Night 56: Stairwell by Waiting Room/Lobby 2

[selfnighted]

[from here]

Maya shone her light all around the stairs to confirm there was nothing on them, then lifted her pipe so it wouldn't bang on the steps while she ascended. Careful to be careful; quite the concept, yet she'd failed at it earlier. Maya was unused to exercising caution in hallways.

That was the excuse, at the very least. On the contrary,

Comments

[selfnighted]

"Making do with whatever is at hand?" Maya responded. Continuing in a direction was admirably organized. On the other hand, she imagined a courtyard represented, more than any other place, the possibility of escape.

[to here]

[fourstonewalls]

[from here]

Once in the stairwell, Lana rolled the notebook and tucked it back in her pocket. "The files downstairs, as far as I could tell, covered current patients. First half of the alphabet on the right, as you face the door. Alphabetic by false names, of course."

There were several reasons to be interested in those files; any hints as to what, precisely, had been done to some patients at night were welcome, both to friend and foe. So was the full list of names and false identities; a census and a notification system for arrivals and departures would boost morale significantly, though it would be a lot of work, none of it guaranteed to succeed.

But if that was all that was in the two small rooms downstairs, what was upstairs? It could be substantially more informative than a set of fairy tales, no matter how artfully constructed.

[scientist_skye]

"Well, I've been here ten days and ten nights," Ema corrected. She had arrived in the afternoon of her first day; Lana had arrived later that night. Neither sister knew of the other's imprisonment until the following morning, however, so it was understandable that Lana would forget that detail.

As they made their way up the stairs, Ema turned back to her sister. Even though Ema had been a patient for slightly longer, there was no denying that Lana was the better informed of the two. "You don't think that the files upstairs will contain anything on released patients or on our real lives, do you?" The question was mostly directed at her sister, but she made sure to glance back toward Morgan to get his input as well. Not that Ema was able to imagine what other kinds of files there could be. M-U and Special Counseling data, perhaps? If that turned out to be the case, Ema didn't really want to know what was in her own file

[mirthfulness]

> Gamzee: Ascend stairs again.

This was where the beams of anyone else's flashlight interfered with Gamzee's night vision the most. He didn't know how humans could stand it, but didn't feel like puzzling over it either. Scientific explanations were for trolls that didn't believe in miracles.

At the top of the stairs he stopped, frowning only slightly. Rose had been moving fairly quickly the night before, but he was almost certain she hadn't made all that many turns. "She all went up the motherfuck this way, bro. Like right at this corner, then right again. Two rights. So like, doubly motherfuckin' right."

He grinned. Two rights obviously didn't make a wrong.

[forgot_it_all]

"The sort of possessions that used to belong to the people we're supposed to be," Ritsuka said as he followed Gamzee up the stairs. He paused just before they reached the top, however, and wondered if what he said was right. It sounded right to him, but maybe others wouldn't see it his way. That seemed to be a running theme here: disagree with Ritsuka's views. Everyone here was so quick to jump to violence after all. It'd resulted in Peter getting burned, that kid getting shot, Albedo having his throat crushed - when all that needed to happen was for them to walk the other way.

Hurrying up the rest of the stairs, Ritsuka decided to correct himself just so he wouldn't have to worry about future mistakes. "You know, the people the Institute thinks we are."

Or maybe he didn't know. Gamzee didn't seem to be the most up-to-date sort of person when it came to certain things.

[to here]