damned_institute | M1-M10 Hall, Outside M5, Nightshift 22

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M1-M10 Hall, Outside M5, Nightshift 22

It was going to be a busy night. Maes Hughes had no less than three visitors slated for the night - Ed wouldn't take too long to deal with, Alfons he planned to just arm and give a few pointers to, and then.... Roy. Assuming Roy was going to follow through with what he'd said. Who knew?

At least he had a decent roommate. Hughes had to admit that he didn't mind Crawford - he seemed smart and had a good head on his shoulders. Not a bad guy to share personal space with. It was almost like being back in the military dorms.

Armed and with flashlight and radio in hand, Hughes stepped out into the hallway - in case Ed or Alfons had forgotten his room number.

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"Hmmm...alright. What'm I going to do tonight?"

Taking a few steps beyond the relative safety of his room, Ichigo paced out into the open hallway, and decided to begin his evening with a quick series of limbering stretches. He began with his arms, pulling the long, slender limbs out to each side as far as they would bend, then the other, while flexing his wrists in winding circles simultaneously. He crouched down next, bending against his own weight on one leg, then off to the other, letting the lean muscles reaching all the way down to his calves pull completely taut, then relax again. The young man was certainly athletic; the wear and experience shown across his body, over the ridges of his muscles and the scars across his chest and back, was a perfect testament to his condition.

All the while, he couldn't help but grumble faintly to himself, muttering crossly about wondering if he should wait for Renji, or even Rukia, tonight, or just head off on his own and hope to find them later. Conveniently, he had already forgotten whether or not he had promised to wait around, and found himself scratching at his head in thought over the matter with a pondering look on his face.

"Well..." he finally concluded, resting with his back propped against the wall. "...I'll wait around for a little bit, but if nobody shows, I'm leaving."

Recluse opened the door to his cell as quietly as possible, staring out into the darkened corridor. His highly sensitive eyes had been a painful aggravation in the daytime’s brightly lit halls, but now they gave him an advantage over the others trapped here.

He still felt unbearably vulnerable. For a human, he had an incredibly powerful build, but that wasn’t enough- unarmed and without his powers, stealth was the best option. And he needed to find weapons. The flashlight (its batteries removed- he did not want its light) had some weight to it, but it was a pitiful thing, even for a makeshift bludgeon. The damn thing was, he had no idea where to start searching.

There was another prisoner standing outside one of the cells just down from his. Maybe he could be useful. Maybe not. But Recluse wasn’t fond of the idea of walking blindly out into the halls of this place. It was the direction he needed to be heading in, anyway. He quietly padded towards the man for a closer look, not bothering to make any noise to signal his approach until he was probably too close.

“Excuse me…”

Sound or none, Ichigo's head swiveled sharply in the direction of the one approaching him, even before those words left the man's lips and graced the ear. He was greeted immediately by a strange and questioning stare from the boy with the striking orange hair, arching a brow and letting his lips curl distastefully.

How had he recognized Recluse's approach? Immediately, Ichigo squinted his eyes across the shadows, giving his fellow patient a long, hard stare. The depth of his eyes, with the same fathomed strength of an ocean tide, swept against him piercingly, as if Ichigo squinted only to see straight through him. Whatever he found there, he wouldn't say, remaining tight-lipped as ever, but it didn't seem very appealing.

"Another new guy." The first words that came from Ichigo were hardly welcoming. He sighed, then stared reluctantly away, leaving the silence of the night to creep right back in where it had been displaced. "Did you need something?"

Recluse's red eyes narrowed, dropping any pretense of politeness in response to the boy's sneer. He honestly prefered it that way. It was more efficient.
"Any directions to a place where I could find a weapon."

"Man..." Ichigo replied, giving the ridge of his head a soft, pensive scratch with gently curled fingers. "Everybody wants a weapon here. Was that the first thing you thought of?"

Sadly, politeness would have been the only way to get any help out of Ichigo. He was Japanese, after all, a culture that had thrived on custom and manners for centuries, and the instinct was practically engraved in him. His response to Recluse hadn't been a sneer, but simple uncertainty instead, but it was growing more and more into distrust and disdain.

