January 07 - Paris - Ward 7

[robertod]

Paul Mandrin meets the investigators as scheduled. He's nervous. He continually advises them to make little noise and move quick, while drops of cold sweat slowly fall down his pale face. The whole asylum appears to have drifted into a lethargic sleep, occasionally broken by isolated moans of dream-haunted patients. He leads the group down the corridors of the cellars. The walls and floor are of rough and dark unpainted concrete. A single swinging light bulb dimly illuminates hallway that never seems to end. At one point, a large iron door with a glass window to peek inside interrupts the walking. A new hallway continues by turning right. Mandrin turns to the investigators.

"This is ward 7"

He pauses and swallows the saliva.
"I'll stay here on the doorstep, bul the door will stay open. I do not think they are aggressive. They have never been, at least with me."

After taking a final look at the corridor, he quickly opens the door, enough to let the group step inside. Beyond the door opens a large room, cold and damp. A light bulb emitting soft yellow light dangles from the low ceiling.
It seems to be the worst circle of the hellish asylum. An unbearable stench reigns in the room, a mixture of urine and sweat. There are seven occupants. They are as dirty as tramps, dressed in once-white pajamas that have long since taken on shades of gray. They have the air of being patients of whom few, if any, know of their existence. They aren't patients but inmates, faces wiped clean by the medications, barely human at all. The room walls are sheets of smooth stone, with no contact with the outher world. Beds are mattresses on the cold floor with a single blanket for warmth. At the back of the room is a large rusty metal wardrobe, with the doors now falling down. A closed door leading to another room is located beside the wardrobe. At the right corner is a small room. It is the bathroom. The door is open so a washbasin and a toilet are on sight.

A young girl is sitting on the mattress, immobile and catatonic. Her limbs are as stiff as a mannequin's. She probably could not refuse those poisons that made her mind slow to the point of stopping at cease every emotion. An unidentifiable trembling human shape is curled up and wrapped in blankets in a corner of the room. A man is lying on the mattress, seemingly sunk in a dreamless sleep. A young man of indefinable age is whispering random phrases while talking to himself, completely indifferent to what is happening around him. He has thick straps over his arms and legs. He seems dimly aware of his body being rigid and straight. Only three people, two men and one woman, pay attention to the new entrants. They stand in the center of the room staring at them, with scrutinizing and inquisitive eyes. One of those three looks to be the one more in good shape. He has long grey hair and sunken eyes, filled with a mixture of curiosity and distrust.

[Mephistophilis]

Gazing around him at the human detritus, cast aside by their fellow man, Andrew is filled with anger. 'What are these people doing down here, these French are simply barbarians!'

[Mr. Handy]

"Bonsoir," says Felicity, her heart going out to these poor people. "We're here to help you. Do any of you speak English?"

[aine]

Clarence moves to the side and, hiding his immense distaste crouches down on an empty mattress in the hope it will make him seem less formidable and put the patients at ease.

[SaintMeerkat]

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Archie shook his head and swallowed hard. He's seen a lot of hard cases during his years at a physician, but this completely broke his heart to see all of these patients looking so haggard and pathetic. He walked slowly from patient to patient, and stopped by the catatonic girl.

[In French]"As my friend say, we are here to help."

Is there anyone whose condition that I immediately recognize that I can actually treat with what I have at hand?"

[robertod]

Two of the trio in the center of the room back away, as if the words of a stranger in this room were a threat in themselves. The silver-haired man remains in his position and stares at Felicity, motionless as a statue, then speaks in a loud and thundering voice, with a solemn and imposing tone, gesturing with his arm, like a prophet.

"Help? What you mean help? Are you people of consciousness? What are people of cousciousness doing here underground? Help yourself with your own ignorance while you still can. This is not place for people of counsciousness. This is the place of those who sank into the true reality of their own misery. It was from feeling ourselves that we had reached the last barrier. That it was horrible, but that it could not be otherwise. That there was no escape for us. That we never could become different persons. That even if time and faith were still left us to change into something different, we would most likely not wish to change; or if we did wish to, even then we would do nothing. Because perhaps in reality there was nothing for us to change into."

The man speaks correct English although with a strong French accent. He certainly did some academic studies.

Approaching the patients Archie and Clarence notice that their shabby and decadent appearance reflects their mental state and the effect of the medications. Nobody looks sick or undernourished.

While taking care of them, Archie and Clarence can pay more attention to the young man with stiff limbs, speaking to himself, in French.
"Down.. from the depths ... it returns ... consciousness deludes itself to banish it ... but it returns ... returns ... returns from Pnath .... the real.. the self... it does comes back from the underwold."

[Mr. Handy]

"You must be Jacque," says Felicity to the silver-haired man. "My name is Felicity. What do you know about the man below?"

[SaintMeerkat]

Archie is mesmerized by the powerful man's voice. Although mental health is not his specialty, he is starting to see why this man is being held here. He frowned at the word 'Pnarth,' not sure if he's actually understanding what was said.

He piggy backed his question onto Felicity's: "And where is this...what did you call it...Pnarth?"

