damned_institute | Day 43: Courtyard, Third Shift

Entry tags:

Day 43: Courtyard, Third Shift

Once again, Endrance's nurse interfered with his plans. He had been planning to look around the Game Room, but the moment he began to move towards the Sun Room, she had taken him by the arm. "Your family has asked that we make sure you get as much fresh air and sunshine has possible, and you won't get that by staying inside playing video games all day."

He had thought for a moment about protesting, but decided against it. After all, if what had happened to Haseo was punishment for having spoken too strongly the day before, he didn't want to make that worse somehow. So, when given the choice of going out to the recreational field or the courtyard, he chose the latter.

There were a few reasons behind the decision, the most salient being that he wanted to see what the area looked like for a second time - this time without the threat of a brainwashed patient surprising him. The second reason was just as strong as the first, and it had to do with the presence of a second former Demon Palace Emperor. As energetic as she was normally in The World, he couldn't imagine Alkaid not wanting to spend some time outside.

Just as before, he sat down under a tree by the side of the pond, keeping one eye on the door.

[closed to Alkaid]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

It was hard to think about anything in the current state. Whether it was I.R.I.S, his encounter with Snake, or the institute and their staff in general.

Whatever they had injected him with, it was stronger and kicked in much quicker than any of the sedatives they'd developed and tested in Zanzibar for interrogation purposes. And whatever signals and impulses his brain was sending to the artificial nerve system, they didn't quite match up with his conscious decisions most of the time, so he figured the relaxant wasn't at all compatible with the prosthetics. Writing on the bulletin board had turned out to be an almost impossible task, and seeing himself -- or rather those subsitute parts of himself -- break so easily under a simple drug, as well as the fact that he had little control over what was going on and himself was infuriating, to put it mildly. But even then, he had no outlet to express his anger. And he figured he wouldn't have one anytime soon, even with Snake around.

The longer he thought about it, the funnier it was. Had they no use for him anymore, either? Had they played around enough and chosen to discard their pawns in such a way, leaving them to themselves and the hatred they had sown--

Big Boss just sat there, on a random bench near the pond, for a long while, staring at the cold metallic hands laying in his lap which just --

-- weren't his, anymore. The first two years with these things had been pure, constant pain. His body kept on rejecting them, and Madnar had to do dozens of adjustments, and exchanging his own blood for artificial, modified blood had helped to speed up the process a bit. It had still taken another year until he got used to it and was able to fully operate again. And yet another until Snake destroyed it all once more. On Christmas, no less.

Snake. It all came back to Snake. It must be hilarious to watch this unfold. And like so often, he was lacking control when he wished he'd possessed it.

[Snake]

While Snake hadn't been able to recognise the writer of that scrawl on the bulletin, he was smart enough to have a few ideas. On some level, he understood that Big Boss was always under everything. He was always the person waiting in that last room. It had been a long time before his nightmares would end without a voice screaming you've gone too far.

Drugged, his lagging mind didn't even question why he was going out of his way to see Big Boss again, but by the time he reached the bench where Big Boss was sitting, he realised he knew. The sense of sorrow surrounding him as he stared down at his hands smothered the air like a cloud, and Snake was reminded of all the times he'd looked into Big Boss's eyes and thought he'd seen something very sad hiding in there.

He supposed he probably had sad-looking eyes himself. That was blood relation for you.

"You told me to come," he said, as neutrally as possible, but there was still a serrated knife-blade of intimidation on the edge of each word. "I don't know why I raised a weapon at you, because even if I'm here, I'm still free." He'd only got a comparatively light dose of the drug, but his head was still spinning. "I don't need to kill any more, and I know it sounds insane, but... I want to save you. Not that if you start trying to build your mercenary nation here, I won't do everything I can to stop you - " he gritted his teeth - "but, for now, we need to work together if we're going to live through this. And I don't want to kill you again."

Big Boss didn't look up, not immediately. Over time, it had gotten easy to tell when Snake was on his way, or in his vicinity. Even if he hadn't told him to come outside -- he'd know where to go. And he wasn't in the mood to delay the inevitable. Done that often enough.

When he spoke, it was slightly slurred. This was worse than a hangover. "The least you could do is being honest with me," he said. "You're not that selfless. You're too preoccupied with saving yourself."

Too busy getting your own fix with your eyes closed. It's difficult.

"It's written into your genes. Self-preservation. You can go and deny it if it makes you feel better about yourself, but look back on your actions in Outer Heaven and Zanzibar. You'll kill as soon as you have a suitable excuse." He lifted his head, narrowing his eye and focusing on Snake's silhoutte -- or rather, the blur that looked like Snake. "And something tells me that you already have one." Because if he hadn't, he wouldn't have made an offer like that.

"So, if it's written into my genes, you're the same way," Snake said, decisively. His over-relaxed muscles craved sitting down, but he wasn't going to share the bench - instead, he squatted down with his legs at right angles and rested his forearms on his thighs. "And that means it's in your best interests to listen to what I'm about to tell you."

He could feel his mind fizzing in that slightly unreal way that he knew led to those strange feelings and visions halfway between memories of Outer Heaven and some of his quieter nightmares, and so he decided not to think too hard about who he was speaking to. He began:

"This place is called Landel's Institute. It likes to claim to its patients that it's a mental hospital, and that we used to have different lives, and are only here because we're delusional. They told me that I used to be Justin Halley," he looked over at Big Boss, "and you are Evan... Halley," he guessed. "It used to be run by some doctor named Martin Landel, who had a feud with another doctor named Alec Doyle. But he died... they both died, Doyle first, and Landel the night before you arrived. It was Doyle who killed Landel."

