Found Family
From that point, clearing out the rest of the Mruklurks was trivial, although Larry did get scratched up a bit in the process. He was perfectly fine after Jerry smeared some sort of disinfectant jelly on the cuts. All in all, the expedition was a success, and now began the tedious period of time where they had to drag all the bodies out.
Luckily, they wouldn’t be required to carry them all the way to base, and a separate crew would come and collect them to be processed and cured for food stores. The Frear Squadron was still left to retrieve their kills, as the collection team wouldn’t know their location, and more hostiles could have appeared in the meantime, even if it were unlikely.
Groaning, the Squad complied with their disgusting task, as most of the bodies had been partially roasted by whatever Arasaka had done to create that light. It was unpleasant work to say the least.
Several hours later, the Squadron had finished its task, and was ready to finally return back to Marineford. Of course, they still had to march all the way back, but at that point most of their minds were already goop at that point.
Even Logan was feeling tired, as the adrenaline had long faded, leaving his body overtaxed. His teleportation was noticeably less harsh on his systems now for some reason, so Logan wasn’t too exhausted though.
So when he got back, he played around with Remy to make up for leaving him alone again. Logan would throw acorns around the field, and the Rizzel would teleport around and catch them. It was a satisfying game for both parties, so Logan was almost disappointed when Amar interrupted him.
“Can we talk for a few minutes please?”
Logan threw one more acorn for Remy, before turning to one of the people he had known longest in this strange, new world.
Hey bud, I need a sec.
-Sure!-
“Sure thing, what do you want to talk about?”
----------------------------------------
“I’ve been trying to talk to you for a couple of days now, but you are never back in the barracks. What do you do all night?”
“I u-uh…”
This was not what Logan had been expecting from this conversation.
“I guess I go running…?”
Amar just raised an eyebrow at that.
“Really. Well, it doesn’t matter too much to me if you want to keep whatever you are doing at night a secret. I… Well, Gregor told me that I should talk to someone about Jeremiah, before we made it here, and you knew him the best after me, so I figured we could talk about him a little.”
Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road.
“Oh, yeah of course. Do you want to head to the cafeteria or is it fine out here?”
This is what Logan had been expecting. They hadn’t really spoken of Jeremiah since the day of the funeral, and Amar had clearly been different afterwards. Logan hadn’t known her for long at that point, and hadn’t wanted to intrude, but had been worried.
“Out here is fine. He always loved being outside, I could tell he was more comfortable under the sky than a roof.”
“Very true. I loved his accent, although that man always tried to avoid speaking as much as possible. I remember the one of the first nights I met him, he told me all of this history stuff, I thought he was a blabbermouth! Imagine that, huh.”
“He was my father.” Amar blurted out.
“What… Really?”
The news shocked Logan. Jeremiah had always appeared so solitary, he couldn’t imagine the man having a daughter, at least not one that he never mentioned.
“He, well, he never got a chance to know. I was going to tell him the night of the festival, but…”
“Oh my, I’m-I’m so sorry Amar.” Suddenly so much about her response made sense. She was grieving, and felt guilty that Jeremiah had passed without ever knowing.
----------------------------------------
“If there is anything I can do for you, all you have to do is ask. My condolences for your loss.”
“I-I never even got to tell him I- '' At this point the tears were flowing down Amar’s face, which was causing Logan to tear up in response.
“Shhh, it's ok, you aren’t alone. It wasn’t your fault.” Amar had leaned into him, as Logan gave the young woman a big hug.
From there the conversation devolved for more than a half hour as Logan just consoled Amar. He was sure she hadn’t done anything like this since she had lost Jeremiah, and he didn’t mind being a shoulder for someone to cry on at all. Especially as Amar was one of the few people who had really earned his trust.
After about an hour, she managed to compose herself.
“Sorry, I needed to sleep hours ago, staying up must have taken more out of me than I thought.”
Logan didn’t think that was the case, but he wasn’t going to say anything. Somewhere through the night, Logan had realized that he had to look after Amar. She was strong, but she was still a fair amount younger than him, and needed someone watching her back. Moreover, Logan owed it to Jeremiah to protect the man's remaining family.
In a way, Amar was now Logan’s family, like a little sister or maybe a cousin. He would never say it out loud, of course, as Logan had a feeling it would sound incredibly lame or cringey.
Instead, he would do things like tonight, just giving her the reassurance of another’s presence. That was enough, Logan thought.
----------------------------------------
As Gregor went down to the private dining room, he found himself looking forward to breakfast. Over the week he had been here, it was the only time of day he could reliably get human interaction.
Once he got there, Gregor met Micah at the table, and after getting some food for himself, joined the Major. Together, they slowly worked their way through their heaping plates of food. Lots of eggs with baked in cheese and sausage links went brim to brim, with a selection of bagels between them.
They spent several minutes wordlessly, before they were forced to come up for air. Then the two of them spoke of the usual things, how Gregor’s training was progressing, and how the camp had been running. The Major complained about how his coworkers were too strict, and should loosen, and Gregor gently disagreed.
Everything went as it had the days prior, but Gregor didn’t mind. He had been finding the routine of improvement satisfying, content with how he was spending his days. The ability Micah had introduced him to had almost endless applications for Gregor, and spending time exploring them was fulfilling and exciting.
“Gregor, you know, I’ve been wondering, why did you join the Legion?” Micah asked over a mouthful of eggs.
“I wanted to see the world, and if I serve a term in the Legion I’ll be able to see a majority of Austen. Then, after the term is finished I can travel wherever, on what I've saved up.”
“Oh, so you want to travel? Like up North, maybe?”
“Uh, usually I would say yes, but with the war brewing going North may be a tough proposition.”
Micah just stared at Logan for a couple of seconds, before saying, “Yes, yes of course.”
Leaving it at that, the two men finished up their breakfasts, and got ready to face the day. Gregor had another interesting idea for the Aura Ability.