Razputin had woken up in a groggy haze, with the feeling that last night had been something heavy, but unsure what had happened yet.
Someone had wrapped him up in a blanket and placed him on a couch. Before he could really observe where he was, a few memories of what happened last night began to trickle into his head. He groaned, closing his eyes and shoving his head into the pillow. Whatever was about to happen, he didn't want to deal with it right now.
Unwelcome memories pushed their way in as he refused to acknowledge reality, reviewing the previous night in a series of fuzzy flashbacks. He was running, quickly, out of breath, through the woods. He reached a small river at some point, but didn't see the slope of rocks just before it. The ground disappeared beneath him, only to be found again as he plunged into the rough stone. Trying to shield himself with his arms didn't work, neither with his legs. He lay at the bank of the river, content to rest, but knowing that despite the blood soaking into his shirt and pants, he needed to run. He just hasn't remembered why yet.
He forced himself up. He needed to get across the water, to put something between him and who he was running from. The rocks at least came in handy, there's something to help him across the water. He was about halfway across, he could make it.
"Razputin!"
His dad stood on top of the slope of stones, glaring with all the anger he could possibly direct at one person.
Raz tells himself that everything would be better if he just listened, if he came home now the punishment would be far less worse than if he continued. His dad would apologize for being 'too hard on his son', and then everything would be alright and his father would still love him.
But something keeps telling him this isn't right, it shouldn't be like this. He checked where his foot was, then where the next stone was, and took a step. Dad yelled again, making him wince and struggle as he took the next step. His dad forgets yelling and starts to climb down the slope, quickening Raz's pace to the point where he panicked and slipped. Half of his body is in the water as he held onto a rock for dear life, knowing he can't hold for long.
But Dad will catch him, surely, and he'll make sure to put this whole mess behind him and say he was in a bad mood, he wasn't thinking straight, he'd take the blame.
Dad reaches the river and suddenly stops, glaring down at Raz as he tries to hold on.
He doesn't help him. Just glares and lets Raz know what he's done.
He is slipping and his father is doing nothing but making him think about his actions.
Raz woke up again with a start, breathing heavily as he realized he had dozed off into his memories. Reality sounded like a much better option now. He stared hard into the folds of the blanket around him, noticing a tag. Maybe he could drown out memories with instruction on how to wash a blanket. Too bad the instructions had been obscured by a worn sticker.
Property of Thorney Towers Home for the Disturbed
Thorney Towers? He knew that name. Where the inmates of what was left of Shaky Claim used to be, trapped on an island in Lake Oblongata. If this blanket was here, that had to mean someone associated with such was nearby, right?
Of course! He had stayed in touch with most of the inmates. Boyd, Gloria, Fred, and Edgar, he knew them all. They had stayed at Whispering Rock while adjusting to the modern world (though mostly, for not having anywhere else to be). He'd become good friends with them, promising to visit their new suburban home when they had settled.
Was this it? It certainly seemed like a suburban house to him- or rather, not a caravan. That might as well be suburban.
Raz blankly stared at the room around him. He realized he had never actually been inside their house, being too busy with camp and Psychonauts missions to visit. Of course, the circumstances of this "visit" could be a little better, but it was nice to finally see the inside for once.
He wasn't sure what it felt like to live in a run-of-the-mill suburban home, but from what he had seen during his time in Boyd's mind, it matched the feeling of the numerous houses he had entered in his search for the Milkman (though this time, without cameras and eyes watching his every movement.) He could see why Boyd had been so excited when Gloria had vouched for a quiet, ordinary home to counter her previous exotic life. The house felt like a memory, residue from exploring so much of Boyd's mind.
He stared at a coffee table before him. A few magazines were strewn on it, a cup of half drunk coffee soaking a circular stain into one. He noticed a rather worn looking magazine- wrinkled, with a small tear on the cover- depicting him and the rest of the Psychonauts all posing together. But it couldn't be old, this had to be a recent issue, since he was only publicly announced as a Psychonaut a few weeks back. Had they been keeping up with news about him? He pondered the thought for a moment, that these people who he had only been with for a small moment, cared that much about him. It stuck with him as he observed the rest of the room.
An old-looking TV was propped up on a small shelf, worn books placed inside. A window on the wall next to it filtered pale sunlight in through its blinds. A stairway led into the room, continuing on to the rest of the house.
