Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The Cypress tree: symbol of an everlasting life, of a life that carries on after death. It is known not only for its beauty and elegance, but for its intertwined fate with that of the underworld. A Cypress means life, and a Cypress means death—an existence which contradicts itself simply by being, an illusory strength so conflicting within itself it wills even the dullest rock to polish itself, and the broken shards to mend themselves together.

To protect. That is the oath that was given to the world by the Cypress Commission—an underground organisation officially called the International Ministry of Public Safety. They operate by slipping through the cracks—between the law and the outlaws, the government and the underground, a thin barrier between life and death, safety and danger. The Cypress has many loyal operatives around the world, all standing as tall as the tree emblazoned on their insignias, empowered by their wills to bring change to the world. They had taken down terrorist organisations and underground rings, prevented armed conflicts and successfully retrieved outlawed military artillery and rescued prisoners of wars all around the world. An organisation that worked for no one, but helped everyone, affiliated to none but itself—thus was the rule of the Commission.

And yet, like any other organisation, they sometimes faced problems they simply could not solve by themselves—that being a severe lack of new recruits, which pushed them to accept even the young and vulnerable in their military forces. It was a difficult job, to appeal to an audience which could not be made aware of their existence. And thus begins the story of a young boy…

∙∙•「⸙」•∙∙

April 16, 1997 - Nowhere Town, Germany

The patio door opening onto a small yet cosy kitchen—all painted in tints of greens and purples—was slammed open by a young boy, who couldn’t have been older than six years old. That was Basil Gaertner, a child who lived alone with his grandma in a lost town in the middle of Nowhere, Germany. In the boy’s small hands were slowly wilting flowers,

“Grandma, grandma!” the boy excitedly shouted as he entered the house, the bright sparkle in his eyes rivalling the mid-summer sun in brilliance. “Look at what I found!”

He quickly removed his mud-covered boots in front of the door, stumbling slightly in his excitement, before running to the kitchen and pulling out two glass pints from the cabinets, filling them up with water to the brim.

“Basil, dear? You came back already?” Weide Durchdenwald, Basil’s grandmother, asked from where she had been knitting in the living room, a bit farther down the hall. The house was small, and so they did not have to shout to be heard by the other.

“Yes! I found some cornflowers growing in the cracks of the sidewalk down the road,” as he spoke, he methodically placed the flowers in the water he’d prepared. He brought one of the makeshift vases with him to the living room to show his grandmother. “Look, these ones grew so close together their stems merged! I’ll grow them here, since they couldn’t have survived on the sidewalk for much longer. You see that yellow patch?” Basil indicated a part of the flower, where the petals were a faded yellow instead of the bright lavender the rest of the flower displayed. “That’s a sunburn, since they can’t get enough water and nutrients from the cracks.”

“That’s very nice, Basil,” Weide hummed, happy to see her grandson so excited over something he was so very obviously passionate about. “Do you have everything you need to take care of the flowers?”

Basil placed the transparent vase over his head to inspect the roots. “Hum,” he hesitated. “No, I should be fine. Cornflowers are pretty easy to grow.”

There was a slight furrow of his brows, though, which Weide took notice of. “Are you sure, Basil? You seemed preoccupied.”

Basil thinned his lips in a slight frown, before laughing awkwardly, pulling his features back into a smile. “No, really– I was just thinking that maybe I’d replace the gardenias with those. I’m sorry, I know you really like the gardenias, grandma…”

“What’s wrong with the gardenias? Didn’t you like to take care of them? You were constantly talking about those flowers, a few weeks ago…”

“Ah, well– gardenias are pretty hard to grow, you know, so…” Basil’s eyes flitted to the floor quickly and he shrugged weakly. “I decided I didn’t want to do it anymore.”

Weide frowned. “But you were so excited about those just a few days ago– you don’t have to lie to me, Basil. What’s wrong?” She put her needles down, focusing her entire attention on her uncomfortable grandson.

Basil exhaled sharply and bit his lower lip, as if to contain the sound. His fingers were restless on the glass—tapping and shifting on the glass as if it were a piano and he was a renowned composer. “It’s just… the fertiliser, you know, for the gardenias. It’s so expensive, and I know you’ve been worrying over paying for your medicines since you broke your knee last month and we had to pay for the operation, so I just though-”

“Oh, Basil…” Weide said, the heaviness of Basil’s words coming to weigh down her heart and drag the corners of her lips down. Her face twitched. “Come here.” She opened up her arms, and Basil put down the vase he was holding on a nearby table before running into the hug. Weide felt his little shoulders shake in silent sobs, and had to force her voice not to crack.

“You don’t have to worry about those things, alright?” she whispered in his ears, hugging him tighter. “Let me take care of this and have fun with your flowers without worrying about boring things like money. Those are adult things, okay?” She hummed as he started to shake harder. “Don’t worry. Everything’s going to be alright…”

“But you said, since mom and dad stopped sending money, you couldn’t pay for the medicines anymore-” his breath hitched at the end of the sentence and he buried his head further into Weide’s neck.

“Shh,” Weide shushed him gently, pulling him away from her so he’d look her in the eyes when she spoke. “I’ll be fine, Basil, don’t worry. I’m sorry I couldn’t buy you those shears you wanted for your birthday. I promise we’ll be fine, though, alright? So dry those tears, my boy… we’ll be fine…”

“You promise?” Basil sniffled.

“I promise,” Weide said, punctuating the statement with a warm smile. She grabbed his hand, intertwining her wrinkled pinky with his smaller one. “Here, now it’s official.”

Basil giggled wetly. “Alright…” he whispered. “It’s okay, about the shears. I’ll just continue to use the kitchen knife instead, since it works okay.”

Basil took the vase with the cornflowers back and headed to his room—to place them near the window, Weide didn’t doubt. Basil had so many plants in his room that it had gotten dangerous: he couldn’t sleep without his door open nowadays, or else he’d wake up in the middle of the night, suffocating because of the plants’ respiration. Still, Weide didn’t have the heart to tell him to stop bringing home plants, since it was the only thing that really animated him since her daughter Daphne and her husband had left for America, leaving a four years old Basil alone with her, wondering where his parents had left to this time around.

Her smile fell. Basil was such a considerate boy—she knew he tried his hardest to take care of her and her weakening state, even when he was so clearly struggling himself. It pained her to see him put so much pressure on himself, and she sometimes resented her daughter for leaving such a burden on her son. Basil really was her own little ray of sunshine…

“I’ll try to split the flowers so we can have more,” Basil said from the stairs, his soft footsteps barely making any noise as he walked down to the kitchen. “That way we can maybe eat some, if we need more money again. But they’re not very nutritious…”

“Really?” Weide asked. “What can you eat cornflowers with? Maybe I can find some recipes for us to try.”

She heard Basil move around the kitchen, probably setting up another pot for his numerous plants. “I think I saw someone put some on ice cream as decoration? Or maybe it was yogurt…”

Weide laughed lightly. “That sounds delightful, Basil. I’ll find us something so we can try those flowers of yours-”

A loud noise interrupted her sentence, and she heard a loud ‘ crash ’ down the kitchen—Basil must’ve dropped the plate he’d been holding in surprise. The front door—that’s what made the first noise. It had been broken down.

“Hands up!” Three men walked into the house, holding shiny guns in their gloved hands. “Nobody moves!”

Weide quickly pulled the yarn from her knitting needles, holding one in front of her with a shaky grip. She needed to get to Basil.

“Put the needle down, woman,” the first man growled, shaking his gun harshly in her direction. Weide gasped and quickly complied—she needed to get to Basil. She needed Basil to be safe.

“Grandma!” the boy in question yelled. She snapped her head to the corridor leading to the kitchen, wide eyes wild in panic, and surely, there he was: Basil, running towards her—towards the guns—without a care for his safety.

“Stay back,” she shoved him behind her as soon as he got in reach. Basil stumbled and fell to his knees, behind their small but sturdy centre table. He landed with a small yelp. Safer, Weide’s mind supplied, and she exhaled shakily. “Stay there, Basil.”

The three men shook their guns harder—most likely, they were trying to remind Weide of who was in power, at the moment. “Weide Durchdenwald!” the man in the front of the group yelled—unnecessarily, considering there was about five metres between the two of them. “We’re here for your daughter, Daphne Rosenberg! Where is she?”

The two men behind the first one made a show of looking around the house.

“I’m afraid you boys are ill informed,” Weide stated steadily, keeping the men’s attention away from Basil. “My daughter moved away to America with her husband a few months over a year ago. I haven’t seen her in more than a year.”

The man swore. “That bitch,” he spat, and Weide narrowed her eyes. “What about documents, then? She left anything here for us?”

Weide kept her eyes from darting to the table, where she could see Basil shivering. Her daughter, Daphne—Weide had always suspected there was more going on than a sudden desire not to have a child behind her decision to leave the country for America. Although she’d never expected quite this, that was true.

Daphne hadn’t left anything behind, but she didn’t know what the men would do if she told them that. Weide nodded.

“I’ll go look through the study,” she said, and then painfully added, “Please stay here.”

It pained her to say this, to leave those men with Basil, but she wouldn’t be able to contact the authorities if these armed men were monitoring her. She hoped Basil would know to stay quiet and not attract attention to himself—maybe the men would leave him alone.

“Hold up, lady,” one of the men put a hand on her shoulder as she walked by, stopping her dead in her tracks. “I’ll be coming with, to make sure you’re not trying to slip on us.”

He placed his gun against her temple, sliding it on her hair a few times as if she were a pet and the gun, the owner’s hand. Mocking her, they were mocking her.

Weide walked down the hallway towards the study—which was really only a glorified closet, since in the end, they couldn’t afford enough books or even paper to justify anything bigger—with a gun pressed to her head, no plan and a thought repeating in her mind over and over:

What do I do, now?

She needed Basil to be safe.

「⸙」

Basil’s breathing fastened as he heard his grandmother’s steps retreating down the corridor. The two remaining men were loudly talking to each other.

“Look at the little guy,” one said. “Isn’t he obedient, sitting there all silently and letting the adults talk in peace?”

Basil hugged his knees tighter to his chest—he wanted to disappear. Or maybe he’d like for these men to disappear. Either was fine with him, right now.

“Shut up, man,” the second guy—he was taller than the other two, with red hair and tattoos going from his jaw down his neck—hissed, giving the first man a harsh slap on the back. The first man laughed, an ugly sound Basil immediately associated with retching.

“Don’t worry, nobody cares about the kid anyways.” He turned towards the table Basil was hiding behind—the young boy quickly averted his eyes and slammed back into the wood, eyes wide and spine ramrod straight. All his blood rushed to his head—he could feel his heart beat a thousand miles a minute in his icy fingertips. The man continued, “So we can do what we want with him, right?”

Basil somehow heard the red-haired man scoff over the whooshing noise reverberating in both his ears. “Keep your hands to yourself, you creep.” He sounded like one might assume he would while conversing with a man whose voice was reminiscing of vomit.

The first man laughed, and Basil watched him throw his hands up in a ‘what did I do?’ gesture from the corner of his eye. Still, he took to staring down the hallway instead of towards Basil, and the boy felt his shoulders slightly relax. Not completely, though, because the read-headed man was still staring down the living room with what felt like double the intensity the duo had been before—he wasn’t looking directly at Basil, but the boy still felt scrutinised. He struggled to swallow, hunching himself further.

Two pairs of footsteps echoed down the corridor—Basil’s grandmother was coming back with the gang’s leader. Basil peeked his head from behind the table, careful not to be too visible, and tensed when he saw the man was still pointing a gun at his grandma’s head.

“Looks like the hag did have something for us, boys!” the leader cheered, grabbing Basil’s grandmother by the arm and shaking her around in victory. She struggled to gain her balance back for a few seconds, but inevitably failed to hold herself up when the muscled man threw her in front of him, in the middle of the group. She landed on the floor with a yelp, dropping the thick folder she had been holding to the ground, and Basil startled, his muscles immediately tensing as he fought the instinct to get up and run to her side. Scattered papers fluttered down the hallway.

“Guess we don’t need you anymore, then,” the leader said with a very wide grin, revealing sharpened rows of menacing teeth. “Farewell, granny.” He flicked his metallic gun around and, in a swift motion, pulled the trigger down.

There were a few seconds of fragile silence, brittle like a very thin slate of glass, and then…

“No!” Basil screamed, pushing himself up on shaky legs—he took a few steps before faltering at the scene displayed in front of him. He shook so hard he felt his bones clatter against each other, a sound like the tiny tiles of a morbid glockenspiel being repeatedly stomped on breaking the silence of his fractured mind.

Three tall men were staring him down, their eyes harsh and the metal of their guns reflecting the sunlight coming from the window in a display of beauty violently opposing their grotesque nature. In the middle of the trio, laying on the ground, was Weide Durchdenwald, Basil’s grandmother, a crown of blood quickly pooling around her head like a halo. The files she had dropped in her fall were stained red—splatters all over the snow white paper. The puddle of blood was quickly expanding, and so the leader swiftly leaned down to pick up the files before it could reach them. Basil dropped to his knees, his legs growing too weak to support himself.

The man flipped through the papers before harshly throwing the entire document to the floor and grabbing his head. Basil didn’t even twitch.

“Fuck! She crossed us! There’s nothing good in these documents!”

“So what do we do?” Read-head asked, frowning. “We’ve got a body and no files to show for it?”

“I guess so, Eric,” the leader said, voice dripping with sarcasm. He pulled his head from his hands and sighed heavily. “Damn it.” He started pacing. “Henry, kill the kid. We’ve got to bail before someone reports the shots.”

“Kill him?” Henry slowly stepped towards Basil, who was still on his knees. The blood almost reached him, now. “Have you seen him? You’d want to kill off such a cute kid?” He crouched in front of Basil and harshly grabbed his face. The boy’s eyes watered from the pain, but he kept quiet.

“So quiet, too…” Henry hummed. He jerked Basil’s head to the side, and this time, Basil couldn’t help the small intake of breath. The man smirked. “Good boy.”

“No witnesses,” the boss stated, crossing his arms in front of his chest. He raised an eyebrow when Henry still didn’t let go.

“There’d be no witnesses if we sell him off after, right? Think about it that way: how much money do you think he’d make us? 10 000? Maybe we could even go higher than that…”

The leader’s eyebrows furrowed, and he took a few steps forwards so he stood right next to Henry. He pushed the other man’s hand away, grabbing Basil’s chin and examining his face from all angles. Once the examination concluded, he patted Basil’s cheek a few times, his strong arm making it feel all the more like a slap, and smiled a crooked smile.

“I think you’re right, Henry!” he clapped. “How unexpected!”

“I try, thanks” Henry mock-saluted the crowd.

“Well, let’s make it good, then.” The leader turned to Eric, who’d been standing near the doorway with a progressively grouchier expression on his face for a while, and asked, “You’ll stay here, I assume?”

Eric scowled. “Yeah, fucker. I’ll go check whether there’s anything useful in the study. You know, like the files we came here for.” He spared a haughty glance at Basil—once again, the young boy felt like a bug under a microscope. “Don’t take too long.” Then, under his breath, “ Bastards .”

The two men laughed, and Basil was dragged away.

「⸙」

A shivering child walks into a bar, escorted by two strong men…

「⸙」

December 5, 1999 - Gonzaver, Spain

“So you’re the boss’ son, aye?” Basil snapped his eyes away from the stairs in order to lean away from the man who’d just slumped over his register. His breath smelled strongly of alcohol—he must’ve been in the bar for a while, then.

The Moon Lily Casino—that’s where Basil had been staying for the past two years. The establishment was a casino in name only, seeing as the whole ‘gambling your money away’ part of the business had died down many years ago—nowadays, it was mostly just a bar. Basil, now eight years old, had been working there since the first day he’d stepped inside the dark, shady building that was the Moon Lily Casino, more than two years ago.

“Yes, sir,” Basil courteously answered the drunk man—right now, he’d rather be anywhere but here—well, no, not anywhere . That wasn’t right. There was at least one place that Basil knew of which was worse than the casino’s reception room.

The casino’s back rooms. Those were definitely worse than the front. Come to think of it, most of the second floor probably counted, as well… So at least two places were definitely worse than here. That didn’t make Basil feel any better in the moment, though—if anything, he felt even worse than before, because he hated thinking about those places even more than he hated being polite to drunkards.

“You’re a whole lot prettier than him, I’ll give you that,” the man slurred.  As the man spoke, spit flew into Basil’s face, and he instinctively took another step back, wiping at his face with his old uniform. The man laughed. “C’mon, don’t give me that! Where’s your daddy, uh? Got some business with him, and all.”

“He’s in the back,” Basil answered quietly. The man was very large: Basil knew he wouldn’t get him to budge any time soon. Hopefully, if he acted boring enough, the man would leave Basil alone once he got his directions. “With the others.”

“Some kid misbehaving or something?”

Basil got another draft of alcohol-scented breath straight in his face and fist-fought the urge to gag at the smell—he hated it so much. That man must’ve been in the bar for a really long time, because the smell seemed to permeate his clothes and his hair. That meant that he’d likely been coming from behind Basil, and that Basil probably hadn’t noticed him coming because he’d been busy cultivating the pit of poisonous vines that had been taken his stomach hostage as he watched another—much scarier—drunk man drag a terrified 14 up the stairs. The poor girl’s legs, with the man’s grip lifting her in the air, had been almost too short to reach the steps, and she’d have to struggle to keep herself from stumbling. Basil was used to sights like these—how could he not be after spending more than two years in the casino, as the clerk no less?—but it didn’t fail to steal his voice and hold him in petrified silence every time. About three times a week minimum, but it could go up to three a day if the kids were unlucky. Every time Basil noted a new name down in his spiral notebook, he wished he could do something, anything to help, but Basil was eight years-old. A child in the Moon Lily Casino. The best he’d achieve would be to become another one of the numbered kids, in the back.

Basil swallowed once, hard, and lifted his eyes to meet the guy’s. “28 is very sick,” he said through the paste clogging his throat. He struggled not to cough on the guy—though Basil doubted he’d even mind it, with how out of it he was. “Mr. De Angelis is making sure she is fine.”

The guy laughed, a quick, mean sounding laugh that made Basil’s instincts enter fight or flight mode, every muscle going rigid.

“What, he cares for the kids, now? What’s she got?”

“Hypothermia.”

The back rooms tended to get very cold during winter. Basil hated going there in general, but it was even worse during the winter—it always felt like stepping into a giant freezer, except the freezer was made to refrigerate kids. It was even worse than during the summer, because even though the smell got terrible and most kids ended up with heat strokes and severe dehydration, in summer, most kids were able to survive the season, something Basil could not say about winter.

“Eh? The back rooms ain’t heated enough?” the man mocked, unknowingly echoing Basil’s earlier thoughts. The boy bristled. “Shame… You know, men like me aren’t interested in dead kids, or frozen ones. You should probably tell De Angelis to get them some blankets or something. At least that way we won’t have to wait thirty minutes for it to warm up, you know?”

The man spoke like he was raising a valid concern, maybe about the weather outside being particularly bothersome for his crops or whatever adults were usually concerned about—Basil couldn’t say he had a lot of normal interactions with adults. Or with anyone, for that matter. The person he interacted the most with was Mr. De Angelis, and it was mostly conversations where Basil was told how to best fool the cops should they come snooping around or asking for reports about the bar’s deals, something Basil was pretty sure an eight year old should have no business managing.

Basil didn’t mention that the numbered kids did have blankets, just not nearly enough to split between all of them.

The man’s eyes focused on Basil a little more intently. “Well, you sure are lucky to stay out of the back in the nice, warm air with us, aren’t you?” He reached out as if to pat Basil’s shoulder, whose eyes went wide just at the potential idea of that happening. Luckily for him, the man was drunk and there was a counter between the two of them, so he missed and slumped over the wood instead.

And then Basil took a second for the words to register, and he lowered his eyes. Because even if he hated it, the man had a point—Basil was very lucky. He didn’t know why, exactly, Mr. De Angelis had chosen him to front as his son—it had something to do with the police, Basil knew. If there was an unharmed kid up front, then there were less chances for the cops to go snooping in the back, is what Mr. De Angelis had told Basil when he’d asked, in the very first days of his new job. Basil was sure it also had to do with the fact that his previous fake-son had died a few days before Basil had arrived—that’s what he heard the older numbered kids say, one time, when he passed near the back rooms. Whatever the reason was, Basil knew that he’d been blessed, that he somehow ended up drawing the only long stick of the bunch.

“Well, kid,” the man pushed himself up, leaning heavily on the counter to support his weight. He grinned—he was missing a tooth, Basil noticed, and he thought he might recognise him. That man had probably tried 6 at some point. The moment of realisation felt like a hard slap in the face. Somehow, Basil knew exactly what he was going to say next, and his guts grew cold. He recognized that look in the man's eyes—the predatory, sinister glint he grew to hate more than anything. “I’m not here just to chat. Book me a kid.” Basil’s hand immediately went to grab his spiral notebook, eyes going blank. He stared towards the man, who pretended to be deep in thought, looking at him but never really seeing. Finally, the man grinned sharply. “Orchidae just turned 15, right? I’d like to celebrate with her, if you know what I mean.”

Basil picked his pen with trembling fingers—his tight grip on the notebook had whitened his knuckles. He really, really hated this man.

Orchidae, he wrote. December 5, 1999.

Orchidae’s birthday, two weeks prior, had been the bar’s most important events in all the time Basil had been here—for the numbered kids, at least. She was one of the only kids who remembered their birthday’s date, and the only one Mr. De Angelis deemed worthy of celebration. He’d bought her a small, cheap cake on the day of her birthday, and allowed her to share it with the other kids. She’d earned it , he had said. She was one of Mr. De Angelis’ clients’ favourites. That way, she had also earned herself a name instead of a number, and a higher price tag for the hour.

Basil was pretty sure the cake had been supposed to make the kids fight over it, and that Mr. De Angelis had been disappointed when Orchidae had split it into even, tiny parts instead of shoving it in her mouth whole.

“Under whose name?” Basil whispered.

“Valiant. 4 hours. Come one, kid, you know me, by now!”

Basil did. Valiant had come 3 other times that month. Basil just didn’t bother remembering the clients’ faces, since he didn’t need any more faces to haunt his nightmares. He already had his parents, his grandma, the three robbers from that day years ago, Mr. De Angelis and the first kid he saw die in the Moon Lily for that.

Thomas Valiant, 4 hours, 800$.

“I’ll go tell the boss,” Basil announced as he got up and circled around the counter. Unfortunately, Valiant stood beside the counter’s exit and the rest of the bar.

“Hold up, kid.” Basil tried to convince himself he wasn’t scared of this man, three times his size in both directions, who loomed over him in all his ungodly aura, his slimy shadow engulfing Basil’s form and sticking to him like putrefying goo. “You’d leave poor little old me all alone like that?”

“Yes sir, unless you’d rather I lead you to Mr.-”

The man didn’t even let Basil finish his sentence before picking Basil up from the ground bridal style. Basil’s whole body froze at the sudden contact, his breath suddenly so shallow he’d convince even the best forensic expert he was the grim reaper himself—skin pale as snow, eyes wide as the moon and breathing and pulse negative. Cold.

Basil tried his very best to push the obvious discomfort he felt at having a very drunk man invading his personal space from his expression. The regular Moon Lily client usually enjoyed intimidating the weaker—more often than not, that applied specifically to kids, and Basil really hated to give them that. It always tied his stomach into little knots when he saw that specific glint in their eyes when he showed he was anxious or stressed. He forced his muscles to relax slowly, and the man laughed—Basil almost had to restart the whole process when he heard the sound.

“You like that, uh, kid?” Valiant looked satisfied. Basil wanted to throw up on his clean black suit. “Alright, lead me to your pimp.” He threw Basil a few centimetres in the air like Basil remembered his dad used to do to balance Basil better when he held him, before he left for America—he used to like it, back then, but right now, the gesture sickened him.

“I could do that better if you- if you put me down, sir,” Basil said, desperately clinging to every drop of professionalism left in his blood.

Valiant hummed, making no sign of having heard Basil in the first place. He continued to cradle Basil to his chest like a newborn child. The trembling in his limbs got worse.

“P-please. Put me down. Please.”

“Nonsense,” the man said, his vice like grip on Basil tightening. His hair was practically in Valiant’s nose, and the man sniffed hard. “You like this. Take me to your pimp, kiddo.”

“How…” Basil whispered. He took to staring emptily in the general direction he was facing—he could see a table with four adults in classy clothes discussing. The waitress brought them long, thin flutes of something Basil recognised as champagne—that was nice. Champagne was a… nice sounding word…

“Just give me directions! Come on, I don’t have all day!”

Technically, this was allowed. Valiant was allowed to pick Basil up, or really do anything he wanted while Basil went to notify Mr. De Angelis. Still, that didn’t change the fact that Basil’s mind was constantly screaming Danger! Too close! Danger!

“Awe, come on, kid, live a little,” Valiant groaned. “You look like you’re about to kneel over.”

Basil nodded, barely moving from where Valiant held him so tightly he could almost feel the air being crushed out of his lungs. The bar wasn’t that big—Basil could give directions. He knew where Mr. De Angelis was. This wouldn’t last too long.

Basil spent about two minutes directing Valiant through the crown—it felt like an entire hour. They finally arrived in front of the rusty door that had once been the same colour as the wall to make it harder to see, but was now just an obviously dirty metal plaque slapped on top of a wooden door after one of the older kids had managed to steal a screw from the other side, prompting Mr. De Angelis to renovate a little—both the door and the kid’s face. Basil took a deep breath when Valiant opened the door. He couldn’t decide whether he was relieved or not—relieved because Valiant would have to let him go soon, and not because…

The door opened to a barren and dirty room—a cement floor, cement walls, cement ceiling and the wooden door behind them—with two dozen kids huddled in a corner, shivering, practically sitting on top of each other in an attempt to keep what little body heat they had left between themselves for a while longer. It was even harder because they were wearing dirty, worn rags, with no shoes to protect their feet or buttons to keep the robes closed—buttons could be swallowed, and that was dangerous, Mr. De Angelis said. Basil was pretty sure that meant a kid had tried to kill themselves with one at some point.

A few feet apart from the group of children stood a tall, thin man facing the direction opposite to the door, hunched over the figure of a young girl with long black hair. He was wrapping yet another blanket onto the many already wrapped tightly around the girl—all of the back room’s blankets, leaving the other kids to shiver in silence. Basil already knew that Mr. De Angelis would refuse to provide more blankets, blaming 28’s hypothermia on the others’ lack of sharing or some other dumb reason like that and using the moment as a ‘lesson’.

“You’re not allowed to enter that room, mister,” Basil whispered to Valiant, trying to keep the man’s predatory eyes from 28’s vulnerable form on the ground. Valiant was, as a client, technically allowed to enter the room to pick up his partner by himself if he wanted to—but that wasn’t important right now. What mattered was that he was looking at 28’s limp body with way too much interest for Basil’s taste.

“Rowan!” Mr. De Angelis said brightly, turning away from his meticulous work and throwing his hands in the air as a greeting. “What brings you here?”

“A client, sir,” Basil said, discreetly trying to wiggle himself free of Valiant’s arms before the pimp decided to comment on it. Valiant tightened his hold.

Mr. De Angelis stared blankly at Basil’s position for a few seconds. “Really? Are you sure you don’t want to take care of him yourself, Rowan? You both seem very close!” A smirk visibly tugged at Mr. De Angelis’ lips, as if he knew that Basil, deep down, wanted to do so. Except the truth was, he really, really didn’t. He also didn’t want to speak the next sentence, still his mouth opened to softly announce, “He’s here for Orchidae.” Like a death sentence.

Orchidae, who had slowly been reaching towards 28 since Mr. De Angelis had turned his back on the kids, pulled her arm back like she’d been struck. Her bottom lip quivered.

“A fine choice, sir,” Mr. De Angelis assured Valiant, whose eyes were now darting between the kids with interest. The pimp beckoned the girl up. “Orchidae.”

She rose, graceful despite the cold which was probably still clinging to her bones like smoke to heat—but that was part of the game. Her wide-eyed, terrified expression shifted to a carefully blank one, to a seductive smirk in a few seconds—two layers of armour every child in the Moon Lily learned to wear in a few weeks after their arrival. Orchidae walked towards Valiant in long, calculated strides, her dirty rags dragging on the floor like a prison chain.

“What’s your name, mister?” she whispered in his ear, grabbing his arm with one hand and the back of his neck with the other as if she was about to kiss him. Basil felt Valiant shiver and started to struggle harder to be let down—this time, Valiant didn’t fight him. Basil immediately put as much distance as possible between the two of them. Orchidae’s figure didn’t move, but Basil could still feel her eyes following him.

Orchidae stood up on her tippy-toes and started to drag Valiant away from the room—a few seconds later, the stairs above them creaked under the weight of two pairs of feet. The back rooms weren’t very well isolated—Basil very clearly heard Orchidae’s muffled voice and Valiant’s drunken giggles, giddy and disgusting. He could picture the carefully crafted smile on Orchidae’s face as she whispered in the man’s ear and giggled in response to whatever he’d say…

Mr. De Angelis whistled. “You’re good for business, kid!” He approached Basil with heavy steps, slowly clapping. His proud smile almost made Basil back away, but he was too well conditioned to do so. “You’re taking matters into your own hands, these days? Trying to bring up sales? Attract more customers?”

Basil averted his eyes, pointedly not answering the questions. After a few seconds of silence, he glanced at 28, whose shivering had gotten weaker. “Is she going to be okay?” His voice was low, as if he didn’t want to be heard at all. The pimp looked over his shoulder towards the girl.

“Don’t think so, kid. She was almost gone by the time I came down to check,” Mr. De Angelis said lightly, conversationally. He shrugged. “Anyways, go back to your post, Rowan. I’ll let it slide this time, since you seemed-” his smile sharpened, “-awfully close to the client, but you know you’re not supposed to leave the front.”

The rest of the kids stayed silent, wide eyes disfiguring Basil like he was the newest threat. Mr. De Angelis stared at him expectantly. Basil knew not to argue with him—that he was supposed to leave his post when clients ordered the Golden Flower Special unless instructed otherwise, and that he’d technically been dragged here against his will. He knew from experience it wouldn’t amount to anything. A few new bruises of broken ribs, at best.

Basil bowed curtly, turned around and left the room, the unblinking gazes of dozens of children following his every step well after he stepped past the threshold. Eventually, their eyes were joined by those of the many drunkards hanging out in the bar. Basil felt very, very small, and hurried his strides towards the entrance.

There was already a new customer waiting for him as he sat down in the big office chair that swallowed him like the Pacific would a tiny coastal island during high tides—this was an adult’s job, and Basil was reminded of it every step of the way, even in simple furniture. The man watched him approach the front desk with an increasingly confused furrow of his brows, which reached its peak when Basil grabbed the spiral notebook from under the desk and addressed him directly: “What can I do for you, sir?”

He really, really hoped the man was here for some cheap alcohol. Basil couldn’t handle a third Golden Flower tonight.

A beat passed, in which the man silently eyed the notebook clutched in Basil’s hands.

“Hi there,” the man said after a second, his features pulled high and his voice perplexed. “I was under the impression an adult would be running the bar’s entrance.”

Basil smiled and hoped it came out as genuine—Mr. De Angelis would kill him if he found out he hadn’t been acting his best while handling customer interaction. “My dad is the bar’s owner,” Basil explained with another eye smile, repressing the urge to laugh nervously at addressing Mr. De Angelis in such a familiar way. “Don’t worry, I’m formed like the other members of the staff.”

The man nodded sceptically, but still pulled out his wallet and started to sort through its content. “Still, isn’t it weird for a kid to work in a bar? Your dad lets you?”

Basil nodded in a way he hoped conveyed enthusiasm. “Yep! But I’m not allowed to work in the back,” he specified, pretending he was only speaking about serving alcohol and not other nefarious activities that made him want to throw up. “My dad says it’s good that I practise my in-ter-actions.” He pretended to stumble over the word. Then, as an afterthought, he added: “And work ethics. Oh, I’m going to need to see your ID,” Basil quickly added as the man made the move to hand him a 20 dollar bill.

“Oh? I heard this bar was a bit particular about entrance fees and such, but I gotta admit, it’s been a while since I was IDed,” he laughed, then easily pulled another card from his wallet. “There you go.”

The card read Arthur Jeong. Basil distractedly handed the man a menu in exchange, not taking his eyes off the ID. He quickly calculated Arthur's age from the birth date: 24 years old. He flipped the card over—genuine. As he looked the man over, he couldn’t see any badge of police uniform. He handed the ID back, and found the man blankly staring down at the menu.

“Aren’t menus usually inside bars?” he asked. Basil knew the Moon Lily’s identification procedure wasn’t standard procedure—it was just their way of profiling the customers, especially new ones. Basil needed to know which type of services they were here for, and what, exactly, they knew about the establishment. Their reactions usually told him enough to deem them safe or not.

“There is a menu displaying the drinks over the bar inside,” Basil explained. “However, you’ll be paying here, and I will hand you a card displaying the price option you chose. You will need to show it to the barman—he’ll know how much you’re allowed to have based on the colour. You’re allowed to come back in the front if you want another card later tonight.”

Arthur hummed and skimmed through the list, his eyes finally settling on an option set apart from the others at the bottom of the page. “‘Golden Flower Special’?” he asked. “What’s that?”

“Special services.” Basil wasn’t allowed to elaborate to a customer without them being personally profiled by Mr. De Angelis.

“What type of services?” Arthur pressed, as most people did.

“You need to be a member to access those services,” Basil stated. Arthur sent a quick glance to the side, before his eyes widened and he turned back to Basil.

“Oh,” he said, and his startled expression melted to a wide smile. “How do you get a membership?”

Whatever soul Basil had left after spending so much time in the Moon Lily decided it was the opportune moment to say farewell, and he was left a thin skeleton drenched in freezing water shivering in his too-big office chair, the harsh slap of reality too much for his lagging brain to handle. He’d thought… Arthur had seemed so much nicer than the Moon Lily’s usual clients…

Turned out, he was just like every other adult to ever set foot inside.

“You need to talk to my dad,” Basil answered flatly, any will to pretend to be invested in the conversation he had having vanished the second ‘ gold memberships ’ were brought up. “Would you like me to get him for you?”

“Actually, can you bring me to him? I suspect this conversation will be better held somewhere else than the entrance to a crowded bar.” Arthur had the nerve to look embarrassed , awkwardly rubbing the back of his neck.

Basil nodded, defeated. “Yeah,” he breathed out. “Sure. Follow me.”

He was supposed to notify the pimp beforehand, and then bring the customer up, but it didn’t really matter. Either way, it ended with a new membership , at the end of the day. Basil led Arthur up those damned stairs and led him left. He knocked on Mr. De Angelis’ door.

“Come in? Rowan, is that you?”

“Mr. De Angelis, there is a new customer for you up front.” He gave said customer another empty smile. “Well, actually, I already brought him here.”

Mr. De Angelis stood up from his correctly sized office chair, throwing his hands up in his usual greeting. “Come in, come in! Thanks for bringing him here, Rowan.”

Basil nodded and stepped aside to let Arthur enter the office—it was a small room, but the most comfortable one in the Moon Lily, with a couch, a desk, brightly coloured walls and a small potted tree in the corner of the room. It was a weeping fig, if Basil remembered correctly.

Basil watched the scene unfold with a strange detachment. Mr. De Angelis warmly greeted Arthur, who warmly accepted the handshake, in the bright— warm— colours of the office, and Basil, as he stared at the pair, felt a harrowing cold seeping into his bones like swamp water. He closed the door and made his way back to the front without a noise.

「⸙」

Number 28 died in the following week, her body unable to withstand the freezing cold any longer. There was no one to cry for her: the other kids were too empty of tears to shed another one for the deceased. Her body was disposed of in the dumpsters behind the Moon Lily Casino, her name to be forgotten by the world…

Chapter Text

December 11, 1999 - Gonzaver, Spain

“Hey, kid!” Basil lifted his eyes to meet a pair of sparkling green ones. “Rowan, was it? I’ll take the Golden Flower Special, please.”

Basil had never been more disappointed to see someone in his life. He had kind of hoped last week had been a misunderstanding and Arthur hadn’t understood what the Golden Flower was, and that he’d leave and never come back once Mr. De Angelis explained it to him. Maybe even call the cops, if they were lucky—Basil couldn’t be blamed for it, if a group of armed cops swarmed the building. Mr. De Angelis couldn’t have blamed it on him.

Yet here he was, Arthur Jeong, standing in front of Basil with a wide smile on his disgusting face. Asking for the ‘special’.

“Why did you come back?” Basil asked. He needed to understand why so many people kept coming for this.

Arthur frowned. “Why? Well, I kinda missed my personal celebration for my work accomplishment last time, with the meeting with your dad about the membership and all that, so I decided to come back today instead! Plus I just got that membership, so it’d be a shame not to take advantage of it before going back to work, right?”

Basil stared at him blankly. “I suppose…”

Arthur grimaced. “Yeah. Anyways, how about that special, now?” He smoothed out the edges of his suit, back to business. “I heard you take requests?”

“Yes, sir.”

Arthur nodded. “What about your oldest one, then? What’s her name?”

