The Daily Grind - Chapter 166 (Patreon)

Some quiet time.

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“I have never once had narritively appropriate sex.  Nor has a loved one’s death been a metaphor for something greater.  Sometimes, things just happen.  That is life, and our stories should reflect that.”  - Cameron Lauder -

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Monsters and domains, small gods and big responsibilities, new faces and new attempts.  The Order spent a lot of its time, day to day, being *busy*.  It wasn’t just as an organization either; individually almost everyone had a laundry list of important stuff to take care of, and downtime was both precious and welcome.

Not that the work itself wasn’t rewarding, and often fun in its own right.  But it was *work*.  Effort and energy, put toward something bigger.  Not bad, but not exactly restful.

So it was that when James found himself with a day off, he increasingly loved just being able to kick back and do *nothing*, guilt free.

Of course, today, he wasn’t doing nothing.  He was meeting up with his partners for coffee, because there was an amount of free time on their parts too, and they all wanted to just sit and relax and enjoy the evening together.

Their apartment sat at the midway point of a winding black asphalt path that cut through multiple suburbs and small shopping centers, a belt through the rampant greenery that would, if James followed it for twenty minutes, lead him to the coffee shop that he loved living nearby.  It wasn’t exactly all green anymore; the mid-September environment being one where a lot of the grass had dried out from the summer sun, and been trampled into a series of foot paths by an uncountable number of excited dogs and teenagers.  But the leaves of the trees hadn’t started to change yet, and the summer warmth stretched on even into this later month.

He enjoyed the simple pleasure of the walk, smiling as he saw a deer by the side of the path where it ran by a patch of wooded land, smiling more when one of those excited dogs being walked in the opposite direction stopped to give him a friendly sniff.  The air smelled like living things, and he could hear more birds than cars, and it was wonderful.

James wasn’t an outdoorsy person, not really.  But he vastly preferred this kind of blended environment to the noisy hostility of denser urban spaces.  Especially when these environments gave him convenient and pleasant paths between his apartment, and caffeine.

“Hey guys.”  James greeted his partners, the two of them sitting at a heavy wrought iron patio table.  James deposited his coat in an empty chair, and leaned his walking stick on the wall nearby.   “Hope I’m not too late.”

“Not too much.  Why do you have a stick?”  Anesh asked, eying the carved wood suspiciously.

James grinned.  “It’s my wizard staff.”

“Are you a Wizard?”  Alanna asked around a bite of the muffin she’d bought.  “Actually asking, I’m not sure if that’s your official title.”

“Well yeah, though not because of the staff.”  James admitted.  “It’s also not an official title.  I think, for legal reasons, my rank actually is ‘paladin’, which I’m not sure if I should be happy or embarrassed about.”

Anesh sighed, and held out a hand, palm up.  “Does the staff...“ He paused, “actually I guess I need to be less sarcastic asking things like this these days.  *Does* the staff do anything?  Does it shoot fireballs?”

“Don’t be silly, this isn’t stargate.” James rolled his eyes.

“So you can’t shoot fireballs”  Alanna challenged him.

James shook his head.  “Anyone can shoot fireballs, with a little effort.”

“So…”

“And the right training.” He added.

“So it can’t…”

“And the gun that shoots fireballs.” James finalized.

Anesh broke first.  “James what does the bloody stick do?!”

“It makes me feel like a wizard.”  James couldn’t keep the wide smile off his face.  “Also it’s a walking stick, because my feet hurt from all the endless running we do.”

“Go get your coffee.”  Alanna and Anesh said in harmony, shaking their heads and pointedly turning away from him.

With a quick laugh, James pulled open the glass door of the cafe, and went to place an order.  Walking through lacquered wood tables and a fairly sizable crowd as he did so.  It was, he realized, partially a good sign, that so many people were out and about again.  Their area, at least, was on the road to recovery.  James was still more than a little annoyed that he hadn’t actually been able to punch the pandemic, either physically or metaphorically.  But it was also a sign that the world moved on even if he didn’t personally intervene.  There were a lot of smart and dedicated people out there, solving problems at high speed, just like him.  It felt good, to realize.

It still made his teeth itch to see a crowd of more than five people after over a year of quarantine and lockdown procedures.  But still.  Optimism.

Though as James turned to stand at the end of the counter and wait for his mocha, he did also notice that he and his partners weren’t the only members of the Order here.  At a table in the corner, Deb and Frequency-Of-Sunlight sat sharing a piece of cake; the camraconda doing an excellent impression of someone who was unbothered by the curious glances they were getting from the three tables that had line of sight on them.

