entrancelogs | [closed] What will you gain, making your life a little longer?

Entry tags:

[closed] What will you gain, making your life a little longer?

Who: Philip [

radiopalkiller] and audience (read: Evelyn O'Connell [

nascensibility], Will Graham [

notyourteacup], Ned (The Pie Maker) [

wordvomit], The Once-ler [

thneedifestdestiny] & Peter Rumancek [

gadjos])
Where: Philip's room (5/499) & assorted Wonderland hallways
When: 11/19 - 11/23
Rating: R for graphic violence, animal death, people death & naked werewolves
Summary: If one death opens a door for darkness, then seven deaths rent a wrecking ball and tear down the walls. Two gunshots, two zombies, one stab, one fall, and one sip of poison later, and Philip is once again caught vividly reliving things he would much rather leave behind for good.
The Story:

His head jerks up, not for the first time in the last hour. Shadows stare back at him passively, from all the corners the lamplight doesn't reach. Three in the morning. Four, at most. Philip doesn't bother to check his watch for confirmation. Another sound in the distance. Wonderland never lies silent, but tonight it whispers ominously, tonight he swears he can hear it groan with the voices of ice and stone.

Tonight is colder and darker, and blaming it on the oncoming winter does nothing to reassure him.

'It definitely has lost weight. This one is so special, so central to what he is doing, he can't stand to wait long, and he doesn't have to. Tomorrow afternoon, he can do it, or tomorrow night. The next day at the latest. Soon.'

Philip turns the page, and watches the book slip through his hands, along with the last of his desire to keep reading. From its permanent paper prison the large moth looks at him accusingly. It's enough to drive him from the sofa, but sitting up feels heavier than it should. Philip exhales, and his breath fogs the air. Darkness swallows his frown as the light goes out.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Literal darkness, seriously? That's what we're doing here, a blackout?

Philip groans, but the sound comes muffled and breathy, and doesn't do his annoyance justice. He stands up, and cautiously makes his way to the closet. Its door creaks quietly, and the next moment the weight of a flashlight feels more comforting in his hand than he wants to admit.

The empty blanket its light shows in Faraday's sleeping corner is less reassuring.

He didn't hear her stir at all, did he? He whistles, and lets the cone illuminate his room from wall to wall. Not a sound, not a sight. He whistles again. Checks the closet, checks under his desk, despite knowing that neither is her brand of mischief. He whistles again, louder, and wishes he could still call out her name.

She replies all the same, a loud yelp of agony jolting Philip to attention. Outside, that's- that's coming from outside!

Gun hurriedly drawn Philip rushes through the door, before he can wonder why it even stood ajar in the first place. He glances to the left and right, staring anxiously at nothing. Looking, listening, finding not a trace of his dog. Not a trace of anything. Only above him the lights in the corridor seem unusually dim, flickering, and their electric hum becomes all but deafening. Tentatively Philip turns back to his room, but within that motion something catches his eye.

Next to his face chalk looks bronzed. No, he mouths. No, no, no, nonononononono over and over again as his eyes grow wide in terror, and jittery shadows betray how badly his hands are shaking. The others need to know. She needs to know immediately.

It is the gun Philip puts away when he needs another hand, while he keeps the flashlight raised like a sword, praying it will hold. Fumbling for his communication device he takes the briefest of glances down at the keypad, and hastily types out an urgent warning.

keep thr light on watever you do keep the lighyt on.torches wont e enough hast o be as brightas possible

He doesn't stop to look down again as he writes, can't bring himself to look down for a second, and lose sight of the hole in the wall. Not much bigger than a dog door, inconspicuous it looks at first glance, only at first glance; before you see the scratch marks, the green ooze that covers the walls inside. Before you see the blood. How did he almost miss the blood?

c.over the holes in the walls if ypou can but be careful..

His finger presses down one last time, and the message is sent. He exhales shakily, braces himself, and sprints back into his room, slamming his hand down on the light switch, slamming his entire weight against the door. His breath of relief is cut short by a low growl, no more than a few steps in front of him.

Panicked he reaches for his gun, just as the decaying monstrosity breaks into a sprint.

Evelyn's lucidity is flickering, she knows that the animal shrieks and groans are the product of the event, nothing more. She knows better than to fall prey to its wiles, to slip into the complacency of Odysseus' lotus-eaters, those who allowed themselves to be taken in by the ruse and lose sight of what mattered.

