INTRO 001: BEGIN

[706mod]

INTRO 001
NAVIGATION
⩕ ARRIVAL

It’s arrival time. Or is it? For some, this situation seems eerily familiar. In fact, this has happened before, you are sure of it. The voice makes the announcement and the door rolls open. You hear the frightened voice and it begins again.

There might be memories of this place but things will seem… off. As if walls are a slightly different colour, corners a bit sharper, the door handles a bit higher. If you explore the rooms of interest you will find a few things have changed.

The cooler with the tongue is now gone, and in its place a locked door with a strange device placed next to it. It looks like an intercom. The yellow message on the wall has changed, it now reads:

There’s sunshine, daisies, and tulips too
Just remember that when you’re feeling blue ☺

The writing is clearly different than the previous message.

The room with the tube is mostly the same, except the rusted cabinets are now shiny and brand new. The tube’s liquid is now dripping a rust colour fluid.

Any items collected will be somewhere nearby.

⩕ ODE TO BEVERLY

After exploring the new (?) developments something strange is now happening throughout the complex’s floor. A shrill crying. It sounds hysterical.

It leads you to the bathroom with the shattered glass. The sound is coming from the drain of a sink.

There’s broken words, too jumbled to really understand. But the hello from earlier? Definitely the same voice.

As your face nears the sink suddenly long black hair springs from the drain, shooting up and strangling and snaring any bit of you it can. The more you struggle the more it becomes aggressive, cutting in to your skin, peeling away flesh. All the while the shrieking and wailing grows to thunderous levels.

The only way to escape is with outside help. But your rescuer has to be careful not to also get caught.

The hair or whatever it may be seems intent on blood.

⩕ THE CHASM (PART ONE)

Some of you might have escaped the hair with most of your important parts in place. But any open wounds will freely flow blood and not seem to want to staunch. Any materials found seem to be useless in treating the cuts. And when your droplets of blood hits the ground it hisses as if like acid and then unexpectedly the floor around it cracks into a hairline split. The more blood that is dropped the more the cracks appear.

Throughout the following days and nights the cracks randomly split wider and deeper.

Investigating further you will notice that the same nausea you might have experienced before is now back-- and wait! Did you just see a pair of eyes inside those fissures?

Somehow you know in your gut that the only way to stop the progression of the splits is to drop more blood in to it, but not your own. In fact, this idea takes hold despite your better judgement. It is a compulsion. Better find a willing volunteer or perhaps it will come down to a fight.


⩕ HELLO GOD? IT'S ME 7░ ░

Something odd happens many hours in to your stay. Those of you who have found a walkie will receive a broadcast. It is a man speaking. It sounds like an old recording. Soft conversation is happening in the background overlaid with a hum of machinery.

Obviously I am a man of logic. In this day and age how could someone not be? Our primitive instincts are only a tool for survival so our higher minds can concentrate on things like advancement and discovery. This a belief everyone should have. Or isn’t it? It frustrates me that few are on this level of thinking. Too many are preoccupied with that in which cannot be seen. What cannot be hooked in to.

His voice then says your number. You are certain that you have never met this person, but he definitely just addressed you specifically.

I know you are reasonable. Tell me what you believe in? In this moment, what do you believe?

As you answer, you get the distinct impression that the entire complex stills to listen. But whatever frequency he was using is now dead. The question seems to be one to ask one another, broadcasted far and wide.

⩕ ⩕ ⩕ ⩕ ⩕ ⩕ ⩕

⩕ The Chasm will continue to grow throughout the next month. It becomes more and more cumbersome to navigate but the blood does seem to help to keep it at bay.

Comments

[sweariff]

[Just when he starts thinking that this thing is broken, or it's another trick and he's talking to dead air, the voice returns and Bigby is this close to breathing a sigh of relief.]

Nope. Gonna throw myself out here on a limb and take a wild guess that you woke up in a box too.

[freightcars]

[ There's a much shorter pause this time, as though he's not debating whether or not to answer but rather what to say. ]

Yeah. Feels like- [ A beat. ] Feels like not the first time.

[sweariff]

Like you've done this before, right? I know.

[And that's the really worrying part. There was a small but growing part of him that was worried he was the only one.]

It's the same rooms, same almost...everything, just a tiny bit different. Stuff's missing or not where it used to be, like the cooler. You remember that?

