damned_institute | Nightshift 38: Men's Bathrooms (M41-M80)

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Nightshift 38: Men's Bathrooms (M41-M80)

[from here.]

"...But, really, Hei-chan, you ought to tell them about the time that you and Kazu...huh?"

Shinichi had made enough use of the facilities in his day and a half at Landel's to know that the bathrooms did not normally look like that. They were clean and plain and institutional and reeking of antiseptic...just like every other hospital men's room.

These bathrooms, on the other hand, were not like other hospital men's rooms. They looked like a set from a B-rate horror film, except that the slime on the walls and the horrible reek were real. The detective half expected a gaunt woman in a bloodstained kimono to jump out from behind one of the broken stalls and try to eat their brains.

He'd seen dozens of crime scenes over the years, all gruesome and usually very bloody. Shinichi thought that he'd grown accustomed to horror, or at least a thicker skin, but...this was something else entirely.

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Shin-chan? Hei-chan? What? Sokka looked between the two, confused. Ok, they either were related somehow, or they were actually insane. So far he was leaning towards the latter, but hey, he'd been wrong before. Still with the way the Heiji guy talked, he couldn't overlook any possibility.

The name he didn't question was that of the other who didn't look anything all like the boys from Japan. Commander. Now that was a name! It was all military and cool! And even though it didn't exactly fit for the age of the kid, that only made Sokka's curiosity act up all the more. He found himself slipping back beside the younger boy to have a little chat. "So, Commander. How'd you come across a name like that?"

Maybe not relevant to the fact that he wasn't where he was supposed to be and he was just following with people he'd just met, but hey! It was an important matter! If this guy was called that because of some battle experience then maybe he could help with stuff after the Comet had come and gone. Sokka's Dad was still pretty awesome when it came to stuff like that, but another head was welcome any time.

But of course, relevance went away once he took a peek into the place he'd been lead. His eyes widened, and Sokka's eye twitched before he looked again to Shinichi. "You sure I'm not dreaming here, because this is really really creepy..."

The Commander stiffened a little when Hattori (Hei-chan?) put his hand on the his shoulder, but didn't protest. The soldiers usually had enough sense not to put hands on him or pet him, even if he was smaller, but he had authority over them. Hattori was the leader of this group, even if he was only leading because of a choice by the leader of the History Club which was in turn chosen somewhat arbitrarily by the Commander in the first place. It was more like the practice of obedience than a real sense of obligation that kept him from protesting, and the fact that the movement didn't seem to be hostile.

Following the group as it headed into the bathroom, he noticed Sokka's holding back to come closer, and looked up at the question, momentarily unable to answer the newcomer's question. "I am the Commander. It's my purpose." It was like being asked why he breathed. Thinking about it a little further, he clarified, "My king needs me to be the Commander." That was really all there was to it.

As they stepped through the doorway and into the bathroom, everyone seemed to pause, and Sokka questioned all of reality itself. Not certain why there was a pause, seeing no immediate threats, the Commander agreed with the only problem he saw. "This bathroom needs to be cleaned."

But that wasn't why they were here, and it wasn't getting him closer to finishing this task so they could start the other. He headed forward towards the sinks, not at all repelled by the sanitation problem and unaware of the generally malevolent atmosphere. Their target was clearly visible.

Heiji entered the bathroom, casting a cursory glance around it. He was about to correct Shinichi on all of the counts presented (for one, Meitantei-sama was just pushing it...), but the guy seemed a little disturbed by what he saw. Heiji had been in here before, by himself to boot, so he was used to what was before them.

He rested a hand on Shinichi's shoulder, knowing full well that this was not the time to continue joking around. His team was nervous, and for a good reason. He had to get serious now.

"Some superior knowledge, huh?" Heiji said, briefly patting Shinichi on the shoulder before taking a position in front of the other three.

"All right, here's th'deal. We're gettin' metal for weapons. As you can see," Heiji walked over to one of the sinks and gave the pipe a good kick. It gave a little and leaked some dark water onto the floor. "Th'pipes aren' exactly up t'sanitary standards anymore. So, le's get t'work on these. Take any scrap you can pry off. I have--" He reached down into his pocket and produced a pair of pliers and two screwdrivers. "Some tools, but they migh' be a bit difficult 'n dangerous t'work with. Brute force may be th'best option. After we've gotten as much as we can, we're takin' it back t'your room, Kudou. It's the shortest distance from here, 'n I don' wan' us walkin' around more than we have to.

