Tatiana and Madness stared down at each other in the study. Both are tense, unsure of what the other will do. Madness rotates its disjointed hand a full three hundred and sixty degrees deciding how to deal with the thief in front of it. Tatiana darts her eyes around, trying to figure out the best way to escape safely, unfortunately...

Tat: Damnit! There's nowhere for me to go. Even if I can grab the case and leave the room, there's no way to get away from the stand. It may have a body, but this entire space is its domain. Hell, the house itself might even be an extension of its body...

Madness: Many before you have attempted to rob me, and your efforts will be as fruitless as those fools.

Tat: Hold up!

Tat: I'm not stealing anything from you. I'm only here for that box.

Madness ignores Tatiana's words and continues its march

Madness: Everything Winchester owns-

Tat: That box isn't hers. That belongs to someone else who wandered in a while back, and I'm just here to get it back.

Madness stops and takes a second to look at the case carefully. At first, it looked doubtful, then began to soften as if remembering something. Finally, its face contorts as it looks back at Tatiana, recollection detectable in its fingers' slight twitching.

Madness: Yes... I recall a man now. He wasn't a thief but instead left a small box.

The stand rotates its left hand and gives an irritated scowl, disgusted in being in the wrong. Madness looks toward the box again and immediately gains its composure.

Madness: Ah, my apologies, you are correct. You are no thief but instead a member of the Pony Express. Very well, I'll admit to my hasty assumption.

Tat: Yea?

Tat: Pony Express?

Tat: Ah, well then, I'll be leaving now. No hard feelings?

Tatiana calmly walks over to the box containing the following photograph. A pitter-patter sound fills the room as she bends to pick it up.

Tat: The hell?

Madness: You are not innocent of wrongdoing, however. I still have a right to be angry!

The rhythmic pitter-patter continues uninterrupted

Tat: Pardon?

Madness: You may not be a thief, but you are a miscreant that vandalized MY property.

Tat: I what?

Madness's disembodied hand points the globe on the ground. Tatiana looks to where she picked up the box and looks at the globe it was initially hidden in. The globe was lying on the floor, cracked open and with multiple fractures around its surface.

Madness: You destroyed something of mine, so punishment is still required.

Tat: God da-

Tat: Petty piece of shit!

Madness gives a cheeky curled smile approving of Tatiana's change in demeanor and poses innocently yet creepily intimidating. It takes its hand and leisurely twirls the frills where the arm would have connected.

Madness: Now, I did make a mistake and misjudged you, so I'll let you walk away with that box of yours without further burdening you. However, I will leave you with a spirit that's been here for oh so long. If you can survive him, then you may depart with no quarrel from me.

The pattering hastens its rhythm and grows louder.

Tat: What the fuck is happening...

Madness: All who have been killed by the contestable tools of Winchester end up here. They are forever bound to the last tragic moments of their lives. Tools from these spirits' final moments can appear so their end can be met as it did and assist them in tasks they were doing, mere moments before death. Objects which may have been essential in leading to their death.

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The pattering turns into a violent ferocious banging on the ceiling.

Madness: Best of luck, friend!

Madness begins to back up, and both of its hands fly behind it, tearing open a hole in the bookcase for it to walk through.

Tat: Garbage shit-eating stand!

The door Tatiana previously fell through reopens on its own, and Madness's voice echoes in the room.

Madness: Some advice. There's nowhere to hide, so it's best you start moving.

Begrudgingly Tatiana listens to Madness and runs out of the study and into an absurdly long hallway filled with windows and plants hanging from the ceiling. As she's running, she looks out the windows to see what's "outside."

Tat: All that pounding before. Is this rain? Actually...

Tatiana stops running and sees the same mess of architecture she saw while falling from out the window, along with water falling like rain.

Tat: It's only happening on the other side of the window in that M. C. Escher mess, but not in the study or this green room.

Tat: It said that tools would appear, but it didn't say anything about the environment changing.

Tat hears something rubbing up against the glass behind her, but a voice leaps out at her before she can turn to see what it is.

???: Hey!

Startled, Tat looks to see a random regular dude in a clean white polo and khakis.

Tat: (Oh c'mon)

Clean Dude: What are you doing?

Tat: I can't afford to look after some poor idiot that got unlucky

Tat: Look, guy, you're not in the position you think you're in.

Clean Dude: Oh no? Well, you're in no position to talk to your superior like that.

The man furiously makes his way over to one of the closed doors. He makes an agitated motion for Tatiana to follow her.

Tat: Hey idiot, that isn't safe. You don't have a goddamn clue what's happening right now.

Clean Dude: Watch your mouth. I already warned you before

Tat: You only just got here

The man walks through the door, Tatiana begrudgingly following him into a darker room.

Tat: We're in the basement now. We were probably on the second or third floor before, but now we're in the basement all of a sudden, so stop and listen to me, so you don't die.

The man stops in front of a furnace and looks at Tatiana with confusion, anger, and disappointment.

Clean Dude: What the hell are you talking about? Was that a threat?

Tat: No, you illiterate; I'm trying to help. We are in danger right now, understand?

Clean Dude: You know what? I think I'm done with your shit. I warned you.

Tatiana, infuriated with the dense man, walks up to get in his face

Tat: You. Just. Got. Here.

Clean Dude: It doesn't matter! It's called a ten-minute break! Not fifteen, not twelve, ten! Got it, Miguel?

Tat: Miguel?

Clean Dude: We're gonna go back out on the dock, and I'll show you how much time you wasted.

Tat: Dock? Hold up, this is like with those other guys, but he doesn't look like he's from the west.

Clean Dude: Actually, you're fired. I don't want to deal with you anymore.

Tat: That stand said that the spirit that would chase me has been here for a long time, but it never said it would be the only one

Tatiana quickly leaps away from the man, and, almost as if on cue, a safe crashes down on the man's skull and immediately kills him on impact.

Tat: That's right. Winchester is still around today, but now they put their focus on making safes instead. He looked like someone I'd see on the street regularly and wouldn't question it.

Tat leaves through the still-open door back into the green room.

Tat: Come to think of it, this is the first time I could backtrack to the same room. The rooms must change whenever you close a door. Good to keep in mind.

Out of the corner of her eye, Tatiana notices a figure out the window

Tat: JESUS!

Tatiana gets startled, flying back into a wall, and points at something through the glass.

Tat: How? There's nothing out there to support them. How can they-

Tat stops and notices that another Arm is pointing as well in the same position her hand is.

Tat: That's right.

With more confidence now, Tat's and the ghostly hand beside hers pointed toward a figure outside the window she looked out.

Tat: I'm not gonna be caught off guard again. I'm working on a new and exciting way to interact with things now. This rain is a tool. With that in mind, the spirit that I have to beat-

Outside, the figure leans in closer, revealing itself more clearly. A lean man in a heavy poncho covered in rings around the upper body for ropes to tie through, rain pants that double as his rain boots with a repeating pattern of circles with a tail. A ponytail pokes out the top of the hood and dangles around in front of the man's face. A small umbrella that barely protects the man from the rain juts upward awkwardly from his hand.

Tat: Is just some dead punk-ass stand user that already lost.

Obscuring the man's face is a white mask with four gapping slits around the mouth with a smaller hole over each. The colors blue, green, and red streaked across the mask with the only thing that can be seen on the man's face is his empty, soulless gaze.

To Be Continued