And back to Plaguey!

This chapter's a bit on the short side, but it's longer than the last one, so... yay?

Anyway, Guy Who Reads My Stuff: Bah, who needs medical patient confidentiality anyway? And yeah, Percy's still sitting about in the lab. He shall get his tiny-ass role in the next chapter.
Also, I did buy the knockback prevention armor for both of them, I just never wore it. Most of SK's playthrough was in the golden armor, and Plague Knight had the Treasure Trappings, because I am horrible at not getting killed, so once I figured out charging attracted my lost treasure to me, I was completely sold on the idea. After I had nothing else to buy, then I very quickly switched to the Dandy Duds (Well, that's the first time I've paid attention to that name. It's amusing.)
By the way, you are, by far, one of the most loyal readers I've ever had. Ever. It's really kinda neat.

Ah, anyway, go read!

Short 16

(Day 12; 5 of the kidnapping crisis)

Plague Knight stared blankly at the men in front of him, not really noticing they were there. He'd long since learned to tune them out. He'd tried for two days (if you count the day he was brought to his 'cell' a day) to get them to listen to the reality of the situation, but they were stubborn. Three days ago was when he realized they weren't going to listen to him, so he figured why should he be kind enough to pay attention to their words?

They collectively heaved a sigh before turning to leave. This caught his attention. "Wait, can you at least let me look out the window?"

"Once again, Adam, not until you start to cooperate."

Plague Knight slumped for a moment before an idea popped into his head. "May I suggest something?"

He had their attention now, he knew.

"Why don't you let me wander the house? I mean, it's not nice to not let me know what I'm getting myself into with staying with you. Of course, I won't put up a fuss over having someone watch me at all times and what-have-you."

The three looked to each other. "So much for unbreakable will," Peter muttered.

"It's not so much as my will breaking, it's more of a matter of whether or not I'm going to go crazy from staring at a wall for several days."

"Outside," the father, who, on the second day, Plague Knight had learned was named an uncreative John, ordered.

Plague Knight patiently awaited their decision. He knew they would either take his idea as a sign that he was trying to figure out how to escape, which was pretty much true, or a genuine desire to join the family. The latter was, of course, a poor assumption, and he would lose any faith he had in the idea that these people were in any way bright if they decided that was the correct one.

At length, the men finally returned to the room. To Plague Knight's glee, Peter silently began untying the ropes keeping him in his chair. "Were you trying to break free?" He held up to rope that had tied his hands. Surprisingly, his continuous sawing had actually made it a quarter of the way through the thick cord.

"Nope," Plague Knight defended himself with an innocent tone of voice as he brought his hands in front of him, rubbing at the wrists. "You see, I have a bit of a… nervous habit, and I need to do something with my hands if my mind is not occupied. Therefore, my hands played with the only thing they had access to, that being the rope." This was actually the truth, as he had long since given up actively attempting to cut the cord binding, but allowed his hands to saw at them when he had nothing better to do anyway.

John was clearly lost in thought for a couple moments before accepting this fact.

Plague Knight jumped to his feet, stretching. "Much better," he stated, turning around and taking a good long look at the room he was in. Sure, he'd been able to get away from the chair whenever he had to use the toilet, but he was not allowed the time to look around. To his disappointment, it seemed to be nothing more than a guest bedroom. The sky outside the window seemed to indicate that it was reaching the evening.

Finding the room to be wholly unremarkable, he made his way to the hallway, noting all the while that he was watched like a hawk by all three men. He forced himself to ignore them and proceeded to poke his nose into every room he spied in a manner similar to what a puppy might do when brought to his new home. While plenty of things scattered about seemed to be quite shiny and expensive, he found he was underwhelmed with the lack of points of interest.

Out of boredom, he let out a yawn. His self-appointed shadows took this as a sign that he was actually tired, and so he suddenly found himself being ushered towards a room he had looked through earlier.

Once inside, Thomas moved a dresser in front of the window to keep him from escaping, therefore blocking most natural light from entering.

Plague Knight tried to tell them that he wasn't tired, but before he could actually state this, he found himself lying in the bed. His mouth was left agape in confusion as the men all turned and left him alone.

"What just happened…?" He questioned uselessly, keeping his voice a low whisper.

Rolling his eyes at their nonsense, he waited 5 minutes before he climbed out of bed, frowning when he realized that he now had no way of getting back on. Not that it mattered to him, as he wasn't actually in the mood to sleep.

Lightly humming a random tune for no reason in particular, Plague Knight gave the dresser a light shove, testing its weight. It moved a couple inches, to his surprise. The only issue with this being a viable way to escape was that it made a screeching sound on the floor that made him momentarily believe that a cat was being trampled by a horse just outside his room.

