Work Text:
Four concerned faces hover above Gem.
She wishes she could reach out and comfort them, but she’s too weak to move her arms. Her hands rest on the soft green blanket Impulse had provided when the doctors declared she was going to die. Outside the medical tent, the sounds of battle carry on.
In a war between two kingdoms, it’s a given that there’s going to be casualties. Gem just hadn’t expected to be one of them. That’s what she gets for going after the king.
The stab wound in her stomach throbs. Martyn’s sword had gone straight through her like she was butter, right into her organs. She’d like to live, but they don’t have the medics nor the medicine needed to properly treat her wounds. She can hear people fussing about within the tent, but her friends block her view. It’s probably for the best. Strangers seeing her die would be quite embarrassing.
Grian, Impulse, Scar, and Skizz are all in various different stages of mental breakdowns.
Turning her head, she coughs into the poor excuse of a pillow beneath her. It tastes like blood. Gem puts on the bravest face she can manage and speaks with a tired, raspy voice. “Guys?”
Skizz kneels down next to her and starts running his hand through her hair. It’s comforting. “Yeah, Gemstone?”
“When we win, give Martyn a good punch for me.”
A teary-eyed Scar chuckles at her request. “Of course we will.”
Suddenly, Grian stomps up to her and grabs her hands. “Are you sure you don’t want me to heal you?” His face is both determined and scared. As if to show he can, Grian opens the eyes that tend to hover around him. It’s impressive, but Gem knows he’s straining his Watcher powers enough already.
“We both know that’ll just kill you instead.” Gem shakes her head weakly.
“I can do it! Gem, please!”
Impulse puts his hand on Grian’s shoulder. “She’s right,” He says, tail curling unhappily behind him. He stands tall, but Gem can tell he’s about to crumple.
Grian huffs with frustration. “So we just– just let her die?! Why even have magic if I can’t save my friend!?”
It’s funny, to die while surrounded by immortals.
As Gem closes her eyes, the noise of the four bickering fills her ears, and she wouldn’t have asked for anything else. The ache of the stab wound begins to fade away, as does the feeling in the rest of her body. With her consciousness slipping, Gem decides to make one final comment.
“I’ll see you guys again eventually,” She takes a deep breath, “Couldn’t get rid of you all if I tried.”
“Fresh produce! Come get your fresh produce!”
Gem weaves through market stalls, pulling her hood further down to cover her face. The sun beats down on her like it’s trying to cook her alive. She continues anyway, stepping between people and wagons with practiced ease. She makes sure to stick to the shadows where any of the posted guards won’t notice her.
Let it be known that Gem’s not proud of what she does. If she had money, she wouldn’t be stealing her dinners, but she doesn’t have the money nor the time to get a job. With her mother sick at home, she can’t afford to leave the house for anything aside from quick trips to the market. She does what she has to to stay alive, to keep her mother alive. It is what it is, a motto that’s constantly on repeat in her mind.
She leisurely walks up to a stall she knows she hasn’t robbed before. Many of the owners know her face now, and it’s difficult to steal when one word could get her thrown in a dungeon, so she targets the newbies. This stall looks nice — there’s a large assortment of bread, produce, and even some jewelry. Gem considers taking some of the jewels to sell, but decides against it. She doesn’t need the sparkly necklaces to live, she just needs food. While the stall owner is distracted by another customer, Gem grabs a loaf of bread and as many random vegetables as she can carry and takes off. Loud shouting lets her know she wasn’t as sneaky as she thought.
Her shoulders bump against people and she does her best to yell apologies. Heavy and loud footsteps follow her, telling her that at least two members of the guard are chasing her. Their armor clanks together with a sound that makes Gem want to rip off her ears.
“Stop!” A deep and gruff voice calls, “Theif! You’re under arrest!”
Instead of doing as she’s told, Gem darts into an alleyway. Her lungs burn from the strain of running and her heart beats rapidly with adrenaline, but she doesn’t stop.
Gem makes a sharp turn into what she expected to be another back passage behind houses, but she’s instead met with a tall brick wall separating her from escape. Dread pools in her stomach as she realizes she can’t escape . She can’t climb the wall, let alone with the things she’s carrying. Just when she turns around in search of another escape route, the two knights that had been chasing her round the corner, effectively trapping her in.
“Shit,” She says under her breath as they step closer like they’re hunting prey with their swords drawn. The metal glints against the sun, momentarily blinding her. One of them speaks much louder than he needs to in such a confined space. “Put your hands where we can see them!”
