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Edwin didn’t think this case was going to take more than a day. They received the case in the morning, he worked with Charles all afternoon to research information regarding the case, then he took the agency group out to the forest to solve the case, but the solution didn’t work.
By the time he tried his solution for the third time, Crystal suggested he stop for the night (it was only one in the morning, Edwin didn’t see why that mattered) and regroup in the morning. He didn’t want to stop and regroup in the morning as the case should’ve been solved by now, but Charles took away his magnifying glass. . .
As soon as Edwin agreed to stop trying to solve the case, Crystal and Niko left. Apparently, they were tired from walking around the forest for hours without having much to eat besides the trail mix Niko packed in her bag.
Once the ghosts returned to their room at the agency, after walking a couple minutes and mirror travelling, Edwin went back to researching the case. Ghosts have been disappearing in the forest for the last week, and it should’ve been easy to find them with the stones that Charles keeps in his bag.
Similar to the Case of the Creeping Forest, the stones never glowed and Crystal had a hard time reading the plants around her for any signs of ghosts. It gave Edwin terrible deja vu.
Edwin spends the next four days reading the different books on his shelves and dragging Niko with him to his favourite library in London. In the meantime, he sent Charles and Crystal on their own investigation back into the forest to look for clues. The two of them weren’t happy to be sent away like that, but Charles can be very distracting at the worst times. His partner is truly a menace when it comes to taking the time to analyse their cases. Edwin claims he’s too handsy.
There’s finally an update about the forest on the fifth day. Niko gets a text from Crystal, telling them to meet at the entrance to the forest as soon as possible. Edwin is thrilled with this news. Whatever Charles and Crystal found is going to connect with everything he and Niko found at the library, and the case will be solved.
Charles looks nervous when they arrive, pacing back and forth between some of the trees with Crystal nowhere in sight. As Edwin walks closer, he notices a decent size hole in the ground and an abundance of red string at Charles’s feet.
“What’s happened?” Edwin says once he comes to a complete stop in front of Charles. “Where’s Crystal?”
“She’s fine,” Charles dismisses, looking back one last time at the hole before walking towards Edwin. “Let’s go talk in private.”
“But, Niko . . ?”
“I’ll be here when you get back!” she smiles warmly at Edwin and sends him two thumbs up in reassurance (which turns out to not be reassuring at all).
Charles gives Niko a quick nod before taking Edwin’s hand and walking out of the forest. It’s strange to see Charles being so secretive around their friends as the four of them don’t keep much information confidential from each other, especially when it revolves around cases.
After a minute of walking in silence, Edwin is bothered. He pulls his gloved hand away from Charles and crosses his arms around his chest in frustration. “Are you going to talk to me or are we going to keep walking?”
“I think you should sit this case out.”
“I beg your pardon?”
Charles shoves his hands into the pockets of his coat, staring at the toe of his shoes and ignoring the hard look on Edwin’s face. It’s always been Edwin and Charles, the Dead Boy Detectives, solving cases together across England. Even when Crystal and Niko unofficially joined the agency, they never solved cases unless the other boy was there.
It’s exactly why Edwin is confused when he’s being asked to step back from solving the case, especially after he spent days reading up on ghosts disappearing in forests. He can solve this case. Why won’t Charles let him solve this case?
“We found the ghosts,” Charles finally says, taking a deep breath, “but they’re stuck inside of a labyrinth. I’m worried about you going down with us.”
“I’ll be fine, Charles,” Edwin says in a steadying voice. He pulls his hands from his chest and places them palms up, indicating for Charles to take them in his own hands. It’s not often Edwin is the first to present himself when it comes to physical affection. Usually, Charles is the one who provides the first touch-of-the-shoulder or a short hug after a long day at the agency.
A small smile appears across Charles’s face as he removes his hands from his coat pockets. He delicately places his palms on top and looks up from the ground to stare at his partner’s face. It’s almost concerning how calm Edwin looks at that moment.
“I appreciate your concern for me, especially with my past, but,” Edwin gives Charles’s hands a light squeeze, “this isn’t hell. Nothing bad is going to happen to me down there. In any case, you’ll be at my side with the cricket bat at a moment’s notice.”
Charles repeats the squeezing gesture. “Will you tell me if you start to feel too overwhelmed?”
