Queen's note: Why is it when I try to do a short check in chapter, it's three days, and 11 pages later?! Also! I have a discord channel now if anyone is interested to come visit and geek out or read some cute things. let me know in a review and I'll PM you a invitation link!

Garnets

Chapter Sixty One:

Kind

"Is something wrong Lily?" Asa asked, looking up as the smaller human wavered a moment beside her.

"...ever have both a bad feeling and something like excitement at the same time?" Lily asked with a frown, lifting a hand to check her pulse. A little confused at finding it picked up in pace again. "And back to a full on bad feeling?"

"Quite a lot actually." Asa nodded, reaching out to the smaller human. Rubbing Lily's back as she was learning a lot of the younger humans liked. Or at least the humans on the Fortress seemed to all like. "Vega? What's happening with the Lord Slayer?"

"The Slayer and his group have just entered a battle, they found some Argenta survivors." Vega supplied, the AI making the choice not to mention the sighting of the possible gorgon crystal growths on the demons they were facing.

Asa turned to look back down at Lily, "That might explain what you're feeling Lady Lily. You're connected to the Demigod, and though I doubt he would willingly or subconsciously let you feel what he does when fighting,"

Asa knew all too well what he was like fighting. He was a demigod of war and death after all.

"Given the distance and his likely subconscious want to keep you safe," Asa smiled as she got one from Lily, "I would wager you're just sensing his excitement at being able to fight. He loves that after all, but you do not enjoy it so it doesn't fully sit well. That's my assumption for why you don't feel good about it."

Lily snorted, that last part seemed far too much of an understatement. "No kidding. Is it going to be normal for me to…pick up things?"

"I wouldn't be surprised," Asa aloud, thinking about it, "It's a bond for sure, but not an open gate for things to freely flow back and forth. Nor like a one way valve."

"Just picking up echoes of excitement?" Lily asked, lifting her new mask for a dose of medicine. Thankfully with lungs cleared of the toxic demon made gasses she did not need it as much as a few months ago.

"At the distance right now, it's an echo I would think." Asa thought, and then paused at a long set of stairs. Offering her arms to the nearly winded Lily. Waiting until the smaller human gave a nod with a grateful nod before Asa picked her up almost effortlessly. "Remember what you said, that feeling you had before we woke up and the Slayer found the other humans on earth, but you were here on the Fortress?"

Lily considered, very happy to not climb the stairs herself right then. She tucked her hands against her chest, realizing this was a similar sensation as back then. "It was like something pulsing, or… a different heartbeat than mine. And this same sort of static feeling."

"That 'static' is the wraith energy in you reacting to the Slayer's own." Asa nodded, pretty confident now what Lily might be feeling. "Does it seem stronger than the last time?"

The human was quiet, thinking about it. As well as that same static-twisting feeling in her stomach right after getting her own gift from the Wraith Gaia. When John was trying to help her breath before she slept for those two days. "Yes… that's a reaction to John?"

"I would assume so." Asa nodded, clearing the top of the stairs already but did not put the human down as she headed towards the direction of medical, "My guess is that it will dull the more exposure you have to the Slayer again. It's already surprising that you have no negative reactions to him to start with. If anything, it's just natural."

"That's a thing?" Lily blinked, baffled at this new information. "Did you react…bad to John?"

"Not exactly, not like some other Night Sentinels." The healer slowed her pace a moment to think about it, frowning a bit. "He's always felt hot to me. Never painful against my wraith gift. But I've been around the Slayer… John since he found me about Heather's age? I was bigger than her, little smaller than you back when he found me."

"You grew up around him?" Lily asked, smiling to get a confirmation of this information instead of a passing comment from Valen.

"Rai and I did, yes." Asa smiled, despite some of the memories that led to being found, "He found us and others. After Hell's invasion on Argent D'nur."

"Galin too?"

"No, Captain Mila found him." Asa snorted, "He's younger then Rai and I, but I think the Slayer is fond of him too. Not as much as he's fond of you though, Lady Lily."

Lily squinted up at the healer, her voice going a bit dry, "Asa."

"Yes Lady?"

"Why does that sound more like you're trying to give me some sort of title instead of a polite way of referring to someone?"

Asa smiled, almost a smirk but she did not let it change fully as she looked at the smaller human. "Because I did."

"You're crazy," Lily deadpanned, and then made a face as the taller woman just laughed. Then she got squished a bit, Asa giving her a head press to show affection. "Rude."

"Not at all." Asa snorted, though it was not clear if it was to either of Lily's statements or both. The Argenta healer headed to a side area near medical, but not in it. One of the meditation areas that she was happy to see the humans liked to be inside of too. "Now, daughter of my King, let's work on using your Wraith Gift."

"What?" Lily demanded before being plopped on a low bench with a padded seat. "What?! Asa, I have a dad! He's…in…a…sword…thing."

