damned_institute | Day 41: Women's Showers

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Day 41: Women's Showers

Utena was very, very glad that the patients were finally being allowed to go to the showers. Even for a girl more used to sweating than many in her gender, two days without a shower was definitely enough to make her feel stickier and stinkier than she preferred to be. Especially after all the running around and tearing apart of rooms she, Celes and Edward had done the night before.

I really hope those rooms magically turned clean this morning or something, like every other place in here seems to, Utena thought at that, hoping that no patients had awoken to the rather desperate-looking remains of a break-and-enter.

Taking a wash towel from one of the baskets, Utena headed for a free showerhead.

[Free. Limit: Any]

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[i don't really care |D]

Well, breakfast was definitely kind of... depressing, though she didn't regret it. Yukari didn't know how well her words helped Renamon, if they had at all. But if they didn't, hopefully she'll be able to get standing again soon enough; it was difficult-- and a first-- to see her otherwise. As usual, breakfast eventually ended, and the nurses pushed them in opposite directions, insisting it was time she do this and that.

At least showers was something Yukari couldn't say no to. Soon enough the dull, grey uniform was removed, and after grabbing one of the smaller towels she wandered in towards the direction of an open shower head. Glancing by at the nearest figure, she noticed there was Tsubaki; a pleasant sight, given the girl had a cheerful disposition whenever they had talked before.

"Hey," Yukari greeted, giving her a nod in lieu of a wave of her hand. "Mind company?"

_{[Me neither! XD]}

It there was one thing Tsubaki missed--in the long, long list of both important and obvious things--it was daily baths, even a daily shower. She was used to living rough in a variety of ways, but here washing was an indulgence. Heck, clean water was a privilege depending on the time of day; she hadn’t forgotten the feel and smell of the mess lurking in the pipes at night.

The shower might not have been enough to wash all her worries away, but it did a lot for her spirits.

Tsubaki was just beginning to lather shampoo into her hair when the shorter figure came up beside her. With her arms raised, she turned her torso slightly and smiled over her shoulder so that she didn’t flash Yukari openly. Public showers weren’t so embarrassing, but most often had dividers, and Tsubaki felt a sense of etiquette in that way. There was enough sex talk and violence in Landel‘s--out-and-out nudity didn’t need to be shown off.

“Not at all. How is everything today?” Actually, she remembered reading about Yukari and a bear that morning…

"Better," Yukari replied simply, even if it wasn't entirely the truth. The morning hadn't started off too great, but if she could convince herself that it was, perhaps the day would be. She's had good days before-- well, the kind of good you could get here-- so they could definitely happen again.

She focused more in what was in front of her rather than Tsubaki beside her, doing her part in common courtesy. Nothing about this really bothered her, but nobody wanted to be stared at, even if Yukari did notice the other girl was admirably tall and... probably was looked at often, with a figure like that. Turning the shower on, Yukari tested the waters with a hand until it felt comfortable enough to step under. "Mmm," she hummed, clearly pleased with how it felt. "Yeah, definitely better. I feel like I could stand under this forever."

She watched Yukari for a moment longer, noting that at least the girl wasn’t sporting any injuries as bad as Kurogane’s. “That’s good,” said Tsubaki. “I hope you managed to stay safe last night, too.”

It was a lot to ask of Landel’s, which was the unfair reality; just last night alone, she’d seen too many people intent on conflicts that weren’t in their favour, whether it be against person or creature. Catching glimpses of wounds on other’s bodies that were otherwise concealed by clothing was a reminder of that danger, but both she and Yukari looked okay, any fatigue aside.

“I know what you mean,” she added in response to Yukari’s comment, a wishful smile coming over her face. Someone would really have to hate water to not want to hug their showerhead at times like these. Any longer without allowing the prisoners to shower, and the staff would be bordering on neglectful. And the hot water just felt nice on tense muscles. “I think I’ll stay as long as I can.”

"Nobody got hurt," Yukari responded with, since what happened definitely wasn't safe; what she said was the important part. "But I don't want a repeat of it. You sound fine yourself, so I guess you pretty much ended up well enough?"

With a nod, Yukari didn't do much beyond allowing the water to splash on her face. She really should have started getting cleaned up with the soap quicker than she was, but she wasn't in any rush and the shift gave ample time to do so sooner or later. "Me too. I bet it would just end up being boring sitting around in the sun room while trying to kill time."

Tsubaki’s thoughts ran a similar track: “That’s all you can hope for,” she replied positively, because it was the truth. Success of an assignment could be of utmost importance, but Landel’s set the stakes on endurance, and staying in good health was all too critical. “I thought I recognized your name on a message about the town outside; it sounded chancy. I went into the forest with a partner, myself, though thankfully we didn’t meet any threats.”

