“As in choosing to surround ourselves with the people who use their freedom to celebrate and encourage us to embrace our own; we may not get to choose who we’re related to, or who we love. But we can always choose our family.” - Ian Martin, Buffy Episode Guide, Family -

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James took a bite of his apple, the snap of the fruit as his teeth broke off a piece fresh and crisp, and sagged back into the beanbag chair. It was a warm day outside, a late summer heat wave baking everything in its path, but warded off by the Lair’s air conditioning.

There was a fundamental truth about the Order, and by association the Lair, that it was a sort of difficult to classify thing. Was the Order a professional delver organization, or were they a loose affiliation of survivors, or were they something else, either more or less? Similarly, when it came to the Lair itself, the vibe of the space often existed in multiple zones of thought at once.

Was it, for example, a dedicated space for careful research? Testing and cataloguing artifacts and phenomena, trying to turn weird dungeon rewards into powerful tools? Or was it a home base, a place to rest and rearm between missions, where the people who spent the most time there were the ones doing paperwork? Or was it a clubhouse? Just a big building that they’d inexplicably secured as a place for the various knights and aspirants to hang out while they waited for the world to get weirder?

James was pretty sure it was all of those, and probably a few more, too.

But it also left them in a really weird position sometimes, where in the back warehouse space among analyst desks and an armor printer, Nate was doing a preliminary debriefing with the rogues over the events in Townton, upstairs in a well appointed office Karen was making phone calls to various government bodies in the state of Tennessee that had no idea what was happening, and in the lobby, James was sprawled on a beanbag chair.

He liked these beanbag chairs quite a lot. They were really soft fur padding, and whatever was used to stuff them was fine enough that it felt rather decadent to take the time to relax on one. The dissonance of beanbag chairs in the headquarters of a paramilitary paranormal knightly peacekeeping order was not lost on him, though.

Around the lobby, humans and camracondas moved through the space comfortably. A few people moving around the Lair, a couple people relaxing like himself, a few people having quiet conversations, one of their interns doing some light cleaning. There was a fairly large group that kept coming through in ones and twos, checking out and making moves on some absurdly large scale wargame that was set up in the far corner. A people heading home, or coming in for the day, many of them members of Response. At one point, Bill had come through the door hauling about four hundred pounds of two-by-four, and everyone within eyeshot was suddenly in concerted motion, helping the man funnel several tons of wood from his truck into the basement, and making damn sure James didn’t try to help as well.

Which was fine, as far as he was concerned. As soon as he’d landed back in the Lair, and he didn’t *need* to keep going, whatever magic Endurance granted him had just peaced out to take its own nap, and James had practically collapsed. Over the next couple days of rest and medical examination, he got his full personal inventory of damage.

Moderate muscle damage in his right leg, two broken fingers, four cracked ribs, a sprained ankle. A number of cuts and abrasions which, while they’d begun clotting quickly, would still take a while to fully heal. Fairly bad blood loss, which was at least mostly taken care of by one of his purples. And, of course, bruising. Bruising across his chest, his arms, legs, shoulders, basically all of the right side of his hip was one massive bruise. And, of course, a lump on his head the size of a baseball.

It turned out, it didn’t matter how many superhuman feats of endurance he had stacked up. Getting in multiple car crashes and fighting through an army of necromantic constructs with a *sword* was grounds for injury.

Anesh and Alanna had both gotten out cleaner in the ‘hit points remaining’ contest. But they also hadn’t been in a car that was flipped over, so James wasn’t prepared to concede anything yet.

Instead, he leaned back, took the deepest breath he could before his lungs started to ache and his throat locked up from the pain, and enjoyed his relaxation time. Just laid back, enjoyed the sunlight filtered through the slim secure windows around the upper half of the front wall, and watched the people who had thrown in with him and his stupid ideas enjoy their time in this communal space.

And then, he perked up, as a familiar voice made its way down the hall.

“...need anything else, alright?” Anesh’s English accent, lighter now than it had been years ago when James had met him, was still smooth and stood out easily to his ears.

“Alright. Uh… thank you. Really, thanks.” Alanna’s own voice, a bit awkward, but still just as comforting as it had always been to James, came back. “You sure you don’t need help with anything?”

The two of them came into view around the corner of the row of lockers against the wall of the common area, and James found himself smiling at the sight. And also the sight in the background of the hallway of Ava riding a camraconda down toward the cafeteria. “Not a chance.” Anesh said. “You got the holy hell beaten out of you. Go relax for a while. Get some food if you need it, whatever. Technically, I wasn’t there, so I’ll be fine.” James checked without being too obvious about his staring, and noticed that while Alanna still had a number of bandages on and her arm in a sling, Anesh looked like he’d been in perfect health for his whole life.

“Okay, okay.” Alanna laughed, and it felt like the world shifted into being correct again. “That’s really unfair, you know!” She said as Anesh grinned at her.

“I hear that a lot.” Anesh looked like he was suddenly unsure of where to move his feet, and made a motion that was half stepping forward, half turning away. Alanna noticed, and without breaking her smile, slipped forward and gave Anesh a one armed hug. “You’re good.” She muttered to him. “There’s no rush now, right?”