"Sorry, pal, but you're on your own." he finally stated, tilting his head rakishly away. "You're not giving off anything but a really bad vibe."

Recluse's first reaction was anger at the reply. Why must efficiency be so often sacrificed for manners? He hid it as best as he could, bowing his head slightly.
"...I'm sorry. Not the best day, but I shouldn't forget my manners." In all truth, he had lost those along with all his morals nearly 80 years ago. His mind had felt so much clearer thanks to the change. "I just would rather not find myself unarmed if I meet one of the monsters people have talked so much about."

Ichigo quietly nodded his head in reply initially. He wasn't cold-hearted, after all, just he tended to hold up a detached image in front of perfect strangers. "No problem," he said taking the apology at its full worth, though it might have lacked such. "I guess it's pretty stressful, showing up here out of the blue."

"God...this guy's reiatsu is awful. It's seriously...cold." Thinking to himself, Ichigo felt a faint, frigid shiver caress the length of his spine. Surprise, not intimidation, was what chilled him. So as not to betray any signs, he glanced casually away, and stared down along the length of the hall, back until he could make out silouetted figures of other patients.

"Look, if you're really that worried about it, just go to the kitchen or something. Most people manage to dig up a knife or something sharp there."

Recluse sighed. "Yes, 'stressful' is one way to put it. Whoever captured me removed eight of my limbs." Oh yes. You could call that stressful.
There were damn good reasons why Recluse gave off such a disconcerting aura to those attuned to such things. He was damn proud of most of it, too. His list of personal accomplishments included killing half of his own family, genocide, and allying his nation with a hostile alien race, all in the name of efficiency.
The subject of knives was a welcome one. Finally, some useful information. "I'm affraid I'm not sure where that is, otherwise I wouldn't have bothered you."

Ichigo's demeanor soured even further. He certainly wasn't about to deny the existence of other worlds, some far beyond his own understanding with their own set of rules and intangible physics, but eight limbs being removed? He could only gain the impression that this man was an actual patient here, and not in the right frame of mind. "Ehh...yeah..." he replied shakily, looking rather disconcerted.

Maybe it was time to just get rid of the guy, before he rambled on any more. Leaning out into the male dorms' connecting hallway, his head and shoulder peeking just into view towards the far door, Ichigo turned to Recluse, and pointed off in its direction.

"I can't take you there. I'm sort of waiting here for someone tonight, but you just need to leave this hall here and turn right, take a left at the end of that hall, and then..." he paused, staring up at his own forehead thoughtfully, "...I think it's a left at some big, open doors."

It was so amusing to see the boy's reaction. But really, what was so strange about the idea? (One must note that Recluse is the ruler of a place where villains have been heard to swear that they received orders directly from a television, via X-Files, Dragnet and even Pokemon. Strange is par for the course.)
At least he finally was able to get something useful out of one of these people. He smiled slightly, an expression that always came across as disconcerting, no matter how thoroughly he hid his true feelings. "Thank you. I think I'll be alright from here." He turned to leave. Oh, wait. Damn. Humans generally liked introductions, didn't they? He turned again to glance back at the boy.
"By the way... My name's Stefan. Nice meeting you." The old name again. He hated it. But without the spider aspects, Recluse just seemed a little rediculous here.

Returning to his post, wedging the square of his back against the wall adjacent from his bedroom, Ichigo had already seemed to go back to minding his own business even before Recluse had left. Interacting with clueless new folks like this one was just getting incredibly old, and he wanted to cut things off with 'Stefan' as soon as possible.

"I can't stand being around this jerk any more. He hasn't done anything, but all I want to do is knock his teeth in!" Alone, with nothing else to focus on but the spiritual sense Recluse unconsciously emitted, it wasn't hard for Ichigo to get a grip on what lay beneath the grand villain's feigned smile. Cold, almost mechanical malice was the general impression.

"Uh-huh. You can call me Kurosaki." he replied casually, not sparing the man another glance. "Good luck."

[[going to here (http://community.livejournal.com/landels_damned/76874.html)]]

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M1-M10 Hall, Outside M5, Nightshift 22

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