damned_institute | Day 50: Patient Library (3rd Shift)

Given a choice, as should have been implied by the whole "Free Choice Day" thing, Scott would have gone straight for the Game Room. Maybe it didn't have the greatest selection of games, but he was raring for another epic Tetris match with Indy or anyone else who cared to challenge him. Unfortunately for him, however, his nurse was already onto his line of thinking.

"Now Bryan, I know how much you love your games, but don't you think some more time away from them would be good for you?" the woman asked him in a soothing tone, gently taking his shoulder when he turned toward the Game Room.

"Uh, why would I think that?" he asked, blinking at her in honest confusion.

"Well, I know your family was worried about more than just your condition before you came here. They're hoping you can start to wean yourself down to a more healthy level of enjoyment with your games, too," the nurse explained with continuing gentleness.

"Yeah. And?" Scott raised an eyebrow. "It's Free Choice Day, isn't it? Don't I get to choose and stuff?"

"Of course, Bryan. But I'm still here to make suggestions, and I think you'd do well with a different activity today." The woman smiled at him, genuine care and concern in her expression. "You can always come here later in the week. It'll probably be more rewarding if you wait, too."

Scott was silent, considering the advice. He raised an index finger. "Well, I suppose... Uh, yeah no. Please to be going to the Game Room now, thanks."

The nurse frowned.

Five minutes of irritatingly gentle coaxing later, and Scott found himself in the patient library. "Stupid guilt tripping never even talked to my real mom and dad I bet I could be playing Tetris right now they don't even have any cool books in here..." he grumbled to himself under his breath as he lazily perused the shelves. He picked a book completely at random, The Oxford Book of English Verse. He was half-hoping that maybe pulling the book out would trigger something more exciting, like a secret item appearing, a bonus stage unlocking, or a new shortcut tunnel opening. But no, Landel's reality was boring as ever. "Maybe there'll be an awesome poem or something in here, at least," he told himself as he headed over to an empty seat with a short sigh.

[Unknowingly waiting for Sam]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

That this person hadn’t been tangibly helpful wasn’t much of a stretch. Following in his predecessor’s footsteps, indeed. “And did he answer?” said Aidou, though the question was more rhetorical than not. No doubt Marc looked down his nose at the prisoners like everyone else involved with the Institute, and being upfront about his whereabouts and function would go against the spirit of the game. The noble couldn’t think of their situation in any other terms.

Likewise, if Marc did know of the basement, how likely was it that he’d convey his knowledge? It sounded like the encounter had been more of the usual--the dropping of obscure hints and enticement to keep paying attention to one piece of junk or the other, in this case the radios.

Slowly, he brought his arms together to fold them across his chest. Hime’s question required little answer. Any of Landel’s secrets, as well as his truths, were suspect. As were his so-called enemies.

About the lack of notable characteristics… “Does that mean,” Aidou began, “that you couldn’t tell whether he was human or not?”

"He did, actually, though not with much more than could already be inferred," Hime replied. "He gave us his name and told us he was part of the same resistance group as Jack and Jill. He'd been the one Jill had been urging us to save the night before and had traveled to Doyleton after that before coming to his current hideout last night. Though, I suppose it may have been helpful to question where he had come from before that and the origins of their group - I had never met or really listened to any of these people before in the first place, so even knowing as much as he had told us had been something of a surprise." Looking back, their time with Marc had been something of a golden opportunity that wasn't likely to come around again any time soon - but then, how much would Marc have actually spilled? He still was quite secretive about some of the larger things.

"Hmm... well, I didn't see anything that marked him as non-human," she replied, "like some of the tattoos or other subtle things that give us away." A smirk, one that clearly revealed her pronounced, fang-like canines. "But then, just because he lacks those things doesn't mean he's human."

He’d said he’d travelled to Doyleton before moving to the mountains? Aidou followed this line of thought while he listened, reorganizing the timeline in his mind. Why Doyleton?

And then there were these ‘subtle things’…

The vampire blinked down at the female. How much of it was a creature’s appearance and behavior giving them away versus how well she could sense a lack of humanity? She made it sound like Marc hadn’t made an impression on her instincts… which could very well be true, Aidou thought. He couldn’t be confident of his own judgments unless something irrefutable like blood confirmed them. And even then…

He didn’t respond to her pointed gesture. If she didn’t already know what he was (and what he wasn’t), Aidou wasn’t going make a display of baring his fangs in return. “Yes,” he agreed shortly. “Your night was curious, at any rate. You believe he will do something extreme tonight?”

Unfortunately, as knowledgeable as Hime was about various monsters and such, she had no innate sense of them, basing her assessments instead on observation, experience and context. The institute's tendency to humanize its prisoners, as well as the differences between parallel (and not-so-parallel) dimensions made much of that useless. Perhaps a gut feeling, little ways in how he talked and what about made her suspect Aidou might be something other than human, but it was just a feeling and not something she could say with confidence.

"Extreme? I somehow doubt it," she replied with a sigh. "Even if he does promise to be more straightforward and proactive that his predecessors, he's still cautious of Landel - what happens tonight will likely be all through the radio." Though, if he did use that computer of his to do something a bit more flashy, well, Hime wouldn't say no to that. Was Marc capable of something like that though?

The surprise of hearing about the female’s unusual night had stirred his thoughts into a tumult, more so than the information he had gleaned from Anise, being that he had seen the ruins with his own eyes. He could not say the same of this Marc figure.

Now that he knew, well, he would undoubtedly have to take his radio with him…

Aidou let out his own soft sigh and once again stepped back against the bookshelves. The latest discovery was just one more fact to keep in mind, as was Hime‘s opinion of the man she‘d met. He didn’t like that he was on the outside of the equation, but he had to make do with what he could infer from others. Sometimes that was enough. Or it’d have to be, for the moment.

“I see,” he said simply. A beat of silence passed before he added, “And what do you plan to do? The basement?”

"Eventually, but not tonight," the Royal replied. "As I mentioned we're still down enough people. Besides, I obtained some other interesting items last night, but there are some tools I'll need to put them to use - I intend to grab those tonight. Conveniently, that also means being available with the radios when Marc starts his broadcast."

Of course, this would be the real time of assessment for the radio man - whether she abandoned her own short-term goals for whatever clues he gave them would depend entirely on him and if she thought he was worth the time. He'd proven good so far, but there was always room to unimpress the princess.

Day 50: Patient Library (3rd Shift)

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