Chapters The Tritone Disappearance of Paprika Blues
We're in a city, but it stinks. Bad. Trixie wrinkles her nose in disgust.
A piercing, wailing noise breaks my train of thought. I turn towards the direction of the noise, and see a - a human, running past the alleyway looking extremely frightened. A massive metal carriage roars and barrels through a few seconds later, definitely the source of the noise. I'm half certain it had the word "POLICE" etched into the side of the carriage.
Great. Even in another universe, there's cops.
It's an entire goddamn human civilization. They're all a bit taller than the average pony, by at least thirty or so centimeters, generally, but height seemed to vary.
"Okay, well, we're gonna stick out like a broken hoof if we don't have a disguise." I groan. "You know any transformation magic?'
"Pfft. Trixie does illusion magic best, Miss North. If you wish to remain hidden among these aliens, avoid being touched."
She lights up her horn, and I can see another.. me, overlaid on top of my mostly invisible body.
Wait, why are the teats on the chest?? Weird. Kinda cool, but weird.
Trixie hums. "Trixie supposes she can make a distraction with fireworks."
The earth pony side of my blood goes haywire in warning. My fetlocks get all tingly in fear, and I hold a hoof up to her withers to stop her. "No! Nononono. Bad idea. Baaaad idea."
Trixie looks bemused. "Trixie does not have bad ideas."
We wander the city for a little while, and I honestly feel completely in my element. Trixie keeps challenging me, saying things like, "Tell Trixie where the next stop on the route of that mobile trolley is!"
Just then, a human that was sitting by a stand approaches us, holding a clip board with their paw.
I look over at her stand. There's a banner that reads, "MANAHEMO ENERGY SOLUTIONS, LLC."
Trixie jabs me in the side, and whispers, "Hey, North, look. Didn't that book have the same name..?"
"Uh.. sure?" I give the lady a weird look.
Ah shit, I hadn't gotten that far.
The lady looks at Trixie with a slightly tense look on her face. "Oh, uh, congratulations?"
The lady makes a bit of a noncommittal shrug. "It's still under wraps until the testing is complete, this is just the company reaching out to the public to see who might be interested!"
Trixie raises her hoof- hand up, palm out towards her.
And Trixie starts to walk away. The lady turns to me, and tries again. "Well, maybe you-"
The lady's smile gets really tight, and she says, "Okay, have a good day!"
Okay. I sound like a New Yorker. Good to know.
We end up at a library, after a while. There's a sign out front advertising the fact that they have free water, which confuses me. Water is free, generally, right? It's water. You can't put a price on water. Everypony - no, everyBODY, needs water.
"Now that I think about it, some water would be primo, right now." I clear my throat.
I count my lucky stars when I see how the water fountain is operated. It's so strangely shaped - like an upside down metal L, buttons on the side, and the spout on top. Most of the humans I see drinking from it have to bend over to reach it.
I guess it makes less of a mess than an Equestrian water fountain, but it still doesn't feel right.
When I get back, I find that Trixie is boasting to the librarian at the front desk - and frankly she looks enraptured.
I see a poster on the corkboard by the front desk full of different advertisements for community events and such."Ever feel like you're not human? Like you were meant to be a different creature, one that chirps, or roars, or howls, or whinnies? You may just be therian! And you're not alone! Come to Felicia's Dive Bar on 107 Sturges Avenue after closing to meet for a weekly support group! We meet on Tuesdays."
Okay. That's a really good start.
"Hey, uh, weird question, what day of the week is it?"
The librarian nods. "Ohhh, yeah, my cousin up north, Moitié has that problem. It's so funny, she'll ramble on and on about magic being real, and all her studies into the occult, and then forget what she had planned for dinner."
"Ah yes, that sounds quite like you, North." Trixie grins at me.
We enter the bar sometime around ten pm, which I know thanks to the clocks we've seen all over the city. I wonder who's responsible for the moon here, because I don't see it anywhere as the sun sets.
The bar itself is decorated in a very.. bright and colorful scheme. Reminds me of one of the all-night diners that would play Shimmy Hoofit frequently.
There's a big lady at the bar who eyes me and Trixie up. She's got deep black hair, and violet in her eyes. Behind her, there's an absolute powerhouse of a human stallion, wearing a cowmare's hat and a red neckerchief. He's pure lean muscle, and also eyeing us suspiciously, his ruby red eyes almost piercing my soul.
