In his dream hes walking over a giant obsidian ring embedded on the sandy shores of a river. He's walking with the girl in the white dress. Her hair today is gray and white with streaks of brilliant orange, as if the sun is setting behind her. Her dress today is a spiderweb of steel lines and glass. The eyes are always the same: dark eyes that shimmer with a thousand stars, gold gleaming around the edges.

“You were asleep. You still are. Remember me. Please.”

Corvayne nodded or said yes and tried but everything around the obsidian circle wavered. They were coming up to

the center of the ring. A door, made of glittering diamond, stood above him in the center. A sky blue dragon larger then the door even was there, and nodded it's head. “It is good to see you, young hero.”

He laughed. Good to see you too misses dragon!

The woman in the dress tugged his arm.

“You were lost. You still are. Find me.”

[98.4%]

He woke up.

Wick tugged his arm.

“Hey fucker. Wake up.”

He blinked. “What?”

She smiled. “Training!”

“I'm in my underwear.”

She yanked the sheets off the little bed. “So what? Oh ho ho. Good dream?”

Corvayne stood up and started putting his pants on. “Sure.”

“Don't get salty. I did that BECAUSE I wanted to get an eyeful... Sorry I gotta remember you really don't like being teased.” Wick looked nervous. Corvayne took a deep breath, then exhaled. It was the second day of training. The first he had advised her not to do anything more then a light jog. Wick had a form fitting outfit for working out that meant whenever he lapped her around the warehouse he couldn't help but check her out. Grunt seemed amused when Corvayne asked if that's what everyone who worked out wore, and just nodded and shrugged: You get used to it. Well, getting used to it was not making his attempts to keep his mind on task easier.

Yesterday they just did jogging, so he hoped the weapon testing they were planning on doing would have him spending less time looking at her behind. He grabbed a red T-shirt Wick had bought him, then put his boots on.

“I gotta get you some sneakers.” She mused.

“Why would I need different shoes?”

“The little things together help make you more attractive to... other girls.” Wick looked him up and down again. “Just in case you forgot, I'm going to help you find someone to get all that out of your system.”

Corvayne stretched his arms. “If I fall in love with one of these girls and neglect the partnership to spend all day in the arena spilling olive oil all over each other, that would hurt your plans.”

Wick squinted her eyes at him. “I don't get the reference but okay. Oil away. I help my friends out. If you dropped our friendship because you were infatuated with a girl but were happy... I'd at least get to enjoy the moral high ground!”

Corvayne waved the comment away. “I was trying to tease you back. It worked I suppose.”

Wick scrunched her face up. “Terrible! Everything about your attempt was awful! We'll work on it. Put you on a ROM-COM diet. I'll leave the room a lot.”

“Sounds like a military term.” He opened the door out to the warehouse for her.

“They both deal in guys with square jaws, ha! Anyway... Mister I is dropping the weapons off. Go to Grunt's garage. He wanted to also give you a quick check-up. Mister I. Grunt might too.”

Corvayne went down the stairs and walked through the back office hall to the boiler room. Grunt was there, opening the door to let the beat up pickup in. The old monk was smiling as usual as he got out.

“Grunt! Corvayne! Oh and Wick too! I saw your ankle yesterday, I cannot believe how fast it healed! It was black and blue when you stumbled out of the woods. Corvayne, come here... how is your side feeling?”

Corvayne shrugged and lifted his shirt a little. Mister I carefully looked at the slightly yellow skin and nasty looking cut. “Incredible. Does it hurt when I do this?” He used two fingers and pressed on each rib.

Corvayne didn't think it hurt much so he said “No.” prompting Mister I to jab harder.

“A little now.” Corvayne added, which made the monk interested and he jabbed even harder.

“Please stop.”

Mister I laughed. “Your burns are covered in new skin. I think it might be that food. My old foot injury hasn't hurt for two days! Let me know if you need a ride to get more miracle meats.” Mister I's eyes sparkled.

“No hunting today.” He wanted the option of using a gun for when he encountered something like the steel vine trees, and Wick had said she'd have a gun, or guns, by the end of the week. Mister I left a little later, saddened that his culinary adventure was not today.

First up was just seeing which of the tools actually counted as what. The hand sickle, with it's green plastic handle and price tag still on it, DID count as a scythe. [Reap], [Thresh], and a swing that both forced him to move very slowly and left a weird shadowy afterimage: [Soul Reap]. The broom handle staff only activated cross-skill abilities. Cross activating [Shield Slam] and [Thrust] were not nearly as taxing as any given sword skill with the handle. Maybe it was considered a staff, something he hadn't trained with.

Grunt had a piece of warped plywood lying around meant for the garbage and so they tried the bow next. Corvayne took a few shots, activating [Double Shot], which created an extra arrow somehow, and [Pinning Shot]. The extra arrow after a minute crumpled into dust, and the one from [Pinning shot] was almost impossible to pull out. He visualized a gun then thought a little about what he had been planning to do and relaxed the draw before pointing the bow downwards.

