damned_institute | Day 40: Lunch

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Day 40: Lunch

*hobble wobble*

"Damn that SCOURGE!" Starscream cried out, the slowly-filling cafeteria producing a jarring echo of his raspy voice. His limping, already bad enough from not knowing how to properly use his crutches, was now exacerbated from the injuries he'd received the shift prior. Despite the gauges in his non-casted leg so lovingly provided by the aforementioned 'patient', Starscream could still put some weight on it, but not so much that he could really stop and rest; relieving the soreness under his arms was out of the question. The nurse that walked behind him with his tray, already upset at having to deal with yet another troublesome inmate, was growing rather impatient as his charge slowly made his way down the food line.

"Just...give me a standard serving of the aquatic creature's flesh, some of those fried potato slices, two bananas, and three bottles of juice," Starscream sighed, his anger from just a moment ago assuaged by the physical exertion needed to move the way he did. "I'm going to sit down here...bring it to me when you're done."

He was hardly surprised to find that one of the bananas was completely bruised along its inner curve, or that the handful of 'chips' on his plate were all on the small side. Tired and frustrated as he was, however, he could barely muster a 'damned flesh-creature' before moving his fingers to the plate, picking one of the longer 'chips' and shoving it into his mouth listlessly.

There was an unusually high concentration of sodium chloride crystals on it. Of COURSE.

[For Tony Stark]

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"I am not inviting it, but focusing on the things that need done while I can, when I can," Momo replied, sounding very tired. "This body is nothing more than a shell."

She looked up at the hand on her shoulder. "You know... he said he loved me. She died protecting me from the man that wants my blood. My friends should stay away from me - all I do is get them killed."

"You still need to take care of it if you're going to stay here. And none of what happened was your fault." Raine speared a piece of fish on Momo's fork and pressed it into her hand.

Don't let the bastards here win. Remember that you are stronger than this.

"Really? Not my fault?" Momo did not resist the fork being shoved into her hand, automatically grasping it.

"He came after me because I killed the Noah," she said, touching the base of the broken pencil to her dead eye. "I assigned her to come with me to meet him. Her blood is on my hands, no matter what she or anyone else would say."

Reinforce felt only slightly less lost now than she had after that first conversation with Raine. The night had helped to solidify the problems in front of her... that was, the suffering of those around her, since her own status was so uncertain, but thanks to that uncertainty it was hard to see what her place was, how she should combat those problems.

And she didn't really want to take her problems to the other patients. Compared to the coming of the night that loomed before them, she was sure her little existential crisis would seem quite trivial. They had their own issues and, hopefully, their own support. Right now she would most likely be interfering with most, and that wasn't what she wanted to do...

So in the end she gravitated back to that single face she knew, the half-elf, and sat beside her. She was already in conversation with another, so Rein only nodded.

"That doesn't mean you're responsible," Raine said firmly.

When Reinforce appeared, she looked over and smiled; this was a surprise. At least they seemed to be friends again.

To Momo, she added, "If you want to protect the people that are still here, especially the people important to you--you have to start eating again. Now here." She let go of the fork she'd pushed into the shinigami's hand, but she clearly expected her to eat that bite, and then everything else that was on her plate. If trying to eat again made her sick, she STILL wasn't going to be let off the hook.

"How is it not when it was my foolish pride, my decision to 'settle' things with the first Noah that brought about the death of one of the greatest warriors I have ever had the privilege to know, cross blades with and call friend? And to a cheap trick," Momo retorted back, her eyes briefly flickering past the half-elf to see Reinforce.

She fell silent then. Raine clearly hadn't figure out who Momo was talking about and the shinigami didn't want to say the knight's name. It was irrational, but it was the way she felt. Yet, here was Reinforce, somehow back here again; she had a right to know, being the knight's creator.

She looked back at Raine and then slowly took a bite off of the corner of the piece one her fork. When she swallowed it, an uncomfortable look on her face, she followed it up with some water. She then addressed Reinforce.

