Chapter Ten
"Man, this place has really gone to the dogs since last time, huh?" Freckles commented, scrunching up her nose as she glanced around the garden. Ciel nodded absently, eye roving the unkempt lawn. She was entirely right. As far as he remembered, the gardens were always surprisingly nice, considering where they were. Sure, a little messy, but still tasteful. Now leaves coated the ground like a carpet, the bushes were haggard and in desperate need of a trim, the branches of the trees starting to become gnarled.
Even the bench the two sat on was dirt-encrusted.
"They should get a gardener or somethin'."
Ciel just nodded absently again, barely listening to what she was saying, so Freckles stood up with a sigh and ran over to join Dagger and Jumbo.
Ciel frowned as she left, the pounding at his temples making its presence known once again. With a hiss, he pinched the bridge of his nose and bade the headache away. For the past two days, his head had been splitting, no matter how much he tried to sleep it off.
Stupid Sebastian.
The headache was, of course, Sebastian's fault. In fact, anything that happened that Ciel didn't like lately was Sebastian's fault.
Stupid Sebastian and his stupid sticking his nose where it didn't belong.
How the hell had he even gotten his hands on his file, anyway? For fucks sake, Claude, get a lock for your drawer.
Ciel tossed his legs up onto the bench, laying down for a bit of cloud-watching.
He didn't know what exactly was in the file. It wasn't as though he had ever had the opportunity to read it. Somehow he doubted he'd want to if the chance presented itself. Still, Sebastian had known about The Fire... If he knew about The Fire, what else could he know about?
Them? What they'd done, or worse, what he'd done?
The thought chilled him. More than he'd imagined it would. It went without saying that he didn't want anyone knowing what he'd done, but why did the prospect of Sebastian knowing twist his stomach into knots so much?
Seriously? Playing blind can only go so far. You know perfectly well why-
Ciel bolted upright on the bench with a snarl, banishing the little voice from his head.
He'd long since surpassed confusion and was well into the realm of completely fucking baffled.
With a well-practised ease, Sebastian smoothed the frown from his face, the usual slight smirk taking its place.
Either every single person in St. Victoria's was a master liar or not a single person knew who Finnian was. It had been a long morning of cornering staff, both those he knew and those who didn't even register in his mind, and trying to wheedle any slight hint of foul play from them. So far, he'd received nothing but blank faces and concern for his well-being.
He doubted they were all lying. Even if they were masterful in the craft, enough so to catch him out by some miracle, there was the question of why Finny? After all, the boy was nothing but a minor character in the grand scale of things. The none-too-bright gardener was hardly an important player. So why would he be targeted by whatever was going on?
Better yet, why was Sebastian the sole exception?
It had been just over a week since his fight with Ciel, and Finny's disappearance. Although Ciel had made in perfectly clear in that time that he had no intentions of reconciliation, Sebastian threw caution to the wind and made his way over to the boy's room.
Ciel was the expert of St. Victoria's, its veteran patient. If anyone could shine some light on the situation, it would be him. If he hadn't been affected, that is.
"What the... Get out!" Ciel snapped as Sebastian strode into his bedroom, ignoring protocol and closing the door behind him. He ignored the boy's indignant spluttering, walking up to the desk where Ciel was sat, looking him dead in the eye.
"Finny."
One word was all it took for Sebastian to know that whatever was going on had happened to Ciel too. There was no recognition in his eye at the name of his friend, just a flicker of confusion amidst the annoyance Sebastian's presence caused.
"What?" It was quite astounding how much irritation Ciel could inject into the one short word.
Ignoring him, Sebastian ran a hand through his hair, dropping onto the edge of his bed. The sheer amount of exasperation and anger was like a ton of bricks falling on him, and he needed a moment to clear his head.
