![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
xp_phoenix posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
xp_logsGarrison, Jean, Natasha, and Stephen find the haunted house's ballroom, as well as some red in one's ledger.
"A ballroom. I know, before I came to the mansion, I'd never seen a real ballroom. It's like a big fancy gym." Kane said, looking around the once grand and now shabby wood floors and ornate fixtures covered in cobwebs.
"Really? My parents went to a lot of faculty parties," Jean said, warily glancing around the room. Their footsteps echoed as they walked.
"I'm used to seeing the room full."
The only light came from the windows around them, but it was almost like the further they walked in, the dimmer it got. Jean focused on a pastoral scene painted on the ceiling for a moment, the painted fields looking strangely familiar.
"Does...that grass look like it's moving?" she murmured.
"Not to me but I-" Kane said, looking closer. "Wait, are those tombstones in the background there?" He pointed at the mural.
Stephen craned his head back, dark eyes squinting at the ceiling as he bit his lip thoughtfully, "Umm...I think..yeah and that's a bird, I swear I saw it move."
"I think I can read the inscription..." Garrison's voice trailed off as he peered closer. The closest stone said 'Summers, Scott' with a date only a few months from now. The next 'Dane, Lorna' with the same date. "Gwynn, Megan', 'Hayes, Molly', 'Keller, Julian' - all the same date, names going on and on until he froze.
'Frost, Adrienne'.
Natasha hesitated before following the others into the room. She wasn't a stranger to ballrooms and this one felt entirely too familiar. The white columns were now gray, coated with dirt, and the cobwebs an all too appropriate decor item. How appropriate for her ghosts to rise out of the past on tonight of all nights. "Something feels really wrong about all this...."
Music creaked to life, wafting down through the air, along with the loud smack of a heel against the wooden floors.
"That's not good." Stephen's head dropped down to stare at Natasha, one hand coming up to rest on his neck, worry dancing between his dark eyes, "I...those names...how do they know? That was...what's going on here guys?" For a moment the boy sounded just as young as he was, hands clenching at his sides as he glanced around for the source of the music. "I...don't like this anymore, I think I wanna go home." To check on the others, make sure they were ok, to check on Clea, the name he'd seen written on a gravestone.
Jean reflexively moved closer to Stephen to comfort him, gently putting her hand on his shoulder. "We'll find a way out, okay?" she said gently. That unease was growing within her. She could sense it all around them. It wasn't just them. There were more minds around. People they knew, people they didn't. But the name of the game was fear.
The room was gradually growing darker. A spotlight suddenly struck the center. Someone was about to perform.
"What the fuck-" It was... ballet. Nothing Kane recognized, which wasn't surprising as Prokofiev's 'Chout' wasn't anywhere near as well known as his famed 'Peter and the Wolf'. As the strings rose, the background lights rimmed red around the spot.
Natasha shuddered. She knew this act. She knew them all. The lead ballerina appeared, floating into view on her tiptoes. Her own body twitched with the suppressed muscle memory. She'd danced it herself. Again and again until the movements and the low commands were entwined in her psyche. Their potency had dulled over the years, but nothing would make her forget. "We should leave. If this is what I think it is, we're not welcome and we're about to be surrounded by deadly assassins."
The dark-haired magician's head shot up, eyes staring at Natasha for a moment before he pointed at him, his head twisting around to glance at Jean.
"Umm...I say we do what she says, I like watching assassin's in the movies, but I kinda like y'all too much to see anything happen to you." This house was freaky enough, but piling killer ballerina's on top of everything else was a tiny bit too much for common sense, or well his sanity.
Jean could feel the uncomfortable buzzing growing stronger in her head. She kept her eyes on Natasha, then glanced back at the ballerina, sending a gentle mental probe her way. She was rewarded with a sharp stabbing pain in her head, and she put her hand to her temple.
"Whatever that is it isn't human. There's something...around us but..it's everywhere."
Part of her wondered if they had somehow fallen asleep (again) and were on the Astral Plane.
"Assassins." Kane said quietly, almost to himself. "That's what happened. No way it happened in a straight up fight. Some would get out. But they sent assassins..." He trailed off, a chilling cold under his tone.
"Go. Assassins want a second crack, let the fuckers try." He all but snarled the final words.
Natasha was right. The lights lifted and illuminated all around them were the faces of her childhood. The young girls Natasha had grown up with and watched turn into women. The ones that had slowly been culled from the program one by one. They were dressed identically in black tactical suits. Their hair pulled back to reveal their innocent faces but their blank eyes were a memorial to what the program had wrought.
They were severely outnumbered and while Natasha knew her companions could fight, were they prepared for the onslaught that was about to happen? She swallowed and stepped forward to face them. "Let them leave. You're here for me."
