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damned_institute2011-03-09 12:03 pm
tightsofmight) wrote in damned_institute2011-03-09 12:03 pm
Entry tags:
- aidou,
- alaric,
- albedo,
- anise,
- ax,
- badd,
- battler,
- bella,
- brainiac 5,
- byrne,
- canada,
- claire bennet,
- claire littleton,
- claire stanfield,
- claude,
- damon,
- dean winchester,
- dexter,
- edgar,
- edward cullen,
- erika,
- firo,
- franziska,
- goku (dragonball),
- gren,
- gumshoe,
- guy,
- guybrush,
- ilia,
- japan,
- kairi,
- kaworu,
- kenshin,
- kibitoshin,
- kinomoto sakura,
- kirk,
- klavier,
- kratos,
- l,
- lana skye,
- leela,
- lightning,
- lion,
- lunge,
- matt,
- maya,
- mccoy,
- mele,
- mello,
- minato,
- nigredo,
- peter parker,
- peter petrelli,
- prussia,
- rapunzel,
- renamon,
- rita,
- ritsuka,
- roxas,
- ruby,
- s.t.,
- sam winchester,
- sasuke,
- scott pilgrim,
- shinji,
- snow,
- sora,
- soren,
- spock,
- stefan,
- sync,
- taura,
- the doctor,
- the flash,
- the scarecrow,
- tsubaki,
- two-face,
- venom,
- yue,
- zack,
- zevran
Day 55: Cafeteria
A night spent inside his room had done nothing to ease his jitters. Peter couldn't stop worrying. Over Brainy, what he thought of him now that he knew about what he'd done to Grell, and where he was going for the night. If he'd be safe. If Indy and the others would be safe, trucking on down to the basement. (Not frigging likely, considering 'basement' was synonymous for 'giant ass doom pit'.) If that ominous intercom announcement had meant anything. Peter had spent hours staring into the dark after that, his stomach churning his supper into butter over the horrific possibilities. Whatever punishment that arose for the food fight was a mystery. It didn't seem to infect him, unless it was a particularly trying case of insomnia. No matter how badly Peter tried, he couldn't find the will to sleep. Much of the night had been spent making notations and doodles in his journal by flashlight, peppered with long stretches of staring at the dark.
Honestly, he'd rather be taking another crack at the Hall of Hallucinations instead of rolling around in his bed. Paranoia was his only company the whole night.
Morning felt like a blessing by the time it came. He wasn't sure when sleep had finally overtaken him, but as he blinked his way into life he couldn't help feeling a bit...off.
It was really quiet. Peter's face scrunched under the light, and he stretched underneath the covers. There was a zip of cotton on cotton, and his shirt half dragged itself out from under the belt.
His eyes shot open. Belt? The covers flipped back, and Peter gaped down at his form on the bed. ...Belt?!
What the frigging hell was this? Peter jolted to his feet, patting himself down. He looked like some kind of air cadet. There were freaking epaulettes on his shoulders (was that even what they were called?), boots on his feet and a beret on the dresser. A single pin was nestled into the front, looking freshly polished as it glinted in the light. Peter snatched the hat up and stared. Two letters were inscribed on the pin. Nothing more, nothing less.
"SC..."
Special Counseling? Peter's expression took a turn for the frantic. What else could it stand for? He tried to run through a few candidates, but nothing stuck. Nothing applied so neatly without being ridiculous, because it clearly didn't stand for Super Cuckoo or Spider Cadet. Was he supposed to wear this like some stupid badge of honour? God, just brand it across his forehead, why don't you? My name is Peter Parker and I totally snapped a guy's arm for Mother Landel's. Hail the Smiley!
Peter pressed the beret against his face and groaned into the fabric. This was it. They weren't playing games anymore. They were finally turning this into death match boot camp and sending them off to war. Shit. Shit he was going to be in the frigging army in some messed up alternate universe, and he didn't even know what the frick they were fighting against or why they were fighting. If they were pulling magical whatsits out of every book and TV show known to man, then who knew what wacky threat they were up against. Aliens? If it was aliens, he was quitting. He was going to curl up on the ground hugging a grenade and pull the pin. Just no. No. This was not happening. This could not be frigging happening.
Except that it was. The person who whipped open the door that morning wasn't the affably sour Nurse Rachel, but a hulking, thickly built man who looked like he consumed a toddler a meal solely to fuel his pecs. Peter couldn't even find the breath to argue as he was told to tuck in his shirt and put on his boots and come to the cafeteria. He left just as another soldier brushed past them to collect Brainy, and Peter abruptly realized that in his confusion he'd forgotten to check if the boy was okay.
