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Then.
They sleep in cold beds.
Like all things at The Institution, sleeping is simply another task. They are allotted four hours for each twenty-four hour period – enough to rest their minds, yet not so much that they begin to indulge slothful habits. The mattresses are firm and the pillows crunch when they lay their heads on them. The sheets are crisp and white, sterilized. They are not uncomfortable, but they are left wanting for something that they cannot identify: an affectionate warmth that they have never known.
His first night at The Institution, Twelve goes to bed shivering. He doesn’t remember where he slept before he was brought here, or how he slept, or whether he was cold or warm, but he knows that he has never been as frigid as he is this night. It feels as though the cold is seeping through the barrier of his skin and infecting his insides, chilling his heart. His teeth chatter painfully against one another, and when he draws his knees to his chest in an attempt to conserve his body heat, his stiff joints creak in protest.
Twelve begins to cry.
His sobs tear through his chest, ugly animal sounds that threaten to wake the other children. He presses his face into his pillow in an attempt to muffle the sound, but the ragged breaths that he is drawing demand ample access to air. Desperate as he is to remain quiet, he is not willing to suffocate to save his pride.
“Hey.”
At the sound of a voice he looks up from his pillow, his tear-stained cheeks shining in the dull white light seeping through the crack under the door. From the bed beside him a dark-haired boy peers at Twelve, thick-framed glasses resting on the pillow beside the boy’s head, his expression blank and noncommittal.
Twelve sniffs. “What?”
“Stop crying.”
“Oh.” Twelve scrunches his face up as more tears stream down his cheeks, trying to get his breathing under control. He’s embarrassed to have been caught, and he’s lonely and cold. He wants to leave. He doesn’t have anything to return to, but that would still be better than this. “Sorry.”
“You need to sleep,” the other boy says, drawing himself up onto his elbow. Twelve notices that this boy is tall; he’s probably about two years older than Twelve is, enough so that he commands at least four more inches of height. “You’re new, right? Have you been evaluated yet?”
Sniff. “Evaluated how?”
“Everyone here has been evaluated. They give you a bunch of tests, and if you do okay you’re put in one class, if you do well you’re put in another class, and if you do super well you’re put in a different class.” The older boy frowns. “You should’ve been evaluated as soon as you got here. If not, they’re probably going to do it tomorrow. You’ll want to be well-rested.”
“Have you been evaluated?” Sniff. “How long have you been here?”
“I’m in the top class.” Twelve expects the older boy to smirk, to show some kind of pride or arrogance, but both his voice and his expression remain flat. Like all of the people at The Institution, he is void of individuality. He is colorless and blank. “It’s been a year for me.”
A year, Twelve thinks, is far too long. He can barely endure another day. He can’t imagine having to live here for a whole year's worth of days. “What do they call you?”
“I’m Nine.”
Twelve doesn’t understand why, but hearing this other boy’s ‘name,’ knowing that he isn’t the only one with a number, relieves him. He allows himself to smile. “Hi, Nine. I’m—”
“—Twelve. I know.” In the dark it’s hard to tell, but Twelve thinks that Nine almost looks startled. “It’s easy to learn the names around here. There were eleven of us before you came, so it wasn’t hard to guess what they would call you.”
“So does that mean the others—?”
“—are one through eleven, yeah. Go to sleep now.” Nine throws himself back onto his pillow, the mystery material from which it is made crunching in protest. He shuts his eyes tight and pulls his blanket up to his chin, and Twelve takes that to mean that they’re done talking. He doesn’t mind, though, not really, because all of a sudden he doesn’t feel quite so alone. In this foreign world of cold, unfeeling adults who address the children only when it is absolutely necessary and take every opportunity to reiterate the meaning of the word ‘task,’ Twelve is comforted by the knowledge that there is another thinking, breathing child just feet away from him.
The cold inside his chest doesn’t seem quite so icy after that.
He tries to sleep, honest. He closes his eyes and stretches out his stiff body, tries to let his mind wander. He imagines a faceless woman with thick blonde curls scooping him up in her arms, and he calls her ‘mother’ and she plants warm, soft kisses on his cheeks and smells like fresh-baked bread. She doesn’t exist, not as far as Twelve knows, but the idea of her comforts him. He likes to think that his mother is out there somewhere, waiting and wondering, aching for her son the way her son aches for her. Usually, thoughts of her can put Twelve to sleep. But not tonight.
