Chapter Text
“There was a blackout.”
The TV in the living room was mumbling quietly along to some video that had long since autoplayed past what it was meant to portray, the idle silent noise filling the spaces between sentences. The floor around the TV was scattered with bags of snacks, canned drinks, bottles of teas and processed juice. A half-eaten cake was on the coffee table, left by 3 mugs of half-drunk tea.
The time was 2:47 AM.
Brooke Lohst’s silence only grew deeper as she marched back into the living room from the kitchen. Even with her pajamas on, she looked for all the world like a girl on a mission, something focused burning behind her eyes. She continued her pacing in the living room, in front of the TV, her body blocking some of the only light that was available to them. Her brown brows were focused down on her face, as she stared through the mess of blonde hair across her face.
“What kind of a blackout?” was the earnest, equally focused answer. Jenna Rolan wasted no time in replying, her phone screen dim enough so that the light wouldn’t sting her eyes. She sat up a little straighter from where she had been lounging on the floor, mirroring Brooke’s tense demeanour.
“One street. Streetlights went out, then a bunch of houses, around midnight tonight.” Jenna recited, HER burning focus narrowed into making sure she recited the information correctly.
However, in response to that statement, a head lurched up from behind the coffee table, dark hair pulled back into a sturdy ponytail. Chloe blinked hard, squinting slightly through the lack of light. “What--” She started, feeling around the floor near her. After a moment or two, she brushed a few straggling bits of hair from her face, carefully placing a pair of thin, black, wire glasses onto her face. “How are you supposed to know exactly when the blackout happened? How do you quantify that kind of thing without, like, being an electrician or whatever.”
Silently, Brooke looked back over at Jenna, in non-verbal agreement. Unphased, Jenna turned her phone for the other two girls to look-- Chloe, leaning across the far end of the table, and Brooke, pivoting at the hips. The images in question were screenshots from Snapchat, and Jenna swiped through them periodically. “Rich, actually. He was up late and noticed the electricity was being weird on his street. Said that he heard a ‘popping noise’ before his house lost power.”
Chloe scrunched her mouth to the side, biting the end of a pen that was dangling between her fingers. “Well if it was at night, maybe he should’ve been asleep.” Quickly, Brooke turns to give a stale glare at Chloe, gesturing around the trio and their mess with a single, stiff, sarcastic arm.
After all, the three girls were having a sleepover.
A moment passed, and Chloe pointed her pen at Brooke, lips tight. “--Okay.” She stated, and ended her sentence there. She rolled back over to the floor, sitting on her hip. The movement attracted Brooke’s attention, as she walked to squat near Chloe’s area.
“Did you figure anything else out yet?” Brooke asked, her chin propped up on her forearms. Chloe pushed a few lined sheets of paper into place, spreading them out around on the floor. Jenna stood up from where she was sitting and moved to look over at the array. Chloe took the fine felt-tip pen from out of her mouth and gestured to the pages, sucking a thoughtful breath through her teeth.
“Okay. I’m referencing a lot of stuff from the conversation you wrote down from the library, and a bunch of the added context of the actions. The mall stuff was relatively interesting, but not quite for the stuff we’re-- well, you’re looking for.”
Chloe took a beat to roll back on the floor and scowl slightly at her friends. “This is still weird. I don’t know if you two are getting this, but this is weird, Brooke.” Jenna piped up, cocking her head to the side with a sarcastic little smile. “Chlo, I don’t know about you, but this is extremely interesting to me. You are outvoted 2 to 1 by default.”
“I fucking hate democracy,” whispered Chloe, reaching to pull her own phone onto these reference pages. The image on the screen was taken from Brooke’s perspective: A zoomed in photo of a teenager with dark, misshapen hair, staring intently at a machine in the library. Chloe poked the glass with the back of her pen, and opened her mouth to speak. Brooke interrupted her immediately.
“Shut the fuck up. Stop doubting me on this one. I know what I saw. There was nothing plugged into that printer thing.” She folded her arms, as Chloe retorted. “It literally could’ve been like a default printing thing or something. Do not be so fucking dramatic.”
(Jenna, in the meantime, felt a buzz from her phone. She became distracted from the bickering.)
“Okay, let me add this shit up.” Began Brooke, standing up. “They accurately predicted Jenna showing up in the bathroom-- Foresight. They were using the printer weirdly-- Technology control. Their PUPILS are in the shape of SQUARES and their EYES are CYAN BLUE. They confused Japan with Korea when I asked where they were from. That is a mistake that people do not make!”
Brooke held a finger aloft to accentuate her points. The silence returned to the room a little bit more, as the youtube video in the background had changed again. Chloe stared upwards at her.
(Faintly, in the flickering light of the TV, she could see discolouration on her neck. Rigid lines, starting at the base of her skull and creeping down. They had… mostly faded. But for Brooke, at least, they were still there. Chloe knew that much. For Jenna, they were worse. As for herself, Chloe was lucky enough to be skilled with concealer.)
“I believe Brooke on this one, Chlo.” Said Jenna, breaking the tense aura. “I know you’re being careful-- honestly, I’m a little shocked that Brooke hasn’t been more careful about this one. But, you gotta realize that this stuff adds up.”
“I saw it on their hands, too. The--...” Brooke’s hand lingered in the air, her thumb feeling her wrist. The phrase lingered in her throat, like it was stuck. Chloe responded.
