Chapter Text
OK, so. I’m shitting my pants now. What a way to die.
Hide was smiling through his fear. Yes, he knew the risks about on field missions, hell! He knew the risks for this mission! But that didn’t stop him. Oh no. He’s going to go head first into the unknown and death. Well, at least he could say he lived a good life. Ha.
The Mado Squad, minus Seidou thank God, was in a parked van outside the scheduled location. Needless to say, it was scary. It didn’t help that they were operating at night.
“It’s bigger than I thought it was going to be,” Hide voiced his opinion. Amon made an hmph of acknowledgement and Akira just typed away.
“You know,” Amon started. “It’s not too late to back down. I wouldn’t think any less of you-”
“I would,” Akira interrupted. “And I wouldn’t be able to look you in the eye with all the disappointment.” Akira swirled around on her chair and faced Hide, her neutral face not betraying any emotion. Hide shivered.
“I-I got’cha.”
“Good,” Akira faced her computer once more. “You’ll start round the back.” She pointed at her computer and Hide moved closer, listening closely to Akira like his life depended on it. Technically it did, but that’s not the point here. “There’s a basement door at the back. If by any chance there’s a padlock or chains, just cut it with the pliers.” Hide nodded.
“When you’re in, find the stairs and head to the second floor.”
“Why the second floor?” Hide asked.
“My sensors picked up low electric currents coming from that floor. My guess is that one room there has computers,” Akira explained.
“Remember Hide, you go in and collect information. No getting carried away or exploring unnecessary parts,” Amon glanced at the blonde. Hide nodded. Amon smiled a bit and took his seat at his computer.
It was time for Hide to depart.
Hide was clothed in black. Black shirt, black trousers, black shoes, black gloves, hell! Even a black beanie! Well, blonde hair does stand out, so it is understandable why he’s wearing one. He was equipped with pliers, as promised, a Bluetooth headset, a phone, a USB stick and a head torch. Oh, let’s not forget a handgun. You know, just in case all went to shit, Hide at least could protect himself. Well, now that Hide was feeling energized with determination and stupidity, off he went.
It really felt like one of spy films Hide watched and loved, but now, he’s actually playing it. It’s all fun and games until someone kills you, which Hide did not want. Yet he still took that job at the CCG, even wanted to go on field mission! Well, he shouldn’t complain, he got what he wanted. So, it’s alright. He guess.
-Hide-
Boy did he jump. Hide quickly placed a hand over his heart, trying to calm it.
“Akira! Don’t do that again! You scared me,” he hissed.
-So you can hear me?-
“Yes. I thought we checked this before I left.”
-Just making sure. Are you at the doors?-
“Almost.”
Hide turned a corner and saw the doors for the basement. He was not looking forward to going down there. He’s watched enough horror movies to know where that’s going. He quietly walked up to it, noticing chains wrapped around the handles with a padlock securely on it.
“Damn, padlock.”
-Quietly cut it-
“Wasn’t gonna have any other way,” Hide muttered.
Hide freed the pliers from his belt and held the end to the padlock. Slowly he applied pressure, waiting for that clank. It came, but it wasn’t silent. The padlock slid down the doors onto the ground, with the chains rattling as they came undone and followed the padlock to the floor. After that little fiasco, Hide still stood in the same position, pliers in hand and face blank from emotion, sweating bullets.
-Please tell me that’s not your definition for quiet-
Akira’s voice broke Hide’s trance.
“Well- I… No?” Hide stuttered. Akira sighed.
-Just go in-
Hide equally sighed. I guess I’m not going on any missions for a while. He opened one of door, coughing away the dust that escaped the down below. Hide switched his head torch on, staring down at the stairs of doom.
“I’m going in.”
Well, locating the stairs was harder than Hide anticipated. Not only that, but it reeked. Hide pulled up his shirt to cover his poor nose. Looking around, there was a lot of empty shelving units, all lined up like in a warehouse. They were all as tall as two Amon’s. They were old and rusty, Hide was surprised they were still standing.
