Despite the bit of bravado he'd displayed for Yuffie's sake, seeing her that way really had done a number on him. It was a good thing he'd found the bulletin board afterward. Having it confirmed that this state wasn't normal (was, in fact, new as of that morning) made it much easier to think positive. They'd get back the Yuffie they knew one way or another.

The girl had gone into the other activity room, so when Cloud was offered a choice he picked the room she wasn't in. He wouldn't be able to keep a watch on her this way, but neither would she be able to throw another fit over being stalked. This also gave him a chance to keep an eye on the board for anything else important that might show up.

Sighing, the blond made himself comfortable on one of the sofas, watching both the nurses and the cats roaming the floor. What were the people in charge of this place trying to accomplish?

[free]

Today was really trying to rain on her parade, wasn't it?

Well, it wasn't gonna work! Hanna was determined to stay strong and cheerful, in spite of Kenshin throwing a mega bitchfit and that the chick from the library being… Yeah. Her flightiness had been bad enough, but the half glossed-over memories had bordered on terrifying. Had she really been that far gone? It had to have been the meds. Just the meds. Yuffie was a douchey, semi-sociopathic klepto ninja thing, but even in that imagined world of hers, she hadn't gone around slashing people to ribbons for fun. Had she? Ugh, Hanna didn't even know anymore. Crazy people were capable of crazy stuff

Hanna's gut clenched just thinking about it, and she turned determinedly back to her lunch. The food wasn't exactly great, but it was better than some of the stuff she'd eaten. Like Stan's Deep fried Twinkie and mashed banana hot pot. Or, y'know, the normal stuff that teenage semi-runaways ate. Craptastic sandwiches and super economy potato chips, when she could get them, and whatever was in Tiffany's fridge when she couldn't. Dignity was dignity, and dignity was important, but being able to scratch a living from a rock was a handy life skill to have.

Stuffing another few chips in her mouth, Hanna did her best to ignore the door—and, by proxy, anybody who happened to come through it. Nostalgia trip aside, hadn't the Head Nurse said something about a whole new batch of crazycakes? Now she'd feel even more like a sardine than ever. Great.

[ For Cloud? :D ]

There was something fishy going on in the Institute today. All over the bulletin board, people were talking about having "woken up", having been "cured"... and it seemed as though ZEX was one of them. Tanaka wouldn't have recognized the note at all if it hadn't been signed - his wording, his handwriting, even his name had changed - and a part of him still wondered if it had been an imposter, trying to pull the wool over the Captain's allies.

But it'd be easy enough to find out the truth. Whoever it was had agreed to meet him, and Tanaka was waiting for him just outside the cafeteria doors, ready to catch him as he came from breakfast. If "Max" was an imposter, then he'd discover the identity of a hidden enemy. And if he was really ZEX...

...well, he'd have a whole new set of things to worry about.

[for a spoiled rich brat brainwashed Admiral]

Mori woke with a start. He lay on the bed for a moment, staring up at the ceiling and sighed quietly. Another day, another round of shifts and people and-- Wait a minute. Breathing in carefully, Mori's brow knit together as he realized that his ribs were no longer broken. After testing his collarbone, he found that it, too, was healing faster than it should have. Not that he was complaining, but there was something odd about broken bones setting so quickly. Pushing himself up out of bed, the teen shook his head, knowing that he'd have another day or two of the sling and then he'd be free from it.

But more important than that was finding out how Mitsukuni was doing. The last thing he remembered was the bathroom and gathering metal. Since they were together at the end of the night, Mori was certain that Mitsukuni would be fine, but...well, he still liked to confirm such things with his own eyes. With the twins gone and Tamaki still missing, Mori didn't want to take any chances anymore. Especially not with the strange announcements this morning.

As usual, his nurse came to collect him and helped him into his sling. Then he followed her quietly into the cafeteria, taking notice of the unusually empty bulletin board. They really were cracking down on it already. Weird. Even weirder? For once, he was the first into the room. Picking up a tray, he pointed out what he wanted, making sure to take double of the pancakes (asking to keep them away from the sausages for now), double of the strawberry jam and biscuits, and an extra helping of fruit. To top it off? Milk. It'd help his bones mend. Hopefully.

