PART 2.1: DION IN THE DUMPS
"Gisu, Gisu, Gisu, Gisu-Gisu. Gisu, Gisu, Gisu, Gisu-Gisu; I luuu-uh-uv, you. Ohhh-oh!"
The day was bright and cloudless. Its sun cast long shadows from the feet of the two circus boys as they carried a pair of large crates across their family campground. The taller shadow glided over the ground at a swift yet steady pace. The shorter shade scurried behind it
“Dion, can we slow down for a second?” Raz huffed, trying to keep the box full of circus props in his arms from spilling over.
“There’s no time.” Dion said, not bothering to look back as he easily handled his much larger and heavier container. “We need to finish our chores AND Frazie’s since she’s no longer around.”
Raz tried to be happy with Dion’s answer. It had been the longest sentence the teen had spoken to him in days. Before this, he would just flatly tell Raz when it was meal time or when the caravan was moving out, or simply grunt in acknowledgement when Raz told him the same.
Had he not been psychic, the smaller acrobat would have attempted to just converse with the older boy to break this silence. There was no shortage of topics to choose from: Could a crocodile beat a shark? What was faster: a frisbee or a boomerang? And how had he pulled that Chariot card out of nowhere during the family’s last big game of Gruloky? Raz so missed their little talks. But the boy did have psychic powers, and so he saw what flared up whenever he was near Dion.
There was a tight, crimson sphere of anger surrounding Dion’s head. Though it was strong and dense enough that it masked his thoughts, it hadn’t leaked into his words or actions. Not yet at least.
It would’ve been safer to leave it alone, let it fade. But what if it didn’t? Or at least, what if it lingered? The curse proved that the deceased could still hold onto grudges for decades; why not the living?
And just beyond that ball was his older brother. Raz could reach him if he was careful. That shouldn’t be too hard. He could be suave and charismatic like the spies he read about in his Psychonaut comics. Some tact, misdirection, and charm, and he’d defuse this situation easy.
“When are you going to stop treating me like that’s my fault?” Raz blurted out.
“Isn’t it though?!”
The bubble burst.
----
“Dion, you blockhead.” Frazie fumed.
“It’s not all on him, Frazie.” Raz said. “You being gone was tough on all of us.”
“Well, if a memory of him being a jerk popped up, that must mean we’re getting closer to where he is. Joy.”
----
The pair proceeded through the inner ring of the crater by hopping from one pair of aquatic eyes to the next.
“…say, Pooter? Do you remember Touch n’ Toss?”
“Of course I do. I loved that game.”
“That was fun, right?”
“It was until you decided to stop playing with me.”
“Yeaaaaaaah, anyhoo, why don’t we have a match right now?”
“Didn’t you tell me not to use my telekinesis?”
“No, I told you not to cheese off the psychopath holding dad and Queepie hostage by throwing sporting equipment at his head. To tell you the truth, I was kind of impressed that you managed to almost do that. Ditto for you reaching out to get that guard’s helmet back during our first swim.”
“You saw that?”
“Sure did.”
“I wasn’t able to reach it though.”
“Just another reason to practice. I’ll go first.”
Touch n’ Toss is a very simple and mildly dangerous game that Frazie and Raz made involving telekinesis. The rules are as follows:
Lead player selects an object. It’s usually a rock that Frazie or Raz find lying on the ground but it can be pretty much anything. However, something with at least a bit of weight and heft is preferrable. A handkerchief or a feather wouldn’t work very well.
Lead and second player pick somewhere to stand five feet apart from each other. No more, no less.
Lead player grabs the object with telekinesis.
Lead player telekinetically tosses the object up into the air.
Second player must then telekinetically catch it, but only after the object has crested and is starting to fall.
From where the second player has caught the object, they must throw the object back up into the air. The rules for catching it are the same as rule #5.
The first player who fails to catch the object or is unable to exceed the height of the opposing player’s previous toss loses.
Moving from the chosen spot they are standing on will also count as a loss.
In matches with multiple rounds, the second player becomes the lead player, and so on.
Additionally, players can agree or disagree to allow verbal and/or visual taunts for distracting one another. However, physically or psychically striking the other player or directly interfering with tosses and catches is always prohibited.
Frazie selected a piece of lifeless coral the size of a footrest to start the game.
From the get-go, it wasn’t as exciting for her and Raz as the previous times they’d played it. Partly because they aren’t in their physical bodies, so the fear (and thrill!) of what they’d flung falling back onto their faces wasn’t there. And also, because throwing something upwards underwater and waiting for it to come back down is a much slower process than it is on dry land.
Frazie tried to spice the game up by Psi-Punching the coral upwards instead of grabbing and tossing it, and an elated Raz followed suit. But it was still a far more easygoing experience than either of them expected or would have liked.
They played a couple of rounds, idly chatting all the while before moving on.
They soon reached one of the great dark metal barricades Frazie had seen earlier that blocked off sections of the crater.
It was too big to look around or over, and too thick to see through for vessels beyond it, but there was a selection of levers and switches on a console built into its base.
“Frazie, look. These buttons and toggles look brand new. They probably open up the gate. But I don’t see any guards.”
“Even someone as nuts as Loboto probably didn’t see the point in putting any here. There’s a mile of saltwater above us and the Psilirium’s better than any attack dog unless you’ve either got gills or an ironclad cranium like yours. Speaking of which, why don’t you try getting this plate out of the way?”