Well, two tables.  One of them appeared to be a somewhat rambunctious group of teenagers, some of whom James recognized as people he’d interviewed for internship positions.  None of them were staring, even the ones who didn’t actually work with the Order, which James could appreciate.

He traded a nod and a smile with Deb, collected his coffee, and headed back out to the warm night to sit with his partners.

“So!”  He asked as he slumped into his chair and painfully sat on the keys in his coat pocket.  “Is this just where everyone from the Order hangs out now?”

“Pretty much.”  Alanna said, tipping a finger off her cup to point down the side of the cafe, to where Simon stood against a railing staring down at the pond that bordered the edge of this little shopping area.  “It’s nice, the staff knows us, is used to our bullshit, and they have free cake for nonhumans.”

“Wait, seriously?”  James quirked his eyebrows.

Anesh gave a quick nod.  “Oh yeah, they’ve got a sign for it and everything!  Though I think it was here before us, and they meant ‘cake for dogs’.  But… well… we’re here now!  And they actually stuck to it, which is kind of them.”

“It’s nice.”  James mused as he shifted back to a relaxed posture, letting his shoulders slump a bit as he leaned into the chair.  “It’s nice to see normal people not caring about the camracondas.  It makes me feel good.  And fuck knows the snakes deserve some kindness.”

Alanna swallowed her mouthful of drink and made an interjecting noise with her throat.  “I’ve actually been meaning to ask about that.”  She said when she could.  “And I wanna start this with ‘I am not trying to be a shit’.  But, do the camracondas actually have the population needed to be a part of society?  There’s only… forty of them?”  She glanced at Anesh.  “Help me out here.  Is that the right number?”

“I’m a mathematician, not a wiki.”  Anesh indignantly stretched out the word ‘mathematician’, putting emphasis on each individual syllable.  “...Also it’s forty nine.  You were close.  Did you know James initially miscounted by, like, a dozen?”

“Technically fifty one, now.”  James pointed out, rotating his drink in his hands and waiting for it to cool.  “Sort of.  The two camracondas that Simon captured from the Office are… I’m not gonna say ‘integrating’, exactly.  But they’re in the custody of the others, and I’m given to understand they’re growing and learning.”

“That’s really cool, but I’m still just worried about population.  It would suck to just drop them into the fray of Earth as an eternal minority, and tell them to go nuts, you know?”  Alanna frowned. “We’ve got a numbers disparity.”

“Oh, oh!”  James slapped the table, and instantly regretted it as he precariously rattled the drink in front of Anesh.  “Sorry!  But I just thought of something!”

“We can’t duplicate camracondas.  They’re too big.”  Anesh told him dryly.  “Also the whole… dungeon thing.”  He waved a hand idly.

James stuck out his tongue at his boyfriend.  “No no no.  The stuff you brought back from the Akashic Sewer!”

“The stuff that smells, looks, and has the same chemical composition as, sloppy joe meat?”  Anesh asked with a puckered grimace.

“Ugh.”  Alanna commented.  “Double ugh.  Why is *that* the stuff that makes me feel sick, and not the… I dunno, river of literal puke?”

“I don’t know, also can we please switch back to my thing, so I can enjoy food without feeling sick sometime in the next month?”  James interjected.  “None of those things.  The shaper substance!  We know where to find it now, we know it can alter biology on a macro scale.  We should probably check with Deb or, like, an actual expert, on if it actually changes genetics, but it could be something that could modify the camracondas to be able to… you know… have kids.”

“Didn’t the ratroaches say it’s incredibly painful?”  Alanna asked with a worried expression.  “And they were walking around unperturbed by broken ribs.  ‘Painful’ for them is a high bar.”

“Deb had a plan for that.”  James said.  “Also, side note, does anyone know if the ratroaches have names? Saying ‘the ratroaches’ over and over is getting weird.”

“We should ask Sarah.”  Anesh suggested wisely.

James nodded.  “Good plan.  I’ll text her.”

“Why?”  Alanna asked.  “Just ask her.”  She pointed to behind James where Sarah was walking up to the door of the coffee shop, chatting and laughing with a group of people James didn’t recognize.

“Okay, seriously, does *everyone* go here now?”  James chuckled.  “Also I’ll ask her later.  She seems busy, and we’re relaxing.”

“We absolutely are not.”  Anesh told him.

Alanna tilted her head at her boyfriend.  “Yeah, we’re talking shop.  This is work.  And I’m supposed to be off for most of the rest of the day!”

