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Nathaniel lay upside-down on the stairs, hands behind his head, staring at the ceiling. A fly was flying around; a big fat one. Nat hated flies. He found them repulsive creatures, on whom life was wasted. He stood up, recalling a tiny spider he had seen in the landing window. As the fly flew into the open window and attempted to reach the outside world through the screen, Nathaniel slammed the window shut. He smiled.

"Your welcome," he whispered to the spider, as the fly zoomed around the window in a frenzy, eventually becoming ensnared in the silky threads where the spider hung.

The house was silent. Nathaniel was, unusually, the first to have arisen, and he was unmotivated to make himself breakfast. The last time Nathaniel had attempted to cook, he had ended up setting the house on fire. Of course, he had done that on purpose, but he had gotten in a lot of trouble. So, for now, Nat contented himself with lying upside-down on the stairs, watching the spider and the fly. The fly struggled, resulting in further trapping itself. Herself, Nat thought. The fly is a girl. Why a girl? She looks like a girl, don't you think? How can you tell what sex a fly is? {It's a fly.} She's a fly. {Oh, and I suppose the spider is a boy?} I don't know. {Well, you cold tell with the fly, couldn't you?}

Nathaniel covered his ears. "Shut up," he murmured. Nat was never sure whether what he heard were his own thoughts, his imagination, the result of his disorder, or creatures from the netherworld. In any case, he was resolved to ignore them when he could. Most of the time, when it was just one voice having a conversation with him, Nat assumed it was normal; just his imagination. But hey, better safe than sorry.

The spider was now slowly knitting a cocoon around the fly, which was now giving forlorn shakes of her wings.

A shriek of pain from the fly made Nathaniel jump and shout.
{NATHANIEL!} he heard it yell, the voice familiar, yet strange beyond his recognition. {WHY HAVE YOU MURDERED ME?} The fly's voice was joined with another, which yelled similar accusations at Nathaniel. He glared at the fly, and shouted, "I haven't killed you! Leave me alone! I never killed anybody!" Nathaniel put his hands to his ears again, and murmured, "Kill her, kill her," to the spider, hoping it would hear in the din, and snuff out the life of the fly. He stopped moving, and slowly, gradually, the screeched indictments faded.

The eight o'clock alarm shocked the middle ground Cal inhabited, the place between dreams and reality, where vivid pictures can form in one's mind and yet the hands can feel the sheets and the demands of the world press in as insistent knowledge that never quite forms into actual thought. Cal used to like this place, but one day it had crossed her mind that it might be a bit like what some of the patients felt and since then it had had a sickly tinge to it.
Eager to escape it, she wrenched hr eyes open. The first foot she placed on the carpet rocked unsteadily for a moment, then flung her to the ground. It was a clumsy but proven method of getting her across the room. Her arm shot up to turn the alarm off, and for a few seconds she just stayed on the floor, eyes on a very specific square inch of white in the ceiling, and enjoyed the silence.
Cal was expecting lots of yelling today. And possibly new bruises. But she was resigned to that.
Getting to her feet, her eyes traveled, out of habit more than anything, over the bruises she already had. Some of them were just from perfectly normal clumsiness. Her mother had always said never to underestimate clumsy people. Clumsy people are constantly in pain and if you can endure that smiling you're a force to be reckoned with.
Cal smiled and began the motions she went through each day. Familiarity and routine were supposed to be reassuring, which seemed to her to be true in that she felt comforted, and at exactly eight o' five she pivoted around the corner and onto the stairs to make sure Nat and Salvage were waking up.
Nathaniel was on the stairs already, his hands over his ears. Cal's smile faded to gray as she trotted up the stairs to him. Something in the back of her mind nagged her that she was forgetting Salvage. Again. But perhaps even being neglected felt like a kind of routine to him now. Nat was always a time suck, due to his dangerousness if nothing else.
Cal did not touch Nat but instead stood on the step below him, very near, and looked up with concerned attention. For a moment she couldn't think of anything to say.
"Anyone in particular?" Empathy, currently a sort of vague general empathy that lacked specific focus because she didn't know what was specifically wrong, permeated her being, but the question was asked more in curiosity than anything. She leaned a shoulder against the wall and her eyes flickered up to the spiderweb. It triggered something disturbing to float around and make her stomach sick, but she couldn't identify it so she ignored it.

((Omg, DCLXVI, sorry for the ooc but your post like, gave me chills.))

A groan left Judith's lips at the sound of the alarm. Couldn't they let her just sleep? For once a nightmare hadn't been her company that night. It had been wonderful, or maybe that was the new pills she was trying out. Either way she knew that she had to get up and turn off the alarm. With a sigh she stood and moved through her room, flicking the switch that turned the alarm off. She was still locked in the room though and needed to get out. She was sure Cal would come get her soon and in that time she needed to be dressed.