Tonight, nerves zing through his body, making his stomach tight, making his mind stay awake despite knowing that he desperately needs sleep. The word ‘evaluation’ is rattling about his brain, and he can’t keep himself from fearing the worst. What if he fails? What will they do to him? Take him back to where they found him, filthy and wandering? Or will it be like it is in the stories, when the cruel adults dispose of the unwanted children? He isn’t wholly sure how old he is, but he knows it’s too soon for him to die. The idea of it seizes him with fear, makes his chest feel tight and his breaths come faster. The only thing that keeps him from crying is the promise that he makes to himself just as the lights come up: ‘I will not fail.’
And he doesn’t.
No one tells Twelve his score, but after his evaluation one of the adults walks him toward a classroom. He can’t tell for sure, but this adult seems kinder than the ones Twelve met before. She is pretty and tall, with light brown hair pulled into a short ponytail and a smile that makes her seem like a sister. She holds Twelve’s hand on the way to the classroom. Her skin is warm.
When the door opens before them, Twelve is greeted by the sight of two children seated at large desks with textbooks open before them, a grown-up man in a lab coat standing at a chalkboard in the front of the room. One of the children is tall with dark hair and thick-framed glasses. He looks up at the sound of Twelve’s entrance. Nice Lady and Lab Coat Man start talking, and Twelve doesn’t know what to do, so he smiles at Nine. Nine does not smile back.
The other student is a girl. Her hair is white and her eyes are purple, and she scares Twelve. He’s never seen a person who looked like that before, and with her pale skin and her white hospital-like uniform, Twelve thinks that this girl looks like she belongs here. Like everything else, she is washed out and plain.
“Introduce yourself,” Lab Coat Man says brusquely, “I’ve already set up your books. Hurry so we can continue the lesson.”
Twelve feels a lump rise in his throat. Lab Coat Man scares him a little bit, and Nice Lady is already retreating out the door, leaving him alone again in this room full of strangers. He realizes then that the hours of testing he had undergone earlier that morning had distracted him from the terrifying, fish-out-of-water sensation that plagued him since yesterday afternoon, when he first stepped through the glass doors of The Institution. Now, with nothing but the unknown before him, he remembers to be afraid.
“On with it,” Lab Coat Man says roughly. His eyebrows knit together in frustration. The other children watch patiently with unfeeling eyes.
“I’m…” Twelve starts. He tries to look at Nine, but he’s embarrassed and he isn’t sure why. So instead, he casts his eyes to the floor and shuffles his feet. “I’m Twelve.”
“Hi, Twelve!” the girl speaks, and her voice his bright. He looks up at her, surprised to find her is smiling. He can’t help but smile back. “I’m Five!”
“Hi, Five.” Twelve thinks that maybe he was wrong in judging this girl. She is startling to look at, but when she smiles her eyes twinkle. Twelve isn’t sure how old she is.
Her friendliness gives him the courage to look over to Nine, who is still watching with a blank expression. Before him sits an open notebook with a page nearly full of notes. Twelve isn’t sure, but it looks like Nine is writing in numbers. “Hi, Nine.”
In response, Twelve receives a curt nod.
“Your seat is to Nine’s right,” Lab Coat Man says. “We’re on page five-hundred ninety-two of Computer Structure and Theory. Keep up.”
Hesitantly, Twelve stumbles over to his desk. There he finds a pile of books, each with a corresponding notebook. There are pencils sitting beside the notebooks. The pencils do not have erasers.
His second night at the Institution, Twelve goes to bed shivering. But on his second night, his teeth don’t chatter. He does not cry. Instead, he keeps his eyes open and trained on Nine. They are facing each other, and although Nine has his eyes closed, Twelve can tell that he isn’t asleep. Only about twenty minutes after ‘lights out,’ Nine opens his eyes, his expression accusatory.
“What do you want?” he hisses.
“How come you didn’t talk to me today?” Twelve whispers back.
“We don’t talk in class.”
“How come?”
“Try it and you’ll find out.”
Twelve frowns. “You could’ve at least smiled. Five smiled.”
Nine’s eyes widen at that. When he speaks again, his voice is harsh and serious. Twelve remembers a little bit of his fear. “Listen to me. Don’t make friends with her, okay?”
“How come? She was nice!”
“Just don’t!” Nine’s voice rises, and one of the other children in the room stirs, but does not awaken. Nine casts a cautious glance about the room before turning back to Twelve and lowering his voice. “I’ve been here longer than you. I know things that you don’t know. Trust me. You don’t want to be her friend.”
“Well then, can I be your friend?”
“No.”
Twelve huffs in frustration. “Can I be anyone’s friend?”
For a moment, Nine is silent. When he speaks again, he seems reserved, withdrawn. Twelve gets the sense that he has done something wrong, though he can’t begin to imagine what it was. “Not if you don’t want to hurt.”
That doesn’t make sense to Twelve, so he presses on. “If you don’t want to be my friend, then why do you keep talking to me?”
Nine frowns. “Why do you keep talking to me?”
