Re: The Gradual Massacre (GBS2G4) [Round 5: GrandCon]
05-06-2012, 01:42 AM
Originally posted on MSPA by MalkyTop.
The cleaning lady rapped sharply on the door and waited, leaning on her cart. Keeping close proximity to it made her smell somewhat like sickly clean chemicals, something that she had tried to meticulously scrub off when she had first taken the job, but she had stopped caring long ago and had simply allowed layers of smell to just caress her into a permanent relationship.
When there was no answer, she carefully set an ear against the door. The unmistakable sound of a hissing shower greeted her.
Before she could pull away and move on to another room, muttering to herself darkly all the while about how it wasn’t hard or anything to put up the ‘Do Not Disturb’ sign, a muffled yelp sounded out.
“Um! Sorry! Hang on, hang on! I’m just – “
There was a thud, then another, then a worrying crack. The water shut off and soon after, the door was opened and the room's inhabitant stood there, half-naked, sheepishly wringing out his shirt. The cleaning lady watched the water sink into the carpet.
“We have laundry service,” she said.
“Oh well,” said the man, pulling the damp shirt over his head. She noticed that he had some sort of hat shaped like a worm on. It was also rather damp. Did he really take a shower with his costume on? “You see, this is kind of…my only set of clothes. So obviously, the, uh, laundry thing, wouldn’t be very feasible or anything. Because then I’d be kind of, um, naked.”
The cleaning lady stared impassively, recalling the list of reasons why she hated this time of year. The man’s eyes lingered on the cart beside her and visibly brightened. “Oh, wonderful, do you have towels there? ‘Cause I could use some. And some extra soap. I would absolutely love soap, and shampoo, as much as possible. Do you mind if I just, um, took some?”
Without waiting for an answer, the man stepped out of the room and dove into the various little boxes, stuffing anything he deemed important in his pockets. When he ran out of room, he just filled up his arms. At one point, he tried stuffing a bottle of shampoo into his mouth. Finally satisfied, or at least realizing he couldn’t possibly hold anything more, he turned around and stared blankly at his closed hotel room door.
“Um,” he said, the shampoo bottle dropping out of his mouth. “I, uh, forgot my card. Also, I don’t think I would’ve been able to take it out in the first place, um, because my hands…”
The cleaning lady opened the door and he loped in happily, looking around for his backpack. She took the chance to follow and do her job.
She stopped and wondered how exactly the sheets got so dirty while the man opened up the fridge and stuffed more things into his backpack. After a minute of contemplation, he shoved in a bottle of champagne and tried to push in a second one before realizing that he would have to carry it under his arm.
“Hang on, could I have a second towel maybe? Yes, thanks, thanks a lot, really appreciate it…”
She kicked him out.
Blinking at the closed door, Algernon tentatively knocked, with increasing frequency. “I – I don’t, I still don’t have my, um, room key – “
“Wow, dude, lame. Algernon didn’t take showers.”
He turned around at the sound of his name and was rather confused to find a woman dressed in a distressingly dead way. That is, she appeared to have a large amount of knives stabbed in her back and front and all over, as well as a noose around her neck and her feet embedded in what looked like cement but was actually grey Styrofoam.
“I – uh, who’re…what…”
She raised an eyebrow. “Too obscure for you? C’mon, I’m Bartleby. See? Get it? The guy who always dies? I’m dying in multiple ways?” She tried to gesture at all of herself and accidentally knocked off a plastic knife. “Ah, shit,” she muttered, trying to figure out a way to pick it back up without dislodging all the knives somehow attached to her back.
There were very many words she had said that Algernon completely didn’t understand, even though he knew the actual definitions of the words. He tried to wrap his mind around whatever possible context this lady was speaking in and gave up. For a moment, he only stood there stammering. Then he finally said, “But Bartleby’s a boy’s name.”
Bartleby-who-is-not-a-boy rolled her eyes. “Gender doesn’t matter. What does matter is that Algernon doesn’t take showers. ‘Cause how does a guy in a post-apocalyptic world and then in a multiversal battle have time to bathe?”
‘I don’t appreciate someone gabbing off about me as though she knows exactly what I should do,’ Algernon was about to say, but instead he said, his voice trembling on the edge of squeaky, “How—how’d you, that, uh, I’m not…I mean I wasn’t, um, that…I mean, last time I checked, it wasn’t a crime to want to take a shower or anything,” he said sadly.
