Tola had to stop himself from crashing through the doors of the Community Housing Center. Stopping, he opened the door with a measured motion, stepping in through, and catching his breath. He barely waved at the girl at the counter as he headed back to his room.

“I thought you had work today, James?” Lily was the usual “face” of the facility, since she was good at being all smiles and sweetness.

“Something came up. Gotta change clothes.”

“Um, okay? What happened?”

Tola didn’t respond, didn’t even turn to look, just walked with laser focus. Unlocking the door and opening it, he stopped. “Why… does it look like my room has been ransacked?”

“Oh, it’s laundry day! It’s the day we change out all the sheets and get them washed, and to help out, we also wash clothes.”

“What? No, no no no, I need those clothes right now. Where are they?” Tola had to take a breath to remind himself not to shout. He had no idea why Princess had cut off her own collar, or if the kid had told things wrong, but either way it was making a heavy feeling of dread settle in the pit of his stomach.

“They’ll be in the laundry room, it’s staff only though.”

“Then come with me. Please. It might literally be a matter of life and death.”

“Really?” Lily seemed surprised, but conflicted. Rules Were Rules, after all, but if she accompanied James, it’d be okay, right? “Well… Just this once, okay? Never again, you’ll just have to plan better. I don’t get how clothes are a matter of life or death, though.”

“I have some special items in the pouches on that outfit, I might need them to save a life. It’s… hard to explain. But if she’s… Please, I really want to hurry.”

“It’s not drugs, is it?”

“It’s not drugs!” Tola snapped harsher than he meant to. Continuing through gritted teeth, he tried to apologize. “Sorry, it’s just… I seem to be getting asked that a lot here, and it’s a bit frustrating. Please, the clothes.”

Lily got up and looked around, but figured it’d be unlikely anyone would need her at the desk for a few minutes. Pulling out her set of keys, she led James through the door towards the basement.

In the laundry room, there were piles arranged for each room, a set of folding tables with masking tape to divide them in half. A gap indicated which loads were currently in the machines. In one pile, the distinctive set of garb drew Tola’s attention, and he rushed over to grab them. They didn’t seem to have gone through the wash yet, though hopefully they wouldn’t have with the leather pouches and belt still attached.

“Oh, thank goodness, it’s all here. I just… um… Screw it, watch if you want.” With that, he started to hastily undress, changing into his Terra outfit.

Lily let out a squeak, blushing as she turned away. “J-James! This is… inappropriate!”

“I’m done anyway.” Tola tugged the clothing into place, buckling the belt, his back straightened as he looked himself over. “Wait, no I’m not, my badge.” He started digging through the pile when another employee wandered into the area, presumably to check on the machines.

“Yo, what’s a resident doing down here?” He was a large, muscular sort, probably got stuck with a lot of grunt work. His nametag stated his name was Fred.

“James really needed this set of clothes, so I brought him down so he could get it.” She was still looking pretty embarrassed, not fully recovered from seeing a grown man start to undress in front of her.

Fred did not seem amused. “Eh, if you’re gonna do stuff, couldn’t you pick a supply closet or something?”

Before Lily could say anything, Tola cut in. “You’re the one that’s responsible for the laundry?”

“Yeah? Look, yours ain’t done yet, so don’t complain if the clothes are stank.”

“I don’t care, I care that something is missing. A badge from this outfit, it was right here.” Tola pointed to his upper right chest, right about where a cloak would attach if he wore one.

“Look, the Community Housing Center is not responsible for anything lost or stolen.” Fred rolled his eyes and recited the line with a practiced rote.

“No, but if you took it, YOU are responsible. It was there this morning when I left, my room was locked, and you collected the laundry. So, are you going to give it back, or do things need to get ugly? Because I am in a pretty severe hurry, and I am NOT in the mood to suffer jerks today.”

“You wanna say something to my face?” Fred looked eager for a fight. “Go on, call me a thief again, see what happens.” He was grinning, cracking his knuckles. Sneering, he added, “It was contraband, it had a needle, you could use it as a weapon.”

Lily tried to help defuse the situation, with “Residents are not allowed weapons, James…”

“It’s a badge. It’s hardly a weapon. But fine, you want to say it is? Then attack me with it. I have far better ways to defend myself than the pin of a badge. Besides, you know it’s not gold, right? It’s copper.”

With a too-practiced motion, he pulled a pocket knife out from a holder on his belt. “Got a better one than this?”

