Jason’s face was squeezed in an annoyed scowl as he walked. Abed had been more than determined not to say anything about who’d cleared the monster hunt. In fact, the man had had the gall to joke about giving them another monster hunt. And while Jason had roughed him up a bit, the man had said nothing.

In truth, Jason doubted he could call shoving the man against a wall, roughing up. The problem was he already had a reputation to the man. Everywhere they went he was the civilized one. The one who wouldn’t use violence against another mage unless he was threatened. So no matter what he did, Abed would never really have felt like his life was in danger.

Jason knew he should’ve taken Chris with him. At least, with her Abed would’ve been afraid. Even if he wouldn’t be afraid of death, he would’ve been afraid of damage since they were both in the same category and she was known for her personality. There was no point in it now, though. Jason groaned once more at the lack of information, knowing what his next move was going to be.

He was heading for the meeting point when something caught his attention. He turned at the sight of a red hair and was surprised to find Zed without Oliver. Even more surprising was what he was wearing and who he was standing with.

Zed wore a light brown duster coat that was long enough to settle just above his ankles. He’d packed his hair back up in a bun since his encounter in the forest and let the single lock Cindy had braided fall down the side of his face. Zed stood with a young girl, no more than eighteen, maybe no more than sixteen. Her dark skin was stained in smears of brown dirt and she wore a tattered gown that did little to hide the appeal of her petite size. She had a mop of unkempt brown hair and she was definitely pretty for a girl in this specific town.

Jason watched in growing confusion as Zed talked to her. There was no sign of the jovial annoyance he was still learning to tolerate. The joviality was there, still, but it was different. It was playful, teasing. It was in the soft upward turn of one side of Zed’s lips, the gentle eyes. It was in the way he gave her his attention.

There was a calm glint in Zed’s green eyes as he gave the girl his entire attention, looking down at her blushing face even as her hand reached hesitantly for his hair. Zed glanced softly at the hand then moved his gaze back to her. He said something with an acquiescent nod and the girl reached up, took the braid in her hand and rubbed it as if it was something beautiful and new.

The girl giggled at something Zed said as she played with the lock, mesmerized, then she chuckled shyly.

Jason’s mouth dropped. Zed was flirting. And he looked good at it. With the red hair, green eyes, duster, and the height he had on her, it looked like a scene from a romance movie.

Jason turned in their direction and stalked up to them. Zed caught him a moment too late and there was an odd shift in his expression.

“Is my friend bothering you?” Jason asked the girl as he rested an arm on one of Zed’s shoulders. To his greatest surprise, Zed sighed and turned to him.

“Did you get the mana stone?” Zed asked him.

He looked at Zed, confused.

“What mana stone?” he asked.

“The one you went to—and she’s gone,” Zed said with a sigh.

Jason turned to the girl and found her already retreating down the busy path with hurried steps.

“Good job,” Zed said, tilting his shoulder so that Jason’s arm slipped off it. “You scared her away.”

“You know she’s a child, right?” Jason said, folding his arms.

“She might be older than you think.”

“Nope, definitely a child,” Jason said. “She hasn’t even awakened yet.”

“And how do you know that?” Zed asked.

“Her aura. It’s that of a normal person. She can’t be more than seventeen.”

“Really?”

“Yes. If you’d cared to check, you would’ve known. Have you not been practicing as Oliver told you to?”

“Let’s say I have and I just forgot this time because I was talking to a fine girl.”

“I know it hasn’t been long since you met us,” Jason said slowly. “And I know you might not think it’s my place to say this, but isn’t she too young for you.”

Zed turned to him, confused. “What?”

“Not to be the moral mage in a post-apocalyptic world, but child abuse is still child abuse even if there’s no one there to prosecute it.”

“You should tell that to Madam Shaggy and your friend Abed.”

“And what about you?”

The flirt Jason had seen a moment ago was gone. While Zed was yet to return to his normal self, Jason could see the transition coming.

“What about me?” Zed asked.

“Do I need to talk to you about child abuse?” Jason clarified.

