Even on a calm day you could feel the Infinity Blade breathe. The figure currently standing on it knew its exhalations well, nights spent lying on top of it as one might a lover's chest to feel the slow, often almost absent rise and fall of its shared currents. The gust, then, was unusual, but in this instance not unexpected.
Rez waited for it to end, then took a deep breath. "I know. They're coming." Her head turned to gaze northwest across the Driftless. "It's showtime."
She rose then, her right hand gripping the hilt of the large knife at her hip. It was wrapped in coal-black leather with a pommel in the shape of a stylized raven's head, the chipped polish of her small hands slipping piecemeal into its shadows. With one stroke, she brought the knife out and forward, for a moment parallel to the Infinity Blade before the smaller blade and wrist curved down and to the left in its own tiny spiral. The move was dramatic, but would have been nothing more-- had the Infinity Blade not erupted in something that looked like pixel degradation before following the raven's curve.
The slide and curve were next, and then Rez was standing on the ground, the Infinity Room now far above Inspiration Point and the darkened café. "Huh. Two together are always going somewhere." Time was precious, but she took a moment to raise an eyebrow at the knife. "Imagine if we had three."
The door was locked, but the knife could cut as well as direct, and she slipped through the wound of shadow and noise as easily as she had bent the architecture, which healed with a similar swiftness but was not finished responding. The glitches and static were now following her down the hallway, twisting themselves into more stable ley lines of gold through the crimson carpet and its memory well of handprints.
Amber began to flow up from the cobwebbed floor below the walkways, its glow filling cracks between organ pipes and distillery gears that reasonably were connected to nothing at all. "What day is it?" She let her fingers run through the gold dust and shag as she spoke.
The currents bled into the frayed edges of her gloves and coat, fractal embroidery rushing into fabric, skin, and alongside the tracks of crimson in their silver coils before the trine-twisted grooves of chrome and oil slick installed in her back began to draw and direct the flow.
WEDNESDAY. TODAY IS WEDNESDAY.
"Thought so." The words were ritual but necessary; it was always Wednesday here. She stopped before the door to the Chalet of the Raven and brushed her fingers at the left corner of her lips, wiping the errant strand of gold ichor that had escaped them in the surge before entering. "Time to change into something less... uh. Leaky."
The Chalet was currently more of a closet, but such was the way of the House. Luckily the drywall and concrete weren't the point, but the thing hanging from the largest wall of the box was: a raven's skull, gargantuan in size, beak closed and eye sockets covered with a writhing black film that shimmered gold as it idly glid across the crags of its cheek and fissures of its skull-plains.
Their hands reached it just as the bass from outside picked up. The House was on schedule as well, and the time for talk was soon, but not now. With a last almost-human look towards the door, she lifted the corvid's headcase off the wall and put it on her own. When it hit their neck, the long grey hair snapped up into the head cavity as the film spread downs their form in deliberate waves, coalescing into an oil-slick jumpsuit, one shoulder covered in a mid-length cape that perched strangely at attention on her shoulder, less an accessory than a wing.
And in the left socket, a small red light began to hum and glow.
Now in proper work attire, Rez exited, and the great turbine began to groan and scrape against the floor, adding to the cacophony of steel and gold dancing against the walls. Smaller noises, too, that they had come to know after some time: the still-booming Mikado drummer, of course, but the distant, ominous whale song beneath carnival organs and xylophones. The murmur of the still porcelain lips as their joints creaked and turned, the bustle and tiny screams from the model circus and coaster, the rain of dust over a low whinny every time the horsemen had their interest piqued. Her path now circled beside the turbine and below the great Heart and its Eyes, though the upward spiral would not lead to quite that height.
