Snippets from WIP "Mind-Hopper"

[blue_mouse]

(AKA the project I'm consulting lb_lee on.)

Quick info! Speculative fiction story about rescuing a mind-entity. Featuring a cast of PoC, mixed-race, non-binary, plural and singlet characters.

Also in this story: Scrappy espionage attempts, slice-of-life humor, criticisms of systemic inequalities, and many gently surreal moments.
 

Opening scene:

“Kei. Darrell’s in trouble.” The voice of Rinth, from the Meadows System, came through my cellphone.

I lowered my glass of shiso juice, ice cubes clinking, taking this in. Darrell… in trouble? Was Darrell lost on his way to a book convention? Was Darrell attempting to watch an acclaimed psychological thriller and having to take a breather? Did a too-trendy cafe overwhelm Darrell and was he now mournfully standing outside and wishing he could somehow get a cup of tea?

I clunked my glass down on the table, as more serious scenarios ran through my mind. “Wait, Rinth – did some white people do something? Or – Rinth, is Darrell okay?”

“Darrell’s…? Maybe okay?” said Rinth. It was a rather weak assurance. “But he sent an odd text. Asking us, Casa Meadows, for help. For plurality help, specifically.”

“What?” Neither Darrell nor I are plural. What’s a singlet like Darrell asking the Meadows system for help with?

“Yeah, all of us here are confused about it,” agreed Rinth. “Kei, you work in the same company as Darrell, right? I think we need your help getting to where Darrell is, right now.”

“You mean, at work? At Lamerie Support?”

“No, he’s somewhere else I think. ‘Contract work at Synapsens’… Does this sound familiar?”

I sat up. “Wait. Maybe.” I pushed my shiso drink away.

After a few more questions and exchanges, we hung up. I knew I needed to get ready to meet the Meadows Crew. But I took a moment to look around my kitchen, one last time.

My day off. White morning light streaming in, reflecting off the pale walls, hitting the leaves of my herbs and making them glow bright yellow-green. The air still smelled of the shiso leaves I had been boiling. The counter cluttered with a packet of citric acid, silverware and chopsticks. My half-washed glass, pink with juice, sitting in the sink.

Something told me I should savor and remember this peaceful moment, because things were going to become strange.

The title or passage may change.

*****


Kei and Darrell snippet, which may end up in final story:

One time, I turned to Darrell, looked him in the eye, and said something like: “I lost my gender in Ohio.”

Darrell looked back at me askance, because I was saying random things again. Nevertheless, he asked, “...When were you in Ohio?”

 “I’ve flown over the state at least once,” I noted. “That’s when I misplaced my gender. It must have slipped out of the airplane, though the escape hatch.”

Darrell thought about this. He finally followed up with, “I lost my gender at the bottom of the sea, in a conch shell that never existed.”

Darrell and I have a lot of differences. Our tastes in movies, for instance, have little overlap. It wasn’t until we watched our 6th movie together that this finally dawned on me. However, the fact that we can chatter freely and flippantly about gender things is a comfort and one of the facets in our friendship.