The Movement of Five Colours

[Eventua]

At this dark and gloomy crossroads, despite the scent of old mildew settled in your nose, your thoughts take on a surprising clarity. While you have no end of questions about this place, and you'd love to have the time and energy to get answers to them all, right now your focus needs to be on escaping.

Bippy mentioned being in a 'basement', which implies to you that the best way to head is upstairs, but you also consider the layout of the basement back home. After all, that had an old fire escape built in, and so your thoughts turn to the door – and the ominous, faint moaning that ripples away from it.

Remind Myrtle and Alex to ease up on the horror films when I get back.

"Say, uh, Bippy. That door – where does it lead? And, uh, why is it..." you whisper, "grumbling?"

Bippy goes dull and shrinks for just a moment, as if deep in thought, and then springs back to fill your vision.

"Oh!" they chirp, "That's the garbage disposal, where dad tosses failed experiments for compost!"

You briefly try to imagine what fresh hell a place like this would call 'garbage disposal' but then decide it's best not to dwell on it if you can help it.

"Ah, okay, so there's no, like... exits? To outside?"

"Oh, not at all! The entrances are all on the ground floor!~ Along with a bunch of other cool stuff!~"

Well that's a relief, I guess...

"Wait, and the moaning?"

"Oh, you might hear that in a few places where it's gloomy! It's just a nest of nameless hoping you'll stay away, they do that sometimes!~ I know dad finds it annoying when he has to throw the garbage out, but they're pretty harmless!~"

Your eyes narrow as you try to figure out if Bippy is aware just how terrifyingly ominous every other thing they say sounds.

"Nameless?" you repeat, and Bippy seems to go dull again, before suddenly snapping into place merely an inch or two from your face. The glow is bright enough to almost blind you, and you hiss from the flood of pain like some sort of newly awoken vampire.

"Yeah... you know! Small, shadowy, always lurking just outside your perception!~ You have them on the first sphere too!~ You were probably too busy sleeping, though, hehe!~"

You pause, considering the weight of that. Invisible... shadow... things? Just... always there, on Earth? You think back on hokey ghost stories, or poltergeists and tricks of the light, and wonder how long things from other worlds might have been living there.

Wait.

"What... what do you mean, sleeping?"

Bippy tilts slightly, and you're reminded briefly again of Forrest's pet hamster, "Yeah! Everyone on the first sphere is asleep, like... all the time!~ It's why they're not aware of other spheres!~"

You pause, and as you try to puzzle through what on earth Bippy is talking about your attention is drawn – quietly but irresistibly – to the curtain covering the large object at the other end of the corridor. Even in the light projected by Bippy and the faint blue and gold glow of the hooked lanterns on the walls, it stands ominous like a sentinel, watching you.

"And... what about that thing?" you say, gesturing to the curtain.

Bippy seems to... you think it made a sound like 'mmmmmm', but it almost had a slight buzz to it, like the hum of an old light bulb that's been left on for a long time.

"Oh!~" they suddenly perk up, "That's one of dad's old mirrors!~"

You cross your arms, your thoughts feeling a little clearer and easier to muddle through than before, "A mirror?"

"Yep!~"

"Like, just... a mirror-mirror? For looking at yourself?"

"Yeah! I'm surprised you know what a mirror is, Silas!~ You're just full of neat and unexpected things!~"

"... Why wouldn't I know what a mirror is, Bippy?"

Bippy pauses again, and their voice suddenly seems uncertain, like a small child that wasn't paying attention in class suddenly being asked for an answer... or, you realize, perhaps like someone trying to make up a lie on the spot.

"Because, uh, the first sphere is pretty, uh... badly educated...?"

"Wow. Uh... thanks, I guess."

"But not you! You're bright as a button!~"

This thing is patronizing you, and you think it's lying to you while it does it, and honestly you're not sure which is more frustrating. You shake your head and try to refocus.

"Why is it covered, though? Did your dad just get tired of looking at himself?"

If I was him I probably would.

Bippy pauses again, and then flickers towards the base of the stairs.

"Yep! Dad gets lonely sometimes, and it reminds him of the loneliness!~"

You take a deep breath, and try to push away the steadily whispering thought that Bippy is lying to you, and consider the stairs. Right now they're the most obvious way to go to escape from this place, though you realize you're not sure what's out there or where you go next, but anywhere has got to be better than as the prisoner of a mad scientist cyclops who apparently plans to chop you up to figure out how you got here.

