[center][img]http://i.imgur.com/vcyTlTu.png[/img][/center][center][img]http://i.imgur.com/3R5vYYi.png?2[/img][/center][hr][center][color=silver]𝕊𝕖𝕡𝕥. 𝟛, 𝟚𝟘𝟚𝟘   / /   𝕌𝕊𝔸ℝ𝕀𝕃ℕ 𝔼𝕒𝕤𝕥   / /   𝔻𝕠𝕣𝕞 𝔹𝕦𝕚𝕝𝕕𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝔸 : 𝕊𝕦𝕚𝕥𝕖 𝟛𝟙𝟟  / /  𝟘𝟠𝟙𝟚[/color][/center][hr]

Sander had come in with a quick wave and exited just as quickly while Christmas had been working on his placement exams. He had felt guilty for wishing that Sander wouldn’t come back any time soon, but had found it easy to distract himself from the thought by simply firing up his Vita and resuming a save file.

The games were his way of daydreaming. Anyone who cared to look for long periods of time would realize the screen often remained frozen on a line of dialogue while the arrow to proceed flashed slowly in the corner. Christmas played mindlessly easy games for the sense that he was doing something and to prevent himself from looking around as he withdrew into his mind. 

In that mental landscape, the world had fixed itself. He could go to school normally. Friends would greet him in class. His parents would welcome him home and ask about his day—sincerely. He’d be allowed to tell them all the little things that bothered him from day to day: the girls cooing at how “cute” he was with the ribbon in his hair; the guys jeering about how “gay” it looked; and the crueler people spreading rumors that he was just an attention whore. And maybe his parents would tell him it was okay. That he didn’t need to worry about them. That the things he liked were all right.

[center][img]http://i.imgur.com/3R5vYYi.png?2[/img][/center]
[hr][center][color=silver]𝕊𝕖𝕡𝕥. 𝟛, 𝟚𝟘𝟚𝟘   / /   𝕌𝕊𝔸ℝ𝕀𝕃ℕ 𝔼𝕒𝕤𝕥   / /  𝔹𝕦𝕚𝕝𝕕𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝔻: 𝔻𝕚𝕟𝕚𝕟𝕘 ℍ𝕒𝕝𝕝  / /  𝟙𝟚𝟛𝟘[/color][/center][hr]

He ended up daydreaming for hours, the Vita running out of batteries on his lap as he continued staring at the blank, black screen.

When he finally tuned back in to reality, he realized, with an alarmingly loud rumble of his stomach, that he was starving. A quick check of the map reconfirmed the dining hall’s location before Christmas made his tentative way towards the building, making sure to grab his ID card before he left.

Glassy, tall, and just as stylishly modern as Building A, Building D boasted three stories of floor-to-ceiling windows displaying buffet-style food bars complete with cozy tables, chairs, sofas, couches, and even an alcoholic beverages bar in the corner of each floor, no doubt for the older students and staff members. 

It was strange to see the pocket of coexistence here, like there was potential for a world where this microcosm of reality could expand into the bigger whole. The soldiers and staff members sat in their own sections of the massive dining hall, segregating themselves as best they could from where most of the subnaturals sat, but even in that they were still managing to sit and eat in the same room. Well, most of them. Christmas watched a few soldiers and staff members pack several carryout boxes with food before leaving. Not perfect. And not perfect was okay. 

Walking inside was a battle between his fear of all the potential death and destruction gathered into one room and his growling stomach. Hunger won out in the end and Christmas took several deep breaths to steel himself before following a group of subnaturals through the double glass doors and into the lobby. No one gave him a second glance as he entered the building during the afternoon lunch rush, with soldiers, subnaturals, and regular staff members all busy picking through the day’s selection on their respective ceramic plates, tall, crystal glasses, and large, earthenware bowls. 

One of the men sitting at the counter of the dining hall’s lobby ran Christmas's ID card through a quick scanner before waving the student through as the light on the machine flashed green. The receptionist repeated the process for everyone coming in, regardless of status. Christmas caught the name “Jason” on the man’s name tag and thanked the bespectacled worker out of habit. Jason raised an eyebrow, but didn’t respond.

Inside the building proper, the selection of food was dizzying, from the meat and seafood section to the salad bar to the soup bar to the entirety of the daily rotation at the rest of the unnamed sections. Christmas twirled a bit of spaghetti and meatballs onto his plate, peeking around at others to see if it was all right to take more food. A fat man in a bulging suit waddled by with two plates piled with steak and lobster to confirm that gluttonous consumption was completely sanctioned here.

Reassured now, Christmas added one more large forkful of spaghetti to his plate.

One of the cushy sofas was empty and Christmas walked over to it cautiously, in case someone else wanted to grab the seat before he did. An older woman with long, brown hair tied in a ponytail was seated on another sofa across the glass table from Christmas. She was dressed in the business suit that seemed to signify all regular staff members, but the white mark on her face denoted otherwise. To her left and right were two soldiers each, though that didn’t stop her from giving Christmas a kind smile as he sat down. A weak smile wavered into existence on his face as he tried to return the greeting. The lapels on her suit were ironed hideously uneven, but Christmas didn't think it would be polite to point that out.

