Title: Split Up (Tentative)
Rating: T, teasing M
Warnings: Sexual themes, Language, Death

"Natalie?" Lance asked in a flabbergasted and disbelieving tone.

Natalie stiffened at the familiar voice calling her name, and whipped around. Her eyes fell on Lance, staring at her, and her cheeks heated with embarrassment at the same time a thrill of complete disbelief ran through her. She'd been sure that none of her friends had ended up in this twisted world. And yet that was definitely Lance at the bar, staring at her; the same red hair and eyes, the same lean physique. He'd recognized her, called her name, and was now looking between his drink and her, obviously contemplating if he'd been drugged.

Natalie's mind raced. She couldn't sit down and speak with him—certainly not with so many prying eyes and ears surrounding them—but the only way to gain any kind of privacy would be for him to buy her services. She had all of those thoughts and realizations in the span of a few seconds, and came to a conclusion. She adopted a seductive smirk and sauntered over to Lance at the bar, whose face, amusingly, heated with a blush as his eyes instinctively dropped to take in her body and revealing clothes before snapping back to her face. Natalie was long past the phase of feeling shy about her body, and knew what a potent tool a little seduction could be. Plus, it was the only way she'd be able to speak with him privately.

"Hey there, tough guy," Natalie purred, running a soft hand across Lance's cheek and down to his shoulder, fighting hard against the urge to laugh. Lance's expression looked like she'd just smacked him with a fireball spell. He remained still, his eyes wide and his jaw dropped as Natalie slid into his lap, loosely looping her arms around his neck. She could feel the beginnings of an erection against her crotch as she began slowly grinding against him.

"Natz, what-" Lance started to say in an uneven tone. He wanted to protest, to demand to know what the hell she was doing, only to be cut off as Natalie suddenly pressed her full lips against his. His hands came up to her shoulders to push her away, but stilled when her eyes flashed with a sort of desperation. He could only stare as she pulled back of her own accord, still giving him a sultry smile, her tongue darting out to lick her lips. If she weren't his friend and he wasn't so confused he would have ravished her right then and there.

"Ah, ah, words only if you pay for it," Natalie tutted in a husky voice.

Lance felt like he was going to have a permanent blush staining his face. He knew exactly what Natalie meant by 'pay for it'. For whatever reason, she'd become a whore since they'd been split up. And while he was usually okay with paying for a night of pleasure, there was just something inherently wrong with this situation. Natalie had always been rather reserved, standoffish, towards sex. She'd never once taken any interest in him, always focused on Matt, and she abhorred the idea of women selling their bodies for money. But her tight, revealing outfit, her seductive tone and motions, and her words all pointed to her being a whore.

And yet, Lance could tell she was trying to tell him something with those words. Before he could figure out just what, however, a man wandered over and lifted Natalie clean off his lap. Lance's eyes narrowed and he tensed defensively as he watched a flicker of frustration cross Natalie's expression before she shifted back into the sultry routine. She didn't resist at all when the man started grinding against her, merely demanded he pay before touching. The man murmured that he could make it worth her while for free. Natalie pulled away and ran her hands down the man's arms and directed him to the front desk. The man rolled his eyes, but turned promising to be back. Natalie purred for him to hurry up before someone else got her first; she shot Lance a desperate and pointed glance.

As soon as the man was gone, Lance stood up; abandoning his drink and ignoring the awkward boner he had gotten from Natalie. "How do I pay?" he asked her in a level tone.

Natalie's eyes betrayed her immense relief as she looped her arms around one of his and guided him to a desk. Lance had a brief discussion where he handed over a surprisingly large amount of cash and followed Natalie to one of the many doors lining the dim room. He watched Natalie make subtle seductive motions at the men she passed, but maintained a steady course for the doors. He headed inside as soon as Natalie opened one, and watched her lock the door behind them.

Instantly, Natalie's entire countenance shifted. Her shoulders slumped as she pressed her forehead against the door, and let out a heavy, tense sigh. Lance watched her with a level of concern and confusion. Finally, the young woman turned around and beamed at him.

"Sorry about that, Lance," Natalie breathed. "I'm technically on the job, and they get…. mad if I stop to chat with people."

Lance arched a brow, but nodded. He sat down on the edge of the bed at Natalie's behest and waited until she settled beside him before saying, "So I'm equal parts confused, aroused, and upset. I thought I was the only one here, and even if I had thought you were here too, I never would have figured you'd pick up whoring. What happened?" A thought occurred to him and his eyes narrowed as he demanded, "Wait, are you being held here?"

Natalie shrugged with a flicker of shame crossing her features, "Yes and no to that last one. Women aren't allowed to do basically anything here, and I needed food and shelter. Plus my body is… well suited for pleasure. I tried to do other things, but I was turned away everywhere I went, and thievery is severely punished."

Lance blew out a long sigh and ran a hand through his hair. He studied Natalie for a long moment, not doubting her words, but taking in just how tired and worn she looked. Clearly, she wasn't happy living this life; her face was drawn now that she'd let her act drop, her eyes shadowed with despair, and there was obvious shame to her expression. He felt awful knowing she'd made the choice to give up her morals to keep living, and wished he'd found her sooner.

"Whatever kept you alive," Lance finally said in a quiet tone. He awkwardly wrapped an arm around Natalie's shoulders in a one-armed hug, trying to comfort her. After a moment, he added, "I've picked up some unsavoury work as well, if that makes you feel any better."

Natalie cracked a small half-smile as she murmured, "Misery does love company, I suppose. What have you been up to?"

Lance's voice was quiet, his eyes cold as he replied, "I'm an assassin now. I've killed a lot of people who probably did nothing to deserve it because someone wanted them dead. Old, young, strong weak—if someone pays to get a mark on a head, then I take out the target."

Natalie shook her head slowly, and returned Lance's hug as she quietly said, "What a fucked up world this is."

Lance nodded silently. After several long moments, he offered, "Well, at least being a hitman pays well. I can support you and me easily, so you don't need to work here anymore. What do we need to do to get you out?"

Natalie twisted to gape up at Lance. She hadn't even thought about getting out of whoring, merely wanted to speak with her old friend. He met her incredulous eyes with an arched brow, and the expression was so painfully familiar that Natalie's eyes welled with tears. Still, she felt guilty to just be taking advantage of Lance. "I can't accept that, Lance," she said quietly, her eyes dropping to where her fingers picked at the sheets of the bed. "I have no way to pay you back, nor will I ever have a way. I can't just start freeloading off you."

Lance snorted and replied, "Well I can't accept leaving you here for whatever man who wants you to shove their cock in you just so you can get some food and a place to rest your head. You're my friend, and I have absolutely no problem with supporting you. Besides, I don't plan on living like this forever, so you can help me figure out how to bust out of this crap hole of a place."

Natalie smiled softly as she breathed, "Thanks, Lance."

"You're welcome. Now, do I need to pay for you to leave, or can you just walk out?" Lance asked.

"I refused to sign their contract, so I can just leave at any time," Natalie replied, standing up. "It meant that I get none of the benefits aside from a place to sleep and two meals a day, and they keep eighty percent of my earnings, but I'm also technically not their whore. I'll just need to tell them I'm leaving, and they should let me go."

Lance nodded standing up as well, "Got it. Let's go, then. We can head back to my place and set you up in the guest room. Do you have anything you need to bring with you?"

Natalie didn't reply, but moved to a corner of the room. She knelt down and pried up one of the floorboards and withdrew her Adventure Pouch. All of her worldly belongings were stored in it, even if she never got the chance to use them anymore. She'd debated simply selling the gear inside, but hadn't been able to part with any of them, as they were her only reminders of her old life. She pulled out her old Red Dress and held it up with a distant look in her eyes. It felt like it had been an age since she'd last worn it.

Lance waited patiently with his back turned as Natalie stripped down and pulled on the dress. He was tempted to ogle an eyeful, but decided he wanted to savor the fact that he had at least one of his friends back for a while before he started making them yell. Still, he felt his almost gone arousal come back at the thought of a beautiful woman stripping behind him. He blew out a silent sigh as he wryly mused that he and his hand were going to have a moment later. It never crossed his mind to ask Natalie to lay back, as he had paid for her. In his mind, she was Matt's girl, and whether or not the swordsman was here was irrelevant to that fact; never mind the fact that she was his friend.

Natalie finished dressing and followed Lance out the door. She stuck close beside him, only breaking away to inform the desk that she was leaving, and not coming back. The person manning the desk shrugged and waved her off. And then the pair was outside in the chilly night air. Natalie grinned up at Lance, who smirked back and led the way down the dark street. After a brief walk, he stopped beside a hoverbike and waved Natalie onto the backseat. The mage looked surprised at the vehicle, but sat down without protest and accepted the spare helmet Lance offered her.

"I didn't think you'd own one of these, though I suppose it is your kind of toy," Natalie commented as she buckled the helmet on.

Lance grinned as he settled down with a second helmet on. He inputted his code and sent a small spurt of mana into the machine, causing it to whir to life. "Yeah, I love this thing. It'll get us to my- our place in just a few minutes," he replied. He felt a distinct thrill of delight at being able to call it their place, not just his.

Natalie felt as the bike lifted into the air. She leaned forwards to wrap her arms around Lance's waist for stability as he suddenly took off. A bubble of warm air formed around them to protect them from the chill wind. Lights flashed past below as Lance expertly piloted the bike between buildings and over streets. Before long, he was parking it inside the garage of a small, nondescript house. A work bench lined one wall, littered with tools and bits of scrap parts. A single door led the way inside.

Natalie waited as Lance had shut the garage and powered up the security and followed him inside. The events of the evening suddenly seemed to finally sink in, and she drew in a sharp breath, prompting Lance to look back at her.

"I'm not dreaming, am I?" Natalie asked in a dazed voice.

Lance snorted, "Not unless we both are. Come on, I'll show you around."

