[from here]

Kurogane couldn't tell how long it would be before he would begin seeing other patients about, however if the hallways continued to be empty for too long he would have to start becoming suspicious. There was no chance that he was the only patient in the place, yet the moment the thought crossed his mind, he couldn't ignore the potential that the building had for messing with them. Whatever magic was involved here could manage something that could make it seem like there wasn't anyone else around.

He was overthinking things now. Anywhere else and he'd have been able to handle things like this, but not here. Landel had managed too much. Had Kurogane not wanted to kill the bastard, he might have commended the guy for it. Maybe.

[gone here]

[from here]

Another empty hallway. And the same hallway at that. Kurogane had yet to find any of the "changes" the intercom had gloated over so far, but given his pace that was bound to change. If he trusted the intercom words to anything, it was that he would be facing something sooner or later. Hopefully after he got the magician.

He turned left at first, intent to take his usual pathway through the field but paused at the memory of the day. Right, it was probably still raining outside. Much as water didn't bother him, Kurogane didn't feel like getting weighted down by soggy clothes tonight. He was already hindered enough by the restrictions here that anymore could end up being lethal.

Turning back, Kurogane moved instead towards the next hallway. It wasn't too much trouble going the indoor route, and since he was out so fast, chances were he could still catch the magician before he tried to get too far ahead of him.

[gone here]

So much for a relaxing shower. Anise couldn't possibly relax around someone with a voice like that! This was beyond weird. How could a girl who didn't have any relation to Sync have the exact same voice as him?

And what made it even weirder was that this wasn't even the first time Anise had encountered something like that. There was a boy, who also had tattoos like hers, who sounded just like Luke. What was his name? It was so long ago, Anise couldn't remember. Maybe she'd know it if she heard it again, but...

That gave her an idea. She wasn't using her journal for much besides cooking notes, recipes, and a few room numbers, right? Maybe from now on, whenever she saw or heard something really strange or suspicious, she'd write it down. Then, if it happened again or she learned more about it, she could look back to the entry and add the details. She'd call it... 'Anise's Mystery Diary.' That sounded kind of cool!

During the lunch shift, Anise worked on putting as many memories as possible to paper. The radio man, the rumored third floor, the ruins she found last night, things like that. By the time fourth shift rolled around, she wasn't quite done yet. It was getting harder to think of more things to write about, even though she was sure there were hundreds of mysteries in the institute. Maybe she'd feel more inspired if she took her writing outside.

"Oh, Dolores!" A nurse came to stop her as she was walking out the door. "If you're going outside, you should put on a coat! We wouldn't want you catching a cold." Even though Anise disliked being assisted by the nurses, she cooperated as the woman helped her into the coat, quickly putting Tokunaga back in its place on her back when they were finished. It did look kind of cold out, so there was no point in arguing.

Outside, Anise found herself a bench to sit on while she wrote some more in her journal. Occasionally she'd pause and fidget with the pen for a bit, or doodle some stars and other shapes into the corner of the page she was on, unsure of what to write next.

[free!]

It had all been going so well!

Seeing Cloud and Aerith(!) again had brought a now unfamiliar lightness to her shoulders. Work would be harder from here on out, but she wasn't on her own anymore. She was getting a second chance she'd never thought was possible. And then, then they'd trekked outside, totally ready to face the fog and the unknown (privately, the ninja had been a little worried; it couldn't happen again, it just couldn't, but what if it did?)—only to wake up. In their beds. As usual. Gaaaaaawd—!

"I just want you to know," Yuffie informed her nurse, grabbing her journal from the desk on her way out, "that your hair looks spectacularly god-awful today. What did you do, stick your tongue in a socket? I'm not exactly hip on fashion, too busy badass for that fluffy stuff, but—"

Plucky looked ready to plant her face in her hands. Or to plant her hands somewhere else. To her credit, and much to Yuffie's eternal disappointment, she did—tried to do—neither. "One of those days, is it?" the nurse sighed, disapproval incarnate. "Well. You're just going to have to behave; the new batches of patients are due today. We don't want to make a bad impression."

