Something Unexpected

[animusmods]

Characters: characters selected to go into the elevator
Setting: the admin levels
Format: any
Summary: The admin elevator has been left open, its destination preprogrammed. Where is it going to take you?
Warnings: general horror warnings for now

The elevator doesn't announce itself when its doors slide open. There's no alarm, no message to be found about it. It sits open and waits for anyone curious enough to enter. There's a barrier on it that locks out anyone without a collar, and it isn't going to stay long, but aside from that there appears to be no security. There's nothing stopping someone--or multiple someones--from climbing into the elevator and going down.

Where's it going? Who knows.

Hub Area
A lounge area with sofas and chairs. It's large enough to hold the entire group, constructed similarly to the dorm rooms, and is connected to five doors.

Door One
???

Door Two
???

Door Three
???

Door Four
???

Door Five
???

Comments

[swordofzero]

[Suzaku nodded and took the gun back before stepping through the door...

And stopping... To look at the corpse machine in horror. He recognised one or two here and there... people from the tower...

The movement at the top of the machine caught his eye, he recognised the girl from the elevator... He watched silently, hoping the others in the group stayed quiet as well.

The machine extracted... something... Suzaku blinked and looked at the others.]

[neverbeamemory]

[Sephiroth wasn't going to hold the door this time. He'd open it and step through, allowing each person behind to hold it open for their own entry.

First there was a quick glance around their immediate area to take in details and ensure no threats before - damn, big machine. Something going on the top of the machine caught Sephiroth's eye. Violet. His collar, the color he had gotten all too used to. Some bright, glinting light in a sphere was unmissable.

He'd likely have identified it as a soul if his powers hadn't been turned off but as it was Sephiroth could connect the dots well enough. It took great effort to force himself from staring up there at what was going on but that dropped feeling in his stomach was growing quickly, just at the extensions of thoughts by the very fact they appear to be extracting someone's soul from them and carrying it off- this is where it all happens!-

No. Unacceptable. Sephiroth tears his eyes away and that hand that's strayed up to fiddle with one of the tubes on his own collar.]

We shouldn't linger here. [He muttered, catching Suzaku's glance for a moment before dropping it to look again around their immediate surroundings. He's trying hard to control that outrage now, reminding himself strongly that he doesn't have the power to do anything about this insult right now.]

[notsogrimreaper]

[Ryoji knows he should move, that they need to keep going, but he's frozen. Just a few hours ago, he had been speaking with the girl whose body was now trapped inside the machine. He's disgusted, and all he wants is to look away, yet the machine holds his gaze. You can't pull your eyes away from something so terrible.

When the shock finally overwhelms him, he feels an overwhelming need to scream, cry, vomit, attack something, do anything, but the part of him that used to be Death is keeping him sickeningly in control. All he can do is say her name, voice hoarse.]

Sheba... What did they do to you?

[justabignobody]

[Riku just swallows at the sight - what in the light's name!? - then reaches up to pull the hood of his cloak over his head, better safe than sorry after all. His hair isn't exactly all that inconspicuous after all.

He presses his lips together before pushing onwards, carefully tapping Ryoji's shoulder, voice a low murmur.]

He's right. If we don't get moving, we'll end up like that too.

[Possibly. Maybe. Riku honestly doesn't want to think too much about it.]

[animusnpcs]

[They can go upward to the catwalks, down to the main floor, or climb the machine from here.]

[swordofzero]

[Sheba... She was dead then... He looked at the corpses again, dead bodies didn't really phase him, but this machine... Suzaku didn't understand exactly what it was doing, but it was extracting something... He reached up to touch his own collar when Sephiroth did and stepped closer to the others.] Which way?

[neverbeamemory]

[Sephiroth doesn't know Sheba at all but nevertheless casts a glance back at Ryoji. While clearly the process is somewhat shocking to witness, he figures this is what gives them all the ability to even survive here. Despite the process shouldn't they be at least a little safe in the fact that it actually works? What was the alternative, other than being dead on their dead planets?