"Can I help you girls?" The big lady asks.
She goes from suspicious to motherly delight in a nanosecond. "Oh!! You saw my flyer! Oh, lovely, lovely - you're a bit early, but go on and take a seat, make yourself comfortable. I'll get you two something to drink, on the house."
We turn and look around, and one spot catches my eye. There's a mare across the room, reading a book about pianos. She looks troubled, in more ways than one. I decide to approach her.
"Hey," I say, "You okay?"
"What's your name?" I ask, taking a drink and immediately savoring the taste of whatever this stuff was.
Chelsea shakes her head in confusion. "Magna..?"
Chelsea blinks. I facehoof- facepalm, and sigh. "Trixie doesn't like to break keyfabe, even when she's not doing her magician gigs."Magna."
"Great and.. Powerful.. Trixie.." She furrows a brow, then suddenly flinches, hard. "OW!"
Trixie and I exchange a glance.
"Damn. I can't imagine what that must be like." I mutter, genuinely at a loss.
Ah, shit. I'm at a loss there, it has to be something specific, it couldn't just be -
I have to put in effort to not gawk at the fact that there is a borough in New York called Manhattan, which just so happens to sound like Manehattan. Another mystery for somepony with a higher power creep. Not my problem.
"Yes, quite. Trixie comes from old money, but her family has since disowned her for reasons she'd rather not get into."
"How do you feel about cops?" Chelsea asks me.
Trixie spits her drink. Chelsea and I look over to her, and she wipes off her face with her cape, then grabs a napkin to wipe off the juice from the table.
I give Trixie a slight shake of the head.
It takes every muscle in my body to not laugh.spells for us?"
I see something red in my peripheral vision, and notice that the big stallion jerked his head towards Trixie, before shaking it and getting back to work.
"Okay, you're fucking with me, there's no way you genuinely believe that unicorns control the world, while not having heard of the lizard people thing."
My face is in my hooves. I am going to lose it.
Wait. No.
It can't have been that easy.
No bucking way.
It takes every fiber of my entire being not to explode then and there. That's too damn specific not to be anypony else. I'm talking to fucking Paprika, and she doesn't even know it. Tears well up in my eyes. What happened to her? Why does she not remember?
I look at the bag, the one that has her feathers in it. No, no, not yet, she barely knows me right now. I have to get her to trust me. I can't just whip these out now, and say, "Haha! You were my best friend in another life and I'm here to take you back home!"
"I've been in denial about it, to be honest. Felicia, she's.. convinced that I'm like her, that I was another creature before, but then.. something happened. She claims the same thing happened to her too, and, I never believed her, until. Today. Seeing a goddamn unicorn cadaver. I'm beginning to wonder.. if there's.."
She trails off.
"No.. that would be too easy."
Oh, sweet Celestia.real? Well- augh, no this is just. Wayside style lizard people. Nevermind."
Trixie and I exchange glances. We shake our heads - best not to tell her yet. First and foremost, we need to stick by her side until she can trust us.
The Tritone Disappearance of Paprika Blues
"What can you say about Paprika Blues?" I gave the crowd my rhetoric and expected no rebuttal. It was a funeral procession, after all, kinda rude to interrupt the mare at the podium. The few awkward participants in this sad little corpse-party-sans-corpse awkwardly coughed and somberly looked on.
"You could say she was weird. A bit touched in the head. Loud, and overtly-critical. Eccentric to a fault."
The crowd furrows their brows at me. They're hooked, moving onto the true statement.
"But you'd be missing the forest for the trees. You could inspect Paprika in all her strange little details, and only when you looked at her head-on would you realize she was like the music she loved. Chaotically harmonic. Passionate. Loud. Full of crescendos and decrescendos, and wild splashes of color. If Pinkie Pie had met her, they'd have been best friends, and this funeral would be way more lively."
One stiffled laugh breaks out. I'll take it.
It takes every muscle in my body to not cry. Inhale, exhale, this speech is over soon, I think to myself. I make the mistake of looking up to the perfect, clear sky. It wasn't raining at all today, and it's not what Paprika would have wanted.
She loved the rain. Every chance she could get, she'd hang around on the edge of rainstorms and watch it all fall onto the city. She'd dance in the puddles and reach her apartment soaked. She always talked about the rain being a great inspiration for her art. The idea of raindrops cascading onto ivory piano keys and playing a perfect symphony in the chaos never left her mind.