What grounds her are books, the tangible, the written words that are considerably more difficult to read as of today, stray letters dancing off the pages as though she had imbibed one too many beverages of an alcoholic persuasion.

The PING of her phone gives her a little start, slamming the book shut as her frayed nerves shudder into silence once more. Upon reading the message, Evelyn has to wonder if the errors can be attributed to her own waning literacy, or if others are suffering in quite the same way. Philip's urgency is more than obvious - it is screaming wrongness.

what are you talking about
what holes

most of the library is dimly lit, you know that

Edited 2014-11-23 17:55 (UTC)

Philip still feels his fingers pushing down on the trigger, even after the beast has stopped moving. Four shots, and he will need a lot more bullets than that soon. He kicks the dog in its flank, and watches blood seep from the already decaying corpse, from exposed bone and tattered skin, from another thing that shouldn't even be alive anymore.

At least the sound of his communication device is grounding.

He scans the rest of his room, but it is safe for now. The door-- He shudders to think that the door might not hold, given what the mansion seems to have in store for them, but he locks it just the same.

it's my event be careful
monsters don't try to kill them, they hate the light
dogs again, dogs from the mines
be careful take weapon be careful
don't be alone

Philip sends the message away with a frustrated groan. Not his best literary piece, was it? Earlier he felt even Evelyn's brief reply press into his scalp painfully, clearly the first messengers of a worse headache yet to come. He falls down into his sofa, and counts down the last blissful sixty seconds, before he gears up for the days ahead.

If the environment around her would stop flashing between the hypostyle hall in Karnak and the dark, shuttered stacks of the Wonderland library, it would make things considerably easier on Evelyn. Evelyn, who is trying hard enough as it is to read Philip's text as she receives it and doesn't quite comprehend what he's trying to say. What may or may not be legible reads as:

i 's y ev nt b caref l
d n't t y to k ll the , ey ha e h li ht
do s a ain, dog fro he min s
b ca eful ake we pon e caref l
do ' e a one

Her literacy is getting worse, everything is beginning to look like real gibberish.

"Oh, for Heaven's sake," she mumbles desperately, watching as one of the Rs starts making its way across the communicator as though it has a better place to be. Tapping out a response, Evelyn hopes that it's clear when it reaches him.

where are you?
dogs?
the library looks like the cairo casbah right now

She hits Send.

He wraps Faraday into a blanket, and carries her into the room next door. She was all right once, she might be all right again, he thinks, and closes his eyes to the red glow. Two hands grow from the ground to receive her, and Philip wonders if her sacrifice would set anything in motion.

No motion, no altar, just a fall to the floor, he reminds himself, and pretends that it sounded convincing.

Afterwards he walks back defeated, exhausted. He changes shirts, from bloody to less so. Adds a sweater, because in that regard the illusion of an icy wasteland is at its most convincing. He turns on the fireplace for good measure, and comes to appreciate an instant of quiet, a moment in which his room and his thoughts seem to lie undisturbed, rooted in the reality where they belong.

Philip's watch ticks to the next second, and a chuckle at the back of his mind shatters the last of his peace.

'You, uh, you wanna go back and check that blanket again? I mean, you sure that was your dog, and not some other poor soul you had over for a visit? I'm just sayin', we both know you got a taste for it. Wasn't the first time, won't be the last, if you catch my drift. Sure, can't put the blame on your old buddy anymore, but you gotta love this place for lettin' you play the whole boo hoo, the event made me do it card. So how 'bout it, eh? You go ahead and grab that pickaxe again, just once. Come on, monkey, do it for old times' sake!'

Edited 2014-11-20 20:17 (UTC)

You don't forget the smell of blood thick on the back of your throat. Like it would sink down into your lungs, your stomach and heart, a black miasma that has that gore taste, that red scream ready.

Philip's door is open, a fire roaring and its heat billowing a humid death into the hallway. Will's hand strays to his side and unholsters the handgun, boots muted in the carpet. From their perch, he and Hannibal watched the masses tear each other down and eat the entrails when they, for all intents and purposes, lived in a land of plenty. Insanity has taken root and Will can't find any boughs overhead except Wonderland's, seeds dropping into minds fertile and receptive.

An orange-limned silhouette in Philip's shape reveals nothing, no change that would tell Will why blood clogs his lungs, what madness skipped him this time and planted itself in new soils. The gun angles slightly downward, ready to be raised again.

"Philip?"

