damned_institute | NIGHTSHIFT 42: BLACK ROCK HOTEL

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NIGHTSHIFT 42: BLACK ROCK HOTEL

Snake jerked his head away from Fox's hand and shot to his feet, disorientated slightly by the sudden shift. The grout in the tiles was black with what looked like old blood, and the stench of rot heaved in his throat. Something was badly wrong. He sensed threats - left, faint shapes in the dark outside the large windows - Fox - something creaking in the ceiling - a long groaning voice off to the right, past the walls - and something moving in the back of the room -

It staggered towards him, and before he fully knew what he was doing he ripped the match from the book and struck it with his left hand alone, popped the cap off the hairspray, and blasted a tongue of flame at the aggressor, aiming for its face. He saw, in the flickering light, long hair and long nails and the skin on its rotten face peeling and cracking and bubbling in the heat. It gave a long, screaming cry, and toppled to the floor. Its arms and legs writhed and kicked furiously, an automatic, animal gesture, before it finally lay still.

"Here?" he snapped at Fox, wrapping his fingers around the can of hairspray. "This place gets better and better. It's like a theme park." His voice quaked with anger. The place now stunk of something far worse than rotten meat, and for a fraction of a second he thought he could hear Big Boss's voice saying something he couldn't make out before he realised that it had come from inside his own head.

"At least I don't have to be the only thing here back from the dead," he growled. The woman zombie was leaking something he didn't want to think about. He guessed that the decomposition must have trapped methane and other flammable gasses inside the body, hence why it went up like a candle.

That said, he didn't really think he could burn anything else again. For a while.

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"Depends on whether I'm serious or not," Sheena muttered. "And if I know who my target is. If I have to confirm before, it's kind of direct and not very ninja-y. Like with Colette. Wasn't sure if she was the Chosen or not, so I had to get everyone's attention and ask. Then I said she was going to die and attacked." Then fell down a hole.

The ninja shuddered at the thought, but quickly felt her eyes slipping shut at the youkai's touch, an unconscious purr coming from the back of her throat. "Actually, it was like the third time I fought them that I finally told them my name."

Yukari's bubbly voice startled Sheena and she peered up at the youkai with unfocused eyes. "Don't do that again. That was really creepy. And you are so not seventeen. That make you younger than me. I'm nineteen." Information Yukari probably already knew, but the ninja didn't think about that. Her eyes fell shut again, her voice losing a bit of strength before the ninja coughed and shivered again. "Something like that, but not now. Just curious," she mumbled in answer to Yukari's question.

"Wouldn't confirming the target stealthily be the most ninja-like part?" wondered Yukari aloud. Well, somehow she got the feeling Sheena wasn't a ninja in the strictly historical sense. All that summoning and those flashy spells... like someone's fantasized dream of ninjas.

"Well, you've said you don't want to know my real age, so why not seventeen?" said the youkai with a shrug. "If I still had my abilities, I could be any age I wanted."

The playful look on her face faded at the ninja's sudden fit. Pausing in her massage, she checked Sheena's pulse again. It wasn't much worse, but it wasn't stable, meaning that as time wore on, things would only get more dangerous.

"Look, Sheena, about fixing this mess..." she started, not wanting to force the issue too much at first. The ninja was sure to resist, so it would be best to ease into the issue rather than fire it up into a full-scale debate from the start.

"Kinda hard to do when the target moves around a lot and is as... unpredictable as Colette." Meaning the girl was so clumsy, her mistakes often ended up in her favor.

"And I say no seventeen because I like you being older than me. Dunno why, really. Just do," Sheena responded to the issue of ages. She also couldn't picture Yukari as younger than her, preferring the way the youkai looked now. It seemed to suit her.

Weakly, Sheena tried to pull the youkai closer in an attempt to soak up her body heat as the ninja was finding herself oddly cold considering how hot she'd been not too long ago. The things going on with her body were making no sense. It was very confusing and it scared Sheena. She just wasn't sure exactly how much it scared her. As it was, it took a few long moments to respond to Yukari's prompting.

"If I had my real cards, this wouldn't be an issue, even with my mana restricted. Mizuho fashion most of their spell cards to be extra effective on undead since we have so many of them nearby. That'd fix this mess." Whether Sheena was purposefully dodging the issue or simply misinterpreting the youkai's intent was anyone's guess.

