[complete]

[animusnpcs]

Characters:Dax and Riki
Setting: floor 17
Format: prose
Summary:Dax and Riki and floor seventeen.
Warnings: none

The administrative elevator comes to a slow stop on floor seventeen. Dax, for once, looks quite unhappy, frowning at the blood and the screaming and the tower itself all at once. Stepping out of the elevator, he waves a hand at Riki behind him, though he doesn't turn.

"And this floor is for what, exactly?"

Comments

[animusnpcs]

"I built an empty room," Riki says, still sounding calm even if Dax is quickly increasing in pitch. "I didn't fill it. It's for that--whatever it is he's got planned."

[animusnpcs]

"I didn't approve of any of this!" Dax finally quiets down a bit, seeming to realize at least to some degree how loud he's being. "I didn't approve of bottomless rooms either, you know. Where did he get permission for any of--"

[animusnpcs]

"You know where he got it," Riki said. "He went to her. Over your head."

There was a pause, then, as if he was considering responding at all, but then he does: "Building a void is harder than you'd think, you know."

His eyes sparkle a bit--it's the most interested in anything he's seemed.

[animusnpcs]

Dax sighs, looking defeated and exhausted all at once.

"You lot just do what you want, but you know I'm the one who has to explain it to them. Should I haul the both of you up and have you tell them why there are screaming rooms and bottomless pits in this place?"

[animusnpcs]

"'S your job," Riki says. "Building's mine. Science's his. Unless you mean her."

His tone is sarcastic--of course he doesn't mean her.

[animusnpcs]

Dax's grip of sarcasm, however, seems lacking, and he pales slightly. "Of course I don't mean--just... At least tell me before you do things like this. Or before Jason has you building empty rooms for him, if this is what he's going to do with them."

[animusnpcs]

Riki shrugs and steps back into the elevator. As far as he's concerned, the conversation is done. There's not much he can do about it at this point anyway. Well, he could convert it, but he doesn't have the clearance.

"Talked to him a bit," Riki said. "This month'll be a good test for your PR skills."

[animusnpcs]

Dax joins him in the elevator, and the staircase opens up again as the room becomes accessible to the general populace of the tower.

"What do you mean, what's he doing this month--"

But then the elevator slides shut and begins its descent, and nothing more can be heard except the screams of floor seventeen.