When Henry opened his eyes, he noticed that one, it was really fucking bright, and two, his arm hurt like hell. He laid there with his eyes closed until he heard a slight laugh. Oh no. He sat up quickly, scanning the room for Sammy.
He was standing in the middle of the room, holding a handful of feathers and chuckling.
"Sammy?"
"Yeees?"
"What did you do?" The feathers weren't a good sign.
Sammy's hand flew up to his chest as of he was offended. "I did nothing my dear friend."
Henry glared.
"Fine. I put feathers in yer hair."
"You what?!" Henry felt for feathers, wincing when he brought the injury covered arms up, and let out a sigh of relief when he felt none. "Very funny Samuel. You've lost nickname privileges."
"I didn't lose much then." Sammy dropped the feathers and walked over, still grinning dumbly. "Want to go meet Alice now? It's ten in the morning."
"Fine. If I have to." He was kinda excited actually.
"Well you do. Come on." Sammy held out a hand, which Henry ignored.
"I can get up on my own thank ya very much Mr. Lawrence." As he got up however, a bolt of pain made him immediately start to fall backwards. Sammy reached out and grabbed his friends shoulders, not wanting to put too much stress on the injuries.
"No, actually I don't think you can." What was that about? "Are you gonna be alright enough to walk 'round?"
"Yeah. I think it's just the pain from the cuts. You know you can move your hands now right? I think I'm okay now." He didn't know that for a fact though.
"Okay." Sammy let go, and looked relieved when the other didn't immediately fall over. "Well, if you're not going to pass out or anything I guess we should get going. It takes a little while to get to Alice's...domain."
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"Are we almost there?" Henry had been quiet until now. They'd made several wrong turns on account of Sammy not remembering the way to the elevator.
"Nope, not even close!" Sammy replied, walking ahead. He'd grabbed the axe before they left, and he would be glad about that decision soon.
As Sammy stopped to think about which direction to go next, he heard a shout of surprise from behind him, then a low groan. Great, the searchers are here. The one currently sitting in front of Henry regarded the man curiously, as if it actually had sentience.
Then the curiosity faded, and the human-like pile of sludge lunged at Henry, who had no defense whatsoever.
Sammy, who hadn't turned around yet, but did at the choking noise of pain he heard, swung the axe too late. The thing had already pulled Henry down into the ink, and Sammy knew there wasn't anything he could do now but wait. He knew about the loop, and the whole getting brought back from the dead thing.
It's gonna be hard to calm him back down after this...Sammy felt a little bad as he sat next to a Bendy altar to wait. He supposed he should have told him what could happen.
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Joey hadn't expected a death so soon. No matter, the dead could always be brought back in his story.
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When Henry opened his eyes for the second time that day, he could only think about one thing: he should be dead. Instead, he was in the middle of what seemed to be an inky, oddly glowing tunnel with his heart racing out of control. Surely this couldn't be what death was like right?
He was going to just sit in the middle of the tunnel for a little longer, when someone, familiar, said his name.
"Sam? Do- do you know what's going on?" His voice came out whisper like.
Go to The End. It will help. That was a random thought. But, it seemed like it was his only option.
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Sammy had been contemplating ideas when he heard a groan come from right beside him, and noticed something touching his arm. Another searcher? He started to reach for the axe before realizing it wasn't a searcher, it was Henry.
"Mornin' sleepyhead." He turned to look at said person, who was leaning up against the Bendy altar. Maybe he wouldn't freak out quite as much of he thought it had all been a dream.
"Sammy? Can you tell me what the actual fuck just happened?" Okay, so that didn't work.
"Yeah, about that. You just died Hen. I probably should have told you it could happen sooner, I'm sorry." He searched Henry's face for a reaction, and regretted doing so when he saw the look of fear resting there.
"What? That doesn't...that doesn't make any sense Sam. I could still see stuff. I still have a pulse for fucks sake, you wanna check?" He said the last part a touch frantically, holding his hand out, because this was a little freaky.
"I know it doesn't make sense. It's just how the studio works though. The sooner you accept that, the easier it will be. I know it sounds absurd but trust me." He reached out and grabbed Henry's hand, mostly to calm the other down. And to make sure his friend did in fact have a heartbeat.
After a few minutes of awkward staring, Sammy thought it was time to get moving again. If the other searchers heard the commotion, they would have no problem taking down a scared and confused person.
"Do you want to keep going? The searchers hardly ever go to Alice's domain."
"Do you think more will attack?" Henry looked terrified at the mere thought.
"No, not if we find the elevator quickly." He got up, pulling Henry along in the process. He didn't let go of his hand though.