Anti-zombie weaponry would certainly be handy. More and more, Mizuho were starting to sound part-Shinto. It would make sense if they were the only pseudo-Japanese culture in their world. Still, that was besides the point.

"I meant what you were referring to earlier," Yukari clarified, voice firm. "Your condition's not getting better. Much worse and, well..." She frowned. She wasn't really sure what she'd do should the ninja fall unconscious on her. Probably go looking for help and hope nothing found the ninja to eat while she was away? It sounded stupid, but the other options mostly involved sitting around hoping to be saved. Like they were now.

"We have to do something about your injury. Now," said the youkai in a tone that wasn't about to be argued with.

"What I said earlier..." Sheena's brow furrowed as she searched her memory. Oh. The Life Seal. Yukari's commanding tone meant she wasn't about to back down from the issue and that any intelligent person wouldn't even try. Of course, Sheena was going to argue.

"No," the ninja replied. "I will not. I put way too much into making sure you're safe, that I'm not going to hurt you myself."

Not surprisingly, the ninja was going to be stubborn about this.

"Your life is in danger and mine is clearly not," said Yukari, pulling back from Sheena so she could look her in the eye. "I'm not asking to trade places with you, just help even things out between us and hopefully that'll be enough to pull you above the critical line. And if we're attacked again, I want you to be able to stand on your own. So unless it's going to do some kind of permanent damage to me, I don't think you have much of an argument to stand on. Because I can assure you, if you cross the border of death, or better yet, we both get eaten and cross it together, that will be very permanent."

The idea that Yukari might die permanently didn't often occur to her now and she really didn't think she would either; she was sure that death would pose no boundary to her. But as for the ninja, she meant every word of what she said.

"So are you going to do what I say, or do I have to start being mean to you?" she asked. Her mouth was set in not-quite-a-frown, so it was hard to tell just how irritated she was at this point. As if that would even deter the ninja.

Sheena opened her mouth, ready to snap at the youkai, but then she paused. Yukari had a point and the ninja knew it. Still, if she was to be truthful, she was scared, but she wasn't desperate. Her fear was centered on the uncertainty of the situation.

"I..." Sheena dropped her eyes. "I don't know if it will do anything permanent to you," she replied quietly, removing her arm from around the youkai to steady herself on the washer. "Normally, I have very precise control with that seal and take no more than the barest amount needed. I don't like the vampiric nature of the seal. But here..."

Her voice grew even quieter. "With my mana as reduced as it is and feeling all weird since--" She cut herself off, though her hand strayed to her chest again. "The only time I used it here was when I was evil and beating the snot out of you. I..."

She completely turned her head away from the youkai. "I'm scared. OK? I'm afraid of..." Her voice trailed off as she busied herself with the examination of the claw-like cuts in her forearm.

Oh, so she actually had a valid fear. Well, that made this a little more difficult. If there was a chance that Sheena's poor state would result in, rather than the technique not working, the draining technique running out of control, then there was an actual risk involved. Personally, Yukari would have thought the girl's weakened state would just make it less effective, but when she factored in how feverish she was acting and that she didn't actually know exactly how Sheena's magic worked, she couldn't come up with a perfect argument. Being that as it was, she felt it probably wasn't fair to be "mean" yet, a tactic she'd been saving for an unreasonable ninja, not a somewhat reasonable one.

"I understand," said the youkai, laying a hand on the ninja's head with a sigh. "We're both scared right now." To varying degrees, but technically a true statement. "And right now, I'm scared you're not going to make it through the night if we don't do something." A very true statement. "I'll accept that there's a chance that... something could happen to me if we do this. But something's already happened to you and there's a good chance it's going to get worse. So please, I think we should do this." Even if Yukari was a little fuzzy on the details of exactly what "this" was. "It's a risk I'm willing to take." More or less. "For you."

Hopefully, she could appeal to whatever reason or sympathy the ninja had left. If not, there was still the option of being mean.

[I kind of want to know what being mean entitled. But Yukari said some of the magic words. Oh well.]

Hearing the youkai admit she was scared and the hand upon her head made Sheena stop poking at her arm and look up at Yukari. As she listened, she bit her bottom lip and a card appeared in her hand, idly (and clumsily) twirling between her fingers. She was scared and she was nervous and she still didn't want to use the seal. The youkai didn't understand, not completely, she--

"For me?"

