Cause and Effect

Who: Kyle, Ashley and Nic
Where: the living room
When: evening

Kyle had wandered into the living room to sit by the fire for a while, but he'd been halted by the posters and flyers that seemed to be all around. His first thought was, so that's where Kaori ran off to this morning. They'd stayed in her room the night before, with her dutifully waking him up every three hours or so, since Dave had determined that he had a concussion. He knew something had to be wrong with him, since it wasn't usual for him to sleep that soundly. Once she'd gotten up for the day and checked her messages on the computer, she'd kissed him and hurried off without telling him what was going on. It made sense now.

His second thought was, what if whoever put these up is lying to stir up trouble? He wouldn't put anything past the scientists, cold bastards that they were. And his third thought was, what if it's true?

He must have been scowling without realizing it, because when Ashley walked in, still dressed in the rainbow-striped leotard and jeans she'd been wearing earlier in the day, she stopped, as if uncertain if she should approach. Finally she said, "Hi, Kyle," sounding a little unsure about it.

Kyle turned his head. "Hey." He couldn't remember her name for a few seconds, but finally he placed her. "Ashley." The girl who'd freaked out all over him in the hall the day Eris had hung herself. He pulled in a breath and exhaled heavily, adding, "More bullshit."

Ashley moved closer and read the poster, looking bewildered. "That's... horrible." She knew who Janie was, though she'd never met her when the girl had been conscious, and she had read the article that had been put under her door this morning. Her gaze turned to Kyle, and she said, "They caused this. What gives them the right to... to break people like that?" She was getting upset, and she turned her eyes away, not wanting to seem like an emotional basket case since she'd already shown this guy her worst side once before.

Nic wandered into the living room, unwilling to sit in his room all evening when there was a house full of people that he still didn't know. The count may have been up to three, but he could tell there were so many more, all behind their doors, talking quietly, or not at all. It made him want to eavesdrop, except he knew he wouldn't like what he would hear. He passed by without listening.

The posters, though, he couldn't ignore. He read them before he even realized there was anyone else in the room, mumbling to himself. "Damn..." He knew he couldn't do it, sit by and watch someone die. It didn't matter if they were a friend or not. Maybe if it was cancer, but that was different, he told himself. Bleeding to death was something he could help with, even with no medical knowledge. He could call for help. He would, he told himself. Then he realized there were other people in the room.

"Is this true?" he asked. No introduction. No 'good evening'. He had more pressing matters on his mind before he realized he'd forgotten his manners.

"Fucked if I know," Kyle said. It didn't phase him that the guy speaking to him was someone he hadn't met. There were still quite a few people he hadn't met, and more were being added all the time, seemed like. "I'm thinkin' it probably is, though. Least the part about the suicide attempt." He didn't say why he thought it was true: his girlfriend was the house psychologist and she'd gone rushing off after checking her mail.

"I don't know, either," Ashley said more quietly. She was trying desperately not to show how upset she was, and she ended up crossing her arms and wandering over to the window for long enough to compose herself. She knew they were all adults and they'd all signed up for this, but to deliberately pass around something that they'd have to know might send someone who was already unstable (and he had to have been, or why else would he have done that?) over the edge... that was unconscionable to her.

Nic rubbed his hand over his face and through his hair, then left the posters to flop down on the couch. This day just kept getting better and better. With every person he met, the story expanded, giving him a pretty good idea of things to come. "I'm Nic. Nicodemus," he said, looking first at the guy, then the girl. "I got here this morning." And he hadn't even known this was going on. Brilliant.

At least he hadn't arrived during the great snake and bugfest of '06, Kyle thought. He cast a quick glance at Ashley, mildly concerned, and then turned his blue eyes back to Nic. "Kyle," he introduced himself. "Welcome?" There was a deeply sarcastic bent to his expression.

Ashley turned back around and approached the two of them again, determination in her expression. She might've been a touch paler than usual, but her complexion was dark so it was hard to tell for sure. "I'm Ashley," she said to Nic. "Nice to meet you." She smiled, uncrossing her arms and hooking her thumbs in the front pocket of her jeans. "Has your first day been okay? Mostly?" Wow, you're an idiot. Maybe the weed did something to your brain...

