primrosella | Quest 115

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Quest 115

[Accidental Voice Post]

[The device switches on amidst a shuffle of cloth, presumably by accident--as though, perhaps, it is being kept in a pocket, out of sight, and its owner has jostled it by mistake.]

Don't look don't look don't look don't look--

[The whispered words keep time with the faint clicking of footsteps.]

There's nothing there, it's fine, it's fine, don't look, don't look, there's nothing there, just keep going one step at a time, don't look, don't look, oh, drat these boots! Don't look, there's nothing there, don't look--

[Somewhere nearby, gears grind and electricity crackles. A strangled sort of cry escapes before she can restrain it, and when she begins to speak again, it's with renewed, frantic vigor.]

No, no, no, there's nothing, it's fine, it's fine, there's nothing there, don't look, one step at a time, one and one and one and one, it's fine, it's all right, just get home, it's fine, it's fine--!

[The sound of machinery returns, louder now, clanking and rattling and grinding. Too close--this time, her fear wins out, and her scream is filled with revulsion.]

Get away!

[And now there is scuffling, shuffling, and the distinctive gasping of someone running, stumbling, and running again, as though her life depends on it.]

[OOC: It's mentioned a couple times in the King's Quest Companion that people from Daventry have a deep, universal loathing for technology. Of course, seeing as how the Daventry definition of "technology" means gears and cogs and clockwork stuff...yeah, Rosella's not having a good day. She's been fighting to keep her freaking out under control all day, but between the steampunk atmosphere and her wardrobe modification, it finally got the better of her.

All responses are assumed to be voice, and action for

not_so_smooth and

bombylious.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

I know, I know. And you can stay right there, just tell me where you are.

I'm in--I'm in my cave.

[The sound of tires squealing and an engine gunning.]

We're on our way, just stay there.

I'm not coming out.

[Shifting, shifting, trying to get there as fast as possible.]

You don't have to move, you can just stay in there where it's safe.

Even my Network device is like that, Sam...

I know, just don't look at it, I'm just about there.

[Skidding tires as Bee stops and Sam jumps out to run to the cave.]

[Rosella's pressed about as far back into the cave as she can, huddling against the wall a few feet away from her Network device, which is lying on the ground in the middle of the cave floor.]

Thankfully(?) Sam had been living in Bee the last few days so he had a blanket and a some food that he grabbed before running into the cave. He and Rosella could stay in there all night if they had to.

"Rosella?" he called out, waiting for his eyes to adjust to the darkness. "Where are you?"

[ooc: HOpe the format switch is okay. It's just easier for me to respond to action like that.]

Rosella wasn't quite as hysterical anymore as she had been while walking through the altered City, but she still felt cold and numb and stiff, and she couldn't seem to get her hands to stop shaking. It was like something out of a nightmare.

She almost thought about "forgetting" to mention the location of her Network device to Sam, just for the satisfaction of seeing the infernal thing crushed to bits, but in the end, she decided against it.

"I'm here," she called back, trying to keep her voice from cracking. "Don't step on that--on the device. I threw it...somewhere."

Sam saw the faint glow of the network device on the cave floor well enough to avoid it while he followed the sound of Rosella's voice.

"Hey," he said, crouching down next to her and holding out the blanket. "Come on, you've got to be freezing, put this around you."

"I'm...I'm okay. Everything's okay. All those things, those--" she began, fumbling to take the blanket from him.

Her fingers didn't seem to want to work properly, but in the end she managed it, and resisted the urge to pull it over her head and hide in the dark. "It's awful..."

Sam sat down next to her and instinctively put an arm around her, hugging her close. Any awkwardness he felt from the curse a few days ago vanished at Rosella's panic.

"They're all out there," he said. "Bee will make sure nothing gets in and I'm staying here with you."

Under normal circumstances, Rosella would've had a keen awareness of just how awkward the situation really was, in light of everything that had happened. But these were far from normal circumstances, and she was much too rattled by the curse to do much of anything but sit and try to get herself under control. She'd make herself sick if she couldn't calm down, she knew.

"I tried not to think about it," she whispered, staring blankly at the floor and leaning a little into the arm around her shoulders. "I really did, I just--I tried, I thought I could make it...I thought I could shut it all out..."