"After this," Heiji continued, shouldering his katana. "We head for the rec. shed and get you guys bats. And a soccer ball, Kudou," he gave him a wry smile. "That should do for a weapon in th'short run 'til the Weaver c'n get you guys some better weapons.

"If there aren' any questions, le's hop to it, yeah?"

Shinichi snorted weakly. "Yeah," he said, quirking an eyebrow. "No kidding."

Last night hadn't really seemed real. Sure, they'd gone through the halls and they'd found someone who'd been abducted and tortured, but that was surprisingly routine for the young detective. It was the horror aspects that were getting to him the most right now. And the smell.

He still had no idea how rusty old pipes were going to get turned into 'weapons' (unless blunt objects counted, which they probably did), or how Heiji had managed to get his hands on that sword. He was pretty damn certain that katana were not part of the standard Landel's starter pack. Another mystery he needed to solve. Or at least ask about.

"I'm cool with that. We can use my closet. Assuming the nurses don't find it." Wouldn't the stench give it away? Well, it was worth a try. He gave Hattori a lopsided grin when the other detective mentioned a soccer ball. "...My hero," he said dryly.

And now it was time for 'hopping.'

Except that, up close, it smelled even worse than it had near the doors. And the pipes were cold. And...slimy.

Sokka held up at the answer he got. Ok then, it probably wasn't his name, but if he went with it, that was his thing. Sokka had his own names he went by as well, despite none of them being so cool as Commander. "Your King, huh? Sounds pretty important then." He paused a bit, then grinned when the idea struck him, "So I guess that means you're not a royal pain, right? Get it? Because you're the Commander and all!" He nudged Commander a bit with his elbow. "Huh? Huh?"

It didn't look like any of his great jokes would lighten the mood though. Not even his sense of humor could get rid of the smell anyway. It smelled worse than week old saber-tooth moose-lion meat... which actually still tasted good if you cooked it, but meh. He'd eat anything that was still considered meat, smelly or not.

And come to think of it, he'd still not had breakfast!

"Hey, after we with your leaky pipes?" Sokka pointed to the mess Heiji had already made with a face, "And your bats and... whatever Soccer is? You think we could go find something to eat? I didn't exactly get breakfast when I woke up."

"Huh?" he echoed up at Sokka, staring blankly. The nudging wasn't hard enough to be a problem, but if it continued, the Commander decided he'd have to hit back. Fortunately, Sokka stopped before too long, apparently distracted by his stomach. He reminded the Commander of the Pigmask troops, actually, between the sometimes inexplicable behavior and the desire to eat. "Yes, my King is the most important person in the world." It hadn't been exactly what Sokka had asked, but again the Commander wasn't sure what Sokka was trying to ask about and so he stuck with basic truths.

The side conversation itself wasn't important, anyway, especially since Hattori had offered tools. Unsure what good a screwdriver would be to loosen the pipes, he took the pliers without asking permission, and crouched down to start removing pipes. He didn't give a second thought to taking the most useful tool, though the fact that he also was the smallest person there might have been a reasonable excuse. The water on his arms made the hair there start to feel strange and ticklish, although he couldn't see it sticking up in the dark of the room.

Heiji blinked a little when Sokka asked for food, but was brought out of his disbelief when the Commander took the pliers.

"Uh... honestly can't ya wait 'til breakfast? I'd rather not endanger the team runnin' aroun' tryin' t'find you a snack. It won't be long, promise," Heiji said, trying to sound reassuring.

Meanwhile, he himself took a crack at the sink furthest away, mercilessly pummeling the pipe with a series of vicious kicks. He'd gotten metal this way before, and with four of them, it shouldn't be long before the job was done.

"...I'm surprised you can even think about food after this lovely smell," Shinichi said dryly, looking up at Sokka from his position under the sink. Something cold, wet, and slightly more viscous than it ought to have been was dripping down the back of his neck, and he had to fight the urge to run to the nearest shower and scrub himself raw. The sooner they got as much metal as Hattori decided he needed, the sooner they'd be getting out of here.

