"Ah-ah-ah, don't tell me you're not going to let the little one try, as well."

Jesse freezes at the leader's words, glancing at the others with wide eyes.

Lukas is now not the only one who has developed some sort of injury (although Jesse can't actually see it, he periodically has to smear blood off of his mouth with his sleeve). Aiden has a new cut on the bruise (which looks horribly sore), Maya's definitely got a pronounced limp now, Gill doesn't look very different but the way he's gingerly holding his arm speaks volumes, and Petra looks very definitely dizzy.

(Lukas quietly reassures Jesse, through soft coughs, that Petra will be fine once she sits for a bit.)

After Lukas went, the others went down even quicker and even worse than he did, which startles Jesse.

They haven't known the others for very long, but they've gotten used to their fast movements, bold fighting, rough way of dealing with things, bickering, being perhaps a little prideful- sometimes for good reason.

They're not very used to the others losing.

But then the October Children try to get the deal with over quickly.

They did technically agree to it, after all, and they're certain that they'll be able to recover their supplies at Sky City, and 'currency is just currency,' Lukas reassures Jesse, they earn more than that and they can ask Romeo for more if they really have to.

And now the leader wants Jesse to go and do the same things the others did.

"After all, we said any member of your little group just has to handle the magic, and you all can go free. Unless I'm mistaken, they haven't gone yet," the leader hums breezily.

Lukas's lips turn down in a frown. "That's not fair. They're younger."

Jesse would really argue about the 'younger' point, but in all honesty, it's better to just pretend they're just younger than have to elaborate on how they're quite short, so they don't really say anything and just blink up at Lukas.

"And they're a lot smaller. Not to mention, they haven't handled magic before. They're the member that's most likely to get badly injured if you try a general magic blast on them."

The leader just gives him an enigmatic smile. "Mmnn, well, that's your own fault for agreeing to the deal, then, isn't it?"

Lukas glares at her; she matches it with a pleasant smile. "Come on, have them give it a go and we'll go easy on them."

"You're lying about that, aren't you," Aiden mutters, hissing as he shifts and the bruise-cut-combo gives a rather vocal complaint.

"Of course I am. Now, chop-chop, or you all die and we take your valuables anyway." The leader shrugs. "We find that most people pick the first option."

"I wonder why," Gill mutters sarcastically.

Petra opens her mouth to protest (still looking quite loopy), but a moment later Reuben squeals loudly, and Maya finds herself having a green backpack shoved at her as Jesse looks up at her, giving her the most natural smile they can.

Which is to say, at the moment not very. They're terrified. But it's a good imitation.

"Can you hold that? If they do end up knocking me out or something I'm not sure I wanna get what's inside damaged."

"Jesse, you can't be seriously-"

Jesse gives Lukas another crooked, scared smile. It's less of a smile and more of a quirk of the lips. "It's either I go and get whopped in the face with magic, or we all die. I prefer the first option."

"But... but..." Lukas's head shifts back and forth, before he leans forward and lowers his voice to a hushed whisper. "Most humans don't have any magic resistance. Even something as small as a flick of their finger could pretty much blast your guts out."

"You do paint a pretty picture, Lukas," Petra murmurs, still somewhat dazed.

Jesse shrugs at Lukas with a helpless little smile. "Well, then, better that my guts get blasted out than all of us dying. I'm pretty sure Romeo wouldn't be very pleased about that."

And then they tread across the path before the others can say anything else, shoes padding softly across brick until they're in the center of the circle of raiders, trying not to show the fact that their hands are shaking and failing miserably.


Jesse looks so tiny in the center of the circle.

Of course, the human's tiny at the best of times, and it's not like Lukas doesn't know that, but it just feels as though he took a small child, blindfolded them, and then plopped them right in front of a firing squad.

Well, not quite blindfolded, if the way they're paler than death at the sight of dozens of dark figures standing in a ring around them is any indication.

"Romeo's going to kill us," Gill mumbles, although he does look a little worried at the sight of the tiny human in the center of the circle. "He's going to find out that Jesse's had their brains blown out by magic, and then we're all going to die."

"Let's worry about these magic people killing us before we worry about our boss, how about that?" Aiden hisses back.

Maya bites her lip before glancing at Lukas. "Is it possible that Jesse could have a higher magic resistance than the average human? They were able to sense the magic in the tree."

"It's possible, but magic sensitivity doesn't necessarily correlate to magic resistance." Lukas presumably has his eyes fixed on Jesse, the blindfold hiding where he's actually looking.

For all they know Lukas is just staring at the floor but not moving his head.

"I certainly hope it does, but..."

"In that case, we're really just relying on a hope and a prayer that Jesse isn't reduced to a smear on the floor," Gill summarizes.

