Welcome to Gaia! ::

At the very base of the Observatory point there was the faintest of clicks, entirely unnoticeable through the loud swaying of the tree branches and the wind. However, there was a strange feeling, an ancient sort of Fear that emanated from the small open door at the base of the oversized tree, possibly the eldest tree in all of the Isle of War. The rest of the way dissolved into stifled darkness downwards

There was a set of stairs, simple stone slabs that paved the descent, but as any curious eyes continued walking, it was obvious that they were in a rather forbidden area. Though the ground was dirty, dry, the soil gradually shifted to stone, the transition sudden, the warmth bleeding into a sudden cold. The further the students went, the more ominous the Fear, a strange pulsating aura, a feeling that ebbed and flowed in waves, as if breathing. The walls themselves were filled with carvings, archaic even, pictures of Four Clans members and their purposeful destruction of the Human World, through plague, hellfire, arrows, the graphic depictions continued on wall to wall.

And minute later, at the very, very far end, was an alcove-

- A blast of overwhelming Fear stopped all students in their tracks: they were literally unable to move a step further. It was a strange feeling, an overexposure to an entirely foreign Fear that caused strong waves of nausea, dizziness, bordering between pain and agony. Deep below them was a symbol, surrounded in glyphs - Four Clans glyphs, humming, pulsating with a life of their own. In intermittent, consistent waves, the buzzing would grow louder, the Fear radiating from it overwhelming the students entirely, causing their own forms to flicker and begin to dissipate drawn towards the source. They could feel something in them give away, their hands first, then feet slowly fading away, disappearing, feeding the energy source below-

- It would only take a few moments longer for them to disappear entirely, permanently.

Roch dropped down from the ladder the last few feet. He bent his knees with the impact of hitting the ground, crouching for a few seconds before he looked up at the tree again. Well, then, he thought. Had he known it would just take him right back down, he wouldn’t have bothered to open the door up above. He took a deep breath, wondering if the lack of meals all day long was starting to make him a bit weird. No, he’d always been--

The sensation of FEAR--not the same type that surrounded him on a daily basis, no, this was something strange--but it drew him. Without thinking, the punk boil turned and headed closer to the base of the tree, wondering what it was. He almost balked at the sight of a small open door there, hidden in the shadows. After so many traps, he thought, here was another--of course this one didn’t beckon him in like the giant mouth on the wall of the haunted house, but just like Calder’s skirt (kilt, Roch, it’s a kilt) the door was shouting “it’s a trap!” as loud as possible while keeping silent. Maybe he shouldn’t take Calder up on his kilt thing, after all. But regardless, he thought, shoving the kilt thoughts to the side, going into that door was a very, very stupid thing to do. So... uh... why were his feet heading forward?

He looked down the stairs, seeing the darkness below and nothing else. Turning, trying to look casual, he looked over his shoulder to make sure no one could see him--then he headed inside. He took the stairs, wondering why it seemed so unnatural--then he realized, he hadn’t seen much pavement on the island. He looked around, noticing just how much he probably shouldn’t be there. He came to the walls, seeing the designs, feeling the FEAR pulsating like a living being around him--breathing, his mind provided.

The pictures caught his attention, riveting him to the graphic carvings of death and destruction, it was hard to believe that you could see blood and death so clearly and vibrantly when it was all stone colored, but he could. The mixed feelings from the canopy returned, then changed--he wasn’t--not even the hunters deserved this, he thought as he came to a particularly graphic image. The sight of a human scareling’s head hanging from long hair, grasped in the hand of a triumphant war member’s hand--he stared at that one for a long moment before forcing himself to move forward.

He reached the alcove. And he stopped. For a moment he couldn’t move--it felt shockingly like that moment in the tube--his FEAR was being pulled, sucked from him. He gritted his teeth, his determination, mixed with a hint of insanity and hatred, forcing himself back to something close to solid. Insanity--no, not the same thing that had infected the creatures in the snowglobe, no, this was a tiny part in his mind that had snapped during the last trial and had never quite gone back into place.

“Stop it,” he growled at the overwhelming FEAR that was trying to eat him. He forced his foot to move, one step, another, each step weighing a million pounds and taking a thousand years, but he clung to his being--clung to his living state with both hands and all his teeth. He was dissipating--but he wasn’t going to, jackdammit. He wasn’t going to go out in a tiny little tunnel surrounded by images of graphic, mindless violence.

