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Deuce was a little weary about going to visit his estranged roommate, especially after they had found all of those strange pictures on his phone. Ace Trappola was a mystery, having only arrived at the school during their second year, and yet he was able to keep up with everybody else as if he had been there the whole time. And then they find out that he has pictures of their friend group? Pictures that he couldn’t possibly have? Pictures that would have had to have been taken last year?
Safe to say, Deuce was suspicious of the guy. That’s why the others all wanted to go visit him over winter break, to get to the bottom of everything. He didn’t seem like a bad guy, but having all those pictures of them was creepy! And if it turned out he was some weird stalker, well, Deuce had no qualms about getting into a fight for his friends.
Ortho had looked up his address, and they found out he lived in an apartment practically by himself. He had no emergency contact, no parents, no siblings, no relatives. It was honestly concerning. No, focus, don’t feel bad for the potential stalker until he’s proven to not be a stalker. Plus, he apparently lived relatively close to Deuce. Ace’s apartment was located in Crimson City, albeit the rather run down part of the city.
Steeling their resolve, Deuce and the others began their trek to Ace’s apartment. It was definitely in a concerning area, and Deuce could see the clear signs of gang activity all around. He wasn’t too surprised, Ace had a lot of unexplained scars that lined up with fights that he used to get into himself. If anyone knew how to spot a delinquent, it was Deuce, and Ace had delinquent written all over him.
As they walked up to the apartment door, they hesitated. Do they just knock? But who should do it? Deuce’s last interaction with Ace was him yelling at the other boy about all of the creepy photos, so maybe he shouldn’t be the first face the other sees when opening the door. Yuu finally just groaned in frustration, before shoving their way to the front and knocking on the door.
As they waited, they heard a thud from inside the apartment, followed by some shuffling and words they couldn’t make out from behind the door. Then the door opened slightly, and a rather tired Ace Trappola appeared before them. “Is that you, Granny…” Ace trailed off as he saw their group at his door, his eyes widening in surprise. Suddenly, he slammed the door shut, a muffled curse coming from behind the door. Deuce looked at the others, who looked just as confused as he was, before the door opened again. This time, Ace was wearing a face mask, shielding the lower half of his face and only bringing out the bags under his eyes more. To be honest, the guy looked awful.
It became clear exactly why he looked so bad when Ace tried to greet them again, only to be interrupted by some of the most painful coughs Deuce had ever heard. The poor guy looked dead on his feet, and all the righteous fury Deuce might have had at the other for secretly having a ton of photos of his friends without their knowledge just drained out of him. Honestly, the guy looked too pathetic to be mad at, and Deuce could tell the others felt the same.
“Um…are you doin’ all right?” Epel hesitantly asked, to which he just received another pitiful cough. They had no idea what to do. Their only plan going into this was to confront Ace about the photos, but the guy could barely stand, let alone be interrogated. Ace just sighed, before waving them in. “I-” he cut himself off with another painful sounding cough, “I’ll make some tea. There’s not really anywhere to sit, since I’m sure you don’t want the couch where I’ve been sick all day, so…just grab some floor space if you want.”
And wasn’t that concerning. The guy was clearly on his own, had no furniture apparently other than this singular couch, and was so sick they could practically feel it in the air. And yet, he still offered them tea. Did they have this guy all wrong? He wasn’t ever cruel or creepy to them in the first place, it was just the fact that he had so many pictures that threw them off.
Jack piped up, stopping Ace from heading to the kitchen. “Actually, I know how to make tea, so if you just tell me where it is, I’ll put some on. I can smell how sick you are right now, you should not be standing.” Thank Seven for Jack, because while Deuce could make tea, he wasn’t necessarily good at it.
The fact that Ace let them push him onto the couch with little to no resistance was another red flag. The guy wasn’t confrontational per say, but he definitely didn’t go down without a fight. He must be really out of it to have even let them into his apartment in the first place, let alone agree to let Jack take over the tea making. Deuce couldn’t help but think back to his first year, where he was pretty sure one of his roommates had been sick, and wouldn’t accept anyone’s help until they literally forced him into bed and shoved some medicine down his throat.
Weirdly enough, though, Deuce couldn’t remember which roommate it was. The more he thought about it, the more the memory slipped away from him, so he decided it probably wasn’t important. He needs to focus on the task at hand, the mystery that was Ace Trappola. He looked up at Yuu, who was looking around the apartment, and noticed just how little was truly here. The kitchen had maybe two pans, a few cups, and the barebones of kitchen appliances with a microwave that seemed to be on its last legs, a kettle that was currently whistling from the water that Jack was boiling, and an oven that looked like it would sooner blow up than actually cook anything. The living room was no better, with no decorations hung up anywhere, no furniture other than the couch, and a single blanket and pillow that Ace was currently using, his thin frame wracked with shivers as the boy sniffled.
That’s when Deuce noticed a door, the only other room in the apartment. Surely that had to lead to Ace’s bedroom, right? Why would the guy want to sleep out on the couch when he had a nice comfy bed? Maybe he was waiting for someone, he did mention a “Granny” at first when he opened the door. Still, they should probably get him to bed instead of the rather uncomfortable looking couch.
“I’m going to go check out his room real quick, I think we should probably move him to the bed instead of the couch,” Deuce said, getting up to do just that. “Yes, that seems like the logical course of action!” Sebek said, a lot quieter than he usually speaks. That didn’t matter though, since Ace still seemed to wince at the conversation around him, burying his face deeper into his pillow.
What Deuce wasn’t prepared for was what was inside this room. All signs had pointed to it most likely being a bedroom, and yet it seemed more like a studio if anything. There were paintings lining every wall, sketches scattered across the floor, and a canvas in the middle that was clearly an unfinished portrait. Deuce looked in awe at the level of detail in each painting, when a small table with a few picture frames caught his eye.
A brief moment of anger overtook him again, as he saw himself and his friends were, yet again, the subject of the pictures. But…he hesitated this time. Looked a little closer. These pictures were clearly from his first year, he remembered taking these photos, but something was off. A weird gap in the photo here, all of them off center in another, it just felt wrong. Like something was missing from each photo. Like someone was missing.
There was no way Ace could have gotten these photos, they had only printed out enough for each of them. One for Jack, one for Epel, one for Sebek, one for Ortho, one for Yuu, one for Deuce, and one for…one for…they had printed out seven photos. One for each of them. But there were only six people there to need the photos, since Yuu and Grim would just share. Why would they have printed out seven, and how did Ace have the last one?
The more he thought about it, the more his head hurt. It was like his brain didn’t want him to continue thinking about it, like…like he wasn’t supposed to remember that there were seven photos printed. He quickly grabbed the photos, and made his way back into the living room. Ace was muttering something under his breath that Deuce couldn’t quite make out, but that wasn’t what was important. Something was up here, something to do with these pictures and Ace Trappola himself, and he was going to get to the bottom of it.
“Guys? I think there is something you’re going to want to see…”