Nic didn't miss the sarcasm, laughing shortly in response. "Thanks," he said, then turned to Ashley, who was a touch warmer than Kyle. At this point, though, he was expecting the attitudes. He must look like a first class idiot for signing up, but then, so did they. "It's been okay. It was a little unsettling to be deposited blindfolded in a room, but that's been the worst of it." From the sound of things, that wasn't bad at all. "Met Rebekah, Dan, and Lina, so I'm not totally in the dark."

"'Least you didn't get here during the power outage. We really were in the dark," Kyle said, managing a more genuine smile. He was disturbed by everything suggested by the flyer, but that certainly wasn't this guy's fault. He'd have no way of knowing about Kyle's strong emotions on the sanctity of life, would he?

"I hated the blindfold thing," Ashley commiserated. "It's really scary. Well, I thought it was." She couldn't imagine burly Kyle being scared of much of anything, actually. She'd managed to collect herself, and at least she didn't feel like she was going to cry anymore. That was a plus.

"Thank God for that," Nic laughed a little, glad to see someone in the house had a sense of humor. "It's bad enough trying to find my way around with the lights on. I couldn't imagine arriving here in the dark." The blindfold didn't count. He could take it off once he was officially there. He shrugged, not discounting Ashley's comment, but not completely agreeing. He wouldn't have called it 'scary'.

He was quiet for a few minutes, thinking silently, before he finally spoke up. "If I, for any reason, tried... I hope ya'll would try to save me. Even if you don't know me." It bothered him that someone wouldn't. Nothing was that bad. At least, it never had been, and he hoped he could get past it if it was. But just in case...

"That somethin' you think you'd do?" Kyle wanted to know. He kept his voice calm and even, but he couldn't deny that the sheer number of suicides in the house since he'd been here troubled him. It had been less than three months. Had the scientists deliberately stacked the deck with quite a few unstable people, or was there something else going on here?

"I don't think that's what he meant, Kyle," Ashley hurried in. Honestly, guys. It was as plain as the nose on his face what Nic was wanting, she thought, mildly exasperated. "He wasn't saying he was going to, like, kill himself." She turned to Nic and said, "I'd never let you or anybody do that if I had any idea. If I could stop them." She was completely earnest as she smiled at him.

Nic bit his lip as they both spoke, actually giving thought to the question because it deserved it. Katalina had said this wasn't common, that Jesse wasn't the first. That meant the stress levels they were undergoing were far above the norm, that they were being pushed to their breaking point. Nic didn't know what his breaking point was, nor what he'd do when he got there. He only hoped that someone would be sane enough to stop him and calm him down till he came to his senses.

"I don't want to die and I have no intention of trying to kill myself," Nic said, trying to answer them both at once. "I've never considered it and hope that I never do. But... if I ever got to that point, I'm not sure I would be in a state of mind to know what's best for me, you know? Anyone that's willing to kill themselves is no longer thinking rationally..."

This was Kaori's territory, and Kyle wasn't sure what to say, so he just nodded at the man. He could agree with the lack of rational thought he'd mentioned. He leaned one shoulder against the wall, looking to Ashley to see if she'd have anything to say about it.

Ashley had moved a little closer, and she bit at her lip, her eyes ticking from one man to the other. She flicked the tips of her fingers toward the poster, saying, "I just--. I can't help wondering if maybe he changed his mind and wanted to stop, you know? Would he have been able to tell her to go get someone?" She hadn't really addressed what Nic had said, though, she realized, and she put a hand on his arm. "I know we just now met," she said, "but you can come talk to me if you ever feel... bad. Like, you know, like you might..." She couldn't even finish her statement; she found the thought of it that distressing.

Maybe he shouldn't have spoken up because now the both of them seemed to think he had a problem. Nicodemus didn't think he was going to kill himself. He hadn't even considered it and, for the moment, doubted he ever would. Nightmares, no matter how bad, would never result in him trying to take his own life. He'd just have to stop sleeping, if that were the case. But it wasn't.