“It’s 6, sir. He’s a boy,” Basil clarified, because the last time he forgot the specify he’d almost gotten murdered by Mr. De Angelis. He still had the scars on his collarbone from when that ceramic vase had shattered on it.

“He doesn’t have a name?”

Basil hesitated. “No, sir. He wasn’t given a name because he keeps trying to fight the clients.” Honestly, it was a miracle that 6 had lived to see his 17th birthday—well, not literally, since the Moon Lily didn’t usually do celebrations, but still. 6 was 17 years old. Basil didn’t know why Mr. De Angelis hadn’t murdered him yet, with how often he was complaining about him—maybe he didn’t want to deal with a body, or maybe he thought keeping 6 around and beating him up in front of the other kids was a good motivator to get them to behave.

“A fighter, uh…” Arthur trailed off, a contemplative expression on his face. “What’s the worst thing he did to a client before?”

“Uh…” Basil tried to think, searching every corner of his mind for a suitable answer, but the only thing he could hear was Mr. De Angelis’ voice from the week prior, screaming at 6 to stop trying to bite clients’ dicks off. Basil could still picture Mr. De Angelis’ red face and bulging eyes—it was the angriest he’d ever seen him, and the night had finished with a lot of blood on his hands and on 6’s face. Still, 6 had been laughing until the last punch was thrown his way, and Mr. De Angelis had stormed out of the back room with fumes coming out of his ears.

“...He sneaked a screw he’d taken from the back room’s door into one of the rooms and stabbed a client in the eye with it, once,” Basil finally settled on. “Since then we have wooden hinges.”

Arthur whistled. “Damn.” he said as if Basil had just shown him a particularly cool bug and not told him a 17 years old had almost blinded someone in self-defence. “So he’ll try to kill me the second I step inside the room, then?”

Basil thought back to the dick incident. “No… since my dad disciplined him last week. He would probably only attack you if he really hated your guts.”

Arthur nodded, his eyes taking that contemplative glint once again. “Alright, I’ve got something I can show him that I’m pretty sure will make him not hate my guts,” he said with a self-satisfied smirk that Basil wanted to slap off his face, and patted his pant’s front pocket. “I’ll take him.”

Basil opened a new page in his spiral notebook—he’d filled up yet another one two nights before.

#6 , he wrote. December 11, 1999.

“Under whose name and for how long?”

“Arthur Jeong,” he said, then hesitated. “An hour should be enough.”

Arthur Jeong, 1 hour, 50$.

Basil snapped the notebook shut with slightly more strength than necessary and sprung up from the office chair. “Unless you want me to do it, or you want to go yourself, I’ll be getting Mr. De Angelis to get 6 in the back.” As Arthur didn’t answer, Basil continued: “Come with me.”

He closed the register and led Arthur up the stairs for the second time that month. This time, he took the right corridor and showed the man to room—as soon as Arthur entered, he sat himself stiffly on the very edge of the bed and stopped moving. After a few seconds of Basil staring at the shallowly breathing man from the door, Arthur met his eyes and smiled, shooting the boy a quick wave. Basil narrowed his eyes at the suspicious behaviour—that was not typically how ‘ excited new members ’ acted on their first evening. Still, he closed the door and went to find Mr. De Angelis on the other side of the hallway.

“Mr. De Angelis,” Basil said as a greeting. “Mr. Jeong requested number 6 in chamber 1.”

The pimp nodded with a slight grimace. “Thanks Rowan. I’ll bring him there.”

Basil went back to the front desk to attend to the other customers—a couple wanting access to the open bar for the night, and a woman coming here for the Moon Lily’s special drink, which was literally a mix of whatever the barman got his hand on the fastest served in a fancy glass. It was also usually strong enough to knock out a horse, because the barman did not care enough to make it safe, and he also found it a bit funny to ‘prank’ unsuspecting new clients. When he finished registering the clients, Basil glanced back towards the bar and saw a scowling 6 being escorted upstairs by Mr. De Angelis, who was smiling his fake placating smile as he said something the noisy room drowned out. 6 swatted the man’s hand away from his shoulder and started climbing the stairs by himself, leaving the pimp in the dust with an amused smile.

An hour passed without much activity, with more customers leaving than entering, and then Basil spotted Arthur Jeong walking down the stairs, 6 nowhere in sight—as customary, considering the numbered kids often had to clean the room up after the clients departure or just take a breath before going back down—and not a crease in his clothes—that was a bit more unusual. There was a strangely satisfied smile on his face, happy in a way unlike the clients usually were when they got out. Purer, maybe. Basil couldn’t dwell on it too much, though—he had more clients to attend to.

「⸙」

December 28, 1999 - Gonzaver, Spain

“Hey, Rowan,” Arthur said the next time he entered the Moon Lily Casino, about two weeks after his first purchase. “I brought friends, this time. I hope your pimp won’t mind too much.”

Basil stared at him, confused, before silently darting his eyes around. “Uh?”

Because Arthur stood in front of him, smiling widely, hands in his pockets and perfectly alone. Basil craned his neck to stare out of the bar’s glass door—maybe Arthur’s friends were waiting outside? Or was the question about Mr. De Angelis genuine? Did he want Basil to go ask him?

As it turned out, Arthur’s friends were waiting outside. With guns.

“Uh…” Basil repeated. Arthur pulled a card from his front pocket and slid it across the desk so Basil could grab it—which he didn’t, instead opting to gape at the card resting on the polished wood. It was one of those official IDs Basil had been warned to look out for. International Ministry of Public Safety , the card read. There was a picture of Arthur’s face on the left of the card, but the name written next to it was Min-jun Hyun, not Arthur Jeong.

“We’ve surrounded the building,” Arthur said, not unkindly. “We are going to arrest your father under human trafficking charges, amongst other things. Do you know what that means?”

“...You’re arresting Mr. De Angelis?” Basil asked, stunned. There were connections trying to be made inside his mind, but the surprise of the situation was blocking the current and so Basil only gaped at the man with wide eyes and stiff limbs. “...Why? You’re… a client.”

Arthur’s brow furrowed in something Basil could only describe as sympathy, though he didn’t really understand why that would be directed at him of all people.

“He’s been doing bad things to you and your friends, right? We want to stop him from doing that again,” Arthur explained. His usual wide grin was replaced by something cautious as he took a step closer to take back his ID, his hands always visible at his sides. With wide, clear movements, he placed the card back in his front pocket. “Your father’s not going to be able to make you do things you don’t want to do anymore.”

“He’s not my father,” Basil softly stated, because that had been the only thing that had made sense in the last sentences—the only thing Basil registered. He didn’t really understand ‘ safety ’ anymore, but he felt Arthur was safer than Mr. De Angelis ever would be.

“He’s not?” Arthur asked, his tone even. He didn’t even twitch—maybe he’d already known, or suspected at least. “We will help you find your parents back, then. You don’t have to worry about him anymore.”

Something in that sentence—probably the part about his parents—was enough to clear Basil’s foggy mind—to drain the soft, fuzzy cloud that had wrapped around reality and seeped into his brain and jumbled his thoughts. Something in that sentence was enough to make him giggle in disbelief.

Was this real? Like, really real?

Basil was pretty sure his parents wouldn’t want him back. That thought, too, was wrapped in fuzzy clouds. He didn’t even know where they were. His mind kept conjuring the image of his grandma, still, cold on the floor in front of the living room. The red of her blood seeped into the floor and muddled Basil’s thoughts like the grenadine in those fancy cocktails the bar offered—he willed the image away, but it stayed in the back of his mind like a ghost, an afterthought.

A comforting hand was placed on Basil’s shoulder and he instantly flinched away, almost falling from his chair in his attempt to back away.

“I’m sorry,” Arthur apologised quickly, holding his hands high beside him so that Basil could see them. It had been so long since someone had apologised to Basil that, somehow, it felt like the first time. Arthur quickly moved on, though: “I’m going to have a nice talk with De Angelis while my friends arrest the other patrons, alright? Can you go tell your friends that we’re coming?”

“Why?”

“Well,” Arthur began, a soft smile slowly forming back on his lips, “they know you, but they don’t know us. They’d probably be scared of us if we came without warning, but if you tell them beforehand, they’d expect it. So it’s less scary, yeah?”

Basil hesitated, then nodded. “Okay.” His voice was so low he could barely hear it himself, but Arthur nodded back encouragingly.

“We’ll be right behind you, okay? Don’t worry.”

Basil closed the register like he’d done a thousand times before, his hands shaky and clammy. This time, it felt more important, like it’d be the last time. Maybe it would be, if Arthur was serious. His legs were filled with cotton when he got up. Arthur gave him a comforting smile and thumbs up, and he gestured through the transparent door to his friends before disappearing behind the wall separating the front from the bar—to find Mr. De Angelis, most likely. Barely a second later, a dozen other guys in uniforms entered the bar—that was the most people Basil had ever seen coming in at the same time, since the Moon Lily did its best to stay undercover and attract the right—bad—kind of people. One of the men called a quick succession of numbers in a small device—Basil realised he should probably go, now. Somehow, Arthur’s smile had made him just a tiny bit braver.

He quickly made his way through the bar, trying his best to ignore the rising commotion behind him. He opened the back door and felt the cold air prick his face like thousands of tiny needles. Basil was faced with two dozen pairs of eyes staring at him with varying degrees of fear and apprehension. A couple kids huddled closer together.

He froze. What was he supposed to say?

“We are being rescued,” he stated weakly, keeping his eyes glued to the floor. He was quickly growing uncomfortable at the gazes—as terrible as it was, when Basil entered this room, Mr. De Angelis was usually with him to take the stares in his stead. Or, if he wasn’t, Basil didn’t stay long, saying the few words he needed before fleeing like a coward. He hated the back rooms, but he was sure the other kids did too. With Mr. De Angelis usually acting as a malignant shield between the two parties, Basil felt really detached from the others—he really didn’t know how to handle the current situation, how to talk to them and reassure them like Arthur had asked of him.

He raised his head and nearly flinched when he was met with even more scorching gazes—Basil was sure he would never be able to wash off the feeling. Not like anyone was able to wash off much of anything here in the Moon Lily. There was shuffling from the back of the room and 6 peeked his head from behind the taller children with wide eyes. He scrambled up and made his way towards Basil, stumbling slightly over the other kids in his hurry.

“Is it Mister Min-jun? He really wasn’t lying?” 6 made a move as if to grab both of Basil’s shoulders, but thought better of it and placed his hands back to his side. Even crouching to meet Basil’s eyes, 6 was almost a whole head taller than him.

“Min-jun…” Basil repeated. He met 6’s eyes—warm and brown, and sparkling brighter than any other child’s ever did in this building. Recalling the card Arthur had handed him, Basil nodded hesitantly. “Yeah. It’s them.”

6 threw his arms up in a quick cheer, turning around to raise the nearest kid—a small girl Mr. De Angelis had named Lily—in the air in victory. He hugged her tightly, and she looked confused and a bit fearful, but also seemed to recognise the occasion as a happy one from the way her mouth quivered slightly upwards as 6 put her back down. Lily scrambled back to Orchidae—Basil vaguely recalled something about them being brought together a few weeks after himself. He was pretty sure the two of them were related—cousins, or sisters maybe. Lily whispered something and Orchidae nodded slightly in answer.

“Rowan,” 6 called, looking at the back room’s door with slightly foggy eyes. There were people shouting protests outside—the patrons, protesting their arrest. “Are we leaving now? Is Min-jun coming?”

Basil kept listening to the various curses coming from beyond the door. It didn’t sound very safe out there—Arthur was probably still busy. “I think he’ll come get us when they are done,” Basil said. “Or maybe one of his friends.”

He wrung his hands together nervously. He wasn’t sure Arthur, or anyone, was going to come get them, but it sounded like people were smashing things out there. There had been many patrons—drunk of course, but still numerous—and fewer agents. Surely they’d be fine, but it might take them a while longer to get things under control, right? It had been about five minutes since Basil had left the front desk. Not that long to arrest all those people. But what if they stayed in the back room when Arthur wanted Basil to take everyone outside?

Well, Arthur did say to warn the others they were coming. So surely he wanted them to stay safe, and he’d get them?

6 nodded and continued staring at the door longingly, as if he wanted nothing more in the moment than to reach out and run through the bar, through the fight, towards freedom. To Basil, the situation still didn’t seem like a part of reality, so he elected to stare at the floor, wondering what he’d do if it turned out Arthur had been messing with him after all. Or if he woke up in the small, cluttered closet Mr. De Angelis had given him as a bedroom when he’d refused to sleep in the first bedroom—that had felt… wrong. And disgusting. Basil had thrown up on the sheets the first time the pimp had locked him in there—he was pretty sure that was the only reason he’d been allowed to sleep in the closet instead. If asked, Mr. De Angelis still said Basil slept in the first bedroom down the right corridor, to keep up the ‘loving family’ front.

After another five minutes, the noise outside subsided. A few of the children started to whisper between themselves, in a voice so low Basil, even standing in the same room a few feet away, couldn’t make out most of the words. It was as if they were scared Mr. De Angelis would be summoned from the icy air of the room and the few hushered sentences to beat the words out of them. That was something he had most likely done at some point, so Basil could understand. Mr. De Angelis didn’t like it when Basil talked if it wasn’t about a client, so he imagined it must be the same over here. He elected not to join the discussion—he didn’t really know any of the kids, so they would probably rather he stay away. In fact, he was pretty sure most of the older kids hated him, especially those that were here before he arrived, since he had somehow inherited privileges they never had access to, despite them arriving first.

The wooden door behind Basil scraped against the floor, the metal plate on the other side of it making a high-pitched screeching sound as it rubbed against the floor—Basil jumped, the tiny hair on his arms standing on their ends. The door finally fell silent as it hovered around the three worn wooden steps down the back room. The group turned to face the door—there stood Arthur, who winced at the sound before straightening himself with a friendly smile.

“Hello everyone,” he greeted with a small wave. “My name is Min-jun. I work for the International Ministry of Public Safety, though that probably doesn’t tell you anything.” He chuckled lightly. So he really wasn’t ‘Arthur’, then. Basil, distantly, thought he might have lied about his name because he didn’t want to show up on the Moon Lily’s records—he could respect that. The people on that record were horrible, vile and disgusting. “My friends from the Ministry and I are going to get you out of here, okay? You’ll be safe, and we will help you find your parents or a place to stay. Is that alright with you? Do you have any questions?”

Min-jun was, predictably, met with silence, but when Basil looked back, he could see a smiling 6 ushering the others, who were starting to smile tentatively, up. The smaller kids, who were all grouped in the middle because that was where the warmth stayed the longest, were looking around in vague confusion and panic, but the others around were silently offering them comfort and reassurance.

“Alright, can all of you walk?” Min-jun asked, clasping his hands together all business-like. There was a vague murmur of confirmation, so he continued: “There are cars waiting for you in the parking lot to bring you to the police station. There will be a lot of people outside, but I promise they are only here to help you. Most of them will not even talk to you. When we get to the police station, we’ll make arrangements to decide where all of you will be going after today.” As he spoke, he swept the room with his eyes, somehow making it seem like he was speaking to every kid individually. When he finished, he straightened himself out, addressing the room: “Does anyone have any questions they’d like to ask before we go?”

A boy in the back raised his hand, and Min-jun beckoned him to speak.

“Dahlia and 34 are still up there,” the boy—Basil recalled he was number 8—said in a flat, quiet voice. There had been two Golden Flowers tonight, and it was true that they hadn’t been brought back. The customers were a lot more frequent these days—two in an evening used to be particularly unfortunate, but it had somehow become a regular occurrence, where it happened up to four times a week. Basil had started to wonder, at some point, whether the Moon Lily had launched a publicity campaign out there.

#34, December 28, 1997, Marco Lewis, 2 hours, 300$.

Dahlia, December 28, 1997, Sofia Martinez, 3 hours, 550$.

Instead of answering the boy, Min-jun nodded and raised his hand to his earpiece. “Hyun to Ivanov and Martin. Back clear, initiating step 3. Two kids upstairs; situation?”

The crackling of the device answered him, and Min-jun listened to it for a few seconds before lowering his hand from his ear, nodding despite the people on the other side of the device not being able to see him. He turned back to 8. “Your friends have already been escorted outside. They are waiting for you in the cars.”

8 looked away from the man’s honest gaze, imperceptibly nodding—Basil had to admit, he wouldn’t really know what to answer either, in his place. Min-jun sent him a reassuring smile before turning his attention back to the larger group.

“Alright, can the oldests help me bring the younger kids outside? I’ll lead you all through the bar and to the cars outside. It’s right at the entrance, in the parking lot.”

Orchidae nodded, glancing up at 6. “Help me out?” she asked. He nodded.

They began placing the younger kids in rows, reassuring a few and instructing a few other kids to carry the ones that were too scared to get up. Basil—neither one of the oldests nor the youngests—stood aside awkwardly for a few minutes, watching, before Orchidae ushered him over to the back of the line.

“Hey,” she said quietly. Her eyes were a bit wide, her posture stiff, but she spoke with the confidence of an older sister guiding her younger sibling through an injury. “I can see you’re scared, but you don’t need to worry. Everything’s going to be alright, yeah?” She smiled, and it didn’t quite reach her eyes, but Basil appreciated the effort enough to try and reciprocate. His smile wavered, and he averted his eyes in shame.

“Can you watch over Jean for me?” Orchidae continued, gesturing to the small child beside her, who was staring at them with wide eyes. “I need to get back to my sister.”

“Yeah…”

“Thank you, Rowan.” Orchidae stiffly patted his shoulder and walked off to the front of the group. Basil followed her with his eyes as she picked Lily up and listened to whatever Min-jun told her in the front.

A tiny hand tugged at his sleeve.

“Hey, mister, why did Clara leave?” the kid, Jean, whispered. “She said the mister in the front was taking us all away, but I don’t think he can do that. Is she going with him alone? I don’t want her to do that, ‘cause she keeps getting hurt for us but that’s not fair. So it’s my turn now…”

Basil’s breath hitched.

“...You don’t have to do that,” Basil answered slowly, looking down at Jean with wide eyes. “Mister Min-jun is going to help us now. It’s safe.”

Clara… had to be Orchidae. Basil’s heart felt heavier, suddenly. He hadn’t realised the kids knew each other’s names. He didn’t know their real names, and they didn’t know his. He’d assumed Mr. De Angelis had forbidden it—well, he knew he had. He’d only given his real name to someone once—by accident. He’d blocked out Mr. De Angelis’ reaction from his memory, but he’d woken up the next morning with large hand-shaped bruises around his neck. Maybe he should’ve still asked…

He really was terrible, wasn’t he…? He made the other kids’ life here so much worse just by existing…

“Oh, okay,” Jean answered, lowering her eyes. Then, she met Basil’s gaze with curiosity. “Hey, what’s your name, mister? Mine’s Jean, but the mister in the hotel told me to say it’s 39.”

“I’m… Rowan,” Basil answered still. He really couldn’t say his real name… what if Mr. De Angelis found out? Even knowing he most likely wouldn’t, the response had been conditioned into his brain—he wouldn’t—couldn’t— answer anything else.

From the corner of his eye, Basil saw Min-jun raise his hands in the front of the group, trying to call everyone’s attention. Orchidae and 6 had regrouped in the front of the group, but Orchidae leaned over to whisper something in 6’s ear and he broke away from the group to close the line, just behind Basil and Jean. Orchidae nodded to Min-jun.

“Alright, is everyone ready to go?”

There was no objection—Min-jun looked up to 6, who quickly glanced around the room before sending him a thumbs-up.

“Let’s go, then,” Min-jun announced, opening the back room’s door with another loud screech from the metal plating the outside. He climbed the rusty stairs in quick strides and held the door for the kids to pass.

It was the last time Basil would be inside the back room. The feeling coursing through his veins as he took the final step up the stairs, holding Jean’s hand—she’d grabbed his when they started moving—was indescribable. He didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.

6 held open the door with his forearm, for himself, and Min-jun regained the front of the group. A second after, there was a loud bang from behind him, and a laugh, and Basil turned to look only to find that 6 had slammed the door shut and punched the flimsy handle off its hinges. He turned back to follow the group, a slight smile on his face. Sincere, this time around.

The bar was empty, with only a few officers standing around, discussing amongst themselves or talking in expensive looking two-way radios. The artificial lighting illuminated the broken shards of glass scattered around the tables and the abandoned, half-filled drinks forgotten around the bar in the wake of their owner’s arrest, some of which had spilled and dripped from the table onto the floor, seeping into the wood. Basil would hate to clean that up. He hoped Min-jun wouldn’t make him, even if it was technically part of his job.

Min-jun opened the door leading to the parking lot, and the kids felt the fresh, outside air for the first time in—for many of them—years. The sky was blue and free of clouds, the road was paved with stones and weeds grew around the building, and there were flowers–flowers!—in a nearby shop’s facade, in small pots hanging from windows. The air smelled like rain—from a few nights before, Basil supposed as he observed the tiny puddles that refused to seep through the stones—that shop’s flowers, the gas of passing cars and bread from a bakery a few shops further down the street. The bar had been underground—Basil hadn’t seen natural light for more than two years. He stopped dead in his tracks as soon as his feet hit the ground, overwhelmed by the overload of unusual sensory input. Around him, many of the kids did the same. Jean started crying, as many of the children in the front were already doing. Basil tightened his grip on her hand.

The parking lot was very small, allowing less than a dozen cars to park along the side of the joint building the Moon Lily was a part of. All the spaces were occupied by what Basil could only assume were police cars, and larger vehicles for the children were parked in front, blocking the road. There were a lot of people, too—officers walking around quickly, leading drunk, cursing clients to the cars, or talking rapidly amongst themselves on devices as they handled their various tasks. There was tape surrounding the area, with officers surrounding the perimeter and keeping curious passersby away from the scene.

A few officers came to divide the group into the different cars—the first group was led away by a kind looking woman in uniform, and they joined another officer, who was crouching down in front of Dahlia and 34, in front of the cars. A man came to get the second group—Basil and Jean followed him to the second car along with six other kids.

The ride was quiet, the silence only broken by the sound of old classical music playing on the radio station the driver had picked. Basil busied himself staring out the window and taking in his surroundings—mostly buildings and houses, as they were in the middle of a city. The houses’ facade were all in shades of white, beige and orange, more often than not supported with wooden beams embedded in the concrete, but the roofs were colourful—from reddish tints to blueish greys. Those, coupled with the clipped gable roofs, the multiple, small windows and the occasional vines hanging from the walls and windows, reminded Basil of the small town he’d grown up in with his grandma. The familiarity was comforting.

When they finally arrived at the station, 20 minutes later, Basil was impatient to get out of the car, the short ride already starting to give him motion sickness. He wanted to feel the fresh air again, maybe stretch his limbs, walk away from the town to never come back. Maybe he could find himself a nice forest to lie in and never get up again.

That dream was quickly ripped apart when the car’s driver led them inside the police station, where they separated the kids by age, the children younger than 6 in one room, older than 14 in another, and the middle kids got another room—there, Jean was separated from Basil. He reluctantly let go of her hand, and she clinged to his arm a bit tighter, but eventually let herself be dragged away by a sympathetic officer. Basil crossed his fingers that Jean would find her family and live a happy life.

Since a bit less than half of the kids were 6 years old or younger, Basil ended up in a room with 20 other children. The room was large and comfortable—filled with couches and nice chairs. A lady came in to give the group some colouring books and tell them it wouldn’t be too long before someone would come speak to them—except the next time the door opened, it wasn’t an officer.

“Let go- Let us in! Don't touch me-”

“Please, mister, you have to understand-”

The children in the room stared with wide eyes as the half opened door shook before slamming closed, the person holding the handle on the other side having seemingly been pulled away.

“I don’t care!” The angry voice came out muffled, as the door now served as a wall between them and the kids. “Let us in!”

“There are only 5 of us, surely that won’t overpopulate the room by that much,” another voice protested—this one, a girl.

There was a loud ‘thump’, and the door opened a few seconds later, revealing 6’s scowling face, with another girl Basil only knew as Camellia in the background. 

“Why did you do that?” Camellia asked flatly, levelling 6 with a stare .

“They wouldn’t fucking let us in! What the fuck else was I supposed to do?” 6 threw his hands in the air.

The officer on the ground groaned in pain.

“Uh… Gillian?” a girl next to Basil asked. “What’s…?”

Camellia—Gillian, apparently—sighed.

“The officers wanted to separate us older kids from you guys, but this overprotective jerk-” she kicked 6 in the ankle, who flashed a bright smile in response, “-wouldn’t have it, so he fought the police.”

“Come on, you know I’m right, though,” 6 said, widening his grin. Gillian rolled her eyes.

“Yeah, sure. I’ll go tell Clara and the others they can go to the youngers’ room.”

She swiftly took her leave, and 6 loudly plopped himself on a seat close to the door. He looked over to the kids next to him.

“Wha- Wait, you guys got drawings? No fair!” he protested dramatically.

A few kids laughed, and one handed him a piece of paper and a blue crayon. 6 immediately went to work, making a show of sticking his tongue out and drawing in wide gestures, to the delight of the other children. A minute later, Gillian came back and quietly sat herself next to him.

Another minute later, the door opened again to reveal a discouraged-looking Min-jun.

“Please don’t fight the police officers,” he said, levelling 6 with a comically flat stare. 6 only grinned wider in response, and Min-jun sighed.

“You guys are allowed to stay here, as are your 3 other friends in the other room,” he said, addressing 6 and Gillian. “But please don’t do that again. I understand you were worried, but the police station is safe for everyone here, okay?”

“Eh.” 6 shrugged. Min-jun’s lips twitched into a small, amused smile, before he straightened his expression.

“Alright, now that that’s settled-” he clasped his hands together and turned around so he faced most of the group in the centre of the room, “-we’ll be taking separate statements from all of you about your experience in the Moon Lily Casino. Is there anyone that would like to start?”

6 instantly raised his hand and jumped to his feet. “I want De Angelis in jail,” he said in lieu of an explanation. Min-jun nodded and led him out of the room.

With the room silent, Basil let his mind wander. The situation still felt unreal, but with the soft fabric of the couch he was sitting on tightly gripped between his fingers, the antiseptic smell of the air and the harsh lighting of the room illuminating a dozen drawing children, it was a bit hard not to find some hold onto reality. But the sudden awareness and clarity raised many questions in Basil’s mind, the most important of which being: what was going to happen to him now that he was out of the Moon Lily? It wasn’t like anyone needed him, wanted him, outside of that place.

He was pretty much useless now.

It was better than bringing harm to others, as he did in the Moon Lily, but it did leave him feeling numb and uncertain—maybe a bit apprehensive, also—towards his future. He looked at the other children in the room. Some of them were talking quietly amongst themselves, showing off their drawings, laughing, nervously looking around as if they feared someone was observing them. Basil sat alone in a corner of the room, isolated from the group. The girl that had sat beside him when they were originally brought into the room had left at the first occasion and was now resting her head on Camellia’s—no, Gillian’s —shoulder. Her eyes were closed, and the older girl was humming lightly as she ran her fingers through the girl’s hair. It looked warm.

Basil’s corner of the room was a lot colder, and darker.

It took a long time for a new officer to enter the room.

“Is there any other volunteer who would like to give their statement?” the officer asked, flipping idly through a clipboard.

He was, predictably, met with silence. In fact, the room got completely silent the second the door opened.

6 poked his head from behind the wall, gauging the room’s atmosphere with a glance. He blinked, before his gaze settled on Basil.

“Min-jun’s taking the statement,” he stage whispered as he looked intently in Basil’s direction.

Basil, glanced away from him, hesitating. Min-jun was nice, but… well, he was a bit scared of what he’d be told when he gave his statement. And he didn’t know the man all that well, either.

He looked up and met 6’s encouraging gaze, and gave in. He slowly got up from his safe spot in the corner of the room. “Okay, I… I’ll go.”

6 flashed him a smile and a thumbs-up and took back his seat next to Gillian. Basil stared for a second before resolving himself to follow the agent. They took a long corridor, and finally, the agent opened a door at the end—a room with white walls, with a table where a big computer rested in the middle and two seats on each side of it. Min-jun sat in the seat facing the screen, jotting down a few words on a clipboard.

Basil hesitantly looked up at the officer behind him, who gestured him into the room. He closed the door as he left, and Basil looked at it for a few seconds, frozen—was it locked? Was he trapped here?—before he hesitantly took the seat across Min-jun, sitting on the very edge of the chair.

This was fine.

“Hey, Rowan,” Min-jun warmly greeted, setting his clipboard down to look at him. “I can say, it is nicer to see you outside of the bar.” He smiled. Basil looked at him with wide, vacant eyes. “How are you feeling?”

“Fine,” he answered, quickly and quietly. His instinct from the time he spent in the Moon Lily kicked in—professionalism and all that. It was better to divert attention away from himself. The most important rule had always been: never answer anything about yourself, lest the client take it as an invitation. Min-jun’s smile didn’t waver, but Basil could tell he noticed what Basil was trying to do.

“That’s good to hear,” he said pleasantly. “Now, let’s cut straight to the chase, shall we? I’m going to be taking notes as you answer. Is that alright with you?”

Basil mutely acquiesced, and Min-jun nodded. 

“What name would you like to use for the statement?”

A name…? 

“Rowan De Angelis,” Basil answered. He looked away, but didn’t miss the slight tightening of Min-jun’s lips at his answer.

“Alright then, Rowan. Let’s begin,” he said, and he leaned over to press a button on a device setting between the two of them on the table.

“This is agent Min-jun Hyun of the Ministry of Public Safety, interviewing Rowan De Angelis about the Moon Lily Casino case, case number 0463718, in Gonzaver Police Station, Gonzaver, Spain. Date of recording: December 28, 1999. Rowan, your statement will be recorded for the archives—do you consent to the recording of this interview?”

Basil stared at Min-jun blankly—those were a lot of words for a simple question. It made his answer seem important, like he needed to sound as clean and professional for it to count—count for what, he didn’t know.

He didn’t really have a reason to decline, though. He nodded his head.

“Please state your answer verbally for the record,” Min-jun requested with an amused smile—which wasn’t audible in his voice.

Oh, right. The record. “Yes, it’s fine,” Basil answered, barely louder than the first time. It seemed loud enough, though, because Min-jun continued:

“Al right ! Let’s start with the procedure questions, then: Please state your name for the record.”

“You said it in that long introduction,” Basil pointed out. Min-jun chuckled.

“That’s correct, but it’s still part of the protocol. You need to identify yourself for the record, so we can verify who you claimed to be in case of identity fraud.”

“Uh-” Basil panicked. “I’m not lying, I swear!”

“I know, kid. It’s just protocol.”

Basil swallowed. “Okay, uh- Rowan De Angelis.”

That name was imprinted in his brain with a hot iron rod, the burning metal melting through and imprinting in his hippocampus—he knew Mr. De Angelis hadn’t bothered legally changing his name, since he would’ve been arrested instantly if he tried—but, uh, that didn’t count as lying if that’s all anyone had called him for over two years, yeah?

“Earlier today, you told me that the bar’s owner, given name Giorgio, last name De Angelis, was not your father. Was he the one to give you that name?”

“...yes.”

Basil would probably go to jail if he lied. He really didn’t want to go prison again—one was enough, visiting the others did not sound appealing to him at all.

“If that’s the case, do you remember the name you had before that one?” Min-jun asked.

“...yes.”

Min-jun stared at him expectantly, but Basil could not get his mouth to open and continue. When it became clear he would not elaborate, Min-jun pushed. “Can you tell me that name? It will help us find your parents, later.”

There was a type of pure compassion held in Min-jun’s eyes as he spoke that Basil hadn’t seen since his grandmother. That did not help him speak. Instead, Basil raised his knees onto the seat and buried his face away from those soft eyes, hugging his knees tightly in the hopes that if he held them strongly enough, Min-jun would have gone away and he wouldn’t have to answer. Basil knew his parents wouldn’t want him back—his question was pointless, if that was truly his goal. To them, Basil Gaertner might as well have been dead since he was four—and he was dead to the rest of the world the second his grandmother’s head touched the floor. A forgotten child, and a new body in the basement of a bar.

“That’s fine,” Min-jun assured him. “If you want, tell me later, okay? Do you want me to continue calling you Rowan?”

Basil raised his misty eyes from the crook of his knees and meekly nodded—he didn’t really care.

“Don’t worry, you’re doing great,” Min-jun said in a comforting tone—it wasn’t really effective, because Basil knew he was lying. He failed to answer the only question he was asked, what about that said ‘doing great?’.

“Let’s start with the real questions now, alright? Can you tell me about how you came to be in the Moon Lily Casino? Do you remember that?”

Basil nodded—and then he remembered he was supposed to answer out loud for the record. “Yeah, I remember…”

“Can you tell me a little about that?”

Basil averted his eyes again—in all his time at the Moon Lily, he had avoided thinking about that day. Somehow, even with all the horrible things happening in that place, thinking about it had always seemed like the thing that would actually end up finally shattering his mind—as if the moment the veil was lifted, the memories would come flooding back and drown him, swallow him down into their murky depths and never spit him back out.

“Some- some men broke into my house,” Basil tentatively started. He lifted his eyes to meet Min-jun’s eyes and was met with yet another comforting gaze. He swallowed thickly before continuing. “They wanted… something from my mother. They shot my grandma, and then…” He curled himself up tighter. “They put me in a car and drove me to the bar.”

Basil stopped there, fixing his teary eyes to the ground. He knew he wouldn’t be able to go into more details.

“I’m sorry about your grandmother,” Min-jun said with a sympathetic frown. “Do you know what they wanted? Did your mother give it to them?”

“My mother’s in America” Basil furrowed his brows and started to harshly pick at the hem of his pants. “She wasn’t there.”

Min-jun nodded and noted something down on the clipboard. “Alright, so they broke in, expecting your mother to be there, but she wasn’t. I assume they were after a valuable of some kind?”

“...files, I think.”

He remembered a paper slowly falling in the deep pool of red staining the hardwood floor, the snow white document absorbing the life out of the blood and muddling the prints, and a man hurriedly picking it up, cursing his grandmother out for bleeding too much. He had wanted to defend his grandma, back then, tell him that it wasn’t her fault, but he’d been too busy trying to suppress his trembling to speak out. When the man had grabbed his face, his bloody fingers had left a red mark on his cheek, and suddenly he could smell the blood on his skin more than the fear coursing through his veins.

Min-jun interrupted Basil’s reminiscing. “And I assume they couldn’t get it, if your mother wasn’t present?”

“My grandma gave them a fake.”

“Do you know what the files were supposedly about?”

Basil shook his head. Min-jun clicked his pen. “You don’t. Alright. How did the men bring you to the bar?”

“In a car… I said that already.” Hadn’t he? Was Min-jun talking him in a circle?

“I know, I’m sorry kid. They sold you to the Moon Lily, correct? Do you have anything to tell me about that?”

“Um- n-not really. I wasn’t here for the negotiation. They locked me in the back room with the other kids.”

It had been the only time he’d been in there as a prisoner and not an executioner. As soon as the negotiations were done, Mr. De Angelis had dragged him up the stairs by the arm and told him he was his dad, now. And then he’d locked Basil in his office for the rest of the day, to make a point.

“Right, about the back room—can you tell me about your time in the Moon Lily? I think your role was a bit different from the others’?”

Why was this statement phrased as a question? Min-jun had seen him work—he knew what Basil did. He knew exactly what Basil did, the vile, disgusting things he did.

Oh. He was putting it back in his face.

Well, he had a right to be mad. Min-jun had rescued everyone, including Basil, but Basil was a part of the problem—he’d be mad, too, in Min-jun’s situation.

“...they needed someone to lie to the police. Also I lead the others… for the clients.”

“Can you explain what you mean by ‘lying to the police’?” Min-jun asked clinically, pretending he didn’t care about the second half of Basil’s statement—the worse part of Basil’s statement.

Basil bit his lower lip. He was anxiously anticipating the other shoe to drop, but he also needed to answer Min-jun’s questions. He didn’t want to go to jail. “Mr. De Angelis said that if he had a healthy kid in the front, the police would be less likely to go snoop in the back.”

Min-jun frowned. “Uh. Peculiar way of thinking, considering they put you, a child, in charge of a bar’s entry fees. How were you treated back there?”

“Fine,” Basil answered quickly. Min-jun’s eyes narrowed.

“Alright, then what about the others? How were they treated?”

“Uh… not good.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“Mr. De Angelis didn’t care for them, only for the- the clients. Sometimes he beat them up if they didn’t do what he wanted. He also didn’t want to heat up the back room in the winter, and he refused to clean it—and he- he banned me from doing it, too… So the room was always filthy and smelly and full of blood. A lot of kids d-died there. I don’t think Mr. De Angelis cared about that, either.”

“Alright…” Min-jun’s mouth was set in a grim line as he noted what Basil said on his paper.

“They put the bodies in the back,” Basil added in a haunted voice, “in the dumpster. He made me carry them, sometimes-” Basil’s breath hitched as he swallowed down a whimper. Min-jun froze before slowly nodding.

“Yeah… I’m sorry you had to live through that, Rowan.” He tried to smile, but it didn’t come out quite as bright as usual. “Do you really think you were treated fine, even after you told me that?”

