Somewhere in the large, mysterious universe, whatever omnipresent being tasked with watching over Henri sighed to itself and covered its face with its hand.

Henri would find the temperature becoming cooler and cooler, quickly dipping into freezing, in fact, and if he opened his eyes, he would find himself upright, staring down at a fresh corpse; it lay upside down in a pool of slick, black grease with an arm bent awkwardly against its chest, its fingers curled back and disjointed.

The face of the corpse was unrecognizable, it was badly bloated, its features distorted in pain and mutilation, but despite all this, there was a sense of familiarity to it

A cold wind whipped around Henri in a howl as the rain continued to pour and the storm raged against the earth.

"HUh?"

Henri wasn't awake, he put himself to sleep in a nice warm bed in a nice warm house, so hopefully when he woke up he'd still be there. It was cold, his dream must have switched locations.He wish he hadn't cried so much, or have gotten rained on so badly because he could feel his soaked clothes, hair and even the tears on his face begin to freeze.

For a moment he entertained the idea of trying to make the world burn, just to warm the god damned place up a bit.

Clutching his body for warmth, chattering and shivering like a sad, shaved wet cat he carried onward, deciding for now not to try any shenanigans,lest he went ahead and made things worse again. Luckily, things were pretty uneventful until he stumbled across it.

It must have been that thing that was all "thrashing about in it's death throes" as Roland said. Whatever it was it filled the category quite well. Very very dead looking, pained and hauntingly familiar. But who could it be? Nobody could look that much like a whale, only his fa-

"DAD!? D-dad, DAD!!!"

He upchucked a bit when he realized who the figure probably was, and swallowed the bitter mouthful down enough to cry out his name some more.

Holy fuck, it was his dad. All broken and mutilated. That was not how he died, he died peacefully in his sleep with a wheel of cheese and ham lodged into his heart.

"BAWWWHAWWHAWW FUUUUUUUUCK!" Anymore tears at this temperature and Henri would have a facesicle. The sight of his father was too disgusting and traumatizing to look at, so he sobbed with his back turned trying to reason with himself.

Henri this is just a dream. It doesn't matter, he's dead in the real world anyway. Should I wish this away? If it's opposite day I should wish for this to stay here, then it'll go away right? Everything is already here so if it doesn't work the worst that can happen is that shit stays the same.

But he knew it could get worse.

"I-I do NOT want to wake up!" He declared to the sky, the dream and whoever who was listening. Hopefully his opposite day theory was correct.

Why?

A gasping voice slowly escaped from the corpse, its sunken eyes seemed to glow with a small, rekindled flame, and its lips, trailing with blood, smacked in a failed attempt to suck in air.

“Why me? Always me,” the voice begged and pleaded, “I tried, didn’t I? Who is perfect? A man, that’s all. I tried, but what was the point? Here,” the thing shuddered and its fingers uncurled, its legs kicked, and its heart seemed to beat harder and harder, until is erratic drum began to hit against corpse's ribcage. "I end up here? This is my reward," spit and other fluids seeped from in-between its lips, as it tried its best to send an accusatory finger towards Henri, but failing that, it gave up and allowed its hand to fall back to its chest.

“Keh ... hahah ....,” a slow release of air blew from its torn nose. “Henri,” the thing whispered after a moment. “Son,” its voice grew soft, “come closer, boy, I need to tell you ... To warn you.”

Why?

"Huh!?" He looked up to the sky, it seemed that he'd finally gotten through to whatever omnipotent being ran the place, he just didn't expect it and wasn't prepared to actually -answer- him.

"Well becau-" Henri looked all around hoping he might find this God like character, but stopped when he realized there was nobody but him and his dad. His dad who was now very much alive all of a sudden. As alive as he could be anyway.

"DAD!?"

Zip! Henri was back at his father's side, and heck if he wasn't so heavy he'd be holding him in his arms right now, but carefully holding his hand would have to do. "Everything's going to be alright dad, don't, don't say dumb shit."Reassuring a man in this condition was difficult, and sadly for Henri this would be his attempt whether or not he was dreaming. With the newfound possibility of his dad being alive, he hoped he wasn't, but would still try his dream theory physics anyway.

