Zan went to bed. Simple as that: he wandered back into the command center, told the Wardens not to be bothered, and went down to the barracks to sleep.

He slept well. No dream. Pure sleep.

When he woke, he stopped by Jiehong’s room and knocked.

No response came. As usual, Zan stuck his head inside — Jiehong actually was sleeping on a bed.

Ducking his head out right away, Zan gave his buddy privacy. After his encounter in the ornate room, Zan knew a rule or two about privacy and bodily awareness. Shuddering at the encounter, Zan bullied off to the kitchen.

And for the first time since the chef’s hiring, Zan saw his cook!

“Ah, welcome, monsieur! I am happy we finally have time to meet! My name is Jean Paul-Paul the Fourth and I will be your humble chef this morning. Tell me, garcon, what is your eating desire?” the man said with a thick accent.

Zan thought over what he wanted to eat. Zan will confess: the chef’s unique way of talking distracted him.

Snapping out of the reverie, Zan eventually sputtered out a simple order. Eggs, bacon? Something like that.

Once free from his mouth, Jean Paul-Paul (the fourth), snatched up the words and began cooking up his order so quickly, it seemed to Zan, at least for a second, that the chef was making his words become real through some hyper-advanced technique of transfiguration.

Minutes later, the clang of cooking utensils faded and slated before Zan was a plate of food. Steaming, piled high, and covered with some fatty-sauce, Zan’s stomach growled with fever.

‘Thank you…” Zan said, almost trance-like.

“Oh, de rien, you precious! Welp, I will be off to partake of the next culinary adventure! Till the afternoon!” Jean Paul-Paul (the Fourth) said, leaving Zan to a defenseless plate of food about to be massacred.

As usual, Zan finished his plate, burped loudly as any rambunctious child, and cleaned up his plate.

Stepping away from the sink, Zan rubbed his belly, helping digestion.

Thinking he should check-in with the Wardens, Zan wandered his way up to the war room.

“Hey, guys, any news on the weird-thing I encountered in the Backroads?” Zan asked.

“Unfortunately, no. We have only barely scratched the surface of our investigation,” Sigma-Prime said.

“Neato, I guess. I am going to head out soon and do some adventuring. Searching for the lodestones, all that good stuff. Thought I should drop by and let you guys know… though now I am thinking of it, I could have just pinged you through my earpiece, right? Right. Yeesh. I am still adjusting to everything,” Zan said in a wandering way.

“Apologize not, Zan,” the Screen Master said. “It takes every Ranger-Knight time to acclimate to the changes thrust upon them. Neither myself nor Sigma-Prime expect you to understand the nuances and every thread of history our order has had over the centuries. Take this at your own pace. The rest will follow.”

The knowledge the Wardens did not expect him to master everything so soon caused a happy feeling to spread in Zan. Zan did not like being rushed to do anything, let alone master a subject of the mind.

Stepping outside and breathing in, it seemed Zan had some time to kill.

He wanted Jiehong to go with him, for safety, if nothing else, but Jiehong remained asleep. Should he wake his friend? Zan considered. He did not consider for long when the answer found him.

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From where, he could not say, but Zan found standing before him one of the younger children of his village. A small lass, Zan thought, whose name she shared with a flower.

“Oh, hi, there, Jas… is it?” Zan asked.

The girl replied right away and said, “Yea! That’s my name, sir…”

“Oh, you don’t need to call me ‘sir.’ Just last week you called me ‘booger-breath,’ didn’t you?”

“Yeah. I want to apologize, sir. Last week I was but a rude little girl. With the war, my parents tell me every man who fights is a hero. No hero can be a booger breath. Plus, you saved me from that big, four-legged meanie!” the lass said.

What should he make of the situation? Zan had no clue. He was not used to younger kids praising him. If adults rarely praised him, his younger peers sure-as-heck never did!

The world of children, after all, is a strange mixture of inclusion and exclusion.

Settling on an easy response, Zan said, “It’s fine, Jas. Call me by my name, okay? I’ll like that a lot. Just my name.”

