PART III - DAY TRIPPER

In the end, it was Lena that did the actual stabbing. Xin was more than perfectly willing to jab holes into Callie, but her claws made it a little difficult to hold the tiny needle, and it kept slipping out of her grasp. Still, with Xin's new Suppress Pain skill, a timely pulse from her Totem, and a little application of slow healing, Lena was able to quickly poke two clean holes into Callie's ears. Shaman magic managed to get things fixed right back up. There wasn't even a worry about something so silly as infection. Sure, it wasn't as quick and easy as going to a professional piercer, or even to the mall, like getting pierced back on Earth, but it was this world's next best thing.

After cleaning up the few specks of blood and assuring that the new earrings would work, the three of them got dressed in the fresh clothes. Once on, there were some noticeable differences from the style they were used to. They were still very similar to the everyday clothing they all wore, but changes in cut were apparent, as were decorative stitch-lines, and both gave everything much more of a uniform feeling. Callie and Lena complimented each other on how sharp they both looked, as well as Xin, although the Lizardkin did spend the requisite several minutes in general whining about having to wear clothes and boots.

Before leaving Ogre House, the basket containing the dress and the rest of the outfit was put under Lena's bed, on the off chance Pixyl came by. Callie's plan was that somewhere between the end of dinner and the start of the dance, she would try to slip away so she could change and then come back to surprise Pixyl. If needed, Lena said she'd get Vanis or someone to cause enough of a distraction to allow the opportunity.

As the three began the trek towards the training field, they were joined en route by Ambria and Koka, who were still busy making flirty googly eyes at each other. Callie couldn't help but chuckle a bit at the antics. The Faun was definitely in a happy mood, though, smiling, laughing and even doing a cartwheel for no particular reason. It was even pretty good, although not anywhere near Lena's Acrobatics level. Koka, for her part, laughed at the silliness while also gushing again about how jealous she was of Lena's new Wings of Glory skill. The Tigerkin hadn't yet reached Silver, but hoped to after the next training day, if not the one after, currently having a score of BRONZE.961, which was identical to the score her brother had.

"It's harder for me to get my new tier," Ambria groused, putting her lower lip out in an exaggerated pouting fashion. "All I do all the time is heal, heal, heal. So while I do get really good with my skills, it's a lot of the same things over and over and over and over again, and not much creativity. As a result, we tend to rank up slower, and I probably won't get Silver until late in the week." Then the pouting look instantly went away, the big, happy grin back on her face.

"Ahh, I suppose that could slow things down," Callie agreed. "Still, even with the two combat missions, you're that far behind us?"

Ambria idly spun a couple times for no reason in general glee, arms wide as if flying, before hooking arms with Koka as they talked and walked. "They helped, I'm way ahead of the other Combat Healer. They won't make it until the next week for sure." She shrugged. "It's just the way it is. The Warlocks have the same problem, because they spend so much time simply summoning Demons over and over and over and over and over again for other people to train against." She giggled, oddly repeating the word 'over' with wide eyes.

Before long, the heavy-booted patter of Nola quickly approached, the Lizardkin also seeming a little excited and bouncy as she sidled up to Xin. Like Ambria had with Koka, she hooked her arms with the Shaman, although with far less enthusiasm, before mentioning how much she was looking forward to dancing together later in the evening. Like everyone else, Nola was wearing the pseudo-uniform clothing, but over the top of that she wore the intricately detailed figure-eight styled mating shawl.

"I know I shouldn't be wearing clothes under this," Nola said to Xin with a bit of an apology, "but I thought it would be polite to wear something for the dinner. Don't worry, you'll get all my clothes off later."

At that, Ambria broke down into howls of laughter, eventually needing to stumble to a tree to catch her breath and keep from falling. Her laughter was so awkwardly uproarious that Callie wondered if she wasn't possibly high on something fun. Her behavior seemed a little familiar in that respect. and it would certainly explain Ambria's demeanor, and the spinning and cartwheels, too. For her part, poor Xin seemed absolutely mortified by Nola's comment and her subsequent teasing grin, and pleaded with a 'save me' look towards both Callie and Lena.

Nola wasn't really part of Callie's immediate friend group at the camp. Instead, the young Bladeweaver generally hung out with a few of the other under-twenty crowd that tended to consider people closer to Callie's age and up as old and boring. As a result, Callie wasn't completely sure if this less-grumpy attitude was typical behavior just for Nola, or if also for other Lizardkin, only having Xin's deadpan demeanor as a comparison. It was certainly quite the contrast though, and made it critical to find a way to give her cabinmate a little bit of grief.

"Nola, Xin mentioned something about a moonlit walk later?" Callie said mischievously.

"Oh yes! It will be wonderful. A walk in the woods under the moon would just be perfect."

"Maybe we will be attacked by something," Xin growled under her breath at the reminder. "Perhaps we'll be lucky enough to be eaten."

"Oh I'm not worried," Nola beamed. "I'm sure that between the two of us we'd be able to fend off anything." She held up her fist, a glowing, green blade of energy appearing. "I'd just need to take my band off. I'll have almost everything else off by then."

Xin groaned, putting her hand to her scaled face and shaking her head, trying to ignore everyone and stay above the innuendo.

"And when you get back from your walk, you can snuggle and count the stars," Lena eagerly added, trying to hold in a snort. "There's nothing like a good snuggle, right Xin?"

Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more.

"Oh yes, snuggles are great!" Nola agreed brightly.

Xin stopped, the spines on the back of her head rising just a little in growing annoyance as she glared at Lena for bringing that topic up. She sharply held up a single clawed finger. "She is allowed to have exactly one snuggle, and one snuggle only!"

Upon arriving at the huge, temporary dining tent, the group found a bit of a line. Camp personnel, recruits, and visitors were all queued up waiting to be seated by one of several escorts. Rather than join the line right away, Callie and the others stood off to the side so they could people watch, while waiting for it to thin a bit.

Callie and the other recruits felt quite underdressed compared to many others, despite the somewhat-fancier clothes they'd received. Visitors, in particular, were all dressed in various finery, as were many of the staff. Most ladies were in simple, loose and light-weight dresses of at least knee length, pretty necklaces and earrings, and many also had poofs of scrunched-up brightly-colored netting in their hair, secured with jeweled pins, at least for those that had enough hair on their head. Most of the Beastkin had to go without. That explained the poof of netting that had come with Callie's outfit. For the civilian guys, Callie wouldn't call them suits, but their outfits were sharply cut and well fitting, and apparently very-short capes were in fashion for the moment, with several visitors sporting them. Most were a dark fabric with brighter designs or symbols on them, hanging to just about the middle of their back, and several wearers were complaining about how they got in the way and were utterly impractical despite looking quite stylish.

For the soldiers not otherwise on duty and able to attend, they were in actual uniform, and being a formal affair, many also were adorned in any medals they had been awarded, either at their neck or pinned to their chest. Uniform colors were either greens or blues depending on their roles, with the greens for those with a combat background, while blues were for support and logistics personnel. When several uniformed soldiers reached the front of the line, they were pulled out and pointed off somewhere. Among them, Callie spotted Maugra and Rowani, both decked out in uniforms of green. Both also wore what looked like a Bronze Sword, like Pixyl's, around their necks. Each shoulder of the pair sported red fabric with two black stripes, indicating they were officers and their rank of captain.

"I wonder if we'll get uniforms when we leave?" Callie thought out loud.

"I asked the Major about that when she was complaining about having to wear her's," Lena said. "Conscripts don't get a uniform unless they are at least the rank of corporal or have earned a medal that would otherwise be displayed with one. I suspect that someone important doesn't think it's worth the effort for front-line soldiers that might not live long." She gestured down to her clothes. "It appears this will be the best we get."

"Aww, bummer," Callie said. "Well, I was a corporal, even though it was only for, like, twelve minutes. I wonder if that would count."

"Doubt it," Ambria said in a singsong voice. "You were de-mote-ed!" She sounded out each syllable slowly and with additional singing. Her eyes were closed as she twirled, arms out and face drinking in the sun. "De-mote-ed," she sang out again.

"Girl, what are you on?" Callie asked, laughing, now absolutely sure Ambria was high on something, acting much like Callie had seen back during college at some of the more intense clubs. Ecstasy, maybe? Or whatever this world's equivalent was? She was definitely in an overly-good mood, though. Randomly, Callie had a sudden vision of Ambria attending Burning Man, and realized her free spirit bohemian attitude would probably be perfectly at home there.

"Me? Oh, Lhawni snuck us some Shaman dreamers. I probably should have waited until later." She hooked her arm with Koka again and looked around with wide eyes, "But right now, the colors are so wonderfully loud and smell so good, and I wouldn't hear them all in the dark!"

"Is she going to be okay?" Callie whispered to Lena.

"Eh," Lena said, waving the worry away. "She'll be fine. They don't last very long, maybe a few hours, depending on how strong they were. Still, she should have at least waited until after dinner."

Ambria shook her head violently in response, pointing at the sky with both arms, as if to defend her actions, the wide, colorful expanse explaining everything.

"Koka, you know how to take care of her, right?"

"I've got it," Koka said quietly, awkwardly patting the grinning Faun on her head as if she were a happy puppy. From the grin, that wasn't far off, actually. "I'll make sure she doesn't get hurt."

"Dreamers, huh?" Callie said. "So were you going to share with the rest of us?"

"May-beeeee," Ambria sang back, before promptly doing another cartwheel, landing upright and throwing her arms out to the sky, face smiling in a happy moan. "Blue!"

Koka cleared her throat and held up a sickly-looking grayish-green potion. "Remember your promise?"

"But they taste yucky," Ambria whined as she pouted, "and make my nose drip."

"Nonetheless, once the dinner starts," Koka said, scolding a bit. "That's what you promised."

"Fine…" replied the resigned scowl.

"Up until now, I believed the Little One to be the strangest in the camp," Xin said flatly. "I am now forced to reconsider this." After shooting Calllie a glare, she added, "It is, however, still a difficult decision."

While Koka made a half-hearted effort to keep Ambria grounded, the group was soon joined by Moka. He was quite confused as the Faun took his hands, skipping in a circle around him while chanting out what sounded like a random nursery rhyme about a polka-dotted dragon.

"The dreamers?" Moka asked his sister.

"Yes. She promised to drink a detox …"

"... when dinner starts." he sighed, finishing the sentence for his sister. "I thought you were going to wait?"

For her part, the healer immediately stopped her skipping and glared at Moka. "Shhh! I'm listening to all the colors! They taste like candy!" She then gestured widely to indicate the entire world, as if to make her point. "Stop being such a drimling!"

Callie, deciding to have a little fun, stepped away from the group and plucked a little yellow flower. Essentially it was this world's version of a dandelion, and a quite common weed. She walked back and offered it to her friend. "What's this one saying?"

Ambria gasped, squealed while doing a little happy-dance, and took the flower. She inhaled deep, taking in the scent, and then held it up to Lena to force the Elf to take a good sniff, too. "It says 'I am a very pretty flower and I should be in your hair'. Who am I to argue with flowers?" With that, Ambria tucked the weed behind her ear, where it contrasted sharply with the deep-red hair and face full of freckles. "There, now it can sing to me all night long." Before she could react, Ambria leaned down and pulled Callie into the biggest of hugs, before planting a hard kiss on her forehead. "Your pink smells so good!" she added excitedly as she finally let go.

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.