damned_institute | Day 22: Brunch

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Day 22: Brunch

Cid usually liked sleeping in, especially in a place as messed up and uninviting as this, but this happened to be one situation where he really wished he hadn't.

Right there, on the bulletin board. The Head Doctor and he'd fucking missed it? Some part of him wished he'd been there to take his eye out and another part of him knew he wouldn't have been able to. No man that powerful who hid for so long went to dangerous places without some kind of entourage.

Brunch sounded like it'd be filling, at least, though he nearly stopped in his tracks when the bastard announced TEA. TEA. It'd been a damn long while since he'd had some fucking tea, though with all the stress this place had found fit to rain down on his fucking head, it hadn't really been the first priority on his mind. Kinda nice, even if Cid was sure this was just some game the mother fucker was playing to get them all stuck neck-deep in Stockholm Syndrome.

He scanned the mostly-empty room for any sign of a familiar face once he'd piled waffles and sausages and syrup on his plate, though the person he really wanted to talk to was that Reynolds guy. "Spaceship" was the last word he remembered clearly before waking up in his bed, and dammit if he wasn't going to keep it stuck like glue in his mind.

He found a table where he could watch people come into the cafeteria and grabbed for his mug. The steam rising from his drink and the bag of herbs in it was nearly enough to make him grin despite it all, and it was with marked leisure and a little relief that he drank his goddamn tea.

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Yohji's eyes widened at the glow that seemed to come from the girl's hands suddenly. He leaned closer, staring at the symbol which seemed to be floating in the air. "What," he began, before blinking several times to make sure he wasn't seeing things. "What is that?"

He tilted his head to take a better look at it. How bizarre. Some kind of illusion? Maybe she was a psychic which would lend credence to this being an Esset facility. "I've never seen anything like that."

That made Xigbar grin and wave his hand dismissively, taking some chomps out of his burger before he spoke. Ah, things were always better with flame-broiled beef! "Nah, just wanted to chat it up a little, see if we couldn't build some bridges or whatever you youngsters call it now."

To be honest, Number II was in a surprisingly good mood. It seemed like everything was going to plan, and actually getting to talk was quite the surprise. Novelty was a weak spot of the Nobody, after all. "See, you say that you're normal dudes, but we all know that's not really it. You've got the freakin' Keyblade, and you're a Princess of Heart, and both of you broke all the rules for cranking out Nobodies." Xigbar indicated each child in turn, gesturing in a remarkably relaxed manner.

"So I figure, if anyone can tell me if working together with normal people is possible, it'd be you two, right? So, if we can have a nice normal chat, without somebody getting something sharp and pointy in the face by the end, I'll call it a good day's work." He paused for a moment, then leaned forward, a grin on his face. "First things first; how's life been here in the wonderful Institute? Keeping safe from the creepy-crawlies?"

Hmph. Envy smiled smugly and brushed himself off, remarking on how nice and efficient the system was; very good at squashing out violent attempts by patients. It was nice to know. He was sure the Colonel, who had looked about ready to burst a vein in his repressed urge to throttle the cheeky androgyne, heard that as a warning. And it pissed him off even more. Delightful.

He observed the sets of glaring eyes that surrounded him, completely unthreatened by the fact that the odds were so stacked against him. He had advantage over these creatures, each one; always had and always would. He knew their weaknesses, and that they were all cursed with a shorter fuse than he had on all accounts but one single weak subject that Envy was smart enough not to divulge to anyone who was not sure to die soon after. He had only his one great wound; an ancient one, aged and refined to something properly epic; an anger worthy of centuries of fermentation. These humans and lone homunculus were open sores. Greed was far less obviously so, but he had his thin points, and as illustrated, he could be quick to rash anger to a far more liberal range of stimuli than Envy had.

This wasn't to say that Envy wasn't fond of a good tantrum here and there; wanton violence was great fun. But only one thing ever provoked him to honest passion- to vulnerability, and that was not to be a subject broached here.

He calmly seated himself, testing the cooling tea with disturbing civility. This faking act was a pretty weak one to begin with, he decided, and it had grown rather stale, as had the initial twitching urge to have a good little spat with Greed. He didn't want to take risks with his weakened body until he knew its limits entirely, and besides- it was an often overlooked fact that words could do more damage, and the truth be far more scathing than deception.

