Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

As she adjusted the blue eye pendant around her neck, Maxx stared at her reflection in the mirror. She messed with the black, long sleeved shirt underneath her short, white dress, trying to neaten out the creases. 

She grabbed the belt dumped on the edge of her bed and fastened it around her waist. She nodded to herself, satisfied with its look. 

She reached for her ID badge to attatch to her belt. 'Maxxine Danziger' it read boldly. Despite multiple attempts, she couldn't get anyone at work to just call her 'Maxx'. Always something about more formality and less familiarity. 

Next to her name was the logo. Those crossing lines she'd seen so many times she could probably draw it in her sleep. The letters beneath were burned into her retinas as well. TMS. The Midnight Society. An organisation with a thing for secrecy. She hadn't known about its existence until they recruited her. She wasn't allowed to disclose a lot about her job to those outside: too much was classified. There were even things they didn't allow her to know. For the most part, it didn't bother her, but there were some things she just itched to learn. Subject K was at the top of her list. 

Subject K: it seemed to be both the biggest deal and biggest mystery in The Midnight Society. Always talked about between colleagues, but no one really knew exactly what it was. 'Maybe today will be the day' she always told herself, hoping one day she'll find out. 

A soft nudge against her leg prompted her to crouch down. 

"Hey Pistol." 

As Maxx stroked her head, she wrapped her tail around her arm, leaving behind a few hairs on her sleeve. 

She stood back up and made her way out the room, making sure Pistol had left before she closed the door. 

*

Walking up to the big, metal entrance door Maxx reached for her ID badge. She scanned it on the sensor. It beeped loudly before the robotic voice spoke. 

"Please state passcode."

"Don't overthink it." 

"Voice confirmed. Welcome, Maxxine Danziger." 

The door buzzed and she pushed it open. 

Once inside, she headed along the hall and caught the attention of her friend who was conveniently walking past. 

"Hey, Marjorie!" 

"Maxxine!" She hurried over, looking excited. "We're starting a new study today: Experiment #143." 

"Know anything about it yet?"

Marjorie nodded. "They say Subject K is involved..." 

Chapter Text

Marjorie soon had to be called away to help Ashley with something - and likely to speculate with her about Subject K, too. She had left Maxx with various thoughts rotating around inside her head - all relating to Subject K. 

Maxx was sat slouched at her desk, leg bouncing rapidly, typing up a transcript from some log of a recent study. She wasn't really paying attention to it, the words travelled in her ears, through her hands, and into the document, but her brain didn't listen. She was too busy thinking about Experiment #143. She wished she had a higher position here, some way to guarantee knowledge. Unfortunately, all she could do was hope one of the logs found their way to her desk to be typed. 

With both her hands and mind busy, she almost jumped out of her skin when she felt a sudden tap on her shoulder, ripping her back to reality. 

"Maxxine?" 

She whipped her head around to face the owner of the hand. "Oh, hey Patrick."

Patrick had a folder in his hand, he smiled and handed it to her. "There's something I need to go deal with, can you get this to Jon Lundin for me? He's in PVR 3." 

Maxx took the folder. "Yeah, sure."

"Thanks." He had a coat in his other hand which he pulled on while hurrying to the exit. 

Maxx's attention turned to the folder in her hands. She gasped upon seeing the label, slapping a hand over her mouth to keep quiet. 

Subject K.

She was desperate to take a look inside, just sneak a glance at the truth of one of The Midnight Society's greatest mysteries. 

The room was busy... but everyone was focused on something else. She could be seen... but would that really be an issue? 

Quickly glancing around, no one seemed to be looking in her direction. 

She opened the folder. 

There was a single sheet of paper inside. Not much to see, only a single sentence, but what it said meant everything. 

Experiment #143: Observations to be carried out on how the mind behaves in Elsewhere while the body is deceased - Subject K. 

The Midnight Society was going to kill someone while they were in Elsewhere?

Maxx slammed the folder shut. She had to get herself involved in this somehow. Sure, TMS wasn't entirely ethical, but she never thought it would go this far. 

If Jon was in a Portal Viewing Room, that meant it was about to begin - Subject K would soon be entering Elsewhere. 

She hurried down the halls, ignoring anyone trying to get her attention. She would find them again later, this was more important. She might be able to 'happen to' be in the room when the experiment started...

Chapter Text

When Maxx finally reached the room, she was short of breath. She took a moment to compose herself. While she did, she began to worry. 

The door to the PVR was closed. That meant the portal was active, and there were people inside. She must have been too late. 

Then again, Jon needed this folder, so there was still hope. 

She knocked twice on the door, and it opened almost instantly. 

"Maxxine?" Her boss, Jon Lundin asked upon seeing her. 

"Patrick told me to get this to you - he had to leave, some kind of emergency." 

Jon opened the door a little further. "Why don't you join us? It's almost time for The Shattering." He said with a smile. 

As soon as the door closed behind her, Maxx held the folder out to Jon. 

"The Shattering?" She asked. Maxx had heard it many times, but was never able to put together enough information to know exactly what it was. 

