DAY 20: LUNCH

[prisonerofdeath]

While Arts and Crafts wasn't all that bad, Gray Fox was greatly relieved when an intercom announced Lunch. He had almost reached the point where he was going to start eating more of the building materials

Comments

[lustful_thing]

"We're up against a great deal," Lust said, completely blunt and frank. Her flirtatiousness and coyness were all dropped when speaking with another woman - another woman she doubted would care one way or another for her charms, at least. "A building that shifts itself and changes its structure at will. Monsters with amazing strength at night - chimera like creatures, massive and twisted versions of normal creatures. Doors with locks that resist picks. A mad man calling all shots from behind an intercom, a radio that claims to help but speaks in riddles and seems to mock us. And most likely other obstacles that I and my usual companions have yet to encounter. And of course the exerimentations that they liked to do to us."

She started on her own meal. Red meat. She found it somewhat disgusting. Thick and heavy and clogging, almost.

"Yes, my abilities are weakened." Lust drew down the collar of her shirt, displaying bare skin where the mark of a homunculus should be. "I'll be honest with you, lieutenant, I'm more human than not in this place. They've experimented on me on top of normally weakening me."

[sasuke_of_sound]

The blonde woman dropped her voice, making Sasuke tense and wonder if he'd have to join the conversation to learn anything.

Then the other one spoke, and it was no longer really a choice. When Yohji hadn't mentioned a loss of abilities, Sasuke had simply assumed that the man either didn't have non-physical abilities or didn't want to share. But a building that was alive? Monsters? Madmen? It sounded almost like Orochimaru's lair, but Sasuke was positive that wasn't it.

And a woman who also found weakened abilities.

"Then everyone in this place is weakened? Permanently?" Sasuke demanded, shifting to face the women, and then colouring slightly as his rudeness dawned on him for once -- this was part of why he didn't usually go undercover, damn it -- and appended: "Um, miss."

[gun_fire]

"I see," she murmured, not without sympathy.

Riza was still absorbing the information Lust had given her--mostly just what the brigadier general had said, stated differently--when the boy addressed her companion. It was only now that she noticed how young he was . . . twelve, maybe thirteen. This place really was indiscriminate. But he seemed to have been through more than the usual childhood.

Of course, he still had a childishness about him. No doubt he had some true gift that balanced out his rudeness.

[lustful_thing]

"Joining a conversation without even introducing yourself?" Lust chuckled and raised an eyebrow, appraising the boy carefully now. He looked about Haru and Kyo's age, not uncommon in this place.

"But to answer your question, yes. Everyone with any sort of ability is weakened in this place. Not permanently. When patients are in the grip of the hospital's mind control, their powers are at full strength. It only lasts while they're released from the hospital's grip. However they're weakening us, it isn't permenant. I imagine it doesn't extend beyong the place's walls." She chewd idly on a bit of vegetable. So this boy had some kind of ability, then, a power. How interesting.

"And you needn't call me 'miss'."

[sasuke_of_sound]

"Sasuke," Sasuke said immediately. What had the 'Lieutenant' called her? "And you are -- Lust?"

He held his hand out, remembering that the two had shaken hands earlier, and falling back onto stiff formality to cover his earlier mistake. "I am pleased to meet you, Lust, Lieutenant. So this hospital isn't a regular facility? Do you have any idea how they weaken abilities?"

It wasn't so much that he was weakened, he realized as he analyzed his state more carefully than before. He'd assumed it was simple chakra depletion, but now that he thought about it, it felt more like suppression.

[gun_fire]

She nodded to the boy--Sasuke--when he introduced himself, remaining quiet as she listened to Lust's explanation. Riza didn't entirely mind his intrusion. She was new enough that any conversation she had access to was bound to tell her something she didn't know.

She was starting to feel somewhat lucky that she did not have some kind of ability like the colonel's or Lust's. Certainly having it at all was better than not, and yet she had never become accustomed to having that sort of power. She didn't feel the handicap that they did.

[lustful_thing]

Lust took the boy's hand and shook it.

"I'm afraid, Sasuke, that I don't have the answer to your question about abilities. But this place is nowhere near a normal hospital facility. Monsters come out at night and the building changes, as I was telling the lieutenant here. Im sure you must have heard." Lust's voice was teasing, her entire manner changing when interacting with a male. Even a young one. He was probably the same age as her lover, after all.

"I take it you have some ability, then?"

[sasuke_of_sound]

Sasuke returned the handshake and withdrew his hand, forgetting about his half-eaten lunch in light of the rapidly dawning comprehension that shit, this is actually serious.