"You are far too good at sniffing out lies, Major- I mean, Brigadier General. That, of course, was why I had to do it," He made a trivial motion with his forefinger, leaving out the sound effect of 'bang' as a moot implication, "Nothing personal, really. Sure, I wasn't fond of you, but I was just following orders." His smiling slitted eyes slipped sharply towards the overly defensive looking Mustang, "I'm sure you know all about that sort of thing."

He returned to his cool collected speech, "Just as you suggested, sir. Let us discuss this as normal civil humans. I'm sure it'll be great table conversation to describe just what it feels like to die. For that matter- why do you suppose it is that we're all here? You can't really think it's something so surface-value literal as us being hospital experiments, can you? I would have thought better of such a successful investigative officer."

(ooc- following up with a second post- TL;DR, yanno? Envy has a bit more to say, so hold on.)

When Miku was very little, her mother taught her manners and other important things to use in a social situation (and thanks to her mother's death and seeing nastly little things like ghosts, were never really used).

She was rather sure that killing someone was not one of the lessons she learned. Indeed, it was rather frowned upon. Still, he was giving her more clues to what was going on. Powerless state? What did that mean?

"It is... nice to meet you," she replied, but wasn't sure if she actually meant it.

"Ah, I see. That’s really unfortunate, I hope they’re alright" No matter, she’d find out on her own time. Maybe someone else had a better idea of who had been taken.

“Uh huh.” She nodded and smiled. “I guess I’m tougher than I look. Or perhaps I’m just lucky that they didn’t pierce a lung or… my heart.” If only he knew. “I was bleeding a lot, and I passed out after the initial jolt. But when I woke up this morning I had bandages wrapped all around the wound. I think it’s been sewn up too.”

If it was, then it would most likely leave a scar. A scar on her chest, right where her heart used to be… How poetic.

“I wonder if I can get some painkillers or something, because it still hurts a lot.”

"Isn't it obvious? That big old H-E Double Toothpicks, for you family types," He almost seemed to wink, "The place where all we sins and sinners are destined to go upon our demise," His gaze slid over to Greed, "Obviously for us- half dead defective garbage to begin with- we weren't destined for any other place to begin with. Of course I know even if we weren't I've earned my seat for an eternal inferno grill, and am damn proud of it."

He took his time to sip the tea again, pulling at the bag intermittently and frowning at he bitter infusion, as if that would change it to a better grade.

"Of course, there are plenty of ways to earn your damnation, be it in a fiery lava pit or an overly sterile nut house that serves waffles and stitches smiley faces on the patient uniforms- stuck with the delusion that there are monsters after you and that 'the man' is just decieving you and telling you you're a regular hallucinating crazy." This time his grin- not yet toothy, though slowly evolving in that direction, was directed towards Mustang, "Things you've done that you simply can't change. I'm sure you, for example, Mister highly decorated war hero, have plenty of baby-killing stories to pass the time around the proverbial hell campfire." He knew he was pushing it and he loved the thrill, in addition to the fact that- saving what they might do to him before an orderly swept in and put the offender away for a long time, they couldn't act on their burning desires to hurt him. Not now.

He practically slithered to stand and slide into a seated position on the table, in love with how disgusted they all were with him for saying these things that were in all likelihood true, and he crossed his legs nonchalantly, sipping again at his simple white mug.

"But you know- that's where the curiosity got me. That's where, if I may be perfectly honest, like a 'normal human' just as you requested, I have to wonder, now. How does a veritable saint- a do-gooder hero; father and protective figure, a well loved community family man, someone who did all of those things practically guaranteed to grant you a full immunity- wind up in hell with the rest of us despicable screwups?"

He leaned in, then, towards Maes, not so close that it warranted an all out declaration of space-invasion, but close enough to make that Roy bastard practically steam with protective righteous anger,

"To be separated from your lovely wife. Your sweet, innocent little daughter. For all eternity. What kind of grave sin does someone have to commit to nullify all those good deeds and earn that punishment? What-" He smiled, his tone rife with venomous implications- "Or who- could possibly be worth that?"

He pulled away, casually passing it off with a tactile, "I wonder..."

"A pleasure."

Was the blunt reply. God, he was bored and hungry. Plus, the girl looked good enough to eat too. The skull splitting grin returned to his pale, sharp features, now staring at Miku intently. Alucard didn't really like beating around the bush when it came to food. Not at all.

"Tell me, would you mind feeding a starving man?"

"I'm Rabastan... Rabastan Lestrange."

