No Mistake

The Sideralis family had sequestered themselves in the study, and for once, there was no butler allowed. Jugemu had been dismissed for the night, and his father had been left to stand in the hall, watching the heavy wooden doors as he waited to be called.

He wasn't called for a very long time.

The Sideralis's continued to talk for almost an hour--at one point voices briefly rising in what sounded a whole lot like an argument--and only almost twenty minutes later did the door crack open, with Evan emerging from the room and quickly shutting the door behind him.

He looked fine. A little bit tired, but fine.

"Could you please go get Jugemu for me?"

He stayed where he was, back up against the door as he waited, making no effort to move. He wasn't the butler's master--that would be his parents--but he still held rank within the house just the same.

Evan was tired. He was only going to be more tired by the time the morning rolled around, but there was no other way. Not really. He'd sat there for almost ten minutes, trying to wrap his head around things. Around what was the best option, the best way out.

Jugemu had said his allegiance was to Evan, not the Sideralis family, and now Evan was going to find out how true that was.

"Come inside," Evan said, pulling the door ever so slightly open to let Jugemu in.

All three Evans were inside the room, a universally terrible decision that Evan rarely made. He almost always had one off somewhere else, just in case something happened. This was probably the first time Jugemu had seen all three in a room, but he was unlikely to recognize the significance, as Evan had kept it a very firm secret just how many he could make.

One was standing not far from the door, his arms folded across his chest, his face sour. The other was sitting with his back to the door, his head only barely visible over the back of the couch.

The room smelled ever so faintly of blood.

"What happens to a butler once things are done? Do they just move to the next person in line in the family, or?" The Evan closest to the door asked once the door itself had been closed behind Jugemu.

Oh. Suicide. Hn.

Both visible Evan's looked unhappy with that, exchanging a glance between each other for a brief moment before the one with it's arms crossed turned it's attention back to Jugemu.

"Does that always happen? Because, quite frankly, that honored tradition is bullshit. Is there some way to just... not do that?"

That was an unfortunate kink in his plans, wasn't it?

There was no way things were going to go well. There was no version of events that didn't end with... with what? With Jugemu's father dead, from the sounds of it. From a lot of people very upset and angry.

"I killed my parents," one of the Evan's said, and it would probably take a moment for Jugemu to realize that it wasn't either of the ones standing that had spoken. Instead, it was the one sitting on the couch, his head hung forward.

The one in front of Jugemu grimaced.

"We need to know how good the lawyers for the family are, and if they'd even work in this case. Are they on my parents payroll, or are they on the family payroll?"

Truly, Evan hadn't known Jugemu had it in him. He'd expected... well, acceptance. For Jugemu to nod and act like it was no big deal, because that was what he'd always done. He'd never shown much reaction before. He'd been agitated at worst, but that had always been subdued, like every emotion Jugemu showed was muffled under a thick blanket.

But this was new. Genuine anger. Not yelling, but anger, thick and hot and clear as day, even if it was obvious Jugemu was trying to stamp it down.

The Evan by the door looked uncomfortable. The one in front of Jugemu was doing a bit better, but only just. There was still a thin layer of discomfort, of I have to keep it together and figure this out, but he could at least manage a response.

"They were going to send me back. If they send me back, I die. So I wasn't going to let them. It was me or them, and I chose me."

Selfish, maybe, but his parents had never been good people.

Evan didn't answer Jugemu's questions. The bodies told the story clear enough. His father on the floor, face down, surrounded by blood. His mother hadn't made it far, sitting slumped on the floor in front of her seat. There was a knife still in her, protruding just below her neck. There was a lot of blood. Blood had soaked his parents clothes, had soaked through the thick carpet. It would be difficult to clean up. Difficult to get the smell out.

"I need to find a lawyer," Evan said, going back to his very first question. "I need to find someone who can handle the case. Self defense..." Evan faltered for a moment, uncertain. "The argument can be made for self defense. They weren't going to kill me, but they were going to do something that amounted to the same thing. The argument is sound. But I'm not a lawyer, and I don't know how I'd argue that. We need to... to figure that out, and then you can call the police."

