damned_institute | Day 63: Bus 1

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Day 63: Bus 1

As soon as Anise achieved wakefulness, the Head Doctor's words from the previous night immediately came floating back into her mind. People were getting sick. They were going to turn into monsters. That thought alone was chilling enough, but it was nothing compared to the terror that struck her when she sat up and saw her own hand. A red blotch covered the back of it, extending upwards to the wrist. Where did that come from?

The signs are already showing. That was what Landel said.

It couldn't be. Not her. If it was really true, then her life was as good as over. No... it had to be a mistake. Maybe the Head Doctor's words had scared her to the point that she was attributing random things to his threats. She was being paranoid. That was all it was.

And yet, no matter how many times she told herself that, she feared what might happen.

A nurse came to her soon, bearing an outfit for her to wear on the field trip. The striped shirt and gray skirt weren't particularly appealing to Anise, but the purple coat she was given wasn't so bad. It was a little big on her, but it was a nice, feminine color... and the extra long sleeves served to cover most of the strange rash. Anise didn't want to look at it, and she sure as heck didn't want anyone else seeing it.

When it was time to board the buses, Anise quietly took the lunch bag, climbed aboard, and sat down. She didn't look anyone in the eye. Even after sitting down, she merely stared down at the contents of her bag. The muffin didn't look the least bit appetizing - not while her stomach was busy twisting itself into knots, anyway.

[free!]

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For Robin to have been there last night, Brook could only wonder if any of the others had managed to make it back as well. Or if Franky was going to have his first visit. This place seemed to really like his crew for some reason. Now that he was dressed for Doyleton in the only clothes that probably would fit him, he was determined to seek out any of the rest who might have wandered back, regardless of how he still felt or what strange ringed rash he'd gotten the night before.

What was that anyway?

He almost gave his right arm a look as he boarded the bus, scratching the back of his hand, but stopped when he found that there was only one other aboard at the moment. And someone he knew!

"Anise-san!" he waved cheerfully before heading right to her. She was a friend, and though not one he was looking for, he wouldn't pass her by. At least not when she didn't seem to be in the best of moods. "It's been a while, hasn't it? How have you been doing? I hope nothing bad happened to you last night?"

It was frustrating to have spent a night doing next to nothing after sleeping for a whole day, and yet there wasn't much that Guy could do about that. While he woke up feeling annoyed because of that, he had to focus on the fact that he had at least been able to reconnect with some of his friends. Unfortunately, that didn't change the fact that he hadn't even been able to check Luke's room before the Head Doctor had come on last night to give that cryptic announcement. Just what was going on here?

Well, in reality it was pretty straight-forward. Some of the patients had been infected with something that was supposedly going to change them into monsters eventually, and Landel was just going to sit back and watch how all of that played out. It was impossible to know how to handle something like that when they had no idea if or when it was going to happen, but...

The signs were already showing, apparently. While Guy had slept longer than planned, that had been a fairly common occurrence for patients from the start, and he didn't feel weird now. Chances were it was probably something else, but if that was the case then what should he be looking for? Were any of his friends suffering from this illness?

Guy's nurse showed up with a pair of pants, a green sweater, and a striped scarf -- hardly the worst thing he'd been made to wear here. He got dressed quickly and then collected his breakfast, coupons, and spending card before boarding one of the buses.

He was still on the lookout for Luke, but it was Anise who he spotted. The girl was already talking to a (very tall, very thin) man, so Guy decided to leave her alone, only waving for a brief moment before he went to take a seat by one of the open windows. At least this would give him a good view of the institute's entrance, so he could keep an eye out for Luke and wave to his friend when he walked past.

Guy just hoped it was "when" and not "if."

[For Luke.]

So this was the trip into town that she had heard so much about.

Lust hadn't known what to expect, and her thoughts come morning hadn't been on the day ahead. Rather, the night behind. Some progress made and she knew she should be pleased with that. But there were still so many questions! They chased one another round and round her mind and sometimes it felt like her head was going to burst!