Basil stiffened. “Yeah,” he whispered, but his face was most likely too blank to be believed. In an attempt to be more convincing, he added, “I needed to look fine for the police, right? So they wouldn’t start an investigation…”

“Okay, if you’re sure you don’t want to add anything to that…” he trailed off, and Basil shook his head. “Then, what exactly was your role in the bar? What did De Angelis ask you to do?”

“Uh…” A lot of things. Many things that didn’t even have to do with the bar—he was often treated like Mr. De Angelis’ personal servant. Basil tried to formulate an appropriate answer. “I checked in the clients and made sure they were allowed to enter, either for the bar or the… other things… Mr. De Angelis wanted me to check the IDs to make sure they weren’t police. His voice got quieter. “Though that didn’t really work out for him, since you managed to enter…”

It was a bit funny, that Mr. De Angelis had welcomed a government official into his office without any doubt as to his identity. Basil stifled a giggle—he was so tired. He felt like he was about to burst into tears.

“I suppose,” Min-jun said, a vaguely concerned curve in his brows. “Anything else?”

“Not really.”

“Then do you want to tell me about your relationship with the other kids?”

Basil’s face instantly dropped. “There was none. They don’t like me.”

Min-jun frowned, surprised. “Uh? Why do you think so?”

Basil’s lips quivered. “I’m… I’m the one that…”

A tear slipped from his eye, leaving a dark spot on his knee where he rested his head, and he instantly buried his face away from sight, trying to keep his shoulders from shaking too badly.

“Oh, Rowan…”

Basil heard Min-jun rise from his seat, and he felt a shadow suddenly loom over him—he raised an eye and found the man crouching in front of him. But Min-jun didn’t touch him. Instead, he spoke. “Nobody blames you for that, okay? You want to know a secret? I’m not supposed to tell you that since it’s technically part of his statement, but Damian said he wanted to talk to you later, to thank you for trying to stick up for him multiple times when De Angelis got mad at him. He also said- uh, not so savoury things about what he thought of De Angelis’ treatment of you, and that he’d be willing to punch him in the face for you and the other kids. See- he likes you. No one’s mad at you for what De Angelis did…”

Basil sniffed. “Who- who’s Damian?” he asked in a watery voice, latching onto the unfamiliar name.

“Oh, right- you’d know him as 6, correct? He gave me his name at the beginning of his statement.”

“Oh…”

Damian, uh… Basil thought that fit him. But if he gave his name, then Basil probably should…

“Hey, don’t worry. Even if Damian wanted to give me his real name, it doesn’t mean you have to, okay? You can wait until you feel comfortable enough to tell me.”

Basil nodded, not bothering with a verbal response. He hugged his knees tighter—he kind of hated statements, he decided.

“We’ll end it here, if you don’t have anything to add, alright?” Min-jun asked, still crouching in front of Basil. “Do you want to give me any information to contact your parents?”

Basil shook his head. “My parents don’t want me. They’re in America, now.”

“What for? They might still want to get you back, even there, don’t you think?”

“No…” They had left a four years old Basil all alone with his grandmother. Basil was pretty sure they left for America specifically to be as far away from him as possible—they’d made it pretty clear they didn’t really care for him, with how distant the both of them were, probably from the moment of his birth. They probably didn’t even know he’d been missing. “They don’t.”

Min-jun hummed sympathetically. “That’s alright too. We’ll figure something out for you. Let’s have a talk to discuss your options later, okay?”

Basil nodded, and Min-jun led him back to the door, where the officer from earlier still waited. He was led back to the room with the colouring papers, and as the door opened and he took his seat back in the corner, he eyed 6— Damian —with curious eyes. The older boy was surrounded by four other children and seemed to be animatedly drawing a diagram showcasing something Basil couldn’t understand from where he sat. He debated going over, before he ultimately decided not to—just knowing he maybe wasn’t as alone as he’d previously thought was enough to lighten his heart.

Nobody blamed him for what Mr. De Angelis did… that sounded too good to be true, like a very pretty sounding lie, but maybe he could make a friend, despite everything.

「⸙」

January 3, 2000 - Sonnenstadt, Germany

The group—consisting of Basil, Damian, two girls named Zuri and Anastasia and Min-jun—had arrived in Sonnenstadt, home of the Ministry’s European headquarters, four days prior. They had left the other kids—the ones that knew where they were going to go from then on, those who had parents, relatives or friends willing to take them in, or who’d rather live in modern orphanages than keeping the veil of mystery covering their uncertain futures—in the hands of the police back in Spain. Basil hadn’t even known the Moon Lily was in Spain. Min-jun had promised to help the remaining four find a living arrangement. They’d opted to follow him back to Germany.

Basil had mixed feelings about being back in Germany. On one hand, it was where it all began, and the country held his worst memory—the one from that night. On the other hand, it was the only place he’d created happy memories in at all. He had half expected to smell blood in the air the instant he stepped off the train after their day-long trip, but the air was as pure as it had been before his grandmother had died.

He’d been given a room to share with Damian in the headquarters—they had temporary spare rooms for their agents and unfortunate guests who, for some reason, needed to stay there. Despite sharing a room, Basil did not talk with Damian much after the first day, except for occasional evening talks when Damian came back from what he was doing with Min-jun. Damian was spending most of his time out—Basil guessed he must be discussing the case with the agents, since he was older and also more involved in the actual events than Basil had been. They still got along well, despite their minimised contact. Damian was really nice.

He was still waiting for Min-jun to talk to him about his options. Basil understood the other was probably busy with more important matters, and he didn’t really mind waiting—after all, the room was really nice, compared to his closet in the Moon Lily, so he didn’t mind spending all his days inside. He’d found a thick catalogue about North American plants in the back of the small, dusty library in the corner of the room, so he had busied himself with reading it from cover to cover—he was almost done, though, so he’d soon have to read something else.

Basil was debating whether to close the book and rest his eyes, tired from reading all day in a semi-dark room, or start reading the next entry—the Viburnum Trilobum, or American cranberrybush—when the door opened to reveal a tired looking Damian. The sky had just begun to darken—at about 5 PM or so—so Damian was earlier than usual.

He closed the heavy door behind him before letting himself fall down, face first, on his bed—the one closest to the entrance. Basil closed the catalogue and placed it in front of him on the bed, hesitating. Should he check-up on the other…?

“Damian, are you okay…?”

Damian groaned, keeping his face firmly into the mattress even as he raised his arm to give Basil a thumbs-up. He took a few seconds before finally rolling over. “Yeah, I’m good. Just realising I’m an idiot,” he said, rubbing his left arm as if it were sore. Basil pretended that answer cleared anything up. “Oh, by the way,” Damian added, seemingly remembering something, “Min-jun says he’d like to talk to you now, if you’re ready?” 

He raised his head to look Basil in the eyes, resting his chin on his hands. “But I can tell him to wait a bit, if you’d prefer.”

Basil shrugged—he had had plenty of time to prepare. “It’s fine, I- I’ll go now.” He paused. “Though, uh… c-can you lead me there? I don’t know where he is…”

Damian laughed. “Yeah, sure, no problem! Let’s go?”

“Yeah.”

Basil got down from the bed he was sitting on, and Damian held the door open for him. “What were you reading?” he asked as they started walking down a ridiculously long corridor that twisted in about every possible direction at one point or another. Without Damian, Basil was sure he would’ve gotten lost after ten steps.

“Oh, uh- it’s a book about plants…” Basil answered, nervously rubbing his hands together.

“Yeah? Tell me more?”

So Basil tentatively began to explain what the last entry he had read—the Veronicastrum Virginicum, from the plantain family—and Damian somehow pretended it was interesting to him. Well, maybe it was—you never knew, with Damian. He had a lot of weird interest, as Basil had learnt during the last four days when Damian had started reciting from memory an excerpt from his favourite book he’d read when he was a kid, Mechatronics: Electronic Control Systems in Mechanical and Electrical Engineering. Basil had barely understood a word of it, and Damian had assured him he had understood very little of it himself, back then, but it had still been his favourite book. During the long, cold days in the Moon Lily, Damian had recited the parts of the book he remembered reading from when he stole it from his dad, and he’d come to appreciate the words even without understanding their meanings.

‘ I used to think my father would pay attention to me if I showed interest in his work; that’s why I liked that book so much. I felt it brought me closer to him, y’know? I stole that book from him at least once a week back then, ’ Damian had told Basil when the younger boy asked him how he remembered a book he’d read so long ago. ‘ It really didn’t work, in the end, but it ended up saving my ass from boredom when I was rotting in that hell of a bar. Take what you get, and all that. ’

The closest thing they found to that book in the library was a book on chemical engineering—not really what they’d been looking for. All of that to say, maybe Damian really was interested in the various characteristics of the Veronicastrum, but Basil had no way of knowing. He sure seemed interested, asking further questions to what Basil told him, but most of the bar’s kids had become good actors after a few months of staying. He kept talking anyway.

It took them less than five minutes to arrive in front of Min-jun’s door, and Basil thanked Damian for showing him the way before tentatively knocking. He was invited in by Min-jun’s usual cheerful voice.

“Sit down, sit down,” he invited Basil in, gesturing to the chair across from him. The office was reminiscent of the one he’d given his statement in, the week prior, with two imposing chairs, a table and a big computer to the side. “How are you feeling? The headquarters are treating you well?”

“Yeah,” Basil said, trying to figure out if he was supposed to elaborate.

“That’s great to hear!” Min-jun replied, confirming that Basil did not, in fact, have to elaborate. “Now I’m sure you know why you’re here today? We’ll be trying to figure out where you’d like to go from now on.”

Basil nodded, as he’d been expecting this. “I don’t know where I want to go,” he stated quietly, in case Min-jun was about to ask him if he had any preferences.

“Hm, that’s fine, don’t worry,” Min-jun smiled, organising a few papers. He placed them in front of Basil, who tentatively grabbed the one on the top. “That’s why we’re here! Let’s look at your options together, okay?”

Basil nodded, eyes flitting through the words on the list. None of them sounded appealing.

“Now since we don’t have your name, the first options aren’t really available, since we’d need to contact your relatives, but you can start on the second page, alright? That’s where your available options begin.”

Basil glanced at the page he held between his hands—detailing the procedure needed to send him back to his parents, or to have him adopted by another relative or family friend. He put the page down and took the second one.

“It’s Basil,” he said in a whisper, his eyes fixed on the paper between his fingers. He didn’t take back the first paper, though, because even if the possibility was open, he didn’t want to burden his parents with a child they did not know.

“Basil?” Min-jun asked, tilting his head to look at him through the computer’s screen.

“My name. It’s Basil.”

He raised his eyes to meet Min-jun’s, whose face split into a smile. “That’s a nice name, Basil. Can you tell me your last name as well so I can look you up in the system?”

“...Gaertner.”

Min-jun started typing on the computer, and Basil turned back to the paper in his hand. This one was about the foster care system—it sounded about as appealing as the first options did.

“Ha-ah!” Min-jun exclaimed, and Basil looked up to him with curiosity. “I found you.”

Basil tried to see the screen, but the computer was turned away, hidden from his sight even as he craned his neck.

“Basil Gaertner, birthday February 18th, 1991, born to Aspen Gaertner and Daphne Rosenberg in the small town of Nowhere, Germany. Is that correct?”

Basil nodded. Min-jun read a few more words.

“Oh. Your parents- uh. ” A weird expression crossed Min-jun’s face, but it was quickly hidden back behind yet another smile. He scrolled down a bit before waving Basil over. “Do you want to see? Come here.”

Basil tiptoed around the desk, keeping a safe distance away from Min-jun even as he tried to see the screen. He couldn’t read the small text very well, but he could see the pictures and headlines. Min-jun didn’t beckon him closer.

In the top left corner of the screen was a small, black and white picture of Basil, dating a few years back—he recognised it as a picture taken at a local event, when he was six years old. He was smiling widely, and he knew the picture was cropped, removing the potted plant he’d been showing off and his grandmother by his side—you could see a bit of her hair on the side of the picture. Under the picture were a bunch of information, dates and locations. Right over the picture was the headline.

MISSING - Basil Gaertner, April 17, 1997.

“Here it says your neighbours were the ones to report you missing,” Min-jun said, putting a part of the text in evidence with his cursor. “Were you close with them? We could try to see whether they would be willing to take you in.”

Basil didn’t answer, his gaze fixed on his past self’s smiling face on the screen. The boy in the photo was a ghost, his pale skin rendered see through by the black and white filter over it, and the picture was decorated with black satin and the regret of a past life, the very image of a memorial shrine mounted in a venue filled with echoes. The smile on his face was plastered on the paper, immortalised and frozen in time for a remaining eternity—it seemed fake, rendered plastic by the electronic glow of the screen. He was looking at his own ghost. Basil shivered, the cold coming from the spectre’s lingering touch seeping in his bones .

He teared his gaze away, brushing away the disconcerting feeling and trying to think through Min-jun’s proposal. He didn’t remember his neighbours much—they’d mostly been close with his grandmother, and everytime they came over, he was off in the fields behind the house, playing with flowers. It was nice of them to report the incident, but he knew he would only burden them by tasking them of caring for a troubled child. No one would want to inherit such a task.

“No,” he answered simply, pretending it did not take him two long minutes to come up with the simple word.

“Alright,” Min-jun said easily. “Would you be willing to try foster care, then? You wouldn’t necessarily have to be adopted if you did, you could only stay in their facilities with other children. Boarding school is also an option, if you’re willing to go through the paperwork necessary for admission under government funds.”

Foster care… and living close together with a bunch of other kids. Basil tried to imagine himself living that life, and his heart did a triple somersault, leaving him feeling dizzy and nauseous. He could understand why the other kids found the appeal in living so close to other children—to them, the group had been their only source of comfort and safety back in the Moon Lily. A setting where they were allowed proximity with others their own age, others who were ‘safe’, could be familiar and comforting. But to him… he hadn’t been allowed contact with the group. In fact, the only time he’d spent with such a large group of children had been when he was about to lead one of them to their metaphorical execution. The thought of constantly feeling this disgusting way simply because of his living arrangement instantly put him on edge. He knew he was being difficult, but…

“No.”

“Okay…” Min-jun took it in a stride, checking out another tab on his computer for the following options. Basil came closer so he could read it, gripping the edge of the desk between his fingers. He knew Min-jun was about to suggest something else, but the truth was, as Basil tried to imagine himself going back to a normal life, he found he didn’t really want to be anywhere. He couldn’t imagine himself doing anything with his life, no matter the place or the people he would be with.

“What about-”

“Can’t I just stay with you?” Basil asked, and, upon realising he had really just said it out loud, slammed his head on his hands on the desk to avoid seeing Min-jun’s reaction. How embarrassing…

“What do you mean?” Min-jun shifted in his seat to face Basil.

“I- I didn’t mean anything,” he whispered, trying to quell the panicked spikes of his heartbeat. “I’m sorry-”

“Don’t apologise, it was a valid question,” Min-jun tried to placate the boy, his hand hovering over Basil’s shoulder without touching it. “Did Damian tell you what he was doing with me during the week?”

“What… uh, no, he didn’t,” Basil answered, suddenly quite confused about where this conversation was headed. He raised his head so he could send the man a confused look. Was Damian getting adopted by Min-jun or something…?

“Hm, I thought he might have…” Min-jun trailed off. “Well, I’ll tell you, then: he’s been training. He decided that, since he’s almost an adult, he wanted to stay here to work with the Ministry.”

Basil’s eyes widened. “Oh… can I do that, too?”

The question was spoken with childlike innocence, mostly curious, but Min-jun winced, hesitating before finally answering. “I could ask my superiors…” He briefly stopped, carefully weighing each word on his tongue before continuing. “But you’re just a kid… I don’t think it’s right for you to work here, or even train to work here, just yet, you know? It’s a tough job—dangerous also. You could have a safe, comfortable life with a nice family, away from here.” He looked Basil in the eyes, assessing. His brows furrowed. “I know it’s scary, now, but I promise you’d get used to it. You’d be happy.”

“But… I don’t want to go back to a family. It feels… wrong.”

He thought of his parents, whom he could hardly even remember the face of. He thought of his grandmother’s blood, splattered on the floor like a macabre painting. He thought of the heavy feeling on his tongue as he called Mr. De Angelis ‘dad’. After everything, Basil could hardly imagine himself living among a loving family.

Min-jun nodded slowly, his lips pursing slightly. “Well, alright. I’ll talk to my boss and arrange a meeting to discuss your admission. If they accept, I’ll explain the job in more detail, and you’ll make your final choice then, okay? Don’t feel pressured to accept just because you said yes now.” His voice got more serious as he said that part, needing to hammer down the importance of the sentence. He softened his face as he continued, in a gentler voice, “Think about it, okay? You can ask Damian to tell you a little about what we’ve been doing during the week, if you want.”

“Okay, t-thanks,” Basil answered, ducking his head away from the man’s undivided attention. It made him feel a little bashful, but he was glad Min-jun was at least considering letting him stay.

“No problem, Basil,” Min-jun answered, back to his usual, wide-smiled mood. “You can go now. I’ll call you back to tell you the higher-ups’ answer.”

Basil nodded and wordlessly made his way out of the office. As he closed the door, he heard Min-jun mutterering a few reluctantly amused words.

“Ah- first Damian, then Anastasia, and now Basil… what the hell did the Commission feed these kids in the last few days… We’ve never had-”

The door closed with a small ‘click’, and Basil silently made his way back to his room, smiling slightly. He was grateful for Min-jun for rescuing him and the other kids from the Moon Lily, and for Damian for being so nice to him in the past few days… he really hoped he’d be allowed to stay around. Maybe he should get Min-jun and Damian some plants as  thank you gifts…

「⸙」

8 days later, three new files were added to the Ministry of Public Safety’s—often known as the Cypress Commission—archives.

Damian Creed, 17 years old — Agent in training. Recommendation: Agent Min-jun Hyun, field agent, Europe Headquarters. Supervisor: Agent Min-jun Hyun, field agent, Europe Headquarters.

Anastasia Alanis, 12 years old — Agent in training. Recommendation: Agent Min-jun Hyun, field agent, Europe Headquarters. Supervisor: Agent Min-jun Hyun, field agent, Europe Headquarters.

Basil Gaertner, 8 years old — Agent in training. Recommendation: Agent Min-jun Hyun, field agent, Europe Headquarters. Supervisor: Agent Min-jun Hyun, field agent, Europe Headquarters.

And thus our story begins…

∙∙•「⸙」•∙∙

MISSING - Basil Gaertner, April 17, 1997

Basil Gaertner, originally from Nowhere town, Germany, was last seen on April 16 in the afternoon, walking home from the village’s town market where he liked to walk presumably to his house. The supposed itinerary the boy would have taken is as follows: town market, back city fields, Mondbezirk district.

Basil’s biological grandmother, Weide Durchdenwald, was found dead early this morning by the family’s neighbours, having been shot in the head one time by a ranged weapon. The couple, after calling the police, searched the house for Basil, but was unable to locate the boy. The culprit was not arrested.

If you have any information regarding Basil’s disappearance, please call the number 1-866-543-xxx or contact your nearest police station.

Chapter Text

October 22, 2001 - Sur-le-Chemin, France

A soft breeze swept through the small village the mission was centred around, ruffling Basil’s hair as he walked yet again down the street leading to the town square. Like every morning, he chose to meddle with the civilians instead of aimlessly wandering around the amusement park—it always felt weird to do so, and that was why he’d gotten tired of it so fast. Basil was… undercover. He, along with two older agents—Yasmin Kasra, undercover agent extraordinaire, and Erik Olsen, in human intel—had gotten an assignment which required them to hang around the place.

It was a weird experience, to set base in a children’s amusement park with two highly trained Commission agents for an intel-gathering mission Basil would not even be a part of. Basil wasn’t really a child anymore—not in the conventional sense, at least—so being here made him feel out of place. The higher-ups at the Cypress Commission had simply needed a believable reason for two older agents to go to France, and the park had been the closest settlement to their contacts that wouldn’t need them to buy a house to stay there for more than a week. They were… playing family. So for the past week and a half, Basil had been taking a fun little trip to one of France’s most popular children’s parks, by himself. It was the weirdest ‘ trip ’ he’d ever taken. Did it even count as ‘vacations’ if he used his time to do recon work?

Because, despite his orders only giving him the task of hanging around, that’s what he’d decided to do. Basil used his annoyingly-free time to go down the park’s hill, walking down an old stone road, to the nearest village, where he spent most of his day walking around pretending to be a lost child to gather various forms of human intel and assess the field. With the recent beginning of the War in Afghanistan, communication with the NATO’s allies was crucial—and France, while not being a part of the organisation, was still an ally of it. Basil wasn’t really sure what he was trying to accomplish by walking around a village populated mainly by civilians, but he wasn’t given instructions other than ‘stay in France where Yasmin and Erik can get to you quickly’, and it was honestly better than walking around an amusement park by himself with all the responsible adults gawking at him. A solitary child standing in the middle of a crowd and disinterestedly staring at the rides tended to gather attention, as he’d rapidly learned during the first two days of his stay.

Yasmin and Erik’s mission had to do with intel gathering for the war—that, Basil knew. Unluckily for him, he wasn’t given any more information, seeing as he was technically just an asset and not an active agent for the operation. He heard them talking about contacts, though, so it must be something akin to an exchange of information. And Basil really couldn’t help with that, so he did the next best thing—keep himself occupied by pretending to be helpful, and gather useless intel on the civilian’s preferred places to have lunch and the best place to set base around those while waiting to launch an operation which would never happen—because really, who in their right mind would raid ‘ la Pâtisserie Joyeux Sourire ’ or ‘ le Resto-Bistro de Glenn ’. What would the government want with those perfectly innocent restaurants?

Yeah, Basil was wasting his time. There wasn’t much else to do here, though.

When Basil came back to the hotel room that night, he was never happier to hear footsteps quickly tail him. Usually, that meant he was in imminent danger and needed to move —but now? It meant he could finally do something useful with his time again—Yasmin and Erik were back earlier than usual, which most likely meant they were done.

“Basil, we’ve settled the deal,” Yasmin predictably said as soon as she came within his visual field. “We’re going back to headquarters.”

“You packed everything, kid? The valuables?” Erik asked, sweeping the small room in a glance. The ‘ valuables ’ in question being documents from the Commission, Basil bent over to retrieve a thick, black suitcase he’d kept under the bed.

“Everything’s in here,” he said, trying his best to lift the box as he held its handle with two hands—it was too heavy for him to easily carry. Erik quickly took the load away from him.

“Thanks, kid. Ready to go?”

At Basil’s solemn nod, they took off. With their plane already ready for them when they arrived, it took them about an hour to be back in the Commission’s main base of operation and ready to report.

“Here, Basil,” Yasmin said, handing Basil two moderately-sized folders. “Mind giving that to the boss? Erik and I still got to go through HR.”

“HR? Why?” Basil scrunched up his nose, confused. It wasn’t procedure for agents to report to HR after missions—HR was in charge of recruitments, training and interpersonal issues, mostly. And he knew the boss had asked for the reports to be sent to her directly, for this specific mission, so he really didn’t know why Yasmin and Erik would possibly need to go through HR.

Yasmin’s smile sharpened at its edges as the question, but she kept a friendly looking expression on her face—Basil was surprised she’d bothered, since she was the ‘ hit now, ask questions later ’ kinda woman, and ‘friendly’ wasn’t typically a part of her vocabulary.

“We’re negotiating the pay for the operation. You see, they didn’t notify us we’d have to deal with contract negotiation—we were told it had already been handled by our sweet Miss President up there.” She pointed to the elevator behind her with a sharp thumb gesture. “So the board better pay up. We had to improvise like hell on the spot, back there.”

She huffed, and Erik cringed, his hand halfway raised over her shoulder in a show of vague support.

“Don’t worry Basil,” Erik added placatingly, even if Basil wasn’t really surprised by the situation, or even involved in the first place. In fact, he was pretty confused about where Yasmin was going. What, exactly, was she hoping to get out of the President? “We’ll negotiate for you as well…” He grimaced, as if unsure he wanted to go through with it at all, be it for Yasmin, Basil or himself.

“Uh… Thanks guys,” Basil said, not quite understanding but not wanting to hurt the others’ feelings. This was clearly something upsetting to Yasmin. Though he was pretty sure she was getting her hopes up—the president wasn’t one for negotiation, so he figured HR wouldn’t be of much help either. When unexpected situations arose during his missions, Min-jun usually told Basil to go with it and not ask questions.

“No problem, kiddo.” Erik ruffled his hair. “Here, take this as well-” He handed Basil the suitcase with the Commission’s files. “You’ll be fine, right? I’ll keep her out of trouble. Hurry along now, okay?”

Basil nodded and quickly made his way to the elevator, clicking on the highest floor—the main office. Balancing the suitcase and Yasmin’s folders proved tedious, and he struggled to knock and open the door to the President’s office. He finally managed to hold everything up with a knee and open the door with his hand bent in a weird angle—without even dropping the files! He would’ve made a pretty sad Commission agent if he couldn’t handle this simple task.

“Ah, agent Gaertner,” Aluna Jemal, the IMPS’s president, welcomed him. Basil presented her with the case and placed the folders on her desk before assuming a kneeling position. “I see you’ve come back. How did the mission go?”

“The mission was successfully completed, ma’am,” Basil said stiffly, keeping his head bowed and his gaze on a fixed point.

President Jemal was a dark-skinned lady with strong shoulders and fierce eyes—she could be a little scary, at times, but Basil knew she only meant to keep the Commission safe and efficient. Her posture exuded confidence and grace as she nonchalantly flipped through the first folder.

“Yes, I see that. Where are agents Kasra and Olsen? They were the ones responsible for this mission, were they not?”

“They wanted to go through the Human Resources department before giving their own reports.”

The president raised an eyebrow. “I see. I’ll arrange for a later meeting, then…” She glanced at Basil’s still bowing form before letting out an amused breath. “Basil, you know you don’t have to do that here.”

Basil raised his head to meet her gaze, hesitant. “But Min-jun said I should…” Still, he let his posture relax into something that couldn’t quite be considered a bow anymore. When Jemal simply raised an amused eyebrow at him in response, he finally gave in and stood up, brushing himself off.

“Sorry, ma’am.”

“No need for the formalities. You know Min-jun thinks it is funny—he says a lot of things that aren’t true, especially to newer recruits.” And that was true—Min-jun did say a lot of things to mess with Basil, Damian and Anastasia during their initiation. Nothing too bad, of course, but Basil learnt to ask for clarifications twice, just to be safe. Still, he felt bowing was a necessary show of respect. He owed a lot to the Commission—to the President—simply for getting him out of the Moon Lily and taking him in.

Jemal continued to read through the files for a few minutes as Basil stood to attention in front of the desk, before she finally nodded and put the files down. She handed them to him.

“Take the first folder to the vault on your way out, and give rest to Albrecht Schmidt from IB. I have another matter to discuss with you before you leave.”

Uh- was he already getting sent to another mission?

“W-what is it, ma’am?”

The president smiled tightly. “I assume you are aware of our sister base in the United States of America?”

Basil was. The Ministry of Public Safety regrouped many countries from around the world, but it split into two communicating main branches with smaller administrations—in Europe, Germany’s Cypress Commission, and in America, the US’s Soter Project, both named by their own agents to avoid confusion and to facilitate exchanges. Anyone who worked for the IMPS knew as much. At Basil’s curt nod, she continued: “Alright- the Headquarters recently contacted me. They are in urgent need of additional field support for a specific mission, due to most of their officers being suddenly busy with the declaration of war on Afghanistan. I assume you know how it goes, especially with their headquarters in the centre of the conflict.”

She looked at him expectantly—when it became clear she was waiting for an answer, Basil scrambled to come up with one.

“Uh- Yeah, it must be hard for them to, uh, plan operations,” he said, trailing off at the end. Jemal raised her perfect eyebrow once again—her expression making Basil feel as if he was royally missing her point. Except he didn’t really have much more to say… “Uh, I don’t mean to be rude, but why exactly are you saying this to me?” Basil asked. “Ma’am,” he quickly tackled at the end of his question in order not to be disrespectful.

“Well, agent Gaertner, we of course are going to be sending one of our best agents to support the ministry. Since-”

“W-wait-” Basil cut her, and he flinched when he realised he just interrupted his boss, but what he wanted to ask was important . “Are you- Are you sending Min-jun away?”

Basil didn’t know what he’d do if that was the case—Min-jun was so important to Anastasia, Damian and him! Of course, they’d always have each other, but… It wouldn’t be the same without Min-jun’s mischievous but comforting, and most importantly, constant —up until now, at least—presence. Of course, Min-jun, as one of the best, was often sent away on missions, but he always made sure to contact the others as soon as he could, and to spend time with them when he came back. But if he was in America…

They most likely wouldn’t know the length of the mission—and Min-jun might get requested for a permanent transfer, or at least asked to stay a few years, if they really were as short staffed as the President said. It might take a while for them to speak again, with such conflicting schedules, and Basil would… miss him.

The President sighed heavily, rubbing her forehead with a hand. Basil tensed, posture straightening instantly.

“ No , Basil,” she said, as if he’d asked something stupid. She looked him straight in the eyes as she said, “I recommended you .”

Huh? She had- what?

“W-wait- You’re- you’re transferring me to America?” he asked, eyes wide as realisation dawned on him. That didn’t make any sense…! “B-but I’m not one of the best- I-I’m…”

President Jemal’s eyes softened slightly. “Basil,” she said, “you have brought nothing but success in your missions since you came to us. You may be young, but you are definitely one of our best agents.”

If possible, Basil’s eyes grew even larger at the praise. The President was not one for compliments—in fact, he was pretty sure it was the first time her assessment of his skills was positive. She thought… he did good? That he might even be… valuable?

Doing his best to steel his posture and his resolve, he asked, steady, “The mission they need help with—is it for the war?”

The President smiled—the corners of her eyes were tight. “I don’t know, Basil. They didn’t say.”

Basil frowned, taken aback. Were they even allowed to request field support without specifying the task? Well, if the President supported him going there, he supposed it was fine…

But he’d have to leave Min-jun, Damian and Anastasia behind…

Was it worth it, for a mystery mission in foreign lands? He didn’t care much for America—with him having nothing but negative feelings attached to the place. That’s where his parents had gone when they’d abandoned him—he might even run into them, there.

Looking back at the President, though, he knew his choice was already made for him long ago. It was his duty—he was prepared for the eventuality he might have to separate from his new family for extended periods of time. He’d just have to hug them extra hard when he came back!

He couldn’t say no.

“So, agent Gaertner,” Jemal prodded, “do you accept the request for transfer?”

“Yes, President.”

“Good.” She smiled. “I’ll send them the confirmation. Your plane will leave in two days.”

“So soon?” Basil asked before he could stop his mouth running. He’d just come back from a long mission, after all—the agents usually had at least a week to rest and settle the aftermath before being tasked again.

“It’s a time-sensitive case,” the President said as an explanation.

“Okay…”

“I look forward to hearing of your success, Agent Gaertner,” she said with a smile that wrinkled her eyes around the edges. Basil did his best to reciprocate despite his nerves, bowing a last time—out of habit, at this point—before taking his leave from the office. He had a lot of preparations to do, after all…

「⸙」

He boarded the plane exactly two days later, having bid his goodbyes to Min-jun, Damian and Anastasia the night before. There was a small pit of dread in his stomach, one that always came with assignments and that he’d slowly grown used to over his multiple years of work. This time was different, though. This time, he was moving across the world without a clue as to what he’d be needed for there. It was… understandably, Basil was convinced, very nerve-wracking.

The pilot led him to the back of the small plane, where a nervous looking woman already sat. She looked to be no older than twenty years old, and was fiddling with the hem of her skirt. Basil supposed she had also been assigned for transfer—though he had trouble associating the clearly stressed woman with one of the Commission's best.

Basil sat next to her—the only other seat there was on the plane, bar the co-pilot’s. There was no need for a larger form of transportation, especially if they were trying to avoid attention. He wasn’t sure whether the tasks they’d be assigned in America would require discretion or not, but if it did, a larger plane was sure to be detected by the American Air Traffic Control. From the small plane’s looks… they’d definitely be trying to avoid that. Basil set his meagre belongings, all fit into a single backpack, at his feet, his eyes quickly darting around the room. By then, the pilot had already left to prepare for takeoff, leaving Basil and the nervous woman alone in the back. It made for a… frankly awkward atmosphere, if Basil were to be honest. Should he attempt to spark a conversation?

Before he could resolve himself to ignore the ambient awkwardness and spend the ride mentally going through his plant encyclopedia—perhaps remembering all of America’s potentially useful flora, since he’d be staying there for a while—the lady cut through Basil’s thoughts with a simple greeting.

“Hi there,” she began with a small smile, obviously shy. “You’re Basil, right? I’m Mary-Paula Keller, but most people call me Polly.”

Her voice was very soft. It was… nice.

“Hi, Polly…” Basil replied, his anxious energy mirroring hers perfectly. He didn’t know what to say, unused to having normal conversations with people outside of his very small immediate circle. “It’s nice to meet you. Were you… also assigned to America?”

Basil instantly cringed at his words. What an oblivious question that had been—Polly was in the same plane as he was. Of course she’d been assigned to America! Instead of judging him, however, she lightly laughed, smiling at him in a way he could only call comforting.

“Yes, I was. I’m a new recruit, you see?” She handed him her Commission ID—only a few months of training without field experience, it read. Basil frowned. Hadn’t the President said-? “I supposed they didn’t quite know where to put me, since I have very little talent outside of acting…” Her expression briefly darkened as she seemed to muse her incompetence. Basil wanted to reassure her—after all, acting was very valuable, in their world. She’d simply need to focus on undercover work. But before he could, she continued, all traces of sadness leaving her face: “Well, it’s no matter! I’m here to learn, after all! I heard you’ve been an agent for the Commission for a really long time, so I hope to learn from you! The President had nothing but praise for you during our meeting. How long have you been working as an agent?” Polly softly asked, politely awaiting his answer.

Basil’s eyes, which had been slowly widening as the lengthy flood of words left her lips, averted her gaze. It seemed his earlier assessment of Polly had been wrong—she was not shy at all, merely inexperienced. He found it hard to look her in the eyes as he stumbled through an answer, still processing the barrage of new information she’d just given him.

“Er… I’ve been here since I was eight, so it’s been about two years…” Basil mumbled. “But hold on, you are a recruit? Th-”

“What?” Polly cut him off, eyes wide. “You’re ten? And here I thought you simply looked incredibly young…” She looked to the side, seemingly slightly disturbed. She opened her mouth to say something, but closed it when her eyes met Basil’s confused ones. “Ah- My apologies,” Polly laughed uneasily. “You were saying something?”

She smiled again, but this time, there was a tense edge to it. Basil couldn’t help but feel like he’d displeased her, but he didn’t know how to fix it, so he simply proceeded with his question.

“You said you are a new recruit,” Basil stated, “but President Jemal told me Soter was only enlisting experienced agents. How come you are here?”

Polly’s frown deepened. Basil grew nervous as she took a minute to contemplate her answer. There was definitely something going on that he was not aware of—the only question was, was it important? “The President thought I would be the best person to accompany you, since I am not yet used to field work.” Polly finally answered. “She thought it would be a great training opportunity for me and that it could… provide some comfort for you, a type of normalcy… you know? Since the mission’s going to be pretty… rough, for you?”

Basil’s heart flipped before starting to wildly attempt to break through his chest. “What?” he asked quickly. “You know the mission? Why wasn’t I told anything about it, then?”

Polly seemed distressed. “I don’t know! I was told not to talk about the mission with you, and that an American officer would brief us in more detail once we got there. I didn’t think it was because you actually didn’t know about the tasks… Oh, and you really are a child…”

“What’s… what’s the mission…?” Basil asked shakily. Such secrecy… did not bode well for him. The President had never attempted to hide a task from him in such a way before…

Polly hesitated, biting her lower lip with such vigour it was surprising she didn’t break skin.

“Please,” Basil insisted. “I need to… prepare myself, don’t I? I can see it on your face.”

“Yes…” Polly took a deep breath—to steel herself, most likely—before she turned her eyes to meet Basil’s head on. “Alright, firstly, you need to know that I would’ve never agreed to this if I had known you were actually a child. I don’t think… that it’s right for you to do this type of work. But Soter needs someone to infiltrate a problematic… trafficking ring.” Basil’s breath hitched. “Apparently, they’ve been tracking them for years with no success, and they’re getting desperate. It’s still not right to bring you into this, though…”

Her words were like a bucket of icy water that was unexpectedly dropped on him from the sky. It drenched him to the bone, shocked him into silence. Basil knew that Polly was still rambling, but he couldn’t hear anything that came out of her mouth over the hammering of his own heart in his chest.

“O-oh … That’s what… what…” he stuttered out. He could barely hear himself .

Basil couldn’t believe the President would do something like this to him. But… it made sense. She didn’t tell him because she needed him to accept, and he might’ve gotten scared if he knew what he would be needed to do. So… so shameful. A real agent wouldn’t force their commander to lie to them so they’d take on a simple mission—they’d simply accept anything handed to them without a flinch. Oh god , the President must be so disappointed in him. He really was a failure—if their intel was to be believed, and the ring truly had been running for years, thousands of children could’ve been abducted by them. Even thinking of refusing… it was shameful. What was Basil’s suffering in the face of thousands of others? How could he even… entertain the thought of running off the flying plane back to Min-jun and Damian…? Something warm rolled down his cheek. He wanted to call Damian and have him comfort him . He wanted to roll up in a tiny ball and let Min-jun take care of everything like he always seemed to do.

