The man looked up from his breakfast as other people entered. As the young girl approached him. He would raise an eyebrow at her, at her questions, and then drag a single finger through the air and towards the back of the cafeteria where the cereals and other breakfast foods could be seen. On his breast was a light blue square, and once he had made a gesture, he would return to his food, seemingly mute in his interactions with the newcomers.

Across from where he sat, the ripped and torn bodies lay, unblinking, unmoving.

After the commotion in the hallway Red was happy to see people had calmed down. Although during this interaction he considered stepping in and his hand got all frosty again. After seeing all the strange things the others seemed to have going on he had a sneaking suspicion of what his deal might be, but he wasn't exactly ready to try and test it out quite yet.

Upon entering the cafeteria the first thing any reasonable person would notice would be the bodies against the wall. Something had come through here and it was not happy. There was a guy eating off to the side and a couple of the others were over there, Red started to make his way to the guy who may have answers, but it seemed like he was just out of it. He didn't talk, just pointed to where the food was then went back to eating. Like he couldn't see the mess of blood and other viscera that was just left in the room.

Red should probably have been freaking out, but he just felt a sense of cool and calm. And it made sense in a way, panicking wouldn't bring the guys back from the dead, and if he didn't eat he wouldn't have any energy to try and fight off whatever did this. So he heeded the silent mans advice and simply went to grab some food. He then proceeded to sit down at a table with some cereal and a few muffins. "I may not remember anything, but I do know that I'm hungry." Red didn't really speak to anyone in particular, he just sorta spoke because he felt like it.

'Ay, don't threaten me, a'ight?' he declared, inhaling annoyance again. 'Te cortaré, moza, ¿me oyes?' Even as he said this, he knew there wasn't as much heart in it as he thought there should be. The wind had deflated from his sails - and he was pretty sure he couldn't win a fight in this sort of situation, not when he could be easily thrown a huge distance.

'Euh... a'ight fine, no more violence for now... I guess,' he agreed, not too long before Dolly ran back into the cafeteria- ah, shit. He'd gotten distracted again. And like that, the girl was traumatised, or at least frightened as shit. Still, Blade couldn't just let her deal with it on her own, could he? Uncertainly, he turned round just enough to have her crying on his hip instead of his back, patting and stroking her hair to make sure she knew he was there - helped a bit by the other lady putting her hand on the young girl's back for a bit and soothing her.

'Yeah, yeah, I've got you, Dolly,' he murmured, kneeling down to... shit, was this okay? This was some guy's kid, he didn't want to be mistaken for... fuck it, he decided to cuddle her too. She needed a cuddle. 'You'll be okay, missy, a'ight? You're gonna be okay. Estarás bien.' He repeated himself like that over and over, until she was a bit calmer. You didn't leave an ally on their own. It was always part of his... his code? His code, specifically? Or was that related to something... shit, he didn't fucking know.

But, once she was more calm, he'd stand back up, put his hands on her shoulders, and tell her 'A'ight, Dolly, I'ma go get some breakfast, for you and me, we can eat together out here. You, uh, you... stay out here for a bit, I'll be back with all the stuff, right?' Once she'd agreed to it, he headed back into the cafe. That shit was a bloodbath, and Blade couldn't help but curse as he took a proper look at it all. Real sick and twisted shit that happened here - and given how Dougie reacted to being touched on the arm, maaaybe he shouldn't have left the guy in here?

'Er, can someone take Dougie out into the hall with Dolly?' he suggested, his vision firmly focused on the breakfast foods at the other end. 'I'ma go get stuff for me an' them to eat.' Double-checking to either side of himself, just in case who- or whatever did it came back, he half-ran across the cafe hall to the food aisle, grabbing some bowls, milk cartons, those small single-portion cereal boxes, some muffins and stuff...

...who arranged all of that? Aw, hell. This was straight-fucked, this was all kinds of fucked six ways from Sunday. And he still had to carry it all back to the hall, too... whatever, it'd work out.

