[open] open 24 hours

[metafictions]

Who ⬤ Kamui and you
What ⬤ The extremely cursed 7/11 night shift
When ⬤ throughout May
Where ⬤ that one Sutoku/Shuten 7/11
Content Warnings ⬤ n/a for now, will update
Notes ⬤ please see Kamui's permissions to opt into having him sense your character's criminal power!

A. convenience store;

[It's 2 am, or thereabouts, and you are on a street where Shuten and Sutoku territory just barely overlap-- so it's a bit of a dodgier visit tonight. However you managed, you've finally bypassed the oni punks squatting outside the automatic doors and made your way into the waiting fluorescent arms of the 7/11, only to find...]

Welcome.

[this guy, dispassionately welcoming you to the store. Like, has he even blinked? It's like they've seated a cryptid behind the counter in a silly uniform. His lack of enthusiasm, his unbroken stare, and the strange presence his silver left eye seems to radiate all combined make this late night convenience store visit feel especially unnerving.

Sometimes, he pauses to stock the shelves, but it always sort of feels like he's watching you. Not that he's a rude cashier, or treating you like you're going to shoplift: he'll ring you up just fine. It's just his terrible vibes. Sorry.]

B. toilet dungeon;

[There's also a public restroom in this 7/11... if you can find it!]

Oh, welcome back. [says Kamui breezily, as his customer emerges from the 7/11 back door for the second-- or third?-- time.] Did you find the WC yet? I'm sorry for the inconvenience, it was cursed last week, so the hallway has gotten longer. You need to follow the directions exactly or you'll just be sent back here right away.

[In one long, breathless sentence, Kamui repeats the directions:]

Go through the door in the back, take a right, go through the fourth door, turn through the first hallway on the left, then keep going straight until you take a right at the intersection, go through the second door and you'll get to a staircase, so go all the way down and through the emergency exit on the right, take the stairs all the way up to the top, and you'll hit a T-shaped hallway, and you'll find the WC just past that.

[He blinks, head canting ever so slightly to the side.]

Please take your time.

C. hani-uhh???;

[There's a haniwa figure that has cropped up right next to the magazine aisle. Fortunately, this is one of Kamui's earlier shifts, so he's not the only employee around and won't be abandoning the register for this-- but they've still got to figure out what to do with this distinctly-cursed looking little guy before one of their oni regulars kicks it over, right?]

Erm...

[Except that, especially with his ability reactivated, it really, really feels like a bad idea to touch the clay figurine. And yet, he definitely can't just leave it there, can he?

Kamui's brows knit together with concern as he stands over it, armed with one of the tongs for hot food. He clicks them together, uncertain, before he crouches down to get a better look at it. He might be poking it with the tongs. Give it a few moments-- he's making up his mind.]

D. wildcard

[here for a vending machine substory task (or another substory)? just wanna generally harass your friendly neighborhood 7/11 cryptid? go wild my dude]

Comments

[medicative]

N-no...beyond those dolls that keep showing up, there was nothing...

[she's gone paler, arms folding and eyes staring the machine down as if it will start talking and giving them answers. something's terribly, terribly wrong, but she's trying to not panic. it won't do anything. still, her eyes flick up, to outside - it's not raining, but distantly she thinks it should be.]

[metafictions]

[The haniwa... of course. He's been getting rid of them all week. They always felt wrong to him, but with no way to gauge exactly what their power was, it'd been impossible to predict something like this. Kamui furrows his brow tightly, and reaches for Emily, resting a protective hand on her shoulder.]

Then it's them. Stay close to me, okay?

[And, one by one, the fluorescent lights above them begin to flicker erratically.]

[medicative]

[he can feel the tension that's flooded her frame, how her posture has gone still, taut. but she does manage to nod, and glances up at the lights, stepping back towards Kamui. even Hibiki is on edge, and she can feel it in her mind, the telltale headache of their stress mingling with hers.]

What do we do?

[metafictions]

Leave.

[He turns for the front door, ready to haul out of there with Emily in tow-- but the door seems further somehow, the room unnaturally long. Far away, dark tendrils gather across the entrance, blocking it from their path like a bramble of thorny vines.]

Shit... it's getting worse. [He doesn't think twice. Kamui reaches into his coat for his weapon-- a customized harpoon gun, blade sharp on its end-- and takes Emily's hand with his free one.]

[He glances back at Emily, as if to make sure that she's still there and whole, before returning to scanning the area with wary eyes. His silver eye's no more reflective than it always is, but it seems to gleam brighter as it catches the wavering lights overhead.] There's a back entrance over there. Inside the employee area. [nudging with his head behind the counter.] We're going to move that way. Is anything happening to the door?

