(Disclaimer: OMG, there's swearing in this chapter. Not a lot, but the "f" word is used, so if you don't already know what the "f" word is, maybe you should leave now and go back to watching Teletubbies.)
-Chapter 2-
Milla Vodello and Sasha Nein were the original dynamic duo. She was happy, social, emotional, caring, and bubbly. He was gloomy, introverted, logical, sarcastic, and very serious. She was outgoing and approachable. He was quiet and yet somehow threatening. Together they were the best agents in the world, and somehow, they had managed to reconcile their differences and become best friends—only friends. Milla loved him, and she knew, deep down, he loved her back. After all, Sasha hated germs, sunshine, and children, and he probably never would have agreed to come work at Whispering Rock if he didn't care about her.
He had set up a lab underground in the first year, and every summer since then, he would hole himself up there, usually working himself to exhaustion. His current pet project was the Brain Tumbler—a machine with which any psychic could, potentially, connect themselves to any other mind. It made projection easy. So easy, sometimes the subject didn't even know their brain was being picked at.
Milla had made the mistake of picking at Sasha's. He had always been frustratingly closed up. She had known him fifteen years, and she still didn't know anything at all about his home, his family, his life. Attempts to do so usually resulted in an abrupt change of topic. The Brain Tumbler had just been too tempting. And so she'd decided to take a quick peek—one which threw her entire understanding of Sasha completely askew.
Milla had astrally projected herself into 1,353 minds during her career as a Psychonaut. She had never seen one as… empty… as Sasha's. Empty and gray. It was a giant, condensed cube floating in complete and utter emptiness—no explanation for his introversion or his unwillingness to give a relationship a try. (Milla had been struggling for years to jump-start a relationship, but Sasha only met her with cold, platonic responses.)
With a sigh, Milla realized she was going to have to confront him face-to-face.
And so, for the second time that week, she found herself trudging across Whispering Rock, heels getting muddier with each step. She hadn't talked to Sasha yet. How could she? How could she explain she'd invaded his privacy? Sasha was generally a level-headed person, but when pushed, he certainly had a temper—and nothing bothered him more than people's attempts to poke around in his private life.
The Geodesic Psycoisolation Chambers were a rusted white elephant of a monument to the days when the Psychonauts sanctioned psychic isolation as punishment. A lot of cadets had gone insane and the Chambers were no longer used—except the very center one, which Sasha had made the entrance to his lab.
Milla ducked inside it and flipped open the trap door, thinking about the irony of Sasha isolating himself under these gloomy, outdated ruins.
"Darling?" she called out.
"Agent Vodello," replied a deep, dull voice.
Milla sighed. Fifteen years and still he couldn't say her first name without reminding.
She navigated her way down the stairs, stepping over the piles of boxes, books, and papers Sasha seemed to have left everywhere. Sasha himself was standing over an electrical board, carefully waving a magnet over it via telekinesis.
"What are you doing?"
"I'm magnetizing this, obviously."
"Why—" began Milla. Then she stopped. Sometimes, with Sasha, it was best not to ask. "So… sweetheart…" she said, clearing her throat. Her mind was already drifting, her anxiety setting in. What if he was insane after all? What if he was really devoid of all emotion and nothing more than a soulless shell of a person?
"Why are you looking at my shoes?" asked Sasha.
Milla jumped guiltily. "Oh. They're… nice. I was just noticing how nice they are."
"I've been wearing these shoes all summer."
Milla cleared her throat. Maybe Ford was right. Maybe Sasha just had a fetish. "Do you like mine?" she asked.
"They're okay."
"You're not even looking," insisted Milla, nudging Sasha's leg with her toe.
"Please cease kicking me, Agent Vodello."
"Would you rather talk about yours?"
Sasha paused, then turned slowly, staring at her. Milla stared back. She had never seen beyond those sunglasses. Fifteen years, and she didn't know what color his eyes were.
"Did you come all the way down here to talk to me about shoes?" he asked coldly.
"No," said Milla meekly.
"Because, contrary to what you may have heard, I detest shoes."
"Okay," said Milla meekly.
"I loathe shoes. Why you believe I would want to waste my time talking about shoes is beyond me."
"Sorry," said Milla meekly.
"Shoes," muttered Sasha under his breath, shaking his head. "Absolutely disgusting." He trailed off, mumbling. "Shoes… ach du liebe… fucking things…"
"Sasha!" said Milla, shocked. "Do you kiss your mother with that mouth?"
A heavy silence settled over the lab. Faintly, Milla could hear a dripping noise, a lonesome reminder that they were deep beneath the earth. Sasha didn't move. The magnet which had been drifting back and forth had stopped; it floated idly in the air, Sasha's hand frozen over it.
"Sasha?" asked Milla after a moment, acutely aware of her voice echoing.
Sasha twitched suddenly. "I—I apologize, Agent Vodello. If you could leave me to my work, please…" he mumbled, still sounding very far away.
Milla obediently edged away, well aware that Sasha didn't intend to work at all, and that it was more than likely he was simply stand there for a long time, staring off into space and thinking thoughts she could never hope to comprehend.