“Oh yeah, Response tonight?”  James asked her.

“Yup!  By the way, thanks for telling me about the armor thing.  Nik actually shaped me a custom plate.  It’s so much nicer.”  Alanna said.  “But also, this doesn’t count as relaxing either.”

“Well that one wasn’t *my* fault.”  James rolled his eyes.  “Alright, alright.  No work stuff.  Anesh!  How’s… working for NASA… going?”

Alanna gave him a *look*, while Anesh just let out a snort of laughter.  “Ah, it’s going!  I’m making friends with a lot of the other people there, actually, which is weird.  I dunno if I’ve ever talked about this, but syncing up to myself always leaves me feeling like I’ve had really, really full days.  Not busy, exactly, but *packed* with stuff.  But yeah, it’s going good.  We’re putting a new satellite telescope in orbit soon to watch sunspots, and I actually worked on it, and I don’t know if I can fully express to you how ridiculously good it feels to *put something in space*.”  Anesh glanced down at the table, partially hiding the small smile he was wearing.  “Oh!  And I’m on the unofficial NASA basketball team.”  He added.

“That’s a thing?”  James asked, curious. “Also wait, no, that’s way less important than your first space project!”

“Oh, I only did a small part of the space thing.  The basketball is way more impressive.”  Anesh said.  “Can I just say, if I haven’t before, that skipping the boring initial learning wall of a hobby makes it way more fun to engage with that hobby?  Getting to get right to the meat of basketball has really given me an appreciation for playing it.”

“I feel the same way about a lot of skills, yeah.”  James agreed.  “I think a lot of it is that learning usually takes a lot of failure.  But before you have any way to contextualize that failure, it can just feel like a brick wall.  At a certain point, you know enough to learn from it, but until then, it’s just aggravating trial and error.”

“And breaking stuff!”  Alanna added.  “Back when I was first starting to work in the garage, I completely bricked the motor assembly in a car window because I screwed one thing up.  And I didn’t know what thing, because I didn’t know what thing, if that makes sense?  *Now*, I could just look at it and see where I screwed up and just go ‘welp, won’t do that again’.  But then, it was like headbutting a rock.  I messed up, and I *knew* I’d do it again.  That feeling sucks.”

“I often forget you were a mechanic.”  James noted.

“I was lots of things!”  Alanna cheerfully reminded him.  “Worked a bunch of stupid jobs.  Mechanic was the most fun, like Anesh said, once I learned what I needed to learn.”

James shook his head.  “Well, I’m sorry we’re trying to put you out of a job by making cars obsolete.”

“No hard feelings.”  Alanna told him wryly.

They sat for a while, letting conversation lapse while they just enjoyed each other’s company; sipping drinks and checking their phones, or just enjoying the evening.

Until Anesh ruined it.  “I don’t mean to ruin anyone’s night.”  He opened with ominously, “But is that cop car watching us?”  He tilted his head slightly, indicating direction.

James and Alanna turned, not to look directly where Anesh was indicating, but instead toward each other.  Making a small motion like they were secretly whispering to each other, and easily putting the indicated car in their view.

“Yes.”  James said, as they turned back to Anesh.  “Probably.”

“Should we do something about that?”  Anesh looked worried.

Alanna sighed.  “The local police are *pissed*, because we’ve been doing their jobs better than them.”  She said.  “Technically, what we’re doing is super illegal.  But practically, no one has charged us with anything, and even though we aren’t a big public group yet, word is getting around.  So they don’t want to randomly arrest us.  But I think this is the start of them… well…”

“Harassing and threatening members.”  James growled.  “Not directly, at first.  But making it implicit, and constant.”  He rolled his shoulder.  “Because they’re assholes.”

“Not *all* of them are assholes.”  Alanna sighed.  “But that guy there, specifically, probably is?”

Anesh cleared his throat.  “So, again, what are we doing about it?”

“Oh, nothing, right now.”  James said.  “He seriously cannot hurt us.  I dunno if they’re aware of that, but it’s just true.  So we’re just gonna sit here and *relax*.  Also, yeah, how is Response going? I haven’t had time to join a shift in a while, but I really want to.”

“It’s going good!  And we’re back to talking shop.”  Alanna pointed out with a grin, which even a worried Anesh returned.  “But whatever.  It really is going good.  A lot of what we do is honestly just medical transport, but we’re *really* good at it.  EMTs keep asking us for jobs.  Oh, Harvey or Karen is gonna present a plan to you to actually go formal and interface with insurance companies so we can cover expansion costs.  I dunno if I’m supposed to tell you that, so act surprised?”