But Basil was the only one who could do this mission. Soter didn’t need a ‘good agent ’, they needed a ‘ child ’. And as much as Basil felt otherwise, sometimes, he was a child. The… the Commission’s youngest child, most likely. In the end, the reason only two agents, Basil and Polly, were sent was because the Americans didn’t need more people—they weren’t understaffed, like Basil had been told—but they needed them specifically . Him , specifically. So he had to do this, or else they might never find the ring and these thousands of children might be lost forever, in eternal pain because Basil had been too much of a coward to face his past.

So he’d be fine. Even if the thought of going back into a trafficking ring, a place filled with nothing but pain, violence and abuse, made him nauseous, Basil was a Commission agent. He was trained to handle difficult situations like these. With one last shaky breath, Basil forced himself to wipe the tears from his face and offer the world a shaky but resolute smile. He met Polly’s gaze, wide eyed and filled with compassion and worry, with his own red-rimmed eyes. Her hand was on his back in an attempt at comfort—Basil realised he had been too caught in his head to notice it.

“I’m fine,” he said, his voice barely wavering as he did his best to appear confident. “I- I’m fine.”

Polly offered him a sad smile. “You’re really brave, Basil. I’d say I’m forbidding you from taking part in the mission, but I know there’s no chance of that getting through the President.” She hesitated. “I’m sorry… that you have to go back there.”

Ah. He was being obvious, then.

He offered her another smile as his eyes started to water again. A single tear slipped past his defence, trailing down his cheek and landing soundlessly on his hand. He wiped it off. From the innermost corner of his mind, Basil swore he could hear Mr. De Angelis laugh at his misfortune.

「⸙」

The plane landed in a remote location, safely away from the American population’s prying eyes. Basil and Polly were led to one of the Soter Project’s bases of operations, where they met with the lead agent for the case along with a few government workers. It seemed the case was important enough for America’s FBI to enlist the IMPS’s help. Well, it was most likely because the IMPS was not bound by legal constraints. They could definitely get away with more than the FBI could. This did not help to ease Basil’s nerves in the slightest.

The Soter agent debriefed them on their mission, and it was about what Basil expected: he’d infiltrate the ring and gather evidence from the inside with hidden cameras and audio recorders while other agents tracked his location to wait outside and storm the place when he had enough conclusive evidence. Polly would play his mother before the ‘abduction’. When the agent went over her part, Polly had looked increasingly uncomfortable, but she didn’t protest, even when he’d described the different ways she should act in order to ‘sell’ him to the organisation if they took too long to target Basil. Basil didn’t protest, either. In fact, he barely breathed at all during the debrief’s duration.

They were given the keys to an empty house where Polly would be required to stay during the mission, not far from the last abduction’s location. Soter believed it was close to the ring’s ‘headquarters’, thus them staying there would increase the chances of Basil being picked out.

The agent also gave Polly a car so they could drive to the house. It was located in a small town named Faraway—a name which Basil thought fitting, as they’d travelled all the way from Europe to get there. Faraway, however, wasn’t their goal. The neighbouring city, Clauser, was—with a count of 37 missing children in the past year, it was by far the ring’s most active base. Basil would be able to walk to Clauser every day until he was noticed by the ring, after which, well… walking a couple kilometres every morning would be the least of his worries. He shivered at the thought. He was really putting that much effort into getting abducted...

The car pulled into the driveway of a house—a reasonably sized, one story house with a nice green roof. Half of the houses in the neighbourhood were freakishly huge, in Basil’s opinion, but they were likely average-sized in American standards. His skewed perspective was probably due to the fact that he’d been raised in a poor part of Germany, then kept in a basement for the better part of his life, and lived in a military base for the past two years. But still, some houses he’d seen had two whole stories and a basement. That was insane—it was almost a shame Basil wouldn’t get to stay around for long, as he’d like to see what such huge houses could look like from the inside.

Polly turned to him before she opened the car’s door. “Alright, we’re here…” she said, beginning to fiddle with the hem of her skirt again—a nervous tick she’d surely need to get rid of if she wanted to be able to do infiltration work. “We need to keep appearances, right? So from now on, I’ll have to…”

She trailed off, averting her gaze. Basil knew what she meant, though.

“It’s okay, Polly. I’m not mad that you’re going to sell me to a trafficking ring, since it’s for the mission. So… don’t worry about it, okay? Just do your part.”

Polly winced. It seemed Basil hadn’t gotten better at comforting people over the last few conversations he’d had.

“Ahh..” she sighed, dropping her head in her open hands. “Don’t say it like that… It sounds so bad when you say it like that…”

“Well… It would be very bad if it was real, so isn’t it fair to speak about it this way?” Basil asked, slightly confused. Polly sighed again, huffing a weak laugh.

“Yeah… you’re right. Well, let’s go, then. We have to get ready for tomorrow…”

She muttered something under her breath, but it was too weak for Basil to hear. Then, she opened the door with a lot more strength than necessary, unbuckled her seatbelt and whirled on Basil, her expression suddenly filled with vitriol.

“Come on, kid, I don’t have all day to wait for your lazy ass! Get the fuck out or I’m leaving you here for the night!” she snapped. Basil stared at her with wide eyes. It seemed she hadn’t been lying, when she said she was a good actress. Well… it seemed like the show had begun, so…

“Y-yes, mama …” he stuttered, barely needed to fake it from the sheer whiplash he’d just gotten. Even then, it took him a moment to snap out of his wide eyed stare to— shakily , he was a ‘scared kid’ right now—unbuckle his own belt and follow her out.

“Don’t call me that… fucking brat…” he heard her mutter from the other side of the car. He hung his head low like a child being scolded by their parent. He couldn’t say he had much experience with that, though. His grandmother had been really hard to anger before she died, and Basil hadn’t been a difficult kid from what he remembered. Still, he hoped his performance was convincing enough, in case somebody happened to be watching.

Basil followed Polly to the back of the car, where all of their fake furniture for the house was. Boxes upon boxes of clothes that would never be worn, photoshopped souvenirs and useless trinkets were piled up in the trunk. Because Polly’s character was rich, apparently.

She unceremoniously dropped two boxes in Basil’s arms—he had to rush forward to catch them before they spilled onto the floor, and stumbled as he did so. He managed to steady himself without dropping the boxes in a stroke of both luck and reflexes from his training with Min-jun. Polly scoffed and walked off without a glance back.

“You better get this inside before dinner, or so help me…”

And with those words, she slammed the door, leaving a bewildered Basil to gape at it behind her. His hold on the boxes was starting to get painful, however, so he hurried to the door to set the boxes down next to it before coming back for the rest. It took him a few minutes to get all the boxes to the porch, and half that to get them all inside, where he handed them off to Polly so she could set up the house. The exchange was a lot smoother since there was no need for Polly to act within the safety of the house.

Basil went back outside one last time to close the trunk’s door and lock the car. There was laughter coming from the other side of the street, and his eyes met a colourful group of children walking along the road, seemingly coming back from church if their semi-formal attire was anything to go by. There had seemed to be an event going on when they drove by earlier—some kind of outdoor community buffet?—so that must be what they were coming back from. A bit strange for a Wednesday afternoon, but maybe Basil simply wasn’t used to American customs. One of the kids, with shoulder length hair and flashy orange clothes, cheerily waved at him when their eyes met, and Basil hesitantly returned the gesture. He watched as the orange kid turned to say something to his older brother, presumably—they looked similar, at the very least—who shook his head in response. The kid briefly deflated, turning back to Basil with a final, saddened wave before he immediately brightened and pounced on another kid, this one with short dark hair. The older brother, along with the last person, a girl, laughed at the antics before they began to usher the youngest further down the road.

And Basil was left there alone, thinking… Well, it was for people like this that he was willing to take on his mission. There had been such joy in the interaction he just witnessed. It made him want to protect it all at cost. Basil would make sure these children wouldn’t be the ring’s next victims—he’d stop that organisation before it could claim anyone else.

His determination renewed, Basil walked back inside the house to meet with Polly so they could plan the mission’s debut, the next morning. She had already begun to set up their fake house, leaving only one box clearly separated from the dozen open ones—their cameras, recorders and weapons. When they would finish setting up their ‘set’, they could begin planning.

“Here, this is yours,” Polly said as she handed him a half-full box. She turned around to put a framed picture of herself and a Commission agent who’d been picked as her placeholder ex-husband on a small table next to the couch. Both the picture and the couch were littered with cigarette holes. “You can take the room next to the bathroom in that hallway, and I’ll take the other.”

“Thanks, Polly.”

He easily found the room Polly had picked for him and set the box on its floor. The room was… large. Probably larger than the back room where all the kids had stayed in the casino, and definitely bigger than the small room he shared with Damian back at the Commission, where the two beds and small bookcase barely left them enough room to walk around. Even after he placed everything that was in the box—which was admittedly not that much, since he wouldn’t actually be staying here and Polly wasn’t supposed to be a ‘good mother’ anyways—the room felt empty. It felt wrong for him to have it all for himself, even if it was just pretend.

Once he’d stored the few sets of artificially-worn clothes into the dresser, haphazardly placed the couple books he’d brought into the bookcase that was actually the top part of that same dresser, made the bed and unfolded the massive rug that had been stuffed at the very bottom of the box, Basil was left standing in the middle of the room, hesitant. He didn’t think this room would pass the test, if someone were to check if it truly was lived in. It felt empty . Then again, that was probably what they were going for, so it was probably fine. He folded the cardboard box and walked back to the living room to regroup with Polly.

They set up the rest of the house in relative silence. Again, it probably wouldn’t pass a thorough inspection, but the chances of anyone having to come in, especially their target, were so low that it didn’t really matter in the end. They ate prepackaged sandwiches they’d brought from Germany and parted for the night. A good night’s sleep would be important to face the next day’s tasks.

Basil woke up early the next morning. Predictably, he had to wake Polly himself—unused to field work, she hadn’t yet developed her internal alarm clock. The nine hour jet lag couldn’t have helped. He gently nudged her awake, but she still jumped when she saw his face hovering over hers in the dark hours of the morning.

“Hi, Polly,” he said. She stared at him with wide eyes.

“Uh- H-hi, Basil…”

He smiled at her. “We should get ready. I looked at the maps and there’s a popular bar in Clauser that’s right next to a park, so it would be the perfect place to start… you know…”

“Yeah… I’ll get ready.”

Basil left her so he could put on some new clothes from the supply they’d been given. He picked out an unkept uniform from a primary school in Clauser—that should do. It was a weekday, after all, so he’d probably end up looking like he was ditching class. A perfect victim for predators, as a missing child during school hours would likely go unnoticed until hours later, when the parents realised they hadn’t yet come back from school. Basil messily tucked his jacket into his pants, leaving a part of it hanging on the side. Then, he clipped a couple audio recorders into his clothes, small camera lenses onto the buttons and a tracking device in his sock. He slipped a map into his back pocket and met Polly at the door.

“All ready?” she asked with a weak smile.

“As I’ll ever be,” Basil answered, steeling his nerves. He couldn’t afford to get nervous now. He went on plenty of missions without as much as a flinch before—he’d be fine.

Polly opened the door, almost dragging him all the way to the passenger side of the car by his arm. He obediently sat down and buckled his belt, waiting for Polly to start the car. She let him choose the radio station as they drove to Clauser.

“There you go, brat,” Polly drawled as soon as she opened the door again. “Walk to school or something, I don’t care. I need a drink.”

She immediately started walking off in the direction of the bar Basil mentioned that morning, leaving her supposed ‘son’ standing all alone on the sidewalk. A few nearby people glanced over, but no one made any move to help. This worked out just fine for Basil, even if he found it a bit sad.

He stood still for a minute, aimlessly glancing around, before he finally opted to go sit somewhere in the park and watch the people coming and going. He found a bench and stayed there… until the night, when Polly came back to get him smelling strongly of alcohol, even if he knew she hadn’t actually touched a drop of the thing. They drove back in silence.

The next day, Basil only waited in the park for a few minutes before he slipped the map out of his pocket and started walking in the direction of the school his uniform belonged to, studying the path closely as he walked. It was a five kilometres walk, so it’d take him about an hour to get there—less if he hurried. Basil, being obviously not enrolled in the school, figured he’d just loiter around the building for a few hours before walking back. That night, Polly loudly scolded him for being late to their meeting spot and making her wait in the cold. She said the next time it happened, she’d leave him there for the night and pick him up the next day. She apologised as soon as the car door closed.

The next two days were the weekend, so Polly took him bar-hopping. As a child, he was barred from actually entering the buildings, so Polly left him on the doorsteps and he used the opportunity to look around the city for hints of the ring’s whereabouts. He knew Polly was doing the same in the bars, pulling intel out of drunkards mouths as easily as running water.

On Monday, Basil wandered the town without really minding where his feet got him. On Tuesday, he walked to the school, but ended up turning back because there seemed to be an outside event going on there—every single student seemed to be playing outside instead of going to classes—so he’d likely be spotted if he stayed too close. On Wednesday, he realised he couldn’t see any school buses as he walked to the school, which was unusual for a weekday. Basil then realised that the school was completely empty even though it was supposed to be a school day. Did… something happen? He began to walk back to the park to figure out his new strategy, his heart beating wildly in his chest. If… another child got abducted…

He didn’t get very far, however, before he felt a hand on his shoulder. It… wasn’t Polly.

“Hey, kid,” a woman with long blond hair and warm eyes greeted him. “I’ve noticed you walking around here a couple times last week. Are you new here? Where’re your parents?”

At first glance, she didn’t seem suspicious at all. Then again, Basil couldn’t really figure out what she’d been doing, hanging around the park like this. She’d been sitting on a nearby bench when he’d walked by her, which wasn’t suspicious in and of itself. She really could just be a worried passerby.

Something in his guts told him she wasn’t, though.

“Me and my mama just moved in…” Basil said, channelling his inner ‘regular reserved child’ to the best of his abilities. “She’s… Uh, I don’t know where she is…” he mumbled.

The woman offered him a kind smile. “I’m Emily. I can help you find your way back, if you’re lost. Are you lost, kid?”

Basil turned his eyes to the ground, kicking the stone pavement with a foot in fake shyness. A-L-E-R-T , he typed in morse, triggering the transmitter attached to his shoe. Simultaneously, he spoke: “Uh… no. It’s just that… she left me here. This morning. I thought there was school still, but I think it’s over now?” he said, fishing for information. Emily laughed.

“It’s Halloween, little boy. Primary schools are closed today.”

“O-oh… They are?” Basil asked, trying not to let his infinite relief seep through his tone. His shoulders dropped. It seemed the school hadn’t closed in response to another tragedy, then.

“Yes. Aren’t you going to run tonight?” Emily asked, head tilting in curiosity. 

“‘Run’…? ” Basil mouthed, unsure what she meant by the word. “Uh, I mean… my mama … I mean, I don’t know…?”

To be honest, Basil wasn’t really sure what ‘ Halloween ’ was. From the way Emily was speaking of it, it must be some sort of holiday, but either it wasn’t celebrated in Germany or Basil just… hadn’t had the time to learn of it. Maybe it was an Independence thing? Basil had heard Americans were big on that.

“Your mom’s not such a nice person, is she?” Emily asked, voice full of sympathy that sounded very manufactured to Basil’s experienced ears. Basil quietly shook his head, carefully watching the woman’s expression for any sign of suspicious behaviour. She hummed, her eyes darting to the side as she obviously fought to keep a neutral face. Bingo. “Well then, why don’t you come with me? I’ll teach you about Halloween, yeah?”

“R-really?” Basil asked, his eyes glinting with tentative hope he definitely was not feeling, but imagined he should be if the situation was real and he truly was as oblivious as Emily believed he was.

“Sure, kid. What’s your name?”

“...Rowan.”

“You’ll be safe with me, Rowan,” Emily said as he finished typing his last code with his shoe.

I-M-I-N

Emily started to lead him away, her hand on his shoulder.

It would be a long night.

∙∙•「⸙」•∙∙

November 3, 2001 - Faraway Town, United States of America

It was perfect picnic weather today—the sun was shining brightly in the sky, there wasn’t a cloud in sight, it wasn’t too cold and most importantly, it was the weekend, which meant Mari would get to enjoy this perfect day to the fullest! She brought out her picnic basket—the one her mother had gotten her for her twelfth birthday, last march—and filled it with whatever food she managed to get from the fridge, fully intent on dragging her brother, Hero and Kel for their last picnic of the year. They had to take the opportunity before the first snowfall, after all!

Mari had woken up especially early that morning to make sure she’d have the time to convince Sunny to come with her to the park. And if he refused, well, she’d have already prepared the basket, so he’d have no choice to come along anyways! Checkmate, Sunny!

“Hero!” Mari excitedly called out as soon as their neighbour’s door opened. A tired looking Sunny trailed behind her, looking like he’d rather have stayed in bed for another few hours—but that was okay! At least he was here. Plus, she was sure Kel would be able to wake him up some if the food and the cold air couldn’t.

“Uh- Hey, Mari,” Hero answered hesitantly, holding a spatula with one hand and the door handle with the other. He was wearing his striped pajamas, and Mari giggled at the sight.

“Hi! Do you want to go to the park with me and Sunny?” she asked eagerly, her hair swaying behind her as she bounced slightly in place. “I’ve brought the basket!”

She waved it around proudly. Hero glanced back into the house, clearly hesitant.

“Uh, Mari, it’s eight in the morning…”

“So? I’ve-” she began, but was cut off by a voice coming from the inside of the house, in the direction Hero had previously been looking towards.

“Going out, son?” Hero’s dad, Adrián Rivera-Sanchez, asked from the dining room. “At least get those eggs out of the pan first!”

“Yeah, Hero, and you promised me bacon! You can go out with your girlfriend after you give me the bacon!” Kel called out, also from the dining room. Hero’s face instantly covered with a furious blush, and Mari’s smile widened.

“I- You- She’s not- She’s not my girlfriend, Kel!” he stammered, his skin entirely red. He nervously glanced back at Mari, who grinned at him devilishly before she leaned into the door frame.

“Sunny’s here too!” she announced, listening for the immediate racket that followed as Kel rushed over.

“Sunny’s here? Sweet!” he shouted as he nearly tripped over his feet in his haste to meet the group, the prized bacon already forgotten. His eyes met Sunny’s, who was still hiding a couple feet behind Mari, and he brightly waved at his friend. Sunny tiredly returned the gesture. Just as expected! Mari winked at Hero, which only caused his blush to deepen.

María Romero-Alvarez, Hero and Kel’s mom, appeared from the kitchen, a pink apron tied around her waist.

“Boys, don’t go running off before you finish breakfast! Get in here!” she yelled, before turning an apologetic frown in Mari’s direction. “Mari, sweetie, I’m sorry, but could you come back later? Kel’s only just woke up, and Hero’s helping me with breakfast…”

“Yeah, sorry Mari…” Hero sighed, looking back and forth between his mom and the basket in Mari’s hands. “We can meet you there, if you want?”

“Can’t Sunny and Mari just stay here for breakfast?” Kel asked, already turning begging eyes towards his mother. Hero turned to her as well, waiting for her response.

“...Have you eaten already, Mari?” the woman asked after a brief moment of contemplation and yet another sigh.

“No actually! Our breakfast was supposed to be this!” Mari brightly answered, showing off her full picnic basket to the woman. She leaned over to examine the content of the basket presented to her before meeting Mari’s eyes with a horrified stare.

“Oh, no no no, that won’t do! Come in, you two. Hero, we’re making another batch of eggs!”

Mari giggled at the woman’s antics, putting her hands over her mouth to stifle a snort as she met Hero’s apologetic glance. Kel had already dragged Sunny inside, so Mari quietly followed Hero into the dining room, where she sat in between Sunny and what would be Hero’s seat when he finished cooking. Easy banter was exchanged between the two families until everyone had finished eating the delicious meal prepared for them by Hero and his mom.

“And don’t even think of eating that junk for breakfast again, young girl!” María scolded Mari as she accompanied the children to the doors. “You come to me, alright? I’ll give you proper food. Now, have fun, kids!” She waved them off before closing the door.

Mari rushed the others to the park, wanting to take advantage of the day for the longest possible time. Hero helped her set up her blanket and plates of food while Kel talked Sunny into playing tag. Mari watched with amusement as her brother tried to hide under the park’s picnic table—which was definitely not as fun as her blanket!—in order to avoid Kel, who seemed to currently be the chaser.

“So…” Hero began as he tried to pile up a couple crushed sandwiches on the last plate. “Nice weather, uh?”

He instantly cringed at his words, and Mari burst out laughing. “Yeah, I thought so as well! Thanks for breakfast, by the way!”

“Oh, it was nothin-”

Kel, who had found Sunny and managed to drag him out from under the table, threw himself onto the blanket, almost toppling over the neat piles of snacks Mari and Hero had set up. “Heroooo! ” he whined over his brother’s scolding. “Tag is boring with only two people! Can we ask the new kid to hang out with us?”

“The new kid?” Hero asked, his brows furrowing in confusion.

“Yeah, you know-”

“Oh!” Mari exclaimed. “The blond kid from last week, right?”

“Yeah! Hero didn’t want me to speak to him ‘cause it was ‘too late’,” Kel pouted. “Anyways, me and Sunny thought he might be lonely since he just moved in and he doesn’t know anyone here! So maybe if he hangs out with us, he’ll want to be our friend and play tag with us?”

Mari turned to Sunny. “Aw, really? Was it your idea, little brother?” she asked, ruffling his hair. She knew very well it was Kel’s initiative, which did not stop her from laughing when Sunny mutely shook his head.

“Well, I think it’s a good idea,” Hero weighed in. “He might end up in your class anyways, if he joins the same school as us, so it’s a good idea to get acquainted now!”

Kel cheered, and Mari did the same, tugging her brother closer for a celebratory hug. Then, she remembered a crucial detail.

“Uh, Hero… I’d love to meet the new kid, but we did just set up a whole picnic…”

Hero’s eyes widened as he took in the massive amount of food laid out in front of them. “Oh, yeah…”

“Come on, we just ate breakfast!” Kel whined. “We don’t need to eat all of that! Let’s gooo! ” He started to shake Sunny by his shoulders to emphasise his point, who let himself be pushed around with a bored expression.

“But Kel,” Mari pouted, “I went through all the trouble to get this food for us…” She blinked quickly, the perfect image of an innocent maiden. Hero choked on a laugh as Kel shoved three whole cookies in his mouth, struggling to swallow the pasty lump, before grinning victoriously.

“There, I ate the food, we can go now!”

Mari sighed with an exaggerated pout, mentally bidding goodbye to her perfect picnic. “Fine, then. But I’m setting it all up again later!”

“Whooo!”

Hero helped Mari put all of the displayed food back in her basket while Kel excitedly chatted at Sunny about all they could do with a new friend. As soon as the picnic was put away, Kel began to drag Sunny to the street.

“Which house was it, Hero?” he shouted at his brother, who was hanging behind—along with Mari, of course. Hero sighed.

“I’m not even surprised he couldn’t remember it,” he muttered to Mari, before raising his voice so that Kel could hear. “The first one on the street extending the church’s. You know, the one with the green roof, where granny Sandra used to live? But, hey- Wait for us, Kel! Kel! ”

But Kel was already running in the direction indicated by Hero, oblivious to his brother’s cries. Mari laughed before she grabbed Hero’s arm, dragging him after their youngest siblings.

They made it in front of the house a few minutes later, just a few steps behind Kel and Sunny—the advantage of having longer legs! Hero was panting when they finally came to a stop.

“Kel- Kel, wait…” he huffed when his brother started to walk into the house’s driveway. “Lemme just- huff …”

“You’re so lame, Hero!” Kel pouted, but he obediently flopped onto the lawn instead of running to the door. Sunny sat down next to him, tightly hugging his knees, his usual blank expression never leaving his face—even after the long run to get there. Mari could see Hero wanted to scold them for sitting on private property, but he was too busy huffing and puffing to act on it. She patted his back, a wide smile splitting her face.

“There, there…”

“Ah-” Hero’s face flushed. “I’m fine! Thanks, Mari…”

“No problem!” she brightly answered. “Let’s go, now! We shouldn’t keep our new friend waiting!”

“Heck yeah!” Kel shouted, already halfway to the door and very pointedly ignoring the shout of ‘Language!’ Hero yelled after him.

Kel quickly knocked on the door, only stopping when it opened to a dead-eyed woman wearing wrinkled, but very expensive clothes—the kind of which Mari had never even seen in real life. Mari froze as she recognised the woman. She’d met her in Othermart! And, well… to be honest, she hadn’t really seemed all that nice…? Mari had tried to greet her, back then, only to be ignored and pushed out of the way so that she could access the display behind her—alcohol, mostly. She had then stared at Mari with blank eyes for a few seconds before walking away, leaving the girl with a confused smile frozen on her face. That had been… a little weird. But… a single odd meeting probably didn’t mean anything! Mari wouldn’t be so pessimistic on their second meeting!

The woman blinked in surprise as she took in the four kids on her doorstep, before her expression turned cold. Mari’s own smile chipped at the edges—they hadn’t even said anything yet! She could sense Hero tense at her side, but Kel, ever the oblivious kid, barged on.

“Hi, ma’am! Is your son there?”

She blinked. “My son? Oh, right…” she averted her eyes to the side, almost… guilty? “No, he’s… not here, right now.”

Mari frowned, her grip on Hero’s arm tightening.

“What?” Kel dramatically shouted obliviously. “But I wanted to play tag! Sunny doesn’t want to anymore, and it’s hard to convince the other kids to join when I’m alone! Miss, do you think your son will want to play tag with us when he comes back? Sunny said he’ll draw us as superheroes when we play, since he won’t be playing!”

The woman continued to stare at Kel with wide, unblinking eyes. Hero coughed, uncomfortable with the new tension within the group.

“Don’t worry, Kel…” he said, patting his brother on the shoulder. “I’ll play tag with you.”

Kel instantly perked up. “Really? Really really really? You promise?” he asked, jumping up and down. “No take back if you get tired, right?”

“Yeah, buddy,” Hero said, his eyes meeting Mari’s with a bright, flashing SOS signal. She smiled tightly, offering him a thumbs up. ‘ I’ll help you out, don’t worry ,’ it hopefully conveyed. She turned her eyes back to the woman with squinted eyes.

“When will your son be back?” she asked, not liking the woman’s evasive attitude. It reminded her of herself when she broke a rule and tried to avoid her father’s wrath. “My brother and his friend are very excited to meet him.”

Kel nodded quickly, his hair bobbing up and down with the motion. Sunny, who was still hiding in the back of the group, made no move to confirm or deny her claims.

The woman hesitated, suddenly looking uncomfortable. “Later this week…” she vaguely answered. Mari was… definitely worried about her son, now. She sent a quick glance in Hero’s direction and saw that he was also frowning. She curtly nodded at him, her mind set.

I’m handling this . Detective Mari is on the case!

From what she’d gathered, this woman’s son could be in danger! And Mari was not one to let things like this go without acting, no way. She needed a way to gather more information… and also of letting this woman know that she wouldn’t let this go! She wouldn’t hurt her son if she knew Mari and her friends would be back to check on him, right? Of course not!

“We’ll come back, then, if that’s alright with you!” Mari announced, pleased when the woman nodded with wide eyes. There, now her son would be safe! Next… Mari bent down to ruffle through her picnic basket in search of her best asset. Got it! “Here,” she said, handing the woman a large can of Easy Cheese. “This is my welcoming gift, to welcome you to our town! Welcome to Faraway!”

“What the hell are you doing?” Hero asked her through gritted teeth. Mari simply smiled back at him when the woman took the can with a bewildered expression. There, now she’d be so grateful for this awesome gift that she’d invite them in, and Mari would be free to investigate the house! Another win for Detective Mari!

“Er… Is that… aerosol cheese…?” the woman asked, clearly confused as she inspected the can with furrowed brows.

“Yep! It’s amazing, trust me!”

“What… are you even supposed to do with this?” she asked, much to Kel’s outrage.

“Miss, do you not know what Easy Cheese is?!” he exclaimed, offended on the cheese’s behalf. “What do you even put on your crackers? Actual sliced cheese?”

“Kel, putting sliced cheese on crackers is normal,” Hero sighed.

The woman only seemed more confused at the bickering, so Mari quickly stepped in to save her plan. “I can show you how to use it, if you want! It can be a little hard to use the can if you’re not used to it.”

“Yeah,” Hero chimed in, sheepishly rubbing the back of his neck. “It took me a while to master it as well, so don’t worry if you don’t get the hang of it quickly.”

Good job, Hero! Mari thought as his words seemed to ease the woman’s hesitation. He must’ve caught onto what she was trying to do and given up on stopping her—as a true friend would!

“Uh… Alright… Come in, I suppose.”

She stepped away from the door to allow the group in. Mari barely managed to stop herself from jumping in victory. Instead, she turned a sparkling gaze towards Hero, like, ‘Have you seen that? We did it!’, to which Hero responded with a tense smile. Not faltering for a second, Mari turned around to grab Sunny, who’d been slowly inching away from the group since the beginning of the conversation, by the arm to drag him inside.

As soon as they entered the house, Kel tried to run off—presumably to the living room, where the only thing of interest seemed to be a huge four-seater couch which Kel seemed intent on jumping on. 

“Geronimo!” he yelled, but Hero, with the awesome foresight of an older brother, quickly grabbed him by the shoulder, successfully preventing him from tracking mud all over their host’s hardwood floor.

“I am so sorry-” Hero began, instantly trying to placate the lady. Mari almost expected her to kick them out instantly, as she hadn’t seemed certain she wanted them in her house in the first place. What she didn’t expect, however, was for the woman to start laughing . Even she seemed surprised, as she stared at them with deer in headlights eyes for a few seconds before she sighed heavily.

“No worries,” she waved off their worries with a slightly uncomfortable smile. “Make yourselves at home.”

“Yeah!” Kel cheered, but respectfully took his shoes off before running in when Hero’s grip tightened on his shoulder. Sunny, who had stayed close to the door since they entered, hesitantly looked between Mari and Kel’s newfound place on the couch, before ultimately deciding on safety and grabbing his sister’s sleeve.

The woman led them to a small kitchen in the corner of the main room and Mari followed her, picnic basket in hand as she looked around the house with thinly veiled suspicion. It was a mess, to put it simply—with only a few pieces of furniture, damaged picture frames and trinkets and a few scattered bottles of alcohol in the living room and on the kitchen counter—but even so, there was an air of unsettling neatness to the place. Mari felt like she’d just walked into a movie set, the house merely portraying unkempt and disordered. It was a really weird feeling, which she did her best to push away to the back of her mind. Mari wouldn’t want it to distract her from the true goal of her being there, after all!

“You show her how to use the can, Hero,” Mari interrupted the uncomfortable silence that had settled between the group, shoving the can of Easy Cheese into her friend’s arms. “I need to use the bathroom.”

Hero caught the can with a panicked expression, his eyes betraying nothing but horror at the idea of his partner in crime suddenly leaving him alone to deal with the distraction. Still, Mari ignored him in favour of blinking wide, innocent eyes at the woman.

“Uh, it’s the first room taking that door,” the woman said, and Mari got the unsettling feeling that she was fighting back a smile—how weird!

Still, this gave her the perfect opportunity to sneak around and unearth any evil scheme! So, she happily skipped in the indicated direction, content to see the house wasn’t much bigger than the main room and that very hallway—in fact, there seemed to be three rooms and a narrow staircase leading down—and that was all! It would take no time for her to snoop and come back unnoticed!

Mari opened the first door and was met with a boring bathroom, just like the lady had said. Still, she wasted no time opening any cabinet she could see, torn between disappointed and relieved when she saw they were mostly bare. Well, no time to waste! She tiptoed her way to the room on the left, finding a bedroom—likely the woman’s, if the scattered skirts and dresses were anything to go by. A quick glance around the room revealed the same organised clutter than before. There was nothing under the bed, and the closet was surprisingly empty of clothes. No matter. Mari was sure she’d find something in the last room!

She could still hear Hero and Kel in the other room, explaining the many uses of spray cheese. They were turning out to be quite the team, the three of them! And Sunny, well… she wasn’t really sure where he was, but surely Hero wouldn’t let anything happen to him. Mari discreetly sneaked her way into the last room, closing the door behind her since it was more in view of the kitchen. Once again… there seemed to be nothing really weird about the place, except an unsettling emptiness. It was the boy’s room, no doubt—but there weren't any toys, and barely any clothes. The most interesting things she managed to find were a few books on top of a dresser—and even then, that was reaching. Plants of the World… Field Guide to America’s Medicinal Plants and Herbs… The Picture of Dorian Gray…? Was a ten-year old really reading those? Did someone even live there? Dejected, Mari resolved herself to find something in the very last place—the basement.

She slowly climbed down the staircase, relieved when it didn’t creak, and fought a shudder when she reached the bottom. Not only was it way colder than the rest of the house, it was also unbelievably creepy! Well… not really . It was just so empty—a large box with walls of concrete, the floor being much the same, and an unfinished ceiling. It would’ve been the perfect place for a crime to take place, if it didn’t once again look like nobody was ever there in the first place. At this point, Mari was beginning to truly wonder if she hadn’t walked onto a set and the lady was an actress for some sort of social experiment—but even she had to admit that was far-fetched. Starting to get the creeps from the strangely liminal basement space, Mari rubbed her arms to get rid of the goosebumps on her skin before running back to the bathroom, running the sink for a few seconds before stepping out. There, nobody would ever know she’d been snooping!

The woman was staring straight at her when she came back. Mari froze, expecting a reprimand—had she been caught? But she simply received a smile before the woman turned her attention back to what Kel was saying.

“-and that’s why Mikhael doesn’t wanna play tag with us anymore. But it’s not like we asked him to jump off the monkey bars! It’s so unfair, right? So now I have nobody to play tag with, cause Hero’s so bad at sports right?” Kel said without even pausing to take a break, ignoring the betrayed look Hero sent him at his last comment. “Hey, miss Polly, when’s your son coming back?”

“Basil?” Polly, apparently, said. Mari guessed ‘ Basil ’ was the name of her son—such a cute name! “Near the end of the week? I mean, I think…”

There went the evasiveness again. This time, though, Mari had no reason to think she was lying—her house was weird , but there was nothing suspicious about it past that—so she took the answer at face value, pushing down her wonders about why Polly seemed so unsure in the first place.

“Basil?” Kel made a face. “That’s such a weird name!”

Hero immediately punched his shoulder in warning. “Don’t say that, Kel. And Polly told us when he’d be back earlier, remember? Don’t make her repeat herself.”

“Really? I don’t remember that…”

Mari distinctly remembered Kel had been there when Polly had answered that question—probably distracted thinking of all the games he could play with three players instead of two.

“Pay attention when people talk, Kel…” Hero sighed, before turning back to Polly. “Sorry about that, my brother is… easily distracted. Anyways, where even is your son?” Hero asked, casting a furtive glance in Mari’s direction. “Isn’t it the middle of the school year?”

“Yes…” Polly said, averting her eyes again. “Basil is spending the week at a special camp for… grief counselling. It was recommended by his therapist before we moved here… It should be over by the end of the week, but depending on the feedback we receive…”

“O-oh…” Mari said, suddenly feeling very bad for all of her previous assumptions. “What… What happened…?”

She spiritually felt Hero’s distressed expression without even seeing it. “It’s alright if you don’t want to talk about it!” he hastily tackled at the end of her sentence. “Actually, I think it’s best if we leave-”

“Oh, no, it’s okay…” Polly said, a sudden sadness in her gaze. Mari’s heart clenched painfully in her chest. “When my… husband passed, it was very difficult for the both of us. Basil wouldn’t eat anymore, he wouldn’t go to school, he wouldn’t even leave his room… And I am ashamed to admit that I wasn’t the best mother to him when he needed me most. We moved here with the hopes to… leave these old memories behind and start anew. I am- I’m trying to be a better person for him…” Her breath hitched at the end of her sentence, but even with the obvious moisture in her eyes, not a single tear fell. Mari was grateful for this very small blessing, as she was sure her chest would’ve caved in if any more guilt was added on the top of her already very large mountain of it.

“I’m sorry about your husband,” she quietly said, hoping to convey her sincerest mental apologies in the statement.

“Me too. It’s amazing that you’re trying to do better for your son,” Hero added with a small, saddened smile.

“Ah, thank you…”

Kel, who had been eerily silent up till now, suddenly spoke up, his voice full of childish innocence: “So does that mean you sent Basil away ‘cause you were too sad to take care of him?”

Mari’s eyes widened, ready to scold Kel herself this time. Hero whirled on his brother with a horrified expression. Polly’s eyes went wide, and she choked on a breath-

And started laughing. This was the second time, now, that Mari had horrible whiplash from being in this house.

“Uh…”

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry-” Polly laughed, before she took a long breath to calm herself down. With a smile, she turned to Hero. “Your little brother is very honest. Don’t worry about it, he is right, in a way. Both Basil and I needed a bit of space, after…”

“Yes, that’s understandable…” Hero muttered, before addressing Kel with a stern gaze. “You should still apologise. You know that’s not right to ask…”

“Sorry…” Kel grumbled. Hero looked displeased at the lacklustre apology, but Polly spoke up before he could press his brother about it.

