Joel Miller (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
shivving) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
entrancelogs2017-10-07 04:08 pm
shivving) wrote in entrancelogs2017-10-07 04:08 pm
open; lay your weary head to rest
Who: Joel & YOU
Where: Tartarus
When: Throughout the event
Rating: R for eventual death
Summary: There's a hundred monsters between him and Ellie. Joel will cut through every last one of them to get to her if that's what it takes.
The Story:
[ Joel opens his eyes, and his heart sinks. The room he's in is unfamiliar, and it's immediately obvious what's happened. It's another event, the mansion transforming itself around them as they sleep.
At least he remembers who he is this time.
He gets to his feet and goes to the window, frowning at the sight of a dark, foreboding green sky. Then he takes out his phone and calls Ellie. The connection's spotty, but he manages to get her location - his main objective, because he's willing to bet that she's no longer in the next room over, as she had been when he'd gone to sleep the night before. He's also willing to bet that it's not going to be a picnic in the park getting back to her.
And as it turns out, he's right. He's barely taken two steps when something horrible and screeching whizzes past his head, and just the sound alone is nearly enough to drive him insane.
Oh, this'll be fun. ]
Where: Tartarus
When: Throughout the event
Rating: R for eventual death
Summary: There's a hundred monsters between him and Ellie. Joel will cut through every last one of them to get to her if that's what it takes.
The Story:
[ Joel opens his eyes, and his heart sinks. The room he's in is unfamiliar, and it's immediately obvious what's happened. It's another event, the mansion transforming itself around them as they sleep.
At least he remembers who he is this time.
He gets to his feet and goes to the window, frowning at the sight of a dark, foreboding green sky. Then he takes out his phone and calls Ellie. The connection's spotty, but he manages to get her location - his main objective, because he's willing to bet that she's no longer in the next room over, as she had been when he'd gone to sleep the night before. He's also willing to bet that it's not going to be a picnic in the park getting back to her.
And as it turns out, he's right. He's barely taken two steps when something horrible and screeching whizzes past his head, and just the sound alone is nearly enough to drive him insane.
Oh, this'll be fun. ]
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That's - that's my friend. Evelyn. [ He cups her cheeks with his hands, brushes her hair back from her face. ] She lives here, just like me. An' now you.
[ Sarah looks solemnly at Evie, then frowns. ]
Dad, she's...she's looking at me weird. Can you...can you ask her to leave?
What? [ He glances back again, frowning at the look on Evie's face and shooting her a glare, knock it off, what the hell's wrong with you, then turns back to Sarah. ] No, no, she's just...surprised to see you here, that's all.
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Is she truly warm, and comforting? Is she not cold and clammy like the image her reflection shows?]
Very surprised, [Evelyn assures them tightly, nodding.] And very happy you're here.
[If it doesn't sound convincing, it's because she's nearly incapable of lying. Especially about this, when it is right in front of her.]
Joel, may I speak with you for- for just a moment?
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A chill passes through him, and he looks back at Sarah, frown deepening. Now that the initial wave of emotion has started to recede, she isn't quite as warm as all that, and he rubs his hands up and down her upper arms distractedly, just as he used to. ]
You cold, baby girl?
A little.
[ He nods, then hoists her up in his arms, her legs around his waist and arms wrapped tightly around his neck. She's getting a little too big to carry her like that, but it's not impossible. Not yet.
Holding his daughter close, Joel walks over to Evie, looking at her solemnly. He's still none too happy with the way she'd scared Sarah, and it shows. ]
What is it?
[ Sarah turns her head, glaring at Evie. ]
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Gently, Evelyn cups one of his elbows in her hand, urging him to move closer. Privacy would be preferred but they haven't the luxury, and that "little girl" is glaring daggers into Evelyn's heart.]
I need you to look in the mirror.
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Evie, what's this about?
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[It's strained, but controlled. A firm request that she sincerely hopes he will follow through with, for all of their sake, because Evelyn doesn't think he could ever forgive her for what she might be forced to do if he doesn't listen.]
I- I noticed something when we were walking here. About the mirrors, our reflections in them.
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Honey, what -
Please, Daddy, I'm scared. Can we go? Can we please just go?
Yeah - yeah, honey, one minute. Jus' one minute, and then we can go.
