Day 67: Breakfast

[knightspirit]

For the first time since Kyousuke arrived, waking up didn't feel the slightest bit strange or out of place. It was still like night had suddenly stopped, with nothing in-between then and now, but instead of being disorienting, or like there was something missing, it was like waking up from a nightmare. His breaths came heavy and anxious, everything flooding back to him, but unlike last night, he had more mental clarity, and he actually understood what it meant.

Sora... was dead.

After a moment, his breathing seemed to ease up, and he sat up slowly, and simply stared down at his blanket. The motion hurt quite a bit, a lot worse than it had yesterday morning, but he seemed to be in decent shape, all considered. Sore, battered, a little faint, but compared to worst of it...

He wondered if he should feel upset right now, or want to yell, or cry, but the truth was, he didn't. If anything, he was just numb. Tired and listless. He wasn't sure what to think or feel about anything, but somehow it seemed distant and disconnected, like something that hadn't actually happened. Yet, if he lingered on it too long, the lifelessness grew into something nauseating, heavy and constricting in his chest, and he didn't even notice until he realized he was gripping his bedding unnecessarily hard. So he forced himself to relax, and not focus on it too much. ... He preferred the cold sort of nothingness.

When the nurse arrived, she wasn't empty-handed, unfolding a wheelchair by his bedside and looking at him expectantly, as if she wanted him to settle himself into it. Looking at it was strange and uncomfortable, and he found himself refusing automatically.

"... I can walk fine. I don't need—"

"What you don't need," the nurse said sternly, "is to be overexerting yourself. You got to walk around yesterday, and what do you do? You go and reopen your injuries! Honestly, Mr. Taylor, you might be young, but you need to take better care of yourself! Today, you're resting, and if you're good about it, we'll see about maybe taking the chair away tomorrow."

That was bad enough, but then she wouldn't even let him wheel himself, and pushed him along from behind. This was totally unnecessary... But though it made him feel helpless, Kyousuke didn't have the energy to argue, so he let her do what she wanted. She asked if he wanted to make a quick trip the bulletin, first, but... Would the news be there? There were people who deserved to know, but there would be reactions to it, questions he didn't want to answer, and feeling his stomach give a lurch, he decided he didn't want to deal with it. Any of it.

Once in the cafeteria, the nurse asked him about breakfast, but Kyousuke insisted he wasn't hungry. ... He wasn't. Sensing he wanted to be left alone, she wheeled him off to an easily overlooked portion of the cafeteria, but quickly returned, setting food and some juice in front of him, "just in case." She set a small paper cup with a couple of painkillers on the tray, and after that, she left, leaving the boy to stare down the meal he didn't really want.

[ Kratos! ]

Comments

[nobleman]

Being approached by a stranger certainly wasn't new for Guy, but he had to admit that it hadn't been happening as much as of late. With everyone concerned with their own groups of friends and their illnesses, branching out didn't seem like the best idea. As eager as he was to find Anise or Claude, though, he wasn't going to ignore someone who walked right up to his table and took a seat, no questions asked.

Not to mention the fact that this woman would have been hard to ignore regardless of that. She definitely had a few inches of height on him, something that Guy took note of before she sat down. And the fact that she hadn't asked permission to sit probably meant that she was a veteran of this place. He was pretty sure he'd see her towering over other patients before...

Well, it had probably only been a matter of time until they met, then. Guy offered her a smile even as he watched her dig into her food like she was on a mission. "Hello there, miss," he said, charming as usual. "The name's Guy. Let me guess... you've already been here for your fair share of time."

[heroesdontshave]

"Dazed" was a good way to describe Snow as he walked into the cafeteria. Or maybe "drained." It felt like he'd been sick forever by this point, and spending all his time trying to act like he wasn't sick took a lot more energy than he really wanted to admit. He couldn't even bring himself to be rebellious that morning and just went along with his nurse with little more than some grumbles and dirty looks.

