2020-02-03 - The Secret Basement

Tonight's destination is Two If By Sea, after dark.

With special dispensation from on high (ie. its current owner, Easton Marshall), the last person to lock up has been instructed to let Isabella and Alexander in before doing so; patrons have been kicked out, the tables wiped down and the chairs flipped over and set upon them in the way normal bars and restaurants clean up for the night. It isn't long until they're left to their own devices, and without the brighter lights and constant hubbub and drunken revelry that tend to fill these rooms whenever open, the building is a completely different animal in the dead of night - wood creaks ominously as winter winds forces it to settle on its foundations, bits of sand blown from the surf leaving popping sounds against the windows when thrown against them.

At least it's warm inside; an active kitchen would do that, the scent of just-fried tater tots still lingering in the air, someone's last snack before heading off into the dark, wherever it leads him or her.

Isabella's clad in her lightweight runner's hoodie, weatherproofed for the darker months, with her black thermal leggings tucked into sturdy snowboots. Her hair is left loose, her style over the winters, and inquisitive green-and-gold eyes take in their surroundings in an attempt to acclimate herself with this version of the bar. She has mittens on, warm and worn - the kind that could be peeled back to reveal fingerless gloves underneath. Her cheeks are still flushed from the cold outside, drawn by one of the only two ways that consistently brings out heightened color on her. "...this building looks a lot different when it's dark," she tells Alexander quietly, scanning the walls and floors.

"It looks lonely," Alexander says, quietly, voice hushed as if they were trespassing, even though they have permission. He's dressed in a heavy sweater in a faded black, dark jeans, and his stompy work boots, with his green jacket thrown on for extra layers. "Places that are meant to be filled with people always do, when they're empty." It doesn't stop him from snooping, though. He immediately goes behind the bar and starts poking around through bottles, and behind the bar. It doesn't seem like he's looking for anything in particular; he's just looking.

Lonely. "We'll go with that," Isabella tells him with a smile, following him towards the bar. There's a wistful look towards the row of bottles behind it, and at the moment, being too close to it seems like a bad idea from her perspective, so she gestures towards the back room. "I'll start over there," she says, towards Easton's office, before she proceeds to do just that. In the dark, skulking around an empty bar in a creepy, haunted town, there's absolutely no hesitation in the archaeologist at all in haring off by herself, her slender form limned by light but ultimately swallowed in shadow the further she moves in.

"I tried looking at old building permits and blueprints, but the ones City Hall's got has no indication as to where this thing might be." Her voice drifts from the side. As always, she defaults to research first, and powers as a last resort. "So I suppose we're going to have to do this the hard way."

The floors behind the bar creak strangely under Alexander's more significant weight; there's the occasional hollow thump, but if he looks and inspects the boards, there doesn't seem to be too much of an indicator that there had been something there before.

Or is there?

"If it has to do with something...odd, it probably wouldn't. The local government gets remarkably obscure when anything to do with the Veil, or the Asylum, or our abilities ends up on the table." Alexander's voice is rough with frustration at the admission. He pokes and prods, until he notices the different sounds his feet are making on the floor. "Isabella." He goes to his knees, and starts knocking, trying to feel out the size and shape of the hollowness, and look for any signs of a hidden trap door.

"Hope springs eternal that something slips through the cracks now and then." He sounds frustrated, but Isabella sounds cheerful, at least - she finds the chase just as thrilling, and considering the fact that major archaeological finds take years of searching, it's probably a blessing that she does. When called, however, she moves towards the bar, peeking over the counter to watch the investigator get on the floor to start knocking.

It isn't consistent; the thumps are solid up until a patch here and there, and they sound small. The flooring, however, is pristine - someone took plenty of care to make it consistent throughout. The signs of a really good contractor, perhaps.

The young woman sighs. "The hard way it is," she says, before she slips around the counter to start assisting his hunt. As he pokes at the floors, she gets down on one knee, to feel with her fingers over the ridges of the boards, and underneath the cabinets. "There's definitely something underneath, I can feel it," she murmurs to him. "But it's not...there might be a switch somewhere."

"I wonder how they do it," Alexander muses, even as he feels around on the floor. "There must be some ability denied to us, something like remote viewing. And then someone to keep watch on anything that might surface. Maybe prognostication?" He frowns.