“It’s alright. I’m glad to know my Basil will have kind children like you to greet him when he comes back from camp,” Polly said with a kind smile.

“Yes, we will be there to welcome him when he comes back,” Hero agreed. Mari watched him with soft eyes—he always knew just what to say to make things right.

That’s when Sunny decided to come back from the living room, where he’d been hiding behind the couch with his sketchbook—which he’d probably hid in the picnic basket before they left that morning, hellbent on avoiding social interactions, and decided to take it back out now instead of taking part in the discussion. Mari exasperatedly shook her head—it seemed Sunny would never change. But instead of clinging to her sleeve like she’d expected him to, Sunny ripped a page from his precious sketchbook and shyly handed it to Polly.

“I drew it from… the picture frame,” he said quietly, ducking his head when Polly softly gasped at the picture. It was of three people—Polly, on the right, was smiling and wearing an elegant dress. In front of her was a small kid, Basil. Next to them, with a hand on Basil’s shoulder, was an unknown man—though it wasn’t very hard to guess who it was from the context.

“But how…” Polly asked with tear-filled eyes. “Basil isn’t in that picture...”

Sunny hid behind Mari. “I… remember him,” he simply stated. Mari was hardly surprised—she knew her brother had an incredible visual memory and a talent for drawing. Polly, however, seemed incredibly shocked, a hand frozen over her mouth as she stared at the drawing with wide eyes.

A tear fell. Then another, and another… Mari’s own eyes widened, afraid Sunny’s gesture had been badly received, and she opened her mouth to apologise on his behalf—she knew Sunny had a bit of a harder time than most, socially. Polly, however, smiled at him through her tears.

“Thank you…” she said sincerely, wiping her tears with a hand. “You are a very kind young man.”

Sunny didn’t answer, too busy burying his face in Mari’s back. Polly didn’t seem to mind as she quickly moved on, carefully placing the drawing on the counter before turning to the group.

“Well, let’s eat those aerosol cheese crackers we made before you kids go home, alright?” she brightly asked even with the tear tracks on her cheeks, clasping her hands together. “It would be a shame to let those go to waste!”

“Yay!” Kel cheered, immediately diving in.

They enjoyed the crackers together before ultimately saying goodbye to Polly, leaving with a promise to come back in a few days to check on Basil. By the time she reached the park with the rest of her group, Mari had completely forgotten that she had been worried about Basil a mere hour earlier.

∙∙•「⸙」•∙∙

Polly watched the children go with an exhausted sigh, relieved to finally be allowed to let go of the act. They had truly been good kids, obviously coming in to check on him after witnessing her questionable behaviours—that girl, specifically, had been incredibly persistent. Unfortunately for her, that simply meant Polly had to dial her act back to a hundred. Ah, she couldn’t believe she’d just fake-trauma dumped about her dead husband, which did not even exist in the first place, to a bunch of children…

She glanced at the drawing the youngest had given her—it was beautiful, really, especially for a kid that young to have drawn it. With a sigh, she made her way to the living room to display it next to the picture of herself and the other agent, which had predictably been moved from its original face-down position. She couldn’t bring herself to throw away such a heartfelt piece of art.

Satisfied with the drawing’s new place, Polly finally allowed herself to tap her earpiece once to send an affirmative message back to the Soter Project’s headquarters. During those children’s visit, she’d received a coded message from Basil, which she quickly decoded.

D-A-T-A-S-E-C-U-R-E-S-A-F-E-B-O-A-R-D

It seemed the mission was finally coming to an end—and even quicker than she’d expected. She was glad. It had been obvious to her that Basil had been uncomfortable with the mission tasks, and clearer still that he obviously had some sort of experience with situations like the one he’d be thrown in. She found it… disgusting, really, that the President was willing to send him, a ten-year old, to a place such as a child trafficking ring. It made her reconsider her career path, at the very least.

She took satisfaction and comfort in the fact that, right about now, that very ring would be stormed with agents, and that they’d be on their way to Europe as soon as Basil handed them his records. With any luck, they’d be back in Germany by the end of the week, and wouldn’t have to worry about rings and vile missions like that for a good while.

Hopefully that boy’s next mission wouldn’t be so demanding of him.

∙∙•「⸙」•∙∙

October 31, 2001 - ???

[Shuffling sound]

[Muffled heavy breathing]

Unknown speaker (whispering) [5:34:17]: Agent Gaertner reporting from- from Clauser? I’m in the trunk of a red Honda Accord heading for the ring’s operation base. My hands are- are tied behind my back. I had a gag, but I managed to get it off…

[Loud grinding sound]

Gaertner (whispering) [5:34:34]: Ah - I’m fine, I-I’m fine. Okay. T-there are two people in the front, including the driver. I think we’ve been driving for a few hours? I-it’s pretty hard to say, cause they- they drugged me before they put me in the t-trunk… But I’m-

[Mechanical whirring stops]

Gaertner (whispering) [5:34:50]: Ah, I think they’re coming now… 

[Muffled footsteps]

[Trunk opens]

Woman (from afar) [5:34:57]: Aight, Vich, you get the kid to the boss, I don’t care when but I’m out. [Sigh] Y’know, I’ve been waiting for this one in the cold for hours now, think I can get a bonus for that?

[Loud laughter]

Vich [5:35:13]: In your dreams , maybe. I think you’d be luckier tryna- uh? Hey, what the hell? Emily, did you forget to gag him?

[Ruffling noises]

Emily [5:35:23]: You know I didn’t, you ass. The kid must’ve figured out a way to get it off.

Vich [5:35:27]: Ah! The boss’ll be pissed when we tell him that, aye? He’s got himself a little mischief maker for the clients?

[Ruffling noises]

Emily [5:35:35]: Oh, come on. Hey kid, are you going to stare at the clients like that with those wide eyes of yours? Get a freaking grip, that’s what you get for following strangers around.

[Struggling noises]

Emily [5:35:46]: You-

[Loud slap]

[Muffled gasp]

Emily [5:35:49]: Yeah, yeah, keep your whines for later, ‘kay? You’ll have plenty of opportunities for that with people way more interested in that shit than me. Now get going, Vich. You wouldn’t want to be late to hand over the merch.

[Laughing]

Chapter Text

October 31, 2001 - Clauser, United States of America

Basil struggled as the man—Vich, Emily had called him—tightened the cloth trapping his hands behind his back before roughly pulling him out of the trunk by the new bound, skewering Basil’s sense of direction even as Vich held him up by the arm. The man’s careless grip made it hard to stay upright—and the sedative drugs coursing through his system were not helping his case. Basil tried to squirm out of Vich’s hold, but his efforts only resulted in the man twisting his arms further up—almost dislocating his shoulders, which would be terrible for the mission—so with a well-practised panicked gasp, Basil froze, holding his breath as he waited for the duo’s next move.

“There, all better,” Vich drawled over Emily’s distant snickers. His eyes flicked to her retreating form and back to Basil before he grinned, baring his teeth at the ‘frightened kid’ in his hold. “Now, a word of advice from me to you, kiddo…” Vich crouched so he spoke directly into Basil’s ear, holding him in an uncomfortable half-hug which made Basil tense immediately. “Don’t struggle that much when you’re up there. They tend to like it,” he whispered with a menacing smile, bursting into loud laughter as Basil looked back at him with wide, horrified eyes. Vich straightened up with a cheerful slap on Basil’s back, as if he’d just told the most hilarious joke to a friend, before turning and violently slamming the car’s trunk door. Basil jumped at the sudden noise, his already out-of-control heart skipping a beat.

“Let’s go,” Vich announced, laying a heavy hand on the boy’s shoulder.

The man pushed him through a series of twisting corridors that Basil did his best to memorise the layout of, uncaring that Basil’s shorter legs made him trip every other step as he did his best to keep up. They took the stairs up from the underground basement, walked through a few more rooms, and soon enough, they arrived in front of a door in a hallway removed from the rest of the building. Vich came to a halt as he struggled with a key holder. Basil immediately focused on the object. Vich, although his hand still loosely held Basil’s arm, seemed distracted. If he could only grab those…

“Ah-ah!” While Basil pondered over his options, Vich had seemingly found the correct key amongst the dozens hanging from the ring. He reached to unlock the door before immediately hanging the key holder back on his belt, hidden by a large coat and well out of reach of Basil’s bound hands. Just as Basil began to lament the lost opportunity, Vich tugged the boy in front of him and started to undo the cloth around his wrists with a heavy hand on his shoulder to prevent an escape, unaware of Basil’s keen eyes on the mountain of opportunity hanging from his belt. The man removing the ties now must mean that they were deep enough in the building and Vich was confident someone would be able to catch him if he did manage to run off—after all, Basil had never known ring members to be careless, lest they get themselves caught and thrown in jail. Unfortunately for them, Basil was there to do just that. Without an exit close to where the children were kept, it would be much harder to plan an escape, but it was no matter. Basil had planned for this—it was an opportunity lost, but another gained.

“Well, you’re about to meet your new best friends,” Vich stated as the cloth finally came undone. Basil’s entire body prepared to carry out his plan, maybe even to fight, but the man seemed entirely unaware of the fact as he continued with a sarcastic cheer: “Aren’t you excited? I heard the accommodations here are just great. ” Vich grinned, once again pleased by his hilarious ‘joke’.

Basil glared at him, unable to control the disgust he felt at the man’s taunt. If he was right, and he knew he was, there were children suffering on the other side of this door, and here Vich was, getting enjoyment out of making fun of them. Basil found it hard to understand how people like that could exist, despite having spent the better part of his life dealing with them.

Basil should’ve expected the slap that came with his brief moment of rebellion. Somehow, he was still surprised at the sting—Vich had slapped him on the same cheek Emily had previously hit.

“Ah…” Vich sighed. “You’re no fun, little mischief maker. Keep that fire for the patrons, yeah?”

Vich muttered something foreign under his breath before he turned to open the door, muffled noises and heart-wrenching wails coming from the other side. The hand on Basil’s shoulder attempted to push him inside, but Basil, with his quick reflexes, latched onto Vich’s coat before he could throw the boy into the room.

“W-wait-” Basil stammered with wide eyes, quickly taking on the role of a terrified child again. He raised a trembling hand to steady himself with the other panel of Vich’s coat, swiftly grabbing the keys from his belt before the man could react. The shift in weight went unnoticed by the cruel man, who, predictably, took no time to grab Basil by the back of his shirt and harshly throw him into the open room with a vaguely disgusted expression.

The keys safely pressed against his chest, Basil fell to the floor, hitting his head as he attempted to keep his newly acquired trophy out of sight from Vich. His attempt visibly worked since the man slammed the door without sparing the boy a glance. The door clicked, locking automatically, and Basil heaved a sigh of relief. It would most likely take a while before Vich noticed the missing keys, then. He had been afraid he’d have to fight Vich in order to keep them.

Basil took a second to push down the dizzying feeling of his brain slamming into his skull, closing his eyes and seeing a thousand new colours, before he forced himself to sit up and get to work. He needed to assess his equipment’s condition, figure out the room’s layout and plan his following actions. With nimble fingers, Basil untied his uniform’s tie, slipping both the cloth and the keyring into his pant’s back pocket. He then did a quick survey to make sure all of his equipment was in place—to avoid suspicion, he didn’t have much. Audio recorders stuffed in his shirt and their corresponding transmitter, the wires stitched into the fabric, his usual morse transmitter in the front of his shoe and another stashed in his blouse’s front pocket, the Commission’s newest micro-camera on his shirt button, the tracker, obviously, and a few hidden blades for good measure—three in his pants, two in his shirt, one on the sole of each of his shoes. He couldn’t even bring a taser, his preferred weapon to incapacitate opponents, because of its size. He’d have to do without, no matter how uncomfortable the lack of safety was to him.

Satisfied with his evaluation, which had taken him a few seconds at most, Basil finally raised his head to take in the room he was in. The first thing he allowed himself to register were the pitiful cries of a child, the only sound in the room beside the occasional scratches of pens on paper. Ignoring the dead-eyed stares of the children surrounding him, Basil extended his gaze further until he was met with the source of the sound—a small girl, curled up against the wall close to the door. Her long, tangled hair fell in front of her eyes, obscuring her face even as she hugged her knees tightly. Basil’s heart instantly sped up at the sight, memories slamming to the forefront of his mind, and he forced back an instinctive gag—he swore, he’d seen this exact scene about a thousand times back at the Moon Lily. The girl’s pink skirt was askew, and one of her long socks was entirely missing, leaving her shivering and halfway barefoot in a room full of grime. Her shirt, which depicted the American version of Schneewittchen, was crumpled and stained. Despite the pathetic sight she made, and how just the sound of her wet sniffles left Basil on the edge of tears himself, when he looked back, not a single other occupant of the room was even glancing at her. Every child was faring to their own occupation with tired, blank eyes.

A few were staring at Basil. No one made any attempt to soothe the crying girl.

Basil took a deep breath, attempting to steady his erratic heart. Wrestling with the flashbacks assaulting his mind with every step, he walked up to the girl and quietly sat down. God , she did not look any older than six years-old… Even faced with the new presence, the young girl did not react further than a hitch in her unsteady breathing.

Basil wasn’t very skilled when it came to comforting people, but this? This, he’d heard Damian and Orchidae help children with thousands of times through busy evenings and cold nights. He would never dare say he knew what it was like, but maybe… well, he couldn’t stand to leave this poor child shivering and bawling on the dirty floor like he had to before.

He took another deep breath before he turned to the girl.

“Hey…” he began hesitantly, cringing at how wobbly his voice sounded. The girl only sobbed harder, her grip on her arms tightening further.

“...No…!” she cried. She buried her face deeper in her arms. Basil winced.

“I know it’s scary right now… a-and it probably hurts a l-lot… but you’re okay now, right? Can you-”

“No!” she shouted, her words reduced to whimpers as she continued: “I w-wanna go h-home! It hurts! I wanna go home!”

“I-I know. Trust me, I know, and I’m… I’m here to help with that,” Basil stated, feeling his own heartbeat quicken and his head spin. “Please listen to me, you’ll be fine. Everything… will be okay. Focus on your breathing, okay? Here, I’ll help…”

Like that, Basil started to take exaggeratedly deep breaths, the task made harder by his own unsteady breathing. The girl continued to cry, but after a few excruciating seconds, she began to mirror Basil’s attempts at calm, paced breaths.

“That’s great, you’re doing great!” Basil praised her with a weak smile, though she could not see him. He waited a bit longer, still breathing deeply to guide the girl. When her breathing finally began to slow down and her heart wrenching sobs were reduced to sniffles, he continued. “Good job, good job…” He let out an exhausted breath. “Can you look at me now? I promise I only want to help.”

Tentatively, the girl turned around, her wide, frightened eyes peeking from under her hair. “W-who are you?” she whispered upon seeing his face. Basil smiled weakly.

“I’m here to help you. My name’s Rowan,” he said softly. “What’s yours?”

“Sage…”

“Well, you were very brave just now, Sage. Do you think there’s anything more I can do… to help you? Do you need something else?”

Sage’s eyes darkened and she averted her eyes, wilting like a flower on a harsh and sunny day. She dropped her chin on her knees.

“H-hey, that’s okay!” Basil exclaimed with wide eyes, scared of losing all the progress they had just made together because he’d said the wrong thing. “No worries! Here, do you want to know a secret?” he asked, inching slightly closer to her to give them an air of secrecy. Sage’s eyes sparkled with a small flicker of curiosity.

“A secret?” she asked, tilting her head in his direction.

“Yeah,” Basil said. He looked back at her shirt and smiled, his voice dropping to a whisper. “I am actually a knight. I came here to rescue you and your friends from this place.”

Sage gasped, her wet eyes gaining another small spark of life. “Really?” she asked quietly, leaning down so only he could hear her. “You don’t look like a knight!”

“I had to disguise myself so the guards didn’t notice me,” Basil said conspiratorially. “Don’t tell them, okay?”

“That’s the same clothes as my brother,” she giggled, and a stone unexpectedly dropped 70 feet straight into Basil’s stomach. Oh . So Sage was one of the children that had been taken directly from Clauser. Her brother was attending the school Basil had been walking to every morning for almost a week. Her brother hadn’t been taken to, had he? Oh no, her family must be terrified-!

“O-oh, really?” Basil asked, the words sour on his tongue. “Well, you’ll see him soon! Y-you can tell him then, okay?”

Sage nodded slowly, her eyes slightly wider than a few seconds before. Oh no, Basil must be making a strange face…

“I… I have to go now, but-”

Sage’s face immediately scrunched up. “Y-you’re going? B-but-” Her lips trembled. Basil’s face fell before he was able to stop himself.

“H-hey, don’t worry, I’ll be back, okay? Everything will be fine. Um… Here.” He riffled through the fabric of his shirt, ripping a few stitches on the inside in order to free one of the audio recording devices. After a second of hesitation, he also unclasped the transmitter—surely, it wouldn’t hurt to have an in inside the room where all the children were kept, and he had other means to communicate with HQ. He reconnected the two devices, making sure both were fully functional, before he looped the wire around Sage’s neck. The small girl flinched from the contact and Basil mentally scolded himself for forgetting to warn her. “This thing is connected to my friends outside,” Basil explained. “If you press on this button right here, they’ll be able to hear you and come to help, even if I’m not here. Use it if something bad happens, okay?”

Sage hesitantly grabbed the wire around her neck, fiddling with the transmitter. After a few seconds, she nodded, still looking scared, but at least having something to reassure her. Basil gave her a small smile before he turned back to assess the rest of the room. Already, he was so tired he might’ve been the one coming out of a panic attack—but that was no matter. He had to move on.

The room was large, a lot larger than the back room in the Moon Lily, but similarly unkempt. There were a couple mattresses and blankets in the back of the room, where a few children laid with their eyes blankly fixed to the ceiling. Unlike the Moon Lily, this organisation provided their prisoners with ‘entertainment’—battered dolls and action figures, toy cars with missing wheels and chipped paint, snapped crayons and crumpled sheets of paper. None of the children seemed enthusiastic about the toys, despite the few that were clutching some so tightly their knuckles turned white. The room looked so different from the Moon Lily, yet there was no escaping it. It was the same. No matter where he went, the children’s eyes were always the same—tired, traumatised, dead. Feeling his heartbeat fasten and his breath stutter, Basil forced himself to blink away the dark thoughts and focus back on his tasks. Find possible exits. Locate information sources. Plan future moves.

No matter how he looked at it, though, there were no exits that Basil could find. The walls were bare of anything save the disturbingly large mirror on the right wall and the occasional stains. He’d heard the door lock behind him earlier, and from the look of it, it was of similar quality to a vault’s—no chance of breaking through it. There were no trap doors on the floor and no aeration system on the ceiling. Needless to say, Basil might have been playing prisoner, but by doing so, he’d gotten himself actually trapped. And his only way of getting out was to… Basil took a deep breath and clasped his shaky hands together to soothe the trembling. He couldn’t afford to spiral again. Next step.

Back at the Moon Lily, the kids with the most information were Damian and Orchidae, the oldest. That was a constant in almost every mission Basil had to take—when in doubt, the oldest target should be a reliable source at the very least. Basil quickly looked between the children laying around the room, before his gaze stopped at a tired-looking teen girl—about 14, he’d say—with messy blond hair and a black eye. She was staring right back at him, glaring, and despite the tangled mess of knots his stomach had become and the cold sweat running down his back, Basil knew he’d found the one who would be able to tell him the most. Quickly, he walked across the room and up to her.

She glared at him for a few seconds—he did not dare break eye contact during that time—before she huffed and crossed her arms. Her eyes were now pointedly fixed on her feet. “It was her first time today, you know?” she asked, voice rough from lack of use. Basil felt like she’d just punched him in the guts and his eyes widened—why say it in such a dispassionate tone? Still, the girl was unbothered by his incredulous stare and she continued: “You must’ve lied to her to calm her down. It was nice of you, probably, but it won’t help her when it happens again.”

“What?” Basil asked, feeling the room spin around him.

“They’ll come back for her. You know that, right?” the girl asked, raising an eyebrow. “You know why you’re here, right?”

“W-wha- Of course I know,” Basil said, his brows furrowing despite himself. “I-if it was her first time, and you know what that’s like, why didn’t you help her? Why didn’t anyone help her?”

She scoffed bitterly. “What, like it’d change anything? Listen, kid, it’s best you get used to it. Here, kids get brought in and dumped out all the time. It doesn’t even matter if anyone helps them out, because everything that happens in this room is forgotten in the end anyways. Suffering, pain… or comfort… don’t matter at all!” she said with a scowl. Basil stared at her in disbelief. Even at the Moon Lily, he’d never met someone with these views. He thought back to Orchidae’s kind words and Damian’s fierce protectiveness, heart swelling as he glanced around the cold room. The children here didn't have anyone like this to help them…

“B-but she’s just a girl. Someone should’ve helped her,” he argued helplessly.

“Focus on yourself, kid. Flirt with the guards if you want any favours, but don’t bother the others, ‘kay? That goes for me, too.”

Basil gaped. “H-how could you just say that…?”

The girl laughed. “What, never heard of survival of the fittest? It’s why I’m still here, so you better do the same and shut up. Don’t bother going around ‘comforting’ the others with your lies. They’ll be gone before you know it.” She punctuated her horrifying statement with a defying glare, as if daring Basil to disagree. The world tilted on its axis and Basil saw red.

“H-how dare you say things like that? We’re all in this together, right? Here, it’s not us that have power, it’s the ring and the clients. How can you possibly expect to survive all on your own?!”

The older girl smirked. “That’s right, get angry. Maybe you’ll live to your next birthday if you keep that up!” she said with a mean snicker.

Indignant and trembling, Basil went to reply, but he caught sight of Sage from the corner of his eye and remembered what he was truly here for. Information. He needed to get a grip—it didn’t matter what this girl thought, because every children would be out of here by tomorrow and she’d be free to bring her horrifying opinions with her and get therapy. It.. wasn’t really her fault, if that’s what she had to do to survive. No matter how upset Basil was with what she said. Instead of replying, he took a deep breath and looked straight into her eyes. She narrowed her own back at him.

Then, Basil swiftly pulled the stolen keys from his back pocket, wrapped in the tie and hidden from potential cameras. He discretely pulled two strips of the cloth away from each other to reveal the metal inside, still staring straight at the girl. Her eyes widened.

“Uh-? W-what the…?”

“I… I don’t care what you have to say,” Basil said quietly. “I’m in contact with people on the outside. You understand? I’m here to get everyone out. I need information, and you’ll give it to me.” Then, he remembered her statement about the guards. “Um, and don’t bother telling the guard about this yet, okay? I’ll know about it. Give me a day, then you can do whatever you want with what I told you.”

The girl blinked once, then averted her eyes. “Ah… I’m not that cruel, you know…” she said bitterly. Basil didn’t answer her, and she sighed, all the fight leaving her body at once. “Fine, I guess. Pretty fucked up of them to send a kid in here to do their dirty business, but shoot. It’s not my problem if you get yourself killed. What do you need?”

“How often do clients come here? Do the guards check in on this room frequently?”

“Hm…” She leaned her head on her hand. “Often enough, I guess. There’s about a fucker every few hours—most of them work around here, you know? It’s not the safest place, even on the outside. You know it, when you grow up here…” She trailed off, her eyes growing cloudy for a few seconds before she regained her focus. “But nah, the guards don’t bother coming ‘round here unless there’s a bitch waiting for us. Why bother, with a door like that?” She sharply pointed her thumb in the direction of the vault-like door. Basil had to agree, the chances of a child escaping with that locking them in relied entirely on the guards making a blatant mistake. With a nod, Basil narrowed in on a part of the girl’s speech.

“You said this ‘place’ isn’t the safest—do you know where we are?”

“What, your buddies sent you in without telling you?” the girl snarked.

“They didn’t know either,” Basil said, doing his best to remain calm despite the girl’s provocative attitude. “There’s a tracker in my hair clip.”

She narrowed her eyes at it as if she could see the device if she looked closely enough. “Nice,” she said blankly. “Anyways, we’re in Portland. This is the Black Luthor casino-hotel, you know, the one known for being in a super-safe part of the city?” She rolled her eyes. “I grew up here, every kid ‘round these parts knows not to poke around this place. I was just stupid enough to not listen when my parents nagged me about it.”

Basil’s eyes widened—he knew exactly where he was, now! The city of Portland, though known primarily for its eccentric looks and natural beauty, had a darkside—much like any other place wealthy enough to attract tourists. Organised crime ran rampant in the shadows of the city. Basil had heard all about it in the mission debrief from Soter—he’d even heard this specific hotel mentioned by name. The Black Luthor of Lloyd District, gathering place of the local mafia, run by greedy swindlers. It had been one of the Soter Project’s most likely suspects for the ring’s base, but the idea had been discarded when children from the city had stopped disappearing—it seemed like the top dogs had found themselves a good deflection. Basil frowned. The girl’s eyes bore into his and Basil realised he’d been thinking for a while too long.

“Uh- Right, thanks for the info,” he continued, ignoring his embarrassing loss of focus. “What about the layout, do you know anything about it?”

“You sound so serious, you know…” She sighed. “The rooms are just a few rooms down the door. There’s this big empty room where the guards take us when the clients aren’t sure which kid’s their favourite victim and they wanna see us closer, then another door down, a corridor like this, and all the rooms are there,” she said, gesturing throughout her explanation so Basil could visualise it. “I don’t know about the rest of the building, but from what I remember, they brought me in from a door over there.” She vaguely pointed to her left towards the large mirror. “Like this,” she added as she mimed a series of corridors with her arms.

“And they never take you out?”

“Why the fuck would they take us out?”

Basil mutely nodded. He’d only asked to make sure, because in some cases, clients could take the kids out under special conditions. With all of his bases covered, Basil sent a weak smile to the girl before he sat down next to her with all the restraint of a falling sack of potatoes. That conversation had been more helpful than he could’ve hoped—not only had he a vague idea of the way to two of the exits—the one mentioned by the girl and the one to the underground parking lot—but he also knew exactly where he was in relation to HQ. Now, he only needed a plan.

He kicked his shoe to the ground in rapid succession—a message to his mission supervisor.

L-L-O-Y-D-B-L-A-C-K-L-U-T-H-O-R

They’d know what to do with the new information. Now that the intel gathering part of the operation was mostly concluded, Basil once again felt all of the energy he’d channelled to his body leave him, replaced by the lovely feeling of cold, hard dread. He was still drugged—though the effects were slowly receding—his arm was injured from the fall earlier and he’d hit his head. This was far from the ideal condition to carry out a solo operation where the freedom of dozens of children relied on his success, regardless of the fact his only chance of getting out of this room was to be ‘chosen’ by a client. The thought alone sent the room spinning wildly, tiny knives pumping his heart far past its regular speed and sending nausea up his throat. He wasn’t supposed to delve on his feelings during a mission, but try as he might, Basil was unable to calm himself down without the distraction of a task at hand. He gripped the fabric of his pants tightly between his fingers, repeating the same breathing pattern he’d shown Sage only a few minutes ago. Somehow, it’d been more effective back then.

“You better not have been lying earlier, you know,” a voice sounded from next to him. Basil snapped his head up and met the blond girl’s tired eyes from where she’d scooted away from him when he had sat down. “You’re like, half my age. If you lied, I’ll kill you myself,” she stated boldly.

“W-what?”

“You look like you’re about to kneel over. Obviously, you’re tryna keep silent, but that look in your eye is obvious to everyone here, you know? You’re scared shitless. So, if you lied, that’s a very shitty thing to do and I’ll kill you.”

Basil let out a weak laugh. “ Ah, I wasn’t l-lying. Sorry.”

“For not lying or for being scared shitless of the freaking child rapists you’ve supposedly been sent down here to deal with alone?”

Basil’s eyes widened. “Uh-”

“I’m fucking with you. Also, I don’t really care as long as you stay quiet.”

Basil nodded and went to reply when the door slammed open and a guard appeared in the frame. Suddenly, the entire room froze, charged with icy needles hanging over every child’s skin. The bated breath waiting did not last long, however, because the guard’s eyes swiped the room and immediately zeroed on the girl Basil had just been speaking to. Unfortunately, Basil knew what he had to do. He tapped twice on the camera hidden on his shirt and took a deep, calming breath, resolutely ignoring the trembling of his arms.

“Yellow, kiddos,” the guard greeted sarcastically, pretending to tip his nonexistent hat. “Clients today want someone experienced. You’ll do- uh.” The guard’s eyes fell to Sage, who had hurriedly back away from the door as soon as it opened. She trembled. “Someone shut the kid up? Or did you do that on your own?” he asked the girl, whose eyes filled with tears at the question. She fiddled with the audio device—luckily mostly hidden from the guard’s sight by her hair—but she did not press the button. “Well, maybe you’ll do well here, then,” the guard offhandedly said, dismissing her with a wave of his hand. He focused back to the girl next to Basil, who tensed slightly but did not react further.

“Anyways, you be a good girl and follow me out, okay? The clients paid handsome money to have you.”

The girl opened her mouth—most likely to say something snarky, despite the very real apprehension Basil saw in her eyes—but Basil’s nervous non-persona beat her to the chase.

“W-wait! Um, I’ll go- I-I mean, I can… Can I… take her place…?” The girl turned to look at him with a baffled expression. The guard did much the same as he paused, taken aback, before he squinted his eyes at Basil.

“You’re new, aren’t you?” he asked. Basil quickly nodded, eyes wide and heart pounding in his ears. He both hoped and dreaded his success. “That’s good with you, girl?”

“Uh- y-yes. Yes,” she said quickly, almost desperately, despite her eyes never leaving Basil’s pale face.

The guard took one long look at him before turning back without a word, closing the door behind him. Basil slumped against the wall and the girl did the same, like puppets with their strings suddenly cut.

“Are you insane?” the girl asked tonelessly after a long silence, staring at him with her blankest gaze yet. He could see her lower lip tremble, which he ignored.

“It has to be done,” Basil whispered back breathlessly. He kept his eyes on the door, waiting for the guard’s return.

He told himself he’d knock the guard out as soon as the door closed. He didn’t have to reach the clients—that definitely wasn’t a part of the mission, right? Basil could gather evidence in other meaningful ways, right? But deep down, Basil knew that line of thought was willful ignorance, and it wouldn’t help him in the long run. That guard had been about thrice his size. Basil had no way of overpowering him without a solid element of surprise, something he would not have as he’d likely be plain in the man’s line of sight the entire time they got to the rooms. So he’d have to figure everything out… later.

The door opened.

“Well kiddo, the clients are intrigued by your… enthusiasm,” the guard said dubiously. “‘S not like they asked for a specific kid anyways, so let’s go.” He walked up to Basil in large strides, and the other children backed away as quickly as their small legs allowed them to. “Don’t regret it too hard, yeah?”

The guard smiled meanly and tossed Basil under his arm like an annoying dog. Basil didn’t yelp because he was in control of his emotions, he really was. Still, his stomach did a triple somersault and fell all the way to his knees. It was a controlled kind of somersault, most definitely.

“Lucky you,” the guard said mockingly, turning his attention back to the blond girl. He patted her eyes and she flinched, her defiant gaze remaining locked on the man. “I bet you’re so grateful you could just kiss him hard , uh?” Basil’s gaze locked into hers—she glared at him.

The guard laughed loudly before he turned on his heels and left through the door. As soon as they were out of the kids’ earshot, he squeezed Basil tighter and whispered conspiratorially: “She kissed me , once. For some food scraps, that whore.”

And he laughed at Basil's horrified stare.

Basil did his best to observe his surroundings on the way to the room—however hard it was to focus over the nauseatingly strong hold around his midriff—but it really was just as the girl had described: the kids’ room; a large, empty room with a door left and another front; through the front door, a new corridors with a few rooms. Basil would have to find a way to explore the left door later. For now, he had a new mission objective: escape .

The guard opened the first door in the short corridor with the rooms, and finally, the suffocating pressure on Basil’s waist was lifted and he could breathe . He was tossed into the room like trash and landed on his side with a dull thud.

The door slammed shut behind him.

Assess. Plan. Move.

A quick sweep of the room revealed it to be empty save for a single bed and a closet in the back corner. It was dimly lit, but Basil clearly saw the two figures sitting on the bed, almost overlapping with how close they were. A shockingly blond man with a manic aura sat with his legs propped on the other man’s—a serious looking fellow with piercings and red and blue dyed hair—lap. The blond one perked up as soon as he took notice of Basil’s splayed form on the ground—their gazes met, and Basil was paralysed.

“Wooooow!” the man drawled with a sloppy head tilt, his greasy, semi-long hair swaying with the motion. His deranged grin acted like bolts screwing Basil to the floor, his brain flooding with mounting horror. “He looks like my- like he could be my brother! Wooow!” He stumbled off the other’s lap and waddled up to Basil, crouching and running a shaky hand through Basil’s hair. “Twinsies!” he trilled, eyes filled with insanity. Basil stared back with wide eyes. The man burst into hysterics under the unimpressed glare of his partner.

Upon closer inspection—his arm being literally in Basil’s face—there were track marks all over his skin.

Basil tried to will himself to get up and move , but he was breathing so hard and he couldn’t see anything, and his limbs were jelly and glued to the floor. He let out a choked sound as a hand ran down his arm and the man laughed harder.

“Get a grip, you asshole . It’s been two freaking minutes,” the man on the bed hissed. Only another laugh answered his demand.

“Come- Come on , you loosen up, Ren!” The blond man’s erratic breathing tickled Basil’s ear. He wanted to crawl into a hole, but the two hands prodding his shoulders rendered them stone. Unfortunately for him, it seemed Basil’s fight or flight was freeze . “I knew it was a good idea to come here. Lo- Look at how cute he is!”

“You’re crushing him,” the other man replied, unimpressed. “Also, he looks like he died. I told you we should’ve stuck with a kid who knows what they’re doing.”

“But where’s the fun is thaaaat? ”

Ren stood up from the bed and began to make his way over in large strides.

Get up. Get up. Get up.

“Listen, babe. Just like I told you before coming here: get it the fuck over with and stop bothering me. You still owe me 15 thousand dollars,” Ren said, punctuating his words with a vicious glare. The blond man laughed.

“Yeahhh, but…” He got up on shaky legs and took his offending hands with him. He placed them on Ren’s chest. “You love me too much to stay mad at me, right?” he asked in a sultry voice, whose effect was completely nullified by the drunken slouch of his posture. Before Ren could answer, the other man had crashed his lips onto the other’s—Ren immediately responded by grabbing the man’s wrists and harshly shoving him across the room. He hit his head on the bed frame and began laughing hysterically on the ground, clutching at his stomach. Basil watched the scene unfold like a car crash, his sluggish brain unable to process the insanity.

Ren’s intense glare turned to Basil, and he immediately attempted to get himself standing, but his trembling arm gave out under him the second he put pressure on them. His chin slammed into the ground and a second later, he was picked up under the arms and tossed onto the mattress. All of his muscles tensed like a ramrod.

Don’t touch me.

A few seconds later, the blond man was tossed right on top of Basil, knocking the breath straight out of his already overworked lungs. His eyes widened in shock and pain. The laughter was unbearable.

It all happened very fast. One second, the blond man was standing on top of him, laughing, digging his elbow painfully into Basil’s stomach as he tried to right himself. Then, both of his hands were on both sides of Basil’s head and he was looking down with a taunting grin, and Basil could hear his own breathing and he gripped the fabric of his tie in his front pocket like a lifeline.

And then the blond man leaned down.

And then Basil had his legs hooked around the man’s torso as he propelled himself up, the tie still clenched painfully between his fingers but now it was also around the man’s neck as he choked.

And the man fell face first on the bed, Basil on his back like a morbid cavalier, and he did not get up.

Please.

Basil’s grip on the cloth slipped and he stumbled off the bed, barely managing to right himself and avoid falling to the ground. Ren was shouting, but he could barely hear him over the sound of his own heartbeat.

It didn’t matter. Basil had just killed a man.

Until it did. Because Ren was still shouting, at him, at Basil, and he was coming closer and it was not enough because Basil was still in danger. Ren made a move to grab him, but Basil deftly slipped under his arm and kicked him in the knee, sending him tumbling to the floor. Before the man’s knees could touch the floor, however, Basil harshly kicked his shoe to the ground, freeing the blade attached to the sole. With a single spinning hook that left the blade buried in the side of his neck, red splashed down the floor and the man fell down, dragging Basil with him by the foot. The boy slipped to the ground, his brain exploding in a million stars as he hit the floor again, and the blade unstuck itself from Ren’s flesh with a sickening squelsh .

And Basil was left alone in a room, panting from exertion.

It took a few seconds for him to fade out of autopilot, but when he did, the weight of his actions crashed down on him so fast it knocked the breath out of him for a second time.

He’d just killed two men. Basil had just killed two men.

What do I do now?

Basil had never killed a person before—he’d never had to. In all of his missions before, he’d assumed a supportive role. That, or they had been pretty straightforward in type: get in, get the thing, get out. There was never nuance. There was never death. And now that there was, he didn’t know what to do.  

He’d just killed two men.

It was self-defence. It was justified.

Does it really matter?

