Pieces and Quiet on a Silent Night: CHAPTER 2 CASE

Okay, Root was not doing fine. The hallucinations were getting increasingly odd. There were times when he'd see his dad and he would whisper in his ear that everyone was out to get him, and he needed to get away. But his mom was always there, telling him it was alright. And that was the only way he kept sane, or at least as sane as someone who talked to people in his head could be. He only wished that he could see his sister, but his mind would not let him see her, talk to her. He wanted to tell her what was going on, what was happening, but never did she appear.

He managed to convince his mom that he and Willow were not a thing, though she was still convinced that he had a thing for Willow because why else would he have kissed him? Ah well, it didn't matter. Root stayed away from Mariko most of this time, because he was trying to decide how to approach her after such a fail in the last trial, how he obviously couldn't be her confidence because his confidence was fake. However, after talking with Willow, he decided he would approach her again, but he needed the right words. It was so hard to concentrate. He would write several sentences down apologizing to Mariko, and then write something about a black hole, and then write something about the brain, but he didn't know where those other things came from, since he was trying to focus on what to say to Mariko.

Root kept away from the water. Though he would occasionally try to go near the bodies of water, he never managed to force himself to get any closer. With the amount of sleep deprivation, he was going through, he needed to sleep before he even got close enough he could drown, for even when he was well rested, he would have a high chance of drowning and he preferred not to die.

Today, Root had decided finally to just approach Mariko, his mother encouraging him to do what his heart told him to, and the lack of sleep lead to a dip in logic and well, he wasn't as afraid, somehow to approach her when he was like this. Maybe this was like, sleep drunkenness. Anyways, he went looking for Mariko, and he spotted her not too far away down the pathways. However, she walked up to the entrance of the log flume and Root stared for several moments, hiding at the side.

Until she screamed. He paused for a moment as a couple people went past to find out what the scream was for, before finally Root's mind comprehended what had happened and Root jumped into action, dashing up to the log flume where he and Alexia had shared a good conversation a few days before. It took him a moment to notice the head in the log and Mariko obviously affected by the discovery. Root stared, not knowing how to react. It was… different when he would study the brains of dead people, because they were already dead and he didn't know them, but… Saoirse.

He was speechless, and it wasn't normal for him to be speechless. Normally he'd have words of comfort for Mariko or the others around him, or some sarcastic comment or joke. But his mind could not think of words to say, and he was logical enough to not speak the words on his mind which were mostly sentence fragments.