Marin was glad she didn't have to drive on the second day. Her arms still vibrated from gun practice. Her shoulder killed her where the butt of the rifles had rested. Her right shoulder was stiff and covered with bruises, she still had to learn how to hold a gun. Not that she really wanted to learn. She only let Danny teach he this much because he depended on her. As well they had far more ammunition than she had mana in a day, especially a week.
She just hoped she would never have to fire that gun to survive. Marin was an idealist, but she knew when she was dreaming.
"Look!" she could see the peak of the rocket first, over the trees.
"I see it." Danny didn't look up, keeping his eyes on the road and the traffic.
Marin tapped out a song on the handle of the door. "Uh, you said there was a contact in Rocket town?"
"Yeah."
"When would you guys have gotten there?"
"Last night, after dark."
Marin licked her lips, "Maybe stopping in Rocket Town isn't a good idea."
"Well, we don't have a choice." He proclaimed.
"What?" she noticed that they were slowing down.
"Traffic."
"Can we go around?" Marin asked.
"Not yet."
"Don't forget to plaster your tourist face on. Going to watch the launch."
"I think I can manage." Danny spoke into the steering wheel.
They proceeded slowly, getting stuck behind a queue of trucks and other tourists.
Marin thanked Gaia, when they didn't see ShinRa checkpoints on the road.
"So much for your Atheism." Danny quipped.
"We're not on Earth Danny." She told him.
"You said Gaia isn't a god."
"Gratitude for the little things is divine." she told him. "God or not."
"Sure, whatever." they slowly rolled through town on the main roads.
The launch was now in less than two days. The town was bustling with industry and people. There was a hotel under construction, as well as more buildings. The only places that looked like they could stay had no vacancies.
"I dunno, I have this feeling in my gut that we shouldn't stay anyway." Marin said. "Just recharge the car's Mako cells and get out."
"I wouldn't mind staying in a bed tonight."
Marin shrugged, "And your contact here is either in trouble or..."
"Dead. Or they were the leak." Danny looked at the back seat, "I hate sleeping on those seats."
"I'd rather sleep on them than get caught."
"Hmm, let's look for the next energy station."
Danny left Marin in the car, while we went to pay for their car's recharge. On top of filling some back up cells in the trunk. Going south there would be distant between Rocket Town and the next place they could 'gas' up.
Marin stared at someone changing Mako power batteries one car over. Mako was the soul of the planet, yet Danny still used it without hesitation. The stuff was worse than gasoline, on a spiritual level. She and Danny still used it, to move the car. Not that there was anything else they could use. Between the ShinRa Company producing Mako from the planet's soul, and fossil fuels on earth, she mused to herself. 'The more things change, the more they stay the same.'
"I thought you didn't want this." Ardyn's voice was behind her.
Marin twisted in her seat. Despite the luggage, Ardyn's form was seated comfortably in the back seat.
"What do you want Ardyn?"
He checked his nails, "I was just asking a question."
Marin huffed, "Yeah, well. I don't regret asking for Danny anymore."
"You didn't."
"What?"
"You never asked for him."
"Then why is he here?"
"Again with the whys."
"Well, then how is Danny here?"
Ardyn only chuckled. "What did you want?"
"I wanted my friends. But I didn't-" she swallowed, "I didn't ask you to bring them here. For them to get stuck here with me."
Ardyn shrugged. "You want to see your friends. You don't want to go back to your home. What did you think was going to happen?"
"I don't know." she looked to the power station, Danny was half in and half out the doorway of the fuel station booth. Danny stood there, frozen in time. "what- he's not moving."
Ardyn chuckled again, "You never noticed that."
"What, you froze time every time we talk?!"
"You have to pay better attention."
Marin swallowed again, "So."
"So?"
"What's the price, for Danny to be here?"
Ardyn shrugged, "I'm not going to make you pay anything for what you want."
"Then why do you wrap it up in so many implied threats?"
"Sometimes what we want is the worst thing we could have." Ardyn creeped Marin out, she heard her own voice speak her words from Ardyn's mouth.
"Oh, OH! Never do that again!"
In his normal, Ardyn, voice, "Did I get the point across?"
"Fuck! Yeah."