“…Did you wash your clothes in the sink or something?” Bartleby suddenly said. “Why’re you holding a towel and a bottle of champagne?”
“That’s, uh, none of your business, and I don’t think I want to talk to you anymore so, um, uh, bye.”
He marched worriedly down the hall, hoping that the woman wouldn’t trail behind.
She did.
“Hey! Wait, actually, hang on, you’re not that bad. You’re playing him in-character as though he actually were in a hotel, right?”
Algernon slowed down and stared at her, wide-eyed.
“Yeah, I get that, like Algernon’d totally jump at the opportunity to finally take a shower if he could. Also, the worm coming out of your head is really great. How’d you make it anyways?”
This lady was absolutely crazy. “I knitted it,” he stammered, resuming his fast-walking.
The Bartleby-woman caught up easily. “I hope that wasn’t supposed to be a joke. I’m really asking here, and if you really don’t want to tell me your secrets, then just say so, okay? ‘Cause otherwise you’re just being rude. Why are you going down the stairs?”
He didn’t stop this time. “Because I want to go down floors and also not be up here, uh, with you.”
“You could take the elevators,” she shouted down as he rounded the corner.
“Elevators don’t work!” he yelled back.
Bartleby started to follow again, running to catch up, trailing fake knives along the way. She began to regret the decision to put Styrofoam around her feet. “Hey, dude, your attention to detail’s cool and all, and you’re really good at acting, but this is like the twelfth floor or something!”
“Tenth now,” he shot back, speeding up.
“I’m just saying that getting all sweaty and tired for the sake of verisimilitude isn’t gonna do well for convention-going, right?”
“If you’re tired, you can stay up there then!”
“Are you trying to imply that I’m not fit?” She ran faster. He attempted to adjust his own speed accordingly and almost tripped over himself.
“Elevators are – are just not, y’know, safe or anything, this big box in this big shaft held up by some rope or something – “
“You do realize that those ‘ropes’ are built to carry heavy loads, right?”
“W-well, you know, I’m just saying, and also, you know, if it like, shuts down while you’re in the middle of, uh, riding it, then you’re stuck inside, so – oof,” he grunted, accidentally running his shoulder into a wall.
“I’m beginning to think,” said Bartleby, trying to grab for his arm and failing, “that you are really legitimately a paranoid moron.”
He was full-on sprinting now, practically jumping all the way down to the foot of the stairs. “Oh yeah? Well d’ya know what this paranoid moron’s gonna do when you get trapped in an elevator and – and die of elevator stuff because you’re so – do you smell something?”
Bartleby crashed right into Algernon’s back and fell over, spraying fake knives everywhere. “Hey! Jerk! You know how long it’s gonna take to get all this – oh.”
Both pairs of eyes stared at the splash of blood they could spot from around the corner of the hall. Almost mesmerized, Algernon staggered towards it, steadily revealing more and more of the gore to himself until it was all there, right in front of him. Bartleby, not about to be shown up, followed.
There wasn’t much left of the body besides all the blood. There were definitely bones. And miraculously, it seemed that a bit of entrails had survived the whatever-the-hell-happened-here. But mostly, there was just blood, painting the walls, the carpets, even flecking the ceiling here and there.
Algernon wasn’t sure whether it would have been more horrifying to actually see a, a face or something, like an actual substantial body where he could see mangled skin or whatever. But then he started thinking about how thorough the whatever-the-hell-happened was with removing everything about the person, actually stripping the person to the bone and he turned around, feeling dizzy.
Bartleby, meanwhile, came to the quick conclusion that this probably wasn’t some sort of promotional thing for a new book or movie or whatever and promptly turned her mind to the various exciting mystery novels and noir films she had absorbed throughout her whole life. This seemed like a perfect chance to pretend to be a detective for a while.
“Oh god oh god oh god oh god oh god.”
She slapped the broken record of a man and he blinked before adding, “We need to tell somebody.”
“No,” she said emphatically, grabbing his arm to stop him from running off again. He blinked. “If you do that, they’ll shut down the convention!”
Algernon tried to think of a suitable answer to that and found that he couldn’t. So he settled for the gut reaction. “You’re insane.”
“We have to clean this up before someone finds out,” she said. “Gimme that towel.”
“Um, no.”
“If you don’t help me, I’m totally going to beat you up.”
