overworked and under-informed

breaking the rules

𝖙𝖗𝖎𝖌𝖌𝖊𝖗 𝖜𝖆𝖗𝖓𝖎𝖓𝖌𝖘 𝖆𝖗𝖊 𝖑𝖎𝖘𝖙𝖊𝖉 𝖎𝖓 𝖙𝖍𝖊 𝖔𝖕𝖊𝖓𝖎𝖓𝖌 𝖈𝖍𝖆𝖕𝖙𝖊𝖗

✬˖༄ ♡ ࿐*✬

they never spoke about the phone call and, for that, karl is endlessly grateful.

when he woke up in the early hours of the morning, the call had already ended and he was left with the simplest message.

'don't stress about last night, i was happy to help. thank you for calling me x'

karl had left a thumbs up on the text, and the subject had never been touched again.

karl had worried it would be brought up while they're quite literally trapped in a room together, but they've been far too busy arguing over numbers and puzzles to talk about anything to do with real life.

"i checked there!" karl insists, laughing harder than he has in any of his recent past. he'd entered the escape room initially anxious, worried that the solitude would be awkward and he'd be overly aware of the fact that a worker was watching their progress through the cameras in each room, but he's none of the sort. in fact, karl can't remember the last time he felt so carefree.

"yeah, well you said you checked the couch too and that's where i found the key!" sapnap replies, laughing equally as hard as he flips one of the dining chairs upside down. karl doesn't even know why they're laughing but he's bent over, clutching his stomach. breathless.

sapnap's giggles fade as his gaze skims the chair. "hm, nothing there."

karl's laughter is set off again, impossibly harder than before. he's glad that he left his water in the car, because he knows he would've been anxious sipping this whole time and, by now, he would've been desperate to pee. "i said there wasn't!"

sapnap gasps, sitting back on his thighs. the ravenette has been crawling about the floor for the greater part of five minutes now, suggesting there must be something hidden under one of the surfaces. "i've got it."

karl sucks up a breath, trying his hardest to stop the laughter that fights through him. he clears his throat, wiping his face of imaginary tears. "what is it?" he asks, barely composed.

"the newspaper in the last room," he says, scrambling back onto his feet.

karl gasps in realisation, the lightbulb illuminating in his mind, and turns back to the previous room where they'd spent the greater part of forty minutes trying to 'escape'. any minute now, the timer will go off and they'll officially lose, so karl moves quickly as he goes to get the prop newspaper from the coffee table.

his attention is turned down on the first page, skimming over the details as he blindly walks back towards the second room. "the front page has a story dated in-"

karl stops with a humph sort of sound as he walks straight into a wall, mildly surprised by how soft it feels.

until he looks up and sees that the 'wall' has ravenette hair and a neat beard and a stupid smile on his face. and that the 'wall' is actually a man (sapnap) who had clearly moved to stand in the doorway and watch karl right as the brunette went to exit.