Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Pitter-patter on the greasy concrete floor, breath laboured as she dashed through the corridor, notebook tucked in her arms. She just finished her session with Nefaria – a young, blind, modified female test subject on Floor 4. The poor woman finally had something going for her, however small it may be. Ever since they injected her with the serum, she’d been able to ‘see’.

Not literally but doctor Black had been investigating the mental bond between twins. Don’t ask how the grump did it but he managed to create a serum to strengthen that bond and gave it to Nefaria, the youngest of a pair of female twins. Her modification expressed itself through telepathy with her sister so now our dear blind Nefaria could read the mind of her twin sister, Venomera. Venomera would describe the scenery in front of her in thoughts to make sure her sister could see it. Dr. Diamond wasn’t sure if that was a positive thing yet. After all, her twin sister was the reason Nefaria was locked away in a facility like this. The reason both of them were sentenced to Test Subject.

Venomera, during multiple crimes, had told her sister lies about what was going on and took advantage of her loss of sight with it. It was a toxic relationship with a more dominant sister taking control which was probably the reason Venomera got the adaptation to the chemicals.

BUT.

Nefaria was doing well and that was all that mattered to doctor Diamond. Now she raced through the hallway in search of her boss. She was certain Martin said he spotted him on floor 5 but unfortunately, floor 5 was the largest storey so he could’ve gotten far by the time she reached it. Maybe she should’ve asked Martin to be more precise. Oh well, at least floor 5 was pleasantly quiet, a nice contrast to the noisy scoundrels from floor 3. Just thinking about those loudmouths made her skin crawl. They just loved being the loudest in the entire department. God, especially-THERE!

“Doctor Cain!” Airia called out, drawing the attention of a few curious Test Subjects in their cells siding the corridors but none of them said a word. There was a dark glare from Subject 22 – Adam “Dark Soul” Alma. Now that man was wicked. He gave her the chills. She never looked him in the eye.

She was told not to since the convicted serial killer was very very fond of eyes. Especially in a jar.

At the end of the hallway, nearing the stairs stood doctor Cain, the head of the Department for Experimental Sciences and Test Subjects. He pivoted to see who called for him and smiled as Airia skidded to a halt in front of him.

She leaned on her knees heavily, panting and slightly dizzy from the physical effort it took to get there. “I-I…”

“Easy, doctor Diamond. I don’t want to have to send you to the infirmary”, the boss chuckled kindly.

Thank you but no thank you. The infirmary was doctor Delmare’s domain. That man, however kind he may seem, had always been a little peculiar and frankly, a bit creepy as well. No man was ever THAT lenient and willing to take on any task. Plus he was just so damn jumpy and nervous all the time. What the hell was he hiding? Maybe he was just REALLY fond of coffee?

“Doctor Diamond?”

Airia looked up, startled out of her thoughts. “Oh yes, sir! I was just wondering. I finally got to take a look at the file you sent me of my new colleague? Doctor Murillo?”

Dr. Cain hummed. “Yes, our new psychiatrist. What about him?”

“Is that uh- Daniel Murillo?” the young woman asked, tucking a loose strand of auburn hair behind her ear.

“Yes, doctor Danny Murillo. Are you familiar with his work?”

“More like, his life”, she replied. “I went to medical school with Danny. I saw him last year but I had no idea he had plans on joining us here.”

“He only recently asked to transfer to the 4C. His references were very promising”, dr. Cain thought aloud.

The 4C prison as the public called it. The Crimson Cove Correctional Center. A well-known and highly secured prison near the border of the US. The only prison in the country to have a department for test subjects. Needless to say, all death penalties in the country were sent here to remain as test subjects. In the last few years the Department of Experimental Sciences and Test Subjects had doubled in space and resources to accommodate to the subjects’ needs. Only a small part was left for the inmates sentenced to a temporary stay.

“He is a very, very fine doctor, sir. Professionally speaking of course”, she smiled awkwardly, earning an all-knowing look. “I understand. Back in my days in the psychology staff, I was Danny’s supervisor during his internship.”

“Danny was an intern here?”

“Yes, quite a long time ago.”

Back in the days when Danny and Airia were still in medical school, doctor Cain was a respected psychiatrist working hard so he may one day take over the department from his father, Cain senior. Now he finally had the position he’d been working for all his career. “Danny’s arrival is set for Tuesday. I thought it would be in his best interest to let him start on a Friday to process the information and events sink in after his first day. Especially since some of these subjects can be quite a handful. Unfortunately I need him to start on Tuesday already.”

A loud bang reverberated through the cells. Doctor Cain peeked through the tiny window of the massive steel door. “Keep it down, Miss Jackson.”

There was no reply but dr. Diamond was sure the subject was glaring at her boss with enough hatred for two.

“The first few times can be very heavy, especially getting to know these poor residents.”

“Airia, plea-…”

“Poor residents”, she repeated more sternly. It was hard to call them a “test subject” sometimes. No one ever asked to be tested on so severely but it was their punishment for the crimes they had committed. At least it wasn’t the death penalty? And it was in the name of science! That made up for it, right? No?

“Anyway, there will be a brief introduction and tour of the department but then I’ll have to get going. I’ve got too much work to do to guide Danny through his routine the entire day but I trust you will assist him, should he have any questions?” dr. Cain requested.

There was a low rumbling in one of the cells but they paid no attention to it.

“You can count on me, sir!” dr. Diamond smiled.

“Thank you, doctor. I’d like for us both to monitor his first session with a patient to see how he interacts with them and guide him to avoid certain topics. I’ll have mr. Theil and miss Wilma on duty to keep him safe should anything happen”, he thought aloud. Martin Theil was our oldest warden, not in age but in experience. He’d been here since he graduated and knew every nook and cranny of the place by heart.

“If you don’t mind me asking, sir, which subjects will you assign Danny to?”

Doctor Cain glanced sideways at cell number 3. “He’s taking over doctor Michael’s patients.”

“Makayla’s? But sir, you know they drove her to… the incident”, Diamond expressed her worry but Cain sighed. “They’re not animals, Airia and I’m sure dr. Murillo will be more than capable to handle himself with them.”

He gestured to the cells surrounding them. Especially Subject 3 and 4. Those two were awful when they were together. Same for Subject 1 and 5 – Trickster and Miss Jackson. Their cells were separated for a reason.

“If you say so, sir”, Diamond sighed, checking the clock on the wall and gasping. “I’m late for my appointment with Venomera!”

Not that she’d realize her doctor was late. These subjects had no idea what time it was or what date and day. She thanked her boss for his time and ran off towards the stairs behind him. Cain shook his head amused and followed, letting his footsteps die down on the heavy concrete.

Inside cell number 3 a man tapped a small rock against the ground, mimicking the soft noises of the doctor’s feet until they faded into nothingness. His back against the wall opposite of the steel door. He lifted his head, face damp from breathing against the mask he wore. He blinked, looking at the ray of light from the hallway, coming through the tiny rectangular window of his door.

He could see the cell across from his. Cell number 4. “Did you hear that, Charlie?”

His voice was a low rumble, slightly hoarse.

There was no movement in the cell across from him but Subject 3 knew his friend was listening. He grinned, a strained movement for the skin around his mouth and pressed tightly against the mask. “We’re gonna get some fresh meat around here.”

There was a light shuffle of fabrics before the familiar sunglasses appeared in the window of cell 4. The Subject was grinning behind the cloth he wore to protect his mouth and nose. He tipped his glasses down to reveal his stark white eyes. “Doctor Danny Murillo won’t know what hits him.”

Chapter Text

A static murmur – and he could've sworn he saw a spark – before the speakers sputtered to life. A bored, nauseating voice coming through. "Name?"

It wasn't pronounced like a question with the tone lifting at the end, more of a monotonous statement. Danny wasn't sure if the person behind the microphone was a bored student getting paid loads for working in a prison or someone who'd been there far too long. Maybe someone who never saw any visitors and was just filling out a word puzzle while picking their nose, feet propped up on the table. Occasionally speaking up and forgetting to press the microphone button to speak to the visitor on the monitor.

That would explain the exasperated sigh before speaking.

"Danny."

Another sigh. Trademark move to visitors perhaps? "FULL name."

Danny could envision the guard spitting into the microphone while over-pronouncing that "f" and wondered if the guard was in a bad mood because they were having a bad life. Bullied in high school maybe but what for? Being ugly? Maybe their over-pronunciation of the "f" got them regularly beat up in a bathroom back in the awkward teenage days. Yeah, that must be it. Worst part was, their bored voiced could belong to both female or male. Probably a robot.

"Daniel Rose Murillo", the brunette smiled at the camera, as if his charms would change anything about the other's tone. Much to his surprise, it actually did make a difference. The next words were far more actively spoken. "Reason for to your visit?"

"It's my first day", the man fidgeted a little awkwardly. He had imagined the reception on his first day of work to be different.

May we present to you… the amaziiiiing Doctor Danny Murillo! Okay, fine, he had unrealistic expectations of meeting the staff of the Crimson Cove Correctional Centre but come on, everyone dreams of the perfect first day and they are always disappointed.

"Then you need the staff entrance. This is only for visitors", the static voice spoke and Danny's smile melted off his face. He looked around in the deserted area, up the walls to the barbed wire and couldn't find a door. "Where's that?"

"East side."

Jesus, did the amount of words they spoke cost money or something? He nodded politely to the camera, pretty sure the guard had already stopped watching and continued to fill in their word puzzle as he did so. He rolled his eyes to himself and swung his backpack over his shoulder to go find the staff entrance.

It was far less dramatic than the visitor one and it made him wonder if that was because they thought visitors were stupid. Visitors need a big, massive entrance to make sure they wouldn't walk around like lost little ducklings. The dramatic grey bricks of the prison walls held a small similar grey steel door. A tiny red button to the side with "press to call" next to it.

Maybe the entrance was small to prevent visitors from coming there all the time. Danny shrugged and pressed the bell. This time there was a more friendly, perky and female voice coming through. "Hello!"

"Hi, I'm doctor Murillo coming in for my first day."

He awaited the reply and was startled by a loud buzzing so bad that he almost forgot to push the door. How embarrassing would it be to press that bell again and be like "hi, it's me again…"

God.

He carefully pushed inside, slightly intimidated by small area and stairs leading downstairs. This was nowhere near the reception he had expected. There was a lady with a blonde ponytail and a headset strapped to her head, sitting behind glass on the left. She smiled intently at Danny when he entered. "The head of the department will be right with you, dr. Murillo. In the meantime, we would like you to store all personal belongings in the lockers downstairs."

She shoved a tiny key through an opening in the window. Locker #3.

He nodded a thank you and took the key, looking around slightly lost. There was a door to the left and a door to the right, two benches and the stairs. He turned back at the woman. "Where are the lockers?"

"Downstairs, dear", she stated still friendly as ever. She was so different from the bored voice at the main entrance. It was a bit of a shocker. Danny walked downstairs to the lockers and got what he needed out his backpack – lab coat, phone. The rest of it he stored into the locker and kept the key inside the pocket of his jeans. He put on the coat and went back upstairs.

"Doctor Cain?!" Danny expressed baffled. A black-haired middle-aged man smiled his way, hands in the pockets of his coat. "Doctor Murillo! Good to see you again."

Danny shook his hand, a smile plastered on his face that he got to see a familiar face in the new workplace. "I thought the head of the department would meet me here?"

"You're looking at him", dr. Cain nodded.

"Whoa, you got a promotion? What happened to Cain Senior?" the brunette wondered as Cain opened the door to the left to guide him inside.

"I'm afraid my father left us shortly after you went back to school and I took over right away", the boss sighed, earning a whispered "my condolences" from Danny.

"On a more positive note, you're here now as our latest addition to the psychology staff", Cain beamed. "I think you still know the drill of those you used to shadow. Talking to the patients will be your main task at hand but I need every bit of progress on paper. For now I'll have you focus on getting familiar with your patients since you probably won't book any progress as long as they don't know you."

"Okay."

The pair walked through the hall, passing by test subjects' cells. In the meantime, Cain informed the fresh doctor of what was expected of him in the next few days. He was registered in the system, he could badge in and out every single day. He'd receive schedules by mail, indicating when to speak to which patient. He was allowed to make changes in his schedule with the consent of his patients or should a patient need more attention than initially thought but some gaps were to be left blank in case of emergency. Those blank spots were meant for paperwork regarding the progress and notes on the experiments unless an emergency did present itself. They took the elevator upstairs and Danny felt like he spent an eternity nodding to the information his boss was giving him until they reached a clean, empty office. Danny's new office. Cain gestured to the office. "Go ahead and make yourself familiar. This afternoon there will be a monitored first conversation with one of the subjects. It'll take some training to know which topics to avoid with certain subjects since well, some of them may attempt to get violent if you speak to them the wrong way. That's why we'll have two wardens on the lookout by the door while you speak to your patient. Doctor Diamond and I will be watching you from the outside. Some of the subjects don't deal well with many people present in the cell."

Dr. Murillo nodded, smiling slightly at the mention of yet another familiar name. Dr. Diamond had been the reason he wanted to transfer here. A friend at work seemed too good to be true sometimes. There had been so many co-workers envious of him on his previous job that he felt like he had to leave to keep his life from becoming HELL.

"Questions?"

Danny looked into the office, spotting a pile of files. "Are those my patients' files?"

"Yes, read them, get familiar with them. You're going to need the information to speak to the patient this afternoon."

"Who will I meet for this 'test' appointment?"

"Subject 98"

Danny nodded in understanding and said his goodbyes to his boss as he left to get other things done as well. The brunette let his fingertips trace the edge of his desk as he walked by, falling back in his new desk chair. He could get used to this. He looked through the subjects' files. Subject 1, 3, 4, 5, 22, 23, 39… There, Subject 98!

He opened the folder to find his personal information along with a picture, notes of previous appointments with doctor Michaels attached to the sheet. He looked at the picture, a seemingly normal male. Eyes skimmed the information.

Test Subject 98

Name: Jorel "J-Dog" Decker

Age: 31 years old

Sex: Male

Convicted of: causing a train wreck with 123 casualties

His eyebrows flew up in surprise. He had expected his patients to be… different from what he used to see in the psych ward of his last job, but this exceeded his expectations. He bit his lip. He did sign up to monitor the mental health of test subjects. No expectations could've prepared him for that experience, despite being an intern all those years ago. Guess he better prepare himself to meet this J-Dog.

Chapter Text

Previously on American Tragedy;

Danny arrived at the 4C and met doctor Breccan Cain, head of the department, again years after Danny's internship. Danny has to familiarise himself with the files of his patients before a session will be monitored in the afternoon with subject 98 J-Dog.

Danny walked with a skip in his step as he hurried down the stairs to the corridor. Out of all injuries he had sustained in his first morning at the 4C, he had managed to get a fucking papercut. Well, not just ‘a’ papercut, but one that seemed to drain the blood out of his finger like some demonic summoning ritual in a paranormal tv show. He sighed at his own clumsiness, halting when he heard voices coming from the infirmary. Danny snuck closer, wondering if he was interrupting the staff working with a subject. He suddenly felt a flash of ‘maybe I’m not supposed to be here’. Was there a hidden infirmary for the staff or something?

The infirmary was spacious, empty beds siding the walls and carts with medical supplies around as well as closets marked with neat labels with the contents inside. Danny could only see two people in the middle. One wore a lab coat, presumably a doctor. This prison was most likely the only place everyone was obliged to wear protective clothes – lab coats for the doctors, protective plastic for the wardens or other staff that come into contact with the subjects – but then again, some of the subjects were modified to have acid spit so it was probably for the best. The other man in the infirmary must have been a subject. One hundred percent sure.

The doctor huffed in annoyance as he wrapped the bandage around the subject’s shoulder. He growled to himself, muttering incoherent insults to no one in particular. The patient was getting slightly uncomfortable the doctor wasn’t talking to him. Danny looked around, now spotting two wardens by the other exit of the infirmary. The doctor whipped his head around, pointing at warden Martin Theil – Danny was learning names today! He recognised the other warden to be miss Wilma. “You!” the doctor shrieked.

Martin Theil looked up startled, flinching under the unwavering mad eyes of the doctor. Judging by the dishevelled look and nervous demeanour of the doctor, Danny guessed that this man was doctor Keith DelMare. He’d learned DelMare was a strange case. Friendly man, sure, but he was very lenient and compliant aside from seeming like he’d rather go jump off a cliff sometimes. Danny also learned he was quiet until a subject disobeyed his medical advice. “Get me more bandages!” DelMare yelled at Theil.

Danny felt like a creeper standing in the hallway but he just didn’t want to disturb them. He wasn’t even sure if he was allowed inside! Although his cut was really making a mess now.

Martin nodded and left the infirmary, coming Danny’s way as quick as lightning. Danny tried his best not to look suspicious but the warden stopped when he spotted him. “Doctor Murillo?”

Danny pursed his lips. “Hello, Martin.”

“What are you doing here?” he asked.

Danny shrugged. “I kinda need a band aid?”

He showed the warden his finger and he stared at it with wide eyes. “Well, better head inside then. DelMare will help you. I have to go get some bandages for subject 97. Be back in a minute.”

Danny nodded and finally walked into the infirmary. DelMare had his back turned to him, looking at Subject 97. They hadn’t noticed him yet, it seemed. “I told you not to!”

“I know. I’m sorry”, the curly haired convict croaked, low growl in his throat. “It itched. Had to bite it. I wouldn’t have had to if I hadn’t been cuffed.”

To emphasize his point, he snapped his jaw shut, clicking his massive predatory fangs together but Keith only sighed. “I know your modification is still new and something to get used to but that’s exactly why we restrained you. To keep you from hurting yourself while you get used to those teeth and instead, you decide to bite your shoulder over an itch?”

The subject shrugged. “Dr. Diamond sedated me to ease the pain so I guess I wasn’t thinking clear.”

Dr. DelMare blinked. “Dr. Diamond sedated you?”

“Well, she had someone inject me so it wouldn’t hurt as much. These fangs hurt, doc”, Subject 97 moaned.

“Because they are new! Your jaw’s adjusting to give them more space and some of them are still growing. Giving you painkillers was a really bad idea because stuff like THIS happens! I will definitely have a word with dr. Diamond!”

Martin returned with the bandages and put them down two carts away from doctor DelMare to avoid joining the conflict. The warden was far older and had been working there for far longer than doctor DelMare but everyone in the 4C knew – even Danny already knew – Don’t test DelMare’s patience.

DelMare turned around and the subject gave Martin a nasty grin. “Oh please don’t get her in trouble.”

There was a smugness to his voice that only showed how happy he would be if Dr. Diamond got in trouble. Wonder if he even got sedated at all because Danny could see clear subtle signs of pain he’d learned to pick up on. DelMare grabbed the bandages of the cart, finally spotting Danny. “Oh. Hello.”

The subject cocked his head curiously and then it clicked into place. Curly hair, subject 97. Danny had been staring at his picture just this morning! This was Da Kurlzz! One of his patients. Danny hadn’t recognised him. In the picture of his files he didn’t have the large fangs denting his lips. Guess they hadn’t changed his picture yet. Danny held up his hand to doctor DelMare. “Hello, I’m sorry for interrupting. Do you have a band aid for me? Got one of those horrible papercuts.”

He’d been dripping blood on the floor all because he was afraid of interrupting them. Real smooth getting the priorities straight, Danny.

Keith pushed his glasses further on his nose and paused. “I… Of course, you must be doctor Murillo”, he stuck his hand out and Danny hesitated. “I’d shake that hand but uh, the papercut’s kinda bad.”

DelMare inspected the papercut, humming as he walked away to fetch a band aid from another cart. He cleaned the wound and wrapped it around the tiny little cut. The tiniest wounds bleed the heaviest sometimes. “Now please excuse me, doctor, I must wrap things up with Subject 97. It’s infirmary protocol.”

Danny laid his eyes on Da Kurlzz and the subject licked across his teeth in a threatening manner. “Hello, doctor.”

Danny shuddered when he bared his fangs further, cursing himself for feeling that way about a patient! He was supposed to help them, not be afraid of them.

“Da Kurlzz is going to be a patient of mine”, Danny replied. “The first of my patients I have met.”

“A new doctor? What could’ve possibly happened to doctor Michaels?” Da Kurlzz asked. Danny wasn’t prepared for that question about doctor Michaels and looked at doctor DelMare for help but the man kept his head down, avoiding the gaze. There was an awkward silence. Finally, DelMare cleared his throat. “Well, try not to bite your itches anymore. The modification won’t hurt once your jaw is accustomed to them. I’ll have a word with dr. Diamond about sedating you.”

The subject nodded shortly, jumping off the examination table. He bumped into Danny, muttering an ‘oops’ in a low unapologetic voice before he was guided back to his cell by mr. Theil and ms. Wilma. “See you later, Doctor Murillo.”

Once the subject was gone, Danny sighed. “I froze.”

DelMare looked up at him. “Excuse me?”

“I met one of my patients and froze when he asked about doctor Michaels. Great first impression of a professional right there.”

DelMare shrugged. “I don’t think he was actually asking because he knows exactly what happened to Doctor Michaels.”

Danny said nothing, waiting for the doctor to explain what he meant but DelMare averted his eyes to the floor. “I- I think we all choke when we’re eye-to-eye with one of the modified beings. I usually leave them up to Tania but they were ill today. It’s fine though. Da Kurlzz is uh… a gentler soul compared to…”

“Compared to?”

DelMare seemed uncomfortable, fumbling with his sleeve. “His friends.”

“Friends?”

“Yeah. If you’ll be taking over Doctor Michaels’ patients, you’ll meet his friends soon enough”, DelMare laughed awkwardly. “I didn’t mean to…laugh at your misery but they’re something.”

“I’m here to help so I’m sure I can handle them. They’re still human. Although the crimes some of them have committed are like nothing I’ve ever seen before”, Danny began confidently but his sentence trailed off into a mutter.

“It can be overwhelming”, DelMare agreed, eyes darting back and forth nervously. “They still scare me too but you’ll find your way.”

“Thanks. You’re doctor DelMare, right?” Danny asked.

He looked up. “Oh! I’m sorry. I’m Keith DelMare. I mostly work here at the infirmary but I try to treat the easier patients and inmates. If you have to be here at all, I’d say you’re more likely to find Tania.”

