damned_institute | Day 46: Sun Room

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Day 46: Sun Room

Peter woke up suddenly, his body twisting in the bed and then forcing him to catch his breath in pain. Pain, which was coming from his middle because of the thing that had scratched him last night, and after that...

After that, Zach had jumped in front of him like some kind of martyr, like the exact opposite of everything Sylar stood for, to take the next hit for him. It got pretty fuzzy after that, so night must have ended right around then.

The man let out a pained grunt as he straightened himself up in bed. For some reason, he got the feeling that he'd slept in. There was no way for him to really tell without a window in the room, but he just knew. The fact that Sam's bed looked long since vacated was another clue.

Sam, but was he Sam again? Had the brainwashing worn off, as he and Roland had hoped, or was he going to have to go through this nightmare for even longer? He didn't know how long he could handle "Zach" and "Harrison" before he started going batty himself.

Pulling himself out of bed, Peter lifted his shirt and saw that he was tightly bandaged. The scratch most likely wasn't nearly as bad as the bite that "Zach" had received, but it still smarted. He let his shirt fall and then had to deal with a nurse chiding him for sleeping through the morning announcements. Not that Peter really cared at the moment. He was too busy thinking about last night and the fact that in a way, he now owed something to Sylar. Except it hadn't been Sylar. That was something he was sure of now.

Lost in his thoughts, Peter reached the Sun Room right as the rest of the patient populace was trickling in from breakfast. Sighing to himself, he headed over to the bulletin board and then saw a note written in familiar yet unpleasant handwriting. Holding his pen in a vice grip, Peter scribbled out a reply and then stalked over to an armchair and fell into it with a huff.

While Sylar was maddeningly frustrating, there was one good thing about the fact that he was himself again. It meant that Nathan was too.

[For Spock!]

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Kagura had been talking to Yuna when the nurse suddenly pulled her away; she didn't even get to finish her breakfast! Poor tummy. I have to last until lunch. She continued to lament her hunger until she made it to the Sun Room and saw Hime. As she walked closer, she could see the blond was playing with an adorable calico kitten.

"How cute," Kagura said, referring to both the kitten and the way Hime was handling the little guy. She sat down on the couch next to Hime, content to just watch the activities, for now. "Morning Hime-san."

Hime noted the girl's approach before returning her attention to the kitten, which was now gnawing on her finger. She didn't seem to mind the needle-sharp teeth and let the animal continue its play as Kagura took a seat beside her and the Royal turned her attention to the newcomer.

"Good morning, Kagura," she said with a nod. Red eyes casually glanced over the girl. "I see you've made it through the past day and night without injury."

At least, the kind that Hime could see. Mental wounds were another manner, and were no less common in this place.

Kagura winced when she saw the kitty bite Hime's finger, but since the blond didn't seem to mind, Kagura refrained from acting, even though she was tempted to rescue Hime from the little guy's jaws. Maybe Hime wasn't feeling that much pain? The kitten did seem a little young, so it probably didn't have that much strength. Hime didn't strike Kagura as the type of person to just endure something painful for no reason.

"Yeah. You seem to be fine too," Kagura replied. Although she hadn't been physically harmed, mentally was a different story. Having her mind brainwashed into believing lies left her feeling violated, however, she was more concerned about Yomi. With the sesshouseki twisting Yomi's emotions, there was no telling how the other girl would react to what happened yesterday. "What did you do last night?"

The pain barely registered to Hime and provided a distraction besides; this place could be so dull during the day. Her gaze did immediately snap back down to it when she felt a fang break skin and she gently but firmly held down the kitten with her free hand while she extracted her finger calmly from its jaws. She merely glanced at the injury with idle curiosity; it was a pinprick wound, nothing more, so small as to be invisible were it not for the ruby droplet of blood that welled up like a jewel.

"What a waste," the Royal murmured before wiping it on her pants - something she'd never do had she her own clothes, but then, if she had, she would have had a handkerchief - and rolling the injured finger in the loose gray cloth until it stopped bleeding. Ironic that some would go so far for that precious droplet, now but a smear, yet no one here would likely ever know.

"Last night was relatively uneventful," replied Hime, turning her attention back to the girl. "Along with a couple others, I tried exploring the Doctor Offices again - a different one this time - but found very little." Nothing at all, in fact, though considering how the time with Kagura and Sokka had gone, that was an improvement. "Do you happen to have any knowledge of computers? Bypassing passwords and the like specifically."