"Greetings, Reinforce-san. Whereas I am loathe to say it as I'd prefer you not be here once again - Welcome back." Given the way the woman was acting, it was reasonable to believe she did not hold any memories of being here before. "If you don't remember me, I am Vice Captain Hinamori Momo of the 5th Division of the Gotei 13 - shinigami."

"Another who knows me..." Reinforce said, studying Momo carefully. Potential friends, potential enemies... but this one was with Raine, so she was probably someone she could trust.

Probably.

"As you've guessed," she said slowly, "I don't remember you, or anything else since my death on Earth. If you don't mind me asking," she said because she knew she very much would mind too much probing into her nature, "What do you mean by 'shinigami'?"

God, spirit, reaper... had she really known a person who claimed to be such a thing? How much like a fantasy, well beyond the vague edges of her own mythical status.

Raine relaxed, very slightly, to see Momo take at least a small bite. But she still wasn't getting off her case until she'd either eaten a decent amount or proved that she honestly couldn't have any more.

At some point, she needed to find out what Reinforce was doing tonight, but she'd ask later.

Momo glanced over at Raine and took yet another tiny bite, the same look on her face. Eating did not... feel good.

Reinforce confirmed she did not remember her previous time in Landel's. Had Momo been of sound mind, she may have pondered if this was even the same person. Unfortunately, she was not and she'd never seen Reinforce's spirit threads to verify anyways.

"I am a Death God," Momo explained, "that generally lives in Soul Society - the spirit world that is parallel to the living world. A shinigami's duty is to maintain the balance between the living and the dead, making sure spirits that have yet to cross from the living world to Soul Society do so before they become hollows - corrupt souls that feed upon the spiritual essence of other spirits, including that of humans with uniquely strong souls. We protect humanity from non-human threats that would upset that delicate balance."

She paused, going over her explanation before nodding. "That is what I mean by shinigami."

"Non-human threats..." Rein repeated slowly. A label that could easily be applied to her... she wondered whether the so-called shinigami realized that. The thought somewhat clouded over her excitement at the prospect of listening to a genuine god describe its realm...

How long had it been since a piece of knowledge had felt so utterly foreign to her? Like being here in the first place, it was a bit hard to react to. The world about which she'd known so much suddenly seemed small and incomplete.

"Tell me, is it common for gods or spirits to mingle with mortals in your experience? In all my time I've never seen anything like you," she said, voice tinged with curiosity. She didn't have any idea how much questioning this... person or the population in general would tolerate, but this was a rare opportunity...

Raine smiled slightly, dryly. She could fill in a few things later if Momo didn't want to answer, but she certainly knew how Reinforce felt.

Hopefully this was a topic Momo didn't mind talking about, or even liked; it might not be much of a distraction, though.

Then again, I don't want her to have too much of one... because she's eating as much as of that as she can stomach if she likes it or not, and I'm not leaving her alone until she does. Anything she could get down was good, and the fries could be easily carried in a napkin if need be.

Raine was in Mommy Mode, and nothing could pull her out of that until she wanted to be.

Had Momo been in the right mind, she never would have said what came out of her mouth next.

"Had our worlds been the same, you and I may have met much sooner and under far less favorable circumstances. But that is neither here, nor there, and my understanding is that you are not what you once were, Blessed Wind." Momo paused then, realizing she'd said far too much. "My apologies. I know far more about you than I should given my association with one of your knights. I will not speak of any of that again. Please, forgive me."

Sighing, she went to set down her fork so she could get her water, pausing just before releasing the utensil upon feeling Raine's piercing gaze. "Stop that," she said quietly to the half-elf. "I am nearly a century and a half in existence, Raine. If I do not wish for food, you cannot force it on me. Be thankful I see the logic in your argument." She looked up. "Holding a glass is not easy in my other hand." With a slight raising of her left hand to remind Raine there was a cast one it, the shinigami released the fork and took up her glass.

Rein's feature's hardened. This was precisely what she had been worried about... though it seemed that in this case it had not been her previous self but one of her guardians who had let more be known than she wanted. It was that much harder to be as Hayate had wished, if she was thought of as the thing she had been.

