Lunette stares at the bracelet around Kayde’s wrist in shock, not able to comprehend what he just told her.

“You’re… Wait, what?” Lunette asks, trying to make sure she isn’t hallucinating.

“I’m an AI,” Kayde repeats again, adjusting the bracelet around his wrist so it sits better.

“No way… This is extraordinary; I’ve met a real AI. I can’t beli…” Lunette drops to the floor passing out from astonishment.

Kayde goes over to her side, “Hey! Hey! Are you okay?” He shakes her a couple of times, trying to wake her.

The door to Lunette’s room swings open, Kali emerges through it.

“What happened? I heard screaming?” She asks, initially worried about him.

She notices Lunette passed out in Kayde’s arms and questions, “Did you just kill her?”

“Nope, all I did was put on this bracelet,” Kayde holds up his arm to show Kali the bracelet.

Kali’s face turns from confused to annoyed, “Okay, but why is she on the floor?”

“Like I said I put on the bracelet, and then she passed out because it was all too exciting,” Kayde reiterates.

“Yeah, I still don’t get it,” Kali notes, not knowing what is so special about the bracelet.

“Look, the bracelet is her invention that lets us talk to animals, but it fries human brains if they try to use it, so I’m not human so my brain isn’t fried, so she collapsed because she was shocked that she is seeing her experiment work,” Kayde finally gives her the entire context of the situation.

“Whatever, she is okay right?” Kali asks, pointing down at Lunette.

“Yeah,” Kayde nods, looking at Lunette’s now sleeping face. Kali grabs Lunette out of Kayde’s arms and puts her in her own bed.

Kayde takes a seat at her desk and starts to look over the loose scraps she has around.

“What are you doing?” Kali asks, thinking he might mess with something and cause the entire hovel to explode.

“I’m just waiting for her to wake up,” Kayde explains. he doesn’t want to test out Lunette’s invention without her present. Kali leaves the room, not really interested in whatever is going on.

A few hours later Lunette wakes back up. At first, she starts to think to herself that meeting Kayde, Kali and Fore was just a dream, until she sees the android waving at her, the bracelet still around his wrist.

“Hey,” he greets her upon awakening.

Kayde watches as Lunette goes from drowsy to perfectly awake, her eyes growing wider and wider every second she looks at him.

“You okay?” Kayde doesn’t even finish his question before Lunette passes out again.

Kayde sighs, the first time was understandable, but now it is getting a little repetitive. He goes over to her bed and tucks her back in, exiting the room this time so she has some time to herself when she wakes up the next time.

Kayde doesn’t find Kali in the other room; she left to go hunt for dinner. Now that he has some time to himself Kayde starts to think about their situation. Once Lunette is up, they should search the city, if the other three lived they would most likely have ended up there.

Kayde’s thoughts are interrupted when he hears the door to Lunette’s room squeak open.

“Sorry about the going unconscious thing… I was just really shocked,” Lunette apologizes, embarrassed by her reactions in front of her new guests.

“Don’t worry about it,” Kayde waves it off.

“You want to go try it out!” Lunette’s eyes light up excited to see the fruits of her labor in action.

“Yeah,” Kayde gets up, also looking forward to talking with Fore. They walk outside where Fore and the other wolves are sitting together.

“So how does it work?” Kayde asks, not sure what he is supposed to do.

Lunette grabs his wrist and pushes a bunch of buttons, the bracelet elicits a series of beeps before she tells him, “Okay it should work now”.

Kayde walks up to Fore asking, “Hey buddy how are you doing?” Fore’s ears stick up upon realizing he can understand Kayde.

“How?” Fore asks bluntly, his usually carefree face now skeptical.

Kayde points to the bracelet on his wrist, “I got this new device so now we can talk to each other”.

“Oh cool, I like you,” Fore goes back to his relaxed attitude.

“Yeah, me too buddy, ever since I met you in the marshlands,” Kayde agrees heartily.

“Marshlands?” Fore isn’t sure what he means by that.

“Yeah, that’s the name of the place where I found you,” Kayde explains, realizing that there is going to be some disconnect in how they reference things.

“The lonely place, okay,” Fore notes, panting heavily.

“I’m glad you came along too buddy,” Kayde starts to scratch behind his ear.

“Oh yeah, don’t stop that’s the best stuff,” Fore urges Kayde on as he is getting pet.

“Look Fore, I don’t know how long I’m going to be able to keep this thing, so let’s talk about some things okay?” Kayde tells Fore wanting to have as long and detailed a conversation as possible.

“Yeah, I like talking to you metal man,” Fore agrees.

