damned_institute | Night 72: Sun Room

[From here.]

A raised voice just outside the Sun Room was probably enough to warn Ed that someone was coming just before Lloyd stepped in. Still caught up in his attempt to distract Castiel from what he'd said, it took Lloyd a moment to realize that there was someone else there in the room. The teen blinked in surprise when his flashlight caught the highlights of Ed's blond hair. Recognition dawned, and he forgot what he'd been about to say. He lifted his hand holding the flashlight in greeting.

"Oh. Hey, Ed. I didn't think I'd run into you here."

Unfortunately for Lloyd, he showed up after two different groups got past Ed. So he's not exactly in the best of moods.

"What are you doing here?" Ed snapped as he looked past him to see how many others were with him. He knew Lloyd had to be talking to someone. At the moment, he's hoping the group isn't too big. That would make chasing them off tricky.

It's not what you think, Kratos said. Castiel was going to need more of an explanation than that. He hadn't missed the look that Kratos had given Lloyd, one of pure irritation that he had let that detail slip. If anything, that made it worse, because it made it crystal clear that Kratos had been trying to keep this secret from him.

And for what purpose? Kratos already knew what Castiel was, so why would he need to hide his own nature? There had to be something more to all of this, but Castiel wasn't given much opportunity to ask about it, not when Lloyd barreled ahead after explaining the trick behind that one room to them.

They couldn't have metal on them when walking through that arch? It was a strange concept, but Castiel assumed it was for instances where humans wanted to prevent people from taking a weapon into a particular place.

It was something they would have to test for themselves. Castiel followed after Lloyd, stopping in his tracks when they encountered another patient who Lloyd seemed to know. Automatically, Castiel sent a glance in Kratos' direction. What was this all about?

Properly chagrined, Lloyd had taken it upon himself to change the topic to something he thought would properly distract them, and for a second, Kratos was: they needed to take off anything metallic to pass through the arch? That...he thought about the number of buckles holding together the outer shell of his uniform and sighed inwardly. No use in complaining about it, though: if Lloyd's information was correct, he had a choice between partially undressing and receiving an electric shock, and it didn't take a genius to recognize which one would be more inconvenient.

They entered the Sun Room and were immediately met by a short, ornery blond that seemed to be an acquaintance of Lloyd's. As the two talked, Kratos exchanged glances with Castiel. While their initial exchange seemed innocuous, his instincts were telling him otherwise, especially given what room they were in and what often transpired here during the night.

"A friend of yours?" he asked Lloyd, all the while preparing to bolt at the first sign of aggression.

Ed's presence was enough that Lloyd was no longer thinking about the metal detector or what passing through it might entail. He blinked at the question, taken aback by the blond's irate tone. Had something happened before they got here?

"Yeah," he said in response to Kratos's question first. "This is Edward Elric. Ed, this is Kratos and Castiel. We're heading to the third floor. Why? Is something wrong?" Something did feel wrong, and it took him a moment to pin it down. He glanced around the room, brow furrowing. "Hey, where's Al?" He'd always seen the brothers together at night. The fact that Al wasn't here was a little odd.

Ed scowled at him. "What's wrong is that people aren't staying in their rooms like they're supposed to!"

He ignored the question about his brother. It wasn't relevant. What was relevant was getting people back to their rooms. Or taking them down if they weren't cooperative.

It didn't take long to determine that this Edward was not a friend, at least not for the duration of this night. Castiel had heard that sort of language before, and it always meant that the person in question was under the institute's brainwashing.

This wasn't good. They couldn't afford to be held up again, but Castiel felt that there might still be a chance to get away from the young man. His skillset was unknown, which made it difficult to know how to best proceed, but the library door was so close...

Castiel looked back to Kratos and made a tiny motion with his head toward said door. He wasn't usually one to flee, but this wasn't something they had time for.

Ah, there they were, the magic words. Just as Kratos had suspected, "Edward" had been picked for Special Counseling - which meant that they had precious little time before he finally made his move and attacked them under the pretense of driving them out of the Sun Room.

He looked at Castiel and nodded. The library was close, and the door was also open; if they ran now, they could possibly make it. The only problem now was Lloyd...