There was literally nothing on the shelves as Hide walked through. He didn’t know how big the room was, but he was getting an idea. Looking around, he tried to find some sort of indication of a door, but the light would just stretch into the darkness of more shelving units. He was hoping to run into a wall and just trail it, but not even a wall was visible. Akira’s voice buzzed in.
-Find the stairs yet?-
“No. I can’t even find a wall.”
-I’m getting an idea of your surroundings. On the next junction, turn left and just carry on. I’m certain there will be a door-
“You sure? I mean, I’m like lost. Like, right now.”
-Don’t worry. The computer is generating the room the more you keep walking-
“I hope.” Hide really did. The smell sort of disappeared, but he still wants to leave. Hide walked until the next junction and turned left, exactly as Akira said. He just hopes that there’s a door at the end of the path.
Well, what do you know? A door.
“A door,” Hide breathed.
-Were you doubting me?-
“No- No! Of course not! I-”
-Keep quiet. You don’t know if Aogiri pests are here-
“I understand. Sorry.”
-It’s OK. Just get past the door and find some stairs-
“Yes ma’am,” Hide saluted, even though Akira couldn’t see, he felt she knew he did it. He looked at the door and found that there was no handle. Great, an electric door. Better hope there’s still power in it to open. Hide find an electronic lock besides the door, showing the numbers and a small screen on top of that. Fishing out his phone, he quickly went to work.
Switching the phone on, Hide smirk. Hacking was his talent. And this was going to be a piece of cake. The phone supplied by Akira is a CCG make and their own software for hacking. Not as great as Hide’s, but it does the job. Tapping the app, Hide hovered the phone over the lock, waiting for it to gather information. After a short few seconds, the phone finished up and showed four numbers in order. Sweet. Tapping the correct numbers and the door slowly opening, Hide was out of here.
Basically, more horror stuff. A long, dark corridor with shut doors was each side. Great. This is how I die.
“Akira, you there?”
-I’m always here Hide. Any problems?-
“No, just. Getting to the stairs is a lot more complicated than I thought.”
-This must be some sub ground floor. Continue on your right. Then, when you hit the end, go left. Understand?-
“Yeah. Turn right. Hit the end and go left. What’s there not to get?”
-Good. You wouldn’t believe the type of morons I had to work with who couldn’t understand that much-
Hide giggled. It was nice hearing some funny stuff to lighten the mood and Hide really appreciated Akira for trying.
“To think they couldn’t understand the Akira Mado. Shame on them.”
-Ha ha. Laugh it up Hide. You at the stairs yet?-
“Yeah. Luckily it goes all the way up and not just one floor.” Hide was right. The stairs penetrated all the floors all the way up to the fifth floor. At least he wouldn’t have to go searching for more stairs.
Reaching the second floor was no adventure in itself. Luckily. Hide did not know what would have happened if he ran into trouble. Or worse, an Aogiri member. Yeah right. What could they do? Hack me? A snort escaped from his mouth. Who was he kidding? They’ll probably kill him. Yeah, maybe I should stop watching those movies for a while.
Walking down the long, empty, creepy, dark, I could go on but I won't. Jesus I want to get out of here. Hide opened every door that he saw, but in every one there was nothing but abandoned tables, chairs and a few shelving units. But no computers. Hide was beginning to wonder if Akira’s sensors were right. He was almost at the end of the corridor where it splits off in two directions. Hide really didn't want to venture further if trouble does come, since he’ll have a difficult time remembering where the exit is, since everything looks the damn same.
Hide entered the last room before he would have to make a decision to go either left or right and go deeper into the lion's den, he was relieved to find a room stacked with computers.
“Akira, I found the computers.”
-Well done Hide. Hopefully one of those computers should be on-
“Yeah, hopefully,” said Hide.
Hide walked into the dusty, dark room and looked around for any computers with a green or orange light on or a low humming sound. On the fourth row to his left, right at the end a computer was humming. Perfect. Hopefully it'll switch on. Walking towards it, Hide leaned down and switched the power button on. The computer screen shone to life.
