"Skiing? You want to go skiing?" Harold asked with surprise.

"Please?" Marin, as Janine, asked gently.

Her situation in the house made everything awkward. So while Shelly was at the grocer, Marin had asked Harold straight out.

"Janine, you've never skied before."

"There's a first for everything."

"I dunno if you're strong enough?" He pleaded.

Marin's lips became very thin. "I feel stronger every day, lately." she fed him the lie. Marin had never been sickly, that had been the state of the woman whose name she now used. But her health was not as delicate as Janine's. At least Marin's physical health was, mental health was a different issue.

At least she was too far away from the people she knew to wear her shame for what she did not remember.

Even when Shelly wasn't around, the man felt better when Marin kept up appearances. Right now, he held all the cards, owned the house, worked for the food they ate and the clothes she wore. She had no independence, she risked her shelter in using her real name. She needed to get outside, out of that house.

So she tried to convince Harold to let her go skiing. Harold knew how to ski, Shelly knew how to ski. Janine had been too weak for that much exercise, until now.

Harold continued, "It takes a while to learn," he was wringing his hands.

"One day. Will you let me try for one day."

Later Marin was in her room, staring at the wall while Harold talked to Shelly.

Marin had been skiing cross country since she was six. It never took long for her to get acclimated to skis each winter. Her father had coached her and her sister how to walk on the backs of his skis.

It had been a couple of years since she had put on skis. But Marin was confident that it wouldn't take long, and then she could have some time to herself on a trail, out of that house.

For sure, she needed only a few minutes to acclimate to skis. Whether it had been since the last winter, or years before. Marin could really get going on skis. And Icicle Inn had the facilities for various winter sports, especially for the tourists.

Janine, how ever, had never skied before that day.

'Janine' had also found her appetite the last week. Shelly was being the over protective mother. Providing a sliver of meat, and bowl after bowl of broth. Which were paired with fresh bread rolls. Sometimes there were vegetables from out of town, or tubers from the cellar.

Marin ate every bit and had started asking for more.

There was a knock at her bedroom door. "Janine?"

"Yes?" She opened it to Harold's face.

"Tomorrow, we can go skiing tomorrow."

Marin found herself grinning ear to ear.

"But-"

Her face fell.

"But only if it doesn't endanger your health. Shelly doesn't want you getting sicker."

"Mmm, okay. Thanks."

When the door close, she pumped the air with victory, silently. What brought her down to reality was the absurdity of the situation. She was on another world, trapped in a video game, asking for permission to go skiing.

Sighing, she missed the problems she had left behind on earth. Calling Jamie wasn't scary anymore.

Skiing around the area, while this planet slowly died, seemed peak selfishness. The Northern-lights were the life blood of the planet leaking into the air from a two-thousand year-old crater. Give or take where in time Marin had arrived.

Real solutions to problems like this were outside of Icicle Inn. Marin was putting off leaving, doing something about the end of the world, or finding out how to return home.

Even fake-Ardyn had warned her of that.

But for now, for right now, she could get some exercise, get back into shape. So the couch potato she had turned into these last few months could make up for all the gym classes she had missed.


Harold had taken a while to get 'Janine' some skis. Everyone knew everyone that lived here. So he had chatted up the guy renting out skis.

Marin waited, trying not to show impatience, while she was fitted up and got her kit for skiing around.

Harold was bright talking about his 'daughter' and her improving health.

Marin just tried to stay out of his way as he caught up with the people he knew and she had never met.

There were no pictures of Janine at any age. But eighteen-year-old Marin could pass for a Janine that no one had seen for many years. "I remember when you were this tall." Had come up a lot that day.

"Test them out." the guy finally said as he showed her how to pull the harness around her boots.

They were an antiquated version of cross-country skis. They went over her normal boots. They didn't click like the modern ones she was used to. But they pulled and pushed the same way. If anything, being easier to slip off would reduce injuries in a way. Not that she planned to get hurt. Or Shelly might never let her go skiing again.

The guy led her to circle the little park while someone showed Harold the ropes.