The ninja blinked her eyes and the look in her tired and barely focused eyes changed. There was quite a mix of things in them, swirling and colliding like a great storm on the surface of the sea. There was that feeling of being wanted (even if only temporarily) by the youkai, a genuine surprise that the sentiment of what those words generally related to, a willingness to do almost anything just to be worthy of that concern, and an intense fear, greater than anything she'd shown before. The last time someone had been willing to take a dangerous risk for her ended up dead because the ninja failed. In fact, as far as she could remember, every time someone said words like that to her, she'd failed and they suffered. Corrine. Grandfather.

'For you.'

"I don't..." The pause lingered a little too long. "...want you to be scared, Yukari." She dropped her eyes again. The card in her hand stopped its pathetic path between her fingers as she stared at it. "Not over me."

[Being mean entailed deliberately hurting Sheena into critical condition so that she'd be forced to use the Life Seal. She's fairly confident the ninja would do it if she was actually about to die (for a stupid reason no less). At least, she hopes the ninja wouldn't be dumb enough to just die rather than hurt Yukari. It certainly wouldn't make Sheena like her any more, but it would get her to help herself.]

"Then don't give me anything to be scared for," she said gently. Good, it seemed she was about to agree. She just needed one little push more and...

Yukari's head snapped to attention at the sound of the table scraping across the floor. Something was moving it and, now that she looked, peering in through the near complete darkness, it was being pushed inwards. There was something at the door, trying to get inside.

Yukari brought a finger to her lips for silence from the ninja as she disentangled herself from the girl, turning to face the possible threat. If only she had managed to convince Sheena faster, this situation would be a lot easier to deal with. As it was, either staying and fighting or trying to run away were both poor options.

The youkai elected to stay for the moment. There was always the possibility that it was an enemy Yukari could handle by herself or that it would go away. On the other hand, if they tried to run, that would mean moving the ninja. And there was no guarantee the rest of the hotel was any better than wait was trying to get in. Plus, they could always run later.

So it was that Yukari placed herself between the ninja and the slowly budging table, ready for whatever undead horror shoved its way inside.

[[From here (http://community.livejournal.com/damned/676352.html?thread=56103424#t56232448).]]

Standing just far enough inside the room so she could look in (but more or less far enough back so she could move quickly) Raine looked around, waiting for her eyes to adjust so she could see more than what was directly in front of her--which included a vaguely familiar blond girl.

"I'm looking for a friend," she said to explain her presence. As she spoke, she registered another's presence against the far wall... "Sheena?"

Sheena barely stifled a whimper at the combination of someone trying to get through their barricade and the pain associated with tensing up so quickly. Her head swam for a moment as she tried to get up, unwilling to let the youkai stand alone, but decided that was a horrible idea. It felt weird, seeing Yukari put herself between the ninja and the door, just as Sheena would have done had their positions been reversed.

It was so hard to figure out what the youkai's intent was with every interaction between Sheena and her. She wanted to believe that the youkai actually cared for her, but she constantly wanted to squash that feeling so it'd hurt less when the games and whatever connection Sheena felt was over.

Sheena couldn't see very well given the weird black spots that liked to invade her vision, but she could tell there was a figure carefully emerging from the door. It wasn't until she heard Raine's voice that she knew they weren't zombie food for a little longer. She breathed out a long sigh of relief as she reached out to wrap an arm around the youkai's waist to pull her backward toward the ninja.

"It's Raine," she told Yukari, that relief clear in her voice. "She can heal me. We got lucky. I don't have to..."

She then called to Raine. "I'm here, Raine. Bleeding. A lot, but something's not normal about it."

Rein was slightly annoyed that Raine had pushed ahead as soon as she'd gotten the door partway open without waiting for her to check - if there'd been a zombie inside being halfway through a door was potentially rather dangerous - but it sounded as though they'd found who they were looking for.

"She's there?" Rein asked Raine from outside, unseen but most likely audible to the others in the room. "We should get inside. Some of the zombies we avoided could still be following us."

It was lucky for Raine that Yukari was the type to at least attempt to identify her enemy before just opening a gap from floor level to head level and kicking them in the face. She had been contemplating doing just that when the healer spoke up.

"Here, let me help move that," said Yukari after heaving a sigh of relief. Last she checked, the zombies weren't really the talkative type and, even better, Sheena confirmed that this was someone they could trust - after all, the undead weren't the only dangerous ones about. Moving over to the other end of the table, she helped pull it out of the way of the door so that the two could come inside.