“Because I want a friend!” Twelve says, his brows knitting together. His toes are so cold he’s sure he’ll lose feeling in them. He has his arms wrapped around his stomach, and all of a sudden he feels like he’ll be sick. “I want at least one friend. I don’t… I don’t want to be alone.”
Something in Nine’s expression changes then. Twelve thought that the older boy had only one expression, but even in the dark he can notice the way that Nine’s eyes and posture soften. Again, he considers his response for a while before speaking. “Okay. I’ll be your friend. But you have to promise me something.”
“Anything!” Twelve gasps. He feels a euphoric rush of disbelief cloud his thoughts. In this unfamiliar place, surrounded by unfamiliar people, the promise of having someone to talk with, to confide in, is sweeter than anything Twelve could possibly imagine. He had been told to abandon his friends from before The Institution, to abandon who he had been before. His new life would begin at The Institution, he was told. He would have the excitement of doing everything for the first time, all over again.
As far as Twelve is concerned, Nine is his first friend.
“Don’t talk to me at night anymore. We only get four hours of sleep, and I intend to use every second.”
Twelve pouts at that, and his hesitation makes Nine repeat himself. “Promise.”
“Okay, fine.” Twelve sighs and presses his cheek into his pillow, drawing his blanket up to his chin, trying to make himself small. “I promise.”
“Good.” Nine closes his eyes then, signaling another end to another conversation. Before he has a chance to drift off, though, Twelve speaks again.
“Hey Nine?”
“What?” Nine growls.
“Goodnight.”
The pause that follows is so long that Twelve is sure Nine just ignored him and decided to fall asleep anyway. Just as he teeters on the edge of unconsciousness, sweet fantasies of a nonexistent mother pulling him deep into the land of his dreams, he hears the tentative reply: “Goodnight, Twelve.”
The following day is Twelve’s first structured activity period in which the children are made to perform a physical task instead of an intellectual one. Where most structured activity periods involve things like puzzles, word games, and number games, that day’s activities take place in the small courtyard just outside The Institution’s doors, the tall, chain-link fence bordering the courtyard humming threateningly. Beside the door stands an army of staff members, coolly observing as the children run in circles about the perimeter of the fence.
Twelve has to fight to keep up with Nine, whose longer legs allow him to cover a greater distance than Twelve in the same amount of time. He doesn’t mind, though; in fact, he finds that he enjoys the physical work far more than the intellectual, his body feeling free for the first time since his arrival. He remembers the way that he used to run before The Institution, chasing his friends down dirty and crowded streets, slipping coins from the pockets of passersby whenever the opportunity presented itself. They would play at the game for hours, darting through alleyways, climbing up scaffolding. It was taxing, but it was fun.
But here, now, Twelve has only Nine, running steadily and quietly beside him, the weight of their new friendship hanging heavy in the space between them. Twelve isn’t sure if he’s supposed to say something, isn’t sure if Nine agreeing to be his friend meant to Nine what it meant to Twelve. He casts a few cautious glances toward the other boy, questions and comments and little pieces of conversation dancing on the tip of his tongue but never making it past his lips. When he finally accepts that the two will run in silence and gives a forlorn sigh, glancing beyond the links of the fence in an attempt to see beyond The Institution, to imagine the freedom of what lay beyond the horizon, Nine speaks.
“Is there something you want?”
Twelve stumbles a little. “No – ah, um, I just – well –!”
Nine gives Twelve an irritated, sideways glance. “Why do you keep looking at me?”
Nine is direct, and Twelve is having a little difficulty adjusting to that. In fact, almost everyone at The Institution is uncomfortably direct – they don’t insinuate or imply so much as they tell you the exact words going through their minds at the exact moment those words occur to them. It’s unusual, but Twelve figures that if Nine gets to be direct, then Twelve does, too – albeit a little petulantly. “I was wondering if I’m allowed to talk to you or not.”
“Why wouldn’t you be?”
“The last time I tried to talk to you, you got mad at me.”
“That’s because I was trying to sleep.”
“So I can talk to you now without you getting mad?”
“That depends on what you say.”
Twelve pouts. “I don’t even know where to start.”
Nine doesn’t seem to have an answer for that, so Twelve retreats back into silence and tries to ignore the way his muscles are starting to fatigue. He thinks about how good the crisp, clean air of the outside tastes in his throat, or the way he can feel the heat of Nine’s skin when their arms occasionally brush together. He focuses on the way that Nine’s presence beside him is already comforting and familiar, despite the fact that their friendship is in its infancy. They know so little about each other, yet among all of the children at The Institution, they are probably two of the closest. Knowing that – knowing that Nine has lived at The Institution for over a year yet Twelve is his first, real friend – gives Twelve the courage to keep talking.