Though pliers would have been a good idea. The detective stared at the Commander a bit, still rather disconcerted by the kid's talk of "kings" and whatever. But not as much as he could have been. After spending the last several months as a first grader, Kudou Shinichi knew very well what it was like to be underestimated because of age (or apparent age).

Kicking worked just as well as pliers, though. He was, after all, very good at kicking things.

Especially now that he didn't need superpowered shoes to get results.

Shinchi stood up and gave the pipe he'd been working on a good, solid kick. Maybe even a game-winning one, if the goalie wasn't quite up to par. There was a crack and a clang and the pipe separated from the rest of the sink.

He got a mouthful of awful black sludge for his efforts.

Sokka's face fell when Commander didn't get it and just listed facts. "Well, I thought it was good," he huffed, "It wouldn't kill you to smile a little either, kid."

Turning to the ones who weren't going to let him eat, Sokka made a pitiful face. "But I just woke up!" he complained, "That means it's breakfast!" Or it did so far as Sokka was concerned. He hadn't even gotten his firegummies at the show last night, so of course he was hungry! "And while the smell in here isn't exactly appetizing, I've smelled worse. Doesn't mean you can't eat because some meat's spent a liiiiittle too much time at the bottom of your pack, right?" Right. No, not just right, more than right! It just didn't do to let meat of any kind go to waste unless it was his!

Since it didn't look like he'd be getting any food anyway, Sokka sighed and went over to the smelly pipe things. "Soooo, what are these things anyway?" he asked, running a finger along the less-than-smooth top of the corroded sink. He'd seen things kind of similar when he'd gotten the grand tour of the Northern Air Temple, but with how grungy these things were Sokka couldn't be sure that they did the same thing. He squatted to look at one of the pipes as of yet untouched by anyone else, hand cupping his chin. "It looks like some kind of transport system," he looked up just in time to see Shinichi catch the results of the tampering and snickered, "I'm guessing for that black stuff you've chosen to bath in."

Fairly oblivious to Sokka's mood, the Commander ignored the suggestion of smiling, instead focusing on his work. The others weren't having any trouble getting the pipes free, and with the help of some leverage and slightly stronger than proportionate upper arms, he managed to loosen one of his own pipes, not surprised when his arms were soaked in turn by the gunk that had doused 'Shin-chan.' It did make him pause, frowning down at himself. The strange sensation from the liquid continued, even if it didn't seem dangerous. It was bad enough to already be malfunctioning, he couldn't let himself be damaged more by sewage leaking into important systems. But his arms seemed to be all right, after wiping one off, just a bit irritated.

"It's a bathroom." Which really, really needed to be cleaned. "Here, you wash your hands. In the stalls over there, you release waste." The water seemed more like someone had reversed the order of the two, though. He started pulling off another section of the pipe, easier now that the unit was separated. "How many of these will we take? Will we take apart the toilets?" The last was directed towards Hattori.

Heiji grimaced when the sludge started coming out in droves as his team took apart the sinks. Frowning at Sokka for the comment, he untied the sweatshirt he kept around his waist and handed it to Shinichi to clean up.

"It's a sink," he clarified, adding on to the Commander's explanation. "We're takin' 'em apart for weapons, 'case y'didn' get the memo. Work first, you c'n eat later."

Harsh, perhaps. But Heiji was now responsible for the team. He didn't want them to stay in that bathroom any longer than was possible. If Sokka's whining about food and questions about plumbing slowed them down, it would be him who would have to answer for it.

"No need for that," Heiji said, giving his own sink pipe another kick. It clattered to the ground, oozing sludge all over his ankle. Ugh... "Jus' the pipes from th'sinks should do f'r now." He started in on another sink. They were moving along nicely.

Shinichi barely managed to nod his thanks at Heiji before the taste and the stench overwhelmed him and he found himself gagging in the corner. Well, at least he didn't have to worry about whatever little of the sludge he may have managed to ingest. Or his dinner, for that matter. Once his stomach had stopped heaving, he used Heiji's sweatshirt to shakily wipe his mouth and try to clean his face as best he could. He also tied it around his face, just in case the next sink decided that it wanted to follow suit.