“Right.” Anesh smiled, his whole body shifting in relief. “Okay. I’ll see ya later.” He said, turning and heading to the stairwell door that led to…

James couldn’t keep track of the basements. One of them, though.

And then, Alanna looked around the room, spotted him, and the smile on her face quirked upward a bit again. She strode over, taking limping steps from damage to her knee; she was wearing shorts, and James could see the heavy bandage held in place with medical tape. “This is woefully unprofessional.” She told him, towering over his makeshift bed.

“You’re absolutely right.” James agreed. “I should have a *throne*. Bring me more beanbags.”

Alanna rolled her eyes and barked out an off guard laugh, before dragging another beanbag over and settling into it next to James, pushing the two pieces of plush seating together and wedging a manilla folder between them as she relaxed. “See, the crazy thing is, I *know* you’re in charge here.” She said to him.

“Whoever told you that lied.” James groaned, closing his eyes as he chewed more apple. “Also, what’s in the file?”

“Huh?” Alanna glanced down. “Oh, right. An Anesh…”

“You can just say Anesh. They’re all the same.”

“That’s gotta take getting used to, right?”

James chuckled. “You think that’s bad? When he first started doing his whole clone production line thing, there’d be two or three of him around in the same room, and they’d alternate which sentences they spoke.”

“...I remember that, yeah.” Alanna said softly. James glanced over at her, giving her a worried look. “I’m fine, I’m fine.” She insisted. “It’s just weird. It’s mostly back, but there’s all these little things I’m still getting connected. Oh, like, the file. Anesh gave me a list of things I could do.”

“Uh… you can…”

She made to swat at his arm, but stopped remembering how beat up they both were. “No, you jackass.” Alanna’s voice held an amused tone. “Like, a list of all the purple orbs I have. As far as was written down.”

“Oh!” James laughed awkwardly. “Yes, that makes way more sense than what I thought. So, aside from that, how’s it been? Are you doing okay? Settling back in alright?”

“I guess.” Alanna shrugged. “I remember us, a bit more. I… fuck, I don’t know how to even start with this. I remember loving you, and why, and I still *feel* that, but it also feels like… like we’ve got no momentum? Like I’m missing all the little rituals and habits of being together with someone. Not that I actually know what that’s like. Like, I *remember* a lot of it, but it’s not *happening*. And… okay, weird question, but was my relationship with you two the first one I’d ever been in?”

“It sounds like you just need to reestablish emotional reflexes. Also… ah, no! I can answer this!” James blinked, trying to pull up a memory. “You briefly dated some guy named… Scott? Back in school as a teenager.”

“Scott… Ogden. Yeah. Yeah! That guy fucking sucked!” Alanna snapped her fingers as she put it together. “God, compared to that, any relationship is probably pretty good, huh?”

“Yeah, but like, ours is better anyway, cause you and Anesh are in it, and I love you.” James let the vulnerable words slip out before he could stop himself, and abruptly hoped he hadn’t pushed over a line he wasn’t supposed to.

“I love you too.” Alanna said without thinking about it. And then, a second later, her face lit up crimson as she looked away. “Oh!” She cleared her throat awkwardly. “Welp! Guess that reflex is still there! Great, cool!”

“Shit, are you okay?” James asked quietly.

“I’m…” she took a breath, and looked back at him, seeing the concern in his eyes. Then, she tilted her head, and took a quick breath. “Actually, yeah. I’m good. I *am* good! That felt great! I’m gonna say that again!” She paused, and James raised his eyebrows at her, twisting painfully in his seat to lean over. The moment stretched on as he waited, until Alanna suddenly said, “Okay, I thought about it too much! Nevermind!”

James couldn’t hold in a relieved laugh. “Okay, well, no rush.” He said.

“God, I can’t believe I got hit in the head so hard it made me an awkward idiot again.” Alanna bemoaned.

“What, like, just now?” James quipped.

She snorted. “Nah, I mean, with the memory loss thing. Was that not head trauma? Nate filled me in on the whole Status Quo siege during my preliminary debrief. I don’t remember the whole thing, but I do know I got taken out midway through.”

“Oh!” James suddenly remembered something, and pointed at her with what remained of his apple snack. “That’s not head trauma!”

“What?”

“Yeah! Apparently, people have known about this for a *while* and Research only just got around to telling me! Abruptly breaking the hardware part of the skulljack connections to other people causes loss of access to long term memories! Normally it’s not a problem, because you’re right next to the person and the memories recover quickly. But when Anesh teleported back and left you, he didn’t take the time to do it right, and so you woke up without memories, and no way to get them back.” He scowled lightly. “Everyone just kind of assumed I knew this, so no one informed me directly, which is a *dangerous* way to think around here.”

“Wait, why didn’t that Anesh remember then?” Alanna asked, confused.

“Uh… that was the Anesh who died.” James muttered, trying to press away the pain in his chest that wasn’t quite physical. “Rapidly, upon return. So he might have had memory problems too, but… well.”

