damned_institute | Day 31: Sun Room (Fourth Shift)

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Day 31: Sun Room (Fourth Shift)

Though perhaps not entirely as successful as he wanted it to be, Homura walked away from lunch feeling satisfied with his efforts. Roland and Fai both had shown interest in the goal, and that was enough for the moment. Homura could be patient, had already been for five hundred years, and felt no harm in waiting another five hundred if he had to. He would have his goals realized, no matter what obstacles he faced, be they from the prison or those trapped within.

But now was time for business of a different sort, and the demi-god made his way to the Sun Room, near the common board. He made sure he could be seen from the entrance to the cafeteria, knowing that one stranger and one member of his own group both wanted to meet with him. It worked out well enough, especially given that the stated purpose of the History Club was simple.

Revenge and escape.

For now, Homura had no intention of revealing that it'd grown more complicated than that.

[Waiting for L and Junior]

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"Yeah..." That boy... Kurogane hadn't gone looking around for him. He wasn't good with thanking others, but he should at least say something. Fai might have been mauled and eaten by whatever had been in the Sun Room if that boy hadn't gotten him out.

Kurogane looked at the map, doing his absolute best to ignore the brightly colored pictures of... they reminded him of the Manjuu, only deformed... memorizing what he could of it quickly for later. While he did have to map Haku had given him, he remembered the second floor being incomplete.

"It wouldn't have been anything that simple," he said to the Pharmacy mention. "He's trying to get something particular, and that he thinks is important. He went up there alone, and that's why he's in such poor shape right now. He's an idiot, but even he wouldn't risk doing something that stupid over a thing like supplies."

Rukia pursed her lips, thinking as she continued to examine the map. "Maybe he was... going to pray?" she joked, pointing to the chapel.

"Or there's also the room where I guess they store our 'files' whatever those are. I think someone said they have information about our 'real' lives. Not very useful though," she commented dismissively.

"Don't joke," he warned, not finding it funny.

Files. Information about their supposed "real lives". Out of everything he'd heard and inferred, that was the first things he knew would make sense. He already knew that Fai had been buying into this place's trap by believing what he was being told about his "real life". Last night had given him more proof with Fai's babbling about Robin and Ashura. How Ashura needed Robin. Fai was trying to become this Robin Cross because of that person, the one in this place.

"That's it." The thing Fai wanted - information about who he was being told he was supposed to be. It made the most sense. He wanted to be this Robin Cross no matter what it took, to stay here and not have to face whatever it was he'd been running from, and that required he know everything he could. "He wants that file, the one for Robin Cross." He was risking his life over a damn file!

Fai was going nowhere tonight!

"Aw, you're no fun," she chided, nudging Kurogane's shoulder with her own. Rukia found that she was becoming rather fond of the grouchy man; she liked the surly ones, apparently.

"Is that his name here?" she asked. "But why would be want that? I don't think they have any useful information..."

"Oy..." he sneered at being nudged like they'd known each other, but responded by brushing his arm back in a kind of nudge of the same kind. Just on an annoyed reflex.

He kept silent a moment at her other questions. Explaining why Fai did things was no easy task. The man was more complex than he'd likely let on for this girl as well. "I don't know much about his past, but I do know that he's running from someone or something. Being told that he's someone else, someone without whatever it is that he'd running away from... he's the type of person that would want to believe it." The type of idiot who would, in any case.

Rukia snickered, grinning up at him. Even sitting down, she was always looking up at people. She liked that he was fighting back, anyway.

This new information from Kurogane made a lot of sense, and made Rukia more determined to do what she could to help Fai. "That's awful," she murmured, "Wanting to believe in a false life to escape your own..."

He might have thought that it was awful, but he didn't care for Fai's past. That's why it bothered him so much that the man was trying to escape something from it. He shouldn't have been lingering on things that couldn't be changed. "I don't much care for what happened to him, but I'm not going to let him keep running away like this." He needed to find Fai before night fell. Bringing up things like this with Ururu and Orihime around wouldn't get him anywhere. They'd probably throw fits if he was too harsh towards Fai as well.

Rukia nodded slightly, approving of Kurogane's reasoning. She was tempted to tell him that that was just the kind of thinking that made for a good friend when she spotted Fai entering the sun room.

Leaning forward conspiratorially, Rukia lowered her voice. "He's right over there, if you want to talk to him now..."

