[CENTER][Img]https://i.imgur.com/8BJy5WD.png[/img]
[b][code]Hillview High - Mason Square[/code][/b]
[sub][@Surtr Inc][@Mike73][@Atrophy][@Majoras End][@Fernstone][@Pretty much fucking everyone][/sub][/center][hr]

Relentless, the eldritch mass pressed on towards them. Nate felt his stomach lurch, his mind battling his body just to stop it from locking up, when he felt Paige's hand clasping against his, followed by a second against his other hand, then felt the weight of someone else tugging on that second hand's, forming a human daisy chain one by one. "Please work, please work," he mouthed, aware of the closing abomination which seemed unphased by anything they'd tried to throw at it, undeterred by the intensifying glow and heat from the smouldering interior of the building that Justin had managed to set alight.

A glance at either side showed just how many people had linked hands, arms - whatever it took to join themselves to him. [i]Please work.[/i] It had to - it was only like the phasing he'd managed before, right? Like making sure his clothes phased with him, or the stuff in his pockets. Just... bigger clothes, bigger pockets. The tendrils were closing - he tugged at either side to signal he was closing with a solid surface, so the others would know to follow, then concentrated... and for a moment, the human daisy chained connected to Nate collectively felt the sensation of water rushing through their bodies, colour bleeding out of vision as they each sank into the wall, passing through like murky water.

Each step felt like he was carrying a weight of several times his own with them, in a sense - he'd never tried something so massive a scale before, he'd barely even got his head around his [i]abstraction[/i] when this had all gone to shit. Nate's heart smashed against the interior of his chest, pounding with each movement, halfway out of the sheer chaos of the situation and halfway out of physical exertion, refusing to rest. Light spilled back into view, colours too as they emerged on the other side of a wall, some of the group still halfway across. He didn't dare break concentration for fear of leaving one of them behind, he just kept moving. "Don't stop, keep going..."

Another solid wall. Or was it a door? He didn't care - he led them through that, too, colour seeping away in the brief transitionary period between surfaces. It was behind them. The Glutton was still tailing them, ebbing forward at a steady but [i]definitive[/i] pace. Was this the way out? He kept going, kept leading them. Silhouettes spilled into his view as they crossed between the planes and, just for a brief, fleeting moment in their escape, the others could see them too. Like the silhouette that had been stalking them outside John Reid's house, like the other silhouette that he'd briefly seen in the hallway - what had been a sight exclusive to him was shared among the rest. 

If nothing else, they were the closest they'd get to the [i]memories[/i] of the dead without joining them.