damned_institute | Day 38: Patients' Library

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Day 38: Patients' Library

The intercom rang out, disrupting what had turned out to be a rather pointless breakfast conversation, at least in Brainiac 5's eyes. He couldn't wait to put more distance between himself and Scar's blather of how logic, of all things, might not work the same way in this dimension. It was almost enough to make him believe that the man may very well have been a lion originally after all, as he'd never heard anything so very... ignorant and uneducated.

He quickly finished up the fruit he'd been nibbling on - he was no longer as hungry as he had been - and looked around automatically to see where Clark was. Unfortunately with the press of people around, some being led off to the library and others to the mentioned 'therapy sessions' - if that was what they really were - he had lost sight of the Kryptonian. Still there wasn't many places he could go, so Brainiac 5 would be able to catch up with him eventually to check on his condition and try and learn more about what had happened last night. That the Chapel had healed him - admittedly by passing his injuries to another - was interesting, but far more important in his eyes was what had happened to Clark and his powers. They hadn't been working correctly and that worried the Coluan boy more than he would normally have admitted. Without Clark's abilities... he wasn't sure what they would have to rely on in order to escape.

Another problem he would have to deal with was Grell... or, if he was to believe the notes on the bulletin board, the person pretending to be Grell. But that was going to require more careful planning before he made a move. Come to think of it, he had agreed to meet another in the library today on that same post that had sparked this whole mess. At least then he would have something of interest to look forward to, as he doubted any of the 21st century books were likely to be worthwhile to someone of his advanced intellect.

Following the nurses led him to what must have been the library; a reasonably large room filled with a range of archaic books on tall shelves, a few tables and chairs interspersed around the room. The Coluan boy couldn't refrain from wrinkling his nose in distaste as he entered the room, not liking the cumbersome books and the dust that he knew would have gathered on them; he much preferred the clean arrangement of his C.O.M.P.U.T.O. systems back in the Legion headquarters. It was much more practical then shelves and shelves of books on fictional worlds and dated information.

Trying to avoid as much of the room as possible, Brainiac 5 settled himself down on a chair to wait, keeping an eye out for a tall, dark-haired man with a red... something on his forehead.

[for Homura]

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"Guy is fine, if you can get him," Dias replied with a slight shrug. "He seems like the best choice, and probably the most convenient. If you bring someone else, just make sure they won't slow us down." That had probably been an unnecessary addendum, but then again...Claude was occasionally too good-natured to think practically. Dias wouldn't put it past Claude to show up with some clingy kid and a sheepish 'it followed me home, can I keep it?' look on his face.

In response to the meeting place, he simply nodded. "I'll see you there." And he would not check Ashton's room on the way. He wasn't going to continue feeding that false hope.

It would be too simple to keep pushing further and see what came of it. But she had more respect for Jiraiya than that.

Renamon let a smile grace her lips, and decided to let up on the man. "Relax, Jiraiya. I won't bite."

Jiraiya sighed and sagged a little in relief, very glad that he wasn't going to dig himself into a further hole. She enjoyed teasing him, didn't she? While he could understand why she enjoyed it, he wished that he could get her as equally flustered.

Although the idea of an exceptionally flustered Renamon nearly broke his brain.

He thought about her reply for a moment, and then grinned slowly, "But what if I like a woman that bites, hmm?"

She raised an eyebrow sternly. "Then I'd have to remind you that I am not a woman."

Though part of her was amused. Jiraiya was certainly less crass than Impmon, but at the same time, he was more brazen than the small Digimon. She wasn't quite sure which she prefered.

...Prefered? Renamon gave a small sigh. She had been a human for far too long already. She had no preference to people, only loyalty to those who earned it. Prefered, indeed.

She shook her head slightly. "So you're coming along to get weapons tonight?" Asking an obvious question to force a subject change. Very nice.

