Hallway Leading To Blah

Jarus followed, eyes scanning for any sign of...well, something. Something that didn't belong. He saw nothing, but a bad feeling nagged at him when they entered the hallway. Nothing like how Mai could feel this to be the right place, but his warrior sense told him that there was something wrong about this hallway. His right hand unconsciously moved to the hilt of the sword at his right hip. "So, now what?" he asked, so alert that he rose to the balls of his feet, legs braced in a defensive stance.

Mai didn't show any sign of unease, she entered the hallway, casually brushing her fingers against the wall, simply waiting for a vision to occur- "There's something weird here." She murmured, "I can feel it. It's just... It's not human. Can you sense it too?" She inquired, looking up at Jarus. Her eyes looked uneasy for a brief moment, but she managed to hide her unease, causing her eyes to look guarded. Years of practice had taught her to hide certain emotions, even when others looked her in the eye, but it wasn't perfect. Often, others could tell she was hiding. "What's that?" She said suddenly, glancing at the end of the hall.

There was a woman, floating... She was pure white, a hood over her head- white pieces of fabric hung off her body, and at the bottom, the pieces were covered in blood.

"Ohmygawd."


[freakyladyclickhere]

Jarus stepped forward - well, not so much stepped as flowed, as if he were made of liquid shadow - and interposed himself between Mai and the figure at the end of the hall. His hand was now tightly gripping the hilt of his sword, but he did not draw yet. "What manner of being is this?" he asked, seeming to speak to Mai, but raising his voice loud enough that he could be heard throughout the length of the hallway.

"Jarus, I don't think she's bad." Mai murmured, taking a step past Jarus and towards the spirit. "I think she wants to tell us something." She didn't feel any fear at all, but she was curious- curious to the extreme, not even the slightest bit suspicious. She glanced back at Jarus, wondering if he was going to follow, or if he would hesitate. Mai expected him to try to stop her, "She's not going to attack." She said simply, and the spirit nodded. She approached the two teachers, her aura one of sadness.

Jarus let out a breath, easing his hand of the hilt of his sword and letting Mai take the lead. The hairs on his neck still bristled, and his body was tense, but he tried to let Mai take the lead. As it approached, he laid a hand on her arm. "Let it come to us," he said softly. "And...and be wary. Whatever its intentions are, there is something not right."

Mai jumped a little when he put his his hand against her arm. She looked up at him curiously, and then nodded in agreement when he suggested to let the spirit approach them, rather than approach it. She slowly glanced back at the spirit, biting her lip- waiting for something to happen... Mai was quite positive that the spirit did not intend to harm anybody, but she had this feeling in the pit of her stomach that the spirit wanted to get a message across... That there was something important that she needed to know in order to prevent the disappearances from happening.

The spirit approached the pair, examining them closely, circling around them. She exuded a feeling of sorrow, and turned her back on them, looking over her shoulder, as if urging them to follow.

"C'mon." Mai gently took Jarus by the hand and began to follow after the spirit.

Jarus's accepted her hand in his, giving it a squeeze to let her know he was good. He wasn't scared, not really, but he hadn't ever encountered a ghost before, and he didn't know how to fight them. Almost nothing solid and real could perturb him, but he had no idea how to deal with spirits. So he let Mai lead as they followed the spirit, keeping a good grip on her hand so that he could watch behind them and still be sure of where she was. Whether or not Mai could defend herself didn't actually factor into his thinking; it was just in his nature to be the protector. Besides, he liked Mai, and he'd be damned if he'd let anything happen to her.

She suppressed a gasp as the spirit led them down a corridor... And through a door- a door that would have been hard to notice unless you had been there before. Without hesitation, Mai opened it and entered a whole new corridor- it seemed to lead under the school- and it was dark, creepy- it looked hundreds of years old. "Woah." She said, her voice dripping with awe. As soon as Mai led Jarus into the new corridor, the door slammed shut behind them. "Oh crap." She turned around sharply, attempting to open the door, but to no avail. "Okay then, I guess we need to saunter forth." Mai murmured, mentally stabbing herself.

"Well, not really. If we really needed to get out, I could try forcing the door. If that didn't work, I could always force the wall around the door. But we did come here to find out what we can, so we might as well continue," he advised. But despite the reassurance in his voice, he kept a hand on his sword. It was an unnecessary precaution - he could draw his sword without his hands if he needed to - but it was instinctual, and it made him feel prepared.

Mai ran ahead, not showing any sign of fear- but then her hand brushed against the wall, and she stumbled forward, nearly tripping through the spirit. Her eyes widened and a glazed look came over her eyes- her face began to pale. This place... This place had a horrible history- it made her sick to her stomach. "Oh my god." She whispered, looking up at the spirit with a mixture of pity and pain. The spirit simply nodded and disappeared. Mai brought her hand to her temple, thinking. "The people who lived here a long time ago- they believed that the blood of children protected them from demons." She murmured, just loud enough for Jarus to hear. "This woman- the spirit- when she was alive, she was against.. I don't know- but she opposed the people who lived here- and was tortured." She didn't know if she should go into detail or not, but decided to continue on. "They tied ropes to all her limbs and pulled- just pulled over and over- until she died."

The description didn't disturb Jarus too much - he was focused on trying to fit this information into the disappearance of children. "So, do you think maybe she's kidnapping them? To protect them or something? Or are the demons still trying to get their fill of young blood?" Neither idea sat well with Jarus. If it was the spirit at work, who knew where she could take them? And if it was the demons, it wouldn't matter where they were taken, they'd end up dead.

"I think she wants us to know what's going on with the children... What's happened to the children. It all happened so many years ago.." Mai's face was still pale- she disliked seeing somebody needlessly tortured. Often, her visions would lead to another, which would lead to a flashback of some sort- "Let's just keep going." Mai murmured, continuing on. She felt like she was being lured- she hated it, but yet- she loved it. She needed to go further- she needed to find something. It wasn't something that she wanted- she didn't want it at all...

Jarus could feel Mai's discomfort, which made his own sense of malefaction deepen. He unconsciously reached out and took her right hand in his left again so that he could return his eyes to watching their rear. There was a different rear that Jarus would much rather be watching, as he glanced back at Mai. Then his cheeks colored and he cleared his throat aloud, bringing his focus back to the hallway behind them. He couldn't allow himself to be distracted, no matter how nice a posterior she boasted. He sighed again and shook his head. He needed something to focus on, or his brain would continue like this until something decided to attack them. He stretched out his free hand and closed his eyes, sending a pulse of telekinetic energy back down the hall. If anything was hiding itself as it followed them, he would be able to detect the reverberation as the energy bounced off them. It was similar to SONAR, only the signal was sent back to his mind, rather than his ears.

She was being quiet- extremely quiet- multiple thoughts running through her head, all at the same time. Thoughts that one would not normally associate with being stuck in a creepy underground tunnel beneath a school where the blood of children may or may not have been shed. Mai was not really focusing on where she was going- she was letting herself be pulled towards something... It was a calling, yes- definitely a calling... As she drew closer, it got louder- stronger.

"Notez-vous quelque chose peu commun? I mean, besides the spirit and being in this tunnel-" She inquired, speaking quite fluidly- her words in French would roughly translate into something like, 'Do you notice anything unusual?', And she did not seem to realize that she had slipped into a language that Jarus may not have known. Mai opened her mouth to speak, when her eye caught sight of something, it was close enough to be able to assume it was being hung from the ceiling, but far enough away that it would be difficult to know what it was.