Shimmer, Glimmer, & Gleam - A Quest of Loss & Gain

The first order of business is to see to your friends. So you have a word with someone who has a word with someone else, and about twenty, thirty minutes later you get a paper plane right to your EAR, GODS WHY but when you track where it had to have come from there's little Greggie. He's like, seven, honestly that paper plane throw was his best one yet, so you get up and casually follow after at a distance, trying not to look like you're tailing him.

You got a lot better at that, Inside. He keeps stopping to make sure you're there and you keep having to deliberately get his attention. Poor bastard wouldn't last a minute -

No. No no no. That place is done. It got eaten. No more prisons, ever, anywhere.

Eventually, though, you're led through a hole in a fence and into some rusting shipping containers, and specifically into one whose lock only looks locked. You take it off yourself and pocket it, glaring at Greggie the entire time, and he sheepishly leads you inside to where the kids of this nameless new community have gathered around plastic furniture with tealights, their stuffed animals clutched tightly to their laps.

Oh...right...yours is. Probably with Jack...

"I'm not going to waste time," you tell them, lurking near the door so you can bolt whenever you need to. Your new wings light the place up like a campfire. "We're all gonna take some new lessons for a few days, get into shape, and then we go back to helping Andrea and them. Okay?"

A hand goes up. Josie. You ignore her: "Great! And hey, don't worry, there's gonna be crossbows." You try a smile. It seems to succeed?

"Really?" Greggie breathes, eyes wide.

"So many crossbows," you promise.

* * * *

So you didn't lie exactly. That part's important. You did not lie to your friends who trust you. You just omitted some details. Like the morning runs and the obstacle courses and the survival lessons. The signs of rebellion begin pretty early and you stave them off by forcing smiles you don't feel in your heart and with flagrant bribes of candy and other treats. Well. 'Bribes'. When you told the doctors what you were up to they gave you expanded rations for training the kids with, but they don't need to know that.

You try to check your conscience to see if you would have done this kind of thing before you went Inside and discover, unpleasantly, that you don't know.

Some part of you was anticipating the breakdown in like, the obstacle course or something, but it's during the campfire cooking lessons that little Missy Misty (age ten and a half) clatters her spoon into a little folding pot and starts sobbing, there out 'back' of the kitchens. Chef Nettleson tries to move over to comfort her but you're already there, reaching a hand -

"No!" she snaps, skittering away on her butt and smacking at your hand. "I-I don't wanna go with you! I wanna stay!"

"...What?" you ask, unable to even be hurt in your sheer confusion. "Missy -"

"Mom and Dad said you did something really really bad, and you have to l-leave, a-and never come back, and n-now you're making us learn all this stuff so you can take us away too and I don't wanna g-go -"

You freeze in place, at least until you notice Nettleson moving out of the corner of your eye; you turn your head just a little, and he nods his head towards Missy before beckoning over one of the line cooks, a woman maybe Sasha's age with tattoos who's been chewing her way through the camp's toothpick supply in an effort to quit smoking. It takes a moment of the two of them having a quiet talk off to the side of your lesson area for you to realize that he's trusting you to handle this.

Oh. Wow. Thanks Chef, that's...it's honestly a little touching.

"Missy," you murmur gently, and she just cries harder. "Missy, c'mon, listen to me -" nope, volume up. Is it because you've changed? The last time you were around everyone feels like years ago, because it was, but...oh, gods, you did change, you've been treating them like the fucking adults do, all soft voices and shit instead of the leader they knew and loved as kinda a 'big old b-word'. No wonder they're anxious. You do your best to clear your throat under your breath and then you put on your mean voice: "Shut up!"

That startles her out of it, but now all eyes are on you. You scoot around the fire and ruffle Missy's hair a little dismissively, and you flash her a wan grin. "I'm not gonna take you away, dummy," you tell her. "And even if I wanted to, which I don't 'cause I've got sick-ass wings now and y'all don't so you'd just slow me down, I can't. I gotta do it by myself."

Somewhere in the chorus of objections and the kids protesting that the wings aren't that cool and how dare you, you pick out someone asking if you really can't come back. And you tell them you're going to come back.

(Off in your peripheral vision the tattooed line cook, her girlfriend, and an older teen barely taller than Orchid leave the kitchen. Many hours later you will hear people talking about how Missy's parents tripped and fell down a set of steps in a warehouse and into a rack of spare boots, which would certainly explain the unusual bruising that must have No Other Source. Mysteriously, they apologize to you shortly after that.)

You kinda clear your throat. "I just...you all trust me to take care of you. And I gotta be gone for awhile. So I want you to be able to take care of yourselves a bit, when I'm gone."

"The grownups will be here," little Greggie says, and you flash him a sad smile.

"...I had grownups with me," you say. "And they did everything they could. They really did. The grownups are good people but sometimes bad stuff happens. I'm not saying no grownups, okay? Just...it'll be easier for them to help you if you can help yourself a little. Okay?" You wipe away at something hot coming out of your eyes, damnit -

Sometime during the resulting group hug the food y'all are cooking would have burnt, but Nettleson has your back there. Later, when the lesson breaks up, you spot him heading off towards Orchid.

* * * *

Okay. The spiders. They often kinda congregate, though many have joined the perimeter patrols and the construction teams. There's some kinda plan to go after that amusement park, but honestly a huge chunk of the docks will need development, and those webs are very good for the gardens too. So you roll up on this one with red hair your stupid sister has been thirsting after, whose spider body has these graduation caps and diplomas and beakers depicted on it, and you clear your throat to get her attention, but your hands on your hips -

- Wait fuck there's a missing bit of information here -

- Power through, be scary! "What's your name?" you demand, with only a little squeak in your voice.

She takes her hat off and shakes out her long hair and you're not gonna have feelings about that this is scary talk time, and raises an eyebrow with an amused smile. "I'm going by Garnet," she says in that gorgeous voice and UGH. "And you are dear Sasha's brave little sister. It's nice to meet you."

URGH!

SHE'S NICE TOO! WHY DOES SHE HAVE TO BE NICE?

Choose 1
[ ] Power through, you gotta act tough
[ ] ...You know...you're more like them now. Something changed...

AND

Running out of time...(Pick 2)
[ ] Asset Protection
[ ] Clara
[ ] Andrea and the knitting crew
[ ] The gardens