He began to realize just about everything in this house seemed old- the coffee table had chips of wood missing, the couch he was on had a tear, even the books on the TV's shelf had wrinkled pages that had been rifled through so many times. What confused him was that the house wasnew. The fuzzy carpet beneath him had a minimal amount of lint, the walls mismatched the shelves with their fresh paint, it didn't match up.
Then he realized. Everything except the house itself was from the asylum. He had seen the couch he was on while dodging confusion rats, the same books strewn on the floor of the numerous patient rooms. Had this all been taken from there? Had the inmates taken everything that wasn't consumed by the fire?
He wondered for a moment what it would be like to leave everything behind, only taking a few items to attest to your past life. Noticing his backpack sitting by the coffee table, he considered the fact that he did know- he had just gone through it.
What was he going to do now? He couldn't possibly expect these guys to adopt him on the spot. He couldn't return to his dad- he'd certainly be dead if he ever showed his face around him again. Could the Psychonauts take him in?Wouldthey take him in? What would he do if they didn't? What if he never-
A sudden snore erupted from the chair next to him, breaking the string of panic-inducing thoughts. Edgar had been sleeping there the whole time, slowly waking up from the light in the room. He seemed confused at the fact that he had been sleeping in a chair at first, then jolted forward in his seat, frantically looking about. He finally noticed Raz on the couch, then sighed in relief, leaning back once more.
"Oh, Razputin!" Edgar had realized Raz was awake and staring at him, "I didn't realize you were awake. Are you alright? I found you so bruised, I didn't know if you would…" He gave a bit of a nervous chuckle. "Well, it's good that you're safe now. Heh, you should have seen Fred. I didn't know he could swear like that!"
"Are you alright?" He asked again, "How are you feeling?" He leaned forward with a concerned look on his face, Raz realizing he had faint circles under his eyes.
Howwashe feeling? He took a moment and moved his legs a bit, only to have a searing pain shoot through them. He threw the blanket off to look for the source of pain, to find his clothes torn and covered with a concerning amount of blood, bandages doing their best to keep the rest of him together.
While he mentally started to panic, his body felt too tired to bother with any of that. A creeping sense of cold started to crawl on him, forcing him to weakly wrap himself in the blanket and try to regain the warmth he had thrown away earlier. Why was the house so cold? He was shivering, the blanket adding only a minimal amount of heat to soothe his shaking legs.
"Bad," was the only thing he could muster out, as he curled up and hoped the aching feeling would ebb away. Edgar reached a hand over, pushing it to Raz's forehead and keeping it there for a moment. Was he sick? That would explain the sudden onslaught of shivering.
Edgar's hands seemed soft for a guy who looked like he could wrestle a tree in half with one arm behind his back. He soaked in the strangely fatherly touch, almost missing it when Edgar pulled away.
"Ah, give me a moment," He hurried downstairs, leaving Raz back with his thoughts for a moment. Was Edgar going to take care of him? It's not like he could stay here for long, Dad would be searching for him, and caring for someone else with no forewarning had to be a huge bother. He felt useless, like someone just leeching off the general kindness of someone else.
Before he could hate himself too much Edgar had returned, a bowl of soup in hand. He came over, carefully handing it to Raz once he had sat up (this time carefully keeping the blanket around him) with a "Careful, it's hot." He sat back in his chair once again, more relaxed now that he knew Raz wasn't dead.
Of course, there was still the obvious question that needed to be asked, and Raz was dreading it. "So…" There was no real way for Edgar to ask it casually, "What happened, exactly? Wounds like that don't come from circus acts, as I recall."
Raz, now suddenly having the inability to say anything, proceeded to stare a frustrated hole into his soup. It's not like he could casually tell him he had ran away from his dad, earning his hate along with the loss of his home. He instead substituted with "Fell off a cliff. Into a river."
"Ah, yes, that's where I found you." Raz could practically feel the fact that Edgar knew there was more to the story, knowing he'd have to elaborate on it soon.
Mostly because tears were starting to prick at his eyes as he thought about his situation. Edgar seemed to understand, letting him take his time in order to explain.
"Dad. I was running. From Dad." He had to choke it out, knowing he wanted to tell Edgar, but not wanting to say too much.
Edgar paused for a moment, taking this in. Nobody really knew what his dad was like, most hearing they'd made up over the whole mind entanglement situation with Coach Oleander.
