Work Text:
Night 131-134:
It had been close to three months without any noticeable change in Nick’s functioning, and Zoldrak was beginning to fear that Nick would never improve further. He'd made no progress in researching something to help, either.
Tierza had started her next term of classes, but she’d taken to visiting every weekend to help out with Nick. Often, she brought course materials with her so she could get some studying in.
Right now, though, it was the middle of the week, so Nick and Zoldrak were alone. Which meant coming home from work, getting an hour or two of sleep before sunset—which was coming sooner and sooner as the days grew shorter—and then waking up to change, feed and change Nick again before settling him down to watch TV while Zoldrak got more sleep.
Usually, Nick acted upset about being trapped in the crib when he first awoke, but not tonight. Zoldrak awoke to his alarm and came to find Nick sitting quietly, watching the door. He moaned as Zoldrak came in, showing his fangs.
“You hungry, buddy?” Zoldrak asked. Nick moaned again.
As Zoldrak lowered the side of the crib, Nick lay down. “Why you laying down?” Zoldrak asked, surprised. Usually, Nick tried to get out immediately, and Zoldrak had to wrestle him down to get his diaper changed.
But this time, Nick offered no resistance, watching in silence as Zoldrak changed him. When he was done, Nick moaned and got up, heading out of the room. He stopped uncertainly in the hallway.
Zoldrak led him to the kitchen, where he heated up Nick’s blood. Again, Nick watched patiently, which was unusual—usually he’d try to bat at the blood as it was being prepared, or sniff around Zoldrak contemplating biting him, but not this time.
He only reacted when the microwave beeped, moaning and moving towards the sink where Zoldrak kept the spoons. “OK, this is definitely new.” Zoldrak said. “Are you starting—” Nick moaned, “to get the routine, now, buddy?”
Nick moaned again, so Zoldrak grabbed the spoon and swirled the blood to even out the temperature, then started feeding Nick.
Over the next few nights, Nick continued to predict the routine. This caused a problem when Tierza showed up and changed things—Nick seemed confused and kept trying to wander off. Zoldrak explained what had been going on to Tierza. “I think he’s starting to understand a bit more?”
“I’ll run some tests, while we’re hanging out.” Tierza suggested.
Zoldrak went to bed gratefully. When he awoke around 3 am, Tierza told him that her tests had mostly given the same results—Nick still couldn’t recognize objects or understand any speech, and he still lacked object permanence. “But one test was different.” She said. “I tried seeing if he could recognize a pattern in a sequence of events, and react differently to an expected or unexpected ending. Last time I tested, he showed no success. But this time, he was successful with the simplest pattern.”
“So, he can predict a pattern?” Zoldrak asked.
“Yes.” Tierza said. “Probably only very simple patterns, or ones that are repeated a lot. Which explains why he now seems to expect the usual evening routine of looking after him and then putting him in his crib while you sleep.”
So, Nick was improving. Slowly, but he was improving.