[freightcars]

Exactly.

[ Is his muttered answer, though whether or not it goes through depends on if they're both holding talk at the same time. Bigby isn't the only one feeling a little relief. He'd been afraid for a second that this was... that it was his mind going out again, like it was ]

With the tongue? Hard to forget.

[sweariff]

You know it's not here anymore, right? Neither is the poem about dogs and cats. It's something about tulips and sunshine now.

[From the way he speaks, all disgruntled exasperation and annoyance, you can tell the effect it's left on him is more or less unchanged.]

There's a cabinet in one of the rooms that used to be falling apart but now it's brand new, like it's never been touched. But when I did touch it, I left a mark that looked kind of one the rust stains that used to be on it. Somehow it was replaced or they glamoured it up, or...or something.

[There's a word that slips out before he realizes what he's saying or even what its significance truly is — glamour — because using it just feels natural and normal, but saying it aloud to a stranger certainly doesn't.]

[freightcars]

[ He hadn't actually noticed that the cooler was missing; he'd avoided the room entirely, if he's honest, so to hear of the changes is surprising. It does wonders, actually, to bring him back to himself - to reduce the amount he questions the nature of his reality.

If other people now these details, they're real. They happened.

He rakes a hand through his facial hair, passes a palm over his mouth. Thinks. ]

It's psychological conditioning.

[ He speculates finally, sounding somehow both wary and certain. ]

They're resetting things, changing 'em just enough to make us wonder. Gaslighting. I don't know what else the point could be.

[sweariff]

That...makes sense, I guess. That guy's babbling about logic and higher thinking sort of gave away their intention; same with the serial number branding and the voice over the intercom.

"Day One". It sounds like an experiment. I don't know who or what the Rosemary Division is, but if they aren't scientists, they sure like acting like the worst of them.

[freightcars]

[ He'd be inclined to agree with everything but the serial number thing; more of a labeling system, he thinks, but only because the army had given him one as well. ]

Makes you wonder what the experiment is. [ A beat, and then the idea occurs to him: ] Makes you wonder if they've got a control element, too.

[ But that's a dangerous thought path to travel down, even if it does hike his wariness of Bigby up a couple notches. Nothing personal. ]

Guess you weren't any better off finding a way out than I was.

[sweariff]

I could take a few guesses.

[They're not good ones by any stretch of the imagination. The time to be optimistic and think of the best instead of the worst is over. Being tattooed is pretty low on his list of worst things ever, but it makes you wonder what else the people running this are willing to do to their bodies, and their heads.]

No, every way out's locked. I can't find any windows either. [Because that would be too easy. He goes quiet for a moment, awkwardly trying to think of some relatively good news to break away from the bad.] Do you...remember much about what you were doing before you woke up?

[freightcars]

[ He could hazard a few guesses himself, some of them might even overlap Bigby's. He doesn't take the time to voice them, though. At this point, it won't do them any good. ]

Last thing I remember... [ He starts and then stops, fuzzy. Frustrated. ] Think the last thing I remember is getting- going to sleep.

[ Which is skirting the truth a little, but the fact that things are spotty, that he doesn't remember anything after? Not good. ]

What about you?

[sweariff]

[That's about as thorough an account as Bigby expected. His isn't much better.]

Not much. I was outside, talking with someone. It was...raining. But I remember the sun was out just a little, and there were cars, and—

[He cuts himself off, trying to smooth out these jagged fragments of memory and reorder them into something more manageable. It does pay off, because he's able to remember something new — or something old, but made clearer.]

...New York. [He says the name slowly, wonderingly, but adds with growing decisiveness:] I was in New York City. That's where I live.

[freightcars]

[ Well would you look at that. That, at least, earns him a little more favor in Bucky's book. ]

I'm form Brooklyn. [ He responds, the slightest tone of amusement in his voice. The first positive emotion he's had all conversation. ] That's not where I was before I woke up, but-

[ He figured it was worth mentioning. ]

[sweariff]

Manhattan. [It's all coming back now. He feels himself smiling again, a bit more genuine this time, and mostly because it proves that whatever was done to his head isn't permanent.] It's...not my favorite place, I think. Now, though, if you asked me where I want to be, I'd take the worst parts of Midtown, even Times Square, any day of the week over one more second here.

[It's the 80s, man.]

