All Falls Down
Chapter 1: Only the Lonely.
Hojou had a dilemma.
He could stay here and go feed whatever those things were that they kept locked up in the back behind the 10 inch steel door. He didn't like going down there. He felt like a zoo keeper in some sort of science experiment gone wrong. He remembered the one time there was a breach and those things ran loose around the building.
They weren't human, that was for sure. After that, security measures rose to make sure it didn't happen again. But the fear of seeing them free again made him double check the locks on all the doors twice.
He valued his human and at times uneventful life enough to not rely on luck to save him twice.
He wasn't at all sure just what it was that Shikon Inc. made. At least that's what he told anyone who asked. And he wouldn't question it, as long as they kept those circus attractions behind steel doors and away from him. Plus, they paid nicely for their employees to keep their mouths shut.
He knew whatever they were doing wasn't entirely legal, but he also knew to keep his mouth shut, head down, and not look at the blood stains on the floor too closely. Ignorance is bliss, and in this case, bliss kept you alive and out of the obituary section in the local newspapers.
Occasionally, people got curious, of course. Take Ron for example. A nice enough guy, he was a vegetarian, supported recycling, participated in charity events. Probably even adopted a few stray dog or something heroic like that. But Ron was also a curious guy, and instead of going with the flow and not making noise, Ron did a very stupid thing.
He tried to dig up exactly what Shikon Inc. was doing behind closed doors. On the surface, they are a typical bio-lab, focusing in some sort of government issued experiments. A pretty good one too, considering that they helped out all the local animal shelters by taking stray animals. Obviously, anything government issued is a cover.
Hojou wasn't sure how much snooping had to be done to discover what Ron had found. But he must've broken quiet a few password secured locks to get the hundreds of copies of lists of people. People who were all women, all pregnant, and usually in bad situations. Beside their names were recorded amounts of money, and beside that, the gender of the child they received in exchange.
Shikon Inc. wasn't any normal government lab. They were running an underground human testing facility. On top of that, they were trying to mutate human DNA with that of animals they take from the local animal shelters.
All in all, this was some twisted shit going on right under everyone's noses. But they knew how to keep the cover going. With nice paychecks, they lure in college students, who don't much care about what to do, and are more interested in who's throwing the next party, then who's being dissected on the other side of a password secured door.
Hojou knew very well exactly what was going on. And he also knew better then to open his mouth and mention it. After Ron's discovery became known, he was immediately let go. He was also found dead, in a dumpster behind his building, the next day. It was said to have been chemical poisoning, a mixed up date on the expiration of his pills. Except it was none of that, and he should think a lab would have more then ample access to chemicals, should the need for them arise.
Closing the online chat room on his computer, he logged out of his account, shut down the computer, and with one last look towards the steel door at the end of the electronically lit hallway, swiped his access card through the door slot. It blinked green, and the lock clicked open.
Hojou walked through, and headed right, down another hallway. He didn't particularly like how this building was made, keeping the circus freaks entirely too close to the working college students, but nothing could be done about that now. He would just have to hope layers of steel and bricks, as well as daily doses of tranquilizers would keep them from making too much noise.
He knocked on one of the identical white doors, ignoring the music spilling out from the room. The supervisors probably wouldn't like that, but they never actually come to see the "Above Ground" workers, except at monthly meetings. The music screeched to a stop inside the room, and a few seconds later, the door swung open and innocent blue-grey eyes peered up at him.
"Hojou?" she was a tiny girl, maybe 5"2, with amazing blue-grey eyes, long black lashes, and black hair, recently died to include metallic blue highlights. Clad in all black, as was customary here, the only splash of colour were the bright blue stilettos on her feet, matching her hair in colour.
"Blue this week?" he joked and she laughed.
"You like?" she twirled around sassily, blue streaked hair flying around her like a cape.
"Very nice." He conceded. "Anyway, I have to leave early today. You'll be fine on your own?"
"Yes, go! I don't need a babysitter. I'm a big girl now!" she joked. He could've argued that point, considering that she was only 19, and still adorably tiny.
"Alright Kagome. Call my cell if you need anything. I'll see you tomorrow." He bend down and hugged her briefly, before she bounced out of his embrace and back to her computer. This room was generally used as a storage, but it's the only one that allowed her to work by herself, since no one else could handle her music the whole day. So she stayed by herself, in the farthest corner, while the rest of the room was littered with boxes and blankets and medical supplies anyone rarely used.
He slammed the door shut, and seconds later, the music once again spilled from behind the door. He shook his head with a smile, and headed towards the front of the building.
Looking outside, he zipped up his waterproof hoodie jacket, and pulled on the hood. He hoped Kagome had an umbrella. The summer heat finally broke, and it was raining like hell.
Taking a deep breath, he pushed the front door open, and made a break for his car.
Time to get home to his girlfriend, who promised to be waiting for him in nothing but her lingerie if he could get home in less then 20 minutes.
