Chapter 26 (1/2)

”You have what?!” the princess shouted in a quite unladylike manner as she jumped to her feet and slapped the tabletop, prompting me to quickly grab the drinks in the middle before she would flood everything with them. I breathed out a sigh of relief as I managed to do so in the very last moment, then I glanced up at the wide-eyed girl standing on the opposite side of the dinner table.

”Careful,” I told her as I set the glasses back down, then after a moment I added, ”It's not such a big deal,” but she only shook her head in response.

”No, this isn't something you can just trivialize like that!” she exclaimed again, and I let out another tired breath and gestured for her to sit back down.

Now, for a bit of an explanation, we had to turn back the sands of time for about… ten minutes or so? Anyways, since my new girlfriends (damn, that still sounded weird, no matter how many times I repeated it) couldn't agree on who should make dinner, by process of elimination, they both did. This explained the fact that we had two different kinds of broths, mashed potatoes, some kind of fruit salad, a plateful of toasts and even homemade waffles. Even if we considered that there were three of us, the amount of food on the table was a little daunting. As for where they even got the ingredients for all of this, that was one of the seven mysteries of my kitchen.

Anyways, once we sat down around the table, I decided to let the princess in on one of my little skeletons in the closet, namely my amnesia. She was my girlfriend after all (still weird), so it was only proper to let her know about some of my secrets, and this was one the less weird ones. … Which made me realize how messed up my life was once again, so I was trying to ignore it by filling my stomach, which she rudely interrupted. Hence, we were back in the present, where I rubbed my temple with one hand while grabbing a toast with another.

”I'm not trivializing anything. I had it even before we first met, and I learned to work around it. In other words, it's not that big a deal.”

”How can you say that?” she continued to protest while leaning closer, her hands still on the tabletop. ”And why didn't you tell me about this before?”

”It's complicated, so I kept it a secret,” I answered between two bites. ”In fact, you are only the third person in the know.”

The blonde girl's eyes narrowed in suspicion as she took a sneaky glance at my assistant, who was quietly eating her broth on my right.

”Who are the others?”

”Judy and Josh,” I answered honestly.

”A—!” She began while she pointed an accusatory finger at me, but then her enthusiasm wilted in a matter of moments and her exclamation ended in a soft ”…ha?”, then she shook her head and leaned even closer, to the point where she was practically on top of the food in the middle of the table, and she asked, ”I kind of expected Judy, but Josh too?”

”He was the first,” I answered while I extended my arm and pushed her back with an index finger while telling her, ”If you keep doing that, the end of your hair is going to get into the soup.”

She let out a soft 'Oh' and sat back down, only to give me a weird look a moment later.

”Why didn't you tell the others about it?”

”I told you, it's complicated,” I answered with a voice that was only a tiny bit exhausted.

”But you told me.”

Now it was my turn to give her a weird look, and since she didn't seem to get the message, I told her, ”It's because we are going out now.”

”Oh, right,” she muttered with an absent-minded voice, then her cheeks very slowly flushed as her lips curved upwards in a dopey smile and she began to giggle.

”Chief, she is creeping me out,” my dear assistant stated with her usual deadpan voice, which was quite an achievement considering her cheeks were so full of waffles she reminded me of a hamster. Unexpectedly, the princess didn't react to her words; instead she had a weird, dreamy look in her eyes. I looked between my two girlfriends (nope, still weird), and for a moment I couldn't decide which of them was the stranger. But then again, people in glass houses shouldn't call other people weirdoes or something. … I never got that saying, by the way. Who lives in glass houses? And why would they throw rocks? Language is weird.

Anyways, I exploited the fleeting lull in the conversation to empty my mug, and by the time I put it down, the princess got over her momentary stupor and shook her head.

”Wait, don't try to sweet-talk me!”

”I didn't,” I answered her protest with one of my own, and she honest to goodness huffed.