“Fred! You can’t…! What are you doing? This is not proper procedure at all! James…! It’s just a badge, right? You can get another one?”

Tola stared with a mixture of disdain, contempt, and growing anger at Fred. “I don’t know, you tell me.” With barely a word muttered under his breath, he had summoned a smaller version of his ice lances, a long thin blade of ice in his hand that looked almost like a forged sword. He gave it a practice swing before holding it aloft and pointing the tip at Fred.

“James? Where did you… What? How did you get that?” Lily looked around, but there wasn’t a freezer, and a wispy mist fell from the blade as it moved through the air.

Fred was similarly confused. After all, he had gone through those clothes. He must’ve brought it in from outside, but how did he make it look like ice?

Tola wasn’t the most confident in his skill, mostly he hoped he’d watched Lance and Aesis enough to at least know the basics. But it was a reach advantage, hopefully that would be enough. “Now. The badge. You won’t get much for selling it, but it’s custom made. Sentimental. I’m asking you, please, to just return it.”

“You little–!” Fred’s wit failed him at coming up with anything to say, and he simply charged, swinging his knife.

Tola stepped out of the way and gave a slash, leaving a thin red line on Fred’s arm through the sliced-open sleeve, the edge of the ice sword impossibly sharp. Steam rose from the blood on the blade.

Fred looked down at the line, the chill’s numbness starting to fade. “What the hell? How sharp is that thing? I didn’t even feel it, but now I do!”

“Sharp enough. Better than some silly pin, isn’t it? And this is just what I used because I don’t want to kill you. It’s not worth the headache.” Tola’s tone was as cold as his blade. After all, he was a full Mage with the Mage’s Guild of Terra, it was about time he got some use out of everything he had worked for this last year.

“Just… take it back, then! Shit!” Reaching into a pocket, he fished out the copper badge and threw it at Tola’s chest.

Catching it as it started to tumble down, he inspected it and found it wasn’t damaged. It had two small gemstones set into the design, and both were still present. It was the symbol of the Mage’s Guild, a circle with the “Start” rune in the center, with the pair of stones just underneath that were supposed to represent the mage’s main talents. Tola had a sapphire for ice and an emerald for earth, which he installed after mastering the spell that let him win against the gryphon. With Fred running up the stairs and out of the room, Tola let the sword shatter apart without the magic keeping it together, each small shard of ice melting quickly into a small puddle. In victory, he affixed the badge in the usual spot and smiled.

“How did you… do that, James?” Lily stared in shock at the display.

“Do you want the long answer, or the short answer?” He was already heading towards the base of the stairs.

“I’m not sure.” Lily passed him to lead him out of the basement.

“Then perhaps you don’t want to know at all.”

“Yeah, maybe I don’t. Just… don’t do it again.”

“As long as I don’t have to.” With that, Tola walked out of the center and waited for Cheryl to arrive. This time, he wasn’t “dressed like” a mage from Terra, he was a mage from Terra, and he was going to find his dragon.

Cheryl pulled up to the Center to find Tola looking through his spellbook. It wasn’t the best of reference material, but he was hoping he could cobble together something useful out of the various spells he’d crafted. It was better than trying to do it from scratch by memory, after all. “Tola? That’s… You’re dressed like a video game character. That’s what was so important?”

Tola got into the passenger seat. “The pouches were important. This is… going to be tricky, I’ve never done this before. Hm, might be best to start working at the bookstore, that wind tome might have something in it.”

“Yeah, I guess…? You really believe in that magic stuff?” She started driving the car as Tola continued to flip pages in his book.

“I just fought a man by summoning a sword of ice to make him return my Mage’s Guild badge, so yes.” He could have been more delicate, but today has been a very bad day so far.

“What? Like, in a game, or…?” She turned down the road, before reaching the parking lot for the store.

Tola stopped in his tracks, looking up after a moment, raising an eyebrow. “Ah, I take it Princess didn’t tell you. I am a mage, I cast magic. This is my spellbook. It has spells. Yes, it’s real. If you insist, I’ll show you, but I’d rather not take any more time than necessary. Every moment might be crucial for finding Princess before something happens. She’s without her collar, and that makes her situation exceedingly dangerous.” He got out of the car and fast-walked to the shop door, juggling book and keys. With the door open, he hurried inside, but didn’t flip the sign off of Closed.

Cheryl followed him inside, looking around, but everything seemed so ordinary, aside from the man at the counter, muttering as he pulled out a sheet of printer paper and got to work, his spellbook and a second book from under the counter spread out before him.

“There’s… kind of a lot Princess hasn’t told me. She swears she’s not a Hellhound, but… she won’t tell me what she is. She did let slip she isn’t a dog.”

“Hellhound? So that was her? Hah, now I’m very curious what happened with… Wait, does that make you the girl ‘Lucille’s boy’ threatened with a rifle?”

“Word travels fast, huh? It was a shotgun. Princess defended me, but her wing got injured.” Cheryl shuddered a little at the memory of the traumatic incident, just two days ago.

Tola looked up from his work, eyes wide. “This boy hurt Princess? Where is he now? Wait, no, Princess first, punishment later.” He was scowling at the runes, the collar sitting on the counter next to the paper.

“He’s in jail, last I heard he’s confessing to everything. Says he’s turning over a new leaf, embracing ‘God’s Love’, I think that was Princess’s doing…”

“Hah. I will have to ask her for the story when I see her. Assuming I can get to her before someone else finds her.”

“Well, why don’t we check the clinic roof?”

“Because– What? What roof?” The interruptions were about to make him snap, but he processed the words just in time.

“The roof of the clinic, it’s where I met Princess, and it’s where she pretty much always goes. It’s worth a shot, isn’t it?”

“By all means, yes! I’m panicking, I didn’t even think to ask– Of course you’d know where she hangs out, you’ve been spending time with her. Argh!” He quickly packed up the two books and came around the counter.

Cheryl crossed her arms instead of budging. “But first, I want to see magic. I want to know something about what’s going on. You said something about a sword of ice, right?”

“But–! Very well. Elsie can complain about the puddle later.” With a quick mutter, and with the assistance of the badge, he formed another sword made of ice in his hand, the blade glinting in the lights of the store, the mist falling from the blade. “Is this satisfactory?”

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

“Holy–… You actually did it? Can I touch it?”

“I would recommend you not touch the edge itself, but yes.” He laid it across his other hand, holding it sideways. The unprotected hand felt like holding an ice cube.

Experimentally, Cheryl placed a finger on the flat of the blade, pressing lightly, eyes wide. “That’s so amazing…!”

“Yes, yes, I’ve worked hard at my craft, but I’m still very worried about Princess now. I have no idea why she’d cut her own collar off like that, she has to know how important it is.”

“Sorry, yeah. Let’s go.” Cheryl led the way to the car, and Tola locked up once again.

“You two used to live somewhere pretty far away, yeah? Were you happy there?”

“More than I realized. I’m from… not too far from here, I think. Originally.”

“You have the same ‘I’m hiding secrets’ tone as she does, you know. But yeah, she talked a lot about finding you and getting home.”

“That does sound pretty nice, yes.” Tola was trying to flip through the wind tome, but reading in a moving car was not agreeing with him.

“But when we found you at the bookstore, you were talking about how great things were here. Did you really not have running water back where you two were living?”

“That’s… I… Oh. Oh no. No, no no no, please PLEASE tell me that’s not what she was hearing…!” Tola began to shake as the car pulled into the clinic parking lot.

“Is it that bad?” Cheryl got out of the car, Tola was already pacing between the car and the clinic door.

“It’s… She’s… She’s had a pretty bad time of things, and she… That’s part of why I was so confused and worried, she’s always come to me when she’s depressed or freaking out or something. But if she… I know I’ve been talking about… cities and stuff for a while, but if she thinks I hate… where we were… Argh!”

Cheryl was already leading him inside, having to argue with the person at the counter to let Tola past the lobby. “Look, he’s a friend, it’s a long story, but we need to go to the roof right now.”

“Really? That’s your make-out spot? Wait, is that who I heard you talking to the other day?” Counter Guy gave Tola a confused look.

“What? No! We’re not– It’s… I… I can’t explain to you right now, okay? We’re going!” Cheryl stormed off, waving for Tola to follow.

“Now you know how it feels to not be able to tell people things.” He chuckled softly as they came up the stairs. Putting a hand on her shoulder, he called out. “Wait a moment. Princess… Without her collar, she’s… She might not want to be seen by you just yet.”

“Are you kidding? I’m more worried she’s not going to want to see YOU right now, after the stuff you said! Look, let’s just go together, okay? We’ll deal with apologizing if she’s even there.” With that, Cheryl opened the door and stepped out, Tola right behind her.

The roof appeared to be empty. Up until I sniffled from behind the HVAC unit.