"It's fine, I'll wish for a doctor and a hospital and everything is going to be okay." Surely Mr.Bernard felt safe and secure in his sons hands now, who had no idea how exactly to will things into happening but would keep trying until he got it right.

Come on doctors and hospitals doctors and hospitals doctors and hospitals, doo iiiiit do iiiiit come ooon.

And then, “Keh ... hahah ....Henri.Son, come closer,boy, I need to tell you...To warn you."

"Yes dad?" This brought Henri further onto his knees, leaning closer to his father, still holding his hand eager to listen to what he had to say, doctors and hospitals repeating itself in his head over and over.

As Henri leaned in he would find his dad's hands grasping at his clothes, clinging tightly, and drawing him even closer until a whisper could easily be heard.

“D-don’t you trust them, Henri,” the corpse’s voice trembled and cracked. “Even if they look like it, they aren’t your friends... None of them, do you hear me? They, they’ll eat you alive, do you understand?”

The corpse finished speaking and the rekindled flames of life slowly began to die out once more, the light fading quickly from its eyes, and before long Henri would find himself to be the only living, breathing person left.

It seemed that Henri had deep seeded trust issues he wasn't aware of that needed addressing, that is, if this was a dream and if dreams were your subconscious mind working out issues like he heard about once.

The meaning of all this flew right over his head, since his father had died right in front of him and he didn't know what to do. It all felt very real, and he was just too sad. Because he was alone in his dream, he indulged in a good hard cry while there was nobody around to watch, and that was it.

Sobbing shamelessly, he shivered from the cold, stood up, and just started walking. His cries vibrated in his mouth through his chattering teeth (probably the weirdest cry he'd ever cried) and he shivered the whole time. Holding his arms close to his body didn't help either, he might freeze to death in his own dream.

Now what? His father was dead, that was pretty traumatizing, so upsetting actually that it felt like his dream did it to make a point, to punctuate something. A big fat lardy period at the end of the sentence. The only way it could get worse now was if Roland died too. Hopefully he'd wake up before that happened.

"Come on...wake up, wake up."

With each new step taken, the muddy earth would try just as hard to swallow Henri up, sapping away at his energy, until, in the end, when he felt like he could go no further, he would find himself succumbing to the will of the terrain; it would be a great upheaval, as the ground started to convulse, sweeping up and over Henri, only to come crashing down atop him, pinning him, and sending him to mysterious depths.

It would be in this pitch-black darkness, surrounded by nothing for miles around that Henri would become aware of the overwhelming sense of free-fall, of gravity taking control of his body and sending him plummeting towards the unknown.

After a while, a blinding light would rip through the darkness, following this light would be sounds, pain, and more sounds; it was a return to the real world, Henri would find, but the real world also had real pain: he was laying on his hand, awkwardly, and dangerously close to the edge of his bed....

The earth sucked him up, the landscape collapsed beneath him and he fell into a dark void, screaming and plummetting into nothing. The reaction was completely called for, except that suddenly he wasn't screaming in a dark abyss, after a flash and lots of pain he was alone, screaming in his bed.

Hopefully nobody heard him, but at least now he was finally awake. Thank goodness.

"Geezes fuck. Ow!" Very carefully he rolled on his side and off of his hand,making sure not to fall off the bed. Once he was off it, he stood up in bed, rubbing his palm, trying to bring the sleeping hand back to life. He was awake, but he wouldn't get out of bed just yet, he sat there taking reality back in, getting a grasp of his surroundings, and going over his chores for the day.

He had a lot of things to do. Finally he got his ass out of bed and threw on the same get up he wore in his dream, rushing to get dressed before Roland came knocking on his door. If Roland was wearing the same thing that he wore in his dream, he'd trip balls.

With his sense of reality shaken pretty badly, Henri carried on his day nervously.

Offtopic: Wasn't feelin this one, sorry.

Why did he have to do this? He was neither a babysitter nor a woman; hell, he fought in two wars: he was a veteran--a professional, driven soldier of Sigma! It was bad enough to be stationed in the middle of Nowhere, Mercoras, but this, this was just ridiculous. Just because an undereducated hick could not be trusted to do his job, he had to go and fetch him? It was true that their expedition was a bit undermanned, but this was still insulting. Did they even need guides? In fact, maybe-

“Voici--ahem, ‘ere is where he lives,” a rough common accent interrupted the man’s line of thought. The voice belonged to Roland Dufort, the first of the two guides, who he had met on the way to the second’s home, and thankfully that did save him a bit of time; it did little to calm his mood, however.

