[from here]

There wasn't time to do more than a cursory examination of the room, enough to determine no strange beasts or ambulatory shadows were lurking in a corner and ready to pounce on the first unsuspecting person to come through the door. It seemed safe enough for the moment, but Ayumu had no desire to lurk long enough to see if something would arrive, even if she hadn't been in a hurry. Time had been passing, both while she and Okita had waited in the hallway, and while they were talking in the morgue, and she only hoped they wouldn't be late to their real mission for the night.

A search of one of the cabinets (made only after she had cautiously pulled it open, just in case something was inside of it) yielded a number of small blades, more than she could easily carry about her person. And yet this seemed far too useful to simply pass up - if she had enough of these, she'd not have to worry about using them as throwing weapons in a situation where she wouldn't be able to retrieve them after. Fortunate, then, that she'd had the foresight to bring a pillowcase, wasn't it? Hopefully she'd be able to hold onto it when the night ended.

[back out to here]

[From here.]

Scourge shivered as the chittering and scratching of the test animals reached his ears. Even without the traumatic memories that accompanied this place the sounds gave him the surges. He had no idea what was back there, no desire to find out, and no clue exactly how strong their cages were.

"Keep a watch out for monsters. This is where the spider got me."

He jerked his head up and searched the ceiling, turning around to make sure he didn't miss any dark corners where giant arachnids might be hiding. Nothing yet, but then again there'd been nothing there the last time he'd been on his way in--the spider had only appeared when he was trying to leave.

The chemical closet was the second door on the right, the one that wasn't making horrific organic noises. Scourge slid the tip of his blade into the lock and gave it several good, hard thrusts and twists to break it apart. "C'mon."

[from here]

The stairwell was empty, but Heat wasn't too surprised. Despite all those milling about already, he'd still left his room as soon as he was able. That the others hadn't been as fast was still well within the realm of possibility. He didn't like it, but he'd give them time. Seraph apparently wasn't here to set the pace, so someone had to do it.

Still, he was impatient. A lack of any real sustenance over the past day and night already had the demon roaring at the back of his psyche. Shackled as he was, the feeling was unbearable. He stood just a moment with his back against the wall in some small attempt at restraint, but was soon pacing back and forth in what little space was provided.

They all needed to hurry the hell up.

[from here]

This hallway was an unfamiliar one, though as far as Ayumu could tell it was of the same size and general shape as the others on the floor below. And just like the floor below, the first door she encountered on the wall to the left had a solid door with, she discovered, an even more solid lock securing it. The room hadn't been labeled on the map she'd seen, and that was likely the reason why. Pity, that.

For now she just settled there to wait for Okita to rejoin her. She heard nothing to indicate the presence of others in the area, so it should be safe for them to meet here at the moment. Hopefully he wouldn't take too long, and they could be on their way. She was curious about why he'd invited her along on this little expedition; though she had her guesses, Ayumu much preferred solid information rather than supposition.

[To here]

After reaching the top of the stairs, Tenzen slipped into the next hallway. This time, the hallway consisted out of a normal floor, ceiling and walls, as opposed to the pulsing flesh from last night.

Sliding his hand along the wall, the ninja kept his flashlight switched off as he headed East.

[To here]

[f25, specifically]

Alkaid finished her supper without a damn thing happening. No nurses coming to snatch her away for crazy torture sessions, no roommate coming to make awkward conversation with, no nothing. Kind of boring. She knew that no news should be good news, or whatever... but somehow she just felt unfulfilled. What was she going to do tonight? It hadn't been quite decided yet, but she was going to meet that exceptional dork, at least, and they could go adventuring just like old times... At least that'd be fun.

She gathered what had become the usual stuff - her bat, her flashlight, and the vial of acid that Badou had given her, which she popped right into her cleavage. Hey! Bazooms like this were good for something!!

Then she looked down at the cast on her arm, tapping it with the bat. Okay, yeah, this thing wasn't gonna come off tonight by any stretch of the imagination, but if the arm was healed under it then the cast itself wouldn't be a problem. The bad thing was that she felt the old zombie rot start to spread just where it had last night and the night before. Well, damn.

She was almost done getting ready when she heard the intercom go off. Huh... Was the Head Doctor trying to make himself out to be the hero of the day? Apologizing for stuff? Geez, things sure had changed in the week she'd been stuck in that coma. Weird as hell.

Oh! One more thing! She emptied a pillowcase and held it in the hand with the flashlight. It could end up useful. So now that she was all geared up, she headed out!

[to here]

[From here]

Hime peered out into the hallway. It was mostly empty; it seemed she was one of the first to come out of their cells. While this presented the problem of wandering alone without the cover of the herd, this also gave her a chance to scout out the population as they left their rooms. While Hime had confidence in her fighting abilities, she had no delusions about taking on whatever horrors lurked here by herself. Besides, she needed to find people who could fight; the basement did not sound like the kind of place one explored on their own, or even with just one other.

Recalling that all the patient rooms filtered out into the main hallway, Hime headed that way.

