[🌟] - he only nods at leah’s confirmation, though she wouldn’t have been able to see it, with a muttered ‘yosh!’ as he picked himself up from the ground. the carpet held no hidden trapdoors much to his displeasure. by now he had inspected every nook and cranny this beautifully decorated room had to offer and found nothing. now he paced the room, his head bowed and hand under his chin in rushed thought- what was he missing?
he glared at the fireplace. annoying merry looking thing! the fire seemed to dance upon the logs and his shadow flickered in time with the fire. his wild thoughts ignited and so did his crazed speculations- what if they fell victim to the ghosts. would they be stuck here forever? will anyone notice their disappearance? with a slap to his face, he shivered and brought his sanity together. being in this chateu was doing strange things to his th-
the room was cold. eyebrows scrunched in deep confusion, barry brought his arms down in slow realization and approached the fireplace. his brain struggled to understand why he didn’t feel any warmer.
without hesitation, he plunged his hand into the fiery embers and yelped when he felt, not burning flesh, but cold, empty space. as if the fire was merely a projection and there was something beyond not visible to the naked eye. that’s it!
☆ ・‥… “Leah!” ・‥…━━━☆ he whirled around at the same time the loud bang shook the entire interior. it only further proved his suspicion- the chandelier, china plates, and other movable decorations did not budge, not even shudder with the impact. ☆ ・‥… “whoa-ah! Aercus-!” ・‥…━━━☆
the fire behind him blazed up, growing and spreading across the walls as if it was a live entity- and it was pissed. the amount of flare there was now would have seared anyone in the room. if it was real HA!
☆ ・‥… “It’s fake! Quickly, through here!” ・‥…━━━☆ barry waved a hurried arm towards the fireplace, the image warping but could be distinguishable as a rusted metal, old dumbwaiter! in one smooth, quick motion barry released infernape, Chaos!, and Heracross! though their trainer issued no order, they both sprung into action, as if they knew what was happening and acted on instinct. Choas scooped up Leah and Leo and, with a quick nod to barry, jumped in the dumbwaiter.
in the same instance, barry and heracross rushed in and slammed the door shut once more. he wasn’t sure how long they could withhold whatever was outside, but the other’s safety was first priority. his lungs heaved as barry hope chaos or leah would give the signal that they were in the clear.
x ♫ - AL NIENTE; Relief flooded her senses upon hearing Barry call her name, which soon turned to concern upon hearing his exclamation-- yet within the short amount of time it took for her to turn to Barry, all was already engulfed in flames. Natural instinct SCREAMED at her to escape at the very sight, much effort required for her to will herself not to move, still pushing against the door amidst the imaginary flames. Said flames, imaginary or not did however provide light to their current whereabouts, allowing her to cast away her fears even if it were but a moment’s respite. All the better perhaps, since it meant she could put her all in helping Leo keep the doors shut and provide Barry all the time he needed to find an exit. And with the banging against the door increasing in intensity, there was only so much time left for them to make their escape...
His next words indicated that he found an exit, yet Leah found herself before a dilemma of sorts. Moving meant passing the reins of keeping the doors close entirely to Leo, and the aggressive banging could only be held for so long by the Psychic type. Prolonged use was always advised against to those that had psychic abilities, may they be human or Pokemon and she was beginning to worry that he was straining himself. But the need for a decision was whisked away as she and Leo were both scooped into Barry’s Infernape’s arms and brought away, the suddenness of it all causing Leah to yelp in surprise and Leo to lose control of the doors for a brief moment. The Espeon’s position was quickly taken by Barry and his Heracross, though the pass-over still causing a light slam of the door-- and suddenly, all was silent.
All of the banging stopped. Flames still danced across the room, but they were eerily silent-- the lack of the natural crackling of fire or any semblance of sound whatsoever was deafeningly quiet, the beating of her heart beginning to be all that she could hear instead. Leo was quick to get off the arms of the Infernape and scan the room, readying his psychic abilities if need be and the composer did what she did best. Observe. Or at least, what little that she could observe from where she was. What she did notice, was the sudden twitch in the Psychic type’s ears, alluding to the fact that he had sense something that could shed light to the weird situation that they were in. Something that she would not be able to find out any time soon it seemed, when the tearing sound of rope could be heard, and rusted parts screeched as the dumbwaiter plunged down.
This was not how she was planning to spend her day.
Adrenaline helped her react to the sudden movement quickly, an attempt made to escape their falling doom with an outreached hand-- only for it to have been far too late and said hand to earn a long scratch that drew blood, a hiss of pain escaping her lips. The pain was soon taken over by panic, realizing that they were trapped due to there no being any openings as it went down, down, down. And then, a loud crash, accompanied with a soft yelp from the now mildly injured composer. At least there was some light now, seeing that there was now an opening before them. “ W-We’re fine! ” The shakiness in her voice returned, both due to her newly earned injury and the unexpected ride down, but she still made an effort to reassure Barry who was now a floor above them. “ I.. I think we’re in some sort of kitchen on the ground f-floor, so we’ll meet up at the eventually! ”
Mean while, at Barry’s side would be a rather displeased Espeon, his initially calm disposition now turning into a rather agitated state, seeming like it was something that resulted from Leah’s absence. But even then, his attention would be taken once again, as the sound of a young girl giggling resounded throughout the room-- to which Leo responded by looking over to Barry to see what he was going to do next. As much as he would have loved to jump down the dumbwaiter to get back to Leah as soon as possible, it was rather illogical to do so. Quickly making their way back to her was the better option, but going alone would earn him reprimands from Leah as well... so he waited. Waited for Barry to act, and he would follow suit. ♪
