Day 50: Cafeteria (Brunch)

[selfrescuer]

Somehow, after their talk in the chapel, Elaine felt simultaneously more accepting of and more irritated by her future husband. On the one hand, seven years had clearly been good to him. He seemed more sincere and thoughtful than he had been before his disappearance, and he had a more mature (dare she say, handsome?) look to him. On the other hand

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[otnemememento]

Leonard picked a table that was empty, setting his tray down before using both hands to rub his eyes. He shook his head- Tired. Why am I so tired? It was impossible to know what he'd done the previous night, if he'd gotten any sleep at all or if he'd stayed awake, his mind too busy to give him a moment's rest. All he knew was what he had now: he felt as though he'd either slept too long or not at all, his body aching at various points, his head swimming. What was I doing last night?

He removed from his journal from his pocket, flipping to the first page, looking for information on his activities. He paused, taken aback by what he saw: a photograph of a monster, a charred picture, his own writing speaking of a murder from within the walls of the institution. He read the notes again- if it hadn't been his distinctive lettering describing these events, he'd have thought they were the disorganized notes of a lunatic. Then again, he'd been institutionalized for God only knew how long. Maybe he really had gone insane.

I'm not

[unheroed]

All in all, the chapel had been even less interesting than he'd expected. He had heard whispers of the time when the Head Doctor himself had showed up there, but it had been foolish of him to hope for a repeat performance, especially after what the man had pulled last night. Chances were that the patients were frothing at the mouth even more than usual when it came to sinking their teeth into Landel considering what he'd just put them through

[otnemememento]

Leonard smiled wryly, sure he'd heard that line from dozens of people, even if he couldn't remember a single time. The bandaged man looked like he recognized him and sounded as though he'd heard about his condition. It wasn't terribly surprising- within the walls of an institution, he was bound to see the same people again and again. It was one of the few advantages of being in a controlled environment, even if its validity as a place of recovery was questionable.

He closed his journal for now, favoring conversation when it came to him. "Not at all," he said with a shake of his head, reflexively reaching into his pocket. His hand returned to the table with a collection of polaroids: among them was a picture of the man across the table. Harvey Dent. He turned to the back. He understands you- he has also lost someone. "That's why I have a system. Pictures, notes, things to help me know who I know, who I can trust

[unheroed]

Just like clockwork, the guy started to fish for his pictures, and Harvey couldn't help spotting the one the man had taken of him during their first meeting, where he was leaning against the wall out on the field while squinting against the light; it'd actually been sunny that day. He still couldn't decide what kind of weather was preferable. Overcast was best, but it usually had to be one extreme or the other in this place

[otnemememento]

From the way Dent was talking, it sounded like something major happened during the night. Leonard skimmed the last pages of notes while listening- he'd not written anything down, nothing that would have concerned more than just him. Grabbing his pen, he turned to a fresh sheet. Better take this down, just in case.

"I don't think I wrote anything about last night," he said, "so I'd like to hear what happened. From the look of what I've got written here... this place isn't what it's supposed to be, and there really isn't any other way to explain it. Either that, or I've really lost my mind." That last part came with a tentative grin- he was still trying to convince himself he hadn't.

[unheroed]

It seemed like Leonard did want whatever information he could get, regardless of how unimportant it might seem. Granted, ending up somewhere outside of the institute was pretty remarkable, even if it had been both temporary and disorienting

[otnemememento]

The scratching from Leonard's pen moving quickly across the paper was met with a pause as he stopped mid-sentence, taking in all that Dent was saying. The man sounded serious as he spoke, no lightness in his comments, no joking in any way; however, what he was suggesting- the doors led to some town, the impossible things Leonard had already noted but wasn't sure he believed being true- all sounded like someone who belonged in a genuine asylum, unable to handle the world outside its monitored walls.

Then again, some people ended up in hospitals when they didn't need them. Leonard could easily see how someone would think he belonged in one himself. They didn't know about his system. He could handle the world. It worked.

He continued writing, scribbling notes that seemed necessary. He could only be so specific with his pace. "And what was the best part?"

