damned_institute | Day 58: Cafeteria

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Day 58: Cafeteria

Anise woke up feeling lucky to be alive. She still felt a bit waterlogged, even though her skin, hair, and clothes were completely dry. During last night's adventures, she'd swallowed a lot of water, and it still felt heavy and disgusting in her stomach. Her arms and legs were tired from treading water. Lying still in her bed, she still kind of felt like she was floating and bobbing in the water.

But she was alive.

Knowing how close she came to death last night, and remembering the lengths her friends had gone to in order to save her, there was no way Anise could let a little discomfort get her down. She had to be at her best today so she wouldn't seem ungrateful to Guy and Claude. On that note, she had to remember to thank them properly, now that she was better able to express herself.

While getting ready, Anise was surprised to actually run into Claude that morning. He came to her room asking for the notebook he stored there (or maybe it was an excuse to see her cute face again), so Anise happily located it and handed it over. She was pretty tired, but the big smile she gave him was genuine. Who wouldn't be happy to see her savior so soon after a dramatic rescue?

After he left, Anise finished re-tying her pigtails into a low position so the military beret would fit on her head, and then she was ready! Even though her stomach wasn't feeling that great, she figured sitting down to a decent meal would help normalize it. And luckily for her, she was among the few who had the privilege of eating such a meal. Anise filled a plate with french toast topped with syrup and fruit, accompanied by small portions of each of the available side dishes.

It looked like she was early, which meant there weren't a lot of people around. That was okay, though. Anise could get a good head start on her meal before any company came around. She sat down at a table by herself and started on her sausage first.

[for Tolten!]

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While Sora could have been offended by Riku calling his plans a waste of time, he wasn't. It was something that he'd done for Kairi's benefit from the start, and while he was curious about the new area, it sounded like his friend had scoped a lot of it out already. Sora didn't always have to listen to Riku, either. If he wanted to check it out some more, then he would. But it was mainly Kairi who he was worried about.

"Kairi's the one you have to tell," he said after a pause. "I mean, you can't really blame her for being curious. I think she's hoping that some of those rooms might jog her memory." Though Sora got the feeling that Kairi wouldn't really want to remember those days she'd missed in the end. Still, it had to be disconcerting, knowing all that time had passed and having no memory of it.

In fact, Sora knew all about that sort of thing, seeing how he'd lost all of his memories of Castle Oblivion. It was something he'd come to accept since then, especially since a few of the blanks had been filled during his time here, but the point was that he could empathize with Kairi.

Either way, his friend wanted more information, and so Sora started sorting through the past few days for something of interest. "Oh! I made it out to the forest a couple nights ago. Someone told me that the guy who makes the radio announcements hangs out there sometimes, but I don't know how true it is." Not that he thought Venom had been lying, but it seemed like the chances of actually finding Marc were pretty slim. The outside area was a place that still needed to be explored, though, so he'd have to see what Riku thought of the news.

Just as he expected, Kairi was the one who needed to be filled in. But if his memory hadn't been jogged, why would hers be? Reason stated that they were both apparently kept there, though he hadn't confirmed for himself yet. He didn't think it mattered that much, if, in the end, his memories were gone. What chains were taken away probably wouldn't be replaced until they took care of the institute altogether. That made the most sense to him, anyway.

"I'm planning on it."

He left it there and pressed on to consider what else Sora had to say. A lead to the radio guy himself? That seemed to be the best way to circumvent following clues. If anything, they might be able to get some real information, rather than the snippets that were sent out at night. Anything they could actually follow could work—and if the Head Doctor was there, they could ask about their memories, too. Riku liked that idea already.

"That's where we've gotta go," he told Sora. "If Kairi insists on the medical wing, we can compromise, but the forest is our best bet for everything we need to know. How to get out. What's going on. And if our memories can be recovered, we might be able to get Landel to tell us." His voice darkened at that last bit, and he figured Sora would pick it up. He doubted his friend would mind a little fight, especially since that guy was the reason they were here in the first place. Replaced or not, it wasn't like Riku had any sympathy for him.