Dammit. Come on. It was just a little bug going around. Why was he letting it get to him this much? There was too much going on right now for him to sit around and do nothing. He needed to keep going. There were people counting on him. Besides, there were plenty of people moping around without him adding himself to the count. Come on, wake up! Snap out of it! No way was he going to let something like getting a little sick slow him down!

After mentally pep talking his way through the breakfast line and getting his weird grid-shaped food, Snow felt a little better. Or at least he felt like he could definitely push through and keep going like normal, which was good enough. He just needed to get a little energy going was all it was. Food ought to do the trick. And maybe some conversation.

As far as the latter went, Snow was remarkably unbiased and just plopped himself into the first seat he saw that happened to have a living body sitting across from it. No greeting. No introduction. No asking for permission to sit. He just spread a big smile and blurted out, "Whatcha got there? Anything good?"

Despite the fact that the guy was obviously really into whatever book he'd managed to get his hands on, it didn't occur to Snow that the guy might be busy or that he might be interrupting.

[asteroidbelt]

The first thing Ryusei caught sight of as he looked up was his roommate, looking much worse than he'd had the last time he'd seen him. Well, naturally—that was the result of fighting. But it was...odd.

"Nothing," he replied, turning his gaze to the person who'd addressed him. Who seemed...scraggly. "Just my journal." Now the question was whether this big guy's smile was fake. It was hard to tell sometimes what would cause certain people to snap, and Ryusei was wary about cheerful people right now because there was that stereotype about the mentally ill....

He placed the notebook next to his tray and folded his hands above it. ... Why not take the chance? It was better than interrupting someone random later who might not want to be disturbed. "Hey. Uh, I'm Sakuta. What's that thing where they take you somewhere at night?"

[baniichan]

"One of the many oddities of the institute, it seems," Barnaby neutrally replied. To be honest, he didn't fully understand it, much less the implications behind a speedy recovery. Given their captors' resources, though, that was hardly the most shocking thing they were capable of doing to him.

At least the judge had a relatively peaceful night. Of course, Barnaby realized it was entirely possible he ignored his advice and ventured into the hallways anyway. Yuri Petrov wasn't a short-sighted man, however, even if he occasionally came across as a little absent-minded. At any rate, he appeared unharmed, which was really the heart of the matter. Although Barnaby had little personal attachment to Petrov, he knew that Stern Bild would not take a judge's death lightly. That was especially true if there had been a (former) hero there to prevent it. Tarnishing Hero TV's reputation was the last thing he wanted to do, especially when he thought of the tremendous debt he owed Mr. Maverick.

There was little reason to voice those thoughts out loud. In a deliberate attempt to appear at ease, Barnaby lifted his utensils and began cutting into his waffles. "May I ask who your roommate is?" he asked.

end game t&b spoilers coming through

[voiceofthanatos]

Yuri couldn't have cared much about HeroTv's former golden boy either. But he was a civil servant towards the city, and Barnaby had a hand in thwating Maverick's plans so he had to at least pretend he cared about Barnaby's well being too.

Yuri sliced a few more bites of his waffle apart, eating a small piece of his breakfast while he listened to Barnaby's concerns. He had a few of his own, but would allow Barnaby to take the lead for now.

"That would be Riley Poole. An American, a few years older than you however I don't trust him completely. Have you seen him before?" Riley's slightly grizzled appearance did raise a few eyebrows Yuri, but otherwise nothing else to write home about. Still by default, he couldn't really put an ounce of trust into anybody here so he kept his things under tight lock and key.

[repelling]

Unlike every other morning, the lost days notwithstanding, Uryuu did not wake before the morning broadcast. As the bell jingled and the Head Doctor's voice disturbed the morning, Uryuu stirred, but only that. As if caught by the same fog that coated the grounds, the words and their content seemed as much a part of a dream as the vague recollection of fangs, orange, and a ballerina. His body, so wired to wake with the dawn even when dragged into unnatural and unremembered sleep by this place, for once succumbed.

If not for the nurse who shook now at his shoulder, he might have slept in, a first -- at least for a number of years. Even grievous injury had failed to disrupt his routine. This was different. His entire body, every millimeter, had been disrupted. His nurse's hands clutched at him, jerking his arm and tugging down the blankets; his eyes opened and shut again, tight against the ache.

