The amount of buttons of the wall are... Astounding. None of them are labeled.

Luna does a fuckin eeny meeny miney mo on the various buttons, then just closes her eyes and picks one at complete random. "Hope this works?"

The door closes. It feels like the elevator is sinking. The elevator is going down. Takes a while. After a bit there's a faint ding! The door opens. Seems like an office building, but something feels off.

Luna steps off of the elevator and looks around. "What the fuck is this place? And why does it feel like something's really wrong here.... other than it coming from an elevator in the middle of the woods of course."

Otto walks out and looks around the place. There's a couple of papers but they're mostly redacted, the bits that aren't are just random words from what it seems. "Hey, uhh... Is this hell? Cuz a 9-to-5 is torture for me-"

Luna chuckles. "I guess for an enaturalist, a 9 to 5 office job would be a horrible hell." She continues walking around and tries to find something that could explain where they are. Or why this place feels off.

They immediately notice the walls. The way they're structured just feels... Weird. They're all over the place and some of them are going in and out slowly. There are no windows to be seen, even from a hallway to someone's office. There's barely any color too.

"Gods this place sucks. It's like whoever designed this building intended for its workers to suffer. Boring, drab, the structure makes no goddamn sense." In any case, she heads down that hallway to investigate the other office.

The office is a bit more decorated, there's a wooden table with a phone on it. There are some pictures which seem to have a human, but they look way too unsettling.

Otto's still in the first area. "Hey, uh, should we go to another floor?"

Luna shouts to Otto, "Yeah, sounds like a plan." Then walks over to them.

He goes inside the elevator and waits. Luna joins him. "Okay, your turn. Pick your favorite button."

"Bet, uh... This one." He presses a random button. The lift goes down.

After a bit it stops. This floor is different, the first thing you'd notice is a staircase to the left, the other is a sign with a couple of indicators.

She goes over to the sign and reads it. On it are directions to different locations on this floor

<--- Intersection

<--- Research Division

Hypnagogic Testing Initiative --->

Director's Board --->

"Hypnagogic Testing? I know it has something to do with sleep. Weird. Honestly, I kinda want to explore that. Otto, you down?" She turns to him.

"Yeah, sure...? Not liking the vibe of this place but... Eh.” He shrugs. “You wanna lead the way?"

"Sure." Luna takes a deep breath and leads the way to the Hypnagogic Testing Initiative.

Otto follows. The first thing that's seen is another sign, just pointing to the director's board. Theres a small section in here where they're able to see what seems to be a cell kinda. Soundproofing with a chair. That's it.

Otto looks around and finds a couple of documents. Mostly not redacted, shockingly.

"...you said this was about sleep yeah?"

"That's what Hypnagogic means unless my knowledge is wrong. It's like the period right before you fall asleep, the hypnagogic state."

"Yeah, I know, but... Uh... Just listen to this-" He reads the document aloud.

“The initial phases of the experiment depend on a subjects willpower. The weaker a subject, the better they are for the test. They are to be placed in the holding cell to test how long they are able to go without pleading to be let out. Depending on the results, either discard or proceed…”

"Secondary phase is redacted. Other stuff here is just experiment result shit." Otto explains.

"Oh gods, no thank you. That sounds awful. Alright, how about the director's board?" Luna asks.

"Sure...? Uh... I don't know, I have a weird feeling about this."

"You're telling me Otto. Everything about this place gives me really uncomfortable vibes. Would you rather try a different floor?"

"No, no. Let's just see if there's anything there I guess. Better have some info before leaving, don't wanna go back empty handed." Otto says before waiting for Luna to move forward

"Right." Luna heads over to the Director's board to continue her investigation.

Otto follows closely behind. The walls here are a bit more erratic in a sense. The door to the board is closed. She tries to open it and it opens up rather easily. The second Luna enters, the door closes behind her. Otto is stuck out.

"Shit."

Otto knocks. "Hey, uhhh, what's going on-"

Luna tries to open the door to let Otto in, but it doesn't work. There's a slithering sound kinda outside.

"Shit shit shit." Luna begins to panic.

Otto is grabbed by something and is DRAGGED. "AH FUUUUUuuuuu..."

"OTTO!!!!!!!!"

Luna is alone in the director's board. The door is stuck shut. There's no other way out it seems.

"Fuck." Since Luna has absolutely nothing better to do, she begins her solo investigation of the DIRECTOR'S BOARD.

There's a couple of other documents in the board. One of them stands out, it seems to be covered in... Ink?

Luna equips her gloves from her bag and tries to wipe the ink off the document to hopefully read it.

Experiment Number [covered in ink]

Research by [ink]

This specimen is particularly odd, it was found within the facility and no scientist has any recollection of bringing or making anything like this. It's viscous and tar like, and seems to be somewhat aggressive and manipulative.

Junior Dr. [Redacted] was influenced by it somewhat, letting it out of it's containment cell for a brief period of time.

