Seras stared at the map only she could see. According to it they had moved at least a hundred miles further east than when they entered the Astral space. There was a huge conspicuous gap in-between the shaft and the super-cavern. Almost like the astral space were supposed to be in that space. But according to astral magic theory these spaces didn’t actually take up space in physical reality. There was a range of space where its apertures could be reached, but the astral space was not in this prime dimension.

“Well,” Athena asked?

“Sorry, just contemplating how weird Astral spaces are. That was my second and the physics of it all was confusing me.”

Athena frowned, “what’s hard to understand? They’re a separate demi-dimension attached to our own that run by their own rules. They’re pretty common.”

“Was that a call back to what I said when I first met,” Seras asked?

Athena scowled, “oh, you mean that one time you told me my understanding of reality was fundamentally wrong. And also implied that interdimensional drifters were a common occurrence?”

“Was that a no or a yes?”

“No Seras, Astral spaces are common. There just another part of geography, like mountains or rivers.”

“You realize how weird that is right, we’re talking about functional sub-realms. How has no one studied this before? I mean, beyond the average ‘where is it’ and ‘what’s in it.’ The existence of these things would reshape my entire world’s understanding of physics.”

She shrugged unhelpfully, “I don’t know, ask an astral researcher. Now do you have any idea of where we are?”

Seras was reluctant to let it go, but the shortness in Athena’s patience, and her own mounting exhaustion reminded her that now was not the time for rigorous testing and hypothesizing. “We’re much further east now, we’re no longer under the Heidle-back mountains and are on the silver plains.”

“The names around here are weird,” Athena said.

“And where are you from again?”

She opened her mouth, and then paused, “damn almost got me again.”

Seras chuckled, “most place names are simplistic when you get down to it. I’m from the ruined world of Ruin, from the city of Mantle that was built on the giant crater that extends down to Ruin’s mantle.”

“So does that make it easier to get out or harder?”

Seras frowned, “not sure yet. Theres less rock hanging over our heads now, but the tunnels could prove uncooperative and just skin below the surface for a while.”

“Well, there’s still only one way forward for now, so we might as well start.”

Seras nodded her head and dismissed the map. They had only just escaped from the astral space and the things hunting them and were now once again wandering through the green tunnels of the labyrinth.

They both walked for hours in companionable silence. Normally Seras would have tried to fill that space with some inane chatter, but after everything they had gone through she was content to stay silent for once.

Five hours in and they spotted their first monster, an iron ranked bushy hedgehog but compared to everything they had faced up to that point it hardly felt like a challenge. Seras shot it three times with her rifle and sucked up its essence to top off her mana.

“Plant quintessence, iron ranked spirit coins, and nothing else. Kind of lame,” Seras remarked.

Athena got a contemplative look on her face, “that reminds me, what did you get from all the other things you looted?”

Seras huffed, “why, worried about your cut?”

Athena scowled, “no, I’m just curious.”

Seres shrugged, “nothing wrong with keeping track of your pay. I once had to put a gun to an employer’s head before they finally paid me for my work. Cheap ass was trying to short me.”

Athena rolled her eyes, “charming,” she remarked dryly.

“Yeah, slimy prick. Kept saying he gave Cash my share, but Cash said he never got it.”

If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. Please report it.

“Whose Cash?”

“Oh he’s my best-… he was my partner.” Seras had been so lost in the retelling that she had accidentally brought up Cash.

“I see, and you’re sure he hadn’t received your share and just lied about it?”

Seras shook her head, “No, not Cash. He and I were tight. He wouldn’t have done that.”

“It just seems like the more likely option. I don’t know too much about how things are on your world, but shortchanging the cold-blooded killers you hired sounds stupid to me.”

Seras didn’t like where this conversation was heading, “anyways you were asking about the loot? A few fists full of bronze spirit coins, a smattering of miscellaneous quintessence, and some of the Golem components. But those are just listed as serial numbers. Like this one-,” she summoned up a metal cross between a plunger and foot-, “this one is just XVB-T147785.”

Athena didn’t respond after a minute, so Seras turned back to look at her. The tall woman had crossed her bronze-colored arms and was giving her a flat unamused glare.

Seras sighed, “too oblivious.”

Athena rolled her eyes, “as obvious as a bosterian”

“A- a what?”

“They’re magic so you probably don’t have any. They’re just very obvious.”

“Right…” Seras trailed off.

“Don’t look at me like that, you use phrase and metaphor I don’t know all the time,” Athena snapped.

Seras shook her head, “that’s not, I wasn’t, it’s just don’t want to talk about Cash if that’s alright.”

Athena nodded her head, “that’s fine, I can already put together some of the pieces from context.” They walked on, each step making a sort of rustling sound as they scraped the moss carpeting. “He was your friend, not just a partner. You were going to say best friend even. And I take it someone killed him.”

Seras grunted, “on the money there.”

“Is the killer still on the loose then, or did you catch them?”

Despite her mood Seras laughed to herself, “I know exactly where that bitch is.”

“Even here on Pallimustus?”

Seras couldn’t help the wry smile that came across her face, “oh yes, she’s here, see her every time I look in a mirror.”

