damned_institute | Day 54: Sun Room

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Day 54: Sun Room

[From here. All your top posts shall be mine.]

Peter entered the Sun Room with a dour expression. Goody, he was the first one here. Fancy that. Pick of the couches was his then. Eeeny meeny miney...moe. Peter stalked over to what he knew from experience was the fluffiest couch in the room and eased himself into its downy soft embrace. Ordinarily he would have just pounced on that sucker, but yeah. His arm was in a sling for a reason. He sighed and wormed his way into a full body sprawl. He didn't care if it was irresponsible of him. This shift's only mission was to remain as still as possible.

Of course, being the first one in here had some stipulations. With great opportunity came great responsibility. Which today, came in the form of a soft meow from below. Then the sound of puncturing fabric, advancing upwards towards him. More meows, independent of one another and even more tiny punctures.

Peter Parker was now officially the cat sitter.

"...Oh hi... lonely kittens," he said uneasily as the first scrambled over the edge of the cushion. It padded towards his face. "No no, kittens don't belong near faces." He gently picked it up and put it on his chest. Two more crawled over the edge.

He had never really had a pet growing up. And he didn't hang out with a lot of people with cats or dogs, either. So of course, he didn't have a good idea of how to properly handle most animals without ticking them off. It looked like he was going to have to make up for lost time now, as the cats' numbers swelled to four. Two were exploring his legs, another batted at a fraying string on his sling, and the first stumbled back towards his face and mewed plaintively. Peter frowned and gave it a ginger pat on the head. That seemed to to the trick. He put it back on his chest again and scratched behind its ears.

"You guys had better not start doing that claw thing on my leg. I can't reach right now, but revenge will be mine if you do."

"Meeeeew!"

"I'm still petting you! Geez."

[For Elle Bishop.]

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_{[Closed to Kuro and Fai?]}

It was terrible, Tsubaki couldn’t stop coughing, and her throat her badly. It’d been bad enough with the soldiers lurking in every corner, but when the fighting had broken out… Jeez. She beat her nurse into the Sun Room, rubbing her eyes, which were still a bit red and sore.

Fighting the prisoners was hardly fair when the uniformed people had weapons whereas the prisoners had nothing but their repressed powers. She didn’t know what that gas was, but it hurt. Her nurse had tried to pull her through the crush of staff members to get her out of the cafeteria, but the room had been full of moving bodies and clouds of gas and she’d inhaled some before the nurse could drag her out. As a consequence, she’d spent the next few minutes in the bathroom, eyes tearing, while her nurse had rushed around attempting to flush out her eyes, saying things like, "Tear gas!? I can’t believe them… I’m so sorry, honey… Here, here, hold your head back…"

"It’s--it’s all right, I’m oka--" Tsubaki had tried to get out once, but she’d started coughing soon after and couldn’t finish. Eventually, she tried not to speak at all.

Her nurse had continued to fret all the way through getting her a new change of clothes, and Tsubaki could understand her concern. For a while, she had hardly been able to see through her runny eyes and had needed a guiding hand to keep her from walking into walls. What a horrible weapon… and a horrible thing to do. She could also understand why so many people had struck out against the staff and the soldiers, but between the two sides, things were out of control. There were people who couldn’t defend themselves in there, injured people, children… She didn’t want to think what a full dose of the gas could do.

Back in the Sun Room, she could see there were fewer people than normal, in part to the split shift and also no doubt due to other punishments. It hardly seemed right to go about a normal day with the stone-faced soldiers still looming everywhere.

She scrunched her nose and rubbed her eyes some more.

[from here (http://community.livejournal.com/damned/1034326.html?thread=75352150#t75352150)]

Coming inside again after the chill outdoors made it seem far too warm, but he followed his nurse, hesitating a moment when she told him to sit. It wasn't that he didn't wish to, but of all the people she might have chosen for him to sit with, it was Tsubaki. He hadn't seen her in person since that night and frankly it was no easy feat to face her. They could pretend though, couldn't they? They could both play along easy enough.