Frowning at the pair, Bast patted the radio he held in the crook of his arm. Ever since it had spoken up the second time, Bast had become even more convinced that there was a small man trapped inside it. If he kept it safe, maybe it would let him stay here in Landel's forever.

"Ohhh... is Alphonse the name they keep calling you, Draco? They keep calling me Stephen King. Whatever Obliviate spell they tried on me didn't work. You know, everyone always did say that you didn't have that strong of a mind or a will for that matter. That's all right though. You're just a kid."

Giving the man a sunny smile, he turned back to Bellatrix/Lust.

"Don't you worry any, Bellatrix. You're the smartest, wickedest, and slyest of all the Death Eaters. It's why the Dark Lord likes you the best. He hasn't let any other women join, you know. I'm sure you know at least fifty ways to make the rest of these people do whatever you want or to take over. Can't I help? Please? I promise not to tease you about Sirius anymore!"

"Friends are pretty valuable here, when other resources are so few," Kurama pointed out. "You've been here two days, haven't you? You should know that you can't wander about by yourself. Not only that, but there's strength in numbers and the such. And not just physical strength."

Kurama sighed, folding his hands once more and resting his chin on them. His gaze was contemplative as he stared at the table. "Sometimes, friends are just important to have in a place like this. It can't be explained. There's something about a one-man-show that just drags you down after a while, leaving you nothing more than a shell, going through the motions. And I should know. I almost died by putting my faith in only myself, and I still didn't learn from it. It took a human woman to teach me that there's something special in the bonds we make with people...Something that can save more than just our lives. It can save everything that makes us who we are, and then some."

Alphonse turned to Rabastan, keeping a soft frown back. He didn't want to deceive this man, not at all, but it looked like Rabastan was already doing all the deceiving himself.

Not a strong will? ... that was Draco, not him. So he only smiled, while his mind inched back towards confused wanderings. --Then his eyes suddenly flickered down. The food.

While still courteously listening to Rabastan, Alphonse's eyes ran over all his choices. The nurse sure had piled the tray up. For some reason, it all made him nervous. There were eggs and sausages and bacon and some things he wasn't even sure he recognized, but they all looked good. And now he could try them. Then there was an apple, just on the edge of the tray. And maybe it was for the familiarity, a big red country apple... He reached out for it.

And took a slow, almost shy bite of it. He seemed to just stay there with the piece in his mouth for a while, then he started gradually chewing it, and in the next minute had eaten the entire apple. He wasn't a wildly hearty eater usually -- he hadn't been an eater at all for the past few years -- but in the next moment he was excitedly diving into the rest.

Hisoka shook his head, feeling odd for being the one to receive Kurama's explanation. Or perhaps he was just feeling out of place because he wasn't used to the lack of negativity. Even after being Tsuzuki's partner for several years had not allowed the boy to grow used to the lack of hate, not when he was always preparing himself for something that would make his partner snap and just... leave.

Funny how he tried to save the overgrown idiot when the time came.

The boy shook his head again.

"In a way, you're right... there are times when you need a friend to be there," Hisoka replied, definitely feeling odd as the words tumbled from his lips. "But people are liabilities. Friends are liabilities. You always worry about them, if they're okay and you have to protect them when they fall."

Like someone he knew. Hisoka frowned, fighting back the wonderings of just exactly what happened to his partner after the fire.

"And I've met a few of the people here, they are less than savory characters... I think it might be better if I'm alone."

Waka played for some time before he lowered the flute; entirely aside from taking some genuine pleasure in playing for an appreciative audience(it had been some time since he'd had any audience at all, at least aside from Amaterasu and Issun), the music also soothed his own unease at being in this strange and inexplicable place with its complete lack of taste in food, clothing, and architecture.

"I don't believe we've been introduced," he announced after a moment. "My name is Waka."

"Rabastan," Lust repeated, carefully enunciating the strange name. She watched Alphonse out of the corner of her eye, curious to observe him. From what he'd said... he had only just been returned to a body, hadn't he?

But again, she was distracted. The comment about getting people to do what she wanted struck a chord. After all, how many men in the place had already pledged to protect her, already sworn to lay down their lives for hers? How many scrambled like eager dogs to do as she asked, get her what she required?

"I have my ways," she said, carefully. "And his name is Alphonse, it's the name he has had since birth. And mine is Lust - they call me something altogether different." And then there was Isobel, the name she had answered to in another life and had no claim to now. But she doubted she could convince this man to call her anything but 'Bellatrix'.

