Chapter Text
Henry was a man who believed in the supernatural. It was a very strange thing, considering he was a scientist, and that he knew how the body shut off after death.
But Henry had a little game he liked to play: how many times can you kill a person, and have their soul come back?
The answer?
As many times as the soul wanted to.
Henry tapped his foot on the floor as one of the workers talked to him about a little girl who’d gone missing. The worker had stopped him on his way to get William, strangely enough, and it seemed that the worker just wanted to get the word around about the girl.
“—We just can’t find her anywhere! It’s like she completely disappeared…” the worker said, sighing and leaning on a wall.
Henry blinked a few times before responding, “Did she run away?”
The worker froze. “Oh my God. That’s possible. Hang on—“ then the worker scurried off towards the main office.
Henry scoffed. How did people not think of running as an option? Even if she hadn’t run, and he knew exactly where she was. Dee Kennedy was busy being a solution to mortality, and everything involved with the human body.
Henry had figured out how to keep a specimen alive, despite digging around in organs or completely rearranging them, all thanks to William. Well, semi-alive, as the soul would typically try to remove itself; but another thing Henry learned was that a soul couldn’t move on if it was stubborn enough.
William was too stubborn to leave Henry, and Dee was too stubborn to leave her brothers.
It all made sense in a morbid kind of way.
It was almost as if the soul had a choice. It could choose to leave the world, forever peaceful, but forever leaving behind all loved ones. Or, it could choose a vessel, and come back every time. Whether that be a TV, a lamp, or their human corpse, they could come back. The soul typically only came back when it had unfinished business, but what unfinished business did William have other than pleasing Henry? It was quite fascinating the way that worked.
And that led him to the human brain. Or William’s brain, since he was starting to heavily doubt William was even human. When Henry had poked around at William’s frontal lobe, tissue and all, even pulled a few sections out, his brain had done something different than Henry’s hypothesis had come up with. William’s personality had changed a bit. Where the memory of a person was supposed to change, William was able to remember everything.
Jack, however, was a more reliable source of information. Not only had Henry studied the reaction of William once he began experimenting on Jack, but Henry was also able to study a more typical example of the human brain. Henry was able to remove little enough tissue to where it wouldn’t be a problem, but just enough to mess with the teen’s memory.
As interesting as it was to watch Jack become completely fine, and entirely unaware of his illegal procedure, Henry became fascinated with continuing human experimentation. If Jack had offered all of that with only his brain, imagine what Henry could find about souls in humans?
And, as if that wasn’t exciting enough, he’d learned something new about William.
William had fancied himself a little friend, and was completely attached to him. Henry had written down William’s reactions to Jack’s short lobotomy, and they were quite interesting to say the least. More quiet, yet somehow more irritated, or even violent.
Turns out Henry had also taken interest in the human brain’s attachments to certain things.
If he had gotten all of that out of one person, he couldn’t imagine what else he could find with a second.
So he didn’t allow himself to imagine.
He got himself another human experiment.
~~~~~
Dave would be lying if he said he were outside, getting ready to look for Dee with Jack.
Don’t get him wrong, he hadn’t lied. He was obviously going to help Jack find his little sister, because Dee going missing was devastating, even as a sentence.
But what was he supposed to tell Jack?
Was he supposed to tell his Old Sport that he’d found Dee, laying with her head cracked open on an operating table, with Henry digging through her brains for some sort of sick experiment? Was he supposed to tell his orange baby that his sister was being operated on just like he had?
He could imagine his Old Sport’s face. It would freeze for a moment, before he would laugh. Then, once he’d finish laughing his ass off at the explanation, he’d attempt to kill Dave for “lying” about where she was, and making a joke out of it.
But what fun is a joke when it’s too horrifyingly true? What fun is a joke when people—no—people’s lives are at stake? And for what? A stupid experiment that may not even work, so Henry would toss her out and get another test subject?
Fuck no!
Dave wouldn’t allow it. He wouldn’t allow his Old Sport or his sister get poked and prodded at underneath a blinding light with portions of their brains missing. Dave was grateful that Jack had been okay, with no complications or infections to his stitches like Dave had in the past.
But Henry did that as a test.
Now, he was doing the real thing, and the thought made Dave curl into himself.
Dave had known Henry would try to find him, whether that be to threaten him to keep his mouth shut, or experiment on him instead, only Henry knew. And Dave had known that Henry would search for him outside, inside, anywhere they were allowed to go during their free time.
So the solution?
Go somewhere that’s not allowed.
Dave sat huddled in the cupboard of the kitchen. Every few minutes, he’d shift nervously and his crooked neck would knock a box of lab-grown food onto the floor. He’d panic, pick it back up, and hold his breath until he was positive nobody had heard. Never once did anyone come by the kitchen, not even the staff at the orphanage.