Alanna’s face twisted into a sad and angry look for a moment before she composed herself. “I’m a lot more glad that they’re all dead already.” She grumbled. “I actually… like Anesh, you know?”

“Don’t think I’ve forgotten that the first memory you recovered of him was hot.” James reminded her with a grin.

“Oh my god shut up!” Alanna looked around for some kind of pillow or other soft object to smother James to death with. “Changing the subject now! What’s the whole Order been up to since I’ve been struggling to survive Florida? Like, it’s been *months*. Have we taken over the government yet? Ended all crime everywhere?”

“Not quite.” James’ felt his cheeks start to ache from how much he was just casually smiling in his partner’s presence. “Oh! Through both dungeon magic and also basic research, I can now safely tell you that your plan to digitize human minds as a way to combat poverty would *not* work the way you wanted. It’s also not really an effective way to deal with crime, since it turns out the overwhelming majority of ‘crime’, at least in this country, is wage theft. So we’d be better off just destroying capitalism, as always.”

“Mmh. Okay, but, how will I get paid for my hard work?” Alanna asked, kidding. “I feel like I should be given a million dollars for every time I save the world.”

“You joke, but this is actually a real problem in how people talk about things that we’re trying to combat around here.” James sighed. “Capitalism is different from ‘the abstract concept of commerce’, you know? I’m not saying we get rid of money, just… I dunno, honestly. I don’t have a plan in place for this yet. It’s half baked. But my point stands; no creating digital refugees! It doesn’t solve anything!”

Alanna rolled her eyes. “Well, that shoots down an idea I’d forgotten I’d had. What about any new stuff?”

“Uh… I dunno what everyone else has brought you up to speed on. Have you talked to Sarah yet?”

“I haven’t. Though I *do* remember her. Like, a lot, actually. Where is she, anyway?” Alanna looked around the lobby, focus briefly settling on the scene of Deb taking a shellaxy for a walk before she shook her head. “I feel like she’s pretty much always been present, but she isn’t around lately.”

James shrugged, and winced. “More or less.” He said, taking another small bite of his fruit, and realizing suddenly he was going to have to try to lob the apple core into a garbage can from ten feet away without getting up if he wanted to remain comfortable. “She’s in the Attic. Clutter Ascent. It’s… I mean, it’s nice. It’s a friendly place. I really like it there, and I think it likes us back. There’s a group of Order members who live in the house around it as kind of caretakers, but Sarah’s really the one who thrives there, and I think the dungeon feels the same way about her.”

“That’s pretty cool. Does it still do the mental puzzle chests?” Alanna asked. “I never got a chance to try one of those.”

“It does, and they’re *super* relaxing actually.” James nodded. “Want to head over there later, when my legs don’t feel like jello and I actually want to stand up?”

“Sure.” Alanna smiled. “So, what else?”

“Well, we hired some new people. Uh… found the kid of the woman who the camracondas worship. Started replacing the police. Cured cancer. Oh, we also-“

“No, no. Stop. Go back.” Alanna let out a long breath through her nose, pinching her eyes shut. “You can’t just say that.”

“Which part?” James smiled to himself.

“Let’s start with curing cancer.” Alanna said.

James chomped off the last piece of his apple. “Okay,” he said around a mouthful of fruit, “well, we found an orb that reduces cancer. And we’re copying a lot of them. It’s not actually nearly enough, but it…”

There was a sudden pop of displaced air, as a small glass vial filled with some kind of yellow substance appeared and dropped to James’ lap.

“What.” Alanna blinked, not sure she’d seen that correctly.

James looked down at the finished apple in his hand. “Oh.” He shook his head, trying to focus his thoughts. “Right. *Right*. Completely forgot about that!” He let out a relieved laugh as he tried to get over being so completely startled, before picking up the small container of saffron. Glancing around, he caught the attention of a camraconda that was moving in the right direction. “Oh, hey, Frequency!” He called, and the young snake pivoted her body to correct her course toward him.

“Hello.” Frequency-Of-Sunlight said as she approached. “Welcome back. Both of you.” The camraconda bobbed her head in greeting.

“Thank you.” James smiled at the snake. “Man, I just realized I haven’t gotten a chance to talk to you in a while. Your English is getting a lot smoother.”

“I practice. Deb helps me.” Frequency sounded rather self satisfied, the various tricks the camracondas had to turn synthesized voices into appropriate tones and tenors. “Do you need anything? I am going to help the kitchen.” So saying, the camraconda rippled the set of mechanical arms harnessed to her back, the gesture coming across as an almost organic looking display.

“You’re getting good with those.” James smiled. “I’m glad they made something like that for ya. I should give our basement team a raise. But also, if you’re heading to the kitchen, can you drop this off?” He held out the spice vial.

“Absolutely!” The camraconda assured him. “I take this, too.” She unfurled a pair of her manipulators, and gently plucked the manifested spice, and also the apple core, out of James’ hands. “Thank you! Please stay seated and do not nearly die again. It would make many of us very sad.” Frequencey-Of-Sunlight said, bobbing her head again, and turning to slither off.