"I.. will miss. Paprika.. Every day. And if I had the chance, I'd fight hoof and tooth to get her back.".
Almost there, Maggie. Steady breaths.
"I hope wherever she is, she's resting well and enjoying the arts they have to offer. May she rest in peace."
There's a solemn bowing of heads and polite applause as I clamber off the podium. Some heads look up at me as I move away from the procession, but what else is there? The cops didn't even find her body. There was nothing in that stupid casket to say goodbye to. So I left the scene.
This suit had gotten too damn tight, but it's a rental. I fade through the alleys of this city to the boutique where I got the thing, The mare running the Saddle Row shop asks if anything was wrong with the getup, and I just say, "It was for a funeral. It did its job perfectly."
The second I make it back to my apartment, I'm in another argument with Sugar Dust. I don't even have the heart to put any effort into it, and when she says she wants to break up, I say, "Sure! Buck it! I'm moving out, update the lease yourself!"
I can wander this city for hours. It's a therapeutic thing for me. I end up at a longue that Paprika frequented to play her improvised jazz piano sessions. Sometimes she played with other musicians, sometimes she didn't.
When we all graduated from Manehattan U, Paprika attempted to climb the ladder and book exhibits or performances with higher crust establishments. She got the buck every single time. Her radical attitudes made her less than ideal material for what was considered "proper art", according to the snobs.
I didn't think it would douse her spirits like that..
I leave the bar. Try not to think of her. Move on, dammit.
As if right on cue, Miss Stable Upbringing emerges from the entrance and canters to me to give me a hug. She offers some condolences, as is custom, but I don't have room to store them anywhere. I politely drop them on the ground when she isn't looking, but I accept the hug. You can never have enough hugs.
I pass by the ramen shop, a little hole in the wall place where some Kirin have made a quiet living. It was the last place Paprika was seen publicly, before we took her back to Sugar and I's apartment. She was drunk, and we didn't want her to risk going back home in a thunderstorm.
I find the back alley where Paprika tried to fly for the first time, and fell into a dumpster, ticking off some geezer. I wonder if flight's all she cracked it up to be. For all I know, it's what killed her.
I find a clump of feathers in the alley, blue, just like Paprika's.
Wait.
Those ARE Paprika's. They have the little subtle flecks of lavender at the tips. I'd recognize those things anywhere.
I hurry to them and stop when I realize something is.. wrong.
I decide to not grab them with my teeth. I scoop them up in a paper bag and wonder what my next options could be.
"I'm sorry, but I refuse to study the thaumaturgical makeup of these feathers."
I'm silent.
None of the professors wanted anything to do with what looked to be potentially fatal magic. They shooed me away and called security for good measure.
Chaos magic, huh?
It's difficult, invoking a chaos god. It's even more difficult to ask a favor from such a guy.
Currently, he had enchanted my compass cutie mark so that the dagger-shaped needle actually worked. He also enchanted the rest of me to rotate in alignment with the needle, causing me to flip around in place as he juggled extremely powerful magnets.
"Don't think you would've heard of her. Paprika Blues. Musician and comics artist from Manehattan. She loved freeform jazz."
I show him the feathers. He hums, he hems, he haws. And then he has the balls to say this to me.
He inspected the feathers closer with some novelty sized microscope.
He gave me a slip of paper that read, "#|¢[ÆÑ €@4Ī±". No idea what it meant. Or how to pronounce it.
"My advice? Find somepony with experience in punching holes through realities. That's not my bag, but it's definitely someone's."
I wander once more, and see somepony performing at the annual Midsummer Theater Revival.
The Tritone Disappearance of Paprika Blues
"I had that dream again."
I squint. "Mmmmmno. Felicia, no, this is not a therian thing. I'm not a fucking animal."
I dig into my can of peaches. Stab em with a fork over and over. Slippery bastards.
I snort. "Magic is just what people think happens, when really they're just being fooled in one way or another."
I chuckle. "No I don't, and I have the oldest life known to man." Stab another peach.
I sigh. "I guess.. try my hand at piano again? Maybe I'll break the curse this time."
I look at the piano I managed to snag from an entirely different thrift shop. It had gathered dust for a while. A simple little spinet, which somehow never needing a tuning, sat there waiting for its true master to take on the world.
So I don't. My name is Chelsea, and I'm practically the pet of some insane MILF who's convinced she's a dragon.