[color=f7976a]“You’re only going to eat spaghetti?”[/color] she asked incredulously, her voice a bit deeper than Christmas had been expecting for someone who was only a few inches taller than him.

[color=8493ca]“Y-yes?”[/color]

[color=f7976a]“N-no,”[/color] she mimicked back at him, taking his plate away before substituting it with her own, piled with mashed potatoes, a chunk of steak that was practically bleeding, and a hearty helping of romaine lettuce on the side. [color=f7976a]“Eat that, Blood Bag.”[/color]

[color=8493ca]“Wha—"[/color]

[color=f7976a]“Yes, I know about your power,”[/color] she interrupted, turning back to look at him. Glowing white lines now speared outward from her eyes, giving her the look of cyborgs from a typical sci-fi movie. [color=f7976a]“I [i]knew[/i] about your power,”[/color] she corrected, [color=f7976a]“but having you right in front of me gives me a better look.”[/color]

Her wink was playful and a bit of the tension relaxed from Christmas’s shoulders as the woman leaned back cheerily.

[color=f7976a]“But I wasn’t kidding about eating, you know. You can’t regenerate your own wounds, much less your blood, so make sure you’re supplanting your body with steady nutrients to replenish lost blood.”[/color]

[color=8493ca]“Oh—okay…uh, thank you,”[/color] he awkwardly began poking at the huge plate of food in front of him, stuffing a piece of lettuce into his mouth after much deliberation on where to begin eating. 

The woman in front of him sighed gently.

[color=f7976a]“Do you know how the effects of your power work?”[/color] she asked kindly as Christmas nibbled on some of the mashed potatoes.

He shook his head, one hand instinctively grabbing the ribbon to prevent it from straying towards the bit of mashed potato on the side of his mouth.

[color=f7976a]“About 50 mL of your blood is enough to close up most minor wounds over a short period. The more others drink, the faster those effects in a shorter time. Your blood over a wound can also repair it, but it’s weaker.”[/color]

As she spoke, she reached over with a napkin and wiped the small mess from his mouth.

[color=f7976a]“You’ll remember all that, right?”[/color]

Christmas nodded, eyes wide. She didn’t scare him [i]per se[/i], but having someone explain his own power to him when he barely understood it himself was surreal.

[color=f7976a]“Take care of yourself, sweetie. Your type is rare and getting rarer,”[/color] she patted his head and stood up, her entourage of guards following her. [color=f7976a]“Ribbon suits you, by the way. Thought I’d mention.”[/color]

He blinked after her as she left, realizing too late he had forgotten to ask for her name.

[center][img]http://i.imgur.com/3R5vYYi.png?2[/img][/center]
[hr][center][color=silver]𝕊𝕖𝕡𝕥. 𝟛, 𝟚𝟘𝟚𝟘   / /   𝕌𝕊𝔸ℝ𝕀𝕃ℕ 𝔼𝕒𝕤𝕥   / /   ℂ𝕒𝕞𝕡𝕦𝕤   / /  𝟚𝟘𝟝𝟟[/color][/center][hr]

Taking a walk had never been one of those things Christmas ever planned for. If they happened, they happened, and this walk had certainly happened. After lunch, he had whiled away his hours exploring campus, enjoying—strangely enough—the freedom of walking around without needing to report to his parents where he was every few minutes. He had taken breaks on benches and decorative cement partitions where he had needed them, and simply let himself wander.

A quiet fear that he would get lost if he kept wandering like this instilled itself firmly in his mind the longer he walked, but Christmas took his deep breaths and kept moving instead. Things that he didn’t want to go to back to and situations that he wasn’t ready to face swam through his thoughts like titanic leviathans, unrelenting in their motions as they displaced his attempts at self-distraction one by one.

He hadn’t given himself the time to think too deeply about the current situation. There was only one end in sight there—“Bad End No. xx.” Christmas shuddered, thinking back to his last bout of panic in the suite, where he had curled up on the floor to steady himself, arms wrapped around his legs as if he was afraid to lose them. In this place, he probably would.

He had heard of subnaturals being sent to fight Dreamcatcher abominations back when he was “normal.” Kids in class would talk about the latest fight like they were talking about a TV show. How this subnatural was cooler than that one and how the latest monster was way better or way worse than the last round. This wasn’t what the world was supposed to be. People just played into it anyway for lack of choice. But then, it had always seemed like some distant problem for some other important folks to deal with. He was a civilian. No responsibilities in the problem. Not his concern. “Safe.”

And now he could potentially be one of those subnaturals the high schoolers would watch on TV and call “lame.”

The sudden blaring of the alarm from both the school speakers and the ankle cuff made him jump. He would have fallen over if a nearby soldier hadn’t caught him. Christmas muttered a quick apology as he righted himself and the soldier gave him a strained smile, the man’s blue eyes looking instead at Christmas’s ankle cuff where Director Zhang’s voice was detailing orders. Terrifying orders. A battle and a Precursor. [color=f7976a]“Kill on sight.”[/color] 

It was the soldier’s hand on the grip of his pistol that prevented Christmas from falling apart right then and there.

As she finished, the same soldier grabbed Christmas’s arm and checked a map on his smartphone, leading the subnatural boy quickly to the trucks as Christmas bit the insides of his cheeks, struggling to remain calm and just barely succeeding as the others came into view.