Sam reached over with his other arm now and hugged her even more close, letting her vent a bit. She was coming down a bit from her hysteria, which was good, because if she wasn't he wouldn't know what to do.

"But there's not any in here," he told her. "And there won't be any."

He paused, searching for something more to say.

"Your dress is really pretty though."

"Just that," she answered, motioning vaguely toward the little clockwork device on the ground. "I threw it...but it didn't break."

She shivered a little, trying not to think about the spinning gears and wheels, and the grinding noise they made as they turned. There were other things to focus on--Sam's voice. The soft blanket. The lump in her throat, even.

She swallowed hard. "This awful thing? I had to wear it. All my other ones turned out the same way."

Sam scrambled up for a second and picked up her device and threw it as far and hard as he could toward the cave opening. Hopefully, that would break it or get it far enough away that she could stop thinking about it.

He sat down next to her and hugged her close again.

"I didn't really get a good look at it," Sam confessed. "I just know you look nice in dresses. Do you want Bee to play some music or something? Or I could tell you one of the stories I know that you might not have heard. Or both, could totally do both."

"It's these boots that are the worst," Rosella muttered, extending her legs a little and pulling back the blanket to display the riveted leather boots. "It's bad enough trying to--to run through the forest, and doubly so in things like these."

But she was calmer now, and the cave was cool and dark and quiet. It felt right, and that made it much easier to cope with. "Is he all gears and things too? I don't--it'd hurt his feelings, I think, if I saw him and screamed. But music...that'd be all right. And you know I like stories."

"Well, you can take the boots off if you want," Sam suggested. "We won't go anywhere until midnight. And Bee's normal, so he can just play music into the cave for us."

Sam sat up a bit and called out to his friend. "Hey Bee, can you play us some music?"

There was the warble of a searching station and then, "When the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie, that's-"

"BEE!" Sam shouted. The station changed and played some soft instrumental.

Surprisingly enough, Bee's antics managed to get a weak laugh out of her; she might not have recognized the song, but Sam's reaction to it was all too familiar. Curses or not, some things never changed. "Oh, Bumblebee..."

She shook her head and then sat up a little, too, straightening out the blanket and tucking it more carefully around herself. No machines. No awful noise. Just herself, and Sam, and Bumblebee being ridiculous, just like always.

"I'm sorry if I scared you," she murmured. And then, with another weak chuckle, "...And for ruining your vacation."

Sam ran a hand through his head and smiled over at her, glad to see Bee managed to make her smile a little and she even chuckled.

"I've just never seen you that scared," he said, voice etched with concern before going back to something more casual. "Ruin? Who said you ruined my pretend vacation? Spelunking was next on the list of things I was going to do. I was just heading home to see if you wanted to come so really, you were just a step ahead of me the whole time."

"No one else seems to mind it very much," Rosella remarked quietly, thinking back to the people she'd passed as she ran through the City. They'd all seemed perplexed, bemused, and usually intrigued by the changes in the City, but none had been as horrified or disgusted as she had. "But other people are used to--to things like that, I suppose."

She drew a slow breath, then let it out again, glancing over at Sam and giving him a shaky smile of her own. "Spelunking? That sounds like the sound a heavy rock makes when you throw it in a deep pond. But anything sounds more interesting than sitting around in a cave all day, really."

"Magic would probably freak most people out," he said, shrugging a bit. It still weirded him out some, but not too much. He preferred technology but it wasn't like he didn't live in a giant warehouse protected by magic with a magical princess for a roommate.

"Spelunking is just cave exploring," he said. "Although it does kind of sound like what you described."

"Magic makes sense, at least." Why, yes, she was deliberately being stubborn about it, but she'd had an awful day and so she felt a tiny bit justified in being difficult. "It's natural."

But the talk of magic, combined with the topic of cave exploration, got another laugh out of her. "There isn't much left to explore in here, I'm afraid. You recognize this cave, don't you?"

"So you can explain to me then," he said, giving her a skeptical look. "Why your rock had to be a strange color? Also, what good is a teleportation rock if you don't use it?"

Sam nodded at that. "This is Rosella's Sleepy Time Cave."

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