She didn't imagine this little jaunt was going to clear anything up, either. But she was content enough with the clothing the nurse gave her - a cream colored sweater and a long green skirt with a black long jacket - and they were being given money. Or whatever apparently passed for money in this place. What sort of things could be bought in this town? The packet of vouchers gave some insight into what to expect, but only a small glimpse.

And now, on the bus, Lust realized how good it felt to be getting out of the institute. She didn't mind it as much as others she'd met, but now almost beyond them she felt the constraints of the walls.

Now if only she had some pleasant company for the trip....

[Free as a bird!]

Anise looked up at the sound of her name... then looked a little higher, as the man who'd approached her was a bit taller than most. She gave him a smile, even though she wasn't really feeling it. "Oh, hey! Brook, right?" They'd only met once, but between his towering height and his unique hairdo, he wasn't exactly a forgettable guy.

Since she'd been staring at the paper bag for so long, Anise made sure to take something out of it, just so she wouldn’t look suspiciously out of it. She didn’t have much of an appetite, but the juice box seemed easy enough to swallow.

She shook her head when he asked about the previous night. "No, nothing bad happened. The intercom was creepy, but that's about it." Between staying safe and finding Guy, it really was a ‘good’ night as far as the institute went. “So, um, I’ve been doing pretty good! How about you?”

Luke eventually came out, but it had been quite the process. He had woken up more than just refreshed. After sleeping a whole day and night, the young man felt like he had come back full-spectrum to tired and particularly grumpy.

It didn't help that his groggy wake had then been jarred by a nurse shuffling in with a pile of clothes. They were odd, but more practical than the messy pajamas he was forced to wear. Apparently his confusion was written all over his face because the woman finally said.

"We'll be taking a field trip today to Doyleton. It's a small town just down the road from us..."

"Oh... Really?" The idea perked Luke up, if only momentarily. "You're letting us go out, not just outside?"

"Well of course! Your health and development depends on interaction with society. Keeping you cooped up won't help you..."

"Uh huh..." Her stirring speech about knowing what was best for him earned her no points with Luke. He simply stared at his hand-me-down clothes until she eventually exited to let him put them on privately. Curiosity was the only thing fueling any kind of fire under his butt to get dressed as the nurse suggested. In some ill-fitting bleached out denim jacket and black shirt with a skull and cross bones, the young woman who hovered perpetually around him completed the jarring look with a multi-colored scarf.

The buses outside were the next big spectacle. It was like a giant carriage without any beasts of burden pulling it, but it still sounded incredibly noisy like every foncraft he had flown in. Frankly, it looked like a giant iron bee. The redhead was escorted aboard (where he noticed Anise who shot him an odd look) and there he found Guy sitting alone. Relieved to see a familiar face, the replica brushed off his grouchy lethargy for a sleepy smile.

"Hey, Guy," he greeted before taking a seat right beside his friend, but suddenly he grew nervous. "I-I can sit here, right? The nurses won't get mad...?" Honestly, if they had assigned seats, Luke was going to be so angry.

"Yes, it usually is," he agreed about the intercom, remembering all the strangeness it had spouted during his talk with Robin. It had seemed to be malfunctioning though, so he hoped it wasn't anything he'd have to worry over. "But that's good! The nights are usually so hard to manage. And I've been doing well!"

He was a little itchy, but he had skin again, so he was assuming that came with the territory. The rash wasn't too bad either, though it did concern him that it was on his right hand. He could play with either, but he was better using his right to fight. "Oh yes, would you be all right if I sat with you along the way? Travel is so much better with company!"

[Yours if you want him. Just let him leave if you don't?]

"Sit down Mr. Cross, right there!" With how Kurogane had been acting that morning, the nurse had had it with her charge and was intent on making him miserable for at least one part of the morning if she had her say. Currently she was forcing him towards sitting with a woman already on the bus. "Lord knows you need to learn how to talk to a woman properly," she huffed, her look daring him to ignore.

Kurogane growled low, wondering why the hell she'd care how he spoke to others. He'd never said more than a few words to her, and most of those had been out of earshot. Just to get her off of him, he took the pointed seat long enough to watch the nurse stomp off before moving to get up.