“I know what you mean. I don’t think any of us want to say it."
That silence sat a little bit longer, as the conversation seemed to crawl on around them without the need for words. Jenna’s attention, again, focused in onto her phone, as she typed with a newfound interest.
“...Brooke, what is this all about. This is too much social engineering for you, even for me!” Chloe sat up a little more, gesturing to the spread of papers. The notes were meticulous, and all in Chloe’s handwriting.
“You know what this is about!” Brooke forced, not expressing enough hostility to actually be upset. Her arms wrapped around themselves. “Its about… it. I am… so paranoid right now, Chlo.” She unfolds her arms as quickly as she had folded them, opting to rub her wrist again.
“That guy, they behaved like-- like they weren’t there. Like they were just… an alien, crash landed on Earth, trying to blend in. The way they move-- you haven't seen it up close, but its stiff. Its stiff like their body is wanting to do one thing but-- but doing something else.”
(That remark gets a morose glance from Jenna.)
Chloe’s stood up now, lingering closer to Brooke, trying her best to put on what looks like an empathetic expression. Her face rests at ‘emotionless’, but Brooke’s been around her long enough to know. Brooke was staring at the floor, refusing to make eye contact for fear of getting misty-eyed.
That silence sat once more.
“They’re a nice guy,” croaks Brooke. “I really think they’re a nice person. Its just-- I’m scared that--”
“Somethings getting in the way.” Finishes Chloe.
A beat. Brooke’s expression was very easy to read. In an odd, haphazard way, everyone feels as though they had a significant hand in the events that transpired during last autumn. During September, at Halloween, and at the evening of the school play.
These things are tricky. People’s minds, and the guilt that they construct, are tricky. Even machines, however perfect and intelligent they might be, can provide oversights to how the human mind collects guilt. Christine, for instance, still has a lingering sense of sadness over how she ignored Rich during Halloween. Rich, for another, has an overwhelming hole to fill, regarding his past of… instructed bullying. Jenna felt guilty about her networking that day, both metaphorical and horrifyingly literal. Chloe felt bad because some of the pressure she had put onto her friends had driven them to these desperate states.
And Jeremy? Well, I don’t need to explain that one.
(A funny thing about connecting human brains to a digital network, is that once you deactivate the software, the hardware will remain. This can manifest in being… aware of people’s feelings and thoughts, without them being truly communicated.)
“Its cause you noticed Jeremy, right?” Begins Jenna, looking up from her phone. Brooke stares at her instead, abandoning her vigil of the floor.
“You were one of the only people who paid attention to him when things first started getting bad. So you noticed someone else, and you see problems more clearly than you did before. You’re trying to jump the gun on this one and stop a problem before it gets really bad again.”
…Brooke’s silence was all that Chloe and Jenna needed to hear.
Chloe sighed. “...Okay. I try really, really hard not to judge people or be like, rude and assuming. But you do have something here. A lot of evidence. It kind of freaks me out. Mostly the fact that you managed to get all this superspy shit--” (that earns a little giggle from Brooke) “--but, also, the evidence itself. I didn’t wanna be mean to this guy, but I… also think you’re right. I think there’s something wrong.”
And again, the silence falls. But its not as tense as it was before. Its almost understanding.
“...Thanks, Chlo. I’m sorry for being… pushy about this.”
“You are,” Said Chloe, wrapping her arms around Brooke in a hug, resting her cheek on Brooke’s shoulder. She rocked them both back and forth. “You are so very pushy about this, but its okay because I am your bestest friend and you are probably right about this.”
“Not just PROBABLY!!” retorts Brooke, happily held. “I am good at this undercover investigator stuff. I should be like, a detective when I get older. Some real Elle Woods shit.”
“Elle Woods was a lawyer.”
“Elle Woods could be a detective if she wanted to be.”
Chloe rocked them both back and forth, eventually swinging them around hard enough for Brooke to stumble and shriek a little. “Gaah-! Chlo, don’t kill me! At least let me solve this mysteryyyy!”
“No, you will die before its finished and you’ll have to solve it as a ghost.”
“Noooooo!!!”
Jenna rose up from where she had sat down, having fully been distracted by her phone. “Guys,” She began, tone serious. Chloe and Brooke look over from their embrace, giggly demeanour diminishing. “--What is it?” says Brooke, slipping out of Chloe’s arms, who follows close behind.
“Rich sent me a video he took earlier tonight. He said he heard someone screaming and walking around the street all weirdly before the power went out, so he took out his phone and started recording.” She opened the messages she was having with him, going back and locating the video. “He didn’t send it before because you couldn’t see anything in it. But, I ABSOLUTELY saw something.”
And so, Brooke, Jenna and Chloe huddled around the phone as Jenna pressed play.
The video was shaky, firstly. It started inside of Rich’s room, with light swearing under his breath. You can hear the sounds of shouting from outside, faint-- yet full of anger. He barely makes it to the window in time before there’s a loud popping sound, and the scene is plunged into complete darkness. The sound of a phone case tapping against glass is heard, as the camera is pushed against the window. Its as Rich said: you can’t see much.
But Jenna zooms in on a spot of the scene.
And moving effortlessly down the street, floats a pair of blue, glowing eyes, blinking off and on intermittently.
They turn to look at the camera, and Rich does not notice.
Brooke lets go of a breath she didn’t know she was holding.
“Found you.”