Cheryl called out. “Princess, you’re safe! It’s me, I’m here. You gave us a scare, disappearing like that, you know?”

“Hah. ‘Safe’. I’m not… You humans…!” I swiped with my tail and sent a shower of gravel in the direction of the voices. I heard them both cry out, and used a wing to slide over another small pile.

This time, Tola called out. “Princess, please, just talk to me! Tell me what you’re feeling, why are you doing this?”

I let out a low growl, sending another shower of gravel. “Why pretend to care? You HATE me! You… You hate Terra, you hate ME! I’m what Terra forced on you! You’re back in glorious ‘civilization’ now, enjoy it!”

“What Terra forced…? Princess, I don’t… You were never ‘forced’ on me! I want you around!”

“Who’s Terra?” Cheryl tried to ask, but neither of us were in a position to answer, too busy focused on our own emotions.

“You’ve hated me… since… since I laid my eggs! That was the thing that pushed you over the edge! Ever since then, it’s been nothing but ‘Back home, this’ and ‘Back home, that’! That’s when I became too much, that’s when you got fed up with… with me!” I sniffled and coughed, but this body wouldn’t exactly cry or sob.

“Eggs!?” Cheryl’s eyes were wide, looking between the HVAC cube and the shocked Tola. “What? Hang on…”

Tola raised a hand with a single finger, an unspoken promise to answer the question as soon as he could. “Princess, no! I… Oh, geez, that’s what you’ve been thinking? And I… No, I messed up so bad…! Princess, I’ve never thought that about you, ever! Remember what else happened right around then? We were heading to the mining outpost, where we fought the…” He trailed off, looking over at Cheryl. “How much have you told your friend?”

I sniffled again. “What am I supposed to tell her? Fine! I’ll tell her right now! We fought a damn gryphon that almost killed us! Every last one of us! And… and I’m not Princess, I’m a damn stray! I don’t have a name, a collar, anything, I’m j-just a wild, stupid monster! Better kill me, I’m a danger to you humans!” I sent another shower of gravel to accentuate the point. But when I went to pull together a pile, it was pretty pitiful. “Just s-so you guys know, I’m… almost out of gravel. Consider that a warning.”

“You’re out of ammo and that’s a warning?” Cheryl brushed herself off.

Tola shook his head. “She, uh, she can breathe fire. The gravel was the ‘nice’ option.”

“That’s… Oh, yeah. Um, okay, well, clearly we don’t want that. Anyway, okay, if Tola can do magic, you can fight gryphons, I guess? Look, I said I’d trust you, that means I’ll believe anything you want to tell me, okay?”

“Do you want to be a stray, girl? I don’t want to lose you. You’re my partner, we’ve been through so much already. Please… Just… I was… focused too much on what I’d lost to see what I’d gained, then. But what you heard today, that’s just me trying to look at the silver lining of being trapped here! I didn’t think I’d ever see you again, but you’re here, somehow! …Wait, how ARE you here?” Tola’s voice was breaking, I didn’t think I’d ever heard him like this.

I sniffled, shivering in place. Finally, in a tiny voice, I responded. “No… I don’t… wanna be a stray… B-but I can’t stay here… I can’t live on Earth like you.”

“On Earth? Will one of you two PLEASE tell me what’s going on already?” Cheryl stomped the ground and glared at the only one she could see, Tola.

He winced, having been dreading this since the initial meeting. “It’s a very, very long story. The short version is, the place I’ve been the last year is another world called Terra, where magic is real. Well, I guess it’s real here too, but it’s common there. And so are mythical creatures. Like Princess.” He called out to me. “Do you want to be the one to tell her what you are, or should I?”

“No, I’ll do it… It’s well past time anyway.” Slowly, I stepped out from behind the HVAC unit, head low, slinking into view. Once I was out in the open, I sat down and looked up sheepishly. “I’m… a dragon.”

Cheryl stared with her mouth agape. But there wasn’t really any counter argument to the large scaly animal with wings before her, and her mind simply stepped through all the things from before. The eyes, the roar, the claw marks, the wings, the fire breath, the flying, the mention of eggs… “You… This whole time? But you… I’ve… You were in my car. I had… a dragon– a DRAGON, in my car.”

“You’ve also had a mage in your car.” Tola chided her, smirking a little.

“I’ve had… I… You… Ugh? I think I wanna sit down.” She plopped herself down on the gravel, cross-legged.