And he felt better, oddly enough. He gave the Commander a silent nod and a smile, and Sokka got a cheeful "fuck you!" and a look that clearly said that if he didn't shut up about his stomach and get back to work soon, Shinichi might decided to weaponize the pipes prematurely. "Breakfast should be in another couple hours at most," he added. "So you'll get it soon enough."

"Sink. Right, gottcha," Sokka nodded that he understood to make them both happy, but he'd meant to hear the more detailed parts of how this sink worked. Where did the piping lead? He could only see that it went back into the wall, but that only told him so much. And who would want to pipe gross sludge everywhere? Unless this thing went into a swamp. ... did it go into a swamp?

These guys didn't seem to like his questions, some more than others, so he didn't voice any new ones. Or any new jokes he could have made - sink was just golden for this kind of situation - either! They really had no sense of humor. Sokka missed his group already, even if Appa did lick covering him in Bison drool and Toph used him as a punching bag too much. At least they put up with his humorous side. Even Zuko would have been in higher spirits than these guys, and that was saying a lot.

And it wasn't as though he knew the guy would start throwing up either!

"Look, sorry, all right?" Sokka held up his hands, both apologetically and defensively, "You guys are all just so serious... I was just trying to lighten things up. I mean, come on, only one of you guys has smiled this whole time, and he's the one I can barely understand." He huffed just a bit before giving Heiji a quick, "No offense," and going back to his main point, "And usually I'm the one who's all for getting things done, but since I still don't know what the heck's going on, I can't be as into this as you guys!"

Sokka was doing a lot of talking, especially about things like food, and not very much working. Yes, he would have fit in very well with the other soldiers. Shin-chan, on the other hand, had done a good job of continuing to work even after the liquid made him vomit a bit. Aware of the nod, he nodded back, although he wasn't sure what the reason for the exchange was. Still tugging at his own work, and more liquid came loose with more piping, the metal pieces dumped on the ground to free his hands for more. The fact that his upper body and abdomen were now covered in the sludge didn't bother him, but the tingling sensation remained.

He didn't understand the confusion; it seemed simple to him. They were gathering metal for a group, and that metal would be turned into weapons. Slowly, after a long wait in a line, something the Commander had already decided that he couldn't pause for. Unless... He glanced towards the group's leader again. "If we participate in a club's activities, will it speed the time for getting a better weapon?" A bat would be fine if he had to improvise, but he'd been built to use a sword.

Oi... Heiji hadn't expected Shinichi to ralph all over everything either. He was starting to wonder if his first night had really been okay, or if he should recommend to Homura that he stick with the other detective for the next few nights or so. He felt bad for him, really, and not in the 'Sucks to Be You!' manner that was normal for him when thinking about Shinichi's problems. Genuinely bad. None of them had asked for this, that was for sure, and despite the fact that they were used to messy murders, Heiji could safely say that neither of them had ever been in a prison like this.

A vein went in Heiji's temple, despite the fact that Sokka had tacked 'no offense' onto the end of that little speech. He hated it when people claimed they didn't understand him. He was speaking plain Japanese, after all! Nothing hard about that, even if he had an accent. But he had to keep his cool.

"Listen, no one's attackin' ya, but y'r not exactly makin' this any easier. I'm of th'opinion tha' we c'n screw around durin' th'day, but at night, screwin' around gets people hurt. Look around, Sokka. I don' know where y'came from b'fore this, but y'ain' in Kansas no more. Monsters come out at night. Things attack us without warnin', and they don' back down until someone's dead--them'r us." He shouldered his katana, "I'll tell ya what's goin' on though. We're bustin' out, and that requires weapons, which require materials, which requires manpower. We're th'manpower righ' now. S'get t'work on that sink pipe, 'n maybe we can get th'fuck outta here b'fore somethin' decides that we look tasty. Comprende?" Heiji tossed a screwdriver at Sokka. "Y'work, or I leave ya behind in Kudou's room."

He nodded to the Commander. "Yeah. Th' more metal we get," he glanced at Sokka. "Th' more material there is t'go around and th'faster you can get somethin' that isn't jus' a blunt weapon." He threw the pipes he'd procured from the two sinks into a pile on the floor and began looking around for something else to scrap while everyone else worked on their pipes.

