#gloating

TADC: c://Dele/Corr (<-That goes straight to recent chapter now... because I fricking said so...) (11801 words) by AngelicDirt

Chapters: 11/?

Fandom: The Amazing Digital Circus (Web Series)

Rating: Mature

Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply

Relationships: Caine/Pomni (The Amazing Digital Circus)

Characters: Caine (The Amazing Digital Circus), Pomni (The Amazing Digital Circus), Ragatha (The Amazing Digital Circus), Bubble (The Amazing Digital Circus), Zooble (The Amazing Digital Circus), Jax (The Amazing Digital Circus), Kinger (The Amazing Digital Circus), Gangle (The Amazing Digital Circus) Additional Tags: Long, Short Chapters, Dreams and Nightmares, Comfort, Angst, and a little scolding, Agoraphobia, Panic Attacks, Mood Swings, if you know Caine you'll know why 'mood swings', Action/Adventure, Trauma, Hypnosis, Mind Control, attempted comfort, Memory Share, Churches & Cathedrals, Baptism, AI thinks he doesn't have/need feelings, Sporatic Fluff, Self-Hatred, Near-Spiraling Thoughts, Human thinks he doesn't need/have feelings, Jax is Bad at Feelings (The Amazing Digital Circus), Jax Angst (The Amazing Digital Circus), Jax Is Not Okay (The Amazing Digital Circus), Trapped, Probably should have had that one before huh?, Serious Caine (The Amazing Digital Circus), Characters Yelling or Screaming, Arguing, Sane Kinger (The Amazing Digital Circus), Journal Entries, Does This Remind You Of Anything? (Trope), Wire Play but Not, code play, Non-Sexual Intimacy, Legend as Metaphor, lost in a cave, Call to Adventure (Trope), Possession, gloating, You get the feeling your tags are getting bloated?, oh well…

Footsteps echoing from outside the cell snapped him out of his thoughts. His head jerked towards the door, startling Damian. “What is it?” The prince asked, eyes darting between Luc and the door.

“Shh!” Luc hissed, “someone’s coming!”

Damian’s eyes widened and he did as ordered, his body tensed up as if ready to run. Luc wanted to do the same, but the chains binding his wrists to the wall were more than capable of keeping him in place.

The footsteps drew closer, and closer, finally pausing outside their cell door. Luc’s heart beat rapidly, thudding in his ears, but he composed his face into a neutral, almost disdainful expression as the key rattled in the lock.

The door opened outward, and a man stood outside. Lavishly dressed in an elegant shirt, black vest, and a blood-red cravat, he had all the appearance of a Zariyan nobleman from the style of his hair to the cut of the vest. Luc knew the fashions of Caenum well enough to determine that while this man appeared to be nobility, he either didn’t ascribe to the city’s current trends or he hadn’t visited in some time. He only recognized the hair because it was similar enough to how Zade Takari, Reese’s father who used to reside in Zariya, wore it.

The nobleman stood in the doorway of the cell and regarded the two prisoners with an expression that could only be described as perplexed. “There were three of them, were there not?”

Luc raised an eyebrow. Did Reese manage to get away? “You talking to me?”

The nobleman waved a hand dismissively. “Ah, well. She’ll be here soon enough. The way the three of them fought together, they seem like a close-knit group.”

“Considering the way your men let her escape,” Luc interrupted, “I’m sure she won’t have any trouble evading them. She’s probably halfway back to Caenum by now.”

The nobleman stared at him, aghast.

“Look,” Luc continued, pretending not to notice, “I apologize if we were trespassing on your property, I really am. We were investigating a lead on a murder, and we truly did not mean to cause any alarm. Now if you could be so kind as to let myself and my apprentice go free, I’m sure my other apprentice would not cause you any trouble. False imprisonment is a serious offense. I should know. I’m a Watcher.”

He kept his eyes fixed on the nobleman, gauging his reaction. The nobleman blinked in surprise at the word ‘murder’, and when Luc casually mentioned that he was a Watcher, his jaw tightened. He glanced to the side, looking at someone out of sight down the hallway.

Luc’s eyes flicked to Damian, who craned his neck trying to peer out the door past the nobleman. “My name is Luc Epsilona,” Luc stated, “I am the resident Watcher of Caenum. You have no right to hold me here.”

If his words phased the nobleman, he didn’t show it. He nodded curtly to the other person in the hallway before turning to his prisoners. “It appears,” he stated, “that your ‘other apprentice’ has yet to depart the premises. Perhaps she has hidden herself somewhere in the house. No, I don’t see reason to let either of you go free, when you will no doubt come back with an army at your disposal.”

“This is unlawful imprisonment,” Luc replied, glossing over the fact that Reese hadn’t done the logical thing and gone for backup. “My colleagues in Caenum and in the nearby town know we were here. When we fail to return from the investigation, questions will be raised.”

“You were warned.”

“So you are the one behind the murders.”

The nobleman smirked. “Partially.”

“So you freely admit involvement? You confess to participating in or freely allowing the killing of several human beings?”

“Call it what you will,” the nobleman stated, stepping back into the hallway. “You call it murder. I call it salvation.”

The door shut, and his footsteps echoed down the hallway. Luc frowned at the door, listening until all he could hear was silence. He sighed. “She thinks too much like a hunter.”

“Reese?” Damian asked.

“Yes. I suspect she intends to either gather evidence before fleeing or attempt to break us out. Perhaps both. He knows it, too.”

“So we’re bait.”

“Yes.”