damned_institute | Nightshift 30: M31-M40 Hallway

[M39]

Being dragged away from ZEX mid-conversation was something of a mixed blessing. On the upside, it meant that Zelnick would have at least few minutes to regain emotional balance before spending the whole night with the guy....

Well, perhaps it was more of a mixed curse. Normally Zelnick didn't begrudge allies their oddities, but ZEX had this amazing ability to jump straight from normal conversation to oh-god-awkward innuendo-laden flirting, and Zelnick couldn't do much but hope that he'd keep away from the latter.

In any case, he paid closer attention to where they took him, this time, not just his room number, and he realized he was actually really close to Yuber's room. Wasn't that convenient?

Once he was in his room, he started to get ready for the night; skillet, knife, pestle, all loaded into the apple basket that had wound up in his closet, along with a couple pens and the radio (hadn't Yuber said it spilled hints at night?). This meant he couldn't take all the apples with him, so Zelnick wrapped them in one of the extra shirts and left them in the corner of the closet. All that was left was to get the flashlight, which he found under his pillow like he did last night.

Then the intercom clicked on.

So that was their lord and master, in this place? After spending the first night confused and the first day hearing the voice of the Head Nurse, he found that the guy sounded pretty sane, until he admitted to killing someone. "The man on the radio--" did he mean whoever was on the other side of the little antique, sending out hints? And the method of death sounded... frighteningly personal.

He unloaded the skillet from the basket and held on to it as the doors unlocked, and sat at his desk to wait for ZEX.

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And of course, the moment Edward sat down Bella was up and moving across the room to lean against the wall, her attention turning towards Harry.

“Oh, yeah …” she started at the mention of going out alone, her arms wrapping protectively around herself as she started to remember her first night at the asylum, “You really don’t want to go out alone … trust me. I’ve gone through it.” At least they would be able to help someone else not get hurt or anything like that. What had happened to her sucked, and she wouldn’t have wished it on anyone.

Well, that was a lie. The person she did wish it on was gone.

Shaking her head to clear her thoughts, Bella suddenly remembered that she had forgotten about her pipe. “Damn, I forgot my pipe back in my room. I’ll go back and get it and come back here to not waste time …” it was worth a shot.

Giving only a small glance to Bella, Edward made no other reaction to her words. "It's no problem," he replied to Harry with a smile.

With Bella's suggestion, however, she did receive a hard glare. "No. Just take mine; I won't be able to use it, anyway." Not without ripping his wound open. Wonderful. He got up to lift the mattress he had been sitting on, bringing his rusted, dirty bathroom pipe out from the flat bed. "We can stop by a bathroom on the way out of the block and get a few more - "

He paused midsentence when he heard a familiar tune. Music? Don't Fear the Reaper, his mind immediately indentified it as, along as remembering that horrible skit from some mindless comedy show that had been quoted for years. "One moment," he said, moving over to the solitary desk in the room to rummage through the first drawer. He found the radio he'd almost set aside for junk, seeing as nothing had ever drawn out of it before.

He remembered something of a death of the "radio man", though the title didn't hold much to the vampire besides the name Jack. And now Jill.

Edward was surprised to hear the man had been giving out hints; only during the night, it seemed, when the vampire had never stayed in his room long enough to hear one of these hints. At least he knew better now. Better late than never.

"Anyway," he continued, after the message was over, sticking the radio in a pocket. "Let's get moving, shall we? We can find a pipe for you to use as a weapon, Harry - if you don't have one already."

Harry did not like Bella's suggestion that she go out alone. It was bad enough that she had come here alone, but there was no way he was going to let her leave too. Luckily, Edward stepped in to protest it, considering he was the one who actually knew and cared for Bella it was more appropriate for him to be the one to step in.

Harry listened to the radio with a slight frown. He wasn't sure he could trust it, but there had been something like it during the war back home (Potterwatch, he remembered proudly).

"I haven't got one," he admitted. So it sounded like a good plan to him. He moved to towards the door to open it for them. "Do you think we can trust that?" he asked, pointing to the radio in Edward's pocket.

Well, it was worth a shot.

Looking at the bar that Edward pulled out from under his bed, Bella’s eyes lowered to the ground, almost as if she were ashamed. Which she wasn’t, really – she was just … it was a strange feeling, to actually not want to be close to her fiancé for his own sake. She moved slowly towards Edward as he held out the pipe, quickly taking it from him with a smile. “Thanks. I’ll return it later.”

She made sure to be the first out in the hallway once Harry opened the door, her eyes quickly looking at the aforementioned radio that Edward had shoved into his pocket. “I’ve heard it a few times before. I think it’s pretty handy, actually. Gives you clues to where things are hidden and stuff like that.”

Now out in the hall, Bella took a deep breath, releasing it a few moments later. She could hear talking in a few rooms, but other than that the remainder of the hallway was mostly empty.

Mildly creepy.

A part of her was slightly worried to be heading off to the bathroom again – the last time that had happened blood had started pouring out of the faucets and she had nearly puked in a hallway. Not a fun trip, in her opinion.

“Let’s see…” she whispered to herself, lifting her flashlight to peer down the empty hallway with a frown. “Which way?”

Edward shrugged. "It's still something else. Take it with a grain of salt?" He didn't exactly trust the last man on it either; it would be foolish to blindly follow any off-hand clue some clouded figure might dish out. The fact that he was dead only proved to be some sort of small, personal victory for the head of the Institute. Probably the same old story of animosity between men with egos. He'd seen it in action a thousand times before.

Looking beyond the scope of the light, he glanced down both ways, mentally examining the map he had drawn in his memory. He had at least the way to the second floor, which was a good start. It was a comfort to know he wouldn't need to draw one out to remember it. "To the right," he said, moving past her, out into the hallway. "The bathroom is right around the last room."

Nightshift 30: M31-M40 Hallway

M36

M36

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