He frowns as they don't find a handle, immediately, but nods to Isabella's suggestion. He sits back on his heels and studies the area thoughtfully. "If I were hiding a switch, where would I do so?" He starts searching, methodically and relying on his experiences of people trying to hide criminal evidence. Hidden rooms are dens of iniquity!

"That would be a little frightening to contemplate," Isabella tells him quietly. "We already know most things are possible here, if we're denied access to that kind of foresight, leaving it to the exclusive use of someone or something else..." She exhales a breath and shuts a cabinet. "Nothing here, we should look at the rest." She starts on the next cabinet.

Their search leads to nothing for a good hour, though they know that this is the area where they ought to be concentrating, given the young woman's sense of space and the hollow somethings that Alexander has managed to detect. Finally, whenever they're possibly on the verge of giving up, and perhaps to prevent Isabella from reaching for Easton's tools with that dangerous look in her eye, the investigator manages to find it. One of the boards, whenever he goes back to check it, manages to give - he needs to press it in, before sliding it inward to reveal a heavy iron ring underneath - the kind that needs to be twisted, and then lifted, and then pulled.

"A little?" Alexander grins. "It scares the piss out of me. More than a little. But it's the only thing I can think of, unless I want to accept a massive, wide-ranging conspiracy that allows some organization or organizations over there to have moles in almost every lab, newspaper, and archives on the West Coast. It was Yule and August's experiences that really started me thinking about it - how would they know that such samples had been sent? Hell, how would they know that when August requested a new MRI it was for this purpose, and not just because he's a man with a lot of injuries who needs regular checkups? They must have some information system - and for once, 'magic powers' fulfills the Razor better than 'endless sea of lackey informants'." He rambles more in this vein as they search, with occasional forays into actual conspiracy theories, wondering if some of the might be how people without Glimmer rationalize having run into the Veil's spooky information services.

He's actually kind of enjoying himself, but he still lets out a huff of pleased air as he finds that odd board. He slides it to reveal the ring. Then stops. "This is very...secure. And it's Gray Harbor. Isabella, let me go first. For all we know, this is where the last guy who owned this place hid all his victims."

"Just a little. A tiny bit." Isabella lifts her thumb and forefinger, squeezing the air in between until the space between is minuscule, but good-humor lights up her eyes and transforms them into catlike beacons in the dark. "Though if you're looking for a conspiracy, Gray Harbor isn't that big - it's not like Seattle or Los Angeles or New York, everyone talks to everyone else, whether townie or outsider, and it probably wouldn't be all that difficult to have a mole in each of the major organizations here. Though your point about August's situation is sound, but..." There's a pause, and she looks up from where she's kneeling. "...maybe the funeral put all of us in someone's radar?" she wonders. "What if, because of the summer past, everyone who attended or who even looked like they had something to do with it ended up on someone's wall? Kind of a rogues gallery for the weird?"

She would say more, but forgets to do so when Alexander finally hits paydirt. "Yes," she whispers, a full blown grin playing on her mouth, so excited and so sharp that it gleams a brilliant white and cuts through the shadows like a knife. She is already reaching out for the ring, to grab it and twist it, but before she pulls, she hesitates and flashes him an amused look.

"I feel like even if I protested, the moment this thing opens, you'll be diving right in anyway before I could even take a step in that direction," she tells him dryly, but fondly. "Fine. Just this once, and only because I think you're devastatingly attractive when you're being protective." And with that, she pulls the hatch up and open; they'd find that the floorboards are constructed so carefully to perfectly camouflage the door Alexander has managed to find, revealing a yawning, black space underneath, years of dust kicking upwards and a draft washing outward, brushing their skin. A flight of rickety wooden steps caked in dust extends down to the bowels of the building.

"It's not just Gray Harbor, though. August and Yule explicitly sent their various requests out of town. And you were originally trying to get records from the state archives when we got invited to the Veil City Hall. Before the funeral." Alexander sits back on his heels and frowns. "It's just something to keep in mind, is all. I'm sure we're on a variety of watch lists. Or shit lists. Hopefully not hit lists," he adds, with a flash of humor.

When she says what she does about his protective nature, he chuckles...but doesn't deny it. "Thank you for not making me dive down there, though. Falling down the stairs isn't a great way to start a spooky treasure hunt." He stands and reaches for his phone, activating the flashlight app. "Okay. I'll go down first, but I'm counting on you to back me up. And if anything tries to eat me, please pull me back," he adds - only half joking, despite his smile.

