damned_institute | Day 41: Intercom, Evening

When the intercom's jingle sounded, there seemed to be some kind of tapping in the background noise, like letters being punched into a keyboard. It stopped and the Head Doctor chuckled.

"Hello, everyone! I'm actually taking a break from paperwork for once – everyone needs some recreational time, you know! – and of course, now we can all look forward to a scrumptious dinner from our cooks. Tonight, herb-seasoned grilled salmon is on the menu, served with buttery mashed potatoes and asparagus. All our regular drinks and vegetarian options are available, and for dessert, we will be serving yellow cake with a whipped cream icing.

"...Well! I can hardly wait to get my own dinner after saying all that. Good bye for now, everyone, and enjoy your delicious food!"

The intercom clicked off.

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While Otacon's perusal of the bulletin board had prepared him for the idea of people wandering around claiming to be fictional characters, he still found himself gaping when confronted with one in the flesh. And of course it couldn't be the cute heroine of a shoujo love comedy, it had to be a career soldier whose death had reduced Otacon to sobbing uncontrollably in front of his computer screen.

Get a grip, he ordered himself for what was possibly the tenth time today. Aloud, he blurted: "Otacon. Er — that is, my name is Hal Emmerich, but everyone calls me Otacon." He considered, for exactly one second, the implications of explaining otaku culture to an anime character, and shook his head. "It's... complicated. But nice to meet you, Hughes. Which club are you in charge of? I read the list posted on the bulletin board, but I didn't have time to memorize everything..."

Otacon sat down at his desk, and was suddenly reminded of how little he'd eaten at lunch.

"Otacon it is," Hughes said, nodding. He knew he'd heard the name before. Someone Roy had known, right? He was pretty sure it wasn't the same one, but it stood out enough for Hughes to make the connection.

He had no idea whatsoever what was going through the man's head, so he just raised an eyebrow at the fleeting look of shock that crossed the other man's face. That was a little weird.

"I head up the Cooking Club. We gather supplies, make sure people can fight, produce weapons... a lot of it ends up happening here, though. Uh...I actually haven't had a roommate for a few days, so I kind of got used to this being HQ, so to speak. You okay?"

"Sure. I mean, it was your room in the first place. I'm still just trying to understand everything," said Otacon, busying himself with the asparagus on his plate in a futile attempt to stop from staring at Hughes. Of all the things which would take the cake for Most Surreal Event of the Day... Although he wore none of the things which would make up a proper Lt. Colonel Maes Hughes cosplay, Otacon's roommate still looked uncannily like the character. Person. Oh, hell.

Otacon put his fork back down when one of Hughes' words settled in his overworked brain. Weapons. "How dangerous is it here, really? I mean, I heard about the monsters, but..." He hesitated. He didn't even know if Snake would welcome seeing him again.

"Dangerous," Hughes said, bluntly and without much emotion. "You don't want to go out unarmed, you don't want to go out alone, and you don't want to go out without a map." He pulled out his own, offering it to Otacon.

"You can copy this one, if you want. It's got all of the accessible first floor." He had a second floor map as well, but that one had private notes and markings regarding the key experiment on it. That one wasn't handed out for copying.

"If you need a weapon," he went on, opening his desk drawer and drawing out his knives. "Let me know. I can get you the basics - sword, knife, something like that. Can't do guns or anything complicated like that, our weaponsmith has limited ability, so to speak."

Otacon laughed, somewhat self-deprecatingly. "Ah — no, that's fine, I'm not a fighter. In fact, it's usually me who's assembling the weapons, but... I'm no alchemist, and I'm guessing this desk doesn't contain any of the tools I usually need." Otacon opened his desk drawer with a rueful smile, then looked back at Hughes. "But thank you, I'll keep that in mind. I might know someone who could use the offer."

He accepted the first floor map with another thanks, and quickly found the pen and paper for copying it down. While Otacon hadn't expected a different answer to his question, he wasn't about to eliminate the possibility of having to venture out alone.

Day 41: Intercom, Evening

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