Kagome cracked her knuckles. Her hands were sore from typing up invitation letters to people she'd never meet. She was in charge of scheduling, which was a simple enough job, but if not done, could be very troublesome. She never got the replies to her invitation; they were automatically forwarded to another account, dealt with by a person she's never met before either. She didn't even know what she was inviting these people to.
Not that it seemed particularly important right then. Just strange that a science laboratory seemed so involved with people.
She pushed her roll-away chair from the small desk and got up. Her stomach's been growling for the past 20 minutes and would not be ignored any longer. Her heels clicked sharply against the linoleum floor, stopping only when she stopped to pick up the piece of cardboard she used as a door stop.
The air conditioner was finally dying out, loosing the battle against the summer heat. Shoving open the door, she stuck the cardboard underneath, propping it open to air out. The hallway was empty, like always. No one liked night shifts here. There just seemed to be a certain creepiness that settles in as soon as the sun goes down.
But she had her music, and no vampire movie was going to scare her out of a perfectly good job. The kitchen was down the hall, and as she pushed through some suspicious looking containers, she pulled out the brown paper bag she kept stashed in the back of the fridge. There were 3 sandwiches still in there, which meant Hojou didn't eat his share before leaving. She pulled out the top sandwich, and shoved the rest back in its hiding place. Slamming the fridge shut, she glanced up at the flickering lights.
That would be just lovely, for the electricity to go down on the hottest night of the season. She opened one of the cupboards, reaching for a water bottle when just that happened. All the light flashed off.
"Shoot!" she mumbled as her head connected with the cupboard. Now what? If all those fancy security systems went down, the whole building was completely unguarded. The whole place is programmed to unlock in case of fire. Unless someone turned on the back up generator, something bad was bound to happen.
Pulling the cell phone out of her back pocket, she dialed Hojou.
The food was late again. It wasn't enough that it only came once a week, but it was late. Again.
He stretched his limbs out on the dirty blanket on the floor. His arms were healing, but his stomach wasn't doing so good. It may have gotten infected.
And he was starving.
The light bulb in the corner of the room flickered precariously. He ignored it in favour of glaring at the food tray slot at the bottom of the door. It remained shut, and no footsteps could be heard outside.
The tranquilizers and painkillers have worn of completely, leaving him hungry, irritated and in pain. Not a good combination. The light flickered again, before giving a suspicious buzz. One dog ear twitched atop the silver head, and one golden eye flickered a short glance towards the light source.
Then everything went black.
He jumped in surprise, then clutched at his stomach. The buzzing continued, before slowly dying down.
Then he heard a sound that didn't happen often without a tranquilizer gas bomb shoved through his food slot.
The click of the door lock.
Suspiciously, he came towards the door, and with one clawed hand, pushed it. It creaked open slightly.
Stepping outside into the dark hallway, he looked around. No one was anywhere in sight. He glanced back at his room, then to the clipboard attached to the hook next to it. Carefully, he unclipped the top paper and stuffed it into his back pocket. Then shut the door to his cage. Looking around one more time, he made a break for the big door at the end of the hall.
It was time for a fieldtrip.
Sandwich and water bottle in one hand, the held the cell phone in front of her as a flashlight in front of her. It lit a small portion of the floor in front of her, which was a relief. Walking around in heels in the dark was a bad idea.
Houjo's been informed, and said he'd turn back around to restart the back up generator. He told her to go back to her office and wait for the light to come back on again.
So sandwich in hand, she was on her way. After 10 minutes of stumbling around, she was back in the room, carefully stepping down the three annoying stairs, placed inconveniently in her room. Who put stairs into a storage room anyway? Whoever designed this place just wasn't very bright.
With a sigh of relief, she walked towards her desk. Usually, the place was creepy. Without lights, it could've been a horror movie set, she mused.
Someone stumbled behind her. She whirled. Hojou should've been outside, fixing the back up generator.
Lights blinked on and off overhead, and finally stabilized. She was left staring at a boy with white hair, half bent over, clutching at his stomach and holding onto the railing. It seemed like she wasn't the only one who had problems with those stairs.
For a second, she wondered at the choice of hair colour, but then shrugged it off. Hers was blue at the moment, so she wasn't one to judge. If he wanted to have silver hair, more power to him.
"Hey, are you okay?" she asked. Dropping the water and sandwich on a nearby box, she walked towards him.
His head snapped up, and she stumbled. His eyes were gold, pure melted gold. She's never seen eyes that could on a human. Hell, she didn't even think they made contacts in that colour.
He tried to straighten up, but it was not meant to be. Clutching his stomach again, he doubled over again. For the first time she noticed the red stains over his shirt, and the slowly increasing puddle at his feet.
"Oh god, you're bleeding! Are you okay?" without a second though, she went closer to him. His head snapped up again, and he growled. Honest to god, growled. She froze, and looked him over again. Something twitched atop his head, and she focused on it. There, blended among the silver hair, were dog ears, pressed to his head.
For a few seconds, she felt like she would faint. Shaking her head, she blinked a few times, in case she wasn't getting enough sleep and was seeing things, but the ears remained there, twitching periodically.