“A few years ago, one of my friends and I got caught by the police,” he mutters. He knows that talking about life before The Institution is strictly against the rules, but Twelve has never been one to follow the rules anyway. He just makes sure to drop his voice extra low when they jog by the staff. “We were orphans, all of us, and the homeless people in Shinjuku just kind of adopted us, I guess. I don’t remember ever living anywhere else, anyway.
“So the police caught us, and they took us down to the police station and asked us who our parents were. But we didn’t have any parents, which was the problem. We had no idea what to say, so we just looked at each other, and neither of us said anything.” Twelve smiles fondly, the blurry memory coming to the front of his mind. Some of the details are a little fuzzy now, like what his friend looked like or what his friend’s name even was, but those aren’t as important. The heart of the story remains clear in Twelve’s mind, and so long as he can hold onto that, he will be happy.
“They ended up deciding that they were just going to take us to the orphanage and be done with it, which worked out really well for us. We ran away as soon as we got there. They tried chasing us for a little while, but we were faster than they were. That was one of the best days of my life.”
Nine is silent for a long time. Twelve could almost think that Nine is ignoring him, but the way that Nine’s eyebrows are knit tightly together and the way his lips are pressed into a tight line suggests otherwise. More and more, Twelve is starting to think that Nine is just someone who chooses his words very carefully.
The reply comes just as one of the staff members blows a whistle, indicating that the children can stop their running. Whistle Man steps forward and begins demonstrating proper “cool down” stretches just as Nine begins to speak. “Why?”
Twelve tilts his head. “Why what?”
“Why was that one of the best days of your life?”
Twelve tilts his head toward the sky in contemplation, arching his spine backwards with considerably more flexibility than the staff member giving the demonstrations. “I guess…I guess it’s because I was doing what I wanted to do. I was with my friend, and we were living our lives the way we wanted to. Not according to other people.”
“Why did you tell me that story?”
A smile spreads across Twelve’s lips, Nine’s ‘why, why’s amusing him for whatever reason. He likes talking to Nine, likes that Nine can make him smile without really trying. In this place, he thinks, I need a reason to smile. “Because you’re my friend.”
The mile-deep crease in Nine’s forehead creases a little deeper. “So?”
Twelve hums. “Well, when you’re friends with someone, you want them to be happy, right? That’s one of my happiest memories, so I thought maybe if I told you, it would make you happy, too. I guess.”
Once the explanation is out, it sounds absurd, even to Twelve. He and Nine haven’t established how much sharing is too much; they have drawn no boundaries, so it is impossible for Twelve to know if he is crossing a line. He bites his lip nervously and looks away from Nine, bending forward at his waist like Whistle Man is yelling at him to do. He presses his forearms to the ground, surprised to see that the children around him can barely manage to connect their fingertips to their toes.
“Thank you.” Nine murmurs. Twelve glances back over at him only to find that Nine has redirected his gaze, clearly trying to look anywhere but at Twelve, a light pinkish color spreading across his pale cheeks. “For your story. I enjoyed it.”
“Ah, really?” Twelve can feel the warmth of relief spread through his chest, relaxing him. “I’m really happy, then!”
“It makes me think…” Nine starts, then shakes his head.
“What?”
“Nothing, never mind. It wasn’t important.”
“Nine,” Twelve starts, his tone reproachful despite the ridiculous pout on his face. “Friends don’t keep secrets.”
Nine sighs, glances at Twelve, then looks back at the ground. His blush is fading, replaced by a look of uncertainty. This is a critical moment for their budding relationship, Twelve knows. He can feel the importance of the decision Nine is weighing, can sense that if Nine confides in him, it will push them forward. But if Nine decides not to, well.
“I was going to say,” Nine whispers, righting himself in sync with Whistle Man and reaching around to pull his right foot against the small of his back, demonstrating as limited flexibility as Whistle Man, “that it makes me think of something I would like to do. Soon.”
Twelve just gapes at that. The meaning is not lost on him. In fact, as far as breaking the rules goes, Twelve thinks that Nine has just broken the most important rule there is. The children are strictly forbidden from even thinking about leaving The Institution, let alone talking about it. But Nine’s expression is schooled back into something noncommittal and uncaring, and Twelve doesn’t know how to react. He’s about to reply, about to say something stupid like we could or I’ll help you, when Whistle Man blows his whistle aggressively and motions for the children to begin lining up. Nine moves away immediately to take his place beside Ten, and it is all Twelve can do to fall into place behind him, beside Eleven. He wants to say something, wants to somehow let Nine know that he understood and that he thinks maybe they can swing something, but their structured activity period is over and the staff members would never let them speak. So on a whim, quickly so that Whistle Man and his little minions don’t notice, Twelve reaches up and pinches Nine’s side.
