damned_institute | Nightshift 62: Morgue

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Nightshift 62: Morgue

If not for the cold seeping into her body, Yomi might not have bothered coming out of her slumber. The darkness in the depths of her mind was warm, safe; she was cradled in oblivion, comfortable, the same feeling she had had as a girl during dark winter nights when she had sat in front of the space heater and father had told her stories. Home. She didn’t want to let that sense of belonging go. She craved it in secret places she didn’t know she had.

But like the tide, the darkness was slowly receding to reveal what waited underneath--an onslaught of sensations that resembled a beach littered with thousands of shards of broken glass. There was no safe place to step on that dead soil. Every time Yomi’s mind brushed a sharp edge it released a starburst of pain, and she badly wanted to go back, to return to that sea of gentle nothingness where nothing could hurt her.

And she couldn’t hurt anyone.

Wait, why did that sound so familiar? Had she been the one to think that? Why… would that…

Her fingertips and toes were sore from the cold, and the discomfort strangling her nerves was what drew her back into her body more than anything else. Something wasn’t right. Many somethings. Her body hurt in unusual places, and there was something soft on her face that cast her shallow breaths back against her skin. Her heartbeat was audible in her ears. With the darkness all around her, it almost enough to convince her she was still in that comfortable place from before. But it wasn’t the same. Reality demanded attention and it nagged at her like the hum of a live wire.

You’re not--

What? Whose voice was that in her head? She wasn’t what?

It was with the fumbling of a disoriented child that Yomi ended up stretching her hand along the cool metal surface underneath her. It extended to the left and right of her, then up, up above her head and over her in a suffocatingly tight formation. She slapped at it softly. No give. There was still something covering her face and she worked it off until it pooled at her collar, letting in a caress of cold air. A sheet or a blanket, she thought.

The moment she opened her eyes properly, she opened them to an impenetrable blackness, and that confused her the most. Why? Why was she here and why did it hurt? It made sense if she couldn’t see anything, because you couldn’t see anything when you were--

Were…

Wait. Wait a minute!

When you’re dead. And you’re not dead. You’re still alive.

Yomi couldn’t breathe and although she opened her mouth to suck in air, nothing came. No, she couldn’t possibly be…? She dug her fingertips in with more purpose, but the metal of the chamber around her was solid and gave her no answers. A shrill sound left her and it was the sound of her own voice, high and rough with panic, that positively let her know that it was true, that this wasn’t death or even life after death. She was still alive. Oh god, alive… But no, no, no one could have survived what had happened. Her body had been broken and scattered, too much for the sesshouseki’s debilitated healing to repair. No human could have put her back together. Could be holding her together.

She wasn’t alone in the coffin-like unit, and that knowledge made tears spill from the corners of her eyes.

Bucking upward only served to bang her head against the shelf, but Yomi didn’t stop--couldn't, not with terror climbing her throat with burning hands. She thrashed, beating her fists against the sides and roof until she could feel her bones begin to bruise and heal and bruise all over again, the blows seeming to fall into a rhythm with her internal protests: no, no, no, no! That was when the screaming started. The screams were not sounds of a sane person claiming their second chance, but the wild shrieks of something that knew it shouldn’t exist. A part of Yomi felt that if she could scream hard enough, it would just go on and on and on and she would die from a lack of air before she had to face another moment as she was. Alive.

This couldn’t be happening, it couldn’t, not again. She couldn’t still be… here!

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Rose stood on the battlefield of Skaia, two needles the size of swords in her hands, and faced her opponent. Two armies surrounded her, one made up entirely of Daves, all of them missing one or more important body parts, red capes (and, in some cases, entrails) flapping in the breeze. His skin was so pale it glowed, in contrast to the army of trolls. She didn't recognize most of them, but they recognized her.

She couldn't exchange more than basic pleasantries while they had a battle to fight. She braced herself, and her opponent leapt into the air.

Jasper landed on her chest, bowling her over and onto the checked ground, his claws poking through the flimsy head of an unsuspecting cotton Squiddle. She squinted up at him.

"You're not supposed to fight me, you're supposed to feed me. I'm a cat." He was purring, though, his dead, glassy white eyes closing as she reached a hand up to pet him. He basked in the attention for a few minutes, and then his claws dug in deeper, as his tentacles wrapped around her throat. Squeeze. "Wake up, sleepyhead! You're going to be LATE."

The lately un-late Rose Lalonde, woke up gasping for air.

She was in a box. A small, metal box, not much larger than she was. Having never attended a large, stereotypical, pedestrian public school, she had never been shoved into a locker, but this seemed like a likely comparison. If the locker was then tipped over and dumped in a refrigerator. She reached her fingers up, and ran them along the inside of the box. Then along the bandages wrapped around her chest, which was probably a bad idea, since there were a lot more of them than she wanted to think about, and then over her lips.

Had someone kissed her? Had Gamzee kissed her? The face she made could only be represented by extremely terrible lineart in hilarious fashion. Moving that much, even if it was her lips, made her chest ache. Or maybe that was just the idea of having her first kiss be from a murderous alien covered in her blood. Who probably got off on that kind of thing.

Also, someone was screaming.

Her fingers left her face and went back to studying the box. There was a tiny line of slightly less-dark darkness at the end; she poked at it, and the entire box shuddered. Then she pulled, and it slid out a foot.