His lips moved, but produced no sound; his tongue felt raw. As if it--no, as if every part of him had been put through a meat grinder. His gnawed tongue better fit, but the description seemed fair for the rest, for seventeen, eighteen months of growing pains tucked into an hour. His toes, his knuckles, his knees and elbows and wrists, his joints. His jaw, his lungs, his skin, his every muscle and every nerve. If not in outright, lingering pain, then they felt alien. Not comically different, three feet longer and absurd, but only a little, the differences so minor that it was almost worse.

As he sat up, as he reached for his glasses (both familiar and new, and his mind pounded and see-sawed and spun), as he tried to collect himself enough to justifiably refuse his nurse's help in sliding on his slippers and standing, all felt just that much off. A vague sense of not belonging, of skin that did not fit and was not his, of fingers and arms and where they fell that unsettled. Not enough to demand second looks or even peripheral disturbance, but a niggling, persistance itch.

Uryuu tried to focus. On standing, on what his nurse said ("goodness, Mr. Way, are you getting sick? Aah, once you've got some food in you, and your new medication, you should feel better, so let's get you to breakfast, all right?"), not on the pins and needles in the soles of his feet, but on pushing past the weighted migraine splitting his skull, to order and fix and keep every detail of the night before (Kuchiki-san in a tutu? That hadn't... a town to which he'd not yet been, no, it was hazy, here or there, too much to try and keep in his hands and sliding like water and sand between his fingers), of the memories.

All that, and also the now. He reached, unthinking, to hold his pulsing forehead, but unwilling to yield to or show its effect, pushed his glasses instead. He stared as he did at his desk, ignoring the pull of his nurse for a moment, trying to remember (hah) what was missing, what he needed, what kept his heels fixed. It struck him, finally: his journal. Insisting on stopping at his closet ("I might want a sweatshirt" he worked out, tongue tenative and sore), he found it hadn't gone back to his pillow case, either. At which point his nurse's patience had run out, and she escorted him from the room.

She did allow his usual stop at the bathroom, and Uryuu stared at the mirror. His black eye had gone, and he would have smirked at that, but... Again the slightest, infinitesimal sense of wrong, even as another part of him declared no, no, this was right-- it fit, and he finger combed his longer hair, his bangs, into a side part. Remembering the last procedure and its corroding burn, he tugged down his shirt collar, stretching it until he could inspect the scar left from Ryuuken's arrow. No new marks. No sign of whatever putrid thing had been injected.

Then the Cafeteria. Struggling still, it took an inordinate amount of effort to focus on shuffling in line and collecting a waffle and water. His nurse would have done it if he hadn't. For once, he could not make an effective scan of the room, searching out familiar faces--only looking for Inoue-san (had Vantas-kun...) before letting the woman guide him to a seat.

Perhaps his expression or the color of his skin as he looked at the waffle told her just how nonexistant his appetite was, as when she dropped a cup of pills onto his tray, she pulled and encouraging smile. "You'll feel better if you eat, you know. And those really shouldn't be taken on an empty stomach. Especially the anticonvulsants."

Nodding, but unable to pinch his mouth close to a smile, Uryuu at least toed the act well enough to thank her.

Anticonvulsants. Perhaps all that shredding and extending of his nerves posed a seizure risk. If he could trust they were what she said, but what would be the point in lying, when they could as easily drug the food? Which should have smelled promising, probably, and been ever appealing as free and practical. Instead, his stomach shrank back from it, and nausea oozed in his throat, tangible and sticking.

Compromising with the water, he sipped it, cool over his tender tongue. Setting down the glass, he propped his elbows on the table and folded his hands together, supporting his head against them. The disarray of his mind was maddening but he worked at it, as if following a thread to try and untangle and impossible knotted mass.

[ SUPAH LATE and tl;dr for Orihime!!! ]

[stop_the_rain]

Despite the wet and the cold and the fact that they hadn't gotten anywhere, Murphy had to say that the previous night hadn't been that bad. Hell, they'd gotten over the wall, which was more than he'd managed in a few nights of effort.

