Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Finn wakes to a sledgehammer sound outside his head. Not inside, though that would make sense too. His skull feels puffy, like there’s insulation packed between his brain and his skin. Light comes in a mean, sideways stripe across the bed, and he squints, checks the clock: 7:32.

For a second he tries to piece together a dream he might have had—Caleb launching pizza slices like ninja stars—but it’s all gone. He rolls onto his back and groans. Stretching, he catches movement beside the bed. Reggie. The bunny is real, not a hallucination. He’s squashed himself into the smallest possible circle, head tucked and ears vanished, a snowdrift with feet. Finn watches the slow, steady rise and fall of his breathing.

Something thuds hard against the trailer door again. Finn pushes up to sitting, rubbing the crust from his eyes. He’s in last night’s t-shirt and not much else, so he yanks the blanket over his lap before shuffling to the door. From the little half-window, it’s just an overexposed wedge of sky and the top of Millie’s head, hair fuzzed out at the temples in an unmistakable helmet.

He unlocks and cracks the door open, squinting through the sliver. “What.”

Millie’s already halfway through the door, a suitcase in one hand and her phone in the other. “Why aren’t you wearing pants?” she says. Her voice sounds like she hasn’t had coffee yet. She stares pointedly at the blanket, which Finn tightens around his waist.

He leans into the door frame, trying to block her view inside. “It’s seven-thirty. I wasn’t expecting company.”

She ignores this, swings the suitcase into the tiny entry like she’s claiming territory, and sidesteps past him into the trailer. “Noah’s missing.”

Finn closes his eyes for a full second, lets himself be the most tired version of Finn possible, then pops them open and summons a smile. He closes the door behind Millie, careful so the click doesn’t sound like a slap, and grabs the jeans off the floor without comment. He shimmies into them with a practiced two-step and knots the drawstring so tight it nearly bites through the denim.

“Missing,” Finn repeats, like the word is a new flavor he’s not sure he likes yet. “As in—?”

Millie plants herself at the kitchenette, hands gripping the edge of the counter. “Yesterday, at the party,” she says, “Noah told me he felt weird. Like, really off. So he bailed early and went back to his trailer. Which is fine, except—” She glances at her phone. The screen’s lit up with a text thread that looks like a murder scene: all blue bubbles, no replies. “He hasn’t answered me since. And he’s not opening his door.”

Finn shrugs, tries to play it cool. “Maybe he’s just sleeping it off. Or, like, taking a walk? He does that sometimes, right?” He doesn’t actually know if Noah takes walks, but it sounds plausible and Millie’s the type who needs plausible.

She scoffs. “Not at seven a.m., and not without his phone. Also: the mess hall said he never picked up his breakfast.”

Finn nearly laughs. “Okay, but, like—” He gestures, palm up, inviting Millie to explain why this is his problem. “You’re acting like I’m Noah’s handler. Why are you coming to me with all this?”

Millie’s face does a thing, like she’s about to say something sharp, but instead she just looks at the floor. “He felt bad about leaving your party, Finn. He thought you’d be pissed.” She picks at her thumbnail, worrying it until the skin turns white. “I just figured, you know. If he reached out to anyone, it’d be you.”

Finn’s about to rattle off something snarky about his own reliability as a confidante when Millie’s gaze skitters sideways, past him. “Uh, Finn,” she says, voice flattening. “What the hell is that.”

He follows her look. It’s Reggie, who’s uncorked from his snowball pose and is now upright, ears at half mast, blinking at Millie. Finn clears his throat. “That’s, uh. A bunny.”

Millie narrows her eyes. “I can see that. Why do you have it?” The last word lands with extra pressure, like she’s accusing him of shoplifting from a petting zoo.

Finn tugs the waistband of his jeans higher, feeling the elastic bite. “I…sort of found him yesterday? He was outside, looking cold. Didn’t seem like he belonged to anyone, so I brought him in.”

Millie steps closer to the bunny, squats until her knees pop, and extends a finger. “That’s not just any bunny,” she says. “That’s a Netherland Dwarf, right? Look at the shape of the skull. The ears. I used to have one, but he never looked at me like that.” She leans in, squinting at Reggie’s face. “What’s up with his eyes?”

Finn shrugs, like it’s obvious. “He’s just…intense. Maybe it’s a breed thing?” He tries to sound like he knows what he’s talking about, like he’s not still a little thrown by how Reggie’s gaze seems to drill right into him.

