S.T. stood in the dark of the room, staring at the point where the intercom speaker had been when it had last been visible. It hadn't moved, at least not based on the sounds coming from it, but he wasn't willing to put more than a twenty on it. Two hints in the speech. More of the usual doublespeak. S.T. didn't care much about either, which might be playing right into the fucker's hands, but he was capable of heartwarming personal moments. That and the number of friends he had in body bags was moving from hard-luck story to Ted Bundy wanna-be.

"If you're coming with me, giddy-up, amigo." His flashlight was just where he'd left it, taped to the top of the toolkit, and he switched it on. The door was where they'd left it, too. "

"Goodness, is it really already time for dinner? Time certainly does fly! And such a lovely day, too. I certainly wouldn't mind having a nice cup of cocoa out on the patio or something..."

That was how the Head Doctor greeted them, although it apparently didn't take him long to realize he'd gotten a little off topic.

"Now then, it's time for the nurses to escort you all back to your rooms, where you'll have the opportunity to tuck into a scrumptious plate of turkey and gravy. And, of course, we always carry vegetarian options for those who don't eat meat. We also have our usual assortment of water, juice and milk.

"Also, some of you will be receiving some extra help in warding off whatever bug some of us have been catching. Please take care, everyone, and be sure to wash your hands! I'll talk to you all again later. Enjoy your dinner."

The intercom clicked off, leaving patients with the prospect of preparing for yet another grueling Nightshift.

((Respond to this post with your character's room number in the subject line. New room assignments are listed here. If you have any questions, let us know!))

After that miserable breakfast, Kratos was truly ready to go hide himself away in some dark corner of a room and refuse to speak to anyone for the rest of the day. It was utterly pathetic that he was actually giving that kind of behavior serious thought, but somehow, in the wake of Sora's death, everything, from company to even eating, seemed too loud or too exhaustive; his energy seemed to slip away the instant he gained it.

Ironically, this behavior was not previously unknown to him; it was just that the last time he'd fallen into this kind of slump, his circumstances were such that engaging in extreme antisocial behavior and refusing to eat did not carry severe consequences like they--that was also pathetic, that he'd just entertained the idea that the days following Anna's death could have been more bearable than now. Could he possibly frustrate himself even more? The paradoxical part was that he enjoyed doing it in a strange, perverse way.

He wrote out a few listless, largely formulaic responses over the board to some notes he'd pinned up right before breakfast, and then wandered over to a nearby couch, where he sat down, stared at the coffee table for a moment, and then slumped back against the couch, one hand draped across his eyes, with a sigh. For a few seconds, he stayed that way, letting the wave of emotion wash over him--it was simply too much; he had reached the point where he was willing to give up and acknowledge that--and then, as if a switch had been flicked, Kratos straightened up, everything once again carefully masked. He exhaled, slow and steady, and looked down just in time to see a cat pass by, meowing for his attention.

He wasn't particularly fond of animals, as he'd once told Lloyd, but right now, all he wanted was something to distract him, and a cat was much preferred to a person; after all, the cat didn't talk, nor did it require him to talk. Kratos reached down to scratch it between the ears and then paused as it leaped onto the couch to curl up next to him. It was a stretch to think that he might be able to spend an entire shift petting a cat (also pathetic, but in a different way), but he would do it for however long it held his attention, or vice versa.

[Flora!]

[From here.]

The wool beret made L's head itch.

If he hadn't been ill, if he hadn't felt that he was reaching certain limits of what he would tolerate in terms of low-level personal physical misery, it would have been a trade-off: he hated hats and he didn't always mind being wet, and under other circumstances, he might not have bothered to cover his head. Sometimes it was good to feel the rain on his face and in his hair.