"I seriously doubt that should ever be the case, but thank you," Nic said, smiling softly. He hadn't meant to scare her. That really wasn't the best way to meet someone, but asking them to save him if he ever tried to kill himself. "Am I allowed to come talk to you, even if I don't feel that bad?" he asked. "Cause I'd hate to knock on your door and that somehow indicate I'm suicidal."

Ashley's smile brightened. "Sure, come by anytime," she said. "I'm on two. I won't automatically think you're losing it." She realized that she still had her hand on his arm and removed it, shifting her weight and taking a step back. "You can meet my rats... they're very personable for rodents." She giggled, suddenly feeling foolish. Sometimes her mouth moved faster than her brain, she thought. He was going to think she was nuts.

Kyle was smirking, mildly amused by Ashley. Nice girl, but she came across a little spacey sometimes, he'd noticed just in his brief acquaintance with her. "What I'm kinda wondering," he said, changing the subject a little, "is who the hell'd go to all the trouble to put up posters like this? I'm assuming they're all over the house like they are in here."

"Great," he said, grinning at the way she removed her hand and stepped back, as if it'd been a sudden realization that it'd been there at all. "Rats?" he asked, his smile dying to become something far more nervous. He couldn't imagine rats being personable, but if they were in a cage... well, what happened if they got out? Rats were smart. He'd thought they were all out of the house now.

Kyle stole his attention back, anything better than thinking about rats overtaking Ashley's room. "Maybe someone who wants to alienate Janie? Or wants everyone to know that Jesse tried to kill himself? But it seems like word would travel fast around here, even without the use of posters." He picked up a poster, reading it again before folding it up. "It's more hurtful to Janie than Jesse."

"They're pets," Ashley hastily explained, since Nic was looking dubious about the whole concept. She sighed at Nic's words and added, "What bothers me is that they'd think it was okay to spread around that article about him. I know we're in an experiment, and it's high-stress, but-- that's not okay." She frowned, frustrated by her inability to explain what she really felt about it. Words just weren't enough.

"Nah, it's not," Kyle said. "I mean, do you have anything in your past you'd rather everyone not know about?" he asked Nic. Shrugging a shoulder, he said, "I do. Not that I'm gonna try to kill myself if it gets leaked, but... ya know what I'm sayin'?"

Pets. It didn't mean they weren't smart. When it came to scientific research, rats were a popular choice due to their high intelligence, ingenuity, aggressiveness and adaptability. Their psychology, in many ways, was similar to that of a human. If a human could get out of a cage, so could a rat.

Damn it. Calm the fuck down.

He couldn't, not if Kyle expected a detailed explanation. He could answer straight enough though, and did. "I do... but it's not worth dying over. I can understand why he'd be upset that everyone know about it, but that doesn't mean we're going to judge him." But had he? Nic took a moment to rethink the contents of the article and what they seemed to be implying. Where he'd grown up, his own youth minister was married. He'd had kids. It was acceptable for him to be attracted to someone. Nic didn't know the details of Jesse's case, but the girl he had been fooling around with wasn't a child. She'd been a number of years out of school. If they hadn't been caught in such a way, it might not even be a problem.

So maybe Nic had judged him, but it was in his defense. He couldn't find anything wrong with that.

Personally, Ashley couldn't think of a thing about her life that she'd mind anyone knowing, so she guessed she was lucky in that respect. Needing a focus for her uneasy feelings, she started taking down the posters on the wall. "If that's true, that she sat there and watched him? I'm sorry, that kinda gives me the creeps."

Kyle joined Ashley in taking down posters; seemed like a good idea to him. "I saw him sittin' with her in the library while the power was out," he said. "They must've been friends, but... yeah, I'm not sure why anyone would do that, myself." His gaze turned to Nic. "I wouldn't've judged him for it, either, but there's prob'ly people here that would."

Nicodemus began to help them as well, pulling the posters down off the wall and gathering them from the floor. It was such a waste, printing off hundreds just to make a statement. It could have just as easily been done the way of that morning's newspaper article or with a bigger poster, stuck up on the wall. It just seemed like a lot of effort for nothing, but then... he wouldn't have done so in the first place.

