companionwolf

“Try poking it with the activated protojack?” says Tulip, and the engineers nod. PC shrugs, fits one of the jacks to his arm, sparks it to life, and lightly clamps the progs around the crystal. Green light crackles about it, but nothing else happens. 

Tell us something, PC thinks at it, tell us anything. Tell us where to go. Tell us. 

The protojack crackles; the crystal sits glimmering yellow orange, still and silent. 

PC sighs, turns off the protojack and puts it away. Tulip makes grabby hands for the Shard, and he lets her take it, watches her handle it in much the same way he did. 

“Maybe we should turn it over to the government,” says Davey. 

A chorus of ‘no!’ answers him, and he relents, mumbling something about ‘it was just an idea’. Bigly talks of taking a sample, running it through tests, but PC isn’t sure breaking it is a good idea. 

The Shard makes its way to Alex, whose hands barely wrap around it. They stare at it, and their shoulders slump slightly. A sort of dazed looks comes over their eyes, and for a moment, PC thinks he sees something flicker in them, but he isn’t sure. 

“You okay?” he asks.

Alex does not respond. Tulip gently punches them in the shoulder; the motion makes their body sway slightly, but still they do not make any move to show they have registered the hit. Davey frowns. 

“Alex—“

The freshman’s eyes, which have slid shut, snap open again. Their hands drop from the crystal, letting it clatter against the table. Lizard chides them, but there’s still a faraway look in their eyes that PC thinks means they don’t hear the other at all. 

“Alex?” he asks. 

“Latitude: -37.60903, Longitude: -161.80187, Distortion: 1.59,” they mumble.  “Latitude: 40° 38' 5.39" North, 

Longitude: -80° 04' 33.00" West.” A blink. “I don’t know what that means. But it’s important. 

Almost as soon as the coordinates have left Alex’s mouth, multiple people are whipping out their phones, typing furiously. It’s Tulip who gets the news out first: “It’s at some kind of facility, the second one.”

PC’s heart sinks. “What kind?” he asks. 

Tulip squints, scrolls. “Some kind of retreat? A ... camp? Something for helping people with CPS...”

“What’s that?” asks Davey, as he puts the Outsider Shard away into the prototype case, struggling to find a configuration in which it will close. 

“Some kind of headache disorder? Seems more than that. Bloody noses, headaches, insomnia, faint feeling, pain behind the eyes, exhaustion, fatigue, heightened anxiety...”

Alex, still half in a stupor, sits up slightly. “What’s it called, again?” they ask, voice thick. 

“CPS,” says Tulip. “Not to be confused with Child Protective Services.” 

“Shit,” says Alex.

“What’s wrong?” asks PC, even though something in him is screaming, has been since Tulip read the symptoms list. He just can’t figure out what it’s trying to tell him.

“I think I have that,” says Alex.

Tulip and Davey exchange looks as the latter finally snaps the case closed. “I guess we have a way in,” he says as he slides the case under the bed and stands up. “Can you call? Email?”

“Doing the second one so now,” says Tulip, Alex moving to sit next to her and PC on the floor, murmuring their symptoms so that the other can include them in the report. 

“What was the other coorindate set?” asks PC.

Bigly frowns as he types. “Just the middle of the ocean,” he says. 

“Ah,” says PC. “I... I think I know what that is.” He glances at the others, who shake their heads. 

“Nothing we can do about that,” says Tulip. “Let’s focus on this facility.” 

“So what about the Psi Gate?” asks Davey. Lizard starts to ask what he means, but Tulip answers faster. “We’ll have Alex go in, and snoop around ourselves. It could still be on public property, like some woods nearby or something.”

“And if it’s not we’ll go full XCOM?” 

“Yeah, exactly!”

“Your encouraging her just makes it worse,” says PC, laughing tiredly. 

“I mean, she’s got a point,” Davey says after a moment. “We might have no other choice.” He pauses. “This has been one long road trip,” he adds, mostly to himself. 

“Isn’t it better then bar tending?” asks Tulip.

“Oh, god, yeah,” Davey says. Tulip laughs.

“And sent,” says she, putting her phone away. “We can head out toward there tomorrow morning, acceptance or not.”

The humans drift out of the room then, into the other spare bedroom, leaving PC to ascend back up the stairs to lie on his sleeping bag and Alex lying back down in the bed. They roll over so that they’re looking down at PC, and Alice and  Espeon as they emerge from his coat pocket.

“Do you think they can help me?” she asks.

“I’m sure they’ll be able to at least give you a direction,” Alice says. Alex gums and turns back over, shuffling a little and then falling still. 

PC watches them sleep for a while, nothing the rise and fall of their body as they breath, and the distinct lack of that in his own body. He consciously breathes for a few moments, but it only serves to make him well aware of his lack of actual nose, actual lungs. Alice looks up at him from her place near his head.

“You’re worried?”

“Typical Awakening anxiety,” he says, as Espeon curls into the crook of his leg. “I guess I’m just nervous something’ll go wrong.”

“More often then not, it all ends up okay,” says Alice, and he wants to believe her. He does.

But he cannot.