Day 58: Sun Room (Second Shift)
[From here.]The room was mainly empty when Michael reached it, which was fine by him. It wasn't that he didn't feel sympathy for the other patients, but he also didn't know if it would be helpful for him to talk to them. The staff seemed to think that forming bonds amongst themselves would lead to recovery, but to him it felt more like they would
( Read more... )
With most of the room to choose from, Zack went ahead and picked a couch near the middle of the room to sit on. He was positioned right under the glass roof, which almost gave the impression that he was outside. He already missed the free choice from the day before, but he realized that the staff couldn't wait too long before allowing them outside again.
His hair was still damp, anyway -- with how long it was, it took a good while to dry. He probably shouldn't be out in the cold when it was still wet, and the fact that the view overhead was mainly cloudy meant that the weather couldn't have heated up much in the past day or so.
Really, what he needed to be doing now was getting more of his plans together for the coming nights. He would hopefully have a proper weapon after what he'd suffered through the night before, so what was his next step? Checking in with his friends was probably the best place to start, and so Zack strayed away from his seat to grab some paper from near the bulletin and then sat down to draft out a message to them. This would take up a bit of time until he found someone to chat with, anyway.
[For Rose.]
Reply
It turned out to be a good choice when she spotted Zack across the room, scribbling on some papers. The sight had her smiling faintly as she crossed the room to sink down on the couch beside him, not missing the fact that he'd apparently hit the showers first thing as well. She didn't blame him at all. If she'd felt awful this morning, she couldn't imagine how he'd felt.
"Taking advantage of having thumbs again, are you?" she teased him gently as she grabbed a pillow and curled herself around it, her arms snugly tucked about its center. "How are you feeling this morning?"
Reply
"You bet I am," he replied with a laugh. "But really, I have to say, I feel great. I didn't even know if I'd be back to myself when I woke up, so I was pretty thrilled when everything was back where it should be." And as far as he could tell, nothing had been misplaced when he'd been put back together. He was just glad that he didn't actually remember changing back, since it wasn't like he needed to go through that pain twice.
"What about you?" She wasn't jumpy, but it also wasn't dark in here. Still, he was guessing that if his side effects had worn off completely then Rose's probably had too. "A shower can really make all the difference, can't it?"
Reply
Especially after breakfast with Damon and Alaric this morning. Normally she could get along better with Damon's comments and sense of humor, but she'd been raw this morning, and feeling vulnerable. Not a good time to be around this particular Salvatore brother. At least, not as he was now. It made her miss her friend even more, now that that balance was unsettled and missing again. She stifled a sigh, wondering if she'd ever get it back.
"I'm glad you're feeling better, though," she added, derailing her own trail of thought before she depressed herself again. "No lingering side effects, I hope? Mine seemed to fade when I woke up this morning, but it's not really dark and scary at the moment, either. I suppose I'll have to wait and see how things are tonight. And no more experimentation with unlabeled drugs in the future, I think."
Reply
"Nope, no side effects," he replied with a quick shake of his head. He would have noticed by now, he was sure; nothing had seemed off when he'd taken the shower, either. He felt like a new man, as cliched as that phrase might be. In this case it was all too applicable.
"I saw that that guy was bugging you at breakfast. Damon, right? I hope he didn't give you any trouble." The man had seemed laidback enough when Zack had spoken to him that one time, but if he was the sort of person who relentlessly bothered someone who was clearly in a bad mood, then he had to reconsider what he thought of the guy. Zack wasn't going to jump to any conclusions, though, and so he waited to hear what Rose had to say about it.
Reply
"We knew each other before we showed up here," she added, then hesitated, figuring she better amend that. "Sort of." There was a faintly wistful tone to her voice as she spoke, but she did her best to shake it off.
"Let's hope it stays gone, whatever it was," she added a moment later. "I'd prefer not to have that linger more than it did. It would make nights damned inconvenient around here."
Reply
Either way, it seemed like she had some history with the man, though it wasn't the sort of thing he could ask her about. Even if they'd been through a rather harrowing experience together, this was still their third time talking. There were certain things you didn't talk about until you knew someone a little better.
"Believe me, I feel the same way." Maybe Zack's change wasn't quite as crippling as what Rose had been through, but not being able to open doors or talk was problematic enough. He was still worried about what might happen tonight, but he didn't want to bring it up and make Rose worry even more.
"Anyway, I wanted to thank you for sticking with me last night," Zack said as he turned toward her with a soft smile. "I know you must have been scared out of your mind, so I appreciate you not running away at the sheer sight of me." It was easy to laugh about it in retrospect, but that would have been quite the hard hit to take if it had actually happened that way.
Reply
Rose shot him a weak smile. "Well, luckily for both of us, you were astonishingly less frightening than whatever my imagination was conjuring in the shadows," she commented. "Which is impressive, since... dogs are not my favorite creatures." Understatement of the century, that.