"I'm starting to wonder how we were selected," he said, looking down at the flyer in his hand. "But I haven't been her long enough to figure it out." A single day didn't give him enough background to even start, but now that he knew how they were being tested, he would start paying attention. Nic shook his head, rereading the poster. "I didn't know he'd tried. I wouldn't have even had a clue..."

"I don't know if I've ever even seen the guy," Ashley remarked. She knew that someone named Jesse lived here, because she'd passed his door on the first floor on the way to the kitchen. But that was all. "I don't know how most of us would've known." She sighed and dusted her hands together. Mission accomplished.

"You could speculate," Kyle said to Nic's remark about how they'd been chosen. "But as far as actually knowin' for sure? I dunno." He made a wry face.

"It seems like everyone would know each other. How many rooms are there in the house? I guess if some are new, like me, then that's not the case, but..." He trailed off, not sure where he was going with that. He was just used to knowing everyone around him, or at least a large number of people. He'd known everyone he graduated high school with, then everyone in his fraternity. He knew everyone in his department at work, and then there were the people that lived along the edge of his life, that he just got to know along the way. There were only four floors to the building, maybe five, and it wasn't built like a hotel. There couldn't be more than ten rooms on every floor, which he seriously doubted was the case.

So if there were thirty of them... how come they didn't know one another? It seemed like, with all that was going on, they'd work together to get through it. Instead, they all kept to their own little corners.

"There's no way to know for sure," Nic said. "Not unless we have information from the outside, which I doubt they'll provide." Unless it was information like the morning news article. Nic wouldn't appreciate waking up to that every morning. Hopefully that wouldn't be the case. The hard part was, he knew he'd read it every time, else he'd have no idea what was going on.

"Oh, wow," Ashley said. "There's five floors that have bedrooms on them. There's gotta be at least... thirty five, forty bedrooms?" She'd dropped the posters she'd removed on top of Kyle's stack of them, and she reached up to tuck her hair behind her ears. "But I don't think all of them are full at one time. People get removed from the house sometimes." To herself she wondered why she'd said removed instead of left. Maybe because it felt just that arbitrary, with people not given the chance to say goodbye to anyone.

"There's new people all the time, seems like," Kyle affirmed. "Not many left from the first of the year, when I came in." He reached down to pick up the stack of posters, glanced around, and then shrugged and took them over to the fireplace to begin feeding them to the flames, one at a time.

"Removed," Nic said, the word echoing in his mind. It sounded so cold, so... helpless. Like it wasn't by choice, they'd been 'removed' from the test. They'd been taken out of the sample, for whatever reason. Saying they'd left would have indicated they'd planned on leaving. He wondered how it felt to wake up one morning and find someone gone.

Blood spattered across the sheets, cold. A pillow torn to shreds.

Nic shivered. No, he knew what that was like. Unpleasant. Terrifying. He doubted the removal happened in such a way.

"You've been here since the beginning?" Nic asked, attention turning to Kyle. It wouldn't have been that long ago, but it could seem like forever if the tests were as intense as he'd heard. "How many would you say have left? Did you ever know why?"

"Yeah," Kyle said, methodically burning the posters and flyers they'd taken down as they talked. "New Year's Day, 2006." He wasn't sure what to say to Nic's next question. He didn't really want to get into the murder and rape that had occurred, particularly since the girl who'd been raped was still here in the house. "I guess... at first some of 'em just decided this wasn't their thing. We never really got told why."

Ashley leaned against the wall, crossing her arms over her stomach. "A guy I was friends with left pretty recently. You just get up and see that their room is empty."

That was something to think about. If he really wanted out... really, seriously wanted out... could he leave? No. Nic shook his head, quietly thinking to himself. He couldn't leave. They might be looking for him. He might be wanted for something. No matter how bad it got in here, it was always safer than being out there. He couldn't face it. He wouldn't be there if he could.

"So, do ya'll communicate with them?" Nic said, looking up as if there were cameras. There had to be cameras. He hadn't seen them, but he knew they were there. As for 'them', he meant whomever put them there, the guys in charge of the experiment. "Do they ever communicate with you?"

