Day 31: Breakfast

[tsunagari]

And then he was back in his room again. Sai frowned at the ceiling momentarily, but was soon sitting up. He was back in the Landel's uniform again, which really saved him the trouble of having to change, didn't it

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[son_ofkrypton]

"'Morning," Clark replied. His smile was a little on the feeble side. At least he managed one. He didn't feel in the best of moods, but he had to at least seem friendly to his fellow patients no matter his own issues. Being nice went a long way with people and anyway, it wasn't really fair to take out his problems on others.

Naturally he hadn't seen this guy before: he would've remembered the red hair, first of all, and the fact that even as people were to Clark, this guy was really, really short. Clark ate in silence for a bit before he spoke up again, by now noticing the bandage around the other kid's arm. It was almost exactly like his, and Clark had to wonder if the other patient had a run in with a nightshift nurse like he had.

"That looks like it hurts," Clark said. He nodded at the bandages. It was stating the obvious, but he wasn't really sure how else to bring up possible-injury-by-nurse. Obviously this kid was (mostly) okay. Clark cringed a little mentally when he thought about the nurse. They might turn into monsters at night, but they were still people, something that he was getting the feeling a lot of patients here didn't believe. He was concerned for both this kid and the nurse who attacked him.

[udo_retrovirus]

"A bit," Junior admitted, shrugging. "The nurses are kinda cranky when they haven't gotten much sleep." Then again, his little group had gone to call them out last night. That was just tempting fate. He glanced over at the guy to see a similar bandage on his arm. "What about you? Anything more dangerous than a cranky nurse?"

From the way it was bandaged, probably not, but the redhead had no clue what all lurked in the building at night.

"I'm Junior, by the way" he said, introducing himself before picking up a pig in a blanket. It was the nice thing to do, seeing as how they didn't really know each other, and...hey, that was pretty good. He didn't remember anyone back home ever making this, but he'd have to try to convince someone to do it once they got home. They had to try this. "Do you remember what they said about this?" he asked, holding up the pig in a blanket. "It's really good, and I want to see about getting a friend back home to make 'em."

[son_ofkrypton]

Clark couldn't meet Junior's eyes. Not when he was talking about what happened on the bus a couple of nights ago.

"It was one of the nurses," he said, feeling that surge of guilt all over again. The injury on his arm still hurt (it was odd, feeling pain at all), but he cared more about the nurse and less about the fact that he actually got injured. She'd been a person before even if she'd changed and begun to attack anything; he still believed that, although he had growing doubts about what happened that night. Now he was wondering if what he'd even seen was true. That flash of heat and burning flesh had seemed so real; TK the probably-cop guy had seen it too. But Lex'd asked the staff and they said the nurse was on vacation. Clark might not trust Lex entirely, but he did believe him. And he couldn't see what the point of lying about this would be.

What was going on?

Clark was relieved when Junior changed the subject by introducing himself. Introductions he could handle.

"Clark Kent," Clark said. He watched as Junior took an experimental bite of the pig in a blanket. Judging by the expression on his face, you think he'd never had one, but at least he seemed to like it. "Uh, they're just pigs in blankets. Y'know, sausages and pancakes. I think they said it was buttermilk pancakes."

For something that was probably mass-produced for all the patients, they did taste really good. Almost like it was home made.

[udo_retrovirus]

Something had happened with the nurses, and it was bothering the guy. Whatever it was, it wasn't any of his business, especially not this early in the morning. Talking about stuff like that was a real mood-killer, and while Junior did say the wrong thing sometimes out of ignorance, he was pretty good about picking up on the whole 'I don't want to talk about it' vibe.

"Nice to meet you, Clark...er, given the circumstances. And thanks!" he responded, his face brightening. Wait until Shion heard about-- wait a sec.

