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He knew he was falling, but for some reason he got the distinct impression of walking on the ground. He could barely make out a hallway he was walking down. Time seemed to slow down as this... vision or whatever played out hazily before his mind's eye.\n\nHe saw himself stop at a door. It had something written on it, but Simon couldn't really make sense of it. The door opened to reveal a storage room of some sort. A gap in the shelves made room for a clear container filled with some sort of off-white, shiny liquid. The container was around the size of a football, and had a control panel on the top.\n\nSimon saw his hand reaching out – it was inked over, but for some reason it looked more green than orange – and pressing a couple of buttons in sequence.\n\nThen Simon felt his body hit the ground. It was surprisingly soft, but the impact still managed to jar him out of whatever weird trance he was in.\n\n“What... was that?” Simon asked out loud.\n\n“Was... sorta hoping you'd tell me,” came a voice to Simon's left. Quickly looking around, Simon managed to make out the crocodile guy in the gloom – wow, it was really dark down here. “I guess you're [i]really[/i] not on their side, huh?”\n\nGradually, Simon's eyes adjusted to the gloom. They were in a storage room of some sort, filled with bedding, medical gowns and scrubs. Simon had landed in a box filled with pillows.\n\nThe older reptile hadn't been so lucky. Simon gasped in horror, scrambling out of the safe padding of his box as he saw the plastic rod jutting through the crocodile's left thigh. He had fallen right through one of the shelving units!\n\nSimon felt Fortis recede, finally, the cool air flowing from the hole in the ceiling above brushing against his fur. “O-oh my gosh I didn't- I'm so sorry!” Guilt washed over Simon like a tidal wave. This sensation wasn't... particularly novel to the boy, though. Not like the intense, overwhelming fear he kept feeling today.\n\nHe wasn't sure what to make of that. It happened every time he saw that... inky insect thing. Thinking back, he didn't think he was really [i]that[/i][i][/i][i][/i] scared of it, even if it was kinda creepy...\n\nGetting distracted. Focus, Simon.\n\nBefore Simon could say anything else, the crocodile spoke again. “That armband ain't a disguise, huh? Okay, kiddo, I need you to use those claws of yours to rip up some of the material in here to make something you can tie around my leg. Can you do that for me?” Simon nodded mutely.\n\nAfter a beat, Simon quickly scrambled over to box of bedding he had fallen into. He heard the crocodile give a faint grunt. Was he annoyed? Or just... no, he couldn't be in pain, the human body wasn't stupid enough to keep sending pain signals [i]after[/i] a traumatic injury. He was definitely annoyed.\n\nSimon dug his claws into a sheet, gripping it with his other hand and doing his best to rip it into strips. It was slow going – the fabric was pretty tough! But eventually, he managed to get some... straight-ish strips. Straight enough to be used as a makeshift tourniquet, anyway.\n\nSimon handed him the makeshift bandages, helping to get them around the injured leg just above the wound. “Okay. Now, I need you to find a first aid kit. There should be one nearby. We're in... I think this is storage room B2a? So if you go out that door you should be approaching the cafeteria. I know there's one in the kitchen...”\n\nSimon nodded. He could do that.\n\nSimon didn't even notice the crocodile's anxious glances at the hole in the ceiling as he walked out the door.\n\n* * *\n\nAfter stepping through the doorway, Simon felt an odd, fuzzy feeling on the back of his hand. He looked down, eyes squinting through the gloom. The back of his hand had turned... orange.\n\n“There's something weird here. Can you feel it?” came Fortis's voice from the orange patch of skin, buzzing against the back of Simon's hand.\n\nSimon frowned as he kept walking, his voice hushed. “Um. Well when we fell down here I saw... something? Didn't you?”\n\n“No? I meant... it feels like a part of me fell off. But I don't... I don't think I'm missing any pieces?”\n\nSimon contemplated this for a while as he walked along. He quickly came to the conclusion that he had no idea what to make of it. Simon rounded a corner, lost in thought, only to be jolted back to awareness by a sound coming from the other end of the corridor.\n\n“Someone's coming,” Fortis whispered. Simon darted back around the corner, peeking out around it. He strained his ears...\n\n“...n't know why you're going around spooking the locals,” came an approaching voice. A young child's voice, or at least the voice of someone rather small. It sounded jovial, playful – a stark contrast with everything going on, really. “I mean, no skin off my nose, but isn't it kinda a waste? Compl needs us to find the thing as soon as possible, y'know.”\n\nThere was no reply, just a weird sort of clicking sound that began as the voice stopped.\n\n“Yeah yeah. Blame me.” More clicking. Around the corner, Simon could just make out two figures... a small humanoid of some description, as well as... a familiar-looking bug thing. Just how was that thing getting around so fast?\n\nWere there more than one? Oh God please let there not be more than one.\n\nSimon ducked back behind the corner, breathing heavily. He could feel his heart pounding, almost like it was trying to rip itself out of his chest and flee. He didn't have anywhere to go. They were coming down the corridor and there weren't any doors he could get to without them probably hearing!\n\nThe distance to the nearest door seemed to get further and further the more Simon looked back at it and convinced himself he couldn't make it in time...\n\n“-Yeah, I know it's [i]literally[/i] my fault. That's the [i]joke[/i] chica, come o-,” the voice said as its owner rounded the corner, suddenly cutting off.\n\nSimon froze in place as he stared up at the owner of the voice. A boy around Simon's age, so really, there wasn't much 'up' to look. A dog or possibly a wolf – Simon really couldn't spare the attention to really figure it out right now. The pup stared back at him in astonishment.\n\nThey both reacted at the same instant, Simon turning tail and fleeing while the other boy raised his right hand. Simon promptly found himself running right into an invisible wall with a reverberating thud that probably would've been comical had he not been terrified out of his mind.