sit yourself down, and meet the best inn keeper in town ( O P E N )

[checkingin]

Who: Everyone!
Where: The initial arrival rooms, the main lobby, all over the place.
When: February 3rd
What: Welcome, newbies.

ARRIVAL.

you wake up when you hit the floor in a dark room, and the air is knocked out of your lungs. the carpet is threadbare, worn with use, kind of dusty. and you're not the first person to endure this crash landing. nor will you be the last.

once your vision rights itself, you can see the well-lit hallway through the doorjam straight ahead of you. not to say there’s monsters in the shadows, but something propels you towards that door and out into the bright hallway beyond.

and once outside your room, you can hear it: the steady thrum of rain outside.

MAIN LOBBY.

there's a staircase at the end of the lengthy hallway you tumble out of. grab your suitcase and follow the dull green exit signs on the ceiling until you reach the disappointingly bland stairs that lead you down to the ornate old fashion hotel lobby.

to your left is a warmly crackling fireplace, to your right is a lobby desk. straight ahead are three large sets of doors, though only one of them is open to the public. and outside the few (curtained, permanently dark) windows is the continually steady hiss of rain.

welcome to the hotel.

FRONT DESK.

though there is a bell and a plaque designating the desk to be the main desk, the customer service desk, there are currently no staff members behind it. none shall answer your calls, either.

terribly sorry for the inconvenience.

SCREENING ROOM.

on a tall pull-down screen, a silent version of nosferatu will be playing on loop. at the back of the room, between the neat rows of fold out chairs, mounted on a wobbly table is the old timey projector, and mounted on the walls are some rather old speakers that warble out "terrifying" old timey music.

along the curtained windows is another long table, with a large bowl that looked like it once would have held popcorn. but is now unfortunately empty. same for the large hot drink dispensers labeled "hot chocolate" and "coffee".

OTHER.

the ballroom and breakfast hall are currently closed, grand doors locked.

there is no main door leading to the outside, good luck trying to find one.

the door to the courtyard is locked.

ROOMS.

you've a room key with your assigned room number on it. all the new guest residences will be located on floors one & two. while there is an open elevator in the main lobby, and the buttons light up inside, the doors will not close. all in all, you'd be better off taking the stairs.

while they're the same stairs you undoubtedly came down to get to the lobby, the door to the endless hall everyone woke up in will not reappear between the main floor and the subsequent residential halls.

there are twenty rooms per floor. feel free to get to know your surroundings; or your neighbors as they trickle in around you.

Comments

[hacker]

No. No, god, I know who you are—You're Captain freaking America. Everyone knows who you are.

[ Perhaps not by sight like this, Skye. But she's used to nonchalance with her vaguely stalkery oversight. Their loss for not paying closer attention to files and every available second of camera footage. Skye takes superheroes Very Seriously. ]

Okay. Okay, Skye, just — Calm down. [ She placates herself, drawing her hands back to a soothing, zen gesture down in front of her, palms spread. A deep breath later, she turns a more targeted gaze on him. Focus. Back to the mission. It's all very attentive, snappy field agent, pushing aside the fangirling. ]

So it was them. [ She says it like that must confirm every suspicion she's had. Concern mounts. ] This was HYDRA. It had to be, right?

[starspangled]

[Steve is a little surprised, but maybe now he can worry less about freaking her out now that she knows who he is.

Nope, still freaking out.

He moves closer, watching, taking a deep breath with her. His own almost catches when she says the H-word.]

We don't know anything yet. [And he doesn't want to draw any conclusions.] How much do you know about them, anyway?

[Maybe she read about them on the internet after Natasha dumped everything there.]

[hacker]

Everything.

[ Baffled, her shoulders shrug forward, and she shakes her head. It feels like an overstatement, but all things considered? She knows as much as anyone. Ward, her father, Raina, Simmons, Morse, they'd all been inside of it. Between interrogating Bakshi, looking into Whitehall, and doubling down on digging into old SSR files, there wasn't a lot about HYDRA (as it exists now) that they aren't on top of—at least, she'd like to believe as much. ]

I had just joined SHIELD before they took it apart.

[ Her voice carries a sense of mournful loss with that. The family she'd finally found, torn apart in an instant. Her detest of HYDRA is visceral and unerring because as she saw it, they'd pulled the rug out from under her the very moment she'd thought she could put her feet up. ]

How much do you know about what HYDRA's been up to since the Triskelion fell? [ She pushes away from the check-in desk, folding her arms over her chest and getting straight to business. It's hard not to be excitable when she might very well have to brief Captain America on the HYDRA threat. (His arms, let the record show, are as super heroic in real life as they are on TV.) ]

[starspangled]

You worked for them? An agent?

[Well, that certainly makes a good case for Hydra being involved with all of this. Steve's jaw clenches for a moment, just long enough for that little muscle twitch. Yeah, they'd done that to him too. A couple of times.]

