The commotion in Bus 3 led to an unintended consequence. On the final mile during the trip home, a patient's actions forced the bus to careen off the road and crash its side against a tree, throwing everyone into disarray. The staff managed to pacify those involved before it escalated to chaos, and thankfully, no one was hurt; however, they had no choice but to park the vehicles on the side of the road and inspect the damage.

Thankfully, only Bus 3's starter managed to suffer in the accident. A quick repair was necessary to get the bus started again, but it would still require some time. The rest of the patients stayed within the buses, monitored closely by the nurses and the orderlies in the event another person acted up.

The sun continued to sink toward the horizon, threatening the world with nightfall.

As the bus drivers continued to look at Bus 3's engine, waiting patients could see the last traces of the setting sun's melancholy orange glow as it sank behind the mountains. Just a little further down the road, Landel's Institute peered at them from behind its walls, its exterior reflecting some of the remaining sunlight.

The wind howled, as if sounding a warning in response to the few twinkling stars that had already appeared in the dark sky above. Night was rapidly approaching.

Any light chatter from outside suddenly halted, as if drowned by the wind, and the dark, swaying trees.

Some of the veteran patients would recognize the strange, tight feeling that clung to the air. They had every reason to dread the next few moments. The nurses, on the other hand, didn't seem to notice anything amiss. Instead, they stood at the front of their buses and prepared to address everyone about their unexpected delay.

Helpless to stop the natural tides of time, the patients could only watch as darkness fell across the grounds, and the sun winked out of sight. The wind grew louder, until it was split by a piercing scream that echoed from the surrounding trees.

The world rippled, shifted and folded, as if the night had altered the very fabric of reality. At the front of the bus, the nurses collapsed to the floor, bodies twisting and breaking as they transformed. Needles and scalpels tore through their skin and ripped their uniforms. Their skin boiled and their limbs distorted. Screaming and writhing, the nurses could do nothing to end their pain as the humanity in their eyes died.

From further down the road came screeches of predatory birds, while a few large shadows swooped over the parked buses. The grotesque creatures of the night were ready to hunt. The nurses, now deformed monsters themselves, lurched to their feet, their howls more blood-curdling than the wind.

Nightshift had come.

[ Please refer to this Lounge post before continuing! ]

Kotetsu was permanently twisted around in his seat as he stared out the emergency exit at the bus behind them. Out of nowhere, it had veered right into a tree and dented the side of the bus, leaving the other buses no choice but to pull off to the side of the road and assist in anyway they could. It was hard to tell whether anyone had been hurt, but thankfully every bus was equipped with nurses so Kotetsu hoped any damage inflicted on the patients could be treated immediately.

Either way, the bus apparently couldn't start up again and that left them all little choice but to wait. With little to see and no signs of emergency care or an ambulance, Kotetsu started to get antsy in his seat.

Some of the other patients seemed just as restless as he, but in a much more dramatic fashion. Some stared out the windows with restlessness, with anxiety, and even grim resignation. It seemed like an odd mix of emotions to him, but if they had problems with hallucinations and schizophrenia, the night wouldn't be a very fun time for them.

Soon, though, the sun set, the rays fading with it, and then all hell broke loose. Kotetsu should have read the signs, seen how some of the adults and children on the bus clawed at their seats like they were on fire. When the nurses fell to the floor, Kotetsu instinctively jumped up to assist, but what he saw had him frozen in place. They were literally changing into ghouls and panic quickly overtook the entire bus.

The former Hero was grateful the nurses--Now monstrous villains--hadn't confiscated his new, crappy mask along with his alcohol as he dug it out of his jacket and cinched it to his face. He turned to his partner, but neither Hero needed words. They simply understood and Kotetsu immediately broke open the emergency hatch behind them with experienced ease, while Barnaby tried to corral the masses to the back of the bus. The alarm sounded but it really couldn't be heard over the raucous surrounding them all.

....the fuck?

Murphy Pendleton couldn't decide what was a dream and what was reality. Another strange bed. Another memory of....

God. What now? Wasn't this nightmare over?

His things were gone again. But...had he even had anything on him, before the darkness took him that last time? No, that couldn't have been real. It had been some...some crazy vision. The town could do that somehow. He just...saw what Cunningham saw, that was all.