\n\n“Ha! [i]There[/i] you are, chiquito,” the boy said, a jovial tone that really didn't fit the situation at all. Simon stared, wide eyed, trying to back away despite having his back to an invisible wall, feet scrabbling and pushing against the ground. “So where is it, huh? You know what we're looking for.”\n\nSimon just continued to stare with wild eyes, tears starting to well up and drip down his cheeks. His heart felt about ready to explode. The dog – or wolf – frowned, and glanced at his insectoid companion. “Oye. Cut that out.” He snapped the fingers of his left hand in front of the bug's face, as if to get its attention.\n\nImmediately, the fear was washed away. Simon's heartbeat slowed, his breathing became more even, and his thoughts became clearer. The insect thing didn't look quite as scary as before... in fact, it almost looked goofy, with wide eyes, tiny little claws on its lower arm-analogues, oversized antennae with large bulbous tips... it didn't even have the slightly creepy compound effect in its eyes that most insect-style [i]humans[/i] had!\n\nThe boy, on the other hand, was dressed in a button-up shirt, dark grey pants and black shoes. He looked like a school boy in a pre-splice movie or something. On his right, still-outstretched hand he wore a white glove, although his left hand was bare. It looked pretty weird.\n\nSuddenly, with an inhuman roar, the insectoid monster – er, alien – swung one of its larger, upper arm-analogues at the black-furred boy. He ducked and leaned backwards, almost casually, before bringing his right arm up to block a second swing with a loud 'clunk'.\n\nSimon fell over backwards as the invisible wall behind him suddenly vanished.\n\n“Oh, you wanna go chica?” the boy smirked. “C'mon, let's go! Maybe you'll actually get a [i]hit[/i] in this time!” A black, inky substance began to creep up the boy's left arm. He seemed to have forgotten about Simon.\n\nSimon didn't waste any time. He leapt to his feet, snapping his fingers to send a shockwave at the two strangers while bolting for the nearest door. He barely noticed as the shockwave bent around the canine rather than actually hitting him, slamming the door shut behind hin.\n\nHe heard a yell from the other side of the door, then the sound of something heavy breaking. Simon swiftly turned to grab a cabinet and tried to shove it in front of the door. For a moment, nothing happened, until Fortis coated his body once again and Simon found the cabinet much easier to shift.\n\nIt fell into place with a loud 'crash', as Simon stumbled back and took stock of his surroundings.\n\nIt looked like the maintenance office, or maybe one of several. Simon didn't know how much maintenance staff a hospital this size really needed! There was a desk against one wall, with a rather rugged-looking terminal atop it. Next to the desk, and indeed all over the room, were a number of cabinets and cupboards, as well as cleaning supplies just left strewn about haphzardly. In the opposite corner there was a vending machine.\n\nFortis withdrew from around Simon, until all that remained was an orange patch on the back of his hand. “You should get something to eat,” the patch told him.\n\nSimon took a step towards the vending machine reflexively, before looking down at his hand. “Wait, why?”\n\n“You've been using my power a lot today. It's... draining you pretty hard. You have to replace the energy before you crash.”\n\nSimon was already munching on a chocolate bar before Fortis finished talking. “So, like. Your powers use calories?”\n\n“No, they use prana. It's... life energy, I guess. Living things have it. You make it all the time but my power is kinda spendy? So if you use it a lot you'll lose more than you make, and that's...” Fortis trailed off. “...Look just buy another couple of bars, okay? You're gonna need them.”\n\nSimon glanced at his PET to check his balance. There was a message from Kelly, flashing at the top of the screen. His heart soared. She was okay! But just as he reached out to tap it, he noticed it had been sent almost twenty hours ago.\n\nHis heart plummeted again. Oh no. She probably thought something had happened to him because he hadn't responded. Or... or maybe something had happened to her! His finger trembled slightly, an inch away from the screen. He wanted to open the message. He needed to know if Kelly was okay. But he just... couldn't...\n\nHis breathing grew ragged. Oh God what was he doing here? He should be at home. What was he thinking, pretending to be a hero like this? He couldn't do anything to help anyone!\n\n“I... I-I need to get...”\n\nThere was a crash behind him. The cabinet he had shoved in front of the door sailed right over Simon's head, so close he could feel the breeze of its passage, as he turned around to stare at the now-broken door. In the shattered doorway stood a canine figure, coated in a black inky substance, two dark grey eyes staring out at him. “Thought you could [i]hide[/i]? God I'm gonna enjoy-”\n\nThe menacing canine was suddenly cut off as a green... something... batted him out of the way. “Gwark!”\n\nSimon's head suddenly felt fuzzy as a green figure stepped into view, retracting a long green tentacle it had obviously just hit the canine with back into its body. It turned to look at him, and the fuzzy sensation got worse. Simon staggered back, holding his head – then with a yelp, thrust his hands out to catch an object the green figure suddenly hurled at him!\n\nIt was a clear, spherical container containing an off-white, almost silvery substance, that caught the light in a similar way to... ink.\n\nThe green person was suddenly standing right in front of Simon, black eyes almost seeming to stare into Simon's soul. The fuzziness was even worse. Simon could barely even think. He barely registered that this person's hair, and tail, and... build and everything was completely identical to his own. Except he was covered in a green inkling.\n\nBut Fortis was orange...\n\nSuddenly, his doppelganger reached out and touched Simon on the forehead. Then everything went white.", "writing_bbcode_parsed": "Simon's head felt... fuzzy. He knew he was falling, but for some reason he got the distinct impression of walking on the ground. He could barely make out a hallway he was walking down. Time seemed to slow down as this... vision or whatever played out hazily before his mind's eye.

