damned_institute | Day 28: Bus 2

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Day 28: Bus 2

The group hadn't made it to the Twin Pines before the nurses started ushering them back to the buses. Sanji didn't believe the small sack dinner he was handed would make up for the meal they would have had at the restaurant, and aside from that he'd still wanted to check the place out. Now he had no way of comparing it to what they served at the asylum and he couldn't help but wonder if the staff had planned it that way.

Somehow in the large crowd of patients and nurses he lost track of his crewmates, something that seemed to be occurring just as often as Usopp warned it would. He had their room numbers now, though. He would find them tonight if not before.

His dinner was eaten quickly and he found it lacking, but he wouldn't complain. What he really needed was a cigarette. Bringing it up on the walk down Main Street earlier had only made him think about it more, and now he was just irritable. He tapped a light broken rhythm on the plastic pane of his window, staring out at the other patients as they were loaded into the buses also.

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Sanji did not want to go that route. Any further along that route and his inexperience would show. That, or he'd have to start lying Usopp style. Though that wasn't looking like too bad of an option at the moment. What would he say? They call me the God of Sex where I come from. Women come by the dozens, no, hundreds just to beg for a night with me.

Yeah. No.

"I don't want to hear about your sex life," Sanji sneered. "A disgusting old man like you? It's like thinking about my parents." Who had been dead since he was a child and remembering their faces at all could be difficult, but that didn't matter. He just needed to turn this conversation around.

Jack nearly choked on his sandwich. A 'disgusting old man'?! Jack was old, sure (older than anyone here, he reckoned), but there was something to Sanji's tone that made it seem as if the pirate was implying he was covered in wrinkles and balding. Swallowing down the food in his mouth, he turned to his seatmate coldly and said simply, "You care to repeat that, kid?"

Having gotten a rile out of the other blond, Sanji allowed himself to smirk. He leaned a bit more towards Jack, speaking slowly and over-enunciating just to push things further. "I said I don't want to hear about the sex life of a disgusting... old... man... like you."

For someone who had just been bragging about having done things while the chef had been in diapers, he was sure insensitive about his age. Would he even be willing to start a fight here on the bus? The staff wouldn't have any difficulty getting to them, with as many as there were.

Jack gritted his teeth but refused to strike the other--not yet, not unless he crossed the line (which he was, admittedly, close to crossing). "Yeah, sure," he said, pretending to shrug it off and went back to his sandwich. "Anyhow, since you asked, I'll start by telling you about this one chick I met outside the tavern this one winter when I was wandering about the countryside. She had this annoying laugh, but jugs the size of Wisconsin. So we're drinking this ale--it's some strong shit. They don't brew ale like that anymore, which is a shame because it was always a nice thing to swallow down after a hard day. She drops something, I dunno, whatever it was she was holding and bends over to get it..."

Or had Sanji said he didn't want to hear? It was a known fact that the elderly lost their hearing, so Jack decided he must have missed that part of Sanji's request.

Sanji rolled his eyes as Jack went on with a story anyway, obviously just in an attempt to tick the chef off further. He didn't have any clue what the man was referring to when he mentioned "Wisconsin," but the idea still got across. It was already sounding like a rather rude way to go about picking up women.

Though, Sanji couldn't say he hadn't attempted to hit on women while they were intoxicated either, but Jack's methods were simply cruder. Really.

"Well I suppose you would have to go for the drunk ones," he interrupted. "As nobody sober would sleep with your ugly mug."

"You're funny, buddy," Jack smiled widely, combating his anger with an overdramatic show of friendliness. "A laugh a minute."

How could anyone find him ugly? He didn't need to get them drunk to score. Most of the time, anyhow. Plenty of sober women were constantly wooed by him and remarked on how he was sex incarnate when he wasn't trapped in this hellhole. Men wished they could be him; women wished they could have hair like him. Point being, Jack was a sexy beast and he knew it.

HA! So who was this mundy to make him question his own appeal? HE WAS JACK HORNER, Jack of the tales, Jack the hero of every goddamn story he was in, who always got his woman and was adored by everyone! This loser was obviously jealous of him. Jack would set him straight. "You're one to talk, anyhow. What's up with your eyebrows?"

"What, this?" Sanji asked as though he hardly realized there was anything different about his eyebrows, even though Zoro made fun of it at any opportunity. He traced a finger over the swirl of the one eyebrow that showed. The smirk remained on his face.