Pulling off the oversized shirt she looked at the scars that littered her body and let out a sigh. No new ones. They were very careful here not to give her anything sharp unless someone was watching. It wasn't like she was hurting anyone else. Just herself, but they all seemed to mind and she supposed that that should be enough.

A plain white bra, and panties to match she was trying to find her favourite set of sweats. There was a new guy coming and she would rather be comfortable in case he really was one of the crazier ones. It was quite possible, a lot of them had started out really bad. Not that Judith talked to a lot of people. Not only did the nightmares come at night but one little incident and she could see the people around her turning into stuff that not even crazy people see in their nightmares.

Three draws later and she found them, feeling the soft velvet of the black pants. She smiled and pulled them on, covering the scars that littered her body. With this she moved towards her door and looked out the window, trying to see down the hallway. As far as she knew she was one of the only ones to have a window. It was to check on her almost constantly.

"Oh come on. Let me out." She tried jiggling the door but it was locked.

The alarm clock woke her up. She was on a bed,and this felt strange to her. Even stranger she was laying on her back. She rolled off the bed,and fell to the floor.
"Moo." Amy mooed,tiredly. She trotted,in a cow like manner towards,the door. It wasn't open,so she hit it with her head. Again. Again. And again.
Finally Alex,who had come to get her,opened the door. Ay mooed with delight,and Alex laughed.
"We better get you some pills,Amy." He said,going to grab her. She ran on her feet,and hands. She came to the stairs,where she saw two other people.
"Moo!" She said,as she feel down the stairs. She came back on her four feet,and hid behind a woman. Alex ran after her,like he did every morning,for the past month.
He ran down the stairs,past Cal,and Nat. "I'm sorry,guys."He started. "Aim doesn't like her pills." Alex finished. He was the one who had come up with Aim. Most everyone else called her Cow,which he didn't think was nice. She continued running away,and Alex ran after her. He'd never seen a human run that fast on hand and feet.
"Mooo!"Amy mooed back at him.


OOC: Yeah,DCXVLI,that did give me the creeps to..

[[Sorry, people, I forgot to subscribe and I didn't realize anyone had posted. ._.]]

Nat was shaken from his reverie by the crazy girl tumbling down the stairs, newbie in tow. He stood up, and shook his head. That lady was standing next to him, just about his height. He shrugged. Nat remembered her name, but he didn't like it. "California" made him think of the state, naturally, and that made him think of the fog. He couldn't help but remember the fog; how it waited out by the ocean during the day, and floated in to the city at night, every night, like some ghostly presence. It hadn't made Nathaniel particularly afraid or anxious, but he was glad to get away from it.

He had had to watch the fog every night, and every morning. He had to wake up while it was still in the city, and could only leave his balcony after it had receded far out to sea. Then, in the evening, he had to be back on the balcony to watch it come in, and often fell asleep there, making sure it stayed in the city. He often found himself feeling the same way toward the blonde woman. He often wanted to be in her bedroom with her, until she fell asleep, then wake up early the next morning to watch her arise.

"It's OK," he said softly, when the blonde woman addressed him, "She's dead."

Wide eyes, Cal whipped her head around to see Aim land, but something about Nat's answer kept her locked on her stair. Slowly her gaze moved back to the window, the sunlight glistening off the strands and a clump in the middle that might be a dead something. Thinking she had just very brilliantly figured something out, she looked at Nat for confirmation, widening her eyes questioningly and pointing.
The churning in her stomach came back, stronger now.
"Do you want to tell me about it?" she asked like a mother whose child had had a bad dream. She tried not to demand - just to be there, just to be a constant in an erratic world. In the whole year she'd been here she hadn't quite worked out whether Nat ever actually needed emotional support or not.
Or, in fact, whether he knew her name.

Alex finally got Amy calmes down,and she sat,less-than-human like,on the floor. He had her pils in his hand,where she couldn't see,and put it in a plate of grass he had picked a smal bit earlier.
Alex gave her the plate,and she ate the grass,happily,not noticing the pills. A couple minutes later,she snapped back to reality. Wondering why in the world she was on the floor. Amy got up,and stretched her arms,and looked at Alex. She hated this place,but he helped her,and that she was glad off.
Alex then,went,back up the stairs,walking to Lucas's room.

Judith grumbled as she saw no one down the hall in her tiny window. She banged a little harder on the door her eyes opening wide. She didn't want to be stuck in her room all day again. That had happened once when she had snuck into the kitchen to get a knife. No one seemed to understand that the pain stopped the visions and the nightmares. They gave her sedatives at night if she needed them but she preferred natural sleep. So now they locked her door so she didn't get out and try and hurt herself.

