He didn’t leave the room until the next morning, and refused to come down to eat at all the day before, so by breakfast time he was starving. He regretted rejecting the sandwich yesterday in the car, as he felt like he'd been hollowed out. He lifted his face from the still damp pillow, and crawled on his stomach so that half of his body was hanging off the bed, and reached for his unpacked suitcase. He rummaged through the miscellaneous content, tossing half of it onto the floor in the process, and pulled out some clothes to wear.

He had forgotten to put his phone on charge the night before, so he quickly hooked it up now, checking for texts, of which there are three: two from last night and one from this morning, because he was too upset to text Tao last night after the 'test'. It was nearly ten o'clock now, so he was positive he would be awake. He decided to call him, because he needed to do something that wasn't wallowing in despondency. He was safe here, so that was all that mattered, right?

Tao picked up on the first ring,

“Sehun?! Are you ok?” he asks frantically. Sehun sags with relief at hearing his boyfriend's voice,

“Yeah. Yeah, I’m good now.”  Now that I’m talking to you.

“You clearly aren’t. What happened?”  He stayed silent for a moment, trying to formulate a sentence that didn't sound horrible, but he couldn't come up with anything,

“They made me watch a video of you when you were in the cell. Of when they were injecting you.”

“Oh,” he stopped short, unsure of what to say next. Sehun was fairly sure Tao knew that he meant a video of him screaming in fear and pain, “why would they do that?”

“Did I not tell you about my tests? I thought I did,” Sehun lied. Actually, he knew full well that he hadn’t told him, and he hadn’t wanted to. It wasn't usually even as bad as that, but he definitely didn’t want to go into detail now, it would just make it sound worse than it was.

“Nope,”

“Oh,” he sighed into the phone and rolled over onto his back, readying himself to explain in a way that might not worry him, “well most of it is like normal doctor-y stuff, like checking my heart rate and things like that, but then they have to measure my hormonal reactions too. They used to just make me run for ages, but it stopped working very well, so they changed tactics and made me watch videos designed to provoke a reaction instead.”

“Videos like what?” Tao's voice was shaking ever so slightly, and although he felt cherished because that meant he was worried, he also don’t want to cause him unnecessary grief. He’d been a little fragile lately, due to obvious reasons.

“Like murder scenes and stuff from horror films. Things that make you jump. Once they even tried to make me watch , that had been awkward." It hadn’t even worked. He'd just glanced over at Mr Evans occasionally, until he consented to turn it off. He'd seemed a little disgruntled that it hadn't worked, which hadn't made sense to him then, and still didn't now. His parents had drawn the line at hooking him up to the machine and making him e, though, for which he was definitely grateful.

Tao chuckled light-heartedly, “so are you ok now, then?” Sehun's stomach growled conspiratorially at the exact moment he replied,

“Yep,”

“Haven’t you had breakfast yet?” He asked, and Sehun could practically see his disapproval from miles away, though the phone,

“Uh, no. I haven’t eaten since yesterday morning,” Sehun inwardly cursed. Why had he confessed that? He did’t want him to worry more,

“Are they not feeding you?!” Tao exclaimed, sounding very upset.

“Um, no, they are, but-“

“Well why haven’t you eaten then?” He suddenly felt a bit stupid. Well, a lot stupid.

“I don’t know…” he trailed off to avoid giving the real answer. He didn't want to admit to pouting like a child and refusing food simply out of spite.

“Go find something to eat then,”

“Ok, fine, but I’m taking you with me,” Tao laughed at him as he slowly get out of his bed, groaning, and reprimanded him for not even getting out of bed yet. He put the phone down to get dressed in the clothes he chose earlier, and then slipped into the hallway, phone pressed firmly to his ear.

His parents’ room was on another floor, and he didn’t even know where Mr Evans slept. Assuming he actually slept a all - he hadno idea, he just knew that there was nobody around right now. Last time he was here there had been cleaning staff milling around occasionally, but maybe they’d all been fired or something, because during the travel to the kitchen, he hadn’t seen anybody. At all. Not even the man who worked in the kitchen.

“Tao there’s, like, nobody here. It’s way too quiet. And creepy.”

He peered into the lounge- a farcical excuse of a room, really, expecting to see his parents because this was where they usually were if not in the lab,

“Don’t panic, maybe they’re just out buying food or something?” Tao suggested, trying to stop him from panicking.

“Everyone? There’s usually loads of people here, but now the whole place is empty.” Despite the weirdness of having no one around, he thought that this was as good a time as any to raid the fridge. At least now he don’t have to swallow his pride and ask anyone for permission, or help cooking.