The t-shirt Rose had been given was, if anything, more relentlessly cheerful than the normal ones with the smiley faces. A giant, frilly heart was centered exactly over her own. And, by extension, the bandages and the healing puncture wound underneath them. She'd thought resurrection was supposed to be either painless or entirely unsuccessful. This hadn't been in the FAQ. Not that there was one, aside from the fragmented notes she'd been assembling.

The skirt was, if anything, worse. Frills and knee socks. Halfway between schoolgirl and lolita, but too shitty for either. At least she wasn't going to have to go out naked. And there was a jacket and an orange fuzzy hat, which matched exactly none of the rest.

She dressed slowly, declining any assistance other than the nurse's continued patience, and made her way outside. She was short of breath by the time she was climbing into the first bus, though she tried to hide it by slumping into a seat and scowling at the window.

[Alle!]

It was pretty hard to refuse company, and it would definitely be strange for someone as sociable as Anise to do so, so she was quick to nod and accept. “Of course! Go ahead.” Maybe having someone cheerful to talk to would help improve her mood. Then she could start putting things into perspective, instead of just panicking over things she didn’t understand. That sounded like a good plan.

She stuck the straw into her juice box and took a few sips, taking another glance down into her paper bag. Removing the box allowed her to see some things that had fallen to the bottom of the bag, and one item in particular stood out to her. Anise pulled it out, examined it, then gave a small gasp.

It was a happy gasp. “They gave us money again!” Anise wasn’t sure what was going to happen after the military went away, but it looked like the institute had decided to keep that little idea of theirs. It wasn’t enough to make her forget her worries completely, but it was definitely a silver lining. “I wonder what I should buy today…”

"Getting frisky with the nursing staff?" Lust raised an eyebrow as the man was deposited beside her. She was mostly teasing - she couldn't imagine the situation here was that desperate. It was interesting, the way the staff treated them by day. Did they know anything at all?

Waking up hurt. It wasn't the usual 'being stabbed and clawed hurts' kind of hurt either. he could deal with that. It was more a bone deep weariness combined with headache and nausea and did they really expect him to sit on a bus for however long it took to get to town?

Yes, apparently they did.

The point was, that he felt terribly ill and how did normal people do this? How had they not died out by now if they had to put up with this every few months?

He noticed the mark as he was getting dressed, pulling on the black t-shirt with... was that a skull? and jeans that restricted his movement far too much and a jacket. The nurse said that he looked very cool. He thought that the effect was probably ruined by the mittens she gave him to wear. It was while getting dressed though that he noticed the mark on the back of his hand; an odd ring of red inflamed skin which itched like crazy now that he'd noticed it.

He wobbled a little just climbing up onto the bus and quickly determined to find himself a seat where he could close his eyes and not watch as the bus moved. He made his way through the seats, gripping the backs of them hard as he passed only to stop dead when he saw a flash of pale and frills and oh...

He settled gingerly into the seat next to Rose, offering a small smile and hoping that she didn't mind. "They said that you were dead."

Guy had actually noticed Luke the moment that he stepped outside. The red hair was hard to miss and his friend looked pretty ridiculous in the clothing that the staff had given him, enough that Guy had to struggle not to chuckle to himself at the sight. While he tried to wave to his friend and grab his attention, Luke didn't notice. It was by luck that he happened to get on the same bus.

It was more or less natural for Luke to come join him at that point, and Guy fixed his friend with a relieved smile. "Hey, good to see you," he said, although he did find himself a little confused by Luke's question. "Why would they get mad? They're going to be more upset if you try to stay standing." He scooted closer to the window in order to make sure that Luke had enough space.

"Anyway... where've you been? Anise said you weren't responding to notes yesterday." Neither had Guy, for that matter, though it was pretty strange to think that both of them had fallen into a deep sleep on the same day. "Did you sleep through it?"

Whether it was a coincidence or some kind of sign was hard to know, but it bothered Guy either way. At least Luke hadn't disappeared completely. That had happened too much for comfort already.

