inaugural tdm of unspecified duration.

[vestigemods]

VESTIGE TEST DRIVE MEME

WHAT IS THIS?

This is a test drive meme for Vestige is a musebox-game successor to The Box (yeah, the one that died like five years ago). It's invite-only with no activity check and almost no application to speak of.

This is a horror jamjar based on Cabin In The Woods, in which characters are pulled into this containment zone run by the Technicians working from a lab underground with the goal of creating Good Quality Suffering™️ to appease the elder gods who hover on the verge of creating a worldwide apocalypse. But of course, suffering is pointless if everyone is too numb to properly suffer, so there are plenty of morale boosts provided in between bouts of fear and misery.

This TDM is ongoing and will fill the gap between now and when I get around to setting up the comms. There is no official start date and currently literally nothing but this TDM available for perusal, but I'll update this section of the blurb as that changes. Threads in this TDM are welcome to be game canon once this shit opens because fuck it. If you have questions, feel free to ask in the top-level below or just wing it tbh, we'll be doing a lot of winging it up in this shit.

Characters arrive with all powers intact and carrying all items that they had with them on their canonpoint.

Also, feel free to hit up the Intro + Friending meme to network with your future peers in this suffering endeavor. (EDIT 5/20: We also now have a DISCORD SERVER! So hop on into that if you'd like.)

PROMPT 1 ► just your ordinary cabin in the woods

⬛ARRIVAL + GENERAL PROMPT

Whenever you're from or wherever you were, you awaken now with the mildest of headaches in a medium-sized wooden cabin. Maybe you wake in a bed, barely padded and covered in dust (so are you now, congrats!). Maybe you wake on the floor, arguably softer than the bed in spots thanks to some handy dandy water damage. Either way, you certainly aren't where you were before, and you have no recollection whatsoever of arriving.

The cabin is modest but multi-roomed and fully kitted with a kitchen and cozy living room. Nice, dry wood sits stacked by the fireplace, and if you check the various switches, the lights turn on with only the faintest protesting static. The cabinets are surprisingly well-stocked, as is the fridge, with perishables and non-perishables alike. As if someone has been here recently... but how, when everything else seems so thoroughly abandoned?

Should you choose to ignore the cabin's supposed hospitality and try to leave, you'll find that both the front and back doors are securely locked, in a way that no amount of fumbling with the locking mechanism seems to remedy.

That's when a sloooooow creak draws your attention to a door nearby, one you may not have noticed before... but it's open now. Was it before? Better yet, should you check out what lies beyond?

PROMPT 2 ► who's up for some fighty-fight, kids??

⬛MONSTER HORROR.

The basement is musty and dim, though a pull-string at the curve of the creaky stairs seems to turn on a sparse row of lightbulbs dangling precariously from the ceiling along the center of the room. This little bit of light illuminates a room absolutely packed with items, furniture and boxes and various knick-knacks of unknown and questionable origin. Spiderwebs litter nooks and crannies, many with actual spiders still nesting inside, and a layer of dust coats most every surface in sight.

It doesn't seem like there's anyone down here, nor is there any sign of an exit at the basement's far end. There is, however, something that catches your eye. An item, one that your feet seem to carry you toward without your mind quite telling them to do so. Perhaps it's familiar somehow. Perhaps it's so foreign to you that you can't help but get a closer look. One way or another, you somehow end up reaching out to touch it. But what harm can that do, a single touch?

Oh, sweet summer child. Haven't you seen this movie?




---




Whatever else your characters might touch, to activate this prompt they'll also touch one of the following five items:


• A child's drawing, of what appears to be... shit, what even is that? Is it a bat? Is it some kind of... reptile? We just don't know. (result! warnings for gore/violence.)
  
  
• A light-blue paper face mask, the sort used in hospitals for patients who have a cold. Maybe you guys should've brought masks too. It sure would keep all this dust the hell out of your nose... ( result! warning for body horror! )
  
  
• A buzzsaw blade, dusty but intact. ( result! warnings for gore/violence. )
  
  
• A music box, covered in faded yellow flowers. I wonder what music it plays? ( result! warnings for gore/violence and Alarming Children. )
  
  
• A funeral urn. But... It seems that someone glued it shut around the edges? I guess that's one way to make sure nobody spills grandma. ( result! )

These enemies can and will follow characters outside, should they try to flee. It might actually be a good idea to face these foes outdoors where it's less confined, provided they don't stray too far from the cabin (see prompt #4).

The blurbs are just guidelines, feel free to scale up or down how strong/weak the monsters are, how many there are, etc. in order to better fit your characters' level of capability. The Technicians know your characters' strengths and weaknesses, so they'd know how to send enough to make this challenging but not insurmountable.

PROMPT 3 ► congratulations, you fucked up

⬛SURVIVAL HORROR.

Perhaps you didn't touch anything in the basement. Hell, maybe you didn't even set foot through that ominous basement door. But hey, we get it. Not everyone likes to party. You're not getting off easy, but at least you can say that you didn't fall into the trap.

If, by the time an hour has passed since the creaking open of the basement door, no object has been touched and no baddie has been summoned, you'll find your nose assaulted by the prevailing smell of smoke. One glance out any window tells you why: The cabin has been surrounded in it, an oblong ring of fire six feet thick burning tight along the exterior cabin walls. You're safe inside for the moment, but how long will that last?