Thin air has whispered that name too many times, and disembodied voices like their personal touch. Philip, even at times when he wasn't, and people paid the price for their mistake. A name can feel grounding. This one does not.

He jerks around towards the disturbance. The silhouette looms in front of him, unrecognisable. Like hot wax, molding itself into everything he dreads.

Philip would have called it friendship so readily, no matter how flawed, as long as he could deny it for the desperate grasp at stability that it was. The agent still looks like the next James Bond today, neat suit stained with blood, weapon drawn. How many people did you kill? Curiously. Philip has never seen the hunter terrified like this before, not once. His voice shakes, shakes, but the gun in his hands stays steady. I can't go...I can't go...they're gonna rip me apart, forty years, forty years, Jesus, you ain't turnin' me into no goddamn monster. She's one of them, that much he still remembers from the stories, or at least she wants to be. She looks more at home behind the bar, or at least he'd rather have her there, if the alternative is a pistol pointed at him. You know my name?

The wax keeps dripping. The play has a theme. Philip pulls his gun, and shakily points it at God knows what. Threatening reality to reveal itself is not the worst idea he has ever had.

Looking back at the sum of his past ideas does not make this a comforting thought.

In his mind Wonderland's design is long gone, but now his delusions have crawled to light, and his room has adjusted to his needs. Even the unaffected can see the crumbling walls now, bare safe for a number of medical charts, faded articles, and even paler photographs. The floor is tile and cold, so cold, Christ, it's so cold, and on it Philip's every footstep echoes through the emptiness.

An operating table stands abandoned in a corner, steel and rust and stains of blood which offer their sense of familiarity, if not their comfort. Even the closet looks old and rotten now, but from it he pulled a marker, because his notes are gone, but he needs to recreate it, he needs to remember how it went, if he can produce another dose he can combat the effects, because it worked, it worked at least for a while.

ACETONE, he writes on the wall. IODINE. SULPHUR. ARACHNIDA. NITROGEN

Philip scowls.

He scratches at the back of his neck, and crosses nitrogen from the list.

After unsuccessfully locating Tohru, accidentally visiting with a friend and his cannibalistic more-than-acquaintance*, and wandering through much of the mansion thinking he might be able to help others where, in the past, he has not been helped himself, the Pie Maker decides to make a concerted effort to assist people he at least knows better.

If not Tohru, then a man who lacks the physical ability to voice his concerns.

Hey.

I thought I would stop by to say hi. People are kind of losing it out here.

*How Will Graham could stand to be in the same room as Hannibal Lecter is beyond Ned.

The machine at his back beeps, beeps, beeps. Philip whirls around frantically, and stares into the blinding light. Green and burning like acid, NON-HUMAN SAMPLE. INSERT NEW SAMPLE AND TRY AGAIN. He storms across the room instead, kicks into the device.

It falls. The screen cracks. The message still blinks.

Philip shakes his head angrily, and returns to the drawing board, or his makeshift equivalent thereof.

BOMRNIE CHORILNE ATCOEN

The throbbing in his head grows sharper and louder and louder and sharper.

IIODNE SUPHULR NTIRGOEN

To Ned he leaves the following response:

To Ned he leaves no response.

Philip does not reply.

This would not be such a worrying development if text was not the primary way of communicating with Philip these days, and the Pie Maker frowns deeply at his phone for a good five minutes. It drags into ten minutes. He sets the contraption down long enough to pull a peach cobbler from the oven.

Still no dice.

Do you...need me to swing by?

Another beep, coming distorted from the machine. A chipped and dented husk that still insists on performing its irritating function. Philip dedicates one breath to a hollow groan, and hopes that the device will die in time.

The back of his neck prickles, and he scratches hard. That's where the cold seeps in, like poison saturating his every fibre. Even the blood that sticks to his fingertips doesn't feel warm. He shivers, and watches his breath dance in the air, before it settles at his feet, a blanket of fog.

A en obiticHe mEnr olNo rEd In her itingLo ursU pon, the drawing board reads, uncooperatively.

Philip's hand clenches into a fist.

To Ned he leaves nothing.

Thanks to the wholeheartedly eloquent helping of nothing that he gets from Philip, the Pie Maker assumes the worst. It is in his nature to assume the worst, being the sort of man who not only believes that the glass is half-empty, but that the contents of said glass are either laced with cyanide or are comprised of backwash, which is pretty disappointing any way you slice it.

I'm going to take that as a yes.

