Meeting- chase: part 2
"Damn," Xavier said, holding a flashlight on to his skin and watching as red circles appear on him, "for a household appliance, this thing is one helluva bitch maker."
Will turns away from the mirror and gives me a quizzical glance. I shrug in response and Look at Ed, who's still waking up. I watch as he runs his hand through his hair in an attempt to comb it, and makes smacking sounds with his mouth.
Xavier, on the other hand, has finally put the flashlight down and is now poking the red circles around his arm.
"Dude," I ask him, "what are you doing?"
"I already told you, or at least showed you: I'm experimenting with my new bitch maker."
"And why do you need a 'bitch maker'?" As I move out from under my sheets and rest my feet on the floor, Ed shouts and I look over to see him putting a hand over his left foot (or hoof) in pain. Soon enough the sound of Will giggling draws my attention.
"Man," he says, "if I'd done that a week ago you would've killed me."
"Yeah well the fact that you did it now just gave me the thought." Ed retorts, glaring daggers at Will.
"Oh you're fine. It's not like you took damage from a harmless prank in the safe zone of a PVE server."
"Oh yeah, my shout of pain was strictly from surprise." Ed rolls his eyes and picks up the tacks that he'd stepped on and begins flinging them towards Will, who gets hit by one and give a little shout.
"Yep, those definitely hurt." Will grabs the arm that was hit by the tack's blade and winces.
"Exactly."
We open the doors to the old castle and the sight of the aftereffects of last night's celebration being cleaned up fills my vision. We'd just figured out last night where Neverland's base was, so we decided a celebration was necessary. Surprisingly, Xavier and Tonya were able to keep their shirts on long enough for us to get them out of public eye, but it was a bit of a restless night for three hours afterwards.
Will walks over to what's been dubbed the "Strategy Table", even though it's just a round table with bar stools, and motions us over.
"Alright," he says, "thanks to Incognito going Incognito over at Neverland's base, we found out that they're all camped out in Appleloosa."
"So what? You wanna stage a raid?" I respond, "Wouldn't that be a bit too much for a guild that hasn't done any-,"
"No Jake, I'm an idiot not heartless. What I'm proposing is that, since there are five of us, two people can go to Appleloosa in an attempt to bring Steven back, while the other three check out the dungeons that were announced in last night's patch to see if any of them are the major dungeon we've been searching for." The instant Will stops talking, Ed shoots his hand up.
"I should be one of the people to go over and see Steven. It's my fault he left in the first place, so it only seems right that I go." After hearing this, Will nods his head.
"Jake, you wouldn't mind going with him in case you two are discovered before you make it over there would ya?"
"Nah, I tried to keep Steven in the group when he tried to jump off the train, so I suppose it'd help if I was there."
"Good, you two should move out immediately, while the rest of us will go and check out the possible locations for the major dungeon. We'll all meet back here in two hours. The train's gonna leave this station in a few minutes so you two better get going now."
I grab another doughnut from the food tray I snagged from the dining car earlier and offer it to Ed, who shakes his head. I shrug and bring the doughnut back to me before taking a bite and promptly spitting it out. Of all the flavors, I had to grab the damn jelly-filled one.
"Son of a bitch I got it all over the carpet." I say, bolting upwards and quickly searching for a napkin of some kind. I open my inventory and settle for using a piece of cloth armor, since I won't be using it, and quickly wipe up the mess, before trashing the now dirtied item. Once I sit back down, I notice Ed's nervous appearance.
"Hey Ed, what's wrong?" Ed sighs in response, his breath shaky, and he speaks for the first time since we got on the train.
"Steven's probably gonna be pissed the moment he sees me. Either that, or he's gonna run away and make me feel even worse. I can't see any way that this is gonna end happily. There's no way Steven's just going to accept my apology and come back to the guild with us." I look at him, a bit more seriously now, and sit upwards before putting my hand on his shoulder.