"So we're not dead," she called out, and then regretted it. Ouch. Talking hurt. Moving was going to hurt more. The other person was still screaming. "It's a drawer. Reach up, find the edge, and push."

There was too much, too much for her brain to know what to do with. She had been brought back against all odds again, a sack of meat and bone with one small red rock keeping it all together; knowing as much would have terrorized braver souls than hers.

Everything felt dirty. Wrong. She was not supposed to be like this.

Deaf as she was to the outside world, Yomi didn’t stop. It wasn’t out of a need for escape that she continued to thrash, but regardless, her fit had caused her shelf to roll out a few inches, and it now exposed her feet to the icy air outside. Cold penetrated the sheet and deep into her flesh.

She was like a caterpillar laboriously emerging from its chrysalis. A caterpillar that had gone to sleep dreaming of butterflies only to find it was the same unsightly creature it had been before.

Yomi coughed. Something warm flowed into her mouth and she coughed again, misting herself with it. Blood.

If she moved slowly, it didn't hurt as much. If she moved quickly, it was over sooner. Rose pushed the drawer out further, rails squeaking, and then levered herself out of it, going with the first approach. Oof. Actually standing up unassisted hurt.

She tried the other tactic, and pulled the drawer that had stopped making alarming screeches and now sounded like someone was dying and/or having a hairball, out in a single, swift move. And then fell over. She waved her hands and feet for a second, completely ineffectual, and then realized how stupid it would look. Instead, she aimed for tranquil repose, as long as it didn't involve standing back up yet.

"Are we dead?" Talking didn't seem to hurt as much as moving, as long as she didn't shout. "I distinctly remember dying."

What had she done wrong for her to be brought back twice? Tears blazed sticky paths down her face as her body fought to bring in air, a survival reflex made all the harder by her injuries. Injuries that existed because of the Coliseum, wasn’t that so? She had survived the Coliseum?

Survived the… Survived…

No, no, her life was supposed to have ended with the children and Klavier, not continue on so that the night’s events could become memories!

Then someone was sliding her out feet-first, and the result was an overpowering sense of vertigo that swept her from head to toe. She couldn’t understand why it seemed like she was moving when only a moment age she been encased in metal and darkness, and she clawed at the shelf over her head uncomprehendingly as if to pull herself back inside. What! No!

A whimper escaped her, wet-sounding due to the blood in her throat. She was out in the open, heart beating, air on her skin, and there was someone there, someone who had drew her out of her chamber. Flailing, Yomi was oblivious to the edge of the shelf beneath her until she had already pitched over the side in a tangle of sheet and naked limbs. The ground met her without mercy, but the she barely felt the pain of having her wounds start to reopen.

What the hell had gone wrong…

She didn’t want a stranger near her, or anybody or anything; panting, she curled inward, showing Rose her naked back. Dead? Dead? No, this wasn’t the peacefulness that came with death. Not at all, not even close.

It wasn't until she saw the woman in the drawer cringing away, the naked line of her spine almost glowing in the dark, that Rose realized she wasn't wearing anything herself. Somehow she'd assumed she had on her Dersite pajamas, luminous and ethereal and not something one generally noticed at all, in dreams. Which meant that she was standing in front of a stranger, stark naked, and, consequently, that this wasn't a dream.

At least it was dark. She squeaked and stepped behind the drawer she'd woken up in, which didn't cover everything, but it was a start.

"No. I stand by my original statement. We're not dead. And we need to find some clothing, or this is going to get very awkward. Also, cold."

The nakedness of either herself or her companion--a female? a girl? a child?--was of little consequence to Yomi in those early moments of rebirth. She didn’t respond to Rose’s sudden jittering movement, and in fact she didn’t seem to comprehend much of anything that was going on around her.

There were words, but they were far away. Too far away to reach her where she was. Yomi put her hands over her face and felt herself shaking as she cried. Even the sounds of her own grief seemed out of reach, but the movements of her body confirmed that she was a living, breathing thing once more. Every spasm, every pain… they wouldn’t let her be. They gnawed at her much like the sound of Rose’s voice.

Her hands moved higher, to clamp on either side of her head. It was supposed to be enough!

[increasing the awkward from here]

True to caution, Klavier didn't simply barrel on through to the heart of the room. He moved inside warily and quietly, braced for whatever sights he might see within. Admittedly, he had never actually been inside a morgue himself (and hopefully it wasn't a trip he'd have to often make), but he already had some basic expectations of what he would find upon entering. For example, the cold. That was perfectly normal. As were the hospital beds and basic equipment.

What wasn't normal... was that sound. It was... weeping? He froze in place for just a heartbeat, hairs on the back of his neck standing on end, before he quickly swung the light of his flashlight toward the sound. In that moment, only a few details registered immediately: open body drawers, pale white legs, and a mess of limbs, cloth, and long black hair on the floor.

Which, by the way, is the equivalent of every stupid pop-up scare in every ghost movie ever conceived.

He jerked and moved back a step, but thankfully had had enough warning to stifle anything audible. Of course, once that brief, instinctual reaction had passed, he fully realized these were people and not ghosts he was dealing with... though that perhaps depended on one's definition of the word. Because obviously they hadn't walked in through the door. Had they been... shoved into the freezer alive?! Dear god...

