The First day: Waking from the dream
"Impressive, once again we find ourselves a rare fool of this era. It is quite disappointing, yet unorthodoxly exhilarating."
"Ha! Haven't met face to face yet and already got praises from you of all people. Knew I saw something in him."
"Quite insolent of you to speak our stead... But perhaps, you are not entirely wrong."
"What of you, Prince?"
"he foUgHT BRAVeLY, even PowErless."
'"That's not it, isn't it."'
"..."
"hE DId NOT SeE i, as a merE AnIMAl."
"Indeed? We could barely spot any differences."
"▅-!"
"Hoho! Still, you fall for such petty taunts Beast. Continue and perhaps we may be truly convinced someday."
"You're on clean up duty now."
"You wouldn't dare…?"
"Yes, yes I would. Everyone else has already done their thing, time to do yours."
"Hah... We suppose it's inevitable that you would require our help again. Very well, let us put this chaos to rest."
And just like that, the last remaining echoes of the first night faded like a lucid dream, gently into the dawn. A new day has arrived yet again, and want it or not, only one man is left capable of facing it.
It is time for him to awaken.
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!"
"Jesus!"
"Gah!"
"You Little!"
For the crisp morning air of that day, nothing could've been quite as filling as the sound of screaming men. One Larry Dalley was fortunately just there to start it off properly as soon as he awoke.
"Larry, watch it will you? We're too old for surprises." One voice wheezed in between deep calming breaths, one Larry idly recognized as one Cecil Fredericks, his senior in age and profession.
Larry had a lot to talk with him about.
Or at least, that's what he thought he had, all thinking power reserved for that thought drained away as quickly as the strength in his limbs when the true weight of consciousness settled in. Reducing him to a groaning, drowsy mess.
"Where am I?" That was a good question, but probably a bit redundant, Larry never remembered returning to his apartment, and the events of last night didn't allow him much time to… leave…
At that moment, even subconsciously, Larry realized that it was incredible how little restrains the human body exercises when it comes to self-preservation.
And on a completely unrelated side note, were one present, any halfway-decent athletes would've wept in unfathomable joy at the textbook-perfect, adrenaline spiked, kick up roll Larry performed.
Gus might've, but Larry didn't have time to pay attention to that, as soon as his hands then feet touched the ground again his eyeballs were wide, bouncing like ping pongs across every lightly illuminated wall and windows of the corridor to find...
Absolutely nothing.
Not a tile out of place, not a speck of dust or chunks of reinforced concrete the size of his torso, only a line of neatly spaced glass cases and panels, lining the entire morning lit corridor.
In other words, an impossible sight considering the horrible, horrible battlefield of a dream he had last night. Like a loose puppet, Larry felt the tension leave his shoulders all at once.
For once, Larry felt good to be wrong.
"You alright son?" To the right of him, a voice asked, from a dark-skinned gentleman he spotted in black winter clothes over a light brown yarn sweater, one who Larry knew to be Reginald.
The concern of the elder's tone wasn't hard to catch, and on his face even less so. It was more than enough to straighten Larry out of whatever funk he was in.
"Uh, yeah, I'm fine." He really was, now that the panic was blowing away from him like a breeze that was never there, he had more than enough rationality to realize he must've fallen and knocked himself so hard to have nightmares. Though Larry did not need the guilt to know that he indeed startled some seniors for no good reasons.
"And sorry about that, everyone." With little else, he offered sincerely, hands already itching awkwardly on the back of his head. "Must've slipped and fallen last night"
"Oh, you will be!" That was Gus, with as much fire barely contained under a heavy brown set of jacket and newsboy cap as Larry was knowing him for, so he was ready to take that as the best acknowledgment he'll get from the - allegedly - old brawler.
Didn't stop him from flinching though.
"Or rather, I believe what Gus here is trying to say-" Then there was the white-haired but spry Cecil, cutting his friend off with a disarming gesture. "-Is that it's completely understandable. He had a long night, Gus, give him some space."
