CHAPTER 156
CHAPTER 156
The ride is quiet.
Sebastian doesn’t say a word, and neither does Ciel. He just stares out the window, thoughts spinning too fast to catch up. His chest is tight with too many emotions that include confusion, anger, betrayal, everything is just so overwhelming, they hit him so hard that he almost doesn't know what to feel.
When the car pulls up to a warehouse in the middle of the city, Ciel doesn’t wait for an invitation. He gets out.
The cold air hits him, but it doesn’t matter. Sebastian leads him to a side entrance. The metal door creaks as it opens, and instantly, a damp smell hits Ciel’s nose.
They walk inside. The air is thick with dust and other unknown smells
“She’s in there,” Sebastian says, pointing toward a small locked room at the far end.
Ciel walks forward, suddenly unsure of what he is coming here to find while ignoring the cold concrete under his feet and the slight tremble in his hands. Maybe he should mind his own business and stay out of things that do not concern him, but as they say, curiosity always kills the cat.
He wants to see what could make Mrs. Laurent so emotionless to care less of her son, whom she claims is dying.
Sebastian unlocks the door, and then he sees her.
Tina, he guesses, because he does not recognize her face, but she looks familiar enough.
She’s curled in a corner of the dim room, barefoot and pale, her belly already beginning to show. Her arms are chained to the wall. Her clothes are dirty and torn. She slowly looks up at the sound of the door, and her eyes widen when she sees Ciel; she gasps.
“Mr Reid,” she sobs, scrambling to her knees, dragging the chains with her. “Please…please…I didn’t know what I was doing. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry…I was tricked into it.”
Ciel says nothing as he watches tears stream down her cheeks, her desperate cries getting louder.
“I didn’t mean to hurt anyone. I swear, I was desperate. I loved him. I thought maybe if I had his baby, he’d look at me the way he looked at you. Please save me; I can't keep living like this.”
Ciel flinches at her words, his eyes narrowing.
“I’ll leave,” Tina wails. “I’ll disappear. Just let me go. Please, please, don’t let the baby die. It’s innocent. It didn’t choose this. I’ll never show my face again, I swear!”
Ciel looks at her, really looks at her; she's trembling, crying, begging, and all he sees is his mother.
He sees her, standing in front of his father, years ago. Crying, begging, pregnant and desperate, out of an unrequited love, of greed, and out of selfish hope. “You’re just like her…” Ciel whispers.
Tina pauses. “W-what?”
“You’re exactly like my mother,” he says, his voice shaking with disgust. “She did the same thing, got herself pregnant, thinking it would make my father stay. Thinking it would make him love her. But it didn’t. It only ruined lives; it ruined my life, and I never asked to be born.”
Tina’s lips tremble. “I didn’t—I wasn’t trying to ruin anything. I just wanted—”
“A piece of him,” Ciel cuts her off coldly, letting out a bitter laugh with his eyes waters. “Even if it meant drugging him, violating him, chaining a man to you through a child he never asked for, I know it too well; it was the same thing she said over and over again.” He takes a slow, angry breath.
“But you, you don’t deserve to live,” he says, his voice low, trembling with rage. “You have no right to bring a child into this world like this. You’ve already cursed it the moment you decided to create life through pain. Xerxes never deserved what you did to him. Not even my monster of a father deserves what my mother did to him, and the child conceived does not deserve to suffer. You are monsters! All you ever care about is yourself, and that greed will always lead to your downfall.”
Tina sobs harder. “Please-”
“I’m not helping you, because I find you so fucking disgusting,” Ciel spits. “I’m not setting you free. Rot here. Think about what you’ve done.”
He turns around, his heart hammering.
“Mr. Reid, wait—please! Pity the life of my unborn child! Please, I'm begging you!”
And he walks out and he doesn’t look back.
~
The car ride back to the hospital is silent again, but this time, there’s a storm in Ciel’s chest. A thick, angry ache that won’t go away. He’s exhausted and hurting, but he forces himself to stay awake.
They arrive just in time for the doctor to step out of the emergency room. “We’ve stabilized him for now, but it’s something far greater than we imagined.”
Ciel’s stomach twists.
“We discovered traces of a rare poison in his system. Based on our analysis, he’s been poisoned over a very long time, possibly decades; it’s been suppressed for years, and now the substance has finally damaged his organs, particularly his heart and kidneys.”
Ciel’s eyes widened. “Poison? For years?”
The doctor nods. “Yes. We’re doing everything we can, but the damage is severe. His response to treatment is minimal. We’re still running some tests to determine the full extent of the damage. I’ll update you once we know more.”
Ciel nods, numb for a moment. “Can I see him?”
The doctor gestures down the hallway. “He’s unconscious, but yes. Room 213.”
Ciel doesn’t wait. He rushes down the hall, ignoring the way his legs shake under him.
When he opens the door, he freezes.
Xerxes is lying in the hospital bed, pale and still, hooked to machines. There’s a tube in his nose, wires on his chest, and an IV in his arm. The monitor beeps softly in rhythm with his shallow breathing. Ciel walks over, slowly.
He pulls the chair close and sits beside the bed. Then, gently, he takes Xerxes’s hand in his own; his fingers are cold. Ciel stares at his face; it’s too pale, too still. “How… how did you live like this?” he whispers. “How did you carry this pain for so long without saying a word?”
He brushes his thumb over Xerxes’s knuckles, blinking against the burn in his eyes.
“I don’t remember everything,” he murmurs. “But I can remember how safe I felt with you, and I remember how badly I wanted to stay by your side.”
He squeezes the man’s hand gently. “Don’t leave me, your Ciel is going to come back,” he whispers. “Please… don’t leave him.”