He had leaned away when she'd come closer, thinking she wanted to try nudging him in play again, but then he heard her word. Looking up, he spotted the blond hair and the chair with wheels over by a table. There he was.

"Ah..." he nodded, the rose. "Thanks for helping," he managed as a means of appreciation, then turned to head for the table.

Rukia watched Kurogane leave, then settled back on the couch again. Opening her notebook again, she made a show of being absorbed in writing, but kept her head tilted so that she could hear some of the conversation across the room.

Ah, the Sun Room-- one of Kadaj's favorite rooms by far, and certainly much better than the Game Room. The only thing that could have made this better was if that new batch of patients the Head Doctor had mentioned were here already and included his two brothers, but since they weren't, well, he'd have to find other ways to entertain himself.

... Like the bulletin board, for instance. That looked like fun.

Wandering over, he made his own meaningless contribution before finding a seat somewhere near a black-haired girl he didn't know and allowing his mind to wander while he waited for a response. There were more productive ways to spend his time, of course, but where was the fun in that? He could do something productive when night came.

Rukia was still paying attention to Fai and Kurogane's conversation, but when a young man she had seen many times before came and sat a few seats away from her, Rukia looked over at him. It was odd, that they had both been here over a week and never spoken. But it seemed there was always something to do.

She watched him for a moment, then smiled. "Are you playing that game someone started on the board, too?" she asked. "The word one?"

"Hm?" Kadaj looked up, visibly confused for a moment before his expression cleared. He knew perfectly well what game she meant, but he honestly hadn't expected her to speak to him. "Yes. Are you? It's fun, isn't it?"

He glanced back at the board again, but since that he had a more readily available source of entertainment, he turned away again fairly quickly. "My name's Kadaj. What's yours?"

"Yeah," she agreed, grinning. "I like it. And I like reading what other people have written, too."

"Kadaj," she said, repeating the strange name. "It's nice to meet you. I'm Rukia." She bowed her head in greeting, but remained curled up on the couch. "You've been here a while, haven't you?"

... Oh, right, he was supposed to be polite. "It's nice to meet you too, Rukia," he replied, giving her a short nod back. "And yes, I've been here awhile. I think it's been two weeks now, but it's hard to tell, you know?" It still sort of bothered him that he didn't know for sure how long it had been, but at least now he had the weekly visits with Mother to help him keep track of time. Now, if only those were biweekly visits, or better yet, triweekly...

"How long have you been here?" he made himself ask, forcing away those thoughts. He'd gone over them more than enough times already and doing it again wasn't what he needed right now.

She made a face. "I know what you mean! I think I've been here... nine days? But I'm really not sure." She rubbed her forehead, still trying to remember exactly how long it had been. "The days and nights seem to blur together after a while." She wished that she'd had the presence of mind to make note of each passing day from the beginning, but she supposed it didn't really matter that much.

She paused, a thought occurring to her. "I wonder who the first prisoners here were?" That was potentially a very morbid line of thought, though. Hopefully Kadaj wouldn't be too put off by it.

Kadaj shrugged. "I think Alex was one of them, but she's not here anymore. A lot of people aren't." Like she didn't already know that. Nine days wasn't as long as he'd been around, but it was fair to assume that she'd seen enough by now to not be surprised by that.

After a short pause, he added, "I think Roy or Hughes might know. They're part of the Cooking Group-- heard of it? If not, well, there's always asking on the bulletin. I think people would flock if you called out the first of us, though, so it might not be the best idea. You might scare them off."

Rukia nodded, very much aware that a lot of people who showed up there didn't stay around for long. Alex didn't ring a bell, but the other names definitely sounded familiar. "Roy..." she murmured. "Oh, Colonel Mustang, right? Yes, I've met him; he made an excellent weapon for me."

She shrugged. "I guess it doesn't really matter who was here first, or even here the longest, but I can definitely see people going a bit nuts over it. I certainly wouldn't want that kind of popularity." Letting out a small, somewhat embarrassed laugh, she added. "I guess I was just thinking out loud before."

Roy was just so popular, wasn't he? Annoying, really, but mainly because it meant it would take even longer for him to get his own weapon finally made. He might not have found Roy first, but since he'd been around the institute longer than Rukia had, that should mean he should have seniority rights or something, right? Well, whatever. "Yes, him," Kadaj settled for saying. "He's very helpful." Probably an understatement, but that wasn't his problem.

