☆TRACK II: DISCORD AND RHYME

[interdimanagers]

Who: Kidnapped Pride Members
What: Corporate hazing, in the style of themepark murder clowns.
When: October 18th-19th.
Where: A large, empty carnival, apparently.
Warnings: This is basically Saw games for babies.

“Burning the ground, I break from the crowd I'm on the hunt, I'm after you. I smell like I sound, I'm lost and I'm found And I'm hungry like the wolf.” ☆DISCORD AND RHYME It’s your first free night after a particularly feverish series of performances. It’s a comparatively lazy Sunday evening - one that all of you are obligated to spent in the HQ. Things are normal, at least as normal as they ever are, are you’re free to go to bed early and for once have the luxury in sleeping in tomorrow. At least theoretically. Whether you go to bed or not, you’ll find yourself drifting off - and then the sound eerie, peculiar music...like the sound of an old music box, with a soft feminine voice singing wordlessly along. You’ll fall asleep, hard, and when you wake up you are somewhere else. "【Sad and Scary Song】"Come Out And Play"Creepy Music Box】[HD]" (Watch on YouTube) ☆THE SACRIFICES At first, you wake up in what seems like some kind of boiler room. Some parts of the floor are slick with moisture, and your hands and feet are bound, with your wrists locked to the industrial piping behind you. Regaining consciousness is slow and difficult, as if it wasn't meant to come to you quite yet. You can hear water and steam flowing through some of the pipes, and the complex is obviously still active with...whatever it's supposed to be doing. But maybe you're just too busy freaking out at your evident kidnapping to think too hard about circumstantial evidence. You aren't the only one in here. Whether they are awake or unconscious, four other Pride members are bound nearby. Around the side of some of the machinery, you can see the glow of computers, though you can't quite see the screens - there are chairs, though, and a cup of Starbucks that is still steaming. Whoever brought you here is probably still around, and there's no telling how long you have before they return. (Click here for your top level!) ☆THE CHALLENGERS You wake up sitting in what appears to be a bumper car of all things - you know, one of those little vehicles you drive around at carnivals to crash into each other? You're sitting in one, and your hand are handcuffed around the bar behind you. Your neck is definitely sore, like you've been sitting like this for a while. It only takes a moment to realize two things: 1) you actually are in a theme park of some sort, and it's still night time, and 2) you're not alone. At least a dozen other Pride members are handcuffed to the bumper cars around you, all pointed in the direction of an empty stretch of wheel worn floor - like an audience, intended to view a speaker. Whoever brought you here doesn't give you much time to be confused. They stride into the center of the "stage" like they own the place. They are wearing a hooded coat of a decidedly gothic style, with a hood that shadows their face. When they speak, they sound feminine - almost like the voice you remember putting you to sleep earlier. "Welcome, ladies and gentlemen," they say, "to your trial by fire." (Click here for your top level!) “Strut on a line, it's discord and rhyme I'm on the hunt, I'm after you. Mouth is alive with juices like wine And I'm hungry like the wolf.”

Comments

[blindfoldcode]

She's glad she remembered to snatch up her hoodie from outside the swings as she moves over to him with it. He's drenched and he'll get sick and holy shit what is wrong with these people?

"Tiger?" Jesus, what even happened to him? Kido's gonna punch a somebody.

[tigermillionaire]

Tiger had just been hanging out in his room working on stuff when this all started, so he's only just wearing his boxers and a sleeveless black undershirt - it's what he usually wears to bed. He sees Kido advancing, and he sees Xanxus over to the side, and he loses control of himself. He rushes the cage's gate and books it onto the pavement, even while barefoot. He tries to run past Kido, too.

[blindfoldcode]

Yeah, she is not having any of that, trying to stop him before he gets past her. "Tiger, what happened?!"

[tigermillionaire]

He stops, almost stumbling over his own feet in the process. He doesn't even have an answer for what just happened, because he has no idea how he got here, how he didn't drown, but he can hear people snickering at him, just like Xanxus did.

"I don't know," he sobs, and it's genuinely at least. He doesn't keep running, even though he seems incredibly defensive. "Leave me alone."

[blindfoldcode]

His tears snap her back into reality--back into herself, panic ebbing. She's not allowed to panic anymore. She shakes her head, wrapping her hoodie around him whether he wants her to or not.

"I just want to see if you're okay. I was looking for you guys..."

[tigermillionaire]

Looking for them...like Wakana and Xanxus had been, or something? Why had they even bothered? They didn't even care. Had they all just been...brought here? For this?

And he's drowned. He'd died. But not.

He gives the three members of Predator a persecuted look. He's hurting physically and emotionally, and he still doesn't even fully understand what happened. But he understands that, somehow, they were the ones that brought him here. The fear in his eyes is obvious.

"You d-didn't fine me," he chokes out, giving her a similarly cornered look, "did you?"

[blindfoldcode]

She can't meet his eyes as she shakes her head. "I got caught up... helping somebody. I tried to look for you after, but everything led here." You have to believe her she tried really, really hard to come find you. She worked through some serious shit.

[tigermillionaire]

He looks down, internalizing that. She'd been here she just...helped someone else. Rationally speaking he couldn't blame her. But right now he isn't feeling rational at all.

"You shouldn't have bothered anyway!" he yells, and tries to pull away from her. Everyone is watching him cry, he thinks. They're watching him be a big joke.

[blindfoldcode]

She's not letting him go just yet. "Don't run away. There's still creeps. They might try to scare you again." Please don't hate her for this...

[tigermillionaire]

"I'm not scared!" he yells despite it obviously being true. He is a child throwing a tantrum, though one rooted in something really deep and ugly. He's shivering in her hold even with the hoodie around his shoulders.

[blindfoldcode]

"Well I am." She lifts the sleeve of the hoodie to wipe away the destroyed makeup. She kind of lets her words hang. Like she doesn't want to say anymore. She's scared... she's really scared. But she can't fully pick apart why.

[tigermillionaire]

He looks up at her as she wipes at his make up, and also at his fresh tears. Something in his expression crumbles, and when he speaks again his voice is quiet and fragile.

"Don't pretend like you care," he says, and while in the past this may have just been him being obstinate, right now it sounds like it's coming from a place of very real hurt. Like he really feels like she is lying to him, and that he somehow isn't worth it.

[blindfoldcode]

"I don't give a shit about most things, Tiger." She wipes again at his face at the tears, more gently than before.

"But I don't bother pretending I care about shit, either." So take the hoodie, let her hold onto you, and don't run away. Please, kid. "Can you at least put up with me until we get home? You can kick me out of the penthouse--hell, you can kick me out of the band, after, if you really think I don't care."

[tigermillionaire]

He stares up at her for a few more moments, and then seems to relent. It's an exhausted, helpless kind if relenting, but it's better than nothing. He falls silent and stares at the ground, allowing her to clean him up a little and to have the hoodie tucked around his shoulders.

He'd wanted more than anything to just run away a minute ago, and he still kind of does. But her words make him stay, for now.