The Daily Grind - Chapter 173 (Patreon)

We're back!

___

“Do no harm, but take no shit.”  - Moira Fowley-Doyle, Spellbook of Lost and Found -

_____

“How are they?”  James asked.

He was standing in a space that had once been, and still technically was, a containment and quarantine facility for people who were either under the effects of unknown memetic agents, host to novel infectious diseases, or who just wanted to kill James in some way.  It was all clean white tile and bright lights.  No shadows or blemishes, and no sense of lingering hostility either, which he appreciated.  This place existed for a purpose, but that purpose didn’t have to be *mean*.

They had used it twice.  It wasn’t something that came up much.  Three times, now, if you counted its apparently ongoing conversion to a well appointed medical facility.

He was talking to Deb, who was currently sitting at the desk in the observation space, sipping lukewarm coffee and wincing as she couldn’t stop smelling the ichor and blood that had been near her hands an hour ago.  Her hair, kept perpetually short, was still pulled back in a tight bun to make absolutely sure it had kept out of her eyes and or patients, and she hadn’t remembered to undo it yet.  Her eyes looked tired.  It was a feeling James emphasized with.

“Alanna is fine.”  Deb started with, pushing the unpleasant coffee away and leaning back. “She has a concussion, but the cuts weren’t deep.  Whatever threw her around was the problem, her super skin kept her from bleeding too much or losing a kidney.”

James sighed in relief.  “I think it was more that it was just a glancing hit.  If the thing had meant to nail her, it’d be worse.”

“As with Arrush.”  Deb pronounced the ratroaches name like a whisper, no hard r’s involved, and James suddenly wondered if he’d been butchering the name.  She glanced up to the window of the observation chamber where her patient was currently sleeping.  “Two things you need to know about his physiology.  First, he is *built to break*.  If he wasn’t, he’d be dead already.  He has between eighteen and thirty broken bones, depending on how you count, major blood loss, several lacerations that would have been lethal to a human, and also frostbite.  And *yet*, he is still alive.”

James followed her line of sight to where the ratroach was laying on the medical cot, breathing heavily, an IV drip feeding into his arm.  “What’s the second thing?”  He said softly.

“He’s not meant to break painlessly.  From everything I can tell, his species has incredibly dense nerve clusters.  His skin, where he has it, would be able to feel tiny differences in temperature, or even wind speed, without any real focus on his part.  Internally, he actually has the same kind of nerves that you have on your fingertips woven into his muscles and I *suspect* around organs.  They are built to *feel pain*, James.”  Deb closed her eyes, and held them that way for a long breath.  “And I didn’t even notice before.  I only just realized he was reacting, *while unconscious*, to being touched.  Had to restrain him to sew up that hole in his side, even with anesthetic.  I hate this.  I… ugh.”  She made a small noise, deflating slightly into the chair.  “When did I become our doctor?”  Deb whispered.  “I haven’t even gotten my nursing certification and I’m doing improv surgery.”

“But he’ll live?”  James asked, deciding to loop back to the personal crisis in a minute.

Deb took a deep breath and nodded.  “Yeah.  Nik and his authority kept him from losing too much blood - and it is blood, by the way, you don’t need to call it ichor - and I have the majority of the breaks splinted.  And his body is absurdly resistant to infection.  I think it might be *eating* it, as stupid as that sounds.   When he wakes up, there’s a pile of purples with his name on it, too.  Otherwise, I’ll start looking into how to make casts, I guess.”

“Then that’s why you’re our doctor.  I mean, that, and because we’re starting to hit the point where a good majority of our members aren’t human, and you are literally *the* leading medical expert on ratroach treatment.”  James sighed, leaning his shoulders back against the wall by the door.  “So… Good job!”

Deb stared at him, head between her arms but no longer supported by them as she turned to give James an incredulous look, hands held open as if to say ‘what the hell, dude’.

Before she could actually get into rattling off reasons why she was a bad pick for all of that, someone buzzed themselves through the security door to the observation room.  Two people, actually.  JP, and one guy James didn’t recognize.  Thin, hawkish nose, someone he hadn’t actually seen around the Lair before.

But he’d been the one to buzz in, and JP was following him, so James didn’t get up from his perch against the wall.  The new guy made a beeline for Deb, and handed her a pair of folders, one thicker than the other and packed with documents of some kind.  “Thanks Aaron.”  She said, tiredly.  “Is this everyone?”

“Yup.  Except him?”  The guy expertly raised a single eyebrow, like he practiced it, and jutted a thumb at James.

“That’s your boss.”  Deb said offhandedly as she started flipping through the smaller folder.

“Hey!”  James protested.

The new guy just looked awkward.  “Oh!  Uh, sorry sir!”  Was all he said, nodding once at Deb and then scurrying out of the room, holding the door for Anesh to follow in after him carrying a heavy backpack.

“What the heck was that about?”  He asked, affectionately bumping shoulders with James.

JP just grinned.  “I like him.  Shows proper deference!”

“This is why we broke up.”  Deb said without looking up.  And then, as if suddenly catching up to what she’d just said, snapped her head up with a horrified look on it.  “Wait, no, I mean…!”

But JP’s face had already cracked.  Not the direction James had expected, though.  His friend wore a massive grin, and it didn’t take long for him to burst out laughing.  A big, hearty laugh, like he’d gotten used to being at ease and happy.  “Ha!  Ah, yeah, that checks out, huh?”  He said eventually, wiping at the corner of his eye.  “Hey.  So, who’s the new guy?”

