Hey, haven't updated in a while, have I? *apologetic smile* heh, heh, uh... sorry? As apology, longer chapter today, I think. Hey, I take requests, ya know! Well, now I do. Don't beh shy, folks!
...I was listening to Shadows by violinist Lindsey Stirling while editing this. Don't know her? Check her out on youtube! watch?v=JGCsyshUU-A, or if you want an awesome animation using the song, watch watch?v=egPR5MuE7u0
Groping around in the darkness, Garry heard a yelp and a thud. "Ib? You okay?"
He heard a muffled response and raised his eye brow. A bit of shuffling, and then the response repeated, clearer. "Just tripped over something, hang on."
There was a small click like something hitting metal.
It sounded familiar...
Another click and a small flame was born to show Ib's face, holding Garry's lighter.
"Ah! My lighter! I must've dropped it when we fell." He exclaimed, taking hold of the lighter from Ib.
Her eyes flashed suspiciously and he laughed. "Don't worry, I don't smoke or anything, I just keep the lighter in case of something like this. No, not like I suspected we'd end up here again, I mean if I'm somewhere dark."
Ib nodded and had Garry light her path while she search for a light switch. Her hand bumped something smooth and waxy. Three of them, really.
She smiled. "I think I found some candles, can you light them?" She asked Garry, who swept the open flame over the three wickers.
They burned brightly, too bright for normal candles. Each lit up to a three foot perimeter, giving them plenty of light for now.
Garry stuck his lighter back in his coat pocket and each took a candle, leaving one there.
Breaking off to separate corners of the room, they continuously found more candles among the walls, lighting them. Only when the entire room was illuminated did the return to the third candle.
Looking about, It was a rather large room, full of paintings of different places.
A restaurant in Italy, a beach in florida, A battle in Ancient greece, even a large portrait, huge and so detailed it could have been a picture, of atlantis. It drew the two to it, awing them.
As Ib Looked closer, she noticed something... Each painting was alive, in a way.
Fish swam past the pearly white columns of Atlantis, A whale singing its songs in the background, passing by. A Hammerhead shark nuzzled its head along the ground, looking for food. Dolphins played around the columns, seeming as if it were a game of tag.
In The Greece painting, Spartans and Athenians roared battle cries as they exchanged blows.
In italy, a chef was busy making Pizza in an empty restaurant.
In the beaches of florida, boats buzzed as they sped across the glassy surface.
Then, Garry noticed something, words were scribbled into the wall in blue paint beside the one of Greece. He began to read it out loud. "Finish the paintings if you wish to leave."
Finish it? Did they mean like, find a paintbrush and doodle or something?
He turned as Ib gasped. "I think I know what it means. Look!" Squinting, he realized what she meant.
The chef could not complete the pizza, for he had no sauce.
There was no ocean in atlantis, it was all just a white background. The sea creatures looked lost and confused.
In the battle, they had no weapons, no sheilds. They would not fight, they only yelled insults, looking infuriated and frustrated.
The beach had no sand, and no waves.
But it seemed to have too much water in the ocean, barely any of the stones that formed the beach. A bucket drifted in the waters, a rather large one, rocking gently with the current.
Weapons littered the beach, some sticking upright with the stones. Spartan and Athenian shields lay with them.
Two dolphins were playing with a bottle of tomato sauce in Atlantis, squealing.
Garry brushed a hand across the Beach of Florida as if wiping away dust that didn't exist.
His fingers sunk into the painting.
He yelped, withdrawing.
Slowly, Ib poked at the surface of the seemingly Paint-portal, jaw dropping as her pointer finger tapped the overflowing ocean. Pulling back, her fingers were now wet.
"I get it..." Garry muttered, reaching in and grabbing the bucket. He filled the bucket with some of the water of the Ocean, pulling out with a large bucket filled to the brim with salt water. Grinning, he dumped it into Atlantis.
It filled up, the animals screeching with delight. Dolphins leaped above the waves, abandoning the sauce. Ib grabbed hold of it and pulled it out.
Immediatly the painting froze in place. "It looks like they become normal paintings again once everythings in order again." Garry mumbled half to himself.
Ib nodded silently and reached into the Italian restaurant. The chef held out his little arms and took it from her gratefully, smiling. As he returned to his pizza, his painting froze in place just like Atlantis.
Garry plucked each weapon and shield from the bank and showered them over the two armies. They gave a battle cry and began to fight with them, the painting freezing.
In florida, the waves now formed, having enough space now to do so. But there was still no sand.
The two frowned. "But if the other three are complete that must mean the sand isn't in another painting, it has to be in this room." Ib said.
Garry turned, giving the room a once-over.
He saw a bookshelf, one peculiar book with a velvet satin color that seemed to glow. Tiny grains of glowing sand spilled from the book, about a hand full over the shelf.
Walking over silently with Ib watching, he tugged the book from its confides, opening it hesitantly.
There lay a huge picture sketched there of multiple mounds of sand, a city buried beneath, building tips peeking through. Tiny humans ran along the surface, crying in sadness for their buried loved ones still under.
Rushing to the Beach, he shook the book at the paintings, the sand falling from the picture into the painting.
As the beach filled, the city appeared, the pictures residents yelling in joy as they hugged their families.
Both the picture and painting froze in there respectful places, the room no longer filled with the sounds of waves upon sand or happy cried from the story people.
Sucky ending of a chapter that can't even count as a cliffhanger. Listening to Palladio on itunes. Sweet starclan, what is WITH me and orchestra music today?!