mortemscintilla | IC Contact

[ There's a sharp recrimination clamoring through Hei's mind. This is what you get for coming here. The lift subsides lower, lower, but still the creatures hover on the encircling staircases, eye-glowing, whisper-creeping. The quiet menace coming off of them -- more than menace, outrage and affront -- is palpable. ]

[ Beside him, he senses Korra step into battle-mode. His own isn't quite so apparent; how can it be, when it's a default state? He flexes the fingers of his hands, keeping his cold gaze fixed on the illumination of those eyes. ]

[ When the lift touches the bottom floor, Hei yanks the rattling door open. ] Let's go. [ He doesn't take her arm. But he does usher them down the echoing passageways and drafty chambers at a fast clip. When they're at the ruined doorway, he nudges Korra out. But he doesn't make it after her. (Later, analyzing and retracing the scene, he'll remember a piercing cold that catches him in the chest like a blow. The floor seems to give way under him. Not give way -- melt -- and swallow him as if in a viscid pool of black. A million cold fingers -- feelers? tentacles? -- pluck him, handle him. Spreading dread and disquiet.) ]

[ (It's midnight, a voice croons, and it seems right by his ear. There's something else it says, something else he feels. But he never knows what. Darkness engulfs him.) ]

[ To Korra, it'll seem as if he was right behind her. That he vanished in an eyeblink, right when she stepped out of the building. ]

Hei -- Li?

[Korra whirls around, but he's not there. There's no sign of him anywhere. He wouldn't have -- No, he would have. But he couldn't have. She'd only taken her eyes off him for a moment.

She quickly puts on her bra & shirt, distantly grateful that no one's around to see her topless. Mostly she's worried.

Where did Hei go?

She heads back to the house. Whatever happened to him happened in that house. But something inside her stops at the threshold. It's not fear. Fear won't stop her from trying to save someone. It's just a feeling, almost like the times when Avatar Aang communicated with her.]

Fine.

[She steps slowly back from the house, and then jogs off. She'll do a quick pass through the area, in case Hei really had just bolted faster than her. You know that's not what happened. If those spirits actually had taken him...she'll figure out something.]

[ You do that, Little Miss Avatar. ]

[ He'll just be. Y'know. Off collecting souls and such. ]

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⊕ Friday!

⊕ Friday!

⊕ Friday!