In the end, Chelsea’s team won.

George and I managed to keep her occupied long enough for our squads to finish their battle, unfortunately my side took heavy losses in the skirmish, so they couldn’t finish the chimera off.

Overall, I’d say it was a tie. Losing two squads and a boss, in exchange for four squads and injuring our opponent wasn’t terrible... The only downside was Bea was a little emarrassed by the experience, and avoided me for a few days. She got over it soon enough.

Thankfully, the skirmish really did help me work through my nervous energy so I was able to get to work, and the rest of the week flew by. There were plenty of preparations, and details to go over leading up to our first match, and before I realized it, the big day arrived.

That morning I ended up waking up super early, due to the commotion in my room. George, the massive goof that he was, stole my blanket, somehow managed to get it stuck over his head, and ended up running full speed into my dresser. The combination of his disturbed screech, and my dresser falling over, were more than enough to bring me to full wakefulness.

When I saw the giant arachnid pinned under my dresser, whining, all I could do was sigh. After pushing the furniture upright again, and retrieving my blanket, I marched the embarrassed spider down to the infirmary to get looked at. George was tough, and he probably wasn’t injured at all, but considering how important today was I wasn’t going to take any chances. The nurse on duty, a naiad by the name of Sarina, didn’t even ask what happened. Over the last couple of weeks George had developed a little bit of a reputation as a reckless troublemaker. He never injured anyone, but he came close to injuring himself PLENTY of times. As far everyone was concerned, it was only a matter of time until this happened.

As soon as the check-up was over, George squirmed off the table and took off. “He’s quite excitable, isn’t he?" Sarina asked, with a sly smile.

“Unfortunately. Let’s hope he can put that energy to good use today.” I gave her a tired smile, before heading out to track the troublemaker down again. “Thanks for your help today.”

“Good luck!” she called as I stalked out into the hallway, only to find George once again gone. It was definitely a rough start to such an important day.

I eventually found the cowardly arachnid cowering around the corner from my room, warily watching the hallways. I didn’t approach him, instead I just opened the door and waited for him to scramble inside. “Please don’t tell me you were afraid of the healer,” I said while I pulled on my outfit. I missed most of George’s reply, since he’d burrowed under my bed, and only caught the occasional, vaguely negative, muffled grumble from his hiding spot. Since I had a lot of time to kill before the match, I took my time to make sure all my equipment was fully polished, and in top condition, before putting it on.

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When I finished dressing I briefly considered leaving the naughty spider behind, going to breakfast alone, but that would just put George in an even worse mood when the match started. “Come on you, it’s time for breakfast. You’re lucky it’s such an important day, otherwise I’d consider grounding you,” I called to my partner. George just let out a sad ‘Murrr’ as he slunk out from under the bed, and slowly crept down the hallway after me.

The cafeteria was absolutely packed when we arrived, despite it being fairly early in the morning. When I strolled in it took me a minute to find Kass, sitting in the back. She was bouncing animatedly, stuffing pancakes into her mouth. She smiled when I approached, brandishing a fork in my direction, “Good morning Tal, excited for the big day?”

I sank down into the booth next to her, “I’m not sure if I’m excited… a little stressed maybe? I’ve been putting together strategies for long enough that if things go wrong I’ll feel like it’s my fault.” Kass started to open her mouth, so I quickly put up my hand to interrupt her. “I KNOW it won’t be my fault, I’ll just feel like it is.”

“Well, that’s an improvement from a couple months ago anyways,” she nodded. “You might not be excited, but everyone else is. You can just feel the nervous energy from everyone in here.”

She took a small bite of bacon while I glanced around the room. The place was certainly buzzing, plenty of low conversation, but I did notice something.

“Where is everyone else?” I asked. “I don’t see Bea, Chelsea, or anyone else. I know it’s early, but I would have expected them to be here.”

“Oh, they’re probably doing another check on their floors, it IS an important day," Kass replied, before taking another bite of her breakfast.

I glanced back over at her. "So why are you here?"

“Oh, I did my checks yesterday. I’ve learned to not leave my checks until the last second, nor worry about them the day of. Unlike some people,” she sighed. “I’m hoping that Bea, Chelsea and Calliope will learn to relax, and realize they don’t need to triple-check everything. As for the others… Voss will ALWAYs worry about his staff, and despite my best efforts to teach them, I don’t think Luther or Sullivan will ever learn to plan ahead.” She stopped cutting her pancakes for a second and looked my way. “You know, I’m actually a little surprised you’re not doing a check right now.”

I shrugged. “I’m worried about whether my plans will succeed or fail, not how well my staff will perform. If they do badly we lose the floor and I can re-assess for the next match. If I do badly, I may cause a cascade reaction that results in the loss of our match.”

Kass just shot me a disappointed look. I knew I shouldn’t be thinking like that, but I couldn’t help it. Out of the corner of my eye I caught a long, arachnid leg reaching up from beneath the table, towards Kass’s plate. I quickly smacked it, then shot George the evil eye. “I’ll get you some, no stealing.”

The naga laughed as I flagged down the server, and placed our breakfast order.

The day had barely started, and I'd already had just about as much stress, and excitement, as I could handle. I could only hope that I'd have enough energy to make it through the rest of the day.