Hide waited for the computer to bring him to the desktop, which did take a while mind you, he looked around the place. It just looks like a normal computer room you find in offices and libraries. In all honesty, Hide didn't know what he was expecting, just nothing, ordinary like this.
The computer finally loaded and showed a quite empty desktop. I'm surprised it didn't ask me for any login. Maybe they weren't expecting an outsider to come and casually use their computers. Hide wasn't surprised by how little the computer as. Guess they cleared everything away. There were a few notes here and there, the Internet and a couple of normal software you find on any computers nowadays, but nothing out of the ordinary. Or even information. Might as well look at the notes left behind.
Ayato, I told you to feed the prisoners.
Yeah, yeah, I'll do it. We're running out of food, you know.
I'll tell someone to do that.
Well, Hide thought. That was interesting. He rolled his eyes and clicked on another note.
Kanou is getting excited.
Yeah, heard his lab rat came in. Heard he was a success.
Yeah but, now what? What can he possibly do now?
Extract results and repeat it? I don't know. I’m no doctor.
Well, whatever it is, I'm not gonna be near him. He's a fucking creep.
“Akira?”
-Yes Hide-
“Ever heard of a Doctor Kanou?”
The line was quiet with a faint sound of a keyboard being used.
-Yes. He was a medical doctor who worked with the CCG for a while. Then he suddenly vanished. Guess this is where he disappeared to-
“Nothing on experimenting on people?” Hide questioned.
-... No. Nothing. He must have hidden very well to conduct those and not raise suspicion. Getting people who are invisible to the world. If he did experiments. Hide, that’s a bold statement, are you sure he did that?-
“Yeah, the people here in Aogiri were scared of him. Makes you think.”
-Yes. Well, as least you found something. Keep looking, don’t skip anything out-
“Got’cha!” Hide pressed on, opening the second to last note.
Dude, did you see him?
Who, that white haired kid?
Yeah. Try’na act hard and scary when he’s nothing. I can easily take him down.
Ha ha. Attempt it, you’re scared of him.
What?! No! ...No. He may be a success, doesn’t mean he
He what? Hide questions. There was nothing else on the note apart from what he read. Who was the white-haired person? Were they important? And why did the note cut off there? So many questions, so little answers. It’s starting to hurt my head. Onto the last note it seems. Hopefully there Hide will get some answers.
He’s been reluctant, but that’ll soon stop. He’s going to give up eventually.
That’s good to hear. After it becomes a success, we’ll be able to make more. Keep me inform about him.
I will.
“Who…” He whispered to himself. Is that it? Really? After all of this, I came for four vague notes? Great accompaniment Hide. Your parents will be proud. Sighing, he ruffled his hair, staring at the desktop. Might as well copy those onto the USB stick. Reaching for his small pouch, he grabbed the USB and stuck it into the computer. When the file pop up, he selected all the notes and dragged them into the empty file. Hide decided to look through the computer's files to see if there was anything else hidden inside.
After a few minutes of clicking around and finding empty folders, Hide sighed in defeat. There was literally nothing on this computer. Probably nothing on the others too. Looking at the computer again, he noticed that the bin had something in it. Strange. Wouldn't that be empty? Clicking on it, Hide finds a nameless folder. He restored it to the desktop and clicked to see if there was anything inside of it. Only a little icon with a blank paper and underneath it is ‘.exe’. Empty. No title or header. Just a blank .exe.
“Must be a virus,” He muttered to himself. Well, I’m interested in what it is. It’ll only affect this computer. Hide knew the risks of clicking on a .exe files, but if it gets him answers, literally anything, he’ll be super happy.
After activating it, the mouse just kept it’s loading icon. Nothing was happening. Hide clicked it again. Again, it was loading. Just what was loading? Man, Hide didn’t have time for all of this waiting. Moving his mouse, he hovered over the Start button to shut it down.