Kurogane looked back to the seat, better taking in the woman he'd been directed towards. There were so few women in this place that it was hard not to notice the few there were. This one he'd seen before, a long time back. Like that Renji guy, he'd seen her then but not for a good while. Either he'd not been paying enough attention, or she'd been one of those who had gone and come back.

Whatever.

"Who'd want to?" he grumbled, still angry at the woman, but partially at himself. Another night of chaos and a morning just as terrible had put him in a worse mood than even his normal, and snapping at his nurse had seemed a good way to relieve the stress at the time. Now it just seemed like a poor decision on his part. Being sick was hell for his senses.

Lust shrugged and glanced out the window before looking back to her current companion.

"In this place? Who knows? Stranger things have happened." She shifted slightly in her seat, leaning back against the crook of seat back and window to better appraise whatever his name turned out to be. "I'm sure someone's tried it in an effort to glean information."

Pity so much of the staff was female, really.

"Have you been to town before?"

"Thank you very much!" Brook lowered himself into the seat, pulling in his legs in tight despite how strange his knees looked sticking up over the seat edge. He was used to it and only laughed when he continued speaking. "I wonder what we have in here today~?" he started digging into the bag just as Anise was discovering her own contents.

He looked over at the card she'd pulled out before rummaging to pull out his own. "Yes, it seems so! I wonder if they might have a violin somewhere in town..." he mused hopefully while absently scratching at the back of his hand. He so wanted to play his favorite of the stringed instruments again! But he'd yet to find an instrument store in town. As he thought of where he might look again, he realized that he was scratching his hand and looked down.

"Ah, maybe I'm just itching to play?" he offered, grinning at Anise hopefully.

It was a little funny to see how high Brook had to bend his knees to get into the seat, while Anise’s toes barely reached the floor.

“A violin? That’d be pretty expensive though, wouldn’t it?” Anise couldn’t imagine getting something like that with the meager funds the institute provided. She was going to have to plan out her purchases if she wanted to make the most of the money she had.

The man’s scratching caught her eye, though, and when she glanced at his hand, she froze. He tried to play it off with a joke, but Anise wasn’t so sure it was a laughing matter. “Your hand… How did that happen?” she asked cautiously, glancing briefly to her own to make sure it was still out of sight.

At the suggestion, Luke swiftly sat down beside Guy before anyone could spot him. "Ah, I guess. I don't know," the young man sighed, scratching the back of his head and messing up his already sleep-tousled hair. "She was getting on my case all day yesterday."

But from the way Guy was talking, yesterday seemed the wrong word to use. "You're talking about that 'bulletin board', right?" Leaning back into the stiff padding of the bus, Luke stared up at the ceiling, trying to gather some recent memory of this note Anise left. Nothing, he noticed with alarm, was coming back to him.

"Huh, guess... Guess I must have slept through it, yeah..." It was written off with a laugh, but it spooked Luke more than he wanted to admit. It seemed like these black outs were increasing in length. "Or maybe I just, you know, missed it. I mean, sleeping for a whole day sounds a little dramatic, don't you think?"

She had missed another day, looked like. Doyleton hadn't been so soon when Utena had gone to sleep last. And what that meant was that the horrifyingly girly outfit she found herself faced with in the morning came as a complete (and thoroughly) unpleasant surprise. "Ughh, seriously...?" she groaned to herself as she started changing.

The long, airy skirt swished around her legs in exactly the way she hated as she was escorted down the halls to the bus. Her cheeks were faintly flushed already. This was ridiculous. Why did she have to dress according to the whims of some fake "her" that wasn't even around to object to anything? Especially when the fabric of her skirt was so light that she was pretty sure she would catch whatever cold it was that Landel had mentioned over the intercom.

Looked like she didn't even have the luxury of sitting with a friend to take the edge off of the embarrassment, either, she thought as she was loaded onto one of the buses. Anise was there, but it looked like she had a seatmate already. Utena gave her roommate a nod as she passed, but otherwise moved quickly in the hopes that the other girl wouldn't get a great look at her in all her baby pink and white glory.