He saw himself stop at a door. It had something written on it, but Simon couldn't really make sense of it. The door opened to reveal a storage room of some sort. A gap in the shelves made room for a clear container filled with some sort of off-white, shiny liquid. The container was around the size of a football, and had a control panel on the top.

Simon saw his hand reaching out – it was inked over, but for some reason it looked more green than orange – and pressing a couple of buttons in sequence.

Then Simon felt his body hit the ground. It was surprisingly soft, but the impact still managed to jar him out of whatever weird trance he was in.

“What... was that?” Simon asked out loud.

“Was... sorta hoping you'd tell me,” came a voice to Simon's left. Quickly looking around, Simon managed to make out the crocodile guy in the gloom – wow, it was really dark down here. “I guess you're really not on their side, huh?”

Gradually, Simon's eyes adjusted to the gloom. They were in a storage room of some sort, filled with bedding, medical gowns and scrubs. Simon had landed in a box filled with pillows.

The older reptile hadn't been so lucky. Simon gasped in horror, scrambling out of the safe padding of his box as he saw the plastic rod jutting through the crocodile's left thigh. He had fallen right through one of the shelving units!

Simon felt Fortis recede, finally, the cool air flowing from the hole in the ceiling above brushing against his fur. “O-oh my gosh I didn't- I'm so sorry!” Guilt washed over Simon like a tidal wave. This sensation wasn't... particularly novel to the boy, though. Not like the intense, overwhelming fear he kept feeling today.

He wasn't sure what to make of that. It happened every time he saw that... inky insect thing. Thinking back, he didn't think he was really that scared of it, even if it was kinda creepy...

Getting distracted. Focus, Simon.

Before Simon could say anything else, the crocodile spoke again. “That armband ain't a disguise, huh? Okay, kiddo, I need you to use those claws of yours to rip up some of the material in here to make something you can tie around my leg. Can you do that for me?” Simon nodded mutely.

