damned_institute | Day 30: Cafeteria, Dinner

[Waiting for ~~Busty LaRue~~ Orihime. XD]

Keman was feeling refreshed after his shower, but he hadn't been able to find Inoue, and that concerned him. He hoped that he hadn't gotten the time or place wrong. What if she'd been waiting and he never showed? He'd feel like an absolute wretch if that happened.

Sighing, he grabbed his food and started to poke at it with his fork. It tasted all right, but he was far too preoccupied to really enjoy it.

The nice feeling of being freshly showered disappeared rather quickly for Orihime. First she'd showered too fast, then the nurse fussed with her until she had washed all of the soap off her skin, and though she protested the woman wouldn't even let her have a fresh set of clothes until she was completely dry and brushed. By the time she'd been allowed to leave the shift was over. Just another side effect from the morning fight, she guessed.

She didn't see the things she put into her tray, only knowing that she'd grabbed something hastily to placate the ever-looming nurses. She'd put off their meeting twice now. When she finally spotted him, Orihime practically ran to the table, skidding a little before she caught herself.

"I'msorryKemansan!" She said in a single breath, trying to bow and hold the tray aloft at the same time.

Keman blinked, and then he started to laugh. "That's all right!" he chuckled. "Breathe." The young dragon stood up and took her tray, placing it gently on the table. "Sit down, okay? You look a little...stressed."

But she also looked very pretty, with her cheeks flushed and her hair still a little damp from the showers...

...What was he thinking?! She wasn't even his species. What in the name of Fire and Rain was wrong with him lately?

"Are you all right, Miss Inoue? How's your day been?"

He really hoped she hadn't gotten caught up in that mess at breakfast. He couldn't stand the thought of her getting hurt in any way.

It was a lot easier to do one thing at a time when she wasn't juggling a tray. She hadn't expected him to be mad, really, but she didn't want Keman to think she'd ignored him on purpose or something. She had to laugh a little when he did, relived and a little bit flustered.

"I'm ok. The nurses wouldn't let me rush through my shower. I think they're still cross about what happened in the morning." He hadn't asked for one but she still felt like she owed him some kind of explanation. She collapsed into a seat beside him less-than-gracefully, releasing a breath. She was getting really out of shape without Tatsuki to run her all over the place.

She shook her head to clear away the nostalgic thoughts that might follow. "A lot of people are still upset," She added. "Are your friends ok? And you?"

"I never thought I'd say this, but I don't really blame them," Keman said, still laughing. "I mean, it's got to be tough dealing with all these patients and/or prisoners as is, and then to have them revolt like that? I'm sure that our lovely captors have had a stressful day." The sarcasm was only kind of obvious. He did feel a little badly for them (having seen how much their transformations hurt them that night on the bus), but he also still resented them for hurting him that same night. He couldn't help it. They'd wounded him--badly. They'd given him marks that he couldn't make disappear, and they were starting to fill in the gaps that the faceless Head Doctor left. They were starting to represent this place.

"No, we're all fine." He shook his head and cleared his thoughts. No use brooding over that right now! "How about you and yours?"

Orihime didn't seem to notice the sarcasm. She nodded a little. "I really wonder if they have any more choice in this than we do."

She'd seen them transform on the bus too. Were even their thoughts being controlled like that? She thought of how painful the transformation looked. Everything here seemed to be alive with pain at night, the monsters and the patients they so easily slaughtered.

She shouldn't be feeling any sympathy at all for the monsters, not after what they'd done to Ururu-chan and so many others. They were like hollows; even if they'd once been human all that was left was something hungry and sadistic... They were better off in the ground and she knew it, but it didn't make things any easier.

This place really lent itself to depressing thoughts. She'd come to have an art lesson with Keman, right? She stuck out her tongue a little at the question. "Stubborn as ever but that's a good thing."

"Do you want to try sketching in..." Her stomach chose that moment to growl. Loudly. Orihime looked down and gave it a little pat. "Hey, be quiet traitor."

Keman also nodded, his face suddenly serious. "I don't think they do. You saw how much that transformation hurt them, didn't you? I really don't think they have a say in this." He sighed. "I still blame them, though. I know it makes me sound like a petulant child, but I can't forgive them for what happened to me on that bus, and for putting my sister in danger." It felt better to admit it, at least.