”You think I wouldn't be on to you after all this time?” she asked with a cocky grin. ”Whenever you want to dodge a question, you would say something to embarrass me. However, it's not going to work anymore!” Saying so, she pointed a challenging finger at me. I don't know how I knew it was a challenging one and not an accusative one, I just did. ”Since I'm your girl… friend… now…”

Aaaaaand she got exactly that far before her voice trailed off, an almost translucent blush conquered her face, and her mouth twisted into a dopey smile… again.

”Chief, I think Eleanor is broken. We should return her to the shop while we still have the warranty on her,” Judy spoke up with a serious expression, then after a momentary pause she added, ”No need to fix her, just ask for our money back.”

”Hush, Dormouse,” I chided my assistant. ”She's just not used to the situation yet. Remember how much she used to freak out whenever I teased her in the past? She got over that too. I'm sure if we give her a little time, she'll be fine.”

Judy looked over the princess, then shrugged her shoulders and continued eating her fruit salad. In the meantime, Elly wiped the smile off her face and scowled at me.

”Oh, that's a nostalgic look,” I spontaneously muttered, earning me a curiously raised eyebrow from both girls, so I hastily added, ”It's been a while since you glared at me like that. It brings back memories.”

The princess let out a huff and averted her face with a pout.

”And whose fault was that?”

”You can't fault me. It's in men's nature to tease girls.”

”No Chief, that's just your nature,” my assistant retorted between two bites.

”Right, it's all because you are a flirt!” Suddenly the princess's eyes opened a fraction wider and then her brows immediately knit together in a frown as her gaze returned to me. ”Now that you mention it, no more flirting!”

”Pardon?” I asked reflexively, taken more than a little aback.

”I said, no more flirting,” Elly repeated with a look that was even more intense than usual. ”Since we are in a relationship…” She paused for a moment, and while I was half-expecting that she would start giggling to herself again, she only closed her eyes for a moment, took a huge breath, and continued, ”… since we are in a relationship, you cannot flirt with other girls anymore!”

”I never flirted with anyone other than you,” I answered emphatically, which, to my sincerest surprise, drew a reaction out of the other girl.

”I knew it!” Judy exclaimed… well, no, in her case it was more like 'said a bit more forcefully', but the effect was the same. Semantics aside, she continued by stating, ”So you were aware that you were flirting with Eleanor.”

”Well, in retrospect…” I muttered while scrutinizing the far corner of the room. Because it was interesting. There was no other reason. I was most definitely not avoiding her gaze at all.

”He was flirting with you too!” the other girl exclaimed as she pointed at my assistant with a fork in hand.

”That's a given,” Judy answered, completely deadpan as usual.

”What is that supposed to mean?”

”It means it's only a problem when he flirts with other girls.”

”That's right!” the princess agreed, completely ignoring the fact that Judy probably meant said category included her as well, and she faced me again. ”There you go, we are both in agreement! You are no longer allowed to flirt and tease girls.”

I let out a small sigh and faced her accusatory fork (that somehow collected half a kiwifruit somewhere along the conversation).

”Fine, fine. So what you are saying is that I am only allowed to tease you from now on, my princess.”

”That's…” Elly gave me a classic deer-in-the-headlights look.

”Say no more! I promise that, from now on, I will dedicate my whole being to teasing you!”

”Don't do that!” she riposted while she was getting red up to her ears again.

”But I have to! You just told me that it's my nature, and therefore I have to tease someone. Since you are the only one I can tease, it is only logical that I will—”

”What about her?!” she interrupted me while waving her hand towards my assistant. I also glanced over, and for a moment our eyes met. We held eye contact for a second, then Judy put down her own fork and let out a small sigh that sounded weirdly exasperated.

”I guess I have no choice,” she uttered in a defeated voice, ”Since you asked me directly, I will oblige and tease you too. Are you happy now?”

”No! That's not what I was asking for!”

”Too late,” Judy said before she turned to me and asked, ”Chief, since you are awake now, would you mind if I stayed over?”

The question raised a brow on my end, especially since it felt like a bit of a non-sequitur, but in the end I nodded. We had a lot of things to discuss regarding the past three days, the state of the Celestial Hub, and some other things as well, so I was already inclined to ask her to stay for a while longer.