...the door opens and someone walks through it, they sit at the end of the board.

"...oh gods."

"Good evening." It smiles.

"Uhh hello. I seem to have taken the wrong turn at Albuquerque." She looks really nervous, even scared. Her breathing is slow and heavy, as if trying to refocus a bit.

"Hah." It sounds disgusted. "Please, take a seat. I'd love to talk with you."

"Me? U-um, okay." She does as instructed, taking note of its oddly disgusted tone.

"Now, if it's not too much to ask, would you happen to know about an individual that goes by the last name LaFleur?"

"The one I was forced to murder? One Ivory LaFleur?" The deep breathing seems to have calmed her nerves, so she speaks with a calm but focused tone.

"Ah, so you do know Ivory. Good. I'm one of her... Closer friends. You may call me Zyzzyx. Or Petal. Whichever one works best."

"Okay Zyzzyx, cool name. Mine's Luna. So what exactly is this place?"

"It was an old laboratory. The scientists here went missing, per se. I merely took it for myself. There were several names given to this place before my ownership, but now I just call it 'The House.'" Zyzzyx says.

"’The House’. How very simple, and yet there's beauty in simplicity." She takes a deep breath. "Look. I was told to help find two of Ivory's acquaintances, Clementine and Ludwig. I was also here with another enaturalist named Otto, but he was taken away by some weird creature. Do you know where I can find those three possibly?"

Zyzzyx looks weird at her. "Bit weird to call someone you just met a 'weird creature'. I sent them to the lobby. The first two kept creeping around like pests. The other one that came with you was snooping around too much as well."

"Wait, hold on. That creature was you? And you sent all three of them back to the lobby?" Luna asks it.

"Mhm. They're waiting on the bottom floor. I'll allow you all to leave once this conversation is done." It coughs. "Now, would you mind telling me what you know about Ivory?"

Luna raises an eyebrow. "Not much honestly. I know she's an enaturalist, she was reborn as a Sisyphean Lust demon. There was a 'party'", she does air quotes around party, "in which it was an excuse for her to end her own life at the expense of my fucking sanity..." She goes quiet.

It smiles. Luna starts to feel the need to cough. "Tell me more, please."

Luna tries to hold back the cough, but it fails. "u-um, there was something about " cough cough "her sister dying to her hands, but I don't have all" cough cough "of the det-- ils. Something about r0-" cough gag ack "53. as well." She tries to smile, but all it does is make her cough. Luna is having a really bad time.

"Yes, yes, Myla. I know about that. What about... Hm... Her morality, from your point of view."

"Moralit-" cough cough ack "ty? I mean aside from the murder p--" cough "plot, I don't really know. Wouldn't exactly call her a moral butterfly, who the hell is in an apocalypse, hell even I'm not perfect." She manages to get that whole sentence out gracefully before taking a couple minutes to cough wildly. "But after she apologi-- to me, I kinda fe--t as though she was truly s--" so many coughs help.

"Hm. Interesting." Luna starts to feel a bit better. "It's nice to see someone's perspective on her. I see her as a... corrupted soul. She hasn't been 'herself' since this whole thing started. And hey, whenever someone tries to help her, example being me, she throws them away like trash." It chuckles.

"Y'know, she's a bit of a bi-" Cough. "...a weakling. Hiding behind the safety of a scythe which she is undeserving of wielding. She should've stuck with a regular butter knife!" It laughs maniacally.

"She tries to be something she's not. She tries to be useful and ends up causing more and more mistakes. I want to fix her from that. And you could help me."

"...help you? How would I do so, if I choose to do so." Luna glares at Zyzzyx, showing it how serious she’s taking this.

"Simple, just try to bring her to me. Shouldn't be too hard."

"And if I refuse? Cuz I'll be honest, I see a lot of myself in her. Someone who tries to be useful, but at the end of the day, I'm not that strong and will ultimately fuck something up." She sighs.

"You're free to refuse..." Her tone is off.

"...hm. Something is wrong here. If I refuse, what happens?" Luna takes another deep breath.

The walls start to move in and out slowly again. It stays quiet.

"I think we're done here Zyzzyx. The whole maniacal laughter and teasing of a person I kinda like is bothering me a lot, plus those walls are fucking with me." She glares at it while not matching its eyes.

"We're not done yet." Zyzzyx says.

"Oh? Then please, go right ahead." She takes a moment to take a deep breath and focus herself.

"Listen, I've been trying my best to made that BITCH realize what she is. A broken mess. I can fix her. She just needs to listen. You're going to help me. You just need to bring her to me. Shouldn't be too hard. It's simple. She's a corrupted mess, she's a-" It keeps going on and on, repeating what it already said, it's voice getting weirder throughout, pitch shifting and the like.

"And once more, I refuse. Did she fuck up a lot? Of course. We all do, we all make mistakes! I believe she's starting to realize it too." She explains her reasoning to it, but the language its speaking bothers her a lot. She hovers her hand over her sword, just in case.