---

Dolly, wasn’t much crying as she was just trembling from the scene she had just seen. She wasn’t sure who, what or why everyone in that room were dead, but she knew enough that you should not be able to see their insides. She was overwhelmed at the sight that she had lost her ability to take it in and cope, crying as a way to express her fear for the gruesome sight.

She tensed when she felt the hand on her back, but relaxed when comforting words followed it. She looked up to see one of the shadow creature’s companions. While Dolly was not entirely sure of that group’s intentions, this act of kindness had helped comfort her. Blades hand upon her head also helped. Her eyes still watered as he kneeled down to her level. Seeing how Blade was still calm but comforting made her feel much safer. Since they had met, she was probably more of a burden than an ally, but she loved how he continued to show care for her. She stood there, still sniffling trying to stop crying as he embraced her, wiping her eyes when he let go and stood back up.

She still sniffled a little, but now she had stopped crying tears, trying to put on a brave face. He didn’t say it, but somehow Dolly knew that even though the scene in the cafeteria was frightening, they needed to move forward. And moving forward started with a full stomach. She agreed to wait outside while Blade returned to the cafeteria. She was sure she could muster up enough courage to follow him inside now knowing what to expect. It was a relief that she wouldn’t have to.

Blade walked in the cafeteria, and Dolly’s sight followed him in, turning away before she risked seeing too much of the scene. She looked around. Of their little group, she found herself alone. She was with strangers now, but much like that girl said of the shadow creature before them, they didn’t seem like they would hurt her. Still she stood wary, keeping to herself, clutching the doll she had with her.

How many had entered the cafeteria? She knew Blade and the woman who threw him. The group with the red patches seemed to have vanished, so perhaps them as well. The woman who helped comfort Dolly had left, too. That left the shadow creature, and someone else behind him. It wasn’t an ideal situation, but it appeared that everyone was scared and confused, not just Dolly. Taking a quick breath, she took a step forward to the one hall with the most people remaining out. They had yellow patches on their clothes, in the same place Dolly’s group had purple. Nervously she waved her hand, saying hello.

@Randomness@BCTheEntity@Nyxira

Vayla flinched back at the man's reaction. He certainly didn't seem to be all there. Had he really not noticed them at all until she touched him. Concerned, she tried to calm him, moving a bit more in front of him so she was more fully in his line of sight, "Hey, it's okay...I'm not trying to hurt you or anything. Just want to make sure you're okay."

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Blade heading further into the cafeteria. Meanwhile, Dolly still waited nearby. She didn't know who Dougie was, but...was he maybe the man she was talking to? That was her guess anyway. He certainly seemed to be the one who would most benefit from leaving this scene, aside from Dolly. "I'll take them," she volunteered in response to Blade's request, and gently took Dougie's hand, "Come with me. We're going to go somewhere...less terrifying." With that, she began to lead him towards the door, then reaching for Dolly's hand as well as she came near, "Let's go back in the hallway. We can hang out there until your friend comes back with food."

The boy had been frightened when he'd heard the sudden yelling, even more so when the source of that yelling had charged his friend, knocking them to the ground. He watched as the stranger repeatedly struck his friend realising he should do something, but finding himself instead frozen in place. Would he get hurt if he stepped in? He didn't think so, or at least he didn't feel like he'd end up injured. Still, the idea of getting into a fight was terrifying enough for his to freeze in place, as much as he wanted to help his friend.

It wasn't until the teenaged girl from earlier had hurled his friend's assailant across the room that the boy was finally able to spur himself into action. Running up to his shadowy friend the boy tried to help them to their feet, not that he really had the strength to do much.

"Are you okay?", the boy asked, blinking to prevent tears from forming in his eyes. It looked like things were beginning to calm down, the man who'd attacked before didn't appear to be making any further moves against the boy's friend and both the woman who'd made the bone thing and the really strong girl had moved away to deal with other things. Even so, the boy was still more than a little spooked, despite not having actually been involved in the fight himself. He wanted to get moving before something else had a chance to go wrong. "I think we should go to the cafeteria now", the boy suggested, feebly tugging the shadowy creatures arm in the direction of the cafeteria.

