"they sowed their isn't; they reaped their same"
"Vexen," I called to number 4, not really certain where in the laboratory I might find the flaxen blond scientist. "The titration is done, sir."
"What were your results?" He called back to me, his voice slightly muffled; it sounded as though he was working in the ventilator hood.
"13.7 milliliters of one molar NaOH until titration was complete," I reported dutifully, reading the meniscus of the flask carefully.
"And your indicator? Which did you use?" Vexen called back, sounding somewhat irritated. I flushed hotly; surely, by now, I should know that I had to report everything I did to him. Leaving things out was careless, no other way around it.
"Phenolphthalein," I chirped back, trying to sound as if my oversight hadn't embarrassed me quite so much. Which, really, it hadn't; I had no heart, or so I was told. All of my emotions were pretense, a memory of how to react to a situation. I could not feel, and neither could Vexen.
Such was the life of being a Nobody.
"Run the titration again," the scientist demanded. "Change no variables; check only for test-retest reliability..." the man trailed off, clearly becoming more absorbed in whatever he was doing under the ventilator.
"But -" I began to protest. Titrimetry was painfully boring; all I did was stare at a solution while I dripped another in, drop by drop, until it changed the pH enough to change the indicator's color. The process could take a half hour. But I was still a neophyte, and I was lucky to even be allowed to work with Vexen in the first place. Grunt work couldn't be avoided. One day, though, he'd respect my work enough to allow me to work alongside of him... "As you wish, sir," I responded, swishing the neutralized analyte and indicator around in its Erlenmeyer flask. Satisfied that it posed no biological hazard, I dumped it down the drain and rinsed the flask out, placing it back under the burette partially filled with sodium hydroxide.
Dutifully, I located my 100 and 50 mL graduated cylinders in my lab drawer and trotted off to the second ventilator hood to get some more of the analyte and the phenolphthalein. Vexen was bent over the first ventilator, working with something smoking on a hot plate. Whatever it was, it had started to form what distinctly appeared to be heart-shaped crystals.
I gaped for a moment too long at the startling sight – crystals never arranged themselves in heart shapes in nature! - and Vexen craned his head, his emerald eyes fixing on me.
"Yes?" He drawled, raising one eyebrow suspiciously at me. "What is it, Kanatrix?"
"Nothing, sir!" I chirped, giving him my best smile before turning back into the other hood filled with flasks of the chemicals I needed. I buried my face deep in the hood, hoping he wouldn't see how badly I was blushing. How stupid could I be, staring at what was supposed to be top-secret Organization work? If the Superior heard about this, I'd be punished for sure, maybe even considered a traitor...
"Kanatrix," the scientist called again, his tone harsh. Pulled out of my thoughts, I jumped reflexively, spilling a drop of 1M NaOH on my left hand and banging my head on the low ceiling of the ventilator hood. My skin began to sting and my stomach dropped. Was I in trouble?
I set down the NaOH I'd been pouring, wiping my minor burn away on my lab coat and pulling my head more successfully out of the hood.
"Sir?" I answered him in a small voice, trying to be as respectful as possible.
"Would you like to see something, Kanatrix?"
Was this a trap? If I went and saw what he was creating, would he take that to mean that I was trying to infiltrate his project?
"Sir, I-" I began, uncertain how to phrase my next words.
"Get over here, number fifteen," Vexen ordered, suddenly impatient. I scurried over to his side, praying I hadn't left the sodium hydroxide open under my own hood. Sloppiness was not tolerated in Vexen's lab.
"Yes, sir." Orders were orders, and he had told me, not asked me, to come see his work.
"My name is Vexen, Number Fifteen," the flaxen-haired man told me, his arms crossing over his chest, one long-fingered, gloved hand drifting up to brush his sharp jaw line. His tone softened slightly as he continued, "You will call me by my name or by my number. 'Sir' is too formal; I dislike it."
I nodded intently.
"All right, Vexen," I agreed quickly, still desperate to show him respect. Calling him by name felt a bit too informal for my tastes, but it was better than addressing him by a number.
