Everyone was looking at me. I hate when that happens, doubly so because it is almost always my fault. Turn one snow lion inside out…yeah upon further review I get it. I tossed the corpse into my inventory.

“You alright Doug?” Angelica asked. Apparently Celeste had tagged out. Makes sense she had limited time and it was just before sunrise.A lot could happen between now and midnight. Angelica was leaning on me hard. She clearly didn’t want to put weight on that bad foot.

Health regen is great.

I had one of those idiot moments. Angelica was touching me. Did that mean something? Was this related to Wilson’s dumb plan? Was my fixating on his stupid plan, part of his plan?I needed to focus, “Yeah I am good.”

“Are you sure?” Rachel asked. She pointed at her face. Her right eye specifically.

My vision was a little pink. I tried to blink. Only my right eye closed. “I am no longer convinced I am alright. I think something is wrong with my eye.”

“Lean down,” Brunhilda said, walking up to me.

I did what she told me.

Brunhilda studying my eye, “Ah. Your eye popped out and then the lid closed behind it when the nerve pulled tight.”

Everything about that sounds terrible, “Can you fix it?”

“Yeah, just hold still. On the count of three. Ready?” She didn’t really wait for an answer, “One… two…”

“Wait, it is- ahh!” I managed. I was going to ask was it on three or three and then go, but Brunhilda made her move on two. She pressed her metal clad hand against my face hard. Using her thumb and forefinger she pulled the skin apart with steady but relentless force. Then with her other hand almost gently she prodded my eyeball. It popped back in the socket.

I only said a majority of the swear words I knew.

“We should get moving,” Philip said. “There may be more demons.”

No sooner had he spoken those words then something substantial exploded in the goblin camp. It was an earth shattering kaboom. I turned expecting to see smoke and flames. There wasn’t though. Instead a massive cloud of ice and water quickly solidifying back into ice was erupting. Whatever went bang didn’t start a fire… nope. There's the smoke.

Angelica Climbed up on my back. Almost in a piggy back fashion, “I can’t run with my foot burnt. Go”

“I’ll watch out for the others, Bubby,” Brunhilda assured me.

That was all the more assurance I really needed. I sprinted. To my slight surprise Philip wasn’t immediately falling behind. He eventually lost ground to me, but he wasn’t slow. I guess that did make some sense if he was a ranged combatant Mobility was likely a primary attribute for him.

I got to the source of the flames and found a mess. Well that is a bit dramatic. A crowd had gathered, and a good hundred goblins were throwing snow and a burning tent. Toad was leading this effort. There was also a huge crater and in the bottom of the crater was the old Goblin Pappy Havok. He was crushing the charred skulls of three demonic skeletons with his big club. A not small portion of the crowd was cheering him on.

“Keep going! I don’t care that the flames are gone. Smother the heat. Make sure the fire is dead,” Toad called as some of his workers stopped their efforts to look at me. “Doug, the situation is under control.” he paused, seeing Angelica’s injuries. She wasn’t the mangled horror she was before Brunhilda’s intervention, but she still looked like she had lost a fight. “I take it you have also encountered demons.”

“I tried to stop them from getting here. …sorry,” Angelica said. She was watching the firefighting efforts. She opened her mouth to ask something, but didn’t speak.

Toad could read between the lines, “You have nothing to apologize for. You clearly bled for us. All we lost was a rocket, and empty tent.

“Empty tent?” I asked.

Toad considered and then spoke in as delicate of a way as he could, “The residents of this tent all are… fraternizing with… the Chimera soldiers.”

“So nobody died?” I asked. That seemed too good to be true.

“The demons seem to be dead.” Toad said, watching Pappy Havok trundle his way out of the crater. The old goblin was not fast. That said the crowd parted for him as he made his way toward us.

“What happened?” I asked.

“I killed the demons,” Pappy Havok said in an impossibly deep basso voice.

We all paused at that. I looked at the old goblin he was winded from climbing out of the crater. He was a bit above average size for a goblin… I think. A large portion of the goblins' physique was hidden by an almost body length gray beard. He also wore a large brimmed off white hat.