The next fifteen minutes were spent acquainting Natalie with the small, one floor house. He had two bedrooms—a master and a smaller guest room, two full baths—one connected to the master bedroom, one just off from the guest room, a fairly sizeable kitchen with all the major appliances a person would need to cook, a laundry room, a dining room with a square table and two chairs. Just off of the dining room was a fairly large sitting room with a long couch and a plush recliner; a low coffee table sat in the center of the space, and shelves were along the wall with the windows looking out at a small backyard. There was an electric fireplace set into the wall adjacent to the shelves. Finally, there was a basement where Lance had set up a more comprehensive workshop.

"Nice place," Natalie complimented.

The pair was seated in the sitting room with cups of hot chocolate. Natalie was perched on the couch, and Lance was flopped in the recliner. A bowl of chips sat between them on the table to share.

"Yeah, I guess," Lance agreed. His eyes drifted around the space for a moment before he added, "It's a little big for just me, but cheap; plus I had… kinda hoped I'd find one of you guys, so I bought a bigger place to room us."

Natalie set her mug of hot chocolate down on the table. She studied Lance's wistful expression as he stared out the window. "So you haven't seen Matt or Anna, huh," she said, though her voice made it clear that she wasn't asking a question.

Lance shook his head, "No, I haven't. You'd think Matt at least would be easy to find what with his perchance for getting into trouble, but I guess he's not here with us." He brought his gaze around to Natalie as he asked, "Any chance that Anna picked up whoring, too?"

"Maybe," Natalie said with a shrug. "I hope not, though. I had the body to get into a fairly reputable place, but if she's whoring… Well, she'd be working the streets, which is a lot lower of pay, and a lot more dangerous. It's possible that she picked up thieving, though. She certainly has the skills for it and to avoid getting caught."

"Anna the thief, huh," Lance mused with a smirk. "I'll laugh so hard if that's what she's doing. Of course, she may not be here, either."

Natalie nodded somberly, "That would be better, I think." There was a long moment of silence before the mage shook herself. She turned her eyes on Lance and asked, "So what can I do to help you? I'll pick up the chores and cooking, if you want."

Lance nodded, "Yeah, that's fine. I need to go to the store to get some more food tomorrow, so I can show you the way. I may leave for days on end, by the way; it depends on if I have a job or not. I'll see about getting something to keep you entertained here." His head tilted and he studied Natalie for a long moment before adding, "I'll have to pick up some other stuff for you, too, I suppose. You'll need your own bath stuff, your own clothes, plus we'll need more dishes, and a few other things."

"I don't need new clothes," Natalie refuted. "I can make do with just my armors."

Lance arched a brow and calmly said, "I somehow doubt your armor will fit in around here."

"Then I'll just stay inside," Natalie said stubbornly, crossing her arms.

Lance rolled his eyes and asked, "What's wrong with getting new clothes, Natz?"

Natalie was quiet for a long time. Finally, after another prod from Lance, she murmured, "I already owe you so much for getting me out of that pleasure house, Lance. I don't want to be a bigger burden than absolutely necessary."

"Okay, let's clear this up right now," Lance said flatly. He leaned forwards and fixed Natalie with a stern look, "I have a shit ton of money saved up with no plans to spend it in the foreseeable future. You are my friend, not a burden, and it cheapens our friendship for you to be thinking the way you are. If you really want to repay me, then just be my friend. It's been a long six months since I've seen anyone from our team, and I'm lonely. You being here to talk with is a huge blessing, not a burden. Got it?"

Natalie stared at Lance for a long moment before smiling softly and nodding, "I'll just shut up and let you pamper me, then. Let me know if I can help beyond housework, though."

"Well you can start by promising to never, ever, seduce me ever again," Lance said with a smirk.

The mage across from him flushed lightly and mumbled, "Yeah, that shouldn't be a problem."

Lance's smirk widened, "Good, but if you'll excuse me, I still have a problem already caused by you to take care of. This is probably not a good thing to say, but you made a hot whore."

Natalie buried her face in the arm of the sofa and pointed at the hallway. Her voice was muffled as she said, "You are just as horrible as always. Go masturbate or whatever before I remove the problem permanently. I'll be here, purging my mind of everything you just said." Her voice carried a large amount of amusement, however.

Lance chuckled and strode off down the hall. Natalie sat up as soon as he was gone and shot an amused and exasperated smile at the bathroom door as she heard the shower turn on. Lance was as incorrigible as ever, and it was a relief to see and hear. His jokes brought a level of familiarity back to her life, and she was looking forwards to cracking more with him. Now that she was no longer virgin, she was a lot less flustered about the topic.

Natalie stood up and retrieved Lance's empty mug as well as her own and the mostly eaten chips. She carried them into the kitchen and set about putting everything away. As she worked, she wondered what Matt was doing. It wasn't the first time the swordsman had crossed her mind; she spent many hours each day wondering about him and the others of the team. She'd worried that maybe they would look at her differently once they found out how she had been living, but Lance's response settled those fears. Still, she wished she could see Matt and Anna again.

Footsteps down the hall just as she was drying the mugs had her glancing back to greet Lance with a smile. The gunner grinned back and leaned in the doorway to watch her set the mugs she'd washed in the cabinet. He still had a hard time believing she was here now. It was the end of long days and nights of just surviving, wondering and fearing if he'd never see the team again. Now he had someone to come back to, to talk with. Natalie had no idea how closed off he'd gotten after the first couple months alone. She'd successfully snapped him out of his depressed funk just as effectively as she'd snapped him out of his heartlessness when they'd first met.

"So, off to sleep now?" Natalie asked as she spread the towel she'd used to dry the dishes off on the counter.

Lance snapped out of his thoughts and nodded, "Yeah. The guest room is yours now, so feel free to shove furniture around and set your stuff out. I don't have any jobs lined up for now, so we can spend all day catching up and shopping tomorrow."

Natalie grinned at him as she stepped past to head for her room. "You sound like a teenage girl," she joked.

"Not until I start talking about how cute the nearest boy is," Lance shot back. He paused at a window and stared at his reflection, jokingly flexing an arm and saying, "Wait, look at how hot he is."

Natalie burst out in laughter, and shoved Lance. The gunner chuckled as well before saying, "Good night, Natz. See you in the morning."

"G'night, Lance," Natalie replied, still grinning.

They slipped into their separate rooms.

OOOOOO

Late the next morning saw Lance trailing along behind Natalie, holding onto a number of bags. They were walking back to the house after a trip to the grocery store and a retail store. Natalie had picked out a few outfits to appease Lance, and they had grabbed a couple of towels and soaps for her to use as well as some cheap dishes. They had also gone to get a duplicate of the house keys for her to keep on her.

"Why did I agree to this again?" Lance asked with a frown.

Natalie's eyes twinkled as she looked over her shoulder, "Because you're an awesome friend."

"Yeah, awesome friend, not bag boy," Lance huffed. He shifted the bags looped over his arms to a better position and grumbled, "I feel like your boyfriend. That's Matt's job, not mine."

"Matt and I were never a couple," Natalie reminded him as she unlocked the front door.

"Only because you were too much of a wuss to ask him out, and he was too much of an idiot to even consider romance," Lance muttered. He set the bags down in the front hall with a sigh of relief.

"I doubt Matt ever liked me enough to think of dating me," Natalie replied with a wistful smile. She picked up the groceries and carried them into the kitchen to put away.

Lance followed her to help and suggested, "Well, you can always ask him straight out when we see him again."

Natalie paused where she was placing a box of energy drinks in the fridge. She stared at the label as she asked quietly, "What if I never see him again? We don't even know if he ended up here with us, or how to get back."

Lance placed a hand on the mage's slumped shoulder and said, "You'll see him again, so don't give up. We both thought that we were the only ones here, and that turned out to be wrong. I bet the other two are running around somewhere as well, you'll see."

"But what if I don't?" Natalie persisted, finally shutting the fridge when it began to beep at her.

"You will, but if you really want an answer, then I guess you move on," Lance said firmly. "Matt isn't the only nice guy you'll ever meet, and I'm sure you could win someone's heart if you wanted to try. You're strong, smart, beautiful, funny, and kind."

Natalie shot him a grateful smile and said, "Careful before all these sweet nothings go to my head and I fall for you."

Lance made a face and said, "No offense, but I've already got someone I'm looking at."

"Oh?" Natalie asked with a grin. "Would that someone happen to be a petite ranger with green hair and eyes and a fierce temper? Her name just might start with an 'A'?"

"Maybe," Lance smirked back. His hand sneaked to rest on Natalie's ass and he said, "The only thing I might every want from you past friendship is relief." His eyes sparkled with mischievous humor.

Natalie smacked his hand off with a laugh and said, "Not happening unless I suddenly wake up hot and bothered with an urge to bang." She leaned one hip against the counter and crossed her arms as she added, "Besides, I'm pretty sure you told me no seduction."

"Yet another poor decision on my part," Lance joked. He turned back to the bags and moved a number of boxes and bags of crackers and chips to the pantry. His lips were quirked in a half-smile as he bantered back and forth with Natalie. He was used to her blowing up at him with flustered yells when he said similar things to her in the past, but these new interactions were way more entertaining, and far less painful.

Natalie stacked the fruit they'd purchased in a bowl on the counter. With the groceries away, she asked, "What now?"

Lance shrugged, "Dunno. I normally just sleep when I'm not on a job or repairing things, but that was more because I was depressed. I don't have much in the way of entertainment aside from a few books and the TV."

Natalie's eyes softened with concern as she asked, "Are you still depressed?"

"Are you kidding me? I have an awesome friend to crack off-color jokes with," Lance said with a smirk.

"And what else is there to depression or lack thereof other than the odd grope and sex joke?" Natalie said with a grin. She led the way to the sitting room, flopped on the sofa, and suggested, "We could start really looking for the other two."

Lance dropped down in his recliner and said, "Yeah. I tried to locate them from rumors while I'm on the job, but I haven't seen hide nor hair of either one. If Anna's become a thief or is whoring, then she'd be pretty low profile. Matt might have joined a guard somewhere, because he certainly isn't at any gladiator pits."

Natalie frowned thoughtfully as she mused, "I doubt Matt could hack it as a guard. He's too undisciplined, and guard work would be boring for him. Are there any other places a strong young man could have ended up that don't involve fighting?"

Lance tilted his head, staring blankly at the dark fireplace as he thought. Finally he shrugged and said, "Well, manual labor is always a possibility. He may have gotten roped up in the mines, or something."

