Issue 1 Downtime

Will lay in bed.

More accurately, he had been placed in bed, and the covers drawn up.

Sara had rushed in a short while after, asking questions that no one had answered. Now she's just sitting on the chair next to the bed, slumped over and lieing on Will's chest. She looks like she's been crying.

Will, of course, made no reaction to any of this.

Ms. McManus quietly stepped into the room.

"There's... something you rather ought to see. The way there isn't pretty, but I'm fairly certain that he meant it for you."

Sara looks up and rubs her cheeks with the back of her hand. "Sam, thank goodness! What... what's wrong with him? And what do you mean he meant to show me something?"

"Something in his mind. A part of him she couldn't get to. I could try to open it, but I think he'd rather you do it."

Sara sniffs and straightens up. "Okay. Just tell me what I need to do."

"I'm going to bring you with me into his mindscape. It's going to look... well, it's going to look rather bad. I just need you to stay with me and don't flinch from this. I'll get you safely to where you need to be."

Sara nods. "I can do that."

And with that, Samantha made contact with first Sara's mind, then Will's. It wasn't as smooth a transition as it usually was, though whether that was due to Samantha's mental state or Will's was anyone's guess. Slowly, they descended into the mindscape.

Thick black smoke and soot were there to greet Sara and Sam, admist the broken shards of alphabet blocks. The air was thick with it, stinging the eyes and singing the throat.

The library was in tatters, the observatory in rubble, and the gingerbread house in crumbs. Will was nowhere to be seen.

In fact, the only two things that COULD be made out through the smog, the apparent only two things remaining standing, were a giant statue of Mel, seemed to be made out of bits and pieces of the junk left from Will's head...and a small thin black building, with the Knight pinned to it.

Sara shuddered at what she saw.

"Oh my god..."

"She... wasn't kind." Samantha said ruefully. It was clear she took no pleasure in seeing this either.

"It's over this way," she said as she gestured towards the small black structure.

"Is... is that me?" Sara asks as they come close to the small building and the figure pinned to it.

"That's kinda sweet. Or weird."

"Is that weird?" she asks Sam after a short pause.

"I'd stick with 'sweet.'"

Sara nods, though she does cast a dubious glance at the Mel statue, even if it's clearly 'artificial' and wrong, unlike the knight.

"Now, as you know a great deal here is surprisingly straightforward in its metaphor, as literal as Will tends to be."

"And recall, black boxes are the records of a plane in case it crashes."

"The knight here told me that only one person is allowed to open this one."

"And that's me?" she asks, putting a hand up against the box.

"How do I open it?" she wonders, looking for a door-knob or a latch or something.

There was a handle--this was the handle that had fried McDohl quite badly. It was located just above the body of the knight.

Sara awkwardly reaches past, well, herself, grabs the handle and tries to turn it.

Surprisingly (or not, depending on your point of view), it opened without much resistance, other than the weight of the knight dragging along the ground.

The inside of the room was very very dark and dusty, as if no one had been in here for years. It looked like the hall of some sort of museum, with tiny exhibits lining the walls, leading up towards a raised pedestal on the far side, covered in a blanket, in a spotlight.

"Will?" she carefully calls out as she steps into the hallway, looking at the lined up exhibits.

"Or a museum, but I really hope you're right..."

There was no sign of Will, anywhere.

The exhibits....were crudely made. Like, out of popcicle sticks and glued on macaroni and things.

Some of the exhibits were versions of buildings they had encountered in the mindscape--the library was actually quite impressively done, if done by like a 2nd grader.

Other buildings were entirely new--there was some kind of boat, and some kind of factory, and some kind of palace...all kinds of different buildings.

Little pipe-cleaner people were around the buildings, too.

"Is... is that enough for him to... you know... rebuilt?"

All the exhibits were neat and all--and if they wanted, they could actually pick them up and stuff--but they were all sort of leading Sam and Sara on a path towards the covered pedestal.

Sara nods and keeps walking along the hall towards the pedestal. Part of her hopes it'll be what she thinks it is and part of her is afraid it might not be.

Whatever she did or did not hope it would be is rather irrelevant at this point, isn't it?

Under the blanket covering it was a pedestal with a single red button, under glass. In front of the pedestal were two footprints, indicating where to stand.

"That seems rather straightforward..." she says, though she casts a questioning glance at Sam before she goes about pushing any big red buttons.

Samantha gave a weary chuckle.

"Jolly, candy-like."

"I can tell you, as I said earlier, that she couldn't reach in here. I doubt he'd have anything that would harm his mind in here."

"Okay." she nods and slowly flips open the casing over the button before pushing it with her palm.

*bloop*

A...well, a infobox, for lack of a better word, popped up, floating in mid air above her eyes.

Code: Select all

The following action is IRREVERSIBLE.  Are you sure you want to continue?
     _____     _____
    | yes  |  | no  |
     _____     _____

In addition, a small...rectangular thing with, like, a lens or something popped out, and shined a red dot on Sara's forehead.

Sara hesitates for a moment but then pokes the "Yes" box with her finger.

And that started one hell of a chain reaction.

First off, a laser beam came out from the rectangular thing, and pierced right through Sara's head, which was uncomfortable but not as painful and, you know, deadly as it would be had it happened in real life.

Outside, there was a tremendous roar, and a flash of brilliant white light, followed by one HELL of a shockwave. The darkness inside and the lightness outside made it very hard to see, but things were getting blown around quite dramatically out there.