POA ch004 — i̶̱̾t̶̳̓'̴̔͜ṡ̷̬ ̶͇͑ü̷̗s̴̘͌.

Summary: i̶̱̾t̶̳̓'̴̔͜ṡ̷̬ ̶͇͑ü̷̗s̴̘͌.

Author's Notes: Hello again lovely Hive Mind! Thank you, as always, for reading, voting, liking, and commenting on the previous chapter. Your time is a valuable resource, and I am grateful to you for sharing some of it with me. If you liked this, please share it with your friends or on social media — the more the merrier in Henry’s brain, amiright?

Content Warnings: Scopophobia, doctor’s offices, possession (or is it?).

It’s us.

They aren’t words, exactly, that whisper through Henry’s mind. The sensation is wispier, like a half-formed thought, but revoltingly foreign.

“What the fuck!” Henry recoils violently from the mirror. He spins around so fast he accidentally upends Naomi’s shower caddy with all her hair care products and sends Ash’s shaving cream toppling to the ground with a loud clatter.

He pants, shoulders heaving and heart hammering, in the empty bathroom. He is alone. He feels alone. But, for a moment, he could have sworn—

He thought, for just a second, that there had been—

Henry cuts off those thoughts.

“Henry?” Naomi calls from the hallway, on the way to her room. “You okay?”

“Yes!” Henry calls back instantly. No use in worrying her. It’s probably just his nerves — he’s had, quite apart from any potential effects, an incredibly odd few days.

Naomi pulls the bathroom door open, and Henry yelps.

“Naomi!” He protests. “I’m— I’m in the bathroom!”

“Yes,” Naomi replies. “And you forgot to lock the door. And shouted. You sounded like you might be in distress.”

“I’m fine,” Henry insists.

Naomi narrows her eyes.

“Why did you shout?”

“I— I thought I saw something,” Henry admits. “Something b-behind me. It felt like— like suddenly I wasn’t alone.” Henry gulps. “Like— like there was someone else, maybe more than one other person, here with me. A-almost like they were trying to— Um.” Henry laughs. “Sorry, I— I sound like a lunatic.”

Naomi frowns. “I hate that word.”

”Sorry.”

“No worries.”

Henry glances across at the mirror. Naomi follows his gaze.

“How many people do you see in the mirror, now?” She asks. Her voice is tight, as though she is meting it out carefully, wary of revealing the depth of her worries and destabilizing him further.

Henry scans his reflection. Unbidden, his eyes find that area above his shoulder, by his ear.

That feeling is still there. Not as strong, not like before. Before, Henry felt as though something was trying to speak with him. Now, he only feels like something is standing behind him, a hand on his shoulder, a breath on his neck, invisible fingers trailing down his vertebrae.

“Just me,” Henry replies, and shakes the sensations away.

…

Henry makes his way back to Pembroke Lab the following day, a slice of leftover pizza from the day before in his hands. He finishes the final bite and claps his hands together to clear them of crumbs before pulling open the glass doors to hospital and winding his way towards the reception area.

Deborah, a woman who is roughly the exact same size and shape as her office chair, greets him with a warm smile and a wave. Her dangly earrings shiver with the motion.

“Hello, love,” Deborah says. “Back for your check-up?”

“Yep,” Henry confirms. “You told me I have the 1 pm slot, I believe. I’m not sure who it’s with.”

“Seonjae and Dr. Pembroke are splitting their patients equally today,” Deborah replies. She clicks here and there on her monitor, one long fingernail tapping against the desk. “Alright, looks like you’re with Seonjae. She’ll take you in shortly. They’re running a little bit behind, I’m afraid. Please, have a seat, and she’ll call you when she’s ready.”

Henry nods and settles into one of the uncomfortable chairs scattered around the waiting room. There’s nobody else waiting, the only sounds the ticking of the clock and the crinkle of Deborah unwrapping her lunch. Something pungent and mustardy. Henry pulls out his phone and begins to mindlessly scroll through his social media feeds. A message from Ash appears.

If you’re going to be kidnapped again for the next two days, do me a favor and let me know in advance this time x

Henry grins and rolls his eyes.

It’s just a checkup x

On second thought, Henry follows that up with another message.

But ya I’ll lyk

Henry is drawn away from his phone as the door leading to the offices and examination rooms opens. He’s expecting Seonjae, but it’s someone else who exits — a woman Henry has never seen before. As she strides over to the receptionist’s desk, her right arm twitches involuntarily.