But even if there was a hint of challenge in the way she'd set it, at least the woman had seen fit to tell her she knew something. Better than not knowing. This and an apology, she could accept.

"Signum must trust you a great deal," Rein said as neutrally as she could. She wouldn't help herself or anyone else by being hostile over what someone else knew. That would only serve to convince people that the new self was only an act. "Tell me, where can I meet our lady's general? I haven't seen her since I arrived."

"As your friend, I'm worried about you," Raine replied softly. Sometimes she just had an odd way of showing it.

And now things were only getting more tense... Raine wondered what exactly she wasn't getting here. "Blessed Wind" didn't sound like a bad thing to be called, but it might be private, or related to something Reinforce would rather forget.

For now, Raine kept quiet. Hopefully it would be possible to interfere if need be.

The shinigami froze, save for the shaking in her hand, before the glass slipped from her grasp and fell to the table, spilling her half-full glass of water across her tray and onto her journal. It was a long moment before Momo reacted, grabbing the journal out of the puddle, hoping she hadn't ruined any of the drawing inside, shaking the book to get as much water off as she could, a few errant pieces of paper fluttering down onto the drier areas of the table - mostly reports.

She should have known Reinforce was going to ask about Signum, but for some reason it hadn't occurred to her to that the device would ask right then.

"You won't," she said in a wavering voice as she flipped pages, past drawings of her friends including one of the knight in question, to see if she'd ruined them. Grasping her napkin, she blotted at a few particularly wet pages, purposefully avoiding Reinforce's gaze.

Rein froze. The meaning was clear, but her thoughts were not... the very idea was unfathomable. She had accepted that Signum was here, with her, but somehow she could not imagine that the knight would die and she would live. While she had lived the knights had shared in her unimpeachable permanence, and she had died so that they might live as well. It was not...

Fair. A foolish sentiment, from one who had seen only disaster for millennia. She had admonished Hayate, for thinking this same thing when she was about to die, but here with her master's heart she felt the same. She had thought she had made everything right. For a beloved knight, who had protected her through the long ages she had not deserved it, even blind, and at last been freed from that darkness to far from her master's side and that promised end-

"Say it," she said in a voice hollowed by pain. "Please."

A cruel request, perhaps, but it was a cruelty too to leave her that small sliver of doubt, that only nagged more the more she told herself it was unthinkable that there could be any other meaning to the reaper's words. And she wanted to hear something, even those words, more than she wanted to chase this feeling in her mind as she had her sorrow in the old days...

Raine winced; oh, no. Now she realized, too late, who the fallen friend referred to had to be.

She almost wanted to say it herself, to spare Momo this one thing, but since she didn't know many details--or really, anything for sure--she kept quiet. Maybe it would leave Momo feeling like the wound had been ripped open again before it had even begun to heal, but then again, maybe it would just strip away whatever denial she was holding onto.

Momo went still again. No. She didn't want to. Reinforce was intelligent; she should have figured it out. The shinigami did not want to voice it. She didn't want to walk that precarious emotional edge again. She didn't... she needed to be strong and if she talked about it, even if Reinforce was the one person within these walls that had a right to know...

Momo put a hand to her temple as she stared unseeing at the wet journal. She needed to... didn't want to... no. She... She'd find a way. And she did. She shut her emotions down again, blocked them off. If she forced herself not to acknowledge them, she could... she could say it.

The journal was closed with a heavy hand, the shinigami raising her empty eye to meet Reinforce's.

"Two nights ago, Signum was killed by another patient. She'd drawn her sword to..." Something flickered in her eyes briefly. "...to defend me against that patient as he wished to end my existence. Unknown to either of us, he possessed an ability to render steel useless against him."

Momo looked away then, unable to keep things locked back any longer. Her gaze moved to her right hand as she realized she'd had it clenched so hard her nails had cut into her palm to draw blood.

"It was my fault. Her choice to stand between us be damned, it was my fault," she whispered. "I started it all... foolish pride..."

She shouldn't have said it, she knew. Better to suffer an unintentional cruelty than inflict one yourself to relieve it. Why hadn't she seen that before she'd spoken? Change the name, change the self, but she was still far from Hayate's vision.