For some reason, that last part hit differently, like instead of courtesy, there was genuine sympathy from the red-scarfed older man in gray winter suits that spread across his friends soon after. Like he was aware to some degree of the irrational conflict Larry just had internally.
"Thanks," Larry said, and that was that.
"Any time, Larry," Cecil replied lightly. "We were checking on you to see if you're doing okay, all things considered, you were taking it quite well. Better than we ever were on the first day at the job." At this, all three men shared a small chuckle, likely reminiscing a shared experience.
"Ah, I see, that was very thoughtful of you all" Not to mention touching, in a confusing out-of-loop way to a stranger and greenhorn like Lawrence that only seniors can manage, but it was simply how it is. The gesture by itself was genuine enough to make him smile.
"Only natural Larry, you've done pretty well yourself, so it's the least old-timers like us can do." Cecil's words were light and casual, yet some tint of self-deprecating humor surfaced in it at the end.
Larry got an idea of why, but wisely chose not to mention it, and fortunately, none of them dwelled on that longer than necessary.
"Well, get going now, you have another long day ahead of you." It was Reginald that spoke up next, already casually strolling away to his own pace "Go around, take in the sights, and maybe you'll learn something. We'll just be around." the man gave a wave, prompting his friends to follow him much the same.
"Bye." Lawrence was similar, he gave the trio his bid goodbye, and all went their separate ways. Larry on his way to the main hall, and the old guards on one more visit to their lifelong workplace.
Despite how things started that morning, it ended quite normally. Larry liked that, he liked normal.
Because if he wasn't, there were too many things that he didn't want to think about that possibility...
Despite having reached partly to its summit, the sun shined little on that chilly winter morning. No snow has fallen the previous night, but that didn't seem to encourage the people to make their day any faster.
The imposingly tall entrance of the Museum of Natural History stood silent to the monotonous life passing before it, chiseled walls and massive reaching pillars of an awe-inspiring sight of solemn beauty, just as it has always been, just as it should always be.
Yet, looking at it now, it's awfully lonely isn't it, this place.
Finely maintained and aged like a sight taken out of time, yet still, the stone fades. Tall and proudly beautiful to stand the ages, yet still, in time it casts only shadows. Not even for those it contained, these grounds themselves are history, yet still… Nobody knows.
A magnificent, desolate monument destined to remain, but little more than a memory. For however long it remains in this world, how steadfast it will persist with tranquil grace, all the image it once held dearly will, too, wane.
Forever present, forever untouched, and all alone.
Has it always been this way?
They've been here since almost the very beginning, but there were a few times they've like this, all across the street at this exact same place, the exact same bench…
Yet it never looked the same, they hated that it never ever looked the same. They were missing.
They may have lived a life before this, so long ago, but just as everyone else plucked so far away from the time of their ultimate end, this was their world for as long as they've known it, there wasn't any more to their waking dream outside of these walls. Didn't need to either, everything they could ask for was already there… Was...
No matter how things were before, it seems that they and this place are now very alike, inseparable even.
There was truly no escape from that reality, thirteen hours and thirty-six minutes are all they could manage. Not enough, not nearly enough, yet.
Without further prompting, they rose to full height from their rest on the bitterly cold metal bench like the awakening corpse of a Titan. The ashen gray cloak that draped around every inch of them flowed into place with the sudden action until everything down to their form faded into finely embroidered cloth.
Calling what they did next as moving was inadequate. For the light tone of their cloth, it did not call into the reflection of the moderate morning light. For their intricacies, ornamented edges of silver blurred into the gray of concrete and barren trees after the wake of their delicate pace.
No presence concealment whatsoever, just raw overwhelming speed and grace.
Were any more present, many would have easily mistaken them for a specter, had it not been for the light, but ever-present clicks of their steps, barely audible in the urban white noise.
As it were, little to none was able to keep their eyes on that ethereal form, then fewer still after the gentle early breeze ceased and the grand archway loomed over them in its shade once more.
Even their pale silhouette would dim here, and then, it would be their time to fade away until no trace remains.
It was time to go home.
