Yuffie was in two minds about how the 'meeting' with Orangello had gone. No, scratch that; two was way too small a number. Maybe four? Or five, no, make it six. Maybe. The only thing she knew for sure was that something had to give, and it sure wasn't going to be her. Whether or not she actually joined up with anybody was irrelevant, as long as she got the results she was aiming for; Yuffie wasn't so proud that she'd refuse help when it was offered. But whether or not that she could trust the ones offering…

It was enough to give her a headache.

Still, messing around on the bulletin had brightened her spirits a little. There, she could pretend to be friendly with Orangello. There, she could pick on Yukari. There, she could gather and exchange - haha - information with people like Suzie, who (like Yukari) was the epitome of entertainment. And with the likes of Lelouch, who she really didn't know quite what to make of. He was an arrogant bastard, but even Yuffie couldn't deny that he'd be handy to have on-side.

The day's schedule, apart from the time in the Rec Field later on, looked like it was designed with the sole intention of boring her to death. Yuffie sighed noisily at a plant, easily kidding herself into believing that nope, she wasn't happy to be around some genuine greenery again. Gardening was for people like Aerith. Hopefully Elena wouldn't take too long to find her.

[For Elena]

First things first, then.

Now that she was fully dressed (in her own clothes!) and as equipped as she was going to get, Yuffie headed out into the hallways. She didn't want to dawdle, or even worse, take another nightshift-long nap; one of those was enough. Tonight, she had stuff to do - talk to (or at) Kenshin, then go off and get the metal she needed for her weapon. "Wow," she grumbled under her breath. "That sure sounds exciting."

At least she had knives. They were tiny and not the sharpest things in the world, but they made decent throwing instruments, and... and they were knives! They'd do for now. It wasn't like she'd be stuck waiting forever for a weapon, either; now that she was on Skuld's list, it was only a matter of time. Then, she could really get her act together. The unstoppable ninja Yuffie would finally be back in action!

[To here]

[From here]

Belatedly, Yukari yawned in response to the doctor's own repose. She'd been awake for more than half the day; it was no surprise she was tired. Youkai were nocturnal, after all. But there were so many things to do, so many people to see, so many new and interesting phenomena.

Maybe she'd catch up on her sleep in a few weeks. Just sleep a month straight. Yeah, that sounded good.

Yawning again, Yukari headed onwards.

[From here]

Yukari peered up and down the hallway, deciding against shining her flashlight this way and that; she didn't particularly want to attract any monstrous attention. Mentally going over the maps, she tried to remember where she was going. Ritsuka had said M35, right? So that was the next block over... she'd have to go through the West Hall, but hopefully could get through without getting attacked her first night.

M35... why did that ring a bell?

Giving a shrug, the youkai headed on her way.

That really hadn't been the breakfast she'd been expecting, but Yuffie couldn't bring herself to complain. The kid made for good company, and was, if nothing else, pretty entertaining. She could've just done without the whole choking thing. That… That had been embarrassing. A bit. Okay, a lot. Yuffie was starting to get a feeling that this day was -- for once-- actually going to ping on her ‘interesting!’ meter.

Whether or not that was a good thing, she didn’t know.

By the time she’d reached the Sun Room's bulletin board, a kitten on her shoulder and a pen twirling between her fingers, Yuffie was starting to put her finger on why she had that weird, nagging feeling. Though on second thought, it was less like putting her finger on it and more like it had jumped up and punched her right in the nose; the feeling wasn’t just about waffles, magicians, or tricky candy thieves. Sagara hadn't answered her bulletin post; he hadn't answered any bulletin posts. She hadn't seen that stupid, spiky head of his all morning. It was like radio silence without a radio.

Agai-- No, Yuffie cut herself off sharply, frowning. She was just jumping to conclusions. It wouldn't be the first time, right? Right! And yet… instincts were instincts for a reason, and in a dump like this, who knew what could happen?

[for Okita?]

Ah, that was right. He should roll up-- Huh?

Cross blinked his eyes open to stare up at the ceiling, then sat up quickly. That was odd. Hadn't he just been in the hallway? This was the second time he'd woken in a room like this and it was baffling. He didn't even recall anything that would cause him to fall unconscious again. Sitting on the edge of the bed, he took a moment to scratch his head and try to put together pieces of a puzzle that had no intention of fitting.

This was ridiculous.

He wasn't allowed much more time before a boisterous woman arrived saying something about breakfast. Too surprised to put up much of an argument, Cross allowed her to lead him out of the room to a familiar and yet unfamiliar hallway. This wasn't the same room he'd been in the night before.

Trying to ask what was going on proved to be fruitless, and he decided to just take the food he was served and sit down. There had to be someone around here who knew something. And what had happened to Ryuuzaki?

[free]

Though experimenting with playing cards wasn't exactly the hardest of bodily training, Ophelia did feel that the rigorous testing of her speed, accuracy and throwing power had sharpened her mind for the coming night, and she went out into the night confident that she would be able to handle herself much more gracefully than she had previously. It still irked her greatly that she was no longer able to face any challenge that came her way head on, but she realized now that if she was going to make any progress in attempting to get her power back and shove Martin Landel's balls up his own esophagus, she was going to have to turn down a few fun opportunities here and there.

