Almost as if on cue, Dalila sprang back up to her feet, looking around herself before squealing at the amount of papers on the floor. “I’ll clean these up!”
To which Richard laughed, letting out his stress and worry with it. He’d been worried that all of this would change things. That he would suddenly be unable to live the life he had, but this... Well, it was a little more chaotic, but it was what he’d come to expect from them. Concern, care, and comedy.
All while Akira, who had succeeded in finding her knife, continued to smack her head against the window across the hall, or ‘getting air’ as Keran had put it, and muttering, “Damnit,” over and over to herself.
Epilogue
Richard sighed as he stood in his backyard. Or, what used to be his backyard. He’d wanted to come home before he went back to Alice, the opulent apartment, and… everything. Just a moment to get away from it all. To be able to try to forget, even if for just a moment .
He slowly shut his eyes as he took a deep breath in, before he heard the sound of grass being crushed underfoot. He knew who it was of course, as she was one of the only four people he’d told about the trip, so he didn’t bother turning around. Not while he was content like this. “Good evening, Cierra.”
The blue haired girl stepped to his side, smiling at him out of the corner of his eye. She looked lovely in the fading sunlight, just as she always had. In fact, anytime he thought about Cierra nowadays he felt bad for never really telling her any of his thoughts. He didn’t want to be more than friends with her of course, but she should have known he thought she was at least beautiful.
Cierra stopped as she leaned gently against him, their shoulders touching as they watched the horizon. “Last train back to Grand Noiga leaves in a little over an hour. Will it have you on it?”
Richard swallowed hard before he let out a soft sigh. “Yeah. It makes it easier to get to school, even if I didn’t have to worry about what Alice might think if I stayed away right now. Sorry.”
She shook her head, having read the texts that they’d shared on his train ride over. “No, I understand. She needs you right now, and besides, I don’t want you staying here. Not after all that’s already happened.”
Richard shut his eyes to that. “I sometimes wish it didn’t. That I could ever just relax. That I could not worry about anything like the days before now. Back before this… year.”
Cierra gently grabbed his hand, squeezing it so that he knew she was there. “Do you really? I know I’ve always joked about how much you wish you could be a hermit, but I know you better than that. How you are when helping a new student, training with Karen, all of that stuff that’s changed in your life. Would you really want that gone? ”
A soft breeze ran through the backyard as Cierra finished, and Richard didn’t really have a response. To say no would deny the pictures he’d drawn over the past few months, him and Prim, him and Alice, and even meeting Akira. He would be back to just quietly, subtly drawing people and studying.
He would have one other thing though, he thought as he squeezed his friend’s hand. “I’m sorry I’ve been gone so much. That I haven’t been able to hang out after school or any of that stuff. Even before this ID, I became a bad friend in that way.”
He winced as she punched his arm. He knew it was a playful though, and… When he turned to face her, she was scowling at him, as if he’d actually done something wrong. “What?”
She stepped forward, her hands on her hips. “Each day I get to watch the one guy in our town who I knew shouldn’t be here, who should be doing more, do just that. I got to watch my best friend seek opportunities that neither of us had thought possible.”
Cierra reached forward, grabbing his shirt. “Even this is more than we thought was possible. You and I were always just supposed to be bystanders. I would go on to some customer service job after cheerleading, and you would be a form of accountant or something, but now you might be a real government official, and the art shows at school might make you a professional painter.”
“So,” she said as a set of tears came down her cheeks, “don’t think you’re a bad friend because we don’t see each other much. Not when I couldn’t be happier for you.”
Richard smiled a little at the words, before he helped brush Cierra’s tears away. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt you.”
She shook her head and looked down. “Richard, you could never hurt me. You should know that. ”
And with that, Richard finally let himself just enjoy his new thoughts. He didn’t put a hand on her shoulder, or say something kind hearted, but instead stayed silent as his arms wrapped around his best friend.