“Thanks for the band aid, doctor”, Danny said.

“P-please, call me Keith”, he said but it was said in such a way that Danny wasn’t sure if it was genuinely how he wanted to be called or if it was something he felt obliged to say. “If you need anything, don’t be shy to ask as well”, DelMare added.

Danny smiled. “Thanks. Good luck.”

“W-with what?”

“Just the rest of the day”, Danny shrugged. “I guess I felt the need to wish you luck with the subjects.”

“Oh. Yeah. I probably do need some luck, thanks.”

Danny left the infirmary more confused than anything else. He usually didn’t want to psychoanalyse anyone he just met or anyone who wasn’t a patient, but he couldn’t help but notice just how peculiar that doctor was.

Chapter Text

Previously on American Tragedy;

Danny unofficially met one of his patients down at the infirmary, as well as the unsettling Doctor DelMare. Both seem to know what happened to doctor Michaels.

Danny flipped through several files, sighing as he did. He had many test subjects to attend to and most of their crimes were bothersome to say the least. He had to keep an open mind that these people were still human, not monsters, even if some of the crimes indicated otherwise. Cannibalism, serial killers, hundreds of successful heists, master hacker of bank accounts, mass murderers. The list was endless and depressing.

“A penny for your thoughts?”

Danny jerked in surprise, gaze lifted to face the doorway. “Airia!”

“I’ve called your name three times since I got here”, Airia complained, arms folded. “You’re always so lost in thoughts.”

Danny lifted the stack of files at her to demonstrate his focus of attention. “It’s a lot.”

“You do have more residents under your care than I do”, she admitted. “But it’s because Cain has faith in you.”

“I’m not sure if I have faith in myself when I look at some of these”, Danny chuckled.

Airia entered the door, not asking for permission. She looked around the office as if she didn’t expect it to look like this, as if she had been there before but it had changed since the last time she was there. Danny dropped the last file he had been looking at back onto the stack. Airia turned to face him. “Do you want to discuss it over a late lunch?”

On cue, Danny’s stomach let out a growl and he placed his hand over it. “I guess I’m really hungry so yes, let’s go to lunch.”

She smiled, pleased with the answer. Danny put the files back into the drawers of an archive by the wall with a sigh. “I was putting off lunch because it meant it would still be morning.”

“Why did you want the morning to last?” Airia asked.

“Because I’m meeting my first patient this afternoon and I’m beyond stressed”, Danny admitted. He held out his hand to illustrate how it twitched nervously. “I hope I can help them and keep an open mind. I hope I can keep myself from judging them based on their crimes.”

“Then don’t look at the crime”, Airia stated. Danny locked his office – just in case a subject would manage to flee and wreak havoc. They walked down the corridor of the second floor, passing by several other offices. It was the sole purpose of the second floor. Above it, at the third floor, began the cells. It made escaping a lot harder as they had to reach the ground floor first. “How could you not look at their crimes? We’re here to help them so we must know what goes through their mind?”

Airia called for the elevator, scanned her badge and turned to Danny. The elevator changed floors inaudibly, coming towards them. “We’re here to assess their state of mind in function of the experiments. We’re not here to help them reintegrate into society. We’re not here to ‘fix’ what caused them to commit their crimes. We’re here to help them deal with the distress, pain and suffering of the experiments. We’re here to see if they are fit for certain experiments or not.”

The elevator arrived as soundlessly as it had slid into motion and both entered. Airia pushed the button for the first floor, scanned her badge and watched as the doors slid closed. Danny blinked confused. “What do you mean we’re here for that? We’re just supposed to keep them groomed for the experiments?”

“I wish you wouldn’t think of it like that”, Airia clicked her tongue annoyed. “These experiments need to happen and with the law inhibiting animal testing, we had no choice but to test these residents to keep medical development from stagnating. The least we can do, is make sure they are comfortable and okay as they are still human after all.”

On the first floor the elevator looked out onto a narrow hallway siding the hallway test subjects took to leave for the cafeteria. It was wisely separated by a wall to keep subjects from trying to use the elevator, even if it needed a badge from the staff to operate. The narrow hallway led them to the staff’s room. None of their colleagues were present as it was late for lunch. None except for one. Alone at a table by the window sat a green-haired man, back towards the window. He lifted his gaze off his plate of food for just a second to look at Danny, light brown eyes piercing his before he averted his eyes again. Airia walked before Danny past the tables to get a plate of her own. “Good afternoon, Simon.”

Simon nodded to acknowledge her but said nothing as he had his mouth full of mashed potatoes. She nudged Danny. “That’s Simon Lauren. He’s a warden and he’s the subjects’ favourite by far.”

“Why is that?” Danny asked. He thanked the personnel handing him a full plate of food before he followed Airia to sit by the window two tables away from mr. Lauren. Airia shrugged before she absentmindedly stabbed her fork into some meat. “He does all he can to keep them comfortable. He gets them things they like when they obey and behave.”

“Is that allowed?” Danny asked.

Airia shrugged. “As soon as we suspect the subject means harm with any of their rewards, we can take them all away again.”

Danny stuffed his face with food as if it were the last meal he’d ever eat. In between bites, he spoke. “I met subject Da Kurlzz in the infirmary.”

“You did?” Airia asked. “How was he?”

“He asked about dr. Michaels”, Danny raised an eyebrow. “I understand I am filling up the gap she has left but everyone seems to act as if something happened to her?”

A loud ringing ran through the building, startling Danny in his seat. He was facing the window and looked around to find the source of the ringing. Airia smiled. “Don’t worry about that noise. It’s the alarm to indicate the test subjects will be outside for two hours.”

Danny nodded and relaxed, looking out the window that overlooked the courtyard as it filled with people. “Oh.”

Airia cocked her head. “As for doctor Michaels. It is well-known around the 4C that there was an incident with her. Her patients know of it too. They carefully planned for it to happen.”

“For what to happen?” Danny asked.

Airia finished her plate and leaned her elbows on the table. “I don’t know the exact details but her patients drove her mad. They manipulated her to insanity. The poor woman lost her marbles and got herself sentenced to test subject.”

“What was her crime?” Danny asked.

Airia held up her hand. “I have no idea. She is one of your patients, I’ve been told.”

“Oh?” Danny wondered. “I haven’t seen her file yet.”

“It’s yet to be printed”, Airia nodded. “She goes by Doctor Madness now.”

Danny scoffed. “What is with these flashy names for the test subjects? Back in my internship, these names weren’t there yet.”

His friend hummed with a smile. “It was Cain’s idea to give them nicknames. It makes them less human to not speak about them with their original name. It makes the thought of what purpose they serve bearable if we think of them as something other than human.”

“And yet we want to humanise them to make our job easier instead”, Danny countered. Airia shrugged. “It’s a weird mixture. But the subjects benefit from having a nickname. It helps them separate their current life from the life they used to lead. A lot of them have had positive reactions to it and wish to be called by nothing but their nickname anymore.”

“I can understand that. Their real name holds a memory of freedom”, Danny agreed. He finished his plate as well, wondering what his test appointment with subject 98 would bring. “Doctor DelMare says Da Kurlzz is more docile compared to his friends.”

Airia shuddered but hid it well. Danny only caught a hint of it. She turned to look over her shoulder at the courtyard. “Him and his friends are known to be troublemakers together.”

Danny craned his neck to inspect the courtyard and to follow her gaze. She was looking at a group of individuals by the fence. Da Kurlzz was amongst them. There was a man with a mask, one with sunglasses and a bandana, another one with short brown hair and a fifth person with black curls different from Da Kurlzz’. “That’s them?”

“That’s them”, Airia said, turning back to face Danny. As she did, the five men lifted their eyes to stare at the window, seemingly staring right through Danny’s soul. He shuddered at the thought of it and couldn’t help but wonder if they were really staring at him or if they were only looking through the window by coincidence.

Chapter Text

Previously on American Tragedy;

Danny learns of Doctor Michaels' fate on his lunch break with Airia. In the meantime, he finds some of the subjects staring at him through the window of the first floor.

"Here", Mary jabbed the pack through the fence as if it were her weapon. Johnny grinned beneath his mask and took the pack of cigarettes. "Thanks, Mary."

She huffed. "You need to better your services, 3 Tears. Great Pretender cut off my hair!"

She demonstrated it by whipping her hair to the front. The ginger curls were cut unevenly and Johnny held back the urge to smirk. "Ah Mary, you know I do all I can to keep the subjects off your back but try not to turn your back on the fence if you don't want your hair cut short."

Mary gave him a look that he could only describe as condescendingly insulted. "If you want me to keep getting you stuff, you will keep me safe."

"I am keeping you safe from the test subjects. Aesthetic damage hardly seems like a reason to throw a tantrum", Johnny snorted. He lifted his mask to adjust it and she caught the deep lines of scars snaking across his jawline. He was right, she figured and she walked away with a huff. Johnny turned to lean his back against the fence, looking over the courtyard. It stretched wide, leaving enough room for them to form patches of bunched up test subjects. One of the patches were himself and the gang.

It was their usual hangout with Johnny and Charlie leaning against the fence, J-Dog and Funny Man sitting on the table of the little picnic table, more tables like it scattered across the courtyard.

Johnny took a cigarette from the pack and cursed when he didn't have a lighter on him. "You got one?" he asked, turning to J-Dog.

"Nah, man, as if they'd led us have lighters when people like Ignited Imposter and Phoenix walk around", J-Dog chuckled. He leaned his elbows on his knees, searching the neighbouring courtyard of the inmates. He wasn't looking for anything particular. He just liked looking like an absolute predator since most inmates were terrified of them.

Johnny snorted. "Didn't have to be rude about it."

Funny Man leaned back on the table with a grin and Johnny gave him a look. "What?"

"Just a thought Jay had."

Johnny squinted his eyes, tucking the pack of cigarettes away in the waistband of his pants. "Fucking dysfunctional bunch, you."

"Oh shut up", Charlie exclaimed next to him, both hands solidly clutching Johnny's arm. "As if you're any better, Johnny."

There was an amused tone to his voice so Johnny snatched his arm out of his grip. "Watch it or we'll walk away without you. Good luck finding your way then."

Charlie grumbled. "That's a dick move. You know I need your eyes."

In the middle of their banter, Da Kurlzz walked up to the group and J-Dog flinched when he saw him. "Dude, you fugly."

Da Kurlzz glared at him but eased when he remembered Jay's modification. Charlie turned his head to J-Dog's direction. "What? Who's fugly?"

"Da Kurlzz just came up to us", Johnny hushed him. Charlie laughed. "He's always been fugly, Jay, how come you only now notice?"

"Because dude has fangs", Funny Man chimed in. "Like actual deep-sea horror creature fangs."

Charlie squinted his eyes behind his sunglasses. "Damn, gonna give him a good onceover when we're inside. Can't see shit right now."

"Despite the sunglasses Lauren got you?"

Charlie hummed affirmatively. "Do you think I'd be holding Johnny's arm like a goddamn kiddo if I could see shit right now?"

Johnny made a face, indicating he was considering the answer to that question but he earned a smack to his arm from Charlie. "I know you're considering saying yes, asshole."

"You know me too well if you know what I'm doing without looking", Johnny admitted. Charlie fought a smile but it didn't matter because his face was covered with a bandana anyway. It protected him from the light. His skin had become awfully sensitive after a series of experiments that resulted into his current state.

Funny Man furrowed his brow and Johnny didn't ask. He had gotten used to Funny's constant changes in facial expressions as he caught different things. Johnny seemed to remember something and nodded at Da Kurlzz. "You have a lighter? I got us some cigarettes."

Da Kurlzz shook his head. "We can ask Mary to get us one?"

"Gotta hide it well then", J-Dog popped up. Funny nodded along with it. "Some of our pyromaniacs may use it to blast our floor."

"Would it be so bad if our floor got blasted?" Johnny asked.

Charlie raised an eyebrow behind his sunglasses. "Do you think they'll ever put us in cells across from each other again if we were moved?"

"Maybe?"

Da Kurlzz looked up at the gang, interrupting Charlie and Johnny's eternal discussions. "I met doctor Murillo this morning."

"What?! Dude visited you first?" Charlie called out. "Fucking hell. I wanted to go first!"

"Nah, we met in the infirmary. I was telling DelMare some bullshit about Diamond to get her into trouble and he was bandaging a wound for me", Da Kurlzz explained. He demonstrated it by grasping his bandaged shoulder. Funny shook his head. "You fucking bit your own shoulder with those teeth?"

"Hey, we've all done stupid things before", Kurlzz complained. He nodded towards J-Dog. "Dude fucking told Michaels about your mod."

Funny rolled his eyes. "Jay can't help that. He had no control over it yet."

"Ladies, I love your banter but please fucking tell me what Murillo was like? I want some ammo to freak him out", Johnny said. Charlie nodded along. "Me too, dude."

Da Kurlzz turned back to the pair. "He's a cute guy, actually. Looks fairly innocent and easy to get under his skin. I only had to ask about doctor Michaels and he froze."

"I can't wait to get under his skin", J-Dog excitedly stated.

Johnny folded his arms, aware that Charlie had let go of him. "I hope they didn't tell him about your mod. He's gonna freak the fuck out when he sees you if he doesn't know."

"Hey, Murillo's at lunch with Diamond", Da Kurlzz called out, pointing at the window of the first floor. Three of them gazed at the window, Charlie just drooped his shoulders disappointedly, trying to look in the same direction at least. Johnny grinned when he saw the pretty brunette at the table. "Man, we're gonna have some fun with him, Charlie."

"I bet we will", Charlie chuckled.

Chapter Text

Danny couldn’t shake the nervous sensation the group of patients gave him. On one hand he was happy some of his patients seemed to have formed friendships but on the other hand, it just made him more jittery to hear they were known troublemakers.

He finished lunch and cleaned up his plate to trail after Airia back into the narrow hallway and to the elevator. “You’re monitoring my afternoon session, aren’t you?”

Airia looked up. “Oh, your test appointment with J-Dog, yes. He’s one of the easier residents to talk to so Cain thought he’d make a great first attempt. He and I will be outside to listen in but you won’t be alone in the cell. Wilma and Theil will be joining you as guards.”

“As guards”, Danny repeated. “In case he’s hostile?”

“Just a precaution but J-Dog hasn’t assaulted a staff member since… last month or something.”

Danny shook his head. “You say that as if it’s supposed to be reassuring.”

“He assaulted a warden who got fired for abusing the test subjects”, Airia deadpanned. “I was rooting for J-Dog when it happened.”

Danny chuckled. “Alright then. I’ll go read up on J-Dog some more.”

On the second floor, he parted ways with Airia and went back to his office. He unlocked it and entered, returning to sit behind his desk. He trusted Cain would come fetch him for the test appointment as no time had been set for it yet. He found a sheet of paper underneath the file, a sheet he hadn’t noticed yet.

It seemed to be a list of instruction on how to get started with setting up his account on the computer. Guess he knew what to do now.

He used the log-in provided on the sheet and changed his password to his choice. He found his mailbox through the instructions and found that his email address had already been setup for him and all he needed to do, was customise his password again. He noticed a single notification.

From thirty minutes ago.

Breccan Cain

Subject: First appointment

Fuck.

Danny let his head fall to his desk with a thud. If he had noticed the instructions to setting up his account earlier, he would’ve seen the email on time, maybe. Or not because he was out for lunch after all. Either way, he was late to his goddamn first appointment and he furiously hoped J-Dog had not been informed of it yet. Great first impression, Danny.

He gathered the stuff needed – nothing too fancy, just some materials to write with – and set off to meet Cain on the fifth floor. He skidded to a halt in front of cell 98 and gave Cain an apologetic look as he panted from running upstairs. “I’m…”, he leaned his hand against the wall to catch his breath before he tried to speak again. “I’m sorry I’m late. I only saw the mail now.”

“It’s alright, we were late too”, Cain assured him.

Behind Danny, dr. Diamond arrived as well. Cain was sided by two wardens. He recognised Martin Theil and the smaller lady must’ve been ms. Wilma. Cain clapped his hands together. “Let’s move. You’ve been reading on J-Dog?”

“I have, though the file seemed incomplete”, Danny said.

Cain gave a nod. “Ah yes, a while ago, there was a great fire and a lot of our records were lost. Conveniently a lot of the records of our troublemakers gang”, he nodded towards the cell door. Danny leaned forward to peek inside, catching a man giving him a charming little smirk. Danny immediately pulled away from view.

Cain looked down at his notepad. “Well prepared to take notes, but it’s just an appointment to introduce him so you won’t need it.”

“Oh”, was all Danny said as he handed over the notepad to Diamond.

Cain opened the cell door and allowed the two wardens to enter first before Danny did. They closed the door again but Cain and Diamond waited outside, out of view. Before Danny said anything, Cain’s voice popped up. “I’ll have you reminded, J-Dog, you’re on camera and have two witnesses in the cell with you so don’t try anything funny, alright?”

It made Danny’s skin crawl.

J-Dog sat on his bed across from the door, just a sink and toilet next to it. He had an empty plate of food on top of the sink. There was a small table and a chair to Danny’s left so he dragged the chair to sit in front of the subject. He sat a good distance away without making the chair block the cell door. You know, just in case he had to make a run for it.

“Hello doctor Murillo”, J-Dog smiled. “I preferred Michaels. I’m not really into dick. At least she provided a sight for sore eyes to me.”

Danny blinked, surprised. “Oh. You’re the second subject to tell me that today. Da Kurlzz has, too.”

Danny gritted his teeth. He had no idea why he just told him that. This wasn’t about him. J-Dog leaned forward, elbows on his knees. “We messed with her head a little too much, I guess.”

“Yes, you did. She snapped and got herself sentenced to test subject. She is one of my patients now”, Danny blurted. He shut his eyes, tightly, trying to regain control over his nerves because he had NOT meant to spill that. He wasn’t supposed to say stuff like that to a patient. That was confidential!

“I know”, J-Dog chuckled. “But you didn’t know you were going to tell me that, did you?”

Danny shook his head. “I didn’t mean to say that.”

J-Dog gave a fake concerned sigh before the smug smile returned. It hadn’t been charming before. It had been predatory. As if he knew exactly what he was doing. “We endure loads of experiments here and sometimes, well sometimes, those experiments leave us disfigured, dismembered or if we’re among the ‘lucky’ subjects, modified. The regulations of now-forbidden animal testing don’t apply to human test subjects. You can be curious to know what happens, file for the experiment and get approved. But that’s not the point. I was modified. Cursed, if you will.”

“Cursed? I haven’t read anything about your modification. The information must have been lost in the fire or is it a new modification?” Danny asked, biting down on his tongue because he made himself sound insecure by putting all of his questions out in the open like that.

“It’s not new. They tested a truth serum on me”, J-Dog leaned back. “I only speak the truth but in return, only the truth can be spoken to me. You cannot lie to me.”

“That’s concerning”, Danny said. “I’ve been nervous enough to meet you and the known troublemakers gang. I feel like I have no idea what I’m in for.”

Danny got up, suddenly. J-Dog laughed. “Ain’t that the truth.”

“I’m ending our conversation here”, Danny said. “I’m afraid of what you can make me spill.”

He pursed his lips and gestured for the wardens to open the cell door. The pair gave him an apologetic look and opened the door so he could slip through, face heated from embarrassment. Cain and Diamond followed as he walked away from the cell. At the end of the hallway, Danny turned to face them. “Why didn’t you tell me about the truth modification?”

“Because when modifications pop up, we usually find out by experience. No one hands us a paper slip with ‘oh by the way, they have this mod now’. J-Dog was kind enough to inform you of his modification”, Cain explained. “Others won’t be and you need to learn to spot modifications.”

Danny nodded weakly before he excused himself to go downstairs and back to his office. He had to prepare better for situations like these. These weren’t normal people. They had crazy modifications like truth serum.

Cain and Diamond gave each other a look. “Was that too harsh?”

“No, the guys won’t be soft on him either”, Diamond sighed. She turned her gaze to the cell to the left and then to the right. “The duo will rip him apart if we don’t help him prepare.”

The two stalked off while the two wardens walked in opposite direction. The place where they previously stood, was in between cell 3 and 4. Charlie appeared in the small window of his door. “J-Dog got the honour of getting under his skin first? Damn it.”

He earned a chuckle from Johnny. “That’s a good thing, Charlie.”

Charlie fell back. He barely reached the window properly to look through it. “Says you.”

“Da Kurlzz was right, though”, Johnny mused. “Murillo is definitely good looking.”

Charlie clenched his jaw. “Uh-huh.”

“What?”

“Nothing”, Charlie grumbled.

Chapter Text

Previously on American Tragedy;

Danny spilled the beans on everything he didn’t want to say to J-Dog because no one told him J-Dog was modified with truth serum. He cannot lie but in return only the truth can be spoken to him.

Danny rubbed his forehead and down to his eyes in a frustrated attempt to ease an upcoming headache. J-Dog’s introduction had been an absolute disaster and he didn’t really know how to deal with it yet, but those were worries for later.

He’d gone home, had an absolute shit night of disturbed naps instead of a long night of rest and came to work, already irritated to begin with. So yeah, today promised to be absolutely peachy.

Hell, Danny had forgotten his badge at home when he left for work and had to call in with the receptionist again. The blonde ponytail with the headset, whose name appeared to be Olivia. She was a real sweetheart, didn’t even comment on the fact Danny looked like he just crawled out of a grave and dug his way through the dirt to the surface.

“Happens all the time”, she had reassured him.

Danny had looked up confused, wondering if everyone really walked in looking like death but she cocked her head. “They all forget their badge sometimes.”

Oh.

That.

Danny shrugged it off with a friendly smile and got ready in the downstairs locker room before he found himself at his desk, rubbing his head. He was pretty sure the headache was from exhaustion. Not because he felt ill. He checked his emails first.

Breccan Cain

Subject: New appointment

Hi Danny

I’ve put your schedule in the attachment. The schedule will be automated digitally soon, but since you’re new, I’m sending you this week’s schedule. I hope you’ve gotten past the incident with J-Dog because today you’ll be meeting subject 1 and 97. Their files are complete and they do not have hidden modifications, I promise.