This was getting ridiculous. People didn't just vanish off the face of the planet! A person couldn't just be erased like that! Sebastian had found no-one like himself who remembered the blond, found no trace of him within St. Victoria's. Yet he remembered, remembered only a week earlier when he'd sat and had breakfast with him, talked to him, endured his bubbliness with far more patience than he usually would have. He clung to that memory as he raised his head to return Ciel's impatient look, and tried again, "Finny."
"Why do you keep making that noise?"
No. There was nothing. No spark of recognition, just more confusion than before.
"It's a name, Ciel. Your friend's name," Sebastian stated, watching his face intently for any sign of... of anything. The only thing he saw was Ciel's increasing discomfort under such blatant scrutiny.
"What the hell are you talking about? I don't know anyone called that... Has Grell slipped you something?" Ciel leaned forward in his chair, returning the assessment with mild amusement.
Sebastian almost shuddered at the idea. Honestly, if he hadn't have taken a leaf from Will's book and started booby-trapping his room after the unfortunate pants incident, he wouldn't have put it past the deranged redhead to do just that.
"Look, this is going to sound weird – it is weird – but just listen, alright? You're mad at me, I get that, and if you really want to then we'll talk about it later-"
"There's nothing to talk about. You had no right-"
"Listen. Up until a week ago, there was a man – Finny, Finnian, whatever – working here. He was the gardener. The two of you got along, it wouldn't be completely wrong to say you were friends. But a week ago, he... he disappeared. Not just disappeared, but it... it's like... it's like he was never here at all. It looks like I'm the only one who remembers him."
He was going to say more, but stopped as he gauged Ciel's reaction. He'd expected the boy to laugh in his face, make some sarcastic comment, something along those lines. He did none of that. Rather than mirth on his face, there was pity.
Before Sebastian could continue, Ciel shook his head, "There's no 'Finny', Sebastian."
"...Yes. There is."
"No. It's only to be expected. This place, it does things to your head. Believe me, I know. Quite a weird little fantasy you're cooking up, I have to say, but it's just that; a fantasy." Ciel's words were laced with the same pity that lay in his eye, the traces of anger from before draining away as he looked at Sebastian like there was something wrong with him.
Alright, he hadn't expected Ciel to just agree with him straight away, but what the hell was this? The brat was talking to him like he was the mental patient!
"Environment effects mind. It's a proven fact. I'm actually surprised it took this long for the place to start taking its toll. Take the day off, get some sleep, rethink this Finny thing tomorrow when your mind is more rested."
It was unbearable, the sympathetic and downright patronizing tone used to spoon-feed him advice. He didn't want rest, he didn't need rest. This wasn't some side-effect of being in the Institution too long – or was it?
Sebastian tore his eyes from Ciel as the seed of doubt the boy had planted began to grow.
He was the only one to remember Finny. It was simply logical that if he was the only one saying Finny was real while a dozen other people were saying the opposite, then he was the one in the wrong. After all, there was no conceivable way for every single person, bar him, to suddenly forget a person's existence. It was completely impossible for every trace of that person to disappear, for the person to disappear. Maybe Ciel was right. Maybe he was wrong, maybe St. Victoria's really was doing something to his head. Hell, most of the staff were insane themselves. Maybe they hadn't been when they'd first gotten the jobs-
A scrap of bright yellow caught Sebastian's eye and that train of thought was derailed.
"What's that?" Ciel asked as Sebastian darted around him and grabbed something from the floor next to his desk.
'OH NO SHE FOND OUT SHES NOT REALLY GABYS DAUGTER!'
There was no mistaking it; the spelling errors, the abuse of exclamation marks, the messy doodles clustering around the words. This was Finny's writing, the post-it note he'd asked Sebastian to pass on to Ciel just before he disappeared.
"It's from Finny. Read it," Sebastian borderline ordered, brandishing the little yellow note in Ciel's face.
This time Ciel really did laugh at him.
"Well, I have to hand it to you. That is dedication to your little mental lapse. Going so far as planting 'evidence' in my room."
"Just read it."
Ciel's snickering ceased at the growl, the same irritation from earlier seeping back.
