With a huff, Jasper lowered himself onto the bed after some time fruitlessly willing the ship to crash or something with all of the floor-shoving. Sitting, arms resting on their knees as his head hung, he stared into the floor and then his hands, turning the palms up. This was a lonely haunt; all the threat of what reminders were scribbled on the clipboard hung beside the sliding door outside. In truth, he couldn't tell if was even still there...and the darkness of their thoughts began to sink back in with that single spark to reawaken old demons and fresh wounds.

[color=gray]What if they all know? Lock the box and throw away the key, forget about the door and its contents, weld the door shut and nothing in his smooth metal tomb would change...for centuries.[/color]

The worry made his throat tighten up once more, choking back the emotions that had once been released years ago as tireless screams of vocal cords that would re-knit themselves fresh with every breath.

[color=gray]Forgotten~
Newspaper footnotes to be gawked over and then discarded~[/color]
[color=f26522]"...How appalling! How Horrifying! Have you heard the news? Murders...murderers a-and..."[/color] Jasper looked up, thinking he heard something like a voice so clear he could have sworn it was right beside him. A palpable moment of stillness came and passed, waiting with a racing heart before lifting his hands to his face. Deep calming breaths dragged the seconds by, but the ghosts would not go so quietly.
[color=gray]All the lies~
Imagine the spin they put on it, even~!
Faces; expressions aghast with slacked jaws as they watched you do it, [i]saint[/i]~
The trees are gone, now. [i]You[/i] cut them down. You cut them all down with your own hands and drank their sap to spite their memories.[/color]

[color=black]It was then just a brief flicker of a woman's face, contorted in a dislocated yet silent scream. Their skin a pale grey, pulled taught over the bones and sinew, beneath, sunken and sallow like the hollow, accusing eyes.[/color]

He was on his feet, retching and spasming even as he stretched to the tips of his toes, fingers twisting as they pressed into his face almost as if trying to crush his own skull. A soft gargle of a shivering inhale reluctantly hissed between his chattering teeth, the promise his ghosts demanded being made as his lips twisted into horror.
Yet...before his anguish could break the silence in another fit of screams, another sound made the walls gently chime. Distant thumps and pops accompanied by the screams of others from beyond the walls. Audible rushes of air being devoured by flame and the snaps of doors sliding open, only for the voices and noise to continue anew, refreshed by the next victim. This tangible stimuli was a sickening comfort...that the hollow void of space would house fates as awful as his own waking nightmares.

Jasper sank to his knees, arms swinging to the sides and dragging across the floor as his expression relaxed into an empty stare. If there were tears left in him, he would have been a mess at this point, but the bloodshot thousand-yard stare held a chilling reflection in the door of a repeatedly broken animal who came out the other end with an anticipatory realization.
These sounds were not stopping...these ones were quite real...and they were getting closer.

Standing once more, he swept up to the door, pressing his ear against the metal to listen to the sound of change. The world was once again alive with death; he was certain something was happening, and this singular detail teased the outline of a manic grin on the corners of his lips. The sounds were coming his way! The doors would be opened and...and whatever happened after...who knew?
The unknown variables set alight his senses as if shaken awake, his heart fluttering with a desperation to join the sound...to make [i]more[/i] of it. The elation spurred a brief maddened laugh as he looked around his room and then down to himself. Any other circumstance, the promise of entertaining guests would send him to and fro to make himself presentable and prepare hors d'oeuvres. Unfortunately, his state would have to suffice...and the guests would have to be the ones providing the snacks.
Jasper shook the sudden pangs of hunger at the thought, easily distracting himself with equally unsound processes of contemplation. His mind swam with what his words would be, squirming and stumbling, indecisively, through a few terrible jokes as he failed to grasp the danger behind the noises.