“My assistant.”  Deb was now hiding behind the folder, trying to cover up the bright red flush on her cheeks.  “He’s… fine.  Smart, picks up stuff well.  Good at using knowledge from yellows.  But kind of a jerk, really.  You know the kind, the sort of people who no one’s ever said no to?”

“I honestly haven’t met anyone like that.”  James said.  Everyone turned slowly to stare at him.  “What?”  He asked.

Anesh cleared his throat.  “Really?”  He said.

“Yeah, I don’t meet many people who… oh, I mean, I guess you’re counting everyone who tried to kill us?”  Slowly, Anesh, and then the others, all nodded at him.  “Okay, well, yeah.  I just mean they don’t tend to work here.”

Deb sighed.  “Yes, because exposure to this place changes us.”  She intoned in a dramatic voice.  Or, what she thought was a dramatic tone, anyway.  Her voice cracked halfway through and she ended up covering a dry cough.  “Ugh.  I’m too tired for this.”  Pivoting, she leveled a finger at Anesh. “Why are you here?”

“Uh…!  To… talk to my boyfriend?”

“Good.  You!”  She turned her finger on JP.

“Here to request visiting hours for Keeka, and also to ask for medical advice for his sprained ankle.”

James spoke before he could stop his mouth from opening.  “If you’re teaching new people your ways, you shouldn’t start with the sprained ankle thing.”  JP didn’t even turn as he flipped James off.  But the grin on his face was still easy and unfazed.

With a sigh, Deb lowered her finger.  “Same as for a human; keep weight off it, it’ll heal over time.  They *can* take ibuprofen, but *no aspirin*.  Double the recommend dose, or it won’t do anything.  And I’ll text you a list of times.  Thanks for asking.”

“Yeah, I’m trying something new.”  JP said casually.  “Alright, I’m out.  You’ve got my number.  James, Anesh, good to see ya.  Drop by sometime, help fight road monsters.  Love the new tattoo.”

James blinked. “The new…” He raised his hand to where JP was pointing, before frowning and dropping his arm.  “I got poisoned by angry wood.  Don’t judge me.”

JP cleared his throat.  “Ah.  Well.  Then I… hate it?  Or is it… you know what? You do you.”  He reclaimed his cheerful attitude, hastily pulling out a telepad he had obviously prepared earlier, and blinking away suddenly.

The other three stared at where he’d been a moment before.  Deb spoke first.  “Is he… okay?”

Pushing himself off the wall, James rolled his eyes.  “He’s overcompensating for everything he thinks he screwed up.  But… I dunno.  That was weird.”

“It felt a lot more sincere.”  Anesh commented.  “Did something happen to him?”

“Possible.”  James admitted.  “People’s lives go on when they’re not on camera, you know.”

“How is the whole Townton thing going, anyway?”  Deb asked.  “Sunny wanted to go check it out, but I’m worried.  Because, you know, everything to do with that.”  She gestured idly at where JP had been.

It had been going good, actually.  James had spent the last four hours catching up on reports, and he was kind of surprised by how smooth it had been.  Smooth relative to their normal lives, anyway.

The majority of survivors had taken payouts from the Order to start new lives, handing over property rights to their destroyed homes.  That, mixed with the Horizon cult also transferring ownership of the *many* properties they owned around the city had left them with actual, factual, legal ownership of most of the place.

It did fall below the minimum population to actually be legally a city in Tennessee, though.  Which made them… something else.  It was unclear.  Their lawyer - they had a real lawyer now! - was trying to get them registered as an unincorporated township.  But was running into the ongoing problem of the place not being remembered, or connected to any actual highways.

Also there were still roving packs of asphalt and bone claw monsters that prowled the streets.  They weren’t spreading out into the wild areas around the city, as far as anyone had noticed; instead staying within a few hundred feet of asphalt at all times.  But it was ‘a problem’ in a lot of ways.

But JP and his group were making progress.  Picking off the creatures - they called them necroads - recovering personal effects from destroyed homes to ship back to victims, and making sure that there weren’t any leftover surprises from the Mechanic still around.  Also looting.  JP didn’t call it looting, but they were looting.

There were more than a few banks in Townton, and no one really felt like diving Bank of America their money back.

James caught them up to speed while Deb half-listened and half-napped, and Anesh, having heard this before, slipped into Alanna’s room to sit with her while she slept.

“I don’t really get why you put JP in charge of that.”  Deb said, shaking her head.  “I mean, he’s not a bad guy or anything, but...”

“Oh!”  James gave a bark of laughter.  “He put himself in charge, more or less!  Again, he’s trying to unfuck everything.  Also… okay, you know how he’s absolutely ravenous for people to compliment him, and-“

“Yes.”

“...okay, wow, no hesitation, eh?”  James chuckled again.  “Well, I think he’s figuring out that he doesn’t need to con anyone to get that.”  James shrugged.  “It’s kind fun.  Reminds me of a sci-fi book series I read a while back, about a couple people with too much power and the emotional development of middle schoolers, trying to puzzle through why the people they governed were voting for them on purpose.”

Deb stared at him.  “I understood all those words individually, but I think the wisdom coffee is wearing off.”

“Okay, yeah.  Go to bed.  It’s… like, almost midnight?  Go sleep!”  James insisted.  In response, the beleaguered young surgeon nodded, and slowly lowered her head to the desk.  “Go to sleep in your bed.”  James rephrased the statement more securely.  “Don’t you have a permanent room here?  Here, I’ll help you walk if you need to.”