Kind regards,

Breccan Cain

Great. He downloaded the attachment and opened it. There were still a lot of blank spots in the schedule for changes, literature studies and reading up on notes, plus filling in reports but today he was scheduled to meet 2 of his patients for an introduction. He wasn’t supposed to do much for them yet, just introduce himself so they would be aware of the changes. He flipped through the patients’ files, neatly kept in a drawer now. He pulled out the first and flipped it open.

Test Subject 1

Name: Mike “Trickster” James Morris

Age: 33 years old

Sex: male

Crime: serial killer (10 known murders)

He closed the file and pulled out the second one at the end of the cabinet.

Test Subject 97

Name: Matthrew “Da Kurlzz” Busek

Age: 33 years old

Sex: male

Crime: assault, murder, cannibalism

Danny took a deep breath and felt the headache intensify. Great. He was meeting a serial killer and cannibal for the job today after he didn’t even manage to have a normal introduction with a guy who derailed a train.

Nice.

He shrugged it off and checked the time. He was set to meet Da Kurlzz first in an hour. Details beneath the schedule specified that he would not be monitored aside from camera footage and that he had to call on mr. Lauren to guard the cell door during his visit. There was file attached with the phone numbers of each warden to ensure effective communication. Danny spent some time putting all those numbers in his phone, but Cain had assured him he’d receive a work phone soon.

The order had been placed but his phone had yet to arrive. So for now, he’d contact the wardens by his personal phone.

He sent out a text right away.

Danny

Hello mr. Lauren, are you aware of the appointment at 9:30?

-Danny         8:45am

He hadn’t even put his phone down before he received an answer.

Simon Lauren

I am. I will meet you by the cell door     8:46am

Danny gave a satisfied nod before he pulled J-Dog’s file out of the drawer. It was unfortunate most his records had been lost in the fire but he had to add the truth serum modification to it and figure out how to deal with that. He couldn’t just keep spilling stuff he didn’t want to say to the man. He had to find a way to get around it. By the time he finished, he checked the time again. It was about 9:15 so he shrugged and got up to leave, locking up his office. No notes for first time meetings, he remembered and left empty-handed to head over to the fifth floor.

With no colleague or warden by his side, the floor was a lot more restless. They muttered to themselves as he passed them, some even called out but he couldn’t quite catch what they had tried to say to him. The familiar green-haired man was waiting for him by the cell door as promised. “Doctor.”

“Mr. Lauren”, Danny nodded. “Thank you for joining me.”

“Call me Simon”, Lauren said. “I share my last name with a test subject’s original first name and it hasn’t been working in our favour. Subjects talk. They tell each other Lauren can get them stuff and suddenly the test subject is bombarded with requests because they didn’t think of me”, Simon grinned. “It was a funny day for all of us.”

“Sounds like one hell of a story. I’d love to hear the details someday”, Danny smiled before the warden opened the cell door for him to see Da Kurlzz. “I wouldn’t usually accompany you so closely unless you ask, but you’re new and Da Kurlzz – well, he has fangs and a record for cannibalism so… you see my motivation.”

“Right”, Danny muttered before he entered. Da Kurlzz’ cell was different from J-Dog’s, despite being opposite of each other. Now that he thought of it, J-Dog hadn’t paid any attention to him while talking to Simon. Guess, he’d still been asleep. Or he didn’t care. His cell was the same size, sink opposite of the door, bed to the left with the toilet besides it. Opposite of his bed was a table and a chair. Danny pulled the chair up again to sit while Da Kurlzz sat on his bed, looking at him curiously.

Danny cleared his throat. “Good morning, Da Kurlzz, we meet again.”

“Danny”, Da Kurlzz acknowledged him.

Danny was a little uncomfortable by the first name use by a patient, but shrugged it off. “I’m here to formally introduce myself as your new psychiatrist. I will be assessing your mental health under the experiments from now on.”

“I know. You wanna know what I’m thinking?”

“What are you thinking?” Danny asked.

Da Kurlzz smirked, baring the needles that were his fangs, even if he couldn’t hide them that well with his mouth closed. “I kinda wanna bite you. I wonder human flesh tastes better now that I have predator traits.”

He unconsciously touched his bandaged shoulder when he mentioned biting. Danny squirmed in his seat. “Okay, that’s fair. Do you often want to bite people?”

“Just you. I used to slice up my victim piece by piece. I’d cut off parts tactically to keep them alive as long as possible. If I could, I’d do the same to you”, Da Kurlzz promised. “If there were a time I could escape, be free, I’d come get you, doctor Murillo.”

Danny gulped, hoping for Mr. Lauren’s input but he said nothing to make his presence apparent. “You seemed far more docile with doctor DelMare. What caused this sudden change of behaviour?”

“There is no change in behaviour”, Da Kurlzz chuckled. “Doctor DelMare has helped numerous of test subjects by patching them up after the test tinkers have torn them to shreds or after a bad courtyard fight. The infirmary keeps our pain to a minimum. You guys? You haven’t helped a single soul. You dig around in our heads for your own amusement and to decide whether we’re fucked up enough yet to stop experimenting on us but if there’s even the slightest hint of us being fit for experiments, we go into them again. I became modified a few days ago and you know what happened today? I got injected with new stuff already because I was deemed fit for experiments by you people. The psychiatric department of the 4C is a waste of our time. It’s a taunt to make us realise we’ll never be free again. You can’t help us. You can’t save us. You’re just guiding us to our inevitable death by a lethal experiment.”

Danny stared at the subject who gave him a smug smirk. “Speechless. I expected as much. You’re new so maybe it’s not fair you take the heat on your first time, but don’t expect us to cooperate because cooperation only enlists us in more experiments.”

Danny pointed his gaze downward. “I can help you in ways you don’t even realise. Maybe I helped you by letting you get those frustrations out? You don’t know that.”

Da Kurlzz huffed. “If not to you, I would have spoken them to someone else. Now stop wasting my time and go bother another guinea pig.”

The man turned away from Danny to face the wall. Danny got up and put the chair back. “It’s good to meet you, Da Kurlzz. I’ll see you next time.”

Da Kurlzz said nothing but when Danny walked out of the cell, he could see J-Dog through the window of his cell. He was watching Danny but gave no comments. Simon quietly closed the cell door behind the doctor.

Chapter Text

Previously on American Tragedy;

"Docile" Da Kurlzz appears to be far more aggressive than he seemed at first sight. He claims the psychiatrists don't help the test subjects and he wants nothing to do with them. Meanwhile Danny's having a bit of a shitty day.

"Thank you, doctor Murillo."

Danny gave a polite smile. "Of course, Trickster."

He got up and gave the blonde a final glance. The poor man was blind out of his left eye and had a scar running down the side of his face. Danny wasn't sure if it had happened in his life before the 4C or if it was a result from experiments, but he felt bad for the man. He could barely see the serial killer beneath his shy exterior. Hell, he nearly thought he had entered the wrong cell.

But then it made sense. He committed the crimes with his best friend and judging by the shouts across from Trickster's cell, the best friend was an aggressive type. Must've put him up to it, Danny thought. He left the cell, finally feeling better about his job. J-Dog and Da Kurlzz had been a fail, but Trickster seemed to be pleased with the conversation. Danny walked downstairs quickly to keep the comments from other cells to a minimum and made his way to his office. He had several notes to write down about Trickster and go over the ones he made that morning about Da Kurlzz. Even if he wasn't supposed to take notes yet.

He couldn't shake the hatred he'd seen in Da Kurlzz' eyes. The man had clearly been here for a long time already. Danny pulled up a document and added what he could remember from Trickster's conversation before he saved it and pulled up Da Kurlzz' notes.

I was deemed fit for experiments by you people. Danny furrowed his eyebrows. He hadn't met Da Kurlzz before he saw him in the infirmary so who deemed him fit for the experiment today?

Danny pulled up his email and began typing.

To: Breccan Cain

Subject: Da Kurlzz

Dear dr. Cain

Could you provide me the information on who authorised the experiment on Da Kurlzz today? He hardly seems fit for experiments so shortly after his recent modifications.

Thanks in advance

Kind regards,

Doctor Danny Murillo

He hit send and re-opened the notes. He quickly typed up that Da Kurlzz would not be participating in any experiments for at least a week or two. A short notification sound alerted him of an email.

Breccan Cain

Subject: re: Da Kurlzz

Hi Danny

I authorised the experiment because Subject 97 was fit enough. Minor aches and resentment are not valid reasons to pause experiments but if you deem him unfit for other reasons, I will reconsider based on your arguments.

Kind regards,

Cain

Danny sighed and had to remember test subjects were treated more roughly than… normal people. He had wanted to think it. He almost thought 'normal people'. He sighed and sunk his face into his hands. What a shitshow of a day.

With today and yesterday having been an absolute nightmare, Danny decided to call it a day fairly early in the afternoon. Cain certainly didn't seem to mind when Danny came by the office to ask if he could go home. He felt like a child for having to ask and technically, he didn't have to ask as long as he spent enough hours working but being new and having it only be his second day on the job, he figured it was the polite thing to do.

Danny got his stuff, waved a quick goodbye to Airia when he passed her office before she called out his name. Danny took a few steps back. "Yeah?"

"How has it been?"

"Great", Danny smiled, feeling as if she could read right through his lie. He glanced at the door to the stairs briefly and then back at her. "But I'm heading home."

"Already?"

"Yeah, it's been an intense day", Danny cleared his throat. "See you later, doctor Diamond."

She blinked and watched as he vanished. "Bye Danny."

Danny couldn't escape the 4C any quicker and almost breathed in relief when he stood just outside the grey brick wall and the steel door with his backpack swung over his shoulder. He kept his lab coat at the 4C to prevent taking home any…contagious materials or you know… Acid spit for example. He didn't want any of that eating away at his home interior.

He felt like his job at the 4C had seemed like a dream when he decided to transfer. He'd had an internship of a lifetime back in college but things hadn't been nearly as tough then as they were now. The residents were dehumanised, carried nicknames, were tested on more aggressively than Danny remembered. Or maybe they weren't but he'd been remembering the 4C more sunny than it actually was. He found his car just outside the massive building complex in the staff carpark next to the visitor spots. Visitors were only allowed for the small inmate department of course. Test subjects didn't have visitors, didn't have relatives or friends anymore. They were isolated from everything they ever knew outside the 4C. That, too, was new since Danny's internship.

Danny swung his bag into the trunk of his car and drove off to head home. He lived a while away, about a thirty minute drive, but he'd deemed it worth the effort because the 4C was a great opportunity. He was having some trouble finding the motivation he'd had when accepting the position in the 4C.

He felt like he wasn't helping any of the subjects by being there for them. They only saw him as someone to lie to or else they were put up for experiments. Danny slowed down when he noticed his thoughts were giving him a bit of a heavy foot on the gas pedal. He found himself brooding and took a deep breath.

He could still change it all around. He had to keep up. Maybe the worst subjects had been fired at him to test him but he knew there were patients like Trickster who appreciated his efforts. Besides, since when did he want praise for his efforts? He only met them once. Plenty of people needed a couple of appointments before they would open up and allow someone to help them deal with struggles. Hell, he'd seen it at his last job. This one person was closed off for eleven appointments before she finally told doctor Murillo about her life. It was only a small insight into her experiences but progress is progress, no matter how small.

By the time Danny got home, he felt a lot better. He felt like he spent the entire thirty minute drive clearing up the thunder cloud above his head. He smiled to himself when he took his backpack out of the trunk and headed into his house. The house used to be his parents' property before they moved away. They preferred the house to stay in the family and well, when Danny's siblings didn't want it, he gladly took it. It was tough enough to get a house at the age of 32 anyway.

He headed inside, dropped his bag onto the couch and sighed relieved. No place smells like home.

And nothing feels better than coming home after a rough day at work.

Chapter Text

Previously on American Tragedy;

After another rough day, Danny calls it a day a little earlier.

Danny awoke feeling as new – somewhat replenished, at least. He spent the rest of the afternoon cooking up arguments for Cain to bench Da Kurlzz from experiments. It was the least Danny could do for the subject and the least he could do to prove him that his expertise could help them. Even if there was no freedom in store for any of them.

He took his scribbles of notes, shoved them into his backpack and left for the 4C early in the morning.

Today would be better, was exactly what he said to himself in the mirror.

Today would be better, he repeated to himself in the rear-view mirror of his car.

He huffed to himself. Today would be fucking better.

With the stride of a man with a goal, he’d gone inside Starbucks, ordered himself a coffee and strode right out with the confidence of a man who had achieved his goal. Instead of “thank you”, he’d almost said “Fucking better” to the lady serving him his drink so his confidence had wavered a little bit.

But!

Today would be fucking better.

Danny grumbled it under his breath to himself, a look of determination in his features. He badged himself in with his cup in hand and gave Olivia a smug smile of ‘Look at me, I didn’t forget my badge today!’. She smiled back at him, almost like she understood his non-verbal look. Maybe it was because he marched in with the confidence of a lifetime, a lot better than when he’d left the building with his head hung low yesterday. Downstairs, Danny temporarily debated on what to do with his coffee cup while he put his stuff in the locker. He eventually decided on balancing the cup on the sink at the other end of the room before he put on his lab coat and put his phone into the pocket of his jeans. He locked his stuff inside and walked upstairs to head to his office.

…

Before going back to retrieve his cup of coffee of course. Duh.

Danny emptied his cup on the way to the second floor and dumped it in the trash can in his office before he sat down and logged in. He checked the schedule. Today he was set to meet Subject 99 and Subject 4. He took a deep breath. Troublemakers. He cleared his throat and pushed back his concerns. No, not troublemakers, just patients having a hard time expressing themselves. He sent out a quick text.

Danny

Hello mr. Clark. Are you aware of the appointments today?

-Danny         8:40am

Cutler Clark

I am. See you soon  8:44am

Danny gave himself a satisfied nod. He pulled out the drawer with the files and took out Subject 4 and Subject 99. He flipped open his first patient of the day. Test Subject 99 was a 29 year-old male nicknamed Funny Man. Great, that promised to be a very serious appointment then. Wonder how he got the nickname. The rest of the sheet of paper was gone and held burn marks. Danny sighed. Guess he had to be cautious for any modifications on this individual. There weren’t a lot of notes on Funny Man so Danny had to treat him like he knew nothing about him to start getting to know him. He put the file in the corner of his desk for later and pulled out the next one.

Test Subject 4

Name: Jordon “Charlie Scene” Terrell

Age: 30 years old

Sex: male

Again, the rest of the sheet was ripped off and held burn marks all over. Though in the left corner of the sheet, there was something handwritten;

JOHNNY 3 TEARS!!

It was underlined twice as if it were a very significant piece of information. Danny blinked. Who was Johnny 3 Tears? The name sounded familiar. He dug into the files on the computer, finding a patient overview. Besides everyone’s personal files, there was a list with their names and cell numbers too. Danny pulled it up and skimmed it. It didn’t really help some of those numbers were out of order but he ignored it and looked for the name of Johnny 3 Tears, finding it next to ‘Cell 3’. Cell 3… That was across from Cell 4.

Johnny 3 Tears was Charlie’s neighbouring test subject and one of the bunch. Danny checked the time. It was about time he left for his appointment with Funny Man but he made a mental note to ask about Johnny 3 Tears when he saw Charlie Scene.

Danny rushed to the fifth floor, bumping harshly into another man. He bounced back and uttered a frantic excuse but found a man smiling back at him. “Doctor Murillo?”

Danny blinked. “Mr. Clark?”

“In the flesh”, he smirked. “Let’s go. I love what your department does for these inmates. Getting the mental guidance they need.”

Danny raised an eyebrow but said nothing when Clark entered the fifth floor, yelling. “Good morning, inmates!”

He earned a few tired grumbles before the silence resumed. They walked to the end of the hallway to cell 99. Danny spotted Da Kurlzz giving him hard stares but J-Dog was once more absent at this hour of the day. Clark opened the cell to subject 99 and let Danny in. Funny Man’s cell was exactly the same as J-Dog’s. Funny Man lay on his bed, seemingly still asleep – Danny thought. He wondered if he were supposed to let the subjects know he was entering before actually entering, but then again, the wardens knew 4C etiquette, right?

Funny Man opened his eyes and sat upright. “Good morning, doctor.”

There was something static about him and yet his face shifted slightly, like a nervous twitch but it wasn’t a constant feat. More like a different twitch every now and then, mostly in the eyebrows.

“Good morning, Funny Man”, Danny said. He thought a second about how strange the nickname felt to speak out loud. Funny Man gave him a grin. “I got that nickname before the 4C. A friend’s brother would call me the funny man because he thought I wasn’t funny at all. The gang started calling me that name when I got here and well, when the nicknames were entered into the system, I got mine integrated.”

“That’s a good story”, Danny said. “I was wondering how you got it.”

Funny Man’s smirk didn’t waver. “Sit, please.”

Danny took the usual chair and sat down. “I’m doctor Danny Murillo and I will be your psychiatrist from now on.”

Funny Man stared at him. Despite his calm demeanour, Danny felt his nerves flare. He had to remember that this was one of the difficult patients. He’d been informed as much. What if this appointment went just as poorly as it went with J-Dog or Da Kurlzz?

Funny Man cocked his head. “I won’t threaten to bite you as Da Kurlzz did and making you spill truths is hardly in my book of tricks.”

Danny blinked. “Excuse me?”

“I’m different from Kurlzz and Jay. If anything, you’ll find me more fun to talk to”, Funny Man grinned. “Or not talk to. It doesn’t really matter if you open your mouth.”

Danny was taken aback for a few seconds but remembered he should be checking the man for modifications. He gave him a onceover. Funny Man seemed younger than he was, looked fairly lean and had a something charming about him.

“Thank you, you’re good-looking, too, doctor”, Funny Man grinned and Danny blinked.

Oh crap.

He’s reading my mind, isn’t he?

Funny Man chuckled. “We’ve got a winner!” he called out before easing into a cocky smile. “I’ve been reading your mind since you entered the premise and doctor, how do you cope with all that insecurity and loss of motivation? Whether you’ll find your place, whether this was a good decision, whether we’ll cut you some slack or even if you’ll break like doctor Michaels.”

Danny tried to stop thinking in that moment but trying not to think, only made him think harder about stuff. He had to admit he wasn’t aware of his fear of becoming like doctor Michaels. Now he noticed Funny Man’s twitches were responses he had to reading someone’s mind.

Test subjects must have one Hell of a thought process.

“They do”, Funny Man hummed. “Some of them are about murder, some about drugs, some about sex. Most about sex. Can you blame them? They haven’t gotten laid since arriving here and fucking another test subject is entertaining but there is no privacy at all. No fun. Unless you’re into that.”

Danny scrunched his nose and Funny Man laughed. “Yeah, me neither. You know what’s entertaining about reading other people’s minds?”

“I don’t want to know”, Danny said, but his thoughts claimed otherwise so Funny Man shook his head. “People can’t lie to me because I know everything about their thoughts. I know whether someone is genuinely my friend or if they’d kill me if they had the opportunity to. I know exactly what your patients think of you. Even those you have judged to be “harmless” and “put up to their crime by their best friend”. I could tell you so much stuff that would make your job so damn easy.”

“Then why don’t you? My job is to help you deal with this situation”, Danny argued.

Funny Man’s smile melted off his face. He furrowed his eyebrows. “Because you won’t use the information to help us. I have seen it before. Doctor Michaels wanted to help us but her thoughts grew darker and darker the longer she spent time with us. I couldn’t bear listening to that train wreck of a thought process anymore. She tried to help us but the system prevents you from helping us. Even if your intentions are pure, doctor, you won’t win this fight with the big boss.”

“With doctor Cain?”

“Cain’s only the puppet of the masters. As long as they are pulling the strings around here, you won’t be able to help us ease our minds”, Funny Man leaned in. “If you can’t help us, then I have no choice but to sit by and watch as you ruin yourself with this job. And the idea that I could’ve helped you… but didn’t, is exactly what’ll make me feel better about you bunch ruining our lives.”

Chapter Text

Previously on American Tragedy;

Danny wants to find out more about Johnny 3 Tears and his connection to Charlie Scene while he finds out Funny Man has a mind reading modification.

Subject: subject 97

His behaviour borderlines hopelessness and could mean he's sinking into a depression. Depression is detrimental to the reproducibility and reliability of the results of any experiments performed on him. In time this brutal way of thinking of him as being fit for experiments, will keep him from sharing any useful information with the psychiatrists of the 4C and in this case, we could miss signs of stress and pain and render the results of our test tinkers useless. This goes against the 4R principle's R for reduction as unreliable results would mean the experiment has to be repeated with different individuals.

Danny sighed when he finished typing. He'd typed it up quickly just to organise his thoughts but it somehow didn't seem like enough to convince doctor Cain of Da Kurlzz' mental state. Maybe he had to stress the fact it could mean Da Kurlzz would burn up and be unfit for any experiments at all in the future. Maybe, yes. He shrugged the thought off and figured he'd give it another try later. He saved the document onto his computer and gave an exasperated sigh.

Though he felt his determination turn to steel. He didn't want to be perceived as weak anymore by patients like Da Kurlzz, Funny Man or J-Dog. He definitely didn't need Funny Man's pity. He'd remained strong and said everything he needed to say before concluding his first meeting with the man. He was pretty sure he'd had some thoughts Funny Man could've easily teased him about but the man surprisingly ignored a lot of them.

Danny still had a few minutes before he'd meet Subject 4 for the first time so he sent out a quick email.

To: Breccan Cain

Subject: Johnny 3 Tears

Dear mr. Cain

Charlie Scene's file mentions Johnny 3 Tears. He appears to be one of the troublemakers. Do you know what his connection is to Charlie Scene?

Kind regards,

Danny Murillo

He looked into Charlie's file once more. The note at the top must've been written by doctor Michaels before she was forced to leave. He perked up at the sound of a notification.

Breccan Cain

Subject: re: Johnny 3 Tears

Hi Danny

Please use subject numbers in the future, I don't know all subjects by name. Doctor Michaels believed to have a lead on subject 4's crime that was lost in the fire but never got to pursue it.

Kind regards,

Cain.