Immediately Twelve glances over at Eleven, afraid that she’ll raise her voice and tattle and tell the staff members that Twelve and Nine are plotting something awful, but she shows no sign of having noticed. Her blank blue eyes stare forward apathetically, her posture so perfect and still she hardly even looks alive.
Breathing a sigh of relief, Twelve turns his gaze back to what’s in front of him only to find that Nine has shifted. Instead of holding his hands carefully at his sides, as per the rules, his hands are folded neatly behind his back. Twelve hesitates for a moment, looks up at Nine who is facing forward as obediently as ever, but in that moment, Twelve knows. He knows that Nine doesn’t accidentally break rules. He knows that subtle things, like a pair of hands strategically placed somewhere hands are definitely not supposed to be, can convey more words than the two boys ever dare speak aloud.
After that, structured activity periods aren’t quite as bad as they used to be.
With the understanding between them that they are both miserable and that, ultimately, they both hope to escape the horrid place to which they have been taken, Twelve and Nine grow inseparably close. It’s hard to notice, because the children are given so few opportunities to determine how their free time is spent, but Twelve takes note of the way that Nine makes an effort to sit across from him during meal periods so that they can share private glances and careful whispers, just as he notices the way the two of them begin to work almost exclusively with each other during structured activity periods. At first, Twelve is afraid that the other children will notice and, by extension, the staff members. But the children are cold and unfeeling creatures who care so little about their own comfort that they are not like to notice the shift in Nine and Twelve’s relationship, and the staff members are ignorant and unintelligent and incapable of perceiving the subtle way in which the two boys have become closer.
They’re working on a project one week, a floor puzzle with one thousand pieces that must be completed within the hour, when Nine’s elbow bumps against Twelve’s. It’s a signal that Twelve has come to recognize – there’s something that Nine wants to talk about, and he wants to talk about it now. Twelve indicates his understanding by leaning away from the puzzle for a moment to cough into his elbow before returning quietly to his task, making sure to keep his gaze fixed on the project before him instead of looking expectantly toward Nine.
“Did you know that there are supposed to be rolling blackouts next week?” Nine murmurs when Twelve leans toward him to work on a different section of the puzzle. Twelve has, over the last few weeks, learned the art of communicating subtly, and as such makes sure to keep his expression cool and noncommittal. He doesn’t reply, waiting for Nine to continue. “Apparently, some of the night guards are concerned that said blackouts will affect the electronic locking system as well as the electric fence.”
“What are you proposing?”
“What do you think?”
Twelve smiles then – he honestly can’t help himself – marveling at the way that, since they started talking more and more, Nine has become sassier and sassier. He has yet to crack a smile though, and Twelve promises himself that one day before he dies, he’ll see a grin spread across Nine’s face. A brilliant, genuine smile. “What do you want me to do?”
“Memorize the guards’ shifts.”
“Done.”
Nine glances at Twelve in surprise, and Twelve feels a spike of pride rush through him. He likes surprising Nine, who has planned for almost every outcome, who’s somehow always seven moves ahead in every game of chess. “I’ve already thought of a way we can slip past them.”
“Then what’s left?”
Nine reaches for the final piece of the puzzle and pushes it into place. The timer at the front of the room reads seventeen minutes, twelve seconds. “To make it happen.”
Two days later, Twelve receives a note. He finds it tucked under his pillow at night and, seized by excitement, he pulls it out to read it, only to find it written in code. Instead of a heartfelt message, Twelve is greeted by a series of numbers structured like sentences but revealing no words. Of course, Nine hadn’t bothered to attach a cypher. Twelve knows that he can’t very well ask Nine about the meaning behind the note during the day time, as the students are always supervised by one staff member or another, and they are forbidden from talking outside of meals and structured activity periods. So he tucks the note carefully into his clothes and breathes deeply, willing sleep to come, knowing this is just another kind of test. If he can break the code, he and Nine will be free. If not… well. Twelve doesn’t allow himself to worry about that, not yet. What Nine needs from him is focus; he cannot afford to lose himself in meaningless ‘what if’s, drowning in scenarios that may never come to pass.
Learning things comes easily to Twelve. He doesn’t understand why the children in the other classes never seem to want to participate in group evaluation activities with him, but the only other person he ever works with is Nine. Not that he minds, of course – he and Nine work so efficiently together that even Lab Coat Man stops to gawk at them once or twice. And Twelve likes Nine – likes the way that Nine makes him smile, likes the way that Nine makes him feel not so alone. But even Five stays away from them, migrating among the students in the lower classes for most team-building or cooperation-oriented activities. Twelve isn’t sure why, but he thinks it may be because it took her far longer than seventeen minutes to complete the floor puzzle.