"Then let's do that. I don't want to see that again. It was terrifying." He didn't pull his hand away either.
"Then let's go." Sammy walked down the hallway, this time making sure Henry was keeping pace, and looked at the staircase they were met with. "I guess we'll have to go up a couple more floors." He paused when he felt Henry's heart rate bump up through his hand.
Henry noticed too. "Sorry I just don't like high places. Elevators this high up just...freak me out a little bit." He lifted the hand that Sammy was holding onto. "If you couldn't already guess that."
"It'll be fine! Just think of it as a carnival ride. You have to like those right?"
"Yeah, I guess?" They started to walk up the staircases.
"Speaking of amusement parks, did you know Joey," he spat out the name, "was going to make one eventually? Was gonna work with that big shot Bertram Piedmont. Would've been cool if none a this happened."
"No, I didn't. What was he going to call it?"
Sammy looked around. One more staircase left. Then the elevator.
"Well, for a man runnin' an animation studio he wasn't that creative with names. The name was going to be Bendy Land."
"Bendy Land? That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard."
"It's true." Sammy was grinning now. "The elevator should be right up here." He felt Henry's hand squeeze his own harder in response.
"It'll be okay Hen. Trust me." The elevator was right in front of them now, and Sammy was about to walk towards it when a question from Henry made him stop.
"How many times have you, died, Sam?"
It felt wrong to say the words, when obviously Sammy wasn't dead.
"Oh well, I'm not exactly sure. After the first ten times I stopped keeping track. It was just too strange to think about." He'd been terrified.
"Ah. I just. Its- its just kinda only setting in right now. That I was dead, and now I'm not and-" He was hysterical now, a reaction Sammy had expected earlier. Sammy had an idea, though it felt a little wrong to trick his friend who was mid panic attack, it would make the elevator ride easier.
He led his shaking friend into the elevator and pressed the button for level nine. Alice. The door slid shut with a metallic click.
Henry still had ahold of Sammy's hand, and was gripping it as though it was going to disappear if he didn't. Sammy walked to the back of the now-moving elevator, a fact Henry fortunately didn't seem to register yet, and sat down, pulling the other down as well. His companion just pulled his knees up to this chest and rested his head on the arm Sammy didn't have ahold of.
"Hey, Hen look at me okay? Don't focus on what happened alright? You're here now and you're okay. We're safe." The other was still curled up, but Sammy could tell from his frantic breathing that he wasn't asleep.
"Come on Hen. You know how to deal with this. If you freak out, it's not going to help. If you don't want to look around, just look at me. It's okay. We're safe."
Sammy watched as Henry slowly lifted his head up, breathing not quite as erratic now. "I'm sorry Sammy. It's a dumb thing to get worked up about and I'm sorry." He was starting to shake again, and Sammy let go of his hand and instead hugged him, an action he hadn't decided to do until he was actually doing it.
"It's okay. Nothing's going to happen now okay?" At least I hope so.
He sat there, and was about to pull away when he felt arms circle around him, hugging him back tightly.
"I think I'm...better now." As Henry said those words, the elevator suddenly stalled, and he drew back, looking around for the cause. "Sam?"
"It's fine. The elevator does this sometimes, it's been out of service for a while." That's all it is right?
Then, the elevator stopped fully, screeching loudly. They were here.
"I think we're in Alice's domain now. Do you want to stay here, or see if we can find somewhere safe? We can always find her tomorrow." That should probably be a better idea anyway. Dying for the first time in the Studio was a shocking experience.
"Find somewhere safe." Not the elevator.
"Okay. Grab my hand." This time Henry didn't object, and grabbed the outstretched hand with his slightly less injured arm.
"So where do we go from here?"
"Just walk until we reach where she stays. It's not far now. By the way, don't mention the name Susie around her."
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Alice looked down from above. The hidden walkways she'd installed in the ceiling were really paying off. The prophet had brought a new sheep. She didn't know if it was for her to lead to the slaughter or not. She kind of hoped not.
She was a little lonely to be honest. She had stopped trying to fix her melted face a long time ago, but all of the studio's residents still knew her as the Fallen Angel, a title she didn't want to claim anymore. Even though her efforts had stopped a long time ago, the Butcher Gang and searchers stayed far away from her sanctuary.
She pulled herself out of her thoughts and looked down below once more. The prophet was talking to the...person. Yes that's what it looked like. Not a toon or warped creature of the ink.
Alice could hear their conversation. It seemed they were coming to visit her. Well, she could give them a little help along the way. But she wanted to play around with the new thing as well.
Maybe a couple of devilish scares would be in order. There was a reason for the horns after all.
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