Pancakes, pancakes...had anyone ever made pancakes before? He couldn't really remember, and cooking was definitely not his strong suit. If they had, it was probably something he'd only had once or twice. It was sorta bread-ish, he could tell that, and he got the butter part. Butter was always a great thing to add, even if artificially created wasn't that great. But hell, cows were rarer than real dogs or cats back home, it'd be hard to spread that out over a universe.

"This'll...probably sound stupid," he began again, scratching his head, "but how do you make pancakes?"

[son_ofkrypton]

Clark blinked. Was he serious?

"It's really easy," Clark said. He sorta-kinda knew how to make them. Not as good as his Mom, but it wasn't stomach-turning either. "You get stuff like eggs, milk, butter and flour," he paused as he tried to think what else there was in the mix, "oh and you basically just mix it together and put it on a frying pan."

He didn't think that Junior was stupid, not at all. He'd already met someone who didn't know what a Gameboy was - who'd initially been scared by one - so he supposed that he shouldn't be surprised that someone else didn't know what a pancake was. No point being a jerk about it and it wasn't like pancake recipes were top secret either.

[udo_retrovirus]

"Oh." 'Easy' didn't mean much to Junior until he heard just what to do; he just ate the food when it was ready. "Yeah, that does sound pretty easy. I think even I could do that without destroying a kitchen. Thanks!" he said, smiling widely. Not that he'd ever destroyed a kitchen by cooking, but it was always a possibility.

"So..." the redhead continued a bit slowly, hoping that Clark didn't mind him asking more questions about cooking of all things. He was curious, though, and he really wanted to be able to have some when he got back. "Do you know how exactly they do the whole 'pigs in a blanket' deal? Do they wrap the sausage with the pancakes and then cook it, or do it afterward?"

[son_ofkrypton]

Come to think about it, Clark wasn't exactly sure. He threw out a wild guess: "Um...I think they do it afterward, but I don't know exactly."

It felt a bit weird to be talking about something as normal as cooking of all things, but Clark was somewhat glad that he had the distraction. He wondered where Junior came from. As far as he could tell, everyone he met seemed to speak English, but he'd seen some of the messages on the bulletin where patients claimed they were from other countries - other planets, even. He tried not to get his hopes up too much about that. While he had no choice but to believe in life beyond Earth - living proof right here - as far as he'd known up to now, he was the only alien actually on Earth.

Clark polished off his own pig in a blanket, positively inhaling it and not feeling in the slightest bit full. "So I'm guessing you don't cook a lot or something?" he asked.

[udo_retrovirus]

"Thanks, and nope," Junior responded, moving on to the bacon on his plate and biting off a big hunk. "Never needed to, so I'm really not that great at it." He paused for a moment to swallow the bacon, and then continued. "You seem to have some practice, though, for knowing that off the top of your head."

That did make him wonder, though, where Clark was from. Obviously, it had to be a place sorta similar to wherever this place was located. That, or they just liked bringing in food from everyone's different homes. Couldn't hurt to ask, gauge how many people were really from Earth and how many were from other places. "So where are you from?"

[son_ofkrypton]

Clark smiled a little. He wasn't exactly capable of culinary masterpieces - all he knew was how to make a few things in the chance that his parents were busy or out of town.

And then Junior asked where he was from. Clark was starting to give up on anyone knowing where he was from, but he still couldn't help sounding a little hopeful: "Smallville. It's this town in Kansas - near Metropolis?" he added, searching Junior's face for any sign he recognized the town. At the very least he'd had to have heard of Kansas. Or maybe he was even from the area, better yet.

Unless he wasn't "from around here" like some other people already claimed.

[udo_retrovirus]

Junior rolled his eyes toward the ceiling as he thought, chewing on another piece of bacon. He'd sort of heard of Kansas, at least. Then again, he couldn't count on an ancient classic like The Wizard of Oz to be terribly accurate. It was definitely on Earth, though. That made, what...four people, and the first who wasn't from Japan. No wonder the guy had sounded sorta hopeful when he spoke. Junior felt bad about having to break the news to him.

