~ Tнє Pαяα∂σχ Hσυѕє ~ now back to regularly scheduled chaos

Nico thought he was having fun, though he hadn’t had it in so long that it was hard to tell if he was right about that. He thought the thrill going through his chest was fun, at least. Being here with Sam… well, it made him feel almost like he could do anything. Even if ‘anything’ just meant being a kid and having fun for once. He hadn’t allowed himself that pleasure in far too long.
“I have no clue,” Nico murmured, looking ahead at the thing Sam had noticed. His mind was starting to go through all of the options, all of the things the House could throw at them… it didn’t look as dangerous as the platforms that seemed about ready to break, but it could be a trap. Still…
Sam’s joke landed a second later and Nico broke off, a small smile crossing his face. “Ha,” Nico murmured, the sound coming across as genuine, if a little bit surprised. “I… I mean yeah. Sure, let’s jump to it.”

Kelsier | Holiday Baking Room | mintedstar/fur

“Now?” Kelsier smiled, stepping back. It looked...well, it was hardly polished, but he hardly cares about that. It looked like a proper falling apart building to him, just more colorful.
“Think I can make it fly?” He continued, looking at Myrnin, one eyebrow raised conspiratorially. “Get over here, you have to help. Hold it up, will you?”
He was ridiculously excited. This wasn’t anything hard, but he felt like it would be an accomplishment to be successful anyway...and he wanted Myrnin to see his Allomancy in action.

“Well,” Orpheus murmured, a small smile touching the corners of his lips, “I’ll be pleased if it ever gets to 0%. But if it doesn’t, I understand. I suppose there are a lot of reasons why someone might be persuaded to betray a friend… and I suppose there are even more reasons in the House, where the House can decide that its goal is ultimately to make me betray you or something like that.” He really, really hoped he hadn’t just planted an idea in the House’s head. It would likely have to change him fundamentally, way deep, deep down for him to betray L, though. L was his best friend, and he wanted him to feel safe and comfortable, and to know that there was someone there for him if he needed it outside of his world. He wasn’t going to ruin his first real friendship just because the House had decided it might be fun to try to break them apart. L’s percentage may never get down to 0%, but Orpheus was already convinced that there was little to nothing that could make him even think about betraying his friend. He understood, though. If L let himself trust that easily, he would be dead.
“When was the last time you slept?” Orpheus asked, the question seeming to come almost out of the blue. His eyes were wide and intense as he searched L’s expression. He knew that L had been struggling lately, he knew that it likely would be difficult to sleep knowing that you could be found at any minute, but… but he knew that L needed sleep. He could have been wrong, but there was something about the way the detective was staring at the board that seemed to betray his exhaustion. There was nothing Orpheus wanted to do more than help, but he didn’t know how that would be possible.
“You could… you could sleep here, if you’d like,” he offered, biting his lip. He knew this could still become a dangerous room, but if he were to wake L up before that happened… but would there be a way to wake L up when he blinked back to his own world, where he needed to be alert and aware of danger? Orpheus pondered that for several long seconds, eyes wide as he looked at L, as though waiting for an answer.

Matt | Pride room | ®Hawkpath® strider |

"Huh?" Matt blinked, confused, and then lit up, excited to be able to explain. "Ohhh, yeah. This place translates for us. So I probably don't speak what you're speaking, and you probably have never heard of English, but we can still have conversations and stuff. It's kinda cool, right?"

He smiled at the two new blinkers, glad they seemed friendly. He could use some people to talk to who weren't.....practically supernaturally intelligent.

"So another cool thing," he continued, pushing his fingers together as he spoke, "Is rooms. They can be like, super bad and dangerous, or just cool and fun, or totally random like this one we had once that was just bagels - anyway, I'm probably gonna go in one. You guys can come, if you want."

L Lawliet | Amplifier Room | strider ~∂єѕтιиу Razzle Dazzle

With the way things were going, L was fairly sure now that Czeslaw had been right. Something was wrong here. He wasn’t sure what it was, exactly, or how badly affected he was, but it was becoming very clear that he wasn’t quite himself. He didn’t like it, but he got the sense he was a lot more okay about it than he would have been under any other circumstances.
He didn’t know what to do. His brain wasn’t analyzing the situation the same way it normally did. He felt as though, if he could find the right words, he could find a way to solve this peacefully. He just needed to -
“Orpheus, look out!”
The words leapt from his throat as Czeslaw moved, his voice still croaky and rough from being strangled, but it was more than loud enough. He tried to move forward, but he knew he was too far back to do anything - why had he let Orpheus get so far from him when Czeslaw was armed? - and then the sword was plunged into the wall and he stopped, his heart beating fast in his chest. That had been close. That had been closer than he liked, and he hadn’t seen it coming. He hadn’t really thought Czeslaw was a threat...he was still having trouble thinking of him as one, even if a part of him was fighting that now.
He stood still, looking between them, his expression open but wary. “Can I help rearrange it, then?” He asked finally, looking at Orpheus, if he could make this go any faster, he was all for it. He wanted out of here, and he thought the rest of them probably did, too.