Banging a little harder she gave a cry of helplessness. She was hungry and her stomach let her know that. Where the hell was her carer? She banged again, another loud one and grumbled some more. Slowly she slid down the door until she was sitting at the base. It was 8:30am now and the new guy would be here in about half an hour. Maybe they were scared she'd have another vision with the new guy and scare him more.

"LET ME OUT!" She screamed at a seemingly empty hallway.

Nathaniel scowled at the blonde woman. "That's the girl who yells a lot," he remarked, hearing a cry for release from above the landing. He didn't understand Judith, the girl who hurt herself on purpose. Nathaniel had never needed to hurt himself when he had problems. He supposed it was her size that made it difficult to inflict pain on other people. That had been a problem for Nat before he discovered the gratification in arson.

Or, perhaps, Nat thought, She enjoys pain. Perhaps she gets real pleasure out of it, and she doesn't feel like going around asking other people to hurt her on purpose. {Well, that's never been a problem for you either, eh?} It was true; Nathaniel had always known just how to get people to want to punch him. Happily, for the sake of his face, such attempts were usually thwarted by the rationality of the people he annoyed. {Don't you think "annoy" is putting it a bit lightly?} No, why? {Why, you practically drive people mad.} You mean sane people, or---

Nathaniel cut himself off, then whacked himself lightly in the head. "Shut up, I said."

Cal whipped her head around in the opposite direction and she thought that if the morning continued to be this exciting she would get whip lash. She sprinted up one stair then, stopping with awkward abruptness she turned back around and, holding Nat's forearms, said insistently, "Stay right here, pease." She didn't have much faith that saying it would affect his decision in any significant way, but she could always hope. Within a moment she was off again, running recklessly on the steep stairs, and feeling horrible.
Judith locked in her room. By herself. Looking out at an empty hall. Not traumatizing at all. Well, maybe not, actually; not for someone already so traumatized. But as Cal unlocked and wrenched open the heavy door, she was already apologizing and inwardly telling herself she really wasn't very good at this. Sure she was trustworthy, had a calming effect, all very useful things. But she seemed incapable of keeping a thought in her head or caring for two people simultaneously.
"-So, so, so sorry. I was about to come up the stairs, but I had to, I mean, Nat was..." she trailed off, realizing Nat "was" nothing in particular. Nothing unusual. She had no excuse, and the name, the name that was ever-present at times like this, hung still in the air and refused to go away, no matter how much Cal willed it to.
Another thought crossed her mind, yet another thing she probably should know but was definitely not anywhere in her head, and, less frantically but with a whole new kind of apology in the way her head was bent and the tentativeness of er voice, she asked, "Um, do you know when the new patient is coming?"

Amy walked out to the where the stairs where. She must have looked like a mess. Not that she cared. She was in with a bunch of crazies. She didn't belong with them..So she acted like a cow,some little kids did the same thing. She walked back up to her room,passing a person. Uhm,Nat was his name she believed.
She opened the door to her room,and walked over to the vanity her mom had made them place in there,after a request from Amy.
She combed her hair down,to a respectable mess,and applied some eyeliner. She closed the door,and changed. Her favorite pair of underwear,and the matching clothes. It was a black t-shirt with a skulls on it. The skirt was the same,though she added,because she liked it,some black leggings.
Amy walked out,down the stairs. She looked at Nat,for a moment. Not sure what to do.
"Hi." She said,trying to start one of her rare conversations.

((Matching underwear and clothes. o.O XD))

Judith moved as the door was wrenched open and she grumbled a little. She did like Cal but she hated being alone in her room. As soon as Cal said something about Nat Judith nodded and started to move past the woman, her eyes glittering softly. "I understand." Nat shocked a lot of people, but not that Judith knew too much about anyone else for she just usually kept to herself, finding it easier then to try and get to know everyone and fail miserably at it. With a smile she nodded her head at Cal's other question. "New one comes at 9am." With a soft smile Judith moved past her and started heading towards the stairs.

She was hungry and as much as she usually would stay and clam the other woman down saying the apology wasn't necessary her hunger took over. She found that since she was no longer dancing she could eat what she wanted most and no one went off at her for her diet. It was almost pure bliss if only she could get rid of these damned nightmares and visions. "Oh and the new sedatives worked better." She thought that would make her carer happy. After all it was her that had suggested trying the new ones.

