Sarah Erebus's Story

Event!Sarah.

“I simply desire to challenge your perceptions. You honestly believe your inner certainties to be true, I want to examine that.”

Sarah leaned back and glanced upwards, sighing deeply. “This is the part where you start to crawl inside my head, isn’t it?” The balls of shadows in her hands never ceased moving. “The problem with that is, first we all have to agree on a definition of sanity, no?” She grinned slightly, the kind of grin that invited the watcher to smile along with her. “See, my definition of sanity includes the fact that shadows can be manipulated as easily as you pick up a pencil. Your definition includes some things that mine doesn’t, I’m sure. I’m sure that there are other definitions out there that we might consider crazy, no?”

“So . . . that means that sanity, is really a construct of the masses, huh? The state of normal that applies to the greatest number of people. So really, if everybody out there started seeing purple elephants, then the one guy who didn’t see them would be labeled nuts. After all, everybody else sees them, why shouldn’t he?”

Sarah leaned forwards again, raising one eyebrow at the other woman. “Which means, if you want to challenge my perceptions, you’re going to have to find a handle on my mind.” A hard smile crossed her face. “So just how much do you know about me and mind? Because the world where I grew up is far different than you might think.”

A distant look crossed her eyes as she remembered her family, the history lessons she learned at her Grandmothers’ knees. The family name, Erebus; it was the name of one of the primordial deities of the old religions, the personification of darkness. It was also a place that stood between the land of the living and the dead, a place of chaos and change. Her family had held this name, passed from mother to daughter for as long as they could remember. Men had never tried to influence them for better or for worse over the millennia, some of them had lived to regret it. The older one got, the stronger their manipulative powers grew. Although there was a downside to the use of shadow power, it had kept them safe for so long . . .

Sarah flicked her eyes back up at Icarus. “You want to alter my perceptions, Doctor? You may get far more than you bargained for.”

Sarah tilted her head to the side as she watched Icarus stand up. She had seen the brief flashes of real emotion behind the mask that the woman normally wore. They intrigued her, given that it was the only time she though she had seen anything of the true woman. Perhaps it was possible that she could get a handle on the other woman as well.

When you hold a tiger by the tail, watch for the teeth…..

Or perhaps not. There was a hell of a lot of crazy hidden behind her eyes and what was worse was that she was holding all the cards at the moment. She wasn’t the only one and she wasn’t the one at the top of the pile, but she played by a set of rules that only made sense through the looking glass.

Leaning back, Sarah looked over the table once more, trying to glean any scrap of information for it that she could. It had been set up by the other guy, the “Instigator”. Looked like he liked to play mind games, but his were much more overt. If she watched for things along those lines, she’d know when he had a hand in whatever was going on. The other woman, she was much more insidious. It’d be harder to tell when she had a hand in whatever was going on, but it’d be more spectacular, what ever it was. And much more dangerous.

Silently, Sarah waited for Icarus to leave and the next phase of the game to begin.

Sarah woke up suddenly, confused by the change in scenery. The last thing she remembered was being the guest of honor at the Mad Hatter’s Tea Party. The fact that it was put together in order to mess with her was a warning that there wasn’t a damn thing that she could trust in this place.

So what do I do now? Can’t trust what I see or who I’m with . . . . Maybe not even the other patients. Certainly not the orderlies or doctors.

Is there anything here I can trust?

Probably not.

Sarah took a deep breath and stood up, pulling her hair back and rewinding it into a braid. She wouldn’t learn anything just staying here in this room. Squaring her shoulders, Sarah strode out into the hallway. She thought that Jack and Matt had been in one of the rooms from the wings to the right of where she was. Whatever was going on here, it was better not to have to face it alone. And she didn’t know if Jack was recovered from his seizure from earlier.

“Matt!”

Sarah started down the hall towards where she thought he had been. Ordinary rules weren’t going to work here. Fine. She’d believe in six impossible things before breakfast; if that’s what it took. As she walked down the hall the shadows trembled and stretched after her, twining in long tendrils at her heels.

"... S... Sarah..?"

