The four of them walk around town together, having decided to take a stroll to really see the sights one last time. Though, the ‘decision’ wasn’t exactly that for everyone. Fresh had to beg and plead with Jubilee, in order to convince them to go outside with the rest of them. Jubilee had joked that it was embarrassing to be seen out in public with them. Fresh cried.

After that, Jubilee had little choice but to give in. They really are getting soft.

“Where are we going?” they ask.

“We’re walking,” explains Fresh, looking over at Jubilee.

“To where?”

Fresh shrugs. “We’re just walking so that we can walk.”

Basil holds out her arms to Jubilee. “Would you like me to carry you? I’m used to carrying kids.”

Jubilee glares at her. “Only if you want to leave the mountain with fewer fingers than you arrived with.” In truth, Fresh knows that Jubilee is just a little cranky. Veli didn’t take the news well at all. The fairy had assumed straight off of the bat that they were leaving because he hasn’t been working hard enough. Logically, that idea obviously doesn’t make sense. But logic wasn’t at play in that conversation. It broke Fresh’s heart to hear, especially when he promised Jubilee to do better. This hurt her even more, because she knows that he had been trying his best without fail for weeks now, even with his broken arm that was finally starting to heal.

Basil had been off-put by it as well and even if the priestess doesn’t say anything, Fresh knows that, as someone who has been abandoned and has abandoned others, the topic sits deeply in her heart as well.

Fresh giving him one of the heartstone-rings didn’t help alleviate his grief. Given the way he broke down in the store, they might as well have told him that everything he loves is dead and maybe that’s exactly what they did. She doesn’t know if he has much to do outside of the purpose that he had defined for himself with his work, in all honesty. He took a lot of pride in it. The fact that he would be in charge of the new enterprise, that he would be given legal control of a full-fledged human house didn’t seem to help him either. The house and the business aren’t what he wanted.

As the four of them walk quietly down along the river, stopping occasionally to look at the windows of the many stores around themselves, or to buy a drink or a snack at a stall, Fresh can’t help but think that the fairy Veli simply wants the same thing she wanted when she was like him. He’s hungry for community, purpose, a sense of belonging. An empty house and some magical jewelry can’t replace that.

But she doesn’t know if they can offer him those things.

They don’t all know each other that well. Outside of work, they have no idea about Veli and he has no idea about them. Let alone her class and the secrecy-driven nature of their existence. Having no real, deep context of the morality of this world, he likely wouldn’t be fearful of her if they told him the truth. But who’s to say that that itself wouldn’t cause a problem? What if he, in his fairy excitement, says something he shouldn’t say to the wrong person? What if he does something he shouldn’t do? What if his actions, born of a desperation for belonging, born of a desire to prove his worthiness, causes trouble for her new life?

Fresh stops, staring down at the reflection in the water, at the wobbly visage staring back up her way. That last doubt of hers rings around her mind, over and over, filling her with a deep sense of irony and shame. Hadn’t she done all of those things herself?

And now here she is, worried that someone else is going to do what she herself has done, because this time, it could inconvenience her. Just like she had inconvenienced Jubilee. But Jubilee had let her do it.

She really is very selfish, isn’t she? Looking back up towards her friends who have stopped walking, perhaps wondering why she was just standing there, she realizes that if Jubilee has become too soft from her presence, then maybe she herself was becoming too hard in some senses, too greedy. This new life of hers, she might be clutching it too tightly and if she keeps squeezing, she might end up strangling it instead of simply keeping it held firm.

In reality, maybe that hardness is exactly what she needs to have, in order for them to survive and to thrive like she wants them to. But Fresh doesn’t and never has lived based on the foundations of pragmatic reality. Pragmatic reality is what has made the world that they’re in so horrible to begin with.

“Fuck off,” says Jubilee, perhaps having already seen the lines form beneath the corners of her eyes, as she scrunches her face, about to ask an uncomfortable question. Perhaps they had seen the fidgeting of her arm, rubbing the other in a familiar tick, or perhaps Jubilee simply knows her too well at this point. “We’re not doing it. The last thing I need is another one of you babies to corral.”

Basil crosses her arms. “It might do you some good to actually do some work though,” states the priestess. Shamrock’s hand lowers itself down, blocking Jubilee, who looks like they’re about to push Basil into the river.

Both of them look up at Shamrock. The man speaks, throwing in his opinion into the conversation, the topic of which they all know about already without stating it. “He did a lot of push-ups.”

“What does that have to do with anything?!” barks Jubilee.

Shamrock shrugs. Basil sighs, not having a clear answer either to the dilemma, apparently. Fresh however, has made up her mind.

“Let’s ask Veli to come with us,” she says.

Basil yelps and Jubilee lets out an annoyed grunt as Shamrock picks both of them up with a hand each and sets them down in front of Fresh, so that they can speak with quieter voices.

“If you pick me up again, I’m going to sell your armor to the forge,” snaps Jubilee at the man. Basil doesn’t say anything, simply dusting herself off. Fresh assumes she’s gotten used to the hoisting at this point.

“Not my helmet,” says Shamrock, tapping his head. Jubilee glares up at him. “- Because you can’t rea-”

*Kaduuung*

Jubilee’s boot kicks against his shin, interrupting his sentence.

“Come on guys, let’s not fight,” laughs Fresh. “We need to talk about this.”

Jubilee’s glare turns her way again. “It’s a bad idea. Talk over,” they say.

“What do you guys think?” asks Fresh, looking at Basil and Shamrock.

“I don’t know,” sighs Basil.

“He did a lot of sit-ups too,” explains Shamrock, lifting a finger.

Jubilee steps on his foot. “That isn’t relevant!”

Shamrock looks down at Jubilee. “More sit-ups than you.”

“I don’t do sit-ups!” says Jubilee, placing their hands on their hips.

Shamrock does something that Fresh hadn’t expected the man to do. He lowers himself down, placing a single finger against Jubilee’s stomach and poking it ever so slightly. “You should.” Basil snorts, covering her mouth very quickly.

“If we get rid of you, we might have a slot open after all,” states Jubilee in a cold, emotionless voice, leaning in forward against his finger to prove a point.

“Hidden beauty must be preserved,” says the man, his breastplate heaving. “Even if none can see it. For we know it is there.”

Jubilee continues to glare at him, but then quietly looks away, crossing their arms. “Shut up.”

“What a save,” laughs Basil. Jubilee grumbles something inaudibly.

Fresh blinks, her finger scratching her cheek. She isn’t really sure what just happened, but she thinks it’s cute.

“It’s dangerous,” explains Basil, seeing that she’s waiting for their conversation to continue.

“I know,” replies Fresh.

“This carries great risk,” says Shamrock.

“Mm!” nods Fresh, knowing that already too.

Jubilee sighs. “Whatever, who even gives a fuck anymore?”

“You’re the best, Jubilee!” beams Fresh, knowing that this is just Jubilee’s way of agreeing to her question. Fresh is delighted. The four of them make their way through town, heading towards the gate to find Veli.