Day 60: Intercom, Evening

[damned-intercom.livejournal.com]

The intercom jingled at its standard time, with the Head Doctor still in his over-the-top, jovial mood. It seemed not even the evening light could keep down the love he held for his job.

"Good evening, everyone! I hope your soul is filled with music from last shift; I know mine is."

There again was a stretch of silence. When the Head Doctor continued, he sounded marginally disappointed.

"But now it's time to wind down the day with a bit of dinner. Tonight, we'll be serving turkey breasts and quality gravy, with sides of garlic mashed potatoes, steamed broccoli, grilled asparagus, and a small salad. For dessert, we will be having pumpkin pie with optional whipped creme. As per usual, we will have our vegetarian alternatives and a wide selection of drinks available. Turkey lovers, be sure to take advantage of the food; it'll be an entire week before you can have this delectable meat again."

He chuckled at the statement. One might have labeled it as dark.

"Anyway, enjoy! I will wish you all a good night momentarily!"

The intercom clicked off.

Comments

[lighthearted]

If the other boy had seen Neku's name on the bulletin, that was probably because of the Arts and Crafts organizational posts that Sora had put up. He didn't know how much people who weren't in the club paid attention to all that, but since they were daily it made sense that it had stuck in the other's mind at least somewhat. Not that Sora needed to explain that now.

He didn't have to ask for the other boy to give the same information, and as he started to explain Sora stood there and listened with genuine interest. He didn't know this Brainy (that was his name, right? Or maybe it was a nickname, if the two had been close), but he made sure to hear out the boy anyway.

"Huh. They acted like robots?" Maybe he had been kind of like Tron, then. "That sounds pretty interesting. I..." He wanted to say that he wished he'd had the chance to meet him, but he realized that might be too much for either of them to deal with right now.

"Everyone can be a little stupid sometimes," he said instead, with a brief smile. It wasn't nearly as bright as his usual ones, but he still felt like he needed to be the one to break that ice. And since he hadn't been snapped at or tossed out yet, Sora went ahead and took a seat next to the other boy on the bed.

"You can tell me more about him, if you want," he encouraged the stranger. "And the name's Sora. I know this isn't the best way to meet, but..." Both of them had been here for a while now. That didn't mean they were reliable, but they could learn to be friends, couldn't they? Sora wasn't going to quit making them just because he'd lost some along the way.

Besides, he would save them someday, if they didn't make their way back on their own.

[tightsofmight]

"Yeah. It was pretty messed up," Peter admitted thinly. Blabbing everything that came to mind was putting his mouth to good use. It kept the momentum up. Didn't give him a break. "They named everyone according to their function, so he was Brainiac 5. The fifth Brainiac. And they like...he sat up straight like there was a brace on his back and he wrote like a printer."

How much longer until the lights went out? Peter cast a despairing look upwards. The whole of the paneled ceiling seemed stiflingly bright.

"Um..."

God, this kid was some kind of saint or something. Peter found himself edging a bit away, unable to think about what to do or...anything. He had been on the other end of this before. Patting total strangers on the back was something that happened a lot when he was Spider-Man, usually because the people were a wreck after almost-muggings (or worse). But in those cases, he usually had to leave. Let them cry on his shoulder for a moment or two, then jet before the police showed up. He had never had to sit there and actively talk the whole talk through, and that was precisely what this guy was doing. Sora. His name was Sora, and he was trying to make Peter feel better even though he knew nothing about him, even though he had lost his own roommate.

It just...didn't sit right. This was wrong. Somehow. Maybe Peter was being a dick here - Excuse me if missing my fucking best friend is being a dick - but this felt inexplicably wrong. It was just this feeling. He stood up from the bed, jamming his hand into his brow as if the pressure could stop the ache.

"'m Peter," he muttered, beginning to pace. "Just...dude, aren't you pissed? Aren't you like - how are you sitting there like this? How is this okay with you?"

[lighthearted]

Brainiac 5. Sora thought it over, wondering if that meant that the other boy's roommate had been really smart. It was weird to think that he'd been treated like a machine rather than a person, though. Still, it was clear that Peter had been friends with him, so he must have gotten to open up at least somewhat. That was a nice thought, except that Landel had come in and screwed it all up.

Sora had gotten Neku to open up too. Not completely, but they'd had some good conversations, and over time Sora had come to really trust him. It was hard to have to start over with Peter now, but Sora had done this a few times already. He wasn't going to let Landel turn him into someone who didn't even bother making friends because of the threat of losing them.

