Troy watched silently, as emotions moved rapidly through Charlie’s face. He could understand that, being told something that broke his perspective so hard, that his brain needed a few seconds to reboot. It was something that would require a deeper change in him.

Shock to fear. Fear to confusion. Confusion to surprise. And surprise to anger. Charlie seemed to have been fixated on the last one. Troy thought he saw some sadness in there to finish things off, but the man was apparently fixated on being furious. How curious a thing, not wanting to move on from what would likely cause the most damage. Then again, expecting anyone to act rationally after being told that Troy was not expecting to stay there more than a week more… it was logical.

“Is she making you do it?” Charlie said, cold anger looking to fit nicely on the man. He was not looking ready to shout, his veins were not bursting from pressure. If anything, he looked closer to his usual attitude than he did only moments before. Yet, those eyes of his were not as they were supposed to be.

God, those eyes were cold. Not the cold indifference that Dr Hale showed to everything. It was more the cold of ice, ready to slowly kill all that was around it. Those eyes showed everything in the world slowing down, not instantly but steadily, with time causing everything to perish. These were the eyes of a man who would calmly wait for somebody to die. That… was what Troy could get out of that look.

There was just something about eyes that had always spoken so much about a person. It was such a basic feature of the body, yet they could reveal more than one would think. There was a reason that one could describe nearly everything about a person, using only their eyes as the focus.

Troy’s uncle had always shown a small form of mania inside him, concentrated in those fluttering pupils of his. The arms, legs, and whatever else there was below the neck might have looked utterly unassuming, but those eyes still caused the young man fear whenever he thought of them.

His father was different in that way, not having one bit of mania to them. They were perfectly understanding, always knowing just how much he was hurting Troy. He just liked it, really, those eyes greedily taking in every sign of pain that anyone showed. He liked the dose of adrenaline given, and he searched for anything and anyone that could give it. There was never a moment where he was misled by these cravings, every action of his being well-calculated. Those eyes were special in that way, as they made Troy learn that coldness did not always equal something better than insanity.

Perhaps it was his mother who showed the most promise in displaying emotion through those eyeballs she was so weirdly proud of. She had never looked much at him, doing her absolute best to pretend he did not exist. Troy had been fine with that back in the day, the two having clear barriers that neither wanted to break. Yet as time progressed, the chance increased for such to happen. Every time they would meet, her eyes would show the clearest contempt. There had never been a moment in his life, where Troy did not know she hated him. He was something forced on her, and she had hated every second of it, pushing all of that onto one small boy who did not understand it all. Those eyes showed so much hate, so much disdain, that Troy for a while had expected such emotions in the eyes of all others. He had thought himself one to be naturally hated as if he needed to build himself up from that. Those days had likely been some of the worst he had ever lived.

As one last person whose eyes had made the largest of impressions was the eyes of Finn, that sweet little boy who had been his friend during a time Troy had thought he did not deserve any. Their time together might have been short, yet those memories were some of the most well-remembered that the young man had at his disposal. With how things were going, it would be a wonder if those memories would not be thought of in his last moments.

Oh, those eyes that Finn had back in those days. Having lived in the same place, it was impossible for them to have been innocent. But, they still had a similar trait to them, the warmth attached giving a homely smile. That boy had been supposed to be in the arms of a caring family, not somebody happy to see him go into the void. Troy could remember Finn as somebody whose eyes spoke of acceptance. The little boy was fine with living the life he had, not yet understanding the lack of permanence around him. It was a saddening experience, seeing those eyes scared, desperate, and helpless, during the last moments Troy had seen him.

Perhaps… perhaps it was because of those eyes that Troy could understand Charlie so much. In any situation other than the one the young man was in, there was no way out of the facility. More likely than not, even the corpses would be burned before they ever had a chance of leaving. The stay here was permanent for almost anyone, and nobody he would ever know would be outside of the average in that aspect.

Truly, there was only one way to leave. It was a more permanent solution to it all, one that certainly would stop Dr Hale from making him bleed in any capacity. It would in fact stop any bleeding ever again. And, Charlie had just been told that Troy had that idea in his mind, even having set a time-frame for it all.

While Troy might not have been able to see the eyes that he portrayed to the world, he could guess what they might have shown. During the heated moment seconds ago, he had been concentrating on the aspect of acceptance, how he was fine with the wounds if the end-result would be on his side. Charlie thought he was accepting his own death.

