damned_institute | Nightshift 39: M91-M100 Hallway

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Nightshift 39: M91-M100 Hallway

"Of all the accursed...why did they have to place his quarters at such a distance from mine!"

Starscream continued to look over his map angrily; shining his artificial light upon the paper clipped into the cover of his notebook, he once again traced the two possible routes needed to get to Lockdown's room. "One is far longer...but potentially safer," he groaned, sliding his finger down the halls, across the large entry way, and back up to his destination. "The other...it takes me to the "soccer/recreational field". That's where that 'meta-bitch' 'Richard' mentioned was, the one who could made extreme cold. On the other hand, it IS shorter..." Closing the book with a sigh, he weighed his options carefully.

Laziness won out.

"As long as I am careful...I might avoid confrontation tonight," he reasoned. Clutching his book, a few pens, and the flashlight tightly, he made his way down to the M-C Block hallway.

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[From here (http://community.livejournal.com/damned/579331.html?thread=48051203#t48051203)]

Satisfied she'd made her walk nice and short, even after being waylaid and kissed (admittedly, her head was still somewhat fuzzy and her cheeks still felt red, but on the whole, she felt good!). Miku adjusted her bag again and knocked on Subaru's door. "Sumeragi-san? Are you awake?"

Subaru had, in fact, been asleep since shortly after lunch, but the knock on his door woke him where the various intercom announcements had failed to do so--the announcements had become familiar sounds, at this point, and Subaru had managed to sleep right through them as a result.

Jerking awake suddenly proved to be a bad idea, considering Subaru's wounds, so it was a moment before he recovered his breath and managed to get up to answer the door. "Hinasaki-san. I'm glad you made it safely."

"I'm lucky; it wasn't a far walk at all." Which was strange - didn't the block above hers house rooms that went from one to fifty not too long ago? Miku gave Subaru a rather concerned look. "Are you sure this is okay? You don't look so well..."

Well, that was the understatement of the century. Subaru's wounds far outweighed her own, and while she was finally getting peppy enough to slowly walk to the next block, he looked like he'd run a marathon just getting to the door.

"Yes, I remember that the women's rooms are just the next block down." Subaru blushed a little and looked sheepish, realising how bad that sounded. "Ah, the one who made my ritual knife, we met in her room, so that's why I..." Yes. Ahem.

Subaru didn't bother trying for a smile, at the moment, being well aware of how awful he probably looked. "Yes, this is no problem. I sat up too suddenly when I woke from my nap, that's all. It's better I have something to do that doesn't involve going out and running around, anyway." Subaru was not well-suited to extended periods of idleness--he'd doubtless do something stupid like go out if he didn't have something else to do.

Miku still looked dubious, but it really was better than allowing Subaru to go out in his condition (now, if only she would listen to the same advice when Sousuke gave it to her). "Well, alright. Then please instruct me," Miku bowed.

This would be strange, Miku thought as she offered Subaru a little smile. But, I'll do my best so he and Sousuke aren't disappointed in me. "I'll do my best to not disappoint you," she added.

Subaru's own bow was a little shallower than usual, as he didn't want to strain the healing wound on his back too much just for the sake of politeness. "Oh, no. I'm more concerned I'll disappoint you. I'm not even sure how much I can help, with the way this place has limited my abilities. But please, come in. We won't know until we try."

"That's true," Miku replied as she stepped inside his room. Quietly, she put her bag down beside her at the door and winced when it rubbed against a still-healing rope burn. Tomorrows showers would not be welcome, she had a feeling. "So, how do we start?" Miku laced her fingers together and kept her flashlight pointed to the ground. "Shall I take notes, or...?"

Subaru hadn't even thought about showers yet, but once he did he was going to be quite torn between the appeal of getting truly clean for a change, and the worry that someone he knew would see the stitches on his back and realise just how serious his wounds really were.

For now, however, Subaru's mind was on the matter of how much, if anything, he could teach Hinasaki-san with his powers so limited here. "I'm afraid the first bits are really not exciting. A lot of mental discipline and learning to sense the source of your own power. It will be easiest if we sit down." Subaru gestured to his room-mate's bed, and settled down on his own.

Miku stepped out of her slippers and sat down on the empty bed - hoping that Subaru's roommate wouldn't mind. "It's fine, I don't really need excitement," she answered honestly. This place filled Miku's 'excitement' quota ten times more than she would ever need. "It and Trouble both seem to find me, though."

She offered a Subaru a smile in the dim light, "But you know about that, too."

"Some supernatural entities are more attracted to humans with a degree of spiritual or magical power of their own. To put it bluntly, that type of human makes for a better meal. I imagine the rest is just a combination of bad luck and a curious nature." Subaru did smile a little at Miku, at that--he'd already seen that she was interested in the supernatural, which was a pretty good way to get in trouble with it. Subaru was in much the same boat, if more because it was his job than because he was curious.

Curious nature and bad luck were something Miku had inherited in spades, if the lack of family were any indication.

"They never tried to eat me before." Stab her, set her on fire, decapitate her, draw and quarter her and strangle her, yes. Eat her? Not so much. "Though, when I was touched, sometimes it felt like they were draining away my strength." And, as evidenced by her many bandages, something much worse happened. She didn't say it, but Miku wondered just how different things between her world and his actually were. "And sometimes I saw things about them."

