Day 49: Morning - Bill's Hardware

[idontregret]

[from here]The room they entered was full of tools, and Heat was reminded for a moment of vendors he'd known in the past. The ones in the Junkyard had been far easier to sort through than this mess, though it helped that they'd had a better idea of what to look for then. This was just shelves and racks of various odds and ends, some which seemed

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[no_dont_go]

Aigis trailed closely after Heat into the hardware store, grateful that he had not turned her away when she followed. Not that she had expected him to, but his mood did seem to swing a bit towards the negative fairly easily. At least it seemed they both agreed to drop the humanity issue. She didn't want to think about it if she had the choice not to

[idontregret]

If it had been less obvious Heat would have asked about it, but it was pretty clear that 'yen' was a type of currency. Like macca. The people in Karma City had taken 'dollars' in exchange for items. He wondered what these people accepted. It wasn't as if he even had anything of value to offer as trade on him if that was even an option

[no_dont_go]

"Even were I to have the proper tools, it would be difficult to manufacture..." Aigis trailed off, suddenly aware of a nurse's close scrutiny. She would never had made a mistake like this before coming to Landel's. If only her sensors were working properly

[idontregret]

The demon allowed Aigis to drag him around the store, looking mildly bemused and thrown off by the action. She was clearly trying to keep out of ear-range of the staff, and he didn't blame her in the slightest. Firearms seemed appropriate for someone as slight as her who wasn't capable of changing into demon form. And she was right - anything like that would be difficult to come by here, nevermind the Institute. (Unless they could get one from one of the place's occasional guards - like that girl in the rec field his first night there

[scalyfishman]

Doyleton was virtually untouched. Unbelievable.

For all the broken glass, rotting corpses and debris the patients had managed to leave in their wake last week, the only real damage left in the town now was those smiley faces on the store fronts, and Depth Charge was pretty slagging sure no one had bothered to put those there last week in between fighting for their lives. There was something deeply frustrating about that- it was like a giant 'Smelt You' to whoever possibly might have thought that they could leave a mark on the Institute or the surrounding area. A great, big, reminder that, ultimately, their attempts at escape were completely and utterly meaningless. Great.

It was unsurprising, therefore, that the Depth Charge that slunk between the shelves at Bill's Hardware (latent guilt from pillaging that crowbar?) seemed stubbornly determined not to let anything resembling a real smile cross his face. Just another day on the town- the most he could hope for was that this one wouldn't end with a zombie apocalypse.

[Scourge!]

[haplesstracker]

It looked like it should smell like rain. Scourge scowled as he wandered through the town, hands warmed in his pockets. His first chance out of the institute in a week and he was nose-blind or whatever the humans called a lack of smell and taste. That meant no eating food because it would taste like nothing and no heads up on rotting flesh. Stupid Landel.

First order of business would have been to get his nails fixed, but Scourge was wary of this place and the graffiti just made it worse. First order of business now was weaponry, and the tracker headed to the hardware store to do some pillaging. Nice, innocent evil, nobody to bother him.

Scourge was on the verge of slipping a screwdriver up his sleeve he noticed Depth Charge lurking at the other end of the aisle.

"Oh. You. Hi," he said flatly, rolling his eyes and pushing the handle of the screwdriver into his sleeve. "You're not dead yet, congrats on that."

[scalyfishman]

Looked like he wasn't the only one in a bad mood. Depth Charge had barely been in the store for five cycles before a certain no-good cowardly Decepticon decided to put in an appearance down the aisle from him. As if his day couldn't get any worse. It was a bitter little comfort that Scourge seemed equally thrilled to see him, at least- misery shared was misery squared, after all.

"Yeah, yeah. Cut the sarcasm," he answered, waving a hand dismissively. "I could say the same for you."

Still, Depth Charge gave Scourge a critical look up and down for thoroughness' sake. He was in one piece too (unless chipped nail polish (?) counted as damage), though just how much of a good thing that was he couldn't quite decide. On one hand, the guy wasn't exactly his worst enemy; on the other, he was more of a vague irritating blip on his radar than anything. After a moment his eyes settled back onto Scourge's hands again, focusing, and then it clicked what he was doing.

"A screwdriver? Really?" Less incredulous, more bemused. What was he going to

[haplesstracker]

"Shh!" Scourge hissed, looking over his shoulder to where the hardware store owner was pointedly trying to ignore their shenanigans. "I'm just stocking up, all right? You remember what happened the last time we were here."

The screwdriver had served him well last week stabbing zombie hands, and there didn't seem to be an easily accessible armory in the town to better supplement his weaponry. Scourge shoved his hands in his pockets and moved on, trying to seem innocent as he scouted the walls for better devices.

[usoppsenchou]

[from here]

Usopp had seen some activity in the hardware store through the window, but not enough to recognize anyone. He was startled when he noticed Scourge, of all people, standing and talking with someone else. Hopefully that meant the former robot's hearing had come back. Usopp still owed him for helping pull Usopp back from whatever had been in the water, but drawing attention to the other patient might not be appreciated.

Besides, he'd also been partially Scourge's guide, so keeping Usopp in good shape made sense from a purely mercenary standpoint. There was another set of patients, too. Usopp had to wonder if they were all there for the same reasons. Scourge, at least, didn't seem to understand human tools very well beyond weapons (a lot like Zoro, really) but here he was. Maybe the other patients were here to look for something potentially dangerous to sneak off with. Or maybe they were like Usopp and just liked tools... no matter what Franky said about how Usopp held a hammer

[zack_fair]

Unlike Usopp, Zack didn't know any of the patients who were in the store, so they didn't get more than a cursory once-over from him. It wasn't that he was uninterested, but at the moment he was talking to Usopp, so wandering over to meet other people wasn't really in his plans. If nothing else, it was nice to be out of the rain for a bit. Zack drew his hands up to his hair and then ran them through the cluster of spikes, trying to shake some of the water out. At least it wasn't pouring... so far

[usoppsenchou]

Usopp had been examining one of the electric tools on display with more professional curiosity than real intent. It'd be hard to sneak an electric drill past the nurses under his shirt, even if he had been sure how to power and use it. The interchangeable bits were nice--if he'd been home, he might have used some of his shore allowance from Nami to buy it

[zack_fair]

Zack couldn't help blinking at the other patient when he mentioned that his ship (was it his, really?) had been on the verge of falling apart in the past. That couldn't be good. Even though any pirate was likely to be good at swimming, shipwrecks had to be pretty nasty. Zack was glad to hear that they'd found someone a bit more capable. Usopp didn't seem too self-deprecating, at least, especially if he had that nifty proverb to go by.

"Yeah, that sounds pretty good to me," he agreed, hands on his hips as he gave a firm nod. Zack had prided himself on what he was good at, but he knew there were other areas that he would not do as well in. Gardening, for instance. He could still remember the way Aerith had glared at him the second he'd gotten too close to her flowers. It was probably for the best, too