Being soaked to the bone when he'd already felt like he was coming down with a nasty bug for most of the previous five days wouldn't be pleasant, though, and it would be important to stay warm so that his condition at least remained stable. Even if the illness was caused by something implanted in his stomach, that didn't mean that lowered resistance wouldn’t exacerbate his symptoms. He couldn't afford to allow it to become any worse. This trip to the river was already extremely questionable... not something he would do if he felt that he had any better options. The only reason he had to believe that it might not end in futility or disaster was the fact that Harrington’s first clue had helped the people who were foolish enough to do what it had seemed to suggest. L's anger at feeling cornered into making the cold damp slog would help fuel the rest of the journey... but if he wasn't careful, if he allowed it to grow with every step, it might become a distraction.

There was lightning in the sky--neither consistent, nor sporadic enough to ignore. The rain wasn’t as heavy as it might have been... he would still have preferred to be safe and warm and dry indoors with a pot of coffee. Now that they were breaking away from the Institute, across the field, the ground was muddy, dirtying his stiff Institute-issue boots.

Was Lana regretting the shoes yet? She must be, or else she would be soon. He didn’t see any point in asking her.

The grimness of his determination to reach the river showed on his face, hard and set. As they moved, he tried to remain as aware of their surroundings as he could.

[from here]

"Ack!"

The door finally gave way, sending Gumshoe stumbling forward into torrential rain. He straightened back up and whipped around to face the others, pumping his fist in the air and grinning. "Alright! We made it outside!"

The deafening roar of rain would make it harder for them to hear one another, so he shuffled closer to both of them. "Let's stick close to each other from now on!"

[From here.]

L held the door open with his back as Lana and Gumshoe filed into the room ahead of him.

His heart beat faster as he prepared to follow them. He had been in this area twice. The previous night, it had only been for a few minutes; the time before that, he had been with Jones. The man who had been waiting had been hard to see, even with flashlights, and had thrown a knife at him, one which had found its mark.

He eased the gun from its holster in his coat pocket, making sure he had it in hand before stepping over the threshold and allowing the door to close behind him. It would have been possible to leave it open, but that would leave them vulnerable to an attack from behind. Closing it meant that it would take a few seconds longer to get out of the room if they were attacked, but on the whole, it seemed like the better choice.

[From here.]

It was an odd thing really. Sechs had been so used to walking through those rigid hallways for the past few weeks that this trek through wide-open space felt almost foreign to him. No walls, doors, stairs or tiled floors... Just a wet, open field with grass, rocks and the occasional shrub. It was like he had returned to a very old memory, one of traveling for miles on foot through deserts and canyons back at his homeworld. He didn't think he would ever get rusty at this sort of thing! This nighttime walk was reminding him of just how much he missed all that freedom of travel before. Now if it hadn't been raining so damn much...

Ascending the peak of a sloping hill, Sechs paused and scanned the area to make sure they were going in the right direction. The rain was coming down so thick that he had to wipe his drenched hair away from his eyes to see properly. From there he could barely make out the pitch black wall of trees near the base of the hill. Sechs gave out a mixed sigh of relief and trepidation. They had made it to the forest, and so far it wasn't looking one bit welcoming...

"We made it..." he panted, "Now we just gotta find where those leaves come from and whatever water source is nearby..." He stopped and looked to Link, "I don't think there's any paths we can take there. You uh, you good at navigating through forests?" he asked, looking somewhat abashed that he had to ask that question in the first place. "They're uh, not too common back where I come from..."

The intercom coughed on. As usual. S.T. kept his face planted in the pillow as the Head Bastard went on about waffles or whatever they were having for dinner. Wait, stick a pencil in the cassette and spin to rewind. Dinner? Shit. He'd lost the entire day. Did people still say rewind? Cassette tapes were like Neanderthals. A scientifico-evolutionary dead end, leaving only its bones behind.

The lights switched off while he was still stumbling out of bed and over to the desk, leaving him to stuff teriyaki chicken in his mouth with sticky hands. He wiped them on the blankets. Room service didn't understand the concept of saving water, so why not? Landel was in creep mode now, all absent-minded professor gone bad. None of the tempura had come back to life and started trying to strangle him, yet, so Landel was lying about the unexpected.

