Artificial Insecurities

Chapter 20

I awoke in Pixel's pocket. I just now noticed that Pixel doesn't really breathe, his chest doesn't move an inch. Anyways, the memories from last night flooded into my mind as I attempted to find the exit.

I found one of Pixel's massive hands instead of an exit and went the other way. While I was walking I heard something that sounded like John waking up. I finally found the exit and found Alex and John covered by, what looked to be, five blankets. John slowly opened his eyes and was pretty surprised that he was on top of Pixel.

"Whaaa, I remember being on the floor under Pixel's hand." John looked around drowsily. "Oh, hi Daniel." I walked over to him and helped him up.

"Morning John." I said. John immediately wanted off of Pixel and travels over to his other arm to get down.

I didn't want to wake him up so I went back to the pocket. I noticed John up in the treehouse through the window. I was almost at the pocket when Pixel started to wake up. I bolted into Pixel's vision. Pixel started mumbling nonsense.

"Hey, hey there bud. Calm down, Alex is still sleeping." I waved my hands trying to catch his attention.

"Daniel? Wait, oh gosh now I remember." He laid back down. "Morning." He said tiredly.

"Good morning too. Well Alex is still sleeping so stay down." I told him. "Anyways, looks like you had a good sleep." Pixel's hair was going in all sorts of directions.

"Eh, how'd you sleep?" He asked.

"Pretty good. John said he slept under your hand and he ended up here, did you move him?" I asked.

"Yeah, it looked uncomfortable on the floor so I moved him up here. Alex fell asleep on my shoulder so I set her there too." Pixel replied.

"Morning peeps!" Alan yelled from below us. "Fine morning so far. Say, is Alex still sleeping?" I crawled to the edge of Pixel's chest. Alan had his hands in his pockets walking up Pixel's arm.

"Yeah she's up here." I said as he made it up here.

"Nice! So how did you sleep, Daniel?" Alan said. He sat next to Alex on Pixel's chest.

"Pretty nice. So what's the plan today?" I asked.

"I don't think we have a plan yet." Pixel noted.

"Well I do! I'm going over to Benny's!" Alan yelled excitedly. He still did not grasp the size concept but still was really excited about this Benny guy.

"Who's Benny?" Pixel asked.

"A good friend of mine." Alan said.

"Is he human or a ghost?" I asked.

"Ghost, Benny and I were buds on the army." Alan replied. Alex shifted and Alan jumped back in fright. I watched him and laughed.

"I didn't know ghosts could get scared!" I blurted.

"That was, just, very sudden." Alan defended himself.

"Yeah." Pixel murmured. Alan stood up straighter.

"Well I for one have places to be." Alan announced. "As soon as Alex gets up though." He whispered to himself.

"Well Imma go get some food." I said. I climbed off Pixel and headed to the treehouse. Alan decided to walk along beside me..

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I hate being this size. It's fun for a little bit until it just becomes a pain for me and a weird giant person for everyone. I just don't really like it. Especially the fact that everyone just slept on me.

Daniel and Alan just left and now I'm left here with Alex sleeping. She was covered in blankets, only her head poked out. The sun was rising and it was starting to get in her face. Slowly , I put my hand in front of the sun to block it. I really want to sit up but Alex looked so comfortable. I just laid there, staring at the sky. I bet I sat there for about an hour, slowly drifting of to sleep.

I woke up suddenly to moving under my hand. Alex was sleeping right? I slowly sat up and turned my hand over. There was a small, soft clump of blanket in the middle of my palm. It moved and looked up at me, Alex looked up at me. She was shivering. She must have been really cold.

"Hey, Alex you good?" I asked.

"I- I just forgot how large you are." She said as soon as she found her voice.

"Yeah it happens." I smiled a bit. "Alan was waiting for you by the way. He's in the treehouse with the others." I spoke softly, Alex looked around.

"Do you mind if I stay with you?" Alex mumbled into the blanket. I was surprised she didn't want to be with the others. I widened my smile a bit.

"Sure you can stay." I replied. She smiled and burrowed deeper into the blanket.

"Thanks." She said. She sat upright, huddled in the blanket, and leaned back on my fingers. She took out her phone from her pocket and started typing.

"What ya writing there?" I asked.

"A little story I've been working on." She replied, looking up for a moment.

"Cool! If you don't mind me asking, what's it about?" I didn't want her to feel uncomfortable.

"Just, um, stuff. Some things here and there." With her free hand she did some exaggerated movement. I couldn't really see what it was. "So yeah it's mostly random things I think of piled into a current three page thing." She held her phone away from her and set it down, almost immediately picking it up again.

"Interesting..." I looked up at the sky. I was gonna say something else, then I forgot.

"Yeah..." She trailed off. Her train of thought ended. "Anyways, what do you do in your free time?"

"I just hang out with Daniel most of the time. If I'm not doing that then I'm exploring my surroundings." I said. I looked back down at Alex. She flinched a bit, then settled back into her blanket. "I don't do much but it's what I do." We sat in silence for a bit.

"Have you ever built something?" She asked.

"Like what?"

"Like a house or a, um, thing."

"I have a 3D printed house if that counts." I said hopefully if it was what she was looking for. She moved her hand in a circular motion, asking for more. I tilted my head.

"Really, that's it?" She answered. I nodded gently. "I would have suspected John would have done something with wood with you. He used to do it all the time."

"So he would carve things?" I asked.

"Kinda, he would carve, build, and do all these crazy projects. My dining room table he had built." I realised my eyes had widened. "Yeah, pretty surprising. He was a great woodworker."

"Sounds like it." I said.

"If you wouldn't mind, could you place me on the balcony?" I nodded and gently moved my hand over to the balcony.

"Could you go get the chip from Daniel?" I asked.

"Sure, be right back." She disappeared into the treehouse. I sat there and waited. I decided to lay flat on the ground after a minute or two. I watched as Daniel scurried around the treehouse. John came into view and passed something to Daniel, probably the chip, and Daniel came outside. He didn't notice me laying there so as soon as he saw me, he leaped sideways.

"Opps, sorry." I sat up and Daniel relaxed.

"My bad. Anyways, here's the chip." He set it down on the railing. I gave him a smile, and disappeared into the chip. He picked up the chip and set it on his shoulder. I appeared on his shoulder and gripped his shirt collar.

"I swear I'll never get used to this." Daniel whispered.