"Anyway, before I leave. Just to warn you, whatever you pay to get something. Sometimes keeping it comes at a higher price." He cackled and was gone. This time disappearing in front of her eyes.
"Something wrong?" Danny asked her.
"Let's get out of here!"
"What is it?" He asked as he turned on the ignition.
"I saw him again." Marin told him.
"Who?"
"The guy that looks like another Final Fantasy character. I'm scared OK? Let's go."
"OK, OK." He pulled away, turning for the south road. "But I think you're letting him get under your skin."
"I know I'm letting him get under my skin." She could feel her heart racing. She felt like he had threatened her with taking Danny away, or trying to. She did not like that feeling one bit. Now that she had what she wanted, she had to hold on or it would get taken away.
"You gotta let people stop doing that to you."
"I know, I know!" she wanted to pull on her hair, she put her hands in her lap. "But it's easy to say, harder to do."
Marin could look down to the west road, for a second she could see straight down to the rocket launch pad. At least it was a relatively safe distance from town. She considered, 'but it could be even further.' She was used to the Earth-based space program, and the very-very far distance it was from civilization, the nearest beaches, and even launch mission control. Though their rocket program was a little more robust, with a longer history than the one that existed on this planet. And NASA had gone through a few more scrubbed launches and catastrophes as well.
It was rocket science, after all.
They were most of the way out of town when Danny spoke up. "Better already?"
"I was thinking about the space program on earth."
"Still scared?"
"A bit."
"I was talking to the attendant, the launch will be tomorrow morning. Unless it's scrubbed for weather again."
"Why bother asking?"
"If we don't stop for target practice again, launch will be long before the mountains block our way. We could watch the launch on the way south."
"I guess." Was all she said.
"How about we get you something to calm your nerves?" Danny asked.
"Eh," Marin made a noise with her mouth.
Danny pulled in to the side of the road near the edge of town. "Looks like there's a tea shop in that Inn." Danny suggested.
"I guess."
"Come on." He urged her, getting out of the car.
Marin Shrugged and followed Danny out of the car.
The front door to the inn burst open. Out of which issued a younger man, with straw-colored hair and green cargo pants. "FUCK!" He yelled. "You know where ta fuckin' find me!" He yelled over his shoulder, to whoever was inside.
Marin was nearly bowled out of the way, her mouth was locked in surprise. She thought, 'he looked younger that I thought he would be.' She thought, she could not get any words out of her mouth.
"Hey!" Danny called out the man's rudeness.
The man waved it off, "Git outta my god-damned way."
Marin grabbed Danny's shoulder.
Danny called again. "Hey!"
The man was ignoring Danny now.
Marin holding Danny back allowed the other man to be out of earshot of each other.
"Marin!" Danny told her. "That guy nearly knocked you over." He shook off Marin's hand.
Marin shook her head. "Don't, please."
Danny's face fell, "What is it? Did you recognize him?"
Marin nodded, "let's just go inside and have some tea."
Minutes later, they had tea in paper cups. The inn was full, the tea room was full. Marin and Danny were sitting in Danny's car, sipping tea for lack of a better seat.
"So, who was that?" Danny asked, from the privacy that the inside of the car afforded the two of them.
"His name's Cid."
"He's rude."
Marin shrugged. "I don't disagree with that statement."
"Anything else I need to know?"
Marin shrugged, "I was trying to enjoy my tea."
"Marin. This is important. Who is he?"
"Nobody we need to worry about."
"Yet?"
Marin nodded.
"Anything else?" Danny asked.
Marin shrugged again. "I know I'm not being very clear right now."
"Hah!" Danny laughed at the obvious.
"It's a long story." She told him.
Danny shook his head, "It's always a long story."
"What about you?" Marin asked. "How have your last five months been?"
"That's different." Danny snapped at her, "And you know it."
"That is true. I also know that it's a long story."
Danny grumbled under his breath.
Marin did her best not to listen.
"But do we? Will we ever have to worry about Cid?" Danny asked her.
"I don't think so? Let's just go. I just want to be far and away from any AVALANCHE or ShinRa, as soon as possible."
"Wow, you really don't want to fight."
"You know I don't like taking risks."
"Sometimes you take your risk aversion too far."
