A child alone and unwatched over may have been a strange sight on another day. Here, it seemed, he would be ignored, the rain giving the effect of caretakers forcing patients inside, and the townspeople did their best to overlook a small presence, bedraggled as that one was. Their irritation was almost soothing; a familiar sensation when nothing else was.

He didn't remember leaving the video store. He didn't know where Yomi had went. He felt as sick as he had been at that place.

He had been moving, stumbling down an aisle without realizing. He came to a halt, leaning heavily against a shelf, one arm wrapped around his lower torso, the other splayed over his face.

Movement... was as faltering as progress.

[for a sibling.]

[ Continued from here. ]

The damn burger place was actually the last place Haseo would have wanted to revisit after the previous week, but there was little other choice when practically dragging the distraught Endrance along with him and trying to find an appropriate shelter: he couldn't be certain anywhere else close would have somewhere to sit down, and the only other place he'd actually been inside of - the grocery store - had been somewhere Endrance had also been in when the town had been full of zombies.

This was where Haseo had been with Leon and Kibitoshin when the nightmare started, but... well, he couldn't remember if he'd ever mentioned that particular piece of information to Endrance or not, and at the moment going somewhere that wasn't as bad to Endrance, even if it was more unsettling to Haseo, was more important. Most of the places were enough to make Haseo feel secretly sick to his stomach anyway.

Hurrying through the door, he immediately guided the Blade Brandier to the side, behind a dividing booth and by a window sporting a display that mostly blocked it. He couldn't keep from staring around a bit (was that chair over there the one he'd used as a weapon?), and his mind was strangely blank, but he'd gotten alright at doing things without thinking. If only that could work all the time.

"Sit," he said seriously, and made to do the same.

The town did show signs of damage, but not the kind Indy would have expected--it looked more like petty vandalism than the aftereffects of an onslaught of the living dead. The yellow symbols, the same as the ones on the Institute's uniforms, seemed to be meant to suggest Landel's, but he wasn't sure what the point was. A patient causing trouble, or a half-hearted attempt by someone else to explain the residual damage?

He didn't have any particular destination in mind, so Indy ambled through town and turned in at the electronics shop. Might as well make a day out of learning about the future, he decided, and it was as good a place to get out of the drizzle as any. He took off his cap as he entered and nodded at the woman behind the counter. She didn't look pleased to see him. Since his pockets were empty except for a handful of coupons, Indy couldn't blame her.

Idly, he wandered over to the display of television sets and inspected what looked like the nearest model. "Look at the size of that screen," Indy marveled quietly to himself. The picture was in color--almost astoundingly natural-looking in comparison to the Technicolor films that had been getting more popular lately--and so clear you practically felt like you could step into it. Things had come a long way since 1938.

[Carter}

[From here.]

Easily forgiven? Unlikely. A pair of (presumably) mental patient committing theft. No, it was highly unlikely they would be easily forgiven. Conscience-wise? It wouldn't even stain his thoughts, really. Nothing like ten years of judgemental slaughter to make your mind jaded against the simpler crimes in the world.

Either way, it could prove to be... okay, he didn't want to say fun because not much about Venom was even slightly amusing (and Edward was very much ignoring the teenage part of him that was all ready to rebel), but it could prove to be adventurous. Especially since he didn't have the agility nor the power to make the feat easy. Having Alice play the stock market wasn't exactly the most hands-on way of stealing after all. It couldn't really be called stealing, after all... it was just using her naturally-created gifts to further the family's fortune.

So his morals were a little skewed. That was okay with him.

Once he'd left the polluted bus behind him - fresh air, thank god - he smiled to see the sky completely overcast, the smallest drops of water misting through the air. He shrugged into the obnoxiously bright raincoat he'd been given, tucking the coupons and the untouched breakfast into one of the pockets, covering his face with the hood. The suit he was wearing was a little worse for wear, but the vampire wasn't exactly looking forward to marching around damp.

Waiting just off to the side for Venom, Edward surveyed what he could see of the town so far. It didn't seen very big... which was good, he supposed. That way it would be easier to navigate. Now that the first order of business had been planned, they would need to find the right outlet for their theft opportunity.