“Telekinetically?”
“Duh. The fish we’re in might not have hands, but that doesn’t mean we still can’t use it to get a good grip.”
“You took the words right out of my mouth. Head. Thoughts. You know what I mean. Now we just have to decipher the proper combination of pulls, presses, and squeezes to pry this bad boy open. There could be dozens, maybe even hundreds of possible – oh, look. There’s a little cheat sheet nailed to the side of it.
“A sticky note sealed in a ziplock bag. I’ll give Loboto this much, that’s pretty cheap and effective waterproofing.”
Raz and Frazie shifted between sea creatures that were in front of the console and those that were closer to the note as they manipulated the controls.
“Circumventing enemy security systems by gathering and executing intel. Hehe. Just like the Psychonauts.”
“Raz, the answers were almost right in front of us. So don’t get too excited with your super spy fantasies.”
They quickly managed to get the barrier to fall away. The metallic grumble it made as it did so sounded almost thankful. As if, like his scaly henchmen, the door hadn’t been all that enthused about working for Loboto either.
“Nicely done, Pooter. Y’know, you’re doing so well, that you just might be ready to learn a whole new psychic power.”
“Really? Cool! Which one?”
“Pyrokinesis.”
“Pyrokinesis?”
“That’s what I said.”
“Not like Invisibility or Levitation?”
“Those wouldn’t be very useful where we are now.”
“And Pyrokinesis would be?”
“I dunno. Maybe.”
“So…you’re going to teach me Pyrokinesis…while we’re under the ocean?”
“Probably the safest place to learn it.”
“This is so lame.”
“It could be worse, Pooter.”
“How? You’re about to teach me how to make the water warmer. We got stoves for that.”
“Oh, for the love of-fine. You can have this one, but you better behave after you see it.”
“See wha-?” Suddenly, the sea had pulled back and there was a cute girl with long red ponytails in front of him. She held up a fingerless-gloved hand, and before Raz’s eyes, a spark of flame crackled and vanished across it.
----
“Think of fire.”
“No, really?”
“...And heat. Hot things. A boiling kettle. The summertime beach. The sun! ...Two suns! Think of the hottest thing you know,” Lili urged her on. “Feel the heat build within your mind, then expel it. Push it towards the hay!” Frazie squinted even harder, pushing her fingers outward... but while the targets remained unphased, Lili looked up to spot a little smoke rising from her head. “...Expel it, I said expel it!”
Too late.
Frazie’s concentration broke when she felt little licks of flame crackling along the far ends of her hair. “AH!” She batted at them, swung her head, anything to put it out.
She dropped and rolled, keeping the fire from spreading at the very least. Thankfully, her coach had come prep-.
----
“HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!” Raz cackled.
“I wasn’t hurt by the way.” Frazie clarified. “Thanks for asking.”
“Is that the real reason you stayed away from home?” Raz wheezed. “So you could wait for all your hair to grow back after you burned it off?”
“There was just some slight singeing at the edges. I didn’t lose any!”
Properly placated enough to learn what he thinks will be a pretty useless ability, Raz quickly takes to it.
Visually, underwater pyrokinesis is a bit lame. There’s some foggy haze and bubbles ascend faster. Raz could at least appreciate the heat it still created when it causes fish to scatter and when it caused a giant clam open up, revealing a humongous pearl that neither he nor Frazie can bring back with them what with their current lack of physical digits.
Raz continued to practice as they hopped from host to host.
“Okay so Wet Pyrokinesis isn’t as worthless as I thought it would be.”
“Told ‘ya.”
“But do you got any tips for putting a little more ‘oomph’ into my flames? Such as they are.”
“I guess there wouldn’t be much harm in sharing since you aren’t in any danger of spontaneously combusting down here. Sprinkling in a bit of intense emotion can help. But just a little. You don’t want to set the room on fire whenever you’re feeling passionate or angry. A pinch of rage ought to do it.”
“A pinch of rage. Sounds reasonably unreasonable. And I do have a lot to be frustrated by. The crash. Loboto. My dreams of becoming a Psychonaut being ultra unlikely now. And there was also…also…oof, am I really still mad about that?”
----
Raz often had trouble reading Dion’s mind.
It wasn’t that his head was naturally shielded from telepathy like their father’s.
Rather, every now and then, a thought would crop up in his older brother’s head, and then he’d voice it.
At first, Raz mistook this as a sign that Dion was very simple. Maybe even stupid.
But over the years, he came to realize that it was more like he didn’t think very loudly that often.
By the time he had a thought that was decipherable on the surface, it had already been thoroughly formulated and vetted deeper within his psyche.
What was there was what he would say: word-for-word.
In effect, Raz was about to be yelled at and insulted twice over.
Admit it! Dion accused.
“Admit it!” he actually yelled. His kid brother almost found it impressive that Dion was pointing at him with one hand and using his other to balance the box of weighty safety netting and stakes on his shoulder; and in such a way it wasn’t mussing up his hair; as if he was just going to carry on with his day after the shouting and belittling was over. “It was you and your stupid comic books that gave her the idea to ditch us. ‘True Psychic FAILS’ or whatever it is!”
What a silly mistake for Dion to make, Raz thought. ‘True Psychic Tales’ was practically alliterative. So easy to remember even if you weren’t a fan. He’d have to set the record straight so that he wouldn’t make such a silly mistake again.