“No, no, ‘m fine.”  Deb insisted.  “I just don’t want to leave Arrush here alone.  Davis’ll be here in an hour.  I’ll sleep then.”

“Davis?  Why?”

“He was a med student for a few years before he switched majors in, like, the 80s.”  Deb muttered.  “He’s a decent guy.  Good with patients.”

“I feel like I’m gonna regret asking this, but how many injuries are you two dealing with around here?”  James was suddenly concerned.

Deb shrugged awkwardly from where she was slumped over.  “A few minor things a week.  Research keeps causing small explosions, and the camracondas aren’t used to living… uh… that’s it.  They aren’t used to living.  We need an actual dedicated space for this, or for local hospitals to clear up.  And learn alien biology.”  She paused.  “Also, don’t forget that you need to get your arm looked at.  Probably by someone with an X-ray they don’t have to get someone to sneak you into.”

“If it’s any consolation, at least around here, the hospitals *are* getting less overwhelmed.”  James told her, deflecting from his own injury.

“Oh good.”  Deb sarcastically bit off.  “Maybe soon the people who think medicine is a liberal Jewish hoax will stop getting in the way.”

James cleared his throat.  “You seem to have… an opinion…?”

“I’m gonna build a catapult that fires vaccinations.”  Deb muttered sleepily.

James covered his grin with a hand, closing his eyes and trying not to laugh at the exhausted woman who’d saved the life of at least one member of the Order today.  Glancing over, he saw Alanna awake and talking quietly to Anesh, and so he stepped back from Deb’s makeshift pillow with similar quiet and slipped in the door to join them.

“Hey.”  Alanna said upon seeing him.  “We fucked up.”

“Hello to you too.”  James said, going for a more traditional greeting.  “How ya feeling?”

“My head hurts.”  Alanna said bluntly.  “Probably something to do with the part where I hit a boulder with my head.  I’m still waiting on the doc’s opinion on that one.”

Anesh shifted his chair over, giving James some room to stand.  “It’s pretty bad.”  He told James with a tone that indicated he wasn’t at all serious.  “She’s talking like you when you’re in a comedy mood.  The head trauma must be extensive.”

“Hey!”  James and Alanna both said at the same time, giving their boyfriend mock glares.

But James couldn’t keep up the joking forever.  He took a deep breath, and let it out along with a lot of the tension he’d been feeling.  Of the two people seriously hurt, at least now he had proof half of them were reasonably okay.

“I’m glad you’re okay.”  James said.  “Let’s not do that again for a while.”

“Yeah, especially until we undo our fuckup.”  Alanna said.  “Because it wasn’t the dra… okay, it wasn’t *entirely* the dragon.”

Anesh looked between the two of them as James started nodding.  “Sorry, what?”

“Arrush.”  James said, trying and failing to pronounce it like Deb had.  He couldn’t get the r’s right.  “We didn’t… we just assumed that because we’d seen him fight a couple times, he was competent in the same way we’ve been training ourselves and the rest of the Order to be.  And…”

“And we fucked up.”  Alanna said again.  “He saved our lives, but holy shit, did you see how he fought?”

“Graphically.”  Anesh said. “But I’m actually not as battle hardened as you two.  What am I missing?”

James closed his eyes, tilting his head down as he answered in a soft voice.  “He fought like he didn’t expect to live through it.”  He said.  “He wasn’t trying to survive.  He was trying to kill his target.  And maybe it was just the only thing he had as an option, but… no.”  He looked back up and met Anesh’s eyes.  “He threw himself away like he was expendable.  And before we let him, or Keeka, or *any* of the others we’ll inevitably rescue from there get involved with any kind of delving activity, we need to make damn sure we actually go through real training with them.  And also therapy.”

“Do ratroaches respond to therapy?”  Alanna muttered, sinking back into her pillow.  “They seem more alien than we’ve run into so far.”

“I think the problem,” James told her, “is that they’re not alien at all.  They’re reacting like abuse victims are.  We’re seeing high levels of trauma in action.  And we absolutely shouldn’t have taken Arrush into the field.  I suspect that he came along in part because he thought it was required of him to stay with us, even though I told him otherwise.  Because… well.”

“Because you can’t believe people once you’ve spent long enough being lied to by your mom.”  Alanna answered.  James and Anesh both looked at her, thin frowns on their faces and sympathetic hurt in their eyes.  “Parents.  Dungeon.  Whatever.”  Alanna tried to wave it off.  “Ugh.  I’m dizzy.  I need to sleep.”

“Yeah.  Good call.”  James said, leaning down to gently kiss her on the part of her forehead that wasn’t a massive bruise.  “I’ve gotta go talk to Reed, if he’s even here.”

“Oh, before you go.”  Anesh leaned down and unzipped the backpack he’d been hauling around, revealing a row of textbook spines.  Most of them battered, slightly waterlogged, and otherwise damaged.  “Want a rundown of the dungeon’s power?”

“It has been *two hours*.”  James spoke with resignation.  “Is this Nik? Did Nik just start cramming more magic into his face?”