Marin literally skied circles around them, once she was used to the sinew harness grabbing her snow boots.

There was more spring to these skis, but otherwise her muscle memory quickly took over.

"She's never skied before?" the man asked, while Marin made another pass.

"No." Harold looked lost.

"She's a natural."

"Thanks." Harold told the other man.

They were on the trail after wards. Marin tried to let Harold set the pace, but he wanted to be behind her like a chaperon. So she went no more than a turn ahead before waiting for him, usually she stayed within sight while they skied down the trail that edged the woods under the alpine slopes. Or she circled a tree a few times waiting for him.

"Hold on! I'm coming!" He huffed and puffed.

Marin reined in her impatience. It wasn't the first time she had managed a parent.

Her father had never needed it, but he had moved out a year before. At least Harold wasn't like her mom. He merely had control over her life here, in return for a bed and safety. Marin was happy that Harold was nothing like her mom.

Marin skied down the trail, moving her feet, pumping her arms, feeling the wind burn her cheeks. Freedom.

"Are you sure?" Harold asked at the bottom of a slope.

You could either take the long way around on level ground, or climb up the hill and slide down the other side.

"This way," She told Harold.

Marin crossed her skis behind her heels, it had felt like no time at all since the last time she had skied. "I'll be fine. See you on the other side."

"Watch out for wild animals!" He warned. He looked dubiously at the slope, his own skills were not there for the short climb.

"Yeah."

"And when you get to the top, wait for me to get to the other side."

"OK."

"I want to see you go down the other side."

"OK!" she was already halfway up.

The down slope would require care, she hadn't done much like this, even five years ago. But she was pumped from getting back to it.

There was someone waiting for her at the top, the trees there blocked Marin from seeing Harold circle the slope.

"You." She told fake-Ardyn.

"Me?" He said in that very Ardyn-like affectation. He stood on the top of the tiny hill, umbrella protecting him from the sunlight, no skis or even a walking stick. "I see you've been let out of your prison."

"For a few hours anyway."

He had a melodramatic golf clap for her, one hand over the one holding the umbrella. From anyone else it would have been demeaning and sarcastic. From him, that meanness was doubled.

Marin only glared.

"It's so good of them to let you out for some exercise. Then back in you'll go."

"What do you want Ardyn?" She didn't believe he was Ardyn, but had no other name to go by. Her current situation was just beyond anythings she could have imagined a week ago.

"I wanted to see if you were still determined to rot in place or do something." He waved at her skis, "it's not much, but it is indeed, something."

"So? Is there some grand adventure planned for me then? Some story you want to push me into? Or are you going to continue to leave me with no answers, twisting in the wind?"

"That's an awfully small assumption of you, to think that I'm the one with a plan."

"Well, are you?"

"How human of you, to think that this is all about you, and not about us."

Marin stuck her ski poles in the snow and crossed her arms across her chest. "What do you mean by us?"

"Why, me, you and everyone else here." He wiggled his free hand at her, "Surely you've figured out the predicament that you're in by now."

Her eyebrow twitched, "I'm trapped in a video game, and my only guide is supplying me with no answers. Only more questions."

His own eyebrow arched, "Oh, is that what this is." He looked around, nonplussed to whatever he perceived with his eyes. "Well, if you know where you are. Then why aren't you doing anything about it?"

"About what?"

"Well, if you know where you are, then surely you know something about this place."

She looked confused, "Do you even know where we are?"

"I know exactly where I am, girl." the tone was suddenly demeaning and more intimidating that anything she remembered seeing from video game-Ardyn. "The question is," His Ardyn mask and tone was back, "What are you going to do with what you know?"

Marin licked her lips, this conversation was suddenly weirder and more adversarial than the last time. "I don't have long to decide, do I?"

"Why? Are you immortal?" the Ardyn persona back in place.

"Of course I'm not immortal, I'm a human being."

"Well, then. You know you do not have forever to do everything."

