"Fuck," Tim groaned.

"Yeah, that was a good one. We'll do it again sometime," Scipio said as she stood up between his legs. Her shirt disappeared, and then her body exploded into a blinding mass of crackling lightning for the blink of an eye. Within seconds, she was again clothed in her typical plain shirt and pants that hinted at the fit, gorgeous body beneath.

Slight fragments of the overwhelming pleasure that his couplings with Scipio always resulted in were still racing through him, but he still managed to appreciate the incredibly brief sight of her re-dressing herself, especially the twenty-out-of-ten dimples she had just above her butt. Well, it went a little better than the first time. Weird, but definitely not bad. "How do you do that thing at the end?" he managed.

"Just electricity knowledge," she replied in a typically nonsensical answer. "Uh, here, I suppose I'll give you a towel?" she added, pulling a towel out of the air next to her. "Maybe some water too, huh." She set it down with a pitcher next to him. "I'm gonna go see if I can find Ir'alith for you. Last time she floated out a little far." She flashed him a grin that he felt he'd underrated previously—deciding now that it was a strong eight-point-six—and disappeared.

He sat breathing on the step for a short while as the remaining sensations of their incredibly brief session faded. Eventually, he took the pitcher and poured it over his drenched lower half. This part is weirder than the act itself. At least Sateus seems to be keeping this citadel place clean. Maybe the stairwell gets remade every time someone enters it for all I know. He worked to towel himself off.

"Are you fucking serious?" came a half-whispered voice from above.

Tim looked back and up over his shoulder and groaned, this time for an entirely different reason.

Half of Kazuto's face was peeking around the uppermost reaches of the stair, and the kid started drawing closer when he realized he'd been noticed. "Did… You and her are friends with benefits?" he asked, sounding amazed.

Is that what we are? Tim stood up and finished wiping himself off before he dropped the towel and reached down for the pants pooled around his ankles. "Something like that," he said.

"That's awesome!" Kazuto exclaimed. "She was so cool about it! Like, suddenly she really wanted your dick, and you banged her out, and then she was like see ya!"

"Uh, sure," Tim said as he adjusted the waistband of his pants.

"And she was super hot too," Kazuto continued. "Well, her tits are kind of small, but that ass, you know?"

"Uh…" Tim looked to the kid who was now standing a couple steps up from him. Is he… This is actually how he talks? Sober?

"Sorry I ditched you when we were drinking before," Kazuto said, now studying the wall. "Uh, I mean, not that I got drunk, obviously, but I must've just been really tired after my thing." He took on a too-wide grin. "Yeah, that tentacle chick really had a great mouth."

Not sure I remember him describing that thing as resembling a chick in any way. Tim glanced towards the bottom of the staircase, and he grimaced. Damn, I probably can't go anywhere near Ir'alith if this kid's tagging along with how much she seems to hate him, so that sort of—

"You got any more fuck buddies here?" Kazuto asked. "I mean, not the blonde chick, obviously, because I called dibs on her, but… You working on anyone else? Like, outside or wherever? How do you get out of here anyway?"

Tim took a long blink as the words rushed past him. "Well," he said.

"I had some fuck buddies back at the castle," Kazuto continued. "It was… Well, it wasn't exactly the same as her, because they weren't as amazingly cool, but they totally wanted my—"

"Hey, what do you think about grabbing something to eat?" Tim interrupted. I think I'm going to actually lose my shit if I have to listen to him ramble through more stories like this. "Feeling hungry after…"

Kazuto vanished mid-sentence in what seemed likely to be a billion-out-of-ten use of god powers.

"Fuck," Tim said with a deep exhalation. Alright, Sateus can be a prick sometimes, but that was awesome. Feels like I actually won something, even if it's just some of my sanity. He kicked the damp towel aside and headed down the remaining steps.

The platform was empty and silent as it had been the last time he'd been down here. "Scipio?" he called. "Ir'alith?"

Scipio appeared a short while later, blurring into existence a few steps away. "Yeah, that didn't work," she said with a grimace. "She just kept saying she wasn't sane and needed to meditate more."

Tim stared. That's…definitely not good. Shit. Carl, your alien girlfriend is a lot of work. I better get a big thank-you if I manage to pull this off.

"I'm sure she'll be fine eventually," Scipio said with a wave of her hand. "I wanna see how strong you've gotten. Feels like it's been… Eh. It's been a while." She took up a stance with one foot ahead and her hands raised in loose fists, and her eyes gleamed over a bright grin. "Let's fight!"

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With a sigh, Tim raised his own hands and stepped forward. One thing at a time for now.

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"You're definitely faster than I remember," Scipio said. "Must be doing some good training."

Tim took another deep breath to steady himself and reached up to wipe the sweat off his brow with the back of his hand. "Am I? How much faster?"

"Mm." She tapped her fingers against her chin. "Maybe one or two divinespeed?"

