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Goddamn I hate those bastards already.
Glad I hid this shit, because it's only ten minutes after I lie down to space out that a nurse comes in the door waving to me like a goddamned presidential canidate and grinning like we're buddies. I'm a friendly guy, so I smile back, but I don't get up. First thing he says to me is I ain't gonna need my clothes. Why not, I'm askin him. I like my clothes, and I ain't a fucking loony. I don't need a straight jacket or anything.
Turns out there's a hospital outfit for you no matter who you are here. Don't matter if you're in for the night or til all seven of the hells freeze over. Holds out a pair of pants so goddamn white I thought my eyes were going to bleed. Or maybe I'd just had too much to drink, but that wasn't very likely. Being the nice and compliant little kitten I am, I swing myself off my bed and get the cloths from him. I'm into the bathroom attached to my room and throwing my old clothes out of the door when all of a sudden the guy speaks up.
"What's this, Kyotoshi?"
Must have read my name off the sheet on the bed or something. I come striding out, only half dressed and still trying to tie those stupid drawstring pants, smiling at him. What's what, I ask. Then I see he's got my jeans in one hand and the brandy in the other. Something hit my heart and crunched it tight. He'd been going through my stuff while my back was turned. And what was more, he was probobly going to take my booze away from me. I didn't like that at all. I told him it was mine, simple as could be. Feign ignorance and sometimes you get away with things.
No such luck. He's unscrewing the cap already, and you'd have to be a bloody idiot to not know the smell of brandy.
Scuse me for pausing while I work on that serpent here...But I'm pretty ticked off.
The guy shakes his head and starts talking to me about hospital policy. Says I'm not allowed to have that specificly, because they're trying to make me cope with things better. And if I'm drunk, it's not coping, it's hiding. I tell him that's a form of it, though, right? I'm smiling and trying to crack jokes.
He tells me I might be an alcoholic, and so I shouldn't have it anyway. Especially here. I ask him where it says I'm not allowed to have it for that reason. He's looking down at the flask but he points to the chart. Ah, fuck. I twist up my face and try to think of some sort of excuse, but the best I can come up with is "It's medicinial."
This gets him to laughing, and so I start laughing too, leaning against the bathroom door with my pants untied and no shirt, ribs poking out and arms folded over my chest, shaking my head and smiling. I felt kind of exposed...Thin as I really was and now he could see me and gawk. But he didn't. When he stopped laughing, he put the flask in his pocket. I felt something twist in me again and a demented determination rear up.
"Hey, please, I need that back, a friend gave it to me. I might not see her again, okay? She's sick." Kinda true, kinda not. He asks me what's wrong with her and I say she's a heavy Stim addict. He just kind of looks at me sadly and tells me it's all the more reason I shouldn't have it. My ears drop down and I start whining. This is what we call an addiction, kids, make note of it. Suddenly I'm at the guy's feet begging him. Dump out the contents, then, just don't take the flask. I need that, Kammi gave it to me. I need it. Inside my mind I'm thinking I'll probobly get it back when I leave anyway but that's not coming out here.
He shakes his head. "No," he says "You might use it to get more."
God. Damnit.
He turns around and starts going through my duffel, but nothing's in there. He's just trying to sort out my things to take them back with him. I slump down and just stare at the floor, the lenolium floor with scratches in it already from my claws, which I guess I haven't cut in a while. A few minutes later, the door shuts, and my cloths and half my booze is gone. I get up to try the door, but it's locked. The guy must have said something like "See you tomorrow!" but I didn't hear him. My heart's hurting and my stomach's aching and I lie down on the bed staring up at the ceiling again, feeling my fingertips twitch against my bare stomach. I scratch my chest to waste some of the movement.
It wasn't until now that it hit me. This is going to suck so much.
Observation of Patient 3455
Day Two- Morning Therapy
Notes: During the initial collection of personal items by our hospital staff, a silver flask was confiscated from the posession of the patient. The contents are confirmed as brandy, an Earth-originated alcohol.
