Day 54: Breakfast

[arc_wrench]

For once, HK was working very hard to hide a giddy facial expression as he met his nurse at the door. He'd already hidden his scalpels in his clothing. The wonderful, sharp implements of doom would be needed today. “Statement: Despite my reticence towards all processed meat and plant products, I am experiencing intolerable levels of hunger,” he

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[windstwilight]

[I am good with that! ^_^]

And that was that, she guessed. Another night, another day, and hey, look--cut out just in time before the angst patrol settled in for good. Man, she was tired of all this BS. Put the institute aside, and she was tried of the internal drama of existence. And more than fucking tired about worrying about the people she'd come to care about. The guys got back to her quick enough. But that still left some people unaccounted for. The Living Dead Girls Club was diminishing, and Senna wasn't sure if she was the only one yet remaining.

What did that mean, then? If the one that wasn't supposed to exist was the only one left?

Ahhh, she wasn't going to think about it! There was still a whole day for them to respond, and anyway, she was epically tired of the personality switch. Today she would be 'Senna'. As she was supposed to be. No angst allowed. Just fucking sunshine and rainbows. Hell. She would try at least.

The girl gathered up a mound of muffins and made her way to a mostly empty table. Another chick was close-by, and Senna swung into a seat diagonal, shoving half a muffin in her mouth. That done, she swallowed roughly and grinned. "Hey. How's it going?"

[thatdemonbitch]

Naturally. It seemed like every time Ruby wanted to take some time to sit by the curb and observe the other patients rather than bothering to put up with them. Still. It was early enough in the day that she was annoyance-free enough to manage a quickly flashed smile when the dark-haired girl walked up. When she sat down, the smile grew a little strained, but Ruby kept her frustrations quiet. Sure, sit right on down. I'd love the company. Except, y'know, not even close.

Automatically out of sheer force of habit, Ruby gave her a critical once-over, scrutinizing any oddities and assessing the girl. She was just a kid, by the looks of it. No more than fifteen or sixteen, but Ruby was the first to acknowledge that looks could be deceiving in that way. No conclusions until she had a better way of telling. Hey, how's it going didn't exactly set off the supernatural alarm bells, but around here, she wasn't ruling it out

"Seen better days. Think we all have." Her eyes flickered up to the intercom thoughtfully for a minute, then she fixed her eyes on this new stranger, cocking one eyebrow. "Landel included. Any idea what the deal is? Don't remember seeing these guys around before." She gave a pointed look to some of the uniformed officials mulling around. Not nurses, that was for damn sure. They were way too well trained, and the black stood out like a sore thumb.

Then again, she didn't have real extensive experience in the department of knowing how things in the institute were supposed to go. One day wasn't a lot to go on, but she wasn't sharing her experience deficiency with anybody if she could help it. Considering the way she'd apparently gone out, she didn't really want people figuring that out if they'd seen her around before.

[Awww thank you. ;_; Good news, I may be able to keep up a little better after all! But still slow.]

[windstwilight]

[♥ No problem.~ Take what time you need.]

Better days was an understatement. Half of Senna wished for the first week that she was here, when she still thought this place was preferable to anything else. Ah, well. She had learned, hadn't she? Was taught with her friends' blood and other patients dying because of her. Fuck. Yeah. This place teaches everyone well. She let out a sigh without thinking. "Yeah, you can say that," she offered, eyes skirting the cafeteria. No Meche. For some reason, this was what bothered her the most. That friend. That agreed to have lunch once they both got out.

But Meche was already dead, wasn't she? Even if her self had continued. She was dead when she came here. And Senna... Her existence had halted the moment before she found herself here. Unless Senna was Sarah and Meche was Maria, they wouldn't be doing any eatery bonding outside this place. Fate was not that kind.

But here she was, breaking her declaration. She resolved to pay more attention to the person in front of her. "This stuff? Nah. Never seen anything like it. Hell, might be like that computer crap. Just a weird day in a series of weird days." Understatement. Massive, retarded understatement. "Anyway, I'm Senna. Nice to meet you, despite all this."

[thatdemonbitch]

Ruby's attention moved back from the armed guards to Senna, eyeing her. She seemed to be as resigned and nonchalant about the whole thing as Ruby had tried to put off during her conversation the previous day with Harvey. If it weren't for the damn bodylock she was wound into like some kinda twisted bondage shit, she probably would've been just as legitimately casual -- but as it was, at least half of that was a front.

That was what made Senna interesting. As good as Ruby was at reading people, she wasn't seeing any falsification of that attitude in her breakfast companion. Like she wasn't afraid to be there playing fright night and fighting to survive under the strained circumstances that they'd put everybody else under. She seemed like she was just bugged and not determined.

"Ruby," she returned the introduction with a casual nod of acknowledgment, taking a bite of her english muffin to mull it over. "What computer crap? I musta missed that one in the flurry of all the usual weird." Speaking of usual weird … across the cafeteria, it was getting loud -- rowdy, even. Food was being flung and suddenly, Ruby was pretty damn glad she'd picked a corner table. Who was this joker? It was gonna take all of two seconds for the nurses to descend like vultures, he had to be some kinda stupid to throw himself out there and not try and keep it low profile.

