Willow
Observing the Final Mapped Jimble-Grimb Camp, Feather-branch Forest, Savriâ
The thought that Kent would be the one to charge the pop-hopper camp first had never crossed Willow’s mind. Which was why, when he did, she didn’t immediately react. She watched in shock as he suddenly stood from cover and charged toward the camp with a determined expression on his face. The expression was imagined, of course, she was too far away to actually see his face that clearly. She could hardly imagine any other face he’d charge toward enemy lines with, though. Kent was halfway to the pop-hopper closest to him when her brain finally kicked into gear and she shot herself from cover. She was just about to close on the pop-hopper closest to her, but wasn’t really paying attention to her upcoming quarry. These little guys were hardly a challenge, after all. It was likely she would have missed what Kent shouted, had most of her focus not actually been on watching him curiously. As it was, she faintly heard, “Catch that one!”
Following Kent’s extended finger, she looked at the hopper that had just recently came waddling awkwardly into the camp. She could only assume there was a reason for the request. As if it realized it was being singled out, the new arrival leapt away. The speed was actually surprising, its movements significantly faster than any of the other stinky-pops she’d seen so far. Although, to be fair other than the one lone scout in the forest they didn’t tend to run away. This one was faster than the scout she had lost, let go, by quite a lot. She quickly channeled her focus as she ran. She concentrated, sending a swirl of her unnamed mana into the ability but maintained her hold over the energy. She twisted it in the way she’d figured out let her alter the area of the grey-out and time freeze effect.
Her quarry landed and leapt again, already half way to the treeline. She knew if it managed to reach the trees, it’d be able to ping-pong off of them far faster than she’d be able to keep up with. Good thing I’m ready! She internally cheered. Her ability activated, modified so that the ability’s external effects were fully concentrated in a straight line from her. Just as the pop-hopper landed and crouched for the final jump required to make it to the treeline, the line of grey just managed to wash over it, ending meter centimeters past the creature. Just like everything else between it and Willow, the fleeing hopper froze as if in stasis. Grinning broadly at the successful field-test of her little ability modification, Willow didn’t stop running. When she reached her now helpless prey, she grabbed it by its scrawny neck, spun on her heel and began racing back toward the campsite.
As she returned, she sharply reduced the amount of non-disciple mana so that she was feeding her ability to less than a third of what she’d channeled to catch her enemy. The field of grey around her reduced to a bit less than half meter around herself instead. She watched in some amusement as one of the pop-hopper’s limbs would fall outside of the field for a moment and begin attempting to flail, only to freeze again the next moment as it came back within her area of influence.
Ahead, she saw Naomi had rushed out to help Kent. They were doing well enough on their own and had killed three of the little brutes between the two of them. There were four left, fortunately these hoppers were way too stupid to use their numbers against their opponents. Kent had managed to grab the attention of three of them and was leading them in a kind of zig-zagging circle. He was staying near their campsite, but kiting them back and forth along the edge opposite of Naomi. Speaking of Naomi, she was swinging her stave at the hopper semi-wildly each time it leapt toward her.
Somehow, Kent was keeping track of what Naomi was doing while also leading his own little train of critters. He was calling out advice which she caught the tail end of, “…always the same, just step right when it leaps like that and swing hard to the left like you’re swinging at a baseball.”
Following his advice, Naomi stopped her wild swings. Setting her face into a slight frown of concentration, she pulled her stave into a bater’s position. The long branch was a bit awkward, but she made due. She waited for another quick hop which she side-stepped before swinging with all of her might, twisting her body to follow-through for a solid connection which surely would have resulted in a home-run had the pop-hopper head she struck actually been a baseball. Instead, the thing’s head crunched and squished unpleasantly. Its body went limp underneath it and it flopped to the ground.
Willow had stopped a bit away, ready to intervene if needed but interested to see how the two did without her. It seemed like they had things in hand. She grinned and waved at Naomi when the other woman looked her way, noticing her observing. Willow gave a little “shoo” motion with her left hand while holding her prisoner up in explanation for why she wasn’t helping. Frowning, Naomi appeared to be planning to yell for her to help but she didn’t get to before Kent’s voice called her over, “Naomi! Come grab another one, please! Willow can help us if we get overwhelmed, but I don’t think that’s gonna happen. These things are way too predictable.”
Silently, Willow agreed with Kent’s assessment as she saw him dodge one of the hoppers as it leapt at him from a blind spot. Had she not been painfully aware of how little combat experience, or even sporting experience for that matter, the man had, she might have been fooled into thinking he was dodging by instinct. What he was actually doing was no less impressive in her opinion. He seemed to have figured out the exact timing and attack path of all of his enemies and was simply responding accordingly. His motions were stiff and wooden, almost robotic, but also economical and prompt. If the boat floats, don’t complain about the duct-tape. She could almost hear her dad’s laughing words. He’d always been a fan of silly looking things which were shockingly effective; and Jonah’s lurching steps, halts and twists fit that criteria perfectly.
