Another Epic Collection

by Aysu

More Epic Battle Fantasy stories and ficlets, though sometimes with mature themes. Warnings inside.

15. Reincarnation (T)

Title: Reincarnation

Genre: Friendship

Rating: T

Warnings: mild language

Pairings: Lance x Anna, mild Matt x Natalie

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"This is cruel."

The thought was more bitter than he'd ever expected it would be—more hot and angry—though his eyes didn't betray that feeling, nor the way his chest ached. Certainly, the woman standing before him had no clue what he was thinking as she bowed and offered a stumbling apology with the items she'd knocked from his arms held out to him. Matt's fingers twitched with the urge to make her stand upright; his throat moved against the words of assuring her she had never needed to apologize to him. He would look insane, or like he was coming onto her. She couldn't ever understand that he would be talking to someone who had been dead for centuries.

"But, gods, it's like Natalie's come back from the dead," Matt thought with a flash of utter sorrow. He swallowed that back, too, and offered a grin. "Don't worry about it. I probably shouldn't have been looking down while I was walking, anyway. Are you alright? You hit the ground pretty hard."

The woman—not Natalie, never again Natalie—gave him a wry smile as she rubbed her hip. "It's a bruise for sure. Serves me right for oversleeping, I guess."

Matt offered another smile—slightly wider, and more bittersweet. This Natalie lookalike even overslept like the late mage did. "Missed setting the alarm, huh? Well, don't let me keep you from... wherever it is you're supposed to be right now."

"Crap, that's right! I was supposed to be in class ten minutes ago!" The woman yelped with a glance at her watch. She took off running with a final call over her shoulder, "Sorry for bumping into you!"

Matt remained standing where he was, staring after the young woman long after she whipped around a corner and out of sight. For the first time in a long while, he felt the many years weighing heavily. How long had it been since he'd buried his friends? Five hundred years? Seven, maybe? Longer? He felt ashamed for having lost track. He felt even more shame upon realizing that he'd forgotten so much of what Natalie's face had looked like until seeing someone who looked so much like her. Had she always had that ring of green around her pupils, the splash of light freckles across her nose? Surely she hadn't been that much shorter than him?

Shaking himself, he stuffed his hands into his jacket pockets and continued walking down the path. It wouldn't do him any good to dwell again. He wasn't like his friends—he never had been, and never would be. He rode the currents of time far differently from them, and while they had understood that, and he thought he had, too, it hadn't been until the years stacked so painfully high that he truly understood what it meant. Living longer meant seeing more. It meant building more memories before being forced to give them up. Natalie had died. Lance had died. Anna had died. Everyone he'd ever learned the names of after them had died. He hadn't, which was why he'd quit interacting with people.

"Gods, what would Lance say if he saw me moping so impractically," Matt muttered to himself.

He couldn't remember the gunner's voice any more than he could remember his face, but he imagined there would be some sort of sarcasm, and maybe a jab at how thinking wasn't his strong suit. Matt's eyes narrowed in intense thought as he struggled to remember anything else about the long-dead, prickly man whom had always had his back.

"Red eyes? Yeah, pretty sure he had red eyes—his hair was red, too, but was it long? Short? Maybe curly...? No, definitely not curly. We were outside a lot, so he probably had tanned skin..." Matt murmured under his breath before shrugging the thought away with the guilt. He wouldn't remember without a vision of Lance reincarnating before him, too. He snorted at the thought. "Clearly, it's time to visit the graves again, if I'm stuck dwelling and dreaming."

Still, he couldn't quite keep his shoulders from slumping as he trudged towards his home.

OOOOOO

"I definitely need to review that last part about transmutation," Natalie muttered to herself as she frowned at her notes.

"Why bother? It's not like it'll be on the exam—Professor V even said it wouldn't," a cheerful voice laughed on her left.

Natalie briefly glanced over with a crooked grin at her friend. "Yeah, well not all of us are going into trade, Anna. It may not be on this exam, but it might be on the final, or important in a later year."

Anna rolled her eyes with a yawn. "I highly doubt mythology is going to be super important in your life. I mean, really. All his talk of fire flying from fingertips and sticks, giant beasties eating people whole, a race of cats with no legs ruled by a vicious cat god? It's a bedtime story. I half expect the board to make him retire for his mental health, the way he raves about that stuff like it's all fact."

"Maybe the fact that they don't means it is true?" Natalie suggested mildly as she shrugged her bag around to tuck her notes away.

"And the fact that he's, like, a gazillion years old with no surviving family to spend his time with has nothing to do with it," Anna countered in a droll tone. She nudged the other woman's shoulder before trotting off, "See you after classes?"

"Same place as always—try not to bring the creepy stalker this time," Natalie called back with a smile.

Her lips soon fell as she headed to her own next class. Logically, she knew Anna was right: magic couldn't exist. It defied all the known and tried laws of science, physics, and reason. One couldn't create matter from nothing—so many problems wouldn't be problems if that weren't true. Yet somewhere in her heart, she clung with a childish desperation for fact to be fiction and fiction to become fact. All her life, she'd dreamt of strange places and creatures, her fingers performing complicated spells, and a thrumming power springing forth. Half the time, she found herself wondering if maybe what she was doing now was the dream, and not the other way around.

With a self-deprecating huff, she shook her head back to the present where she was sitting at a desk, and turned her eyes to the board with a pen in hand.

OOOOOO

"...And then Lance, the bastard, tried to blame me for the spilled chemicals! Which was really stupid because half the class was watching him be a creep, so they saw him accidentally shove the cart," Anna chattered with a light of irritation in her eyes.

Natalie listened in amusement with her cheek resting on one hand and the straw for her milkshake stuck in her mouth. "You know, if you'd quit flushing and reacting when he hits on you, he'd probably quit it," she offered mildly for what felt like the hundredth time that year.

"He is not hitting on me! He's harassing me!"

"And yet you don't ever actually do anything to stop him," Natalie, noted in a singsong voice with a widening smile. "~Anna and Lance sitting in a tree..."

"Ugh. Ew. Gross. No."

Natalie leaned forwards with the largest grin yet. "Is that a blush I see? I think it is!"

"You are impossible," Anna groaned in defeat, burying her face in her arms.

"Only when I'm right. And speaking of being right, you've been blushing almost since before you walked in here. So, spill: has he asked you out, yet?" Natalie asked as she leaned back to slurp the remainder of her drink. She nearly choked on it when Anna's flush darkened so much that her ears, still visible with her face hidden, turned red. "Oo, I'm picking up a ton of vibes right now, Anna..."

"He did, ah, ask if I was free to study at the cafe Friday evening," Anna admitted in a squeak.

Natalie's grin widened so far her cheeks were aching. "Uh, huh. Definitely not hitting on you. So are you going to go?"

Anna finally raised her head, her cheeks still pink, and unable to quite meet Natalie's eyes. "I dunno, yet. I told him I had to check my schedule. He gave me his number to shoot him a message later."

"Do you want to go?"

"I mean, it couldn't hurt," Anna mumbled. "We're just going to drink some tea, or coffee, or something, and review the notes."

"With an evening kiss on the cheek when you're done, right?"

Anna fixed her friend with a deadpan look. "You need to get out more. You're taking way more interest and excitement in this than I am."

Natalie laughed, conceding the point, but still unable to resist one final prod, "Ah, but why would I do that when you provide all the drama for me?" Her smile shrank some as she leaned forwards in a more business like manner. "What do you think about Lance? I mean, he must be interested in you if he's taking you out for coffee, under guise of studying or not. Guys just don't do that if they aren't interested. But you shouldn't string him along if you aren't interested in him like that."

"He's cute, I'll give him that, and he can be pretty funny and witty," Anna admitted, turning her head to look out the window and study the low hanging clouds. "I've never really thought about dating anyone, much less Lance. I suppose I could do a lot worse than him, and he has to be pretty smart if he's an international engineering champion."

Natalie's eyebrows flew up in surprise. "He's a what? This is the first I'm hearing of that."

"He told me back when we first got partnered in lab—right along with saying I looked like I wouldn't know what to do with a hammer and a nail," Anna explained with a roll of her eyes. "The teacher certainly expects him to know all the answers, and he hasn't screwed up yet, so I'm inclined to believe him."

"Weird that he's going to a small town college like the rest of us average intelligence citizens," Natalie thoughtfully mused to herself. She shook her head before briskly stating, "Well, you think he looks good, that he's funny, interesting, and smart, and he certainly keeps you entertained, so you might as well give a date a try. Worst thing that happens is it doesn't work out but you get some extra study time in."

"What do I even say to a guy on a date? And I'm still not wholly convinced that that's what this is," Anna wondered aloud.

Natalie shrugged. "Don't look at me. I've never dated. I'd say just be you, ask a little about him, don't follow him to his place for a night of wild sex, and see if he asks for a follow up date. Shoot me a text when you get there, leave, and get home, though."

"Yes, mom, I shall be sure to also tell you when I've finished brushing my teeth before my bedtime at nine," Anna drawled.

"Just being cautious. I doubt Lance would do anything, but it'll be late when you leave. And speaking of it being late, we're getting the side eye from the guy behind the counter. I think two milkshakes isn't enough of an offering to the lords for a table here," Natalie said as she slid her chair back to stand up and waved to the impatient teen manning the front desk.

Out on the street, both women shivered and pulled their hoods up as the brisk late autumn wind blew past bringing the scent of rain. They hurried down the street in near silence, already looking forwards to the warm beds in their dorms. Neither one noticed the shadow watching them in dumbstruck awe and confusion from a nearby alley, as he'd been since he'd first spied them in the shop on his way back from a bar.