“I guess I never did tell you my name. I’m Kayde,” Kayde introduces himself.

“What’s a name?” Fore asks, not familiar with the concept.

“It’s something we label ourselves so we know how to refer to each other,” Kayde explains, knowing Fore probably won’t be able to grasp it off such a brief clarification.

“So if you don’t know about names how do you refer to the others?” Kayde asks, noting that Fore called him metal man.

“What?” Fore doesn’t quite get it.

“My friends, the ones I am usually with, what do you call them?” Kayde elucidates, curious about the answer.

The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

“The one that is with you now I call dark lady,” Fore notes, at least able to distinguish gender.

“Fore, maybe you shouldn’t use skin tone as a way to distinguish people. Just call her Kali from now on okay?” Kayde tries to get Fore to be more sensitive about that kind of issue.

“Okay, I’ll call her Kali,” Fore agrees without much trouble.

“What do you think about her?” Kayde asks, wanting Fore’s insights on his friends.

“She is confusing. I know she is really nice, but I feel like she is trying to be mean. It doesn’t make any sense to me. Is it a human thing?” Fore explains what he senses from Kali.

“No, buddy that isn’t a human thing. Well, it’s true of some humans, but not all. Sometimes humans put up a front to shelter their own emotions… what am I saying, that isn’t going to make any sense to you,” Kayde stops, knowing he won’t get anywhere.

“Never mind, what do you think about the others?” Kayde moves on.

“There is the big scary guy. I don’t like being around him if I don’t have to,” Fore explains his fear of Drakthar.

Kayde chuckles a bit, “Don’t worry about Drakthar, he may come off that way, but he would never harm you”.

“Okay, Drakthar. That is his label. Also, there is the skinny guy, I didn’t really like him before, but he brought me on this flying metal thing, that was really cool,” Fore mentions Xander.

“Hold on, he brought you to the airship?” Kayde asks, unaware that was where Xander went.

“Sure, he hugged this old guy, and then they started to drink this really weird smelling water,” Fore let’s Kayde in on Xander’s meeting with Grayson.

“Do you know why he went to see him?” Kayde asks, unsure why Xander would go there.

“He went to show the guy a box. It has a shiny silver band inside of it, we got it from a woman in that place where all the humans are,” Fore lets out Xander’s secret about the ring.

Kayde realizes what this all means, “I see… You wouldn’t understand this, but he is going to give it to Gwendolyn, the woman with the bright hair”.

“Oh, the pretty one?” Fore clarifies whom Kayde means in his own head.

“Yes, there is a tradition among humans where men give women metal bands, and if they accept, then they will be lovers… permanently. Well not always permanently, but that is the idea,” Kayde tries to explain to Fore what marriage is.

“Oh, I didn’t know humans took permanent mates,” Fore notes, thinking the concept is rather strange. Just as Fore says this Kayde notices Kali cross the tree line carrying a couple of dead squirrels strung up in one hand.

“You know, Kali is trying to become Drakthar’s mate,” Kayde tells Fore, in case he didn’t notice.

“Hmm… okay, if the scary guy is with the dark girl and the skinny guy is with the pretty woman then who is your mate?” Fore asks, now assuming all humans have mates automatically.

“I don’t have one,” Kayde informs him.

“Oh… I thought all humans had mates,” Fore notes, thinking that was what Kayde was trying to tell him.

“Sorry to interrupt you two, but does it work?” Lunette asks Kayde, her eyes wide with anticipation.

“Yes, it works like a charm. Fore and I are having a very pleasant conversation. I even learned a few things from him, like how he knew that one of my friends is going to ask another of my friends to get engaged because he saw him buy the ring,” Kayde informs her, still giddy from his conversation.

“That makes me so jealous! God, I really want to use it, it’s killing me!” Lunette exclaims.

She sighs before adding, “But seeing it work is truly an amazing sight. I’ve wanted to communicate with animals for my entire life. Their intuitions are way better than ours. I believe with enough time and questions we can learn a whole lot from them”.

Kayde nods, understanding first hand what she means, “Yeah I think so too”.

“I guess I’ll leave you two to it then,” Lunette states dejectedly, turning around to join Kali back inside.

As soon as Lunette is gone Kayde turns back to Fore to ask, “Did you hear what I was saying to her?”

“Yes, but it was confusing. I couldn’t understand her. We just met her, who is she?” Fore asks curious about this new person who is friendly with so many wolves.

“Her name is Lunette, she is a scientist. She created the bracelet that lets us talk,” Kayde explains who she is.

