“Where’s your head at?”
Fern jerks a little, pulling their attention back to the present. “Sorry,” they say automatically. “Was just thinking.”
“I could see that,” their handler says drily. “What about?”
Fern tangles their fingers together anxiously. They don’t like this, they don’t like conversing with their handler, not even on a normal day, but today it’s harder; today they have to lie. They can’t say that they were thinking about an airplane hangar scuffing across their hands, or boots colliding with their ribs. They can’t say they were thinking about hands pushing and pulling at them in the middle of the night, and they can’t, they can’t say they were thinking about a knife-blade against their throat, pouring a torrent of fear and pain into them through the millimeter line of its edge.
“…ey, hey. Snap out of it.”
Their handler has them by the shoulders, his grip a firm, blank pressure through the double barriers of gloves and Fern’s agency-issued scrubs.
“You’re shaking, what’s the matter with you?”
I adore Fern and I adore the Path ‘verse and this piece has so much of the early Fern bits that really get me. Their attachment to their cubby, the way that the knife reads, the casual abuse they’re used to, the way they are looked after but only as cursory necessity, as maintenance for equipment.
I love the whole touch-telepathy concept and how beautifully you always convey it, I love the Path ‘verse, and Fern is so soft and gentle and undeserving of the way they’re treated.
I love
Fern jolts and yelps as a slap stings across their face, knocking them to one side so they have to grab onto the table to stay in the chair their handler put them in. They cower closer to the table, ducking away from their handler’s anger.
and
There’s a scratchy blanket draped over them, muttering about frequent washings and industrial-strength laundry detergent and many many other sick people’s quiet misery and boredom. Fern twitches their hands up and away from it, onto their shirt.
and
“There are ways to get you a new handler - quietly, without him knowing you had anything to do with it.” [. . .] Their handler isn’t the problem; he’s better than their last one, and they’d rather stay with him than risk someone worse.
and
a knife, The Knife, taps against their throat, sending lightning-quick flashes of fearterrorpain jolting through their brain, and Fern whimpers, humming high and soft as every inch of them feels like a live-wire waiting for the next touch.
and
They don’t want to, they don’t want to - they part shaking lips, just a little, and freeze, quelling even their breath as the flat of the knife blade slides gently across their tongue, chiming crystalline death against their teeth until the tip just barely touches the roof of their mouth. Sense-memories tumble across their tongue, words babbled in terror and useless, frantic pleading, screams, choked-off whimpers, more. The taste of blood pours down their throat, so thick they don’t know if it’s real, if it’s theirs, or just part of the reading, or maybe both. Tears dampen Fern’s blindfold, their own fear and the fear of everyone who’s come before them leaking out of the corners of their scrunched-up eyes.
and
The door hishes open, but their handler doesn’t let go. “Get some rest,” he says instead, gruff overtones atop weariness betraying his own desire for sleep. “And if you’re having a problem, tell me next time, before you collapse again, got it?”