"Mines?" Natalie repeated in a confused tone.

"Yeah, mining is a big industry here, and they're always looking for new workers," Lance explained. "Still, I can't really see Matt whacking stone with a pickax all day; especially if he can't keep the stuff he digs up."

Natalie frowned and asked, "Do they ever have unwilling laborers? Maybe the reason we can't find Anna or Matt is because they're stuck in the mines."

"You know, I'm not sure," Lance murmured thoughtfully. "The mine shafts are like mazes, so running isn't really an option, not if you want to avoid starving to death, anyway. I've never heard of forced labor here, but that doesn't mean it isn't a problem. I suppose I could ask my contacts."

Natalie nodded, "You should do that. If nothing else, then we can write it off as a possibility if slavery isn't a thing here."

Lance stood up and stretched, "Well, then I guess I'll go do that now. Feel free to do whatever while I'm gone."

"See you later," Natalie replied.

Within a few minutes, Lance was walking out the front door. Natalie lied back on the sofa and stared up at the ceiling. She wondered where Matt and Anna were, wondered how many contacts Lance had, wondered what they'd have for dinner that night, wondered where the heck Matt and Anna would sleep if they came to stay here too. Amidst her wonderings, Natalie's eyelids drooped before shutting as she fell asleep.

Lance came back just after sundown. His contacts had been shifty about the mines, saying it was dangerous to pry into the mining industries affairs. Still, they had helped him get into several of the larger companies records, and helped him transcribe a number of files to browse through. He figured that there was indeed something shady going on if even the assassins were uncomfortable discussing the topic.

The gunner toed his boots off and opened his mouth to call for Natalie, only to shut his mouth again as he spotted her. The mage was lying on her side on the sofa, her arms drawn up to her chest as she slept. Her face was relaxed and strands of hair lay haphazardly across her face. Lance shook his head with a grin, thinking that she would have been more comfortable if she'd walked the twenty paces to her bed. Still, he padded silently over to his recliner and pulled the throw off the back of it to drape over Natalie. He'd let her sleep while he threw together something for dinner.

Natalie woke to the smell of something delicious cooking and the faint feeling of a breeze drifting past her face. Crickets chirped outside, and the cool breeze paired nicely with the blanket placed over her. She peeled her eyes open and was surprised to see it was dark outside the windows, which were open to let in some fresh air. Rock music faintly drifted from the kitchen where she could also hear Lance puttering around as he threw together what smelled like some kind of roast.

The mage sat up, letting the blanket fall to her lap. She stretched her arms in front or her before standing up and folding the sheet. She padded over to the kitchen in time to see Lance moving half of a pork roast to a platter. A covered bowl of some kind sat not far away, steam drifting up from under the plate set over it. The gunner turned with the platter of meat in hand, only to stop when he saw Natalie.

"Well, well, the sleeping princess awakens without the kiss of true love," Lance joked, reaching one hand over to turn off his music player.

Natalie chuckled and said, "Sorry, about falling asleep. I should have made dinner, not napped."

"Eh, it's fine," Lance replied with a shrug as he walked past to set the food on the table in the dining room. "I'll just leave you with all of the dishes in revenge."

"That's fair," Natalie agreed, carrying over the covered bowl, which she discovered were mashed potatoes. She saw that a salad already sat in the other room. "This looks good, Lance," she complimented.

Lance nodded, "Yeah, simple but tasty stuff. I don't normally cook, but I figured we have reason to celebrate. Do we break out the alcohol?"

"No true celebration passes without a little drink," Natalie agreed with a grin.

"That's what I think," Lance smirked. He headed back into the kitchen and pulled out a couple of beer cans and tossed one to Natalie when he came back, "Beer, the poor man's wine."

"I thought you had a shit ton of money?" Natalie said with a grin as she popped the tab on the can.

"Ah, but I have the poor man's taste," Lance said before taking a gulp of his beer. "Matt must have rubbed off on me."

Natalie laughed as she served herself some food. She took a bite of the savory roast and made a small sound of appreciation. She swallowed the food and asked, "Speaking of Matt, what did you find out?"

"Not too much, yet," Lance replied as he scooped some potatoes on his plate. "My contacts seemed pretty shifty about the mines, not answering one way or another on whether there are slaves or not."

"Which means there probably are," Natalie noted mildly.

"Exactly," Lance agreed. "They did, however, help me hack the systems of a number of the bigger mines. I've got a data dump to wade through which will hopefully contain a record of the miners."

"Alongside endless order forms, requisition forms, reports, inspection, management," Natalie listed with a wry grin.

Lance sighed and nodded, "Probably. Maybe I'll make you help me with that."

"Dishes aren't enough punishment for sleeping through cooking dinner?" Natalie asked with a grin. "Sure, I can help. Just tell me what to do."

"After dinner," Lance said around a mouthful of salad.

The pair ate the rest of the dinner in silence. Afterwards, they packed the leftovers in the fridge and Natalie set to work scrubbing the dishes. While she washed, Lance poked fun at her, asking if she'd like a nap, or saying to put more back into scrubbing the pans of meat drippings that had burned on. That finally stopped when Natalie flung a handful of soap suds at him, the foam landing on his face in such a way that Natalie laughed that he was rabid. Lance made a few snarling noises that dissolved into spitting as he got the soap in his mouth. Natalie doubled over laughing as he made several strange faces at the bitter taste, until he finally washed his mouth out with an energy drink.

"And that does it," Natalie exclaimed, setting the last dish in the dishwasher with some soap and setting it to run. She dried her hands off and smiled at Lance as she asked, "Shall we throw ourselves into the dull life of corporate work?"

Lance heaved a sigh, "Might as well. It isn't going to just spit the information at us, after all. More's the pity."

Natalie followed Lance to his room where he had, to her confusion, two laptops and a desktop computer lined up on a long table with a single rolling chair. A ceiling fan was turned on low, generating a soft breeze. There was a door leading to a small closet, and a small book case with a few novels lined on it beside a weapons rack. A queen sized bed was against the far corner, the sheets and pillows all bundled up from sleep. A side table sat to one side of the bed bearing a lamp, an alarm clock, and a small framed photo.

Curiosity piqued, Natalie moved to pick up the photograph, and her eyes widened in surprise. It was a picture of the team sitting in the grass in Greenwood. She and Anna were smiling, Matt had made a strange face right as the picture was taken, Lance looked like he had been immensely bored with the whole process, but his face was mostly relaxed. She remembered when this photo had been taken: it was right after they had returned the Jewel to Greenwood after defeating Godcat. Anna had insisted on a photo, and had gotten a villager to snap a picture for them. She guiltily couldn't remember what she'd done with her copy, but Lance had clearly held onto his. By the creases in the paper, he'd folded it up and stuck it somewhere safe.

"Sentimental, I know," Lance suddenly said. He had moved to boot up the computers, and was watching Natalie out of the corner of his eye.

Natalie set the picture back down and said, "Maybe, but there's nothing wrong with being sentimental; it's nice, actually. I'm surprised you still have it, though."

Lance shrugged and murmured, "Well, back then I was pretty insecure about my place on the team. Anna's got a far better personality than I do, and could do just about everything I could. I worried that maybe you and Matt would start pulling away, leave me out of things, or maybe even ask me to go. I worried about that the whole quest, wondering if it was my last on the team, which translated to aggressive behavior towards Anna, who I saw as a replacement, but that wasn't what happened at all. We just added Anna, and that was that; just one more… member of the family. That picture is a nice, physical reminder that we are all on the same team, and happy about it."

Natalie stared at the side of Lance's face, speechless. She'd had no idea back then that Lance had thought she and Matt would throw him aside. She also had no idea that Lance saw the team as a second family. She knew he'd had a crappy childhood, though he never really talked about it beyond the occasional tidbit. He must have feared that any change to the norm would upset and destroy his zone of comfort. Her eyes drifted back to the picture as she realized just why Lance had gotten depressed when they'd all been separated, and why he was so adamant that they'd find the others. They were his family, his rock, his roots, now. He didn't want to face the idea that they were gone, so he refused to.

Finally, the mage said softly, "Well I for one will never make you leave, Lance. Now we just need to find where Matt and Anna are holed up and we can get back to being a team again."

Lance shot her a grateful smile and held out a laptop for her to take. "I've already copied the files onto it. We're looking for records of workers, quotas being filled, even disciplinary measures might help. I can't imagine Anna or Matt staying in the mines quietly if they're there," he instructed.

Natalie accepted the computer and snagged a pillow to prop against the wall behind her back on the bed. She settled down and began delving through a seemingly endless source of files. Lance worked through two other companies at the same time, leaving on to load a search and browsing the second before switching. The soft sounds of keys being hit and yawns were the only noises for a while.

Natalie's dulled eyes skimmed yet another report about workers in a mine called Azure Dust. Suddenly, a thump had her jumping in surprise. She glanced over at Lance to see that he'd fallen over asleep on the desk; a glance over at the clock told her it was three in the morning. She smiled at the gunner and set the laptop aside to stand up and wrap a blanket around his shoulders. Lance blew out a content sigh at the added warmth, but remained asleep, one arm coming up to pillow his head.

Natalie located the power supply for the laptop she was using and plugged it in before slipping out of the room. She shut all the open windows in the house, latching them. Then she checked to be sure the doors were locked before snagging an energy drink to bring back to Lance's room. She settled back down on the bed and returned to browsing files, sipping at her drink to stay awake. She sank into the information she was going through, pulling up file after file and scanning them. It wasn't until the sun was just rising that she found anything of interest.

"New batch of workers received. Two not compliant to regulations. Requesting workers one-twenty-seven and one-twenty-eight be moved to shaft B-54, sublevel three until further notice," Natalie read aloud to herself in a whisper. She pulled up a search for the two numbers and her eyebrows shot up at the number of reports that came back listing damages and disciplinary measures. Her tired eyes widened as she found a file with photograph identification for the two workers. She clicked on the file and it opened to reveal Matt's and Anna's faces.

"Bingo!" Natalie exclaimed.

