The Innocent (A 'Finder' Fanfiction)

Shadow of Pluto - 25 - Mikhail

He growled and muttered some Russian curses under his breath that were all in all rather nonsensical. Not that he cared about being reasonable or making sense, presently. There was a searing pain between his shoulders that spread up into his skull and down his spine, and it took him a good while to feel capable of even moving in the slightest.

Yet time was on his side anyhow, he estimated – and found that thought proven correct, once he managed to sit up and lean against one of the old walls.

He was in a small chamber that consisted solely of red bricks and gray gaps in between, and of a dark screed floor. One lamp without shade or casing spread a damp yellow light around. There was nothing else. No shelves, no furniture, not even dust. The stupid basement was just as clean as the rest of the house. It looked as if Maxim had his staff come down here and keep everything tidy as to not disappoint any sudden prisoners.

Mikhail groaned and pressed his face into his hands. He was happy they were pretty cold because that felt good and eased the throbbing for a bit.

If the staff indeed had to clean the basement as well, that would be a fucking lot of work. When he had been brought down here, he had been dragged down several corridors, some brighter and even with decorations or wainscoting, others darker and seemingly belonging to the maintenance areas of the building. The men, who had half carried him, had tried numerous doors, but some had been locked without a key and others had revealed rooms that had not been to their liking. Into this chamber Mikhail had been tossed in the end. The light had been left on; the door had been thrown shut.

How much time had passed in between, he could only tell by his watch: 3.30hours.

'A lot of time to hurt someone', sprung a thought into his mind and he kicked at it by smashing his foot against the nearby door. It did not do him any good apart from replacing the dreadful idea with a new rush of pain to his neck.

Overall, it was the observation that no one outside complained about him making noise inside, that made him fight to get up. He gritted his teeth doing so, but the pain had to wait. When this was all over, he would find a large bathtub, fill it with hot water and a lot of foam, and would lie in there for hours – and he would drag Fei Long inside clothed and everything should he be reluctant to join.

That imagination was enough to make him get going. He checked the door first, yet found it locked, of course. Still, he searched for any weaknesses, the hinges maybe, or might the old wood have become brittle, might the lock have become rusty? There was a tiny bit of movement on the one side indeed, as if the lock had gotten some play in its frame or as if the bolt had become somewhat loose. Potentially, he could smash the goddamn thing open with a well-placed kick.

He already took a step backwards, then reconsidered. He was unarmed and had no idea what was going on outside. Breaking free like that might just get him shot.

When the hurt came back from the frustration, he pushed his face into his hands again, but now there was no coldness left, and it did not help. He looked around instead, yet the only thing he had not seen before as he had not really turned his aching neck towards the ceiling were a group of pipes protruding into the room through the wall on one side, crossing it and then vanishing in the next.

They were unreachable for as long as he just stood here and raised his arm. Yet, they also hung a tiny bit below the ceiling, fixed on some steel carriers. Jumping against the wall, kicking himself upwards from there, Mikhail tried to grab a hold onto the pipes.

It made his back hurt so fucking hard, he had to wince a few times in between to get rid of a tiny bit of the agony. He also cut his hands somewhere on the pipes, maybe on screws or sharp welding seams. The blood made his fingers slippery, but then he was suddenly hanging there, fighting and gritting his teeth again to ease down the ache, to get his senses back which were temporarily drowned out by a white, harsh noise in his ears, and to concentrate on his fucking hands to keep their grip.

In the end, he managed and did not find himself caring about the strange whimper that escaped his throat in triumph. There wasn't anybody there in the first place, but then again: Whoever would have laughed at him, should try this himself!

Slowly he moved hand over hand – or rather finger over finger and inch by inch – along the batch of pipes. He did not even know why or what for, yet it was the only thing in there that was not a brick wall and a hard, impermeable floor.

Screeching and creaking accompanied his every movement, and the metal carriers trembled and strained with his weight tearing at them. Suddenly, he thought about what might happen if there was gas in them, or boiling water. Yet, the pipes weren't hot and – he hung there for a moment, then looked up and checked whatever he could see of the bundle of metal tubes again. He decided to trust in Maxim's eagerness to keep all of this tidy and in perfect shape, and into the regulation mania of the EU: Gas pipes had to be painted yellow or to at least have some warning stickers attached to them, wherever they could be mixed up with other tubes anywhere nearby. How did he know this? Oh, it had its advantages to know such things when you sometimes wanted buildings to be unsuspiciously evacuated of all personnel or inhabitants.

Relieved, he continued his work – for a mere second. Then all of a sudden, the pipes gave in.

He fell before he realized it and hit his back on the floor so hard, he passed out.