”Very well. We need to explore a lot of things,” Judy told me with a weird emphasis on the word 'explore', but I still nodded. ”For example, we need to document your scars. I want to observe your body. From up close.”

Again, there was some weird emphasis on certain words, and I finally figured out where she was going with this, so I gave her a knowing smile and told her, ”Sure, you can look as much as you want.”

”Can I touch too?”

”Only if you promise you won't poke too hard. I'm sensitive.”

”I know. I will be very gentle for your first… examination.”

”Now that you put it like that, I am getting a little shy,” I told her with fake modesty.

”I want to see all of you, but I guess we can do it in the dark for the first time.”

I wanted to point out that the innuendo no longer worked with that, but then all of a sudden there was a loud creak coming from the other side of the table. We both looked over and found the princess gripping her fork so hard it was being bent out of shape.

”Leooooo…” she began to growl in a weird voice, but before I could answer, she suddenly jumped to her feet. No, correction: she jumped right over the table and towards me with a weird battle-cry saying, ”LEWDING IS PROHIBITED!”

Before I knew it, I too was on my feet and, using my finely honed girl-catching reflexes (which was a skill I still couldn't believe I had to develop), I grabbed the irate girl under her arms with a deft motion that surprised even me, then I spun her around to disperse the momentum. This part made me a little dizzy, but by some miracle I somehow managed to land my butt right back on my chair with a faint thud, followed by another soft sound as the princess landed on my lap.

After a long moment of silence, during which I admired the fact that I somehow managed to do all that without turning over the table, or even disturbing the dishes too much, I let out a pent-up breath and asked, ”What does 'lewding' even mean?”

”Was that really the first question that you should ask in this situation?” my disgruntled assistant inquired while getting out from under the table. I was tempted to ask just what she was doing under there, but then she sat down like it never happened, so I decided to ignore her and focus on the beet-red girl on my lap.

”What was that all about?”

”Shut up,” she answered while averting her eyes. ”You two are jerks.”

”Now, now,” I reflexively patted the head of the sulking girl. ”We were just teasing you. We even told you we were going to do it.”

”That's…” she began speaking, but then she just fell silent. I let out a sigh and looked over at my assistant, only to find her frowning back at me.

”Is there something you would like to say, Dormouse?” I asked cautiously.

”She tried to attack us, and you are now rewarding her. You are spoiling her, Chief.”

”I'm not,” I answered indignantly. ”Not to mention, I am pretty sure that wasn't an attack, just another one of her embarrassed reactions. She didn't mean harm, right, Princess?” The girl on my lap nodded without a word. ”You see?”

Judy's expression didn't change an iota.

”Playing favorites already?” she asked with thinly veiled irritation.

”Most definitely not,” I answered in kind.

”That's not how it looks like from here,” came the instantaneous answer, prompting me to roll my eyes and gesture with my free hand.

”Then come over here.”

There was zero hesitation in her movements as my dear assistant stood up, walked over, and pushed the princess to the side with her butt so that she could also sit on my lap. For some reason, I was getting a distinct sense of déja vu…

”Are you happy now?” I asked with a smile I hoped was dry enough to soak up oceans, but then Judy honest to goodness raised a finger to her lips like she was deep in thought before she lowered her head.

”Head pat,” she stated with her usual lack of enthusiasm, yet the small tinge of red on her cheeks told me she was less calm than what she showed on the surface. Since I didn't respond right away, she repeated, ”I demand a head pat.”

I rolled my eyes again and used my free hand to tussle her hair a little.

”We should've done this in the first place,” Elly grumbled, earning a questioning look in the process.

”We should have done what? Head pats?”

”No!” The blonde girl puffed her cheek for a moment, then she exhaled and told me, ”I mean, I'm not saying I'm against it. It feels really nice and comfortable, and it makes my heart beat harder, and… Um…” She paused, probably realizing she went off-topic, and then she came back with, ”I wanted to say we should've sat like this from the beginning. I sat on the other side so we could eat face to face, but then Judy sat down next to you. Then I realized I wanted to sit next to you too.”

”… Then why didn't you just come over?”