Going to a nearby seat, Mori took a look around the empty room and shivered. Kind of eerie in here without anyone else but the nurses. Someone was certain to come sooner or later though, right? He hoped so at least.

[for Chihaya]

"Take care," Sheena called to her new roommate as she slipped into the hallway.

The girl seemed nice and she wouldn't have minded talking to her more, but the ninja had stuff she needed to do. The more important one being the reaquisition of her ribbon. Now, if only the youkai had it and wasn't going to hold it over her head or something. Sheena had some time to spare since she wasn't meeting up with anyone, but that didn't mean she wanted to be caught up more than fifteen minutes with Yukari. That damn youkai was distracting and... stuff.

Obi ribbons fluttering behind her, the ninja moved quickly down the hallway. Yukari's room had been a few hallways over. She just needed to get there relatively quickly.

As soon as she had the chance, Sheena ninja'd herself out of the cafeteria and away from the conversation she'd been semi-forced to have. She probably could have just clammed up and told the boys to go away, but she'd kind of owed at least Endrance some kind of explanation. It wasn't everyday the embodiment of darkness pops up and delivers a mighty bitch slap.

She stayed close to the door, out of immediate sight, as people left the cafeteria. As soon as she saw him, the ninja grabbed Soubi's sleeve and pulled him quickly to a corner away from the general area where there were only a few chairs. When she let go and turned to say something to him, words failed her and she just stared at him, a little lost about how to talk about what she wanted to talk about.

Then again, did she really want to talk to Soubi about Yukari and what had happened? Soubi obviously knew about these kind of things, but he'd tease her about them. Sheena idly played with the small round bell at the end of a string hanging about her neck, a bright red ribbon that was clearly not her usual pale pink ribbon holding her hair back.

"Umm... Hey."

[closed to Soubi with a later thread-crashing youkai]

The sting of the water on Momo's wounds reminded her exactly where each and every burn was. Between that and the clear plastic wrapping the nurse placed around the long cut up her arm to her shoulder, she decided as little time in the actual spray would be wise. Sitting on a stool out of the direct stream, she went about scrubbing the grit and grime.

It almost felt weird to be alive with her throat intact, but Momo was not about to wish it was otherwise. In the past, maybe, but she remembered who she was and could not allow herself to become what she had been prior to her encounter with the undead knight. Wincing a bit with the pain of washing, she turned her thoughts to her upcoming meeting with Shikamaru. Or rather, she tried to. She still had to see Hitsugaya once she finished her shower.

[closed]

Yuffie had died.

No, really. Seriously. She had actually died. Bleeding all over the place, making a horrid, sticky mess and scaring the hell out of Suzaku; she remembered it clearly. Kind of. Sort of. Through the blood loss, the pain, and the visions. Through Aerith's voice whispering in her ear, Cloud's stricken eyes, and her own panic. As bad nights went, it had been Bad, capital B and all the trimmings, and oh, god. She sat, trembling on the edge of her bed, eyes closed and hands pressed hard over her racing heart. The by-play between Landel—Landel!—and Lydia barely even sunk in. There was nothing in the whole world, any world, that could prepare you for something like…

Had it all been some kind of hallucination?

Had she imagined the whole thing?

No… She didn't think so. Nightmarish or not, Yuffie knew reality. But if it had been real, how was she alive now? That kind of pain wasn't something you could just cook up, was it? She thought about it all the way to the cafeteria, drifting behind her nurse without focus or intent. Maybe if she tried to stay clinical, tried to step back… But she'd never been good at that when things got personal. And every time she closed her eyes or blinked, she swore that the scenes played back to her, like an overused commercial on a crappy channel on a crappy TV, in a run-down dump of an inn that smelled like mothballs and yesterday's breakfast.

