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They’d been off the island for three, maybe four weeks, and Fatin would much rather be right back there than have one more conversation with Agent Faber. Fatin wasn’t stupid, this obviously wasn’t a true rescue, yet Agent Faber insisted on carrying on a ruse as though it was. He kept saying how circumstances had come up and quarantine needed to be prolonged and their parents wouldn't be able to visit yet, how out of fear of compromising the investigation the girls weren’t allowed to communicate even if they’d been through every last detail of their time on the island over and over again already.
Which is exactly what they were in the middle of, Agent Faber sitting in the singularly chair in the room with his stupid tie and his stupid glasses and his stupid notepad, grilling Fatin for details about the island that she had already disclosed, seemingly trying to get her to focus less on the island and more on her feelings and personal trauma with every meeting. Honestly Fatin was just done with it, she was ready to just be done with the conversation and curled back up in bed to try to wait out the never ending monotonous nothing of the day, when suddenly sirens began to blare and alarm lights began to flash. That wasn’t something that happened every day, and it piqued Fatin’s curiosity enough to actually sit upright in the bed.
An orderly poked his head into the room, glancing from Fatin to Agent Faber quickly before simply stating “code grey” and hurrying on his way. The words set Agent Faber into action and he was whirling around like a bull in a china shop, grabbing his papers and pens and knocking over a lamp on the desk next to him in the process. It would have been amusing to watch if Fatin wasn’t so full of dread thinking about what could send the man into such a tizzy.
“Code grey, what’s code grey?” And then she heard it. Heard her. Leah. An agonized scream broke through the air, and Fatin was on her feet in an instant. “Leah! Leah, that’s- that’s Leah! Leah!”
Both Faber and Fatin rushed to the door, but Faber narrowly beat her to it, scurrying out into the hall and slamming it shut on her just as she flung herself against it, banging her fist on the window.
“Just let me see her! Goddammit, Faber! Let me see her, just bring me to her- Leah! Leah, Leah I’m here! Leah!” She screamed until her voice was hoarse, throat burning with the effort. She continued to throw herself against the door until she was sure her side was black and blue with bruises. She scratched at the lock on the door until her fingers were bloody in a mad, desperate attempt to get free and to get to her friend’s side and protect her.
Eventually, she had to give up, and as her adrenaline left her, so did her strength, leaving her to stumble towards the bed and practically collapse down. As she curled up, she tried to remember how things were on the island. Sure, they had plummeted from the sky onto a deserted island with limited resources and the ever present fear of death, but given all that, the island had its upsides as well. Like the way Leah began to open up with the group, showing off her truly beautiful personality for all its worth, playing around with the girls and holding her own against the best of Toni and Rachel’s joking ribbing. Or the way the light would catch the glimmer in her eyes, those piercing blue eyes, when she threw her head back in a laugh, smiling so wide and so brightly Fatin thought she might go blind. Or the nights where they would cuddle up beside the fire, not out of necessity of warmth with the blaze before them but purely because they enjoyed being wrapped up in the other’s presence. Part of Fatin wanted to go back there, a larger part than she would willingly admit. Because even with the plane crash, limited resources, and threat of death, at least she could be by Leah’s side.
That night she came up with a plan, and the next day when the orderlies brought her breakfast she shoved the tray right back at them, not taking food or water. “I’ll eat when I’m with Leah.” She snapped, promptly turning and returning to the bed. She had gone without food or water before on the island, she could sure as hell do it again if that’s what it took to get to see Leah. She reasoned that the people keeping them here needed them alive and well, or what would the point have been to even take them off the island (God, she wished they had left them alone on that island instead of bringing them here). Given the reactions of the orderlies when she denied her meals, the panicked whispering and frantic glances, she had been correct in her assumption. She continued to refuse every meal for the rest of the day. And the second day. And the third. She could tell that she was pissing Faber off, if his irritated face in the porthole of her door was anything to go by, and she just prayed it was enough to make him give in.
The fourth day without accepting any food or water, Fatin was greeted with the sight of Faber followed by two orderlies towing some sort of equipment behind them. She was weak, she couldn’t deny that, which made it far easier than she would have liked to attempt for the orderlies to pin her to the bed and force the feeding tube down her nostril to her throat. It was undeniably the worst experience of Fatin’s life, and she quickly tried to tune it out, to get lost in a memory of better times; picking a memory better than the current reality was an easy task, and she forced herself back into it to escape.
“Where the hell are Toni and Shelby with the lychees, didn’t they leave like an hour ago?” Leah mused, looking around confusedly from her spot laying next to Fatin in the sand as they waited.
