trap yourself in a room with no lights. Evil shadows don't need light to live, and will tell you so themselves in the same breath that they're insulting you."

[fangirlfatale.livejournal.com]

"Hey, don't rule out the possibility until we're sure. Especially since he's the most likely suspect whenever your wife goes missing." Aside from Elaine herself, of course. She was probably just off somewhere with three sea chimps in drag.

Morgan nodded as Guybrush went through the answer to her questions. "That's not a good sign," she commented when Guybrush mentioned the weapon. "Something tells me Elaine probably wouldn't leave her room voluntarily without her sword, especially right after getting it made." She ran down the revised list of options: Elaine could have been kidnapped (again) during the day; she could have been taken at night by an armed mob (not likely--any mob member worth his salt would've taken the sword); there was even a slim chance she could've left to go somewhere where she needed to be unarmed. A meeting with LeChuck? Didn't seem likely.

Which left her...where? Usually she tracked pirates down by reputation or whatever info she could pick up on them. This wasn't exactly that kind of situation. She could try to search the room, maybe intimidate some possible witnesses, she guessed, but... "Do you know if they've replaced her with someone else in that room?"

So something weird had happened to Guybrush last night too. "Thanks for the tip," Morgan said. No, her shadow hadn't gotten poxy, and no, she wasn't feeling talkative about it. She frowned. "Either way, here's my solution. We wait until this evening, grab one of the nurses, hold a blade to her throat and demand she tell us where Elaine is. In my experience, that usually works. If not, there are enough of those sea hags here that we could keep going for a while."

[threepwood]

"LeChuck does have the worst reputation for Elaine-napping, but she's capable of handling herself when it comes to him," Guybrush said in partial agreement. "It's the fact that she's nowhere to be seen now, that she's been replaced in her room already, and that she was brought here from so far from the rest of us that has me worried. Still not sure why that is, by the way. I figure Landel had to grab us when we were unaware we'd be pulled through time and space, whether it was because we were cursed into gold or dead. Or almost dead. Or very, very dead."

Still, Guybrush had to admit that Morgan was thinking on the same wavelength he was: if they'd been in any other circumstance, LeChuck would have been his first suspect, hand (and hook) down. And LeChuck had been the one to suggest they work together in the first place!

... But this was the same LeChuck who paraded around as Goody McNicepants with his flowing beard and charming smile, only to betray them all and steal La Esponja Grande. It was right up his alley to shake with one hand and impale with the other.

"On the other hand," Guybrush said with an irritated look, already peeved by the idea that LeChuck had actually schemed up the whole fake-asylum scenario as his most ludicrously elaborate kidnap-Elaine-and-humiliate-Guybrush plot yet, "you do make some good points, and even though I'd much rather leave people in one piece, your method does tend to get results." He nodded. "Let's go with your plan. I've already tried playing nice. If the nurses won't tell me during the day where Elaine has gone, we'll make them cooperate at night. But, you know, let's not actually hurt them too badly. I'd rather not have Stanley show up to defend me for a murder charge, too."

[fangirlfatale.livejournal.com]

Wow, she hadn't actually thought Guybrush would agree to that. She'd already been bracing herself for an alternative plan involving talking to everyone in the entire building repeatedly, stealing everything that wasn't nailed down (and maybe some things that were) and trying to fit it all into their pants, and probably getting chased by an angry mob bent on engineering a break-up between their heads and their necks. At least the last part sounded pretty interesting.

Morgan quickly mastered her surprise and jumped right back into her orders. "Right. Someone put up a map of the building with the 'staff' areas marked today. I'll get a copy before they drag us back for dinner. Meet me in the main hallway right by the cell blocks and we'll go carve some answers right out of them!" She caught Guybrush's eye and her grin quickly subdued itself. "Fine. Only in ways that won't leave too much residual scarring.

"You did get Elaine's sword while you were in her room, didn't you?"

[threepwood]

"Oh Mo," Guybrush said with a smirk, "You think I'd leave something like that behind, even if it wasn't Elaine's? Of course I grabbed it! Oh, you should see it. The blade is just the way she likes, the handle curving perfectly to fit her slender..."

He got the vague feeling she didn't want to hear about this. "You'll see it tonight. Trust me, it's perfect. She'll be happy I grabbed it when we find her. If we find her. We'll find her." No matter how much the situation pointed otherwise, he couldn't give up hope, especially when his future depended on Elaine's safety. If she was gone, what would he have left? What good was searching for treasure and adventure on the high seas without his Plunderbunny?

He wasn't willing to give up yet. It took more than some time-travel and a disappearance of his wife-of-the-past to make Guybrush cave. "Okay, so main hallway tonight. I'll swing by LeChuck's to see if he wants to come along. Torture is sort of his thing. I prefer the Q&A."