The Color Of Horror || Packing and Moving
Nov. 4th, 2021 11:22 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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xp_logsIf they banter enough, maybe it will make Avalon less weird. Maybe. (It doesn't.)
Avalon was never a particularly fun place to be (unless you were Topaz), but there was definitely a noticeable difference in the air. Reality itself seemed to waver every now and again, with brief cracks appearing along the walls before disappearing again. Whispers echoed off the walls over the sounds of hurried footsteps and rattling boxes. The lights Kyle had installed were almost constantly flicking in and out, leaving the group in the natural lighting of the pocket dimension for a couple seconds at a time. It seemed like the bulbs were taking longer and longer to come back on, but that might have just been perception.
————————————
Topaz had already been doing this for a couple days, and had a system at this point — look to see if there was a note (she’d made good progress in her assessment and cataloging), double check in case it was something she hadn’t gotten to, distribute it into one of the five boxes she kept beside her at all times for different sizes and shapes and levels of danger, repeat until a box was full, then tape it up and put it at the end of the aisle for someone to grab. It was almost mindless work at this point. She didn’t dare put her headphones on now, just in case. The sounds had been getting louder and weirder too. She probably needed to pay more attention to that.
“I thought this place was creepy enough before,” Darcy said from a few steps away, dropping a few empty boxes. “But the singing is just…” she shuddered, refusing to look towards the portal. “Glad to be doing the heavy lifting instead so I’m not constantly hearing it.” She grabbed the box Topaz had just finished, humming along to the sounds coming from the portal as she disappeared around the corner.
“Singing?” Topaz looked up, tilting her head for a minute. “Yeah, guess I can hear that.”
“It’s a very hypnotic swaying,” Darcy called from the end of the aisle. “Which is why I’m trying not to look at it. Having the sound stuck in my head is bad enough.”
Molly made a face, holding a rather large crate over her head like it were nothing. “Are we sure this is a good idea gathering stuff up and not just...I dunno, getting the heck out of dodge? Maybe like...throwing a stick of dynamite at it?”
“This stuff’s valuable,” Amanda pointed out from where she was taping up another box. “And dangerous - we don’t want to risk some of it vanishing who-knows-where when this place collapses.”
The pocket dimension seemed to respond to that, shuddering for a moment before the lights went out, then popped back on again.
This got both a stop and glare from a man darting past through the air, carrying a pile of heavy looking wrapped items like they were nothing. “We will stop and remind the group that this place houses countless historical treasures. They are properly invaluable.”
And then, woosh.
Kyle looked up at the lights, and shook his fist dramatically. "I know you're not actually my mom's ghost, you can stop pretending you have authority over me." He set down a box - one that he had brought in. "More light bulbs, because two already exploded. You know what's freaky? They exploded cold. Like, turned into frosted obsidian. Wild, right?"
“Man, if it’s my mom’s ghost I’m gonna be pissed -- she ain’t even dead yet.” Alani made a face as soon as the words left her mouth, like putting that into the universe was a good idea. “Wait, like the glass of the bulb chemically transmuted?”
“Dynamite would make it angry.” Darcy’s voice was faint with distance, but got clearer as she moved towards the group. “Probably some of the magic items, too. The songs are catchy, though.” She hefted a few more boxes, disappearing back into the shadows.
“The sound is...I can feel it in my bones,” less a ‘noise’ and more of a feeling. It was disconcerting. Matt grabbed another box, to take out so there was more room to pack and maneuver. “Feels a lot like when my dad died. Which makes no sense, but I’ll be glad when this is done.”
Darcy caught the last half of Matt’s comment, wrapping an arm around his waist in a silent squeeze of comfort once he’d put his box down before moving back to the boxes.
Another light popped and Kyle looked up at it. "I dunno if it transmuted, let's find out." He dug in the box of supplies and held out a fresh bulb. "I didn't bring the stepladder, someone get on my shoulders."
“Alley-oop, Gibney, make a stirrup.” Doug waited for Kyle to lace his hands together and then put one foot in to boost up. As he went, he hooked his leg around behind Kyle’s head and twisted so that he wound up standing on Kyle’s shoulders facing the same direction. He reached up with his nanite hand to twist the old bulb out - less chance of cutting himself on broken glass that way.
“Signs point to yes,” he said after examining it. “No metal -or- glass left in it. Let’s hear it for magic.” He replaced the bulb and then hopped down off of Kyle to the floor.
“If the glowy portal would like to do us a solid and bring the brightness in the room up to about 70%, that’d be awesome for when I hit the edges of the room.” Darcy muttered, narrowly avoiding a faceplant into one of the bookcases.