L Lawliet | Chess Room | strider

“Precisely, yes,” L agreed. He wasn’t worried about Orpheus saying it out loud. The House had proven multiple times that their heads weren’t any safer, and Orpheus couldn’t help that the thought had occurred to him. In this case, L would at least have some warning if the House did decide to try it. Not that he would have been completely unprepared anyway...he had given this a lot of thought.
“The good thing about rooms is that they end and you can see whether you were being changed or not,” he added, searching Orpheus’ eyes as he tried to push his exhaustion aside once again. “It wouldn’t be fair to hold you responsible for a decision you made under the House’s influence. So if it changed you, it wouldn’t count as a betrayal. The House can’t betray me because we aren’t friends and I don’t trust it at all.”
He blinked, hesitating as Orpheus continued. “I...don’t know,” he admitted after a moment, frowning a little at the board. “I have no way of telling the time. Or, I suppose I technically could use the shadows, but I haven’t been.”
He tried to think how many days it had been, but he didn’t know that, either. He wasn’t good at keeping track at the best of times, and these were not that. He blinked back the urge to close his eyes, looking at Orpheus once again and attempting to focus.
“Not since it happened, anyway,” he managed a moment later. “I’m fine, though. I go without sleep all the time.”
And then he passed out for a long time. Which wouldn’t be possible until Watari found him. He didn’t mention that part, though.
He hesitated, eyes widening a little as Orpheus spoke. “Sleep in the House?” He repeated uncertainly. “I may blink out and be left vulnerable…”
But realistically, how much longer was he going to be bake to stay awake? This was better than passing out in his world. There was a chance the House would allow him to stay, even if it was a slim one. And he was a light sleeper.
“That may be a good idea,” he admitted finally.

Spook | Pride Room 2.0 | <Raintalon> strider

Spook blinked, eyes flicking back and forth between the other two as they answered him. He frowned a little, wishing he knew what a play was...it would be helpful if he knew what the others were talking about, but he didn’t think it mattered very much. He focused on Matt, eyes wide as he took that in.
“Oh…” he murmured, looking down. So they could understand him even though they didn’t know slang. That was a good thing, he decided. He didn’t like no one knowing what he was trying to say even when he did happen to speak.
He blinked at Matt, then glanced at Wylan, frowning a little at the idea of rooms. “Can’t you avoid the bad ones?” He asked tentatively.

Nico glanced at Sam, then launched himself up to the spring once Sam had hit ‘three.’ He didn’t know what it was until his feet hit it, when his eyes widened and he glanced at Sam, heart thumping much louder than it had just moments before. Instinctively, he pulled himself just a little bit closer to Sam so they wouldn’t get separated when they landed.
They were soaring, he realized. It was… well, it was like flying, but without an angry god of thunder around to make you feel like you might die if your feet left the ground. A wild, uncertain grin broke out on his face until they hit the maximum of the parabola, arcing downward right towards another platform.
“Woah,” he whispered, squeezing Sam’s hand as they landed.

Czes - amp room - Orpheus, L, unconscious Hook

"Yes... English." Czeslaw scratched his head, startled by the realization that the three of them were speaking different languages. He often forgot that, especially since he usually didn't think about other people's perspectives around here. Whatever the case, he was brought out of his brief discouraged stupor by this, and he was glad that Orpheus was putting the focus on the potential riddle.

He wasn't sure if he could think clearly, even when he rose back to his feet and peered toward the strange bricks. He couldn't help but remain cautious of proximity with the other two, as there was no verification yet that they weren't immortals. The intensity of his emotions in this place had officially worn him out, his movements slow.
"It looks like it's in four sections." He felt silly as soon as he said it, since it was probably obvious. But then, he flinched upon skimming one of these sections. His gaze caught on the words 'god' and 'immortality'.
...Would the Paradox House really go this far? A knot twisted in his stomach, and he avoided reading the lines a second time.
"These phrases should be switched," Czeslaw determined, sticking his arm past Orpheus and pointing them out.

