That night, Xena, Dewie, and Lexie had a sleepover, eating pizza and talking just like the old times. Mostly Xena talked, telling them all about her adventures on the Fae Planet. Dewie also pitched in about his classes, his extra classes, and all the stories Jace had told him about his upbringing. Lexie was silent but attentive, smiling at all the right places, but mostly she was desperately using her friends to drive off all the other things she was trying to avoid thinking about. She still hadn't checked her inbox.

She would do it eventually, just not now.

They all dozed off sometime during the middle of the night, only to be awoken by Emma, who stormed into the room, crying, cuddling Xena, and scolding her for not telling her before she left.

Xena and Dewie went back to school later that morning. Dewie was a little concerned since he knew he would get in trouble for not returning on time, but Xena assured him she would get him out of trouble using her Lightlark privilege. Lexie saw them off at the train station and walked back with Emma, who was happy to see her daughter and was blissfully unaware of anything that had happened with Lexie.

Their paths diverged when Emma had to go to the hospital and Lexie went back home. On the way there, she finally opened her messages, seeing a bunch from Dewie, about five from Conrad, and a few each from Cara, Tate, and Boris. They were all messages asking how she was, and Boris' specifically said, Holy shit. Did that really happen? I watched it but couldn't believe my eyes.

She texted everyone back, saying she was fine and she was sorry. She sent a long apology to Conrad for everything, just in case he got in trouble because of her. Then she put her SI back on DND before they could respond, not ready to deal with it yet.

She just wanted to enjoy nature and peace today, though she knew it would eventually be ruined.

Uncle Max was at her home when Lexie got there, wearing his favorite leather boots, his lucky ripped vest, and his trusty backpack strapped on. He was sitting and having a coffee at the table while Aiden baked.

He grinned when she walked in. "There's my little killer."

Lexie flinched, and Aiden turned to frown at him. Max smiled unrepentantly. "What? Too soon?"

Lexie nodded, but she went over to sit beside him anyway. "Where are you going?"

"First dungeon of the season. It's in Piorta, District 7. We're going in for probably a few weeks or less."

"Now?"

He nodded. "Yup."

"Oh." She didn't know what to say, but she was very anxious, probably because of everything that she'd found out about dungeons. She debated whether or not to tell Uncle Max about dungeons being Eldritch dreams, then decided that if it were a good idea, Aiden probably would have told him already. "Be careful."

"I always am. I just came to say goodbye and to give you this." He handed her a key.

"What's it for?"

"For the guestroom, in case you fight with your Dad again. Also, I fixed that creaky drawer in your room, you've been telling me about."

"What creak–" He winked, and she suddenly got it. "Oh, right. That creaky drawer."

"Yeah," he smiled. "Anyway, your dad told me about everything that happened yesterday. Bane sent me the video too. Don't worry about the investigators. I've been investigated a bunch of times myself, and nothing bad happened." He gave her a meaningful look. "But if they give you too much of a hard time, just call Luke. I left something with him that can make your problems go away."

Lexie wondered what he was talking about. Another gun?

"Thanks, Uncle Max," she said. And then, on instinct, feeling nostalgic, she leaned and hugged him. He patted her head in a very Uncle Max fashion, and she let go when he began to get uncomfortable.

After he was gone, Lexie went up to her room and discovered that in her 'creaky' drawer–also unlocked with the key Max gave her–was her pink lighter gun.

She smiled when she saw it. "Thank you, Uncle Max."

After hiding the gun, Lexie went back downstairs to spend some time with her dad as he baked. She asked him about the ISTS 'Welcome Manual' screen, explaining that it had shown up when she woke up from her coma last year. That and the phone.

Aiden frowned in thought, and he kept that expression throughout her explanation. She couldn't share that screen with him, didn't know how to undo the privacy setting on it, but she explained as well as she could.

Her father shook his head once she was done. "I don't know. That has never happened before to the best of my knowledge."

"You sure? I mean, maybe it did, and I just kept it a secret."

"No," he said. "In the past, you've told me a few things about where you're from, but this 'Welcome Screen' was not even mentioned. Neither was the phone. Come to think of it, you didn't have it then either."

"I didn't?"

"No. I saw it for the first time last year, but just assumed that your mother got it for you at some point."

"Huh." She drummed her fingers on the table. "So maybe there's something different about this awakening?" Lexie asked.

Aiden nodded. "Maybe. I'll look into it."

They did receive a visit later that afternoon after Aiden and Lexie had time to get their story straight. Lexie was supposed to say that Aiden had received the cards as a gift from the Fae ambassador. It was an old gift that he'd forgotten he had lying around, and Lexie found them by coincidence. Lexie would also tell them that she had no idea what the cards did, and simply thought they would be good in a fight. After her screw-up, though, her cards had been confiscated by the ambassador, so she didn't have them anymore.

