[Day: Wednsday, June 5th. Time: 12:00 p.m.!] [Yesterday Rei died, but not really. She's like a ghost now. And Katsu died, but not really. He's like a mummy now. A mummy with a lot of broken bones. But we don't care about that! You're at the hospital to visit Maria, who didn't die! Just came close, is all. But that happens regularly, so... no biggie.] [Mini start!] * Lazar steps into the hospital, then turns to his companions. "Makoto, you want to ask what room little one in? You brought in, would know explanation better." * Makoto nods and heads over to the busy reception-type desk to acquire the appropriate information. [The receptionist is so busy that a room listing is posted nearby anyhow. Maria is in room.... 456.] * Chomei walks in to the hospital and steps near Lazar. "I'm wondering how we're paying for this." Interpol must have health plan, I think. Wonder if have retirement plan... * Makoto notes the information and returns to the doorway where Lazar and Chomei are lingering unnaturally. It's not their fault. They just don't look like they belong in a hospital lobby. Okay, got the room number. 456. I think it's this way. * Chomei nods. "Probably, but I doubt anyone ever gets that far." * Makoto leads them toward the elevators, because elevators are exciting. * Lazar nods and follows Makoto. "Question, Makoto. You think we get health plan from Interpol?" * Chomei follows Makoto. * Makoto taps his chin with one hand as he uses the other to jab the button that summons an elevator or two. "I'm not sure, Lazar. When I signed up for this I wasn't really interested in any benefits beyond the immediate. I guess if we're like the grunts, we'd probably get some kind of coverage. Otherwise Interpol would run out of ground troops." Well, they probably saving money on me. All I need is time and sandpaper. * Chomei chuckles. [They get to the room. Which has x1 Maria in it.] ( And x 47 Makotos. x48 now. ) ( Whoo! ) (Yeah, you can never have enough of you, right?) ( Dang straight. ) * Lazar pokes his head in. Is Maria awake? * Makoto waits behind Lazar, surreptitiously checking the hallways out of habit. * Maria is lying in the hospital bed, but she's awake. * Lazar waves. "Can we come in?" * Maria looks up and smirks. "Hey, Laz! What're you doin' here?" * Chomei waits patiently behind Lazar and Makoto. Eh? Oh, sure! ...we? Who'd you bring? Makoto, Chomei, and silly detective guy. * Lazar grins and steps inside, letting the others come in. ...silly detective guy? * Maria waves to Makotoni and Chooze. "Heya, guys. Nice surprise, seein' ya' here." * Makoto reaches behind his back and up underneath his untucked, baggy white overshirt as he walks in behind Lazar. "Hey, Maria. I brought you a pillow to help you feel better." He brings his hand 'round from behind his back to present a squarish pillow about a foot across on each side. It has a zebra pattern. Am kidding. How you doing, aside from big cut on torso? * Chomei nods and smiles. "Good to see you too. How are- yeah, what he said." * Maria grins. "Nifty. It's prolly better than these hospital pillows. I don't even wanna think about all the chemicals I can smell on 'em." * Makoto nods gravely and hands the pillow over. "The only chemical on this pillow is a subtle aphrodisiac that will have you aching for my touch in about twenty minutes." He says this with a completely straight face. Oh, I'm doing good. Real good, actually. I may be discharged today. The docs are baffled, and I am, too. Not that I'm complaining. * Lazar lightly whaps Makoto upside the head. Urf. * Chomei shrugs. "The miracles of modern science and how they can't explain anything." ( Yeah, Makoto. That's not for another 10 sessions. ) Lazar, could you wh-- thanks. ^_^ ( Oh! My mistake. <^_^;; ) * Makoto rubs his head where whapped. * Lazar grins. "Little one like small squishy golem. Heal fast." You gotta watch that Lazar. Those hits really do hurt. * Maria giggles. "Thanks." * Lazar nods. "I know. Would noogie be better?" And, uhm, really, I gotta stop bothering people with swords. Swords don't seem to like my much, lately. And for the record? I hate swords. * Chomei nods. "Either that or weggie." Healing fast is a very useful thing, though. Did you know that they charge you per night, per bed, per meal, per everything in these places? You'd think this was the Hyatt, to look at the bill. Nah, too expensive to be Hyatt. On bright side, we separate Katsu from sword. So no more attack by evil Rei brother. * Makoto sidles away from Lazar and Chomei. He's been noogied by Maria and wedgied by the golem already... ( Chomei mentions a 40 year old anime @_@ ) * Maria nods. "Good to hear. So... we won that one?" ( Oh. My mistake. 