#her friends not being together. The only one with a really strained past is Saki who spent her 'prime years' in a hospital | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

neyla9 · 6 years

Text

Cipher’s House: Fallen Star Chapters 20-22

Ao3 Version

I think I’ve gone insane. There is no way this place can be real… No, I have to stay strong. My brother is trapped somewhere here, and if I don’t find him… I won’t even think about what might happen to both of us…

Mabel ran. At that point, it was all she could do. She had to find Cipher’s room so she could finish her deal with Saki. Then, she’d find her brother, somehow, and they’d escape this living hell.

When she arrived at a staircase, she leaned against the railing for a moment, trying to catch her breath, before proceeding to climb the stairs. She came face to face with a door; it looked so much different from all the other doors, like it didn’t belong in this hotel. It was made from dark, almost black wood, and it lacked a number plaque, instead it just had some weird pattern carved into it.

Mabel carefully opened the door, poking her head inside. Inside was a short hallway, three doors on each side, with the hallway ending in a final seventh door. The seventh door had a golden pattern similar to the one she had just gone through. It only made sense that the souls would be hidden behind that door, so Mabel ran to it, trying to open it, only to find it locked. She heard footsteps from behind the door; they sounded panicking. She then heard the sound of someone running up the stairs.

Panicking, Mabel ran to one of the other doors, ripped it open, and hid inside, praying that whoever was coming wouldn’t find her.

Luckily, she heard the footsteps walk right past her and open what she was pretty sure was the door she had tried to open.

“Is everything alright!?” she could hear a muffled voice ask; it sounded worried, scared even. She couldn’t hear the response, but it didn’t seem to soothe the other person’s worries. “What?!” they exclaimed.

There was the sound of another door opening, and someone else speaking; “It was me, Bill. I wanted to give you an important message, and I thought you were in your room.”

“Well? What is it?” the first speaker asked, and now that Mabel knew it was Bill, she felt even more scared than before; she seriously doubted Bill would forgive her for breaking into what appeared to be his home.

“Our guest decided to leave,” the other person said. “Guess she gave up on finding her brother.”

“What!?” Bill exclaimed. Mabel could faintly hear someone respond to his outburst, but it seemed to be the person who had been in the room Mabel tried to break into; the one Mabel couldn’t clearly hear. “Will, keep Pine Tree in your room; guard him with your life. If anything happens to him while I’m gone…”

He didn’t finish his sentence, but even Mabel could feel his threatening gaze. There were more sounds of footsteps along with more doors opening and closing. Mabel waited for a couple of seconds with bated breath before she dared to go back into the hallway.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The hallway was abandoned once again. I don’t know who the two people Cipher spoke to was, but… One of them was either seriously misinformed or, the somehow more likely solution, they covered for me…

Mabel decided to try the door she had originally wanted to go through; it was no longer locked and, as she poked her head inside, it was empty. The room was golden and black in color, and basically looked like a normal bedroom; a very fancy and expensive bedroom to be fair, but still. There was a king-sized bed, a violin lying on said bed, a dresser, a desk and office chair, both of which was covered in papers and documents, in front of the door was a big mirror, a low table underneath it, with two ceramic pots growing flowers; the room was also decorated with some potted plants. Cipher hadn’t seemed like the caring type of guy, but maybe he acted differently to plants than his hotel guests.

She walked over to the desk and began to look through the various papers; at first she was curious what they were, but then she realized that they were all related to the hotel. There were work schedules, lists of activities and arrangements, maintenance notes; they looked like they could have belonged to a normal hotel. Then, after digging through various notes, she found stacks of papers that were different; they looked almost like… police files or public records.

The first one she picked up had a picture of a young man with a strained smile. Then there were pages on pages describing what appeared to be his life, specifically how he had been verbally abused by his mother for playing with dolls, how that had led to issues socializing with others, how that had turned him into a hermit, and so on, escalating until the last page described how he, in a fit of rage, had murdered his mother by stabbing her repeatedly with a knife, then attempted to… sew her back together, and when it didn’t work, the file simply said: “He could no longer face reality.”

Mabel looked through some of those other files, and they were all the same; from early childhood they would describe how certain events led to others, eventually escalating to some kind of tragedy, and then ending with the words saying that they “could no longer face reality”.

She clutched her head in her hands. What did all of this mean? Who were these people? How did Cipher have such detailed files on their lives? And why did they all end the same way?

It was then that Mabel spotted another file, hidden between the various papers strewn about. She could only see part of the picture poking out, but there was no doubt about it; that was a picture of her. She hesitated for a moment, but forced herself to pick up the file and read it.

