Despite all the strange feelings that followed a big dramatic discussion like that, we all managed to pack up and hit the road with only a few hours’ delay. Things weren’t exactly tense, but there was emotion in the air. Everyone retreated to their separate corners, as it were, and kept their thoughts to themselves for a while. With most of my gear already packed and Tanis not having gotten started at all in favor of sneaking into my room, there was a full forty-five minutes where I was sitting on the bed doing nothing, waiting for her to be ready to go. I had an urge to pull out the grimoire and review what new options I might have, where my experience was sitting, and consider my options for improvement, but the entire debacle left me feeling drained. So, instead, I cat-napped until Tanis knocked on my door frame with an apologetic smile. We gathered downstairs, turned in our keys, and started on the Western leg of our journey, heading South. With exception to the occasional coating of ice and snow, the streets of Brum were fine for walking as the sidewalks and plazas of any decent-sized civilization I had occasion to visit on Earth, but so far nothing compared to the state-of-the-art, well-maintained path that was Triangle Road. Only the ritziest of theme parks I’d visited maintained their paths so meticulously, used materials that were easy on the stride and respected the effects the environment would have on both the road and the people walking it. The comparison that kept popping into my head that morning was the difference between Disney World and Universal Studios. The former used light-absorbing materials on their walkways to keep heat from reflecting back up at their guests and create an environment of cool breezes and mitigation to the unrelenting Florida sun. Universal Studios did not, and the whole place made me feel like an ant under a magnifying glass. The difference between the two felt like magic, and for all I knew, Triangle Road was in some way kept up by the arcane.

The first day was quiet. Tanis busied herself with getting a read on all the people around us before falling in line to watch my back. I certainly wasn’t in a hurry to chit-chat, myself, being exhausted of social interaction. While I wasn’t physically tired, the idea of needing to put forth conversational effort triggered my inner two-year-old. No matter what I said, it probably wasn’t going to be very friendly, or helpful, or representative of my actual feelings. The only ones who seemed unaffected by the whole affair were the espers, and they mostly maintained conversation among themselves. Occasionally I’d catch a stray word of Ruben or Esperlang, but I had no intention of eavesdropping, so I let the conversation wash over me like the words exchanged between everyone else on the road. Even after five days of inhabiting Brum and adding Grajo to our numbers, Triangle Road felt like the real routine: the return to normalcy for our little group. There was a clear shared goal with almost everyone else I could see in heading South, and I found comfort in that. Some folks were moving in the opposite direction, but true to the League clerk’s estimations, their numbers were few and none of them had any espers in tow. The lack of espers still felt sort of odd, even knowing I was late to the typical start of the journey, I expected more stragglers like myself. Perhaps they began elsewhere and were wisely saving Brum for a warmer season instead of risking travel in and out during its worst conditions. Still, not every chainer was involved in the sport of professional esper battling, and it felt strange that my friends were the only extraplanar creatures in sight. Well, aside from myself, of course.

I almost picked up the grimoire at the end of that first night, but I felt almost as wiped as I had the night before, when the thrill of victory and the social currency spent on partying leaving me too tired to think clearly. Emotional and physical drain took their toll all the same, and I tried not to beat myself up for not taking the initiative on allotting my remaining Xp. The yeti attack on the way to Brum was so sudden, and no matter how unlikely, I wanted to be ready in case something similar happened. There was also the obligation to check out the new entries about Tanis and Red, to see what the point of the Companion Records chapter was at all. I had a few theories, of course; Michael had made mention of a few LitRPG stories where the protagonist could enhance his closest allies somehow, usually in the process of complaining about the moronic choices they made, or just relishing in the world-building aspect, or the unique mechanics of the system. I wondered if he would find my choices acceptable? He would almost certainly agree with Tanis, that I should purchase Legerdemain. He loved spells like that.

Perhaps it was me thinking so hard and so specifically about the past while I made for bed in our small, rented tent that brought back a facet of my life on Earth I decidedly did not miss, and plagued my mind with nightmares for most of my sleep. What I called nightmares weren’t so much being chased by monsters or stalked by shadowy, unknowable figures (though those did occasionally occur, often coupled with sleep paralysis. Fun!) but instead the people I held closest to my heart would become emotionally abusive and cruel. Predictably, Michael starred in tonight’s dream, though when I tried to go to Red and Tanis for help they were unsympathetic. There wasn’t a point to it; nothing really made sense. I couldn’t even remember what he was doing that was so mean when I woke up, but it created a knot of anxiety in my head that stayed with me for the rest of the day, and the stress of fitful sleep hung around me like a dark cloud. Everyone seemed to be giving me a wider berth than normal, which compounded my bad mood. Sometimes I hated being observed, and resented when people did things I didn’t ask them to do for reasons they thought were in my best interest without checking with me first. I didn’t want people to make a big deal of anything when I felt like crap, especially not strangers on the road. Of course, they were just travelers minding their own business like any other day. Whether they sensed my ill mood and intentionally gave me space or not, there wasn’t anything personal about it. But if someone had tried to explain it to me in the moment, I would’ve likely snapped at them.