At least, that was what's supposed to happen, for all their methodical effort to remain unnoticed, they know all too well that even they aren't infallible to the effects of variables.
As the purpose of all entrances was to guard, entering a building will always more than likely expose them to a split-second blind spot. Even to their senses, the price of being in the initiative can only ever be dismissed, not bypassed.
Then there are the other kinds of variables, those which cannot be planned around, the mere fact would've been devastating if not for its aversion to information. They knew this place, knew that no one would be here at this time, that statistically, nothing should be behind these doors, but that was not adequate apparently.
A hand reaching out for them, unnoticed by having remained behind cover, but its movement was ultimately clumsy and so slow it may as well be standing still to their reaction time. Though not that it mattered.
Stranger.
The subject is a male, caucasian, 170 centimeters tall, black hair, likely slightly above average physical conditions. There was no hesitation in his movement, the clear intention was to directly gain physical contact with them.
Danger.
Threat assessment: Pitifully low. But that didn't change anything.
Bad touch bad civilization.
There was only one way to end this.
INITIATE: COMBAT
Yep, that's Larry. Now, if this memory ever comes back to haunt him, he would likely wonder "How did I end up in this mess?" and everything else that followed it, right, at this moment.
To that, the answer will always be that his ass thought a shady heavily cloaked figure he saw moving around erratically from the window was synonymous with a lost kid who was way too late for Halloween, fault in his bleeding heart and terrifyingly similar experience respectively.
In his defense, they truly and utterly felt… lost.
Then again, that was a big if he was leaning on, after all...
He didn't know if he was going to survive it.
"Hey, you alright there-" His words, unfinished. His hand raised to tap their shoulders, pain.
It happened almost too fast for him to notice, but there was this very instantaneous sense of falling, so abrupt it almost felt like the shock of danger desperately reaching for his brain was silenced by the force of his back impacting the floor.
"-Hg!"
By the time it did, Larry didn't have enough air left in his lungs to voice a complaint, a weight descended onto his chest that wouldn't just go away no matter what. And all responses his arms were giving him was that they weren't there to break his fall, they wouldn't be there for him now.
In less no more than a blink of an eye, Larry was practically splattered on the floor. His vision was swimming, and nothing wanted to make sense through the oh so slowly creeping pain throughout his body.
Nothing, except brilliant, piercing red eyes.
It was strange, staring so intently at something so menacingly looming above him. But held paralyzed on every cell of his body, the only thing the instinctual part of him could do was latch onto the one defining proof of a human being in that intensely shadowed visage.
He couldn't look away even if he wanted to. Those eyes, so red they seemed to glow without a trace of heat, like an impossibly intricate camera lens attached to the barrel of a gun, sharply and mercilessly pinning him down like a bug with the mere possibility of its lethality.
That's the true weight Larry was under, life or death. He truly felt that any action of his would set it off, cause that bleeding sharp, apathetic gaze to stop regarding him like an insect and truly register him. And by then it's game over.
His tortured breathing became still, his movements ceased and it was not even thanks to the unreal strength of the knee pressing on his ribs. Eternity seeped in and crawled along in deathly silence.
When it ended, Larry was so positively sure he was not long behind that he almost fainted from what happened next:
He was wrong.
It was brief, so brief that anyone who hasn't been paying life-threatening attention - like him - would've noticed. But at the last second, those eyes gained a new light, as if finally seeing something in him that neither of them noticed, not from him, but something he has.
Not that it mattered, when the pressure was lifted from his chest, Larry was too busy taking in greedy gulps of glorious air to notice. To an awkward angle to the side, his arm finally regained any sort of sensation, almost tangling itself is the cascade of fabric that dragged across him as the being stood to their full height.
He must've looked so bad right there, but hardly did the cloaked figure standing above him care. In stark contrast to what it did to the man on the floor, white cloaks fluttered almost… attentively, to something that slid its way across the floor and away from where Larry was sent flat.
It was unknown what sort of object can render a being already so silent into a state that can only be described as stunned. But it was good enough to give the groaning body below time to gather himself and some much-needed oxygen together.