"She's feverish, alternating hot and cold and seeing black spots too," said the youkai clinically with a frown. "Your help would be much appreciated." She couldn't really see them in the dark, especially silhouetted against what little light filtered in from outside, but if the first was Raine, was the second Reinforce? Maybe she could find out why Sheena had reacted oddly to her mention. After the ninja stopped being in danger of combined death by zombie bites and stubbornness of course.

"What do you mean?" Raine asked, both relieved to have found Sheena and worried to see her in such bad shape. She lost no time getting to her friend's side (and thus making room for Reinforce to come in, because Yukari had a point) to look at her.

The bandages around her side were concerning... and not entirely because they were soaked in blood, either. Raine touched it, very gently, and winced when she confirmed the bandages were holding in some foreign object to keep her from bleeding to death. "Sheena, I'm sorry, but I'm going to have to remove this before I do anything else. If I don't, it may cause complications and it will hurt even more." She considered asking Reinforce to help, but she had a feeling that wasn't the greatest of ideas unless absolutely necessary.

Upon discovering that Sheena had a chunk of wood embedded in her side, Raine was even less happy. She unwound the last of the bandages, told Sheena, "Get ready," and began casting First Aid. She could hold a spell for a few seconds when she had to, and she wanted to prevent Sheena from losing as much blood as possible; she was in enough danger already. When Raine had the spell nearly complete, she braced one hand on Sheena's shoulder, yanked out the wood, and finished the spell.

Just one First Aid was clearly not enough--she wouldn't be remotely surprised if she was left asking Reinforce to cast what she had as well--so as soon as she could, she started the spell again. At least with most magical treatments, the patient didn't need any breaks during the process.

"I know," Sheena replied, completely trusting Raine to keep her from dying. This wasn't the first time she'd had to rely on the half-elf to keep her alive during the course of their travels. As it was, she almost passed out from the pain when the wood was removed, rocking unsteadily as she sat, but the healing magic prevented that from actually happening.

She felt better, especially with the second spell. Though the magic had taken care of most of her side (it was still very tender), all it managed to do to the bite wound on her shoulder was slow the bleeding by maybe a fraction. It was as if the zombie's bite was refusing to let the magic heal it. Already, the second compress was soaked through with blood.

"Thanks. I don't think I've gotta worry too much about dying now," she whispered as she pulled the compress off and dropped it with the first one she'd used. Seeing no more cloth in reach, she asked Yukari, "Got another of those sheets nearby? It's not stopping and Raine's outta magic."

Rein moved into the room, closing the door behind her, but she hesitated to approach Sheena. She wanted to bring about an understanding between them, to lessen the fear she had inspired- after all, what Hayate had taught her was that such things, even if they could not be reversed, might at least be repaired no matter how intractable they seemed- but the woman's aversion to her was strong and the task therefore delicate. With Sheena wounded, on a confusing and terrifying night such as this, it would be all too easy to deepen that fear. It would be best that she not crowd her unless her aid was needed.

Instead she busied herself replacing the table barricade with one of the heavier dryers Yukari had initially eyed, dragging the heavy machine noisily in front of the door. Another might have been bitter that with all her accumulated power and knowledge she was reduced to often being most useful simply for being somewhat stronger than average, but her pride in her origins was less than her humility as a penitent.

Yukari stood by the ninja, watching with concern and only glancing up when Reinforce began dragging around one of the machines to block the door. She winced sympathetically when the wood was taken out, glad that Raine could actually do something about it, unlike the youkai, who's only choice before was to hope the Institute would take care of it should they last the night. Once again, she noted that odd twinge, a hint of annoyance at being so powerless. To not be able to do anything about something so trivial as massive blood loss and an injury to the side...

The bite on her shoulder seemed to be a little less trivial. Was it simply because Raine had used all her magic on the side wound, or was it something about the bite itself? Nodding, Yukari went over to the shelf where she'd grabbed the first sheet from and pulled down another, letting loose another torrent of dust. Closing her eyes and shaking the sheet off away from her, Yukari did her best to try not to choke as she shook it relatively clean before bringing it back over and starting to tear it into strips.

Noting that the ninja's wounds weren't sealed, Raine checked Sheena's temperature and frowned. "You're still losing too much blood. To be safe, I think you should be healed again." She glanced back at Reinforce.

