Day 34: Breakfast

[screwthegods]

[starting off in M13]The last part of the night was little more than a blur in Homura's mind. The men had rushed in, but not joined them, instead staying off to themselves. Before any of them had a chance to react, however, a voice sounded through the air, mocking some other person Homura had never heard of, and the patients themselves

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[cigarettes_plz]

The first thing Badou did was check for his hard-earned cigarettes. The second thing he did was resist the urge to cry like a bitch. In heat. Being taunted by really hot male-- wait female bitches who were on the other side of the fucking fence. He knew they were there. Taunting him.

And he could touch but he couldn't drink in their sweet delicious cancer-inducing chemical-filled glory because they were useless without fire. Even the cavemen got fire. It wasn't fair. He forced himself to hide them under the mattress before the nurse came in.

He had four more, but if he ate another one and died from the poison he would be missing out on the other three. Too risky. Badou sighed and looked up. "Alright, alright, I take back my hedonistic ways and repent. There's a god, and he's -" He groped for words. "a bad person. Like that one bully episode of Sesame Street --"

The nurse from yesterday seemed to be accustomed to this when she walked in, but she had some amazing skill to actually nod every now and again while Badou ranted close to her ear. "And how the hell do you fuck up a purple dinosaur -- yeah, language, I heard --- wait that's another show anyway --" And on and on. "I'll screw him over -- god, not Barney, I hate that fucking show but he's scary -- and find fire if I have to drag it out of the devil's -- Oh, you got a light by the way? Matches? Anything?"

The nurse smiled patiently at him, put the tray down on the table with surprising ease and walked away. Badou thought it'd be kinda sad if she resigned. He'd have to start annoying someone all over again. Still, it was kinda nice to know other people were now sharing his pain in some form or another. It was their fault. They deserved what they got. If only that sounded a bit less creepy and sadistic, he'd be golden.

He plopped down where she'd left him and blinked at the guy across the table. Great, the no good tomato thief. He pulled his tray closer and held on, giving the guy a suspicious look. "Hey, it's the rooster head."

[damnrudecock]

Sano could only watch the spectacle with a flat look, not understanding half of what the guy was saying, but he doubted anyone could. The nurse did her best, and Sanosuke had to give her credit with that much at the very least.

Then she left, abandoning Sano to the tomato hog. Great. "Morning to you too, flower boy. Nice to see you didn't get yourself killed."

He ignored Badou's clingyness towards his tray, opting instead to shovel a large chunk of pancake into his mouth. He had his own food this time, so Badou could keep his damn pancakes. Weird guy like him probably put weird crap on them anyway.

[cigarettes_plz]

Badou's pancakes were indeed drizzled with syrup and all kinds of fruit that the nurse must have tossed in while he was ranting, plus a couple of those little plastic containers of syrup and butter in case he wanted to drown them further. He shrugged and popped a strawberry into his mouth. He kinda missed fruit, he realized. It was delicious in a totally not greasy way.

Seeing as how rooster guy made no moves toward his tray, Badou relinquished his hold and started cutting into his pancakes. He had a plastic knife if the poultry got any ideas. "It's tomato man to you. I figured you'd give me a shitty eulogy so I decided to stick around." He pointed the knife at rooster head's tray. "You just gonna eat them plain like that?"

[damnrudecock]

Sanosuke was almost tempted to steal a bite of Badou's pancakes out of spite, the way the guy had been clutching his tray. But he listened to the more sensible portion of his brain, deciding it wasn't worth it. Now verbal sparring, on the other hand, totally was.

"Tomato asshole is more like it." No, Sano had not forgotten or forgiven that particular transgression. It was food, damn it. Food was important. "And damn straight I would've. Here lies a fucking tomato hog. He died a stupid death."

Still, Sanosuke grinned as he spoke. At least until Badou implied there was something wrong with his breakfast. "Well, yeah. What's wrong with that?" Sanosuke thought they tasted fine just the way they were, and more importantly, he didn't want Badou to suddenly try and screw with his food. Or worse, steal it. Now it was the fighter's turn to be all protective of his tray, eying the other man warily.

[cigarettes_plz]

"Fuck you, damn vagrant. You could go work for your own tomatoes instead of bitching about other people's hard-earned profits."

Badou shot back lazily, that arrogant-as-all-fuck grin returning for an encore. It was kinda hard to be offended considering that he wouldn't really care what kind of speech he got when he was already on his way into the ground. And besides, he was an asshole and damn proud of it.

He eyed the rooster's plate, just to egg on the suspicion he already saw. Then after a little too long he said, without a hint of mockery, "You've never had pancakes before, right? Here." He snagged two of the little containers off his tray and tossed them at the rooster. "The dark stuff is syrup. Try dipping it in that. Most people like it, but it's sweet as hell. The other one's just butter."

To show some good faith - and prevent any theft that might occur - he cut off a syrup-covered bite of pancake and thrust it into his mouth as if he didn't care whether rooster took his advice or not.