“I don't want to do [Ricochet] inside.”

Everyone agreed it would be a bad start to the day if they needed to go to a hospital to pull an arrow out of someone.

The machete allowed him to use [Light Cut] which made the blade gleam as he swung it. It felt like the hunk of metal he was swinging around WAS lighter, too. He wasn't sure what was special about [Sundering Strike] but it was supposed to be for breaking swords, so maybe he could use it for things that were too solid to deal with otherwise? He then had an idea pop into his head. It was from one of the lessons where he had been excluded from anything but watching One-Last-Note. Holding the machete up before him, he closed his eyes and took a few even breaths.

[Crescent Blade]

He felt weirdly unstable. He swung the machete and it felt like a thin layer of himself was left behind. He took another step while swinging, then a third and stepped forward. Grunt actually whistled. Wick started yelling “Look! Look behind you!”

He turned and saw three weirdly blue glowing images of himself in the poses of the swings he had just made. He lept back from the closest one. That it worked was surprising. It might be a better way to hurt those trees. “Don't touch those images before they totally fade out. They cut.”

Of course, Wick grabbed a plank of wood and poked an image, causing it to burst like a bubble and blast the stick out of her hand, sending chunks of wood clattering to the floor. He was glad his version of the effect was weaker. One-Last-Note left behind images that you could roll a boulder into and watch it turn into gravel.

After a few moments the images faded. Corvayne didn't want to yell at Wick about listening to him about safety so he just moved on. “It's probably supposed to be 'moon blade' but... that's another handy tool. What's next?”

“The spearfishing spear is for me... how about these?” She handed Corvayne the hatchets. Corvayne saw Grunt perk up. Temper your expectations, Corvayne thought, I'm barely qualified to chop down a tree. He swung them together and alternating swings a few times to limber up and get a feel for them, then lined himself up with the plywood they had used as an archery target. He swung out with [Whirling Axe] and a greenish swirl went flying at the board, chopping in an X shape and breaking the plywood into 4 pieces. He could smell sawdust mixing in with the faint smell of motor oil and laundry detergent that normally lingered in the garage. Grunt mimed clapping and was smiling.

Wick lightly backhanded Grunt's shoulder and nodded at the display he had put on. “See? He didn't think this was magic!”

He considered his surly axe instructor. Mugs-Empty-Again was burly, with a bushy beard and thick hair covering basically the entirety of his face aside from part of his nose poking out. If he wasn't a normal height Corvayne would have just pinned him as a fantasy dwarf. The man bellowed non-stop, trying to show him how to hurl an axe the right way, that his feet were wrong, that he needed to love the axe, or that he'd probably just do better drunk and blindfolded. Practice axes were sort of just big chunks of axe-shaped wood so he had taken a lot of abuse from Mugs, one session trying to teach him how 'proper' axe use was to just stand there and trade blows...

[Chop]

He swung, standing his ground.

[Chop]

The next swing was easier. He kept his feet planted.

[Chop]

It became effortless.

[Chop] [Chop] [Chop]

Using the skill over and over, it clicked. He had spent those sessions surly as well, thinking about what he'd do to Mugs-Empty-Again if he had his spear. Trying to avoid everything. No, the essence of the style was to have an axe, maybe a shield, a whole lot of armor, and to tap into the rhythm of downing foes. It was the problem he had with fighting around Wick: He would dodge or move enemies around and all the sudden she was in trouble. When they were cornered by the bigfoot swarm, he might have stood at the top of the stairs and fought for days with the ability used the way it was meant to be used. Well, that and chopping trees. He stopped swinging, no more tired then after the first.

Corvayne spun the axes around his finger like how he had seen a gunfighter on television treat his guns. He didn't have a holster so he just stopped after a few spins. “Hmm... I need a shield. Ok, one more move. Give me room, hitting anyone with this would be very bad.”

Wick gestured at the mostly unused garage. “You got room just uh, point it at a wall?”

The walls were a pretty important part of the building. “No no, it just would make training dummies fall apart when the axe trainer used it.” He stepped over to where the open door out to the warehouse yard was. He thought of the hatchet in his hand as a long hafted axe, then focused on the image of a hardened clay statue being cleanly sliced apart, arms falling on the ground and rolling.

[Limbtaker]

The swing felt heavy. Raising his hatchet felt like he was lifting a car. Letting it drop had the same inevitable feeling as when he skewered the dragon: once the swing started he could stop it even if he wanted to. There was actually a snapping sound as air parted then came back together. Mugs-Empty-Again had both told him he'd never master it, then also warned him to never use the move on a living creature he didn't mind dying, even with a practice weapon. Make up your mind! On top of being dangerous, using [Limbtaker] also drained him more then chopping over and over had. He huffed and let his arm fall. Another finishing move he guessed.

