“Great flaming flamingos that is the third time today we’ve had to escape from the Guards.” Ash brushed more dirt off of his body.

Ave pulled the dust cover off of her head. “You either have very bad luck, or maybe we’re just not escaping well enough. Is there somewhere we could go where we could actually hide?”

“Not in town.” said Ash.

“You don’t have any friends?”

“Uhhh…”

“Any favors you could call in?”

“Errr…”

“Do you have a job?”

Ash scratched his neck. “ I don’t… stay in town a lot.”

“What about outside of town?” Ave asked.

“We could go to my house.”

“Is it safe?”

“Oh yeah. Nobody will look for us there.”

“I suppose it will have to do.”

Ash shook Luke by the shoulders. “Luke snap out of it. We’re going to my house. Will that make you feel better?”

“I suppose.” Luke mumbled.

“Yeah it will.” Ash patted Luke’s shoulder.

Ash pulled the sheets off of them and tossed them into the gutter.

“Ugh. We smell like mothballs.” Ave wrinkled her nose.

“Do we?” Ash sniffed his own arm. “Hopefully it keeps any more people from ‘bugging’ us. *Chuckle* Let’s get going. As long as we don’t run into anyone else it should be a straight shot to the East Gate.”

#

“I really need to learn to shut up today.” Ash said to himself.

The three of them were hiding in an alley off of the main street leading to the East Gate.

“What’s the problem now?” Ave was scanning the crowd in the street.

“One of my friends is in the street.” said Ash.

“Isn’t that a good thing?” asked Ave.

“Sorry, wrong word. Less friend, more enemy, I guess acquaintance is a better word. If they recognize us it could be a problem.

“Can we go out of a different gate?”

“Sure. But the North and South Gates are on the other sides of town. You know, because of their names.”

“And the more time we spend in town the more chances there are that some Guards find us.”

“Who is it?” Luke peeked around the corner.

“Ted.” Ash pointed.

Ted was standing in the middle of the road helping unload bags of flour into the bakery.

“Is that Ted? Wow. He got big. Or should I say bigger. He was always larger than all of the other kids.” said Luke.

“Yeah. And right now he’s a massive roadblock.”

Ave joined them at the corner. “What’s the problem?”

You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

Ash pointed down the street. “Ted is one of our old childhood friends. He’s right in our way. We could try to sneak by but if Luke recognized him then there’s a chance that he’ll recognize Luke as well.”

“Can’t we just walk past him?” Ave asked.

“Yeah, can’t we?” Luke repeated.

“Ted’s weakness is that he likes to be helpful, for anyone, and everyone. If he sees us and the guards ask him any questions, he’s gonna tell them. Our best chance is to sneak by. But we need a distraction.” Ash squirted at Ave. “The people in our Town wouldn’t recognize you would they?”

Ave frowned. “No. No they won’t.”

#

Ted finished loading the flour into the Baker’s cart. “There you are. That should be all of them.”

“Thanks for all your hard work Ted.” The Baker said.

“No thanks needed. Helping people makes things easier for everyone. Just let me know if there’s anything else I can do.” said Ted.

“Have a good day.” The Baker headed back into his shop.

“You too.” Ted turned to leave. There was a young woman standing in front of him. She was… plain. She was also holding a bucket of water.

“Can you hold this for me?” She held the bucket out to him.

“Uh. Sure.” Ted carefully grabbed the bucket.

“Thank you.” She turned and lifted up another bucket that was sitting on the sidewalk. “And this one too.”

“Okay.” Ted stepped forward and took this bucket as well.

The woman turned. There was a line of wooden water pails in a line on the sidewalk behind her. She leaned over again.

“And this one. And this one. And this one. Here’s another one. And this one. One more. Rebalance those, and here’s one. Another bucket. Just put this one on top of the others. And here’s one more…”

Ted lost count. There had to be fourteen or fifteen buckets by now. He had started stacking them in an inverted pyramid just to keep up. The pile was so tall that he was having trouble seeing what was in front of him. He couldn’t see the young woman anymore.

“Hello? Did you need me to take these somewhere? Hello?” Ted called out.

There was a rattling sound. The buckets were poorly made. Water was starting to seep out between the cracks in their planks. One of the buckets at the top of the pile was tipping sideways. Its contents were spilling over and pouring into the buckets below causing them to overflow and spill out as well.

“Hello? I don’t know how much longer I can hold on to…”

*Ker-sploosh*

The stack of containers exploded. The contents became a miniature waterfall that soaked Ted. Not a drop of liquid reached the sidewalk. Ted’s thick woolen clothes absorbed it all. He found himself instantly trapped inside a moist sweater cocoon. The woman he had been helping was nowhere to be seen.

*Sigh* “I better find a clothesline.” Ted waddled off down the street.

#

Ash, Ave, and Luke made their escape down the street.

Ave turned to Ash. “How did you do that?”

“Do what?” Ash looked back.

“You’re kidding?” She glanced at Luke and then back to Ash. “You’re kidding right?”

*Shrug* “What are you talking about?”

“Seriously? Your summons. You made those water buckets even though you summoned twice already. And I’m pretty sure you summoned back in the restaurant too so that makes three. How did you summon three times in one day? Are you secretly a crystal wizard or something?” Ave scanned his clothes.

Luke nodded in realization. “Oh right. She doesn’t know.”

Ave looked confused. “Doesn’t know what?”

“It’s kind of hard to explain. Ash can summon a lot but…”

“It’s trash. It’s always trash.” Ash continued. “No matter what I summon it is always the worst possible result.”

“Right. I guess it’s not so hard to explain.” Luke nodded along.

Ash tried to keep the annoyance out of his voice. “I can’t explain why but whatever I summon is always the lowest tier in terms of quality. But it also doesn’t use up a lot of my mana. So I can summon multiple times. It’s just never anything useful.”

Ave held up her hands. “So wait, you’re telling me, that he always summons the worst possible result.” She pointed at Ash. “And you always summon the best possible result.” She pointed to Luke. “And the two of you are also childhood friends that grew up in the same town.”

Luke and Ash looked at each other.

“Yeah.” said Ash

“Pretty much.” said Luke.

Ave stared off into the middle distance for a moment. “That doesn’t sound strange to you two?”

Luke looked introspective for a moment.

Ash interjected. “Luke has light hair. I have dark hair. He’s taller. I’m shorter. He’s athletic and handsome and I’m not.”

“Hey now.” Luke spoke up. “Don’t say that. I’m sure you clean up really well. Maybe get out of those dirty clothes. Are those holes in the elbows of your shirt?”

“That’s not the point.” Ash slapped Luke’s hands away. “He was born one way and I was born another. It’s the will of the gods or some other nonsense. No point thinking about it. It’s just what happened. Trying to find some weird pattern isn’t going to help us sleep any better at night.”

“That’s right. And that’s why we’re best pals.” Luke smiled.

“Save your energy. We might be prison pals by the end of the day.” Ash turned back to Ave. “I can’t explain it, but is this really the strangest thing you’ve ever heard of?”

Ave looked contemplative. “No. I suppose that you’re right.”