A slow grin creeped into Zed’s lips and a glint touched his eyes. Jason had spent enough time around Zed to know the implications of it and he raised a hand to forestall Zed’s response

“You know what,” he said. “Forget I said anything.”

“You sure?” Zed asked, grinning.

“Very,” Jason replied. “Instead, where’s Oliver?”

The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

“I left him after we were done talking to the ring leader of the local female gang. Slipped out from under his nose. You mages should learn to be more attentive to your surroundings.”

“This town doesn’t have a gang,” Jason pointed out.

“They don’t?” Zed mused. “I could’ve sworn there’s a gang of females in the south of the town. I think they go around calling themselves hookers. The balls on them to lie so blatantly.”

Jason took it Zed had met Madam Shaggy and her gaggle of girls. They were certainly not what someone who didn’t know much about the world after the apocalypse would find alluring. But the people living here would be hard pressed to find an actual beautiful woman who’d be willing to lay in bed with them. As for Oliver’s absence, Jason knew he’d make it to the meeting point on time, so he wasn’t worried.

“So what did you learn from Madam Shaggy?” Jason asked.

“Oh, we learnt that whoever you guys are looking for, Abed has most likely told everyone who knows something to say nothing. I doubt anyone will get any useful information about—oh, and Oliver seems to think the mage might be some Christian rank or something like that. I’m sure it was one of the clergy, just not sure which one.”

“Bishop rank?” Jason asked, a bit concerned.

“Yea, that’s the one. Bishop rank,” Zed said. “What’s that?”

“It’s the rank after Rukh.”

“Oh,” Zed mused. “Sounds bad.”

“Yes. But there’s something not right about this whole thing. I don’t like it,” Jason said, then turned back to the road. “Come on, let’s head back. The others would be waiting for us by now.”

Zed followed Jason and they walked a distance before Jason let his curiosity get the best of him.

“Where’d you get the coat?” he asked.

Zed held up one side of the lapel and looked into it.

“It’s cool, right,” he said. “Do you know it’s called a duster? I had no idea until I saw it. Just remembered it out of the blue. I think I used to love them.”

“Where’d you get it, Zed. There’s no way it was cheap.”

“Picked it off some guy in an alley,” Zed said, dropping the lapel.

“So you just took it?” Jason asked, surprised.

“Yup,” Zed said, nonchalant. “I think he was dead because he wasn’t breathing, but I didn’t check to see if there was a heartbeat. There was no one there to ask so I just assumed a dead guy didn’t need a duster for anything.”

“That’s stealing, Zed.”

“More like grave robbery, but since he didn’t have a grave, I guess you’re right. Should we go give it back? I only took it because I thought I’d look good in it, and I do.”

“Never mind,” Jason said with a sigh. “Knowing this place, chances are he was dead and the coat wasn’t his. It’s too clean to have belonged to the kind of person you described.”

Zed looked down at the cloth, spotting the stains of dirt all around it, then shrugged.

While Jason wanted to apologize for the events at the forest, he couldn’t bring himself to find the right time and couldn’t make himself feel responsible for the entire thing, so they made the rest of the walk in silence.

…………………………………….

Jason and Zed found the others waiting for them at the shriveled up fountain with the street post. Oliver had the dissonant look of relief and annoyance when he spotted Zed. Ash looked the same as when Zed had last seen her, quiet and unbothered. Chris, however, sat on a part of the fountain looking angrier than usual.

“Where the hell did you go?” Oliver asked Zed when they met. “And where did you get that coat?”

“I got it off a man Jason and I agree was dead,” Zed said. “And I went to talk with Shanine. But not necessarily in that order.”

“You got the coat after you met the girl?” Jason asked, surprised.

“No, I got the coat before I met the girl,” Zed answered. “I said not necessarily in that order. Not that it was not in that order.”

“You know Shanine’s a minor, right?” Oliver said. “She’s pretty, but for you it’ll be child abuse.”

“And I can make a joke about catching them young, but that would be insensitive and shed me in a worse light,” Zed said with a shrug. “So, instead, I’ll say it wasn’t like that. She’s been spending time in Abed’s bed and men like Abed like to talk to the insignificant. I can bet he must have told her something about the mage you all are looking for.”

