Nightshift 28: Bus 2

[misterprince.livejournal.com]

Sanji was blinking furiously, trying to figure out why he still felt awake though everything was dark. The sedatives, just recently injected into his system, were working full force and he was having difficulty figuring out which way was up and down. All the sounds were reminiscent of something out of a nightmare. Was that what this was?

But why couldn't he see anything?

He struggled out of his seat and into the aisle. Slipping and falling to his knees from lack of balance once there, he simply sat for a bit with a hand on the seat behind him. "Th'shit is... What?" his slurred question probably wouldn't mean much to anyone, but that didn't matter. The floor was as good a place as any for the moment as he tried to get a clearer view of things going on around him. Squinting into the darkness revealed very little, and so many voices just befuddled his drugged mind further.

What the shit was going on?

Comments

[arc-wrench.livejournal.com]

HK watched for a moment, fascinated and bemused as the nurses began to scream when the world went strange. But that was only for a moment, as it quickly became clear what was happening. He was up and out of his seat, over the other meatbag and into the isle, heading straight for the closest nurse near the front of the bus. While he had no weapons, this made him very happy. The killing started early tonight!

[icy-demise.livejournal.com]

SubZero jumped up out of his seat immediately, looking around and trying to determine the best course of action for just a moment. With all these other patients around it could become complicated very quickly.

However, when HK rushed past SubZero decided there was no point in wasting time thinking, so he charged along after the other assassin. HK would be outnumbered, and SubZero was prepared to get anything that tried to gang up on him, as narrow as the isles were, even at the front of the bus and fighting over seats it would be difficult for more than three people to fight at once.

[nadine-he-loves.livejournal.com]

Nadine had been curled up on a seat near the rear of the bus, staring out the window and ignoring her dinner and anything going on around her. She had spent most of the trip simply wandering the town, amazed at a place where nothing apocalyptic had ever happened. It was so much like how it had been before the end. It had been...nice.

Now she was snapped back to what had become her reality. Now she stared in rapt horror, feeling her gorge rise as she watched night come over the institute.

Her heart pounding so hard she thought it would burst, Nadine pressed herself tight against the back of the seat and screamed.

[unmocked-lawr.livejournal.com]

Javert was, as a rule, not particularly good at getting people to calm down. That task had usually been delegated to a younger officer back in Paris - one more experienced in the art of the murmuring of soothing words and the offering of handkerchiefs and whatnot. Dealing with a screaming woman was not his idea of a good time.

Still, the importance of getting her out of the bus outweighed his initial reservations (he had promised to protect her, hadn't he?), and anyway, he'd been told that unpleasant as he was to be around, he did have a certain reassuring presence about him. With these thoughts in mind, he cautiously approached Nadine, careful to stay a reasonable distance away from her.

"Mademoiselle?" he said, trying to make himself heard over her screams and the surrounding noise. "Nadine? It's Javert. Let's get you out of here."

[fuyunohanabi.livejournal.com]

Almost as soon as she'd seen the nurses fall to their knees and begin to... to change, Rangiku had slipped one of the knives out from beneath her shirt where she'd stashed it during dinner with Homura. Her eyes widened slightly at the sight of the way the nurses and orderlies transformed into grotesque shapes, not even really human. She took a moment to examine the situation. Nurses between the front and the back. They were trapped in the middle.

Holding the steak knife firmly, she tested the edge; not as sharp as she would like, but it would do some damage and it was better than nothing. Someone though, needed to get things in order before this became a massacre.

Quickly, she stood up on her seat, raising her voice so that she could hopefully be heard. "Everyone!" She was practically shouting to be heard. "Try to break the windows if you can! If you have weapons, hold them off! Move injured out of the way!" If they didn't work together, then they could quite possibly die.

[fuyunohanabi.livejournal.com]

Most of them were gone. a few still fighting, but there wasn't the room for her to join and she was probably already late for meeting Gin. It might be best just to go herself. Try to make things safe for the others who would be exploring.

[To here (http://community.livejournal.com/damned/252798.html?view=19096702#t19096702)]

[bond-off-lame.livejournal.com]

[God, unknowingly waiting for Raiden to naked cartwheel onto him]

Ever since him and Kairi parted ways soon after their little lunch 'date' the day just seemed to get duller by the minute. It was already too late to go anywhere else, so Axel waited near the buses until everyone was eventually wrangled up back into their seats. Maybe it would've done him some good to stick it alone for a while, picking up the second bus and plopped himself near the back for the remainder of the trip.

