"So you're telling me we've spent our entire lives working on this, and even now its not ready?"

"No, it's ready. Just - it has a few kinks to work out."

"What in the Nineteen fucking Hells do you mean a few kinks to work out?"

Several loud, displeased voices sounded through the room. It was a room with unblemished white walls, with the floor embossed with several magical diagrams. Complex, mind-bendingly detailed symbols interwoven together to create an image of complete and utter power.

"I can't f-" The voice silenced itself with a sigh. "I can't believe that after we threw our lives away all those years ago, worked on this project, that there's still things we need to fix..."

"To be fair, we could fix these things as we go along... little updates, patches. Things like that."

The room went silent, and then every person broke out in laughter. It wasn't a sarcastic laugh, either. They all had genuine happiness to them, and those who weren't laughing at the start broke and eventually smiled at the least.

"Fair, fair," said one of the voices, "I suppose I didn't think of that."

"None of us did it seems. You're fine. We can pass Frontier off now, I suppose. We'll fix it as we go along."

And with that, the collective paused for a long moment.

"Have we figured out how to implement it? How we'll choose the first users?"

With that, one of the voices came forward, a physical form this time. A scarlet cloak and robe, as they pulled their hood down off of their head.

"On those topics, I have an idea. We should not grant the system to confirmed criminals. We can verify these ourselves, or we can have Frontier do that for us. And, the first users should be chosen via lottery, or a simple game of chance."

This caused several voices to accede, and another form appeared, pulling her hood down. They opened their mouth for a moment, before closing it and pulling their hood back up; but the voice of that woman spoke nonetheless.

"The implementation is fine but... have we confirmed the world, or worlds, we'll use?" Again, the first figure to appear spoke.

"How about we let Frontier choose? It should determine what planet is good enough to use for them - for us. I, for one, would like to moderate the world - not alone of course, I'm the newest member after all." The form shrugged in a noncommittal sort of way. With a sigh, he pulled his hood over his head. "If none of you are willing to admin the world with me, you're giving me, the newest member, free reign over the creatures, the people, and whatever is there before the users arrive, you realize this right?"

Without hesitation, everyone agreed that they would give him the chance. He could ask for the assistance he needed of course, whenever he wished for it they were all good friends made over the past several centuries after all. The meeting soon came to an end, and every voice quieted until there were none left in that pale, white room.

"Another day, another discussion ended. I hope that people enjoy Frontier."

It was the middle of the work day, I was on break and the bar was somewhat empty now and the ones who remained were those who like to drink in the relative quiet the bar offered compared to others, or the employees; myself included. I couldn't help but sigh. In the back room, I was sipping on a Capri Sun, Strawberry Kiwi flavoured of course. I popped a breath mint into my mouth after I finished it off, leaning back on a chair. I couldn't help but smile weakly. I love my job, I really do, but sometimes when the customers attempted to get handsy with my coworker, I got tired of having to step in for her. One of these days I'd have to tell Cait to grow a pair of tits and stand up for herself eventually. But she was just so cute it was difficult to make her do anything.

As I sat still on a slightly uncomfortable chair, I opened up my phone and browsed the internet, checked Twitch, and some whatever bullshit news I could find. It always entertained me to no end when she found an article about something serious, only to have it turn out to be complete and utter crap.

"Hey Ki," came a woman's voice, causing me to almost choke on my drink. "oh, my bad, should have knocked." Their smile, although contagious and pointlessly gorgeous, irked me for some reason. Maybe it was the fact that they actually knocked on the door after they said that. Maybe not.

It was definitely the fact that she just knocked.

"Hey Lacey." I responded, still clearing my throat from the unexpected influx of Capri Sun down my windpipe. She moved to the opposite of me and sat down, chin on her palm as she narrowed her eyes slightly. I... really hoped that she was just going to strike up a conversation, and not the usual attempt at a hook-up.

"So... how'd you deal with the last one to mess with Cait?" They asked and I could swear I let out a breath of relief.

"I tossed him out after he paid for his drink and I almost kicked him, but held back." I shrugged. "I'm not really a fighter." For some reason that got a snicker out of her.

"You're a terrible liar. I can always see the satisfaction, and then dissatisfaction when you're about to start a fight, only for you to hold back and just toss them out. If this was a novel, I'd say you were a battle-junkie." I let my actual dissatisfaction show by way of me groaning to her accurately describing how I thought. She giggled, I eventually cracked and giggled too, and then my alarm went off. Looking down I saw my break was over and I groaned as I stood up.

"Well, you have a nice break, Lacey." I breathed as I opened the door to head back to the bar.

"And you work hard Ki. Work as hard as I would work you."

"AND I'm gone!"

I realized soon after that she had planned that entire thing. But I didn't let it get to me too much, as I returned to work to find Cait smiling and working her drinks to newcomers and returnee's alike. A new person walked in, with a strange get-up that I had to admit almost made me laugh. They wore a red coat with white down the back of their spine and the sides of their arms, and it hid their face just enough that I could only tell they were a man. Or were they... I lied I couldn't tell worth a damn.

They sat down at the bar and I walked over, grabbing a clean glass and pouring it with water in front of them.

