[log] Event: Lavender's Green, Part Two [open]

[snowblindmods]

Characters: everyone
Location: mysterious, white hallways
Date: Day 193-194
Summary: Find friends. Get lost. Don't look.
Warnings: Potential for gore and psychological horror. Please note any specific warnings in your subject lines!

While confusingly similar, the area is split into a few different sections:

The Core
The hallways here are narrow and twist at a rapid rate. With how dazzlingly white everything is, it's easy to not realize you're coming on a turn and slam right into the walls. There are no rooms here--no one starts here, though they may find it while they wander. At the center is a large, round area, like the center of a spiral. There's a lot of air pressure here.

The Inner Hallways
The largest area, filled with dead ends, gentle slopes and twists, and, occasionally, difficult-to-see drops where a higher hallway intersects with a lower one without a wall to separate them. The whole place tastes vaguely like blood. Most rooms are here--most people start here.

The Outer Hallways
The outer ring of the ball of yarn. It's not as thick with halls and twists as the other two areas, leading to a lot more boring walking in one direction. It's totally possible to circle around the same path multiple times without realizing it, as everything is so similar here. Occasionally, footsteps can be heard just outside the farthest walls. Sometimes, something breathes. There are a few rooms here--some people will start here.


Remember to note what kind of eyes your character has in their top level!

Comments

[rubikscomplex]

Oh, goodie. We get to wait for them to come on. Where did you come from? Anything in that direction?

[thewarningafter]

[He's not going to argue the point about the eyes -- as far as he's concerned Doctor House is perfectly right to assume this will all go to hell.]

Well, first I was in a white hallway, and then I found a white hallway. Sorry, I forgot, there was a white hallway in between.

[Okay, now that he's got that out of his system:]

The halls were more curved where I started out; had more intersections, too. I'm getting the sense that I've been getting further away from the center of whatever this place is.

[rubikscomplex]

Cute.

[The sarcasm is practically dripping from his tone for a response to that first bit. He perks up at the rest, though.]

Then I need to turn around. I'm looking for the center, not the edges. Everything cool happens at the center of the labyrinth. Maybe we'll find the Goblin King. You like Bowie, right?

[thewarningafter]

What kind of monster doesn't like Bowie?

Speaking of monsters, though, I didn't hear that thing on the other side of the walls until I got out here.

[rubikscomplex]

I ask myself that every time I meet one of the heathens.

[House glances around at the walls.]

We've heard a heartbeat before during maintenance. If this is actually maintenance, I'm gonna be pissed.

[Because that means Holmes wins a point, and House hates that.]

[thewarningafter]

Maintenance?

[Someone hasn't read that far back into the network yet.]

I don't know what you heard, but it wasn't a heartbeat when I heard it. More like something trying to tear down the walls.

[rubikscomplex]

[House gives Stephen a look, unimpressed.]

You seriously haven't finished reading through the archives, yet? Maintenance. We got locked in, time slowed down for everything except the tablets. Ecks put a stethescope to the window and heard heartbeats. Happened after a night where all of us got up and walked around after lockdown without anyone remembering what happened.

[thewarningafter]

I've been too busy practicing my typewriting.

[It's been like four days since he got here, House. He's a prodigious reader but he's not that prodigious.]

The, uh...golem? Was she the only one who heard it?

[rubikscomplex]

Well, we both know that's about as useful as me warming up for a run when I first got here. [Which... Stephen wasn't around for. Right.] Protip: They'll probably fix your hands if you just die. [He rubs the back of his neck for a moment and glances away.] I was missing about sixty percent of my Rectus femoris on the right leg when I came in. Died. Woke up able to walk, muscle restored. [And completely blind for several days, and absent his Vicodin, so his elation had been short-lived, but it had been there.

And thinking of his missing Vicodin now sends a lance of phantom pain through his leg. House reaches down to rub over his thigh with the heel of his palm. If Stephen's very observant, he might note that that particular area of House's jeans is worn down in comparison to the rest.]

Ecks heard the heartbeat. She's the only one. I trust she believes that's what she heard.

[thewarningafter]

[Stephen stares at him, mouth going dry and heart thudding away at the thought of it. Just like that -- just die one more time, and he could have working hands again. In the grand scheme of things that's not so great a price, really, and he has to remind himself sharply that it isn't the same as before. There's no Eye here guaranteeing that his death will be temporary.

He hears the second part, the clarification about the heartbeat, but he's having a little trouble caring as he watches House rub at the leg he shouldn't be able to stand on, some voice in the back of his mind rattling off an easy observation about phantom pain.]

That was the first time? Your first death?

[rubikscomplex]

[House just inclines his head. For as much as he's an asshole about Stephen's hands, the guy deserves to know there's a possibility of getting them back.]

It's been fine ever since.

[thewarningafter]

[House could be lying to him. This could be bait to get him to fall in line with the mindset that finds fatal self experimentation worthwhile. If it's true, though, there will be some sign of it on the network, some reference to the former injury he can verify once they have network access again.

If they get network access again.]

Why are you telling me this?

[rubikscomplex]

[House rubs his thigh a few more times, then locks eyes with Stephen.]

Because I know what it's like to wake up and be in pain. To go to work and be in pain. To go home and be in pain. To not be able to walk three steps without a cane or something else to grab onto. I didn't lose my job, but... that was about the only thing. And one friend. And he died here a little while ago. Call it honoring him memory. One cripple to another.

[House walks past Stephen in the direction the other doctor has come from.]

Plus, if you tell anyone I told you, they're not gonna believe you. Doesn't ruin my rep. If you find something interesting on the edges, follow the arrows back to me. Later, Mirrorverse Twin.

[thewarningafter]

[If you'd asked Stephen ten minutes ago, he wouldn't have thought House was capable of empathy. Of course, it's a special kind of empathy that leads a person to advise someone to kill himself, even with the caveat that he has a decent chance of "surviving" it.

Is he willing to die for that, to take the risk? He's not sure that the answer is no, even knowing that he's never going back to his old life no matter what happens here.

He doesn't turn, just lets House on by him as he draws one of those hands down his face, forces his breathing to stay steady.]

Your secret's safe with me. If anyone asks, you're still an asshole.

[He does turn, decides to risk just a little sincerity.]

Thank you.

[rubikscomplex]

[House just raises a hand without looking. His ears are listening closely, though, and the casual gesture belies how tense he is.

Those Prophet Eyes terrify him, and he's glad to get away from the other man.]

[thewarningafter]

[The man is an enigma, though it doesn't take a genius to see why this situation enabled that exchange. Stephen watches him go a while before he turns and goes on his own way, preoccupied with thoughts of death and resurrection.]