Now, you have no choice but to try to escape the blaze. It overtakes the cabin quickly, creeping up over the rooftop, shattering windows and burning a path inside. No matter which way you try to run, you're almost certain to get burned... But that's certainly better than burning to death in here.

PROMPT 4 ► "escape"? never heard of her.

⬛PSYCHOLOGICAL HORROR.

For some, staying in this creepy cabin with its stupid locked door was never an option. Maybe you break one of the windows and crawl through that, or maybe you're angry and OP and punched a man-sized hole in the wall itself. Hey, we're not judging. You got yourself outside, and that's what counts.

The outside of the cabin is... actually pretty nice. Picturesque woods, birds singing, perhaps a couple of deer bounding through the trees not far off. This place might actually be relaxing, if it weren't so alarming and kidnap-y. But it is, so it's time to get the fuck out of Dodge.

Or to try to, anyway. Just a few short meters into the trees, you find yourself entering a deep and all-encompassing fog. You can barely see your hand out in front of your face, let alone your path through the forest ahead. If you're not alone in this venture, you'd best keep a hand on your companion lest you lose track of them, as well. And is it just you, or is there a slight chemical taste to the fog that you're breathing in?

(Yes. The answer is definitely yes.)

Before long, you find yourself turned around, stepping back out of the fog with the cabin in front of you. Little do you realize that simply turning you around is the most merciful fate that this fog has to offer.

---

This is easier to break down without narrative, so!

• The first time your character ventures into the fog, they're just turned around and sent back to the cabin.
  
  
• The second time, they hallucinate things that they don't want to hear. Something they fear, something that hurts them, something that stresses them the fuck out. Maybe a character's worst fear is wildcats and they hear one growling just out of sight in the mist. Maybe instead they hear a loved one crying for help back in the direction from which they've come, drawing them back to the cabin. Or maybe they hear the voice of someone they admire berating their cowardice or stupidity or something, for running away from the cabin in the first place. The goal is to psych them out and send them running back to the place where the action is happening.
  
  
• The third time, it's the same but full-blown visual or even physical hallucinations. Basically anything that might lure, scare, emotionally wound, etc. them into going back to the vicinity of the cabin.

Characters are welcome to start off venturing into the mist together, or to discover one another while they're already in the mist. If it's the latter, look out - it may be harder to tell friend from foe when you can't quite trust your own mind.

THE LOOP ► a note on replayability

Regardless of which prompt your character faces, they'll be left unbothered after the creature is defeated or the problem is overcome until sunrise the following morning. Though the fog still keeps characters from straying from the area, they're welcome to recover and lick their wounds in the immediate cabin vicinity. An unburnt cabin leaves them food and resting facilities, while a burnt cabin... Well, at least the fire never spread from that self-contained ring, so they have some nice unburnt grass to sleep on.

Come sunrise, all characters still awake will fall unconscious. At this point, many of them will reawaken in a perfectly undamaged cabin back in Prompt #1 to begin the loop anew. They may have the same comrades in this loop, or perhaps they have different ones. Maybe their new companions have done this before as well. Maybe they're brand new and have no idea what they're up against. R.I.P., you poor unsuspecting fucks.

This is, in effect, a series of trial runs by the current batch of Technicians to see if they're able to run this containment zone scenario long-term. When Vestige opens properly, characters will awaken free of the loop and will have quite a bit more continuity and recovery time between horrors. The 'loop' mechanic is specifically in place to give this TDM some shelf life and let y'all entertain yourselves while I work on the actual pages and such, rather than the one-and-done feeling of the usual TDM.

CODE BY TESSISAMESS (patreon)

Comments

[channellings]

[yeah, yeah, it's a good point made and klaus can admit that despite his reservation. upstairs, they'll have more room to move, maybe trap whatever it is up here in an empty room to give themselves a better chance. he's frightened, but he shall gather his courage for them too, get downright stalwart, even.

it's only a couple more steps and they're at the door, he reaches out, grips the knob with his thumb and first two fingers.] Alright, on three.

One, [as he grips the doorhandle tighter.] Two— [klaus exhales the breath he didn't know he was holding then:] Three...! [and throws the door open, stepping forward when it swings out, knife at the ready in case anything's immediately coming their way.]

[channellings]

[god, he missed this little feral forest gremlin so much. a soft oof is his response to the kick, although he hardly even flinches, let alone moves with the gesture.

first comes a fleeting glance around them, his attention lingering on a nearby window before directing back to lalli after consideration.] Good question, [klaus admits.] Looks like some backwoods nightmare bullshit to me.

[channellings]

[way more polite than klaus's planning to be; he's pretty sure he has never bowed to anyone in his entire life and, despite huaisang being as cute as he is, he's not about to start.

man, teaching everyone about friendly affection all over again? actually, let's be honest, klaus is kind of about it whenever he considers. getting lalli used to it had been interesting, sharing tactility with emil was always good, so why not help other repressed people out, too? it'd be an injustice if he didn't help them, frankly, because everyone should experience how great casual physicality is.]

Huaisang it is. [then comes a brief fingergunning motion directed huaisang's way and he clicks his tongue.]

Sure there are, doll. Here, [he crooks the same fingers of the hand he's already raised, beckoning huaisang even closer as he strides toward the nearest lightswitch.] I dunno that everything is as strange as a lightswitch, but I'm sure we'll find something bizarre if we keeping searching long enough.

