by Billy Wong
"Er, well, I guess it would be nice to catch up more with you..." She didn't sound the most eager, though. She probably visualized taxing exercises in the future. "So do you guys still plan on using the elemental's core after hearing what you did?"
Lars exchanged some whispered words with Allen and answered, "Yeah, we'll still try it. Maybe we weren't justified in killing the first one unprovoked, but since it's already dead, we might as well not let it go to waste."
"Its body is floating over there. We can grab it on the way back."
They headed back the way they came dragging the smaller elemental along, Jen helping Cart-Dragger swim as she winced. When they emerged from the pond, Lars saw she had brought her wagon. It felt a little strange seeing it empty until she laid the hammer down in it. "You took that big cart along even though it wasn't transporting anything?" he asked while he and Allen strained to pull the dead serpent out of the water. "You obviously don't need it to carry around your hammer."
"It's a habit. I just figure it never hurts to be prepared in the event there is something you'd want a cart for." She eyed the heavy carcass they had finally managed to get on land. "Case in point."
"Looks like your women's intuition was correct," he said after catching his breath.
"It's more about always being ready." The men hauled the serpent onto the wagon. Cart-Dragger moved aside. "Your first step towards repaying me will be to pull my load for me this time."
Lars figured she just didn't want to drag the cart while hurt, and potentially look weak struggling with it. "That's fine," he said, and took her place at the handles.
#
They returned to town. Cart-Dragger retired to her home to rest accompanied by Jen, while the men borrowed tools to dissect the armored God Soldier and extract the core without damaging their weapons. After removing the mass of glowing rubbery, blue material the size of a melon where a normal creature's heart might be, they asked around to see if anyone had a sick animal they could test its healing properties on. Eventually they met an old woman who said her granddaughter's cat had fallen ill after giving birth and led them to their residence. A girl of about twelve came down from their second-story apartment, cradling a nearly motionless skinny black cat in her arms. Lars fed it a tiny piece he peeled off the elemental core, hoping it wouldn't die. That would be awkward. About fifteen seconds after swallowing, the cat seemed to gain strength and raised its head to lick at the girl, who giggled in delight.
"I guess if a cat survived it," Lars said to Allen, "you better not die just to avoid the humiliation."
Still not certain it was safe, they told the girl they would be outside and asked her to tell them if anything happened to her cat. After a few hours, they grew worried enough that the core might go bad if left unused for too long to go ahead and try it. Lars cut off an apple-sized chunk and handed it to Allen, who hesitated before working up the courage to bite down.
"So um, how does it taste?" Lars asked his friend while he chewed.
"Cool and... fresh, like mint I guess."
He waited until Allen finished the chunk. "How do you feel? Do you notice any change yet?"
"I feel better, less tired. My aches and pains fading too." So there was some healing effect. But his voice sounded the same, slow and effortful.
"Is your mind getting any clearer, does your memory seem better?"
"I feel more awake..."
Lars wanted to take that as a positive sign, but rationally it seemed more just the flip side of being less tired. "Maybe it just takes a while to work on older or more serious injuries. Let's just wait a bit and see what happens."
They spent the rest of the day at the inn just chatting and reminiscing about old times, Lars mentally pleading to see the noticeable change in Allen he yearned for. But he remained the same, slow in gathering his thoughts, with a tendency to repeat things and difficulty grasping more complex ideas. As dusk darkened the sky outside, he said with heartbreaking self-awareness, "It not working, is it? I'm still my dumb self, sorry."
"Don't say that, we can't give up yet," Lars said desperately. "Maybe if you eat the whole core, then you'll be cured."
"Not sure that's a good idea."
"Well, the thing isn't poison, what's the worst that could happen?"
He managed to convince Allen to eat the whole big mass, forcing down the last of it against his body's wishes. What he got for his efforts was a painfully bloated stomach followed by repeated runs to the lavatory, but no improvement in his mental acuity. "Seems that didn't do it either," Allen said, looking miserable.