Fatin propped herself up on her elbows, looking over at Leah with a knowing smile. “I mean, can you blame them for taking a while? Only time they can get some alone time away from this little family of ours? They’re probably having a lot more fun out there than just gathering lychees.” She plopped back down again in the sand as Leah nodded with this insight, seemingly thinking very seriously.
“You know, we could always find a lychee tree of our own to have a little fun in the shade of.” Leah commented, acting as nonchalant as she could while also letting her eyes flicker over Fatin’s face as she tried to gauge her reaction. It wasn’t very hard.
Fatin shot upright with an eyebrow raised. “Don’t tease me here Rilke. I will absolutely make sweet love to you under any tropical tree of your choice, don’t have to ask me twice, just say the word.” She finished off with a Jadmani famous eyebrow wiggle, and Leah threw her head back laughing that infectious laugh that made Fatin’s heart clench.
Eventually Leah shrugged, looking at Fatin with a smirk and a mischievous glint in her eyes. “I mean, it seems only fair that if anybody on this island is getting some, it should be you given your deep, generous sacrifice of orgasms.”
Fatin bobbed her head enthusiastically in agreement. “Absolutely, absolutely. And… are you offering to soothe this injustice, Miss Leah Rilke?”
Leah merely shrugged again. “Maybe. Maybe lychees are some sort of aphrodisiac.”
In an instant, Fatin was running. “Toni! Shelby! You best get back here and bring some of those magical sex lychees, mama wants to get laid!” Behind her, she could hear Leah cackling, and a smile broke out across her face.
When Fatin found reality creeping in again, she was alone in her room, feeling violated in a way she’d never imagined. She could hear voices in the hallway, loud and harsh, and she strained her ears to hear despite her exhaustion. It didn’t surprise her that Agent Faber’s voice was present, but she was shocked to also pick out the voice of Agent Young, the more amiable of their two interrogators.
“This is ridiculous Daniel! This is getting out of hand!”
“Dean, you know very well that this is all necessary for-”
“I don’t think it is! I think it’s just you getting your rocks off on making these girls suffer, and I’m done with it man. We have two girls refusing to eat, and it could easily be remedied by just letting them see each other. We have their statements, there’s no need for this.”
The keypad to her room beeped then, and heavy footsteps followed, making her stiffen for a moment before she heard the tell tale clearing of a throat. Agent Young. The man consistently had the mannerisms of a guilty child, clearing his throat to stall having to speak, or looking around the room instead of making eye contact. Fatin had a feeling he didn’t agree with what was going on here, which lessened her animosity at him just slightly, though he was still allowing it to happen. Allowing her and her friends to suffer.
“Miss Jadmani… Miss Jadmani, you need to keep your strength up. For her, for Leah, she needs you, so you have to keep it together.”
At that, Fatin lifted her head, meeting Agent Young’s eyes with as much steel and determination she could muster. “Then bring me to her. If she needs me, bring me to her so that I can comfort her.” She spat with venom in her tone. However, when she looked at him, she felt her front fade as she noticed how genuine he seemed, how distressed and tired and sad. Seeing those emotions in him, her own exhaustion set in, and she felt the tears welling up in her eyes before she could stop them. “She’s not eating either?”
Agent Young shook his head slightly, clearly perturbed by what he was about to say. “That code grey the other day was because Miss Rilke reacted a bit… explosively, to assisted feeding. She hadn’t been eating for three days beforehand. And I’m sorry you had to hear it but… I have to say, I’d prefer her act out than her just sitting there… she’s not doing well.”
Fatin nodded along to this new information, the first update of any kind she had heard about any of her friends the entirety of their bunker stay. For the briefest moment she wondered if it would’ve been better not to know, to live in the blissful ignorance of there being a chance that Leah was absolutely fine and doing wonderfully instead of having the truth confirmed for her. Though it’s not like not knowing had been doing her any good anyway. “Tell her… tell her not to go dark on me. Tell her… tell her I’m here. I can’t get to her but I’m here, please at least tell her that, please give her my words if you won’t let me be with her.”
Fatin could feel the tears beginning to burn in her eyes, so she rolled away to face the wall again, unwilling to let Agent Young see her cry. Mercifully Agent Young was able to take a hint, and murmured a simple affirmative before leaving her alone. Once she heard the sound of the door closing behind him, she clung to her pillow and sobbed, letting out all her exhaustion and despair. She sobbed for her biological family, even if she was still pissed at them for getting her into this mess to begin with. She sobbed for her found family, locked somewhere in this bunker with her but just out of her reach. She sobbed for Leah, the love she had found when she least expected it only to have her ripped away and locked behind metal doors where she couldn’t get to. She sobbed for herself, feeling all of these emotions and dealing with all this trauma when all she wanted to do was live.
