Contributing Author: Miles English

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“I think… I need to sit down,” said Jill. Holding her head, she sat on the bench in front of the apartment complex. She closed her eyes, breathing slowly and firmly, and grabbed the anti-homeless spike strip as if she’d fall off without its support.

“Do you need–?”

“I just need a minute,” said Jill.

Trey’s phone buzzed. He still had his phone? How in the world was it still working? And who would even call him? No one called him. No one even texted him any more.

“Oh, go ahead and answer it. I’ll be fine. I just need to catch my breath,” said Jill.

Trey turned so that she’d be in the corner of his eye instead of directly staring at her and pulled out his phone. The call was coming from “Connor.” He didn’t know anyone by that name, but he shrugged and answered it.

“Trey! Thank you for picking up my friend. I’m your aphid companion.” The voice was deep and commanding. Superman, if Superman was also a Navy commander. “My name is Connor. I’m the competent one.”

Trey took a calming breath. That wasn’t the craziest thing an aphid had ever said to him. But who actually just went out and said that they were competent?

“Someone who is confident in his abilities, that’s who,” the commanding voice said with enthusiasm.

“Why did you call me instead of…” he glanced at Jill, still sitting on the bench with her eyes closed, but near enough to hear the conversation. “You know.”

“We needed to have a chat, and I didn’t want your lady to believe you mad,” said Connor.

“Oh,” said Trey. “That’s actually… a very competent thing to do. Thank you.”

“Ha HA! Of course, my young friend,” said Connor.

“So what am I in for now? Fighting clown ninjas on the moon?” He rubbed his face. “I’m sorry. It’s just… it’s been a lot. It’s starting to get to me.”

“I can sense that. You need a break! Tell you what. You have the evening off,” said Connor.

“Really?”

“Of course! I am not the aphid to call myself competent and then immediately burden you with a new set of troubles. Go. Take some time to yourself. Why not ask the pretty girl on a date? I know you want to. And if it helps? She’ll say yes. I guarantee it.”

Trey felt himself going cold. He carefully didn’t look at Jill. “How can you know that? Did you–?”

“I have not interfered with her in any way except to improve her natural healing a bit. She likes you, Trey. Be a man and ask her out!”

“I get it,” said Trey. “You need love for the garden. That’s what this is about, isn’t it?”

“Absolutely not,” said Connor. “I give you my word that this is absolutely not about that. It’s simply the fact that I care about your well-being. Working with us is not going to be one of those superhero deals where your personal life falls apart because you’re too busy super-heroing to live your life. The Host must come first. So I mean it. Take the night off.”

“What about my job?” said Trey. No, he honestly couldn’t see himself going back to work after this, but he needed his apartment. After all, Jill lived next door.

“What about your job? You majored in Business. That shows a man of responsibility and foresight, but it doesn’t speak to someone who is passionate about what they do. If you really find fulfillment in it, we’ll work something out. Otherwise? Here. I’ve transferred five hundred thousand dollars into your account. Call it a reward for successful Quest completion. I’d also appreciate it if you started paying for things rather than letting my misguided cousins steal everything in sight.”

“I can do that,” said Trey.

“Good! Now, here’s what I’ll do. I’ll be here if you need me, but I’m going to take a step back and give you kids some privacy. I’ll also lock these memories so that no aphids will be able to use them to taunt you with them later.”

Trey sighed in relief. “Thank you.”

“Think nothing of it. They should not be doing that kind of thing. Please understand, they’re coming from a place of extreme insecurity.”

Trey nodded. “I can understand that much.”

“No. You really can’t. When you’re a thousand years old, you will be astonishingly wise. You will not be a fashion-challenged recreant with a personality disorder.”

Trey laughed.

“Thank you for looking after them, by the way,” said Connor. “Now! I believe Jill is starting to recover. Wait, one last thing. Might I borrow your phone?”

“Sure,” said Trey. His hearing went out. He felt himself pressing buttons, but couldn’t see what he was typing. He felt the vibrations in his throat, but didn’t know what he was saying. Then it was over, and his senses were back.

“I apologize for the secrecy. It’s a surprise. A good one! But I sense that if I told you who I called and what I said, you would think about it all night. Now, quick cliff notes for my turn: You will be competent at everything you try. Let me give you the first little nudge. Don’t dance around the issue, don’t hem and haw. Just ask her out.”

