damned_institute | Day 26: Group Therapy Room One

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Day 26: Group Therapy Room One

It happened every so often that a doctor was unable to stay working at Landels, whether it was because they were simply no longer happy with their work, or because they had found better opportunities, or they just hated the patients. Needless to say, the staff of Landels had been a bit downsized since the last doctors shifts, and for the patients who had lost their doctors, group therapy was assigned for them.

The nurse in charge waited patiently for her first batch of patients to arrive, confident that she would be able to care for them until a new doctor could be assigned to them. Simon Pastello, John Trick, and Mark Lancaster were on her list. Hopefully, they wouldn't cause too much trouble. The adult patients, particularly the men, never seemed to care about things like talking about their feelings or passing around stress balls and introducing themselves and a hobby they enjoyed doing, but she would try her best. It wasn't their fault, after all, that they were so delusional...

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Jack was led from the cafeteria to the therapy room with bemusement. Where was he being taken?

Upon arriving at his destination, Jack realized exactly what was happening. This was mental institute, wasn't it? So it was expected that he'd have to sit through at least one shrink session.

He glanced at the new nurse as the other one left. Nodding at her and blowing a kiss, he took a seat. "Hey, there, babe. Here to pick my mind, I assume?"

Shortly thereafter, having finished up his talk with Usopp, Sai was led in as well. He'd actually known he'd had therapy this shift, but what they were going to talk to him about he had no clue. Seeing "John" already there, he made his way to a seat right beside him, usual smile in place.

"Trick-san. So you are here. This is a coincidence." He couldn't say they had exactly gotten along well during the past two times they'd spoken, the last just over breakfast, but at least he was someone familiar.

Oh my fucking Christ.

Crane had pussied out and run away.

Fucking unbelievable.

Eddie Brock stewed over this, hardly unable to believe he'd missed his chance at payback, and wondering how he'd tell Luffy they'd both missed the opportunity to get at Crane. It wasn't fair, dammit. While yeah, he'd taken great pleasure out of further crippling the cripple, he'd been saving his best stuff for Crane, dammit. And what was this bullshit about group therapy? He wasn't going to pour his heart and soul just because someone said please, much less in front of a bunch of people who probably were insane.

At least his symbiote was taking the whole deal with Crane a lot better than he was. Later, it purred. We can hunt him to the ends of the Earth when we're free. It'll be...fun.

Yeah, well, Brock was more of an instant gratification kind of guy and he didn't think that chasing some two-eyes with a fetish for laughing gas was his idea of fun.

Brock was considerably grumpy when he was led into the group therapy room. There was one of the primly dressed nurses already there, plus two other men. Muttering an annoyed fuck dammit under his breath, Brock sat down, folded his arms crossly over his chest and waited to get this over with.

The nurse only gave a weak smile when Mr. Trick referred to her as babe, though she was pleased that at least Mr. Pastello was regarding the other patient with his true name and not those made up identities. And then her smile weakened just a little more when Mr. Lancaster finally arrived, with a glare that could have killed her if such things were possible.

Not wanting to have the situation go out of hand when it didn't even have the chance to start, the nurse cleared her throat loudly.

"Erm. Mr. Trick, just 'Karen' would do," 'Karen' introduced herself to the group. "But yes, I am Karen, and I will be your group therapy nurse for the day!"

She put on another smile and looked around to her small group. It seemed like a few of them knew each other, but...

"Why don't we start by introducing ourselves? I think you may already know each other, but I want you to use your real names, not the ones that you came up with," She gently suggested, reminding them to use their true names. "Why don't we start from the left?" She looked to John Trick.

"Karen," Jack smirked. "I like that. What are you doing after our session, Karen?"
The Fable tried to ignore Sai's presence, well aware that his attempts to escape had been futile. Was it coincidence or Ninja skills that found them situated together again?

He instead, put all his energy into flirting with Karen. "What other names would we have, Karen? I think you already know my real name. But-" He glanced at Brock. "...I don't think I know you, buddy. The name's John Trick."

The fact that Sai was ignored didn't bother him in the slightest, and he turned his smile to the nurse instead. "Hello," he addressed her with pasted-on cheeriness. "My name is Simon Pastello." It was just a guess, but since the nurses always seemed to address him by that and Usopp had made mention of the false identities before he came, he could only assume that would be the name they'd prefer.