And no horrific monsters had attacked.

The ex-con found himself heading to breakfast feeling calmer than he had in a while. His conversation with Gabe was still fresh in his mind, as was the Magdalena he'd found the previous evening in his room. The lady of repentant sinners had come to him, probably the only way she could in this place.

Okay, maybe that was a ridiculous thought, but Murphy couldn't tell what was ridiculous and what wasn't anymore.

He grabbed his breakfast - actually hungry - and took an empty seat. He knew things were bad overall, but...it was like prison, again. His people (did he really have people?) weren't affected, so he wasn't going to waste much of his energy worrying. He couldn't afford to. You had to look out for your own, here.

And anyway...what the hell could he do?

[free]

Apologies for delay!

[longlivetheking]

"Scar," the former lion offered as he began picking at his meal with a visible degree of disinterest, considering there was hardly anything lying on his plate that he deemed to be remotely edible. "A pleasure to meet you indeed, though I don't suppose you might want to share your real name rather than what the nurses call you?"

He supposed such a question didn't hurt in establishing what were hopefully useful relations with the poor fools here. Scar even offered the other man a brief smile that was polite and almost pleasant - he didn't quite succeed in masking his annoyance completely, after all.

[thecamellia]

Had she ever seen Kurogane looking so... run-down? Whatever the injury was, it had to be serious what with all the bandages. What had been going on!?

When he noticed her and lifted his eyes (or eye, in this case), she moved a little closer. The more she looked him over in turn, the more concerned she got. "What did this?"

[she_is_ruin]

Yomi had just finished deciding whether or not she should leave a message for Albedo on the bulletin board when a certain someone entered the cafeteria. A man, looking and whole and healthy and amazingly well-preserved for someone who was, by all accounts, nothing more than a normal human.

Klavier.

The moment he turned her way, Yomi knew there was an unpleasantly high chance there was going to be some attempt to... to bring up what had happened before Landel had launched his little epidemic. Even if he didn't, his presence was enough to do it for him. Old wounds that didn't heal properly oozed, contaminating everything, impossible to ignore, and old memories were the same. Especially the painful and intimate ones... like those from the Coliseum, and from everything before and after it.

Klavier had been privy to a lot--more than he should--and that was impossible to ignore. He carried the stink of her pain and regret on him. Ghosts of a humanity that should be dead.

He was a walking history lesson that she could do without.

Yomi lifted her eyes and blinked, expression as smooth as glass. Her wounds had healed, yes, and so had that temporary lull in the sesshouseki's control. She was not broken or weak. She would not cry in front of a man. She was not the old Yomi.

She followed him with her eyes before nodding, an almost tranquil smile working at the corners of her mouth. Things had changed, anyway, things that would probably shock Klavier when he found out. "Morning." There was a moment where she pretended to think over her words. "I'm feeling fine. Back to normal."

[redcladidealist]

At least Zero had a better excuse for his lack of table manners. If he'd only been eating for a week, when would he have had a chance to learn not to talk with his mouth full of food? Lloyd, on the other hand... Well, growing up out in the woods with only a lone gruff dwarf as his main teacher and role model, manners hadn't really been something Lloyd was exposed to all that much. Dirk had tried, to a certain extent, with better success in some areas than others, but when it came to food? Lloyd figured all was good so long as people understood what he said.

In the middle of another bite, he used his tongue to push the food in his mouth to the side before answering. "Some of it," he said. His expression turned serious. "I've heard about the sickness, and what the doctors here do. I haven't really seen much of it for myself." And he'd prefer to keep it that way. "Some of it doesn't make any sense, though." He paused here and swallowed, wanting to clear his mouth. Then he set his fork down and pulled one of the journals around so Zero could see the layout. His finger traced a path from the door of the institute outside and away from the building.

"The first night I was here, some friends and I broke out, but something happened and we woke up back here, but I don't remember what. That happened again last night, too, except I wasn't outside. What I don't understand is, if we're prisoners, and if they caught us, why did they let me keep things when they brought me back? Even things they wouldn't want me to have."