Marin scratched her right arm, where one of her old scars sat above her elbow. "At school all the fights I've been in haven't been for live or die stakes. I don't want to die."
"Neither do I." Danny agreed. He started the car and pulled away from the road to continue the journey south.
"There's a 'but' in there somewhere."
"Yep, Marin. I don't want to die either. But, there is such thing as a healthy amount of risk."
Marin looked down at her hands. "I know. But-"
"It's easier to say than do. I know, I know." He punched her in the shoulder, playfully, he was in a better mood the longer they got from talking about his last five months here. "At least you didn't balk at trying out different guns."
"You do remember me saying that I didn't wan to die, right-Hey... Look!"
They passed someone just outside the edge of town, holding up a sign. Marin was caught by his face, not the sign he was holding.
"You're risk adverse, but you want to pick up a hitch hiker?"
"Stop the car!" He head jerked forward as Danny pumped the brakes.
"What, really?"
"That looked like Jamie's brother!"
"When did Jamie have a brother?" Danny asked.
"Reverse!"
The road was empty of through traffic, as most of it was going between Rocket Town and K-town. Which gave Danny all the room to start reversing to the hitch hiker.
The guy waved to someone off the road, who came out of the tall grasses, lugging two small packs.
"Stop!" Marin yelled at Danny.
"Now what?"
The guy, who had been holding a Nibelheim sign, looked at Marin's car with trepidation. Now that they had stopped a distance from him.
Marin hopped out of the car and ran to the woman who had come out of hiding by the side of the road.
The woman from the grass yelled "Marin!"
Danny started slowly reversing the car to them.
Marin ignored him, running up to the two hitch hikers. It was definitely Jamie's brother, now that Marin could see Jamie.
Jamie was just a nickname, for her birth name Jameela. Only her parents called her her birth name. That another woman with that name was famous made it worse to use Jamie's birth name. People still insisted teasing that Jamie and that celebrity were twins.
Jamie and Shawn were halfway between Marina and Danny for skin tone. Jamie's hair was loose, framing her beautiful face in wavy dark-brown hair. There was a blade of grass stuck in it above Jamie's left ear. But she was just as radiant as the last time Marin remembered seeing her. Her dark brown eyes just as bright as ever, and happy to see Marin.
Marin crushed Jamie in a hug. Jamie hugged her back, dropping the bags.
"You didn't answer my texts." Jamie whispered.
"Jamie." Marin told her back, squeezing her girlfriend.
Shawn, the mirror of his sister, both in the scruffy jeans and coats and shirts they were wearing from somewhere, staring over Jamie's shoulder at Marin. His hair was cut lose, but jut as dark and wavy. Over a stern face. Marin could tell that he was being the protective older brother, and Marin was the girlfriend that he didn't know yet.
Marin squeezed her eyes shut, while she embraced Jamie, just holding and existing next to each other for a moment.
Danny had the car backed all the way up by now.
"Marin." Jamie intoned.
Marin pulled herself half out of the hug, "I'm sorry, I'm not ready to talk about it yet."
Jamie squeezed Marin's arm a coupe times. Marin squeezed Jamie's arm back the same number of times. Like they'd been apart for no time at all. Marin wanted to preserve that feeling as long as she could. "Please, just-"
"Danny! You're alive!" Shawn shouted as Danny joined them. Shawn was Jamie's older brother, much older brother. Jamie's sibling had moved out a couple years ago for college, then contacted Jamie. Jamie had told Marin and showed her a picture of Shawn. Marin had been waiting for the right moment to tell Danny about Shawn's new name. Danny apparently dying on Earth had taken the moment away from her.
"Who-" Danny looked surprised.
Jamie piped up, "Danny, this my brother" Jamie emphasized the word. "Shawn. And Shawn, this is Danny."
Danny finally put it together, "Oh, you're her brother!" Danny came around the car and stuck his hand out. "Hey, Shawn!"
Shawn and Danny had never met, Shawn held out his hand tentatively. Shawn had moved out of his family home years before Jamie had turned Marin and Danny into a trio of friends.
"So," Jamie asked. "You guys headed to Nibelheim?" she wiggled the sign Shawn had been holding.