"What the hell-" There was confusion there, plus a bit of hysteria and a healthy dose of righteous anger in Larry's tone. But that didn't go anywhere when his jaw clamped shut on it the next moment.
"Mine."
Uttered in an absolute monotone, words spoken solely for the purpose of speaking, the only catching trait of that sentence would've been the contrast it made with how an actual person would speak. But somehow, that wasn't the part that was bizarre enough.
"Mine." The light, frigid, and unmistakably female voice repeated with every ounce the finality and force of a knife in his throat. In her arms, a shape was held so tightly the cloak around her concealed everything but its small size.
Larry, in all of his wisdom, did not speak beyond any of that. It was quite similar to hiding from something by hoping it wouldn't notice his immobile form, but it worked by some miracle, and he was not going to change that.
Gradually, that sharpness to her visible eyes dimmed to a vacant stare that he uncomfortably knew somehow was normal on her. She took her eyes off him for the last time, favoring looking down at whatever in her arms as if afraid to lose it to him of all people.
Then, just like that, in a flash of white, she either disappeared or ran away too fast for him to follow. Larry couldn't move his head to tell either way.
It took him, just a little bit, to properly compile everything. Some bewildered looks were thrown all around the empty lobby. Then, a decision.
Just as the museum was opening, Larry ran for the hills.
"Wallet," Completely intact, with all the meager amount of bills he could muster.
"Keys," Replaced too frequently for him to memorize which is which, but as far as he can tell none of the important ones are missing.
"Flashlight" Flashlight.
In other words, nothing important was missing.
Like a meteor shower of potatoes, Lawrence plopped onto the couch of his humble flat. The lights were out in favor of what little lumination the window can offer, so the muffled sound was the only man-made element that venerated across the spartan interior, much like how the highlights of the previous events kept replaying in his mind.
No matter how much he thought about it, he could neither make heads nor tails of that encounter. It just felt.. entirely too random, that person - whoever or whatever they were doing looking like that - felt like she ran into him purely by chance, but that later interaction felt uncannily personal, at least to her.
The outrageous show of what he assumed was the self-justified defense he can reason around maybe, but that sudden escapade at the tail end of it? Yeah, Larry didn't know what he had to do with her, but for some reason, he can't shake the feeling that there was more to it.
The memory of those red eyes resurfaced, and Larry for his credit didn't suppress the shudder that ran through him.
Daley knew that life more than likely had it out for him to take his time with it as difficult as possible, but this felt way too much even for his old frenemy to throw out. Way out of the blue to just happen without any apparent reason.
Well, there was the location to take in, could it possibly have to do with what happened at the museum… No.
Larry shook his head to discard the absurd thought for what it is, with some success… But even if he didn't, a little break from work on the second night wouldn't hurt, right?
As if to answer him, the phone that has been lying placidly beside the couch suddenly chose that very instance to blare his ringtone. A bit of fiddling with the buttons on the device had the voice of his former spouse sounded in the speakers.
"Hello there Larry, how's it going?" There was a cheer in her voice, which usually means good news, thankfully.
"Pretty well, all things considered." He lied through his teeth - no need to mention that when he didn't know what happened himself - then continued "What about you?"
"Well, I've heard about your new job, that's very good news." She responded, which cleared that question well enough. "So I guess I just wanted to say I'm proud of you, that was a good call." She added.
Despite everything that has happened, that did lighten his mood a little, when the next line came out, it was a lot more natural. "Yeah, I thought it was a good time to finally have a fall-back as you said. Be what I need to be for little Nicky, y' know. We wouldn't be moving around anymore, so tell him that can you?"
"Of course, he'll be happy to hear this." She agreed, and as an afterthought, added "What is it that you've got by the way?"
"Oh, it's security, I got to spend a Night at the Museum," Larry answered, feeling weakly like he has just made a joke at the end there, but...
After that, the conversation soon lapsed into a small bit of quiet, not awkward, but not companionable either… Sometimes, it's still like this, but fortunately, Larry made another wise choice.