The scent of blood and damp, rotted wood clogged her nose. Disgusted, Yuffie shoved her bowl of cereal—handed to her by a clucking Plucky—off to the side so that she could melt into her chair, palm heels scrubbing against her eyes. Too much. This was… Too much. She couldn't even paste a plastic smile on her face to make herself feel better. Her usual shield, the white noise of inane babble that could filter out almost any crisis, was in tatters all around her. Five minutes, she gave herself.

Five minutes (not) to think, five minutes to get her act together, because there was no way she could let herself shatter here. No way…

[Closed to Sheena]

Breaking down the bed frame after she'd eaten some of her meal had given Teresa something to do while she waited for the night time phenomena to arrive. Having not been conscious when it occurred the previous night, she was curious. She was not disappointed. The overhead words were certainly something different.

As the door opened, Teresa finished wrapping shredded bedding around the bottom portion of the six foot long metal bar that had once been a main side support of the bed's frame. It wasn't good quality metal by any means, but it was better than nothing. At least, she didn't think it'd break the first time she hit something with it given her reduced strength. As she hefted the weapon, she swung it around to get a feel and decided that it would do for now. Should she manage to find the right kind of stone or a file, she could even work a rough edge onto it.

A few more strips of cloth and the hybrid tied the makeshift weapon across her back, the 'hilt' sticking a foot and a half above her shoulders, and fashioned the cloth so she could pull on the knot by her right shoulder for a quick release. That done, Teresa took her flashlight and exited the room.

[to here]

Hello! I.R.I.S. here once more to announce to you, our honored guests, that you have officially made it through a day of our typical Landel's treatment. Of course, it isn't quite over: we will now have you retire to our designated patient quarters with one of your agency partners to inspect their sleeping area and the tools that we provide them with for the true bulk of our behavioral testing. On an added note, we would like you to notice once again that the meals we provide to our subjects are of the highest quality.

For those of you feeling apprehensive about taking part in our more intensive methods, please be aware that we would never imagine putting all of you in any danger whatsoever. This last shift will be your last at our Institute; afterward, we will escort you to our Head Doctor's personal observation station to survey some of our test Next-Wave participants in the rigorous trials we put them through – all for their betterment, of course.

Once again, we hope that you are satisfied with what you find, and as always, direct any questions you may have to your console.

The nurses began to escort the patients to their rooms. They didn't even seem to be brought to awareness by words such as "testing" and "subjects."

[ All room threads go in response to this post; please post your character's room number as the subject line of the initial post. (Find all of the newly changed room assignments and shift introductions here.) If you are introducing your character during this shift, you may either choose for them character to wake up before their roommate gets back, or after. ]

It would have been impossible not to see this coming, but after the night he'd had and seeing Euphy in the cafeteria-- hadn't the past twenty-four hours been enough? He couldn't do this anymore, not after seeing her walking around as if nothing had happened and knowing that Suzaku was going through a similar ordeal. His knight-- no, former knight now-- had been so transformed by her death, and having to behave now as if none of that had occurred had to be-- but it was out of Lelouch's hands now. Both of them were, and although he would have liked nothing more than to speak to her again or tell Suzaku why he couldn't tell him what had happened, he couldn't do that to either of them. It would be easier for them this way.

For him, however, the torment was just beginning. There was a wide variety of people the institute staff could have chosen from that would have a deep impact on him, but when the most obvious choice would have the worst-- he couldn't do this! He had spent almost all of his time here carefully shutting out thoughts of Nunnally after Suzaku had told him what would happen to her, but if he had to come face to face with her-- the walls were already beginning to crumble, and if it hadn't been for the fact that he knew his nurse would have grabbed and probably sedated him the instant he tried to bolt, he would have done so immediately.

As things were, he allowed himself to be led placidly through the Sun Room and the main hall, eyes downcast and shoulders beginning to quake ever so slightly with barely contained emotion. Nunnally-- he hadn't had a conversation with her-- a real conversation, not something rushed over the phone that hid more from her than he ever wanted and not something filled with lies and false reassurances, but a real conversation where he could ask how her day had been and lightly cradle her hand in his as she excitedly told him about the latest tidbit Sayoko had told her about Japanese culture or expressed worry about something in class she hadn't fully understood or sweetly smiled at him as she--

Lelouch shut his eyes tightly, barely hearing the nurse as she left him in the lobby to find a seat and somehow keep himself preoccupied while he waited and tried his hardest not to remember what the rest of his conversation with Suzaku had held that night. If he did...

