Who: Carson and Nic When: Evening, Saturday, June 23rd Where: Phone call Status: Complete
As much as Carson was relieved to not be in Point Pleasant anymore, it was sometimes frustrating. He didn’t know what was going on, beyond the vague updates he got from friends and family he kept in touch with. Most of them kept conversations to the mundane -- Vex was a glaring contradiction to that, and Carson called him fairly regularly, but even he didn’t know everything that was going on in town. Especially with Jules.
Carson had been worried about her ever since he’d gotten back to the real world, but he’d felt especially fretty since he’d left town. She’d become like a little sister to him, and he kind of felt like he’d abandoned her, even though he was keeping in touch as much as he could. So when she’d stopped answering his mental reach outs, Carson worried even more.
He couldn’t even wait much more than a day, prodding at Jules through their psychic connection with more insistence as the hours went on, and still getting stonewalled. Maybe she was busy ... but maybe she was in trouble. She hadn’t been doing great, he knew that, and he worried some about these people she’d fallen in with. After some thought, he decided that the only logical person to reach out to for help checking on her was Nic Castell. Jules didn’t like or trust Neil, and Carson didn’t know who else in her life would believe his concern except maybe her ex boyfriend, but that seemed like a messy risk to take.
So Saturday afternoon, pacing the length of his and Rylee’s apartment, Carson called Nic -- from his cell, not his mind, though he couldn’t really explain why.
Despite the mental connection Nic had with the other Dreamers, he very rarely heard from them. It sometimes seemed to him that they should be closer after what they’d went through, but instead they often felt very far away. He’d always figured that was circumstantial—Jules was a teenager, Neil was an ass, and Carson probably kept his distance because… well, he didn’t have much of an answer there, except that Rylee had blamed him for losing Carson and he’d been too fucking broken at the time to argue about it. Nic knew Carson and Rylee were close—knew more than he suspected he should—and figured that if he’d lost one, he’d lost them both. Plus, they’d moved away.
So it surprised him to see Carson’s name pop up on his phone, especially with no mental warning before hand. Maybe the connection had died. He used it so rarely, it wouldn’t surprise him. “This is Nic,” he said, not entirely sure if he expected Carson on the other end or someone else entirely.
Carson knew it might have been more efficient to telepathically call out to Nic, but something felt weird about it, like it wasn’t as private as he needed it to be. Could Jules and Neil listen in if they wanted to? None of them had ever been quite sure how it worked. Carson had had plenty of mental conversations with Jules that had seemed private, but for some reason he didn’t want to chance her overhearing him sending someone else to check on her. “Hey Nic, Carson,” he greeted, still pacing the length of the room. “How’s it going, man?” Even though he had a purpose to call, it was always good to start with some pleasantries, right?
“Hey,” Nic said, a small smile curling on his lips. “It’s going okay. Things are pretty quiet around here. Better. Better than usual.” Lem was better, which had played a big part in him being better himself, though he’d never voiced any of his problems to Carson and the others. He felt like they had enough to deal with on their own that they didn’t need to worry about his sorry ass. Carson, more than the others, since he’d been stuck like the fog people. He’d heard from Vex that Carson had spent the entirety of the stay there as a werewolf, but one with control, and Nic had a handful of questions he wanted to ask him. But it never felt appropriate. Now didn’t feel like the time either. “What about you? Things better elsewhere?”
He was relieved to hear that Nic was doing okay and things were quiet for him. It gave Carson a little hope that things were quiet for Jules too, she just hadn’t been answering his mental calls for some other reason. Maybe she was off on a girly trip or something and just wanted some privacy. But Point Pleasant didn’t usually leave much room for optimism. “They’re ... less hellish,” Carson answered with a faint chuckle, glancing around the apartment. “No uh, things are good. Me and Rylee are kinda settled in here, it’s a nice change of scenery, you know? I miss everybody though ... how’s your sister? And the crackpot neighbors?” The last question had plenty of affection in it -- he only talked to Vex sporadically, but Carson still felt close to him.
