Young Writers Society

Bleffles looked up from her job to see Griffith looking very quiet, over by a pillar. She figured that if she had skeletal arms, she would be shy about them, too.

She looked down at the sarcophagus.

"Don't even think about it," she told it, offhandedly, as she slid to the ground.

Having safely deserted her post, she walked over to Griffith. She tried to approach him gently.

"Hey, uh, you look like you got a bit of a fright over there. You feeling all good?"

He looked up at her, and found that he didn't know what he was supposed to say. He wanted to give an honest answer. He really did. But honesty would require revealing the truth, and people never accepted him for that. Bleffles would either scream and run or beg for mercy, even if she realized that death wasn't coming for her now. Or maybe it was. He didn't think this place was remotely safe, and it was very likely that someone was going to die by the end of their time here.

He let out a noise that sounded remotely like a sob.

Pulling his legs close to his chest, he continued to try thinking of a response. "I'm not...I'm not scared," he finally said. At last that part was the truth. He was upset and worried, but he wasn't scared of his skeletal features.

Natalia looked over at Bleffles and Griffith after Adeline had finished with her arm. She got up and quietly walked out of the room. She wasn't scared of Griffith, but he wouldn't believe her if she told him that. She was shaken, and her arm hurt, and asking Tiron for help like that hadn't helped anything at all.
She began to climb the stairs, then sat down on the windowsill on the first landing.

Adeline glanced toward the door after Natalia left, and was briefly torn between waiting out in the hall with her or staying to talk to Griffith. She decided on the latter.

Gingerly, she walked over and took a seat next to him, setting a hand on his shoulder without comment.

"Great. I'm not scared either!" Bleffles said, jokingly. It was very obviously untrue, but she hoped that the silliness of her statement might cheer Griffith up.

She followed Adeline's suit, and patted him on the other shoulder. Her eyes widened, and her mouth screwed up a bit.
Ah. Ahah. Griffith's collarbone felt a bit funny, in that it was the only thing there that she felt.

Bleffles took her hand away and rubbed the back of her neck with it, in a masterfully casual transition, and gave him the thumbs up with her other hand.

"Haha, yep, we'll all get through this juuuust fine," she said.

Griffith buried his face into his skeletal hands, but he had been unprepared for the addition of his mask. Another sobbing noise left him. It wasn't really a sob - it never could be - but it was the closest description he had for it. He wished he could be anywhere but here right now. Pushing off the inevitable reveal that he wasn't...normal only made him feel more miserable and hopeless, and he came to the conclusion that there was only way to handle this situation.

He would have to tell the truth.

He could deal with the ramifications later. If he had to, he could just follow them as a partial - they'd never notice him, and he could make sure that they were safe from harm's way. He raised his head from his hands and fumbled for the back of the mask. Finally managing to find the strap that kept it attached, he carefully removed it to reveal a skull.

He placed the mask down beside him.

Then he got up, stepped behind one of the pillars, and took the rest of the costume off. He pulled out the ratty old cloak hiding in the depths of one of the suit's pockets, slung it over his shoulders and pulled up the hood. And then, knowing that this would do little to prove his point without the final key detail, he let his scythe appear.

He stepped out from behind the pillar.

"My name's not Griffith," he said, trying to keep his voice strong and confident as he spoke. "I'm the Grim Reaper."

Adeline's heart chimed away as she took in Grif- the Grim Reaper's appearance. Well. She was genuinely surprised. Of all the strange people and things she'd seen, all had come with some sembelence of a scientific explanation. None that she'd met, however, had had purely supernatural roots.

Like she often did when faced with something she wasn't sure of, or hadn't experienced, Adeline started quoting. She mostly did this unconsciously, as a way to make sense of things and orient herself with something she did know (granted, often solely from a form of literature or media).

"Of all the wonders that I yet have heard, it seems to me most strange that men should fear; seeing that death, a necessary end, will come when it will come." Her mouth moved quietly with the familiar phrase- one that she had quoted before when thinking of death. She mostly saved Shakespeare for the deep things.

Natalia had quietly returned to the door and seen and heard everything.
"Hello, Mr. Reaper." She calmly and quietly.

He stared at the two people who had spoken. How could they be taking this so calmly? Adeline was quoting Shakespeare, and Natalia had called him Mr. Reaper. The thought of someone referring to him so formally made him deeply uncomfortable, though that was probably because people tended to scream or grovel at his feet when they saw him.

This didn't make any sense. None of this night made any sense. Mummies weren't supposed to move on their own, King Tut wasn't supposed to have died two hours ago, people weren't supposed to have glass butts, and, most importantly of all, he was supposed to be feared!

He finally found his voice. "H-" he started to say, but he quickly bit his nonexistent tongue. They, weirdly enough, seemed to respect death. What if the only reason they hadn't run away screaming was because they thought he was the sort of person to be put on a pedestal? He didn't really like the idea, but he also didn't want to follow them as a partial for the rest of the time here.

"Hello," he decided on. That sounded a little more mature than "hi" did, and, when he used the deepest voice he could muster without it sounding unnatural, it did make the greeting sound fairly ominous.

Natalia tilted her head. "Wondering why we're not scared? For myself, I've never really been scared of you, plus, I'm already dying. And we can't afford to not trust each other in a place like this. I took a look out the window on the first landing of the stairs. We are surrounded by a labryinth made of hedges."

At least the others weren't scared. Theoretically, if the others weren't scared, maybe Bleffles could also be not scared. It was possible. It was conceivable.

A thoroughly spooked Bleffles tried to downgrade to a mildly perturbed Bleffles, but her face was not obeying her. It was all she could do to reply with anything other than a timid 'Meep.'

"H-hey, it's all cool, b-bro. Ha. What Natalia said. Mazes and all." she coughed, meaningfully.

"I mean, what brings you here? To our, plane. Ifyou'renothereforoursoulsImean." she rushed out the end bit under her breath.

"I mean it's an honour to meet the Griff Reaper-" Griff Reaper. Did she just say Griff Reaper?

Bleffles turned away in shame.

"...just kill me now."

Bleffles whipped back around again, blushing in fright, with tears lacing the corners of her eyes.

"I d-didn't mean it like that, I'm sorry!"

Natalia came forward and put her hand on Bleffles shoulder. "It's okay. You at least are acting normally. He's not going to hurt us. Here, do you want me to show you the maze?" She said it kindly, trying to help.

"Aheh. Heh. Yep, I love, I love mazes. They're the best." Bleffles muttered bewilderedly, not entirely there.

She was still watching Griff to see if he would do anything. But not at his eye sockets, he might not like that. She instead watched his feet.

"Come on." Natalia said, gently leading her to the door and out of the room. "Up there, on the first landing."

Trevor was decidedly Not Okay with this revelation. He supposed it was all well and fine that Griffith was a skeleton, but the Grim Reaper? Trevor thought that if he had come there to kill them, they would all be dead right now, but... could he have sent them there?

Oddly enough, instead of thinking about that, Trevor suddenly worried that he might’ve said something offensive, like, “I feel dead inside!” Then he realized that he hadn’t said much, so it was probably okay. Probably.

He wanted to say something to reassure Griff (And also to reassure himself) but ended up blurting, “Do you know when we’re gonna die?” He hurriedly covered his mouth. That was something he definitely should not have said.

“I mean, you’re the Grim Reaper, it’s all cool, you have a very nice, uh, cloak there, I guess the truth is all out now?” He tried to backpedal, but it wasn’t working very well. He turned helplessly to Natalia and Bleffles, who somehow seemed to be handling this.