Arriving to “grab” another pop-hopper, Naomi caught its attention through the simple expedient of trying to wallop it over the cranium with an unskilled overhead chop. She only missed because she mistimed the attack, clipping one of the extended legs mid-hop instead. It certainly got the pop-hopper’s attention as it hissed and screeched from the ground where it writhed. Clearly, Naomi had managed to break the bony limb with the full-commitment strike. If she wasn’t concerned it’d distract her friends, Willow would be hooting and hollering at the excellent show!
Firming her grip on the stave, Naomi strode forward and mercilessly slammed it down on the crippled hopper. It took two more attempts before she managed to hit something important somewhere within its bulbous body and it stopped moving.
Meanwhile, Kent had gone on the offensive against his opponents. He used one of the extremely basic stave techniques which Willow had been drilling them in. At least one of them remembers what I showed them! I’ll have to give Naomi a bit of a hard time about it later. Willow noted to herself. Some good-old-fashioned gentle ribbing would hopefully help Naomi remember she didn’t have to use the weapon as a horribly balanced bat. Or maybe we should try to craft her a bat instead? Hmm… Fit the fighter to the weapon, or the weapon to the fighter?
Pushing aside plans for future training and equipping of her crew to later, Willow watched Kent step left while holding the stave near the center with both hands. He flicked the right side out in a quick, but somewhat light, slap. Despite being a fairly light hit, the popper clearly felt it as it screeched and tried to jump at its attacker again, all three arms extended and claws bared. Kent stepped back to his right, causing both of his opponents to collide in a masterful display of planning. He’d very intentionally let the other hopper awkwardly shuffle around to his blind side, if Willow was any judge, which I am, of course.
Not letting the opportunity go to waste, Kent followed with another technique she’d had him practice to rapidly slide his grip down the length of the stave shaft while bringing his hands up and to the left, then sharply down. The cross-strike was actually fairly flawless, technically. The finesse was certainly lacking and it somehow seemed almost like his body was following a series of instructions rather than performing a practiced motion. She knew for a fact that he hadn’t ever pulled off something as ‘fancy’ as repositioning from a middle guard position into a forward stance followed by a sharp cross-strike. There was simply no way he should have been able to manage that, given he’d barely been able to perform the cross-strike from an carefully formed forward stance in their last little practice session a few days ago.
Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
Regardless of supposed to or likelihood, Kent’s strike crushed the head of the pop-hopper on top. His follow-up stab from low guard knocked the final hopper’s noggin’ hard enough to finish the fight.
Letting go of her focus and her self-control, Willow leapt in the air - thrusting her captive high above her head as she shouted, “THAT’S HOW YOU DO IT! MA’MA COULDN’T HAVE DONE IT BETTER HERSELF!!” She whooped and rushed toward them excitedly.
Kent was looking sick as she approached, but he was clearly getting himself under control. She could understand, killing those things was gross. Also killing is wrong, remember Willow? Ehhh… Unless you’re killing gross little monsters who destroy ecosystems, maybe?
While making her way toward her friend, she noticed the hopper she was holding was scrabbling at her hand. She realized that she was definitely strangling it. She loosened her grip, then immediately firmed it back up as it tried to slash toward her face with its flailing limbs. It returned to trying to pry her fingers from its neck. When it tried to stab her fingers with its claws she deftly repositioned so it only managed to harm itself.
Arriving in front of Kent she let herself bounce in place excitedly, “That was SO good! How’d you suddenly go from novice staff technique to novice staff technique with a bit of control?! That was incredible! And NAOMI!” She spun and pointed toward the brown haired girl with her pop-hopper-prop as she made her way toward the other two at a trudging pace. She blinked a few times as she realized she was being praised. Naomi smiled wanly, “It was only thanks to Jonah, really. I don’t know how he could fight and also talk me through my own fights like that. But…” She stared off into nothing again.
Having learned that Naomi sometimes just needed time to think, Willow turned back to Kent with a grin, “You gonna leave us hangin’ like the old tack in the back of the barn?! Come on! Spill! What changed?” She stopped bouncing as she noticed Kent’s attention below her eyes. Said attention snapped back immediately as he flushed in embarrassment. Not caring, she just waggled her eyebrows at him, encouraging him to get on with the explanation.
“I… I got my insight.” He sounded somehow both pleased and disappointed all at once.
“That’s fantastic! Was it what you wanted?” She leaned forward. Loosening her grip on her captive as she felt it go limp in her grasp. Whoops. It probably isn’t dead. Can’t be that fragile, right?
Kent shook his head, “Not exactly. It’s The world is just a game.” Willow was as startled as Kent looked when the words echoed coming out of his mouth.
“Oooooh cool effect! Is that part of the insight?”
“Uh… I don’t… The world is just a game.” The echo came again. “That’s so weird. Why is that happening?”
