DM POST
[member="Oran Shule"] / [member="Liya"] - The sad and wicked lives of the infirm, the crazed, the delirious. All of them neatly laid out around them, bound and secured by straps and belt restraints, half of them with silver buckles. Mouths were gagged, some silent, others less cooperative as they moaned out muffled howls in to the din of music. How much sorrow had they endured? How much pain had they caused others? Were they friendly?
It was the question of the hour for Oran and Liya.
Where one door appeared, another always closed. In this case it spared them from the mob that ascended from the bowels of hell. The music that had provided atmosphere, strange. The way that those who wished to tear and mutilate them, strange. How the wall and door flexed inward as knuckles were beaten bloody and shoulders were used in ill-fated attempts to batter their way in, strange.
The people, this place, the City and World itself, all strange.
The clarity of why may never become apparent. For them, they simply had to endure. This was merely an entrance, a security protocol from a time long ago, a place where if one door was escaped through, there was always another to maintain the barricade. But now it was made better, now it was made for a greater purpose.
Flanking the door a single gurney lay silent and empty, straps with silver buckles dangling between its security bars to the floor. On the opposite side an Electroconvulsive Panel stood in haunting gloom, a portion of it connected in to the wall the door sat in. It’s dials heavily modified, specifically the current strength. Marked with numbers that wrapped around it that went from 1 through 20. Beside this there was two simple pictures, a male and a female each with a silver nodule.
Now for their game!
The gurney was set with two very specific weights - their weight. A fraction of a pound over, and the door that held back the mob would open, done properly with the correct current code, the door in to the the actual Ward would open. But what could the code be?
Strange. There were no clues. So strange. How many patients were in here? Ten? What did they experience first? What did they see first upon entering? Strange. .
A better question: Which of the two - Oran Shule or Liya - would endure the three treatments as the combination got dialed in? Who felt like losing some of their mind and getting even more lost in this wonderful Hospital?
[member="Jorryn Fordyce"] - Maenans the planet over were huddled around every viewing device in existence as Jorryn came face to face with some of the Hawkins. For them, this family was legendary. Their history had roots deep in Maena’s, their establishments known in the lower levels as particular haunts. The bottom of the city made two kinds of people: those who wanted to escape but couldn’t and so grew tough and mean to survive, and those born as if there were nothing more natural. The Hawkins were the latter, and a special breed at that. They’d carved out their own piece of the 600 Cities. They thrived. Strange, twisted, but successful in a way accepted only in a place like this.
In bars along the Top 50 Levels, the elite sat mesmerized near holonet screens casting the show from the center of every tabletop in the place, hung in every corner of their gilded rooms. The view of Jorryn’s escape from gouts of fire flared through the screens in every storefront. The same could be said for seedier establishments down deeper in the city. On Level 246 an entire square had been set up to broadcast the show, thousands of people crammed together to watch as Jorryn pulled herself in to the makeshift tunnel. People leaned out their apartment windows if they were lucky enough to have one overlooking said square. Those who didn’t, huddled together with their family and friends, whomever had the largest apartment playing host to those they knew as they gathered around the holoset. On movie theatre screens in all levels that had stopped all showings just to play Horrible Hawkins Halloween live, Jorryn crawled through the tunnel as thousands sat on their edge of their seats, popcorn forgotten halfway to their mouths. The streets were crowded with revelers looking up to see the broadcast plastered over the sides of buildings, fires burning in the streets, shouts and screams of debaucherous joy cascading in echoes. In the Slums, people had been lined up for days to get a spot in the few bars, dens, and theatres that would be showing the event. People with holosets charged others exorbitant amounts to come over and view the show. Friends and family closed their curtains and watched. Those truly desperate huddled around radios, listening to the action narrated by some more privileged viewer.
300 Million people held their breath, watched Jorryn Fordyce crawl through Hawkins Manor and waited for her guts to paint the wallpaper. But her fight kept them interested.
Gambling increased in earnest as they took bets on her chances.
But for the woman crawling alone in one of the City’s deepest levels in a house forgotten by time, there would be no revelers, no indication that an entire planet watched her with bated breath. Nothing except the one tiny, dark camera that hovered soundlessly in front of her ash-kissed, pale face as she put distance between her and the men arguing behind her.
Behind the small flap that Jorryn pushed open lay a room indicated on the small, scribbled map as Momma’s Dolls. While the label may have been ambiguous if the room’s contents were unseen by the reader, peering down from Jorryn’s vantage point would illuminate that Bill had been nothing but to the point in his description. Dozens of porcelain dolls of all kinds were carefully arranged on dustless shelves. Unlike Great-Grandpa’s room, this was a place regularly visited and well-loved. Each doll was carefully arranged and posed, obsessively categorized by height, hair color, outfit, and type.
Scrawled in something dark red on the far wall were the words
“One of these things is not like the other!” The handwriting looked just like that on the map.
There was a choice to make here. Whatever had been left was important. Whatever had been left might change the game. It might even be a way out. But it wouldn’t be found without strings attached. Was the hidden thing worth the risk?
