Day 40: Greenhouse [Fourth Shift]

[toxicspiderman]

Most days, fish and chips (and a cold beer or three) was pretty goddamned high on S.T.'s list of perfect expense-account lunches. Today, the idea of picking at greasy hunks of unidentified bottom-feeder odds-and-ends (politely known as scrod, to the delight of teenagers all across the Northeast) didn't appeal.

He begged off and collapsed into his bed, after using his damp shirt as an excuse to surreptiously check the contents of his closet. Bingo. His nurse watched his little show, unimpressed but (more importantly) unsuspicious. Not that his hairy chest was much of a catch today, pale and sweating from fever. At least she didn't tuck him in.

The intercom woke up up right on schedule, and pulling the sheets back over his head almost won. But a handful of unanswered missives and a vague sense of duty dragged him out to the bulletin, and from there it was easier to stagger over to the greenhouse.

It was warm inside -- a deep, humid warmth that actually penetrated to the aches in more joints and muscles than he could remember the names of. Like a sauna, without the hassle of finding someplace to look that wasn't a mound of pasty middle-management cellulite. Or a sweat lodge, without the opposite hassle of being conscious that he was the only white guy in the room. In fact, besides the nurses in holding patterns, he was the only person in the room.

He located a tray of tomato seedlings going rootbound in their tiny six-packs, and a potting bench whose location was a quick-and-dirty approximation of equidistantly far from anything blooming. He assured his nurse he knew what he was doing, and after a couple of successful repottings, gently sliding the little seedlings out and loosening the tangled roots, she seemed to agree and backed off. It was, by far, the most fucking theraputic thing he'd found in this hellhole so far, and he let himself sink into the rhythm of the task.

[Free!]

Comments

[31st-of-china.livejournal.com]

"Sanzo. And it depends what 'the same thing' is. What did you run into?" Had this man been to the basement? Whatever the reason, he didn't like the fact that Brian had actually brought his condition up. He was fine and he was getting tired of people thinking otherwise; it was just getting too humid in here for some reason.

There was an explosion of coughing nearby, loud enough to draw Brian's attention. Sanzo glanced over at the source, in time to see another patient choking out...what the fuck was that? That wasn't--

It was. It was a honest-to-gods clump of hair, shaped roughly into a sphere and shiny with saliva. Sanzo couldn't stop the slight look of disgust from crossing his face. He looked back at the empty pot. Who the hell ate hair? The only way he could see human hair (and it definitely looked human) being ingested in that amount was if he was similar to some of the youkai filth.

A cannibal?

Sanzo spared one last glance at that patient, memorizing the face. If he was one, it marked him as potentially dangerous.

[kindalikedit]

Dean shrugged. "I didn't get a good look. Went outside and ran into this thick fog. All I know is I heard a female voice chanting this weird crap," and it was weird, even for him, 'cause it sure as hell didn't sound like the typical things you'd expect to hear from a witch's mouth, "and I was gettin' hit with..."

He trailed off, not entirely sure if he wanted to go with the "it's magic" route. If he'd been hit with the same mojo, then great, they'd have a common enemy. If he didn't, Dean supposed he could always take a page out of Ron's book and pretend he was just coping. So long as he said he didn't actually hunt these things, he should be fine.

"Magic, I guess," Dean said. "Like, suddenly there was this feeling of freezing cold, colder than anything I've ever felt before. And it actually got worse even though I booked it outta there."

He glossed over getting rescued by Ron. That wasn't important. What was important was finding out if Sanzo ran into the same witch; better yet, if he knew what she looked like so he could find her. The best Dean himself had seen was just a fleeting shadow against the fog and her voice, but trying to root through all the patients and staff, hoping to find that voice? Wasn't gonna be easy.

[31st-of-china.livejournal.com]

"I didn't run into anything like that." Sanzo said coolly. Whatever that was. A patient? Or one of the creatures here? The chanting implied a need for something to help focus the power. "Another patient ran me through."

He didn't miss that small hesitation at the word 'magic'. Maybe they didn't have spells or abilities like that back where Brian came from. It was possible this was the very first time he'd ever been confronted with something like it, and now wasn't sure how to deal with it. Or the fact that it existed.

...Or he was trying to cover something up. Sanzo wasn't sure what that'd be just yet. But he knew better than to assume on good faith that Brian was telling the truth. Everyone lied. The difference was whether that lie would get your ass killed or not. Sanzo didn't harbor any illusion that the other prisoners were his allies. It didn't matter if they were all in the same shithole, that didn't mean a damn thing.

It was clear he was new to all this. He had to get this pre-emptively. "And I want to make something clear. It's obvious that you're new. And I'm not going to babysit you: find someone else."

[kindalikedit]

Getting run through? Yeah, that'd fuck a guy up: Dean was frankly surprised he was standing and not, y'know, resting. Then again, he had no idea how long ago he'd been stabbed. What Dean did know was that it sucked for Sanzo that he'd been tagged, it also told him that obviously he had to look out not just for the monsters, but also for the normal humans.

It probably didn't need to be said, but it still didn't surprise people: people were crazy and getting thrown into a place like Landels? Probably wasn't helping. The only person he knew he could trust for sure was Sam.

Any sense of sympathy he had vanished once Sanzo rounded on him and started to bitch him out. Dean's eyebrow rose. Okay, dude, not cool. Sucked he'd been tagged, but he wasn't about to stand here and get treated like he was a pain in the ass who needed handholding and diaper changing. In short, a friggen civvie. Dean set down the pot, didn't slam it, and turned toward Bitchy, his lip curled in a sarcastic smirk. At least he wasn't gonna start swinging, like he had yesterday. Slugging Slappy in the face had been, what was the word? Oh yeah. Relaxing.

"Pretty sure I can handle myself." Dean's smile wasn't at all friendly; he wasn't even trying. It was almost an unconscious challenge. "Least I know to watch my back."

[31st-of-china.livejournal.com]

Sanzo's mouth curled into a slight sneer at that. How often had he heard that before, and it turned out to be a load of bull? How many times where people laughed at the idea that the nightshift just might be more than they could handle? Maybe it had sounded crazy the first time, but he'd known better than to completely ignore it.

The monk didn't quite glare at Brian, instead gave him a decidedly chill look. It hadn't been about watching his fucking back. He hadn't gotten ambushed like a dumbfuck kappa.

He wasn't going to rise to that bait just yet. Of course Brian'd chose the most moronic route to go; he didn't like being told point blank how things were going to go down and grabbed the nearest thing.

"This is coming from the person who ran outside and got hit by a little fog." Brian was smiling, but Sanzo wasn't taken in by it. He'd seen that look on Hakkai and Gojyo's face before. Mostly the roach's. The monk just jerked his head slightly at the bandages on half of Brian's face. "Those wounds? You can handle yourself, I'm sure."