Edwin sighs, glancing back down at their hands. It hasn’t been easy in the past few decades to identify the tight feeling in his chest as overstimulation; he usually associated that feeling with wearing his chest compression when he was alive, so he didn’t think anything of it.
It wasn’t until Niko noticed Edwin’s shortness of breath and the tight fists he made with his hands when someone asked him if he was okay. (That case is a touchy subject for Edwin. It ended with him finishing the case much faster than the group expected, jumping through a mirror, and crying underneath his desk.)
Since that day, he’s been trying to take care of himself better and listen to his body’s warning signals when the overwhelming feeling starts to take over, but when a case calls, it’s the only thing Edwin can focus on. (Needless to say, Edwin is not very good at taking care of himself.)
“I will try,” he finally says back.
Charles brings their gloved hands up to his face, placing a small kiss against Edwin’s knuckles. He appreciates Charles keeping their public affection for each other at a minimum, as Edwin was raised in a different generation and continues to get embarrassed when the two of them do anything more than that. (He’s working on that too.)
The two boys share a private smile before walking back towards the labyrinth. They find Niko talking into the hole in the ground, which isn’t the most unusual activity she’s ever done. Edwin has seen her explain one of her favourite mangas to Charles, and that’s arguably a worse activity than whatever she is doing now.
As soon as Edwin rounds the corner of a particularly large tree, he finds Crystal’s head poking out of the hole, and it makes him feel better that Niko isn’t actually talking to the dirt. The girls turn their heads to look at the ghosts, blank expressions crossing over their faces. Edwin couldn’t pinpoint their confusion until he watched Charles shake his head out of the corner of his eye.
The three of them were definitely conspiring with each other about Edwin’s feelings about labyrinths. He’ll have to speak with Charles about this later.
Crystal claps her hands together. “I have good news and bad news. Good news, I found the ghosts. Bad news, they’re lost in the maze and they refused to follow me out.”
“That’s fine.” Edwin shifts uneasily on his feet, glancing at the hole in the ground Crystal continues to stand in. “They’re most likely in a repressed state if they are unwilling to follow you out of the labyrinth. We’ll simply have to wake them up with ammonia inhalants.”
A wide grin appears on Charles’s face as he drops to the ground to dig through his backpack. “Oh, mate, I’ve been waiting for the day we get to use these smelling salts.”
“Smelling salts?” Crystal quirks an eyebrow at the two boys.
“Persciously,” Edwin holds out his hand as he waits for Charles to finish rifling through his bottomless bag. “We must wake them up as soon as possible, and while using strong chemicals on ghosts isn’t ideal, it’s the only available option right now.” The bottle of ammonia inhalants lands in Edwin’s hand once he finishes explaining his thought process to the girls.
He continues talking as Charles picks himself up off the ground and digs into his bag one last time, pulling out his cricket bat and winding it up once behind him. He throws his backpack over his shoulder and finds the others staring at him, Edwin smiling slightly. “What?”
“Just waiting on you, Rowland,” Crystal grumbles with an eyeroll.
With that, the four of them descend into the labyrinth to find the lost ghosts. Crystal leads the way into the newfound territory, carefully following the red string along the ground.
The first turn to the left officially brings the group into the labyrinth, and Edwin makes an audible gasp at the site. The walls of the maze are made of stone and they’re covered in overgrown foliage and cobwebs. It looks like nobody alive has been down in the labyrinth for a long time.
It reminds him so much of–
A hand touches his upper back. Edwin finds Charles standing right behind him, sending a worried glance his way after stopping in the middle of the pathway.
“I’m fine,” he scoffs.
Edwin pushes his feet forward and catches up to the girls, ignoring the burn from Charles’s eyes in the back of his head. The last thing Edwin will admit is the sudden mental toll this case is taking on him. It should’ve been done days ago. It is going to get done today.
The first ghost is easy to find in the elaborate maze.
He’s a young man with long hair and a big smile on his face upon seeing Crystal. She approaches him with a matching grin, which Edwin can tell is fake as it’s the same grin she uses on Edwin. Charles follows Crystal to the strange man, starting an easy conversation with him about his sick clothes.
Edwin doesn’t think there’s anything “sick” about his clothes, although they're rather colourful. Too colourful for Edwin’s taste.