"I don't appreciate the tone, Sebastian. Ask nicely or don't ask at all."
Sebastian's patience was wearing thin. If Ciel would just read the fucking note, stop being a brat for five seconds and do what he was told for once, Sebastian knew things would turn around. He wasn't even sure why he was so convinced the note would help. Maybe because it was the only scrap of Finny he could find. Surely there was some significance that it belonged to Ciel?
"Ciel, will you read it?" Sebastian swallowed his surging annoyance, attempting to sound reasonable and civil. Either Ciel was still pissed off over the whole file thing or he was just in a obstinate mood, as he simply smirked in the face of Sebastian's herculean effort to stay calm.
"What's the magic word?"
If he weren't so determined to stay on the little bast... brat's good side, he'd have punched him.
If only to wipe the smug look off his face, Sebastian conjured up a smirk of his own, "Please?"
"Was that so hard?" Ciel gave a long-suffering sigh, holding his hand out for the note. Sebastian pushed it into his palm with more force than necessary. He sincerely hoped Ciel's fingers weren't as brittle as they looked.
With an exaggerated effort, making it perfectly clear that he was humouring Sebastian and nothing more, Ciel brought to note up to eye-level.
Later on, he'd rank the sudden fire behind his eyes as he absorbed the words on the post-it as the third worst physical pain he'd ever felt. No sooner had he finished scanning the short sentence had the lingering headache surged, so intense he'd actually thought he could be bleeding from the ears.
Finny-
The note drifted to the floor as his hands shot up to clutch at his head, nails digging into the translucent skin and scratching, clawing, wanting to break through the barrier and drag the source of the pain away. A hot dampness ran down his face in rivulets, and then Sebastian's hands were gripping his wrists, forcing his hands away from his head, stopping him from doing himself any more harm.
FinnyFinnyFinny-
He could hear Sebastian repeating his own name, Ciel!, but it was like he was underwater, the voice distant and indistinguishable. All he could think of was the blinding heat inside his head, shining blue eyes that never once judged him despite knowing everything and even back then when he'd been at his worst had never once treated him like anything other than a person-
FINNYFINNYFINNYFINNY-
And then the pain was gone in one final white hot flash, and Ciel could hear himself, voice hoarse and too loud, shouting Finny's name over and over.
Ciel sagged, abruptly silencing, and it was all Sebastian could do to keep him from crashing face first into the floor. Touching him as little as possible, he pushed the boy back onto the chair, hands hovering, ready to catch him if he still wasn't steady.
After a few minutes of silence, Sebastian disappeared into the bathroom to grab a cloth, dampening it under the sink. That... had been a little more than he'd expected. He was relieved, of course, that Ciel had remembered Finny, but damn, that had looked painful. His face had contorted into pure agony, his breaths harsh and panicked. Then he'd gone and started clawing at his own face, viciously enough to not only draw blood but keep it flowing steadily even after Sebastian had pried his hands away. He'd been so out of it he hadn't even flinched at being touched.
Sebastian had been worried someone was going to come barrelling in once Ciel had started screaming bloody murder, Alois or Soma ready to defend their friend's honour or something, but thankfully no-one seemed to hear. That in itself was suspicious, since Ciel had hardly been quiet, but Sebastian decided to accept the smallest mercy without questioning it. God knows there were already enough questions on the table.
When he left the bathroom, Ciel was still sat where Sebastian had left him, though he had the post-it note clutched in his fist. He didn't look up as Sebastian approached, nor did he shy away when the dripping cloth was brought up to his face. Ciel sat there quietly as Sebastian wiped off the still wet blood, only moving to slap away his hand when he'd tried to remove the eye-patch.
Sebastian was growing a little worried at Ciel's hollow silence, was considering going to get Joker or one of the others to see if they might be able to elicit a response from him, when a low growl sounded from the boy.
It was feral, carrying in it far more anger than any words could have. Now Sebastian looked more closely and saw that Ciel's shoulders were trembling. He thought for a minute that maybe he was crying until Ciel's head snapped up. That single eye had never looked more blue than it did in that moment, burning with absolute fury.
