Hostages

[idolpro]

[ Though you were in the elevator just moments before, when the lights were cut your vision went dark and you woke up somewhere else. Your body is in a good bit of distress, and if you think back you remember how you got there: like a story someone else told you recently, your memories relate it back to you. You know it, but it's not your problem. Not yet.

Unless you can't get someone to save you in time, and then it doesn't matter whose story this was originally, before they wrote you in. You're going to be the one suffering the consequences, because that's your body there, hanging in the balance. But your mind is still in this liminal state, and you can reach back and send your unitmates messages-- sort of. Dreams aren't the most reliable of messengers, but they're all you have to work with, as time is paused and your body is paralyzed, three threats breathing down your neck. ]

Comments

Threats: Wolf, Shattered mirror, consumption/TB

[idolpro]

[ Every mirror in your house is shattered, the broken glass crunching beneath the shoes you insist on wearing inside-- tradition be damned. The hard wood floors can take it, and after all the trouble the damned dark woods gave you, they deserve the wear and tear. You sacrificed so much to build a future in gloss and lacquer and nails, in electric lights bright enough to shine into all the dark crevices the horrors hid in, and keep your people safe. You had tried diplomacy at first, with the people there, but they said what you asked was impossible-- you couldn't rid the forest of all the wolves.

So you got rid of the forest.

People talked, and said you'd be cursed for it, but they didn't fight progress. Straw-thatched roof houses were cleared away, for heavy brick foundations in the western style, and your city hasn't been wolf hunting grounds for years now. They like the comfortable warmth, they like not hearing howls, and they forgot about the curse the people in the forest promised. You weren't fortunate enough to be in a position to forget about it, as you hid the handkerchiefs you coughed into, the red stains that you couldn't let anyone know about, because you knew for a fact they'd talk about the curse coming true if they knew your lungs had betrayed you. If they knew about the cold wet cough that had moved in, the threat coming now from within, rather than without.

If they knew about the things that moved in the mirrors, the dark yellow eyes that should be gone, gone! So you bloodied your knuckles and broke every mirror in the house. But it did no good. You hear breathing in your house's dark halls, and your broken-down body with its broken down lungs won't let you run anymore:

Not in this house made with wood from the Black Forest, all the beams and pillars like boughs and thick trunks. No one needs to huff, and puff, and blow your house in. The wolves are already inside: you hear behind you, as you can't turn around and look back-- the click of their claws on the wood, more of the clinking and shattering of glass as they stalk you leisurely: just waiting for the right time to pounce. ]