Danny hummed and closed the file before pulling out Subject 3. Johnny 3 Tears, age 34, but his file was empty. It only held a note with his name, age, sex. No crime, no therapy notes, nothing. Just this. What a coincidence the bad fivesome seemed to have their files burned and others were mostly intact. The idea made Danny's skin crawl so he shook off the sudden feeling. He kinda wished he could see Funny Man's response to that thought.

Danny put away the file and left to meet Charlie Scene. Maybe he could provide Danny some more answers. Subtly of course.

And first he had to spot Charlie's mod. If he had any.

He met Clark by the stairs as he had that morning, gave him a greeting in a nod. The warden still had his strange demeanour, greeting the fifth floor once more. Though now he actually got a response out of a few subjects.

"Afternoon, Clark!" came out of a few cells. Danny couldn't imagine a day where the subjects would greet him with that enthusiasm.

"You're set to meet Charlie, right?"

"Yeah", Danny said as they walked through the fifth floor. Clark twirled his keys with the badge attached, between his fingers. Man, if he'd let go, that badge would fly into a cell and all Hell would break loose. But Danny avoided that thought.

"Charlie likes his cell dark. He's nearly fully blind and has got very sensitive eyes", Clark shook his head. "But don't worry. The cameras record right through the dark and I'm here, too, so just give me a yell and I'll come to your rescue."

"Blind?" Danny repeated. "Just that? There's no other modifications to look out for?"

"Modifications? What world do you live in?" Clark chuckled. "They're human. Not animals. Most of the staff don't want to entertain his request for total darkness. Will you?"

Danny swallowed a lump in his throat. "Should I?"

Clark shrugged. "I'll be outside the door. What could happen?"

He could turn out to have Da Kurlzz' teeth and kill me. He could turn out to have claws and kill me. He could have an acid mod and kill me. He could- Danny shrugged it off. It was in the subject's best interest to reduce stress and increase comfort for the result of the experiments so he just had to suck it up and risk it.

"I suppose I will allow it", Danny hesitantly said.

Clark knocked onto the 4th cell door. "Jordon?"

Jordon? I thought the nicknames were used these days.

Danny furrowed his eyebrows. Clark closed the door's window to the corridor to cut off the light and opened the door. Danny stepped inside, catching sight of an individual with sunglasses and a bandana. The heavy door closed behind him and he was inside the cell.

"Who's there?" Charlie asked when he turned around. The light in the cell shut down and Danny nearly gave a helpless yelp but Clark probably turned off the light switch. Well, most definitely did.

"Doctor Danny Murillo", Danny said when he recovered from the surprise. He couldn't see shit. "Do you prefer I call you Jordon over Charlie Scene?"

There was a shuffling sound but Danny assumed it was the sound of Charlie standing and stepping into the room. If he were blind, they were on the same boat, at least. Neither one of them could see shit. "Clark has been here a while before our nicknames were entered into the system. Guess old habits die hard."

Danny could hear him coming closer.

"But don't use my real name. Don't try to tell me you think of me as a human instead of a guinea pig. Maybe you do, but I don't care", Charlie's volume increased as he got closer to Danny. Danny took a shaky breath. "Well, I'll be your new psychiatrist from now on. What I think of you, is irrelevant to your wellbeing."

Danny felt a strange sense of danger when he could hear Charlie's feet on the concrete floor. This cell wasn't that big, where was he going? The steps sounded more to his left now, indicating Charlie wasn't coming towards him anymore. "Thank you for turning off the lights for me, doctor. Since doctor Michaels lost her marbles, none of the doctors have been willing to indulge in my request. Punishment for what we did to her, I guess."

"Discomfort is bad for your wellbeing", Danny muttered. He tried to organise his thoughts and ignore the fact Charlie's voice came from behind him and the footsteps had encircled him. It wasn't possible. Charlie was blind. Charlie couldn't know where Danny was in the room. Unless his hearing was amazing? Would that be it? Would Charlie Scene have enhanced hearing? Or echolocation?!

Charlie huffed at the comment. "Wellbeing. I'm forced to wear my glasses and bandana if the doctors don't dim the lights of my cell. They're afraid I'll be hiding something in the dark and they won't be able to notice it unless they look at camera footage. It's the first time in weeks that I get to take them off."

"Why the bandana?" Danny asked. "I thought your eyes were sensitive."

"Not exactly", Charlie hummed in response. "Harsh light just hurts my fucking face. Even the test tinkers don't get where that side effect came from but it should pass, they said. Well, it should pass."

"How long have you been blind?" Danny asked. The sound of footsteps had stopped for a while but now resumed, bringing Charlie back full circle. Charlie chuckled and Danny nearly jumped when the sound was so close to his side. He was lucky Charlie couldn't see his reaction.

"They told you I'm blind?"

Danny's heart sunk. "Y-you're not?"

He cursed the quiver in his voice.

"Are you afraid of me?" Charlie asked, still as close as he'd previously been. He wasn't moving anymore.

"No", Danny said. He took a deep breath. "I'm just trying to understand the darkness."

"I can see that", Charlie whispered before he chuckled to himself. "Probably the dumbest pun I've made all day."

Truth was that Danny didn't know if he should've feared Charlie. Charlie was known to be a part of the troublesome five. If only Danny knew Charlie's crime – even if Diamond had advised against looking at the crimes. Cain had mentioned Johnny 3 Tears was the key to finding out about Charlie's crime so clearly, the crime was important to understand this man.

"Are you not blind?"

"No. Not right now."

"Then what are you?"

"A man. A rapper, I can spit some sick lines, you know", Charlie joked and Danny tried not to sigh. "If not blind, what's going on?"

"I'm just having a good look at you, doctor, don't get upset. I won't hurt you on your first appointment", Charlie promised. The voice switched from his side to right in front of him. Charlie was standing in front of him. Danny could feel the hairs on his skin raise. "A good look at me?"

"Yes, assess the goods I'm working with. You are very attractive. I bet you broke a lot of hearts in college", Charlie teased. Danny ignored the comment. "Can you see me in the darkness?"

"I can", Charlie sounded bored now. "I've been enhanced with night vision so I'm day blind. Are you happy now?"

"How I feel, is irrelevant", Danny said and Charlie made an amused sound but said nothing as he resumed the circle around Danny. Knowing he could see in the dark, only made the motion of walking around Danny seem predatory. Danny knew he was testing his luck, but he was curious to see what would happen, so he asked: "May I ask what your crime was?"

Charlie's footsteps stilled suddenly. "It was lost in the fire."

"Are you willing to tell me what it was?"

"Ask Johnny", Charlie chuckled. "He tells the story a lot better than I do."

Danny cocked his head into the darkness. "Who is Johnny 3 Tears to you?"

"You really are a handsome individual", Charlie noticed. "You have something calming, something caring about you but at the same time, you've got a very, very attractive edge. I bet you're popular in the market, still, even after college. How unfair someone gets to have the looks and the brains. You must have an extremely poor sense of humour then."

Danny shifted but said nothing. It was best to ignore the remark. Charlie's footsteps resumed while his voice took a lower dip. "I can see what the guys see in you", the footsteps became louder and Danny swore he felt Charlie's breath in the back of his neck, before he heard his voice, close to his ear, too close. "Johnny is everything to me."

Chapter Text

Previously on American Tragedy;

Danny meets Charlie and having "Johnny 3 tears" written at the top of his file didn't seem exaggerated.

Danny was relieved to be home. He'd left early again, but he had promised Cain he'd be working from home for the rest of the afternoon. His to-do list had been done for today, sure, but Danny still had to work on his arguments for Cain to approve his decision to bench Da Kurlzz and he wanted to give his interaction with Charlie a second thought maybe. Or maybe go over the schedule for tomorrow. He had time to figure out what to do with his time.

First things first, he set up his home laptop. He had received a plug-in to connect his home computer to the 4C databases. This way, Danny could access all files he could at the 4C but his home computer would be traced by the main computer to keep track of his activity. They didn't want just anyone accessing their confidential information after all. Some of these things could never leak out to the public. If people had been difficult about animals getting tested on decades ago, then they'd be difficult about the circumstances of the 4C as well.

Danny sighed. He felt like his days consisted of sighs at this point. He'd been confident before meeting Funny Man. His confidence had wavered but he'd entered Charlie's cell with renewed determination. He felt like Charlie didn't tear into him completely – which he appreciated – but he could tell Charlie was toying with him and the most difficult patients were those who considered everything to be a joke. Aside from those who didn't speak at all. It was a defence mechanism, obviously, but all of the test subjects became defensive quickly. Who wouldn't after being subjected to a bunch of experiments already and being robbed of their freedom?

Once his computer connected to the main server, Danny opened the document of his arguments for Da Kurlzz. He had uploaded it but would remove it after sending his email to Cain. Danny took a deep breath.

He felt more comfortable in his own house. He sat at the dining table by a large window, overlooking the lawn of his garden surrounded by a white picket fence. He made himself some coffee in the kitchen neighbouring his dining area and grabbed the TV remote off the couch further to the front of the house. He turned it on and put it on some random channel. He didn't like silence. He liked to work with background noise.

He tossed the remote back onto the couch, temporarily froze when it bounced and seemed to launch itself further onto the couch. Glad it didn't hit the floor, Danny walked back to the dining table and sat down with his coffee to start organising his email for doctor Cain.

To: Breccan Cain

Subject: Subject 97, "Da Kurlzz"

Dear doctor Cain

You mentioned you'd reconsider Subject 97's current fitness for experiments if I could provide some valid arguments for benching him.

First of all, Da Kurlzz' behaviour does not only harbour resentment but also a deeper feeling of hopelessness and his wording of the resentment, give me reason to believe he could be spiralling into a depression. Depression is detrimental to the reproducibility and reliability of the results of any experiments performed in vivo as it influences the subject's normal behaviour. In time this approach for subject 97 will keep him from sharing any useful information with the psychiatrists of the 4C and in this case, we could miss more signs of pain and stress and render the results of our test tinkers useless. This goes against the 4R principle's R for reduction of subjects used as unreliable results would mean the experiment has to be repeated with different individuals. As for the minor aches, I did some digging into previously executed experiments on Subject 97 and have found two prime examples in the pile of papers;

Black et al. 2082 Nature. Page 34-35

Subject 97 showed no pain and hid internal haemorrhage; nearly bled to death.

Aquaines et al. 2084 (unpublished due to unreliable results)

Subject 97 lied about symptoms and went into anaphylactic shock due to allergy for the marker's substrate.

He has been found to mask pain fairly often in recent years with the two examples above listing the worst cases, dating back as recent as 2 years ago. In some, he may even refuse to show any pain at all. The fact he tells us he has minor aches, may be an indicator of major pain inflicted by his current modification. As you know, pain is an important factor that disturbs the normal functioning of an organism so any experiments currently conducted on Da Kurlzz could end in aberrant results.

Furthermore, I believe that allowing subject 97 to take a break to recover, could prove to increase long-term productivity because without breaks, he would most likely burn up quickly and become useless for any experimental procedures at all.

This being said, I hope you'll reconsider using Da Kurlzz for more experiments and allow him to regenerate for 2 weeks.

Thanks in advance

Kind regards,

Doctor Danny Murillo

Danny had never felt as fancy as when he used 'furthermore' in an essay-styled email. He remembered to use the subject numbers for Cain to identify him. He figured it was best he followed Cain's advice if he wanted to convince him. He hoped it would be enough to convince Cain. Maybe Da Kurlzz would be grateful enough for the breather that he'd actually cooperate.

Danny took a deep breath after hitting 'send' – but first checking the mail address and email about five more times. Then he opened tomorrow's schedule to see who he'd be meeting up with.

…

Danny blinked, closed the document and re-opened it to check if it were a joke. Nope, it wasn't a joke.

Danny was set to meet Subject 3. He was set to meet Johnny 3 Tears. Danny hit his head against the table and groaned. They really set up his schedule to meet every single one of the fivesome in a single week. What the hell.

Danny grabbed his phone and went over the contact details of all employees until he found Diamond. He dialled her number and called.

"Doctor Diamond."

"Hey Airia", Danny supressed a yawn when he realised just how tired he was. "You busy?"

"No, I was about to head home, what's up?"

"At the start of the week you told me about the troublesome five, remember? The guys who would give me a hard time?" Danny asked.

"I remember", she responded. There was a shuffling sound at the end of the line, sounded like she was putting away paperwork. "What's up with them?"

"I met 98, 99, 97, 4 and tomorrow I'm meeting 3. Why did doctor Cain put them all in the same week? Does he want me to fail?" Danny grumbled.

It was really starting to look like Cain had set Danny up for failure. Maybe he'd hoped Danny would quit.

Airia chuckled. "No, Danny, he just thought things could only get better afterwards. He has faith in you."

"He shouldn't. I mean. I don't have faith in me. This is insane! Every day has been a rollercoaster!" Danny complained.

"He has faith in you because you did your internship here and you know the motions of the 4C."

"It's been a decade!" Danny's voice raised a few tones. "So much has changed. Everything has become so… dehumanised. There were no nicknames back in my days. The department was much much smaller. What the hell changed in 10 years?"

"I don't know", Airia sounded genuine. "I really don't. I've only joined the 4C after the nicknames were entered so I wouldn't know if it's different now."

Danny rubbed his eyes. "Didn't you deal with my patients after doctor Michaels left?"

"Doctor Cain and I shared the appointments of your patients, yes."

Danny raised an eyebrow. Frequent changes in caretakers of a test subject could induce stress, but go off. He kept the comment to himself. "Then why do I get all the mean ones and you get none?"

"Excuse me?" she called out. "I have troublemakers! Amongst my patients there's Deuce, Viral Tiger, Gadjet, The Great Pretender and Dark Soul. Do you need me to go on?"

Danny rolled his eyes and was grateful she couldn't see it. "Fine, you have some difficult people, too, I guess, but they don't form a gang."

"Sometimes they do. Anyway, I'm gonna hang up, Danny, because I'm going home", she said.

"Alright", Danny smiled. "Thanks, though, I was starting to think Cain had no trust in me at all."

"Don't worry about it. Bye, Danny."

"Bye."

He put away his phone with a relieved sigh and furrowed his eyebrows. Now why did the 4C change so much? There had to be something about it online. He googled the 4C and the first results mostly consisted of protestors' arguments against the 4C as well as the papers published by doctors of the 4C and legislation regarding the Crimson Cove Correctional Centre's Department for Experimental Sciences and Test Subjects. He continued to scroll, finding a news article about Cain senior's passing and Breccan Cain taking over as the head of the department.

Danny hummed. It was impossible the 4C had become so cold because of Cain junior. It could not be.

Cain's only the puppet of the masters. As long as they are pulling the strings around here, you won't be able to help us ease our minds. Danny remembered Funny Man's words. Someone was pulling Cain's strings. Unless it had been a lie but he couldn't be sure.

Who was the big boss then?

The owner of the 4C?

Danny quickly googled who owned the 4C and skimmed the results.

THERE!

As a fifth result, came a title; "Correctional Centre of human testing reels in big investor."

Danny clicked the link and quickly read through the text.

Blah blah blah, 4C is a prison with research on 'death-sentenced' inmates blah blah history of petitions lead to animal testing to be illegal blah blah. Oh, there it was.

In 2079 the 4C prison and Department for Experimental Sciences and Test Subjects was sold to Book Technologies to increase the budget for their research.

Danny frowned. Book Technologies?

Chapter Text

Previously on American Tragedy;

Danny worked out a thorough argument for cancelling planned experiments on Da Kurlzz and wonders why so much has changed since his internship last decade. He finds out the 4C prison was sold to Book Technologies 7 years ago.

Danny shifted in this seat.

Nothing.

Silence.

He swallowed and felt like it made the most noise in the world. "I saw Charlie Scene yesterday."

"Charlie", he croaked in response. It was the first word he had spoken since Danny had entered the cell. Johnny 3 Tears was not what he expected him to be. He had expected a monstrous human to taunt him, bully him and to drive him crazy but instead, he had found a tall, broad man with a '3' tattooed in his neck and a blue mask covering his face. The mask held the same '3' and a butterfly pattern. Danny wondered if the number '3' held a significant meaning to him.

He wouldn't know, of course, because his file was completely lost in the fire.

"Charlie", Danny repeated. "Or does he go by Jordon for you?"

Johnny rolled his eyes behind the mask. "That name ain't dick so keep it out of your mouth. No need for full names or real names. Just Charlie."

Danny was taken aback by the snarky remark and gave a shaky nod. It would be easier if he could catch onto Johnny's expressions but the mask revealed nothing. "Charlie told me to ask you about his crime. Said you tell the story a lot better than he does."

It was unnerving Danny couldn't see any facial expressions at all. He didn't even know what Johnny's face looked like, but his body language spoke volumes. Johnny folded his arms more tightly around himself in his position leaning against the wall while he sat on his bed. He was back to giving Danny the silent treatment.

Danny tried his best to keep a sigh in his throat. "Do I only get a response from you if I'm wrong about Charlie?"

Another eye roll. Danny could start keeping score of the eye rolls on a sheet and he would fill an entire page with it. Johnny's unresponsive behaviour was the opposite of what Danny had expected from a man who carried the name of the 'most difficult patient to deal with'. Danny kept an eye out at all times for possible modifications but it was hard to spot any at this rate.

Maybe Charlie was the master mind behind the reputation of the duo? Danny had dealt with quiet patients before so this was nothing new. Though given Johnny's situation, it was new because Johnny did not want to ease the struggles of his mind. He did not come to doctor Murillo willingly. "Do you have anything you want to say? If not, I'll come back next week."

Johnny lifted his head. "It was nice to meet you, doctor, watch your back when you walk these corridors."

Danny didn't know what that was supposed to mean but he wasn't going to let it get to him so he gave the patient a nod before he got up. "Until next time, Johnny 3 Tears."

"Just Johnny", Johnny muttered.

"Just Johnny", Danny repeated. He walked out of the cell to ms. Wilma. She looked up at him, said nothing but held a plush object in her hands. Danny had noticed the young lady had tried to explain it was for comfort. Tried, because her understanding of the English language was a lot better than her speaking. Danny followed her to the door to the stairs. She opened the door and Danny paused. He glanced back at the cells. Wilma said nothing but waited patiently. She didn't understand what Danny was waiting for, but neither did Danny. He just… He was waiting for something.

"Charlie?"

There it was.

"What's up?"

Johnny held a moment of silence before he spoke. "You told Murillo to ask about your crime."

"Snitch", Charlie huffed. "Yeah?"

Danny pursed his lips. He felt anxious to know what was coming next. Johnny sighed. "What else did you talk about?"

"Nothing important", Charlie hushed him. Neither of the two appeared in the cell window to look at each other for this conversation. They freely spoke across cells. It was a strange interaction to witness. Danny could hear Charlie's smile: "I scared him a little, I think. You?"

"Nothing at all", Johnny mused. "I wanted to observe him first. Get a grip on his personality."

"And?"

"AH! Good afternoon, ms. Wilma, doctor Murillo!"

Danny nearly jumped out of his skin when Theil snuck up behind him on the stairs while Wilma still held the door open. Danny could've smacked himself for letting Theil blow his cover. It was too late to hush him now. The subjects heard the doctor was still there and now he'd never know the answer to Charlie's question. The hallway of the fifth floor was quiet again. No more talking between them.

Danny nodded at Theil. "Hello, Martin."

There was a sound of shuffling that made Danny look over his shoulder at the fifth floor. Charlie's sunglasses and bandana appeared in the window of his cell. He grabbed the bars and cocked his head. "Hello, doctor, listening in, are we?"

Danny didn't say anything so Charlie chuckled. "Oh don't worry, I'll hear your thoughts later when I see Funny Man."

God fucking damn it, Charlie. Is it too late to ask Funny Man to keep his mouth shut? Danny thought to himself.

He excused himself with Theil and Wilma and walked downstairs to head back to his office. He bumped into Diamond when he opened the door to the second floor.

"Oh! Sorry!" She called out when she bounced back and she looked up. "Oh, hey Danny. Haven't seen you all day. How are things going?"

"They're going", Danny awkwardly smiled. "I mean… You know what they're like."

"Yeah", she turned serious. "How was Johnny?"

"Well, he didn't say much."

"He never does", she shook her head. "Aside from snide remarks, he likes to analyse us instead. What about the rest of the subjects?"

"I saw Trickster and Ignited Imposter aside from the five. They're different."

Different – read; cooperative.

"Good", she said but Danny noticed she shifted uncomfortably at the mention of Trickster. "But how are you dealing with it?"

"Not", Danny chuckled. "I'm going back to my office. It's been an exhausting week."

"It'll get better", she promised before Danny walked past her to head to his office. He sat down and had a look at his documents.

Johnny is everything to me.

…

That name ain't dick so keep it out of your mouth

Danny knitted his eyebrows together tightly. There was definitely a lot to unpack with those two. There was an obvious barrier between the two of them and the outer world. The unapproachable duo, the modified pair that liked to mess with the doctor and then there was Da Kurlzz, who resented him for his job. Oh and Da Kurlzz really wanted to eat him. Great.

And of course, Funny Man was most likely listening in on all of these thoughts. Danny checked the clock. It was 4pm. On a Friday.

Yeah, he was out of there.

Danny packed his bag and looked into the file drawer. Maybe he should take home some files to see if he could learn something from doctor Michaels' old notes. Some weekend preparations to make sure he wouldn't look like a fool in front of them anymore.

Stop caring what you look like to them. You are their psychiatrist, not their friend.

He shrugged and took several files before locking up and leaving his office to cross the second floor and head downstairs to the ground floor.

Olivia was sitting at her desk when Danny entered. "Hi doctor Murillo."

"Hi Olivia. Call me Danny", Danny called out before he entered the locker room downstairs to stuff his lab coat into locker #3. He put the files into his backpack, put on his jacket and walked back upstairs to the ground floor.

He was about to leave when he heard Olivia. "Uh, Danny?"

"Yeah?"

"You need to register all files leaving the premise. Since they contain confidential information of the 4C and all. We need to be able to trace back our information to keep employees from selling information about the test subjects to the media. Our department is already under fire."

Danny blinked. "Oh. I never even thought of it like that. Of course, where do I register them?"