Still, this place works by rules or principles you don't fully understand, so before you make your way upstairs you decide to ask one more thing.

"Bippy, how do the colours work...? What do they do?"

You immediately regret that question because Bippy seems to almost... inaudibly explode? Like a recording of giant fireworks display with the sound muted, you back away and almost crash into the mirror as you try to blink away the confusion of different shades of golden light, your eyes desperately trying to adjust.

"Ah, Bippy, what-"

"WEEE!~" they buzz, and you try to make as 'quietly loud' a shushing gesture as you can, considering the fact you still don't know where the giant is right now.

"Oh...!~ Sorry, Silas, I got excited! I love colours!~"

"Uh, yeah... you said."

"Right!~"

…

There is only the distant whispering of the nameless in the next room, and the slow groaning of the wood in the house, and the faint buzzing of Bippy in front of you.

"So...?"

"OH OH, yeah, yeah! Colours!~" they say, "Well, uh, mmm... I'm not really a science-y sort of spark, I just think it's neat!~"

"A what-what?"

"But I know the gist of them! I'm gold, the colour of warmth!~ It's life and healing and swell times with friends and kindness and good food!~ The fact you're standing in my golden light is probably the reason you're not unconscious right now or bleeding out, hehe!~"

Your eyes narrow as you nod, trying to take it all in, and sadly struggling – aside from the uncomfortable thought of what it would mean if you tried to escape without Bippy with you.

"I don't know the others so well, sorry... but I know that red is the colour of big muscles and doing your very best like no one ever did, and spicy food!~ Black is the spookiest colour, of changing and making and being asleep, while blue is the colour of speaking and thinking and working stuff out – like, numbers and stuff. That's dad's favourite colour."

"... And silver?"

"Oh gosh, I forgot about the cage...! Silver is the colour of being neat and tidy and everything staying the same – it's predictable and honest, and I think that's pretty neat.~"

"I see. So the colours are like... a personality, or an ideal?"

"Yep!~"

"But they're also, like... tangible? Like a physical, material thing? Or a kind of energy?"

"Yep!~"

"... Huh. What... what about green?"

It is your namesake, after all.

"Green?"

"Yeah, you know. Blue and yellow mixed together," you gesture to a spot or two on the wall where the glow of a blue lantern touches Bippy's golden light, forming a sort of sickly greyish green. It's imperfect, but it's close enough.

"... oh!~ I see the confusion!~ Green is a colour, but it's not a principle colour, it's not an axe of virtue."

"A what?"

"Gold, Red, Black, Blue, and Silver. There's five of them – the five axes of virtues!~ Other colours are just tones or combinations of those five!"

You cross your arms, and try to keep it all clear in your head. You don't really understand it all in detail, but you think you can remember the gist of it – enough to work through and puzzle out the details of it when you have more time and a safer environment.

With a smile and a nod, you head for the stairs. The gentle moaning of the nameless behind the door grows a little heavier as you approach, and you're sure you can make out voices. With trepidation you slowly, carefully place your ear to the wood. You can hear something in the walls – chewing and grinding, like planks of wood slowly moving alongside each other – and beyond it you can start to make out the words whispered.

itsdarkandlonely, pleasedontlook, dontcomein, lostboythoughts, noone, noone, wellbequiet, wellbegood, dontlook, pleasedontlook, thegianteats, thelostboysneaks, silas, parasite, parasite, thehousehasteeth, yumyum, goaway, stayaway, knothomenothome, ournest, notyours, ournest, nameless, nameless

On and on the whispering goes, the voices both comforting in their familiarity and yet unrecognisable as anyone specific. Your eyes closed, your imagination starts to fill the blank with the day Myrtle-

"Silas!~"

You return to the present, and sigh. Need to focus - present, not past.

Get home first. Then you can make sure they all know how much they mean to you.

"Yeah, sorry Bippy, was listening to the whispering. Brought back some old memories, that's all."

"That's okay!~ That happens, sometimes! We should get you back to the cage anywa-"

"Actually!" you cut in, smiling widely through the pain, "I wanted to ask about upstairs. What's it like up there...?"

"O-oh!~ That seems..." Bippy narrows again, "pretty risky! I really don't want to get in more trouble, and dad'll be on just the first floor, probably...!~"

You try to keep up the smile, listening out. You'd not really noticed it through the sound of something chewing or grinding against wood, or the whispered moaning of the nameless, but there's definitely the faint and echoing sound of distant footsteps far above you.

