White box

Emerald Alchemy

"Yes?" Marcus asked after having erased his previous expression, and since, rather than drawing back like her brother would, he looked at her straight on, Stephanie knew he wasn't Tim after all.

"Did something happen?" She asked. He was probably trying to be considerate, but she did not want this consideration.

Marcus's smile faded, but he did not reply, thinking. He seemed unwilling to say.

"Is Bill fine?" she asked. They wouldn't have gotten into a fight, right?

"He was fine when we parted," Marcus replied, then added, like giving up: "I'm just getting scared about this body influencing my mind too much. I feel like Timoty's memories are merging into me and like I don't have any control of myself at times," as he said that his complexion cleared up a bit, like the act of saying it out loud already solved something within him.

He seemed to be thinking it over, and Stephanie too needed a little bit of time to let out a relieved breath. So he was as unsettled about it as she was, and he had confirmed what she felt about it. But - it would be wrong to say that a part of her had not intuitively felt that he was, while not the same as Timothy from before, also a sort of Timothy.

A part of Timothy had died and, replaced by an alien prince, but most of him had remained intact. If this astral body part contained personality and memory, then it looked like those two had also remained to some level. And that meant more than half of Timothy had survived.

Rather than death, it looked like Tim had suffered in some accident and lost a part of his brain, but the rest was still there, which was sad, of course, but it was not death by any means. So, no matter how she looked at it, Marcus Revo Turoleo was her brother; it was the same as Tim developing a split personality and Marcus now being the 'main' one.

The thing he was troubled by was so very human that it was funny - "You know, Marcus, humans too consider that to be a problem," Stephanie said with a smile. "So, we have ways to tackle it."

Marcus showed surprise. A big one at that revealing that her foolish brother had not known a thing about it, huh? But it would be a lie to say Stephanie had not noticed that Timothy had been an idiot about everything other than stuff related to clocks, so - as expected.

"Meditation is the most popular one," Stephanie said. "But, I take long walks if I need to clear my mind and think."

And saying that set Timothy to think and Stephanie could see his face growing calm, understanding, relieved, and also resolved. It was nice to have a brother who listened to her advice and shared his worries - had the original Timothy been like that; then, things would have never turned out the way they had.

"Y'know, it is common sense to rely on your family and share your concerns if something troubles you, two minds are better than one," Stephanie added.

Marcus smiled. "It sounds like you've adopted me."

"I have," Stephanie nodded.

Marcus let out a warm, albeit a little bit troubled smile. "Then I'll let myself be adopted," he said.

Stephanie felt warm inside as they went upstairs, and after exchanging goodnight, they went to their rooms. As usual, Stephanie did some piano and singing practice before bed. Her room was soundproofed, so that was fine to do, then she slept and then a new day started.

Again it was a game of avoiding to cross eyes with anything strange to school and the same game coming back, but a man with pastel green hair caught her eyes as he walked down this yellow brick road, and soon another person did, this one a more regular seeming one.