"What have they done to Finny?" Continuing in the low growl, each word shaking from the sheer lividity, "What did they do to me?"
"Has anything like this ever happened before?" Sebastian asked, turning on his heel and pacing the room once again. He couldn't sit down. He was far too restless. At least as he moved, it felt like he was doing something.
"Not as far as I know," Ciel replied, but Sebastian noticed that his words missed their usual self-assuredness. The boy had calmed down a little now, had fallen into a calm quiet that was unnerving him a bit. Sitting bolt upright on his bed, he clutched the post-it note like it was the only thing tethering him to Earth.
He was shaken, to his core. Whether it was the fact that he'd been made to forget Finny, or whether it was just that he'd been made to forget at all, the boy was spooked.
"...Do you think he might be in The Room?" Sebastian ventured, voicing what he was beginning to dread.
Ciel looked about to speak, hesitated, then finally murmured, "It's a possibility."
"Is another rescue mission in order?"
Ciel didn't answer, and Sebastian didn't push him, resuming his pacing. He'd wanted Ciel to tell him no, there was no chance Finny was in The Room. After all, he was staff. That place was only for patients, right? He didn't want to go back to that room, to see Finny with half his arm burned away and weeping like a child. Yet... a part of him did. Not to see Finny like that – no, he had no desire for that, of course. It was just that the last time, when he and Ciel had gone to get Joker, he'd been so distracted by what was going on that he didn't really see The Room. Sure, there were a lot of mirrors, but there had to be more than that. The way the patients spoke of the place with such fear, even Ciel was afraid of it, and there was no way mere mirrors could do what was done to Joker, so what had? It was a morbid curiosity that Sebastian knew he shouldn't have, yet he couldn't help but want to know more.
"If... Finny is just in The Room, then why make everyone forget about him? If he's in there, then that'd mean he might be coming back, right?" So lost in his thoughts, Ciel's sudden mutter startled him.
"... Do you think he's dead?" Sebastian asked, and they both winced a little, neither wanting to hear what they both already thought.
"It's likely, especially if he stumbled across something he wasn't supposed to know. It'd be just like that idiot to accidentally uncover something," Ciel laughed humourlessly, clutching the note in his hand a little bit tighter.
They fell into a heavy silence, each imagining just what Finny could have done, could have discovered, until Sebastian spoke once more.
"What do you want to do, Ciel?"
Ciel sighed, looking more haggard than Sebastian had seen him before, "Well, we're just going to have to rescue him then, aren't we?"
"Have a look around, see if you can find anything, but be subtle. I'll start thinking of something."
That had been Ciel's parting statement the previous day.
Easier said than done. He hadn't become Sherlock Holmes over night. What was he supposed to do, whip out his tweed cap and assess the clues? There were no clues. That was the problem.
After a restless night, the only concrete decision Sebastian had made was that it would be beneficial to get Bard and Meirin on their side. After all, they were so minor in the Institution that they could easily go around without being noticed. Surely a useful asset to have.
Jog their memories like with Ciel. Well, it seemed like a simple enough idea, but as always, it wasn't nearly as easy as it sounded. Despite Sebastian's best efforts over several days, no amount of cajoling brought forth any recognition at the name of Finnian. During that time, he'd been trying to find little mementos of Finny's. Anything of his that he could show to Bard and Meirin. There was nothing, nothing but the post-it note that Ciel had yet to let out of sight.
It was a last-ditch effort, but the only option left. Sebastian took the post-it from Ciel's room, pocketing it and taking it down to the kitchen with him when he went for dinner.
"Meirin? Can you read this for me? I just can't make out the handwriting," Sebastian sighed, shooting her a winning smile that made her weak in the knees and hot in the face.
"Of course! Um... 'oh no, she fuh-ond... found? out that she's not ruh-healli... really Gaby's door...daughter...'" Meirin stuttered through the scribbled words, not a clue who Gaby or her apparently fake child was.