Basil pressed his hands to his mouth to stifle a sob. The puddle of blood under Ren’s neck was growing with every second, slowly covering the trail connecting it to Basil’s foot. He could feel the liquid seeping into the fabric of his sock and tainting his skin. He could never take this back. He’d just killed two men.

They deserved it.

He couldn’t breathe.

All of his training with Min-jun had been useless. He hadn’t even stopped to think before sticking a blade in someone’s throat, relying on pure instinct to get himself out of a situation he had put himself in in the first place. God, he really was useless.

Does it matter?

He was breathing way too fast. He needed to complete the mission.

There was blood on his shoe.

With a choked breath, Basil uncurled himself from the defensive protection he’d assumed against nothing, as the room was now empty by his doing, to inspect the damage. The entirety of his heel was a sickening red colour, wet and sticky, but the morse transmitter at the front was luckily untouched. Good. Good. He quickly typed the SOS signal, because it wouldn’t be long before he was in deep, deep trouble for the stunt he’d just pulled, and he’d rather not be alone to face the wrath of the entire Black Luthor. With a deep breath, Basil slowly pushed himself up, using the wall as a support to not fall over immediately. He looked back at the mess in front of him and pushed down the intense panic the sight stirred in his chest—it’d be hell to clean up the evidence, and he needed to move now.

With uncontrollably trembling arms, Basil pushed himself on the bed and rolled the blond man over the side, deliberately ignoring his glassy bulging eyes. The body dropped to the ground with a thud. Basil went back and dragged Ren over as well, out of sight of anyone standing by the door—keeping the puncture wound on his neck covered with his hand to avoid leaving another trail. Then, he used the sheets to clean the blood off his shoe and hands—there was no use in hiding evidence if he would be leaving a trail of blood on his path—and pushed the blade back into the now split open sole of his footwear. He bundled the covers and threw them over the pool of blood. It was the best he could do. There.

Just like new.

Basil ignored the sick feeling crawling in his guts as he looked over his handiwork with a small frown, standing near the closed door like it was a gallow. This should buy him a minute at the very least, if the guard decided to come poking around for one reason or another. It hadn't been that long since he left, so it would probably be a while before he came back. Basil pursed his lips and turned back to the door, debating sneaking out carefully or simply walking out and fighting anyone on his path. In the end, rationality won over the apathy of just having killed two people for the first time ever, and Basil stuck his ear to the door to listen for noise.

There was nothing.

Basil took a last deep breath to steel his nerves before he pushed the door open, peeking his head out to make sure there truly was no one waiting for him outside. Not a soul in sight. He quietly stepped out and closed the door behind him, the hallway feeling eerily quiet after what had just transpired. The silence was unnerving, further fraying his worn nerves. He lifted an arm to loosen his collar, to make it easier to breathe, before he remembered what he did with the tie and froze—nothing to loosen then. Except if he wanted to expose more of his skin— never again —by unbuttoning the button of his collar-

Oh.

Button which had been recording the entirety of what had transpired in that god forsaken room. Basil was fucked.

He quickly tapped the button in question two times to stop the recording and allow himself a minute to panic over the realisation— not the time . But he couldn’t help the horrified bubble from exploding as he realised his utter incompetence had been caught on tape for his supervisor to see, and he’d panicked for so long the camera probably didn’t have much recording space left at all. It was very small, ultimately, and like all new technologies, it wasn’t entirely on point yet. Which meant he’d wasted more than half the storage space on the memory to freak out over a little spilled blood. What an agent he was.

Fortunately for him, he’d caught the initial interaction with the guard and the clients’ disgusting behaviour—or else, he might’ve just died of embarrassment over his own incompetence. His supervisor would be able to cut any useless tape from the finalised version they’d give the FBI. Worst case scenario, their American colleagues wonder why there isn’t any more tape from their undercover agent. It was bad, and he’d most definitely get scolded for it, but it wasn’t over.

Basil needed to contact his superiors soon, that was clear. Because he’d used the distress signal, the standby team would be bursting into the building in an hour’s time, with or without his intel. And he’d given his audio transmitter to Sage back in the room, and morse was one-sided and terrible for long strings of information—Basil mentally cursed his past self for his lack of foresight, but there was nothing that could be done about it now. He’d have to find the exits and figure out a new way to contact HQ in under an hour. Way to go.

Basil began to think up a new plan as he slowly walked to the next room. Confirm the exit the girl had told him about, then find any other hidden exits. With a confirmed location, Basil’s supervisor should’ve been able to pull out a plan of the building from their associate’s archives, so he only needed to focus on what the ring’s leader might’ve thought necessary to tamper with. Then, he’d sneak out and make it to the first floor—either by the stairs or the outside—and walk up to the reception. There’d be a phone there, and as long as he kept up his act, they’d have no reason to suspect a lone kid of anything.

As for the number of enemies, there shouldn’t be many. As the blond girl had pointed out earlier, the vault-like door would be enough to keep any kid from escaping. Honestly, there should be more focus on the guards’ part on keeping people out, rather than in. For that reason, Basil estimated around five people would be in the basement to keep an eye on things. From what he remembered from the very brief mention of the Black Luthor in the debrief, the building was large, but not overly so. There wouldn’t be a need for more than four people at a time, plus one guarding the stairs. If he remembered the path they’d taken from the underground parking up to the room, drugged as he had been, every area of the basement was open and large. No need for sentries at every twist and turns if there was no such thing.

Vich had probably gone back to guard the stairs to the parking lot. That wasn’t really an exit, but Basil would have to take into account that there had to be a way for the cars to get to the underground— that was an exit, one he was sure the grunts keeping guard over the children would have no qualms about using.

So, one confirmed exit, one hypothetical, and possibly others, if Basil was unlucky.

A sudden noise in the next room sent Basil slamming into the wall, heart pounding. There was someone there. He hadn’t heard them before.

There was muffled shouting from the other side of the wall. The guard that had previously escorted Basil to the room let out an annoyed groan. “I do not know, nor do I care, about where your damned key went, Vichter. ” He spat the name out like it was a foul snail. “You wouldn’t be in this mess if you could just look after your-” More muffled shouting followed. “Oh, so now it’s my problem, what the boss thinks? You didn’t see to think so when-”

The guard, still yelling—though now unintelligibly—stomped towards the muted voice—Vich, apparently, who had noticed the missing keys and was now looking for them. Basil waited a few seconds before he peeked his head around the corner, muscles tensed in anticipation of a fight, should he be spotted.

Luckily for him, both Vich and the unnamed guard were arguing in what seemed to be an office room. The door was halfway open, but neither seemed to be looking out—in fact, the unnamed guard’s back was facing the opening, and given the nature of their discussion, he would be very unlikely to turn away from his colleague. This gave Basil plenty of opportunity to sneak around, should the rest of the room be empty. A quick glance around confirmed it to be.

Very quietly, lest he alert the arguing duo, Basil sneaked into the room. Right next to the office’s door, there was a large, empty hallway that led to a decrepit cement staircase, which Basil recognised as the path to the parking lot—no need to venture down there again. On the opposite wall, there was a large opening leading to a set of corridors and a single door. In front, the twisting staircase to the first floor, most likely guarded by a man at the top. Basil wouldn’t have to go that way either, if he was lucky with his finds. That left only two options.

He opened the door first, after checking for any suspicious activity on the other side. It was surprisingly heavy, and closed back on its own after Basil released his grip on the handle, leaving him in semi-darkness. The first thing that hit him was the horrible smell. The second: this room was a filthy bathroom, which could not be further from relevant to his case. Basil scrunched up his nose. A quick inspection of the room revealed it to be, predictably, devoid of any secret compartment or door. Basil hurriedly made his way out, breathing in deeply as soon as the door closed. The two guards were still screaming at each other back in the office, but Basil did not think he needed to check this room at all. Based on the structure of the surrounding rooms, there was no way it branched out into anything else, and an exit there seemed unlikely. So, Basil turned back to the last path.

The opening split into two corridors—left, a straight path with what seemed to be a window leading to another room on the wall, though he did not have a great view of it from where he stood, and right, a crochet with a couple doors. According to where the girl had pointed back in the children’s room, the door was most likely to be on the left path. A quick glance around revealed both paths to be devoid of any sign of life, but Basil would have to be careful of the window, since he didn’t know who could be on the other side. Though, given its location… Wait. A stone dropped into Basil’s stomach and he practically sprinted the rest of the way to the window.

It was as he’d feared. Basil remembered the suspicious mirror in the children’s room and shivered. A one-way mirror. Anyone could’ve been looking at the captives at any time, without their knowledge. The guards probably took their guests here so they could make their ‘choice’.

How… horrifying.

Disturbed, Basil walked up to the glass, resting his hands at its base. Inside the room, he saw Sage, laying on the ground with her hair spread around her head like a halo. She was sobbing, seemingly trying to contain herself, as she fiddled with the wires he had wrapped around her neck. Basil couldn’t see whether she was pressing the button or not, and he winced. Hopefully, if she had, his superiors wouldn’t be too mad with him for giving up important equipment during a mission. Hopefully, her talking or crying would count as evidence and could replace the wasted camera footage.

Basil then turned his eyes to the other side of the room and spotted the blond girl that had given him information. She hadn’t moved from her spot at all since he’d left—in fact, she was blankly staring at the door with what could only be described as utter exhaustion. Basil wished he had a way of telling her how the mission was going on his end, but tapping on the glass would obviously startle everyone inside the room without any benefits, and even if he had a way to tap into the device he’d given Sage, only he could listen to what was going on their end, not the opposite. With a sigh, Basil realised he’d have to carry on. He felt weirdly heavy.

With a brief glance back to make sure no one had sprung up on him during his momentary distraction, Basil continued his trek down the corridor. It was only a few more steps before a single door caught his attention at the end of the hallway. It seemed this place’s purpose was entirely to showcase their ‘prizes’ to the guests, dangle them in front of those wild dogs like a piece of alluring meat. Vile. Basil stepped up to inspect the door, unsurprised to find it locked. He tried a couple of the keys on the ring he’d stolen from Vich until the handle clicked, allowing him to open the door.

He found himself in a small vestibule, the size of a supply closet. In front of him was the door to the outside, with a window letting Basil gaze upon a tiny sliver of sky. Longingly, Basil wished he could just open the door and leave, never to come back to this horrible place again. Unfortunately for him, he was a trained professional.

More unfortunately for him, footsteps coming from the right corridor echoed through the large corridors. Basil turned around, wide eyed, only to see a guard he’d never seen before rounding the corner, phone in hand. Another man in uniform trailed behind the first as he  nonchalantly twirled a set of keys like a lasso. In a panic, Basil shut the door behind himself, vainly hoping the guards would turn on their heels and leave. He crouched down, resting his back against the door, his heart hammering wildly in his chest. In the worst case scenario, he could always just jump at the men—although his chances of getting the upper hand in this situation were close to nonexistent.

But no. Even more unfortunately for him, a new figure appeared on the other side of the door leading to the outside, and Basil realised that the man had been on the phone with a client. And now there he was, sandwiched between a rock and a hard place, helpless. There was no way the element of surprise would help him fight three men in such an enclosed place. So, facts: he was alone, there was at the very least one man coming his way, and two waiting on the other side of a door that was in no way sound proof. A fight would attract attention to himself, something he could absolutely not afford without dooming himself to fight a losing battle that would in the very best scenario stop him from delivering his intel in time. And- Too late. Basil watched in mute horror as the outside door opened, as if in slow motion, and the client entered the vestibule. He was out of options. There was no time.

The man spotted him on the floor, furrowed his brows, opened his mouth-

Basil’s heart skipped a beat and he immediately grabbed a fistful of the man’s shirt, roughly pulling him down in a display of surprising, adrenaline-fueled power—and their lips crashed together painfully, and Basil’s heart quickened, and an overwhelming feeling of nausea spread through his body like a plague. With wide eyes, he watched as the client blinked in confusion and clumsily pulled away, Basil’s hands still firmly fisted around the fabric of his shirt. He gave the boy a confused look, and then a sick understanding sparked in his eyes as he gave him a second once-over, still leaning uncomfortably close. Basil felt like a piece of meat being studied.

“Oh,” the man breathed. “I see they’ve upped their services since last time?” He grabbed Basil’s wrist from his shirt and started pulling him back. “Are you the one who-”

Basil unceremoniously slammed his knee in the man’s nose and used his now free hand to press the pressure point in his would-be aggressor’s neck until he slumped against him limply.

Without a single noise to alert the two guards inside.

Basil swayed under the sudden weight and his knees buckled from under him, sending him stumbling to the ground. He didn’t get up, too dazed to even shift as the dead weight on his chest made it hard to breathe.

She kissed me, once.

He had found a way out of the impossible situation. So, why did he feel so sick?

Basil blamed the previous events for his inability to think of any other distraction. He knew he couldn’t have fought the man without alerting the guards, and it had been, theoretically, a perfect distraction, but surely- surely he didn’t have to do that. Why did he do that?

Flirt with the guards if you want any favours-

Basil startled and quickly pushed the body off of him. A phone slipped out of the man’s front pocket and clattered against the stone floor, and Basil distantly hoped the noise wouldn’t be enough to notify the guards of his presence—but it didn’t matter. He needed to get out. He hurriedly opened the door to the outside and slumped against it to close it behind himself, the last noise he heard from the inside the distorted ringing of a phone. Shit. Quickly, he climbed up the stairs, hidden from outsider view by strategically placed vines.

He greedily breathed in the fresh air from the outside, crisp and new and clean. He was hyperventilating. He tried to control his messy breathing but did not make it further than the first step of his calming routine before the irrepressible revulsion crawled its way up his throat and left him spilling his guts on the grass in a disorganised jumble of stomach acid and burning shame. The nothingness corroded his throat on its way up.

Shakily, Basil wiped at the corner of his mouth and eyes. He took a few deep, unsteady breaths, eyes hot with repressed tears and closed to avoid looking at the translucent puddle of sick at his feet. He couldn’t go back inside now, that was- that was very clear. He’d have to move on to the next stage of his plan without having completed the last. How shameful, a traitorous part of his mind whispered, right in a way that hurt. He ignored it in favour of tidying himself up, unwilling to proceed with the mission looking like the victim of a particularly unfortunate incident—even if it was technically true. He smoothed out the crumpled edges of his uniform and redid his tie. Then, Basil unsteadily started walking to the entrance of the Black Luthor, ignoring the weird looks sent his way as soon as he approached the main street. A single, frazzled kid in the middle of a neighbourhood renowned for its criminality—surely, he made for a peculiar sight.

The first time Basil had entered the Black Luthor, mere hours before, he had been smuggled in like merchandise. Now, as he walked in like a guest, he found he felt no better, his clothes having just been unwrinkled and his eyes reflecting the light just slightly oddly. Still, this time, he had a clear objective, which is why he resolutely walked to the front desk instead of uncertainly lingering around the lobby like he had in the children’s room.

The room was large and filled with a few dozen expensively-dressed guests, every one somehow looking less reputable than the other. Most of them wore poker faces like masks and huddled around the hotel’s round tables with purpose, mafia types carrying out shady deals in the shadows of the brightly lit hotel lobby. None turned around for him, but Basil still found himself walking a little faster.

Despite the dubious nature of the company, the man and the woman sitting behind the desk appeared to be respectable people. The man was finishing what seemed to be the verbal assault of a drunk client—who had been, from the receptionist’s words, harassing the female worker. The guest stumbled away, clearly pissed, and the man behind the counter took one glance at the retreating man, leaned down to whisper something in the woman’s ear—she smiled slightly, obviously still uncomfortable—and disappeared out of the back door.

The woman turned back to her computer to type something and startled when she was met with Basil’s intense stare over the counter. She put a hand over her heart and dramatically exhaled.

“Sorry, kid, I hadn’t seen you!” she said with a small smile as soon as she had regained her composure. “How can I help you today?”

“D-do you have a phone?” Basil asked quietly, intending to contact his mission supervisor as soon as possible. There couldn’t be much more time left before they hit the one hour mark, after all. “Um- I lost my parents…” He tried to keep his voice from shaking too visibly, but apparently failed, as the woman’s brows furrowed with pity.

“Are your parents guests here?” the receptionist asked with worried eyes. “Or did you lose them outside?”

“U-um- Outside,” Basil said, knowing he didn’t have the time to deflect should she ask for a room number or anything to identify his fictional parents as guests. The woman gave him a relieved smile, which he ignored in favour of staring at her with wide, anxious eyes.

She coughed. “Right, so you’d like to call them. Come here, this is no place for a child to be.” She walked over to the side of her desk to open the small door and let Basil behind the desk. “I’ll let you use our phone, alright? Do you know your parents’ number?”

Basil nodded wordlessly as he accepted the receiver of a rotary dial. He quickly composed his supervisor’s number.

“Hello?” Erin said seriously on the other end of the line, taking no time to answer her phone as he had expected.

“Um- Mom? I-I’m sorry, I got lost…”

“Basil? Where are you? Who’s with you?” she asked quickly, and Basil understood her question for what it was— who’s listening in on this conversation?

“No one- um, I’m in this big building, uh…” Basil trailed off as two men emerged from what he assumed was the door to the basement, sidestepping the doorkeeper that was standing guard at the entrance just as he had guessed. One was Vich, and Basil thought the other must be one of the men that had ambushed him at the exit. A few seconds later, the second guard entered the hall through the front door, like Basil had a few minutes before. The three men started looking around the room.

They must’ve gotten sick of waiting and found the client’s unconscious body. Damnit. Basil pressed his body as close to the desk as he could while looking natural, hiding most of himself from the men’s view without arousing suspicion from the receptionist.

“The Black Luthor, it’s a hotel!” the receptionist, who had been listening to him out of worry and noticed his prolonged pause, kindly supplied.

“The Black Luthor, a hotel,” Basil parroted obligingly, willing to play the role of an oblivious lost child if it allowed him to stay hidden longer. He kept his eyes fixed on Vich as he progressed through the lobby. “The receptionist is very kind.”

The woman in question smiled at him warmly before turning back to her computer. Even though she couldn’t see him, Basil smiled back tensely. Even if she didn’t seem suspicious of his sudden appearance, he couldn’t be sure she wasn’t also part of the scheme. He needed to stay cautious of what he said in front of her.

“Am I to assume you have collected enough intel?” Erin said, dropping all pretence as she knew no one except Basil could hear her side of the conversation. “The standbys are waiting just outside the building, ready to engage. Just give me the layout and I’ll inform them of it.”

“Um… yes, I have everything,” Basil said uneasily as Vich approached a small group of mafia types and struck an angry conversation with them. “Big brother is coming to get me, right? Is he back from Trois-Rivières yet?”

As agreed upon before the infiltration, asking for ‘big brother’ was code for a dangerous situation. He used the city’s name to represent the number of enemies threatening his position. Basil heard Erin hum on the other side of the line, before she pulled away from the phone to shout something to the other agents in the room with her. A muffled voice answered her. As soon as she came back, she said: “Our agents have secured all of the first floor’s exits. Just tell me about the layout inside, alright? We’ll figure out the rest.”

“Uh, y-yeah- I guess it’s okay if you come instead, if he really went all the way down to One Pine Hill.” There is only one man in the basement. “Is the car’s right door still broken from when those vines fell on it? It won’t take too long for you to come, right?”

“Good, I’m communicating the directions to Derek. He’ll secure that exit,” Erin said, and Basil heard the tell-tale clicking sound of her typing on her communication device. “Are there any others that you know of?”

“W-what?” Basil said, doing his best to sound like a dejected, anxious kid. “You left the car in the underground parking? So h-how long do I have to wait here?”

“Yeah, we already knew about the parking. There’s no path leading down to it except the underground car lift, so don’t worry about it for now. How much time do you think you have before being discovered?”

Basil discreetly peeked over the desk, only to find half a dozen more men, the ones Vich had been talking to, begin to scatter around the lobby. He hurriedly turned away as Vich himself stepped away from his group with a pissed frown, storming straight in the receptionist’s desk’s direction. Shit shit shit-

“U-um, maybe two minutes?” Basil said, voice imperceptibly higher. “I-it’s pretty scary down here…”

“Shit,” Erin eloquently said. “Alright, stay put, I’m sending the team down now. Don’t do anything rash.”

The call disconnected with a beep.

With a soft exhale, Basil handed the phone back to the receptionist. “Can I, um, stay here until my mother comes to get me?” he quietly asked.

“Of course!” she answered with a sweet smile. “Don’t worry about it, I wouldn’t want you wandering around this place alone anyways. It’s… not safe, around these parts.”

Basil quickly returned her smile and sat down against the wood of the desk, relieved to finally have an excuse to get out of the hotel guests’ line of sight.

“Right, you can stay there. I’ll tell you when your mother shows up!”

Basil opened his mouth to express his gratitude—and then promptly slammed himself against the desk as a man’s looming figure materialised over the counter, violently hitting the surface with his fists. The receptionist, upon being suddenly charged at by a furious customer, paused, an uncomfortable smile gracing her features. It quickly was replaced by the typical ‘customer service’ expression. She straightened herself up fully, ignoring Basil’s decidedly strange reaction in favour of focusing on the situation.

“H-hello, how may I help you?” she asked nicely, despite the tenseness of her mouth.

“You wouldn’t happen to have seen a blond kid running around here, would you?” Vich asked, his teeth audibly gritting against each other. He leaned in closer to her and Basil pressed himself further against the wood.

“Why do you ask?” the receptionist demanded to know in an uncharacteristic display of bravery. Well, Vich clearly was not Basil’s ‘mother’—perhaps she thought Vich to be a creep, something that would not be too far off the mark. Regardless of the reasons, Basil was glad she had decided to cover for him. Maybe it would buy him enough time for the backup to arrive.

He heard Vich scoff. “Parents’re looking for him. He keeps giving us the slip—y’know how kids are, though. Couldn’t give a damn ‘s long as they’re having fun,” he drawled. “They’re worried sick.”

The receptionist squirted her eyes at Vich, clearly recalling Basil’s very different story. “Oh, really?” she slowly said. Basil held his breath. “Well, I’m sorry, but I haven’t seen him. I can file a report, if you’d like?”

“‘S that so? Cause-”

The loud ‘bang!’ of a door slamming against a wall was heard and half a dozen sets of footsteps followed suit. “Everyone drop on the ground, hands on their head!” a command rang through the air like a gunshot, radiating authority like microwaved aluminium foil radiates heat. The receptionist dropped her pen in surprise, and it clattered to the floor, barely audible over the angry muttering of the guests. The agent shouted a few threats and commands, and the room quickly complied with his demands. The receptionist kneeled down next to Basil with her hands on the back of her head, glancing back at him with wide eyes.

“D-don’t worry, kid,” she whispered. “Everything’s gonna be fine.”

“I know,” Basil replied with a small smile. “They’re here for me.”

「⸙」

D-A-T-A-S-E-C-U-R-E-S-A-F-E-B-O-A-R-D

The first thing Basil did as the agents handcuffed the suspects was contact Polly. He knew she’d been worried, and he needed to let her know that he was fine. The mission had gone as well as it could go. It was over.

Chapter Text

October 31, 2001 - Faraway Town, United States of America

Basil let himself fall face first into his bed as soon as he stepped back into his room in the Faraway house. All the adrenaline-fuelled tension drained out of him like a plug had been pulled as he was back in a space his body considered safe. Well, not exactly safe, but safe enough, neutral grounds where he could allow himself a moment of respite. It was late. He’d given his report to Erin, and she’d dismissed him quickly, with barely a nod of acknowledgement before he was ushered out. He felt… empty. Completely void of anything he logically should be feeling after such a mission. Basil lifted his head to stare blankly at the wall in front of him. His shoulders were trembling slightly, near imperceptible movement betraying the void in his chest. He wished he could just forget about this mission and fly back to Germany.

After Erin had dismissed him so flatly, Basil had followed Polly, who’d come just to pick him up, out of HQ. Simply going through the motions. She had tried to make small talk, a tight and clearly uncomfortable smile on her lips that she was obviously trying to pretend wasn’t there. Basil hadn’t been able to muster up anything other than clipped one-word answers, staring out the car window as they drove away from the people who’d no doubt be calling him back to pull more information out of him soon. His guts crawled with tiny bugs as her voice turned to static in his mind—he felt bad for ignoring her, but he simply… didn’t have the strength to care at the moment. He could feel Polly’s gaze boring a hole in his skull through the rearview mirror, though, even as he avoided acknowledging her or her worries or anything at all, really.

He slowly turned to lay on his back on the bed, bringing an arm up to cover his face as he felt his eyes water. He didn’t understand. It was over. He should just forget about everything, he should push it all down to the darkest corner of his mind and never bring it out into the light again. Why was he feeling so much? It should be over. He’d completed the mission, it should be over, he should be done, but it wasn’t and he wasn’t and suddenly his eyes were overflowing with tears he didn’t know how to contain. He curled into himself, willing himself to keep quiet so as to not bother Polly in the next room over.

Basil didn’t remember any other mission affecting him this much. Not his first mission, or the mission where one of his colleagues went missing and he’d learned after the fact that she was KIA, or the mission where he and two other agents were ambushed and he ended up scrubbing blood off his skin for an hour after his seniors took care of the enemy. Why was this such a big deal? He’d just done what needed to be done. He’d taken care of the problem in a quick and efficient way, like he’d been taught. If… if he wasn’t happy with the way he’d done things, then he just should’ve found another solution—so really, it was his fault that he felt like this at all. He shouldn’t feel this way when his actions had helped dozens of children escape a fate he himself considered worse than death.

Basil desperately wanted to call Damian, though.

Damian… Damian would understand. Damian was the only one who could understand him now—Basil knew that not even Min-jun could really relate to their experiences on this matter, despite his many more years of experience. Even Anastasia, who shared their unfortunate history, was never as easy to talk to as Damian, his big brother, was. Basil wanted nothing more than to call him and listen to him telling him things would be fine. He knew he’d believe it, at least a little, if Damian told him he was fine.

But it was very early in the morning in Sonnenstadt. Basil couldn’t allow himself to bother them, or worse, wake them. He knew how hard the both of them worked—and if they were not up training yet, then they would be getting some well-earned rest. Basil wouldn’t get in the way of that. He would be a good, strong agent and take care of himself.

Still trembling, Basil didn’t even bother changing his clothes or pulling the blanket over himself before he let his mind drift off to sleep.

「⸙」

“You’re new, aren’t you?”

“I knew it was a good idea to come here. Look at how cute he is!”

“I told you we should’ve stuck with a kid who knows what they’re doing.”

“But where’s the fun in that?”

「⸙」

Drip.

Drip.

Drip.

Basil’s eyes fluttered as he laid on the mattress, something cold and sticky dripping on his face. A cold drop landed on his nose and slid down to his cheek. He swatted his arm around to try to stop the liquid from landing on him, but only ended up with his arms tangled in the white sheets draped over the bed.

White…?

Basil opened his eyes fully. The room was very dimly lit, but he was still able to make out the red splattering across the pristine white of the sheets, trailing down his arms and staining his hands. Another drop landed on his matted hair, already coagulating in a glutinous mess. He raised a hand to try and wipe the liquid off, but only succeeded in spreading it across his face—the sensation viscid and unpleasant.

“Gh…”

He blinked, still a little dazed, and ran his fingers through his hair again—which did not help reduce the amount of bloody liquid caking it. His elbow bumped into something next to him. A warm body.

Suddenly alert, Basil turned to face the person—blond hair, just like his. They were asleep. It was- His breath caught.

It was the man from the Black Luthor.

His breathing quickened as he realised the man’s arm was loosely wrapped around him, as if they had fallen asleep this way. Another drop fell, this time on the man’s cheek. It rolled down into his partly-open mouth and stained his lips red.

Frantically, Basil untangled himself from the sheets and tossed them on the end of the bed, falling onto the floor and curling in on himself. He tried to wipe the blood on his hands onto the floor. It stained red, but his hands were not any cleaner. His breathing resonated loudly against the cement walls of the room. He raised his head, his eyes wildly flickering. The grey ceiling was drenched with red, dripping down onto him like rain.

Quickly pushing himself up onto shaky feet, Basil was finally able to recognise his surroundings. His heart dropped to his stomach so quickly he almost fainted. The back room. He thought he’d never have to come back here, and yet the cold cement walls and floor were unmistakable.

Hardly breathing, Basil turned to look at the man again, but he was gone. So was the bed—and it was too dark to see well. He had to get out of here.

The room was too big, too empty, too dim—but Basil had been here enough times to be able to make his way through and to the door with his eyes closed. He started walking. His bare feet scraped against the dirty, uneven floor. It hurt. He should have reached the door by now, but he was still alone in the darkness.

“H-hello? Damian? Ana?” he whispered shakily. They should be somewhere around here, surely. Even for a mission, they wouldn’t let him come back here alone.

On the ground, a puddle of blood reflected light from an unknown source. It hadn’t been there a second before. From it, a long trail, as if something had been dragged out of it. Basil’s eyes widened as he started to run, following the trail through twisting corridors after corridors. He arrived in front of a door.

“Your brother can’t come pick you up,” the Black Luthor’s receptionist said as she opened the door. Basil’s heart stuttered, painful beats and skips hammering against his ribcage.

Damian, prone on the dirty ground, stared back at him, one of Basil’s wooden training daggers protruding from his neck. When he saw him arrive, he smiled.

“You liar. You liked it,” Damian said, his voice low and gravelly, sounding more like the Black Luthor guard than like Basil’s older brother. “You wanted to kiss him. You wanted it.”

“N-no…!” Basil breathed out, but his voice failed him as he swallowed tears. He stared back at Damian with wide, terrified eyes, his feet frozen in place as he looked at his brother’s body taunting him. He ignored the sharp stab of betrayal he felt at the words. You wanted this. He hadn’t! He would- He would never-

“How could you?” came Anastasia’s voice, sounding small and afraid, like when she was twelve and had daily nightmares in her room in HQ—only Damian could comfort her. But he was dead. Basil looked around to try and find her, but she was nowhere to be seen. “You know what they did to us. Right here, in this room…!”

“I- I’m sorry, I didn’t-”

An arm wrapped around his shoulders and Basil flinched. He tried to pull away, but he wasn’t strong enough. “You always were the luckiest out of all of us,” Damian said. He cupped his cheeks with his hands as he giggled and cackled and laughed. Then, he leaned down and suddenly he was the blond man from the hotel and his mouth was on Basil’s. He couldn’t breathe at all. He fell backward and landed in a pool of blood on the cement floor.

“What are you doing, Rowan?” Mr. De Angelis asked in an annoyed tone. “There’s a client waiting for you in the room. Bring him the kids.”

Basil scrambled to his feet to face the man he used to call his father. De Angelis pushed a pair of terrified children in front of him—Sage and an older boy wearing a school uniform. “Go on, bring them up!” Mr. De Angelis asked as Sage started to shake her head, tears quietly falling from her eyes. Basil shakily took her wrist and started climbing up the stairs to the first room. Opening the door, he was met with the figure of Min-jun sitting on the edge of the bed.

“I’m so disappointed in you, Rowan,” Min-jun said, eyes full of disdain staring right into Basil’s own tear filled eyes. He opened his mouth to apologise, but Min-jun had already disappeared, leaving only an empty bed in his wake.

“Would you kiss me if I asked you to? You sure seemed eager, back there,” Mr. De Angelis’ amused voice observed from behind him.

“What’s the point?” the girl from the hotel replied. “We’re all gonna die here anyways.”

Anastasia started screaming, horrible, pain filled wails that had Basil’s heart speed up and his knees buckle. Damian was also shouting. His head was full of static as he hit the ground, sinking into the red liquid. He tried to call back to her but a hand wrapped itself over his mouth and suddenly Basil couldn’t even move at all.

Basil woke up with a name on his lips and tears in his eyes. Immediately, he scrambled off the bed and fell to the floor, rubbing his hands together to rid them of the ghost feeling of blood coating them. His eyes were too blurry to really see anything. He tried to keep quiet to avoid bothering Polly in her room, but had trouble stifling the sobs erupting from his throat. With shaky hands, he grabbed the phone the Commission had provided for him and dialled Min-jun’s number. It rang for a long time before it was picked up.

“Hey, sorry to whoever’s calling, I’m training with Damian. What’s up?” Min-jun’s voice casually asked over the phone. Basil was only able to stay silent for a little while, biting back a sob, before he broke down. It started with a hitched breath—and he began crying harder when Min-jun spoke again.

“Basil? Hey, hey, what’s wrong?” Basil tried to open his mouth to answer but nothing came out except another wail. In the background, he could barely make out Damian’s voice. He sounded worried—Min-jun answered in the same tone before speaking to him again. “Alright, Basil, breathe with me, okay? One, two, three… everything will be alright, you hear me? Whatever’s wrong, me and Damian will do our best to fix it. That’s right… Four, five, six… You’re doing great…” he said, taking deep, exaggerated breaths between each sentence.

Min-jun was great at calming people down, his presence a soothing balm even with an ocean between them. Basil had not inherited his natural talent for it when training under him—but his social shortcomings were not relevant as he kept weeping and slowly, slowly began breathing again under his mentor’s guidance. He exhaled loudly one last time, his breath still a bit shuddery, before Min-jun spoke up.

“Great, good job…” His voice remained low and reassuring. Still, he sounded worried as he continued: “Alright, can you tell me what’s wrong? Is your mission over? Do you need backup?”

“I-it’s over, I’m sorry for calling…”

“Hey, it’s alright! Damian and I were just reviewing some dusty old files, you’re not interrupting anything. Say, what time is it in the US?”

Basil glanced at the small clock on his bedside table. “It’s midnight…” he whispered.

“It’s a little over 9 for us, kiddo. See, you’re not bothering us at all. If anything, it’s you that should be asleep. So, what happened?” Min-jun softened his voice at the end. Basil felt a little bad for calling, despite his reassurances. He wanted to hang up, to not tell Min-jun of all his mistakes. He was ashamed of himself and ashamed that he still needed help through nightmares like a little kid. He was never a part of the children that deserved reassurances.

But he wanted them.

Basil sobbed again as he began to speak, words stumbling over themselves as he tried to shove them all at once through the tiny speaker. “It’s- I- The mission was to infiltrate this hotel, but it was a front for a trafficking ring, a-and all the children there looked s-so terrible and then I had to- t-there- th- but I escaped, I- I managed to escape but then I- I kissed him and it felt so horrible but it was my fault and I’m not a good agent, I’m going to get fired- ”

Basil cut himself off with a sob—he could hardly breathe at all, and it was difficult to speak with the vice ensnaring his throat. He sniffed and cried and thought he could hear some muffled cursing from somewhere far away.

“Hold on, hold on-” Min-jun tried, speaking quickly in a futile attempt to drown out Basil’s spiralling.

“I’m sorry, I’m s-sorry…!” Basil blubbered, clutching the phone with two shaking hands. “D-don’t tell Damian, please, Min-jun-”

“Hey, it’s alright, please breathe-”

“He’ll hate me forever- ”

“Of course he won’t, Basil, you know Damian would nev-”

 Min-jun’s voice faded out as the phone was presumably snatched from his hold. There was a short shuffling sound before Damian’s voice took over with boiling intensity.

“Basil, listen to me carefully now, I could never hate you, especially not for this. If anything, it’s the president who’s gonna hear a piece of my mind-” Min-jun’s unintelligible voice sounded, staticky through the phone’s speaker, and Damian growled in answer. “No, listen, I’ll fucking kill her, what the hell was she thinking, sending Basil out there to-”

Damian interrupted himself, taking a deep, shuddery breath. Basil, who’d stopped trembling to listen to his brother’s angry rant with wide eyes, could perfectly picture his face—closed eyes, furrowed brows, deep breath—as he tried to calm himself down.

“I’m sorry, Basil,” Damian finally said after the short pause. “This isn’t about that f- it’s not about her. You need to know, though— nothing about what happened back there was your fault. It will never be your fault, because anything you did was for your own survival.”

“Y-you don’t even know what happened. I could’ve-”

“It doesn’t matter,” Damian interrupted, firmly but gently. “The people there, they- they have a way of getting into your head, alright? You’re so scared and trapped, you can’t think straight and you just do the first thing you can to get a hint of control. It’s not your fault. You’re just a kid.”

Basil’s eyes watered. “I was so scared…” A mere whisper.

“I know,” Damian answered softly. “I was, too, back there. But I know now, it wasn’t my fault, and it wasn’t yours.”

“T-thank you…” Basil’s voice wobbled.

“You’re welcome, little bro. Now tell me, are you coming back soon? The mission’s all done, right? I’ll treat you to brezeln when you come back, it’ll make you feel better!”

“Y-yeah, they’re wrapping up the last details and then I should be good to come back…”

“Well, they better hurry or I’ll come get you myself! We all miss you!” Basil could very well picture the impish grin on Damian’s face. He giggled weakly.

“R-really?” he laughed. “I’ll come back soon, don’t worry. Say hi to Ana for me.”

“Will do! Now go to sleep! It’s super late!”

“Yeah…” Basil whispered. His mind wandered back to the room where the kids were kept at the hotel. “Ah… um, Damian?” An inquisitive hum answered him. “Thank you for keeping the kids together back at the casino. I never knew… just how important it was. I’ll see you soon.”

“No problem! See you soon,” Damian agreed, his tone so enthusiastic Basil knew he was exaggerating to keep his temper at bay. The phone clicked, and Basil didn’t doubt that Damian was already ranting at Min-jun. His heart felt warm and light at the thought.