He slid lower against the wall, loosing the fight against gravity.
Ignoring the growling, she moved closer to him. "Its okay, I'm not going to hurt you. Let me see what's wrong." she didn't know how to deal with wounded anything, especially anything with dog hairs, and now that she noticed it, claws. But the growing puddle of red at his feet was really starting to freak her out.
Slowly, she held out her hand. He watched her with pained eyes, before slowly putting his own hand in hers. She stepped closer to him, then pulled his arm around her shoulder, and slid her arm around his back. "Okay, lets see if we can make it to that couch over there.." taking some of his weight, they stumbled towards the couch.
Slowly, she helped him sit down. She sat on the floor in front of him, and looked at him carefully. "Okay, I'm going to look, so I need you to pull up your t-shirt." He took the ends of the shirt, and carefully peeled it up. She hissed through gritted teeth. His stomach was shredded, and sewn back together. If this had been an operation, he could probably sue his doctor. But considering the state he was in, she doubted it would come to that.
She took a deep breath, then another. Then stood up. Turning away, she took one step before someone grabbed her hand. She looked back. His golden eyes were pleading with hers. She squeezed his hand and tried to smile. "Its okay, there's medical supplies in some of the boxes here, I'm gonna try to find some. Don't worry." She squeezed his hand again and pulled away.
As soon as she turned away, she had to blink her eyes repeatedly. Shaking her head, she swore she wouldn't cry in her head. It wouldn't help anyone right now.
She walked between isles of boxed, scanning the labels. "Aha!" she exclaimed softly. Dragging the box off the stack, she pried it open. Taking some gauze and peroxide, she hurried back to the couch.
Pulling some gauze off, she tried to rip it. Three tries later, she was ready to start screaming. Carefully, he placed one clawed digit against the material. It came apart easily.
"How nice." she mumbled, bemused. He half-smiled.
She folded the material carefully, and looked up at him. "Okay, this might hurt a little, I have to clean off the blood. He gritted his teeth and nodded. She took one of his hands in hers and squeezed lightly. He squeezed back.
With slow, careful strokes, she cleaned around the wound. Her hand was gripped tightly in his, his eyes scrunched shut. In a few minutes it was over and molten eyes started into her once again.
"Okay, Now we'll have to do peroxide so it doesn't get infected. And this… is gonna really hurt." she looked apologetic. She reached for the peroxide, and poured some on a new piece of gauze. He wrinkled his nose.
Slowly, she dabbed it against the side of the wound. He jerked his hand away from hers and hissed under his breath. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, but its necessary. It'll be worse if it gets infected." She sat beside him on the couch, close enough to touch. His arm snaked around her waist, pulling her closer, and his head rested in the crook of her neck.
"Ready?" she asked. He nodded, his face rubbing against her neck. She took a deep breath, and dabbed at the wound again. He whimpered, pressing even closer to her. She could feel his lips against her neck. Now if that didn't mess up your concentration, she didn't know what would. Forcing herself to focus on the matter at hand, she continued.
Minutes later, she heard her name being called. She completely forgot about Houjo.
"Oh shit!" She whispered heatedly. Pushing the boy away from her, she whispered quickly. "Lie down here and down move and don't make noise." She pushed his carefully down on the couch, and threw the blanket over him, then kicked the gauze and thankfully closed bottle of peroxide under the couch.
Just in time she thought, as Houjo stumbled into the room. She whirled back to him with the brightest smile on her face. "You fixed it!" she exclaimed. "I was worried there for a sec."
Houjo looked around the room briefly before his eyes found her again. "Are you okay? I thought something happened when you didn't answer your phone."
"Oh? No, I just put it back on silent when the light went back on, and then went to get food since everything was okay again." She followed his gaze to the puddle of blood on the floor. "And of course I'm such a klutz, I totally dropped a bottle of punch and it spilled everywhere. Don't worry, I'll clean it!" She chirped.
"Yeah.. Well, maybe you should go home for the day. I think they're gonna send some people over to check out the facility, so I doubt you'll get any work down anyway." He said carefully.
"Oh, yeah, I was almost done anyway, just a few more letters." She smiled. She wondered if it looked as forced as it felt. For some reason, she didn't trust Houjo to not freak out about the boy under the blanket behind her. Call it a hunch, but Houjo didn't even like dogs.
"Do you want me to wait for you?" he stepped a few stairs down, careful not to step into the "punch".
"Oh no, it's okay! Sango's coming by and we're going to her place after, so really, you should go. I'm sorry I called, your girlfriends probably pissed by now." She hinted. His eyes widened for a second before he grinned sheepishly.
"That's right, okay then, see you tomorrow!" he turned and half ran out of the room, reaching for his phone as he went.
She turned back to the blanket and sighed.
She had a big problem with digging her own grave.
Pulling the blanket off the boy she stared into impossibly golden eyes and dreading the answer, asked "Now tell me what the hell happened."
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