Dropping everything she’d taken, Gem holds her hands out in front of her. A knight ties a rope around her wrists tighter than necessary.
“We’ll be taking you in for questioning, thief.” One of the knights spits out thief like it’s a curse and, yeah, maybe it is. Maybe her luck has finally run out. She made it a while before getting caught, at least. But then Gem remembers her mother is lying in bed at home, too sick to sit upright, completely helpless, and that lights a fire under her. She has to get home. If she leaves her mother there, wondering why Gem never came home, she’ll surely die.
Gem ignores every disgusted stare directed toward her as she’s led on a rather humiliating walk through the town. She analyzes, takes in every possible way out. Unfortunately the knight dragging her along has a tight grip on the rope binding her wrists, so she’ll have to wait until they slip up and let go.
Once they reach the nearest prison, she’s unceremoniously tossed into an empty room filled with only a table and two chairs. The knight that had been dragging her pulls another rope out of thin air and ties her legs to the chair and sneers at her. “No funny business. The head of the guard is coming to talk to you. I’m going to be paid so much once he realizes that I caught the thief who's been robbing all of the market stalls.”
Refusing to give them a verbal answer, Gem rolls her eyes. They huff and leave the room.
She sits there for what feels like hours. They could have at least provided some sort of entertainment. Eventually the door opens and Gem’s met with a… familiar sight?
Not familiar in the way she knows this person. Familiar in the way a wave of nostalgia washes over her for no identifiable reason. Suddenly she’s longing for a time long ago that’s just out of her reach, because that face, she should know that face, but she can’t put her finger on why.
He’s tall. Freakishly tall. Gem assumes he’s the head guard or whatever, she doesn’t really care, she’s just looking for a way out of this mess. The knight stills in the middle of the doorway when he lays eyes on her like he’s seen a ghost. Gem considers making fun of him, but then realizes that definitely wouldn’t help her get out of here, so she refrains despite how tempting it is. “...Gem?” He asks, voice softer than she expected from a man of his stature.
She almost replies with how do you know my name but catches herself. The less he knows about her, the better. Even if she really wants to know how he knows her name, especially when she’s spent almost her whole life staying under the radar of knights. Instead she turns away to look down at the bare table in front of her.
The knight snaps out of it and gives himself a good shake. He sits down across from her. “I’m Skizz, head of the royal guard. You must be the thief we’ve been trying to catch.”
Despite the serious accusation, Skizz looks more amused than he does upset or angry like she’d expect from a knight. If her eyes aren’t deceiving her, and they’re not, it almost looks like Skizz has a small grin on his face. Maybe she hit her head and is imaging things, because there’s absolutely no way the person who’s supposed to be interrogating her is smiling fondly like she hasn’t robbed a ton of people.
“Am I going to be imprisoned?” Gem asks.
Skizz sighs. “Probably. You stole a lot of shit, Gemstone.”
“Gemstone?”
“Sorry — just Gem.”
She ignores how easily the nickname slipped off his tongue like he’s been calling her that her whole life. Gem also ignores the longing that grows in her, aching to hear Gemstone come from Skizz’s mouth again. “Why have you been taking things without paying?”
This is her chance to escape. She can use whatever weird emotional connection they have to her advantage. Surely such a nice knight wouldn’t punish a girl for needing to take care of her sick and dying mother. “Well, my mom– she’s sick,” Gem puts on her best innocent troubled girl voice, “And I have to take care of her, so I don’t have time for a job.”
The sob story works immediately. Skizz’s face softens with sympathy, and Gem would feel bad if it wasn’t true.
“I’m so sorry. I– I’m not supposed to do this, but if you promise to at least try to get a job, I’ll let you go.” Skizz runs a nervous hand through his hair.
Gem nods rapidly in an attempt to seem like she’s actually agreeing to the deal. “Yes! I promise!” The lie easily slips from her tongue. She would cross her fingers, but they’re currently bound in front of her where Skizz can see, so she refrains. He gets up from his chair and walks around the table to untie her from her rope shackles. First, he frees her legs, then her arms. Gem rubs her sore wrists and follows Skizz out of the building. The sun almost feels as good as freedom.
“If you need food, I can help, Gemst–”
The moment Skizz looks away, Gem slips off into the crowd of people walking around, not wanting to stick around longer than necessary. She is not giving the knight the chance to change his mind.
