damned_institute | DAY 23: BREAKFAST

That hadn't felt like an entire night.

And his goddamn head hurt. Pounded, even. Enough that he wondered if he was going to end up playing another round of "Christen the nurse" this morning.

Maybe it was because he'd spent so much time and energy trying to find Nowe. That could be the reason behind both those problems. Just the thought of it made his stomach turn, made him want to fucking choke something.

Still, there was shit to do. He forced himself out of bed to put away his pens and the other leftovers from the adventures that didn't happen last night. He'd have to try to talk to Sora today, to see if they could just do tonight what they were going to do last night... and to see if the kid was doing alright.

...he just wished his head would stop hurting. That was probably the result of just how badly he'd overreached himself the previous morning.

The nurse that showed up to get him was cheerful. He grunted at her, listening to her with only half an ear until she mentioned all the excitement, about someone pretending to be a patient, all that crap that Landel had mentioned.

Renji gave her a narrow-eyed look. "Dr. Landel is a goddamn lying coward, and he's lying about that, too," he said. Whether it was true or not, there was only so much good cheer he could take on a shitty morning. "I hope he chokes on a cock." No matter how much venom he put in that statement, it wasn't enough.

Then he had to listen to a lecture about language and gratitude for the rest of the walk to the cafeteria, so maybe it wasn't worth it after all. She dragged him through the breakfast line, and he ended up with granola and toast and tea and a cinnamon roll, because not even a shitty fucking night could ruin his sweet tooth. Though that thing was looking a little too sweet.

The cafeteria was pretty much empty; he had his run of the place. He sat himself about as far from the doors as he could get, and proceeded to stare at his breakfast.

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"Hmph. Scars of valor, perhaps." Reinforce scoffed at Zelos' flippancy. Not that she was any kind of expert. Her judgment in any matter beyond the very limited scope of her life experience was usually born out of the odd mixture of Belkan traditionalism and Hayate's preferences, and combining the whims and philosophies of a long-extinct martial culture with those of an eccentric little girl gave atypical results, to say the least.

Her voice dropped to a near-whisper as she returned to the conversation Hisoka had interrupted last night. "You didn't tell me where that sword you have is from."

The woman's offer-- he would have to figure out her name eventually, he supposed…-- dragged Hisoka back to a slight physical state of awareness, his shoulder and chest throbbing suddenly as he thought about it. He had not realized the wounds were still there, he supposed that answered the question about his healing abilities. Regardless, the shinigami did not move his eyes from his journal. In a way... the red-haired man reminded him of Tsuzuki...

Act like a fool, smile, flirt...

It hurt to think of it right now, he pushed the thoughts away and reached out with his empathy-- or what was left of it-- in attempt to see the other three's motives. There was no way he could trust any of these people. Although they so far showed no incentives for violence, the boy was not a fool. He had attacked them last night and blood shed only led to further blood shed. He was getting sick of the smell.

Yet despite his efforts, the boy could hear nor feel nothing, finding himself come against the equivalent of a brick wall in his mind. His head only pounded more with the effort too, so much for that. It was truly silent now...

Still not looking up he shook his head.

"I'm not wounded."

Zelos really didn't want to give Rein the full truth - that he'd taken it from a dead man, but a half truth was just as good, right?

"Do I get a little something in return for this information?" He whispered at her, grinning. His eyes casually flickered up from the table to were the short blonde was sitting. "That blonde shrimp with the ponytail? He's the one to talk to."

He didn't want to spill any more information he had to, especially in such a public area.

"I find that unlikely," Raine told Hisoka. She wasn't touching him and didn't intend to, but one hand was a few inches above the tabletop, posed to start the somatic component of First Aid. Angry as she still was, she was best directing that at the people who had made him do what he did, not Hisoka himself. "You took more than a few blows just last night; they can't have healed this quickly without some sort of intervention, and I don't recall seeing you demonstrate healing magic."

If they liked it or not, they were all on the same side, and so it didn't serve anyone if they couldn't at least tolerate one another. For example, she'd lost track of the times she had healed Zelos while he all but tried to get her into bed, something that hadn't exactly endeared him to her. They didn't have to like each other, but they did need to be able to work together.

"But you didn't get yours from him." Rein was surprised to hear that the alchemist was the source of the weapons she kept seeing, but it didn't show.

She'd suspected something had happened to Zack when she'd seen the weapon the previous night; there might be swords in the facility identical to each other, but the others she'd seen hadn't been. She knew she could probably have had an answer immediately by asking Zelos about Zack directly, but the contrast between his disrespectful flippancy and apparently good intent had aroused her curiosity. Rein wanted to take some measure of him, know whether that grin hid a lustrous or rotting soul.

Unfortunately it was a test wherein as much could be lost as gained, and the rewards were likely less tangible than Zelos seemed to have in mind.

Although he had trained himself over time not to flinch when people were near him, the pure exhaustion running through his veins and numbing his mind dulled this self-control and the boy could not help but flinch away, eyes flashing wildly before narrowing into thin slits.

If this woman was going to touch him she was in for a surprise.

Yet the sound of the intercom slicing through the noise of the cafeteria stopped whatever action the other was going to take. Hisoka could see it as she suddenly twitched-- he could relate, the bastard doctor was talking about showering. Adrenaline seeping out of him the boy visibly slumped, he really needed to get away from these people...

Zelos smiled then, more of a secretive smile than the usual flirty one. It was almost dangerous. "Heh. Beauty and brains. But you're going to have to convince me a little harder if you want a full answer."

He wasn't about to tell her, oh yes, I simply took this from a dead man I failed to help. Suddenly he wondered where Aerith was.

The intercom cut in, announcing showers just as a nurse came by. Unlike Hisoka, Zelos didn't shy away from her. Instead, his grin became flirty again. "See? Take a note out of this lovely lady. She's eager to get me undressed!"

Raine made herself take a deep breath; it was okay, no one here had reason to wonder what she was... if anyone saw her ears as she was washing her hair, it was unlikely they'd wonder.

Right?

Seeing Hisoka sink down onto the table actually made her worry for a moment; she had little doubt he was lying about not being hurt. She could heal him anyway, since he didn't need to agree to it...

When a nurse came over to collect her and Reinforce, though, she decided it was best to wait on that. She didn't know what would happen if the staff saw her using magic.

She realized she'd never gotten a chance to eat anything, but the thought of being found out put enough of a knot in her stomach that she found she wasn't hungry anyway. If other worlds had half-elves known for anything like what they were in hers... she'd be looked at as no better than the Landels staff.

Maybe it was a good thing that the spell "Nurse" was almost undoubtedly beyond her capabilities here.

Rein eyed Zelos. A compliment and dismissal in one. He wasn't becoming any clearer. Though she was disappointed not to have learned anything from this first probe, she felt an unfamiliar thrill at the developing game.

Unfortunate, then, that the nurses came to interfere. Inconvenient automatons... but there would be time later. A game worth playing was worth taking time to play. For now, Zelos was on probation.

DAY 23: BREAKFAST

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