---

Dolly watched as the last remaining person decided that the cafeteria would be the best place to go. She tried to speak up and warn him of the sights that soiled the place, but the words got caught in her throat. The boy looked to be almost the same age as she, but had a different aura around him. Despite seeming scared as well, he appeared to not want to wait outside the cafeteria with her. This left Dolly by herself, and she did not like it. There were things around, and she had no idea what or where they were.

Once the boy had passed through the doors, Dolly had inched her way back. She faced away from the entrance and took a deep breath. Blade was in there, and so was the girl that threw him. If everyone they had made contact with at this junction were now in there, Dolly felt that despite the horrific scene, she would be safe. She was given a small sense of false confidence that perhaps they could deal with or at least run from whatever had harmed those people. And the best way would be to stay together.

Dolly took one more deep breath and turned to enter the cafeteria. She knew what to expect, and was as prepared as she’d ever be to deal with it. As she walked through the door, she instinctually looked at where she had found the bodies slumped over. Her eyes then darted to the man ripped open. It was still horrifying to look at, but Dolly closed her eyes, and looked away. When she opened them again, she saw that woman from before. She was leading Dougie back towards the entrance. With a small skip forward, she stopped in front of them.

“Everyone is in here now.” She said, “I didn’t want to wait out there by myself. I… I’m okay now. I’ll be stronger.” If whatever else that roamed the halls were capable of doing what was presented in this room, then Dolly felt that she had to do her part. She knew she couldn’t fight, but at least she should try to not hinder everyone else. That girl that threw Blade, and the woman who stood by Dougie, even the boy she followed in, Dolly wanted to be less of a hassle much like them.

Dolly looked at Dougie. He didn’t seem too bothered by the gory sight that was spread before him. Then again, he didn’t seem aware of anything besides of whom addresses him. Dolly took a step towards him, and placed her hand upon his.

“I’m sorry we left you in here.” Dolly apologized, “I don’t know if you saw, but I’m sorry for what happened.” She then turned to the woman who was leading him out. “I’m sorry to you, too. I’m not sure what is happening, but I think I want to stay in here with everyone else. No one else is out there. My name is Dolly, what’s yours?”

She then noticed Blade as he had his arms full of food stuffs. She waved as he probably noticed that Dougie was still in the room. She gave him a forced smile to show she was okay, and sat down at one of the tabled farthest away from the bloody scene.

Others were coming in it seemed. Having been directed to where the food was, the environment was not really conducive to eating. It was not that the gore didn't bother her. It was jarring but she had a goal to reach that she could focus on. Blade had gone ahead and retrieved some things to eat, but the rest of the group had decided to join them, including the little girl. Her attention would turn toward the bodies, which she had tried not to give a whole lot of attention of focus to. It was easier to pretend they weren't there, but if everyone was going to come in then it was going to be harder to pass over. Adelina glanced around a bit for something to hide or cover the bodies.

Her gaze drifting down to the table she had her hand on an idea came to her. Despite wanting to keep her distance, for the sake of everyone's sanity she would start to walk toward the Southwest and Western wall where the bodies were. Taking several empty tables she would turn them over on their side and place them in the way to prevent the others from being able to see them. Being up close it was a whole lot harder not to look and try to see what had happened. Adelina could only stare so long before the realization of horror would snap her back in the moment. She did notice the one different figure that had been completely torn open. It was by far the hardest one to look at and she only forced herself to observe to try and figure out what might have happened.

Taking a step back the girl would collect herself as best she could. Internally she wanted to freak out and hide. Doing so would scare the children more than they had been already. There was also one other detail she'd spotted that required going back to the bodies. The lab coat one had a blue card in his hand. Given the place they were in it was probably an ID or maybe to some door. Retrieving it meant getting a lot closer though. Going back she vaulted over the table, being careful to avoid landing on any pools of blood, and hurried over to the man. Grabbing the card she wasted no time pulling it away from the stiff body and bolting back over the table. Sitting on the floor for a minute she wouldn't even look at the thing she'd just stolen off a corpse. Eventually though she would lift it up and look it over. What anyone else was doing at the moment was a blur to her.