Ophelia left her room with Kio's maps and a handful of pens in her pockets. She felt more than a little naked without anything else in hand, and she was reminded instantly that she missed not having her full night vision, but no matter. She had to get to the Sun Room quickly. There was no way she was going to get tied up again and miss the opportunity to get further into the basement. The fact that Landel had mentioned something about "down there" specifically in his intercom announcement only made Ophelia more eager.

The Claymore hurried down the hall as fast as she could while making sure she didn't bump into anything in the dark.

[To here]

The Head Doctor sounded rushed, as usual, as he began speaking on the intercom.

"Good evening, everyone, and I once again express my highest hopes that your collective therapy sessions and good, old fashioned relaxing went well! Now, perhaps we shouldn't excite you at the end of the day, but... I fear I must! You see, we're just beginning to bring in our new batch of patients, and they will join their new roommates come dinner. Yes, yes – apologies for the slight disorganization, but we can only accommodate so many people at once, right? Right.

"As for dinner itself, I'm sure many of you will enjoy it, even if it isn't quite authentic. We have shrimp and vegetable tempura along with chicken teriyaki; there is dipping sauce included, along with a bowl of rice, bean sprouts, and edamame – that's soybeans. In addition, your dessert is some delicious green tea ice cream. Mmm!

"I hope you all enjoy dinner as much as I suspect you shall, and I bid you farewell until I say goodnight."

Just after the redundant statement, the intercom clicked off.

[ If you would like to introduce your character during this shift, please respond to this post. You can either choose for your character to wake up before their roommate gets back, or after they do. Find your character's room assignments here.

All room threads go in response to this post; please post your character's room number as the subject line of the initial post. Thank you! ]

_{[continued from here]}

Aidou was both smart and cautious, knowing from experience that the stairwells were not the best areas to use in feeding, however… At the moment, there was no one watching, no one coming, and no one accompanying the woman. Chances were high that her senses were dulled without light, where his were heightened. If he could stun her in one good move like he hadn’t quite with Kagura…

He moved like a ghost, charging the woman’s unprotected back without a noise to give him away. He jabbed hard at her neck, intending to send her off into unconsciousness long enough to pull her under the stairs and take the blood he needed, and at the same time ready to push her down with his momentum and body weight if it shouldn’t be enough.

As far as dinner shifts went, that one had actually been enjoyable. It had been nice to have somebody to talk to, to show off for, and Sen hadn’t seemed to mind all that much. Except for that one teeny-tiny little slip, just after Yuffie’d revealed that she was a ninja…

What was with that?

Yuffie knew that it was a little unorthodox to be quite so ‘open’ about what she did, both back home and here in Landel’s. She had her reasons, though; logical reasons, no matter what anybody else had to say about it. And those reasons had a lot more to them than a simple love of showing off.

Maybe Sen was going to be another one of those who underestimated her, then - the woman had seemed to soak up everything she’d said like a sponge, hadn’t refuted anything, but… Yuffie couldn’t quite shake the feeling that something was off. Sen seemed so normal and, yeah, totally defenseless - but as far as she could tell, Landel had a weird fetish for kidnapping fighters, or people with some kind of ability or significance...

Ugh, maybe this place was just making her paranoid. Besides, now wasn’t the time to be cross-examining and mentally dissecting her roommate! She had places to go, people to see, and a Turk to interrogate! With that in mind, after a quick double-checking of her ’equipment’ - a small bunch of pens tucked away in various places, the gardening claw, and her flashlight - the young thief headed out into the night.

[To here]

[From here]

As she entered the hallway, Ophelia stopped for a moment to quickly fold up Kio's maps and stuff them into one of her pockets. She had been hoping to take a peek at them at various intervals during the night, but in this dim light, there was no chance of being able to see them. For now, she would have to travel by memory of where she had been taken during the day.

At least this time the choice of where to go was easy. On one side she could just barely see the hallway ending, and on the other it continued for a ways. The path that continued would surely lead to the Sun Room and the areas around it. She started running again with a grin spreading on her face, emboldened by the long, seemingly unobstructed length of the hall. Perhaps she would find her first challenge of the night soon.

[From here]

Ophelia was faced with a choice upon entering the next hallway. The path to her right she remembered would lead to the areas she had visited during the day. The path to her left lead to an unknown area. While the thought of upping the challenge (and thus the fun) by going down an unknown hallway in the dark without her night vision was appealing, she decided to save it for another night, perhaps. Tonight she would try to build off of where she had already been, so she decided to take the right-hand path.

She could see barely there patches of moonlight from a window in the hall up ahead, and sped up to a jog in her eagerness to get to where there was a little bit of light. Despite the danger of running into something in the dark, her growing excitement was getting the better of her.

[From here]

Turning right at the end of the corridor, Ophelia squinted in the dark, trying to remember how this area had looked in the daylight. She could somewhat see a door to the next hall down at the end, though she was only able to make it out because she knew it was supposed to be there.

Not able to hear anyone in her way up ahead, the warrior sped up her walking pace as she made her way to the door.