[wittingly]

[ A defensiveness flares up in him on instinct, that want to deny there's anything wrong with him or the choice he's made. To pretend like it's a totally reasonable choice, a healthy decision in any capacity. It's not bad because he's choosing it, right? It's not like he can't, it's not like there's something wrong with him preventing it, it's a choice. It can't be bad if it's a choice.

A choice made out of fear and old hurt and unresolved problems.

She smoked through the entire time. Even through the chemo, she just kept smoking. Didn't qualify for a transplant because no doctor would fucking bother, even if she had the insurance to cover it.

Ian, honey, what's the point in stopping now if it's already got me?

She didn't have to leave him, she just did it anyway.

It's hard to swallow for a second, and his tongue passes over his teeth behind his lips. Shakes his head in lieu of speaking for a minute. ]

Nah, I'm... I'm good, man. I don't need it, you know? I have enough... stuff in my life.

[ Which is... it's a knee-jerk answer, and it doesn't accurately reflect the present anymore, does it? He needs Mace like he needs fucking breathing.

But he's been telling himself that line over and over for years. He has work, he has a social life, he has coworkers and students and projects and other forms of fulfillment.

He doesn't have to need anybody. He doesn't want to need anybody.

And where that leaves them, where it leaves them if they get out of here? He can't even... start to unpack it. That might be clear in his sudden quiet, and in the way he stares deliberately outward toward the opposite cave wall.

I don't mean you-

Or maybe he does. Fuck, he doesn't know right now. ]

[hydraulics]

[ Ah, so that’s where he’d fucked up that first time, back in the cabin. Psycho-analyzing him out loud, incorrectly feeling out the things in between the lines that Ian wasn’t saying — you do want a hypothetical somebody — because from the sound of it, it’s not just that Ian doesn’t need anybody, he doesn’t even want them.

From the sound of it.

It'd make things less complicated if Ian’d said it differently than he had, said it with full confidence and without having to swallow and pause, in a way that would leave no room for doubt in Mace’s mind. After all, he wouldn’t have to make sure he himself gets out alive too, could focus on Ian and Ian alone.

But Mace isn’t so sure he believes him completely right now.

The silence that follows is heavier than it’s been thus far between them, and Mace’s eyes flicker down to Ian’s motionless head — not forehead anymore, because he’s studiously looking at the wall across from them, mercifully devoid of foreboding obituary headlines. He wonders if they're thinking about the same thing right now, of a what if scenario where they both make it out of here together.

And maybe it's the thought of that which has him asking abruptly: ]

Anybody ever try to fight you on that?

[ He realizes after the fact that it might come across as him trying to present himself as an option, which. Judging by the silence Ian's settled into after what he just said, it's probably not what he wants to hear. Not something reassuring, but something claustrophobic instead, and they're already in a cave.

Great. This isn't what he'd been aiming for with that kiss, had only wanted to take Ian out of his thoughts and out of their bleak reality for a few moments, not shove him deeper into it. With a quiet humour in his voice that he's not entirely feeling, Mace adds, ]

A student get too pushy? 'Cause, you know. I'll punch out a freshman if I have to, I don't give a fuck.

[wittingly]

[ The question does take him aback, has him flickering his eyes over and up again to parse out Mace's intention. Why, are you gonna try? The little furrow in his brow doesn't give away much about how he feels about the idea, probably. An inscrutable little divot, a wrinkle.

Picks up on the caveat, too, and that it's probably an attempt to mitigate the assertiveness the first question implies. He offers up a small consolation smile to ease the tension out, a little fond, maybe a touch sad. ]

I appreciate the offer. Your willingness to punk out a freshman is an extremely attractive quality. But no. I've never really given them the chance.

[ He ghosts, or he does that "taking the high road" thing where he acts like "the bigger person" and calmly but resolutely states that it's not gonna work out, and he has to go, and that's it. End of transaction.

He shifts, knees coming up, one hand breaking away from their little hold to scrub across his face - mouth, beard, both. ]

I didn't mean to make it... complicated. Honestly, I don't know what in the hell I'm doing, man. I don't know what... If we met anywhere else I'd have bolted, but we're not anywhere else. We're here. So. I don't know what that means, or if I even know how to do...

[ This. Whatever they're doing. ]

I just know we're doing it.

[ In a... nonsexual sense, but like, that too. ]

[hydraulics]

[ He glances down just in time to catch that little smile in the growing darkness of the cave, and returns it with a wink of his own; the humour's easier this time, more honest. ]

I know, it’s on all my hookup profiles. [ Let he who hasn’t wanted a smarmy undergrad to get his goddamn lights punched out cast the first stone. It’s what Jesus would’ve wanted, too.

Although he’s still a bit confused, same as he was when they’d first touched on the topic with Ian’s college infatuation dude. Never really given them the chance —

In Mace’s book of one-or-two-or-maybe-three night stands, that’s usually along the lines of the final morning after conversation where both parties decide that was great, let’s not do it again. But that’s both sides, coming to a joint agreement. This sounded like it was something else.

But. Ian’s scrubbing a hand across his face, knees folding up, and there’s a continuing uncertainty in his voice that Mace automatically wants to make go away somehow. They’ve got enough to be unsure about as it is; there’s probably a fuckin’ dead body here somewhere, and knowing their luck and this place, she might decide to become very much undead soon enough.

