Chapter Text
Oscar’s POV:
“Hey Oscar,” Zane said, knocking lightly on the metal door to my office. “I need a favor real quick.”
Turning in my chair, I raised an eyebrow. “What?”
“I need you to watch a kid right now. A one-three X. My wife is going into labor and I can’t wait until my break in twenty minutes.” He looked to the left, then to the right of the hallway outside my office before leaning in closer, a small smile spreading across his face. “How bout’ an entire night of drinks on me?”
“Sure,” I said, shrugging as I closed my laptop.
“Really?” Zane stood up straighter as I got closer to him.
I patted him on the shoulder before locking up my office. “Yeah, really. Besides, I honestly needed a break.”
“Thanks, man. You’re a lifesaver,” Zane said, turning to leave.
“Yeah, yeah. Just don’t let them catch you,” I called out after him. He gave me his middle finger as he opened a window and swiftly snuck out. “Jackass,” I muttered under my breath, putting my keys in my pockets.
Turning down the hallway that Zane had come from, I ended up in a room with a small isolated glass cell in the middle. It reminded me of an observation room, except I’m sure anyone inside would also be able to see those outside through the clear glass. Looking above the cell, I noticed a metal plate over the door that read A13X. Moving my gaze away from the metal plate and into the glass cell, I observed a little girl–probably about five or six–fast asleep inside.
She was snuggled up into a ball on the floor, yet had a firm grip on a brown teddy bear and a small pink blanket. Her long blonde hair obstructed her face from my view. She wore a baggy white t-shirt with white shorts and matching white socks that, if she wasn’t snuggled up under her pink blanket, would’ve made her blend into the floor. Noticing several red stains on the cell floor, I turned my back to the glass and looked for the keys to the door of her cell, my breath quickening with every second as the worst filled my mind.
I searched all the desks in the room, moved around blueprints for machinery I didn't quite understand, and regrettably went through every filing cabinet before stumbling upon a hook on the wall where a carabiner full of keys hung. Sighing, I took the keys off of the hook and sorted through them until I got to one that had A13X engraved in it.
Singling the key from the rest, I turned back towards the glass cell only to find the little girl awake and staring intently at me. When she saw that I was staring back at her, her dark brown eyes went wide and she hid her face under her blanket. I cautiously moved closer to the cell, careful not to make a noise that would startle her.
She peeked an eye out when she heard the keys jingling. Realizing that I was about to come in, she scouts over to the corner of the cell farthest away from me and the door before hiding herself under the blanket again.
I attached the carabiner of keys to one of my belt loops before letting my hands fall to my side. As the door opened, I heard the little girl let out a small whimper. Noticing her trembling hands peeking out from under the blanket, I decided to let her have her space, so I sat against the glass wall farthest from her. She adjusted the blanket so one of her eyes was able to look at me and I caught a glimpse of a small cut on her cheek.
“Are you okay?” I asked softly, gesturing to the cut on her cheek. She stayed silent, still staring at me with one wide eye. “What’s your name?” I tried. “Mine’s Oscar.”
She looked down and mumbled something under her breath.
“Sorry, what was that?”
She mumbled again.
“Could you be a little louder?” I said, trying to be as gentle as I could.
Looking up at me with wide eyes, she took her face out from under the blanket. I saw the cut on her cheek was still actively bleeding as she opened her mouth.
“O-otter?” she asked.
I nodded. “Your name is Otter?”
Shaking her head, she pointed at me. “Otter?”
“Oh. Is my name Otter? Uh—” I stalled, considering if I should correct her or not. “Sure, yeah. You can call me Otter. What about you?”
She shook her head again.
“Do you-do you not wanna tell me?”
She grabbed her teddy bear and blanket and held them up to me. “Teddy,” she said, shaking the teddy bear. “Blankie.” She shook the blanket this time.
“Are those their names?” I asked as she held them in a tight hug. She nodded, then pointed to herself and shook her head. “And… you don’t have a name?” I started fidgeting with the keys on the carabiner. “Would you– would you like me to give you a name?” I whispered, glancing around the room through the glass to make sure that no one was around.
At that, her eyes lit up. For the first time, I saw an actual child in front of me. She nodded excessively, the ghost of a smile pulling at her lips.