The nightmares continued for three more days, and though my frustrations dwindled, I still was in no mood to do anything that resembled mental work. Get up, walk, grab some food, walk some more, grab some food, rent a tent, sleep. Repeat. My hormones or brain chemicals or whatever finally calmed down enough that I was capable of polite conversation, and moreover the three of us just seemed to miss the typical dynamic of our group. There was an energy between us, a bond that kept me from flying off the handle at Tanis’ invasion of privacy, that kept her from selling me out and snatching up the book in the first place. We all eased into it, in our own ways; Red with his casual observations and details about Barbavia which he could now dole out a little more freely with Tanis in the know, myself with unimportant questions about the taste of a kebab or the scent of roadside flowers, and Tanis with… well, being Tanis.

“It’s still cold as balls out there,” she said, entering my rent-a-tent that Ujur morning.

“It’s gonna be for a few more days, at least,” Red responded from atop a small stack of luggage where he was enjoying a light breakfast. “Winter’s kickin’ off hard this year an’ we ain’t far enough South to stop feelin’ it yet. Glad we got outta Brum when we did.”

“I’ve never gotten that expression, ‘cold as balls’,” I mused. “Balls are warm. That’s, like… part of their job is to stay warm.”

“Wait, for real?” Tanis shook the snow out of the fur on her coat, brushing it to land as much outside the flap as possible without exposing anyone overmuch to the elements. That she’d accumulated so much in the time it took her to get from her tent to ours didn’t bode well for the quality of today’s journey. “What’s the rest of their job?”

“It’s…” Awkwardness caused me to hesitate, not because she didn’t know what was part of pretty standard high school curriculum where I came from; I had no expectation that the Barbavian education system was as standardized or thorough, nevermind no clue how far their science had gotten to know this in the first place. I just didn’t feel comfortable talking sexy stuff at the best of times, even when I was being clinical and instructional. Euphemisms and allusions were more my strong suit, but there wasn’t a great way to dance around the subject when we were talking about hard facts. Not one that didn’t make me sound like a toddler, anyhow. “They make and store sperm. That’s why they have to stay hot, so the sperm cells don’t die.”

“Huh! I never knew that.”

"It’s more of a regulation thing, actually. There’s a sweet spot they wanna keep at, so if you’re too cold they go up, an’ if you’re too hot they hang loose.” The esper education system was apparently a little stronger than my own, or at least Red’s scientific memory was better than mine. Remembering a number of historical facts Michael had to correct me from what was taught to me in school, I wagered it was a bit of both. The esper quirked his brow and turned to Tanis again. “What’d you think they were for?”

“I dunno,” she shrugged. “I just figured they were… there. I’ve got a whole bunch of stuff downstairs, I don’t know what it’s supposed to be doin’. I just know what feels good.” My mood might’ve increased over the last few days, but I can’t imagine the state of mind I’d have to be in to want to talk openly with my friends about the status of their genitals.

“OK, can we table—”

“Hang on, you’re naked all the time, where are your balls?”

“Inside,” Red said simply, crunching on a fish flake. “I got a little pouch thing, an’ all the fur of course. Hides the whole shebang.”

“Wow, that sounds convenient,” Tanis put her hands on her hips, impressed, “way better than what we gotta deal with. Well, not me, but like…” she gestured to me with one hand, indicatively, then snappily withdrew it. “Wait, hang on, do you have junk like all the other humanoid guys? Or is it all… different in your world?”

“That is a valid question I don’t feel comfortable answering,” I blushed, and tried to hide it by throwing a blanket around myself.

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“Aw, c’mon. We’re all friends here. Tell us about your crotch.”

“Yeah, d’you got a pouch, too, chief?”

“I do not have a pouch.”

“Tsk tsk tsk,” Tanis shook her head as she clucked her tongue and turned to catch eyes with Red, barely suppressing a grin. “He doesn’t even have a pouch.”

“As far as I am aware my genitals are perfectly in line with the standard genitals of most people in this world. Now can we stop talking about our dangly parts?”

“See, now I don’t have anything that dangles,” Tanis gesticulated in exactly the way I didn’t want her to. “So maybe stuff from your world is different from stuff here—”

“You guys suck,” I grumbled, and the two of them finally burst into laughter, unable to maintain the playful rib any longer.