“That’s not what they’re called.” Raz weakly retorted, trying to keep the grip on his own crate steady. If Dion wasn’t going to put his down, he wasn’t going to either.
“Sorry. ‘Drool Psycho Tales’. My bad.” Dion ran a hand down his face, which pinched the bridge of his nose on the way down. Usually a good sign for Raz or whoever he was arguing with as it meant he was about to back off and move along. “I bet they had maps to that summer camp, and that’s how she knew where to run off to.”
Despite how Dion had muttered that to himself with such brazen finality, Raz still flatly said, “No, they didn’t.”
Dion turned his back to Raz and started walking away, thinking ‘And why should I believe you.’ Except it wasn’t going to be a question.
“Because if my comics did have a map to Whispering Rock Psychic Summer Camp, I would’ve used it to ditch this rundown circus ages ago!”
CRASH!
Clubs, balls, and shiny plastic scimitars scattered across the field.
“Hey, we’re supposed to juggle these not throw them on the ground! Raz? Where are you going? Raz!”
--
“Pooter…”
“I don’t think our circus is THAT rundown. Keeping my powers a secret just made it feel lonely sometimes, is all. Besides, that was another memory! And it was pointing me over…there!”
--
Raz nudged their shared vision towards a set of broken train tracks curving above a smattering of small geothermal vents.
Stranded on one side of the tracks was an actual, Wild West locomotive engine. And on the other was a copious colony of shrimp swarming around something. There were so many crustaceans swirling about at such great speed, that it was impossible to see what they might have been concealing.
“Raz, are you sure Dion isn’t actually in that old train?”
“I wish. But that memory is pointing me in the general direction of all that shellfish.”
“Well, those visions haven’t failed us yet. Let’s try to find a way through these guys.”
The skittering, pointy cloud of chitin proved to be quite the obstacle.
Casting clairvoyance into it was as erratic as it was discombobulating as the shrimp were too densely packed in and swimming too swiftly for Frazie and Raz to psychically hopscotch deeper into it.
The sheer quantity also made direct pyrokinesis used against them ineffective as their numbers just diffused the heat. Telekinetically throwing rocks at the pack caused portions of them to temporarily scatter before they resumed their previous formation.
“What to do? What to do.” Raz pondered. “They just won’t stop or go away no matter what we try.”
“Maybe it’s mating season.” Frazie joked.
“Dion alone amongst couples? I never thought I’d see the day.” He mused, scanning the sea floor beneath. “Say. Maybe if I use this on…”
“Shame we don’t have some butter and lemon on hand.” His older sister noted. “We could’ve eaten our way i-.”
BOOM!
A shockwave pulsed from below, rattling the rails. The blast reached the shrimp, spooking the whole swarm into fleeing. If the siblings hadn’t been in a jellyfish and whatever passed for its eyes, their vessel might have scampered, too.
“Where-how-whuh-?” Frazie sputtered. The jellyfish had no ears, but its pink, bulbous body had still felt the water around it violently shudder.
“Yikes.” Raz gulped. “Maybe I was a little more angry with Dion than I thought.”
“YOU did that?!”
“K-kinda? I saw a couple of those undersea vents down there – the ones letting out the bubbles? – and I figured maybe I could sort of coax it into letting out an itty-bitty boom to scare the shrimp awaywithpyrokinesis.” He finished quickly.
“So you saw an underwater volcano-.”
“Technically, it wasn’t an actual volcano. More volcano-adjacent.”
“-and decided to try and DETONATE it?”
“Just a tad.”
“You could’ve blown up the entire Rhombus!”
“Good thing that didn’t happen, right? Aheheh.” He tried to giggle. It was strained and reedy. “Are…are you mad?”
Frazie didn’t answer right away.
Despite how far they were floating above the geothermal vents, there were suddenly an awful lot of bubbles tumbling into view. The surrounding sea grew hazy and wavered as if churned by phantom paddles. Fish gave the railways a wide berth, their eyes bulging out and their gills trembling. Raz himself felt like it was getting a little warmer in their shared headspace.
“No, Raz.” Frazie choked out an assurance. “I’m not angry. I’m just so SO so very glad that your clever and resourceful idea cleared a path, and that it didn’t result in a devastating chain eruption that would have engulfed this entire crater and everyone in it. So.VERY.GLAD.” those last three words came out in a fiery gurgle. “It could’ve been worse. Pyrokinesis can be as volatile as it is tempting to use once you learn how to do it.”
“And you’d know.” Raz perked up. “Since you taught it to me.”
“I sure DID.” Frazie tersely agreed. “Away from oxygen, dry wood, eyebrows, and yet somehow-!” The water began to calm. The heat tapered down. “Pooter, you meant well, and it turned out well. Let’s just leave it at that and get to Dion once we find a way into this…school bus? Aww, that’s grim.”
“Yikes. I hope the kids managed to get out before it started to sink.”
“There’s some light inside of it. And I think I can see Dion’s pompadour. Figures. The schmuck crash lands into the ocean and his hair still manages to stay perfect. There’s a whole gang of those fish goons in the other seats, and, whoah. Raz, check out the front of the bus.”
“Is that…Agent Milla Vodello in the driver seat?”
“It would explain why there’s so many guards here.”
“Ehh, Dion can be pretty dangerous when he’s put into a corner.”
“Usually, but let’s take a peek into his head to see how badly the Psilirium is affecting him before we place any bets on the guy.”