Suddenly, a window opened with a black background and white binary appeared, slowly cascaded down the window. As quickly as it appeared, the whole window disappeared. After a few seconds passed, a new window appeared, this time showing a singular, blood red iris against a black background. There was no writing, no numbers, nothing. Just that picture.
“A Ghoul.” Hide stared at the screen, paralyzed. He honestly didn’t expect an actual Ghoul virus to be here. Still staring, the windows disappeared. As quick as humanly possible, Hide copied that file into the USB folder and shutdown the computer. Letting himself breathe a bit, Hide reached for his ear piece and started talking.
“Akira.”
-Yes Hide? You sound out of breath. Did something happen?-
“Well no, but yes. Yes, something did happen, something big.”
-What is it?-
“I found a Ghoul virus.”
The line went dead silent. This was the purpose of the CCG. Eliminating Ghoul’s for a better and safer world. Obviously, it’ll be a big thing. Question is, now what? Without the proper equipment and correct software, Hide can’t destroy this Ghoul. The only thing he can do is confined it and hope for the best.
-Hide, you still there?-
“I’m always here Akira.”
-OK, what did you do with it?-
“I copied it onto the USB stick. It didn’t do anything to the computer so I’m guessing its program has already fulfilled its purpose,” Hide explained.
-Sounds possible. Well, with this, we can see what makes a Ghoul virus tick. Good job Hide-
“That’s what I was thinking. Thank you,” smiling, Hide made his way out of the room and down the corridor to the stairs. Luckily, the way out was a lot quicker than the way in. Finally emerging from the basement, Hide lightly jogged to van. Quickly getting in, the van rumbled to life and drove away from the building.
“Good job Hide,” Amon approached Hide, giving him a light pat on the back. Hide sheepishly smiled, rubbing the back of his neck.
“Thank you, Amon-san. I tried my best.”
“You found something of value. You should be proud of yourself,” Akira had her arms cross, but a small smile broke on her face.
“I did’ya proud, right Akira-san?” Glancing towards her, eyebrow wriggling.
“You sure did,” Akira stood up and rubbed a knuckle onto Hide’s head. Crying out in pain, Hide jumped backwards, rubbing the abused patch on his head.
“Well, enough of the praise, down to business,” Amon said. “Since Hide found a Ghoul, we’ll have to take extra precaution towards it. Afterall, it might be a trap.”
“It was held in the rubbish bin,” Hide pointed out.
“You always need to be on your guard. No matter where you find it,” Amon’s eyes narrowed. Hide meekly nodded. “Anyway, we should tell Washuu-san of your findings. After that, we write the report.”
Hide groaned. He hated writing reports. it was the next thing to breathing in the CCG. Reports were 85% of the CCG job. He wasn’t joking.
“What sort of Ghoul was it?” Akira asked.
Hide looked confused at Akira. “I didn’t know there were different ones.”
“Well, there are, but most of them are based and made with the same purpose.”
“I see,” Hide looked away, thinking. “I don’t know. I haven’t really encountered a Ghoul before, so I wouldn’t know.” Hide looked at Akira again. “Sorry if it doesn’t help.”
“It’s OK. You’re one step closer to becoming an Investigator,” Akira closed the gap between them and patted Hide’s shoulder, smiling softly.
“Thank you, Akira. That means a lot.” And he genuinely meant it. Being praised by one of the best Investigator is an honour in itself.
“We’re almost at the building. You have your USB ready?” Amon side glanced.
“Yeah, all here,” Hide patted his little pouch, feeling the USB stick there.
Standing in Washuu Yoshitoki office was menacing enough, but having him stare at you was whole other feeling. Hide was to get out, now. Amon looked unfazed, having done these multiple times, he was unaffected. Lucky. At least give me some of that confidence or something. Both Amon and Washuu were talking. Hide heard bits and pieces there, but all in all, he was trying not to show his uneasiness. He was succeeding, somehow. Him sweating didn’t help though.