"It's on the way." Danny said.
"To where?" Shawn asked.
"Away from trouble." Marin opened the back seat and rearranged the bags to fit two people in the backseat. "Let's just get out of here." Marin felt a low rumble in her chest.
"I guess they're launching the rocket early?" Jamie said.
Marin looked towards the rumbling that was getting louder. There was a growing tower of smoked in the sky, it looked wrong for the smoke of a rocket con trail. And far too distant.
"No, it's too far east. The rocket pad is that way." Danny pointed at the tree line, where the rocket would appear.
"It's green," Shawn said.
"Greenish-white, like the Mako reactor in K-Town." Marin said. "Rocket con trails are white."
"Where?" Jamie asked her.
The four of them watched the column of white-and-green smoke disperse the higher it got. They watched the off-white smoke fan out an hang above the tree line as it slowly dispersed.
"The locals call it K-town." Marin told Jamie. Marin wrestled the last bag in the trunk, giving the Mako cells extra room. She didn't want to touch the batteries.
Technically, her Materia was made from the same stuff. But activating magic Materia didn't 'throw away' Mako like cars did. Once spent, Mako did not return to the Lifestream.
"Kuar-glen's nickname is K-Town." Danny said. While three of them watched the smoke rise from the suspected damaged reactor in Kuar-glen.
Marin went back to the car to prepare to leave.
Flipping the back seat back up, she said "Let's get away, before the concussion gets here." Marin went in the back seat, it was closer. Shawn piled in beside her. Jamie grabbed the front seat.
The car jerked as Danny piled on the gas pedal.
Marin pulled her hood up, they would be two days travel from K-Town soon. Even the high probability of being outside the window-breaking circumference of any blast, she still wanted to get as far away as they could.
A couple cars had the same idea, speeding up and passing their car as Danny drove away from Rocket Town.
"So, Danny, Shawn is..." Jamie started.
"I get it." Danny told her.
"OK." Jamie dropped it.
Danny clearly didn't want to make an issue of Jamie's trans-male brother. While also trying to make Shawn feel welcome to be in the car.
Shawn stared at the back of Danny's car seat, as if staring at it would tell him something.
"What else went on while I was, uh, gone?" Danny asked Jamie.
Marin caught Jamie giving her a glance in the rear-view mirror. Marin gave the tiniest shake of her head, pulling her hood tighter around her head.
Jamie went on about things that had happened at school, among their friends. Circling around her brother coming into town to visit her, without giving too many specifics. Like Shawn's transition or Marin's breakdown.
Marin listened to Jamie for what she had missed herself.
The leaves and grasses flattened along the road they were on. The wind of the concussive blast had caught up to them. None of the glass blew out, they were more than far enough away from the Mako reactor blast.
Marin made a little noise when someone poked her in the shoulder.
"Sorry," Shawn told her.
"S'okay." She had been on edge at suspecting that it was the reactor blowing-up. They could go big and bright, they could create an exclusion zone of Mako poisoning. They also tended to be so integrated into the rural towns they were built near, that they could take out some or all of the buildings near them if they blew. That included any people in them when an explosion happened. Marin dropped her face into her hands. "FUCK ShinRa!" she yelled into her hands.
Shawn rubbed her back in reassurance. "I know."
"Fuuuuuuuuck!" she shouted into her hands.
Danny pulled the car over. "What's wrong Marin?"
While Marin held her face in her hands, Shawn explained.
"Mako reactors have a tendency to take out everything in the area, buildings, people..."
"What the Fuck?" Jamie cursed like she never would have around her parents. The people that called out Marin and Jamie for swearing were a world away. On this planet, they could be themselves.
"That is fucked up." Danny said. He asked Marin again if she'd be okay.
"I will be, let's just go."
Jamie leaned over, "But if there are survivors..."
Shawn shook his head, "Mako doesn't linger like radiation does on earth, but there'll still be an exclusion zone for a bit. And we have no way to protect ourselves from that."
"Look at that, another encyclopedia of Gaia." Danny told Shawn.
"How?" Shawn asked. He looked at Marin and Danny, "Which one of you played FF7 before?"
Danny stuck a thumb to Marin, who was sitting behind Jamie. "This one has apparently been playing it quite a bit before she got here."