They were still his friends, even when they were gone. He could still feel them in his heart, even if he didn't see their faces every day.

He watched as Peter started walking around restlessly, letting him do so as he ignored the smell of the turkey coming from their desks. Sora felt a gnawing in his stomach, but he didn't have it in him to eat right now. He'd just have a lot at breakfast.

The question was understandable, and Sora frowned as he tried to figure out how to reply. "It's not okay with me," he said first and foremost. "Nothing that's being done here is okay or right. I've lost a lot of people since I've been here, but just this morning someone... someone I thought was dead, who died a few weeks ago, he came back. It doesn't always happen, but it means there's a chance." He paused and smiled up at Peter. "A chance we can save everyone."

He started fiddling with his hands, letting his gaze fall down to his lap as he kept talking. "Every time someone leaves, it hurts. But if we let ourselves get so upset that we can't keep going, then that's the same as letting those people down. So we have to just hold onto the people who are still here, and keep fighting." He glanced up and looked the other boy right in the face. "That's what I believe, anyway."

[tightsofmight]

Peter was quiet as the grave. (Ha ha.) Funny thing, that rerun schtick of Landel's. How long had it ever lasted?

The thought was a bitter one, considering he had just gotten Indy and Badou back from the morgue. But it was hard not to think back to Logan. Or Luxord, even. Both men had been here before Peter arrived, and then vanished. Then someone saw fit to give them a second go around. And where were they now? Hmm? Not here, for sure. They had both stayed less than a week the second time around.

And Harry had said a different Peter was here before. The older version of himself. Peter gritted his teeth. He didn't know what to think of that, either.

"Yeah, well..." He scoffed. He had stopped pacing. That wasn't so much of a positive as one might hope. "Pardon my asking again, but what are we fighting, exactly?" He shrugged viciously. "I don't know. I have yet to punch anything that wasn't some cleverly calculated monster opponent or another patient. And I don't know if you were there last night, but when they shut off whatever that - that suppressor thing is? Yeah, when they shut that off, exactly how many soldiers did we get to knock out? How many people busted out and ran off into the wild? Hmm? How far did we get when we all had our special little specialness back, and we were giving it all we got?

"Because quite frankly, I've tried almost every avenue we have here. I can't get into the third floor. I went downstairs and -" There went that invisible hand around his throat. Peter clutched at it, coughed. He had to hold onto the desk for support, bending forwards and lecturing the floor when he could speak again, because all strength was leaving him. "I saw things. My best friend, I saw his throat get ripped open. I've had people chunks fall on me from when they exploded. And Brainy." With astonishing suddenness, he whirled around and pointed a finger at Sora's bed. "Do you know what I woke up to on my second morning here? Do you? It was him, and he had been stabbed in twenty different places. Not by a monster. By a patient. This - this absolute fucking nut who decided he was bored, so he snagged a couple of scalpels and waltzed on over to our room!! For no reason!! Brainy was in a wheelchair - I had to carry him on my back through that zombie thing in Doyleton! And now he's just...gone? Gone?!"

There was a heavy clatter and a snap. Peter's tray flopped onto Sora's bed, split down the middle, as bits of turkey and potato clung to the wall where Peter had flung them from his desk. His cheeks were livid white.

"SCREW THIS!!"

[lighthearted]

As it turned out, Sora's words hadn't had the effect that he'd been banking on. Instead, it was clear that he'd either said something wrong or Peter had just hit his breaking point, because the other boy fell into a rant as he paced around the room. Usually getting it all out like that was supposed to help, but in this case it seemed like things only got worse the more that Peter said, until he finally tossed Sora's tray of food onto his bed.

Instead of being upset about that, Sora just watched with a severe frown on his face. It was hard for him to see someone who was in so much pain, especially since he could hardly blame Peter for what he was going through. There were plenty of times when Sora had wanted to be angry at the world, too, but he realized that those sort of emotions would only take him down dark paths. If only he could make Peter realize that...

"I know," he said after the silence had stretched between them for a while. "It seems like each step we take forward, we fall back two more, and it's hard. I've seen other patients do some bad things here too, but that just means that those of us who are good need to make sure we outnumber them and keep them out of trouble." Sora had had to worry about all of those Organization members, not to mention Scar (even if he'd been in a human body). Now, all of them were gone. "Even if a lot of good people disappear from this place, a lot of bad people do too."