Kyle made a sound that was suspiciously close to a snort. "Hell no. Why would I wanna do that? I mean, you could, but what're you gonna say? 'Hey, thanks for visitin' the great plague of Egypt on us.' I mean, fuck. I spent days cleaning bugs and snakes out of my bathroom 'cause my girlfriend was freaking out." He'd probably sounded a little more caustic than he'd intended to, but anything concerning the scientists was a sore spot with him right now.

Ashley's eyes had widened as she stared at Kyle. Turning her head in Nic's direction, she said, "Just through notes on the computers, that I can remember. We can send them notes too... requests, or I guess other things through the journals."

Well, he could see that. While he didn't intend to communicate with the scientists, he still wanted to know if it could be done. Kyle's answer didn't really tell him that, but Ashley was far more helpful. The computer, of course, was for far more than their own personal journaling. He'd known that, but he hadn't considered it a method of communication back to the ones that were running the show.

He wondered what she meant by requests. Please, Mr/Ms Scientists, Don't send any more fucking bugs/snakes/rats. Love, Nic. Yeah, like that would work.

"Good to know," he said, making a mental note not to write anything too private in the computer journal. He could keep his own, a bound paper notebook, for those purposes. There were a few things he wanted to sort out mentally and he didn't necessarily want the scientists helping him along. He had the idea they'd steer him in the wrong direction if they had the chance.

Kyle had burned the last poster, and he gazed at the roaring fire with satisfaction. "Good riddance," he said. He took a deep breath and let it out, then turned to the other two. "I'll catch you guys later, alright? Welcome to the house," he added to Nic, not wanting to come across as a complete ass-- though he probably already had, he thought ruefully.

Ashley smirked, unable to resist teasing just a little. "Yes, scurry along and take your anti-cranky pills!" She pretended to hide on the other side of Nic. Her usual nature was sunny, and she had to try to add a little levity to the situation.

"Thanks," Nic said, as Kyle started to leave. He was one of the few that actually welcomed him in, even if it wasn't the most promising of starts. He laughed as Ashley hid behind him, calling out to Kyle as he disappeared. "Good night!"

Nic peered over his shoulder, smirking at Ashley. "I think you're safe," he grinned. It was good to be around someone willing to laugh a little. While there was little around that gave them reason, he hated that the day continued to be so depressing.

Ashley smiled back at him. "Good. There's been enough trauma going on," she said. She rubbed at her eyes with her fingers, not caring that she was smearing the small bit of eye makeup that remained. It was late in the day, she was tired and any vanity she might have possessed was thrown to the wind. "I'm glad those posters are gone. They're just... horrible."

"I almost hope it was someone running the tests that put them up, rather than someone in the house." Because, somehow, that made it better. It meant they weren't living with someone so cold. Nic could see the point of view described on the posters. He understood what they were trying to get across. But it wasn't necessary. There were better ways to go about spreading such a message if it had to be done. "It'll take a while to get rid of them all, but one room down certainly helps."

"It's possible that it was, I guess," Ashley said. She moved to sit on the stone hearth, her back to the fire, propping her elbows on her knees. Her gaze skittered away from his, and she stared at the coffee table a couple feet away, then shook her head and looked back up. "I think," she said carefully, "there're people here who'd do that, though." After all, there was somebody here-- unless they'd been removed since then-- who'd thought it'd be keen to desecrate a dead body and spread it all over the foyer.

"There's always someone around willing to cause a fuss," he said, following her over towards the fire. The warmth was relaxing, calming in comparison to the conversation. "I guess that gossip is all we've got. Someone wanted to get their point across. And even though I can see where they're coming from, I don't think that was the way to handle it." He couldn't imagine being in Janie's place. Nic didn't know how it had gone down. He hadn't been there. It didn't seem fair to judge her without knowing the situation from start to finish.

"So, tell me about yourself," Nic said, taking a seat at the hearth. "What did you do, before enrolling in this thing?"

"I'm a vet tech," Ashley said, "studying to be a veterinarian." She still considered herself to be that; she was just taking an extended break. "Hence the rats-for-pets thing." She half-smiled at him. "I'm from Delaware. How about you? Where're you from, and what did you do with yourself there?"