"I look like a hobo," Yuffie whinged.

"You look lovely," her nurse consoled.

Yuffie was having none of it. "Hobos aren't lovely," she argued. "They're smelly and gross and they try to steal your small change." And then they realize who you are, and why they've suddenly got their feet jammed up the exhaust pipes of two separate trucks. And then they wet themselves (though that might've just been the cheap booze they'd been guzzling; she hadn't stuck around to find out).

Plucky sighed, ushering Yuffie firmly onto the bus. "Sit by the front," she said, still affecting that disconcertingly soothing air. "In case you feel ill."

In case? In case? "There's no 'in case' about it! You could always let me walk, y'know. Or, like, hook up a skateboard to the back of this bolt-bucket. That'd be mad cool, huh, don'tcha think? Near death-experiences always did help keep dinner down the trap-hole." Well, it was true. They did help, adrenalin being awesome like that. Unfortunately, Plucky was a prude, stubborn, and a complete party-pooper. All she did was shove a breakfast bag into Yuffie's hands—orange juice, thank gawd—before gliding away.

Left alone, it was all Yuffie could do not to fall into the biggest sulk of the century. If she didn't look like a hobo, she at least looked like she'd crashed into three separate wardrobes and come out wearing whatever fell on her first. And, and! And, the jeans! Why in Leviathan's name would anybody consent to wearing something so restrictive? They were like death in denim form.

Admittedly, part of her ire—most of it—was down to how far she'd gotten last night.

Because she hadn't. Gotten far. At all. Ugh!

She dropped her head forward, then knocked it back once, hard, against the seat. It's just one of those things, she could hear her old man say. Nothing you can do, he'd add, so you might as well go along with it. Crotchety, senile old jerk, always talkin' like he had the answer to everything right there in the palm of his hands. What a dumb way to live.

[Kurogane?]

[From here]

Who needed flashlights when you had mad ninja skills?

Yup, Yuffie was good. All senses primed and ready for action, just in case any action decided to come along and, y'know, happen. Which was about as likely as Barret turning up with a basket of posies and a bottle of blueberry wine.

She kicked back against the wall a few meters away from the door, shuriken half behind, half to the side. There were no shadows deeper than any of the others for her to dramatically skulk around in yet, so she shrugged off the reflexive urge to seek one out. She'd give it a couple of minutes, to see if John (or anybody else interesting) turned up, and then she'd move on. The night waited for no-one, least of all when you were under the thumb of a madman who thought regular, predictable wake-up calls were for lesser beings.

Which they kind of were, but that wasn't the point.

So much for a relaxing shower. Anise couldn't possibly relax around someone with a voice like that! This was beyond weird. How could a girl who didn't have any relation to Sync have the exact same voice as him?

And what made it even weirder was that this wasn't even the first time Anise had encountered something like that. There was a boy, who also had tattoos like hers, who sounded just like Luke. What was his name? It was so long ago, Anise couldn't remember. Maybe she'd know it if she heard it again, but...

That gave her an idea. She wasn't using her journal for much besides cooking notes, recipes, and a few room numbers, right? Maybe from now on, whenever she saw or heard something really strange or suspicious, she'd write it down. Then, if it happened again or she learned more about it, she could look back to the entry and add the details. She'd call it... 'Anise's Mystery Diary.' That sounded kind of cool!

During the lunch shift, Anise worked on putting as many memories as possible to paper. The radio man, the rumored third floor, the ruins she found last night, things like that. By the time fourth shift rolled around, she wasn't quite done yet. It was getting harder to think of more things to write about, even though she was sure there were hundreds of mysteries in the institute. Maybe she'd feel more inspired if she took her writing outside.

"Oh, Dolores!" A nurse came to stop her as she was walking out the door. "If you're going outside, you should put on a coat! We wouldn't want you catching a cold." Even though Anise disliked being assisted by the nurses, she cooperated as the woman helped her into the coat, quickly putting Tokunaga back in its place on her back when they were finished. It did look kind of cold out, so there was no point in arguing.

Outside, Anise found herself a bench to sit on while she wrote some more in her journal. Occasionally she'd pause and fidget with the pen for a bit, or doodle some stars and other shapes into the corner of the page she was on, unsure of what to write next.