The bar had been set pretty low as far as improvement went, but Nic was still glad to hear that things were better for Carson than they had been. He needed a break, a chance to recover, and he was probably more likely to get that away from Point Pleasant than staying there. The town hadn’t been good to him, doling out more than its fair share of trauma in only a matter of months. Leaving was probably a smart move, though Nic had never considered it for himself. “Zan’s good, though she thrives on chaos, so she’s probably bored,” he smiled. “Vex and Lem are hangin’ in there. Doing a lot better now. We just celebrated Lem’s birthday, so… things feel a bit more normal. Vex misses you though.”
Carson could always just call Vex to check in, but it was also nice to know that Nic was right there next door, someone sensible who would be honest with him about how things were going over there. Carson loved Vex, but he wasn’t the most reliable narrator. And Lem was ... well, she seemed crazy in her own way, but Carson wasn’t going to say so to Nic. “That’s good man, that’s good,” he said with a faint chuckle. “I miss him too. And you and everybody. Which, uh ... which kinda brings me to why I called.” Carson wet his lips and walked another lap through the living room. “Have you heard anything from Jules lately? Like in the past few days?” He knew it was kind of a long shot, Jules was closest to him out of the dreamers, but maybe Nic had run into her by accident or ... something.
Nic knew there was probably a reason for Carson’s call, since he’d never called to chat before, but he wasn’t expecting it to be about Jules. He hadn’t seen her since the night on Witcham Road, something he felt somewhat guilty about, but he’d been so wrapped up in his own issues that he hadn’t checked in like he kept meaning to. She could have reached out to him at any time, but he was the adult. He should have done a better job at looking out for her. Just because things had returned to normal didn’t mean that everything was okay. “No,” he said with a small frown. “We don’t really talk. Which is probably my fault. I wasn’t very useful while… while you were gone. I kind of assumed things were better now. Why? What’s up?”
Not for the first time, Carson was tempted to just drop everything and drive to Point Pleasant again to check on Jules himself. He’d tried to reach her through their mental connection, and then her phone, and she wasn’t answering either one. So he was worried. Maybe needlessly, maybe she was just being a teenage girl, but she’d never gone dark on him before like this. Nic was the only connection to her he knew and trusted enough to do this. “Me and her kinda ... got close, as friends, through all this, you know?” Carson started, hoping that didn’t sound inappropriate. It still felt weird to be friends with a teenage girl, but hopefully Nic knew him enough to know he wasn’t that kind of predator. “We keep in touch. She’s going through a lot ... but she always answers me when I reach out to her, but she’s stopped answering. Brain, phone, all of it, I can’t get a hold of her. I was wonderin’ if you could maybe, like, swing by and check on her?” He grimaced a little even as he said it, aware he sounded like some fretful grandmother or something. “I’m probably worrying too much, but ... yeah, I’m worried.”
It didn’t sound inappropriate to Nic, though he understood why Carson might worry. He’d kept his distance from Jules for exactly that reason, already aware of the looks people gave him for being with Lem. He didn’t really give a shit, Lem was of age, but Jules was in high school. Or had been. And the last thing she’d needed was him ruining her reputation by appearing to creep around. But if something was wrong, it was worth the risk. It shouldn’t hurt anything for him to drop by her house and say hi, just to clear things up. “Yeah, I can do that. She lives, um… down the street from my parents. I’ll try to catch her today or tomorrow, just to make sure things are okay. Anything I should be aware of?” Carson had said Jules was going through a lot, but he wasn’t sure what that meant outside normal high school drama.
Carson hesitated, not sure how much of Jules’s business he ought to be telling anyone else. This felt like something to worry about though, a silence that was different from her just putting Carson off while she was busy. She hadn’t even texted him back, and that was unusual. “Well um ... her and her boyfriend broke up, I know that. Jasper Lucas, he was one of the ... people, stuck over there. And she told me she’d found these scientists to help her control her portals, people her dad used to work with? She mentioned Neil, that he was wrong about them ... I dunno man, I didn’t question it at the time because she seemed so happy about it and said they were helping her, she can access different places than the fog world now and it doesn’t hurt her anymore ... I’m just worried something happened to her, doing all this.” Carson stopped for a breath -- his words had gotten faster and more intense the more he spoke, and he deeply regretted not asking more questions about these scientists helping Jules. “All that shit fucks my head up,” he muttered, rubbing at one eye with the heel of his hand. “But what if she’s locked away somewhere and can’t reach out? I couldn’t reach you guys when I was gone, you know?”