[medicative]

[as if in answer, there's a solid, metallic bang against the doors, hard enough to make it shake. the darkness, splintering off and forming a crow, one with silver eyes. and then the bang again. something's trying to get in.

Emily's hand grips his, and she's gone pale, but there's a certainty to her expression that says she's prepared to follow his lead.]

We've got about twenty seconds before the door breaks down, and whatever's outside comes in.

[metafictions]

[Kamui swears under his breath, glancing at the shadowy crow: it's Hibiki who comes to mind first, especially with Emily at his side, but he can't entertain the thought of the presence being a friend when it could just as easily be a foe.

(The weight of the gun, the warmth of Emily's hand, tether him to the Earth. The burden of options, the blessing and curse of a choice in his fate-- their fate-- on his shoulders again; is this the part where Akama and Aoyama gun him down or drag him to another timeline?)]

Good... that means it's not at the exit. I'll coax it away: run, and I'll be right behind you. Get ready, Emily.

[fifteen, fourteen, thirteen, twelve...]

[medicative]

[how many times has she heard words like that? stay put, I'm coming - shouted them herself to be backup, running for someone else's sake. she has to trust him, though. teamwork only came to bloom when one actually tried, when risks got taken, and she squeezes his hand while nodding.]

Be careful, please.

[eight, seven, six - she's running in the direction he indicated, while that clang on the doors gets louder, and what's behind it threatens to break them down. she has to trust he can handle himself. she has to keep moving, because she doesn't want to be hunted down like prey again. why, why is the path so impossibly long?]

[metafictions]

[three, two, one.

When the door breaks, its hinges splintering and pulling apart with a whining, metallic screech, it seems like nothing's behind it for a precious second. Nothing but the end of a dark hallway, obscure and pitch black in the low light.

And then the blackness advances, a solid undulating mass. There are no shadows on the shape, no reflections; it's as if what stretches out towards the two of them is nothingness itself. Kamui fires his weapon, piercing that darkness directly, but as the blades connect the shape separates into four, eight, sixteen, splitting and splitting then pulling out and stretching thinner and thinner. A number of them shoot straight out towards Kamui: he recalls his blade and ducks away behind a counter, but he's too slow to dodge a few hair-thin tendrils. They wrap around his left hand, tugging; sharp like piano wire, they dig into his skin. Kamui grits his teeth and pulls against them, drawing blood, but at least the strings have been broken.]

Give it a few more seconds!

[Though he's drawn most of the presence's attention, a thin shadow creeps Emily's way, pooling at her feet.]

Emily, step back!

[medicative]

[she leaps back, terrified, and she doesn't know what to do, the panic rising in her throat. this is too much like last time to feel safe, and her body shakes -

her head drops forward, and then straightens up. Kamui will know the look in those eyes, recognize the way the body moves, and how they utilize their wings to be faster, tuck up their legs and hover to return to his side, a strong pair of wingbeats like a sweep of a fan to throw some of the tendrils back. there's precious little to be a real weapon here, but they snatch the back of his collar and pull him their direction. half tug, half drag - but the message is clear. we do not leave someone behind.]

Uehara. Don't suppose you were ever a cursebreaker in those points of yours?

[metafictions]

[He's never seen the switch occur in real time. Until now, Kamui's only run into Hibiki when they were already around-- his adrenaline is pumping, prepared to sweep Emily out of there if she's somehow fainted. But the mannerisms are familiar; movements different now, bolder, as he suddenly jerks backward in the daitengu's grip.]

Hibiki! [he blurts, now in relative safety; but the shadows are still encroaching upon them no matter how well they've dispelled them.]

Sorry, never. [He thinks of Natori, purifying this area only a week ago: little use that had been with a curse this pwoerful.] Do you have any ideas?

[medicative]

Right now? Run.

[if Kamui won't keep up, they'll keep half carrying him away. down that hallway, up over that shadow thread, and things keeping moving.

distant and growing louder as they're chased, chanting that flows like a murmuring river, voices that aren't from Kamui's dreams - no, there's something colder, stronger. onward and onward, lest they be caught and trapped.]

[metafictions]

[It's awkward, following their lead. As the two of them flee, his feet only sometimes touch the ground as he runs, occasionally skipping over it as Hibiki half-flies him along on their escape. But however far they run through the hallway, the maze continues to twist and turn. Even if they'd followed the directions, Kamui knows they'd have been turned around by whatever presence was here.

And whatever the source of these voices is, it chills him to the bone. Kamui casts a glance back at Hibiki, apprehensive--]

We can't run forever. I feel it drawing nearer.