"Maybe our requests don't actually make it out of town," Isabella says after a long, contemplative silence over Alexander's counterpoint. "We already know there's a complicated bureaucracy operating on the other side. At this point, though, I'm not ruling anything out."

When thanked for not spurring him into doing something drastic, resignation falls on her expressive face. "Yeah, well, I'm not going to lie to you, that's the other reason why I'm letting you go first and you're not going to be able to run away from whatever's down there if you break both your legs." Her expression does soften when she continues, "Be careful, and don't worry, if anything tries to eat you, it's dead." She leans over to kiss him. "Good luck."

The stairs manage to thankfully bear up his weight when he descends, the beam of his smartphone's flashlight catching objects within. It isn't a small space, but rather it's a hidden room that hasn't seen much light in decades. There's a desk, an old chair and empty cabinets. Dust is thick, and breathing too deeply within would probably leave him coughing and gagging, but one doesn't have to be a genius detective to realize what it is that he's stumbled into.

It's an office, and one with extremely dated furniture, possibly turn of the century or a decade or so after that. There's an old oil lamp situated on the desk, and its details are largely engulfed in shadow - they're going to need more light to mine it for its secrets, but at least nobody is getting eaten. Nothing jumps out at Alexander in the dark, so there's that.

Alexander coughs and hacks as dust comes up and around his feet, making its way to his nose along with stale air too long confined. His eyes water, but he stays alert as he carefully moves down, sweeping the light around to see where the ambush is likely to come from. When there isn't one, he relaxes a little bit. "Seems clear." A pause. "Not clear. Dusty as hell. But it looks like some sort of office. There's an oil lamp down here, so maybe early nineteen hundreds? Could use more light," he calls up to her, before starting to prowl around. He leaves the desk for the moment, giving Isabella time to descend as he checks out the rest of the space for clues. Or horrible monsters.

There are quick thumps that suggests that Isabella is hurrying down, albeit a little later than anyone would expect from her. There's a TIBS matchbook in her hand, and she, too, coughs when she gets a whiff of the air within. "What the hell?" she murmurs, relying on the investigator's light as she takes in the space. "Why would there be an office down here when there's a perfectly good room for it upstairs?"

She moves for the desk and the oil lamp, the telltale hint of chemicals and sparks in the air when she strikes a match and uses the lamp. As she works on getting them more light, with Alexander prowling around for clues, he would find an old, yellowed piece of newsprint tacked on the east wall, dated sometime in 1910, but the headline of the Gray Harbor Gazette would probably take up the lion's share of his attention:

BILLY THE GHOUL CAPTURED BY GRAY HARBOR SHERIFF

"For secrets and skullduggery, of course." Alexander hums to himself as he explores. "Anything from smuggling to labor organizing to strike busting to mass murder could always use a nice, secret place. Or just plain old crooked bookkeeping - but that's not nearly as exc-" He breaks off as the light brightens in the room and his eyes light on that old sheet of newsprint. "Look at that." A sad little laugh. "We're never getting away from this guy, are we?"

It doesn't stop him from moving forward and checking out the article, as well as looking for any other unusual wall coverings. "So, we know it was in use in 1910, at least. And this is where you guys got sucked into that recreation of the showdown, wasn't it? Maybe there was a reason William came here to make his last stand."

The newsprint is all that remains on the wall and what's strange about it is that it details Billy the Gohl's capture by way of shootout - at Chuck's By the Sea, but what is written on it is exactly what happened in the dream that Isabella, Isolde, Bennie, Easton and the rest have been pulled in, including the purported victims of the shootout, though no details as to the exact identities of these.

As Alexander takes a closer look at it, he'd find that his companion is strangely silent through his observations and quips. The lamplight is also moving, followed by a quiet: "Alexander." There's a hint of urgency, also.

Should he look over, he'd find the young archaeologist at the very back of the room, the oil lamp held aloft in her hand by its handle and her head tilted up. She is standing in front of a black door, wedged right up against that very wall, with its ornate knob and an equally ornate lock. She is busily inspecting its markings with her eyes, her shadow flickering by the way flame dances within the receptacle in her hand.

"...you might be right," she tells him. "About Billy choosing this location for his last stand - he might've known about this. I don't think this was his office, though, or anything....presumably he was already captured when that article was hung up." There's a glance over her shoulder at him. "What do we know about the prior owner? When Billy was at the bar with Isolde and me, he was calling Easton 'Chuck'. Was this his secret office?" But there's a more important question in her eyes.