"How's Nicky by the way?" He asked casually, but both of them knew for long enough that was a routine at this point. Larry couldn't be here for his boy all the time, but he never forgets to check on him, he needed to ask this at least once at all time.
"Oh, he's doing fine, excellent even." Relieved that he was the one to open a new subject, Erica was more than enthused to answer. "He's been excited about this presentation for half a month you see, he'll get to bring one parent to class."
Ah.
"Ah, career day, I've heard about that. Knowing him, I'm sure he'll do well." Larry said casually, but inwardly he fought to keep that composure. It appears the crux of the problem came back to haunt him again.
It hurts, knowing his little angel felt the need to keep Larry out of his life like that. But that's what prompted Larry to take on this in the first place.
In the end, Larry just had to suck it up and do his best to fix it.
"So, see you soon?"
"Yeah, see you, bye."
"Bye." And with that, the line went dead. Leaving Larry alone in his apartment again.
Of all places, this was where he all but promised would be where he settles financially and physically, for his son. Finally, a home where he wouldn't have to add to the already taxing amount of moving around his situation already put Nicky through.
And all it pegs on was his nightguard career, as he was so timely reminded of.
Larry signed and stood up, looks like the break won't be coming tonight or anytime soon. Just suck it up and move on he guess.
And so, in the familiar confines of his residence, Lawrence Daley unwinded in a rare lull to gather his wits with the power of human rationalization.
He was going to need all of it.
"Besides," he reasoned "it couldn't be all that bad."
A whopping 20 hours later, Larry was pretty sure he gained super memory from the sheer pressure on his skull because he can vividly recall that line he said, playing on repeat in his head. It was this close to making him develop psychic power capable of slapping himself silly across time.
And all too oblivious to his plight, the final judgment to the end of his sanity was busy manifesting before his shell shocked eyes in a shockwave of rippling air pressure.
Teeth, muscles, scales, and flesh came to life where there were previously only dry fossilized bones. A majestic shape congealed from what looked almost like a raw orange inferno that sprung to life and engulfed everything, slowly at first, then gradually becoming a tornado so fierce it blew itself apart.
From the embers, Prince once again stood before and above him, in all of his russet scaled-dark striped glory. The tyrant lizard king grunted once, his tails swinging wildly in what Larry took in a wild guess as the reptilian equivalent of a stretch or something.
"yOu arE EaRLy, yOUNg KEepeR, VeRY COmmEnDaBlE."
He radiates impossibly nonchalant energy despite being a killing machine the size of a bus.
"wELcOme bACK tO the lonG nighT-"
Whatever Prince's thundering voice was going to announce next wasn't enough to stop this. With the grace of an anvil thrown from a bridge, Larry bid goodbye to the conscious realm and fell over backward.
The last thing that registered to him was Prince's face, frozen with a ridiculous likeness to shock while emitting an uncomfortable noise, akin to a whale stubbing its toes.
Too bad, Larry didn't want to wake up.
Author Notes:
Welp, it's a tad later than I intended, but good thing I didn't make a schedule yet lul.
But more importantly, welcome back readers, for another chapter of Ben Stiller's Bizzare Museum Night Adventures™ by your host Indom. This chapter is not that much in terms of events, but then again it's not exactly supposed to be one either. You can consider it an interlude, of sorts, time after each night to set up events and the such.
The part I had fun with the most here would be writing characters like Larry and Cecil, since the story is a tad deeper than a comedy, it's fun to explore their character more in a different situation with existing knowledge of them. Of course, Fate characters would be a joy to write too, but their's a different sort of flavor.
Also shoutout to my man and one review from last chapter rc48177, and countless other favorites and follow. I do check out on every one of them.
I welcome all thoughts and opinions on it as long as it's not toxic or anything, it helps shape the story and me as a writer, so feel free to leave a review as always. Fanfiction net recently fixed their PM function I noticed also, so I can finally be interactive with my readers again, which is a plus.
Also follow and favorite and all that, if you feel inclined.
Belated Happy Holidays, from yours sincerely,
The Indominator.