"I suppose I could be persuaded to allow you to aide me," she went on, narrowing her eyes. "If you're useful. Tell me, Rabastan, what can you do?"

"Killing them isn't that entertaining," Schuldig replied with a slight shrug. "If you break a toy, you can't play with it again. It's more amusing to break them, to play them off each other, to make them suffer for as long as I can keep coming up with ideas. Usually that's a long time." He smirked.

So the boy was finally rethinking killing him. It had certainly taken long enough to talk him around. A one-track mind was difficult to divert.

Darman frowned, trying to turn over this new viewpoint in his head and still finding that he couldn't quite understand the point of all it. It seemed like it left too much room for error - it was entirely possible to break down someone through proper demoralization (what Skirata called just a fancy name for torture of some kind), but he was of the opinion that there was still a risk involved. Something could always trigger hidden reserves of strength or willpower and then you'd have a potentially messy, ugly fight on your hands.

But he supposed that this strange mind-reader had a somewhat different agenda compared to his and took more pleasure in the means than the end. All he knew was this Force user certainly didn't sound very Jedi-like.

Still, he would prefer to just kill the Jedi rather than leave them as loose ends, but he supposed that incapacitating them would fit the bill. At least temporarily.

"And how do you plan to do all this?" Darman asked. He couldn't help a glance at General Kenobi, deep in discussion with Takaya.

Well, that came right out of the blue, didn't it?

"Well, no, I wouldn't. I suppose." Certainly the question had to be hypothetical.

Right? Of course he meant hypothetically, she assured herself. Miku felt his eyes boring holes into the side of her head, and turned to see him.

"It a nice thing to do."

"That's all I needed to know."

His voice had taken ona deep, throaty purr, Chesire grin getting yet wider. And in an instant, it was gone when she said she would. Oh, she had no idea what she was getting into.

Alucard leaned right over the table, eyes glowing like coals.

"How about giving up a pint of blood for this hungry one?" he asked huskily.

Edgeworth was also hoping that he didn't see anyone. It would be incredibly easy to tell that the "visitors" weren't real in his case, because he didn't really have much of a family, and the one person that was left wouldn't let herself be seen in a place like this, even as a visitor. Of course, they'd made him speak with his father the night before, in a matter of speaking, so who knew, at this point? Especially if they were brainwashing others...

It was crystal clear from the looks on their faces that the others did have actual families, or at least close friends that would have come had they actually been in their own worlds, and somewhere in the mess of slowly clearing thoughts, he realized that he owed them another apology, this time for his earlier harshness.

Tamaki is just a kid...and despite everything he's talking about, and how much older he seems than the other, Adelheid's a kid, too. What's more, Wright's got to be worried about his family, and he's probably worried about Maya Fey, too. She might as well be a sister to him.

When Adel changed the subject, he was almost glad for the distraction. It wasn't easy to get used to the idea of other worlds, but if it took everyone else's mind off the worry, so much the better. Conversations outside of work had never been his forte, and particularly not now with his brain still fogged from the sedatives, but he knew it would be better for all of them if he at least made an effort.

"In my line of work, before I woke up here, I dealt with criminals each day. I can't say I've ever faced one with the type of weapons this one has, but I don't think, based on the bulletin board transcript of the speech, that they took the time to actually bring in family members of ours. I don't know why, but I believe the advice is sound. They aren't the ones we care about, no matter how much we want them to be. I'm just not sure why they would do this at all, other than to keep up an illusion."

He didn't mention the hypothesis Wright had come up with. It was too soon, yet, for that, and if he didn't have a visitor, he'd want to go back to the library to see if there was any information at all there. It had mostly been nonfiction before, but people had been known to write in library books before...

Kurama shook his head. "It's never better to be alone. Sure, friends can be troublesome at times. They can cause their share of heartbreak and pain. You have to protect them and watch out for them. And when they get hurt, when you can't save them... It hurts you, as well." He paused, frowning slightly as his thoughts drifting back to Kuronue. There was that promise not to dwell on it...but it was hard to not think of it. Especially since his partner had disappeared again. As if he'd been swallowed up by this horrible place. The urge to look for him was strong, but there was nothing he could do during the day...

"But they give you a strength that no amount of training can produce," Kurama continued, the frown vanishing. "I've seen a boy with barely any training taken on a full-grown demon. Electrocuted nearly to the point of death, he was clearly outmatched. But knowing that his friends were in danger, that boy used his own life energy to attack the beast. He nearly died from it, but he won. If he had been fighting for himself, he never would have been able to tap into that energy. He would have been killed." He paused, smiling slightly.