Alanna waited until the snake was around the corner before rolling slightly and saying to James, “You know, I *remember* that I have camraconda friends, but it is still really weird actually talking to a non-human life form.”

“It’s pretty weird being *guilt tripped* by a non-human life form, too!” James protested, crossing his arms and tipping his head back over the back of his beanbag. “She’s been practicing!”

“She’s the one dating Deb, right?”

“Right.” James confirmed.

Alanna nodded, then held up a hand, making a gesture of trying to figure out what she wanted to say next. “How do… I mean, is…. I just…um…”

“For reasons that are way less fun than you’d think, I can confirm that camracondas *can* have sex, yes.” James told her, not moving from his odd spot.

“...Maybe I wasn’t gonna ask that!” Alanna’s turn to protest. “Maybe I was going to ask how you made something appear out of nowhere!”

Rolling his head forward again and adjusting to sit up a little bit more, James smiled over at her. “Suuuure. But also I can answer that too. I absorbed an orange orb a while back, and unlike Anesh, who got the power to clone himself, I got the power to spawn small amounts of saffron whenever I eat enough apples.” He snorted a small laugh, and shrugged. “It’s… whatever. Kind of my own fault, I think? I should have planned more carefully. But also it’s handy for the kitchen, and Nate’s paella is delicious.” He found himself smiling again. The two of them lapsed into a comfortable silence, until James added, “I dunno, I just kinda feel good with… I guess, just having a community that has that kind of stuff going on.”

“What, people dating?”

“I mean, yeah!” He laughed. “We’re… alive. We’re people. We aren’t some creepy corporation trying to maximize efficiency or a military trying to homogenize everyone. We’re us. Sometimes, that means our interpersonal drama is gonna cause some issues, and that’s okay. And sometimes, being us means that we’re dating camracondas.”

“Actually, that makes me think of something. Do camracondas date each other?”

“I… haven’t asked!” James realized, rubbing at his chin and realizing suddenly that he needed to shave. “That’s a good question. I should ask.”

“This place is so weird.” Alanna murmured, pressing herself deeper into the beanbag.

“Isn’t it great?”

“Kinda, yeah.” She took a breath of the pleasantly cool air of the Lair’s interior, and closed her eyes, snuggling back into her seat as she slowly continued to let go of the tension of the last several months. Finally, *finally*, she was somewhere that she didn’t have to be aggressive or stealthy just to get through the day. She could, at long last, relax. And no one would try to hurt her. “I like it.” Her voice was tinged with exhaustion.

The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

With a lingering look and a small smile, James watched her doze off. “Enjoy your nap.” He spoke softly. “Hell knows, you earned it.”

“M’not asleep.” Alanna mumbled in her sleep, turning to curl herself up in the beanbag.

James stifled his laugh so as not to wake her, and just lounged back, trying to find a new sitting position without having to put pressure on his broken fingers. The splint for those was still taking some getting used to.

And he went back to experiencing the moment. Feeling the tired bruises slowly heal as he unwound and relaxed, and casually watching the people around the Lair. There were more people than he’d really realized.

“Um… excuse me?” A voice from the front door spoke. James looked over, seeing a middle aged man in a button up shirt. The guy had a classic businessperson style going on; neatly cut hair and slacks accenting his look. He had that classic attitude of someone who was used to being on top of the situation, and that equally classic attitude of someone who had just walked into the Lair for the first time. “Uh.. am I in the right place?” He said, confusedly staring at a camraconda.

James took a breath, and made to stand up and greet the guy, but someone else beat him to it. Ethan, walking by from the back briefing room, gave the guy a friendly wave. “Yeah, you have to be. You can’t get in here if you aren’t scheduled.” He looked the man up and down. “You’re one of the lawyers?”

“Oh, yes.” The man stuck out his hand, “Aaron McKinly. Estate specialist.”

Ethan gave a weird teenager impression of knowing what a handshake was, and James tried not to laugh, while also promising to show him how to do that correctly later. “Okay. Well, you’re gonna want to talk to Karen. She’s upstairs, just go back along the left, and take the elevator up. You can’t miss it!” He called over his shoulder as he turned and half jogged back to whatever meeting Nate was running.

“Elevator?” The lawyer looked around at the various people going about their day like he was being pranked. “This is…”

A human emerged out of the stairs just past the lockers. “It’s a single floor building, we know.” Marcus said, shutting the door to the stairwell behind him and going over to the row of lockers. “Are you one of the lawyers? I think Karen is upstairs. Just take the elevator up, you can’t miss it.”

“I should have been filming this…” James whispered to himself, regretful.

Being told twice was apparently enough for the lawyer, who shook off his confusion and walked past, giving a wide berth to the exasperated camraconda moving past dragging a folding chair.

“That was kind of perfect.” James said to the young man who’d come up from the basement, which he realized must be the Response HQ. He was wearing one of the stylized pins that someone had been making for Response members on his coat shoulder, right next to a rainbow flag pin and another one that was some kind of fancy sun emblem. “Have you been here long?”