I didn’t want to be rude, but the little goblin didn’t seem like he should have been able to do that, “How’d you manage that?”

Pappy Havok spate. The wad of phlegm froze before it hit the ice, “With a rocket.”

“You just had that?” Angelica, the woman with an antitank rifle asked.

“Ayup,” He said and proceeded to pull a small tube-like device from under his poncho. “I saw them coming. They didn’t see me cause I was outside the camp.”

“What were you doing outside the camp?” I asked. Trying to put things together.

“Takin’ a shit,” Pappy Havok answered bluntly.

I looked at the demons’ skeletons. I have been hit with missiles before. Well I guess they were blasted by a rocket. Either way to hell with them, I hope it hurt.

Philip arrived at that moment.

“Seems like everyone is okay,” I told him immediately.

“What about Spine?” He asked.

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I didn’t freeze so much as I stopped myself from flailing about in panic. In hindsight tossing someone else’s child at a second kid so they can go off unsupervised in what was effectively a warzone, could be read as irresponsible.

“Hey Dad! Hey Doug!” Spine called. From the crowd. He was standing next to a young goblin girl with large glasses. That wasn’t Crafty. I looked at the young girl. Her name was Jen Errol Havok.

Philip also noticed this, “Son, who is your friend?”

“Hi, Mr. Spindle-Bite, I’m Jen,” She said. She tried to wave with one hand, but that was the hand she had clasping Spine’s. After a beat she waved with the other.

“I feel out of the loop,” I said mostly to myself.

Philip nodded, “I thought you liked the Shiv girl, Crafty”

Spine flinched.

Jen was unbothered, “Yeah he made a pass at her last night. The thing is she and Stabby Screwdriver have been a thing forever, at least a year now. She thought he was cute and seemed like a nice guy. Also I just got shot down when I asked Ben Franklin out, so she introduced us.” She leaned forward conspiratorially, “I have a good feeling about this.”

Philip and I exchange a look. I did not miss the awkward dating stage of being young.

Angelica shifted on my back. That sent pins and needles down my spine. Now I was covered in goosebumps. …goddammit.

Pappy Havok looked between Jen and Spine, “hmmmm, I think you can do better.”

Jen frowned, “You say that about everyone.”

The goblins took almost having a demon hitsquad loose in the camp more or less in stride. That said there was a lot of repeating the same conversation over and over. Yes the demons are dead. Angelica killed most of them. Pappy Havok got to these guys. He got them with a Rocket. Yes, that is cool. No, the tent is empty. Yes, that was lucky. I went through that cycle over and over again.

Brand, Aiko, and Brunhilda caught up to us eventually.

Brunhilda, a natural sprinter, who was clearly dangerous at short distances, was huffing and puffing as she jogged up to us, “Where… am… I… needed…” she managed.

“Nobody actually got hurt,” I assured her.

Brunhilda nodded and kept sucking air. “Good!” She doubled over.

Angelica tapped my shoulder, “We should go check on the Mandir.

“Already resolved,” Sunit said. He was walking up to us. His jovial smile was back in place. The effect was a bit different this time, because he had several demon heads on his belt. “At least I believe so. I defeated five of the damned.”

“I got three,” Pappy Havok said, still eyeing Spine.

“The leader of the Chimera soldiers killed one as well,” Philip said. After a moment he added, “after I shot it in the face.”

Everyone looked at Angelica and me.

“I didn’t kill any,” I admitted.

“Really?” Spine asked with more disbelief than disappointment in his tone.

I shrugged, “I am a lover not a fighter?” Why did I say that? Don’t get me wrong. I was strong, but right now I was surrounded by nothing but people who were way more hardcore than me. The old dude goes to the can with ordnance.

Angelica laughed. She wasn’t laughing at me. She thought the joke was funny. When did I get hyper aware of her? Wilson you well poisoning son of a bitch.

When she quit giggling she said, “I am pretty sure there were fifty at the start. I got forty-one.”

Sunit smiled and laughed with Angelica, “Well done Mahout!”

Did he just call me an elephant? Honestly, that’s not a bad of a burn.

“If the demons are dead, then I think we should wrap the last of stuff and make plans to get out of here.” I said.