[Mephistophilis]

While the others question the patients, Andrew takes the opportunity to look around their meagre accommodation. He strolls over to the metal
wardrobe to take a look inside and then tries the door to the adjoining room.

[robertod]

Andrew scans the room discreetly. The wardrobe is almost empty. There are some clothes and old sheets. The room is a dusty closet, filled with shelves, piled up mattresses and pillows scattered on the floor. The shelves contain folded pajamas, wooden board games (checkers and chess), notebooks with yellowed pages, pencils, and books, mostly novels.

The man does not respond to Archie. Now his words became meaningless syllables, as if it were a radio receiving disturbed signals.

One of the men who was in the center of the room, with a darkly depressed face, approaches Archie and shakes his head disconsolately.
"He won't answer you. He won't answer us either. He feels thinks and just tells us what he wants to tell us. The man below said Pnarth is a place far away. Far from this Earth. He said he has friends there... and "

Jacque turns to the patient talking to Archie and yells at him.
"Shut up! Don´t say a word more!"
The man falls silent, with a mortified face.

Then Jacque turns to Felicity. His face lights up with hostility and reproach.
"I knew you have come for him. I knew that sooner or later they would come back to search for him. People of cousciousness like you once tried to imprison him. Others tried to kill him. But things went wrong for them."

He then he makes a few steps towards Felicity, staring at her with a piercing gaze.
"You'll never catch him. You understand?"
He then bursts into a big laugh.

[Mr. Handy]

"I suppose I don't understand," says Felicity. "You're much wiser than I. Why can't we ever catch him?"

Using Flattery.

[SaintMeerkat]

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It is al Archie can do to maintain his British stiff upper lip when the patient starts the terrifying laughter. He forces himself to breathe, and then looks around at the spokesperson.

"If we can't catch him...can you? Can you help us?"

[aine]

Clarence stands up and tries a different tack.
“Is it possible to learn from the Man Below? - Or from you? He must have a certain power.”

[Mephistophilis]

Andrew flicks through the crumbling notebooks and novels, looking for any writing or notes recorded in them.

[robertod]

Jacque replies to Felicity in a shrill voice.

"The underground man is elusive. You see him and you don't see him. He watches you and you don't know. When you think you have him, he vanishes in a mist."

Suddenly, as he sees that Andrew has entered the other room, Jacque goes there. He stops on the threshold and yells at the investigator.
As Andrew is leafing through the books in the small room, he suddenly hears a voice berating him.

"Hey you! Duke of Buckingham! What are you doing? We are the wrecks and scraps of society, but we retain a modicum of dignity. Do you think you can walk in here and rummage through our things as if you were at your home? Get out of there right away. You hear me?"

One of the other men that was standing next to Jacque, a young man, approaches Clarence and Archie and answers them. The other depressed man stay silent. The young man is about twenty, thin and pale, with a feverish face. He introduces himself as Etienne. He speaks in a low voice.

"We ... we don't really learn from the man below. We helped him and he will help us. So he promised us ... so Jacque believes ..."

Etienne briefly points to the other catatonic patient who keeps talking to himself.
"He felt the presence of the man below. His mind communicates with him somehow."
"We helped the man below to free himself. He told us he would take us away to the world of dreams. We want to be free, but we cannot be free in this world. This world is not made for us. The man below told us he will take us away to another world. But first, he has to do something here in this city. That is why he has disappeared for a few days. He has gone away to the depths of the earth, where his friends live, those who live underground. They help him too. He manages to get everyone to help him. But I think he has abandoned us. But... why do you want to catch him? Who are you? "

[Mr. Handy]

"What does he have to do here in this city?" asks Felicity, hearing Etienne's response.

[SaintMeerkat]

"Well, we don't so much want to catch him as to ask him questions," Archie explained to Etienne en Francais.

"I'm Archie. We are on an errand for a friend who asked us to do something for him, and the search for information has led us here."

[aine]

“We thought the underground man might be able to help us too. Tell me, Etiene, does the underground man wear old fashioned clothing? Such as an actor might wear perhaps.” Clarence asks.

[Mephistophilis]

Raising his hands and backing out of the cupboard, Andrew flushes a deep red, 'Je suis vraiment désolé' he stumbles.

[robertod]

Etienne answer to Felicity and Clarence
"When Albert brings his thoughts back to us ... the underground man looks for his skin ... so Albert sometimes says."
Albert is the patient who rambles on to himself.

"No, he has normal clothes. But clothes that cover him well. He has a scarf and a hat. He doesn't want to show his face to anyone .... nobody can see his face ... nobody .. . "
As he talks in detail about the mysterious man, a tone of enigma and fear takes over Etienne's face.

At this point Jacque runs towards Archie, with eyes full of anger. His nose gets a few inches from the investigator´s face. He yells at him in French.
"What do you want to ask him questions about? What kind of questions? What do you want from him? You want to kill him too, want you? You need to tell everything to us if you want to meet him. And don´t you dare to lie to us."

Meanwhile, Andrew, just before leaving the small room, he notices that a large pickaxe lies on the floor, hidden under a pile of clothes.