Marcus grabbed a small pill bottle out of his locker and pocketed it. “A little while, yeah. Are you new here? Or…” He looked over James with a worried look. “Someone who got teleported for medical? Uh… is your face alright?”

“Face… oh! Right. Chemical burns. They’re not serious, it just looks bad.” With the realization that he was sitting atop a mistake identity comedy gold mine, James just gave the smallest, least painful shrug he could. “I’ve been here a while. Clearly I don’t know everyone though.”

Marcus laughed, and James decided he liked him already. “Yeah, it takes some getting used to. I still don’t know everyone. Course, I spend most of my time in a basement.”

“Oh, don’t sell yourself short. Research spends all their time in at least one basement, and they get recognized.”

“I keep meaning to ask what exactly they research, but I always forget.” Marcus stared off into the middle distance. “It’s probably teleporters.” He decided.

“Shockingly, no. They’ve been banned from stupid telepad tests for a month.” James cracked a smile.

Marcus gave him a polite, if slightly confused, smile. “Yeah, well. The things work, so I guess that’s good enough.” He shrugged. “Anyway. I need to get going. I’ve been sleeping here for a few days, and I need to refill a prescription. Were you part of the big Response deployment? Something happened to a whole city. It was…” Marcus trailed off, both uncertain if he was oversharing, and also still clearly disturbed by what had happened. “I wasn’t even there, but god, the whole thing was… bad.”

“Yeah, it was.” James agreed. “I’m just glad we have people who *can* react to it, you know? Without Response support, there’s a lot of people who’d be dead right now.” He hadn’t heard much, yet, but he did know that of the survivors, many of them were people trapped under debris and rubble, or sealed into buildings by asphalt barriers.

“Yeah. Are you in Response? I haven’t seen you around yet. Oh, I’m Marcus by the way.”

“I’m…”

“James!” Momo inadvertently finished his sentence, crashing into the side of his beanbag in a power slide that left her sprawled on the floor next to him, and James slightly jostled but otherwise unmoved. From her shoulder, a harried looking Rufus scuttled up onto the beanbag and settled in on James’ lap, like the world’s most self assured cat.

“Ow.” James might not have been sent sprawling, but he had felt that hit in his bones. “Momo, why. I’m supposed to be resting.”

“You have never, once, after *any* fight, actually wanted to rest.” Momo countered.

James glowered at her. “I always *want* to rest, you… you… whatever you are!” He sputtered. “But there’s always stuff to do!”

“Well, you looked restful, and I figured I’d give you something to do. Do you wanna help me try to make some life in the basement?” Momo looked altogether too excited.

“You come in here, wake Alanna up even though she’s politely pretending you didn’t, interrupt my pleasant conversation…”

“Shit, sorry Alanna!”

The taller girl cracked an eye open. “S’okay.” She said, before closing it again and trying to ignore what was going on.

Momo wasn’t done. “Also sorry Marcus! How’s your shift going? Anything I need to know about?”

“No ma’am.” Marcus said, in the kind of voice people used with authority figures. “Nothing new, we’re resuming normal operations later today. Harvey has a few things to talk to you about, but he said he already messaged you.”

James looked back and forth between the two of them. “Momo, are you… in charge of things?” He asked, suspiciously. “When did *that* happen?”

“I’m not in charge of anything, I just lead a Response unit, and Harvey delegates a lot to me.” Momo said.

“That’s the same…” James and Marcus started speaking at the same time, then made eye contact over Momo’s sprawled form, and shook their heads at each other. This wasn’t an argument they were going to win.

James continued. “Momo, go do your job. We’ll talk later.” He looked away a little sheepishly. “And also… I am feeling better and already plan to attend the full debrief later. So, let me nap in the sun for a little while, alright?”

“Yeah, yeah.” Momo said, rolling to her feet. “Rufus, you want a ride back downstairs?” She asked, but the stapler just waved her off. “Alright, your loss. Keep up the good work!” She said to either of them, as she rushed off.

“That girl has been drinking too much of the special coffee.” James grumbled.

“Uh…” Marcus looked like he had a question to ask, and James have him an open handed invitation to continue. “How long have you been here? I didn’t actually ask properly.”

James held out his good hand, offering an introductory handshake. “Hi.” He said. “I’m James. I started… this.” He looked around the common area.

“I was expecting someone taller. And not on a beanbag chair?” Marcus was dealing with it pretty well. “You’re not a very dignified boss.”

“First of all!” James protested. “I’m not really a ‘boss’. I just kind of give people resources and nudges, and they do things without me. Also, I just fought a tanker truck dragon, a crazed necromancer, *and* saved hundreds of people from extermination by an indifferent demigod! I’ve earned my beanbag!” He crossed his arms, causing a protesting tap from Rufus as the idle petting stopped.

Marcus stared at him, crossing his own arms. “How much of that did you just make up?” He asked, suspicious.

James laughed. “Good question. None of it. But still, good question. You fit in here pretty well, don’t you?”

“Yeah, I like it. I’m doing something important.” Marcus said.

“It’s nice, huh?”