The redhead looked back at Clark and scratched the back of his head. "Haven't heard of either of those cities, sorry. Heard of Kansas, but that's it." With a generic name like Smallville, he'd figure it'd stick out more, but apparently not. Then again, he was going off of history. If the city was really...well, small, then it probably got overlooked. He gave the guy a smile, anyway. "It's only fair, though. You probably haven't heard of my home, either. Place called Second Miltia?"

[son_ofkrypton]

Clark's shoulders drooped a little. No such luck. Again, there was someone who hadn't heard of Smallville or Metropolis, leaving him wondering if Lex might be right in the first place. No, he couldn't be - not when Clark had just seen his parents a few days ago and had walked into the glowing cellar back on the Kent farm that did exist.

He felt bad when he had to shake his head. "Sorry, never heard of it," he said, and regretted that he didn't. "Where is it?"

[udo_retrovirus]

You probably wouldn't believe me was Junior's first thought, but after a moment's consideration, he went with something else. "Didn't figure. It's a star system a long way away from here." He shrugged and went back to chewing on a piece of bacon. "I bet you'll find someone from home at some point, though, or someone who's at least heard of Smallville. Just might take a while, with all these people."

After all, if there was someone here to share the redhead's crazy future-space-travel 'hallucination,' there had to be someone around here who knew of Clark's small town in Kansas. There were just too many people from Earth for there to not be.

[son_ofkrypton]

"You're from another planet?" Clark blurted out. It just came out before he could stop himself. "Like, an alien?"

He wondered for a moment if Junior was delusional. The last time he'd run into someone who claimed he was from outer space - from Krypton - the poor kid had been mistaken, had been caught in the Smallville meteor shower and fabricated this whole background about going "back". Clark had really wanted to believe there was another like him. He wasn't too optimistic about his chances finding someone from Smallville, but running into soemone who claimed he was from another planet was plenty distracting enough.

[udo_retrovirus]

"Yeah, I am. But I'm not an alien," Junior responded, looking Clark right in the eye. "Doesn't matter what planet I'm from, I'm still human." Well, human-ish, at least. Even the Gnosis had been human once, so 'alien' was a word that shouldn't even exist.

After a moment, Junior lightened up again. He really shouldn't be getting all serious about something like that; it's just that he'd just been called a weapon too many times in his life to let something like that just bounce right off of him. "S-Sorry, it's just that...well, let's just say the universe has seen some really strange stuff." The redhead chuckled nervously, then opted to change the conversation's direction. It was breakfast, things were supposed to be looking up, and he was going to try to keep it that way. "It's pretty awesome, though. Especially the space travel."

Sure it became normal after a while, but Junior did still enjoy the view of a planet after getting out of a UMN transfer. They always looked so peaceful, even if there was nothing but fighting down on the surface.

[son_ofkrypton]

Clark was confused. As far as he knew, humans were only from Earth. Sure, there were aliens out there who could look like a dead ringer for a human (he should know), but there was definitely differences from humans and beings from other planets. He mulled it over for a bit, trying to find an explanation, and found that he couldn't.

"So what's it like?" Clark asked. He wanted to ask about Krypton, but he wasn't sure if he should. It'd be obvious he had some kind of stake in it and he didn't want to start asking questions to people who, while nice, were still strangers to him. "Space travel, I mean."

[udo_retrovirus]

"It's really nice, when you don't have anything on your tail," the redhead responded, leaning back in his chair. "Just you and your shipmates and the quiet. It takes a while to get around without a warp transfer system, but ships make for a good second home. You get to know the other people real well, sort of like families on smaller ships. But the best part is getting to the planet. Have you ever seen pictures of Earth from above, taken from a satellite or something?" They did have pictures like that of Earth, didn't they? "It's kinda like that, except it's so much more peaceful-looking in reality." It was kind of eerie on some occasions, though, like for Old Miltia and Michtam...planets that had been abandoned long ago and forgotten by time.

"Just don't ever go without artificial gravity, if you can help it," Junior advised. "It's really hard to move around."