Sarah spun in place where she was on hearing her name. The relief she felt when she saw he was still around vanished when she saw the state he was in. Not normally a physical person, she reached him in two long strides and wrapped her arms around him in a brief hard hug.
“It’s all a game to them,” she whispered in his ear. “Whatever you saw, whatever they did, it was all to mess with you.” She released the younger boy and reached up to grip the sides of his head gently, looking him in the eye and willing him to believe her.
“We’re going to get through this, so long as we stay strong, ok?” She leaned back and watched him for a moment before smiling encouragingly. “Hey now, let’s go find Jack, ok? Everything’s a bit easier to deal with when you’re together, huh?” She turned around and looked down the hall, coming to an abrupt halt when she saw Aveline standing there. While there was a slight chance that the other girl wasn’t going to start screaming and try to jump on them; she wasn’t going to be the one to make the first move. Instead her shadows wrapped around their feet in a protective tangle. If crazy girl made any sort of move, they’d be ok.

Sarah arched an eyebrow at Aveline. The shadows at her feet knotted themselves tighter and higher, coiling like snakes. She tightened her arm slightly around Matt's shoulders.
"I don't think so. They're part of me and I'm part of them. You can't make parts of yourself go away, can you?" There was no use talking in straight lines to this girl, but if she came at it round abouts, maybe she could talk some sense into her. Or scare her away. When in doubt, pretend to be the biggest predator. And actually, it wouldn't be pretend. So far all she had done was a bit of harmless reshaping. She could do so much more......

"I'll make you a deal, ok? You leave me and my friends alone and we'll leave you alone. This place is big enough for the all of us."

Sarah arched an eyebrow and replied drily. "Friend. Noun. A person whom one knows and with whom one has a bond of mutual affection, typically exclusive of sexual or family relations." The shadows at her feet continued to boil, almost shapes appearing and disappearing with alarming ease. "I'm afraid we can't be friends because I don't trust you, Aveline. Not when you attack people for no reason. I get the feeling you like to hurt people, make a big fuss and watch all the chaos, dance around it it like a kid in the rain. That's the kind of thing I want to stay very far away from." She glanced down at her feet, only then noticing that things were starting to appear that had too many legs; things with tentacles that stretched out....... She closed her eyes briefly, taking in a steadying breath. Slowly the shadows subsided, slowing until they lay harmlessly at her feet once more. It was sloppy of her to let that happen.

"But I'm going to go find Jack," she announced softly. She loosened her arm from around Matt's shoulders, leaving it up to him if he wanted to go or stay. She hoped he would come with her, but she couldn't drag him around after her like he was a toy. He had to make up his own mind. Still, she looped on hand around his and gently tugged, inviting him to come with her. Stepping forward, she walked past the teal haired girl, the hair on the back of her neck rising as she passed.

Residential Hall
1316

Sarah glanced up at the announcement, but didn't break stride, merely wrapping her fingers around Matt's instead. She looked over at him, noticing the hungry look he was giving her. She bit her lip slightly, not wanting a return of the Mad Hatter's feast she had been subjected to the first time around. Not that they were likely to do such a thing with everyone present, but still. She'd also have to figure out a way to get past taking this medication that was scheduled.
"We have half an hour before anything is served," she said quietly. "That's enough time to find Jack and see what's going on." She rolled her shoulders in an effort to loosen them after the confrontation with Aveline, leading Matt down the hall and straight past the nurses station. "We want to get a good seat!" she announced cheerfully as they sailed past. When in doubt, the best option was a full frontal assault. She knew from her earlier wanderings that the actual medical facilities were...... this way. She strode towards them, her steps unhurried yet implacable. She was going to find Jack if she had to run right over the top of anybody in her way in order to do so. Planting one hand on the door she swung it open, flashing a slightly edged smile at whomever was standing on the other side.

"I'm looking for Jack. Tall fellow, a bit on the shy side, had a seizure this morning. Where is he?"

Sarah followed after Matt; evidentially he had some clues as to where Jack was. Across the room and towards a closet; Sarah winced slightly. For Jack to be hiding in a closet, it was obvious that they had been working on him. Whatever it was, it had to have been bad. She reached out, gently tapping on the door.
"Jack? Hey man. You ok in there?" Nothing. Sarah cleared her throat. "Jack. They're messing with you. Whatever you saw, they didn't it to screw with your head. They want you off balance, they want you suffering. They only win if you give in to it." She waited a beat longer. "Listen, I''m not gonna leave you alone here, ok? So either you come on out and have lunch with us, or I"m climbing in there with you. I'm sure Matt can bring us something to eat. What do you say?" She gently opened turned the door knob and pulled it open an inch or so, not enough that Jack might feel threatened, just enough he could see a slice of her face and hear her voice.