It seemed like the Doctor couldn't see through Grell's disguise, which was good. It meant he could relax a little for the time being. And really? Grell would have loved to travel, but he'd seen enough of the world in London to last him eternity. People were people no matter where they went and unless someone interesting came along to shake things up, then he spent his days in a fair amount of boredom. Which was why the Madam had been so beautiful and also so very disappointing. Nodding slightly, Grell looked down at the book beside him again and ran his fingers over the spine. "I-I suppose...if I get the chance."

Out of the corner of his eye, Grell caught a grin from his mysterious Mr. Smith and he had to hide a smile himself. He was such an eager man - so full of life, so very long lived... What his Record would show could fill Grell's life with endless entertainment. It really was a shame that his deathscythe was missing. Remembering his role, Grell made sure to stare like the Doctor had grown a second and then a third head. "A p-planet? A planet called Barcelona? Are you quite mad? There's no such thing!"

Well, the speech was amusing. Homura leaned back in his chair, ignoring the spike of pain that came along with the movement as he let Brainiac 5 have his say. What was possible, and what was impossible--it was strange in a way that the boy would have such firm beliefs in his own case, yet would so quickly say that others were wrong. Regardless of the hypocrisy, however, Homura kept his reactions in check, even when he decided that with his attitude, Brainiac 5 would have made a very good god.

"And yet it was a car." Homura shrugged, as if it was the most natural thing in the world. "A group of four were using the creature to head to India, across China. One of them is here, should you wish to find out more. A man named Genjo Sanzo." He imagined the priest would have a great deal of 'fun' with such an attitude. "Though if you do talk to him, you would be wise not to mention me. He hates me a great deal." The feelings obviously weren't mutual, but Sanzo was rather trigger happy. It'd be a shame if Brainiac died before Homura could find a way to use his knowledge.

Since his comments on creating a universe were seemingly unheeded, Homura let the matter go. It was another of those things that was simply true, something he had given a great deal of effort towards accomplishing. The theories were more interesting, and in their own way made sense. It explained the time differences, and why, when a person vanished and then reappeared, time could have passed for them in their world. If the first attempt was a failure, they could replace it with another, perhaps drawn from a latter time, until they got it right. If that was the case, then those who were dead in their own worlds were indeed alive here, as a separate existence. It was a simple theory that explained everything.

And it also meant that none of them had a home to return to.

Keeping that potentially devastating thought silent, Homura considered the rest. "Or when they created the copies, they altered the powers." He murmured it softly, another unpleasant thought. What if he didn't have any powers to regain, as he was? A copy of an original, altered to fit the environment he now found himself in. Again, it confirmed to Homura that this theory could not be revealed as truth--the consequences could be too much for some. Fighting towards ones own death would likely stop some from fighting at all, and numbers were too important in this place.

So he focused on the last part, the smugness returned with a well-practiced arrogance. "Not unless you or someone else can find a way to restore the powers. Theories that can't be put into practice won't free us, will they?" He was purposely antagonizing Brainiac now, to see how the boy would react. If he could light a spark in him, and drive that person to focusing on that goal, Homura would then find it helpful.

"Perhaps I will," Brainiac 5 answered noncommittally. But even if he did seek out this 'Genjo Sanzo', he doubted that it would convince him of anything much other than he was yet another individual who would be too busy insisting that magic was real to accept the idea that perhaps what he thought of as magic was simply something that had yet to be fully uncovered by science. Though he doubted there was anything that would actually allow a creature to change into a car, not even Chameleon Boy or any of the shapeshifters from the past had been able to do something like that.

Rather than trying to continue the obviously futile discussion on what was and wasn't possible, Brainiac 5 focused instead on how they came to be here and how those with powers had had them restricted so neatly. "That is also entirely possible," he agreed. "Particularly when considering the technology needed to create new bodies for us in the first place, many of which have curious similarities to our original forms should we have been other than human. It suggests a very high level of control over the appearance of the body, so that control could also extend into less physically apparent areas."

Brainiac 5's eyes narrowed slightly as, despite everything he'd already said to the technologically-inexperienced supposed-god, the older man was still looking down on him with a particularly high-and-mighty expression. "I can hardly just fix a problem like this without having even the most basic of technology at my disposal," he snapped. "Even something as archaic as a microscope would be helpful in determining what might have been done to us, and then I could work on a viable countermeasure. Unfortunately the laboratory here seems devoid of anything useful, and my search in the storage areas was... cut short.

