damned_institute | Day 27: Breakfast

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Day 27: Breakfast

Day came too soon.

Sora hadn't been able to find Rena, had instead been forced to crumple onto the grass of the recreational field and bleed all over himself, and hadn't even accomplished what he'd been sent out to do. What he'd been entrusted to do. He didn't know how he was going to be able to face Renji and the others, but he also knew he wasn't going to hide from them, either. That would just be low, after all, and he was ready to face up to the consequences.

He didn't try to make excuses for himself. Even though there had been a Special Counseling patient, they had managed to take her down by sheer numbers. The fact that he hadn't seen any sign of Rena was what had him the most worried. He hoped he could find her today.

The boy laid in his bed for a good while that morning before his nurse finally came in to collect him. She clucked over the bandages wrapped tightly around his chest and leg, and asked him if he was okay to walk.

Once Sora assured her he was fine (he didn't really want to use crutches, as that would just attract attention to himself, and he didn't need others worrying over him), they made their way to the cafeteria. Sora yawned and winced against the bright light of morning - it seemed even earlier than usual, and he realized why when they entered the cafeteria and found it empty.

The boy shuffled over to grab a chocolate chip pancake, a bowl of cereal, and a glass of milk (good for the bones, or so his mom had always told him) before settling at a table. He kept an eye on the door, hoping he would see Rena walking in soon.

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This one was a quiet one, it seemed. "My name is Sai," the ninja offered first, still smiling. "Was there something you needed?"

He would have thought someone sitting with him just for the company would have begun the conversation themselves, but he could be wrong.

Was this place just crawling with japanese people?

"That's an interesting name," He was named after a weapon? Surely that had to be a codename, especially since he had only given one name. Which immediately begged the question, why did a kid need a code name?

That wasn't exactly an answer to his question, but Sai allowed the swift subject change anyway. "Is it? Perhaps it's unusual in your world." It wasn't his real name, but he'd become a bit attached to it. Those of ROOT generally gave up their real names early on.

"What's yours?"

Of course, the kid would have to ask for his name. Well, he'd already been giving it out to people, so why not once more?

"SubZero." It was an uncomfortable to use that as his name after just saying that someone else had an odd name. But he couldn't really give out his real name, and he didn't want to use the one the hospital had given him.

If the name Sai was unusual, then the name SubZero was downright bizarre. The ninja wasn't one to judge, however, and he simply nodded back. The institute was full of all sorts.

"Okay, SubZero-san," Sai went on without skipping a beat. "Was there something you wanted?"

"Yes. Don't call me SubZero-san. In fact, don't use any honorifics at all," The last thing he needed was to be called SubZero-san or SubZero-sama... and he was fairly sure there were even worse syllables that could be tacked onto the end of his name.

"Oh." Sai blinked, taken slightly back. He was unused to someone asking him directly not to use honorifics. He had read, in his various studies on friendships, that one usually dropped them once they had gotten to know someone better. When they had become close. "Were you interested in becoming friends?" the boy asked in all honesty.

Become friends? What was the kid talking about? And how had he gotten the impression that SubZero wanted to be friends?

"What do you mean, become friends?" Perhaps they had a different concept of the word 'friend'. Or maybe he was asking for an alliance?

"You asked me to address you informally," Sai pointed out. "Like a friend." SubZero might simply come from a different cultural setting, then, which was perfectly fine. He would simply never be used to the way the institute just threw people together. "I won't be upset if this isn't the case."

"That's... interesting reasoning," Weird, weird, Japanese people.

"I just don't like people using honorifics with my name." No one else had ever done that, and he didn't want people to start.

"Understood then," Sai smiled. "I will simply call you SubZero." He might have to talk to Naruto again later. His research had often done a poor job of explaining things to him, so this wouldn't be the first time he'd gotten an issue like that wrong.

He turned back to his breakfast, which he'd really only been poking at with his fork. What was a decent way to start a conversation in a place like this? "Have you been here long?"

"Only a few days. What about you?" SubZero finally started eating his breakfast. He didn't care that his pancakes were cold now.

Well, Sai was a little strange, but then, most people he'd met here were a lot stranger.

"Perhaps we arrived around the same time," Sai tilted his head as though in thought. "This will be my fourth day." So many people seemed to have arrived recently. Was whoever was in charge of this facility gaining power somehow?

"I don't suppose you've heard of anyone finding their way out?"

"Haven't heard of anyone finding their way out yet. I don't think it's happened at all, or the word would've spread by now. I think people just vanish," SubZero was willing to bet that they didn't escape, though. But he wasn't sure he wanted to know what was done with them, either.

It was likely that patients died during night, but he hadn't seen anything about that on the bulletin board.

Sai nodded. The pancakes were odd things. And rubbery. Edible, though. "I've heard about the same." Or rather, not heard, as the case may be. "That isn't promising."

He hadn't made much attempt to escape yet, had he? More scouting may be in order for that. But for Uchiha Sasuke not to have found a way out before he'd arrived, this place must be powerfully barricaded indeed. The image of the missing-nin blowing up a good portion of Orochimaru's hideout when they'd first met flashed clear in his mind.

"It really isn't, but I don't think most people here are trained for this. And the institute clearly has the advantage here," It was surprising no one had gone over the wall yet, but it did look like it would be really hard to scale without some sort of help.

"Yes, a clear advantage, considering most patients remain confused for a good while after arriving. Myself included."

Sai tapped his fork to his chin as though in deep thought. "My companions and I felt something last night," he said. "I thought it felt a bit like a strong chakra aura, but I didn't think any of the patients still had the ability to control theirs. Could it have been an act of our captors? Or one of them?"

"I think it was one of the brainwashed patients with full powers back. Several of the people I was fighting alongside last night were struck by lightning from a female patient. It seems like a large number of people here would be powerful enough to take this place apart by themselves if they had their full powers," Certainly, SubZero would be long gone if he had his full powers back.

The staff weren't easy to fight right now, but with his powers back they wouldn't be much of a problem.

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Day 27: Breakfast

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