[free!]

The world seemed to move more slowly in the showers. Kaworu believed it was the strange half-realized familiarity. He could remember the feeling from before. His mind reached for similarities, of which there were many, but each one was slightly inaccurate. The size was different, the tiles were not the same colors as either the facilities at SEELE, or those at NERV. The only two places he had bathed during his life.

He had spent years in the rooms SEELE had set aside for him, and so it would have been reasonable if that was what he remembered first. A small, practical room with very clean faucets, attached to the room where he slept. Beyond that, the laboratories. One of the spaces had been cleared out, and a piano had been moved in. That was years ago, but Kaworu wasn't precisely sure of the numbers. Ten years ago, possibly? But it was rare that he thought of these places now. Even when they had been the extent of his life, the very limits of his world, he had rarely looked at them. Now they only served as a comparison. Those memories seemed lifeless, and brought him no happiness, except in their passing.

NERV's showers had shown signs of rusting, hidden around the edges of the metal pipes. He had noticed it for a second, but he couldn't bring up any other specific images that didn't include Shinji. And when Shinji was present, he absorbed all of Kaworu's attention. Kaworu would only be passively aware of the setting then.

Kaworu shed his clothing when asked, stopping to fold them haphazardly in an imitation of what Lilim had often done for him in the past. The folds were lumpy, but he left them as they were and walked across the cool tiles. They were still dry, and the bare skin of his feet felt almost sticky on them, having been too warm in his slippers earlier. Soon the room would be heavy and damp with steam.

He reached to the first available faucet, and bowing his head and closing his eyes, he let the stream of cold water hit him. The same ritual as before. Kaworu felt awake for a second, and shuddered in the cold until it slowly climbed to higher temperatures.

[For Shinji, strict reserve.]

Luckily for Mele, the night had ended before Tenzen had changed his mind and deemed Mele appropriate for target practice. Even if the situation of who was mocking who had seemed to change into the Iga ninja's favor. Despite her behavior, perhaps the insolent woman could serve some sort of use nonetheless. He had been trapped in this place for a week by now, he would not accomplish anything on his own.

A week was a long time, a lot could have happened. Of course, he was thinking of the war, the bloody clash of two rivaling ninja clans, whose hatred had gone back for four hundred years. After that infuriating peace treaty had been broken, he, too, could finally release the hatred. And despite their losses, Tenzen had been certain that the Iga clan - no, that he would be the one to remain standing.

Four had remained on both sides a week ago...had the remaining Kouga already been killed? Or had they somehow succeeded in disposing of the remaining three Iga (excluding himself) during his absence? Of those three, two were blind. The situation was not a favorable one, and with himself trapped here before he could return from death, he had to wonder if the Kouga had removed the name 'Yakushiji Tenzen' from the scroll and would believe they had eliminated all of Iga's chosen ten.

The thought - along with no manner of telling this - was enough to make his jaw tighten. The longer he would remain here...

But as unfuriating as it was, it would not help him return. After confirming the presence of the scalpels he had retrieved, a nurse entered his room to escort him to the cafeteria for ridiculous Western breakfast. Unfortunately, the same ridiculous food was the only source of nutrition.

Upon entering, the ninja noticed he was the first to arrive to the area. After deciding on a salad rather than these so-called 'pancakes', he moved to one of the many vacant seats.

[Free to a good home. No limits!]

[ from here ]

To say that Rolo was happy that he actually fulfilled his objective for the night was an understatement, and were it not for the pull of fabric against his skin reminding him that Greta was still with him, he would have just ran into the chemical storage and shut the door immediately. Instead, he looked behind him in slight confusion as the both of them filed into the room, giving Greta a glance before he closed the door behind him. The group outside didn't seem interested in following, which Rolo wasn't going to complain about.

"... You can let go of my shirt now," The assassin mumbled quietly, turning his flashlight beam to the walls of the room. The light revealed cabinets upon cabinets holding the aforementioned chemicals, plus other cabinets that held unknown objects for now. While Rolo was tempted to grab the first set of poisons his hands could reach, he had a slightly different plan for now.

