angryhearts | it's getting hot in here

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it's getting hot in here

SO (PLEASE DON'T) TAKE OFF ALL YOUR CLOTHES

Days are almost meaningless, here in Wonderland. With the eternal twilight outside the windows and many of the hotel's amenities open around the clock, it can be hard to keep track, can't it? But you must sleep, or at least return to your room, some time. It's on one of these times that you may begin to notice a faint sound coming from inside the walls. Or is it the ceiling? The floor? Something that sounds like scratching, or tapping, or the strained whir of machinery. Then it fades away. Whether it's moving on to another room or stopping entirely, it's hard to tell.

After a few nights, or days, of this happening, it suddenly stops. There's a brief period of peace, and perhaps you even get some rest. Then there's a series of thumps, sharp clicks and a loud stuttering sound that signals the hotel's air conditioning unit giving out.

At first it's not so bad. It's dark out, right, how hot can it really be outside? The air itself still seems to be circulating, albeit more slowly, but it's enough that you can breathe. But the heat seems to keep building, and building, the air hanging heavy and thick and leaving a lingering feeling that it's pressing down on you. Even sitting still no longer becomes enough to ease the suffocating heat.

The staff don't know what's happened to the air conditioner, when you ask. "Oh, that finicky thing", they say, as if it's a minor inconvenience. They assure you that the Queen's mechanics will have it fixed in no time — they always do. In the meantime, can they interest you in a refreshing iced tea? Perhaps a dip in the pool?

Is it your imagination, or do a few of the staff seem a little uncertain as they try to brush off your questions? A little less confident than they always have been before? Whatever their demeanor, it seems they still have no answers to give. The astute may notice that after a conversation with one of these staff, they can't seem to be found again.

As if that weren't enough, the scratching in the walls starts up again. With the oppressive heat, the rising tension and frayed nerves, is it any wonder that the staff might seem more apprehensive?

THINGS THAT GO BUMP IN THE NIGHT 06/11 - 06/13

Sleeping is probably hard enough, in a hotel where the activity never seems to cease. At least it's generally quiet in the upper floors, at least Oysters can turn out the lights in their own room and find some peace.

...usually, anyway.

At first it's only the faintest sounds, something only noticeable to those who sleep lightly. The staff, if asked, don't acknowledge hearing anything and seem politely concerned about anything disturbing the rest of their guests. Oysters may be offered ear plugs, or a device to listen to music, or a trip to the spa for relaxation.

Then it grows in both volume and frequency, disturbing even the heaviest of sleepers at night. Some staff still say they haven't heard anything, other staff acknowledge the sounds but brush them off, unconcerned. Every building has its quirks, after all! There does seem to be an increase in staff milling about, however, making it difficult for those who may want to look into things without being seen.

CLICK CLICK... THUMP
06/14 - 06/21

The fourth day of the event begins with a short period of blissful silence, quickly ruined by a loud, persistent clicking sound, audible in all parts of the hotel... And then an even louder THUMP as the air conditioning unit gives out.

At first, it's not terrible — the air is still circulating, and while the heat is uncomfortable it's not unbearable. As time goes on, though, the heat builds and builds, until not even staying in place will provide any relief.

The staff profess ignorance to whatever happened to the air conditioner, if asked — some more convincingly than others. They all offer iced teas for relief, and suggest a dip in the Pool of Tears, though those who seem uncertain when answering any questions will try to leave the conversation faster, and won't be easily found again.

While the iced teas are incredibly effective at helping to beat the heat, they once again seem to offer some strange effects — enough glasses, and Oysters will be overcome either with anger and irritation, or a sense of serene calm. Any little thing could set off an Oyster who's been affected by the anger-inducing tea; an Oyster who drank the calming tea is utterly unflappable. These effects persist for just as long as it takes for the cooling effects to wear off, at which point Oysters are left with a choice — deal with the heat, or take their chances with another tea?

And to top it all off, the scratching noise in the walls has started up again. The few staff remaining at this point are as unhelpful as ever, but they don't have the same infuriating calm to their answers — but who could blame them being a little nervous?