It was clear that putting herself in harm's way wasn’t enough to push Faber to bring her to Leah, so she needed to come up with something else. The next time Faber paid her a visit, Fatin wasted no time. She crossed the room to him while expertly unclasping the watch from her wrist before pressing it into Faber’s hands. “Please, take it. It’s 78 thousand dollars, you can keep it, sell it, marry it, I don’t care, just let me see Leah.”
“Now Miss Jadmani, you know I can’t take this.” He replied, speaking in a tone that was so patronizing and just so condescending. He offered the watch back to her, holding it out like a teacher offering a toy to a young child, and when she refused to take it, he shrugged and placed it neatly down on the side table.
Fatin let out a small sound of anger, looking around desperately. She needed to see Leah and she had nothing else to pull against Faber, no leverage, nothing he might want that would make him inclined to help her. She had nothing but- She stilled for a moment as an idea hit her. She set her jaw and clenched her teeth before stepping up to Faber and dropping to her knees, hands flying out to begin fumbling with his belt buckle.
Agent Faber balked for a minute, looking down at Fatin with shock and a hint of intrigue, seemingly considering the implications and what they could lead to, before he looked over his shoulder at the security camera perched in the corner and sighed, reaching down to push her hands away half heartedly. “Miss Jadmani-“
Fatin only shook her head, reaching her hands back towards his belt buckled with renewed fervor. Tears of frustration and despair were streaming down her face as she looked up at him. “Please! Please, just… just let me do this, a-and then we can talk about me visiting Leah again, please! I know you know about me, you’ve got all that information in your little files so you must know how skilled at this I am, how good I can make you feel, so why don’t I do something for you and you do something for me?”
Faber reached down to her again to wipe the tears off her cheeks with his thumb, making a tsking sound deep in his throat as he dragged his thumb down to her lip before he moved to pet Fatin’s hair, and it took everything in her power not to pull away from his touch. Instead, she shut her eyes tight and tried to picture something better. Blue eyes and a blinding smile, laughter floating out across the beach.
The sound of the keypad to her room beeping and the door being thrown open knocked her out of her reverie. She shot a glance over to the doorway, and there stood Agent Young, looking considerably more pissed off than she had ever seen him. Ordinarily Fatin might be embarrassed at being caught in the state she was in, on her knees offering herself up to some sick bastard like a whore, but she was just too spent to care at all. Frankly someone could have entered the room and pointed a loaded gun at her without eliciting a reaction from her at this point. She just wanted to be done. She wanted this over with one way or another, to either be with her family or to not exist at all. One was certainly more preferable than the other, but she was quickly losing the willpower to care. At least, she thought she was until she heard the next words out of Agent Young’s mouth.
“Miss Jadmani, I’m here to escort you to Miss Rilke’s room. I’ve received clearance from higher up the authority chain for you two to be situated together for the rest of the investigation process.”
With strength she didn’t realize she had, Fatin pulled herself up and rushed to the doorway to Agent Young’s side, noting the death glare he was shooting in Agent Faber’s direction. Faber himself seemed aghast, blubbering and attempting to protest, but Agent Young tipped his head towards the camera in the corner of the room with a smirk. “Out of our hands, Daniel. Can’t disobey the higher ups.” With that, Agent Young stepped aside for Fatin, gesturing for her to leave the room and follow him.
The second they were out of Faber’s line of sight, Fatin collapsed against Agent Young, hugging him and shaking with too many emotions to count. He was quick to return the embrace, not saying a word but holding her in such a way that exuded protectiveness. Fatin decided then and there that maybe he wasn’t the bad guy here. After a few moments just locked in embrace, regathering her strength, Fatin finally pulled away. “Take me to her, please.”
Agent Young nodded, and began to lead her through the corridors of the bunker. It was quite literally a concrete labyrinth, and as hard as Fatin tried to keep track of all the twists and turns they took, she was well and truly lost by the time Agent Young came to a stop outside a door. Fatin knew, behind that door was the love of her life. By the look on Agent Young’s face, he knew it as well, and he put a halting hand out before him. “Now Miss Jadmani, I need to have you brace yourself. Miss Rilke is in a rough place, and she looks it. I just… I know how long you’ve been waiting for this, and I want you to be prepared.” He said softly, before swiping his card through the keypad and opening the door.