Evan hadn't been expecting comfort. He'd been expecting horror. Duty. But instead Jugemu did go out of his way to comfort him, resting his hand on Evan's shoulder.

The bloody Evan on the couch looked up, staring up at Jugemu for several long moments. He just stared for several long moments, trying to process it. Trying to understand what was going through Jugemu's mind.

He was a mystery in a lot of ways.

Evan paused for a long moment, his hand briefly rising as if to cover Jugemu's own, and then it dropped back down.

It was still wet with blood. He didn't want to get it all over Jugemu.

"Alright," the Evan by the door said. "I was going to stay in the room and let you handle contacting the police. If I go anywhere they might think I'm trying to dump something."

Evan couldn't decide if things were going very fast or very slow. It seemed to take an age for someone to knock at the door, but looking back later on he could barely remember. It felt like only minutes from the time Jugemu left to the time the police arrived, pouring into the room.

He was polite. He was respectful. He did what they asked of him, merging back together before finally letting himself be handcuffed. They had a scene to clear. Evidence to take.

Evan was polite, but he knew how things worked. He wasn't going to incriminate himself until he'd spoken to his lawyer, escorted off to the police station in the back of a police cruiser.

Jugemu was probably beside himself. Evan didn't want to know. He didn't want to look. He'd done this sort of thing before, lost everything and had to face the consequences. It was easier to not think at all, to just be quiet and still and let things happen around him, rather than too him.

The lawyer didn't seem all that bothered by the fact that he was defending the man who'd murdered his previous employer. Really, if he was bothered at all, Evan couldn't tell.

"Your story is fine," he said after Evan finished explaining things. "You're running the borderline of a true self defense claim, but it'll play well with a judge or jury. You can probably manage a plea deal, considering they evidence they'll pulled up on your parents. Technically speaking we can argue they were guilty of kidnapping."

Evan hadn't thought of that, but he supposed that was why the man in front of him was getting paid an awful lot of money to keep him from going away for the rest of his life.

Evan was not expecting anything. He wasn't expecting anyone to show up. He'd spent a lot of time alone when he'd done his work. He'd made few friends, kept to himself, and gone out of his way to avoid creating any real bonds. People tended to die. Those that didn't die went away. Getting attached just made things harder, and his guilt had been too great for that anyway.

He'd done much the same on Manta Carlos. He didn't want to get attached. The chances were far too great he'd abruptly be jerked away again. Manta Carlos was a paradise, but it was so good that it simply didn't feel real. It couldn't be happening.

Life in prison was, being realistic, nothing Evan wasn't used to. Holding was holding. A small cell, a small cot, a toilet in the corner. It wasn't meant to be comfortable or accommodating, just temporary. Supposedly real jail was much plusher, but people could afford to suffer a night or two while waiting. Manta Carlos was awfully efficient when it came to sentencing, after all, and there would be no months of waiting for things to get handled. He'd already agreed to cooperate. They'd already dug through the whole house for what they needed.

Evan blinked stupidly at the guard when he arrived, letting him know he had a visitor. Straga? No, Chloe. Chloe seemed the most likely one. If she'd heard, she'd be there to lecture him. Straga would probably show up after his sentencing was done to complain about how inconvenienced them.

It was not Chloe. There was only one Evan, his hands loosely cuffed together, and his face looked more confused than anything as he settled down in the chair, staring at Jugemu through through the thick glass.

Even with all his promises, Evan hadn't thought he'd come.

Jugemu. Just Jugemu. And he didn't even call him master like he always did, just Evan.

Evan supposed he probably wasn't his master anymore. He'd lost any and all claim to the Sideralis family estate when he'd killed them. He was effectively penniless, with his lawyer noting he'd leave a how to get welfare package for Evan when he got out.

He was going to have to get a job. Like, a real job. Evan could think of a few possibilities, but the man sitting in front of him sort of put that on hold.

"So," Evan said, trying very hard to keep things conversational and not show the nerves he was feeling (god, was he nervous? yes, yes he was). "How've things been?"