"Get up, you're going to stain your clothing and goodness knows you’re not going to be able to buy replacements forever as long as you’re out of work." Gayle stood on the front porch, hands on her hips as she glared down at Levi. “They’ve been waiting for an hour.”

Levi was too weary to protest against her accusatory tone. He would not miss using his mother-in-law's as their home base. Reluctantly he stood and walked inside. Gayle preceded him into the house, and by the time Levi reached the door Gayle had returned to the family room and instead Gordon stood in the hall waiting. He held up a hand. “Can I say something?”

Levi exhaled through his nose, braced for another argument. “Fine.”

“I’m sorry for concealing my plan. I understand it was a poor tactical decision.”

Levi laughed in surprise, a small and weary laugh, but a laugh nonetheless. “Apology accepted.”

“But can we please have a civil conversation about our options without you immediately trying to shut it down and override everyone else? You know I’m not wrong. If we were better armed, we would have won.”

“I’ve never denied that guns are effective in the short term. They’re not the problem. You’d have the same problem if you were practicing fighting with… I don’t know, a non-mana sword and shield. The way mana weaponry works it requires time and practice to do it right. You keep avoiding learning to use your mana, relying on your minions and now mundane firearms instead. How do you not see this is a problem? When we are in a fight where you have to be able to charge your armor and power your blade and run with properly moderated use of stamina, you won’t have those instincts trained to battle readiness so long as you’re relying on external props.”

Gordon frowned and didn't speak immediately. “And you didn’t think to explain this before?”

“I told you guns were going to be a bad long term strategy! Very clearly and more than once.”

“But you never explained all this.”

“So you can’t just take me at my word?”

“Honestly? No. You’re doing much better now, but you admitted yourself that the alternate timeline messed you up. You get hyper focused and disregard perfectly good alternatives out of hand. This may not be one of those cases, but how am I supposed to know if you’re actually giving a reasoned argument or an emotional reaction if you refuse to share the important details?”

“You could try trusting me more. I do know what I’m talking about.”

“I’m not denying that, just…” Gordon stopped and took a breath, visibly calming himself. “Your communication skills could use some work.”

“This is why we have a communications department now. Gayle, Laurence, and Cassandra can handle the talking. I’m much better suited to stabbing.”

Gordon shook his head, but he had a faint smile on his face as he did. “And speaking of, we should get in there. Everyone’s been arguing for hours now.”

They entered their war council, which in this case was the family room with extra chairs dragged in from the dining room and a card table set up with piles of paper and boxes, and even more boxes on the floor.

Cassandra had everyone folding brochures which she’d apparently ordered printed by the thousands. Levi picked one up to look it over, impressed by the gloss paper and professional graphics. It was incredible that she’d managed so much in only two days. He read through it carefully, relieved to see it wasn’t spreading misinformation any longer and had clear warnings about dungeons, elixirs, and classes. It wasn’t very in-depth, but for a brief overview that could be safely handed to anyone in the world, it would do.

She also had a stack of white printer pages beside her, which she, Gayle, and Irene were arguing about at present. Levi couldn’t make any sense of their discussion, something about kerning and headers? He had no idea what the context was, but since they kept passing pages back and forth between folding brochures it was clearly something to do with the printout.

Laurence was giving a one-sided lecture on magic, while Peter sat beside the sofa listening with rapt attention as he added to the box of tri-fold pamphlets beside him. Henry lay on his other side, his head resting on Peter’s feet, but the small dinosaur looked up when Levi entered the room, frills flaring briefly before settling. Peter’s rapt attention on Laurence remained uninterrupted, and Levi smiled at the proof of his son’s progress. If he could keep his minions alert even while he himself was absorbed in something else, it was a good step forward.

“We’re back!” Gordon announced, when no one seemed inclined to acknowledge their arrival.

Cassandra waved them over, pulling yet another box of printed brochures from behind her chair, stacked flat and ready to be folded. “Levi! Here you go, there’s plenty to go around.”

Levi took the box and sat down opposite Laurence. Gordon sat beside him and resumed a half-folded box he’d clearly left to come collect Levi.

"So, what did you find for my oh-so-important escort?"

Levi hesitated. He didn't really want to split the team, but this was important, and it was the reason he'd gone boss collecting in the first place. "A couple boss gremlins, to start. They're small enough to stay under the radar and decently dangerous."

"You made us wait two days... for gremlins?" Cassandra narrowed her eyes. "Really?"

Levi wracked his brain for anyone more he wouldn't mind sending. Drok would be ideal as a bodyguard, but a day-long car trip wouldn't exactly work when he could crush the vehicle by sitting on it. Shadevine was too fragile, he needed to stay with the main team since no one would be able to revive him. He opened his minion list to check their options again. "Oh, Crackle can come too." The scarab was similar enough to shadevine in role to be useful, while being a decent bit sturdier thanks to his shell and fur.

Maggie would be a good choice for dungeon infiltration, but out in public? If there were going to be civilians around it would be a bad idea to have a snake that could burn by touch.

"I suppose you can take Cen and Becca," Levi conceded, reluctantly. "She can keep up by teleporting, and a big cat will be popular and a good recruiting tool. Cen is a good tank and very good at intercepting attacks to protect people, so you'll be in good hands."

"And you're sure you don't want to come along? It'll be fun!"

Peter looked up hopefully, but Irene shook her head. "You know that's not my kind of place, Cas.”

“Not your kind of place? I didn’t realize there was such a thing.” Cassandra put a hand to her chest in mock horror. “My sister, having a type of place to not go to? How are we even related! Where’s your sense of adventure?”

“It suffered a sudden and violent death recently. I think our current circumstances represent quite enough adventure for all of us, I have no need to go seeking it out.”

“But this is the fun, relaxing kind of adventure! Just the thing to balance out the madness and death.”

“Nothing balances it out,” Levi interjected. “You can try to bury it or run from it or hide it but it’s never going to go away.”

“Well, thanks for ruining the mood, Mr. Grim.” Cassandra sighed. “If you don’t want to come tomorrow, I will find somewhere else to drag you off to before the summer is out. Mark my words.”

“I appreciate the sentiment, Cas, but today is not the day.” Irene glanced at Gordon, then Levi, her eyes haunted, and Levi suddenly realized that today was probably the first time she’d seen someone actually come close to dying for real. There had been injuries, yes, but until the kalvex nothing had truly posed a threat to their group.

And he’d left her alone for hours, worrying about his own problems, finding his own escape while leaving her mired in the revelation of true danger.

“We should go,” he decided, abruptly, impulsively. “We can split up after.”

"What, really?" Cassandra and Irene both turned to him in surprise. "Why?" "What about the schedule we planned out?"

"I think this is more important."

Irene may not be able to see it, but Levi knew Cassandra was right. She desperately needed something happy and normal in her life right now.

It may not balance the scales, but it would at least make the grim slope down which they all must descend a bit less steep.