He wiggled out of sweats and into jeans, threw his ever-increasing magic jewelry collection into his back pocket, and went with a minimal setup. One piece of pipe, one brand-new flashlight, still off. Sleeping all day meant he had no idea if anything else had gone wrong with the disease threats. If Landel was still all smoke and no acid rain. Or if Harvey and Scott were expecting him to show up. He'd go see.

[to here]

[From here, and for the robutt gang!]

The nearly empty block hallway did nothing to relieve Zero's growing suspicion that something wasn't right. Why weren't there more people around? Perhaps Landel was using some of them, as he'd been used. Or others were transforming, just like that prisoner from the night before - Sora - and the one mentioned on the board...the one who'd attacked two children before being taken down. Landel had said to 'watch your back'...

...well. Empty or not, at least Zero was in the right place to find his allies now. He slowed his brisk walking pace for a moment as he wondered if he should try to go to Harpuia's room directly or wait out here for him to show up. (Hopefully X would be with him.) If this were simply a matter of him getting here too quickly, then they should be coming out of their rooms soon...

[From here.]

That hadn't taken long. So much so that it looked like he was the first person to make it this far. Harvey took a moment to scan the hall with his flashlight, including near the stairs, but he didn't see (or hear) much of anything. It was the sort of thing that set him on edge.

Since he couldn't do much else, he leaned himself against the wall by the stairs and then grabbed for his gun, holding it near his side as he waited. Normally he didn't take the weapon out unless he planned to shoot it, but when there was a possibility that some transformed patient might come barreling down the halls in the next few seconds, he wanted to take precaution.

Hopefully Scott and Sangamon would haul ass over here before all hell started to break loose. If things got too hairy, Harvey was ready to make a run for it on his own. That was the logical thing to do.

[Waiting for S.T.]

[From here.]

This was a trip that had gotten old ages ago, and so Harvey tried to make it as short as possible by falling into a brisk walk. He didn't go so far as to jog, since he didn't need to tire himself out before the action even started, but it was a good idea to save time where he could.

All of that was made very easy by the fact that there weren't any other patients around. He didn't know if it was because they were busy going through a painful transformation into some deadly monster, but if that was it, then he also wanted to get to a more open area sooner rather than later.

Harvey reached the end of the hall and rounded the corner into the main hall.

[To here.]

What the hell even happened last night? Rita remembered struggling with some kind of snake, and then… everything got kind of fuzzy from there. She knew what she saw, but she also knew it couldn’t have been real. It was more like a dream, but then, what was happening in reality while she was ‘dreaming’? Damn it, she must have looked like an idiot!

Rita was getting sick of all these tricks and hallucinations. The next time she encountered a monster, she was going to roast it to ashes, just out of spite.

Still seething, she brought her lunch to the Library and found an empty table to sit at. She went there almost automatically, and silently glared at her surroundings. The useless books, the place where that monster attacked her last night, the trap door she’d once again been unable to pass through… everything about this place was getting on her nerves.

She took an angry bite out of her sandwich, as if even that had wronged her somehow.

[free!]

Link wasn't in the mood for 'rest and relaxation,' as the boss had put it. Daytime here was completely unproductive, and it was frustrating. There was little he could do, other than keep up with recording his map. He supposed he ought to take the chance to get to know the other patients: Who was powerful, who needed help, who knew what... Perhaps some of the people who had been here longer. Link was lucky he had Sora as a friend, who seemed to know a good deal about how things worked.

It was a two-edged sword, though, that the boy had to have been trapped here for quite some time to be as settled as he was.

The Hylian settled into a chair with his journal, tapping the strange sort of writing device he had been given against his chin. It had become evident last night that the building was relatively organized, the second floor being similar in its main layout to the first floor. That was somewhere to start, at least.

[Nina, dearest!]

Five people would turn tonight, said Landel. Five...was a lot. Byrne couldn't help wondering if he might be one of the unlucky five - though that was assuming the tyrant was being honest and not just a manipulative asshole like usual. Regardless, it would not be the only thing going on tonight. Just as Byrne expected, there was another 'mystery message' (or was it not a mystery anymore? That bit at the start -- experiment -- Harrington? The military?!) claiming that there was another clue to be found in the X-Ray room tonight, plus a promise that there was, indeed, a cure for this infection.