"Room for one more?"

Residential Hall.
1320.

Arthur had the strangest of minds. It was the first thing that drew Keiko's attention upon speaking to the boy. She had met him before, of course, if only briefly; Icarus was a loose canon, but there was no way that even she could have snuck someone into the building without anyone knowing about it. Trephan had examined the boy while he was asleep, and declared him interesting, but now, awake and alert and vibrant, Keiko found him delicious. The Instigator would likely find him quite the opposite, but that would only make things more fun.

"Well, it's nice to- uh-" She didn't get much further, as Arthur rapidly lost interest in her and started to walk away. Keiko would have followed, but the sudden presence of the others was more than a little distracting. Devan clearly wanted nothing to do with them, but he was going their way; there was no avoiding the boy. Keiko didn't smile at him, choosing instead to fearfully duck her head in submission, as if hoping he would pass her by without notice.

It seemed to work, given that Devan gave them little more than a look in passing before trailing after Arthur. Aveline, who had been standing beside her up until this point, apparently was not satisfied with being ignored, however. Keiko very nearly smiled when she felt the idea pop into Aveline's head, but she managed to restrain herself, and even look shocked and appalled when Aveline charged forwards and launched herself at Arthur, crushing him to the floor.

"Aveline! That's not very nice! Don't hurt him, he's not done anything wrong!" Oh, if only she knew. There was a special little place in Trephan's heart for Aveline; his murderer. What would the girl say if she realised the man she thought she had destroyed was now possessing Kieko quite so expertly.

Her brother was clearly not particularly pleased with what was going on; Keiko watched him pass with interest, wondering if another battle was about to break out.

Room 1.
1325.

Icarus was a traitor. She thought she ran the game. She thought she was so clever... Tori glared out from the crack in the door, his mauve eyes alight with a fierce anger. Alone now, abandoned by Xavier and left trapped by his own indecision, he looked nothing like the confused but harmless young man that he had been only moments before. That spark of unusual, sharp insight had fanned into a razors edge- there was something dangerous in his expression.

"Sending out your pet, Icarus. That was mean. That was... naughty."

He watched as the others drew Xavier's attention, watched as the focus was pulled further and further away from himself. Aveline too- did she even remember that she had been his? That she was his tool, not a free agent any longer?

Tori closed his eyes, summoning up a strange, warping sensation in a dimension that Arthur could likely sense. "You forget, though, Icarus... people only remember you because you got burned."

To Arthur, it would be as if reality suddenly creased; a dimension of fabric space, running in a plane that overlapped seamlessly with the everyday world, was suddenly torn by expert fingers. Close, but not so close as to be on top of them, the tare widened, exerting a sucking pressure that built and built to a horrible level before suddenly stoppering closed with a jolt. The ripples left behind swirled and settled, but only for a moment before striking up elsewhere, this time with the impression that something had been pulled forth and set back in the physical world before the fabric space was stitched shut again.

Tori had vanished.

Infirmary.
1325.

In literally every sense of the word, Jack felt awful, and for once he remembered every second of what had happened to him. For so many years, he had begged every deity he could think of to let him remember, let the strange, alarming periods of absence leave him, but now, for the first time in his life, he wanted nothing more than to forget.

In one terrible moment, his entire world had shattered into fragments, the bedrock of his soul torn free and shattered. Vinny was gone. His parents were so far out of reach that they might as well be. His friends- his family- his career- in one fell swoop everything he held dear and everything that he had ever worked for had slipped like smoke though his fingers, and he couldn't get it out of his head.

He had woken feeling sick and disoriented, a sensation that lasted even now, hunched up as he was in the tiny, dark hideaway that he had selected after hurling himself out of bed and scrambling as fast and as far as he could away from the corpse he had been laid out beside. It was cramped and uncomfortable for someone of his height to crunch down into such a small cupboard, but it made him feel more secure than anything else had so far.

