Drinks from vending machines are things I've seen like three times across about as many tries at each level. Only one even helped by upping my attack, the other two gave me like 5 extra SP but made me even SLOWER.
The weapon tip is helpful enough, I guess, but it still means that at my fastest, I'm also really weak and outright can't hurt some enemies that are inexplicably resistant to the pistol.
Against the nurses and bodyguards, I don't have a choice but to be at high adrenaline. As I said, they take two turns and grab-loop me before I can take one turn. If an elite turns up who is simply that much faster than me, I just wave the flag and retreat because there's literally no progressing.
On the note of the cat. Never found fish at any point before meeting the cat, and she's now the little girl. Hasn't appeared other than as a merchant ever since. Can I even upgrade my character then or is this a doomed save because I simply progressed too quickly?