[ Sarah starts to cry harder, clutching him tighter. ]
Daddy, please.
One minute.
[ He shoots Evie another look - this better be worth it - then steps over to the mirror, trying to ignore Sarah's shrieking and now kicking. He's not sure what to expect - his own mirror, staring back at him? A glimpse into the opposite side of Wonderland?
He sees neither. Instead, it's just him, and Evie just behind and to the side of him, and Sarah.
He can see her ankles where the hems of her pajama pants had ridden up, her bare feet kicking uselessly at his waist. He can see her bare arms where the short sleeves of her t-shirt end. As he stands there, staring, Sarah shakes her head in a furious shriek, giving him just a glimpse of sunken black pits for eyes and a mouth full of sharp, monstrous teeth.
Every inch of her skin is grey and mottled, almost slimy. Dead.
He nearly drops her, his dubious expression changing to one of horror. ]
What the hell -
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He doesn't refuse her, he doesn't fight her, he trusts her enough to know that this is important, otherwise Evelyn wouldn't push so hard. Insist so forcefully. The little girl in his arms begins to squirm and cry out and Evelyn prepares herself for the worst.
When Joel finally turns to look in the mirror she can see the horror spread across his face, shock at something so alien and foreign, something not natural.]
Put her down.
[Evelyn snaps immediately, reaching for his arm.]
Joel, put her down-
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Waiting. Watching for his reaction. ]
I-it's a trick. [ His voice wavers, and he swallows hard. ] Some kinda - funhouse mirror, a shitty joke -
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[Evelyn insists, more and more unnerved by the way that little girl is staring at him, like something she could latch onto and never let go. Something she would happily destroy. Joel doesn't need the anguish of watching something that looks like his child die - again.
She makes contact with Joel's arm and Evelyn pulls at his shirt, a sharp jerk to drag him back into Now, voice firm.]
Drop her.
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Dad? [ Her lower lip trembles. ] Y-you're not gonna leave me, right?
[ Joel shakes his head, less a denial than a complete inability to address the question. He looks closely into Sarah's eyes, searching her face.
It looks like her. It sounds like her. ]
Sarah...that you, babe?
[ His tone is soft, almost inaudible. Worried. Dreading what her answer might be, dreading the truth he already fears.
Sarah's eyes widen in alarm, and she clings on to him tighter. ]
Daddy, please. Please, don't leave me.
I...
[ I won't, he can't say. Can't promise. He swallows again, past the lump in his throat.
Asking her is irrational, he knows. It won't prove anything. But he can't...he can't just drop her and walk away.
He can't. ]
Baby girl, please. Please say that it's you.
[ Tears have started leaking down his cheeks, blurring his vision. Joel's voice is hoarse, almost broken. All his attention is on Sarah. Evie might as well not even exist. ]
Please...please, honey, I need it to be you.
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Even so, she can feel herself wavering in that determination when the girl's hands cling to him more tightly.]
Joel-
Make her go, Daddy. Make her leave! I don't want her here!
[She neither confirms nor denies, but her insistence turns from small demands to desperate please. Quiet responses to her father, to screaming.]
Make her leave! Make her leave!
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[ But his heart is sinking, turning to lead in his chest. His daughter had been many things, but she had never been jealous. Never possessive. Always eager to meet new people, to get to know them, to help them however she could.
She'd been a better person than him, in that way and so many others.
Evie's tugging at his shirt, saying nothing, but clearly worried. Trying not to antagonize the girl, with little success.
The girl. But it's not a girl at all, is it? Not Sarah. Not his baby girl.
She's sobbing now, face pressed into his neck, and slowly, hating himself, he lifts his eyes, looks into the mirror. Looks at the creature wrapped tightly around his torso, the dead gray skin. He can't see her face, the black holes for eyes, the monstrous mouth of sharp teeth, but he doesn't need to. He'll never forget that sight.
Joel takes a breath, and it hitches only slightly. He sets his jaw, and then, slowly but firmly, takes Sarah's (not Sarah's) wrists in his hand and, gently but with an iron grip, starts to pry her off. ]
Let go.
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[The girl - the thing - hisses as soon as Joel begins to prise her grip free of his shoulders, his shirt. It clutches desperately, a weak thing by nature but no less frightening for what it represents. What it does. Sarah begins to thrash, baring her teeth, and the flicker of her reflection is terrifying.
