With tired hearts, the boys climbed the stairs and reported themselves to the commanding officer. Which was none other than the man with a season for a name.

Colonel Winters was speaking to a room full of uniformly dressed soldiers and officers. By the time he and Jiehong entered, Winters had been in the middle of briefing the other soldiers about their upcoming mission.

Everyone turned to look at them.

Awkward, he felt. He said, “Apologies for our clear lateness. We had… well, we had to get some fresh air after being detained.”

Silence. “Just saying… don’t blame us for your screw up,” Jiehong said, uncharacteristically blunt.

“Who are these guys?” one of the assembled officers said.

“The fellas who took out all the siege artillery near the lake,” Winter replied.

“Damn! Those are the dudes who did it? I was expecting people more beefy. Not these shrimps. No offense, shrimps!”

He waved the officer off. Their description of him as being a ‘shrimp’ irritated him. What could he do, though? Pitch a fit in a room full of military men? That wouldn’t get him honor. Might get him smacked on his ass, however…

“I’m glad you could join us, boys. I was only going over with the men the details of the mission. Everyone knows the plan by heart by now, so you missed little. Tell me, boys, can you ride mounts? My battle plan tonight calls for a mounted assault,” Colonel Winters said.

His cheeks turned red. Jiehong told the group, “Sorry. We don’t actually know how to ride. Maybe we should have led with that?”

Someone in the audience coughed.

“That’s unfortunate,” Colonel Winters continued. “It would have been nice to have backup on the mission.”

Wanting to get out and head to an inn or something, he said, “It would have been nice, yes. But my friend and I are tired. We desperately need sleep. Even if we knew how to ride, we couldn’t come, anyway. Not on the mission tonight. Will there be another mission tomorrow?”

“Not if the mission tonight goes well. With your actions at the lake earlier today, the enemy forces are attempting to shift and make-up for the loss in war material. It isn’t working for them, though. Not by our fleet-footed spy’s eyes and their reports.”

“Understood,” Zan said. “You are welcome for the aid we rendered at the lake. And I thank you for bailing us out of that danger at said lake. But with your mission imminent, and Jiehong and I tired, we should leave for an inn.”

“Yes, yes… you boys are free to go. Should we cross paths in the future, till then,” Winters said, saluting them, then turning back to his presentation.

He and Jiehong exited the room and returned the way they came; he couldn't speak for his brother, of course, but personally, he felt as though the female secretary urging them into the meeting with Winters could've waited if all they were to ask them was if they could ride horses. Heading outside, they leaned over once again near the alleyway.

“So, an inn? With what money?” Jiehong said.

He felt bewildered. “I didn’t think of that…” he admitted.

“So now what? We sleep in an alleyway?”

He attempted to think of a solution, but nothing came to mind. He wanted to cry.

Unexpectedly, the solution came from the military guys heading out on their mission. Passing them on the sidewalk, presumably as they made their way down to the stables, Colonel Winters turned to them real quick and said, “I forgot to mention. The inn travelers usually stay at is in the center of town. Real nice place. Oh, also, nighttime is great for travel. Golems cannot see through the darkness to save their lives. Use that to your advantage.”

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Like that, the troops passed them, leaving he and Jiehong to themselves.

“Think he was right?” Jiehong said. “About the vision?”

Zan nodded. He told his friend, “Yes. I have noticed that too. Even just on our way to town while we were destroying the checkpoints. Golems had terrible sight. Winters must be right. Those guys are doing their mission under cover of darkness, yeah? We, though, could use this dark to our advantage and sneak our way back to the command center.”

“Sneak? You surely don’t mean tonight…”

Thinking on it, he said, “I guess I do mean tonight. We need more grenades. And a place to sleep that doesn’t charge money while still keeping us safe.”

Jiehong couldn’t believe it. “We destroyed, like, what, a dozen siege engines helping this town free itself. How about this? Instead of going on your death march in the middle of the blasted night, we just go to that tavern and beg for a couple of coin for a room? Or beg for the room directly! We can tell them about our heroism!”

“Jiehong, no one would believe us. Honestly, even if they did, do you really think there are any rooms to spare? Look down the street. If that’s the heart of the town, then the town’s already overfilled. I can see people sleeping on the sidewalks,” he said.

“Zan! I’m so freaking tired. Do you really want to walk miles back to the command center, in the middle of the night, while enemies by their hundreds prowl?”

“Obviously not, Jie! What other course of action do we have?! Do you really want to beg? I figured that would go against your honor. Maybe that was another thing you should have asked your parents for — money!”

He expected a response to that, but instead only a bitter mutter came from him. “Yeah. I should have. As I said, I should have asked about a lot of things…”

A moment of frustrated half-thinking later — he could not in good conscious call it ‘thinking’ as his exhaustion kept distracting him at every sight and sound around — and he decided. “I’m the leader,” he said. “And I say we take the risk.”

With legs of sludge, the boys returned to the front gate.

He knew Jiehong wasn’t happy. But he did not care. Not now.

They had done the mission they came to fulfill. Thundervale might not be totally free from the siege, but they had come and destroyed many siege engines and what he took to be commander-level automotrons. They had no money, no grenades. Colonel Winters said the golems are practically useless at night. It made sense to leave now.

“Safe travels, friends,” the guard at the gate told them.

Jiehong stopped in his tracks for a moment and asked the guard, “Is it true? The golems can’t see in the dark?”

“Absolutely! The things are useless! My buddy and I had one too many drinks the other day, and, well, we went out to find one of the freaks, and we messed with it. Knocked it around a bunch. It made weird noises but couldn’t do anything other than stand still. Hilarious!”

Jiehong and the guard made some small talk, but the conversation ended abruptly when the guard’s co-guard told him with bite how his job wasn’t to ‘make chit-chat with every traveler who comes through,’ and how he needed to get to his other responsibilities.

Walking away from the argument, Jiehong wished them both well and returned with him outside the gates.

Away from the town after a good few paces, Jiehong said, “At least Winters seemed to tell the truth on that end.”

“Yeah… good,” he said, never having a reason to doubt the man to begin with.

Although the plan to return to the command center had been his own, he had not considered it in all of its aspects. He knew it would be dangerous, but he… he couldn’t finish his thought. He was beyond spent. He placed one foot in front of the other, mindlessly. Perhaps like an automotron?

“It is quiet,” Jiehong said, passing several unmoving automotrons on the road who had either wandered into the route or had somehow been out of their field of vision when they initially made their way up. As the guard had said at the main gate, they made weird noises, but did not so much as lift a foot.

“Yeah. That’s nighttime for us,” he replied, not really caring how he did so.

They continued to walk away from the town. it was at a at a certain hour of the night when the boys heard far-away screams and shouts. Then an explosion. Then another.

“Must be the operation,” Zan said.

“Hopefully they kill ever last golem,” Jiehong said.

Otherwise, the night lacked suspense. Too tired to even kill the golems they passed, each of the young Ranger-Knights had enough resolve to step and step closer back to the command center and nothing more.

Turning suddenly, a start bumbled in Zan’s heart. “Someone there?” he called out.

But no one replied.

“What are you doing?” Jiehong asked. Right behind him, Jiehong would have seen anyone approach from the rear. He would have seen anything from the front. It might have been nighttime, but the moonlight provided ample light.

He felt foolish. The lack of sleep must be getting to him.

“I, uh… thought I heard someone. Let’s keep a move on,” he said.

In the back of his mind, though, he knew someone was out there.