damned_institute | Day 39: Intercom, Evening

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Day 39: Intercom, Evening

The Head Doctor seemed a little rushed as he spoke on the intercom, not taking as much pleasure as he usually did in describing the delicious food that would soon be served.

"Hello, everyone! Tonight is turkey night, which means turkey breast in a great turkey gravy with some nice turkey sides: peas, herb potatoes, a small garden salad, and for dessert, a slice of pumpkin pie. We of course have vegetarian substitutes available, as well as our usual assortment of drinks.

"...I believe that's it! I'll talk to you soon!"

The intercom clicked off abruptly.

[ If you are introducing your character during this shift, you may either choose for them character to wake up before their roommate gets back, or after.

All room threads go in response to this post; please post your character's room number as the subject line of the initial post. Thank you! ]

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Shikamaru had spent a fair amount of time reading the bulletin, so he couldn't really be blamed for expecting his roommate to be insane. Eating this slop wasn't exactly a sign of mental stability, but overall, the guy seemed normal, if a bit cheerfully absentminded. Cheerful absentmindedness was nothing new to Shikamaru, who'd known Naruto for years.

"Cat ladies?" He held out the smaller plate of turkey in Luffy's general direction, having refocused his attention on the potatoes. It was pretty hard to mess up potatoes. With his other hand, he speared one and popped it into his mouth. "You were here when I woke up, so we're probably roommates now," he continued. Danny, whoever he was, had most likely vanished from the institute.

"Yeah, Cat Ladies," Luffy replied before grinning widely and snatching the plate from Shikamaru. "They're always saying, 'Mr. Cats, do this', or 'Mr. Cats, do that', if they're not calling me something like Timothy. I mean, what kind of name is that, anyway?" He laughed, stuffing a large bite of turkey into his mouth. "A name a Cat Lady would come up with, that's what."

Whether it was the Cat Lady's screw-up or not, though, it definitely looked like Shikamaru was his roommate now. Luffy didn't have any complaints (after all, the guy had just shared some of his dinner with him! Score!), but he did have to wonder where it was Danny had gone. Not that this was the first time people had disappeared on him, but it was still weird!

Maybe he'd gone the same place as Zoro and Nami...

"Well, if you're ever about to disappear, you should let me know," Luffy told him after a moment. "I wanna know where everybody's going."

Shikamaru bit into another potato as he listened to Luffy's enthusiastic explanation. He had a feeling that if he had to deal with this every night it might interfere with his lying-around-thinking-about-nothing time, but for now, it didn't bother him and he responded with a shrug. "They call me Luke," he said before starting on the pile of lettuce. 'Luke ladies' didn't have the same ring, so he'd just stick with 'pushy women.'

"You and everyone else in this place," he responded with a bored snort. Shikamaru leaned back against the wall, folding his legs to hold the plate of potatoes. "I heard that some people disappear and show up again later...how's that work?"

He didn't expect Luffy to know the answer, but sometimes, hearing the ideas of people with rather 'unique' perspectives lit something in his own mind that he'd overlooked due to its absurdity.

"Luke, huh?" Luffy seemed to consider that for a moment, taking his time in chewing his turkey as he gazed thoughtfully at the ceiling. Then, as if coming up with something, he sharply looked at his roommate. "Maybe they're too lazy to call you Shikamaru! Luke's a lot easier to say, right?"

But Luffy was simpler than Timothy or Mr. Cats or whatever. This place was so strange!

As for what happened when people disappeared...Luffy had seen it happen to enough people to get the gist of things, but how it worked?

"How should I know?" he replied with a brief laugh. "I guess they go somewhere else and then come back after awhile. They never remember being here before, or where they went. Maybe something makes them forget." It'd happened to Zoro and Sanji, and now that Zoro and Nami had disappeared, it was probably only a matter of time before they made their way back again, Luffy was sure.

Shikamaru gave another snort. It was kind of cruel to give a long name to someone so lazy, but after several generations, he figured that his paternal lineage had used up most of the shorter things that could be tacked on to the end of 'shika.' "Maybe," he allowed with a friendly smirk as he sliced a piece of the orangy-brown dessert. He was getting the hang of the eating utensils fairly quickly...really, they made more sense than chopsticks did, despite requiring a bit more coordination.

Luffy's answer wasn't that enlightening, but it was nice to hear something that wasn't gloom and doom, even if it probably ought to be. Shikamaru had already spent a lot of time thinking in the last ten or however many hours, and he had a feeling that he was about to have to do a hell of a lot more. It was nearly impossible to come up with an effective strategy without knowing the limitations of your teammates, and at this point, without chakra, he didn't even know his own. After pushing away his mostly empty plate (towards Luffy, in case the guy wanted more leftovers), he fell back onto his mattress with a quiet but dramatic groan and draped his arm over his face. "Are there other people from your world here?" he asked after a few seconds, moving his arm and turning his head just enough to view his roommate.

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Day 39: Intercom, Evening

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