Day 55: Courtyard [2nd Shift]
After what seemed like an eternity of being amused, irritable, bored, in pain, in excruciating pain, and any combination of those, Guybrush was met by the same soldier who had led him to the cafeteria. He wasn't offered a trip to the Sun Room to check the bulletin board, but didn't push for it anyway. That would have been more walking, and moving
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It wasn't like Dean hadn't frozen his balls off before on jobs, but usually he could look forward to a cheap couple of beers at the end of the day, maybe blasting the Impala's heater. Still, he supposed at this point, he should be glad he'd even gotten a jacket. Or something. Call it a hunch, but he figured the days of awesome food as a crap consolation prize were probably over, too. Searching the courtyard for Sam, he caught sight of Ruby instead. She was totally doing that thing, the whole scoping things out without looking like you were and...yeah, this was gonna be awkward. Sam had told him she’d popped up again, back at square one, and right now he wasn’t even sure how much she remembered. Ruby looked pretty good for a chick Sam had told him he’d thought was dead, nevermind the whole memories thing.
He guessed he better see where she was at: way he figured it, Sam probably ran her through some basic stuff when she “came back” or whatever you wanted to call it. Y’know, big clusterfuck of monsters that had no right being in the same location all at once, creepy fake hospital thing (except he wasn’t even sure what was going on with that), and he wasn’t even sure if Sam even told her the whole story. There wasn’t exactly a tactful way to tell someone they’d been here before and they could easily get wiped again. If anyone could get away with it, it’d probably be Sam. The kid did have a way with getting people to trust him, and not just in that foot in the door kinda way.
Dean approached Ruby, copying her and stuffing his hands in his pockets. Still balls-freezing but at least they weren’t making them do crunches in their underwear or something to make another point. He’d seen the looks on a lot of the faces back in the cafeteria, when it was dawning on them that there was plenty more where that came from.
“Hey,” Dean said, searching Ruby’s face for any recognition. It wasn’t as if they’d been close - that’d seemed like Sam’s thing, the whole putting his head together with this chick - but since they were on the same side, sorta, he’d like to know if they were on the level. “Sam told me he hit you up.”
There wasn’t any point cozying up to her. Not that Ruby wasn’t hot, but…yeah.
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But she caught herself quick enough and the look shifted into one of understanding, like she was putting things together and realizing who he was. As if that recognition hadn't been there. She was gonna have to get better at tempering those sentiments and not getting herself caught out.
"Of course he did," she tried not to say it in too much of a way that indicated the level of familiarity she really had with Sam, but with a tone that undeniably indicated an amusement level that went along with comfortable friendship. "He's just filling everybody in, isn't he?" That was probably enough to let him figure out that Sam had briefed her on everything she needed to know.
"Glad you caught me. After Sam fingered you, I figured I better introduce myself. … Again. Dean, right?" She raised a questioning eyebrow as though she didn't already know the answer, then pulled a hand out of her pocket so she could offer it to shake. "Ruby. But you already know that." It made for a good excuse as to why she'd give her real name so easy, anyway. She carried on without much pause. "I figure there's no reason not to get friendly. After all, like it or not, we're more or less working together. Crappy as it is, I gotta say, i'm kinda relieved to have you boys around." It definitely made her real job easier, anyway.
"Sam said you guys had been here for a few weeks now," she trailed off a little, looking for confirmation. Correction: Sam said he had been there for three weeks. Dean, on the other hand … She had a big whopping nothing as far as info on his deal went. It was hard not to make some biting remark and get aggressive. Dean always seemed to bring that out in her. But, she'd tried to play nice when he first found out she and Sam were working together when he got back from the Pit. There was no reason not to try it again now that he was less likely to shut her down. She could be the bigger person here and deal. Play nice, so to speak.
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...Even if he got what Ruby was saying.
At least Ruby seemed up to speed, even if it was really friggen weird to be introducing himself to her all over again. Now he was getting a feeling of what it was like when he'd run into Yuffie. He nodded as she checked his name, reaching out to take her hand in his and shaking it. Chick had a pretty good handshake, which he figured wasn't too surprising: hunters weren't the type of folks to give limp ones. Although getting called "you boys" made him raise an eyebrow in return, ‘cause last he checked, he wasn’t part of some dude harem here. Or whatever you called the guy version of a harem. It was one of those things he somehow hadn’t thought about much.
Still, Ruby was right. He wasn’t much interested in a pissing contest with another hunter or a dick measuring contest (although a dick measuring contest with Ruby wouldn’t exactly work out, but whatever), and anyway, if she agreed not to stab him in his sleep, it was the least he could do to agree not to return the favor. Besides. Sam seemed to trust her. Dean guessed maybe the kid might even have a thing for Ruby. Kinda weird place and time, but hey, it was either that or Sam was still pissed at him or moping. Or both.
“Works for me,” Dean said, dropping Ruby’s hand to shove his own back into his pockets. He could see his breath coming out in little white puffs of air. “Yeah, he’s right, sorta. Few weeks we can remember, but they have a nasty habit of wiping your memory, so there’s no telling exactly how long we’ve been here. Supposedly I was here longer than I can remember, so…”
He trailed off. So he didn’t know how long he even had left or what he’d been up to his last stint in Landels, and he hadn’t met anyone who could fill in the blanks. Ruby was lucky Sam was the caring and sharing type.
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Instead, she gave a wry laugh at his comment on the memory wipes. It was a little harsher than she'd meant it to be, mostly because she couldn't quite shake that bitterness -- demons weren't supposed to be mind wipe-able. They didn't even have real, concrete memories rooted up in their skulls to wipe. Not that she was neurologist material, but she was smart enough to get that.
