C'est La Vie (Worm/MtG) #02.4
AN: Quietly sets down appetizer and backs away .
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Putting my shoulder into the door, I ground my feet into the slick, leaf covered top step and slowly forced it open. It'd been unlocked, but actually opening the door was proving to be a bit more of a challenge. Slow and steady and all that, though.
I was making progress, inch by inch. Slow progress, but there wasn't much of a hurry and I only needed to open it enough to slip through. In the meantime, my swarm was pouring through the halls, closets, and rooms of the building to give me an idea of where to start and— oh the kitchen, the kitchen!
With each passing second, a bit more was added to my mental picture and this was looking to be a good haul, no matter how things turned out.
However, with greater knowledge of the building came awareness of the dangers. As I'd noticed on my initial approach the place was coming apart, it wasn't in quite as bad of shape as I'd initially thought, though.
Its bones still stood strong and due to it's largely concrete and steel construction, it would no doubt survive well into the future. At least in one form or another, whether as a building or… well, a shell as where less robust materials had been used— such as in the wooden studs used to put up dividing walls and load bearing beams that were riddled with termites— decayed into nothing as the building rotted from within.
Fortunately the damage didn't seem like it would be too great an issue, yet, but even so I'd need to watch where I stepped in certain parts of the building, in particular in the upper levels and— Pushing forward another inch my footing suddenly gave way and my forward foot shot back on a now slippery step.
I scrambled and grabbed, as my stomach flopped, fortunately managing to catch myself on the door handle before I could smash face first into the unforgiving concrete. However, in catching myself, I also pulled the door shut as I fell… I closed my eyes and sighed.
Dammit.
-I-
Satchel held tight to my hip, and stomach sucked in deep, I sidled through the gap I'd opened between the doors. Leaves, wet and dry, crunched and squelched underfoot as I slid into the lobby, the damp smell of the jungle and distinct scent of composting plant matter strong in the air despite my mask. Absently, I let the bag hang free to reach out and shut the door behind me, casting a shadow in the wedge of light coming through the gap.
Idly, I followed the dust particles floating in the air and briefly weighed the benefits of leaving the door open. Perhaps to help air out the place or something? However, that would also mean leaving a way into the building when it was already holed like swiss cheese, and did I really want to leave open another path of attack?
The wedge narrowed, then disappeared, as the door shut tight with a faint click and the latch settled with a gentleness that belied the effort it had taken to loosen it a second time. I leaned back against the other door to catch my breath as my eyes adjusted to the dim lighting and took in the lobby with my own senses; absorbing the sight of a gently curving staircase leading up to the second-floor mezzanine overgrown and plant growth young and old that had taken root in the building.
A chittering bird flying in from somewhere deeper within the building drew my eyes; up, to a domed ceiling with a double ring of skylights. Tinted green with algae and so fogged with calcium they were missing any of the clear transparency they might have once had. But they still let in light, not much, but enough; enough light for things to grow, for things to live, and enough to give the place an atmosphere— an air of grandeur and impression of what had been.
Or might have been, rather, as my eyes tracked the bird to a scaffolding that near reached the ceiling.
Eventually, my interest drifted back to the ground floor as my eyes fully acclimated and fixing on a collapsed skeleton at the center of the room. A T-Rex skull, the centerpiece and only thing actually visible among the ferns that grown up around it. It wasn't real, though, not really. Millipedes, centipedes and more had nested within the leaves littering the floor, and through them, I could feel several large vertebrae broken open to reveal foamy interiors.
Castings, fakes. A display piece.
I looked up to the skylights again, then back to the bones and imagined the bones assembled upright as the dinosaur displays once featured so prominently at the Museum of Natural History in New York had. They'd been destroyed, of course. Some no name villain or another that had animated the skeletons undoubtedly thinking they would 'make a splash'. Pictures of the exhibits had been preserved online and I could remember those well enough.
Nevertheless, fake or no, this place… It was no doubt quite the sight to see even while it was being built as with the way the skylights were arranged, there would've been sunlight shining down on the display all day long.
I glanced to the right of the room, where tattered bits of plastic sheeting was all that separated the inside from the outside.
Almost finished, but not quite... What could have been but never would be.