"I hadn't heard anything," Sasuke said, frowning with the realization that he didn't, in fact, know anything, and that he would as a result need to depend on someone else until he could do more effective reconnaissance. "I woke up this morning to a medic who called me by the wrong name and then met someone who told me that this was a mental hospital and not a prison. Do you know why we're here?"

He paused before answering his question, wondering about how much information he should reveal and what could possibly be a trump card without his chakra. "It's not so much an ability as a force that lets me fight," He said finally, leaving out the Sharingan or the Heaven Seal.

[gun_fire]

Though she didn't stare, Riza took to observing Lust with some interest as she spoke with Sasuke. Almost from the moment he revealed his eavesdropping, her manner had been different. With Riza, Lust had been straightforward and practical. But with the boy, she seemed to call upon all the traits of her namesake.

Riza was certain she only did this to her advantage, especially when she chose which people to use it on. It was just what Riza had hoped never to do in her life. Instead she had chosen to elicit equal treatment by encouraging the men around her to forget that she was different from them at all. In fact, she often overcompensated for the differences she couldn't change. And for the most part, it had worked, with some large sacrifices.

They both had ways of getting what they wanted. Riza respected that.

[lustful_thing]

"They call all of us by wrong names," Lust said, twitching her shoulder in a half shrug. "It's what they do. And then at night all of the monsters come out." She chuckled some, a deep and throaty sound.

"You'll get used to it. Well, I sincerely hope that you can fight without that ability of yours, Sasuke, or have found someone who can. This place is very dangerous to those who can't defend themselves. Very dangerous indeed."

[sasuke_of_sound]

"Monsters," Sasuke said disbelievingly. He'd seen his fair share of beasts, training under Orochimaru, but monsters? "What sort of monsters?"

And -- "Has anyone tried escaping?" He asked. It surprised him that Lust hadn't mentioned it yet. The place didn't seem particularly well-guarded -- the medics scattered throughout the lunchroom looked about as threatening as his now-soggy lunch. "There has to be an entrance somewhere."

[gun_fire]

As Riza listened to the boy's questions, she found herself feeling almost lucky that there were others here whom she recognized, others she felt she could trust. Were it not for them, she knew she'd be far more susceptible to the apt madness this place seemed to breathe.

But she hadn't yet been exposed to the worst of it. From everything she was hearing, she wasn't looking forward to nightfall. She was brave, and she was capable, but these were no usual opponents, and she was likely to be without an effective weapon for at least a little while.

She sighed quietly, finishing the last of her lunch, which was cold by now. Even cold, however, it was energy she was likely to need.

[lustful_thing]

"People try escaping every night," Lust explained. "I don't know of anyone who has accomplished it." She rested her cheek in her hand, leaning against the table. "You'll need a weapon to do anything in this place."

She turned to address Hawkeye as well now. "The kitchen's always a good place to find blades or metal. I believe your soldier friends can give you more information - I have my weapon and have no need of others."

What monsters. Why did everyone ask that?

"Giant creatures that hunger for human flesh roam these halls at night."

[sasuke_of_sound]

Sasuke's frown deepened as he glared thoughtfully at the table. So this place has stronger security than I'd expected, he thought. If I had to guess, I'd say that there's a powerful genjutsu that makes the building change, which means that without my chakra, I'll have to get around it in another way.

"Thanks." He remembered to thank Lust for her information, and realized that he now owed her. Addressing the Lieutenant this time, he asked, "There are more soldiers like you? From what army?"

He likely hadn't heard of it, whatever it was called, but it was worth a shot.

Hungering for human flesh -- Sasuke resisted the immature urge to roll his eyes. It sounded like one of Orochimaru and Kabuto's less useful experiments, that was certain. "Do they have any powers?"

[Dude, LJ, wtf. I was definitely in the right journal. ;____; SO SORRY.]

[gun_fire]

She nodded to him when he addressed her. "From the army of Amestris. But it seems as though the people here come from a number of . . . different worlds. Even different times within the same world." She glanced to Lust, realizing she hadn't asked what time she was from.

As Sasuke spoke again, she waited for Lust's answer. She would need to know this, as well, though it was probable that the extent of the monsters here, and their abilities, was not easy to pin down.

[lustful_thing]

"The monsters? Quite possibly." Lust shrugged. She had never paid that much attention. "I haven't encountered all there is to encounter in this place. There have been rumors of creatures that have abilities and powers, but I've never seen any myself. Those that I know are quite strong physically, and very fast."

She turned to Hawkeye, understanding there was a question there. "I came here shortly after the fall of Liore," she explained. "I was working with Edward against my Master, and then I was here."