Chico didn’t like this idea at all. I never really ever feel him get nervous about anything, but here he was, sweating bullets being so far away from me, and the only way this could process through his head was through anger. I could almost feel his mental growls shake me to my core, all the way from where he stayed by Kis’ side.

Dude, shut up, I told him for the thousandth time, exasperated, I’ll be right back, ‘aight? Just chill, dude. I knew how he felt, though. In the aftermath of whatever the hell that confrontation had been between Kis and Volterra, Kis had been a wreck and it would’ve been shitty of me ‘n Cheek if he had just left her like that, defenseless against the sheer trauma of being alive. Her reactions to it were explosive but I couldn’t fault her for any of it; I mean, I felt a lot of the same things she did, but I was stuck with wrestling with the idea of my own ignorance and stupidity—while she had just gone for fucking murdering the dude. And yeah, I have to admit she won the “hardcore” debate on that front.

But the cards didn’t stack up right no matter how hard I looked at it and I couldn’t stop thinking about Volterra and how his eyes had looked as he was getting the shit knocked out of him like that. And even though my time had been wrapped around Kis’ physical and wounds—well, I couldn’t let myself forget about the other side so easily, either. It just seemed like too much of an explosion to leave that kind of tinder loose and wandering around. I hated snooping but shit was becoming my business and I had to put the tea down.

Except neither me nor Cheek thought it’d be a good idea to look for the huge bastard while Kis knew about it. I didn’t want to remind her of it so soon after her outburst, rubbing it in her face like that when it was still so raw from the tears and the shouting and whatever. Besides, what she had said to him during the fight (She's a demigoddess too. Maybe you'd like to—complete the set. Collect all three.) Ugh just thinking about it gave me the fucking willies. Anyway, neither of us thought it’d be a good idea to let her know that I was thinking about him, and that I was thinking about visiting him.

It wasn’t hard for me to sneak away, though; I dunno, maybe her body isn’t built for emotions after all or maybe I’m downplaying her distress, or whatever, but Kis often fell into fitful naps, probably because it helped ease her injuries and dulled whatever was going on in her head at the same time. So when she laid down for her next sleep, I was free to break away from her and her bronze with Chico standing vigil, keeping an eye on her to let me know if she woke up. Chico didn’t like thinking about what might happen if she woke up before I returned—but he was being a bro and I owe him like, 3 pizzas, man.

I went back to the Fields because that was the last place we had left him—and I figured if he had been well enough to move then I didn’t need to worry. Which is why I bit my lip when I saw that he was still there, which meant that I was right to be anxious about it. Not like I knew what to do about it or who to go to without wandering too far from Kis. But I couldn’t just forget, I dunno. “Eesh,” I said under my breath, seeing the sheen of gold scales on his back, his dragon just as incapacitated as her master. Chico’s mind reeled at the shared sight of her, and he was pissed all over again because he wasn’t there to fight for me. Jeez dude, I can handle myself, don’t trip.

“’Ey, man,” I said, calling over to the black mass laying in the pale moon’s light, “You ‘aight?”


"talk"