Slowly, he began to walk over to one of the chairs, all but collapsing into it once he'd reached it and sagging forwards so that his elbows rested on his knees and only barely kept him seated upright. He didn't know how much more he could take, and if his visitor was Nunnally, then-- then what? He wasn't sure. And Nunnally-- what was he supposed to tell her? What could he even say? How could anyone expect him to talk to her now as if everything was normal when he had to-- when there was no way he could--

He stared down at the floor and waited, face blank. He would just have to get through this somehow, and after that-- he would deal with that later. He had to.

Snake jerked his head away from Fox's hand and shot to his feet, disorientated slightly by the sudden shift. The grout in the tiles was black with what looked like old blood, and the stench of rot heaved in his throat. Something was badly wrong. He sensed threats - left, faint shapes in the dark outside the large windows - Fox - something creaking in the ceiling - a long groaning voice off to the right, past the walls - and something moving in the back of the room -

It staggered towards him, and before he fully knew what he was doing he ripped the match from the book and struck it with his left hand alone, popped the cap off the hairspray, and blasted a tongue of flame at the aggressor, aiming for its face. He saw, in the flickering light, long hair and long nails and the skin on its rotten face peeling and cracking and bubbling in the heat. It gave a long, screaming cry, and toppled to the floor. Its arms and legs writhed and kicked furiously, an automatic, animal gesture, before it finally lay still.

"Here?" he snapped at Fox, wrapping his fingers around the can of hairspray. "This place gets better and better. It's like a theme park." His voice quaked with anger. The place now stunk of something far worse than rotten meat, and for a fraction of a second he thought he could hear Big Boss's voice saying something he couldn't make out before he realised that it had come from inside his own head.

"At least I don't have to be the only thing here back from the dead," he growled. The woman zombie was leaking something he didn't want to think about. He guessed that the decomposition must have trapped methane and other flammable gasses inside the body, hence why it went up like a candle.

That said, he didn't really think he could burn anything else again. For a while.

There had still been enough time for the nurses to gather everyone and head back, though it didn't keep Yuuhi from staying near Sakura's side, just in case.  What he hadn't expected though, was the sudden change that came early and worst of all, came fast.  In the time it took to draw breath, the scenery around them changed, as if it was some kind of magic, though it certainly wasn't any spell he'd ever heard of.   

He took a step closer to Sakura, concerned about the nurses and townspeople not far off who had started moving with those strange, almost possessed movements.  The same thing had happened on the bus when they'd been stuck with the nurses and he had no desire to repeat the situation.  At least this time they weren't stuck in the cramped bus to fight them.  All the same, it didn't change the fact that they were stuck outside with monsters in sight and Sakura's guardian was nowhere to be found.  

"Stay close," he told Sakura, keeping a smile on despite the sudden change in circumstances.

Usually it wouldn't be a problem to sense Yue's magic, but here, everything was different.  He had a general idea of where they might be though, and that was really all he could hope for.  Keep Sakura safe; he could do that much, couldn't he? 

"We'll find somewhere safe, ok?"

Sangamon had eaten, caffeinated, didn't need any girly crap, and he'd already ascertained that the bookstore was useless for anything beyond the usual purpose -- namely, providing bored housewives with a rotating selection of paperbacks and cookbooks.

Besides, most of the town was stocked with Institute staffers at a Sangamon Taylor to Opposition (STtO) ratio located somewhere between gridiron blitz and Blitzkreig. Good ratio for a petition-signing drive, bad for a fistfight. And another knot of them was coming up the sidewalk, slowly passing a mating pair of local teenagers. Who appeared not to have noticed the town's temporary population increase. S.T. stepped out of the pocket and into an available doorway.