"It's a very distinguishing feature! How many men have you seen with brows that will grow like this? Women think it's adorable." Well, some women. He didn't know if the ones in Whiskey Peak counted, now that he thought about it. Nami and Robin had never mentioned it, but then he was with them all the time. They'd probably just become desensitized to it.

"Now I've seen everything," The Fable remarked, a bit confused. Was this mundy say he styled his eyebrows? That was the weirdest thing Jack had heard of in awhile. That women thought it was adorable, though...

"How...exactly did you get that to work?" He inquired.

Actually, Sanji had never thought much about his eyebrow. "How did I get it to work?" He looked genuinely baffled by the question. How did he get it to work? "It's just sort of always grown like that," he answered.

Then he was quick to recover. "Like I said. It's a distinguishing feature. Very unique. Not some run-of-the-mill just-a-bit-too-bushy brows like yours."

What was with the character assassination? Jack narrowed his eyes. "Where I come from, the women don't exactly choose based on eyebrows. They look for the qualities of a REAL man." That wasn't entirely true, Jack knew; for example, no hot chick was going to sleep with any man with a unibrow.

But now he was feeling a bit self conscious. Were his eyebrows really a bit too bushy? He knew they were a bit darker than the hair on his head, but come on! Women didn't judge THAT harshly, did they?

Damn this mundy.

"Well of course they don't just judge on eyebrows, dumbass!" Sanji laughed. "Quit reading too much into what I say. It's a distinguishing feature. Obviously I have many others. Just in comparing myself to you, you're rather plain. But who knows? Maybe girls go for plain where you come from."

The continuing inference that he wasn't a real man was grating a bit on Sanji, but he was doing his best not to let this show. He still had the upper hand, or so it appeared.

Plain. He was calling Jack plain. This smart mouthed little shit had the BALLS to call Jack, the greatest and most powerful Fable (under most circumstances, Jack amended his thoughts) who ever lived 'plain'?!

The remainder of Jack's sandwich was smushed as his clentched his fist and gritted his teeth. "You're looking for a beating, aren't you, pal?"

The idea that this crude man was of any threat to him caused Sanji to chuckle again. "From you?" Sure, there wasn't a whole lot of room in the seat they were in, but the chef considered himself to be a pretty flexible person. He didn't think he'd be at too much of a disadvantage.

"I'm not feeling very threatened."

Jack glowered. As much as he wanted to wring the smug bastard's neck, he was aware of the possibility for sedation that awaited him if he started the fight. But would they sedate him if he just fought back in self defense? Surely they took that into account here.

"You wouldn't," Jack said, smirking slightly. He would have to get Sanji to attack first, if the kid was really so keen on going up against him. "Because honestly, I don't hit girls."

"Honestly? Neither do I." In fact, Sanji was pretty certain that he held onto those standards much more religiously than this man did. As much as he loved women, however, he didn't like the idea of being compared to one. After all - Sanji was made for the ladies, not like them.

If the chef hadn't already been so irritable at this point, then he might have been able to shrug off the comment. But that, with the others, was really just pissing him off. He couldn't stand sitting next to the man anymore. "If you'll excuse me, your filthy presence is starting to agitate my nose. I think I'd be better off with the seat to myself."

Saying that, he twisted himself in his seat in order to bring both legs up, which he then planted full force into Jack's side.

Well, the Fable had what he wanted- the other man had drawn first blood. However, Jack had been anticipating something more along the lines of a fist to the jaw or eye socket, so when Sanji kicked him in the side, he was taken a little off guard.

"OW!"

He was forced from the seat and to the floor from the kick, doubling over slightly in a mix of surprise and pain. That little bastard sure had strong legs. Well, Jack didn't have time sit there and take in the hurting; he had some "self defending" to dish out.

Forcing himself into a standing position, he issued a threat ("You're gonna pay for that") and threw the Strawhat a left hook right at his ugly mug.

Sanji had expected to do a little more damage with that kick than he had. The fact that Jack was up again so quickly either meant that the man was more resilient than he thought, or that it was just another aspect of this world's ability to weaken them. He was prepared to deliver another, moving forward in the seat.

Unfortunately, the confined space the seats on the bus offered gave him very little maneuverability. It was only because of that, or so he would say later, that Jack managed to land a blow to his face.

Sanji fell back scowling, with a hand to a slightly busted lip. Quickly, he was up on the seat where he'd be able to dish out more damage. The little voice in the back of his head reminding him of where he was and what could become of this action was momentarily ignored.