Grunt closed his open mouth and gave Corvayne a thumbs up. Was he crying a little? Sometimes his buddy was weird. Corvayne walked off the mat and fell onto a folding chair. “Ok Wick, I'd like you to just swing some weapons...”

“Haha, no! First thing's first.” She held up the one odd object she had bought: the toy wand.

The thing was barely fit to stir coffee, let alone fight with. “Ok. Just find something more sturdy if you intend to take it with you in a fight. A broken weapon only helps you kill yourself.”

She rolled her eyes at him then strode over to the mat, thinking, and examining the wand. Corvayne couldn't figure it out, but she was tracing her fingers over it, rolling it in her hand. Grunt actually was also watching her like a hawk, leaning forward a little, like the large man knew what she was thinking and was willing her to do something with the plastic wand.

Wick swung the wand. “Magic!” she said, her voice cracking a little from the force she put into it.

Corvayne blinked. Well, what did she think was going to happen? Maybe she wanted to make her own move? “The weapon attacks I used, they manifest if I understand what I want, better when I have a clear image about the attack and what the underlying principal is, and best if I know the actual motions and try to do the move manually. Like, if I know what the footwork in the flight is for a use of [Flows-Like-Water], then it's not as draining to do.”

Wick looked back at him, annoyed, then turned and swung the wand again. “Thanks for mansplaining.”

Corvayne's exasperation made him snap back with “I'm just telling you what works.” He clamped down on himself and got his tone under control. “What are you trying to do?”

She took what looked like a baseball practice swing with the wand, lining it up with a wall. Wick closed her eyes.

“I want magic, and I want something as good as that watery-spear move. You have something that gives you defense, offense, and movement. If you were in good shape you'd have just used that in a triangle around the dragon and poked holes in him without the thing landing a single blow.”

Corvayne sighed. “It's not very useful on a lone armored enemy. That's why we were trained on a lot of weapons. To be ready for whatever came along. I knew I wasn't great at any of them, but as long as I was good enough across the board I knew I could get by no matter what happened. That ability is built on fundamentals. And I couldn't do it before I came here, it was too hard.”

Wick stopped and turned back. “There you go again. Saying you're not great when you just kept belting out magical attacks like you know a dozen. Do you have any idea how annoying it is to hear you dump on yourself? What's that say about me?” Corvayne didn't get why Wick was in such a bad mood. What had he done wrong? She, meanwhile, was visibly gritting her teeth as she swung the wand again and again. “Ha! Ya!” She stopped, and sighed, then started doing something like his spear dance...

“Hey were you... watching me do that?!” Corvayne felt really embarrassed.

“Shut up. This requires intense focus.” A sly grin formed on her face. “Hmm, maybe if I take my shirt off it works better?” She turned it into a full on smile back at him, then turned to the wall. She breathed in and out then resumed. Corvayne shut up. She was right about one thing: it did require focus at the start. Wick was folding and unfolding her arms with the wand, taking steps slowly as she breathed in and out. Corvayne got why she might have watched as for a moment he thought of Spears-Like-Water wearing shorts and going through the same motions in a shallow part of the oasis. What a shame they put such a terrible person in such a graceful body. Wick was a little bit clumsier, and the plastic wand with a pink star was pretty stupid compared to the lethal allure of a sharp spear weaving in and out of hands, across the back, rolling lazily with the slower motions of the dance. Wick however understood that it was about control and didn't fumble or drop the wand, just sort of traced circles that stretched her muscles, matching her movement with steady breathing. Then she pointed the wand and flicked it once more at the wall...

Something flew out, like a sort of hazy emerald orb, and slammed into the wall. Coin sized chips of brick fell in a clatter on the ground. Wick looked at the wall, then the wand, then tried pointing a finger. “[Disrupt]!”

A smaller orb flew out from the tip of her finger and once more chipped away at the wall.

Corvayne's jaw dropped then. It wasn't the same as his weapons at all. It was something totally different. He could somehow see it.

“Wick... you just did... How did you do that?! That was magic!” He felt himself stand up.

She laughed and once more slipped into a melodious voice free of scratchy inflection. “You told me how to do it! You're the one throwing wind weapons and stuff!”

“It's just martial arts. That's wizard magic you just did!”

Grunt held up a hand. High five! Wick did that, then offered a hand for Corvayne to slap. He did so, then she turned and added some dents into the bricks with a few more disrupts. She let her wand drop after about ten total blasts. “I'm not tired but it's like... I suddenly got really bored by it.”

Grunt nodded. He stuck his front two teeth out, and mimed pushing glasses up: If you don't mind me nerding out...

He went over to his bookshelf and picked out a paperback, and flipped through pages... did he know the books that well? Anyway he held it open for Corvayne to read aloud.

