PITCH BLACK〔M〕「Hoef & Hannelorian」

[Dire Hoef]

"We're being watched." He scanned the halls one last time. "From the corners of the halls."

He stepped back inside the room, and brought Nora in as well. He closed the door slowly and locked it thereafter. "For now," he opened his mouth for the first time since they've established this telepathic connection, "It can't see or hear into rooms.. We're safe."

It was strangely difficult coming to this conclusion as the answers to its behaviour were laid out before them in a noneuclidean way. But Hachi didn't really care about whatever nefarious feeding patterns this looming threat posed. All he cared about was the mere fact that they can finally breathe. It had been nonstop action from the moment they left this place. He definitely needed a break...

He found his place sitting down at one of the chairs near the desk, dropping into it with a sigh. He looked back at Nora before looking over at the desk she was digging through. "Well, since we can't exactly move around freely... We can forget about the others for a moment. If they're smart, they would've boarded up a room somewhere in the mansion." He disliked how he had to let go of the idea of ensuring their safety, but he was also highly aware of the threat outside. He didn't want to risk safety against an unknown, unseen, enemy.

"As for what those Imperials may have to do with what we saw down there and are now dealing with..." He took a breath as the images of those events very fresh in his mind. He felt as though he was still there, pinned to the floor. And he shivered, a cold, dejected, sensation sweeping from him to Nora. "My guess is that it would have to be somewhere far more private.. This room is far too trafficked to just have that lying around.. Perhaps her private quarters.. Where that is, well.. We'd have to pray that we find it before it decides to show its face.."

[Hannelorian]

"Watched?" Nora was almost surprised to hear the sound of her own voice as it escaped her lips, and was quickly shuffled back into the office space. That wasn't surprising, there were all manner of creatures out there, and after what they had just seen, the notion that something was lurking in the shadows and watching them from the corners of the hallways was plausible. If not probable. Nora nodded silently. Taking a moment to compose herself, to quiet her mind down from all of the questions that had boiled up.

"Let's take a breather." Nora smiled softly and made her way to Hachi, kneeling down beside him as he sat in the chair. Her porcelain face and piercing eyes staring up at him, just watching him. A ginger hand moving up to take his into her own and hold it ever so gently. "If there's one thing we know about your sister, she's smart as they come." Nora was attempting to be reassuring, fully acknowledging that he wasn't just concerned for strangers, but for his own family, regardless of how complicated and difficult those relationships could be.

Nora slowly stood up, and carefully, with all of the grace in the world moved to set herself upon his lap, arms wrapping around his neck, she stared into his eyes, she was unflinching, as though nothing at all was bothering her, or terrifying her. "It's been you and me, since the beginning." She leaned forward, and pressed her forehead to his. "Unknown creatures or not. Mysteries or not. We can handle this." She seemed so sure, so certain. It wasn't a lie.

"To find a woman's bedroom?" Nora smirked. And leaned back a bit, creating a space between their torso's. "Well surely you must know how to find that." Men seemed drawn to such places. Another lean in, her lips pressed to his briefly before shaking her head. "Okay, don't you worry. In a house like this... high up, not too high, in a corner likely, lots of space."

[Dire Hoef]

Nora's assurance was a welcoming sensation. And he took that time to admire her continued persistance. If it were anyone else, he might as well had perished. There was no mistaking how invaluable she became to him. She was now a part of him, and him a part of her. They were in lock-step. And her rather playful teasing was enough to cool any real doubt from his mind. She was like an antidote to a mental sickness plaguing his frontal cortex.

"Yeah.. I suppose we do, don't we?" He gave a small smile and rolled his eyes. "But good to know you have an idea." His small smile grew into a smirk as his playful demeanor came forth with a bit of a sparkle.

"And while we have this time," he came close to Nora but did not connect, "What of that thing the Giantess gave you? I've been thinking about it. It's...innocuous at first, but if I stare at it for too long my eyes get..fuzzy. I don't know what's causing that." He rested back in his place and glanced over at where she had placed the object.

He did not move, and instead remained still. Her energy was coursing through his, intertwining like ribbons. He did not wish to disturb what was delicately made, and thus only really thought about their few series of steps. Since this beast, these eyes in the dark, attack via hallways, they would need to keep their time there short; crossing room to room. Yes. This was a suitable plan, but the dogmen became a quick outlier.

He didn't feel multiple sets of eyes. He only felt one. Where did those dogmen go? Were they subsumed, and conjoined to make the creature stronger? Or do they have a different part to play in this hunt? He didn't know, and the fact that he didn't know really irked him. His face scrunched at the idea that the dogmen operate differently than the watcher.

[Hannelorian]

Nora had gotten somewhat comfortable, given their situation. Perhaps too comfortable and when Hachi had inquired about the object, her mind began to wander to it, as her eyes slowly drifted over it. "I don't know it is... or what to do with it." Nora shook her head, it was an intriguing proposition, this object was clearly worth something, it was meant to do something. But what could it possibly have been meant to do? Perhaps the Giantess had misplaced her faith in the recipient of this object.

