Claude was all too relieved when the announcement signifying the end of lunch played over the intercom system. It gave him the perfect excuse to let his nurse collect his things and lead him out of the cafeteria. He wished he could have privately said something to Luke, at least -- that he appreciated him looking out for him, for one thing, and that he was sorry he'd had to even waste his breath dealing with the likes of Sync on his behalf. But that would probably have to wait for another day, preferably one where Claude could seek Luke out and actively avoid Sync on his own.

He was still pretty steamed, not to mention humiliated, over what had happened, though. As Claude's nurse took him into the sun room, his uninjured hand balled into a fist at his side. Just who the hell did Sync think he was, anyway? Considering he'd been a weeping, bloodied mess the last time Claude had seen him, it was amazing he even had the gall to keep messing with them like this. Maybe Sync had been brainwashed back then, but next time Claude was going to make sure he finished the job right. They'd be on equal terms, if he had anything to say about it, and he wouldn't be holding back.

In the meantime, there wasn't much for him to do except pass the time while he waited for the day to end. Normally arts and crafts would have sounded like a nice distraction, but that wouldn't work today for obvious reasons. Claude just had to keep telling himself that he couldn't give up on getting his sight back. Natalia was kind enough to offer her help tonight, so the least he could do was try not to let himself get too depressed right now.

After the nurse led him to a couch, Claude leaned back against the cushions, tucking one hand behind his head. So far it didn't sound like there were many people milling about the sun room yet, though no doubt that would change soon enough. Maybe he ought to take some time to just relax. He might need his strength tonight, after all.

[For Leon.]

When they told him he would have a visitor, Nigredo could not even feign surprise. He had, after all, asked the one who looked like Citrine to visit again. Despite the falsity of her presence, the child had liked her in the sense that out of all his siblings, she had been the most forgiving on his sanity. Not to mention, a part of him wanted to ensure her health. That her death was a faraway prophecy.

He followed the nurse to the lobby and as directed, found a seat by the other entrance. While the part that loathed the visit tugged restlessly at the wrappings on his injured hand, the rest remained dead calm. Prepared. Every part of him was ready for this instant, for the first time in days. It was disgraceful how he had let his concentration and constitution fall in the past week; it didn't matter what the circumstances had become, it had all been uncharacteristic of his usual demeanor. The fact he could hold every thought in limbo now was a miracle, something like a blessing.

Green eyes gazed unwavering at his hands. Hopefully, she would arrive soon, before the calm he held broke under unseen tension.

It was starting to rain by the time Jim finished giving out his orders for the coming night, as well as the go-ahead to split up and investigate. McCoy gave Jim a nod before he headed off. The air was even colder now, water splattering onto face and shoulders.

The doctor hunched his shoulders and hugged the brown jacket closer to him. Any longer and he'd be soaked to the bone. It'd be a perfect breeding ground for a nasty cold. He wasn't about to get one if he could help it. Being sick during an away mission wasn't at all acceptable for a medical officer, and he wasn't about to lay himself out in his room if he could help it. They had plenty to investigate and, seeing how this place operated at night, plenty of people who might need help.

McCoy ducked inside the nearest building, warmth washing against his chilled face and body.

Something about making patients act accordingly was disappointing in the long run. Drugs were just too easily used. He would much rather have his patients follow an act, answering not because they had no option, but because they felt safe. Each specimen needed different treatment, he knew, however deception was far more satisfying.

His next patient was likely not to give him any more pleasure than the first two. With Mr. Malloy he never knew what to expect, but that was part of what created the doctor's interest in him. The other part was how much he resembled Cain. Jizabel could only imagine the results had he provided medicine to him rather than Mr. Cross. How much the boy would have resembled Cain then.

But the fantasies would have to wait for a later time. He could hear the nurse knocking at the door and knew it was time to begin.

[from here]

622 headed down to the last door in the cell block corridor, keeping alert for anything that might already have set itself up in the hall. There usually weren't any ambushes this early in the night, but better safe than dead.

He knocked on the door to M41, waiting slightly back from the door for the Commander to open it.

(From here.)

Sean's legs were starting to burn from the effort of keeping Schuldig on his back. It was only a few more feet, he told himself. Like he always did when he was running with the soccer team. He was always last, but he could finish the run at least.

The boy pulled Schuldig over to the plush red carpet in the center of the room and lay him down. The sofa probably would have been a better choice, but Sean intended to barricade the door with that.