What they have isn't something Ian needs to doubt, or worry about. Evenly, with a faint, sad smile of his own aimed at the back of Ian's tousled hair: ]

And we’ll keep doing it until we can’t. As long as you want it … [ In the non-sexual sense, in the sexual sense, and everything in between. ] I’m good. And when that changes, you make sure I know. That’s your only job. Until then —

[ Outside, the fog goes from a dim murky grey to pitch black, as if the Sun’s been swallowed by the horizon. All the steadiness in Mace is replaced by a sudden stab of disquiet; the hand Ian had let go of had been the one around the bottle. They’re both holding onto the knife still, Mace's grip tightening on it and trying to tug Ian a little closer at the same time as he sets the tequila down with a loud clink.

His now free hand goes out to fumble for the box of matches he’d left at their side, fingers picking one out blindly. It’s stupid of him, but he doesn’t want to let go of Ian in the dark. Not without the weight of him back in his arms, or the sight of his face. ]

Ian, hold the matchbox, I’ll light one up.

[wittingly]

[ He wants, more than anything, to find the right words to say that are both honest and reassuring. He wants to make promises he doesn't think he can keep, and he wants to believe them himself. It's an almost overwhelming urge all of a sudden to make Mace feel like he really... like this is more than just about surviving. More than just about here.

He wants to say I don't let anyone in and I never wanted to, I still don't want to, but I'm pretty sure you're already in and I want you to stay there even though that fucking terrifies me.

But he won't, and he can't, because the world reminds them rather abruptly that what they're worried about is fucking stupid.

They should've been building a fucking fire. They should've been sharpening some fucking stakes and setting them up at the mouth of the cave. They should've been doing literally anything other than sitting together talking about their fucking relationship and he hates himself for it.

For the wash of cold sliding through every bit of him.

He grips onto Mace too tightly, like they're reading one another's minds. Never again, please never let go again, please don't let them rip one of us away.

He passes his free hand along the back of Mace's clasped one, so he can feel where to put the matchbox.

He needn't have bothered; the blue glow starts up of its own volition in Ian's wrist. Radiating out from the veins, the bones, traveling up through his wrist and into his palm. illuminating the immediate area with dim light. ]

[hydraulics]

[ The relief that goes through him at the feeling of Ian's hand tightening around his own is only comparable to the one he feels when a familiar blue filters softly from Ian's other wrist, even before Mace can strike the match to the side of the box.

And he pauses, because for a moment he thinks maybe Ian's making something. But a beat passes with nothing forthcoming, and then Mace gives an anxious side-glance to the rest of the cave before a tiny flame flickers to life. Small, yellow light, enough for Mace to be able to see Ian's face in a warm glow when he lifts it up close.

All the pensiveness, the vague sadness and the humour and that strange-cute divot in the middle of his brow when he'd been listening to Mace, all of it's gone. Wiped clean, replaced by fear. ]

It's okay. Ian. Hey.

[ Fuck, but it isn't, or it won't be for long anyway. Mace could wring his own goddamned neck for wasting this much time. For letting the warmth of Ian's body seep into his own until he was half-thinking with his heart and half-thinking with his dick, instead of getting off his fucking ass and pre-emptively protecting that body.

For not telling him of what he'd seen on the wall behind them until now. ]

It'll be okay. But there's something I gotta. [ An amendment, as he shuffles forward a little, still gripping Ian's hand like a lifeline. The other hand sweeps the match around in a half-circle around them, with him not as worried about it going out, now that he knows Ian can summon up his blue light like a flashlight.

That worry comes roaring back cold and hard when he sees the far end of the cave.

The rucksack is gone.

The furs are torn open.

The lamp is shattered, upside down.

Do you know how he killed Mary?

The match burns out and Mace quickly goes to light up another one, cursing under his breath at how he fumbles one-handed. They're gonna need another slow-burning plate, they're gonna need another knife if Ian can manage it, but if he can't, that's fine. Mace just needs to get him behind him and not let go. ]

I think somebody was murdered here. It was written the wall behind us, I.

[ In the darkness in front of them, from the wall they'd been staring at not one minute ago, something gives a very low, very sibilant hiss. ]

[wittingly]

[ What's really fucking him up initially, what's fucking him up too much to feel comforted by Mace's voice, too much to notice the disruption to the furs is-- he's not doing that. He's not making it. He's not lighting himself up, it's just happening like it's beyond his control. The same way his heart rate is beyond his control. He's staring down at his hand with lips parted and staggering uncertainty gripping at him.

It's a kind of body horror he can't describe, that maybe Mace won't understand. Having this thing that's part of him, that he knows intrinsically, that he has always controlled suddenly be different is like-- it's like if colors switched in your eyes, and everything red was now green. You can still see, it's just wrong and that sudden change, that wrongness, it's scary.

I think someone was murdered here, it was written on the wall--

Why the fuck are they still here then--

Shhhh-

Ian's body moves faster than his mind. His knees were already up, it takes absolutely no thought for them to start skidding against the rock with enough force to drive him backwards, half-stumbling, half dragging Mace with the clutching grip they've got on each other's hands. It fills the cave with papery scuffing sounds, and it's punctuated by the sharp, staggering gasps that suddenly replace his breathing - that pre-hyperventilation sound. It's knee-jerk, it's pure flight, pure fear, instant distancing. Blue light illuminates them like a goddamn beacon, like bioluminescent fish in the deep, dark parts of the ocean where the sun can't reach.

He can't make it stop.