"I can assure you, though, that not everyone here is unsavory as you think. I wouldn't mind being your friend if you think you can stand it," he added, teasingly.

Ari opened his eyes once the music stopped, though the echo of the melody was still drifting about in his head. It was quite possibly the most beautiful music he'd heard in a while, and he wanted to hold onto it as long as possible.

"I'm Ari," he replied to the introduction, following soon after with "Where did you learn to play like that?"

"You shut the hell up."

Hughes had been keeping a level head, keeping himself relatively grounded - stiff and clearly on the defensive, but calm and in control of himself. But now? Now, as the sin continued to speak, dropped all pretenses, showed his true colors... now Hughes was beginning to lose his temper.

He had shifted much of the blame onto Dante, after seeing the woman himself, seeing what a twisted excuse for a human being she really was. And despite intelligence and a logical mind, Maes was human and wanted to place blame. Envy, by sheer reason on non-proximity, had been more or less forgotten.

Not anymore. Not now. Hughes' face tightened, as did his fists. He remembered all too clearly that night - for him, it had happened but a few weeks ago. What that bastard did, how he did it...

And that the sin would have the audacity to speak of his family! It made his stomach twist in a way that told him brunch was most definitely over for him. He clenched his teeth together tightly, his body rigid as he fought to remain in his seat.

It wasn't that Hughes believed anything Envy was saying - he didn't believe in hell, and if he did, he knew it wouldn't be this place. This place was run by humans, not demons. But it didn't matter. He didn't care about much of what Envy said, except the parts that pertained to him.

He was seeing red by the time the sin finally shut up.

"You shut the hell up and you get the hell away from us. Now." Before Maes lost his temper and tried to throttle the son of a bitch right over the breakfast table.

"Nice to meet you, Ari." Waka smiled at the boy. Really, how long had it been since someone had truly savored his music? It was probably his own fault, keeping to himself as he did, but the people of Nippon would have been knocking his door down for exorcisms (of even the weakest demons, hardly worth thinking about when there were far stronger ones for Waka to be concerned with) and assistance and fortunes and who knew what else if he made himself readily available. And that would have interfered with his greater duty not just to Queen Himiko, but to Amaterasu in setting her on the path that would lead her back to the heavens where she belonged.

"I'm flattered you like my music. I could play for you again some time."

"Also," River piped up again, a small, child-like grin spreading across her lips as she peeked up from Dias' shoulder, "the food isn't drugged." Though it would seem to be little more than a joke, the reality of it was that such information was probably more vital than most people might think. "If it were, Dias would've been incapacitated for weeks by now." Of course, that little comment was clearly meant as little more than a bratty jab about the amount of food he was eating by a mischievous, little sister. Now that they were established as brother and sister, Dias would just have to take the bad with the good. At least she wasn't dumping pudding in his hair yet. Poor Simon.

"River. It's appropriate," the girl spoke up, lifting her head a touch more and fixing Ashton with a relatively satisfied expression. She turned to Valyn. "The Lord wished to know as well. If you need a bodyguard, I'm available. Just ask Dias. I've been taking care of him since I got here." Such a brat. Simon would probably sympathize with Dias at this point.

Miku found herself leaning far back from the table, eyes wide in surprise.

"D-did you just ask..." The thought was too insane to comprehend. He just asked have her donate blood to him? Somehow, Miku didn't think that it involved a needle. And all those teeth...

Then, quite suddenly, her chair's legs gave way backwards and BANG Miku found herself on the floor, dazed. "Tss, tss, tss, it hurts..."

"I'll hold you to that," Snake smirked. He honestly hadn't intended for his words to be taken that way, but was willing to play along with it. After all, it was at least friendly contact, and Otacon had suggested befriending as many patients as possible.

He liked flirting. It certainly wasn't a gift of his - it'd never come naturally to him. Why would it? He wasn't trained for people skills after all.

But it was satisfying. It showcased intelligence, quickness, and tension. And it had the useful side-effect of throwing people off-guard.

He started it, he assured himself.

"Mind telling me your room number?" he asked. "You never know when I might need to call you up on that proposal. I'm in M51."

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Page 22 of 28

Day 22: Brunch

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(ooc- following up with a second post- TL;DR, yanno? Envy has a bit more to say, so hold on.)

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