The glowy portal, shockingly, did not respond.
“Topaz, permission to keep the creepy lightbulb remains?” Alani raised her voice to ask the question then immediately regretted it, as the voices picked up. “Do not like. Ugggh, I’m coming back for that lightbulb.” With that she hefted her own box up to get out for at least a moment.
“Permission granted,” Topaz called after her, raising her eyes to the rippling ceiling. She blew out a long breath. The pocket dimension was unstable, but still holding. That was all she could ask for.
“This box is ready to go,” Amanda called out, patting down the tape and stubbornly ignoring the voices she could hear from the shadows around her. Familiar voices, of people who didn’t exist any more. “Who wants this one? It’s heavy.”
Molly raised her hand. “I’ll take it!” she said, pulling her hair into a ponytail. Grabbing the box, she propped it up against her hip, then looked around. “Not gonna lie, I’m not going to miss this place. It’s a little altogether ooky.”
America walked by with two boxes stacked on each of her shoulders. “I kinda dig it.”
Topaz’s eyes flicked to her, a small smile gracing her lips. “Sure you don’t have too much there?”
Jubilee for her part had been helping ferry boxes and vibing with the somewhat catchy singing. If DJ had still been around she might have asked him if he could lay down a beat for it.
“Nine out of ten for the music, it’s got a beat and I can dance to it. You want me to climb up and start bringing down the really high stuff? I’m kinda curious if this place has a roof, honestly.”
“No roof that I’ve found, but the tallest ladder I’ve gotten in here is fifteen feet.” Topaz looked up and around. “Maybe go up and look at the note cards? Let us know what’s there? Still trying to limit who touches what.”
Wanda was, fortunately, one of those who was allowed to touch a majority of everything. She frowned at the ever growing list in her notebook of the items she was hastily cataloging. “I’m billing someone for that iPad that broke when I tried to bring it in,” she joked, shaking out her hand as she stood, closing another box and writing down another item.
Another woosh, and the ankled-winged prince was back. “Ladders. How common. Pfft. We have no need for ladders, for you have Namor.”
“Yes but the ladders are far less dramatic,” Wanda replied dryly.
“And potentially more stable,” Matt added, taking another box and hefting it. No super strength for him, but he worked out regularly. The music had transmuted somehow into a sort of hypnotizing reverberating drum. It was disconcerting, but also...comforting. That alone made him nervous. “Unlike everything else in here.”
“Dude, remind me to tell you about the time we had to retrieve like, a ceremonial mask in Guatemala City from some crime family. They’d been using it to control their own little empire and they did not want to give it up.” Jubilee pulled out a pair of gloves as she talked and started walking along one particularly tall series of shelves, looking for the best way up. “Now that shit was creepy, like seriously creepy. People in thrall will do absolutely anything, and they don’t even feel it when you stab them.”
Alani made a face upon hearing Jubilee’s statement. “Oh god, that is fucked.” Finding a box in need of moving, she glanced quickly around the space. “But a firm disagree with whoever said this was an environment they could get behind, if I’d known it was like this I’da begged my grandma for a taonga to ward off the heebie jeebies I’m getting.”
“Oi, you lot could treat the place with a bit more respect,” Topaz called without any real conviction. “It has feelings, you know.”
“It loves me! Else it’d be singing punk rock tunes from the eighties.” Jubilee noted with a grin down at Topaz, she’d managed to make her way up to the top shelving and was slowly looking over things. “Yo, Gothica, you missed a few things up here. Want me to bring them down?”
Topaz backed up a bit to squint up at the top shelves, then dug a small book out of her bag, flipping through it. “Yeah, those are safe to touch. Just don’t throw them or anything. And maybe get gloves from Darcy. It can’t hurt.”
“And don’t steal any of it just to prove I could? Gotcha.” Jubilee dropped from the shelving and rolled into a crouch before standing to walk casually across to Darcy. “Yo, my dude. Got some gloves for me?”
“No, Jubilee, bad Jubilee,” Wanda muttered, completely out of instinct.
“Yeah, sec.” Darcy grabbed a set and wound them into a ball before using an underhand throw to toss them towards Jubilee. “Nice catch, chica.”
“All the baseball practice against Garrison every time we have a Fourth of July, that man took his sport seriously.”
Jubilee tugged them on before heading back toward the shelving and her path upward. It was an easy climb and she had the artifacts down and to Topaz in no time, heading back toward further shelves in the distance.
