Day 60: Intercom, Evening

[damned_intercom]

The intercom jingled at its standard time, with the Head Doctor still in his over-the-top, jovial mood. It seemed not even the evening light could keep down the love he held for his job.

"Good evening, everyone! I hope your soul is filled with music from last shift; I know mine is

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[scintillatingly]

Three weeks was really nothing to sneeze at. Most people didn't stick around here for that long, and Sora got the feeling that this place had worn the other boy down in more ways than one, judging from the look on his face and the way that he wouldn't meet his eyes. Sora felt his own shoulders slump, mainly because he wasn't sure that anything he said could cheer his new roommate up at this point. The fact was that he wasn't whoever the boy was expecting, and that wasn't about to change.

Still, he wasn't just going to let them both sit here and mourn their friends. Not that Neku didn't deserve to be mourned, but he knew that Neku wouldn't have wanted him to sit there and mope about it.

Food wasn't really something that Sora was thinking about at the moment, so instead he took a few more steps toward the bed where the boy was sitting. It would be better if the other boy got all of his feelings out instead of balling them up, and Sora was willing to listen.

Before he could say anything himself, though, the boy asked a question. Sora frowned, but in the end he didn't mind explaining. He wanted to make sure that Neku was remembered, after all. "His name is Neku." He wouldn't say was because Neku was still out there somewhere. "He's around our age... Actually, we kind of look alike." It was how they'd ended up talking in the first place. "He's kind of quiet and he kept to himself, but he's a good guy underneath it all. He was always there to help when I needed it."

Sora wasn't the best at speeches, but he hoped that that would be good enough. Not that he could ever forget Neku. The boy had taken a place in his heart the moment that they'd become friends.

[scintillatingly]

If the other boy had seen Neku's name on the bulletin, that was probably because of the Arts and Crafts organizational posts that Sora had put up. He didn't know how much people who weren't in the club paid attention to all that, but since they were daily it made sense that it had stuck in the other's mind at least somewhat. Not that Sora needed to explain that now.

He didn't have to ask for the other boy to give the same information, and as he started to explain Sora stood there and listened with genuine interest. He didn't know this Brainy (that was his name, right? Or maybe it was a nickname, if the two had been close), but he made sure to hear out the boy anyway.

"Huh. They acted like robots?" Maybe he had been kind of like Tron, then. "That sounds pretty interesting. I..." He wanted to say that he wished he'd had the chance to meet him, but he realized that might be too much for either of them to deal with right now.

"Everyone can be a little stupid sometimes," he said instead, with a brief smile. It wasn't nearly as bright as his usual ones, but he still felt like he needed to be the one to break that ice. And since he hadn't been snapped at or tossed out yet, Sora went ahead and took a seat next to the other boy on the bed.

"You can tell me more about him, if you want," he encouraged the stranger. "And the name's Sora. I know this isn't the best way to meet, but..." Both of them had been here for a while now. That didn't mean they were reliable, but they could learn to be friends, couldn't they? Sora wasn't going to quit making them just because he'd lost some along the way.

Besides, he would save them someday, if they didn't make their way back on their own.

[scintillatingly]

Brainiac 5. Sora thought it over, wondering if that meant that the other boy's roommate had been really smart. It was weird to think that he'd been treated like a machine rather than a person, though. Still, it was clear that Peter had been friends with him, so he must have gotten to open up at least somewhat. That was a nice thought, except that Landel had come in and screwed it all up.

Sora had gotten Neku to open up too. Not completely, but they'd had some good conversations, and over time Sora had come to really trust him. It was hard to have to start over with Peter now, but Sora had done this a few times already. He wasn't going to let Landel turn him into someone who didn't even bother making friends because of the threat of losing them.

They were still his friends, even when they were gone. He could still feel them in his heart, even if he didn't see their faces every day.

He watched as Peter started walking around restlessly, letting him do so as he ignored the smell of the turkey coming from their desks. Sora felt a gnawing in his stomach, but he didn't have it in him to eat right now. He'd just have a lot at breakfast.