Lance jolted upright mumbling, "Was his name-o?" Clearly, he had heard Natalie's exclamation, but his half-asleep mind made up an entirely different context for it. He blinked at the mage's grinning face for a few moments before his eyes drifted to the pink sky outside. His jaw cracked in a wide yawn before he asked, "I fell asleep, didn't I?"

"At about three," Natalie confirmed. She turned the laptop around and added, "Does this make up for sleeping through making dinner?"

Lance's eyes widened at the images on the computer screen before he shot to his feet with a cheer. "You found them!" he said excitedly.

Natalie nodded, turning the computer back around. She clicked a few times and started reporting what she found, "Apparently, they were brought in to Azure Dust mines five and a half months ago at the same time. Both of them put up a struggle for the first few days, almost escaping on day five. Their overseers then requested they be transferred to the deepest shafts available." She scanned the document silently for a moment before adding with a frown, "They might not be there anymore, though. This document is the most recent one, dated back five months ago."

Lance shook his head, "Even so, at least we know they're here too. We'll have to go to the mines and ask for them… or break in. I'll bet that they won't be willing to admit to owning illegal workers, so we may have to bust them out." He slumped back to sit down, his eyes distant as he turned over several thoughts in his head.

Natalie covered a yawn with her hand. Now that the excitement of her discovery had worn off, she was abruptly reminded of the fact that she'd just spent the last several hours doing mind-numbing research. Still, she was determined to stay focused on Lance as he came up with a plan. He had better knowledge of how the world here worked, and was experienced at getting into and out of places undetected. She waited patiently for ten minutes, her eyes feeling dry and tired, yawning every fifteen seconds or so, and her head slowly drooping only to pick back up again.

"Go get some sleep, Natz," Lance suddenly said, finally catching onto Natalie's exhaustion. He shook his head and firmly spoke over her protest, "This is going to take some serious thinking and preparation that, between the two of us, only I can do. You might as well go get some rest so you'll be ready to move."

Natalie hesitated for a moment longer before nodding, "Okay, but don't leave without me."

Lance smirked, "And come back to a fireball in my face? No thanks. We can't go for a few days, anyway; I have a contract they foisted on me when I showed up yesterday. It's a local hit, so it shouldn't take long, but an infiltration like we're looking at here will take some serious thought and planning."

"Okay, good luck, then," Natalie mumbled tiredly as she headed for the door.

OOOOOO

Clang. Clang. Clang. Shuffle. Scrape. Groan. Clunk. Squeak. Squeak.

Those were the sounds that made up much of Matt's days. His pickax rose and fell seemingly without end, chipping away at precious minerals to load into carts which were wheeled away to tracks. From there, the minerals were taken to larger carts and sent to the surface. His world was a pool of light, a worn tool, and endless stone. He could hardly remember what the sun looked like, or what fresh air smelled like. Down here, everything was dark, and smelled of dust, sweat, blood, and despair.

Matt paused after another swing and raised an arm to wipe the sweat from his face. He had a strip of cloth tied around his forehead to keep sweat from rolling into his eyes, but the drips on his nose were irritating. He dully eyed the vein of minerals in front of him and sighed before raising his pickax once more. He had two fill two more carts before last meal or go to sleep hungry. He let his mind go blank as he swung, sinking into the monotony of mining. He broke off another sizeable chunk of ore and tossed it into the replacement cart for the one he'd filled and sent off.

Not far away, Anna was straining to push a heavy metal cart of mined minerals to the drop off. Unfortunately, the entire trip was uphill, making gravity work against her. The air was stale and hot, with vents here and there to cycle oxygen down to the lower levels. She relished each time she passed one, as it blew a cooler breeze across her face. It made the endless toil of heaving a cart that was several times heavier than she was up a seemingly endless slope slightly more bearable. Still, her muscles trembled under the strain, and she let out grunts of exertion. But she was almost there, she knew, and this was her last load of the day. Then she would go to the mess hall—quite literally a hall where the miners were given their food—and she would get to see Matt.

Anna's brow furrowed for a different reason at the thought of her friend. Matt was starting to really worry her. He was so lethargic lately—barely speaking, picking at his food, never smiling, only showing any real interest in his surroundings if someone harassed her when she was around him. She knew he had all but given up on getting free after gods only knew how many days they'd been down here. She feared that maybe he would just will himself dead before too long, like many of the older miners did. They merely gave up on life, deciding that death sounded like the perfect rest. She didn't know what she would do if he died and left her here alone.

Anna breathed a heavy sigh of relief as she finally reached the drop off. She locked the wheels of her cart in one of the several rows of other full carts. With that done, she turned and walked towards the mess hall. She passed a number of workers who all whacked at the walls, grunting, panting, and groaning. She tried to tune out the sounds, weary of hearing them. She quietly hummed a nonsensical tune to herself, no longer able to recall any of her favorite songs anymore. She felt like she'd forgotten a lot of things since coming down here, and some of the events she knew she had participated in felt more like dreams. It had been easier to remember herself when Matt spoke with her, but she was starting to forget now that he'd withdrawn. Still, even if he wasn't speaking to her, she made an effort to speak with him.

Anna turned a corner to see the worn wooden tables and benches of the mess hall. She paused for a moment, peering around for Matt. A small smile curled her lips when she spotted her friend sitting at the end of a table, his head leaning on one hand as he swirled whatever glop they were serving as food around in his bowl. She quickly got in line for her own food and sighed at the off color soupy paste that was ladled into her bowl. Still, it was edible, if only barely, which meant it would work to keep her going. She strode towards Matt with her food in hand and sat down beside him.

"Hey, Matt," Anna said as cheerfully as she could.

Matt remained silent, though his eyes flicked up to acknowledge her being there before dropping back down to his bowl.

Anna felt the familiar twinge of sorrow at his lack of any kind of effort at speech, but pushed it away as she always did to smile at him. "Glad to see you didn't drop your pickax on your foot, or something; that would have sucked," she said lightly.

Still he was silent.

"One of the guys I was working alongside almost crushed an overseer because he was going too fast downhill," Anna commented between bites of the tasteless glop. "He was newer here, so he hadn't gotten boring yet, and he kept cracking these awful puns every time he passed me because he knew I'd seen the incident. Want to hear one?"

Matt made no motion to affirm of deny any interest in her words.

"'Well, looks like I nearly ran over the overseer; what an oversight that would have been'," Anna recalled with a grin, regardless of Matt's lack of care. Still, she felt the familiar burn of tears in her eyes, and, for once, was unable to stop them before one leaked down her cheek.

Anna hastily wiped the drop away, blaming her lack of control on a long day of hard labor. A part of her mind acknowledged that the real reason was because she could tell she was losing Matt. Unfortunately, while Matt may not have noticed, the man sitting not far away from her did. He started loudly whispering about emotional women and how he wished she would just keel over already, earning him a round of chuckles from the other men.

Anna tensed angrily, but said nothing. To her dismay, however, Matt said nothing either. It was the first time he'd not leapt to her defense. Instead, he laid his spoon down and stood up, his food only half finished. Anna watched with despair as her friend trudged off without a single glance back. She didn't know what to do. Being held captive for so long had destroyed Matt, and while she might have slowed the inevitable for some time, she couldn't stop it. She couldn't free him—couldn't even free herself—couldn't offer any whimsical plans of escape or disruption, and couldn't keep his spirits up.

Anna stood up before finishing her food as well. She could feel the tears just waiting to fall, and didn't want to be surrounded by judging strangers while she broke down. The only person she knew here was Matt, and he no longer seemed to really be alive anymore. Still, the ranger forced her tired and sore body into a jog after her friend. She knew he would be curling up to sleep and she wanted to try one last thing to keep him with her.

The young woman caught up to Matt just as he was settling down in his usual nook. He didn't even acknowledge her presence this time, merely laid down with his back to her and fell still. Still, Anna knelt beside him and gripped his shoulder with one hand. She gave him a few shakes, well aware of the tears on her cheeks as they trailed through the dirt and sweat on her skin. After the fifth shake, Matt finally rolled over to look at her with dull blue eyes. His expression didn't change at all at her obvious distress; he merely waited numbly for her to say what she wanted to say.

Anna leaned down to wrap her arms around Matt where he lay on the stone. She whispered in a desperate voice, "Please don't leave me behind, Matt. I'll fall if you're not here anymore."

Matt still didn't reply. He didn't even twitch at her emotion leaden words. His mind barely comprehended his own name, anymore. And yet, he recognized a familiar voice thick with grief through the fog shrouding his thoughts. He tried to focus on it, but couldn't bring himself to reply in any way—couldn't bring himself to care. The person clinging to him seemed to know this because they tightened their grip on him.

"This is it, isn't it?" Anna murmured sorrowfully when Matt remained unresponsive. She finally released him and whispered, "Well I'm not going to waste away down here. If I'm to die in these gods forsaken mines, then it will be on my terms."

Matt felt a stir from her words. He could tell the strange mixture of defiance and final defeat, and his tired soul began to protest fearfully.

"First, though, I need to kill a few of these bastards. A pickax should do nicely enough for a little while. Goodbye, Matt. I'll be waiting for you and the rest on the other side," Anna murmured, standing up.

Matt's mind snapped to sudden, sharp clarity at those words. He let out a desperate, keening cry in a hoarse voice and lunged forwards to latch onto Anna's arm. Not another one, he couldn't let another one of his friends vanish from his life. He was unaware of his raspy babbling for Anna to not go anywhere, his voice rough from so long without use. Anna was all he had left, and if she went, then where would he go? What would he do? Who or what could possibly call him back anymore?

Anna was startled at the sudden intense display of emotion and noise from Matt. Now he was the one with tears running down his face. He clung to her with the desperation of a starving man, pleading brokenly for her to stay with him before moving to cries for Lance and Natalie to come back and broken apologies for whatever he'd done to deserve this. Anna slowly wrapped her arms around Matt, and held him tightly against her chest. He was snapping in a far more apparent way now, and she could only hope that her presence would be enough to salvage his strained mind and soul.

Matt continued to shake and cry, fearing that the silence from Anna meant that she wasn't planning to stay. His breathing caught in a desperate, choked sob as his mind recoiled from the idea of being all alone and he let out another keen of despair. And then, he felt Anna's arms come around him and her soft voice begin to sing a sweet song. His scrambled mind couldn't pick out the words in his state of distress, but the tone was soft, and the tempo slow. It worked wonders on calming him down, his cries fading to the occasional hiccough.