“IIIII’m sorry, Glenn. I just can’t resist seeing you flustered! You’re usually so composed, it’s funny that a little thing like talkin’ about balls can get to you so well!”

“It wasn’t the balls—” I stopped myself and chuckled in spite of my own minor frustrations. “God, you guys are the worst.”

“On that note,” Red hopped down from his perch, still giggling, “I should go check on the other espers. You know how Wysteria gets in the cold.” He donned the knitted toque to keep his ears from freezing and made his exit from the tent, swearing as his bare paws encountered what was to him knee-high snow.

“I hope we didn’t razz you too hard,” Tanis apologized around an amused smile. “I’m still tryin’ to learn about those boundaries.”

“You’re fine. I’m just not used to having conversations like that. In high school—er… in my teens, sure. But that was over a decade ago. Since then, it’s become… I dunno, taboo? Impolite? It’s just not how I engage with my friends. I don’t think it’s how most people do.”

“Smart but sheltered, huh? Is that how they do things where you’re from?”

“Earth,” I said. “It’s called Earth.”

“The name of your home world is a fancy word for ‘dirt’?”

“I didn’t pick it,” I responded, a little more defensively than I meant to. “And we’re not sheltered, just… it’s actually kind of complicated. Maybe in some ways the people where I come from are more reserved compared to other cultures. In other ways, we’re not, and ultimately it depends on the individual experiences of the person in question.”

“Well, that’s pretty much everywhere, isn’t it?” I nodded in agreement and Tanis came to sit down beside me on the bedroll, likely to escape the uncomfortable icy breeze from the flap at her back. There was only so much room in our humble shelter, but she was very careful to leave as much personal space between us as was reasonable, and I appreciated it.

“I had a question for you, if you feel like talking?” I offered her half of the soft, woolen blanket I’d draped over myself in embarrassment, and she took it with a grateful smile, wrapping it around her shoulders.

“Sure, what’s up?”

“You were supposed to steal the grimoire for your boss, right? I would assume he’s not gonna be very happy you haven’t reported back?”

“Eh, yes and no,” she sighed. “The circus has been on hard times lately, so he’ll be upset to lose a pair of hands, especially ones as multi-talented as mine. That’s why he was willing to take the gamble on the book in the first place; if we could secure it and use it, or sell it to someone who could, it woulda been a real boon to business. But not having it or me around isn’t the worst thing in the world for him. People come and go as they please, hence our numbers being kind of thin. A good burglar gets caught and goes to jail, or the roustabout gets knocked up by one of the clowns and they settle down… it happens. Ebb and flow like that is kinda the standard in our line of work.”

“And Sid’s cool with all that?”

“I mean, he can only choose to be cool or be a real dick about it,” she shrugged. “We make money, sure, people have responsibilities. But it’s informal. We’re more of a family than a business. You might be sad to see a cousin or an uncle split off and go do their own thing, but that’s just life, right? Whether you’re part of a crime circus or a… big home with a lot of kids.” Tanis screwed up her face and laughed a bit at herself. “Sorry, all my frame of reference for how a normal family works I got from the Tanner Clan novels, and I’ve been informed on several occasions that’s not how most people grew up.” That name sparked some seed of memory in my head, but I buried it for the time being. I had no frame of reference for these novels, but a big house with lots of kids certainly didn’t resemble my upbringing in any way.

“How did you grow up?” Tanis studied me for a long time before responding, her eyes passing over my own, and all across my face, searching for something.

“You really haven’t read that bit in your book about me, have you?”

“I have not. Admittedly, I haven’t even opened it up since our conversation the other day, but even if I had I wouldn’t betray your trust like that. Not when we’re trying to… y’know. Rebuild.”

“Huh,” she smirked. “Ask me a month ago and I probably would have, in your shoes.”

“Not anymore?”

“Mmm. I don’t know,” she tilted her head a bit, looking away from me and adopting a faraway glaze to her crimson eyes. “I grew up on the streets of Yona Ceriba-- that’s the capital of Teren Balt.”

“I’m aware, thank you.”

“Right. My earliest memories were in an orphanage, and it was a nice enough place, but you know how it is when you’re young; always wanting to be out from under the thumb of anyone resembling an authority figure, no matter how good their intentions are. I learned how to survive the hard way, the stubborn way, knowing full well a hot meal and a warm bed were waiting for me whenever I wanted to come back and rejoin the other kids… but I was so full of piss and vinegar, and I felt like I had something to prove. Maybe I thought it would show whoever my parents were that they shouldn’t have given me up, or I’d force the universe to accept me as an important part in it and my life would turn around like it does for the hero of every story I read back then. I dunno. I fell in with Sid while the circus was in town. They caught me trying to lift a bag of popcorn and he offered me a home on the road. I was maybe twelve? He’s the closest thing to a dad I’ve ever had, and like I said, the circus itself is the closest thing to family.”