Algernon twitched uncomfortably as she started squeezing his wrist. He certainly liked to avoid beatings whenever he could…
The cleaning lady rapped sharply on the door and waited, leaning on her cart. Keeping close proximity to it made her smell somewhat like sickly clean chemicals, something that she had tried to meticulously scrub off when she had first taken the job, but she had stopped caring long ago and had simply allowed layers of smell to just caress her into a permanent relationship.
When there was no answer, she carefully set an ear against the door. The unmistakable sound of a hissing shower greeted her.
Before she could pull away and move on to another room, muttering to herself darkly all the while about how it wasn’t hard or anything to put up the ‘Do Not Disturb’ sign, a muffled yelp sounded out.
“Um! Sorry! Hang on, hang on! I’m just – “
There was a thud, then another, then a worrying crack. The water shut off and soon after, the door was opened and the room's inhabitant stood there, half-naked, sheepishly wringing out his shirt. The cleaning lady watched the water sink into the carpet.
“We have laundry service,” she said.
“Oh well,” said the man, pulling the damp shirt over his head. She noticed that he had some sort of hat shaped like a worm on. It was also rather damp. Did he really take a shower with his costume on? “You see, this is kind of…my only set of clothes. So obviously, the, uh, laundry thing, wouldn’t be very feasible or anything. Because then I’d be kind of, um, naked.”
The cleaning lady stared impassively, recalling the list of reasons why she hated this time of year. The man’s eyes lingered on the cart beside her and visibly brightened. “Oh, wonderful, do you have towels there? ‘Cause I could use some. And some extra soap. I would absolutely love soap, and shampoo, as much as possible. Do you mind if I just, um, took some?”
Without waiting for an answer, the man stepped out of the room and dove into the various little boxes, stuffing anything he deemed important in his pockets. When he ran out of room, he just filled up his arms. At one point, he tried stuffing a bottle of shampoo into his mouth. Finally satisfied, or at least realizing he couldn’t possibly hold anything more, he turned around and stared blankly at his closed hotel room door.
“Um,” he said, the shampoo bottle dropping out of his mouth. “I, uh, forgot my card. Also, I don’t think I would’ve been able to take it out in the first place, um, because my hands…”
The cleaning lady opened the door and he loped in happily, looking around for his backpack. She took the chance to follow and do her job.
She stopped and wondered how exactly the sheets got so dirty while the man opened up the fridge and stuffed more things into his backpack. After a minute of contemplation, he shoved in a bottle of champagne and tried to push in a second one before realizing that he would have to carry it under his arm.
“Hang on, could I have a second towel maybe? Yes, thanks, thanks a lot, really appreciate it…”
She kicked him out.
Blinking at the closed door, Algernon tentatively knocked, with increasing frequency. “I – I don’t, I still don’t have my, um, room key – “
“Wow, dude, lame. Algernon didn’t take showers.”
He turned around at the sound of his name and was rather confused to find a woman dressed in a distressingly dead way. That is, she appeared to have a large amount of knives stabbed in her back and front and all over, as well as a noose around her neck and her feet embedded in what looked like cement but was actually grey Styrofoam.
“I – uh, who’re…what…”
She raised an eyebrow. “Too obscure for you? C’mon, I’m Bartleby. See? Get it? The guy who always dies? I’m dying in multiple ways?” She tried to gesture at all of herself and accidentally knocked off a plastic knife. “Ah, shit,” she muttered, trying to figure out a way to pick it back up without dislodging all the knives somehow attached to her back.
There were very many words she had said that Algernon completely didn’t understand, even though he knew the actual definitions of the words. He tried to wrap his mind around whatever possible context this lady was speaking in and gave up. For a moment, he only stood there stammering. Then he finally said, “But Bartleby’s a boy’s name.”
Bartleby-who-is-not-a-boy rolled her eyes. “Gender doesn’t matter. What does matter is that Algernon doesn’t take showers. ‘Cause how does a guy in a post-apocalyptic world and then in a multiversal battle have time to bathe?”
‘I don’t appreciate someone gabbing off about me as though she knows exactly what I should do,’ Algernon was about to say, but instead he said, his voice trembling on the edge of squeaky, “How—how’d you, that, uh, I’m not…I mean I wasn’t, um, that…I mean, last time I checked, it wasn’t a crime to want to take a shower or anything,” he said sadly.
