Woah! Chapter 3 already! Yeap, this is a lot of writing in one stretch of time. Am I still alive? I don't even know! But the temptation was irresistible, AND I had a day off. So it's a win-lose. But that's just fine! I hope this chapter is entertaining! I'm so excited to be writing!
And off we go!
Chapter 3 - Setting Into Motion
Into the room walked two scientists. Their garb consisted of long white coats. Simply, they just wore plain pants, plain shoes, and those signature white coats. No wonder Max seems to have adopted a personal slur for them, Conan thought, but I have to wonder, are they really all that bad? He thought for a moment. Well, I guess with the fact that I am physically a human child and yet I'm still in a cage should answer that question on its own, shouldn't it? Not to mention Max. He glanced over to her, but she was occupied with watching the scientists, undistracted by anything.
There were name tags pinned to the front right breasts of their coats, a small pocket stitched into the left side of each, and all in all, they just seemed so normal, so plain, so boring, given what they must be involved with. Conan noticed at least two people outside the door as well, but it was quickly closed and he could get nothing more from looking in that direction. For now, his focus was on the scientists, the same as Max's was.
Both carried with them a clipboard in one hand and a pen in their pockets, peeking out of their coats. The man, appearing to be in his late twenties or early thirties, with a shock of dark hair and ebony eyes that matched his Japanese appearance, held in his other hand a large stack of papers that Conan could not get a look at, damn his current angle! The woman, seeming to be of early middle age as well as of mixed descent, approached ahead of the man. She only had a clipboard in her hand, nothing more, and placed it onto the table before coming to stand directly in front of Conan's cage.
She swiped her name tag through the lock pad at the front of the cage and reached in as if to grab him. No, she did grab him; she didn't even spare a single word to him. He felt quite undignified within her grasp, but elected not to say anything on account of the fact that she was not harming him and he wanted to appear to play the good hostage, if only to both lower their guard and potentially collect as much information as possible.
She began to inspect him, turning him about and scrutinizing him with her cold, unfeeling glare. He continued not to talk, but was certainly approaching his limit. Before he could say anything, she turned to the man and thrust him into his arms. The man, unprepared for this and still having two full hands, dropped all of his things onto the floor with a loud whoosh of papers from the large stack and a light thunk of the clipboard. The scientist went over to her own clipboard, sparing a glance and a quiet "sorry" over her shoulder before writing something down on the sheet attached to the clipboard, saying aloud, "GP - 0717021: slightly damaged, though visual assessment reveals no excessive problems." Both the man and Conan had yet to recover from the suddenness of their current position before she took her clipboard and pen in one hand and grabbed Conan from the man's hold with her other, holding him by the middle of his torso, her arm now being the only thing holding him up, barred across his chest and keeping him from plunging face first into the ground.
"You can pick those up now," she told the man, looking at him for a second without any particular expression and then turning to leave. Conan looked up, coming out of his shocked stupor and thankful to be able to read her name tag. Una Yoshimura it read, showing a picture of an unexpressive woman with short dark hair that looked unsurprisingly like the woman who was carrying him now.
The man huffed and shook his head, but did as he was told. As Una and Conan exited the room, she turned towards the people at the door. Four people, two more than Conan had thought he saw earlier, all wearing dark but plain clothing. Security, he presumed.
"Go in there. It's GP - 0314007's turn now, if that wasn't already apparent enough," she said, gesturing with her clipboard-ridden hand to the boy at her side and then back to the room she had just exited.
"Yes, ma'am." Three of them entered the room, but one of them followed the duo, a thin man with unshaven stubble that made him look a little unprofessional, given what Conan had seen of the place thus far. He followed at a moderate distance as the three continued their journey down the hall, shouting that sounded alarmingly like Max's trailing after them. Conan knew there was nothing he could do at the moment about that, and began glancing every which way in order to get as best an idea of their predicament as he could.
The whole place seemed pretty big, and just as plain as the room he had been in before; every wall was white and spotless, though the grey trimmings certainly helped him to not lose his mind looking at it all. There were so many hallways and doors that Conan couldn't manage to count them all as he passed and looked down as many of the stated hallways as he could; the place was a maze, one he'd surely memorize soon enough. It was after a minute or so of walking that he risked speaking up.
"Where are we going?" he asked the woman carrying him. She graced him with a glare for a split second, then looked forward again and continued walking as before, making no more indication that she had even heard him and reacted, let alone that she would respond. Looking back, the security man was stoic, though he was fidgeting a little bit. He seemed to be trying to act oblivious to it all, and would obviously make no move to respond to him, either. He tried again.
"What's a GP? That's what you called us, right?" He did his best to pour the curious, adorable, innocent child act into the questions; it didn't work. She didn't even spare him a glance this time around, but her grip on him tightened ever so slightly.