That shut her up. From the lack of scuffs Seras could tell that she had stopped walking, Seras didn’t stop. A minute later hurried steps signaled Athena catching up.

“Seras?” Athena said hesitantly.

Seras waited patiently for Athena to ask why she’d killed her best friend. A man who was basically a brother to her seeing as how they grew up together in the same gang.

But that wasn’t what Athena asked, “why did you get mad, when you realized that the golems were mutilated villagers.”

Seras scowled, “answered your own question there,” she pointed out.

“No, I know why anyone would be upset by that, but why did you get mad.

“Should I be offended, I feel like I should feel offended?”

“But you don’t,” Athena pointed out.

Seras sighed, “you have an annoying habit of being right. No, I’m not offended, you’re right to question my actions. Most people would care about that sort of shit, but I’m not a good person, so why did it bug me?” she shrugged her shoulders as if to say, ‘fuck if I know.’

“That’s the thing though, you say you’re not a good person, and all your stories back that up, but you don’t feel like a bad person.”

“Then you’re too trusting.”

“And you’re not?” she countered. “Seras, you joined up with the first people you met and have stuck with them despite having multiple chances to leave.”

“They’re good people, I’ve got no reason to leave.”

“Except that a less trusting person would have a harder time believing they were good people.”

Seras shook her head, “look I don’t know how to explain it, but I had a gut feeling about them. Dust, Petra, Rohan, and even Flint, they’re all good people, and they’ve proved me right several times over now.”

“And has your feeling ever been wrong?”

Seras’ mind flashed back to the Volta job, little drops of red blood and black oil floated through the stations control room. One cold eye started at her in shock, the other side of her face completely blown off from Seras’ iconic black pistol.

“Yeah,” she said after a long pause.

Athena bumped her shoulder with her own. A familiar gesture for a person she had only known for a few days. “It’s not a bad thing; in fact I think it’s your most enduring quality.”

Seras scoffed, “I think you’re seeing what you want to see Athena. Do you know how many people I’ve killed.”

She shook her head.

“Neither do I,” Seras said. “From assassination, to gang wars, to people just getting in the way, I can’t honestly tell you how many people I’ve killed. The only thing I can say with confidence is that between the two of us we don’t have enough finger or toes for a whole tally.”

“Soldiers kill, adventures kill, my own parents have killed people.” She said all this with a shrug as if that was an acceptable thing to say. “Our world is a violent place, and sometimes life is cheap. We do what we can to save those around us, and sometimes that means killing. Your world sounds worse, despite lacking monsters and dark gods. I can’t imagine what kind of things you were forced to do to survive.”

“It wasn’t all just survival,” Seras growled. She didn’t know why Athena’s attempts to validate her murders pissed her off, but it did. “I killed for money, I killed because I was pissed and needed to shoot something, hell I once did it on a dare. Frost doubted my sniping skills, so I killed to prove how good I was.”

Athena bit her lip, “alright maybe you’re not a good person, but I refuse to believe your just a ‘bad person.’ A bad person doesn’t constantly put themselves in danger just to protect one stupid girl who got herself captured. You’ve broken your arm, been melted, nearly disemboweled by a space monster, burned, shot, and stabbed. And through all of this you never asked me to use my abilities, you even tried to stop me. You’re not a bad person.”

“I aint a good one either,” Seras shot back.

“You’re not. You’re… something else. Not in between, but something else.”

Seras stopped in her tracks and glared at Athena, “don’t do that. Don’t try to sanctify me, or whatever you’re trying to do.”

“Then quit lying to yourself,” she said obstinately.

Seras glared at the woman, until her eyes drifted down and noticed the missing stump where a hand should be. Seras turned away and began to stalk forward, long quick strides taking her farther away from Athena and the uncomfortable things she said. Athena stood still for one moment, then started forward and caught up quickly with those long legs of hers.

They walked in much less companiable silence after that, an awkward tension permeated the air. They kept it up for hours, long past when they would have considered bedding down, since that would have meant sharing a tent.

They walked until Seras felt a change in the slight ever-present breeze of the labyrinth. Seras stopped and listened hard, it was barely audible even with her ears, but she heard the crick of bugs. The weird jumping ones that made noise at night.

Seras went from standing still to a full-blown sprint in seconds, her feet pounded the slight incline of the tunnel rhythmically until she emerged from the tunnel and onto the surface.

Real stars twinkled above them, and a cold desert breeze blew her hair back. A second set of footsteps approached her, and Athena broke out of the labyrinth as well.

She looked around and began to smile, it was a weary, desperate thing. It fell from her face in a moment when she looked past Seras.

Seras felt a powerful aura descend around her as a bow string creaked from being pulled back. She slowly put her hands above her head and turned to see her ambushers.

Four men wearing dark raw hide clothes had bows trained on her and Athena, they had darkly tanned skinned, amber colored eyes, and wore dark feathers and obsidian beads in their pitch-black hair. And at their center was the reason Seras hadn’t even considered fighting her way out of this.

A single silver ranked Leonid woman with dark brown fur was staring at them with sharp predatory eyes.

“Fuck my life,” Seras muttered.