"Yes, you do, and you are now connected to the Slayer." The argenta agreed as she knelt and then settled on her knees on the ground to put her more even with Lily. Asa gave a soft chuckle, taking the younger woman's hands, her own hands cool with the wraith energy. Letting it spread and sooth sore muscles from Lily working with them on the Fortress and helping with wrangling the now active kids.

Lily stared down, surprised, tilting her head at how things were moving. Then fascinated, and distracted, starting to feel how Asa was using her wraith gift. "Can I do that?"

"To others likely, to yourself not so much." Asa started to explain. "A healer's gift is a little bit different from others. Nor is it a catch all. Just like I didn't know how to buffer your soul with the Wretched demon, or where human arteries are to try and force them closed. Even then those wounds aren't always gotten to in time."

"So it's, sort of, easier to heal someone else rather than yourself." Lily asked, flexing her fingers against Asa's palms. Trying to mimic what she was feeling, brightening as it seemed like she matched it, like an unseen internal wiggle and then shrug to the right. "...like this?"

"Yes, there you go. This is just something small to start. To help cool and relieve pain. Like for those that are overworked, over train, or still restless after a real fight." Asa smiled and explained, "It's one of the things you'll use the most. No need to dump everything into it."

Lily gave a somewhat guilty smile, "No need to…panic dump or…pour it out."

"Yes," Asa nodded, though doubted what happened with Valen and the Wretched would not likely happen again. Not with what Gaia had done to Lily, the girl had a decent sized well to draw on.

"...does something like this, well, work on John?" Lily asked, thinking about how he came back from earth or hell sometimes in a non reactive state. Even when the visible cuts he had did not bleed. "Or help?"

"I and other healers have helped him." Asa nodded, letting what she was doing bleed out and stop to focus on what Lily was doing. She was definitely learning best how to use the new gift by seeing it happening first. "Both smaller and larger wounds, or just to feed him some energy. I would not suggest that you do anything more than something like this. Bi… John would like it if you tried just this."

Asa remembered long ago for herself. Of being much younger and proudly showing who saved her not just the prosthetic ankle and foot was working, but her wraith gift. It was a fond memory, as well as the Slayer seemingly having now trouble letting that younger version of Asa practice healing him.

"...what did he go by before?" Lana asked suddenly, looking up as she caught the correction. "You're not the only one stumbling over what to call him."

Asa blinked, and smiled, "Bi'Jay was the name he went by on Argent D'nur. Or at least I think that was the Argenta version of the name he gave. I've only ever known him as Bi'Jay, and now 'John,' I don't know if he ever went by something else. But given his age, I wouldn't doubt it."

"Do you know how old John is?" Lily brightened, distracted that her gift pulsed steady with her heart beat now.

Asa did not miss that and kept talking so Lily could learn to keep this low level of use. "Not counting the time in Hell, because time never flows correctly in Hell. He spent at least eight hundred years in Argent D'nur that I know of, before Hell invaded my homeworld. I can only roughly track…maybe a thousand five hundred years, not including the time I spent in stasis in the sarcophagus."

"...is that normal?" Lily asked in a confused tone, glancing down and watching the softer silver-white shimmer sparkle around her fingers for a moment before trying to pull back.

"For some immortals." Asa guessed letting the girl go and motioned her to flex her hands and wrists, "Most immortals are killed before they die though. thus…"

"Imortal." Lily finished, thinking as she did as told. Making sure the smaller joints were loose again. "John's a… wow it feels weird to say aloud… he's a demigod… god? And Valen is immortal. Like different levels?"

Asa chuckled, knowing the feeling Lily was having all too well. "Yes, just as what happened to Valen is different from the other Night Sentinels that are immortal here. And then between them, like Captain Mila, Haco and both myself and Rai."

"And Argenta are longer lived than humans as it is." Lily paused and glanced up at a camera, remembering what Vega was teaching her. "Right?"

"Yes," Vega supplied, happy to be invited back into the conversation. Though he was also just as happy to listen to the two as well. "Humans at this time, excluding exposure to Argent Energy, or Hell Energy, average a hundred and three years old to a hundred and sixteen in age. Pre Invasion that is."

"Unaltered Argenta can live upwards to four hundred." Asa noted, glancing up and then back to Lily, not bothered with Vega at all. He was quite the well of knowledge and a kind personality as far as the healer could tell. "Outside of stasis, I'm only 160. Maybe 168 in the body."

"Only… wait how," Lily started, no wonder the Argenta and John still thought her really young. Not really a child just like being respectfully treated as a teen. And then she frowned in confusion as she looked between Asa and Vega's nearest visible camera. "How… what does this really mean for my lifespan? I know most of my biological family averages around 90 years?"

"It's impossible to give exact estimations, Lily," Vega said gently, or just kindly. "But you will likely exceed two hundred as a safe 'guess.'"

"Notwithstanding anything catastrophic or sickness?" Lily guessed, missing a momentary horrified look on Asa at that thought.