It is during one of their group evaluation activities that the children are taught about and tested on something called the ‘Fibonacci Sequence.’ It’s a series of numbers, beginning with zero, continued through the pattern of a number added to the number preceding it. The children are asked to find each number in the sequence until they just surpass one thousand. Nine and Twelve are the first to finish.
“Interestingly,” their teacher begins. This is not Lab Coat Man, but a younger man who always wears a bright-colored shirt under his lab coat. His first day was the same as Twelve’s first day. His last day arrives within the week. “Some people, in the past, used this sequence to code their messages! The code was very difficult to break because, more often than not, only people in the mathematic and scientific communities were familiar with Fibonacci.”
That night, Twelve deciphers Nine’s note: “Soon.”
There are some other superfluous letters thrown in, probably to confuse anyone who happened to find the note and cared enough to try to crack the code. But, once Twelve realized which numbers corresponded to letters in the alphabet, it was easy for him to realize what the true intent of the message was.
Using the same code, he begins to construct a reply. Twelve thinks about what to say for a little while, wonders if there are some feelings that he should keep to himself, but then he remembers what he and Nine have said to each other, the things they talked about. As scared as Twelve is of getting in trouble, he knows that Nine could get in just as much trouble, too. He knows that he and Nine agreed to be friends, and friends don’t keep things from each other, ever. Hastily, he scribbles, “I’m ready.” He hides the note in Nine’s shoe and hopes to God that it doesn’t fall into the wrong hands.
His first disciplinary session is later that afternoon.
Their teacher had said that using Fibonacci’s sequence was “very clever,” but “not quite clever enough.” They stand before this teacher, an unfamiliar and threatening woman that Twelve has never seen before, as she calmly asks them questions.
“Whose idea was it to pass notes?”
Twelve chances a sideways glance at Nine, who is staring at the teacher with a blank expression. He does not say a word. He does not blink.
“Whose idea was it to code the notes?”
Silence.
“Whose idea was it to run away?”
When they both fail to give her an answer, she sighs and waves her hand. Two staff members from the back of the room come forward, taking each Twelve and Nine by the arm, then leading them into separate rooms. Twelve is just about to ask what is happening when he is struck from behind and falls to his knees. The staff member alternates kicking and punching until Twelve coughs and blood splatters against the white linoleum floor. Every breath he takes is agony. The joint of his left shoulder is swollen and jutting forward, and Twelve finds that he cannot move his arm.
“You’re lucky.” The staff member says nonchalantly, placing his foot on Twelve’s shoulder blade and pulling his arm back roughly. His shoulder pops back into place with a dull crack, and pain shoots through Twelve’s entire chest. “Your little friend decided to tell the truth. Good thing he fessed up when he did, too. Any longer and they probably would’ve had to carry you out of here.”
That night, Nine’s bed remains vacant.
The following day, Nine is absent from classes.
He doesn’t know what he expected to happen, but Twelve hadn’t anticipated that his hope was going to be stolen from him quite so swiftly. He moves through his days in a stupor, feeling out-of-touch and out-of-time. But there’s a strange tightness at the back of his throat that, no matter how much water he drinks, doesn’t seem to go away. And every once in a while, he’ll take a deep shuddering breath that leaves him wanting to stomp his feet and scream and cry and then go to sleep and never wake up. But these strange emotions pass just as quickly as they come upon him, and in the daylight hours, Twelve is somehow able to convince himself that he’s okay. He tells himself that even though he and Nine agreed to be friends, they didn’t know each other, not really. The only reason he’s upset, he thinks, is because of this strange new environment full of these strange new people. He tells himself, like the staff members of The Institution tell him day after day, week after week, month after month, that he’ll acclimate soon enough. He just needs a little more time.
At night, though, Twelve begins to cry again. He cries every night for months, the days blurring together. Loneliness strikes the deep, sensitive place inside his heart that has been aching for love since before he can remember. The places in his chest that always felt warm whenever he and Nine were together ice over every time Twelve glances at the bed across from his and finds it empty. At night, emotions that Twelve must work tirelessly to suppress during the day overwhelm him, and the exhaustion from pretending to be okay is just enough that he cannot hold back his tears. After a few nights, the other children even stop trying to hush his sobs.
The other children do not want to be his friends. Whenever he tries to talk to Five, she gives him a pretty smile and her eyes twinkle, but she never says anything nice in reply. Once, she tells him that the reason no one wants to be his friend is because he’s worthless. After that, she refuses to call him Twelve; she begins to refer to him as Zero, because he is nothing. Too soon, Twelve starts to believe her.
