Crossover Escape: Gotta be more than Lucky to survive

1.23 Sensory interference

[Rӓv: Ah huh found you.] Luca glanced back at Rӓv who looked positively smug. Well at least something good had happened. Though Luca didn’t think they actually had the time to look through yet more information. They hadn’t had the time to go what they’d already collected let alone anything new.

[Holly: Lucky? Is there a problem?]

[Lucky: At this points it’s actually a shorter list of things that aren’t problematic. I’m going to turn my coms of and shout, tell me if you can hear me.] Luca waited for an agreement before reaching up and turning his coms off. Once the coms were off Luca took a deep breath and shouted “HAVE YOU NOTICED ANY PARTICULAR DIFFERENCES IN ANY OF THE ENTRANCES.” Luca picked something innocuous to call out that way it wouldn’t matter if anyone else heard.

Luca waited a moment and then turned his coms back on. [Lucky: Did you hear anything?]

[Tails: Not a damn thing.]

[Rӓv: The main thing is that his shouting didn’t deafen me standing right next to him. I suspect without the coms volume adjuster conversation here would be impossible.]

[Lucky: I was afraid of that. Has anyone else been hearing muffled talking?]

[Holly: Yes, a high childlike voice but I can’t make out the worlds.]

[Ghost: Da. Old man yelling but is not clear]

[Tails: Yep. Sexy women tone but no distinct words]

[Rӓv: Yeah. Teenage boy seems like cursing but not sure what sort.]

[Lucky: and I hear a matronly voice calling out, but I can’t tell what she wants.] Luca sighed not terrible surprised to have the affirmations and equally unhappy that while they were all hearing things none of them were hearing the same things. Just peachy.

[Holly: Well at least where all hearing something right? No one is ah imagining things.]

[Lucky: Yeah. That’s something, I guess. Hearing is a sense that’s relatively easy to mess with so be careful of that.] Luca recalled the incident on his arrival and added [Lucky: also be careful of anything off with any other senses.]

[Roger.] Luca turned back to the pyramid at the chorus of agreements and continued along the walkway to the next entrance. Approaching the next entrance Luca spotted three men who’s every air screamed delinquent. Luca’s group was walking on one of the cross paths having just come up from the lower level and so approached the path T junction and looked directly into the pitch-dark entrance. Luca had never been introduced to them, but he did recognise them. They were the three men he had seen in the cage on the back of the Ute.

What Luca was interested in was their clean an uninjured skin. It had only been a couple of days since they’d arrived and yet the injuries Luca had noticed before where gone. Not to mention Luca had inferred from there shouting while held that they had wanted to give up the competition, so it was strange to see them seemingly seriously investigating.

Luca had to wonder if they had been convinced or ‘convinced’ to participate. Luca was thinking about looking into it when he saw the tallest of the three men pull out a flare and light it. Luca realised what they intended to do just as they did it. There was no time to call out and Luca doubted they would have heard him anyway. He certainly hadn’t heard the mocking comment the tall one made right as he tossed the flare into the entrance.

The flare arced through the air and landed on the ground in the bare tunnel. Luca flinched as it landed expecting to hear the clatter of the flare striking ground only to be met with silence. The light of flare revealed a smooth pristine corridor. The flare shone steadily for a few seconds before it began to grow steadily brighter. Luca turned away abruptly reaching out to cover Rӓv’s eyes while mirrored Luca’s movements.

Even behind closed eyes Luca saw the explosion of light. Luca blinked his eyes back open and turned around again prepared to give the three idiots a sound talking to, but the words died on his lips. There was no sign of the delinquent trio save for a burned-out flare on the metal walkway in front of the entrance. Luca moved forward cautiously until he stopped directly before the flare.

Luca frowned down at the flare, it looked days old not mere minutes. Ghost stepped up beside Luca and peered both directions along the walkway as well as over the railing before looking dubiously into the entrance.

[Ghost: Oni ischezat.]

[Lucky: It is disturbing how often that had applied to our last couple of weeks.]

[Rӓv: I got nothing, play back the last couple of seconds and the display is blank like there was a cap on the lenses. Rӓv tapped the butterfly sitting on her shoulder with disgust. You shouldn’t have blocked the glasses.]

[Lucky: Did you get even close to closing your eyes in time? No? then just as well better to have no recording than to have no sight at all for who knows how long.] Luca looked around at  the empty walkway.

[Lucky: Hopefully that would be all that you lost.]

Rӓv followed Luca’s gaze and winced.

[Rӓv: Right.] the walkway beneath their feet shook abruptly and Luca turned sharply before he relaxed as Tails and Holly sprinted towards them. Luca left it to Rӓv to explain what had happened as he stepped to the side and examined the glyphs around the door. The main purpose was to allow the glasses to take a clear recording of the glyphs so that they could compare all the entrances when they got back. As Luca stepped across the front of the entrance to look at the other side a waft of putrid air spread out from the entrance it was a gagging sent of rotting meat.

Luca jerked back a step and then stared hard into the pyramid but could see nothing but endless blackness. Luca had contemplated getting Rӓv to send a butterfly in to scope out one of the entrances but after what had just happened, he dismissed the idea, at the very least he wouldn’t make that suggestion while they were anywhere in the vicinity of the damn thing.

Luca led the way as they continued to look around essentially killing time while they waited for the return trip to the main compound. Luca examined every entrance but didn’t feel like any one was better than any other.

As they were led back out of the cavern Luca took a last look over his shoulder and thought he saw a flickering shape behind the pyramid like a mirage of a forest. As he stepped through the door he felt an incredibly real sensation of a hand brushing over his neck and down his back there and gone. Luca resisted the urge to turn around as he knew full well, he was the last man in the group to leave the room.

There was a strange urge to turn around, to go back the further away from the pyramid that Luca got. Because he was at the back, he could see that several others half turned to look back or stopped in place only to be knocked into by someone else who had looked back while walking. The collision would snap them out of there daze, and they’d shake their head before they continued forward.

Luca took a step forward and hooked an arm through Rӓv’s while putting a hand on Ghost’s back. Ghost started in place. Luca noticed the minute Ghost realised the problem as he stretched out to put a hand or Holly’s shoulder. Holly Jerked in place her eyes re focusing on Ghost before he blinked twice and snapped his head around to place his hand on Tails.

Luca kept his eyes faced forward ignoring the urge and using the shifts in touch on the others to maintain his focus. Out of the corner of his eye Luca noticed that Zeno and Desmond’s team took a similar approach with the method spreading amongst the teams until they were all safely seated in the vans.

Luca contemplated for a bit before speaking aloud, “That was interesting but I’m not sure repeated examinations will provide more information.”

“Da, nothing more to see. Is better to plan approach.” Ghost agreed quickly. Tails and Holly seemed trapped in contemplative silence, but they nodded in response to Luca’s comment.

Rӓv followed up, “Yeah, I think going back there will be a waste of time when its only open to exterior exploration. It will be better to try and prep somethings.”

“So you’re still going to compete, even after seeing the place?” Zeno asked with a disapproving look. Luca glanced at him and then looked to the suit driving the car before he responded.

“None of us are in a situation where we can back out now” Luca tried to keep the melancholy from his voice, even though he hadn’t seen the bodies Luca was certain that there had already been a lot of deaths over this. if he could have backed out, he would have done so in a heartbeat because things had started getting closer to harm for his friends than he liked. Still if they backed out now it would be as good as selling themselves to blood games for the rest of their lives so the only way they could go was forward.