[freightcars]

[ He huffs a laugh, a cynical sounding chuckle, dry but with at least the trappings of humor. ]

I'd almost rather be in Jersey.

[ Almost. Ha, ha. Nothing about this is funny, though, is it? He sighs to himself, lets his head fall back and thump against the wall. ]

[sweariff]

[He hears that sound — both of them — and once again reality does a u-turn to smack him in the face.

Yeah, no, fuck off, reality. At least let them have this.]

No, you don't. What do you think they do for fun over there every weekend?

[Wow, l a m e. But even if he can't allow himself to be optimistic, he doesn't want to give the sickos in charge of this the satisfaction of knowing they were able to break him, or any of them, down.]

I wouldn't be surprised if that's where we are right now. 'course, it would be easier to tell with a window.

[freightcars]

[ He can't help the little head bob of acquiescence that he gives at the mention of a window. Somehow, he thinks even just the sight of the sky might do wonders for his mental health right now.

Which means, of course, that there aren't going to be any to be found anywhere.

After a long pause, he thinks to ask: ]

Got a name?

[sweariff]

Bigby Wolf. I'd like to pretend that guy didn't just call me by the fucking label he stamped on my neck, so just Bigby is fine.

[Truly today has been a day of charming meetings and magical revelations.]

You?

[freightcars]

[ There's no denying the way an eyebrow shoots up at the name, which is rude as hell. Fortunately for them both, these walkie talkies have no video feed. Nobody sees his critical expression except, perhaps, any hidden cameras stashed about the place.

He would be absolutely 0% surprised to find out that was the case. ]

James Barnes- Bucky. People call me Bucky.

[ It's an important distinction, he thinks. If people start calling him Sergeant Barnes or Mr. Barnes here, he's going to lose his fucking mind ten times faster. ]

[sweariff]

[Unfortunately, Bigby himself has no such filter.]

Do I have to? I just sitting here thinking you sounded more like a Jim or a Jimmy. [Not really, though, because those names imply some degree of happiness and Bucky sounds like he's farther along on the edge than Bigby is, which is clearly why teasing is important now more than ever!!]

[freightcars]

[ Well, it's working. It draws a wry scoff from him. ]

Haven't heard that since grade school.

[ Which is even bigger than it sounds, considering grade school was nearly a century ago. Coincidentally, that's about the last time anyone heard any real degree of happiness in him, so Bigby's not so far off.

He's had a few dames call him Jamie over the years. That didn't stick either. ]

[sweariff]

Well, we could try to bring it back, make it mean something again. Or I could just call you what everyone else does, but fair warning, that name's a letter off from sounding like something I'd say when I'm pissed off. Which I am, right now.

So I can't guarantee that won't come up in the future, especially if I'm in a really bad mood. [There is a 95% chance of this happening.]

[freightcars]

Rather be a Fucky than a Jimmy.

[ He answers bluntly, though there may be a detectable note of amusement in the tone.

He doesn't know who you are, Bigby, but he's coming around to you already. Granted he'd be happier if they never met and instead kept plugging away back home doing the daily grind, but as far as strangers you meet while kidnapped in a psychologically terrifying insane asylum style office building?

Not so bad. ]

[sweariff]

There you go again saying things you're almost certainly not going to be able to take back. Of all the bad habits to have, you pick the one that's the most exploitable.

[• Bigby will definitely remember this.]

If it's torture they're after, they lucked out by picking us.

[freightcars]

[ He snorts again. Yeah, of all the people to pick, he thinks maybe their captives might have made a few bad choices here. If nothing else, they'll sure as hell be the biggest pain in the ass prisoners in the facility, from the sounds of it. ]

Make a deal with you, Bigby.

[ He starts, walkie talkie an inch or two from his mouth. Pauses, then plugs on. ]

You help me find a way outta here, you can call me whatever the hell you want. I'll get it tattooed over the serial number.

[sweariff]

...I rest my case. [Wow.] You know I was going to do that anyway for nothing, right?

[And now he has an extra special incentive to work even harder, as if the promise of survival wasn't good enough. God.]

Fine. Consider it official in the eyes of the law. [Literally. Moving on:] Before, you said something about this happening to you before. What did you mean by that? This isn't the first time they—

[He doesn't even know if he should finish that. Suddenly, this guy's dour mood seems so, so much more appropriate than it already was.]