It seemed that he'd hit on the right thing to tell his friend, if Riku's reaction was anything to judge by. Sora was glad that he'd come across a piece of information that counted as useful in Riku's head. It meant that he'd accomplished a thing or two while Riku had been gone. He didn't want Riku to get his hopes up about all this, since Sora still thought that running into one guy in a whole big forest was pretty unlikely, but...

Hey, he was the one who was supposed to be optimistic, right? They would just have to go back there and do their best to track Marc down.

"That all sounds good to me," he agreed. Even the last part, since Landel deserved a taste of his own medicine by now. Sora couldn't assume that the man was completely weakened even after he'd been kicked out, seeing how he was forcing Marc to work with him. Still, those force fields might have come down by now, which meant they had a chance.

"Anyway, we can always split up too. One of us could go with Kairi to the med wing, or she can head there on her own with some of the other club members." Sora still wasn't that comfortable with the idea of Kairi heading off on her own, but it wasn't like she hadn't done so in the past. Plus, she had that sword! Which they still needed to take some time to show her how to use. "I know how to get to the forest, though, so I should probably head that way." Not that it would be that hard to give directions, but it was always easier to be shown rather than told, right? He had to wonder if he should invite Venom along for this, too. Even if he wasn't a part of the club, he'd probably be interested.

The idea of sending Kairi off alone didn't appeal to him, either. Weapon or no weapon, Darkness or no Darkness, the idea that she would be off somewhere else without them being able to keep an eye on her made him uneasy. It wasn't like he explored every section of the medical wing. Worse, if there was more than one spider hanging out there, who knew what else there could be? He wrote off the idea as soon as his friend suggested it. They agreed from the beginning that Kairi would be with them every night. There wasn't a reason to change that.

"We'll send someone else to the med wing," he said. "If they find something worth looking at, we can head there the next night." That sounded like a compromise that Kairi would agree to, as well, if she were here. He preferred knowing where she was when the night fell, and though he got through the previous night okay, her presence was still a mystery. It wasn't any longer.

"So the three of us can work together," he continued. This plan was largely because Riku wanted to explore those woods for himself. Sora played the big hero enough times that Riku wanted to encounter Landel for himself and see what he could do. It was time to take another shot at that himself. The med wing last night was one thing, but Landel was definitely on the scale of Xemnas. They had to chance it.

"But first, let me find Kairi and make sure she's okay with it." Riku realized that just telling her what they were doing might upset her. "I'll drop you a note about it."

At first, Sora felt a little apprehensive about the whole thing, mainly because Riku was making all these decisions without even asking Kairi. He knew that both of them had a tendency to fuss over the third member of their group, but he'd been making an effort to be better about it.

Luckily, Riku then cleared it up by mentioning that he was going to find her and ask her, and suddenly Sora's expression flipped into a smile. "Sounds good! Hopefully she won't mind. And she shouldn't be too hard to find, either." Though... Sora didn't see her in the room right now. Maybe she was sleeping in? Chances are she would have found them and dropped by otherwise.

His only concern now was that he never seemed to get that far when he was traveling with Riku and Kairi specifically. He knew it sounded crazy, though. Why should the people involved matter? And it wasn't like they wasted time. It was too weird of a thought for him to voice out loud, even to his closest friend.

"Anything else you were curious about?" he asked instead, glancing around the room. He wasn't sure he'd covered everything, so it was best to make sure that there weren't any aspects that Riku was still confused about.

What else was there? Riku considered Sora's appearance and came up with a few. Last night, the announcement mentioned pins, and he figured he might as well looked into that. But what else? Was the only clue from the radio guy the one about the forest? That seemed to be kind of a let down, so he needed to be sure. Any strange circumstances from the last few days needed to be examined. If he couldn't do it first hand—and Riku still kicked himself a bit for deciding to disappear the moment everything went down—then he might be able to sort it out this way. He was on his way just before.