“Let me know if the place starts going all freaky woo woo shit, but I should be fine off on my own for now.”
Avalon was never a particularly fun place to be (unless you were Topaz), but there was definitely a noticeable difference in the air. Reality itself seemed to waver every now and again, with brief cracks appearing along the walls before disappearing again. Whispers echoed off the walls over the sounds of hurried footsteps and rattling boxes. The lights Kyle had installed were almost constantly flicking in and out, leaving the group in the natural lighting of the pocket dimension for a couple seconds at a time. It seemed like the bulbs were taking longer and longer to come back on, but that might have just been perception.
————————————
Topaz had already been doing this for a couple days, and had a system at this point — look to see if there was a note (she’d made good progress in her assessment and cataloging), double check in case it was something she hadn’t gotten to, distribute it into one of the five boxes she kept beside her at all times for different sizes and shapes and levels of danger, repeat until a box was full, then tape it up and put it at the end of the aisle for someone to grab. It was almost mindless work at this point. She didn’t dare put her headphones on now, just in case. The sounds had been getting louder and weirder too. She probably needed to pay more attention to that.
“I thought this place was creepy enough before,” Darcy said from a few steps away, dropping a few empty boxes. “But the singing is just…” she shuddered, refusing to look towards the portal. “Glad to be doing the heavy lifting instead so I’m not constantly hearing it.” She grabbed the box Topaz had just finished, humming along to the sounds coming from the portal as she disappeared around the corner.
“Singing?” Topaz looked up, tilting her head for a minute. “Yeah, guess I can hear that.”
“It’s a very hypnotic swaying,” Darcy called from the end of the aisle. “Which is why I’m trying not to look at it. Having the sound stuck in my head is bad enough.”
Molly made a face, holding a rather large crate over her head like it were nothing. “Are we sure this is a good idea gathering stuff up and not just...I dunno, getting the heck out of dodge? Maybe like...throwing a stick of dynamite at it?”
“This stuff’s valuable,” Amanda pointed out from where she was taping up another box. “And dangerous - we don’t want to risk some of it vanishing who-knows-where when this place collapses.”
The pocket dimension seemed to respond to that, shuddering for a moment before the lights went out, then popped back on again.
This got both a stop and glare from a man darting past through the air, carrying a pile of heavy looking wrapped items like they were nothing. “We will stop and remind the group that this place houses countless historical treasures. They are properly invaluable.”
And then, woosh.
Kyle looked up at the lights, and shook his fist dramatically. "I know you're not actually my mom's ghost, you can stop pretending you have authority over me." He set down a box - one that he had brought in. "More light bulbs, because two already exploded. You know what's freaky? They exploded cold. Like, turned into frosted obsidian. Wild, right?"
“Man, if it’s my mom’s ghost I’m gonna be pissed -- she ain’t even dead yet.” Alani made a face as soon as the words left her mouth, like putting that into the universe was a good idea. “Wait, like the glass of the bulb chemically transmuted?”
“Dynamite would make it angry.” Darcy’s voice was faint with distance, but got clearer as she moved towards the group. “Probably some of the magic items, too. The songs are catchy, though.” She hefted a few more boxes, disappearing back into the shadows.
“The sound is...I can feel it in my bones,” less a ‘noise’ and more of a feeling. It was disconcerting. Matt grabbed another box, to take out so there was more room to pack and maneuver. “Feels a lot like when my dad died. Which makes no sense, but I’ll be glad when this is done.”
Darcy caught the last half of Matt’s comment, wrapping an arm around his waist in a silent squeeze of comfort once he’d put his box down before moving back to the boxes.
Another light popped and Kyle looked up at it. "I dunno if it transmuted, let's find out." He dug in the box of supplies and held out a fresh bulb. "I didn't bring the stepladder, someone get on my shoulders."
“Alley-oop, Gibney, make a stirrup.” Doug waited for Kyle to lace his hands together and then put one foot in to boost up. As he went, he hooked his leg around behind Kyle’s head and twisted so that he wound up standing on Kyle’s shoulders facing the same direction. He reached up with his nanite hand to twist the old bulb out - less chance of cutting himself on broken glass that way.
“Signs point to yes,” he said after examining it. “No metal -or- glass left in it. Let’s hear it for magic.” He replaced the bulb and then hopped down off of Kyle to the floor.
“If the glowy portal would like to do us a solid and bring the brightness in the room up to about 70%, that’d be awesome for when I hit the edges of the room.” Darcy muttered, narrowly avoiding a faceplant into one of the bookcases.