He's moving too slowly and her little legs wrap tightly around his waist, elbows flailing when he pushes her hands away. A hellion, not a daughter. So as not to rush Joel, but assist him, Evelyn reaches down to help unhook her feet even as the girl kicks and screams.]
No no no no no no no!
Get her off, Joel, [Evelyn snaps with more force than she intends to, because if he dies with his throat torn out by those teeth she doesn't know what she'll do.] Come on!
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He doesn't look. He stumbles away, down the hall, wavering drunkenly at first and then running until the sound of his daughter's voice fades and he falls to his knees, his hands coming up to cover his face as he collapses, sobbing. ]
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When she catches up to him he's fallen, crumpled under the weight of loss and Evelyn's heart breaks remembering how she had shaken apart when they had stolen her son away.]
Joel.
[On her knees in front of him without hesitating she touches his quaking shoulders, gently prises his hands from his face to pull him into an embrace. Better to hide that sorrow in a robe and willing arms.]
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Perhaps it's a bit of both. In any case, Evie eases Joel's hands away from his face, wraps her arms around him, and Joel lets her. He goes willingly into her embrace, hands clutching desperately at her as he buries his face helplessly in her shoulder. ]
Sarah...
[ It's a lament at once tender with fresh pain, and all but bursting with grief that's been kept buried for two decades. ]
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He has waited for so long, agonised for what is probably years, having lost someone so desperately important to him he probably never thought about what life would be like without her. He had to learn anyway, on his own. Had to make peace with that, or at least put it away in a box that never sees the light of day.
Joel sags against her and she lets him press his face into her shoulder, saltwater seeping through thin fabric. His fingers twist into her robe with frantic motions, ghost sensations of wanting to hold the daughter taken from him not once, but twice. That the girl in the hall was never any relation to him has no bearing. She was every hope he left behind.]
I know. [One of her hands curls around the back of his neck, holding fast as he shakes. Nothing she can say will ease the burden.] I know.
i'm really sorry but this is honestly the most appropriate icon i have rn
He turns his head, looking back down the corridor. She's still back there, somewhere. ]
I can't leave her.
[ Even if she's a monster. She looks, sounds, feels like his little girl. He can't. He can't walk away. ]
LMAOOOOOO
[Her tone firms, and just as hardened is her determination that he not fall prey to the thing from which he just escaped. He pulls away just enough to give her an anguished look and Evelyn sets herself, cupping his face with both hands and dragging his wandering gaze back to her.]
You are not going back there. This place fabricates illusions. She won't be there, and she is not your daughter.
Do you understand?
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If...
[ He swallows, roughly. ]
If she kills me, I'll just come back.
[ Isn't it worth the risk? To walk back down that corridor? To see Sarah again, even for a few short minutes, even if it was never really her? ]
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I'm not letting you go back there.
[Evelyn states with enough conviction it might be believable, even with their size difference, even with his superior bulk. She remembers shrinking into the floor in a pool of drying blood while Will pulled her out of the mire with contact, distraction.]
Come with me, Joel. [Her hands never stop moving, for that purpose. Over his forehead, his jaw, his neck. Trying to maintain the tether so he doesn't drift away.] Please. Come with me.
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(How many times had he idly fantasized about her touching him this way? More than once, certainly.)
But neither can he bring himself to turn away from that hallway, from Sarah. He doesn't push Evie off, but he stays where he is, looking with longing back the way they had come. Anguished. Irresolute. ]
I can't.
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With some insistence Evelyn delivers a gentle smack to one of his cheeks, forcibly dragging him back.]
What about Ellie, hm? She needs you. Don't do this. Don't fall down this hole.
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[ She'd been the first one he'd called, when he'd woken up to this mess. Confirming her safety had been the only thought in his mind, and the only reason he'd left his room at all had been to get to her, as quickly as possible.
She's still out there. Still waiting for him, and facing who knows what nightmares in the interim, while he wastes time here.
Guilt and fear hit him like a stone, and he wipes the last of the dried tear tracks from his cheeks, shaking his head. ]
I gotta...I gotta find her. I gotta get to her.
[ But he doesn't move. Not yet. ]
(no subject)