Sarah opening the door, on the other hand, was not so nice; the light slanted in and burned Jack's watering eyes, leaving him feeling even more nauseated than he had previously. But despite the fact that he was forced to turn his head away with a shudder, part of him cried out desperately for the few people that had become familiar to him in this nightmare.

"I- I don't think I'm ready to come out yet..." It would be a tight fit, with Sarah in the closet with him, but Jack couldn't actually think of anything he desired more than being held right about now.

Infirmary
1330

Sarah smiled gently and opened the door a bit further. "All right. Scoot over then." It was a tight fit and she ended up in something of a crouch, but she needed the extra height in order to wrap her arm around Jack's shoulders and bring him closer to her. She frowned as she could feel the tremors snaking through his thin frame; rubbing her hand up and down his back as she hummed softly.

Sarah was troubled. The entire time she had been free to wander about, she had been careful to build something of a mental map of this place. She had seen what she thought was an exit and she had also noticed the locks. Locks that needed keys. Keys which the orderlies would have. It would take some doing, but she was pretty sure she could make her break for it tonight. She didn't think that they would expect an escape attempt so soon, and thus they might be a little lax in their security measures. It would take some doing; but she wasn't going to stay here a second longer than necessary.

But........

She glanced down at the top of Jack's head and held him a little tighter. Jack was fragile, that was becoming alarmingly apparent. He might have had some sort of difficulties before he ended up in this hell hole, but much longer here and one of the merry band of lunatics would manage to shatter his mind like fine china. While it wouldn't be her fault, if she didn't do something about it she would carry the guilt for the rest of her life.

Sarah glanced out the door at Matt. Him too. Not as fragile as Jack, but vulnerable. She wouldn't give him more than a couple days at best before something permanent happened.

Your soft heart is going to be the end of you someday. She could almost here her older brother laughing at her. She wasn't all that close to him, he being a whole eight years older and too busy for a little girl growing up; but that hadn't stopped her from tagging along after her. When will you learn, little wisp? You got to look out for yourself before you can help someone else. Sarah mentally gave the memory of his words the finger and kept up her soothing rocking.

They were getting out of here. All three of them.

Tonight.

Dining Hall
1335.

The Dining Hall was indeed shut when Devan arrived, but there were definite signs of life behind the sealed double doors. Lunch, as far as could be divined, was certainly in progress; the smell of cooking was drifting out into the hallway, and general noises associated with food preparation were audible.

The fact remained, however, that the doors were locked, and the sign affixed to the laminated surface declared that lunch would begin at 12:00, which a nearby clock stated would be in exactly fifteen minutes.

Infirmary
1330-1340

It took Jack almost ten minutes to get himself back under control again (seven to stop sobbing onto Sarah's shoulder, and three to get his abject, mortified embarrassment under control). Normally, he would have devoted a good hour or so to outright hysterics, but the longer he dwelled on what had happened, the closer to being completely out of control he felt. It was in the interests of self preservation that he forced his miserable panic down to a dull roar, and finally raised his head.

Still afraid to look outside the boundaries of his closet for fear of seeing a dead body, Jack started by cracking open a puffy, leaking eye and peered worriedly at the floor. Matt's feet were the first thing he actually ended up seeing, and it was such a blessed relief that he almost burst into tears again.

With a wet sniff, he looked up a little further, finally allowing himself to make eye-contact with the boy who had rapidly become his friend in this chaos. Matt looked happy to see him, which was comforting, but there was a little tag of something else lurking there that unsettled him; what had happened, while he had been unconscious (dead?!) in this horrible room.

"I- sorry." His voice was a wreck, and there was something that was probably mucus sticking to his face and Sarah's shoulder. Jack had never wished for a handkerchief more, but he had been stripped down to a gown at some stage. He didn't even have pants on, he realised, quite horrified given his current position ensconced in Sarah's arms.

"Uh." If his face hadn't already been aggravated to a blotchy red by crying, he was certain that he would have blushed right up to his ears. "Do, do either of you know what happened to my clothes?"

Residential Hall
1327-1335

Keiko watched with something akin to fascination as the scene before her played out in a chaos of emotion; a veritable riot of reactions and quick-fire responses. It was obvious that Aveline was following something of her own agenda, but that was okay; The Instigator might become irate at sudden and inexplicable changes to The Plan, but as far as Trephan had always been concerned, they were what made life fun.

