Chapter 114: Chapter 114
Misha’s talons clicked a quick rhythm as he bounded up the steps, a custom-made bag looped around his neck. Bran had made it two weeks ago for him and it, after a few alterations, worked perfectly as a shopping bag for fresh veg and other produce, making the loong’s daily trips down to the market far easier given that Bran had given up going with him. Life seemed to follow wherever Misha went and the local’s crops grew quickly, even in winter, so they were more than happy to give them a few bits of this and that as thanks.
Misha reached the top of the stairs leading up to the observatory then took his customary route up the outside of the building, bounding from the bits of wall that jutted out to provide housing for air-conditioning units and other devices, and paused a moment on the roof before continuing on.
Bran had given up going anywhere. He woke late and slept late and tended to sit in a sort of daze each day.
At first Misha had thought it was just exhaustion - he had been working on pure adrenaline for ages and ages since getting captured by Malcolm - but after a while he realised it wasn’t so simple.
It hadn’t been obvious at first, perhaps because Yidi and Zhan had still been around and Bran had still had some human contact, but some serious business that no one had explained to Misha (or Bran for that matter) had drawn them to the mainland leaving the observatory in Bran’s hands. Things had spiraled from there.
Then he stopped eating.
Well, not totally not eating, he still sometimes ate something at night, but the vast majority of the time, he sat on the patio, back against the external wall, and stared at the trees and the sea beyond them.
Misha worried but there wasn’t anything he could do other than try nudging uncooked foods at him (the consequence of not having thumbs). He couldn’t speak and so couldn’t ask Bran what was wrong - did he want to eat something different? Did he want to go somewhere else? Was there anything he could do for him?
He couldn’t ask anyone else for help either for the same reason and he found himself getting more and more annoyed that no one came to visit since, if they did, then at least someone would know that something was wrong with Bran.
Or perhaps that was the problem.
Each day as Bran sat or walked aimlessly, Misha would accompany him, sometimes close by or sometimes at a distance (he was trying to test to see if it made a difference), and that meant he also had time on his hands and he began to suspect the source of this lethargy.
Not the loss of a person, per se, but the loss of who he had been.
Bran, before all this had happened, before he’d even met Misha, had a job and a purpose and, while it wasn’t easy, Misha could tell that he found satisfaction from it, at least from the little he’d seen. There were things he could do, things that lots of other people couldn’t and when Misha recalled those photos on Bran’s old phone and imagined what it might have been like growing up in this place as an outsider that didn’t speak the language... that sense of place that a role could provide grew in importance.
No magic, no spells, no gathering up luck and making a wishing box for people to use for their woes.
That was bad enough, the kind of thing older adults griped about when struggling with mid-life crises, but it went further than that.
Misha had gotten the sense from the short time he’d spent at Aunt Yeung’s Cloud Flame Manor that far from being an unknown side character in Whale Toes, Bran had had a significant standing. He guessed it had initially been because of Aunt Yeung taking him under her wing (and the oh so important seal in him) but the guy was smart and would have made headway in that area, earning respect from those around him.
And now that was gone too.
No one asked Bran what he thought, no one asked if he had any insights into the current situation, no one paid him any attention. After those flurry of meetings early on where he’d explained over and over what he’d seen and heard, he’d been sidelined, for lack of a better word.
Healthwise, Bran hadn’t shown any negative symptoms (vampirism or fainting and all that) but he’d lost everything else.
Well, not everything. He still had Misha, but in his current state, what good was he as a companion anyway?
These worries had circled around and round in the poor loong’s head for ages until he reached a kind of peace about the situation.
He carefully monitored Bran’s weight (it had gone down a little but only a little), and did what he could to get him to come for walks with him, and gathered what food he could get that he could that didn’t have to be cooked and patiently try to get him to eat.
He’d worried initially that things would just get worse and worse, but since then things seemed to have hit a kind of equilibrium and-
There were papers scattered on the patio outside their window, blowing in the wind. Misha stopped and looked them over. There were pencil scribbles on them, but nothing legible. He looked towards the window and saw a light inside.
Quickly, he crossed the expanse of concrete and wormed his way inside, making a concerned whine as he did.
But Bran was not at the desk.
The loong gave a high pitched trill, more to express himself than to call out, then trotted out the door and down the hall.
Ears at the ready, he’d just finished negotiating the stairs (going down was always so much more difficult than going up...) when he heard the rustle of paper. It was a very particular sound and he knew it to be Bran turning the page of a book.
The loong sighed in relief and oriented himself to the sound.
The lower level of the observatory, apart from the large areas containing Yidi’s equipment, was dedicated to his vast supply of paper-based records and other reference material and it was in the large, pleasantly musty room that Misha found Bran sitting by the single window, a book in his lap, and a notebook on a small folding table he must have brought from the kitchen.
Misha stopped in the doorway and drank in the scene.
He was better. Not totally okay, Misha could still see the lethargy in his body, but Bran had definitely hit some point or started some journey or something. There was something different.
Bran looked up and saw him and he reached out a hand to him. Misha immediately surged forward to meet that hand and press his body against Bran’s.
Bran chuckled and steadied himself against the wall. He set aside his pen and combed the hair on Misha’s head with his fingers.
Perhaps, Misha thought, he’d been wrong. That period of withdrawal he’d seen creep into Bran wasn’t the negative result of a malady but a necessary step in his life going forward - his chrysalis for his next transformation.
That thought made him happy and he made a clicking sound as he looked pointedly at the stack of notes on the table.
"I’m learning," said Bran. He picked up the book on his lap and turned it over, "Computer science."
Misha blinked with surprised and cocked his head to one side.
"Don’t look so shocked. Look," Bran set the heavy book on the ground beside the table then leafed under some papers to pulled out a black, rectangular object.
A smartphone. His smartphone. Official source is novel·fire·net
He pressed the lock key on the side and the screen lit up.
Misha looked between the phone and Bran.
"I don’t disrupt technology anymore, so I can finally learn this stuff," he said.
This sudden turn of events took Misha by surprise but he also found that it made perfect sense. Bran was a real bookworm after all a room full of books was his natural habitat.
"Right now," Bran went on, not knowing what was going on in Misha’s head, "no one on our side of the world has access to magic and that’s a big problem, but that doesn’t mean we can’t do anything." Bran picked up his notes and straightened them then set them to the side. "I remember you saying you wanted to study Computer Science before, so I started looking at Yidi’s books since I thought ’I have the time so I might as well try to understand what you like about it’. And, well," he smiled, "I’m starting to think you’re right about programming: it’s a lot like spellcraft, the magical feeling included when it works. See?"
He tapped at the phone then turned it to show Misha an app that the loong was more than familiar with.
Misha’s tail thumped excitedly on the floor making Bran chuckle. He set aside his phone. "It’s a really interesting project. I have lots of questions I want to ask Yidi once they come back..."
Bran’s voice trailed off as he got lost in his thoughts. Misha sat on the ground by him and rested his head on the table, gazing up at him.
"Do you know anything about ’opensource’ technology?" Bran asked suddenly.
Another blink of surprise of the loong, then a nod.
"Good. I think I have a bit of an idea and I’d like you to listen to it. Maybe you can indicate to me if I’m on the right track. If it’s good then..." Bran looked out the window, a finger tapping the desk to a silent song, "maybe we can fix all of this..."