Sebastian watched her face intently, for any sign of anything, but she just handed the crumpled note back to him with a smile.
Nothing. Was it because the note hadn't been written for her? Did it work for Ciel because it meant something to him?
He went through the same rigmarole with Bard and achieved the exact same result.
Disheartened, he ate little of his dinner, and left the kitchens in a hurry, barely registering Meirin sweeping the note off the table and into the bin.
Ciel did not take the loss well.
"You idiot!" Sebastian dodged the rubix cube hurtling at his head, "Get it back! It's mine, I want it! Get it back!"
Sebastian Michaelis was beginning to question his own sanity. The entire Finny scenario, no, that was perfectly sane. Digging around in the trash for the sake of a fucking note for a temperamental teenager? That was definitely crossing some line he used to have, pre-St. Victoria's. In fact, he rather missed that line, which he was now nicknaming self-respect.
"Ugh..." Grimacing, Sebastian flicked his hand, sending the rotting banana skin as far from him as possible.
He'd been tempted to tell Ciel to go to hell. Sebastian Michaelis did not rummage through rubbish for no man... at least, he never used to. But he hadn't missed for a second just how earnestly Ciel had been holding onto that little yellow note, reading it over and over as if the words had changed in the five seconds since he'd last looked. He was beginning to realise just why the note was so important to him now; the post-it had been the thing to trigger his remembrance. Ciel seemed to think if he let it out of his sight that he'd forget all over again. Although Sebastian didn't think that was going to happen, the sheer panic in the boy's eye was too pathetic to bear.
Besides, although Sebastian hadn't believed Ciel capable of lifting more than his nose, the chair he'd launched at Sebastian's face had begged to differ. He'd take five minutes of digging around in trash over a concussion any day.
"Ah!"
He lunged at the little dot of yellow in the midden, snatching it up, and then he saw it.
Later he scolded himself for not grabbing it too, taking it inside and showing it to Bard and Meirin. It surely would have worked. After all, whenever you saw Finny, you saw that straw hat too. He would have taken it, if not for the splattering of blood, already dried to a crusty brown. Just the sight of that stain, a stain Finny never would have let happen to his precious hat, sickened Sebastian.
"There's nothing for it. It goes without saying it's not the best of plans, but The Room is the most likely place he'll be, so it should be the first place you check," Ciel stated. He didn't look very good. White as a sheet, his paleness only making the angry red cuts down the sides of his face and the dark circles under his eyes all the more pronounced. Clearly Sebastian wasn't the only one suffering sleepless nights.
"...The first place I check?" Sebastian frowned.
Ciel raised a brow.
"Yes. Obviously I won't be going with you. You remember the way, I trust?"
"Why exactly won't you be coming with me?"
Ciel sighed, "Because, clearly this is the staff's doing. I have no idea just how they're doing it, but they definitely are. The fact that you're the only exception to whatever they've done means that it's likely they're watching you. You can easily explain away wandering around the halls at night, but letting me out of the ward again? Somehow I doubt they'll believe you were just taking me for a pleasant evening stroll. No, it's too risky. Besides, Ash's illnesses have become too few and far between. We can't afford to wait for another one... Finny can't afford to wait."
What a lovely long way of saying he was terrified of going near The Room.
"Now, listen very carefully. There are three things you need to watch out for; one, while Ash stays on the ward at night, word of mouth says that Angela prowls the halls. Keep an eye out for her, and have an excuse handy in case you're unlucky; two, I've also heard that Undertaker is fond of taking midnight strolls, so keep an eye out for him too, and have a joke or two handy just in case. Out of the two of them, Undertaker's the one you want to avoid. There's just something about him; and three, two floors down from here, there are two sets of staircases. One leads to a dead end, the other carries on to The Room. The right one creaks like a bitch, the wrong one locks automatically. Make sure you're going into the right one before you let the door shut, or you'll be stuck until someone else opens the door, and God knows how you'll explain that away."