Very soon after the words had left him they arrived at their destination. She scrambled a bit to get her keycard, but realizing that with her full hands, it was futile, she spared a glance toward the security man. As he moved closer, Conan read his name tag: Ryoma Ito. He quickly unlocked the door and stepped back. The woman stepped in, still holding onto Conan, and Ryoma followed in after, planting himself just in front of the door.
Looking around, Conan noticed that a table with adjustable straps took up the middle portion of the room, and as they approached it, he was placed onto it and quickly strapped in by Una. He did not struggle, knowing there'd be no escape for him even if he did manage to free himself of her grasp. Ryoma was still at the door, and the room was much like the one Conan was previously held in in that there was only one door, this one without a window in it, and the same small air vent occupied a space in the ceiling, taunting, and surely no means of escape for him.
Even if he was not held down, it would have been impossible. Unarmed and small as his body currently was, with not one but two adults around and no apparent way to outsmart them or even anything at his disposal, he was at their mercy. His only weapon was his childish acting, but even that seemed to hold no benefits for him, what with their adamant refusal to acknowledge him.
This room, however, was set up differently than the first one, for other reasons aside from the table in it obviously being for a different purpose when viewing the properties of its straps, shape, and size. There were two walls with nothing but outlets, wires, and various machines strewn up on them, directly behind and to the side of the bed. The other wall, the one where the door was not, hosted a countertop, complete with a sink and cabinets that existed both within the countertop and above it, such like the ones found in kitchens. There was a small garbage bin on the ground to the side of the long gray countertop closest to the door, and for all its appearances, the place looked just like a hospital room. Well, aside from the bed with straps attached to it. The bed he was now currently laying on…. He could only pray that they would not do anything too terrible to him. The thought that it appeared to be a hospital room was somewhat calming, but with Max's testimony and the way he had come to wake up and experience this place so far, his mind was still not holding out for him an abundance of hope.
Una had walked away from the bed and was doing something on the countertop, her body and his current angle blocking him from seeing just what it was. She left whatever she had been messing around with and walked over to the machines behind and then to the side of him, pressing buttons and making them beep with different, unique noises. She walked back over to the countertop again and approached Conan with a syringe, a blue rubber string, a cotton ball, and a bottle of something in her hands. He recoiled slightly enough that it was not noticed, keeping his expression neutral, and then noticed that the syringe was empty. Silently, she poured a bit of the substance onto the cotton ball and cleaned a spot on his arm, tied the string around it, and began to draw his blood. She then walked back over to the machines.
As things progressed, all Conan could see that she was doing was giving him a routine physical, along with other various types of check-ups one would receive occasionally to check on their health. A handful of whitecoats walked in at one point with materials to do a dental screening on him, and then left as quickly as they had come upon its completion, leaving Una to finish her check-up on him. The only speaking that took place on their end was when the others came to do the dental check-up, but all that was spoken was the information on his oral health and confirming with Una how they would set up the room and how much time they would be.
During this time, Una was in and out of the room, messing with the machines and various things over at the countertop. He had tried a few times to weasel out some information from her again, but it was useless. He even needled the dentists who had come to work with him during the brief moments that Una was not in the room; still, no one would speak to him. It was unnerving, but he began to feel that, for the moment, he was just fine; nothing apparent gave him signs of coming to potential harm.
After Una seemed satisfied with the exams, she had removed his clothes and changed them for a blue hospital gown. He struggled and even yelled at her, but she held him fast and completed the swap quickly. Then she hooked him up to a few wires and messed with the machines yet again, after which she and Ryoma finally left the room. He was all alone, and the silence was deafening. He could still see a shadow beneath the door, assuming that Ryoma was left to keep guard. He tried again to talk to him, but as usual, it was to no avail.
Conan did not know for how long he sat there. The exams themselves had taken forever, and he was uncomfortable in his position, unable to even fix himself for the straps that held him down. Eventually, Una came back with her signature clipboard and approached the machines, writing who knew what down. Then she attached more things to him; this time, they were tubes that stuck into him, feeding something into his system. He again tried to talk to her, with the same result as always. She left, and it must have been hours before Conan's mind, after spending so much time contemplating and reasoning through everything all at once, finally drifted off to sleep, lulled by the rhythm of the beeping machines around him.
When he awoke, he was back in his cage. Max was in hers as well, sleeping and looking a bit beat up, wearing nothing but a blue hospital gown identical to his as well as, hopefully, something underneath. He refrained from letting his mind tread down that path, though.
Conan couldn't help but wonder what they had done to her, or if all of it was from the fight at the start of this whole endeavor. He sat up and talked to her, trying to rouse her.
"Hey, Max," he said. She didn't stir. He tried again, a little more forcefully.