It happened to belong to the toy store. It was quieter than the other stores he'd been in. Maybe just because there wasn't much trouble he could cause in a store catering to litigious yuppies and their ostensibly precocious offspring, who for all their intelligence had not yet mastered the art of containing an oral fixation to appropriate venues. Plastic made-in-China Patent Pending crap.

The primary-color monotony was broken by an outcropping of earth-tone pseudolandscaped papier-mâché. It was a train set and associated paraphenalia. Halfway decent, by the looks of it. O-gauge, attention to detail in the extruded plastic, perfectly to scale if you ignored the three-foot-tall (scale equivalent) smiley faces on the front of each car. Not like that was much of a change. He found the control box and started twisting the big friendly dial.

Flick.

Neutral. Transformers hummed with excess power, electrical potential looming like a thunderstorm cell.

Flick.

Reverse. The engine seemed to sigh. Then it restarted its rhythmic pilgrimage, course as fixed as its (increasingly ironic) grin.

[for Phoenix and his jailbait armada entourage]

[continued thread from here]

Hahaha~ Poor Sheena. At this rate, she was doomed. At least it was a playful kind of doomed. Sheena was her friend after all, and if Harley actually felt the girlie was in any danger, she wouldn't have been as nice to little miss youkai over here. Sheena was so dramatic sometimes, heh.

Harley made an excited Oh! noise when she heard this was Yukari's first trip. Fun! "Place is small and boring, but you can have fun anywhere if you know how. We're all dolled up with nowhere to go anyway. Let's hit the town!~" Dusty, little Nowheresville town, but still. Might as well take advantage of whoever's tax dollars were funding this little trip.

She turned away from Yukari, leaned forward, and held a hand up above her eyes as though she was concentrating real hard on looking far away. She turned her head back and forth eagerly as she spoke. "I just been down this street before. Not a whole lot. There's a burger joint and some beauty places and a grocery store and some place with TVs and ya can't really see it from here but there's a hardware store waaaay down there, too. Also heard there's a toy store somewhere around here!"

Harley wasn't a really picky person when it came to the where. If it was up to her, she'd be picking up a big mallet, some machine guns, and a flamethrower... some snacks, too. She hadn't had anything high in sugar in a long time. Since even she knew those weren't an option, well, there had to be some place that was fun.

Tim knew he shouldn't go and eat some greaseball burger meal, but really, the calorie content of a meal that he might actually enjoy was the furthest thing from his mind. Might as well get some use out of their bogus coupon book. It still struck him as really odd; this wasn't how mental facilities worked. It seemed like ridiculously low security to him, even with all the staff milling about.

Well, whatever. He was hungry and the sack lunch just wasn't doing it from him. So he ordered his meal, complete with the greasiest fries in the state of New Jersey, apparently, and sat at a table. The jeans were still annoying him. The skinny jeans fad was stupid, as far as he was concerned, because the pants were designed so tight that they were actually falling down if he sat. Wonderful. The next person he saw wearing these things voluntarily was getting punched in the face, just for being a moron.

...Okay, not really, but it was nice to entertain the thought.

He was glad to be away from Alfred for a few minutes, to clear his head. He wasn't sure where the butler - er, right, gentleman's gentleman - had gone, but he knew Alfred wouldn't follow him into a fast food place. Anyway, if there was anyone that knew how to take care of themselves in weird situations, it was Alfred. He'd be okay.

HEven with all the grease, the fries were palatable enough, and he opened another ketchup packet, glad for the chance to just sit here for a few minutes and think.

[Waiting for one impulsive speedster, and possibly one Superman clone.]

The bus ride had been uneventful. Tim was more than a little annoyed at the shirt he was wearing. He was sure it was a girl's shirt, but the nurse had assured him it wasn't, and had refused to get him anything else. The way too tight pants weren't really any help, and he was sure the color coupled with the tightness was some not-so-well-hidden hint that they knew exactly who he was. At least the coat covered up the stupid shirt. It was unnecessary, maybe, but it served it's purpose. And he could do worse than worn out blue Converse. Why they were blue and completely refused to match the rest of the clothes he'd been brought, well, who even knew.

