END GAME: THE COUNTDOWN STARTS

[sailmods]

[the prisoners wake up on cold, hard floors.

the lights are bright, glaring, a sterile cell with sterile bars facing a sterile hall. the prisoners with you, across from you, and no one else. no rocking of a ship in waves, nothing. just the prisoner and their prison.

time passes, one assumes. the rhythmic click of Friday’s heels down the hall. it’s almost like the ticking of a clock.]

Comments

[inhairently]

Goddammit —

( is all steve manages before he's falling, too. he lands hard enough to knock the window out of himself and can only lay there for a moment, but at least nothing seems to be broken. )

[redlightgreenlight]

[Valdis just manages to scramble out of the way before Steve hits the ground. She's not going to try to catch Natsuno either. Her hip and left wrist hurt from hitting the ground, the pain leading her to believe the wrist might be broken, but she'll survive. She has to.]

[neverleave]

[He feels cloth snapping tight around his ankle, and manages - ]

It caught me!

[But the metal floor gives with a groan, and he hears fever cursing as she falls. We're going down Valdis says, and Natsuno forces himself to realign. Focus. He's not being devoured like the cat, escape first and worry about the leg later, you promised them.

Steve falls. Natsuno scranbles to the edge and see he's still lying there, but with the tightness around his ankle and Guatava's screams, he's not waiting around.]

I'm coming down!

[Thanks for cushioning the fall, Steve. Natsuno does try to roll away as fast as he can, even with the wind knocked out of him.]

[sailmods]

[the space around them is just as dark as the one they just left, and here is Natsuno, cursed with the ability to see.

immediately, he can see that they are all on a metal floor, surrounded by tall towers. what would he like to examine more closely?]

[abhorrently]

[okay. now that she's let the pain melt into some kind of focus, she can live with it. she sits up slow, pulling herself to her feet with an unseen wince. what she wouldn't give for a healing potion right now.]

Everyone intact?

[they're all probably hurting, but voices in the dark will allow them to regroup, come back together, and figure out how to move when they can't see anything. even a candle's flame would be enough to illuminate the entire room for her, but endless black allows nothing, only the slimmest understanding of things based on what can be heard.

if she can find them, she'll touch them, to let them know she's here.]

[inhairently]

( steve makes the sort of noise you make when you fell 10 feet from the ceiling and immediately have a person fall on top of you from those same 10 feet. it sounds something like nngggnnhhgrrrgh. )

Yep, ( he groans after a moment, pushing himself up and sliding towards fever's voice (and hopefully out of the trajectory of anything else that comes tumbling out of the vent). ) Yep. Just peachy.

[abhorrently]

[yeah, that's about how she's feeling too. step by careful step towards his voice, until her foot nudges his side.]

I'm holding my hand down, if you need it to get up.

[she is not even going to try to get down on his level right now. her leg can only stand so much changing position before she's going to need to get real creative with the swearing.]

[inhairently]

( he accepts her help and climbs shakily to his feet. his back hurts. breathing hurts. everything hurts. )

That sucked.

[neverleave]

[Natsuno grunts an "I'm fine" in response to Fever and tries to catch his breath. Steve Harrington is cushier than a metal floor, but everything still hurts - even if nothing seems to be broken.

First he looks at his ankle, trying to loosen the tight cloth.

Then, he looks around. Let's see those towers...]

[sailmods]

[all around them are cardboard boxes, piled one on top of the other. they are rather haphazard; one has a corner that leans out, and considering the vaguely Fever-sized hole in the bottom of it, that seems to be where they fell out of the vent. the boxes seem absolutely massive, each larger than the cells they had previously been held in.

and, above the boxes, peering down, is the impossibly large face of a man with buttons for eyes. Natsuno may recognize him from the freighter.]

[redlightgreenlight]

[Valdis finds herself with her back against something that doesn't feel quite solid, almost as if she could break into if she hit it hard enough, but the throbbing in her hand and the lack of need to do so stops her from trying anything out of turn.

It's very dark, but not so dark that she's as blind as the others, still it's hard to make out much.]

[neverleave]

[Speaking as he looks around:]

I think we're in a warehouse. Giant cardboxes all around. Some of it looks unstable, so be careful when you move ar -

[He sees the giant face. Sucks in a sharp breath. Then, very calmly:]

Jenny's brother is here. I see his face above us. He's - a giant face, looking down.

[inhairently]

What? ( steve hisses in natsuno's general direction, looking up quickly as if he might suddenly see something through the dark. he doesn't, of course. )

Can he— ( he's already whispering, but he faulters and starts over, dropping his voice even lower. ) Can he see us?

( oh to return to a time when giant faces would sound both implausible and impossible! )

[abhorrently]

[fantastic. pinned in, unable to see, and with a god potentially looking for them. this is how she wanted to make her grand escape. deep breath, and when she speaks, it's as quiet as Steve.]