"Alright, one was bad enough, but two of them? And they're friends?" Matt breathed.

Against all his better judgement and reason, he began to wonder if there had been truth to the old legends of reincarnation. And if Natalie and Anna were there, then maybe Lance was, too? His excitement wilted as he recalled "Natalie's" reaction to bumping into him that morning: she hadn't recognized him at all. He didn't even know what their names were, what their lives had been like, if they even had the same personalities as before. Only one thing was for sure: Natalie hadn't known him. And if Natalie hadn't known him, then neither would Anna and Lance, if he was indeed around. Even if they were the same souls, they were now different people, and it wasn't right to influence their lives just because he was yearning for something that had died when their ancestors had been ancient. Besides, he'd just outlive them again, anyway, and seeing them grow old and die had been bad enough once.

Two days later, and he was beginning to think he'd have to move to escape Godcat mocking him. Still, he bent to offer a hand to "Natalie" knocked back on her butt again. He couldn't bring himself to ignore her and keep walking—not when she looked so much like his old friend.

"Deja vu, huh? Forgot your alarm again?"

Natalie blinked up at the man leaning over her and her eyes widened as she let out a short laugh. "What are the odds? And, no, just out for a walk," She accepted his hand and was pulled to her feet where she dusted her pants off before holding her right hand out with a smile. "At least I didn't knock your groceries all over the ground again, though. Might as well exchange names if this is going to become a biweekly crashing."

Matt inwardly sighed, but accepted her handshake. "Matt, and I'll be sure to step aside next time." He couldn't resist the flip his stomach made when she smiled in amusement at him, and when she told him her name, his heart stopped.

"Natalie, the girl who can't get her head out of the clouds long enough to pay attention where she's walking." Natalie's smile faded when Matt merely gaped at her like he'd seen a ghost. "Er, you okay?" She frowned when he pulled his hand back like he'd been shocked. "Rude."

"Sorry, I just- You look a lot like someone I knew... a long time ago. Even have the same name. Weird, huh?" Matt laughed nervously, though his eyes remained looking a little haunted.

"Really? Maybe we've met before?" Natalie suggested skeptically as she studied his face. "I think I'd remember that bright of hair, but I just..."

Her voice trailed off as her eyes went distant in puzzled thought, and Matt held his breath. Guiltily, he hoped maybe she'd remember him. For the sake of simplicity and not getting hurt more, he hoped she didn't. How the hell could he explain everything to her if she remembered only bits and pieces—or even if she remembered everything?

"You look... really familiar, but I don't think..." Natalie murmured quietly with a distressed look on her face.

"Well, you did quite literally run into me two days ago," Matt pointed out in an effort to keep her from trying to remember him.

"Yes, but I feel like I know you, and I'm sure I've never met you before in my life."

"In another life, maybe?" Matt thought wistfully. What he said instead was, "Where did you grow up? Maybe you remember me from there?"

"A small town about four hours driving west of here called Brookshire," Natalie replied promptly.

"Hmm, nowhere close to where I'm from," Matt laughed quietly and truthfully. "Well, sometimes people get those weird feelings. I'll let you get on with your walk."

"Wait," Natalie suddenly said when Matt turned away. "Why don't you walk with me? I was thinking of going to the bakery for breakfast, my treat."

Matt hesitated, knowing he should cut this short here, but he brushed that warning voice off. Just because this wasn't really his Natalie didn't mean he had to be rude or that they couldn't be friendly. "Sure, but I insist on paying."

Natalie's responding smile was brilliant and Matt felt like she'd sucker punched him. But it was too late to back out now and he followed alongside her into town. Twenty minutes later saw them sitting at a booth with food and drink before them and Natalie chattering about the classes she was taking while Matt listened dutifully.

"What classes are you taking? I haven't seen you on campus at all," Natalie suddenly asked.

Matt blinked in surprise before shrugging, "I'm not in school. Finished it ages ago, I guess you could say."

"You can't be that much older than me," Natalie refuted skeptically, and she didn't understand why that made Matt laugh in such a sad way.

"No, I guess I don't look like someone who's already finished college, huh?" Matt replied evasively while he mentally scrambled to come up with a cover story to explain his living. He doubted saying he lived off of a massive hoard of gold coins won from the corpses of dragons and monsters would be accepted, and he didn't have a real job anymore.

"No, you don't," Natalie slowly agreed with a suspicious look in her eyes.

"...I went to trade school when I was young," Matt finally said. "It paid really well and now I'm between jobs, I guess you could say."

Not exactly a lie. He'd been apprenticed to a blacksmith at a young age before he'd picked up sword fighting, and itinerant adventurer was kind of like a job, right? And he didn't have some pressing mission or quest right now—hadn't in the last couple hundred years, if he were honest—so he was technically between jobs.

"Oh, what do you do?" Natalie asked curiously.

"Odd jobs, mostly, now. I'm pretty handy. The work dries up in the winter, though." Matt gestured at her before shifting the focus of the conversation back to her. "What do you plan on doing with your life?"

"Well, I really like my historical mythology courses, but... I'm not sure there are a lot of openings for wanting to study myths my whole life. I'm pretty good at the biology courses, so maybe something in the science field. I don't really know for sure, yet, I guess."

"Just make sure you can at least tolerate whatever you end up doing, and you can always change your mind down the road," Matt suggested as he raised his drink to sip it. A few minutes passed in silence before he pushed his chair back. "Well, this was a nice change of pace. See you around, I guess, Natz." He froze at the slip of the tongue and prayed she wouldn't notice. Of course, there was no such luck.

"Natz?" Natalie repeated in flustered amusement. "I've barely known you for an hour and you're giving me a pet name?"

Matt flushed pink and mumbled an apology before leaving the bakery—and it was definitely just leaving, not fleeing. Outside, he ran straight into "Anna," and figured his day couldn't get too much worse.

"Oh, sorry," the young woman apologized as she reached out to steady Matt.

"It's fine," Matt muttered, already edging around her. He was not going to stick around for another awkward conversation. Godcat laughed at him from whatever plane of existence she dwelled on when Natalie spoke up behind him.

"Maybe it's been you running into me and not the other way around, Matt. How're you doing, Anna? Here for your morning muffins?"

"Matt?" Anna repeated in a strange voice with an equally strange look at the man. Her eyes widened in shocked recognition, and she blurted out, "I saw you last night!"

Natalie's brows rose. "You, what?"

At the same moment, Matt said, "I think you've got me mixed up with someone else. Good day."

Neither woman stopped him as he walked away, but Natalie was grinning at her friend.

"Already cheating on Lance before your first date? Tsk, tsk, Anna." When the other woman remained silent and staring after Matt with a stunned expression, she frowned. "What's wrong?"

"I- I had a dream about him. Matt you called him? You were there, too, and Lance," Anna finally replied in a low tone.

"I don't wanna hear about your weird dreams," Natalie warned.

"Not like that, perv," Anna snorted. "We were fighting a bunch of weird creatures. It was so vivid, too, like I could feel the heat of the fire breath as it flew past."

Natalie stiffened at that. "You've dreamt of fighting monsters, too?"

"Yeah, almost every night since- Wait, what do you mean 'too?'"

Natalie frowned in thought. "I wonder if Matt has had dreams like that, too. He gave me a super weird look when I told him my name, like he'd seen a ghost. He tried to pass it off as some kind of resemblance, but now..."

Both woman stood there looking at each other before an irritated cough from someone wanting to enter the bakery startled them back to awareness. They quickly stepped aside with an apology and set off down the street.

"You think Lance has had the dreams, too?" Anna wondered. "I mean, three cases seems like too many to be a coincidence."

"Even if he has, what does it mean? The things I've dreamt don't exist anywhere..."

Anna shrugged before obviously trying to put it from her mind. "I'll try to bring it up with Lance tonight, see what he has to say. Maybe we've just been studying too hard or something."

"That'll be a weird icebreaker," Natalie laughed. "Speaking of your impending date, what're you going to be wearing? And don't say what you've got on right now."

"Thought you said to act like myself?" Anna muttered mutinously, having been planning to dress exactly as Natalie had refused.

"You have got to have something a little nicer than a worn out cartoon tee and beat up jeans. I know a dress would be asking too much, but surely you've got something."

OOOOOO

"I'm never letting Natalie drag me to her closet ever again," Anna grumbled.

She stood just inside the cafe Lance had suggested meeting at, wearing a long black skirt with an emerald green blouse with low neckline, both borrowed from her friend. A light jacket went on over the top for warmth and cover, but Anna still felt uncomfortably exposed. This wasn't her style at all, and she could only be glad she'd refused to wear the make up Natalie had suggested. Her hand fiddled with the strap to her shoulder bag as she scanned up and down the street for her "date."

"Wow, you're all gussied up."

Anna jumped at Lance's voice from directly behind her and spun to see the man leaning just inside the second entrance. He'd worn a fresh-pressed yellow shirt with buttons up the middle, and black slacks—relaxed enough to be normal, but definitely more cleaned up than she'd ever seen him. Anna wondered if maybe he had an annoying friend who had pushed him to dress up, too.

Lance arched a brow when all Anna did was stare at him, and he cracked a half smirk. "C'mon, I got us a table already."

He held the door open and waved Anna through and followed after to lead her to their booth in the corner. Anna's movements were stiff as she slid into the seat and awkwardly straightened her skirt before slipping her bag's strap over her head to set beside her. By contrast, Lance looked perfectly composed as he smoothly sat down on his own side and dragged the small tablet over to order.