'Check his heart!'

"Check his heart!" Sean said as he passed Chris on his way back to the door. He closed it, then rounded the couch. With a grunt, Sean started pushing it towards the door. It was taking him a while, though, as the couch was much heavier than Schuldig and he was moving it across carpet.

(From here.)

Pulling Chris through the door, Sean nearly slipped on the grass as he ran barefoot across the yard outside the greenhouse. It was quiet--a strange and eerie silence that made Sean's skin crawl. He had a bad feeling about being outside. Like eyes were watching him run across the grass. Like he shouldn't be out here without something... but he couldn't put his finger on it.

"This way," he whispered to Chris, guiding his friend around the back of the greenhouse and ducking down into the shadows. Maybe Schuldig would think they'd gone through the door on...

Goddammit! Why hadn't he taken them through the second door?! Now they were trapped here, praying that Schuldig didn't see them hiding behind a glass wall.

'He's going to kill you now,' Artemis gloated. 'You heard him--he's going to be even angrier now that you've made him chase you this far. And only to be caught~ How disappointing.'

(From here.)

Sean rounded the corner, Chris in tow, and skidded to a stop (fortunately not wearing shoes had helped him run faster, though his feet felt uncharacteristically dirty--the floors were clean, weren't they?). He looked around frantically in the dark for at least one glimpse of a member of the night staff. Nothing. He and Chris were on their own.

"Try the doors!" Sean instructed, letting go of Chris' hand to yank on the first door handle available. Locked. He tried the next one. Locked, too.

"Chris you remember what I said about that bruise being done myself?" Sean called over the frantic jiggling of doorhandles. "I lied--Schuldig did it while trying to get Artemis back. I'm sorry I didn't tell you sooner, but I'm afraid he's going to do it again!"

(From here.)

Sean kept charging down the hallway, not pausing to see if Schuldig was still following them or not. At this point, his priority was getting both himself and Chris to safety as soon as humanly possible. Fortunately soccer practice had done something besides give him bumps, bruises, and skinned knees--he could run for a decent amount of time at a swift clip.

"Let's try the doctor's offices!" Sean replied. Maybe one of them would be unlocked and they could hide in there until someone found them. At this point, getting in trouble was better than facing Schuldig.

[From here]

Place was pretty quiet, Tyki noticed. He casually swept the beam of his flashlight around the hallway, but there really was noone in sight. No monster, no patients, nothing. Huh. At this rate, he was going to think he was breaking his personal record of being early or something.

Even though the amount of his cigarettes declined, the Noah only paused to light one. He took a grateful drag from it before moving on.

[To here]

[from here.]

There seemed to be a lot more options here, Aerith noted as she passed a few doors along the way. Maybe she'd come to center of the building? It was hard to tell, and her sense of direction wasn't fantastic. She was lucky if she'd remember the path she'd taken so whimsically to get here. Stopping in front of a particularly large set of doors, the flower girl took a quick break from her exploration to try and commit to memory all the turns she'd taken to get here from her room.

It was certainly worth noting that she still hadn't heard even a whisper from the Planet. Aerith had always thought she would be thankful to not hear the screams and whispers for once in her life. Now that her wish had been granted, she honestly found it strange and more than a little unsettling. Even in Midgar, she'd had a place that she could always go to if she needed to hear the echo of her mother's voice. If anything Gaia had always given her direction and companionship. Clearly, she'd have to apologize when she got out of this place.

And Aerith Gainsborough would get out of here. One way or another. She had to believe that.

The young woman lifted her flashlight, scanning every inch of the wide hallway that she could. Maybe it would be best to take a moment and collect before she continued on her exploration.

Hayes paused in the middle of assembling the few useful items he had- the flashlight and TK's map, of course, and maybe one of the pens in case he wanted to note some kind of landmarks- to scowl up at the intercom. He talks like a schoolteacher and laughs like a damned Ilwrath, he thought, with a very slight shudder. A laugh like that was never good news, and worse when you were defenseless.

Then the lock clicked off, a tiny sound that completely shattered any remaining illusion of this being a legitimate psych unit. The door opened easily under Hayes' touch, and he turned back to look uneasily at his cellmate.

"I guess we have our answer," he said grimly, and turned his light into the dark hallway.


[For McCoy!]