Inventory. Not an exact one, but Rolo wanted to get a better feel for what this room had to offer, which was why he went for the blue cabinets first, the ones that didn't reveal their contents immediately. As for Greta, it seemed like Rolo had completely forgotten about her in favor of investigating the room.

[from here]

S.T. stopped as soon as he'd reached the side hall and took a deep breath. It still smelled like roadkill, but at a lower concentration. A few parts per million. Fucking boxcars.

The incipient catechism was interrupted by a brief word from their sponsors. He wiped his eyes and nose surreptitiously as he stopped to tune in.

"Lame." The word came out like a belch, guttural and dismissive. "Tell us something we didn't already know."

Carter wasn't going to have a clue. He'd have to head off the questions before they overflowed everywhere. "There was this dude. Jack. On the radio, before my time. The Head Bastard offed him on live coverage. Then he came back as a zombie, returned the favor, and it didn't do a damn bit of good. The intercom announcements sounded like a robot phone sex operator for a few days. Then the whole place rebooted -- Martin Landel, and Jack, at least for a day."

He took a breath. "This was all over the intercom. Could have been just a show, except the zombies were real. And the deaths. The patient ones. Be glad you missed your chance to play Jesus. Shit fucking hurt, man."

There had been ethanol in that supply cabinet, hadn't there. S.T. knew better than to add more volatiles to an already aromatic situation, but he was earmarking one of those for his personal stash.

[from here]

Once Ema and Agatha made their way upstairs, they were officially in unfamiliar territory. At least, it was unfamiliar to Ema; the girl had no idea where Agatha had and had not been. She figured it was time to check in with the other party. Even if there was an unspoken agreement that Agatha was the leader of the pair, Ema still wanted to know what exactly was going on.

"Do you know where we're going, exactly? Is our stuff up here?" It was possible that Agatha had gotten some sort of tip, after all. Ema wished she had checked the bulletin board more closely when the pair had checked it before dinner instead of simply correcting someone else's scientifically impossible assertion. It would have been nice to have been more fully informed.

A bed could be made out of many different materials. Straw beds were nice but could be rather itchy, not to mention you'd be pulling bits of straw out of your tail for weeks! Ranulf didn't like feather beds much either, although he didn't suppose he had a wide variety he'd slept in to make a valid opinion of. He'd tossed and turned in the one he'd had the privilege to lie in before, and after half an hour had chosen to sleep on the rug instead. This was the main reason, of course, that he'd chosen to sleep on the tall stone altar in the Serenes Forest that night rather than do what an ordinary person would by making a bed out of piles of dead leaves and other assorted forest debris. The altar was firm and had an odd sort of energy to it that comforted him as he drifted off, much like a heartbeat would to a young kit. This resonance, paired with the ambient noise of the forest, was like a lullaby as he'd closed his eyes and drifted off into unconsciousness.

This, perhaps, was why he realized something was wrong. Half-asleep, eyes still shut tight and attempting to block out the possibility of his body even attempting to awaken, he felt something was off. No not off . . .missing. Ahhh, man, now he couldn't get back to sleep. He probably just needed to roll over. Yeah, that must be it. Ranulf reached down to move his tail out of the way- and his eyes shot wide open as his hand grasped nothing.

"Wha.. What?"

He sat up quickly in the dark, both hands now scrabbling across the lower half of his backside trying to locate the appendage that somehow no longer existed. Ranulf tried to reason with himself. This had to be a dream! Tails didn't just... well... disappear! He brought his arms around his knees, attempting to collect his thoughts. As he did, his mind realized a missing tail may be the least of his worries. The noise of the forest had disappeared, the altar he'd been sleeping on replaced with some kind of... what was this? A boxy mattress? He pressed down on it a few times, feeling his hands give a sort of spring as they bounced back up again, the strange bed squeaking in protest. Something must have been wrong with it though because the squeak wasn't nearly loud enough. Then again, now that he thought about it, everything seemed quieter. He reached up to dig his right pinky into his ear and ended up nicking himself in the side of the head. His ears!

