Jay hadn’t bonded with either of them in the short time since he had been stolen off the unsafe streets and sold into slavery. Not that anyone would be interested in forming emotional attachments to people who intended to use one as monster bait. By that same line of thought, they were also the only people keeping him from being eaten by those same monsters. Good or bad, no matter how it shook out, the boy was aware of the main reason they were all out in the woods with the monsters, and he’d now been left alone with that reason while trolls were hunting them. It wasn’t a good way to comfort anyone, yet alone an untrusting street kid.
Adam was suddenly much more cognizant of all of the issues surrounding Jay, and they weighed on his heart far more than he thought they would. Even worse than his own emotional turmoil at the situation they were in, his skills were rubbing his nerves raw with their demands. Even Mama Bear, his only true combat skill, was starting to grumble inside his mind. The bear was close to waking up, edged on by the small boy weeping in terror in the back of the cave. The interesting insights into how his skills worked, as well as the true state of the younger boy weren’t things he needed distracting him at the moment.
He tried to think up a plan while waiting for Martin to draw the trolls away. He wanted to poke at Mother Knows Best in an attempt to force it to couch up some more knowledge, but the old crone in her cottage was standing on her porch with arms crossed, glaring and tapping her foot. Following a brief stalemate, she huffed and started marching down the path through her garden. He had no idea where she was going; there was nothing past the end of the bubble the skill resided in. Mentally shrugging at the incomprehensible doings of strange old women that are supposed to be a skill, Adam instead turned to Jay in the hopes of alleviating at least some of the boy’s stress.
He’d thought that with the System Assistance pushed back, he could finally have an actual conversation with the boy. Unfortuneately, he’d thought wrong.
As always seemed to be the case for him when talking to children since aquiring his class his words were not his own. He’d meant to say, “Don’t worry, buddy. Martin and I’ll get you back home safe.” That wasn’t at all what came out of his mouth though. Instead, it was, “Come here, moppet. Let’s get you some snuggles while we wait on your old grumper.”
Once more he considered killing himself out of pure shame. By the look on Jay’s face, the boy was wondering why he hadn’t gotten around to it yet. With no ready response for the scorn and disgust in the younger boy’s eyes, Adam just hung his head. Moments later a massive roar from nearby rattled around through his skull.
Whipping his head back and forth, he searched for the source, praying Martin was alright. On one turn he caught Jay looking at him oddly. He paused to look at the boy again when a sharp whistle, and a pounding vibration rolled through his senses. Since he was looking straight at Jay when it happened, he realized the boy showed no reaction at all to the noises. He’d also not flinched when the roar had reverberated through him.
Mother Knows Best gave him the answer he was looking for. Jay hadn’t heard any of it because it was literally all in his own head.
Turning his attention inwards once again, he discovered where the crone had been going. There were now three entities in the bear den. The old witch had somehow marched her way across the void of his mental landscape to poke the bear. Normally, such an action would have resulted in a blood bath and snack for the bear, but in this case things took a turn for the worse. Much, much worse.
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Somehow, the bear and the crone were both glaring at him.
Once they had his attention, and had taken the appropriate amount of time to make absolutely certain that he knew he was irritating them, the old woman pulled the weeping boy out of the cave and hoisted him up onto the bear. When he didn’t immediately congratulate them for their brilliance, they both glared at him again.
Adam began contemplating sanity. He’d always heard that people got crazier as they aged, but he thought he had decades left before it set in. Maybe it was a side effect of classing up as he did, or from those horribones that Szellem was talking about. The man had said that they drove teenagers crazy. On the other hand, he did apparently have four different people living in his head now, so maybe a little crazy was to be expected. Although why one of them is an angry, old-
He didn’t get to finish the thought as the reverberating pounding started up again. He got a clear view of what was causing it that time as well. The crone from Mother Knows Best was beating her walking stick against the ground, drawing his attention and disrupting his thoughts. Frustrated at the waste of his time he tried to get back to his planning, but a pain that felt like someone trying to rip his ear off jerked his attention back. Once more he was faced with a glaring old woman, but she was also pointing at the bear. He was worried what expression the bear would be wearing, though he didn’t get the choice to avoid it.
Adam was surprised to see the bear walking around with the skill created version of Jay on its back. If anyone had asked, he would have blamed surprise for the length of time it took for the idea to register, but eventually he got it. With his realization, the plan that Mother Knows Best had devised trickled into his consciousness. The plan wasn’t nearly as stupid as the ones he had been thinking of.
Ignoring the pride radiating from the old woman, Adam resolved to one day make better plans than his skills did, no matter how stupid of a concept that was.
When he refocused, Jay was looking at him oddly again. It was beginning to seem as though the boy was only capable of being angry, disgusted, or disturbed. Or in the case of the face he was making just then, all three at once. With an internal sigh, Adam tested out his chances with speaking again. In an attempt to prevent the System Assistance from losing the message again, he kept it short.
“How’s your throwing arm?”
It didn’t help. At all.
He had to wait while System Assistance ran his mouth for him. It just went on and on, but at least the message got through. Mostly.
“OK, sweetums. It’s time for some fun. Mommy’s going to give you a bear back ride now. It will be nice and warm, and none of those stinky things will lay a finger on my brave little man. Oh! I know! How about you help Mommy keep them away? All you have to do is throw these little jars at any of their ouchies, and you’ll get to be a big, strong monster hunter. Doesn’t that sound like fun? Until then, why don’t you take a nap all nice an warm while I carry you. If we find any of those nasties you can play hero.”
Somewhere in the middle of the System’s rambling idiocy, Adam managed to pass along the vials of Trollburn. He couldn’t exactly use them as a bear, so hopefully the kid had managed to make some sense out of the longest speech ever. The look of complete confusion on his face was new, but he was sure it would be replaced with one of his stock three soon enough. Dealing with Jay was beginning to change his mind about dealing with duke’s kids. If they were half as much trouble and a third as annoying it’d be a miracle.
Not bothering to waste anymore time, he metaphorically poked the bear. As Mama Bear activated and he felt the mass of muscle, fat, and fur added to his existence, he realized two very important things.
Jay had no idea at all what he had said.
More importantly, he appeared to be terrified of bears.
Moments later, a herd of trolls watched on in bemused curiosity as a screaming human child was chased through the forest by a huge, roaring bear.