He spared his son a glance as well and made his decision in an instant. Clearly, Lloyd's instincts were not likewise screaming danger, and it would take time they didn't have to convince him otherwise - and alert Ed to their intentions. The only solution, then, was to forcibly move Lloyd regardless of whether he understood.

"What a shame," he said brusquely. "Excuse us." Grabbing Lloyd by the arm, Kratos ran for the library door.

Something was wrong. Lloyd knew that much, but that didn't mean he was prepared to have Kratos grab his arm and physically haul him off. "Wha- Hey! Let go!" He stumbled, his first instinct to twist his arm and resist. "Kratos, what are you- It's just Ed!"

Still struggling to keep his balance with Kratos pulling on him, he threw a look back at his friend. Something wasn't right, but why would Kratos and Castiel be reacting this way? "Ed, what's going on?!"

Rather than answer, Ed clapped his hands together before kneeling to use alchemy to make a wall shoot up to block the doorway to the library. While he wasn't fast enough to keep Castiel and Kratos from vanishing into the library, it did stop Lloyd.

Then he rose to his feet and charged Lloyd with a snarl, clapping his hands together and forming his arm-blade. Since they were all obviously uncooperative, he wanted to take down the one he could fast and hard. Maybe it'll help assuage the frustration of the night.

Lloyd was protesting, but there was no stopping now. They were almost to the library, just a few steps away; in fact, Castiel had already gone through, and Kratos had a foot through the door himself when suddenly, the floor shot up, knocking his hand away from Lloyd's arm. Freed abruptly from the added weight, Kratos stumbled forward, but swiftly caught himself and pivoted just in time to see the newly-formed wall slam into the ceiling, neatly dividing their group in twain.

Lloyd was capable of handling himself, he knew that. Unfortunately, after everything that had happened, from experimentation to even the previous night's episode with the metal detector, Kratos's fear of losing his son had slowly grown to the point where, if provoked, very little could defeat it, not even reason.

"Lloyd!" He took one step toward the door, then another, and then suddenly, he was sprinting, throwing his weight against the wall as if to shatter it. "Lloyd!" Naturally, the wall refused to budge, and Kratos was left, head bowed, to try to convince himself that this wasn't his fault - and more importantly, that Lloyd would be alright.

And then the world began to spin again, his vision blurring and his heartbeat beginning to pound relentlessly in his ears as the Exsphere wasted no time in taking advantage of its host's sudden (and prolonged) emotional turmoil. Kratos squeezed his eyes shut and tried to force his body to cooperate, but the air around him was growing heavier by the second, the amount of mana so high, so stifling that it was visible, a cloud of brilliant blue shards flickering in and out of existence as they struggled to coalesce into the individual segments of his wings.

Castiel found it efficient that instead of trying to explain anything, Kratos simply dragged Lloyd along with him. There wasn't time for anything else -- if need be, they could go over it all when they reached the library. He still needed to find out what these "angelic abilities" of Kratos' really were.

He hadn't been prepared for a wall to shoot up from the ground a good ten feet, erecting a solid barrier between them and Lloyd. Castiel paused and spun around as he reached the library door, watching as Kratos tried to ram the wall. But it was thick concrete and there would be no way for them to breach it, not with their powers so limited.

And yet again, Kratos was overcome with a need to protect Lloyd. It was only when the younger man called back to him from the other side that Castiel finally understood: they were father and son.

That meant it would be even more difficult for Kratos to leave Lloyd behind, but there was no other option. Castiel noticed the shining particles that were starting to form around Kratos' back then, and while he had no idea what they were and couldn't properly sense them, he could see that Kratos seemed to have weakened somehow.

Not willing to wait any longer, Castiel moved back over to Kratos, grabbing him by the back of his collar to turn him around and then tugging him into the library by the crook of his elbow.

[To here.]

Lloyd never had a chance. Since when do walls shoot up out of the floor?! The solid concrete slammed up between him and his father, breaking Kratos's hold on his arm before Lloyd could so much as give a panicked yelp. "Dad!" The word escaped from his mouth without thought. He tried to gather himself to jump, but it was too late. The wall hit the ceiling, cutting him off.

Unfortunately, he didn't have time to process even that. Ed was already attacking, his blade (where had that come from?!) slicing through the air straight for Lloyd. The teen threw himself to the side, barely dodging the thing. "Ed! What the hell are you doing!?"