"Need anything? We've got alcohol, alcohol, and more alcohol." The person with the hood looked up, eyes wide and mouth slightly open, before he lowered his hood. And shit... he's hot.

His eyes were a golden hue and I could swear they began to glow at certain points. His hair was a pretty brown and they had that look that made you want to drag your hands through them just by how soft it seemed. His face was extremely cute, but it also had that sexy quality to it, leaving me almost reeling and making my heart throb. I think. He had those pinchable cheeks and I was sure he would get angry if I tried. Looking no older than myself, I couldn't tell you how much I wanted to pat his head. But I really wanted to pat his head.

"I'll have something... light?" And he was a light drinker, alright.

"I'll have something for you right away." I told him and turned around and took stock of what we had. I began to grab some things, poured some crushed ice into a cup, Club Soda, Peach Schnapps, and a small amount of Vodka. I poured it all into a glass, put it on a coaster, and put that in front of him. "Sex in the Driveway for you then. And, despite how it sounds, I'm not propositioning it, just the name of the drink." I chuckled. Yeah, sure, he was sexy in a cute way, but I am not tossing away my V-Card so quickly. Gotta get that wizard status!

I sighed mentally when I realized how stupid that thought was. Truth be told I'd just never held a relationship for long, at most for around two months before I got dumped. They never gave me a reason, either, so that always got in the way of my mood. After college, I just gave up. I'd find someone eventually.

The man, or boy, I couldn't tell how old he was - but he had to give his id at the entrance, so he had to at least be legal. The man-boy looked up from his drink after taking a few sips and silently smacked his lip.

"It tastes... citrus-y." He said.

"That's the goal. Light, tastes good, and you won't get a headache, I hope." I chuckled, and it seemed a bit contagious, as he let out his own as well.

"Well, Kiera, I hope your day goes well, I suspect life will be quite hectic soon." He said, placing a couple of bucks on the counter before he simply seemed to disappear.

Is this what they call a Grey Man? What the hell... and how did he know my name?!

After shaking myself out of my thoughts, I looked down at the drink, grabbed a straw, and took a sip. No one had to know I took a drink during work. Nope!

… This tastes terrible... I forgot I hated drinking alcohol. How did I forget I hate drinking alcohol?

Bewildered, I kept the drink on the coaster and put it off to the side, wrote a note saying:

Do NOT touch this drink. - Kiera

I think it got my point across.

The day passed by, uneventful save for what happened with the cosplay-dude. Time passed. And passed. And passed some more until it became closing time. Cait, Lacey, and the only other employee working at my time, Joseph, all walked out after cleaning up. We were all good friends, flat-mates and went to the same college. All-in-all, we're pretty tight-knit I think. As the streetlamps illuminated the sidewalks, we walked beneath their light. I had the joy of looking up towards the sky and taking in a deep breath of the air. That cold, refreshing air that Washington almost always had. The smell of lavender bushes beside us as we walked down the street together, and the sounds of crickets slowly picking up. As I was lost in my little world, Cait grabbed my shoulder and pulled me back.

"Alright, guess I'm here now." I said before looking forward. There was a... I'd like to say a man, but I couldn't be sure. They were lanky, with long arms and what seemed to be a knife in their hand.

"Just hand over your money, and nobody gets hurt!" He yelled, definitely a he by the sound of their voice. Brandishing his knife, the light glinted off of the blade from the lamp, and shone onto his eyes, perfectly showing us his dilated pupils.

Huh, plot convenience and cliché. I like it. I thought. I couldn't tell what drugs he was hopped up on, but I could tell it made him irrational, as most tend to do, I think. Joseph barked at him to back off, which only seemed to incense him. Want to know how I knew? Because he made a mad dash towards Joseph, knife at the ready.

Now, I'm not proud of what I did. Joseph was a pretty big guy, mostly muscle, but he had some brains there somewhere, and he is a complete sweet heart. I'm sure he could have just bat his hand away and all that, but I couldn't help it. It was as if instinct bade me to jump in front of him.

With a sudden realization of what I just did, I crossed my arms as fast as I could, and a moment later, I found out just how stupid I was.

A searing pain ran through my wrists, and letting loose a muffled scream as I grit my teeth so hard I was sure that I heard them crack, I looked down slightly with tears forming, I saw just how bad it was. A small amount of the blade wasn't in my arms, and I could see that it was fucking serrated. My breathing sped up before I felt another pang of pain hit me. I tried to move my hands away from my chest, only to find out first hand that not only is the knife serrated to high heaven, it's also a long fucking blade. My wrists were currently pinned to my chest as it were. Now, I don't have big breasts, I'm pretty flat really, but this bastard just happened to stab between them both, as if life was mocking me over my almost non-existent titties. Well fuck you too cunt!

I slowly came back to reality, adrenaline hitting me like a freight train, as I saw the would-be robber running off into the distance as Cait panicked around me and Joseph was calling the ambulance. But, life isn't so kind as to let me off with a stab to the wrist. I chuckled at my own terrible joke as I looked back up to the stars, the warm sensation dripping and flowing down my arms and chest.

Oh, this is going to hurt like a bitch when I wake up...