“Relkir? Is everything alright?”
The family home was full of life today. Gath was doing at-home care with baby Retvik, and the schedules of Litvir and Relkir had coincided, meaning they both somehow had the day off at the same time. Because of this, Gath had decided to do a family meal together, and had completely taken over the kitchen while Relkir did art and drawing with the kids.
Of course, Retvik being a baby, they had gotten paint all over themselves, so Relkir had taken Retvik upstairs to clean them up. Litvir in the mean time had decided to tidy up the art stuff, then help Gath with the cooking. Gath had picked out some interesting things, namely an exotic meat, something called a ‘milkbird’, and they were now roasting it in the oven alongside a lot of vegetables and potatoes, and Gath was also making macaroni cheese and a rich gravy to go with it.
However, after about ten minutes, both Gath and Litvir realised that things were oddly quiet. There was very little movement coming from upstairs. Not wanting Gath to get too worried, Litvir suggested that maybe Retvik had fallen asleep, and that they would go up and check on both their dada and their little ba while Gath kept an eye on the stove, since Litvir didn’t really know how to cook.
Litvir didn’t rush upstairs. That would have made Gath concerned. They headed up slowly and carefully, then made their way to the bathroom. Litvir’s telepathy did already tell them that their little sibling was fine, but they couldn’t help but smile as Retvik lit up, as Litvir entered the room.
“Ba! Ba! Bubub!”
Retvik was sitting in a recently emptied bath, playing with the leftover bubbles from their bath. They were squeaky clean and very happy, amusing themselves and putting the bubbles on their head and their bath toys.
“Yes, bubub!”
“Ba! Play!”
“I will in a moment, little ba…”
Litvir remained smiling, to cover their unease. While Retvik was absolutely fine and unaware that anything was wrong, the same was definitely not true for Relkir. Relkir was also sitting down, but they were sitting in the corner of the bathroom, knees held against their chest, arms wrapped around themselves, eyes sealed shut and utterly frozen in fear.
A telepathic feel suggested that Relkir hadn’t noticed Litvir come in, that Relkir hadn’t really noticed anything in general. They were non-responsive. Worse, that telepathic feel told Litvir that Relkir was getting Defensive Stance bubbles.
“Dada…” Litvir whispered as they edged closer. “Dada, can you talk?”
Relkir blinked. They glanced at Litvir, then shuddered and held themselves more tightly.
“Dada, you are scared. I want to help you. Can I help you?”
Some hesitation. Relkir was struggling to speak. Eventually, they looked up at Litvir properly, then nodded.
“Alright. I am going to come close and kneel down next to you. Can I do that?”
A small nod. Upon closer inspection, Litvir noticed that Relkir was crying. Litvir did as they said they would and kneeled down next to Relkir.
“May I touch you?”
This time, Relkir shook their head. As they did so, Litvir noticed those little time glows around Relkir’s eyes. While Relkir had learned to hide the glows on the visible light spectrum, Litvir could see past both ends of the visible spectrum and those glows were definitely visible on ultraviolet and infrared.
“Why not?” Litvir asked.
Relkir opened their mouth to speak, but nothing came out. They shivered again, then clammed up.
“Dada, whatever is wrong, I will help you. Same way you help me. But like you said to me a long time ago, you have to let me help you.”
Relkir nodded a little, accepting what Litvir was saying, but they remained silent. Luckily, Litvir had alternate ways to communicate with people.
“Dada, may I come in, so you can talk to me that way?”
More hesitation, followed by a nod.
“Alright. Thank you. I will be gentle.”
Relkir tensed up briefly as Litvir held their hand above them, but quickly stopped, as they realised Litvir wasn’t going to hurt them. However, before Litvir said anything or tried to prompt Relkir to speak, they glanced at Relkir’s recent memories and very swiftly pulled away. Whatever it was they saw was blurry and hard to comprehend, but it was clearly some sort of time thing that Litvir didn’t quite understand. What they did understand though was that Relkir needed a special sort of help. Help that Litvir couldn’t provide.
“Dada?”
Relkir looked up, tears in their eyes again.
“I know you are scared, but we cannot stay here. I need to take you to see Kyr Dalosisaar, so he can help you work out what you are seeing, and so we can make you feel better. But I also know you do not want mama knowing. So I will tell mama that you have the flub again and I will take you to the doctor. I will tell them that we do not want to make mama and little ba sick again, so we are going, just us two, just in case. Is that alright?”
Some hesitation. Relkir rubbed their eyes, then sniffed.
“Dada, will you let me take you?”
Relkir looked up at Litvir some more. They finally managed to utter a single word. “Scared.”
“I know you are scared, dada. But we will fix things. We always fix things!”
Relkir didn’t respond. Instead, they glanced to the bathtub, where Retvik was still amusing themselves with their bath toys and the remaining bubbles.
“Ah…” Litvir realised what Relkir was hinting at. “Alright. Stay here for a moment. I will sort out Retvik and take them down to mama. Then I will come back, put a face mask on you and help you downstairs so we can go to the doctor. Does that sound good?”
Relkir took a deep breath, then accepted Litvir’s words. Satisfied, Litvir got up, grabbed a towel then headed over to the bath.
“Little ba, it is time to dry off!” Litvir smiled.
“Ba! Bubub gone!” Retvik seemed to complain. Most of the bubbles had gone down the drain.
“Sadly, bubbles go away on their own. Do you want to go see mama?”
“Yes! Mama! Want!”
“Well, we have to dry you off, first! Can you put your arms up?”
Retvik did as they were told. Litvir quickly wrapped Retvik up in a towel, dried them off as best they could, dried off one of the bath toys then picked Retvik up, ready to take them downstairs. Before they did so though, they glanced back at Relkir, who was trying to pick themselves up.
“I will be back in a moment, alright, dada? I just need to take Retvik to mama.”
Relkir whispered a thank you. Litvir smiled, then carried Retvik off. Retvik waved at Relkir as they left the room, not bothered at all because they didn’t know what was going on.
“You will be fine, dada…” Litvir muttered. “I promise…”