At least she must like animals other than rats. Still, he'd rather have a dog for a pet. Something about them seemed a bit more cuddly, even if Nic realized he found that to be a required quality in a pet until then. "I'm from Texas. I was a chemical engineer before I left, but I don't know if that's necessarily what I want to do when I return." That confusion what part of what sent him there in the first place. He needed to figure himself out. He needed to see what he wanted without the pressure of his parents. "My dad was a chemical engineer," he explained. "I kind of got pressured into it and I think I might want to do something else with my life. I just haven't figured out what yet."

"I'd think you'd have to be pretty smart to do that," Ashley observed. "I mean, it sounds complicated. So even if you don't want to do that when you get out of here-- at least you know you're capable." She wasn't sure if that was helpful or not, though she'd intended it to be. "Texas, huh? I've never been that far West."

Nic smiled, seeing what she said as a complement, even if it'd always made things difficult for him. He was smart because he was expected to be, but he guess he had the intelligence for it if he'd managed to get through it. "I guess," he answered. "Hopefully it'll help me with something I really want to do. Or maybe I can keep doing what I do, but under different circumstances." With that, he meant 'not working under his father'. "I've never been up to Delaware. Do you get winters like this?"

"They're pretty rough sometimes," she said, "but I have never seen as much snow as this before, anywhere. I'm wondering if we're really in Antarctica." She made a face, wrinkling her nose at him. "You probably don't get snow in Texas at all, do you?" She thought Texas counted as the South, but she wasn't 100 percent sure.

"I'm not sure we'd have all those trees if we were in Antarctica," he laughed, though he knew she wasn't serious about the suggestion. He had no idea where they were. He suspected that was the point. "It doesn't snow at all in Houston. It rarely gets cold enough, and when it does, it ends up as ice. Unfortunately, that leads to pure havoc, as people don't know how to handle it, but it doesn't happen all that often." If he lived a little farther north, then he'd have gotten snow once and a while. The only time he remembered it snowing in Houston, it didn't stick to the ground. Everyone went outside to see, just to have snow in the air.

"I can't imagine living where there isn't snow," Ashley said. "Even though I'm pretty sick of it right now." Being in the shed for several days had reinforced that, since they hadn't been able to even see out the windows through the heaped-up mounds of white. "I'd love to see what the grounds look like in spring."

"It'll be nice to get outside," he said. "I was trying to think what we could do with this much snow outside, but I couldn't come up with anything other than snow ball fights, and it's too cold to stand that long. But in the spring, we could orchestrate some games maybe. By then I think we'll all have a bit of cabin fever." While he didn't have it now, he knew he would after a few months. He'd be out in the cold just to be out of the house.

"There's snowmobiles somewhere," Ashley offered. "Back in the shed again, probably. I've never ridden one but I've heard other people doing it. But yeah, winter sports aren't really my thing." She lowered her head to rub at her eyes again, feeling really worn down all of a sudden. She sighed, figuring that she looked like a raccoon by now.

"It could be fun sometime. I guess it depends on what we have to deal with." There was sure to be more to come, even if he couldn't predict when. Nic watched her rub her eyes, then closed his own and yawned. He couldn't remember the last time he'd seen a clock, but he had the feeling it was getting late. "About ready to turn in?" he asked.

"Yeah, I think so," Ashley said. She quirked a smile at him and rose from the hearth, holding out a hand to help him up, though it was unlikely he'd need it. "Hate to leave good company, but I've gotten tired." It seemed like it had been a really, really long day for some reason.

He took her hand, not because he needed it, but because it was offered. "Don't worry about it," he smiled, this time a touch sleepy. "There's been a lot going on. Stress makes you tired." He stretched, pushing his shoulders back, then rolled his head to pop his neck. Nic sighed, feeling lethargic. "Sleep well, then. I'll see you around."

"See you," Ashley said. She'd take the stairs one flight up to her room, wash her face, coo at the boys for a minute and then collapse into bed. That seemed like about all she could handle for the rest of the night.