The investigation would probably end there since no one had died and the Fae Ambassador wasn't really under human jurisdiction. There might be a minor probe after the fact, but Lexie would probably be fine.

If she wasn't fine, Aiden said he had a contingency in place to make sure she wouldn't get in trouble.

Lexie was ready for all the questions they would throw her way, determined to protect her father from suspicion and scrutiny.

But when the knock finally came, it wasn't from who she expected. She thought it would be mundane officers, or [Heroes], or stern-faced King's Knights. Instead, it was the president of the AFC himself, Herbert Douglas.

He was dressed in his trademark white cowboy outfit, down to the boots and the matching hat. He smiled, looking like a jolly grandfather, but there was a greed in his eyes that had Aiden stepping in front of Lexie to completely shield her view.

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"Can I help you?" Aiden's voice was quiet but wholly unwelcoming as he stared at the other man.

"Hope you don't mind," he said with the affable nature of a Texan, pulling off his cowboy hat and holding it in front of him. "But I just wanted to take a few moments of your time to talk to you and your daughter."

"And you are?"

"Mr. Douglas. I'm the president of the AFC."

"I see." Aiden turned to Lexie. "My daughter's not really in the mood to talk to anyone right now, so if you would please…"

"Well..." Douglas sent them an apologetic look. "I mean, I totally understand your hesitation, and I would be the same way if some old fart was trying to talk to my kid. But I figured you'd rather hear from me than from the authorities. I promise it will only take a few minutes, and I'll make it worth your while."

"It's fine," Lexie said as Adien opened his mouth to argue. "Let's just talk to him and get it over with."

"That's the spirit," Douglas winked as Aiden reluctantly stepped aside from the man to enter.

"Hello, Lexie." The man sent her a very white smile. "I hope it's okay for me to call you that. I asked Conrad, and he didn't give me any other names you might prefer."

"Conrad gave you my address?" she asked, hurriedly opening her system messages as the man continued to talk.

"Nah. That stubborn brat categorically refused to give me any information about you, even after I did him that favor yesterday. I'm sure he warned you that I would be coming too."

Yup. One of Conrad's first replies to her apology message had been to tell her that the AFC president had been asking about her and that she might want to leave town if she wanted to avoid him. Conrad ended the message with: He can find you everywhere, though. He doesn't know how to quit. Say no!

Lexie crossed her arms and stared at Douglas. Uninvited, he arranged himself on their couch as Lexie and Aiden shared looks.

"So Lexie Sparrowfoot," he said. "Since I'm on a bit of a time crunch and your father here seems like he's trying to glare at me into the stratosphere, how about I get right to the offer? How would you want to join the circuit officially, backed by the AFC and a handful of VIP sponsors for deals worth a hundred thousand credits?"

Lexie blinked. That was the last thing she had expected him to say. "Are you serious?"

"As a heart attack," he said and chuckled at his own joke, which led to a minor coughing fit. "Sorry. That would have been funnier if you knew that I actually suffered a heart attack two months ago. But enough about me. I am serious about the offer. We can work out all the contract negotiations later, since I'm pretty sure you don't have a lawyer right now, and I don't think you should sign anything without a lawyer. I mean some scumbags might take advantage of that, but not Herbert Douglas. No, sir. I'm a decent Guardian-fearing man."

"Right," Aiden said. "Well, I'll let my daughter speak for herself, but I'm pretty sure she's not interested. Right, Lex?"

Lexie nodded but also needed clarification. "Wait, I don't understand. What I did in that fight…I mean, that was illegal, right?"

He pursed his lips. "Well, we don't know what it was actually. We're hoping you could clear that up, but apart from the spectacle, it doesn't seem to have caused any long-term harm. Ms. Diana Jordan is up and recuperating, and only has the trauma to deal with."

Lexie swallowed. "Sorry."

"It's alright. It's not your fault. If anything, it's ours for not checking through your cards and making sure you didn't have a deck that did...well, that. If you plan on continuing with that deck, we're gonna have to figure out how to take it down a notch. It was our oversight that led to this, but that's only because we never thought card magic could cause anything like this. No one did." His eyes remained on hers. "I think most people pretty much underestimated you. But then I discovered yesterday that you were a level 7 intellect, a downright genius, and suddenly it all made sense."

"Yeah. But I thought you were here to sanction me or bar me from ever fighting again."