Marin rubbed her face with her hand. "Usually there's an event or something from a guide-type that spurns the hero on by now." she said, sighing at all the cliches in stories wrapped up in that sentence.

"OH, is that what you want? To be the hero?"

"Oh fuck no! Heroes get other people killed. The happy endings are just when less people suffer in the end."

"Hmm."

Marin had lived with those stories in books, movies and video games for so long. She had been here a week. Nothing compared to two months in a hospital, with only one visitor. Even longer at home ignored by her mom and sister. The reality of this situation made her cynicism come out in a hard way.

Marin sniffed the air, smelling the snow and trees on the trail. Her dreams and nightmares had never felt this real. She had spent the last few months re learning how to live in 'the real world.' and now she was stuck in this one.

"I don't want to be a hero."

"But-" Ardyn started her next sentence.

"But." She continued, "This world is dying." she looked to the north, in the daylight, the lights from the Wound were invisible. The trees were also tall enough to block the curtain of mountains north of town, the mountains were a crater that had risen around an old meteor strike. This she knew.

"I don't want to be skiing while the world falls around me. I want to help."

"Well, then, get up and do something about it." He urged her.

She shook her head. "How? I've never traveled before. I don't know when I am. I'm just vicariously living out each day until something happens. But the world is just moving on without me." 'Again,' she thought.

"Is that you're biggest concern? Living on your own out there?" He gestured to the south. The rest of the world was south of this hamlet.

"No. Adventure sounds like a plan. But a safe bed costs money, called Gil here. Food costs money. And I'm not exactly rolling in Gil. Nor do I have the sorts of skills that make a lot of Gil around here." she looked down at her skis, "Not unless I started offering skiing lessons." Her music was a hobby, and she wasn't good enough to teach it or perform with it for Gil.

"Is that how you'd like to save the world? With skis?"

"No, do you have a better idea?"

Fake-Ardyn held his chin with his hand, considering. "Aha!" He snapped his fingers.

Marin didn't believe that anything about the man was real. Even with the sun making the day slightly warmer. His finger-less gloves would have lost him his fingers. The man, if he was even a human, just had the appearance of a fictional character. The cold didn't touch him.

'Maybe he isn't even human at all.' Marin considered.

"While I'm here," Ardyn continued, "Was there anything else you wanted?"

"Excuse me if I don't want to take whatever you're offering."

"Hmm, sometimes that is wise."

Marin spat out an answer to try to get him to stop. "I want to go home, I want to see my friends again. I want my bed, my stuff. But not from you. I don't want anything from you."

Instead of respond to Marin's anger, he looked down the slope ahead. Asking again, "Anything else?"

"I know better than to ask for what I want from mysterious beings." she told Ardyn.

He guffawed loudly, "Yes, well. It might be too late for that. Anyway, I believe I have held up your guardian for long enough."

"What do you mea-"

"Janine!" Called from the distance.

She looked to the sound of the distant shout, the trees muffled it. Even bare of leaves, she could not see Harold.

Marin turned back to Ardyn. He was gone. Looking down at the ground, there was no sudden wind to hide his footprints. There were no traces that Ardyn had even stood there.

"Fuck!" Marin cursed to herself. She chewed on her tongue as she slowly made her way to the edge of the slope. She recalled telling that guy what she had wanted out of frustration. What she really wanted was be back on earth, move in with her dad until she could get an apartment with Jamie. She needed Jamie, Marin didn't want to be on this planet anymore.

She couldn't recall exactly what she had discussed with Ardyn the last time. She was discomforted with him saying 'it's too late for that.'

The only solid thing she had so far was that he had never been the 'real' Ardyn, and maybe not knowing what he really was might be better. And it would be even better to not get flustered, or say something out of anger around him again.

At the end of the day, it depending on what her angry words were going to cost her. On top of the thought that getting what she wanted might cost her more than what she wanted to pay.

She cursed stories and their twisted wishes as she readied herself to go down the easy slope on cross-country skis. Sometimes what people wanted most was the worst thing for them, there was no need to twist a wish then.