He walked closer to the counter. Olivia shoved a sheet of paper towards him under the glass window. It stated the test subject's number and the reason for it leaving the building. Danny filled in the numbers quickly; 5, 40, 80 and 99. As a reason, he drew a line and wrote "familiarising with the patients' files" for them all. He handed the sheet with the pen back to Olivia. She gave it a onceover. "Lots of work this weekend, huh?"

"I wanna be prepared for next week", Danny assured her. She gave a satisfied nod. "Good idea. Have a nice weekend, Danny."

"You, too", he called out before he left the building and returned to the normal world.

Chapter Text

Previously on American Tragedy;

As Danny struggles to find his place, he finally meets the infamous Johnny 3 Tears but he's given the silent treatment. So far, the troublemakers seem to consist of an impermeable duo, a modified duo that liked to mess with the doctor and Da Kurlzz who resented Danny for his job

The needle touched the vinyl. Danny watched it carefully, wondering if it would play or not. The record player was ancient, an item that had been around for over a century. It was considered to be ancient back when this one was made as well. In the 1900's, they invented a record player and then in the 2000's, people were suddenly obsessed with integrating record players into speakers. Danny was lucky enough to find one in perfect state, which was a miracle because the thing was produced SEVENTY years ago!

No one used record players anymore. Or cd players. Hell, all music was digital now. The vinyl carefully started spinning and the speakers crackled to life. Danny breathed a sigh of relief. Good. His brother had once called his music taste "prehistoric", because Danny loved to listen to artists from the 1960's and 1970's. He'd once mentioned he loved music from the 60's to a date and she'd been excited they had the same music taste. Until she realised Danny's sixties weren't the 2060's. She'd thought her music had been 'ancient' for being twenty years old, but Danny's were 120 years old. Beat that. He smiled to himself. Saturday had never been more welcome, after this exhausting week. Danny had slept late, hadn't had his phone with him all morning. He'd just been sleeping and once he got up, he cooked himself lunch. He loved to cook, preferred to. It was something that always caused bumps in the road when he was in a relationship. He loved to cook but often, his partner did too and oh "just cook together", right? No, Danny would fucking chase them out of the kitchen with a hiss. He hated cooking together because he wanted to make things his way.

He shook his head at the idea. Lunch had been good, he was definitely full. Now he could enjoy his music, maybe check social media for a bit, check his emails from the 4C.

Why check the emails on a Saturday? Because Danny preferred to know what he was up against this week and if something had happened and one of the weekend wardens was trying to warn him, then he preferred to be prepared. He grabbed his phone and logged into the mail app for work, an app he'd throw off the device once he got his work phone.

Good thing he checked. He had an email.

Breccan Cain

Re: Subject 97, "Da Kurlzz"

Danny jumped when he noticed what the mail was about. He walked to the living room part of the house and sat down on the couch before he opened the message, nervously. He'd worked so hard on his arguments to bench Da Kurlzz. If Cain were to deny him the rest, Danny would… well, he had no idea how he'd respond but he would be pissed.

Dear doctor Murillo,

After thorough consideration and checking your sources – primary sources, I asked doctor Black and doctor Aquaines for their opinion on those experiments conducted years ago – your arguments for Subject 97's leave from experiments are valid reasons to be worried for his mental health.

Therefore I will allow Subject 97 to be inactive for 14 days. Thank you for your research and do not hesitate to contact me again if another test subject is showing concerning symptoms. Please communicate Subject 97's state with doctor Aquaines so he can adapt the experiments scheduled for this week.

Kind regards,

Cain.

Danny blinked at the screen. He got it.

He got it!

He got the 2 week leave! Danny sighed relieved and realised he'd been holding his breath while reading. He felt the need to do a victory dance but kept it in. He couldn't keep the smile off his face though. Man, Da Kurlzz would appreciate that effort and maybe it would improve his behaviour! Or at least, maybe he wouldn't threaten to eat Danny anymore. He shuddered at the thought and got up to open his laptop. He got logged into the 4C's server and searched for the work contact details of the employees.

He skimmed the mail addresses of doctors and phone numbers of wardens until he found the name he most likely needed; Charles Isaac Aquaines. He opened his mail account and typed up a new mail.

To: Charles Aquaines

Dear doctor Aquaines,

Doctor Cain has agreed to allow subject 97 (Da Kurlzz) a break from experiments for his mental health with a duration of two weeks. Please adapt the experiments schedule accordingly if any experiments were planned for Da Kurlzz.

Could you send me a copy of the experiments conducted on my patients?

Thanks in advance!

Kind regards,

Doctor Danny Murillo

Danny gave a satisfied nod to himself before he sent the mail and remained at his computer for a bit. He read over Cain's mail again to make sure he didn't misunderstand, but it was right there. Cain approved of his suggestion. Danny felt successful for once. After a series of horrid appointments, it was a welcome change to be able to help for once. Even if it was just a little bit of help.

Danny briefly considered asking Cain about the Book Technologies change but decided against it. It was none of his business why the 4C had changed their approach so much. Danny ran his internship in fucking 2075, of course things were bound to have changed! That was ten years ago! More or less. Danny shook off the feeling and noticed he vinyl had stopped playing.

He got op to have a look and noticed the needle was stuck. He sighed and manually reset it. He had to press the button three times before it placed the needle back onto the vinyl and the music started playing once more. Danny stopped to stare through the window into his garden. The weather was really nice outside. The summer sun was hitting his garden just right today. He deserved to celebrate his small victory by sitting outside with a drink. He opened the door and stepped out into the sunlight, still glowing from the small victory over his new job at the 4C.

Chapter Text

Previously on American Tragedy;

Danny cries victory over getting permission to change Da Kurlzz' status to inactive

Danny looked at himself in the bathroom mirror. "Tomorrow, the test subjects won't get to me. Tomorrow, I will fucking help them. Whether they like it or not."

Danny briefly winced at how weirdly crazy that sounded and splashed water in his face. He had dreamt of the 4C and woke up, still hearing their laughter. He dreamt his job had been a joke. That there were no psychiatrists at the 4C anymore because the position had become useless since the prison was sold to Book Technologies. That they had hired Danny just to see him struggle, see him fail and laugh at him for entertainment.

God, it had been a horrendous nightmare. Danny shuddered at the idea. Tomorrow he wouldn't be the laughing stock of the test subjects anymore. He would exude professionalism and earn their respect. He took a deep breath and got dressed to head downstairs and have breakfast. He'd never had such a calm Sunday before. At his last job, he'd been forced to take his work home. Sure, Danny took home some files to check out, which he briefly did last night – probably why he dreamt of the 4C, but at his last job, he'd been a workaholic so bad that his last relationship ended because of it.

Said Danny was too busy dating his job.

What a joke.

Danny wondered what to do with the free time. Maybe it was time to give his family a call? Call his brothers? Tell them-… Danny furrowed his eyebrows. Tell them what?

He wasn't allowed to tell them anything. At his last job, he could complain about patients as long as he didn't disclose their names. The 4C? He couldn't even do that because it would tell outsiders confidential stuff about the Department of Experimental Sciences and Test Subjects. The department was already under heavy fire by activists all the time! First animal testing was cruel, then they complain that replacing the death sentence with the 'test subject'-sentence was cruel! People just didn't know what they wanted anymore.

Danny groaned. It would suck if he wasn't allowed to vent about the 4C's patients to anyone who didn't work there. He couldn't possibly talk to Cain or Diamond about this. Diamond always tried to find a solution for his complaints, didn't understand that sometimes Danny just wanted her to say "Damn, Danny, that fucking sucks, dude". He didn't always need solutions. He needed to be able to vent, to complain, to be whiny for once. He smirked at the idea. Though he felt a thought creep up in the back of his head; kinda feels like I'm trapped.

Danny took another deep breath and shook it off. He walked up to the table and grabbed his backpack off the chair. He took out the files he took home and put them on the table. He checked his phone's mails for today but expected none. Who the Hell works on a Sunday, right? Well, except for the weekend shift of the wardens.

Yet he had an email from Doctor Aquaines. The doctor was kind enough to tell him the schedule had been adapted and in the attachment, there was a copy of experiments planned for this week on Danny's patients. Danny opened the file.

There was a test for eyesight planned for Subject 4 of which the goal was briefly described as "Testing of phototransduction in night vision" but it only consisted of a non-invasive protocol of asking Charlie what he could see. Charlie could lie, Danny thought, but he figured the test tinkers knew how to exclude that possibility, right? Maybe a lie detector. There was a food supplement test planned for Subject 5 but it only meant his diet would change for a bit and they'd investigate the effects on his blood levels. It looked harmless enough.

Finally, there was one more experiment planned on subject 80 to… assess toxicity? Danny raised an eyebrow. He opened subject 80's file, one he hadn't touched yet as he'd mostly been reading up on subject 5 last night. Subject 80 was a man nicknamed Putricide, Danny noticed. The file held no burn marks or mysterious notes and nothing seemed to be missing from it either. Danny gave it a onceover quickly. Putricide was sentenced to test subject for mixing all kinds of poison into people's drinks. He'd been making all sorts of chemical cocktails to kill people. Ironically Putricide had developed the modification to change a liquid into any substance with just a touch. Now Danny understood the toxicity assessment. They wanted to check the levels of what Putricide could make with just a touch of the liquid.

Danny went over some of the notes. He noticed words like "narcissism" and "God complex" so he closed the file with a sigh. Great, he was meeting a self-proclaimed God of test subjects. At least he would head inside knowing what mutations awaited him.

Danny had kept the best for last; subject 40. He carefully opened the file to the picture of a blonde lady with fair, pale skin and green eyes. Next to it, a more recent picture. Looking at it, felt like looking at the life cycle of a wilted flower. Her hair was cut unevenly, she had blotches of red on her perfect skin, marks of scratches below her jaw, deep and dark circles around her eyes which sunk back in her skull, giving her a very skeleton-like look. Danny noticed she seemed to have lost weight in the second picture. Makayla J Michaels. Danny looked over the notes. She lost her license as a doctor when she attacked a patient and was admitted to a psych ward of the hospital for her psychotic episodes. After supposedly being rehabilitated, she snapped and killed her household. She seemed to have patches of clarity and episodes of madness which gave her the nickname Doctor Madness. Danny sighed as he looked over the file. No notes. She was new. She had only been at the 4C prison for two weeks and was set to have Danny come see her twice every two weeks. No one had visited her yet because they used to be colleagues and she would not accept a former colleague to assess her mental health. She needed someone who didn't know her to help her deal with the experiments so Danny was the perfect fit as her psychiatrist.

Danny sighed and closed the file. This week was going to be a tough one. He was set to meet Subject 5 – who was Trickster's best friend and accomplice in their murders but Danny was convinced Subject 5 had been the one to put Trickster up to it.

I know exactly what your patients think of you. Even those you have judged to be "harmless" and "put up to their crime by their best friend".

Danny remembered Funny Man's words and swallowed a lump in his throat. What if Trickster's cooperative behaviour had been an act? What if this man was truly a monster below the surface?

What if Funny Man was just messing with his head?

Danny took another deep breath. He couldn't let anyone get inside his head. Don't take your work personal, Danny said to himself, You'll be helping them in ways they can't imagine. Your job matters.

Danny shoved the files back into his backpack and closed his computer. Maybe if he told himself he was helping people at the 4C enough, he'd start to believe it.

Chapter Text

Previously on American Tragedy;

Danny reads into the files of patients he's supposed to meet this week and gets the experiment schedule from doctor Aquaines.

Johnny scratched a pebble over the stone wall opposite of the steel door. He was sitting on the pillow of his bed. He preferred to lay facing the door. Just in case anyone would invade his cell while he slept. He briefly felt the hairs on his skin raise but ignored it. He noticed the pebble drew a white line into the dark grey rock. Johnny sighed and let the pebble drop to the ground. It gave a sound when it hit the surface and was launched under Johnny's bed.

He wished he could draw. Johnny had never been one to draw, not one to work with paint, to sculpt or draw. He'd been someone to play guitar every now and then, but even that was a hobby he never fully indulged himself in. Though since he'd been at the 4C, he had found himself furiously wishing to be able to draw. The stray pebble he had found when he first got into this cell, could draw white lines on the rock wall opposite of the steel door and the white lines would vanish if he rubbed water over it whenever he was allowed to drink.

If he'd been able to draw, he could've…

Johnny dropped his forehead against the wall.

He could've drawn their faces.

Just to remember what they looked like when he could still see them. He scraped his mask along the wall when the familiar ringing ran through the hallway. The cell door unlocked and swung open. Johnny took a deep breath, got up and stood in the door opening. He stopped to chuckle when he saw Charlie. Charlie was carefully feeling around with his feet to make sure he wouldn't trip over something while he held out both his hands. "Don't fucking laugh, the light's bright!"

Johnny dipped into the cell to take Charlie's arm and pulled him into the hallway. "Come here, you dumbass."

Charlie gladly grasped the arm, head shifting in all directions but he couldn't see anything with the light fully turned on. They followed the stream of subjects into the subjects' exit of the floor, dipping them temporarily in darkness. Johnny could hear Charlie draw in a relieved sigh. "You look tired, Johnny."

"I am tired", Johnny said. "Bad night."

"Bad dreams?"

"Bad dreams", Johnny confirmed. Someone turned on the lights of the staircase and Charlie was robbed of his sight once more. Though the lights weren't as bright as they were on the fifth floor so through the sunglasses, Charlie could still catch some of his surroundings. Mostly contours. "Did the guys leave the floor without us?"

"They think you're slow", Johnny chuckled. "You kinda are."

"Next time, take my bandana to blindfold them and we'll race downstairs, alright?"

Johnny laughed at the comment. "Sure thing, I'd love to see that."

"Have them try stairs when blind", Charlie huffed. They reached the outer doors, sided by special force officers and found themselves on the courtyard. At the end, J-Dog and Funny Man were seated on the familiar bench and table. Johnny pointed their way. "There they are."

Charlie directed his face at Johnny. "Wow, thanks, Johnny, I can absolutely see which way you're pointing, asshole."

Johnny took Charlie's wrist and pulled him along as he strode over to the guys. "Hey, dumb fucks, thanks for waiting."

"Half our time outside would be over if we had to wait for you", Funny Man replied. "Where's Kurlzz?"

"Didn't see him", Johnny shrugged. "Infirmary?"

"I didn't either so he must be", J-Dog mused. "Have you guys met Murillo yet?"

"Yeah", Charlie chuckled. "He's afraid of me. For sure."

Funny Man nodded at Johnny. "Cigarettes?"

"Lighter?" Johnny asked in response. Funny Man looked around to see if none of the other subjects were spotting them and when they didn't, he tossed him a lighter. "I fucking love the weekends. Less security, no experiments, no doctors and Mary gets visited by family so she gets us shit."

"And then Monday came", Johnny huffed. "Back to work."

He took out the cigarettes from between his waistband and took one out to light it up. He tossed the box at Funny Man. "I didn't talk to Murillo and it made him uncomfortable."

"It did", Funny Man said before he lit up the cigarette. "I could hear his thoughts from the other side of the hallway. He's trying to find out what your connection to Charlie is because Michaels was onto you two."

"Onto us?" Charlie repeated.

Johnny kicked a stray pebble away. "Murillo doesn't know shit. If he thinks he'll understand us by figuring out we knew each other before the 4C, then he's an idiot."

"I don't know" Funny Man shrugged. "Michaels thought there was a link between you and Charlie's crime, it seems."

Charlie coughed when he inhaled the smoke from the cigarettes and waved it away. "Fucking hell, guys, at least light one for me, will you?"

"Why don't you do it yourself?" Johnny asked.

Charlie grumbled. "Great idea. Give the blind dude a lighter."

Da Kurlzz finally joined the bunch, no one had seen him coming their way. "Infirmary", he said when he walked up to them. "What did I miss?"

"Funny Man smells Murillo's desperation", Charlie said before he took a lit cigarette from Funny Man. "And we've got a lighter. Funny Man fixed us one yesterday."

"Awesome", Da Kurlzz replied before leaning in to take one. Johnny stopped him. "First tell us about your meeting with Murillo."

Da Kurlzz shrugged. "Not interesting. Told him I wanted to eat him."

Johnny took away his arm. "Good answer. Have one."

"How'd he react to your mind reading? Did anyone tell him in advance?" Da Kurlzz asked Funny Man while he took and lit a cigarette as well. Security really didn't care enough to do anything about it. Funny Man had read their thoughts about it.

"No one told him" Funny Man smirked. "Dude was checking me out when he noticed I responded to every thought he had."

"He was?" Johnny laughed. "Oh man, that must've been embarrassing."

"Definitely", Funny Man confirmed.

J-Dog looked up at the sky. The sun was scorching hot over these grounds and the inmates were trying their hardest not to look at the subjects, they could tell. Funny Man lay back onto the table, looking into the cloudless sky. "I wish we'd be informed of experiments sometimes."

"Me too", J-Dog said. "Not knowing when your name's up for something is nerve wrecking."

"Agreed", Da Kurlzz stared down at his feet. "Last week they had me injected with some random shit just to test the efficiency of their new components in the solution."

"After your recent mod developed?" J-Dog asked.

"Yeah", Funny Man said, wincing when he did. "Sorry, I know I should stop replying for someone else but it's hard when I know the answers already."

"Then stop listening to our thoughts, asshole", Johnny punched him. Funny Man tried to punch him back but hit the air instead.

J-Dog blinked at Da Kurlzz. "It sucks they used you for that one."

"Yeah", Da Kurlzz sighed. "I know it was just some placebo and it wasn't going to do much, but I just… I couldn't calm down."

"Pussy", Charlie snorted.

"Strong coming from someone whose mouth is always duct taped during experiments", Johnny teased.

For the rest of the two hours there wasn't much to do. It was a boring day. Usually on a less boring day, someone would get into a fight and they'd start betting stuff on who would win – stuff Mary got for them or Simon Lauren. If they were lucky, special forces had to rip them apart or get involved.

Sometimes doctors or wardens would be present on the first floor in the cafeteria but it was afternoon already so no entertainment from them. Monday was the first day of the work week so the resources had to be replenished at the 4C and the garbage cans were empty. If not, the gang could always see if there were something to find in the storage space beneath the building. The storage space was a space accessible from the courtyard but from inside the building as well.

Though there was no way to escape there because the door was heavily locked and could only unlock with a badge from the staff. It was a small, secluded area with garbage cans for the staff to use, for subjects to use – if Simon got them a snack as a reward for example. Not a lot of staff members used that space when subjects were out though, they were too afraid of subjects waiting for them to attack them.

Like that would happen.

"I wish something would happen around here. Not speaking of experiments but just… entertainment, you know? Do you think we could ask Lauren for a tv? For internet?" Funny Man wondered.

"For internet", J-Dog repeated. "As if he would allow us internet. Some of us committed cybercrimes, you know."

"That's true", Funny Man shrugged. The fivesome gave an annoyed groan in unison when the bell rang. "Fucking feels like elementary school's recess with that bell", Johnny huffed. "I'm not a kid."

"No, you're a big boy capable of murder", Funny Man teased but when Johnny glared back at him and he held up his hands in defence. "Murder by glaring, obviously. Not trying to guess your crime."

"Fuck off, Funny Man", Johnny grumbled. They did their walk of shame back inside and upstairs, hurried to by the special forces and wardens. Getting the subjects outside was easy but back inside? Not all of them liked it. They held their heads low, tried not to be noticed by them. Charlie noticed the corridor of the fifth floor's lights were still out when they entered the floor so when Funny Man wanted to split off to his cell, Charlie tripped him.

"Dude!" Funny Man complained. The lights flickered on and Charlie looked around like he didn't know what to point his gaze at. "What? Can't hear you over the sound of I'm day-blind, idiot!"

The other four laughed before J-Dog and Da Kurlzz were back in their cells as well. They had learned it the hard way what happens if they don't go back to their own cells. Charlie still had a scar on his lower back somewhere from when he'd entered cell 3 after two hours on the courtyard.

They entered their respective cells and when the wardens checked the floor, the cell doors shut automatically again. Johnny breathed a sigh, back behind bars. "Hey Johnny?"

"Yeah?"

"You never shared your thoughts on Murillo's personality with me. Since he was listening in and all", Charlie wondered.

Johnny chuckled before he took off his mask. His face was ducked below the window, forehead against the cold steel of the door. "Yeah?"

"Well, what did you think?"

Johnny wanted to smile and reply with something nasty but the smile didn't come when he stared down at his mask. "I bet he became a psych because he likes to think he can help others, since he can't seem to help himself. I bet he's just as pathetic as us, with a void in his heart but working keeps him from thinking about his own life lacking… lacking everything. That's just a hunch I get from him."

"You think that guy has no family at home waiting for him?"

"I'm sure", Johnny's voice nearly reduced to a whisper before he clicked his mask back onto his face. "Or maybe he did at some point, but I bet his work came first."

Johnny shrugged to himself. "Or I'm all wrong."

He turned away from the steel door and heard nothing from Charlie. The floor was void of any sound. No subjects talking. Just Johnny in cell 3, Charlie in cell 4 and doctor Danny Murillo by the door as he had heard everything.

Chapter Text

Previously on American Tragedy;

The guys have their fun with sharing experiences about Danny over a smoke, though Johnny and Charlie haven't got a clue Danny heard everything they said about him.

Danny already had an exhausting day. He met up with subject 5 in the morning and it hadn't… gone according to plan either. Subject 5 was nicknamed Miss Jackson, the fiery redhead best friend of Trickster who worked on disposal of Trickster's bodies after he killed them.

Danny still didn't believe Trickster was the one who murdered them all, but it was none of his business who committed the actual murders. The point was that both of them had killed a dozen of people. Miss Jackson had been a joy.

"So what did you talk about with Trick, huh? I bet it was about me", he'd said as soon as Danny entered the fifth cell. Danny could've sworn he heard Charlie Scene chuckle from across the hallway but he convinced himself it were his thoughts playing a trick on him. Most of the appointment, Miss Jackson had been an absolute nightmare to deal with. Moments of clarity mixed with paranoia, aggression brought into the equation. Danny couldn't help but sigh when he left the cell and then he felt guilty for doing so.