"Coffee, or would you like something else?" he asked.

"I'd like to be somewhere else," Anna blurted out before slapping a hand over her mouth with a flush and mumbling, "Sweet tea, please?"

Something akin to disappointment crossed Lance's face before he brushed it away to cover up with a smirk. "I'm not going to eat you, you know. You can calm down."

"I know that!" Anna squeaked, growing more mortified and red by the second. She couldn't quite meet Lance's eyes as she asked, "So, uh, you wanted to... to study? Did you have a topic in mind? Chapter twelve was kinda tricky, but I took some good notes in class, and the professor gave me a study sheet, and-"

"Deep breaths, Anna," Lance suggested before grinning teasingly. "Geez, anyone would think you've never talked to a guy before."

"I have! Just not in a coffee shop... after dark... while dressed up... And Natalie, er, talked this up, and..." Anna cut herself off when she realized she was babbling again and slumped to bury her face in her arms. "...Am I dead, yet?"

"Mm, no. Clearly something wants you to suffer a little longer," Lance replied in amusement. His expression became more serious as he offered, "We can cut this off now, if you're that uncomfortable."

"Feel free. I'm clearly not up to this," Anna mumbled, her voice muffled in the table.

Lance's expression fell and he let his eyes drift to the side. He'd thought maybe Anna would be amendable to a date or two, but if just sitting and talking to him made her so uncomfortable... Who was he kidding? Everyone hated talking to him, why would Anna be any different? Just because she responded to his jokes and jabs in class didn't mean she was any more comfortable talking to him than anyone else ever had been—she just had more of a backbone.

"...Let's just get our drinks and go," he murmured.

Anna lifted her head up enough to peek up at Lance. He sounded defeated in some way, and was now checking his phone. Any of the suave joking he'd been doing before had vanished, leaving him looking tired. His shoulders were slumped ever so slightly and his mouth and eyes were tighter at the corners than usual. It suddenly occurred to her that he must have been looking forwards to this date, and she'd ruined it by melting down like she had.

"No, let's see this through," she offered, sitting up straight. "I'll quit freaking on you...

Probably."

Lance briefly glanced up from his phone before looking down with a sigh and setting the device aside, face down. "...You were saying something about chapter twelve?" he asked in a level voice.

Anna's lips pursed as she realized he was turning their date into an actual study session, and while that gave her an easy out, she decided she didn't want that. That meant she needed to derail that path entirely. "I had a weird dream the other day. A bunch, recently, actually. Probably too much studying; it'd be nice to take a break from it for a little while. Natalie is too much of a study bug to really relax while the semester is still in session, and I don't really know anyone else around here. So thanks for inviting me out."

"Really? I thought you were a local?" Lance asked in surprise. Their drinks arrived, but he hardly noticed even as he reached out to pick up his coffee.

"Nah, I'm a country bumpkin. I'm just here for the schooling because my parents insisted," Anna admitted with a wry grin. She stuck her nose up slightly and started doing a poor imitation of her father. "'Carving doesn't get you retirement pay, and arthritis will keep you from carving 'til you die, so go learn a book. You've already wasted half your life running wild in the woods like some kind of hooligan, and it's time to really grow up.' Or something like that, anyway."

Lance started laughing. "Wow, and I thought I had downers raising me! You're not even twenty-one and he's planning for your old age!"

Anna shrugged slightly with a grin. "He's a worrywart is all, which is better than mom. She thinks I'm going to meet some guy to marry here. Neither of them went to college, so I don't think either of them really get what it's like being here. What about your parents? They must've really pushed you if you're already an international champion."

Lance snorted and shook his head. "Nah, I never knew them. I'm from the foster care system." He waved away Anna's wince and apology. "It's fine. I had a bed, food, and clothes, so nothing really to complain about. Would've been nice to not have to move every few years, I guess, but I met a lot of smart people who pointed me in the right direction."

Anna frowned slightly and opened her mouth to ask why he'd never gotten adopted, but shut it again when she realized that was an incredibly rude thing to ask. She opted to sip her tea instead and idly wiped the condensation droplets around on the table with one finger. "So you've been to a lot of places then? Where was your favorite?"

Before long, they were swapping stories of things they'd gotten up to as children, and more current interests. Lance ordered them a small plate of pastries to share, and it was while they were eating and he talked about owning a firm of his own someday that Anna remembered to ask about dreams.

"You've always dreamt big, then, huh?" she asked.

"I guess, yeah. Go big or go home, right? Though I suppose it must be nice to have a traditional occupation to fall back on. I'd like to see some of your carvings sometime.

"Sure, I'll load up some pictures on my phone to show you next class," Anna agreed cheerfully, derailed again. She glanced at her phone and blinked at the time. "Wow, it's gotten late fast. So much for studying, eh?"

Lance started and checked his own phone. "Crap, ten already? And I promised to be up early to help a buddy move..." He quickly swiped a card through the tablet to pay and stood up with a smile. "This was fun, Anna. Thanks for coming."

"Thanks for sticking through the horror of the first ten minutes," Anna joked as she shrugged her jacket on and slung her bag over her shoulder. "We should do this again sometime. No freaking out, promise."

Lance's smile grew, though his eyes glinted with mischief as he offered an arm. "I'll walk you home and we can talk on the way."

Anna eyed him suspiciously, but tucked her own arm through his with pink cheeks. Her flush darkened when he tugged close enough to be flush against his side and looped the arm he'd offered arm around her waist instead, and she rolled her eyes.

"I was wondering where you were this evening," she snorted, though without any real heat, and no struggle break free. She had to admit that Lance's chuckle sent a pleasant shiver down her spine.

They walked in silence for several minutes before Lance spoke up again. "So, think you've relaxed enough for no weird dreams tonight?"

Anna smiled up at him. "Yeah, I think so, but I actually wanted to talk to you about those."

Lance looked down at her in surprise before he grinned and wiggled his eyebrows. "Oo, I think I like where this is going..." He suffered Anna's jab against his side with a chuckle. "I'm all ears."

"For as long as I can remember, I've had these really vivid dreams," Anna admitted slowly, her eyes drifting back ahead. This was weird, she thought uneasily. Who started talking about literal childhood dreams on a first date? But when Lance merely hummed in reply, she relaxed and went on. "I... I saw you and Natalie in them, years before I met either of you. At first, when I met you and Natalie, I thought maybe I was convincing myself of some kind of deja vu, or making up memories that weren't really real. But then just a couple of days ago, I ran into another new guy who had always been in them, too, and Natalie says he'd had a weird reaction upon meeting her, and he did for me, too. Plus she admitted to having similar dreams."

Lance's footsteps slowed to a stop and he willingly let go of Anna when she pulled away to meet his eyes. His own mind was racing as he recalled dreams of his own where he'd been sure he'd seen Anna, but had similarly thought he'd retroactively placed her face in a memory of an old dream. "That... is really odd..."

"By your face, you either think I'm crazy, or you've had the same dreams," Anna decided uncertainly. She hesitated before betting on the latter. "What do you think? Could they mean something?"

Lance's brow furrowed in thought and he started walking again with Anna at his side. "I'd... almost forgotten about those dreams, though in hindsight maybe because I saw you in them was why I thought you'd be okay going on a date with me—you were familiar already, anyway. But even if they do mean something, what does it mean for us? Does it matter? I mean, I'm a good shot with a gun, but the stuff I remember doing in those dreams was insane. And I'm pretty sure dragons, and golems, and magic, and legless cats are fairytales."

"...Natalie doesn't seem to think so, but she's always been something of a dreamer for as long as I've known her," Anna murmured. "Maybe we should all meet up and talk about them? There could be some kind of common link to them all, like maybe we all were read the same bedtime story, or something."

Lance shrugged as they came to a stop outside the women's dorm. "I'm free all weekend, if you and Natalie want to meet up. How well do either of you know the other guy? What's his name?"

"Er, Natalie called him Matt, but I don't know how she knows him, and I only know him from running into him once. I'll ask her when I see her."

"Matt, huh...?" Lance repeated in a low murmur. His eyes flashed with thought at how familiar that name was before he blinked. Remembering could wait. "Well, you have my number. Give me a time and a place, and I'll be there."

"Wait!" Anna suddenly said just as Lance began to turn away. Her cheeks flushed and she looked down while she scuffed the ground with one foot. "About tonight... It was really fun, and I'd like to return the favor. There's this noodle place on the corner of Seventh and Ferndale that's nice and quiet on weekdays. Want to meet up for lunch there sometime?"

Lance's smile softened as he nodded. "Yeah, sounds fun. Wednesday work for you? My classes are over by ten that day."

Anna beamed as she nodded. "It's a... date, then. Good night, Lance. Have a safe walk home."

He nodded and turned to start walking off down the street again. Anna was sure her smile looked goofy, but she couldn't help it, even after her phone buzzed with a text from Natalie asking if she'd made it home, yet—with a heavy innuendo that she'd better not be "having fun" at Lance's place. Her responding message was sarcastic, but assured that she was fine as she headed up the stairs to her dorm for bed, still smiling.

Late the next morning saw the two women back at their favorite drink cafe, laughing over Anna's embarrassment the night before. Natalie smiled as she studied Anna's smiling face and lightly flushed cheeks. Her friend looked happy, and definitely deep into a crush, and she had to admit that it sounded like Lance had behaved surprisingly well, which Natalie privately admitted was surprising. He was well known for his crass, insensitive humor and misogynistic remarks, but it seemed his quieter reputation of respectfully sticking up for women in tough situations had some truth, too. He'd made a pass or two at Anna, but had taken her discomfort seriously and made an effort to accommodate, and had even volunteered to walk her back to her dorm since it had been so late.