”Because it would've made it look like I was following Judy's lead, and I didn't want to be second in line.”

For a while, I could only stare at the girl in disbelief.

”Don't tell me we are going to be dealing with this kind of nonsense from now on?”

”It's your fault,” Judy told me while she reached over and grabbed a toast.

”Yeah,” Elly agreed while trying to, and failing, to reach her plate while still sitting on my lap.

I couldn't help but shake my head. My girlfriends (no, still not used to it) were on the same wavelength at the weirdest of times, but I had to grant it to them, they were right. I chose this outcome, so I had to live with the consequences. We still had a lot of kinks to hammer out though. For example, how the heck was I supposed to have dinner like this…?

”Repeat after me!” the princess demanded with a severe look while standing on my front porch, her extended finger pointing at me in a very princess-like pose. ”NO,” she stressed the word, then her finger moved over to my dear assistant standing right next to me with her arm awkwardly entwined in mine, ”LEWDING!”

Both of us gave her a flat look in return, and Judy voiced my thoughts by telling her, ”'Lewding' is still not a word.”

”I don't care,” my girlfriend told my girlfriend with a huff. ”I want you to promise me you won't get up to anything while I'm away.”

”So it's fine when you are around?” I asked in a very innocent voice that was completely genuine and in no way mischievous.

”Yes! I mean, no! No lewd things are allowed yet!” the flustered girl replied with a pout.

”She said 'yet',” Judy stated at my side with a strange light in her eyes.

It didn't go unnoticed by the princess, as she grabbed hold of my assistant and leaned closer to whisper, ”We are going to discuss this later, you hear me? Between the two of us. As girls. Understood?”

I had no idea what she was referring to (maybe some 'girl thing', as Josh would put it), nor did I know if my assistant understood, but after a while she gave the princess a shrug, which she conveniently accepted as a sign of agreement.

”Good.” Saying so, she turned to me and poked me in the chest. ”As for you, Leo: You are still recuperating, so go and rest. Don't go outside. Don't move too much. Do not do any… activity that requires you to move your body a lot.” She paused, then repeated her words with extra emphasis: ”Any. such.activity.”

I gave my girlfriend a wry look and sighed.

”I got it, we are not going to tear our off clothes and jump into the bed the moment you leave, I promise.”

Elly's ears went crimson again, which of course didn't secretly amuse me or give me any kind of satisfaction, but she quickly overcame her embarrassment and mumbled something along the lines of, ”So long as you understand.”

It was around this time that her usual limo rounded the corner, and after some final farewells and a peck on the cheek, my girlfriend left the premises, leaving me alone with my girlfriend.

… Yeah, I know, this is confusing, but this was the bed I made, now I had to lie in it. That aside, Judy and I closed the door behind us and I immediately exhaled a small sigh.

”All right, it's just the two of us now,” I said before I glanced down at the girl still holding onto my arm and continued with, ”You know what that means, right?”

”We are going to tear off each other's clothes and jump into the bed?”

I gave my dear assistant a flat look and said, ”I am going to flick your forehead now.”

She only blinked at my statement, so I proceeded to do just as I said, earning me a frown and an unenthusiastic 'ow'.

”Chief, that hurt,” she told me while rubbing her forehead, but I scoffed at her protests.

”No it didn't, I barely touched you. Not to mention, even if it did, you would've deserved it. Now stop messing around and please get your notes.”

My assistant let go of my arm with what I presumed to be mock reluctance before she clicked her tongue and mumbled, ”Spoilsport.” Still, in just a few seconds she bounced back and we both took up our customary places in the living room; she sat on the sofa with her phone in hand, while I paced up and down all around the place.

It was at this point when I took a huge breath and tried to clear my head from unimportant thoughts as much as I could. After I felt adequately prepared, I gestured for Judy to pay attention.

”Let's not beat around the bush: the events at the school last Sunday were a disaster, and I believe we are to blame for it.” I paused to see if Judy would like to add something, but she was only looking at me expectantly, so I continued, ”The writing was on the wall, yet we… No, I ignored it all. One mistake and we could have ended up with one of our friends dying.”

