I woke up the next morning feeling surprisingly rested, considering I had been active in my mindscape all night. In addition to a hammer, I now had tongs, rasps, a set of welding goggles, and an apron. All of them had been made fresh, not drawn out from the mindscape. Only the hammer had felt right to craft from my self-identity. The others I had made much like I shaped other objects.

I sat up and did a quick pat-down of my limbs. I had been using a lot of myself in the mindscape. I didn’t feel anything amiss, though. My senses were all working, my arms didn’t even feel tired. I did feel a little emotionally wrung-out, but at the moment I couldn’t be sure if that was from my first deliberate foray into construction or everything else that had been going on.

Boddy was already up. He had pulled the curtainshades, though I could see little rays of pale light leaking through cracks. He was also in his natural hob shape. I had never seen a hob in the realis. I hadn’t even been aware they could be in their natural hob shape in the realis. But there he was, carefully maintaining his revolver. He had laid its pieces out on a cloth that was probably one of the pillowcases. Hopefully it didn’t stain.

As I started moving, Boddy grunted, “Morning, Daniel. You ready to go get some answers on constructing? And more importantly, on why Carver is trying to sell out Community and most of its allies to the interests of some ludicrous moneybagging dandy?”

I made a mental note of that phrase. It was a good insult.

“I think so. I did some practice last night. I can at least make objects, now. Or…ones that work in here.” I tapped my temple. “When we get to the other side I’m going to see if I can manifest them. Since they don’t have motives or personality--”

“Don’t make that assumption. I’d wait to see if we can find someone who knows more about this stuff. Even a purpose could give them dangerous traits when manifested. It’d be almost impossible to make something without one. What kind of objects did you make?”

“Tools,” I pulled on my shoes, then my jacket. “For forging new constructs.”

“Hmm. Constructive purpose is gonna be better than destructive. I’d still rather you wait but if we can’t find anyone I guess you’ll just have to give it a shot.”

I checked my phone. No messages. I was supposed to be at work in about fifteen minutes, though. Which was going to be difficult, considering I wasn’t even in the correct state at the moment. I flipped through my contacts to my manager and gave her a call.

“Morning, Daniel,” she answered. The incongruity of hearing that phrase from a hob I had known scarcely two days and my boss of several years just a few minutes apart made me pause. I covered it up with a cough. Dana interpreted it differently, apparently. “Oh, are you calling in sick? Daniel, this better not be about the moonlighting thing. I told you I couldn’t approve it and that if you took it it was at your own risk.”

“It…it’s more of a hangover situation from going out with some new friends I met over the weekend.” I answered. Hey, it was almost halfway true. Everything except the hangover part. “I may have wound up in a different city while not in my full faculties. It may be a little far away.”

“What the hell?” Dana sounded more shocked than angry, though I was sure the latter was still coming. “How far away?”

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

“Grayhound tickets at least. Probably airplane, if I can find any that aren’t gonna cost my spleen.”

Dana sighed. Then, in case I hadn’t heard it, she sighed again, louder. “Alright, Daniel. Get home. I’m going to have to write you up as having an unacceptable excuse. It’s gonna be in the system now. You’ve not had any problems keeping your hours before, so I don’t think you’re gonna get fired over it. The damage will also be mitigated by the fact that you at least called to tell me about it.”

“I understand. It won’t happen again. Honestly not sure how it happened this time. There’s a lot of lost time.” That was also true, if only because I had been knocked unconscious for twelve hours. “I at least know for a fact I wasn’t driving when we left town. Left my car at home. Caught an Uber to the party.”

“Congratulations,” Dana sniped. “That doesn’t really help your situation, though. You presumably went with these people willingly, seeing as how you aren’t calling from a police station to say you were kidnapped.”

“Yeah. I mean, at the start of the weekend, they seemed cool. Figured, hey, I’ll come back and watch the game with them. I don’t even remember how we ended up on the road. Pretty sure they ditched me once I got a room, though. Assholes.”

“It’s so hard to meet people.” I couldn’t honestly tell if she was being sincere or sarcastic about my supposed escapades.

What, it wasn’t like I could say ‘Oh, by the way, I went to a psychic realm inside everyone’s minds but also it’s nowhere, and I got betrayed by my own imaginary friend pulling a gun on me. When I ran away, I took the wrong exit and wound up in Timbuktu.’

“I understand you’re gonna have to write me up,” I said. “It’s my problem. I just thought you should probably know I wasn’t going to be able to make it into work today.” I considered. “Or maybe tomorrow, depending on whether I can find a bus or plane or just…how much are car rentals these days?”

“I appreciate the warning, at least.” Dana answered. Well, the first bit. Apparently she thought the car rental question was rhetorical. I guess in a sense, it was. “We’ll do the whole HR punitive action rigamarole tomorrow when you clock in.” I heard a voice in the background on her end. “Tomorrow, Daniel. Or the write-up is going to have a lot more flags and I won’t cover for you if that happens, you understand?”

“Crystal clear.” Dana hung up on me. I guess it made sense. The drivers’ shift should be getting in right around now. She had manager stuff to attend to.

I looked up at Boddy. He had reassembled his revolver and was now loading it with an almost painful slowness. He checked each round meticulously for…I don’t even know what for. A bullet is a bullet, to me. I knew just enough to get the right caliber. Provided I knew what the right caliber was.

“Didn’t realize you still had your old job,” he said, conversationally, eyeing me past the point of a revolver bullet. It apparently passed inspection, because he slid it into one of the chambers. “Figured with how much Master Carver was paying you, you’d quit. Buy an island, or something.”

“Seemed too good to be true,” I said, honestly. “Figured it was best not to burn bridges until I have that money in my account.”

Boddy nodded. He slid the last round into place and clicked the revolver closed, then picked up one of his quick loaders and began the process anew. So far, not one round had failed his inspection, but he was no less meticulous about it. “Sure, that’s smart. Cover your ass. Keep an escape route. Basic self defense stuff.”

“I guess I didn’t think of it in that lens, but yeah. Basically. Plus, I’m still half certain I’m hallucinating this whole escapade due to a concussion or tumor or something.”

Boddy kept one eye and ear trained on me for a long five seconds, then barked out a genuine laugh. I grinned back at him. While he finished his gun maintenance slash quality control, I went to the sink and splashed some soapy water on my face and through my hair. I didn’t think I had time for a full shower. I hadn’t thought to pick up a toothbrush while I was getting a phone charger, so I made do with the complimentary mouthwash. By the time I had dried my hands and face, Boddy had finished reloading his quick loaders, which he slipped onto his belt.

“We should get moving.”

“Yeah.” I checked my watch. We’d been in L.A. since about 4 P.M. the night before. It was a few minutes past nine in the morning now. Maps and Rookie would have had plenty of time to get to Inheritance. The only question was whether they thought to look for us there or tried to track us down in realis. Rookie had been in my mind listening in when Lady Liu had told me how to get to Inheritance. He knew I hadn’t received instructions for any other House besides Community. I was not hopeful about avoiding them getting back to irrealis.