Cellum is gone for the next few days. I drift through them, moving on autopilot. Speaking to Equinox at the meetings is the only break in the blank dullness.
“Right guys, I have some exciting news to announce,” Jodie says from the front of the room, interrupting our conversations. “At the end of the week you will receive your final assessment, that decides whether you are fit to return to society. Between now and then, we will be helping you contact family or friends, and organise a place to stay. Before our next meeting, have a think about what you might want to do when you leave, and who you want to contact first. See you then!”
The atmosphere in the room picks up, the buzz of conversation gaining an excited tone. Everyone seems to have friends or family that they plan to get in touch with - everyone except me. Guess I’m the unlucky one again.
“What will you do Ben?”
“Well, Cellum offered me to stay at theirs. Other than that, I don’t really know. Are you going back to your family?”
“Yes, and I am looking forward to seeing them again. It has been a long time.”
“That it has. I hope they can figure out how to make your house suitable for a giant bird.”
“I am sure they will have had some ideas. They are resourceful.”
We bid our goodbyes and I wander back to my room, wondering if Cellum has had any ideas about changing their house to fit a giant wolf man. Hopefully Sandwich didn’t help them with the designs. I smirk. That would be a disaster.
The smile drops from my face when I let myself think about anything further than the house. While I’m looking forward to getting out of here, I dread it too. Most of all what everyone is going to think - about me, and about Cellum for taking me in. And whether it’ll be safe for them, though I guess that’s what the assessment is to make sure. You’ve got to admit, they have been careful. Maybe they can handle the magic they’re messing with…no, no chance of that. We’re just edited humans. Investigating the magic is like investigating the wind, or radiation, only no-one has any idea at all how any of it works. One can only hope they can stay fairly safe while doing whatever it is they’re doing.
Cellum is back the next day. They apologise for their absence, and grin at my frantically wagging tail. “Happy to see me, eh? Sorry I was gone so long, I had a, uh, a project. To work on. Which needed more supervision than Sandwich could provide.”
I type as I bark out a laugh. Having a speech app makes it easier to talk and laugh at the same time, I guess. “Is it something I’ll get to see?”
“Oh, yeah, hopefully.”
“At the end of this week?”
“It’s that soon! Goodness me, I’m glad I took that time off - can’t have you come home to an unfinished house, now, can I? I’d be a terrible host.”
“You’d be a brilliant host I think. In general. Ignoring the state of the house.”
“You think? Well that’s good, because I’m the host you’re gonna have to put up with. Anything interesting happen while I was gone?”
“No, not really. Just a few nightmares.”
“Oh you poor thing. That had to happen while I was gone didn’t it? I’d offer to fix you some way to contact me if you need me, but since you’ll be moving into my house in a few days, I don’t think that’s really necessary at this point.”
“Thanks for the offer though. You are staying until then, right?”
“Yeah, unless the deliveries particularly require me to wait at home to receive them. Probably could’ve sent them here really, and driven them home.”
“Deliveries?”
“Yeah, like a bed and a chair for you, and a taller table. I’d better order myself a taller chair too, come to think of it.”
“Would those even fit in your car?”
“Well, they’d be flat-packed, of course, so…possibly?”
I laugh, and they do too. Then they fumble in their pockets and pull out their phone.
“Do you want to see the plans? I can’t show you pictures of the actual house yet - it’s not painted, that’s happening today and tomorrow - but this’ll be how it mostly looks like.”
I look at the screen as they scroll through the images. The main focus of the plans seems to have been making the whole house taller - it’s a bungalow, so that wouldn’t have been difficult. Doorways are as tall and wide as the ones here, an easy fit for me, and the guest room extends more into the garden.
“It didn’t even have an ensuite before, so I got that added too - upscaled of course. No use you trying to use my tiny toilet. And you should have enough room to put other things in there with the bed and still be able to move around the room, which is quite helpful. The rest was enlarged a bit too, and I basically took out the inside walls, except the load-bearing ones - well, you’ll see when you get there.”
“Sounds like a lot of work just for me.”
“Ah, well, I’d been wanting to get some work done anyway. I was planning on just a paint job, but instead I got a cool new living room, so I’m not complaining!”
“Bet it was expensive.”
“Oh, not as much as it would’ve been. This place offered to pay for home alterations up to a certain amount.”
“Well that’s nice of them. They got us out, they may as well pay for our continued existence.”
Cellum laughed. “You’re still not convinced by this whole thing, are you?”
“Of course not. They cut down an ancient and infamously dangerous forest, decided that the best thing to do with the creatures that were once human is to rehabilitate them and reintegrate them into society, and to try to study and control the magic that made us monsters in the first place. They’re either dangerously clever or dangerously stupid, and I don’t know which option scares me more.”
“Oh, Ben. They have your best interests at heart. I’m sure it will all work out ok in the end.”
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