“Felicity,” Deborah says. “Checking out?”

“Yes!” Felicity replies. She hands Deborah a form.

“Lovely,” Deborah replies. “If you could just sign off on your check-up responses…”

She slides the form back across the counter along with a pen. Felicity takes a moment, steeling herself, and picks up the pen.

Snap.

Felicity’s hand clenches around the pen, snapping it clean in two. Ink sprays across the paper. Felicity winces.

“Oh dear!” Deborah yelps.

“Fuck— oh. Apologies,” Felicity says, slapping her other hand over her mouth.

“No problem at all.” Deborah recovers smoothly. “Happens all the time. Let me just get you another form, if you could fill out with your answers again, that would be lovely.”

“I’ll do my best,” Felicity says, with a huff of a laugh. Her fingers come up and nervously fiddle with her long braids.

“Wonderful,” Deborah says, fishing around for a new copy of the check-up form. “Right, so, you’re next check-up will be in one week’s time, with either Seonjae or Dr. Pembroke. Bring this back to me once you’ve filled it out, and then you’re free to go.”

Henry twitches.

Felicity takes the fresh form and the pen in her other hand, and walks towards Henry. This is when she notices him.

“H—” Felicity tries to greet him, but her mouth snaps shut before the world can fully form. She settles for a wave.

“Hello,” Henry waves back. Felicity gestures at the seat next to him, and Henry nods.

Silence but for the ticking clock and the scratching of Felicity’s pen against the forms. Henry notices that she has some flecks of ink across her chin, dotting against a patch of skin that is starkly lighter than all the rest of her— vitiligo, Henry realizes.

“Oh, you have—” Henry taps his own chin. “Ink spots— from the pen."

“Ah, fuck,” Felicity says again. She pulls a small tissue out of her purse and dabs at her chin. “Better?”

“You got it,” Henry confirms. Felicity smiles at him, and goes back to her form. She answers a few more questions as Henry scrambles for something else to say. Felicity beats him to it.

“Are you…?” Felicity nods at the sign pasted across the door, reading Pembroke Lab.

“Oh, yeah!” Henry says. “The, um… whatever study they’re doing.”

Felicity lights up, and her hand spasms again as though trying to get her attention.

“Me too!” She says. “So, you get the whole… you know.” Her eyes dart to the misbehaving hand and she trails off, eyebrows arching expectantly.

“Oh,” Henry says. “Um. Not really, actually. I just had the procedure, like, a few days ago.”

“Oh.” She echoes. Her expression turns concerned. “You mean you haven’t noticed—”

“Henry Choix!” Seonjae’s voice calls from the door leading to the offices.

“Coming!” Henry replies.

Felicity rips the corner of her form off and scribbles something down. Her hand jitters, again, yanking backwards and dragging the tail of the final ‘7’ in a long, harsh line down the page. But she manages to finish. When Henry takes the slip of paper from her, it has her phone number on it.

“If you wanted to talk. About this,” Felicity says. “Anytime.”

“Thanks,” Henry says uneasily. “Good luck.”

”You too.”

…

“All your vitals look normal,” Seonjae reports, taking the oximeter from his finger and double-checking it. “How are you feeling?”

“Good,” Henry lies.

“Yeah?” Seonjae asks. “I have to ask you a few more questions, if that’s alright. And we’ll you to fill out a form to hand over to Deborah on the way out. First, though, totally informally… is there anything you wanted to share? Anything odd happen? Odd feelings, odd sensations? Literally,” she says encouragingly, “anything could be of interest. Tell me what you ate for breakfast, if it felt a little stranger than usual.”

Henry hesitates, gazing into Seonjae’s expectant gaze.

“Um,” Henry says, unsure, “Well—”

Poll 

Image Descr.: A screenshot of a poll at the bottom of a Patreon post, with two options. Option One — Tell the truth. Option Two — Pretend everything is fine. Initializing... Polling... fifty percent, tell the truth. Fifty percent, pretend everything is fine. Fifty-fifty. We are tied. Indecision.

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➡️ Read POA ch005 — Indecision

Points of Articulation is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial ShareAlike 4.0 International License. It is written and created by Hannah Semmelhack, with beta-reading by Fiona Clare.