[unheroed]

Maybe the man believed him, and maybe he didn't, but either way he was writing something down, which showed some amount of faith in what was being said. Harvey didn't really care either way, but he would like to think that someone would at least try to act interested when he was taking the time to give an explanation. And why was he, anyway? Because he felt pity for the guy? That could be it. He didn't want to study his own motivations more than he had to, though

[otnemememento]

Leonard's pen stopped a second time. He wasn't sure exactly how much of his own notes he believed- the movie-looking zombies or the murder or whether or not the institution was legitimate or not- but what Dent was saying was far beyond the line of insanity. He couldn't help but feel conflicted, though. It had been his job to read people, to find if they were telling the truth or not. He'd been good at it. Logic was telling him Dent was clearly crazy- no one in his right mind would think he'd somehow ended up in some 1930's college while wandering around. It had to have been some sort of delusion or hallucination. Or something the drugs did to him.

However, Leonard's gut instinct told him that Dent was telling the truth. Something about the way he talked about it, the tone of his voice. He was either speaking of the event as he believed it happened, or he was an amazing liar. Either way, he scribbled a quick note about it.

DENT SAYS DOORS WEREN'T WORKING THE OTHER NIGHT- TOOK YOU PLACES OTHER THAN WHERE THEY WERE SUPPOSED

[unheroed]

As tempting as it was to just lean forward across the table and see what Leonard was writing down, Harvey didn't think that would make the best impression -- chances were the guy would take that down, too. He wasn't sure why he was so curious about what the man thought of him in the first place, but it probably had something to do with a general concern about image. That had always been on his mind while running for DA, and while the very idea was ludicrous now, considering his face, he clearly hadn't kicked the habit entirely

[otnemememento]

A long moment of silence passed as Leonard considered Dent's words, the wheels in his head turning over and over as he tried to find something he could latch onto, something he'd said that could be understood. Maybe he had lost his mind, or he and this Jones were having some sort of shared hallucination induced by the layout of a room; maybe Dent was telling the absolute truth, and he really had been transported somehow to another area just by walking through a door. But how could he ever know what was real?

Leonard looked at his notes, his pen still resting on the paper, a blot of ink forming under the nib. He knew he could fully trust what he'd written and the photographs he carried: they were the only concrete evidence he had of his time in the institute and what he'd experienced. Just because I don't remember doesn't mean it never happened, even if it sounds incredible. He took a deep breath- the world didn't just disappear. He had to believe he could trust himself, even if he'd lost his own mind. There was no one else on

[unheroed]

At least the guy was self-aware enough to know that he'd probably been through this before. Maybe not this exact conversation, seeing how Harvey was pretty sure this was the first time the whole moving rooms and being transported to New York colleges thing had happened. On the other hand, unexplainable events were pretty much the institute's MO, so Leonard likely had a whole journal full of notes about things that made no sense. Trying to read all of that over ever few hours had to be enough to make his head spin. With that in mind, it was pretty surprising that he was staying so calm

[otnemememento]

Leonard shook his head. "I'd know it if it wasn't my writing," he said with utmost confidence, as if the very idea that someone could imitate his script was something as unbelievable as the things written in his journal. "You just know your handwriting from all others. You have to be able to trust it. Anyone could write you notes, try to lead you on the wrong path, but you know you can trust yourself. It's not memory- it's written proof."

No matter what he said, there was a small seed of doubt planted in him. He wouldn't let those notes out of his sight. He wouldn't lose them. He couldn't allow himself to lose them. "You can't doubt what you know is true when you're like me. I know what my writing looked like before this happened to me. You see that writing over and over and force yourself to learn every nuance of it. Conditioning. Discipline and routine make my life possible."

[unheroed]

Harvey was starting to get the feeling that talking to Leonard was going to feel like listening to a broken record after a while. It made sense, seeing how he couldn't know what he had or hadn't said to any given person, but it still had the potential to get old after the third or fourth conversation.

"I guess you'd drive yourself crazy if you were always wondering if your notes were legitimate or not," he conceded. The question was whether or not Leonard had already passed that step. He seemed so fixated and so sure of himself that it was almost like he was reading lines off of an index card, but that wasn't something he was going to mention out loud, even if the man would most likely just forget.

"So, what are you going to do now?" he asked, wondering how much of a goal the man could have in mind when he could barely keep track of what was going on.