Cal woke up to someone’s hands around his throat. Not this again. Somehow, he had forgotten about these two. His anger flared. He punched out hard with his left arm, and without thinking, he channeled a small lightning blast into his fist. He had just assumed, like before, he wouldn’t have access to his core.
That had changed. His training was counteracting whatever methods they had used to suppress him. He channeled energy downward into his bed, rocketing himself upwards. He kicked out into the one that had just been choking him, knocking him across the room into the wall. The walls rattled with the impact.
Cal saw the other one reach into its jacket for something. He blasted it in the face with another shot of lightning before it had a chance. Well, at least these idiots wouldn’t be a massive problem for him in the future. They were down to a minor annoyance. Still, he wished this wasn’t how he had to wake up every new loop.
He checked them over. They were both still alive. He riffled through their pockets and inside their suits, taking out everything they had. He then tossed them both into the void realm and stepped through after them.
He quickly noticed the change in the realm. The sky was beautiful, but there was no time to focus on that at the moment. These two needed to be placed in confinement.
“Andrew, I need help!” Cal called into the void house.
Cal heard some clamoring from inside the void house before a half-dressed Andrew burst from the doors.
“What? Why are you already here? Oh, those two. I had nearly forgotten about them.” His words were tinged with grogginess. Cal had apparently woken him up.
“Yes, help me get them inside. We can lock them in two of the unused bedrooms for now.” He instructed.
Andrew listened and grabbed one, dragging it ahead of Cal. Cal struggled to continue pulling the other. The worst part of a new loop was always the first few years in his smaller body. The best part was the lack of random back pain.
Though now that he thought about it, that had been decreasing the more, he increased his mana channels. He didn’t remember feeling many of the effects of aging last loop at all. He would need to talk to Ethel about that.
They shoved them both into separate rooms and locked them.
“Alright, I’ll be back. I’m sure Bug and Dad are worried, assuming they woke up. I did manage to rattle the house, though, so I’m guessing Bug is about done chewing through my door.”
In answer, they both heard a voice calling from outside the void house.
“CAL ARE YOU HERE?! IS EVERYTHING OKAY?!”
“It’s alright, Bug, I’m safe. I managed to capture both of them this time around. Sorry I scared you, but I wanted to get them locked down before they woke up, so I dragged them here.” Cal opened his arms to hug her.
Bug obliged and leaped into his arms. He scratched behind her ears, and she started to calm down.
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“So what do we do with those two anyway?” Andrew asked.
“No idea. I think I’m going to go get some more sleep. I’ll look around at these changes once I don’t feel like walking death. Bug, can you let Dad know everything is okay?” Cal asked his ever-loyal companion.
“Sure can. I’ll see you both in the morning.” Bug walked back through the cracks to her other, more Earth-bound home.
“Night, Andrew.”
“Night.”
Cal felt safer in the void house these days. His bedroom just wasn’t the same since the two Cyclopean aliens had started their attacks. He closed his eyes and tried to sleep.
*
“Cal, wake up!”
Cal bolted awake at the sudden voice. He realized it was just Bug, luckily before he had released the mana he had pushed into his hands.
“Hey girl, let’s not do any sudden wake-ups early in the loops, okay? I’ve got some PTSD I have to work through still.” He smiled at her to let her know he wasn’t actually mad.
“Sorry, Cal, everyone is here, so I thought you’d want to come join us.” her tail was between her legs.
“No, it’s okay, I do, just more gentle wake-ups, please.”
“Okay, I promise.”
He pet her head, and her tail started wagging.
Cal and Bug headed for the situation room and settled into their usual spots. There was a plate of food waiting for him. It looked like they had let him sleep longer than Bug let on. The Capybaras had already set up the kitchen.
“Hello everyone.” He looked around the room. They were all there, digging into their own meals and making their usual small talk. Ethel spoke up first.
“We need to start arranging pickup for Many Eyes, Many Legs, and Trashcat at the start of these loops now. Bug and I told her to meet us at the dumpster where we first met if she remembered. I used my root network to grab her this time, but I’d rather not use mana in the future.”
“Wait, does that mean she’s loop-aware?!” Andrew interrupted, his voice full of a rare excitement.
“Yes, it does. She is currently being shown around my realm by Gus, but I’ll drop her off here later today. Now, as I was saying before, I was so rudely interrupted. We need transport for these three at the start of every loop. Albert, do you think that’s something you’d be able to handle?” She looked at the Capybara.
“Probably, I’ll need Bill to join me and get a good look at the areas so we can design some stones to easily transport there. Once we have the prototypes, we can build a supply and keep them here like we do the stones to our cave.”
“Perfect. Thank you, Albert. If I decide to link my realm here, I may need your assistance with more stones.”
“No problem, professor.” The capybara had a rare respectful tone anytime he addressed Ethel these days, quite different than when they had first met him.
“Where is Barron anyway? I wanted to talk to him about the changes.” Cal asked.
“Barron isn’t Barron anymore, Cal. He and Bolt are now Fulginanis, and they promised they would be back later today. Apparently, first, they needed to test the boundaries of their combined realm and prepare a point for a gateway into Ethel’s.” Andrew said.
“Huh, interesting. Alright, breakfast and then R.I.S., it is.”
In a rare moment, there was universal agreement among the group.