A shadow dances across the corner of Edwin’s eye. He turns to find nothing there, but the idea of something being there makes his skin crawl. Not even a second later, Edwin hears a noise from the opposite direction of the shadow. His head whips back towards the noise, only to find Charles grinning at him.
“You still got the smelling salts, mate?”
The small bottle feels heavy in his hand.
Edwin takes a deep breath and sends Charles a tight knit smile before making his way over back to assist his friends. The three of them watch Edwin intensely as he uncaps the bottle and carefully wafts the ammonia inhalants in the direction of the ghost.
Before they know it, the ghost's eyes grow wide and mouth drops open. Both girls gasp as the man turns towards them, but the shock doesn’t last long as he continues spinning towards the entrance of the maze and stops. The ghost’s open mouth turns into an uncomfortable smile before walking out.
“Well, I hated that.”
It doesn’t take long for the next ghost to be found and the terrible noise to return. She’s an older woman in a nightgown, eyes full of panic and hands trembling as she runs her hand along the labyrinth walls. His whole body itches now.
“What . . .” Niko starts, “what happened to her? She doesn’t look too good.”
Edwin doesn’t look too good either.
He identifies the noise as a low humming sound, similar to the humming he listened to for over seven decades. It makes him want to rip his ears off. Why haven’t the other three noticed the noise? What was he supposed to be doing right now?
The woman cries out in pain right as the bottle of ammonia inhalants is grabbed from his hand. That was supposed to be his job. Why can’t he do his job? He can’t believe this is happening to him. He was fine merely thirty seconds ago.
In his moment of terror, Edwin takes a step back from his friends, gripping the front of his vest to claw away the constricting feeling of his clothes. Why does his chest hurt? Why can’t he breathe? This feeling is too familiar. He hasn’t felt this way since . . .
There is no way this is happening to him right now. Charles was right.
The humming sound only grows louder as Edwin cups his hands around his ears to stop the noise. His eyes close shut next, not wanting to witness whatever creature is making that wretched noise and rip him apart into shreds. That’s how it always happens. It’s inevitable.
It doesn’t take long for his body to crumble to the ground as his last defence mechanism. His knees tuck into his chest and his elbows wrap around his legs, curling up into a ball on the dirty labyrinth floor. If Edwin makes himself as still as possible, staying as quiet as possible, maybe they won’t try to take him again. And again. And again.
A pair of hands grabbing onto his shoulders startles him. Edwin tries to move away from whatever has a hold of him, but it’s no use. He’s never been able to escape from the creature before, so what does it matter now?
“Edwin, it’s me, come back to me, love,” a voice says near him. The creature said his name, of course it knows his name. It only makes his hands squeeze against his head tighter.
The feeling of hands on his shoulders loosen to a gentle touch, thumbs rubbing softly against his collarbones. It’s very strange for a monstrous creature to be holding him there, unless . . .
“That’s it, I’m right here, Eds,” he hears Charles talking to him in his soft voice that is only used when no one else is around. Edwin loves when Charles speaks to him in that way. It makes him feel special.
His eyes open first, coming face to face with his partner, who looks terribly worried. Edwin didn’t make him worried, did he?
One of Charles’s hands moves from Edwin’s collarbones to cup the back of his head. The pressure from his hand isn’t noticeable, but he knows it’s there. It’s comforting. It’s grounding.
“We’re going back to the office, okay?” Charles says quietly. His thumb rubs against the back of his neck for a couple of seconds as Edwin absently nods his head. He wants to ask Charles about finishing the case with their friends, but the words aren’t coming to him.
Charles moves quickly to remove his backpack and pull out the emergency mirror. Nobody liked the idea of Charles carrying around a mirror in his bag; Edwin thought it was risky with ghosts potentially travelling into the bag and Crystal hates carrying it back to the office (which happens more often than one would think).
The emergency mirror lands on the ground with a heavy thump and the top layer of dirt flies into the air towards the girls. Niko coughs as Crystal waves a hand in front of their faces to blow the dirt in another direction.
A couple more words are exchanged between Charles, Crystal, and Niko as the humming sound grows louder, drowning the three of them out. Edwin’s eyes shut once again and his hands squeeze tighter around his ears to stop the wretched sound.