He raised an eyebrow when Orihime's stomach started to growl. "I brought my journal, if you'd like to use that, but maybe you should eat something?"

Orihime nodded. "You don't have to forgive them." She said sternly because, in a way, she couldn't forgive them either. "But don't hate them either. It only makes it easy to kill...and that doesn't make us any better than them."

She liked Keman. He was kind and protective. Even if that protective side got the better of him sometimes there wasn't any real harm in it...and she thought it was noble. She didn't want to see that perverted into a real desire to kill. She didn't want to see him lose himself behind a mask.

She was hungry. She'd given her breakfast to her friend and her stomach kept reminding her that no good deed went unpunished. "You too. The food is actually really good here."

And that was all the warning he got before Orihime inhaled most of her tray. Speed records were, most likely, broken. Two glasses of juice later, she picked up the conversation as if there hadn't been any break at all. "I'm glad someone remembered to bring paper." Orihime patted her stomach absently. "Do you still want to do portraits first? We can draw each other."

Keman just stared, fork midway to his mouth.

Where...had the food gone? Not two minutes before, Orihime had been so pretty and dainty...and now she was inhaling her food like a pack of rabid loupers all packed into one tiny, human body.

He grinned.

He liked this girl.

Finishing his own meal (not quite as quickly, but with few concessions to table manners and other similar and equally useless niceties), he reached into his pocket and pulled out the journal. It was slightly bent from being rolled up, but still perfectly serviceable. Only the first page had been written in, covered in tiny, intricate Draconic runes. The rest was as blank as it had been the day he found it.

"Sure, I guess." He handed her a pen. "Er, do you want to take turns with the journal, or shall I rip out a few pages?"

She was glad he ate so enthusiastically. Maybe she could convince him to try one of her recipes sometime. She'd already found one person who didn't seem to mind her taste, what was to say there weren't plenty more of them?

She looked a little to the left of the journal when Keman opened it, not wanting to pry even by accident. She still caught a glimpse of strange, intricate writing. She hesitated after accepting the pen.

"Don't do that! Let's take turns. We can pose like this -" Orihime made a face at him. "One of my art teachers used to say," Orihime straightened her back and made her voice a little deeper. "It's good to express yourself, hohoho!"

Keman laughed at the face she made and shook his head. "I don't know if I can pose exactly like that, but what about this?" He relaxed, a small smile on his face.

After a few minutes of posing and trying not to watch what Orihime was doing, a thought occurred to him. "You actually had a teacher just for art? Wow. Your family must be really powerful, to be able to afford that!"

Orihime studied Keman's features, determined to get it right this time. He'd liked the question mark from that first day but she wanted to make the picture something special for him. She wished she had some colours.

"Nope, not even a little. At least, not that I know of. My brother raised me and we didn't really have a lot of contact with the rest of the family." She explained, still sketching. She realized it might not be much of an explanation from Keman's point of view. "There are public schools where I come from that all the kids go to. You take classes in all kinds of things like art and music and math and science... One time a girl spilled the mystery liquid on herself and she had a big pink splotch on her face for a week. I thought it looked really neat but Tatsuki said it wasn't a good idea to try that sort of thing in case I ended up with horns and tentacles."

Which, admittedly, sounded pretty cool too.

"Done! Your turn." Orihime handed the pad to Keman, beaming. She wasn't a great artist by any stretch and it looked a little 2D but she'd enjoyed drawing it. His hair was messily done, and there was a smear near his cheek where her hand had disturbed the ink but it was a straight, albeit somewhat sketchy portrait. Underneath she'd written 'From your friend, Orihime.' She handed the pen back to him. "I hope it's ok. I'm not skilled enough to draw your smile the way I see it."

"There aren't any schools where I come from," Keman said, frowning slightly. "Well, I guess the slave conditioning could be considered a 'class,' but that's all I can think of. Oh, and the Citadel, but that's kind of a specialized case. In my world, the only way you can really get educated (if you're a human) is if you've been chosen for some highly specialized skill, like bookkeeping. The elves can afford private tutors for their children. My sister and I were taught by our mother." He sighed. "My world really isn't a very nice place. Yours sounds a lot better. Who's 'Tatsuki'?" He'd raised an eyebrow at the part about horns and tentacles, but he figured it was just a joke.