From afar, she watches him spin in a few circles trying to find where she went. Gem giggles under her breath and pulls her hood back over her head, turning to go home and make sure her mother’s okay after Gem’s longer-than-usual outing. A small part of her hopes she’ll see him again, and an even smaller part reassures that she will.
In a little hut in the woods, Gem tosses a handful of herbs into her cauldron.
Being the local alchemist isn’t easy work. She makes sure none of her hair has slipped out of her bandana, because she does not need her DNA ending up in a random potion again. She stirs the invisibility potion for one of her regulars who’s always up to no good. Gem would disapprove if she didn’t make money from their shenanigans. Thankfully, she has a no-active-potions rule in her shop. Rule breakers get banned immediately.
When she hears the door open from her back room, she assumes it’s said troublemaking customer arriving for their order. She calls out to them, “I’ll be out in a minute with your order!”
Gem doesn’t get an answer, which is to be expected. She grabs five glass bottles off the nearest shelf and fills them with the bubbling potion, careful to not spill any. She then tosses them all into a small bag and makes her way out of the back room. The glasses clink against each other but she’s not worried about them breaking — she gets all her bottles enchanted to prevent that, except for the ones meant for throwing at people.
Surprisingly, she’s met with a new face instead of the regular she was expecting. “Oh!” She says, setting the bag down on the nearest counter. “Sorry, I thought you were someone else. How can I help you?”
The man yelps and spins around from where he’d been inspecting a shelf of herbs. He clutches his heart, almost falling over with surprise. Gem resists the urge to giggle. The man is tall with long, braided brown hair and scars littering his face. He’s wearing a long purple cape that feels a little overkill to Gem, but she’s not one to judge fashion choices. He leans against a wooden cane and smiles widely at her. “Hello! You’re the local alchemist, correct? I’m Scar.”
Scar. His name settles somewhere in her brain that she can’t quite place.
“That’s me! The name’s Gem.” Her arms subconsciously cross as she walks closer to him. Scar holds out a hand that Gem shakes with her own.
“It’s nice to meet you! I’m in the market for anything that can help with pain, as you can see–” He gestures to his legs, then his cane. “–My legs don’t work too well. I’ve tried magic, but it didn’t do anything. I’m hoping maybe potions will help.”
Gem nods along. “I think I’ve got something. Follow me!”
She leads him through the shop to a table filled with an assortment of different potions. Generally, this table is where she keeps the potions that help make people’s lives better. Stimulating potions for those who can’t focus, calming potions for those who get anxious, and most importantly; potions that help with physical pain. She picks one of the bottles up and shows it to Scar.
“This is my strongest pain reliever. But if magic hasn’t worked, I can’t guarantee this will.”
“I’m willing to give it a try!” Scar grins. He follows her back to the counter where Gem checks customers out. “I’ll give you a discount since I don’t know if it’ll help.”
“That’s very kind, thank you.” He digs the needed coins out of his pockets and tosses them onto the counter. Gem takes them and opens up her book that she logs all her customers in, quill in hand. She writes pain reliever x1.
Next to the item he purchased, she writes his name, then looks up at him. “What’s your last name?”
“It’s Goodtimes!”
Scar Goodtimes.
Huh.
Goodtimes falls into place right next to where Scar resides in her mind. Like it’s familiar. She’s pretty damn sure she’s never met this man before, but maybe she’s incorrect. Something about him feels comforting, which is odd, because Gem doesn’t usually let her guard down this much around others. Especially around strangers. For some reason, calling Scar a stranger feels incorrect.
She closes her log book and pushes the potion to Scar before she can dwell on it any longer. He grabs it and nearly drops it before stuffing it into a pocket on the inside of his cape. He turns to leave, but stops himself and raises an eyebrow curiously. “Have we… met before? I feel like I know you.”
Gem blinks. “I was wondering the same thing, actually.”
“What’s your last name?” He asks, staring intensely like she’s a puzzle he needs to solve.
Maybe sharing personal info with someone she just met isn’t the smartest choice, but Gem has a gut feeling it’ll all be fine. “It’s Tay. Gemini Tay.”
Scar’s eyes light up with realization, which only makes Gem more confused, like she’s missing something that should be obvious. Instead of sharing whatever he’d figured out, he rushes to the door with an even bigger smile. “I can’t believe I didn’t recognize you. I think it’s the bandana. Don’t go anywhere Gem, I’m getting the others!”
The others?
Like, a mob of people? His friends? What does he want with Gem?
Before Gem can ask any of her many questions, Scar closes the door behind him, leaving the shop feeling more empty than usual. Her hand twitches with the urge to stop him from leaving.
