damned_institute | Day 30: Patient Library (Fourth Shift)

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Day 30: Patient Library (Fourth Shift)

While he waited for his bulletin board correspondant, Farfarello perused the library's offerings once more. There was no sign of any of the books he'd requested in the suggestion box but he wasn't very suprised that this was the case--even if, by some chance, the Head Doctor actually intended to grant any of the reasonable requests it still would probably take more than a day for anything to happen. The wheels turned slowly, in institutions, and there was no reason for a fake institution to be any speedier than a real one.

For lack of anything better, Farfarello pulled down the Histories volume of The Complete Works of William Shakespeare. A little Richard III would keep him diverted for a short while, anyway.

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Miku looked down at Aidou, and smiled a little, if sadly. "I'm not looking forward to their growth this evening. I'm scared, isn't that silly?" She didn't interject when he mentioned different.

She was just as normal as anyone else... plus or minus a few things. "That's all, though, just that little thing. What about you? Are you all right now?" Have you stopped being angry with me? Miku brought her fingers to her clavicle, searching for the little black band that usually decorated it. It wasn't there, and no one had yet returned that little piece of comfort. What could she do? Make a new one?

"You think it will grow?" asked Aidou. This time, he opened both eyes. That was an interesting comment to make--his had not "grown", they'd only appeared on his skin come nightfall, with the itching pain.

He shifted his head, looking upside down at her, analyzing her.

"I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss it," said the vampire. He wouldn't dare say that about her fear, but what about her warranted such a shift... That was worth protesting. "It might be important. The goal is, after all, to destroy it once and for all." Among the rest of the Institute, but that went without saying. As for any concern on his behalf... Curious how she was still able to consider others, whether sincere or not. It was interesting to note how they internalized in such different ways. Idly, anyway.

"The markings and that which comes with them as not reappeared," Aidou answered. It was a purposefully misleading response. He wasn't going to point out utterly not right everything and everyone was.

"I think so... there..." Miku paused, why was she telling Aidou, of all people, this. Aidou wasn't... he wasn't like Rituska and Alfons, who would understand, or at least try to. What could she expect from him but a snide remark?

No, she had to believe in him, that he was a good person. "There was something that happened, before I came here, it's not quite the same, but the feeling behind it is." If I must suffer, so must you. Wasn't that what all the grudged ghosts felt? She put her hands down on either side of Aidou's head and sighed quietly. "It will be fine, though, I'm tougher than I look, Aidou-kun."

He reclined patiently enough, letting her get the words out. As with most things in this godforsaken place, Aidou had learned that rushing them would only make things worse. Seemed like it was personal. As a matter of fact, the last time he'd received a confession of personal history from a human girl, it'd been from Yuki, and right before he'd tried to kill her...

Hm.

"I don't believe it's fine, but if you say so," he allowed. If she wanted to believe in her 'toughness', then whatever. He wasn't going to start arguing with her over whether she was all right or not. "But what you're saying is that you've had a similar experience, is that it?"

Even if he was in a physically vulnerable position, he didn't see the point in avoiding the issue.

She nodded, slowly, leaning back in the padded seat to look down at him. "I have... but it was a long time ago." Two years was long enough, wasn't it? Or was it three now? This stupid place's sense of time was so confusing.

"While I was there, there were times that... they would put me to sleep, and when I awoke the next time, there would be another mark... and another... and another..." Miku shook her head, the sudden flare of pain in her face and palms surprising.

Survived. Wasn't able to save him. Shouldn't have survived.

She touched the inside of her right wrist in memory, where the first rope had appeared. The skin was pale and white, lined with the deep blue of her veins where it met the heel of her hand. "But, I stopped it, and they're gone now. Of course... I wonder if the cost was worth it sometimes..."

The vampire's analytical mind whirred like an overdrawn machine. A premise worth being skeptical over, but Aidou couldn't deny the bizarre conglomeration of people and creatures within these walls... The sincerity of Miku's words was what made it easiest to not completely write them off.

And he had been marked by that bestial priestess too, hadn't he?

His chest expanded under a deep, silent breath, but he didn't say anything while she touched at her rest, just watching her upside down face. Finally: "Do you regret surviving?"

His question caught her off-guard. "I don't know..." It wasn't a lie, not really. She was happy that her brother had thought to send her ahead, but... he'd stayed without thinking that she'd be left alone too. It hurt.

She shrugged and kept looking down at him. "Sometimes. It's very lonely, sometimes." Even with Rei and Yuu, she knew she was encroaching on their to-be-family. They must've minded a little; the sister of a colleague that vanished, just suddenly taken in by Yuu. "Anyway, I think you've heard quite enough about me, Aidou-kun." Miku returned to rubbing away the phantom pain of the rope burn.

When Aidou thought of human girls and their tragic pasts, he imagined weeping and breakdowns. Wet eyes, at the very least. He had to admit, this strong act between Yuki and Miku was curious; emotions were vaporous, so he didn't exactly criticize himself for not being able to pick them apart like hard, cold chemical elements.

Yuki, he had never bothered to ask. Now that Miku had revealed some of her history, it helped illuminate certain things. Not that he had a vested interest in Hinasaki Miku, not at all. Phantoms and curses, though... Yes, he supposed it might be lonely. The way she talked, she acted as though she'd lost loved ones, which wouldn't be surprising. In his opinion, he believed there to be a considerable gap between a human's idea of loneliness, and a vampire's--just another difference that inflamed tension between the two--but there was no point in saying that.

"Yes, I suppose you're right," said the noble, blinking up at her face once more before turning his gaze to the room. "If you've done it before, any opinion on how to get rid of this phantom woman?"