“And did you get anything?” Chris asked, scowling.

“First,” Zed said, looking at her expression, “I’m beginning to think the only emotion you have is grumpy. And second, I got very little before Jason over here chased her away.”

“And what did you get?”

“You aren’t looking for a mage,” Zed said. “You’re looking for a group of mages. According to her she’s never seen them before. They were pretty organized, too. Not like us. And funny enough, they had guns.”

“Fuck,” Ash swore and Zed turned to her.

“Language,” he said. “And why fuck? Is it the guns or the group? What’s wrong with having a group of mages? You guys are a group of mages.”

“Do you think they’re coming back?” Ash asked Jason, ignoring Zed.

Jason shook his head. “No. Abed looked more cautious than terrified. It was more likely he didn’t want to give them a reason to come back and that’s why he’s keeping his mouth shut.”

“Sounds like a good reason.”

“Fucking assholes,” Chris muttered. “Going around like it’s the colonial era all over again.”

Zed turned to Oliver. “Who are we worried about? I think I missed the memo.”

Oliver waved him to silence as if hushing a particularly talkative child and Zed’s mouth fell open while Oliver turned a worried look to Jason.

“Do you think they came looking for something or are just passing through?” Oliver asked.

“I can’t be sure,” Jason answered. “But Heimdalll needs to know. And we need to be certain.”

Chris hopped up to her feet and dusted her clothes.

“So what are we doing?” she asked. “How are we going to be certain?”

“We head to where the monsters were seen,” Jason said. “And pray we’re wrong and it’s all just a speculation.”

“Can someone please be nice enough to tell me what we’re so concerned about?” Zed said. “I’d like to be properly concerned, too.”

“The people Abed might be so tight-lipped about might be the VHF,” Ash said.

“Those guys with the boring name?”

“Yeah.”

“Then why are we worried, exactly?” he asked. “Aren’t they interested in humanity or something like that?”

“They are,” Chris said. “But they are also more like colonizers. They go somewhere and take over.” She shook her head. “Heimdalll will not be happy to hear this.”

“Enough talk,” Jason said. “We’ve got to go get our gear and get out of here. The sooner we’re done with that confirmation, the sooner we can get back and warn Heimdall before they can find the town.”

While they walked back to where they’d stashed their gear, Zed wondered at what was so bad about the VHF. To him, everything sounded more like Heimdall not wanting to relinquish the power he had over the town. It sounded more like personal ambition than what was good for its inhabitants. He kept his thoughts to himself, though, because he had an idea it would make him no friends amongst the others.

Before long they’d gotten their gears and left the town. Chris took the lead as they walked back into the woods, a map in hand. It wasn’t long before they came to a stop.

Around them were felled trees and stains of blood. There were trees with holes in them still standing with reckless stains of blood. The chaos was grand and the number of felled trees were so much that there were more shattered stumps than trees. Surprisingly, there was also a giant hole in the ground large enough to fit Zed and the others. It looked like a rabbit’s burrow if the rabbit was humongous.

“Are there giant rabbit monsters?” he asked Oliver.

Oliver’s mood was serious with a touch of fear and when he answered, there was no hint of the jovial guy Zed often saw.

“What do you think?”

Zed pondered on the austere nature of the team. Perhaps he truly needed to be worried.

“Alright,” Jason said, heading towards the giant hole. “Time to confirm what kind of trouble we’re in.”

He leaned over the hole, peering into the darkness. After a moment of speculation, he opened his palm and an orb of light manifested above it. He dropped the ball of light into the hole and it illuminated everything on its way down.

Zed watched it fall and shivered.

“That’s a lot of blood smears,” he said. “Any idea what the VHF is doing here? I remember someone telling me they stay very far away.”

“Must be the same thing we were doing when we found you,” Chris said, as Jason jumped in the hole.

“What’s that?” Zed asked.

“Looking for the mana surge,” she answered, then jumped in after Jason.