My hands ache and I get that little feeling underneath my shoulder blades. I reach a hand back there and try to massage the spot, but it's just beyond my reach.
Felicia's already going haywire. "EEE! I knew it! You're dealing with phantom limb sensations, just like meeeee~!"
Huh. The pain stops.
"They're poseable too. Tug on the wires in your harness."
I tug open a wing and watch it unfurl. I stare myself down in the mirror.
"No, that doesn't make sense."
I grunt and strain my way down into all fours and flare the wing again.
I look up at Felicia and realize I probably seem like a total dolt. She's leaned up against a wall, arms folded, grinning with a matronly pride.
I get back up on my hind legs and take another look at the wings.
She frowns. I hate it when she does that. I'm getting trying to get a good grade in adoptive-roommate. Something normal to want and possible to achieve. I've known her for like, two years now, and she's never given up on the Idea that she's a dragon from another world.
"Where did you find me again?" I ask.
I try to look at the scars along my back. They look like nerve endings, I guess. Tons of tiny little burns. I still don't know what got me.
I try to remember what insurance is.
Library card, huh?
She hands me a flyer, which reads,
Ever feel like you're not human? Like you were meant to be a different creature, one that chirps, or roars, or howls, or whinnies? You may just be therian! And you're not alone! Come to Felicia's Dive Bar on 107 Sturges Avenue after closing to meet for a weekly support group! We meet on Tuesdays.
"Eh, sure." I fold the paper up and stuff it in my pocket.
I grab my coat, some coins for the bus, and make for the door, stopping only to give Felicia a hug. You can never give enough hugs.
And then I head on out into the big bad city.
The Tritone Disappearance of Paprika Blues
It's Trixie Lulamoon. I heard a few rumors about her. One about buying a cursed artifact and using it to enslave a town. Another about her contributions to saving the Princesses and the Elements of Harmony from the Changelings.
If nothing else, her performance has ponies enraptured. Enough that some prick of a mare attempts to discreetly steal from the tips jar. I'm about to get in the way, when,
She points to the thief, who looks around, and mouths, "me?" while pointing to herself.
Ohhhh.. I get it. Funny.
"Let this be a lesson to never try and pull a fast one on the Grrreat and Powerful Trixie."
By the time the show's over, I've made my choice. I trot up to the mare packing up her wagon.
I sneer."Hello and welcome to Stable Upbringing's Orphanage for Wayward Manehattan Foals, thank you for visiting and we hope you find a colt or filly you'd be willing to call your own."
Trixie makes a face and cringes. "Okay, okay, stop it, you don't have to remind me of that!" She stomps and huffs. "Trixie barely remembers anypony from that blasted building. Who are you in specific?"
She furrows a brow.
"..And that's why I think there's more to Paprika's death than meets the eye."
Trixie inspects the feathers cautiously before dramatically looking off into the distance. The stallion that ends up in her line of sight awkwardly waves and continues to eat his sandwich.
She magically produces a magazine titled "LAST TABLOID ON THE LEFT", whereupon the cover showed me, Sugar, and P'rika in a group photo polaroid. Paprika's face is crossed out with a big red ❌.
"Scandal in the making!" It screams. "Paprika Blues and Magnetic North - secret lovers? Jealousy driven murder? Details on page 16!"
I'm not even sure how they got that photo. Maybe Sugar gave it to them before the funeral. I toss the bundle of lies back to Trixie. "But I can agree that I don't think Paprika's death was normal. The last time I saw her was drunk asleep on my couch futon. Something happened between then and the morning. I talked to Discord-"
"With a patience that has been honed after years of working as a tour guide for rural ponies, whose children do not know what a crosstrot is. Anyways. Discord said it was magic from another world.. and gave me this." I show her the paper. "Recommended I find a pony that can 'punch holes in reality'. It sounded up his alley, literally, but I guess helping a grieving mare isn't super chaotic."
She inspects the paper. "Trixie can certainly assure you this isn't ordinary magic. Hanging around two extremely powerful wizards has allowed Trixie to accumulate some.. abilities. But this seems above Trixie's paygrade. She already dealt with the Changelings, which was bad enough."
She eyes me up, "And, no offense, you don't look like you've got much on you."
I take a slow, calculated sip of my coffee. One cream, no sugar. I shrug and put the mug down. "Well, I just need a unicorn that can work the spell. If you're scared, you don't need to come along."
She gets the feathers in the paper bag, downs the rest of her coffee (and mine) in two gulps, and leads the charge towards..?
