Oktoberfest '08 Entry, Playing Dress up by shira

[blind-nights.livejournal.com]

Title: Playing Dress Up
Author: shira (blind_nights)
Beta: NONE. I again fly by the seat of my pants this year too.
Word Count: 2220
Rating: G.
Character(s): Guy Cecil, mentions of Anise, mentions of Jade, a surprise cameo.
Pairing(s): None.
Summary: The afternoon of Halloween finds Landel's Institute giving their patients a chance to have fun on the holiday.
Notes: I haven't written Abyss fic in, like. What? A billion years? So forgive me for my complete lack of characterization, AND ALSO, for playing house with our deus ex machina radio characters. LAWL.



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Playing Dress Up
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Well, Guy thought, things could be worse.

He wasn’t exactly sure what ‘Halloween’ was, or ‘All Hallows’ Eve’, or ’Samhain’, or any of the variations the Head Doctor had mentioned over the intercom that morning, but neither did a lot of people, if the sudden flood of notes on the bulletin board was any indication. Apparently it was an Earth thing, and Guy only knew that much because there were a lot of people from that world around.

Bonfires, dressing up in costume, haunted houses… it sounded a lot like a regular old festival, if not for the theme of scaring people silly. Giving candy to kids for nothing, though, that wasn’t strange to him. When he was young, Luke (the Luke that wasn’t Asch) had thought every celebration was a good excuse for him to be doted on. As though it wasn’t like that all year round, anyway.

Guy couldn’t help smiling a bit as he read over some more bulletin board notes. It faded quickly--thinking about Luke only reminded him of the Luke, here, at Landel’s, the one who’d gone missing and who no one had heard from, including Jade.

No use letting it get to him, right?

When he was done skimming over the post he was on, Guy stepped away to make room for someone else to take a look, stretching his arms behind him with a yawn. It was almost time for fourth shift; he’d asked his nurse if he could make a stop in the Sun Room at the end of lunch, if only because he’d had to go to the bathroom. And clean off some sticky orange juice from his arm. Another couple of somebodies had broken into a fistfight nearby and bumped his table, causing a few spills. Nothing new there. He’d gotten used to it.

Before he could even make himself comfy on one of the couches, the intercom cut in right on time. Guy listened more attentively than he usually did. Today was a bit different for a couple of reasons: ‘October 31st’ didn’t mean much to him overall, but apparently it was a solid date in time, which meant people familiar with that calendar could make something of it. The Head Doctor having mentioning the date for the day was strange enough, but that morning he’d gone out of his way to announce a ‘surprise’ before dinner.

Normally someone’s response might be, “Oh yeah, what kind of surprise?” Guy, on the other hand, thought most of the prisoners knew better. Landel’s idea of a surprise could mean a lot of things, most of them bad.

“The sun hasn’t gone down yet, though…” Guy observed under his breath, somewhat curious, somewhat not. The previous night had been a long one. He was still feeling the toll. A surprise might not be the best thing.

Shuffled back into the cafeteria where the population of prisoners was chatting animatedly, Guy noticed the difference at once. All the trays had been cleared away from the tables and a couple of orderlies were carrying a fold-up one to the front. What was more, nurses were going up and down the rows, laying out newspaper on the tabletops--Guy saw a lot of unhappy faces as people were asked to lift their elbows so that they could work.

He made his way back to his original seat, seeing a couple of people had taken seats nearby, not having been there during lunch. Guess this is part of the surprise.
Definitely curious now, Guy watched the front of the room where all the action was happening: now there were four small tables being set up. And all of a sudden, out of the kitchen doorway, nurses and orderlies began carrying pumpkins out. In various places around the room, some excited sounds went up, and Guy saw the sources were either all pretty young, or from people he hadn’t seen around for that long of a time. Something good, then? He could hope. With chin in hand, he watched as arm load after arm load of pumpkins were stacked on the tables up front, and… was that orderly carrying knives? He was.

Again, Guy’s gaze flicked around at the sources of the murmuring. The response was different, without a doubt, and some prisoners were smiling fiercely. Seeing nurses and orderlies with knives was one thing, but he was sure most were envisioning trying to take them for their own and using them against the staff in the name of escape.

Couldn’t blame them. Guy’s attention returned to the front. He wasn’t about to start that kind of thing, himself. He was at the back of the room, anyway.

He wasn’t sure what the other stuff they brought out was, but eventually one of the head nurses spoke to the room once they’d gotten everything sorted out, saying, “I hope you enjoy your surprise! Pumpkin carving!” There were various responses from the prisoners, but she kept speaking over it. “Of course, we’ll be handling the carving itself, but there should be enough pumpkins to have one for every two or three of you. We’ve got all kinds of stencils to choose from! Then you’ll be able to scoop out the pumpkins yourselves, though be sure to put the insides in the bags we give you; we’ll collect the seeds and roast them for a snack tomorrow. Also, for dessert tonight, we’ve got candy apples!”

Guy blinked and kept his seat, even after the ball started to get rolling and suggestions for stencils were called out at random. He saw Anise sitting with a girl around her age, one who seemed to be chatting about the custom with her. After a minute, Anise waved her hand frantically to flag down a nurse and supposedly began talking about what kind of stencil they wanted. Pumpkin carving, huh? He could see from the looks of things--there were already a few orderlies finishing off some quick drawings and beginning to cut into the face of the pumpkins--that they were talking about hollowing out a picture, for whatever reason. He couldn’t imagine he was the only one who wasn’t familiar with the Halloween tradition.

There were a lot of smiling faces, however, and that was nice.