They both stared at each-other for a moment, then both looked at Naomi, who shrugged and pointed at Willow’s prop, “So why’d you ask her to catch that thing?”
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Naomi
A few Kilometers from a Destroyed Jimble-Grimb Camp, Feather-branch Forest, Savriâ
Jonah had explained that he’d been given a quest to “discover the contents of the message” of the jimble-grimb which he’d pointed out to Willow. That had lead to them carefully searching the monster in question, as well as the campsite. They did find a piece of paper, or maybe it was parchment or velum or something given how shoddy it was, but it was illegible. The thing looked like it had just been scribbled on by a child. Hoping the one Willow had caught could, and would, tell them what the message was, she brought it with them when they left the camp. They hadn’t gone too far away this time, only walking maybe ten minutes before they found another of the little campsite clearings that seemed to be a staple of this forest.
Willow had dropped her burden, then pulled one of the ropes made of braided vine fibers she had stored in her pack. She tied the little monster up and then proceeded to start firing questions off at Jonah while they waited for it to wake up. He’d explained that he’d had a kind of too-real daydream which lead him to ‘finding’ his insight. Although he was clearly happy to have an insight, it was just as obvious he was a little put out that he hadn’t gotten one along the lines of what he’d been trying to get. Willow just shrugged and pointed out that the things people think they know aren’t always what they actually know. That had started a round of lighthearted bickering and teasing, including Willow nudging Naomi and asking her if she forgot the long stave she was carrying wasn’t meant as a sports implement.
The three of them had setup their now customary semi-circle of tents, with a fire circle a few meters in front of them, with the largest branches or stones they could find set up on the far side from the tents to act as seating. She seated herself to the far left, while Willow and Jonah had sat closer to the middle.
She’d did her best to join into their good-natured banter throughout, but was finding it difficult to focus and participate. Eventually, she’d given up and gone quiet as she let her nagging thoughts claim her attention. The fact that she’d felt nothing both times she killed jimble-grimbs was concerning. It should probably be more than concerning, and Naomi guessed it was. She saw the joy Willow had when destroying the monsters. She wasn’t sure if that was good, but it was something. She also saw the disgust and horror cross Jonah’s fate at the end of the fight. The same horror she’d seen on his face the first time they’d killed a couple jimble-grimbs together during their previous raid. She hadn’t felt one way or the other either time.
The more she acclimated to this new world, this new life, the more she seemed to revert to her former self. She could tell she was slowly becoming more reserved and withdrawn, despite her best efforts to put herself out there. Even now, she was trying to banter with her friends, but she just didn’t feel it. More and more the numbness was returning. She was feeling less. After crying her soul out on Willow’s lap, a memory which should have had her burning with shame, she’d felt the emptiness set back in. After hearing Jonah’s explanation of his insight, she realized she’d known hers since that night. She just hadn’t spoken it, she hadn’t dared.
Now, she was torn… Or she thought she should be torn, but the longer things went on the more the “tear” was academic. She logically knew she should be worried, but she didn’t care. She knew she should want to change, but wanting something required feeling like she wanted something. There was a part of her which thought she should miss the rawness she’d felt upon first arriving in the world from Earth. The world had been bright and vibrant. Especially Willow. She’d felt upset at being tricked into a contract. She’d felt excited and scared when she followed Willow through the portal. Those feelings were growing more distant. And she didn’t care. Couldn’t.
So she didn’t want to change, but she thought she should. Did she want anything? Looking up from where she was staring at her toes, she saw Willow watching her. She didn’t look worried, exactly, but curious and… there. Interested. Interested in her. Not in what she could do for her, but in getting to know Naomi herself. But she doesn’t know you at all. She knows the emotions that came with your new life. The emotions that the emptiness ate. But… She considered, Do I want anything?
Still staring into Willow’s eyes, unconsciously having locked herself in a kind of staring contest, she could answer that one easily. Yes. I want to have friends. I want to feel comforted like I did that night when I was upset. It felt horrible to be that sad, but also so good to have someone there with me. If I admit my insight, will I lose that chance?
Taking a deep breath, she decided to just ask, “Willow, if I became really… Cold and distant, would you still be my friend?”
Although part of her hoped Willow would answer instantly, a part that surprised her, another equally surprising part was glad she thought about it. Her eyes narrowed slightly in thought, her thumb tracing her bottom lip. They continued to just sit there without breaking eye contact until Willow finally answered, “If that’s what you want to be, then I’d still be your friend. I guess if you are that way and don’t want to be, but don’t work to change yourself… Well I’ll still be your friend, but I’ll be angry at you.”
The answer was… Not surprising. Naomi forced a smile onto her face, acknowledging the colors that spread across the darkness that she’d been able to feel within her since that night. Then she opened her mouth to speak her insight, then paused, and changed it slightly, I am empty; but I don’t want to be.
Willow’s eye’s widened slightly and Kent looked up sharply from where he was sitting, staring into the distance, probably looking at his UICI.
She felt the inner darkness pulse and awaken.