[SleepyShadow]

@Lady Moreta: Yes, you are correct. He was squeezing because touching the screens with the creepy people on them seemed like a bad idea at the time. As for comments on your snippets ...

Spoiler

#1: Overall, I liked your first snippet quite a lot. It had a good story going and could easily be continued further. A small complaint I had was that Lance seemed somewhat vague as to his position. I gathered that he was a bardic colleague, but is he a romantic interest or just a friend? He seemed to waiver back and forth between the two.

#2: Forgive me for saying this, but until you said Silver was a woman I could not shake from my head the image of an old character of mine by the same name. Just a silly coincidence, I know Moving right along, I liked the writing as a whole, though I had a few things to point out.

Perhaps I just missed someone saying it, but I never noticed the name of the character whose POV we are seeing this from. It's not necessary to know, but I just think it would be a nice touch for someone to say his name at some point.

What is Persephone? Just curious.

I felt that the list of the POV's thoughts was a little awkwardly written. In particular:

Silver herself cast that spell… I am – doubtful that any of the company would be comfortable having her in that role again

It may just be me being picky, but the floating hyphen added nothing to the sentence in my opinion.

Lastly, I can agree with Silver. No one likes unexpected demon babies

Alrighty, here we go now. More steam-powered anime Cthulhu goodness!

Sound and Light

Spoiler

A few tense moments passed in the pitch blackness, the only sounds to be heard were Lucy's frightened breathing and the rapid clicking of Derive's clockwork fire-starter as he tried to relight it. At last, the three investigators were blessed with the dim glow from the tiny flame of the gnomish gadget. Lupin looked toward Lucy and smiled when he saw that she calmed down quickly.

"Okay," Derive asked, "so what happened there?"

Lucy held up her hand like a schoolgirl answering the teacher's question and smiled brightly. "The projectors broke."

"How insightful," the swordsage grumbled. "Do you have any useful knowledge, or are you really that dumb?"

"Does Profession (Bartender) count as useful?" Lucy asked, tilting her head slightly.

Lupin quickly interposed himself between his two companions as Derive lunged for Lucy, reaching out to throttle the catgirl.

"The projectors broke because they weren't gnome-built. They were dwarven craftsmanship," Lupin said quickly as he struggled to keep the swordsage away from Lucy, who cowered in fear of Derive's wrath.

"I thought dwarves were only good at building weapons," Derive replied, ceasing his attempts to strangle the catgirl.

Lupin nodded, glad to have stemmed the conflict for the time being. "They are. Projectors aren't supposed to run off of black powder, after all."

Suddenly Lucy's tall furry ears perked up, and she looked around quizzically. "I hear someone out in the bar."

Lupin nodded to Derive, and the swordsage placed his hand on the hilt of his sword as he crawled out of the hidden chamber. Lucy looked at Lupin nervously, and the halfling took her by the hand and pulled her along behind him as he followed close behind Derive.

"Who's there?" a deep voice called out to them from across the room.

Lupin squinted in the harsh light of the newcomer's hooded lantern, but smiled when he recognized the carpenter from the lobby.

"Hi there, Frank," the halfling said cheerfully.

"Oh, it's you three," Frank replied as he set his lantern down on a nearby table. "Did you find anything?"

"Yeah," Derive answered. "Found that hidden chamber over there and I found this book here."

"Hey, I found it," Lupin grumbled.

Derive shrugged noncommittally. "Anyway, it says here that this place used to be a hideout for a group called The Order of Light and Sound, a group that worshiped something called The Watcher from Beyond. Does that ring any bells?"

Frank looked at them very gravely and nodded. "Aye, it does ... do you know what films are made from?"

"Talent, vision, and wonderful acting!" Lucy suggested with a smile.

Frank shook his head. "Light and sound. Light and sound are what films are made of. It's what everything is made of. It Who Seeks is an unmaker, an antithesis of light and sound ... it is more than darkness and silence, it is nothing. Nothing at all. Nothing but sound and light and void ..."

"Frank, you're scaring me," Lucy said worriedly, taking a step toward the back corner of the room.

"Light and sound and void ... light and sound and void ..." Frank repeated over and over, saliva dribbling down his chin. "The void unmakes all ... but you can't know that ... I will unmake ... I will unmake the three of you!"