To say it was a shock to see another Flint in my midst… a bit of an understatement.

“You don’t think you could’ve told me?” I said to my compatriot. “Not even a little hint you had a twin?”

“Not my twin,” Flint said. “Someone similar.”

I admit the lighting could’ve been better in that dank, little room, but I wasn’t blind. The man was Flint’s spitting image.

I stuck my foot inside the oak chest, and nudged the sleeping 2nd Flint around his knee.

“Don’t do that,” Flint said. It was the most threatening I’d heard his tone yet.

“What? Try to wake him? We’re here to get him, are we not?” I said. “And, what kind of human trafficking operation are we running here anyway? Who delivers a person in a box like this to a dodgy bank’s back room?”

Flint frowned at me. Then he turned his cool countenance back to Sleeping Beauty, and pondered him for a moment.

“Strange,” he said.

“What’s that?”

“He shouldn’t be this way.”

The manner in which Flint said it caused me a few seconds of alarm.

“Please,” I said. “Don’t tell me.”

I couldn’t help myself, I had to check his pulse. With great relief, I gulped in some musty air. The man had a faint pulse. Really faint.

“So, he’s not in a good way,” I said. “We need to find a doctor. Do they even have those in this time in history? I suppose they resorted to witchcraft or some such?”

“He doesn’t need a doctor,” Flint said. And, his words were left to hang in the air, forever, if need be.

You could wait for Christmas, and Flint was never going to elaborate, on anything it seemed.

“Well?” I said, exasperated. “You know he doesn’t require a doctor, how, exactly?”

“Because he needs this,” Flint said. Then he began undoing his belt.

“Wait,” I said. “Whoa. What are you doing?”

He ignored me, as per usual, and once his belt was loosened, he pulled the side of the pants down to reveal his naked hip. He pressed his index finger to his skin just above a small, cylindrical black mole. Turns out, it wasn’t a mole.

“This,” Flint said. “Press it.”

My face tightened. I grit my teeth together. “You want me to touch you… there?”

“Affirmative. Press it.”

“You press it.”

“I can’t. Now, stop wasting time.”

I exhaled hard. “Fine.”

The things you wind up doing in your life. You just never know what’s coming down the track. I pushed in on Flint’s oblong mole, and the mole that turned out not to be a mole immediately popped outward. Like the innie became an outie. I could’ve fainted on the spot. And, strangely enough, that’s exactly what happened to Flint.

The mole popped out a good two inches from his bare hip, and it basically stuck to my fingertip as I pulled it away, and the mole came with it!

As soon as this black fleshy rectangle was clear of Flint’s body, he passed out. For the record, the spot where the mole had been on his hip was totally gone. No hole left behind, no blood or anything. I wanted to freak out, and run around screaming, but I guess the dim surroundings, and low ceiling of this secret place kept me somewhat subdued.

Not as subdued as poor Flint, however. He just laid there in a heap next to the oak chest. I still had his mole stuck to my finger. Right, it wasn’t a mole, I’d said that, but it still bloody looked like one. Gross.

“Flint,” I said, barely above a whisper, no idea why. “Flint, you alright?”

Clearly, he wasn’t. I wasn’t alright either. I had no idea what to do. But, then I had a light bulb moment. In retrospect, I wonder if the System put it into my brain for me, because I got the genius idea on the spot, to pull the 2nd Flint’s pants down, just as the first had done. With his belt loosened with my free hand, I yanked his trousers off his hip enough to expose the same area of skin the first Flint had shown me. To make the day even stranger, of course the gross mole stuck on the end of my finger slid right inside the 2nd Flint’s hip, and created a flat, cylindrical mole exactly like the one Other Flint had shown me.

Two seconds later, the new Flint’s eyes snapped open. His neck twisted, and he looked dead at me, and just when I thought he was about to speak, he grabbed hold of my pelt coat, and brought my face directly in front of his. He frowned right after he did this, and let go of me, then panicked as he reached to pull up his trousers.