Either way, the decision should be made quickly. It was likely that it wasn’t just Bill that knew where all the secret tunnels went, and Jorryn wouldn’t have long to herself if someone came looking. A quick glance at the map showed a landing leading to stairs towards the massive first floor right outside this room, and more to explore on the second floor extending past that.
The camera flew past Jorryn just a bit to pan over the pristine, too-white faces of the dolls. It stopped for a moment, convinced it had caught movement of the eyes on one with dark brown hair. But it let it go, flying back to catch a shot of Jorryn looking down from the passage.
[member="Jacob Crawford"] / [member="Imogen Daniels"] - From one side of the Hallway to the other, around and through the black-banded cords that drooped lowly and extended with frayed ends from opened ceiling panels. Jacob and the vile man struggled. One built large of heft and wielding incredible strength, the other trim and strung solid - made for speed and perseverance.
Lunge and miss. Slash and stab. Pencils penetrating through flesh and clothes took effort. Effort that increased greatly as the blood began to seep from puncture jabs of shaved wood and pointed graphite. Blood that began to slick the palm of Jacob’s hand, and eject heavy eruptions of crimson gore as the wound pattern was violently prodded time and time again.
By the time the two men had began to grapple over the blade in the dissonance of sound that Imogen Daniels provided as she slavishly began to kick her way out of the locker again, the splash and smudge patterns were so heavy across the floor and lockers that it was a wonder how still this terrible man was standing from the agony dozens of stab wounds should have left him in.
But as she emerged, there they were. Blade trembling against the pressure each man provided in their respective fight against the others will. From the man’s knuckles blood flowed freely, squirting with even more intensity as his fingers drew tighter on the wet grip. And upon Jacob’s face did this crimson paint land, thick dribbles that splashed upon his eyes, down his cheeks, in to his mouth.
The position was dire, the time for help was close. That blade had drawn closer, New City held there breath in anticipation. Eager to witness redemption after the death of The Butcher. Hungry to watch the tip of that blade press down upon Jacob’s face. Rabid to hear the bone crack and separate as weight was applied and it would slowly feed in to his brain.
But they were denied!
Just a fraction of a centimeter from it’s mark, there was Imogen Daniels, legs barely able to wrap the whole way around the girth of this mans body. Her arms locked under his neck. The first instinct drove him off from Jacob - and her back first in to the lockers with another force to dent them inward.
The blade fell from his grasp, clattering heavily on the ground beside Jacob, a golden Fifty-four, carved in to the end of the pommel.
“Mmm. . . “ He obscenely gasped, feeling Imogen pinned between the back of his body and the surface of the Lockers.
“I--I’m gonna. . “ the man stammered, bloody spit wetting her clutching arms as his chin tucked down close towards her forearm, just moments before he mightily lobbed the back of his head towards Imogen’s face.
“Wear his skin when I make you suffer, thing! ”
End his life. . . sever his veins. . spill his blood and let’s move forward. This journey of survival still had so much more fun to be had!
[member="Zul Grimm"] / [member="Kyle Raymus"] / [member="Causstik Rahn"] - Indeed, all three were at a most perilous juncture. Hank was dead. Hank was dead, and despite an appearance that might suggest that he was not a smart man, he’d had plans for that. Hawkins Meat Hook had stood too long, was too revered an establishment, for one of its own to leave the mortal plane and simply fall in to the hands of graffiti artists or other ne’er-do-wells. No, Hawkins Meat Hook would not fall in to obsequity. It would fight until another Hawkins came to oversee it. The original site would never be tarnished by interlopers.
The building, would, by some force of will perhaps, come ‘alive’.
But yes, it would seem that the three were ill-matched, both in temperament and usual pursuits. But that was one of the many things Maenans lived for. Would one of the contestants themselves prove to be one of the cast of villains? Would one of the ‘volunteers’ plucked from planets all over the galaxy turn out to be worse than the antagonists of the year? There was tension here among this group, uncertainty fuelled by the stakes of the situation. The audience leaned in closer.
Those who’d somehow escaped the facility - a horde that Causstik Rahn was familiar with - had long since either gotten themselves killed or found a way out. Mostly killed. Windows were almost non-existent in the large building, and most of the doors had been chained. Most of them. This left the building under the pall of an eerie silence, corpses lying in filth as their panic sent them pushing each other in to machinery or they succumbed to something as fatefully tragic as a bump to the head.
The hallway that extended out from beyond the Boar Pens was a long one, alternating with patches of light and dark where the fluorescents had started to go. To the right the trio would find a large industrial rolling door pulled a few feet up as if someone had slipped under it at some point today. From underneath came the same sickly glow, but dozens upon dozens of crates were scattered and stacked all around the room. A storage area of some kind? One could crack the crates and find out. Maybe there would be something useful as a weapon. Or maybe there would be something disgusting inside. Either was equally likely.
Or they could take the hallway that veered off the one they were staring down, taking themselves left. Without windows it was difficult to get a bearing on which way was “out”, but the only way to gain information was to explore.