"Besides," he said with a condescending smirk, "if your 'magic' is so powerful, then why don't you all pool your resources and find your own way to restore your abilities? Or isn't it capable of that?"

Jiraiya's bubble almost burst right there. It was true that Renamon was not a woman, originally, and there was a chance she'd not want to be with any being other than another Digimon, or anyone at all. Which meant that Jiraiya might have no chance at all with her.

But then she abruptly changed the topic. His eyebrows raised a bit at that. Well. That meant she was forcing herself to not think about that subject, which meant she could be interested despite her protest and was trying not to be.

Jiraiya honored her wish and let the subject slide, nodding at Renamon's question, "My group needs weapons, so I'll be there. Where exactly do you want to meet?"

The more Kio listened to the boy the more it occurred to him that he himself had started ignoring the nurse. He had hardly been here and already he was zoning out? Did they drug the food? No, no, if they did they would make them all accept their lives, as the Institute described them.

"They seem to be eager to push us that way, though." Kio looked closely at the boy. He seemed sad. Lonely. Enough to make the man want to take care of him. When the mention of his friends dying came, Kio looked away for a minute. He couldn't imagine Sou-chan going. Being taken away. Dying. They all meant Kio would be alone.

"Allen-kun, I am sorry. But... if it helps, I can be your friend?" Kio smiled at him, the warm reassuring smile he had for everyone in need. "You can tell me about your home. I can tell you about mine. I'm an artist back home, a student at University. I could draw you a picture of your home, so you won't feel so lonely. Would that be better?"

She was relieved that he let it slip, which surprised her. She would seriously need to analyze her behaviour soon to try and make some sense of it.

She was reminded of her conversation with Yukari from yesterday, and her cheeks momentarily flushed. Damn. She was supposed to have been working to rectify that.

Ignoring it completely, she replied, "I have business at the F-A hall, so I'll be there for a bit. If you need to talk to your student first that might work out, or you could just meet me there."

She was being uncharactistically obvious. Painfully so. Perhaps she should just stick to business subjects after all.

Indy was a little unsettled. No one he'd met so far, with the possible exception of Aurion at breakfast, seemed to have the kind of internal logical consistency he would have imagined he could expect from mental patients with lines like these. No one insisted they were right, no one had elaborate stories to try to explain why everything they were saying made complete sense. This kid just put his cards on the table and said, I know it sounds crazy; that's all I've got. Pierson hadn't even been interested in justifying himself that far. And that kind of insanity--if insanity it was, or delusions, or what-have-you--was tough to negotiate.

Either way, as logical as the boy sounded, Indy was going to need more than that; looked like he'd have to get it somewhere else, though. He tried a different tack. "What do you think Landel wants with us? Especially with so many kids?"

Oho! Renamon was now blushing! It took all of Jiraiya's many years of training as a ninja to school his reaction to that. So maybe his chances weren't totally sunk after all.

He was enough of a gentleman that he didn't bring up the blush, either. Renamon was ignoring its existence entirely, so it was probably better that Jiraiya did the same thing. No need to make her even more uncomfortable in her human body than she already was.

"I'll be checking up on Naruto before I go meet you," Jiraiya confirmed with a small grin. "I may have to punt him in the ass to get him moving, but I'll come meet you when I can. My room's M29, but I'll probably be in a nearby hallway if it takes me too long to come find you."

Focusing had made the warmth leave her cheeks, though the irritation from it was harder to vanish. She continued ignoring it. Playing their little game would allow her to be distracted.

She blinked innocently at Jiraiya, before responding in a lower tone. "Oh, I know your room number." A moment of pause, then she smirked and walked around another corner to the next aisle.

She was still oblivious to the possibility that their 'game', as it was, might be one of the causes of her emotional reactions.