"A... Are you two alright?!" he called out. Admittedly, a part of him was still cautious, but the horror of the implication was enough to get him moving forward. One of them, a young girl, was standing and partially obscured behind one of the drawers. ...And Klavier turned his flashlight down towards the ground when he realized why. She didn't have any clothes on her. And judging by the woman on the ground and what limbs were exposed, she was the same within the sheet.

Honestly, modesty was the lesser of the issues at hand. But for the sake of courtesy, he held his light down as he got closer. It was enough so they weren't completely illuminated but he wasn't blind either.

Rose had a coping mechanism for being almost entirely naked, except for the bandages that were covering both her as-of-yet nonexistent chest and a wound that made diving for cover inadvisable at best. She talked. One might call it rambling, if one were willing to venture a critique.

"Yes. Sort of. I'm not dead any more, which is a distinct improvement. But I'm not sure my companion here agrees. We did get off on the wrong foot. A misunderstanding, really." Rose was very grateful all of her typical ways of expressing emotion involved very minor movements; her chest was in more pain every moment she stood standing. One eyebrow raised, and that was enough. "Unless she's always like this, in which case, I'm not sure being alive is an improvement." She'd been assuming the other woman had died as well, possibly under similar circumstances. But if so, why was she so upset? Had she seen something, out beyond the Furthest Ring?

Also, Rose hadn't yet determined how she'd been revived, unless...

"You didn't kiss me, did you?" The odds that her first kiss was going to be unmemorable due to being dead had been steadily increasing; she'd carefully not been holding out hopes as to who would do the honors. Because that would involve emotions. But the idea of it being a complete stranger was disconcerting. Whether it was more disconcerting than Gamzee murdering her and then having sloppy makeouts with her corpse, she wasn't sure. Maybe if Mr. Mysterious turned that light on himself so she could see his face.

Light. The sudden bloom of light from the man’s flashlight stung her eyes, blinding her, and she let out a high, breathy shriek that was quickly stifled. Pain flared in her throat--overuse.

Everything hurt again. So long as she remained living, there seemed to be no end to this pain.

She dug her fingertips into her skull until the need to hide grew too strong and she was forced to drop her hands. Where was there to hide, though, to get away from all these people? She couldn’t even see, couldn’t even be sure where she was… Ah, but if she was still in the same place she had “died,” then she knew exactly where she was. That hospital. That terrible nightmarish place that used her as an instrument just as purposefully as the sesshouseki.

Yomi scrabbled forward on her stomach, the sheet abandoned. There were hospital beds in the corner and she tried to crawl behind one, gasping with the effort of getting her limbs to move in coordination.

The woman's brief shriek made him wary of getting too close too soon, and he paused in his steps as he got closer. Ignoring the bandages on her body, the girl seemed like she was doing alright. Well enough to attempt to make light of the situation to some degree, which was sign enough of some sense of stability. That was at least one relief. The woman, however, clutched at her head and seemed very much not alright at all. And after listening to the girl's small explanation, one could understand why.

Not... dead anymore. That was what the girl had said. So they hadn't been shoved into the freezer alive but had been-- Is that possible? Did the girl actually remember dying? Was it a mistake... or was this more along the lines of what Nigredo had been talking about? Nigredo had seen that some people killed could be healed and brought back to life, even when supposedly torn to pieces. The person in question had still retained injuries but they were very much alive the following day. So did that mean these two had undergone whatever process was used to accomplish that and then had been... left here? And they woke up on their own while inside the...?

He frowned at the thought. Honestly, his confusion and curiosity was enough to keep him from reacting to the image. Rather than shuddering or being horrified, he immediately wanted to press the girl for more details regarding her memories and what had happened to try getting a clearer picture of what was going on. But unlike certain defense attorneys, he possessed a logical sense of priorities. Right now wasn't the time. He needed to assess both their states and help them first before he moved on to anything else. Their safety was all that mattered.

Klavier stopped where he was and knelt down to place his flashlight down on the floor, balancing it on the flat end so it would stay pointing at the ceiling. Not great, but it helped free his hands, and the glare was enough to mildly illuminate their general area of the room. He also dug out the radio from the pocket of his hoodie and placed it on the floor next to the flashlight along with his metal pipe. Just putting them down for a moment... should be fine.

Then he shrugged off the hoodie and approached the girl, holding it wide open as he did so, so it kind of obscured his own vision of her body even as he handed it to her. He himself wasn't actually embarrassed to look at them. More he felt embarrassed for them. Having some stranger walk in while you were exposed wasn't exactly a comfortable experience, especially in a place where you didn't know what kind of a psychopath you were going to be running into next. And worse yet if you were a woman. So he put on a small smile that somewhat went along with her light-hearted comment. Hopefully that would make her less nervous. And also calm any fears she might have had about him planning to chop up their bodies and roll around in their intestines or anything like that.

"I can't say that I did, no. I only just got here myself, after all. ...Here." He held the hoodie out to her and let her take it. "I will check on your friend. Then we can look for more blankets."