Sunits smile faded slightly, “I hate to say it, but that is likely for the best.”

“We do need to pull the leaders together,” Philip admitted.

“I need to take care of something too. Meet you after.” I looked over my shoulder at Angelica, “We should probably split up.”

Angelica frowned, “I am not sure we can get away with splitting up constantly anymore.” she quickly added, “The Demons know where we are.”

That is a valid point but I had a counterpoint, “I am going to help Rachel pry the goblins and chimera corp apart.”

“Oh screw that,” Angelica hopped off my back immediately. She landed on her bad foot. “Oh… no. Ouch! Uh… Brunhilda… help please.” Her voice had a haunted quality to it.

“Why are you standing woman? Your health is in the orange,” Brunhilda gazed at Angelica sternly.

Angelica being a noble hero, obfuscated blame immediately, “Brand is only in the yellow, and had multi conditions too. He was jogging.”

“I am going to go…” I could read between the lines. If I stuck around somehow my friends being as negligent as I am toward self care would be turned around on me. Then Brunhilda would have to yell at me. I couldn’t put my drinking buddy through that.

I found Rachel by the Chimera Corp trucks. She was gazing at the frigloos. She held a megaphone in one hand and an aerosol can in the other. The can had Mangle-Bear Spray written on it.

“Are you sure you want to go that agro with the… decoupling?” I asked her.

“Originally I was think stun baton, but you need to get within arms reach to use that, which means going to the frigloo, I hate that name by the way.” Rachel shook her head as she eyed be with disapproval.

“The silver medal name was Bang Bunker,” I told her. “I still think Bear Mace is kinda harsh.”

“Sarge talked me down from just tossing a flash bang five minutes after last call.” Rachel said.

“Have we given a last call yet?” I asked.

“Rachel just kept gazing at the frigloos.

“So that’s a no?” I asked.

“Get off my back. There were zero leadership powerpoints on how to handle this situation,” Rachel snapped “I just have to figure out what to say.”

“Good morning everyone. You have ten minutes. Get dressed and go home. Your frigloo will be turning into water after that?” I offered.

“...that’s better than ‘Hey perverts, stop it!’” Rachel admitted.

Honestly, playing roustabout wasn’t that hard. Other than a lot of awkward conversation and literally everyone wanting a high five it was basically just herding cats.

I was rubbing ice shavings on my hands after.

“What are you doing?” Rachel asked.

“Did you see anyone else washing their hands?” I asked.

A look of realization flashed in Rachel’s face, “Egh!” she pulled some sort of small bottle out of her pocket and spurted some clear liquid on her hands. She then vigorously rubbed them together.

I waited. I need to figure out some way to bring up Seth.

Rachel was standing there shifting her weight from one foot to the other. She also was trying to figure out how to say something.

We both started talking at the same time. “So… oh did you have something to say? No, you go first. Wow that was weird… ok so… stop talking!” We just looked at each other for a very long moment.

Rachel cracked under the weight of the relentless pressure of how awkward things became first. She waved her hands to signal that I should talk.

I pulled the journal out of inventory, “This has pictures of your mom. It’s Seth’s sketch book. He wanted you to have it.” I paused to check Rachel’s reaction. Her eyes were locked on the leather bound book. She didn’t look angry. I continued, “If you want to meet him inside the Mandir, he would like to talk to you.”

Rachel’s focus snapped back to me, “About what?”

I considered. It wasn’t my story to tell, “His side of things. It’s not my place to tell, but he believed James Smith had killed you.”

“My dad would never hurt me,” Rachel insisted.

“I am not here to convince you. I am just passing you the message,” I explained.

Rachel went back to looking at the book. When I offered it to her she didn’t take it. Not looking up, she asked, “What’s your stake in this?”

That wasn't as hard of a question as I feared, “Seth is my friend, but I am not going to pressure you to talk to him?”

“Why not?” Rachel asked. She almost sounded disappointed.

“Rachel, Seth is your father, that means he has an obligation to you. You do not have an obligation to him. That’s how parenting works.If you talk to him, do it because you want to. That said, I know from experience life can be better without some people.”

Rachel took the journal.