damned_institute | Day 44: breakfast

Entry tags:

Day 44: breakfast

Yuffie had died.

No, really. Seriously. She had actually died. Bleeding all over the place, making a horrid, sticky mess and scaring the hell out of Suzaku; she remembered it clearly. Kind of. Sort of. Through the blood loss, the pain, and the visions. Through Aerith's voice whispering in her ear, Cloud's stricken eyes, and her own panic. As bad nights went, it had been Bad, capital B and all the trimmings, and oh, god. She sat, trembling on the edge of her bed, eyes closed and hands pressed hard over her racing heart. The by-play between Landel—Landel!—and Lydia barely even sunk in. There was nothing in the whole world, any world, that could prepare you for something like…

Had it all been some kind of hallucination?

Had she imagined the whole thing?

No… She didn't think so. Nightmarish or not, Yuffie knew reality. But if it had been real, how was she alive now? That kind of pain wasn't something you could just cook up, was it? She thought about it all the way to the cafeteria, drifting behind her nurse without focus or intent. Maybe if she tried to stay clinical, tried to step back… But she'd never been good at that when things got personal. And every time she closed her eyes or blinked, she swore that the scenes played back to her, like an overused commercial on a crappy channel on a crappy TV, in a run-down dump of an inn that smelled like mothballs and yesterday's breakfast.

The scent of blood and damp, rotted wood clogged her nose. Disgusted, Yuffie shoved her bowl of cereal—handed to her by a clucking Plucky—off to the side so that she could melt into her chair, palm heels scrubbing against her eyes. Too much. This was… Too much. She couldn't even paste a plastic smile on her face to make herself feel better. Her usual shield, the white noise of inane babble that could filter out almost any crisis, was in tatters all around her. Five minutes, she gave herself.

Five minutes (not) to think, five minutes to get her act together, because there was no way she could let herself shatter here. No way…

[Closed to Sheena]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Sakura woke suddenly from her sleep, flinging away the blankets and throwing her things into their hiding spots. She paced nervously as she waited for the nurse to arrive and take her to breakfast, but managed to cool her worry when she stopped in the Sun Room to check the bulletin board. Everyone was okay. Everyone was pretty damn stressed and stretched thin, but they were okay. That in itself was almost enough to make her cry in relief. Jerks, making her worry like that!

She was a little late getting to the cafeteria, insisting that she check the bulletin for any other posts, especially after a night like last night. The nurse allowed it at first, but hurried her along after she'd been writing notes for a good fifteen minutes.

As she walked in, there was a bit of a commotion, though her nurse pushed her on to the line. She glanced back, recognizing the face at least of the man she'd met just the other day. Howell, wasn't it? His hair was different, but that was definitely his face. Sakura picked a few things from the line and walked over, though she'd missed most of the action.

She set her tray down in the seat next to his, touching him cautiously on the shoulder. Damn, they'd gotten to him with the sedatives already? Great. Well, at the very least, she'd be able to see up close what kind of effect the drugs had on the patients here.

"Howell-san? Hey, are you alright?"

Howl had stretched his arms across the table in a sprawled position, with his head resting on them. His hair pooled around his head, but his eyes were exposed so could still look up at the pink figure that was approaching him. He smiled at her, and wondered how old she was, before realizing she had asked him a question.

"Oh," he mumbled, just to acknowledge that he had heard and was not ignoring her. He would sincerely hate for... Ah. What was her name? Sakura? What a strange name. Well, he'd dislike for her to think poorly of him. Though perhaps it would be best if she did. He had a laundry list of those he had failed to do right by. People whom he had known for far longer than this strange, pink haired girl. Hadn't he been prepared to abandon her last night out of cowardice and impatience? Maybe it was some cosmic punishment to have Ryuuzaki collapse and die in front of him. Perhaps it was to remind Howl that he was better off far away from people, or to reprimand him for his willingness to only rescue those who were conveniently located, or any other number of twisted morals.

"Good... morning, Miss Sakura. No, no, I'm not alright." He retracted his arms and folded them under his head, which allowed him to bury his face from view. "Not alright at all." He sounded muffled and pathetic.

For a moment, she hoped it might be someone else under that mess of hair with his already strange eyes looking dazed just a little glassy. Nope, it was Howell alright.

She took up the seat next to him, looking him over once to see if he'd taken any injuries since she'd seen him last. He did seem alright, save for being drugged. If she had access to her chakra, it wouldn't be difficult to separate the drug from his bloodstream and get him feeling better quickly, but of course, this place insisted on making things difficult.

"Would you like to talk about it Howell-san? I'm sure it can be really difficult your first few days here." Hers had been... interesting, but she'd been trained since she was a child to be a ninja. Not everyone had that kind of upbringing.

"You're a very kind girl." Howl smiled again from underneath his arms, despite everything that had happened. The world seemed full of kind people willing to be drawn in by his charms. If he were responsible at all, he would have told Sakura to go away, but he couldn't. He liked her company and attention far too much to be a martyr today. The drugs in his system made him lose track of all of his worries, so he was left simply feeling tired and a bit lonely.

"I saw a man die last night," he muttered. Saying it made it real, and he remained silent for a heavy moment. He finally pushed himself up onto his elbows, looking as though his head weighed a little too much for him to lift. It allowed him to more properly look at Sakura, with the sedatives making his eyes duller and more like marbles than ever.

