Day 22: Brunch

[dawning-dreams.livejournal.com]

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.

Comments

[outtokillhim.livejournal.com]

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.)

[outtokillhim.livejournal.com]

"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..."

[felled-hero.livejournal.com]

"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.

[muted-flame.livejournal.com]

At least Greed hadn't screwed things up and the nurse had gone off without much of a fuss. He removed his hands from the homunculus and took a step back. Even though Roy was one of the patients who had been at Landel's the longest without having his memories wiped, he had stayed out of solitary. He'd rather it stay that way, and the solution was simple - keep all of his violent attacks on other patients to after dinner.

"This isn't hell," Roy grumbled. He was surrounded by people that had died, but he hadn't. He was almost certain of that, though he didn't know why he was so sure. Still, what had happened before he'd been brought here wasn't something that could have killed him. He had been closing the Gate, which was dangerous, maybe, but not life-threatening. It wasn't as if he'd been performing human transmutation...

He wasn't denying that if there was a hell, that he would go there once he died. He would, and he'd be there right along with Envy (and most likely Greed, as well). Roy was trying to make up for what he'd done in the past through his goal of becoming Fuhrer, but he had no delusions that it would absolve him. He wasn't religious, in any case, and doubted there even was a heaven or hell. To continue hypothetically, however, Hughes would most definitely have gone to heaven. Envy could imply as much as he wanted, but there was no truth to what he was saying.

Even though the sin targeted him and touched at his weak spot, it was difficult to take him seriously knowing what he was guilty of. Roy was quickly getting tired of hearing the sin's voice - he realized Hughes was upset, but hoped that the man would come to see that there was no point in letting those words get to him. Still, he did hope Envy would listen to Hughes' demand and leave.

Turning to Greed, he scratched at his head and made sure his bangs were still smoothed over his left eye. "Is he always like this?" he asked under his breath with a sigh.

[grabby-hands.livejournal.com]

Greed knew the bitch had always been one to talk, but damn. It was like the bastard had to make up for his lack of a backbone with a bunch of baits and insults, and though Envy usually knew how to rile the other homunculus up, he seemed to be focusing on sheet-guy enough at the moment that Greed could stand back and see how ridiculous the other's tactics were.

Brigadier General, huh? No wonder Greed didn't care for the guy, though if Envy was picking on him, maybe there was something likable to be found in his uptight military face. In any case, Greed was sick and fucking tired of hearing Envy's self-absorbed rambling, and knew that if he interjected, he'd get violent along with it. So, instead, he moved to grab his food tray from the nearby table, (it was lighter than usual for the fact that he only had one hand to carry it with), glaring murder at the other sin's back as he tried to find a seat close enough to him to keep an eye on him but far enough that he couldn't smell his proverbial stench.

Mustang's question found him first, however, and though it caught him off-guard, he smirked in response to it.

"Yeah," he muttered, though his voice was loud enough for the other homunculus to hear. "Bitch, moan, bitch. Or help seal you up for a hundred years. Whatever works to piss you off."

[outtokillhim.livejournal.com]

Envy snorted and smirked, raising an eyebrow at their cynicism. They were all too quick to doubt him, not that that was surprising, but it didn't make much of a difference. He knew he was right. The joke was on them either way.

"How else is it that you were dead before but still conscious now?" He asked, "Honestly, you morons are so peurile sometimes. You only believe what your lame grip on 'science' can tell you," He picked up his plate and slid off the table, "Take it from the Gate's own little abomination; there's more to the universe than your limited views on life and death. I know where we are. And your denying it doesn't change that."

He began to walk away, smiling to himself.

"Have fun faking innocence, you two," he called, "Nice to know you're still as impulsive as usual, Greed. We're going to get along so well." He disappeared in the crowd to put away his things and meet up with his nurse like the good little patient he was.