He could almost hear them--the screams coming from the humans depicted on the walls. They echoed in is mind--past the point of the scared, startled humans that had been in that plastic room the little white furball had taken them to--no, this was far worse. This was an agonizing sound, despair and pain mixing together, tossed with a sound like that of teeth clenching, gnashing together--

He stumbled slightly, but forced himself to go on, not about to bow a knee to this hellish tunnel that was trying to devour him. He was getting tired--so tired. Each step weighed more than the last, and he was seeing flickers of movement--hints of scenes, all of them trying to draw his attention away from the exit that he was positive was straight ahead. Another step--don’t look at the scene beside you--just keep moving forward, man, unlike the tube there IS a way out of this. He kept chanting this to himself, focusing forward, listening to the screams--

He held up a hand--his right hand--and saw the FEAR trying to dissipate. His fingers were starting to pull unnaturally to the side, disappearing--Jackdammit, he NEEDED that hand. He clenched his hand tightly, forcing his fingers to keep shape. And he trudged on. Each step was agonizing. Had he heard stories about the Christian Hell, he would have thought he was walking through it--it didn’t help that he caught sight of hands reaching towards him from the corner of his eyes, even though he knew there was no one else in the room.

When he stepped out of the exit he took a moment to breathe. Tears were streaming down his face, but he didn’t realize it. He just knew one thing. He was NEVER going back in that room again.

((WC: 907))

Tybalt was on his way back to find either Jove, or Amphi to hang with until class started, when something caught his interest.

A strange... Fear?

He stopped, looking over at what appeared to be a door at the base of a tree... Looking at it curiously, he then, out of the instinct, looked around him for any horsemen nearby. He hadn't gotten any permission to enter this particular area, so if he went in side, there was no telling what would happen if he tress pass on forbidden ground. Hell. A smarter dog would have chosen to avoid it completely, but Tybalt was drawn to it. He wanted to know where this Fear was coming from.

IDIOT! Turn around and go back to where the others are! Don't let your curiosity get the better of you!

That was what his brain was telling him, but Tybalt was never one to obey his brain. Besides, no one was around, so it wasn't like anyone was there to get him in trouble, right?

Suddenly feeling very adventurous, he stepped inside, making his way down the spiraling stone slab stairs. It was dark, but the black dog had no problem with seeing the dark. Nor did he feel the sudden drop in temperature. He could walk through a blizzard with nothing more than his skin and feel nothing. A wonderful benefit of a ghost, one would think.

Descending further, the black dog finally came across the murals on the wall; sucking in an unneeded breath when he saw them. As detailed as they were, whoever was responsible for making them had horrible taste. They were disturbing. Really, who would want images of disaster after disaster? What a mood killer!

Tybalt had no love for the humans, but he would never wish something as gruesome as that on them.

Feeling he had seen enough of the murals, he moved on; descending further and further into the darkness, only to be hit by blast of Fear. The force of it caused him to stumble back. It was foreign. Different from the comfortable Fear he was used to surrounding himself with back in Amityville. This... This was making him feel ill..!

Another wave of nausea washed over him, forcing the black dog to drop to his knees.

"The Jack is this..!?" He hissed out through clenched teeth, a hand against his head in an attempt to stop the world from spinning.

A few more moments of this passed until suddenly--he didn't feel anything at all. It was... peaceful? A feeling like he had never experienced. It was... he couldn't put it into words. He just wanted to stay here. Stay and protect the clan. Never leave, just remain here and---

His eyes snapped open and he gasped. More out of shock than necessity.

What had just happened? Did he just...? Oh Jack! He had to get out of here! If he stayed here much longer, there was no telling what was going to happen!

As Edel climbed down the ladder after yet another failed attempt at getting to the observation point, the ghoul noticed something ... strange. She hadn't seen the door at the base of the tree – how come she had never noticed that before? Immediately ruling out the possibility that the door would lead to an alternative way to the observation point, the ghoul couldn't help but notice a strange sensation of fear emitting from the within the door, getting stronger and stronger as she approached it with care.

She had doubts that the open door was an open invitation for her to enter and she was wary of what reckless curiosity could do, but the ghoul was not only keen to satiate her simple curiosity anymore. Whatever that lay within there ... it could be a clue to unravelling the mystery that surrounded the three factions in the feud that was heating up as of late.

Down the steps she went, and the ghoul was getting the feeling that the room was ... alive. A strange pulsating aura filled the room, growing and ebbing as she went. Down down down and the Fear was getting stronger and stronger -

She knew at once that she wasn't supposed to be here. The blast of overwhelming Fear was quickly accompanied by the feeling of her very life source draining towards the center of the room – decorated by an odd spiral symbol that was surrounded by glyphs that she could only assume were native to the clan.

She had to get out of here.

Her hand traced the wall and leaned on it for support as she made her way out of the room. Strange flickers of images were flowing into her mind ... what exactly were they?

Shehk had, like Shun, climbed back down to the ground to go look over the edge of the platform at the ground so far below. However, once her feet touched the ground there was almost an overwhelming feeling. A feeling of..what? She wasn't sure. Yet looking around, she also noted the door, brows furrowing together as she moved to go and step inside of it.

Her question about places she couldn't go had never been answered, after all, so why couldn't she go take a look inside of there? She opened the door and stepped inside, looking around curiously. Oh lord, that was dark.