Ned dons his battle garb, which is the same as his regular garb, which is a cardigan over his t-shirt. The walk to Philip's room feels unnecessarily long, but it might just be Ned's nerves sending discomfiting prickles across his skin like a hundred-thousand ants.

He stops at the door. The Pie Maker always knocks twice.

The walls are covered in pictures and cuttings and quotes, and obscured by bookshelves. The dead dog in the closet is starting to smell, but nobody is around to eat it anymore. The walls are icy and grey, and crumble into pieces of plaster. Some things won't find him if he stays quiet enough, but the cold will kill him just the same. The walls are green and tile, sickly green and dirty tile and blood, always blood on the floor. The doctors are dead, and they are coming for him.

Philip shifts, and the pain shoots from his wrist through the rest of his body. The walls are irrelevant, the handcuffs are real. He laughs out loud and pained, or so he thinks, but of course he can't have, his voice isn't real either anymore.

The walls are white and glowing and they want revenge. Brick by brick they melt until the warmth becomes heat, until the walls are merciless metal, and the incinerator traps him in a cage of flames and steel and the skin peels from his arms, curling and black.

Philip screams, and the walls are gone. The wind is howling, and there is snow, only ice and snow, as far as the eye can see. Except for one thing, only a few feet away; only a hatch, which opens into darkness and warmth. But Philip's body won't move, can't move anymore. He is too weak, and too cold, and he will die here.

Thank god, he will finally die here.

Honestly, it took the Once-ler a while to figure out what was going on this time. Sure, that Alice girl left a message that was incredibly ominous, but when event time rolled around...nothing. Nothing for him, anyway. It's not the first event recently that's been not nearly as horrible for him as everyone else, and he's starting to get kind of suspicious. It's not like he did anything to deserve getting spared, after all.

But then that other girl made a post that explained all of it - he's not out of his mind because he hasn't died yet, somehow. Honestly, he hadn't thought that was all that unusual, but watching everyone in the mansion lose their minds has made it clear that no, he's the odd one out here. Especially when he's been in Wonderland as long as he has.

He can't help thinking about Phil. He's probably having a terrible time, considering this event hits anyone who's died before, and he's died probably more than anyone else the Once-ler knows. However, he wavers on checking at first. Phil probably has other people helping him, people who might actually know what to do or how to help. The Once-ler doesn't feel good about not trying at all though, so on the third day he heads over to Phil's room and knocks on the door.

"Phil?" he calls out, pressing an ear to the door. "You in there, buddy?"

He keeps forgetting that Phil can't talk anymore though, so he feels kind of dumb for asking. But honestly, the lack of an answer or any sign that he's moving around in there is enough to have him frantically try the door to see if it's unlocked.

Second, due to the nature of our work here, should you feel in any way ill, light headed, or otherwise mentally incapacitated, DO NOT report to the medical facility.

His head hurts. His eyes hurt. The back of his neck, ouch. His wrist as well, but that one's on him. He can hear the whispers, loud and clear. Murmurs and breaths like a stream, but he can barely make out their words. Sometimes they call out his name, he thinks. Philip. Phil. Over and over again. Until he finally gives up and joins them.

Fasten yourself securely to whatever solid object may be available, attempt to seal all connecting doors, and await retrieval by our trained professionals.

The wall is just a wall, painted dull like sand. That is the objective truth. Even Philip sees it like that now, like the plain remains of an already too frugal office. A mirror. A closet. No windows, one desk. One very sturdy desk, to which the pair of handcuffs at his wrist clings. The door, he forgot to lock the door, didn't he?

In a worst case scenario, be prepared to swallow your personal cyanide capsule - which will be issued after this briefing.

Apprehensively he looks up, twists his head as far sideways as it will go, so that he might see who is coming to get him. Help, is it help? Is there any help at all? Philip tries to lean forward, and the cuffs cut into his wrist, not for the first time. He groans, hoarse and pathetically, without voice.

The door opens when he tries it, and the Once-ler invites himself inside. He's not inhibited by nightmare visions or hallucinations, so all he sees is Philip's room, exactly as it was the last time he was there.

Well, except for Phil handcuffed to his own desk. That part's new.

On one hand, the Once-ler feels like this completely validates his decision to come check on him, but on the other he has absolutely no idea how to help from here. He quickly crosses the room and moves over to the desk, but stops short before he gets all the way to Philip. He's clearly a mess, and the Once-ler is more used to being a mess himself than the other way around.