"There's nothing wrong with thinking out loud," he continued, giving her an odd look. "Finding whoever's been here the longest would be helpful, I think, but you'd need to be sneaky about it, wouldn't you? Should be fun, if you do it right." He wouldn't mind seeing that, but then he wasn't so sure Rukia was the person for the job. She didn't seem impressive enough.

"He is," she agreed, "Though I think that comes along with being a military man. At least, a good military man." There were, of course, plenty of sleazy, useless people in military organizations, but those who were there for the right reasons were noble of character. In Rukia's experience, anyway.

She pursed her lips, thinking over Kadaj's words. "Hm, they might have some insights into the way this place works," she said, thinking of her earlier discussion with Ryuga. "Maybe they've noticed patterns or flaws that the rest of us haven't seen yet..." She grinned; it did sound like fun. "Kind of like detective work, huh?"

Kadaj's expression darkened. Military men, pah. Roy and Hughes were all right, and so was Sagara, but in his experience, military men only led to trouble. Those three were just the exceptions, right? "... Right," he muttered, half to himself. He had to be polite, even if she was wrong.

"Detective work? I suppose so. You'd have to ask them to find out, though." He wasn't terribly interested himself, but that was only to be expected. Unless it had to do with tracking down Mother, engaging in "detective work" himself was just so... menial. Better leave it to someone else while he focused on something more important. "If not Roy and Hughes, then... hm." He pointed out the short, spiky-haired kid-- what was his name again? S-something-or-other, right? Whatever. "He's been around awhile too, hasn't he? He was here when I arrived, I think."

Rukia tilted her head, asking mildly, "I take it you don't agree?"

Looking to where Kadaj indicated, she nodded. "Yeah, that's Sora. I didn't realize he's been here that long!" Poor kid. He was certainly very good at staying cheerful though. Well, at the moment he looked a little sad, but Rukia couldn't hear his and Renji's conversation well enough to tell what they were talking about.

Shifting slightly, Rukia settled more comfortably against the back of the couch. "So, Kadaj, what have you been doing to keep yourself occupied? If you don't mind me asking..."

"And what, oh, what could have given you that idea? It's none of your business anyway. Long story, too, so unless you're in the mood for it, I don't really think I want to tell you." ... So much for being polite. Kadaj hadn't meant for that to happen, but really, he didn't feel like talking about it right now.

He didn't have much to say on the topic of Sora, so he merely offered a shrug before moving onto the next subject. "This and that. Are you really interested, or are you just asking for the sake of asking?" A relevant question, and one he was perfectly willing to hide behind because, quite frankly, he didn't have much of an answer. A little bit of everything, it seemed like.

"Trying to get out," he added eventually, sounding uncertain. "The same as everyone else, right? Unless you meant what I do during the day, which is much less concrete. Exciting, isn't it?"

Rukia blinked, a bit taken aback by his sudden shift in attitude. Her first instinct was to snap back at him, but she had just finished speaking with Kurogane about Fai, who was very touchy about his past. Maybe this was a similar situation? Maybe something very painful had happened to Kadaj, and he was still bothered by it.

"It's up to you," she said after a moment. "I would like to hear your story, but I don't want to pry, either." Well, she did want to pry, but that might just make Kadaj angry, and then her curiosity would never be satisfied.

She considered his next question for a moment before answering. "No, I'm genuinely interested. After all, you might have found much better ways of passing the time than I've discovered." Which was the truth. Plus, finding out might give Rukia some insight into the young man before her. He couldn't have been more than 16 or 17, she thought, but he acted even younger.

"Oh, I don't know if that's everyone's goal," she commented. "Me, for example, I'm not leaving until I've gotten revenge." Perhaps that would pique his interest.

"... Ask me again later." That seemed like a reasonable enough compromise to him. Wouldn't kill her to be patient, either, so even if he did change his mind at some point in the conversation, he'd at least have fun making her wait.

"I doubt I've found better ways," he muttered, giving her another strange look. "There isn't much to do during the day. Talk to people, post on the bulletin board-- things like that, you know? If Yazoo were still here, I'd be talking to him or we'd be bothering the president, but both of them are gone now. It's a shame, really; that was the highlight of my day.

"And I'm... interested in getting out first. Mother's waiting for me. Once I get her, we're coming back for revenge. Might as well make it a family affair, especially after what they did to her."

Day 31: Sun Room (Fourth Shift)

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