It isn't strong enough for him to see what's in the distant dark. ]

[hydraulics]

[ One minute they’re both raised up on their knees, trying to get a better look at the rest of the cave with whatever light they can muster (or so Mace thinks) — the next, Ian’s all but hauling him back, until they’re hitting the wall with their backs flat against it, unable to physically go any further. Scuttling backward like some strange fleshy crab.

The only thing that keeps Mace from getting even briefly lost in the sudden, ugly flood of fear in his veins is the sound of Ian’s breathing, ratcheting up from normal to something staccato and loud and gasping, a precursor to what sounds like some kind of an attack. He sounds terrified. Fuck. And Mace can’t even —

Mace firmly shakes the hold they’ve got on each other, a bracing rattle of fingers, his eyes still straining to see ahead of them despite how badly he wants to look at Ian again, help him, calm him down. Quietly: ]

Stay with me. I need you.

[ Okay. Okay, fuck. Think, Mace. They’ve got the knife. He has the matches, pocketed them right before that goddamn hiss that made the hair at the back of his neck stand up — he readjusts his grip on Ian, making up his mind. His peripheral vision able to tell him by the blue glow that Ian’s still right next to him, breathing fast and hard. Thank fuck for the tether.

Another hiss, slow and wet and dragging, echoes from the dark.

Mace grits his teeth, and starts moving slowly ahead with the match held aloft. The light passes over the bottle of tequila only a few feet away, which might probably come in real fucking handy very soon. Another step as he senses something up ahead, purely through instinct.

Stops when he’s about far as he can go without disentangling their grip, still with some give to the tether. Then the yellow halo of the match just about manages to shed light on what's in front of them, and Mace’s stomach turns to lead when he sees it.

It’s female. Long, straggling hair obscuring its face, head bent at a slight angle, arms rictus straight at the sides with fingers straining back unnaturally, the palms facing the floor, and the feet —

The feet.

They’re pointing backward.

Mace’s brain, for a handful of horrible seconds, stops processing what he’s seeing. Bony, bloodless heels facing him. Feet can’t be pointing backward. It shouldn’t be able to fucking stand if that were the case, wouldn’t be able to balance properly, Jesus Christ — ]

Ian. [ Barely above a breath, as he stumbles back to Ian’s side in the dark as quickly as he can without tripping over his own damn feet, letting the flame go out. It’s better that way. Positions himself so that he’s blocking the light of Ian's arm with his torso, standing right in front of him. ]

Gotta turn that thing off.

[ Again, a hiss. Drawn-out and watery and a lot closer this time, as Mace realizes with growing dread what that fucking sound is. It's fucking breathing. ]

[legbreakings]

"I have... I have every right?" he hisses out between clenched teeth. "It's not you who decides what right I have! You have no right to give me permission! I don't need your blessing!"

He doesn't want this to be another noble, futile self-sacrifice, doesn't want to end up standing there again drinking wine that tastes like the ashes being scattered. This time it will be vengeance. This time, he will come away feeling something other than numb and sick and robbed by something he is told would be justice and yet didn't feel like it at all.

This time... he just needs Wen Ning to stop talking before he sees a man instead of the monster who took everything from him.

He's crying freely again, he doesn't even notice it until his face is wet with tears and a sob works its way out of his throat. "You did cause me pain!" he bellows, screaming at the top of his lungs now and it feels so good to be screaming that he never ever wants to stop. "You took them all away from me! If you hadn't killed him they wouldn't have died and now you tell me you are sorry!" His fingers tighten on Sandu's handle, it is slick with sweat now by now while the blade is already coated in Wen Ning's blood. There is red in front of his eyes, a world of red, the red that pooled when the blade pierced Yanli for the second time, the blood that spilled from her lips, the blood that Wei Wuxian shed when he turned the battlefield into a massacre, the blood he never even got to see because he didn't get so much as a corpse to burn... "You've got no right to be sorry!"

A shudder runs through him and the blade twitches forward. Later, Jiang Cheng won't even be able to say for sure if he truly made the decision to push or if it was a mistake made in the heat of the moment, when he only wished to frighten him - or maybe he simply won't want to be able to say, and find professing ignorance easier.

In this moment, another choking sob runs through him as the blade pushes forward.

[legbreakings]

"If this were an actual date it would mean I could stand you, so of course you would stand a better chance," he snaps, shooting Klaus one of these withering scowls of his in his very best attempt to hide how utterly flustered he is still looking. The cute ones! Klaus had called him cute. Cute when he is clearly handsome and very intimidating. He pauses, thinking for a moment, and as he thinks, his hands clench and unclench and clench again at his sides. He really, really wants to shake this man but that would require touching him and that is just going to encourage more flirting. And on that note... "But that would still be no chance because I'm not shameless and I don't just go around sleeping with people!"

Theoretically speaking, if he had dates. On his theoretical dates with theoretical people, he would not be theoretically sleeping with anyone.

"And what right do you have anyway to call me cute!" he finally blurts out, unable to ignore it even for a moment longer though that's another point on which he knows better than to encourage. "Do I look like a fluffy dog to you?!"

[wittingly]

[ Stay with me, and it takes Ian some real work to unpack that he means mentally rather than physically. He'd have laughed at that last one, if he could, because there isn't a force on fucking earth that could convince him to let go of his own free will right now. Nothing, not even if Mace asked him to, he doesn't think he could convince his fingers to unfurl.

But mentally. Okay. Stay checked in. God, fuck, a big animal part of his mind doesn't want to. It'd be easier to succumb to the mindless instinct that his brain pulses with, the kind that deer get when they spot a hunter. He's not terribly far off from being one himself.

