vivarium | CALHOUN HOUR

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CALHOUN HOUR - ESCAPE

When characters begin to wake up, instead of finding themselves in the usual warehouse, they will instead find themselves in an a very unfamiliar area. Maybe they'll wake up alone, or maybe they'll wake up with someone else. Either way, the biggest point is that they're in God-knows-where and it's the start of a new Calhoun Hour.

Within seconds later, a familiar voice booms throughout the loud speakers.

"Ahem, testing, testing! Hello, can you all hear me?"

It's, without a doubt, your favourite robotic mouse, Calhoun. As usual, he sounds a cheery as ever.

"Wow, isn't this familiar? It's almost like the first time we've met, you know. Test subject in a new location, maybe alone or maybe with someone else, my charming voice rings throughout the room, trying to drown you all in an elevator. Good times!"

"Well, anyway, welcome to your new Calhoun Hour! You can see that I've taken the liberty to move you all to a more suitable location. You may not know it, with how small your brains are, but you're all stuck in a maze! I've had my fair share of running around in mazes, you know, being a mouse and all, so I want to return to favour to you humans! So, you know the drill: explore, look around, try to escape, blah blah blah, I don't need to explain all this! Just get to it! Who knows, maybe the exit here is an exit out to the real world. I might be generous like that, if you manage to find it. If not, well, I guess you can all starve here!"

He snickers, then pauses. Suddenly, a loud gunshot-like sound rings throughout the speakers, and Calhoun screams again.

"Let's get started!"

BASIC INFO ✖ ESCAPE ✖ POST-EVENT MINGLE ✖ TURN-IN

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"Another one of them water traps?" Heiji asked Hershel. "I fell into one earlier, it was in this room with a glass floor..."

Hmm, but the question was who to fuss over first. "You ate drugged food?" Problem solved; Heiji went over to Snake and put a hand up to his forehead to check his temperature. "You feelin' okay now?"

Though not even Heiji was aware of it, there was a quality of warmth that crept into his voice when he talked to Snake that wasn't present when he talked to the others in the warehouse. "Jeez, I gotta watch you like a hawk..."

"What? Are you alright?" At least Heiji didn't look as drowned rat as these two nerds, so that was probably a good sign. Wouldn't stop Hershel from being concerned though.

He watched as Heiji went over to Snake, smiling to himself like the shitlord he is after a moment. He was right. it was him. He so called it. Victory was sweet. Everyone bow to him, etc.

Heiji, I am perfectly fine. It doesn't sound like there's a semi chasing me any more. But you...you're sure you're all right after that dunking and going into the sauna? You don't feel cold? *Because getting a cold and worse would be hell in the warehouse with no medicine to fight it.*

"Yeah, I'm fine. Gave me kind of a start; the floor broke under me and dropped me into some icewater."

He turned to face Snake again, shh Snake, keep the sauna part on the DL okay. "I think I'll be okay. I been sleeping out in the open, and that's supposed to give ya a cold, too."

Heiji eyed both of them suspiciously. "So neither of you got hurt, right?"

"You should probably be careful anyway, Heiji, going from those two extremes in one day..." He'd done the sauna thing, it sucked, on Snake's side of worry about illness here.

And he shook his head. "Just a bit damp now, really." No need to mention punches in his professional opinion. Also forget the temple cut, that's covered by hair though, the natural... bandage I guess? Whatever point is the world's a song. "Just make sure to avoid that room if you can, it's... finicky."

Edited 2014-12-14 22:54 (UTC)

Highly finicky. *Wait a minute. Did his ears deceive him or did Heiji just talk to him differently than Hershel? He'd need a bigger sample study in order to put his hypothesis to the test.* And slightly damp. *Yes because sometimes you just had to punch a bro to escape a water trap.*

Did you find anything else in your search of other rooms, Heiji?

"Hey, I ain't a flower! I'll be just fine." He looked Hershel up and down, but apparently the evidence of Hershel's terrible abuse at the hands of his fellow test subjects was well-concealed.

He turned back to Snake. "You mean clues?" His voice was different. It wasn't that it was cold when talking to the others; Heiji had always had a rather warm, expressive voice, and Hershel was one of his closest friends. But when he talked to Snake, there was a subtle difference. In addition to the bit of extra warmth, the changes in his pitch were slightly different -- a little more pronounced, occasionally dropping a note or two lower than when he was talking to someone else.

"I didn't find anything useful. But I did leave a message on the chalkboard to let people know where I was headed. Thought I'd hang out in that room past the inner-outer puzzle once I was done with the rest. I've seen the Calhoun shrine, the aquarium, that boulder room, the coffins, the room where you gotta stick your hand in that hole in the wall..."

"You may not be a flower but you are human, you know." Hershel pointed out, raising his brow at Heiji. You aren't escaping worry, dude, he's keeping an eye on you.

Hershel glanced between them again with that smile before squashing it pointedly, listening to the various rooms, frowning a little. "Coffins?" He asked uneasily. "I probably don't even want to know... I've seen the sauna, that room with those dolls- have you seen anyone else around here, Heiji? I'm a bit worried about some of them."

"Well, all you really gotta know is that you shouldn't try to grab anything in those coffins, or you'll have robots to deal with," said Heiji.