"My sister... she lives in a world that looks just like this one," he admitted, quick to avoid talking more about Ryuuzaki's death. It still made him feel ill, even through the haze. "I had wanted to call her. I thought, perhaps, I had just dreamed it all, and she could have me released."

Sakura felt her cheeks blush at the sudden compliment, somewhat thrown off by the comment. She pushed it aside fast enough though, lifting her glass of juice and pushing it in his direction.

"Have a drink, it'll help," she offered. It might not speed the process too much, but at least it might get the drugs through his bloodstream a little faster. And any drug was going to be more potent on an empty stomach.

After his explanation she took in a breath and drew it out in a long sigh.

"I'm sorry," she said honestly. And really, she didn't know if she could say a lot more without seeming trite. She'd seen enough people die that she knew how hard it could be. And Howell seemed like someone fairly fragile of spirit, so in his case something like that could be devastating. It was hard to decide if she needed to be firm with him or if she needed to comfort the poor man.

"I'm afraid it isn't a dream. And for a while we're going to have to play by their rules. But you shouldn't give up Howell-san. We'll get out, don't worry."

"Thank you," Howl said gratefully, looking piteous without even having to try. He had to sit up straight to take a sip with any dignity, which was quite a challenge at the moment. As much as Howl often enjoyed wallowing in self-pity and complaining about how no one cared for him, it was a lovely feeling when someone did, even to a small degree. It was probably the driving force behind a good number of selfish things he had done over the years.

"You're horribly optimistic, you know. It's making me feel guilty," he teased blearily, smiling over at her, before taking another sip of the juice.

"But in a place like this, I suppose it's what's needed. I'm afraid I've proven to be quite useless..." Howl collapsed sadly back into the crook of his elbow. Every inch of him seemed to wilt, and he sighed sadly. "I'm usually very adept at escaping from places I don't wish to stay in."

Alright, so it was hard to be mad or abrasive when the guy was so damn cute. He just looked pathetic in a way that made a person want to look out for him. And it wasn't like he wasn't kind too. He'd been polite from the first time she'd met him.

"Don't feel bad," she assured him, watching as he took a few sips of the juice. "We all come from different worlds. What's difficult for some is easy for others and the other way around."

She fiddled with her own water glass for a moment, hoping she could say something to make him feel better. "I used to feel that way all the time, believe it or not. Sometimes it takes a while to figure out the things you can do."

"I'm beginning to form an idea of what my limitations are," said Howl, although there was a very quiet tremor in his voice. Normally, he would have been able to sound as flippant as ever about the serious subject, but the drugs were leaving him stripped. Not only that, but he could scarcely find the energy to care.

Here he was, separated from Calcifer, heartless and forcibly sedated, with scarcely enough magic to fix his hair permanently. Had someone forcibly broken their contract when he was sent here? Had Calcifer simply fizzled out, leaving Howl to slowly wither away..? He missed Calcifer dearly all of the sudden.

"Which world do you come from? Not anywhere like this place, you said so the other day," Howl thought aloud to himself. It helped him keep his thoughts somewhat solid. When he held them all in his head, they dissolved too quickly. "I don't suppose you've ever heard of a country called Ingary? Strangia, perhaps? Rashput..?"

Any other girl probably would've known exactly what to do in this kind of situation. But Sakura's nurturing skills were more than a little lacking. She might be a medic, but matters of the heart was a different story.

"We all have them here," she said, patting his shoulder gently. "Back home I could run on water or punch through thirty feet of rock or even heal a wound in only a few seconds. If we had access to all we used to be able to do, we'd have kicked this place's sorry ass a long time ago. So... maybe it'll take a little longer without those things, but it doesn't mean we can't still do it." At least, that was what she kept telling herself. She had to believe it too, for the sake of her own mental stability. For her, it was never a question of whether or not they'd get out, but a question of when.

Though it was a little hard to keep up with the flow of Howell's thoughts, she tried, and considered his question for a moment.

"I'm sorry, but I don't know any of those places. I'm from a place called Konoha, which was a hidden ninja village, but there were other villages too. Usually there's a village leader, called the Kage, and a Daimyo, who's like, the leader of the whole country around it. There's the Fire country, Water, Sound, things like that."

Howl laughed deliriously at his own poor luck. The wildly foreign names didn't ring a single bell. A great deal of that world had yet to be explored, being just on the edge of colonialism, so it was still possible they were talking about the same place. But somehow, looking at this strange girl, Howl knew she was something else.

"I've never heard of your home either," he admitted. "Alas. There's no harm in asking, I suppose."

The juice was thankfully making his head a bit clearer, and sitting up so he could look at Sakura was no longer such a chore. "Wait," he muttered, as something occurred to him. "Punching through walls and running on water? Are you a witch?"

Howell looked like he was doing a little better, but it was hard to tell. The poor guy seemed so fragile. She hoped Sai got her that sample of the sedative soon, so she could start working on antidotes. Being sedated could hardly be considered productive, after all.

Something seemed to click, though when he said it, she had to wonder if he was still in a daze. Then again, it could be another translation error. Those seemed to be happening a lot. The same words held different meanings depending on what world you were in. "Am I which what?" she asked, scratching her head. "I um... I'm a ninja, well, a kunoichi if you want to be specific."

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Day 44: breakfast

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject