Chapter Text
In an empty alley, your footsteps resounded in the cobblestone road as you made your way through the mist. The darkness swallowed your surroundings, no moon or stars in the sky, and the dim lights from the lampposts barely illuminated the path in front of you. But you knew the way by heart.
Even if you wanted to, even if you could afford it, taking a trolley car to your destination wasn’t an option. Not even the machines were awake at that time.
Adjusting your coat, you strolled towards the side of the road. A well-known detour that you had added to your daily commute. The fog swirling around you began to dissipate as you approached a faintly illumined storefront. Behind the thick glass were all kinds of utensils: silver kitchenware, teacups, delicately embroidered towels, and even a copper phonograph. But your gaze always darted towards the small, crimson carousel toy, just below the golden picture frames.
You had never seen it turned on, but it wasn’t hard to imagine how those white horses moved around, up, and down. It probably played carillon melodies while the platform spun, the star on the tip shining with an incandescent glow.
You could stare at it all day, but your eyes ended up turning to the price tag, hanging from one of the horses. You weren’t good with numbers, but that four-digit figure was like a snap of fingers, awakening you from your daydream.
You resumed your walk. Not in a million lifetimes.
Your destination wasn’t too further away from there. You could already see the golden tips of the spires, and just a bit later, the arched windows. And then, the elegant stone and steel staircases leading to the main entrances of the Academy.
But those weren’t for you.
Instead, you turned towards the backstreet. No lampposts or grand steps welcoming you. Just a narrow passage, a tiny door, and the rusty keys you held in your pocket.
Inside the storage room, your mind switched to the same old routine. First, change into the teal uniform and apron. Second, put all the cleaning products, mops, and rags into that annoyingly screeching cart. And finally, revise your schedule, framed on the door. Luckily, there were no numbers or complicated words. You just had to look at the Academy’s floor plan and check which rooms had been marked with a purple sticker. That was what you were: a purple sticker.
Your finger hovered over a new spot on the plan, one corresponding with a room that you thought had always been empty. Laboratory 237.
It was also the one closest to the storage room. A good enough excuse to not start cleaning the sticky, stinky chemistry labs.
You pushed the cart outside of the room. You hadn’t even turned around the corner when it began screeching again, echoing over the empty, dark hallway. Instinctively, you kicked its rear wheels. Sometimes that quieted it for a bit. Most times, it didn’t.
The keys clinked against each other, hanging from the large keyring in your hand. You separated the one with the engraved 237 on the handle, but as you laid your hand over the cold doorknob, you realized you wouldn’t need it.
The door opened with ease and a slight creak. The large lamp on the ceiling cast a bright, eerie light over every surface. For a room that must've just been assigned, it had already been completely taken over. Blueprints, blackboards, and bookshelves covered the walls, and you could barely distinguish the desk underneath all the tools and papers. Rather than the lab of a scientist that had called it a day at six in the afternoon, it looked more like they had run away in the spur of the moment, leaving everything without a care.
You sighed, pushing the cart inside. After covering your hands with worn-out black gloves, you took out the cleaning sprays and rags and placed them on the desk. But first, you had to remove all the paperwork. That was the protocol: remove every movable object, clean the surfaces, and place everything back. Always carefully and methodically, so you wouldn’t disarray someone’s loose notes or ruin their experiments.
You had to leave everything as if no one had ever set foot in there. A ghostly duty, silent to the point that none of those bookworms would ever wonder why their desk was shinier every Monday.
Of course, they didn’t know what you did, but you didn’t know what they did either. All the documents you moved around, meticulously placing them in separate stacks, looked like gibberish to you. Even more so than usual.
But a certain piece of paper on the desk grabbed your attention, and then your curiosity. It had little text, and a large drawing of a rock, fragmented into pieces. The sketch was so delicate, almost alluring, begging you to understand it.
You slowly took out your gloves and grabbed the paper, turning around until your back leaned against the table. You frowned, trying to read the notes surrounding the drawing. But the syllables were hard to recall, and even though you knew you were alone, an instinctive nervousness crawled under your skin.
After all, what would those scholars think of someone who could barely read?
A shaky breath escaped your mouth, remembering what you used to do at school before hardships had forced you to quit. How the choir of kids chanted the syllables and words.
“The…ru-nes.” Your voice cracked, and you moistened your lips. “The runes are stab…stabili—Fuck."
You threw your head back, heart pounding against your chest. Witnessing your own embarrassment was bad enough already. But you tried again.
“The runes are…stabilized.” You frowned, dragging your index finger against the rugose paper, right under the letters. “The runes are stabilized as a … a … a pre ...” Your grip on the paper became tighter, wrinkling its edge. “Pre … prem—”
“Pre-emptive.”
A shallow voice interrupted your reading, and you instinctively let go of the paper. It drifted down to the floor, but your eyes were fixed on the slender silhouette leaning against the entrance frame. A dark-haired man of your age stared at you decisively.
“The runes are stabilized as a pre-emptive measure,’” he spoke, with an accent you couldn’t quite pinpoint.
Your entire body felt paralyzed. You weren’t supposed to dig your nose into confidential, scientific affairs. Racing thoughts began to make your mind spin around, almost to the point that your knees weakened. If he were to tell your supervisor, or worse, the Dean, you’d lose your job. You would be out on the street. Again.
“I’m—” Your voice faltered, and you tried to conceal your nervousness by bending over, grabbing the paper from the floor. “I’m sorry.”
The stranger finally entered the room, and you noticed the cane he used to support himself, clinking against the marble floor. You turned around, leaving the note back on the table and grabbing your cleaning products in return. If he didn’t see your face, you wouldn’t be in trouble.
“I didn’t mean to interrupt.” You noticed his voice behind your back, but you didn’t face him. “Please, go on.”
Your stance became shakier as you looked at him from the corner of your eyes. The amber irises that stared at you in return seemed curious. And that also meant danger. Why would a scholar like him say something like that? Was he trying to make fun of your struggles?
“I have work to do,” you whispered, gliding away from him and towards the cart. You didn’t look back as you pushed it outside the room, not even bothering to shut the door behind you.
If looking at that file wouldn’t make you lose your job, not having cleaned that lab definitely would.
But at that moment, neither of those ideas felt as horrifying as the humiliation engulfing you.