Upon hearing the cacophony, he froze, awaiting the inevitable return of his kidnappers.

But no one came.

Plague Knight blinked, confused.

"Oh?" A smile grew on his face almost immediately as it occurred to him that the house very well could have walls and floors thick enough that noise would have a difficult time traveling through it. He focused on the dresser. Regardless of the idea that the residents were unable to hear most of the noise he made, he was still somewhat paranoid. After a moment of thinking, he snatched the sheets from the bed, carefully lifting up each end and shoving fabric underneath the legs.

Smiling to himself, he started pushing the dresser, glad to find that sheet kept the noise to an absolute minimum.

He froze when he heard a knock. 'Did they hear?' He questioned himself. He glanced at the partially hidden window. He'd have to get himself going pretty fast to squeeze through the gap as it was.

"Adam, are you awake?" An extremely muffled voice questioned, likely one of the brothers, he figured, simply because he doubted John would be willing to 'wake' the child that already acted like a hormonal teen.

"Y-yeah," he answered, wondering if they had somehow missed the racket he had been making, considering the casualness of the call.

"Dinner's ready."

"Dinner…?" Plague Knight questioned under his breath as though it were a foreign concept. It wasn't, technically. He'd eaten dinner before. The problem laid in that he, and Mona as well, had a nasty habit of completely neglecting it to the point whereas they had to be reminded what it was on the rare occasion anyone brought it up. It didn't help that he hadn't been allowed any until now because of his 'bad behavior.'

"Adam?" The voice called out when he failed to respond.

This snapped Plague Knight out of his thoughts. "Oh, um… Sorry!" He started to move towards the door. "Coming!"

The door swung open and Plague Knight looked upwards, finding that it was neither Thomas nor Peter that had been sent to retrieve him, but rather a young woman.

After a moment of silence, he questioned, "Who're you?"

The woman looked equal parts heartbroken and completely understanding at his lack of knowledge. "Why, I'm your mother!" She replied with a cheerful tone.

Plague Knight's jaw dropped. "What? I've been locked up for a good five days, and you're only just now introducing yourself to me?"

Now the woman's face shifted into a sort of resentment. "Your father wouldn't let me go see you. Something about you being crazy, but you seem sane to me."

Plague Knight let out a relieved sigh. "Finally, someone who might have some common sense. Listen, I'm sorry to tell you this, but I'm not your son. I'm a grown ass adult who got turned into a kid as a result of a magical accident. My name's not even Adam, I just took the name because I didn't want to face everyone with the fact that I messed up."

"Then what's your real name?"

Plague Knight averted his gaze. "I'm not going to tell anyone that, let alone someone I hardly know."

"You're not going to let anyone know that? But that would mean… either you're a horrible recluse…" Plague Knight murmured 'Effectively.' "Or you're a knight."

"That too," Plague Knight said. "I'm both of those, okay? Now can you please tell your husband that I'm not his kid?"

The mother looked unhappy with this. "Will you at least stay for dinner?"

Plague Knight raised an eyebrow. His stomach made up his mind for him with a gurgling noise. "That answers that, I guess."

The young mother giggled softly in response to this, taking his hand (though he wasn't particularly happy with this), and led him into the decent-sized, expensive-looking dining room that Plague Knight swore was not there before. Seriously, he had no idea how he managed to overlook it while touring the house.

John was already at his spot, and the two brothers were on either side of him. There were three remaining spots, the one directly across from John likely for the mother. Ultimately, there was a single remaining chair when everyone was accounted for, likely for guests.

The men looked to him and smiled.

"Ah, Adam. Did you sleep well?" John asked as Plague Knight took a seat beside Peter, the one who infuriated him the least overall. Oh, he was still pissed about the shoulder stab, but as far as he could tell, what Thomas did after he was knocked out was far worse.

Plague Knight nodded without really thinking about the question. He hadn't attempted sleep at any point, but he didn't want anyone asking what he had been doing the good 7-something minutes he'd been in there. Why did they even assume that he could fall asleep and get a good rest from 7-something minutes anyway?

Peter noticed his lack of true reaction to the question and lack of attention to the adults and smiled, patting him on the head. "Aw, he's still tired!"

"Don't touch me," Plague Knight snarled, lightly swatting at the hand. Then, in a lower voice that no one else could catch he asked, "Why did I agree to this?" His eyes looked to the mother as she brought in freshly baked goods. "Oh, right. That."

Yep, Plague Knight decided 'You know what? I'll stay for dinner.' He is apparently very easily bought. Also, he revealed as much of the whole truth as he can without telling the wife that he's Plague Knight, the killer of just about everyone. How does she respond? "Come eat dinner with us!" Really, lady?