He licked his lips. "And that's when this gets really insane. At night, this whole building shifts. Like a nightmare. It changes to look like no-one's been in this building for tens of years, peeling paint and rust all over the place. It's very homely, you'd like it. The real danger at night is that the nurses and doctors shift too. They become monsters, and many more monsters of different kinds appear. I've only seen one, and I didn't get to kill it. But the night before you arrived, we were stranded in the neighbouring town. The villagers rose up, like... the dead. And one of the dead things brought back to life was Alec Doyle. He killed Landel and went back to rest when the sun came up. That's we've got this I.R.I.S. thing, and you can make your own conclusions about what that robot's for."

He swallowed.

"The other dead things that come back to life are - the patients," he explained. "Like me. This place - for whatever reason, it takes people out of their timelines. I was here before, as someone else - as the man I'd be in the future. I ended my own life... with Fox. Fox helped me. He was the one who told me. Gray Fox is here, too."

It was too much to process in such a short time, in such a dazed state, so he filtered out the most important information -- Doctors, monsters, Fox -- and saved the rest for later, when his mind and sight would be more clear. The names of the doctors weren't familiar, but that didn't have to mean anything. Could still try and run some more gene or AI experiments in a facility that was disguised as a mental insitute.

Instead of spouting long winded, convoluted theories sparked by paranoia, Big Boss settled for a simple, weary sounding "I see." It was unlikely that Snake would lie to him now, of all times, it was just that he didn't know the full story himself, and neither did Big Boss right now. It was a nostalgic, ugly feeling, being left in the dark.

He looked down on Snake with the bandaged arm and patched nose, still in his crouch in front of him. It was hard to interpret this; the fact that he prefered kneeling in front over sitting at his side, and Big Boss opted not to think too hard about it. His head was hurting bad enough.

"I need to talk to Fox," he said eventually, stressing certain vowels to try and make his voice sound clearer. The last time he'd seen Fox-- well, it hadn't been that long ago, actually. But the last he'd heard of him was an explosion, and that was enough. Maybe like this, he could simply ignore that fight had ever happened, at least for a little while. 'Fox' and 'beaten' were two words that didn't quite exist in his vocabulary, at least not in that combination. Just like 'Fox' and 'Snake', but he knew, and although he hated it he couldn't find it in him to get upset over it. Not even back then.

And Fox was the only person he could and would trust. Even if he might be a fake. Everything here might be a fake, Snake too. It was frustrating. So why --

"How's your arm?"

-- should he care?

Snake raised his eyebrows in contempt. The tape along the left size of the gauze over his nose detatched from his skin, and he reattached it, attempting to look dignified.

"My arm's been better," he said, wiggling it as best as he could in its sling. "You did a good job on it. Very thorough. Fox'll be jealous when he sees what you've done to me."

He swivelled his head around on his shoulders to loosen up his neck, and stood up.

"I haven't seen Fox today," he said. "He's in room M59 last I heard. You should visit him tonight. By the way," he frowned, "you weren't the one who taught him how to drive, were you?"

Big Boss quirked a brow, but in the end, was too tired to really question the meaning behind that statement. Not like he was in the mood to joke around either, but...

"Only how to pilot giant robots," he replied flatly, and while it wasn't him who had taught Fox, the statement still remained true. Big Boss himself didn't even know how to drive a wheelchair right without constantly crashing into things, and for some strange reason (fortunately) he'd never had to do any driving himself, anyway.

"You won't be using that arm for a while," he changed the topic again, and asked himself in the same second why. It'd be bad if he mistook a simple inquiry for concern; after all, everyone liked to be reassured of their good and thorough work, as Snake called it. Humerus and wrist usually took the longest to heal. "Makes holding a can and a lighter at the same time kind of difficult, see." But you'd probably find a way around that too.

Yeah, he noticed the bitter sarcasm, and it would take a long time for him to drop it, but he didn't care. For now, he would be content with talking to Fox, and to endure (tolerate) Snake's presence, for a little while. At least until there were no nurses or other strange things in sight.

Snake couldn't resist a wicked, joyless smirk. His right hand curled around an invisible can.

"Sounds like you want to risk finding out how difficult," he said, teeth clenching. Immediately, he was disgusted with himself for saying that. Threatening someone in a way that makes it sound like he'd enjoyed it - what the hell was he even doing?

Getting his bearings, he found most of his anger and hate had dissolved, and he awkwardly extended his left arm towards Big Boss before catching himself and turning half around, regarding Big Boss out of the corner of his eye.

"You did a pretty bad job," Snake said. "His driving absolutely stinks."

Considering that everything he did had a certain risk to it, maybe (definitely) that wasn't too far from the truth. Without it, the whole point would be gone. He'd known that Snake could very well kill him with that fork back in the cafeteria if he'd just done it right, and he'd liked that -- the thought, the possibility, even if he would never outright admit it like that. It was difficult to grasp, but he just ascribed it to the extreme tension he had felt. Battle.

"You should know," Big Boss said, humorlessly, not moving from his spot just yet. "Now go before the effects of these drugs wear off."

Snake scowled. For a second, he thought about remaining there with him until he recovered - not out of any desire to challenge him, but because it felt wrong to leave him vulnerable like that. However, he didn't really need much encouragement, and headed into the field.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Day 43: Courtyard, Third Shift

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject