damned_institute | Night 50: Main Hallway, 2-West

All clear except for the two people standing just ahead of them, and even then he was pretty sure they were patients rather than any sort of serious threat- the brainwashed guards tended to be a little more intimidating than a big guy in slippers and a little girl.

Depth Charge glanced back at Hime, waiting for her to meet him in the hallway. "Did you find that ring the Head Doctor was talking about?"

Coming to the top of the stairs, Hime stopped when she saw Depth Charge waiting for her. It didn't look like there were enemies, but his question made it clear why he'd halted.

"I did," she answered with a smile, holding up her right hand - the silver band and red stone gleaming in the beam of their flashlights momentarily. "Considering his description though, I don't think we want to be breaking it any time tonight. Unless you'd prefer a square full of zombies?"

"Cute and impractical. Suits you," he answered flatly, raising an eyebrow at the flash of colour in the darkness. "I don't know. Could be useful to have a link to the town, you know?" Provided you didn't mind digging your way through a minor zombie apocalypse, of course. "Gotta wonder why the Head Doctor'd be giving us something useful for once. I don't like it."

Checking the coast was clear, he nodded for Hime to carry on. "Go ahead. I'll cover you."

"You forgot 'dangerous'," Hime retorted, not missing a beat. She took a moment to consider the ring seriously though. "He did mention there are other uses for it, the other reason why I'd prefer not to use it yet. I'm as suspicious as you are of it, so I'm sure there's a price for its use."

Those considerations would be put aside for now - they'd be crossing over the Sun Room now, and while she wasn't sure whether the monsters the supposedly roamed it would attack them up here, it never hurt to be wary. Knife in one hand and flashlight in the other, the princess led the way.

[To here (http://community.livejournal.com/damned/945976.html)]

Well, that was completely embarrassing. A crowbar might have worked pretty well against most of the monsters here, but when it came to the ones that were actually armed it was like taking a slingshot to a gunfight (then again, those primordial humans had always managed that pretty well).

He breathed out, running a hand through his hair and feeling the static disperse across his fingers with a sizzle. Crazy, crazy place. But he could still see the glow of that sword from here. He couldn't lower his guard until he was sure Hime had gotten out of there- who knew what that woman might try?

Hime wasn't far behind the man in retreating. If she was going to have to face off against some woman with an electric sword, and she had the option, it would be with a big man with a crowbar, not without him.

"It seems moving to the upper level was ill-advised. We might be able to avoid her by using the stairs that lead to the second floor on the other side of her-"

Hime's suggestion was cut off as her radio suddenly turned on (http://community.livejournal.com/damned/948319.html), Marc's enthusiastic voice chiming in before suddenly being cut off.

"...So, something happens if you use the ring twice? Or was he going to say something else had to be done with-"

And once against a wave of static interrupted her, this time from the intercoms (http://community.livejournal.com/damned/949047.html). Hime listened, unimpressed by the doctor's posturing. However, when that last bit of static came on, even she flinched, wincing in pain.

"...and just what was that?" she asked in Japanese.

The crackle of the intercom inspired, for once, a cautious little glimmer of hope in Depth Charge- Marc'd at least managed to get things up and running, which was something in this place. Less successful was his attempt not to let his positivity take too much of a knock when the message was cut off with a less-than-positive screech- the Head Doctor probably didn't want anyone upstaging him while he was busy with his experimental ring thing, true, but-

As if prompted, the intercom switched on. Depth Charge shot the speaker mounted on the wall a disdainful glower, folding his arms defensively. "Yeah, yeah, just keep talking, big guy." Rings, experiments, blah blah blah... for a klik, he thought he might have heard the sound typing.

He didn't get long to dwell on it.

The second screech hit his head hard, leaving him clutching at his head and reeling with nausea in the second before the silence settled in. Hime said something, but he didn't catch it for some reason- probably aftershock. "What was that?" he managed in Cybertronix, shaking his head slightly. "Whatever it was, it didn't sound good."

Unlike Depth Charge, Hime heard what the other said loud and clear. And didn't understand a single word of it. For that matter, were those even words? It sounded more like a machine malfunctioning. He'd said he was a robot, but... could human vocal chords even produce those sounds?

"...Depth Charge. What's wrong?" she asked firmly, staring the man straight in the eyes. If whatever Landel had done had somehow injured the man... that was quite the display of power.

And for some reason, Hime... still wasn't making any sense to him. At all. As in, he couldn't make out a single word she was saying to him in the slightest. What was this some kind of orphaned punchline he hadn't been around to hear the setup to? If that was Cybertronix then he was an Earthling.

... metaphorically, that was.

That look wasn't helping, either. Made him feel like his gearbox was hanging out or something. Depth Charge scowled back at her. "Not cute and not funny. Knock it off already. You're starting to creep me out."

The irritable look on his face wasn't particularly surprising, as that seemed to be one of Depth Charge's default expressions when dealing with Hime. However, that it persisted, along with the tone of his - she hesitated to call it a "voice" - indicated that not only was something wrong with him, but the robot didn't realize anything was wrong.

The Royal's expression darkened, but there was also a hint of curiousness to it. Just what was going on here?

"Depth Charge. If you can understand what I'm saying, clap," she said, deciding at the last minute not to ask him to jump up and down. There was a chance he wouldn't do it even if he could understand her.

Hime's expression flickered. The look he was getting wasn't quite so penetrating this time and ran more on the confused-but-interested side of things, as though she'd just discovered a new species of particularly toxic fungus. She didn't look like she was screwing around with him, though- and in hindsight, if she was going to mess with him it wouldn't have been by talking scrap at him and pretending something was wrong. Wasn't her style.

Which meant that something was wrong. Very wrong. He peered at her uncertainly again- but nope, still nothing. If she was saying something important, he wasn't getting it at all. Beautiful. Just beautiful.

Well, if it was mutual, there was no point in telling her as much. Instead (first checking that there was no one around he recognised) he made a great show of shrugging his shoulders and shaking his head, feeling for all the galaxy like he was in some kind of warped sparkling's TV show.

Well, at least that seemed to wipe the irritated expression off his face. The shrug was an understandable reaction, but it was no clap. So, he couldn't understand a word she was saying, was that it? And was speaking some kind of robot language as well. If only it was Fuga, she might have at least understood what he was saying, even if he couldn't do the same.

The strangest part was that the man hadn't noticed at first what was wrong with his own speaking. Of course, this also hinted at the distinct possibility that she was the one who'd been affected, even if she was sure she was still speaking perfect Japanese. But then, wasn't it suspicious anyways that everyone here, from the doctor to the nurses to the patients from other worlds entirely, all spoke Japanese? There had been talk about the language differences... perhaps, like the flashlights and doors opening and all the other little helpful hints Landel gave them, he'd also given them the ability to communicate with each other. And now, that was gone.

"How truly irritating," Hime murmured. Then she turned her attention back to Depth Charge, inclining her head back at the stairs. "We're going. Something like this won't get in our way."

And with that she started heading back the way they came in a clear enough message of her intentions even if her words couldn't be understood.

[To here (http://community.livejournal.com/damned/943057.html?thread=71087313#t71087313)]

"Yes?" He wasn't quite sure where this line of questioning was going, but wherever it was, he undoubtedly wouldn't expect it.

He was proved absolutely right in short order, almost stopping dead in his tracks in surprise, only just managing to keep the reaction from being quite so comically obvious. Yes, he'd met Captain Chise before, who was even less of a likely candidate for her rank than Anise was by his estimation, but somehow with a Sergeant, it was different. Probably because he was one of them. "...Oh. I'm sorry, I really wouldn't have guessed," he admitted, a little sheepishly. Now he felt like even more of an idiot than he usually was.

"Ehehe. I get that a lot." Probably because she was so cute. "I guess it doesn't help that I don't have my uniform here." Most people could probably take a look at the tabbard and guess that she belonged to the Knights. But... then again, maybe military uniforms looked really different on other planets. Maybe it wouldn't clue anyone in.

... Anise still missed her uniform, though. Really, she would take anything over the drab institute clothes.

"Should we go to the janitor's closet first, then?" she asked him, just to confirm. She was already walking in that direction, but she wanted to make sure he was on board before leading them too far down the hall.

"That would make a difference, although I suspect no one here would be able to tell my rank even if I had my armor." It was more immediately obvious than the tiny little rank bars and code cylinders of the officers, but it went on a completely different system. The white rank pauldron marked him out far more clearly than them, although it wasn't always a good thing.

"Sure. We just have to be careful in this hallway, there are sometimes hostiles stationed here."

"Well, they might not know your rank, but they'd know right away that you're a soldier," Anise said, though she began to wonder how well that would work with her uniform, which was a little bit different from most soldiers', even on her planet. Some people might just think it was a cute dress with a weird tabbard. It was kind of a funny thought.

There was a brief pause, and then she added, "...even though I guessed it right away without it." She grinned, pleased that her initial guess had been right on the mark. Not that it was a challenging thing to guess, though. Everything about this guy seemed to scream 'soldier'. Anise hoped that years of military service wouldn't end up making her serious and boring like that. It seemed like lots of soldiers were like that, but it was an attitude that just didn't suit the girl.

[to here]

[from here]

"I wonder what'd happen if you lost it? Everyone has flashlights, and they give us new shirts if we tear them all up." He hadn't turned all of his spare clothing into makeshift all-cotton rope, but he'd done a lot of it over time. "Then again, you could end up with neither." He shrugged, and looked out at the hallway.

"Looks clear." The last time he'd turned right here, he'd been dying of liver cancer. Cheery thought. No amount of armlinking and skipping down the corridors would make that a less gut-twisting thought. He gritted his teeth a little and went back to his mental set of bullet points to nail to Martin Landel's door.

Edited 2010-07-15 22:25 (UTC)

The Scarecrow hadn't considered what would happen if he lost his light entirely, and he wasn't sure he wanted to pursue such thoughts as they entered the Horrible Hallway. There were far, far worse things to worry about than being left without a flashlight: the somethings that skittered around the floor in the dark, the Mangled Witch, the strange creature lingering above the Sun Room, or maybe something worse he'd not yet met. He could feel his legs shaking beneath him at the mere thought of what could be out there- creatures far worse than lions and tigers and bears, that was for sure.

He peered into the hallway cautiously from the stairwell and saw that Sangamon was right: the hallway did look unoccupied- well, aside from a few passing patients. He took a few small steps, attempting to hold his jittering hands still enough to get a decent look at his map under Sangamon's light.

"W- which way do you think we oughta go now?" he asked in a timid whisper, unsure of both where they'd find a player and if he really wanted traverse the Horrible Hallway to find one in the first place.

The Scarecrow was getting twitchy. Afraid of something? Low blood sugar? S.T. wasn't sure, though the question raised a likely theory. He didn't want to go over by the M-U rooms. Understanding and white-hot rage were not, as some people might think, mutually exclusive. Giving a kid's-show inspirational character PTSD was like the press catching Mr. Rogers in a strip club. It went beyond the pale.

At least it was a distraction from thinking about anything else. "Down this way. We'll hit the training room first."

[to here]

[from here]

Sounds. People. There were some people up here. Too bad that couldn't serve as too much of a comfort in this kind of place. Admittedly, it did calm him down just a little to know there were others around up here. It was only human nature to feel more at ease in a group.

But Klavier kept his distance from any and all of them, sparing them only a sidelong glance before continuing on. To the right... yes, he remembered. There was an area that overlooked the Sun Room. If he continued down, the very last hallway led to a good number of rooms that were ideal for supplies. Closets, storage...

He closed his eyes for a moment and let a melody come to the forefront of his mind as he tried to recall the map he had copied of this floor. He could picture it perfectly. There was a hallway near where he was. Up that way... He recalled there were labs all the way down, though he didn't have any details regarding them. In the area overlooking the Sun Room... He hadn't memorized the rooms. But he recalled the words "staff" used in several instances. If the labs turned out to be a dead end, that would be his next destination.

He took a very deep breath, trying to maintain this slight sense of calm he had going now, and moved forward.

[to here]

Edited 2010-07-16 02:41 (UTC)

[from here]

And to follow quietly, to pause when another hesitated, to speak to the silence and shadow and listen as it giggled--a cold laughter in tune. He knew this place, knew this path, but not when the man veered off. And would Albedo follow, into darkness and despair?

Too easily given, was the answer. Here again was one to take his mind from what truly mattered. He understood the shifts to make, and the mentality to take. He had done so before, after all. When stalking another altogether different prey.

[to here]

Edited 2010-07-16 06:00 (UTC)

[from here (http://community.livejournal.com/damned/947340.html)]

Which was nothing. He could hear sounds of fighting ahead, but no familiar voices, and Shikamaru could think of no reason that any Leaf-nin would take interest in the area above the Sun Room. The promise of files in the opposite wing might be tempting to some new arrivals, but not new arrivals like Naruto and Kiba. They weren't the type to look for answers in manila envelopes, and Sakura had already been to the area.

He tried to avoid attention as he turned left, assuming that the other patients would hold the interest of whatever was attacking.

[to here (http://community.livejournal.com/damned/945428.html?thread=71221268#t71221268)]

Edited 2010-07-19 04:04 (UTC)

[from here (http://community.livejournal.com/damned/945428.html?thread=71221268#t71221268)]

Retracing his footsteps shouldn't be a problem. This time he moved with more ease, still listening to the sounds of fighting but not considering them a serious threat. It was only a few steps to the stairwell, and when he stepped into it, he pulled the door shut behind him to slow anything that might choose to follow.

[to here (http://community.livejournal.com/damned/947340.html?thread=71222412#t71222412)]

Edited 2010-07-19 04:28 (UTC)

[from here]

A few more steps and she finally reached the top, first peeking around the corner before stepping into the hallway. Which looked... pretty much exactly like the one they just came from. No matter! Elena took a few steps out into the hall, trying to cover every inch of space in front of them with her flashlight, and decidedly not getting worked up over the lack of ideas she had for them to get out of here.

"Aren't your spidey-senses tingling or anything?" There was that, too. As far as she knew, Stefan could usually hear things coming from a mile away. It must have been the same for Damon, right? Especially with their, er, difference in diets. "We can't be the only ones walking around this giant building."

His spidey-senses, as Elena so quiantly termed it, were decidedly not tingling because Damon didn't know what the hell happened to them in the first place. This was extraordinarily annoying. And he really didn't want to admit as much to her because while Elena had had a lot of people try to target her in the past, this was a particularly special set of circumstances and he could tell she was about half a step from freaking out.

Which he wouldn't blame her for, but that didn't mean he wanted to see it happen.

See, this was why he didn't get attached to people in the first place. Everything got twice as complicated. Who decided to make her look like Katherine? Honestly, of all the six billion people she could've resembled. The single year he'd spent in Mystic Falls following his return had brought on more trouble than he'd run into during his entire life as a vampire. Considering that that was one year out of almost two hundred (170, to be precise, but who cared about counting when you didn't age?) it wasn't any kind of small feat.

Things would've been so much easier if only Elena had turned out to be the same Taylor Swift, Twilight-reading teenage girls that made up eighty percent of the population.

"We're not alone," he said. "There were people downstairs. No idea who they were, though."

He didn't care about them, anyway, unless they had something to do with why he was here instead of at home, in bed, or at a bar or, you know, anywhere but here. Being left to wander around like this was so not kosher. He might've had all of eternity, but he still didn't derive pleasure from having his time enormously wasted.

Pausing briefly at the fork in the road, he peered around the corner. A door caught his eye. Okay. Doors were better than nothing.

[going here]

[from here (http://community.livejournal.com/damned/943057.html?thread=71359697#t71359697)]

"There are Weapons, with a capital W, that appear when the planet is in jeopardy. Large... creatures. They rose from the Northern Crater." Zack was trying to combat his previous, admittedly depressing statement with optimism. That was so very like him that Cloud couldn't help but go along with it. Being negative wasn't going to get them anywhere, after all. "We ended up havin' to fight them too. That sword came from one."

Easy enough to say, wasn't it? Never mind all the damage they did to Junon, Midgar, and Mideel. Or at least damage that was in some way related to them. "You find all sorts of strange things fighting monsters, but I'm sure you already know that." He gave his friend a bit of a smile - all right, we'll do it your way - before moving on.

He let the beam of his own flashlight take in the area this time. There were other patients around now, both here and further down the hall, which made him wonder how much of this was worth searching. What if some other group found her first? If she was even anywhere to be found...

All this talk about Weapons and northern craters were enough to make Zack's head spin, but he didn't want to start firing off questions, since that could quickly get annoying. He'd mainly worked past his overly-excited, constantly questioning stage. Key word being mainly. He still had a lot that he needed to ask his friend, but now he knew the virtue of going at it one step at a time.

In the end, he figured that what these things were and where they came from wasn't necessarily all that important. What mattered was that Cloud (and probably a few friends) had managed to kill one, and he'd gotten that sword as a reward. "Sounds like you earned it," he said with a smile as he glanced around the hallway. This was one he'd seen twice already. Zack was starting to hope for chances to head in any other direction. There was the basement, which might be happening tomorrow night...

In any case, he was just glad that his friend had managed to keep a hold on the Buster Sword, even if he'd found other weapons that had suited him better. But now that they were up here, it was about time to decide where to go next. "How well do you know the layout of this place?" he asked his friend. "'Cause I'm kind of at a loss. The only place I've been to is that exercise room."

Cloud shook his head. "I haven't been here any longer than you. Don't know any of this." Teleporting around the night before hadn't done anything to help with his sense of direction here either. He'd spent even less time on the second floor than Zack had, so how his friend expected him to be able to lead them any better he didn't know.

He pointed down the hall they'd been facing when they came up the stairs. "I know the chapel is that way from this morning." If there was any room in the building one would think would be associated with Aerith, it was the chapel. However, why she'd be there in this situation was anyone's guess. She wouldn't have gone off on her own, and he couldn't think of any reason one of the staff members might have brought her up there. Still, the mere connection might mean it was worth a look.

"We can start there. Work our way back, maybe? There has to be something." Or they hoped there'd be something. Most people who disappeared didn't seem to leave much of a trace of themselves behind, so if that was the case this shouldn't be any different. He just knew they both hoped that wasn't the case.

"Ahh, just checking," Zack said as he drew a hand through his hair, glancing around them as if there would somehow be a clue to where they should go. He'd kind of been hoping that Cloud had seen more of this place, since even if they had arrived at about the same time, they'd spent a few nights separate from each other. There had always been a chance that his friend had looked around up here, but apparently not.

Which meant they were just going to have to search around together. Zack was no stranger to exploration, and he'd been preparing to just pick a direction and start walking, but that was when Cloud spoke up again. The chapel. Right. It was only a starting point, as the blond pointed out, but it did seem like it would be an oversight if they skipped it.

"Yeah, it's worth a shot," he agreed with a nod. This was hardly the time to visit a chapel, but Aerith could have had her reasons. Zack didn't know what they would have been, but she had always been something of a mystery, hadn't she? "It's not that far, anyway." He had also been to the place of prayer that morning and remembered how to get there, so he didn't wait to get a move on.

[from here] (http://community.livejournal.com/damned/943057.html?thread=71397585#t71397585)

The hallway the stairwell opened to was all but identical to the one below. The difference was only one, though it came largely of note. Unlike the other hall, this one was completely empty. The sounds of a building settling and other creaks, accompanied by the fading sounds of others below them and in the distance came as surreal. He was unsure, suddenly. How much of this was actual and not something his mind had concocted.

Even if all he had been seeing was progress, there was no reason to think his mind couldn't contort in some twisted kind of relapse. Though, this, as an outlet seemed too flawed for that idea.

By now, the darkness and noises in the night were not something Minato found unusual; months of traveling through Tartarus made these bouts of exploring seem similar to home, and brought about a freedom that was missing during the daylight hours.

Minato surmised that the same basic layout could be applied to the second floor. That meant that going further down the hallway would lead to the big windows and railing that overlooked the Sun Room. With a glance back at Gaara, he started down in that direction.

[to here (http://community.livejournal.com/damned/945976.html?thread=71477048#t71477048)]

[From here]

Utena couldn't see anything ahead just yet, but that didn't mean the person they were looking for wasn't still around, either hiding or being just plain out of sight. Himemiya hadn't been visible that night until Utena had gotten close enough to see over the...

The balcony.

Utena forced a gulp down. What were the chances an SCer would be hanging out over that gap again? Almost zilch, she had to remind herself. Nothing else had ever been there in the times Utena had been upstairs. And even if this person was there, she wasn't going to make another suicidal jump for them. It had been a miracle Himemiya had snapped out and caught her then; someone else under Landel's control definitely couldn't be saved that way by a total stranger. It would be completely and utterly foolish to try something like that again.

So Utena told herself, anyway.

"Careful," Utena said in quiet English for lack of any other warning phrases in her brain. She moved up closer to Ema, keeping her sword raised and ready as they approached the center of the hall.

Lacking any other weapon, Ema clung tightly to the flashlight in her hand. It had been a useless weapon against the rats, so Ema didn't anticipate being able to use it to any effect against Agatha if she had to defend herself, but she felt better holding onto something. Even though Lana's plan of cordoning off the area to prevent a fight was no longer feasible, since there were already people upstairs and fighting, Ema's role in warning other patients to stay away was still a viable one. She could at least prevent the fight from getting larger. She would also be kept out of the fray that way, something she was sure Lana would approve of; Ema was no fighter.

Ema nodded a little in response to Utena's warning as the other girl moved closer. "You, too." It seemed a little sillier in reverse, since Utena was armed and obviously capable, but it seemed rude not to reciprocate somehow. She didn't have to help them like this.

And so the three of them moved forward.

[to here (http://community.livejournal.com/damned/945976.html?view=71451448#t71451448).]

Edited 2010-07-29 17:03 (UTC)

Now this was new. Which direction had she traveled with Yakitori? It'd only been a few days, and she should have been taking note of the route. Left? Yes, they'd gone left. But if she'd come up a different staircase, her destination would be right. Alternatively, there was a hall right in front of her.

Mele spared a moment to tap her foot on the floor, then decided that more exploration wasn't necessarily a bad thing, and turned left. Which...led to the other staircase.

She shone the light around the dead end (she was not going to go back downstairs), then sighed in frustration and backtracked, at a slower pace. In something near the middle of the hall, Mele noticed an opening into yet another hall, and turned into it.

[From here (http://community.livejournal.com/damned/943057.html?view=71488465#t71488465), not breaking html this time.]

Nothing here either. What a shame. Well, he supposed he could lead them to the kitchen, that always had monsters in it, as well as pointy things. Always an added bonus!

The layout of the second floor seemed to mirror that of the first floor. Ratchet wasn't sure what he'd been hoping for, but the sight of so many doors was a little discouraging. Walking over to the nearest doors, he tried the handle. Locked. He tried the other one with the same result. With his luck, every door up here was locked. He turned to HK and shrugged.

HK pointed down the hallway to the kitchen and set off. Quietly. Sigh.

[To here (http://community.livejournal.com/damned/955736.html)]

[from here (http://community.livejournal.com/damned/943057.html?thread=71553745#t71553745)]

Mello looked--made himself look, because his instinct was to avoid it--to his left, when he reached the top of the stairs. That urge to reach for the back of his neck was still in effect, apparently. He knew the signs of post-traumatic stress perfectly well, and recognized in himself a desire to try to get desensitized to something he doubted it was possible to stop being affected by. He didn't hear anything, didn't see anyone waiting to launch a rescue mission, and he still couldn't stand to look that way for very long.

"You didn't. There's no way to predict what shit this place'll throw at us." The point was to break them, he thought, and for no reason he could see other than sadism. It would suck what little determination he had left right out of him if he let it.

"But, listen. I have a plan. It's a long shot, but no one's tried it before that I know of." Running was a bust, and the outside world might as well be the moon for how easily they could contact it. A lunatic plan was better than nothing at all, and though Mello had to keep fighting to believe in it, and to keep his impatience from getting the better of him again, the likelihood of it working was not zero. He just had to keep telling himself that.

Edited 2010-08-06 07:00 (UTC)

Night 50: Main Hallway, 2-West

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