However, just as he was close to drifting off, the curdling scream that filled the air was enough to pull him from his sleep, blinking blearily around him at the chaos that now took over the bus. Confused at first, the redhead whipped his head about the cramped space, finally catching sight of the deformed nurses that prowled the halls at night.

Except they were now in the bus.

"Grody." Was the only thing Axel could say for the moment, standing up onto his seat so he could catch a better glimpse of both ends of the buses. By then people were shouting out various orders, making him groan outwardly before rolling his sleeves up.

Looks like they were in for a good old-fashioned brawl.

[sneak.livejournal.com]

Their plan didn't end up going anywhere, and Raiden had been expecting that to an extent. Even with Snake and the legendary Gray Fox at the head of their attempt, it was pretty hard to sneak anywhere in broad daylight. Though, in the end, they ended up just not having enough time to try anything, and nurses were collecting them and pulling them back to the buses before they knew it.

On the way back, Raiden once again chose to sit on his own, and for once no one had come to sit with him. He had to wonder where the others were, but it seemed that none of them had made it on the same bus as him. That was all right, though - he would find them later.

The trip was peaceful enough, and he even ate some of his food, but as they reached the institute again, everything started to feel very wrong. The scream was the first thing he reacted to, and it was enough to get him to stand from his seat. It was then that he was forced to watch as the nurses morphed - if this had been happening to him before he'd been through Big Shell, it might have made his stomach turn.

As others jumped into action, Raiden tried to decide on what to do. There were more than enough people there to fight the creatures, so maybe it would be best for him to slip out, especially since some of the patients were already making their own exits. He started to move toward the center of the bus and then caught a shock of red hair illuminated by the moonlight.

"Axel!"

[roses-bleues.livejournal.com]

Diva had been, quite frankly, discontent and bored with the unremarkable bus ride and the woman hovering at her right elbow.

But then something happened.

It was almost instantaneous, how quickly the Chiropteran perked up--her head jerked up even before her eyes tried to adjust to sudden gloom and the sight of shifting bodies. That didn't disturb her, as Chiropterans did it all the time. The inhuman screams weren't new, either. In fact, none of it was. Really, this was her first encounter with a Landel's nightshift, but by then, Diva knew when something was trying to attack and kill her.

Although it'd never happened in such close quarters. Bloodshed in such a confined space would be wonderful.

In one fluid movement, Diva was on her feet on the seat, cocking her head first one way, then the other, curiously absorbing the sights. Huh. To get out to the aisle, she had to step over (or on) Max, and that's just what she tried to do.

[transgenix.livejournal.com]

Max had hardly been prepared for the shift to happen before they'd gotten back to their quarters, and this was the first time she was out of her room to witness the effects of what actually happened when darkness fell. The sight of the nurses writhing, screaming, morphing was something that turned Max's stomach - not an easy feat - and she didn't even have the good luck of having the sight dimmed by darkness, what with her enhanced vision.

If she never watched something like that again, she'd be quite happy. Not even the old gruesome horror flicks she'd seen in the past could compare to that.

Even as the screams filled the bus - and the night outside - her seatmate perked up, showing more life than she had the entire journey. As darkness fell and panic began to flit along the buses inhabitants, the girl at her side scrambled for the aisle.

"Wait, wait! The exits are blocked!" she tried to warn the girl, certain that she must be looking for a way out in her fright.

[reanalyze.livejournal.com]

Citan had been dozing on the ride back, waking when they came to a stop. He had only fully woken up when the world began to change and shift. He blinked, frowning as he realized what was going on.

Well, this was certainly a surprise. So this was what happened when they were locked in their rooms. Interesting. He couldn't tell what triggered it - if it was tied to the sun or a manual trigger. He did wonder....

But it was clear they needed to fight their way off the bus. He hoped his body was up to it. He knew a woman was calling to move the injured, but damned if he was going to simply sit by.

He moved to the center of the aisle, flipping his ponytail over his shoulder.

"Form a box in the middle," he called out, hoping people were listening. "Keep open a safe place for those who cannot fight!"

[raptscarecrow.livejournal.com]

Kakashi had never liked irony. Or bad luck. Having been watching the nurses at the front when they stepped up, he received a pretty clear view of what followed; and while it was certainly horrific to watch, the surprise wasn't so intense that he didn't react immediately. He had seen weirder in his days, after all.