Too late for that now. Peter tried to match pace with the burly man, fumbling to put his snazzy new beret on and watching with wary eyes as other patients were dragged by. Things seemed even bleaker as they hit the cafeteria. The buffet was empty. The scent of food was lacking. Soldiers packed along the borders of the room so neatly you would think they were part of a particularly tacky wall paper. And worst of all? Buckets. Mops and rags and brooms, all piled in the center of the room.
The lady officer's speech was entirely unnecessary at that point. Peter withered where he stood as she told them their duty. It was like a scolding from Aunt May, if someone gave her a gun and a license to use it. Except the joke only made things worse - now he just wanted his Aunt. The force of his loneliness bowled him over like a wrecking ball. He might never see Aunt May again. Peter's gaze fell to the floor and he clenched his fists.
Was this it? Was his life really over? Escape never seemed so far away.
There was no protest from him as they were sent to work. Ashen and queasy, Peter stumbled towards the cleaning supplies and selected a bucket and a rag. He couldn't even bemoan his lack of breakfast. His nerves were making it impossible to even think about food.
They needed to get out tonight. Everyone. Somehow...
[Lion!]
no subject
An animal, was he? Less than sentient? Aidou woke to the indignation he’d felt at those words still smouldering in his chest, which flared back to full strength once he realized morning had come. Who the hell was tha--
His thoughts were interrupted at the sight of what he was wearing in place of the typical grey sweat suit. What the hell was this? But he hadn’t… He drew away the touch of metal from his skin, exposing dog tags, of all things. It read "Aidan Fairbairn, S Rank," and what looked liked an I.D. number. So what, the dress code had changed to suit the new military presence?
It took Aidou only a second more to process the possible implications of such a noticeable change.
He lunged for his closet and was still taking in its near empty expanse when the cell’s lock turned unexpectedly, emitting the soldiers. Gone! Everything that wasn’t standard issue was gone. All that he had amassed, even the box under his bed he’d refused to touch. Damn it! And he couldn’t even demand to know what happened to it all unless he wanted to make an idiot of himself. He already knew the answer--acting predictably wouldn’t help. Still, ask questions he did, once he had ascertained the situation from his lead escort. To add further insult, the man actually seemed interested in being companionable, and it made Aidou more angry than learning he was (naturally) expected to maintain his new uniform and that there would be new routines taking the place of old ones. Like the ranking system, of which Aidou was apparently part of the highest rank. What a joke.
So was the sight of the cafeteria when he was finally led inside, mood growing more dark by the second. Instead of breakfasting, those who’d started the debacle yesterday were expected to stand around while the rest--including himself--were to clean? After everything, these guys, the farcical charades, the new uniforms, they expected their prisoners to do menial labour for the sake of the Institute?
His soldier, with the same subdued amiability, pointed out the supplies in the middle of the room. "The quicker you start, the quicker it’ll get done."
The noble grit his teeth harder before snapping out a single word. "No." It was the first time since waking up that he’d earnestly acted against orders, which was essentially all the Institute was. Orders. Expectations. And he assented in order to better his chances. But this? Absolutely not. It wasn’t that as an aristocrat Aidou was unused to chores or that he found the act itself completely unbearable. No, what was unbearable was the idea of lowering himself further in front of his enemies while they watched, like a show pony, like an "animal." He wouldn’t do it. Not that day. Not ever, for that matter.
There was a pregnant pause while the man took in Aidou’s obstinate stance before warning him of what would happen if he disobeyed.
"No," was his simply reply. "Do it yourself."
And no amount of warnings changed his answer. He stood rigidly, arms crossed and jaw clenched, refusing to look at any of the uniformed people about the room. His first undeniable insubordination, and if this was how things were to continue, probably not his last. He didn’t care. He’d bear the childlike punishments during the day and whatever worse punishments came later.
no subject
The door opening woke Leela, and she blinked--she was getting good at the closing-both-eyes-simultaneously part--at the not-DOOP guy who stood there.
"Where's Betty?" she said.
"Gone. Up and moving, now."
Leela sulked (he wasn't even cute), but she did have a kind of snazzy outfit now. Of course, this meant someone had changed her at some point, and that wasn't cool. "Changing my clothes in my sleep? You perverts!"
The not-DOOP guy remained unmoved, and Leela felt an odd wave of belated affection for Betty, who had called her the wrong name and been unrelentingly perky, but had never... interfered with her. Leela had never thought about what Betty's life was like, and she was now, assumedly, out of a job. It was sort of sad.
"I need to leave a note for someone," Leela objected, when she realized they were heading straight for the cafeteria.
"Not now," Not-DOOP said.
"Betty would have let me," Leela muttered mutinously. With little else to do as they walked, she inspected the necklace she'd acquired somehow. Lisa Townsend, D class, 13738484F. Gibberish, and not even interesting gibberish.