「⸙」

November 1st, 2001 - Faraway Town, United States of America

When morning came, Polly came to tell him they’d been called in to report. They drove to HQ in silence—Basil could tell Polly wanted to say something, as she was visibly worried, biting her lip and glancing at him ever so often—but she did not speak up, so neither did he. They were alike, in that way: they preferred to keep a respectful distance rather than risk blundering. Basil would not have made a fine conversation partner, anyway.

The agent assigned to take Basil’s account was tall, with dark skin, long braided hair and a serious face. After Basil finished his retelling, he revealed that the little girl Basil had given his transmitter to, Sage, did end up pressing the button and talking to an officer. She had apparently gotten scared when Basil was taken away, even if he hadn’t left for a long period of time before he was able to call for help. The agent told him he had done a great job securing more evidence that way, that it would help the case. Basil did not ask to hear the recording, even if he had the sudden urge to—to remind himself that Sage was safe, now. That they were out.

Basil was also scolded for killing two men, and for cutting his camera after doing so.

“It could have had grave repercussions on our operation,” the man said, staring straight into Basil’s eyes with a serious expression. He remained frozen in place, nervously gripping the fabric of his trousers as he fought desperately to maintain eye contact. “Fortunately, one of the hotel’s staff was found cleaning up the scene when our team came down. The offense has been attributed to him, so you’ve been cleared of any guilt. We’ve also removed any account of your involvement in the reports, and the clips have been cut. Do not mention this incident ever again,” he warned. Basil quickly nodded, swallowing the lump in his throat. I made things difficult again…

“As I’m sure you understand, it will take some work to clean this up, and we’ve had to open a separate file for the incident,” the agent continued, tapping the tip of his pen on the paper in front of him. “You, alongside Agent Keller, will be asked to remain in Faraway for the duration of the procedures.”

Basil looked down at his lap. Yes, it was standard that the agents involved in a case needed to remain on standby until the case was fully closed, in case some unexpected complications arose. He hadn’t expected that his fuck-up would get him and Polly stuck in America for an unforeseen amount of time. He took in a shallow breath and nodded. “Yes, sir.”

He missed his family.

Polly decided to make small talk while they drove back—after another long while of tense silence.

"A few kids came over while you were gone," she began, keeping her eyes on the road. She sounded a little awkward, like she didn’t know how to talk to him. Basil could relate. "A very nice girl and her friends. I think they were worried about you. Maybe you could go talk to them if you have time today, while I finish cleaning up the house."

“...I have to finish my written account,” Basil replied, still fiddling with the fabric of his pants. His gaze flicked away, even if Polly wasn’t looking his way in the first place. “Also, we’ll be leaving… soon, so…”

Basil didn’t look at her, but her silence was loud. He imagined her biting her lip like she always did when she hesitated—which happened often, when she talked to him. “...Basil,” she began gently after a while. “We won’t be leaving for a while, you know that… I think it would be good for you if you went out a little…”

Basil knew what she was doing. She was trying to distract him from the case, from everything that happened—even if she was not on field, she was a part of the case and must have gotten some debriefing. But Basil wasn’t a normal kid—he didn’t just… go out to play with people his age. He was an agent and had to conduct himself as such.

(“Basil, won’t you come to the town square with us? I’m taking Anastasia to buy some thread for her project,” Damian had asked one afternoon, stepping into the room a nine year-old Basil had been practicing his aim in since morning.

Basil had shaken his head. “I have to train.”

“...You know, you can’t keep going on like this,” Damian had said, his eyes filling with pained understanding. “It’s not healthy, little bro.” Basil had shaken his head again.)

Basil shook his head. “The report…”

“...You gave a statement today. I’m sure the people from HQ noted everything down, alright? Did they really tell you to write a report…?”

Basil stayed quiet. They hadn’t… But he was so used to doing so back in Sonnenstadt, doing otherwise would feel… wrong. He knew President Jemal would ask him for a written report on top of the one sent back by Soter when he came back, and… What else was he supposed to do with his time?

…Go out, apparently.

“Wouldn’t it be nice to talk to someone your own age, for a change?” Polly prompted gently when it became clear Basil was not going to break the silence.

For some reason, Basil found himself shaken by the question. He didn’t remember the last time he’d genuinely spoken to someone his age outside of a mission. Even Anastasia was four years older than him. He wasn’t sure he would have anything in common with other ten year-olds… And the thought brought an unpleasant pressure in his chest.

“They’ll be sad if I talk to them and vanish after. It’s best not to get attached,” Basil reasoned. He turned his head towards her just in time to catch the minute furrowing of her brows, which would’ve probably been imperceptible if he hadn’t been trained to read such microexpressions. It was important on the field, but now, it just meant he knew exactly how disappointed she was with that answer.

“Alright, if you say so…” Polly replied slowly. They finally made it back to Faraway, a little decrepit sign on the side of the road proclaiming, ‘Welcome to Faraway Town, where dreams come true’. Basil turned his gaze back to his knees. “There’s a nice park a few streets up… At least get some fresh air, okay?”

Basil mutely nodded. Maybe he could find some cool plants there, if he was lucky enough.

Polly made them some late lunch while Basil began to pack the props in his temporary room so the house would be ready for the IMPS when they left. There wasn’t much, so he just put the few books and clothes in a box and placed it beside the door, easily accessible for the time being, but easily carried out when they went to leave. By the time he was done, Polly had finished heating up some bread for a quick meal. She prompted him to go out again as they ate.

Basil spent some time laying on his bed, feeling aimless, before he finally gathered his courage and decided to heed her advice. He quietly walked out of his room, unnoticed by Polly, who was quietly humming along to a song he couldn’t hear—she was wearing earphones, the music coming from some kind of audio player—as she cleaned.

Basil didn’t know where the park was, exactly, other than ‘a few streets up’— but he thought he could probably figure it out. Faraway Town was very small, after all, and he was capable enough to find his way through much more complicated cities. He did not tell Polly he was leaving, not wanting to bother her while she seemed to be in a good mood.

Basil hadn’t had the time to visit Faraway, since he had been busy with his mission in Clauser. He’d passed through some part of the town when he walked to the school, but hadn’t seen a park. Still, Polly’s instructions were straightforward, though not comprehensive, and–two streets north—allowed him to easily find Faraway Park.

There were already a few people in the park—a young boy throwing sand at two other children, who seemed to be twins, in the sandpit while their parents watched fondly from the sidelines, talking to each other with content smiles on their faces; a black-haired girl sitting alone on the swings, idly kicking up dirt; an elderly man who appeared to be taking a nap on the grass in an secluded corner; some people running stalls. Basil headed straight for the back, which was occupied less by people and more by vegetation. There wasn’t anything special, but Basil decided to pass some time identifying the species of the trees and bushes along the edge of the fence. It was peaceful. Basil found himself breathing a little easier than before, relaxing at the familiarity of the activity. He knew most of these plants like the back of his hand—recognising them was mindless, calming…

That peace was inevitably disturbed some time later when, with a loud, excited shout, another boy ran up to him, his footsteps loud and easily traceable. Basil startled when the boy—whom he could see was much taller than him—stopped right next to him, holding about four bags’ worth of groceries more than he looked like he should handle.

“You’re Basil, right?!” the boy asked loudly, sporting a bright grin on his face. His skin was tanned, his hair down to his shoulders, a warm brown slightly lighter than his eyes. Basil realised that he recognised him—the cheery boy from when he’d first moved in, who had waved at him. “Your mom said you’d be back! Wanna play tag with me?”

“Uh- what?” Basil asked dumbly, staring at the boy with wide eyes as his heart hammered in his chest. This was what happened when he did anything without a plan, especially talking—and it was nerve wracking.

“Oh, shoot, you’re right!” the other boy replied, lifting his arms, grocery bags hanging on both sides. He shook them for emphasis. “I got too excited! My mom’s expecting me to bring this back for dinner, so I gotta go.  But I really wanna play tag with you someday, okay? You do like tag, right?” The boy stared at him earnestly. Basil stared back with wide eyes, speechless. He’d never been… invited like that, before. This bright kid wanted to play with… him? Basil wasn’t meant for this. Still, he didn’t know what to do in this situation, so he mutely nodded. The boy jumped up in victory, pumping his fists—the bags he was carrying shook dangerously.

“Yes! I knew you’d say yes! Oh, and I’m Kel by the way!” the boy, Kel, introduced himself. “And you’re Basil! You should meet my friend Sunny also.” Kel spoke as if he needed to get all of his thoughts across in a single breath, lest he lose them forever. He smiled at Basil, probably waiting for an answer, before his smile abruptly fell into something more sheepish. He jerked his thumb backwards, towards the street.

“So…” Kel chuckled awkwardly. “ I really should get going, cause I did stop at Hobbeez and my mom told me not to ‘cause she needed me back quickly. But we'll hang out some other time, right? Wait, umm…" He paused, seemingly thinking hard, then began to rummage through one of his bags. He pulled out a paper package which seemed to be for crackers, before carelessly putting all the bags on his left arm on the ground, trying to balance the packaging with his knee and chest while pulling a black sharpie out of another bag. It seemed incredibly unbalanced and Basil wondered why he did it like this. Kel hurriedly scribbled down something on the paper label before handing the entire bag of crackers to Basil, who instinctively took it. Numbers.

“That’s my house’s phone number, okay? Call me soon!” Kel explained, already picking up all the bags he’d dropped. And just like that, he ran off.

Basil watched him go, baffled by the odd interaction. He glanced down at the bag of crackers in his hands, the label covered in Kel’s messy scrawl.

Basil stayed there for a while as he tried to process the strange boy’s excited behaviour. He wanted to be friends. With Basil. He gave him his number and… crackers. Were they friends now? Was that… was that how it worked…?

Basil walked back to the house with the crackers, tearing off the paper label and shoving it in his pocket before Polly saw it.

…They ate crackers with their dinner. Basil wasn’t sure if he was expected to pay Kel back for them.

After they ate, Basil went to his room and shoved the label in his empty bedside table’s drawer, out of sight. It would do him no good to get attached. Basil wouldn’t stick around long enough to know what it was like to really have a friend.

「⸙」

November 12, 2001 - Faraway Town, United States of America

A little more than a week passed without Basil going out again, too paralysed at the thought of seeing Kel again and disappointing them both with his inevitable return to Europe—not that Basil… wanted, kind of, to know what it would be like. To have friends of his own, to be a normal kid. Because he wasn’t, and he shouldn’t hope for such nonsensical things, anyways. On the ninth day, Polly got a call from Soter’s HQ saying they were expected to be able to leave by the end of the next week, as no complications arose.

Basil spent his time working on his report for President Jemal. He wasn’t on Soter’s team—there wasn’t much he could do to help the American agents with their jobs, so… he passed time the only way he knew how to. With work, and training, and he did end up reading The Picture of Dorian Gray from the set of props.

Beginning to feel restless as the date of his return home approached, Basil decided to go to the park once again. It was early in the morning, too early for there to be many people. The stall owners were only beginning to set up their products, and the same man he had seen resting on the grass last time was sleeping against a table. A girl who seemed to be about his age was eating a muffin on a park bench, so quickly it looked like she hadn’t eaten in days. Basil walked along the fence for a while, observing the flora and listening to the birds, until he found a path leading up to a grassy clearing, tall trees surrounding a small lake with an old pier and moss-covered statue. The trail leading up to it was filled with vines on both sides, but the ground was beaten as if people regularly passed through. Considering the colorful pinwheels stuck in the ground around the lake, far cleaner than the pier or the statue, and the basketball laying in the middle of the space, Basil thought that was a fair assessment. Feeling like he was intruding on a private location, Basil walked back out and turned the street, walking until he arrived at the department store.

He decided to buy some food for his and Polly’s lunch—since they were leaving soon, their small fridge was mostly empty, so they had to sustain themselves with simple foods. That meant they’d been eating mostly bread and hummus for the past few days, or pre-made meals. Wandering down the quiet aisles, Basil picked up two bento boxes before walking to the register to pay with the coins he’d taken for that purpose when he left. He nervously smiled down at the floor, wringing his hands together as the teenager behind the counter gave him the stink eye when he presented her with the two dozen coins—but he did not have anything else to pay with. He hurried out of the store, intending to go back to the house as fast as possible.

∙∙•「⸙」•∙∙

Aubrey’s parents were fighting again. She had run out the house before the sun even peeked through the horizon because she heard the sound of a bottle smashing from her room and got afraid—she was not sleeping well lately, or at all, because this happened so often. Her parents always screamed, but lately, they screamed louder. Her father always hit, but lately, he hit harder. She was afraid he might go up to her room if he was angry enough, or drunk enough. So she’d slipped out barefooted and ran all the way to the park where it was safe. Her feet hurt.

She hugged her knees to her chest tightly, burying her face into the crook of her arms, and cried without restraint—there was no one to hear her here, no one to shout at her for being too loud. Safely hidden in the Cat, her favourite playground instalment, she could pretend that she was a beautiful princess running away from a dangerous dragon, like in the Sweetheart movies, rather than a scared, helpless little girl whose parents hated her. It would have been easier if she had something to distract herself with.

Aubrey stayed there for hours, long enough for the sun to peek through and Granny Oakes and the fruit guys to arrive to set up their stalls for the day. When they did, Aubrey tentatively exited her safe haven and walked up to the old woman’s stand. ‘Save the Earth!’, a sign proudly declared. A lot of kids from school liked to mock Granny Oakes because she cared so much about the planet, and they said she was useless and that they didn’t care about her flyers at all, but Aubrey thought Granny Oakes was very nice. She often gave Aubrey some beetroot muffins she baked when she passed by…

The old lady smiled when she saw Aubrey, which took a little while because her sight had gotten bad. Aubrey wiped her eyes and smiled back, quietly greeting her as she began helping setting up the stall. Granny Oakes gave her a muffin again when they were done, calling her a good girl and saying Aubrey was raised right. It always made Aubrey feel light and warm when she said things like that. Aubrey’s parents were bad guys, but she was good. At least one person thought she was well-behaved, not that she always caused trouble and was a waste of space and resources.

She thanked Granny Oakes and went to sit down on a nearby park bench to eat the muffin. She hadn’t eaten since the previous day’s lunch, so she was really hungry. She ate the muffin quickly, feeling a little disappointed that it was done so quickly. She was still hungry…

She glanced around. It was still early, and… she couldn’t go back home. Today was Monday, and school would begin soon, but she did not feel like going. First of all, her measly school supplies were still in her room at home, and she knew her teacher would scold her again if she came to class empty handed. Second of all… school was just… not that great. Aubrey’s classmates didn’t like her, she didn’t have any friends and she was bad in every subject. Going there just made her feel stupid.

So… she stayed on the bench, knowing no one would bother with asking her why she wasn’t in class. The concerned, well-meaning parents who sometimes came to the park on weekends would be busy working today. Aubrey was free to practice her monkey bars skills, play some tetherball if the neighborhood kids hadn’t stolen the ball again, hide in the Cat, sit around on the swings… all by herself… Maybe Granny Oakes would have some stories to tell, but it was a little difficult to hold sustained conversations with her.

Aubrey stood up to go give the old woman her reusable muffin liner back, and as she did so, spotted an unfamiliar boy walking along the far edge of the park, his head turned up like he was lost in thought staring at the tree leaves. He walked slowly, without a purpose or destination in mind. Aubrey had never seen him before. She was sure of it—his hair was blonder than her classmate Mikhael’s ugly, fake wig, so she would’ve remembered him for sure. Did he just arrive in Faraway? She wondered who in their right minds would move here, of all places. Clauser and Heer City were only a few miles away, and she has heard they were way better places to live in. After all, Faraway was a dump, small and empty, and half its residents lived near the poverty line. His family would’ve been better somewhere else.

Aubrey watched as the boy bent down to run his hand through a patch of grass. It was difficult to tell from her point of view, but she thought he might be looking at a bed of small, purple flowers. She liked to pick some to make crowns with, sometimes. She tore her gaze away from him and walked to Granny Oakes’ stand. When the silicon wrapper was safely back in the woman’s possession, Aubrey decided to waste some time trying to beat her record on the monkey bars. As she didn’t have any form of timer, she wasn’t sure if she succeeded by the time her hands felt too sore to continue.

Looking around, the mysterious blond boy was nowhere to be seen. Aubrey was bored.

She sat against a tree, feeling vaguely miserable as the sun rose higher and the pit in her stomach grew deeper. She didn’t feel like doing anything anymore. Instead, Aubrey closed her eyes, beginning to doze off as her exhaustion slowly but surely caught up to her—until, an unspecified amount of time later, a hand hesitantly tapped her shoulder. She blearily opened her eyes, blinking at the person now crouching in front of her. It was- It was the blond boy from earlier, who was now carrying two bento boxes. She couldn’t help her gaze from being drawn to them.

“Ah, s-sorry for bothering you, but… Are you… okay…?” the boy asked, and it took Aubrey a moment to realise that he was genuinely asking her. She realised that she still didn’t have shoes, and that her clothes and skin was dirty from laying around, her hair probably sprinkled with sand from the time she’d spent in the Cat. She abruptly sat up and tried to pat it clean.

“I’m fine!” she replied, her voice cracking at the end—her throat was dry.   The blond boy looked at her, obviously unconvinced, and her cheeks flushed in embarrassment. He probably found her weird.

“...are you sure? You’re…” His gaze flicked to her worn clothing, loose because it was her nightwear, and bare feet, then away. He bit his lip and did not continue.

Aubrey brought her knees to her chest, holding them tightly against herself as she fought the urge to cover her face with her hands. Her eyes lingered on the bento again. She pinched her lips together tightly. “Yes,” she said in a small voice.

The boy followed her eyes to the bento he was holding. He looked hesitant, eyes slightly widened like a startled deer as he looked between the two. “Are you… hungry?” he asked slowly, and Aubrey’s face burned. Here she was, dirty and begging for scraps from this stranger. Still, after a while of frozen embarrassment, she nodded once, keeping her eyes on the ground. The boy remained silent for a while, as well.

“Here,” he finally said, holding one of the bento for her to take. She looked up at him, stunned, and hesitantly reached out to take it. She looked at the box—rice, lettuce, vegetables, some kind of sliced fried chicken… It looked better than anything she had eaten in a long, long time—her mother only bought cup noodles—and made her mouth water.

“Is it… really okay?” Aubrey asked, looking at the boy, who did not seem to hold any judgement in his eyes. He nodded.

“I think… you are probably hungrier than me.” He spoke with a slight accent, barely noticeable, that she did not recognise. He looked up at the sky, still crouched in front of her, holding himself tightly. “Is it noon already…?” he mumbled to himself. Aubrey glanced at him, awkwardly fiddling with the lid of the bento.

“Um… I don’t have a watch, sorry…”

He shook his head, putting the second bento on the ground beside himself as he turned away from Aubrey, sending a sharp spike of panic through her. Don’t leave yet. Please.

It was the first time in a while Aubrey spoke to another kid without them making fun of her or calling her poor and disgusting. He seemed kind, and had given her food, and she didn’t want him to go yet. He did not know her, didn’t know that her parents didn’t buy her nice school supplies, or that she was kind of weird, or that the other kids at school didn’t really talk to her. She wanted to talk more…

But rather than standing up and walking away, the boy simply extended an arm towards the sun, palm facing himself, before turning back and picking the box up again. “Ah, yeah… It’s closer to 12h30, actually…” Aubrey’s eyes widened. How did he know? But before she could ask, the boy started to stand, for real this time. “I should head back…”

“Wait!” she called out, her hand automatically reaching forward as if to physically hold him back. He turned back, looking equally startled by her outburst, and she flushed. “Uh. You should- eat with me.” She patted the ground beside her. “Since you gave me this. Sit here.” Her tone came out a little desperate, which only served to embarrass her further. The boy stared back at her for a few seconds, and Aubrey was sure he was about to purse his lips at her and refuse, but a strange expression crossed his face before he asked:

“You want to eat… with me?” His tone was so hesitant Aubrey felt bad for him—and she was the one who’d never had a friend before. She felt some sort of kinship with this boy and, more confident now, nodded firmly.

“Yes. Please sit with me.”

The boy hesitated for a few more seconds before slowly sitting down next to her, visibly tense. Aubrey stared at him and decided to break the tension herself. Ignoring how wrong it felt, she opened her bento first, clumsily picking up the wooden chopsticks and bringing a bit of rice to her mouth. Immediately, it became difficult not to shovel the rest in her mouth as fast as possible. She forced herself to turn away from the food and back to the boy, pushing down the embarrassment she felt upon seeing him staring directly at her, and smiled.

“How did you do that thing with your hand to tell the time?” she asked curiously. He turned his head to look up at the sky again.

“Ah… Um, hold out your hand, like this,” he instructed, and she obediently followed his directives, copying his movement. “If you place it over the horizon line, under the sun… um, every finger represents fifteen minutes of daylight, so a full hand is about an hour…” He pulled his own hand back to his side and began tracing the edge of his bento with his thumb. “So I just estimated… based on the distance. It’s not that precise or anything…”

Aubrey squinted as she counted her fingers and then some. The sun was still high, but she was surprised to see that it made sense! She looked back at him with sparkling eyes. “That’s so cool! How do you know that?”

The boy flushed slightly, ducking his head. “Um… my father taught me…”

“He must be really cool,” Aubrey said honestly. She pushed the image of her own father to the far back of her mind—jealousy would do her no good. A small smile appeared on the boy’s face.

“Yeah. He is.”

The conversation faded into comfortable silence.

“I’m Aubrey,” Aubrey suddenly blurted out. The boy turned to her and gave her a small smile.

“N-nice to meet you. I’m Basil.”

Basil continued to teach Aubrey how to determine the time using the sun, and how the results changed depending on the time of the year. Aubrey listened to everything he said intently. He explained himself much better than her teachers, in her opinion. They ate and talked and Aubrey almost forgot all about her troubles that morning. Eventually, Basil seemed to relax and began speaking with more ease. It was… nice.

When they were done eating, a little less than an hour had passed. “I really… should go, now,” Basil said at last, beginning to stand, and Aubrey felt the familiar coils of panic ensnaring her throat. She quickly snapped her gaze up at him, looking for any excuse to keep him here longer. She felt like she had a friend for the first time in her life. Like she was a normal girl.

“Wait! Do you need, uh-” She gulped. “Do you need… h-help, carrying those?” Aubrey asked, vaguely gesturing to the two bento boxes he had picked up to throw away. He looked down.

“Ah… I think I will be fine, but… thank you for the offer…?” He smiled awkwardly, but did not start to walk away. The two of them stared at each other in silence.

“Can I walk you home?” Aubrey asked. Basil hesitated again, but nodded wordlessly. They walked to the trash can together, and Aubrey took the opportunity to shout her goodbyes to Granny Oakes. Then, Basil started leading her down the street.

“Did you just move here?” Aubrey asked as she walked beside him, tilting her head to look at him better. “I’ve never seen you around.”

He nodded. “Hm, me and my guardian just moved here from Europe.”

Aubrey, who had never left Faraway Town, had no idea what Europe was like other than what she learned in History & Geography class. She knew that there were a lot of countries in Europe, because they were very small so they could fit more of them on the continent, and also that each one of them had very different cultures. It sounded so much better than this small town—she couldn’t understand why Basil’s family would choose to leave his country to come here.

“That’s so cool… I wish I could travel. I want to go to France! My teacher said they have great bread and also hot chocolate,” Aubrey said. She remembered the pictures he had shown them. It always made her feel depressed, remembering the mouthwatering sweets and knowing she would probably never have access to food this great. “And also, Italy! And Spain!”

Basil looked away, pinching his lips together. “Yeah… I’ve been to a lot of places, um… France is pretty cool, but I like it here, too.”

Aubrey couldn’t understand that at all. She opened her mouth to say something, but Basil’s attention was on the other side of the street. An old lady, coming from the department store, seemed to hesitate to cross the street with her bags. Basil looked back at Aubrey with a quick, awkward smile before looking on both sides of the streets and rushing over to help her. Aubrey blinked—she barely had the time to realise what happened before Basil took the woman’s two bags and began helping her cross the street. Aubrey ran up to them, taking one of the bags from Basil’s hands even if he probably could handle it himself. Basil asked the woman where she was going, and she told them she lived nearby. Her mobility scooter had broken down and she hadn’t been able to get it fixed yet.

“Thank you, youngins…” the old woman croaked, her voice weary with age, when they arrived at her house, just a few plots away. “Your parents must be very proud to have raised such nice young people.”

Basil smiled at her, helping her in. Aubrey’s heart clenched a little at the words even as she beamed at the woman. “Thank you, m’am, it was a pleasure!”

They both politely bid her a good afternoon before returning to the road. Aubrey smiled at Basil. “You’re a very nice person, you know?”

Basil’s eyes widened slightly. “A-ah? Oh, thanks…”

Aubrey giggled. Basil seemed surprised every time she complimented him, but she didn’t understand why. He was smart and kind and made her feel listened to during the short time she had known him. She really, really hoped they could be friends after this…

“Thank you for the bento,” Aubrey said when Basil stopped in front of a house on Church Street, which she assumed to be his. “And… for talking to me today. I’ll see you around?” she asked hopefully. Basil smiled awkwardly.

“Yeah… See you around,” he repeated. “I’ll… probably come back to the park later… if you want to come…”

Aubrey nodded fervently, her eyes sparkling. She got a friend! A real friend!

Aubrey skipped back to the park, feeling lighter than she had in years. She had just spent a good part of the afternoon talking to someone her age, and he had interesting things to say, and he didn’t make fun of her and even listened to her when she had something to ask or to say. She was so happy!

She returned to the park the next day, skipping school for the second day in a row—which was not that unusual, for her—and just as he said, Basil came back, and he showed her around the park she’d known all her life. For the first time, she paid attention to the things she passed by without noticing every day: the plants, the birds, the insects. For the first time, Aubrey thought that maybe she didn’t hate Faraway so much, after all.

∙∙•「⸙」•∙∙

Basil called Min-jun, Damian and Anastasia.

“Yooo, Basil! How’s it going?” Damian asked enthusiastically over the phone. Basil smiled, holding the device close to his ear with both hands.

“I’m doing better than last time,” he replied honestly. He was almost afraid to admit to himself that going out… talking with people his age, taking a break from agent work… had helped him feel calmer than he had in a long time. He almost…

No. Basil wanted to go back home, he really did. But… he couldn’t lie to himself and say that a part of him didn’t kind of wish he could experience this idea of a normal life for a while longer.

Shaking himself from these shameful thoughts, Basil tuned back in to Min-jun’s warm voice.

“That’s great to hear, kid. You really got us worried, that time.” Hearing his mentor’s kind tone, somehow knowing exactly how to sound like he cared without putting to much weight on his embarrassing display, Basil suddenly longed to be with them in person—for Min-jun to playfully ruffle his hair, Damian to punch his shoulder with just enough strength to hurt but not bruise, Anastasia to curiously tap his shoulder and ask him what he was reading.

“What are you doing back home?” Basil asked instead of vocalising those thoughts.

“Reviewing old shit, mostly. You know how President Jemal is with protocol.” Damian sighed, before adding, “Anastasia’s leaving on an assignment soon, though.”

Basil hadn’t known about that. Learning about it while thousands of miles away from them made his guts clench in anxiety. He didn’t like surprises—would he get to see her before she left…?

“A-ah? What kind of assignment?”

“It’s Direct Action,” Anastasia’s light, mellow voice answered, sounding rather proud of the fact. “And I’m leaving with a unit for the first time!”

“A unit?” Typically, a mission required very small groups, rarely more than three. Dispatching a unit must mean this was a larger scale mission, which were often longer and more dangerous. Anastasia had not yet reached majority, so why would they send her…?

“Yeah, she’s replacing Min-jun,” Damian drawled, obviously sensing Basil’s confusion. “She managed to convince the president that he needed a break and that her small-ass body would be better for infiltration and shit.”

“It is.”

“Why’d you wanna go so bad in the first place?” Even through the phone, Basil could sense Damian’s agitation, his tone raising slightly. He could tell this wasn’t their first disagreement about this. His grip on the phone tightened, his expression turning more worried. Was there something wrong with the assignment…?

“Min-jun just took several missions in a row, he does need to rest sometimes. And I want to help, too-”

Basil winced. “D-don’t put yourself in danger, please…”

“Ana, you know you don’t need to do this to be helpful,” Min-jun cut in, and Damian immediately jumped on the chance to weigh in, audibly cross.

“Yeah, you don’t see me taking Direct Actions in freaking flashpoints, and I’m older than you by five y-”

“Alright, that’s enough,” Min-jun’s firm voice interrupted. “While I can’t say I completely agree with the decision, Ana’s her own person and the president already approved the dispatch. Arguing about it won’t change anything, Damian, we’ve talked about this…”

Damian scoffed, but fell silent. Basil found himself rather uneased by the conversation—like he was missing something important. “Flashpoint…? Where is she going?”

“It’s perfectly safe-”

“They’re sending her to the freaking Uzbekistan border!”

“That’s enough, Damian,” Min-jun insisted, a small edge to his voice. He pushed the phone farther from his mouth—Basil could not hear what he said clearly anymore—said a few stern words that made Damian grumble, and spoke again, his voice calmer. “Enough about that, Basil. How about you? How are things on your side?”

Basil remained silent for a few seconds, trying to process what he’d just heard. He didn’t know much about Uzbekistan, or what Anastasia’s mission was, or why Damian insisted it was too dangerous. It made him worry. After a short delay, he shook himself and finally found it in himself to answer, questions still swirling through his mind—though it was clear Min-jun was done talking about the matter. “U-um. Like I said, I’m cleared to come back soon… By the end of next week, they said…”

“That’s great, kid, it’ll be good to have you back!”

“Will Ana have left already, by then?” Basil asked, biting his lips, and did not like the short silence that followed.

“...Sorry, kid. Chances are you won’t arrive in time to see her off.”

“There’s a lot of preparation to do away from HQ, and we have to take a flight to Iran and then travel by foot to avoid detection,” Anastasia explained, sounding equally regretful. “Since we’re trying to make good time, we’ll be leaving soon.”

“Oh…” Basil wasn’t sure how to answer that. He did not want to vocalise the pit that opened in his stomach at the news, so he settled for silence. The feeling seemed mutual, and the call remained awkwardly silent until Min-jun spoke up again, changing the subject.

“What are you doing while waiting to fly back?” he asked, his tone just a little too light. “You don’t have too much work to do, right? Is that lady agent treating you well?”

Basil blinked. “Polly? Y-yeah, I mean, I guess… I’m not a part of the CID team, so I’ve kind of just been sitting around…”

Anastasia, who hated ‘sitting around’, was quick to scold him. “Basil, don’t waste your time like that, this is a great opportunity! I heard the States are very fun and diverse, you should go out!”

“I mean… I went to the park,” Basil weakly argued, which made Min-jun laugh and Anastasia click her tongue.

“That’s not right, you should be taking this time to try new things! Go to LA, or New York or something!”

Basil pinched his lips. “Ana, I am in a small town in Oregon. There’s nothing here.”

“Go up to Washington and say hi to the President, then!”

Basil furrowed his brows. “I can’t just do that… Plus, I have been going out and trying new things,” he said, which was true—having so much free time, he’d even let Aubrey drag him into Hobbeez and show him a selection of Sweetheart movies—which she said she saw in class and were her favourites. They read comics and even tried to play music on the guitar… “I talked to a girl.”

“ Ooooh~ A girl, Basil? How scandalous!” Damian immediately asked, the urge to tease Basil over his clumsy wording stronger than his need to sulk. Basil could almost imagine him leaning closer to the phone, a mischievous smile on his face. He blushed furiously, spluttering.

“N-no, not like that! I swear…!”

To be honest, it had all started because Basil had been worried. He’d seen Aubrey around the park briefly before, and that time, she’d seemed… well, Basil wasn’t sure. In the morning, he’d spotted her on a park bench when he walked by, eyes rimmed red even as she devoured a muffin like her life depended on it—and he’d assumed she might’ve fought with her friends or parents or something similar. Regardless, he was not good at comforting people, so… he walked by. But when he walked back from the store later that day, he’d seen her again, sleeping against a tree, her expression scrunched up with sadness even while unconscious. Now, it was Monday, and he wasn’t sure if people his age often skipped school to sleep in public parks, but…

Well, he hadn’t wanted to risk it. What if something bad had happened?

He was glad he talked to her, even if maybe he shouldn’t be. He thought he’d probably miss her when he went back to Germany.

“I know, I know,” Damien reassured him, a grin still audible in his voice even through the phone’s bad audio quality. “I’m just teasing you. You made a friend?”

“That’s great, Basil,” Min-jun warmly encouraged him. Basil looked down at the floor.

“Yeah…”

“What is she like?” Anastasia asked, curious and enthusiastic. Basil hesitated, knowing he was opening himself up for more teasing. Still, he kind of wanted to share his experience with his family.

“Um… She is… kind. She listens to me talk about plants and she says she likes it. And she brought me to a store to show me the things she likes.”

Damian laughed, cooing at him. Basil felt his cheeks grow hotter. Still, he continued.

“She gets excited quickly, but she’s also anxious a lot, I think…” Basil remembered how desperately she’d tried to get him to share a meal with her on that first day, and how he’d sometimes see some flicker of insecurity cross her features when she spoke, like she wasn’t sure if what she said was interesting or important enough. “And she’s also stubborn and, um… very competitive. Like when we were trying to find four-leaf clovers…” Aubrey had been determined to find one more quickly than Basil. It had made him laugh. “...I think I’ll miss her a little when I come back,” he admitted quietly, almost ashamed to say it out loud.

“Oh, Basil…” Min-jun said softly, his playful tone immediately becoming more serious. There were a few seconds of silence, before…

“You should stay, then,” Anastasia bluntly stated. Basil froze.

“What?”

“I’m saying, if you’re afraid of missing your new friend, you could ask for a transfer. They’ll probably let you stay in the town, if it’s close to American HQ, and then you won’t have to miss her at all. You’re just a kid, you should be allowed to have friends.”

‘You’re just a kid, too. You should also be allowed to have friends,’ Basil did not say. He ignored the twist of longing he felt at the idea, embarrassed at the mere thought of President Jemal’s disappointment if he were to ask her for a transfer after she’d spent so much resources training him.

“Uh… Yeah. We’ll support you if you’d rather… y’know,” Damian hesitantly added, sounding slightly reluctant. Basil knew he meant it, though, and that was the worst of it. After what they all went through together, separation was inimaginable.

“N-no… I don’t…”

“Hey,” Min-jun gently stopped him. “It’s good, kid. Pick what’s best for you, alright? We’ll all be here for you either way.”

“Okay…” Basil swallowed uneasily, frowning. “I love you guys…”

“Love you too, Basil.”

∙∙•「⸙」•∙∙

International Ministry of Public Safety

United States of America, Soter Project

Portland, OR 97202

November 15, 2001

BASIL GAERTNER

IMPS AGENT, EU

XX CHURCH STREET, FARAWAY TOWN, OR 97207

Dear Mr. Gaertner,

The IMPS, U.S. branch, would like to take this opportunity to formally thank you for your recent assistance with the Black Luthor (#L-15904) case. Your quick thinking and problem solving abilities, along with your ability to carry on with the mission in the face of unexpected dangers, have proven to be invaluable to the mission and have impressed us at the IMPS, U.S. branch.

Following this impressive demonstration of skill and considering our current situation, we would like to extend a formal invitation for Agent B. Gaertner to join our team at Soter Project GHQ. Please find attached the list of benefits and possible future assignments.

Thank you for your consideration,

James Taylor

President of the IMPS, U.S. branch

Fax: XXX-635-8714

Chapter Text

November 16, 2001 - Faraway Town, United States of America

Basil made a friend.

This was a problem for many reasons.

He was supposed to leave Faraway in a week at most. The case he’d taken would soon become history. They tied up the loose ends. Basil was going back home.

And yet, here he was, a girl waiting for him at the park, a phone number and a letter hidden in his drawer.

Basil couldn’t be making friends now. He was leaving.

(He couldn’t be thinking about how nice the last few days had been.)

The letter from Soter’s president weighed heavy on his mind, because it gave him an excuse to stay. They needed him here. Basil’s work impressed them. If he stayed, he could keep working for the IMPS, keep making a difference… and maybe he’d still have time to spend with Aubrey, in between missions.

Basil wouldn’t do that, though. Min-jun, Damien and Anastasia would miss him. He was also needed back there.

(“You should stay, then.”)

(“We’ll support you if you’d rather… y’know.”)

(“Pick what’s best for you, alright?”)

He’d miss them, too.

Basil wasn’t even thinking about it.

“Polly, I…” Basil began that evening, at dinner. He paused. Chewed on his lip for a second. He hadn’t thought this through... (He’d been thinking about it all day.) He was making an impulsive choice. (It made sense. He really wanted to.) “I want to be transferred.”

Polly froze. “What?”

Was it childish to want to live a normal life?

Basil looked down, fiddling with the lid of his bento. “I… I got a letter from Soter. And… I’ve been thinking, and…” He took a deep breath and looked up to meet her eyes. “I want to ask President Jemal for a transfer. It’s okay if you don’t want to stay. I’m just telling you.”