Speaking of...there was no one in this place, which looked like a hospital. That was strange...he couldn't remember any hospitals. And it was curiously quiet; no strange giggling or pained moaning echoing through the hallways. No static. Even his clothes were different, and he hadn't changed them himself this time.

"What's going on?" Was the town still playing with him? Or was he like Bobby now, stuck and forced to spend his existence in hell until he broke one of their stupid, arbitrary rules? No. That wasn't fair. That wasn't fair at all, he'd done what he had to, God damnit!

Murphy took a deep breath. He needed to focus on the positives and maintain calm. Whatever was happening, he was still alive. And after everything he'd made it through up until now, he could get through this, too. There had been clothes in the closet of the room he'd woken up in, and a radio and journal to replace the ones lost. Even a flashlight. The best weapon had been a chair, but he'd hauled plenty of chairs all over Silent Hill already.

Having no clues at all to guide him and no sense of immediate danger, Murphy began traversing the halls of the unknown hospital that had claimed him....

[from here]

Footsteps echoing in the dingy corridors, Murphy kept his ears alert for the slightest crackle of static or rumble of thunder. But he heard neither. Something was...off here. More off.

"You know you've got problems when you're worried about levels of fucked-upness," he muttered to himself, peering around the corner into a wider hallway. It looked like it led out of the patient room wing. No monsters in here, and no Cunningham either.

Not to mention a lack of jarring paperwork scattered about. But of course there wasn't, what was left?

"Don't try to understand. You're not going to, not like this. Just...get out."

That core objective remained the same. Get out. Get...somewhere. Anywhere. Make like the couple in the song, go down south to Mexico and live on the beach. Lay in the sun and drink fruity drinks all day, try and be happy.

But first, another damned hallway....

[from here]

...Another empty hallway.

Chair held by both back legs - one in each hand - Murphy sighed and slumped against the wall. These stupid clothes didn't have pockets, and shoving things awkwardly in the waistband of his pants was beginning to become a pain. If this were a normal chair, like he usually found, he'd just break it apart and use one of the legs. Unfortunately, that didn't look like an option.

There was less junk lying around here, too. Practically none, now that he thought about it. Maybe...maybe he didn't need a weapon? The radio had remained silent, and there were no corpses lying around. Not even a blood trail.

He set the chair down and took the radio out, wondering if maybe it was broken. He stuck the end of the flashlight into his mouth to free his hands and allow him to investigate the piece of equipment.

Maybe this was some sort of clue....

[For Nina!]

Nina Fortner stirred with a soft, tired groan. She rolled from her back onto her stomach, only to feel her face press against soft, cool fabric with a hard shape underneath it. She immediately pushed herself up, making another little noise, one of confusion, her eyes popping open to see nothing but darkness. One hand felt under the pillow until she touched plastic.

Her hand curved around the elongated shape, fingers feeling over its grooves, trying to discern what it was. A flashlight! Nina's eyes had started to adjust to the darkness a little, but this was much better. Almost immediately after her hand wrapped around it, Nina pushed the covers off and sat up in her bed, turning on the flashlight with some gentle pressure to the tiny button and a small click.

The last thing she remembered was sitting beside Dr. Tenma in Ruhenheim, rain pouring down on them. Nina had felt both sadness and relief. She had lost her brother, as far she knew, right after she had forgiven him. But at least it was finally over, and at least Dr. Tenma hadn't been the one to pull the trigger. She could take solace in that, even if the ache of wanting to forgive Johan and not getting to remained.

Not that she had much time to meditate on it. All she could think about was how she had gotten from Ruhenheim to this new, strange place. It looked like she was in some kind of hospital room, but she wasn't injured, and everything felt too real for this to be a dream, no matter how strange it seemed... so where was she?

Nina felt the metallic tang of fear in her mouth but forced herself not to panic as she ran through the possibilities in her mind. Had she been taken into custody by the police, or some kind of government official? Had she been kidnapped? Why? By who? And why had they changed her clothes like this? She felt of shiver of combined embarrassment and worry as she pointed the flashlight down at herself, revealing the form-fitting smiley face t-shirt and nondescript sweatpants.