Slowly, he begins to harden. He builds a protective shell around himself in an attempt to shield himself from the judgmental looks of the other children. To distract himself from his loneliness, Twelve throws himself wholly into his work. He completes his homework within minutes of it being assigned. He receives perfect scores on all of his tests. At first it’s difficult, to ignore the other things and focus only on learning, but the hardness of his shell begins to seep inward and it replaces the icy loneliness with a new, unfeeling kind of cold. He stops caring that he must complete group evaluations by himself. He stops listening to the barbed words that Five throws his way.
Around that time, he begins earning higher marks than Five, too. It is his fourth month at The Institution, and his one hundred seventh examination. He beats Five by two points. Later, in the hallway on their way to a structured activity period, she spits on him. He doesn’t even bother to look up from where his eyes are trained on the floor. He simply continues walking, uses the sleeve of his hospital-like uniform to wipe the phlegm from his cheek. Five shoves him, then stalks away, fuming.
It is one year to-date since his arrival at The Institution that Twelve walks into his classroom and sees Nine sitting there, expression carefully schooled into something noncommittal, taking notes as though nothing had ever happened. He is taller, and he looks older, but Twelve supposes that compared to how he looked a year ago, he, too, is taller and looks older. He stands beneath the doorway in a shocked silence for a few moments before Lab Coat Man, whose name Twelve never bothered to learn, snaps at him to take his seat. When Five comes skipping into the room twenty-three seconds late for class, she tries to contain her reaction to Nine’s return. But Twelve can see the way that her smile tightens and becomes mean and, for the first time in months, Twelve feels a spike of satisfaction. He realizes with no small amount of surprise that he is happy to see Five upset.
That night, when Twelve goes to bed, he does not pretend to be asleep when the lights go down. He lies in bed, staring at Nine, who stares right back at him. They watch each other, neither saying a word until they are sure the other children are asleep. Then, wordlessly, Nine lifts his blanket and watches as Twelve slips out of his own bed and pads silently across the short expanse of linoleum tile that separates their two beds. He sits on the mattress and swings his feet under the blanket, then lays his head carefully on the pillow in an attempt to keep the crunching to a minimum. Nine lowers the blanket and, with their faces mere inches apart, Twelve begins to notice the scars.
“Where have you been?” he whispers, the conversation feeling private and intimate due to their proximity. He is surprised when Nine answers quickly, maintaining eye contact so steadily Twelve feels a blush creep up his neck. He is thankful for the dark.
“Independent study.”
“What does that mean?”
Nine smiles ironically. Idly, Twelve realizes that it is the first time he has seen Nine smile. “Extended abuse with the occasional lesson mixed in.”
“Is that how you got the scars?”
Nine frowns and brings a hand up to tug his shirt collar farther up his chest, hiding some of the fine white lines now decorating his skin. There are a few left on his neck, too, but the majority of the marks seem to be hidden beneath his shirt, where few would be like to notice. “I didn’t think they were that obvious.”
“They aren’t. I have good eyes.”
“I’m sorry.”
Twelve knits his eyebrows together, confused. “For what?”
“They got to you. I can tell.”
Twelve feels the smile spreading across his face before he is even consciously aware of smiling. He hasn’t smiled in months, he knows, but when he’s with Nine, it feels natural. He can’t help but smile, because his friend is back. But this newer, older version of Nine, different from the one who left, is a Nine that Twelve does not know. Instead of coolly regarding Twelve with an emotionless expression, Twelve can see the way that sincerity and affection dance in the light of Nine’s eyes, the way that Nine’s brow creases in concern. “They got to you too, though.”
“Being in constant pain for the better part of a year has an oddly humanizing effect.”
Twelve giggles. “It’s okay. I like you better this way.”
“How about you though, Twelve? Are you okay?” Nine reaches up and places a hand on Twelve’s upper arm.
“I’m okay.”
Nine frowns. “No lying.”
“I mean it,” Twelve insists. “I wasn’t before, but I’m okay now. I promise.”
“Okay. If you say so.” Even after they slip into a comfortable silence, Nine leaves his hand resting on Twelve’s upper arm. They continue to look at each other, though, and from that staring Twelve receives a sudden and unexpected rush of courage. He scoots forward until his forehead is pressed against Nine’s chest, and he throws an arm around Nine’s waist and presses his toes against Nine’s shins. He isn’t really sure why he’s doing what he’s doing, only that he feels like he needs to do it. When Nine’s arm slides from Twelve’s upper arm to his back, then around his waist, Twelve thinks that he probably made the right move.
“I missed you,” he mumbles against the fabric of Nine’s sleep shirt. He feels the hot burn of tears in the corners of his eyes – a sensation that he hasn’t felt in a blessedly long time – and he presses his face deeper into the fabric in an attempt to hide his crying. “I was so alone.”
