#gricko mentioned but not necessary tag

[ouaw-facts-i-just-made-up]

Not so much a headcannon but more so speculation based on canon??

In episode 12 Frost's fear had a ton of emphasis on being alone with no one to talk to after losing all of his friends suddenly and violently. I assume on the index card Derek wrote on, he specified that Frost would start to feel insane and start making up friends in his head to talk to.

My theory is that he felt that way in the psionic order. Without any close relationships of any kind he probably started to experience some sort of derealization and imagined what he would say if he even had friends to talk to. After leaving the place he's terrified something bad happening that would pull him back into that monotony that made him feel crazy.

I think that's what Derek might've been trying to hint at with Frost's deepest fears but that's just a theory.

This is a true Speculation-Based-On-Canon.

I had a similar thought about it that he might experience some intense version of maladaptive daydreaming.

It's actually something I thought he might have done as a child (perhaps I'll make a separate hc for that?), where he wasn't necessarily isolated but struggled with friendships, so he was stuck in his mind a lot, thinking up friends that liked and understood him.

Perhaps that's why he was picked in the first place? Obviously one who stays in their mind a lot *and* has the ability to use psionics is going to have a leg up. Who cares if that's not actually really that good for the child and their mental health?

And so after losing his parents he *really* disconnects. Great student, very skilled, but always feels like he's not really there, or nothing around him is really...real. It feels like whatever he thinks about in his head is far more real that his studies.

And the brief period that he was probably fully alone for the first time when he left probably didn't help. Not much to do except delve into your mind day in day out.

After meeting with Gricko (and Hootsie!) He was finally having real actual human(oid) interactions again. It was weird. But slowly he felt like his grip on reality was mending itself. He is real. This conversation is real. This odd sense of companionship is real. And he still likes to think and be in his mind, honing his skills sort of, but he takes more breaks, remembers that food exists, that sleep is necessary, that there's another person out there that wants to hear what he has to say.

And the thought of losing that? The idea that his reality could be snuffed out and he'd have to return to living solely within his own mind? By himself for eternity?

That's terrifying