"Yeah, what are the pins for?" he asked first. "And was that the only clue? What about the past few days? Was there anything like last night?" He meant the weird speech and the invitation to take the drugs. Riku assumed then that it was the only thing, but there had to be build up to that speech. From here on, he wanted to work on a full pack of information, and he didn't want to feel like he let his friends down by letting them take him. The thought hadn't really occurred to him yet, and he wasn't about to let it.

The combined factors of being able to sort things out before and last night changed his tune a lot. He realized that. Some mornings, he ended up here with a plan, and it was a plan to do something different. Now, he thought it was time they stuck with what they were doing right. Or rather: what he was doing right. It wasn't that he faulted Sora, but his friend's priorities would always be different. And in Riku's mind, he needed them to be safe. Somehow, he figured Sora would transmute that into everyone being safe in his own way. That was why they worked well together.

It wasn't too surprising that Riku had a lot of questions. Even if it'd only been a few days, a whole lot had been packed into them. Sora tried to take it one thing at a time, though, taking a few more bites of his breakfast as he thought it over. It was strange -- even though Riku had that gross pink stuff, Sora didn't feel as guilty eating around him. It was probably because Riku just didn't get hung up on things like that. Sora hadn't even noticed him eyeing his food or anything.

"I don't really know that much about the pins," Sora admitted. That might have something to do with the fact that despite his rank, he didn't have any. He didn't know what they stood for or how people got them, except... would Riku end up with a pin for taking those drugs last night? "I know you earn them in different ways and if you have enough it gives you certain privileges, but that's it." It was something he could probably ask one of the staff members about and actually get answers, since they seemed to think of him so highly.

"Oh, and the other thing you need to know is that when the Head Doctor spoke to us -- while he was with Marc -- he mentioned stuff about the basement. He's trying to tell patients that that's where they need to go to get out. I mean, he might be telling the truth since he's trying to get back at Aguilar, but who knows?" It was something you'd just have to go with your gut instinct on, or so Sora guessed. He'd made attempts to get down to the basement before, but none of them had been that successful. For now, he figured focusing on the outside area might benefit them more. Still, he'd see what Riku had to say about it.

The information was something to consider heavily. Riku decided that the pins might be useful if it gave them privileges, but he needed to figure that out later on. He poked further at his slop as he assessed the pieces dropped about the basement. If that was the truth, why hadn't anyone done something about it? Wouldn't that be common knowledge? He figured it was a lead, but heading outside would be more productive in the long run. Plus, he hated being trapped in here.

"I'll stick up a message about it on the board," he said. "We'll find out if anyone's found anything good about the basement that way." If they did, then they could adjust their plans accordingly, but he did like the idea of going outside. Maybe another set of people could go there.

The fact of the matter was that Riku didn't like following a lead that even Sora didn't think was a good idea. Playing along with Landel's scheme didn't seem like the way to go about this. So he liked his plan; that way, someone else could do the work. As much as he preferred first hand experience, he also didn't like walking his friends into a trap.

"All right, you can give that a shot," Sora agreed. As far as he'd been able to tell, though, people kept their mouths shut about the basement. He didn't know the reasoning behind it, but that on its own was enough to make him worry. He realized that sometimes you had to brave serious danger to get anywhere, but he was fine with trying out the forest first and seeing what they found there.

Before he could say anything else, however, the intercom went off and they were treated to a rather cheerful, casual voice. Well, up until the guy was apparently put in his place. Sora frowned, wondering why they couldn't have something a little more laid back to listen to for once.

"Well, I guess that's it," he said with a sigh. "Try to find Kairi! She'll want to see you." He stood up from his seat, glancing down at his half-finished breakfast for a moment before meeting his friend's eyes. "And... it's really great to have you back, Riku." He was sure that Riku already knew how relieved he was, but there was nothing wrong with reinforcing it, was there?

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Day 58: Cafeteria

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