damned_institute | Day 30: Cafeteria, Breakfast

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Day 30: Cafeteria, Breakfast

Hitsugaya woke with a start.

His entire body ached, but the pain was nowhere near as bad as it had been the night before. His injuries had been tended two with clean gauze and bandages, and he found every movement wasn't agony. He wasn't in the best of shape, but thanks to the miracle of landel's strange time distortion, he had mostly recovered from the vile poison without having to waste anyone else's talents.

And in his hand, still...there was the key.

He dressed quickly, sliding the key onto the key ring from his desk drawer and stuck it into his pocket. Whether the key stood to gain them anything or not, it stood as a vital reminder that they could succeed in this place. There was hope, as insignificant as it often seemed. They could beat this place.

That small shred of hope made getting up worth it.

The nurse who escorted him to breakfast was cheerful, and commented idly about how wonderful it was to see young Tommy Winters up and about again after his unfortunate run-in with a bad case of food poisoning. He smirked slightly, knowing that any lies the institute forced into their heads were only that: lies. He wouldn't buy it for a second. And on top of that, the concept of muffins sounded almost appetizing. While he still preferred his authentic Japanese cuisine, the food here was slowly becoming more and more bearable. He would have preferred a warm bowl of sweet nattou over rice over the mufffins, but they would do. The plain yogurt and fruit, on the other hand, was excellent. He piled his plate high with fruit as usual, and got several small bowls of yogurt as well.

Finding the most convenient table to the end of the food line, he took a seat and scanned for the new arrivals. New arrivals meant people who would be lost and confused. Renji did a good job of making a bulliten post last time...he should recommend abarai-fukutaicho do the same again this time.

[Waiting for Angel]

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"Are you trying to tell me something?" Hokuto laughed, grabbing their umbrella out of the sand and trying to shield them both from the sudden rain. At least it wasn't too cold, but her idea of a good day at the beach involved sunshine.

Kakyou half-smiled, replying sheepishly, "You know I've never been swimming."

"No, but you don't have to worry about drowning in a dreamscape, do you?" she pointed out reasonably.

"Well, no..." he quickly stood up as the wind nearly tore the umbrella from Hokuto's grasp. "Let me--aaah!" Lack of exercise meant he was no stronger than Hokuto, and taking the umbrella from her wasn't going to work.

"It's trying to fly away!" she said, laughing. Working together, they forced it down into the sand, but it still seemed to be fighting them.

"Maybe... we should let it." Kakyou was looking only at her.

She looked back up at him as thunder began to crash. "Maybe we should." Her voice was nearly drowned out by the worsening storm... no, was that the storm?

Kakyou looked up, then back at her. "Your alarm clock."

"Yeah." Hokuto moved her hands over his for a moment, then let go.

She woke up as the static over the intercom subsided in favor of the actual announcement; she sat up, a little startled, then smiled as her eyes misted over. "I miss you too," she whispered.

When she shifted to get up, she felt a lot more than just her shovel--specifically, two trowels and a dagger. Hokuto yelped and went to hide everything; she wasn't supposed to have all that! I'm sorry, Signum-fukutaichou! I don't know what happened...

When she was escorted to the cafeteria, she looked around quickly; no Signum. She'd still have to apologize later, though.... for now, it was time to eat. The sight of so many sweets cheered her up, at least; she promised her nurse she would have a balanced meal and went to pick something out. What she actually ended up with wasn't nearly as healthy as she said she'd intended on... she was a martial artist, not a ninja, but she did know some slight-of-hand!

As always, she was glad to see Subaru; she would always worry about him. She would have gone over, but... he was with Sei-chan. She smiled a little more and took a different path; she'd leave them alone, for now.

As for where to sit herself... she looked around and spotted a cute boy sitting alone. He was focused on the sweet stuff, too; a kindred spirit! Hokuto went over and sat opposite him, smiling at him as she put her tray down. "Good morning."

Leon paused, a piece of cinnamon roll halfway between his plate and his mouth. He'd been tearing the roll into bite-sized pieces, so the fingers of both hands were covered in sticky sugar. It was an incredibly embarrassing position to be caught in, and Leon reddened slightly when he realised that he had forgotten himself to such an extent. "... Good morning."

He still wanted to suck the sugary icing and cinnamon filling off his fingers, but he would never do so in front of an observer. Reaching for a napkin, he carefully cleaned off his fingers, taking particular care with his maimed hand. The wound was closed and showing new pink skin all over, but Leon was still in the habit of treating it as though infection was a risk.

"I've missed pastries," Hokuto said, taking a bite of cinnamon roll and closing her eyes. So good... keeping it near her face to breathe in the scent let her pretend, just for a moment, that she was in a bakery somewhere.

Opening her eyes again, she happened to spot Leon's maimed hand. Yikes--she did her best not to wince, since he probably didn't need any more attention called to it. "If only it was cold enough to wear jackets inside. I'd love to smuggle out any extras," she confided, softly enough so the nurses shouldn't hear.

