Day 44: Arts and Crafts Room, 4th Shift

[ryuuzaki]

The day had been slow for L so far, slower than he required: the events of the previous night were traumatic, but they did not outweigh his need for information and a useful way in which to apply whatever he might learn.

When the nurse shepherded him from the cafeteria, through the Sun Room, and over towards the door of the Arts and Crafts Room, he experienced a small internal wince: this was the room where it had happened the night before. Unpleasant, yes, but likely to be irrelevant in terms of my own welfare, except in terms of what I can learn from it, he reminded himself.

He had the impression that he could avoid the room if he wanted to, but there were several convincing reasons to push past his reluctance: his meeting with Lunge was necessary, the opportunity to see the room in more usual circumstances might be valuable, and he did not want the staff to see that he had been affected. He wasn't sure how they were tied to the events of the previous night, but the buzz of information around the Institute suggested some kind of strong connection.

As he stepped into the room, feet feeling imprisoned in the slippers that the staff kept insisting that he wear, he avoided the area where he had collapsed. Instead, he turned to the right and proceeded as far into the room as he could, then left, then took a seat in the back corner.

If the nurses pressed him to be more creative, he would take up painting. However, he expected to express his creativity in other ways.

[For Lunge.]

Comments

[idontregret.livejournal.com]

The last conversation had ended on an interesting but rather unresolved note. Heat had not at all been pleased to be separated from the boy before their conversation had ended, and now he was going to have to find him later to hear what he was talking about. What power?

His nurse was busy explaining his next activity as she led him into a different room. It smelled odd, like too much wet paper and something else he didn't recognize. Earthy. All he got out of it was that there might be paint involved. That, at least, could be promising.

He spotted a familiar head of pink hair almost instantly and veered in the woman's direction. It was about time he actually saw Argilla in this place. The demon took the seat across from her with a smug sort of smile, holding up a recently acquired jar of orange finger paint. "There you are," he said by way of greeting.

[demon-beast.livejournal.com]

Even though she'd known that Heat was there again, had seen his note on the bulletin, there was a difference between knowing that and seeing it with her own eyes. She seemed surprised to see him, eyes widening and than narrowing with wariness. He seemed different somehow to the dangerous savagery that she remembered from their last meeting. It wasn't an unwelcome change though, just strange.

The sight of the jar of paint made a smile quirk her lips.

"Here I am," she agreed. "It's a surprise to see you here again."

[idontregret.livejournal.com]

Argilla, he noted, was wearing the shirt with its yellow logo facing out like everyone else. He frowned at this, but didn't bring it up. That could be fixed momentarily. What she said caught him off guard, and he stopped unscrewing the jar of paint half-way through. 'Again?'

"What do you mean 'again?'" There was a bit of a chuckle in his voice. She must have been referring to being reunited in this strange place so shortly after being removed from the last. The wording was questionable, though. He hadn't been here before, not as a captive in this glorified laboratory.

[demon-beast.livejournal.com]

Argilla blinked in surprise at his question, but she supposed that it was to be expected. he'd disappeared, and people who returned after that rarely seemed to remember anything about their time in the Institute. "You were here before," she replied after a moment. "You don't remember it, but you were, with me and Roland. You disappeared a short while back."

[idontregret.livejournal.com]

That was... disconcerting. Roland hadn't mentioned anything of the sort, and he was definitely going to have to question him about that later. "I haven't been here." He frowned again, deeper. "I couldn't have been. We were all together just yesterday." As solar data, at least.

The lid of the paint jar clattered onto the table and Heat took a brief moment to see if any of the nurses were looking his way. Even if he was confused beyond anything, there were still certain matters he was fully capable of resolving. Sure he wasn't being watched, he dipped as many fingers as he could fit into the top of the jar, coating them in orange paint. Then, he brought those fingers across the front of his inside-out shirt. The mark was more similar to Serph's, but at the moment it was the easiest to do. He quickly added a second coat before the nurses could take notice.

"It couldn't have been me." Heat waved a now orange hand, repeating himself. "That's impossible."

[demon-beast.livejournal.com]

Just yesterday? Argilla frowned at that. He really didn't remember, that she could accept, but when was he from that he believed that they had all been together so recently. "The last time we were all together was when you killed Serph," she said, her voice taking on a slightly harsher edge, nails digging into her palms. He'd killed their leader for the Karma Society.

She snorted softly when he smeared the paint over his shirt. Orange of course. It wasn't a bad idea, but she wondered how long it would last before being mysteriously cleaned overnight. "I have orange armbands myself," she said, amusement quirking her lips. "And it was you. No-one else has such a cast iron stomach." Or such a desperate hunger.

((So many spoilers.))

[idontregret.livejournal.com]

"And I'm telling you it wasn't." Now who was the one that couldn't remember things? Argilla's reminder of his previous actions caused him to scowl. That was the last time he'd seen her before they'd died, yes, but if he recalled their time on the sun then why didn't she?

He shook his head and slid the jar of paint across to her, leaving orange fingerprints all over the glass. "Serph didn't die anyway. Bastard came back and killed me later." Just like he had before. But that was done. "You weren't there, though." Dead at that point, wasn't she? And Roland... "Don't you remember when we all came together again?"

Heat thought he'd been finished then, but apparently that wasn't the way things worked.

Re: ((So many spoilers.))

[demon-beast.livejournal.com]

Argilla's frown darkened at his insistence and she shook her head, fingers clenching on the edge of the table. "It was! I remember it. The last thing I remember is the power plant being destroyed. There was nothing after that." Nothing could have happened after that. They couldn't have met again because she'd died there with Roland.

Her eyes widened though when he said that Serph hadn't died. "What? He survived?" That was incredible! If anyone could have done it, then it was Serph though, their leader.

[idontregret.livejournal.com]

Heat snorted. "Of course he didn't die. That fluid in the EGG kept him alive." Something in the demon's expression changed. He bent down slightly and lowered his voice, not that it mattered all that much to him if anyone else heard their conversation.

"You can't tell me you don't remember the sun. All of our solar data gathered to face God?" Why would he and Gale remember, but not Argilla? And why would Argilla have forgotten that, yet believe he was previously in the Institute when he hadn't been? It didn't make any sense. Worse, it made him feel like this place was playing him for a fool through his own comrades. It had to be their fault before it was hers.