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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Ururu had indeed loosened her hold when Fai-san prompted, but she immediately grasped him around the chest when she'd been settled into place. Eating wasn't too high on her list of things to be worried about just then, even if her stomach was growling a little. Still, Fai-san and Kurogane were there, and that was most important.

"I couldn't find either of you last night, Fai-san. I was really scared." Sheer relief had made Kurogane's words much easier to take today; Ururu was so happy that he was still there to be grouchy that she didn't mind Kurogane's scowling nearly as much. "Have you seen Orihime-san or Shiki-san? I can't find them, or Ken-kun." She didn't know if either of the men had met Ken though, so they might not be able to tell her about him.

She pulled away a little, just enough to look around the room for her friends. "Maybe they got moved to a different room like before. But they still have to be here...right?"

Since Fai had the girl now, Kurogane determined that he could answer her questions in a way that wouldn't make her start bawling at him, and so the ninja returned to his food.

He'd already ended up with one crying girl that day - just how that had happened, he didn't know - and he wasn't going to have a hand in another one bursting into tears because he wouldn't have lied to her. Neither girl was there anymore. Kurogane hadn't seen them for the past two days, and Fai had confirmed that he couldn't sense them. Ururu should have figured out for herself by now what not seeing them for so long would mean.

It wasn't too difficult to wrap a napkin around one of the fish pieces and hand it to Ururu, though not without warning that it was hot. He picked up one of the friend potatoes and ate it too, in an effort to keep her from any more fretting. The poor thing might've stopped crying now, but the evidence of it was still there.

"I'm sorry," he apologized, though he didn't give an explanation for the absence. "I didn't mean to make you worry. But me and Kuro-pin are just fine."

When she suggested that the girls might have simply been moved to another room, he nodded, "that's probably it. I don't think they'd make you worry on purpose. Maybe they just aren't feeling so good today." It was hard to smile when he knew they were gone, but the girl had been through enough last night without having to worry about the others too.

Ururu was reluctant to pull even a single hand away from Fai-san, still fearing that if she let go, the man might disappear right before her eyes. But she was hungry, and Fai-san was being nice enough to share. So she took the piece of fish and began to eat, holding on even tighter with her other hand to make up for letting go.

Kurogane hadn't said anything, and Ururu had no reason to doubt Fai-san. So when he offered no explanation for his own absence, and the words Ururu wanted to hear about the others, the girl nodded quickly. "I hope so. I mean, I don't want them to be sick. But it's better than if they were gone."

She looked down then, having to sniffle as she thought about it. Fai-san had to be right, didn't he? Orihime and Shiki were strong too. They wouldn't have just vanished like that.

No lies, but he was skirting around the truth a lot. Kurogane took a large bite out of another fish thing to keep his own mouth shut and also to hide some sneering.

He didn't like it, letting the man almost lie to the girl, but Kurogane honestly hadn't ever dealt with a kid so young. The kid and Princess were closer to Tomoyo's ago, and his own Princess didn't count from when he'd known her earlier because he'd been close enough to the same age then.

It was a relief when she took the food and seemed satisfied with the answers he gave her. The last time she'd been upset when Kisuke vanished, he'd not been any help at all and if she had to deal with both of the girls having gone at once, well... it was hard enough for him to think about, let alone think of how to help someone else.

"Mm, we'll do our best to find everyone, ok?" he assured her, "that's why we're Lost and Found."

"Okay." Fai-san did have a point, though they hadn't actually found anyone yet. Ururu didn't like thinking about that though, so instead she leaned against the man, and kept eating small bites of her fish. Now that she wasn't crying or worrying so much, she felt really tired. It was kind of like after she had practice fights with Jinta-kun, except not.

"Where did you go last night?" Ururu spoke quietly without lifting her head, knowing she should ask. It was important, just in case she couldn't find them again. She didn't want that to ever happen, so next time, she wanted to know where to look if they weren't where they were supposed to be.

The friend potatoes were a little greasy, so he picked up his juice and took a long drink before answering. How much would Kurogane let him lie? He'd been there with him last night, and even drugged as he was, he'd known exactly where they had been and where they hadn't.

"Oh, you know Kuro-piki doesn't like to stay put. I had to drag him back to bed and make him rest," he explained. While it wasn't a complete lie, it certainly left out a lot of the truth. "I'm sorry if we worried you."