Ironic, since she often didn't bother keeping her voice down much when discussing nighttime plans... well, those sounded like proof of her insanity. This was a little more mundane, and the nurses tended to interfere then!

"Or you could ask a nurse if you could have one or two extra for later." Leon just stared at the girl, a little baffled as to why she'd think it necessary to steal something as minor as a pastry. The staff here did try to pretend they meant well during the day, after all, and it was such a small thing to deny someone. "They've provided them in the first place, so it's not like they're forbidden."

Obviously his breakfast companion was one of those women--no dignity or class whatsoever, nothing like dear Marian or even the women he'd known in the military. More like his bloody sister.

"One or two, but an entire tray would probably be frowned on," Hokuto said, smile getting a little wavery. She was sad about the dream, and a few other things, but she was trying to work past it. She did see that he was annoyed about something, but for all she knew it had nothing to do with her.

"Besides... they pretend to be nice, at least, but it means they treat us like little kids," she said, voice still soft, but this time from half-hidden emotion. "We're not even free to gorge ourselves on junk food if we want to."

But enough of that--she didn't want to start crying. It would definitely chase the boy off, and she wanted to enjoy herself here as much as she could. "Anyway. I'm Hokuto; nice to meet you."

Leon couldn't help it--his expression twisted into one of disgust. He loved sweets, very much so, but the thought of eating an entire tray of pastries was absolutely nauseating. "Why the hell would you want to gorge yourself on junk food? That's disgusting." A bloated and sluggish soldier was a dead soldier, completely aside from the disturbing mental image of a young woman cramming pastries into her mouth one after another.

Hokuto raised her eyebrows. Large amounts of chocolate helps with cramps was probably a bad response... "Because sometimes, people do things that aren't very advisable."

She could guess that Leon wasn't much for company... that, or she reminded him of someone he didn't like. She didn't intend on moving just yet, though, so she simply kept eating.

Well Leon knew that, but in his experience people only did inadvisable things when there was some perceived gain in it for them--making oneself sick and fat didn't sound like much of a benefit to him. He snorted softly and said derisively, "Then it's probably for the best that they treat you like a child, since you seem to want to act like one."

Hokuto just smiled, a little sadly; she did, honestly, want to act like a child. She wanted to chat with her friends, complain about being assigned too many chapters to study, find love notes in her locker. To hit the mall as many times in a week as they could get away with.

To get stressed out about things that weren't matters of life and death.

For now, she did her best to simply clear her mind; it helped, in ways not much else did. She'd be okay... it was just hard. The boy who hadn't given his name couldn't be having an easy time here, either.

Leon had never had any easy time anywhere, and frankly wouldn't know what to do with himself even if he did somehow stumble into such a situation. Truth be told, this place was in some ways easier than his life had been before he came here.

Shaking his head, Leon spoke once more before turning his attention back to his food. "If you want to get yourself killed being a silly girl, go right ahead. I don't care." And he meant it, too.

Hokuto looked at him and smiled, gently. "In a place like this, the balance between being a warrior and whatever else a person is--including being a silly little girl--is easier to pull off than it is elsewhere, I think. I can indulge myself in the morning, as long as I'm careful not to overdo it so badly I still have a stomachache by nightfall."

Serious fights were unlikely during the day; they happened, but not usually to people who didn't provoke them. Sparring matches did require her to be in decent condition, but she'd rushed off to karate class after a meal at McDonald's too many times to count, and only regretted it when she was kicked in the stomach--never a pleasant experience anyway!

If he wanted to keep trying to provoke her, let him. Maybe she'd find out what was bothering him so much if he did.

Leon wasn't trying to provoke anyone. As far as he was concerned, Hokuto was trying to provoke him by interrupting his breakfast and generally being irritating. Even more annoying was her assumption that everyone was necessarily something other than a warrior; Leon knew he wasn't the only one for whom being a warrior came first and nearly only--Kratos had suggested he was much the same way, and there were doubtless others.

Snorting again but saying nothing further, Leon attempted to will the stupid woman out of his personal space.

Hokuto had learned to ignore the sound of fights, but she nearly dropped her juice at a particularly loud shout; she looked up, and when she saw the riot starting to break out simply went very, very still for a moment. This kind of thing wasn't supposed to happen during the day.

After a long pause, she snapped out of it and scrambled onto her chair, then a clear spot on the table to get a better vantage point. She had no idea what anybody in her group was doing, and she needed to know before she did anything.

It had slowly been becoming clear to Leon that this morning's round of pointless fights was getting a little out of hand. But as far as he was concerned it wasn't his problem unless the riot actually got close enough to him to interrupt his meal.

At least, until the stupid girl decided to jump on the table. Protecting his breakfast from her feet, Leon shouted angrily, "What the hell are you doing, woman?" It was obvious to him that the staff would shut the riot down in a hurry, and getting involved was just asking for trouble.

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Day 30: Cafeteria, Breakfast

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