Day 30: Cafeteria, Dinner

[captain-hunam.livejournal.com]

The cafeteria was all but empty when Zelnick got there. He was a little disappointed; he had gotten the impression that patients usually ate dinner in their rooms, so he hadn't arranged to meet anyone, and there really wasn't anyone to sit by and engage in conversation yet.

Quietly, he collected dinner and a big glass of orange juice, and chose a seat near the food-serving counters. Talking for so long had made him thirsty... and, well, fruit juice was a luxury he had missed.

[Stalk away, my dearest Admiral. <3 ]

Comments

[sasuke-of-sound.livejournal.com]

... extendable jaw. The things in this place were every bit as oddly creative as some of what Kabuto and Orochimaru came up with. If that was the only threat, though, Sasuke wouldn't have a problem. (And if Allen's multi-legged beast showed up, Sasuke had handled the spider alright. With backup, but alright.)

Aidou's query about his eyesight drew Sasuke up short, a quick flashback to the bit of taunting this morning as compared to what seemed almost like a civilised question, but then again: Aidou was flighty and weird. There was no point in trying to understand him if it wasn't key to the alliance.

"Nothing, but I'm getting used to fighting with it," Sasuke said, and still left out Sharingan. At this point, it was still only Sakura and Naruto who (might be gone) knew for sure. He frowned when Aidou asked, but not talking about it would be akin to admitting that the surgery itself was still something that affected him. Which it wasn't; or at least, he wasn't going to let it. "A portion of my cornea was removed and replaced with the opaque patches that are there now. It blocks off light to the pupil."

[idolism]

That made Aidou's brows shoot up, and he had the strangest urge to laugh. An interesting choice of surgery... with inserts, there was a chance for recovery should a second reconstructive surgery be preformed, perhaps. Surely it would have been easier to just permanently blind the boy.

Though, maybe that wasn't the point.

"I see... well, that's somewhat beneficial to you, I suppose." In truth, Aidou had thought maybe Sasuke could help out with another experiment of his... if it had something that hadn't involved such obvious implants, he might've thought to test his healing abilities. He still could, but removing whole patches of natural tissue made things more complicated. Oh well.

[sasuke-of-sound.livejournal.com]

Sasuke was almost suspicious at what Aidou said, but there was absolutely no way for Aidou to possibly have known about the Sharingan.

"I have reason to doubt it was done with just the blindness in mind," he said with a bit of a shrug, and finished the rest of his juice. "The doctor who performed the surgery said that he was collecting my genetic information as well."

He said it as neutrally as he could, because Aidou seemed to speak to plenty of people and might have heard of something similar. With River it seemed to have been purely to mess up her mind even further, but taking Sasuke's DNA was another matter.

[idolism]

"You must have an ace in the hole if they're interested in your genetics," the vampire mused. He found himself not quite as curious about that. "The thing with yours eyes done with something specific in mind, maybe?" Who knew. Even if it had been random fun for the doctors, the loss of sight was still debilitating on a whole, being the most used sense.

The experiments themselves were probably one of Landel's sideshows that made the most sense. What other purposes could it serve, beyond poking at lab rats and spreading turmoil? Even if there was something more nefarious in mind, Aidou surmised it would not come into action so soon.

[sasuke-of-sound.livejournal.com]

Sasuke made a noncommittal sound at the first comment. He did, sort of, limited as his bloodline was here, but there was no point in advertising.

"I've spoken with River on the subject and at least one other patient who had been experimented on," Sasuke was assuming that Aidou had heard of River, since pretty much everyone in the Institute had. "Based on what was done to us, it seems like the experiments themselves are done primarily to cause mental strain without lowering our physical ability to the point where we are unable to fight."

It sort of fit with the theory that this place was performing military-related research. Mark had his questions, but Sasuke had seen Sound.

[idolism]

River...? Yeah, he recognized that name. Crazy girl. Supposed telepath. "Oh, then she wasn't completely nuts before then?"

The boy's observation was otherwise accurate, though he didn't point out that Sasuke was doing an awful lot of blundering around for someone who claimed to still be able to fight. Without even having to look, Aidou knew when twilight turned into evening, and happened to surprise his nurse by standing up before she did.

"All right, it's that time. See you soon."