Here, he turned to look at the woman on the floor who was just starting to scramble away. She crawled along the floor in a manner that was both desperate and awkward. Her movements were off in a way that he couldn't quite pinpoint, but it was pretty obvious something was very wrong. The other girl was hurt. It was possible this woman was, too. But it seemed like she was scared or confused as well. At this rate, she could only hurt herself more. And this theory was proven correct very quickly. As he approached her, he could see her torso had been wrapped up in a fashion similar to the younger girl. And as he snatched up the abandoned sheet on the floor... he could see there were some signs of blood on the sheet. Not an alarming amount, but it was hardly a positive sign.

"Ah. Fräulein." He kept the same calm, reassuring tone for her as he had for the young lady. He needed her to calm down and not panic. There was no telling what she thought she was running from or what distressing her so severely. Perhaps the experience of death had been enough to break her. He certainly couldn't imagine it. Hell, he would probably be fairly panicked himself.

Klavier managed to reach her before she got to the beds -- What was she doing? Trying to crawl under one? -- and knelt next to her. He placed the sheet over her shoulders before gently grabbing hold of both shoulders himself, like one might do while waking someone. He needed to sit her up, get up off the floor, but first to get her still and keep her from wanting to thrash. He pulled just enough to turn her so she might face him, trying to meet her eyes "Fräulein, it's alright. I'm not here to hur--"

And then he stopped. The perfect, gentle tone and soft smile both dropped and he stared in open shock. Certainly, she was in a different state, had a different expression, but there could be no mistake. Her face. She was... This was...!

"...Yomi?" Oh my god, it couldn't...! "Yomi!"

Edited 2012-03-28 04:18 (UTC)

Rose took the sweatshirt and donned it, pulling the hood up over her head. It was big on her, flopping over into her face, but, more critically, coming down well past mid-thigh. She let it shade her face as she stepped forward in tiny shuffles, each sending shockwaves through her chest.

"She isn't my friend," Rose added, because keeping the record straight was important, even when she could barely talk. "I just met her." Then the man, who was older than she'd first guessed, and had hair the same ashen shade as her own, proved himself to be knowledgeable as well as generous.

"But apparently she is your friend. Do you know what happened to her?"

Speaking hurt, as did thinking, breathing, moving. Creeping away was the best she could manage, mostly to protect herself and the thinning thread tying her to any semblance of sanity. Too many voices. Too many, in her head as well as outside it, some painfully familiar and some not. She just wanted to be someplace quiet, some place else…

But it wasn’t just the sesshouseki and the young girl who wanted to drag her back to reality. The sheet she had woken up fell over her--a bloodied shroud, or so it should have been--and then there was someone pulling at her. The touch made her shudder and she scratched at the floor like an animal struggling to stay on all fours, a cry caught in her throat. Although she knew she would heal in time (oh yes, she knew it as well as anything), at the moment there was only so much the stone could do to salve her injuries. She was too weak to resist being rolled over like a life-sized rag doll.

Somewhere inside, Yomi knew that once this person saw her for what she was, it would be the death of hope. Some reunions were not meant to be had. She blinked rapidly, lashes made heavy from the wetness leaking from her eyes, and lifted her arms up to block his line of sight.

She did not want to hear her name ever again, not ever!

It was difficult to believe. Had he not been here witnessing it himself, he probably wouldn't have. But this woman was most definitely Yomi. Yomi who had been very viciously impaled last night and had been, without a doubt, very much dead. And yet... here she was. She was panicked and distraught, but doubtlessly alive. And for the second time today, Klavier could feel relief twisting in his chest. This wasn't as strong a sensation as earlier and was wrought with both confusion and wariness, but it existed nevertheless.

Yomi's appearance here... seemed to explain all the greater details. She had been killed, underwent the process they used here to restore her life, and then had been left here. They had probably been planning to wake her by the time morning came, but she had woken up early, unfortunately, and had to pull herself out of the freezer. The other girl also seemed to be in a similar situation from what little he'd gathered from her. In addition, Yomi's bandages coincided with the injury that had taken her life. How much of it had healed by this point was impossible to determine, but the signs of blood beginning to seep through the bandages were evidence enough that she hadn't recovered enough to be completely in the clear yet. All this flailing around she was doing was only making her condition worse. Though he could also understand why she was doing it now. The way she had died... had to have been traumatic. She'd been killed rather violently, after all. That was probably the last memory she held. So of course she would be panicked.

She threw her hands up in front of her defensively, like she was trying to protect herself. It seemed she hadn't fully grasped her surroundings yet. It was understandable, but at this rate, she was just going to do more damage to herself. ...The slip of both his face and voice proved to be only momentary, and he returned to a sort of level, serious expression. It was soft, but the smile was gone.

"Fräulein, it's alright! It's me. It's just me." Not Albedo. Not one of the doctors or nurses. Not anyone who would do her any harm. Just him. "Listen. You're alright. You're okay. Please... calm down."

To those who knew him better, Klavier did not have a reputation for coddling. Not with strangers or friends, and most certainly not with his subordinates. Even in this sort of extreme situation, there was no intention on his end to baby her. That was an insult and a disservice to them both. No, his focus was on trying to reason with her calmly and getting her to focus on her surroundings. And he needed to keep her from continuing to reopen her wounds or doing anything worse to herself. He didn't know what he would be able to do if that were to happen. So the words were spoken with a level, negotiative calm rather than anything particularly sweet and sentimental. The command itself was a simple sort of sternness, like something a parent might use on a child. "Just relax. Try not to move so much, alright?"

