It's late evening when this particular clamour starts rising from the Mansion's lobby. It's a happy one, filled with excited, giddy tones that briefly change to surprise and annoyance before slipping into teasing and affection.

The culprits happen to be one Kaito Kuroba and Aoko... well, normally one would assume Nakamori, but Kaito's jacketless suit and the short, white dress and white roses that Aoko is wearing might suggest otherwise. And if those didn't, the close, doting way they're hovering around each other — and the matching rings glinting on their left hands — would.

They're tousled and a little tired-looking, but there's still a strong spark in Aoko's eyes as she makes a face at her companion, her arm comfortably hooked in his. "I can keep up just fine, Bakaito, even with a detour."

Kenta came through one of the many doors in one of the lower floor corridors, but now he's lost.  He didn't think the place he was in was so big-!

"Hello?  Hello....?"

He'll just keep wandering around and randomly opening doors until he can find someone to tell him what's going on.


[ooc: So, this is Kenta!  As in, from the Knightmare heist.  But he's sort of crossed over with Marvel. :'D  And he needs a tag.]

 There is a wooden figurine of a familiar face somewhere.

Be it a table or just plain lying on the floor.  He's only six inches tall.  And things are a lot bigger when you're that size.

So he's moving.  Attempting to find a safe place.  If such a thing exists.

...Feel free to see him.  Or watch.  Or just plain trip over him.  He's small enough to miss.

It's a dark night in the Mansion this evening.

To be fair, it's dark every night, as the area is significantly lacking in any buildings or bright lights other than those that shine from the Mansion itself. But tonight the stars and the sky are obscured by low-scudding clouds pushed by a slow, damp breeze, and the moon is only visible as a hazy, sticky nimbus of white behind them.

The interior of the Mansion feels muffled as well. The lamps are turned low, their glow barely reaching farther than a handful of feet, and in many hallways there's hardly any light at all. The only illumination comes from the occasional occupied room, or a window open to the fitful light of the moon.

Of course, it's well past the twelfth hour, so this is hardly an inconvenience for most of the Mansion's guests. But deep in its darkened recesses a spill of light cuts across an empty hallway, green and flickering. The door it shines from is open a crack, revealing just a glimpse of a small, shadowed room: neat and plain, but crammed to the brim with strange and occasionally menacing knickknacks and minutiae. A faint scratching sound floats out on the light, overlaying the soft glow with an urgent, almost manic intent.

It originates from one Miss Ran Mouri, clad in a red, Victorian dress and sat at an equally Victorian desk, bent low over the pages of a journal. Her work is lit by a single foxfire candle; two greenish wax stubs already sit burnt and depleted before her on the desk. She writes frantically, without pause, filling page after page with tirades delineated in a black, scrawling hand barely recognizable as her own. Her face is drawn, her skin pale against the dark tresses of her hair, but her blue eyes are wild and feverish as they race ahead of her pen.

She does not seem inclined to stop any time soon.



((Feel free to use as a mingle, and to respond with prose or action, whichever you prefer!))

In the aftermath of Christmas, the Mansion is still decked out in its festive finery, inclusive of the trees dotted around everywhere.

Tadashi has found a comfortable spot in the lobby, a big armchair by the fire that he's currently curled up in with a good book.  If you were to get in close enough to read the title, you'd find that he's reading Holmes.

Strangely enough, there's a white fox next to his chair, although it does seem to be asleep right now.

They both seem very relaxed.  Which is, of course, clearly a sign that they want to be bugged and annoyed, right?

One moment he was on a case - he'd almost figured out the method, and the culprit wasn't going to get away - and the next he was in a hallway somewhere, furnishings completely different from any room in the house or district he'd just been in.

Cautiously, he starts looking around, opening doors and investigating floors.  The look on his face isn't too dissimilar to that of Kudo Shinichi or any of the other high school detectives... apart from the fact that he's over twenty years before their time.

It's Christmas time, so the halls are being decked out with everything the Mansion itself has not already provided - there's tinsel, and fairy lights, and red and green bunting all over the place, alongside more humanly put holly and ivy sprigs at regular intervals, and the trees are all the same size, in sizeable pots with decorations carefully laid out next to them ready to be put on.

Perhaps one of the things one should be more cautious about, however, is the fact that there is now fresh mistletoe over certain doorways.

You can find the perpetrator of this up a ladder, happily putting up more mistletoe which, while normal in every other sense, won't come down once it's been put up there.

It's probably a good thing to watch what you're walking under... and who with!

[OOC: You can have characters finding mistletoe and decorating the trees Akio put out both here and in new threads!   I hope everyone has fun with this.   I'm thinking that anything he puts up like this will last as long as whatever the Mansion does for the Christmas season, and this can apply for anything anyone else does as well, I suppose. :)]

Kaito- whose puzzle is really all that's needed to give this particular Kaito away- is currently standing in the middle of a large hallway somewhere in the middle of the mansion with a list in his hands. It's noted that this particular hall is nicely decorated up like a typical department store/mall would be around now.

Which means lots of tinsel, lots of trees, lots of santas...

And it would appear this is OK, not Kaito, given the look on his face. "Tch... How mean, making me do all the Christmas shopping..." The frown he has deepens. "Where am I even supposed to put all this stuff until the 24th..!?"

The new arrival this time around isn't all that obvious.  It's likely you won't even see him, going about your business.  But if you're going through the lobby, you'll likely hear him if it's quiet enough and you listen.

Somewhere, a young child is crying.

[OOC: More information on the kid's world on his profile.  Anything else, don't hesitate to ask!]

There's the black suited Kazuha again. Though it might be you hear here before you see her. Not that she's shouting this time. No, it's more the ragged breathing and the stumbling down the hall, mostly moving along with a hand against the wall. Sometimes gripping the light fixtures and turning to press her forehead against the wall and letting out a long, low keening sound, like a whine really. Her free arm is pressed against her stomach, looking almost in pain.

Though the most worrying fact is the large amount of blood on her face. Mostly it's on her face and slight smatterings on her neck and along the top of her shirt. It also seems her suit is oddly singed.