damned_institute | Day 35: Bus 1

Sanji woke up groggily to find his nurse already in his room. He gave a sleepy and half-hearted "Buh?" before realizing that nurse meant dayshift, and he'd fallen asleep after dinner.

"Shit!" He sat up abruptly, which gave his nurse a start. "Nami-swan!" How had he allowed himself to sleep through an entire night? What if she'd tried to return to the basement? What if she'd been waiting for him to appear and protect her? He'd let her down!

"There, there. Calm down." His nurse set a familiar flannel shirt down on the bed and Sanji eyed it with confusion. The last time he'd worn that had been... "Sorry I didn't knock or anything, but I was so excited~!" A pair of jeans followed the shirt. "Today is the field trip into town! Aren't you looking forward to it?"

The chef had to admit, the town had been an interesting enough place the last time he'd been. If he could find Nami early on he might even be able to lead her around... So he didn't complain too much as he changed into the other outfit (which he really wished they'd let him keep - anything was better than the regular gray) and was led out to the first of the buses.

He took a seat near the front, hopefully easily visible to any of his crew - especially to a certain member of his crew.

[for Usopp!]

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That didn't sound entirely promising. "Right." Sanji wasn't going to say much else about it, however. Truth be told, he wasn't entirely familiar with how to put together a grill - just how to make use of it. "Whatever you need my help for, just give me a heads up."

This bar of food was just shaped grains. Not a bad idea, he supposed, for someone who was going to be traveling. And there was a good many patients to feed, so this was probably inexpensive. Still, it didn't seem necessary - especially with some of the breakfasts they'd been given before. He finished it off anyway, grumpily turning to the apple slices as a means of following up with something softer.

Breakfast wasn't helping him in turning down Usopp's idea at all.

Usopp folded the notebook back and tucked it away at his side again, to get a better chance at his breakfast. The apple slices Sanji was eating now didn't look so bad, although what had that been in the foil wrapper, anyway? A brick? Even when Sanji had cooked up things that might not ordinarily be eaten or that took weird methods, he'd never, ever serve them bricks for breakfast.

Well, maybe Luffy, but Luffy'd probably like it if they soaked it in beef stock or something.

Either way, Usopp needed to go on another shopping trip. Two, really. But could he leave his room alone now? Well, Sanji was coming by earlier in the night, although that was assuming they all got off the buses and into the buildings in one piece. He could wait at least until he'd talked to Mello about moving the growing chemistry collection and until he'd had time to talk to the others, both his crew and the people interested in his projects, on the board. Junior had wanted in on the raid for the gardening shed...

"Thanks, Sanji." He nibbled on an apple, and looked around the bus one last time. No sign of anyone still. Well, there were three buses, and seven Strawhats, so the odds were... was that Tanaka? Usopp sank down further in his seat, not hiding, just not ready to deal with all of that mess again so early in the morning. "Um... what... what'd the brick taste like?"

Sanji noticed Usopp sinking in his seat, but said nothing. He'd obviously seen another patient that worried him, but if the sniper needed help he'd ask for it. Or start making frantic gestures. He'd know in either case.

As for the 'food'... "Tastes like wood," the chef mumbled. "But it's edible." Somehow. It was food and yet not. He wouldn't feed it to his crew regularly, that was for sure. It was probably a good thing that there was only so much breakfast in the bag he'd have to stomach.

Now Usopp was actually curious, because he'd never had edible wood, so far as he knew. But Sanji had downed it all fast enough, so it couldn't be that horrible, although he had to wonder if even Sanji could take edible wood and make it tasty somehow.

"Hey, Sanji, have you been in the gardening shed? The shed that's in the middle yard?" Usopp clarified, although really, he figured a shed where people went and came back with gardening equipment spoke for itself. But if Sanji hadn't ever been, direction might help make it clearer what Usopp meant. "I'm going to need to go there. Not tonight, I don't think. Tonight's gonna be too much of a mess anyway. Remember last time?" He let out a little shudder, and finished eating his apple slice.

Well, Sanji sort of remembered last time. Not fully. But he understood what Usopp was getting at. He'd been incredibly lucky to find the help that he had in getting back into the building. He hadn't spoken to Allen for a while now that he thought about it. Hopefully the kid was doing better than he'd been the last time they spoke.

"I can't say I have." Sanji frowned as Usopp mentioned the shed. "If tonight isn't a shitty mess, though it's bound to be, perhaps we can give it a shot?" The middle yard the other pirate spoke of was on the way Nami usually took trying to get to the basement, wasn't it?

It was too bad Sanji hadn't been, because Usopp was really hoping that he could get some visual confirmation from somebody who came from his own world and his own level of technology that what he thought was in there, was in there. Or at least something very like it. Those blades had to have been powered by something stronger than just human muscle to be effective, right? That meant an engine. Or something he'd just never encountered before but that someone like Zelnick would consider commonplace. Or something else entirely, something he couldn't even imagine, like the Dials on Skypiea. Alternate universes were a big pain in the butt when it came to planning.

"Well, maybe. Luffy's room is on the same hall as mine, maybe we can meet up with the others sometime tonight, if we don't all get eaten, and talk about plans?" Usopp suggested, the idea of being eaten thrown out pretty casually as a worst-case scenario. "There was a guy who wanted to come with me to raid the shed, but I'll probably want to try for it more than once if this works out, and if the way isn't too messy, maybe we could have a first run at it and at least know if it's worth the time." It wasn't a very clear plan, but at least the shed wasn't too out of the way, and didn't involve going anywhere near the Sun Room. "If nothing else, you can drop by and try on my shoes."

"Sounds like a plan." Okay, maybe not so much a plan as a series of possibilities, but when it all came down to it, there was a basic underlying get to this location that he could work with.

He frowned again, thinking about the previous incident with the buses. "Did you guys have it pretty bad last time?" He basically just recalled a lot of noise, not what monsters or otherwise might have been causing it. But Usopp talked about that night as though it had been an incredibly dangerous affair.

"Did we have it bad?!" Usopp paused to stare, as though Sanji had just said he didn't want cigarettes or Luffy was refusing food or... something. He knew Sanji had been in the Institute by then, so why--oh. Hadn't he been acting strange that night? A little out of it?

"There were monsters on the buses, patients scrambling all over each other to get out, and outside, giant birds trying to eat people, Sanji!" He gestured widely, flapping his arms to demonstrate and nearly hitting Sanji in the process. "It was only a good thing I managed to distract the birds with my expert imitation-calls and voice projection, making them think there was a flock of lady birds in the woods off to the side, or we'd have all been eaten. Then everyone cheered how great it was to have the amazingly talented Captain Usopp on your crew, and after that..." We all went to the kitchen and my best Institute friend beat us up. "We went inside and explored a while."

Sanji backed up against the window as Usopp's arm's went flailing, holding his own up in a surrendering gesture. "Oi, oi! Monsters. Got it." He didn't remember any giant birds somehow... It had just been himself and Allen and a bunch of people running about and the damn kid had ripped the side off the bus...

He did remember the exploring the Institute part, for however brief that had been, though the details of how it ended were sketchy at best. Either night had come to a close the way it tended to do there, or something had run into him or both. But still, you'd think if all the things Usopp had said were going on he would have noticed some of it - drugged or not.

Day 35: Bus 1

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