“I mean, that’s cool.  I’d prefer it be free, though.”  James said.

“It’s a weird deal, you’ll probably like it.”  Alanna said.  “But yeah.  Busy.  And *weirdly* non violent!  I mean… just based on what I was expecting.”

Anesh made an appreciative noise.  “It’s better that way.”  He said.  “I’m helping out in one of the training courses later this week, and it’s almost all deesclation and subdual tactics.  And I think the fact that so far, that’s basically all we’ve needed, really drives home a point.”

“Well, also to be fair, we don’t respond to certain things.”  Alanna reminded him.

“Ehhhh.”  James wobbled a hand.  “We don’t respond to, like, shoplifting, or stuff like that.”

“Yeah, why is that?”  Alanna asked.  “Isn’t it still ‘a problem’?”

“It’s a problem we aim to address in other, larger ways.”  James told her.  “But also just on a practical level, it is literally not a problem.  Unless someone is stealing from, like, a farmer’s market? The company is gonna have loss insurance, and they’re literally not ‘losing’ any money.  Interference from us would just be punitive, and stupid, and most importantly, a waste of Response resources.”

“But we do get calls about it now.”  Anesh pointed out.  “Kind of a lot of calls.  I think people think we’re reckless vigilantes.”

“Which is *totally* wrong.”  Alanna leaned forward, folding her arms on the table.  “We are *very* precise vigilantes.”  She looked over at James.  “Also to be clear, just because I expected something different doesn’t mean I’m against this.  It’s working, you’ve got good reasons, and that’s good enough for me.”

“I do appreciate that.”  James said.  “I know you’ve got, like, a personal attachment to the idea of law enforcement.  And I love you and shit, so I don’t wanna be an asshole about it.  But the way things are now just doesn’t work, and we can do better.”

“It’s the ‘and shit’ that really sells that sentence.”  Anesh added.

“Ah, fuck it.  I agree.”  Alanna sighed, laying her head down on her arms.  “I don’t *wanna*, you know? Like, I want things to be better *now*.  But it’s hard to not agree overall.  And honestly, we can’t punch every problem.”

“So I’ve learned.”  James admitted unhappily.

“Actually, James, you talked to Momo earlier, right?”  Anesh asked him.  “Did she tell you about the new immunity programs?”

“Somewhat.  Not all of them.  She has supposedly sent me a list, but I haven’t seen it yet.”  James tapped at his phone, scrolling through messages and looking for anything from Momo.  “Or she’s gotten sidetracked.  Why, wondering if there’s an ‘immunity to the police’ in there?”

Alanna peaked out of her makeshift table bed.  “I think Sarah said there was one that gave immunity to words, but she might have been joking.”

“Like… from… being convinced of things?  Like rhetoric?”  Anesh narrowed his eyes and gnawed at his lip.  “Or like, if words caused physical damage? Like if something was too loud?  How do we even *test* that?”

“We don’t.  We put it in a box and bring it out if it becomes relevant.”  James told him.  “That said, a couple of these might come in handy for… wait, hang on, I’m getting sidetracked.  Anesh, why did you ask about that?”

His boyfriend gave a sheepish smile.  “Oh, I was gonna try to make a joke, but now I’m sidetracked with the words immunity, and it wasn’t funny.  I really hope that isn’t real.  Anyway, go on.”

“Oh, I was just gonna say that some of them might be useful for climbing the mountain dungeon.”  James said, eyes lighting up.

Anesh and Alanna groaned.  “Uggggh.”  Alanna expressed.  “It’s gonna be cold and covered in snoooooow.  I hate snow!”  She moaned.

“Also wet.”  Anesh added.  “And, you know, attempting to kill us.  But yes, mostly cold and wet.  Pretty bloody cold, too, from what we know.”

“It’s a dungeon!  Come on, where’s your sense of adventure?”  James gave them a vicious grin.  “It’ll be fun!  I mean, obviously, if you two want to come with me.  I’m not gonna make you or anything.”

“No, no, I’ll go.”  Anesh sighed loudly and dramatically, swirling the remaining coffee in his cup with a regretful expression on his face.  “I’ll just complain the whole time.”

Alanna had a different take on it.  “Do you think the mountain will have some kind of dragon’s hoard of gold and loose gems?”  She asked.

“...Maybe?  Probably not?”  James gave her a curious look.  “Why, do you know something I don’t know?”