His eyes widened in shock. "Of course not. That's too extreme, I wouldn't come all the way here to sanction you. And if we banned every fighter who caused minor or major trauma to another fighter, then we would be out quite a few fighters." He shrugged. "The investigators wanted to make a big deal about it, but I calmed them down once I showed the girl was fine and she wasn't going to sue. She was more embarrassed than anything. Besides, law enforcement has their hands full with all the villains running amok lately, so they were pretty happy when I told them we would handle it in-house. So I took care of all that and got them off your backs."

At that, Douglas gave them a pointed look and seemed to be waiting for something.

When it wasn't coming, he coughed again, intentionally this time. "That wasn't easy, you know. Getting them off your backs."

Lexie raised an eyebrow. Did this man actually have that much power over the authorities? And was he going to hold that over their heads, or was he just angling for some praise?

"Thank you," Lexie said, and he beamed, waving it away.

"Of course, no sweat on my back. I'm happy to help a future star in the making."

Aiden frowned at that, but he seemed interested in a different part of the man's speech. "When you say increased villain activity, do you mean GLITCH?"

"Nah. Haven't you been watching the news?" Douglas said. "Not just GLITCH. They're all getting in on it, and all the lowlives are coming out of the woodwork all of a sudden and giving the Heroes the runaround. It's a jungle out there. The good thing is they're too busy to chase small fry like you."

"I'm nearly average height for my age," Lexie said automatically, which made him smile.

"I didn't mean that literally. I meant that you're unimportant to them right now, but you are very important to me. This deal is fully comprehensive, believe me, and that amount would increase with every year you remain signed to us. We've had a sponsor already express interest in you, and I'm sure more of them will once we get you a proper costume and once you start–"

"Why?" Lexie interrupted. "Why do you want me to join the AFC?"

He relaxed like he was expecting that. "Simple. You're what I've been searching for in the past year. Fresh blood."

"What?

He sighed. "Again, not literal. The truth is, the AFC fights are starting to get a little stale and predictable. Every single fighter is either a brawler, or a weaponist, or a speedster, or a shooter, and no one has seen anything that surprised them in a while. It's also pretty difficult to find worthy, challenging matchups, which means that those fighting, the actual good ones, have to stifle themselves all the time. It's bad for viewership, and truthfully, the numbers are starting to show it." He sighed. "When I first envisioned the AFC, soliciting street fighters to fight in my circuit, everyone told me that it wouldn't work. No one wanted to see normal people fighting, they said. The only Fighters they looked up to were [Heroes]. Fighting was supposed to be something noble, not done for entertainment. No one saw the vision like I did."

He tapped his foot in thought for a few more seconds, then continued, "When the AFC started growing more popular, the same people told me its popularity would be a flash in the pan. For the past year, I was scared that they were right. We've been expanding quickly, but our viewership was stagnating. Nothing had topped the Conrad versus Top Dog match, and with that brat Conrad leaving the circuit, we were scared that nothing would ever come close. But something has."

His eyes glittered. "Have you just checked the numbers on your last fight, Miss?"

Lexie shook her head. She hadn't watched the fight specifically because she hadn't wanted to see it. Every time she thought about it, it felt like she was on the verge of throwing up.

"Let's just say that those are very unprecedented numbers," Mr. Douglas grinned. "Not to mention that you're the talk of the forums. It makes sense given your story, who your father is, and who your mother is rumored to be. You're [Hero] royalty and AFC royalty. Someone everyone is curious about. Add your incredible and versatile card skills to it, and it's clear you're going to be huge. I'm just buying the goose before it lays. Excuse the farm reference. Did I mention I was raised on a farm?"

Lexie sighed. "Thank you for the offer, but I'm not looking to join the AFC, and I'm not using my cards for fighting anymore. That particular deck wasn't meant to be used how I used it, and that was why Diana got hurt. It was my fault. I don't want anyone to get hurt like that again. Plus, I don't have the deck anymore."

He frowned. "I'm sure you can use other cards to–"

"No," Lexie said. "No other card can do that, and even if it could, I don't want to."

Mr Douglas gave her a long look and heaved a heavy sigh. His gaze turned skyward. "All the best ones either don't want to fight or retire early. That's the crux of my problems." He got to his feet with a grunt. "Well, I promised that I would only take up a few minutes of your time, and I did. But know that I'm not giving up on you, miss. Think about it carefully, and just in case you change my mind, I'm giving you my card."

Just then, she got a receipt from him into her inventory. His business card. He nodded at Aiden as he began walking away.

The second the door shut behind him, Aiden turned to her. "Lexie..."

"Don't worry." She gave her dad a comforting look. "I'm don't plan on going back. From now on, I'm done with the AFC."

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