“Better than the alternative.” Marcus agreed. “I guess I just appreciate the chance. Also the people here are nicer than they should be, and it’s weird, but also cool. Also *aliens exist and I can be friends with them* so *that’s* happening!”

James held up his injured hand in a ‘hold on’ motion. “Okay, as great as it is to see people as excited as I am about all this, I think it’s important to note that the camracondas or Rufus here or any of the other non-human life around here aren’t actually aliens.”

“How do you figure?”

“They’re *from here*. Maybe not the normal places, but still from Earth. They have the same claim on the world that we do. We’re all… citizens of the world, you know?” James looked over at the camraconda helping a human set up for the support group meeting later today. Looked down at Rufus, nestled in his lap. “It’s different, but it’s not alien.” He reiterated. “We’re all in this together.”

“I like that.” Marcus shrugged. “Also, shit, I guess of anyone, I should be more careful with language like that. My bad.”

“Eh. Just gotta keep improving, right?” James nodded at him. “Also, don’t let me keep you. You seemed like you were in a hurry earlier.”

“Yeah, gotta get to the pharmacy before it closes.”

“Just teleport there.” James suggested.

There was a pause. “Um… that seems… wait, that was an option?”

“Maybe? I teleport everywhere. But then, I think a lot of people just don’t want to tell me I can’t, and I may have special permission because two of my cars have died in the line of duty.”

From his side, Alanna spoke up for the first time since pretending to go back to sleep. “Your most recent car isn’t dead, just upside down and in another state.”

“Oh well in *that case*...”

Marcus chuckled. “Alright, I’ll go ask Harvey. Anyway, nice meeting you, uh… sir?”

“James.”

“Boss? Harvey calls you boss.”

“Harvey is breaking the rules.”

“Glorious leader?” Marcus asked, slipping into the stairwell.

“Oh my god leave!” James looked around for a pillow to throw, but came up short.

After the door had clicked shut, Alanna rolled herself back over to stare up at James with smiling eyes. “You like him.” She said, confidently. “God, I can *feel* it. It’s like a million little things I’m remembering all at once, and every one of them is you being belligerent to authority figures. Did you once flip off a cop when we were in high school?”

“Technically I did it after we were out of high school too, but that time they’d been shooting at me and it felt more justified.” James grumbled. “Also yes, he’s my style of person. Completely disrespectful of my position as supreme leader.”

Alanna laughed, and the two of them lapsed into comfortable, companionable silence for a while. Both of them just enjoying being together again, and not having any pressure for a while. At some point, Anesh - the Anesh who had been injured alongside them - joined them, dragging over a pair of beanbags and making himself something closer to an actual bed that he could spread out on and lay behind their heads. He’d brought Ganesh with him, and the drone and Rufus were soon scrambling around the pile of relaxing delvers, playing their own game while Anesh caught the others up.

“El’s gonna be in the hospital for another day for observation.” He said as he sunk into the warm fur. “Response thinks they got all the survivors out that were still alive. It’s… not good. But it could have been worse. We’re gonna need to talk about some stuff in the next few days.”

“Yeah, I’m going to the meeting tonight.” James said.

“I’m not. Well, I mean, this me isn’t. I’m going home and going to bed and sleeping for another twelve hours. I’ve been making that iced coffee you were using, and I’m gonna give that a shot.”

“Was that a coffee pun?” Alanna asked. “Also, yeah, I want to go back to the apartment! I’ve been either in the hospital, or here, since we got back. I want my… normal… bed.” She trailed off, suddenly nervous. “Oh wait.”

“Yeah, we just have one really big bed that we, uh… you know.” James gave her an awkward look. “Do you *want* to come back? Like, I’m gonna be honest here, I’ll find it awkward until we’re actually there, and then I’ll be fine because things will get back to normal. But I want *you* to be comfortable.”

“Yeah, I know, it’s cute.” Alanna told him. “Seriously, though. I’d say I remember about ninety percent of myself at this point? And most of it’s the important stuff. Probably. So yes, I’d love to go sleep with Anesh.”

“I’m flattered.” Anesh put a hand to his chest. “To be so highly thought of…”

Alanna flushed a deep red. “Wait, no! That’s not what I meant!” She tried to backtrack. “I mean, it *is*, and I’m not trying to leave you out, or prioritize him, or, uh, but I…”

It was too late, James was already cracking up laughing at the situation. “Oh man,” he shook his head, “you have no idea how not worried I am about whether you prefer sleeping with me or Anesh. Seriously, it’s fine, chill.” He ruffled Alanna’s hair. “I’m just glad you’re back, and we can get back to normal at whatever speed you like. And since I’m going to camraconda movie night, it *would* be you sleeping with Anesh.”

“Aren’t you supposed to be resting?” Anesh asked him.

“Explaining the Princess Bride to camracondas who have minimal exposure to Earth culture *is* restful.”

“That’s a lie at best.” Texture-Of-Barkdust said as she slithered by, carrying a stray backpack in her maw.

Anesh perched himself over James, looking down into his boyfriend’s eyes. “Even the camracondas are aware of it, James.” He said. “You need to sleeep.”