What a strange man. Hopefully telling him her name doesn’t bring about any trouble.
She starts brewing more pain relief potions, though, because she has a feeling he’ll be back even if they don’t work.
“Do you think anyone’s actually going to show up?” Gem asks, fidgeting with a wooden drumstick.
Scott looks up from his seat on the floor where he’s tuning his electric guitar. “I hope so. We can’t really be a band without a drummer.”
“Yeah. I could always learn if we can’t find anyone.” She sets down the drumstick and walks to the garage door, grabbing the metal handle to lift it up. It squeaks obnoxiously as it opens, a sound that grates on her ears like it’s trying to kill them. Sunlight fills the garage enough for Gem to turn off the overhead lights. It’s early in the day, so the air is still fairly cool. Gem’s suddenly glad she’s wearing a sweater.
“You can’t sing and play the drums at the same time. I feel like that would be hard.” Scott tilts his head to look up at her. She shrugs in reply and sits down on the pink beanbag they keep around in the garage. Gem opens her mouth to say something, but is interrupted by an unfamiliar voice.
“Are you the people looking for a drummer?”
Turning around, Gem takes in the appearance of the man. He’s an average height demon with a thin tail curled behind him. His voice is… calm. Sweet. It softens Gem’s rough edges like a pillow, like it’s a comfort, like it’s always been there. What the fuck. “We are! I’m assuming you’re here because you know how to drum?” She asks.
“Mhm!” The demon nods and pulls his own pair of drumsticks out of his pocket. “I’m Impulse.”
His name feels like a hug. Like a remembrance. Like an old friend she hasn’t seen in years. But none of that makes sense, because she’s never met him before. Right?
“You’re Gem and Scott, right?” Impulse points to both of them and continues speaking when they nod. “Great! I saw your flyer in the newspaper and had to come to see if it was really you. And it is!”
“What do you mean?” Gem asks. See if it’s really her? What?
Impulse walks over to the drumset and sits down. “Man, you really don’t remember in this life either?”
“What? You’re not making any sense. Is this a threat on Gem’s life?” Scott stands up and protectively raises an arm in front of her, glaring at Impulse. He raises his hands in surrender with a nervous chuckle. In the light, Gem can see words are engraved on his drumsticks. “No no, I’m just here to drum!”
Gem raises an eyebrow and pulls herself up. “Okay… Well, get playing. Let us hear it.”
“Gem?! Hello!?” Scott spins around to face her and Gem would laugh if he didn’t look so serious. He grabs her hand and drags her outside the garage, far enough to have a whispered conversation without Impulse hearing while still keeping him in sight. Scott grabs her shoulders and gives her a good shake. “Why are you letting him stay? We should kick him to the curb, he’s weirding me out, Gem. Don’t roll your eyes at me, I’m being serious!”
She giggles and grabs Scott’s wrists, pulling them off her shoulders. “Sorry, sorry. I just… have a feeling about him. Like– like I can trust him. Look at him, he looks harmless!”
Gesturing to Impulse, who’s busying himself with studying the drumset, Gem takes a step closer to Scott in an attempt to comfort him. “See?”
Scott sighs heavily. “That’s insane. You sound insane, Gem.”
“Maybe I am. I don’t know Scott, what if he’s nice and just a little odd?” She grins as Scott’s walls start to crack. Considering they’ve known each other since they were in diapers, Gem knows how to get her way with him. “My gut’s telling me he’s good. And I’m never wrong.”
“...If he murders us, it’s your fault.”
“Yay!” Gem cheers and walks back into the garage with Scott close behind. “Alright, Impulse, get drumming!”
Impulse grins, throws a drumstick into the air, then catches it and starts playing a beat. Gem hums along and Scott even strums a few chords on his guitar. Something about it all feels so easy, so natural. Like falling into sync with Impulse isn’t even something she has to think about. The garage is filled with music and by the end of the day they have at least four songs planned.
Gem startles awake to the sound of something smashing in her kitchen.
“Fuck,” She groans, “Again? Really?”
As if to answer her, another plate shatters against the floor. She hauls herself out of bed and makes her way to the kitchen, phone in hand to use as a flashlight. The screen tells her it’s way too late to be awake. Great.
Of course her new house is haunted. That’s just her luck. The realtor could have at least fucking warned her an angry spirit roams the halls and enjoys breaking fine china. She would’ve locked up the expensive fancy plates her grandmother gave her a few years back for her birthday. She doesn’t really care about them, but they were a gift. It’s common decency to not break your gifts into tiny little pieces all over the floor.