This being the first time Sephiroth's been able to informed-ly think that logic through and he doesn't much like it. His soul is HIS SOUL and after so much work in empowering it the way that he has - how DARE they think they can just control it such. He's always been the one with the will over his own soul; impossible it may seem the Tower just got more personal.

This wasn't the time to work his mind around it all. Suzaku had asked a question, and with another glance around Sephiroth looks down now at the rest of the machine below them. Anywhere up, and even climbing the machine was possible but it would leave them out in the open - easy to spot if anyone was looking.]

I'm going that way. [It wasn't an invitation so much as a 'do what you like but it's not a good idea to stand there gawping and I'm not about to drag you away'. Sephiroth heads towards the route leading down onto the main floor. If nothing else, they've been in a downward journey this whole time and therefore it makes sense?]

[notsogrimreaper]

[It takes a moment for Ryoji to listen, but he does eventually shake himself out of his terror, listening to Suzaku and Sephiroth.]

Should we stick together or split up?

[He's going to be even less help if he's partnered up with someone, but he'll agree to whatever they decide. He's still in shock from losing Sheba, and is finding it difficult to care about his own safety.]

[swordofzero]

[Suzaku frowned but nodded at Sephiroth before looking towards Ryoji.] We should probably stick together... [And either way he would be sticking near Ryoji, not willing to leave him alone here.]

[animusnpcs]

[As they travel downward, the chutes become easier to see: they may recognize the bodies as some of those from the Tower. They may recognize their own bodies as well, if they've died recently.

The main floor is swarming with worker units, but they seem primed to ignore the passing group.]

[justabignobody]

[Riku can't help the nods of agreement, both when Sephiroth decides their path and when Suzaku motions for them to stick together - splitting up at this point really won't do them any good. Besides, strength in numbers, right?

He is glad that his face is hidden when he glances around as they move and sees the bodies, some familiar, most not so much. He is trying rather hard not to think about the implications of it too much.

Not yet. Thinking about it could come later, once they've made it out of this place again.]

[neverbeamemory]

[Though it doesn't actually seem all that dangerous down here, Sephiroth isn't about to let all the bodies in the chutes catch too much attention from him. He cannot afford, given his weakened state, to let it bother him as again he's ended up leading the group down into who-knows-where.

As soon as he noticed just how many worker units were swarming around on the main floor to which they were headed, Sephiroth abruptly stopped. Almost as if waiting for them approach the group and for it then to be game over. They weren't retrievals though, just like the drones upstairs, which then begs the further curiosity; what were they all actually doing on this floor.

He won't make any comment back at the others but surely they may be all thinking the same thing; so many workers, for what? Very slowly so that he could keep his eyes in all directions, Sephiroth began to advance down the rest of the route onto the main floor.]

[notsogrimreaper]

[Ryoji forces himself to look anywhere but the chutes, but his hand unconsciously drifts up to hold his scarf over his collar while they pass. His body wasn't real, was it? He supposes it never was in the first place, even before he came here, but knowing that this wasn't the form Minato had given him, that it was just a copy to be replaced every time his soul tried to escape into death... It's hard to take all the sadness and guilt and frustration that comes along with that revelation.

He knew he didn't deserve a body, and he was right. He'd been given a fake container so he could 'live' here. But why did they want him of all people in the Tower?

He has to stop thinking so hard. Ryoji looks back up to the rest of the group and follows them to the main floor.]

[swordofzero]

Suzaku felt sick, seeing the bodies on the chutes. Knowing that they were people he knew, people who were still in the tower now...

Which meant that ball of light...

Their consciousness perhaps? Their mind...

He walked at the back of the group, looking around, making sure they weren't spotted.]

[justabignobody]

[Riku releases a shuddering breath, even though he's tried to keep his thoughts away from that topic, they still keep drifting towards the bodies...

He clenches his hand after a moment, eyes closing under his hood as he centers himself and whispers.]

The body doesn't matter.

[Not like the heart. Not like the soul. As long as those are intact and unchanged, the body doesn't matter. He's had his body invaded and taken from his will, has been ripped from it and cast into Darkness, has been reunited and struggled with the Darkness inside.

He knows his heart, he knows that it's his own, that that's what is real. And as long as that holds true, nothing else matters.]