He sat heavily on the same couch, offering the girl a false smile and a cheery wave before leaning his head back as far as it would go. At least they didn't have to worry about flying food or poison gas for a little while.

"Looks like we all had a pretty rough morning," he offered

With the annoyance of a pestering nurse, Kurogane was eventually allowed back inside to "rest", but the moment he was free of the woman he searched for his target. Over on a couch he spotted the blond already with another, and moving closer Kurogane make the figure out as Tsubaki. Right, she had to have been in the cafeteria mess as well. Kurogane tried to picture either of them as having been sedated for it, but with what little he knew of Tsubaki, he could take a guess that he was the only one who'd taken the needle.

"Damn..." he breathed, again under his breath, before forcing himself to head their way. He wasn't at his best and he was mad as hell, but that still didn't let Fai off the hook. As he came up, he heard Fai mentioning the morning and huffed at the observation, "The hell was your first clue?"

Hopefully the residual itchiness would go away quickly. She might have a problem if it got worse instead of better, though continuing to irritate her eyes by rubbing them probably wasn’t helping. And what about everyone else? Those who’d gotten the brunt of the soldiers’ counterattack?

Guiltily, Tsubaki dropped her hand--only to nearly jump out of her skin as a tall, blond form dropped into the seat beside her. At the sight of Fai, her eyes flew wide. In the moment, there was only the fact that he was there, with his limbs intact, and hadn’t disappeared over the course of the night. “Thank goodness…” she exclaimed on an exhale, sounding drained out. In the confusion, she hadn’t been able to reach anybody, and meeting now certainly beat trying to find him later.

Before she could structure something more to say as she looked Fai over, it was Kurogane who of all people who spoke next. Good timing! So far, this fortunate turn of events was the high point of her morning.

“Did anyone get hurt in there?” she asked them at once. Who knew how many people had been dragged away to solitary.

He really hadn't meant to startle her as much as he had, and once again, the smile faltered a moment. Had it not been long enough since the last time she'd seen him? He could hardly blame her, given the state of most everything that night. But perhaps he'd just well and truly startled her.

There was no time to ask before a familiar voice sounded grumpily before them, enough to set his nerves on edge. Their last meeting too had been less than productive and their messages on the bulletin as well as Kurogane's none-too-subtle threats were enough to have him wondering where the nearest nurse was.

"Hard to say," he replied to Tsubaki, ignoring the sharp retort from the ninja. "Things were pretty messy in there."

"No idea," Kurogane sneered, not caring. He'd barely seen the Cafeteria that morning so if anyone had gotten hurt, it was their own damn business. Besides that, someone must have started that mess and whoever he was Kurogane definitely cared the least for.

Giving the couch more of a glare than either person sitting there, Kurogane brought a hand up to rub at his eyes before looking for another place to sit. If it had been just one of them he'd have just ordered someone to move over, but not with the both of them there. He didn't really want to share a couch with the magician anyway. After a quick look told him the closest chair might be a black blur over by a window, he let it go and fell into a seat on the floor. This was fine, and better than him going over if the sedated started making him dizzy.

"Dammit," he swore again, this time running a hand back through his hair as though it may help clear his head. Sitting or standing didn't matter, everything was still spinning. Any other morning...

“You guys surprised me,” she said, half in explanation to Fai. This would probably not be the most comfortable conversation in the world, not just due to the morning’s events, but she was happy to see the both of them. “Did you get hurt?” she asked the man beside her, before turning her gaze on Kurogane to show that the question was meant for him, as well.

It wasn’t his cursing that seemed off, but rather his overall behavior; Kurogane didn’t look too good. More obvious by the second when he dropped to the floor like a rock.