Jon put a hand on her back, leading her to the front of the room: close to the large window in the wall. 

"When the subjects become aware of their entry to Elsewhere. Less easy to manipulate than in The Midnight State, but much more interesting results." While Jon spoke, Maxx stared at the portal. 

It radiated light, the pink bubbles of the edge dripping, yet leaving no trace on the floor. It was beautiful. 

"Maxxine." 

"Yes?" She was entranced by the portal, but the tone of Jon's voice finally registered and she snapped her head to the side to face him. 

"You read it, didn't you?"

Shit. "No, of course not." She tried to stay as calm as possible. 

"Are you lying to me?"

"No." Her voice faltered a little, she hoped he hadn't noticed, but it was almost guaranteed he did. 

He watched her for a few seconds. A few agonising seconds. 

"Good." He finally said. "Because if you did, there are certain measures we would have to follow, especially if you tried to intervene."

Maxx nodded and silently turned her attention to the portal, internally screaming. 

Focusing back on the hypnotic bubbles, she practically jumped out of her skin when the silence was broken by the sound of glass shattering. 

"And so it begins." She heard Jon say. 

In front of the portal now stood two women, with broken glass scattered around them. 

Maxx watched as they stared at the portal, the one with longer hair stepping closer first. 

Now was her chance, she had to stop them. Maxx raised her arms, lunging towards the window. She wanted to bang her hands against it, make a loud noise, try to catch their attention and stop them from going into Elsewhere. 

She'd barely moved when someone stopped her. Strong hands gripped her wrists, pulling her back. Before she could try and fight back, she tripped. While getting back up on her feet, she briefly relaxed her arms. Big mistake. Her arms were held in place over her chest, and she was pinned back against someone very strong. 

Realising only one arm held her, she tried to break free, but stopped squirming when she felt something sharp press against her neck. 

"I warned you." Said Jon calmly, not even taking his eyes off the portal. 

"You can't just kill them!" Maxx yelled, crying out when the needle was pushed into her neck. Things went fuzzy very quickly, she felt her eyes trying to close. Despite trying to fight it, she soon slumped down. Unconscious.  

Chapter Text

Following her friend into the portal, Zoe felt like she was being hit with hundreds of emotions at once. Every feeling she could think of, she felt. It was overwhelming.

After just a few moments, a fortunately brief flash of bright light brought a return to normal. 

Well... normal certainly wasn't the word. They seemed to be in a place which was the furthest thing from normal. 

She watched the pink, bubbling portal close behind her, leaving the bright blue room she found herself in practically empty.

Zoe turned towards Cody. They stared at each other in shock. 

"You...You're pink." Zoe said.

"Yellow..." Was all Cody could say while pointing towards Zoe's hair. She was trying to process exactly what just happened.

Cody looked down at her clothes - they were now colourful. The colours in question included various shades of pink. She caught sight of her hair, holding it up in front of her - it had also been turned pink. 

Looking back up at Zoe, she saw her taking in her own changes - her clothes combinations of black and yellow. She looked at her own hair colour change, but the short length of her hair made that quite a difficult task. 

Out of nowhere, the portal suddenly reappeared. It spit out a girl in all green before closing back up as swiftly as it came. 

Cody and Zoe eyed the girl with caution. She grunted as she sat up after having landed flat on her face. She rubbed her nose a little as she looked around. 

"No." She breathed. "No, no, no, no." She threw herself at the wall, banging her fist against it. "No! Jon you can't do this!" She screamed. "You can't just throw me in Elsewhere, you asshole!"

Cody couldn't just watch the girl's distress. "Hey..." She began, the girl immediately froze. "Are you okay?"

She slowly turned to look at the source of the voice. Zoe moved closer to Cody, watching her with considerably more caution than her friend. 

"You. You're Experiment #143." She said. 

"What?" Cody asked. "What does that mean?"

"What's 'Elsewhere'?" Zoe asked before the green girl could answer. 

Taking a moment to look at her surroundings, she replied. "Elsewhere. It's the place we're in now - well, it's sort of a place." 

Zoe narrowed her eyes. "The hell does that mean?"

"We're only here mentally, our minds travelled here when we entered the portal, while our bodies remain outside it. With The Midnight Society."

"The Midnight Society? What's that?"

"Secret organisation. We send subjects into Elsewhere and study them."

Cody cut in. "What do you mean 'we'?"

"I work for them."

"Well, if you work for the people who put us here, how do we get out?" Knowing she worked for this Midnight Society, Zoe was even less sure this girl could be trusted. 

"I don't know..." She said quietly. 

"Bullshit."

"It's above my paygrade. I type transcripts at a desk. I'm not allowed to be involved in the experiments. Everything I know is what I picked up from the report logs I hear."

"If you're not allowed to be involved in the experiments, how are you here?" 

"Pretty sure this was me being fired. I opened a file I shouldn't have, and tried to intervene, they sent me here."

"Why? What did you find?"

She hesitated. 

Zoe pressed. "What?"

"They're gonna kill one of you."