"Ahh... Himemiya, why can't you be here to help me out right about now?" Utena said to herself as she slid into an empty seat.

[Locke~]

"I got better." Rose pronounced the words with the solemn reverence due Shakespeare, which was stupid, since everyone who had taken sixth-grade English knew that was Mark Twain.

"It's not as much fun as it sounds like." Though, to be honest, dying didn't really sound like fun. Even when Dave was trying to make it sound like popping down to the corner store for vodka and milk. It was less fun than that to experience. "Were you worried about me?"

She meant it to come out sarcastically. Which it did, if one was listening with the emotional acuity of a fellow 13-year-old.

... she had a point.

Kurogane had seen every kind of idiot there, and probably every manner of staff too - from the Head Doctor right down to the most pathetic of lackeys. And that wasn't even counting the monsters he had met.

Taking in her reasoning more, he found himself lowering back into the seat. He wasn't used to speaking with women here, but by the way she spoke, she appeared to be thinking about the aspects of this place more than most of the patients he got saddled with. Maybe he'd learn something useful from her as he had with Hijikata.

"Yeah. It's nothing much during the day, but it can be hell at night if they leave us." The subsequent times there had been less monsters roaming the streets, but after that first night he wasn't leaving anything to chance. Landel could always pull a repeat performance if it struck his twisted fancy.

"A good one would be, yes..." he admitted a bit sadly. Even as the smallest of the family, a violin would still be quite expensive if it were properly made. Still, just the chance to play one...! "But if there was a store, maybe the owner wouldn't mind just letting me play one for a short while? I'd be happy to give him all the money I had for that chance!"

When it came to his hand, part of Brook had been considering the itching had been caused by his desire to play. The rest, and more sensible part of him knew better though, and at Anise's prompt answered truthfully. "Mmmmm, I'm not so sure of the how, but I know it started after one of the announcements last night and hasn't stopped! I know it's been a long time since I even could get itchy, but this does seem to be a little much, I must say."

Now if he truly was just itching to play a proper instrument, he'd have to consider this some kind of withdrawal.

“After the announcements?” Anise’s eyes were wide. She’d been wearing gloves at the time, and there was Luke to worry about… If the same thing happened to her, she wouldn’t have noticed. “Are you sure?” If the rash was connected to the intercom, there was a good chance that it really was one of the “signs” the Head Doctor had been talking about. Which would mean that Anise was really…

A momentary distraction came in the form of her roommate nodding to her as she passed by. Trying not to let her face betray her fears, Anise simply nodded back at Utena, then returned her attention to Brook.

“...What do you mean, ‘a long time since you could get itchy’?” she asked after a moment of thought. While the issue of the rash itself was more important, Anise wanted some time to wrap her head around the information she had before getting too deep into it. And besides, that was a really weird thing to say. Didn’t everyone get itchy sometimes?

"Well, obviously," Allelujah said, giving an awkward little smile. Sixth Grade English had never been a thing that happened to super soldiers in training. For some reason, it just wasn't considered a necessity.

She seemed very hard to be making light of the situation which he supposed was understandable. Maybe. Who wanted to dwell on the circumstances of their own death?

It probably came up less often than one expected actually.

Unfortunately for Rose, Allelujah had not been 13 for the better part of eight years so he missed entirely the sarcasm in her words and just looked slightly bemused instead. "You were dead. I think that's a good time to be worried about someone."

Indy was gone. Peter was gone.

Everything sucked.

Also Scott was dressed for Doyleton now. Super fashionable.

[Free but incredibly mopey]

Edited 2012-04-12 15:27 (UTC)

"Leave us? Overnight in the town?" Lust's eyebrow shot up and she leaned forward, suddenly very interested in this surprisingly helpful young man. "How do they contain us? What measures are in place to keep us prisoners if left in the town overnight?"

She assumed it fell prey to the same changes as the institute, turning decrepit and filled with danger. But it was a town. It wasn't the same, and the force and foresight needed to turn it to something akin to a cattle pen would be...well...worrying, to put it mildly.

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Day 63: Bus 1

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