“I see,” Orpheus replied, though he found he thought that if you hurt a friend while under the House’s control, it was still technically a betrayal. He knew there was no way to worm your way out of the House’ grip on your head, but… still. He didn’t want to hurt L at all, even if it was at the House’s behest. He shook his head of the thought, not wanting to dwell on it for too long. If the House decided to take his ruminating as an idea… he shuddered at the thought. He wanted this room to be good.
“How would you know that… well, say you came to trust someone in the House, and in one room they hurt you, then said the House had control of them, even if it didn’t. How would you tell?” He wasn’t planning on doing anything like that, but he was… well, he was curious. L seemed to have thought all of this out very thoroughly, and if he had, Orpheus wanted to hear it. He realized after he had asked the question that he probably should have waited. He wanted to hear L’s thoughts, wanted to know his theories and strategies, but not when doing so would be taxing to L. Even if he didn’t know how long he had been awake, Orpheus could tell that it had been a long time.
“I don’t… know how this would work,” Orpheus admitted, tilting his head just a little bit. It was a shame he didn’t have his guitar with him. If he had, he might have been able to create an ambiance to allow L some more restful sleep. And it might have created a jarring enough difference between the House and where L was staying that he would wake up as soon as he blinked back.
“We can try to make the House as different as possible from your world,” he said after a moment, standing up and letting himself forget about the half-played game on the table. He crossed to L’s chair, leaning on the armrest and very gently combing his fingers through the detective’s hair. “If it’s different enough, your body might wake you up when you blink back,” he theorized, though he didn’t actually know if that was how that worked. He hoped it was. “I can… I can hum, if you’d like. If you think that might make a difference.”

“Oh definitely. More people started blinking in pretty soon after I got here but none of us had any idea what was happening. Most of the first blinkers were from an Earth actually.” Were. Arlo’s gaze traveled over the room again, expression wistful. It had certainly been confusing, but it hadn’t been bad. The House itself hadn’t changed much since then, but the blinkers sure had. It had been a long time since she’d seen the people she’d met on that first blink… and that was something she didn’t think would change.

“Yeah,” she agreed as she pulled her mind back to the present and the blinkers she was talking with. “I thought that too before I went to the island… It can be pretty rough but there are nice things about it, I’ve been there for years and I’m never quite sure what I think of it really. I still choose to stay, so I guess it’s worth it,” She admitted. Some of the worst experiences in her life had been there, but while it had taken so much from her, it had also given her things she’d never imagined, and even now there was so much she hadn’t learned about it, that she might never learn about it. She smiled slightly again as a thought occurred to her. “Thinking of it that way, it’s a bit like being here.”

“Hmm…” Arlo considered the question, thinking back to when Kerah had answered the same question for her. “It’s been going on for centuries, so I don’t know how exactly it started. People believe ra’Seirri draw shades because their energy is different, and that if they’re attacked by shades they’re more likely to be turned than regular humans since they tend to have a better chance of escaping. Then there’s the people who think ra’Seirri are the reason shades exist somehow, and the ones who see them as a threat because of their abilities…” She paused and sighed. “It would be interesting to know how it all really started but records from then aren’t particularly common- and anything you do find has probably been changed over the years.” The chance of her finding information on events that far back that hadn’t been distorted to the point of becoming fiction was unlikely. “But yes, shades feed on the energy of humans and ra’Seirri, and while I haven’t met one myself I’ve been told that there are shadehunters… I think they’re mostly elves, because of their immunity- if humans or ra’Seirri with human blood get bitten or scratched by one they become shades themselves.” Or at least that was how she’d been told it worked.

Arlo couldn’t help but be amused by Starling’s reaction. She’d gotten so used to magic over the past decade that it seemed normal to her now. “It’s fine, I was shocked too when I started learning to use it,” she said, the energy dissipating with a flick of her hand. “As for this place…” she looked over the room again and she shrugged. “A lot of people think that the first time or two. It’s understandable enough.” Especially when some of them came from worlds without any magic.

“From-? Oh…” It was a normal enough question, but something that she hadn’t been asked about anytime recently. “There… used to be one.” Vyra… where was she now? Her gaze drifted away, landing on a book that hadn’t quite been put back on the shelf completely. “I haven’t seen her in a long time though.” Years had passed but the memory of the day she’d lost her was still stung the same.

“A-alright then!” She forced thoughts of the past aside and refocused on the current situation. She walked over to the table and shrugged off her soggy coat, making sure to take her notebook out before tossing it over a chair. “Might as well leave it here so it can dry,” she explained as she started toward the door, “It should blink back with me.”

Arlo paused and looked back when he spoke again, now holding what seemed to be an ordinary pocket knife. “Well, that’s about what I had when I started blinking and I did well enough- there’s a chance that it won’t be dangerous, but you can borrow one of these if you prefer,” she replied, unsheathing one of her daggers and spinning it a couple times. Since she mostly used her powers now if she needed to fight in a room, she figured she’d be fine without it.

The hallway stretched out in both directions from the living room’s entrance with various paths branching off here and there. The rather dim lighting made it a bit difficult to tell how far it went on. “It looks like it would be easy to get lost here, but as long as you stay on the path and don’t go through the doors you’ll always end up back at the living room… I’m not quite sure how it works, but that’s the only thing that doesn’t really change.” She looked over the doors as she spoke. She didn’t think it really made a difference- the House would send them wherever it wanted regardless of which door they used- so she approached one not far from the living room’s exit and reached for the handle before glancing back at the other blinker. “Ready?”