Xaviers!

Miriam had been wallowing in self-pity for a solid week, which was very easy to do when her 'sleep' schedule meant she was automatically rather disconnected from everyone else. And she most certainly did not care to seek out help for her 'condition' if it meant risking bumping into Wanda at the Lighthouse on top of probably having pointed out what terrible affliction she's managed to take on. Add to that the almost certainty of getting yelled at by any number of people for the whole Will situation meant it was easy for her to hole up in her room and the relative safety of the thick curtains of her bed and a mini-fridge of blood-packs.

And of course the moment she runs out of 'food' is when reality decides to turn into a kaleidoscope, forcing her to poke her head out of her room, covered by a blanket she's wrapped around herself protectively in case of unpredictable windows or angles of sunlight. And she looks like a mess anyway, so the blow to her ego is preferable to the possibility of being burned as she wanders down the mish-mash of different hallways.


((open))

After some wandering to try to find her way out, Miriam would get the distinct feeling she was being watched, but if she attempted to pinpoint by whom with her mind, she would hear nothing at all, nor could she feel anyone near by that would be the source.

"I am not in the mood!" she shouts, before realizing she's yelling at empty hallways.

"Great, going crazy already..."

There was an extremely long pause of silence before another answered.

"....You're not crazy." A semi-familiar voice replies. Only semi, she and the voice hadn't spoken much.

"Not making a great case here, disembodied voice..."

"Sorry... I'm stuck like this.

Whatever the bloody hell this is."

"Right... Benson." she says and instead of sounding relieved bit if an edge creeps into her voice. "Why can't I feel your thoughts?"

Another pregnant pause."...

That's new. I don't know.

Not like there's anything you'd want to know about anyways though so no worries there eh?

What's with the blanket?"

"It'd make me feel less like I'm talking to myself." she mutters.

"And I have sensitive skin." she says, tightening the blanket around herself. She does look awfully pale to the point that here and there the tiny branches of blood-vessels show as vague criss-crossing shadows on her cheeks.

If Basil was her friend, he'd say she looked like shit. Instead of said-
"You do look ill. Anything I could do?"

"Yes, but you wouldn't like it. I need to find the exit, so I can get to the medical center."

"I've been wandering for some time now looking for Madame Rosenhof so we can get the hell out of here.

Shall we wander together for a spell? Two heads are better than one."

"I suppose. Which one is Colette? Maybe I can find her before you do."

"The pink one with the usually pear shaped figure and the bunches."

"Ah, yes, hard to miss that one. She's certainly... unique."

Basil of course caught the British politeness, but he wasn't bothering with that at the moment.

"Quite the reason I am concerned. I should have found her by now, even in a situation like this. She's not me, she's not exactly incognito."

"Have you tried going out a window instead of wandering around this House of Leaves?"

"Yes." Basil replied sounding more like he was speaking in his professional voice than his personal one. " The window dumped me into another hallway. One I was slightly less familiar with than this one."

"Well that's just bloody fantastic..."

"Indeed." Basil replied, a piece of chalk appearing at random from somewhere.

It marked an X on the wall as it passed.

"So, any other ideas?

My newest tactic is plotting my path as I go, but I've yet to come back on myself again."

Miriam's eyes focus on the chalk. At least it gives her something to look at. And a direction to lunge should she get really desperate...

Pushing the thought out of her mind she tries to focus on the current situation. "Have you checked any of the rooms proper?"

"I have tried checking the room numbered for her, but it's not hers.

I've tried a few of the others but frankly I wasn't much for what I found behind them."

"Well there's got to be a way out somewhere. Otherwise this'll get nasty right quick."

"But..." Basil hesitates.

"What if she's still in here somewhere? I can't just leave."

"Fine, I'll see if I can find her with my telepathy, but I'll need something from you if I'm going to keep wandering around her much longer..."

"What is it?"

Miriam is quiet for a moment. She hates the fact that she can't gauge Basil's reactions at all, neither in body language nor - much more importantly to her - mentally. It only adds to how weirdly vulnerable she's feeling.

"Blood." she finally says.

"Issss this some kind of magic voodoo malarkey? Did you become a disciple of Khorne and no one informed me?"

Basil seemed more concerned with why she needed it than the fact that she asked.

"You're pretty daft sometimes, aren't you? To drink." she says, pulling back her lips as she does to show the sharpened incisors. It'd be more threatening if she wasn't swaddled in a big comforter.

There was another one of those awkwardly long pauses of hos before he apoke again.

"Considering the headmistress entertains people who claim to be magic users, thinking you might want it as a reagent doesn't seem that far fetched somehow?

But insulting me will definitely get you fed." Basil sniped back, but there was still a distinct lack of 'no in his response.

"You want my help or not?"

"Sure, if you're not going to infect me. I've enough problems."

"Feeding isn't going to turn you. I am going to need some help finding your wrist though."

"... should I find something to cut myself with and drain it into a receptacle? Or you want me to just shove my arm in your mouth and you bite me?

I'll be honest, the second makes me... squeamish. It's... vaguely sexual, and I feel like the Madame wouldn't approve."

"I'm not drinking from a soda can again. Don't be so difficult, your blood is the only bodily fluid of yours I remotely care about."

"Mmmm perhaps, but Madame doesn't get to drain me of my bodily fluids, so why should you?"

Miriam makes an intentionally overdone face of disgust. "Sorry about your sex-life?"

"My point is, I don't harbor any particularly fondness for you or your gender, but what the bloody hell, I can hardly sink any lower. Let's find an empty water bottle..." she sighs.

"Never said she didn't trrryyyyy." Basil replied in an amused, sing-song tone in response to her appalled visage.

"Don't worry, I've something better than a discarded piece of garbage right here on my person.

I have nearly everything I'd need, save something sharp enough to cut myself with.

But I doubt breaking a window is to your liking."

Miriam wordless turns towards the closest door and walks into whoever's room it happens to be, grabs one of the chairs in there and unceremoniously chucks it through the window. Plucking a suitably sharp piece of glass from the window frame she steps back out into the hallway and presents it to, well, the thin air where she assume's Basil is.

"Well then...." Basil replied at her abruptness.

The glass shard floated, disembodied like as Basil found a place to sit.

First, she would see a blazer appear out of thin air and drop unceremoniously to the ground, then the sound of fabric being cut.

Things got really silent after that with some mild shuffling about, but after a moment she would see a liquid dumping over the makeshift blade and the distinctive smell of juniper filled the air with it's presence.

With a deft slicing motion, the smell of blood filled the air and the blood itself came into being from seemingly nowhere, and likewise disappeared into thin air, but if her patience held, Miriam would be rewarded with the vision of a flask of Basil's blood set neatly on the floor, with a few red finger print smudges on the exterior.

His blood was longer free flowing through limbo, but she couldn't yet see what stopped his bleeding.