It had her name, her age, her birth date. It detailed how she and her brother had been friends since they were born. How they had always considered each other their best friend. How Dipper had excelled in school, and Mabel had grown jealous. How said jealousy had caused her to seek away from her brother, getting new friends. How when Dipper had begun to struggle in school, Mabel had been secretly happy. How Mabel had still tried to help her brother, but had eventually given up and convinced herself that her brother was just lazy and didn’t try hard enough. How she had abandoned her brother when he needed her the most to pursue her own social life. How her brother had stopped answering her scarce phone calls and messages after his exam. How after he came back, he got his grades back, and learned he had failed. How Mabel had told him to just try harder. How her brother had gone quiet once again. How a suicide note had been found in his dorm room. The file ending such: “Realizing she had caused her brother’s death, she could no longer face reality.”

Mabel let go of the file. It had been right. Mabel couldn’t deny it any longer. She knew now why she was in this hotel, and why she was being tormented like this; she had killed her brother. She curled into a ball on the chair and started rocking herself back and forth, crying softly.

“Are you really gonna give up like that?” a voice asked from behind her. Mabel turned around and almost screamed at who she thought was Bill, but she realized it wasn’t Bill, just someone who looked a lot like him.

“Who are you?” Mabel asked, drying away a tear.

“My name is Will,” he responded. “You know now why you’re here?” he nodded towards the various papers and files.

“Because I killed my brother,” Mabel sobbed.

“No!” Will shouted. “Come on! It literally says it in every single file!”

Mabel blinked her tears away, mostly because sorrow was getting replaced with confusion.

Will picked up Mabel’s file, which was still on the last page, and used a finger to underline the last sentence.

“I can’t… face reality?”

“You couldn’t face the fact that your brother was dead,” Will confirmed. “But it seems like you’re able to now, which is… interesting.” He got a pondering look on his face.

“I need to know one thing,” she paused and tried to brace herself for the answer. “Did my brother ever… end up here?”

“… Yes,” Will responded. “I actually thought he’d be the first to escape, but… he came back. And now, he’s dead.”

“So… he came back because he couldn’t face reality either,” Mabel nodded to herself. Now she knew what had happened to her brother; after everyone, including Mabel, had pushed him away, he had decided he would rather return to the hotel and die there, than face reality.

“Don’t blame yourself,” Will said and put a comforting hand on her shoulder. “This hotel has taken so many souls; it’s to blame.”

“No,” Mabel shook her head and stepped away from Will. Her voice was hoarse with emotions, but her expression was steadfast and stern. “I am not going to lie to myself any longer. If I had been a better sister, my brother wouldn’t have died. But that doesn’t mean this place doesn’t share some of the blame. I am going to leave this place, but not before I destroy it, so it can never hurt anyone again.”

“Wow,” Will looked at her in shock, but slowly a smile crept on to his face. “Yes,” he nodded. “That could work… In one of the hotel’s hallways, there’s a jar containing The Eternal Flame. If you let it lose, it can burn down the entire hotel. But you have to promise to never return to hotel, otherwise it won’t work.”

“Okay, but first, I have one last piece of unfinished business; Saki saved my life, and in exchange I promised to bring her one of Cipher’s souls… Also, how do I find that Eternal Flame?”

“Follow me,” Will led her out of the room and through another door, which led to an enormous room filled with shelves upon shelves of jars with different colored lights inside. Will surveyed them before grabbing one and rearranged the others, so that it was less obvious one had been taken. “Here.”

Will handed Mabel the jar. “Give this one to Saki. And don’t worry about finding her or The Eternal Flame; this hotel has a habit of showing people exactly what they want to see…”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I know now why I’m here. I can choose to either give up and receive my punishment for letting my brother die, or I can make sure that no one will ever suffer because of this hotel, again.

Wandering through the hallways, it didn’t take long before Mabel arrived at a hotel door different from the others; like the door to Cipher’s home, it lacked a number plaque and was also more fancy than the other doors, albeit not to the same degree as Cipher’s.

Mabel knocked on the door and it didn’t take long before it opened. Saki’s head poked out and, as soon as she saw the jar with the soul, she snatched it out of Mabel’s hands and popped opened the lid.

“Oh! I’ve waited so long for this,” she said with an almost orgasmic delight. She plucked the soul out of the jar using her thumb and forefinger, and proceeded to lick and suck on it while making obscene sounds.

“Um… I’m just gonna go now,” Mabel said and began to shuffle away.

“Mhm, sure,” Saki nodded between her moans and headed back inside her room. Mabel wondered how long that soul would even last…

As Mabel began to traverse the hallways once more, hoping to find that Eternal Flame that Will had mentioned, she heard that familiar song from behind her, slowly getting louder; “Do you know who I am? They call me Judgement Boy~”

#billdip #cipher's house #cipher's house au

2 notes · View notes