Anna felt a rush of relief hit her as Matt finally seemed to be soothed. She'd never seen anything like his breakdown before and it had scared her. Her frantic mind had cast about for some way to calm him, and finally settled on a wisp of a memory. The tune and a few words of a Greenwood lullaby had come to her, and she'd started singing. As she sang, the rest of the words came to her mind and flowed out of her mouth. It was a gentle song about warm days, soft breezes, sleeping animals, bright sunshine, and cool streams. She was overjoyed at being able to remember something, and even more so that the memory had helped Matt, who was now quiet, though still shaking slightly against her, his face buried in her shoulder.

"You okay now?" Anna asked quietly.

"Are you going to stay?" Matt asked in reply, his arms tightening around her waist.

Anna nodded, "Of course."

"Then yes, I am," Matt whispered. He felt Anna slowly pull back and let her go so that she could shift to sit beside him.

Anna was silent for a long while, letting Matt lean against her to reassure himself of her presence. She was grateful that they had both skipped out of eating early, as this would have been impossible with a crowd of uncaring spectators. She let one of her hands rise to rub Matt's leg as he wiped his face clean of tears and finally whispered, "I'm glad you're back. I've missed you."

Matt stilled and lowered his arms to stare at Anna in confusion, "Back? I've been here the whole time."

Anna shook her head slightly, "Your body, maybe, but not you. I've been watching you slip away for a long time now, and I thought that maybe you'd finally given up. You've been so quiet and lifeless, not even really looking at me anymore. I thought I'd failed as a friend to keep you strong. And maybe I did; you would never have gotten to that point if I had been stronger."

"Your strength pulled me back, though," Matt said in a firm voice. He wrapped an arm around Anna to give her squeeze as he promised, "I won't do that again, I promise. It'll be you and me until we get out of here; and we will, even if we have to dig a gods-damned tunnel to the surface."

Anna chuckled slightly, "Well, we both certainly have the knowledge to do that now, but I doubt we could manage it." It felt so good to laugh, and even better to hear Matt's laugh. After a moment, she fell back into a more serious mood as she murmured, "You were crying out for Lance and Natalie."

Matt winced but nodded, "Yeah. I- I miss them… a lot. They aren't here, and then you were going to not be here, and I just wanted everything to just go back to how it used to be, and-" He cut himself off as he realized that he was beginning to babble, and instead said in a sincere tone, "I'm really sorry for scaring you—for leaving you behind."

Anna shook her head slightly, "It's all good now. We'll see them again, someday, I just know it. Maybe they're even looking for us."

"Maybe," Matt agreed with a faint smile. His eyelids began to droop and he let his head rest on Anna's shoulder. He remembered doing this once or twice with Natalie when they had finished a harrowing battle and were exhausted. It had always made him feel safe and so happy, and Natalie had certainly enjoyed it. While he didn't get quite the same feeling with Anna, he did feel comforted by her presence. She'd been tying him down the whole time, and she had called him back when he'd finally broken loose. He felt her head fall to rest against his, and he let out a smile as he was immensely grateful that at least he had one of his friends with him.

Both friends fell asleep like that, drawing comfort from each other. Anna was relieved at Matt's return to himself, and Matt was relieved that he wasn't, and had never been, alone. Their peaceful rest lasted the whole night, though they couldn't see the sun or moon to know that. Each of them dreamed of better times and of hopeful looks to the future when they would be reunited with their friends.

They woke the next day to the raucous clanging of the overseer calling them to breakfast. Both felt far better for the night's peaceful rest and the reaffirmation of the others' presence. They filed into the mess hall with the rest of the miners who'd come in after they'd fallen asleep. Anna stoically ignored the mocking tear swipes and sniffles some of the other miners made when she passed. She didn't care that they were so near-sighted and downtrodden to need to bring another person down to feel better. She had her friend, and that was enough.

Matt, however, shot dangerous looks at each of the offenders that had them backing off. He caught Anna's relieved and thankful grin, which he returned before making a face at the sad excuse for porridge that was ladled into his bowl. He and Anna made their way to the end of a table and sat down. Matt picked up a spoonful of the grey sludge and let it drop back into the bowl. With a sigh, he shoved a spoonful into his mouth and swallowed it. At least it was warm, he mused wryly.

"I swear this is paste," Anna muttered as she prodded the grey substance with one fingertip. "And why is it grey? Porridge is supposed to be a tan color."

Matt cracked a grin and suggested, "Maybe they're adding rocks to it. Gods know we have plenty of those down here."

Anna was taken aback for a moment at Matt's reply. She was so used to him remaining silent that she'd expected to have to answer her own question, but it was a very welcome change. She shot a grin back at Matt and mused, "Maybe they think we'll have better luck digging if we have some kind of stone sense; maybe eating rocks will give us the ability to just tell where the mineral veins are."

Matt chuckled around another mouthful of porridge. He swallowed and muttered, "Wait, isn't cement grey with a similar consistency to this stuff?"

Anna shrugged with a wide grin, "Kind of, I think? Maybe we really are onto something with this rock-food, thing."

A call for the workers to line up broke them away from their conversation. They abandoned what was left of their mystery porridge to stand and await their orders for the day. Both exchanged delighted grins when they heard that they were both on digging, and on the same ore vein. They stepped forwards to retrieve their tools before heading off to start working. They worked in tandem, cheerfully and quickly depleting the vein before moving on to the next one. The work was better with company, even though they hardly spoke at all. A passing overseer complimented them for the rate at which they dug before moving on.

It was shortly after the overseer had left that Matt paused mid-swing. He glanced around the dark space with narrow eyes, lowering his pickax to his side. His pause made Anna stop as well, wondering what was wrong. She noticed that Mat was scanning their surroundings, and her own eyes drifted. Then, her own eyes narrowed as she picked up on what Matt had sensed. Someone or something was nearby, and it wasn't a worker or an overseer. Matt's hand gripped the handle of his pickax, and he glared into the shadows, his blue eyes gleaming fiercely. Maybe he didn't have a sword, but he was willing to bet he could take out whatever was there with a pickax.

"What are you two doing?" a voice suddenly said imperiously.

Matt and Anna both jumped and turned to see the overseer from before striding towards them. The man looked angry, and was already unclipping a taser from his belt. Matt shot a look at Anna, who was pale. They'd been on the receiving end of the electric jolt from a taser more than once, and neither one wanted to repeat the experience. Still, they could hardly attack an overseer and expect to get away with it.

Matt stepped forwards with a sneer on his face, "I was just thinking about sticking this pickax into your face. Your skull is probably about as hard as a rock, anyway."

The overseer turned bright red with anger as Anna choked on a mixture of a laugh and an exclamation of surprise.

"Oh really, worm?" the overseer spat.

Matt gave a bored shrug, "Well, it's dull down here. I've got nothing better to do than imagine fun ways to kill you guys." He glanced over his shoulder at Anna and added, "She's no fun. She keeps stopping me."

Anna felt her blood run cold as she realized what Matt was doing. He'd successfully taken full blame for stopping working and made it seem like she had merely paused to prevent him from attacking someone. Before she could open her mouth to protest, she heard the familiar hiss of the taser start up. The overseer ducked a purposefully clumsy blow from Matt and jabbed his taser into the blonde's side. Matt went down with a cry of pain and twitched on the floor. Anna fell down beside him and looked up at the overseer.

"He won't do it again, please stop," Anna begged.

The overseer ignored her and raised his taser again. And then his head suddenly twisted with a sick cracking sound and his body hit the ground. Anna recoiled from the corpse with an obviously broken neck, and crouched over Matt protectively, clutching her pickax tightly in both hands. The blond was dazed, and didn't seem to realize what was going on. Anna glared at the shadowy figure that stood just out of the light's reach.

"I'm glad you two are still alive and sane," a familiar voice said.

Anna froze, her pickax dropping from her hand to hit the ground with a dull clatter. She stared at the shadow and stood up before mumbling, "Lance?"

And sure enough, Lance stepped into the pool of light with a broad smirk, "Sorry it took so long to find you guys."

Anna lunged forwards and tackled her friend, causing him to grunt as the air was forced from his lungs. She clung to him babbling about how glad she was to see him, asking how the hell he'd gotten down here, and begging him to get her and Matt out. She felt arms come around her as well and for the first time in so long, she felt safe.

"Hey, hey, calm down so we can go," Lance murmured, stroking Anna's matted hair with one hand.

Anna sniffled, but pulled back with a nod, "Right. Sorry."

Matt let out a groan from behind them, causing Anna to whip around and pull him up. The dazed swordsman let out a yelp of surprise that soon turned to a gasp of shock. He gaped at Lance with ridiculously wide eyes before giving himself a hard pinch. He heard a chuckle from Lance as he yelped, proving that he wasn't dreaming.

"Come on, we don't have a lot of time," Lance said firmly. "Natalie's distracting the guards, but I'd rather not leave her there for any longer than necessary."

"Wait, you left Natz with the guards?" Matt asked in a disapproving, incredulous voice.

Lance's face tightened as he muttered, "You don't know the half of it. She volunteered and it was the best option."

Anna frowned as she and Matt started following behind Lance. "Your tone makes me think she's doing something dangerous," she commented softly.

"Dangerous? No. Questionable? Yes," Lance replied. He shot a look over his shoulder and said, "I'll tell you what she's doing if you both promise to keep your exclamations to a minimum."

Matt nodded, "Sure."

"Of course," Anna agreed.

Lance blew out a sigh and murmured, "She's had a rough several months, but the… skills she picked up are useful for distraction. She's currently seducing the men guarding the entrance to this shaft. She may even be offering her body up at this point."

Matt froze with a wide-eyed look of horror, "She's doing what?"

Anna shook her head and murmured, "I can't see Natz agreeing to that, much less managing to pull it off."