"I should be thanking you, honestly. And apologizing. I feel rather mortified about it now. Having a hysterical female on your hands wasn't high on the priority list, I'm certain. Especially when you technically didn't have hands. Thank you for being patient."
Reply
"Hey, you couldn't help it," he replied with a shake of his head and a shrug of his shoulders. "We both helped each other out last night, so let's just call it even, all right?" He was also pretty relieved that those bats hadn't managed to sink their claws into either of them before the night ended. That would have just added insult to injury -- or the other way around, in this case.
"I'm just hoping that Aguilar is actually going to keep to his word." If they had been tricked into doing this only to get no reward, he was going to be genuinely angry. He also realized he'd only have himself to blame; trusting your captor was a pretty stupid move, after all.
Reply
At his mention of the man who seemed to run this place, she cocked her head to the side, cheek propped on her palm as she studied him intently. "Is he likely to? I don't know much about him, or the ones in charge here. And from what it sounded like, what was offered last night was pretty rare?"
Reply
The point was, he wouldn't mind wandering around with Rose again, and maybe they could actually accomplish things instead of going on drug trips. It was something to keep in mind, anyway. She seemed pretty reliable.
The questions about Aguilar weren't ones that he could answer easily, and Zack wasn't afraid to admit it. "I don't know that much either. I mean, the military only took over a few days ago, so it's hard to say. Still, I am pretty sure that's the first time anything like that has been offered. But... I don't know. I kind of feel like Aguilar might keep to his word more than someone like Landel would have." Zack realized it was naive of him to say such a thing, but a lot of weight was given to keeping to your promises in the military, at least as far as he knew. A real soldier, a real general... wouldn't trick people like that.
Reply
She'd pieced together details here and there, from conversations and information, all from different sources. But more was never a bad thing and she was still trying to get a better view of the bigger picture. Although she didn't know how successful she'd be. She wasn't sure anyone had a good idea of the big picture here.
She was relieved Zack was so willing to talk, however. He was the first person she felt comfortable relaxing with around here, what with everything else so confused and jumbled. Or forgotten entirely. It was a relief, not to have to watch every word out of her mouth.
Reply
"There isn't too much to tell, honestly. I mean, Landel and Aguilar are different and similar at the same time. Landel was way more..." He paused, trying to think of the word. "Manic, I guess. He was overly cheerful during the day and then taunted the patients at night. And we were treated like mental patients then, although he dropped that charade once the lights went off. My guess is that he's the creator, seeing how all of this is named after him."
Zack couldn't even be sure of that, though, seeing how the military had been able to kick him out with little trouble. It was possible that the name and his position of power here had all been a cover for the military's involvement. The longer Landel remained fired, the more likely that seemed.
"Anyway, as for Aguilar... he usually lets his subordinates talk for him, and I think he tries to make every word count for something when he actually does bother to speak to us." Which might explain the full-blown rant they'd been treated to last night. "I'm not sure if the two of them have different goals or if they're all part of the same organization, but... in the end, they're all keeping us here, so..." The persona hardly mattered when the end result was the same, or that was how Zack saw it.
Reply
Which was frustrating, but unsurprising. She tilted her head back against the back of the couch, staring up at the ceiling in thought for a moment. "It all sounds rather futile and impossible, when you look at what we have to work with. Impressive, really, since I bet if most of us were home, a place like this wouldn't contain us for longer than five minutes."
She'd observed a lot of that over the past day, mostly hinted at in conversations she'd listened in on, or what she'd picked up from the board this morning. And from what she observed. Considering who'd been picked from Mystic Falls, she had to wonder if that was the pattern. This place certainly seemed to be collecting people who would otherwise be very hard to keep.
She wondered if Zack qualified for this category himself, but wasn't sure how to come out and ask him. As long as turning into a canine wasn't a habitual thing, it didn't really bother her one way or another, but it was interesting.
Reply
And it would happen.
"Ha, you're right about that last part," he said with a grin as he leaned further back into the couch. He was probably getting it wet with his long, damp hair, but that wasn't something he was inclined to worry about too much. "Wouldn't that be nice, if we could just all pool our powers together and bust out of here?" But it had already been made obvious that that wouldn't be happening.
"Still, don't think of it as impossible," he continued, turning to Rose with a slightly more serious look on his face. "We might have to hold out for a while, but I'm sure we'll make it out someday. You can't keep this many people captive for that long." Certainly not for years, like what had happened to him before all this. He wasn't sure why it was that everyone seemed to want him caged up like this, but he was starting to wonder if he'd be spending the larger part of his twenties as a prisoner.
Reply
Realizing she'd derailed her own train of thought again, her gaze flicked back to his face, letting herself relax a little more. "No. They won't be able to hold this many for long. I can't imagine any force that could, to be honest. Apparently they enjoy a challenge."
Either that or they were extremely lucky.
Reply
Leave a comment