Though the afternoon appointment hadn't been much better. Subject 80 was… something.

"Do you have some water for me?"

"No, you're not allowed to have water."

"Why not?"

"You know why."

Putricide seemed insulted but smirked. "Ah, I get it. You're scared. I'd be scared too if I met a God. Of course, I am the God."

"Why do you think you're God?"

"I can turn water into wine. Literally!"

Danny had rubbed his eyes. "That was God's son."

"Surely he must've inherited some of that from daddy-me."

"Putricide, you are not…. Why are you called Putricide?"

"Because I kill all that is putrid on judgement day. The rest is allowed entrance into Heaven. Have you never heard of judgement day, doctor?"

Danny had tried his best to stay calm with that one and this had only been a small part of the interactions with Putricide. It got a lot worse when he began preaching sin to Danny. It's a sin to lock him up! It was His will to see people die after he mixed their drinks with horrible substances!

So let's say Danny's day had already gone to Hell. Not because he was failing or because he felt bad about himself, no, because the patients had been particularly exhausting. Appointments were set closer to one another now that Danny was adapting to the 4C's environment with at least three patients a day. He'd entered the fifth floor for his final appointment of the day after the subjects came back from the courtyard break and then he'd heard it.

He'd heard Johnny talk about him.

Talk about how Danny became a psych because he couldn't help himself but wanted to help others. That he was a workaholic to compensate for something he lacked or that he must've had someone waiting for him at home until his work took up the first place.

It wasn't surprising the patients would slander the doctor like that but it was surprising how right Johnny was.

Danny never wanted to be alone with his thoughts, never knew how to handle himself when alone so he'd submerse himself in work so much that his high school sweetheart, his wife, had complained. Danny hadn't paid much attention to it until he had realised what he lost by continuously choosing his work over her. And now?

Now he had no one waiting for him at home.

Not even the dog they used to own.

He sighed, heading downstairs to return to his office. Johnny would have been a good psych if he would've been interested in helping people. He definitely had the observing eye for it.

"Ah Danny!"

Danny whipped his head up to look into Cain's bearded face. "Doctor Cain!"

"Good to see you. I was about to email you. Your work phone arrived", Cain said. Danny had bumped into him when he'd reached the third floor by stairs on his way back to his office. Cain came from the third floor's door and brought along all kinds of sounds from the third floor. "Sorry, noisy bunch", Cain smiled when a particular loud shout broke through to the hallway. "If you have some time, I can give you the phone."

"I've got time. I've seen the patients I needed to see. Just some paperwork left to do", Danny shrugged.

"How are things going? I know we're not really guiding you closely right now but I have faith you still know the drill and I'd like to think you would ask for help if need be", Cain asked while he walked up front. Danny followed. "Yes, they're going. I'm not really having any difficulties keeping up with what to do and protocol or anything but the patients are definitely unusual."

"Some definitely are", Cain chuckled. "But it's good to see that you're adapting well."

Adapting well is kind of an overstatement.

Danny struggled to keep up with Cain's pace when they reached the second floor, heading into the maze of offices. "So much has changed in 10 years. The nicknames, the files, the staff… It takes some time to get used to it", Danny expressed before hastily adding: "But I'm sure I will soon."

"I'm sure you will", Cain agreed before rounding the corner into his office. Danny took it in but there wasn't much to see. Nothing on the walls, not much furniture except for his desk with the computer and a chair with some cabinets for files. You'd expect him to decorate his office a little, but it looked bare. As if no one worked there.

Cain took a box off his desk and handed it to Danny. "Your new work phone."

"Thank you", Danny took it. "I hope these patients open up sometimes. Some of them are just so closed off. I feel like I could really help them."

"Some patients don't want to be helped, Danny", Cain sighed. "You need to remember that these patients are the worst of the worst society had to offer. These people would have been sentenced to death sixty years ago."

"I know", Danny mused. "But still. We are here for a reason. I want to matter."

"You matter", Cain assured him. "You helped Da Kurlzz with a two week recovery."

"Right", Danny perked up. "Thanks, doctor Cain."

"Anytime."

Danny turned around to walk away when Cain called for him. "You can see the subjects on the courtyard from the cafeteria on the first floor."

"I am aware, doctor", Danny said. "Doctor Diamond took me there for lunch on my first day."

"You should watch them from the first floor sometimes without distractions. I always find I can better prepare for a meeting with a patient once I've seen them interact in group on the courtyard. Maybe your difficult patients would show some interesting behaviour on the field that you otherwise wouldn't pick up on in a cell", Cain advised him.

Danny looked down at the phone box in his hands. "I never even thought of it like that. Thanks for the advice. I will."

Chapter Text

Previously on American Tragedy;

Danny has turbulent meetings with Miss Jackson and Putricide. Johnny is right about Danny. Danny gets his work phone and Cain advises him to assess the patients' group behaviour to learn a thing or two from what they do.

There was a loud ringing reverbing through the building and Danny whipped his head up immediately. It was the sound of the subjects going outside for two hours. This was his chance to follow up on Cain's advice to watch them from the cafeteria.

Well, since they were going to be out for two hours at least, Danny decided to finish up on the paperwork that was left to do about the subjects he'd met today. He had to fill in when he'd seen who and what had happened. It was this sort of agenda he'd made for himself to keep track of things.

He checked the time once he was done. The subjects hadn't been out for two hours yet so he locked up his office and flew down the flight of stairs, took the elevator to the first floor and followed the narrow hallway into the cafeteria. It was empty as it was late in the afternoon. Some of the doctors and wardens had gone home already and the late shift of wardens had arrived but Danny was still there. He had wanted to see the patients outside like Cain had mentioned.

The courtyard was full of patches of subjects communicating with one another. Some loners stood by themselves. Some were playing sports, some were fighting but nothing major that needed intervening. It took a few minutes before Danny spotted some of his patients. There were Miss Jackson and Trickster in the corner. From Miss Jackson's closed posture Danny could tell that he wouldn't take kindly to any subjects trying to mingle into his conversation with Trickster. Trickster himself seemed distant.

There was a part of the 4C building that stretched a roof over part of the courtyard – maybe in case it rained? – and it was were Danny could see Putricide leading against the pole supporting the roof. He had no subjects with him. Guess he was one of the loners.

By the border to the courtyard of the inmates of the actual 4C prison, Danny found the five sitting on a bench you'd typically find in a park and eat lunch in the sunlight. J-Dog and Funny Man sat on top of the table, feet resting on the bench part of the table. Johnny and Charlie leaned against the fence and Da Kurlzz stood in between the two pairs, facing the four. J-Dog didn't seem to talk much while Funny Man would often take the word and earn some form of negative response from the others but it all seemed in good humour.

When Charlie spoke, he would look around without seeing anything, a sort of helpless motion. Maybe he did it to convey just how helpless he felt without his sight? Danny couldn't be sure but Johnny surprised him. He hadn't wanted to talk to doctor Murillo but on the courtyard, he was talking to his friends, talking to other subjects who came up to them and even to inmates across the fence! All in thirty minutes time before the ringing of the bell signalled the end of their break. Danny didn't know what to do with that information at first but it looked like Johnny wasn't the type to be against social interaction at all. He'd been laughing, possibly even making jokes as the others had laughed after he said something.

He needs more attention than once a week.

Danny rushed back through the narrow corridor and into the elevator, ran upstairs and bumped into a warden. Danny was panting, completely out of breath and couldn't say much but he held up his hand to draw the warden's attention. It was none other than the familiar green-haired man himself. Danny took a deep breath. "Simon, are you busy?"

"Nope", he replied, giving Danny a onceover. He wasn't used to being ambushed by a doctor in the hallway after all.

"Come with me, please", Danny requested before he headed into the second floor offices and into his own. Simon followed cluelessly while Danny sat down behind his desk to bring up his emails. "Doctor Murillo?"

"Yes?"

"Why did you need me?"

Danny looked up. "Oh, I need you to accompany me but first I need to let doctor Cain know I'll be increasing Johnny's appointments per week."

"Do you have a valid motivation for that?" Simon asked.

"Yes, he needs familiarising before he'll open up so I want to accelerate the process. Every second counts when your patient could be hiding information detrimental to their mental health, physical health or experimental data", Danny replied and he typed exactly that into an email for Cain. He was allowed to do that, right? Doctor Madness also had two appointments per week because she was new and needed it.

Simon shrugged. "You're the doctor. You know best."

"I'm glad you feel that way because we're visiting Johnny right now", Danny said before he closed the emails and locked the office back up. Simon carried a worried frown. "You want to visit Johnny 3 Tears now? Doctor, most of your colleagues have left or are preparing to leave. It is 6 pm. Hell, I just arrived for the evening shift."

"I know but I have a fairly busy schedule this week and if I want to increase his appointments, it needs to be today or else it'll be too close to his originally planned appointment on Wednesday", Danny argued.

Simon nodded. "Alright, then I'm coming with you."

Danny was thrilled to head upstairs to the fifth floor with mr. Lauren following him but to say he was thrilled to see Johnny, wasn't entirely true. It was more like Danny was thrilled to see that Johnny wasn't a quiet type in a group so there was hope for the continuation of their meetings.

Danny entered the fifth floor, getting nasty glared from the first two cells and when they made noise, he saw Charlie appear in the window of his door. "Who's there?"

"Some doctor", came the reply from the first cell. Charlie fell back into his cell, not interested.

Simon knocked his fist onto the door of cell 3. "Visitor, Johnny."

He unlocked the door and let Danny enter. Danny had felt confident in his decision before but being there again, in cell 3, he felt the confidence drain within seconds. Johnny 3 Tears had been sitting on the end of his bed, back turned to the steel door and pebble in hand. He dropped the pebble and turned around to look. He said nothing, did not even show a sign of surprise when he saw Danny but turned back to face the wall.

Danny cleared his throat. "Johnny."

Johnny turned to sit in a normal position and face the doctor. It was strange how little that mask on his face revealed about his expressions. Danny fully had to focus on his body language to know anything about his non-verbal responses. Now that he had Johnny's attention, he sat down on the chair again. "I'm here because I know you're not the quiet type you've shown yourself to be to me. You're very talkative, very sociable. I've seen so on the courtyard. I thought that maybe you needed some adjustment to a change of doctor before you would open up and share something with me."

Johnny stared at Danny, didn't even blink.

"So I'm here. To hopefully help you get used to me so that we can improve your mental health sooner than later when dealing with these experiments", Danny smiled gently, despite the nerves.

Nothing.

Silence.

"I'm here to help", Danny sighed. "But it's okay if you don't want to talk. Not everyone's comfortable talking to me at first. Or maybe you don't know what to say but if that's the case than you can say anything, even if it's just a little story or something you miss about the outer world, a test subject you dislike or someone you like. It doesn't matter. I'm here to listen. I've had patients like you before", Danny said.

Johnny scoffed at that, a response at last. Danny continued; "I've had patients like you before. They don't talk for a dozen meetings and then… they do. It's usually because it hides a deep pain inside. I'm telling you. I'm here to help and the sooner you open up, the sooner I can help you assess your mental health."

Johnny balled his fists at that and Danny swallowed a lump before he continued. "Peace of mind can do a lot for you."

Johnny got up so aggressively, Danny nearly fell backwards with chair and all when Johnny yelled. "I don't need peace of mind! I need MY FREEDOM!"

Chapter Text

Previously on American Tragedy;

Johnny's group behaviour is in contrast with his behaviour when he sees Danny so Danny drags Simon Lauren with him for an additional meeting with Johnny. Johnny is not happy to see him.

The blankets were too constricting, too warm and Danny could hear the branch of the tree next door tap the window. Just this continuous… tap tap tap silence tap tap tap silence tap tap tap wind whistling. Damn, it was really windy tonight and Danny really didn't like that.

Whenever there was too much wind, he had to close his window because there would be this horrible clanking noise of the curtain ring against the metal bar. God, he absolutely hated that noise but since it was the middle of summer, he kinda needed the breeze. Though unfortunately he preferred the silence over the breeze.

Danny turned over in his bed for the sixth time and he really didn't know why he was so hyper focused on the noise or not being able to sleep. He could feel his mind wandering and going back to the situation in the 4C. He felt like his days were going quickly, yet insanely slow. Tomorrow he'd have been there for a week already.

Crazy!

Especially if he thought back of the second time he saw Johnny. I don't need peace of mind! I need my freedom!

Danny knew he could be very pushy and persistent on making a patient talk. He just wanted to be able to help so bad. He wanted to know more and it took every bit of himself not to push his patient to talk. He had to calm down and just let time do its thing.

Though he didn't know how time would end up fixing that he was getting owned by all these modified individuals. He had to figure out how to compose himself around J-Dog, who made him spill all kinds of truths he didn't want him to know. Or Funny Man! Who could read the truths in his mind, even if he didn't want him to.

Da Kurlzz may calm down now that he got his two weeks off thanks to Danny but who knows. Maybe he'd still want to eat Danny anyway. What are 2 weeks off in comparison to the time he had spent here already anyway? Danny felt like he considered the two weeks off to be such a huge favour to the subject when it really wasn't like that at all.

Putricide was an absolute nightmare modification-wise as well. Danny had to remember to never bring any liquid in with him or he could be poisoned in a second. Danny blinked into the darkness and finally found a position he liked. He took a deep breath and closed his eyes, spinning through the patients he'd seen in the past week and the advices he'd been given. It seemed like he was more on top of his mood now and he refused to be toyed with this week. Johnny may have yelled at him, but venting is a form of therapy too and Johnny really needed to get that out of his system, it seemed.

The thoughts slowly drifted into the abstract as he finally felt the calm sense of peace wash over him in the form of sleep.

Just silence and calm in the black of the darkness. Until the darkness began to swirl in shades of black and grey and Danny found himself sitting at a bar.

Danny ordered a drink from the bartender, just this quiet man who didn't speak to him. Above the shelves of liquor, was an old tv. An ancient television. It wasn't even flat. The kind of television from a hundred years ago. Danny didn't know what was playing on there but it looked like some kind of official giving an interview as a huge building rose up behind him.

Danny furrowed his eyebrows. "Why am I here?"

The bartender looked up and Danny turned his face to him. "Why am I at a bar tonight?"

The bartender shrugged.

Danny shrugged back and sipped his drink. It had been a beer a second ago, now it was a glass of water but he didn't notice the difference in taste, colour or glass. It was like it hadn't changed. Danny spun around on the barstool to face away from the bar. It was crowded. So crowded you could barely walk.

There was a green-haired man by the door and a blonde woman who looked like she was exhausted and about to fall asleep. Or drop dead. Who knows. Danny skimmed the crowd to find familiar faces. Airia was in the back with Trickster, clearly involved in an argument. She looked like she was about to hit him in the face but Miss Jackson stood behind him, ready to defend if he needed to.

Danny blinked, slowly. The bar was empty.

The bar was empty except for a man with wild curly hair and blue eyes, looking right at Danny. "Hello."

"Hi", Danny said. He didn't even notice the bar was empty now. "What are you doing here?"

"Enjoying life", Da Kurlzz replied. He smiled. His teeth were perfectly white, like those from a toothpaste commercial. Danny couldn't help but smile back. "Oh, before I forget to tell you! I put you on inactive for two weeks."

"Inactive?"

"For experiments", Danny replied, furrowing his eyebrows. He felt like a thought was escaping his mind and he didn't remember why he was saying what came out of his mouth. Why was he talking about experiments at a bar with a random man whose name he magically knew?

"Experiments?" Da Kurlzz repeated. "What world do you live in?"

A weird one.

It was just a thought but it drifted out into the open, into the air and it hit the person sitting next to Da Kurlzz. The man hadn't been sitting there before, but now he was. "Hi Danny."

"Hi Funny Man."

Funny Man smiled too. Something seemed strange about him, just like Da Kurlzz seemed strange. They held dead eyes.

Just a dull look of lifelessness. As if they had lived and they had died. Danny swallowed a lump in his throat. "W-what's going on?"

"Just an improvement. An instalment of nicknames and a system. An expansion of the prison. Book Technologies will be good for all of us", came a voice, low and detached from what Danny could see. He turned around and the bar was crowded again. He was looking at Charlie, standing half-hidden behind Johnny. Johnny's mask held an unsettling grin and the butterfly came loose to fly away and into one of the bar's lamps. "Have you joined the corporate rat race yet?"

Danny turned around when he heard it, J-Dog standing behind him. "Have you?"

"What?"

J-Dog repeated his words but it sounded like someone had turned the rewinding of a tape into baritone. Like hearing words through a watery swirl of vibrations, low and pleasantly ticklish to the skin. "What?"

Again.

"Wh-What?"

"I can better assess a subject's group behaviour from the first floor."

Danny spun around again, finding Breccan Cain staring at him with his hands behind his back. The bar was empty again. No one there except for Cain. He smiled but the smile kept growing until it was out of proportion and twisting his face in a swirl. Danny frowned to himself. This isn't real. I was going to bed just a minute ago.

Wake up, Danny.

The swirl mingled with the surroundings when Danny's eyes fluttered open and he was left staring at the alarm clock besides his bed, shifting to 4:33 am. Danny sighed. Just a dream.

Just a nightmare.

Chapter Text

Previously on American Tragedy;

Danny has a nightmare about… well who knows what that was about. His patients being unsettlingly happy and a bar.

Danny was tired.

No, that was an understatement. After the weirdest nightmare in ages, Danny hadn’t slept anymore. The sleeplessness made him nervous because every hour lost to insomnia, was an hour he’d feel the next day at work and well, he was set to meet doctor Michaels for her very first appointment.

No other doctor had entered her cell yet. They wanted to spare her the pain of meeting old colleagues as her doctors so they had eagerly awaited Danny’s arrival. Danny knew it was in doctor Michaels best interest but still, it almost seemed as if he was being thrown to the lions by treating a new arrival before anyone else got to assess her.

The advantage was that she hadn’t endured any experiments yet so maybe she would be less apprehensive to talk to Danny.

Danny sighed deeply before going up to cell 40. Virginia was accompanying him today. Danny had seen her walk the fifth floor and he’d been tempted to ask the lady if she was lost and needed help, but Virginia DeMonel was not lost. She was usually assigned to the third floor as she was the best at keeping rebellious subjects at bay, but it seemed like she occasionally drifted to the fifth floor. Danny had no clue why but she looked caught when he’d seen her. Danny actually thought she was a wanderer instead of a warden, which was dumb because the prison had a very tight security system, but she was just… a very… mature lady. Very… grey, for a lack of better wording. A silver lady, Danny tried to tone it down but he only made it sound like a B-movie villain.

Virginia turned out to be his warden for this appointment. She wasn’t very chatty. Though she’d told Danny she would accompany him to Doctor Madness today and to Johnny 3 Tears tomorrow. After that, it was time for Danny to do his thing by himself and only call on wardens if he didn’t trust a certain subject not to harm him. Wardens weren’t made to stand outside after all. Danny had only been joined by one for every appointment as a precaution for a new guy. Starting tomorrow afternoon, Danny was on his own with the camera security keeping the subjects in check and the wardens patrolling the floor to come to his aid.

Sounds horrible. But the subjects know what happens if they attack staff. Danny was curious to find out but not first-hand, of course. He’d ask someone at some point. He was glad enough to hear from DeMonel that his request to see Johnny 3 Tears more often was approved by Cain.

“Let’s go”, Danny agreed when she opened the door to cell 40. Doctor Michaels, a shadow of her former picture, sat in the corner on the floor of her cell. She had her arms wrapped around her legs tightly, rocking herself slightly. She was whispering to herself and Danny caught some of it.

It’s okay, It’s okay, It’s okay.

Danny pulled up a chair. “Doctor?”

He winced when he used the term. She had been stripped of her medical license so he wasn’t allowed to call her a doctor anymore but he hushed himself by remembering her nickname included the title, too.

“Yes?”

“I’m doctor Danny Murillo. I will be your psychiatrist from now on.”

She breathed a sigh of relief. “You’re the psych? Oh thank goodness. I thought they came to get me for my first experiment.”

The fear struck her eyes like a pebble in green seas but lessened after she realised she wasn’t in danger. She nervously tucked a strand of blond hair behind her ear but it dropped to her face again. Danny looked around and found several plucks of hair lying around. He cocked his head to look at her. “Doctor Michaels-…”

“Don’t call me that”, she hissed, looking like a deer caught in headlights. Her eye twitched every now and then and she had a nervous motion in her mouth as she spoke. “I left that name behind when I lost everyone. I am not Makayla Michaels. I’m not even her shadow. I’m…”, she paused. “Madness”, she whispered to herself before a sob broke through. Danny swallowed a lump in his throat. “Doctor Madness?”

“Thank you”, she said.

“Obviously you’re still adjusting to the situation. How have you been dealing with the changes?” Danny asked, carefully. He barely knew what to talk about with someone who’d recently been admitted to the prison. He felt a sudden heat creep up his neck when he wondered about modifications but she hadn’t been tested on yet. She couldn’t read his mind or make him spill truths or… Danny found his mind wandering and brought himself back to Doctor Madness who spilled a lot of thoughts, but not every one of them was coherent.

She seemed to sink into a different world when Danny asked her that question. She said something about the 4C being the nine circles of Hell and she had tried to escape her destiny so life brought her back to her destiny but now as a sinner in Hell. That she died when she committed her crime. When she killed her household.

Danny barely had to say anything to get her to vent about the situation.

She took a deep breath before she got up and out of the corner to sit on the bed. “I’m sorry. I know I’m a mess. The subjects caught me at a very fragile state of mind and to think that they are now my peers, is unsettling to say the least.”

Danny raised his eyebrows in surprise when she finally seemed to compose herself a little better. Doctor Madness cleared her throat. “I hope you’ll never have to deal with my patients.”

“I am dealing with all of your patients”, Danny replied. He felt like he was on thin ice but if anyone understood what it was like to deal with all these patients at once, it was doctor Michaels – or Madness, whatever. Doctor Madness lowered her gaze to the floor. “Before I… snapped, I was insecure and looking for confirmation in my patients. Don’t do that. Funny Man read my mind and used it to destroy me.”

“How did you deal with his modification before?” Danny asked. “He just reads my mind to get under my skin, I’m sure, but still.”