"Hey, Max!" This time, he noticed a slight movement in her shoulders. He watched as her eyes blinked open, their brown irises staring into his inquisitive blue ones.
"Uh, g'mornin'," she said, sitting up and blinking the sleep away.
"What's a GP?" he asked her, immediately searching for information.
"Geez, kid, I just woke up! Calm down." She sighed before giving him an answer; at least she didn't try to hide stuff from him, and he was very thankful for it. "It stands for guinea pig; remember, they don't see us as people here. That's why I said you should leave? Remember that? Because it's dangerous, and you don't belong here?" she replied with an edge in her tone, her voice rising a bit as she continued. Her annoyance with his continued presence was palpable. Guess she's not a morning person, he thought. She seems to have quite the big heart though, worrying about other people despite her own glaring issues.
"Are those injuries from before or from here?" he asked her, unable to hide the small hint of worry in his tone.
"Both," she replied, her previous annoyance visibly melting away.
"It won't be long 'till they do the same to you, you know. You gotta at least try to escape, even just for me," she continued.
"I already told you that that is not my plan for the moment. By the way, you said earlier on that you had family; who exactly are they? If they're family, as you said, then are they like you?" he asked, glancing at her wings. He did his best to use one of the tones of his childish façade in order to heighten the chances of her answering him. Despite her previous annoyance being seemingly gone for the moment and the fact that she had not seemed to have held back anything thus far, such a personal question may have been too soon to have been asked on his part, too intrusive for her to want to answer. He didn't want to potentially push her away, but he had to ask; he needed to know. He needed to see as much of the bigger picture as possible, as soon as possible, else escape may be more difficult and longer in coming, not to mention his counterattack. Given that, alongside the way that they were separated just recently, brought him to realize that he couldn't count on the fact that he'd be there with her for very long, or very often in the future; that severely limited the timespan he had to gather information from her. He simply did not have any definite constants to fall back on at the moment, and so he decided to expedite his interrogation, if only by a little.
She smiled, and Conan could not read the expression on her face. She began to tell him about the Flock.
"Well, they are like me, but when I say they're my family, I don't exactly mean by blood. Or- sort of by blood, since we all share the same mutation in our genes, but it's not that we all come from the same parents. We actually just recently found our roots, and really, it was… it was an experience, to say the least. We all grew up here, at the School, together. I'm the oldest, so I'm the leader; knowing them, I'm sure they'll find this place soon and try to break us out. Not that I doubt that they will, but since I am the leader, it's sort of my job to look out for everyone. I can't lie and say I'm not worried that they'll make some stupid mistake on accident and get themselves caught, too. Usually, I trust them with my life, but this country is new territory, and I can't stop myself from worrying about them. Hell, even when we were in America they had me losing my head with worry half the damn time…." She drifted off, going somewhere Conan could not follow inside her mind.
"...Could you tell me about them?" She perked up quickly, gazing at him with a proud smile before telling him all about her family, her Flock. She told him about Fang, the tall, dark, and brooding one with a heart of gold, second oldest and, from what Conan could gather without her direct words on the topic, someone she viewed as a potential partner. She told him about Iggy, the next oldest, also fourteen like her and Fang, smart and incredibly intuitive of the world around him despite his blindness. She told him about how and why that came about, how the whitecoats had tried to improve his vision but ended up permanently blinding him instead, and how through that, his other senses had heightened almost supernaturally. She told him all about what an amazing cook he was, drooling all the while, and how he and Gazzy were definitely her favorite little explosives experts.
That then got her to talking about Gazzy, the young eight year old boy who had the smelliest and most questionable intestines known to man and an incredible talent for mimicking voices. He reminded Conan of the Kaito Kid, who exhibited just such a talent and shared a similar disturbing interest in explosives. Never let those two in the same room for more than five minutes, he thought to himself. That chaotic duo could probably shake the Earth, if I take what Max is saying to heart. Add that Iggy boy to the mix, and we'd all be done for.
She then told him about the eleven year old hyperactive Nudge, her annoying yet sweet as pie Nudge, of whom she was certain would be a celebrity and have hundreds of friends if she had been able to lead a normal life.
Lastly, she spoke about her beloved Angel, the six year old and youngest member of their Flock, whose appearance and personality did nothing to take from the meaning of her name. He gathered how much of a mother she must have been to the child, and his heart ached that they had to be separated like they were. If she were as innocent and lovely as Max had described, he couldn't keep his heart from going out to her. The poor little one did not deserve such tragedies in her short life; no, every one of them deserved better. All in all, her story only pushed Conan to become even more determined to save these children from the lives they'd been forced to lead.