“Uh, ‘sec,” Roland said with a wave, jogged up to Henri’s door, knocked in his usual fashion, and then ducked out of sight, gaining a quirked brow and confused expression from the older man.

When he answered the door, expecting to see Roland, Henri would instead see a large, shirtless man from Escona. This man was older than the group of Esconians that Henri had seen at the docks and he was particularly angry looking, too--a scowl (and a tattoo of several horizontal lines) had taken permanent residence upon his face. Out of sight, Roland eagerly awaited a golden reaction from Henri.

There was a knocking on his front door. He could clearly hear it all the way from his room, since only his friend Roland knocked with that much force. One two three four, four knocks! He'd been expecting this all day just, well not this soon.

"Coooming!"

Henri was only half dressed! From inside the house you could hear Henri making a dash towards the door, throwing on his shirt while he ran. When the door opened the man would be greeted by one of the little "helpers" assigned to him, shorter than Roland and definitely, smaller in stature (he was hardly as beefy as his friend) and sloppily put together, buttoning up the same mess of a shirt at the door that he wore yesterday, hair all a mess from tossing and turning in his sleep and the shoes were muddy but, they weren't his. He was "borrowing" them from his brother since he couldn't find his shoe after the party two nights ago.

"Sorry about that Roland I wa-" In the middle of tying his hair back he looked up and realized his friend, was not his friend. Unless he was dreaming again. More likely Roland was off hiding somewhere waiting for his reaction, which was what he wanted. Henri was definitely dumbfounded, but he would try to play it cool.

"Oh hallo Roland! You look uh...good? Ton cheveux...ees uh,

If anyone else pulled this prank he'd have this handled. It didn't translate into common as well though, especially since he hardly spoke any at all. Henri chuckled nervously and offered the giant scary man a sheepish smile, obviously embarrassed.

"UH...un second! ROLAND!? ROOOLAND!?"

The ebony skinned man narrowed his eyes and almost seemed to growl towards Henri; it was perhaps not a good idea to keep this prank going, Roland thought to himself.

"Shri Bernard?" the older man spoke slowly with a deep, gravel-like voice that rumbled from his chest. For the most part, he looked to be a formidable man, to be sure, but he was not outright aggressive; it was rather obvious, to Roland at least, that this was a man who was restraining himself heavily.

Emerging from Henri’s blind spot, Roland started to explain Henri’s poor common to the older man, the conversation lasted maybe five seconds before ending with a snort and shrug from the Esconian.

“Friendly, ain’t he? He’s takin’ us to the meeting spot,” he said, “and you, you didn’t tell me we were supposed to meet ’our boss’ at the Duncan’s, you asshole.”

Henri was greatful to see his friend appear, being alone with this man just did not seem healthy. He might fill the hole with his dead body if Roland waited a second longer.

“Friendly, ain’t he? He’s takin’ us to the meeting spot,” he said, “and you, you didn’t tell me we were supposed to meet ’our boss’ at the Duncan’s, you asshole.”

Or you know, Roland could be the one tossing his corpse into the pit. He'd completely forgotten all about their meeting spot, if his dad hadn't have thrown the job at him last minute on a day like yesterday, he might have remembered but now was no time for excuses. The bottom line was that he forgot. He was too tired hungry and shaken by his dream still (not to mention intimidated by his boss) to care. Roland probably took a lot of flak from the guy. Henri felt bad but hey, shit happens. He just wanted to get this job over with.

"Shit, I completely forgot. Sorry, let's go." Surprisingly he took the full weight of the blame without making any snarky comments on jokes.

"Eh? ... H-uh," Roland was surprised and it showed all over his face. This Henri, this guy he had known for so long, was he actually apologizing and taking blame for something? No, that was just too weird, too wrong.

"A-alright, no harm done," he shook his head, "but we gotta get movin'. This guy," he gestured towards the other man with his hand, “says the boss hates people bein‘ late.”