A question, probably, about the placement of the door, because it makes no sense and by all rights, really shouldn't be here.

"This doesn't seem quite--" Alexander breaks off again when Isabella speaks, turning to face her. The door is studied, and he moves quickly to her side, flashing his flashlight on it. "Yeah, that makes sense. I wonder who this," he makes a grimace of distaste, "'Chuck' was, anyway." The door is stared at. "If this leads to a massive baby, I'm going to be a bit worried." A pause. "But here's another interesting question - why would information about this place be hidden in the Asylum, of all places? Did William do it? A guidepost to anyone who came after? Or...I don't know." But what he does know is that he's stepping forward to try the door knob.

The door is locked. It jiggles, the metal dusty and cold in Alexander's grip. But it doesn't budge.

"...a massive baby? Like the one Mister Carver was keeping in his house?" Isabella wonders, watching him attempt to get the door open. "There were three locations in the clockface I remember, but this is the only one that I've managed to track down, so far." And at the cost of something precious, though she doesn't know it. "And that's a good question, I don't know if it's because of Gohl, but all the details we're accumulating seem to point to the possibility that his connection to the place might be a part of it." She smiles humorlessly towards Alexander, a hint of apology it. "Maybe we really can't get away from this guy, after all."

She reaches into her pocket, and pulls out a key. The Key.

"I asked Easton if I could borrow it, just in case," she tells him. "I thought maybe I was going to need his Key to get into the secret basement, if we managed to find it, but now I'm thinking..." She toys with it, and eyes the lock. "...that we have a decision to make. See where this leads, or come back with an army, and then see where it leads." Her eyes lift to meet his dark ones. "You're the one looking for someone," she reminds, quietly. "I'll follow your lead." A pause. "Except telling me to stay behind, because that's not happening." Followed by the familiar, stubborn tilt of her jaw, expression set determinedly.

"I don't think he was keeping it in his house. I think it was behind a door. Like," Alexander waves at THIS door. He gives her a sidelong look, that turns more open as she pulls out the key. He studies the key, and then the door. There's a grunt. "The responsible, logical thing would be to gather a group and come back to explore what's behind that door...and, that's probably what we should do," Alexander allows, after a moment. "We've gotten torn up too badly for going off half-cocked, of late. I'd rather we not turn into the town's next casualties. Easton and Byron, perhaps. And Bennie, if she's feeling up for it. She's got medical training that doesn't rely on Glimmer, in case we get fucked by something that doesn't want us using abilities." A glance to her, one eyebrow raised.

There's a befuddled look when Alexander lifts an eyebrow at her. "I said I'd follow your lead," Isabella says with a small frown, in case he had doubted that, and slips the Key back into her pocket. "That sounds like a solid line-up to me." There's a note of wistful curiosity there, because there is some part of her that wants to crack it open and take a peek - but she's still recovering from everything else and she doesn't want to get anyone killed because she's less than a hundred percent, or be a liability. She turns away from him then, to take another long, scrutinizing glance over the walls and the article that's still pinned up on the wall, her expression thoughtful.

"It gives me time to think over some things also," she tells him quietly. "I feel like there's something I ought to be giving more consideration over." She taps her fingernail absently on the oil lamp, chewing quietly on her bottom lip, before she shakes her head and tilts it towards him. "Shall we get out of here?"

Alexander blinks a couple of times. "Hm? No, that's not - I don't think you're going to charge in there of your own accord, Isabella. Promise." He places a hand over his heart and smiles. There a thoughtful nod. "Sounds like a plan. Shut this place back up for a bit, do our research, and see if those three are crazy enough to wander through the door to nowhere with us. At least we should be able to put together an exploration pack by then," he adds, with a grin. He rubs at his head, and coughs a few more times - the dust really is terrible. Then he starts heading out of the basement, although he watches Isabella carefully in case something jumps out of the shadows.

"Sounds good, I'd rather we have at least one standard exploration pack with us, though I think Yule still needs to talk to Itzhak about developing chalk grenades," Isabella tells him with a quick smile at his dramatic gesture, though there's another longing look towards the door. "I hope you know how herculean my willpower feels at the moment." The last is a quiet grouse as she starts following after him, expression shifting to fondly exasperated at the wary look he's giving her and the shadows that slide over her frame. She reaches over to try and give him a playful push towards the stairs. "It's fine!" she laughs. "We're leaving without incident, and seriously, we should count this as a win. How often does that happen, really?"