"Well, sounds like you had a good time—good enough of one to be the instigator for the next date," Natalie finally said with a smile when Anna had fallen silent to grin at her drink.

"It was really awkward, at first, but, I dunno... He was nice, and okay with keeping going after I nearly ruined it," Anna admitted with a sigh. She let out a soft laugh and added, "It helped when I quit overthinking it so much and realized I was being silly."

Natalie nodded and sipped at her smoothie before looking out the window at the overcast sky. It definitely looked like rain later, and she sighed at the thought. Rainy days meant wet shoes and clothes, frizzy hair, and staying inside. Her thoughts turned, as they frequently had as of late, to Matt.

"I didn't see him on my walk today—Matt, I mean," Natalie murmured. "It's going to be hard to contact him if I don't know where he lives."

Anna shrugged the worry away. "He probably has some schedule he's following. Just take a walk at the same times you did this last week and you'll probably see him again. Lance said he's free this weekend to talk about our dreams, though, so we can start with just the three of us."

"So you actually brought them up with him?" Natalie asked with an arched brow. "And he didn't think you were crazy or weird?"

"No, he said he'd had them before, too, and that he'd recognized me from them. Dunno about you or Matt, but he did seem vaguely familiar with Matt's name and existence."

Natalie drummed her fingers on the table and began chewing on her straw in thought. It was certainly a start, and perhaps better this way. She hardly knew Matt, so inviting him to meet with two more near-or-complete strangers to talk about some mystical dream memory was a little extreme. She and Lance already had a passing acquaintance with each other from school over the last few years, and he and Anna were starting dating, so it would be far less awkward to meet up with him. They could see about reaching out to Matt if they didn't solve the mystery on their own.

"...Earth to Natalie! Come in, Natalie!" Anna called in exasperated amusement. She grinned when her friend jumped back to awareness, and nodded to the straw she'd mangled. "You've gnawed that to into fine art, and we're done eating, so why don't we go find a quiet corner at the library? I texted Lance and he said he could meet us there in twenty minutes."

"Sure, but I need to swing by my room to grab my umbrella," Natalie agreed as she stood up to throw out their trash.

"It won't kill you to get wet, you know. And besides, it's just supposed to be a drizzle."

"You wouldn't understand since your style is 'just rolled out of bed,' but my hair gets stupid when it gets wet, and I don't want to spend an hour detangling it again. Plus the rain tends to do awful stuff to my acne," Natalie huffed. "Besides, wet clothes feel gross."

"For someone not interested in dating, you sure are picky about your appearance," Anna dryly noted, and not for the first time.

"Excuse me for wanting to look good for myself," Natalie sniffed as they stepped outside.

"You're excused, Princess."

Natalie snorted at the nickname and led the way down the street to her dorm where they briefly stopped to pick up some clutter from her roommate. Anna gathered up many crumpled balls of paper while Natalie stacked dishes in the sink and scrawled a note that she wanted them washed. They left fifteen minutes later with two umbrellas to see a deceptively heavy misting rain had already begun to fall. Natalie arched a superior brow at Anna as they put up their umbrellas and she set out.

"We'd be soaked in a minute in this. Good thing one of us is smart, huh?"

"Yes, yes, I bow before your foresight," Anna sighed with a roll of her eyes. She squinted when a gust of wind blew some water into her face before she could adjust the umbrella to block it. "This a little heavier and windier than they were forecasting."

"The weathermen got the exacts of the weather wrong? I'm shocked," Natalie snorted as she reached one hand up to turn her jacket's collar up to tuck her nose behind. "Would be nice to be able to just control the weather—make it sunny and warm all the time."

"Good thing you can't. We'd all starve to death before the year's end because the plants dried up in the fields. But, hey, your hair and skin would look nice at your funeral."

Natalie elbowed her friend for the jab, but her lips were twitching trying to suppress a smile. Anna shoved her back before ducking away with a laughing protest when Natalie spun her umbrella to splatter her with water. Then a car drove past, sending a wave of water crashing over both of them, and they spluttered out curses, now soaked.

"Asshole!" Anna shouted after the driver as she pushed her sodden bangs from her eyes. Wryly, she folded her umbrella up. "Well, this isn't much use now, I guess."

Natalie scowled as she did the same to allow the rain wash some of the grit from the puddle off, muttering, "And we were only half a block from the library. Jerk. You're supposed to go slow in the rain. We'll be dripping for hours, now."

"Maybe we can borrow some towels from the gym next to the library," Anna sighed as she pushed the door open.

The librarian shot them a sour look before handing over several paper towels to dry their hands and faces. The two women offered meek apologies for the puddles they were spreading, and were waved off with an admonition to not touch the books with their soaked hands. Lance waited for them in a study nook in the far corner with his attention absorbed in a large textbook. A duffle bag sat on the floor beside him along with a heavy looking backpack. He glanced up at their arrival and his eyebrows flew up at their soaked appearances.

"They invented umbrellas for a reason, you know," he pointed out with a smirk as he set his book aside and reached for his bag.

"We had some, but it turns out they aren't infallible," Anna replied sourly. She blinked in surprise when he procured a couple of shirts and two pairs of sweats from his duffel bag.

"Here, go change in the bathroom," he offered calmly. "Don't worry, they're clean. I picked them up from the laundromat on my way here."

Even Natalie looked surprised by the offer, but she accepted the change of clothes with a mumbled thanks. Ten minutes later saw all three of them seated in the nook with the women's soaked clothes in an old grocery bag on the floor.

"Way too big, but dry," Anna noted with a grin as she pulled at the hem of her borrowed shirt. "Thanks, Lance, we owe you one. Now if only we had some spare shoes." And indeed, their sneakers were still waterlogged where they sat off to one side, but their feet covered in oversized black socks also borrowed from Lance.

Natalie looked a little more self-conscious, constantly adjusting the neckline, but she added her own thanks as well as a promise to wash and return them as soon as she could. Lance waved the concern off for the moment as he leaned forwards, settling into business.

"So, these dreams. Anna tells me you've had them, too, Natalie," he started with an interested expression.

"All my life," Natalie agreed with a tense smile.

"Same here, but I never really thought much of them until now," Anna echoed.

"I don't think they're natural," Lance announced after a few moments of silence. "The brain is impressively creative, but it can't generate faces without actually seeing them first, and I know I've never met either of you before college, and never anyone with Anna's hair color. I think even the monsters would be too much for it to come up with on its own, and their forms have always been remarkably similar with each dream. You could possibly make an excuse for picture books read to you as a kid, but I've never seen a picture book with such graphic imagery."

"Then what causes them?" Anna wondered. "I've never heard of three people sharing the same dream... hallucination... vision... whatever."

"Four, if this Matt guy has had them, too," Lance corrected before glancing down the row of shelves beside them. "Speaking of, could you not get him here?"

"Turns out Natalie hardly knows him more than I do. She literally ran into him for the first time this last week—twice, actually."

Natalie reluctantly nodded when Lance turned an intense look on her. "I don't even know his last name, and I didn't see him on my walk this morning. But he seemed to know me, though he tried to blow it off as me resembling someone he used to know."

"He said you looked like someone he knew?" Lance repeated in a murmur. "Why would he claim that?"

"It would be a little weird to say he'd dreamt of me, don't you think? Though, that didn't stop Anna from saying pretty much exactly that when she first saw him."

"I was surprised is all!" Anna protested with flushed cheeks.

Lance only looked more interested. "What did he say when you said that? That you'd dreamed of him?"

"Nothing, really. Just kind of excused himself," Natalie replied when Anna let out an embarrassed squeak. "He didn't even seem perturbed by it, though, which I suppose is a little odd."

"I wonder if he knows more about this than we do? It's a bit of a jump in logic, but he's the only one who's had a different reaction to discovering the linked dreams," Lance mused.

"He seemed scared when he first saw me—or uneasy at the very least," Natalie offered with a shake of her head and an inexplicable sense of disappointment. "He tried to dodge around it, but his expression was definitely spooked."

"He was scared of you? No offense, but you're hardly an imposing character. Have either of you ever dreamt of threatening him?" Natalie shrugged at the mild insult, but shook her head, as did Anna, and Lance frowned even deeper in thought. "Very interesting..."

"Yes, it's very interesting, but we still don't have a cause," Anna pointed out impatiently.

Lance shrugged, "No, and we may never get one. Even if Matt knows more than us, there's no guarantee he has an answer for us, and I can't think of any rational or scientific answer."

"...What about something a little more supernatural?" Natalie quietly suggested. She flushed when Anna rolled her eyes with a sighed mutter of here we go. "Hey, we can't rule it out, yet! Just because science can't explain it doesn't mean it can't be true."

"I tend to err on the side of reason, but what are you suggesting, Natalie?" Lance asked with a frown.

"Professor V, the historical mythology professor, has a theory of souls," Natalie started. She kicked Anna for her snort. "Shut it, Anna. Anyway, he theorizes that a soul stores memories independently from the mind. If we take that theory along with the theory of reincarnation-"

"You think we're remembering stuff from a past life?" Lance interrupted with a raised brow. "That's a little extreme, Natz."

Natalie flung a finger out to point at him. "That nickname! Matt called me that, too! Neither of you know me well enough to give me a nickname, and I've never heard it before, but both of you say it in such an easy, familiar way!"