QUEEN'S ADDRESS
06/21

And finally, the tenth day brings relief in the form of a loud shuddering sound, and then the quiet whoosh of a working air conditioner. Over the course of the day, the Hotel gets progressively cooler, until it is once again at the comfortable, cool temperature Oysters had grown used to in their first month here in the Hotel.

It also brings an address from the Queen.

"Oh, my curious Oysters, when you try to play with that which you don't understand, you break things! Not to fear, all has been set to rights now that our dear Dormouse has fixed what some careless guest disrupted. If you wanted to play games, you should have simply said! I have a dear companion for you who is so eager to join in the fun."

The Queen will not respond to any messages sent back to her.

If you have any questions, please direct them to the OOC post here. RNG results for the off limits areas will be going out tomorrow, so if anyone would still like to sign up for those that hasn't yet please do so tonight!

PREMISE RULES FAQ TAKEN RESERVES APPLICATION MOD CONTACT HIATUS & DROPS WORLD INFO NPCS CALENDAR AC REWARDS

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

CLICK CLICK... THUMP

[ Sam's no stranger to the heat. With how many places he's been in the last few years alone, let alone with his time in the military - he's had to pull missions in every weather extreme. So he's not thrilled about it, but whatever, he can deal.

At least there's the pool, and it doesn't seem to be up to whatever crazy nonsense was going on with it when he first tried it out. That's where he spends most of his time, lounging in a pair of swim trunks. There's a tray with a pitcher of something colorful and filled with ice beside a couple of glasses next to him - clearly something he's snatched from the buffet. ]

Want one? It's not the tea they're pushing on us, I promise.

[ It may or may not be alcoholic, however. ]

CLOSED TO MIKUMO GUYNEMER

[ When the air conditioner first breaks and the noises stop, Sam doesn't for a second think that means this is over. It being slightly too hot just doesn't seem like enough for the ones behind all the stuff that's happened before, which just means he's gotta be ready for when it does.

There's a small handful of people he's interacted with enough that he wants to see what their opinion on this latest hotel shit is - and he wants to check on them, to make sure they're okay. Mikumo's first on his list, since he still wants to thank her for being there when they both lost their hearing. It would've been a hell of a lot harder confronting the staff without her.

He debates for a moment before pocketing the glass vial he'd found in his room - he's not sure he wants to know what it means by boost, but if it's something that can help with whatever this latest thing is, he wants it with him. Then he heads to Mikumo's room, knocking on the door. ]

CLOSED TO CROWLEY

[ Still a little damp from the pool and wearing only his bird swim trunks, Sam's made his way into the bar. It's a hell of a lot hotter in here, sure, but he needed something stronger than what he'd been able to snag from the buffet. Which is why he's sitting at the bar, sipping at something that resembles scotch over ice.

He's also currently having a staring contest with a couple of rats sitting on the bar stool next to him. ]

If you guys get me kicked out of here, I'm gonna be real damn pissed. Can you even understand me?

CLOSED TO COMMANDER SHEPARD

[ At some point, he seeks Shepard out. He doesn't really know her yet, their probably too honest conversation in the bar when they were drunk and happy aside, but he knows enough to consider her a potential ally - and for her to be one of the people he wants to check on in all of this.

It's not at all a surprise when talking with Shepard leads to investigating with Shepard, and soon they're where the loudest of the noises had been last night, breaking open the hatch on the top of the elevator. ]

Do elevator shafts look different on spaceships than they do on Earth?

[ He doesn't question that she's been in an elevator shaft or two in her time - he's just going to assume that of course she has, because who in ther similar lines of work hasn't. ]

Edited 2020-06-14 02:14 (UTC)

Depends on the elevator, right?

[And then she looks. It's a squarish, narrow room, that goes about as far up and down as she can see, squinting into the darkness.]

The cables are weird, for me. Most elevators in space use mass field motors to run; doesn't depend on gravity. But hey, as far I can tell, everything here runs on miracles and wishful thinking so who knows what these actually do?

[She sticks an indicative thumb at the cables, already reaching out for the shaft wall, where a service ladder has been recessed. It's just deep enough a gap for one person to climb, and not be crushed by a passing elevator. She hauls herself into place without any visible effort, and hangs there by one arm and leg, to look back at him.]