As she finished, the light in her eyes never left, and he could almost tangibly feel the love she was gushing for her family that filled the air around them. He let himself be swept away for just a bit during her revelations, but then continued to keep pressing. He could not lose sight of his goal of acquiring information. He could only hope that something would eventually give him enough to work with, enough to help liberate the two of them at current or to give him something to look into in order to free the Flock from their cloud of never ending paranoia. For now, the background she had provided had helped to give him the necessary information to begin viewing a more complete picture of the situation, and to push his determination to launch a counterattack to its limits. He began to continue his questioning.
"So, I must ask, how come you were all alone in that alleyway? It seems impractical to leave on your own in an unfamiliar place such as an entirely different country, with danger potentially lurking in every corner. Also, what exactly led you to Japan in the first place? You said they wanted to bring you here; how did you get here then, and why did they want you here? Do you even speak the language?"
"You seem to make it a habit of yours to ask too much at once. But that's fine. If you're stuck here with me anyways, and if you're a-" she cut off with a smirk and a snort- "a uh, detective, as you say, then I guess it's understandable." She took a moment to recollect herself, then straightened up to continue talking.
"I was out on my own 'cause I didn't want my Flock to wake up starved and grumpy. You wouldn't want that if you were me either, trust me. I left them a note, but you're right, in hindsight, it was stupid of me. I was just gonna dumpster dive, nothing real dangerous, but then the erasers showed their ugly faces. That's when you interfered," she made it a point to glare at him as she said this, "and we got caught. The Flock has definitely already noticed I'm gone, that's for sure, and they'll definitely be here soon.
And actually, the whitecoats were the ones to bring us to Japan; I'm not entirely sure why, but I overheard some talk about us bringing them too much public attention back in America. I also gathered that there was a new branch of the School in Japan, and we all agreed that it would be beneficial for us to look into it. We got caught on purpose back home so they could give us a free ride; flying all that way would've been really tiring, ya know? We were probably supposed to be transported here, but we escaped while we were on the road, since it wasn't really in our agenda to be entirely in their clutches. It was easy peasy, too. Guess the Japanese erasers are too new to be a real threat for now. But that's beside the point; we're pretty skilled, ya know." She smiled, likely reminiscing on the details of it that she had neglected to provide. Then she remembered that last question and looked at him again.
"And no, I don't speak Japanese," she added. "And not gonna lie, that's definitely made this whole thing just a little harder."
The lock to their room went off with a beep and the door suddenly swung open. The two prisoners had no warning in the form of voices this time, and they both immediately whipped around to stare at the people who entered the room. It was the same two scientists, this time accompanied by five security guards, one of which was the Ryoma Ito Conan recognized from earlier. Three guards approached Max's cage, and the male scientist approached Conan's. Una just stood near the door, as if waiting for something.
Now that the man was closer and his mind wasn't reeling from being thrown at him, Conan read the name tag: Kenma Takahashi. He looked at Conan with an apologetic expression, then reached in and grabbed him, holding him a little more considerately than Una had, especially since he had nothing in his hands to stop him from using both of them to support him.
A few seconds later, he saw Max being restrained by the three security guards who had turned into erasers- Oh. Security. I get it now. In the next few moments, Conan watched in horror as she was dragged out of the room, kicking and screaming, followed by Una and one of the other guards who was currently not looking very wolfish. The remaining guard followed Kenma and Conan as they too left the room, trailing a little closer than Ryoma had earlier during his time with Una.
They took a different route down the halls, Conan again mapping the place out as they went. They soon arrived in a very strange looking room with metal grating for a floor, on top of which stood high walls that did not quite reach the ceiling, and which seemed to create a path. Unfortunately, he could not make out where it led to against the prevailing whiteness of said walls.
Kenma set him down gently and gave him a careful look before exiting the room. Conan looked around, unmoving, analyzing his surroundings. There were dark gray, round speakers set high into two towering walls adjacent to the one with the door he had just entered through. He noticed as he was looking up, glancing back and forth between the walls, the beginnings of two long, one way windows (he had seen enough interrogation rooms to understand that that was what they were), situated on either side of the room, stretching past the strange walls that suspiciously did not attach themselves to the ceiling. He looked down and noticed many grooves were set into the oddly grated floor. Perhaps they move the walls with those, as if sliding them around, he thought. But… why?
A few moments after Kenma had left, the speakers sounded with a loud dong, vibrating the floor slightly, and Conan could suddenly feel a light tingling in his bare feet that began to slowly snake its way up his body….
.
.
.
Well, being the author instead of the reader for once is certainly an Experience™. I finally know what's going to happen and I'm not the one in suspense. It's not such a big deal to leave a cliffhanger on my end, but man, it could surely be for a reader! I just find it so easy to end in places like these, they are the perfect scene cuts to keep things flowing between chapters, to make someone wanna keep reading and also for me to find a resting point that also is a good place to pick up again. So yeah. Here we are!
Thanks for reading, hope you enjoyed! See you next time~! (I hope…)