Jiraiya had called it right, because it seemed like Renamon was irritated at her blush now. It was good that she was aware enough of her body to get irritated--it meant she was adjusting. Although the expression on her face at that moment was definitely edging towards "cute".

His eyebrow raised as she spoke before walking into the next aisle, "Oh, you do, do you? What else do you know about me?"

She didn't even play at looking at the books this time, and simply turned around fully to stare at Jiraiya with a smirk.

"What do I know? Hmm...." She brought a finger to stroke along her lower lip in thought. "Depends on which conversation you want me to reference. The one with Kakashi, or the ones with your student."

The fact that Jiraiya couldn't know what she had heard amused her.

While Jiraiya had been aware that she had overheard his conversation with Kakashi, he wasn't aware that she had overheard at least one conversation with Naruto as well. Although it wasn't hard to overhear Naruto, considering how easy he made it... She wasn't kidding about her hearing being good. If other patients had hearing of a similar quality, then he'd have to be careful.

He let out a sigh, but then grinned a bit. "I can guess what you overheard with Kakashi. Now, with Naruto... It's easy to overhear him, really, so I wouldn't easily know which conversations you could be referring to...."

Allen nodded in agreement. The staff in the daytime seemed to just blend into the background, that is, unless fights broke out or there were other kinds of trouble. They remained pretty unobtrusive. He supposed they were probably used to rejecting the pleas of patients who claimed they were sane and after so many days, a body could only be rejected so many times.

Kio's offer was a kind one, and Allen had to admit he was sort of... surprised to hear it. "Ah... I... I would like that," he said a little quieter than before. "If it's not too much trouble, it would be nice to be friends."

He scratched his head, somewhat embarrassed to be asked so many questions, but Kio did appear much nicer than he'd been before. Allen could at least show him the kindness of a polite conversation.

"You're an artist?" Allen asked, curious now. "I draw too. Sometimes," he admitted, "but they're not very good."

"I... back in my world, I travel a lot. It wasn't until recently that I had a place to call home. I'm an Exorcist," he explained, "I work for the Dark Order, a sort of... private sect controlled by the Vatican."

For Grell's sake, the Doctor hoped Grell would get the chance. It was a big universe, after all, and even if all a human could see was his tiny little planet, that was big all by itself. He couldn't imagine staying in one place his whole life and not seeing anywhere else.

And maybe in Grell's case, seeing more would broaden his perspective. 'No such thing'? Really! "Of course there is," he said matter-of-factly. "You lot just don't know about it yet, probably. But in a few thousand years, well..."

She tilted her head. "Yesterday, I overheard you talking about one of your student's teammates being gay--the one with the sword, I believe? As well as discussing Naruto's history. And a lot of teasing," she added, giving Jiraiya a patiently amused look. "Which it seems like you like to do.

"And this morning..." Renamon paused, trying to think back. She was preoccupied with Yukari that she hadn't devoted much attention to that conversation. "This morning I heard your student yell... once again... that you were a pervert. And then you hushing him that 'she' would hear. But after that I was... preoccupied."

Renamon raised her eyebrows yet again. "Should I be concerned that I am that 'she', and your interest is only as your student so loudly repeats?"

The Digimon was mainly teasing still, but she still had an offhand interest. If Naruto claim was true in any way, it would affect how she acted towards the Sannin. But, it depended exactly what was meant. And it still might only be 'just a nickname', odd as that may seem.

At first, Jiraiya looked amused. The one with the sword was a hilarious way to describe Sasuke, if he was actually that way. Which he probably was, considering Naruto didn't mention Aidou being thrown into the nearest wall followed by Sasuke freaking out, regardless if it was a kiss or not. It wasn't as surprising as he thought it would be.

And he couldn't refute the fact that it was fun to mess with Naruto's head a bit every now and then, because the kid just had great reactions to practically everything. But the comment about Naruto's "history" made him a bit more serious, because that was something only a few knew, and the kid was still dealing with it himself. It wasn't common knowledge.