"Basically, yeah."

Aiden crosses his arms and glances down at Reuben, who's squealing periodically and running around in panicked little circles. "Well, the pig sure doesn't seem confident that it'll work."

"The pig is literally Jesse's heart; if they're scared then Reuben is going to react," Lukas points out. "It's not like Reuben actually knows what's going on with Jesse physically."

Reuben gives Lukas an unimpressed oink.

"You know what I mean."


Jesse can feel the weight of magic on them, pressing down into their shoulders slightly as they watch the ring of dark figures regard them.

(They're not sure, but they feel a vague feeling of guilt emanating from some of them, and some of them are shifting almost awkwardly.)

The leader has a smug grin on her face as she regards Jesse. She's probably figuring out just how much is going to be needed to blast their brains out.

Yes... just what Jesse wants.

Several staffs swing up abruptly, glowing with magic heat and making the weight in the air grow even heavier, tugging downwards so much that Jesse momentarily wonders if gravity has increased.

They squeeze their eyes shut instinctively.

Something brushes their shoulders gently, almost teasingly tracing something there, before it's gone in a whisper of wind too brisk and pleasant and sweet for Jesse to properly catch, replacing the whisper of wind with the pleasant scent of the Rayiha flowers.

A beat of silence.

Another.

They don't feel dead.

Or any pain.

So that's good, they suppose.

Jesse very, very slowly cracks their eyes open...

... to find all the staffs still pointed at them, the expressions of those wielding the staffs almost being thunderstruck. The leader of the robbers, in particular, is gaping stupidly at them in shock.

They blink a few times, taking inventory of their own body very slowly.

Well, their guts are still in their body.

So are their brains.

They slowly flex their fingers, pleased to find that besides the fact that the air is literally so heavy with magic that it's weighing them down, they can still move as normally and freely as they want. So the magic hasn't done anything weird to them on that front.

They lift their eyes back to the ring of raiders around them, scanning the circle until they find the October Children and Petra, just to make sure they're not having a death hallucination.

Nope. There they are. Staring at Jesse with just as much shock as the robbers.

"Did you guys make a mistake?" they call out to the circle of stunned-stupid robbers.


"Well, I'll be," says Lukas to nobody at all.


Jesse watches as the robbers flee into the tree line, feeling vaguely amused and (at the same time) incredibly bewildered. "They sure lit out of here fast once I beat their system..."

Petra gives her head a little shake. Perhaps it's because the magic is clearing up, or because enough time has passed that whatever the robbers did to her is clearing up, but she sounds more lucid when she speaks next. "That's basically what robbers do. Do stuff until it fails, and then hightail it out of there."

Reuben leaps into Jesse's arms, which makes them grin and squeeze back as he snuffles happily. "Hey, Reuben. I'm okay."

The pig oinks and presses his nose to their cheek happily. They beam even brighter and rub his head gently.

Lukas gives his head a shake, a smile playing on his lips. "You are just a bundle of surprises, aren't you."

The human's cheeks proceed to tint a very pretty shade of pink. "I didn't really do anythin'... it was probably a fluke or something, since I've got Reuben." They lift him. "If he's a familiar or a vessel creature, then wouldn't he boost magic resistance or something?"

The blonde half-demon's smile curves into a thoughtful frown. "Hm... you know, I'm not really an expert on that. We can probably ask Romeo or someone who's good at magic the next time we see them."

"Not today. Talking to Romeo once in one day is good enough for me, thank you very much," Aiden grumbles.

Gill rolls his eyes, giving Aiden an unimpressed look. "Okay, we'll tell Isa to pass that on when we see her-"

"No, no I'm good on that too, thank you."

Jesse giggles a bit while Lukas chuckles, looping an arm around Jesse and giving the tiny human a squeeze. "Eh. Well, it was nice of the robbers to ambush us about twenty minutes from Sky City. We'll make it with plenty of daylight to spare."

"Sky City ought to at least be slightly calmer," Maya hums, her goodwill apparently also drained by the robbers.

"I'd be impressed if it wasn't. You know Mevia and Reginald really crack down on criminals."

"You know it's less Mevia and more Isa. Mevia's in charge of the army; Isa handles the people and she's a huge stickler for the laws." Maya sends Gill a wicked grin. "You'd better not break any."

Gill sticks his tongue out at her. "Bitch."

"Bastard." She gives him a friendly sort of punch on the shoulder and starts walking. "C'mon, we'd better get going before Aiden complains about us all being too slow."

"I don't complain that we're too slow..."

Petra gives Aiden a wicked grin. "Oh? Then what do you call telling us to 'pick up the pace before we all turn to bones'?"

"Encouragement."

"Weird form of encouragement."