“Thanks,” said Trey, and tried to steel himself against his nerves. He’d done all kinds of things today, so why was it that this made him the most nervous?

He panicked a bit when he realized what he must look like. He’d been in the sewer in these clothes… but when he looked down, he realized he was wearing well-fitting slacks, a nice shirt, and a sport jacket. Thanks, Connor. He felt a mental thumbs up in return.

Jill stood up. “Sorry about that. I feel much better now. A lot better actually.” She looked up at her apartment window dozens of feet above them. “How am I alive? You can’t just ‘be fine’ after falling from a third story window because someone catches you. That’s not how anything works.”

“I know this doesn’t really explain anything, but I’m sort of a superhero now,” said Trey.

Jill nodded. “No, yeah, that actually explains a lot. So Geneva…?”

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

“Yeah, it’s sort of a random kaleidoscope of powers, and there’s a helper that comes along with each of them to help me out. You met the robot one, Geneva,” said Trey.

“And who’s in there with you now?” asked Jill, a hint of worry in her eyes.

“No one. It’s been a long day and they decided I could use some me time,” said Trey.

Jill visibly relaxed. “Oh, good. No offense, but I’ve been worrying all day that you got possessed by robotic alien monsters.”

“Right, yeah,” said Trey, scratching the back of his head. Smooth as hell, but for once the mental sarcastic commentary was absent.

“And they came after me because… I’ve been Mary-Jane’d haven’t I?” She quirked an eyebrow playfully. The fact that she still had the presence of mind to be a little bit playful spoke volumes about her. Trey was certain he’d be a weeping puddle of nerves by now if he didn’t have the aphids pushing him forward.

“That’s not fair,” she continued. “I’m not even your girlfriend.” She looked at him with a meaningful expression, and unless he totally didn’t understand human women at all (which for the record was totally possible), that was an invitation.

“We can fix that,” said Trey. “Would you want to…” He almost said ‘hang out’. That’s how it’d started with Stacy, with ‘hanging out’. They’d spent their first evening together watching reruns of her favorite sitcom. And that’s what they kept doing until they broke up. Did they ever go on an actual date? Well, yes, twice, and they’d both been a disaster.

“... would you want to go out with me? Like, on a date.”

Jill smiled. “Sure!”

Trey wasn’t prepared for the jolt to his heart. Man, he barely knew this girl. Talked to her a few times, sure, but just here and there. It was completely insane that he already liked her this much.

“We could take my car, or…” he glanced at the absurdly powerful motorcycle that had somehow returned to its parking place across the street. Had Connor done that, too? Or had the doorman, Carl, found it and brought it back?

“Oh, the bike! Definitely the bike!” said Jill.

Trey reached into the pockets of his clean-and-pressed pants and, to his surprise, the keys were right there.

“Great. Let’s get out of here, then!”

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The date wasn’t an unqualified success. The movie they went to was so bad that they walked out after the first forty-five minutes. But it was bad enough that it gave them something to laugh and talk about as they rode towards the restaurant.

Trey picked something expensive, after checking with his banking app that yes, Connor’s money was really there. The food was good, but there was a couple at the next table who’d been so distracting that Trey and Jill hadn’t really been paying much attention to each other as they’d both been surreptitiously snooping on the other couple.

A tall red-head in a red dress raved passionately about her favorite movie: The Human Millipede, much to her date’s complete and abject terror. He’d even blinked at the waiter so much that the waiter had come over to ask if he needed help. Despite all of that, the Human Millipede fan completely won over her date by the end of the night, and they were even talking about a themed wedding until they both got thrown out for being too rowdy.

It left both Jill and Trey in stitches, which was honestly exactly what he’d needed, anyway. After dinner, Trey suggested they visit the New City Botanical Gardens. The place was a complete dump, but he really didn’t want the night to stop and he didn’t have any other ideas.

“Could we stop by the drug store first,” asked Jill. “I’ve got a monster headache.”

“What? We should get you home. Sorry, asking you out right after–”

“No, it’s ok. I want to keep going. Just, um–”

“Yeah, totally fine,” said Trey, and detoured to the nearest Fallgreens.

Jill found the painkiller section, and seemed to be ready to take a minute to decide between two options, so Trey scanned the store. Only to find exactly what he didn’t want to find.

“Well, shoot,” said Trey.

“What is it?” asked Jill.

