Laios's Heart Game

[myhungryass]

It's dark, and you are not quite conscious. You have the sense that you are climbing; that you have been climbing for a long time. You can feel the burn in your thighs, the ache in your calves. You're a little too hot, and what you're wearing is a little too heavy. You have the sense of taking a last weary, heaving step onto a plateau.



You find yourself in a dark, blank place, dominated by a huge, dead monster, building sized, as big as a tower. Each of its enormous heads that you can see laid out before you is easily the size of a ballroom. There is blood on its lips and nostrils, blood crusted around its empty eye-sockets, but there is a feeling of hollowness about it. On second thought, you're not quite sure if it's a corpse or a moult.

There is no sign of the stairs you vaguely remember climbing. You are standing on the surface of some opaque black liquid. It feels almost completely solid under your feet, springy, but your footsteps leave ripples spreading out in rings... all around you is a velvety, impenetrable darkness. The only thing you can see is the vast, lifeless beast in front of you, illuminated as if by spotlights, though no actual light-source can be found.

Its orifices are mostly clogged with blood, but somehow, as you stare at it, one vaulted nostril on the wolf's head begins to seem like an archway... the lolling tongue hanging out of the rhinoceros's head like an entry ramp... the exposed, hollow eye-socket on the eagle's head like a portal...

Of course, if you're not quite ready to step inside a monster, you could keep walking around its body and see what you find.

Comments

[aluminumfoil]

You'd better be okay! You're too light!! When did you last wash your hair?!

[myhungryass]

"I don't remember. It's fine, Falin will make me wash it... I'll be okay." He presses his face against Kabru's neck. He truly smells so bad. "You already know I'll be okay."

[aluminumfoil]

[he smells so bad. does not put him down. just walks along the caravan carrying him hefted tightly, like the worlds gangliest koala.]

... Alright...

What should I do?...

[myhungryass]

"You have to go find Leonard Miller, Caterpillar, right?"

[aluminumfoil]

[and he knows about that,]

You're my top priority. If this is about you, he's probably fine. He said he was at a big, tasty gem?

[myhungryass]

The conversation only happened on the other side of the wagon... it's not that big a wagon...

"A tasty gem...? I'd like to try that."

[aluminumfoil]

[IT FEELS... LIKE A PORTAL...]

Of course. ...Do you know how I get there?

[myhungryass]

"If you go back into the wagon with your eyes tightly closed, it'll take you back outside. Then you can follow his route."

[aluminumfoil]

Okay.

[He puts him down, but gathers both his hands and squeezes them tight.]

I'm gonna find you, and I'm gonna fall for you so hard I'll look like an idiot.

[myhungryass]

"No, you'll look beautiful and cool." He gives Kabru a grin. Even now, it looks a lot more tired than it did on the kid's face, or even the way it looks in Tributary... but he sounds so sincere.

[aluminumfoil]

[He'll just die on the spot. He knows he desperately needs to see more of this place, find out what he should do, and also probably find Leonard. But it's still hard to tear himself away from the Laios in front of him. He kisses him firmly right on his grimy mouth!]

[myhungryass]

He tastes so bad, but he kisses back with desperate longing, shivering against Kabru.

[aluminumfoil]

I'll find you.

[retreats to the caravan!!]

[myhungryass]

If he closes his eyes and steps into the wagon... he'll find that he's actually stepping back out the side of the snake, onto the dark water.

[aluminumfoil]

[...!!!

Runs to the front!! staring up at the giant beast as he goes.]

This big?! This big?!

[myhungryass]

It is Too Big.

The other three heads face him just as before.

[aluminumfoil]

[FINE!!! THE THINGS I WILL DO FOR THIS MAN!!!!!!

he CLIMBS INSIDE THE APEX RHINO MOUTH.]

[myhungryass]

The tongue is a little spongy underfoot, but it makes a surprisingly good ramp. As he steps between the monster's teeth, the smell of blood gets heavier and stronger... but also more appetizing.

His stomach growls. His mouth floods with saliva. It smells good in here. As he walks into the red cavern of its mouth, he'll only grow hungrier.

[aluminumfoil]

[Holy shit. He gulps. He's Scared, but a weird excitement jolts in his gut. Fine, if it smells good and he's this hungry, that's better than fear. He pushes forward.]

[myhungryass]

Strangely, it's better lit in here than it was outside. The walls of the mouth are vivid pink and red, the clear pathway down the esophagus easy to see.

As soon as he steps up to it, there's an enormous gulp, all around him, and he's swallowed. There's nothing he can do. One moment he's pushing carefully forward, and the next he's sliding helplessly, rushing along, squeezed down by that powerful contraction of muscle, slick fluid making it impossible to find purchase.

As he's dragged along, a memory washes over him.

He lands with a thump in a dark, cavernous space, on a flagstone floor. Before him are three large archways. Between him and the archways sits a familiar figure.

Congratulations, you found your doppleganger. He is almost cross-legged, one knee up with the foot planted on the floor. There's a slightly dangerous light in his blue eyes. Also, there's a big ol' hickey on his neck and he is not wearing a shirt.

He doesn't speak, but he gives an ironic little wave.

[aluminumfoil]

[SCREAMS WHEN SWALLOWED!!! cuts off at Falin memory.

there's -- me?!]

Holy shit.

[myhungryass]

He shrug-nods, like, yeah man, I feel you. "Are you looking for Leonard?"

[aluminumfoil]

Uh... yeah.

Why am I... uh, you... in here?

[myhungryass]

"Because Laios wants you, Kabru."

That sense of appetite hasn't faded one bit.

[aluminumfoil]

Oh.