Lars poured him water to replace that he'd lost to diarrhea. "Dammit, why?" he snarled in frustration. "It can heal fatal wounds, but not a stupid head injury?"
"Maybe we could ask Cart-Dragger and Jen what they think tomorrow. For now let's get to sleep, that rump exercise you put me through took all my energy and then some."
They went to bed, but the knowledge he had failed made Lars spend the night awake, crying at times. He'd thought he was so close, he had almost touched the old Allen before reality pulled out the rug from under him. Was it time to give up, was this the person Allen would be forever from now on? But what purpose would they have if they let go of their only dream... the world didn't leave a very high ceiling for dreams these days, and a life solely for the sake of living seemed rather pointless.
The next day, they asked the innkeeper the whereabouts of Cart-Dragger's manor and headed there. Lars was unsure how to approach the armored guards bearing large intimidating polearms, but upon noticing them one of the men addressed them first. "Are you Lars and Allen? If you're here to see Lady Willow, she told us to let you in."
"Thank you," he said as they opened the doors and stepped aside.
A butler wearing a well-made but faded jacket led them through the spacious residence and to Cart-Dragger's room. When he knocked, Jen opened the door and they exchanged greetings. Lars spotted Cart-Dragger lying in her opulent canopied bed under the sheets. "How are you?"
"I'm severely injured with probable damage to multiple organs." She smiled at his wide-eyed expression. "But I'll live."
Recovering his game face, he said, "Sorry about getting you so hurt."
"You needn't feel that bad. If you didn't lead me to learn Leviathan was hiding out around here and deal with her now, her rage against humans might have built up until she did go and destroy Velinthe without me getting a chance to stop her."
"What and where is Velinthe, anyway? A floating city, she said?"
Cart-Dragger gave a little shrug. "It's supposed to be a man-made island somewhere out there that's home to a good number of human survivors. I don't know where it is. Maybe Leviathan did. So how did it go with Allen and the core?"
"Not well. He ate all of it, but there's been no significant effect."
She motioned for Allen to come closer. "Let me see your head." After examining it, she frowned. "The dent in his skull is still there."
"So it can heal wounds to vital organs but not bone?" he asked. "Not sure if that makes sense."
"I don't think that's it. If that was the case, it should have healed his brain like it did the mythic king's heart, unless his dented skull was getting in the way. But I suspect it's more likely that after a certain amount of time has passed, injuries aren't considered injuries anymore for the purposes of its healing, and instead just part of how you are."
Allen's face fell. "Does that mean I can't be fixed?"
"I know it must be discouraging to think you were so close to your goal only to find out otherwise," she said gently, "but you needn't give up already. This might not be the only possible way to cure your illness. The world is a big place, after all."
Hope returned to his eyes, and he suggested, "Maybe we could break the part of my skull that's pushed in again and try healing it with Leviathan's core."
"No!" Lars and Cart-Dragger said at once while Jen blanched.
"Why not? Like you said the dent might block my brain f
rom healing."
Lars replied, "The main reason is it could kill you before we can even attempt healing. Aside from that, I really doubt it's 'blocking' it. Makes less sense the more I think about it. If it could and would otherwise heal your brain, why wouldn't it heal the dent too?"
"I guess you're right. Stupid me again, wanting to kill myself for nothing."
He put an arm around Allen's shoulders. "Don't disparage yourself like that. You may be having some trouble right now, but I hardly think you're stupid."
"Speaking of Leviathan's core, though," Jen said, "maybe we should remove it and store it somewhere in case we need it, if it keeps. We might not be able to move it by ourselves though considering how big it must be, so you should probably send a crew to pick it up, Willow."
Cart-Dragger grinned. "I might be able to move it if I was in better shape. But it would be a waste of time for me to go all the way back there personally, so yeah, I'll send some guys."
