Night 52: M111-M120 Hallway
When the intercom rang through the cold room and the lights shut off in time with the click of the unlocking door, Edward remained where he was, staring at the space where the liquefied dinner had been sitting. For the second time that day, he wondered if he could starve here. Being in no condition to hunt and having no energy to keep the rotten,
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As the girl gave her own opinion about whether it was safe for them to head back in or not, Peter couldn't help smiling. She made it sound like they needed to put a gun to Edward's head in order to get him to agree to let them help him, which was kind of backward and counter intuitive. In the end Edward was the one who had to decide if he was going to get healed or not, but Peter wasn't sure what secret would be important enough that he'd rather keep those wounds them tell them the truth.
Between himself and Claire, Peter was pretty sure that they could get some sort of answer out of them, which was all that they needed. "Sounds good to me," he told the girl with a nod before turning back to the door.
[To here.]
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The hallway was as empty as it had been earlier, which meant that the two of them were just left with the awkwardness of the situation they'd just escaped from to talk about. Peter could have brought up the blood, but there wasn't much to say about it just then and he doubted that Claire would want to hear it. She had just helped out two people who had betrayed her trust, after all.
In that case, it was probably better if he just focused on their next step, whatever that might be. They clearly hadn't planned far enough in advance, which was good in that it meant that they'd been efficient for once, but was bad because now they were floundering.
"Was there anything else you wanted to do tonight?" he asked his niece with a slight frown. He wasn't trying to ignore what had happened, but he didn't want to force Claire to talk about it either. "Did you ever find out your fake name? We could try the file room again, maybe." Which reminded him that he really needed to look through his own file at some point, but that would obviously have to wait.
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As they ducked from the room, Claire intentionally avoiding Bella's gaze, she pushed it from her mind with the reassurance that Edward had claimed himself that the pain was gone entirely. It had to be the ability. Whether that was a relief or something to dread, she wasn't sure.
Apparently, though, Peter had a similar hope -- that they could just bury the problems long enough for them to not be problems anymore. Or, maybe he just knew it was what Claire would want to do. There was really no way of being sure without asking and defeating the purpose of the gesture entirely, so instead, she offered a grim shake of her head.
"Honestly? I don't know; I didn't really have anything in mind before I talked to Bella and I didn't get a name from any of the nurses." She looked back at Edward's door behind them, shutting it pointedly before looking back to Peter. Mostly, she just wanted to get as far away from there as possible.
"I might try to just go to sleep early, I mean, I think we can consider this a rousing success as far as making use of my ability goes, and I'm pretty sure we don't have much time left." She chewed on her lip, shifting her gaze to the left and then the right of the hall, realizing she'd been in such a rush to follow Bella that she didn't really remember which side they'd come in from. Hopefully Peter would. "Would you totally hate me if I asked you to walk with me back to my room?"
Mistrust had bred paranoia. If she couldn't trust Bella, then there was no one in this institute besides her uncle that she could, and that made those halls the last place she wanted to be alone, even if it was just a short walk.
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He wanted to tell Claire that she should make sure she figured out her fake name sooner rather than later if she wanted that file, but now really wasn't the time for him to be advising her. She might take it personally or consider it condescending, so he'd leave it for later, when he could make sure he didn't come off that way.
The idea of just turning in was a pretty revolutionary one, mainly because Peter never wanted to allow himself that sort of break. Still, it was a good idea, and he was more than happy to support other people doing it. He was almost tempted to just stay with Claire, and maybe they could actually talk about some of what had happened, but that was up to his niece.
Though when she asked him to be her escort, Peter couldn't help smiling; he nodded firmly. "Of course I wouldn't. I'm happy to take you anywhere you need to go. It's not like it's too far. And hey, maybe I'll stick around, if you aren't too tired." If Claire wanted to just get to sleep and leave it at that, then he would totally understand, but he would just have to wait to see what her reaction was.
For now, he led them down the hall, back the way they'd come earlier in the night.
[To here.]
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