[member="Darren Onyx"] - The show clicked through contestants slowly, spending time on each scene of bloodshed, horror, or gore with a lingering that indicated a sick disposition. It stopped once more as it reached the Meat Hook, capturing every moment of the bloody duel between Human & Questionable Human. This was, of course, what the city lived for. Every business, legitimate or otherwise, closed for the occasion saves for bars, theatres, clubs - places the employees could watch the show as they partied with the masses. There was not a citizen that wasn’t watching Onyx’s violence. They could not, of course, know him. But if they did, would they wonder at what was happening to him? Would they question the path he chose?
If only Smell-O-Vision had been invented in this galaxy of wonders, for surely the stench of Hank’s burning brain as the hot knife plunged in to it must have been something to behold!
It was a shame, of course, that Hank had died so early, foregoing respect for those who’d put so much time in to building the show. But there were other horrors.
Of that, the screenwriters had made sure.
There was silence for a moment after Hank’s fall. He did not stir. Not even a death rattle or a twitch of dying nerves.
That meant there was only one thing for it now - escape. There were few windows in this place, and those that were weren’t the sort that opened or fell to things as simple as projectiles. A door was needed.
[member="Aria Vale"] / [member="Greta Kohler"] - The two women parted, Greta smartly pulling a weapon - however meager it may have seemed - in to her purchase. While Aria continued on the door, continued to try and scrape and press the toothed head of the key in to the rusty indentation that would allow it to unlock. On her shoulder, Kali still loomed, holding her more tightly. While Aria may have struggled to find that lock, her aim in to flesh seemed entirely natural.
No amount of trembling managed to bias that stab. It came in steady as a blaster bolt. . . until it met resistance.
The rounded tip that sat forward of the tooth found Kali’s eye - her one eye. Inwards it bent, a thick feeling bubble that depressed inward with the jab until the gel of the globe burst through the thin veneer of membrane. More sickeningly up until the bloody brass cracked against the orbit of her skull, Kali had saw the whole thing up close. She saw as it pressed in, she saw as the viscous goop swelled outward and her lense was folded in to the back of her eye socket. Then blackness as she wobbled backwards, a hand cupping the wound.
“MY EYE!“ The girl roared wildly,
“MY EYE!” the words repeated. With one hand cupping the disabled orb, she swung a probing arm in front of her, turning as violently as she cried. Searching for Aria. Searching for Greta. She needed to grab on to one of them, bite and chew the face off from their skull. The Doctor could repair them. But by terrible Matsu, her eye was missing! Her vision was gone! It hurt! Oh how it hurt!
“Doctor! Doctor!! DOCTOR!!! DOOOCTOOR!!!!!” She began to wail,
“They’re tryna’ escape! DOCTOR!!”
As Aria Vale fled for another set of doors to attempt and open Greta had a choice of her own to make. Silence Kali for good? Or allow her continued sobs to echo. For it seemed with every yell that boomed, something from an opposite side of the room replied.
Footsteps.
Heavy.
Fast!
Breathing!
Coming.
Coming. .
The Doctor was coming!
[member="Kyrel Ren"] / [member="Halron Corr"] - Bill & Lily were close. Born only a year apart, they’d gone through all their growing pains at the same time, learned their likes and dislikes, played out on Maena’s asphalt and given each other bloody knees. Somewhere along the way they’d seemed to develop a completely silent communication. Not even their parents would have been able to guess how their children had learned to speak without speaking. Even so, the connection was undeniable. And as Lily emerged from the basement where her sacrifices were still struggling to leave their bony prison she just had a feeling…
She was usually the one that just enjoyed observing Bill’s games, finding her time better spent on more direct endeavors. But she could still be found giggling in the corner when he found new and inventive ways to torture house guests. Ever since she’d...converted, she was less prone to leave the house at all. Bill brought them all in, and she chose the ones she thought most likely. The rest she just watched die. It was a good way to pass the time. So many hours spent, often solitary, in the Hawkins Manor was liable to drive even the sane quite mad. And Lily wasn’t at all sane.
Questing outwards with her power, she wrapped herself around the minds of each she could find crawling, walking, prowling around in the Manor. Some were so very dull, or already known to her.
But then she stopped on one…
A little hint of fear led in to the taste - sensible, understandable. But following that was power, raw and riveting, shrill on the bead of focus. She chased it, following it back to the source. A man’s mind. He was threatening another, larger man holding the woman that Bill had made part of his game. Oh, brother wouldn’t be pleased that the girl had lasted this long…
But the man whose power she’d traced to the source...now he might be interesting! He might make a good sacrifice indeed… Lily planted herself next to the coil of his control in the Dark side of the Force, whispering in to his mind.
He is the enemy. He’ll act like he doesn’t know what you’re talking about, but he would have already cut in to that girl if you hadn’t come along. He’s a monster. A monster. And you have the power to stop him.
She was moving up the stairs slowly, following power’s trail to the place where Kyrel’s came from. But first she would see if she couldn’t get one of them to eliminate the other.
NEXT DM POST
Zahori / Asheda
Xin
Vulps / Lark
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