Once she'd settled down and gotten a better sense of her surroundings, then he could think about moving her. For now, he left her where she was so as to not risk aggravating anything for now. However, he stayed holding her shoulders in case he needed to keep her still. It wouldn't be an issue if he could just reason with her, but she seemed unstable at the moment. In the face of unpredictability, it was best to be ready for anything.

Klavier turned his head just enough to look at the other girl through the corner of his eye. Enough so he could still keep Yomi's movements in his periphery. It looked like the hoodie had been enough to cover her adequately, though she had to still be freezing. It seemed like the girl had only found Yomi here after waking up herself. They didn't know each other at all. But her earlier claim of having died now seemed far more credible than it had been a minute ago.

"She... also died. She died last night. In the basement." The details weren't something she needed to relive at the moment. He wasn't going to traumatize her like that. "It was... pretty bad." That was vague but it should hopefully serve as some kind of explanation regarding Yomi's behavior. Not to say any death was particularly pleasant, but....

Edited 2012-03-30 01:32 (UTC)

"That makes two of us." Rose blinked, and weariness hit her like a juggling club to the temples.

"I need to sit down." There wasn't anywhere good to sit except the drawer she'd come out of and the floor, and doing the latter gracefully while not wearing underwear sounded like a task for a greater Hero than she was, right now.

"I wonder if your party was there before us or after. Our gracious host failed to tell us anything other than the bare bones of what was going to happen. Perhaps there's some sort of transtemporal colocation going on." She was talking to herself more than to the other two, since she never expected people to listen to her ramble. "He turned Gamzee back into a troll. I wasn't really sure about the whole alien thing, but that was some fairly convincing evidence. Especially the part where he killed me without breaking into whatever colorful analogue alien trolls use for sweat."

If Yomi had been killed last night, someone who was with her had to have done it. The man, who still hadn't introduced himself, sounded like he might have seen it, which would put him on the list of prime suspects. "Did you kill her?"

She was all right? She was okay? She was anything but those things. Everything, everything in the entire world was wrong. The knowledge tore at her like a hungry beast.

Yomi let her head drop to the floor, but the dull ache of her temple hitting the tile was nothing compared to the pain in the rest of her body. In the face of Klavier’s insistence, she fell into stillness on her side. Not moving, yes, she could do that. There was no point in struggling to break free; it was not them she was fighting. But her grief didn’t stop--it continued to flow out of her in tears and choked noises, a grief that seemed to have no bottom to it. She wouldn’t have been surprised if all the blood in her body had been replaced with anguish, her heart pumping it in a never-ending circuit throughout her body, powering her limbs where the sesshouseki powered what remained of her soul.

Kindness would have been doing what the man asked and calming herself down. Climbing out of the ashes of her hope and donning a brave face would put them at ease, let them cling to a veneer of normalcy. But what was left of normalcy to cling to?

There was none. That, too, was something she had to accept.

She knew as well that the moment she was able to put on a smile was the moment the sesshouseki renewed its hold over her, and that terrified her beyond all reckoning. She gazed sightlessly along the floor, only vaguely aware of what the two above her were saying. Her. They were talking about her, what was wrong with her. But although Klavier had been there to see her fall, but he didn’t know… he didn’t know…

It was Rose’s accusation that pierced the dark cloud in her mind. Her eyes flew wide. Denial came instantaneously, but the words wouldn’t come.

No, no, that was a mistake… No one had killed her. She had done that herself.

Yomi's head hit the floor with a dull, distinct thud, and Klavier couldn't help but wince for just a second from both the sight and sound. Thankfully, it hadn't been that hard from what he could tell. It also seemed like his words had broken through and reached her. She wasn't scrambling to escape or trying to fight him off or anything of the sort. It seemed like she had relaxed to some degree, though she was still crying. He was trying very hard not to outwardly react, but honestly those noises she was making were cutting deep into him. It was an anguish, raw and perfect, coming out in a broken, staggered melody. ...He never wanted to hear sounds like this ever again.

It hurt, seeing her like this. Seeing anyone like this, honestly, but she was a face he knew. And worse yet when he knew exactly what had led to it... and that he had been unable to do anything to keep it from happening. But he could do something now, and it was more important to focus on acting now than mulling over those details.

However... Klavier was a prosecutor. He wasn't an officer or a member of EMS or anyone who would better know the fundamentals of dealing with this sort of situation. And that was something he became even more aware of when the other girl suddenly announced that she needed to sit. He turned his head back toward her, immediately concerned. ...If she suddenly fainted or collapsed, Klavier was too far away to be able to grab her before she hit the floor. Maybe he shouldn't have left the other girl standing there like she was perfectly fine when he knew full well that she had just experienced something similar to Yomi. He shouldn't have just assumed she was fine. He should probably help her. But he also didn't want to leave Yomi's side, as broken as she seemed to be at the moment. Damn it.