"I am feeling so completely convinced of my wrongdoing," Yuffie confided. They stepped into the cafeteria, practically empty as of yet. The chocolate cake last night had worked a treat, whetting her appetite. Honestly, she was getting sick of pecking at scraps like a runt Chocobo in the snow plains—but not literally, of course. Ew. She got more than enough of that on those damn buses once a week. Now that AVALANCHE really was dropping onto her lap—and remind her to get the hell out of dodge if Barret ever took his turn—she couldn't afford not to keep her strength up. For one, she'd be a liability. For two, she'd get her spine chewed out.

"Fruit," said Plucky, hovering as her charge picked out her choices for the day. Rolling her eyes, Yuffie grabbed an apple, slinging it onto the tray alongside an 'English' sandwich. "That'll do. I'll leave you to your breakfast, now." Somehow, that sounded about as comforting as 'My name is Don Corneo and I am raiding through your panty draw', and Yuffie was stopping that thought right there. Oh, god. Eurk. Bad, bad, bad! Bad, brain. Bad. That—yeah, no. Just, no. 'Sides, the guy was as dead as a doornail, splatted across Da Chao's feet. Dirtying them, really, but somehow Yuffie couldn't bring herself to be sorry about that.

(And it wasn't like the creep'd ever end up here, right? Right!)

She took to a seat, dropping her tray and her journal both onto the table. The book fell pages-down; Yuffie flipped it over, thumbing through to the middle as she worked through her apple. An almost finished map of Gaia stared back at her, neat as she could ever manage. Dots for major locations, squiggles for mountains. Stars for the materia caves, Chocobos for the tracks. All labelled in Wutaian. It was just a little piece of the home she absolutely had to get back to, 'cuz Leviathan knew what kind of trouble they'd be up to their necks in without her.

[For Donna]

[from here]

He really had beat the rush. Suzaku found a chair as close to the corner and as far from the bulletin as he could, and turned it to face the wall before curling up in it. His nurse frowned at him again, but she was still being cooperative, and frankly he didn't care what she had to say in the slightest. He didn't care even if he got sedated. All he cared about was finally having a few moments to himself, to sort out what Euphie's love meant and what the hell Lelouch's problem was.

It felt like he had all the pieces of a puzzle and was just too stupid to figure out how they fit together. What Lelouch had said about Shirley at breakfast and the tone he'd taken with Euphie on the board, Lelouch asking how Suzaku was, Lelouch dying. . . "All we can do is move forward and look out for the ones we care about." Euphie struggling to get out her last words, pain overtaking Suzaku's consciousness while he fought pathetically to carry out Lelouch's order. . . The last couple days, when he'd felt like he was finally figuring this out, seemed so far away now.

There were a couple things that were certain, at least: he hated what Lelouch had done, he always would. But he -- he didn't hate Lelouch, and he hadn't for a while now, and that wasn't going to change. And he didn't have much time, because everyone but Suzaku was terrifyingly mortal. And Lelouch was an idiot, but he still wasn't sure about the how and why of that one yet.

[for the Saucinator]

Soubi was restless. Demyx had provided a distraction from thoughts of Seimei and Soubi had other things to distract him once he was with Ritsuka. Now he just had to make sure Kio was sticking around and not sneaking off.

He'd been pacing by the door for only a minute before the intercom clicked on and the doors clicked open. He was out in a flash, waiting at the door of the room next door.

He wanted to move quickly. Make the exchanges he needed to and... set to work on this. Oh, and Ritsuka wanted to see Miku. Soubi was jealous curious about that...

[from here]

Even distracted as he was, Suzaku remembered to stay on his guard as he passed into the main hallway. He would only be here for a moment, but there could still be a monster lurking in the darkness. And it was so quiet and deserted just now that he would make easy prey.

[to here]

[from here]

The halls were empty so far, which was probably a good sign. Suzaku was hoping to get a move-on quickly, so they could hurry up and get Yuffie's sword made. The first night he'd been here, he'd been pulled back to his bed the instant he made it outside, so they'd have to move fast if they wanted to make any decent progress. And right now he couldn't afford to focus on anything but just that, making progress.

[to here]

[from here]

Raz trudged on forward over to the Sun Room. Still no monsters...

[to here]

[from here]

As he scurried through the corridor, the boy started to notice something was off.

"Where are all the monsters?" Raz wondered aloud. Everyone else was stressing the fact that this was a terrifying place crawling with giant snakes and zombies, but none were to be seen so far.

But then again, that was... probably a good thing.

[to here]

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.]

