At Pilgrim Hospital, Chapter Two

There were two other people already in the waiting-room, and Presh had a feeling she knew them too. Putting her bag down on a coffee-table she greeted them both, hoping who exactly they were would come to her in a minute.

The girl was Presh’s age, and of the same kind of diminutive build. Her eyes and hair were silver-blue, and she was dressed just as Presh was in a beige tunic with boots to match. That wasn’t all that surprising though, since Robin likewise had always worn such clothes, and so indeed had Mini-Flash Juniper on the day of the tournament. There seemed to be a lot of it about. Meanwhile the other visitor was male, older and taller than the girls. He had long brown hair, and was wearing a trenchcoat and cowboy hat.

If that was the name for hats like those. It was one of those funny words, of which Presh was never quite sure. One that sounded as if it came from another language.

Speaking of which, the girl’s manner of speech turned out to be so odd that Presh in all honesty couldn’t always follow her. Nevertheless she did her best with the small talk, even while continuing to wrack her brains. One thing Presh couldn’t miss was the apparent grave concern that was written over every look this pair of visitors gave her. Well, Presh then said to herself, nothing else would have made sense. It was obvious they were here for the same reason she was. Funny though, that the longer their chit-chat wanly went on, the more it felt to Presh that these troubled expressions were not for Sonica, but for her.

It was however late, and Presh had enough on her mind. So with a few closing generalities on how terrible it was she pointed the duo in the direction of Sonica’s ward and departed, all the while wishing she could remember more about the various faces which had crossed her path this bad night.

Presh was round the corner and halfway to the stairs when she remembered her bag was still sitting on top of that stack of old magazines.

As she neared the waiting-room again, Presh heard her own name. Apparently the visitors had struck up a conversation about her the minute she was out of earshot.

At once Presh slipped into the payphone nook, from which she could listen unnoticed.

Bad manners? Fine. She’d been told so before. Only it seemed to Presh that talking about people behind their backs was bad manners too.

“She remembered us, and Sonica, at least on some level,” the cowboy was saying to the girl with silver-blue hair. “Comparatively speaking, that indicates a remarkable persistence of memory. I don’t know why that should be. Is Presh somehow different to other Mini-Flashes?”

“Beats me, kid,” the girl replied. “First time I pinned that little booper was right here in la-la land.”

“Not even Special Program powers were necessarily proof against the schism,” her companion went on. “Look at Juniper, for example. Your proximity to me was presumably a factor in your memories making it through intact. Just when I thought we’d established some sort of pattern, along comes a wildcard. It's the last thing we need.”

All this Presh tried her best to take in, though she understood no more than one word in five. Nevertheless, her head was awhirl. Juniper? Were these two secretly keeping tabs?

Splitsville. Why did the girl bring that word to mind? If it even was a word.

“Which moves us on, Splitsville,” continued the cowboy.

And that was weird, thought Presh. Not that any help was forthcoming as to what his name was. For all Presh’s recollections were worth, he might as well have never had one.

“I'll say,” returned Splitsville darkly. “Sonica may look squarer than the square, but same day we met, that chick and I dragged. She handles her rod like she’s at the Tablet and your narrator’s the one and only who ever shut her down. Some buddy-boy messes with a sister, he better be ready to back it up.”

“There’s more to it even than that,” the cowboy pointed out. “This incident, a violent attack on a lone girl…it doesn’t fit, Splitsville. There’s no precedent in Joe’s past experiences.”

Presh was struggling more than ever. Joe too?

Who were these people?

It was like that television programme Presh sometimes watched, not to mention the song. Things were getting strange alright, and she was starting to worry. Mulder went on:

“Yes, such things happened all the time in Pre-Nottingham Earth, but you and I both know Joe can hardly be accused of having lived there during the era on which this whole psychic scenario is based. And yes, we’ve seen there are threats native to the realm, but these derive from half-forgotten facets of Joe’s childhood psychology and manifest themselves in outlandish shapes such as Crushroom. That’s nothing like the crime we’re dealing with here. It belongs somewhere real. The galaxy we came from, for instance.”

Presh could only blink several times. The import of this was lost on her, but from the grim tone of Splitsville’s response, not so Scully.

“That notion gives me chills in a way I don’t feature, Rio Grande,” she declared. “You figure somebody else from outside has made with the big crossover?”

“How that can have happened, I don’t know,” concurred the cowboy heavily. “But it’s the only thing that makes sense.”

To some, maybe, thought Presh. By now she was thinking only of recovering her bag at the first available opportunity. She couldn’t keep up with the rest of it.

“That crazy jazz is starting to hit a beat I can relate to, not that it’s good news,” Splitsville went on. “Here’s what clues me in. You know I’m down with the heart-throb, and I get that what he was into in his own tunic-and-boots days was intended for private audiences only. But you’re hip to Boston High Road and its whole candy-box scene, booper-wise?”

“To the extent I’ve often felt I should apologise on Joe’s behalf, yes,” agreed the cowboy.

“All those far-out figures are strictly picture-show,” elaborated Splitsville. “Coincidences I dig, but if the girl currently convalescent happens to be part of our pack…”

Her companion finished for her, his voice slow indeed, and hushed.

“Then the intruder can tell the difference,” said he.

Somehow Presh didn’t like to breathe in the silence that ensued, as Splitsville and the cowboy shared a horrified gaze.

“And we just let her walk straight out the door,” he whispered. “On a dark night…!”

The duo clutched each other then ran full-tilt from the waiting-room, straight past where the startled Presh was hiding, and out through the hospital exit.

END OF CHAPTER TWO