[from here]

From the Recreational Field wall, Anise lowered herself so she was hanging from the top, then brought her feet as close to the ground as she could get before letting go and dropping to the soft, wet grass.

Well, that wasn’t so bad. Anise was sad about the way her dampened pigtails were starting to droop, but at least the wall hadn’t been too slippery for her. There was still another wall to go before reaching the Greenhouse, though. Anise picked up her meat tenderizer from the ground, flicked her flashlight on, then looked back to Guy to show that she was ready to move on.

[From here.]

Guy realized that their plan to make it over to the greenhouse quickly could easily be ruined if they were attacked by something. Still, as he darted out onto the field, he didn't see any signs of something that might attack them. He wasn't about to tempt fate, though, and so he waved for Anise to follow after him as he veered to the right toward the wall separating the field and the courtyard.

He shined his flashlight around and then found some of the conveniently placed vines clinging to the wall. Nodding to himself, Guy tucked the light under his arm. His sword was already in his self-made sheath, so he didn't have to worry about that. With both hands free, he started to haul himself up. Hopefully Anise would pick a spot a little further down, and hopefully she could make it up on her own. He wasn't sure what he was going to do otherwise.

[Inside F15]

Some friends?

Korra swallowed when the man over the intercom seemed to... change. It sounded less like a friendly announcement and more like threat. The switch was as instant as the flick of a light. Did that mean it was officially night time, and that the faking was all over? The Avatar watched the speaker for a moment after the announcement was over, her expression serious.

She looked sideways to Tsubaki, frown deepening.

"So does this mean everything's 'different' now?" She definitely hadn't believed that part of things until hearing Landel's voice darken like that.

[From here]

And there he was. Link stood near the wall, idly tapping the toe of his boot against the ground as he waited for Soma and the others she had recruited. He doubted they would take long. Soma seemed like a competent young woman. Hopefully that meant that she would have found strong allies to take with them.

He stood with his flashlight, along with the katana she had allowed him to borrow. Link was in his tunic from home, as he always was at night.

[For Soma and the Green Team!]

[from here]

Spotting the door to the second block, Al quickly went over and opened the door. After shining the light both ways down the corridor to make sure he wasn't being followed, he went in.

[to here]

[from here]

For a moment Al pondered which direction to go. He'd seen other patients being led both past this block and down the hallway to another. After a moment he headed down the hallway and through the open door, keeping an alert eye out for anything odd.

[to here]

[from here]

For all the halls themselves weren't terribly different, the dark corridors sent a shiver up Al's spine. Perhaps it was knowing there were monsters prowling, but not where or how many--or who they'd been before. How fast did that sickness take effect? He had no idea if there was an hour or so of breathing room before his fellow inmates here might turn on him.

It wasn't a pleasant thought. Gripping the torch a bit tighter, he opened the door to the hallway.

[to here]

[In M1]

The second intercom message had startled Alphonse, and the chilling change to the doctor's voice threw him off more (though if he were honest he had expected something of the sort). He didn't waste much time, grabbing the 'magic torch' Link had told him about and searching around the rest of his side of the room.

A keyring in the desk and what he could only assume were batteries for the flashlight were the only really useful things he found. Still, it was better than nothing, and after he switched the slippers for shoes he slipped out of his room. Setting down the hallway at a trot, he turned down toward the entrance to the block.

[to here]

Under any other circumstances, Klavier would have berated himself on wasting so much time and getting so little accomplished over the course of an entire day. But when he found himself waking with a fever and a pounding headache, it suddenly seemed like a much better idea to slow down and tend to his health. ...That and he was terrified he had managed to fall victim to the current epidemic, and he wasn't quite sure what would be the best course of action. Exposing himself to the populace didn't seem like the best option, in any case.

He'd spent his morning trying to force himself to remain calm, sifting through his notes, and dealing with the constant harassment of his nurse... who simply couldn't fathom why he refused to take whatever pills she was trying to shove down his gullet.

Maybe it was because he'd refused the pills or maybe it was because he had successfully kept himself from getting too agitated, but he had slowly recovered over the course of the day. Enough that he felt up to venturing out for what little remained of the day. He was plagued with little more than a headache at the moment, so there was little point in allowing himself to remain completely useless. Did his fading symptoms mean he didn't have what others were getting? Or did everyone go through ups and downs? Nigredo had seemed alright the day before, so perhaps...

In any event, perhaps he should take this as a sign that he couldn't afford to delay his progress any further. A wake up call... or a warning, perhaps, from the powers that be. At the very least, he needed to obtain some of these flowers that supposedly cured what was spreading. Assuming they were still available to be found, that is.

...Funny, isn't it? How much time had they all wasted trying to figure out this illness instead of looking for ways out of this mess? Heh. Bravo, Herr Doktor.

