Re: [Portal: Holly & Noah]
That prickling on the back of Noah's neck happened in tandem with Holly's. It was an atavistic instinct, prey running from predator. A sense of danger pressing down, urging you to become small and still. But, humans had managed to hang around a long time, even with crazy shit on the planet, so Noah had no doubts, dude, that Holly could get through this too. What they had on whatever it was that was stalking Holly was ingenuity. Because, whatever-it-was wasn't human. Noah couldn't feel it like that. It was the same, skewed sensation he got with animals—fleeting, little things, more push and pull than anything coherent. (Noah knew non-human beings had thoughts, right? They had a lot of the same ones humans did, really. Complex processes of interpretation of their environment(s)/situations/etc. But, without the structure of language, he did a lot more feeling than, say, mental eavesdropping. And this thing? Felt hungry. Dark too. Noah's head felt like it was being cleaved in fucking two, but he just tried to focus, focus. He made himself think about the wind rushing through the broken windows to keep himself from fully spilling out of himself.
Holly huddled in the hollowed-out hole. The tree wrapped around him like a hug, like a wall, a moat, like a metaphor for bad coping mechanisms. The whatever-it-was was sensing with heat, Noah thought. Heat and smell? Its chittering growl was low, almost insectile. It didn't help those rising hairs on Noah's nape or arms. Closer to Holly... if there was such a thing as mental distance, the dude's mantra of home was playing itself out. Holly hugged his arms around his knees, and Noah would've squeezed him if he could. The thing was moving by. The monster. Noah could feel its shifting bulk. Just another couple seconds, he tried to tell Holly. As for humoring? Noah had to work to remember what it was he was humoring Holly on.
He got there. He didn't think any specific words. He shared that feeling, the one he'd done before—that bottomless sense of loss and need and more loss, the edges of it ragged and raw, like a suppurating wound. It was gut-wrench pain. It was homesickness without a home. And then... Noah pulled it back. Back, so it didn't suffocate Holly. Back, because the monster was prowling away from the dude, and Holly needed to be able to move. It's gone. Noah felt out in the merciless abyss as best he could. Okay, he offered as he kept driving. Almost there now. Go.