"Phil? Phil, hey-- h-hey, can you hear me?" he asks. He knows Phil can't talk, but he figures he'll nod or look at him or do something at least.

Of course, with no context whatsoever, the Once-ler assumes that someone else probably handcuffed Philip there. With that in mind, he looks around on the top of the desk. Maybe someone left the key? Then he can unlock him and...well, he's not sure from there, but he can't just leave him like that. There was a time in his life where he would have jsut left him there, but he likes to hope that era of his life is over.

"Don't worry, I...I'm gonna get you out of there, alright?"

The door opens, and Philip hears the approaching steps clearly on the ground, and he sees... he sees nothing, nobody, just steps, the sound of those steps on wood, tile, concrete, stone, ice, carpet. Carpet? He shakes his head, but it doesn't clear. Something isn't right. He pulls angrily at his confines of his own making, and a trickle of blood runs down his arm.

Think. Think.

He locked himself up and threw away the key (threw it across the room, anyway), because he had to, because there was no choice, he was... sick, he was sick, he had to follow Archaic protocol, because--

He never had to follow Archaic protocol, those people had no idea what they were doing, what they were dealing with, and they paid for it, they all paid for it, and he inherited the price from his father when he came to... when he came to... to the mines, yes, the Shelter, but- but the name, the name, Christ, reference N81.6914, W58.3154, but why can't he think of the name? He'll never get out of here, if he... if he can't...

He never got out, he never made it.

And this, all of this, the twisted mines, the endless white spaces, the puzzles that led further and further into nothing, this supposedly populated mansion, it was... it was, it is all just the last fever dream of a dying man, isn't it?

And this? This could be the end, after all, at last.

Philip sees a shadow, and he flinches. Something dark and distorted by his desk, just within reach. He scrambles away, but it doesn't follow. He stares at it. It shifts, flickers, but not by much. Like an error, a tear in his confines. Hesitantly he reaches out with his free hand, wondering if a void can be felt.

The Once-ler doesn't wait too long for an answer, especially when he knows a verbal answer won't actually come. He can't tell what's going on, but he raises a concerned eyebrow when Phil flinches. Is he really flinching at him?

But he can't dwell on it because he needs to look for that stupid key, which isn't on top of the desk. So, he crouches down so he can look through the drawers (and because he's so ridiculously tall, he crouches almost all the way down). He doesn't really look at anything, and just gives the drawers a quick rummage to see if a key fell to the bottom.

Bending down that much puts him close enough for Phil to touch his face though, and the Once-ler has no idea what to do with that at all. At first he tries to ignore it and keep going, but that proves to be really difficult.

"...Heeeey, Phil," he says, awkwardly. "Yes, that...that sure is my face. That you're touching. Yep. ...Hi?"

Eventually, his own discomfort shoves aside the need to be a good friend and he (as gently as possible) takes Phil's hand and guides it away from him. He doesn't think much about it though, and stands back up. A key probably wouldn't be here since Philip could probably reach it, if he has a long enough moment of clarity, so the Once-ler moves across the room to look around there.

"I'm still here," he belatedly calls out behind him, though with the way Phil is right now he's not sure he will hear or understand him.

Edited 2014-11-23 16:14 (UTC)

He half expects it to tear his hand off, half curses himself for reaching out all the same, but it... it has texture, and surprising warmth for a void. It gives a static hiss at his touch, and some resistance in the air presses his hand aside.

Something flickers into his view, a pair of eyes, a flash of green, a memory of Wonderland.

Wonderland, when was that? Before? After? During? The twisting tunnels, the rust and rot, that wasn't it. Not the light, the bricks, the screaming machinery. No, that... that was different, there were people, other people, and--

He sees his room, comfortable and carpeted, a mandatory mirror, a magical wardrobe. It looks safe, and inviting, and- and then it is gone again.

The shimmering void fades, and disappears. Philip is alone again.

He forces himself to breathe, in and out, in and out again. In and out one more time, just for good measure. I'm having an existential crisis here, and you can't even say a word! But that was his choice wasn't it? He could have, and now?

"Hello, can you hear me," he mutters to nobody; at least he tries, but the words don't come out, not as far as he can perceive.

But that means-- It didn't happen like that, not in- not in that place, not before Wonderland. Then what- what if he has it all wrong, what if he has it backwards, if the lies aren't peeling away, they're piling on. Burying him while he still sits... in Wonderland, could it be?

He tries to focus, but the reality of his bleak prison is unyielding. Only the void flickers again, for the briefest of moments at the other end of the room.