When she began talking about his discussion with Naruto during breakfast, Jiraiya actually paled a bit. While she had only heard some of the discussion (which was almost too much), Jiraiya was relieved to know that she hadn't known the specific topic. Except then she said something that changed his mood entirely.

Renamon implied he was only interested in her because of her body. He was angry before he knew it, but he wasn't sure at whom. Or how angry he was. Just that he was angry, and that he--

"I'm not that kind of man," Jiraiya stated in an even tone, his expression closing up. "For me to be truly attracted to a woma--" Wait, Digimon. "--female--she would have to be special. Women with beautiful bodies exist anywhere. Women--and men--with a mind like yours are rare."

He almost glared at her but turned to stare hard at a spine of some innocent book instead. "If a man saw you only for your current body, he'd be a damned fool."

So many remarks Renamon could have made to what Jiraiya said. She could have made any sort of remarks, teasing or somewhat thankful, based upon what he had said. She passed on the majority of them, writing off a few, and putting a select group to memory.

A slightly wider blink was her only reaction. Coolly, she stated, "That's good to know."

Jiraiya didn't say anything in reply to that, forcing himself to read each individual title of the books on the shelves. It was the only way to cool his head. Even though he knew better, he was still as hot-headed as he was when he was half his age--it just took prodding in a certain manner to bring it out.

He reached up to rest his fingertip in the binding of one book, almost as if he contemplated taking it down to read--but both of them knew that he wasn't hardly even aware of the book's title. Renamon wasn't leaving, even though he practically told her he liked her. Which was frustrating, especially since she didn't feel the same way about him.

"Sorry," he quietly muttered out, knowing Renamon could easily hear him--he was just embarrassed enough to not want others to hear him apologizing; he raised his voice a bit louder after that. "Got carried away."

"You said what you wanted to say," she said in that same cool tone. "And from your emotional reaction, what you felt."

Which was the opposite of Renamon at the moment. The Digimon was like ice, as cool as her diamond shards. There was no way to guage what she was feeling, or if she was feeling something at all.

"So don't apologize." Especially if the man wasn't even going to come out and say it, much like the children they both watched over.

That sounded like a rejection, Jiraiya's first thought was. And he wasn't at all surprised--almost enough that it didn't sting. Or he wasn't going to let it sting, perhaps. Right now, that should be the least important thing on his mind. He needed to be there for his student.

And Renamon wasn't human. Digimon possibly were unable to share that sort of attraction, considering they didn't need to mate. And he was used to it, really--

"--It's not fair to you," Jiraiya stated finally, glancing slightly in her direction. "While my emotions don't care that you weren't human, it's not right to expect the feeling to be mutual."

Then, he finally really looked at her, and smiled, "... I'm fine, though. It's just been a long while since I reacted this strongly towards someone. That's all. So don't worry about it."

Homura's expression, his condescending air didn't fluctuate in the least when Brainiac spoke to him in anger or in self-assured victory. This response was exactly what the demi-god wanted, after all. Something to make him angry, and all the more eager to accomplish that one, specific goal. In his own world, he had used his strength to antagonize Goku and the others. Here, he'd use his wits.

"I can have a group look for the things you're after." Though he didn't know what a microscope was, there were enough people from the future in the History Club that he thought someone would. Brainiac had called it archaic, after all. "Searching for supplies is hardly an uncommon task, after all. I would just need a list of what you'd like to have." And providing those supplies would put Brainiac into his debt, though Homura had yet to determine if he was the kind of person who believed in such principles.

When it came to the question of magic, Homura chuckled at the boy's attempted impertinence. The question was short-sighted. "There are several reasons. One, the specific ability to grant powers has been reduced or eliminated; I know this firsthand, as I once had the ability to turn mortals into gods. The powers I'm left with don't quite do the same thing. And two, we don't know if it is magic, technology, or a combination of the two that is the cause of the loss. In my world, both exist, and the combination of both is what can do things beyond the imagination." Which was why it had been forbidden--not that a rule stopped certain ambitious mortals. "So magic alone may very well not be enough. Obviously it's already been limited to begin with, hasn't it?"

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Day 38: Patients' Library

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