“Surprisingly, yes.”  Anesh said.  “But don’t think too badly of him, I asked, and we had backup around.”  He sat back, not bothering to pull the books out of the bag.  “Each of these corresponds to a skill.  Not specifically a college course or anything, but there’s a lot of overlap.  For whatever reason, we all have one slot for them that we got when we left.  *I* think it’s because we killed the dragon, but it might be something else.  Anyway. The books contain a single power that resonates with the skill it lists.  You *do* get a chance to refuse if you want, and a little advance knowledge, which is nice.  The books-“

“Yeah, dang, how often do the dungeons actually ask for informed consent?”  James cut in.  Then, seeing Anesh glowering at him, held up his hands in a placating gesture.  “Sorry!  Carry on!”

“...the *books*, James, are reusable.”  Anesh switched back to his normal lecture tone.  “Same power every time.  What am I forgetting?”

“Do the powers cost anything, and is it blood?”  Alanna said, not opening her eyes from the bed.

Anesh nodded.  “Yes, and no.  Breath.  As in, the pool we’ve already gotten.  But *here’s the thing* that makes it a problem.  When you spend your Breath mana, or whatever we’re gonna call it, it apparently feels like it’s sucking the actual air out of your lungs.  Along with a drop in internal temperature.  And that’s not just a feeling; it *does* make you colder.”

“That might be useful, actually.”  James said.  “As far as side effects go.  We could go to California!”

“We already go to California.  Regularly.”  Anesh looked confused.

“We could go *outside* in California, and not just an air conditioned office!”

“Touché.”  Anesh nodded.  “Anyway.  Nik and Alex picked already.  Nik took the anatomy book, and got a power that lets him replenish blood with ice, snow, or cold enough water.  I think he’s actually trying to end up as a healer.  Alex took the Endurance book you… I guess made?  It’s weird.  Oh, also, no idea if the books being damaged makes them less effective.”

“What do we have?  I might save my slot.”  Alanna muttered.

“Go to sleep!”  James bopped her on the nose.  “This can all wait!”

Anesh answered her anyway.  “Human anatomy, spatial geometry, civil architecture, the Endurance one, early history of Australian Aboriginal peoples, and one that’s got a damaged title but I’m pretty sure is just industrial workplace safety.  Got a preference?”

“I don’t… know.”  James said.  “Doubling up on Endurance tempts me.  I’ll talk to Alex first, though.”

From the door to the room, a raspy voice called their attention.  “Architecture, please.”

James snapped his head up to see Arrush, IV stand dragging behind him, wearing nothing but his fur, standing and barely supporting himself against the doorframe.  “Jesus Christ!  Get back in bed!  What are you *doing*!?”  He rushed over, Anesh shoving his chair back behind him and keeping up.  As gently as possible, remembering what Deb had said, James looped an arm under one of Arrush’s main limbs, and tried to support as much of the ratroach’s weight as he could.  “Come on, carefully now.”  He moved slowly, linking hands with Anesh to support Arrush’s back, and guiding him back to his bed.

Deb spotted them as they did so, jerking awake with a snort, eyes widening in alarm and the kind of fury a doctor manifested when you started trying to walk on a broken splinted leg.  With her help, and under her guidance, they get Arrush laying back down.

“...And *stay there*!”  Deb finished her command as they got him settled.  “I don’t want to tie you down, but we *will* if you do this again!  You need to heal, and you can’t do that if you’re stressing your fractures and breaks even more!  So *stay here!*”

She stalked off, leaving Arrush breathing heavily and James standing next to his bed, while Anesh gave them space.

“Hey.”  James said.  “How ya doing?”  He quietly asked their newest team member.

“Hurt.”  Arrush said.  “I heard… you.”

James nodded.  “Figured.  How much? Just the books, or…?”

“I am… a problem…” Arrush heaved out the words, speaking taking a lot of effort with his broken ribs, but with a resigned note to his speech regardless.

“That’s not how people work.”  James told him, reaching forward and almost setting a hand on Arrush’s shoulder.  But then, he stopped at the last second, and withdrew. “You’re different.  New.  We need to adjust, and we didn’t.  We’ll all do better next time, okay?  We’re mad at *ourselves*, not at you.  For not doing what we should have done.”

“Mmh.”

“Yeah, mmh.”  James snorted.  “So stop thinking you need to make yourself useful, or push past your breaking point.  Sit here, rest.  We’ll get you a stack of purples for accelerating the process, if you want them.  Keeka will be here tomorrow to stay with you, probably.  If you get bored, I’ve got books to loan you.”

“Architecture.”  Arrush restated.

“If you want.”  James’ voice was sad.  “You really don’t need to worry about that right now.”

The ratroach looked up at him with all six of his slightly asymmetrical eyes.  The beady points blinked at James, before turning as best he could to look away.  “Want to.”  Arrush said slowly, measuring his breath and words.  “You… keep talking… about building… things.  Cities.”  He sucked in a harsh breath, and continued.  “They sound… beautiful.  The one I have… seen… is… beautiful.  I want to… build things…” He trailed off, and it took James a minute to realize that he had fallen asleep, and was snoring softly.

“I know the feeling.”  He whispered, turning and softly pulling the door open to duck back out of the room.  “He’s asleep.”  He told Deb, before noticing that she, too, was napping.  From the other room, Anesh gave him a wave, and a nod to a sleeping Alanna.  “Okay, everyone’s asleep.”  He smiled to himself a little.

Truth be told, he could go for some sleep himself.

There was a small amount of his brain, currently, that was devoted to keeping him focused and moving from task to task.  Which was important, because other parts of his brain were mostly engaged in silent screaming, and sleep seemed like a great idea on how to shut them up.  Part of him was still, again, grappling with how close they’d come to death, the situation turning in an instant to something less adventure and more execution.  Part of him was revolted by the fact that he’d had his perception, and his inner thoughts, hijacked and twisted by the awe beam the dragon had hit them with.  Part of him, a smaller part this time, was just in an ongoing state of panic over his general responsibilities to the Order.