Millie shakes her head. “No. I mean, I’ve seen a lot of rabbits. Like, a lot. And none of them ever looked like they were plotting something.” She gives a tiny snort and stands up, brushing at her knees. “Anyway. I really have to get to the airport, so can you just—” she gestures at Finn, at the trailer, at the general state of things—“go by Noah’s trailer later? Tell him to call me. I don’t care if he’s dead, I need to know he’s not actually dead.”

Finn’s about to tell her she’s being dramatic, but she’s already halfway out the door. She stops, turns back, and snatches her suitcase off the floor. She fires one final glance at Reggie, then at Finn. “And feed that poor thing somethng green, okay?” She’s gone before Finn can respond.

The door slams, rattling the trailer. Finn stands there for a moment, brain processing leftover bits of her presence. He checks his phone. No messages. No missed calls. He wonders, briefly, if Noah’s actually in trouble.

He rubs his temples, glances at the bed, but he’s not getting back in there, not with his pulse doing this. Reggie is nosing at the edge of the backpack barricade with unsettling purpose, those eyes fixed on Finn as if he’s just realized he’s being watched.

He bends down, peels away a flap of masking tape, and scoops up the bunny. Reggie weighs almost nothing. Just a handful of white static, with a velvet nose and preposterous little claws that scrabble against Finn’s palm. He stands, holding the rabbit out just far enough to look it in the face. “What am I supposed to do with you?” he says.

Reggie blinks. Its whiskers tremble.

Finn brings the bunny closer, until their noses almost touch. The rabbit smells like nothing, like the inside of a clean pillowcase, but its warmth is real and immediate. Finn grins. The absurdity of being responsible for this twitchy little life-form is almost enough to make him laugh out loud.

But then the logistics start hammering at him. He has nothing to feed a rabbit. He proves this by rifling through drawers and cabinets until he comes up with a single, ancient granola bar—the kind with a thin chocolate bottom and peanuts glued to the top like a tar pit of allergens. He breaks off a chunk, crumbles it into a palmful of sticky gravel, and offers it to Reggie.

The bunny sniffs at it, does a weird little head jerk, and shoves the food away with its nose, as if personally offended by the suggestion.

“A little diva, huh?” Finn mutters. He holds the chunk out again. Reggie blinks, then shifts his body to face the opposite direction, butt presented in the universal language of no thank you.

Finn snorts. “Fine. We’ll get you the good stuff.”

He sets the bunny back in its lopsided corral, pulls on socks and sneakers, and shrugs into his jacket. He grabs his phone and, after a moment’s consideration, tucks Reggie into the crook of his arm.

Outside, the air is damp and sweet, the sky a flat, milky blue. Finn jogs down the steps and toward the mess hall, which is open but empty except for the woman behind the counter. She’s reading a paperback, lips moving with the words, and doesn’t look up until Finn’s shadow falls across the serving line.

She looks up, still holding her finger on the page like she’s afraid the story will vanish if she lets go. She smiles, wide and real, and for a second Finn feels like he’s done something right today.

“You’re up early,” she says. Her voice is a little rougher than usual, like maybe she’s been up all night or maybe she’s just not a morning person. “Got a flight this morning too?”

He shakes his head. “Not for a few days. I just… got woken up.” He doesn’t say Millie’s name. Doesn’t say Noah’s either. Just lets it hang there, like he’s the kind of guy who wakes up at sunrise for no reason.

She tugs a hair tie off her wrist and knots her hair up. “You want the usual, or…?”

Finn glances down at Reggie, who is staring at the salad bar like it’s a crime scene. “I’m good, but if you have something green? Like, really green?”

She raises her eyebrows, glancing at the bunny. “Who’s your little friend?”

Finn shrugs, tries not to sound weird about it. “Found him outside yesterday. He seemed lost. Now he’s… sort of my roommate.” He pauses, then, casual as he can manage, “You seen Noah around? Or heard anything?”

She shakes her head. “Nope. He’s usually in here by now, though. Maybe he finally slept in for once.”

Finn waits as she disappears into the kitchen. The sound of refrigerator doors, the scrape of a plastic tub. For a second, he stands there, Reggie pressed to his chest.

He rubs his eyes, knuckles digging in. The light in the mess hall is cold and surgical, the kind that makes him aware of every pore.

A plastic container lands on the counter. “Here,” says the woman, sliding out a handful of baby spinach, a few carrot curls, and something that might be a sprig of parsley. “He’s cute. Don’t let him eat chocolate. Or onions.”