Why didn't she remember anything in between trying to console Dr. Tenma and waking up in this weird room, and where was everyone else?

Well, she wasn't just going to sit around and wonder! After everything she'd been through, she deserved an answer, and she wasn't just going to wait around until she got one. Nina stood up, taking a deep breath and started to examine the room. The closet was largely uninteresting; nine other t-shirts, identical to the one she was wearing, more sweatpants, and a few other things that weren't important right now. She did put on the sneakers she found there before moving to examine other areas of the room. Wandering around barefoot wouldn't do any good.

The dresser was a little more helpful, but not much. There was a radio, which refused to turn on no matter how hard Nina tried or even faintly pleaded under her breath. When she examined it more closely with the flashlight, though, she couldn't seem to find anything defective about it. With a frustrated sigh, she eventually set it back where she found it. It was as good as broken right now if she couldn't get it work. She left the pens and the journal untouched without a second thought. They weren't any use to her right now. The only thing she took was the keyring, after experimenting and realizing that one of the keys went to the desk drawer. She wondered what the other key was for and decided to keep it with her until she found out. It didn't look small enough to go to another desk drawer.

The rest of the room was just as uninteresting and just as unhelpful. There were no sign that anyone else had ever been in the room recently, or maybe ever at all. Except for Nina, the room was empty. She was alone.

After she'd finished thoroughly exploring the room, Nina went to the door and gave it a light knock, hoping to attract attention and an explanation. When no one answered, she knocked a little louder and harder, calling, "Hello? Is anyone out there?" She didn't sound uncertain or frightened or angry, not for now, at least. Still, there was a definite, insistent purpose in the undertone of her voice. Nina knew what she wanted to hear: A familiar voice, or failing that, at least an official-sounding one that could explain everything.

So far, though, there was nothing but silence. Maybe everyone was asleep. But the circumstances were so strange that Nina just couldn't wait for morning to find out what had happened to her. Nina gave a third, even more forceful knock.

The door swung open.

By the time the darkness fell and the strange fluxing of air swept across the buses, Tolten still wasn't certain what was going on. Only that there was some problem with the final bus, and that they had been waiting to resume.

Of course now it was very certain that there would be no return trip tonight. Whatever the implications of that were, the young king had no idea. Nor did he spare a thought to it. Rather he found himself lurching to his feet and losing his lunch in the empty seat space behind him.

It was the only reaction his body could offer to what he saw unfold before his eyes, a twisted carnival show of gore and depravity the likes of which he had never imagined. Even the creatures in the sewers were less violent and torturous than this!

He knew he didn't have time for pity or wonderment as to whether or not the staff was always like that, under the surface, but his mind was slow to follow. He could only stare, shaking, his mind buzzing with fear and disgust and sorrow.

This was simply wrong!

[For Locke!]

With the blond's outburst disturbing not only the peace and quite of the trip back, but the trip itself by way of a detour into a damn tree, Kurogane's patience had worn thin by well before the sun had begun to set. No amount of alcohol would have helped temper his mood either. Stuck on the side of the road with the night drawing ever closer... it was almost as though Landel had intended for something like this. That man knew what happened were they not back in the building by nightfall, and a good number of them knew the same.

Probably not the blond idiot.

Though his patience was all but gone, his attention to the situation was heightened with the threat of darkness closing in. Each passing moment put them closer to another attack like before, and if there was where the night was to begin, he wasn't going to be trapped in any vehicle, moving or otherwise. That decision kept him on edge, watching between the window and the bus's back door beside him and waiting with the only remaining patience he had to spare.

"Be ready," was all he'd said to the girl beside him, knowing or at least hoping that she understood what was soon to come. He wasn't sure if she'd been there the time before, but as a ninja she should have known enough to expect anything with the tension aboard.

The moment he caught the sun's final dip beyond the horizon, he was out of his back seat and unhinging the emergency hatch for a quick exit to the ground, expecting that Tsubaki would be close behind. "Come on!" he barked back before starting around the bus at a quick pace. The town was long gone, but the chance stood that the Institute would be not too far ahead of them.