40 year old hotel. ) ( Hah! ) ... kind of. Kind of? ( I figure it got bought out by Hatt hotels. ) Katsu's been permanently damaged from the look of him. I don't even know if he's alive anymore... Rei's... Oh, yeah. You probably haven't heard yet, Maria, but Rei's body died. * Lazar rubs the back of his neck. "Had to really hurt Katsu to keep him down..." ( Yay for being almost totally insensitive to death! ) * Maria winces. "Ow. Poor Ka..." she blinks, looking shocked. "...Rei's *dead*?" No, not really. Her body expired, but her spirit is still alive. So it's like she's astral twenty-four seven now. At least until we find her a new body. * Maria looks like she's about to leap up right there and go huntin', but she stops after Mak's explanation. "...er ...how's that work?" ...oh. Weird. Is like me, kind of. Old body no work, but soul still do. Weird vampire lady show up, tell us where to get new body for Rei. Apparently, that blue stone Katsu has cut some kind of link between Rei's soul and her body. We weren't able to get her back in time, but apparently we can find a fresh and uninhabited body in a place called... Nero. So, are we gonna stick Rei in a rock-body, too? She'd prolly make lots of bad jokes with it, y'know. No, no. No goyim golem. Goyim? ... Right. Mean "person what no Jewish". Ahhh. That would be all of us here except for you. Ah. So, uhm, what. They just have spare bodies for sale or something? ( It's Japan. Rei is Jewish. And Catholic. And Buddhist, and Shinto, and.... ) * Chomei shrugs. "You got me." * Makoto shrugs, too. I've never been there. Rei is really keen on going, though. I think she would want to visit even if she didn't need a new body. * Lazar nods. "We get Rei body what better than golem body. Else Makoto get crushed very often." *smirk* Now that she knows it exists. * Makoto sniggers at Lazar's comment. * Chomei snickers. * Maria blinks. "Why would Mako... no, nevermind." * Makoto grins impishly at Maria. "It's okay. I could demonstrate for you sometime, if you like." Things no go way would have wanted, but should be fixable. *noogies Makoto lightly* Gkkk! * Chomei nods in approval. "Much better Laz." Uhm... that grin tells me I don't want you to demonstrate. Sorry. * Maria sticks her tongue out at Makoto. Nyeeeh! Fine. I'll get Chie to show you. She owes me some footage... And hopefully, Rei no throw me out window for hurting Katsu... *eyes Makoto* * Makoto rubs his head again, where he was noogied. Hopefully the rubbing will protect him from further golem-induced punishment. * Maria tries to change the subject. "So, how'd everyone else end up? Anyone else get hurt?" I think you were the only one who got really hurt. Besides Rei and Katsu, of course. Nobody else was around to get hurt. Lazar and I kept that sword pretty well contained, but I lost one of my favorite yo-yos. * Lazar shakes his head. "Chie pretty upset, but no hurt." ... ah! I forget. *reaches into his pouch; hands Makoto his yoyo* Aww. Well, I'll getcha' a know one. ...or Lazar could. Hee. Oh! Hey, thanks, Lazar! Did they give this to you when they took the sword? And yeah, I can understand why Chie'd be upset. * Lazar shakes his head. "Wrapped sword in metal when gave to Interpol people. No needed yoyo." * Chomei nods. "I suppose I'm going to have to talk to her about it. And about giving things back..." Chomei produces Maria's stealth suit. It's folded rather neatly, and doesn't look like it was cut at all. "The shirt was beyond repair, but I did manage to get this working again." ^^; ( Chomei got Maria's shirt? Hmmm.... ) ( Yeah, Chomei! Score! I didn't know you had it in you! ) ( Probably from the doctors. *cough* ) ( *looks down; blinks* ... hentai! *slapslapslap* ) * Maria grins. "Thanks, Cho! Now I won't have to wear this hospital thing home. ...er, how'd you get this?" ( From the doctors. Uh huh. Like Maria would know, being unconscious at the time :P ) And before you ask, I got it from the doctors. * Maria nods. "Alright. " ( Hm. Damn, I should have gone into medicine. ) I think that when Rei gets... a bit more settled down, she'll want to go find this Nero place right away. * Maria nods. "We'll prolly do that tonight, then. Any idea where it is?" Peter doing research on Nero thing... hopefully, he figure out where, what it is. * Maria nods. "Alright. Once we know where it is, we can get there easy enough." If Rei's been to see her brother she'll probably want to kick all our asses first, though. * Chomei winces. "I hope she's not that upset." * Maria giggles. "Well, if I were feeling better, I'd teach you guys how to hide." She winks. * Makoto waves a hand dismissively. "Oh, I can hide. I just hide in plain sight." ... golem no good at hiding. Unless in art museum. * Chomei snerks. "Yeah, but I bet you can't hide from Rei." * Makoto looks up at Lazar speculatively. * Maria blinks at Makoto. "Can you turn into a lamp or something?" * Chomei looks at Lazar. "... Right." What? If I no move, I look like big statue. With pouch. And loincloth. * Makoto grins and turns back to Chomei, and Maria. "I can't turn into a lamp, but unless Rei can read my thoughts she'd have a hard time picking me out of a crowd if I didn't want her to." * Maria nods. "True. But it'd be cooler if you could turn into a lamp. Or a wall pannel!" Yeah, then you could make sekrit rooms and stuff. Rei no beat you up, Makoto. She like you. And you no kick brother in man parts. Lazar, please stop reminding me you did that to Katsu. * Maria giggles. "Yeah. Laz's the one I'm worried about." No guy deserves that... except for Mr. E. Or that Batboy. * Lazar shrugs. "Was angry. Hurt little one. And seemed like most quick way to stop him..." I don't think there's any question that you stopped him. * Chomei nods. "I just hope Rei sees it your way." Well, it's not like he was going easy on us, or anything. * Lazar nods. "What is is." * Chomei frowns. "It's not like I didn't go easy on him..." ( You shot his hand with your strongest attack. You're lucky he still has any hand left :P ) Yes, but you no dropkick in face. Really, if a villain doesn't wanna get sucker-punched or something, he should stop and set up some rules with us before we start trying to hurt each other. (Yeah, shoulda gone for the head. :P) * Maria yawns cutely. (Aw, isn't that cute?) ( Yes. That's the point. ) ( ^_~ ) (That's not the correct answer though. ^^;) Okay. I'm healing, and if Katsu's healing as good as I'm healing he'll be fine in a week. And tonight we go body-shopping. It most certainly looks that way. I wonder how you shop for bodies... Hope no have to pay arm and leg. * Makoto grunts, not cutely at all. He's obviously thinking. "I wonder how Katsu got mixed up with the others. And what exactly Mr. E. has to do with those corporate guys..." Probably chance and everything. Bad luck? I'm not thinking too hard about it right now. We have to get Rei a body first, then we worry about it. * Maria nods. Maybe. It's just that I'll probably be just tagging along on this Nero trip unless they have relatively normal humans there. I'll probably be thinking a lot. Right. Being without a body gets old after a while, I'll bet. * Chomei nods. "And if she's not in her body, she's gonna be bugging us all the time instead of most of the time." More important thing, Makoto... keep Rei from being too sad. * Maria giggles. ( I had to stop myself from saying "lift her spirits"... =P ) Er, yeah. I imagine being dead would be a downer. (Oh com'on. That woulda been gold!) Mm. Good point, Lazar. I'll keep her as occupied as I can. I think she's going to be really eager to find this place, though. I may end up trying to reign her in more than I try to calm her down. Or cheer her up. I've never seen Rei really upset. I'm not sure how she's going to react. * Chomei snickers. "Well, just tell her to wait for us. I think there's a reason that... vampire told all of us and not just Rei." * Lazar nods. "Is no easy no having body, though. First few days as golem very hard." * Maria nods. We'll just have to take care of this fast, then. * Makoto jerks his thumb toward the door. "I think I parked in the loading zone. Lazar's really heavy, y'know. I'll go bring the car around." [Mini End!]