"I didn't so much mean physically eat..." Though of course Subaru's thoughts did stray into that realm a bit more than usual, lately, since he'd come so close to being very literally eaten just a few nights ago. "But the more strength you have to drain, the more strength the spirit will gain, right? That's why I said only some types are drawn by power, though--others are simply angry and lashing out at whoever they can."

Subaru hmmed thoughtfully, when Miku mentioned that she was able to perceive things about the spirits when she came into contact with them. "That's unusual, to be able to connect with them that way. It sounds like you have a bit of shamanic power. I speak to spirits, myself, and often they're willing to respond and to tell me about themselves, but that it happens instinctively for you is impressive. If probably unwelcome at times."

"Ah," Miku nodded, and tucked her fist under her chin thoughtfully. "I suppose that it is an eating of a sort." It didn't explain why they would leave her alone when she passed out, though, Miku wasn't going to argue with incidents in the past. She was lucky to have made it out of there at all, after everything.

"Only sometimes, though. I see things a lot easier if it's through an object, and with less risk. Usually, when someone like that touches me, I just want to bat it away as quick as possible." Which had various degrees of success, now that she thought about it. "Sumeragi-san? I'm glad that you're easy to talk to about... this kind of thing."

Subaru's expression softened and he wished he could really do something for Hinasaki-san, like he could have back home. "It's a difficult thing to deal with, in a modern society wherein most people don't even believe in the supernatural." Children could be especially cruel, and Subaru hoped that Miku had at least come into her powers somewhat later than he had, and been given a chance at a reasonably normal childhood.

"That's true, I've been... well, I guess it doesn't hurt to tell you. I've been seeing them since I was small, and at first, I couldn't really see them, exactly, just a fuzzy outline. When I was older, I could see things more clearly." And then for a short time, there hadn't been anything at all.

"My mother, my brother... all the way up the line on my mother's side could do the things I can." If there was anything like hereditary unluck, then her maternal line probably was cursed with it forever. Especially if she could protect Sousuke from things he couldn't hit, like the ghosts that kept cropping up.

Subaru personally felt that Hinasaki-san's ancestors, in that case, were a bit remiss for not getting some training that they could pass on to their children, but he could also understand the fear of revealing themselves so it was a sticky situation all around. No sense lecturing about what people who weren't here might possibly have done, especially since he didn't even know the full circumstances. "My family has been doing this for thirteen generations. Or, well, not exactly generations. The title of head of the family passed from my grandmother to me, not to my mother, and it's been like that a few times in the past. But even then, it was hard for me as a child--I couldn't always understand why people treated me the way they did, when I talked about the things I saw."

"They would say, 'You're imagining things' or 'There's nothing there', too, wouldn't they?" Miku knew how that was. The first time, her mother had told her to be quiet and not talk of it ever again. Afterwards, Mafuyu had kept it to himself.

Unlucky, how unlucky.

Subaru decided it was better not to tell Hinasaki-san about some of the worse experiences he'd had as a child--he knew the truth of the matter now, but Mitsuki-san declaring that she hated him because he was abnormal... that early broken heart had haunted him for a long time. "Mm. Sometimes they'd even call me a liar." And worse. A freak. Scary. Abnormal. It was tough growing up different from everyone else.

"Or worse," Miku completed the thought for him. She would never admit how often she thought that vanishing from school would fix her problems. But that was silly, and even now, she'd learned to live with her ability thought it scared her and worried Sousuke when she went off following something he couldn't see.

"Sumeragi-san, do you ever see the ghosts here in the Institute? Not the ones that anyone and everyone can see, but..." How did she explain this? No one else saw the little helping spirits that sometimes watched from the walls or led her to and from certain places "The ones that help, sometimes."

Subaru winced and shook his head, looking down at his hands. "No. It's like I'm blind, here." He touched the side of his face that was still swathed in bandages and smiled bitterly. "It may sound strange, but losing this eye was actually less disorienting than waking up here and realising I could no longer see the spirits I'd interacted with all my life."

"I can understand that," Miku replied. There was a time where everything had been silent, for two whole, peaceful years. She was sure that she had Mafuyu and Kirie to thank for that, though she had started seeing things again. "Maybe this will help you, too, Sumeragi-san."

It would be better if they snapped themselves out of the painful reverie of their pasts and looked to the present.

Subaru had a sinking feeling that this exercise would only make him feel more useless and helpless, especially if he wasn't able to help Hinasaki-san at all. He couldn't even see what she would be doing, or detach his mind from his body to try to help her more directly. But, well. She was right that they at least needed to try. "Have you had any experience with meditation?"

Miku shook her head, "Not really, no. I mean, unless you count going to the shrines once in a while..." Did prayer count? Now Miku was curious. She shifted in her seat, mindful of her still-healing torso.

Then again, she didn't stay very long at shrines - there were too many things around before the loss of her abilities, that she'd never gotten into the habit of going regularly.

"Any use of magical or spiritual power is inherently dangerous. It can rebound and harm you if you allow yourself to be distracted at a critical moment. Being able to sense what you're doing and being able to keep control of what you're doing even under stress are both very important, and a calm mind is an important step in acheiving that." Subaru smiled gently again, not wanting to discourage Hinasaki-san completely. "Which is not to say that you can't get upset or frightened or react to the things around you. But there needs to be a small part of you that remains focused on what you're doing, always."

Miku nodded, "Ah, I see." Meditation would be something she'd have to practice more often. Maybe, if her mother had been able to still her mind, she wouldn't have done that terrible thing.

She certainly wasn't discouraged. "So, what is the best way? Or is it different for some people?"

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