After a beat, Simon quickly scrambled over to box of bedding he had fallen into. He heard the crocodile give a faint grunt. Was he annoyed? Or just... no, he couldn't be in pain, the human body wasn't stupid enough to keep sending pain signals after a traumatic injury. He was definitely annoyed.

Simon dug his claws into a sheet, gripping it with his other hand and doing his best to rip it into strips. It was slow going – the fabric was pretty tough! But eventually, he managed to get some... straight-ish strips. Straight enough to be used as a makeshift tourniquet, anyway.

Simon handed him the makeshift bandages, helping to get them around the injured leg just above the wound. “Okay. Now, I need you to find a first aid kit. There should be one nearby. We're in... I think this is storage room B2a? So if you go out that door you should be approaching the cafeteria. I know there's one in the kitchen...”

Simon nodded. He could do that.

Simon didn't even notice the crocodile's anxious glances at the hole in the ceiling as he walked out the door.

* * *

After stepping through the doorway, Simon felt an odd, fuzzy feeling on the back of his hand. He looked down, eyes squinting through the gloom. The back of his hand had turned... orange.

“There's something weird here. Can you feel it?” came Fortis's voice from the orange patch of skin, buzzing against the back of Simon's hand.

Simon frowned as he kept walking, his voice hushed. “Um. Well when we fell down here I saw... something? Didn't you?”

“No? I meant... it feels like a part of me fell off. But I don't... I don't think I'm missing any pieces?”

Simon contemplated this for a while as he walked along. He quickly came to the conclusion that he had no idea what to make of it. Simon rounded a corner, lost in thought, only to be jolted back to awareness by a sound coming from the other end of the corridor.

“Someone's coming,” Fortis whispered. Simon darted back around the corner, peeking out around it. He strained his ears...

“...n't know why you're going around spooking the locals,” came an approaching voice. A young child's voice, or at least the voice of someone rather small. It sounded jovial, playful – a stark contrast with everything going on, really. “I mean, no skin off my nose, but isn't it kinda a waste? Compl needs us to find the thing as soon as possible, y'know.”

There was no reply, just a weird sort of clicking sound that began as the voice stopped.

“Yeah yeah. Blame me.” More clicking. Around the corner, Simon could just make out two figures... a small humanoid of some description, as well as... a familiar-looking bug thing. Just how was that thing getting around so fast?

Were there more than one? Oh God please let there not be more than one.

Simon ducked back behind the corner, breathing heavily. He could feel his heart pounding, almost like it was trying to rip itself out of his chest and flee. He didn't have anywhere to go. They were coming down the corridor and there weren't any doors he could get to without them probably hearing!

The distance to the nearest door seemed to get further and further the more Simon looked back at it and convinced himself he couldn't make it in time...

“-Yeah, I know it's literally my fault. That's the joke chica, come o-,” the voice said as its owner rounded the corner, suddenly cutting off.

Simon froze in place as he stared up at the owner of the voice. A boy around Simon's age, so really, there wasn't much 'up' to look. A dog or possibly a wolf – Simon really couldn't spare the attention to really figure it out right now. The pup stared back at him in astonishment.

They both reacted at the same instant, Simon turning tail and fleeing while the other boy raised his right hand. Simon promptly found himself running right into an invisible wall with a reverberating thud that probably would've been comical had he not been terrified out of his mind.

“Ha! There you are, chiquito,” the boy said, a jovial tone that really didn't fit the situation at all. Simon stared, wide eyed, trying to back away despite having his back to an invisible wall, feet scrabbling and pushing against the ground. “So where is it, huh? You know what we're looking for.”

Simon just continued to stare with wild eyes, tears starting to well up and drip down his cheeks. His heart felt about ready to explode. The dog – or wolf – frowned, and glanced at his insectoid companion. “Oye. Cut that out.” He snapped the fingers of his left hand in front of the bug's face, as if to get its attention.

Immediately, the fear was washed away. Simon's heartbeat slowed, his breathing became more even, and his thoughts became clearer. The insect thing didn't look quite as scary as before... in fact, it almost looked goofy, with wide eyes, tiny little claws on its lower arm-analogues, oversized antennae with large bulbous tips... it didn't even have the slightly creepy compound effect in its eyes that most insect-style humans had!

The boy, on the other hand, was dressed in a button-up shirt, dark grey pants and black shoes. He looked like a school boy in a pre-splice movie or something. On his right, still-outstretched hand he wore a white glove, although his left hand was bare. It looked pretty weird.