Finn shifts Reggie in his arms, the bunny’s nose wriggling at the smell of the salad, and composes his face into that of a person who absolutely already knew that rabbits can’t have chocolate or onions. “Uh, thanks,” he says, and it comes out more sheepish than he means. “Good tip.”
He doesn’t admit he almost gave Reggie a chocolate granola bar less than ten minutes ago.

He tucks the plastic tub under his arm and finds a table in the far corner. He sets Reggie down on the table, careful, and the bunny immediately fluffs up, nose twitching.

The baby spinach goes first. Finn holds out a leaf, and Reggie takes it between his teeth, eyes never leaving Finn’s face, like he’s waiting for Finn to try something. The crunch is so delicate it feels like it should be illegal to watch.

He pulls off a carrot curl, offers it. Reggie considers, then devours it in three violent bites. Finn grins. He lines up the rest of the salad on the table, and Reggie bounces from piece to piece, chewing with single-minded intensity.

It’s distracting in a way Finn didn’t expect. A small, solvable problem in the face of a much larger one.

He leans his head in his hands, elbow on the table. Yawns so hard his jaw clicks. “Well, at least we’ve got a project now,” he mutters. “Operation Find Noah. Reggie, you’re officially my sidekick.” He taps a finger on the table, as if this will make it official.

Detective Finn and Reggie the Wonder Bunny, on the case. He imagines a badge. He imagines a trench coat. He imagines himself not sitting here in a mess hall at 7:55 a.m., inventing reasons to care about a guy who maybe just overslept.

But it’s better than nothing. It’s better than the weird, echoing panic that’s been building in his chest since Millie left. He focuses on the small, white animal, the way Reggie’s ears flick with every sound. The way his mouth works the parsley, shredding it like an office paper shredder.

Finn is about to make a joke about witness intimidation when he hears his own name, clear as a bell, from behind him.

He straightens up so fast he nearly knocks the salad tub off the table. Tries to look normal, like he’s not having a private breakfast with a rabbit. “Yeah?”

Charlie. He comes over, hands in his pockets, hair sticking up in the back like he’s been electrocuted by the morning. He looks at Reggie, then at Finn, and shakes his head.

“Since when are you so…” Charlie trails off.

Finn jumps in. “Early? Long story.” He lifts a shoulder, like maybe there’s a normal explanation. He watches Charlie open his mouth again, ready for the next question, and preempts him: “And this is Reggie,” he adds. “Hey, can I ask you a question? Have you seen Noah since yesterday?”

Charlie blinks, thinks for a second. “No. Not since the party. I saw him coming out of the bathroom, though. He had cake all over his face. Looked kind of…I don’t know. Tired, maybe?”

Finn hums. He pictures Noah asleep in a bathroom stall, drooling frosting onto his sleeve. Not impossible, honestly. He files it away. “Thanks,” he says, and it comes out softer than he means.

Charlie gives him a look, something halfway between a smile and a question, but he doesn’t follow up. He just gives a slow, deliberate nod and heads for the coffee urn. Finn watches him go, feeling oddly abandoned, like Charlie was supposed to do something besides just…leave.

Reggie finishes a last, dramatic bite of carrot, then sits up and licks his paws.

Finn drums his fingers against the table, staring at the bunny. He feels an unfamiliar, electric fizz in his chest, like he’s actually about to do something, which is new and not entirely welcome.

“Well, partner,” he says. “Ready to start our investigation?”

The bunny hops three times—the first two covering distance, the third with a vertical spring that brings him level with Finn’s chest. Finn reacts out of reflex, hands closing around a bundle of electric-white fur.

“Whoa—careful,” Finn says, pressing Reggie close to his chest, unsettled by the way the rabbit’s pulse seems to synchronize with his own. “Guess that’s a yes,” he mutters, half to the bunny, half to the universe that keeps escalating things.

He tucks Reggie into the crook of his arm, grabs the half-empty salad tub, and heads for the exit. The door sticks, as always, and he has to lean his shoulder into it. The morning is even colder than before. Finn shivers, points his steps toward Noah’s trailer.

It’s a two-minute walk, if you don’t count the thirty seconds spent skirting the puddle that’s frozen solid at the foot of the hill. The trailers are lined up like dominoes, each with its own little patch of gravel and a single plastic chair out front. Noah’s trailer is third from the end, the one with the New York Rangers sticker peeling off the door.