#
The men returned to the inn, where they discussed their future over strong drinks. Cart-Dragger's encouragement not to give up aside, it was difficult for Lars to think of what they should do next. "So we shouldn't take jobs hunting God Soldiers anymore?" Allen asked.
"I'd say we shouldn't kill just any elementals that haven't harmed anyone, but most of the ones we would get paid to eliminate have attacked people already. So it should still be okay for us to take such jobs, as long as we make sure we aren't going after an innocent target." He considered the matter further and frowned. "Leviathan who was searching for a way to reverse their insanity is dead though. So even if they aren't killed, there might not be much hope for them. But I think we still shouldn't stain our hands further by hunting them."
"Matter of principle?"
"Yeah, I guess."
"I don't know if we should keep going the way we have been, anyway."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean like, how we just wander trying to keep fed while you hope to hear about a way to cure me. I think maybe... you're wasting too much time on me." Lars didn't enjoy hearing the guilt in his voice. "You could do more than this. Maybe you could been a mercenary captain by now."
"Don't feel bad, I don't mind helping you." Or trying to help, given that he hadn't exactly succeeded. "And you're the one who should have been a mercenary captain."
"Maybe I should, but we got to accept reality now. You don't need to live in my, ah, shadow."
He shook his head. "I don't want to lead a mercenary company. However, you might have a point. I won't give up on you, but it would feel better if we had something else to strive towards on a day to day basis beyond just working to live while hoping for a cure to pop up."
"Like a worthy cause?"
"Yes, something that would give our existence a sense of purpose... I don't know what, though."
As they were allowed to stay and eat for free at Cart-Dragger's request, they took their time over the next few days exploring the city and their options for a potential career change. Some could have been appealing, if only Lars and Allen had the required education. It didn't seem realistic that they were going to become engineers, nor physicians, nor teachers of anything besides combat skills. They probably had the attributes to be city guards, and Cart-Dragger might well hire them, but that sounded like it could end up like a more boring version of being a mercenary.
They heard Cart-Dragger had considered eating a piece of Leviathan's core to heal herself, but when she had it tested on an injured dog, the dog inexplicably died after being healed. Perhaps healing from a King Elemental core was too much for such wee beings in comparison. She'd apologized to the dog's owner, paid him a generous sum, and shied away from testing it on anything else.
One afternoon, they were having a late lunch back at the inn when Cart-Dragger stomped in. Trailing behind her, Jen said, "Willow, wait!"
The duchess walked up to a formally dressed yet scruffy man drinking at the bar and grabbed him by the nose. "Hey, what are you-ow ow ow!" She yanked him forcefully off his stool and dragged him towards the door.
"Calm down!" Jen cried after her, to which she showed no reaction.
Lars and Allen followed the girls outside, where Cart-Dragger hurled her accostee by the nose into the street. The cart, of course, was parked nearby. "You almost ripped off my sniffer!" the man whined on his butt.
Cart-Dragger loomed over him, her meager height notwithstanding. "That's not all I'll do."
"What's going on?" Lars asked Jen.
"There was an accident—a building under construction collapsed and many workers were hurt, two killed. The fault was attributed to the architect... so now Willow says she's going to kill him!"
"She's going to kill him over a mistake? I understand people died, but that still doesn't seem right."
"Well, it might not only have been an innocuous mistake."
"You drunk, always drinking!" Cart-Dragger snarled. "Does your liver hurt?"
The architect blinked confusedly. "No, why would it-"
She stomped on his abdomen over the liver, making his face scrunch up in agony. "I wager it does now! I bet you were drunk when you drew up those blueprints, weren't you?"
"N-no!" He curled up in a fetal ball as she reached for him. "Please, I beg you..."
"Shouldn't you stop her?" Lars asked. "Even if he is a chronic drunk, there's likely no proof he was intoxicated when he made that error, and it isn't justified to murder him without even a trial."
