MISSION 2.C

[adsum]

Participants: Natsume, Komaeda, Hinata, Helena
Location: Fourth Floor
Date: 08/22 - 08/28

(ooc notes: I will state any possible content warnings in the subject line of the mod response when it comes up. If anything makes you uncomfortable, please tell me so I can back off and refocus the thread.

There will be no tag order, and a mod response will come after at least 4 player responses OR the next day, whichever is earlier. Please note this means that if you're absent for a day or more, the thread will move on, but I will pace things so that people aren't missing large plot beats.)

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Start

[adsum]

[ Regardless of when they pushed through the door on the fourth floor, each person opens the door to find themselves stepping out into complete darkness, as if sight had been stripped away from them leaving only solid footsteps or bumping into one another to attest to the fact that they have not been thrown into the familiar auditorium void. They find no door when they turn back to where they came, but as soon as all four people have found one another, they can each hear faint hissing in their minds, pulsating with their heartbeats.

A faint light shines from above, miles away as if a singular star in the night sky. They can jump, but they cannot reach it. In an empty abyss of nothingness, it doesn't matter which direction they choose, but they should choose and leave together, because if they split up I'm ditching any stragglers and they'll be stuck in the void forever while the rest of the group moves on. ]

let there be light

[adsum]

[ They open their eyes as if waking from a dream, sprawled on the ground in the thickets of a forest with cicadas droning in their ears. To their left is a pile of rocks: a cairn. To their right, far off in the distance, Helena can hear the sound of running water.

Next to Hinata is a backpack, snagged in a tree branch and split open. Inside are two oranges, a pear, and half a box of cinnamon graham crackers. ]

i saw a 10 paragraph dissertation on hope and my eyes glazed over

[adsum]

[ The impact shatters every bone in their bodies, immense pressure on all sides fuses them back together, and they find themselves floating instead of falling, under water instead of in the air.

Those able to swim can fight their way to the surface fifty feet above their heads; those who cannot or are disoriented by the fall find themselves helplessly swept away in a racing current.

The water is frigid, quickly sapping feeling from the extremities, and the light is too bright outside, enough to burn eyes accustomed to the darkness. Snowflakes drift lazily down from the sky above, powdering the trees. ]

End

[adsum]

[ They open their eyes, sprawled on their backs and staring up at the blackened boards of the ceiling, bruised and battered with heavy weights upon their hearts. But when they sit up, pushing the pile of rocks off of themselves, it's to find the air much easier to breathe, to sunlight streaming through the windows of the hallway and illuminating the skeleton of a burnt down hall that left only support pillars still standing, held up by the hundreds of thousands of round, grey stones spilling out from what once may have been classroom doors: hundreds upon thousands of broken gorinto, locked up in this hallway and forgotten for innumerable years.

The four of them stand, wet blood on their hands and on their clothes, socks soaked through with melted snow.

On Komaeda's wrist are 10 additional tallies.
On Natsume's wrist are 8 additional tallies.
On Hinata's wrist are 4 additional tallies.
And on Helena's wrist are 7 additional tallies.

From the 28th onward, the fourth floor hallway is open and accessible to all students, from the stairwell to the locked door up to the rooftop. ]

Aftermath

[futurebullets]

[His legs still feel unsteady, feet feeling like they'll barely carry him if he tries to move. And even with that, it hardly feels like the worst thing he's going through right now.

The sound of that small voice, those small feet, still echo in his head. There's empty space in his chase, something ripped raw from him, a vacuum of grief in the pit of his chest. Stuck in the one place they cannot get away from beyond its courtyard, how will they ever get back to the place they must return to? It makes Hinata want to drop to his knees right there and curl up, shut everything out for a few moments until his heart stops hurting.

But Hinata knows that is not an option. They don't have the time to waste on such things.

There is a lot that needs to be discussed.]

Ko- [His voice breaks, weak with relief in spite of everything. He doesn't know what they might've gone through, but the two of them are there. Both still alive.] Komaeda, Sakasaki... Are you both okay?