"Well, there's the ground floor first, right?"

"I... I guess."

"So no worries. We'll head up to the ground floor, and we can explore it a little more, right?"

"Mmm... then right back to the cage?"

You nod.

"Yep. Right back to the cage."

Bippy pauses, flickers a little more, and then cuts out with a bzzt – the corridor is bathed in thick gloom, and you immediately feel the stinging in your skull crack, the rushing of pain and nausea as your body is no longer supported by whatever strange healing rests in the golden light. Your sense of smell is likewise assaulted, mildew suddenly replaced as the walls and floorboards start to reek like a gangrenous wet dog.

You're about to keel over and vomit up whatever is left in your stomach when your vision is restored to the sound of a way too enthusiastic "Hello friend!~", and you make do with quietly dry heaving and blinking heavily.

"Wh-what... was... what was..."

"Oh gosh! I'm sorry Silas, I didn't mean to leave you alone for so long...!~ I was just checking upstairs, the way is clear!~ There's weirdly not even any scarecrows or anything, so they must be on guard duty or off on a mission or something!"

You nod, and wince as you try to smile. You have no clue what scarecrows are in this context but you hope you don't have to find out.

Definitely need to find a way to either take Bippy with me or something golden, then. Ho boy. Bad. Reminder not to do that again.

You take a few deep breaths, wipe away some more of the blood pooling at the edges of your vision, and focus on the tasks ahead.

The stairs are massive – suitable, you suppose, for such a giant creature. Eyeballing it quickly, they seem to stretch about six or seven feet wide, while each step – which seems to look like a gnarled mess of thick tree roots that then nests a smooth, rectangular black stone as the stair itself – is maybe a two feet deep.

Slowly, steadily, you begin to creep up the stairs. Your footsteps faintly 'clack' against the smooth stone, and you faintly smile at the thought of Jade being here (under less terrifying circumstances, of course). No doubt she'd have a whale of a time with stairs like this for dancing, and mom would be-

…

You wince, and keep your eyes peeled. The stairways lead away, and you are struck by the sense of a thinner gloom – of almost natural light emerging from somewhere further away, just reaching the edges of the stairway.

Slowly, steadily, you poke your head out with each heavy step, and carefully, creepily emerge into a wide central hallway, the floor covered in a massive, filthy rug made of... fur? It's not clear what animal it came from originally though.

Your first impression is of stereotypical old Victorian houses, but as if someone had carved one from the inside of a giant tree – the rooms are massive, the ceilings stretching a good fifteen feet upwards, and the wooden bark panels that cover the walls are much taller and wider here. Simultaneously, though, everything feels 'squeezed' – there are no neat corners or edges where the floor meets the walls, and the ceiling is haphazardly angular. These oddly arranged corners create countless spaces where the dim lighting – of blue and gold hooked lanterns near the ceilings – barely reaches, and from those spots of gloom you can faintly hear more nameless whispering, asking you to stay away.

Sadly, the natural light you could make out appears to be a slightly more earthly shade of the golden light you're becoming uncomfortably used to. There are no windows here - instead, woven into certain walls or corners of the ceiling are... honestly, what look like bugged out 80s box TVs. They're clearly damaged and don't match any brand you recognize, but between the steel-blue casing emerges a faint golden orange light that gives the feeling of some sort of polluted sunrise. The screens seem to show views of some sort of swamp, but it's too foggy to make out anything specific.

The smell of mildew continues up here, and it crosses your mind that the smell might not just be unkempt mould – considering how badly it reeked when you weren't protected by Bippy's light, you're starting to realize just how filthy this giant lives. Indeed, the walls are thickly stained, and there is a dustiness that puffs up in tiny clouds as you carefully step across the wood that fills every beam of light with tiny particles. The unpleasant smell seems to grow worse when you turn to your right.

"Tadaaa!~ You're on the ground floor, how neat is that? Dad probably won't be downstairs for a bit – if he's up in his study right now, he probably won't be back downstairs for a little while!~ Not sure about the scarecrows though!~"

You frown, and try to steady your breathing.