“Nah, I’m just trying to psyche myself up for it.”  She said.  “Look, I really hate snow.  It snows here once every two years, and it’s stupid, and no one knows how to drive in it, so I just hide inside until it goes away.  Going to a mountain full of snow just seems like asking for trouble.”

James reached over and rubbed her shoulder affectionately.  “You don’t have to come with me, you know.”  He told her.  “There’s a ton to do here, and I think we’re well past the relationship stage of needing to share every dungeon delve.”

“Is that a real thing?”  Alanna asked.

James and Anesh looked at each other with suddenly curious expressions.  Both of them opened their mouths, but didn’t say anything immediately.  “Ah…” Anesh hummed out.  “Yes?  Kind of?  Probably not.”

“I mean, there’s a bad tendency that some partners have to want to do literally everything together.”  James shrugged. “So probably?  We’re all powered by magic now, but we’re still people.  Subject to the same problems as everyone else.”

“Until we stack enough immunities.”  Anesh quipped.

“Yes, obviously.  Think there’s an immunity to communication problems?”

“That’s called talking.”

Alanna snorted.  “You two are adorable.”  She muttered, making both boys blush and turn away with mild embarrassment.  “Also, did anyone name the mountain yet?”

“I don’t think so.”  Anesh clicked his tongue as he thought.  “Momo’s been adding to the operations manual with stuff about it, but I don’t think it’s been titled yet.  I think ‘officially’, that privilege goes to the first people in.”

Alanna sat back up and stopped dramatically moping on the table.  “I overheard Liz saying she didn’t think she was smart enough to give something a cool name.”

“I really find it awkward that people think the weird names I stole from other places for our dungeons are ‘cool’.”  James glared into the lid of his mocha before taking a long, aggressive sip.

“...Where did you steal Officium Mundi from?”  Anesh asked.  “Is this going to be something that gets confusing in the future?”

“Uh… a story Sarah read a long time ago online?  And she named it, not me.”

“So no then.”  Alanna nodded.  “Good.”

“Okay, that’s rude!”  James protested.  “It was kind of cool!  I’d recommend it, if I thought anyone had free time.  Actually, wait, Anesh!  You have multiplicative free time!  I can recommend it to you!”

Anesh politely nodded, then turned to Alanna.  “So, any ideas for mountain names?”

“Hey!”

Alanna grinned as she rolled over James’ protests.  “Well, we already used ‘ascent’ in something.  How about Something-Pinnacle?”

“Ooh, I like that.”  James nodded, aggregation dropped in an instant.  “I do think we should give Morgan and Color-Of-Dawn the option to name it first though.”  He shrugged.  “It just feels like a fun tradition, that carries on the rules that biologists have for who gets to name species, right?”  James took a small sip of his drink and sighed as the chocolate and coffee flavors covered his tongue.  “I dunno about you two, but I think it’s kind of important that we actually have some fun.”

“I’m in favor of fun.”  Alanna vigorously nodded.  “But.  Counterpoint!   They are teenagers.  What if they name it something dumb?”

“Color-Of-Dawn is…” Anesh trailed off.  “Camraconda ages are weird.”  He concluded.

“They are *teenagers*.” Alanna insisted.

“Then they name it something dumb, and we get used to it, and it goes from being a joke to a cultural default.  Just like every meme or piece of slang ever.”  James gave her a long suffering look.  “Did you know the kids these days say ‘bet’ as a declarative affirmation verb?”

“I don’t think that’s true, but I also can’t prove you wrong.”  Alanna said.  “Also that sounds dumb?”

James chuckled.  “I mean, I bet that’s what my parents thought every time I called something ‘rad’.  And their parents thought when they said ‘cool’.  Do you wonder if, like, there was some weird Roman slang for ‘I like this’ that irritated the parents of the time?”

“Oh, how could there not be?”  Anesh stretched out, tilting his wire chair back onto two legs.  “It is the duty of children to annoy adults.”

“That’s what people keep saying about us!”  James cheerfully declared.

The three of them shared a laugh.  The conversation idled for a bit, as Anesh decided that he too wanted a muffin, and Alanna stood up a minute later to go use the restroom and stretch her legs.  James enjoyed the brief alone time, casually reading about card games on his phone as he took in the night ambiance.  There were shouts and laughs from down by the pond, one of the omnipresent groups of kids that James fondly remembered being when he was younger.  The sound curled in the air around him, much like the warm night breeze and the smells of cooking food from the nearby restaurants, forming a comfortable blanket that no amount of police surveillance would cut through.

James sighed and rolled his eyes as he had that thought, glancing over at the still-parked cop car, and the officer inside who was either on the longest lunch break ever, or was here waiting for something.