Lance froze at that point and gaped at Natalie, his mind whirling. "You're- You're right. I've never called you... or even thought of calling you... It just slipped out. What the hell?"

Now Anna looked intrigued as she murmured, "Natz. Huh, sounds fitting, though... Weirdly fitting, for something I've never called you. Kinda like it, anyway, though, spooky reincarnation voodoo or not."

Natalie rolled her eyes and forged ahead. "We've all dreamt the same things: fighting monsters together on a... a squad, or... or a team, or something? What if it's something the soul remembers that the mortal flesh couldn't retain?"

"Alright, suppose we are indeed four reincarnated souls," Lance temporized skeptically, "Why do we look identical to the way we did then? And what are the odds that all four of us end up in the same city, at the same time, out of the hundreds of thousands of places in the world and the billions of people? That's way too coincidental, and don't start feeding me some destiny BS, because I don't buy that crap. And we used magic in this supposed previous life. Where the hell did that magic go? Or the monsters for that matter? Or are you going to make a case that we come from another world, too?"

Natalie flushed and shrugged with her eyes turned aside. "I don't know. Maybe something drastically shifted from whenever we existed before? I get that it's wild and super unlikely, but no one else is offering a reasonable explanation. Maybe a reasonable explanation doesn't exist."

Lance scowled, hating the feeling of something being beyond his understanding. "There has to be some sort of answer."

"Maybe we're all crazy? That's always a possibility," Anna offered sarcastically.

"I have a perfect 4.0 GPA, and have all my life. I've been recognized by multiple organizations and schools. I highly doubt I'm that insane," Lance refuted blandly. He cut a look at Natalie before adding even more blandly, "And until this conversation, I've never considered Natalie to be crazy. She's the only one in the school with grades to match mine."

Anna frowned at that, trying to ignore the twinge of shame as she thought of her own grades. They weren't bad by any stretch of the mind, but she certainly wasn't a perfect-score, genius student. Her talents had always laid in her ability to think critically and quickly, not in remembering texts and equations. "If you're both such geniuses, then why the hell are you going to this rinkydink local school? I couldn't afford anywhere else, but surely you both would have gotten a scholarship or something to someplace a little more credible?"

Natalie cast a look at Anna, detecting the bitter undertone to her words, and she chose her next words carefully to try and soothe her friend. "Convenience. It's close enough to home that my parents didn't fight too much on letting me go. And it might be only a local school, but it has phenomenal professors, has been around long enough to be recognized beyond its locale, and has had plenty of accomplished, even famous, alum. We're all lucky to be able to go here for such a modest tuition fee."

Lance looked uncomfortable as he was forced to wonder why he'd chosen this school. Anna was right: he'd gotten a free ride through any college of his choosing. His grades, extracurricular records, and the fact that he was from foster care had assured his place at any school. And yet, he'd chosen a small town college in the middle of near nowhere, to the dismay, and even derision, of some of his peers in the academic field. It didn't make sense, even to himself. Uneasily, he wondered if maybe some unseen force was applying an invisible hand to his life, guiding him here to meet these two women and possibly Matt.

With a silent snort, he chased the ludicrous thought from his head. He'd always made his own choices, and he'd liked the location, seeing it as an opportunity to start a production firm in a location that was relatively cheap once he'd finished his degree. No magical force was controlling his life, that was for sure, and he certainly wasn't tied together with three other people he'd never met before that year.

"Look, maybe we're making a mountain out of a molehill here," he suddenly said. "We've all been working hard, and our minds are desperate for something to focus on other than studying for finals. I doubt there's anything special about the dreams at all."

Neither Anna or Natalie looked like they believed him—he wasn't even sure he believed himself. They sat in awkward silence for a long minute before Natalie's shoulders slumped.

"I guess it is a little silly to be putting so much effort and worry into this. I mean, it's not like it's had any real effect on our lives," she mumbled.

Anna's face softened with sympathy. Natalie always dreamt for much more than was available, and it must've been hard for her to be forced to give up on her first real sign that maybe things were more than they seemed. "Why don't we track Matt down and ask his opinion? He definitely seemed like he knew something more about this weird mess than any of us did. Maybe he's already found an answer, or has a new insight."

Natalie cast her friend a grateful look for the little glimmer of hope. "It's going to be hard to track down a guy I've only met twice and only know the first name of. He doesn't go to our college, either, or any school around here."

Lance shrugged and waved the issue aside. "Anyone can be found if you try hard enough, and social media and the internet makes that easy, no matter all their silly lies about privacy. Give me a week, and I'll find the guy."

Natalie beamed a thanks and Anna grinned at her friend's excitement. Shortly after a discussion of Matt's physical features and details, they all departed with plans to meet up at the same time next weekend. Lance, already more than prepared for his finals, threw himself into the challenge of locating Matt by first name and description alone. As it turned out, this was more difficult than he'd expected. There were no Matts matching his description registered as living in the area, and no photographs posted on anyone's profiles that mentioned him. In fact, it wasn't until he started asking around at local establishments that he even was able to confirm Matt had been in the area at all.

"Young man about your age, six foot two, with long blond hair and blue eyes? Sure I know him. His name's Matt. He's a regular here at the bar. Never accompanies anyone or talks much, but he's pretty free with his cash—anonymously pays for rounds, sometimes, even, and always leaves nice cash tips," an off-duty barista told him late one evening. "What're you looking for him for? He a friend?"

"Not exactly. I'm looking for him on behalf of someone else," Lance distractedly replied with a thoughtful frown. It was the third place he'd heard that story.

Matt was wealthy enough to pay for rounds so regularly that the bartenders knew him? Yet he was always alone. A strange combination, for sure. Usually people paying for rounds were doing it to impress someone—a business partner, or a date—but not anonymously. On the other hand, he was also a regular at every bar in the area, which implied a drinking problem. Yet Natalie had described him as roguishly handsome, with clear eyes and brilliant gold hair, not like a drunken wastrel who reeked of beer.

"Perhaps he's somebody famous or from a wealthy family?" Lance mused that evening as he scoured the web again, expanding his search to encompass a broader market of people as well as group photos of the bars. But while searching for wealthy heirs or children didn't come up with anything, bar group photos did. He leaned forwards to peer at one grainy picture with a sound of triumph, "That must be him at the seat in the back. Let's see if we can get a better picture, though, something with a clear face..."

Four hours later and Lance cracked a near-sinister smirk as he finally found a picture a drunken reveler had taken a year and a half ago with his arm around Matt's neck, dragging him down for the photo. The blond looked surprised and a little disgruntled in the photo, but his features were extremely clear. Brilliant sapphire eyes stared out from the picture at Lance—clear, bright, intelligent, and fierce—framed by long golden blond hair. Matt, Lance noted with no small amount of jealousy, was a man in excellent shape by the muscles in his upper arms, and he had the features of a royal in the prime of his life. Yet despite it being his first time seeing the man, Lance couldn't help but stare at the photo with a wistful feeling he eventually recognized as content nostalgia, like somehow the man was a close friend of his—practically family.

He shook the thought off, muttering that Natalie's talk was getting to him, and saved the picture to his computer before turning in for the night. He had the piece he needed for an in-depth search of the net. One photo was all it took for a facial recognition program to search for him. Matt had to have some form of identification, after all, if he was getting drinks at the bar.

The next day saw him sitting with Anna at the noodle place. Both were dressed very casually as they talked about their classes and random inconsequential topics. Inevitably, though, their conversation shifted to their unique dream connection.

"I had another one last night," Anna admitted in a murmur. "We were spelunking some cavern covered in glowing crystals. Stone everywhere—even the creatures were made of stone and crystal."

Lance nodded slightly. "I've dreamt of that place before. Weird that anything would throw itself into death, though, animate rock or not."

Anna laughed slightly before nodding to him, "Any luck on Mystery Matt? Natalie can't stop talking about him. If it weren't for the fact that she's never interested in guys, I'd say she's grown a crush on him. An obsession, at the very least."

"I wouldn't be surprised if she has. He makes top rate models look ugly by comparison," Lance admitted with a grudging grimace and a shake of his head. "I found a few pictures of him, but not much beyond that, yet. Near as I can tell, he doesn't have an internet presence of his own much at all—no dating profiles, no chat profiles, no video profiles, nothing. Every photo he's been in seems to accidentally have him in the background, or him as an unwillingly participant of a drunk selfie. He's probably the greatest recluse I've ever seen or heard of—not even any family photos, with him in them or otherwise."

"He didn't seem shy, the way Natalie talks about him, and if he's going out to bars, then he doesn't have a bad case of social anxiety," Anna hummed thoughtfully. She slurped up a few more noodles and chewed on them with a contemplative expression before swallowing to ask, "How're you going to get his address if he doesn't have social media? I doubt the police will give it to you, and you don't seem to have found his surname."

"I've got a facial recognition program searching for me right now. I'll check the results when I get back," Lance explained as he swirled his fork in his food.

"Resourceful... and kinda creepy," Anna laughed. "Matt's going to file a restraining order on us for sure if he finds out how stalker-ish you're being."

Lance snorted and mumbled around a mouthful of food, "Hey, I'm all for dropping this. I mean, it's been an interesting waste of time, and I admit it's piqued my interest, but I'm not going to lose a lot of sleep if I don't find the answer."