Edited 2013-09-10 10:51 (UTC)

"If you just went back to your room, you could have avoided this," Ed snarled. "But no, you had to choose the hard way."

He pivots to take another swing at Lloyd, pressing his advantage. If Lloyd's going to be all shocked and not actually defend himself, so be it.

Hey may be shocked, but he's not that shocked. It has been more than a week since he's used a sword, and the sword in his hand isn't what he's used to wielding, but his instincts still kick in, his arm snapping his blade up to defend. Steel clashes against steel with enough force to make the air ring.

"What's so wrong about leaving my room?" Lloyd shoves back against Ed's blade-arm, confusion melting into frustration. "Ed, you know this is the only time we can do anything! The nurses won't let us act during the day!"

"Because it's against the rules," Ed snapped as he backed away to look for an opening. "If people would just do as they're supposed to, I wouldn't have to be here!"

"That didn't stop you before!" As Ed backed away, Lloyd took a step back, too, sword lifted warily as he eyed his opponent, his friend. He didn't want to fight, but he didn't want to let Ed get too close with that sword. He had to talk sense into him somehow! "What changed?!"

"Nothing changed!" Ed charged in again, feinting left before slashing at Lloyd's right side.

Lloyd whipped his sword up to parry again, awkwardly because his other hand moved instinctively to follow through with a counterattack, but all he had was a flashlight in his other hand. At the last moment, he tried to turn it into an attempt to knock Ed back. Hey, it might not be a sword, but the butt of a flashlight had to hurt if it slammed into someone's gut.

"Yes it has! You didn't have any problem going out in the halls before! Don't you remember?"

Ed's breath shot out with a grunt as he stumbled back and turned the stumble into a flip to get further away in order to give himself a chance to use his alchemy. "No."

Then he clapped his hands together again and knelt to construct a cage to trap Lloyd in.

The last time Ed had clapped his hands to the ground, a wall had shot up to cut him off from his group. Lloyd didn't know what Ed was planning to do this time, but no way was he going to just stand still. Again he threw himself to the left, leaping up and over a table. Dammit, he really wanted to throw a Demon Fang, but he didn't want to waste that kind of energy for something he only wanted to use as a distraction. He didn't want to actually hurt Ed. Not if he could help it.

"You're saying you don't even remember when that monster attacked Al with its hair?" he shot back. "You don't remember when your own brother got hurt?" Come on, there had to be a way to jog Ed's memory. What could have even caused this in the first place? Had the doctors done something to him? Somewhere in the back of his mind, he thought he remembered someone mentioning the doctors brainwashing patients. Dammit. Dammit! "Ed, those are your memories! You can't let the doctors win and take them!"

Landing on the ground, he sprinted a few steps before turning and hooking a chair with his arm and hurling it straight at the blond. It wouldn't, couldn't do that much damage, if it even hit at all, but it was the best he could manage to try to distract Ed from throwing up another one of those walls. The last thing he needed was for Ed to try to trap him in here. He also needed time to try to figure out how he was going to get out of this.

The cage closed without Lloyd in it and Ed spun on his knees and lifted his automail arm up so the blade could meet the chair, cutting it into halves that tumbled to either side of him.

Mention of the attack on Al got a brief look of uncertainty to cross his face before it devolved back into a snarl. "You're lying."

He got up again to charge at Lloyd. Since it was obvious that Lloyd wasn't going to stop on his own, he wanted to make him stop talking himself.

That brief look of uncertainty was enough to give Lloyd hope. As Ed rushed toward him, he preemptively swung his sword, fully expecting the other to block.

"Why would I lie! You could ask Al yourself and he'd tell you the exact same thing!"

"To get to me and make me stop. Go to your room!" Ed blocked Lloyd's sword and aimed a kick at his knee with his left foot.

The kick forced Lloyd to pull back, though it still grazed his shin with enough force to make him bite back a curse. It took him a moment to recover, but when he did, he struck again. This time, while his sword was slicing toward Ed, he followed it with another jab at Ed's gut with the butt of the flashlight in his hand.

"No!" he snapped. "I don't want to fight you, Ed, but I will if you don't let me go! If you've been brainwashed, that's only one more reason why these people need to be stopped!"

Posting order: Lloyd, Ed, Castiel, Kratos?

Sounds Good.

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