damned_institute | Day 69: Sun Room (3rd Shift)

Tomatoes in both choices. Lloyd's face fell the moment he heard the announcement, and with a groan he let his forehead thunk against the table in the Sun Room. He couldn't even ask if he could have a sandwich made without tomatoes in it. The lunches were already made, his nurse holding one of each in her hands. Unhappily, he accepted the one that had meat. Maybe something could be salvaged from it.

Ignoring his nurse's cheerful parting words to enjoy his meal, the teen waited until she'd stepped away before he took his lunch out of the bag and started picking it apart - only to freeze, heart pounding unevenly. A deep, rattling breath had just- Lloyd didn't even finish the thought. Something was here! He whipped around, not even sure how he was going to defend himself. The only thing he had was one of those plastic spoon-forks, and if he was up against that same thing they'd run from last night-

There was nothing. Nothing but nurses and patients passing by. Not even any cats. No one else looked like they'd even heard anything. Lloyd's eyes darted around, but still nothing showed up.

Come on, I know I heard it...

[For Ed and Al!]

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Al relaxed a bit--that at least made some amount of sense, even if it didn't diminish the horror of what was really going on. He nodded in response to Lloyd's determined look, then followed his brother's gaze.

Lloyd went quiet for a moment, picking up his fork and poking at his salad with it. Somehow, Ed had managed to hone right in on the biggest problem with his plan, the reason why his plan wasn't really even a plan just yet, but a goal that felt just out of reach.

"It... depends. If someone had an Exsphere attached without a Key Crest first, you can't just take it back off. Their mana will go out of control if you do, and they'll... they'll turn into a monster." Like his mom. Like Marble. Dammit, how could fix this? There had to be a way somehow. There had to. He couldn't accept the idea that there wasn't. "They'd need a Key Crest first, and even then I'm not sure if it'd work." They hadn't tried it yet, for good reason.

Edited 2013-03-04 14:24 (UTC)

Ed blinked a bit as he took that in. "Please, no turning into a monster. We get enough at night, it looks like."

He paused and look at his brother. "Don't hit me."

Then Ed started working on the second sandwich. "So it sounds like the people that already have them will have to keep them?"

Al settled for just glaring at his brother, then stabbing his next bite of salad harder than strictly necessary.

Al frowned as he thought over what Lloyd said. "Is there no magic that could help with that whole problem? Or are the Key Crests the only thing that could affect the Exspheres?"

Lloyd shook his head. "You don't have to worry about me. My Dad made sure I had a Key Crest before he ever let me even touch the Exsphere. I can take mine off without any problem. I just... I can't yet." He jabbed his salad again, frustrated. "I'm not strong enough without it to do the things that need to be done. I still need it to save my world." But as soon as the world was safe and reunited, he swore, he swore he'd find a way to make it so no one ever needed to rely on Exspheres ever again. Not even him.

"Magic?" He echoed the word with a frown, rolling it over in his mind. "As far as I know, there isn't any magic that can take an Exsphere off. The closest I've ever seen is..." He trailed off. The sudden thought all but caught him off guard. Could that...? "I have a friend who knows a healing technique. She saved someone who'd become an Exbelua. One of those monsters. I don't know if it would help, but... Maybe..." He suddenly, desperately, wanted to talk to Kratos.

Ed chewed on his food as he mulled over what Lloyd was saying. "I'm afraid I don't know enough about your world to give you any intelligent advice. Sorry."

"It sounds like something worth pursuing, though," Al added encouragingly. "Do you have anyone here you can ask about it?"

"I... Maybe." He didn't know if Kratos would have any idea if Raine's technique would be any help. He wasn't even sure Kratos would tell him even if the man knew anything. Still, he had to try. "There's someone else from my world here, but I don't know if he'd know if it'd work. I'll have to ask him next time I see him." And that was really the most he could do about it right now.

Lifting a bite of salad to his mouth, he chewed, then quickly swallowed. Blegh. Maybe it didn't have tomatoes, but that didn't mean it was all that great either. Even so, he found himself wolfing it down. Hey, he was hungry, and something was better than nothing. Besides, he half-expected the nurses to start moving in to collect them any minute now. They'd spent a lot of time talking during lunch. The shift was probably near over.

"Hopefully you'll be able to get information out of him," Ed said before settling in to finish wolfing down his own food.

Day 69: Sun Room (3rd Shift)

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