So much had changed, but she was right. They were going to the better, and he was ready to see where the ID may take him, and what people might expect of him because of it.
Which was exactly what the sister that was watching him from a tree in the next yard hoped for, because in two more days, he’d have passed the first week, and he couldn’t imagine how many eyes were on him for that day to pass.
End of Volume 1
Please stay tuned after the artist credits and my thanks for a teaser for another one of my books.
My Thanks
My name is Michael Hudson, and I would like to thank you for having purchased and read my novella. I sincerely hope you enjoyed it, and will let everyone know of your enjoyment, but if you didn’t, I would be just as happy to hear whatever criticisms you have of my work so that next time I may make it better.
I will be continuing to work on this series, while also working on others. A sampling of these ideas range from the story of a lesbian pair of adventurers who face relationship and fantasy problems, a dystopian future where a boy, barely eighteen, has to deal with far more power than one should probably ever have, especially sexually, and a half dozen sci-fi ideas, all of which I need to spear down so I can work on just one .
If you’d like to support me outside of buying and reviewing my book, you can follow me on twitter @mdhwrites, or support my patreon. https://www.patreon.com/mdhwrites
Artist Acknowledgements/Thanks
Demonchester: http://demonchester.deviantart.com/
A great artist who specializes in more anime styles, his renditions of Cierra, Richard, and Alice are fitting with the feel of the story, to me, and most of the pictures were taken straight from the book, such as when Cierra and Richard are together in his room, and when Alice is first seen in the book. They’re great pieces, and I hope you check them out.
Steve Casey: http://steve-casey.deviantart.com/
He’s a good friend of mine, specializing in sexy, certified thick women and a sketch, hand drawn style, he also can do good work on covers like the one he did for this one, and I hope you all get to check a more natural style of his through the link provided.
Sneak Peak
Sarafune Monster Preserve
Vol. 1
The Intervie w
In, out. In, and out. One, two, three, four, five, pause, one, two, three.
The boy in the car that had pulled into the reserve a few minutes ago continued to do this, along with other, simple exercises to calm himself. His name was Charles, and to call him nervous would be an understatement. In short, the poor, black haired, skinny, white guy had anxiety issues. Sure, he'd learned to control them, but they were always there and ready to derail his thoughts at a moment's notice.
To make matters worse, this was the sort of thing that his mind lived for to bring him into a spiral. It had started a few months ago when he graduated from college with a degree in psychology, hoping to put it to use so that he could help others who suffered from anxiety like himself. As most would tell you though, a psychology degree doesn't always get you very far, so he hadn't been able to put it to use, or even really find a half decent job. So, when a position at a research, habilitation reserve on the elusive monsters of the world came up and was emailed to him, he had immediately applied.
He hadn't quite expecte
d to get the position though. Sure, his immediate reaction had been one of delight, as this was the largest reserve on the planet and he had been fascinated by the creatures since he was young. To actually work with them was a different matter, especially since he had expected not to actually be qualified. He had assumed someone needed and he assumed someone needed to know self-defense skills, experience teaching before now, and half a dozen other little things he didn’t have that they simply had failed to mention in the job listing.
But, Charles had applied and been accepted, so-
"Hello. "
"Ah!" The poor boy jumped in his seat from the raspy voice that was outside of the car. Looking over, he noticed a man who looked like he was probably eighty or ninety years old, hunched over and breathing hard.
"I'm guessing you're Charles?" The old man gave him a small smile, before stepping away from the car. "I understand your hesitation, but you have nothing to worry about. I'm pretty bad about giving too many chances, otherwise I'd never have been able to drink with a minotaur. So come on in. I haven’t rejected an applicant yet."
Charles swallowed hard while the old man laughed. He'd never seen a minotaur, a real one that is, even in the news. Then again, these preserves had only started about thirty years ago, and only the most intelligent monsters had left graduated from their respective Habilitation Programs. The best and brightest, and of those characteristics, most minotaurs lacked at least one of them.