A long and arduous wagon ride to Canterlot's prestigious library.
I follow her in. The librarian at the desk gives her a cautionary glance as we pass to a quiet looking corner. Trixie pulls on a pair of extremely dull looking books, opening up a secret passageway into the "restricted section", if the sign was anything to go by.
"How in the name of Luna do you know about this?"
After making sure we're not being tailed, we move in and find the oldest books I've ever seen. For the first time in a week, a little smile cracks my face.
Libraries are proportionately tiny cities for books. That is what I learn as I wander the ancient dusty shelves. In libraries, books have transit, healthcare, leadership, and other amenities. They're organized by district and alphabetized, similar to postal addresses.
Like the time that a rich company attempted to buy up all the property in my block and turn it into a series of bougie highrise condos. They failed, on account of some very choice words being graffitied on the walls by P'rika and I. Nopony wanted to invest in a building that read "HOT GELDING COCK ON THIS BLOCK" in bold red text on the walls.
And my city-slicker senses pick up on one in particular book that didn't really belong.
"MANA-HEMO PROGRAM TRAINING MANUAL: SEED GENERATION, FILTERING, AND ACCESS". It declares. All capitals. No author. No flair or decorations to make it seem like an enticing read - in fact, it's the dullest gray I've ever seen. Scientifically engineered to hide. It uses a strange font that seems wrong. It has a lively, almost friendly shape to it, but is just slightly off-putting, enough to look Wrong, and therefore get my attention.¹
I pull it off the shelf and note that there's no dust to blow off of it.
"SEED SELECTION", I can vaguely translate, but what's a seed in this context? It doesn't mean a plant, does it?
"WARNING: ACCESS WITHOUT PRIOR AUTHORIZATION WILL RESULT IN GROUNDSKEEPER SUMMONS."
I flip through the pages looking for any information on a groundskeeper. No such luck. The flash of the blade, but no cuts, yet. Would this be worth the trouble?
Eh. Buck it, we ride.
Wait, yeah, hang on, that's a human on the cover. They haven't been around since the Dream Valley days. Ancient history, and I mean ANCIENT. Like "before Princess Times" levels of ancient.
"Harry.. Anderson: .. Wise Guy by.. Mike Caverny? What kinda names are those?"
She leafs through the tome and makes a face.
She closes her eyes and lights up her horn, before undoing both.
".. Acquaintance.."
She tosses the letter into the air, swooshes over it with her cape, and then it's gone.
Aw fuck. Trixie looks at me smugly.
She casts the spell and punches the hole, and lightning cracks the quiet air. There's a portal, wobbly and unstable, and I see the other side. An alleyway, much like one from Manehattan, sits quietly. The sound of.. some kinda machine rumbles in the distance alongside the general din of a city.
I crack my neck a bit, and steady my breath. "Alright. I'm on my way, P'rika. Let's do this."
Author's Note
¹Comic sans.
The Tritone Disappearance of Paprika Blues
The plastic-rubber saddle jostles me as I watch the cars in the opposite lane roll on by.
I try not to laugh at the child's self-inflicted misfortune and pop my earbuds in to block out the screaming. I pull out my shitty little thirty dollar MP3 player. Nothing like a bit of The Seatbelts to help drown out a screaming foal. I consider what else I could do today. The City was my oyster at this point.
I had already tacked up that flyer for Felicia's therian support group at the Burbank library. Checked out a few books on piano practice techniques. Turns out the city library is a lot more lenient than I thought. They just needed a name and address. It was then I realized that I didn't know my own last name, what with Felicia handling most everything for me. So, after a quick glance at the librarian's water bottle, I picked the name "Chelsea Bay".
My thoughts return to the now, and I realize we're getting near the stop that's close to my old employer.
They might be spawning faster than they can be caught. I move on, continuing to walk down the street. I eventually end up at an electronics store, the kind that have TVs in the aisles playing the news.
"..members of the energy board have reported a surge of radioactivity in Burbank, near Bob Hope Airport. Citizens are advised to stay away from the area, and are encouraged to redirect any flight plans. Airlines are offering refunds or compensated tickets for all customers inconvenienced by this development. The Director of the Los Angeles Energy Department had this to say:"
It cuts to some guy. He's blabbering on about something vaguely related to the story - until he says something weird.