She quickly became aware that Betty being missing was only the tip of the comet when it came to the changes here. Manual labor was the order of the day, apparently, and while Leela was in favor of swabbing the Planet Express ship when it gave her the moral advantage, as it almost inevitably did where Bender and Fry's lazy, couch-imprinting butts were concerned, she was not so much into making like a cleaning robot for its own sake.
On the other hand, while she was perfectly fine with a blaster, and, like any environmentalist needed to, knew her way around a shotgun, assault rifles that other people had, especially other people who looked prepared to use them, made her understandably uncomfortable, and were an excellent motivator for wanting this place to shine like the spotlights on MomCorp.
She noticed a young man who seemed to be rebelling against the orders. Maybe it was guilt for having not restrained herself from throwing a foodstuff or three yesterday morning, or maybe it was a need to meddle, like Fry had said (and said and said), but Leela just didn't feel he ought to face this alone, so she went over to him on the pretense of retrieving a bucket nearby. She did have some experience dealing with both the military and bureaucracies.
"Don't you require forms in quintuplicate before, um, notarificating the physical enactment of punitative measures?" she said.
Yeah. That should shut them up. Unfortunately, her not-DOOP guy just grunted out a repetition of the order to get to work cleaning, and Leela felt she had no choice but to give the cute young man half a shrug, and get to it.
no subject
As far as retaliations went, Aidou might have expected worse, though chances were that drawing attention to himself would have other repercussions down the line. No food and no rest until sundown. Small prices to pay for his dignity. And if Aidou suffered, if he couldn’t help listening to the blood pumping throughout the many bodies packed into the cafeteria and feeling the hollow gnawing in his belly, it was his own fault. Not for refusing to get on his hands and knees to clean, but because he’d left his feeding too long. He’d taken a risk and the hunger that swayed him was the result.
Would he regret it? Maybe. Would he regret whatever trials he had to go through while he was 'on notice'? No, that he was certain of. Better to stand alone than be part of either group of prisoners, the ones toiling or the ones hovering helplessly. Of course neither group would act out today. Failure was still fresh in their short memory spans, and on its heels was this added humiliation…
Aidou couldn’t expect his fellow captives to do otherwise than obey, but he nonetheless hated them in that moment, just a little.
So he stood and fumed, letting anger distract him until it couldn‘t distract him any longer. Their new armed guards he could dismiss because they were basically nothing more than puppets on strings, but when other prisoners got involved… Aidou had been staring down the rest of the prisoners, muscle jumping in his jaw, when a woman paused near him and spoke up. He glanced at her. The garbled nonsense was a small act of rebellion, left to die off as quickly as it’d come on. In more gruff a tone than Aidou’s had used, her escort directed her back to work and in response to him Aidou turned his face away, nose in the air. In some ways, these soldiers were already worse than the usual patronizing hospital staff.
As for the woman… He didn’t know what her shrug was supposed to mean. Sorry? What can you do? Whatever the case, a meaningless gesture.
Folding his arms a little tighter, the vampire closed his eyes. "You’re better off just doing as you’re told," he advised lowly.
no subject
She didn't mind physical labor, given that she was usually the only one willing to do it back home, and in a weird way, it made her feel less disapproved-of by those kids from yesterday. She'd thrown her share of food, and probably should have been one of the ones standing around, but here she was, quietly subverting the system. That was what she told herself, anyway. It made the prospect of crawling around on the floor with a sponge seem like something better than just following those jerkwads' orders.
"And," she felt needed pointing out, "you didn't." And he hadn't gotten sedated or dragged off to solitary the way she knew happened a lot before the not-DOOP guys took over. Leela would have expected these guys to be harder-assed about that sort of thing. If they were trying to win the patient population over by being less thoroughly horrible than they could be, they had a long way to go, in her opinion.
no subject
He considered just closing his eyes again and ignoring everything until the shift changed. Why the new uniforms were designed as they were, what else the soldiers were meant to do… these were questions that couldn’t be answered until one of the higher-ups made an appearance again, and it was possible that wouldn’t happen until the manual tasks were over.
At the woman’s emphasize, Aidou let out a soft snort. What was this, monkey see, monkey do? "We’re not the same," he corrected. He could manage himself and the consequences to his choices. Everyone else was… well, everyone else. Sasuke, for one, seemed to have chosen to do the deed rather than put up a fight. It was painful to watch simply because these bastards weren't really posing a choice at all. If people wanted to play their cards as carefully as they could, they had no choice but to obey. And some were probably just too cowed to do otherwise. Sasuke likely belonged to the former category.
no subject
"Yesterday it's one way, and today it's another, and no one knows what's going to happen. Probably not even them." She shook her sponge in the direction of the not-DOOP guys. Was an order to clean the floor really that different from an order to sit down and eat breakfast? She didn't think so. "Unless they decide to send us all home, it's just different costumes."
no subject
Besides that, they most certainly were not in the same “boat,” not when one looked at the finer details, but pointing out their differences would also be an unnecessary distraction. It was enough that he knew it, and he didn’t really care if she wanted to disobey her captors with him or not.
