neornitheslogs

For a newcomer, Koizumi was remarkably calm. Things could have been worse. Granted, he could still think of a thousand places he'd rather be than the G block of Deadman Wonderland-- like the SOS Brigade clubroom, or his quiet apartment, or maybe a medieval torture chamber. But he wasn't in any of those places, and no amount of worrying was going to change that. If he wanted to make it through his sentence with his life and his sanity, what he needed now was information.

In the morning he took the basic ration cubes in the cafeteria on the principle that there were more important things to spend CP on, but a couple of bites were enough to change his mind. Two cups of coffee later he could still taste cardboard with undertones of cinderblock. His next stop was the gift shop to buy a communicator.

With the necessities out of the way he spent a few hours exploring the rest of the facility, making a mental map of every area he had access to with the exception of the lounge. He watched the other prisoners as he went, trying to memorize faces and first impressions. In a situation like this, he would need to know who was useful and who was dangerous. This involved more staring than was strictly polite, though he flashed a friendly smile if he was caught.

In the evening he settled down in the library with his communicator. He'd never seen a Deadman Wonderland event before. He rarely had time for TV, and even when he did it wasn't his sort of entertainment. But now it was research. He had to watch it. Not that it made him feel any better as he took in more carnage in an hour than he'd seen in a lifetime. Even with the volume muted, the images were bad enough. He tried not to look at their faces; all he needed to know was what sort of games they played, what sort of obstacles were involved, and what strategies had worked for others in the past. Even from that emotional distance, he had to stop after an hour. His hands were shaking. It wouldn't do to let anyone see him like that on his very first day.

He retreated to the courtyard for the rest of the evening, lying in the grass and staring up at the sky. Usually stargazing was calming, but it wasn't working tonight. The sliver of sky above the courtyard just felt claustrophobic. Still, it was better than being inside, so he lingered as long as he could before lights out.