This won't go over well... The fact that Rein didn't actually have to get anywhere near Sheena wasn't as important as the fact that she would be casting a spell on her. Still, Sheena's condition was bad enough that Raine was willing to go against her wishes if she had to. It was for her own good--and at this point, Sheena owed her.

"I am not going to use my Life Se--"

Sheena was in mid-protest, reaching out to take a sheet from Yukari, when she realized that Raine didn't mean for the ninja to heal herself, but for Reinforce to do so. The ninja froze, her hand clamping like a vice down on the youkai's in the process of grabbing the sheet. Her eyes darted from Raine to Reinforce to the door and then to the card still in her off hand, like a caged animal, as she contemplated the merits of bolting and taking her chances with the zombies than have that woman cast magic on her. It wasn't often that Sheena displayed any signs of fear in regards to another person and she was far too injured and exhausted to even try to cover it up. In fact, the youkai could feel her trembling.

"No," the ninja replied sharply to Raine, never taking her eyes off of Reinforce.

In all likelihood, Rein could simply cast the spell from here and be done with it before Sheena could stop her... which would be better for Sheena physically, of course, but it'd probably get that card thrown at her and...

And, Sheena didn't want it. After all that had led her to this point, forcing her power upon others even for their own supposed benefit was something she had almost as great an aversion to as Sheena had for her.

At the very least, talking came first.

"It's only an imitation of Raine's magic," Reinforce explained carefully, conspicuously still... though, for her, that was normal enough. "There is nothing of me in it. It won't be like the last time."

Yukari winced as Sheena's hand clamped down on hers like she was holding on for dear life. From the way the ninja was acting, it seemed like she believed she was.

As it stood though, the it was clear the the exact opposite was true; the ninja's fear was keeping her from being saved. Reinforce was clearly someone Raine trusted and seemed fairly benign or at least neutral on her own, so Yukari didn't doubt the woman's intent... Still, she was curious as to what caused the ninja to act so irrationally.

"What was 'last time'?" the youkai asked carefully. She didn't remove her hand from Sheena's grip, though she did wiggle her fingers a little, hoping the girl might loosen her death grip.

"It's just First Aid again," Raine assured, making note of Sheena's panicked glance at the door; if she tried to run, Raine wouldn't give her more than the chance to get up. "Reinforce copied my spells, so it's exactly the same as what you're used to. Nothing special or new."

This was for Sheena's own good, so Raine was not going to back down without damned good reason. Still, to start with, she would be gentle with her injured friend.

Instinctively, Sheena's grip lessened on the youkai's hand when she felt her fingers wiggle. She still didn't let go nor did the grip's intensity reduce much.

She was very scared, Raine's explanation doing nothing to assuage the ninja's fears. Intellectually, she understood that the spell would be very similar with just a slightly different feel to the magic as a copy was never as good as the original, but Sheena was not a purely intellectual being. She was a volatile, emotional young woman that was trapped in a room with someone she was very afraid of being told she needed to rely on that person while undead kept her penned in. Sheena didn't like being afraid and the easiest way to deal with fear, when it wasn't crippling, was to channel it into anger. Any ability to control what came out of her mouth disappeared with the acute loss of blood she was suffering from.

"It's NOT exactly the same! Nothing her, Raine. You were there. You know what she did to me," the ninja spat back at her friend.

Her eyes narrowed dangerously at Reinforce. "And YOU! You think I'm going to let you come anywhere near me when I can barely defend myself? You can't just do that to me and then think you can walk up and have everything be okay between us." The ninja's words were edged, but the tone was wavering as she was losing the control to keep channeling the fear into anger. "You can't just stick your hand inside me and mess with my mana, without my consent like that! You used it as a weapon and made me feel like my entire mana well was being ripped out." Her voice suddenly turned raw. "You violated me!"

She shook her head sharply, eye twitching. "So if you think I'm going to let you-- To hell with your-- You ever touch me aga--" Her ability to string complete sentences was fading rapidly and her breathing had sped up to an alarming rate, blood sliding down her back at a faster pace. "I'd rather di--"

The ninja paused and blinked, her vision swimming as the consequences of getting that emotionally worked up with her injuries caught up to it. The ninja paled and muttered something in Mizuho, something that might have been a prayer, before she succumbed to the blood loss and fell unconscious.

[And the ninja is out for the night. Play nice.]

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NIGHTSHIFT 42: BLACK ROCK HOTEL

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