He shifted his weight but didn’t allow himself to slouch. She was right about the disorganization and the fact that they were doing nothing more than playing charades with him. In comparison to Landel’s preferred style of uniform, Aidou didn’t mind the crisp lines and formality of this one in principle. But it was prison garb all the same, a despicable game of dress-up. “If they didn’t have an idea of what they were here to accomplish, the situation would probably be different,” he replied. He didn’t raise his voice, yet he also didn’t care if the soldiers nearest overheard him or not. There was a chance they were real, cognizant human beings, but there was also the chance they were like the typical day staff. Oblivious and probably brainwashed creatures rather than real people who could suffer and bleed.
Either way, their game had changed…
“What rank is on your tag?” he added after a pause.
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She decided a token effort was in order to keep herself out of trouble for now, and started sponging off the nearest table, which already looked pretty clean to her. Actual cleaning wasn't the goal. She understood that.
The blond boy had a point about the not-DOOP guys' behavior, which was sort of like the morning of basic training Leela had undergone, with slightly less bed-making. But they didn't want the patients to indulge in any manly, or womanly, as the case may be, bonding. They wanted them to fall in line. She had never thought she'd miss Zapp Brannigan, but a bit of comical ineptitude in the ranks of these guys would have been nice.
"So, what is it you think they're after?" she aksed. She thought he must have some idea, to have an opinion about how not to accomplish it.
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A D ranking. That was the lowest grouping, or so it appeared. Aidou, meanwhile, was of the highest grouping. The question was, what were these classes based on? It certainly couldn’t be the inborn attributes they brought with them from home, which strictly left their time spent in the Institute. So what separated those who’d been allowed to use the bulletin and those who hadn’t?
Aidou let the thought process take him. Another puzzle to solve. Another detail about how the Institute worked and why. Hence, it took him a moment to realize that the female was still talking, asking him a question, and it was another while before he said anything in return.
“Something in part of what Landel wants, probably,” he said. “This proves Landel’s just one of the figures involved.”
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"Whatever it is, they're not giving us any more reason to go along with it than he did. Which tells me it's evil, and probably insane. Because if it wasn't, they could tell us, and some of these people would probably sign on." She took a look around at her fellow patients. "Actually, even if it's evil, they might get some volunteers."
She had to admit he was right about one thing: it sure seemed like Landel had been working toward something, especially lately, and that the main problem the not-DOOP guys had with him was that he hadn't been doing it fast enough. She wondered if this meant even more crazy things every night. It hadn't so far for her. It had just been the usual brainwashed patients and not enough time to get anywhere.
no subject
“What do you want, all the unvarnished answers? If I had those, do you think this place would still be standing?” His tone was suddenly more direct than it had been, and with a bite to it. “Giving you a full report of my thoughts is also difficult to do in the time we have.”
Who did these people think they were, to get catty with him when they were the ones asking for his opinion, or his advice, or his assistance? Just because he was an authority of a sort, what, did that mean he was responsible to sooth their frustrations, too? To hell with that! He wasn’t even obligated to provide information when he had it, not when half of the prisoners were out for themselves and would sooner lose a limb than reciprocate the same courtesy. It wasn’t his fault he had a more complete history of Landel’s due to being imprisoned for so long. It wasn’t like it’d been his choice.
… Honestly, it was like speaking another language entirely. He frowned and turned his head, calm ruffled. Whatever. He wasn’t here to get into a pointless debate, which was only slightly more useless than being someone’s sounding board.
“If you’re actually condoning joining with these people,” and people was a kind term given the kinds of torment Aidou would have liked to inflict on everyone associated with the Institute, “you’re insane. How long do you have to be stuck here before realizing there’s nothing worthwhile about this farce? Of course they should be your enemy. Look at what you’re being made to do.”
no subject
"It's about patient solidarity, exactly the kind these guys are trying to intimidate out of us." She wasn't sure how this boy had managed to annoy her while she was agreeing with him. It was probably that I know more than everyone else air he was projecting. "I don't really care why they're going to do horrible things to us, but if I knew what the horrible things were, I'd tell people."
It was a more than safe assumption, she felt, that there was horribleness somewhere in their future, and she really didn't care what Landel or this general or anyone hoped to gain from it. All she really wanted was to know whose butts to kick, so she could kick them and go home.