The moment she enters the kitchen, the smashing stops. The ghost is a coward who won’t face her head on. “Stop breaking my shit! I’ve been here for like, a week!”
On cue, something loud crashes onto the floor of her living room. The very thin thread that had been holding her together snaps, and Gem storms out of the house, slamming the front door behind her. She is not above being petty towards a ghost. Especially not a ghost that’s been smashing all her damn kitchen ware.
Her porch is cold. The wood is slightly damp from the night, but she sits on the first step anyways. After turning her phone flashlight off, she opens the search engine and looks up ghost hunters near me. Multiple different companies pop up, all too expensive for Gem. Most of them don’t work twenty-four hours or come immediately, anyways. She’ll just have to go with one of the shadier businesses. She is not going back into that house until the ghost is gone, and she’d like to sleep on her mattress instead of rickety old wooden boards tonight.
She scrolls through a few web pages, frowning at every obvious scam. It feels like ages until one particular business catches her eye.
GIGS Ghost Removal Services.
The website flaunts the fact they’re on twenty-four hour call and guarantees any ghosts will be busted. Gem reads the names of the employees and a strange feeling settles in her chest. Grian, Impulse, Scar, and Skizz.
…Wouldn’t that make them GISS instead of GIGS?
Whatever. It’s far too late to question something as little as spelling. She enters the number in her phone and presses the call button, praying that they’re not lying about always being available.
After a few rings, a tired voice answers. “GIGS Ghost Removal Services, this is Grian speaking. How can I help you?”
“I need a ghost removed.”
“We can help with that–” He cuts himself off with a yawn, “–What’s your address and what’s the ghost doing?”
Gem informs the man the best she can. Something breaks against the front door and Grian tells her it’s not possible to strangle a ghost with her bare hands when she asks. He goes quiet when she tells him her name is Gem, but hangs up saying he’ll be there soon before she can question it. Whatever. She just wants to go back to bed.
She nearly falls asleep on her porch waiting. Her ears start to tune out the ruckus going on inside. Honestly, the ghost can go ahead and smash everything she owns at this point if it’ll go away afterwards.
Wheels skidding against the road startles Gem out of her sleepy haze. A large white van pulls into her driveway at a speed that is definitely over the neighborhood limit. Considering that they’re the cheapest ghost hunters she could find, she shouldn’t have expected anything else. The second the van stops moving, the doors to the trunk swing open and a man in a red sweater comes tumbling out. His hair is messy like he’d just rolled out of bed and there’s a small crack in one of his glasses’ lenses. He looks around frantically until he spots Gem on the stairs.
“Gem!” He yells loud enough to wake up all her neighbors and rushes towards her.
Standing up, she raises a tired eyebrow. “That’s me. Are you the ghost hunters?”
“Gem, it’s really you!” The man grabs her shoulders and shakes her. She’s too sleepy to fight back. She yawns and steps away, taking his hands off her. She’s not sure who else she could possibly be, but that’s not something she feels like questioning right now. Besides, something about this guy is making her feel better. “Uh huh. Can you get the ghost out?”
“Sure can!” A new voice chimes in from behind the red sweater.
In the back of Gem’s mind, she recognizes the faces in front of her. Like a dream just out of her grasp, unable to remember what happened but the feelings are all there.
“G, buddy, you’re getting ahead of yourself.” The tallest of the four pulls G back. “Thanks for hiring us! I’m Skizz. This is Impulse, Scar, and Grian!” Skizz gestures towards each member respectively. Gem nods along, not really paying attention. Usually she’s bad with names, but these four feel embedded into her mind like they’ve always been there. In turn Gem introduces herself, but it doesn’t really feel needed.
Gem leads them up the porch to her front door. They all have tools and gear that she doesn’t recognize attached to their belts. Something shatters behind the door, and Scar yelps, nearly dropping his flashlight. Impulse is the first to go inside, testing the light switches and pouting when it doesn’t work. “I’ll find the breaker. You guys find the ghost.”
“What should I do?” Gem asks.
Grian turns around and stares at her. It’s familiar. “You could… help us. Or stay out here.”
She hums in contemplation. On one hand, catching the ghost that’s been terrorizing her sounds fun, but on the other she’s tired as hell. She shrugs. “I’ll help out.” She’s got nothing better to do, anyways.