Doctor Madness shook her head. “I can give you advice. I can tell you how to get through the modification barrier of these patients, but I won’t do it for nothing.”

“For what then?” Danny asked. He questioned his moral judgment there for a second but what harm could it do to know how to get past the modifications?

“I need you to look into an inmate.”

“A subject?”

“No. An inmate of the small prison department. I believe he was convicted to a lifetime of prison for a crime he didn’t commit”, she sighed. “Will you have someone look into it and report back to me? Maybe even get someone to reopen the case and check?”

“I… I can’t promise it’ll work but I can try”, Danny said. He knew he needed to be careful with promises because she could ask him something impossible if she suddenly lost her moment of clarity. “You don’t want to tell me about it yet because you need to know if I’ll look into it first, right?”

“Right. If I give you my information, you may not try hard enough to help my case”, Doctor Madness smiled carefully. “You help me. I help you. Will you look into this inmate?”

“I’ll try. Who is he?” Danny asked.

“Tyler Michaels.”

Chapter Text

Previously on American Tragedy;

Doctor Madness agreed to give doctor Murillo intel on how to deal with her former patients if Murillo could help her prove the innocence of Tyler Michaels.

Danny wasn't sure what to do at first. He'd experienced numerous of patients in the past claiming all sorts of things about people in their environment who didn't actually exist to anyone but themselves. It had always made Danny weary of believing a patient who appeared to be delirious on a lot of occasions. Sadly, Doctor Madness was no exception to that. While the woman had her moment of clarity, the episodes in between proved to be more than unsettling and reason enough to distrust her input. Then why would you ask her for advice on the patients? Because asking couldn't hurt. If she ended up providing Danny useless tips and tricks for the patients, Danny could just ignore it and move on, figure out a way to deal with them himself. Though if she provided useful intel, he could apply it. There was literally nothing left to lose by asking for her advice on these patients.

So Danny did some digging on a man by the name of Tyler Michaels who Doctor Madness claimed to be her brother.

There was indeed an inmate by the name of Tyler Michaels in the 4C prison next to the experimental department in the database and it seemed as if he'd been there a while already. It wasn't hard to believe this could be her actual brother as they shared a last name. He was certainly sentenced a few years before Doctor Madness lost her marbles and ended up convicted herself. It didn't state clearly why Tyler was sentenced to a lifetime in prison, so there was no telling what he could've possibly been wrongfully convicted for. Danny wasn't even sure if he were wrongfully convicted. He knew it could be quite a shock for family members to realise their relative was capable of crime.

As ironic as that statement was considering Doctor Madness murdered her household and landed herself a position as test subject many years later. Danny believed Doctor Madness wanted him to be innocent but he wasn't sure if Tyler was innocent at all. If anyone were to tell Danny that Rigo had murdered someone, he would've claimed blasphemy, too. Even if it were true.

Danny shifted through various windows of the databases trying to find out more about Tyler's crime and looking for people qualified to investigate this issue for him. Someone with a direct connection to the authorities would likely be more capable of helping Doctor Madness with her brother than a psychiatrist like Danny. Danny sighed, sieving file after file after file for useful information. The main server must've registered the strangest activity for him as no doctor ever had tried to read every single file in the database. No one ever looked at loads of these old files in the database unless something really sketchy was going on. God, Danny hoped he wouldn't get called into Cain's office for doing this.

He took a deep breath and paused. Who could help me here?

A warden? Unlikely. Definitely no doctors. Danny cocked his head. Special forces? He hadn't considered those yet. He dug into the files of the special forces, feeling the urge to yell out his delight when he found a name that could help him.

Esperanza S. – Special officer.

Danny skimmed her description. She'd had a successful career so far and had always been known to be a feisty defender of innocent inmates, re-opening cases as she saw fit and helping wrongfully convicted inmates fight their sentence. The same could not be said for test subjects. The test subject sentence was final. Once a person received the test subject sentence, they were declared legally dead and registered as such. Literally wiped from existence and given a new name. So what if someone gets wrongfully sentenced? The process of being sentenced to test subject was very tedious and detailed. It was very difficult to be wrongfully convicted for these type of crimes, although it might've still happened in the past. Danny knew of no cases like that and a chilling thought ran down his spine; They would never let you know they made a mistake so horrible.

He shook it off. If anyone could help him out with the Tyler Michaels situation, it was Esperanza. He inspected her picture in her file and closed the tabs. He checked the time. He'd look for her later.

It was about time he met with DeMonel for his second visit with Johnny this week, third in total. He headed upstairs to the fifth floor, finding DeMonel waiting by Cell 3. She gave him a greeting nod and unlocked the door as she let him in, closing it carefully behind him when he slipped inside.

Johnny lied sprawled on his back on the bed and lifted his head when the door opened. He jolted upright when he noticed who had entered. "Doctor Murillo."

"Johnny 3 Tears", Danny replied, mustering all of the dominating energy he could, to sound professional and not fazed at all by Subject 3. He pulled up a chair while Johnny shifted into a sitting position, resting his elbows on his knees. "Another visit?"

"Yes. Does that bother you?"

Johnny made a humming noise that sounded neither affirmative nor negative. He adjusted the mask on his face for a second and it crossed Danny's mind it must've been uncomfortable to wear. Danny offered Johnny a smile. "How are you today?"

Johnny blinked at him, slowly. It was the only response Danny could actually see beneath the mask but it was clear Johnny thought his question was stupid. Johnny leaned back against the wall. "It's the third time I've seen you but you haven't visited J-Dog, Funny Man, Da Kurlzz or even Charlie for a second time. They haven't even shown you a fraction of what they could do to you and yet you're already too scared to go."

Danny cocked his head and drew up his eyebrows in surprise. "I am not scared of them. You just need more time with me than they do."

He could feel Johnny's smirk, although he didn't know if the man was actually smirking at him.

"You're favouring me", Johnny said. Danny could hear the smile in his voice but didn't show any sign of surprise. He kept a straight face. Johnny leaned forward again. "Maybe you like me the most because I've been unresponsive", Johnny wondered aloud. "Are you fascinated by a quiet patient?"

How ironic of him to ask after speaking more words now than he has all week, Danny thought. Johnny continued. "Maybe you need validation from your patients to know you're doing well. I know the guys have been making you feel insecure about your talents. It drives you away from them because you don't know how to deal with that. You're used to helping people."

There was a clear mocking tone to the last two words and Danny subconsciously clenched his jaw.

"Maybe you favour me because I'm the only one who hasn't told you your job is useless. I'm the only one who hasn't crushed your hopes of being a good doctor, a good help, for this hellhole", Johnny nearly spat out the final word, showing clear dismay for this place.

Danny gritted his teeth. "You're awfully chatty today. I thought you were the quiet, unresponsive one?"

Johnny dropped his face in his hands, the anger-fuelled rant seemed to slowly dissolve into something a lot less venomous. "I am fucking bored, doc. You're the first piece of fresh meat to come here in years. What fun is it to stay quiet if I can get under your skin instead?"

Danny's expression softened. "Like Charlie. He's been using the same tactic to talk to me as a defence mechanism."

Johnny chuckled but it came out cold and detached. "Of course, Charlie does."

Johnny sighed and covered his face with a hand, keeping his thumb on one side of the mask and middle finger on the other. "I might as well talk. I have nothing left to lose, doctor. I have nothing left to fight for. I've been stripped of my life, my freedom, my dignity…", Johnny clicked the mask off his face. Danny's eyes grew wide, listening carefully. Johnny held the mask in hand, still staring at his feet. "I thought it would be soothing to lose my mirror image. Blur the man I used to be and forget the life I left behind. Keep nothing but Charlie."

He looked up at Danny. Danny inhaled sharply but tried to maintain his composure, keeping a straight face while his eyes skimmed over every jagged line, engraved in Johnny's heavily scarred face, looking as if the lines were carved and burned from the inside out. Not a single spot left untouched. Johnny's intense blue eyes were engraved in a sad expression but the corners of his mouth pulled up a pitiful smile. "I was wrong."

Without the mask, his emotions were a lot more obvious and the tension in his expression conveyed the insecurity his lack of familiar mirror image had caused him. "It hurt a lot more than I thought to lose my mirror image. Besides Charlie, it was all I had left of my humanity. The only proof I once knew freedom."

Danny nodded slowly, afraid to tear into the raw moment with his words. "You lost a part of yourself you had wanted to keep."

Johnny clicked the mask back onto his face. "Was that the kind of crap you wanted to hear from me, doctor? My sob story?"

Danny felt Johnny's guard rise as he hid behind a wall of humour once more. Johnny shook his head. "At least you've got a juicy story to put into my dumpster fire disaster file. Not like there was anything left of it after the fire."

Chapter Text

Previously on American Tragedy;

Johnny’s silence revealed a lot more weakness than he’d meant to show to doctor Danny Murillo. Mainly about how he lost his familiar mirror image to excessive scarring.

“Time, Johnny.”

Johnny could feel a painful pressure behind his eyes. The need to well up but he shut his eyes, catching any signs of it on his lashes before he opened his eyes again with a deep sigh. “Yes, doctor.”

The heavy door slid open automatically at the show of their badge and it revealed an unusual looking person. A doctor with a feminine physique, medium length purple hair and a skin made to be pale – maybe hinting at a goth-inspired look. They cast their eyes down to look away from Johnny but he was used to it. Tania never looked him in the eye. They were too uncomfortable to, too shy maybe, although being someone who was sentenced to test subject, he could never tell if anyone was scared or just shy.

“Awe, you shouldn’t have come fetch me”, Johnny tried to joke. He caught a glimpse of Charlie in the window of cell 4 but he didn’t let his gaze linger because he knew he’d see pity and he didn’t need pity. Tania gave him a polite smile with no real joy behind it. “Weekly means every week, Johnny.”

“No shit”, he muttered beneath his breath before walking out of his cell. Tania was accompanied by Mrs. buff granny herself – Virginia DeMonel – and Simon Lauren. Virginia looked like her voice got stuck in her throat while Simon seemed to wisely know to shut his mouth, despite being outspoken usually.

“Let’s go”, Tania said and the four moved in unison. One of the test subjects yelled “Dead man walking” as Johnny passed them by. Johnny gritted his teeth. These subjects that he dared to call his friends at this point, didn’t even know what he was getting himself into every week.

Johnny didn’t resist the walk much. He knew what resisting would lead to and he preferred to stay out of the isolation cells, preferred to stay in his own cell where he could talk the hours away to Charlie. The walk to the infirmary was quiet. None of the three employees really knew what to talk about when walking Johnny down for his weekly dose.

The infirmary was unusually busy. Several of the subjects were unknown to Johnny, sitting between doctor Rainer and doctor Black. The subjects must’ve been from the third floor. Third floor subjects were easy to recognise as they carried distinct features to set them apart. Though the features made Johnny shudder so he preferred not to acknowledge what those features were. Third floor was the end of the road.

“Jonah”, Tania called out. “Work station for subject 3?”

Nurse Jonah Martin looked up from where he stood next to doctor Black, holding down a squirming subject, one Johnny recognised to be from the fifth floor but her name escaped him. “Station five has been sanitised and is ready for 3”

“Thank you!” Tania called out, guiding Johnny to the fifth chair by a table. It looked just like the chair you’d find at a dentist’s office. Virginia and Simon remained by the door. Johnny sat down and got comfortable.

“No complaints?” Tania asked.

Johnny raised an eyebrow. “Just that I’m here.”

“I mean about the injections”, Tania rolled their eyes. Johnny shook his head. He was starting to feel dizzy, starting to think back of what happened before the weekly injections. He took a deep breath. “It’s just the same shit of every week, right? Not gonna bite me in the ass like the first one?”

“The first one was different. You know that”, Tania warned him. Johnny knew, but it didn’t make the fear coursing through his veins any less. Tania looked back into the infirmary. “Kayla?”

The doctor they addressed froze and looked up. Tania gestured to a series of cabinets against the wall. “Johnny’s medicine?”

“Alright.”

Tania looked back at Johnny. “See? Straight out of Aquaines’ cabinet! Same shit as always.”

“How do I know I won’t grow freak teeth like he gave Da Kurlzz?” Johnny wondered.

The doctor returned with a vial and remained standing at the station while Tania read the label. “Because I check the labels, Johnny.”

“What are they labelled as?” Johnny asked.

“Johnny’s little helpers.”

Tania looked up to find the doctor still at the table. “Do you need help with anything, Kayla?”

“Yes, I mean, no… I go by Raye now, not Kayla. I’m a “they”?” doctor Raye requested, looking a little jumpy. Tania blinked. “Oh, okay. Sorry, I didn’t know.”

“So it’s fine?”

“Are you asking me of all people if that’s fine?” Tania deadpanned. Raye chuckled nervously. “Guess it’s stupid to ask you. Thanks though.”

Johnny took a deep breath and sunk into his own mind while the doctors chattered away. The longer they waited to give him the injection, the more nervous he got. He closed his eyes, feeling the fear swirl in his chest. “Johnny?”

Johnny opened his eyes, looking back into Tania’s eyes. They tugged on his sleeve. “Sleeve up. Let’s go for the quick pain today.”

“I don’t get why I need these”, Johnny grumbled as he rolled up his sleeve. Tania loaded the syringe with the solution. “Because you know what happens when you don’t and you know we can’t have that happen again.”

“I’m sure it wouldn’t be that bad”, Johnny shrugged.

“Sit still”, they said. Johnny always thought Tania injected like they were playing darts. It hurt for a second but then it was over. Though it wasn’t the act itself that bothered him.

It was the memory.

Johnny inhaled sharply, convinced himself over and over that he could not actually feel the solution run through his veins and spread all over his body. It was just his mind playing tricks on him. He couldn’t feel it. Not again. A fraction of a memory flashed before his eyes where he could feel the burning sensation rip through his skin from within, cut through his face like butter. He’d doubled over in pain, screamed, writhed and begged for help but the doctors only surrounded him like kids on the playground watching a fight happen, Johnny’s internal fight. The pain’s gone, Johnny told himself. He exhaled, nerves leaving his body but he’d been sweating profusely and the memory increased his heartrate like crazy.

“Johnny?”

Johnny shook it off and turned to Tania while he rolled down his sleeve. Johnny had never been more grateful for the mask hiding his face but he knew the fear was visible in his eyes. Tania cast their eyes down. “I know you don’t like it because of what happened the first time, but you’re doing well, Johnny. You’re stronger than you know.”

Johnny gave them a shaky nod. “C-Can I go back now? To my cell?”

He cursed the trembling of his voice but he couldn’t fight it. Tania closed their eyes, giving a barely visible nod. They motioned for Virginia and Simon to come fetch Johnny. The pair was by his side in seconds. Johnny looked into the infirmary. The squirming fifth floor subject was gone. One of the third floor subjects lay on a table, motionless. Doctor Black leaned over the subject and sighed. “Raye, lower the dosage on experiment 3265.”

“Overdose?” Raye asked. Black nodded. “Subject’s time of death is 11:02am.”

Johnny got up and tried not to look at the third floor subject, though he knew he’d see that face in his nightmares for days to come. Simon put a hand on Johnny’s shoulder. “You’re doing well, Johnny.”

“Am I?” Johnny heard himself ask, though he felt like there was a monotonous sound ringing through his ears. Maybe it was the flatlined heart monitor from the third floor subject he still heard while walking upstairs with both wardens. Simon nodded. “I’ll get you something soon to make you feel better.”

Johnny shook the numbness off and smiled sadly behind his mask. “Thanks Simon.”

If the walk to the infirmary had been quiet, then he didn’t know what to call his walk back. Not even the subjects had anything to throw at him this time. Johnny felt physically, emotionally exhausted. He’d been so tense when Tania had injected him that he could feel the sore spot on his arm form already. At least the stress was gone for another week.

Virginia showed her badge to open Johnny’s cell. Johnny gratefully stepped back inside and watched it close, separating him from Virginia and Simon. Both wardens left without a word. Johnny dropped down onto his bed with a sigh.

“How was it?” Charlie asked.

Johnny shrugged. “Same as every week.”

“They should, like, invent it in a pill instead for you.”

“Stomach is too acidic for the solution”, Johnny muttered. “I’ve had that conversation with them before, Charlie.”

“They should just let you live without it.”

Johnny lay down on the bed, supporting his head with his hands. “Simon said he’ll get me a reward.”

“I wonder what it’ll be now”, Charlie replied. “Who’s working today? Someone caught a rumour I’m up for testing today.”

“Tania, obviously. I saw Rainer, Raye and Black too”, Johnny sighed. “Nurse Jonah’s working.”

“Raye?” Charlie repeated.

“Yeah. Kayla now goes by Raye”, Johnny yawned.

Charlie hummed to acknowledge it but said nothing. Johnny dropped his head back onto his pillow. He closed his eyes, enjoying the peace of nothingness for now. No testing, no injections, nothing. Just rest. Maybe he could try to draw on the walls with the pebble again?

The cell door clicked open. Now what? Johnny thought. Though when he saw it was doctor Murillo, he jolted upright. “Doctor Murillo.”

“Johnny 3 Tears”, Murillo said while he pulled up a chair. Johnny shifted into a sitting position, elbows resting on his knees. “Another visit?”

“Yes. Does that bother you?”

Johnny hummed. He felt conscious about his face and adjusted the mask. He was already having a shit day and now doctor Murillo was gonna preach peace of mind to him if he kept silent. Murillo smiled. Guess the most positive thing about a visit from Murillo was that he was attractive. Johnny liked his smile and almost forgot where he was.

“How are you today?”

Johnny blinked, slowly, feeling a whirl of emotions at that question and wishing Murillo kept his dumb questions to himself. How am I? I’m stuck in a cell and forced to face my fears weekly. Fears this place caused me to have. Johnny leaned back to shake the thought. “It’s the third time I’ve seen you but you haven’t visited J-Dog, Funny Man, Da Kurlzz or even Charlie for a second time. They haven’t even shown you a fraction of what they could do to you and yet you’re already too scared to go.”

He winced at his own weak attempt to keep the attention off himself. Murillo cocked his head, giving him a surprised look. “I am not scared of them. You just need more time with me than they do.”

Johnny only smirked at it. “You’re favouring me.”

No response.

“Maybe you like me the most because I’ve been unresponsive”, Johnny wondered aloud. “Are you fascinated with a quiet patient? Maybe you need validation from your patients to know you’re doing well. I know the guys have been making you feel insecure about your talents. It drives you away from them because you don’t know how to deal with that. You’re used to helping people.”

The doctor clenched his jaw and Johnny took cold comfort in it.

“Maybe you favour me because I’m the only one who hasn’t told you your job is useless. I’m the only one who hasn’t crushed your hopes of being a good doctor, a good help, for this hellhole”, Johnny nearly spat out the final word, showing clear dismay for this place.

“You’re awfully chatty today. I thought you were the quiet, unresponsive one?”

Johnny covered his face with his hands. He couldn’t fool Murillo by being talkative. Couldn’t evade talking about how he was feeling or avoid monologues from the doctor. “I am fucking bored, doc. You’re the first piece of fresh meat to come here in years. What fun is it to stay quiet if I can get under your skin instead?”

“Like Charlie. He’s been using the same tactic to talk to me as a defence mechanism.”

Johnny chuckled joylessly. He’d known Charlie since he was in pre-school. He knew every single trait of Charlie. Knew exactly what he’d do in situations like these so it wasn’t surprising to hear. “Of course, Charlie does.”

The fond idea faded as Johnny felt his own heartbeat and nerves. The mask was uncomfortable, the discomfort kept reminding him of what the mask was hiding. He knew it was a dumb thing to do, but he wanted to take it off. Show Murillo the clue he was missing. See what kind of psych-shit he had to say about that.

“I might as well talk. I have nothing left to lose, doctor. I have nothing left to fight for. I’ve been stripped of my life, my freedom, my dignity…”, Johnny clicked the mask off his face. “I thought it would be soothing to lose my mirror image. Blur the man I used to be and forget the life I left behind. Keep nothing but Charlie.”

Don’t look up. Don’t look at him. Don’t do it. Johnny looked up at the doctor. While he’d tried to keep a straight face, Johnny caught onto the sharp inhale. Though he’d expected shock, pity, disgust but he saw something else in Murillo’s eyes. Something he couldn’t grasp.

“I was wrong”, Johnny whispered. “It hurt a lot more than I thought to lose my mirror image. Besides Charlie, it was all I had left of my humanity. The only proof I once knew freedom.”

Danny nodded slowly. “You lost a part of yourself you had wanted to keep.”

Exactly, Johnny thought. He clicked the mask back on. “Was that the kind of shit you wanted to hear from me, doctor? My sob story?”

Johnny shook his head. “At least you’ve got a juicy story to put into my dumpster fire disaster file. Not like there was anything left of it after the fire.”

“Thank you for sharing it with me”, Murillo said but it fell flat. There wasn’t much to say after something like that and even Murillo must’ve caught onto the atmosphere cutting off any possible dialogue anymore. He didn’t stay long. Though when he left, Johnny wasn’t sure why he’d done it.

He felt like his monologue had begun to distract the doctor from what a mess he was in the first place, but then he ended up showing him way more than he’d ever wanted to. Johnny sighed and lay down on the bed on his side, facing the wall. It was a dumb thing to do, he thought, like he’d understand this bullshit.

Chapter Text

Previously on American Tragedy;

An insight as to why Johnny broke his silence to doctor Murillo. Johnny’s traumatised by a certain experiment but needs to receive weekly injections and dreads them every time.

Danny was in unfamiliar territory but it was safe. It was safe as long as no subjects were in the courtyard. Once subjects flocked the courtyard, he would be in the way of the special forces doing their jobs; keeping them in line. Danny gave polite nods to the special force officers passing him by. It was narrow to walk along the borders of the wall separating the courtyard from the outer world. Sure, the rails would keep him from dropping several feet to the ground, but it still felt like walking a shaky bridge. Especially with the metal grid beneath his feet. He could see the ground right through it.

“Special officer Esperanza?” Danny carefully asked when he saw a woman lean over the rail to look down at the courtyard. She lifted her eyes from the ground and shifted them to Danny, giving a careful nod. Danny looked over his shoulder. “I heard you’re a well-known vigilant to the innocently convicted.”