She desperately tried to remember what she'd left in this suit. Just her luck that she'd come unprepared. She knew better, but living at the mansion had gotten her soft. She drew her knife and the other one strapped to the inside of her boots then charged at the nearest woman. She disappeared into a flurry of movement and glinting steel as the Widows converged on her.
"You're one of them." Kane snapped the arm of a specter that swung at him. "A lucky friend."
"I left this life behind a long time ago," Natasha called out as she ducked and wove, stabbing bodies and slitting the throats of friends and foes from a long time ago. The rhythm of attack was familiar that she slipped into that state of mind where the goal of the mission was all that was important and the mission this time was to survive and distract the Widows from the rest of the group that had come here with her. She'd been something, someone else, so many long years ago.
Kane reached out and blocked Natasha's strike, twisting her arm back painfully and sending her sprawling with a kick to the stomach. "You would have been there, unsuspected. They never guessed you were there to kill them."
Before Strange or Jean could react, they found themselves yanked off their feet and sent sprawling from the room into the hallway. Before they could react, the doors slammed shut, leaving Natasha and Kane alone and locked in combat.
Natasha had no memories of whatever the hell he was accusing her of. She'd dug and dug to make sure she knew the full extent of her prior life. It was no way to start a new one if she didn't carry the sins of the past with her. She rolled to her foot and darted through the crowd of other Widows attempting to kill her. Why go after her when the rest of the Widows were more than capable of doing his goal for them if he waited? He could've helped her distract them but instead they were playing right into this entity's hands. She swirled through the crowd, using their familiar movements to her advantage and slammed a knife toward his back. It skimmed off. Fuck, she remembered his profile. Nanotech skin.
His arm moved fast enough to blur, smashing into her wrist and numbing her hand as the knife fell to the ground. Kane augmented physical attributes were on full display as he literally picked two Widow's up and smashed them together, knocking them both unconscious.
She danced away, fading back into the crowd of more Widows. She incapacitated them quickly, a stab to the side with her other knife, then a quick twist of the neck, scooping up their discarded sidearms. She paused behind a column to check the clips then darted back out, firing at every target in sight.
Kane wrenched a Widow in front of him, letting her absorb several rounds as he bullrushed Natasha. He smashed her to one side with the dying Widow, dropping the woman as he did so. Before she could catch her balance, he pulled one of the guns away. He tried to bring her down with a pair of sharp jabs but she parried one and slipped the other before catching him midsection with a kick and dancing away. Another wave of Widows fell on them both and their combat was broken as they turned to deal with other threats first..
"A ballroom. I know, before I came to the mansion, I'd never seen a real ballroom. It's like a big fancy gym." Kane said, looking around the once grand and now shabby wood floors and ornate fixtures covered in cobwebs.
"Really? My parents went to a lot of faculty parties," Jean said, warily glancing around the room. Their footsteps echoed as they walked.
"I'm used to seeing the room full."
The only light came from the windows around them, but it was almost like the further they walked in, the dimmer it got. Jean focused on a pastoral scene painted on the ceiling for a moment, the painted fields looking strangely familiar.
"Does...that grass look like it's moving?" she murmured.
"Not to me but I-" Kane said, looking closer. "Wait, are those tombstones in the background there?" He pointed at the mural.
Stephen craned his head back, dark eyes squinting at the ceiling as he bit his lip thoughtfully, "Umm...I think..yeah and that's a bird, I swear I saw it move."
"I think I can read the inscription..." Garrison's voice trailed off as he peered closer. The closest stone said 'Summers, Scott' with a date only a few months from now. The next 'Dane, Lorna' with the same date. "Gwynn, Megan', 'Hayes, Molly', 'Keller, Julian' - all the same date, names going on and on until he froze.
'Frost, Adrienne'.
Natasha hesitated before following the others into the room. She wasn't a stranger to ballrooms and this one felt entirely too familiar. The white columns were now gray, coated with dirt, and the cobwebs an all too appropriate decor item. How appropriate for her ghosts to rise out of the past on tonight of all nights. "Something feels really wrong about all this...."
Music creaked to life, wafting down through the air, along with the loud smack of a heel against the wooden floors.
"That's not good." Stephen's head dropped down to stare at Natasha, one hand coming up to rest on his neck, worry dancing between his dark eyes, "I...those names...how do they know? That was...what's going on here guys?" For a moment the boy sounded just as young as he was, hands clenching at his sides as he glanced around for the source of the music. "I...don't like this anymore, I think I wanna go home." To check on the others, make sure they were ok, to check on Clea, the name he'd seen written on a gravestone.
Jean reflexively moved closer to Stephen to comfort him, gently putting her hand on his shoulder. "We'll find a way out, okay?" she said gently. That unease was growing within her. She could sense it all around them. It wasn't just them. There were more minds around. People they knew, people they didn't. But the name of the game was fear.