( Ranulf's long intro-post XD )

[to here]

Entering the greenhouse was almost like coming home, and Hanatarou had been looking forward to this shift for that reason. Everywhere else in the building was strange and confusing (and often dangerous) but in here was the familiar scent of soil and sun-warmed plants with the musty sort of enclosed-space smell overlaying it. His expression turned into something approaching a smile as he glanced around, moving ahead of his nurse for once.

She seemed encouraged by his enthusiasm, and stopped him long enough to offer him a tray of seedlings, with the suggestion that he go ahead and transplant them into an empty space in the herb bed. He bobbed his head in a vague sort of nod and settled down, almost cheerfully digging a small hole in the indicated spot and reaching inside to test how dry the soil was. Maybe if he didn't look around, he could pretend he was back at work in the 4th Division headquarters....

[free]

Scott wasn't really what one would call the sporty type, at least not currently. In the past, maybe. He could have called himself a hockey player at one point - in grade two (it totally counted). And he had been a jock in high school, hadn't he (he had at least played a lot of Track & Field for the NES, anyway)? Regardless of what his athletic status may or may not have been, sports weren't really what the Scott Pilgrim of nowadays was associated with. He was a fighter, not a lover sports guy. Still, he was surprisingly excited to be going out to the Rec Field. Maybe he wouldn't get any games on, but he could still work off those pesky bullet wounds, right?

He walked as fast as the crutch would let him despite the protests of his nurse and his injured limbs. His hand could grip just well enough to keep the crutch steady under his right arm (gravity did most of the work), and he was thus able to keep a good pace. "All right, not doing bad so far," Scott said to himself with a grin as he hobbled quickly across the field, heading for the goalposts on the far end. He had worked up a surprisingly steady stride by the time he got close to them. Crutch forward, then left leg swung out in front of it. Crutch, leg, crutch, leg, crutch, leg. Nothing to it! Sure, his shoulder was hurting like burning. Sure, his right leg was still giving him similar pain on a smaller scale despite not having weight put on it. Sure, his animal brain was constantly shouting, "WHY WON'T YOU STOP?!" Other than that, though, he was a-okay. He was determined to be. Otherwise, it was Game Over, wasn't it?

Soon he reached the goalposts and stopped, much to the relief of his limbs. He hadn't really gone to this spot for any specific reason. He had just wanted to prove to himself that he wasn't that hampered by his injuries. For now, he seemed to have made a good case for the affirmative on that point. He knew that he couldn't just stop at moving forward, though. He had to see how good he was going to be at fighting in this condition. How was his moveset going to be modified with a crutch added and an arm taken away? That was the million dollar ($1176470.59 CDN) question, wasn't it?

He tried something simple to start - a standing kick with his good leg. He quickly raised his left leg while leaning his armpit against the crutch, lightly touching the goalpost with the sole of his foot. Nothing bad so far. He did the same thing again, only harder. A small wave of pain shot from one leg to the other, causing him to wobble on his crutch a bit. Scott grit his teeth, not liking that result at all. This time he decided to try a small jump kick, just to spite that stupid injury. After backing up a good few inches, he pushed both feet off the ground. "Hiiiiya!" With the end of his crutch still on the ground, he gave himself a bit of extra momentum, letting it fling him toward the goalpost with his left leg outstretched.

One didn't have to be able to predict the future to know what that the result of that was going to be. Foot connected hard with goalpost. Rebound pushed him back against the crutch. Center of gravity over the crutch shifted too far back. Pain shot through both his legs and his injured arm again. This and the gravity shift caused him to let go of the crutch entirely. Body flew back over the crutch and crashed on the ground slightly behind it. Bum (among other things) ended up stinging and covered in grass stains.

"Owwwwww," Scott groaned to himself, fumbling for the crutch. It was in an awkward position, just beyond the reach of his good arm. ". . . Well, could've gone worse, I guess," he told himself as he used his left foot to start pushing the crutch back toward his hand.

[For Keman at first, then Peter and Indy later.]

It had all been going so well!

Seeing Cloud and Aerith(!) again had brought a now unfamiliar lightness to her shoulders. Work would be harder from here on out, but she wasn't on her own anymore. She was getting a second chance she'd never thought was possible. And then, then they'd trekked outside, totally ready to face the fog and the unknown (privately, the ninja had been a little worried; it couldn't happen again, it just couldn't, but what if it did?)—only to wake up. In their beds. As usual. Gaaaaaawd—!