"Oh?" Jamie said, "Playing games older than you instead of texting me back?"
"Whoa, somebody's in trouble!" Danny joked.
Marin shook her head, wiping her face. 'Fuck ShinRa,' she thought. "I kinda deserve it?" ShinRa were the only people that built Mako reactors. They were the only people responsible for them to stay in working order. Wutai was the only dissenting opinion and they were slowly being crushed by the war. The invasion had only even happened because Wutai had, rightly so, refused to have a reactor built on their island nation.
"Oh, I'm plenty mad for letting me think I was being ghosted." Jamie gave a small smile to counter her frustration. "But I still worry about you."
Marin put a hand out to touch Jamie's briefly, before putting it back in her lap.
Jamie told her "We'll talk later." Smiling as a signal to Marin not not worry about the phrasing.
"Yep." Marin worried anyway, trying to pull deeper in her hood while Jamie re-engaged with Danny.
Marin waved a hand at Shawn.
"Yeah?" He asked.
"I played some FF7."
"Oh yeah, how old are you?"
Marin shot him a glare.
Shawn held up his hands apologetically. "Sorry, sorry. I was only asking because of how old the game is."
"Apology accepted." she sighed, "I dug into FF15 and the so-called love story in it."
"That game is terrible."
"I still liked it, though. So I decided to poke into the other 14 games in the series. I only found a few I could play on my Play Station 4, so I've been keeping busy at home." Marin fiddled with her hood's drawstring, "I like the music and the lore the developer Square likes to build."
"Then you're in good company. I like their music too. And did you finish Seven?"
"A few times." she pulled out her notebook, "I have notes before I forget."
"Ooh, ooh, can I read it? I need a refresher."
"Sure. But I don't think you can read it."
"Let me try."
She handed over the notebook.
"You weren't kidding." He turned the book in his hands. "Is that Japanese?"
Marin shook her head. "Those characters are Chinese."
Jamie leaned over the bench seat in the front of the car, "Marin doesn't forget a thing. It's all your keywords, isn't it?"
Marin nodded.
"Keywords sounds apt." Shawn said, leafing through the book. "there are no dates here.
"I don't know them." Marin admitted. "My memory isn't perfect. The only one I remember is X month/X day/X year, they redacted the discovery of something. Even in the game's text they don't pin it down."
Shawn let the notebook close, "I recall that text, but I don't remember where."
"Hmm." Marin said. "me neither." She leafed through her notebook to cram the X's in a random blank quarter page, adding a question mark. Marin had only noted it down in case she remembered where it was from one day. There were had been noted like that, whatever she could recall in the moment, then added to as she thought of it.
Marin continued, "You guys were headed to Nibelheim?"
"Are headed." Shawn corrected.
"Why?" Marin asked.
"Why not?" Shawn told her.
Marin had to bring her jaw up from where it was hanging. "Seriously? Why not go meet some people as kids, screw the butterfly effect!" Marin said.
"Whoa, whoa, we're just going to look around." Shawn defended himself.
"Yeah," Marin threw out her hands in exasperation, "because a backwater like Mount Nibel gets SO MANY tourists during a war, we'll fit right in!"
"Whoa, take it easy," Jamie told Marin. "Shawn has it all figured out."
Marin gave Shawn a look, "And why did you think this was a good idea?"
Shawn looked surprised, "you said the two of you were already heading there."
"Yeah," Marin said, "The only highway goes by that town!" she shook her head. "dude, the butterfly effect."
Shawn shook his head, "We're just in a video game, Marin. Ease up."
Marin looked at Jamie, then Shawn. "Have you guys seen anyone that doesn't belong?"
"What are you talking about?" Jamie asked her.
"A character from another game, or just someone not from this one."
"Uh, no?" Jamie said.
"Who?" Shawn asked her
"What was his name again?" Danny asked Marin.
Marin shook her head, "I dunno, I think they look different, depending on who's looking at them."
"But who is it?" Shawn asked.
Marin sighed, "Ardyn from FF15."
"Who?" Shawn had no idea.
"The main villain? The guy that could switch appearances with other people?"
"Oh yeah, that guy," Shawn said. "I did say we were stuck in a video game."
