#interactions; felix and emine and bella 001

[manybcdthings]

escape room

felix ranstrom, isabella belcourt and emine nazik @ofwrxth

Obviously, Felix was going to take an escape room seriously. A very spiritual metaphor was at stake. Being trapped with only his mind as a way of escape. Naturally, he fell into a more serious demeanor, focusing on the first clue they could find while hearing the slight stirring of mischievous chuckles following Emine and Bella through the room. "Here's one." he perked up, grabbing an ancient tablet and clearing his throat. "I am the key to the past, present, and future, yet I never speak. What am I?" he read aloud, brows furrowing as he took a brief pause to consider the riddle. He was on the brink of an epiphany when, with the unison of a well rehearsed choir, Bella and Emine chimed "CLOCK!" an exclamation that instantly brought a smirk to Felix's face as he blinked at them. "Time." he corrected, but his words were instantly lost to the sound of their laughter. He fought his own, watching them for a moment with an amused glint in his eye. "Wonderful. It's started already. On the first clue." Felix accepted that the hysterics would linger, sighing slightly as he tried to find the perfect moment between their breaths to speak. "Can you...please, by all means, take all the time you need...but...can you laugh and look for something relating to... time?"

[manybcdthings]

"Please don't indulge that." Felix requested in defeat, his head canting to the side with a deadpanned expression to Bella. He had to tune out Emine's puns for his own sanity, until he heard her question about the map but was glued in place to hide Bella's magic. Felix gave an exaggerated shrug, and a look of disbelief at the question. "I...would need to look at it in order to answer that." he stated because in that moment, he became equally as unhelpful to the cause. Once Bella was finished with the sand, Felix immediately turned with focus for another clue, only to naturally take whatever it was she handed to him without much attention. "Oh." he glanced down to the timer in his hands, pushing the lid firmer into place. "Thank you. I was beginning to feel useless."

But Bella was gone before she told him where she plucked the timer from, leaving Felix the annoying task to find it's rightful place. Annoyed at the thought of putting it in the wrong one. He watched the two witches and their excitement with the hieroglyphics, smirking to himself as he tried to hover the timer around the table to find where it belonged. "Where did you...Isabella." Felix glanced for her attention, only to be interrupted by her quip. "Considering it's an ancient and dead system that serves no purpose, no. I can not. Neither can you. Emine is obviously the chosen one." he grinned before waving the timer in his hands. "It's also, obviously, not a clue. Considering...it's an ancient and dead system that no one uses anymore. Do I...repeat myself a lot?" @ofwrxth

Emine tries to help collect sand distractedly, laughter on the tip of her tongue as she and Bella disrupt the flow of the entire game. "I think we all just need a time out." She says finally, descending into a fit of giggles once more, all attempts to help clean gone as she tries to catch her breath. "Okay, this time I'm good. For real. What's next?" She tries to keep her composure, watching as Bella sweeps up the sand with a flick of her wrist. "Well if we're timed it's a good thing we've got plenty of it." The witch chews the inside of her cheek, before gesturing at the hieroglyphics again. "Are you sure this isn't important?" She asks, uncertain how it relates but it's the only helpful thing she's been able to see. But Felix's sarcasm is far more amusing than the prospect of getting out of the room, and she bites back another laugh at his expense.

"Okay. Okay. Can you read hieroglyphics, Felix? I must've forgotten to take that class in college," she coughs, completely entertained as she hops from one foot to the other, studying the symbols before a lightbulb goes off. "Wait. Actually. That's the astonished man!" Emine points excitedly at the figure, without providing context. "That means a million. I don't know if that's the clue." Because it seems unlikely that they'd rely on people's knowledge of hieroglyphics to get out of the room, but maybe it's a shortcut. "And coil of rope!" Emine begins to laugh again, the fact that she was, in fact, reading the symbols, amusing her to no end. "That means a hundred and the staff means one." @rviner

[manybcdthings]

Felix had no choice but to watch what he would describe as pure chaos. Both Bella and Emine cackling like actual witches, even if he kept fighting his own grin for the sake of keeping the focus on track. As Emine pointed out a potential clue, Felix turned and was ready to take a look, only to be pulled right back into the chaos as Bella fired off another pun. "Oh my God." he muttered, watching her almost take down the fake mummy in the process of her laughter and his hand jolted out to steady it. "We're never going to leave this room." Felix said, stifling a chuckle as he looked to them both.

