8.13
CONTENT WARNING: This update contains mentions of gore and self harm.
Abbott’s apartment isn’t far from the DPR campus, in a small, run-down looking complex about half the size of Austin’s, back in Antlers. The door is barred by a thick barrier of caution tape, and as Austin tries the knob, he finds to his surprise that the entire door swings forwards, imbalanced and off his hinges. The sudden momentum nearly sends him and the door both toppling forward, but Cillian catches him and holds him upright. Working together, they lean the door somewhat precariously against the doorframe, with just enough space to duck under the caution tape and squeeze inside.
“It was locked when the agents were here before,” Cillian says, somewhat sheepishly, shifting the door back into its proper place once they’re inside. “Addison had to break in.”
“Right,” Austin says. The caution tape and the door didn’t look disturbed. That’s one strike against Abbott having come back here, unless he took time to put everything back into place.
Austin takes a few more steps into the apartment, looking around to get his bearings. It’s small, utilitarian almost. The foyer opens up directly in front of him, into a living room with only a ratty couch and an old, boxy television for decoration. There’s a kitchenette just off the living room, and even from where he stands, Austin can see dirty dishes stacked in the sink, swimming in old, cloudy water. A hallway leading just left of the living room has two doors - one open, leading straight into a small bathroom, the other closed. Probably the bedroom. There’s an odd smell lingering in the air that’s hard to place, an almost sweet smell that makes Austin’s stomach uneasy.
“Looks like he left in a hurry,” Austin says.
“I don’t think you needed to come all the way here to deduce that much,” Cillian says dryly, already snooping around the kitchenette, peering inside cabinets and drawers. He opens the fridge to the right of the sink, and recoils nearly immediately.
Austin starts towards the fridge, to see what’s inside, but he doesn’t get far before the stench in the apartment suddenly overpowers him, washing over him in a wave that nearly knocks him off his feet. It’s a mixture of sweet and sour that triggers his gag reflex, and as he turns away from the kitchenette, leaning on the television set and retching, he finally recognizes it for what it is. Rotting meat. As Cillian steps away, leaving the fridge door open, Austin can see stacks of prepackaged steak inside, the meat so green it’s almost black. The sight makes his stomach churn even more, and he squeezes his eyes shut, breathing through his mouth until he hears the muffled thud of the fridge door slamming closed.
“Those are old,” Austin gasps out finally, the smell still searing the inside of his nose. Involuntary tears leak from the corners of his eyes, and he wipes them with the back of his hand.
“No shit,” Cillian says, his voice equally hoarse.
“No, I mean, they’re old.” Austin straightens up, trying to will his head to stop spinning. “Those would’ve started to rot more than just a few days ago. Why didn’t he throw them out?”
“Maybe he wasn’t here very often,” Cillian suggests. He rejoins Austin in the living room, his eyes equally red and watery. “He did work late hours in the lab, and it doesn’t exactly look like he made much effort into making this place…homey.”
He’s right, Austin thinks, taking another look around the apartment. Anyone could live here. There’s no pictures on the walls, no decorations that would have sentimental value to anyone. No personal effects.
“I’ll check the bedroom,” Austin says, desperate to get away from the last of the lingering, foul meat smell. Despite the fridge door being shut, it’s still leaking into the air, a little at a time. Cillian must sense it too - he crosses to one of the windows, and cracks it open.
“I’ll come with you,” he says. “If Abbott really did come back here, we’d better not split up.”
“I think the apartment is small enough that you’d hear me calling for help,” Austin retorts, but doesn’t particularly complain when Cillian accompanies him to the bedroom door. It’s unlocked - regularly unlocked, not off its hinges - and the knob rattles loosely in the socket as Austin twists it open.
The bedroom is plain. Austin isn’t sure what he was expecting, really. He flips the light switch on, illuminating a double bed with unremarkable, off-white sheets, a wooden nightstand, a matching desk and chair. There’s a door to the right of the bed that can only be a closet. Austin catches Cillian’s eye, and can tell that they’re both thinking the same thing. Lots of places for Abbott to hide, if he’s here. Better do a sweep before we get interested in anything else, and caught off guard.
Austin nods towards the closet, and Cillian nods back at him, taking up a position in the bedroom doorway, his hand on the gun holstered at his hip. Austin moves towards the closet door as noiselessly as possible, and stops with his hand on the doorknob, taking a deep breath before he throws it open. There’s no sound, no movement, that follows. Austin peers into the closet and finds nothing but shirts and slacks, hung up and neatly organized. The closet is barely deep enough to fit a tiny shelving unit to hold spare linens, and definitely not big enough for a human to stand inside.
Pulling the closet door shut with his foot, Austin’s eyes fall on the bed - on its underside. The duvet isn’t long enough to hide anything under there, and he drops down onto his knees, peering underneath. But there’s nothing. No true underside to the bed, save for a gap just wide enough to wiggle a finger through. No chance that Abbott could worm his way under there. Damn.