“I slept all day. My sleep schedule is so messed up.” James protested. “I’m going to movie night, and I’m gonna eat baklava and talk about meta storytelling.” This is how I relax.

“How he relaxes sounds pretty good.” Alanna admitted, perching on her elbows and gazing up at Anesh. “Maybe we should join him instead of going home and having sex?”

Anesh sputtered. “Wh... I mean… we…” He cleared his throat and rubbed a hand on his neck. “That wasn’t *exactly* what I had…”

Alanna darted forward and interrupted him with a kiss, drawing him down and bumping into James, who was watching the two with a wide smile on his face.

After a few seconds, Alanna pulled back, and Anesh toppled sideways, off balance and panting a little. “Hey, you were right.” Alanna said to James. “Just doing it on reflex does help!”

“Did you remember anything important?” James asked her coyly. “Or do you think you need to do that again?”

“Only time will tell.” Alanna replied sagely, curling back into her relaxed position that didn’t pull at the bandages around her shoulder. “You think Anesh is okay? He seems injured.”

“...My bones...” Anesh groaned out, flopped across the cushion next to James’ head.

“Need any help?” An amused young man’s voice asked. James looked over and followed his vision up from the pair of feet standing behind them to see Nikhail looking down at Anesh’s prone form with something between humor and actual concern. “I can do first aid, if you need it. Probably includes CPR, but it looks like Alanna has that covered.”

“Please kill me now.” Anesh muttered. “I can take it.”

“Did you finally get a copy of an armory package?” James asked. “I saw the note on the server that we expanded the options while I was on vacation.”

Nikhail looked guilty. “I actually still haven’t. Reed says I have to before I’m allowed to go back in the Office, but there’s a wait list. So I’ll probably just join the Akashic Sewer rotation instead.”

“That’s *not better*.” James gaze sharpened. “Now *I’m* gonna tell you that you can’t do a thing. I’ll put in a word with our duplication wizard, and get you an orb set, okay? Though good job learning first aid stuff the normal way.”

“Oh, I did not do that.” Nikhail shook his head. Holding up his left arm, James saw it was wrapped in an oddly patterned green glove that reached midway up the forearm. “The authority that bonded with me can do it. Figured it out when I was assigned to a Response team, actually. It’s really cool, and Reed has a very, *very* long sales pitch to give you later when you’re not injured.”

“So you’re a healer.” James blinked. “You can heal people with magic.”

“Nnnnno.” Nikhail’s voice turned a little pedantic. “Aidimy can do a few things involving first aid and stabilization. Or rather, produce the outcome of those actions. As long as I have the authority - see what I did there - to be operating in that role.”

Alanna sat up, looking at the glove that Nikhail was wearing carefully. “Wait what?” She narrowed her eyes, leaning forward. “These are the things from Status Quo?”

It was kind of a fundamental truth that a lot of the power the Order had to bring to bear was the kind they’d earned through fighting. And the tools recovered from Status Quo were no exception. Except, they were, just a little bit. The shield bracers were something everyone was getting used to, especially as they cloned their own. But the authorities? The strange strain of infomorph was unsettling to be around, and they didn’t know much about them except that they’d been completely subservient to the Status Quo agents who had tried their best to kill everyone in this very building.

The fact that the glove Nikhail was ‘wearing’ looked more than a little bit like a pattern of interlocking chains did not help James associate it with anything comfortable.

“This one isn’t from Status Quo.” Nikhail rebutted. “Aidimy was hatched here. And his focus is on rendering medical assistance.”

“So, the authority thing? We mostly called them that because it’s what we overheard. Is that thematically linked?” James was curious now.

Nikhail nodded excitedly. “Yup!” He flexed his fingers, and the glove rippled around his arm. “His strength appears related to both our institutional strength, and also how well I, personally, am filling my assigned role. It’s a very… well, I think it’s interesting. Reed said you’d have something to say about it.” He raised his eyebrows, looking at James expectantly.

With a long suffering sigh, James flopped back and began to monologue. “It does raise an interesting question about whether or not it was meant to be a kind of control mechanism, in the same way that the Road used the search engines to push people away. It creates a situation where obeying orders and failing to question mundane authority grants greater power to continue to do exactly that, reinforcing the organization and leading to more ‘institutional strength’. That’s actually pretty worrying; it’s a virtuous cycle, except without the actual virtue. Unless there’s an independent decision by the organization as a whole to ‘be good’, which… um… they don’t tend to do that.”

“We do that.” Alanna suggested.

“Well yeah, *we* do that. But we’re a secret cabal of teleporting disaster response superheroes. We get a pass.” Anesh added. “Oh wait, no…”

“Yeah!” James threw a hand over his head, landing it randomly on Anesh’s shoulder in a friendly bit of contact. “Yeah, we *don’t* get a pass! Because our method of enforcing good behavior is *cultural*, not based on organized rules or laws. It’s working *now*, and I think we can make it continue working, but just because we’re doing something abnormal doesn’t mean we don’t have to be on the lookout for factors that incentivize bad behavior in groups like companies or governments.” He looked over at Nikhail’s glove. “And that might just be one of those things.”