“The old wizard-knight laughed at his apprentice. 'I asked you to do those tasks because the spell-sword needs three things: The will to fight evil with it. The strength to keep fighting past when a normal man would die. And the mind, to direct it's power into useful forms.' He pointed at the stump. 'Cutting a tree down needs muscle but it also is a contest of will. Such is the blade, for the evil you face is relentless. For a large tree you must be tireless. However, the flying fish? You needed both will and mind to be tirelessly clever! Cleverness to figure out how to trap them. The will to keep pushing your mind past failure, frustration, and boredom. I watched you looking at them, then the lowly spider. Only when you could see your own net could you use that weave to catch the fish. A sharp mind is it's own blade: Such is the blade's magic. For magic is imagination. Now about the three lasses, it took both the mind you sharpened and your muscles to-'”

Grunt gently lifted the book out of Corvayne's hands. Oh. That's why he knew were to find that passage.

Wick clapped. “Corvayne you are a GREAT storyteller! Why don't you talk like that normally?”

He winced. “I understand what characters in stories like these want, because they are vivid. I feel like their voices are... more real then my own... I was told to be objective all my life. Speaking like I do, keeping my tone even, focusing on facts, that helped me communicate to my village. It's like how Spaces-Torn-Asunder would address things... mistakes: he would avoid describing the quality of what was done, or his own feelings about it. He instead patiently went through what happened in concrete facts, then what needed to happen in concrete steps. I am trying to be more friendly, as I like you two.”

Grunt blushed and rolled his foot on the ground. Aww shucks. Wick laughed then took a deeper voice. “Well, Wizard-Knight, What's my next task?”

“I'd say testing your limits. I'd use that spell, a small one, a few more times. If you get a headache or something, stop... I don't want to discover that if you use too much magic it melts your brain or starts drawing power from your bones and you break your own skull. I know with skills I passed out, so this is mostly to feel out your limits... not break them.”

She nodded. Corvayne was surprised, he was just feeding her lines from books. Wick took longer to focus but shot out another small bolt. This one was the size of a pea and just clicked when it hit the wall. She was fidgeting with the next cast, groaning with frustration. It took her third swing of the hand, yelling “Disrupt!” to make another small ball of energy fly out. “I'm done. I need to do something else. It's like I coded all night and can't look at another word.”

Grunt took the book he had been re-reading, flipped it ahead two pages from where he was, then held it up to Wick. She took it, read for about ten seconds, then her eyes widened slapped his arm with the book. “That's just what a stupid fantasy story written by a guy would suggest!! I'm not doing that for 'mana'.” She looked at Corvayne and looked, embarrassed? He couldn't get what was on her face before she had turned back to Grunt and shoved the book into his chest. Grunt winked at him and Corvayne looked back to where Wick was striding out the door to the yard. “C'mon, lets jog.”

The sun had started to set as they did some laps around the warehouse, then spent another hour with Corvayne going over melee weapon forms with them. Grunt showed that he preferred mace, but was a fast learner with everything. He was adamant about not picking up a hatchet despite how much Corvayne felt a big axe would fit him. It was sort of weird for him to refuse anything, but Corvayne didn't press him. Either way, by the end Wick had the basics of using a spear, and Corvayne gave her training homework: Get good enough with it to throw a ball at a wall then poke it when it bounced back at her. Before they went to get dinner together, Wick tried her spell another time and found that her attention span for casting it had recovered a little.

Wick lived in one of the towers near the community center. There was a noodle shop nearby in a roofed market street where she bought them noodle bowls. In Cascadia one of the seasonings they used in their noodle dishes was a handful of soft pine needles which Corvayne thought added a sort of soapy taste to the dish. Wick added an extra handful and Grunt didn't say a word about. It was probably a personal taste thing. With Grunt being the silent partner and busy using his fingers to hold chopsticks, Wick spoke with him.

“For those coins and gems, there's a pawn shop here you can sell to. They won't give you as much as setting up an agreement with a jeweler's shop, and very few people here in Old Town can buy gems. You'd have to go to either Ko-ban, an island north of here, or back to the mainland. Don't sell anything magic to the shop here. There's a chance the buyer will source it back to us.”

“I saw that Grunt has hover-bikes with wheels.”

Wick gave him a look again that made him feel dumb. “... Yeah. A bike.”

Corvayne felt his own cheeks heat up. “Oh, uh, I suppose hover bike is a portmanteau of hover and bike, now that I think about it.”

Wick shook her head. “... I can't tell sometimes if you're really smart or really dumb.”

Corvayne looked sideways at her.

Wick held up a hand. “Sorry. I meant, you know a lot of things and obviously you know big words, but... I guess you didn't have normal bikes out in the desert.”

“No. Too much sand.” Corvayne kept his gaze gripped on the salty bowl of broth in front of him, watching an onion swirl around it. He felt Wick reach over.

“You know I'm really happy with you today, right? I'm a wizard now.”