All of those parts of his brain were running out the clock on his mental energy, and he hadn’t actually gotten any sleep between the several hours of exploration and multiple dangerous battles to the death, and now.  So maybe a nap was in order.  Or maybe just lunch.  It was after midnight, so Nate probably wasn’t in the kitchen to get annoyed at James for using the flat top to fry a bunch of potatoes.

Slowly, the screaming parts of his brain rotated, and locked into agreement with him.  Yes, yes, death was scary and being mentally co-opted was bad.  But potatoes sounded good right now.  And Anesh was here to keep an eye on things.  So, everyone was going to be okay, and he could just take some time to himself.

He got four steps out the door before Reed caught up with him.  “Hey!  I got your message.  You have some questions?”

“Why are you even *here*?”  James asked.  “It’s late!”

“...none of us have ever been on normal schedules and you know it.”  Reed confusedly rebutted.  “Anyway.  What’s going on?  Everything alright?”

James sighed.  “Okay, walk with me.  I’m gonna go make food.  I’m starving.”

He started walking through the basement, to the overly elaborate mezzanine, and onto the elevator up to the ground floor.  It was late enough he didn’t have to wait long, and he sort of idly listened to Reed talk while they were moving.  A short jump later, the elevator doors dinged open, and James, still being trailed by their head of Research, took long and mostly steady steps around a couple corners back to the dining area and the swinging doors to the kitchen.

“...Anyway, it’s mostly just a quick test to see how people approach problems.”  Reed said.  “People who don’t think too hard are just gonna list names of people to shoot.  But anyone with a little imagination will ignore the gun entirely.  So…”

“Reed, I’m sorry, I’ve been thinking about blood this whole time.”  James admitted, cutting him off.  “For magic reasons.  Not just… you know what?  I will not be explaining.  Can you just repeat that?  Sorry.”

“Oh, it’s not actually the important thing.”  Reed looked a little ashamed to admit that, standing awkwardly by the service counter while James found a bag of red potatoes and a knife.  “It’s a time travel question, just kind of something I found amusing recently.”

James nodded as he started washing potatoes. “I get little questions like that in my head all the time.  Or, like, exchanges from the internet, that I want to share?  Yeah.”

“Anyway.  I don’t actually have anything proactive to report.”  Reed told him, fidgeting with one of the coffee makers over in the front of the kitchen.  “Did you need to talk to me about anything?”

“Yeah.”  James said, mentally bracing himself.  “Did you know that Nikhail was using the shaper substance from the Akashic Sewer on himself?”  He asked directly, knife making punctuation marks for him as it snapped into the cutting board.

There was a pause.  Not a long one, but enough.  “No?”  Reed lied.  James bisected the last potato he was chopping, let it fall to the cutting board, and looked up with raised eyebrows.  “Okay, yes!”  Reed cracked.  “Yeah, I knew!  But it was important to him, and I wasn’t gonna say no!  I’m *terrible* at saying no, and you put me in charge of research proposals!  You knew this would happen!”

“Wow, okay, lot to unpack there.”  James looked back down and with a few quick slices turned the potato halves into chunks. “First off, I didn’t put you in charge, you did that yourself.  Second of all, you say no all the time, and you could have done it here.  Second and a half, you *could* have said yes, but done it in a controlled, safer way.  Third… this one is important.  Please remember that we are going for a blameless culture around here.  I want problems solved, not people punished, okay?”

“Sorry.”  Reed’s voice trembled.  “Okay.  Yeah, sorry.  I did know, I thought it would work out, and I didn’t want to say no and alienate Nik.”

“And the problem with… hang on, I have the message from Deb here…” James slid his pile of potato cubes into a metal bowl, wiped his hands off, and pulled out his phone, doing a quick search for what he was looking for.  “Ah, here it is.  The problem with ‘overwhelming and debilitating pain, during a time where mental focus is critical, and errors could be lethal’.  How were you planning to address that?”

“I hadn’t actually seen that.”  Reed said quietly.  “Wait, Nik… no.  No no.  That’s not…” He shook his head, wide eyed.  “I knew it hurt, yeah, but not that it could…”

He trailed off, and James sighed.  “Okay, I’ve already talked to Nikhail about this.”  He said. “And while I am *very disappointed* that he’s three of our examples of recklessly causing issues with dangerous magic, I’m not actually mad.  This mostly just highlights that what we need is to actually check in with each other.  This largely comes down to being a miscommunication.  So in the future, if something like this comes up, please either talk to whoever it is, or come to me or someone else in our community to do it. Okay?”

“I can do that, yeah.”  Reed still looked shaken.  “I think I can put aside being socially awkward if someone could die.”

“I mean, that’s the thing.  You didn’t know that was on the table here, right? It’s gotta be more proactive than that.”   James shrugged as he dumped a half cup of garlic powder into his bowl of potatoes.  “What I want, here, and to spread the idea of, is that a community of compassion is possible and working.  And part of that means, yeah, we need to care about each other more than we worry about being vulnerable.  And I *know*, believe me, I absolutely know how hard that is.  But if we keep doing it, it’ll get easier.  And then we can drag more and more people into our way of things.”

“Your way of things is terrifying for an introvert with anxiety, though.”