Polly stared back, her mouth half-opened and her fork limp between her fingers. She blinked. “You want to stay in America?” she repeated slowly. “What about Agent Hyun…? You called them just a week ago saying how you missed him and those two kids…?”

“They told me it was alright with them…”

Polly furrowed her brows. She didn’t seem opposed to it, just- Confused. Surprised. “Basil, this is a huge decision. You’re so young…”

“I got a letter from Soter’s president. He said he wanted me on the team, and… Min-jun is fine with it. Damian and Ana, too…” Basil popped the lid on and off the bento, biting his lip. “I’m old enough to be sent to the Black Luthor on my own. I think I’m old enough to decide where I want to stay,” he said, his eyes still down, but a firmer edge to his tone.

Polly stared at him silently for a while. “...You’re sure? May I ask… what brought this on? Even with an offer like that…”

…Worried…? Basil hunched his shoulders, staring resolutely at the bento.

“I made a friend.”

He said it like it was a shameful thing to admit, but Polly’s eyes widened slightly, something like relief crossing her features. “Really? That’s great, Basil! I’m so happy for you!”

She smiled. Basil hesitantly mirrored her, a little embarrassed by her enthusiasm. “Yeah…”

“Let’s call the president tomorrow morning, alright? I’ll stay in America here with you,” Polly declared happily. Basil’s eyes widened, snapping up to meet hers.

“Y-you really don’t need to do that-”

“I want to. What’s your friend’s name, by the way? Is it one of those kids I told you about?”

“...She’s not.” Basil looked down, a soft, hesitant smile curling his lips slightly up. “Her name is Aubrey. She likes flowers.”

Polly’s bright smile at the sight rivalled the sun.

∙∙•「⸙」•∙∙

17.11.2001 Received request from agent B. Gaertner for transfer from IMPS, branch Cypress, Germany, to IMPS, branch Soter, United States of America. Recommendation from agent M. Keller, M. Hyun.

19.11.2001 Transfer request from agent B. Gaertner approved by IMPS, branch Soter, United States of America, President J. Taylor.

23.11.2001 Transfer request from agent B. Gaertner approved by IMPS, branch Cypress, Germany, President A. Jemal.

∙∙•「⸙」•∙∙

November 27, 2001 - Faraway Town, United States of America

Kel was going to the park to play Capt. Spaceboy with Hero and Sunny.

It was cold. Hero said it might snow soon and made Kel wear a coat. Kel, who wasn’t a fan of wearing coats, naturally protested—but his brother involved his mother and from there, it was a losing battle. Hero was such a stick-in-the-mud.

Kel wore the coat.

Kel was glad to be wearing the coat when it turned out to be cold. But he wouldn’t tell Hero that. Hero would use that opportunity to lecture Kel about listening to him because he was older, and that was so annoying! Kel decided he would find a spider at the park just to get back at him for being such a downer.

(Sunny was also wearing a coat. Kel assumed Mari had made him put it on. She stayed in to practice the piano.)

Kel forgot his plan to find a spider quickly, because there was something much more interesting than ugly, spindly critters in the park.

“Hero, look! Basil’s back!” Kel whisper-shouted excitedly, tugging on his brother’s sleeve. The older boy turned to look in the direction he was pointing.

Sitting in front of a bush was Basil, his pale blond hair unmistakable amongst the foliage. Kel had never seen someone with hair so blond, not even that jerk Mikhael with his weird yellow wig he always wore in school and in church. He was sitting with a girl Kel had seen in town before, but didn’t know the name of. They looked to be having fun. Kel wanted to say hi. Maybe they would want to play Capt. Spaceboy with him, Hero and Sunny!

“Baaaaasil!”

Basil looked up, eyes wide, as Kel loudly called his name, excitedly waving at his new friend. They made brief eye contact, but Basil quickly averted his eyes back to his knees. He started picking at the pebbles in the grass. The girl said something they couldn’t hear from there.

“Hero! I’m going to say hi to Basil!” Kel declared, already walking off. His brother quickly grabbed him by the elbow.

“Bad idea, Kel. You saw how he froze up when you yelled? Maybe he wants to be alone for a while,” Hero objected, his tone firm, but not unkind. “He’ll come over when he wants to hang out, okay?”

Kel pouted. “No fair. Tell him, Sunny!”

Sunny’s gaze flicked up to Hero. He didn’t say anything. Hero ruffled Kel’s hair with a light chuckle, pleased at winning yet again. It really was no fair at all—Hero always had the last word! Kel crossed his arms and narrowed his eyes at his brother.

“Stay here with me and Sunny. Let’s play Capt. Spaceboy again, alright?”

Kel stubbornly pouted for a few more seconds, arms crossed, but the promise of Capt. Spaceboy was enough to distract him from the unfairness of it all. He brightened up, raising his hand and waving it around to be sure to get his point across fully: “I want to be the captain!”

∙∙•「⸙」•∙∙

December 21, 2001 - Faraway Town, United States of America

“Basil,” Polly randomly spoke up one evening as they ate dinner—as usual, mostly silently, though Polly often tried to make small talk at some point. It came a little easier to Basil now that he had a friend to talk about. “Have you ever gone to school?”

Basil paused, a little caught off guard by the question. School was the kind of thing he rarely considered, as it had never really applied to him. He had only spent a few months in first grade before those men raided his house. “Um… I went to kindergarten, back in Germany… and spent a few weeks in third grade for a mission, one time. Min-jun is the one who taught me most of what I know.” Basil was not sure if he was taught the content of a regular academic curriculum. Min-jun just taught him what was necessary for him to function within the organisation. “I guess it doesn’t really count…?”

Polly pinched her lips, looking like she wanted to say something, but hesitated to do so. She didn’t seem to like his answer.

“...what?” Basil asked, shifting on his chair. Why was she looking at him like that?

“Would you… like to go to school?”

Basil froze. Go to school…

Was that really possible? Now that he’d been reassigned, he already knew that he would be staying in America for a while. But going to school would not be beneficial to his training, and it could hardly be justified in front of the board—the five-days-a-week commitment would only interfere with his schedule, and in case doubt ever arose within their new community, they only had to say that Polly was homeschooling him. There was virtually no advantage in signing him up. It’s not like the commission cared if Basil had friends.

Aubrey went to school, but she didn’t seem to like it. She never told him why—she seemed to close off whenever the subject of school came up—but Basil guessed it was probably because she didn’t like the people there. Basil could recognise a bit of himself, in her. The hesitance when she spoke to him. It seemed she also wasn’t used to having a friend her age.

Basil thought she might like it, if he went to school with her. And maybe he’d like it too. He could pretend that he was a normal kid who went to school and had a normal childhood and normal friends. He’d like to experience that. To see what his life could have looked like, if he grew up somewhere normal. Would he fit in? Probably not. He was barely able to speak with Aubrey. The thought of going to school, not for a mission but simply because he could, was enough to rattle him. Would he like it?

“Um… y-yeah. I think so…”

Polly smiled. “I’ll arrange something for you, then. Maybe you’ll be able to join your friend when winter break ends.”

She spoke like she wouldn’t have to convince the commission that this would be a good idea—or at least, that it wouldn’t be a bad one. Basil was unconvinced.

“Are you sure…? I don’t think you have the authority to… ask them something like that…” Basil didn’t mean to disparage her, but she had less seniority than he did, and they were both new transfers…

Polly didn’t seem to take offense to his words—rather, her expression turned thoughtful for a second before she turned back to him with a small, reassuring smile. “Don’t worry, Basil. I will figure something out. It’s important that you spend some time with friends your age, alright?”

Basil felt like she was, at least a little, infantilising him. He wasn’t a kid anymore… He didn’t correct her. “...thank you, Polly,” he said instead, because he remembered a halo of blood pooling around his oma’s head, and because he couldn’t quite remember his mother’s face or his father’s eyes which he knew he inherited. He was no longer used to someone taking care of him this way. It was a little nice, even if he didn’t need it.

“No problem!” Polly enthusiastically replied, her smile wide like every time she managed to do something for him. Basil didn’t understand why she cared so much. “I’ll try to teach you the basics so you can blend in with your new classmates, hm?”

∙∙•「⸙」•∙∙

December 22, 2001 - Faraway Town, United States of America

Polly was so glad Basil accepted her suggestion. Ever since she met him, on that plane, she’d been so worried about him—a child in the Commission, being sent on such dangerous missions… That defied every moral principle she had. She wanted nothing more than to get him out of there and allow him to have a normal childhood. The thought of there being more children like Basil horrified her.

To be honest, maybe she hadn’t quite known what she was getting herself into when she agreed to the Commission’s employment offer. Jobless, childless, with no partner and no dream of her own… Perhaps she hadn’t quite known what to do with her life. Their offer had come like a beacon of light to her aimless drive. The opportunity to use her skills to help others, to make a real difference. The chance to make the world a safer, better place.

Polly was beginning to think that the Commission wasn’t as clean as she’d imagined when she joined.

She called Min-jun.

She didn’t even greet him when he picked up, too swept up in what she wanted to say. She had to believe that he would listen, that he would help. He was Basil’s mentor, after all, a man the young boy seemed to trust more than anyone. “I need your help to get Basil in school,” she boldly declared as soon as she heard the telltale sound of the call being picked up. There were a few seconds of silence. What on earth was that sound?

“Well, hello to you too,” Min-jun’s voice crackled over the phone, partially drowned out by the roaring clamor of wind and engine. “Agent Keller, was it? You need me for what?”

Polly’s brows furrowed. “Are you… driving right now?” The background noise remained—whipping, continuous, persistent. Min-jun’s voice came out relatively clearly despite it all, but she was sure. What in Heaven’s name is that man doing right now? According to her calculations, he should still be in office—that’s why she picked this time to call! Agents were constantly busy, and the President even more so. What hope did she have to catch her if Min-jun was out for the day?

“Ah, yeah. Finished work early so I figured I’d get out early as well. Don’t tell the Prez!” he quipped, his tone casual. Polly could hardly believe that this man was supposedly one of the Commission’s best agents. She was sure she was told work ethics were the most important things to the organisation—to the point she had to assure her handler she would be fine forgoing her own personal life… “Anyways, you mentioned Basil? How’s he doing?”

Did this man actually climb the ranks through sheer foolhardiness? He really didn’t sound like he cared about anything…

“Uh…” she began, hesitating to call him out. “Yeah… Yeah- he’s doing fine. I was calling to see if you might be willing to vouch for him so I can enroll him in school.”

A crackling came through the speaker before she heard: “Enroll him?”

“In school, yeah.” Basil deserved that much, at least—especially since he now had a friend he could hang out with in between classes. “He’s still so young, and I… a government agency is no place to raise a child.”

Min-jun chuckled, but before he could reply, he let out a small hum—which didn’t sound like it was directed at her. “Please hold,” he cheerfully replied, before his voice got farther away and he said: “Hallo! Ich möchte, äh... zwanzig Chicken McNuggets. Genauer gesagt vier Chicken McNuggets, zwanzig Stück. Und einen Vanille-Milchshake. Danke!”

Polly’s eyebrows rose up to her hairline.

“Sorry. You were saying?” Min-jun casually asked as he returned to the call.

“A… government agency is no place for a child…?” Polly was… so confused.

“Ah, right.” Min-jun chuckled again. “Is that a question?”

“...No. It’s… how I feel…” Polly narrowed her eyes. “Children deserve to go to school, make friends and play. They shouldn’t be trained and sent on dangerous missions.”

“Why not? That’s how I was raised, and I turned out just fine.”

“...”

The silence stretched. Polly didn’t know how she could even begin to answer that, aside from respectfully disagreeing with that—evidently false—statement. Something told her that Min-jun was far from well-adjusted, despite his high status within the Commission. Just as she began considering hanging up the phone, Min-jun began to laugh again. “Alright, alright. I see your point. You want me to talk to President Jemal for you, that’s it?”

Polly took a breath. “Yeah…”

“You know she doesn’t have that much influence over-” His voice got further away for a second: “Äh, danke- over Soter, right? You’re expecting me to talk to her so she talks to Taylor?”

“Yes, that’s right…”

“Convulted, I like it! You’re going through three middlemen before reaching Soter’s HR.” He chuckled. “Man, who would’ve thought Basil would be going to school in the US, hm? He’s grown a lot since he left! You better tell him to call, okay? I want to know why he suddenly wants to learn third grade maths!”

“He’d be in fifth grade,” Polly protested, annoyed by his nonchalance, but Min-jun had already hung up the call.

She didn’t put the phone down for another full minute, flabbergasted by the odd interaction. How had Basil grown up to be so polite and well behaved if he was raised by such a man?

At least he had agreed to help her…

∙∙•「⸙」•∙∙

January 2, 2002 - Faraway Town, United States of America

Basil knew from that previous mission that he was far behind the other children in terms of education. Not just in terms of class work, but in terms of setting as well—despite all his preparations, he had struggled to blend in well with his classmates. Theory was one thing—an agent instructing him on how children his age typically acted in school, what rules they followed and what they were expected to know… Putting it in practice was a different thing. Luckily for Basil, he hadn’t had to stay in class for too long, back then.

Now, Basil was actually enrolled. It was different. He actually needed to catch up for himself.

Polly had been helping him for the last week, teaching him using material she found in the Faraway library. They’d gotten a letter from Soter’s HR just that morning. They accepted Polly’s request. Basil was stressed.

At least, when Basil hesitantly admitted to Aubrey that he might go to her school after winter break, after she asked him whether Polly would keep homeschooling him now that they ‘moved’, his friend had been so excited Basil hadn’t been able to place a word for the next several minutes. The two of them had met up for Christmas—evidently, neither of them were used to celebrating, but Aubrey had suggested they meet regardless. It had been a little awkward, neither really knowing how to proceed with the usual tradition. They hadn’t had a tree or anything, no sweet treats or hot chocolate… just the two of them with badly wrapped gifts in Basil’s living room. Aubrey had excitedly tugged on his arm when she saw that he had gotten something for her, like she did for him.

She had squealed happily, here eyes sparkling, as she unwrapped Basil’s gift, an eggplant stuffed toy—the one she’d been admiring and carrying around all around Hobbeez every time they visited the store to read comics and hide from the cold. She had tackled Basil with a hug, proudly proclaiming the toy’s name would be Mr. Plantegg and that she loved him. She had looked a little embarrassed presenting him with her own present—three simple clay pots and a few packets of seeds from Fix-It. Basil hadn’t had any plants to grow here since he hadn’t actually planned to stay in America, and she had paid enough attention to his words to notice… The smile that spread across Basil’s face as he realised that had been genuine.

He had suddenly gotten the urge to grow some Gladiolus.

Polly had then urged them over to the kitchen so she could teach them how to bake chocolate chip cookies. The three of them had ended up covered in flour, but it had been a nice, lively afternoon.

Basil was not feeling so relaxed now.

Going to school was no longer a simple hypothetical that he talked about with his friend over cookies and milk. It was a very real reality, now, and Basil did not feel prepared. This wasn’t a simple mission, with guidelines and clear success parameters—this was his real life. He… wanted things to go well. He wanted to have classes and study with Aubrey like a normal kid. He wanted the other kids to like him, to fit in, to learn alongside them and not feel like he was following a script…

So he’d spent the last few days studying off third, fourth and fifth grade school books and asking Aubrey about school. Basil was doing… fine.

Min-jun’s lessons, he learned, didn’t have much to do with actual classwork. Basil learned all about foreign languages and geography, government functioning and branches, fighting, infiltration, espionage… He could speak four languages and was learning two others—Min-jun’s speciality was linguistics. He could draw a passable world map, list off important capitals and hold his own in a fight. He could plan and react quickly for missions. But he didn’t know much about maths, outside of counting money. He didn’t know much about sciences, other than what he taught himself using books. He didn’t know about word classes, sentence types and stylistic devices.

Polly was very kind, but she didn’t know the difference between a preposition, an adverb and a conjunction. She told him to ask Aubrey.

Aubrey didn’t know the difference either.

Basil was almost relieved when he got a call from his new handler telling him he had a new assignment. It got him away from the stress of it all.

Still, as he packed for his two weeks long mission, he found he was a bit more hesitant to leave than he usually was, dragging his feet as he walked to the car. Would Aubrey miss him…? Would she wonder where he went, all of a sudden? Would she be excited when he came back?

Maybe staying in America had been a bad idea, after all.

Despite it all, Basil couldn’t convince himself of it.

Chapter Text

Task Assignment IMPS OR PDX971-D#0258512

Task handler: M. Turner

Head of mission: C. Davis

Assigned Ops: C. Davis, special ops. T. Spencer, field agent. B. Gaertner, field agent.

Antecedent:

IMPS OR PDX971-CI#0063487

-Detection of suspicious radio transmission on Commission CL

RPT: Team intercepted communication between former FBI executive E. Jackson and unknown entity within Canadian borders (QCMTL 45.XXXXXX, -73.XXXXXX )

IMPS OR PDX971-CI#0063594

-Team charged to locate source of transmission

RPT: Location secure, undetect.

IMPS OR PDX971-IG#0228009

-Confirmation of conspiracy against IMPS, U.S. branch

RPT: Foreign agency aims to dismantle IMPS, opposes IMPS practices

ALL FILES ATTACHED

Objective: Locate and eliminate target. Retrieve Documents.

Handler note: Additional performative test for Agent B. Gaertner. Do not alert.

∙∙•「⸙」•∙∙

January 5, 2002 - Faraway Town, United States of America

Aubrey had lost her shoe.

It was almost 6 pm and she had lost her shoe. She needed to go back home. Without her shoe. Basil had left for an unexpected visit to his uncle over in Heer city, so he couldn't help her find her shoe, and he couldn't help her when her mother inevitably snapped at her for losing her shoe. He wouldn't be back for another three days.

She was scared.

She had looked for it in the park by the sandpit, and further down the playground along the swings and the basketball court and the big grass field in the back of the park. She had looked along the sidewalk, near the vending machine that sold disgusting drinks and snacks—but it was the only thing she could afford with her pocket money so she ate them anyway. And she still couldn’t find it! Some stupid bullies had probably stolen it as a prank.

They always did things like that. It wasn’t fair.

And now she’d never find it.

Aubrey needed to get back home. She was already late.

Her parents would be so angry. She was late. What if she made noise when she came in and disturbed her mother while she watched TV? Her father would yell. And then he’d notice her blistered foot from walking around trying to find her missing shoe and she’d get scolded, even if she’d worked really hard picking cans all over the neighbourhood for Granny Oakes to pay for the new shoes herself. She’d just bought them.

Aubrey didn’t have another pair of shoes. Her old ones had been three sizes too small, full of holes in the sole and the fabric. They’d hurt to wear so badly that she’d avoided going out at all, and when she’d had to, she’d worn three pairs of socks instead of forcing her feet into those useless, small, stupid shoes. She’d worked so hard to get herself new shoes. Her parents never bought her anything new.

She’d thrown the old shoes away. They were long gone, rotting in some faraway junkyard—but now Aubrey had no shoes, and school was restarting in two days and she couldn’t work during school and she wasn’t allowed to not wear shoes in school so she’d get in trouble and maybe Basil would get tired of her and finally realise that she wasn’t worth it because she was so pathetic and he would leave her and she’d be alone with no shoes and no friends-

Aubrey collapsed on the sidewalk, hiding her face in her knees as tears threatened to spill from her eyes. They burned. Her foot burned, too. It was so cold, even if there wasn’t any snow yet. Her hands weren’t enough to warm it. She knew it was way past the time she should be home, but she was too scared to go back now. Her parents would- they would scream, even if she’d bought the shoes herself, they wouldn’t care. They’d call her careless, entitled and ungrateful, and they’d somehow find a way to take more things from her, even if she already had nothing! And Basil wasn’t there to let her stay with him like he sometimes did when it got bad, and Aubrey didn’t want to bother Polly—she probably didn’t want her over when Basil wasn’t there… Aubrey sniffled. She was so stupid, crying over a stupid shoe…

“Hey, are you okay?” a worried voice asked to her left. Aubrey lifted her head, wiping her eyes, and met the gaze of an older-looking girl with long, dark hair. Her brows were furrowed as she bent her knees to stare at Aubrey. Three boys were standing behind the girl with varying degrees of concern—two seemed to be about Aubrey’s age, and one older. Aubrey wiped her hand over her face again as she sniffled.

“I- I-”  she stuttered through the tears that kept streaming down her face. “I lost m-my shoe…”

“Do you need help?” the older girl asked, turning to gesture at her friends behind her. “We’ll help you find your shoe, if you want!”

“Yeah!” one of the younger boys, dressed primarily in orange, eagerly agreed. “I’ll find it! Nothing escapes the avid eye of Capt. Kel, space pirate of the galaxy-”

“That’s enough, Kel…” the older boy sighed, placing a hand on the boy’s shoulder as if to stop him from running off.

Aubrey sniffed, shaking her head. “You can’t find it…” Her lips quivered. “I looked everywhere… I- I think someone took it…”

The first boy, Kel, squinted dubiously. “Why would someone steal only one shoe?”

“Kel…”

Kel looked up. At the older boy’s warning look, he quickly moved on, proudly putting his hands over his hips as he dramatically declared: “Well then! Don't worry, girl! I, Capt. Kel, will get your shoe back for you!"

"Kel, not everything is a video game… Have some tact…"

The older girl smiled at the exchange, her eyes sparkling as she turned back to Aubrey. She sat down next to her, mirroring Aubrey’s position. “Don’t worry, you’re in good hands! I think I saw a pink shoe in the ditch on the way here. It looked a bit like yours!” she said, gesturing at the—visibly bright pink—shoe on Aubrey’s other foot. “Maybe someone took it by mistake and left it there instead of bringing it back?”

Aubrey meekly nodded.

Kel laughed dramatically, like a villain from a superhero movie. “I will find the one who took it and make him pay!” he declared, before running off in the opposite direction from which they came. The older boy sighed.

“I’ll follow him.” And he ran off after him. Aubrey watched them go with slightly widened eyes, momentarily shocked out of her mental spiral.

“I’m Mari!” the older girl introduced herself with a bright smile. “This is my brother Sunny!” She pulled the remaining boy—who looked a lot like her, with dark hair and eyes—in a side hug. Sunny looked up at his sister, then back at Aubrey, offering a small wave. He hadn’t said a word since he got here. “The two that just ran off were Hero and Kel. They’re also siblings. What’s your name?”

“It’s…” Aubrey wiped her eyes, quietly giggling at the absurdity of the situation. “Aubrey…”

“Nice to meet you, Aubrey!” Mari was still smiling at her—Aubrey was sure she had never seen anyone smile so brightly before. It was nice. Comforting. Pretty.

“Nice to meet you too, Mari… and Sunny…” Aubrey craned her neck to look at the boy, who was hanging back and still hadn’t made a sound. He was staring at the road where Kel and Hero disappeared. The dim evening light was beginning to cast creepy shadows down the street—and it was cold. Aubrey’s foot was numb, probably already red under her thin sock. “I should go home…”

Mari’s eyebrows shot up. “But Hero and Kel are looking for your shoe! They’ll be back very soon, don’t worry!”

Aubrey bit her lip, her previous anxiety creeping back into her mind. “Okay…”

They settled into silence.

“So…” Mari began after a few seconds. She leaned over to look at Aubrey’s remaining shoe. “Are these shoes special to you? You seem to care for them a lot.”

“Oh… Not really…” Aubrey muttered, leaning her head on her arm. She didn’t want to admit that she didn’t have another pair of shoes—that her parents didn’t care enough to buy her nice things like that. “I like how they look, that’s all…”

“Oh! Is your favourite colour pink, then?” Mari pointed at the remaining shoe. At Aubrey’s nod, she beamed. “Mine’s purple! We match!”

Mari turned to Sunny, staring at him with expectant eyes. His gaze slid back to them, but there was a long pause before he finally answered, averting his eyes. “...Purple.” Mari giggled.

“He only says that because I said it first. But he’ll warm up to you eventually, don’t worry!” Mari leaned down to peek at Aubrey’s face, her long hair almost brushing against the sidewalk as she did so. “I think I’ve seen you around before. Are you in Sunny’s class, maybe?”

Aubrey hugged her knees tighter, averting her eyes. “I’m in the special needs class…” She’d been deemed a troublesome student after several times of being unable to hand in her worksheets, refusing to explain herself or provide an excuse. It was difficult to focus on work, at home. She spent most of her free time in the park.

“Really? Why?” Mari asked curiously. Aubrey shrugged. “Well, if you need help studying, I could help you!”

“I’ve been studying with Basil, actually…” Aubrey said. “He’s my friend.”

“The new kid!” Mari gasped, sounding absolutely delighted at the news. She smiled. “That’s great! I’m so glad!”

“You know him?” Basil wasn’t the kind to have many friends, and Aubrey didn’t think he went out often without her. He hadn’t been in Faraway for long, so she wasn’t sure how Mari knew him.

The girl seemed quite enthusiastic, however. “Yeah! Kel was pretty bummed out that they haven’t had the chance to hang out yet! I’m relieved he made a friend, though. He seemed a little lonely when I saw him.”

“Oh…” Aubrey flushed slightly. Mari was such a genuine person… “I’m happy too... He’s very nice. I hope he comes back soon.”

“Don’t worry, I’m sure he’ll be back soon! You can hang out with me and the others in the meantime,” she smiled again, “if you want.”

Aubrey ducked her head, letting her hair shield her from sight. Mari was a little overwhelming, in a nice way. She wasn’t used to such positive people—the invitation caught her a little off guard, because of it. Aubrey had never had many friends, but… she found herself thinking that she was very lucky that Mari and her friends had stopped to help her today.

“You know… You don’t seem to like your classes very much,” Mari spoke up after a little while. “From the way you were talking before, I mean.”

Aubrey pinched her lips. “They’re boring. I also don’t like the people there…”

The most annoying of all was Mikhael. He was in the special ed class since before Aubrey was, but he hung out with Kimberly and her annoying group of bullies who didn’t like Aubrey for no reason. He kept making fun of her dirty sparkly binders and broken shoes, calling her poor and unclassy. Aubrey really hated him and his stupid wig and annoying voice. She had to break his nose to get him and the others to leave her alone.

(She got detention, but she didn’t feel bad about it. It kept her out of the house.)

Most days, Aubrey wished she could skip school. Somedays, she did. It landed her in detention often too, but she didn’t care any more than she did when she got in trouble for punching Mikhael in the face.

“Well, you could always ask to be transferred back! They might let you since you said you’ve been studying. Do you know if Basil will go to the same school?” Mari asked, already trying to find a solution to Aubrey’s situation. “Maybe it’d be easier for you if you were in the same class! And maybe you’d even be in Sunny’s class, he definitely needs more friends.”

Sunny glared at her from where he sat, a little further away, but Mari ignored him.

Aubrey’s eyes widened as she took Mari’s words in. Her and Basil… in the same class? She hadn’t even entertained the idea—constantly thinking that this winter break was too good to be true, that she’d wake up from this dream and her new happiness would end sooner or later. Could she really be in the same class as Basil? Maybe even Mari’s brother, or Kel, who seemed hyperactive but well-meaning?

“I could do that…?” Aubrey looked up at Mari with pleading eyes. She wanted this so badly, her heart could burst!

“Of course! And if they don’t agree for this year, then I’ll help you for the next! We could even-” The sound of quick footsteps approached them, interrupting the discussion. “Oh, Kel and Hero are back with your shoe!”

Kel ran up to them, proudly waving a sparkly running shoe in one hand. He was slightly out of breath as he loudly announced: “See, I told you we’d find it!”

Hero appeared behind him, panting as he finally stopped chasing after his brother. “It was- in the ditch- like Mari said- Huff…”

“Yeah!” Kel handed the shoe to Aubrey like it was a precious treasure. She quickly bent down to put it on. Her foot hurt. “We conduced- We conduc- conducted a recovery mission! We even had to use a huuuge branch to pull it up because the grass was too high! We couldn’t find the foe who took it, but fear not, for I-”

“Kel… Huff… Please… I’m not- going back…”

Aubrey stood, on the verge of tears again from the sheer gratitude and relief she felt. Her shoe wasn’t lost. She’d be fine… “Thank you! Thank you, thank you, thank you so much…”

Hero sat on the sidewalk and gave her a small but genuine smile. “It’s no problem, really… I’m glad to- be able to help.”

Mari brightened, clasping her hands together. “Now that this is settled, we have some snacks to buy for movie night! Would you like to come with us, Aubrey? It’s for dinner, so we’ll have sandwiches and juice.”

“And Orange Joe!”

Aubrey frowned at Kel’s excited shout. That drink was so disgusting she’d sworn to herself never to buy it again, even if it was the cheapest one from the vending machine. She was convinced it was only so cheap because no one wanted to buy it.

“I, um… My parents are waiting for me,” Aubrey replied, shifting slightly under their gaze.

"Well then, another time! Come on guys, say bye to Aubrey!"

Everyone complied, even Sunny who seemed on the verge of dozing off from boredom. Aubrey started walking back to her house, but as she walked, she heard the muffled sound of their conversation…

"Yeah, and Kel! She said she's friends with Basil!"

"Really?! We gotta invite them both to hang out next time!"

Aubrey walked back to her house, hoping she would see them again soon.

∙∙•「⸙」•∙∙

January 13, 2002 - Périfère, Canada

Manon Roy sat on the porch of a busy café, speaking with an unknown person over the phone as she sipped from a—likely lukewarm by now—cup of coffee.

At least, that was what it looked like to Basil, who was watching her, safely hidden from sight by a convenience store on the other side of the street.

Soon, Basil would walk up to her in order to act as a distraction while his mission partners gathered the intel they needed. Basil wasn’t sure what that was, exactly—so he was a little nervous. He was only brought along for the cover. With only the barest information, it was a little difficult to anticipate what could happen if something went off script.

Basil wasn’t sure what his teammates were looking for. Manon Roy was a part of a conspiracy against the IMPS—working with a former FBI executive who had shared a few cases with the Commission, Edward Jackson, in order to bring it down. The man had apparently deemed the IMPS’ practices immoral and quit his job shortly after one of their collaborations, reaching out to non-American organisations in an attempt to build a competent team. Unfortunately for him, the IMPS monitored potential risks closely—especially when it came to their associates. A CI team had intercepted Jackson and Roy’s communications, and following the subsequent investigation, a team was sent to take care of it. Basil’s.

According to Basil’s meagre information, Roy was the leader of a small Canadian organisation focusing on exposing corruption and systemic issues. She was an RCMP veteran and had built her team with a few people she knew she could trust. Retired, she still worked closely with Federal Policing, and even had a few contacts in the CSIS. Safe to say, she was a well-connected woman, and a significant threat to the IMPS if left on their case. Basil was pretty sure she didn’t have much on them yet, however—or else, he likely wouldn’t have been sent on the mission. Basil was still a new recruit, after all—regardless of his previous experience in the Cypress branch of the Commission. And he may be young, but he wasn’t an idiot: Soter likely didn’t trust him or his skills fully yet. Which meant that this was his tryout mission, and that he needed to prove himself.

To be honest, Basil had a weird feeling about this mission.

From the start, he’d been lacking details about the assignment. Of course, President Jemal had sent him on missions without fully debriefing him in the past—the mission that brought him to the States in the first place was a glaring exemple—but there was usually a reason for it, whether that be a lack of intel or something else. Basil couldn’t think of a reason to keep him in the dark now other than this being a test. And he was determined to pass it.

The Commission had likely determined that Jackson’s plot was not a major threat, which allowed them to send Basil along to assess his skill and, most importantly, his loyalty. Which meant this was a generally low-stake mission, without too many risks—but Basil was still expected to perform his very best.

Taking a deep breath to prepare himself, Basil stepped out of his hiding spot, purposefully widening his eyes in order to give himself a young, innocent look. The café where Roy sat was thematically decorated all in red, and Basil vaguely recognised the name—he thought it might share it with a gothic filmmaker. With slow, hesitant steps, frame hunched into himself, Basil approached the porch, fleetingly glancing between the patrons. He finally approached the closest one—which just so happened to be Manon Roy.

“Kannst… Du mir bitte helfen…?” Basil looked up at her with eyes wet with unshed tears, fiddling with his fingers. “Ich weiß nicht, wo meine Mutter ist…”

The woman quickly glanced down at him, her serious expression melting into one of concern. “Hold on, Natalie, I’ll call you back,” she said, and set her phone down on the table. She turned towards him, leaning down to meet his eyes. “I’m sorry, are you lost? Can you speak English?”

Basil stared up at her with teary eyes, expression completely unchanging—not a hint of understanding on his face. Roy’s lips thinned and she slid off her chair to crouch in front of him, her dark brown eyes, framed with small crow’s feet, staring into his.

“Don’t worry, everything will be alright.” She spoke very slowly, carefully enunciating each word. She looked around, as if searching for help—but nobody came forward. “Alright… You got lost, right…? I’d like to figure out which language you’re speaking… Can you talk a little more? Talk?” Roy pinched her fingers together to mime the word—talk—nodding to encourage him to try.

“Ich verstehe nicht, was du sagst…”

She pinched her lips. “That’s German, I think… Or Dutch…?” she muttered under her breath, but she quickly smoothened out her frown to smile at him, slowly standing up as she took Basil’s hand in hers. “Don’t worry, I will get you some help, alright? Come with me.”

She tried to lead Basil to the café’s door—presumably, Basil guessed, to ask the clerk to use the landline and contact the police. However, Basil had very clear instructions not to let her move from the porch area, and most importantly, not to let her go inside. He immediately began to protest, shaking his head, tugging at his arm and summoning more tears as if he truly were a terrified, lost child.

“Nein, nein… Nein! Ich will nicht gehen!” he protested, trying to tug his hand free. Roy immediately turned back to crouch in front of him.

“It’s alright, it’s alright… We’ll stay here, it’s fine…” She shushed him and looked around, noticing they had attracted a crowd—which Basil completely ignored. “Does anyone here speak German?”

The few nearby patrons exchanged uncomfortable looks, some shaking their heads—none spoke up. Roy gave him another tight smile. She seemed to be genuinely worried about Basil—which surprised him, given that she was a part of a group directly opposing the Commission. The Commission’s goals were righteous, and every operation was conducted for the greater good—Basil had imagined that anyone who would try to dismantle them would not be the kind of people to care for a lost child. In fact, he’d imagined that Manon Roy would take one look at his act and coldly try to pawn him off to another patron. Her work should be more important than any distraction, shouldn’t it? But this woman seemed kind, and had cut her call short in order to take care of him—even offering to get help herself…

Roy tried to let go of his hand. “Please, wait here. I’ll be right back, just-” She turned to the closest patron, likely wanting them to look over Basil while she went inside herself. Basil gripped her hand tightly.

“Nein!” He needed to keep her outside. Cameron Davis, the mission’s leader, had told him he would know when to act. Then, he’d need to take advantage of whatever other distraction the rest of the team created in order to snatch Roy’s belongings—which they thought might contain relevant intel—and run. He’d meet up with their last teammate, Thalia Spencer, and hide until Davis cleared them.

Basil just needed to distract Roy until the signal.

Basil glanced around, trying to figure out what kind of distraction Davis had come up with. A staged robbery, perhaps—though that plan would involve risks for the operative conducting it, and might be difficult to pull off from the outside of the café. On the other side of the road was a gas station paired with a convenience store—where Basil previously hid. A car accident, maybe? But again, important risks would be involved… He kept throwing a tantrum, shouting over Roy’s attempts at placating him–-thinking all the while. Such an act was almost automatic, at this point, far from the most complicated he pulled off. It would need to be something big enough to distract everyone for at least a minute… A celebrity appearance? Maybe Davis would pass by with a limousine, or come in pretending to be the police or a private investigator… There were a few houses next to the convenience store, and directly next to the café…

Basil cried and sobbed and clung to Roy’s sleeve. Several people were staring, couples whispering to each other—such a difficult child, hopefully theirs would be nothing alike! Roy took him by the shoulders, trying to wipe his tears. She was still trying to shush him, whispering kind words that came in one ear and passed through the other. Basil ignored them in favour of keeping up the act. He wiped his tears with one arm, catching sight of the next shop over. A bakery. Did the two shops not struggle to compete against each other? The sun reflected off the lacquered roof, and Basil scrunched up his face to block out the light, his eyes tearing up further. A glare of light—too bright. Basil squinted his eyes-

Wait.

Basil’s stomach dropped. In an instant, he dropped the ‘lost child’ act and threw himself at Roy, tackling her to the ground. Wzzt. His breath hitched at the sharp pain that followed. The bullet grazed his shoulder before embedding itself into the table leg behind him, driving a hole right through it and damaging the cement below. The crowd began screaming. Eyes wide and breathing laboured, Basil looked back at the bakery’s roof only to see the back of Davis’ head as he ducked down and out of sight. His blood froze in his veins.

Around him, the coffee shop’s patrons began to yell and step over each other in an attempt to get away from the site. Manon Roy lay frozen below him, mouth agape as she stared at Basil, then at the table leg, then up at the bakery’s roof where the bullet was shot. Basil stared back at her like a deer in headlights.

There it was. The distraction.

Just as the older woman seemingly gathered herself, reaching out for Basil once again, Basil grabbed the purse she had set down beside her chair and her phone off the table and bolted, taking advantage of the frenzy to slip away, unnoticed by all but one.

As he ran, a single thought repeated in his mind over and over again.

Fuck. I messed up.