“So… he probably knew you leaving altogether was a possibility when he let you go after me in the first place, huh?”

“Yeah, probably more than I did,” she laughed. “He’s got a keen intuition, but he’s too sweet to call your bluff, especially when you don’t know you’re making one. He’s the kind of guy who’ll let you take enough rope to hang yourself with, but then still be proud of you when you come back with a net.”

“He sounds like a good dad.”

“He is.”

“So why stay with us? Not that I’m not happy to have you, it just sounds like you miss it all. Miss him.”

“I do, but I’m just not ready to go back to it. Not yet, anyway. Maybe never? I dunno, it might not be the best reason, but you’re really interesting, Glenn. I’ve never cared much for esper battling outside of running bets or taking in a coliseum fight as a decent way to spend an evening, but I’m still excited to see what the next wild thing to happen is. You keep me on my toes, or maybe the way the world reacts to you does. And there’s this weird sense of, like, pride in getting most of my coin from a legitimate job. It’s not much, but it kinda feels like I’ve finally made it.” She sighed and rolled her eyes at herself. “It sounds so stupid when I say it out loud. Does any of that make sense?”

“It does.” I joined her in staring straight ahead, the fog of my mind both parting and growing a bit more opaque as I traced through my own past and feelings. “I’ve spent my entire life working for someone else, keeping my head down, content with whatever scraps I could scrape together. Earth is big on… like, mercantilism. Business. That’s not really my bag, I was always more a creative type. A free-spirit. This whole thing with the League seemed like a good idea at the time when Red told me about it; a smart enough path toward getting notoriety and meeting people to maybe find a way back home. But now… after that first coliseum win, man… I’ve never felt like that before. It feels good. It feels good to actually make friends and accomplish things and just… even just being on the road with you guys. I couldn’t do this back home. I mean, I could spend two and a half weeks walking along a road, sure, but there’d be a hundred more cities and just way less interesting sights to see. The only monsters I’d come across are human muggers, or maybe a big cat. Everything’s so… settled. I used to feel like I was meant to be born in a different time. I hate romanticizing the past because there were so many things that were messed up about it, like, hating people for their identity or their life choices that don’t hurt anybody, but progress chases progress and I just never felt like I was a part of things.”

“So you don’t really wanna go home either, huh?” Her lips turned up, the tethers of camaraderie between us increasing.

“I… I don’t think so, no. There’s people I’ll miss. Like… a lot. My best friend, my family… but the fact that I got to experience this at all, that I can do magic… I don’t think I’ve spent enough time freaking out about that! I have a magic book that tells me stuff! I wiggle my fingers and people’s wounds shut themselves! I can pull monsters from another world out of thin air and make friends with them, Tanis! It’s incredible! There’s nothing like this back home, only in stories.”

“I like it when you call me by my name,” she giggled, and it was so infectiously full of mirth that I joined her.

“Yeah? Why’s that?”

“I dunno. I just do. I guess it makes me feel more real.”

“Well then, Tanis, I would have to say that even though it hurts to think about the people I love that I might never see again, I don’t know if I can go back to ringing up groceries to make somebody else rich and accepting whatever crumbs they toss me. I feel more like a part of this world than I ever did back home, and that’s saying something because I still don’t talk to strangers and spend most of my time inside. And now I’ve been here long enough that I’d be leaving behind people who are important to me no matter whether I stayed in Barbavia or went back to Earth.”

“I wonder if Red feels the same way? If he has some kind of life in the Esperwild he’s putting to the side for all of this.”

“Who knows.” I had thought about it more than once. Red had been a question mark basically since we met, and he was never much for divulging things about himself. He’d talk for hours about the world and throw out a few harmless tidbits about his experiences, but there was never any concrete recount of the people he’d met and what they meant to him. “ Red’s inscrutable at the best of times, and I don’t really ask questions. I don’t like prying to begin with, and the way he reacts to certain stuff… I just feel like he’s been through a lot, and I don’t wanna drudge up bad memories accidentally.”

“Yeah, he definitely seems like a guy who’s been through it,” she said wistfully. “He’s got that sick wiener pouch goin’ for him, though.”

“Sure, what’s a few tragic memories when your pork and beans are nice and warm all the time?”

“I’m sayin’!”

Tanis and I broke ourselves forcibly from distant memories and difficult thoughts, and began to pack up the tent. There was a lot more chatter on the road that day, a lot more laughter, and lighter hearts. Sometimes, whether I wanted to admit it or not, the thing I needed most when surrounded by a dark, pendulous cloud of negativity was for someone to point out the silver lining, and how it kind of made it look like the cloud had a pair of balls.