Tola took a step forward, crouching down. “Princess. I… I don’t know how I missed how you felt. I know I should’ve told you that there were things on my mind, but I felt like… like you wouldn’t understand, you were being so cheerful about Terra, and I… I was seeing all the worst parts of it. The truth potion was the breaking point, the way Aesis never even apologized, the way she and Lance talked about… just casually interrogating prisoners. Everywhere I looked, it seemed like it was just people being awful. Bandits on the road shot me in the chest. A highwayman tried to rob me barely a month after I got there. I was a few days on Terra when the whole thing happened, with Elimaio.”

“Hah!” Cheryl interjected. “Sorry, just… What do you mean, LMAO?”

We both just looked at her for a moment. Tola began to chuckle, and I couldn’t help but start too. “N-no, I… He… The guy’s name was literally ‘Elimaio”, it just sounds like LMAO.”

Tola began laughing more, the stress getting to him causing him to start belly laughing. “Oh goodness, remember how ticked off he got when I laughed? ‘You dare laugh at the great ELIMAIO?’”

“I know, I did the same thing! That’s what got him started, with his– experiments…” My mirth died quickly. As quickly as the mad wizard did, when I got loose. “…Sorry, I… it’s hard to…” My head sank, and Tola’s laughter stopped quickly seeing me.

“Oh, I’m so sorry, girl. I didn’t mean to… Yeah, that was pretty bad. You’ve told me a lot, but… I’m sorry.”

Cheryl spoke up. “Wait, so that was the guy who… You said the guy that tortured you, that was the first guy you killed? That was this guy?” Ah, so she was paying attention after all, I was worried she’d checked out for good.

“Yeah, that’s him. The first of many. Blood on my claws.” I shook slightly. I heard the sound of gravel moving and looked up, to see Tola standing, stepping closer to me. Once he was in front of me, he knelt down again, resting a hand on my shoulder, gravel crunching under his knee.

“It’s all right, Princess. Just… It’s all right. I’m glad you’re here. I missed you so much. Every day since Roffil sent me here, it’s torn at my heart that I don’t have you with me.” He was smiling so kindly…

“…I’m sorry, I tried to be quiet, but ROFL?” Way to ruin the moment, Cheryl.

“Yeah. Pretty wild, but I guess stuff just works out like that sometimes.” Tola turned back to me and smiled again.

I let out a soft whimper, shifting in place. “I screwed everything up, didn’t I? I ruined my collar, and… and… Oh, mother F– The book! The damn book! I lost the book, where– I… When was the last time I had it?” I started looking around the roof, but I knew it wouldn’t be here. My heart was sinking as I tried to retrace steps, but I couldn’t remember where I lost it.

“The… book? What book?” Tola drew his hand back as I moved, but didn’t pull away.

“Roffil’s book! His stupid book with the stupid gem that was all about the stupid storms, that I lost because I’m so stupid stupid STUPID! Argh!” I spun in a circle in frustration, my tail slapping at the gravel.

“Wait, you have it? Had it? That… That would be incredible! I would love to get a chance to look through it, that idiot had to be onto something…”

“It would be incredible, if I hadn’t lost it! I screwed up everything!” I sniffled again, building up to a wail.

Tola put his hand back on my shoulder, his other stroking along my neck. “Calm down, girl. It’s okay, it’s okay. We can worry about it in a minute, just… First things first, you’re here, you’re safe. Don’t worry about the collar, we can get a new one.”

I shivered and let his touch calm me down, taking deep breaths, wings fluttering in agitation. “You mean it…?”

“Yes, of course, girl. Whatever happens, we’ll get through it together. I promise. We’ll find a place together, we’ll build up, we’ll make it through anything Life throws at us, even this.”

I winced, pulling back slightly. “N-no, I… I can’t… I can’t stay here, on Earth.”

“What? Why not? It’s not that bad, is it?”

“It is! I mean, look at me! One person sees me, and what happens? If I get a new collar and illusion and everything, one person touches me? Doesn’t listen when you say ‘Don’t touch her’? The illusion somehow fails? I slip up? You’re looking at pitchforks at best, a raid by secret government agents at worst? I end up in a lab, as they cut inside me trying to find the secrets of magic, trapped and not even allowed to die…” I was trembling, shaking, the scenario in my head getting worse and worse.

“Woah, girl! Woah, hang on now, you’re… I mean, that’s pretty wild, isn’t it? We don’t know any of that would happen, do we? That’s…” He was trying not to say something like I was being crazy, or that it would certainly never happen.