"I know Steven won't just openly accept your apology, he'll completely reject it if anything, but there's no way he'll think that your apology wasn't wholehearted. He'll know for a fact that you just got caught up in the moment, and that you wish you'd never even called him to that room. It'll take some time, but I know that he'll eventually come back to us." Ed eases up a bit, and looks up at me.
"It's not whether or not he'll accept my apology that worries me, it's how he'll react when he sees me. If it weren't for me, he'd still be in this group." Ed's eyes begin to tear up and he begins to choke on his words. "If it weren't for me screwing up and getting within range of Nightmare Moon, Matt might've had the support he needed to still be alive today." After hearing this, I grip his shoulder a bit tighter and look directly into his eyes.
"Matt's death wasn't your fault. Just like it wasn't Steven's. Matt died trying to protect us. You remember Will's favorite saying right?" Ed nod his head before wiping the tears from his face. "'If you lose hope in yourself, then have hope in others.' As much as I don't want it to be true, I think Matt lost hope in himself. He wasn't very talkative since the moment we found out we were trapped here. When I bumped into him while we were fighting that dragon, I noticed something besides the smile he gave me. I don't know why I didn't realize why, but Matt was crying during that fight." I notice Ed's eyes widen, and he looks up at me with a questioning glance.
"So, he had accepted his death from the beginning huh?"
"Unfortunately." I release my grip on Ed, and lean back in my chair. "It seems that hope is all we have these days, and Matt may have lost his." Ed nods his head before lowering it again, and he begins to sink back in his chair.
"I'm gonna try to get what sleep I missed out on thanks to Xavier last night." I nod, and grab another doughnut before looking out the window, watching what few things the desert has to present pass by.
"Well, here we are." I stare at the thicket of apple trees ahead of us as Ed wipes the sleep fro
m his eyes. "The Appleloosan woods. Once we cross through here, all we need to do is find Steven." Ed removes his hand from his eyes, looking up at the forest's entrance. I see a bit of doubt cross his face, but he quickly puts on a smile and begins walking towards the woods.
"C'mon, I wanna find Steven as soon as possible." I nod and follow behind him as he draws his bow, probably in case we run into trouble on our way. I look around at the apples growing on the trees as we enter the forest. It's rather unusual that apples are growing when it's supposed to be winter, but I guess you'd need some form of food right?
Ed and I look around us at the sights of the forest. After seeing so much sand and cacti it really is nice to see some trees for once. I grab one of the lower down apples from a tree to my left and take a bite. Ed hears me and turns around to see the apple in my hand.
"Where did you get that?" Rather than answer him, I just point upwards to the trees above us.
"Oh, right." Ed shakes his head and keeps moving forward.
Soon enough, we come across a cave with the look of a dungeon entrance. I walk up to it, but before I can press the button I notice the usual flash the indicates somebody about to leave the dungeon. I duck behind the bushes where Ed is hiding and watch as a group of four come out of the cave. The first two, a lime green thief with blonde hair and a tan engineer with black hair wearing a full body latex suit. I didn't know they had fetish clothing in this game, but it isn't entirely surprising since Xavier was able to craft condoms.
The two in back however, are Steven and Incognito. I turn away from the group and bring up my message board. I quickly type in a message to Incognito, telling him where we are, and send it off. Within a few seconds Incognito notices the message notification.
"Hold up guys," he says as he opens the message and reads it. "somebody just sent me a message."
"Aww, does somebody have a girlfriend?" The blonde haired one asks before giving a little giggle, followed by a snort.
"Not yet. But if you want me all ya have to do is ask." He winks back at the blonde one, who rolls her eyes.
"Please, I'd date a bison before I'd even think about asking you out."
"Well Steven has a bison. Care to make that a fact?"
"Go fuck yourself."
"Already did."
"Whatever, I'm gonna go talk to Pyralis."