But she needed to bear witness, too. She, who understood best the kind of lives they'd lived, and could mourn knowing what she would have mourned, what they'd wished for from death as immortals and what they'd wished for from their lives newly-born.

"I see," she said, tears welling up in her eyes. Just as before, her body betrayed the emotions that ran under her orderly thoughts and speech. To think her champion had fallen in a place like this... it saddened her because it was far from the rightful place she'd earned at her master's side, but it was hard to accept for a different reason. She knew well the strength of the knights, who had been a part of her. Signum had been overeager to fight, perhaps, and proud, but she hadn't been a fool...

Still, this woman had survived. The knight had protected her... to her, that would have undoubtedly meant more than her own survival. It was something to take some joy in, in place of one who no longer could.

"Don't say that," Rein shook her head slowly. "Hers was a very long path. It wasn't you who guided her to this..."

Considering how much it took to make Reinforce cry--she only had once before that Raine saw, and that was while sedated--Raine reached out and squeezed her hand sympathetically. She could at least be here for her--for both of them.

"I'm sorry," she said softly, reaching out and touching Momo's hand as well.

But it was I who asked her to keep me alive.

Momo wanted to say that, but the tears that sprang to Reinforce's eyes stopped those words from ever being voiced. What good would they do? Signum had been a knight and a knight had duty, had honor. The shinigami was vain enough to believe that the knight had protected her out of duty as her position demanded, but Signum had been her friend. Maybe, even with knights, friendship was stronger than things such as honor and duty. Maybe Momo was completely wrong; she wasn't a knight and didn't have the capacity (so she thought) to understand what it was to be one. She was shinigami, nothing more, nothing less.

A failure of one, at that. A Death God, yes, but one that got the people she cared about killed. She'd once said to others, possibly even the first Noah, that she was death. Now... now she knew for certain; she brought death to those she cared about.

Swallowing hard, glancing down at her palm, Momo shook her head slightly in response to Raine's words. The half-elf meant well, but this was something she didn't understand - not like Momo. Not like Reinforce.

Standing up, the shinigami moved around Raine and went to stand by Reinforce's side. Without a word, without even asking, she went to gently pull Reinforce to her so she could wrap her arms around the woman in a comforting hug, to stroke her hair and let her cry. It was easier this way, for Momo. This way, she could focus everything on comforting Reinforce, and once again ignore her own emotional wounds, not feel them like she didn't even feel the cast on her arm anymore.

"I miss her," Momo whispered.

Rein watched the reaper's approach warily through her tears, and drew back slightly when she reached out for her, but in the end she had little choice but to accept the hug. She understood what Momo did, that to accept her comfort was to give her some relief. She couldn't refuse that, for the sake of her name and for the sake of the one they mourned.

Still... it was strange to be held, in this form. Especially by one who wasn't part of her, like her masters and knights had been. And yet somehow, the gesture put her at ease too, as it had been meant to.

It was good that she couldn't speak like this... all the calm she'd composed before Hayate in the end, for her own death, had fled her.

Raine wanted to hug her as well, but this time she saw how Reinforce pulled away, and remembered how even after a week together the woman had seemed startled when Raine hugged her. So, she simply moved her hand up to place it on Reinforce's shoulder, in a gesture she hoped was comforting but not overly intrusive.

[call it done?]

Momo could sense that Reinforce was not used to being hugged and, with what the shinigami knew of her, she could understand it. Actually, even without the knowledge that she had, she could understand very well. It still took a lot of effort for Momo to control herself whilst hugging or being hugged by another. This time, though, was far easier than most. Perhaps it was a bit of the mutual grief, though she would never be able to fathom the depth of what Reinforce was feeling. Perhaps it was something else. Perhaps, it simply was.

She didn't say anything more than those three words, just kept comforting Reinforce. Focusing on the other woman's grief made it easier to stem the flow of her own. She wouldn't say anymore on it unless Reinforce asked. If the woman wanted more, Momo trusted that she would ask sometime in the future.

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Day 40: Lunch

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