”You almost died yourself,” Judy told me with a hint of disapproval, and I could only nod.

”Yes, unfortunately. I have nothing to say in my defense. I messed up, and I paid the price,” I told her while placing my hand on the still tender scar on my stomach. ”In retrospect, there were many opportunities to prevent that night. I should have interrogated Snowy better, or looked into Crowey's movements after I learned that he was out for my blood, but I guess I just didn't take the situation seriously enough.” I paused to let my words sink in before I finished with, ”That changes now.”

The expression on Judy's face somehow felt conflicted, and I had a feeling she wanted to say something, but after waiting for her for a few seconds she just closed her eyes, and when she opened them she was back to normal and simply asked, ”How so?”

”First, we have to expand our intelligence network,” I answered after just a moment of hesitation. ”We've been wasting the potential of the Celestial Hub. We only used it as a source of background information. We need to start using it to monitor the movements of the other factions. We need to know if something is about to happen so we can prepare.”

”Sounds reasonable.”

”I'm glad you agree. By the way, I want to leave that part to you. I have other plans.”

”Such as?”

I paused. In fact, I even stopped pacing up and down for a moment before I told her, ”Judy, I'm a mess. I have all kinds of powers, but I have no idea how to use them effectively. Hell, I almost died that night, multiple times, because I kept forgetting about my various abilities at critical moments. I need training. I need to learn how to deal with whatever supernatural nastiness will throw at us next.”

”If that happens, do you plan to get involved again?”

”Only if necessary,” I answered uncertainly, but then I steeled my voice and added, ”No, chances are, I will have to. We have already established that this world is running on the conventions of some kind of 'supernatural-battle-harem-school-life-comedy' genre. I'm afraid what we have seen is just the tip of the iceberg of the 'supernatural battle' part, and I need to be able to hold my own when the next crisis comes knocking around the corner.”

Judy pursed her lips almost imperceptibly, but in the end she just wrote a few more notes. I waited for her to finish, then she finally asked, ”Which power did you forget about? Your Far Sight?”

”Actually…” I paused again, then I shook my head and began pacing once more. ”Actually, open up the file on my powers. I have a lot of new entries.”

”Oh?” Judy voiced curiously before she began to furiously poke at her phone for a moment, then she gave me the go-ahead.

”Okay, so my Far Sight is a given, no changes there. I also told you about my ability to see magic. I can apparently also see through magic, such as camouflage, and I can disrupt magic by cutting it with my fingers.”

”I got all that,” Judy informed me.

”All right. First off, I have precognitive reflexes.”

”Didn't we test that already?” she inquired while glancing up at me, and I shook my head.

”There might be some kind of condition to it, such as only reacting to actual danger or intention to harm me. Either way, it was thanks to it that I could survive against Brang and the chimera.”

”Who's Brang?”

”The leader of the Faun. The one with the spear.”

”You mean the one you growled at?”

That remark made me freeze for a moment before I told her, ”Actually, that's another thing. Apparently I can fluently speak Faunish, and started doing it without me realizing it was a different language at first. It might be just that I already knew it from before my amnesia, or it could be another power or ability. Maybe I have one of those convenient magical translation suites common in stories where someone travels to another world.”

My assistant gave me a strange look, then she gestured for me to come closer. I did so, and after a few seconds of poking her phone, she showed the screen to me.

”What does this say?” she asked.

I took a close look at the symbols on the screen, but I only shook my head.

”I don't know. What is this?”

”Traditional Chinese,” she said as she returned to the phone, and after some more screen-prodding, she turned it my way again. ”What about this?”

”'Si vis amari, ama…' Is that Latin?”

”Yes. Do you know what it means?”

”No.”

For some reason, she clicked her tongue as if I spoiled another of her jokes before she returned to her phone, this time for more than a minute, before she showed it to me again. Even at a glance, I recognized the familiar interface of the Celestial Hub, which earned my assistant a curiously raised brow, but she urged me to read on.

”'… Incident at twelve and ten under zone of school Magi…' … No, wait, it's 'inside the territory of the Magi', I think, and…” My voice trailed off as I focused more closely on the screen. ”Judy, what language is this?”