"Natalie would. I've never seen her so fired up over something," Anna murmured. She idly stirred her ice with her straw as she said, "She's a brilliant young woman, but she's always... detached in a way. She doesn't date, despite the fact that she's beautiful with plenty of admirers, she rarely goes out to a public place unless I drag her, and she always seems distracted. I've tried asking her about it, but she always says her family wouldn't approve of her seeing anyone while she's here, or that she doesn't like being seen as an object of pleasure. The only class she'll readily talk about is Historic Mythology with Professor V, and then she gets this look in her eyes, like she knows everything one could about it, even though it's her first time taking the class. I know it's ridiculous, but she looks... wiser than her years when she talks about it, and so much more alive."

Lance nodded slightly as he waved for the check. "She did really light up when she talked about her theory. And while it is a little... out there... we've all made several points that there's a lot not adding up that we can't explain. I doubt Matt will have any of the answers she'll want or need, but it might help her find the new questions she needs to ask. And I... have to admit I want to know, too. Why do we all have those dreams? Where does this feeling of belonging come from when I think about the four of us? Why is it that every time I pick up a book on engineering, it feels like I've read it before, like I've learned it before, no matter how complex it is? Natalie's theory is a little crazy, but it makes a lot of sense in a lot of ways."

"Yeah, I guess," Anna murmured uncertainly as she scrawled a tip and her signature on the bill. "I think I just want an answer so I can stop thinking about it... but it is true that I've had a lot of deja vu feelings this last year that I didn't have before meeting any of you."

"Well, I'll let you both know what I find. Who knows? Maybe we'll go meet Matt this weekend?" Lance suggested as he stood back. "Thanks for the lunch, Anna, it was really good. Especially since I've been so wrapped up in this mystery I've been forgetting to eat."

Anna laughed as she shrugged on her coat. "Don't get as hooked on this as Natz. See you this weekend?"

"For sure," Lance agreed as they stepped outside. He hesitated before holding out his hand to Anna. "Walk with me? My dorm is on the way to yours, anyway."

"I'd walk with you even if it weren't," Anna promised with a shy smile as she slipped her hand into his.

Each of them relished the firm grip as the headed down the sidewalk. Anna's heart kept doing giddy little flutters every time Lance rubbed his thumb across her knuckles. Likewise, Lance adored the tiny smile on Anna's face every time he looked at her, counting himself lucky that she saw him as someone worth spending time with. His own cheeks flushed and his heart raced when they reached his dorm building and she leaned up to press a chaste, but sweet kiss to his cheek before pulling back with a blush and darting off. He grinned stupidly after her before heading inside with an admittedly excited bounce to his steps.

Five minutes later, and he was staring at the shocking results on his laptop's screen. The program had found Matt, alright, including his current address, but the images and information it also spat out at him made no sense. Among the more recent pictures—some of which he'd found on his own—were black and white artists' sketches of the man dating back hundreds of years ago, grainy black and white photos of crowds outside of old temples with the blond circled in red, excerpts from old scriptures talking about a legendary swordsman, lines from an epic ballad singing to the strength and skill of him and his team... Historians speculated that the "Matt the swordsman" legends spoke of might be a mythical creation of a real historical figure invented to tie different people to one bloodline to bolster a faith in the governments or religions of the times, like some kind of enduring, super ancient King Arthur... All of it linked to one photograph taken by a drunk. Lance sank back into his chair, shocked by the extreme variations in the dates yet the overarching similarities in all of them. He wondered if he was the first to find such a link to the old stories, if anyone else had ever tried to find the truth about Matt and discovered this.

As he numbly clicked through the articles and pictures, he found himself wondering with a sudden unease if maybe there was truth to the myths after all, and if Matt weren't some kind of legendary monster, like a vampire, or a god walking among them. It was a radically different opinion than he'd ever taken before, but he could hardly discredit so much information that agreed with itself gathered independently over the course of hundreds of years.

His fingers reached for his phone almost of their own volition, and he shakily scrolled his contacts to call Natalie and Anna to ask them to meet up at the library immediately. His voice sounded strange even to him as he assured them he was alright, and he couldn't quite remember packing his laptop and heading out to the library. Both women were waiting for him when he arrived, and they exchanged worried looks at the dazed expression of shock on Lance's face.

"Are you alright, Lance?" Anna asked uncertainly. He'd been fine when she'd seen him less than an hour ago.

"I found Matt," Lance murmured as he sat down and pulled out his laptop. He opened the results and spun the computer around to show them. He watched their eyes narrow in confusion before steadily widening in the same shock he'd felt as they read and began to connect the same dots he had. "I didn't think to limit the dates on the search since the program is designed to work from most recent sources working back, and my computer can handle pretty much any amount of data. I figured he would be a more recent subject," he explained thickly when Anna murmured a date almost five hundred years ago. "You could almost make the case that maybe he's reincarnated, too, but there are dozens of depictions of him within fifty years of each other."

"This drawing... it's him down to exact detail," Natalie said shakily. "But it was drawn hundreds of years ago! And the legends go back even further than that! What...?"

"What is he?" Anna asked uneasily.

Lance swallowed to wet his dry throat before saying, "Not human, that's for sure. I don't know what he is, but no ordinary mortal looks exactly the same for centuries. But if anyone has ever wanted confirmation on the supernatural, I think we've found it."

"But why is he here, living like an ordinary person?" Anna wondered as she leaned back and finally shut the laptop. "The legends clearly state a supernatural power about him—magic, I'd wager. How has nobody questioned him, seen him do something out of the ordinary, wondered about his eternal youth?"

"He doesn't tell them," Lance replied tightly. "He has no social media, no official record in the population count for the area, his ID is an excellent forgery from the black market; he doesn't even typically give his name out when he buys drinks at the bar. Who could possibly notice he's not aging if nobody knows him? I suspect he's moved a lot over his lifetime, to keep people from knowing him, keep them from questioning him. And with little wonder. Imagine the riots if people found out someone was legitimately an immortal legend and walking among them. He'd be accused of being an alien for sure, spirited away in the night by some government or underground organization."

"Sounds lonely..." Natalie murmured.

"Sounds dangerous," Anna corrected sharply. "Natalie, I know you're going to want to meet him, but I don't think that's a good idea. He was scared of you. Why, I don't know: maybe because you recognized him in some way, maybe because he definitely recognized you. It doesn't matter. People do stupid, irrational, reckless things when they're scared, and he could have the ability to really hurt you."

Natalie stared at the laptop and thought on that. The fear rang wrong to her very being. If Matt had wanted her eliminated to protect himself, then he could easily have done so—she was hardly difficult to get to, after all. In fact, he'd purposefully tried to mislead her about who he was. And he'd been kind to her, even if no more so than any good hearted stranger would be. And in her dreams—memories—he'd been nothing but a good and trusted friend, covering her and taking care of her. She'd never once felt threatened by him, his memory, or the thought of him.

"I doubt Matt would do anything to her—to any of us," Lance refuted, ignorant of Natalie's thoughts following a similar logic. "It's too much of a liability. My roommate saw his picture and knows I was searching for him, you both are well known as friends, Anna and I have started dating; any one of those factors complicates getting rid of us. Besides, he's never done anything actually evil, even in those legends. He's powerful and potentially dangerous, certainly, but not evil."

"But is it really such a good idea to go whack the hornets' nest?" Anna countered. "Sure, he's been nice, but he's also taken pains to remain off the grid. What would he do to protect that?"

"He would have moved on immediately after I first started to remember him," Natalie replied distantly. "Surely he'd be skilled at picking up and leaving, but he didn't. And in a lot of ways, he seemed to want to talk to me, even if under the guise of a lie. Maybe he's missed me. Maybe he's missed all of us."

"Possibly," Lance agreed. He raised a hand to stop Anna's argument. "Here's what we'll do. Each of us will tell one person—our dorm mate, for example—that we'll be back at a certain time. We'll go meet Matt and present him with what we've found. I suspect he'll try to mislead us, or even scare us, but I doubt he'll hurt us. If nothing else, it would be good to rule out being attacked by him as a potential threat."

Anna opened her mouth, but shut it again as she considered that. Lance made a good point that it would be comforting to know if Matt was a danger to them. And he hadn't seemed bad when she first met him, and she put a lot of stock into surprise first impressions. You could tell a lot from a person based on how they reacted in an unexpected meeting, and Matt had been cautious, but not angry or threatening.

"...Alright, let's go meet him."

Lance stretched out to pat her shoulder. "I'll watch your back, Anna, don't worry—you and Natalie. Do you ladies want to do this now, or another day?"

"I've got my first final early tomorrow," Natalie reluctantly refused. "However this turns out, it wouldn't be wise to blow our education over it. Let's meet him after finals are over. How about that first afternoon after the last exams?"

"Works for me," Anna agreed tensely, though she made a face at the thought of finals. "And speaking of, I need to get back to studying. I was in the middle of a long problem when Lance called."

"Let me know if either of you need help preparing," Lance offered as he stood up, already confident that he'd ace all of his exams. He ran a hand through his bangs after he'd slung his laptop bag over his shoulder, and muttered, "Gonna be hard to ignore this mystery even if just for a few days... See ya, girls."

OOOOOO

"And that's time! Put down your pencils and turn in your exams. Have your IDs ready when you hand in your papers. And don't bug the proctors or TAs for when grades will be ready!"

Anna frowned at the last problem she hadn't been able to get to, but dutifully gathered up the test booklet, her essay question response, and her scantron. This had been the test she'd been most worried about, but while she felt confident that she knew the material, she was still upset at running out of time.

"Well, you don't have Natalie or Lance's super brains, so what did you expect?" she muttered under her breath as she walked out of the class after handing in her exam.