I tried not to think too deeply about how well that sentiment could be applied to myself as I slipped off my satchel, crossed to the stairs, and heedless of the leaves littering the steps or any possible weakness I fell onto them. Dropping the satchel between my feet and pulling out the thermos to take a drink as I immersed myself in the senses of my swarm
I refined my mental image of this place, seeing and feeling what it had to offer and what there was to work with through thousands— millions —of eyes and feelers to… I cocked my head and looked down, through the floor to the ceiling of a large, cavernous room below where a large number of fleas were gathered— Fleas, of all things, and near the ceiling?
One carrier shuffled and it set off a wave of motion from several other carriers immediately around it. Almost like… swaying. Bats. And a lot of them.
I idly began moving a portion of the more useless part of my swarm down to them in the event they ate insects while in the process getting a better picture of the room and quickly realizing it was rather large, the width of the building in fact. Through a number of worms and a fraction of my swarm's fliers I felt a number of large objects that had been partially buried, but the shape… ah, cars. A garage then. Not the only one, though I absently noted; another, to the back of the building, with a pair of jeeps.
Although these were larger, with glass roofs… one appeared in my minds-eye as the swarm gathered over its surface and resolved into the familiar shape of a four-door SUV. But there were two entrances to the garage?
As details were added I noticed the rail— the same one I'd been following that ran the center of the road —descend into the garage and split into three different rails that ran beneath the parked SUV's… almost like a ride at an amusement park. A guided tour?
"Huh."
Aside from the bats and a fair amount of stuff down there though there was seemingly little else of interest. It had shelves full of stuff maybe, but nothing that the garage in the back didn't have and I could leave the bats well enough alone by checking there first. What was of note, however, was another subterranean structure; this one toward the back of the building and positioned beneath a room with very little insect activity so I couldn't get much of a picture save for significant amounts of plastic, glass, and steel.
In contrast to the garage, there seemed like there might be something of value in there as directing some of the swarm down there I found crates, and cabinets with narrow drawers, and metal lockers. There was an issue with entrances, however; one was inside, near a room filled with the remains of what felt like an office space with old CRT monitors, keyboards, and mice littered about workstations. It was also the epicenter of several explosions that had collapsed part of the building which blocked off the door.
Outside the entrance, it seemed to be much less of an issue. The only obstacle being some built up vegetation from jungle encroachment. Unless of course it was locked, which I wouldn't know until checking and really I was probably only getting lucky at this point.
So that wasn't accessible at the moment if I had felt so inclined to try and get into it. Which I didn't, at least not now, and not with when the low hanging fruit in the increasingly clean looking restaurant kitchen would do quite nicely for now.
Turning towards the entrance of the said room, I rocked back as I caught sight of a yellowed yet incredibly lifelike mural painted along the back was boldly featuring the same dinosaur as Manny, Moe, and Mack as they stalked through a jungle.
-I-
Polishing my sleeve against dusty glass set into the walk-in freezers door, I peered through into what could vaguely be described as the biome of some alien world. Milky water dripped from the ceiling— which in itself was hidden behind a layer of green and white fuzz —and from what looked like wire shelves that had somehow toppled over. The entire thing was overgrown, like some twisted version of the visitors center and the jungle as layer upon layer of different molds grew out of each other and squiggles and clumps of something bloomed— I had to fight down a retch at the state of the small, confined space overflowing with death.
This… thing, this abomination that had been born here, was a biohazard to the 'Nth degree. The only thing to do with it was for it to burn and die. Even if there was something of value inside that I couldn't get elsewhere, I wouldn't consider cracking the door's seal without a pyrokinetic and several thousands of bleach on hand… at a minimum, and not even then.
The thought of burning all that was in there with fire certainly helped my stomach, though.
Making an about-face, I absently grabbed my shopping basket (really a black milk crate) off a wire shelving unit sagging under the weight of several other milk crates full of neatly stacked ceramic dishes and stepped over to a wash station opposite the shelf. Scanning the workspace I clicked my tongue in disappointment and clunked the crate on the lip of the deep sink.
Not much, nothing really, but nevertheless I grabbed can of 'barkeepers, a lightly used green scouring pad, and a wire scrubber; rusty, nothing that wouldn't come off quickly enough with a bit of use, though.
Other than that though… I gave the opaque plastic tubs stacked tacked on a rack above the sink a passing glance before glancing below for anything I might have missed, but nothing.