He'd gotten used to Sai, but neither were real in any case.

Brock couldn't even remember his first "real" name right off the bat. He was tempted to flip the woman off and tell her, in loving detail, just what exactly he could do with her small intestine that Crane had pussied out of.

Tempting, but he managed to scrounge up the name after a moment's thought. He wasn't really too keen on the idea of getting sedated when he didn't need it this time around, and he wasn't going to get hopped up on tranqs in front of complete strangers either. Not unfolding his arms, the blond glared at the floor, then at the nurse.

"Mark," Brock muttered. "Should be easy enough to remember."

"Ah, Mr. Trick, we'll be having none of that. You know I'll be working with the other nurses," Karen gently chided the patient, though she found his comments oddly flattering.

It was pretty hard to not notice the fact that Mr. Trick and Mr. Pastello didn't look like they were getting along, and that Mr. Lancaster looked like he would have been happier on death row than to be sitting in this room right now.

Karen sighed. How was she supposed to get these patients to open up? Maybe she had been too eager to volunteer for this.

"OK, we all know each other names, doesn't it make us feel a bit closer? As you all know, this is Group Therapy, and the point of all this is to help you relax. So, let's talk about our favorite things to do! I know we're all on a schedule here, but we all should have our favorite activities here at Landels. I personally like it when I get to take patients to the Greenhouse. What about all of you?"

She looked around expectantly, hoping to hear anything but silence.

None of WHAT? Surely she wasn't rejecting his advances. Jack wouldn't let her disinterest dissuade him and continued at it. "With the other nurses? That'll make things...interesting, don't you think?" He winked at her, hoping she caught the implication.

Continuing, he added, "What do I like to do? Well..."

That was a good question. He'd have to choose what he said carefully. "I enjoy gambling, and socializing, and, of course, lovely women..."

Sai had been absently rubbing one bandaged arm. It wouldn't be good to scratch at the wounds, so he held himself back for the most part. When he noticed it seemed to be his turn to speak, he found he had to take a moment to think about his answer. He didn't really enjoy anything, much less what activities the institute had to offer.

"I like painting and working with various drawing materials," he finally said. It was what he found comfortable doing in his free time, anyway. It could probably be said that he enjoyed it.

Brock only snorted as whatwashisface - John Trick? - kept right on trying to hit on the nurse. Christ. Great priorities there, buddie. She wasn't even that hot, second of all (come on, you could do much better, unless you were into that sort've thing with nurses and shit). The other guy, Simon, was behaving a lot better than John, answering the woman's question.

Personally, Brock didn't care about any of the activities here. They were boring and coupled along with the fact he was treated like a child, not very fun. He supposed he could string the nurse along, but he didn't feel like having to fish for an activity only to have to bullshit why he liked it.

"The stuff here's kinda too kiddy," Brock said, shrugging. And the parts he did like - dicking around with the cripple - weren't exactly on the list of official activities. "I mean, seriously? Arts and crafts? I already went through kindergarden once."

Mr. Trick certainly wasn't going to give up, as Karen blushed horribly once she found out what he was referring to. She was never going to get him to give up, would she?

She looked almost apologetic when Mr. Lancaster complained about the childishness of such activities, even though Mr. Pastello seemed to enjoy them.

"The arts and crafts sessions aren't meant to be childish, really. We find that many of our patients are able to express themselves through art in ways that would get them in trouble otherwise," Karen tried to explain. She thought that the arts and crafts portions of the Landels schedule was wonderful actually. "And some patients, like Mr. Pastello, seem to enjoy just creating works of art. But if they're not to your liking... What sort of activites would you like to see, then?" She asked the patients, mostly Mr. Lancaster.

No, this really didn't have to do with therapy, but maybe it would give Karen an idea of what to do next. It seemed like a fun session of therapeutic art seemed out of the question...

Jack laughed openly at the 'Mr. Pastello' comment. "Poor, poor, Mr. 'Pastello'," He smirked, looking at Sai. "How will you ever communicate expressively without your art? I mean, I've yet to see you do anything expressive outside of your art and, having not seen your work at all, I can only assume it's as..." What was another word for 'expressive'? "...varied as your emotions."

