"Yeah, I guess." Xeno said, picking up a "Make your own planet" kit off of one of the shelves and turning it over.
"What's wrong?" Asked Haiden, concerned.
"It's just that I got into an argument with Aruda earlier, and I feel bad about upsetting her." He put it back down, careful to line it back up with the others.
"I'm sure she'll come around; you two seemed to be pretty good friends." Haiden comforted. "I'm sure this'll all blow over when we solve this."
"Thank you." Xeno looked back at him, and smiled at him earnestly.
"Well, I really should be going." he looked up at the clock mounted on the gift shop walls. "I have the kids from Willowheath Primary to show around. I'll see you later."
"Bye." Xeno said as he left the gift shop. He began walking around the place, lost in his thoughts, occasionally checking out a book he hadn't seen, or a children's toy he found interesting. He remembered the gift shop from when he was a child, and he had gone to Willowheath museum for the first time. That was where and when he had fallen in love with astronomy.
When he was around thirteen, he had gone to one of the Willowheath Museum's showings. There, he had learned about planets outside of the solar system, and seen some of the complex equations that astronomers used to work out where they were. He was enthralled. When he had come to the gift shop, he had bought a book on space. His father and stepmotherthought it was a sweet interest, until he had begun to take it more seriously.
By the time Xeno was sixteen, he told his father that he didn't want to take over at the bakery. His dad had apparently always seen the pair of them working side-by-side at the bakery, so when he heard he wanted to be an astronomer and work in a museum, he was furious.
Because of that, Xeno ended up hiding what he was going to do from his father. He chose food and nutrition for one of his A-levels to calm his father, and chose maths, further maths and physics on the side. "I'm good at them, I'll get easy grades." He had told his father, with no re-mention of astronomy. When he graduated with AAA in the first three, and a C in food tech, he applied for a university far away, hoping to get a full ride scholarship. When he got in, he was overjoyed and hoped his father would come around.
He didn't.
He blinked, and he was back to reality. He was holding a lamp shaped like the crescent moon in a museum gift shop. He put it back down and went back to his office, checking his phone on the way. No messages. He put it to the back of his mind for the time being. As he thought more about the situation, one thing became clear.
He needed answers out of Mr. Crossley.
CHAPTER TWENTY
That night was a blur. Xeno couldn't relax, and fell asleep a full hour later than he usually did (which he, himself thought to be a sign that his consciousness was unravelling).
All he could think of, long into the night, was how badly he had messed things up with Aruda. Worst of all, he'd timetabled a full two weeks of them being free together, so there would be barely any downtime where she could cool off. He had texted her a few times, but she didn't pick up her phone at the best of times. Naturally, she hadn't replied. Not that he was surprised, just.. disappointed?
When he woke up the next day, groggy, he could only think that he and Haiden needed to talk to Mr. Crossley sooner rather than later. He didn't even really remember what the man looked like; he only had a vague recollection of the name.
He composed a text to his Watson; he essentially wanted to convey that he wanted to have a nice, calm, civil conversation with the man. He ended up typing "We need to find Mr. Crossley. TODAY. We need to talk.".
Haiden replied as he was getting into his car. Clearly more level-headed than him, he wrote back. "Noted. We're all free at eleven today. Please be nice to him; let me do the talking. We can meet up for a few minutes beforehand if you want. I'll see him in the morning, so I'll ask him to come to my office around then."
This satisfied Xeno, whose anger was sated as he began the drive to the museum.By the time he had almost reached the museum, Xeno realised he had been so lost in his thoughts that he hadforgotten to put any music on in the car. His CDs sat on the deck untouched. He thought about it only for a second, though, as he put on an old Paramore CD.
Coming through the Astronomy entrance, he thought about how lucky he was that he didn't have to walk across the whole museum. Astronomy was the department that was furthest away from the large wooden doors at the front of Willowheath Museum, and Xeno could drive his Zoe to the back entrance, come in the doors and basically be at his office. It was a shame that he'd have to fight through traffic at the end of the day, but he thought it was a necessary evil.
For the next two hours, he typed up the basic paperwork the museum made all of his colleagues file. He had noticed a recent uptick in its amount, noting that he had seen a large increase in the volume of interpersonal "studies" he had been made to do by Mrs. Pepper, no doubt busywork caused by the "sabotage war".
Finally, ten fifty rolled around. He began the long walk to Palaeontology, coming through the astronomy halls. As he came into the main hall, he noticed Mrs. Pepper giving two very guilty-looking botanists a lecture. Perhaps they had used the Astronomy-Palaeontology feud to their advantage, or used it as an excuse to slack off entirely. Or, he hoped, it could be something completely unrelated.
He tried to slip past Mrs. Pepper. Even though she was nice, she had a tendency to make conversation that lasted hours, and that was time Xeno absolutely did not have at that moment. Luckily, he could get past her without suspicion. However, when he was going through the opening for the department, he caught her eye. She gave him a look of suspicion, but then her gaze softened. He knew she trusted him, even if what he was doing looked suspicious.
The same couldn't be said, however, for the palaeontologists of the department. Every one of them eyed him with a look so accusatory he wondered if he was carrying spray-paint and just didn't know it.
His office was mostly as he had originally remembered it, save for the two extra chairs in front of Haiden's desk. If he hadn't wanted it to feel like an interrogation, he had utterly failed.
Haiden perked up when he saw him, having evidently been lost in thought before. "Hey, he's gonna be here soon." he said, motioning for Xeno to sit down on one of the empty wooden chairs in front of his desk.
"I feel like he'll realise that we're questioning him." he ventured, sitting down in the chair. For bare wood, it was actually surprisingly comfortable. For a brief moment, he considered asking him where he had gotten them.
"I know, but I didn't want him to stand. I know it's embarrassing, but.." Haiden looked away for a second before looking back at Xeno. "I think I've said, He's like my work-dad. He's tough on the outside, but he's nice deep down. He took me under his wing when I started. He helped me make friends, and in return I fixed his computer. And trust me, it needed fixing." Haiden chuckled at that last part before looking back at him.
"Despite that, I've got a Plan B if it goes south. I know you wanted to be here, but when I've asked him about the past before, he's gotten angry."