“He’s not here,” Austin says aloud, once he’s sure.
“I’ll check the bathroom,” Cillian says, and moves out into the hallway, then disappears from Austin’s line of sight.
Austin rises to his feet, still scanning the room. There must be something we’re missing. Everyone said Abbott was different than before. What happened, to make him capable of stabbing someone? And why try to bring me back to Havenwood for Jacob’s sake, only to try and kill him when he disagreed?
He sits down in the desk chair. There aren’t any drawers built into the sides of the desk, but there’s nothing piled on top of it, either, no loose papers or notebooks, no recreational reading. Unless Abbott took it all with him, there has to be somewhere else he keeps that stuff.
Idly, not getting his hopes up just yet, Austin feels along the underside of the desk. He smiles to himself as he feels the shape of a long, flat drawer, and tugs on it to slide it out. Inside is a handful of pens and a simple, black journal.
The journal isn’t long, but the writing inside of it is nigh indecipherable, a list of dates and times without any apparent rhyme or reason to them. Several of the times take place over the course of one day, and each has a note hastily jotted down next to it. One entry reads: Sunday 6/8 - 9:45 AM - preparing meal in kitchen. Another: Wednesday 7/14 - 6:04 PM - out walking near pond in park, alone, no car. Yet another: Friday 8/6 - 11:27 PM - in bed, nodded off?
Austin shudders as he scans the list, becoming more certain what it is with each date he reads. His stomach lurches again, this time with a visceral hatred, the urge to make Abbott pay, to crush these pages into balls and shove them down Abbott’s throat. He tries to snap the journal shut, but both the hand holding it open and the hand keeping his place in the column of dates and times are suddenly frozen in place.
The writing on the page swims before Austin’s eyes, the numbers and letters turning to gibberish, spidery symbols with no meaning at all. As he watches, unable to tear his eyes away, the writing melts downwards, falling off the lines, funnelling towards the bottom right corner of the page, where his thumb is clamped down.
The symbols converge on him like army ants. Austin braces himself, but still fails to muffle the scream that tears out of his throat when they start crawling on his flesh. Nothing could have prepared him for the feeling, an itching so hot and bone-deep that it makes him want to claw away layer after layer of skin, gouging the symbols out of him with his nails. He shakes as they make their way up his hand, past his wrist, and feels tears sliding down his face as the symbols snake their way up his forearm.
His hands are still locked, claw-like, around the journal, the muscles tense and impossible to move. He tries to call for Cillian, but finds his voice tinny, lodged somewhere inside his throat. The symbols reach his elbow, and pass it, and continue on their steady march. Austin’s whole arm is blossoming with pain, every inch the symbols have touched feeling like an oozing blister, a flayed-open patch of skin. The writing looks almost deliberate, a living tattoo. Austin feels it curling up his shoulder, towards his neck, and bites down on his bottom lip hard enough to draw blood.
“I said,” Cillian’s voice says, slicing directly through the haze of pain, “did you find anything else?”
Austin blinks, and drops the journal on the desk, nearly tipping over the chair in his haste to get away from it. He looks at his arm, twisting it this way and that, and finds nothing on it - no symbols, no lacerations, only a few old scars. The itching, burning sensation is gone, save for a slight numbness in his hands. Carefully, he flips the journal upwards, peeking at the first page. The dates and times are perfectly legible again, lined up as neatly as before.
“Austin?” Cillian asks, from the bedroom doorway. “What’s wrong? Did something happen?”
“No.” Austin shakes his head quickly. Better to keep what he saw to himself. His stomach still feels queasy, and his head is starting to hurt, probably from hunger, dehydration, lack of sleep, or some combination thereof. “I, uh, I found some kind of journal. I think it’s from Abbott, you know, stalking Jacob. You can take a look at it if you want.”
Cillian approaches the desk and picks up the journal. Austin waits carefully, ready to snatch it from his hands if he, too, locks up and begins to look pained, but nothing happens. Cillian’s eyes rove from side to side as he reads, and his lip curls in distaste.
“Disgusting.” He lowers the journal, looking at Austin, his expression softening a little. “Austin, you must be exhausted. I think we’ve seen all there is to see here - why don’t you go home and get some rest? We can pick this up tomorrow.”
Austin opens his mouth to argue, and closes it again. Cillian’s right. A new lead isn’t just going to fall into our laps - we’ve already exhausted every avenue we could have. Might as well try and get some sleep, and start on it tomorrow when I don’t feel so much like shit.
“Okay,” he says. The image of the symbols crawling up his arm is still vivid in his mind’s eye, a vision he can’t quite put his finger on the meaning of. But there’s no need to trouble Cillian with it. Cillian isn’t a psychic, doesn’t understand things like that because he can’t see them for himself.
Maybe it’s a huge clue, Austin thinks, following Cillian under the caution tape barrier and out of Abbott’s apartment. Or maybe it’s nothing at all. Cryptic bullshit or not, I’ve got plenty of time to puzzle it out when I get home.