Ixia’s smile spread over her face, reaching up to a twinkle in her eyes as Cormac’s chokehold tightened around her. “And you told me that you were unskilled in this!”

Though Cormac could not see her smile, he could hear it in her voice well enough. Which was causing so many conflicting emotions as he used his arms to apply more pressure around her neck. “Uhhh...y-yeah um…”

“Is something wrong, Cormac?” Ixia’s smile faltered as concern finally made an appearance in her voice as she made an effort to free herself from being pinned down, only for Cormac to move his legs to crush that effort in the blink of an eye.

The redhead grit his teeth, sucking in a bit of air as he chose his words with as much care as he wasn’t using in trying to pin this incredibly lithe plant woman down. A plant woman who seemed completely unphased by his efforts, except of course for...joy? Joy in that after having his wooden knife knocked away Cormac saw an opening in their sparring and used it to subdue and pin her. His current efforts to choke her out were, however, so far fruitless.

“Well-” Her arm tried to work it’s way free once more, and with the smallest of grunts that effort was also put to an end as he was now exerting enough effort into choking her out as to concern him as to how she was still breathing. “See normally you would have passed out from the lack of oxygen but you’re ju- oh right you’re a plant.”

“And if I wasn’t, I have little doubt this would be quite effective!” The smile had returned in force to her lips and voice alike as Cormac relented and released her from the hold. The two untangled themselves, the human being the first to get to his feet as he offered a hand to the dryad who happily accepted and used the opportunity to pull him into a hug.

A hug that piled onto an already growing mountain of mixed emotions that Cormac tried to whittle down with questions while failing to suppress his face going as red as his hair. “Right uh, so do you have lungs or...or if you do are they necessary or-?”

“My lungs aid in the rapid intake and outtake of gasses necessary to what you would call photosynthesis, but what I would call a highly modified version of that biological process as modified to a mobile and thinking being.” Ixia’s smile remained throughout her explanation as she pulled back from the hug, still beaming at a man whose eyes were the only part of him not currently red.

Though Cormac felt as though his eyes would blush from green to red if they could. “Oh. Well that makes sense.”

He wasn’t lying, and what parts his brain was able to process at this moment did make sense. The unprocessed parts could wait for later after the much more vital and lifesaving task of regaining his composure and silencing those conflicting feelings was accomplished.

“I do have a question though.” Ixia brought a hand to her chin as she tilted her head.

“Yes!” Cormac answered too quickly, at which point his eyes searched for a way out. “I mean yes ask anything!” Which he immediately realized was a terrible thing to offer at this moment.

Ixia suppressed a chuckle as she kept her focus for now. “You told me you were inexperienced in combat, where did you learn this?”

“That! Yes! That!” Cormac’s hands had curled into a pair of finger guns aimed squarely at Ixia, a toothy smile accompanying them in their valiant effort. Though he had no idea what exactly that effort was at the moment as he actually processed the question and holstered his finger guns as far less foolish hands on his hips.

“Well, you see I am a ginger so growing up I got picked on a lot.” He stated, immediately noting Ixia’s horror overtaking her as her expression sank. His explanation quickly continued in an attempt to head off any further questions. “See, redheads get picked on a lot. Because uh...well I guess it’s because it means we don’t have souls. Which, depending on who you ask either stems from anti-Celtic sentiment, or weird superstitions about vampires...which might tie into the previous thing, oh and just general humanity finding as many ways as possible to be prejudiced bags of dicks? So-”

Ixia’s growing horror continued to well up and out of her eyes in a small stream of tears. “B-but why?! Your hair is beautiful and so are you!”

There was absolutely no processing any of this at the moment. There was only saving it for a later, more convenient time as Cormac’s brain quickly performed a restart. “Uh…..yeah and um, well see kids can be terrible. And so they would try to pick on me or beat me up. This happened a lot and I got good at fighting back. Dad always said ‘son if you’re going to be victimized by idiot zero tolerance policies, make sure to make it count’. And I did! I got good enough at defending myself that after one kid would try beating me up, no one would try again for a long time out of fear! Which only cost me a fe-, only several suspensions! Sure it got more comments like Fighting Irish but what do they expect when they push me- Uh-”

Ixia had silenced his rant by pulling the man into another embrace, followed shortly by petting his hair as she whispered into his ear “like a white lion of red mane making an example of hyenas.”

Cormac had lost track of how many times he had to smash the hard reset button to his brain in just a few short minutes. “W-well, really it was just self defencing my way into a status of everyone leaving me alone. That doesn’t really count-”

“You easily pinned me down and proved yourself capable in close quarters, you have much to be proud of.” She squeezed a bit tighter in her hug.

The reset button to Cormac’s brain had broken sometime in the last few seconds when he had been desperately mashing it in a futile attempt to regain any sense of composure. The human wasn’t even sure what he was working with at the moment, but he did know that he had no idea what to do with his hands other than finger guns would be wildly inappropriate in the midst of a hug.

A dumb thought that managed to spur an actually useful thought.

“I...I’m glad you think so. Thank you. But I should probably only try wrestling Veiled Things as a last resort.” His ensuing chuckle was like a pressure release valve for nerves. “I wish I had something for range. Like a gun or something, haha! But one that would be effective against the supernatural! Haha!”

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Ixia pulled back from the hug, violet eyes focused and serious as she gave a nod. “You bring up a good point. While you are competent in melee, it would be best to avoid such engagements with the many things capable of tearing you in half.”

“I would like to avoid that.” Cormac noted, blood finally leaving his face as fear drained it away.