Giving a small curtsey, Jas smiled, then rushed away, off to do… whatever it was which little girls did while in a refugee camp. Least she has her family, Zan thought.

Zan would have said the chance encounter with the little girl was merely that — a chance occurrence.

But he couldn’t, for it continued to happen no matter where he walked.

Children, the little boys and girls of his home village, came up to him, one-by-one and thanked him ‘for his service.’ His service? He wasn’t part of the royal army. Thanking soldiers for ‘their service’ was an honor reserved only for the enlisted… or so Zan thought.

Wandering around to the part of the camp many newcomers settled near, Zan found much the same regarding his treatment. Many thanks for ‘his service’ and handshakes.

These new people seem friendly, at least, Zan thought. He hadn’t many opportunities, he realized, to get to know these people.

Heck, why not? Let’s spend our time waiting for Jiehong to wake getting to know these people. Why not? If we’re going to be sharing living spaces, we ought to at least know the basics. Zan thought out to himself.

So, for the next couple of hours, Zan did exactly that — he made small talk.

Many villagers told Zan the same thing: they felt threatened while leaving the encampment to hunt. And rightfully so! One never knew if there would be golems about lurking where you least expect it.

People told Zan how, although they went out with a defender escort — the same guys Zan had fought alongside during the defense of the village — those guys were far from being spring chickens. Being of an older nature, they depleted of energy quickly.

As such, hunts for rabbits, birds, and anything else which was alive and edible, kept themselves short. If they were so unlucky as to encounter an automotron, then the hunt ended then and there.

Zan understood their plight. He wanted to help them, but didn’t know how he could. Facing down an invasion from an entity capable of sending non-stop a steady stream of soldiers was never going to not be easy. Backwater province or no. Zan wanted to say he and Jiehong would scout and de-activate all the automotrons in the area… but what good would that do when more could show up tomorrow?

Thinking it over, though, while being compelled to field an answer, Zan said ‘he would do what he could,’ though he expected the others to call out his inexact answer.

No one called his vague answer, however. Everyone smiled, cheered, and said they would pray for his well-being.

Walking back to the command center to stand vigil as he mused, Zan continued to dwell on the issue. Now, if they could find hunting areas still unsullied by the automotrons, that would be handy! Depending on where those places are, Jie and I could clear out the zone every once in a while…

Walking inside the center, Zan asked Sigma-Prime for places which could be suitable for the villagers. Though she was busy helping the Screen Master with his investigation of the Backroads, she dropped everything to help him, which tickled him pinker than the plumpest slice of ham.

“Hmmm… looks like, here!” Sigma said while pointing at a nearby zone.

Zan looked over the map on the ‘holographic’ table. Looking at the route from the camp to the zone, Zan made careful mental notes of where to go, how to get there.

“You’re so studious!” Sigma-Prime said.

“I have to be… no maps exist of this area. Well, other than the one on the table, I guess. I have to know the land to find my way,” Zan replied.

“An admirable quality to have, Zan. Such a quality, it will please you to know, will become enhanced once we repair a certain tool.”

“A certain tool? What are you talking about?”

“I do not want to say too much more. It will still be a time before this tool is fully repaired. But it will involve the way you see reality itself,” Sigma said.

Obviously, her words intrigued Zan, highly.

If she would not talk any more about it, though, there was nothing more for him to do. Especially not while he was waiting for Jiehong to get up.

“Before I leave and do… whatever, is Jiehong up yet?” Zan asked.

Sigma-Prime said, “Checking…” and spaced out a moment. Then she said, “Yes, he remains asleep. His vitals are normal.”

Zan groaned. Really groaned, loudly enough for the Screen Master to cock an eyebrow… or whatever passed for an eyebrow on his large, semi-translucent face.

Leaving the war room, Zan went back outside. Gosh, Jie, sleep machine or what? I don’t want to waste the whole day doing nothing… screw it! I’m going out by myself to help the villagers.

As if on cue, once Zan resolved himself to help, the rain began to fall.