Book One: PROTEA

Chapter Seven: Plans

 

 

                Kelly’s eyes darted rapidly and she dragged her teeth across her lower lip as she surveyed her company in Bridgit’s living room.  Bridgit folded her clothing as Kate engaged in some sort of drawing jam with Bridgit’s sibling, Linden, who rarely left their room except to spend time with Kate in such a way.  The three of them sat on the couch while Kelly sat on the floor, their attention fixed on their own activities.  Kelly scratched the back of her head, hoping they would listen to what she had to say.

“So, uh, guys, my online friend is sending me some of that Proteus stuff I was telling you guys about?  Like, I bought it off him last night and he shipped it out to me this morning, a gram of it.  He said it’d be some time before his guy would ever have it again, so if we’re gonna take it we kinda gotta plan, like, the circumstances have to be perfect.”

Kate put her sketchbook in her lap and looked down. “Hmm… How long’s it last?”

“18 hours.  S’gotta be on a weekend, I guess.”

Bridgit’s jaw dropped, and she laughed nervously.

Linden spoke up without lifting their gaze or even their head from their sketchbook. “Sounds cool.  Wonder what it’d do to me.”

                Bridgit shot her sibling a look of concern.

“Anyway, if it’s just the four of us doing it, I’m still gonna have a bunch left over.  I’m gonna have to sell it off around campus, I guess,” Kelly continued.

Bridgit frowned. “Are you sure that’s a good idea?  You’re talking about selling something that’s, like… its selling point is what, that it does different stuff to everyone, right? And you wanna… you’re talking about pawning it off on people you might not even know, I mean, you don’t even know what it does to you yet.  What if it falls into the hands of someone who can’t even handle normal shit?”

“Hey, hey, I’m an excellent judge of shit like that and you know it.”

Bridgit gasped and rolled her eyes, impulsively getting up off the couch but still carefully enough to ensure that she didn’t knock over the neat pile of clothing she had set on its armrest. “Are you kidding me?  Remember last year when you smoked up that one classmate of yours, what was her name, Marcy?  And she thought she got turned into a literal zombie until the next day, like she kept saying ‘Don’t touch me, I’m a corpse’ until she fell asleep?”

Kelly shrugged and smirked with a dry, abrupt laugh.  “Yeah.  It was hilarious.”

Kate quirked an eyebrow and looked over at Kelly with a stern half-smile. “Bet it wasn’t for her.”

“Okay, fine, I’ll be extra careful.  I won’t sell it to anyone without a reputation as a seasoned professional at getting fucked up.”

Kate tilted her head towards her shoulder, her expression not changing. “There ya go,” she teased, resuming her sketching.

                As Bridgit sat back down, she caught a glimpse of what Linden was drawing – a demon with sharp teeth and eyes on the palms of its hands. She pulled back her lips and snorted a laugh. “Christ, Lin, what are you drawing? Can’t you draw something cute or something?  Bunnies?  Ferrets?”

“This is cute,” they replied, not looking up.

“You have… a very unique concept of cute.  Sometimes I wonder if you’re really from this world.”

Linden snickered. “Sometimes I do, too.”

Kate turned her head, smirking. “I think it’s adorable.  I wanna hug it.”

Bridgit smiled. “All right, then, I guess you’re both from the same upside-down backwards world, and Lin and I aren’t really related, and they’re actually related to you.”

“Hey, long as you’re not all scaly under your human skin, we’re all good,” Kelly said, snickering.

Bridgit scoffed. “Are you really still on that Reptoid thing?”

“Hey, it makes perfect sense that, like, anybody who’s anybody, like, anybody with any real influence in this world is a different breed.  Look at how the world’s run – nothing natural about it,” Kelly replied.

             "And you think Linden has real influence."

 

"I was making a joke."

Kate piped up lazily, still focused on her drawing. “Just ‘cause it’s not somethin’ that comes natural to you doesn’t mean it’s not human.”

                Kelly shrugged, tipping her head from side to side.

Kate’s eyes lit up and she put her sketchbook down in her lap again. “Hey, remember how you were sayin’ somebody saw some kinda creatures near that shack we visited?  Supposin’ they’re real, what do you think those’re about?  Think they have any cosmic significance or hand in any kinda conspiracy?”

“If I had any idea, I’d’ve said something by now,” Kelly said flatly.

“Yeah, that’s true,” Kate sighed with a smile.

                Bridgit rubbed her eyes. “Don’t indulge her.”

After a brief lull, Kelly clasped her hands together. Linden jumped a bit in their seat at the noise. “Okay, I got it – weekend after next, we’ll go to the park and take the Proteus. Hang out there for the bulk of it, then just come back to one of our places and chill out ‘til we go to sleep,” she suggested, her eyes darting from side to side.

Bridgit crossed her arms and peered down at Kelly. “You want to take an unpredictable designer drug that barely anybody actually knows anything about outside the comfort of a familiar space?”

Kelly paused, staring up towards the ceiling. “Hmm, I guess maybe that wouldn’t be…” She rubbed the back of her neck. “Eh, yeah maybe not. Anyway, if I’m trying to analyze the effects…” She shook her head.  “Yeah, no. Yeah, okay, you’re right.  Weekend after next, though.  For sure.”

“Dang, I guess… Motivation to get work done before then,” Kate remarked, fidgeting with her mechanical pencil.

“I can’t see why not,” Bridgit said, shrugging her shoulders with her hands splayed loosely in the air in front of her.

“Weekend after next it is, then,” Kelly said with a bright, wide grin.

                Kate took a deep breath as if preparing herself for something, and went back to her drawing with a burst of enthusiasm.

 Next Chapter.