“Uh, okay then,” I said, smiling a little bit at her eagerness. I decided I needed to make it easy to remember so I wouldn’t disappoint her if I forgot. Thinking hard, I noticed that my hands were fidgeting with the key to her cell. The one ingrained with A13X. Looking up, I smiled at her. “How about Alex?”
“Alex…” She thought for a moment, then gave me a small smile. “I like it,” she mumbled just loud enough for me to hear.
I chuckled softly as she started playing with her stuffed animals. “I’m glad.”
A commotion coming from the hallway caught my attention. I stood up, shielding Alex from the view of the door. A couple of seconds later, Marshall bursts through the door with several armed men behind him. Marshall observed me and Alex in the cell like a vulture circling his prey. After a small, disbelieving chuckle, he threw something on the ground. It took a minute for my eyes to focus on the body on the ground and it took me even longer to realize that it was Zane’s body on the ground with a bullet hole through his head, still actively bleeding.
Marshall clicked his tongue. “You know I thought he was better than this,” he said in a tone that told me he did not think he was better than this.
“C’mon Marsh. He just wanted to see his kid,” I argued, my stomach climbing to my throat at the body as Marshall circled the glass cell.
Marshall stopped in front of the cell door, blocking me and Alex in. “Oh don’t worry. I made sure he got to see his wife and kid.” The way he said it sent a chill down my spine. I watched as Marshall focused on Alex, who I realized was clinging tightly to my leg and using it as a barrier between her and him. Marshall met my gaze and smiled, showing off his chipped front tooth. “Now that’s an unusual sight.”
“What do you mean?” I asked, attempting to gently peel Alex’s hands away from my leg, which only resulted in her gripping it tighter.
“She seems quite cooperative with you. Anytime we’ve tried to get close to her, we end up with bites and scratches or her sitting still as a statue in the corner,” Marshall said, glancing back at Zane’s corpse before returning his gaze to me, a sly smile spreading across his face.
I shook my head profusely. “No, no. I told you before Marsh; I’ll help you find the kids, but I’m not going to be participating in any of the fucked up shit you do to them.”
“I would argue that you already are. I mean, you’re the one who found her, aren’t you?” He gestured to Alex who was staring intently at the ground, still tightly attached to my leg. He paused for a moment as if considering his next move, then continued. “I’m not asking you to hurt her Oscar. But if you could get her to listen to us, then I wouldn’t have to hurt her at all.”
A wave of guilt washed over me. He’s right; I’m the reason that Alex is here. I’m the reason she doesn’t know her real name. I’m the reason she’s locked in this cell. I’m the reason she’s getting hurt.
“How long have you had her?” I asked, stalling for some time.
“Almost a month,” Marshall replied. “But you and Patrick first met her back in October.”
A memory hit me like a punch to the face.
“Is that her?” Patrick asked, gesturing to the little girl playing tag with her older brother on the playground.
I observed the girl with as much focus as a scientist observing the results of an experiment. I watched her tackle her older brother to the ground before getting up and running away. Her brother got up, brushed off some dirt, and ran full speed after her. Soon after, her brother was able to catch up and tackle her to the ground. “Maybe.”
The little girl got up and I noticed her shoulders were shaking. Her brother was soon up and by her side, wiping away a tear on her cheek. He said something to her that made her laugh, then they hugged and the girl started playing alone on the playground.
“She seems quite resilient,” Patrick remarked. “That’d be useful.”
“I’m sure it would be,” I mumbled sarcastically under my breath. I wiped my clammy hands on my jeans and tried to mentally wring out the gut feeling that had taken hold of my body.
Almost as if she could sense us watching her, the girl met my gaze from the top of the playground platform. She smiled at me and I couldn’t help but smile back.
Patrick nudged me with his elbow. “Also quite observant.”
I gave a small chuckle in response before I realized that the girl was making her way toward us. On her way, she stopped by one of the flower patches and picked out a daisy. As she stopped in front of me, she gestured for me to kneel, so I obliged. Smiling with every baby tooth, she moved a strand of hair out of my face before gently placing the daisy behind my ear. I lightly touched the daisy before returning the smile which only made her smile bigger.
Giggling, she ran off over to where her brother was and tackled him again.