“I *am* an introvert with anxiety!  So I know!”  James grinned in reply.

Reed rolled his eyes, and was about to refute that point, when the kitchen doors swung open and Karen walked in with that confident stance she always seemed to be in.  That kind of motion that sung of ‘I am here for a reason, please let me through’.  Polite, but assertive.  It fit her more than when she’d first joined, and James appreciated the shift.

“Ah, you are here.”  Karen said as James dumped his bowl of potatoes onto the heated and oiled flat top.  “Good.”

“I… yes, I am here.  In the kitchen, where I am not reliably found.  Why did you say that like it was obvious?”  James paused, then cocked the spatula in his hand at her, shifting so he didn’t accidentally touch the hot surface next to him.  “Wait a minute, why are *you* here? It’s almost one AM, and you’re a normal adult!”

Karen scoffed.  “Please.  None of us are normal adults.  And I’m here to ask you for a quick inventory of any potentially useful resources you discovered.”

“Of course.”  James smiled knowingly.  “Okay.  Uh, honestly? Nothing.  We found some fruit that cools things down, but I don’t know if spreading an invasive species is the right way to fight global warming. In fact, now that I’ve said that out loud, I’m sure it isn’t.”  He shrugged.  “There might be some valuable mineral wealth underneath it, but we didn’t go digging or spelunking.  Actually, a shocking lack of caves in there.  So unless you want to harvest snow, ice, wind, or concrete, you’re out of luck.”

“Sorry, concrete?”  Reed butted in.

“There’s buildings.  I’ll have a briefing ready for *tomorrow*.”  James pointed at both of them in turn.  “Not gonna do it now.  I’m having breakfast.”

“That actually smells really good.  Is that rosemary?”  Reed shuffled closer and leaned over the grill before jerking back as James swatted at him with a towel.  “Alright, fine!  Keep your potatoes!  I wasn’t hungry anyway!”

“I made enough to share expecting this.  Sorry, Karen, was there anything else? I really don’t have any useful material stuff from this one.”  James tried to get back on track.

“Not overly concerning.”  Karen sounded perfectly at ease with the news.  “Well, I won’t take too much of your time.  But I should update you on a couple things.  First, I’d like to look into selling the Route Horizon rubber.  I believe we could get an unreasonably high price for it from a number of different companies.”

“How many of those companies are weapons manufacturers in some way?”  James asked casually.

“From a smaller, but still large, pool of potential buyers.”  Karen edited her speech on the fly without a stutter.  “Similarly, we should look into selling samples of the selectively radioactive fluid from the Akashic Sewer.  There are a number of potential applications that I think are valuable to explore with more dedicated professional research teams.”

“Hey!”  Reed chimed in.  And then, thinking about it, shrugged and added, “Actually, that’s fair.  We’re basically powered by necessicity and orb skills.”  He admitted.

“I’ll think about it.  Actually, no, wait.”  James held up a hand to correct himself.  “*We will talk about it*, and then make a community decision.  Because I need to remember that I’m not in charge here, and we need to get used to distributed leadership.”  He took a breath, and nodded at Karen, who returned the gesture.  “But also, thank you for the updates.”  He flipped his breakfast over on the grill, poking a chunk of potato with the edge of his spatula.  “Do you want some food?”  He asked.  “I made extra.”

The look on Karen’s face was the perfect picture of someone trying to avoid eating things that were just starch, oil, and seasoning, but who *really wanted* to eat those things now that she could smell them cooking at close range.  “No thank you.”  The words were pained, but confident regardless.  “Though I do have one question for you, before I go.”

“Sup?”

Karen held up her hand, the back facing James, to show off a small circular mark on her index finger.  “Recently, I shared one of the Ascent’s bonds with my daughter.”  She explained.  “But… I don’t seem to be able to… I don’t know what the term would be.  Unlock it? Connect it?”  Karen lowered her hand and looked down at her fingers.  “We aren’t strangers to each other.  I love my child, and I want her to be safe.  So I was wondering if you might know why this wasn’t working.”

“Ah!”  Reed perked up.  “I can actually answer that one!”

“Can you answer it in a way that isn’t… uh…” James cleared his throat.  “Terrible?”

“All of my answers aren’t terrible.”  Reed earnestly defended himself.  “Anyway.  We’ve actually got a pretty decent data set for the relationsticks now, and…”

“That’s such a good name.”  James cut in.  “Sorry, that’s all, carry on.  I’ll shut up.”  He cleared his throat and looked back at the browned potatoes as Karen glowered him into silence.

Reed also looked back at Karen from his slightly less effective glare at James.  “The point is, it looks like the people need to experience the same emotion at the same time.  I’d tentatively say it also needs to be from the same source.  So, when you and Liz are together, even if you’re both feeling what you’d call ‘love’ for each other, you’re loving her as a parent and she’s loving you as a daughter, and that’s not the same.  My brother and I actually had a similar-ish problem with this.”  He held up his own hand to show his own unconnected corridor mark.  “Just being family doesn’t mean we see things the same way.  Hell, it seems like it makes it *harder*.”  He shrugged.  “It’s probably not impossible.  But I don’t think it’s nearly as easy as it is for everyone else.”

“Damn.”  Karen said simply.