You're the expert here: up or down? [Penthouse at the top floor, at least if this were a normal building, and that's a good target for anyone looking for money, leadership, or metaphorical power. But utilities go in the basement, which is a fine place to look for hiding places, secret accesses, and literal power.] I have no idea what the structure of this place is supposed to be, but it's all the same to me.

[ There's a soft, amused snort at her commentary about this place. ]

Someone's wishful thinking, anyway.

[ Sure as hell isn't his. Or maybe all of this is some kind of messed up afterlife, but either way, he's not gonna change his approach to all of this.

She pulls herself up on the ladder, and. Well he's just going to enjoy that for a moment - just because they're working doesn't mean he can't appreciate a casual display of strength and competence, all right - as he considers the question.

Ideally, they'd go in one direction and then loop back around if they picked the wrong target, but he kind of gets the feeling the staff aren't going to be distracted long enough for them to get away with doing that without getting caught. ]

Up. Even if we can't find 'em, maybe we can get to the roof and get a better idea on what we're dealing with out there.

[ He waits for her to climb enough that he can swing himself on up behind her. ]

Copy that.

[And up we go, hand over hand with a quick, steady pace. Shepard's no stranger to physical exercise, and the downtime afforded by the week she's been here has left her buzzing with the need to move. It feels good.]

Hello, what's this? [She stops, leaning out to prod at the interior of the elevator doors, just one floor up. They're closed tight, but scratched oddly around the middle, as if something sharp had been used to try and pry the door open from the seam. It didn't look as if they'd made much purchase] Looks like we're not the only ones with a big idea around here.

[she moves a couple of rungs up, to give him better access, then shakes her head and gets back to it. Up, up and up, occasionally stopping to ease the ache in their fingers, once or twice to strain at stubborn doors, more for the hell of it than for any reason to believe they'd open. The shaft below and above both come to resemble one another so completely that Shepard might easily have become lost, had she not been counting floors.]

Hey, look at this. [It's the thirty-fourth floor they've come to, so far, and it's got the same gnawed-on marks as the rest, but this one is open. Not a lot, barely half a centimeter, but just barely enough to get some purchase, if one were determined.] Let's give it a shot. You take one side I'll take the other?

[ Doing something, even if this doesn't end up getting them much, feels a whole hell of a lot better than just sitting around, so yeah, he's definitely feeling good about the stretch in his muscles right about now.

He scratches small symbols on each door as they pass it, just in case - look, he remembers when the hotel started shifting itself all over the damn place, all right, he doesn't want to risk them getting lost in here if it happens again. Sam'd told her about that before they decided to do this; how when he got here there was only the buffet and the bar they had access to, except then everyone lost their sense of sight or hearing, rooms started appearing and disappearing and were never in the same place, until things settled down and they suddenly had access to all of them.

Honestly, maybe not the weirdest shit either of them have ever encountered, but you don't go breaking into places with someone without telling them what you know about the place. ]

Hell yeah, I got you.

[ It means getting a little up close and personal, straddling one side of the ladder so they can each grab a side of the door - and pretty much just staying on the ladder by hooking his knee and ankle around it, but hey, never let it be said he skipped leg day. ]

On three.

[ And he pulls, hoping whoever tried this before them damaged it enough that - hell yes, there it goes, and he gives a short grunt of satisfaction as they're able to pry the doors open enough to see the hallway they open onto. ]

[She strains with him, and it gives, then gives a little more. Shepard wedges her shoulder into the gap and heaves with both arms and main strength, making a gap big enough for him to sidle through, if he's not too shy. Not her first time doing that, you see.

The hall beyond is... eerie.

It's quiet, completely quiet, and not the sleeping, disinterested anonymity of a carefully indistinguishable hotel hall. It's more like an office, the walls white not out of a care for budget, but out of a lack of care for anything else. The doors, were they not inset slightly, would be invisible against the walls, and the whole place had an expectant, busy quality, despite the blankness, as if behind each and every door were laboratories, office rooms, and cubicle farms, all full of busy people who very much did not wish to be disturbed. In the airless heat, there wasn't even the sound of a fan to be heard. There was no sound, anywhere, and no end to the white, white hallway, not within easy sight.]