He was about to suggest walking her to one of the beds (and maybe it would be a good idea to place Yomi on one of them, too), when the girl started... rambling. That was the only way to really describe it. Klavier listened to everything, of course, but admittedly only portions of what she was saying even made comprehensible sense. She seemed to be implying that she had also died in the basement last night. ...And the way she explained it made it sound like she had even gone through the same "trial" they had all been put through, if that brief mention of a host was anything to go by. So then both she and Yomi had gone through the same mess on the same night? ...Had there been others as well who hadn't had the fortune of waking up yet?

That aside, however, nothing she was saying was connecting. Something about trolls and aliens? Or someone being turned into one? ...What is he even supposed to make out of that? Especially when it was said so flippantly. For a moment, he had to wonder if she was just blathering and wasn't aware of what was coming out of her mouth. Then... the sudden accusation. Which he honestly didn't care about, were he to be frank. It was neither offensive nor surprising. What was surprising was Yomi's reaction to it. Sudden, wide-eyed shock. Obviously, the conversation was having an effect on her. He had to wonder if maybe the question had driven the memory, fresh and new, right back into the forefront of her mind in a way it shouldn't have. It was too soon to speak of this in front of her....

"No," he said simply, turning his head to Rose again. Half to address her and half to look away from that face Yomi was making. "It wasn't me. Nor was it really as simple as that. ...Why don't we first focus on getting the two of you warm and out of this place. We can always speak of the particulars later, ja?" Somewhere where Yomi wasn't going to have to hear it and relive it again.

He turned back to Yomi, carefully gauging her as he spoke. "Yomi... I am going to sit you up, alright?" He only warned her ahead of time so she could be prepared for whatever pain may come of moving. And to give her a chance to properly protest if it was something she didn't think she could do yet. Getting up would probably be the worst part of it. Hopefully.

"And Fräulein." He glanced over at the girl again. "How are you feeling? Do you think you can walk? I can help you to one of the beds over here if you are unable to make it."

[from here]

Ilia stepped deliberately into the room. Her heart was pounding, but as she had stepped in she had been certain there were voices. Could it be that what Lana said was true...?

She glanced around, barely conscious of the fact that she was panting for breath. Frantically, she took in the scene. Rose, looking pale, but up and alive. Alive! And wearing nothing but a sweatshirt that was too big for her, making her look smaller than ever. Another listless girl and a young man were in the room, but Ilia's mind was a single-lane road.

Ilia released Seishin's hand and rushed over, stopping just short of her previously dead companion. "Rose! Rose you're..."

She didn't know what to say. She wanted to hug her, to touch her, but she didn't know if that was permissible or even safe. Maybe Rose would crumble under her touch. It made her feel even more hopeless than before.

The faint sound of a scream up ahead hadn't escaped Seishin's ears. There was a subtle look of concern on his face before Silvestri-san grabbed his hand. He blinked in surprise for a moment, but allowed it and followed her through the hallway inside the morgue.

He couldn't have possibly predicted the scene he witnessed upon entering. A young man and a listless girl were in the room, both unfamiliar, but along with them--

"--Rose-chan?!" The utterance had left his throat before he had noticed. She was alive. Pale, but alive! This was...impossible? Yet, here she was, in the flesh. One might think he would've been accustomed to people rising from the dead, but the current situation was clearly different. There had been no Shiki, but her own weapon driven in her chest by her...he wasn't certain what Gamzee-kun was to her.

Was she...truly alright?

Silvestri-san had released his hand and rushed over to the girl, but in his uncertainty and hesitation the former priest remained near the doorway. He subconsciously reached out for the doorpost as though he needed to keep himself grounded. But even the mixture of shock, confusion and relief couldn't completely banish a nagging sense of suspicion.

He took a few hesitant steps towards the girl, before asking softly: "...Are you alright, Rose-chan?"

Their knight in a shining hoodie seemed confused by her description, but Yomi didn't. It was the first intelligent reaction Rose had seen from her, although it wasn't much of one. Perhaps she kept her brain in her chest and it was still regrowing.

No, that was too ridiculous, even under the present circumstances.

The man was still busy helping Yomi, which probably meant that clothing was the extent of the assistance she could expect from him. Not that she'd expected anyone at all to come help her. Or expected anything at all, being dead. Still, it stung a bit, and the final grudging offer more so. She drew the tattered shreds of her dignity (and his sweatshirt) around her and declined.

"I can--" walk, she was about to say, but then Ilia and Seishin burst through the door, and it was time for a:

> 2xAWKWARD REUNION COMBO

[skipping Yomi with permission]

Before the girl could really answer, Klavier's attention was immediately drawn away by the sound of people entering the room. His immediate reaction was that of dread. His weapon was well beyond arm's reach, and if it turned out they were a threat, he would have to hope he could get to it before their "guests" did.

Thankfully, that seemed entirely unnecessary. A woman's voice was the first to call out. Not in hostility, but in shock and amazement. A man did the same, and both rushed over to the girl. Rose, evidently. Apparently, they knew her. Had they... come for her? There was a sense of relief in that thought. It had nothing to do with him, yes, but it was a wonderful display. The girl had friends here. There were people who cared about one another enough to come searching. And in the light of tragedy, it was always a comfort to know there were those who cared for you. He was thankful Rose had such people here. Not all did.

With Rose's companions here for the girl, Klavier turned his attention back down to Yomi. Yomi who was still distressed and didn't look like she even had the willpower to move anymore even if she wanted to.

