damned_institute | Day 37: Breakfast

[for Sylar, I believe]

At the sound of the intercom, Wally jerked awake and blinked around at the room. He’d fallen asleep. He should have been up and keeping an eye open for ZEX, but he’d fallen asleep waiting on his bed.

“Idiot,” he groaned, ruffling his hair and sighing in annoyance. “Way to help a guy out, hotshot.” Hopefully ZEX hadn’t dropped by and thought he’d left or something, or wouldn’t be too mad at him for just forgetting about it like that. If he was lucky, he’d be able to catch up with the other patient at some point and explain what had happened.

Rolling himself a little awkwardly out of the bed, Wally took the opportunity to stretch his injured leg and test how well it was holding up. It was feeling a bit better, not so much that he could abandon his crutch or that it didn’t pull painfully if he wasn’t careful, but better. Tony had apparently made it through the night in one piece as well, which was a relief. He really didn’t feel comfortable about the thought of his roommate wandering about on his own with an injured arm. Not when Wally himself could relax and fall asleep in the apparent safety of their room.

Yeah, he wasn’t going to let himself forget that one in a hurry.

It was at that moment that the door swung open to admit one of the nurses. She seemed surprised to find him awake and ready to go already, but smiled warmly. “Hungry, are we Mr. West? Well in that case, let’s get you to the cafeteria. The staff have provided some delicious French Toast as well as a range of other foods I’m sure you’ll like. Now will you be needing a hand with your leg, dear?”

“No thanks, I can handle it,” Wally replied, smiling back. After all, it probably wasn’t the nurses’ fault that this place was so messed up, so it wasn’t like picking fights with them would do anything. With a cheery wave goodbye, Wally slowly made his way to the cafeteria, keeping a tight grip on his crutch all the while. Obtaining a plate of food was only slightly less difficult than it had been yesterday – he didn’t have the painkillers to work around this time – but he managed well enough, coming away from the buffet with a tray containing a plate piled high with slices of French Toast and slathered in maple syrup, butter, and sugar, as well as a glass of juice. Not quite as good as some coffee would be right now, but the sugar would hopefully make up for it. And, with how few people were here at the moment, he could afford to take more food than might have been considered ‘normal’ – he’d have most of it gone by the time anyone came to keep him company, then he could just worry about how many extra serves would be allowed before he aroused suspicion.

Feeling pretty happy with how things were looking so far, Wally hummed faintly to himself as he dug in to his breakfast.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Even if Dias had been so inclined, there would have been no way for him to conceal the look on his face when Guy suggested that Ashton might have been taken for further experiments or brainwashing - might, judging by his continued absence, still be there. It was, possibly, the furthest from helpful that anything Guy could have said could ever have been. "There is that possibility," he said stiffly; the 'and thank you so much for reminding me' was left unsaid for no particular reason, since it couldn't have been more heavily implied.

It took a lot of willpower to not flinch under that glare - Guy didn't completely succeed, but he was able to maintain his composure despite the fact that he had apparently taken the worst course possible in trying to reassure the other man.

"You know," he said, glancing around at the staff that was watching over all of the patients in the cafeteria, "you might want to ask one of the nurses about him, if you know his real name. I think sometimes they'll give out information if... they have it."

Namely, they might know if Ashton had been "discharged," though Guy wasn't about to spell it out for the other man. He figured knowing for certain would be better than having to work with maybes and what-ifs, but everyone was different.

"I already asked," Dias replied, raking a hand through his hair. He hadn't been able to remember Ashton's real name, if he'd ever known it, so he'd simply demanded to know where he was based on his room number. "They were...evasive." Namely, his nurse had claimed that Ashton wasn't one of the patients that she took care of so she really couldn't say, which might have been true or might have simply been an excuse not to tell him anything.

He suspected Guy was trying to be helpful, even if most of the evidence thus far suggested something to the contrary. (Clearly one of the reasons he got along with Claude was because they both had the tendency to stick a foot in their collective mouths.) So, before he could try being any more helpful, Dias added, "And his roommate's missing, too."

That cut down the man's options, then. Guy let out a sigh, realizing that he'd more or less run out of any suggestions. It also seemed like Dias had already tried everything, and he probably wasn't going to be able to calm down until he knew for sure that Ashton was either here or... elsewhere.

If Ashton was gone, there was always the question of how. Dead, or just disappeared? Neither was ideal, but Guy personally preferred the latter. Maybe it was more ambiguous, but sometimes that was a good thing.

"I'm sorry," he eventually offered, not because he was automatically assuming that Ashton was gone, but because this wasn't something anyone deserved to deal with. "My best friend disappeared from this place, so I've been there," he explained. "Hopefully Ashton will turn up."

Dias glanced up at Guy, scanning his face. If he'd interpreted that remark correctly...then Claude hadn't told him about the depth of the relationship between himself and Ashton. That was a good thing, to be honest, since Dias wasn't the type to want those not involved in his personal life to know all about it, although it was a discretion he honestly hadn't actually expected Claude to show.

Then again, Claude still wasn't entirely happy about his relationship with Ashton - possibly it hadn't been discretion at all, but discomfort. Not that it really mattered, in the end.

"Thank you," he said finally, deciding to shove aside his problems for the moment. He had, in retrospect, been a little rough on Guy due to his worry over Ashton, which wasn't quite fair given that Guy hadn't done anything to deserve it(aside from one ill-timed remark; Claude had done far worse when they'd first met). While Dias could be abrasive, and knew it full well, he didn't try to be intentionally so unless people earned such treatment.

"Is your arm healing well?" he inquired, in an almost forcible derailing of the current topic and an awkward attempt at friendly concern instead.

The subject change was welcome to Guy as well, even though he wished there was more he could do to help Dias out. But right now the man was just going to have to resort to playing the waiting game, as frustrating as that would be.

He glanced down at his arm, glad that Dias had asked about how it was healing rather than what had caused it. Guy would have felt obliged to explain, seeing how he had wandered over and questioned the other swordsman about all sorts of personal things.

"It's doing all right. The pain is mainly gone today, so that's good. Though tonight I'm going to get it properly healed." He could only hope that the spell would be successful and that his arm would be as good as new afterward - though if it wasn't, he would just have to deal with it. Staying in one night was acceptable, but he wasn't planning to make a repeat performance.

"That's good," Dias replied with a slight nod. "Has Claude been helping you?" The fact that Guy didn't know that Dias knew how he'd been hurt yet, or that Claude hadn't told him, hadn't occurred to Dias, nor would it really have mattered if it had. As far as he knew, it wasn't a secret.

As far as Guy could tell, that question came out of nowhere and didn't make much sense. He blinked in confusion for a moment before his expression turned into more of a frown. "What do you mean?" Claude had been supportive and escorted him over to the clinic last night, true, but there was no way that Dias could know about that, so what was he getting at?

Edited 2008-11-25 02:23 (UTC)

Dias shrugged slightly. "He was telling me about how he felt guilty for what happened to you, so I suggested he do something other than feel miserable and assist you until your arm was healed. I don't know if he listened."

Claude really felt guilty about it? Well, Guy had already suspected that, but the fact that his friend had gone so far as to talk to someone else about it made it very hard for Guy to hold back a sigh.

He managed, though he was wishing that the younger man wouldn't take all the blame for something that had hardly been his fault. "He helped me to the clinic last night, so I guess that answers your question," Guy explained, somewhat distracted.

Day 37: Breakfast

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