The sky was a clear orange, basked in the glory of a bright afternoon sun. Under its tyrannical gaze, Shanine and Zed walked. Shanine was dressed in a half-torn gown, rips riddling it as if she’d gone through a particularly thick bramble. Zed on the other hand was a far cry from anything near the term ‘family friendly’ in what was left of his pants. He was a slim man with uneven length of red hair and what was the equivalent of a too short short-shorts.

At some point last night, Shanine had unwittingly fallen into the embrace of sleep, pulled into it by fear and fatigue. While she slept, Zed had returned reluctantly to his cycling, turning his mana like a wheel, creating a spiral he intended to be never ending.

He’d kept his attention on it the entire time, half-focused as he kept an eye on Shanine’s sleeping form, making sure her body rose and fell in the rhythm of the sleeping still breathing without strain.

His consideration for her had left his practice less efficient, but it had served to serve its purpose. Before morning, his stomach didn’t hurt so much and his core didn’t feel so strained and sore.

That was over ten hours ago.

Walking alongside Shanine now, doing his best to affect nonchalance and unnecessary joviality, he could feel the whispers of the pain creeping back in. So he walked with an eye out for any monster sign and the nearest exits. He was at least fast enough to flee most Beta rank monsters. He hoped.

“Any idea where we’re going?” Shanine asked in a soft spoken voice.

Despite that, Zed could hear the slight annoyance. He couldn’t blame her for it, and didn’t. She wasn’t a mage. To him this felt like a leisurely stroll on a cool evening but to her it would be a strenuous walk under a scorching sun.

“To see my friends,” he told her.

“And where exactly are your friends?”

Zed pointed. “North.”

“That’s south.”

“South then,” Zed corrected with a shrug.

“And how far away are they?”

“You won’t like my answer,” he said. “Do you still want to hear it?”

“Yes,” Shanine answered.

Zed didn’t miss the hesitant pause that had existed before her answer but said nothing of it.

“Well, they aren’t really that far,” he said as they walked. “But the issue isn’t really the distance. It’s what lies on the path.”

“What lies on the path?” Shanine repeated, worried.

“Yeah,” Zed nodded, stepping around a massive slab of raised concrete and pointed at it. “I know that slab. We’re on the right path. Now what was I saying?”

“The path,” Shanine said, giving him an odd look.

“Yes,” Zed nodded. “The path. Well, it’s not like most paths. With most paths you usually have to worry about fields and fountains, moor and mountains, those sort of things.”

“And with this path?”

“This one’s more of sorrowing, sighing, weeping…”

“Please don’t say dying.”

Zed paused and turned to her. “How’d you know? Have you been on this path before?”

“Just to be sure,” Shanine said, failing to restrain a sigh. “Does this path end in being sealed in a stone cold tomb?”

Zed snapped his finger. “What do you know, you’ve definitely been on this path before. Personally, I’ve never been able to get to the stone cold tomb part. What’s it like?”

“We are not the three kings of Orient.”

“One,” Zed said, confused, “there are only two of us, and you’re a girl. Two, who are the three kings of Orient? Is it like a mage thing? Are they famous?”

“You were just quoting it,” Shanine said, confused.

Zed looked ahead, eyes thoughtful. Then he shook his head. “Nope. I’ve got no idea what you’re talking about.”

They were basically out of the remnants of civilization, leaving it as nothing more than a backdrop to a tired exit.

Shanine watched Zed with a mix of worry and suspicion. She had been partly right about him, maybe too right. He was definitely friendly, but she suspected he was friendly because there was something wrong with his head. Regardless, he was friendly enough that she dared to venture a question.

“May I speak freely?” she asked.

Zed let out an easy sigh, hands now clasped behind his head, fingers interlocked.

“It pains me to know that you haven’t been speaking freely all this while, Channing.”

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“It’s Shanine,” she corrected.

Zed turned his head to the side to look at her. “That’s what I said. Channing.”

Shanine stopped herself from correcting him any further. Scarcely anything good came from correcting a mage, and her question was already going to be disrespectful enough.

“Zed,” she said, then paused. “It’s still Zed, right?”

“Yup,” Zed answered. “Tomorrow it’ll be Zul, or maybe Ned. Haven’t worked out the kinks on that one yet.”

Shanine’s suspicions were getting more solid by the moment.

“Alright, Zed,” she continued. “May I ask a question?”

“Go for it.”

“Alright,” Shanine said, prepping herself for how best to say it. “Why does it feel like everything that comes out of your mouth is rubbish?”

She braced herself for the possible backlash, realizing she should have chosen a different word the moment ‘rubbish’ had come out of her mouth.

However, Zed’s response shocked her.

“Because they are,” he answered easily. “The trick is in making sure you think just enough to filter out the things you shouldn’t say.”

That only served to confuse Shanine more. Weren’t filters meant to keep in all the rubbish?

“So this is you with your filter on,” she said.

Zed shot her a grin. “Exactly.”

They continued on their stroll after that, slipping into an almost silence. Every now and then Zed would say something that didn’t make much sense to her. At some point he spoke of them being monarchs of Orient, mumbling subtle nonsense about how they were failures for not carrying any gifts, despite claiming to know nothing of the catholic hymn.

It wasn’t long before they found themselves walking down an interstate, or what had once been an interstate. What it was now was a pathway riddled with heavy roots that seemed to have something against concrete because they only came above ground to shatter the tarred road, only to disappear back below the earth’s crust, leaving the untarred ground with no disturbance at all. In this way the entire length of the road as far as her eyes could see carried the constant destruction of growing roots.

The road was a long stretch and they followed it judiciously. Under the tyranny of the sun Zed was a happy camper almost naked yet walking without a shame in the world. Beside him Shanine sweated and her feet hurt beneath her.

When another half hour still saw them walking, Zed spoke.

“How about a little conversation?” he asked.

“Would it matter if I said no?” Shanine asked.

“Maybe.”

Shanine sighed but gave up on the idea. She knew Zed not up to a day and already knew talking made him happy.

“What would you like to talk about?”

“How about how a girl like you survived this long and got this far since the party?”

“That one’s simple. I ran.”

“You ran?”

“Yep.”

“Just like that?”

Shanine shrugged.

“How’d you not get shot,” Zed asked, surprised. “I’m a mage and I got shot twice.”

Shanine paused to look at him.

“You got shot twice,” she repeated, doubtful.

“It’s covered up.”

Spotting no injuries on him, her eyes trailed down to the only part of him actually covered up.

“Nope, my eyes are up here, love,” Zed smirked. “You want more, you’ll have to treat me a little nicer.”

Shanine sighed but said nothing. It was beginning to become exceedingly difficult to remember Zed was a mage and could break her head with one punch. He was nothing like the mages in Hillview.

“Still haven’t told me how you didn’t get shot,” Zed prompted.

He was still smiling, a boyish grin that did good things for his looks, but there was something in his eyes, an eerie awareness. Shanine doubted this was just a conversation.

“As long as I avoided the mages, I found out I was good,” she said. “The guys with the guns seemed to only be after the mages. They tried not to shoot those of us without magic if they could help it.”

“That’s odd. I could’ve sworn I saw some of you girls die.”

“I guess they couldn’t help it when it came to some of us.” Shanine continued to stare. Zed’s expression was carefree. Whatever she’d seen in his eyes that had let her know there was more to the conversation was gone. His joviality was partially returned. He didn’t care about the girls that had died. That much she was certain of.

“I see you’re quite accustomed to death,” she said.

Zed shrugged. “Not really. Mostly monster deaths.”

He spared her a glance from the corner of his eye and saw the fact that she wasn’t surprised that the deaths he’d just spoken off didn’t faze him. There was no point in telling her how close to death he had come, so he kept their pace. Walking farther along the road was becoming strenuous and with the now returning pain in his core, he needed a seat. But he was inclined not to have a seat until Shanine was tired.

As for the conversation, he was done with that since it had done more than served its purpose. Last night Shanine had been terrified of him. She hadn’t displayed it wildly but he had seen it, regardless. This morning, when he’d woken her up, informing her that he was leaving, she had hesitated to ask to join him. He knew she’d only asked because she viewed him as the lesser of two evils, or at least a more comfortable one. So he’d talked, said a million things and one until she saw him as less than a threat, harmless. It worked too well and now he could see something more than her wariness towards him in her eyes.

She looked at him with a similar expression to the one Chris often spared for him.

Shanine looked at him like something was wrong with his head.

Not that he blamed her. That one was on him.

“Wait,” Zed said suddenly. “What of the monsters; how’d you survive them?”

“I didn’t have to,” Shanine answered. “I didn’t run into any until I got to the town. Then I saw some fighting and just ran into the nearest building I could find and locked myself in the closest room I saw with a functioning door.”

“Wait, that door was locked?”

“Yes. Why?”

Zed shook his head. “No reason.”

Zed remembered pushing the door before pulling it, breaking it at its hinges. There was a possibility he’d also broken the lock when he’d done that. He also wondered what had made her think a locked door would’ve stopped a monster.

I guess it’s the simple feeling of security more than the actual security, he thought.

“One last question and I promise I’ll stop talking,” he said.

“I don’t mind the talking,” Shanine replied.

Zed laughed. “If you’re going to be a nice person that uses lies, Channing, you owe it to niceness to at least be good at lying. Nothing worse than realizing someone is lying just to be nice to you.”

“Sorry,” Shanine said, looking down.

“Good,” Zed smiled, hands still behind his head. “Now, final question. When last did you eat?”

Zed watched Shanine’s body visibly weaken worse than it already was at his question. Her slumped shoulders were suddenly too low and her arms dragged beside her. Her steps also slowed and her slouch became a bend.

“That long, huh,” Zed said.

Shanine nodded.

“Well, lucky for you,” he said, “there’s a forest just up ahead with blooming trees and beautiful air. I’d bet my last rune-dollar there’s at least fruits we can pluck.”

“Flowers bloom.”

“What?”

“Flowers bloom,” Shanine repeated. “Trees don’t.”

Zed’s lips stretched into a smile as he thought of a forest from not too long ago where trees bloomed and Shanines were wrong. A place where the air was fresh and the sights were beautiful.

“You’ll see,” he said, teasing.

“Sure.," Shanine conceded, not meaning it. "But what about the monsters?”

“No need to worry about those,” Zed assured her. “They’re weak.”

“In case you’ve forgotten, Zed. I’m not a mage.”

“Yup,” he agreed. “But I am.”