"I just want you to know," Yuffie informed her nurse, grabbing her journal from the desk on her way out, "that your hair looks spectacularly god-awful today. What did you do, stick your tongue in a socket? I'm not exactly hip on fashion, too busy badass for that fluffy stuff, but—"

Plucky looked ready to plant her face in her hands. Or to plant her hands somewhere else. To her credit, and much to Yuffie's eternal disappointment, she did—tried to do—neither. "One of those days, is it?" the nurse sighed, disapproval incarnate. "Well. You're just going to have to behave; the new batches of patients are due today. We don't want to make a bad impression."

"I am feeling so completely convinced of my wrongdoing," Yuffie confided. They stepped into the cafeteria, practically empty as of yet. The chocolate cake last night had worked a treat, whetting her appetite. Honestly, she was getting sick of pecking at scraps like a runt Chocobo in the snow plains—but not literally, of course. Ew. She got more than enough of that on those damn buses once a week. Now that AVALANCHE really was dropping onto her lap—and remind her to get the hell out of dodge if Barret ever took his turn—she couldn't afford not to keep her strength up. For one, she'd be a liability. For two, she'd get her spine chewed out.

"Fruit," said Plucky, hovering as her charge picked out her choices for the day. Rolling her eyes, Yuffie grabbed an apple, slinging it onto the tray alongside an 'English' sandwich. "That'll do. I'll leave you to your breakfast, now." Somehow, that sounded about as comforting as 'My name is Don Corneo and I am raiding through your panty draw', and Yuffie was stopping that thought right there. Oh, god. Eurk. Bad, bad, bad! Bad, brain. Bad. That—yeah, no. Just, no. 'Sides, the guy was as dead as a doornail, splatted across Da Chao's feet. Dirtying them, really, but somehow Yuffie couldn't bring herself to be sorry about that.

(And it wasn't like the creep'd ever end up here, right? Right!)

She took to a seat, dropping her tray and her journal both onto the table. The book fell pages-down; Yuffie flipped it over, thumbing through to the middle as she worked through her apple. An almost finished map of Gaia stared back at her, neat as she could ever manage. Dots for major locations, squiggles for mountains. Stars for the materia caves, Chocobos for the tracks. All labelled in Wutaian. It was just a little piece of the home she absolutely had to get back to, 'cuz Leviathan knew what kind of trouble they'd be up to their necks in without her.

[For Donna]

Kaworu immediately gravitated towards the keyboard. It was not a piano, not truly, but it was attractive in all of the same ways. Music freed the mind from conscious thought, and Kaworu was feeling exceptionally weighed down by exactly that. There was a heaviness, as well as a lightness. He did not know where to begin approaching the situation with Shinji. It was a simple task to forget such things when the problem itself was caused by such an enamoring distraction.

Shinji needed to survive, he was supposed to continue, and yet he was here. This place would take his life without needing a reason. A soul so important could simply be put out, and the world would continue as it always had. It seemed wrong, but was it because it was not the way things should be, or simply because Kaworu wished it were so?

And yet, Kaworu could not say he was unhappy. He had done nothing to earn himself more time with Shinji. He had made his decision, and created for himself a fate apart from the Lilim. But as much as many Lilim wished the world to work in those terms, it rarely did. Events would move into place regardless of their actions. It was rare that something happened because an individual deserved it. It was only chance. Kaworu knew that he should not have been glad, but being with Shinji was indescribable.

His long, bony fingers moved across the keys easily, constructing Ode to Joy with each progressive note.

[Reserved for Albedo.]

The mere fact that she'd been susceptible to whatever hold the Institute had had on her yesterday was sufficient to leave Ayumu both upset and angry - no, not angry, downright furious, both at herself and whoever was responsible for that. But there was also the fact that because of it, she'd lost out on an entire day of work, and in several ways had ruined some of what she'd done already. That little conversation with Himura the day before, for instance, was something she'd sincerely prefer not to remember if she'd had any choice in the matter.