[dividedby]

Fortunately, Zero could certainly understand what the other man was saying despite his talking with his mouth full. Understanding was important - especially when it came to discussing such things as the Institute, and how things worked. (Or how no one quite knew anything about how things worked.)

The once-Reploid listened intently, chewing another piece of waffle in the meantime, and this time he waited to answer until he had swallowed. For once. "Things here don't always have a reason," he said, lightly shaking his head. "I think it's intentional so Landel can confuse us, to keep us from figuring out what his plans really are."

That was the only good explanation he could come up with, anyway. The rest of it was just questions, questions, and more questions. The only 'answers' were theories. Sigh. What a wonderful, frustrating system Landel had going on here. It was all in his favor...

"...And I don't know why they let us keep what we find," Zero continued, as he prodded at the bacon on his plate with his utensil. "But it's probably a way for him to keep things more interesting." After all, he could easily let his prisoners fight monsters with nothing but their bare fists...but they wouldn't last nearly as long as if they had a weapon of some kind. Was he perhaps trying to 'weed out' the weak from the strong? Made some sense... Zero pondered that theory as he popped a piece of bacon in his mouth.

[seekingmystrength]

Had the girl been taken before? She'd been there long enough to know that people got taken, but Kurogane had no knowledge of if she'd been one of their experiments. And with how faded some of his memories were now, he wasn't sure if she knew that he'd been taken once before. What he did know was that he didn't want her worrying over the thought of getting taken again. Or what his eye might make her think.

So it would be an injury. For now. She'd find out eventually, but later. When he could think clearer and speak to her more properly.

"Are you hurt?" he said in response. His injuries were obvious whether he admitted to where they'd come from or not. And she was like him; she probably would say, but he knew he'd be able to tell by her answer.

No worries at all!

[ever_loyal_dog]

Scar? Scar. It was hard to tell if it was a family name or a given name, but given how foreign everything else here was, it made some sort of sense. The older man seemed about as interested in his food as Soushi was, though for entirely different reasons.

What followed was a bit more troubling. Scar already knew his real name wasn't Johnathan Fox, so either it was common for the staff to mix up their patients, or he wasn't the only one here who wasn't buying into any of it.

"Miketsukami Soushi," he replied after giving Scar a questioning glance. Who this Fox person was, he'd no real idea. The nurse had been so very sure it was him though...

"Are the nurses just fond of pet names, or is there something more to that?" he added after a moment. There was something just a bit unsettling about the way Scar smiled. He wasn't certain the man wasn't just toying with him somehow.

[complicatedliar]

Well, that had been a pointless evening. A welcome enough break however, he supposed. He would have not been bothered at all, except that a rather palpable deadline had been set and he had every reason to work toward it.

Ah well. The long game was all that ultimately mattered anyway.

Loki acquired a bowl of fruit and some tea, then tucked himself away at a table to begin picking at it.

[The good doctor!]

[madeinthehrl]

Consciousness came slowly to Soma, exhausted as she was by last night's events. Recollection was even slower to return. There had been...a wasteland, and the torn-up remnants of mobile suits...

And Landel's voice. She remembered that, even though she'd heard it from a distance. Two more bite the dust. But who?

One thing was clear, though. The library was a bust. She was stubborn, but she wasn't stupid. There wasn't a single weapon in her small arsenal that would be any use against the thing they'd encountered last night. Part of her still refused to believe it had been real. Surely it had to be an illusion like--like everything else last night.

The bulk of the pain from her surgery had receded by now, but the nurse still insisted she stay in a wheelchair for one more day. Tender as her abdomen still was, she didn't feel inclined to argue. And a quick look at the bulletin board on their way past it told her nothing about who had died last night. But that didn't mean nobody had. Frowning slightly, she scribbled a note for the Once-ler, then looked up at her nurse.

"Is Amanda awake yet?" she asked as they entered the cafeteria, thankful at least that she'd managed to remember Rapunzel's real name. "I haven't talked to her in a while, so I'd like to sit with her today if I can."