[damnrudecock]

"Hard earned my ass." Like the nurse hadn't just given the guy the plant. Sanosuke shook his head. "You should try working for your food." Not something Sanosuke was entirely known for doing, but the point still stood. Just like the grin. Badou was an asshole, sure. But he was the kind of asshole Sano could get along with at least.

Sano caught the little containers, his curiosity overcoming his pancake paranoia for the moment. "We don't have crap like this in Meiji 11--1860-whatever in the west." Just figuring out how to open the package was a pain. Sanosuke poked a finger through the paper top of one, then frowned as his fingertip dipped into the syrup within.

"The hell?" Sanosuke pulled his finger out, a long strand of syrup oozing off the skin. "This that syrup stuff you meant?"

[cigarettes_plz]

Badou just shrugged. "Here? Screw that. Three meals a day for free isn't bad." Three delicious meals. He wished briefly that he'd just gotten himself addicted to food. Sure they'd have to roll him around the institute with a fork lift but at least he wouldn't be suffering much.

He absently prodded the nicotine patch on his chest as if that would magically increase the potency. He must be going totally batshit mad, because he could swear he heard some sense in what the rooster had just said. "...1860? Seriously? I guess they weren't joking about the time thing. Did they even have hair gel back then?" He gave the rooster a vaguely annoyed look at the obvious syrup wasting. Sure he was new at this, but that was hardly an excuse. "Hey, don't waste good food when you spend so much time bitching about it. Either taste it or hand it back you big chicken."

[damnrudecock]

"It's not bad at all, for the most part. Orange rice the other day was too damn weird though." Still, even if it was odd and western and utterly wrong, most of it was better than Kaoru's cooking. A wet rag was probably better than Kaoru's cooking when she decided to go at it. But Pinky wouldn't complain about him eating his fill here, and Sanosuke found that one of the few upsides of this hellhole.

"Yeah, seriously." Badou might have been pretty new if he didn't know about the time thing. Or maybe he didn't have a famous historical idol trying to kill his best friend. Either way, Sano shrugged at what to him was old news by this point. "They pull people from a bunch of different times. Even some dead people from what I've heard. And not just humans either. It's too fucking messed up if you ask me."

At the remark about hair gel, Sanosuke gave the man across from his a pointed frown. "What's with you obsessing over my hair, huh? It's just this way naturally."

And there he went with the chicken comments again. Ass. Sanosuke grinned rather wickedly though, holding out the little container. "Sure, I'll give it back." Sanosuke squeezed, aiming the thing right at the guy across from him so the syrup shot out the hole he had made. Damn pansy could cry about that wasted food too for all Sano cared. He liked his pancakes the way they were anyway.

[cigarettes_plz]

"What the fuck is orange rice? Rice only comes in one colour. It's like the...the one-coloured animal of the plant kingdom." Badou believed this firmly. The rooster was insane, and that was all there was to it. He really needed to remember this guy's name. He had a feeling he'd be pissed if he knew his name had been permanently changed to rooster, chicken, or poultry depending on how hungry Badou felt at any given moment.

"No shit. What do they even want with all this?" Badou asked, gesturing at the crowd in general. Not humans, huh? They all looked pretty human so far except for the things that were trying to kill him. Hell, one of those things was definitely human and the other one could pass in really bad light. Maybe they were all crazy and genetically screwed up. It only took one look at Haine to see how those two things came hand-in-hand.

But a place like this above ground? He'd thought the world - his world? - wasn't that screwed up. Probably. Someone had told him once that things were always worse than you suspect, but it seemed kinda emo at the ti--

"Fuck that's warm what the fuck is - Oh." There was a big blob of syrup rolling down his forehead and nose. At least, that was what it tasted like when it made it to his mouth. When he tried to wipe it off with his fingers, it just got nastier and made most of his his hand sticky. That was fine. "'Scuse me." Badou shifted so he could kneel on the bench and leaned across to try cleaning his hand on the rooster's useless face.

[damnrudecock]

"That's what I said." Sano's annoyance at the stuff came to the surface in a big way, now that it seemed he had someone to complain with. "Some kid said it was supposed to be normal though. From some place called Mexi-something. Hell if I get it, though."

Sano didn't have answers for Badou's questions, but he did laugh when Badou first figured out that there was sticky mess on his face. The guy looked utterly clueless as he tried to wipe it off, and Sano was having a damn good time watching. At least until Badou tried to make him a towel.

"What the fuck?!" Obviously not amused, Sanosuke batted Badou's hand away. "Do I look like a damn rag to you?"

[cigarettes_plz]

Badou couldn't give a flying shit if the rooster was amused. He expected his hand to be batted away, and despite the slight jarring sensation on his bruised wrist he pulled his hand back a couple of inches so the sticky stuff would end up on the rooster's arm. And then he tried dragging his hand further down, just for good measure.

Even without verbalizing it, Badou thought his answer was pretty clear.