Ixia paced about a bit with a hand to her chin as she wondered aloud. “Are you certain that guns wouldn’t be an option? Because-”

“Once again, the rayguns of ‘A Stellar Crossroads’ are not real and the guns of this world just pale in comparison.” Cormac cut her off with a shake of his head. “Also they’re loud and ammo costs money.”

The Dryad frowned, trying to think of some form of protest only to be shot down in reminder that the projectile weapons of the world she had awoken into were impossibly loud things with ammo that could not easily be made on one’s own as opposed to the wonders of the ‘science fiction’ show that the pair had been watching that elegantly harvested the power of the sun into a weapon. Finding no argument, she settled for the smallest of pouts instead. “And you are unskilled in the bow?”

“Grampa took me out shooting guns, not bows.” The human shrugged in sympathy, leaning against a wall as he watched the dryad pace about his cleared out living room. “Also those don’t hit as hard so if a gun would really only work on the eyes I’ll have an even worse time trying to make that happen with a slow firing bow. And I guess I could try and find some magic version of a bow somehow, but if I’m doing that I may as well...ah shit.”

Ixia turned towards her Guardian once more, eyebrow raised. “Is something wrong, Cormac?”

“Yeah.” Cormac groaned as he buried his face in his hands, walking himself over to the couch to collapse into it. “I had a really bad idea.”

The Dryad walked over, taking a gentle seat next to him on the couch. “Would you share it? It may turn out to be a good idea.”

“That might be worse?” The Guardian said as he rubbed at his face, the prior exertion of wrestling a surprisingly strong plant woman to the ground catching up with him as this bad idea tailed quickly behind it. “You said you can do things at range, right? Is there any chance that’s a rarity among the scary supernatural things out there?”

Ixia placed a hand on his shoulder, giving a weak smile. “Vine whips and thorns shot from my hands, yes. From others...expect stinging whip tongues, projectile bone spikes, bolts of lightning, fireballs, sonic blasts, beams of pure pai-”

“Range is just as not optional as melee, understood.” Cormac sighed, chewing at his tongue for a moment as he mulled this bad idea over. “Since we’re desperate, I had been thinking-”

----------------------------------------

The guardian drummed his fingers against the counter he was leaning against, smile as wide as he could force it as he tried to figure out where he was supposed to focus his green gaze on the three eyed, four armed woman. Common sense told him that it was obviously the third eye, while Ixia shattering his worldview every five minutes told him it might not be so obvious. The tank full of glowing plants just to the side of the woman cast their unearthly orange glow across her bubbled and let out a low pop to force Cormac to decide to focus just slightly below her middle eye.

“You’re back.” The horned woman noted without a hint of emotion. “What is it you seek?”

Cormac made a quick glance over his shoulder to Ixia, who gave him an equally forced smile after both of them had somehow agreed to try out this very bad idea. The man steeled himself, turned back to the pale woman and responded “Yes I would like to see your selection of obsidian blades please!”

“We are fresh out.”

“Great! That’s great and very troubling and is somehow exactly what I expected!!” His smile endured while his spirit did not, as he transitioned to the agreed upon plan b. “In that case, I would like to buy one magic gun please!”

“What kind?”

Cormac managed to keep the swearing restricted to his inner voice alone, though it was loud and emphatic enough that he worried it would be heard still. Which was somehow not the least unreasonable concern today. In all their fretting over this horrible, awful, terrible idea they had somehow managed to overlook the possibility that there might be a selection. And all the choices and additional decisions that brought over complicated things.

“Is there...a magic gun section?” The redhead asked, trying to keep his smile of false confidence propped up while the Dryad kept a cautious eye out for escape routes in case the pair decided to flee.

“Yes.”

The strange woman’s answer hung in the air for a few uncomfortable moments as Cormac drummed his fingers ever more rapidly against the counter.

“Can you- would you please show me?” He finally said.

The woman gave a nod, eyes never blinking and never breaking contact with Cormac’s as she made her way out from behind the counter in a glide. Her black and yellow dress reached down to the floor, dragging against it as she led onward to give no indication of any legs moving beneath it. As Cormac once again glanced over his shoulder to Ixia for assurance, who gave a quick and only slightly unsure nod in response, he saw at least ten other things lining the shelves that were a greater cause for concern than a seemingly floating woman who despite a possible lack of legs looked as though she had stepped out of his nightmares.

“You know I didn’t really get to appreciate it this time, but you know-” Cormac said, following as far back as he believed to be socially acceptable while eyeing the shelves. “-this place has some real...real charm to it.”

Ixia followed his eyes to a shelf of desiccated severed hands belonging to a number of things she both did and did not recognize with a musty dusty scent to match. “Yes it….really has some spirit!”

The strange woman reached out a long, clawed finger to point down an aisle they passed. “Charms will be over there at the back wall.” Another arm reached out to point in another direction towards a door barred with heavy metal and glowing blue. “Spirits are to be found in there, please ask for assistance and do not attempt to enter on your own.”

The Dryad and Guardian both had their regrets. Cormac regretted having this terrible idea in the first place, and Ixia regretted not having an alternative idea to go with instead. They both regretted finding the other so very convincing as they shared a worried look as they walked a bit closer to one another in pursuit of the shopkeeper.

“Good to know, but I think we’ll wait to see how much one magic gun will cost first.” Cormac forced a bit of ‘friendly’ enthusiasm back into his voice that only wavered slightly.

“I must remind you that the costs here are non-traditional.” The woman said, not looking back as she led the pair to a far wall.

Cormac clenched his jaw and gave the smallest shake of his head as debated whether a possible alternative of traditional costs that he could pay with a predatory loan with obscene interest rates might be better. “I remember.”

As he followed after her, he decided at least all evil methods of payment here were far more honest about it.