the second occasion

[deepest_magic]

House. Wardrobe. Coats.

Comments

[neverbeatme]

"Okay. See you in a bit. If you find something you think might be useful, bring it if you can; we can always leave it at my place if we don't have room."

[deepest_magic]

Bella nods and goes into her house.

[neverbeatme]

Elizabeth closes up her backpack full of slowly melting snow and bikes back to her place.

She dumps the snow in her bathtub, dries out the inside of the backpack, and starts going through her kitchen as efficiently and systematically as possible.

[deepest_magic]

Bella's there an hour later, her own backpack full up.

[neverbeatme]

"Hi," she says when she opens the door. "I've got all the nonperishable food in the house and the one wind-up flashlight I found that worked. What have you got?"

[deepest_magic]

"Notebooks and pens and my flashlight and a first-aid kit. Granola bars, chocolate chips and Skittles and crackers and a jar of peanut butter and a knife, and I made us sandwiches - they should keep until the next time we want to eat, in our backpacks in winter, even if they wouldn't last days. Box of matches. Water bottle, I could only find one though."

[neverbeatme]

"Nice. I've been focused on the food; I can't go rooting around for useful objects so easily while Chris is working. I should clean us out of matches if I can find any, though. And I bet I can come up with some water bottles. There's probably room to throw a roll of duct tape in here on principle, even after all that..." She hefts her backpack, which is looking pretty full but still has room at the top - it's twice the size of the one she originally filled with snow.

[deepest_magic]

"Ooh, duct tape's a good idea."

[neverbeatme]

"I thought so! It's very - generally applicable. C'mon in. Any more room in yours?"

[deepest_magic]

"A little but not enough that I took the can opener and tuna."

[neverbeatme]

"Okay. C'mon in and let's see about water bottles and duct tape."

She finds those things - two water bottles, one large roll of duct tape. She shifts a few protein bars from her backpack to Bella's to make room for the water bottles (filled), then rearranges objects until she can fit the roll of duct tape and a pair of scissors, plus two warm hats and two pairs of warm gloves. Now her backpack is much closer to full. She also uncovers one box of matches at the back of a drawer, which she tucks in her pocket along with a small notebook-and-pen. She wears the clockwork watch, and a pair of boots that will be warmer than her shoes but are more plausible for wandering around an abandoned house in summer than actual winter boots. (Whether the digital watch would have worked in Narnia or not, it disagreed with all the snow she piled over it and is now out of commission.)

"All right," she says, surveying their full backpacks once this mission is complete. "Any last-minute good ideas?"

[deepest_magic]

"Um - no."

[neverbeatme]

"Okay. Time to get a ride from Chris."

She goes to Chris's office.

"Hi, are you busy?"

[queensidecastle]

"Not especially," she says, turning away from her desk.

[neverbeatme]

"Great," says Elizabeth. "Wanna drive me and Bella to an old abandoned house outside of town so we can look for dead bodies that aren't there?"

[queensidecastle]

"How can I refuse?" she snorts. "Certainly an improvement on looking for dead bodies that are there. Will you also be wanting a ride back at some point?"

[neverbeatme]

"Yeah, come get us whenever you start worrying that we're out too late."

[queensidecastle]

"Seems reasonable."

Out to the car they go, then.

[deepest_magic]

Bella heaves her backpack into the car with her, trying to look excited about a much less interesting adventure than "save Narnia from witch".

[queensidecastle]

Chris doesn't appear to suspect anything.

[deepest_magic]

How convenient.

[queensidecastle]

She drives them to the abandoned house.

"Have fun, kids."

[neverbeatme]

"With any luck," Elizabeth agrees as she disembarks from the car.

[deepest_magic]

Bella follows her.

"Where's the wardrobe?"

[neverbeatme]

"This way."

Into the house, upstairs, down the hall. Some of the furniture has been removed and some hasn't. This particular room contains nothing but the enormous wooden wardrobe, a desk, and a couple of chairs, but there are marks on the floor where a bed used to sit.