Vega did not miss it, and in a way found himself agreeing with the idea behind it as Asa got herself back under control. Considering it was a morbid and mature thought for Lily to mention it, as there was a current hell invasion going on. The AI could all too well estimate and imagine what would happen if something 'catastrophic' happened to Lily now, and the Slayer found out. Or, gods forbid he saw something happen.

Vega shifted some priorities around not for the first time but notched Lily's safety up higher in his personal priorities. Thankfully his charge had admitted to him and Riggs, to want to stay inside the safety of the Fortress. If not starting to be scared of being back on Earth.

"Other than physical things, such as the bruising and broken limbs," Asa had her full control of herself, trying to not think of how John, Bi'Jay back then, had reacted to Rai getting thrusted into a shield wall line before he was ready. It was a good thing there were demonic hodes for him.

"Bi'Jay." Lily sounded out the new argenta name thoughtfully, as if it rang a bell so to say.

Distracted in other words still, and Asa was thankful for that.

"Did he have a surname?" Lily wondered, focusing back on the taller woman as she blinked.

Asa thought for a moment, "That's like a clan name? Not that I was aware of. He never mentioned it, when he could talk."

"What did John sound like?" Lily asked suddenly, hazel eyes widening as she was trying to imagine it from what few sounds she knew he made off and on.

Asa smile turned soft, remembering being just about Lily's size but only a little older then Heather seemed to be. Sitting in the lap of an outlander man who seemed to be bigger than life, head resting on his chest as he talked about what he saw on his last trip.

"...he was soft spoken most of the time." Asa said, chuckling as there was the faintest sound of surprise from Vega, and the head tilt from Lily. "Low, or a bass tone and damage before coming to Argent D'nur, yes, but he was never that loud himself. Even when Haco got him drinking with the sentinels then. But most of all, at least what I remembered most, Bi'Jay, John, was kind. it showed in his voice, more so in the still moments."

"I like that." Lily said softly, thinking of the sometimes small, sometimes not so small actions that were at their root, kind that the Slayer did. Awkward as all hell most of the time but still.

"Shall we continue?" Asa asked, Lily looked up and was more than impressed that the bigger woman showed no signs of being bothered with sitting on her knees.

"Yes please." Lily nodded, she did want to learn about this new side of herself. More so that she was finding the wraith gifts were not some mystical thing, not exactly. Just new.

Lily just always felt colder than normal after using it in these practice settings. Not that she was doing a whole lot, Asa was happy to take this seemingly slow but very steady pace of learning by hands on. Yet there was something that niggled in the back of Lily's mind. Like a problem on the Platform you had to walk away from and focus on anything else but it, until it popped up.

Lily was allowed to escape after an hour, sent to go warm up. The young woman considered something, standing in the big hall as Asa had been asked to help one of the shyly nervous teens. Instead of going where that wonderful hot tub was… Lily turned and carefully navigated herself not to John's room was, but the first place he let her in.

She was still aloud in the odd room that was a mix of work area and man cave. Lily paused at the closed door, looking around for a camera, "Vega? Can I go in?"

"Of course, are you wanting another book?" Vega opened the door for Lily, having been watching her like all the others on the Fortress.

"Yeah, but I wanted to check something too." Lily did come over and sit at the bottom of the bookshelf, reaching for the now familiar books she had been using to help her learn about the Argenta technology before the Sentinels woke up. She was cold now, tucking her legs closer to her core as much to stall to be warm, as Lily used her knees to rest the book with back. Skimming through it, pausing at seemingly random spots.

That niggling, half form thought finally started to form as Lily sat up. Pulling each book out and skimming to find a seemingly random spot that was left open on the floor.

Lily paused as she realized she was holding a seventh book. There had only been six before that were clearly handwritten. There were two new books, clearly newer, blank books found on earth and just a little bit bigger than the others but with similar colors of red or rusty browns.

Opening the two new books showed the same neat, if not really small, hand writing. Same style of the drawings between all of the books.

John wrote the books.

How did he have time to fill out another two books?

Lily did not even recognize where he could have gotten them, at least not from the supplies she knew of. She ran her fingers over the neat letters, and then picked up what seemed like the oldest of the books. Her thumb brushed over the first signed page in that book, at least fifteen pages deep. "Bj. Bi'Jay?"

She tried to imagine the giant man with any name that would fit those initials. Lily faintly shook her head, only really coming up with the outline of her dad. She shifted, careful of the books as the young woman stacked them neatly and set her back to the bookshelf to start reading one of the new books.

Lily lifted a hand to tap her thumb against her forehead with her fingers spread. Signing the only other name she could think of for John.

She hugged the new books and admitted with a guilty tone, "Vega? Can you call someone to help me? I'm really cold."

"Rai is coming to help." Vega said after a moment, a flash of amusement running through his system as he noticed the flush from Lily at the mention of who was coming.


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XFireStoneX: Balter needs a good drink, if it would work on him, and after Meeka is asleep so not to pick up bad habbits. [I think he would if he could but even he can find them all]