Well. Nothing could be done one way or the other until nightfall. For now, he abandoned his continuously annoying nurse to venture into the Sun Room and examine the bulletin board. He'd missed out on an entire day's worth of "gossip", after all. He almost dreaded what might be waiting for him there.

[Flora!]

[From here.]

The whole process of walking through a portal was not something Guy could get used to so easily, but he still did his best to grit his teeth and bear the unpleasant disorientation.

In this case, though, the change was so jarring that he ended up stumbling right into a counter. He grabbed onto it to keep his balance, and it was only then that he was able to take in the area around him. At first he wasn't even able to recognize the room, but the rows of shelves and the counter he was slumped against made it clear it was Doyleton.

Guy clicked on his flashlight and then aimed it at one of the shelves, where he saw a number of kitchen supplies hanging. So that's where they were...

After letting out a breath, Guy turned to the rest of the group. "So you really can get out this far." Come to think of it, wasn't there a chance that some of those zombies could be shambling around? If that was the case, then they probably shouldn't spend much time here. "We'd better be careful." For all he knew, one of those undead things was in the store with them.

((From here.))

The moment he passed through the door, Claude was once again assaulted with a wave of dizziness, and the feeling that his stomach had jumped straight into his throat. His feet stumbled against what he realized was blue and white tile. After he regained his balance, Claude looked up to find the familiar sight of the men's bathrooms -- more specifically, the one they used when getting ready for a shower.

"Oh, come on," he huffed. "A bathroom? Really?"

Then again, what else should he have expected? It wasn't like Landel was going to let them walk out of that last room without any troubles.

[From here.]

While Guy had been on guard even while exiting out into the greenhouse yard, there was no way he could have prepared for what came next. For a split second it felt like he was falling straight down, and in the next moment he got hit with a wave of dizziness that caused him to sway in place. Why did this feel... strangely familiar?

When he opened his eyes and saw a plain, indoor room around him instead of what he'd expected, Guy had to stare at the surroundings in confusion for a few seconds. This looked like some kind of lounge or therapy room, maybe even one he'd been to before. It was so unremarkable that it was hard to remember. The only things that stood out were a few pictures on the walls and a water cooler.

Wherever they were, this made no sense. How had they ended up here?

Guy placed a hand to his head to try and dispel the dizziness, and then turned to the rest of his friends. "What just happened?"

[From here.]

Just straight down this hall, and they would reach the greenhouse yard. Castiel fought for his breath as he worked to move down it at a decent pace, but his arms were starting to burn up from holding all his weight, a threat that they might give out on him.

He paused for a moment to lean himself against the wall while releasing his hold on the crutches. He offered Lust an apologetic look as he did so, but said nothing. Words like "sorry" didn't come easy to him in the first place.

"This is the hall where the doctors see patients, I believe," he said, if only because that would perhaps keep Lust from asking after him. That was the last thing he needed at this point. Castiel didn't have any regrets about undergoing that surgery, and so he didn't need people fretting over him.

[From here.]

It seemed that they really were the first pair of people heading out this way, if the silence in this part of the hall was anything to judge by. Castiel could hear some voices behind them, so there was a chance that other patients would catch up with them soon.

That was fine. With any luck, there would be enough flowers to go around. And if something did end up attacking them, it would be better to have back-up.

As he tried to force his wounded body closer to the next hall they'd need to take to reach the greenhouse yard, Castiel glanced over at Lust. "How about you?" he asked. "Who are you doing this for?" He found it hard to believe that she was coming out of the goodness of her artificial heart.

[From here.]

They'd already neared the Sun Room and the door that led to the building's exit, but Castiel wasn't aiming for either one tonight. It was still quiet on this side of the building, which seemed strange to him. He was using crutches, after all... He would have expected that plenty of other patients would have beaten him and Lust to this point.

It didn't matter. If their path wasn't littered with obstacles, that would make it easier to reach the greenhouse. As for Lust's question...

"There is one person I know who I believe is still ill," he explained. "Her name is Aigis. She used to be an android, though she's been made human here." Just like him, and perhaps just like Lust. Though she was a created human, so he had no idea if she could ever be the real thing. Did she even have a soul? There was no way he would be able to feel for it in this place; he didn't have that kind of power at the moment.

"We have a few things in common, but she hasn't been taking her illness very seriously." Which frustrated him, especially since she had struck him as the goal-oriented type. Did she really have that little concern for her own well-being?

...And do try not to get lost. That wasn't an idle threat. Lana still wasn't sure what he'd meant in his first announcement or the dinner announcement -- she wasn't trying to hide the fact that she was ill, now, and the nurse who'd accompanied her back to her room hadn't said a word about additional treatment. Nor had Lana asked. He might have meant the patient efforts, but somehow, it didn't ring right. He didn't generally go in for complete contradictions between the two late-evening announcements. More that one was straightforward and the other wasn't, though which was which changed from day to day, and he hadn't even chided them for taking matters into their own hands. Notes had been disappearing, but that happened any time people were sloppy and mentioned activities after dark.