I’d fallen backward when he’d released me, and I sat there on my backside staring at him as my heart threatened to explode.

“Whoa,” he said. His voice slightly less gruff than the original Flint. “Apologies. Took me a minute.”

“Okay,” dribbled out of my mouth. I could barely comprehend what was happening.

He stood up inside the chest, still. He dusted himself off. Then he noticed Flint laying on the floor. He stepped out of the chest, and nudged Flint right around his knee.

“Don’t do that,” I said, trying to sound tough like Original Flint, and failing horribly.

He, the New Flint, gave me a quick glance, but ignored me. He nudged Old Flint again. “One,” he said. “Activate. One.”

My brain somersaulted working this situation out. “Activate?” I said. “Like a machine.”

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

“Yes,” said Flint 2.

“Right, so he’s Flint One,” I said.

He shook his head. “You refer to him as Flint, which is correct,” he said. “I’m Slate.”

“Slate?”

“Yes.”

“But, you just called him ‘One’.”

“Correct.”

All I could do was shrug. I should’ve known Flint wasn’t human. The signs were there, but give me a break, I’d been through a lot.

“And you two are assigned to me, or something?” I said.

“Yes,” Slate said. “We’re your security detail, provided by the System. A kind of backup, or insurance plan. Only, there’s been a problem.”

“What is it?”

“It seems there’s been damage done to our drives. Our cartridges maybe. I don’t know, I’m not programmed for that, so I can’t run a diagnostic. All I can tell you, is we’re supposed to both be functional at the same time. All of us are,” Slate said.

“All of us?”

“We have to go,” Slate said.

“Wait,” I said. “What did you mean, ‘all of us’?”

“We’re not going to be able to carry him out of here,” Slate said. “But, we have to go. And, as I’m sure you’re aware, you have a lot to do. Things are fluid. You may not realize how time sensitive certain benchmarks you’re supposed to hit happen to be. Not sure what the System’s told you.”

“Yes, but…”

“We can talk about it more when we get there,” Slate said. “Now come with me.”

I pointed at poor Flint who looked dead to the world. “What about him?”

“We’ll leave him here,” Slate said. “He’s in a secluded spot. He’ll be fine until we can fix the problem.” Then he frowned for a moment as he looked down at his colleague. “Wait a minute,” he said. “Where’s his weapon?”

Right, his futuristic rifle thing. I’d forgotten all about it.

“You know what?” I said. “I don’t know. He had it on him, and then, he just, didn’t.”

Slate let out a big sigh. “That is not good. We need to find that right away.”

“Yeah, it sounded like a pretty powerful thing. 64 blasts or bolts or something?” I said.

“Worse than that,” Slate said. “If anyone tries to use it who isn’t One… I mean, who isn’t Flint, their arm will likely explode.”

“Oh,” I said. “Yeah, that ain’t good.”

Then Slate pulled a black rectangular gizmo from underneath his jacket. Immediately, I could hear a soft electronic beep.

“I take it you’re with a group,” Slate said.

“Yeah,” I said. “That thing told you that?”

“Affirmative,” Slate said.

“Oh, please, not you too.”

Slate held his device in front of him, and he pushed the wood door open. Immediately, I had to close my eyes at the strength of the bright sky in contrast to the dark room where we’d been.

When I reopened, my eyes hurt, but they adjusted quickly. The rest of the group, about fifty feet away, noticed us, and came running.

“There you are,” Aubrey said.

She looked stricken, and I felt bad for causing her to worry.

“We were getting pretty concerned,” she said. “Even Whinging Thom came to check on us.”

“Sorry,” I said.

“Are you guys alright?” Zane asked. “We thought maybe you’d been eaten, with all the stuff Dillard’s been telling us.”

Dillard chuckled. “Telling ‘em about the Quallons, was all,” he said. “You’ll meet ‘em.”

“It’s about time you got back,” Chai said. She’s such a delight.

“Yeah, thanks for caring.”

She ignored the comment.