“That actually explains why it took Anesh and I so long.”  James said.  “We’re close, but we’re… I dunno, we experience a lot of things differently.  It took us a long time to drop our guard, even after we started dating.  Even if it’s easy for you, Liz probably has a hard time being vulnerable around you, right?”  He shrugged.  “I always did around my parents.   And I love them.  That didn’t make it easy to tell them things.  Hell, I never actually got around to coming out to them before…” He trailed off.  The memory of his parent’s disappearance still wasn’t easy to cope with.  Then, the smell of slightly singed potatoes reached his nose, and he snapped back to the moment, latching onto the crisis at hand and frantically killing the heat and scooping his breakfast onto a trio of plates.

“I may have a lead on them.”  Karen said.  “But I didn’t want to raise your hopes.”

“I’ve mostly assumed that I’ll never have them back.”  James admitted as he passed Reed a smaller portion, sending him off in search of a fork.  “They’re not gonna remember me.  And I don’t… I don’t even know if it’d be safe for them to.  I mostly just want to know they’re safe, and alive.  You know?”

“I can appreciate that.”  Karen nodded.  “I’ll let you know if we find anything.”

“Alright.  I’m gonna take this to Anesh, and then get some sleep.”  James said.  “Sure you don’t want one?”

Karen stared at the offered plate for a good ten seconds, before she precisely reached out, and plucked a single small chunk of fried red potato off the top, and popped it in her mouth, either ignoring or immune to the heat.

She closed her eyes as she chewed.  “That.”  She said.  “Is delicious.”

“Want some more?”  James offered.  “I can split this.”

“Absolutely not.”  Karen told him, wiping her hands on a towel.  “I will speak more with you tomorrow.”  She added, holding the door for him as he headed back downstairs.

“Sometimes,” James confided in Reed as the two of them reentered the elevator, “I am really jealous of how she gets to talk like a 1920’s matriarch.”

“You could do that to.  Who’s gonna stop you?”  Reed posited.  He wasn’t carrying a plate anymore; at some point between James handing him his portion and leaving the kitchen the food having been devoured.

James just rolled his eyes, giving Reed a polite nod as the two of them split up from the elevator’s entrance.  Reed back to… something.  Whatever he was working on.  And James back to feed his boyfriend.

Buzzing himself in probably announced his presence, but he still caught Anesh by surprise with a still steaming plate of seasoned potatoes under his nose.  “Here.”  James said, offering him a fork.  “Eat.”

“Oh.  Uh, thank you.”  Anesh looked like he was about to drift off himself.  “Do you have any hot sauce?”

“Any… what?  No.  What?”  James looked down at what he’d cooked.  “You mean ketchup?”

“No, I mean, hot sauce.  Not Tabasco, either; something with less vinegar.”  Anesh stated.  “For flavor.”

James gave him an offended blink.  “I put enough garlic on these to drown someone.”  He said flatly.

“Just saying, I bet someone in Research has some hot sauce.”

“I will check,” James said with a tired smile, “because I love you.  But I promise nothing, and I’m not going back upstairs.”  He ducked back out of the hospital area, holding the door for Davis to stroll in behind him and wake Deb up.  “Hey!”  James called out to the few people who were still working or goofing around in the Research floor area.  “Does anyone here, by some miracle, have hot sauce?”

“Oh, I do.”  Chevoy called back from under the desk she was running a power cable through.

Momo, who had been walking by as James had asked, also stuck her head out of the hallway.  “Yeah, and there’s the fridge in the corner there.  It’s got ketchup in it.”

“First of all, why?”   James asked, then waved his hand.  “No, nevermind.  Just… can I have some hot sauce?  I don’t need to ask questions right now.  Thank you.”   He followed where Chevoy was pointing to her own personal work station, covered in an ongoing assembly project of something he didn’t understand.  And, sure enough, a small bottle labeled ‘End Times Hot and Spicy’.  James didn’t know if this was a dungeon thing, or a hot sauce fandom thing, but either way, he tipped the bottle to Chevoy thankfully and went back to deliver it to Anesh.

As his exhausted boyfriend had something breakfast-adjacent, James excused himself, and left him and Alanna to their quiet time.  A quick check showed Arrush was now *actually* sleeping.  And Deb had stumbled out to her own bed, leaving an almost comically perky Davis behind in replacement.

“Morning, sir.”  The older man greeted James with a raised cup of something hot and delicious smelling.

James shook his head.  “Oh yeah, no, no one calls me that.”

“You can’t run from it forever.”  Davis pointed out.  “How was the mountain?”

“Cold.”  James said, enjoying the idle conversation.  Davis had this kind of way about him, the balding old guy with the friendly face who just had a way of putting even an anxiety ridden mess like James at ease during a conversation.  “I’ll go over it more tomorrow.  Probably gonna spend the whole day answering questions, just take it easy before the next crisis, you know?”

“Hah!  Yeah, that’s how we live now, isn’t it?”  Davis gave a wry smile.  “Well.  I’ll pester you about that tomorrow.  But if you’ve got a minute now…”

James muttered an interruption.  “People keep saying that to me.”

“...I can wait?”  Davis politely offered, already knowing the answer.

“No, no, I’m curious now.  Hit me.”  James took a dramatic breath and braced himself for bad news.

Davis gave a nervous chuckle.  He was adapting to the Order, but sometimes, he still didn’t know how he fit into the social structure here.  “Well.  I wanted to ask about the new baths…”

“Ah.  Yeah, how’s that going for everyone?  I’m concerned about how people are gonna react to the idea of a communal bathhouse like that.  Could you maybe set up a survey or something?”