Grunt stopped slurping his second bowl of noodles to mime his thumbs on a controller across the counter. The gray haired woman serving them saw this and laughed. “I hit level 80 on my Oak Sage Tuesday myself. I guess I'm a big kid too, huh Grunt?” She winked at him and added a few more noodles to his bowl. He winked back and kept eating.

Corvayne leaned over. “He's popular with the women it seems.”

Wick laughed. “They wouldn't dare put a finger on him, not while Dawn's got a claim. But yeah, the whole town likes him because he's a walking police station. The real cops avoid this island whenever possible.”

“So he's a vigilante hero?” Perhaps he should have given Grunt the bow after all...

“You can't stop everything. People here are pretty unhappy. Jobs are drying up. There's still heavy metals from the mines that are used on some big old impulse cruisers but they are a dying breed. We get one landing once every few years, and it messes up boat traffic in the bay because they gotta drop it in water then cruise it into the channel to unload it. Even easing it into the water you're talking ten foot waves. Unless something changes, this place is really only where you go if you want to be a weirdo in the woods.”

Economics wasn't his strong point. “You said this was, well, the backwater of the galaxy. I suppose it's because there's nothing to sell then?”

Wick sounded a little defensive. “It looks really pretty... If you like rain. If fold drives were a thing and cheaper then worm-hole ships, like a quarter the cost, you'd have a run on lumber and I bet you'd be swamped in annoying tourists. Maybe? There's a couple of worlds that have large swaths of forest like this one.”

She had brought up something he had been thinking about. “I'd like to look at maps of other worlds...”

“You NEED a computer. Or a phone. Or both. Sell those coins and emeralds, and have Grunt buy you a computer. I'll give you a phone tomorrow.” Wick set her chopsticks in her empty bowl. “I need to make sure your phone isn't going to rat out where we are if you take it out with you.”

Or Wick, we could go shopping for that phone, together. “Ok. I'll bug him about it.”

Wick lead them out from under the shaded market street to the main road through Old-Town then looked both ways for traffic. It was dusk, when most of the workers left the island for slightly better neighborhoods they lived in, so there was actual traffic to wait out. Corvayne looked at the red 'STOP' palm glowing across the street then looked at Wick. She turned and looked at him.

“What are you staring at?”

“Sorry, just...” He felt immense frustration. Why couldn't he tell her that he liked her? Because she had said no romance. He wanted ask her to explain why she was so adamant about not having a relationship. But she had also said not bug her about her past. On top of dealing with her today felt like a mild version of full-blown Watcher level catty behavior. “... feeling a little odd.”

Wick gave him a look that suggested perhaps impatience? “You can talk to me.”

“No, I can't.” He winced a little. He let what he was thinking slip. Sloppy. He stared at the red 'don't-walk' hand in the crosswalk signal. He imagined it flipping him off.

She meanwhile tugged his arm “What? Are you mad about something?”

“No. I just swore to not talk about it with you.” He placed a hand over his own chest.

“Tch. Whatever. Who the hell already has you keeping secrets?” YOU.

Grunt looked between the two. Corvayne could see him quietly thinking. The big man also gave him a look as if to ask: Can I help at all? Corvayne just shook his head.

They walked the rest of the way silently until they got to her building. “Appreciated. Ko'Ban has a crime wave that's threatening to spill across the bridge. It would be a shame if after all those monsters some idiot kid with a knife got me. Good thing I'm packing heat today!” She showed that she had one of the fire-breathing daggers tucked into a sleeve. Corvayne nodded. “Good. Stay safe.”

He turned and started walking away. He heard Wick ask Grunt if he had sat on his spear or something. Might as well have. He felt alone and lost.

Corvayne could at least work on being lost while he was alone. A computer would let him get at maps. So before work he and Grunt went to the pawn shop and the large man managed to haggle them up to about 1000 credits for the silver coins and emeralds. He had Corvayne save the gold as it would make more sense to go to a better part of town. They took the money to an electronics shop and paid 200 for a used computer, a roll out one that would handle him reading, writing, or surfing the planetary network. He also got a card that could be used for online payments without needing anything else for another 100 credits.

Grunt asked him when they got back to the warehouse loft if he was willing to fly solo for the night. Then after some confusion Grunt used his hands to ask if he was okay working alone. Corvayne nodded and Grunt wandered off, leaving Corvayne with some time to himself. Between his first and second patrol he ended up putting down a whole 2 credits off the card for access to 'The Galactic Library'. He then started a download for all 1000 Colony world maps. “A spear goes forward.” He muttered to himself, watching the load bar do the same thing. It was a weird bullshit mantra, he spent all his time with a spear backing away from things and jabbing in and out. No comment about jabbing Wick then running away too.

The first world to pop up was, of course, The Collective's capital world, Tripic. The entire surface was heavily engineered bands of straight land stretching from north to south alternating with ocean. With a few of those bands being ultra-dense cities it had the largest population in the galaxy. As far as his library access could tell him, humans were alone in the universe, and there were no other large collections of them anywhere. Back to Tripic: It was the sixth settled world and was planned to balance population and nature, hence city and land bands that kept and possibly enhanced biodiversity. No big deserts, just slices of gray and water.

