Once Again

Chapter Nine - Insecurities

In case you aren't following me (or simply ignored my message because that's what I do), I'm changing my updating schedule to Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. I don't like Thursdays.

Insecurities

Echo woke to find himself laying on a cushion. "Where am I?" he croaked.

"Hush," Fij said gently, washing the blood off of his midriff.

Echo stayed quiet as his eyes slowly focused and the light didn't hurt so much. He let his eyes wander around the blanket tent, and he found that it was a lot like Tristam's, only much lighter and comforting. He felt perfectly fine, but he patiently let Fij check him, making sure he wasn't sick and that his gashes really had healed.

At last, the healer gave him a small cup of water and said, "I'm a little ... confused. Where did these scars come from? You've only been away for five days. And your burn is gone. How did that happen?"

Echo hesitated. "I don't know," he lied. If he really was as important as Puppet made him sound, he didn't want to share his newfound powers just yet. He realized he still had the star clenched tightly in his fist, and quickly tucked it into his jeans pocket. It wasn't glowing anymore.

"Interesting. I've never seen this before." Fij sat back and sighed, handing him an oversized t-shirt. "I guess you're as well as you can be. Just ... I'd like to keep you here for the rest of today, if that's alright. Just to make sure."

"I need to talk to Puppet," he said quickly as he struggled to sit up, suddenly starting to panic. He had to tell him to keep his secret.

"Calm down." The healer touched a finger to his forehead and Echo relaxed, laying back down again. "Puppet's resting, too. Now just stay here and rest. When you're feeling up to it, Tristam wants to talk to you."

A burst of fear entered into Echo's heart, but he tried to push it down. Tristam wasn't coming until he felt ready, so he had time to prepare. "Thank you, Fij," he said.

A couple hours later, he was anxiously bored out of his mind, something he didn't know was possible. He wanted to do something, but he knew if he asked Fij, they'd just make him talk to Tristam again, and he didn't want to do that. Finally, he gathered enough courage to point to a little book and ask if he could have it.

"It's my old journal," Fij said, handing it to him. "It just has medical stuff in it. Nothing personal. Need a pencil?"

Echo accepted the journal and the pencil and opened to a blank page. He doodled a bit and then decided to write something. He remembered how Alyssa always kept a journal. She said that if they ever died, she wanted someone to find the journal and remember them. Echo didn't know what to write about, so he started with Haven and the discovery of his powers.

The going was slow, as he had to remind himself how to form the letters and sound out words, but eventually, he got going faster and found more things to write about.

Braken came in sometime later, keeping quiet. Echo noticed that he wasn't wearing his star mask today. He sat down across from him and watched for a second. "You're a Vortex Shifter?" he asked softly.

Echo looked up in surprise, his eyes flickering to his scar. "I ... I guess. You read my mind, right? No one else knows?"

Braken nodded. "Your secret's safe with me."

Echo wasn't so sure, but he kept his thoughts to himself. Or at least, he tried to keep them quiet. He supposed Braken already knew them.

They waited quietly for another minute or two, and then Braken stood up and moved to kneel behind him, watching as he wrote. Echo tried to ignore him, but he quickly became uncomfortable, as he was writing something very personal. "Could you ... could you stop reading over my shoulder?" he asked. "It's really bothering me."