He rolled his eyes, and decided his response to this would be a resounding ‘whatever’.

There was, at the end of the day, only so much the police could do to stop them.  There was a reason that Response teams never teleported to exactly where the problem was.  And there was also a remarkably high level of security in being unable to be located.  It wasn’t impossible to infiltrate the Order, but it would be very, very hard for a militarized force to do significant damage to them.

And maybe the local PD was, specifically, looking for him.  Maybe thinking of arresting him, or worse.  Well, good luck to them.  James could teleport and block bullets, and had a handful of tricks besides.  He knew, *knew*, he wasn’t immortal or invincible.  But it would take more than one cop menacing a parking lot to make him worry.

Then Alanna came back and dropped into her seat, breaking his increasingly confrontational line of thought with a sigh.  “Anesh is still in line.”  She informed him.  “Also, hey, it’s really cool that no one gives a shit about the camracondas.  You were right.”

“Heh.  Thanks.”  James tipped his mostly empty cup at her.  “Also Deb and Frequency are cute together.”  He added.

“You know, I’m still not all the way to fully remembering everything, but somehow, you being appreciative of interspecies romance surprises me exactly zero percent.”  Alanna grinned like a shark at him.  “You’re getting predictable!”

“Getting?!”  James half-protested.  “I’ll have you know I’ve been predictable the whole time!”  He thudded his knuckles on the table for emphasis while Alanna laughed at his display.

“Unrelated,” Alanna said after she’d stopped laughing and caught her breath, “I wanted to ask something.”

“Shoot.”

“It’s about the baths in our basement.”  She leaned forward on an elbow, turning her hand over as she tried to figure out how to word her question.  “Okay, so, it’s *cool*, don’t get me wrong.  Like, it looks awesome, and it’s not even done.  But, uh…”  She rubbed at her forehead.  “Is it not kind of weird?”

“Weird how?”  James asked.  “Like, weird in that public baths aren’t exactly a thing anymore?”

“Yes!  That!”  Alanna snapped her fingers.  “Society, as a whole, has mostly moved on, except for locker room showers, right?”

James shrugged, a little defensively.  “I mean, yes.  And I won’t lie, I’m not perfectly comfortable with it yet.  But I think it’s cool, and that discomfort is a me problem, you know?  I like the idea of collective spaces, I think.  I’ll get used to being naked near other people.  I’m already comfortable being sarcastic to authority figures, and being shot at.  Not wearing pants near my friends seems *easy*.”

“Okay, so, *yes* to all of that, and also more yes to you being pleasantly nude-“

Anesh chose that moment to return with his pastry.  “Oh, are we talking about James naked again?”  He asked with a bright smile.  “I’m on board for this conversation.”

“Agh, no!”  James stared up at the night sky, face a bright red.  “My culturally instilled hubris!”

“-but also that wasn’t what I meant!”  Alanna continued.  “And no.  Kind of.  We’re talking about the baths.”  She filled Anesh in.  “My main question is, why did *Bill* build it that way?”  She asked.  “You, I get.  You would absolutely build a cultural fusion magical fantasy public bath.”  Alanna leveled an accusatory finger at James.  “But Bill *isn’t you*.  And even if he had help and suggestions, why did they land on this idea?”

“Mph!”  Anesh swallowed the bite of blueberry muffin.  “I think I can answer that.  Bill’s thinking.”

James and Alanna shared a glance, then looked back at Anesh.  “Explain?”  James prompted.

“So, Bill’s new-ish.  But he’s been around the Lair for a while, been helping out with stuff.  He’s starting to tap into our subculture.  Now, he decides he wants to do something cool for everyone.  Something impressive.  So he thinks about how we act, and what we need, and puts the two together.  He’s not the kind of person who would default to a… whatever we have in our basement now… but he’s the kind of person who can plan and think.  So he just assumed you’d think this would be cool, and went for it.”

It was a reasonable explanation, but it left James with a new question.  “Okay, so, I get all that.  But why does it look like… you know… that?  Why not something more modern?  Bill’s kind of your average American.  So how’d he get to this style?”

“Oh!  Easy.”  Alanna answered. “What’s the coolest dungeon?”

“Clutter Ascent.”  James and Anesh said simultaneously, not missing a single instant.

Alanna nodded.  “Correct!  And what does the bath remind you of?”

“Clutter Ascent.”  They repeated in unison, reaching across the table to high five each other without looking.