“I actually have an intern for that now.”  Davis admitted guiltily.  “But yes.  It’s strange, I don’t know if I like it, but I see what you’re going for.  I won’t tell you you’re wrong, because historically, around here, that phrase ends up with me eating crow.  But!  My own discomfort about flapping in the breeze around my coworkers aside, I had a question about the magic.”

“Which part?”  James asked.  “The… wait, what magic is even in there?”  He rubbed idly at the wooden growth on his face, itching at the edge of it.  “I know the camracondas helped build it, but I think the whole thing is mundane?”

“The water purify isn’t, actually.”  Davis reminded him.

James snapped his fingers, then realized how loud that had been in the enclosed space of echoing tile, and winced.   He quieted his voice down, too, as he kept talking.  “Yeah, the brooch!  That thing is neat.  What about it?”

“Well, it purifies the entire pool, yes?”

“One segment of it.”  James answered easily.  “It actually caps out at around fourteen thousand gallons, which I think was a consideration when Bill designed the place.  That said, this is a copy, and we don’t know if it scales up as it levels up.”

Davis nodded.  “Right. Okay.  So, we should make more copies of this then.”

“...What for?”

“Well, I have some rough math here.”  Davis flipped open the small notebook he carried with him at all times, revealing an arcane scrawl that would put most wizard’s spellbooks to shame.  “Two days per charge, scaling down by two hours per level, which is workable.  We can fairly rapidly get that down to a day and a half.  At that point, you’re looking at one of these being able to provide for the clean water needs of roughly two hundred people a day, and the numbers only get better as it advances.  Not to mention they’re small, and easily copied.  We could, without much effort, radically improve the lives of a lot of people with this.”

“Hmm.”  James brain whirred as he processed that.  “Wait, yeah, hang on.  I was gonna say this isn’t as impactful as an anti-cancer orb, but these don’t go away, do they? They keep adding value, forever.  Oh, dear.  I didn’t think of that.”

“Well, to be fair to you, I don’t think anyone considered that one of these could turn a swimming pool into drinkable water.”  Davis replied.  “Until Bill did it, and no one realized what that meant.”

“Okay.  Okay, yes.  First off, Bill’s getting a raise.”  James nodded to himself, then cocked a finger at Davis as he started to raise a hand.  “Yes, you get a raise too.  Or something, we’ll figure it out.  Uh… wait, no no no, there’s a potential problem with this.”  James had a grim thought.

Davis wasn’t actually ahead of him, but assumed he was.  “I admit, the fact that it’s a point of vulnerability is an issue. They’re easy to steal, or lose.  But unless they’re destroyed, they don’t go away, and we can make more at a decent rate.  I think it’s worth accepting that loss, though we’ll need to put safeguards on to make sure it doesn’t end up monopolized.”

“Actually, no.”  James shook his head.  “I’m mostly thinking that we need to unlock at *least* one more power on them first.  Maybe two, to be safe.  Because if we do this, they will all eventually get there.  And if one of those powers is ‘kill people’...”

“...Oh.”  Davis deflated.  “Christ, didn’t think of that.”

“Yeah, it’s a bit grim.”  James said.  “But still.  Good idea.  We’ll keep an eye on the thing.  Actually, go check in with Knife-In-Fangs when you get a chance.  He’s got the primary one, and he uses it *constantly*.”

“Alright, I can do that.”  Davis nodded.  “Well, that was all I had.  Don’t let me keep you.”

“Heh.  Yeah, all I’m doing is sleeping until my muscles don’t ache anymore.”  James gave a friendly wave.  “Keep an eye on them, okay?”

“Absolutely, sir.”  Davis nodded seriously, and turned back to his watch on the two makeshift hospital rooms.

James grumbled about it, but figured it wasn’t worth fighting over as he left.

He was still smiling though, as he made his way to the elevator so he could loop back around to the residential basement.  It had been a good week, so far.

Their team had survived the mountain, come away stronger for it, and maybe found some cool stuff on top of that.  And everyone in the Order was… well, getting into the flow of things.  Growing together, forming ideas, trying new things.

James was aware that what they had here was fragile.  But he wasn’t operating without some kind of plan.  He wanted to build a world that worked a little better, and the Order was his proof of concept.  A place where emotional maturity was fostered, vulnerability was shared, and people worked together for each other.  And then, slowly, they could drag more and more people into it, converting them to this bizarre way of life.

But right now, no matter how tired he felt, James didn’t feel fragile.  And neither did the Order.

He was smiling as the elevator doors slid open.  And then, he had to work really hard to keep that smile as one of the new engineers sprinted to catch the door and joined him in the cab.

“Okay!”  Mars panted.  “Sorry to bother you!   Do you know where the paperweight that can’t move in one direction is? Because I think I can build a space elevator with, like, a few of those.”  He had the look of a person in the process of overcoming the barrier of feeling awkward asking their boss for something for the first time.

“It’s two AM.”  James protested weakly.  “I haven’t gone more than twenty four hours since a near death experience.  I am very tired, have to do fifteen things tomorrow, and I just realized I gave my breakfast to my boyfriend.”

Mars nodded eagerly, though his face fell as he processed what James had said.  “Ah.”  He cleared his throat, looking at the now-closed elevator doors behind him.  Trapped in an awkward situation for the next twenty second long eternity.  “So… no space elevator?”

James took a deep breath.  Let it out.  Closed his eyes and tilted his head.  “I will see if I can find it for you.”  He said, calmly.

Because at the end of the day, tired or not…

He really wanted to see where this was going.