The eating man would watch as person after person streamed in, his coffee drunk and cereal devoured. Then, slowly, he would reach into his mouth with his index finger. A few moments later and he would huck a gobbet of crimson saliva, the colour starkly contrasting against the white of the table. Using the same finger, he would reach down and begin to write, the liquid drying quickly into a rusty coat.



Once or twice the man- Mute, would pause to hock another splatter of his 'ink,' but when it was done he would clear his throat noisily, and gesture towards it, taking a step back. What else was there to really say?

'Wha- no, Dol-' Nope, she wanted to be in here now. Everyone else was coming in, after all. He sort of dithered on whether to kick her out of the room again for a moment, then decided, fuck it, she's not freaking out so much anymore. Kids were adaptable, right? This was fine, she'd be fine. And hey, the teenager had flipped some tables up to block the view anyway, it was all fine and dandy. He placed the stuff down for himself, Dolly, and Dougie, all the bowls and cereal bits and that, and then found himself watching as the single quiet guy... oh, fuckin' sick, he was writing in his own fuckin' blood. Holy shit.

'Goddamn, that's fuc- that's freakin' nasty, cabrón,' he announced, sort of staring as the guy kept on spitting up blood to write in, up until they finally got his name: Mute. Though that said... he had coffee. 'Were you drinking that with the open...' He totally had been, now that he thought about it. Holy shit, that was kind of hardcore. But a red triangle... he looked down at his own shirt. Purple. Some of these guys probably had something similar, right?

'Ay, any of you guys have a red triangle on your shirt?' he called out, gesturing for Dolly and Dougie to come over to where he'd arranged breakfast for them. They were all in the same area to start with, at that... they'd probably all have the same purple on them too, right? What did those mean, anyway?

Red ate his food at his own table, no one joined him, but that was fine. He felt like he was different from the others somehow. They all had their own groups, he was the only one with a red patch. His wing had seemed oddly empty, like he was the last of his kind or something. But it didn't bother him for some reason, he seemed to be feeling strangely cold to the situation around him. He wasn't even really grossed out by the bodies that had been massacred in this room. One of the others had gone to the effort of covering them with some tables, so clearly it was something that should concern him, right?

The thought he had earlier wouldn't leave his mind, with these strange goings on, was he not an ordinary human? Was he even human at all? As Red finished his food he looked at his hand and focused, and as though like magic it covered in a thin layer of frost. It had happened by instinct previously, but this time it was through his will that it appeared. He flexed his hand to disperse the frost as someone called out asking if anyone had a red patch on their shirt.

Red left his empty plate and walked over, "yo. I'm going by Red for now, pretty sure I'm the only one with a red patch, what's...." He trailed off as he saw the message in blood written by the man who wanted to go by Mute. "Ah, I see. Well I don't remember her if that's what you were gonna ask. I was the only one in my wing when I woke up and left my room." Was something wrong with him? Was this a side effect of his abilities, staying cool under pressure? Or was he just a sociopath who couldn't find it in himself to care for others? Whatever the reason, Red did not feel any fear of this mysterious woman who mutilated one man and murdered a few others. If anything, he was a bit curious as to why she was not in his wing, and he kind of wanted to meet her.

With the boy's focus on identifying food it took him a few moments to notice the gory sight to the side of the room, but when he did he immediately flinched away, some part of him identifying it as a hazard only to quickly realise a moment later when against his expectations nothing had happened, that there wasn't really anything particularly dangerous about the scene. What had he thought was going to happen? Once again the boy's memories failed to provide him with context for even his own actions a mild confusion that somewhat frustrated him. Maybe it was because it looked painful? Yeah, that was probably it. One of those people looked really badly injured even if he couldn't see the full extent of their wounds and whatever had happened to each of them had probably hurt a lot given that they all seemed to have passed out or something. The thought was upsetting and he felt the sting of tears forming, despite not knowing the people, before blinking them from his eyes.