Unless the man was a complete moron, which, unfortunately, was one thing she couldn't believe of him, he had to have realized just who her brother was. After all the effort to keep that fact quiet (not exactly a secret, but certainly not advertised; half the Shinsengumi probably never even realized it because there was no reason to) she'd gone and chatted about it with him. Told him all about it, practically painted a bright target around a weakness that shouldn't have existed in the first place.

She'd spent the shift in the Sun Room pretending to sleep, while in truth forcing herself into calm. After years of practice she could shunt away the useless and distracting emotions, focusing only on what was important and needed to be at the forefront of her mind, and by the time the intercom signaled the lunch period she was feeling considerably calmer. The time to silently observe others had, as well, alerted her to something she probably should have noticed earlier: Mello was back. Would her previous objective be reinstated now? He seemed to have far less of a bulletin presence this time, so perhaps not. Still, though, it bore investigating.

None of her thoughts were visible, of course, as she moved through the line, examining the lunch selection somewhat dubiously. Now with the benefit of Yuuko's memories she might recognize the food, but she certainly didn't share the enthusiasm for it that her imaginary self apparently had. Ayumu skipped past that part and settled for the salad bar and some bread, then positioned herself in a place where she could watch both the door and the rest of the room, setting her journal open in front of herself as though planning to write something. There was far too much that she'd missed, too much work to do now.

[for Okita]

Peter woke up suddenly, his body twisting in the bed and then forcing him to catch his breath in pain. Pain, which was coming from his middle because of the thing that had scratched him last night, and after that...

After that, Zach had jumped in front of him like some kind of martyr, like the exact opposite of everything Sylar stood for, to take the next hit for him. It got pretty fuzzy after that, so night must have ended right around then.

The man let out a pained grunt as he straightened himself up in bed. For some reason, he got the feeling that he'd slept in. There was no way for him to really tell without a window in the room, but he just knew. The fact that Sam's bed looked long since vacated was another clue.

Sam, but was he Sam again? Had the brainwashing worn off, as he and Roland had hoped, or was he going to have to go through this nightmare for even longer? He didn't know how long he could handle "Zach" and "Harrison" before he started going batty himself.

Pulling himself out of bed, Peter lifted his shirt and saw that he was tightly bandaged. The scratch most likely wasn't nearly as bad as the bite that "Zach" had received, but it still smarted. He let his shirt fall and then had to deal with a nurse chiding him for sleeping through the morning announcements. Not that Peter really cared at the moment. He was too busy thinking about last night and the fact that in a way, he now owed something to Sylar. Except it hadn't been Sylar. That was something he was sure of now.

Lost in his thoughts, Peter reached the Sun Room right as the rest of the patient populace was trickling in from breakfast. Sighing to himself, he headed over to the bulletin board and then saw a note written in familiar yet unpleasant handwriting. Holding his pen in a vice grip, Peter scribbled out a reply and then stalked over to an armchair and fell into it with a huff.

While Sylar was maddeningly frustrating, there was one good thing about the fact that he was himself again. It meant that Nathan was too.

[For Spock!]

For the second time, Rika found herself waking with a start. She blinked at the grey light streaming through the windows, and looked across the room. Anise was still asleep. So. I'm still here. Let me just check...

Rika put on her slippers and walked over to the desk, checking the drawer and breathing a light sigh of relief. Good, the knife was still there. She wasn't sure why it would be there - shouldn't they have confiscated the weapon? Either way, though, as much as she was reluctant to use it, she was glad to have it still there.

Just then, she heard the creak of the open door, and quickly closed the drawer. Her nurse peeked in, whispering, "Rachel? Time for breakfast. You should put on a sweatshirt, it's a bit chilly." Rika nodded, quickly adding the extra layer and following the nurse out into the hall and to the cafeteria.

She was used to a Japanese-style breakfast, so the idea of something sweet - which the nurse was avidly describing, with the waffles and fruit and syrup - was a bit odd. Once she walked in, though, she had to admit it smelled good. She filled her plate with waffles topped with blueberries, some sausage, and eggs, took a glass of orange juice, and took a seat. It seemed she was early, so she took a seat close to one of the windows and waited.

[For Ange.]