"Levant control yourself", yumi grumbled,

she could feel the heat that was emitting off of him, and it was not comfortable, Levant glanced at her as the smile on his face slowly began to drain away, he quietly left the stage, and silently entered into the crowd, everyone drifted to one side or the other creating a path for him, he found his way to the back of the training area, which was now a washed in silence after the showing the four boys gave,

at the front of the training area, Bard had taken center stage again,

"is there any else that wants to take a gander at the glass ball ?", he asked half heartedly,

everyone in the crowd wore a defeated look on their face, as if they all knew that none of them could do any better,

"well on the plus side we can all rest knowing that those four are fighting alongside us", Amon shouted towards the crowd, trying to brighten the mood,

realizing that he couldn't he headed for the stairs to leave the stage, not before stopping next to yumi,

"i know that the battle is close but try not to let that get you to serious", Amon quietly said to her,

she sat down on the stage resting her back against the wall, and let out a depressed sigh, "

for the leader of a rebel army he really is to easy going, that's probably why Aluric is the same way", she thought to herself,

After a while the crowd began to disperse all over the training area, spreading out all over the place, many drinking, eating and dancing, and some leaving to do other things, But yumi was still on the stage quietly observing everything, and in the midst of all the partying she could spot Barak, Levant and Polaris, Drinking and dancing getting along with everyone else, as much as she scanned the area though she couldn't find Aster anywhere among the ruckus, she soon gave up chalking it up to his seriousness, and decided to climb on to the top of the wall,

Aster had left the party and had been wondering around the base, he had just been wondering around the corridors until, he passed a door that piqued his interest, it was a dark blueish gray door with bright blue lines painted over the deep etched lines in the door, and, on the door had a silver rectangular name plate with the words 'Weapons & Gear Tech' , he approached the door, and as he did he noticed the round glass ball with a flashing red light in it above the door way,

as he wondered what that could be as he stood in front of the door prepared to knock, but before he could the door slid open, inside was a poorly lit room, but from what Aster could make out, there were metal boxes packed to ceiling on each side of the room leaving a very narrow passage way to walk through, and there was a strange blue flashing light coming from the end of it, With his curiosity peeked even more now aster made his way through the narrow passage way,

Back outside at the party

Barak and Levant were Now partying with a group of guys and gals, While Polaris laid on the bench passed out, Barak in particular found himself in a drinking contest with another guy by the name of Zack, and with each passing minute zack and barak, kept on goading each other into drinking more and more, all the while Levant was next to Barak whispering in his ear that he can't lose to wimp like Zack, and the pile of jugs just kept growing and growing, until finally both of them had had enough,

zack and barak sat next to each other and began to talk, while Levant had turned his attention to a particular female that had caught his eye,

"Let the goddesses know that there is a man who can drink the heavens and may Pitros, grant him a beautiful wife", Zack shouted with his arm resting on barak's shoulder,

"whats the goddess of love got to do with anything, you know that those goddamn gods only look out for themselves", barak replied, raising his hands in the air and putting up his middle finger to the sky,

"Oh man you're right, If they did care everyone would be back here partying with us", Zack said, as he rocked back on to the table, lifting his head up to the sky,

"yeah yumi told me that there were more people but they were off base", Barak said,

"yup, before you guys got here, as soon as Amon got the letter from, Aluric, he sent out messengers to the others who were fighting in Bolterra and Argon to retreat and return as quickly as possible, for the upcoming attack on their headquarters", Zack explained,

as he continued,"but the fighting there was kinda....k...kinda", zack held his mouth and leaned over to the side of the table vomiting violently,

"right the fighting there was kinda intense and so they should be arriving at least the day before the battle, though we are all betting that those guys arrive the day of the battle", zack continued,

Barak was just sitting there amazed at how easily zack dismissed all that vomiting he just did,

"so how many would that add up to in all ?", Barak asked, but by the time he was finished asking, zack was passed out with his head on the table,

" Damn Zack you really need to learn to hold back on the drinking", Bard said as he sat at the table, placing down a Barrel of alcohol with one hand while he hels a very large jug in the next,

" I happened to hear what you and zack here were talking about", Bard said,

"yeah what about it", Barak retorted,

"nothin' , I'm glad he brought you up to speed, though he was pretty plastered while doing so", Bard said, laughing at Zack's current state,

" I'm surprised though, why does he think that the other forces won't get here til the day of the battle", Barak Asked, ,

"Well it's a little known fact around here that the guy in charge of those two forces is known for his dramatic timing", Bard explained,

The two continued on this conversation for quite a while afterwards,

Atop the wall

Yumi was still on the wall lamenting about the impending war, she had realized that while it was good to stop the guild she didn't particularly like the part of having to fight her once friend, Aluric, but as she came out of her thoughts she saw a feint light flash outside the wall from within the trees that ran along the mountain side, and not wanting to stop the party, coupled with her wanting to be alone, led her to the reckless decision of going to check it out by herself,

back with aster

After squeezing through the narrow walkway of metal boxes, which seemed like it lasted forever, Aster finally made it to a rather spacious opening that had, a giant table in the middle with a blue light flickering over it and various weapons and equipment laying on the table, and surrounding it were various pathways all made in between piles of metal boxes, and from out of one of these pathways walked out a person,

she was shorter than aster but not by much and, she wore a baggy, purple mechanics pants which were covered in oil stains, and a black long sleeved mesh shirt and a pair of oversized dark purple gloves, her hair was long and in dreadlocs all the way down to the end of her back and one side of her head was shaved, and as she removed her, protective shades, her bright purple eyes glistened in the darkness of the room,

as she gasped and shouted,"ASTER"