Chapter Text
The moon's light fought through the curtains in an attempt to invade the office that lay on the other side of the old, classical window. The moon desperately wanted to shine the light on the man who once was bathed in its light every night, but despite the struggle, the light was extremely faint, and its effort was completely unseen to the man who inhabited the room for he had his back facing the silent war.
Edgar sat at his dark oak desk with a piece of paper in front of him. The desk was an example of fine craftsmanship, but its quality was hidden behind a layer of dust. Besides the dust, a stack of paper and an inkwell sat on it. You would expect a desk to have trinkets or perhaps a framed photo of family, but Edgar had long since abandoned the idea of decorating his desk. In his eyes, a desk was only meant to be used for writing, what was the point of decorating it? It served no purpose. His parents didn't deserve a framed photo anyways.
The young man dipped his pen into the well before quickly moving it over to his paper.
The sound of scribbling consumed the room as he wrote with grace, trying to capture the words in his head before they slipped away.
It didn't take long for him to finish writing; he had spent years mastering the ways of the pen after all. His eyes quickly scanned the page before they narrowed upon the words he deemed imperfect.
He slammed his hands into the desk as he stood up from his seat. The pen he held in his hand was snapped. He reached for the inkwell and threw it against the wall. As the ink splattered on his wall, he crumpled the paper and threw it across the room.
It had already been a year since his humiliating defeat to the man named Edogawa Ranpo, and since that day, he began work on the book that would defeat Ranpo once and for all.
Edgar felt his knees hit the floor as his legs crumbled under him. His mind slowly comprehended how long it had truly been since he set out on his goal of defeating “The World's Greatest Detective,” Ranpo.
"A year..." He said slowly.
He chuckled at the thought. There was no way it had been a year, right? He didn't even have a beginning to his book yet… All he had done was crumble any imperfect attempts at a beginning, which he deemed to be all of them. No, it hasn't been a year!!
Edgar clenched his fists at the tragic realization. A sharp pain shot through his left hand as he clenched his fists and a wet squish echoed through the office.
He looked down at his hand to see a crimson liquid spill from an open wound. How did he not notice that before….? The cold air tickled the wound, causing the pain to be worse.
With a sigh, Edgar slowly got up from the floor. He walked over to the office's door and reached out to open it with his right hand. He made his way out of his office and made his way to the bathroom.
He slowly pushed the door open and turned on the light. He let his eyes adjust before heading over to the cabinet which had been chosen to hold the medical supplies. The doors on the cabinet had chipped paint around the handles, a clear sign of how used they were.
It took him only a moment to find the bandages and cleaning supplies, but before cleaning it, he stopped to look at the blood that was slowly spilling out of his hand. It was oddly… comforting. He clenched his hand which shot pain through his hand and up his arm.
He unclenched his hand to see the blood spill out more. He didn't know why he did it, maybe it was to feel alive, but he moved his other hand to poke at the wound. Perhaps he wanted the intense pain to last longer. The pain was like…. acted as a break. A break from the numbness that had slowly taken over his very existence.
Maybe… he should make it slightly bigger… Before he could make the wound worse, a loud CRRRREEAKK broke Edgar’s harmful trance. What was that? Probably just the house settling… There would be no chance someone was here.
With the new state of harm being broken, he poured hydrogen peroxide onto his hand before he wrapped it with bandages, just like he had done many times at this point. He barely paid attention when it came to fixing himself up, it had become second nature at this point.
He placed the supplies back at its designated spots before turning to walk back to his office. He had to continue writing… This wound was nothing, he learned how to write with both hands for a reason. Well, he learned it for another reason, but that didn't matter… They didn't seem to care about his efforts.
As he made his way to his office, he heard another creak. This one sounded closer than the last one. It started to seem unlikely that the house was settling now.
Edgar froze and turned to the direction where the sound came from.
“Hello,” his voice echoed through the (not so) empty house.
Small footsteps could be heard running across the wooden floor.
Edgar narrowed his eyes and walked towards the footsteps. He made sure to put more pressure on the floor to make his footsteps heavier. He wanted to sound intimidating.
Making his way into the living room he barely visited, he looked around to see if he could see whatever was moving around his house. It took him a moment for his eyes to adjust, but after that, Edgar's eyes caught a glimpse of a tiny gray tail slip under the wooden chair that was covered in a thick layer of dust. It certainly had more dust than Edgar's desk, but that wasn't too surprising. He never spent time here. He dedicated his time to writing and writing only, so what was the point of entering this room?
Edgar sighed at the realization that yet another creature had entered his house. It was becoming far too common for him to find mice and squirrels. This creature seemed bigger than a simple mouse or squirrel though.
He swiftly walked over to the chair and got onto his hands and knees. He ignored the pain in his left hand. What he didn't ignore was the floor. Ick… the floor was really dusty…
He lowered his head to look under the chair when he felt something hit his face. The object fell onto the floor and the creature zoomed like lightning across the room and under the couch.
With a prominent frown, Edgar watched the gray blur crawl under the couch before turning his attention to the object he was hit with. Is…. Is that a cheeto? Well, that was truly unexpected.
Edgar pushed himself off of the floor before using the end of his thumb and pointer finger to pick up the stale cheeto that had been thrown at him. He made sure to get as little of the dust on his fingers as he could. He held it away from him like he would get a severe illness if it was too close.
He turned to the classical couch and slowly walked over to it. How bothersome. Edgar needed to spend his time writing, not getting this pest out of his home.
Surely this creature would come out for food. At least, that's what Edgar believed. All animals just wanted food, they all need it after all.
“Ah, I'm sure you would want this…” Edgar stared at the stale cheeto for a second. Well, maybe the creature would find this more delicious than Edgar did. “.... wonderful treat back!”
Edgar got onto his knees and held out the cheeto in front of the gap between the floor and the couch.
“All you need to do is come out. I bet this would taste very g-”
Before Edgar could finish his sentence, black hands shot out from under the couch and wrapped around the cheeto before pulling it out of Edgar's hand and back under the couch.
Edgar blinked slowly as he comprehend what had just happened. He looked down at his hand to see that only the orange dust remained.
A chattering sound that resembled a snicker erupted from under the couch.
Edgar's eye twitched along with his right hand. The sheer audacity of this creature… He didn't have time for this.
“Get out from under there!”
Edgar shoved his hand under the couch and wrapped his fingers around whatever soft fur he could.
The chitter of mockery quickly turned to chittering of struggle and panic as Edgar pulled the creature from the couch and into the air.
In his hand was a baby raccoon hanging upside down. In its tiny black hands was the stale cheeto. It glared at Edgar before shoving the cheeto in its mouth.
Edgar frowned at the racoon who started to squirm in his hand. He walked over to his front door, planning on throwing the creature back out to its family. It had to have a family, right?
As he opened the door, a gust of freezing cold wind attacked his body. He felt the raccoon shiver in his hand as the wind attacked it too.
It was clear the winter nights would be too much for this small creature, but that wasn't Edgar's problem! Yeah… that wasn't his problem. Surely the raccoon’s family would help it survive.
He looked over to the tiny creature in his hand. It shivered, and its big eyes held desperation. Why did it have to be so cute….
Edgar sighed and closed the door before looking back at the raccoon.
“Alright, you win. You can stay, but only for a few days. I'm throwing you out as soon as it gets warmer, ” Edgar muttered as he carefully set the racoon down.
The racoon chittered and rubbed against Edgar’s legs, causing the man to freeze. Huh… that felt quite nice. Perhaps it won't be that much trouble taking care of this baby for a few days.