"So! Where to first?~"

CHOOSE ANY NUMBER:
-- Investigate the main hallway...
---- [] ...the lanterns.
---- [] ...the "TVs".
---- [] ...the rug.
---- [] ...the stairs to your right, leading further upstairs.
-- [] Ask Bippy some questions. [Write-In (please be specific rather than general)]
-- [] [Write-In]

EXPLORATION OPTIONS (CHOOSE TWO):
-- To your left...
---- [] A massive sealed door surrounded by a decorative stone arch - large even by the normal standards of this place.
---- [] A large, partially opened door. There is a gentle silver glow coming from it, and an occasional squeaking noise.
---- [] A wide, square space without a door that smells faintly of compost. You can hear the rustling of leaves, the beeping of machinery, and... something bubbling? There's a strong mixture of blue and golden light from here.
-- To your right...
---- [] A tightly sealed door. The disc at its center is dry and colourless as a bone. (Requires remaining blue liquid)
---- [] A thinner, slightly opened door, and even through Bippy's golden light and the light of the "TVs" you can smell something bad.
---- [] A creeping passage way - seemingly too thin for the giant to actually use, but just fine for you - that seems to turn sharply into empty darkness just out of sight of the light from the TVs. You can hear the nameless whispering from deep within it.

Time may be of the essence.

 

[Eventua]

This soft, golden-orange light that fills the room – like someone had painted a picture of a room during the late afternoon, but the paints they were using were just a little too saturated – starts to grate on your nerves a little. Eyes raised and watching the TV closely, you try to puzzle it out as you step over the rug with only the barest of glances.

The footage displayed on each TV is subtly different, but largely the same – of a crude and twisted tree-line, of huge, knotted black trees that crack and snap back into place, surrounded by a thick and sickly pale blue fog. It takes you a moment, but after a little bit of more concentrated watching it's soon clear even through the fog that the trees are... walking? No, walking is too human a term, the masses of writhing, snapping branches fading in and out of the fog. Crawling? Reshaping? You're reminded faintly of a documentary you saw as a kid about coral reefs, but as if someone had dumped an oil tanker first.

There is no sunshine to the place, but the sky above and that you can occasionally glimpse through the trees is warm and orange and completely, perpetually cloudy. There's no breaks in it – a thick and roiling golden cloud cover, like a soundless storm.

… Is that outside? Will... will I even be able to breath out there?

You hug yourself tightly to keep from shaking, and give one last glance at the TV itself. There's no text on it – just a black symbol running along the bottom in the shape of... some sort of crown?

Or like an abstract, demonic skull.

You're hoping it just means that whatever brand makes TVs for monsters is really into old school heavy metal music and keep focused on the present. You need to keep moving and exploring.

You figure it's best to avoid the place that reeks even through whatever shield Bippy is providing you – at least for now, if you can help it – and so focus on your options to your left. When you were in the cage, you were running on a mixture of anger at the giant, but there was a sort of icy focus – as if the pain was detached or abstract, happening to a stranger – unlike the sort of... rhythmic, looping pain and nausea you've been feeling since.

Silver light it is.

Approaching the door carefully, trying to step carefully so as to avoid making any creaking sounds – though the uneven surface of the floor seems to create nothing more than a firm 'pat' sound as you step on it – it looks very similar to the door in the basement leading to the garbage disposal. Other than being a little taller – appropriate, since you're fairly confident the ceiling here is taller than the basement anyway – it's practically identical, with that same 'disc' in the centre of twisted and centralized roots. The disc has smudges of faded glowing blue liquid, but it's been left slightly open.

"Oh! The kitchen!~" cuts in Bippy, "I'm sorry Silas, I didn't even think about food! Humans and orichal need-"

Another faint squeak rings out from beyond the door, louder than before, and Bippy flares up suddenly.

"Oh no! No you don't...! Silas, go in!"

Your lips curl a little as you try to brace yourself for whatever strange new monstrous thing is making the noise, and with careful, sudden shove you push the door open – and then hop backwards, fists raised.

Slowly, inevitably, the door drags itself inwards to the echoing sound of wood chewing through wood, and as the faint silver light spreads to fill your vision, the thought whispers to you that maybe this was a mistake.

"Bippy, what... what is it?"

"Eugh, the worst creature in all the spheres! Dreadful, dreadful!"

You gulp a little, and then-

…

Wait what.

"Squeak!" says the... well, you can't quite figure out if it's a pigeon, a rat, a parrot, a lizard, or just a really weird, tiny old man in a dinosaur gimp suit.