“Then she is a nice lady, no the best one! Because now I can talk to you,” Fore declares while beginning to pant.

“Yeah, she is pretty cool,” Kayde agrees.

“You should make her your mate,” Fore suggests, hopping back to their previous conversation.

“No, buddy it doesn’t work like that,” Kayde explains, taken off guard by Fore’s statement.

“What? Why not?” Fore asks, seeing nothing wrong with it.

“Because we just met,” Kayde explains.

“It doesn’t matter, she likes you,” Fore tells him, noticing how Lunette has been gravitating towards him, not unlike how Kali does to Drakthar.

“Well… now that is interesting,” Kayde notes, taking a second to process what he should do with this information.

“You didn’t see it? Do human’s not understand other human’s feelings?” Fore asks, curious as to how humans rarely pick up on others' emotions.

Kayde sighs, “Yeah, probably. I think there would be a lot less conflict if they did. I never really noticed before, but I guess slowly I’m starting to become more and more human myself”.

“You’re not human? You act human,” Fore reacts, thinking Kayde was like the others the whole time.

“I was a machine created by a smart scientist. He gave me the ability to learn and adapt like humans can. Now I guess I have become just as human as anyone else,” Kayde notes, starting to get a little introspective.

“You changed species, you’re really cool. But I knew that it's why I came along with you,” Fore tells him, letting out a loud bark that the others hear from inside.

“Hey Fore, do you know why we are here?” Kayde asks him, curious to know how much he pays attention to the series of events.

“Because we rode the wood,” Fore is not shy at all in saying. Kayde looks at him sideways before he realizes he meant when the boat split and they rode their half to shore.

“Yes, technically that is correct, but why did we get on the bigger piece of wood first to come over here?” Kayde asks, thinking of the bigger picture.

“No,” Fore responds plainly.

“There are people here that did bad things to Xander and me, and we want to prevent them from doing any bad things to other people in the future,” Kayde explains.

“Humans shouldn’t do bad things to each other. You’re all the same you shouldn’t hurt each other,” Fore points out, seeing it as needless.

“Humans don’t see the similarities, they choose to look at the differences: hair, skin, metal all of these things being different between humans can lead to conflict. The biggest one is not even based on appearance, it is called religion. When many humans think one thing and other humans believe another, it causes them to fight with each other,” Kayde gets slightly philosophical on Fore.

“Hey, it’s pitch black, get inside,” Kali calls out to Kayde from the door.

“Let’s go, buddy,” Kayde tells Fore, following the wolf that is now sprinting inside. Kayde takes a seat at the table with Kali and Lunette.

“Lunette showed me a way to the capital that is only half a days journey from here, tomorrow morning I’m going to find Drakthar,” Kali informs Kayde.

“Ah, I see… only Drakthar?” Kayde notes her choice of words.

Kali gets flustered, “He is the one I strive to defeat so yes, and I am going to find him. Are you coming with me?”

Lunette butts in, “Kayde I want to learn more from the device, not to mention you cannot go to the capital, you will be found out for sure”.

“I have to go eventually, I have business there,” Kayde explains while his mouth is full of squirrel meat.

“I want you to wait a while, I am developing something right now that will help you,” Lunette tells him.

“What is it?” Kayde swallows the rest of the meat in his mouth.

“It is a device that will mask your appearance with a different one. It should only take a little bit to make, so stay here with me and talk to more wolves for a while before running off and getting yourself into trouble,” Lunette suggests, not wanting him to go into the city looking how he does.

“It’s fine Kayde, I actually agree with her. This way we will have a base camp to return to. I’ll find the others and bring them back here so we can plan things out,” Kali tells Kayde, not wanting him to get caught either.

Kayde takes a few minutes to think if this is what he wants to do.

“Fine, I guess I don’t have a choice. Find the others and bring them back so we can figure out how to take down the Purity,” Kayde orders Kali like it was his idea. Kali nods, confident she can get the job done.

“You want to take down the Purity? That is impossibly difficult. They are huge and control the whole empire,” Lunette is shocked hearing for the first time of their mission.

“I know I think it is crazy too, but they want to go for it so I have to back them up,” Kali sighs, agreeing wholeheartedly with Lunette.

“I’ll help too then. I may not be that great in a fight, but I can make things, if there is anything you need I’ll create it within no time,” Lunette rolls up her sleeves in anticipation.

“Thank you,” Kayde thanks her, a deep sincerity present in his tone. She smiles back at him, happy to help. The next morning Kali wakes up and heads into the city leaving the two crazy people and wolves behind her in order to find their lost friends.