Kyotoshi never went to sleep, so waking up was something that he couldn't do. When light crept into the room through the immovable windows, he was still awake, staring at the ceiling and thinking. The yellow-gold of his fur was stained and stuck together red in places. People often mentioned that thinking too much was a bad thing, and Kyotoshi was proof of that. The insicions on his arms were done slowly, carefully, with surgical presicion. Over and over he would trace the same lines when he was upset, as if the day they closed was the day those things they symbolized closed up within him. He couldn't lose Love, and he needed Apathy to live. The serpent...he wasn't sure what that meant yet. It was new. It also itched the most, the careful thin cuts climbing along his underarm like a peice of jewelry but burning each time he moved his arms. Shirtless, he lay on the bed, eyes glazed and staring into space. Had anyone seen him lying so motionless and silent, they would have made some sort of comment on how it was unsafe behavior, irrational, ill. But Kyotoshi knew better than their words and names...To them it was a sickness. To him it was just quiet time to lie still.
Distractedly, he wondered where Kammi was right now. If it was really even her and missing her which made him lash out like he had at the man taking the flask. He worried about Kammi sometimes...but...Was it really her? Or was he just trying to do something for himself? Someone once accused him of that. Many people accused him of being selfish. Maybe I am, Kyotoshi thought, scratching the roots of his hair above his forehead and blinking. Maybe I am but at least I'm willing to punish myself for it.
A soft knocking on the door made Kyotoshi turn his head that way and give a slight yawn. The dark circles under his eyes were almost normal for him at this point, so was the feeling of absolute exhaustion. But what he suddenly realized was missing, and incomplete from his morning, was the customary nausea, headache, and sensativity of a hangover. As painful as they were, he missed it. He missed having the world still a little out of focus, and despite the pain, having the peaceful feelings still nestled inside his blood. But he didn't have that. And without it, Kyotoshi Lypha was suddenly very nervous. Flicking his tail back and away from underneith him, he sat up. The knocking continued. Kyotoshi found his mind clicking peices together.
The door was already locked when they left. That means they must have unlocked it this morning. Why knock then, why not just come in? Establish trust, probobly. You want trust, bastards, how about not locking me in at night? Wait, it might also be a test. If I don't answer it and they come in and I'm just lazing around, it'll all mean something to them. Better actually get it. Or something like that...
Kyotoshi stretched and placed his thick black claws on the floor as the knocking continued. In a fuzzy morning voice he growled at whoever was there. "Aright, gimme a second. Criaka." The knocking abaited for a moment while Kyotoshi wandered aimlessly around the room, looking for a shirt..any kind of shirt, specificly long sleeved to hide his arms. The only shirt in the room was the hospital garment he'd been given, and that had short sleeves. Kyotoshi cursed and slithered it over his body, hoping its baggyness would hide at least the fact that his hips and ribs were painfully obvious through his skin. The serpent and words were a lost cause, though. Scratching his head and muttering at himself for his own stupidity, Kyotoshi made hsi way to the door to open it. Sure enough, it had been unlocked.
Two people stood in the door entrance, dressed in glaring whites. If Kyotoshi had been hungover, he probobly would have started cursing and staggered away from the reflective clothes. As it was, he winced visably. Were the threads used for sewing specificly designed to reflect into his sensitive eyes, or what? He growled a little in annoyance and backed his ears, trying his best to be friendly. It wasn't working very well. "What's up?"
The first of the two people had dark fur and light blue eyes. Her hands were folded neatly behind her back and her features were no-nonsense. She looked about ten years older than Kyotoshi, but he couldn't be sure. The distortion from the bright white cloths was warping his preception. She must have to pay a fortune on dry cleaning those things with fur that colour, He foudn himself thinking. Kyotoshi's thoughts always tended to slip away from him and go down their own tangents at inapropriate times. The lady spoke curtly, she was here to do her job and nothing else. "Kyotoshi Lypha?"
Kyotoshi smiled at the two and waved his hand back at the rest of the empty room. He let his eyes follow his hand, feeling the comfort of a slightly darker atmosphere. Returning his gaze to the -Doctors? Orderlies? Nurses? How the hell do I know?- he was forced to sheild his eyes against the onslaught of light. "Ain't nobody else here."