[To here]

[in F22]

Falis was sitting on Senna's bed, her back to the wall with the shinigami laying against her, when the weird intercom thingie went off. She looked up at the little box for a moment before frowning. What the fuck had that been? Damnit! Where was Dominikov when she needed him to figure shit like this out for her?

A sharp pain ran through the hunter's left arm accompanied by a searing heat she recognized from the night before. It seemed peoples' fears were going to be true this night. Taking a peak at the flesh underneath her bandage, Falis grimaced seeing the decay return and it work its way up to her shoulder. At least it stopped there, but she wasn't sure it'd stay stopped all night long.

Her eyes slid back to the sleeping shinigami. Falis licked her lips. Damn, she looked and smelled... No. She was not going to do this. She was stronger that whatever fucked up zombie sickness. Senna was important to the hunter. She may be Falis' prey, but not prey like this. Resisting the hunger that lay in her stomach, she idly combed her finger through Senna's hair as she rest her head back against the wall and waited for people to show up or for the shinigami to wake.

Loz immediatly sat up in bed when the intercom went off. Most of what the voice said confused him, but when the door clicked unlocked, he immediatly forgot about it and started grinning.

Night had finally come. It was time to go out and have some fun.

Not even sparing a glance at Tem, Loz grabbed his light-rod and practically leapt out the door. Everything was dark, with not even a window to let in moonlight. That was a little creepy, but Loz wasn't scared. He just turned his light on and scanned around the hallway with it. No one else was out here yet. Loz wasn't really sure where he should go, since he wasn't exactly sure where the big room was. Shrugging, Loz decided on a direction and just went that way.

As he walked, he could have sworn he kept seeing something, but when he turned his head to look, nothing was there.

[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. ]

The late-afternoon sun filled the large, open Sun Room. It was almost enough to make you sleepy, Euphemia thought, as she walked in, brushing a little glitter off her shirt. She didn't particularly feel like she was up to much - the worrying about everyone had drained her, as much as she'd tried not to think too much about it.

With that thought in the back of her mind, she walked over towards the bulletin board. It looked like it was cleared off at the end of the day, because now it was filled with information. She made a note of the 'primer' post, then began copying the maps onto some paper she'd taken with her from the Arts and Crafts Room.

One more thing struck her, though - the idea of visitors. Was this what all the announcements about graduates were? She thought of the others then, and frowned, hoping that neither of them were going through anything like that today.

[reserved for the tallmore.]

Sam frowned when he heard the intercom message. That didn't sound right. He'd gathered from his conversation with Sen that everybody in the institute was sane, but that the staff were trying to convince them they were mental patients for some nefarious purpose. So why that announcement? If Sam knew anything about brainwashing, he knew that it was a bad idea to announce it to the brainwashees. Good thing he was immune to...

"Oh no," mumbled Sam, feeling the top of his head. He wasn't wearing his hat, and if he wasn't wearing his hat, he wasn't immune to mind control. His mind was totally open to whatever insidious brain... control... things this place planned to inflict on him.

They seemed to be leaving him alone for now, though, so he headed back into the Sun Room and inspected the bulletin board, which was very hard to miss now that he was looking for it. It was plastered with messages, some signed with strange aliases, and some babbling about zombies.

Sam read the messages closely, engrossed. The biggest thing he'd learned about solving cases these days was that it was important to read everything. Talk to everyone too, but that could wait. Even that short conversation with Sen had taken all of brunch.

[for Scott Pilgrim]

The princess felt a little better after her talk with Soma. It cheered her up to have made a friend - from what she was quickly learning about this place, the more friends you had, the better off you were. It gave her a little more hope, after what had been said about the Head Doctor. And if there was anything in this world she was good at doing, it was holding on to a spark of hope as long as possible.

She didn't particularly pay attention to what room she walked into as she crossed the Sun Room, and was a little surprised that it looked like the room her art classes took place in back when she was a student. Well, that could be a little fun, couldn't it?

Euphy took a few pieces of brightly colored paper and a set of markers and sat down at one of the tables, then started idly doodling.

[free for playing with glitter with.]

I.R.I.S. here again, and we continue to hope that you are enjoying your temporary stay at Landel's Institute! We hope that our staff have proved adequate for your needs so far, and we are now ready to showcase an uncommon – but vital – aspect of the lives of our future patients. Once every week, we will allow 'visitors' from the outside world to interact with our community and assuage any fears our patients may have. Perfectly tailored for each individual, these visitors will in fact be graduates of the very program that you are surveying now, and a testament to how the methods of Landel's Institute will truly usher in a revolution in the Next-Wave programs.

In order to allow you to see the quality of our work with your own eyes, we have arranged for a handful of our original test subjects to return and show you how profoundly they've been re-educated in such a short span of time. We hope that you are satisfied with what you find, and as always, direct any questions you may have to your console.

Thank you!

Once again, the nurses went about ushering assigned patients into the two waiting rooms as if Martin Landel was announcing with his same old shtick. Non-assigned patients were allowed to remain in the same public room of their choice or to move to a new one.