"Let's see, I ran into you two, plus Sasuke, Wirt, Clive... only people I ain't seen so far is Alfendi and Kuzuryuu. Speakin' of which, when I'm done exploring, I'm gonna stick around that room with the food, near the chalkboard room. Just in case we get separated."

Why would I ever want to mess with those robots ever again? Once was enough. *And yes, Heiji did sound different when talking to him. Warmer. It made Snake smile.*

"Agreed." No more robots. No more robots ever if need be. "Oh, is that where you got the shovel?"

Shockingly hearing Kuzuryuu and Alfendi haven't been around made Hershel look worried. "I haven't seen Kuzuryuu at all, Alfendi's around though... I'm going to go see if I can find either of them soon." He decided. "You should rest though, Heiji- maybe Snake can actually convince you to." His tone is just a liiiitle bit amused, I wonder why.

"Yeah, there were actually a couple of 'em. They didn't seem to care about those, though, just the stuff inside the coffins. I found a cell phone, but it was broken." Not even going to mention the robot hands bursting through coffin lids unless of course someone asked about the robots...

Heiji sounded a little flustered. "Wh... what's that supposed to mean? I can take care of myself just fine! Anyway, I'm almost done mappin' out this maze. I can rest after that."

*Snake, however, understood exactly what Hershel was about and turned his head to face him.* I know exactly what it means.

*Is it possible? Could it be possible?* Hershel, correct me if I'm wrong but your tone suggests that you seem to be quite pleased that both of us are together. Would it be safe to assume that you somehow knew something neither of us did not?

Hershel glanced at Heiji a moment, still a little amused as he turned back to Snake and answered. "Well... it wasn't exactly hard to spot, if you were paying attention." He admitted.

"I mean Heiji was as obvious as you could get-" Friendship. You're welcome Heiji. "-but Snake, you were so... defensive, I suppose? With everyone for a very long time, maybe even now. Not with Heiji, not in the same way, so..." He trailed off, well there you have it. "I'm really very happy for you both, I'm glad something good has come out of all this."

Hershel, you shitlord wanker!!

Heiji glanced over at Snake. "Well, I guess you're right about Snake, at least. I ain't even know how he felt. Try playin' poker with him sometime."

Was Snake really that guarded with everyone else, though? He almost always interacted with Snake alone, so he hadn't really noticed...

I'm glad we could be a source of entertainment for you, Hershel. We'll have to work out our schedules to provide you with a proper showing. Perhaps even charge admission. *It nettled him to think that someone else had everything figured out before he did.*

Heiji tapped Snake on the back of his shoulder with the palm of one hand -- quickly, but without force.

"Don't get too steamed. He was the one who told me to talk to you." Even after Snake had told Heiji he'd rather forget about everything that happened. In that sense, Heiji owed Hershel quite a lot.

Hershel looked surprised a moment before he answered, sounding a tad guilty. "Snake... you're right, it really wasn't my business in the end. I'm sorry, I hope I haven't made you uncomfortable."

He stood there pretty awkwardly for a moment, rubbing his arm. "Maybe I should go, I really do want to see if I can find Kuzuryuu and Alfendi, I'm worried they may have gotten stuck somewhere. Is there anything I should look out for nearby that you know of? I don't think I've been around this area all that much."

*Snake made a little noise as he exhaled. He supposed he couldn't really do anything about it now. And in the end, Heiji did talk to him and all was well. So instead, Snake smiled.* I'm afraid I'm the wrong person to ask what things look like.

I suppose you did meddle, but in the end, it was for a good cause. Otherwise myself and Heiji would be angsting in our separate corners for no reason whatsoever.

Heiji leaned forward and ruffled Hershel's hair, ruffle ruffle, wow what a monster. "If you go over in that direction, you're gonna come to a room where you gotta push this button. One person does, anyway. They're the 'winner' and the other person's the loser and suffers the 'consequences'. I dunno what would happen if you went in alone, though. Maybe you'd win by default?"

When Snake smiled, Heiji looked away a little. Snake had better watch out, or he was going to get a kiss when Hershel went off to find Alfendi and Kuzuryuu.

"Right." Hershel still looked pretty awkward but he smiled at Heiji for his monstrous hair ruffling. "Alright, I'll keep an eye out for that one, I'm assuming the 'consequences' aren't very pleasant."

And with that he stepped back, raising a hand. "I'll see you both late, alright? Try to be careful out there." And off he went in search of idiots, surely nothing bad will happen and no one will be in comas etc etc.

Heiji waved to Hershel. "Alright, see ya! Watch out for any traps!"

Once he was gone, though, he'd take Snake's hand. When he spoke, his voice was lowered slightly. "...You know what he said to me? Hershel, I mean."

No, what did he tell you?

"He said I should talk to you about how I felt, 'cause there's a chance we won't make it out of here." Heiji glanced over at Snake for a moment.

"...I get what he was tryin' to do. And say. But that guy worries too much. I ain't interested in dying in here with you. I want to get back outside with you."

I plan on escaping here too. With everyone I can take with me which better be you. *Good Lord, Heiji, how do you casually say things like that with a straight face? His stomach flips around.*

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detectiveofthewest - 2014-12-23 02:31 (UTC) - Expand

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