When they got to the BBQ place, Erin was right about Nathan’s response. He met them outside, and gave Erin a regretful smile. “Hey Erin, sorry about your apartment. Lem’me know if there is anything I can do?”

Erin brushed the invisible gesture away. “No worries. Tyson got the hardest part done, by helping me grab the biggest stuff.”

“Yeah, Tyson’s good like that, when he isn’t taken away by work to schmooze with his customers states away.”

Tyson frowned. “And why would you notice my absence due to work, Nathan?”

“Because, if you had customers to impress,” Nathan offered as he opened the door for everyone, “you would be bringing your customers to my restaurant to impress them, or your words of praise for my staff may be hollower than I thought.”

Tyson looked abashed. “Hey, now- I mean, I bring them by when I can but not- they don’t always-”

Nathan laughed and patted Tyson on the shoulder as they headed to the line and register. “Relax. I know you would.”

Well versed in the Cavalry’s casual banter, Erin knew when to prompt in order to make sure the topic stayed off her. “How is the Viridian Dragon doing?”

Nathan shook his head, dismissing. “It’s fine, fine.” He looked more directly at her. “Or did you mean that business with the actual dragon? Oh don’t worry about it. Got it sorted out with some local wizard. He said I could expect the curse to remain dormant for another fifty years, at least.” Nathan smiled as bright as his eyes glimmered. “Long enough to pass it on - to my successor, like my parents apparently did to me.”

They ordered their food and took a seat with their drinks. Nathan continued, sitting on the inside of the booth next to Erin. “Otherwise, the place pretty much runs itself. I only need to get involved when there’s something my kitchen manager or accountant can’t handle. My parents only thought their ‘sons’-” there were some gestured air quotes around this, “should be in the kitchen. I was expected to marry into some rich family.”

Tyson made a sympathetic noise. “That sucks, sorry to hear it.” Janey looked confused. 

“No, no, it was good for me. My brothers went back to China to hone their craft, got married and never came back. My parents ended up apprenticing someone in the kitchen who helped keep the Viridian Dragon running. We’ve got some of the best real-estate in town, but if I’d been cooking, we’d be long gone by now. I don’t even like cooking.” Nathan shrugged, “I ended up with a physics and business degree from Ireland, no husband, and became the actual son to inherit the Dragon because I came back. They also moved back to China a few years ago to help my brothers and be with grandbabies.”

Janey started. “Why did your parents expect you to marry-” when her phone started to ring. She pulled it out and scowled at it, “Ugh. Donovan.” She looked up at Tyson, asking, “Mind if I take this outside?”

He was already getting up to let her out. “Nope, I understand.”

Janey shot an apologetic look at Nathan and Erin, already answering the phone as she scooted out, “Hello? Hey, Donovan. Yes, I have a little time. No, I-” She walked out the front door of the store to pace outside on the phone. Erin looked at Tyson, who shrugged, as unaware as Erin with regard to what the deal was.

Erin wondered if Janey had been about to ask the question that had been on Erin’s mind, but decided to leave it be. She didn’t need to know if Nathan was, in his backstory, assigned female at birth, which is what it sounded like. 

Did he enter the world, intending to be transgender? Or did he realize he didn’t want to be a woman after trying it out for a bit? No one had been able to pinpoint when exactly Alleyshadow had entered the world. Erin wondered what the forums would think about such a revelation, but the thought derailed her train of thought, as she remembered she wouldn’t be able to discuss it with anyone in ten days when she was booted from the only community she had left.

Nathan shook his head. “Glad to be my own boss, and to have everything relatively self-sustaining. Though when my finance manager sees how much we spend on fresh crab, I do hear about it each month…” 

“Oh, I believe that.” Tyson followed by asking, “You ever thought about expanding and creating a second location?”

“Not for a second.” His answer was certain and quick. “It would be far too much work, and if people want to enjoy The Viridian Dragon, they should come to us, not us come to them.”

Nathan’s head cook and finance manager were both Pawns, but their seconds were both backdrop and ran a shared private blog - much like Max - in Chinese and English and they’d love this news. They would be the first to take over a new location and it was a frequently posted fear that it would come true.

Nathan asked Tyson about his travel plans for the next month leading into the end of the year, and that carried the conversation until food came. They shared awkward “should we wait for her to come back or not” glances while Janey paced just outside.

Tyson murmured, “It's no big deal if we start. She won’t mind.” He glanced at Nathan. “So you interested in seeing that flash mob caper movie? Erin told us about it months ago, and the teaser trailer already dropped a couple days ago.”

Nathan raised his eyebrows. “I’m sorry, what was that? A flash mob caper?”

“Hadn’t heard the trailer had come out. I’ve been out of the loop on the news for a bit,” she said.

Something must have shown her thoughts in her words or face. Nathan and Tyson gave her a sympathetic look.

Janey came back just as they were about to start eating properly without her, and apologized with exasperation, “Sorry about that. He’s just worried that a particular contract- his baby, though Heaven knows why - is completely non-functional, with a whole team having left the company. Which is why I got you onto his team, though he’s in a tizzy about it right now, he’ll be fine when you show your stuff.” She scooted in and looked at Erin. “You’ve got a reputation for untangling messes.”

Erin offered a wan smile. “Hey, that's what pays the bills.”

The rest of the meal went relatively boringly, though Erin had to work to keep herself from looking and sounding sullen. She’d reached the end of her tolerance for entertaining the Protagonists and Janey. As much as she might like them as people, they were now just a reminder of what she was doing here, why she had a new bed frame and desk in Tyson’s truck.

Tyson and Janey helped drop off Erin’s desk and desk chair and bed frame off in her apartment, where she got to work putting the desk together, splaying out the instructions, tools, and bolts, and ready for the long haul. Tyson and Janey offered to help, and Erin had to beg them off, preferring to do it herself.

Erin finished and surveyed the desk, sat at an angle in the living room so she could look into the kitchen and at the door while still sitting down. Not unlike her old apartment, but with a smaller dining table and a smaller desk. Having the desk away from the wall took up a lot of space, but Erin didn’t intend to have visitors, and it being awkward just for her was not a big deal.

Almost like home. Erin debated having a shower first, or ordering food to be delivered. Preferring to be disappointed now, she looked up a few restaurants on her phone and called a Chinese place. They took her order and address without complaint, and didn’t even ask her name, a surprise and relief.

While she ate, she glanced at the local news, not expecting much. A surprising bit did come out, as apparently there was some machine terrorizing the Finance district, on a Sunday.

Whatever it was, it looked like some sort of mechanized trashcan, twelve feet tall, and rolling around on omni-directional wheels, and firing heavy arms, threatening anyone near the financial district downtown and not behind several walls. The design of the robots looked like something she’d seen before, but according to reports, Boron Heavy Industries had shuttered the bot-building branch of their company years ago.

It looked like Silverknight and The Ferret were already on scene by the time she finished her food, so Erin assumed the little weekend event would be over soon.

At least the business downtown was mostly empty on a Sunday night, though it had been close to the Warrens, which was nearly all residential.

Erin puttered about on the internet for a little longer, but decided to take that shower and head to bed. She’d just sleep in and get to work at a ‘normal’ time tomorrow, rather than aim for ridiculously early. Nothing she could find out on the forums would be available in a couple weeks.

Why bother to keep up? She was alone, even if the Plot refused to just finish her off. She wished it would just kill her and get it over at this point.