"And I believe it's time to start wrapping up the day," was what the Head Doctor said after the intercom's initial jingle. "Now that everyone's all cleaned up, I think it's time for some... that's right, dinner!

"Tonight, we're serving some scrumptuous rotisserie herb chicken, seasoned with rosemary, lemon juice, and other delicious seasonings. On the side, we have cooked asparagus with bits of grilled onion, as well as small roasted potatoes with garlic and butter; for dessert, we'll be serving vanilla ice cream with chocolate syrup on top. Our normal assorted drinks and specialized diet alternatives are available.

"Some of you might find that you have new roommates since your old ones were fortunate enough to recover and leave us. Hopefully, you'll be able to see them again the next time we have visitors if you wish, but in the meantime please treat your new bunkmates kindly.

"I believe that's all for now. I hope you had a wonderful day and that you have a delicious dinner! ...Well, you'll definitely be having a delicious dinner, but there's nothing surprising about that, is there? Hahaha..."

With a seemingly good-natured chuckle, the Head Doctor turned off his mic.

[ All introduction posts for this shift's group of new characters should be made in response to this post. Find your character's room assignments here.

All room threads go in response to this post; please post your character's room number as the subject line of the initial post. Thank you! ]

[Waiting to be ZEXed up~ *ba-dum-tish*]

Huh, visitors? He must have slept through the first time they mentioned that development. Still, it wasn't like he was going to have anyone showing up, right? Not unless the League figured out where he was, and they weren't going to be showing up as friendly visitors if that happened. That was assuming this was even his home reality in the first place. Still, at least this gave him the opportunity to relax, something that was becoming more and more appealing as the painkillers wore off and his knee throbbed more. Not to mention there would be snacks available, so it looked like his concerns about not getting anything until dinner were unfounded.

Waving off any offers of help from Zelnick, Wally managed to get to his feet and retrieve his crutch, leaning a little bit more on it than he had this morning. He wasn't feeling up to moving about so much, so the Sun Room seemed the best option, and he flopped onto one of the couches with a sigh.

Miku hurried away from her new friends (and kitten) to the cafeteria. For some reason she was just terribly ravenous. Her nurse smiled, relieved that her patient had finally chose to eat something and wouldn't continue that backslide into poor health. She loaded the girl's plate with French toast and fruit, dusted the bread in powdered sugar and a bit of cherries in red-red syrup and sent the girl to sit.

"There we are, Alice, a nice healthy meal," she cooed, and patted Miku's head. Miku sighed, but carefully cut into her meal and started eating, keeping her eye out for Sousuke.

(From here!)

Artemis walked into the restaurant and glanced around at the decor. He wasn't impressed, but he wasn't disdainful either. He simply smiled. It was nice... for a town with a population of barely three hundred.

The boy smiled up at the person up front. "Two, if you please."

[With GLaDOS from here]

Nny stayed behind GLaDOS until they reached the stairs, at which point he moved up front to provide light. It seemed unusually empty, a fact he welcomed. Hopefully the second floor would be empty, or at least emptier than the first. He angled his flashlight upwards and ascended the stairs.

"Second floor, right? Which way after that?" he asked. The quicker they got to the kitchen, the better.

((From here.))

And here she was. GLaDOS stopped just outside the doorway to the Sun Room and pressed her back against the wall. She could hear no screaming, no fighting, no splattering of blood or hissing of acidic pools or beeping of a rocket turret finding its target in a laser sight and preparing to fire. It was very quiet, for the moment, unhindered by monstrosities of any kind.

She was sure, however, that there would be someone inside, just waiting for a hapless, worthless human to come slinking by, trying to get through to find their way past all those rooms and into the basement. For her, there was no use for the basement yet. Once she knew where all the cake was hidden, or had made her own, then it might pose some interest. After all, there were rumors of weapons, useful items, and mysteries that originated down there. It piqued her curiosity, but only so much. Very little could surpass her desire for cake.

So she waited for the tall, skinny man called Nny. He'd agreed to meet her, with some hesitation. If he failed to arrive, she'd beat him to death with his own arm the next day.

((Waiting for Johnny.))

Okay... that was creepy, thought Sheena as she stared up at the intercom. She glanced around her room nervously, balled up pieces of discarded paper strewn all over the floor by her. The man sounded like a seriously screwed up Desian that liked to toy with people... like Kvar did. Shuddering, the guardian picked up the cards she'd made with an ink-stained hand and fanned them out.

Alright... not the greatest work she'd ever done, she had to admit, but only three of them felt a little off when she concentrated on them. A few smudges of ink shouldn't matter anyways. Fanning herself once, she then folded the cards back up and looked down at her inky hands. "Stupid pen. Why did it have to break so easily? I was just trying to figure out where the ink was, NOT get it all over me. I hope I don't have any on my face..."

If she did, she was certain Raine would point it out to her. As long as the half-elf didn't do that weird lick her thumb and wipe it off thing she'd seen her do to Genis more than enough times, Sheena would be fine. If not... well... she'd glare at Raine or something. Grabbing her flashlight and cards, Sheena lamented the lack of an obi as she left her room.

Now where was F18?

[to here]