" ... good breakfast, as we're going to be beginning our therapy sessions for the day! Nurses, would you please escort Group 1 patients to their respective doctors as they become available?"
A voice cut into Epros' normally placid sleep, making him frown and open his eyes a crack. He glanced from side to side, half-expecting to see the Circus Master or Linda standing nearby with a megaphone, unaware that they were disrupting his slumber as they made their announcements. But they had never made any kind of announcements involving therapy, or nurses, or even doctors (and Kisling never visited, so Epros was quite sure there would be no need for him).
Then, of course, there was the fact that there was daylight pouring through the window above his head, and the other fact that the room was completely stark-white with no real color to disrupt it. Those two things made Epros open his eyes completely, sit up, look around, and blink several times in utter confusion.
"What manner of place has 'wakened me? From here I feel no familiarity," he muttered, looking from side to side carefully. He slipped out of the bed and felt the icy floor touch his bare feet, looked down out of habit, and realized what he was wearing.
Gray sweatpants. And the same material in his shirt. With a smiley face on it. Utterly disturbing and, most of all, disgustingly unfashionable. Epros almost felt like cursing a blue streak, but that just wouldn't fit him. The fact that he even wanted to, however, meant that something was terribly, terribly wrong with the world.
If this was a trick Beiloune was playing even after they'd defeated him, there was going to be hell to pay.
Suddenly, the door opened, and a young woman stood in the archway with a smile on her face. Epros smiled back out of habit and reached for the shoes he saw sitting next to the bed.
"Good morning, Mr. Houdini," she said, stifling a giggle. Epros paused in slipping on the shoes, one eyebrow quirking up. "I'm sorry, but you've missed breakfast already, so you'll have to go right to the day's activity. I hope you're not too hungry."
Houdini? That was a name Epros hadn't heard before. And since he didn't think there was anyone else in the room ...
"Fair maiden, I'm afraid you're mistaken. Houdini's a name I've never taken."
The woman gave him a strange look (every time someone heard him speak for the first time, they gave him that look; he wondered if maybe he should categorize it), then sighed a bit and stepped back from the doorway.
"You're at Landel's Mental Institute, Mr. Houdini. You probably don't realize it's your name, but it is - you're here because you forgot. Because you think you're someone else." She smiled again, this time a bit more hopelessly. "Now, come on - we've got a treat planned for everyone."
A mental institute? Epros frowned as he stood up. He wasn't insane, he knew that much. And he knew who he was. (Considering how many people he'd known who didn't, it was rather a feat.) Well ... maybe this was all just a joke, or a great big misunderstanding. Things like that happened, sometimes. And besides, she spoke of other people - maybe he could make some friends, and if he was lucky, find out yet further means of magic. Even when faced with something as strange as this, Epros was still a scholar at heart.
But when he took his first step forward and found that, despite everything he tried, he couldn't set foot in the air and float along behind the young woman, he realized that this was in no possible way a game.
no subject
A voice cut into Epros' normally placid sleep, making him frown and open his eyes a crack. He glanced from side to side, half-expecting to see the Circus Master or Linda standing nearby with a megaphone, unaware that they were disrupting his slumber as they made their announcements. But they had never made any kind of announcements involving therapy, or nurses, or even doctors (and Kisling never visited, so Epros was quite sure there would be no need for him).
Then, of course, there was the fact that there was daylight pouring through the window above his head, and the other fact that the room was completely stark-white with no real color to disrupt it. Those two things made Epros open his eyes completely, sit up, look around, and blink several times in utter confusion.
"What manner of place has 'wakened me? From here I feel no familiarity," he muttered, looking from side to side carefully. He slipped out of the bed and felt the icy floor touch his bare feet, looked down out of habit, and realized what he was wearing.
Gray sweatpants. And the same material in his shirt. With a smiley face on it. Utterly disturbing and, most of all, disgustingly unfashionable. Epros almost felt like cursing a blue streak, but that just wouldn't fit him. The fact that he even wanted to, however, meant that something was terribly, terribly wrong with the world.
If this was a trick Beiloune was playing even after they'd defeated him, there was going to be hell to pay.
Suddenly, the door opened, and a young woman stood in the archway with a smile on her face. Epros smiled back out of habit and reached for the shoes he saw sitting next to the bed.
"Good morning, Mr. Houdini," she said, stifling a giggle. Epros paused in slipping on the shoes, one eyebrow quirking up. "I'm sorry, but you've missed breakfast already, so you'll have to go right to the day's activity. I hope you're not too hungry."
Houdini? That was a name Epros hadn't heard before. And since he didn't think there was anyone else in the room ...
"Fair maiden, I'm afraid you're mistaken. Houdini's a name I've never taken."
The woman gave him a strange look (every time someone heard him speak for the first time, they gave him that look; he wondered if maybe he should categorize it), then sighed a bit and stepped back from the doorway.
"You're at Landel's Mental Institute, Mr. Houdini. You probably don't realize it's your name, but it is - you're here because you forgot. Because you think you're someone else." She smiled again, this time a bit more hopelessly. "Now, come on - we've got a treat planned for everyone."
A mental institute? Epros frowned as he stood up. He wasn't insane, he knew that much. And he knew who he was. (Considering how many people he'd known who didn't, it was rather a feat.) Well ... maybe this was all just a joke, or a great big misunderstanding. Things like that happened, sometimes. And besides, she spoke of other people - maybe he could make some friends, and if he was lucky, find out yet further means of magic. Even when faced with something as strange as this, Epros was still a scholar at heart.
But when he took his first step forward and found that, despite everything he tried, he couldn't set foot in the air and float along behind the young woman, he realized that this was in no possible way a game.