Leah looked like shit, plain and simple. Every ounce of light and energy in the girl seemed to have been stolen from her eons ago. She was so much paler than usual, and curled so tightly on the bed it looked like she was trying to disappear from existence. The back of her head was a mess of tangled and matted hair, and Fatin could feel her hands clenching and unclenching subconsciously with the desire to card her fingers through it and untangle it for her. For a moment she didn’t dare to say anything, too worried to break the silence and end up waking from a dream. She just stood there standing and staring, before she looked back at Agent Young for reassurance. When he nodded and made a “go ahead” motion with his hand, she called out.
“Leah?”
For someone who looked like the walking dead, Leah moved fast. She was out of bed and rushing towards Fatin before she had even finished calling her name, only to skid to a halt just a few paces in front of her, drawing previous outstretched hands back in close to her chest as though she’d been burned. “Are you real?” She whispered reverently, voice cracking and harsh from what Fatin was sure was disuse.
To answer her question, Fatin stepped forward and pulled Leah into a crushing embrace, feeling the girl break down in sobs against her and feeling her own tears sliding down her face unrestrained. “I’m here. I’m here and I’m never leaving you again, I promise.”
When they finally pulled away just enough to get a better look at each other, Fatin gasped at the sight of Leah’s neck, bruised and full of puncture wounds. Leah blushed and moved to pull up her shirt collar in an attempt to hide it, but Fatin blocked her, gingerly resting her fingertips on her neck as tears began to stream down her face. “What did they do to you baby?” She whispered, before turning her head over her shoulder to look at Agent Young. “What did they do?!”
The man had the decency to appear to be fighting tears himself, unable to meet Fatin’s gaze and instead looking at his shoes. “Agent Faber believed that sedatives were necessary for Miss Rilke on occasion.” Leah moved impossibly closer to Fatin at the mention of the sedatives, closing her eyes and taking a shaky breath. Agent Young paused to give Leah some time to calm down before daring to raise the level of his eyes to meet those of the girls before him. “I cannot apologize enough for that. It has been decided that I will be taking over for Agent Faber in the administration of your care. No more sedatives, I promise.”
“And the others? The rest of our friends?” Leah piped up, surprising Fatin. All the while she had been focused on getting to Leah, she felt guilty in realizing she hadn’t for a moment considered her other friends as well. Now that the idea had been called forth in her mind, she felt the fear and worry creep right back into her heart. Had they been going through the same suffering?
“I’m working on that,” Agent Faber admitted. “Miss Shalifoe and Miss Goodkind have been putting up similar protests as Miss Jadmani to be able to see each other. But uh, neither of them seem to have drawn the same sort of… interest, from Faber as he has with you two, so while I’m certain they aren’t very pleased with their situation, it wasn’t as dire as with you two. You have my word though, I’m pushing as hard as I can to get you all reunited once more.”
He cast a glance back at the camera in the corner of the room, and adjusted his stance, pulling himself up into a more authoritative posture, reassuming the role of an FBI investigator. “Of course, the quarantine order is still in effect for the time being, so your parents are still not able to come to the premises, but as the investigation nears its end I will do my best to push even harder for you to be able to commingle with the rest of your group as well.” The way he spoke, Fatin could tell that he knew that they were aware the investigation was bullshit, but he was continuing the act because he was being watched. “Now, I’ll uh, give you two ladies some time to catch up.” With that, he excused himself, and Fatin and Leah were alone.
At first all they could do was stare at each other, like the absence of Agent Young had reverted them back into awkward teenagers, nervously sharing space with a crush and too afraid to make the first move. Nevermind the fact they went through this all already on the island, sharing feelings and allowing those feelings to blossom into a relationship. Nevermind the days spent taking any opportunity to be touching, holding hands and bumping into each other goodnaturedly, or the nights spent cuddled together whispering sweet nothings about the future. This was uncharted territory. Finally though, seemingly at nothing, though both broke out into hysterical laughter, clinging to each other once more and just losing it laughing. It was no doubt laughter filled with trauma, but it was laughter nonetheless and it served to calm their nerves enough to fall back into old routines, Leah intertwining their fingers and gently pulling Fatin to the bed, where they wordlessly began to cuddle. Neither one really had the energy to talk yet, to share the horrors they had faced while apart, so they just enjoyed the presence of the other, Fatin beginning to work through the knots in Leah’s hair with her fingers and Leah tapping out a rhythm with her fingers on Fatin’s leg as she did so.
It wasn’t perfect. They weren’t free, they were still trapped in this concrete hell, and they were still separated from the rest of their friends, but they were together, and if Agent Young could be trusted, soon their whole little family would be reunited. And that was enough for now. A small victory for exhausted souls that for the first time since they were brought to the bunker were able to sleep peacefully curled into each other, unafraid of losing the other ever again.