Sebastian nodded as Ciel spoke, committing the warnings to memory. Avoid Angela, avoid Undertaker, choose the creaky door. Simple enough.
"We'll see how this goes. If Finny isn't in The Room... well, we'll figure that out later."
Sebastian had never watched a James Bond movie in his entire life. His mother had been a big fan, but the concept had never particularly appealed to him. Unfortunate, really. His night probably would have gone smoother if he'd ever seen one.
Sebastian left his room with a true silence very few could achieve, armed only with a mirror, a doorstop he'd taken from the leisure room, and a stock of jokes in his mind.
Running over the night Ciel had taken him down to The Room in his head, Sebastian left the dorm building and made his way over to the hospital building. He retraced his steps as best as he could, using the mirror to check around corners for anyone before he rounded them himself.
Sebastian was surprised at just how tense he was. He hadn't been this tense the last time he'd gone to The Room, and he'd known even less about the Institute back then. Was it because Ciel wasn't there this time? Possibly. There was just something about the presence of someone who had a clue what was going on that was comforting, or maybe it was just Ciel's presence in general. God knows having at least one person whose sanity he was positive about around was reassuring.
There was another reason for his tension, however.
A line had been crossed. The distinct line between patient and staff had been dissolved the second Finny had become the victim. The thought that even the staff weren't safe from the madness going on in St. Victoria's hadn't even begun to occur to Sebastian. Maybe the reason he'd been less tense the last time he was breaking Institution rules was less to do with Ciel's presence and more to do with the fact that he held the title of Orderly. Subconsciously he'd viewed that title as a sort of shield, keeping him safe from the things that were being done to the patients.
Not anymore.
If he was caught tonight, what would they do to him? The same thing they'd done to Finny, for whatever slight he'd committed? Would Sebastian Michaelis be erased too?
It didn't take nearly as long as he'd thought it would to reach the two doors. Both were identical, industrial grey and without number or anything else signifying where they led to.
With a growing hesitance, a feeling not unlike fear growing in the pit of his stomach, Sebastian started towards the door on the left to test it for a creak.
Voices, two of them, coming his way.
Sebastian's hand faltered as it reached for the handle. If it creaked, it would be the right one, but the approaching people would definitely hear it. Even if it didn't creak, he couldn't use the doorstop. They'd notice if the door was ajar.
The voices drew nearer, almost clear enough to make out their words.
Mind racing for a decision, Sebastian didn't see the body hurtling towards him until he had already been tackled through the door. The two of them crashed to the ground with a thud, and the door swung silently shut.
There was no light in the corridor, room, wherever they were, and Sebastian couldn't make out the face of the other person. Before they could do anything, say anything, Sebastian drew back his arm and threw his fist into where he supposed their face would be.
The sickening crack that followed made clear that he'd hit his target, the person falling away with a strangled cry of pain.
Loathe to give them a chance to recover, Sebastian grabbed the block of wood from his pocket and brought it down without mercy on the person's head. They sagged to the ground, unconscious, and Sebastian finally relaxed, the adrenalin leaving him as quickly as it had came.
Now the panic was over, Sebastian could finally get a glance of his assailant.
Oh... shit.
Sebastian crouched down at the person's side, squinting to get a better look, and blanched.
Nope, no mistaking it. That was definitely Agni with a broken nose and bleeding head.
If they weren't already fighting before, they sure as hell would have been now.
It was Soma who'd brought it to his attention.
"Your ex is acting like a fruitloop lately."
Even Soma didn't miss that Sebastian was acting oddly. Though Soma missed very little, Agni knew, so of course he noticed.
It was evident in the weariness of the man's smirk, how there was something off in his swagger. Something was wrong with Sebastian, and despite the cold shoulder the two of them were giving and receiving, Agni wanted to know just what it was.
His first guess was that he and Ciel had had a spat of some sort, which Soma had attested to, saying that Ciel was being sulky. However, even after Soma told him they'd patched things up again, Sebastian's odd behaviour didn't cease.