“Anyway,” Aubrey said. “What did they have for you?” I could see her eyes searching me over, looking to see if I had anything on me.

I glanced at Slate, and he didn’t seem interested in spilling on what had just occurred. I followed his lead.

“We have somewhere else to go,” Slate said.

“They sent you away, eh?” Dillard said. “Happens at the Givers all the time. Morons.”

“Turns out we’ve got an item waiting for us, a few hundred yards, that way,” Slate said, and he held his arm pointed out to the south of us.

The land in that direction was a lumpy field of long grass, with an evergreen patch of forest behind it. Slate led the way, and the rest of us followed.

“Cat’s eyes and rabbit ties, this turned out to be one trek, didn’t it?” Dillard said. “We get to walking out here long enough, we’re bound to get swept up by Darling, or Vaggie forbid, ol’ Breg.”

“Were those English words?” Zane asked.

“What?” Dillard said. “I’ve not told you of Darling nor Breg?”

“Can’t say as I’ve heard of them,” I said.

“Best you haven’t,” Dillard said. “You don’t wanna know ‘em. Dragons, they is. But, hey, how about you tell me about that base ball?”

“Dragons?” I said.

I mean, at this point, why not?

“Yes,” Dillard said. “All nine of ‘em.”

“Dragons?” Zane said. He sounded even less-believing than I did. “You mean, like, wings, breathing fire, big…?”

“Oh, you’ve seen ‘em?” Dillard said. “Funny, ‘cause I don’t think they been around in years. One of ‘em comes, and everybody knows. Even if it’s Darling.”

“Great,” I said, throwing a worried glance at Aubrey. “Dragons.”

Her eyes were just as wide as mine.

“You watch the skies, you’ll see ‘em,” Dillard said. “You don’t ever want ‘em visitin. Only ever seen two.”

“One called Darling,” I said. “Any chance they eat T. Rexes?”

The comment actually got half a laugh out of Chai. Small victories.

“Huh?” Dillard said.

“Sorry,” I said, “I meant, could those dragons eat a thunder lizard?”

Dillard smiled wide at the thought. “Could do, yeah. Easy as gap slicing,” he said, confident any of us knew what that meant. “Even Darling could. Like I said, seen two in my life. And the other one’s Breg,” Dillard said. “He’s bloody huge. Could probably eat ten Darlings, let alone thunder lizards, or the likes of us.”

The ground beneath our feet became more unsure. Every lump on the field was covered with tufts of thick grass. Many of the tufts were hardened by the cold weather.

“We’re almost there,” Slate said.

Somewhere up ahead, near the tree line at the edge of the evergreen forest I could hear a banging noise. It was almost rhythmic. An object smacking into another object.

“You been hearing this?” I said to Slate.

“About the dragons?” He said. “Not something to worry about.”

Dillard scoffed at the comment. “Bloody fool,” he said.

“Not until you’ve got your team more established,” Slate said. “Then it’s a conversation.”

“Have to say, Flint,” Zane said, “this is the most I’ve heard you speak. It’s a nice change.”

Slate didn’t respond, and kept walking. I signaled to Aubrey, and she immediately picked up on it, and sidled up next to me as we walked. Funnily enough, I noticed Zane noticing her get so close, and the look on his face was kind of priceless. I’m pathetic, I know.

Regardless, I spoke to Aubrey softly, not wanting anyone else to hear, and whether or not Zane had the wrong idea, I couldn’t worry about that just then. “You know Flint’s gun?” I said. “You remember it, the rifle from the future? He had it on him yesterday.”

Suspicion crept across her face. “Of course,” she said. “Why?”

“You haven’t happened to see it lately, have you?” I said. “As in, today?”

“Oh,” she said, sounding surprised by the question. “Um, now that you mention it, no, not really. Is there something wrong?”

“No. I was just wondering, is all. Curious if you’d seen it.”

She gave a bit of a chuckle. “Well, what’s the big secret?” She said. “He’s right there, why don’t you just ask him?”

That’s when I pulled her close, and whispered the truth in her ear.