So there must have been something else happening, and Lana hadn't been subject to it. And there was going to be something disorienting them tonight, whether it was physical or mental.

It didn't mean she had any good choices other than trying to get to the greenhouse, possibly alone. Possibly she'd been too confident when she'd refused Ryuuzaki's offer of assistance. She might need to work on that, assuming she survived the night.

She threw her coat on, checked that the gun was still safely in the pocket, and strode out of her room as fast as she could without running out of breath.

[to here]

[from here --and waiting for Ryusei!]

There still wasn't a lot of people in the halls, and it was starting to make him nervous. Maybe he should try to find someone to hang out with tonight. Snow and Celty had insisted on how Mikado shouldn't be alone at night--it wouldn't hurt to take their advice. But it would be strange to just go up to someone and ask to walk around with them.

...Wouldn't it?

He made a face, and paused in the hall, looking around. He was more aware of the bandages covering his eye in the dim, and even wearing his own clothes didn't negate that uncomfortability. He was suddenly starting to think he should have just stayed inside.

"Goodness, is it really already time for dinner? Time certainly does fly! And such a lovely day, too. I certainly wouldn't mind having a nice cup of cocoa out on the patio or something..."

That was how the Head Doctor greeted them, although it apparently didn't take him long to realize he'd gotten a little off topic.

"Now then, it's time for the nurses to escort you all back to your rooms, where you'll have the opportunity to tuck into a scrumptious plate of turkey and gravy. And, of course, we always carry vegetarian options for those who don't eat meat. We also have our usual assortment of water, juice and milk.

"Also, some of you will be receiving some extra help in warding off whatever bug some of us have been catching. Please take care, everyone, and be sure to wash your hands! I'll talk to you all again later. Enjoy your dinner."

The intercom clicked off, leaving patients with the prospect of preparing for yet another grueling Nightshift.

((Respond to this post with your character's room number in the subject line. New room assignments are listed here. If you have any questions, let us know!))

When the last of the announcement faded from the air, Lloyd frowned, rubbing the back of his neck. So they wouldn't be eating in the cafeteria after all. It was a good thing he'd arranged a backup plan with Kratos, but he kind of wished there was a way to know in case he wanted to meet with someone else another time. Letting out a breath, he decided it didn't really matter right now. This time, at least, he was prepared.

Once the teen was given his bag lunch, he headed to a table in the Sun Room to sit down and started scanning the room. He didn't know where Kratos had been during the last shift, but he expected to see him any minute. Expected and hoped. Curiosity gnawed at him with each passing moment. Why had the man taken down part of his note the day before then asked to talk to him later? He must have really meant it, too, because he'd written another note to Lloyd today to arrange to meet up with him.

And yet, some part of Lloyd that sat curled and bitter in the back of his throat wondered. Wondered if he'd actually show up.

[For Kratos.]

After that miserable breakfast, Kratos was truly ready to go hide himself away in some dark corner of a room and refuse to speak to anyone for the rest of the day. It was utterly pathetic that he was actually giving that kind of behavior serious thought, but somehow, in the wake of Sora's death, everything, from company to even eating, seemed too loud or too exhaustive; his energy seemed to slip away the instant he gained it.

Ironically, this behavior was not previously unknown to him; it was just that the last time he'd fallen into this kind of slump, his circumstances were such that engaging in extreme antisocial behavior and refusing to eat did not carry severe consequences like they--that was also pathetic, that he'd just entertained the idea that the days following Anna's death could have been more bearable than now. Could he possibly frustrate himself even more? The paradoxical part was that he enjoyed doing it in a strange, perverse way.

He wrote out a few listless, largely formulaic responses over the board to some notes he'd pinned up right before breakfast, and then wandered over to a nearby couch, where he sat down, stared at the coffee table for a moment, and then slumped back against the couch, one hand draped across his eyes, with a sigh. For a few seconds, he stayed that way, letting the wave of emotion wash over him--it was simply too much; he had reached the point where he was willing to give up and acknowledge that--and then, as if a switch had been flicked, Kratos straightened up, everything once again carefully masked. He exhaled, slow and steady, and looked down just in time to see a cat pass by, meowing for his attention.

He wasn't particularly fond of animals, as he'd once told Lloyd, but right now, all he wanted was something to distract him, and a cat was much preferred to a person; after all, the cat didn't talk, nor did it require him to talk. Kratos reached down to scratch it between the ears and then paused as it leaped onto the couch to curl up next to him. It was a stretch to think that he might be able to spend an entire shift petting a cat (also pathetic, but in a different way), but he would do it for however long it held his attention, or vice versa.

[Flora!]