The boy stepped out of his car, and the old man stopped laughing as Charles stood up straight. While the nervous boy couldn't tell it from how the old man looked upon him, he was being analyzed. He wasn't too tall, thin on the arms and legs, though that could mean he’s deceptively strong...
The old man nodded, before gesturing for Charles to follow him. "Come, we'll talk inside, and you can address me as Mr. Sarafune."
For a moment, there was silence, before Charles ran to catch up, words already streaming from his mouth. "Wait, does that mean you're the founder of this preserve? I thought it was simply named after your work in the courts to stop the eradication of monsters after they were rediscovered. Didn't they need more legal..."
For a moment, Sarafune just stared him down, one eyebrow raised, before a faint touch of a smile got to the corner of his mouth. "I thought I was supposed to ask the questions, not you. "
Charles looked down, shuffling his feet a bit before nodding. It's not like he was wrong, but his mind raced with what this could mean. Was this why Sarafune was the largest preserve? Why hadn't the preserve's website said anything about him? Was this part of why you didn't hear much about these places in general?
He could have gone on for another hour in his own head if they didn't reach the one house that appeared to be on the preserve in only a few minutes. Instead, Charles remembered with the sharp sounds of hard heels on wooden boards that he was in fact here for a job. A job that would have him living here if he got it.
The house itself was rather large, almost more a mansion than a house, which made sense. In here would be all the personnel who ran the facility. The gardeners, cooks, everyone. At least, so he assumed. It was surprisingly cozy despite that, looking like a house you might find in a normal town, only with a third floor to it and about three garages behind it. All rounded out with a white paint job and black trim.
Sarafune looked back at the boy, smiling as he saw him pause on the front porch. A knock on a small, wooden set of drawers next to the entrance got his attention back, which was good. "So, can you tell me what you know about monsters?"
Charles clicked his tongue as he stepped in, closing the door behind him silently. "Well, to begin with, back in medieval times, many of the stories they made weren't as much stories, but exaggerations. Accounts made to make the killing of humanoid beings with large changes to physiology okay."
"These accounts were used for the wholesale slaughter of many monsters over the decades, especially by rich families who started to bear the honor of slaying them with great pride. We can only assume that the grander tales like King Arthur’s were records of some of the largest households that did this. The practice died of though with the Explorer’s Age, when they seemingly went extinct
"Over the next hundreds of years, the stories..." Charles blinked a few times, first noticing how Mr. Sarafune had an eyebrow raised, and then realizing that he'd blindly followed the man to a small study with a large, wooden desk. Papers littered the table top, along with books covering every inch of the walls which made up any visual flair the small place had. The only other furniture in the room were two chairs, one behind the aforementioned desk, and one before it. "Um, should I sit, sir?"
A small snort of laughter escaped the old man as he went to behind the desk. "Yes, and you should tell me what you know about monsters, not their history, as I might know a little of that."
Charles blushed as he took his seat. Of course Sarafune knew the history, as he'd been not only their lawyer, but their representative in Congress, before then going to the United Nations and making his cases there. If not for him, it was questionable if they'd be considered 'people' by today, or if the debates would still be going on.
But that left a hard question for him. "Sir, what exactly do you mean?"
Sarafune nodded and leaned back. "Well, what do you know of the people classified underneath the race known as mon-"
Charles cocked his head as Sarafune stopped talking, seemingly stunned for a moment. His gaze was directed at something behind him, and it only now occurred to the boy that the door had creaked a moment ago. Why would the man be shocked by an employee walking in though ?
Turning around, Charles might have realized that it wasn't an employee who had come in. He might have thought that Sarafune was worried about them being roasted alive, or slashed in twine. At the very least he might have registered more than the gender and species of the being in the doorway.
That is, if said being was wearing a single shred of cloth.
* * *
[1] Welp, need to remember this for the first chapter of the next volume .
Inspiration ID 1 Page 10