'Assume the worst, and you will always be pleasantly surprised,' filtered into her brain from one of her books.

Worst case she could think of, was that she was trapped here. Only to leave suddenly for home at an inconvenient moment. But while she was here, skiing. The next worse case was that she was not the only person out of place.

If anyone, stranger from earth, stranger from another planet, or someone she knew could be out there. She wouldn't know where to start looking. And instead of looking, she was skiing in circles.

Marin shook her head, yelling "I'm coming!" She started down the slope focusing on her balance and moving forward. For a moment, trying to avoid a tumble pushed all her worries out of her head. Pointing her body and mind forward, she felt her skis go out of control from under her just as the tracks curved her towards Harold, who waited at the bottom.

He had misjudged the space Marin had needed to slow down, she couldn't slow down on until she got out of the tracks and back onto the wide trail.

The world moved in slow-motion as she started losing control of her skis. She could slow down by crashing into Harold, or crash early and tumble into the bank by the side of the curve. Before she could consider every aspect of the option, she was tucking into a roll, trying to fall well into the bank that had built up on the outside of the curve. Instead of crashing into the other person.

She registered someone shouting at her as she lay half in the bank, half between some trees. "I'm fine. Gimme a sec." she shouted at him as she checked herself.

Nothing had pulled in a terrible direction, one of her ankles had pulled only a little. She had left one of the skis behind on the trail. Wiggling her toes, it didn't seem to have sprained or even twisted. "Hold on Har-, dad. Father. Please." she rolled over onto her butt and looked at herself.

The parka that she had tied around her waist, sweaty from skiing, was tangled with a ski. Otherwise she was caked in snow and felt fine. She had to slip out of the remaining ski to get up. Harold was already there, out of his own skis. He ironically walked across the ski tracks wrecking the trail everyone else had made that day.

"Hold on, I got it." She took his offered hand anyway. Hoping that taking his help would make him feel useful for being concerned. "I'm all right, really."

Harold's face looked like he would be wringing his hands, if he wasn't grasping hers.

Marin let him go and began dusting herself off. "Pass me the parka, please?" she asked him, giving him something else to do. She gathered up her poles and put her skis in the ruined track. She could walk down the slope and nudge them forward. Until she could put them back on.

"Are you sure? That looked bad." He held out the parka.

Just being on the ground for that short while was already giving her a chill. She closed the coat around her with no protest. "I've done worse skiing before."

"Before? But-"

Marin shook her head, "I know, Jani- I've never skied before. But, I know someone who had been cross-country skiing their whole life. And they've fallen before. They might fall again."

His face filled with horror, at the thought of her doing that again.

Marin killed her anger, she had already gotten the spun-glass treatment from her parents on earth. Harold must have been treating his, real, sickly daughter like spun glass her whole life. He was projecting onto Marin, with his real daughter. He was also meeting Marin's needs, to a point, by letting her live with him and his wife. In this moment, he didn't deserve her anger.

Marin reassured him "So I did what anyone would do after falling, I got up. Thanks for helping me."

Ardyn aside, it might be better for the three of them if she found a reason to live independently anywhere else. They had saved her from dying in the cold in a strange world. But Ardyn, Fake-Ardyn, was right. She could let that house and this town become a prison. And once she got used to it, it could be impossible to leave.

That had been her life on earth. As much as she had hated the doctors for wrongly advising she recover at her mother's house. She had gotten used to staying there. She had been letting her friends, and her girlfriend, slip away. Cutting herself off from her community had only made it harder to get out of that damned house.

And now she had been taken from one self-imposed prison and placed in another.

'The world isn't going to save itself.' She thought as the two of them kept a slow pace for the rest of the trail.

Harold kept asking her if she was OK. Either he wasn't sure or he wanted reassurance. Marin gave one word answers, to try to keep him happy. While she chewed on her situation.

She wasn't sure when or how to strike out on her own. Though she could tell that there were no easy answers. That was life though, it usually wasn't easy.

Some of the questions she had asked Ardyn before. They were the sorts of questions people spent their whole lives asking and never got a solid answer. She still would have liked to have known why or how she was here.