He wasn't sure where he was going with this, and he was pretty sure that Peter wasn't going to calm down no matter what he said. But Sora decided to keep going. In the end, he had to fall back onto what he knew. For the moment, he kept his gaze on his lap, not moving from his spot on the bed.

"Where I come from, darkness is more than what you think of it as. It's something that can take over whole worlds and destroy them. It can infect people, too, and make them do horrible things." It was something he'd seen more than a few times by now, and it was never a pretty sight. "I don't know if the darkness is really in this place or not. Some people are just bad because they want to be, but even if they keep breaking us down, we can't give in, right? Because... because then we'd be just as bad as them, I think."

Sora glanced over at Peter again, though he made sure to avoid direct eye contact. "It sounds like you and... Brainy were really good friends. That probably means that he's waiting for you to find him."

[tightsofmight]

He was breathing heavy. On the verge of explosion, if that flying tray hadn't already been the trigger. Yet maybe because Sora didn't explode with him, that he stayed still and quiet on the bed, gave him nothing to counteract - that put a strange hold on Peter. Every muscle was pulled taut and he couldn't move an inch, except that he was moving. Breathing with his whole body, and gasping open mouthed but unable to will himself to punch through the wall or rip the desks apart like he wanted to.

And when Sora spoke, it was equally as hypnotic. Soft and calm. The opposite of anything Peter was expecting at this point.

"Darkness?" he repeated, bewildered. It sounded...vague. At best. But certain parts stuck, and maybe this was a literal thing for Sora and Peter wasn't far off the mark when he was imagining the Nothing from the Neverending Story swooping in and sucking worlds dry. Or even the suit - inky black tendrils swirling around a person, engulfing them completely, turning them into ravenous beasts.

It was making too much sense. Peter wavered on the spot, reaching up to clutch at his head and sinking. Things felt better when he hit the floor and felt the bed post dig into his back, his knees at his chest and protecting his face.

"I know..." The vitriol had been strained from his voice and left a pathetic little warble behind. "I know. I'm sorry, but I just...I want it to stop. I didn't want this."

Nick Fury had been convinced this was exactly what would happen. That Peter would snap and become just as bad as Norman, as Doom or Magneto and dedicate his life to fucking up the world just like they did. But he hadn't snapped then. Things had been bad, but he hadn't snapped. He didn't see anyone else flipping out like he did, either. Maybe a few tears from Claire, maybe some mourning from Sam and the rest, and Scott had been in dire enough straights to try and beat the crap out of him the other night. But now he was...he couldn't...

"I don't want him to be waiting for me," Peter said quietly. "I want him back." He looked up at Sora then. Puzzled. To be perfectly honest, he couldn't remember a single day here where he hadn't seen that spikey hair sticking out of the crowd in the cafeteria, wandering around Doyleton or the Sun Room. He'd even seen him at night. "How long have you - you're still sane. I don't know why or how, but you've been here forever. Haven't you?"

I guess we should start wrapping this up?

[lighthearted]

It looked like Peter had tired himself out, if the way he fell to the ground or the exhaustion in his voice was anything to go by. Sora frowned down at his new roommate, wishing that there was more he could do for him. But he couldn't get his friend back for him, no more than he could get Donald or Nowe or Hanatarou back.

Still, he would. Someday he'd beat this place and he'd make sure that everyone got home safely. They'd ride through the asteroids and take everyone back to where they belonged.

The question that came next wasn't so surprising, though Sora didn't like the implication that he should have been nuts after spending so much time here. No way was he going to break that easily. That would just be giving Landel and the rest of them what they wanted.

"Yeah, I guess so. To tell you the truth, I don't know anyone who's been here longer." Sora scooted back across the bed until he was leaning against the wall, relieved that they were having a proper conversation now rather than the yelling from before. "And people are always asking me how I keep my chin up, but... well, I'm lucky. Two of my best friends are with me. With them around, I feel like I can do anything." Except for the fact that when the three of them traveled together, they never seemed to make much progress. He wasn't going to dwell on that.

"If they weren't here, I think it'd be harder for me. I know there are other people who are struggling, so I try my best to be strong for them. That way, when I'm having a hard time, hopefully there will be someone else who I can lean on." So long as people were trading off, they would be fine. What they had to be scared of was the possibility of everyone having a rough time all at once. But Sora didn't think that would happen.