He can't. He can't.

Just a minute ago he was thinking, we gotta get Mace out so he can be a father.

Tries to use that to ground himself. Efficacy yet to be determined. A good stress test comes immediately, when that firelight match illuminates the thing sharing their cave.

Oh, god.

Oh, god.

His throat clicks shut, it has to, because otherwise he'd whine out a distressed what's she gonna do? Because they all do something, don't they? There's never one that just stands politely in the corner and minds their own fucking business. Lets them leave. It's never that.

But he's got enough composure not to do that, even if he's straining their grip with how hard he's peeling himself back up against that wall again.

Mace is in his space. Ian presses his forearms into his own chest to try and mute it, to softly whisper: ]

I c-

[ A false start, he has to swallow and try again. ]

I can't, I'm not doing it. I'm not- I think it's her.

[ Softly, with no explanation toward how he came to the conclusion.

He just...

The thing in the woods. The flickering of his glow that came from nowhere. The knowledge that the threat wasn't over as a result of it. This place... these things... they gotta be doing something to his body. The adrenaline, the fear, maybe - he doesn't know, but he can't fucking stop it. ]

[mannerless]

( he hears her call, so desperately worried, and it's all wei wuxian can do not to put down the flute and call out some sort of reassurance - but instead, he dutifully continues to play, stepping out through the door and into the path through the flames.

it closes up behind him, tight enough on his tail that it singes the tail of his ribbon, but he does make it through to where yanli awaits. then and only then does he let the flute leave his lips, swiping away a bit of what feels like a minor nosebleed while his other hand finds his shijie's shoulder, guiding again but not so urgently now that they're theoretically free. ) Let's - ( a cough, pardon him, and he tries again. ) Let's get away from the smoke. ( the treeline should be safe enough for now. he knows what lies in the fog in the woods and he'd rather not venture that far, not with shijie in toe. if the fire spreads this far, well. they'll cross that bridge when they get to it. )

[mannerless]

( 'are you going to try it?' well now he has to, doesn't he? wei wuxian narrows his eyes at the bottle a moment longer, but he's already unscrewing the cap again by the time huaisang follows up with encouragement.

it hisses again.

wei ying retaliates by pouring some into his mouth.

his brow knits again, and he swallows his mouthful of liquid with mild confusion. ) It tastes... Like fruit, but angry. You try. ( and he holds the bottle out to huaisang. )

[mannerless]

( by now wei wuxian has grown quite accustomed to wen ning's newfound sturdiness, so while he winces faintly at the throw, he doesn't risk sparing the landing a glance. instead, he bloodies a second finger and fires off one talisman and then another and another in an attempt to do as ning was trying to do and herd it back out the door, each one colliding with the creature and bursting into flame. but while the talismans are enough to have stopped it from encroaching any further at the moment (at least as long as he keeps them coming), they're also not pushing the beast back any.

at the very least, he starts to make his way around the creature in the opposite direction from the one where it tossed wen ning. if one of them can make it to the door and then make a fuss, they can probably lure the thing outside rather than trying to push it. )

[hydraulics]

[ I’m not doing it, Ian says, his voice so faint and shaken that just hearing it would be enough for Mace to know what state he’s in, even without the way his panicked breathing had been on the verge of hyperventilation. The distress is rolling off of him in waves and it has Mace inching into him with his whole body, unconscious and protective. Probably pressing him a little too hard into the wall behind the both of them, straightening his back and widening the stance of his shoulders, despite the way his hindbrain instincts are telling him to hunch them forward instead, reduce surface area and chance of —

Chance of what?

Another rattling, damp intake of air, too close for comfort, too soon for it to make any sense because there’s no fucking footsteps, and Mace’s thoughts flash back to the way those fingers had been curled back, the rotting nails giving way to sharp, blackened bone.

If it. No, if she curled them forward instead — ]

All right, easy.

[ Breathed out gently, knowing what it must be taking for Ian to control his fear, is eyes trying to use the slight blue glow still in the air around them to track any movement in the dark in front of them. Ian’s not doing it, I think it's her, and somehow this godforsaken place must’ve managed to hijack his superpowers, use it for its own evil fucking purposes.

The methodical part of Mace’s brain wants devote time to figuring out why, and the more primitive, knee-jerk part of him is instantly furious, even through the rising fear, that they’re doing something so invasive to his person, which, what the fuck brain —

But they don’t have time. They have.

The knife, in the hand that Ian’s got a death grip around and Mace already knows there’s no way he’s gonna let go, and the bottle of tequila that’s too fucking far away for him to be able to grasp it and stuff it with cloth.

Ssssssssss —

Click.

That wasn’t. Her. That was …

Mace swallows and presses Ian back into the wall with something that’s almost a backward thrust at this point, and —

Click. ]

Ian, it's not a wall. [ A sudden, realizing whisper, because a lightbulb’s going off in his head that’s telling him, what if it’s not just a wall, what if it’s a fucking door. If Ian can feel along the stonework, find something that triggers it into opening —

The vague snatches of a plan are beginning to formulate in Mace’s mind, and he slowly moves forward again, this time with purpose, ears cocked and eyes peeled, albeit to very little effect. Doesn’t need to light up a match because he knows almost exactly where that tequila bottle is now, and it won’t be a molotov cocktail but it’ll be something.

His fingers close around the neck of it.