Hime herself had known the most about computers out of their group of three the previous night, but only by virtue of the other two not knowing what a computer was.

Looked like Kagura was wrong - the little kitty was plenty strong. Hime had disregarded her wound as negligible, so Kagura would do the same. If it had happened to Kagura, she probably would have done the same thing. Being wounded was nothing new to the teenage exorcist, and her wounds were usually on a whole different level, sometimes potentially fatal.

"I'm familiar with using computers, but I don't have any hacking skills, which it sounds like you need, in order to bypass passwords," replied the exorcist, wishing someone like Iwahata was here. Then again Iwahata didn't strike her as someone good with computers, neither did Nori-chan. If Noriyuki had a use for computers it was probably to look up porn. "By the way, where did you get that knife I saw you with?"

"Hmmm, unfortunate," murmured the Princess, now scratching the kitten's belly and keeping her hand out of its inquisitive mouth. "I don't suppose you know anyone here who does have that kind of skill?" While the file room hadn't had anything important, who knew what was stored on the computer. Maybe just more of the same, or maybe far deeper secrets of the institute.

"The kitchen," she answered, nodding back towards the cafeteria. "It was the only one I found and it's not particularly sharp. The need has yet to arise to use it, so I'm not even sure how well it will work on the denizens of this place. Luckily, it takes surprisingly little to harm beasts of the more two-legged variety."

A brief, dark smile lit her face before disappearing into something more light, her attention back on the kitten again.

"No, I don't. Sorry." Kagura didn't know that many people here, despite having been at Landel's for several days. "Maybe you could discreetly ask over the bulletin board?"

Kagura was surprised that Hime had found the knife so easily. She had expected it to have been somewhere hidden or difficult to access. Wouldn't they lock it up in the kitchen? Perhaps Kagura would have a chance to see tonight.

The dark smile that fluttered across Hime's face didn't escape Kagura's notice, but the exorcist was more concerned with Hime's comment. "Hime-san. By 'two-legged,' do you mean other patients?"

"Those that dare to harm me or mine," she agreed with a nod, tickling the kitten under its chin. Not that anyone she considered hers was here; still no sign of Hiro, Flandre or the other two. She turned an amused look on Kagura, a smile playing on her lips. "Surely you didn't believe everyone here is as benign as you? The staff aren't the only ones who pose a threat at night."

Still, here in a world supposedly removed from her own, the chances of being targeted for assassination were actually lower than normal. As long as she didn't make any enemies, this was nothing more than a precaution rather than the necessity it would have been back home.

"The most dangerous monsters are the ones that wear a human face," she said with a fanged smile.

"Of course not, but I had at least hoped the other patients would see that fighting amongst ourselves is foolish," Kagura replied. She wasn't naive. Although her primary duty as an exorcist was to fight evil spirits, she'd had her fair share of unpleasant encounters with the living. "Did someone attack you, Hime-san?"

Hime was one of the few people that Kagura had become acquainted with at Landel's, and despite of the blond's sharp words, Kagura didn't wish any harm upon her.

"Humans are certainly capable of becoming monsters," Kagura said as her blue eyes stayed focused on Hime's exposed fang, reminding her of the inhuman aura she had sensed from Hime. Although Hime wasn't an evil spirit, she wasn't a normal person either; due to her spiritual sense, Kagura was certain of at least that much. Because Hime didn't seem like a bad person, Kagura chose to remain silent on the topic, but if Hime brought it up that would be a different story.

"Not here, but it's not something I'm unfamiliar with," Hime admitted, pulling her hand back as the kitten tried biting again. She let her fingers dangle where it could bat at them but not get its teeth around them. "If anything, it's been easier here. Three whole days and not one serious attempt on my life."

She gave a silvery laugh, soft and short. For this place that was hell, in some ways it was a respite for the princess.

"They certainly are, in a variety of ways. Just what sort of monsters did you fight back home, Kagura?" she asked, her tone idly curious. The youma of Teresa's world, the Akuma of Allen's, did this girl too fight demons that hid behind human smiles?

"Why would people be after your life?" Kagura asked. If Hime didn't want to answer then Kagura would be fine with that. Every person had their individual circumstances, and Hime might not be ready to share hers. Besides, Hime didn't seem like the sort of person that could be forced to do anything.

When Hime shifted the conversation, Kagura had to admit she was relieved. Talking about monsters was somehow easier than talking about the ugliness of the human heart.