"So, I'm not the only one. Good to know. Kinda does something for the old ego hearing the man in charge to the drop on you, too." Actually, it didn't do anything. Dean was a human, a moron, and a million other expletives she could think to describe him with. The last thing she wanted was to be on that same level with him. Still, she had to take one for the team.
Pretty promptly, though, her eyes trailed past Dean's shoulder to glance at the soldiers in the surrounding area, gaze narrowed and mistrusting.
"Well. Used to be the man in charge, anyway." These days? Who knew who was really at the top of that freaking totem pole. Did she wanna know? Sure. But, spending her whole breakfast trying to choke out the angel wasn't gonna get her that, so this was her best shot. Smalltalk with her least favorite Winchester brother.
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He followed Ruby's gaze, shifting his head slightly so he could glance out of the corner of his eyes at the soldiers' positions around the courtyard. These army pukes were a lot more alert than the nurses and he figured they'd pick up on the two of 'em scoping them out if they were both looking. He wasn't surprised to see Ruby getting that look on her face. Probably wasn't too fond of the cops or anyone else waving a rifle around with no idea about what was really out there. It was kinda just part of the gig to be careful around these types. Although…well, they didn’t know how much these soldiers knew about what happened at night. It could be like they were the nurses, clueless and sitting pretty in their get-ups, but Dean wasn’t sure.
All in all, he figured Ruby’s paranoia worked for now: “better safe than sorry” was totally a valid strategy with being a hunter. It’d be an awful short career as a hunter if you ran up to a cop and started waving around your hunting arsenal, for example.
“Yeah, well, we’ll see how it goes. Landel was a huge douchebag, so I’m not sorry he’s outta the picture.” Dean shrugged.
He wouldn’t miss the mustache-twirling or the b-movie speeches, at least. He wasn’t saying he was happy being a prisoner here, but he’d rather deal with soldiers than some psycho who couldn’t make up his mind if he was gonna kill ‘em or not. At least with soldiers, they tended to be upfront about stuff like this. He figured Ruby was practical enough to appreciate at least seeing a threat coming from the front instead of from the sides, like Martin Landel.
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"I remember before I got here just fine, but all the time I was apparently kicking around the Institute between then and three days ago is wiped clean. Somebody musta got inside my head." When they were bringing me back to life. The thought was still unnerving. Not exactly the part about Sam doing it anymore -- of course he had that in him, she was having a harder and harder time bringing herself to be surprised by that fact -- but by the fact that Landel had that kinda mojo on his side.
"Anyway," she dismissed the subject promptly. If all went well, in a way that looked like she was just uncomfortable with the idea and didn't wanna get into it with Dean Winchester. "Devil you know's better than the one you don't, I'll give Aguilar that much, but that's the problem. Where's Aguilar? We've got the soldiers working for him, but the only one we've seen in the flesh is Landel."
So, who did they really have the better shot of dealing with? The one who made contact or the distant, overarching threat that just sent his underlings to do his dirty work? Sure, he was more open about it, but that didn't change the fact that he could be anywhere putting these orders in. It wasn't as easy as Landel's office being somewhere around the building.
"I don't like it." As if that weren't already clear. She put a stop to her uncomfortable, prying gaze that had been flickering around at the soldiers and just fixed it on Dean, looking for his thoughts. Pushing it further, she added, "I don't like that these guys are all that's supposed to stand between us the others in here, either. No idea which of 'em are bad news back where they come from." Like, say for instance, an angel.
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It took Dean a moment to realize what Ruby meant by "the others". It made sense, viewing the other patients as a threat. Hell, there was a Trickster slash possibly a live angel here - well, a douche of one, according to Sam - and the sad thing was he didn't even know if she knew about all that stuff. That apparently there were two supposed angels running around, on top of everything else. Dean just hoped Sam had the sense to keep the whole "my brother got shot at by Daleks" thing under wraps: it sounded crazy and Dean rather have Ruby not wondering if he was going whacko, thanks.
Dean shrugged. "It's probably the same old song and dance with Aguilar, but who knows. I still want to find out where Landel and Aguilar hole up at night."
He didn't have a whole lot to go on regarding Aguilar, but he'd seen enough of Landel to think the guy deserved a hell of an asskicking. No doubt he wasn't the only one to come to that conclusion. And they were supposed to believe Martin Landel had their best interests at heart? Yeah, right.
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Augh. Time travel. The headache itself made her grateful it was the kind of crap reserved for things way stronger than she was even when she was chalk full of demon mojo. But in this case, there wasn't much complaining she could do about it, considering just how far in her favor it'd seemed to work out.
"Intercom system means they're broadcasting from inside the building somewhere. Not that it helps, with how tight the doors around here get locked. Even if somebody found the right office, getting in, we'd need a key, and I don't know about you but considering some of the crap I've already run into, I'm not jumping at a chance to run into one of the nurses after hours." Or any of these soldiers for that matter. They'd probably be leagues worse.
She'd read Sam's journal, she knew the deal, and she wasn't looking forward to the darkness. That was a first. A demon who was even marginally afraid of what was creeping around in the dark. At this rate, it'd be better if she just handed over her membership card and called it quits. But that whole demon thing was still managing to elude Dean, and for as long as she could keep that hushed up, she'd do it.
Hopefully Castiel wouldn't send the cat careening out of the bag at warp speed.
"Don't get me wrong, I'd love to get my hands on either of them as much as the next person, but unless you've got a way to get a key, I don't see it happening." Dropping that suggestion would hopefully do her some good, though. Lock-picking and pickpocketing were hunter basics. If he could at least consider getting the drop on a nurse, it would either be one helluva good day for her and the Winchesters both, or it'd just be Dean who got his ass chewed.
And if he didn't take the bait, well, no harm done.
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