“Fuck,” Nic muttered under his breath, suddenly feeling like someone had pulled the rug out from under him. He recalled Jules having a possible connection to AIR, but he hadn’t worried about it. It had sounded like that path had died with her father. But sometime between then and now, someone had found her. After all that he’d heard from Vex and Shane and the others, it was hard not to assume the worst. “I didn’t realize she’d gotten involved with AIR,” he said, running his hand through his hair. “The scientists, they used to kidnap kids and experiment on them before the place caught fire. There’s no record of what they were doing, but I know some of the kids that survived. Enough of them to know the public had no idea what they were doing back then. Maybe they’ve changed and I’m blowing things out of proportion, but I’d feel a hell of a lot better if we could find her.” He was pacing now, trying to think of the best way to do a locator spell. He could always swing by her house, like he’d said, but if she wasn’t there, he might need someone to help him. “You said she was dating Jasper Lucas?”
AIR? Had Jules called it that? Carson couldn’t remember now, but he was not reassured by Nic’s tone. The word ‘kidnap’ was particularly worrisome. What if Jules had started to question things and they’d taken her somewhere? It was hard not to want to just get in the car and speed back to Point Pleasant, but Carson knew that would be ridiculous. He didn’t even know what was going on, much less what to do about it. “Yeah, well, she was, they broke up right before I left town,” he said. “And she hasn’t said anything about them getting back together. But ... shit, man, she thinks -- I mean, it sounded like they’ve been telling her it was all just some big misunderstanding, they were helping those kids ...” Carson didn’t even need to be told how naive that sounded. “Can you check, Nic? And lemme know? I’ve just got this bad feeling, and all that ... doesn’t sound good.”
“There’s a chance this is a different group, or that they’re practicing within the law this time around. And maybe they are really helping her. All I know is that, if it’s the same group that her father worked for, they’re lying to her about the past. Which means they could be lying to her now, too.” Nic suspected they would tell Jules anything she wanted to hear, so long as she gave them access to her powers willingly. It was great that she was getting it under control, since it clearly pained her to do it before, but at what cost? He really hoped he was making something out of nothing and that she’d just dropped her phone in the bathtub and found herself a new boyfriend. Those two things combined could easily distract a teenager, but he’d feel better if he could see her in person. “I’ll check. I’ll go by her house tonight and if she doesn’t answer I’ll track her down tomorrow.”
Not every teenage girl was easy to lie to, but Jules seemed to have lived a fairly sheltered life, and these people had a connection to a very sensitive, emotional part of Jules’s life. Now he was very worried she was being manipulated. She had an incredible power, and Carson could only imagine the damage it could do, directed by the wrong hands. “Yeah, yeah that sounds good,” he said, running his free hand through his hair. Carson still had the restless urge to drive there himself, but this made much more sense, this was way more reasonable. That was what he was telling himself, anyway. “And you’ll let me know? Because I can drive up -- I’ll come back if there’s trouble. Just let me know, whatever you find.” Carson knew Nic would do that anyway, so he didn’t need to keep saying it, but he felt compelled.
“I’ll call you as soon as I know anything,” Nic promised. They could always speak through their mental link, but he still felt better about a phone conversation. It felt more real, plus he was far more confident that no one else was listening in. “Don’t jump in the car just yet. I… There’s always a chance I’m overreacting. In fact, I really hope that’s the case. I’d hate for you to make the drive for nothing.” He realized he may have prematurely turned the situation into a crisis in both their minds and the only thing that would make them feel better was seeing Jules. Nic could do that without Carson there. She should be easy enough to find, but if he couldn’t do it himself, he’d find someone that could. “We’ll talk tomorrow. Hopefully it’s nothing.”
Even if Jules was actually okay, it didn’t feel like an overreaction to worry about her, but maybe Carson was overreacting too. In any case, he was glad to have at least one person there who he trusted and knew wouldn’t scare Jules. Carson couldn’t even imagine trying to send Vex to her house. “Yeah, hopefully,” he muttered, then cleared his throat. “Sounds good though. Thanks Nic, I really appreciate it. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.” He really wanted to tell Nic to call him back later that night, no matter what he found, but Carson would make himself be patient. He would try, anyway. It was all he could do from there anyway -- wait and hope for the best.