“Seems like she likes someone,” Patrick said, nudging me with his elbow again.
My fingers brushed over the daisy again. “I guess so.”
Looking up at Marshall, he flashed me a knowing smile. I sighed, thinking about how much worse shit she would go through if I didn’t try to stop some of it. “Alright, but I have conditions.”
“Lay them out,” Marshall said, brandishing a toothpick to which he started picking at his teeth.
“One: I will oversee anything done to or with her,” I started. Marshall nodded, still picking at his teeth. “Two: you will seriously consider my opinion about any decisions to do with her. And three: STATIC will stop tracking and hurting more kids.”
At that, Marshall looked up. “Why?”
“Because they deserve childhoods, Marsh. We shouldn’t be taking that from them just because you have some fucked vision for the future.”
Marshall considered for a moment, staring intently at Alex. “Fine. I’ll agree to your conditions, but I do hope you understand that… certain measures you may think are immoral will actually be necessary for the future.”
“What are you saying?” I asked as Marshall stepped back from the cell door. I lightly peeled away Alex’s hands and this time she let me. I watched as she went and sat in the corner farthest from the door and curled up in a ball. Sighing as I left the cell, I walked over to Marshall who pulled out a black notebook with a red eye on it.
Handing it to me, Marshall put an arm around my shoulder. “What I’m saying is that to accomplish what we’ve set out to accomplish, we have to make sacrifices—” he looked back at Zane’s body “—and sometimes those sacrifices are, well, seen as immoral and unjust to the normal eye.”
Marshall gestured for me to open the notebook. I flipped through the pages until he stopped me at a random one. In it, there were notes about what they were planning to do with Alex. One in particular stuck out to me.
“You want to kill her family?” I whispered harshly. “What the fuck is wrong with you?”
“No, no, no. I’m not gonna kill her family.” Marshall smiled that sly smile again. “I want her to.”
I threw Marshall’s arm off of me. “No. A hundred times no. Why the hell would you ever need to put her through that?”
Marshall grabbed me by the ear and pulled me close. “Because it’ll hurt her. I don’t need a human to accomplish my goals, I need a machine. Something as traumatic as this will most certainly make her lose her humanity.”
“She’s a child,” I said plainly, pushing Marshall off of me.
“She’s the future of this place Oscar,” Marshall bit back. “I need a machine,” he repeated, grabbing the notebook out of my hands, “and I plan to make her one.”
“Is that why you convinced her that she didn’t have a name?” I whispered in his ear.
“I didn’t convince her of anything. I took her name away.” Marshall smiled again as if that was something to be proud of.
“You erased her memory of it?” I asked, bewildered. "You said it was dangerous to do so."
Placing the notebook on a nearby desk, Marshall returned his attention to me. “It wasn't just her name,” he said.
“You fucking monster.”
Before I could react, Marshall already had a hand around my throat, pinning me to the wall. “Tell me, Oscar, do you know what people in power typically rely on to fix their troubles?”
“V-vio…lence,” I managed, trying to peel Marshall's hand away from my neck.
“Good,” he patronized me, squeezing harder. “Now, where those in power rely on war and petty money grabs to defeat their enemies, I see the smarter picture. An enemy who you’d never expect. Someone who could make even the smartest, strongest, most resilient person let down their guard.” He looked back at Alex, who was watching us with tears staining her face. “Someone like a child.”
Marshall let go of my neck and I collapsed to the floor. Kneeling, I felt his breath against my ear. “I know where your parents live, Oz. Don’t make me bring them into this.”
My breathing hitched in my throat. I stayed on my knees, keeping my gaze fixated on my shaking hands as Marshall unhooked the carabiner of keys from my belt loop and walked over to the cell. I heard Alex shuffle away from the door, a small whimper escaping her mouth as Marshall slammed the door shut and locked it.
Making his way back over to me, Marshall held out his hand. Hesitantly, I took it. He helped me up and pulled me closer for a moment, almost as if he were going to hug me, then decided against it and headed towards the door he came from. His men followed him and soon it was just me and Alex left alone in the room.
I glanced over at Alex curled up in the corner of the cell, her teary eyes just barely peeking out over her blanket.