And enclosed.

Oh Jack.

Oh Jack.

Oh jack.

Why was she going in?

It was like she couldn't stop herself even as she descended, feeling a great sense of unease as she descended the stone steps, her eyes going over the walls. The cold hit her like a train, causing her to almost pull back entirely - if she'd had the strength to. For some reason she couldn't as she looked over the painted carvings on the walls of the room.

It was...

they were in..

Oh god, she was hyperventilating. She was hyperventilating and she couldn't move. The weight of the room seemed to sink upon her like a punch to the gut. Raw FEAR grabbed a hold of her, like it was trying to rend her apart. Yet she couldn't feel the pain of it. It didn't hurt. It shook her, even as she wrapped her arms around herself.

The room itself seemed to hum, a noise that burned the inside of her ears. It was like a threat – heavy. There were runes that were glowing on the floor, seeming to vibrate, as if trying to lure her in – and there was a part of her that was tempted by that. Oh, she was so very tempted by the ‘COME TO US’ it seemed to call out to her. But no. She couldn’t move. She couldn’t bring herself to move.

In fact, it was taking a lot of energy just to stay up on her feet.

On her feet and not on her knees. Not walking closer. Her pulse was racing. She was beginning to feel almost sick – in an eerily familiar way. She’d had this before, it had been…. She looked down as her hands began to suddenly flicker, and then they suddenly jerked and pulled away from her, dissipating.

She was dissipating

Why was she dissipating?????

Every thought in her head turned into a frantic GET OUT, GET OUT, GET OUT, GET OUT, GET OUT!! All at once. But she couldn’t bring herself to move, spending a few long moments just staring.
Starting in horror.

Why was she..

Why now?

What was with this room? Even as she continued to watch, as if trying to take in the fact that what she saw was actually happening. The room was trying to devour her, one piece at a time. All pieces at a time. She was a walking morsel of food. Of Energy. That’s all she was. Why would they have had a room like this in there at all? She knew she couldn’t ask.

Something in her gut told her she shouldn’t have been there.

If she was eaten there, nobody would have come down there looking for her. Her legs wouldn’t move. She was paralyzed in panic. She needed to go back into that dark and cramped walkway. She needed to go up.

Up.

Get out of there. She took a deep breath that sounded more like a gasp before she finally forced herself out of her funk, stepping back and tripping over herself as she finally got her legs moving again, turning over and pushing herself up to get up again. She was already scraped up, a little bit more pain wouldn’t bother her. She was fine.

She was fine.

Get up the steps.

Go up.
Up.

The images of those carvings on the wall planted themselves into her mind, trying to find meaning as she continued up, hand on the wall as the warmth of the jungle seemed to blow in and remind her where she actually was. She was somewhere warm. Not cold. Somewhere that smelled like greenery, not the gold and dirty earth that she’d just fled from. She nearly stumbled out into the platform at the bottom of the ladder, holding onto the railing cautiously as she wheezed, panting for air.

She was sweating and she wasn’t sure why.

Shehk held out her hands, checking to make sure they were still there. They were. Fortunately they were. And yet, she couldn’t shake the feeling like they weren’t. Like what she was seeing was an illusion.

She was visibly shaken.

She never wanted to go down there ever again.

The sickening feeling had overwhelmed her and the ghoul coughed and collapsed onto the stairs. Willing herself to breathe in deeply and continue going, she pulled herself up the steps one by one, venturing a look back down at the center of the room below. A perplexed expression crossed her face as she gaped at the runes that pointed outwards from the center glyphs now glowing an angry red. Something was happening, and again she didn't know what. But her gut feeling was telling that that something was bad bad bad, and that she would be doing herself a massive favour if she managed to get herself out of the room quickly before it was too late.

Forcing himself to stand again, he was hit by another wave. This time causing him slump against the side of the wall and grip one of the stone slaps for support. Whenever the black dog struggled to walk, the more the dizziness and nausea affected him. Just turning his his head was making the room spin and his vision blur and the buzzing in his ears only made it worse!

Wincing, his ears folded back. The longer he stayed, the louder the buzzing got. Continuing to grow and grow until the point that it was unbearable for his sensitive ears to handle. It wasn't just a buzzing either. He could hear something else... It was... shouting...? screaming? A shiver ran up his spine and he felt ill all over again. The noise... it was worse than the buzzing and the nausea combined. It was hard to listen to. The agony in those screams... it was as though hundreds were being tortured to death.

Tybalt continued to stare at the runes. He was supposed to be trying to make up for lost strength, or something, but that plan failed when he realized the room continued to sap his strength regardless of him laying there. Time to move on, he figured. Or... try to anyways.

"I'm not crazy and I'm not seeing big red glowy symbols." He told himself. "Its just a trick of the light. Once I get out of here, they'll be gone." That was, if he got out there. At this rate, he would be happy if he could just stand up without passing out.