“You could’ve taken my seat,” was her dismayed response as she got to her feet, looking closer at him for the typical symptoms. Besides regular illness, there were two likely culprits: the gas or sedation, and neither was a very pleasant option.

He wouldn't put it past Kurogane to have made an attempt to fight or escape during the chaos. Was he sedated? The way he was acting was certainly off from the usual, which left only so many options. Now that he was seated and the world wasn't spinning, it was a little easier to focus. He held up his arms and kicked his legs up for a moment for brief inspection before glancing over at her.

"Fine as always," he replied. Aside from a runny nose and dizziness if he stood too long, he was probably in better shape than most of the patients. He didn't plan on adding much more to the conversation; if Kurogane had something to say about last night, he could bring it up himself. Yuuhi was quite content to leave well enough alone and hope this headache went away.

"I'm fine," Kurogane huffed at the question, but then watched as Tsubaki got up from the couch to look at him. In his head he was fine, or as fine as he could have been after that mess, but he could understand where someone like Tsubaki wouldn't believe words over what she saw. "I said I'm fine," he repeated, dropping his hand to give her the firmest look he could, "Sit back down."

With that order given, the ninja turned his attention towards the other person claiming to be 'fine'. That, he knew was a lie, though in regards to a different matter. The magician had apparently weathered both breakfast and the night without too many problems, but scars were not always ones that you could see.

"You better not have been alone last night," he growled suddenly, a warning more than anything.

It was hard to tell which one of them was better at deflecting concern. It didn’t look like Kurogane was going to get off the floor, either.

She returned to the couch with a faint sigh, more surrendering than cowed. Of course, then greater gravity set it once Kurogane rounded on Fai. Tsubaki turned to look at the other man, too. Kurogane had made it clear that he accepted there were things that didn’t need to be shared, but in regards to what had happened when she and Fai had reached Doyleton, she didn’t know if Fai accepted that as well.

He could understand worrying over the ring or how it worked. He could even understand a bit of worry over what might happen to their group if anything became of one of the members, but it was hard to understand the way Kurogane's mind worked sometimes. Yuuhi had told him that he didn't want to get involved, that it was safer if he stayed away from people, yet here was Kurogane, insisting he pair off or find a group at night. What did it matter to him?

"I wasn't," he chirped just as easily. It was pointless to argue the real point, but it wasn't as if the ninja had proof one way or another of his actions. "Were you?"

Tsubaki remained silent, save for the sigh. He wanted to say more, if only to reassure her that they weren't a pair of incompetents, but the way things were going, it would be hard to convince her.

"I didn't get very far anyway. What about you two? Find anything interesting?"

Normally Kurogane would not have cared whether Fai was off alone or not. He'd seen the magician take care of himself before, but only during certain times - times when he'd had the kid and the Princess's faces to answer to if he didn't come back in one piece. It had been weeks since they'd been with those two in a group, and roughly the same amount of time since Sakura had come and gone. Things were different now, had been for a while, and Fai was an idiot to think otherwise.

"What do you think?" Kurogane snorted, then ground the backs of his teeth when Fai continued on and asked how they'd done. If he'd known they were together, then why ask if he was alone in the first place?!

Tsubaki tried to take the middle ground so at least someone wasn’t trying to attack or defend. Though she wanted to ask Fai things herself, she didn’t want an interrogation. Overall, this just wasn’t a good morning to be treading on sensitive subjects.

“Kurogane-san and I met. We didn’t go much farther past the cell blocks,” she elaborated softly, taking up the dropped thread. “What did you do?”

He was pretty well used to Kurogane's abrasive moments, so it didn't bother him as much as it should have, perhaps. He shrugged it all off with an easy smile.

"Well I haven't learned how to read minds just yet, so I can't be sure, but with how grumpy Kurogane is today, I'm guessing it didn't go so well," he shook his head. Whether or not Kurogane would act civilly was one thing, but he wasn't going to bring Tsubaki into their personal disagreements. If he wanted to act childishly, that was his choice.