And now the jerk was standing on the seat. Why? To kick Jack in the teeth? 'I'd like to see him try,' The Fable thought, unimpressed in his mind but subconsciously adopting a stance to lessen the chance of losing a couple molars. He bent his knees and raised an arm, feigning a cross between a karate(what did Jack know about martial arts? Nothing! It just looked cooler this way, he told himself) and a boxing pose. If Sanji wanted to make another move, he'd be ready to hit 'im again with...something.

"What's the matter," he taunted, "It's your turn, buddy."

Oh, for the love of -- well, she hadn't exactly expected perfect behavior from the patients, but really, after a day of freedom, you'd think they'd be less inclined to start attacking each other!

"Nathan! John!" The nurse stopped a seat away from the brawling men, her face in a disapproving scowl. "Stop this immediately! You're endangering yourselves and all the other patients!" She didn't come any closer, but her facial expression ... well, it was only getting stronger. "I don't know what's gotten into you two, but I will call for sedation if you don't stop this instant."

The name Nathan still didn't quite register with Sanji, and as such it didn't immediately grab his attention. Though it helped that most of his attention was currently focussed on Jack. His lip was bleeding now. Just a little, but it was more damage than he should have taken.

He had the upper ground now, and he wasn't about to just give it up so easily. Fully missing the nurse's warning, he lifted himself up on the seat backs and brought both feet down on Jack's shoulder's - throwing him forward and down hard into the seat beneath him.

...

Well, this wasn't how Jack wanted to spend the ride back to Landel's. Besides being a humiliating and painful position, the seat tasted of dirty pleather. Ew.

"Geb your dagm feeb og oh me, you ash'le!"

Speaking into a seat tended to garble the sounds that came from one's mouth and it was no exception in this case. Jack shot a hand up and latched onto Sanji's ankle, intending to pull back and take the pirate with him (perhaps slamming him into the ground first).

When both men completely ignored her, the nurse's scowl darkened. She warned the other patients away from them and called to the back of the bus, where a male orderly was waiting to be signaled forward. He made his way quickly to where the brawlers were and hauled Nathan away from John before the latter had a chance to yank the former over.

"Both of you!" the nurse said as Nathan was forced back into his seat. "If you don't stop fighting now, I will have the pair of you sedated. Didn't you hear me before? For now, you're going to be separated. Clearly you can't get along in the same seat!"

The ease with which Sanji was hefted away from his opponent startled the chef. What was this orderly, that he could toss him around so easily. He would have none of it. He was stronger than this. He had taken down enemies that were more than human. Someone like this should be nothing.

Angry, his attention switched abruptly from Jack to the man grabbing him. He angled one knee up towards the man's chin with the intent of snapping his head back.

Too late the woman's voice reached him to make him think better of it.

Jack watched with mild amusement. That idiot was so gonna get sedated.

Come to think of it, there was only one orderly here. The time Jack had been sedated, it had taken a male orderly to subdue him since those petite little ~~sexy~~ whispers of women they called nurses didn't have the muscle to rival the Fable. While Sanji was an annoying bastard, there was no reason Jack couldn't see to use him to his advantage. He could help him take down the orderly by dealing with the nurse and getting her out of the way before she could sedate them (what was she going to do? She couldn't handle all the man that was JACK!), help with the orderly, and be on his way to freedom in no time.

There was a plan Jack Horner could get behind! Hopping up from the seat, he grabbed the nurse by her arm and smirked slightly. "Sorry, sweetheart! I promise you'll only be out for a little while." Pulling his fist back, he drove a punch towards her abdomen, hoping the knock the wind out of her and get her out of the way for a few minutes.

As Nathan's knee jerked toward the orderly's head, the man shoved, thrusting Nathan back down and effectively changing the knee's trajectory. When it had missed, the orderly reached into a pouch-pocket for a syringe - just in time to glance over and see Jack's fist heading straight for the nurse's stomach.

The nurse had initially attempted to break free of John's grip, but when that didn't appear to work and his fist was formed, her expression changed to mild panic.

Unfortunately for John, there was another orderly closer to the front of the bus who was out of his seat in a flash, one hand going for the moving fist and the other for the patient's neck.

If both orderlies were successful, within minutes, Nathan would be sedated and back in his seat, and John's fist would stop before it hit the nurse and he, too, would be forced into his seat. Then the second sedation would occur. The other patients, hopefully, would not ally with this rambunctiousness; both Nathan and John were due for some serious isolation the way they were going!

Day 28: Bus 2

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