The siblings honed in on their eldest brother’s coif and fired their consciousnesses at the brain that was supposedly under it.
They braced for an inferno of furious worry akin to what they experienced in Donatella’s brain, but Dion’s headspace was rather calm. His vision was still framed with the telltale orange glow of Psilirium poisoning, and yet, it was quite peaceful if tinged with sorrow, shame, and an uncharacteristically glum disposition. He was tapping at a blank sheet of a small, spiral notepad with a pencil. A majority of the papers had already been tucked over the rings.
Raz was the first to try to make contact.
“Pssst. Dion? Can you hear me? Blink twice if you can.”
“Raz.” Frazie began. “Why are you whispering?”
“I’m not whispering, Frazie. I’m thinking quietly. Because if I’m too loud, then the guards might, oh. Oh, right,” he thought a little louder. “Hey, Dion. If you can and wanna talk, then just think about it. No need to say anything.”
“Raz? Frazie?” Dion blearily replied. “Is that you?”
“No, it’s your inner child and feminine side.” Frazie retorted. “Of course it’s us, Didi.”
“Huh. It’s good to hear your voices.” Frazie and Raz felt Dion’s lips try and fail to tug themselves into a smile. “I thought I was the only one who made it out of the crash. Did anyone else make it?”
“They survived, too, Dion.” Frazie answered more gently than she had intended. After seeing how Dion had treated Raz while she had been gone, she had planned to give him a dressing-down once she was in his brain. However, she couldn’t remember the last time he had heard her big brother sound so soft and small in his speech. “But we’re very far apart right now.”
“We actually woke up next to Nona. She’s watching over our physical bodies while we went looking for the rest of you with our Clairvoyance.” Raz explained. “We’re here to bust you out.”
“Oh. Thanks, Pooter.” Dion scribbled shapeless rings onto the corner of the notepad.
“Don’t you…” Frazie’s consciousness blinked as the word ‘kickflip’ popped in and out of Dion’s point of view. “Don’t you want to get out of here? I figured you’d have tried to escape on your own.”
“Totally. I’m surrounded by water and I’m cursed to perish in the stuff.” Dion shrugged. “But I’m kinda busy with something. Like, I’m usually alright at multi-tasking, but I can’t seem to think of doing anything else until I’m done with what I’m doing right now.”
Frazie sighed. Dion having a stronger resistance if not outright immunity to Psilirium had been a longshot, so she did her best not to sound too disappointed. “We’re just going to try and talk to Milla over there so she can help us rescue you, okay?”
“M’kay.” Dion nodded as he started to write a letter “G” on the lined paper on his lap.
The pair of psychics hesitated. The wild, desperate look in Agent Milla Vodello’s forest-green eyes as she stretches a hand towards the door well near the driver’s seat made them reluctant to enter them. Yet enter them they still did.
Milla was looking at the old, busted train that was rusting on the other side of the broken tracks. Which from her perspective, looked both brand new and throttling towards her at full speed on a pristine railroad. The siblings couldn’t really blame her. If they hadn’t known the real state of the locomotive, the hallucination would’ve frightened them, too.
“Milla? Milla, don’t freak out. Any more than you are, anyway. It’s me.”
Milla’s eyes blinked, though even in the brief moment of darkness, the Psilirium aura tainting her vision persisted. “I must be hearing things. That couldn’t have been Frazie. The real one anyway. She’s miles away back at base,” the spy pondered.
“I’m not there anymore, Milla.” Frazie revealed. “And it’s really me. I’m here in your head with my brother Raz.”
“Agent Vodello?” Raz squeaked. “Hi, um, we haven’t been formally introduced…until like a second ago, but we’ve met before though I was wearing a-what I’m trying to say is that this is a huge honor. I’m a big, big fan of yours.”
Milla’s thoughts twinkled with an airy snicker. “Now I know I’m imagining you Frazie. You told me your little brother is performing in Indonesia, on tour with the rest of your family.”
“Yeah, Raz.” Frazie jeered. “Why aren’t you in Indonesia?”
“Do we have to talk about this now?” Raz groaned. “There are more important things we should be doing.”
“I agree, Imaginary Frazie’s equally imaginary little brother. We do have more important things to do.” Milla said. “Saving these children from that oncoming train should be our top priority.”
“Children? Dion’s not that young.” Frazie shifted her joint clairvoyance to look back at the passengers seats, wondering if Milla was perhaps seeing her older brother as a kid half or even a third his actual age. What greeted her instead was the miraculous disappearance of the fish mutants who were guarding Milla. In their place were ten distraught schoolchildren, terrified teardrops running down their faces and sorrowful screams sounding from their throats. “That is wrong on so many levels.”
“Funnily enough, depending on when Loboto actually made these guys, they might actually be younger than me.” Raz mused. “Or even Queepie.”
“Pooter, pipe down.” Frazie commanded. “Milla, listen to me. These aren’t really kids. They’re mutant fish people Loboto put on this bus to keep you prisoner.”
“Loboto trapped these children here?!” Milla gasped. “That fiend!”
“Alright, Loboto has trapped some children in the Rhombus of Ruin, but these aren’t those kids.” Frazie clarified.
“I bet he sabotaged the bus, too.” Milla continued. “He might even be driving the train! Well, he’s not going to get them like he did the campers. I’m going to protect these orphans if it’s the last thing I do!”
“Milla these aren’t…you told me that you’d forgiven yoursel…uhhhh, say! Why don’t we turn on the bus’ radio?” Frazie suggested, scanning the dashboard for the telltale buttons and knobs.
“That would be nice, Frazie.” Milla said. “But I already tried tuning it to my favorite station to calm the children down with some funky beats. The radio has no power, and I’m too busy trying to halt this train with my telekinesis to try and fix it. It’s taking all my mental energy just to hold it back.”
“Then how about…?” Raz offered. “…I try singing you one of your favorite songs instead? I read about them in True Psychic Tales so I know which ones you like.”
“Pooter, hold on. Remember what happened when you tried that with me?” Frazie reminded.
“Yeah, but ska is really niche. Disco’s more evergreen and easier to sing. Especially mentally!”
“Pooter!”
“Bus Stop, Bus Stop! Are you Ready? For the Bus Stop?
Roll to the Front/Then Roll to the Back. Toot to the Front/And then Toot to the Back. Front-Back-Left-Right! Bus Stop, Bus Stop!”
Milla yelped. “I can’t lose focus. Stay focused, Camilla. That must have been some sort of sonic weapon. I’m on to you, Loboto!”
“Sonic weapon?” Raz faltered. “Wait! I know more songs. Like ‘Long Train Running’.”
“TRAIN!?” Milla shrieked.
“Raz!” Frazie yelled.
“Okay. Okay.” Raz stammered. “What if we got the train out of the way by (carefully) triggering another underwater ven-?”
“No.” Frazie refused.
“Yes!” Milla agreed. “Do it! Blow it up! BLOW IT UP! Save the kids, Auditory Hallucination Little Boy. Do whatever it takes!”
“Y’see?” Frazie pointed out. “Even if we got rid of the train, Milla would still think Loboto’s thugs are innocent schoolchildren. And Milla’s got a really big soft spot for kids. Perhaps too soft. Soft enough that she might not fight back if they tried to stop her from escaping.”
“But she’s also a camp counselor back at Whispering Rock. They gotta lay down the law in a firm (yet fun) way don’t they?” Raz asked.
“Let’s just say that if mom or dad had been the counselors instead, the spankings would’ve swirled like leaves in a hurricane.” Frazie explained.
“That bad, huh?”
“Most of the campers were good eggs, but a little more micromanaging and discipline would’ve done wonders for that place.” Frazie amended. “Let’s look around the bus. Maybe we’ll find a way to fix the radio, or maybe even a different way to break Milla’s trance.”
They searched the bus. Initially, it yielded very little information apart from how the fish mutants were both lightly armed – though a larger one did have a holstered shock mace - and very bored. But they discovered that a napping guard happened to have an item of interest.
“A working pocket radio?” Frazie noted. “And it’s got a signal. Nice. Now let’s try to find a station Milla might like.”
“105.7.”
“How do you-?”
“Motherlobe birthday party performances.” Raz answered flatly.
Frazie decided to file that away for later, and instead psi-poked the buttons to skip the readout to 105.7. Sure enough, a groovy tune started to waft through the speakers. “Right on the money. Now let’s just float this to Milla and-.” She tried telekinetically tugging the radio, but the snoozing guard refused to let go. “Quite a grip on this fish.”
“Here, let me help.” Raz poured his own mental energy into his sister’s efforts.
They pulled at the radio sideways, diagonally, up and down. They wiggled and jostled the device. All to no avail.
“That’s enough.” Frazie decided. “We can’t risk breaking our only chance at curing Milla.”
“Maybe Dion could snatch it for us.” Raz suggested. “He’s in the seat behind this guy, and he does have the nimblest fingers in the family.”
“Regular Dion might be able to do it, but Downer Dion back there doesn’t look like he could get out of his chair much less reach over it to steal a radio.” Frazie grumbled. “Although, what’ve we got to lose? Let’s give it a shot.”
They zipped back into Dion’s head. He was still obsessing over the blank piece of notepad paper.
“Dion, we’re back.” Frazie stated. “And we need your help.”
“My help? I thought you guys said you were here to rescue me.”
“That was back when we thought we could get Milla to help us bail you and the others out.” Frazie explained. “But she’s in trouble, too. So now we need you to help us help her help you by taking that radio from the seat in front of you and walking it to her.”
Dion leaned over the top of the chair to peer at his supposed target. Then he sat back down. “I’m not sure I can do that.”
“Come on, Dion. Of course you can. It’s just a little skullduggery.” Raz claimed. “And it’s the only way we can break Milla’s trance. We really need her help in saving Dad and Queepie. They’re in a really bad spot.”
“Then why are you asking for my help, Raz? I can’t do anything right. I’ve done nothing but fail today.” Dion’s pencil scratched a little x onto the notepad’s current page. “I couldn’t sneak Frazie out of the Motherlobe. I couldn’t get us to the backup escape route fast enough.” Another x was drawn next to the first. “And our rescue boat sank on my watch.” A hilly curve was drawn below and between the marks, forming a simple yet dismal face. “I could’ve sworn I double-checked it before Queepie and I headed out, but I guess it doesn’t matter. I failed at all that, and I’m failing at this too.” The pencil tapped at the page, invertedly adding a misshapen nose to the cross-eyed frown.
Frazie tsked. “What are you even writing in that thing?”
“Poetry.”
“Poetry?” Frazie couldn’t recall Dion ever writing anything longer than his own autograph. “About what?”