Stay close. We walk quietly. Hold someone's hand if you can't see. If we don't make a fuss, he'll go away.

[she's assuming, and it's a big if, but given that they weren't immediately crushed, it might be safe to go with the idea that the god can't see very well in these conditions. sneaking. okay, they can do this.]

Natsuno.

[he'll have to take point, since without a bare flicker of light, they're dependent on his sight.]

[redlightgreenlight]

[The news that they fell out of a box and there are boxes all around tell her that they may be in some kind of store room on Malin's ship. Which means these other boxes may be other realms.

She slowly rises, and also speaks quietly.]

I...what if we...

[What if they opened the box containing the Eterna? But no...that would give everything away too quickly.]

Nevermind.

Natsuno, do you think you could find your back back to this spot if we leave it behind? My senses aren't working or I would track our path.

[Maybe this place is like the village and they can find the off switch for their powers and destroy it. Something to hold onto hope for at the very least. She's already lost everything else.]

[neverleave]

I'll do my best.

[He unfolds his second set of fangs. There's a soft sound of ripping cloth as he chews on the cuff of his sleeve. If there are too much twists and turns, he can leave scraps of cloth behind.

Natsuno looks around, looking for a path out of there, and hopefully away from the giant face.

(Also did he manage to loosen the cloth on his ankle like he tried a few comments ago)]

[sailmods]

[the cloth around his ankle remains firmly attached. it is pure black, but Natsuno may notice the embossed symbols on the cloth, somewhat tropical in nature.

the face shifts slightly, and a massive hand reaches down at them.]

[neverleave]

[These tropical symbols seem... suspiciously familiar, but before Natsuno can think about it further, the giant hand reaches down.]

He's reaching out - !

[They can't fight him here, with only Natsuno able to see. Run, hide, but where?]

Cardboard box behind Valdis. We can break in, hide -

[He grabs Fever and Steve by the hand to drag them in Valdis' direction. His ankle throbs in pain from the tight cloth, but he ignores it, he has to.

He has every intent of slamming his shoulder into the cardbox, and maybe slam Steve and Fever too.]

[abhorrently]

[break in? to the box? no time to process that before she's being used as a blunt object - and if it's this or get grabbed by unseen god hands, well.

she's got nails, she'll start tearing at it. inside, befofe they can get plucked up and subject to who knows what.]

[sailmods]

[the cardboard tears as easily as cardboard should. the inside of it is entirely empty, with no way out except for the way they came in, where a massive hand feels around blindly.

to escape, they will have to sacrifice one of their own to the hand, enough to distract it.]

[inhairently]

( when natsuno says the hand is reaching for them, it’s as something inside steve clicks into place and he knows, without a doubt, what he needs to do.

people don’t always make it out when things get this bad. he knows that as well as anyone. he also knows that the three people he’s with stand a better chance at helping the others than he does. what he’s planning to do makes the most tactical sense.

because, in the end, it’s not about whether or not steve makes it out alive. it’s about everyone else. arthur, cassandra — hell, even darcy, skulduggery, all of them. this is bigger than one kid from indiana, and steve knows it.

so he lingers behind the others, hesitating as they realize they have to go back the way they came. )

I’m right behind you, ( he says, pressing the sharpened feather cassandra had given him into natsuno’s hand without explanation. then, once the other three reach the spot where they'd fallen through, he hesitates again for only a second, reaches out towards whoever’s there for what, he doesn't know. a brush of their fingers, a pat on the arm, just one last bit of contact, maybe. )

You guys go. I’ll be okay.

( he doesn’t give them time to protest because as far as he knows, there isn’t time for anything at all except a diversion if the other three are to make it out. he turns on his heel and darts into the darkness, intending to draw the giant’s attention that way.

he hopes it’s enough. )

[sailmods]

[the hand plucks Steve by his collar like a wayward kitten, raising him to the giant's face so buttoned eyes may peer at him more closely.

a boon, for those left behind: somewhere above them, a light has turned on, revealing the seemingly endless rows of cardboard around them.]

[inhairently]

( what do you do when you're about to get your ass fe-fi-fo-fummed by a giant? steve doesn't have incredibly high hopes that this is going to go well, but all he can really do is try to talk his way out of it — the best he can, anyway, what with being picked up by the collar. he grasps at the man's hand. trying to stabilize himself the best he can. )

Hey, sorry, man. I was just looking for the bathroom. Didn't mean to interrupt whatever uh... whatever it is you've got going on here.

[sailmods]

[the red-haired giant looks at him in silence for a moment.

uses his other hand to pull open a pocket on his shirt.

and drops Steve inside of it.

there's a mint lifesaver in there but it's still wrapped.]

[inhairently]

( ... huh.

okay. definitely preferable to getting crushed but not much to do right but chill and try to tear the lifesaver open. it's not like they've had access to toothbrushes lately, you know? might as well take the chance to freshen his breath if he can. )