...Okay. What do you think?

[There was no evidence anywhere of whatever had tried to get in here before them, at least.]

Pick a door?

[ Shy definitely isn't one of Sam's defining features, and he slides on through the gap, jamming it open with his own shoulder on the other side until she's gone through as well.

Sam wasn't ever meant for office life, but this - yeah, he's pretty sure it's creepy even beyond his personal distaste for the environment. The silence itself reminds him of the last time he was wandering around areas of the hotel with no idea where he was. This time it's a hell of a lot more intentional, sure, but that doesn't mean Mad March isn't still out there lurking, watching them from some pocket in the long hallway that they didn't even know was there.

Doesn't stop him from moving forward, either, though it does mean he listens very carefully as he does. Then he throws Shepard a little grin. ]

Hope it's a car and not a goat?

[ Which makes absolutely no sense if they don't have the Let's Make a Deal game show where she's from and she's never heard of the Monty Hall problem, but eh, doesn't matter. He tries the first door he comes to, and isn't surprised to find it locked. The next two result in the same, and then he glances back over at her. ]

We going stealth here, or just fuck it?

I like the way you think.

[And, with no further preamble, she leans back and kicks the door right off its latch. It swings into the room beyond, impacting the wall with a bang made only more shocking by the quiet. It ought to echo, but the carpet of the hall swallows it up; not so, for the room beyond.

Shepard, for all her jackbooted tactics, doesn't move to enter.

It's a corridor, grey-blue metal and white-blue lights, signage in a sterile stenciled-on style cautioning the reader to watch the warning lights when airlock is in use. The floor is a grate, showing tubing and wires, a crawlspace beneath clearly visible.]

What the fuck. [Shepard isn't paying much attention to Sam, now, and instead of simply storming in past the dented door and it's ruined deadbolt, she walks past him as if in a daze.] ...What is this?

[To the left, what is clearly a cockpit of some sort, room for three seats, center, left, and right, and all the readouts brought up in their holographic glory. Sam may not know the system or the specifics, but any pilot could recognize a few things; pitch, airspeed readout, altimeter, and the gyroscope horizon-line reading level with text declaring the whole system DOCKED: LOADING CLAMPS ENGAGED.

To the right? Well. More of the same. Seats and stations, crowded in close, like t he belly of a submarine, but very clearly this is not meant to go underwater, not with the endless view of stars out the front viewport. Not with the clearly-visible galactic map on display above a raised station, in the command center to the right. The words stenciled on the wall say it all.]

...This is the Normandy. This is my ship. [There is a pause, as she listens. The lights may be on, but there's no more sound here than in the previous room. Dead silence, not even the air-sounds of a functioning life support system. No ship, however damaged, was ever really silent unless it, and everyone within, were dead.] Something's definitely not right, here.

[ Damn, Shepard. Sam is both suitably impressed and not at all surprised.

He doesn't see what's in the room at first, busy watching her back just in case someone comes at them from one of the other doors - the dissonance of the quiet associated with such a forceful act is creepy as shit, but it doesn't mean no one heard it. It's only when he hears her curse that all of his focus goes back to her, just in time so see her walk dazedly into the room.

Shit.

Sam follows, eyes taking in the sheer scope of what's before him - oh, yeah, he knows what this is despite having never stepped foot on one. It should be impossible, for the hotel to have a door that leads to a spaceship, but then, a lot of things about this hotel should be impossible.

And then the door closes behind them, disappearing seamlessly into the ship as if it was never there, and this time Sam curses out loud. ]

Shit.

[ He pauses from going to check to see if it's really gone, just in case, when he hears her identify it as not just any spaceship, but hers. That - oh, that makes things so much more complicated. ]

Were you on it before you came here?

SO (PLEASE DON'T) TAKE OFF ALL YOUR CLOTHES

THINGS THAT GO BUMP IN THE NIGHT 06/11 - 06/13

CLICK CLICK... THUMP 06/14 - 06/21

QUEEN'S ADDRESS 06/21

Sam Wilson | Marvel Cinematic Universe

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CLICK CLICK... THUMP
06/14 - 06/21

QUEEN'S ADDRESS
06/21