The strange man wasn't talking though. He seemed to be nudging her into taking her own initiative and just putting herself out there.

As frustrating as that was, Marin knew that that was better for her. She could have left her bed and gone for a walk around her mom's neighborhood. Here, she could ask Harold to go skiing. He would not put the skis on for her. And Marin had been the one to push for this trail run.

This Icicle Inn was also nothing like the game. It was a hamlet, sure. But there was more to the town than the few images in the old game. Two dimensional graphics, giving the illusion of a 3D world, were a pale comparison to the Icicle Inn she skied in.

There was a whole world out there that she thought she knew. But just being in this town a week had told her how little she actually knew of this place.

It was all much larger and more involved.

"Err, ah, if you're all right." Harold started.

"Yeah, I'm fine now. Nothings sore."

"Good. Good. uh-"

"Maybe I won't tell Shelly about a little spill?" Marin offered.

"Yeah, good idea. But uh, let's take it easy on the way back."

Marin had hoped to ski all day. They had barely been out for two hours and Harold wanted to go home. 'I had agreed to this. I don't think I've chosen anything that foolish in a while.' She thought. She was only making it harder for herself. For all of them really. They could ignore their grief and pretend that Janine wasn't really dead. Marin was just prolonging their suffering.

Even with Shelly and her fragility. Marin had fallen into her own abyss with her blackouts, and the despair that followed coming out of them. There wasn't exactly hospitals with psychiatric wards here. There was a single doctor in the town, she had beds. But their primary use was for tourists with broken bones to be splinted, until they could be transported to a real hospital.

If Shelly had a bad breakdown, or became senile. It would be very bad for her and Harold to get through that. Not that there were 'good' breakdowns. Just bad to worse ones. And Marin had not had a good one months ago, she could relate.


"Breathe in."

Marin sucked in a deep breathe for the town doctor. The doctor might not have gone to a medical school, but she carried herself and ran this office well enough to reassure Marin of her skills.

This was a different world, with different rules. She was also nervous around the woman. If anyone had known Janine outside of her parents, it was this lady.

"Now breathe out."

Marin complied.

"What's your birthday?" The female doctor asked as she took back the stethoscope.

Despite the kind tone, Marin was nervous. She rattled off Janine's birthday.

"Hmm. Name?"

"Janine Dywer."

Still in a perfectly pleasant tone of a doctor with an excellent bedside manner, "Your real name, please?"

Marin didn't answer, she only swallowed. It was a small town, where everyone knew everyone. Of course a doctor could tell Janine from a stranger. Marin wasn't that good.

"Jan-" Marin cut herself off, at the sharp look from the doctor.

"I'm not a fool. Don't treat me like one." The doctor warned.

Marin swallowed again, preparing something to say. Denial now would only dig Marin in deeper.

"I don't want a story. Just a name, please."

"Marin. Marin Ito." Marin was so rattled, she gave her real name.

"Do you know what happened?" Was all the doctor asked.

Marin shook her head. She really didn't know.

The doctor sighed, "I wasn't sure, at first. Then Harold stopped all appointments and house calls some days ago." She shook her head.

Marin didn't respond.

"I feared the worst. But when I heard that their daughter was up and about. Walking around the town, like the last ten years never happened..."

Marin kept her head bowed. "I know I'm not helping."

The doctor shook her head. "I don't know your story. I think I don't want to know. But-"

"But I'm not helping by staying here."

"At least you're not that stupid." the doctor shook her head again, "I mean. Did you see her? Before?"

Marin shook her head. "Whatever happened, happened before I came here a week ago."

The doctor looked up at the calendar, "Yes, that sounds right." she sighed, "There was little I could do. Janine wasn't getting better." the doctor put the stethoscope away. "All any of us could do was make her feel safe and comfortable until..."

"You knew she was dying." Marin said.

The doctor looked down at the floor. "I don't like talking about other patients."

"Sorry."