"Shoo, shoo!" snaps Bippy, flickering into the kitchen like an angry tennis ball, "Get outta here Faltehim! Stop eating the fruit!~"

"Snrrr!" snaps back the weird creature, a piece of... what looks like a piece of bloody, rancid beef, except it's a dark blue colour – leaping away from the massive wooden sideboard that stands maybe five or six feet off of the ground. It lands against another sideboard underneath one of the blue lamps that line the tops of the walls here – just like the ones elsewhere – and starts to wiggle itself suggestively as it takes another bite of the 'fruit' it clenches in knitted, horrid claws.

"Wh-... what...?" you barely stammer out, and the tiny rat dinosaur bird man sneers, looking you dead in the eye. Your blood runs cold, because you can tell from its expression – this creature has nothing to lose.

"SQUE!" it screams, as Bippy tries to... herd it? Bippy zooms in like a bolt of lightning, and the monster hisses as it bounds away.

"Go on, scoot, scoot! Get outta here!"

"Squeak!" it shouts again, and with another loud hiss it throws the last chunk of dark blue muck right at you and, as you wince away from the cold, foul smelling flesh it dives towards you and dips between your legs, vanishing down the creeping, narrow passageway where the nameless were whispering.

"Wh-... what?"

"Yeah! And stay out!" grumbles Bippy as it goes, and shakes themselves, before turning back to you.

"I... what?"

"Oh, sorry!~ Faltehim is a real pain sometimes, he keeps sneaking back in through the roof!~"

"Faltehim... wait, that's a person? A guy?"

Bippy narrows and fades again, and then springs back into place without a worry, zipping into the kitchen, bathing it in a soft mixture of silver and golden light, occasionally interspersed by the blue light of a few lanterns along the upper areas of the wall.

"Hehe, I sure wish Faltehim was a person!~ Maybe he'd eat less of dad's food if he was!~"

"No, I mean... you gave it a name. Is it... like a pet? What species is he?"

Bippy pauses, and based on the way their light changes you could've sworn they were blushing?

"Oh, no! Faltehim's just a wild animal. He breaks in sometimes when the scarecrows are out, but he's pretty harmless!~"

… You consider pushing further into what exactly Bippy is avoiding telling you, but tuck the thought away for now.

"The scarecrows keep out intruders, then?" Would make sense, I guess.

"Oh yeah! Dad imported them from another sphere – he said that 'the only warrior folk on the ruddy sphere are jokers, and I'll be caught dead before I hire a ruddy joker to guard my property!' – because they're super super good at killing things!~"

Your throat tightens, just a little.

"Why... why aren't they on guard, then?"

Bippy seems to pause for a moment, and narrows so thin they almost become a flat disc – for just a moment you're reminded of a video you saw a while ago of a star being sucked into a blackhole, the jets of plasma stretching and warping out into a flattening, spiraling disc of energy.

Bippy then spoils the illusion of greatness by springing back into their usual shape with a sharp giggle and a spark of damaged wiring.

"Well, they're probably looking for something, or someone, out in the marshlands! Sorry Silas, I really don't know!~"

You sigh again, shake your head, and try to refocus.

Keep focused. Get home.

You carefully continue into the kitchen – where thankfully there don't seem to be any more weird monsters, and get a proper look at the place.

Sure enough, it definitely feels like a kitchen – a floor of smooth black stone, heavy wooden sides with tall wooden cupboards, and a big wooden rack containing a huge array of little clay pots with different symbols on them. Between the rack and the closest sideboard, meanwhile, is a much smaller rack containing hefty pieces of cutlery, all appropriately sized – a hefty butcher's machete that's almost two and a half feet long stands out to you most.

The entire room feels – as do all of the rooms in this place – like it was 'grown into' or hollowed out from the inside of a tree that somehow remained alive the whole time, but the corner opposite is some sort of massive round... well, if you're being honest, it looks kind of like a big stereotypical witches' cauldron.

An enormous dark grey metal pot, maybe 8 feet tall and 8 feet wide, mounted on a huge, elaborate carved stand made of some mixture of that same black stone you've seen before and... what you think might be driftwood? It's got a different texture, lighter and more elaborate, than the heavier, darker, 'fresh tree bark' look of everything else.

Decorative?

