“Levant control yourself”, yumi grumbled, she could feel the heat that was emitting off of him, and it was not comfortable, a small bead of sweat trickled down her forehead, she glanced down noticing the wooden stage floor had began to dry and crack at the bottom of Levant’s feet, dark marks appeared through the grain of the wood, Levant glanced at her as the smile on his face grew even wider, he turned around throwing his hands in the air, the crowd erupting cheering and chanting, Levant jumped down from the stage making his way into the crowd various people patted him on his back or high fived him, someone even handed him a wooden mug full of beer, everyone slowly cleared a path for him until he was to the back of the training area, at the front of the training area, Bard had taken center stage again,

“is there any else that wants to take a gander at the glass ball ?”, he asked half heartedly, everyone in the crowd wore a puzzled look on their face, as if they all knew that none of them could do any better,

“well on the plus side we can all rest knowing that those four are fighting alongside us”, Amon shouted towards the crowd,

“HERE, HERE”, the crowd shouted in unison, Amon headed for the stairs to leave the stage, not before stopping next to yumi,

“I know that the battle is close but try not to let that get you to serious”, Amon quietly said to her, she sat down on the stage resting her back against the wall, and let out a depressed sigh, “

‘ they couldn’t hide the fact that there’re brothers even if they tried, they’re to damn easy going’, she thought to herself,

After a while the crowd began to disperse all over the training area, spreading out all over the place, many drinking, eating and dancing, and some leaving to do other things, But yumi was still on the stage quietly observing everything, and in the midst of all the partying she could spot Barak, Levant and Polaris, Drinking and dancing getting along with everyone else, she smiled a soft tender smile filled with sadness and nostalgia, her mind flashed to a simpler time, and where the boys stood, a vision of her, Amon and Aluric took their place, she remembered how they used to get along like that, how when the three of them were together everyone had a smile on their face, how everyone was happy, as much as she scanned the area though she couldn’t find Aster anywhere among the ruckus, she soon gave up, in the three months and some that she came to know at least Polaris levant and aster she had realized aster was mostly a quiet observer and he would often disappear to be by himself,

“he takes things way to seriously, even for me”, she said softly to herself,

‘maybe I should take a page from his book’, she thought, she dropped her body backwards resting on her elbows, she looked up to the top of the wall, rocking her body back and forth, she flipped over up onto her feet, and in two or three leaps found her self at the top of the wall, she looked off into the sea of darkness that was the surrounding forest, hearing the gentle breeze rustle the leaves on the close by trees,

Aster had left the party and had been wondering around the base, deep in thought, ‘ all four of us filled the ball to the brim, that definitely guaranteed that we will be fighting the four pillars and that we have a shot at getting back at Aluric, but maybe we should find some information on who we’ll be fighting first, and possibly the lay out of their city, It should be close by, saying as how amon said that the final battle is close, which means that with the disadvantage of their size, amon, if he is smart wouldn’t want his army marching to far, to fatigue them before the fighting starts, maybe we should head to the city, but I’ll have to ask someone how to get in there without being noticed, and how far it is and how to get there, maybe we could even cripple them somehow…….’, Asters thoughts trailed off,

he passed a door that piqued his interest, it was a dark blueish gray door with bright blue lines painted over the deep etched lines in the door, and, on the door had a silver rectangular name plate with the words ‘Weapons & Gear Tech’ , he approached the door, and as he did he noticed the round glass ball with a flashing red light in it above the door way,

as he wondered what that could be as he stood in front of the door prepared to knock, but before he could the door slid open, inside was a poorly lit room, but from what Aster could make out, there were metal boxes packed to ceiling on each side of the room leaving a very narrow passage way to walk through, and there was a strange blue flashing light coming from the end of it, With his curiosity peeked even more now aster made his way through the narrow passage way,