The nurse only smiled sympathetically, and Soma's heart plummeted into her stomach.

But it couldn't have happened. She'd seen Rapunzel last night. She'd been there. Asleep, but there.

No.

"No," she said sharply, loud enough to attract the attention of a few other nurses. "Don't you dare--"

"Maria, Amanda's gone home!" said the nurse. "You should be happy for her! I know you'll miss her very much, but--"

Soma didn't hear the rest. She looked down at her white-knuckled fists and tried to focus. If she did anything now, if she fought back, if she caused any trouble, she'd only be as bad as that idiot who'd started a fight on the bus. It would only end in other people getting hurt. She had to remember that.

(But she'd been there last night.)

"Of course," she said numbly. "I'm very happy for her."

And then it was just her and a slowly cooling tray of waffles in a corner of the cafeteria, and the overwhelming knowledge that she'd just lost another friend. And when Landel had said Two more...

No. She refused to consider that possibility. Soma dug her nails into her palms and didn't look up.

[for Sonia!]

[baniichan]

"We haven't met, no," Barnaby answered. "I've likely seen him in passing, though." There were a lot of patients, yes, but they all spent enough shifts together in the same room. Of course, it came as no surprise that Petrov was slow to trust his roommate. Some of the stories floating around here were enough to put anyone on guard, even under the best of circumstances.

As much as he didn't feel like eating, Barnaby brought a bite of waffles to his mouth. The last thing he wanted to do was draw extra attention from patients and nurses alike.

"At any rate, I'm pleased to see that you're unharmed," he added. The farther they could keep the judge away from the terrors of the institute, the better off they would be. He didn't particularly relish in the idea of having another load on their backs while he and his partner searched for an escape route.

[ninelivesonce]

"So have you," Taura replied, tilting her head to get a decent look at him. She'd definitely seen him during the day, but they'd never talked. "I'm Taura," she added.

Then she hesitated. She didn't even know the guy, and already she was thinking of asking him to go in on a high-stakes, low-reward kind of mission. But if she didn't ask anyone, no one was going to do anything. Except get killed. She drummed her nails on the table, and then just blurted it out. "I was thinking...there aren't very many of us who aren't sick. Maybe it's up to us to figure out how to stop them."

[redcladidealist]

"Will they always let us keep what we find?" Lloyd's tone was curious, but the question was intent. The answer would make an incredible difference to how he approached the night. Maybe I should take something with me to carry anything I find... Pockets could only hold so much, after all. Maybe a pillow case...

"You make it sound like he's doing this for fun." Which was hard for Lloyd to swallow. How could anyone enjoy making other people suffer? How could they do that with no other reason at all? Even the Desians in the Human Ranches had a reason for what they did, even if it was one that Lloyd hated and felt was wrong. They made humans suffer so that Exspheres could be created. Was there something like that here? Lloyd pulled his plate back closer as he mulled the thought over. Not bothering with a knife, he used his fork again to cut off another bite. "Does anyone have any idea what it is they do in this place? Why they brought us here?"

The bite of waffle went in his mouth while he waited for the other's response.

[voiceofthanatos]

Fortunately Yuri hadn't run into somebody who give him too much trouble. And if they did, well that would result in a barbecue courtesy of himself. He sipped his drink, nodding at Barnaby's responses. Now he had some questions of his own to raise.

"How is Kotetsu faring?" He hadn't even seen a glimpse of the old guy yet. "And have you found any new information since we last spoke?" This was important to him, especially if they found any clues to escaping this hell.

[longlivetheking]

My, that was quite a mouthful wasn't it? Weeks ago Scar might have wondered why humans bothered with pairs of such complicated names, but perhaps he was getting a little used to their silly habits - something he did not quite enjoy admitting, for that matter.

Something more to the names? Gee, wasn't this fellow turning out to be a clever one?

"Oh, it is all part of this little farce they like to maintain," Scar answered with a shrug, "A different name, and the insistence that everything you've known your whole life is merely a product of your own little fantasies. We're poor lunatics, as far as they are concerned." He gestured to the nurses as he spoke, although the movement might have seemed a little awkward to a human.