Shinichi angrily kicked at one last pipe, freeing it with a terrific clang. He managed to avoid getting slimed in the face this time, but the rest of him was pretty much fair game. He was so evenly coated in a layer of black grime that whether or not his clothes had actually been gray before he'd started was anyone's guess.

The detective had to bite back a snicker when Sokka finally took it a step too far and insulted Hattori Heiji's precious mother tongue. And for Osaka Prefecture's proudest native son, that was one of the worst insults possible.

Shinichi should know. He'd been at the receiving end of such wrath a few times. More than a few times. Almost every day.

"Hate to cut in, Hattori, but how much of this stuff do you need? Just out of idle curiosity, of course."

Sokka fumbled to catch the sharp thing thrown at him, managing to snag the metal end of it before it fell and went through his foot. The fumbling helped to keep him from asking more questions as well since he didn't know a Kansas or what that last word Heiji had used either. It sounded like a question, but Sokka wasn't sure he knew what he was supposed to say. Instead, he looked at the little tool he'd been given, gripped it and nodded. "Yes sir! Oh, and so you'll know? I'm from the South Pole. Southern Water Tribe," he just had to say it so they wouldn't get confused again. "

And again he was back to not knowing what to really do, but he had down that Heiji wanted him to get one of the pipe things away from beneath the sink. He could do that, right? The tool was supposed to help too, it seemed, so after crouching down again and looking between the pipe and the sink, he eventually began beating as hard as he could at the pipe with the wrong end, trying to make it come off.

Having worked with little pause during the tense exchanges, joke sessions and time-outs for vomiting, the Commander was making good progress despite his size limitations. His arms were stronger than they appeared even malfunctioning, and the sludge coating him could have been rosewater for all he cared. Uncomfortably tingling rosewater, but that didn't matter if it wasn't causing real damage.

Tossing another piece of metal into his pile, he stopped again to look to Hattori. "I was told there was a wait to get proper weapons. Can you speed that wait by helping this group?" Hattori had said something about a 'weaver' working for them, which was different from the 'cooking' codeword, but still not too secretive.

There was the fact that Hattori himself had a sword immediately ready, but the problems with trying to claim that were even worse than the problems with Celes's knife last night. No one here would listen to his orders without outside motivation, and trying to take a weapon from an armed person while the Commander was bare-handed and didn't know what abilities Hattori had would be stupid and might just result in more malfunction. The group itself might turn on him. Just doing the work in exchange for the increasingly distant hope of extra weapons was the best way to prepare himself for now.

"As much as we can get from this bathroom," Heiji replied, examining one of the shower fixtures, then turned his attention to the locks on the stalls. He took the extra screwdriver and began going at the screws holding them to the doors. They weren't much, but every little bit helped.

His head turned at the sound of the Commander throwing another piece of metal onto the pile. He caught sight of Sokka going at the pipe with the wrong end of the screwdriver and sighed. He only had to work with the guy right now--he could only imagine the kind of Logic Hell Shinichi would go through with this guy as his roommate.

"Yeah, there's a wait," Heiji said, moving over to correct Sokka's grip. He didn't even want to start on the fact that the South Pole, in his and Shinichi's world, was completely uninhabitable. "However, if y'do your part and work f'r th'team, Homura'd prob'ly getcha a weapon faster. It also d'pends on whether'r not y'can use it. He won' arm people who can' fight b'fore the people who can, y'know?"

He straightened up after correcting Sokka ("Like this. Y'hold th'other end...") and continued working on the stall latches. "After'm done wi' this, we c'n head out to the field."

Oh, great. More metal. Shinichi had been under the impression that they were only going to be working with the sinks, but now Hattori was moving onto the showers. Well, this was perfect. Sighing, he crawled out from under the sink where he'd been uncomfortably cramped. He was choosing to ignore Sokka entirely at this point. Once he started going on about living at the South Pole, he lost whatever small amount of respect the detective may have had left. The kid was obviously insane, and was reaching levels of obnoxious that even some of the more immature kids in his first grade class hadn't even managed to get to. At least they had their age as an excuse.

Plus, he didn't even know how to hold a screw driver. He was a lost cause.