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Back outside at the party

Barak and Levant were Now partying with a group of guys and gals, While Polaris laid on the bench passed out, drunk, Barak in particular found himself in a drinking contest with another guy by the name of Zack, and with each passing minute zack and barak, kept on goading each other into drinking more and more, all the while Levant was next to Barak whispering in his ear that he can’t lose to wimp like Zack, and the pile of jugs just kept growing and growing, until finally both of them had had enough,

zack and barak sat next to each other and began to talk, while Levant had turned his attention to a particular woman that had caught his eye,

“Let the goddesses know that there is a man who can drink the heavens and may Pitros, grant him a beautiful wife”, Zack shouted with his arm resting on barak’s shoulder,

“what’s the goddess of love got to do with anything, you know that those goddamn gods only look out for themselves”, barak replied, raising his hands in the air and putting up his middle finger to the sky,

“Oh man you’re right, If they did care everyone would be back here partying with us”, Zack said, as he rocked back on to the table, lifting his head up to the sky,

“yeah yumi told me that there were more people but they were off base”, Barak said,

“yup, before you guys got here, as soon as Amon got the letter from, Aluric, he sent out messengers to the others who were fighting in Bolterra and Argon to retreat and return as quickly as possible, for the upcoming attack on their headquarters”, Zack explained,

as he continued, ”but the fighting there was kinda….k...kinda”, zack held his mouth and leaned over to the side of the table vomiting violently,

“right the fighting there was kinda intense and so they should be arriving at least the day before the battle, though we are all betting that those guys arrive the day of the battle”, zack continued,

Barak was just sitting there amazed at how easily zack dismissed all that vomiting he just did,

“so how many would that add up to in all ?”, Barak asked, but by the time he was finished asking, zack was passed out with his head on the table,

“ Damn Zack you really need to learn to hold back on the drinking”, Bard said as he sat at the table, placing down a Barrel of alcohol with one hand while he held a very large jug in the next,

“ I happened to hear what you and zack here were talking about”, Bard said,

“yeah what about it”, Barak retorted,

“nothin’ , I’m glad he brought you up to speed, though he was pretty plastered while doing so”, Bard said, laughing at Zack’s current state,

“ I’m surprised though, why does he think that the other forces won’t get here til the day of the battle”, Barak Asked, ,

“Well it’s a little known fact around here that the guy in charge of those two forces is known for his dramatic timing”, Bard explained,

The two continued on this conversation for quite a while afterwards,

Atop the wall

Yumi stood atop the wall, still looking off into the dark forest, she was lost in er memories, she sighed deeply,

“I really wish I didn’t have to fight you”, she said to herself, her mind thinking back to when she and aluric had been sent on a mission to escort a visiting religious figure from the country of etranica, one of the archdeacons, it was at this very outpost they stopped to rest before finally going to the capital, that day she and aluric had been on the wall, same as she was now, it had been a particularly red sunset that evening, she looked on at Aluric his red hair seemed to be on fire from the orange hue cast by the setting sun, he brushed her hair out of her face, and leaned in,

She came out of her thoughts, seeing a feint flash of light in the forest, ‘it’s probably nothing’ she thought o herself,

‘ I’ll go check it out, it wouldn’t be right to spoil the party over nothing’, she thought, she lept from the top of the wall landing in the closest tree top, the leaves of the branch rustling from her weight as she landed, she had been in this forest hundreds of times, even in the dark she knew where she was going,

back with aster

After squeezing through the narrow walkway of metal boxes, which seemed like it lasted forever, Aster finally made it to a rather spacious opening that had, a giant table in the middle with a blue light flickering over it and various weapons and equipment laying on the table, and surrounding it were various pathways all made in between piles of metal boxes, and from out of one of these pathways walked out a person,

she was shorter than aster but not by much and, she wore a baggy, purple mechanics pants which were covered in oil stains, and a black long sleeved mesh shirt and a pair of oversized dark purple gloves, her hair was long and in dreadlocs all the way down to the end of her back and one side of her head was shaved, and as she removed her, protective shades, her bright purple eyes glistened in the darkness of the room,

as she gasped and shouted,”ASTER”