Fabricated Chapter 8

[companionwolf]

 Eventually he grows tired of the noise and pulse of the bar, and steps outside to clear his head. It’s a cloudy night, and he blinks in the dark of the parking lot.

A pair of college kids are hanging out besides a truck bed, one of them lighting a cigarette. Pillow Central, standing near the doorway, feels nonexistent heartbeats skip, feels anxiety pulse in his stomach— Kitty calls it a instinct, to be so afraid of fire as they are, but he isn’t sure it would qualify as such when the beings aren’t alive. 

He sits down on the sidewalk outside the door, idly brining Espeon from his pocket and petting her head. Gravel crunches. He looks up into the dark eyed face of one of the college students. They’re obviously a little tipsy, and he stiffens slightly as they reach into their pocket, and then he settles again as they bring out a handkerchief and dab at their nose with it.  

“Pokémon fan?” they ask.

“Yeah,” he says. He can’t drag his eyes away from the single lock of bright white hair on the their head. 

“You getting the new game that’s coming out? Dweeb over there says it’s no more then a cash grab,” the college student says. The other one, leaning against the truck and inhaling on her cig, coughs and sputters indignantly at her friend. 

“Sun and Moon sucked,” she says as she comes over. “It’s nothing but gimmicks now.” She looks down at Pillow Central. “Aren’t from around here, are you?” 

“What gave it away, the clothes?” he asks. 

“Aren’t you hot?” asks the dark eyed college student.

“No, I have- I have a illness. I have to keep warm and covered up,” he says, and it’s not a lie, really. 

“Oh, shit,” says the girl, taking another inhale of her cig. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Pillow Central says. The bar light catches on the girl’s various pins, and he can’t help but gaze over them- there’s a bi flag, and a antifa symbol, and then a couple of enamel pins reflecting the likeness of cryptids. One reads ‘ghost hunters anonymous’, and the design matches the shirt the dark eyed student wears under their black unzipped hoodie. 

The girl catches his gaze. “Part of a club,” she says. “We’re ghost hunters. Eventually cryptid hunters too, but ghosts to start out.”

“Cool,” says Pillow Central. He suddenly remembers the human convention of manners, and almost bashfully goes, “Oh, by the way, I’m Bradford.” He shakes her hand. 

“Call me Tulip,” she says. One foot kicks her friend playfully in the ankle, they swear at her. “This nerd is Alex.”

“Freshman?” he asks. Then, quickly, “My nephew is a freshman at a college near Dallas.” 

“I’m a sophomore,” Tulip says, “nerd is a freshman, and Davey is a senior.”

Pillow Central tucks Espeon back into his pocket and hefts himself to his feet. “As in the server?”

“Yeah, he works here,” Alex says. “We’re waiting for his shift to end so we can go out hunting. We have permissions and everything.” They point a thumb back at the truck. “All sorts of equipment, a camera, sleeping gear—“

“We’re spending the night,” Tulip says. “Hey, if Davey’s cool with it, you could come with. Having a normie around to validate things would be sick.”

“That sounds... interesting,” Pillow Central says. He hasn’t got anything else to do, does he? 

He feels Alice shift in the pocket, the gentle tap of her paw against his body; he realizes she’s speaking in Morse.

CAREFUL, she says.

He shoves a hand into the pocket and finger spells I KNOW back at her. He feels her paws pat at the fingers, no words but gentle feeling, and he softly runs a fingertip against her forehead. 

Espeon’s tail lashes at him moments later, driving his hand back out from the pocket. He looks back at Tulip and Alex, who are both checking their phones. “Point me where you need me,” he says. 

“You carry the camera, ok? It’s easy enough to work it,” Tulip says absently. “I’ll carry the EMP reader and other electronics, and Alex and Davey can carry the sleeping stuff.”

“Ah, that’s boring work,” Alex says. 

“You wanna sleep on haunted wood?” Tulip asks, looking up over at them from her typing. 

“Spooky,” Alex says, putting away their phone. Tulip follows suit. 

“Davey will be coming out any minute,” she says, only to be cut off as the bar door opens and the man himself comes walking out. He runs a hand trough his hair and sighs.

“Busy night?” asks Tulip.

“Feel bad for the late shifters,” he says. “Think some fights are brewing. Among other things.” He notices Pillow Central. “Hey again.”

“Hello,” Pillow Central says.

“Davey, this is Bradford, Tulip’s new pack mule,” Alex says. Pillow Central laughs, Tulip snorts. 

“He’s the normie to our weird,” she explains. Davey looks like he’s going to say something, and then shrugs. 

“I mean, I’m glad to have a extra hand around,” he says. “And someone else to make sure these two don’t do anything super stupid.”

“Hey we’re young, not dumb!” Alex protests. 

“Arguable,” says Davey. He looks at Pillow Central, and then back at his friends. “Let’s get going then; ghosts don’t like to wait.”

As he follows the trio to the truck, and clambers into the back seat next to Davey and some equipment, Pillow Central can almost forget the nervous feeling in his chest. 

Almost.