All around her, students were chattering about their answers, worries, and relief at being done with the semester. Anna strode past them, ignoring the plans they made for visiting family, or getting jobs and internships. Lance and Natalie would be waiting on her by this point. She still wasn't sure meeting Matt was the best plan, but she also couldn't deny a deep seated curiosity about him. And, privately, she secretly hoped maybe he could give her an insight on her past life to give her a direction for the future. She wouldn't stay in school forever, after all, and her father was right that woodworking wasn't a reliable source of income. Speaking of, she really needed to work on getting the funds or loans together for next semester as soon as possible...

"Anna! Congrats on finishing the exams! How'd it go?"

Anna looked up at Natalie's cheerful voice, and brushed her worries aside. "Didn't quite get to finish the last one, but I still feel pretty good about them overall. You?"

"All the stuff I was worried about wasn't even on the exam!" Natalie complained. "I freaked out and pulled two all nighters for nothing!"

"Better over prepared: isn't that what you told me when I said maybe you should ease up a bit?" Anna chuckled. "Still, it's over now, and knowing you, you'll have top marks. Lance, too."

Natalie grinned at her, "And you'll be getting honors, also. You've earned it with all the work you put in to get ready. You studied harder than I did."

"I needed to study harder than you did. This stuff doesn't come naturally to me," Anna pointed out more sharply than she'd intended.

"Hey, I didn't mean it like that," Natalie soothed. "I'm proud of you for putting in so much effort. I'm sure your parents will be, too."

"Maybe," Anna muttered moodily. She blamed the bad mood on being tired and strung out from exam week, and tried to shake it off. "Let's go meet Lance and get this over with."

Natalie frowned at her friend and reached out to rest a reassuring hand on her shoulder. "You know you can talk to me if you need to, right? I'll do whatever I can to help."

"Can you scrounge together a few extra thousand to foot my college bills?" Anna thought sarcastically. What she really did was give a tired smile, and assured, "I'm just tired is all. Looking forwards to sleeping instead of reading for once."

Natalie lightly squeezed Anna's shoulder, not quite buying that, but let the subject drop. They walked in silence to where Lance waited for them at the edge of the campus grounds. Anna perked up a little at seeing him leaning against a light pole, and darted forwards for a hug. He readily returned the embrace, and offered a high five when she pulled back.

"Did that squares trick work?" he asked as he scanned Anna's tired and stressed features.

"Yeah. It made the math exam one of the easiest, thanks. You ready?"

"Been ready since last week," Lance promised, nodding a welcome to Natalie when she reached them. "Hey, Natalie. Congrats on finishing your degree a year early."

Natalie flushed at that when Anna whirled to look at her in surprise. "Thanks. I'd like to stay for my masters, but I promised the folks I'd take a break to come visit them."

"This was your last year? But I thought..." Anna whispered in dismay before trailing off.

"I was taking the accelerated learning path, remember? That's why I've been so booked and unable to go out to eat more often," Natalie reminded. She smiled at Anna's disappointed expression and promised, "Don't worry, I'll keep in touch even if I'm not in the area, and I'll definitely be back. After all, you're my only source of romantic drama."

Anna couldn't resist a snort at that and finally cracked a small grin. "Right. Well, super congratulations, Natz. So you'll be walking next week, huh?"

"Maybe. I don't really like big ceremonies, so I might opt to just get my diploma mailed," Natalie replied with a shrug. She gestured to Lance and briskly changed the subject with eagerness in her eyes. "So, where are we headed?"

"Not too far: about a twenty minute walk from here. Matt's renting an apartment on Golden Oak drive, and he's definitely still in the area. He was seen at a bar last weekend."

"Then I guess this is it, huh? Think he'll come clean?" Anna wondered as they set off.

"Based on what I've seen of him, I think he'll be an idiot," Lance snorted, referring to the dreams.

"Everyone's an idiot compared to you," Natalie sighed with a roll of her eyes.

She cast a brief look at Anna as she said that, and caught the other woman's wince even as she gave a tight laugh. Her lips tightened slightly and she made a mental note to confront Anna about her intelligence later, suspecting it was the source of her current depression. But now, in front of Lance, wasn't the time for such a discussion—she didn't want to embarrass her friend, or create a wedge between her and Lance. The new couple were happy with each other, and she'd be damned if she ruined that for them—not when Anna had once admitted to feeling wholly inadequate in the dating department. And Lance smiled much more when Anna was around, which was a nice shift from the bored scowl he normally wore in class.

Their journey was made mostly in silence as they headed into an older section of the town. Lance led them down winding streets with neat gardens kept just about everywhere, purposefully striding down a route he'd preplanned days ago. And then they were stopping at a brick walled apartment complex that looked as though it had been there for a long time. It lacked the gated entrance that many of the other complexes had, and clearly was a little more weathered than other ones, but it still looked well maintained with proper upkeep.

"Alright, here we are. Matt's apartment is on the third floor, room 311—it should be on the left side," Lance announced.

"What are we even going to say to him?" Natalie suddenly wondered. "I mean, it was one thing when he was like one of us, dreaming of past lives, but he's not."

"No, he's some kind of immortal demigod creature. I doubt we'll be able to pull a fast one on him, so it might be best and easiest if we come clean about what we know and cut right to the chase," Lance agreed. His hand drifted to his right hip and his mouth set before he started walking again.

The walk up the stairs and down a hall seemed to last both forever and not long enough at all. Their hearts were racing with anticipation, and their palms were sweaty. And then a thick wooden door loomed before them with a faded plaque depicting the number 311. Lance hesitated only briefly before raising his hand to knock firmly. Behind him, Anna and Natalie crowded a little closer.

For several minutes, nothing happened. There was no noise from within, no voice calling that they were coming. Lance was just about to knock again when the sound of a latch sliding back stopped him and the door swung open. And there, leaning against the entry hall wall, was Matt. He wore a rumpled white wife beater shirt, loose gym shorts, and no shoes. His gaze was sharp and intense as he studied them, scanning each of their faces with a sort of resignation. Then, without a word, he pushed the door open wider and gestured for them to enter.

"Take your shoes off and hang your jackets on the tree," Matt muttered without looking back. His voice echoed back to them as he rounded a corner, "Lance, set the gun you've got tucked in your waistband on the table there, along with any switchblades you're carrying in your boots, or jacket, or whatever."

Lance started, his eye going wide. Matt knew his name, knew he was armed, and where the weapons were. Anna shot him a look with an arched brow as she mouthed you brought a gun? Natalie rolled her eyes and muttered about great first impressions as she nudged her shoes off. Before long, they'd followed Matt into a sitting room where he was sprawled in a worn armchair, waiting for them. To a casual observer, the blond looked bored, or merely tired, but the glint in his eyes told his guests he knew who they were and suspected what they had come for. He nodded for them to take a seat on the opposite sofa, above which a gleaming sword was mounted beneath its red leather sheath, hilt shining gold, and blade a blued silver, while a polished ruby gem glinted in the winged crosspiece. Matt opened the conversation without any introduction.

"So. You found me. I'm sure I have Lance to blame for that."

"You know my name?" Lance asked warily, wondering why he was surprised.

"I suspected you might be here, too, after I saw them. And if you were here, then you probably looked the same and had the same name. Natalie has her name and face, as does Anna; it doesn't take a genius to draw a correlation."

"So then you know why we're here?"

"Well, I doubt you came to reminisce," Matt grunted, though his expression flickered with a sort of longing sorrow. "Not one of you knows me. Not really. Not anymore. I assume you've drawn some connections, had questions, and are looking for answers."

"How old are you?" Anna blurted out first. She fought the instinctive flinch when Matt turned that appraising sapphire gaze on her. It was both familiar and not, for more than one reason.

"Old," Matt finally replied vaguely after a long moment. "But you already knew that, or you wouldn't have asked. I stopped tracking my birthday a long time ago, but over seven hundred, now, at least." He shifted to lean his cheek on his hand and nodded to them. "I've got a question for you three: what are you hoping to gain here? Regardless of what you may or may not remember, we're not friends anymore. I'm not going to pretend you're the same people, because you're not. That friendship died centuries ago when you did."

Natalie exchanged a look with Lance and Anna before she took a deep breath. "I don't know what I'm hoping to gain, if anything, but I have a lot of reasons for coming. Mostly questions and curiosity." She held Matt's gaze evenly as he presented a mask of an expression, but was unsure of what he was hiding from them.

"Questions can be dangerous; their answers even more so. You might be better off not knowing, you know. You're each in good health, attending a good school, and, I assume, getting good grades. Do you really want to risk upsetting what you have now by asking after what's gone?"

"I think I do," Natalie replied quietly. "I've never felt quite right. I've... dreamt... of strange places, beasts, and spells my whole life. Until very recently, I thought I just have an overactive imagination. I'm sick of feeling like I'm reaching for something that should be mine by right only to be unable to find it, whether it's magic or a memory."

"You can make new memories, and, frankly, that's what you should be doing," Matt countered calmly, ignoring her mention of magic. He blew out a silent sigh and shifted his weight slightly before murmuring, "I admit, when I first saw you, I couldn't believe it. I denied it, even. You—all of you—had been some of my closest and most treasured companions before age claimed you, and I thought I would never see any of you again until I died myself. When I ran into you, and you sort of remembered me, I began to consider reincarnation: something I'd never believed in before. I started to hope that maybe it was a priceless gift from the gods. But after talking with you, I realized you're not Natalie, Anna, and Lance—not my Natalie, Anna, and Lance—and I accept that."