Under normal circumstances, Roland would not really mind making someone wait, but a man who could break him in half? That was a different story entirely. Plus, he kind of wanted to prove himself to these people; he wanted to say that he was just as good as they were and could pull his own. River’s End didn’t raise no weakling!



The familiar way to the Duncan’s farmstead would go virtually unimpeded. Traveling through River’s End, Roland and Henri would be able to notice that the people, men and women that they knew, were avoiding them, and sometimes outright ignoring any attempt at greeting. Chances were that this was because of the two boy’s extra traveling companion--this would explain why the ‘guides’ were needed. They weren’t here to show the Emperor’s finest a big hole, but to serve as mediators for the town.

Roland sighed.

Disregarding their new stigma, the boys would find their boss and a few other guys at the entrance to the farmstead, standing just before the wooden gate that allowed access to the property. Each man was armed, some more than others, and all of them had a tattoo of some kind.

When Roland and Henri neared, the group of soldiers would notice them and finish the approach. Stopping just short, they and the boy’s traveling partner would exchange words, the language as foreign as ever, but it would end quickly enough, leaving their boss to address them, personally:

“Camp is just outside the safe zone,” in a surprise, he spoke Mercoras’ language as fluently as any native, “have either of you eaten?”

Henri quickly looked up at their boss, a tower pile of steely muscle with an expression just as cold as steel. Someone out there was bigger stronger and had more authority than this man, that man was their bosses boss. Making him wait would be a crap idea. Even Henri knew that.

Responsibility usually eluded Henri and he didn't quite embrace it or understand it, and even avoided it unless it was necessary, but ever since inheriting the lighthouse he learned a thing or two about punctuality. He was an impatient man himself, so naturally if he hated waiting, so would the other person. Fair was fair.

"Ya let's go." A deadpan, compliant Henri responded.

Unlike yesterday they traveled through the crowd with ease, slicing through the masses like a hot knife through butter, everyone stepping aside to make way for the trio. Even people he knew, people he saw at the party weren't looking at him. Their duty became a little more apparent, it was less about filling a hole, and more about mediating. IN his head he imagined the big guy only wanted to make friends and began to feel kind of sorry for him. Looking up at the guy, the scowl easily eased the pity he was feeling. Oh well.

What visibly bothered him most what was he saw when they arrived. Weapons, real honest to goodness weapons. He saw a sword ONCE, and that was decorative at best, they were completely different when they were carried by real soldiers, which is what he assumed they were.

Would they use them if they didn't go a good enough job? What the hell were they for? In any other situation Roland would find him chewing on the bandanna around his neck for comfort, but now he was too nervous. He was here to do a damn good job, and he knew they expected that of him. He could feel them watching, expecting, judging. If Henri were a dog, his tail would be in between his legs.

He could have died of a heart attack when the boss approached them. Surprisingly, he understood everything he said because he spoke Mercoras' language almost as good as he did. It seemed like common sense that at least one of them would speak their language, otherwise neither of them would know what to do, but this also meant their language wasn't a super special secret code only they knew anymore, so he would have to watch his mouth.

Starting now.

Henri's stomach was grumbling, but he didn't dare mention he was hungry. They would think he was weak for being hungry! What if he said yes and they tried to feed him chilled monkey brains or something and he'd have to eat it or else he'd offend them?

"UH..." Henri fiddled with his fingers discreetly, leaving Roland to do all the talking.

"Naw," Roland replied to the man immediately.

He was not one to look a gift horse in the mouth, especially when that gift horse meant food in his stomach; in fact, given the chance, he would probably have eaten an actual horse, gift or not. On second thought, maybe they had actually brought horse with them? Some of the sailors told stories of how tasty it was and Roland had always meant to try it, but horses in River’s End were domestic work animals.

“We usually grab a bite at the docks, but that was opposite of where we were headin’,” he explained with a grin, “and if you’re offerin’, we won’t turn it down.”

Roland and Henri’s boss would gesture for the boys to follow him. The gate to the Duncan’s property was opened and they would be lead inside, the gate closed and locked afterwards, but three of the five men stayed behind, including the older fellow they had arrived with.

“Colonel Dasari,” the man spoke as they walked, “you boys didn’t know my name, right? You can call me Colonel,” he laughed.