And that’s when he realizes he can't hear anymore hissing. ]

[wittingly]

[ He doesn't even think - he doesn't even know if it's necessarily this place hijacking him. It might be, it might be her using it to locate him in the dark, but he's starting to think...

Maybe it's just him. Maybe this place is changing him, maybe he's changing himself to suit it. All of the duress, the constant fear, the constant panic, the desperation for something, anything... Maybe this is the anything. Adapting like Darwinism. Lighting up to warn him against predators.

Luring them in might just be an accidental side-effect.

Although, sometimes in nature bright things mean danger. Snakes. Spiders. Bees. Things that are vibrant and colorful are typically venomous. Poisonous.

Maybe that should be reassuring.

It's not a wall what? He's- pretty fucking sure it's a wall, they were against it, they were looking at it, right?

Fuck it, he's going on nothing but trust. Mace is a fucking genius, if he's saying it with so much confidence then it's probably true. He reels his glowing arm away from his chest, turning so that they're nearly back to back. Shining his light on the reflective surface behind him while Mace dips for the tequila bottle.

They wouldn't have seen it in flickering firelight, centered in the middle of the room and casting strange shadows. They wouldn't have seen it in daylight, probably, with the way it streams from the mouth of the cave.

The only fucking way it's possible to have seen it is with this bright blue, this direct shine that lights up the perfect, straight edge - a seam that's almost-flush but not quite. Not natural, maybe man-made.

A sudden, frantic groping until he finds a groove that feels like a fucking hand print. ]

Fuck- I think I found it, I think-

[ He presses down. ]

[porndealer]

[Again, Wuxian is much braver than him any day. He just goes for it and doesn't immediately die so...]

Okay-!

[Licking his lips he takes the bottle looking VERY DETERMINED, he can do this. Just like Wuxian! Screwing his eyes shut, Huaisang tips his head back and downs some of the liquid in the bottle, swallowing before he can over think it.

Wuxian hadn't been wrong it does bite! It surprises him still, getting a bit if a sputter, but thankfully he'll manage to not spit every where.]

It's good, but... so strange.

[He's just gonna take another cautious little sip, squinting at the bottle after, before holding it back out to Wuxian.]

Feels weird, but I kinda like it.

[hydraulics]

[ Only in the ensuing silence, punctuated faintly by the sound of Ian’s breathing, does Mace understand how he’d been relying on the godawful hissing as much as he’d hated it. Letting him know where that fucking thing was, allowing him to orient himself to where it was coming from so he could unconsciously meld his body in between the sound and Ian. Keep track.

Now he’s well and truly blind. She could be anywhere. Sure as fuck isn’t gone; there’s still that alien, hunted distress prickling along his skin, the sensation of being watched in the dark. He picks up the tequila with fingers that are suddenly cold, his other hand in Ian’s grip starting to feel strangely clammy, his eyes darting around them in the heartbeat it takes for him to draw back to where Ian is.

Their backs touch. Mace wedges the bottle between his legs, fumbling for the matches as dread pools down his spine, lighting up a match. Nothing around them, nothing at the mouth of the cave, where the fuck —

I found it, Ian says, and the relief that lances through Mace is as short-lived as it is powerful, his reply dying on his tongue as the click of Ian’s hand is followed by a

SNAP.
SNAP.
SNAP SNAP SNAP.

It’s not the slow, grating sound of stone against stone as the wall gives way easily, becoming an opening. It's the sound of bones breaking, shattering, dead fingers turning into claws.

And it's coming from the ceiling.

Mace’s blood turns to ice, realizing in a single, terrifying second that he’s been outmaneuvered, knowing before he fully finishes looking up that she’d been hanging inches away from Ian, in the dark. In the rounded corner between the wall and the ceiling, just above their heads, crouched over them like a fucking spider — ]

Motherfuck!

[ Blindly, he smashes the tequila bottle into her head, yanking Ian back with his other hand at the same time. Alcohol drenches dark, matted hair, and this time, there’s no more hissing; this time there’s an ear-splitting, empty wailing that fills the cave as she starts crawling down the wall in jerky, hideous movements. On the floor, moving toward them.

Right before his match goes out, he catches a glimpse of her face, and there's no masking the terror that enters his voice. ]

Jesus, go, go —

[ Practically shoving Ian through the opening in the wall, clambering in after him backwards, their feet landing on what feels like stone steps as the wall groans and slides shut, plunging them into darkness. ]

[wittingly]

[ It is so, so fucking good that he can't see her. That, in his excitement, he didn't piece together right away the fact that she was over him. It's also good Mace is here, because he would not have reacted in time. She'd have dropped on him and probably snapped his fucking neck or worse, except that Mace yanks him back on sheer fucking instinct it seems.

All the same, when he does spot her in the dim light, the way her body contorts, the way her limbs seem to go cracking and over in ways that the ligaments should not move like double-jointed splinters, it's--

Like looking into something empty. It's like looking into a void. It's like peering through darkness down a long hall with nothing in your peripherals and nothing behind you and nothing to look at but that. Rooted to the spot. Uncomprehending. Just flat out not fucking able to wrap his mind around the fact that she's reality.

And then Mace snaps him out of it, and his free hand skids on rock as they go stumbling over uneven path, as stone slides shut behind them and the ground dips firmly downward in sharp, curving grade. He misses a step and one of his knees buckles, nearly dragging them both down, down, down- but he hits level ground, there is no more falling, there is only the sound of muffled breathing in the dark. No transference. Utterly insulated.