“Great! We’ve got spare gear in the van, c’mon.” He leads Gem to the van, allowing her to look at the wall filled with all sorts of ghost hunting equipment. She takes her own flashlight, then picks up a phone-like device. When she turns it on, she’s met with a blank white screen. How useful.
“That’s an EMF reader,” Grian says, as if he read her mind. “It won’t do anything out here, but once it’s near a ghost it goes crazy. You wanna use it?”
With an affirmative nod, the two head back to the front door. Grian pushes it open and they’re met with still-off lights, meaning Impulse hasn’t found the breaker yet. Good luck, Gem thinks. She hasn’t seen a breaker once while living here, which… isn’t actually surprising considering she’s only been here a week and hasn’t needed to seek it out. She follows Grian to the kitchen like a lost puppy, where Skizz and Scar are setting up electronics and books and other things she doesn’t understand. “What’s all this for?”
“This is to figure out what kind of ghost we’re dealing with, Gemstone! We’ll be able to catch it easier if we know its type.” Skizz replies without looking up from the camera he’s setting up on the kitchen counter next to the sink. Scar sets a microphone-looking thing on the floor where she’s sure it’ll end up stepped on. “That makes sense. Kinda.”
Suddenly, the lights all turn on, blinding Gem for a few seconds. The walkie-talkies on the others’ belts all chirp at once as a staticky Impulse says “Power’s on! ”
As the others talk about ghost business, Gem clicks back on the EMF reader. It immediately beeps and a slurry of quickly changing numbers appear on the screen. An arrow points her towards the corner of the kitchen, so she walks towards it, the beeping getting louder and more annoying with every step.
Grian appears next to her. “Hey, that’s an EMF five!”
“Is that good?”
“Yes! Well, not for us, we might get hunted. But it’s good for evidence!” He nods his head with a grin.
Gem raises an eyebrow. “Right. And that’s not… concerning to you?”
“Psh, I’m fine, you know that.” He waves her off. Gem doesn’t know why he thinks she would know that. She also doesn’t know why she believes him, but she does, somehow she knows he and the other three will be just fine.
“It’s gonna hunt soon,” Impulse says, watching a spoon get flung across the room. “Gem — you should… probably go outside. I don’t want you to get caught up in a hunt.”
“What’s so bad about a hunt? Why am I the only one that has to leave?”
All four look at each other like they know something Gem doesn’t. Skizz is the first to speak. “We’re… all professionals. We won’t die. And we can’t have you getting hurt, that would be a lot of paperwork I don’t want to do!” He smiles and lightly pushes her out of the kitchen. “You can go to the van and watch us on the camera!”
She goes without a fight. While being chased by a ghost sounds pretty cool, she’s not in the mood right now. Van duty will be good enough. Maybe she could come with them on a different gig and experience a hunt. They’d let her. Somehow, she knows they would.
The air is cold as she closes the front door behind her. Gem makes her way to the van, guided only by the moon and the street lights. The EMF reader is put back where she found it on the wall along with her flashlight. On the other wall, there’s a bunch of screens she gives up on trying to understand after a few seconds. Junk litters the desk at the end of the van. She pulls out the stool from under the desk and sits down, clicking random buttons on the computer until it shows the camera in her kitchen.
Skizz and Grian seem to be talking about something while Impulse hovers over a dirty old journal they put on the floor. She assumes Scar is sitting on the counter next to the camera, his feet kicking in and out of the camera’s view. For a while, everything seems fine, until the lights start to flicker. Gem stares intensely as everyone except Impulse scatters from the room. Impulse crouches behind the kitchen table. The microphones Scar put down echo light footsteps that don’t sound human-like into the van. It's a surprisingly soothing melody. Gem yawns, tiredness from earlier coming back in full force.
The live footage is interesting for a while. Gem gets to actually see the ghost that’s been bullying her, and it’s safe to say it’s about as ugly as she’d expected. Impulse runs around the table as it chases him with practiced precision that somewhat mesmerizes Gem.
Slowly, without her noticing, her head lowers onto her folded arms.
Her eyelids grow heavy. She watches the four bicker on the screen, and collect evidence, and do whatever else they need to.
Eventually she falls asleep and later wakes to people coming back into the van. Gem closes her eyes again, because she’s too tired to question how she knows she’ll be safe around them. Their voices get quieter immediately when they notice she’s asleep. Something soft is put around her shoulders to keep her warm.
“I’m glad we found her again.” One of them whispers.
“Me too. I missed her.”
Yeah. Gem missed them, too.