The second was Mud. The name didn't sit right with him, but aside from being the planet all humans came from it wasn't notable. Mud's map let him scale back through centuries of maps until they got to fantasy style sea serpents in the water. Neat, but none of the major deserts matched the size or shape of his.

He skipped down to 780: Cascadia. As Wick had said: the desert he walked out of was the wrong shape. He flipped it a few ways, but it didn't line up.

And so he went, making the rounds then spending a few minutes looking at a new world.. Some of the worlds were weird low density super worlds, and those maps might take him an hour look at, the surface more then a hundred times the size of something like Cascadia and requiring him to try to zoom in on square patches of desert, hoping to see the same shape as the map he had looked at weeks ago. He wondered what it would be like to explore a planet like that. Just endless untamed wilds.

Dawn called the office and let Corvayne know that Grunt wouldn't be back that night and also that she had her eyes on him. “Carrot peeler. Got it.” He was glad that his moods were apparently hard to read, because Dawn didn't seem to catch that he was putting a surly edge to it. Come at me. “Glad we understand each other.” She hung up.

He spent some time drilling with the broom handle instead of a spear, willing in secret for someone to show up and try to steal the oversized forklifts again, a distraction from hours of being alone. When two guards arrived for the morning shift, he was all too happy to punch out and shut himself in the loft, turn off all the lights and pull the shades down, then lay in bed staring at the tiles on the ceiling until he fell asleep. Lost. Alone.

Grunt was back when he woke up at the crack of 4 PM. His large friend was sitting in the shared break room in the loft, eating fried chicken. He gestured for Corvayne to sit, then pointed to the clock and made a rewinding motion: How was last night?

“Just fine.”

Grunt pretended to blow on a party favor and mimed opening a can, then gave Crovayne a sort of goofy stern look.

“No parties while you were gone Grunt. I was wondering... do you think I can talk to Mister I about stuff in my head?”

Grunt looked a little offended, holding his hands first at himself then out palms out: What's wrong with me?

Corvayne sighed. “I got a lot of abstract and complex problems to work through. You'd be my first choice, but you'd need to get a pen and paper or something. Also, I don't know if you're maybe too close to the subject...”

He reached over to a drawer behind him and pulled out a birthday cake candle, then pointed to the tip. Corvayne nodded: Yeah, it was about Wick.

Grunt rolled his eyes. He did a little damsel in distress hand on forehead. He puffed up his chest and made lots of spear stabbing motions while looking confident. Then back to distress, but slowly morphing to an 'Ooo I like that' face, finger on lip, nodding. Then back to confident, and then shock, then made a sign anyone could understand, a finger going through an OK sign. One mime of someone shrugging and walking off whistling. Then he started miming someone upset. Hands comparing things. He then pointed at Corvayne and raised an eyebrow: Wick went with you somewhere dangerous. You did a lot of dangerous stuff as you were her bodyguard. She was impressed, jumped you, then acted like nothing happened. Meanwhile, you're freaking out because you don't know what it means.

Corvayne bolted out of his seat. “Seriously how do you do it? I mean, all I did was give you a thumbs up about things going well...”

Grunt held a hand up. He mimed kicking something through a goal. Then he made the sex hand motion.

“I just thought you were just asking if I did well!”

Grunt laughs and reached for a deck of cards. He pointed at Corvayne, and drew then held a hand of 5 cards facing outwards instead of being hidden. Corvayne was annoyed. “I'm that obvious?” Grunt nodded. Then he pointed to the candle. Then held 3 of the cards facing outwards and 2 properly facing Grunt. “We can't all be as unreadable as you, Grunt. Ok fine, I'll tell you what I'm thinking. Can I hold you to confidence? Your girlfriend has stated she will grate my balls with a carrot peeler if I did anything to Wick. I would assume that Dawn would consider everything you surmised 'anything'. I get the impression as well it's not a mere joke.” Corvayne would have to avoid Dawn if he couldn't keep his face straight. Which was rarely a problem before he had met Grunt.

Grunt winced. Then shoke his head. He points at the candle top, then makes a little heart over his heart, then points at Corvayne.

“I don't think so. She said she doesn't want to date, or romance. She's also been... meaner? Since we got out.”

Grunt holds a hand up for a second: Table that. Grunt pointed at the Corvayne, then the candle, then made the heart and tilted his head.

He nodded to Grunt. “I think so. It's why I want to talk this out.”

Grunt nods. He thinks, then points to the candle, makes a heart. Then holds up 1 finger, tilts his head, 2 fingers...

“First time.”

Grunt made the fucking motion. Sort of leaning forward stern look while holding up 1 finger.

“Yeah. She's the first girl.”

