[open]

[altusimperius]

WHO: Benedict and you
WHAT: just a January catch-all!
WHEN: Wintermarch
WHERE: DUNGEON
NOTES: a new year begins in gay baby jail

[Starters in the comments, please feel free to make your own!]

Comments

[skulltasm]

Skull lets Flint's visage dissolve back into the eerie green miasma, reverting back to just a regular ol' cursed skull...with a mustache.

"OF COURSE I CAN."
And yet, he does nothing of the sort.

[altusimperius]

At least he still has a mustache.

Benedict looks hopeful, but when no such thing happens, that turns to disappointment. Perhaps the game is over.
Falling silent for a moment, Benedict's mind goes elsewhere. Then, something occurs to him.

"Who dropped you?" And, well, why have they not retrieved you yet, but that might be a question that doesn't need answering.

[skulltasm]

"MY MUMMY WHEN I WAS A WEE BAIRN."

[altusimperius]

He sighs, but doesn't seem too bothered. You're the kind of guy who makes jokes, huh.

"I mean just now. Odd that they wouldn't come down to get you."

[skulltasm]

"IT ISN'T ODD AT ALL, BECAUSE I WASN'T DROPPED. I WAS PUNTED! BY THAT WEASEL-FACED HUMAN THAT LIKES HORSES SO MUCH."
Odd would be if Marcoulf actually did come down to retrieve him.

"SAY, DO YOU RECALL THE PAINTING OUTSIDE OF THE LIBRARY HERE? OR...IS THE LIBRARY NOT A PLACE YOU FREQUENTED? IT WOULDN'T SURPRISE ME IF NOT."

[altusimperius]

"Marcoulf?"

Well. The plot thickens. Bene glances toward the end of the hallway, or at least what he can see of it. Why...?
Perhaps he'll get a chance to ask him.


"Which one?" he asks, a bit absently, "I spent a lot of time there. But inside it."

[skulltasm]

"THE ONE OF THE MAN. YOU KNOW, THE ONE WITH THE NOSE. IT STRUCK ME AS QUITE AN UNCANNY LIKENESS WITH OUR MUTUAL BUDDY, MARCOULF, WOULDN'T YOU AGREE? HE CERTAINLY DIDN'T. GOT HIS KNICKERS IN QUITE A TWIST, ACTUALLY."

[altusimperius]

It takes Benedict a moment to search through his memory for the right one, but then a slow smirk crosses his lips.

"It does," he admits, "...and he does that."

[skulltasm]

"YES! VINDICATION! NOW, DON'T GET USED TO BEING REWARDED FOR AGREEING WITH ME, BUT I'M FEELING GENEROUS TODAY SO:"
He adopts the likeness of Thranduil, mustache perfectly placed and a very snooty expression on his elvish features.

"Has anyone seen my hairbrush? I must brush my silky flaxen locks one hundred times each morning and night. Also my limbs are very long and I move soooo gracefully. I don't eat, drink, piss, fart, or shit because I am ethereal."

[altusimperius]

The smile broadens, but without too much enthusiasm. Being rewarded for anything is generally not part of his experience down here, and having it pushed in his face like so is a bit of a mood killer.

"Spot on," he says anyway, shivering and readjusting the blankets again.
It'd be nice to be just a skull, perhaps, with no flesh to get cold.

[skulltasm]

Aaaaand it's gone. Back to the old skull in a jar, plus mustache. For a few silent moments he bobs gently, buoyed by his own ectoplasm or whatever that is.

"WELL THIS IS DULL."

[altusimperius]

"Sorry."

Benedict actually kind of sounds like he means it-- there's a self-consciousness to it, an awareness that he's not much fun to hang around, even for a skull in a jar.

"I could read to you," he says idly, after a moment, "seeing as we're both stuck here, there's not a lot else in the way of entertainment."

[skulltasm]

Honestly, what's the point of keeping a boy in the dungeon if he's not being actively tortured? This passive torture nonsense is so, so, so, soooo boring.
"WHAT'VE YOU GOT? WHAT SORT OF THING DO THEY EVEN ALLOW DOWN HERE? THE DAILY DUNGEON? SUMS FOR DUMMIES? THE HISTORY OF PAPER?"

[altusimperius]

"The Word and Challenge of the Chant," Benedict says dully, without even having to look at it. "...and a book of jokes." None of them are especially funny now that he's read it for what has felt like six hundred times.

[skulltasm]

"PHOAH. AND HERE I THOUGHT THEY WERE JUST LETTING YOU ROT. THE WORD AND CHALLENGE OF THE CHANT?! THAT SOUNDS LIKE TORTURE."

And any jokes that come from a book can hardly be any good.

"HOW ABOUT SOME GOOD OLD FASHIONED RIDDLES, EH?"
Quite needlessly, Skull ahems and ahuhs to clear a throat he doesn't have, then recites:

I've measured it from side to side,
'Tis three feet long and two feet wide.
It is of compass small, and bare
To thirsty suns and parching air."

[altusimperius]

This elicits a little smile. Benedict can't exactly disagree with that assessment, even if he's thankful for something to put his eyes on. But then, Skull is proceeding, and he makes a mental scramble to catch the whole riddle before it's done.

He thinks it over for a moment, then tugs out a piece of parchment from the pile, and picks up the remaining nib of one of the pigments Athessa gave him. "Can you repeat it?"
He'll have to stare at it for a while.

just pretend that i'm not fucking with formatting

[skulltasm]

He does so, in Flint's dulcet tones:

"I've measured it from side to side,
'Tis three feet long and two feet wide.
It is of compass small, and bare
To thirsty suns and parching air."

For effect, sure, but also because Flint's voice is much clearer than Skull's scratchy, nasal drawl. So clear, in fact, that the voice echoes off the walls of the dungeon.

He turns side to side like a child in a swivel seat and waits a moment before speaking again, back to normal.

"DO LET ME KNOW WHEN YOU'VE FINISHED. OR IF YOU NEED A HINT."

[altusimperius]

Benedict nods, writing it down. And then he looks at it. For a while.
He sits there in silence, shivering, staring at the parchment, his brow furrowed in thought.

"Not a map," he mutters into the blanket, "...or an eyeball."

[skulltasm]

"AN EYEBALL THREE FEET LONG AND TWO WIDE WOULD BE QUITE A SIGHT."

[altusimperius]

Bene chuckles a little.
"Wouldn't it?"

He keeps staring at the riddle.

[skulltasm]

And skull keeps staring at Bene.

[altusimperius]

Several more minutes pass, and Benedict sighs, sitting back.

"I need a hint."

[skulltasm]

"IT IS A CIRCLE, BUT NOT A SPHERE. ITS WIDTH IS ITS HEIGHT, BUT ONLY WHAT'S ABOVE GROUND.

[altusimperius]

Bene lets his head rest back against the wall, and he stares at the ceiling in thought for a while.

Then, "it's got to be manmade, to be a perfect circle. ...a sundial?" He winces. That's probably not it.

[skulltasm]

"THERE A LOT OF SUNDIALS WITH HIDDEN DEPTHS UNDERGROUND WHERE YOU COME FROM?"