Wanting to push the topic from his mind the boy made to force himself back onto his original task of looking for food only to be distracted by the sight the strong girl from earlier moving tables to obscure the bodies. Was she doing something to help? Maybe. Should he try to help her help? Probably, but that was scary, besides, he wasn't anywhere near as strong as her. Still, his curiosity got the better of him and it provided him with an easy distraction from further pondering the now obscured scene he'd witnessed, so he decided to see if he could get a better look at the very least.

The girl vaulted over her makeshift barrier as the boy got close only to jump back over again just moments later, this time clutching something in her hands. The boy couldn't make out what it was the girl was holding and debated between asking her or just leaving, not managing to make a decision before the girl lifted the object, a blue plastic card, to inspect it herself. His curiosity piqued the boy mustered up the courage to speak. "Did you find a key?", realising that was probably a dumb question given the object was obviously a key the boy added, "Do you know where it goes?".

@twave

@Randomness@Lady Selune@Nyxira

The young girl talking to her caught her attention, and she smiled down at her, "Oh? My name?...Well...I actually don't remember my name. I saw a paper in my room that had VAM on it though that looked like some sort of identification, so I suppose you can call me Vam. Dolly's a nice name. It's nice to meet you."

Staying in this gore-filled room didn't sound like something she was particularly excited about. If Dolly wanted to stay though, she would. She may not really know the girl, but she was only a child, and she felt obligated to protect her. This guy everyone kept calling Dougie too. He clearly wasn't all here right now, so she felt obligated to protect him too. She watched as the tables were flipped over. It was a relief not to have to keep looking at the bodies, especially for the children not to have to look at them. Though she didn't say anything out loud, internally she was grateful to Adelina for that.

She thought for a moment about getting some food for her and her little group, but movement from the man at the table caught her attention. He was writing something, it seemed? She took Dougie's hand again and walked over to see what it was. It made her feel sick to watch him writing with his own blood though, and what he said didn't make it much better. "She...Oh, that's awful!" He must've been in such pain before then! No wonder he'd been eating so messily and wincing. "...How did you avoid...this fate?" she asked, motioning to the carnage around them, "Having your tongue ripped out is awful! I'm sorry that happened, but it seems you somehow avoided worse." She looked around the room for any sort of paper or writing instruments. Surely they could find the guy some better method of communication than his own blood.

---

Dolly sat at the table Blade was laying down the food at. She gave a small smile to Vam and Dougie as they stood nearby, quickly turning her attention again to the food. As she watched, her stomach growled. It was simple cereal and milk, but that didn’t matter to Dolly. Dolly grabbed a couple of the bowls and started to pour the cereal for the three of them as Blade looked elsewhere. As she was preparing her meal, some odd sounds came from behind by the other row of tables. Dolly suspected that perhaps someone was choking on their food. Blade’s reaction quickly squashed that idea.

Dolly’s eyes followed Blade as he went over to investigate what was going on. She saw Vam had joined him along with Dougie. Dolly spun around in her chair now more curious as to what was going on. Right then, Blade had called out, beckoning her to join him. Blade called out wanting to know if anyone was sporting a red triangle upon their shirt. She hopped from her seat and joined Blade over by the lone man.

Standing next to Blade with the other figure at the table, Dolly noticed the writing upon the mostly clear white surface. Her face scrunched upon reading the sloppy writing. She couldn’t help but feel sad for the lone man. She could not imagine what it would be like to lose your tongue, let alone how painful. But the writing also mentioned the red triangle. Dolly didn’t give much thought to the clothes she was wearing. Outside of the bands and collar, that is. Did the patches mean anything?

Dolly took a look at her blouse, and then up at Blade. She had a purple square as did Blade. Dolly looked at the others. Vam had spoken with Mute and then left in search of something, so Dolly couldn’t see her shirt. As for Dougie, he had a… well, Dolly couldn’t quite tell if Dougie had a patch. His sweatshirt covered most of his torso and upper body.