"Aww," says Bippy, who bolts into place just over the massive cauldron, their light tilting downwards as if looking into it, "Dad's not been cooking recently. I can't smell or taste anything, but I know it's better for him to eat proper dinners!~ He hasn't taken the time for a good stew in ages!~"

Your stomach rumbles loudly, as if all of this talk of food and kitchens has reminded you that the only thing you ate today was some milk and cornflakes – and that with everything that went on those are now mostly on the floor of the cage. You sigh, and turn to the wall to your left – cramped from the ceiling moving inwards – where you see two important sights.

The first is a massive, rectangular grey box – the only clearly mechanical object in this room. Sleek and uncomfortably ominous in just how fancy and modern it looks, it's... well, it certainly looks like a fridge. At the edges it glows with a clear cut, wide silver glow, and on the surface is more symbols you don't recognize. There's little magnetic hooks stuck to it, with little leathery post-it notes attached all along the top half of the box, written in a language you don't recognize scratched out in jagged, heavy pen strokes.

Just pass it and at the base of the wall, meanwhile, is thin mesh of roots and wooden growths – distinctly teeth shaped – that arrange into... almost a kind of grate? It's unclear where it would lead to, but you can faintly hear the nameless whispering from it.

Nothing grabs your attention as being immediately useful unfortunately other than the knife, but you do consider grabbing something to eat from the fruit bowl... and then remember the sight of the fog on the TV, and it occurs to you that whatever counts for food here might be poisonous, or attract monsters, or turn your organs into ferrets or something.

You pause, shake your head, and sigh. Keeping the knife logged in your mind as an option should it be needed but leaving it on the rack for now, you consider some of your options. Maybe the room opposite and around the corner? You give Bippy an awkward smile of changing your mind, and back away into the hallway. They dutifully zip back to take the lead, and as they go on ahead of you slightly, you also see one of the golden lanterns on the edge of the corner for the large, wide open room.

They're... they're the same?

You stop dead in your tracks, taking a close look at the way the light pulsates from Bippy, and the light from the lantern, and realize that no – it's more than that.

They're synchronized. You could swear the timing on it was perfect.

"What's up Silas?~"

"Bippy... you mentioned 'sparks' before. What is a spark?"

"Oh!~ What a neat question! It's me...! I'm a spark!~"

…

You wonder if you should've guessed Bippy would work that out as the most helpful answer to your question.

"No, I know that, what I mean is... what are you? Like a... robot? A computer program? A ghost? An alien? When... when you say 'a spark', what does that mean?"

Bippy wobbles in the air for a bit, blinking backwards and forwards between you and the lamp on the wall, before pausing again. You're about to wave your hand to try and gets its attention when in a sudden pulse of light Bippy snaps into place right above the palm of your hand. The warmth of its glow is almost intoxicating, and whatever weariness was forming in your arms and legs fades rapidly, rejuvenated.

"A spark is like... pure warmth. When you have enough gold in one place, focused into a thought, it comes to life. It lives to help and be nice to people... like me!~"

You try to blink away the strength of the golden light at such close quarters, as Bippy flickers away from your hand and returns to its place between you and the lamp. Bippy floats right up to it, and as it suddenly wiggles on the spot you hear the slight 'dink' of a tiny hand gently bouncing against glass.

"These are sparks too, but they're just sleeping. They're being helpful by being a light source!~"

...

"Wait, are they... are they conscious? They can talk and think, like you?"

Bippy stops bouncing against the glass and turns, their golden wings seeming to shift slightly into... crossed arms? Narrowed eyebrows? It's an odd look, but then they suddenly zip down to get way too close to your face, faster than you can blink. You wince as the light gets right in your face again, and worryingly, their voice sharply rises.

"They're not like me, dad made me super special and the best. They're just boring, regular sparks, and they're good at sleeping! They're happy like that!"

… Struck a nerve, huh.

You swallow slightly, glancing over your shoulder, but you can't hear any stirrings of giants or the thundering of footsteps.

Bippy, meanwhile, takes on that slightly hotter, orange-ish glow from the basement, and you're pretty sure you're getting more of a handle for Bippy's moods. You perk up a friendly smile – easier as your strength slowly feels like it's returning, despite your injuries – and raise your hands in a gentle, placating shrug.

"Of course Bippy, you're right, I'm sorry. Thanks for being such a good friend and answering my questions, but..." you slowly gesture with a finger to your lips, whispering, "...secret explorers."

Almost immediately, Bippy returns to its normal shade of gold and backs away a little, shrinking slightly.