Marin shook her head, "I just had final fantasy on the brain before I got here."
"And not your friends, or even your girlfriend, were on your brain?" Jamie asked.
"I think of you everyday. I couldn't-I don't wanna to talk about it." Marin looked down at her hands, "Besides, he's not Ardyn. He's taken other faces before."
"Like who?" Jamie asked. She had a look in her eye for Marin. They were going to have words once they had a chance to be alone.
Marin had been expecting it as soon as their hug had broken apart, she had been putting it off ever since she had seen the messages she was ignoring on her phone.
"My dad, Shell- someone I met here." Marin shivered, she rubbed her neck. It had been only a few days ago. But that sort of illusion still left her disturbed. "And mimicked my own voice."
"Gross!" Jamie said.
"What's gross?" Danny asked.
"Weirdo pretending to be her dad."
"Yikes." Danny said back.
Marin shook her head, "He seemed to be more teasing that trying to trick me about it. The guy is weird, sure." She left out the part where he had ambushed her while taking a bath. "But he was so blatant about it, there was no mistaking him for my dad."
Shawn grinned, "And what about us? How do you know we're really us? Ow!"
Jamie had twisted around to flick her brother on the nose "Not helping Shawn!"
"Sorry!" Shawn said, abashed.
Marin only sighed. "Great. You sure Danny? No one?"
He shook his head, "Nope. Not that I'd notice anyone out of place. When I don't know this one. Only Marin recognized Cid. Not that I know who he is."
Shawn leaned forward excitedly. "You saw Cid? When?"
Marin stared out the front windshield. Shawn sounded like an excited fan. "It was brief. Whatever." Downplaying the brush with Cid.
Jamie talked over Shawn's next question. "What does this Ardyn look like?" Jamie asked Marin.
Marin shrugged, "Striped pants, fancy shirt, big black coat, bigger gray scarf. gray trilby. Sometimes has a deep umbrella. And red hair that's practically purple. Oh, and a stupid smirk."
"Sounds like a real asshole, Marin."
Marin shrugged, "It seems to just be an act to set me off or unsettle me. He legit answered my questions when I was polite." She thought, 'And knows far more than he's telling me.' Marin debated with herself to say more, about being asked what she had wanted. How she had gotten it so far. She didn't think her friends would react well if they thought she was the reason they were all here. Marin was not sure if that was even true, she catastrophized that it was anyway.
"Anything else we should watch out for about this Ardyn?" Jamie asked.
Marin shook her head, "Not sure. But whatever he is, he's not just Ardyn."
"What is he then?" Shawn asked her.
"I dunno yet," Marin said. "But whatever he is, he's more than that. He just looks like him." Marin put her nose in her music notebook, trying to exit being the center of attention.
Jamie started throwing questions at Shawn about this villain from another Final Fantasy game.
Shawn was mostly correct, he hadn't played the extra content for Ardyn, by his admission. But neither had Marin. Marin only interrupted to warn them that whatever his deal was. He wasn't Ardyn, he just looked like him.
"So he's not the villain?"
"I didn't say that, I said I dunno what his deal is yet." Marin was trying to get people away from making assumptions about whatever this version of Ardyn was. But she was afraid that it was too late.
Good or bad, this guy just looked like a character from another game. Whatever their deal was, Marin wanted to know. Ardyn was frustratingly indirect and cryptic, but that didn't make him a bad guy, just hard to talk too.
'He said I could go home whenever I wanted. But what if I don't? And everyone I care about is here. Along with Shawn.' She didn't know Shawn as well as Danny or Jamie yet. She just didn't trust him anywhere close to Danny and Jamie.
Marin pulled out her pencil and jotted down another rhythm. She needed an instrument so she could get her trained ears back into listening for the right notes. But she did what she could to get the relative scales with the songs she could recognize. Running tunes through her head was better than over thinking what Shawn was talking about.
While Shawn regaled the others with his own video game trivia. Marin's music got her mind off of what Ardyn had said.
"Come on." Jamie asked Marin.
"What?" Marin looked up from her music notes.
"Didn't you hear me? I said I'm grabbing a snack from the vending machine. Come pick something."
