Windows Let You See Sunshine (draft)

Kim hit their fist against the wall. The cabin they’d found, what looked like prime fuel, was actually metal. And cold. Just painted to look like a cabin. Kim grumbled. They played with the lighter in their pocket. They were starting to see the pines burn. Leafy lollipops on fire.

Igniph’s laughter licked at their ears, low and boiling. Igniph’s hands closing around their throat and shoulder. Kim was burning up.

Fuck Igniph, Kim refused to drag the trees into this!

They kicked the door down.  \Igniph’s presence diminished, but Igniph was certainly still there.  Just more at 50% opacity.\

Somehow, a gasp rang out over Igniph’s flames.  A raccoon.  His fur was hand-clipped and invaded his eyes.  Scarred on half his face.  He drew his knees closer and lowered his eyes, but not before Kim spotted the tears inside.

Kim’s breath became a fog machine.  The raw fury Kim felt for him―nobody had the right to treat anybody this way!  Their fury shoved Igniph out of the way.

[Igniph uses no pronouns]

“Let’s get you outta here, yeah?” Kim said, gathering him up.

The kid winced at Kim’s touch.  He seemed confused when Kim put him in the truck.  Kim gently draped their coat over him.  All he had was a measly set of scrubs, he was freezing!  Kim wished they had a blanket for him instead.  Wanted to wrap him up in a blanket burrito and never let go…

Igniph just had to come a-calling again. Fucking asshole.  Kim growled.  Igniph just leered.  Kim’s hands started feeling itchy.  Their lighter started feeling like it would just pop open on its own.

Kim grabbed their fire shit and burned the damn hellhole down.  Igniph finally left, satisfied, for now.  Good riddance.

[it’s kind of hard to portray a lack of control, especially without a (neurotypical) audience being like “just control yourself, loser”. neurodivergence and mental illness are already hard to describe to people who don’t deal with those things personally. so i hope by using Igniph, people are better able to understand the lack of control some people have over their compulsions.  you may be lucky to always be in control of yourself. not everybody is]

“Got a name?” Kim said as the engine grunted awake.  June raged on, and hypothermia needed gradual treatment, so A/C was a go―as ambiance, not in the kid’s face.

The kid trembled less violently.  Granted, what he was doing before was outright murder.

[no never mind i don’t wanna talk about this on stream. just know that i’m doing the best i can in a bad situation. and i want other people who are also in bad situations to be able to draw comfort from my stories.  to be able to see people like us being loved and celebrated and heroes. because so often in media, which fuels and reflects how people treat us in real life, portray us as villains to be reviled. and that sort of thing often makes a lot of mental health problems worse. people of all neurotypes need support, including neurotypicals.  neurotypicals just have the benefit of living in a society that loves and supports them. we don’t.]

He looked out the window, slumping despairingly, making his body as small as possible.  Kim kept driving.  The bumpiness and curliness of the road kept them focused on something other than their worry.

“My partner, Ben; and our kids, they’re real creative types,” Kim said. “They can help you figure out a name you like.”

The kid looked at them, hopeful. “Really?”

“Really,” Kim nodded, smiling.  They wanted to encourage him.  They knew what it was like to never get any.

[how to type entirely under the blanket]

[eh i can’t see the keyboard T_T no warm hands for me]

He started flapping his hands and giggling.  Kim didn’t think anything of it; they were watching the road.

But then the air electrified.

Kim pulled over.  The kid’s eyes glowed a ghostly blue.  His hands were going a million times a minute, doing that warping pencil thing.  Cobalt lightning sizzled around his fingers.

Kim double-checked that they were sober before continuing on down the road.

“Do you…?” the kid started to ask.  He flinched and went back to looking at the window.

“Do I what?” Kim asked; inviting, not forcing, him to speak. Never forcing.

Kim understood he was scared.  Talking was hard enough when it was people you knew, never mind a complete stranger.

“Do you want me to not play with Lightning too?”

[to personify or not to personify, that is the question. well Kim already has a personification, might as well give Solnishko one too]

“I,” Kim started, then stopped to find the phrasing. “You go right ahead!”

The kid looked shocked.  He flapped his hands again, watching Kim.  Not going at it as fast as before, but apparently still fast enough to draw out the lightning.  But then he seemed to realized that Kim wasn’t lying or whatever damn shit his captor must’ve pulled on him in the past.  God, to make a kid about that kind of thing…  Kim wanted to rebuild that hell and burn it down again.

“Do you have any Lightnings, Kim?”

“Nah, just some piece of shit fire.”

“Oh.  Is your fire mean to you?”

Kim shrugged.  Didn’t know why Igniph was like that.  Didn’t think Igniph knew either.

[fuck what did i decide solnishko would call his captor???]

[fuck it he’s the Man with Red Lightning]

[oh that’s right: the Future Man]

[save the man with red lightning for a story title or something]

\”Flintlock has Red Lightning.”

“And you got Blue Lightning?”

The kid made an affirmative noise. “Red Lightning doesn’t wanna be with Flintlock anymore, but it’s stuck now.  It thought Flintlock needed its protection.  The old me had Yellow Lightning, but then came from the future”\

[hmm… this exposition doesn’t feel appropriate. solnishko did just meet them.]

[stuffy break]

[it’s important to take some time out of your stream to play with your stuffies instead of leaving them abandoned on your shelves all the time XD ]

[oh cool we’re past 2 hours]

[the garage]

The quiet after that felt so damn good.

Curvy roads along a seaside route gave Kim plenty of time to figure out how to tell Ben “by the way, our new family member is a lab rat”.  Naturally, Kim spent that time enjoying the quiet instead.  The roll of the wind and waves, the rumble of the engine, and the static of the lightning.

The kid spent most of it either playing with his lightning or looking out the window.  The sun and moon were making out at the end of the moon’s shift, but by the time Kim pulled into the garage, the moon had gone home.

[gonna take a nap. might stream again at 8 (hour and 15 from now). i’m a lil tired RN haha]

[but i hope y’all enjoyed the stream ❤ i’m liking how the story’s going now. it feels more true to the character of the original while accounting for the growth i’ve done as a writer and as a person since then]

[we shall raid… omg miktastic is streaming super mario sunshine fuck yes!!]