“Nagachika.” Fast as lightning, Hide flipped his head to look at the man behind the desk. He was lucky he didn’t get any whiplash from that.
“Yes,” Hide answered, not giving away any nervousness.
“Amon said you found a Ghoul virus. That’s very rare. Especially since it came from an Aogiri base.” Washuu continued to look at Hide. “Ghoul’s are hard to come by these days. I’m mildly surprised someone of your rank found one so easily.”
He doesn’t believe me, Hide inwardly cursed. Of course, why would he? It’s quite a bold statement to make, so it’s understandable why he doesn’t him. Hopefully when he shows the file from the USB to him, he’ll change his mind.
“I have the USB I used. Here,” Hide held out the USB stick out to Washuu, hoping he’ll take it. He did. And plugged it in his computer.
“S-Sir! You are sure? You don’t want to wait and-” Amon’s worry was cut off.
“My computer is highly secured. Even if I activate it, it won’t have anywhere to go. This computer is separate from the rest of the computers here.”
Hide gulped. Hopefully he doesn’t look like a fool here. What if it was a fake? What if it didn’t copy properly? I should have thought of these before I went with Amon and presented that USB stick.
The room was silent. The only sound was the clicking of the mouse. Hide was sweating again.
“Are you sure it was this USB you used?” Washuu’s deep voice broke the dead silence.
“Y-Yes. I was only provided one,” Hide stuttered. He cursed himself for that.
“It’s not here.” Hide immediately walked towards the computer in shock. What?! That doesn’t make sense! I copied it! Hide inner terminal wasn’t helped when he saw the open file of the USB and showed nothing. No .exe file, not even the notes he copied.
“That… That’s impossible. It was all there,” Hide’s eyes were wide in shocked. He couldn’t believe it, everything was gone. His hard work, all for nothing. Now Washuu will definitely not believe him. He’ll be conned a liar and be a laughing stock to the whole CCG. I don’t fucking believe it.
“Did your antivirus maybe get rid of it or something? I’m certain everything was there-”
“That’s enough,” Washuu was clearly not impressed. Hide shut his mouth. He made his way back to Amon, head hanging in shame.
“Since there’s nothing here, you two are dismissed.” Washuu unplugged the USB and threw it towards Amon, catching it swiftly with one hand. Amon lead Hide out of the office and towards the office room.
It was a quiet walk for the both of them. Both of them in deep thought. It was Hide who broke the silence.
“I don’t understand,” he started. “It was all there. How could it have just disappeared?”
“Maybe the virus deleted them, then itself,” Amon answered.
“I just- How could- I don’t know,” he sighed in defeat. Amon lightly patted Hide’s shoulder in comfort. He knows this hurt Hide, but what can he do? Thinking back, he did get the USB back, maybe that’ll help somehow?
“I have the USB stick. Would you like to keep it?” Amon asked. Hide looked up towards Amon.
“You sure? I don’t think I’m allowed to take CCG property home.”
“It’s a special case,” Amon averted his eyes, looking ahead. “It’s not like there’s anything on it anyway.” Amon smiled slightly, hoping for Hide to catch on. Hide, of course, caught on immediately. Smirking, he held out his hand and received the USB from Amon, tucking it safely into his pocket.
“Just don’t tell Akira.”
“I won’t. Thank you, Amon-san.” Hide began to walk a bit faster, overtaking Amon before he was stopped by him.
“Hide,” Amon said. “You’re relieved. You can go home and rest. You had a busy day. Well, night now.”
“You sure?” Hide questioned, eyebrow raised.
“Yes, you have three days off to write your report.”
Hide’s eyes sparkled. “Really? Thank you so much!” He did what Hide did, he hugged Amon. Amon of course returned it awkwardly, not really liking the close contact from the younger male. After that beautiful hug, Hide ran off, waving goodbye to Amon.
At least when Hide gets home, he’ll be able to find out what happened to the missing notes. And of course, the missing Ghoul virus.