"She spent the last six months or so working as a whore to get food and a place to sleep, and believe me when I say she is really good at the seduction," Lance told them flatly. He caught Matt's fist as it swung towards his head and said warningly, "None of that. I never took her; it was just her way of getting me to a place where we could talk privately. I've already gotten her out of that life and she's been staying at my place. She doesn't like using her new skills, but she's doing it to get you two out."

Matt felt a pang of sorrow and possessive disappointment rise up in him. He cared about Natalie a great deal, and to know she had been forced to whore her body out to survive was hard to take in. He fell into step behind Lance as the gunner let go of him to lead the way again. Anna squeezed his shoulder reassuringly and he shot her a grateful look. There would be time to talk and be upset later. For now, they needed to escape.

Anna watched as Lance confidently, carefully, and yet swiftly led them through the tunnels. She noted that he wore dark grey clothes, and had smudged soot on his face and neck, breaking up any patches of pale skin. On top of that, he moved with a new kind of graceful stealth that she herself used to get around unheard. She wondered when he'd picked up the new stealth tactics, but figured she could find out later.

They paused at the final turn and Lance peered around the corner to check the way ahead before gesturing for his friends to follow. The two guards he'd drugged were still out, their glasses of water spiked with a sedative. Matt and Anna eyed the unconscious guards, but said nothing as they followed Lance through the checkpoint. From there, they moved a little more quickly, the tunnels more empty as the ore had already been depleted. They passed a number of guards unconscious on the ground, some with their weapons drawn. Clearly, Lance had taken them out on his way down, and wanted to get out before they woke up.

What seemed like hours later, but was in reality only thirty minutes, they stopped at a heavy door. Lance pressed his ear to it and closed his eyes, listening carefully. After a moment, he nodded and rapped the door. There was a tense moment of silence, and then the door hissed open to reveal Natalie beaming at them. Without a word, she lunged forwards to wrap Matt in a tight hug.

Matt returned the embrace and inhaled deeply as her nearly-forgotten scent washed over him—the wild scent of magic with a soft undertone of vanilla. He couldn't smell anything else on her, which pleased him greatly; however she'd dealt with the guards, she hadn't given them sex. He reluctantly let go of the mage when she pulled back to hug Anna and turned his eyes on Lance. The gunner's face was soft as he looked over the reunited team, but he also looked impatient. They weren't safe yet, after all.

"We can do hugs and catching up later, but for now we need to go," Lance said firmly.

Natalie pulled back from Anna and nodded, "Right. I, er, took care of the two from earlier. They won't be bothering us."

Lance's eyebrows shot straight up as he said, "You were that good?"

Natalie shoved him with a flush, though she was smiling. "No, I whacked a couple pressure points. They never saw it coming."

"You know pressure points?" Lance asked in a baffled tone as he turned to guide them on.

Natalie shrugged, "Sure. They're some of the best ways to elicit responses from people."

Matt's mouth tightened as he murmured, "Right."

Anna glanced at him before turning the topic to something more productive and less upsetting, "How far do we have to go?"

"Not far now," Lance replied. "There's only one more touchy part and that's when we get outside. I timed the break in so that the least number of guards would be out and about, and if my timing is correct now, then they should be at their lunch shift. That means there will only be a couple of guards on watch, and they'll be eating, which is a distraction."

"You're good at this infiltration thing," Matt commented.

Lance shrugged, "Comes with the territory. Natz took up pleasure, I refined killing." He suffered the smack Natalie gave him with a grin.

"So that's where all the stealth came from," Anna realized aloud. "You're an assassin now, aren't you?"

"Give the girl a prize," Lance joked. He listened to the chuckles from behind him before waving his hand for silence, "Okay, no speaking at all from here until I say so, got it?"

The others nodded. Lance rounded the next corner and led them past the empty station to a side door where he waved for them to wait. He opened the door and strolled straight through, looking for the entire world like he was supposed to be there. The three waiting outside heard a question followed by a flurry of movement and sound, and then Lance was poking his head out and motioning them in. Two guards lay unconscious on the floor, their unfinished lunch sitting on a table. Lance stepped over their bodies and stopped beside the exit.

"We're going to get as far as we can without being spotted," Lance breathed. "If we do get detected, then start sprinting for the sapling beside the wall straight across from this door. There's a patch of fence that I cut there for us to get through. Now let's go."

Matt and Anna watched Lance throw the door open, flooding the room with sunlight. Both of the former miners winced at the sudden bright light, and squinted. It was brighter than they remembered, and it made their eyes water. Still, the rush of fresh air and the warmth of the light was a blessing to them, something they'd always taken for granted before. They could hardly believe it was a luxury they would once again have.

Lance glanced back at the pair, and frowned when he noticed them squinting. He waited a few moments, to give their eyes time to adjust. He hadn't considered the effects living underground for so long could have. On top of being unused to the sun, their skin was so pale it looked white; at least the patches he could see were. There was a layer of dirt and grime coating their bodies, so much that he could almost assume they had brown skin. Both of them were thinner than he remembered, but it was a lean thinness. Clearly, they had muscle from months of hard labor. Their clothes were threadbare, and just as stained as their skin, but it was a covering.

"You guys set?" Lance quietly asked after a few minutes.

The pair nodded and the gunner smiled. He turned and led the way outside. They stuck to the shadows of buildings and mountains of quarried stone, sliding between them on Lance's command as he kept an eye on the watch. They were three-quarters of the way there when they were finally detected. Lance had thought the man was turning, only to see too late that he'd merely been stretching. There was a moment's pause where the man stared at them before realization lit his mind.

"Hey, you! Stop!" the watch called.

Lance groaned and snapped, "Go. Natz will guide you to the meeting place. I need to stop that guy before he flips the alarm."

Without waiting for a reply, the gunner dashed around the corner of a building, unslinging his rifle from his back. He propped the gun on a chunk of stone and took aim, peering down the scope. In a matter of seconds, he'd lined the shot up and pulled the trigger. He felt the recoil of the gun and heard the muffled ping of the shot. A second later, and he saw the man he'd been aiming for go down, a bullet through his head. Lance stood up and listened for any noise signaling that there were other guards about. When all remained silent, he holstered his rifle across his back again, and turned to head out.

Meanwhile, Natalie had ushered Matt and Anna through the small section of chain link fence that Lance had cut. The pair slid through the gap and dashed for the trees with Natalie close behind them. The mage overtook the other pair and led the way down and invisible, winding trail to the meeting point she and Lance had set up in the event of being separated. There, she stopped, her breath coming in sharp pants. She watched Matt and Anna slump to the ground, gasping for air. Natalie remained standing, and brought her Crystal Staff out of her Adventure Pouch.

As he caught his breath, Matt watched Natalie take up a defensive stance, attention focused on the trees surrounding them. She looked exactly as he remembered: strong, confident, and beautiful. His eyes shifted to where Anna was slumped beside him, and realized with a flash of sorrow that he couldn't recall what she'd looked like before, having been with her as they'd suffered. He mused that they were both probably thinner than they had been however long ago, and in desperate need of a bath. Wash day in the mines came once every month, and only if there was water to spare. He didn't even want to think about what he probably smelled like.

Natalie raised her staff as a shadow detached itself from the trees, but relaxed a moment later when she recognized Lance. "We're free?" she asked.

Lance nodded, "Yeah, we're free. Still, we should hurry to the transport. The sooner we're back at the house, the better."

Anna stood up as she asked, "You've got a house?"

Matt asked, "Does it have actual food, not cement masquerading as porridge?"

Lance cracked a grin as he said, "Of course there's food, but I'm demanding both of you are clean before I'll let you sit down anywhere. It's a miracle your stench didn't draw the guards."

Natalie burst out in laughter at the indignant huffs Matt and Anna gave. The cheerful sound soon spread to the rest of them, and they took a few moments to just laugh. Relief rushed through each of them; they were back together, all of them safe. Finally, Lance motioned for the others to follow. He'd borrowed a larger hovercraft from the assassins and it was hidden not far away. They'd use it to get back to the city where they could finally rest and reconnect.

The next few hours were a blur to Matt and Anna. Both were exhausted from the rush of their rescue. They'd been loaded into a large vehicle that Lance had piloted to a compound that only he was allowed to enter. After that, there had been smaller transports to a house where they'd been pushed into the showers. The warm water had felt like heaven on their skin, and they'd scrubbed off weeks of grime until the water finally ran clean. Both had untangled their hair and washed it out, and were given clothes to wear. Finally, they were sat down on a couch with plates of warm food in front of them.

"I think I died and went to heaven," Matt breathed as he reclined on the couch with a satisfyingly full stomach.

"You and me both," Anna agreed with a lazy smile.

Lance and Natalie watched them with wide smiles, both hardly able to believe that their friends were back. They'd planned that rescue for days, gathering information, scouting the compound, preparing for if things went wrong, and jamming the radio and camera signals with dummy feeds. Despite all that, they had, on some level, believed that they wouldn't find their friends, much less get them out. And both of Matt and Anna were in stunningly good health considering where they'd been for so long, though there was a certain level of clinginess between them. That attachment was to be expected, though. For a long time, they'd only had each other, and the other's presence was a source of comfort and security.

"Thanks for busting us out," Anna suddenly said quietly. "You have no idea how glad we are to be out of there."

Lance shrugged, "You're welcome, I just wish I'd found you or Natz sooner. She was the one who nudged our search in the right direction. I was kind of just blindly stumbling around, hoping to hear about one of you."

Matt sat up straight and turned a tense look on Natalie. "Lance told us you were stuck whoring," he said quietly.

Natalie nodded with a frown, "Yeah, it was all I could do here. I thought I was the only one who wound up in this place, and needed some way to stay sheltered and fed." She shot a grateful smile at Lance as she added, "Then Lance spotted me in the pleasure house and brought me home with him."

"After you seduced him," Anna added with a grin.

Lance made a face as he said, "Please don't remind me of that. It was the most awkward moment of my life."

Matt cracked a small grin as he said, "Well, I wish you hadn't had to do that, Natz, but I'm glad you're safe."

Natalie beamed back at him, "The same from me to you guys. You were down there for a long time, and we were worried one or both of you had died or gone crazy."

Anna winced and mumbled, "It was a near thing, that's for sure."

Lance frowned as he asked, "You slipped?"