“Excuse me.” Dolly said quietly as she scooted up to him. He still seemed unaware, lost in his own eyes. Whatever he could be thinking eluded Dolly, but she felt that he was perhaps uncomfortable with the situation. Dolly certainly was. As softly as she could, Dolly pulled the collar of Dougie’s hoodie to the side, just enough to look at the patch on his shirt. It was also a purple square.

“Um, me and Dougie have purple squares.” Said Dolly. She fixed Dougie’s hoodie as gently as she could, turning around again to face Blade. “Are there other colors?” Just as she asked the question, someone spoke up. Dolly spun around Blade waited for more answers. She watched as a man from one of the other tables came over. It was one of the first people who had entered the cafeteria, and who had come from one of the other halls by himself. He did have a red patch on his shirt, but it was also a square, not a triangle.

“But it’s not a triangle.” Said Dolly thoughtlessly looking up at the man calling himself Red. She wasn’t sure of the significance, Red only had one similarity to the figure Mute described. Even so, Dolly was growing increasingly nervous, but she tried her best to hide it. Everyone was here, so there was safety in numbers. Dolly quickly averted her gaze and left the three of them to discuss it.

Dolly had moved over to near where the one who threw Blade sat against one of the flipped tables. The boy who Dolly followed in was also with her. They had yellow squares on their shirts. Dolly had absolutely no idea what they meant, but now she knew that the colors had to have meant something. What she was able to figure out at least was that everyone from the same hall had the same colors. All the yellow patches showed up together. She and the others from her hall had purple, and Red was by himself. Dolly walked back up next to blade.

“I couldn’t find any other red ones. They’re all squares. No triangles.”

Well, Dolly soundly answered his question, after pouring the cereal and milk and going around looking. Nobody here had a triangle - all squares, including his and Mute's, but they were each squares of different colours. Weird... maybe a triangle meant they were less smart or something?

'Like animals...' he murmured to himself, taking another spoonful of his breakfast. Nice of her to deal with that for the three purples; he made sure to give her a pat on the head for the good work, both investigating and breakfasting. Everyone else seemed occupied - except for Druggie Dougie. He'd stumbled a bit and made some weird groan a few moments before Dolly got back, one of the few noises he'd made up to that point. But why? Was it the blood? If it was anything like with Dolly freaking out before...

Whatever. He looked a little more in-there than he had, anyway. Just in case, though, Blade called out 'Ay, Dougie, you back in the real world yet? Your cereal's getting soggy,' trying to get his attention on to the cereal. Fucker needed to eat, too, even if he was having a crash. Heh, he probably had the munchies going, at that.

---

Dolly returned with Blade to the table where their cereal was starting to soak up much of the milk. She didn’t pay much attention to Blade and Red as she wandered around the others in the cafeteria, but nothing there had seemed to have be a cause for concern. Still though, there was a nagging pinch of fear the sat in Dolly’s heart. It was small, but steadily glowing. Mute didn’t seem like a bad guy, but his experience with it left the feeling of impending doom.

Dolly dwelled on thoughts of what sort of monster who could create such a scene of brutality when her stomach growled once again. She returned to the bowl of soggy cereal that sat before her on the pristinely clean table. She reached for her spoon and took a bite. The cereal was bland, but that small bit of food calmed her stomach. She looked over to Blade as he called out to Dougie. Dolly turned in her seat to see that Dougie was still by Mute’s table. Still unable to even deduce what he might be thinking, Dolly expected he probably didn’t want to wait around the bloody writing.

“I’ll get him.” Said Dolly. She hopped from the chair and half sprinted up to Dougie. Barely any time had passed since the last she interacted with him, so it was probably a false hope to expect that Dougie would have any semblance of gaining active awareness. She grabbed a hold of his sleeve and gently tugged him towards to table with their food. “Come. Come. The food is over here.”

Back at the table, Dolly led Dougie to his seat, and pushed one of the bowls of cereal in front of him. The contents of the bowl spilled partially over the side as it came to a sudden stop. Paying it no mind, Dolly grabbed another spoon and put it into the bowl. She scooted her seat closer to Dogie and grabbed a spoonful of soggy cereal.

“Say ahhh.”