"Oh, coming."
Marin was ambushed while selecting a snack and re feeding the coin into the vending machine. She fed the Gil coin in a fifth time, while Danny recharged at the station. When Jamie spoke up.
"So, five months of silence. And you think nothings changed, just like that?"
Marin paused putting the coin in the slot for the sixth time. She looked at the slot and not at Jamie. "Well, no. But-"
"But? BUT? But what Marin?"
A hand squeezed Marin's shoulder.
"Did you think I wasn't worried about you?"
Marin fed the coin in again, while worrying about Jamie, the coin spat back out again. "I know you were."
"Then why didn't you tell me? Not even a 'message seen'?"
Marin reached into her pocket to try another coin. "I didn't have a choice the first two months. They took my phone away. And once I had it back, it was hard to look at all those notifications. Then it was too easy to just not reply at all." Marin fed a new coin in the machine, getting rejected again. "Fucking machine."
The hand left Marin's shoulder, "Yeah, other people fine. But me? Why did you ignore me?"
Marin fed the new coin in a second time and turned to face Jamie, even as she kept her eyes too downcast to look each other in the eyes. "You deserve someone better than me."
"You don't get to make that decision."
"I'm not safe, not to you, not anyone."
"What are you even talking about?"
Marin rubbed her knuckles. Recalling the bruises and scrapes she had found after her first blackout. "I don't remember what happened at the bar. I have blackouts, they're called fugues. But I hurt someone. I'm not-"
"You don't remember?" Jamie asked, mystified.
Marin shook her head. "I remember being in the hospital. But someone had to tell me that I had been admitted three days before. I don't remember that. Only the bruises and cuts on my hands." Marin shrugged. "I black out and get violent. I'm not safe Jamie."
Marin looked up to see Jamie get an angry look on her face, it scared Marin.
"He deserved every punch Marin."
"WHAT?"
"You don't remember? When when your Ex showed up?"
"What? Don't tell me that creep Cal was there?"
Jamie searched Marin's face. "You really don't remember." Jamie looked around, searching for words. "Your Ex started flirting with you and was talking you into leaving with him."
"What the fuck? I would never DO that with Cal!"
"I thought that too. Until you did."
"I don't remember any of that."
"You were all over the place that night Marin. It scared me when I didn't know what was happening."
"I don't remember any of that. And that terrifies me."
Jamie held Marin's shoulders. "You're upset. We don't have to talk about this now if you don't want to."
Marin shook her head, holding Jamie at her hips. "I want to know."
Jamie's mouth twitched, "Long story short, Cal was happy that you were receptive to leaving with him. Nobody else there knows you like I do. I was the only person who thought anything was wrong."
Marin had only talked with Jamie, about how Calvin, or 'Cal', had been creeping on Marin for months. They had only started dating in high school because Marin had thought that he had broken up with his last girlfriend. "The fucker." Not only was he cheating and making Marin the other woman, but also wanted an 'exotic-looking' girlfriend like Marin. Who looked similar enough to her Japanese relatives for 'yellow fever'.
"Yeah, you don't have to tell me twice why you broke up."
Cal had never broken up with his other girlfriend. The guy was a creep. And Marin had never wanted anything to do with him since.
Jamie and Danny intervened with Cal, if he ever bothered Marin at school. Up until he transferred to another high school. The rumor was that he had been expelled at the other school. Marin didn't care. She was just glad to never pass him in the halls again.
She could feel the anxiety in her stomach. The idea that during a fugue, she had acted so out of character. Put herself in that position, and didn't remember a thing. She didn't remember seeing Cal at the meet-up. But not immediately running away? Now that Cal was a world away, she would never know what might have happened.
"Cal." Marin said.
"Yeah."
"Cal?"
"Yeah."
"So, who did I punch?"
"You had a change of heart before leaving the reserved area of the restaurant. Apparently he started dragging you away by the arm."
"What. The. Fuck." Marin rubbed her belly. Something had crawled into her stomach and died. She no longer wanted that snack.
"Yeah." Jamie twitched a hand on Marin's shoulder. Signaling that Jamie was offering a hug.
Marin pulled Jamie in, and they held each other for a little while. Jamie rubbed Marin's back. "It doesn't matter now. Cal is a world away. You're safe."