Alanna grinned as they turned their high five into curled fingers, the two boys hold hands almost without thinking about it as they waited for her to continue.  She just shrugged.  “Well there you go!”  Alanna spread her hands.  “That actually fits pretty well.  Bill did also say that his kid suggested making the bath from Harry Potter, which… I mean, same kind of vibe, right?  Practical, but a little magical.  Very magical, I guess.”

“The mosaic of Rufus on the wall is also kind of great.  Think we can get one of Fredrick too?”  James wondered.

“...The… gecko guy from the attic?”  Alanna asked.

“Yup.  Gecko raccoon spider thing.  He’s cute.”  James nodded.

“Why is so much dungeon life combinations of other things?”  Anesh asked, suddenly curious.  “We’ve never really delved into that question.”

Alanna shrugged.  “I mean, reading the report from Momo, most of the mountain is just ‘what if parts of the landscape were trying to kill you’.  So that’s novel, at least.”

“Oh good, we’re back to being beaten up by terrain.”  James nodded a couple of times.  “You know, I think the first major injury from a dungeon delve was be being concussed by a plant?”

“What?  No!  It was when *someone* missed with a crowbar and broke my fingers.”  Anesh retorted.

James cleared his throat, looking sheepishly down at the table and wondering if he could hide under it, despite all the holes in its surface.  “Okay,” He said, deciding his escape was unlikely, “well, in my defense… I was still level one at the time.”

“That probably isn’t a thing!”  Anesh was being boisterous, but clearly wasn’t actually mad.  “Ah, well.  Now we can get beat up by new plants.  It’ll be fun, I’m assuming.  Also, we should *really* be bringing back samples of things to do more detailed analysis on.  And, I’m not sure if you know this, but Research wants to spend something like twenty thousand American monies on a spectrometer just for the weird Route rubber we brought back.  So we may as well make them earn it.”

“Oh yeah, I *still* haven’t been told what’s weird about that stuff.”  James shook his head.  “Do you know?  Reed has been mysteriously absent for a while.”

Alanna frowned.  “In that way where people go missing sometimes?”

“No, in the way that he’s avoiding me.”  James clarified.  Then, seeing Anesh giving him a dubious look, he cleared his throat and added, “Or he’s very busy and a hard worker…”  Anesh nodded at him, and James smiled.  “Anyway.  Yeah, I’ll catch up with him tomorrow or something.”  He sighed, suddenly realizing that his arms were starting to get cold as the night wound on, and that he maybe should have worn a coat.  James itched at the edge of the shield bracer on his left forearm.  “So hey, you two got any plans this week?”

“More Response.”  Alanan said simply.  James glanced over at her, and gave her a double take look to the small plate in front of her, raising his eyebrows at her suddenly absent muffin.  “Shut up.”  She laughed at him.  “Yeah, more Response.  Maybe a dungeon or something.  More Sewer things?”

Anesh made a concerned noise in his throat.  “We’re not doing the Sewer this week.  Experimenting with expansion, and how soon it starts to reach out.  It seemed like the most ethical one to fuck with, consdiering it’s… you know… a bloody monster.”

“It’s also under a high school that is now in session?”  James questioned.

“It’s not perfect.  But we’ve got telepads and guns.”  Anesh sighed.  “I don’t like it, but I agree with Reed.  We need to know.  Also I think Texture-Of-Barkdust is working with Lua now, which is safer, but… um… okay, I have to ask, *why* is no one making a big deal out of the camracondas?”

“I have no idea.”  James admitted.

Alanna pointed at him.  “Refuge in audacity.  You’ve gotten away with it a lot.  It’s a very real psychological thing that works on humans.  You know that thing where you can get into most buildings with a high vis vest and a clipboard?  Yeah, it’s that.  If they acted like they were asking permission, people might say no, but they’re not.  They’re eating cake and sitting behind the guidance counselor's desk.”  She chuckled.  “It could also be a dungeon thing.  But if it is, it’s working hand in hand with goooooood ol’ human blind spots.”

“Works for me.”  James shrugged.  “Anesh?  Got anything going on this week?”

His boyfriend glowered at him.  “I mean, now I’m going to be trying to shape an infomorph to test if human psychological effects are weird bollocks or not.”  Anesh said.  “But also, I’m checking in on our cancer orb distribution project.  We’ve got a stockpile built up now, and the two people we picked to get it rolling are coming by the lair to discuss starting.  I think the other me is doing the Office run, just to fire off another dozen duplication boxes of anti-cancer orbs, too.  We’ve got a good supply of mana coffee coming in now, which is neat.”