The sack lunch was a ridiculous touch, as far as he was concerned. And the way the staff was littered all over the place, was this really necessary? It sure as hell wasn't like any hospital he'd ever heard of. Letting mental patients run around a town? That was crazy in and of itself.

He hadn't shaken the feeling he'd gotten last night. Blood all over the place, and he hadn't been able to reach Kon right away, and...

He stood on the street corner, unable to push the thoughts completely out of his head. All that blood, and it smelled real, and he couldn't save anyone because he couldn't be Robin and he wasn't cut out for it...

Dad, I'm sorry.

He forced himself to open his eyes. This was not the time or the place for that. Kon wasn't dead (well, okay, maybe he was, but he wasn't dead again), and the blood wasn't his fault. It wasn't like some other things, and it wasn't something he could have prevented or helped. It was just...something that had happened.

But he hated feeling like he had no control. He just couldn't stand that. So he stood there, fists clenched inside the too-long sleeves of the coat, and told himself to breathe. He had a few short hours to find something useful in this town. There was no sense in wasting the trip.

[Waiting for Alfred. He just doesn't know it yet.]

One second he was in the hallway, dizzy and sickened and barely able to focus as Youko picked him up (and he'd thought for a moment to warn her to be careful before remembering his shirei couldn't hurt her anyway, even agitated as they were) and then the next...in bed. Back in the sterile hospital room, with only the sharp scents of cleaners and laundry soap from the sheets, but nausea and a lingering pain behind his eyes still reminded him of the close call the night before.

Before he had time to think about it for long, though, the door opened and the nurse arrived with a bundle of unfamiliar clothing; she fussed over him briefly, trying to feel his forehead (from which he automatically grimaced and ducked away) and cooing over him like he was an invalid child. Of course he was a little feverish; it would only have been worse if the blood had touched him as it came so close to doing.

But the woman only bundled him into the clothing she'd brought without paying any attention to his protests, and he was hard-pressed to decide whether or not the shirt she gave him was any better than the bright yellow smiling face. And then he was led out to the front yard, through what he noted didn't look anything like the "holy ground" of the night before, and given a brown paper bag before being herded onto a bus with admonitions to "take it easy" ringing in his ears.

He dropped into the first empty seat he found, leaving the bag sitting next to him unopened as he leaned back against the seat and closed his eyes. Food was most definitely not interesting at the moment, and he had things to think about anyway.

[waiting for Youko]

[from here]

The door wasn't locked, so Sheena opened it quickly and darted in low to the ground. She didn't see anything moving, so without stopping at all, she made a full circuit of the room, quickly looking under tables and in corners checking for any and all monsters. There weren't any.

Relaxing a little, the ninja flicked her wrist and the cards disappeared. Rubbing her sore side, she rummaged around in one of the bins until she found a fresh set of playing cards. Boosting herself up to sit on top of one of the tables, she opened the cards.

"Sit down?" Sheena nodded at the chair right in front of where she was sitting. She had no clue how long it would take for Spider to show up.

[from here.]

Nathan moved quickly through the doors and into the Sun Room, pausing for a moment to stare up at the ceiling, through the windows to the sky beyond. The sky was clear, with bright stars -- not a sight Nathan necessarily expected to see in New Jersey, considering the pollution in the air. He'd never seen a lot of stars in Manhattan -- one had to go further upstate to really appreciate the sky.

He wasn't sure how long he'd been standing there, staring up through the windowed ceiling before he finally turned his gaze towards the large bulletin board he'd briefly talked to someone on earlier that day. It was full of tacked-on messages with hundreds of different scrawls -- Nathan even recognized a few different languages, though none he actually spoke. Having nothing to write himself, he stepped away, turning his gaze towards the back of the room. Through those doors was the cafeteria -- and he was pretty sure that was where he needed to be.

Still... this room felt so quiet and peaceful, and Nathan lingered for a moment, leaning against the wall beside the bulletin board, his gaze shifting back onto the sky above.

[to here.]