Anyways, we arrived in town without interruption. 

I looked around.

Left, right, up, down... Left again...

Nope. Nothin'. 

Dangit. 

Only thing of note I saw was some weird guy wearing a suit that appeared to be made entirely out of wood, skipping like a kid out from the shop and headed towards the river. While that suit certainly is a fashion disaster... I get the feeling that doesn't really count.

Wait, who the heck is that guy? Ah, whatever, looks like he's on his way out. Ain't my business.

"Pfft. What a weirdo." Sis said quietly, looking over at the man. Which, while not very nice, was fairly accurate. 

"That's fair." I said, summarizing my thoughts for efficiency.

We quickly made our way over to the twin guards, in hopes that maybe they've seen something interesting. Like a doomsday device, or something. Or, actually, hopefully something less world-endy. I want something bad to happen, but I don't wanna wish harm upon that many people. 

"Y-yo. Anything terrible happen yet?" I asked as I went up to them. 

They looked down at me as if they'd expected me to say that. Which was fair. "No," "citizen." "we" "assure" "you," "the" "town" "is" "protected" "under" "our" "constant" "vigil-"

"HEEEEEEEEEEY, IIIIIIIIIII'M BACK!" Michaus screamed as he ran into town at speeds that'd make a charging bull green with jealousy, with a beaming ear to ear grin on his face, waving enthusiastically, as his firey red hair cut into the-

Wait, red hair? Huh? Was it always- Well, it's not like he's got hair dye out here... Ah, whatever.

Anyways, this whole thing probably would've been really wholesome and adorable, had it not been for all the clearly visible blood on his sword and armor.  

"MAAAN, YOU WOULDN'T BELIEVE THE SIZE OF THE RAT I FOUND IN THERE, IT WAS AS BIG AS, UH..." He pointed over at Sis. "THAT GIRL WHO I STILL DON'T KNOW THE NAME OF!"

Sis didn't seem to mind or care at all. 

"M-micahus! Stop screaming!" Zramazos said as he appeared on the scene, running up to Michaus with a towel. 

Michaus grabbed the towel, and began wiping off some of the blood and sweat from his body. 

"H-hey, what's this?" Zramazos said, reaching behind Michaus's head, and pulling something out of his hair. "A note? What is this...Magic? Hey, Michaus, what's this?"

"Huh? A note? He heck did that get there?" Michaus said, snatching the note from Zramazos's hand, unfolding it. "Ahem." He cleared his throat. Guess he's gonna read it aloud. "Hey, I totally tricked you earlier, and me and my friends are gonna attack your town later. Also, for clarification, this is the guy that you met in the woods a bit ago. We're gonna attack you, realllll soonish. Yeah.

With love, 

Branch."

Wow. That's a really stupid threatening letter. So was the means of delivery, actually. What kinda self respecting evildoer would do something so lame? 

Regardless, Michaus seemed pretty peeved by it, as, after he finished reading it, an uncharacteristically serious look appeared on his face as he began to stare at the ground. 

"Where... Where did you pull this note from again?" He asked.

"H-huh? Uh, it was stuck in your hair- oh crap nononono-" Zramazos said.

Michaus, abruptly, with his head shooting up to the sky, started screaming like a cartoon character, with his unrealistic for an 8-9 year old muscles bulging all the while. 

"DON'T F**K WITH MY HAIR, DAMNIT!!!!!!!!!" He screamed with a thick and incredible rage, before tossing the note aside and sprinting off back into the woods with his blade drawn.

. . .

Wow, a lot of crap just happened in front of me really quickly. And I didn't have a thing to do with any of it. And I certainly don't know what to think about it. 

The guards standing next to me seemed to have similar thoughts, judging from the looks on their faces.

Sis didn't seem to care. 

"Uhhh..." The guards said in unison.

"Oh, hey," The shopkeeper lady from that one time said, abruptly appearing on the scene while munching on an apple, for some reason. "That one guy from earlier said the same thing." She swallowed her chunk of apple. "About the town getting attacked, I mean." 

"Wait, you mean" "that was serious?" The guards said.

"Well, the note sounds like it was written by an 8 year old, and the guy who told me was some lunatic in a wooden suit, so, eh, who knows."

She took another bite of her apple. 

"Well, whattaya think? Should we call the town together and talk about it?" She asked. 

The guards deliberated for a moment.

"Yeah, sure," "we ain't" "got anything" "better to do" "after all." They said, rather nonchalantly. 

"Cool. You guys do the bell, I'll go get some chairs."

"Mmmhm."

Wow. I didn't have anything to do with that, either. Good thing I got here when I did, so I could hear all this. If I'd slept in any longer I'd have missed everything.

Hmm... Well, the town getting invaded certainly sounds bad, but, somehow, it doesn't seem all that intimidating, does it?

Then again...

The town is getting together to discuss it, right? That's gotta count for something, riiiiighht?

Right?

Riiiiighhht?

A massive grin formed on my face. My heart felt like it was going to beat out of my chest.

Aahah! Yes! THIS TOTALLY COUNTS, BABY, WOOOOHOOOOOOO! S, HERE I FRIGGIN' COME, YEEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

"Hey, Sis? Can I ask you a favor? I-If you don't have any other plans." I asked, barely containing my excitement. 

"Huh? Yeah, sure, whatever. Hey, think we should g-"

"Watch the house for me." 

With that, I sprinted off behind the nearest building (which happened to be Charolette's house. Turns out they have a back door. That's neat, I guess.), and slammed my hands together. The second I was out of sight, I ripped them apart, and jumped through. 

WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

---

A certain immortal simply stood still for a moment, stunned.

"-et out of here..." She said, weakly, to the cloud of dust that now took up the same space the boy once stood. 

She hadn't quite fully comprehended the situation yet.

Her mission, for the most part, was monitoring the boy. Making sure he wasn't just sitting around all day, being boring. Her other objective, the one she eventually started to hold more dear and complete with more sincerity, was to make sure the boy didn't die for the second time. 

Fortunately for her, that was actually far easier than she ever gave it credit for, for several reasons, but she didn't really think about that. To her, the boy was precious, fragile cargo, and it was her duty to make sure he didn't break at the slightest gust of wind. 

And, right now, continuing this weird delivery metaphor, it was as if her package had spontaneously sprouted wings and flew away from her, impossibly and irreversibly out of reach. And it all happened in the span of a moment.

The girl, realizing all this at once, simply stood there, her mouth slightly agape, her right eye twitching ever so slightly, with nary a thought in her mind. 

For the first time, it was completely out of her hands.

For the first time, she felt so utterly defeated. 

The immortal was, once again,

powerless.

A lot happened in front of her really quickly,

and she didn't have a thing to do with any of it. 

It took only a moment for the cloud of dust to settle back onto the ground below.

---

'Hmm? Oh, there's something on the back.' Zramazos thought to himself as the note Michaus read earlier fell to the ground.

'P.S Also, Michaus, head over here right away. I've got something fun prepared for you :)', the note read. 

????

"That's... Concerning." Zramazos muttered aloud to himself.