Alice-Edward Labyrinth OOM

[themidnightson]

Edward has a penchant for being irritably snappish and ruefully quieter given the month.

Which means, when he isn't attempting to hold face he's usually alone in his room or Carlisle's study.

On the rare occasions when he needs quieter companionship, for better or worse come the discussion time (or the sharing of "opinions"), he finds himself in the Freaks Only closet with Alice. Today is one of those days. School that day was maddening and his near constant struggle over Bella had him fed up with thinking before he'd finished the days classes, leading him to snap at his siblings before even getting home.

Edward shifted his hands under his head, fingers plaited in his hair, and continued to study the ceiling beam as though his gaze might burn it. The only sound for the better part of the evening was of Alice's sketching, but Edward hadn't looked at it (except through her eyes). It usually didn't bother him -- today it did. Today everything did.

He had considering a number of semi-reckless things. Watching certain ones dance into and out of her thoughts. While she hadn't commented, it didn't stop her from making faces or glancing at him. He stopped the more outlandish ones after she gave a forced sigh and poked him hard in the shoulder with her pencil.

Now he was thinking about Milliways and whether he should simply escape to there for a few hours. He had been meaning to go explore certain areas there. Perhaps, Emmett would like that.

Edward glanced, peripherally. Or maybe...

Comments

[betagainstme]

"Hmph." Alice sighed, grinning as the yeti-wampa-thing roared at them again, taking another stumbling step. "I think we can take this one down pretty easily. Wanna bet?"

She didn't wait for an answer before flitting to the side.

[themidnightson]

Edward laughed watching her go. She was something to watch in the few millisecons pause.

Alice, their tiniest tiny little freak, more lithe and graceful than any balerina, dancing in and out against a beast. Always that one step ahead because she could see what the beast would do before it was doing it, at the moment it made the choice -- to change, to attack, to dodge.

It was always a plus to have her there.

To know what was about to happen just when she did.

"Are you playing with it or fighting it?" He teased, having appeared on it's opposite side, before he jumped at it.

[betagainstme]

"Says the," She murmured as she moved forward, breathing in (all warmth and blood), "boy who played with a dinosaur until it near bled-out."

Alice took one critical step as it swiped at her, making it stumble, enraged, and she came at it again, teeth bared in a snarl.

[themidnightson]

"What can I say?"

Edward grabbed one of the appendages near him and twisted hard. Not the snapping, but the shattering, of bones would have been sickening anywhere and to most anyone else.

It cried out with fury and pain, falling before the onslaught of Alice at the exact same second.

The heart beat accelerating, a racing drum beat.

"I'm a masochist."

[betagainstme]

Its free hand swiped at her as she danced up onto the creature and with an annoyed frown, Alice twisted it out of the way, filling the air with the sickening crunch before she sank her teeth into its pulse.

It flailed, but she held on as long as she could, taking in as much as she could before having to jump back.

Licking her lips she watched it. "Do you think the lack of monsters when we're done will be terribly noticeable?"

[themidnightson]

Blood infused the air, a completely different scent from the dinosaur to be sure. This was musky and heavy, the heartiness of it's harsh seasonal setting.

He hardly needed a greater invitation.

Teeth sank in, giving way from other thoughts.

It flailed loudly, but not loud enough he couldn't hear the whisper faint scuff when Alice's feet touched the ground or her bell voice as the creature shuddered and went still. He wiped the corner of his mouth with a finger, faint amusement in his tone, "Only if they follow the trail of corpses."

[betagainstme]

"Perhaps Milliways replaces them when one leaves." Alice murmured, watching Edward weaken the creature more. She went at it again, sinking her teeth into the creature's arm.

[themidnightson]

"It is a strange place with all it's own rules."

He left her to the end, sedation in his limbs as he enjoyed the warm elasticity sliding through his body.

"But most of them don't know about this place yet."

[betagainstme]

"I imagine they wouldn't." She murmured, stepping away from the yeti-thing when she was done, breathing in deeply and stretching. This was as close to tired as she would ever get, the hazy feeling of being full.

[themidnightson]

The two had been bigger than most things found in the woods nearest Forks. Which led to an intriguing thoughts about sport in Milliways, aside from Demon Bunnies.

"With good reason," Edward said moving from his knees to his feet without the pause of a second, just a flash. "The minor miracle for those who do find it make it out."

[betagainstme]

She stretched again, running her fingers through her hair. Onward?

[themidnightson]

Edward, with dark eyes lightening slowly and the bruises under his eyes fading along with it, smirked a singularly amused flicker and nodded.

Then paused in midstep.

Somewhere nearby, through the fury of the blizzard they ignored, was the sound of music.

[betagainstme]

She canted her head to the side, listening, her eyebrows drawing together. "Where--"

Alice stepped forward, toward the music.

[themidnightson]

It was the sounds of an oddly picked trio set -- a harp, a piano and a flute -- but the musical pieces, all different in their measure and time, seemed to flow together seemlessly.

Edward frowned absently.

Something about it was maddeningly familiar.

But he couldn't place what.

"Westerly." Toward the darkest, whitest part of this snow storm.

[betagainstme]

Darkest, whitest part.

Great. She glanced up at him when she thought it, shaking her head and grabbing Edward's hand, tugging him toward the sound.

[themidnightson]

Edward's fingers curled into hers. It was an after thought in the music, but he allowed her to lead him toward that slowly creshendoing sound.

The snow kept getting thicker and whiter, walls of it inbetween them and wherever it was coming from. Matting in their hair and clothes.

[betagainstme]

Her clothes were soaked through with the snow and while it didn't hurt her in any way, it sure as hell annoyed her. Her entire outfit, more than ruined.

They trudged through the snow, close together, moving forward before they stopped where the music was loudest.

[themidnightson]

Nothing in the scenery had changed.

There was little to see through the snow in every direction now, but they were walking further and further into the music which only seemed to grow larger and louder without becoming disharmonic.

Eventually in a strange slow change the snow solidified while they walked into pristine white room. It seemed to have edges and boundaries but yet they weren't walls. Only an endless field of white space humming with sound.

[betagainstme]

"I feel like we're in a music box." Alice sighed at the notwalls. She took a hesitant step forward. "We're not...stuck in it?"

[themidnightson]

Edward looked around them at the blankness.

His eyes scanning and coming with exactly what he could see through hers: a whole lot of nothing. And still the music continued to play on around them from every non-direction.

"If we were?"

[betagainstme]

"Then I would be annoyed." Alice said, her hands on her hips. She moved to take a step backwards, back toward Edward, when the ground shook.

It was just a rumbling at first, a vague rippling under their feet. The second shake was harder, and she stumbled back slightly. "Uh..."

[themidnightson]

Edward reached out to catch her shoulder out of surprise.

"That's unpleasant." It's the understatement of the day, in a small snarl.

[betagainstme]

"I want..." Alice bit out as she pitched forward and fell back with the rolling of the ground. "To go home now!"

[themidnightson]

That would be a down side to indestructibility.

Even if humans can't move you without your say so, the floor still can. Especially when it suddenly drops out from under you at the same time as the music's gone silent.

The rushing sound would be the air passing them as the ground gives way, then forms into a shoot, whiteness passing into blackness, faster and faster, down and down and down.

[betagainstme]

Alice pressed her fingers into her eyes as they slid down the shoot, sighing in annoyance. She set her hands out just before hitting the ground.

Sort of. More like the ground was ridiculously soft and absorbent. "Really?!"