Grunt looks incredulous. He makes the kissing. He holds up 1 finger after that with a sort of sad look on his face.

“She's the first there too.”

Grunt raises an eyebrow. He nods and frowns. He holds up the candle, one hand held out as if confused by it, keeps that other hand out as he taps his head then holds both out.

“I think I got this one: Did Wick know this?”

Grunt nodded, very pleased. Ok, so he gets that it's sort of tough to follow too. It sort of made Corvayne feel a little better knowing that Grunt probably never could have this sort of talk with most people.

“I told her. The last one you just asked me about. I'll give you the story... we didn't take watches like in the...” Grunt rolled his eyes: Duh. Corvayne continued. “She stated she couldn't be in a relationship. She didn't want to date. No affection. I said okay, because I assumed she was telling me to stay away from her. I don't know if I'd turn her down if she made the same offer again. She wants to be my friend and partner for, well, raiding this tower thing and getting magic. But she said she's going to set me up with a girl to date, while I guess sometimes looking for us to...” Corvayne this time made the universal sex motion along with Grunt. Grunt smiled amused and nodded and gestured for Corvayne to keep going.

“Well I mean, it was the best night, and morning, of my life, and it pops into my head when I'm trying to focus on other things. What's more, the stuff she said she hates like romance, holding hands, walks in the park... it's all the stuff I want to do now with her. I'm also lost. I don't want to ever go back to where home was but I hadn't thought I was on a different planet. I don't want to complain: I got exactly what I wanted. But I'm still settling in and I mean, you're great but I want to be able to tell Wick that she... is kind of... well you read a lot of those hack and slash books? Or the ones about jetting all over the universe looking for treasure?”

Grunt nods.

“Well in them, there's this thing. The first girl.”

Grunt makes an 'ah' face then nods knowingly.

“Ah good. I don't need to explain it, but that's what I know, you know? I feel like it's fate running into Wick, you too buddy, but she is literally the first person to ever say anything nice to me. In that alleyway, her calling me incredible was... it was the first real ray of hope.”

Grunt thinks. He starts emoting something with thinking and heart and Corvayne admits he loses the thread, and Grunt sees it almost to the second. He holds up a finger, then hurries out the door faster then Corvayne assumed the burly fellow could move. He came back in a minute with a dozen books. He flips through them, and in a minute had 10 passages he highlighted.

Corvayne read the first Grunt offered. “Dawnstar was alone in the dark then, a bitter victory behind him... but then he saw the gleam of Dancer's ship, and then another gleam, and another... the fleet pulling into formation behind him...” He wasn't alone, or he thought he was alone but wasn't.

“... Candace took the needle and worked it back and forth, her idiotic banter about how the count's kindness her way of hiding furious calculations as she knitted a message in the fabric. The princess had to see it, to know the secret, how the count hid his true face...” There was a code? Someone, maybe Wick, maybe Grunt, couldn't just lay out what they thought or felt. Or Corvayne couldn't say it. They were hiding their feelings, maybe of protection, and hoped they came across.

The next passage was longer, and Corvayne couldn't figure out what some jackass wasting his dad's money had to do with him. “... and am no more worthy to be called thy son: make me one of thy hired servants. And he arose, and came to his father. But when he was yet a great way off his father... his father saw him, and had compassion, and ran and fell on his neck, and...”

He stopped reading aloud. Grunt had a rare total miss. He felt a weird tightness in his chest. “This story... I can't get into it... my Father exiled me and told me I was always a failure. He told me I'm no longer his son.” Corvayne's eyes stung and he closed them. What was wrong with him? His father deserved to rot in the desert. He was free. Grunt got up and enveloped him in a hug until Corvayne had to tap out or pass out.

“Sorry Grunt. You mean well. But... well, let me tell you about the village.”

Grunt mostly just listened as Corvayne told a few stories. Grunt winced at hearing him being battered and bruised almost every day. His peers leaving him isolated. Mockery of his name, his skills, claims that he only was there because of his father being in charge. Even a few he left out when walking with Wick, like Smiles-at-Dust trying to sneak into his room to kill him.

Grunt looked at him and shook his head. He made the sex hand motion again.

“No, she started strangling me.”

Grunt made the motion of drawing a weapon. Mimed hitting his hand with a pipe. Mimed using a garrote to strangle himself.

“No it was...just her bare hands. She was weird... I was half asleep when it happened. They kept her away from me after that, and I started barring my door when I couldn't fall asleep worrying someone was going to get in again.”

Grunt picked up a book and highlighted another segment. Corvayne read it aloud. “'I'm not locked in here with you, you're locked in here with me!'”

Corvayne wasn't sure exactly what that signified. “I assume because they didn't want her to get in a habit of murdering people, even myself?”

Another passage, same book. “'To protect you!'”

“You are a great person. I'm sort of glad you can't even fathom how miserable The Watchers are. You know, you remind me of a half giant from a story...”