"What? What's a divinespeed?" Tim stretched his arms up over his head and glanced at the clock in his HUD. Still time for a quick shower, but probably no nap. Not that I need it. Feeling amazing right now.

"It's a…" She grimaced. "Don't worry about it, it's just a system thing. You're almost as fast as Carl now. Maybe. Eh, maybe not?"

"That's…not a great comparison," he said.

"I'm bad at explaining shit, okay?" she said. "It's a really fast improvement though." She looked around. "Maybe it's because of this place? I didn't actually try training last time I was here. Just ate a lot."

"You mean this is like some kind of hyperbolic time chamber?" Tim asked.

"A what?" Scipio said, giving him a bewildered look.

"Uh…" Tim turned his neck, eliciting a crack. "Nevermind, it's a thing from my world. So training here's good is what you're saying."

"Seems like it," she said with a shrug.

They stood across from each other in companionable silence for a short while before Tim shrugged in return. "Okay, well, thanks for sparring with me, but I'm probably gonna get a shower in before my next fight, which is—"

"Oh, can I come?" Scipio asked.

Tim gave her a blank look. How does she always surprise me?

"I've never taken a shower with someone," she said, tilting her head slightly to one side. "Could be interesting."

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"I'm trying to get some soap going here," Tim said.

Scipio squirted him again with a powerful spray from one of the wall jets she'd somehow managed to rip out of the shower's side. Another jet had appeared in its place, and the one in her hands emitted a continual stream of water. "Soap's boring. I was right, this is interesting. And fun!" She sprayed his back this time, and the spray continued to descend along his left leg while he scrubbed the scales on his chest with the brush.

"This isn't what I imagined when you said you wanted to shower with me," he said, shaking his head with a chuckle.

"Yeah? What were you expecting?" she called in an amused voice. "Fucking in the shower's not gonna be fun. Never as fun when water's involved. Tried it already."

"You could at least help me wash instead of just spraying the soap off me immediately," he said.

"Okay, but we're gonna have a spray fight after," she said.

"Deal," Tim agreed.

"Good. How's this?"

Tim felt a warm, slippery feeling start to slide across his back as Scipio pressed her sudsy, athletic body against him. "This is nice," he said.

She dropped slowly towards the floor, and her hands circled his right leg. "I'll do this half, you keep scrubbing up there," she called up as she started rubbing his leg.

"I… That works," he said. She's just so weird. But it's a good weird. A comfortable weird.

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"That was more fun than I expected," Tim said as he stepped out of the shower.

"I said it was gonna be fun," Scipio said. She tossed him a towel off the rack and stood dripping on the floor, naked, with her arms crossed and a smirk on her lips. "You had an easy target though, so obviously I was gonna win," she said as she dropped her gaze to the protrusion rising up from just below his waist.

"You're a naked, beautiful woman," he said with a shrug as he started drying his hair.

She frowned up at him suspiciously. "You're not getting weird about this, are you?"

"It'd be hard to get weirder than you already are," he said, contributing a smirk of his own.

She frowned at him until he worked the towel down to his chest. "Okay, good. Because I was sort of thinking of asking if you wanted to be friends."

Tim paused. "Friends, huh?"

She shimmered, and lightning again erupted from her body for a moment, leaving her completely dry when it faded. "Yeah. Friends. You're interesting enough. Sort of strong too. We have fun when we hang out—"

"Are you actually saying hang out?" Tim interrupted.

She smiled a little. "Yeah. Learned it from Carl. Good phrase. Sometimes."

"I think I'd like to be friends, Scipio," he said with a chuckle and a shake of his head as he resumed his toweling. I can absolutely imagine that. Carl's always talking about hanging out. Or at least he was.

"Okay, uh, cool," she said, grimacing immediately. "Nah, that's…"

Tim snickered at her reaction. "You learn any other good words from him?"

"Yeah, some," she said, perking back up. "Um… Scam. And… Farming. And same-y."

"You don't have a word for farming?" he asked incredulously as he wiped his legs.

"Nah, it's a different sense of the word," she said, watching his progress with overt interest.

"Oh, you mean like farming," he said. His head tipped back, and he started to laugh. "That's too good."

"It's a great word," Scipio agreed. "Actually though. If we're friends now, you can call me Vol. And I'll call you Drake."

"Sounds good, Vol," Tim said.

"Drake," she said as though trying out. "Yeah. Okay."

The timer he'd set expired and began to flash.

"Shit," he muttered. He ran through the inventory commands to equip a random set of clothes and his armor, managing to grab his halberd just as his surroundings changed.

"Drake Storm, champion of Sateus!" boomed the announcer.

"What the…" Tim looked around the booing arena, and his eyes locked onto his opponent, a wide, furry creature that resembled a gorilla holding a giant axe. "Shit," he muttered again, chucking his halberd back into his inventory. "Don't do it!" he shouted, waving his empty hands in the air over his head. "Don't—"

"Frebualn, champion of Uvraura, yields! Drake Storm, champion of Sateus, is victorious!"

He groaned. "Fuck!"