quitplayinggames | [??? Day 465]

[you wake up.

the first sensation you feel is your key, warm and alive against your chest. you know immediately that this place is responsive to this power, the power of your will applied to magic. if you've started to experiment with what your special ability is, or if you want to, that realization might be easier to find here as well - though it's not strictly necessary. all you need for sure is a question: what are your desires. . .?

. . . you're in a blank white room. the walls and ceiling are featureless. the floor is covered in a million feathers and scraps of cloth, which drift up in muffling gales around you if you so much as move.

up in one corner high off the ground, you glimpse a splash of bright electric blue through the drifting airy debris. the only other thing of note in the room is the door on one wall: it's white and featureless as a piece of paper, and you get the sense that it will vanish into the wall again if closed. undifferentiated noise pours through the place where it's cracked open, unbearably loud. even with the feathers in the air shutting out the noise a little, it's hard to hear yourself think.

there's something hard and clanging underfoot too, hidden by the feathers. you trip over it immediately because of course you do; ow! what is that?]

((This is a short, individual, play-at-your-own pace plot explore, which will run until 11:59 PM EST on Tuesday, June 2. Anyone jumping in before then is welcome! This is not directly connected with heartgames, so people are free to jump in regardless of whether they've played or run another heart this round.))

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[it's like swimming in feathers - it's kind of nice. he purposely stirs up the feathers a little more as he digs]

[the feathers are mesmerizing, and the dreamy sensation helps you ignore the noise a bit too. . . it'd be easy to stay like this for a while, flapping your arms occasionally.

unfortunately, the irregularly shaped hard objects are still there. with a little effort and persistence, you unearth at least a few things from the pile. you now have:

a crowbar
a pile of paint tubes in crazed bright colors
an antique-looking hotel telephone with the cord cut.

oookay then.]

[he picks up the crowbar and studies the paint tubes, but the phone attracts his attention most]

A phone...?

[lifts the receiver to his ear]

[nothing.]

Hello?

[waits for an answer anyway]

[still blank; no dial tone, no nothing.]

[mysterious]

[closer look at the crowbar and the paints for anything else about them]

[they're paints and a crowbar! the crowbar is a crowbar. the paints are in awful dayglo colors, like the splash of paint over in the corner. nothing else remarkable.]

[Ah...

all right, gathering up his items before going to the door to see about stopping that dreadful noise]

Edited 2015-06-02 04:38 (UTC)

[if you look through the crack in the door, the volume increases even further, feathers settling down to the floor again behind you - you can hear a few individual fragments in there.]

"i want to kiss him i want to touch him i want to"
"i want my freedom, but i'm scared, i want someone to tell me what to do, but i"
"i want to feel safe again."
"i want her back, i want them back."
"i want to go home."
"i never want to see that place again, i hate it, i want to stop remembering--"
"i want them to love me."
"i want to make something"
"i want a burger…"
"why won't they look at me? i want--"
"i want--"
"I WANT"

[. . . the deluge continues indefinitely. can you even process this right now? the words are so loud they hammer on the inside of your skull.

in what tiny space is left for your other senses, you can notice that through the door is an endless series of hotel corridors, with the nameplates on the doors all blank. those of you who have been to Dream's realm or saw a certain memory at Cutie Velvet's sharing game will find it familiar.]

[it's difficult to focus with all the noise, and he covers his ears with his hands does that even help??]

Stop it!

[then goes to pull on the door]

[it doesn't.

you cannot open the door further to go outside no matter how you tug. you might be able to push it shut if you have something to lever it with, though. your key tingles on your chest - this may need more than just muscle power. . .]

[!

applies crowbar to door, really really wanting to shut it]

[your key glows as you move it, brightening as you put more and more of your energy into what you're focused on. the door slowly shuts, moving smoothly.

you can no longer tell where the outlines were by sight, but you can hear the roar of noise from the hall still; at least it's mercifully quieter. the process of applying your will to the space around you with your keys is more familiar, now; it's not the same effort of mere imagination as it was in the cloud realm, but this is still a power you can access.

you can't open the door again, though you can feel the seams of where it was under your fingers.]

[a sigh of relief as he runs his hand along the seams]

[while you're contemplating the results of your actions, you hear a tinny sound, somehow cutting completely through the noise each time: it layers itself on top of all the other voices rather than removing them, so now it's really loud in your head.

it's coming, improbably, from the cord-cut hotel telephone in the pile of feathers.

the sound is impossible to ignore, hideously compelling - who's even calling? it would be very, very hard not to react to the ringing.]

[what is it doing calling now?

heads back through the feathers to answer that ringing]

[what indeed? picking up the phone does nothing right now - the cut cord is sparking a bit, with no indication of where - or if - the other side is in the mass of feathers. THIS IS A TERRIBLE SYSTEM.

R I N G]

[TRIES TO DIAL RANDOM NUMBERS?]

[the air's still dead, though the cut cord sparks even more. R I N G]

Come on...

[starts digging through the feathers, hoping to find the other half of the cord]

[your key reacts to your urgency, blowing the feathers aside. there-- the cut cord disappears into the floor over that way, hanging loose. there's a couple of feet of slack there.]

[follows the cord to that end, where it meets the floor, pulling gently. where does it come from? seeing if there's anything else about it here]

[it comes from a drilled hole in the floor that's exactly the right width for it! he can get a couple more inches out. . . ]

[why not. keeps pulling for more slack for the cord]

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