Grunt got a weird look on his face. Pained, even. He didn't think he was sensitive about being huge, Wick called him big guy all the time.

“Ok. Yeah, the one I'm thinking of was sort of a weird druid who liked animals...”

The pained look faded and he crossed his arms. Really?

“Well, it's a story about a kid who-” Grunt held up a hand and shook his head. Pointed at Corvayne: Focus on you.

“Wait! I mean, you're my first friend. I wanted to tell you that I appreciate you making time to talk to me and help me out. That's in addition to being one of the only people I've met in the city I'd trust to get my back in a fight.”

Grunt nodded and smiled genuinely: My pleasure. The same to you Corvayne.

He then pushed a book forward, skipping a few in the stack he pulled.

“They spent two full nights, sitting in a darkened room, the nights clear and the moon bright. Tilou wanted to get up, to blow open the front door, and start fighting. But he didn't even have to say a word as that first long night rolled on. Every time he looked over at his unfortunate company the young woman waiting next to him would roll her eyes, shake her head, then go back to watching the sky, the ground, the wall like a hawk. It was as she had said: They would have their revenge, but it would take patience. Days of waiting for a perfect cloud to roll across the courtyard and deliver them to the wall.”

Corvayne thought about it.

“So... you think instead of blurting all this out to Wick, or acting... I need to wait and see?”

Grunt nodded.

“Do I really let her find some other girl to date?”

Grunt nodded. Mimed doing sword swings, then acted a pushup on the table.

“Think of it as training. Is that fair to the girl then?”

Another handful of cards, putting one alone in one hand. He looked at the other four of them while glancing at the first card. Then he dropped down to one card in each hand. He started looking between them, thinking. Once he selected one card he immediately put the other down. Grunt looked both ways slyly. Then he picked the card up and faced them to each other, then raised his eyebrows: Or maybe, BOTH.

“Before I start trying anything complicated... well I get the point you started with. It's okay to have feelings for Wick but don't string two people along.”

Grunt then grabbed a full hand, all face open. He nodded slowly and smiled: Or maybe: ALL of them!

“I've read books where they have a harem. That's not a Corvayne problem.”

Grunt handed him a pencil and paper, making two quote marks on either side of the page.

“You want me to write that down? Here you go.”

Grunt took the pencil and dated it.

He grabbed the book from before and flipped forward to right about the halfway point. He had guessed what it was about. Why does that happen halfway though every book? Either way he started reading aloud.

“They laid in bed, Maiser glaring at him. Tilou glared back. He had never had a hate-fuck before. It wasn't that bad. Right now, wrapped up on the bed in layers of insulation against lethal cold filling the rest of the chamber, even glaring at him, she was more of a person then before. A person he still couldn't wait to be rid of. 'We never tell anyone about this. Ever.' Tilou's turn to roll his eyes. 'Don't worry, we'll probably die trying to get out of here.'”

Grunt smirked, then flipped to near the end of the book.

“Maiser sat on the bed. 'You don't have any reason to stay.' She didn't sound happy, but Tilou couldn't tell what she was mad about. He shrugged. 'I can think of one reason.' She looked up, and for a moment the warrior dropped away. She closed her eyes, and he leaned in and kissed her. She was just as warm as before. She pushed him back, but only a little. 'Just one reason?' Tilou smirked. 'We'll work on more.'”

Corvayne looked at the book. “I think... I read this one before. Or one like it.”

Grunt nodded. He pointed to the 23rd edition in the front cover, based on a true story...

“Oh. Well... You think I just keep my cool and I have a shot?”

He flipped a few pages back, and highlighted two passages on the page.

“'We can end this here...' Falenti stirred his tea with a pearl white spoon, the same color as his mask 'with an arrangement we both like. Or maybe one we both hate but can live with.'” Corvayne looked further down the page, skipping plot details to reach the next highlighted section. “'That... or we walk away with our grudges intact, the same as before. Or just try to kill each other here and now. It's not even the outcome that's important sometimes. The thing that will endure is at least one of us remembering this moment. Having tea together as enemies. Even in dark times, there is hope of doing better.'”

Corvayne thought about it. “So... spend time with Wick. Even if things don't turn out, I like spending time with her, and you think I'll grow from it.”

Grunt clapped: Congratulations!

“I feel better talking about it. Though, what about what Wick wants?”

Grunt took the candle and placed it by Corvaynes chest. Corvayne took it. Grunt made a screwing motion, then shrugged. He made the screwing motion again, but then made an X. He shrugged. But then he tapped the tiny candle Corvayne was holding again firmly: Wick might want sex. She might not want it ever again. She needs friends.

“Right. Thanks Grunt. You don't have to worry. I don't want to hurt Wick. I'll also try to make sure whatever happens, I figure out what I want and need and get it.”

Grunt puts his thumb to himself and makes a blowing something off motion rolling his eyes with both hands open: Well what the heck did you even need me for?