Fingers, wasn't there something about fingers? To show you what is real and what is not, for someone buried underneath the avalanche of their mind, to tell which way is up and down. He's not going to like this, is he?

Philip forces himself to sit up, to slump crookedly in that old chair, and place his shackled hand down on the desk's surface. He lifts his ring finger, and presses it apprehensively into the palm of his other hand. He closes his eyes. Then he pushes.

Bone cracks. Philip screams silently.

Without the scream to accompany it, the Once-ler doesn't even turn around at first. He hears the crack of course, but he assumes Phil managed to crack the table while tugging against his restraints.

It takes him a moment of looking, but he finally spots the key not on any shelf but stuck in the carpet. In fact, he's pretty sure he managed to walk over it twice, but that's not the point now. The point is he has the key and he can unlock Philip. The Once-ler gasps when he comes back over though, and sees Phil's hand and all the pain he's obviously in.

"What the...did you seriously just-?!"

But he did seriously just, and that's obvious, so the Once-ler cuts himself off before he asks any other stupid questions. He takes that hand so he can get at the lock, and swiftly releases Phil from the handcuffs.

"Look, I...I-I don't know how to reset bones or splint fingers, so we should really get you to the clinic," he says, practically pleading. "Can you stand up? ...Can you hear me at all? Hey, Phil!"

The Once-ler snaps his fingers in front of Phil's face a couple of time, to try and get his attention and hopefully snap him out of whatever's happening in his head. He has no idea if that will help or hinder things; he's just guessing as he goes.

Edited 2014-11-23 18:56 (UTC)

He slips from his seat, and falls to his knees. Searing agony turns to burning pain turns to a throbbing beacon, underneath the light of which his sight finally clears. Wonderland, of course he is in Wonderland, he has been there for years!

He stands up shakily, his muscles voicing their quiet protest at the new position. He can feel his head spinning, but the sensation is made a relief at the knowledge of his memories gradually slipping back into place. Years of reality dancing and shifting, years of events meant to confuse and deceive, but in the end they never last, and in the end he always comes back to his senses, just as he always has, just as he always will.

Just as he did now, as the final piece clicks into place, and he remembers where the truth has led him, before he strayed from its path.

Before his latest mission on the Mirrorside was so jarringly interrupted, probably by none other than his own counterpart, whose disgustingly familiar face is grinning at him sleazily, right in front of his eyes.

Philip scowls, and steps back warily.

Well, he can stand up, and that's a good thing. He's shaky, but when the Once-ler moves to steady him Phil steps away and looks at him like...like the Once-ler's going to do something to him, or hurt him even more. It immediately sends a pang of guilt through him - maybe he should have just gone to get someone else to help him, someone he might actually want around. Someone he wouldn't be scared of in a delusional haze.

"H-Hey, come on. It's just me. Just the Once-ler," he says, putting his his hands up defensively. "I'm not gonna hurt you. But we should really...get you over to the clinic and have a doctor look at that hand, you know? Since you, uh. Broke your own finger."

The Once-ler's still kind of in shock about that one. He looks down at his hands in front of him and shudders just imagining it.

"C'mon, we should...we really need to get you some help." Firm in that belief, he risks stepping forward again, and reaches out to Phil.

Hey, c'mon, it's just me, the thing says, Philip's own voice twisted to bleat out somebody else's words, words he will never be able to speak again. Just being in its proximity is repulsive, and Philip retreats another step.

Feels the ground soft underneath his feet as he does.

Softer than carpet, like... like grass and earth. Vibrant green sprouting in place of dull furniture, Wonderland's hills and trees, and the scent of honey. The buzzing of his beehive at his back, low and urgent, as if they had a message of their own. His Mirror is gone, in its place another silhouette starts to take form. A breeze makes the forest rustle and dance. Reminds Philip that it is all a ruse.

He cracks the knuckles of his broken hand, and groans through renewed pain. His eyes water, but the blurry truth is better than no truth at all, and he stands firmly back in the mansion again, just in time to see his Mirror reach smirking for his neck.

Philip grabs the thing hard by its wrist, and pulls it forward. Claws his good fingers into the fabric at the back of its neck, and tries to slam its head down against the desk with all the force he can muster.

It's probably the last thing the Once-ler was expecting to happen, and he's not ready for it at all.

