A Cognate Thing-a sophitz story

twenty four

Sophie had barely made it home in time for dinner, if she hadn't been studying at Foxfire Grady and Edaline would have been worried but the council had approved a special spyball for them to check in on Sophie. It only showed her registry pendant location but it did bring a sense of comfort that they could at least see where she was if they needed to.

“Oh my goodness, I am so sorry I am late. Lady Nissa was helping me figure out Elvin history and I completely lost track of time. I had no idea how helpful the tutoring center is. Why have I not been going there all the time for the past 3 years.”

Grady and Edaline gave each other a look, Sophie had come a long way since trying to cheat on her Alchemy midterm that first year. It was kind of nice to see her so focused on school and not solving all the problems in the Elvin world.

“So tell us about studying, I have some Mashed Carnissa Root waiting for us and some pudding puffs for dessert.” Edaline said motioning Sophie to sit down.

Sophie took her seat before starting in on how Lady Nissa taught her to link her photographic memories of Elvin history with the timeline of human history she had learned and rather than confuse the two cross reference them in her brain. It was a time consuming process but once she had done it everything made sense and Sophie could answer all the questions with ease. It almost seemed too easy. Sophie was excited to see what tricks she could learn for her other subjects and before she knew it dinner was over and she was outside cleaning up after some of the animals. She had almost forgot about trying to mind loop with Fitz when his voice popped into her head.

“Sophie, I am going to be done studying in about 30 minutes. Would that be a good time to try out mind looping?”

“Yes I am cleaning up after some of the new animals but I will be ready then.”

“Ok, talk to you soon.”

Giddiness pulsed through Sophie's body, she was going to get to talk with Fitz more that night. She raced through cleaning and ran up to her room to take a quick shower so she didn't feel gross from the animals. After what had to be the shortest shower ever Sophie sat on her bed in her pajamas holding Mr. Snuggles waiting for Fitz to reach out to her. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath smelling Fitz cologne.

“Are you ready?”

“Yes, but I have to ask why does Mr. Snuggles smell like he took a bath in your cologne?”

“Argh, sorry about that Keefe was tossing a bramble ball in my room right before last weekend and hit the bottle sending it flying onto my bed. My room was covered and poor Mr. Snuggles got most of it. That is why I didn't take him home for the weekend, I tried to let him air out but I guess it didn't work. What about Ella? Why does she smell like Calla’s panakes?”

“I try to keep some petals in my room to help with the Iggy smells and one day the vase holding them fell on my bed. It helped me sleep that night so now I keep a couple on my bed, I guess Ella is starting to smell like them. Sorry.”

“It's all good, I figured you had spilled the perfume Dex made you on accident. I like the way it smells. I might have to snag some blossoms for my room next time I visit. So tell me again how this mind looping is supposed to work.”

“From what I read it sounds like we track their location and open our minds to transmit, but then we focus on our item that the other person is holding and then our subconscious connect and either you should feel like you are here in my room or I will feel like I am in your dorm room.”

“Ok that sounds simple enough, are you ready?”

“Ready if you are.”

“Ok we go on 3. 1”

“2”

“3” they transmitted in unison.

There was definitely a mental strain but almost immediately Sophie felt like she was actually in Fitz's dorm room with him.

“Wow,” she said out loud. “This is incredible, I can actually see everything in your room, and smell it too. How big was that bottle of cologne? You're blushing.” Sophie transmitted while mentally walked around Fitz's dorm room seeing his meticulously organized books and a couple of pictures in frames on a shelf on the wall. He had a small bed by elf standards but was still bigger than any dorm room bed she had seen in the college brochures she had gotten in the mail back in San Diego.

The more she mentally walked around his room the more mentally tired she got. “Fitz I think I need to sit down somewhere,” and mentally she started to wobble. Fitz being in her mind but in his room jumped up and went to where she was standing in her mind and reached out to steady her.

“Wow, I can actually feel your hands on me, keeping me from tipping over even though I am sitting right here on my bed.”

“So can you feel me do this?”

Fitz started to tickle her and Sophie's subconscious went crazy. She was squirming all over her bed and it made her drop Mr. Snuggles, immediately her connection was lost.

“Sorry I lost the connection but seriously that was incredible. Do you want to try to come see my room?”

“Let's save that for another night. Can we just transmit for a few minutes. I want to hear how your day went.”

“Well Biana wanted to hear all about our date but Dex and Linh got her started on thinking about alchemy and learning how to mix her own beauty elixirs and gave her the idea to open a styling boutique after graduation where she can give people makeovers all day.”

“That's not a bad idea for her, she would do great at it.”

“I know, then I skipped lunch to go to the tutoring center and Lady Nissa had me come back after school and taught me how to link my memories from human history to Elvin history to cross reference rather than confuse me. It was amazing and I finally feel like I can keep them separate but using them together. How was your day?”

“My multispecial mentor was way impressed with my goblin report, so thank you for helping with that. During lunch I ran into Taron, he was asking Keefe about you.”

Sophie could feel Fitz’s mood shift.

“Oh, I'm sorry Fitz.”

“It's not your problem, I just wish I could be there with you all the time so other boys don’t start to get ideas.”

“Well don't worry about me, I am just trying to get through school and pass my classes as best I can and stay away from trouble. Fitz is this ok that we are talking telepathically to one another? I don’t want to distract you or get you in trouble. I know contact is supposed to be limited so you can focus on your studies.”

“Well they haven't said not to talk telepathically but I get what you are saying. So how about I reach out to you on the nights when I have a few extra minutes to chat and we keep them quick and casual. Then on the weekends we can mind loop since weekends have a little more freedom to hail our families. How does that sound?”

“That sounds perfect!”

“Good well I should probably say goodnight, I have a big project this week so I will try and chat again but it may be this weekend before I can really talk a lot.”

“Thats ok, Fitz I'll miss you.”

“I'll miss you too.”