She nodded again, now a subtle smile on her face. Danny cocked his head, not sure what to think of her. “I heard there’s an innocent inmate in the prison. Would you know how to look into that?”

Esperanza nodded and stared back at Danny when he realised she probably wanted the name of the inmate. “Oh, it’s Tyler Michaels.”

She gave a final nod. Danny furrowed his eyebrows. “Not very talkative, are you?”

She pulled a note out of her pocket, handed it to Danny and walked off. Danny unfolded the sheet and all it had written on it, was a black sharpie “I’m mute.”

Oh, well that explained that. Wonder how many of those notes she had in her pocket.

Danny checked the time. Now that this was taken care of, he was just in time to meet Doctor Madness again. He wasn’t sure if she would provide him the information he needed, if she would even have the clarity to do so or if she would prefer to hear back from her brother before disclosing any information. Either way, Danny had done his part and he was ready to face her and tell her.

Somehow Danny felt more nervous than he’d been in a while. Virginia had accompanied him to his appointment with Johnny as she had promised but from then on, he was on his own. Doctor Madness would be his first appointment alone, only calling upon the wardens in case of an issue.

He showed his badge to the reader system and the doors quietly opened before him. The subject sat in a corner of the room, back turned to Danny. He swallowed his nerves, reminding himself that showing he was stressed out, may cause the patient to think there IS something to be stressed about. Or possibly reminding the patient they have full control over him.

“Madness?”

“They tested on me.”

It took Danny a few seconds to remember what she was talking about. She hadn’t been tested on since she was entered as a Subject. She must’ve finally gone through the first experiment.

“Who carried it out?”

“Aquaines. I thought we were friends”, she muttered.

“Friends love to be present in good times but when the feast ends… not many are willing to stay”, Danny mused.

She turned to face Danny. He could see the fog of madness trying to overtake her in a struggle in her eyes. He could lose her clarity at this point so he quickly said: “I’ve started the investigation to prove your brother’s innocence.”

The fog instantly cleared. She got up so quickly, Danny took a step back, debating on whether or not he could call for a warden. She took a few steps to him but remained unthreatening. She is unmodified, Danny, you could easily overpower her and THEN call for a warden. Well… unless that first experiment caused her to develop a modification…

“You helped me? To clear Tyler’s name?”

Danny nodded. “We agreed. I help you with Tyler, you tell me how to deal with the troublesome patients.”

Madness took a step back. “The Undead guys? No, I can’t. I don’t know how to-…”

“You told me you knew”, Danny warned her. She fidgeted with her fingers and turned her back on Danny. “I don’t know if I can betray them like that.”

“Madness…”

“They won’t know I told you, right?”

“They won’t”, Danny echoed. “Why would I tell them? I’m a smart guy. They’ll know I could’ve thought of this on my own but it would take weeks for me to actually do so and I don’t have weeks to help these guys’ mental state improve. They’re distressed, experiments fail and then more experiments happen. You know how it works.”

Doctor Madness thought it over and slowly nodded. “You are very smart. They won’t know.”

“So tell me”, Danny persuaded her. She sat down on her bed. “Okay…”, she took a deep breath and something in her look sharpened, became like a reminiscing image of the way she used to be before it all happened. “The easiest to deal with, is J-Dog. His truth modification works both ways. You cannot lie to him, he cannot lie to you but somehow he is not spilling every truth on his mind to you, is he? The spilling of truth bombs only happens if you’re not prepared to deal with it. Just keep your mouth shut when something in your head shouldn’t be said out loud. Yes, it’ll make the room very quiet for a bit but it’ll pass with more training. It’ll get easier until you can just silence the truths you don’t want to spill and maintain a conversation.”

Danny listened intently, wrote down whatever he could in a small notepad he’d brought. Everything she said made sense. “Done.”

“Funny Man is very similar in that aspect. It takes an effort to read your mind so whatever he says, just echo the words in your head and he’ll grow bored of what he hears from you and eventually just stop trying to read it altogether. His range also isn’t as far as he claims. For one, he needs to see you. Something about sensing brain wave activity and translating it to words. He can’t hear you when you’re in your office or walking the hallway, unless you pass his cell.”

Danny hummed. “How can you tell for sure?”

“Sometimes he knows things and talks to you as if he read your mind to find out but then it turns out he got the information through other subjects. I once tested that theory by faking something in front of a subject and what do you know? Funny Man claimed to have read my mind to find out.”

“He’s bluffing his way through us”, Danny muttered. “Smart guy.”

“Very smart but doesn’t always act like it”, Madness sighed. “I can’t help you with Da Kurlzz. His modification is new and I haven’t had to deal with it yet.”

“It’s just that he threatens to eat me”, Danny awkwardly smiled.

Madness shook her head. “He did that to me too, even without the freak teeth. But once you gain the respect of his friends, he’ll back down too.”

“You think so?”

“Yeah”, she shrugged. “As for Johnny and Charlie… They’re very close. Find a way to appease one and the other will leave you alone as well. They’ve known each other since kindergarten so whatever their crime was, they’re in here together for a reason.”

“Only no one knows because their files burned down. Conveniently”, Danny sighed.

Madness chuckled. “Yes, the files burned down after I was admitted as a test subject. The entire organisation was in chaos so Johnny and Charlie convinced Ignited to burn down the file cabinet from afar.”

Danny paused his frantic writing. “They burned down their files on purpose?”

“It’s a well-known rumour amongst the test subjects.”

Chapter Text

“And for everything he has done in the field of psychology and psychiatry, we would like to hand this award to doctor Daniel Murillo.”

The crowd applauded, Danny adjusted his tie and stepped up on stage. Some faceless girl handed him the trophy. He swallowed a lump in his throat. The lights were sharp in his eyes and the nerves made him sweat profusely. “Thank you! Thank you! Thank you so much for nominating me for this prize. The uh…”, Danny forgot the name of the prize but held it up with pride like he knew what it was. His eyes adjusted to the lights and the massive audience came into sight.

Danny tried to find his brothers in it but his eyes rested on a familiar face. Not so much a face as it was a mask. A blue one with a three and a butterfly on it. It appeared on the first row, then on the fourth, then on the sixth in the middle. Danny tried to avert his eyes but wherever his eyes went, the mask appeared. And then it didn’t. Then the face appeared. The face with that endless maze of scars running through the surface.

“I…”, Danny stammered. “Johnny, I…”

“Need to wake up”, his voice broke through Danny’s brain. He jolted upright in his bed, wide awake while his alarm went off. Danny groaned and fell back into the duvet and pillow. He’d been having such a cool dream and then Johnny showed up. Horrible. Danny sighed and rubbed his eyes. Today he’d get to try out Doctor Madness’ tips and tricks… Was it wrong to trust the tips and tricks of an ex-psychiatrist who had her license pulled, went crazy and killed all of her family? Huh, maybe. But her tips had been absolutely harmless. It wasn’t like Danny was gonna put himself in danger in order to deal with these guys, right? No, he was just gonna echo Funny Man, keep his mouth shut to J-Dog and… possibly figure out what’s up with Charlie and Johnny. Maybe try not to feel creeped out by Da Kurlzz.

Danny sighed.

He was so not cut out for dealing with this type of crap. Though instead of lingering in bed, Danny found himself rushing through the hallway of the second floor of the 4C with a coffee in hand a shoulder bag bumping against his knees.

“Danny, you’re late”, Airia commented.

“I know. I was having sweet sweet dreams about…”

“Someone I know?” Airia teased from her office but Danny snorted. “About my career. This workaholic is not getting any of that anytime soon.”

“I can’t imagine a late workaholic”, Airia shot back and Danny rolled his eyes before entering his own office. He quickly readied all he needed for the very first appointment; J-Dog. Let’s try not to dump truth bombs.

Clocked in a little late, he still managed to organise his thoughts and plan out his day. Three appointments with the troublesome Five was ambitious and a bit overkill considering how little he had seen other patients, but other patients opened up far more quickly to his mental soothing. Most of the Subjects enjoyed releasing their pent-up frustration.

Oh well, at least he managed to head to J-Dog’s cell on time this way around. Theil was with him. “Doctor Murillo?”

“Hm?” Danny hummed, halfway lost in thoughts still.

“Here”, Theil said, sticking out a round object. Danny recognised it from previous jobs. It was one of those alarm buttons to press when a patient grew violent. “I thought you could use it when dealing with them. Not to actually press it but to feel more secure.”

Danny took the button and slipped it into his pocket. “Thank you, Martin. Don’t tell me we’ll be tackling these 3 appointments alone together?”

Martin shook his head and gestured backwards where Mrs. DeMonel closed off a cell before joining the two of them. “Virginia will be joining us.”

“Perfect”, Danny nodded before heading towards J-Dog’s cell. The panic button was burning holes through his coat but he would not need it. These subjects were scary but hadn’t shown to be dangerous yet. They are not their crimes.

Whatever locked them up, Danny was not here to help them integrate with the life outside once more. He was here to make them comfortable and help them adjust to a lifetime of testing, assisting in whatever he could to ensure their emotional stability in the matter. Who the hell ever decided dangerous people were perfect subjects anyway.

J-Dog gave Danny a million dollar smirk when he entered his cell. “Doctor Murillo, a sight to behold. I’m surprise you still wanna show your face.”

Danny ignored the snippy comment and dragged a chair in front of J-Dog’s bed to sit and face his patient. “Good morning, J-Dog. Let’s go over some routine questions together.”

So far so good, no embarrassing truths spilling from his lips but he was speaking slow and deliberate, like talking to a deaf elderly man. J-Dog rolled his eyes but leaned in. “Alright, I’ll play. Shoot me the questions.”

“Are you physically comfortable since the last set of experiments? No aches?” Danny asked.

J-Dog shrugged. “Just my ego. Tell me, doctor, you were afraid of us last time. Are you still?”

Danny could feel the truth bubble in his throat but he cleared it and carefully replied. “That question is not relevant to my visit, J-Dog.”

J-Dog’s eyebrows furrowed in confusion but he shook it off. Danny resumed his routine questioning. The routine questions were the same for every patient and essential in determining their usability as a subject in upcoming experiments. About physical comfort, mental comfort – as much as their confines could provide mental comfort at least – and what they could possibly use to improve it. J-Dog, of course, sarcastically replied to all mental questions and what he could use to improve it.

“I could really use a good fucking”, J-Dog spilled and Danny’s eyebrows shot upwards in surprise, especially when J-Dog winced at his own comment. He spilled a truth he didn’t want to share.

“I’m not sure we can arrange that”, Danny truthfully replied with an amused smile, trying to fight it off his face. He wasn’t supposed to find his patient’s struggles amusing but he couldn’t help himself. The roles were reversed and J-Dog was spilling a truth he hadn’t wanted to share.

Unfortunately the lack of truths from Danny and J-Dog’s only uncontrolled truth made him shut down on Danny altogether and they didn’t get past the routine questions, sitting in silence for the remainder of the hour. Danny figured it was an improvement from last appointment which he had fled, but it wasn’t ideal still.

He left that cell with a mixed feeling of accomplishment and disappointment. Better luck with Funny Man, the mind reader. Time to echo some thoughts.

Martin was impressed with the improvement in the way Danny handled J-Dog but Danny was distracted by reaching Funny Man’s cell, close to J-Dog’s of course. Martin and Virginia let him go in alone and he gripped the panic button with a reassuring squeeze before entering. Funny Man was already in position on the bed, leaning back. “Doc, I could hear your thoughts from a mile away. Bet your ass J-Dog won’t cooperate when you humiliate him like that.”

“I didn’t even do anything”, Danny held up his hands, dragging the chair to the middle to sit opposite of Funny Man. “But let’s not dwell on J-Dog. How are you, considering the environment?”

Danny consciously emptied his mind, let a tune from some commercial play in his head and noticed Funny Man blinking in surprise. “Really? The toothpaste commercial?”

“Anything to bore you out of reading my mind, Funny Man”, Danny replied, voice sweet as sugar. Funny Man chuckled. “Fair. Listen doctor, I’ll play nice and I won’t read your mind too much if you speak your mind.”

“What does that entail?” Danny asked. Funny Man shrugged. “I’m bored, Murillo, give me something.”

Danny paused, then spoke. “I’m a licensed psychotherapist and psychiatrist but to deal with you troublesome five, I asked Doctor Madness for advice, which is really a bat shit crazy thing to do, considering how things ended for her.”

Funny Man laughed. “It is but it explains why you’re better prepared to deal with us. Alright, deal’s a deal, that was a good thoughtful truth so give me the questions.”

Danny ran through the routine questions with Funny Man, not once did the man use Danny’s thoughts against him. After the questions though, when Danny tried to get him to talk for some personal therapy, Funny Man shut down on him and he got about as far as he did with J-Dog.

He told himself it was normal. Patients rarely ever opened up on the first session and while this wasn’t the official first session, it felt like the first one because they were mildly cooperative. Just keep going.

Man, he was having a busy morning.

Theil and DeMonel followed him through the hall on his way to the last appointment for that morning; Da Kurlzz. The freak with the fangs.

A bit unfair to judge his patient like that, but the man threatened to eat him and Madness’ only advice had been to gain the respect of the others first. So how was Danny supposed to deal with Da Kurlzz?

“Good morning, Da Kurlzz, how are you feeling today?” Danny tried to sound optimistic as he dragged the chair to the middle. Da Kurlzz bore his eyes into Danny with a deathly gaze. “Hungry, care to provide?”

“Always the jokester”, Danny shrugged it off.

“Not joking. The first opportunity I get, I’m eating the flesh off your bones, doctor”, Da Kurlzz grinned, the freakishly long needle-like teeth emphasized.

Danny’s optimism dropped as he took a seat, feeling his pulse in his stomach as he got nervous. He cleared his throat. “Anyway, I do have some good news.”

“Good news?” Da Kurlzz scoffed.

Danny nodded, taking his book in his lap. “Last time I was here, you mentioned in your… very wordy rant about how useless I am that you were in pain and I was sensing some depressive undertones and fear for future experiments since they were already starting something on you? Well, I wrote a hefty report for Doctor Cain and you’re benched for the next two weeks to recover both physically and mentally. It’s not a lot, considering how major the alteration to your body has been, but it’s the best I could do.”

Danny paused at the end, observing Da Kurlzz who stared at him in stunned silence.

“Do you understand what that means?” Danny asked.

Da Kurlzz blinked out of his daze and huffed. “Of course, I know what that means, I’m not stupid. I’m free from experiments for the next two weeks. You actually convinced Cain?”

“I did. I know you think I can’t make a mark on the system for your well-being but I wanna show you that I can and I did. You were concerned with the next round of experiments happening shortly after your modification appeared and I took those concerns to heart”, Danny tried his best to convey the care he could provide his patients if only they cooperated. Da Kurlzz opened his mouth and closed it again. They sat in silence.

Danny tried to start with the routine questioning but Da Kurlzz refused to speak another word. The rest of the appointment, they sat in silence and D anny was disappointed in the outcome of his news. Though when he said his goodbyes to Da Kurlzz, the subject looked up. “Thank you, doctor, for speaking up on my behalf to Cain. I really do need a break from the injections and whatnot.”

Danny nodded with a small smile. “I’m not your enemy, Da Kurlzz, I’m just here to help improve a shitty situation.”     

Da Kurlzz turned his head away but Danny still felt like this was a small victory.

Chapter Text

Danny had an afternoon of paperwork to look forward to and he’d be lying if he said he was thrilled about it. Though the time at his desk, typing away notes on his computer really helped him process the current state of mind of his patients. He had a lot of patients under his care but most seemed to have accepted the 4C as their new life, cooperating in therapy to work through whatever they can work through.

Only the troublesome five weren’t adopting that mindset which really explained why they appeared on his schedule much more often. In case any of them decided to fully cooperate, he could alter the schedule, but for now, it was best to see them weekly, some even biweekly.

Danny sighed, stretching his fingers before continuing to type up a report on his appointment with Doctor Madness. He knew he had to type everything discussed into the report but he was somehow hesitant to describe the deal he’d had with her. She’d tell him how to deal with the five if he put into motion the investigation on her brother. The report didn’t need to contain those details. Maybe Danny should just describe her advice as unsollicited advice and evidence she still had some capacity to care about former patients, but that would be a lie.

Truth is, Danny brought up the five to her and there’s no telling if she would have talked about them on her own if he hadn’t. He’d been so focussed on dealing with the five that he hadn’t provided proper therapy for Doctor Madness, he realised. More like she was providing him with therapy and that just didn’t sit well with him so he arranged a new appointment with her tomorrow to kickstart her own therapy, rather than his advice session.

Danny finished his report on her and continued to work on the backlog of reports left. He hadn’t properly written one for the appointment with Johnny. The one where he took his mask off and showed Danny the maze of scars running through his face. Danny wondered what kind of experiment triggered that, wondered if he had access to the database of past experiments. He paused. Would Airia know?

He locked his computer and shoved his desk chair backwards, deciding to pay his colleague friend a visit. He knocked on her closed door and she yelled for him to come in. “Hey Airia.”

“Hey Danny, what’s up?”

“Do we have access to some kind of database on experiments conducted in the past and which subject was involved in it?” Danny asked, leaning against the doorpost. Airia looked thoughtful. “Hm, we have a database detailing the experiments conducted per subject?”

“Oh, that would be helpful. I know we have paper files per subject detailing their personal info in the archives, but the experiment one is digital, then?”

Airia nodded. “Yes, I’ll send you the link of how to access it but you’ll have to check with IT if you’ve obtained the rights to log in. There was a short training required on how to navigate it but since you didn’t know it existed, I can imagine you haven’t done the short training yet?”

Danny shook his head. “I haven’t. Is it like a classroom training?”

“No, just a digital learning thing when you click on the arrows to get the info and do a test of 3 questions at the end.”

“Perfect, could you send me that link too?”

“Of course”, Airia agreed, typing away on her computer. A few minutes later she smiled back at him. “Sent. Good luck.”

“Thanks, Airia!” Danny called out before leaving her office to go back to his. Guess he could add that short training to his to-do list for this afternoon. He really hoped those access rights were processed quickly because he really couldn’t finish the report on Johnny without knowing what caused his facial scarring.

The training really was a few powerpoint slides to work through and then a super easy test at the end of which he needed to achieve 100%. Really, he had to be stupid not to get 100% on it so he was happy to have that wrapped up in about 15 minutes. Next he requested the rights to the database and while he waited for the system to handle that, he started writing up his report for J-Dog.

J-Dog’s report was a bit tricky because yes, he had been cooperative for the questions but as soon as he had dropped a truth he didn’t mean to drop, he’d been embarrassed and shut down on Danny entirely. Danny wondered why. Sure, the truth was a bit ego-bruising to admit you really missed having sex but surely there were more subjects who missed that part about the outer world. Danny just wasn’t sure what he could do to ease that discomfort. Perhaps encourage masturbation or help channel the sexual frustration into a different activity. Maybe exerting the excess energy in the gym. Did the prison even have a gym? Surely, it did…right?

Danny received an email indicating he obtained the rights to the database and immediately entered, cursing he hadn’t paid enough attention to the slides to navigate it properly. Though in the end, he found Johnny 3 Tears and a long list of experiments since this conviction. Shit, he’d been there a long time already. Guess, it wasn’t surprising the man was craving freedom. Danny sifted through the experiments conducted on Johnny, detailing the effects the experiment had on him. It took a while but eventually Danny found the one he’d been looking for.

The effects were described as “veins burning his face from the inside, leaving a branch-like structure of carved wounds”. Danny shuddered as he read it. He scrolled to find the details of the experiment, only to be met with a huge stamp of “top secret”.

He huffed. Surely, he could know what his patients were subjected to. He opened up his email and typed one to Dr. Cain.

Hi Dr. Cain

I was researching the traumatising experiment on Subject 3 (the one that caused his scarring) but was met with a “top secret” label when I tried to open the description of the experiment. Do you have the details elsewhere I can read?

On a side note, does the prison have a gym for the subjects?

Kind regards,

Doctor Danny Murillo

Danny hit send on the email, pausing to stare at his unfinished report of Johnny. He wondered why the scarring only affected his face. Perhaps the experiment’s active area was the brain.  Though what kind of brain-altering experiment did Johnny go through then? His email pinged, noticing Dr. Cain had replied.

Hi Danny

Some experiments are highly confidential to the point we’re not allowed to know the details. Only the test tinkers know so I’m afraid you’ll have to live with the lack of information.

As for your gym question. The prison has a gym for the inmates, but there is none for the test subjects. Why do you ask?

Kind regards,

Dr. Breccan Cain

Danny considered that answer, not knowing what to reply yet. Instead he finished his report on Johnny’s state of mind, indicating that aesthetic experiments are no longer allowed in the foreseeable future. Any more alterations to his physical appearance would result in an abhorrent state of mind and that would render all future results unreliable. Danny saved the report and typed up his reply to Dr. Cain.

Hi Dr. Cain

Do you think we could arrange a system in which certain time slots can ensure the gym can be used by test subjects for therapeutic purposes? I can imagine many of the subject suffer from an excess of energy resulting in unchecked rage.

Kind regards,

Doctor Danny Murillo

Danny shrugged off the uneasy sense of rejection he got from his boss and focussed on finishing J-Dog report, then onto Funny Man’s. Funny Man seemed perfectly content with the way his life in confinement seemed to be going, he was simply bored and therefore sought out drama through mind reading. It was a minor inconvenience but nothing he really needed to change. If Funny were happy to be cooperative in trade for some “juicy information”, then Danny was fine with that.

Onto Da Kurlzz. Progress was definitely made with Da Kurlzz. Despite his silence, he really took the time to thank Danny for sticking up for him and Danny couldn’t help but feel proud in his efforts to help the test subjects. His work wasn’t useless afterall. His phone buzzed and he furrowed his eyebrows, taking it out of his pocket.

Tyler Michaels is innocent. Refer to the attached file.

S.

Danny paused, confused for a second before he realised it was Esperanza S.

The attached file appeared to be a solid alibi for Tyler Michaels as well as camera screenshots of the true perpetrator. Danny didn’t quite know what to do with the information but Doctor Madness’ brother was truly wrongfully convicted.