"You don't want to go back, do you?" Edgar asked. Raz didn't answer, not wanting to be bothersome but not trying to say he wanted to go back.
Edgar, surprisingly, gave a small grin. "Well, if he ever comes around here," he flexed his arms, "he has to get pastthese." He gave an air of silly arrogance.
Raz, on the other hand, was wrestling with the idea that there were people who would gladly defend him from his dad. Was Edgar just pitying him? He couldn't imagine himself living away from his dad, without the constant cycle of disagreements and apologies.
He couldn't take it. The worn magazines about him, Edgar taking care of him, it felt like too much. They genuinely cared about him, enough to worry about him while he was on some mission, enough to be ready to defend him when his dad would inevitably go looking for him. He felt some kind of anger- he didn't knowwhy-but he felt taken aback by this sudden kindness.
Edgar had noticed the sudden glare directed at him, now wondering what was wrong. "Raz, did I say something?" More concern for him. "Was it the-"
"Why do youcareso much?"
That came out much stronger than he meant, Raz now avoiding eye contact and staring headlong into his soup. Edgar was still for a moment- anger wasn't usually the response to this kind of situation. Tears began to roll down Raz's cheeks, surprising both of them as Raz hoped the tension he created would break soon.
Edgar sighed, wrestling with the right response. Judging by the fact that tears were beginning to drop into the soup, he should start soon. He breathed in, as if preparing for a speech.
"Thorney Towers, along with us, was left behind. The town around us disappeared, the people, the doctors, the orderlies… They abandoned us." There were numerous pauses as he grasped for the right words. "We were left there foryears, Razputin. It didn't take long for us to lose hope about anyone coming back for us."
He stalled with silence for a moment, now getting to the hard part.
"You came. And you helped every one of us. We never asked, we never gave you anything… but you helped us all move on. So, I think I should be asking you-"
He wiped a few tears from Raz's face before they threatened to flood his soup, the young psychic shaking as he struggled not to sob.
"Why doyou care so much?"
Raz began to realize this was a genuine question and not reusing his sentence as a comeback, and now scrambled for an explanation that wasn't a bunch of half-sobbed sentences thrown together.
"You were- I was-" he failed, choking on his words and letting a sob escape.
"Deep breaths," Edgar reminded him, giving him time.
Raz took a moment to compose himself, or at least enough composure to not cry too much when he spoke.
"I was looking for Lili," he was only stalling, that wasn't the answer. "But-" he made sure Edgar knew he wasn't finished, "...When I went into your minds, and saw your memories, I couldn't just-" his voice wavered, "leaveyou there! I wanted to help!"
Edgar nodded. "And so do we. We want tohelp you, Razputin. Just like you did for us."
Edgar was staring at the magazines in front of him, remembering the way the rest of the inmates has flipped through them, hoping to find tidbits on Raz or the nature of his missions, learning about the Psychonauts themselves.
"You really did help us." He was quieter. These words were important. "We wouldn't be here if it wasn't for you. You changed our very lives when you just cared enough."
Raz was crying again, though it didn't matter- Edgar was doing the same, just hiding it better. He turned back to Raz, leaning over to once again wipe away his tears, but this time leaving his hand to ruffle his hair. Raz lay down (Edgar taking the practically untouched soup before it spilled), numerous injuries and a fever being the only thing to stop him from hugging Edgar now.
He took in the comforting touch once again- this wasn't anything like his dad. There wasn't any hidden threat behind it, no sudden tension, no dreadful feeling that this was going to be the same hand to punish him. It was warm, soft- even with the knowledge that Edgar could quite possibly punch a door in half, he knew this wouldn't hurt him.
He eventually pulled his hand away, though Raz didn't miss it this time- it would come back another time. Edgar stretched, having been leaning over from his chair for so long.
"I should probably inform the others, they're just as worried," He stood up, stretching again- falling asleep in a chair was obviously not kind on the joints. He headed out of the room, stopping at the doorway.
"I'm going downstairs, you good?"
Raz shuffled a bit in the blanket, making himself comfortable.
"I'm good."
A/N: Changed this to complete. I feel like this leaves a bit more of an open ending, especially with Psychonauts 2 coming out next year. I really hope Augustus' past interaction with Raz is explored in the sequel, it feels like something was there but it just wasn't fully explored.