Night 59: Soccer/Recreational Field

[strayfag]

[from here]

It was admittedly a little better outside. The air lacked the smell of too many things not-so-freshly killed and it felt less claustrophobic than the hallways by far. Unfortunately, even the sky seemed to be glowing faintly pink, which meant Code Fabulous was still in effect. It was casting a lot of freaky shadows.

Badou was starting to think that this might have been a bad idea. Passing through the Rec Field was the quickest route to Alle's room, but not necessarily the safest one. Despite the fact that he was moving quickly with his back mostly to the wall, he kept thinking he saw shapes moving out on the field.

He couldn't be more relived when his fingers closed around the cool metal of the knob and the door eased open. Unfortunately, he wasn't the only one who wanted in apparently. Something fat and mangy reared up about five feet ahead of him. Badou froze. The squirrel stared. Badou stared back. You have got to be kidding me.

"You wouldn't be one of those singing---"

The squirrel bared its teeth and lunged. Badou swung the door open, throwing his weight behind it as quickly as he could. The impact nearly pushed him off his feet, but squirrel face meeting door was a pretty fantastic sound. Badou grinned. Asshole.

Maybe when he told this story, he'd say it was a bear. And that he'd punched it in the face. And that it had stayed down, because Alvin sure as hell wasn't going to let a little head trauma get between them.

Badou, on the other hand, would be all too happy to end this sordid affair. He bolted. In retrospect, he should have pulled the door shut behind him.

[RUNNING THIS WAY.]

Comments

[herr-inspektor.livejournal.com]

The cold damp of the outside air made Lunge's lungs ache on the first breath, both sharp at cloying at once and hinting at the rainfall of that afternoon, the remains of which made the field gleam wetly in the pink light of the walls. Not simply the Institute's walls, either; the walls of the field were also aglow.

It was, at least, a rather literal breath of fresh air from the red haze of the hallway; if L had seen fit to leave the details of what had happened in there as well, he wouldn't chase them up. He trusted the man enough to accept that there was nothing notable or useful about the event that needed to be shared. The device, meanwhile, was far more valuable to him. He'd become aware of it rather than seen it? That was what the bulletin notes had suggested, but he'd struggled to understand just how that could be the case until now.

"So you couldn't give a description or a location," he clarified, glancing briefly across the field- only one other person, with no obvious signs of danger yet- before carrying on across the grass, "but you have a sense of it in some other way?" It wasn't the way he usually preferred his evidence, bound in some vague metaphysical knowing, but he'd take what he could. It certainly seemed, as L suggested, very deliberately planted.

He nodded, still thinking. "The General mentioned a mole last night- I don't know the details, but there may be something in supposing that they were the one to plant the idea. And if it is a malfunction, it's too coincidental to assume that the two events are unrelated." He paused. "I spoke with Charles Berg today. He couldn't tell me where Nurse Lydia was."

[ryuuzaki]

"Past a vague impression of its size and strength... no, I couldn't give a description." L could hear his own skepticism and annoyance, but it was better to let it show; it might help Lunge understand how much he hated the lack of evidence supporting the knowledge. Past that, he hated that someone had somehow managed to alter his consciousness again, and he hated how much, in the past year, he had had an intellectual understanding of something that he hadn't been able to prove. At least there had been numerous signs pointing to Yagami's guilt. Nothing except the eureka moment, which had come in tandem with the kind of hallucinations that ought to qualify anyone for psychiatric hospitalization, supported what he "knew" about the device.

The pink glow across the sky was bright enough that he could see by it, and the walls themselves were also so radiant that there were no dark corners where they met, so he turned off the flashlight and stowed it in his coat pocket.

But Lunge's next statement caused L to come to a sudden stop just short of the wall, his surprised gaze snapping to the other man's face. "Berg."

He felt a sense of tantalizing curiosity. Berg... how and why? That kind of encounter doesn't grow on trees here, and it wouldn't be random. Lunge wouldn't have been able to manage it by demanding... would he have...? No, these men... under ordinary circumstances, they make a point of presenting themselves as too busy and important to deal with any of us on an individual level. If Lunge had tried to initiate a meeting by offering information, any intermediary might have insisted on delivering the information him or herself. There's the possibility that Lunge could have offered false intelligence, but doing so would be risky, and there would still be the question of what good a meeting with Berg would do under those circumstances. He couldn't be completely sure, but it seemed to L that Berg had probably initiated the meeting, and that it was in some way driven by the same methods and procedures that had the military sending patients out on missions. Likewise, Berg would have had access to real information about Lunge, and would probably have been aware that Lunge might have access to information that wasn't in general circulation in the patient body. If L was wrong, if Lunge had managed to wangle a meeting with Berg of his own accord, that fact would probably come out soon; then he would wonder about Lunge's precise aims and timing.

"What did he want?" Even if Berg was looking for information about the supposed mole, the easiest assumption, it didn't seem likely that any real patient had direct knowledge of the mole's identity. Someone who was themselves a mole wouldn't share it. Therefore, Berg was probably in the market for hints and leads, something either L or Lunge could offer in spades, without guaranteeing the usefulness of those details in any way.

With a glance at the wall, he said, "Hold that thought--we'll continue on the other side. If you'll hand this up to me--" He held the brush axe out to Lunge, and began to haul himself up, using the vines for leverage. When he'd reached the top, he looked around and listened: nothing, and nothing further out, either. There appeared to be more large dead animals in the courtyard, but that was irrelevant to their destination.

He nodded down at Lunge, then held his hand out; when he had the axe again, he extended his arm down the other side of the wall to let the weapon fall gently to the ground. He followed it a moment later, careful not to land too close to the long blade.

[Lunge was presumed to take the axe with permission from his mun. To here.]