The doctor shook her head. "These are extenuating circumstances. But yes, Harold and Shelly wouldn't see it. They wouldn't listen."

"And now I can harden their denial."

"How on earth did you end up here?" the doctor looked at Marin. "The timing could not be better, or worse."

Marin's cheek twitched, "Would you believe me if I told you I fell out of the sky, and nearly froze to death wearing Pj's?"

The doctor guffawed, "I've heard stranger, but believed less." the doctor looked at the calendar again. "No, I don't believe that."

Marin flexed her fingers and buttoned her shirt back up. "I-" she sighed, "I did almost freeze to death. The Dwyers had a warm bed and took me in. It's just-."

"Yeah."

Marin shook her head. "Taking her name, wearing her clothes. It feels...wrong"

"That's because it is wrong."

Marin shook her head. "This world isn't safe. And I don't have anywhere else to go. But." Marin looked back down on the floor. "I don't want to hurt anyone. Or Harold and Shelly any more than I already have."

"Then leave. Go. This isn't your home, it's Janine's home."

Marin held up her hands, "And how can I do that? I have no money to my name. Just the clothes I've been given ..." she trailed off.

"Hmph." The doctor said. "With what you've done so far. It's almost more than you deserve.

Marin gave the doctor a pleading look. "I didn't come here to hurt anyone. I just want to do what's right."

"Then act like it Ja-." The doctor shook her head, "Whoever you are."

Marin shrugged, "I don't have the resources or a plan. I have no Materia to my name. I couldn't make it five steps out of town on my own." Marin threw out her hands. "What do you expect me to do? Just walk out into a blizzard to get eaten by wolves? I don't want to die!" Marin sucked in a breath, the words were fine but her tone was out of line.

The doctor was unruffled by Marin's outburst at least. Coming out of nowhere with, "And if you have materia of your own, what would you do with it?"

Marin shrugged, much calmer already. "Whatever I could to help people. Healing Materia first I guess." Marin wasn't guessing, it was merely a turn of phrase. 'If I could only have one power, it would have been to heal others. Flying, invisibility, laser beams are cool. But If I could have only chosen one, it would be healing above anything else.' Marin thought.

The doctor had no reaction Marin could read. Before the woman pulled up her sleeve, revealing the bracelet and the three green spheres that sat in the slots of the jewelery. Ready to be used at a moment's notice.

"Can you" the Doctor asked, "At least tell what these are?"

Marin could see the spark inside each sphere, the way each moved. But it was all nonsense to her. Clearly magic materia, and seeing it this close was something. Marin shook her head, she had no idea how to tell one form the other.

"Healing, eh?" The doctor pulled one of the spheres out and held it out for Marin to grasp.

"You're not giving this to me are you?" Marin looked askance at the sphere, she had nothing to give in return.

"Oh goodness no. But If I can help you find that independence, the sooner you can get out on your own."

Marin held the green sphere in her palm, it was warm from the doctor's body heat.

"You really can't tell what that is?"

Marin shook her head.

"Useless," the doctor mumbled. "Anyway, that's healing Materia. It has-"

"Cure, Cura, Curaga and Regen spells if you mastered it. Yeah."

The doctor ha-rumphed loudly for the interruption. "And yet you can't tell what it is?"

"I read. A lot" Marin tried to justify her gaps in knowledge. In a way that was a true statement.
The doctor sighed, "anyway. If you hadn't interrupted. I can show you how to use it."

Marin brightened. As terrible as today had been going, this was something. "Yeah?"

The Doctor told Marin how to move her hand, how to hold her self and release. As well as hold back enough for a trickle of magic through the materia.

Marin had done more meditating at home. Grasping the Materia, she repeated the twist of the wrist and the movement of the arm. Before pulling something, or nothing, through the sphere. Marin could not explain it well, even to herself.

"This usually doesn't work at first." The doctor explained, "But, pull your will through the cure. Just a cure mind you. you've probably..."