This was a change of plan; Arthur, certainly, had not been arranged with The Instigator's grand scheme in mind, but there was something exciting about the thought that things were about to go stunningly off the rails. Well, more-so, because there was no denying that Aveline jumping all over Arthur, and Xavier having to wade into save the day were things going 'according to plan'.

Of course, things only became stranger a moment later, when Arthur suddenly paled to a frankly shocking shade of grey and staggered back into the wall. Drenched in sweat, shaking and sickly looking; to the outside, it appeared as if the young man were having some form of cardiac event, or at the very least a panic attack, but Keiko was not looking at the outside at all.

Possessing the unique skills of a telepath, combined with a genuine degree and ages-old observations of medicine through time gave Trephan, and therefore Keiko, a rather extraordinary insight into moments such as these. That was not to say, however, that she had any intention of letting that information slip to her fellows.

"Arthur? Are you okay? Do you need to sit down?" Apparently ignoring the previous animosity between herself and her companions given the sudden potential emergency, Keiko stepped up and addressed Xavier. "He doesn't look at all well. Should we call a nurse?"

It took almost a minute for Arthur to respond to them at all, which likely seemed much longer to those genuinely alarmed by what was going on. When he did, there was chaos in his mind, and if he thought he was fooling anyone by acting normally, he was sadly mistaken.

"Arthur, what was that? You look sick. We should call one of the nurses."

Control Room
1325-1340

"You twisted bitch."

Icarus didn't need the monitors that surrounded her to tell her that 'The Instigator' had entered the room, or that he would be in a towering temper. In this intricate, multi-dimensional game of chess that they were playing, this particular move had been started a very long time ago; he had simply failed to notice that he was being manoeuvred into check until now.

"Yes." She didn't turn to face him, choosing instead to watch him rage in the glossy black screen before her, his visage superimposed over a darkish image of the inside of a supply closet in the Infirmary. "Did you need something?"

There was a disgusted sound, inarticulate, furious, but it was easy to duck the wrathful swing he took at her; a simple matter of kicking off from the desk with just enough force to let the wheels on her chair remove her from his reach. The curse he spat out when his hand impacted with the corner of the monitor instead of her face was deeply satisfying; she let it show, knowing that it would only inflame him further.

"Your pet was not supposed to be here." It sounded like he was grinding his teeth, and Icarus was half-tempted to give him some off-hand advice about maintaining good dentition. "Not least now, when things are already so far off-schedule. Do you forget who is running this operation, Icarus? Or do you want to challenge me?"

As if he would stand a chance if she chose to challenge him; Icarus smiled, pushing herself back into place with her toes, mindless of the angry man currently dominating the room. "Challenge you in what sense? You really should be mindful of your words; given that it's something of your 'thing', you're not being all that eloquent right now. If you mean to say 'are you attempting to usurp my authority in this little game of mine, Icarus?' then I can honestly tell you no. I have no intention to take your toys from you."

Finally, she swung to face him, resting back in her chair and quite at ease, as the beginnings of chaos erupted on the screens behind her. "If you are suggesting that I'm upping the difficulty of things, however- well, you'd be quite correct. We can't have you getting complacent, now can we?"

Infirmary
1340-1350

Sarah grinned a bit and tightened one arm in a quick hug. "Well, I'm not sure what's available, but I'm sure we could find something." She squirmed out of the closet and riffled through a couple drawers; she didn't find Jack's clothes, but she did find a set of scrubs that looked like they would fit his tall frame. She passed them through the door, along with a damp wash cloth that he could use to repair his dignity. She shut the door a bit and turned her back to give him some privacy.

"Ok, if I were a prisoner being held in a psychological torture experiment, how would I go about escaping," she muttered softly to herself. She moved quickly about the room, opening drawers and doors, looking for anything to give her an edge in escaping. Not being a medical person, she had no clue how to use anything drug related that she found, and any sharp objects were locked away. Although, come to think of it, they had been left alone for way longer than they should have been. An asylum of some obviously crazy and violent people, and they were being left alone? It was either incredibly bad management, in which case it she was almost insulted; or it was part of the experiment. Going on that theory, she elected not to steal anything. She would have to think her way out of this, instead of using force.

"Jack, how you feeling? Physically, anyways?"