"No, I did," Matt revealed quietly. He shot a look at Anna as he explained, "I just… gave up. Anna tells me I was basically a walking corpse that got worse every day."

"He was pretty bad," Anna admitted softly. "I don't know how long the whole process took, but he quit talking, quit eating, and never expressed any emotion. The only times he ever seemed to be there were when someone was picking on me and he got defensive, but even that stopped yesterday. I broke down and told him I planned to go out with a few overseer bodies, and something about that snapped him back to me."

Matt swallowed and quietly said, "She was going too, and I didn't want to be alone. I didn't even realize how withdrawn I'd gotten, but Anna pulled me back. I'd probably be insane if she hadn't been there."

Natalie wrapped her arms around Matt and held him tightly. There were tears in her eyes as she murmured, "You're free now, both of you. Thank you, Anna for keeping strong and keeping Matt sane."

Anna smiled with tears in her own eyes, "Keeping him going was what kept me going. I would have crumbled long before now if he hadn't been there."

Lance shook his head and let out a long sigh, "Well, we're all back together now. We should probably get some rest. Natz, there's a trundle bed beneath your bed that Anna can use; it should already have sheets on it. Matt, you can sleep in my room or here on the couch, your choice."

"Anything is better than hard stone, so I'll take the couch," Matt replied with a shrug.

Lance nodded and tossed the throw blanket over, "Then you can use this. Good night, everyone."

With that, the gunner stood up and headed down the hall. Natalie and Anna stood up, leaving Matt sitting on the sofa. But before they could get very far, a hand caught Anna's wrist, and Matt tugged the young woman back into a tight hug.

"Thanks for everything, Anna," Matt murmured.

Anna pulled back and smiled at him, "Of course. Will you be okay out here alone? I mean, I know we're all just down the hall, but I don't want you to panic."

Natalie frowned, "She has a point. You sure you don't want to crash with Lance? His bed is big enough for it."

Matt hesitated before shrugging, "I don't want to bother him." To his confusion, Natalie let out an amused snort. "What?"

Natalie's response was to turn and call down the hall, "Hey, Lance? Matt wants to stay with you after all."

Lance's muffled voice called back, "Sure, whatever." He poked his head out of his room and added, "Plenty of space."

Matt took a step back, shaking his head, "No, no. I'm fine."

"He doesn't want to bug you," Anna explained.

To Matt and Anna's confusion, Lance rolled his eyes with a sigh while Natalie giggled.

"For the love of, it's just like Natz all over again," Lance muttered.

Natalie's eyes twinkled as she chuckled, "I thought it seemed familiar." She turned to Matt and said in a gentle, but firm voice, "Lance doesn't mind helping with whatever you need. I tried the same thing when I got here, and he told me flat out that I'm his friend, not a burden or a bother. You'll upset him if you insist that you're a pain, so you might as well go."

Matt hesitated for a moment before nodding, "Okay then."

He and Lance vanished into the gunner's room and shut the door, leaving Anna and Natalie standing in the hall. The two women soon turned for the mage's room where they pulled out the trundle and flopped into bed. Anna let out a sigh of bliss at the soft mattress and sheets. She listened to Natalie shuffle around until she was comfortable before falling still. But despite the comfort, the ranger couldn't sleep yet; her mind was whirling from the events of the day.

"Lance seems more laid back than before," Anna commented.

Natalie rolled over and said, "Yeah, he is. I think being alone made him more placid. We're a lot more important to him than we thought."

Anna blinked in confusion, "How do you figure?"

"Well, he told me flat out for one thing. Losing all of us was really hard on him," Natalie replied with a sigh. "He's got that old photo of us after we beat Godcat framed on his bedside table. He told me that we're his family, and that he used to worry about his place in it, but found out that change doesn't necessarily mean anything bad."

Anna hummed thoughtfully, "By change, I'll assume you mean me? He always seemed afraid of me for some reason."

Natalie chuckled, "You're sharp. But, yes, he thought you would replace him on the team, and worried that Matt and I were going to ask him to leave. I don't think his social skills back then allowed him to realize that you can add more friends."

"That's… kind of upsetting to hear," Anna murmured in a distressed tone. "He thought I was going to oust him?"

"He used to, but not anymore," Natalie assured her. She smiled over at Anna and added, "You should try sitting and talking with him some time. He's really witty and funny. Of course, his perverted streak is still going strong, but it adds to his charm."

"You crushing on Lance now?" Anna asked in amusement.

Natalie snorted, "Hardly. He's a good friend, and fun to be around, but I don't love him like that. My heart is still set on Matt."

Anna's eyes widened at the blatant admission of her crush on the blond. "Well, well, you seem to have grown a spine," she said slyly with a grin.

"Oh, shut it," Natalie chuckled. Her face took on an uncertain look as she asked, "How did Matt react to my whoring?"

"He was upset, but not at you, I don't think," Anna replied immediately. She grinned and added, "He seemed a little jealous, actually. I think he likes you back, but is too slow to realize it."

Natalie blew out a long sigh of relief, "That's good. I was worried that maybe he'd think I was disgusting, or something."

Anna shook her head slightly, "No, Matt doesn't really think like most other guys do. Some men might think your stint as a woman for hire means you're a slut, but he doesn't. If you decided you wanted to sleep around, have one night stands, or whatever, then he'd be hurt because you didn't seem to like him, but he wouldn't think less of you for it. It is your body and life, after all."

"Yeah, that's true," Natalie agree with a smile. "He's always wondered why women are so restricted in everything from fighting to their personal lives. That's part of what I like about him."

"Well maybe you should ask him out instead of waiting for him to do it," Anna suggested with a smile.

Natalie blushed and mumbled, "Lance said something like that, too, but I don't know if I could manage that. I don't even have any money to speak of, anyway."

Anna shrugged and snuggled down in her blanket, "Well, keep it in mind. You don't need to pay for a date, though. Just take a walk somewhere nice, or something." Her voice was growing slow as she finally felt sleep over take her.

Natalie noticed that and smiled faintly, "I'll think about it. G'night, Anna."

OOOOOO

Matt woke slowly the next morning, wrapped in soft warmth with light falling on his face. He rolled over to escape the bright light and ducked his head under the blanket with a sleepy sigh. He couldn't remember the last time he'd felt so comfortable. His mind slowly reminded him of the events of the day before: his and Anna's rescue from the mines. He gave a sleepy smile as he realized he hadn't dreamed that up. He thought about getting up to check and be sure, but was way too comfortable to bother. Still, a faint scratching sound amidst a few rustles of paper had him sitting up after all. He looked around the room with a yawn and his eyes fell on Lance.

The gunner was seated at his desk with a small stack of papers in front of him and a pen in hand. He wore a loose white T-shirt and a pair of baggy pants. A glass sat not far from his right hand, half full of orange juice. He glanced around when he heard Matt get up, and nodded a greeting.

"'Morning," Lance said. He turned back to what he was working on as he asked, "How're you feeling?"

Matt grinned, "Awesome, of course." He wandered over to stand beside Lance and cocked his head at the papers, "What're you working on?"

Lance made a face as he scrawled a few numbers down on a page in a notebook and replied, "Paying bills. Owning a house sucks; I miss camping in the nearest cave. A cave doesn't' charge you to stay there."

"It also doesn't come with electricity, heating, and running water," Matt reminded with a grin.

"Technically, a person could bring a generator along," Lance replied. He sighed as he reached for a separate notebook, and muttered, "I'm going to need to get a few more contracts."

Matt frowned and asked, "Are you out of cash?"

Lance shook his head, "No, I'm pretty good right now, but you and Anna are going to need some new clothes which will cost a lot in one go, and buying more food will add up over time."

"Sorry," Matt murmured.

"Nah, it's no big deal," Lance said lightly.

"Is there anyway Anna or I could help?" Matt offered.

Lance was silent for a moment as he scrawled a few figures down and dated them before replying. "Anna won't be able to find much in the way of work," Lance said in a level tone. He glanced around and added, "You might be able to, but anything you'd be good at you can't do until we replace some of your equipment."

Matt scowled, "Yeah, they took all of my and Anna's stuff when they found us."

"So you two ended up here together?" Lance asked curiously, stacking his papers.

Matt nodded, "Yeah, we wound up in the middle of some road, from what we were told. Both of us were unconscious, and they just carted us off. We woke up in the yard of that mine and were told to start digging."

"Which I'm sure neither of you agreed to," Lance guessed with a smirk.

Matt grinned back, "Something like that. We may or may not have attacked the guards and gotten tased. That went on for a few days until they got sick of us and threw us down where you found us. Not sure how long that was, though."

Lance shook his head and said, "From the records Natz found, you both were in the mines for just shy of six and a half months." He stuck the papers he'd been working on away with a sigh and murmured, "I'm sorry we didn't find you guys sooner. Until ten days ago, I wasn't even sure you and Anna were here. Hell, two weeks ago, and I thought Natz wasn't here, either, and she'd spent that time servicing whoever bought her."

"You did find us and got us out, and that's what matters," Matt said firmly. He clasped Lance's shoulder and said, "What happened to all of us was not your fault, okay?"

"I guess so," Lance reluctantly agreed. He stood up when Matt removed his hand, and said in a brighter tone, "How about some breakfast?"

Matt beamed, "Sounds like a great plan to me. What's on the menu?"

"Smells like eggs of some sort and sausage," Lance mused with a glance at the door.

Lance led the way out into the hall where they each smelled the delicious smell of cooking food. They could hear the sizzling sound of fat cooking, and a few clatters from the kitchen. The pair headed down the hall and peered into the kitchen to see Natalie shoveling food onto several plates, Anna was already seated at the table, scarfing down a piece of toast.

"Hey guys, you're just in time, grab a plate," Natalie greeted, turning the stove off.

Matt cheered and snatched one of the three plates sitting on the counter and all but ran for the other seat at the table. Lance snorted at the familiar enthusiasm as he gathered his plate up and hopped up to sit on the counter. He made a mental note to get a couple more chairs for the table as he watched Anna relinquish her seat for Natalie to use, her plate already empty. He nodded to Anna as she leaned against the counter across from him, and shoved a forkful of egg into his mouth.