Marin buried her face in Jamie's neck and mumbled something.
"What?" Jamie asked.
Marin raised her head, speaking softly into Jamie's ear. "Except we're not safe. Not here."
"But Cal isn't here. At least. Plus, he got expelled again. So he won't even be at events."
Marin guffawed and moved Jamie to arms-length away. "Oh yeah, and despite that, in a fucked up way. I wish I was back on Earth. Not here. I'd rather worry about mid-terms and Cal creeping around."
Jamie scrunched up her tiny nose in a cute way, "Exams. Fuck 'em."
"I don't like exams either." Marin smiled a little, "You would not believe the homework I had to do, even out of school."
Jamie patted Marin's shoulder in a mock slap. "Homework? Even for you?"
Marin sighed, "Yeah, unfortunately. Anyway, there are things here far more dangerous than that creep. OK." Marin squeezed Jamie's shoulder. "Very dangerous things."
"Like what?"
"Sixty foot snakes that could swallow us whole. Fire-breathing dragons." Marin remembered that she still had a Gil coin in the rejection slot. "Ask Shawn how many ways we can die here. He knows this world as well as I do." Marin turned back to feed the coin, again, into the vending machine. "Maybe better."
"You're joking right?" Jamie was grinned from ear to ear.
Marin fed the coin again, glaring at Jamie from over her shoulder.
Jamie's face fell. "Shit, you're serious."
"That's not counting the umpteen villains that want to summon some giant world destroying monsters. Killing all life on Gaia, multiple ways."
The vending machine made a noise, engaging the coin. Marin had forgotten her original snack choice and pushed any button that worked.
"What? How many times can you save the world in one game?"
The machine spat out the not-quite-a-Twinkie snack. Covered with corporate branding in a plastic bag.
"Not one, several games. And saving the world from some villain is a staple of RPGs. Not that I've played most of them, but I doubt the ones I haven't are any different."
"Sounds nerve-wracking and repetitive."
Marin put her snack in her coat pocket, she still wasn't hungry. Shrugging, she replied to Jamie, "Maybe, but it's not how the game ends. It's the story that gets me there. I've played through saving the world over and over. But the story, and emotions, is why I keep playing them."
Jamie pointed at the machine, "you forgot to push the 'gimme my change' button."
Marin shrugged, "if there's enough credit. Get something for yourself."
"Ooh, big spender." Jamie made a selection. Then another, then another.
"Wha? how much credit is there?" Marin was surprised.
"You fed a 50 Gil coin into the damn thing!"
"Shit, I meant to use another fiver." Marin shrugged. "At least the guys will have something to snack on."
"Guys, how long does it take to get a snac-whoa!" Shawn had come around the corner, looking for the two of them.
"Help us!" Jamie asked him. There were too many things for the two of them to carry without dropping something. The wrapped snacks kept sliding against each other.
"What, did you break it?" Shawn asked, as he helped gather up their purchases.
"I didn't break anything," Marin told him. "I used a 50 Gil coin. Oops."
Shawn chuckled as he helped them shove buns, and Twinkies, and strudels in to their pockets. Gathering the rest in their arms.
Marin hadn't emptied the machine, but several of the items were sold out now.
"Couldn't you have done this with the sodas and potions?" Shawn chuckled as they carried their haul back to the car.
"Even I'm not that rich." Marin told him, as they tossed most of the food on the middle of the bench seat in the back of the car.
"What happened?" Danny asked, sitting in the driver's seat.
"Somebody needs to learn the concept of money." Shawn told him.
Marin rolled her eyes. "I used a 50 Gil coin when I wanted a 5. So what? It's not like I lost money."
"To the bringer of the feast!" Danny called. He held a Twinkie against the steering wheel.
"The feast!" Jamie and Shawn chimed in.
Marin held up her own snack, but didn't answer. She was still embarrassed to have made that mistake.
They joked about it some more, before Danny started the car. They left the truck stop and power station behind. Soon they would hook around the mountain range and be halfway between Rocket Town and Nibelheim.
The recharging station was so obscure, that it hadn't been on Marin's road map. A map which Jamie now held, to navigate for Danny.
