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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[Hopefully it's okay to jump in?]

He'd actually been in a room with Parker and been civil. Brock was shocked at himself. He was also feeling a little embarrassed. Symbiote aside, he'd always been able to come out on top of Parker (if not literally as they'd have liked), and while his methods might have been morally questionable, he still refused to consider the fact that they could act like people together.

Kind of hard to when they were both freaks...only they were at opposite ends on the morality spectrum: Parker was all for wasting his powers on people who didn't give a shit. He on the other hand wasn't. And Brock lived every day with this twisting hate the symbiote had for Parker's rejection inside him warring for its desire to go back to what it once had. The idea of the two of them getting all buddy-buddy gave him the shivers. It felt wrong.

If they were going to get Parker, it wasn't going to be just because they started holding doors for him and getting disgustingly nice.

That wasn't how his Other did things. It certainly wasn't how Brock thought things should end up.

Brock ended up choosing the Sun Room for this shift. He figured that Parker was a big enough nerd to want to play chess; personally, he needed some time to himself to think about how his last two meals had been, with Logan the Shortass Canuck and Peter Parker, Your-Friendly-Neighborhood-Spider-man. If Parker was in the same room with them, there probably wouldn't be a lot of thinking getting done on Brock's part.

Unfortunately, his nurse decided that he needed to be less anti-social and actually start talking to more people. She pushed him over to a kid who looked like he was Parker's age, saying: "Why don't you make friends with Albert here? It's always nice to meet new faces."

The blond gave a kind of noncommittal sigh as she left, turning toward "Albert". "Hi. I guess I'm supposed to make friends with you," he said dryly.

[Welcome! ^^]

Mark was surprised to see a nurse approaching, with patient in tow. This was the first official attempt to get him to do something other than stand around taking notes from what people posted on the board all day long. Then again, maybe this was as much for the other man's perceived benefit. He didn't recall the face, and wondered if the name would bring up any interesting connections.

"It seems that way," Mark agreed, equally dry as he looked up at the other man. A casual tone, then. "I'm Mark. Hi." 'It's nice to meet you' seemed premature, although it wasn't unpleasant, at least. The conversation didn't stop him from glancing at the board, scribbling down a few more names. "Nurses out to rescue you from yourself?" The comment was at least a little sympathetic in tone. Not that Mark had never needed a little help, but the 'help' offered here wasn't precisely Betan therapy. Besides, the Black Gang was needed in a place like this. Without his trusted defense mechanisms, he'd probably have been rolling on the floor in panicked hysteria long ago.

"Eddie," Brock said. He watched for a bit as Mark - now that he had the guy's real name - peered at the board and wrote something down. "Yeah, basically: they seem to think I'm anti-social or something retarded like that. What about you? They tack on some problem onto you yet?"

He hadn't seen this guy before. Landels was always fluctuating in how many people were here; some people would vanish, only to be replaced by others, and after the first week or so of that crap, you started finding that all the faces blurred together. For all he knew, this guy wasn't a total newbie like that Peter kid (not his Peter Parker, but the other Peter), and had been here for quite some time. But newb or not, he'd probably been told he had some kind of mental illness or something and been talked down to like he was made of glass.

Eddie. Nothing came immediately to mind, but then, despite the board's size and business there had to be dozens of patients who simply didn't bother with it at all. Others who had only posted brief notes, nothing that connected with anything else in his mind and so nothing that lasted in memory long. He wasn't going to go looking the name up in front of the man, anyhow.

"Well, they haven't named any specific illness, yet, but they do seem to think I'm in desperate need of healing and the best way to heal is by annoying me or telling me what to do," Mark shrugged slightly. There probably were names for his problems, but nobody here was actually trying to do anything about those problems, as far as he could tell. Just as well, his 'problems' wouldn't appreciate it.

Brock rolled his eyes, not at Mark, but at Landel's idea of "healing". Yeah, sounded about right. "'Cause that's just all what we need," he said. "Getting nagged at and bossed around, like we didn't have that before Landels."

It certainly wasn't relaxing. And the professional help seemed to be on and off - the staff seemed more ready to just pump people up with sedatives or chuck their asses into Solitary rather than try anything else, at least from his experience. He could safely say that he didn't feel any more relaxed and "sane" than he did the first day he woke up here.

Come to think of it, Mark had probably been taken from the most free time he'd ever enjoyed, back on Beta Colony. True, there was therapy, and his mother checking on him through his grandmother (and what a concept that was!) and Kareen had been watching out for him too since she'd arrived, but in all, those influences were more welcome than not. And it wasn't as though they were enforced by shockstick-point. Or needle-point. He eyed one of the nurses a bit more balefully.

"Frankly, I think this place is more designed to make people go nuts."

"I get you there," Brock said, thinking of River. He hadn't seen her around much recently, but she had a special brand of crazy that you could see even on that damned bulletin board. He was of the private opinion that Landels had something to do with it. "Good luck staying sane," he said and meant it.

While he didn't consider himself the nicest guy on the block - not by a long shot - Brock did think that he could reign in his dickish tendencies every now and then. Some people just seemed like decent guys, like Peter (the other one) and Mark here, and while in the end, it wouldn't matter who was sane or not nor who survived, he could at least wish Mark luck, at least.

Maybe a little late to wish that, but it wasn't the fault of this place, and Mark took the wish in the way it had clearly been intended, nodding back. "Thanks. Same to you." Or may you go insane in a manner to your own liking.

Well, it was a manly conversation, at least. Short and to the point. Mark looked over the board, wrote down a few more meetings. Out of idle curiosity as much as a desire to know (he was fairly sure of the answer already) he asked, "You work with any of the groups at night?"

"Not regularly," Brock said. Whatever he did with Parker was more of an impulse and the urge to look after their property than any real planning. Groups weren't usually how they rolled. "You?"

From what he'd seen, most people didn't run solo. Maybe with a partner, maybe with a group, but you'd have to be either lucky or just that much of a survivalist badass to truck through it night after night by yourself.

"A couple. Sometimes big ones, and sometimes just with people I've met." That was actually a long list, considering he'd been here less than a week, he thought. But even when he'd wandered off on his own, somehow he'd found company. Maybe it was just luck--or a sign of how crowded this place was.

What are you talking about? Even if you go alone you're still part of a group! It was a humorous observation, though one he couldn't deny. "It's easier that way." He was sure the other man would think of Mark's height and weight as part of that equation, even if he already kind of liked Eddie for not paying much attention to the physical differences between the two of them. Then again, compared to some people around here, Mark wasn't really that strange looking at all.

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Day 31: Sun Room (Fourth Shift)

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