"Oh gosh, sorry Silas!"

Phew, you think, smiling and nodding.

You nod towards the area opposite the kitchen, just around the corner from where you are currently. As you approach, you realize that the mixture of blue and golden light isn't so much a combination as it is simply alternating between them. Trying to keep your eyes peeled and your hearing keen, you make your way to the edge of the corner, and taking a deep breath you lean around the corner to look inside.

There's no door – instead, behind a faintly shimmering wall of alternating blue and golden light, there stretches out a wide open space, easily bigger than most of the rooms you've seen so far combined. A crooked and jagged room that almost gives the impression of a greenhouse, except for that same lack of windows – instead, huge blue spotlights alternate between blue and gold as they sway backwards and forwards, bathing the plant life. Four rows of wide, smooth wooden platforms, filled with bubbling black soil. Each has space between them sufficient for the one-eyed creature's girth to walk between them.

The plants inside all seem to be of the same species – some sort of tall but thick stemmed plant with twisting, notched bulbs dotted along the surface like a bizarre mixture of broccoli, cauliflower, and... human brains?

Just beyond them, meanwhile, are a set of strange blue machines you can't make out properly from here. They seem to plug into the floor with jagged, chaotic pipe-work.

They're above the cage room, you realize.

Thin strands of some sort of... thread, or wires – it's hard to tell – connect the bulbs of the plants, and you suddenly realize that whatever rustling noise you heard earlier has stopped. Instead, you can hear some sort of... babbling? Whispering? Coming from somewhere at the back of the room, and from the base of some of the giant spotlights.

The shimmering wall of light that separates you from the room gives you a sharp reminder in your stomach, and you wince a little at the idea of touching it.

"Bippy, uh, this room... what is it? What's up with the wall of light?"

"Oh!~ That's the stem garden! I don't really know all the technical side of it, but I know dad uses it to grow food and for the kaleidoscope! Ponderous Five lives here. He gets nervous about strangers though, hehe!~"

"Can I... go through it?"

Bippy dims, lower and lower, almost to the point of vanishing – and at the same time, the wall switches to blue, almost completely cutting you off from golden light. For that brief and horrible coincidence, your senses are once again assailed by the rancid stench of rot and muck and mould, and the pain in your head stabs into you sharply, causing you to keel over slightly... but thankfully, not quite as badly as last time, you think?

And then, as quickly as it struck you the pain and stench is gone, as Bippy zips back into bright golden life once more.

"You're a pretty curious guy, I bet you could!~ But I have to warn you, I can't go in there with you, so it'll probably be really unpleasant for you and I dunno how easy it would be to get out again.~"

You can't help but narrow your eyes a little, teeth gritted. More choices, and no certainty as to how much time you have.

CHOOSE ANY NUMBER. YOU MAY WRITE-IN MORE DETAILED INSTRUCTIONS IF YOU WISH:
-- [] Investigate...
---- [] ...the massive sealed door surrounded by a decorative stone arch.
---- [] ...the nameless whispering.
---- [] …the rack of clay pots (kitchen).
---- [] ...the cutlery rack and sideboards (kitchen).
---- [] ...the "fridge?" with silver light (kitchen).
---- [] ...the "grating" made of roots (kitchen).
---- [] ...the cauldron (kitchen; requires something to stand on).
---- [] …the cupboards (kitchen; requires something to stand on).
-- [] Ask Bippy some questions [Write-In (please be specific rather than general)].
-- [] [Write-In].

CHOOSE UP TO ONE TO EXPLORE:
-- [] A tightly sealed door. The disc at its center is dry and colourless as a bone. (Requires remaining blue liquid)
-- [] A thinner, slightly opened door, and even through Bippy's golden light and the light of the "TVs" you can smell something bad.
-- [] A creeping passage way - seemingly too thin for the giant to actually use, but just fine for you - that seems to turn sharply into empty darkness just out of sight of the light from the TVs. You can hear the nameless whispering from deep within it.
-- [] The stem garden (note: you may not be able to easily leave once you enter). If you do, you may choose to investigate any number of...
---- [] ...the tall, leafy plants.
---- [] ...the 'threads' connecting the plants.
---- [] ...the alternating blue and gold spotlights.
---- [] ...babbling from the walls.
---- [] ...the machine plugged into the floor above the cage-room.

Time may be of the essence.