"One o’clock," Dr. Kaines said, faking cheer. "Lunchtime."
The room was padded and was colored a bleak white. There was a ripped crossword book and a boring novel that the patient had decided was aesthetically better if he turned half of it into fake snow strewn on the floor. Along with those were a few broken crayons—the hospitals couldn’t afford pens or pencils for him—an untouched blanket and pillow and yesterday’s uneaten meal.
Plus one unhappy patient sprawled out on the floor.
"Nummy num. You do want to eat, don’t you? It’s not poisoned, come on. Oh, yes, flip me the bird, real eloquent. Look, I know you want to go outside, we’re doing the best we can. Frankly our budget’s in the toilet and I’m digging into my own pockets. What do you want, MY lunch?
"Oh, don’t glower at me. Look, if you’d talk to us, maybe we’d get enough data to make this an independent project. We’d be able to try for some grants or corporate funding."
The patient said nothing.
"Look, at least let me take your temperature. You haven’t eaten for the last three days and you don’t look well," he said, reaching for the patient’s forehead.
It was grabbed rather forcefully before he could touch him. The patient snarled slightly.
"You bite me and I’m authorized to use restraints. Come on, why don’t you say something? I know you can talk, you called me a bunch of nasty names when you got here."
"My name is Vincent Valentine." He shoved the doctor’s hand away.
"There, you see? That wasn’t so hard. Now why don’t you tell us something else? You already told us your name. Why don’t you—" He was interrupted by pounding on the glass wall.
Both glanced in the direction of the pounding and noticed the huge, blonde, and angry pilot poking at the glass.
"What the bloody—you stay here," Dr. Kaines said to Vincent and left the room immediately. The door locked after him immediately. "Are you insane? This is a mental hospital! You can’t be in here!" he screamed. He turned to a control panel and hit a button, ensuring that Vincent could no longer hear what they were saying.
"What the fucking hell is going on?" Cid demanded.
"That’s what I’d like to know. Who are you and how did you get in here? This is a controlled experiment."
"Experiment my ass! Get him out of there, he’s not psychotic!"
"That," he pointed to Vincent, who sat there watching behind the glass, "is not human. I am doing my duty to what’s left of human society with what’s left of my budget. Sane or not, we can’t let him loose to start a whole new set of disasters. Now you have one second before I have you arrested."
Cid spent his precious second looking at Vincent, then at the doctor, then back to Vincent.
Vincent looked like he might be physically sick, and obviously hated it here. Sitting up, he stared back in confusion. Vincent must be wondering why Cid was here, and why he hadn’t gotten Vincent out yet. In fact, he was probably still confused as to why he was here and they’d locked him up in here.
It was obvious how humiliated Vincent must’ve felt, being locked up and given toys like he was some sort of baby. The white outfit he must have been forced into looked like the ugliest pajamas Cid had ever seen.
"This isn’t over!" Cid yelled at the doctor and left.
The doctor turned to look at Vincent, just in time to see him throw the tray of food at the door before crying.
The doctor sighed. "Just when I was about to finally get somewhere."