Bottles clinked as he opened the fridge door, still glancing around in case anyone tried to jump out at me. He blames the horror game playthroughs he'd been watching recently for his suspicion of every dark corner and empty corridor.

“What should I eat? I can’t cook to save my life,”

“What is there? If you really don’t know I could try and walk you though it, I guess,”

“Yes, please,” he sang, smiling to himself as he reached inside to have a look, “there are…eggs? How do you make omelettes?”

“Look for a frying pan,” he instructed, pretending to act like this was such a burden, but in fact he could tell he was suppressing giggles listening to Sehun make a mess with the utensils. Cracking eggs badly and getting it all over the counter, and having to get rid of bits of shell from the bowl. Whe he was done his creation looked at least edible, so he thanked Tao, and started to eat it, but still didn’t hang up. He didn't want to be lonely, so he chatted to him about how life has been for him lately.

They kept going until he finished his brunch, and he was just washing up so it looked like nobody’d been here, when he heard indistinct voices from down the corridor. He immediately told Tao to ‘shh’ and placeed the plate down gently, using his fingers to cushion the sound. He crouched by the doorframe and tilted my head around like he'd seen people do in movies, but he couldn’t see anyone. He could still hear them talking though, and it was definitely not his parents. So who was it?

He clutched his phone- still mid-call -and inched cautiously down the hallway, wishing he were wearing socks so that he would be quieter on the ceramic tiled floor. The closer he got, the clearer they became until he could tell they were talking, or more like arguing, about him. Who else in this building was known as an 'experiment'?

“Why in god’s name did you show the child the video? I am really questioning your deduction abilities here, David. He’s not stupid, he’s resourceful, he’s not going to just take this; next thing you know he’ll be rooting around in your files. He’ll find something that connects you to Isla.”

David was Mr Evans’ first name, wasn’t it? But who was Isla? And the guy Mr Evans was talking to? He didn’t recognise his voice either.

“Don’t worry so much; he’s barricaded himself inside his room. He hasn’t even come out to eat.”

“Are you monitoring him?” 

“Yes of course, I would know if he came out,” Sehun froze, not breathing. How quickly would he know? 

“Check on him anyway. Make sure he’s not doing something that could flush this entire project down the toilet.”

It was time to leave before he got caught. Heart racing, he scampered back down the corridor trying to make as little noise as possible. Back in his room he recounted what just transpired to his boyfriend,

“But I don’t get who Isla is? I’ve never met someone called Isla before. Do you think I should try and find out?”

“Isn’t that exactly what they didn’t want?” Tao didn’t seem as convinced with this idea as he was.

“Yep, that’s precisely why I should do it. I need to wait until after lunch though, because that’s when Mr Evans goes out, I think.”

"What about the monitoring? Do you think they have a camera in there with you or something?"

"I don't know," the sudden crawling feeling of being watched swamped him, and he wrapped his blankets around him even though logically that wouldn't do much at all. He couldn't see a camera, but that didn't mean there wasn't one there, or some kind of device that picked up only audio. He frowned, if he was being watched then this operation was over before it had even begun.

After a little while, he switched from calling to skyping,as he functioned better seeing Tao's face. They talked for ages, interrupted once by Mr Evans himself a few minutes after starting, and then again to ask him if he wanted lunch. Both times he said as little as possible and hoped he didn't pick up on any difference in his attitude. Tao glared at him through the camera, as if daring him to say no to more food. Nodding resignedly he made to end the call, and after he was gone he stick his tongue out at the shut door, then shut Skype down with exchanges of ‘I love you’s, and kissed him goodbye through the camera.

Lunch was a quiet affair because he was eating alone. His parents had decided to eat in their lab again. Afterwards, he texted Tao and headed down to the lab he was in yesterday. Mr Evans wasn’t in there, and it was unlocked, which surprised him. He thought it would have better security than this. Sighing soundlessly to himself, he surveyed the room. Ok, so how do I even do this? There were several opened letters on the table next to his computer, which he didn’t bother turning on because he didn’t know his password, or how to hack. He opened the first envelope and read it, but it was nothing interesting.

He didn’t strike gold until the fourth letter: the bottom is signed Isla, the person Mr Evans was talking about earlier, but the company logo in the top corner was the same as the one on the building Tao was held in. Was Isla the scary woman who kidnapped him? Had Mr Evans engineered the whole thing?

The paper slipped from his hands and fluttered to the floor. That was why Mr Evans had that video. It felt as though someone had just thrown a bucket of ice cold water over him, he couldn't move.

Then he heard footsteps echoing from behind the door.