With little else to find I moved on, the basket under my arm, I made a fresh circuit around the kitchen with an out eye for anything I didn't have. There wasn't much I was missing, however, there were a few things— I stooped to grab a wood handled grater thing; a 'zester', I think it was called —that could come in handy.
Looking it over I touched the grated side to confirm it was still sharp (enough to go through green wood with any luck) and dropped it in.
There wasn't much else though, or nothing significant at least. Making my way through the five rows of prep aisles I did find a few stainless ingredient containers in better condition than what I'd gathered already, but really, that was all there was left for me to do here: find the thing in the best condition and even on that front it was looking like I could afford to be a picky.
It was almost funny though. Out of everything on this island to damage this place, from the big dinosaurs to the little dinosaurs, it was the humidity of all things that had done the most destruction when the eating area was almost completely exposed to the jungle. But no, without people to maintain the appliances the very moisture in the air had turned 'stainless steel' into little more than a misnomer with the amount of decay that had set into the metal. Overall the damage was little more than dustings of splotchy brown rust and minor corrosion across dulled metal surfaces, but it was still nothing compared to what it could have been. Or even what happened to the rest of the building. Really it seemed like the worst of it was seemed like cosmetic wear and tear aside from one wall where there was the telltale discoloration that a pipe had burst.
At a glance, it almost seemed as if everything was ready to go as is. Probably was, actually. Excepting where the jungle had encroached through the air vents and grown along the high up windows, though that was only a small portion of the kitchen.
There was also just the faintest tracings of moss growing in along the grout, but aside from that… dust, lots and lots of dust. Oh, and the crumbling remains of an old drop ceiling of course. Why, why, there would be a drop ceiling installed in a kitchen of all things I couldn't fathom, yet there was, and just about half of the tiles had fallen to the floor over the years.
Just the effect that steam from the stovetops, or if a fire started… It boggled the mind.
Ultimately, it might have become something more, in time, maybe even as bad as with the radio building. But what growth there had been, was insignificant enough that my massed swarm had rendered it a non-issue while I'd poked around the dining area for the most intact tablecloths and candles.
There was simply nowhere for anything to take root and grow into a problem.
Gradually filling the basket with various cooking nicknacks and miscellanea from the shelves and cabinets and drawers I slowly but surely made my way back to the center counter where I'd been piling everything. Already it was far more than I could carry, and the extra crate of stuff really didn't help, however having it all in one place would help with any future trips and let me have it all in front of me when picking what to take.
Pots, pans, bowls and plates, pitchers, cups and cutlery were just part of the stuff I'd gathered. I had at least one of something with the only thing missing being the sink... and I'd noticed that the wash station had caster wheels so jokes aside that wasn't entirely out of the question. It was everything needed for a small apartment and more, with the 'and more' part being especially important. I couldn't come close to replicating the setup Coil had had installed for me in form, not even if I had the whole of a hardware store to draw from, but I could at least approximate something similar in function with a little effort.
Of course, the radio building wasn't an apartment, per se… of course neither was the Undersiders Lair and it was even worse... Whatever, what it was was a place to live and not a bad one at that. Regardless, apartment, hideout, shelter, base, lair… framing the problem in those terms helped give me a good an idea of what I needed and could use to make things work.
If only the perishables were so easy though.
Reaching into my back compartment and digging out my notebook I got to work sifting through it all and putting together a pile of the bare necessities.
I paused and snorted. "The simple bare necessities," I mused, wistfully thinking back to a night on the couch under a blanket in a home. Then the moment was gone as I scratched out several things that had survived the years. "If only it were that easy."
A little bitter perhaps, in light of the song's message, if only life were so easy though.
Although… glancing up from the notebook I eyed a fine, black lacquered wood box embossed with the T-Rex logo that had been on the jeep, but done up in a crisp gold leaf that almost glowed in the last bit of late day sun illuminating the kitchen. Tea. Over a hundred types packed neatly away in sealed foil packets.
They were likely, yet provided that the humidity or temperature hadn't gotten to them, they should taste just fine with only a minor loss in flavor.
At least there were some simple luxuries.
Looking back to the notebook I flipped back a few pages to cross out several items before glaring at the entry concerning fire and crossed out one of the options. Shelf life for matches my flat ass.
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