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Nasir was always the one who hugged first with new people. He was never hugged by strangers and yet ...

He went easily when Eve grabbed his shoulder and, in turn, wrapped his arms around her in a hug. His left arm he had some trouble moving, especially with it bandaged, but he tried all the same because full hugs were the best. "She is and I wouldn't mind that at all." It was absolutely true: he loved having family and missed his.

The young man leaned against Eve, hugged her firmly and tightly as he could, and likely would only let go once she did. Even then he would stand back up shakily. The bullhorn he had held clattered to the ground.

"Mom, don't cuss," Aleksy said. All this mind-changing was making his head spin. His stomach was rolling, too. Why was that happening? Why was any of this happening? "Good smells," he said, inching the jacket up over the lower half of his face. That made it smell like blood now, which was not a good smell. He shook his head, trying to move the collar of the shirt back down, but that made everything swim worse.

Yeah he wasn't having a fun time. Why couldn't he sleep?

Though it was muted, Ian looked apologetic for her injuries and for her grumpiness as he tended to her cut. It was minor, yes, but better to stop the bleeding now and keep it from getting infected or blood leaking into her eyes. One sleeve of his shirt bore smears of red now but he didn't mind, even as he tied it back around his waist. She was right, though -- there were a lot of people here and a lot of people injured with limited supplies. The situation had changed, it seemed, and now they were trapped in here by a police quarantine.

How did everything turn to such s**t in five minutes flat?

"Ian," he answered, succinct as she continued to speak. Again, he had to shake his head. "I didn't see any of that."

Part of him wished he had, just so he understood what was going on, but another just wished he hadn't come here at all today. It wasn't like anything productive had come from this venture outside of a pamphlet or two tucked into his back pocket, now forgotten. And who the hell was Mercer? Ian didn't bother voicing the question, both due to irrelevance and the fact he almost felt his heart stop when a young woman not too far from them called out for help. Before he could react, someone rushed over to her assistance and Ian was able to breathe again.

"Are you fine to keep walking?" Ian glanced down at the leg she limped with before looking out to the rest of the library. He wanted to help but he wasn't sure what could even be done here, least of all by someone like him. She could tag along if she wanted, in fact it would have been preferable to him given the state of things, but if she felt fine on her own he wasn't going to stop her when the main threat was no longer among them -- at least it seemed.

It had taken a while for Chester to piece together what had happened, an assessment that had involved a lot of circular pacing, eavesdropping, and a careful but polite refusal to assist anyone. At some point he had even surreptitiously peered over the shoulder of a vaguely familiar blond man and caught a glimpse of an old map of this place. Although it was light on any but the most obvious of exits, Chester decided to check out the elevators for hidden fire doors or maintenance areas that repairmen might make regular use of. If they could get the most grievously injured to safety, the rest of them could turn their attention to defending the first floor if the... werewolf... came back.

Werewolf. It was almost too ridiculous to believe.

"I can't control it, I can only ride along with him. But I can see what he's up to," Rylan admitted, looking anxiously over his shoulder at the sounds of people calling for help. There was so much to be done, and he hated the thought of standing here doing nothing when he could be extracting people from under shelves.

But recon was work too, he reminded himself, so he leaned against the table and reached for the little bird with the amber eyes.

Juniper heard Leila and nodded in her direction so Leila would know she heard.

"I'll be right back, alright?" She gave Cataleena another smile, before depositing her used paper towels on the floor to go and retrieve what she could from the first aid kit.

"Thanks." She said as she hurried over to Leila and the first aid kit. Her hands were, once again, splattered with blood. Thankfully, Juniper wasn't much of the squeamish sort otherwise she'd have one hell of a time right now with all of the injuries around her.

The first aid kit didn't have much left. She did find some antiseptic though and some gauze. She snatched up both before returning to the girl she had found. "OK I've got some antiseptic to clean out the wounds and some gauze if we need it to help slow the bleeding."

A song? Eve wanted Tatya for that, Tatya was the one who could sing. Like a nightingale. But where has she gone? Where was his sister… she ought to be there. Was she okay…? Aleksy wobbled his head side to side once he was free of the jackety blood smell and tried to focus on something, anything. A song… he didn't know songs. He knew poems, sad poems like he'd read--a long time ago--

Wait. He did know a song, one song, a very stupid song…

…no, no he didn't.

But he did know a poem.

"'M only say it once," said Aleksy drowsily, eyes wandering off to watch a bird on the third story. This did not seem odd to him; it seemed very natural that there should be a glowing bird.

"Everything on the earth bristled, the bramble/pricked and the green thread/nibbled away, the petal fell, falling/until the only flower was the falling itself./Water is another matter,/has no direction but its own bright grace,/runs through all imaginable colors,/takes limpid lessons from stone,/and in those functionings plays out/the unrealized ambitions of the foam."

Poem shared, he nodded (the room spun dizzily, wobbling on its axis) and said, "Tatya does songs better. But she's… gone."