"You know that, right? And all the jokes about Felamine being a thing will come true because we'll be forced to live here for the rest of our lives." he added, before he tried to reach the potential clue for a second time. But, once again, Felix was pulled back into the moment as he caught Bella's glance to the camera and her nod. With a sigh, and without needing much else in way of instruction, he angled himself to block the camera's line of vision, waving his hand to hurry her up with the magic. "Emine." Felix then glanced to the other, taking an exaggerated gesture of a nod to the clue she pointed out. "We are timed." he explained before his shoulders deflated with his defeated sigh. "Oh, Christ. Now I'm doing it." Felix huffed a laugh, waiting for the sand to be magically swept into the timer before he urged them both to take it all seriously again. "Okay, that was fun. What a funny little moment we can all remember. Har har, great memory. Now it's thinking time because this really isn't that difficult." @ofwrxth

Emine cackles as Bella drops the timer, trying to scoop up the sand. "I think it's going by....to fast," she snorts as the sand slips through her fingers and she descends into a fit of giggles with the other witch. Amusement is rife, unable to be stifle even with Felix's warning. Automatically, Emine lifts her hand in an oath. "Scouts honor." She grins broadly, eyes sparkling with laughter as she tries to keep the smile from her face. "Okay. Okay. Maybe that thing? It looks old timey," she snickers, chewing the inside of her cheek as she points to something that looks like hieroglyphics. "But I don't think it's got much to do with time. It just looks old." @rviner

[manybcdthings]

Felix tried to ignore the constant string of laughter from the two witches, despite a small smirk on the corner of his mouth. "You're not funny." he commented to Emine about her puns, deadpanning his expression at her. Before he could even look at the map she lifted, she put it down again, causing him to huff and pluck it back up to take a look. Felix's intention to press on didn't dwindle, even as he watched Bella and Emine scour the room like little lost sheep. "They're set up for us to find but it doesn't look like we're going to find them." he grinned back to Bella, focusing on the map. "Well, if the clue is time, not clocks and we're in the ancient room...Sun dial? Maybe? Or a sand timer?" Felix thought out loud, until the pop of something falling caused him to turn to Bella's mishap. A slight chuckle of disbelief escaped him, the sand everywhere leaving him no choice but to put down the map. "I...wow. Okay well, this is close enough." he sighed, moving so he could help try and clean the mess. "Please, stop." Felix shot her a look at the pun, and shared the glance of warning to Emine. "And you. Both of you." @ofwrxth

She shouldn't have had so much coffee. Because about five minutes into the escape room, Emine had to pee. And it seemed Felix was so intent on figuring out the clues, that he missed Bella telling her they'd be out in no time. Which for some reason made the first answer to the first clue absolutely hilarious, with Emine and Bella descending into a fit of giggles. Clearing her breath, the witch shakes her head. "That's rude. Nothing's started. Other than we're having a good...time." She chews the inside of her cheek to keep from laughing and clears her throat.

"Okay, okay. Looking! We're very serious escape room artists." Emine cracks a grin. The distraction of a Saturday with friends is more than a little welcome, and she's sure it's more fun this way, than breezing through it as Felix surely wants to do. "The more you say time, the less it means," she quips as she and Bella search. "No clocks or watches or anything but there's this?" She holds up a painting that's missing a piece with a shrug. "Maybe a red herring?" the witch suggests before putting it down and grabbing the written clue from Felix to take another look. "Are we supposed to find something else with time, or something that ties to the clue?" She hands back the clue and holds up her hands. "But of course I defer to you Mr. Time keeper," Emine grins, amusement prompting the twitch of her lip. @rviner