He's lanky and too thin, so he's tugged forward with ease. Before he can even react, Phil has him by the collar of his shirt, but from there the Once-ler fights to tug himself free. Unfortunately is head still catches the edge of the desk when Phil slams him down and everything feels weirdly light for a second just before he hits the carpet with a heavy thud.

For a minute or two he just stays there with his eyes shut, listening to the ringing in his ears. That hurt, but eventually it sinks in that Phil is still there and Phil definitely just tried to slam his head into a desk, and that's enough to make him sit up very suddenly and stagger backwards. He's very wobbly and his head...he reaches up to touch it (and misses in the first attempt and has to try again) and when he pulls back his hand there's blood on the tips of his gloved fingers.

He's gone from wanting to help Philip to being terrified for his own life.

"Phil? Ph-Phil, don't-! Come on, whatever you're...whatever's in your head, that's not real! Phil!"

As he tries to talk his way out of this, he inches back, trying to get closer and closer to the door.

It writhes and almost escapes him, the bastard, but when he pushes down its head hits the desk with a satisfyingly hollow thunk. And then the Mirror scrambles, like the injured animall that it is the fur, the fur, it never even looked white, not until Evelyn told him, not until she made him realise that it wasn't one of the black and rotting creatures, it was Faraday, he shot Faraday, because he thought--

He can barely think at all, not with the noise, something distorted that is and is not his voice, that mocks in the same breath as it pleads, whose words are garbled and jumbled as Philip sways back against the desk, his head ringing with too many sounds, too many voices, too many bees, Jesus, not the bloody bees again!

Philip shakes his head, tries to shake off impressions like a dog shakes off water, tries to- has to focus, because if he doesn't then the Mirror will win, his Mirror - Phil - will win, and it will escape, get more of their kind, and they will-- He can't let it come to that.

He lunges forward, pain be damned, and reaches for the Mirror's throat with his hands.

The Once-ler isn't fast enough. He tries to scurry backwards, the adrenaline of the moment allowing a brief second of clarity, but it's no use. Soon, Philip is on top of him and the Once-ler's eyes dart around looking for any escape route he can possibly find, but there isn't one.

To his credit, he has a lot more fight in him than one might expect. When Phil's hands wrap around his neck, he grabs for his wrists and tugs with everything he has, trying to pry him away. Despite everything he's done and everything he's been through, the Once-ler has never quite been able to let go of the will to survive, and it rises above the fear, the shock, and even the concussion - at least, at first.

He's strong enough to block Phil from trying to snap his neck, but not enough to pull his hands away entirely, and his air supply is being cut off very quickly as his grip weakens.

"Ph...Phil." Talking is a waste of air, but he has to try one last time. "D-Don't. Please."

He can feel himself growing faint, and his head feels strange and heavy and his lungs are struggling so much it hurts. He heaves in Phil's grip, desperate for any small amount of air.

One hazy thought sticks out, and it sends fear rushing through him.

He's not going to make it out of here, is he?

Edited 2014-11-24 01:38 (UTC)

The pressure on his finger hurts about as much as he expected, but the Mirror's neck in his grasp is worth each and every single stab of pain. How are you here again, why did you come? The question burns at the back of his mind, but it will stay just there, because the Mirror doesn't deserve a chance to explain, he doesn't deserve to use their voice anymore.

What, does it want him to die again, does it want him to owe his Queen another favour? Jealousy, is that it? That she revived him, that he is alive again because of her--

Philip squeezes deeper, feels his nails digging into flesh. That he is the better one of them, that she prefers him now; that her own creature couldn't compare, and if it dies, then it dies for good this time. He bites down on his lip hard, and pushes his thumbs down on the Mirror's neck harder. His left hand shakes, his left hand weakens, and both his arms tremble.

But it will be enough, it has to be enough, and he won't let go, no matter what.

Phil isn't just strangling him - he can feel Phil's nails digging into skin. He can't tell if he can really feel it bleeding or if he's just imagining it in his last moments.

The Once-ler's mouth is open wide but he can't breath in no matter how he tries. For a moment the struggle intensifies in a final bit of desperation, but...it can't last.

He lets go of Phil's hands. All of the fight in the Once-ler vanishes, and his entire body goes limp and heavy in Phil's grip.

The light fades from his eyes and he is gone.

He feels resistance, wild and thrashing. He feels gasps, which barely register under his white knuckles. He feels nothing, and still he can't let go. If he holds it forever, then it won't be able to come back at all. Not a second time, not ever. He just needs to stay here, he only needs to keep an eye on the body, and his hands around the thing's throat.