"Good. Now come, take a look at the hot plate..." Vexen stepped back from the hood, gesturing with his dominant hand at the very spot where he had been a moment ago. Anxiously, I took a tiny step towards the ventilator hood, feeling, for some reason, that looking at his work was still forbidden.
It's fine, I told myself. He ordered me to do it.
I took another tiny step towards Vexen's work, glancing up into his keen emerald eyes in a request for permission. To my surprise, he took my cue and nodded his assent, placing one large, long-fingered hand on my shoulder. With a gentle nudge, he guided me until I stood in front of the hot plate.
"Tell me what you see, Kanatrix," Vexen instructed, sounding oddly eager.
I peered in at the hot plate, my eyes widening as I stared at the amazing sight in front of me.
"There's a large, multifaceted, clear crystal suspended in an aqueous solution of unknown composition," I reported, knowing better than to tell him what I was seeing in layman's terms: a giant heart crystal, the size of my fist, floating in a beaker on the hot plate. "Solution appears to be near boiling; no other precipitate or gaseous byproducts appear present. Crystal is symmetrical, approximately the full size of the 1000mL beaker it is floating in. And...it's heart-shaped," I finished rather lamely, unsure of how else I could report that fact to the scientist.
Behind me, Vexen began to chuckle, his fingers giving my shoulder a surprising squeeze.
"And what do you think of that, Kanatrix?" He laughed, apparently quite pleased with himself, and, perhaps, the opportunity to show off to someone for a change.
"It's absolutely incredible, Vexen!" I exclaimed, turning my head to smile at him over my shoulder. "I've never seen anything like it before; it's positively stunning. It's beautiful. In fact, it might be the most beautiful thing I've ever seen. You really created this?"
"I did," Vexen agreed softly, his eyes lighting up.
"You're brilliant," I told the scientist earnestly. "Absolutely genius."
Vexen smirked, withdrawing the gloved hand on my shoulder and elegantly placing it under his chin instead.
"I know," he answered pridefully, giving me a look that clearly said "continue".
"The Organization is lucky to have a scientist as incredible as you, Vexen," I told the man, half stroking his ego and half speaking the truth. He was, honestly, one of the most intelligent men I'd ever met, and I didn't mind brown-nosing if it got me in his good graces. "Without you working on these research projects, we'd never come any closer to understanding the heart...or getting ours back. What you do must be some of the most important work of the Organization."
"Indeed," Vexen crooned, rubbing his chin and eying me thoughtfully. "You're no fool, Kanatrix," he announced after a moment's contemplation. "Unlike many of the other members of our Organization, you see the value in my work. It takes intelligence to see past the superficial side of things and to target what is truly necessary to achieve our goals. Fighting Heartless...bah. What we do here is the true work of the Organization." To my surprise, he extended one large hand, resting it atop my head tenderly. "You have potential, Number XV," the flaxen-haired man murmured, his emerald eyes locking with mine. "Stick with me, and I'll ensure your potential does not go to waste."
My stomach jumped, fluttering, and I was sure I looked like a ridiculous, blushing, dewy-eyed schoolgirl. At the same time, though, I didn't care much. This was the opportunity I'd been waiting for – the chance to learn everything I could from this brilliant man, to have him take me under his wing as an apprentice, not merely a lab-hand.
"I'm indebted to you, Vexen," I gaped, staring at the scientist as if he were an angel. "Thank you."
The rather thin man smiled as kindly as he could at me, patting my head affectionately. I smiled contentedly and nudged my head against his hand slightly.
In the two weeks I'd been in the Castle That Never Was, this was the first time anyone had shown me any degree of affection, and I felt starved for it.
Vexen didn't miss the movement, and chuckled softly to himself.
"Back to titrations with you, Kana," he instructed, nudging me out of the way and returning to his professional, almost icy, demeanor.
I nearly groaned, moving back to the bottle of NaOH (which, incidentally, I had left open), until I realized that he had called me Kana instead of my full name. I glanced up at my mentor before delving back into my own hood, but he was reabsorbed in the beautiful crystal he'd created, his flaxen hair cascading down his shoulders and obscuring his sharp-featured face from me.
All the same, I couldn't help but feel that the Chilly Academic wasn't quite as frigid as I'd thought.