Was it worth it to check it out this time around? Byrne had protection - the handgun he'd found in his box after dinner, the one that proved his partner was no longer in the Institute - but having a weapon didn't mean he wouldn't run into trouble. There'd been a mad rush the previous night because of the first clue, and there'd also been trouble, from what he'd read on the board. No doubt it would happen again.

But what else was he supposed to do?

He couldn't just sit here, and it was too risky (and perhaps impossible) to try to escape this place on his own. Besides, seeing the clue with his own eyes would be ten times more helpful than just hearing about it. Right?

It was risky and he was nervous, but...but he'd do it. Even if it meant...well. Let's not think about that.

After putting on his scarf and making sure the handgun was loaded (because running into danger only to find he had no bullets would be very.......not good), Byrne quickly made his way out into the hallway.

[To here.]

[From here]

No time was wasted in this short stretch of hallway. Link had run across all of Hyrule Field. This hospital was quite small in comparison.

Praying that he wouldn't come across anything to slow him down, Link turned into the main hallways.

[To here]

As some of the clouds from earlier began to clear, the intercom jingle sounded over the intercom once again.

"Hello, patients!" came the Head Doctor's cheery voice. "I hope you're all feeling fresh and clean this evening! To top it all off, we've prepared a scrumptious herb chicken dinner for you to eat before bed. Of course, we have vegetarian options available, so please don't hesitate to ask the nurse if you're interested in that.

Also, since we have the pleasure of welcoming a few new patients into our family, some of you will be receiving new roommates. Let's do our best to give them a nice, big Landel's Institute welcome, shall we?"

The Head Doctor gave a friendly chuckle. "Well, anyway, enjoy your dinner!"

With that, the intercom shut off.

[Note: All dinner threads are posted in response to this entry. Be sure to check the Roommate Assignments if you're not sure what room/roommate your character has! Thanks.]

Showtime. Two parties, one full of alcohol running the gamut from horse-piss to cleaning fluid, plus at least one woman, and one with a walking skeleton, sensory deprivation, and possible death. Together they were the beginnings of a beautiful music video. Unfortunately, Sangamon could only make one of them.

Harvey and Scott would appreciate the sacrifice. He grabbed two six-packs of shitty homemade beer by their polyethylene nooses, and headed out.

[to here]

_{[From here]}

Looking around, Scar wasn't quite sure what to expect upon this returning visit to the medical wing. It was silent, for now. Scar shined his light around each corner as he moved silently through the room, ready for something to jump out at him at any moment. He wasn't sure of what to expect, but he held his scalpel at the ready with his free hand. It was feeble protection at best, but Scar was a sitting duck without his alchemic arm.

He still wasn't sure if he would actually want it back, though.

_{[From here]}

Scar continued through to the easternmost end of the hallway, finally reaching the door to the medical wing. Grumbling at the damn thing being locked, the Ishbalan bashed it a few times with his flashlight until it broke, and he pushed open the door somewhat cautiously.

_{[To here]}

_{[from here]}

She paused again by the Sun Room, probing the darkness. There were no flashlights around to break up the shadows, and no natural light to guide her eyes. After all her many nights moving around the building without her own flashlight she’d become more than adept at navigating in total darkness, but caution still pricked at the fine hairs on the nape of her neck every time she reached an area that was not heavily populated with foot traffic.

If Landel had half a mind to prevent them from reaching the secret in the Medical Wing, now would be the time for him to act. Tsubaki couldn’t trust that he hadn’t heard I.R.I.S.’ relay, if the intercom’s abrupt cut-off had been any indication.

As she passed the doors leading to the entryway, she once again felt her eyes wandering toward them. Would what had happened there happen again? To someone she knew next time?

Would someone be injured because of the transformed prisoner?

Keep going, the assassin in her said. No time for doubts.

_{[to here]}