FieryKathy

Same question as I asked on Vintage Red this week. I want to compare my readership :)

We spend the rest of the evening eating food and mentally preparing ourselves for our trip back to Haurchefaud. Also video calling our friends to see them one more time before we head out. Not that the tension is terribly high but there is definitely a bit of stress palpable in the air. Hilda especially seems to be most concerned about Sam and I. 

“Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do, okay?” She says, pointing her finger at the screen like a stern mom would do. “And take care of each other.” 

“We will.” Sam nods. 

“Yeah, we will definitely keep our focus, but please don’t worry too much about us and have some fun of your own as well.” I reply. 

“Hmm, that will be hard to do, but I promise I will try that. Please send us a message every evening, okay? Normally we should be able to receive it.” 

I nod as well. “We promise.” 

“Good.” She smiles. “Now go and kick some diabolic ass.” 

Sam chuckles. “Maybe less kicking and more shooting, that’s a bit safer I think.” 

Hilda rolls her eyes. “Fair enough.” 

We then say our good nights and wrap up the video call, leaving the entire room quiet for a couple of moments until my sister hugs me from behind, laying her chin on top of my head. She squeezes me tightly. She doesn’t really say anything as everything that she wanted to say had already been said earlier. She stays like that for a couple of minutes before she switches over to Sam and gives her a hug too which Sam returns. 

After that it’s Nikki’s turn to do the same, although a lot more succinctly than my sister. “If you need us to talk for a bit, send us a message, we will drop everything to reply. And please do keep your promise and send us daily updates. We want to know you two are safe.” 

“And if, for any reason, you get back to Earth sooner than expected. Wake us up.” My sister breaks her silence. “I will be very cross with you if you don’t.” 

Sam and I look at each other and give the both of them a confident nod. “Immediately.” We say together. 

This makes Lise smile and give us one final nod. “You better.” 

Last but not least we also say a good night to our cats although I don’t really go into detail with them why we are hugging them so thoroughly, I wouldn’t want to distress them more than needed. 

When we get to bed we lay next to each other for a while without putting on our headsets just yet. Sam takes Mister Snuggles and boops his nose against my cheek. “Do I get a snuggle too?” She raises her voice a little to mimic what she thinks Mister Snuggles sounds like. 

I chuckle. “Yeah, you get a snuggle as well.” I take the plushie tiger out of Sam’s hand and embrace it against my chest after which Sam scootches closer as well and hugs me too, squishing the plushie in between us both. 

“Ready to go? Or do you want to stay like this a bit longer?” My girlfriend asks. 

“Mhmm… It might be better to leave already. The more time we stay here, the more time those Diaboli have to prepare.” 

Sam nods and gives me a kiss on my forehead and after that a kiss on my nose. “Okay. Let’s go then.” She hands me my headset and takes her own as well. “See you on the other side, sweetie.” 

“See you there.” I give Sam one last kiss, this time on the lips, and then turn on my headset.

Just seconds later I wake up in our room in Hofudstadr. Sam besides me is already awake as well. We don’t really spend any more time cuddling up as there is a job to do. I start with reading a message from Veanya that I received just seconds after waking up. It says that the ragtag group of Gods is ready to receive us at the point we had agreed to meet up at. But that doesn’t take away that our bodies here have started to get a little bit hungry in the time we were sleeping, so the two of us decide to go to the kitchen to get a bit of snack. It will also give us the opportunity to see how the kids and their mother are doing away from their homeland. 

It doesn’t take long after exiting the room before we run into one of the kids, who to our surprise is dusting off the staircase. It was the oldest boy, Henri if I recall correctly, who was doing so. 

“Hey Henri.” Sam smiles at the boy who looks up in surprise. 

“O-oh, you are awake!” 

“Yeah, it was about time we went to deal with some business.” She smiles. 

“Where’s your mom, Henri?” I ask. 

“She’s in the kitchen. She’s preparing some food for us. My brother and my sister are still sleeping.” 

“And you are already up cleaning the staircase?” Sam asks. 

He nods. “I always do a little before I head to school.” 

“School, huh?” Sam smiles and then proceeds to pat the boy on his head. “Well, you are doing a great job being that forward about your work.” She holds her hand behind her back and when she puts it in front of her again, she’s holding a golden Dwargon. “Why don’t you go and buy something nice for yourself when you get back from school. There should be some tasty treats you can buy with this, right?” 

“Definitely!” The Langor boy’s eyes start to sparkle as he receives the little bit of money from Sam. He then quickly pockets the coin and starts cleaning the staircase with even more gusto than before. 

We make our way to the kitchen and find Brielle who, judging by the sweet and tasty smell of it, is making some porridge. We knock on the door to not make her jump up in surprise. 

Her visage is quickly filled with happiness as she sees us standing in the door opening. “Ah, good morning.” She smiles. 

“Good morning, Brielle. How are you doing?” I ask. 

“Great.” she nods. “That’s probably an understatement.” 

“How so?” Sam asks. 

“Well, before you adventurers began your big sleep, Hilda wrote a couple of documents for us.” She starts. “You can’t imagine how helpful that has been for us. When you said that my kids were going to be able to go to school I was still a bit skeptical, but when I showed the letter to the appropriate people Hilda told me to show them too, they were all accepted with open arms immediately. It’s… It almost feels surreal. And aside from the school business… We are almost treated like…” 

“VIPs?” 

“Uh…?” 

“Ah sorry.” Sam scratches the back of her head. “Very important people.” 

“Yes!” Brielle nods enthusiastically, almost forgetting to stir in the big pot of porridge. 

Sam smiles. “If it concerns letters of recommendation from the heroes who saved their city…”

“That’s what I figured… But still… From going from the position we were in to where we are now… I could not have imagined that in the wildest of my dreams. And that’s after already meeting a Goddess… We can never ever repay you for this.” 

“It’s really okay.” I reply. “Just seeing how happy your son was just now at the main staircase, that’s already plenty of repayment for me. And doubly so if he’s doing good at school as well.” 

“They are definitely all trying very hard.” Brielle is almost bowing now but Sam stops her by putting her hand on my shoulder. 

“My girlfriend is only partially correct about the repayment part.” 

“Sam?” I squint my eyes in confusion. 

Sam gives me a wink while Brielle looks at her, slightly confused as well. “I think that if we got a little bit of that tasty looking porridge over there…” 

Brielle’s confusion disappears like snow in front of the sun and makes place for a smile that is as bright as said sun itself. “You need not even ask!” She replies. “Do your friends also need some porridge? It will be done in just a couple of minutes.” 

“No, it’s only us for today.” Sam shakes her head. “The others are taking the opportunity to… sleep in a bit.”

“So they are not going to wake up for a couple more days at least?” 

“Pretty much.” Sam nods. 

Brielle shakes her head but still with a clear smile on her face. “I don’t really understand how that works… But I suppose that’s only for the Gods to know and for me to accept.” She looks at me. 

“That might be for the best.” I put my lips tightly together and give her some affirming nods. It’s not like I really know the ins and outs about that either. But at least we can just easily argue that away with ‘the Gods made it so’ and we’d be correct in doing so… 

FieryKathy

Just wrote 250 words today as I came home with a huge headache. It's a bit better now but I feel very 'floaty' because of the painkiller I took.