So yeah, Tsubaki was well enough. Not too bruised up, not too tired, and everything else were things she wouldn’t let impact her performance. Or her conversations. It’d be nice to have someone like Yukari to talk to regularly without... weight. But all the same, the idea of killing time wasn’t something she could disagree with--however, it might not be so boring as slow and somewhat somber, knowing what was going to happen that night like it had every night for who knew how long. The thought that any of her acquaintances would get dragged out of their rooms for experimentation or worse--like Shito had--was a terrible one.

When she was ready to rinse her hair out, she put her head under the spray so that it became a loud babble in her ears. She pulled back after a second, brushing her face free of hair and rivulets of water, and said, “There’d probably be enough people to start a game on the board or something, but cabin fever gets to people,” Tsubaki agreed. “Tomorrow should be a change of pace. Do you have plans to do anything in town?” If their fortune lasted the night.

Strange to think she’d met Yukari a week ago on her first trip, her first morning…

Yukari blinked, surprised to hear the other girl had spotted the report on the board. Of course, maybe she shouldn't had been; it was up there for all to see, although nobody outside of her teammates had ever brought much attention to them. Not to her, anyway, but at least Tsubaki wasn't finding it weird or anything.

"Oh," Yukari began with a hint of her surprise. "Yeah, we did. Senpai wanted us to..." A beat, but she pretended to be distracted by getting some shampoo out of one of the dispensers. "To try something and check out the area, but we didn't get to do much looking. Too busy trying not to become some freaky monster's midnight snack and all." Tsubaki sure was lucky not to have ran into anything. "The area alone was pretty creepy, too. Have you seen it before?"

She finally began to rub the soap into her hair, staring idly into the air as she did. "I almost forgot about that," Yukari admitted, as if it didn't matter whether it was happening one way or the other. Though, being able to stretch her legs some would be nice. "Not really. Maybe see what was missed out on last time."

“Not the town,” answered Tsubaki with a headshake, “just the forest. It’s hard to imagine a place not being creepy at night; everything‘s so unnatural outside.” Ruins of a town more so, though. It was a sign of life that was kind of unsettling. She got the impression that their reason for heading that way was something important between Yukari and her friends; friends from home, it sounded like. Her focused switched to that. “Senpai? Do you know a lot of people from your home?”

It’d be pretty unfortunate to find one’s friends here, but Yukari had familiar faces to travel with at night… Drawing her fingers through her hair, she continued to wash out shampoo from the long locks before applying conditioner. If the luxury was there…

Her gaze flicked to over Yukari’s face from the corner of her eye as the other girl thought about the trip happening the next day. Thinking about the future beyond the next nightshift was definitely a struggle sometimes. “Is there anything fun to do? I didn’t see much of it last time.” Which brought back memories of the initial shock she’d felt at seeing this place’s sun for the first time, and bumping into Yukari by mistake… Tsubaki smiled a little sheepishly to herself. “At least we won’t be eating cafeteria food,” she offered.

"No kidding," Yukari agreed with a sigh. "Before that it was all the fog; I've never seen so much in my life." She fell silent for a moment, rinsing herself off underneath the water before she spoke up again, this time more thoughtfully; "I wonder what happened out there... It's like everyone just up and left all of a sudden ages ago."

Her mind wandered elsewhere entirely, failing to come up with a scenario that sounded right before realizing Tsubaki had asked her a question. "-- Oh, yeah, kinda," Yukari replied absentmindedly, brushing a hand through her hair. "Some of them are here. We've been trying to work together on a few things lately."

It made her wonder what they were going to try to do this night. She'd have to let them know she had other plans, before Mitsuru decided to come up with something for her to go out and attempt to finish.

"No idea, but there's gotta be something worth seeing there," Yukari said, and maybe she finally sounded a little eager about it, too. "It's not the first place I'd want to visit, but it didn't look all that bad."

Yeah, visibility was awfully poor in all directions outside the walls, and there hadn't seemed to be any change in thickness. Just cold, quiet, misty ground. Tsubaki rubbed conditioner into her scalp slowly, unable to help thinking about the reasons for an abandoned town to be out there, either. But the explanations she could imagine had dark ends--there were too many ways to wipe out an entire population, she'd found. She smiled slightly instead, masking her thoughts. "I don't know, it's a mystery to me. Do your friends have a theory?" Upperclassmen implied one or more went to school with Yukari in... Iwatodai, wasn't that right? "It must be a little reassuring to have people you know around. I hope they're doing well, too."

Everybody was working hard in their own ways, so progress would happen one way or another, even if it was only a little. Even if the answers, like the truth behind this place and the outlying land, weren't going to be pretty. But that was getting ahead of themselves.

Tsubaki mixed conditioner into the rest of her hair, then twisted most of it into a loose rope so that she could bring it back over her shoulder and rinse. "The townspeople might have something to say," she added lightly. They could provide a little enlightenment about Doyleton, maybe, even if it didn't seem like getting the day to wander the town had helped much in learning more about their situation. "It should be a nice break, anyway. No sitting on couches in our uniform."

A chance to get out and walk around without it being nightshift was something small to cheer up about, right?

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Day 41: Women's Showers

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