The person behind the first scowled slightly. He was shorter, this one, with lightly orange fur. A few black streaks and spots were on the left side of his face, making him appear unbalanced. The female in white didn't react to his flippancy. She must have seen the scabbed over serpent on his right arm, but she didn't react to that either. The fur there was matted and stuck together with the little beads of dried blood. Kyotoshi was not ambidexterous, the serpent was a challenge. He was proud it was a defined shape.
"Kyotoshi Lypha, if you would follow us please."
He leaned against the doorjamb and folded his arms, the short sleeves of the shirt pulling back farther. The serpent slithered out more, as if it was testing the newcomers. The one behind the female gave the serpent a glance but nothing more. With an unwaivering grin, he raised his eyebrows. "Why?"
The one behind answered without missing a beat, a tone used for explaining to schizophrenics and paranoids what they must do. "You have a therapy session schedualed. One on one with one of our psychiatrists."
Raising both eyebrows, Kyotoshi felt as if there was a demon on one shoulder and an angel on the other, just like in cartoons. Each seemed to whisper into his ear. But right now it seemed as if the angel was sleeping in. He could almost visualize the little shadowy shape grabbing the edges of his ear and hanging on tightly, whispering inside. It wasn't exactly evil, just a little bit of a hard time he was going to give them. Besides, what did they care? They probobly delt with worse. "Oh? And if I don't want to go talk to your nice shrink?"
"We are here as a means of escort."
They flanked out around him and imidiately Kyotoshi realized these were not the people to be fooling around with. Backing his ears and regretting ever listening to the darker half of himself, he shoved his hands deep into his pockets and tried to press his arms hard against his sides. He didn't want them hauling him off like some lunatic. "Alright, alright. I'll go. It was just a harmless question, craika." Even as he began to walk compliantly, they refused to leave his side.
Three in a row they moved down the hallway like a living wall. The two hospital workers cast glances at fellow employees as they moved silently along the corridors, and the others shot looks back. Some let their eyes wander over Kyotoshi appraisingly. What was his disease? How long was he here for? Was it serious, or just adolesence idiocy? He wanted to rub at the serpent but he didn't want them to stare at him any more. Besides, if he moved his arm, one of the two escorting him might grab it. He could tell from the way they moved alongside him they were expecting he suddenly wheel and run headlong back to the room. He didn't like the mistrust.
Pausing at a desk, one of the two scribbled something on a paper. Kyotoshi caught a glimpse of it before he was sheparded away. A check-in sheet. The female worker had loopy handwriting with thick lines...she pressed when she wrote. Kyotoshi could barely deceifer his name amoungst the swirls but he knew it was there. His name was an answer key- it was just long enough between when he saw it and was forced away to learn the strange writing.
Patient: Lypha, Kyotoshi
Time: 13:06
Escort: K. Yulling, P. Jerrim
Jerrim and Yulling? Which was which? He'd learn in time, he guessed. Two weeks was time, he'd have to pass it someway. He tried to start conversations with the two escorts, but no matter what he brought up, their faces remained stoic and impassive. It was as if they were machines, designed to bring him from place to place and show no more emotion than that. It made Kyotoshi feel uncomfortable and he could feel the tension in his chest of another anxiety attack, as well as the twitching in his fingertips.
Each hallway had a tag at its corner, made of fake wood with white letters inscribing the focus of the wing and the direction it went. Kyotoshi watched tags flutter by as he was guided along. Most of them were in Uni, but he understood them just as well. Hydro-therapy, Counciling, Dormatories, Visitors center...it was the hallway marked Counciling he was walking down now. The walls were a pasty off-white colour and made of something that looked like the lovechild of corkboard and tire rubber. The doorframes were made of a thin shiny metal which scratched easily- Kyotoshi could see the markings and imprefections from his spot in the center of the hall sandwiched between his guides. The door they finally stopped at was made of a similar fake wood to the tags. Another tag hung next to it, tiny bumps under the carved name. Braille, for blind patients. The tag on the door read "Dr. E. Shomaii- Psychiatry."
They knocked once, and the door opened. They left him.