It stops.

It gets up and... Turns into a puddle of tar on the floor.

Luna immediately gets out of her chair.

The door is still locked. The puddle starts to grow. Taking shape.

Luna’s sword is out and unsheathed. She knows she has no chance against a dromen, but maybe she can find a weakspot?

It starts to grow limbs. Big ass limbs. It's head having nothing but a mouth. There's also cat ears...? It stops growing after a bit. There's a clicking sound on the door. It seems to be staring at Luna. It's on all fours, some of the limbs touching the walls given how big it seems to have grown.

Luna steps backwards ever so slightly and slowly towards the door. She heard that click so perhaps it's unlocked?

As soon as Luna gets close enough to the door, it GROWLS. It starts to lunge at her.

Luna fucking dashes out the door since it’s open. She’s being chased and the growing happens again.

Luna is fucking running away from the creature trying to reach that elevator PRONTO! She reaches the elevator, but it's closed. There's still that staircase however. She dashes up the staircase as fast as her legs will take her. Luna is rather weak in everything except sheer speed apparently. She successfully reaches the research division and there's another elevator there, but it's also closed. She can call it. The growling is distant.

Luna goes to call the elevator! The elevator is called. It makes a ding. The sound of wet steps starts to get a bit louder.

"Shit shit, open the fuck up ALREADY!" Luna is panicked as she hears a loud GROWL. The creature is at the entrance of the research division. For reference, the elevator is a third of the way through the section.

Luna decides to screw the elevator and continue up the stairs. She reaches an intersection of sorts. All 3 ends have an elevator, only one is open. She goes directly into the one with the open elevator hoping it'll get her out of this BRUTALIST NIGHTMARE! Thankfully there's only one button and she presses it immediately.

Zyzzyx reaches the intersection and starts to run towards the elevator. The door starts to close slowly, of fucking course. It growls. The door closes. There's a loud, wet thud as it hits the door. The elevator goes up.

She fucking cheers as the elevator goes up. "FUCK YEAH I PISSED OFF A DROMEN! Wait, shit!"

After a bit, the elevator ends up in an lobby type area. Otto, Lud and Clementine are sitting on the floor.

She goes right over to them. They can see she's panicked and breathing heavily. "Guys-- can we please go???"

They're all also panicked.

"Yeah, uh, we should go, small issue... Uhh..." Otto points outside.

Luna looks outside. "What's the small issue?"

It's a large field of dead grass.

"...yeah, that's an issue. Guess we gotta head out there and hope we can find a way out."

"Only way I can think to get out is the elevator...? It's how we got in." Lud says.

"It's possible as well. I guess we'll just try it." Luna calls the elevator.

"Fuck, I'm just... Blergh?? Last thing I remember was walking around an office with Clem, and then we got grabbed by... Something. Woke up here with Otto."

"Something? A large blobby thing with cat ears? I was just chased by it. Name's Zyzzyx." Luna says.

"Does the name REALLY matter right now? I just wanna go home. I'd kill for some food." Clementine pleads.

The elevator arrives. "Ugh no, it doesn't. We'll chat when we get out of this place." When the elevator door opens, she enters it and waits for the other three to join her. Everyone gets in. Lud decides to just press a random button. The elevator goes up again. After a bit, it opens. It seems to be the middle of the forest.

Lud steps out. "Uhhh..." He looks around. "We're like, 6 minutes away from the outpost."

Luna steps out. "Glad you three made it out safely, that's what matters."

Clem and Otto get out of the elevator.

"Imma tell the outpost to get some food and shit ready. Uh... Hey, I don't think I ever got your name actually? My memories a mess-" Otto says.

"Maybe stop trying experimental batches, Otto." Clementine suggests.

"My name is Luna." She shows them all a bright smile, honestly thankful that it's over.

Otto looks at Clem. "But they're fun! And I only passed out from them like twice." Then he looks at Luna.

"Well Luna, uh, can't thank you enough really. Pretty sure the whole outpost would be indebted to you."

"Yeah, uh, if you ever need anything you can just come over. I'll tell Sarah about what happened." Ludwig says with a thankful look on his face.

"Thank you. You three are really nice. Hell, every enaturalist I've come across thus far has been awesome. Um, I should head back home. You guys good to go?"

Everyone nods and mumbles in agreement.

"Actually, uh, one last thing!" Clementine says.

"Alright, hope y'all have a good ni-- yes?" Luna stops herself from disappearing to hear what Clementine has to say.

"I think it was either Casey or Bella, but one of them was talking about clocks during the midsommar. Apparently broke one and a piece went missing. According to them it went near the part you guys were sat at. If you ever see it, let us know."

Luna nods. "Of course. You guys will be the first to know. Anywa--" She stifles a yawn, "I'm gonna go do what a Sloth demon does best and sleep. Take care you guys."

"Later Luna!" Everyone waves and they head out, talking about what the fuck just happened.

Luna vanishes with a soft pop.