"It's an old manor house, right?" Nora asked aloud, not necessarily looking for Hachi to provide an answer. "That must be mean there are servant passageways. Hidden doors, things like that. Servants were meant to be unobtrusive, not to disturb the residents any more than necessary." There was something of a cute noise that escaped her lips as she thought a little further. "It would keep us out of the central hallways, and more importantly, we wouldn't need to touch the grand staircase to ascend if we can find the servant's ones."

Nora begrudgingly stood, departing from Hachi's lap she made her way over the nearest wall and rested her ear against it, as well as the flats of her palms. Her palms were roaming along the wall, knocking every so often as she slowly moved her way along. "If this was designed as Yoriko's office... she must...have one...." Nora continued around the room until she knocked and it was hollow behind. A hollow ring was exactly what she was looking for.

"Right... here." Nora pushed on the wall slightly, but there seemed not to be a pressure switch. Her hand was comfortable, and with a single psionic push, the door opened gently, opening inward toward the hidden hallway. They were narrow and certainly dark, but the wear on the wooden floor that was illuminated from the lights in the room indicated that it was certainly well used.

[Dire Hoef]

Robe des Champs - Shiro Sagisu

---

When Nora uncovered the hidden passage way, Hachiro slowly lifted himself up from his seat. He was a little in awe, to be frank. Although this was rather expected according to Nora's tone, so he wasn't that surprised. But at the same time, for the architects to have this much forethought into its construction, was rather bewildering.

He was, however, going to save his shock for another time as a more pressing matter came to the forefront. "Well, in that case, we can move freely." He rolled his shoulder for a moment and groaned at how much he ached. "Still a little sore from before, but I think I'll manage." He stared at the passage way with some trepidation.

"Before that though," he paced around the room a bit, "I wanted to say this now since we probably won't have time to really digest it while we're on the move, but.. My hypothesis for what's going on here is gradually shifting." He stopped by the fireplace and stared into the fire, deep in thought. "As before we're dealing with a hostile micro-organism, but there's an added component now.. Something else is giving it these mutatable characteristics like the dogmen." His thoughts were now free to roam, leaving his mouth like butterflies.

"Comparing the dogmen to the beasts at the institute, it's like night and day. The big thing we blew up was the only thing to compare to the dogmen, and that thing was mostly mindless..acting on impulse. This is not even factoring in the mind altering bulbous thing roaming the halls now!" He huffed, looked up and then over at Nora, "What if the hell we're in now has been here before? This goes back to this having biblical significance. Maybe this isn't one to one, but rather a rhyme in a greater poem? Or a refrain in a greater orchestra? I don't know how to explain it yet.. But that's best way I can say it.. It hurts just trying to wrap my mind around it." He held his right temple.

"Granted," he waded through the furniture to Nora, "There's still a lot more questions than answers to this whole thing, and we haven't even left this city.. God knows what's going on beyond our own situation, but like you said.. We can handle this." He smirked and pecked her right on the lips. "We'll get to the bottom of this rabbit hole, and maybe find the light at the end of it. I sure as shit want to see the sun again."

He held a grim determination, which resonated from his person like turbulent seas.

[Hannelorian]

Nora stopped short when Hachi began to speak, his insights thus far had been on point and she found herself drawn to his words and his tone. "Freely might be an overstatement." Nora scratched her head a bit lost in a thought. "If we're smart enough to find this, what if that... thing can too?" The thought was something she didn't particularly want to embrace. But that was going to be a problem for a later time, Hachi's theories had been evolving.

"Yes. I suspect you're right." Nora took a pause to gather her thoughts on the matter. "As we moved further away from the institute the creatures we encountered are growing increasingly more sophisticated." Nora had to admit that he had a point. He had been picking up on the same thing that she had. "At the Institute, the creatures they were primal. Acting on basic instinct. Survival, food, nothing more. Perhaps protecting their perceived territory, but there was no complex thought."

Nora now was beginning to pace around the room as Hachi stared into the fire roaring. "Some of the creatures... were feeding on the Giantess while she lived... with her innate abilities of creation, is possible they had stolen some of that? Somehow? Gained the ability to evolve?" Perhaps that was thinking too complex, maybe there was a simpler solution, that there were simply bands of these creatures. Each one had a purpose, there were those who were simple, those who were complex.

Shifting to the next thought Nora bit her lower lip. "Okay. Kei said something similar... right? Back in her office? And if you now concur based on what you've seen... that leads us to a paradox of sorts." Nora by this point had finally stopped pacing. "Time is a flat circle." Nora held her palm out flat, and clapped the other palm upon it. "The theory that everything that has happened, has happened before and will come to pass again. Like your rhyme in a poem, refrain in a song, or the exposition in a piano sonata."

Nora's fingers longed to play the piano again, in the comfort of her home on a random night. It was one of the finer pleasures that she wondered if she would ever have again. "So, the question becomes, what in the histories, in the stories is the piece that happens next? Because that is what we're building toward. Can the cycle be broken? Would we even want that?" Hachi was a student of history, the world, Nora was a woman of harder science. She was perhaps embarrassed to admit she had no idea what to expect next... even in tales previously regarded as fiction.