He jumped up as everyone else seemed to, but paused before moving further to assess the situation. The aisle was already hectic -- it would be best to stick to the front of the bus where he was rather than trying to move farther back, if possible. A woman was yelling orders, the fight at the front was already crowded, and he had no weapons -- given the cramped area, it was a bad place for the hand-to-hand he preferred. Damn it.

His attention was drawn to a man who shouted above the rest nearby; acting quickly, Kakashi moved to join him, squeezing between people and seats to try and put his back to his.

"I'm guessing you're one of those who can, then?" he called over his shoulder.

[uruz-vii.livejournal.com]

Well, Sousuke's diversion at the nail salon had utterly failed, and landed both him and Heero back on the bus--separated. He'd spent most of his time looking out the window and trying to memorize any landmarks, but there really weren't any of note.

Unfortunately, there was something more interesting to look at when the buses stopped inside the gates. Seeing as he was in the back of the bus, he had a front row seat to the most grotesque show New Jersey could offer--short of the chemical waste. Two nurses and one orderly were now leering at all the patients in the bus--transformed into what could only be described as monsters.

This situation could get ugly really fast--considering what a small space the bus was. He heard a woman call to hold the monsters off.

"Roger!" Sousuke shouted, rolling from his seat coming up behind one of the nurses. Quickly, he stripped his manly pink dress shirt and tried to put the nurse in a stranglehold with it. If anything, it'd distract the thing for a bit.

[damned-nurses.livejournal.com]

The nurse either was too slow or didn't care about the shirt; it settled around her neck for a moment, tightening. Then she brought her hands up, each finger now tipped with a razor-sharp scalpel, and slashed through the fabric with a rake of her hands. She turned jerkily to face Sousuke, twisted mouth opened to scream.



[Katsu/David - Katsu will post during the night, David if a post is needed during the day.]

[notachick.livejournal.com]

Okita had been so busy doodling on the windows, he hadn't noticed that the darkness had fallen. It wasn't until the monster machine stopped and the monsters actually appeared that he snapped to attention. His head was still groggy and he was slower than he would have liked. He didn't have confidence in his agility or even his aim at the moment, either, but they were in danger.

The swordsman had never seen such horror in his life. The scalpels and needles burst from the nurses' skin and their bodies twisted, dirtied with blood and whatever other horrid matter that the night brought. Creatures were landing on the rooftop and people were panicking, screams and the sounds of uncoordinated attacks richoted around the metal deathtrap.

And all Okita could think was what a shame it was that he hadn't been able to finish his drawing.

Three enemies each at the front and back of the bus, and unknown numbers outside. He needed a weapon. The human side of him winced at what he was about to do, but his practical side saw the scalpels protruding from the nurses and smirked as he stood, carefully tucking his candy away in a safe place again. "An opportunity presents itself, Himura-san, if you don't mind dirtying your hands. I'm going for the scalpels. I hope you'll join me."

Okita leapt over the back of the bench, maneuvering his way down the aisle and toward his goal. He saw Homura and smiled at him as he passed, noting that two more people were already attacking the creatures at the back. With their numbers, it would be difficult to fight, but hopefully easy to destroy these creatures.

[screwthegods]

What he saw before him was something new to even Homura. It seemed not even five hundred years could prepare a man for everything. The twisting of bodies, the screams of agony; Homura could do little more than watch this transformation, which in a way made him feel sympathy for the staff that surrounded him.

So they were as much prisoner as the patients, then? Several thoughts crossed his mind then about the vanished, but they were quickly banished away. Such worries had no place on the battlefield.

Okita was by him like a flash, but Homura caught the grin, and answered it with one of his own. So they had ended up on the same bus. Highly fortunate, given their alliance. He turned to Sanzo with a smirk, and nodded.

"Now I'll take my leave, Konzen. Good luck with whatever you try tonight." WIthout waiting for the snide remark, Homura was out of his seat, following after Okita towards the back. A single type of weapon presented itself, and while it was hardly a sword, the demi-god knew they would have to make due.

Besides, it would do no good to hesitate. So with determination, Homura headed to the back with his fellow.

[unmocked-lawr.livejournal.com]

Night had fallen, but Javert had always had excellent night vision. Now, he was starting to wish he didn't. If he weren't so busy being shocked speechless, he would have been ironically impressed with the creativity the Head Doctor displayed. Every time he thought he'd seen the worst this place could do, Landel came up with something new.

There were patients heading toward both ends of the bus, a few of them brandishing what looked like makeshift weapons - probably, noted a small voice at the back of his mind, stolen from the stores in Doyleton this afternoon. Getting innocent townspeople involved in this was hardly necessary. Still, there would be time enough to be disapproving about it later. Right now, lives were at stake.