Lucas groaned slightly as he sat in his room, he didn't really know what time it was but since the alarm had rung earlier. Lucas didn't sleep it wasn't that he couldn't sleep it was that he was to afraid to sleep. The terifying voice has been talking to him all night reminding him of his parents. Holding his hair in large clumps he waited for Alex to come collect him hoping it qould be soon. Lifting one of his hands of his head he began to chew on his hand nervously, it was a habit that he had developed at the home giving Lucas some comfort when he was nervous or afraid of the world around him. The carers however didnt like him doing it as he sometimes broke the skin of his hands without any realisation that he was doing it.

The blonde woman told Nathaniel to stay there. He sighed, and followed her up the stairs to the loud girl's room. She had been there since before Nathaniel had been brought in, and when the blonde woman had shown up, they had both been assigned to her.

He stood behind the loud girl, still on the stairs, and looked up at her.
"Good morning," he said simply. She wasn't much older than Nathaniel, and her eyes reminded him of his mother. Her voice was eerily familiar, as well. Nat was sure she had spoken to him within the past few minutes, but she had been locked in her room.

{Are you sure it's real?} Of course. She's standing right there. I could reach out and touch her. Nathaniel put a hand on the girl's shoulder.
"See?" he said quietly to himself. "She's real." {She?} Nathaniel winced at the unintended thoughts. He could never tell when his subconscious would lapse into some sort of mental horror.
"You're real," he said cautiously to the girl, almost as a question, implying an "aren't you?" at the end. He stared quizzically at the girl's face, wondering why he felt so strangely. Almost like he wanted to eat her. It was weird, and it made Nathaniel shudder involuntarily.

Alex opened the door to Lucas's room.
"Hey,Lucas. Sorry I didn't come earlier. Are you biting your hand again?" He asked, watching him. He gently tried to take Lucas's hand out of his mouth. "You know,that's dangerous to you." He said,frowning. "There's going to be some new people arriving this morning to." Alex said,trying to make conversation.

Lucas eyes flashed at Alex when he finnaly come in and pulled his hand away from hs mouth. When Alex mentioned that new people were going to be arriving Lucas's body tensed. "He wimpered quietly "A-are they...s-safe?" he mumbled the words hardly leaving his lips. Looking at the floor he folded his arms tightly. Taking a sharp breath in he spoke again "Is..it time for...um?" Lucas said meaning to say breakfast but the word left his mind before he could say it.

"Of course they're safe,Lucas. You have nothing to worry about."Alex said,smiling at him. "Yes,breakfast should be ready soon." He said,knowing what Lucas meant. I'l let you get dressed,and everything." He said,leaving the room,to respect Lucas's privacy.

Judith looked at Nat and her lips twitched in a sort of smile. "Yes I'm real," she almost whispered it back at him her eyes moving to his hand on her shoulder before nodding softly. She knew about Nat, they all knew about each other. Something to do with the idea that they wouldn't hurt each other unintentionally if they knew what ailed them. With a small smile Judith took another step down the stairs, nearer Nat. She was so much shorter than him. She was shorter than everyone, only standing about about five feet. She had a small body to match the small height and sometimes people thought that made her a victim. Only a victim to herself.

She could remember the first time she had seen Nat, when they brought him in. It had taken her months after that to even go near him. New people often brought out more visions and he had changed into something that no human being should see. She had been locked in her room for two days because of that, because she had grabbed a fork and shoved it into her leg to stop the visions. It had been worth it. They'd hurt themselves too if they saw what Judith saw.

The same thing had happened with Cal, except they hadn't locked her in her room because luckily, one of the nurses was there giving check-ups and they had just shoved a needle into her arm full of a sedative. She had still dreamed those horrible dreams and Cal had come in late at night to hold her, making sure her hands were behind her back so she couldn't hurt herself. Ever since then Judith had trusted her.

Amy sighed. "...Just ignore me.." She said,walking over to the kitchen. Even if there was food already,she'd make her own. She knew how. They didn't restrict her from most things,because she didn't have the intent to kill herself.
She started to try and prepare some eggs,bacon,and some toast.

Alex walked down the stairs,looking at Judith,Nat,and Cal. Nodding a small hello to them,before walking into the kitchen. There he found Amy.
"Hey,Aim. Making some breakfast?" He asked,smiling at her. He usually smiled at everyone,mainly because he never smiled a lot when he was a kid,and now he had different reasons to smile,so he did,as often as he could.
Amy looked up from the skillet she was spraying,and nodded a reply.
"Okay,what'cha making,just some bacon,and eggs?" Alex asked her. She nodded again.
"Would you like some,Alex?" She asked. She really wasn't into being a mime,but no one usually talked to her. They were basically all crazy. He wasn't. They could talk.
Alex shook his head no.
"Nah. I haven't been hungry for some reason." He said,stating the truth.
Alex sat in a chair,and started to make conversation.