"Very rarely," Alexander admits. "But yes. We should have supplies. And weapons. And notebooks - if we end up in the Asylum again, I want us to take as many notes as we can manage, in as many ways as we can devise. I'm not sure how they're affecting our memory, but surely there's some medium that has escaped their grasp-hey!" He stumbles a little as she gives them that playful shove, then grins, and starts climbing up out of the basement. "You're a wicked woman, Isabella Reede."

"It would have to be analog. Pencil and paper." Isabella lets him climb back up and out of the basement, before she follows, her hand securely on the rickety banister as she starts climbing up and out. "We still cross over whenever we end up there, so it stands to reason it'll operate by Veil rules when it comes to recording things - I haven't been able to take a successful picture yet, whether by film or digitally and I haven't tried audio yet, but considering the fact that we're not about to make visits to the Asylum a habit with the way it screws with memory, we probably shouldn't chance it." The breath of fresh air that she manages to find at the top is a welcome one, and she inhales deeply. She reaches for the hatch of the secret basement, to close it up and twist the iron ring. "And if that's your barometer for wicked, do I want to know how you'd describe me in the instances when I'm actually trying?" Her trickster's grin lances in his direction, skewering him mercilessly with it.

"That's what I figure, as well. I've never had any luck with recording anything. But who knows, maybe someone else will have an idea," Alexander says, with a shrug. He waits for her to close up the bar. "And, bonus points: We didn't cause any structural damage to Easton's place. I was entirely expecting the bar to be on fire," he admits, not even half joking. And at that trickster's grin, he can't resist sliding up to her and pulling her in for a kiss. "Fascinating? Enthralling? Exquisite?" he offers as suggestions for describing Isabella. Then, just as quickly, he's released her and is stepping back. "Want to grab Thai on the way back to the house, then?"

"Honestly? I was determined not to set TIBS on fire. E trusted me not to get into too many shenanigans when I asked him for permission, I'm not about to cause him a conniption on top of everything," Isabella laughs. "But knowing me? And knowing you? And knowing the two of us together, that was definitely a possibility so I carefully made myself aware as to where the emergency hatchet and fire extinguisher were the moment we walked in." She would probably continue on that vein, but he distracts her easily enough, returning his kiss with youthful enthusiasm. "Enthralling? Oh my. Keep that up and we're staying here for another hour-- "

But he's already stepping back when he's released her quickly, and there's a hint of disappointment there. "Or not?" She tilts her head at him. "But Thai's a passable substitute. Finding secret basements in old turn-of-the-century buildings always makes me peckish."

Alexander laughs. "I'm not having sex in Easton's bar," he tells her with amusement. "I adore you, and I love you, but if Easton found out, we'd never live it down. Ever. Plus," he gives a delicate shudder, "no one needs the emotional residue of a thousand drunk tourists cluttering up their brain space when they're trying to focus on something more beautiful." He offers her an arm. "But your unexpected exhibitionist streak is noted, Ms. Reede. We'll have to find a suitable venue for it."

She must be an extremely strange creature indeed, because when Alexander calls it beautiful, waves of embarrassment pull from his young lover and she's suddenly very interested in the wall behind him. "E would pretty much bring it up every time I came back here, so I can't say that assertion is wholly inaccurate," Isabella allows despite the growing color of one of her unicorn blushes making itself prominent on her cheekbones. But with the offered arm, she does step forward, looping hers around his. "Besides, I was j-- "

Your unexpected exhibitionist streak is noted, Ms. Reede.

"What?!" she cries; the quip is so unexpected that it draws a sudden laugh out of her. "One offhand comment does not an exhibitionist make, and just because I didn't shut the drapes once before I attacked you doesn't mean I'm..." And then there was the Jeep in Thanksgiving. She pauses, falling very very quiet as she reassesses these past encounters, and coughs when he continues on about finding a suitable venue.

"Insufficient data," she declares instead, using his words, pressing a kiss on his cheek as they move for the door, laughter imprinting on his skin. "Which I believe requires a thorough testing of your latest hypothesis, Mister Clayton." She toes the door open at that. "Very thorough."