“Gzzu.” Dion mumbled.
“What?”
“Gisu. Gisu Nerumen.”
“Geezer-I mean-Gisu Nerumen?” Frazie echoed. “That skateboard geek in the Psychonaut Internship Program? That’s who you’re mooning over?”
“Yup.”
“I mean, if you were going for any of the interns, I thought one of those fire and ice sisters would be more your speed. Or Sam. Sam’s cool. But Gisu?” Frazie balked. “She’s short, and skinny, and smart-alecky, and vaguely amoral.”
“I get it. She can be a humongous pain in the butt for someone so small.” Dion nodded. “But she’s smart, and funny, and she can – could – keep up with me during parkour practice. I’m reading too much into it anyway. We just walked, and talked, and raced, and played some practical jokes, and I helped her with a few ‘mid-risk’ experiments with her gadgets. Pretty casual, but she still trusted me. Then I betrayed that trust and locked her in a closet.”
Frazie was modestly surprised that Dion was blaming himself and not her for that. “So you’re trying to write an apology letter? That’s what you meant by ‘poetry’?”
“Nah. I meant poetry-poetry. I’ve written a couple since I woke up on this bus. Here I’ll show you one.” Dion flipped back several dozen pages of the notepad. Not a single sheet was without text.
Poem #12
There was a dino skull on every t-shirt you wore, And I stayed silent as you told me about Jurassic lore, Because during my janitor act, I couldn’t tell you the fact, My real name’s an anagram for what you adore.
“Aha.” Frazie chuckled hollowly. “Number 12, huh? You weren’t kidding about the poetry.”
“y’see.” Dion started to explain. “If you swap the ‘n’ and ‘o’ in dino, you get ‘Dion’. I thought that was a freaky coincidence. And a cute one.”
“Mhmm. Freaky. Yeah.” Frazie shifted her consciousness in Dion’s skull until she found Raz’s. “Pooter, how serious were these two?”
“Uhh, I’m not really sure if they were a thing, or if they used to be a thing, or if they were about to be a thing, or if becoming a thing was even on the table for them. Dad said we shouldn’t pry.” Raz hemmed and hawed. “Though I will tell you that it got super intense for a moment. As in ‘Welcome to the Family’ intense.”
“Raz, please don’t tell Frazie about the crystal balls.” Dion begged.
“Hmmm.” Raz considered his big brother’s request. “Frazie, do you want to know about the crystal balls?”
“Maybe in another life, Raz. Perhaps two or three from this one.”
“Another life. Maybe in another life, Gisu and I could’ve…urgh, this sucks! I just can’t stop thinking about her and how I let her down.” Dion groused. “Raz, you gotta tell me: is this what it’s like for normal dudes? Regular guys with limited romantic options?”
Raz didn’t respond to his older brother. Instead, his thoughts turned to his big sister. “…hey, Frazie? Why don’t we try using Pyrokinesis on Dion’s notepad? It might cure him of his new poetry craze.”
“Oh my God, Pooter. Why couldn’t I have taught you something harmless?” Frazie moaned.
“You were thinking about burning it, too. Our mental tether told me so.”
“Then it also told you that I decided not to do that since there’s nothing stopping him from starting over if I did.” Frazie gathered the facts, studying each facet of this preposterous yet unexpectedly lyrical situation. How could she get Dion to stop feeling sorry for himself? “I just need a moment. Just give me a moment to come up with an answer.”
----
If Frazie and Raz head back to the chamber to ask Nona for advise, she’ll have this to say.
“Tell him to get over her. I never liked that Gisu punk. I swear, what is with this family and falling for girls with terrible attitudes? ‘Oh, Nona. She’s actually very nice, open, and sincere every other blue moon.’ Feh. Just date a girl who’s nice all the time. Is that so hard?”
“Nona, please.” Frazie implored.
“Dion feels guilty and the person who could forgive is in a whole different hemisphere. So make him feel less guilty about what he did. Reframe it, downplay it, do whatever you need to do. Or maybe help him finish his poems; just make sure they match his voice. That boy can be such a perfectionist. Ooo! And try remembering a few so you can show them to me later!”
----
“Dion, did you know that Truman Zanotto is also being held prisoner down here?”
“They got Mr. Zanotto, too?” Dion murmured. “That sucks, he was a really good boss.”
“Yes, they got him. It’s a pretty big deal. But rescuing him would be an even bigger deal.” Frazie claimed. “Saving the Grand Head of the Psychonauts would be sure to dazzle people. People like Gisu.”
Dion’s siblings could sense a crackle of intrigue skitter across their brother’s mind. “I guess. But it’s kind of unrelated to what went down between us.”
Frazie steeled herself so she wouldn’t laugh or heave at what she was going to say next. “Or is it?”
“Wuzzat?
“Maybe the breakout and stealing the jet and locking her up was all part of a bigger plan to save Truman Zanotto from a mad scientist and his army of mutant fish soldiers. You had to go rogue to do the right, heroic, and admirable thing.” Frazie mentally patted herself on the back for not letting her voice waver. “Even if my friend Lili wasn’t his daughter, I’m sure Truman would be willing to back up your story out of gratitude. Within reason. Probably.”
The Psilirium miasma cast in front of Dion’s eyes seemed to recede a little. “But lying’s what got me into this mess.”
“Ahahaha, Didi, why do you think Gisu would hate you for that?” Frazie chortled.