The Commander, on the other hand, he didn't really have much of an opinion of, other than the fact that he was obviously very well disciplined for someone who didn't look much older than thirteen or fourteen. He had been plugging away at his own sink, almost wordlessly, for the past twenty minutes at least. It was pretty impressive, even if it didn't give Shinichi much to go on in regards to his personality. There were very few of those "tells" that helped him deduct things about people that others couldn't see for Shinichi to go on. He did seem particularly interested in weaponry, though. Rather unusual for a kid. Just what sort of place could he have come from?

Oh, well. If what Heiji had been going on about for the past two days was true, he'd have plenty of time here to figure stuff like that out.

Moving over to his friend, the detective made a valiant (but ultimately futile) effort to brush some of the gook off his trousers. "Hey. Want a hand?"

Well, when someone had never seen anything like a screwdriver before (well, maybe something like it, but not similar enough), he had every excuse about not knowing how to use it! But Sokka wouldn't have thought that made him a lost cause unless someone voiced it. And Heiji was nice enough to give him an explanation, so he soon got the hang of it to where he too was covered in a lovely spray of gunk.

"Awwwww," he whined, but didn't barf at the stuff getting all over him. He's been covered in Flying Bison snot before, so this was nothing.

"Sooooo, I'm still allowed to talk, right? No jokes, but questions? Like... which nation is Japan a part of?" Sokka couldn't stay quiet for long, and now that he wasn't putting all his might into beating at the piping, he found himself curious. Shinichi didn't look it at all, but Heiji could have been Water Tribe if you turned your head, squinted, and knew that he probably came from the swamp like Hugh and the others.

"What about you? What's your Nation?" he turned his head to Commander since the other two had gone off.

Anything but Fire would be good. But they probably weren't since Sokka had already let it slip that he was Water Tribe and water and fire weeeeeren't exactly the best of buds.

"I can fight, I was designed to work with a sword," the Commander told Hattori, not pausing in his work except for a moment when the spray had nearly caught him in the face. More metal to throw on the pile. How would they hide the smell of it from nurses during the daytime, if it was hidden in someone's room? It didn't matter; his mission was to obtain metal. Holding it wasn't his concern. "I would be more efficient with a sword."

He also would have less reason to keep working with a foreign organization, but that wasn't important either. For ordinary soldiers, who didn't perform duties just for the sake of their king's will, work meant pay. This wasn't very different from that, he'd worked according to their orders so he was due pay.

Sokka's question caught his attention again. "I am not from a nation. I am the commander of the Pig Mask army and I serve King Porky, who rules the world." He was clearly not aware how strange it was that someone so young could look so solemn while saying something like that. "I was working in the Nowhere Islands when I was brought here. I have never heard of Japan, either."

"Nah, I think I got it," he assured Shinichi, working at the last of the screws. "Japan is a nation, Sokka," he explained. He had to be patient with the other people who weren't from his world, he knew that much. "Land 'o th'Risin' Sun, yeah? We used t'be a buncha wanderin' tribes, but we're our own country now. That era was a looong time ago." He threw the last hinge into the pile and straightened up. "Dunno about any King Porky though--considerin' he isn't the ruler of our world," Heiji said with a grin.

Assessing the pile, Heiji seemed satisfied, and turned back to the rest of the group. "Okay, we're set here. Let's carry this back t'Kudou's room, then we c'n get you guys weapons. Everyone grab what'cha pried loose and follow me."

(To here. (http://community.livejournal.com/damned/547788.html?thread=45995468#t45995468))

"Hurry up," Starscream whispered impatiently as he opened the door and stepped into the bathroom. "I'm sure you know how to...use...what?"

Eying the facility, Starscream's pause was more one of surprise than shock. Gone were the pristine walls and clean fixtures he recalled from his morning cleansing; instead, a peculiar substance seemed to line many of the surfaces, and the pipes that transported the water to and fro were now exposed, cold to the touch. Looking about, he discovered a broken piece of metal that fit neatly into the door hinge, holding it open. Along one of the walls, a few of the ceramic water basins were damaged, their pipes either broken off or removed with some tools, no doubt. The liquid seeped through the thin material of his slippers, and Starscream let out a startled cry at the unexpected cold.