I know they weren't entirely wiped out. [A few rats didn't go down with the ship, as Fury had put it. But it was enough that Steve thought he could focus on another mission, more personal. His brows draw together.] Why?

[And he's suddenly sorry he asked, hands going to his hips.]

They're trying to grow another head.

[hacker]

Not trying. Succeeded. They've got, like, two dozen more waiting to sprout.

[ As she continues her emphatic explanation, her expression deteriorates into something weirded out and a little disgusted. This metaphor is getting away from her. ]

Okay. Totally gross mental picture, but you get what I mean. They're not gone. Not by a long shot.

We started getting wind of a new up-and-comer, Daniel Whitehall. Except he wasn't new at all. This guy, he — [ Cut my mother to pieces, stole her life, turned my father into a monster. ] He served with Red Skull back in your day. Found a way to turn the clock back and make his geriatric ass—no offense, Cap—a problem for us all over again. He was chasing something called the Diviner, more alien tech for HYDRA to weaponize.

[starspangled]

'We'? [Steve repeats the word, looking at her for the answer to his unspoken question. Hydra making another comeback is about the worst possible news he can imagine. But for all he knows, S.H.I.E.L.D.'s in pieces. Who's fighting them now?

And then, naturally, it actually does get worse. And for all the questions that Steve still has, there's one thing that's completely clear:]

We have to find a way out of this hotel.

[hacker]

Yeah. My team. The Director, anyone who's left.

[ No one ever told her. In all the times Coulson established that they didn't know he was back, no one ever warned Skye that it was hush-hush. So when she avoids his name, it's not deliberate. In fact, it's slightly clinical. Detaching herself from the sadness she'd felt at his side after her father had pulverized him. Detaching herself from the fear of how he'd react to her now. ]

And that's great, I'd agree, except needing to do it doesn't make the doing it any easier. I've been trying to get in touch with them since I woke up: there's no connection reaching outside of this building. We're on our own. So unless you wanna you know. [ one-two punch that never actually contacts him. ] Superheroic your way out one of these windows. I sure as hell haven't been able to do it.

[starspangled]

I've already tried that.

[And if she worked for S.H.I.E.L.D., if she'd even seen the Battle of New York on tv, she knows what that means. This place is officially a problem.]

We'll keep at it. Which room are you in?

[hacker]

Kinda forward for a 1940s guy.

[ Smirky smirk. Skye waits a beat for laughter, then her smile dies down and she clears her throat, shifting her weight and nodding. ]

That was a— Yeah. Okay. [ She raises a fist, jerking her thumb towards the stairs as she simply answers in a more straightforward fashion: ] 114. I'm in 114.

[starspangled]

[He takes a breath, suddenly a little awkward. Embarrassed. Because yeah, sort of did sound like that.]

I'm in 111, just a few doors down from you.

[hacker]

Cool.

[ She puts some deliberate effort into muting her excitement because she's three doors down from Captain America. A smile flickers through anyway, breathy and short. ]

Well, if you need anything, just— [ Reaching out, she leans awkwardly to get her fist to knock against the fake wood of the desk. A beat passes. ] Not that I think you'll need anything because I mean obviously you're … you, and I'm just— But in case you do. That's where I'll be. Close. But not, like, weirdly close.

[starspangled]

[Steve smiles at her this time, nodding to show that he understands when she knocks against the desk.]

You know where I'm at too. [And after a moment, he adds:] And you're wrong, I do need things. Like some friends in this place.

[And she seems like she could be a good one.]

[hacker]

Well, I will gladly volunteer to be the first.

[ Overeager? Nah acceptable. Probably. ]

You know ... And this is a long shot, but I have to ask. The Diviner, it was an old SSR artifact. They picked it up during the war, called it an "0-8-4." Object of unknown origin. Packed it away and forgot about it. You don't ... happen to know anything about it, do you? I just thought maybe, it being Agent Carter's team and the Howling Commandos that you might ...

[ Blind hope, born out of not knowing what the hell that thing did to her when it opened up. ]

[starspangled]

[Now there's some names that stop him in his tracks.]

0-8-4?

[Steve repeats the numbers with a frown, thinking back before he shakes his head.]

Doesn't ring any bells. You say Peggy and the Commandos were involved with it?

[hacker]

According to the files, yeah. Agent Carter's authorization was on all of them. [ A simple shrug comes next. ] Obviously, we couldn't exactly go ask. [ Which seems morbid to mention, b u t it's out there now and there's no unsaying it. ]

[starspangled]

[He gets it, nodding softly at her.]

Sorry, it must've been something that happened after I put the plane down.

[In the water. For seventy years.]

[hacker]

Hey, don't sweat it. I knew it'd be kind of a long shot.

[ She waves a hand, dismissing it. ]

Anyway. Bigger issues, right? Like whoa HYDRA-napped. Which, admittedly, is not a first, but with you here, definitely seems worse.