Re: The Grand Battle II! [Round 3: Escheresque!]
01-28-2010, 01:25 PM
Originally posted on MSPA by Sruixan.
The work Maxwell had sought solitude to carry out was actually rather simple; at least, the actions were simple, but the possible reprecussions, scheduled to pop up somewhere further down the line by his own reckoning, were a little harder to bite, let alone swallow. It wasn't going to be a huge deal, and Maxwell was sure he was just hyping it up because of how it would, should, could affect him. And Vyrm'n. That was the tricky bit. But, well, one never knew, and certainly Maxwell never did.
See, the thought that he might have his pocketwatch on him hadn't occured to him before. In the previous round, he'd tried thinking about the time and had wished for its presence, but the myriad distractions were extra-ordinarily adept at keeping him from a particular memory, that he'd snuck a peek of it coming out of the library, that he'd put it back into his pocket after that. Curse the fallability of the human mind, its innocent way of holding up its hands and shrugging dejectedly when queried, then the next moment, absent-mindedness evaporated, producing the very thing you asked it for in the first place from right in front of your nose, taking the liberty of whacking it on the way up, just to rub it in. Literally.
Once again, depending on perspective, the pocketwatch was either nothing special, or curiously something. The intricate designs on the top were of Maxwell's own - the whole thing had been a comission that he'd gotten for his 18th birthday and he'd kept the bugger close ever since - and they did hint somewhat at the oddity of the interior. For a start, there were two clockfaces, one in each half, with the one in the lid keeping a drastically different time to the other. The second folly was the fact that each clock had two second hands, each preferring to plot its own orbit between the numbers, independent of the passage of time.
You couldn't see the third eccentricity, and Maxwell alone knew it was there. Well, he was relatively certain it was still there. It would no longer serve its original purpose, but it could be easily put to another curious and possibly immoral use...
With this certified, Maxwell took from another pocket his notebook, tore a page from it and wrote a couple of paragraphs, before rummaging through aforementioned pocket once more, retrieving some blu-tac and using it to stick the page to the front cover of the notebook. Simple.
Exiting the sideroom, it occured to Maxwell that the absence of noise was probably a sign that the conflict had ceased, which meant he'd somewhat lost the opportunity he had in mind. On the other hand, double doors don't usually start swinging all by themselves...
The work Maxwell had sought solitude to carry out was actually rather simple; at least, the actions were simple, but the possible reprecussions, scheduled to pop up somewhere further down the line by his own reckoning, were a little harder to bite, let alone swallow. It wasn't going to be a huge deal, and Maxwell was sure he was just hyping it up because of how it would, should, could affect him. And Vyrm'n. That was the tricky bit. But, well, one never knew, and certainly Maxwell never did.
See, the thought that he might have his pocketwatch on him hadn't occured to him before. In the previous round, he'd tried thinking about the time and had wished for its presence, but the myriad distractions were extra-ordinarily adept at keeping him from a particular memory, that he'd snuck a peek of it coming out of the library, that he'd put it back into his pocket after that. Curse the fallability of the human mind, its innocent way of holding up its hands and shrugging dejectedly when queried, then the next moment, absent-mindedness evaporated, producing the very thing you asked it for in the first place from right in front of your nose, taking the liberty of whacking it on the way up, just to rub it in. Literally.
Once again, depending on perspective, the pocketwatch was either nothing special, or curiously something. The intricate designs on the top were of Maxwell's own - the whole thing had been a comission that he'd gotten for his 18th birthday and he'd kept the bugger close ever since - and they did hint somewhat at the oddity of the interior. For a start, there were two clockfaces, one in each half, with the one in the lid keeping a drastically different time to the other. The second folly was the fact that each clock had two second hands, each preferring to plot its own orbit between the numbers, independent of the passage of time.
You couldn't see the third eccentricity, and Maxwell alone knew it was there. Well, he was relatively certain it was still there. It would no longer serve its original purpose, but it could be easily put to another curious and possibly immoral use...
With this certified, Maxwell took from another pocket his notebook, tore a page from it and wrote a couple of paragraphs, before rummaging through aforementioned pocket once more, retrieving some blu-tac and using it to stick the page to the front cover of the notebook. Simple.
Exiting the sideroom, it occured to Maxwell that the absence of noise was probably a sign that the conflict had ceased, which meant he'd somewhat lost the opportunity he had in mind. On the other hand, double doors don't usually start swinging all by themselves...