entranceway | Astral Destruction

[ Clementine and Mae appear on the screen. It’s a little girl and a cat girl. They’re standing in a room on the first floor. Clem has a crowbar in her hand, slung over her shoulder. Mae has her trusty baseball bat and a very cat-that-got-the-canary grin on her face.]

Hey, so… Mae told me about how she breaks shit sometimes and how it’s… cathartic? [ that’s the word she used, right? ] And I tried it with a light bulb. It felt pretty damn awesome so we thought it might be cool to have an official place where people could break stuff whenever they needed to deal with bullshit.

[Mae immediately picks up the thread, grinning wide.]

So we are super effing pleased to introduce…The Destruction Room.

[She pans the camera over to the sign on the door. It’s generic and straight to the point. Then she pans the camera around to take in the room. There’s rows of shelves filled with china plates, vases, glass figurines and other fragile-looking items. Along the walls are dozens of light fixtures and free-standing lamps, as well as just a metric ton of lightbulbs, both fluorescent and incandescent. All of it is very precariously displayed and it looks like it wouldn’t take much to just knock some of these shelves right over.]

Isn’t it amazing? We stocked it with everything that could possibly go smash.

[Clementine gestures then to have Mae pan the camera toward the wall on the side which has a giant weapon rack with every blunt weapon imaginable from bats to maces to hammers and more. ]

Over on this wall, we’ve got every blunt weapon you can think of so you can really make the breakables crack into a hundred awesome pieces. Also, it’s on the first floor, room 4 so if you hit yourself in the foot or get glass stuck in your arm or something, the clinic’s right next door.

Yeah, we pretty much thought of everything. Because we’re awesome.

[Mae holds out her hand to Clementine for a high-five. Clementine leans over, high fiving her back, with a smile. Totally awesome. ]

Anyway, yeah, come on down and get your smash on. Work out some of that pre-event anxiety or whatever.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[It's that polite kid again!]

Oh, I'm deffo not worried about my 'rents. They know I get up to all kinds of shenanigans. Plus I don't think it really matters? Everything we smash in there will go back to being unsmashed, cause that's how the mansion works.

[Angus fidgets a little, visibly uncomfortable. He's more concerned about the intent than the damage caused.]

I guess that's true... But, um... smashing things is what bad kids do.

[He knows. He's gotten angry and thrown things and acted out. He knows all about being a bad kid.]

It's not a bad thing if someone says it's okay. Besides, acting out once in awhile is healthy. It's not like this stuff belongs to anyone. Or I mean, I guess it kinda belongs to me and Clem? But we're saying it's okay to smash it all, so there you go.

[Emotional health who??? Angus doesn't know her.

Angus bites his lip and looks past Mae, at the fragile knickknacks and china.]

M... Maybe? Maybe, if it's really okay, and, um, I guess my parents aren't even here, and I haven't even seen them for months, so it's. It's fine?? Yeah.

Hey, I promise it's okay, and no one's gonna get mad about it. If your parents do show up, I'll tell 'em the whole thing was my idea, how's that sound? They can blame me. People are always super okay with blaming me for stuff anyway, so I'm used to it.

[This poor kid. He's probably never experienced the joys of climbing up on power lines or breaking into town hall attics.]

[Never in his wildest dreams, even, has he climbed power lines. Power lines don't even exist.]

Oh, that's not fair to you, miss. But, um, I guess you are a confessed burglar, so...

[That's definitely not exactly what she said before.]

Yeah, I'm a hard-boiled criminal! I've done all the crimes. So it's totally okay to blame me for some--I guess this is vandalism?

[Oh god, he was expecting her to deny it. How much of a hardened criminal is she???]

Yes, miss. More specifically property damage. How many crimes have you committed, exactly?

[He's worried about her... And he doesn't want to think about what would happen if he actually managed to convince his parents that it was Mae's fault if he smashed a bunch of glass figures.]

All of them. Like billions of crimes. So many crimes. I'm wanted dead or alive in every county from here to Chattanooga.

You've murdered people!?

[WHERE'S CHATTANOOGA?]

[It was self-defense. Right? It was absolutely self-defense. And Eide was the one who cause the mine to collapse. Technically.]

[...Technically.]

I've committed numerous atrocities! Mua ha ha! Murder most foul and such! Back home, they call me Nightmare Eyes.

Nightmare Eyes?? Is it on account of your big cat eyes, miss?

I mean, yeah, pretty much. I'm really good at like a creepy stare. Check this out.

[She does the thing where her eyes go wide and her pupils shrink and she stares at Angus and the temperature in Wonderland probably drops a few degrees.]

[Angus' own eyes grow even wider than they were before, and he has to remember to breathe after a second.]

--That's! Definitely a talent!

[He swallows hard.]

W-Were you ever... [He whispers the words,] in prison?

Nightmare Eeyyyyyeeesssss!!!

[Holy crap she's really taking this kid for a ride.]

I spent four hundred years in a secret prison in Turkey for intergalactic war crimes.

You were trapped in a turkey and committed war atrocities???

...Yes.

W-Wow, Miss Mae. I've been a detective for a while, but um, I guess I've never met such a hardened criminal before. I thought people like you were totally made up.

[This is saying a lot. He catches serial killers for a living.]

I'm the standard against which all atrocities are measured.

Um, okay, well... As long as you promise not to kill anyone here?

I make no promises. Mwah-ha-ha!

[She laughs again, and then abruptly realizes that maybe...maybe he thinks she's being serious.]

...Hey, you do know I'm joking, right?

[Angus' face freezes in horror. At himself. At this whole situation.

It takes him a minute to begin to recover, but finally, he insists,]

N-No! I mean, yes! Of course I know! It was a very good joke and I didn't want to insult it by not, um, playing along! And taking it very seriously! I know a lot of things and I'm very smart and perceptive! I'm a detective!

Haha, okay, okay, I believe you. That was really funny.

[Angus groans and rubs his temple. It didn't feel very funny. It mostly felt horrifying.]

Your jokes are just like Taako's...

My jokes are like tacos?

[Is this some kind of slang...]

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taako voice: SOUR CREAM

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