That night, Agni had been on his way back to his bedroom after having a shower – he always preferred them at night, when things were quieter and there was less risk of getting caught in the inevitable fight between Will and the soap-stealing Ronald – when he saw Sebastian striding away from his room purposefully.
Although there were no explicit rules in place that forbade the staff to walk the halls at night, it was just common sense that you were better off staying in your room.
Seeing that Sebastian could only be headed towards the main building, Agni's worry increased tenfold and, despite his still present anger with the man, he found himself shadowing his footsteps. That worry inflated to an impossibly degree when he realised just where Sebastian seemed to be going.
And that had been when he'd heard the voices, unmistakably Angela and Ash's, and he was moving before he realised, pushing Sebastian through the door and out of their potential sight. Of course, then Sebastian had gone bugfuck on him, and everything had gone black.
He awoke with a groan and the certainty that half his brain was splattered on the floor. It was hard to tell in the darkness, but Agni was fairly sure the room was spinning.
"Please keep still," he pleaded with the walls, the words coming out nasally. Ah, yes, he'd almost forgotten about the broken nose. He wished he could forget again, since remembering had been his nose's cue to start burning in pure agony.
"Alive, I trust?" Sebastian enquired casually, as though he hadn't just beaten his friend around the face with a block of wood, crouching by the door. He had the mirror in hand and looked to be trying to reflect some of the light from the crack under the door onto the lock.
"Unfortunately," Agni grunted, dragging himself and his too-heavy head into an upright position. He cradled his pounding skull, and wished he'd stayed in the shower five minutes longer. Then he'd have completely missed Sebastian and would be tucked up in his bed, peacefully sleeping with all of his blood where it should be, not splattered all over his face.
"Care to tell me what exactly you were doing?" Sebastian asked, the same casual tone as before, but there was something sharp to it.
He had a cheek to be mad. His nose was in one piece.
Annoyed, Agni just said, "You could at least thank me."
Sebastian looked at him in disbelief – at least, it looked like disbelief. It could have been anything in the darkness – then gave a forced laugh, "Thank you very much, Agni, for locking me in here and ruining everything."
Agni frowned.
"I thought you were trying to get to room 1800?"
Sebastian had to remind himself that of course it wasn't just called The Room, that it must have an official number.
"That's exactly where I was going until you pushed me through the wrong door."
"What? No, the other door leads to the basements. I mean, you can get to room 1800 that way, but it would take you all night, and you'd probably get lost down there. No, this leads to the lift," Agni stated, pushing himself up onto shaky legs.
There was a lift? And they walked all that way last time?
"Why exactly are you going down there, anyway? You can only go down there with express permission from the higher-ups, Sebastian. It'll be trouble if you're caught." All annoyance was absent from Agni's voice now, just curiosity, overwhelmed by concern.
"...Finny."
It was a worth a try, but Sebastian wasn't remotely surprised when there was no recognition on Agni's face.
"Well, thank you, then," Sebastian said, a little reluctantly, still smarting over Agni believing Soma over him. As he turned to leave, he was unsurprised to find Agni following, and couldn't help smirking.
"It'll be trouble if you're caught," he echoed, feeling his way down the corridor, Agni at his heels.
"...I don't know why you're so intent on going to room 1800, but if it's important enough for you to go against orders over, then I want to help," Agni insisted, taking Sebastian's elbow and steering him towards the lift.
Sebastian didn't argue with him, nor did he try to explain his reasons any further. There was no point, short of making Agni think he was completely barmy. The lift continued to descend to the lowest levels of the institution, the flashing numbers growing smaller and smaller until they reached 0.
There were no words shared between them, both apprehensive as they made their way towards the door of room 1800 for different reasons. Sebastian took out his keycard and passed it over the electronic panel, unconsciously holding his breath as the door unlocked and he pushed it open. Agni dogged his steps, the two crossing onto the mirrored floors.
The room was empty.