”Celestial Script,” my assistant answered without missing a beat. ”It's a type of magical cipher only Celestials can read. I thought you told MoroseMoose to organize the classified reports because you couldn't read them either.”

”Well, I can. Apparently.” I squinted at the letters, which were somewhat hazy on a second look, and asked, ”What does it look like to you?”

Judy paused for a moment, then she told me, ”Like angular hieroglyphs. What do you see?”

”Normal letters,” I answered absent-mindedly. ”Though if I look at it really hard, I can see the words kinda… shimmer and move around? It's hard to explain.”

Both of us fell silent for several seconds.

”So,” I asked tentatively, ”you said it's like a magical cipher? So does this fall under seeing through magic or understanding languages I have no business understanding?”

”Which is the weirder?”

”The latter,” I answered reflexively.

”Then it's that,” she told me with a kind of unwarranted sagely wisdom that made me shake my head.

”Doesn't really matter right now, but we are going to test this to hell and back later. For now, let's focus on my other new abilities.”

”Roger,” Judy answered as she closed the browser and returned to her notes. ”So far we have Far Sight, Magic Perception, Anti-Magic Swipes, Spider-sense—”

”Okay, stop! I will talk to you about the other names too, but that last one is just blatant copyright infringement!”

She clicked her tongue again.

”Fine, I will call it 'Chief-sense' then.”

”That's… only marginally better.”

My complaints fell on deaf ears as she continued, ”Then we have 'Maybe Magic Maybe Mundane Multilingualism'. Anything else?”

I took a long, deep breath, and just let it go.

”Yes, I can also teleport now.”

My previously pouting assistant's expression took a 180-degree turn in a split second.

”Really?”

Instead of answering right away, I took a deep breath and tried to remember how I did it. I had a feeling the process was incredibly complex, but somehow it also felt really intuitive, like riding a bicycle, and after a moment or two of fiddling in the proverbial saddle, I could feel my surrounding blur for a moment before my vision returned to normalcy and I found myself standing behind the sofa. I let out the aforementioned breath, and then quietly placed my palm on the top of Judy's head.

My dear assistant visibly flinched, then she very slowly looked over her shoulder and told me, ”That's new,” in a deadpan voice made hilarious by her decidedly not deadpan expression. The whole thing was worth it just for that. I stifled a small chuckle and then walked around the sofa to be face to face with her again.

”Yes, it's new. I just discovered it during my Dominance with Brang.”

”Another new term. What's a 'Dominance'?”

”A kind of ritualistic magical duel fought with apparitions. More on that later,” I told her before I began pacing again. ”So, I obviously haven't done any controlled experiments, but as far as I can tell, I do not have too many limitations on this one. Using it is like my Far Sight; a little disorienting, but not particularly straining at short distances. I do not know how far I can teleport, but based on my experiences during my chase with the chimera, I was moving anywhere between two to five meters without any issues. Anything more than that, and it became much harder and made me lightheaded.” I halted for a moment and asked something that bothered me a little, ”Hey, Judy? How does this look like from the outside? Did I just disappear? Did it make a noise?”

She was still in something of a daze, but she quickly shook her head and answered, ”First you blurred, like you were out of focus, then you were gone. There was no sound accompanying it.”

”Is that so? So it's stealthy as well. We are probably going to focus on testing the limits of this ability, because I think this has the most potential utility both in and outside of combat, but before that, there's one more thing.” I extended my hand towards her, palm pointing up. ”First, do you see this?”

Judy gave me a funny look, but then she squinted at my hand and observed it from multiple angles. At long last, she shook her head and told me, ”I don't know. Am I supposed to see something other than your hand?”

”So you can't see it, huh?” I mused as I made my brand new phantom tendril limb thing wriggle a bit. For a second or two I pondered how I could explain it to her, but eventually I decided to be blunt. ”You see, after I woke up today, I found myself with a phantom limb of some sort. It feels something like a… tentacle, I guess?”

”Tentacle? Really?” Judy asked with a critical frown.

