Page 15 of Pandion

“Sorry. I’m at my limit.” Kagesawa untied his hair, threw the hair tie across the room somewhere and closed his eyes.

“I whant to sleep but ev’ry time I close mah eyeses I see a bunch a’ garbage.”

“Then you’ll have to accept it and watch some garbage until you fall asleep.”

“Blue, red, redhh… thassa sevensomethin two, red, moooorreeee reddd… green…” Harumine opened his eyes and for a moment, kept on hallucinating a flow of refuse crawling across the ceiling.

There was an uncharacteristically stark flash of annoyance transferred through the link, which startled Harumine to look.

“You’re such a pain in the butt. Just sleep!” Kagesawa cleared his throat.

“I din’t tell youdda drink so much!” Harumine snapped back.

“I had four beers, and it was already ages ago!”

“I don’ wanna fight wih’ you!”

“Me neither, so shut up and let me sleep!” Kagesawa turned his back to Harumine who bit his lip. He knew he needed to sleep, but it wasn’t as if he was trying to sabotage it intentionally.

“I feel sick.”

“If you need to puke, don’t puke on the bed. Let me sleep.”

“Not like t-hawt. Like-ah, uhm, like I’m not right… sumthin’s wrong, I should run a dianst— di— gnosht—ic program t’check…”

“You’re drunk and tired. You need to sleep. Shut up.” Kagesawa sounded like he was about to run out of patience, so Harumine shut up. He reasoned he was not in any immediate danger, but it felt incredibly lonely to have to cope with this alone.

Being drunk was inconvenient but not really a cause for concern. It was the persistent hallucination of rolling shit that kept triggering the uncontrollable sorting responses that worried him. Maybe it would pass with time and rest? He was too exhausted to do anything about it. All he could do was let go.

Green, brown, 476, red, red, 56, r-red… r-redh— r— fi— five… red… f-five… b20. Revert to initial settings. Code seven dash five, project ID: Pandion.

Chapter 7

Kagesawa jolted out of bed with enough force to hit the opposing wall, the impact of which startled him further. “—t the shit?!” There were multiple threats? His instincts told him to scan his surroundings to determine what else was attacking him. The wall? He’d hit the wall? Where…?

In the dim light of the blue indicator lights of his electronics, he could make out the form of a person sitting up on the bed. He was overcome by the rush of adrenaline and panic and all the trappings that came along with it: rapid heartbeat, cold sweat, shakes and shallow breathing.

“Not here, not here, not here…” His head was catching up with the situation, but his body was still reacting to the fear. “It’s not him, it’s not him, it’s not him…” It was a different link. He was fine. He took some deep, deliberate, slow breaths and tried to calm down.

“Are you all right?” Satoru’s voice.

“Y-yes, I’m-m-m fine.” As if it made any sense to lie.

“Who was that in your dream?” Satoru asked. Of course, he’d picked it up. Not this again.

“Shi-Shimizu.” The shaking was the worst. Just when he would’ve most appreciated being in control of his body, he trembled uncontrollably and started stuttering. He made an effort to dampen the link as best he could, regardless.

“One of your previous links?”

“Y-yes.” It had been a while since he’d last had a nightmare or a panic attack, so he’d hoped he was over it. Breathe in slowly, deeply through the nose… exhale through the mouth. “Ah, shit-t-t…” As he calmed down, he became aware of the pain in his shoulder.

As quickly as it had appeared, it disappeared again. He turned to look at Satoru, although in this low light, he could scarcely see his face.

“You’re doing that?” Instead of dampening…?

“Yes, for now. Doesn’t seem like anything serious, but you may want to ice that.” Satoru lay back down. “What time is it?” he asked. Kagesawa checked his watch.

“Four-thirty. Go back to sleep.”

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