He paused for a moment as he looked at her. The floor was freezing and probably wasn't making anything better. But one step at a time. Her wound was in her chest... and back. Bending and standing wouldn't be fun, but once she was finally up, it would be easier to maintain that. ...True to his word, he slowly pulled her up into a sitting position. "Careful."

Flecks of dappled sunlight on the ground. The hospital in Tokyo. The glinting glass ceiling in the Coliseum. Memories cascaded through her, of places she had been… places she had been destroyed and remade and destroyed again.

She remembered how alone she had felt in the other hospital after Mitogawa had attacked her. The nurses had fed her, bathed her, and cleaned her wounds, but it had been with the mechanical professionalism reserved for a patient, not a person. She remembered wanting just a little bit of kindness, to have someone take care of her and soothe her fears. Her, the girl who had never once needed someone to take care of her in her life. And here, now, in Landel‘s Institute the same fear was pressing in. There was a part of her craving that human touch again in the manner of a terrified child.

But it was wrong to want it now, more wrong than it had been before. The loneliness, the alienation… these were things she had earned for herself. Klavier’s attempt to help her was a waste of his time. It was too late to put things right…

Compared to the commotion of more people bursting into the room, Klavier’s request that she sit up was an insignificant discomfort. In the dim light provided by his flashlight, she saw flashes of legs, heard their footfalls thudding on the floor. Who? Who was here now? To Yomi, the strangers might as well have been screaming at the top of their lungs; their presence made her nervously hug the folds of her sheet to her chest. Every sound seemed to go straight through her like a shard of glass.

She didn’t want to move, she wanted to curl up in a hiding place where not even the sesshouseki could find her. But Klavier was pulling her and before she knew it she was upright. It hurt, it was true, but she had done worse struggling inside the drawer. No matter what she did, though, the pain would eventually fade as the sessouseki healed her--that was a blessing, if nothing else.

No, it’s not. It’s not.

Yomi stared at Klavier. How long until she stopped caring who he was?

There hadn't been any outward indication of pain, so he decided there probably wasn't enough of it to worry about. A good sign. But he really wasn't liking the fact that she wasn't really talking. Even if she was complaining, it'd be better than nothing at all. At least then he could better gauge her state and might be able to help her feel better.

When he noticed her looking at him, he perked up with an encouraging smile. Maybe they didn't know each other well enough to really say they were friends, but he was still here for her. And it was good that she know that. It was also a good way to try getting her talking again.

"Good. How bad is your wound? Do you think you'll be able to stand up?" ...They shouldn't stay in here. It could still be dangerous and Yomi needed to get warm. Carrying her probably wouldn't be a good idea, though. He couldn't tell how much of it had healed and how much hadn't, but it was a big wound. They had to be careful.

...He really wished he knew more about this sort of thing. Both how to deal with medical emergencies and how to talk to someone going through extreme trauma. This was more something his subordinates would deal with than he himself. So all he could do was try, really. Hopefully it would be enough.

He smiled, and it made an icy fist close around her heart. Oh god, to think she had finally thought it was over. Now there was a man tainting himself even more by tending to her in her… fractured state, if it could be called such a thing.

Yomi shuddered, more out of horror than the cold. What about any of this was “good?”

Bringing the back of her hand to her face, she brushed at her wet eyes. Regardless of self-consciousness, on a practical level Yomi knew she couldn’t stay the way she was forever, not with people around her. Wounded or not, she was still a magnet for danger. But trying to collect herself brought on a whole new set of dangers: the more she cleared her head, the more space the sesshouseki had to stretch itself out. Was there no way to make it stop? Was there no way to get one of these people to finish what Albedo had started?

Though if it was the Institute itself that kept bringing her back, then there really was no hope left.

Forming words that made any sense seemed a task far out of her reach, but Yomi tried, which only made her cough up more sticky fluid. With it came the sudden, irrational fear that she was back to before, vocal chords broken, forced into unwilling silence; when she touched her throat, however, there was nothing there. No bandages. No mass of scars. (No Mitogawa whispering the words to her destruction.) She had to remember that physically, the only thing wrong with her was what Albedo had done. The rest was all in her head, and it would pass. That was a good thing, wasn’t it?

So she tried again, emitting a rasping sound. After screaming, words felt inadequate.

“… Why… are you here…?”

The words were faint, barely more than a breath.

It seemed like she was starting to gather her bearings a little. Yomi lifted her hand to wipe the tears from her face and attempted to answer him. That only led to a brief coughing fit... with blood. She had coughed up blood. Damn it. Did that mean her wound was bleeding internally? ...What did one even do for something like that? Was there anything? Think. ...Well, she should probably stay upright so there wasn't any risk of her choking or--

Then she tried speaking again. A horrible rough sound came out before she finally managed to whisper out words. Why... are you here...?

...It was an odd thing to ask. Reasonable, but odd given the circumstance. One would think she'd be more worried about her state or what had happened than asking something like that from the outset. That was more something to ask once one stopped to consider the details. He blinked in consideration.

"I came to see whether you were here or not." Well, her and another, but he was very optimistic about the other not being here. "Fortunate that I did, too." He looked her face up and down, trying to read the expression there.

