Just north of his new home, bears' smell gave way to foxes' smell, a rank, acrid sort of smell that stuck a probing thumb in his drowsiness.
He hadn't been able to sleep for days. Not a single hour. He sits on the slope of a hill, knees to his chest. His eyes are sullen and bloodshot, and beneath them are darker circles, and beneath them is a mouth set in a thoughtful, mute pucker.
Taylor considers that it might be him not wanting to fall asleep, and then he considers that he doesn't want to open that particular can of worms. Not here, not now, staring into the sun with the smell of fox scat in his nose and therefore in his mouth. Thoughts, brief phrases, memories, they snatch at his ears. He flattens them and ducks down, his chin in between his hands.
What he needs is a distraction.

He hears him before he sees him before he smells him. But it's the stranger's voice that really breaks him out of thought, and Taylor turns his head with a reptilian sluggishness.
You get used to it, he says, before catching himself. I mean, the smell. He hopes he is going to be more careful with his emotions this time. After Merrick, after Ico, he feels as if he's running out of secrets to keep. Planck wouldn't be happy, a small voice mutters in his head. He responds wordlessly, fuck Planck.
Pulling himself up, he looks at the stranger, really looks at him. He towers over him, Taylor notices, without much surprise. He also wonders if there's an overwhelming abundance of teenage boys in this place, because that's all the people he's been meeting. Not that he minds all that much. I'm fine, the bare daylight washes his face out and turns his blue eyes almost white. Just tired. Then, ...What's your name?

Looking down, chewing at his lip, Taylor notices that clear expression of embarassment. He dimly hopes that it isn't all his fault. 
Evien Kastner. He records the name in his head, pulls open a drawer full of files. In you go, Evien-or-Evie Kastner. Though addled by sleep as he was, he expects it to go missing by tomorrow. He'd remember the green eyes though. 
Taylor loved watching. And listening. And acting like he didn't take up any space, which was usually a fruitless endeavour. I'm Taylor Fields, he recites. But everyone calls me Fields. It really was turning into muscle memory. That made it all the more easier for him. The thing about having a brother that was on the hunt for you was that you got good at faking IDs and never having a home and sleeping in other peoples' cars.
I live with some friends just south, he gestures with his chin, knowing that this wasn't a lie, for once. He dimly hopes that he can keep it together. I'd rather put my foot through a beehive than live here. There we go, there's some humor! There's the Wolfram charisma! Taylor flattens his ears again, though he knows that there's no point in trying to mute that dialogue.

It's nice to meet you, Fields. Small talk! He could never decide if he loved it or hated it. But Evien seemed to be relaxing after the turbulent takeoff— something that Taylor was grateful for. He'd spent too much of his life with people acting like they constantly had crosshairs pointed at their heads. (The main culprit, of course, was himself.)
In spite of himself, he's laughing. Again, there was nothing Taylor was more comfortable doing than listening, and Evie seemed to be comfortable doing the talking.
Then a question is posed, and the gears in his brain start with a petulant whirr. Wanted to take a nap. I mean, I haven't been able to sleep recently. The whirring in his head grows louder. Hoped that maybe the smell would knock me out. See, he's half-joking. 

Evien's sudden insistence on finding him some proper rest both amuses and slightly irritates Taylor. Distantly, he can hear his brother's voice, berating him. There's nothing he wants more to do than tear himself out of this body. This head. 
He wonders if he slams his skull hard enough on a surface, if the brain will spill out of his ears. He wonders if he holds his breath for long enough, if it'll hurt to breathe water.
There's no time to dwell on these things. Wordlessly, Taylor bites down on the inside of his cheek and walks beside Evien with languid strides of his disproportionate teenage legs, away from the fox shithole and towards breathable air.