[ His only advantage is that Quentin has been through enough trials that he can recognize this feeling. This panic--even the suffocated feeling of his shirt pasted against his chest with blood. It's like the trials, it means he has to pull it together. Quentin struggles for good draughts of air, pull it together. He can bring the screaming down to just plain moaning, aimless and continuous--low enough that it's not like an effort to make it happen, but loud enough to focus on that instead of the thing, that thing with a mouthful of him. He tries for a handful of the papers on the table, like they'll tell him something about what happened here, but they disintegrate in his hands and cling in the creases of his palms. The feeling makes him gag--and the abrupt warbling tune scares a coughing fit out of him.
[ And the lights start to go.
[ Keep it together, as he wheezes and shuffles back. Keep it together when Cheryl flickers closer to him and Quentin's careful keening pitches up abruptly. The melting woman in front of him, the maddening mechanical noise behind and above--the next time the bulb flickers out, the plea makes it out of his mouth, desperate: ] --keep it together, christ--oh sh--! [ In the dark, she's close enough that some piece of her fucking face falls and slides down his arm, so he swings an elbow out to make space.
[ His heel hits one step, catches on another, and the benefit to falling is that while it might bruise the shit out of his ass and sides, it frees up Quentin's legs to kick out--or at least to put as a wedge between himself and Cheryl. Chainsaw-roaring rattles his teeth. There's a monster just upstairs. There's a monster down here. This isn't a trial, so who knows where he's going when he dies? Childish, Quentin kicks and covers his ears, one hand digging into his hair and the other scraping along muscle and skull. ]
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[ And the lights start to go.
[ Keep it together, as he wheezes and shuffles back. Keep it together when Cheryl flickers closer to him and Quentin's careful keening pitches up abruptly. The melting woman in front of him, the maddening mechanical noise behind and above--the next time the bulb flickers out, the plea makes it out of his mouth, desperate: ] --keep it together, christ--oh sh--! [ In the dark, she's close enough that some piece of her fucking face falls and slides down his arm, so he swings an elbow out to make space.
[ His heel hits one step, catches on another, and the benefit to falling is that while it might bruise the shit out of his ass and sides, it frees up Quentin's legs to kick out--or at least to put as a wedge between himself and Cheryl. Chainsaw-roaring rattles his teeth. There's a monster just upstairs. There's a monster down here. This isn't a trial, so who knows where he's going when he dies? Childish, Quentin kicks and covers his ears, one hand digging into his hair and the other scraping along muscle and skull. ]