"About the same. We didn't get far. I wonder if that's true for everyone or if time is just passing strangely for us."

"Shut up..." he muttered, half-caring if his words were followed or not. Reading minds had nothing to do with it - he'd known Kurogane had been planning to meet up with Tsubaki and unlike some people there, he kept his word.

While Tsubaki took over explaining what little they'd accomplished the night before, he took to watching Fai and listening silently. She was getting him to talk at least, though not about what they'd planned on speaking over. He could assume that the morning's events might have changed her mind, or else had her hesitating more than she might have. Kurogane wasn't being much help either with how he'd fared earlier.

“We mostly talked,” Tsubaki said.

Whether Fai found that fact uncomfortable or not, there was little point in hiding what they had and hadn’t done, though Fai was very good at answering questions indirectly. Or not at all, sometimes, as the case was here. She thought about what to do. She was in fine health except for a bit of lingering irritation, but with Kurogane as he was and Fai possibly no better off than her, everyone was feeling a bit strained.

“Time does seem strange a lot…” she agreed, because like it or not, time was a valuable thing and by giving them an assignment, Landel might as well have hung a clock over their heads. She didn’t believe he’d wait forever for results. The gravity of the situation brought up another question that the three of them would have to get to eventually. Unless they were going to keep skipping around what had happened last night, why not now?

“About tonight… are we meeting?”

Kurogane's comment didn't tell him much, but Tsubaki's? Either the night really had ended early, or they'd had a lot to talk about. Though he tried to avoid it, he couldn't help a glance at the ninja before he turned back to the girl.

So that was the question, wasn't it. What were they to do? To continue doing? When they went together at least they seemed to get little bits done, but he'd had the most time when he'd just gone alone. Bringing that up wasn't likely to go over well though, and right now, irritating them all was about the last thing he wanted to do.

They had to get to the bottom of this and find Marc and quick. Who knew what might happen to Sakura now that someone who outranked Landel and had military behind him to boot had showed up? He didn't like that one bit, but as usual, he didn't give voice to his thoughts.

"We can probably get more done if we go separately. And if we change around who we go with often enough, maybe we can find out more about that Marc person. See if anyone has met him. That might be a better idea than wandering around without a clue to start with, right?"

That Fai wanted to be away from them was no surprise to hear, but it was not something Kurogane liked the thought of. He'd given the man his night off from frustration already. Letting him do that again would get them nowhere.

"We'll decide that tonight," he eventually said, settling a glare to the magician, "In your room," he emphasized.

After emphasizing that, he huffed and turned his attention off around the room, spotting some of the guards. "I don't like this. Something's up, and that could change what happens tonight. Splitting up now isn't a good idea."

The three of them had to get on the same page, and at the moment, they were far from it. She saw the argument Fai was making--three people wandering around blind without a break in information could mean a lot of wasted time. But unless one of them pinpointed someone who had information on Marc, travelling with companions at random had the same disadvantages. Did Fai have others in mind, or did he have a plan of his own? Or did he just not want to work with them? The problem with involving others, too, was that it could introduce them to the same dangers, and Tsubaki definitely didn’t want that to happen.

It was hard now, and likely going to get harder, but in the long run, it might be better if just the three of them bore the burden.

Kurogane saved her from having to vocalize any of these opinions, compromising in the challenging way he had. At the same time, he was clearly trying to ensure Fai actually met them like he hadn’t before.

Either way, Kurogane wasn’t wrong. There was too much up in the air to expect an uneventful evening.

Brows drawing together, Tsubaki eventually nodded to acknowledge his observation. “Making a plan might be best when we know more about what’s happening tonight.” If Kurogane was leaning toward sticking together, and she was, too, that just left Fai. She looked over and worded her question so that she wasn’t pushing him into another one-sided response. “What do you think about checking in at first?”

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Day 54: Sun Room

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