[skipping Mama-gane with permission]

So that was it. Ururu nodded slightly, then turned to Kurogane with a deeper frown. "You were hurt Kurogane-san. You knew you shouldn't have gone out by yourself. Why did you leave your room?" Ururu didn't really mean to be mean about it, but she'd been really worried. She still was, about Orihime and Shiki and Ken, and knowing that Kurogane had done something like that only made it easier to be upset with him. "What if something really bad had happened to you or Fai-san?! You could've gotten hurt or killed!"

Ururu couldn't understand how she was feeling just then. It wasn't the same as being worried, or being sad. But she had started to tear up again, and her voice had gotten louder. She was even leaning forward and crushing the fish she held in her hand. "Don't you care about that, Kurogane-san?! What if you went missing and no one could find you? Don't you know how sad that would make Fai-san and everyone else?!"

So the magician's lies hadn't kept her from crying, and what's more was that they'd managed to turn her on him with both tears and accusations! Kurogane knew there'd been a reason why he didn't like letting Fai explain.

He didn't look down at the girl, but turned his eyes over at the magician with a glare and almost unspoken demand, but he said it anyway, "Just tell her what happened already."

And that meant at least most of the truth. Kurogane would be fine if he left out what exactly had happened, such as with the arm or even with that ghost child in the hallway, but Kurogane hadn't left his room willingly. Not that Kurogane himself could admit to being taken so easily, but Fai could say it.

She'd taken the rest pretty well, but the last bit hadn't gone over as he might've hoped. But when she started getting upset with Kurogane, he knew the man wasn't going to just let it alone.

"Ah- no, no, no," Yuuhi tried to calm her down, bouncing her gently on his knee and keeping an arm around her waist so she wouldn't slide off. While the confusion was alarming to the girl, he did feel a little bit better that the ninja had heard it. The night before last, when Kurogane had made no effort to let anyone know where he was going or what he was doing... that was when he'd been so badly hurt in the first place. It applied just as well for that night, whether or not the ninja chose to listen. And even if he felt the same as Ururu, he didn't think he could ever say it so honestly.

"It's not Kuro-sama's fault," he assured her, keeping his voice gentle as he spoke. "He was taken away to those rooms upstairs." So when he'd said he had to drag the man back, he'd meant it pretty literally.

"But, but he's okay now, no worries. And I'm sure he wouldn't run off on purpose again."

Ururu almost missed Kurogane saying anything; the more she talked, the easier it was to keep talking. It was kind of like crying, but with words that sounded mean instead of tears. But she had heard Kurogane, and then the girl stopped, looking up at Fai-san. Tell her what happened? Did that mean there was more?

Fai-san was trying to comfort her, but as much as she loved affection, she didn't want that so much as she wanted to know what was going. She was so worried, and not having answers only made that worse.

But the answer she got wasn't good either. Not at all. Ururu's eyes went wide as she realized what had really happened, and she looked at Kurogane in dread. "You got taken to those rooms..." Ururu remembered that place well from the night she went with Rangiku-san and Ichimaru-san. She knew they were bad rooms, and the ghost outside them had been bad too. Realizing just what a terrible mistake she made, Ururu practically launched herself from Fai-san's lap over to Kurogane, gripping him even tighter than she had when she first ran to him.

"I'm sorry!" She'd made such a terrible mistake, and now Kurogane was going to be even madder than before. What would he do if he decided he hated Ururu? There was no way he wouldn't go off by himself then. "I shouldn't have yelled at you Kurogane-san. I'm really sorry!"

He should have expected she might go and latch onto him again. He really should have. But the magician's comforting of the girl had let Kurogane ignore that possibility for a short bit, and it came back to mind hard when Ururu returned to him.

Keeping a hold of his food was not a problem this time, but it was his temper that ended up releasing instead. "Stop, doing that!" he barked, again without taking the time to stop and think. He wasn't exactly angry, just drugged and annoyed and clinging little girls that kept on clinging were not needed with that already terrible combination. That didn't mean he'd tried to remove her though. Odds were that he'd need both arms for that task, so he left her clinging while he tried to calm back to a controlled tone.

"Stop apologizing," he eventually added with a much calmer tone. He wanted to tell her to stop crying too, but experience told him that would be a waste of breath.

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Day 40: Lunch

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