"Let's see. As an exorcist, my job was to deal with evil spirits that posed a threat to the living. Even though many spirits couldn't be perceived by people without spiritual sense, they were still able to cause disasters in the natural world. There were even some spirits that were powerful enough to manifest themselves in front of normal people."

But Kagura's life as an exorcist was behind her. She couldn't go back to the Agency; not after what she'd done, and she couldn't let them have Yomi either.

"It's a matter of succession," she explained with a shrug. It was no big secret, especially here where the struggle wasn't going on. "Only one Royal may ascend to the throne; all others must die. That is the rule set down by the King who stands above all monsters."

An inconvenient one, as far as Hime was concerned. She had no desire to kill her siblings - with some exceptions - but neither had she any desire to be killed by them.

"An exorcist, hmm? I've always found ghosts problematic," murmured the princess. This was the kind of thing she was more familiar with. "Certainly sounds like a busy job."

Kagura didn't have any siblings, at least not by blood, but the mere idea of killing them repulsed her. Kagura had killed Yomi, who was like a sister to her, before, and the act had nearly broken the teenage exorcist's heart. She wondered how Hime felt about killing her siblings? It was hard to read Hime. In the end, Kagura could only say, "Siblings killing each other... That's so sad..."

Kagura wanted to ask Hime if she had killed any of her siblings, but Kagura was too afraid to ask. If Hime had, she might not wish to share that information, and even if she did, Kagura didn't have the right to judge her.

"Yeah. My fight never seems to end," answered Kagura. The exorcist knew very well that her job would never be finished. As long as people lived, they would die and then become spirits, some of them evil.

"And it sounds like yours almost doesn't either. What is it that you do?" And by this, Kagura meant aside from killing her siblings. "If you ascend the throne obviously you'll become queen and rule over your country, but I mean right now, as a princess."

Hime's feelings about killing her siblings wholly depended on which sibling it was and under what circumstances. Killing Severin had been nothing short of extremely satisfying. Sylvia? Hopefully it wouldn't come to that.

"The assassination attempts have a way of occupying a certain amount of the time," explained the princess. "And as a Royal I have a duty to investigate and catalog certain supernatural phenomena and monsters. And of course, taking care of my people... though that groups currently contains far fewer vassals than it previously had."

All thanks to Severin, once again. He really got better than he deserved with such a swift death.

As she listened to Hime's words, Kagura discerned that the topic of her vassals must have been a sensitive issue, because Hime didn't seem like the person to stutter or pause for no reason, so Kagura suspected that Hime's vassals hadn't been fired or resigned. Then again, Kagura could be reading into this too much and imagining things. She hadn't been having the greatest day so far, and her mind was clouded with gloomy, depressing thoughts.

"Hime, you mentioned 'the King who stands above all monsters.' I assume that means you're a monster too?" Kagura asked, trying to change the topic; however, the answer was pretty obvious. If the King was Hime's father then it was only natural that Hime was a monster too.

How Hime's servants had died, how her brother Severin had ousted her from the Kingdom and forced her into the lifestyle she led now, that tale was one of the few things Hime was uncomfortable recounting. It was just as well Kagura didn't ask, for she wouldn't have gotten an answer.

"Well, I'm certainly not human," she said with a smile and a chuckle. "No mortal man has eyes nor blood like mine."

Kagura nodded in agreement; in her time as an exorcist, she had only seen non-humans possessing similar eyes. "I haven't seen any normal human with eyes like yours; they're very pretty. As for your blood, is there something special about it, or is it different just because you're not human?"

The teenage exorcist was happy to learn new things about Hime; the blond was a very interesting individual. The blond reminded her of Yomi in some ways; both had a noble aura, though Hime's was more dignified. Also, Yomi tended to act on emotion, while Hime seemed to prefer logic.

"A drop of blood is the dew of life," Hime quoted elegantly raising the hand the kitten had bit; it had since stopped bleeding but there was still a spot of red where the wound was on her fingertip. The kitten in question looked up from the hand it was batting at towards the raised hand before going back to flicking at the closer plaything.

"A Royal's blood can grant immortality to those that drink it," she explained. She did, however, leave off the other details. Kagura would know what any commoner in the Kingdom would. The details of being a Blood Warrior were something she didn't particularly want circulating about in this place quite yet. "Just a few drops and you can have eternal life."

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Day 46: Sun Room

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