The glowy portal, shockingly, did not respond.
“Topaz, permission to keep the creepy lightbulb remains?” Alani raised her voice to ask the question then immediately regretted it, as the voices picked up. “Do not like. Ugggh, I’m coming back for that lightbulb.” With that she hefted her own box up to get out for at least a moment.
“Permission granted,” Topaz called after her, raising her eyes to the rippling ceiling. She blew out a long breath. The pocket dimension was unstable, but still holding. That was all she could ask for.
“This box is ready to go,” Amanda called out, patting down the tape and stubbornly ignoring the voices she could hear from the shadows around her. Familiar voices, of people who didn’t exist any more. “Who wants this one? It’s heavy.”
Molly raised her hand. “I’ll take it!” she said, pulling her hair into a ponytail. Grabbing the box, she propped it up against her hip, then looked around. “Not gonna lie, I’m not going to miss this place. It’s a little altogether ooky.”
America walked by with two boxes stacked on each of her shoulders. “I kinda dig it.”
Topaz’s eyes flicked to her, a small smile gracing her lips. “Sure you don’t have too much there?”
Jubilee for her part had been helping ferry boxes and vibing with the somewhat catchy singing. If DJ had still been around she might have asked him if he could lay down a beat for it.
“Nine out of ten for the music, it’s got a beat and I can dance to it. You want me to climb up and start bringing down the really high stuff? I’m kinda curious if this place has a roof, honestly.”
“No roof that I’ve found, but the tallest ladder I’ve gotten in here is fifteen feet.” Topaz looked up and around. “Maybe go up and look at the note cards? Let us know what’s there? Still trying to limit who touches what.”
Wanda was, fortunately, one of those who was allowed to touch a majority of everything. She frowned at the ever growing list in her notebook of the items she was hastily cataloging. “I’m billing someone for that iPad that broke when I tried to bring it in,” she joked, shaking out her hand as she stood, closing another box and writing down another item.
Another woosh, and the ankled-winged prince was back. “Ladders. How common. Pfft. We have no need for ladders, for you have Namor.”
“Yes but the ladders are far less dramatic,” Wanda replied dryly.
“And potentially more stable,” Matt added, taking another box and hefting it. No super strength for him, but he worked out regularly. The music had transmuted somehow into a sort of hypnotizing reverberating drum. It was disconcerting, but also...comforting. That alone made him nervous. “Unlike everything else in here.”
“Dude, remind me to tell you about the time we had to retrieve like, a ceremonial mask in Guatemala City from some crime family. They’d been using it to control their own little empire and they did not want to give it up.” Jubilee pulled out a pair of gloves as she talked and started walking along one particularly tall series of shelves, looking for the best way up. “Now that shit was creepy, like seriously creepy. People in thrall will do absolutely anything, and they don’t even feel it when you stab them.”
Alani made a face upon hearing Jubilee’s statement. “Oh god, that is fucked.” Finding a box in need of moving, she glanced quickly around the space. “But a firm disagree with whoever said this was an environment they could get behind, if I’d known it was like this I’da begged my grandma for a taonga to ward off the heebie jeebies I’m getting.”
“Oi, you lot could treat the place with a bit more respect,” Topaz called without any real conviction. “It has feelings, you know.”
“It loves me! Else it’d be singing punk rock tunes from the eighties.” Jubilee noted with a grin down at Topaz, she’d managed to make her way up to the top shelving and was slowly looking over things. “Yo, Gothica, you missed a few things up here. Want me to bring them down?”
Topaz backed up a bit to squint up at the top shelves, then dug a small book out of her bag, flipping through it. “Yeah, those are safe to touch. Just don’t throw them or anything. And maybe get gloves from Darcy. It can’t hurt.”
“And don’t steal any of it just to prove I could? Gotcha.” Jubilee dropped from the shelving and rolled into a crouch before standing to walk casually across to Darcy. “Yo, my dude. Got some gloves for me?”
“No, Jubilee, bad Jubilee,” Wanda muttered, completely out of instinct.
“Yeah, sec.” Darcy grabbed a set and wound them into a ball before using an underhand throw to toss them towards Jubilee. “Nice catch, chica.”
“All the baseball practice against Garrison every time we have a Fourth of July, that man took his sport seriously.”
Jubilee tugged them on before heading back toward the shelving and her path upward. It was an easy climb and she had the artifacts down and to Topaz in no time, heading back toward further shelves in the distance.
“Let me know if the place starts going all freaky woo woo shit, but I should be fine off on my own for now.”