What they did lead to was the Organ. Not a chandelier, but the grand console of the instrument itself. Its already-technicolor array of buttons and switches trembled and for a moment snapped in this world to Rez's sight of it: a seemingly infinite array of vivid lines, gates, and switches against endless dark; lines that twitched and bent as the blade at her side rose and began to hum with an impossible frequency. In seconds, it was a grand console once more, but curved in an almost complete circle of unmarred metal that saw blue sparks dancing across it and the gap. They entered the quicksilver capsule and let memory take over in the hands. The howling pipes around them were indeed not connected to the Organ, but that hardly meant that nothing was, and within seconds the buttons and sliders were in tonight's desired position. Below, the growing flood of light and sound from the Carousel seemed to indicate that the devils were, indeed, all here and had done their respective parts for the class project.
That said. It was a long way down, and out of the few things Rez had dodged, the wandering deal was one. She placed the Raven blade upon the console for a moment and considered the layered labyrinth of wrought iron and carpet before them. Maybe it was another loose remnant she'd have to edit, but the recollection of a certain lack of control over her initial exit lingered, and beyond even that, entrances were important. Arguably, reentrances even more so.
With that in mind, Rez again grabbed the knife, and flicked their wrist. In response, the gold flood of the room surged around the closest iron bridge, and it curved in a shatter of iridescent triangles much as the Infinity Blade had earlier. Here, though, there was no stopping: their feet had immediately followed the flick and glitch, leaping over the top of the console and on to the curving railing of the bridge. Not long enough, though, and not nearly enough fun. The wrist and blade slashed another arc to bend another walkway, sliding from the first as it snapped back to its original position. For a few moments more, the House played with its mischievous raven as she danced and flew with speed and reflexes that seemed almost clairvoyant. Actually, that was the nice thing about not dodging.
As it turned out, the best way to know the future really was getting your own out of the way. But the House and knife and her whims had finally placed Rez at the mouth of the Organ Room, and that future was probably getting impatient. She took a deep breath, then pulled the blade one last time, this time with the tip just touching her still-somewhat-writhing attire, and as it descended the film and skull disintegrated into dark shards and light, a red-gold corvid skull on their hip and the faintest glow of an LED's crimson still almost visible in her left eye.
"Fucking hell. One sec, one sec." She froze mid-step through the door and clenched her eyes, their free hand flailing for a certain coat pocket before pulling out a chunky pair of aviators lined with steel spikes and situating them on her face. "I don't get out much and that thing's blinding in every reality. I'd say we should consider solar, but."
Now that the Carousel was muted, they could finally see their guests: Ellis on the right, and V on the left. Well, both V's; but currently it was easy enough to differentiate between god and sword. "I could talk more, or we could all just introduce ourselves at once."
In response, Ellis slammed her scepter down on the stone floor, a familiar golden light starting to pulse at the site of impact. "Thank you, your majesty. Or perhaps mother." Leaving her grin unsuppressed, Rez turned to the pair. "And if it isn't my favorite sentient weapon rack. No need for formalities; do your thing."
It was rare that Nóttkeyrandi Hefnir ever truly looked like he wanted to say anything, but now was an exception. His blade, unsurprisingly, was less restrained.
"I know you know this, but it's worse when you're right." V rolled their eyes before dropping to one knee and rearing back their right fist. As it flew, the hand shuddered, and then snapped into an instant of red-hot blade before piercing the ground. Tyrfingr drank for a moment, and then retreated, leaving a golden wound to match Ellis' bruise.
Her turn, then. "Right. I assume you're all familiar with me, some overly so. Always nice to see you, V. But others I have known and not met, and it is to them I speak." As V had done, they dropped to one knee, using the raven blade one last time to enter the floor.
"I'm Rez. I am the Hávahol."
What was now a full triangle networked itself together with three forge-bright lines, and as the heat hit their spot on the floor, she twisted the knife and pulled back through the Beast's mouth towards the Heart.
"And I will be your Operator."
The network line flew deeper inside the Organ Room without further aid, and for a moment it was silent, if all too hot and blinding. But then she felt a change, a less scalding current of a red so deep it was nearly black entering it, and the lines around Rez steadied as her lips curled upward once more.
The Heart was singing along with the Carousel.