"Everyone!" a woman was shouting nearby. "Try to break the windows if you can! If you have weapons, hold them off! Move injured out of the way!"

At least someone was thinking on their feet tonight. Javert turned the window by his seat, running a hand over the frame thoughtfully and pushing experimentally at the center of the pane. It was surprisingly sturdy - most likely it would take some time to break - but he supposed it was worth a try.

Oh, if his colleagues back at the prefecture could see him now. Javert permitted himself a brief smirk before he hurled himself at the window.

[janus-006.livejournal.com]

Instead of chatting as the bus made its way back, Alec had been watching the sun nervously as it sank lower and lower. We're not going to make it. He wondered if the town and surrounding woods would come alive with all sorts of interesting beasts if they were caught in the dark, or if they could avoid the night's 'fun' altogether.

They pulled into the parking lot, and he sighed. Okay, they had arrived. And then the sun dipped below the horizon.

Alec Trevelyan really, really, really wished he hadn't been right. He knew the dangers of small spaces with many people and enemies let loose, having dealt with a similar situation on a commercial airliner once. That wasn't fun. This looked to be about the same degree of fun.

"What is this new devilry?" he murmured, more to himself than to anyone else, as he watched the nurses transform from perky caregivers to horrible flesh-rending beasts. He wasted no more time - he was up in a flash, vaulting over suddenly-vacated seats to make his way to his favorite ally.

"Having fun on your day off?" he quipped to Javert after the former Inspector had come back from his first run. "Here. Let me give you a hand."

This was an option he had not had on the plane, to break open a new exit and escape via defenestration. And right now, Alec wanted out.

[norainu]

Renji surged to his feet as everything changed. His first reaction was to grab Allen by the back of the shirt, dragging him to the side of the seat near the window. "Tear a hole in the side of the bus so people can get out," he said. "No one else can!"

Without waiting for an answer, he went over the top of his seat, heading toward the back of the bus. "GET THE HELL OUT OF THE AISLE IF YOU'RE NOT FIGHTIN'!" he roared at the top of his lungs. He was already only a few seats from the back; he charged at one of the enemies that wasn't already engaged.

[roses-bleues.livejournal.com]

_{[from further up (http://community.livejournal.com/damned/252057.html?thread=18723225#t18723225)]}

Diva wasn't the type to listen, nor strategize, nor care about the wellbeing of others.

When she came down the aisle, she was intent on making space, no matter how or who had to be trampled on to provide it. As a loud man decided to get in her way, her forearm met the small of his back, a forceful blow meant to move him aside.

[broken-exorcist.livejournal.com]

Allen had been staring in wide-eyed wonder as the nurses and orderlies changed from the sweet people who'd fed him dinner into horrible monstrosities. They resembled Akuma, but they weren't. Not so far as he could tell. How could something like that still be human?! It took Renji grabbing him by the collar to shake him from his stupor.

Tear a hole in the bus. He could do that. "R-right!" he replied, regaining his senses as quickly as possible. "Innocence, activate!" he shouted as he focused his concentration on his left arm. With an explosion of greenish and silver light, his Innocence took shape, morphing his hand into a massive white claw. It was cramped, but he tore into the metal on the side of the bus, feeling the glass crunch beneath his warped fingers. It wasn't long before the hole was large enough to fit a man through, but he didn't stop there. Allen pushed at the metal and glass around it, widening the hole as much as he could.

"Over here!" he shouted to anyone that would listen. "Hurry!"

[misterprince.livejournal.com]

So much yelling. Sanji dragged himself back to the edge of the seat just to make room for others to get by. He'd already been nearly run over more than once. He didn't need to add bruising to his current list of woes.

The chef knew he had to be out of it when his eyes finally focused on someone tearing apart the wall of the bus. A kid no less, from what it looked like. Most of the fighting going on around him still wasn't registering, but that show of strength right there was pretty hard to ignore.

Staggering slowly towards the newly made exit, Sanji waved half-heartedly with one hand to try and get the kid's attention. "Hey. Hey. What's... goin' on?"

[forgot-it-all.livejournal.com]

The buses screeched to a halt and Ritsuka got ready to deal with his annoying nurse again, when he realized something was horribly amiss. The sun was sinking faster than it should have and he froze as the scream pierced the air. He knew he shouldn't look forward, but he turned anyway and was treated to the sight of the nurses and orderlies morphing into...