"So the souls mean nothing to you?" Lance challenged, feeling a great, inexplicable ache forming in his chest at Matt's dismissal. "We have the souls, the bodies; we even have some of the memories, and more are coming back all the time. Does the fact that time has passed change who we are?"

Matt closed his eyes for a moment to compose himself before opening them again. "No, time doesn't change who you are, but death does. I don't think you get it—maybe you can't. I was at each of your beds as you died. I held your hands, buried your bodies. You may wear their faces, you may have their souls, their memories, but your new lives shaped you differently. You're not the same, you'll never be the same, and trying to shape you to be the same again would be childish and wrong. Besides, the world is radically different now compared to what it was back then. The skills and knowledge you cultivated in that life aren't useful now. The world moved on. You need to do the same."

Natalie didn't understand the sudden burning of tears in her eyes, but she blinked furiously to try and keep them from forming and falling. "Why can't we have both? You clearly knew us well. Do you think we'll be happy that you wrote us off so quickly? You're right: I don't really know you. But despite that, every fiber of my being tells me you're as close to me as kin, and I want to know you. And you look so pained when you look at us, which makes me think maybe we aren't as different as you're claiming us to be. What if who I am now wants this as much as who I was would want this? Don't I get a say in this?"

"Don't we all get a say in this?" Lance muttered in a thick voice.

Matt's lips pursed as he hesitated, having never thought of it like that before. Did he have a right to decide what they did with their lives? If they wanted this, then what could be damaging about it? It wasn't like he was forcing them to remember him and their life on the team. But it was also true that they had grown up radically differently. Monsters didn't roam the world, and combat wasn't the path to a brighter future. Each of them had once had deadly instincts; having those back could spell trouble. But if Lance was right, and they were steadily remembering their past lives, then they could regain those instincts anyway, and they might not mesh so well with the more peaceful lives they led now. Wouldn't he be better served to keep them close, to watch out for them, guide them? It wasn't like he was the only ancient creature in the world, either. Someone might find them—someone with an ancient grudge. Matt's mouth curled into a protective frown, his eyes distant as he thought and weighed the situation.

And, really, he wanted them back so badly it was a physical pain in his chest. He'd been alone for so long in all the ways that matter; didn't he have a right to be happy again? And Natalie wanted him back; Lance seemed to, too. In fact, only Anna had remained silent nearly the whole time.

"What do you think, Anna?" Matt asked, eying the former ranger. "Do think this is worth it?"

Anna hesitated, glancing at Natalie and Lance, who merely watched her in return, not wanting to influence her answer. There was a challenge to Matt's words, but she wasn't sure what for, or if she was ready to face it. And she'd been watching him as he spoke, digging for answers in his expression beyond what he was saying—answers about his own feelings on the matter.

"I think this is all mad," Anna admitted quietly. "I mean, less than a month ago, and I would have laughed this off as a bad story plot. I don't have the same yearning Natalie does, or the attachment Lance seems to have. I think I originally agreed to come only to keep an eye on them, watch their backs, because you're a really dangerous character. But at the same time, I feel more comfortable here than I ever have in my life, which is saying a lot since I've got a good family. And I've recently gained some things that I'll lose if I walk away from this, from you, from who I once was. I won't give them up. If learning about you, them, and myself is what it takes to keep what I have, then I'll gladly welcome you back as a friend. We're already in this; have been since the first dreams. So we might as well give it our all, and see it through."

---

A/N: Another long thingy, and one I've had the idea for for months. I'm pretty proud of this one. :3 Plus I liked writing invasion-of-privacy-Lance and Natalie shipping Anna. This one is at a point where it could be considered completed, though it could also be continued, too. I haven't decided what Matt is in this, but I'm partial to dragon Matt, so he's proabbaly a dragon. XD

As for the missing mana and monsters, right now the thought in my head is that Matt capped the mana sources because people were making giant mana weapons, and if mana is gone, monsters are gone, and people don't really need mana. Stereotypical fantasy plot, I know, but it works nicely. That must be why it's a stereotype, I suppose. :P

Guest Review Responses:

Anonymous: Techie Anna is one of my favorites. In a lot of the future stuff I write, she gets much more informed on technology. Not as good as Lance, of course, but better than Natalie or Matt by a lot.

Yeah, I beat the final boss, too. No spoilers here, but such good stuff!

Miles or Arrow: Yeah, that one ended up being very new and different, but I rather like it. :3

I never used to think encouraging words from a stranger on the internet mattered much, but ever since I first started posting here, that opinion changed a lot. It's surprisingly helpful and encouraging to have people honestly enjoy my work enough to review it again and again, and then become another support net when things seemed all bad. I appreciate you and all the other kind reviewers so much!

Jason: Thank you for finding those typos! They're the little, easily overlooked ones I cannot never seem to find. :P I think I've I've fixed them, now. Expects, when spelled wrong, usually gets autocorrected to excepts, so maybe that's why you see it a lot.

Not sure killing people in your name I should a good thing, but it is sweet here (I think?). Lance and Anna definitely pair off into an adorable couple where Anna knows she can handle herself but also that Lance will have her back no matter what (though she may need to keep his name off the murderer books).

Little Follower (for Gaea review): Quite the split up review. Is the length of the review what makes them vanish into the empty void of the Fanfiction review system? They got a little mixed up, but the part titles helped in piecing them together. I'll try to give a good reply to the parts as a whole review.

(Pt1) Yep, I'm getting better mentally, so it's getting easier to write again. I even tacked a couple thousand words onto the next chapter of Shadow of the Blight, which has been a huge stress topic for me! :O

I do adore writing little moments where the team member is about as educated as a high school dropout. None of them are particularly stupid, per say, but in my head cannon, typically only Lance and Natalie have had a formal education (which ironically lines up pretty closely with the actual cannon).

I tend to write ancient characters with absolutely no contracted words and with a more rigid sentence structure. I'm glad that's translated the way I wanted. :3

Yup. Matt is a dragon. The idea stuck and now it will never leave my head. I'm always wanting to make him a dragon, now. :P Not that age or a few measly drops of dragon blood mixed with his is going to distract him from smiting foes and getting loot, though. He'll have an issue with the consequences of the blood later, but it'll work out.

(Pt2) Yeah, definitely don't let them investigate ancient sites. Next thing you know, Matt's smacking monoliths with swords, and Anna's possessed by a god. XD

Yay! Somebody else likes the romantic part as much and for the same reason I do! I'm quite proud of how the romance is working out in this one. So many of my works it just... happens, which more or less works for Natz and Matt because they've been friends for so long and it's established that Natalie is crushing on him, but it doesn't make much sense for Anna and Lance other than that they're pretty similar in approaches and skills.

(Pt 3) This will also include pt 2.5 since a portion got repeated, I think.

Lance is definitely playing the one-man blame game. Though it hasn't been written yet, he did say some... rather rude and mocking things to the goddess when they beat her. Those words didn't have any effect on Anna's mental state, but Gaea's parting sally of "You may have defeated me, but I've won/but it was at a cost" helped skew his thoughts. He assumes, falsely, that by angering the goddess, he encouraged her to do more damage to Anna's mind than might have happened if he'd kept his mouth shut. Matt's counter was one hundred percent accurate that the moment Anna was possessed to such a degree, her mind was already in the shattered state it's in for the majority of rest of the story.

I'm trying to figure out ways to do passage of time without a major time skip and without a long, boring walking scene that always stonewalls me. I think I've found a few tricks that work, like the apples turning brown. :3

I want a foxhare almost as much as I want a shoulder dragon. I'd probably be allergic to them, but that wouldn't stop me from wanting one! They aren't a crossbree: the name is more of a literal description of their appearance. I didn't want to break up the flow by describing in detail, so it's mostly up to the reader to picture, but in the original design I made of them, they have a feline-like body and legs, habit of climbing up high, and stalking style of hunting; a fox's bushy tail with a white tip and the white belly, and the ability to eat pretty much anything like most canids; a wild rabbit's soft fur, ears, and facial structure. Maple is a kind of mousy brown, but foxhares can come in a lot of colors. They're all very smart, and very opinionated in a cat-like sense.

I'm not sure what you mean by parental affection. His treatment of Maple, maybe? If so, then yes, Lance should never have a pet or a kid. XD

Yeah, I can hardly stand to look at some of my older stuff, it's got such poor writing in it. "Oh, god, why did I put that semicolon there...and there?! wtf was wrong with me, semicolons everywhere!" comes up a lot. And REALLY weird and clumsy efforts at describing stuff. XD An Epic Retelling had a lot of both of those, which, as my first effort, it would. The learning has come a long way. :P But then some of them from a similar point in time were actually really good and still are, and I'm baffled by the phenomenon. It's like digging up a doodle you made in math class in the seventh grade and realizing you can't really draw that well even ten years later and you wonder what artist's spirit possessed you that day. A lot of them I like the plots so much I've rewritten them and they wound up on here, like Heiress, and the plot changes into something even better. It's a lot of fun. :3

Thank you for always saying that and being supportive. :3 I'm doing a lot better, now. I'm finally at the point where I can sometimes tell the dick in my head that it is in fact a dick and needs to go away. It's not all good, of course, but it's so, so much better than where I was in January. Still have moments where I feel like I haven't gotten anywhere in the effort, but those periods are getting shorter each time.

I think that's everything for the reviews... Hope you all enjoyed this, leave me a review, and to any Americans today out there, have a Happy Thanksgiving!