The room was gradually growing darker. A spotlight suddenly struck the center. Someone was about to perform.
"What the fuck-" It was... ballet. Nothing Kane recognized, which wasn't surprising as Prokofiev's 'Chout' wasn't anywhere near as well known as his famed 'Peter and the Wolf'. As the strings rose, the background lights rimmed red around the spot.
Natasha shuddered. She knew this act. She knew them all. The lead ballerina appeared, floating into view on her tiptoes. Her own body twitched with the suppressed muscle memory. She'd danced it herself. Again and again until the movements and the low commands were entwined in her psyche. Their potency had dulled over the years, but nothing would make her forget. "We should leave. If this is what I think it is, we're not welcome and we're about to be surrounded by deadly assassins."
The dark-haired magician's head shot up, eyes staring at Natasha for a moment before he pointed at him, his head twisting around to glance at Jean.
"Umm...I say we do what she says, I like watching assassin's in the movies, but I kinda like y'all too much to see anything happen to you." This house was freaky enough, but piling killer ballerina's on top of everything else was a tiny bit too much for common sense, or well his sanity.
Jean could feel the uncomfortable buzzing growing stronger in her head. She kept her eyes on Natasha, then glanced back at the ballerina, sending a gentle mental probe her way. She was rewarded with a sharp stabbing pain in her head, and she put her hand to her temple.
"Whatever that is it isn't human. There's something...around us but..it's everywhere."
Part of her wondered if they had somehow fallen asleep (again) and were on the Astral Plane.
"Assassins." Kane said quietly, almost to himself. "That's what happened. No way it happened in a straight up fight. Some would get out. But they sent assassins..." He trailed off, a chilling cold under his tone.
"Go. Assassins want a second crack, let the fuckers try." He all but snarled the final words.
Natasha was right. The lights lifted and illuminated all around them were the faces of her childhood. The young girls Natasha had grown up with and watched turn into women. The ones that had slowly been culled from the program one by one. They were dressed identically in black tactical suits. Their hair pulled back to reveal their innocent faces but their blank eyes were a memorial to what the program had wrought.
They were severely outnumbered and while Natasha knew her companions could fight, were they prepared for the onslaught that was about to happen? She swallowed and stepped forward to face them. "Let them leave. You're here for me."
She desperately tried to remember what she'd left in this suit. Just her luck that she'd come unprepared. She knew better, but living at the mansion had gotten her soft. She drew her knife and the other one strapped to the inside of her boots then charged at the nearest woman. She disappeared into a flurry of movement and glinting steel as the Widows converged on her.
"You're one of them." Kane snapped the arm of a specter that swung at him. "A lucky friend."
"I left this life behind a long time ago," Natasha called out as she ducked and wove, stabbing bodies and slitting the throats of friends and foes from a long time ago. The rhythm of attack was familiar that she slipped into that state of mind where the goal of the mission was all that was important and the mission this time was to survive and distract the Widows from the rest of the group that had come here with her. She'd been something, someone else, so many long years ago.
Kane reached out and blocked Natasha's strike, twisting her arm back painfully and sending her sprawling with a kick to the stomach. "You would have been there, unsuspected. They never guessed you were there to kill them."
Before Strange or Jean could react, they found themselves yanked off their feet and sent sprawling from the room into the hallway. Before they could react, the doors slammed shut, leaving Natasha and Kane alone and locked in combat.
Natasha had no memories of whatever the hell he was accusing her of. She'd dug and dug to make sure she knew the full extent of her prior life. It was no way to start a new one if she didn't carry the sins of the past with her. She rolled to her foot and darted through the crowd of other Widows attempting to kill her. Why go after her when the rest of the Widows were more than capable of doing his goal for them if he waited? He could've helped her distract them but instead they were playing right into this entity's hands. She swirled through the crowd, using their familiar movements to her advantage and slammed a knife toward his back. It skimmed off. Fuck, she remembered his profile. Nanotech skin.
His arm moved fast enough to blur, smashing into her wrist and numbing her hand as the knife fell to the ground. Kane augmented physical attributes were on full display as he literally picked two Widow's up and smashed them together, knocking them both unconscious.
She danced away, fading back into the crowd of more Widows. She incapacitated them quickly, a stab to the side with her other knife, then a quick twist of the neck, scooping up their discarded sidearms. She paused behind a column to check the clips then darted back out, firing at every target in sight.
Kane wrenched a Widow in front of him, letting her absorb several rounds as he bullrushed Natasha. He smashed her to one side with the dying Widow, dropping the woman as he did so. Before she could catch her balance, he pulled one of the guns away. He tried to bring her down with a pair of sharp jabs but she parried one and slipped the other before catching him midsection with a kick and dancing away. Another wave of Widows fell on them both and their combat was broken as they turned to deal with other threats first..