I sighed. “I’m sorry kid. I promise I’ll do what I can–” I looked away, scared to let her see the tears building up in my eyes, and whispered the rest to myself– “but I’m not sure if it’ll be enough.”
Later that day...
We ate dinner in silence. I finished first and watched the clock on the oven change as I waited for Marshall to finish.
8:37
8:38
8:39
"You know," Marshall started, wiping his face with a napkin, "I really don't understand what's so different about her."
"What do you mean?" I asked as Marshall grabbed my dish and took it to the sink.
Marshall washed his hands before he answered. "I mean, she's no different than the other kids. So why does she matter so much to you?"
"I–uh... I don't know," I said honestly. I thought back to the first time I met her. How I watched her play with her older brother, knowing I would probably ruin that relationship forever. I remembered how she looked at me with such wonder, even though I was someone she didn't know. I thought about the daisy. The one she so carefully and delicately plucked just to put behind my ear.
I reached up and tucked that same strand of hair behind my ear, just like she had.
Marshall sat back down in the chair opposite of me and raised his eyebrow. "What's with the face?"
"She was just—she was really kind to me the first time we met. And even today when all she currently remembers is pain, she was still nice to me. I just don't see why we should ruin that. That innate kindness, you know." I sighed and leaned back in my chair.
"Sometimes nice things need to be ruined for more nice things to come," Marshall said plainly.
I looked up and met his gaze. His apathetic, steel gray eyes stared into mine, reminding me of a knife's blade, except now I can't tell which side isn't harmful and sharp.
I'm scared that it wasn't there anymore.
"I know I was harsh today, but in my defense, you were an ass, so I guess it evens out." Marshall tapped his fingers against the table.
"Is that meant to be an apology?" I let out a disbelieving laugh when he nodded. "I was an ass? You held me by my throat!"
"You called me a fucking monster," Marshall exclaimed, swiftly standing from his seat. "The hell was I supposed to do in front of everyone?
I scoffed. "Let it go perhaps?"
"My reputation doesn't let that shit slide, Oscar."
"Oh please," I started. "Your reputation is what's important here? What about my well-being, huh? What about Alex's?"
Marshall opened his mouth, then closed it again. His brow furrowed. "You named her?" he said in a small voice that took me back.
"I mean, well... yeah, I did. So what?" I grabbed my drink from the table and stood up, trying to distance myself from Marshall when I saw him start to breathe heavily. Suddenly my head was thrown to the side and a sharp pain spread across my face as my glass left my hand and shattered on the floor. Holding my cheek, I looked back at Marshall who was red in the face. "Are you fucking mad?"
"You just gave her something that makes her human?" he explained, still breathing heavily. "Something that I worked so hard to erase."
"Marsh, calm down. It's not that big of a deal."
He grabbed my hair and used it to pin me against the wall. "What did I tell you about getting in my way–"
"Leave my parents out of this," I said through gritted teeth, scratching at Marshall's hand which only made his hold tighter.
"I'm not sure I will."
Kneeing him in the stomach made him let go of his grip on my hair. Taking advantage of his pain, I swept his legs out from underneath him and pinned him to the ground. I used my knees to staple his arms to the ground and grabbed him by the throat to hold his head still. Raising my arm, I closed my hand in a fist and pulled back.
"Go on," Marshall hissed. "Make me bloody. It'll only hurt you more."
I paused with my fist in midair. "Who are you now?" I whispered just loud enough for him to hear. Marshall kicked at my back as I lowered my hand but kept my knees on his arms. "You've changed."
At that, Marshall stopped kicking and let out a pathetic wheeze. "Don't act like you haven't changed too Oz. You've grown soft." I sighed as he attempted to get free from my hold again. "If you're not gonna hurt me then get off of me."
I stayed on him for a moment, then stood up. With Marshall lying defenseless underneath me, my fists clenched as I thought of all the ways I could make him bloody. I could prove him wrong with me growing soft, but I was reminded of all the ways he could hurt me when he raised his eyebrow, practically begging me to lay a finger on him.
Walking over to the dining table, I grabbed my phone and headed towards the front door.
"I'm going for a walk," I said over my shoulder.
Marshall chuckled as he lifted himself to his elbow. "Don't hurry back," he spat out bitterly.