Charles and Benjamin broke apart slowly. As they walked back toward the couch, Charles interlocked his fingers with Benjamin's, his grip firm and possessive. He walked beside him, matching the slow, heavy pace of the chains, and gently helped Benjamin sit, though Benjamin didn't need the assistance.
"Tsk," Wren clicked his tongue in annoyance, his gaze darting away once more before he finally forced himself to look at them.
"Charles," Wren began, refusing to use any royal title. "You're here because Benjamin requested to see you. We have an agreement, and this meeting is part of it."
Charles ignored Wren. "What agreement?" Charles asked as he turned his full attention toward Benjamin.
"Where to begin?" Wren interrupted. He leaned back, crossing his legs with a sort of detachment. "There's so much you don't know about him, Charles. Do you really care for him at all?"
Charles didn't give Wren the satisfaction of a glance. His face remained turned toward Benjamin as he held Benjamin's hands.
Benjamin took a steadying breath and spoke calmly despite the heavy tension in the room.
"After I graduated from medical school, I worked at the AMA," Benjamin began. "They assigned me to a mission along with a small task force. Our objective was infiltrating a lab where horrific human rights abuses had been reported. I was there to figure out exactly what was being researched. The facility had operated in total secrecy for over a decade."
He paused and his shoulders tensed as he recalled memories of the mission.
"When the mission was complete, I was the one who ended up with the research files. I have all the data from the lab. All the pertinent information," Benjamin said, his gaze turning towards Wren briefly before returning to Charles. "Wren… has asked me for those files."
Charles nodded, but he was visibly taken aback. He finally realized what Benjamin had endured all those years.
"What was being studied?" Charles asked, his voice low with a mix of concern and dawning horror. "Why was it so important for the Empire to hide all this? The dead doctors… did it have to do with the research?"
Wren leaned back, a dark, knowing smirk spreading across his face as he watched the two of them. "Benjamin, care to tell him about who killed the doctors?"
Benjamin looked deeply uncomfortable and his face was shrouded in shame and guilt. He stared at his lap, unable to meet Charles's eyes as the words began to spill out.
Benjamin's voice trembled as he began. "The doctors... they worked at the lab willingly. After the mission was over, after I had retrieved the research files... they..." He paused. "They were all killed. Everyone at the lab. The medical staff, the researchers, and the test subjects. And not one of the task force members survived."
"I remember... the recruiter," Benjamin continued, his eyes glazing over as he spoke about his past. "He was the last person I saw that day before leaving the facility. He was the one who forced me to leave the lab. I saw the dead bodies. The people I knew—they were all dead. Hallways covered in blood. And then... there were even the dead bodies of children."
He swallowed hard as his hands clenched into the fabric of his trousers. "There were children still alive. I went to check on them, but... I saw them being taken away. I froze. I should have done something, but I just froze. Then, the recruiter... he dragged me through the hallways and forced me to leave. He said I had to live. I had to live so that all the sacrifices made wouldn't be in vain."
A single tear slid down his cheek. "He forced me to leave. He dragged me out of there before returning inside. No one else came back out. I waited and waited... before the lab was burned down until nothing was left."
Tears came dropping down Benjamin's face. Charles took him into his embrace.
"Benjamin, it's okay…" Charles whispered against Benjamin's skin as he tried to process all the information.
But, he didn't know how to process the horror. This was the Empire's doing? Why had they chosen such a bloodstained end for the mission? And why was Benjamin the one forced to bear the crushing weight of it all?
A fierce, protective anger burned in Charles's chest. Benjamin had been a mere graduate back then, a fresh-eyed student ready to help the world. To think that his first real experience outside of a classroom had been to infiltrate a lab of horrors was sickening.
Charles could almost see the scenes Benjamin described: the bloodied bodies, the silence of the hallways, and the haunting image of the children. It was a trauma no one should have to carry alone.
Everything finally clicked for Charles. Those moments in the past—the sudden silence, the way Benjamin would flinch at certain smells or medical talk, and the occasional haunted look in his eyes—it all made sense now. Charles pulled Benjamin into a tighter embrace, trying to offer whatever solace he could at the moment.
Wren looked away again. The sight of them was like salt in a wound. Every instinct told him to stride over and drag Benjamin away, to separate them, but he forced himself to stay still, reminding himself of the bigger picture. He just had to wait.
"Aren't you curious about the true nature of the study?" Wren asked, his voice cutting through the heavy silence.
"Why don't you tell me?" Charles asked firmly, his eyes seething with a protective fury as he continued to hold Benjamin, whose face remained buried against his chest.
Wren smiled again. "The lab… My family has long supported the Zephyrian military. This facility was my parents' lab, or it used to be. After they died, I took over."
Benjamin, who had been in Charles's arms, finally went still. He pulled back and looked at Wren. His voice was barely a whisper, but steady. "Your parents… How did they die?"