Charles doesn’t waste anymore time helping Edwin to his feet after reminding Crystal to bring the mirror back to the office and take as much time as they need to close the case. His partner’s eyes remain shut and ears covered as he guides the two of them into the mirror on the floor, thinking about the comfort of their office.
Edwin doesn’t really know how Charles did it. He barely felt the two of them travelling through the mirror or being sat down on the couch. . . or his jacket being taken off, gloves removed from his hands, and shoes removed from his feet. What is Charles doing to him?
When Edwin finally opens his eyes, the office is dark and there’s a few candles lit. Charles is across the room, hanging up his jacket on their coat rack, then removing his own coat and shirt to hang next to it. Edwin secretly loves when Charles wears his singlet around the office. If he moves a certain way, his chest scars poke out from under his armpit and the sight of it makes Edwin smile.
Once Charles has his own shoes off (placed at the front door next to Edwin’s shoes), he walks back over to the couch and carefully manoeuvres his boyfriend into a lying position. His head lands on one of the throw pillows Niko bought for the couch, and while Edwin wouldn’t go for the heart shaped decor for the office, it’s rather comfortable.
Knowing what is coming next, Edwin allows his legs to fall apart and body relax into the cushion. A wide smile dances across Charles’s face as he climbs over Edwin and collapses on top of him. For someone who hates touch, Edwin finds the weight of his partner’s body a huge comfort during overwhelming situations.
Charles carefully rests his head across Edwin’s collarbone as he finds a comfortable position. The moment he stops moving, the other boy’s hands relax into his curly hair and he sighs in relief.
For the next several minutes, neither talk to each other.
Edwin’s breath slows down tremendously, and while Charles can’t feel it, he can hear it. His body isn’t as tense as it was in the labyrinth and he isn’t pulling super hard on his hair anymore. (Charles doesn’t mind the rough hair pulling from Edwin. It feels rather nice due to the fact he can actually feel it.)
As Edwin continues to tug on his curls, Charles takes the time to place featherlight kisses in return. It starts on his collarbones, but slowly travels towards his chest where his thumb is rubbing the outline of Edwin’s ghostly scars.
“I’m . . . sorry,” Edwin says quietly.
Charles leaves one last kiss near Edwin’s collarbone before turning to rest back on his chest. There’s a fair amount of words Charles wants to share with his partner over everything that has occurred in the last couple of hours, but he knows better than to share those thoughts during his vulnerable state. Based on their based experiences, it would only make the situation worse.
And so, Charles waits for Edwin to say more.
He continues after a deep sigh. “It’s not an excuse, but I didn’t think the labyrinth would affect me in that way.” His breath hitches as he thinks about his next words carefully, pausing his hand in Charles’s hair. “It felt like I was back in Hell.”
Edwin doesn’t want to think about the noises he heard, the tightness of his clothes, or shadows that danced across his vision while descending into the maze. Those thoughts overwhelmed him. Those thoughts . . .
Charles shifts into a more comfortable position on the couch, nuzzling his head further into Edwin’s neck. He laughs and readjusts his grip in his boyfriend’s hair. Never in Edwin’s existence did he think he was someone who enjoys the close company of another person, but here he is, lounging on the office couch with Charles laying on top of him.
This isn’t the first time they both found themselves in this position. It wasn’t after the third or fourth time Edwin let the overwhelming feeling take over did Charles discover he liked the pressure from hugs. It was a reassuring hug after a tough case against a warlock, then Charles went to pull away and Edwin wrapped his arms tighter around his shoulders, sighing contently with the comfort of his favourite person in his arms.
“Thank you for letting me pull you from the case,” Charles says back as his finger dances across Edwin’s shoulder. “Sorry if I was too rough with getting you back to the office. I haven’t seen you this way in years and . . . was worried about you.”
“I understand,” Edwin murmurs, “I should’ve listened to you back in the forest. It’s probably best that I avoid labyrinths for the foreseeable future.”
Charles tips his head back and laughs. There’s a fond smile across Edwin’s face as he watches his favourite person in the world laugh at his words. It makes him laugh too. “I love you, Charles.”
“I love you, too, mate.”
“For the love of god, Charles, what have I said about calling me mate during our intimate moments together?”