"I'll join you." The guy in the blue fetish suit follows behind the blonde-haired one, and Incognito turns to Steven once they're out of eyesight.
"Hey Steven, can we talk for a second." Steven gives him a looks at him quizzically before responding.
"Umm, sure?"
"Alright guys, come out."
We get up from our spot in the bushes as Steven turns his head to us. When he sees us he turns to run, but Incognito grabs his arm to keep him rooted in place. I watch as Steven struggles against his grasp and look to Ed, remembering the conversation on the train. His head is hanging in an attempt to hide the tears that are starting to come from his eyes. I grab his shoulder until he looks at me, and give him the best attempt at a reassuring look I can give right now. He smiles, wipes the tears from his eyes, and looks back at Steven.
"Listen Steven," He says, "I just want to say I'm sorry about what I made you do. I know you probably don't want to see me, hell you probably never wanted to see me since the gala, but I need you to know that I was in a dark place and have been since Matt died." Steven stops struggling, and looks back at us. His fearful face replaced with a small grin.
"I'm glad to know that you're sorry for what you did." He sits down on the ground. "But if you wanted to bring me back to the guild, I wont be joining you." Ed's expression changes to one of shock, before he responds with a shaky voice.
"Why not? The guild you're in right now isn't much better."
"I'm here because it's where I need to be right now. When I joined this guild, I was told that I could become stronger. Until I am, I won't leave."
"Why would you need to be stronger? Right now you're a higher level than most of our guild members."
"I don't want to be stronger physically. I want to be stronger mentally, so that things like what happened with Matt don't happen again. I don't think I could live with myself if another one of my friends die. So I'm staying here until I can readily throw myself into danger as fearlessly as Jake here." Ed wipes some of the tears that are starting to leak out of his eyes.
"Do you know what they're doing in this guild?" Ed's voice takes on a more menacing tone. "They're killing players and recruiting others for war! They want to eradicate the Celestial Crusaders, us, just so that they can stay in this god forsaken game!" Steven looks at him with a questioning glance, before leaning back and laying down on the floor.
"Doubt it, so far the only thing that's happened around here is the celebration for a whole new group of new guys. Besides, if they wanted to assault you guys, they would've already done it. You remember the fight Jake and Pyralis had in the badlands?"
"So you were there!"
"Yeah, I was. Jake even chased me for a bit. But that's besides the point." he leans back up and stares Ed straight in the eyes. "I'm not leaving this guild until I get stronger. But if you are right, and Pyralis is secretly planning for war, then I'll leave the minute I find proof. Otherwise, I'm staying right where I am."
Ed balls up his hands, rage clearly getting the better of him. I try to grab him before he does something, but I'm too late. A fist flies at Steven, and hits him directly in the jaw. Steven looks at Ed in shock, and gets up before opening his menu.
"Alright," he says, "if a fight's what you want, I'll gladly oblige. Hell, I'll even come back to you guys if you win." Ed draws his bow, standing rigid as he waits for the duel invitation.
"But," Steven continues as the duel request is sent and Ed hits the accept button. "If you lose, I never want to see your damned face ever again." Hearing his own words from the gala reiterated and used against him, I notice Ed's demeanor changes dramatically. He goes from anger, to despair, before dawning a rather focused stance as the countdown for the duel begins.
Three...
Incognito and I back away and sit behind the bush again, watching and hoping that nothing too bad will come from this.
Two...
The tension in the air rises as Ed loads his arrow and aims for Steven's knee. Steven takes notice, and prepares to roll out of the way of the arrow. I watch as they poise for an all out battle between former friends.
One...
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You updated
5606516
Yeah, I've been a bit busy with a bunch of things, so it took me a lot longer than normal to get this chapter up.
5607755
But still you updated none the less
From
I really need to reread the earlier chapters because I have no idea whats going on
I am reminded of a story of a video game called "Better than Life!" Some people could take being cut off from the machine after awhile.