The doctor trailed off as Marin went through the gesture. Thinking of pulling something through herself and through the magic materia. Streams of green light surrounded Marin. Over seconds the power settled over her. Surrounded by a nimbus of the green strands, they settled on her and vanished. She didn't notice her ankle until the minor ache disappeared from the Cure magic.

Marin was suddenly very tired, she tottered on the examination table.

The doctor grabbed her shoulder, "Careful. That was too much."

Marin held her head and slipped off the armlet. "Ohh, was that a Curaga?" She felt exhausted, like it was the end of finals week.

"Yes! You over exerted yourself!" the Doctor took back the Materia and placed it back in her bangle.

Marin rubbed her temple, she wanted to nap. "It was easier than I thought it would be..." Far too easy to pull the most powerful spell the doctor had trained into the materia, after using it for however long the doctor had had it.

"Am I going to need to lecture you on mana reserves too?"

Marin shook her head. "No, I get it. I wasted the spell for nothing. I just have to..." Her head cleared, she was still tired, but fluttered with excitement. 'I just used magic!' "I need to take a break."

The doctor pulled her sleeve back over her arm. Giving Marin a considering look and pulled something out of a drawer under the table.

"Can you make me a promise?"

"What?" Marin really needed a nap first.

"Let me talk to your fa-… To Harold. About this situation. You're more than old enough to 'strike it out on your own'."

"That's not a promise?" Marin asked, so tired.

"No, but after that little performance. Maybe you'll do just fine with this." The Doctor pulled out another green sphere. The light in this was was much weaker and moved inside more slowly.

"You're just going to give me that?" Marin was in disbelief.

"If you leave, leave the Dwyer's, leave Shelly. So I can do what is best for my patients."

"OK?" Marin felt her voice rise in agreement. She nodded her head. "I shouldn't stay here anymore. I get it. But that-"

"It's not free." The doctor still held the extra sphere in her hand.

"I-" Marin had trouble forming the words. She did want it, and this price was reasonable. "I do. I just. You're giving it to me?"

"Promise me." The doctor did not say or what.

Marin thought she heard it. But the woman had that Materia right there. "What is it?"

"What else?" the doctor rolled her eyes, "I"m not going to hand you Fire magic. It's more healing. When I mastered mine, this was produced."

Marin understood the concept of attuning, or mastering, magic Materia. But she didn't really understand how a mastered one could make more of it's own kind. She only understood that on a conceptual level.

"I promise. I'll leave as soon as I can. And I'll use that one to help people. Whether it's me or someone else."

"No need to exaggerate." The woman thrust the green sphere at Marin. "Go lie down. And I'll talk to Harold." She pulled the Materia back as Marin groggily reached for it.

"What?"

"The soonest it's arranged?" the Doctor asked.

"Yes."

The doctor pressed the Materia into Marin's hand. "Go lie down and rest. Doctor's orders."

"Yes ma'am."

The doctor waved at the empty cot in the room. The sheets were a clean white and smelled fresh.

"I need to talk to Harold about a few other things." she watched Marin totter to the cot. Only continuing when Marin was seated. "Wait here, please."

Marin nodded. Taking her boots off before laying down.

The Doctor left the examination room behind, shutting the door and leaving Marin on her own.

Marin yawned in the privacy the room afforded her. She wasn't exhausted, but she could probably nap all day after what she had done. She felt like she had just come out of two math exams in a row. There was a little fatigue behind the eyes. Turning over onto her side, she hoped that the hard rules of the video game trickled into this world as well. That once she was out, she could not over reach her 'mana.'

What she needed now was a teacher. Whatever was going on in this world, Marin could not do it alone.

That was what scared her most about leaving Icicle Inn. Even as she had felt stuck on Earth, she had made plans. Marin hoped those plans would still hold up if she got back home.

Even as Marin had ignored her friends while recovering. Her and Jamie had put together a plan. To live their lives they way they wanted, whatever their parents said. Marin wasn't going to go it alone. But here, in this place. Outside of the Dwyer's home. Marin didn't have anyone else in a world with magic, monsters, and more monsters.

What she was most afraid of was facing any of that alone.