"In here," he finally called out after a while, walking over to the showers with increased curiosity. Of course, he had no intention of testing out whether they worked or not on his own; he'd let his test subject "Richard" investigate for him. "I do not know if the showers are still operational, but it cannot hurt to try, correct?"

The meta hadn't attacked him. That was taking a bit more time to process than he liked and he barely even noticed them coming up to the bathroom. Either Starscream here didn't plan on hurting him - maybe he was just as confused about going on here as Jason was - or he was one of those idiots who valued a 'fair fight'. No matter what the reasoning, he wasn't going to ask too many questions yet.

And now the idiot was hurrying him along? Jason was definitely going to enjoy interrogating him once he felt better. Following Starscream into the bathroom he stared about at the slime coated walls, the broken, exposed pipes and the disgusting sludge oozing from them.

This wasn't looking like a good place to get warmed up. Hell, it made Arkham look cosy and that was saying something. Shit, he wasn't in Arkham, was he? But the whole wandering around loose thing could almost fit with how often there were break outs there. Snorting in amusement at that wonderful little picture, Jason walked over to the showers, still cradling his immobile left arm protectively.

Eyeing them suspiciously he said, "Yeah, we can try. But not when I'm standing under them." Moving to the side so the spray wouldn't hit him, Jason reached for the taps and twisted the hot tap on. A stream of disgusting, black, foul smelling water spat out the shower head. Jason wasn't sure he wanted to test the temperature if it meant sticking his arm in there.

It had only been a few days since Starscream had found himself inhabiting his synthoid body. As a result, while automatic reflexes such as walking (with a lower center-of-gravity and overall weight) and breathing were quickly assimilated, the new senses that came with the experience took a bit longer to get used to. Smell, especially, was quite the sensation, as Transformers, for the most part, had no need of olfaction when it came to identifying substances.

The odor that erupted from the fixture, therefore, was enough to cause Starscream such unpleasantness that he recoiled violently, tripping over some loose pieces of tile that lay cracked at his feet. The pain of landing hard on his ass was ignored as he quickly covered his nose and began complaining irritably.

"What in Cybertron's name is that stench?!" he shouted disgustedly. "By the Matrix...this is by far the worst sensory stimulus I've encountered while inhabiting this horrid sack of flesh." The Decepticon attempted to stand, his hands now clamped tightly over his nose as curiosity overcame him once more. "It's not oil, though it appears to share its color and consistency. It seems as if the water has become contaminated...but to such a degree in so little time..." I wonder...had I the proper equipment, I could study this further, as it might be fuel nonetheless...something I could turn into Energon with the proper processing...

Quickly coming back to his senses, he looked up at "Richard" with displeasure and a slight shrug. "I suppose you might suffer further injury were you to let this substance come into contact with your flesh. It wouldn't bother me in the slightest, but if you desire to preserve your arm, we'll need to figure out another way of increasing its temperature."

Jason was too drained to do more than snort in amusement as Starscream fell on his ass. It did smell pretty bad, but he'd traipsed around Gotham's sewers before so it wasn't a new experience for him. The speech that followed was though. You'd think after having spent any amount of time around the idiot Jason would used to the way he spoke but it didn't stop it being annoying.

At least he was honest about his complete lack of interest in Jason's well-being. He could appreciate the frankness even if he still didn't know why Starscream was even trying to help him. It might be that he was as confused by this situation as Jason himself was- but, no, that couldn't be right. Something didn't fit with that- Starscream had known where the showers were. He'd been here long enough to know where they were and to use them at some point. But he'd been surprised by the state they were in now.

Jason realised he'd just been standing there, immobile while he tried to put the pieces together. Turning off the tap, he took a deep breath and tried to gather his wits. "Yeah, looks like body heat it is. Since you don't give a shit what happens to me, don't feel obliged to tag along."

He wasn't going to complain if Starscream did choose to accompany him, he could use the opportunity to get some information from him but he wasn't going to push it. Didn't want to appear like he actually needed an escort or any help.

Not waiting for a reply, Jason turned and headed for the door. If Starscream was coming he'd come, no point wasting his breath on niceties.

[to here (http://community.livejournal.com/damned/546812.html?thread=46500604#t46500604)]

Edited 2009-02-18 13:07 (UTC)

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

Nightshift 38: Men's Bathrooms (M41-M80)

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