He didn't know what those things were.

His mind blanked out and he blanched, shrinking back against the seat as if it would protect him. Things landed on the roof and suddenly a hole was in the side of the bus. So much chaos erupted around him and he found himself completely frozen as he stared at two men attacking what used to be his nurse. He knew Soubi was right next to him, but these things weren't anything like what they'd fought before. They were people. He couldn't order Soubi to hurt people! He couldn't-- The busybody had needles and dead flesh rather than her usual cheerfulness on her face - rotting, decaying, bloody, horrid.

She couldn't see him, but he could see her as she attacked people. His brain finally registered what was happening and he couldn't keep himself from screaming.

[qui-gonjinn.livejournal.com]

Qui-Gon materialized behind the screaming patient. It was difficult to make out any details when so much was going on inside the cramped quarters of the bus, but he could tell that the other patient was young and appeared unarmed, and far too close to the nurses - or what was left of them, because they were only humanoid in appearances. There was no time for introductions as Qui-Gon bent down next to him and clapped a guiding hand on his shoulder:

"Come on!" he said.

He hadn't actually seen whoever was responsible for blowing out the side of the bus, but that was the closest - and probably best bet - to escaping. He had no idea what was outside, but at least they would have room to move around instead of being trapped inside the confines of the buses with these warped creatures and no means of defense on hand. If they moved quickly, they should be able to make the exit, he thought, glancing toward the hole.

[qui-gonjinn.livejournal.com]

The thing that hit Qui-Gon like a physical blow wasn't the lights or the screech of the buses as they came to a halt. It wasn't the screaming from the Facility.

It was the Force.

The Force itself seemed to ripple and fold like a wave, tendrils of it darkening and coming from all directions at once; Qui-Gon was faintly aware that he was pressed back onto his seat, his breath coming in unconscious pants. As he was still seated, he didn't actually see the nurses transform - but he sensed it, the Force flickering in and out, and when it touched those human lives, they suddenly winked out in the Force' they were there, but not there, and it was just as disorienting to sense the growing number of holes in the Force as it was the first time around.

It was only a split second of hesitation, but it seemed to last much longer. Forcing himself to get to his feet, the Jedi Master glanced around. With the pandemonium erupting on the bus, dotted with the voids in the Force, it was difficult to tell what was where or even how many patients were on-board. Several were making a stand, others were being attacked.

[at-patera.livejournal.com]

While he had been silent for most of the bus ride back, allowing Farfarello and Schuldig their time together, Crawford had felt a strange sense of foreboding since setting foot on the bus. It wasn't an unfamiliar sensation, as being able to see the future had granted him dominion over it, but this was not the foreboding that came with a vision. It was the foreboding that came with realizing something bad was bound to happen.

The sun was setting, he realized halfway back. They were never going to make it back to the institute before the sun set.

His suspicions were confirmed when everything went black and the screaming started. His instincts reacting immediately to the realization that they were now trapped on the bus with the demons that normally plagued the institute, Crawford stood up and narrowed his eyes in the darkness.

"Schuldig. Farfarello." The chaos that was ensuing around him, both in front and in back, was giving him opportunities to think. "We can either stay and fight, or get off the bus and get back into the institute ... or try to find a way around it." Fighting in an enclosed space like this was not a good idea, but if they wanted to stay, he'd try to coordinate from where he was.

But he was unarmed, damn it. The pipes were back in his room.

[k4t4str0ph4l.livejournal.com]

Schuldig was getting the exact same chaotic input from several dozen different minds, all at once - things had gone to hell. The confusion was so immediate, so disorienting even inside the minds it belonged to, that Schuldig had to rest his forehead on the back of the seat in front of him, however briefly and however dangerously open this left him to attack, simply to focus enough to prevent himself from being overwhelmed.

It would have been roughly like seeing a few dozen jumbled jigsaw puzzles through other people's eyes, except that usually jigsaw puzzles didn't involve cramped buses, lots of screaming, and monsters trying to kill you. Too bad; that might almost make jigsaw puzzles interesting.

Once he'd recovered from the initial shock, the sound of Crawford's voice penetrated - their leader wasn't yelling, but he was the sort of man who didn't have to yell to be heard, no matter what the noise level. The things he said simply found their way to the ears they were meant for, regardless of the ambient noise level they had to wade through. He slid out of his seat and was by Crawford's side the next moment.