Anna watched Lance eat, studying his expression. The gunner looked content as he listened to Matt complimenting Natalie's cooking. The ranger didn't think she'd ever seen him so relaxed before, and mused that Natalie was right about the team's importance to Lance. She smiled and shook her head slightly when Lance shot her a questioning look for her scrutiny.

"Nothing, just lost in thought," Anna told him cheerfully.

Lance shrugged, and picked up the last piece of bacon on his plate and popped it in his mouth. He slid off the counter and moved to place his dish in the sink. He turned to ask Anna if she'd do the dishes, but was distracted by a knock on the front door. He sighed as he recognized the slight pattern to the knock and moved to open it. It was an assassin with a contract for him, which while a good thing, as he needed the money, was also disappointing because he'd wanted to spend time with his friends. Still, he opened the door and greeted the non-descript man on the other side, recognizing the usual trusted runner for the organization.

Anna followed Lance to the front room, but couldn't see who was at the door. She was puzzled at the lack of any words being exchanged before Lance shut the door. Her eyes fell on an envelope in his hands and she asked, "Who was that?"

Lance glanced up and replied, "Just a guy delivering a new contract. I'll probably be out of the house for a few days getting it done."

Anna nodded and followed Lance to the sitting room, and sat down the sofa to watch him open the envelope. The gunner's eyes scanned the information on the papers inside, swiftly taking in the location and name of his target. His lips pursed as he paused on one line for some reason, but soon shrugged and went on. Finally, he nodded to himself and promptly tossed the papers and folder into his fireplace and burned them. The gunner got up and stretched before turning to face the kitchen.

"Hey, Natz?" Lance called.

Natalie poked her head around the corner with a smile and said, "What's up?"

"I've got a new mission. I was thinking you could take Matt and Anna out to get them some new clothes, and maybe swing by the grocers to get some more food," Lance replied.

"Sure, is there a budget on the spending?" Natalie asked, coming around to lean on the wall.

Lance hesitated for a few moments before nodding, "Probably should. I still have to pay the electricity bill for the month. Don't spend more than five hundred and we should be fine. I'll drop the check off for the bill on my way out, and we should have about two thousand in savings."

"Cutting it kind of fine, aren't you?" Natalie asked with a frown.

Lance shrugged, "I'll be getting a lot from this one. Downside is I'll be gone for a while. There's some setup they want done to make the death look like an accident. Faking the circumstances always takes time."

Matt walked out of the kitchen and flopped next to Anna before asking, "Who's the hit?"

"You really think I'm going to tell you that?" Lance asked in an amused tone with an arched brow. "I probably shouldn't even be telling you I'm heading off to kill someone. Just keep an eye on the news and I'm sure you'll figure out."

With that, Lance headed down to his room to get ready to leave. Matt watched him go with a frown, prompting Natalie to ask what was wrong.

"I'm just wondering how okay Lance is with assassinating people," Matt said quietly. "It's a very different thing to kill someone in cold blood, after all."

Natalie hesitated before replying, "He holds up fine, but he doesn't like it. He likened his killing to my whoring."

Anna shook her head with a sigh and murmured, "He probably sees it as a degeneration of his ideals. He likes fighting, but taking someone out without even giving them a chance to fight back probably goes against his beliefs, or moral code, or whatever."

Their conversation cut off when Lance came back in dressed in entirely casual attire: A simple pair of jeans, sneakers, and a loose T-shirt under a jacket. He had his Adventure Pouch tied to his belt and waved before heading for the door. Anna arched a brow at his lack of any weapon on him, to which Lance merely tugged his right sleeve up slightly to reveal a spring loaded blade against his wrist. He also added that he could get a weapon ready from his Pouch in about three seconds. He waved to the others and slipped off into the garage. A few moments later and there was a whirring sound, and then Lance was gone.

"Nice of him to cover the bills, but I'd like to help," Matt murmured.

Anna glanced at him, "Why don't you, then?"

Natalie was the one who responded, "He doesn't have a weapon, and Matt doesn't know any crafts. Plus I highly doubt either of you want to go back to digging."

"Definitely not," Matt agreed with a shiver.

Anna turned a thoughtful look at the front door and mused, "I bet I could be an assassin. I'd need a bow, of course, but I can make those."

"Assuming they'll take women as fighters," Natalie muttered bitterly.

A/N: So, yeah, not dead, yet. :P I was hoping to be done with the next chapter of The Long Road Home by now, but I actually haven't written much at all, anywhere. I blame passing depression and school. Still, I have bits of stories and works to toss out while crying my way (not literally) through another writer's block. So here I am again.

Anyway, this is another story fragment, but most likely not one that will go anywhere. Similar themes used here pop up all over my writing, though, so maybe I should consider it a fleshing out of details in my head. Either way, I just don't have the ideas to finish it/flesh it out, so it is, as of right now, dead in the file hierarchy. This one is fairly old - though I can't really date it in relation to anything - and was written during a transition in my writing style. Please excuse the sloppy sentence structure from figuring out how to write compound sentences properly. XD

The Long Road Home Chapter 10 is in the works, and I'm adding a sentence or so to it a day. Fingers crossed that I get it done before April 7, because 12 months is an atrocious upload speed, even for me. :P

Leave me some reviews, and I'll be back as soon as I can!

Responses to Guest Reviewers:

Anonymous: Well, she has saved the world thrice by this point. If she isn't epic-level, then something isn't right. XD

Little Follower: Ah, yes, that one was done during m efforts to really get battling descriptions down. :P It turned a little more psychotic than I typically write, though.

I think I've finally got description down, now, actually. I've written some things I honestly think are quality stuff. I'll try to upload one of my more recent works soon. They're just on my iPad, which, as I've mentioned before, I can't do much for posting from there. Plus I've got to weed out the explicit things from the normal things. Or maybe I'll finally give FF the finger and upload some lemons again. They aren't PWP, for the most part, so I doubt it'd be a huge issue. Maybe.

As for when I first started writing: The short answer is late June of 2015, when I started writing An Epic Retelling, so a little under two years. The long answer is very long, but I'll write it down anyway. Who knows: maybe you or other people will find it interesting, or inspirational, or ironic, or something? I don't know. If nothing else, I'll be able to look back at it and remember this point in time. :) The A/Ns work pretty well for me as a journal of my writing career/journey.

My first efforts were actually made back in late elementary school some 10 to 12 years ago, but I got a poor response from some of my family and dropped it for a long time. I'm not sure if that point in my life could really be called the start of real writing, though. Still, what I wrote then was of a similar tone to the things I'm writing now, if not as eloquent, and in an entirely different fandom. I highly doubt I have the things from back then, anymore, unless my parents printed it and saved it. What started burning the super-long fuse on my current writing was when I got really into reading fanfiction and watching anime in high school. I started having tons of ideas floating around in my head about alternative endings to plots, what-ifs, better romances, motivations behind characters' actions and philosophies, and so on. Still, I didn't really start writing until late into community college. I have what my family says is a low self-esteem, and I was too shy to write, and figured I'd suck at it. :P It didn't help that I had no idea where or how to start, what fandom to write in, whether to do OCs or not, etc. It also didn't help that school basically conditioned me to hate anything involving putting words on a page. There was too much uncertainty and pre-existing resentment, and I ended up basically shutting the door on myself for several more years. Still, the idea teased me. My brothers all write, so why couldn't I do it, too? Then I played EBF4 (again), and I thought "Well, here are a bunch of vanilla characters, and a bare-bones plot. I could do a novelization, first. That'll save me the trouble of coming up with characters and their designs and skills, a world, and a story. There isn't much written there, yet, either. That saves me from having to live up to some masterpiece already posted." And that was the start of An Epic Retelling. I had a skeleton to build around, and I really took off to the point where it kind of was almost really mine at the end. Sure, it was a huge mess of poor grammar, structure, typos, and could really benefit from being re-written, but it was a phenomenal first effort, and people really liked it. I ended up loving writing, even if I wasn't as polished or good as I could be, and I just kept going and going. And now here I am today, with a modest following of wonderful people who like my works, far improved skills, and lots of ideas. (^w^)

The response from my fans is what really fed the spark, though. I highly doubt I would be where I am now if I hadn't gotten such positive feedback on my first posted story. Sure, I picked a quiet, niche fandom, hoping to get some slack for being one of the few who knew the games and tried to add to the fandom. I very likely would have dropped writing entirely and stuck to lurking on other people's stories, rather than trying to make my own. But my family was very encouraging, and the first few strangers who noticed me were equally so. It's strange, looking back, to think that even one troll could have cut me down early on, and I might never have written anything ever again. I was so unsure that even one negative review would have been enough to scare me away. That didn't happen, though, and it's because of people like you, and LoveDoctor0037, WriteyouCleverGirl, Sylveon0902, Shadowpulse160, and so many others who keep bolstering my self-opinions up, even when I was seriously putting myself down, and perhaps justifiably so, or perhaps not. My earlier works are certainly filled with flaws, but they were learning experiences. I'm never lying, or faking, or kissing up to my reviewers when I say I appreciate them. Without you and them, I wouldn't be an authoress.

...And, wow, now I feel like a doof for dumping my entire writing-life story on you. XD I also think I got way off point, too, haha. Also, if the long, personal story didn't answer your concern, then, no you weren't being intrusive at all. XD

Ham-Chan: First off, I love your penname. XD Thank you for reviewing my story, and I hope you'll be back again in the future! As for the androids, I can't say the idea has never crossed my mind. I haven't written anything for it, yet, but I've considered it. I likely wouldn't do the entire team, but maybe one or two of them. A couple ideas floating around are: Lance replaces himself as a joke to see if they notice he's turned into an android, and, in a similar vein, Lance is replaced by an android, and has to save the team from evil-android-him because they didn't notice any difference. Still, I'll keep the idea of all of them as androids filed away. Who knows: maybe I'll get my writing life together enough to do a story like that? :P

Guest: While I'm pretty sure I haven't written Lance going berserk, yet, I have written combat things centered around him. Anna's technically already shown her scary side in Retribution with Gaia Power, though I have a couple dozen things where she does combat or takes people down in chilling ways. I like to write for the LAnna ship. :3