The body turns to ashes in front of his eyes. His hands burn painfully, and their grip slackens. It won't be enough.

The walls are metal, thick and hot. Dead and cold and icy blue they were once, but now the warmth creeps in, along with the sickening colour of rust. Red veins of lava snake in through the cracks. The room smells like smoke. Only Philip's sight is clear.

It's too late. They're coming again. He can't stay here anymore.

Philip stands, and his feet catch on something invisible. He only stumbles; there's no time to fall. Gasping through the smoke he runs out through the door.

Philip is running, and if the pickaxe in his hand is real, then he doesn't remember where he took it from, or why. He thinks he has a gun, but he can't be too sure. He thinks running is the better option, in any case.

Philip is running, and if the blood on his hands is real and fresh and slippery, and makes it difficult to hold on to anything. If the blood is real and not his, then he wonders why his wrist hurts so much. But his legs don't, and he keeps running.

Philip is running, and the monster isn't real, but he can hear it roaring at his back. It used to be real, he remembers, and then it used to be not. He recalls it in varying degrees of real, but he pictures being torn from limb to limb too vividly to stop. Real or not real, nothing good ever came from letting it catch up.

Philip is running. Everything else is subject to debate.

It makes total sense for Philip to worry about the monster at his back. The event touched down like a fuckin' tornado, after all, and there were crazy assholes running around everywhere lately. Even if he was hallucinating, hell, with the sheer number of exploding doors it's probably better safe than sorry. On the other hand, though, maybe what he should be more worried about is the monster at his front.

The stairwell door bursts open a few feet before he manages to reach it, blown open with enough force to slamit into the wall and rattle it on the hinges. The beast stalks out, hair sticking up along his neck and ears, hunkered low and wary as heavy paws pad across the hallway floor. His eyes, yellow and relentless, lock onto Philip's like the beast only came for him, smelled him through the walls and hated him.

There is no roaring now, only the steady and rising rumbling in the chest of the beast, made all the louder when lips pull back to expose teeth in a wicked snarl.

Somewhere inside the beast's head, Peter is screaming.

It rumbles inside the walls, earth and rock shifting as it burrows free, a steady drumming sound in its wake as metal groans underneath its weight. The last time he looked back into the darkness Philip saw its maw, already too close and coming closer, a tube of muscle and teeth, devouring anything in its path.

Now he looks back and sees nothing.

Instead a door in front of him slams into the wall, and he barely has time to jerk to a halt. To stumble back, turn, and run again, but the sound has him transfixed. Not the giant mutantion come to drag him into darkness, not the Tuurngait out to make him one of their own. None of the faces that have haunted him, nothing to fear, except another mutt.

Philip rubs his eyes. Raw and weary they may be, but no amount of blinking stops them from seeing anything than a dog, a large dog, an ordinary dog that shows neither the mine's breed nor its decay.

It makes no sense to him.

He tightens both hands around the pickaxe, and stands ready to end it.

The wolf's been waiting for this. Everywhere, ever since this started, ever since Wrong Moon has been pulling at it, it's been nothing but threats. Magic pulling at him, making him want to run, a steady beating in his ears that tell him to fight fight fight because if he doesn't he will die, and Peter keeps tearing him away from everyone. Away from the male and the two females, when all it really wanted was to put the threats down.

And then it would stop.

The wolf is in charge now, and this new threat appears. He could smell it in the stairs, smell the adrenaline and fear, the testosterone, the despair.

Blood, and another dog. Death.

That growling amps up a notch or two, like a rabid hound a second away from attacking.

Don't is the first coherent word Peter's been able to form in his mind since the wolf took control. It causes the wolf to snap and snarl in displeasure, fighting against the weak bid for control. Seriously, don't, just don't, just don't-

The wolf lunges forward regardless, teeth aiming for the nearest arm holding that pickaxe, aim skewed slightly by the tug of control from the man inside of him.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[closed] What will you gain, making your life a little longer?

Day I - for Evelyn O'Connell

gross sobbing

no subject

no subject

Day I - for Will Graham

no subject

no subject

Day II - for Ned (The Pie Maker)

/sends anxious text

/laughs madly in a corner and weeps

bro I think u need to lie down

falls down and cries into the carpet

OKAY MAYBE NOT LIKE THAT...............

Day III - for The Once-ler

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

Day IV - for Peter Sexy Manbeast

no subject

no subject

no subject