”Hey, I don't like it either,” I protested. ”Thing is, I can't seem to do anything with it because it's completely intangible.”

”So it's like a real phantom limb,” Judy told me expressionlessly, and it was my turn to return her critical look.

”Yes, Judy. It's like that.”

”So you can't use it to grab things? Or touch things? Or do tentacle-things with it?”

”No, no, and I don't even know what you mean by the third one,” I grumbled as I waved my phantom limb around. ”Look, if I try to use it to grab, say, my mug, it just—”

I got this far in my sentence. As I attempted to demonstrate my point and swipe my invisible appendage across my beloved 'I mug sitting on the coffee table, my vision suddenly blurred. It was kind of like when I entered Far Sight, except about a thousand times more nauseating. I instinctively staggered back and my knees nearly buckled, but before it would come to that, I was quickly supported by Judy.

”What happened? Are you all right?” She asked in a worried voice which, considering her temperament, could be probably translated to mild panic for anyone else.

”Yes, I just…” I began, but I had no idea how to finish that sentence. What exactly just happened? I shook my head and regained my balance. ”Judy, I want to try something. Catch me if I was about to keel over.”

”Chief, you can't be serious,” my assistant answered with the same worried voice, but then she added, ”There is no way I can catch you. You are too big.”

”You'll manage,” I told her off-handedly as I slowly extended my phantom limb towards the mug. Initially I only touched its surface, but there was no reaction. I tried it a few more times, and then I decided to go, for a lack of better words, deeper. It was like when I extended my consciousness towards a 'dot' during Far Sight. In fact, maybe it was exactly the same? Maybe I was extending this 'phantom limb' all this time? These were questions for later, as at the moment I focused on the mug. As I did so, and my appendage reached deeper, I was once again assaulted by violent nausea. I clenched my teeth and endured. Then, just as tunnel vision was about to set in, something weird happened. … Okay, something even weirder happened.

The mug, for lack of better words, divided, but it didn't. It was the same mug, but when I looked at it, there were countless other beverage containers overlaid on it. Tiny porcelain ones, large metal ones, wide-mouthed ones and cylindrical ones, with or without handles, and all of them had countless color variations. The longer I looked, the worse the nausea became, but I soldiered on, ignoring the voice of the girl in the process of steadily losing her composure at my side.

As I looked even deeper, I realized that the different mugs weren't overlaying each other, but they were… it was hard to explain, but if I were to use an analogy, I'd say they were like leaves on a gigantic tree, except instead of looking at them one by one, I was trying to look at all the leaves on an entire branch at the same time while looking at them individually at the same time. Did that make sense? I wasn't even sure I understood my own analogy, but I had no better words to describe what was going on. Then, as I reached even deeper, the nausea very quickly turned into a terrible, terrible headache. A headache that seemed to permeate my entire being. A very… familiar headache.

I'm going to be honest: I panicked. I could deal with pain, but that headache was something else entirely. I tried to retract my phantom limb, but it felt like… it felt like I stretched it too far? It passed through too many small holes? It got entangled with other branches full of different leaves? It made no logical sense, but something told me that I was in danger, so I pulled with all my might, and after a few 'tugs' my phantom limb finally 'dislodged', for lack of better words. Then, just as abruptly as it came, the headache disappeared along with the tunnel-vision and the overlapping mugs, and I could simultaneously feel my legs wave the white flag as they surrendered to gravity, and I would have probably ended up face-planting on my coffee table if not for Judy's intervention.

When my brain finally started working again, I found myself on my hands and knees, hyperventilating, and my stomach threatening to spread my dinner all over my living room carpet. I quickly got my bodily functions under control, and once my ears stopped ringing and my eyes started focusing, I realized that Judy was holding onto my waist with all her might.

”Dormouse?” I whispered.

”Chief, are you all right?” She asked back while still holding onto me like she was afraid I was going to run away.

”I… I'm fine,” I answered through clenched teeth.

”What happened?” my assistant finally let me go and sidled over to the front to look me in the eye. ”You said you would try something, then it looked like you had a seizure. Do you have any idea how scared I was?”