To see… ? Now that she’d recognized she was not dead after all, some parts of her situation had come to make sense in the back of her mind while she’d struggled with her resurrection. (Yes, resurrection, that was a good word for it.)

She was not dead. She was in a morgue. She was in Landel’s Institute. These things, they were a hard truth, but she couldn’t deny them.

But the rest… Klavier’s reason for being there… no, that didn’t make any sense at all. There was a part of Yomi that badly wanted to retreat into the fog shrouding her mind; she bowed her head, sinking her teeth into her bottom lip so no sound could escape. In a place of death, there was so much relief around her. Klavier, relieved to find live people. Relieved to find her. And the others, relieved to find the girl. So happy that what had been done had not been permanent, that the girl had survived. If only her circumstance could call for such happiness. But every time she came back, things only became worse.

Yomi shook her head. No.

But there was a still a question that needed asking. There was something important in the man’s words, something that didn’t add up. He had… come looking for her body? Had he known she would be here, alive or dead? More to the point, he was free. The barriers in the Coliseum had had to have come down for him to be with her now.

“It happened,” she gasped. “The fight, it ended? You got out.” With her eyes opened wide, there seemed almost no contrast between her pupils and the violet of her irises.

She had to have died in that case, hadn’t she?

> 2xAWKWARD REUNION COMBO

Klavier and Yomi could hug it out on their own. Rose pushed herself back to her feet, even if she wasn't sure that was the best idea she'd ever had, and stepped forward into Ilia's persona space. It wasn't so much a hug as a passive-aggressive demand for one. Also for support, as she'd sat back down for a reason.

"I've felt better. It does seem to be an improvement on being dead." There was one person missing from this little tableau -- two, if Yomi's friend was telling the truth and he hadn't killed her, but had merely taken the role Ilia had filled.

Maybe Gamzee had kissed her then, and it had just taken a while to kick in? That was still really kind of gross to think of, even for someone as well-versed in the grotesque and unspeakable as herself. Part of seeing the right answers was asking the right questions, after all, and not asking this one would be an excellent first step. "I suggest we adjourn to somewhere less cold."

Edited 2012-04-10 03:27 (UTC)

Rose approached and Ilia couldn't deny herself any longer. Lifting her shaky arms, Ilia carefully encircled the girl. It took every ounce of self-control she had to not squeeze Rose too tightly. Part of her surrendered to the need for tactile clinginess and her hands grasped at the thin fabric that clothed Rose.

She was freezing, like she really had just come back to life minutes before now. It was so impossible to imagine. Ilia squeezed her eyes tight, trying to fight back the tears that threatened to overwhelm her for what seemed like the hundredth time that day. It was just so surreal.

"You should be dead, you should be... but you're alive and... and that's what matters." Lana had been right. Ilia was thankful she had come, but she did have one more task ahead of herself.

"Okay, we'll take you someplace warm." Ilia cleared her throat and retreated from the hug, her hands rubbing up and down Rose's arms to try and return circulation to them. "I need to check around. Just in the other... cells, okay? Then we'll go back to the rooms and get you some blankets and things."

Ilia suddenly wished she had a flask of whiskey on her. Rose probably needed water more than anything, but the heat from the alcohol would probably have done a world of good for her internal body temperature.

Seishin watched silently as Silvestri-san embraced Rose-chan, having no intention to disturb their embrace. It must have been awful to wake up surrounded by cold and unfriendly steel, all alone. His presence hardly changed anything in regards to that, but he was nonetheless thankful that they had come.

He blinked when Ilia said she needed to check the other...cells. Were there even more people in here? There was the other girl -- Seishin offered her a worried glance, but at least a friend had come for her -- which must have meant more people had faced death that night, all for the sake of Landel's amusement.

Being hugged was a fairly novel experience, and hugs that came without the intent of scoring points or other forms of arcane parental brinkwomanship even more so. Rose patted Ilia's hair like she was some form of wild animal. Ilia smelled faintly of wine, which was comfortingly familiar.

"Yes. We shouldn't leave anyone here. Unless they are, in fact, corpses, in which case the ideal course of action is unclear. If we extract them now, before their resurrection is complete, I'm afraid they might spoil. Or be eaten." She had to stop and take a breath, which was excruciating, but being unable to talk would be worse. "Neither of which is what I would call a positive outcome." Her knees were trembling, and the edges of her vision were rarrowing again. She slipped out of Ilia's arms and back onto the floor. "I'm not going to be much help. I'll just wait here until you're done."

"Let's just hope there is no one else here to find, then," Ilia said, allowing Rose to slip away and move back to the floor. Ilia didn't like the sound of her breathing. It was too heavy, but her lungs had been punctured if last night's battle was to be believed. Breathing was probably the hardest thing for Rose to do at this point.

Ilia took a moment to run a hand from the top of Rose's head and caress her cheek, then stood up. "I'll only be a second."

Steeling herself for any more surprises that could come her way, Ilia made her way to the cells and began to swiftly check them. Her movements were almost mechanic in the way she rushed through them, like a secretary browsing files. So far she was lucky that there were no corpses to see, but she didn't dare risk missing the only other important one that might be here. Lana would be terribly upset if Ilia didn't give a full report.

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Nightshift 62: Morgue

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sorry for the delay, guys

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