“What if it does? Earth is… is a nightmare! It’s horrible, everyone hates everyone… Why do you think I left Earth in the first place?” I sniffled again, looking away.

“You left…? I thought you got caught in a storm by accident?”

“I… I sort of… um, went looking for a storm, when I was… caught.” I couldn’t look either of them in the face, Tola or Cheryl.

Cheryl was the one who spoke up first. “These storms? Are they the… the strange, destructive ones that have been in the news? I’ve been hearing about those. I thought everything that they passed over was destroyed. Some have been calling them things like ‘The Unmaking’.”

Tola looked over. “They seem to be some kind of… I’m not completely sure, but they’re related to the… I guess the boundary between the worlds? Sometimes, they let you pass from one to the other. That’s how I ended up on Terra, actually, I got caught in one and when it cleared, that’s where I was. But I was lucky! Princess, you… you could’ve been killed doing that! What made you take that risk?”

My head dipped lower, my tail wrapped around my feet as I tried to pull myself in tighter, as if I could shrink away. “I was… I mean… I don’t know if I’d call it a risk…”

“How did you even know about Terra in the first place?” He was trying to lean in to meet my eyes, but I wasn’t letting him.

“I didn’t! I went into the storm because I was hoping to disappear! And then… all that other stuff happened, and… and then things were actually good, or I thought they were good, but now you wanna be on Earth and I can’t! I don’t… have that option, like you do. And I don’t know how to get back. Or what I’d even do if I was back. Maybe I’ll find another storm…” I closed my eyes tight and sniffled, cursing my eyes for not letting me actually have tears.

“Oh, you– Oh. Oh, oh, you poor girl…” His hand was back on my shoulder, he had to awkwardly shuffle forward slightly to do it.

“I’ve changed so much, both the… the obvious, and even just… I dunno, personality? My heart? I couldn’t go back, even if there was a way, to the life I had before you. Without you. But I can’t stay here. So… so I’ll leave.”

“No, Princess, no. I… You’re right, I’ve changed too. For a bit, I thought I could just… I don’t know, ignore it? But the things I’ve seen, what I’ve learned, can I really fit in anywhere on Earth? As a mage? Like you said, one slip-up and I might be the one in a government lab somewhere. Or drugged in a psych ward. Or taken out by a sniper before I have any idea what’s happening. Magic is… dangerous to leave uncontrolled, people will be fighting over me if they know…” He sighed heavily. “You know, it’s funny, before all this happened, I thought you were so… focused on the moment that you couldn’t even realize how much you’d lost, but it was me, so focused on what I’d lost that I couldn’t realize what I’d gained. And you were trying to remind me of what I had, what I should’ve been grateful for, and I was too… too… Ugh. Too stupid to see it, too arrogant to think you’d understand, I don’t know! I was such an idiot…”

I finally looked up, letting out a soft whine and pushing my head into his arm, nuzzling lightly at it. “No, you just… were hurting. But you don’t have to keep it in when you’re hurting, we can talk about things. I want to help when you’re hurting, like you help me when I’m hurting.”

Tola smiled and petted me with his other hand. “You’re such a wonderful pet, you know. Look at you, so concerned with me being happy that you’d go through all this, put yourself through all this, so I could have what you thought I wanted. What I even thought I wanted, kind of. But what I want is you, Princess. Let’s get back to Terra.”

“But how? I lost the book! How are we gonna figure out how to… to cross worlds, without it?” I whimpered again, the internal voices screaming about my failures starting to swell up again inside my head.

“Hey, you brought it to Earth, right? That’s a lot closer than it still being on Terra. We’ll find it, or we’ll figure out a way without it, but either way, we’ll try. Okay? You willing to stay with me and try? Mage and pet? Partners, like before?” He had such a warm smile as he looked into my eyes, and it helped calm those voices down.

I was scared of what might happen, but… I wanted to say it. “Tola… I… I love you, Master…”

He hugged around my neck with both arms, both knees on the gravel, pulling me in tight and shaking slightly. “I love you too, Princess.”

I buried my head into his shoulder, sniffling. “…Don’t your knees hurt, doing that?”

“Extremely. Don’t care.”

“Sit down, you dork. Tell me what you’ve been up to, and I’ll tell you how I got here and what I’ve been doing.”

“And you’ll tell me what’s been going on?” Cheryl piped up as Master sat down on the gravel, the thick clothes better able to help with his weight distributed on a wider area than just his knees.

“Well, I think you know most of it, but sure. I’ll tell my story.”