Suddenly, with an inhuman roar, the insectoid monster – er, alien – swung one of its larger, upper arm-analogues at the black-furred boy. He ducked and leaned backwards, almost casually, before bringing his right arm up to block a second swing with a loud 'clunk'.

Simon fell over backwards as the invisible wall behind him suddenly vanished.

“Oh, you wanna go chica?” the boy smirked. “C'mon, let's go! Maybe you'll actually get a hit in this time!” A black, inky substance began to creep up the boy's left arm. He seemed to have forgotten about Simon.

Simon didn't waste any time. He leapt to his feet, snapping his fingers to send a shockwave at the two strangers while bolting for the nearest door. He barely noticed as the shockwave bent around the canine rather than actually hitting him, slamming the door shut behind hin.

He heard a yell from the other side of the door, then the sound of something heavy breaking. Simon swiftly turned to grab a cabinet and tried to shove it in front of the door. For a moment, nothing happened, until Fortis coated his body once again and Simon found the cabinet much easier to shift.

It fell into place with a loud 'crash', as Simon stumbled back and took stock of his surroundings.

It looked like the maintenance office, or maybe one of several. Simon didn't know how much maintenance staff a hospital this size really needed! There was a desk against one wall, with a rather rugged-looking terminal atop it. Next to the desk, and indeed all over the room, were a number of cabinets and cupboards, as well as cleaning supplies just left strewn about haphzardly. In the opposite corner there was a vending machine.

Fortis withdrew from around Simon, until all that remained was an orange patch on the back of his hand. “You should get something to eat,” the patch told him.

Simon took a step towards the vending machine reflexively, before looking down at his hand. “Wait, why?”

“You've been using my power a lot today. It's... draining you pretty hard. You have to replace the energy before you crash.”

Simon was already munching on a chocolate bar before Fortis finished talking. “So, like. Your powers use calories?”

“No, they use prana. It's... life energy, I guess. Living things have it. You make it all the time but my power is kinda spendy? So if you use it a lot you'll lose more than you make, and that's...” Fortis trailed off. “...Look just buy another couple of bars, okay? You're gonna need them.”

Simon glanced at his PET to check his balance. There was a message from Kelly, flashing at the top of the screen. His heart soared. She was okay! But just as he reached out to tap it, he noticed it had been sent almost twenty hours ago.

His heart plummeted again. Oh no. She probably thought something had happened to him because he hadn't responded. Or... or maybe something had happened to her! His finger trembled slightly, an inch away from the screen. He wanted to open the message. He needed to know if Kelly was okay. But he just... couldn't...

His breathing grew ragged. Oh God what was he doing here? He should be at home. What was he thinking, pretending to be a hero like this? He couldn't do anything to help anyone!

“I... I-I need to get...”

There was a crash behind him. The cabinet he had shoved in front of the door sailed right over Simon's head, so close he could feel the breeze of its passage, as he turned around to stare at the now-broken door. In the shattered doorway stood a canine figure, coated in a black inky substance, two dark grey eyes staring out at him. “Thought you could hide? God I'm gonna enjoy-”

The menacing canine was suddenly cut off as a green... something... batted him out of the way. “Gwark!”

Simon's head suddenly felt fuzzy as a green figure stepped into view, retracting a long green tentacle it had obviously just hit the canine with back into its body. It turned to look at him, and the fuzzy sensation got worse. Simon staggered back, holding his head – then with a yelp, thrust his hands out to catch an object the green figure suddenly hurled at him!

It was a clear, spherical container containing an off-white, almost silvery substance, that caught the light in a similar way to... ink.

The green person was suddenly standing right in front of Simon, black eyes almost seeming to stare into Simon's soul. The fuzziness was even worse. Simon could barely even think. He barely registered that this person's hair, and tail, and... build and everything was completely identical to his own. Except he was covered in a green inkling.

But Fortis was orange...

Suddenly, his doppelganger reached out and touched Simon on the forehead. Then everything went white.", "pools_count": 1, "title": "Simon Says, Track 4: Sick Puppy", "deleted": "f", "public": "t", "mimetype": "text/rtf", "pagecount": "1", "rating_id": "1", "rating_name": "Mature", "ratings": [ { "content_tag_id": "3", "name": "Violence", "description": "Mild violence", "rating_id": "1" } ], "submission_type_id": "12", "type_name": "Writing - Document", "guest_block": "t", "friends_only": "f", "comments_count": "3", "views": "117" }