evilwithin (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
evilwithin) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
hillhouse2021-06-06 07:02 pm
evilwithin) wrote in hillhouse2021-06-06 07:02 pm
Entry tags:
MIDNIGHT
[You know you were walking, though you thought it was a dream. Deep into the woods, armed with a flashlight, the fog grows deeper, deeper, and with it, your sense of reality, and of self, blurs.
Leaves crunch. Gravel rolls beneath your heels. An iron gate is pushed open on rusted, protesting hinges. Somewhere along the way, other footsteps joined yours, the cadence too in sync to be natural. All at once you stop, standing, dazed. The fog around you has disappeared, but your head remains clouded.
That's when a clock begins to chime. With each bellowing note, your head starts to clear, your body regaining warmth. When the twelfth, and final, tone has faded, you have full control over your faculties once more. If only you knew why you were here, or where this was, or how you even got to this place.
The house is quiet, but you have the distinct sense that it is simply biding it's time, for now.]
Leaves crunch. Gravel rolls beneath your heels. An iron gate is pushed open on rusted, protesting hinges. Somewhere along the way, other footsteps joined yours, the cadence too in sync to be natural. All at once you stop, standing, dazed. The fog around you has disappeared, but your head remains clouded.
That's when a clock begins to chime. With each bellowing note, your head starts to clear, your body regaining warmth. When the twelfth, and final, tone has faded, you have full control over your faculties once more. If only you knew why you were here, or where this was, or how you even got to this place.
The house is quiet, but you have the distinct sense that it is simply biding it's time, for now.]
no subject
[He says it more to himself than anyone else around him, although he's not not talking to them. Polnareff glances around, taking note of each of the figures: checking out their faces, sure, but scanning them for weapons, too. Anything notable, anything interesting . . .
And then focuses his attention back on their surroundings. He's in a wheelchair, with an eyepatch (a very fancy) eyepatch over his right eye.]
Oye! You guys got names or what? Where you from? Nome? Occupazione? Il capo sarà incazzato . . .
[He says it briskly, not fearfully.]
no subject
Yeah sorry, uh, no hablo. [Spanish is close to Italian, right?] It's David.
[And David is just going to conveniently ignore that second question. He's more focused on the room around them than on... whoever this is. The house is giving him hella bad vibes.]
no subject
[Boy, don't YOU look stupid, his tone says. And now, just to add to the cultural confusion, a French-ass name.]
Jean-Pierre Polnareff.
So this is, uh, different, huh?
no subject
Sure is. Definitely never had anything like this happen before. [He pats himself down, as if looking for something. All he finds is a flashlight, which he immediately tests for batteries, potentially blinding Jean-Pierre in the process.]
Just checking, but you don't remember how you got here either, right?
no subject
He is, however, going to dig around and, wouldn't you know it, that sure is a flashlight. He flicks it on and off, then tucks it next to him in the chair.]
No. But maybe that's not so shocking. You got any criminal connections? Anybody who might wanna get you outta the way or something?
no subject
He tucks the flashlight into a jacket pocket for now.]
Kind of. I mean, I know criminals— [he'd be kind of hard-pressed to name someone he knows who isn't—] but I don't think any of them have it out for me right now. [Though he gets the feeling that someone might. Several someones, perhaps.]
Is there a reason that's the first place you went?
no subject
[It's said mildly enough, like one might say they work in a bank. It's fine.]
What do you mean, you know criminals?
no subject
[Get a load of this kid. The teenager, standing at a mere 5'2" and wearing pigtails, definitely looks like he could be a young girl, despite the slight lowness of his soft-spoken voice. He raises a hand in a muted greeting. Of course, what's really the hardest thing to ignore is the hollow-faced plaster that he wears over his face, blue eyes peering out from behind its holes.]
I'm Sal. Or Sally Face, if you prefer. Uh, formerly of New Jersey but now of Nockfell, and I'm a student.
no subject
[Well, neat. A beat, and though he's clearly, uh, distracted by all this, still Polnareff offers the kid a grin.]
Nice to meet you. Name's Polnareff. You know, I got a friend who lives in New York— that's near New Jersey, right?
[It's not a real question. Polnareff turns towards him, tipping his head. Mildly:]
You got any idea what this might be about?
no subject
No idea, no...I remember walking here, sort of, but it was too dark and foggy to see anything. I thought I was just dreaming.
[He has a lot of weird dreams.]
It's nice to meet you, too. I mean, despite this being...kind of like a horror movie.
no subject
Yeah, no kidding. Let's just hope it's one of the ones where you can kill the serial killer or monster or whatever, hey?
[He wishes he had a gun. Or his sword. Or both! Both would be nice, and he absently pats along his hip, just as he had right when he'd woken up, but no. Polnareff glances around again, then gestures to Sal.]
Gimmie a hand here.
[He's going to stand. He's got a cane strapped to the back of his chair, but getting up out of it requires some help sometimes. Just a quick hoist up, but he can stand on his own. Metallic prosthetics, built from his thighs down, catch the faint light, gleaming. They're nice prosthetics.]
A house like this looks worth exploring, but first things first.
Hey, you don't know either of them, right?
[Jesse or David, he means.]