Just the two of them, and their scuffing friction against rock.

Not even a fucking hint of light. Sheer absolute unpenetrated darkness.

He reels Mace in by the hand like some desperate creature, grabbing onto what he can feel in the darkness - shirt, shoulder, side, tugging him in until they're pressed together chest to chest and clinging on like somehow it'll defend either of them. ]

Sh-sh-

[ Not shushing noises, but the start of the word she that never rounds out. Almost more of a z sound, teeth bared too hard to hit the proper s. ]

Her face, her fucking face- she's not here, she's gone? Is she gone?

[ He doesn't fucking know. He's not glowing. There is no hissing, no clicking no movement but theirs.

Silence. ]

[channellings]

Perhaps a bit of both? Whatever makes him feel better, really, even if it doesn't help at all in the long run. Leading the way isn't normally Klaus's thing, but given the circumstances, he's maybe a bit more qualified to do so.

“No idea if there even is a back door? If there is though, then yeah, hopefully.”

[hydraulics]

[ The darkness they’re in now is unlike anything Mace has seen before.

There’s nothing. There’s nothing, not even the faintest hint of light; Ian’s wrist had gone dark the moment the wall had slammed into place behind them. It's like being in the deepest part of the ocean, subsumed under the weight of black water, and for an interminable moment, the only sound is the blood in his ears.

He can feel Ian’s hand haul him in, finds that his own hand is already fisting into the back of Ian’s shirt even as their heartbeats hammer against together, needing human contact, needing Ian the way a drowning man might need air. Like it’s the only thing that matters.

Then the sound of Ian’s voice tremors and breaks the silence, short, staccato syllables forming the same question that Mace’s entire body is asking, every hair standing on end — and Mace swallows convulsively, unable to answer him for a moment. Not out of fear. Out of the bewildering sense of despair creeping in on him at the realization of what he’s just done to them. Where he’s pulled them into.

Christ, they could be anywhere. With anything, although at least not … ]

She’s gone.

[ Huskily, his hand going from Ian’s shirt to the back of his head, feeling gently along his scalp to make sure he hadn’t been grazed with any of the shards of glass — hadn’t hit his head anywhere in the ensuing scuffle when Mace had pushed him into a goddamn hole without even looking to see where they were headed. A miracle Ian had only tripped down one step, that Mace hadn’t fucking gotten him hurt further.

This, he thinks, is how Trey must have felt. That moment in the Icarus when the alarms had blared and they’d discovered that the shield hadn’t aligned with the rest of the ship’s trajectory.

Well, at least he knows the answer to the riddle scrawled on the cave wall, now. Her face, her fucking face —

Mary had gotten the life choked out of her until her eyes bulged out of her skull, red and wet, hands splayed at her sides, fingers scratching uselessly against stone until the nails tore open and the bone began to peek out.

And then he’d ripped the jaw clean off her head. Whoever the fuck “he” was. Or maybe something else had done that. Eaten away at the corpse, because the tongue had been gone, too, and her nose. Explained the breathing, the damp, rattling hisses; they’d got an eyeful straight down her horrible, empty throat.

Something twinges in his head at the thought — the feeling one might get when they’re forgetting a thing and can’t figure out what it is, like he's missing something here — but Mace pushes it away. Too distracted by the worry and guilt starting to gnaw at him, now that the icy flood of fear’s begun to recede.

Draws back from where his face has been pressed tight into Ian’s neck, his hand clumsily moving from the back of Ian’s head to his face, feeling out for any injury. ]

Are you — she get you anywhere? I get you anywhere? Fuck, I —

[ A blind, frantic kiss in the dark, almost missing Ian's mouth entirely. The need to be close twisting in his gut like a dying flower. ]

I fucked up, Ian.

[wittingly]

No, no she- she didn't-

[ Get a hand on him, thanks to Mace. Always, always thanks to Mace, every single fucking time, the only thing keeping him alive. Reeling him in and protecting him without having the mutual relief of Ian being able to protect him back, god damn it.

But it's okay. It's okay, they're alive, he found the door, there's feet of rock between them and her. No way she can get through it. And with those broken, malformed hands... she shouldn't be able to open it. Ian's not even sure if she'd have the intelligence to open it, she seemed... feral.

Lips hit his cheek, he course-corrects for them quickly, dutifully, so he can press into it with just as much urgency. It's not open mouthed, it's not lustful, not the careful licking into teeth or the quiet statement of other kisses. It's lips on lips and nose smashing a little against nose, eyes closed out of sheer fucking relief despite the redundancy in the dark. Hovering at that peak, still, unmoving for long seconds before he peels back finally.

There's a careful exhale beside Mace's ear, shaky, some of the adrenaline tentatively leaving. He pulls back slow, and he focuses- god, he's almost afraid to, afraid of what will happen, afraid it won't work- focuses on his arm.

It lights up, this time pulling together atoms above it, working apparently to create another box of matches. No issues that he can see - but he's not watching it closely, he's too busy getting a furtive look around their space as much as his gentle glow will allow. ]

Fucked up- fucked up how?

[ And then a flashback to I think someone was murdered here. ]

Hey- yeah, if there's something written on a fucking wall that says someone was fucking murdered maybe that's the first thing that comes up in conversation next time?

[ Probably the first, the only time Ian's ever been annoyed directly at Mace and not just... peripherally because of pain or something out of Mace's control. ]

What the fuck man?