The question was understandable, and Sora frowned as he tried to figure out how to reply. "It's not okay with me," he said first and foremost. "Nothing that's being done here is okay or right. I've lost a lot of people since I've been here, but just this morning someone... someone I thought was dead, who died a few weeks ago, he came back. It doesn't always happen, but it means there's a chance." He paused and smiled up at Peter. "A chance we can save everyone."

He started fiddling with his hands, letting his gaze fall down to his lap as he kept talking. "Every time someone leaves, it hurts. But if we let ourselves get so upset that we can't keep going, then that's the same as letting those people down. So we have to just hold onto the people who are still here, and keep fighting." He glanced up and looked the other boy right in the face. "That's what I believe, anyway."

[scintillatingly]

As it turned out, Sora's words hadn't had the effect that he'd been banking on. Instead, it was clear that he'd either said something wrong or Peter had just hit his breaking point, because the other boy fell into a rant as he paced around the room. Usually getting it all out like that was supposed to help, but in this case it seemed like things only got worse the more that Peter said, until he finally tossed Sora's tray of food onto his bed.

Instead of being upset about that, Sora just watched with a severe frown on his face. It was hard for him to see someone who was in so much pain, especially since he could hardly blame Peter for what he was going through. There were plenty of times when Sora had wanted to be angry at the world, too, but he realized that those sort of emotions would only take him down dark paths. If only he could make Peter realize that...

"I know," he said after the silence had stretched between them for a while. "It seems like each step we take forward, we fall back two more, and it's hard. I've seen other patients do some bad things here too, but that just means that those of us who are good need to make sure we outnumber them and keep them out of trouble." Sora had had to worry about all of those Organization members, not to mention Scar (even if he'd been in a human body). Now, all of them were gone. "Even if a lot of good people disappear from this place, a lot of bad people do too."

He wasn't sure where he was going with this, and he was pretty sure that Peter wasn't going to calm down no matter what he said. But Sora decided to keep going. In the end, he had to fall back onto what he knew. For the moment, he kept his gaze on his lap, not moving from his spot on the bed.

"Where I come from, darkness is more than what you think of it as. It's something that can take over whole worlds and destroy them. It can infect people, too, and make them do horrible things." It was something he'd seen more than a few times by now, and it was never a pretty sight. "I don't know if the darkness is really in this place or not. Some people are just bad because they want to be, but even if they keep breaking us down, we can't give in, right? Because... because then we'd be just as bad as them, I think."

Sora glanced over at Peter again, though he made sure to avoid direct eye contact. "It sounds like you and... Brainy were really good friends. That probably means that he's waiting for you to find him."

I guess we should start wrapping this up?

[scintillatingly]

It looked like Peter had tired himself out, if the way he fell to the ground or the exhaustion in his voice was anything to go by. Sora frowned down at his new roommate, wishing that there was more he could do for him. But he couldn't get his friend back for him, no more than he could get Donald or Nowe or Hanatarou back.

Still, he would. Someday he'd beat this place and he'd make sure that everyone got home safely. They'd ride through the asteroids and take everyone back to where they belonged.

The question that came next wasn't so surprising, though Sora didn't like the implication that he should have been nuts after spending so much time here. No way was he going to break that easily. That would just be giving Landel and the rest of them what they wanted.

"Yeah, I guess so. To tell you the truth, I don't know anyone who's been here longer." Sora scooted back across the bed until he was leaning against the wall, relieved that they were having a proper conversation now rather than the yelling from before. "And people are always asking me how I keep my chin up, but... well, I'm lucky. Two of my best friends are with me. With them around, I feel like I can do anything." Except for the fact that when the three of them traveled together, they never seemed to make much progress. He wasn't going to dwell on that.

"If they weren't here, I think it'd be harder for me. I know there are other people who are struggling, so I try my best to be strong for them. That way, when I'm having a hard time, hopefully there will be someone else who I can lean on." So long as people were trading off, they would be fine. What they had to be scared of was the possibility of everyone having a rough time all at once. But Sora didn't think that would happen.