"There's a camera... I asked about it when I came here last week, but, no one else has heard of it... but, even so, you'd need special film, lenses... the ability required to use it with any hope of success," Miku sighed and rested her head in her hand. She had... the ability. That was it. And even so, it had suddenly flared to life again after Yuu had received the camera in the mail and certainly after they'd come home from the old haunted house in Mutsu.

"It can do it. A person can't do it by themselves. If we were where I belonged, there'd be other things too, that could help, but in the end, it is up to the medium and the camera." Again, her voice was quiet, but her left hand rested on his shoulder. It was weird, quietly spilling secrets.

One eyebrow arched up. "A... camera? How exactly does that relate?"

Aidou understood physical gifts--everything he was blessed with came from capacities he'd been born with. The other freaks in Landel's, and people like Miku, like Renji... Certain powers they'd just been born with. A camera, though? Absurd.

"It's a very long story that has too many branches," Miku said quietly. The fact that the "The short version is that it traps the souls of dead inside to power it, and a strong enough hit from it, then the woman would be sent away, hopefully her Malice would--- I'm talking too much again," Miku pursed her lips at him. It felt good to say something, and Renji-san told her all the time to be more confident in her abilities.

My, he was a sneaky person.

"There's a song, too, Aidou-kun, a lullaby from that place... It's scary, though..." As good as she was with puzzles, something about it just wasn't clicking into place properly. Miku smiled at him, "So don't expect me to sing it to you."

Absurd, absurd, absurd. It sounded more like something from a graphic novel, or a video game, maybe. The only thing saving Miku from a full-on skeptical outburst was that he had seen Reika too--beyond that, it all sounded very silly to him. Souls of the dead trapped in cameras, Malice...

And some people had the nerve to mock ritual magic. It was certainly more elegant than something like that. But he was willing to go with whatever worked; Miku seemed relatively sure of what she was saying.

His expression to mild doubt and amusement at talk of a lullaby--it clearly said he wasn't apprehensive about it. "I'm not easily frightened. But I would only expect you to sing if you had a good singing voice."

Miku rolled her eyes slightly, this, at least, was better than thinking about her own losses and survival. "Well, you'll never know," she tapped his shoulder. "You should let me up, I want to write down more things before dinner. Please."

"If you had eidetic memory like me, this wouldn't be a problem, you know."

After everything, Aidou's mind was still in the process of sorting through what he had learned, and what could be pieced together from said speculation. It didn't prevent him from turning the corners of his lips down a bit--the expression was not quite childish, but getting there.

He was comfortable, so why did he have to move?

"But, I like writing," she told him, and prodded his shoulder. "I guess it's just a hobby. Besides, what if I want someone to find what I've left behind?" Miku knew there was as high a chance of that as there was anything else.

"Please, please, let me up, Aidou-kun?"

Aidou wasn't willing to put up much of a fight anyway; sitting up with a bleary look, he twisted back into his original chair, dropping his feet to the floor and slumping down a bit.

He hid a yawn with the crook of his arm, less for manners, and more to hide the flash of his fangs. "Writing is the last thing anyone will remember from this place, so I wouldn't worry," he commented idly. Of course, someone like him couldn't really see the attractiveness of the idea--he was nearly immortal, would live a long, healthy life, and would have a perfect memory no matter how old he got. Extreme obsessions with memories, like Aoyagi Ritsuka and his pictures, was just weird.

Not that it mattered.

Pulling out his own journal and tossing it onto the tabletop, he made another seemingly absent comment: "In any case, I see you were foolish enough to go get yourself injured. You really don't like taking good advice, do you?"

"It's fine, I was able to keep someone else from being hurt more." She thought of Sagara-san and felt that odd little flutter somewhere in the pit of her stomach. He was okay, too, wasn't he? He must've been, because he replied to the board post, right?

"If the person had been you, the result would've been the same," she shrugged and stood, one hand smoothing out her pants as a force of habit, the way she might smooth a wrinkle out of a skirt. "I'll keep looking for answers, Aidou-kun, and tell you when I find something, is that all right?"

He folded his hands in his lap, lacing his fingers. "You mean you would have helped me, or that I would have helped someone else as you did? Either way, I'd have to disagree and argue the point."

A wane smile crossed his face. He was sure he could have liked Miku whole-heartedly had this been a normal time and place; personality flaws could be overlooked when immersed in the rich, mysterious life of a noble vampire. Girls always wore their best faces. Here, tempers ran high. Especially his. Everyone's issues and shortcomings grated on his nerves. When it came to Miku's altruistic outlook on everything, he wasn't sure if he was perpetually annoyed with her, or if he liked her during the times she wasn't doing some dumb.

"Mm, don't let me keep you," he said. "Just to be sure, the name Kaname doesn't mean anything to you, does it?"

"Yes, I would have helped you, we're... well, we're not quite friends, are we?" Miku sighed; Aidou could be so difficult. She took a long moment to think, had the priestess said something? She'd remembered seeing a man. But...

She shook her head, "And no, it doesn't. I'm sorry, Aidou."

"Sorry, Miku-chan, but you'll just have to settle for 'girlfriend' or 'passing acquaintance'," teased the vampire, wagging his finger. "I just don't support middle grounds." Miku was cute when she acted like he was a normal person.

That, and being light-hearted, even for a few seconds, was an odd way of keeping focus. The name 'Kaname' meant more to him than she would ever know, but he could already guess how it related to that tattoo priestess. The dreams he had... the someone who'd died had been a man named Kaname, of that he was relatively sure. It just showed that wherever Miku's knowledge came from--hard study, or visions, or whatever--his had been slightly different.

He didn't appreciate it.

"That's fine, don't worry about it."

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Day 30: Patient Library (Fourth Shift)

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