He sat back to watch, not particularly interested in getting into the middle of it, especially when the pumpkins started to be brought to the cafeteria tables and people began sticking their bare hands through holes in the top, only to pull out handfuls of the orange glop within.

Nice and messy. Guy smiled to himself. Was Jade getting involved in this too? He could only guess how that’d go, if so.

“You don’t want to make one, Dana?”

Guy jumped, both from the surprise, and over the fact that it was a female voice speaking from somewhere behind him. He turned nervously. Damn, she’d sure snuck up on him. “A-Ah, maybe when it calms down up there. We’re supposed to be in groups, right?” It looked like most of his table had already split up into teams dedicated to pumpkin massacre.

The nurse standing at his side, possessing rather noncommittal features even if she was fairly young, made a thoughtful sound. Then she tapped her forefinger against the clipboard she had under her arm. With the other hand, she raised a finger to her lips in an impish gesture. “You know what, hold on a sec. I’ll be right back.”

Before Guy could say anything, she left, squeezing her way through the crowd to the front of the room, where she disappeared. He felt his shoulders sag in relief for the moment. What was she coming back with, though?

He had his question answered soon enough.

In no time at all, the young woman was making her way back with a pumpkin in her arms, already carved and waiting to be scooped out. She’d lost her clipboard along the way, he noticed, and thankfully he had space to notice, since she stayed on the opposite side of the table when she dropped her offering on it.

“There!” she said. Pulling a clear plastic bag from her pocket, she pointed at it. “You can put the stuff in here.” And then she put that on the table too, and smiled.

Guy wondered what he should say; the nurses he normally got seemed happy to let him do his own thing for the most part. He smiled back, tentatively. Would it be all right to refuse? He didn’t want to rain on the parade or anything, but the staff already thought he was crazy, and he didn’t want to encourage them by not being able to join in with the Halloween celebration. There was nothing like Halloween in Auldrant.

But she must have sensed some of his thoughts, for she pulled the top off the pumpkin and pushed it closer. “Go on, give it a whirl. This sort of thing doesn’t happen often here.”

So he stood up without thinking. Better to just do it and shake her off, maybe. She seemed pretty friendly, and he hoped she wasn’t going to do anything uncomfortable like try to pat his shoulder or something. That wouldn’t go over well.

“Just pull all this out?” he asked automatically, having rolled up his sleeves and peered inside. Guy realized he shouldn’t have said anything--was he going to get one of those sympathizing looks because he’d lost his memories or whatever? When he glanced up, however, he was surprised to hear her giggle.

“First time jack-o’-lanterning?” was her reply, and Guy had to wonder if that was even a word.

“Yeah, kind of.” And to show he got the idea, Guy stuck his hand inside and began pulling out handfuls of the pumpkin’s innards. Now that he looked closely at it, there was a hollowed out picture of a cat on his, standing next to a gravestone. The three people up the table from him had a childish-looking ghost on theirs… “Um, so why did I get one for myself?” he couldn’t help but ask.

The nurse, having been watching his progress, only shrugged. “It’s not mandatory or anything… but it’s a little bit of fun before you get sent to your rooms for the night. I like Halloween.”

She was pretty informal for a nurse, Guy thought, but he didn’t say anything. “Oh.” And then there was an awkward pause where Guy continued to scoop, the nurse turned slightly to survey the rest of the room with a slightly pinched expression, and his discomfort began to grow. She might not be too close, but she was still hovering a bit, and whether or not she was looking at him, Guy still felt like he was under survey. After another long moment, he cleared his throat and said, “What are they going to be used for?”

There was another pause before the woman went, “Hmm?” and looked back to him. “Oh! The jack-o‘-lanterns? Who knows. They deserve a good haunted house, so maybe they’ll go in the Head Doctor’s office. That’s fitting, don’t you think?”

This time, Guy didn’t even notice the pause, he was too busy staring at the young woman with his arm sunk nearly to the elbow in the wet paste of the pumpkin.

Then, like clockwork, the nurse seemed to realize what she’d said, and quickly waved both her hands before realizing that that drew even more attention. She dropped them to her sides, back straight. Even from across the table, Guy could see she was a little flushed.

“Uh, I mean--the Doctor’s not--he takes such good care of you guys--” Then she let out a sudden sigh, putting a stop to her sheepish stuttering. “Forget it? Who am I kidding? You know exactly what he’s like.” Her tone was much more abrupt, and she cast a sidelong glance at the rest of the room.

Guy only pulled his arm out and used a section of newspaper to wipe off the more disgusting bits. He… wasn’t sure what to say. Was he supposed to agree? Was he supposed to argue? It sounded to him like she was openly insulting Landel, and that definitely wasn’t the norm around here, at least when it came to the staff.

His silence caught her attention; her gaze returned to him, becoming slightly sly, despite herself. “Don’t worry. You don’t need to play crazy patient with me.” She shrugged again. “I’d better get going now, kind of blowing my cover here… But seriously, put some elbow work in with that pumpkin! It might not be one of your holidays, but try to enjoy Halloween a bit--it’s the only night when you can really feel the irony, right?” Her short laugh was more dry than anything.

“Wait, wait,” Guy started, “what do you--?”

But she just glanced over her shoulder, smoothed out her outfit, and stepped away from the table in the direction of the exit. She grinned back at him. “I told you, I like Halloween. Like my costume?” Guy was granted with a small, furtive parting wave. “The name’s Jill, by the way. Keep at it!”

Later, when he was listening to a radio transmission in the dead of night, Guy thought things could have been much worse.