“Supervillain, six-o-clock. One second, I’ll be right back.”

It was that guy with the gray fedora and ash-colored suit, the one who walked like a ballerina and had long, yellow nails. Rat.

“Found you,” Rat sang playfully.

“Let’s make this quick,” said Trey. “I’m a little busy, and you’re intruding on my night off.”

He brought out his wallet and found the the Pizza Slum gift card and flicked it at Rat. Rat didn’t flinch, and the card sailed right past him to hit the drug store’s motion sense activators, opening its the doors.

Rat watched on incredulously, then turned his head back around just in time to see Trey’s flying roundhouse kick connect with his face.

The man bounced twice as he sailed through the door and skidded to a stop in the middle of the street, only to immediately get rammed by a moving truck, knocking him another ten feet onto the opposite sidewalk.

Trey watched cautiously as Rat struggled up to a standing position. The villain put his fedora on with shaky hands.

"I thought you might have gotten isekai'd just now," said Trey.

“Everywhere we go, disease and filth follow us. Rats. Everywhere we go the humans follow us,” said Rat.

Something squirmed underneath his sleeve, and a wretched, diseased rat crawled out. Rat threw it at him.

Mind if I step in, really quick?

“Oh, please do,” said Trey.

Connor stepped forward and caught the rat in a sort of blue forcefield that appeared in front of his hand. Then he bent down and collected an empty can of spray-paint, a grocery bag, and a wad of used tissues. He started mixing them together with blurring speed, until he came up with what looked like a stereotypical flying saucer UFO. He stuck the rat inside, and then tossed it in the air.

It didn’t fall. It just kept going, higher and higher, until Trey lost sight of it.

What did you just do? Asked Trey.

“Tossed that thing into the sun. The thing you must remember about the Frugal Five–well, Four, after you escaped them last time, is that they are immortal unless Beetlebub chooses to kill them. It’s better that way, because wounding them wounds him. And he will find that,” Connor pointed at the departing UFO “extremely annoying.”

“What have you done?” screeched Rat. “Frugal Four, first member. Rat! Activate!”

Rat slapped his wrist, and dirty green armor wrapped around him. He smelled awful.

“I’ll make this quick,” said Connor.

He bounded forward and slammed Rat with an uppercut. His fist broke the sound barrier. The impact sounded like a strike of lightning. A shockwave flew through the area, knocking nearby people to the street but somehow not breaking any windows.

Rat was gone. Obliterated, or maybe launched to the moon for all Trey knew.

“That should be good enough for now,” said Connor. “Turning things back over to you.”

Trey was immediately worried about what Jill would think about all of this, but when he returned to her, where she stood in the doorway of Fallgreens, her eyes were sparkling. “Was that an Action Ranger?”

“Yeah, basically. They’re like evil Action Rangers, though,” said Trey.

“That is so cool!”

“Right?”

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The botanical garden was next. Jill and Trey spent the time walking along the paths of the garden, past the trash and wilting flowers. They ignored it all, and Trey listened as Jill opened up about her career, talking about the pitfalls and triumphs of the Illustration business. It was, all-in-all, a magical night.

I’m going to clean this place up. If only so that our next trip here is even better.

Jill suddenly turned and kissed him on the cheek, before abruptly pulling back, blushing. “I should head home.”

“I think I need to stay here,” said Trey. “For tonight.”

“Does that mean I can take the bike?” she asked.

He threw her the keys, and she caught them, then practically skipped to the motorcycle. She hopped on, and immediately peeled out, then zoomed through traffic and the next two red lights like a bat out of hell.

“She’s not like, normal, is she?” said Trey, through a smile that he just couldn’t seem to wipe off his face.

Not at all. Ha ha HA! I like her.

“I found a garden,” said Trey. “But I didn’t bring love. Sorry about that.”

Oh? You don’t love the girl?

“Excitement. Infatuation. Attraction. A crush. I really like this girl. I really, really like her. I think it’ll turn into love, but that takes time,” said Trey.

That’s a very mature thing to say, Trey.

[Quest: Create a Garden] Complete!

“What?”

“Fear not,” said a mechanical voice.

Trey turned in shock. Tater-tot was there, looking surprisingly healthy. His legs were back, and he was standing next to a twelve-foot-tall robot, holding its hand.

“WE HAVE BROUGHT THE LOVE!” said the robot.

Issuing [Reward]…