Apparently, some of the patients had never gotten the memo that you got a lot further with honey than vinegar, considering this guy was literally flinging the honey away from him.

[windstwilight]

Ruby, huh? Interesting, but hey, Senna couldn't argue with a name with the undertones of red. Other than the name, the chick looked pretty normal. But hell if Senna didn't know that looks were deceiving. Still, there was nothing to comment to on that. Nothing to take note to except the casualness. Girl wasn't having it hard, or at any rate, Ruby was fine right now. She didn't have the haunted-determined look going on for her, or the apathetic contempt that the older patients had.

There was a ruckus nearby, and Senna tilted her head to see flying food. This... seemed familiar. Hadn't her and Reid started something like this a couple weeks ago? Though it seemed a lot more people wanted to play today. "The hell...." She laughed, amused, then returned her attention to the girl in front of her, smirking at the crowd. "Anyway, did you sleep through that or something? Or maybe it was before you came here? Lasted all day and all night, this robot chick talked to us instead of the head doctor, talked about military testing, and then at night, stuff flickered like pixels in an old RPG." Which she technically had never played. Still had the memories of. "That... was a weird-ass night. But I don't think we've heard from her since then. That I can remember, at least. But there's a connection to this, I'm thinking."

[thatdemonbitch]

The nonchalant amusement that Senna showed in regards to the flying food earned the slow raise of an eyebrow. Ruby had been ready to remark on how seriously stupid they had to be to try something like that, but apparently, her breakfast companion didn't really share the sentiments.

"Hey, a girl needs her beauty rest," she responded with a shrug. She wasn't going to indicate either way whether it was just a full 24 of rest (wasn't that a little more like a coma?) or if she hadn't been there because she didn't want Senna to know, no matter how useful the girl was being. Definitely someone to keep an eye out for in the future, either way. "Especially in a place like this." The addition was a little more grim, but still in the resigned sense. She wasn't bemoaning her presence here by any means -- she just knew how bad it sucked and was ready to deal.

"Maybe we're finally seeing the military testing she was talking about. The Doc did sound a little distracted. Put that with how little they're telling the nurses …" Her lips pursed in a thoughtful, almost impressed look. She didn't need to add that Senna's deduction made sense, that much was obvious. "Hate to see what the boys and girls here'll do if one of these jokers tries to grab 'em for testing, though."

Which brought up a question. Everyone seemed rather capable. Sam, Dean, Roxas -- why start food fights instead of … ? Loud scuffling jerked her attention back that way. Oh. That was a damn good reason not to, it didn't look like it was doing much good. Not with G.I. Joe and his pals hanging around, anyway.

[windstwilight]

Mm, Senna wasn't so sure. She had enough sleep, and with the way some people lost days here, she wasn't too sure sleep was really good for anyone. But, whatever. She had no need to say that now. So she just shrugged casually, reaching to nibble on some of her food.

The food fight had quietly deevolved into an all-out fight all around, and she became agitated at the thought of her friends getting caught in the crossfire. She hadn't seen Soma, and Nigredo wasn't around. But what about the rest of them? Her eyes roved over the room, but there was little to see in the chaos. "People have been grabbed for testing all the time," she replied, a bit distractedly. "I think it's pretty much the horror foundation of the place."

Which seemed to do its job handily, from Soma's reaction. Plus, there was the brainwashing.... And all of that other stuff. "If the robot chick's right, this whole thing is a test or something. Not just one part of it, but the whole package."

[thatdemonbitch]

The time for talking had passed, it seemed. The more distracted Senna's words got, the more distracted Ruby became. As much as she wanted to know about the deal with robot lady and her promises of their very own Tron-style adventure, she was a lot more invested in combing the cafeteria for Sam.

In the flurry of limbs as people fought and uniformed officials descended to try and intervene, it was pretty hard to pick him out of the crowd, but she spotted him beneath a table after a few moments of searching that were accompanied by a vague 'mmmhm' in response to whatever Senna had said. Was she still talking? Ruby wasn't sure. More interesting -- or highly discouraging -- was the fact that Sam was now talking to the resident angel. It wasn't rocket science to sniff him out, the guy's Grace reeked like Polo on a frat boy.

He was the last person Sam needed to be talking to, but as it stood, there wasn't much Ruby could do about it. The task at hand was a little more demanding of her attention, and there was no running across the goddamn cafeteria to drag him away kicking and screaming. She had a little more tact than that. She'd deal with that mess when she delved into it later on and figured out just what they'd been talking about. For now …

She turned her attention back to Senna.

"Academic integrity's never been my thing. Looks like our lesser-minded cohorts have done one thing right." She gave a nod to the door that led back out of the cafeteria and into the sun room. Into the rest of the Institute, where it would be a hell of a lot easier to get around in the daytime than it was at night. Maybe even with more shit unlocked. "I don't know about you, but I'm thinking we take advantage of the situation."