"No sense staying in here," he remarked, gaze sliding over the chaos of the bus until they landed on the hole in the side. "Not when there's already a way out. We can fight outside, if we have to, but I don't think even Farfarello wants to fight in a bus aisle. As for what we do once we're off...you're the leader, Crawford." This was said surprisingly directly; when crunch time came, Schuldig was surprisingly willing to acknowledge Crawford's authority...or, at least, it was surprising to anyone who wasn't familiar with the Schwarz dynamic and who'd only seen Schuldig at his snarky, uncooperative, independent worst best.

[myopic-mousse.livejournal.com]

Mousse's jaw dropped. Did fear and chaos descend upon this place whenever darkness fell?

The Amazon hopped to his feet and looked for a route of escape amidst the ambush. It would do no good for him to try and take on the attacking forces alone and it's appeared as if waves of patients already had that under control. If one should give him a reason to fight, he hopped he would be able to defeat the former human staff, though bare fisted fighting was not his specialty (and certianly not with an arm in a sling). Now, however, was the time to make a quick exit and look for something to arm himself.

He directed his attention toward an empty seat and began wailing away on it with a flurry of kicks. If only he could still turn into a duck, he would have slipped through no problem! As was, the glass began to crack, but it would still be a matter of time before he could make an opening large enough to escape from the bus.

[myopic-mousse.livejournal.com]

It sure was drafty in this bus, the Amazon mused.

Wait a minute...

He turned around and noticed that there was, in fact, already a hole in the side of the bus. Mentally slapping himself on the forehead for being an idiot and overlooking it, he darted for the opening.

[To here (http://community.livejournal.com/damned/252798.html)]

[koukakurou.livejournal.com]

Get out of the way if you aren't fighting, very wise words indeed. Now if only someone would listen past their panic. Oriya leapt to his feet as the nurses became... not of this world. Although he was weaponless and aching he could still hold his own and there were plenty of others who could barely hope to do the same. He could not afford to rest.

Whirling around and using the back of the seats as leverage, Oriya lunged towards on of the nurses in the front of the bus in hopes to distract them long enough for some of the passengers to escape. Or, in the very least, so those fighting in the back weren't overwhelmed by the nurses in the front.

[damned-nurses.livejournal.com]

With the nurses engaged, that left the orderly. Lumbering and slow, but stronger than anyone should ever be, the distorted hulk stepped forward as the nurses began to fall. It didn't have much room to swing the heavy chain it carried, but it didn't necessarily need the chain. As Oriya dashed forward, the orderly threw a meaty fist out, trying to catch the man in the chest.

[Kaze]

[small-fortune.livejournal.com]

He had seen... something. He couldn't...

The bus erupted into violence, screaming and shouting and people fighting the creatures that the nurses had become. He had almost complained about not seeing a monster in this place yet. Now he'd finally gotten to see one.

We're getting out. He crouched down as effectively as he could, glancing around at the bus and the fights on it. Some people were attacking the creatures, but the fights were all chaotic and disorganized. The man he'd been sitting with had sprung into action. Mark might be able to-- No, we are getting out of here now.

He managed to crawl his way towards an exit that his seatmate had made with some other unknown man, then slipped through. A small round body, he would hopefully pass unnoticed even in tacky bright clothing. As soon as he hit the ground outside the bus, he started running. Plenty of time to try to digest what he'd seen later.

[Headed out here (http://community.livejournal.com/damned/252798.html)]

[highlord-ofhell.livejournal.com]

Saetan stood as soon as the confusion began. He'd not been paying much attention at all on the trip back, musing over the strange girl. But for the longest time--only moments but it felt much longer--he couldn't make sense of the battles. Then it resolved into a few patients fighting up front and the back, trying to overpower the nurses, a few trying to keep the middle isolated, and a few others making their own exits.

Largely, it looked under control. He could not sense Daemon anywhere on the other buses, and put it down to his dulled psychic senses and the tidal wave of wrongness flooding out from the warped and twisted nurses. But it seemed best to be getting out. He made his way to the hole and pushed his way out of the hole.

[dropping down to here] (http://community.livejournal.com/damned/252798.html)

[deathneverlies.livejournal.com]

The ride back to the Institute had been a lazy one. Duo made himself content with slouching down in his seat and dozing off. If the past two nights were any indication, he wouldn't be getting any sleep later. He might as well catch up now.

It was the painful screech of the buses coming to a halt that jolted him back into full consciousness. "There already, huh?" he mumbled under his breath, glancing out the window. The fact that it was almost dark was a little disconcerting. Wasn't that when...

