...Leo? [his voice shakes slightly, confused and groggy (and maybe a little scared -- no one's here to hear it, so what does it matter?). his head is pounding, and he can't remember how he got here, but all he can remember are Leo's words:

"I've come for you, Oz-kun."
what did that even mean? and did that have anything to do with now? unlikely, perhaps, considering the information he'd woken up to and the weight chained to his ankle and he takes a moment to play with the chain before giving up. he can barely move with it nevermind get it off.

the video feed that (accidentally) is initiated a few moments later shows oz crushing his hands to his head in an attempt to numb the pain he's feeling. he's alone, of course, collapsed to the floor with his back up against the weight for support and knees pulled in. his eyes are open, wide and pupils narrowed.

the abyss had been different. he'd been a different person, then, and in the abyss he barely had time to think with the chains present but this place he could sit and think and think for hours upon hours (and perhaps he had depending on when he exactly got here) and the more he did, the shorter his patience was becoming. he can't be here, he has to be with his friends, he has to protect them, he has to protect himself for them and being stuck in some underwater prison isn't protecting himself at all! finally, he speaks up, his voice loud.]

Alice! Gil! Where are you! [it drops, the slight desperation seeping through.] I need you both... [here. with him. where he knew they were safe and not hurt or anything considering the encounter they had had all been facing with leo, vincent, and echo.]

[another presence of silence, just oz's breathing before he speaks again, this time not nearly as desperate. it's like shutting a switch off the way the built up panic dissipates completely. he's quiet, voice low and slightly poisonous with spite.]

...This is stupid. My head hurts.

I can't sleep...

[the video feed is nothing but the lifeless stare of a girl who has lost all hope to what pertains to sleeping. her arrival has made her inner clock all sorts of jacked up and it was messing with her beauty sleep and napping cycle. is she even blinking? (no, she isn't.)]

I am trying so hard to, like, go to sleep but all I end up doing is thinking too much, uhuh. I can't even move and I'm starting to miss being able to move around and choose where I want to take a nap on and be a bum and do nothing all day. I am tired of not doing things. [rolls on her side, because obviously she's resigned herself to lying flat on the floor, the communicator a few feet away from her.] And when I try to take a nap, like, I'm already rested from doing nothin' and I'm starting to really wonder what does the sun look like again?

[this goes on and on; silly rambling over nothing that makes no specific sense. her eyes are bloodshot, her voice monotone and that of a person in deep anguish. pathetically bends her knees and brings them closer to her chest, taking on a fetal position.

obviously she doesn't care about paying attention to her surroundings slash situation.]

Is this deportation, huh? I promise I've been a good girl. I don't wanna be sent baaaack, aru.

[ Being locked up is one thing; being restrained just makes Faith's skin crawl. The fact that okay, yeah, she's kind of totally dangerous doesn't escape her but the problem here is she's usually the target of other dangerous things. Which means having a giant heavy ball attached to her leg makes her way more vulnerable. So the grunting and wheezing should be unsurprising as she tries to yank the chain off of the ball. ]

You think this is gonna help? Seriously, I get it. Normal prison wasn't cutting it, so you pull me out and dump me here. Fine, great. Three squares and a weird headset? All kosher. But this? [ She punctuates that by chucking the welcome basket away with a sneer. ] Ain't gonna cut it -- can't chain me up and dump in some graveyard like old times. I'm only declawed for humans, let's get it straight.

[ Though...now that she's looking around this place is pretty scarce for a graveyard. ]

Okay, what the hell is this? Whack-a-vamp? [ Stiiiiill trying to disable the old ball 'n' chain, here. ]

[There is video, as Rebecca adjusts it-- coming down a little bit on an angle, she's set the device on a shelf while she finishes screwing the case back on to her laptop.

It takes a minute, but then her eyes flick up and she gives the camera a two fingered little wave.] Hey.

Looking for two volunteers for a little project Lacus and I've got going. If you've got a couple hours to spare today and don't mind letting your brain be picked at [kinda literally] I'm fielding applications right now. It involves beta testing a virtual reality simulator. If you saw us the other day around the dome, this is the next step where we put all that sweet data to use.

Anyway, if this sounds like your cup of tea, lemme know. We only need two people right now, adults only please, but we can put up a waiting list if demand is high... oh, and it's totally safe. [She shakes her hand in the air dismissively.] We've done a couple tests ourselves, I'd never put anyone in something I'm not confident about.

Woot, so that's that. Show of interested hands?

[[ooc: Responses to this post/ Rebecca will have a comment thread of their own-- and subsequent chosen volunteers will have their own individual threads with either Rebecca or Lacus watching over them while testing out the VR Machines. Virtual!Lacus may be sprinkled through out. Headers will guide the way~]]