“I know.” Nine mumbles back. “I missed you, too.”
“You’re my only friend, Nine.”
“Me too.”
Twelve sniffs loudly, a whole swell of emotions that he has spent months suppressing overtaking him in the matter of a few minutes. “Promise you’ll never, ever leave me alone again. Ever.”
“I promise.”
“Swear.”
“I swear.”
Twelve sniffs again. “Good.”
They lay like that for a while, awkwardly holding each other in one another’s arms, Nine hesitantly stroking his fingers against Twelve’s spine and Twelve clutching fistfuls of Nine’s sleep shirt, terrified that if he lets go for even a second the other boy will disappear again.
“Hey,” Nine mutters after a while.
“What?” Twelve glances up at him, trying to get a good look at Nine’s face, trying to get a read on what he’s feeling. Trying to get used to Nine feeling anything at all.
Now.
“Your toes are cold.”
Twelve grins and wiggles his toes where they are pressed against Nine’s calf, snuggling deeper into the circle of Nine’s arms. “Oh yeah? What’re you gonna do about it, hmmm?”
Nine frowns down at Twelve as best he can given their current positions. “I’ll kick you out.”
“You will not, liar.”
“I don’t lie to you.”
“You exaggerate, then.”
Twelve receives no response apart from the deepening of Nine’s frown, which prompts him only to smile devilishly and slide his hips forward so that the hardness between his legs is pressed flush against Nine’s thigh. “I know a few good ways to warm you up, if you want.”
“You’re acting like a child.”
“I sincerely hope children don’t act like this, Nine.”
“You know what I meant.”
“Don’t underestimate the power of diction.”
“As if you’re one to lecture me on the importance of word choice.”
Twelve snorts and rocks his hips forward once more, but Nine just groans and pulls his arms from around Twelve to tug at his waist. “I mean it. Now is not the time.”
“Now is definitely the time.”
“Oh, really? Even with her?” Nine casts his eyes toward the closed door across the room, behind which Mishima Lisa is sleeping soundly, a cold compress secured firmly to her forehead and a thermometer sticking cartoonishly out of her mouth.
“She won’t wake up.”
“Do you become selectively deaf during sex, or—”
“Okay, okay, fine.” Twelve waves his hand in front of Nine’s face to get him to shut up, sincerely hoping that the gesture is enough to distract from the warm blush heating his face. “It’s just been a while, okay? I guess I’m starting to feel a little lonely.”
Nine scoffs. “I can’t imagine why, what with your new pet.”
Twelve smiles again before trying to work his expression into something shocked, gasping dramatically. “Why--! No, it couldn’t be. Nine, are you jealous?”
Nine looks as though he doesn’t quite share in Twelve’s joviality. “I don’t have the luxury of jealousy.”
Twelve picks up on Nine’s serious and somber tone immediately, feeling the laughter drain out of him. Suddenly, he feels a sickening dread in the pit of his stomach. This is something that he does not want to think about. “Because of…?”
“Yeah.”
“Oh.”
They lay in silence for a while, and Twelve looks at Nine with soft eyes, noticing for the first time in a long time just how tired Nine looks. They’ve been fighting together for a long time, just the two of them, and even though Twelve can still force himself to laugh, he knows that smiling is sometimes a little too hard for Nine. Especially as their deadline approaches.
“I’m sorry. I shouldn't have said anything.”
“Don’t be, you’re right.” Twelve reaches around and picks up Nine’s arms where they had been laying limply on the mattress, maneuvers them so that they drape around Twelve’s waist once more. “We’ve got a pretty big job ahead of us, huh?”
“Yeah…”
“You’re not starting to get cold feet, are you?” Twelve giggles and tickles Nine’s chest playfully. It’s a tactic that he’s used for years to try to break Nine out of his sour moods, and it still works every time.
“I’m not. Are you?”
Twelve gives a theatrical ‘ha!’ in response, throwing his head back with a flourish before letting his gaze settle heavily on Nine’s face. “I’m with you till the end of the line, friend.”
Nine smiles, then. It’s just a small smile, but for the first time in a long time he looks light and hopeful. Slowly, he reaches up to stroke Twelve’s cheek, pressing his lips against Twelve’s forehead without actually kissing so much as conveying affection. These days, the two of them kiss and do those… other things with much less frequency, often forgoing physical intimacy for emotional intimacy. Twelve doesn’t like to think about the reason for that. “I love you.”
Twelve’s arms tighten around Nine, and he pushes his body as close to Nine’s as he can. They make themselves small in the bed, curling into each other, hiding from the world. “I know.”