Duo didn't even get a chance to finish the thought before the world actually rippled in front of his eyes, and all hell broke loose on the buses. The sight of and the screams of agony coming from the staff had Duo pressed back against his seat in horror. Oh god, what were those things?! The way they twisted and shifted and reformed. Having seen more death and bloodshed than most men twice his age, Duo was hardly one to be called squeamish, but this? The boy pressed his hand firmly over his mouth to help keep from gagging. Humans were not supposed to do that! What the hell was wrong with this place?!

Tearing his eyes away from the gruesome scene, he turned to Omi. "We need to get the hell off this bus. Now." Where the exit was or how it was made or who came with or anything else didn't matter, as long as they got away from those things.

[daddyslilkiller.livejournal.com]

The Omi you are trying to reach is currently unavailable. Please leave a message after the beep. *beep*

Omi wasn't exactly the sort of child who was allowed to believe in monsters under the bed when he was little. In fact, he'd learned fairly quickly that even if there were monsters under his bed, he had far less to fear from them than from the sort of monsters he hunted every night. The real monsters were all human.

Which somehow made the nurses that much worse. And, perhaps, that much more fascinating.

Well, he was a Takatori, after all.

Add to that the fact that this was his first run-in with a real monster (not to mention six of them), and it wasn't hard to see why he wasn't exactly paying much attention to Duo. Of course, it also wasn't hard to see that he wasn't used to losing his head like this just out of a little fascinated terror, so he eventually managed to drag enough of his attention back to Duo to realize he'd said something. "Huh?"

[nobleman]

Guy had headed back to the bus with his stomach full. The burger had certainly hit the spot, though he, Claude, and Ashton hadn't had much time to eat before they had been gathered up and taken back to the buses. Even though Guy had gotten to do some looking around on the trip, he hadn't been able to explore nearly as much as he had planned to. If there was ever another time, hopefully he would be able to make his way through the town a little more efficiently.

The bus ride back probably would have been well-spent talking to someone about their world's technology, but Guy didn't have his notebook with him... It didn't seem practical to try and remember everything that was said. The trip had worn him out some, so he felt drowsy after his meal.

He dozed, half-awake, and jerked up every now and then to glance out the window. With the sun setting, it was harder to see the passing scenery. He felt the bus jostle as they rolled back into their prison. He figured they would be back to their rooms and then night would begin, but as it turned out, it seemed like the timing had been off.

Or maybe this had been intentional.

Guy stayed in his seat for a moment - all he could do was watch as the nurses' bodies convulsed and then morphed. The first thing he thought of was what had happened to Mohs.

The problem was that he had nothing to fight with - not even his bat. Apparently some other people were armed in one way or another, seeing how it wasn't long before fights were raging and the bus was being cleaved open. With how crowded it was, Guy knew it was better to flee than fight at this point. He wouldn't be much help, so it was better to clear out and let the other patients handle the monsters.

Quickly, the blond stood from his seat and darted through the opening in the middle of the bus, out onto the institute grounds.

[nobleman]

[ To here. ]

[haiiro-no-chou.livejournal.com]

Rukia froze when the world shifted around her, and sickening cries came from somewhere in - or above - the institute. As soon as the nurses and orderlies on the bus began to crack and shift into their monstrous night-time selves, HK-47 pushed right past Rukia.

Unfortunately, he also managed to knee her in the stomach. It wasn't a major injury, but she curled up for a moment, muscles tensing. It was only a delay of a few seconds, but by the time she could straighten, it was chaos around her.

Vice Captain Matsumoto was shouting orders; Rukia could only just make out her words. Moving to look for any wounded, since she didn't have a weapon, Rukia spotted Allen tearing a gaping hole in the side of the bus. She heard a low yell from the back of the bus that could only be Renji, but she wasn't going to worry about him now; he could take care of himself in a fight.

In the couple seconds she spent looking for anyone with injuries, more people were piling out of the bus through the hole Allen made. HK-47 and another man were fighting a couple nurses, but they looked okay for the moment.

In the dim light, Rukia caught sight of something shiny and wet on the floor of the bus. Blood. Slipping from her seat, she hurried toward it.

[Going here (http://community.livejournal.com/damned/252057.html?thread=18781081#t18781081).]

[ditched-again.livejournal.com]

He’d fallen asleep at the back of the bus, and was only awoken to the sudden ruckus. “What in blazes is going on here?!” The sword grumpily bellowed out as he stood up on his seat. Glaring for all that he was worth, the Night Rune incarnation got hit with the overwhelming stench of darkness – causing his legs to fall out from beneath him.