He had to wonder why he even bothered with the explanation, as he rarely met other 'patients' often enough in order for something useful to come out if it considering the number that had up and disappeared. It was hardly worth investing any energy in them, it seemed - it was not as though he cared or wanted to be helpful to others, after all, but somehow he had ended up relaying this over and over. Then again, perhaps there was the small chance that it would lead to something, and the former lion knew he had little choice but to bet on such small chances if he wanted to get anywhere in this place.

"Things grow even more delightful during the night, however." If this Soushi did not catch that piece of sarcasm, Scar was going to be disappointed.

[nobleman]

Taura? That was a nice name, and Guy smiled in return. "The name's Guy." He realized that he had to be pretty recognizable to most people by now, but at least they'd gotten the formalities out of the way pretty fast. He remembered when every second person he talked to had asked how long he'd been here. Most didn't bother at this point.

But what Guy hadn't expected was for the conversation to take a more serious turn so soon. Not that he minded it. They were limited in their time here, so sometimes it was better to cut to the chase. He realized it had to be pretty obvious that he wasn't sick. He hadn't even gotten any injuries lately, after all.

"I've been working it. Two of my close friends are sick. We finally got somewhere last night... or at least, I think we did." Guy leaned back in his seat and took a bite of his food.

[a_sin_for_him]

She hadn't been able to find him. Lust had spent the night waiting and worrying, and now she found herself rather distracted by the way her stomach felt sick. It wasn't a familiar sensation, this queasy tightness in the pit of her gut. She was afraid, so terribly afraid.

So much so that she bypassed the Sun Room, for fear of what manner of news may be waiting.

She hadn't been able to find him.

Ignoring the urgings of her nurse to get food, Lust scanned the cafeteria with quick, too-bright eyes. Her small frown only deepened. That tightness in her abdomen seemed to twist and jump. She felt strangely tired through her limbs, as though a creeping numbness was coming upon her.

Abruptly, the anxious homunculus sat at a table, one hand flat on its surface to steady herself.

[ever_loyal_dog]

He had no solid reason to believe Scar; in fact, there were plenty of other explanations, but he had to admit, it was making more and more sense. While the nurses hadn't told him much about Johnathan Fox, he was just as certain that he wasn't that man. Was this too another part of the Wolf's curse? Were the others here Atavists as well?

"By the sound of things, it's not a terribly convincing farce," he nodded once, setting down his fork in favor of the napkin beside it. What was the point then? If they weren't convincing their patients that these false lives were real, why bother? "Have there been other new arrivals? Like me?"

He kept his expression even, though he raised a curious brow at Scar's last little implication. That, certainly, was enough to garner his attention. Night, he was familiar with. When Youkai, Oni, and all the lesser demons gathered their strength. When he and his own kind were the strongest, and at the same time, most vulnerable. There was some kind of connection, a coincidence too close to the truth to ignore.

"Delightful," he repeated quietly, then added his own bit of flat sarcasm. "I can't imagine the hospitality improving upon itself."

[doctor_voodoo]

The night before had been a half-way success for Facilier. The greatest achievement was the killing of his infected roommate, Hakkai. One down, three to four more to go... It wasn't the cleanest or injury-free job however. Facilier had his newly found work beast, Rock Lee, to thank for taking on most of the messy work. The Bokor was unable to get his new minion all fixed up after that violent episode with Hakkai, but at this point he knew he had the useful boy firmly under his wing. The other half of the night that wasn't so successful was his failure to find more supplies from upstairs. The night had ended just as they reached the second floor.

As frustrating as that was, knowing that he had one of Landel's "lambs" taken care of left Facilier with a smug grin as he entered the cafeteria to gather up his breakfast. That said smile only grew to near gloating proportions once he spotted a familiar head of oiled-up hair.

"Good morning, Mr. Lingormr!" Facilier greeted the other man as he took a seat across from him. "How have things been treating y'all since we last talked?"