“I don't think anybody is individually forcing it to manifest. I think it is more just me being in the wrong place at the wrong time,” Troy said, that crack in his voice at the being a hundred per cent natural. It had nearly been forced out to start with, making it riddled with holes. As was clear to everyone who truly did know him, the young man was not the smartest person in the universe. He was not even close to being average. Most that had work could beat him in a battle of intelligence, and there was not much which could change that.

However, there was one way that Troy knew much of. It was a topic that the working people knew as more or less an afterthought in their lives, it hanging over them constantly yet never truly being anything physical. He understood how the government worked when it was desperate. There were many reasons for the state to be nervous, in a sense of mind where the people in it needed action as quickly as possible. As was obvious with an entity as large as the government, this was mostly centred around it being able to sustain itself through any means.

This was originally learned back in the days where Troy would see what could be done to profit off of debt. People he saw daily were used as resources, the owed money hanging over their heads constantly. The rich desired it, and the state did its best to satisfy them, to the point where they would do heinous things to preserve the structure.

It was the same here, only the focus being a little different. Here, it was not people whose reveal would cause disaster. It was information that was the true killer. What would happen if Troy learned something that was one security level above him? He would likely get a stern warning about it, and be told to never tell anyone. If it was two levels above? Well, he would likely be put on a watchlist, to make sure that it was never revealed. What about three? What would happen to him if he learned something three levels above him? At that point, there should have been less than a hundred people in the country able to learn of it. And it was supposed to be kept to those numbers indefinitely, as the secrets at that top would be so classified that it was not written down on any available database. It was at the level where the blueprints to the orbiting rail-gun would be.

A leak that that level had the potential to destroy a country, causing others to turn against one on the spot. Why would anyone risk an untrusted person knowing of such things? For an entity based on keeping itself alive and well, eliminating any potential risks as quickly as possible was only logical. If Troy was to ever know of anything that could make his superiors shake in terror, he was as good as dead. At that point, he should just have been thanking fate for allowing him another second to breathe in.

To avoid further questioning, the young man had done his best to imply this. He wanted Charlie to believe that he had overheard the wrong conversation, that something had caused him to get a document not meant for his eyes to read. Troy wanted him to believe that his death-certificate was already written.

And from the expression that changed rapidly again, Charlie seemed to understand the point he was trying to give. An understanding of the faux situation was shown on his face, one that was tinted with something close but not directly related to sadness, being more along the lines of defeat.

“What is happening to you is not done to harm you. Mara is doing it to protect herself,” Charlie surmised, not seeming to like the words that were coming out of his mouth any more than Troy was. “She is doing it to protect everybody close to you. Does… No, this is screwed up.”

Putting his elbows on the table, hands over his face, Troy was left to sit in silence, as the man who never seemed to break down broke down. There weren't any tears or anything of that sort. It was simply Charlie breathing deeply, keeping his face hidden from the world around him. The younger of the two did his best to give him the space that was needed. Troy might also have needed some of his own, having now lied about why he was so secretive.

It continued on for a few minutes, to the point where Troy needed to take a look at the clock to make sure he was not going to be late. It was fortunate, in a way, that he had gone over to the cafeteria so early. If not, he would have been forced to cut it short. Nobody would have appreciated that, him least of all.

“Is that why you wanted it?” Charlie asked Troy, hinting at the machine that the young man had borrowed a day prior. “You needed somewhere you could not… Oh. I see it now. You do not have to say anything. We are already screwed as we are now. In a way, I can understand why she is doing it now, yet I know I will never be able to do the same. Troy, listen, you still don't have to live through that. Even if it's temporary, I should be able to get you moved over to some other place for a few days. I could even make it mandatory for you not to partake in any work. Are you sure that you do not want me to do this for you?”

Running from work would ruin the original cover-story. Being already two layers deep now, Troy felt no need to complicate it even more. Having looked up at the clock a minute ago, they were beginning to cut it close now. He could even understand why Dr Hale had wanted to go so early before.

“It would just complicate it all even more than it already has to,” Troy said, trying to let the sympathetic man easily. “Now, while you might not be constrained by a schedule, I believe my superiors are waiting for me.”

He only got a couple of steps away from the table, before a voice stopped him from moving.

“Troy.”

“Yes?”

“... Will you be back at lunch?”

“Of course I will.”