Clutching at his chest tightly, the Star Dragon Sword took a moment to catch the breath he lost before peering out from around the corner of the seat. Last night he hadn’t made it close enough to anything remotely evil to gain any strong reactions, but being so close to such evil now was almost completely overwhelming him while in this human form.

Amber eyes blazed in fury, and the sword unconsciously summoned the dark lightning within to come forth and strike down its foes. Leaping off of his seat, the sword only took a few steps before freezing mid-motion when nothing occurred. “What the—?” The question died down in his throat when no attack came forth, and the memory of his sealed abilities came back into mind.

“Dammit.” He was in no fighting condition as he was, and until he’d figured out how to ‘unseal’ them or obtain himself some form of weapon, even the Star Dragon Sword knew he was useless to anybody in his current state. Damn his useless body of flesh! He’d take his steel figure over one of fat and muscle any day.

Sighting a man-made exit along one of the other seating areas, the sword didn’t waste a moment of time as he dove through the hole. Instantlly rolling the moment he came into contact with the ground, the Star Dragon Sword was back up onto his feet before darting off and back towards the institutes front doors.

Jumps through to here. (http://community.livejournal.com/damned/252798.html)

[kingofknights.livejournal.com]

Saber reacted quickly through trained instinct. There would be a mad rush for the door soon enough, and she could already feel the hasty retreat of her companion beside her. The nurses were crowding in on them swiftly, but there was no time to waste. She had a duty to uphold in seeing to the safety of her small group. It was illogical to think herself capable of taking on much more given her weakened state.

With eyes shut only briefly to give in to more darkness, the Servant summoned Excalibur in a quick flash of light before artfully darting and weaving toward the exit.

[i-promised.livejournal.com]

[from here (http://community.livejournal.com/damned/252798.html?thread=18867582#t18867582)]

Zoro entered the bus through the large hole in the side (what the fuck made THAT??), easily avoiding the glass shards and scraps of metal littered around the area. He stepped aside to let a few escaping patients through, pointedly ignoring the counter flow. This bus was just as chaotic as the one they'd left behind and only his battle hardened senses helped him get a good grasp of what was going on.

There were no familiar faces aside from Sousuke bleeding at the back of the bus, but the boy had two people with him and Zoro's nakama always came first. The pirate scanned the bus thoroughly, a critical frown on his face.

"I don't see them..." He muttered, just loud enough for Luffy to hear.

[rubbermancan.livejournal.com]

"I don't either," Luffy responded, a hard frown creasing his face. He recognized some of the faces on the bus, but none of them were anyone he knew all that well, much less any of his own crew.

It was possible something had happened to them, but Luffy liked to think they were still in that other bus they hadn't check yet. After all, his comrades were strong. It'd take a lot more than some mutated Cat Ladies and crazy birds to bring them down!

"Let's go look at that other one," he added, and with that, he turned away and head back outside.

((To here. (http://community.livejournal.com/damned/252798.html?thread=18915966#t18915966) ))

[i-slay-giants.livejournal.com]

Of all the times to be sedate, Jack Horner chastised himself, he had to pick this moment. He shouldn't have been surprised; the universe always had it in for him. Something about order or some such nonsense, Jack couldn't remember what Gary had said about it (truthfully, he didn't listen to closely to much of what Gary had to say, ever).

Still, even with drugs in his system, the Fable knew it wasn't a go idea to stick around. There was a lot of motion and noises, indistinct in his hazy mind; this wasn't a good sign. Also, the complete lack of light was foreboding, reminding him of the institute at night.

Huh.

The thought crossed his mind that perhaps that's exactly what this was; he was back at the institute, at night. It would make sense. Afterall, he had been on the bus back...

"Fuck," he mumbled and pulled himself to his feet, dizzily. He had to get out of here and NOW.

[raptscarecrow.livejournal.com]

Guiding himself through with a hand on the seat backs, Kakashi had little trouble pushing his way over to the nearest guy who looked like he could need it: a pretty tall and seemingly well-built guy at that, but his movements seemed out of it. Either he had been asleep or, Kakashi guessed, he might have been like one of the handful he had seen drugged before now. Stopping by his side, he caught the man's shoulder -- enough to alert and catch him if need be, but it was also distant enough to move in case he got the wrong idea and retaliated -- and called over the noise.

"Hey! Come on -- let's get you out of this mess."