“But… I like him.” Nikhail protested quietly, anxiety in his voice. “And it’s not like I’m doing anything *bad*. Either of us!”

“Yeah, that’s a good point too.” James conceded smoothly. “The fact that infomorphs, including authorities, can become people, is good grounds for not treating them like something as simplified as ‘incentivizing factors’. Also, a focus on healing, or just support actions in general, is a powerful method of making that virtuous cycle actually work in our favor. If we’re known as the people that can magically seal wounds on site, we’re suddenly going to get a lot more of the kind of positive attention we’re gonna need in the coming years.”

“You should ask him if Aidimy can actually do that.” Anesh suggested.

James nodded. “Right. Hey, Nikhail, can…?”

“Yeah, sort of. Probably not as powerfully as you’re thinking, but kind of.”

“Anyway. Closing thoughts, this is the closest we’ve gotten to a healing potion, and I’m on board.” James yelped suddenly as Rufus skittered across his chest in his ongoing game of tag with Ganesh. “Also ow.”

“The magical car repairing gas doesn't count?” Anesh asked. “No, nevermind, I said it out loud and heard myself and now I get it.”

Nikhail nodded excitedly. “Alright, cool. So, if you could just repeat all of that to Reed? Because I’m actually on my way to the Response deployment to Townton for my shift, and won’t be around for a while. And it would be cool to have more authorities around.”

“Oh my god, get out of here before I revoke your permission to go outside.” James rolled his eyes

“That seems like it would actually hurt the authority, though.” Alanna suggested. “Oh, hey, woah, that’s actually a huge problem, isn’t it? Like, doesn’t that link someone’s *job* to an actual life? I dunno if that’s okay.”

“I wonder if we can safely test if we can move an authority bond to a new person?” Anesh mused

Nikhail took a step away, hiding his arm behind his back. “Test it with someone else.” He suggested firmly.

“We’re not gonna cut your hand off. We just want to make sure this is something sustainable.” James sighed. “You don’t want to be your job for your whole life, do you?”

“My ‘job’ is trying to figure out what magic items do, and delivering emergency medical aid via teleportation.” Nik’s voice was so sarcastic it almost triggered Anesh’s venom immunity. “I think I’ll survive if I don’t retire.”

“Touché.” James pursed his lips as he nodded. “Alright. Well, get to your shift. Thanks for giving me more work.”

“No problem.” Nikhail said, waving a hand wrapped in solid green light as he turned and headed down into the basement stairs, holding the door politely for the pair of Response members coming up on their break.

“I feel like this is gonna be another long term concern.” Anesh groaned a minute later.

“That’s all we get these days.” James griped. “Remember when we could just fight the bad guy and then be done with it?”

The other two were silent for a while. Even Rufus and Ganesh stopped their playing to turn and stare at James. Eventually, Anesh cautiously cleared his throat. “That has… never once happened?”

“Oh yeah.” James smiled. “Welp. Add it to the pile.” He said, closing his eyes again. “I’ll deal with it after a nap.”

“You’ve been pretending you were gonna nap this whole time, but still haven’t. People keep coming over to talk.” Alanna complained.

“I know, right? It’s weirdly familiar, and I don’t like it, but it’s also comforting.” James twisted to look over at the far corner of the room. “I just wish someone who’s playing that board game would come by and explain what the rules are, because I am *super* interested.”

“You could just ask.”

“That’s awkward!”

“You literally just fought a mass murderer to the death, and you’re worried about being awkward over a board game.” Alanna said, the sentence morphing from a question to a statement as she spoke. “No, wait, that checks out. I know *exactly* how you do stuff like this.”

“He’s adorable when he isn’t infuriating.” Anesh said.

Alanna grinned. “I remember you saying that! I remember *me* saying that!”

“I’m going to die of embarrassment now.” James informed them. “Inform my next of kin.”

“You can’t die now. You have to go be a leader and decide what to do with the city we own now in about half an hour.” Anesh told him. “Also there’s that movie thing later.”

It irked James, but his boyfriend had a point. He decided to not die of embarrassment until at least tomorrow.

There was just too much to do now to quit.

The three of them actually had some quiet time then. The minutes ticking by in a casual afternoon of lazy relaxation and quiet shows of affection. A few people who passed by nodded to James, but no one else really interrupted.

He’d have to get up soon, he knew. Go talk about serious things, make actionable plans. But right now, he was here, home again, surrounded by magic and magical people, with the two people he loved more than anything in the world. A warm summer day wrapped around the building, and a bustle of activities both serious and silly taking place inside.

He’d been on vacation for almost two weeks, but a fairly large chunk of that time had been spent fighting for his life. And it was, ironically, only now that he was back home, that he really felt like he had the time and space to breathe, and just enjoy the feeling of time passing around him.

Then his phone alarm beeped at him, and he groaned as he rolled gracelessly to the floor, and hauled himself upright.

Perfect relaxing moment over. Time to get back to work.