damned_institute | Night 59: West Wing, North Hall 2-B

[from here]

Lana hurried down the hallway, shoving her thoughts back into some semblance of calm, and her face into a perfect mask.

The morgue door was locked as well. "Breaking and entering. How quickly these things become routine." She stepped aside to let Badd have the first crack at this one. "It won't be easy to go back, provided we can find a way."

It never was. She'd stepped over that line without a choice in the matter, but when had she known? Memory cheated, and she couldn't really say. When had the evidence gone from merely improbably to impossible, and how many times had she just not looked closely enough. Even when it wasn't her case, or Damon's? It was easy. All it took was abandoning true ethics, messy and bloody, for the sheen of quick justice. None of them were coming out of this with their hands clean, except possibly Ema.

And she wanted to go into forensic science. The lab boys -- and girls -- had a few advantages, but there wasn't a department that was immune, and Lana couldn't help wanting to protect her.

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Was that a swipe at him? Probably night.

"We don't have anywhere else to be tonight. We can wait out the night if we really need to." Badd prodded the door, testing the strength of the lock. "Unless you're talking about going back to where we came from. That bridge, we'll cross when we get to it."

It had been his dream at the beginning, before the Institute had battered him lower than he'd ever been. Now he just wanted to get Byrne out of here. Fixing the past could wait.

Badd stemmed back and rammed his shoulder into the door. It gave, but not completely.

"The latter. And you're quite right." This wasn't the courtroom -- the rules couldn't be the same. Clinging to them -- even clinging to the ways in which she'd betrayed them -- was just one way of trying to tread water in a stormy sea. She was out of her element, while Badd looked right at home.

"Right now, we do what we can." He'd sounded a lot more optimistic the last time they'd talked about going back home -- grand plans, grander rescues. Had last night really bothered him that much? No one had died out there, had they?

She couldn't exactly ask. Well, she could, but she valued his assistance and she had no desire to be cruel to him. Which meant a change of subject was in order; besides, in a moment, they would be inside, and she'd be the one in need of a distraction.

"These rings that were passed out a week or so ago. Do you know anything about them?" She sighed. "I hadn't paid terribly close attention to the discussions on the bulletin, not having one. I should have."

"No idea what you're talking about." More prizes for following Landel's orders, no doubt, like those horrible little pins. Badd hadn't been following irrelevant bulletin chatter for the last few days, he'd been too wrapped up in his own problems. What the rest of the institute did wasn't his concern.

Badd slammed into the morgue door again and the lock finally gave.

[To here. (http://damned.livejournal.com/1199737.html)]

[From here (http://damned.livejournal.com/1193305.html?thread=81196633#t81196633)]

Somebody had definitely been through here. He didn't know who, but Raph figured that door didn't bust open itself. It was as good a lead as any. Not like he had much to go on in the first place, but following signs of life seemed like a good idea.

The chances of finding his brothers tonight were slim, but he had to try. He had to do something other than standing around talking all night. If that meant running around like a maniac, that's what he'd do.

The first door was locked, so he kept moving. No use wasting time on rooms that were probably empty. He had too much ground to cover already, and he couldn't risk catching up with ZEX and S.T. again. Hopefully they forgot about him and were hatching some kind of escape plan before they missed their chance.

[to here (http://damned.livejournal.com/1199737.html?thread=81197945#t81197945)]

Edited 2011-11-16 07:46 (UTC)

[From here. (http://damned.livejournal.com/1199737.html?thread=81239417#t81240441)]

Badd shut the door firmly behind them, and continued the conversation. "And I don't think you want me along for that ride," he said quietly. "You know how I got last night. I know you can defend yourself, but Ema can't." He had no control over his own perception and he was capable of murdering kids even younger than she was. If the institute wanted to they could turn him into a killing machine whenever they pleased.

He wasn't a safe man.

"I saw. I read the posts -- you didn't kill anyone. And I've never heard of anyone being brainwashed two nights in a row, or, for that matter, in the middle of the night." Ema's roommate had been taken at dinner, and had been fine the next day; this would be the same.

"I'm not worried about that." She didn't trust him, not entirely -- there were things they weren't telling each other, and they'd both betrayed their duties; she'd admitted hers directly, while he'd merely implied it, but he knew what she'd read.

She did glance at him, then, her expression neutral but open. Her confidence was returning, now that she'd left Gant's ignoble grave behind her.

[to here]

Night 59: West Wing, North Hall 2-B

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