Lukas shakes his head as Petra bolts ahead, Aiden chasing after her and looking like he's going to whack her over the head. "I'm starting to see why people call us the October Children."


"Halt! You may not-" A man with skin the color of tea blinks at the six of them from where he is in front of the gates, before his mustache curls up as he grins at them, red irises gleaming. He's dressed head-to-toe in a very impressive uniform that is interestingly different from the Cosmos one- Jesse thinks it's more of a brown color and has more embellishments. "Well, if it isn't the October Children!"

Maya gives him a bright grin and a wave. "Downgraded to gate duty, I see."

The other guard straightens. "It's not a downgrade, miss! It's been an honor working with him, miss!"

Reginald gives him a wry smile. "Dear lord, lighten up, Dawson, it's a pleasure to have worked with you as well, but I told you, you don't have to stand on ceremony with me."

He turns back to them, giving them a warmer smile. "It's good to see you, October Children."

"What am I, chopped liver?" Petra asks drily with a grin.

He rolls his eyes and beckons his hand. "C'mon, hand me your ID cards and we'll get the process over with, you five." He pauses at the sight of Jesse hugging Reuben, about half a foot behind Petra. "Oh, who's this?"

Aiden sighs, his own smile dimming. "Uh... Romeo's having us watch them while we help out with... that."

The other guard at the gate blinks, but Reginald gives a solemn nod. "Ah, I see." He glances back at them, giving them a friendly sort of smile. "Well, my name's Reginald. I'm Captain of the Guard in Sky City."

Jesse nods and takes his hand, momentarily feeling their hand squeeze as he grips their hand firmly and gives it a solid shake. "'M Jesse."

Reuben oinks cheerfully as they lift him up a little. "This is Reuben. He's my pig."

Reginald gives them another smile, mustache curling a little bit. "Well, it's good to meet you two. Now, are you all alright? You look a little worse for the wear." His expression sobers. "Was it those robbers again? I imagine you need more supplies after that, then."

"Actually, no." Gill gives Jesse a clap on the back with his good arm and very nearly knocks them flat on their face. As it is the slap still stings through Jesse's shirt and makes some bruises there complain. "This little dude managed to get us all out with our supplies... if not without injury."

"I'm sorry, I should've gone first..."

"Jess, you nearly gave me a heart attack going last. I would've gone into cardiac arrest if you just went up first," Lukas murmurs back good-heartedly.

Reginald's eyebrow shoots up. "Really?"

Maya gives a grin. "Yeah. Actually, they've got to have a sky-high resistance; even Lukas couldn't stand up against it and you know Lukas has the best magic resistance."

The Captain appraises Jesse as another demon comes to replace him, the man slipping out of place to allow the other guard to fit into where he'd been standing previously.

Jesse tries not to fidget, trip, or do anything stupid otherwise.

"... interesting."

Jesse likes watching Reginald smile. His mustache just bristles a little at the ends.

"Well, you probably want to see the lords. They're actually free right about now, so we can probably get you in there in about ten minutes."

Aiden lets out a whistle, eyebrow going up almost appreciatively. "Damn, that fast? We arrived at a good time."

"Yep." Reginald smiles and allows the six to go through the gates, Jesse still clinging to Reuben tightly. "Well, lemme guess, kid, you haven't been to Sky City before?"

Jesse (correctly) assumes that he's talking to them, so they bob their head. "Yes, sir."

"You can just call me Reginald." Reginald gives them another grin, white teeth flashing at them. "Well, you'll find Sky City to be a real treat, then. Just, uh... don't drink any water yet." He gives them a look, expression fading to a more serious one. "You five haven't been here for a while either... you might not want to drink it yet either."

Jesse blinks. "Why? Is it poisoned or something?"

"Most drinks are poisoned. Demons and half-demons can handle poison, remember?" Lukas reminds them gently.

"Oh, right..."

So why can't even the half-demons drink the water?


A/N: Worldbuilding is fun

And yes, of all creatures, humans have the least magic resistance, or at least the ones in Cosmos do, since you either have to be incredibly close-minded to have a high magic resistance (because, well, if you don't believe in magic it won't do squat), or... well, you've just got to genetically have it. And most humans don't genetically have high magic resistance.

Responses to reviews!

LegendEmpress: I'm pretty sure you'd die as well; humans have very low magic resistances for the most part. Jesse doesn't. (And no, Jesse's not half-demon. They just happen to have a high magic resistance.) / They're not even hurt that bad; this early in the story is too early to fake killing off characters xD

TheAmberShadow: Yep, that's pretty much it. xD / Here are a dozen virtual cookies xD / Humans have a ridiculously low magic resistance, at least in Cosmos.

That's all! See ya, so long, and g'bye!

x.X. A.L. X.x