Jen hung her head as Cart-Dragger pulled the man up by the hair. "I know. But every time I try to stop her-" Seeing her friend start punching the architect in the liver, Jen ran to her and grabbed her arm. "Willow, stop!" Cart-Dragger simply tossed her aside, bouncing her painfully across the cobbles. Lars hadn't expected her to treat Jen this way, not having seen this side of her before.
He decided to try his hand and walked up to grasp Cart-Dragger's wrist. Allen followed just behind him, but only watched. "I like you normally, but you're being irrational. You can't just kill people you're angry at on a whim, especially noncombatants. Put him down and take a moment to cool off. You'll realize you're overreacting then."
She swung her fiery gaze onto him. "Overreacting? He hurt, no he killed my people! I can't let that go unpunished."
"I understand, but there's a difference between intended harm and unintended. I'm not saying you shouldn't punish him, just that it would be wise to step back and take some time to consider what penalty would be appropriate."
"I already know. Life for a life, or in this case two!" He felt her arm tense, but was unable to do anything to prevent her throwing him through the air to land beside Jen. That inhuman strength... he didn't know if she could be stopped without seriously hurting her.
As she drew back her fist for another blow, Allen spoke. "You know, you really should calm down."
"Shut up!" He hadn't even touched her, but she turned and punched him. Knocked skidding across the ground, he hit his head on a signpost.
"Allen!" Lars drew his axe. "I'm not going to play nice anymore."
Before he could advance, Allen got up with a blank look in his eyes. He darted at Cart-Dragger and assailed her with rapid spear thrusts and swipes. She backpedaled, evading the strikes with wide eyes.
Jen stared. "What on earth? He looks twice as fast as he did when we fought the serpent."
"He used to be an exceptional fighter," Lars said with a proud smile. "Sometimes when he... gets hit in the head, he can briefly capture that again."
"Does he have any control of himself, might he kill her like this?"
He was concerned himself, but answered to the best of his knowledge. "I don't know how much control he has, but he's never killed someone wrongfully that I've seen. He tends to stop after he wins."
Cart-Dragger glanced towards her hammer on the cart and seemed to consider going for it. Instead she dodged a few more attacks with increasing ease, then caught the spear by the haft, just behind the head. She pulled
it up, jerking Allen forward, and threw an uppercut to his chin with the other hand. He flew into the air and came down scarily hard on the cobblestones, out cold.
"I thought he might at least land a hit or something," Jen said quietly. "Even pictured her downed for a moment when you said 'after he wins'—although I then imagined her getting up."
"I said he was an exceptional fighter, not that he was a match for..." And that monstrous girl had been terribly wounded only days before...
Cart-Dragger looked sidelong at him and Jen. "You guys need to stop interfering, before I get pissed off." Lars realized fighting her wasn't going to be the solution, but neither it seemed was reasoning with her. What could they do to keep her from making a horrible mistake? He edged closer to the architect while she picked up Allen's spear.
"I'm getting annoyed, let's end this!" She lunged stabbing at her intended victim. She was so fast, but Lars stood near enough to jump in the way. Shit, he hoped her reflexes were quick enough, and that she valued him as much as he counted on...
Just before it would have plunged through his throat, the spear tip stopped a hair from his skin. Her hand shaking as she held it there, she glared up into his eyes. "What the hell?! I could have killed you! Why do you care about this drunk bastard so much, is he your dad?"
The man giggled nervously, but Lars said, "I don't know him well enough to care about him at all. The one I care about is you. I know you want to rebuild this city and make it great again. But if you kill an architect this rashly and people hear about it, other architects and engineers won't want to work for you. So for the sake of your dream, you need to get your temper under control."
Slowly, she lowered the spear. She gazed at the laid out Allen and Jen rubbing a bruised shoulder. "I guess I was too hard on you all. I can be a bully at times, I admit it. With my strength, it's too easy to sometimes. But I'll try to listen and be guided by reason more."
Lars went to his unconscious friend and gave him light nudges to help him wake up. "You okay?" he asked when Allen opened his eyes.