Weird. How does -
It's about 4:30. If I snag another bus, I can head up Glenoaks and stop near Woodbury, and it's a quick jog to the airport from there. There might be cops, but they typically ignore the alleyways of the warehouses in favor of watching for speedsters along the main roads.
The bus was on time, for once. I trot down Cohasset until I reach San Fernando Boulevard. I hop through the fencing construction - apparently the city is trying to prevent people from walking on the train tracks - wander through all the pre-fabbed commerce buildings, and end up at the fencing that surrounds the airport.
Holy sun and sea. There's a big ass crater in the runway. Big enough to see from at least a mile away, maybe more, but I don't even have to entertain the thought of breaking in. Even if I wanted to, the fence was too tall for me to jump without being seen. Sometimes I wish I could just fly. Sheesh, some days it even feels like I forgot how to do it.
Weird thoughts lately. Anyways, I see a construction crew filling in the hole. They're all wearing radioactive protective gear under their construction uniforms, and it's way too hot to be in those things. I mentally give them my respects - I sure as Tartarus wouldn't be able to do it. Maybe they get water breaks.
I think I've seen what I wanted to see. Whatever they're cooking up, it's.. probably good? All energy sources are kinda volatile right? I turn to leave, look over my shoulder, and see something I definitely should not have seen.
They lift something out of the hole. It's some kind of.. skeleton. Bones bleached pure white, as if whatever caused that explosion also caused the creature to lose all its flesh in one fell swoop - no time to even feel the pain. But that's not even the wildest part.
I squint. It almost looks like the horn on its head is glowing. It's a long skull, some kind of herbivore, given the flat teeth. That's a horse skull, right? Why would a horse.. have.... a horn.
"HEY!" Someone shouts from the construction site, towards me. "YOU'RE NOT SUPPOSED TO BE HERE!"
If I just saw something deeply secret, I'm fucked six ways from Sunday. They're gonna bring out the helicopters, real soon. I turn back down Cohasset, and dart between the buildings. There's a small part of me that delights in having a good reason to run fast - and my heart is beating steady despite the panic. I see a parkway that has a nice, thick tree, which honestly pretty rare in this city, and jump into the leaves. I hide, and see the cop car whoosh past. I wait.
Could be a few minutes, maybe only a few seconds, but I hear a chopper above me scanning the area. I look up, and hope the leaves are enough cover.
I wish I could fly.
Why do I keep thinking that?! Focus, dammit!!
Okay. Think. Best way outta this general area would be to take the bike route near Buena Vista. They saw me when I was wearing my coat. I take it off.
Felicia. I gotta get to Felicia. She'd know what to do!
It's a bit of a walk, but the bike route makes for a pretty good shortcut. I make it to another crosswalk under the freeway and make my way to North Hollywood. Her bar is some ways along the road, but I make it. Sturges. Made it to Sturges. Felicia's Dive Bar, Sturges.
I open the door, and there's a few guys chilling out. I feel myself settle down at the sight of the "We don't serve pigs here" sign, shaped like a highway sign with the numeral label 1312. It's a primo gay bar, and all the folks know it.
Felicia takes one look at me, and turns her head towards the other guy that helps her run the place. "Yggy, hon, I'm gonna take lunch. You think you can hold down the fort?"
Ignacia- Fuck, no, right- Ygnacia (I have no idea why he spells it like that), looks over to her, then me, and I shudder. He always intimidated me. He looks like. Well he has the stoic face of a Yakuza protagonist. I think they set one in Hawaii recently, right? They could totally set one in L.A., and he'd be either the protagonist, or a secretly powerful side character.
He shrugs. "Eh, sure, hermana. Just don't do anything that leaves a mess, ¿verdad? " His thick hispanic accent helps solidify that whole Yakuza thought. She snaps him some finger guns and a lecherous grin. She then grabs me, pulls me aside to the back room slash manager's office, and sits me down on the comfier chair.
I guess I looked worse for wear than I thought. I take a slow, shuddering breath. "I .. I was.." Another deep breath. "Did you see the news?"
"Pigs wouldn't chase you for nothing." She muses, and then leans forward again, close to me, gently cupping my cheek in one of her big hands. Her comforting touch is like water in the desert right now. "You can talk to me, honey. What did you see?"
I have to take a moment to process what I saw. I blink and shake my head and try to recontextualize and logic out the entire thing. But I saw what I saw. It couldn't have been anything else, what with the reaction the cops had. I look back up at her, directly into her eyes.