The picture that Orihime had drawn him wasn't exactly photorealistic, and the hair looked a little goofy, but to Keman, it was perfect. Taking the picture, he smiled. "Thank you. It's perfect."

Now...he supposed it was his turn. Turning to a fresh page, he paused, pen hovering above the paper, and looked at her.

Then he started to draw. Again, the picture was anatomically perfect, and looked like Orihime, but it was still...emotionless. She looked like a blank doll.

Keman frowned again. "They always turn out like that. I can't seem to get any...feeling into it."

[ooc: SORRY FOR MEGAFAIL. OTL]

"There were slaves in my world. It took a long time and a lot of fighting before people even realized it was just an excuse to abuse each other and people still... I think all worlds have problems like that."

"Tatsuki is my best friend. When I was little she protected me from some bullies - totally kicked their butts!" Orihime punctuated this by punching the air in front of her. "It was really cool. We've been friends for a long time. What's your family like?"

Switching between friends and family didn't seem like a change of subject at all. Tatsuki was family. Orihime missed her.

She blushed a little when Keman complimented the picture but it was more pleasure than embarrassment. She tried to hold still for him to draw but she kept trying to peek at the sketchpad when his eyes were down. She wasn't quite ninja enough to manage it.

Orihime leaned over a little to look now that she'd been given real permission. "Wow! It's really accurate." But Keman was right. It looked blank. Orihime looked thoughtful for a moment, then she smacked her fist into her palm. "I've got it! Flip to a blank page!"

Keman looked wistful for a moment. "Hopefully, ours are fixed," he said earnestly. "Right before I was 'taken,' my friends and I were working to change the world--to free the humans and help the halfbloods live without fear. We...kind of inadvertently started a war, but literally hours before I woke up here, my friend sacrificed his life for our cause and managed to end the war. The treaty was signed and then..." He trailed off. "I don't know what we were going to do then. Something good, I hope." He blushed a little and turned away, feeling awkward.

The young dragon listened intently to Orihime's description of her friend, smiling slightly. No matter where you went, people were basically the same. There would always be bullies, and there would always be those who protect others from the bullies.

"I was raised by my mother. I never knew my father; he and Mother parted ways before I was born. It was very congenial, I hear. He simply didn't want to be tied down, and Mother respected that. Anyway, I have two younger sisters. The older is named Lashana (or Shana, for short). She's sitting over there." He pointed to where his sister was talking to Valyn. "The person she's sitting with is another one of our friends from home." He didn't mention that it was Valyn who had "died" out of respect for his sacrifice. "Shana was actually adopted. My mother came across her biological mother in the desert. The wretched woman was an escaped slave who was heavily pregnant, and the strain was too much. She died in childbirth. Mother took the baby home, and I helped raise her." He smiled, but then his expression turned sour when he thought of the other member of their little family.

"The younger of my sisters is named Myrenateli (Myre), and...she's a brat. We've never gotten along. Her name means 'seeker of wisdom,' but the only things I've ever seen her seek were her next meal and targets for her bully friend, Rovy. She isn't really my sister anymore, either. In our culture, you can be adopted by another family in the--" Lair "--village, regardless of who your blood family is. Myre decided she didn't want to be in our family anymore, so she fostered herself on Rovy's mother and lived happily ever after." And then she had beaten Keman all but senseless in a duel. It wasn't a happy memory.

"...My family's anything but 'normal,'" he observed lamely.

He saw her sneaking glances as he drew, and it made him smile. She was really cute when she did that.

Finally, it was done and she was...telling him to turn the page? Mystified, he complied.

Somehow, it wasn't surprising to find out that Keman had changed his world so drastically. He was that kind of person. While she doubted either of their worlds would ever be 'fixed', she was glad that there were people like Keman and his sister and his friends in his world and people like Ichigo and all of her friends in hers.

She smiled a little and looked away, giving him time to regain his composure.