He turned to Brock, gesturing. "It's a pity mean ol' Mark here wants to do away with your one hobby."

He finally put his energy back to Karen. "But since Mark has been kind enough to bring this issue into focus, I've gotta agree with him- alot of this stuff seems really kiddy. Can't we have something more adult-themed around here, babe? Say, maybe REAL therapy, instead of these bullshit group sessions?"

"My art is quite varied," said Sai. "I don't think I would call it 'expressive' as I express nothing with it." He paused. "It's... simply a skill that I find useful."

He turned his attention to the nurse, then. "I haven't been here very long. I'm afraid I can't offer much of an opinion on the daily activities."

Brock was starting to find that constantly being called "Mark" was quickly getting on his nerves. He managed to keep his mouth shut on and on what he thought was on his best behavior, but he wished he had a clock on him or any idea at all how long this group therapy session was supposed to last.

"I don't know off the top of my head," Brock said to the nurse's question. "Something a bit more physical, maybe. I mean, most of us are adults and I think we can handle football or something a bit more fun than finger painting."

Not that there was anything wrong with it - if that Pastello guy was all into that, then that was really his deal - but Brock would rather have the opportunity to stretch his legs than sitting around all day doing kiddie activities.

Karen nodded as suggestions were thrown around, actually writing some of them down. She doubted that any changes would be made to the programs, but it was a nice gesture to do, she thought.

"Well, I will make sure the Head Doctor hears your suggestions," she smiled once more, and decided it was time to move on to something... actually therapeutic. She gave John Trick an apologetic look, despite the remarks he made earlier. "I am sorry, but we are... understaffed, at the moment, and this is all that we can offer to the patients who no longer have doctors."

"So, why don't we play a little game? I'm sure you all know how to play word association?" Karen grinned, honestly thinking this was a wonderful idea. "We'll start from Mr. Trick. Just say a word, any word that comes to mind, and the next person will say a word that comes to mind in relation to the word you just said. And then we can talk about why we chose their certain words!"

She was practically giddy with herself, probably at the fact that she was actually getting something done for once.

Jack blinked. WHY were they going to play a word game? Seemed a bit...stupid.

So, he was supposed to say a word and then someone else would follow up with THEIR words? He glanced over at Sai and smirked. What word to force upon this guy? Hmmm...

"A word, huh, Karen? Let's see...how about 'fornication'?" He stared straight into the nurse's eyes as he said this, his smirk growing wider with each syllable.

"Ah," Sai continued to smile and without skipping a beat replied "Penis." Then he glanced over at Brock without any change of expression.

He'd read about word games before. It seemed the nurse really was trying to hold a therapy session with them despite questions that had so far involved the institute.

It also appeared that "John" might have some sexual interest in the nurse, but he could be wrong.

"Fairy," was the first thing that came out of Brock's mouth and he thought it pretty goddamn accurate.

At least he hadn't popped out anything really incriminating like Peter Parker or Spider, but seriously, "penis"? "Fornification"? What was this, high school? Then again, it wasn't like his was any more mature and while he supposed it could be a bit...hypocritical, considering his own situation, he stood by it, dammit.

Karen could have died. Why... why did she think that this would be a good idea? She should have expected John Trick to pick a word like that, but she still looked like she was ready to bolt from the room and throw herself off the second story balcony.

At the very least, she didn't expect Mr. Pastello to play along, and only Mr. Lancaster refrained from following along the theme. Well, needless to say they wouldn't be discussing this round of words.

"Let's go for another round, shall we?" Karen sighed. "I choose the word 'magic'."

[OOC: Sorry about the delay- I'm currently in a hotel and they only offer a public computer to check email on and they decided yesterday that apparently guests didn't NEED the internet. Sorry if I held anyone up!]

Jack smiled suavely (the best he could pull off suave) at Karen. "Changing words already? I thought we were gonna explain WHY we chose what we did. But if you really want a different word..."

Magic. Hm...what did he think about when he heard magic? "Witch."

"Mm?" Sai's mind struggled to even put together a mental image for the word witch, sorting through any random information he'd read. Hag - that was about the same thing, right? Responding with 'Sakura' wouldn't be fair to the man after him, as he might not know her.

"Woman," he said after a lot of deliberation.

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Day 26: Group Therapy Room One

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