“No word on that other ritual?”  James asked.  “In the tower we found last week?”

“...How, exactly?”  Anesh asked him.  James raised a finger and opened his mouth, before going quiet, and slowly lowering his hand.  “Yeah.  That’s right.”

“We really need a full time post in the dungeon.”  James grumbled, looking indignant.

“What about you?”  Alanna asked him, giving him a reassuring pat on the head.  “Saving the world again or something?”

“Nah, I’m mostly doing research and culture stuff.  A couple interviews, giving a short tour to an independent review group for the Response program, meeting some of our members that I haven’t before.  Figuring out what weird fucking strategy game half the high school kids and camracondas seems to have set up in the lobby.  That kind of thing.  Oh! And visiting a school, taking notes on that.”  James leaned forward, and his partners gave small smiles as he started talking in that voice he used when he’d just learned something new and wanted to share it with anyone who crossed his path.  “So, there’s a style of school that’s pretty much only used for exceptionally young kids called a Montessori school.  Or maybe it’s the Montessori method.  Doesn’t matter.  The point is, the idea is that it uses hands on teaching and self directed learning, with the teachers largely there to be guides, as opposed to lecturers.  So it’s less ‘you have to learn math’ and more ‘find something you think is cool, and we can help you learn the math you need to get really into it’.  I like the idea, but I’m woefully underinformed, as this rambling explanation may have clued you in on.  So I’m gonna go ask some questions, look around, and see if it’s the kind of thing we want to implement on an arcology scale.”

“I *knew* this was gonna be an arcology thing!”  Alanna laughed heartily.  “*Is there*, James, *anything* that you aren’t planning to put in your magical future city?”

“Uh… cars?”  James widened his eyes as he thought.  “Crime and poverty?  Transphobes.  I dunno, I’ll make a list for you.”

“Wait, so you’re not doing any dungeon stuff this week?”

James gave another idle shrug.  “I might go check out Route Horizon with some people down there.  I plan on doing regular check ins with the ratroaches anyway, just to make sure they’re doing alright.  Getting acclimated to things like sunlight and not being at constant risk of stabbing.”  He pushed his chair back, and stretched, indicating that he was about ready to head out.  “Right now, though, I’m good to walk back.  Either of you wanna come with me?”

“Nah, I’m just gonna telepad back to the Lair.”  Alanna said.  “Anesh?”

“I’ll come with you.  I’m just helping set up a server rack in the basement, but it’s still a thing I promised to do.  Shouldn’t take too long?”  Their boyfriend did not look like he believed himself.

“Alright.  We’ll see you later tonight, yeah?”  Alanna asked James.

“I’ll be at home, yeah!”  James smiled and stood, bending down at the waist to give Alanna a kiss.  Then he pivoted on the ball of his foot like a dancer, still leaning forward, to give the same kiss to Anesh.  “See the two of you later!”

The three of them shared a group hug before parting ways, Anesh and Alanna slipping around the corner and out of sight from the road to teleport away, and James spinning around to walk back the way he’d came.  He passed by the big plate glass window of the cafe as he did so, and couldn’t help but give a giddy grin as he saw Frequency-Of-Sunlight lean forward to flick her tongue over Deb’s nose.

He passed by the cop car as he left; still there, still watching.  James gave the guy inside a sarcastic salute, before rounding the corner around another building himself.  He briefly considered teleporting home, just in case, but that might have been too suspicious, even for him.  So he just shoved his increasingly chilly hands in his pockets, and started heading back at a brisk pace.

James stopped at his apartment just long enough to grab a coat, and to greet the giant white ball of fuzz named Auberdeen that met him at the door.  He asked the dog if she wanted a walk - in Spanish, of course, the language the dog had picked up from an orb - and still feeling pretty energized, James clipped a leash to their pet-and-maybe-roommate, and headed back out into the night.

It had been a good day.  Just… nothing happening.  There were absolutely things happening at the Lair, and there always would be.  But there was no crisis that James needed to solve.  No huge problems he had to address right now.  His main responsibility today was to make dinner later for his loves, and see how many episode of Castlevania he could get through.

Tomorrow, there would be time to help out around the Lair.  To dig into how to abuse the magics they’d earned.  To try to build a city in a day.  To hire some people.  To answer some questions.  To do *so much*.

But the days off helped him look forward to it with an excitement he thought that he’d lost a long time ago.  And so he valued this downtime a lot.  Even if he was itching to see if he and Anesh actually could pilot that weird mech they’d built in the basement.

But again.  That was for tomorrow.

Right now, he had a dog to walk.