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 ]

Even before he got sick, Sean had enjoyed reading. His teachers had always said that he read 'ahead of his age group', but he figured that was just because he read more than most kids his age did. He liked everything: fantasy, science fiction, biographies, journal articles... There was just something satisfying about holding a book--something someone poured a lot of effort into producing--to Sean.

Today, though, he didn't want to get into anything particularly heavy or involved. No psychology textbooks for him today--he was going to read something fictional. Pulling what looked like an interesting science fiction novel off the shelves, he cracked it open and began to read happily. Oliver would find him soon enough and no doubt interrupt him, so he'd just read as much as he could for now.

[For Badou]

A shower sounded good, but the fact that he was placed with the children annoyed Hitsugaya to no end. He was a centuries old shinigami for heaven's sake. The idea that he'd be sharing space with a number of naked children running around like idiots unnerved him a little. Someone up there had to be laughing at him.

Nonetheless, he needed to shower. Because he'd been at the institute for several days without a chance to bathe, he was beginning to smell, and after last night, he was especially anxious to wash off his body. There was no telling what kind filth had become attached to him in that strange hallway of flesh.

Thankfully, he was the first one there. He could get this over and done with quickly, and get the hell out of here before the brats came in.

[to here]

That had been a very frustrating shower. For many reasons. At least Raine was going to at least look at Forte. Hopefully, she'll actually heal him. The showers had also succeeded in making the ninja feel like a pervert. A mild one, but still... It was as if Yukari had picked that spot in the showers because she knew the ninja could easily see her.

Ugh! Damn youkai.

Squirreling herself away in a corner of the cafeteria, Sheena finger combed her wet hair before pulling it back with the bright red ribbon. She so needed her own hair ribbon back. She was attempting to formulate her plan of acquisition - she was ninja after all - as people started trickling into the room. The plan was put on pause, though, when her stomach rumbled.

Food now - plan later.

[Closed to Haseo and Endrance]

Astor hadn't talked much after introducing himself, which hadn't bothered Terry. With all the crap their little hospital of horrors piled on the patients, he couldn't blame a guy for not wanting to open up to some stranger. Plus, not talking meant he could get a decent meal in, and then check out the bulletin for the latest in Landel's news and gossip. Turned out to be a good thing he did. He'd have missed a lot otherwise: how many people had apparently gotten slagged last night, Spider-boy's unsurprising guilt trip, a note for a too cheery someone named Harley, and another one signed by a lightening bolt that looked a lot like one he'd seen in Wayne's Justice League files. It was pretty hard to know exactly where to start--especially since so far, Terry hadn't seen any sign of the old man in all that mess. Unless that one guy had meant him by the "you-know-who" that made someone else shake in their boots. Inspiring that kind of reaction wasn't exactly a stretch for Bruce.

Terry would've been perfectly content to stay there and watch the developing news, despite the lack of vid screens making the process almost painfully slow. But his dear sweet nurse had other plans for him apparently. Ones that involved crayons and construction paper.

"Oh come on. You can't be serious."

Needless to say, Terry was less than impressed by the offerings. His nurse didn't exactly care about his opinion though, instead firmly asserting her belief that first grade arts and crafts was the key to mental stability. It made Terry eager to get home all over again, just so he could tell the officials at Gotham's mental wards how'd they'd been doing it wrong for all these years. Apparently Batman could retire in peace, just as soon as a bunch of gangsters got their paper mache on.

And they thought he was the insane one. Obviously because he hadn't made enough popsicle houses in his childhood.

Sitting down at least got the woman to stop her preaching, for what that was worth. Of course, now Terry was left with half a glue stick, cheap paper, and scissors that probably couldn't cut air reliably. Terry couldn't say he was pleased. Oh, but they had glitter too! Well, didn't that just make everything perfect? He could make his own Bat signal that would shine with all the colors of the rainbow.

"This is just slagging great."


[Free as a bird bat!]

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]

(From here.)

Artemis threw open the door to the movie rental while managing to keep Haku on his shoulder. Quickly, he set Haku down, turned to the door and locked it. Looking to his left, he spotted a shelving unit with movies in it. Without a second thought, he went around it and shoved the heavy shelf across the door, cases falling to the floor as he did so.

Once the shelf was in place, the boy went back to Haku, body shaking from how much adrenaline he was running on at that moment. "We need paper materials. We have to set the building on fire."

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?"