She listened intently to Keman's description of his family, looking over to see where his sister was sitting so she could say hello later. She couldn't help but wonder what Keman's mother was like, and what it was like for Shana to grow up with a brother like Keman to take care of and be taken care of in turn. And a mother..what was she like? What did she look like, smell like? He seemed fond of her too. Was it jealousy or pain or something else? Orihime crushed it as quickly as it came.

She looked down at her hands to hide her expression. She felt like a brat just for thinking things like that. "It sounds better than normal." She said brightly, looking up again. "Can I say hello to your sister sometime? Do you think she'll mind?"

When Keman turned the page, she reached over and placed her hand over his. "If we do it this way, maybe it'll combine our art styles into something way better. Who do you want to draw? Lashana-san maybe?"

Keman noticed the flicker of...something...that passed across Orihime's face, but couldn't quite place it. "Hey," he said softly, "are you all right?"

Apparently she was, because within seconds, she was looking up again and smiling just as brightly as she had been. He smiled back, ignoring the strange, fluttery sensations in his stomach. "I don't see why not," he laughed. "I doubt she would mind. She's a very kind, open person. A lot like you." Well, Shana was a little more brash than Orihime, but...well, there were still quite a few similarities.

He blinked when she put her hand on his, but he let her. "Well, all right. And it's Shana, not Lashana...just like it's Keman, and not Kemanorel. My people have the annoying habit of giving children needlessly long and complex names and then shortening them." He gave her a crooked grin and started to draw the outline of his sister's face.

"I think I ate too fast." Orihime explained, laughing it off. She didn't want to upset Keman over something silly. The moment had passed. It was an old scar, and the explanation had been partially true. There was a faint flutter in her stomach. It made her feel light. "If that's true, she's a lot like you too."

"Calling her Shana-san isn't too informal then? I didn't realize your full name was longer..." So many different customs. She wasn't sure Keman would have the heart to tell her if she was being rude. "My people have a family name and then a given name. It's customary to use the family name unless you're really close." She explained.

Orihime was playing this by instinct. She didn't push or try to correct lines, just observing the way his hand moved at first and trying not to mess him up. Once she thought she got the hang of it, she tried moving her hand with his, sweeping this way or that with a gentle nudge when she wanted to make a line go a certain way. Maybe it would work, maybe it wouldn't but it was worth a try.

"I think that might be the understatement of an epoch," Keman teased, laughing. "I've never seen food disappear so quickly!" He knew that it was probably something else as well, but he didn't want to call attention to it. The last thing he wanted was to make Orihime uncomfortable.

"No, I don't think so," he said airily, still a little fluttery from what Orihime had just said. A lot like me? "It's actually a little too formal to call her by her full name. Same with mine. The only time anyone ever calls me that is when I've upset someone." He gave her a crooked grin. "Usually my mother."

"There are family names in my world as well. Like my friend Valyn over there, for instance. The one sitting next to Shana. His full name is V'kass Valyn Lord Hernalth, or Lord Hernalth, for short. Using his given name is considered very disrespectful in 'polite' society. Call him that here, though, and he might get angry at you. He doesn't like his title. Anyway, is it kind of like that in your world? What would you rather I call you?" He was reasonably certain at this point that "Inoue" was Orihime's family name, but with all of the different worlds, he had no way of knowing.

He felt a little awkward (and a little something else), sitting there with Orihime's hand on his, but eventually he stopped resisting and let her guide his hand.

"Aha.. I guess it was a little fast." Orihime scratched her cheek and had the courtesy to look a little sheepish about this statement. If she hadn't wanted to enjoy the food a little she really might have been able to eat faster.

Orihime tried to bit her lip to hide a little smile. It was the way Keman said 'usually my mother'. She didn't really understand why Keman's friend didn't like his title used but she shrugged it off as his preference. She hardly had a problem with it. "Ok. Inoue is my family name, so you can call me Orihime if you want."

The picture was an awkward combination of their styles. It wasn't an easy way to draw but Orihime thought it looked a little more lifelike than the first drawing. She glanced at Keman, wondering what he thought of it.

Day 30: Cafeteria, Dinner

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