“Because I lied?”
“Dion, she’s an intern for the Psychonauts. A spy agency. They lie for a living. Just ask Raz.”
“Actually,” Raz interjected. “The Psychonauts discourage dishonesty and deceit. What they do is more like ethical semi-government sanctioned guile and subterfuge.”
“Y’see? He’s only a Psychonaut fanboy and he just lied to both of us with zero hesitation.” Frazie pointed out. “Imagine how much an official Psychonaut intern must lie; how proud they must be of their capacity to fib. I’m sure Gisu’s lied to you at least once. Like how she did with those crystal balls? I’m assuming.”
“She has and she did.”
“So at worst, you got even with her. At best, you impressed Gisu with your ability to pull a fast one on not only her but the entire Motherlobe. And helping us rescue Truman would make your chances with her even better.”
“Damn. That makes sense. That makes total sense.” Dion’s heart started to rumble, his left knee began to shake, the hand holding the pencil curled into a fist. “Phew. Alright. Alright, you two. We’re doing this!”
“Yes, Didi! Yes!” Frazie cheered.
“Go get ‘em, bro!” Raz hollered.
“Right after I’m done filling out these pages.” Dion finished, settling back into his chair albeit more upright than before. “It’d be a waste not to finish them”
“Excuse you?!”
“Not the poetry, Dion.” Raz whined. “You’ve written at least a dozen already.”
“And I’ve only got three more pages left to go, Pooter.” Dion’s pencil began jotting down some letters. “Or six pages if I double-side them.”
“Three pages.” Frazie instructed.
“Jeez. Alright. Three. But you won’t be waiting long; I’m feeling way more inspired now. I’ve got some strong outlines in mind and just need to plug in some gaps.” True to Dion’s word the skeleton of a poem had already begun to form with only a few blank lines standing in the way of its completion. “Should just take an hour or two.”
His sister was about to object until she saw why it would take that long. Similar to how it was with their mother’s, Dion’s viewpoint was now cluttered with dozens of options for what to put into those blank spaces.
“Eugh.” Raz retched. “It’s like a thesaurus upchucked in here.”
Dion was pulling all the stops now that he knew he only had three poems to go. It could take him hours to review all these alternatives and come to a decision. On his own, that is.
“Can we lend you a hand?” Frazie offered. “Psychically, I mean.”
And Dion, who usually coveted his own space and fiercely defended his opinions, answered with, “That’s cool of you to offer. Sure. I could use some new perspectives.” He tucked his pencil behind his ear and flipped old pages onto his new one. “But before you do, I’m going to have to show you some of the stuff I’ve written so far so you’ll know how to match my style.”
Raz coughed. “I think I’m gonna go back to the chamber to check on Nona.”
Frazie clamped down on their mental tether. “You’re not going ANYWHERE, Raspy. Roll it, Dion. Let’s see what you got.”
Poem #45
If your skateboard had wheels, Like me, you’d make them squeal.
Raz: I feel like I’ve been punched. Frazie: Please tell me they’re all this short. Dion: Some are. But I experimented here and there.
Poem #68
Buzzsaws whirling through the air tonight, I duck and weave before they can slice, All the while, You are on the sidelines taking notes on your device.
Buzzsaws coming from every side, I dive through a gap to stay alive, All the while, We share grins even when flames almost set me alight.
Buzzsaws, fly, Buzzsaws, fly Trying to sharpen our divide.
Raz: Schmaltzy and derivative. Our family can’t afford lawyers, Dion. Dion: It’s an homage. I can’t get sued over an homage. Frazie: Are the buzzsaws and explosions supposed to be metaphorical or-? Raz & Dion: No.
Poem #93
Curly dusk brown locks Scarf flapping in the bright wind A smile unequaled
Frazie: Was that a haiku? Raz: 5-7-5. Shoot, it was. Frazie: And it wasn’t that bad. Dion: I also tried writing a villanelle. Raz: What’s a villanelle? Dion: It’s six stanzas. Five of them have three lines and- Frazie: Got it. Please don’t show us that one.
Poem #112
I just did those tests and trials, And risked certain, science-borne dread, So you would scram for a while, And now I’m the one who left.
Frazie: I’m going to thump this girl the next time I see her. Dion: I exaggerated a bit for this one. I didn’t ever feel like I was in much danger. Plus, I signed a liability waiver. Frazie: Why would you sign something that would let her off the hook if you were maimed in one of her experiments? Were you at least paid for these. Dion: Gisu treated me out to frogurt a couple of times. Raz: Know your worth, dude. Know your worth!
Poem #135
The prank went awry, the whole gang scattered, The sheriff’s dogs began to bark, Your internship would’ve been shredded, If you were caught out here after dark.
We needed a getaway car, And after we found one beneath a bridge, I popped the panel and crossed some wires, And it turned on without a hitch.
You smiled and said, “Smooth moves, Joe. Now let’s go down that road and flee.” But I froze, then cringed, and told you. “Gisu, I’ve never driven one of these.”
You balked. “Joe, you just hot-wired it.” I shrugged. “It’s a pretty universal skill.” Then you mentioned how I’d ridden motorcycles, On narrow gaps and steep hills.
“Why did you learn so many motorbike tricks?” you asked. “And didn’t take one automobile lesson?” I explained. “Because motorcycles are cooler.” Really. Did I need any other reason?