[from here]

"There's gotta be something here you can use..." Yousuke was a little proud of himself for having thought of this, even though it was possible they wouldn't find anything. It would also be less crowded here, at least for the time being. If they could take care of the zombies here and around it they might be able to hold up in there for a bit while they discussed what else they needed to do (aside from finding Kanji). "A sheriff would have a gun somewhere, right?"

Yousuke had never been inside an American sheriff's office before. He'd nearly expected there to be a pole out front with a couple horses tied up. Maybe there were some extra badges lying around...

He didn't have much chance to start looking, however, as not long after they walked in they found themselves being approached by the zombified sheriff and deputy. Despite the situation, Yousuke was still disappointed to see they lacked ten-gallon hats and cowboy boots. "Shit."

At first, the idea of being stuck in this meatbag dwelling sector at night seemed like a wonderful idea. So many targets, such an open field, and so many things that could be repurposed for use as weapons!

...Then he saw all the zombies. After the talk of those 'space barnacles' last night, it was fairly easy to identify them as such. But the only thing was, those things were supposed to only affect droids.

Now there were meatbag zombies. All over the place. And he didn't have a flamethrower. Oh no no no nononono.

In short, HK freaked out.

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.]

[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.]

[from here]

This was boring. They needed to install like teleporters or warp points or something all sci-fi-like if they were going to be doing creepy experiments and shit. And then they'd make weird ass keys to make the transport things work and then they'd just have to hide them all over the fucking place because, clearly, the people running this place were never game testers, just game developers that actually remembered to disable the cheats.

On second thought, Junpei decided he'd rather walk.

[to here]

[From here]

It seemed to be pretty early, because so far Tyki had yet to run into other patients. Pretty odd, considering most people knew him as the last person to be early in the first place.

He lazily swept his flashlight around the area before taking the time to light a cigarette. His first one for tonight, which for some odd miracle he hadn't lit as soon as the nurse had left. They weren't exactly a luxury in this place. But with the seemingly endless string of hallways to look forward to, the Noah needed something entertaining along the way. Cigarettes would suffice for now.

[To here]

[M79, for Fox]

Snake turned the radio over and over in his hands, for want of anything better to do while waiting for Fox to get over here. For some reason, the snoring over the intercom had been more unnerving than an outright attack. Snake was used to his enemies talking, and talking a lot, even as they died.

He'd found out a lot of things he'd rather not have known that way.

The radio emitted a shriek of static as he switched it on - attempts to tune it revealed only more static.

Great, he thought. Would have been nice to have a little light music on while I fight off monsters.

A thought struck him. Maybe the radio was two-way? In that case, he needed to try sending a message.

Superstitiously, he tuned the radio to frequency 120.13.

"This is Snake," he said into it, in his clearest voice. "Are you listening? Your reply, please."

He stared at it for a moment, listening to the cool hiss of the static, and sighed in disgust at his own behaviour. What the hell was he thinking? Maybe he was going mad already.

He tossed it aside, and lay down on the bed, one knee up, his other leg crossed over it at the ankle, and decided to doze for a while. He had a feeling he'd need the rest.

[from here]

Miles slowed again as he entered the hallway, due to another sharp spike of pain in his head. This time, it was accompanied by a louder rumble, one that almost sounded like garbled words.

He swept the beam of his flashlight from side to side. "Now, see? Nothing - and no one - is there," he muttered, hoping that would silence the voice's insistent worry. It was starting to get both annoying and worrisome at the same time. What was making it react like this? He couldn't think of anything, and the intercom announcement hadn't indicated anything particularly worrisome, either.

He sighed and continued down the hallway, continuing to scan for anything in the shadows with each step.

[to here]

[From here]

This hallways seemed familiar. But then, they all looked the same.

Keeping an ear out for creepy-crawlies, Yukari passed the Nurse's station and came to the door to the men's block.

It was this one, right? Why did there have to be so many male rooms? Her mind wandered from the gender-imbalance to poor architectural design to a lack of signs to what room was she trying to go to again? Yawning again, Yukari considered calling the whole matter off and going back to sleep.

No, this was important. Making nice with the rescue team could come in handy later. This in mind, Yukari mentally confirmed her directions and destination then headed onwards.

Besides, if she got there early enough, maybe she could catch a few moments of shut-eye before they headed out.