“…Did you wash your clothes in the sink or something?” Bartleby suddenly said. “Why’re you holding a towel and a bottle of champagne?”
“That’s, uh, none of your business, and I don’t think I want to talk to you anymore so, um, uh, bye.”
He marched worriedly down the hall, hoping that the woman wouldn’t trail behind.
She did.
“Hey! Wait, actually, hang on, you’re not that bad. You’re playing him in-character as though he actually were in a hotel, right?”
Algernon slowed down and stared at her, wide-eyed.
“Yeah, I get that, like Algernon’d totally jump at the opportunity to finally take a shower if he could. Also, the worm coming out of your head is really great. How’d you make it anyways?”
This lady was absolutely crazy. “I knitted it,” he stammered, resuming his fast-walking.
The Bartleby-woman caught up easily. “I hope that wasn’t supposed to be a joke. I’m really asking here, and if you really don’t want to tell me your secrets, then just say so, okay? ‘Cause otherwise you’re just being rude. Why are you going down the stairs?”
He didn’t stop this time. “Because I want to go down floors and also not be up here, uh, with you.”
“You could take the elevators,” she shouted down as he rounded the corner.
“Elevators don’t work!” he yelled back.
Bartleby started to follow again, running to catch up, trailing fake knives along the way. She began to regret the decision to put Styrofoam around her feet. “Hey, dude, your attention to detail’s cool and all, and you’re really good at acting, but this is like the twelfth floor or something!”
“Tenth now,” he shot back, speeding up.
“I’m just saying that getting all sweaty and tired for the sake of verisimilitude isn’t gonna do well for convention-going, right?”
“If you’re tired, you can stay up there then!”
“Are you trying to imply that I’m not fit?” She ran faster. He attempted to adjust his own speed accordingly and almost tripped over himself.
“Elevators are – are just not, y’know, safe or anything, this big box in this big shaft held up by some rope or something – “
“You do realize that those ‘ropes’ are built to carry heavy loads, right?”
“W-well, you know, I’m just saying, and also, you know, if it like, shuts down while you’re in the middle of, uh, riding it, then you’re stuck inside, so – oof,” he grunted, accidentally running his shoulder into a wall.
“I’m beginning to think,” said Bartleby, trying to grab for his arm and failing, “that you are really legitimately a paranoid moron.”
He was full-on sprinting now, practically jumping all the way down to the foot of the stairs. “Oh yeah? Well d’ya know what this paranoid moron’s gonna do when you get trapped in an elevator and – and die of elevator stuff because you’re so – do you smell something?”
Bartleby crashed right into Algernon’s back and fell over, spraying fake knives everywhere. “Hey! Jerk! You know how long it’s gonna take to get all this – oh.”
Both pairs of eyes stared at the splash of blood they could spot from around the corner of the hall. Almost mesmerized, Algernon staggered towards it, steadily revealing more and more of the gore to himself until it was all there, right in front of him. Bartleby, not about to be shown up, followed.
There wasn’t much left of the body besides all the blood. There were definitely bones. And miraculously, it seemed that a bit of entrails had survived the whatever-the-hell-happened-here. But mostly, there was just blood, painting the walls, the carpets, even flecking the ceiling here and there.
Algernon wasn’t sure whether it would have been more horrifying to actually see a, a face or something, like an actual substantial body where he could see mangled skin or whatever. But then he started thinking about how thorough the whatever-the-hell-happened was with removing everything about the person, actually stripping the person to the bone and he turned around, feeling dizzy.
Bartleby, meanwhile, came to the quick conclusion that this probably wasn’t some sort of promotional thing for a new book or movie or whatever and promptly turned her mind to the various exciting mystery novels and noir films she had absorbed throughout her whole life. This seemed like a perfect chance to pretend to be a detective for a while.
“Oh god oh god oh god oh god oh god.”
She slapped the broken record of a man and he blinked before adding, “We need to tell somebody.”
“No,” she said emphatically, grabbing his arm to stop him from running off again. He blinked. “If you do that, they’ll shut down the convention!”
Algernon tried to think of a suitable answer to that and found that he couldn’t. So he settled for the gut reaction. “You’re insane.”
“We have to clean this up before someone finds out,” she said. “Gimme that towel.”
“Um, no.”
“If you don’t help me, I’m totally going to beat you up.”
Algernon twitched uncomfortably as she started squeezing his wrist. He certainly liked to avoid beatings whenever he could…