The sirens wailed. You rolled your eyes. And to my scandalous dismay, A tiny menace climbed on my lap, And shoved the driver’s seat away.
You grabbed the wheel. Your curls were in my face, Which had turned fifty shades of red. “Work the pedals when I shout. I’ll shift gears and steer!” You said.
“Brake!” I braked. “Gas!” I gassed. “Less gas!” The car shot down the street, We fishtailed past three trash cans, And spooked a gang of geese.
She turned. I stomped. We survived. And managed to stay free. We ditched our ride and laughed, Before dozing off to sleep.
Frazie: When you say ‘sleep’, you mean like a nap, right? Right? Dion: Are you really asking me that now? With Raz around? Frazie: Dion. Dion: Yes, Frazie. Gisu and I chilled under a tree for an hour, then said goodbye, and went our separate ways. Raz: Also, you gotta change the names in this one to protect the guilty, man. This is like super incriminating as is.
More familiar (if regrettably so) with how Dion writes, Frazie and Raz assisted in completing his last three poems, which consisted of a basic rhyming work, an acrostic, and a Tanka of all things.
“Thanks guys. Whew. For some reason, my head feels a lot clearer now.” Dion pocketed his notepad.
Frazie was relieved to see that the Psilirium’s glow streaked across his eyes was weakening. “Good, now getting the radio might be a bit tricky.”
“You mean this one?” Dion asked, holding a small, rectangular plastic box to his face so his siblings behind it could see.
Raz gawked. “When did you-?”
“You guys were taking a while so I just swiped it so I wouldn’t have to do it later.”
“Okay, great. Very proactive. Now just get out of your chair, and slowly walk it over to Milla. After she hears the music, she’ll the handle the rest.”
“Sounds easy enough.” Dion agreed, his usual cocksure tone returning to his voice. He even took a moment to check his reflection in the bus window. It wouldn’t do to have his hair messy for such an important mission.
“You got something in your teeth.” Raz claimed.
“Nice try, Pooter.” Dion pulled back and started to walk down the aisle towards Milla, radio in hand. The fish guards eyed him warily for but a moment before they resumed fiddling with their tools or reading magazines. The young man had been dour and delirious for hours, so he probably still was. “By the way, what did you guys say about dad and Queepie being in trouble?”
“Oh yeah, um. They’re in a bad situation.” Raz explained. “Especially Queepie. The Psilirium’s made him really, really sick and these guys captured him and tied him up with a bunch of chains. And dad is-.”
Though they understood that the Psilirium was largely to blame for him being so fixated on his maybe-girlfriend, Frazie and Raz had still been somewhat disappointed that Dion had shown so little worry for the safety of their separated family. Those concerns about how much their brother loved them along with their carefully salvaged plans were laid to rest when Dion twisted his hip and swung his arm to smash the pocket radio on the head of the first mutant he passed, knocking the minion out instantly.
The tangerine inferno of the Psilirium was back. A single word, a solitary thought blared into his headspace.
[STRIKE]
To be continued…
----
Commentary:
Art by @pocheezy
Besides the beautiful linework, coloring, and character expressions, please give them a big hand for managing to cram in “Experiment Liability Waiver” in that small piece of paper!
Lili's cameo is lifted almost entirely from the original Later, Traitor. A little trip down memory blaze for my fellow fans.
Some more VR gimmicks as both a story means for Frazie to teach Raz new psychic techniques and to call back to the original game. Touch n’ Toss is the most obvious one, but Frazie and Raz help Dion finish his poems by dragging floating words and placing them into the blank spaces on the paper so he’ll write them down; if the budget is big enough, you could have Dion read out the finished poems no matter how ridiculous they may appear, adding a bit of replayability.
You may remember that Raz’s sorrow and resentment over not getting to go to Whispering Rock is also detailed quite emotionally in DiLithiumDragon’s own Later, Traitor AU tribute “Funicular and Fancy Free”. Though his awkwardness with his family is more modest there as it has the same time frame as the original Psychonauts 1-2 (a few days) rather than festering over a few weeks, Raz’s heartbreak in that story is nonetheless very poignant. You just want to give him a hug. Would recommend.
Speaking of which, I swear that I didn’t steal ‘True Psychic Fails’ from one of @soothedcerberus’ wonderful Psychonaut comics. But you should also read those anyway; very beautiful and cozy pages about the Aquatos and pals.
This chapter was a great opportunity to flesh out some of the story elements I kind of just listed in Dion’s Joe Nash bio in Depths of Denouement and the associated commentary. So I took it.
To that end, the poems. They’re why this section took a little longer to write than I thought. Originally, Dion would just show them to Frazie and Raz who would be repulsed by what they saw, leaving it up to the imagination.
I was just so charmed by Pocheezy’s art that I wanted to give it further tribute by actually making those poems real; bit of a challenge since they couldn’t be wholly incompetent to the point of being unreadable but they still had to be rather bad. The one about stealing the car took the most time to make as I really, really wanted to get the whole story down in rhyme and that was a struggle. I think that’s why I ran out of steam towards the end and couldn’t write the acrostic and tanka like I wanted.
There should be more mad scientist girl and lab assistant/test subject dude pairings in fiction and real life. I think Georgia Sivana/Billy Batson has some potential! It’s got big Catwoman/Batman energy!
Though the the deadly obstacle courses failed to endear Gisu to Nona. Sure, her family does dangerous stunts for a living…but they get paid for those!