Dave was sure Jack had noticed him missing, and was actively looking for him now, and that was fine. What wasn’t fine, was that Henry was also actively looking for him. And if those two interacted again, Dave was certain Jack would be back on the table.
Right along with his sister.
And their older brother—they had one of those, didn’t they? Jack had mentioned him before.
It was Patrick.
No, not Patrick.
Pat?
Parker?
Uh.
Peter!
Their brother Peter, who’d apparently been saving financially to adopt them back into the family! Imagine his reaction if he were told both of his siblings were found dead in the orphanage, heads split open like porcelain, brains flowing out like expired jello.
And they’d both be dead. Unmoving.
And Dave wouldn’t ever get to hear his Old Sport’s laugh ever again.
And that thought wrecked him.
Dave inhaled sharply at the thought of Jack’s body on the ground, and he hit another snack container. Following his usual reaction, he panicked and grabbed it again, putting it back on the shelf. He held his breath for a moment, awaiting the sound of footsteps. Of Henry.
“Dave? Is that you?”
But of course, Henry was never there. Even when Dave needed him.
So the familiar voice of Old Sport made his heart jump (both because he remembered Dee’s situation, and because Jack wasn’t dead like he’d imagined. Hooray?). He could hear Old Sport creeping into the kitchen, likely hoping not to be caught.
“Dave…?”
And for some reason, this whole ordeal felt so familiar, but like they’d switched roles. Not that Jack would remember.
“I’m here, Sportsy,” Dave said quietly. Strangely enough, Dave still felt like Henry would pop into the room at any moment, and inject another dose of whatever-the-fuck into his Old Sport, knocking him out cold once again.
“Fucking hell, Dave,” his Old Sport said as he opened the door to the pantry. Dave’s eyes squinted at the light from the kitchen, but most of the light was blocked by Jack’s short figure. “What’re you doing in the pantry? And why are you sitting like you’ve got scoliosis—?”
Dave looked down and realized how close his neck and head was to the floor. Huh.
“Lookin’ for snacks, Old Sport,” Dave responded coolly, because what else was he going to say? Oh! By the way I found your sister on an operation table being cut open illegally! Like, what the fuck?
“For three hours?” Jack raised his eyebrows, which matched the color of his hair. “And you still haven’t found any?”
Dave smiled guiltily. He hated lying to Jack. “Well, I’ve obviously found some! I didn’t get breakfast this morning,” he said, trying not to glance up at Jack’s head, where he knew the scar was.
Jack nodded suspiciously with a brow still in the air. He crossed his arms and leaned onto one of his legs, making him look like he was five seconds away from chewing Dave out. And honestly? Dave had fully expected that, after all, he had told Jack he’d help him find Dee, even though he knew where she was and that she was—
“Okay, listen, how about we come back to snacks later, huh?” Jack said mirthfully, acting like he was talking to a toddler. “Can we look for Dee, now?”
Dave nodded, mostly to himself, and picked himself up off of the ground. His head was pounding as Jack began to slowly lead him out of the kitchen and into the hall.
Jack had no idea. He had no idea he’d been cut open and studied and now his sister was going to be as well. Hell, he probably hadn’t even noticed the scar running down the center of his scalp yet! His Old Sport was just as oblivious as he was observant.
And that was another thing Dave had noticed.
How long had he been referring to Jack as “his?”
Dave knew he loved Jack, but this wasn’t platonic love anymore. Platonic love wasn’t getting warm-feeling butterflies in his stomach every time he found himself around Jack, or being on Cloud Nine every time he laughed at a strange thing that Dave often found himself doing. Platonic love wasn’t thinking about him 24/7, and becoming beyond excited once he saw him.
It just didn’t add up.
Dave knew the moment he dragged Jack away from Matt in the hallway that things would be different between them. Jack wouldn’t just be a friend. He’d be his friend.
And for some reason, that never failed to make Dave happy.
It was only once Jack pushed open the door to the main hall that Dave finally spoke up.
He couldn’t not tell Sportsy his sister was bleeding out on a surgery table, having her brain rearranged. It was his sister, he couldn’t just hide it from him! Besides, he was helping Jack anyway, so why not help him as much as he could? He liked Dee a lot, and he loved Jack. There was no reason not to snitch.
“Hey, Jack, I’ve got something to tell you.”
The thought of Henry didn’t even cross his mind as he began preparing himself to explain.
—————
”Project_02. Test subject awoke today after I tried to fix her torn brain tissue. The subject certainly acted a bit different, but the most noticeable thing was the memory.”
”The test subject had looked at me like she recognized me, before she simply shook her head and asked who I was. It took a while to explain to the subject that the matters at hand are helping the world, helping me figure out immortality, and the way the human body and soul handle it.”
”Today, I shall test my theory on a different portion of the brain, and may I only hope the experiment isn’t futile.”
The click of a tape sounded through the room, and distantly, one could almost hear a girl sobbing, begging to be put back together.