Finn slows as he gets closer, scanning for signs of movement. The curtains are drawn. The lights are out. He knocks, knuckles rapping out a pattern that’s meant to sound casual, not desperate. “Noah?”

He imagines the door swinging open—Noah in his perpetual sweatpants, hair a mess, looking like he just rolled out of a cloud, that grin stretched lazy across his face. Finn’s muscles lock in anticipation: the shape of Noah’s eyes, the way they narrow when he’s about to say something dumb. The memory alone cues a jerk of a smile on Finn’s own mouth before he can stop it.

He blinks, twice, and the door stays shut. Silence rings in the space between his heartbeats.

“C’mon, Noah,” Finn says, voice pitched low, like he’s coughing up the words from somewhere deep. He knocks again, this time with the side of his fist. He glances at Reggie, who’s tucked under his jacket now, chin poked out, whiskers trembling in the draft. “You’re making me look stupid in front of my new friend,” he mutters.

He presses his palm against the door, as if he might sense a heartbeat through cheap aluminum. What now? He runs the scenario tree in his head: call Millie, admit defeat, or—

Charlie’s words come back to him: the holding room. Noah leaving the bathroom, cake smeared across his face, looking tired. If there was a clue, it might be there.

Finn pivots and heads across the gravel lot toward the holding room. He tries to walk with purpose—a detective on the job, not a guy in yesterday’s jeans carrying a salad-scented bunny.

The glass in the entryway is still fogged from last night’s damp. Finn pushes through the glass, Reggie snugged in one arm, and is greeted by the room in a state that can only be described as post-catastrophic.

Cups everywhere, plastic stacked up in little pyramids, a weirdly perfect slice of cake abandoned on a plate. Somebody’s going to get yelled at for this, but it won’t be Finn.

He sets Reggie down on the cleanest patch of floor he can find and starts his sweep. The bathroom first. He pushes open the stall door, half-expecting to see Noah drooling on his sleeve, but it’s empty. No shoes poking out from under the door, no weird snoring. Just the echo of his own footsteps.

Finn peers into the trash. Nothing but napkins and a single, tragic party hat. He’s about to give up when something behind a chair catches his eye—a jacket, mustard yellow, slumped with its sleeves inside out like someone ripped it off in a hurry.

He picks it up. When he brings it to his face, he catches that smell again. Blue. Sharp and sweet, not just a color but a feeling, the kind that hits somewhere behind his ribs before his brain can name it.

It’s definitely Noah’s.

Finn feels his shoulders drop, just a little.

He sniffs the jacket again. Just to be sure.

He’s mid-inhale when he realizes he’s doing it, and glances around, embarrassed. The room is empty, but Reggie is staring up at him from the floor, head cocked, eyes unreadable.

Finn frowns. “What are you looking at? I’m confirming it’s evidence. That’s what detectives do.”

Reggie’s gaze narrows, as if he’s conducting a forensic audit of Finn’s soul. Finn looks away, cheeks going hot. There’s no reason to let a rabbit psych him out, but here they are, in a trashed holding room, Finn feeling like he’s just been caught doing something embarrassing. He makes a show of checking the jacket’s pockets.

First, lint. Next, a folded napkin, still sticky with frosting residue. Then—a key.

Finn holds it up, the cheap brass tag glinting in the fluorescent light. Noah’s trailer key.

His stomach drops.

If the key is here, then Noah didn’t use it last night. Or he never made it back at all.

He keeps searching, fingers methodical. His reward: a small envelope, tied with an absurdly neat blue ribbon. Finn’s name is written across the front, Noah’s handwriting unmistakable, the letters slanted and slightly hurried. He realizes he’s holding his breath. He pulls the envelope free with a sharp tug and shoves it deep into his jeans pocket before he can think better of it.

He exhales. The air feels thinner in here. “Okay,” he says, voice scratchy, “let’s get out of here.” He tucks the key into his palm, knuckles whitening.

Reggie, apparently satisfied, gives a single, businesslike twitch of the whiskers.

Finn sweeps the room one last time, but there’s nothing left except half-deflated balloons, a chair with a busted leg, and evidence of a party that already feels like it happened months ago.

He scoops Reggie under one arm, the bunny’s body taut with silent expectation, and moves toward the door, the small, stiff rectangle of the envelope in his pocket suddenly feeling impossibly heavy against his thigh.

Detective Finn and Reggie the Wonder Bunny, leaving the scene of the crime. If anyone asks, they were never here.