5 - Ashley! Ashley! Ashley!

“What the actual fuck?” I asked Mara. We were huddled up in the livingroom while the others were chatting in the kitchen.

“What are you complaining about? Everyone knows that adventuring with a party is better than trying to go solo.”

“Ok, but two people counts as not going solo. What was wrong with that plan?” I asked exasperatedly.

Mara rubbed the back of her neck. “Well, after you left John called telling me about his and Oliver’s skills. He was like, ‘let’s go hunt monsters!’ And I was like, ‘Yeah!’ and then he suggested calling Ashley and inviting her so it’s an all queer party. So, I told him about you already planning on going with me…and we both decided Ashley was a must. It’s for your own good.” She tried to hide her smirk. She thought she was so smart.

“Oh my–” I growled, “Are you still on about thinking I like her or something? Cause I don’t. She’s too annoyingly chipper. You know I’m too realistic–”

“Pessimistic,” Mara interrupted.

“Tomayto, tomahto. Either way, I don’t like her. I mean, is she nice to look at? Of course. I have eyes. But we would never get along. So quit pushing this crazy ass idea,” I fumed.

“Me think the lady–”

“Don’t!” I held up a finger in warning.

She put up her hands in surrender, “Fine. Fine. Have it your way. You don’t like her. But she’s already here and we’re all ready to go hunt monsters and portals.” She busted out her puppy dog eyes, “Pwease.”

“You know that’s not fair,” I complained. “Why are you immune to my puppy eyes, but yours are super effective?”

“Empathy. You have a lot more of it than you’d like to admit.”

“Gross. How do I turn it off?”

Mara just laughed. Stupid best friend. Stupid feelings. Stupid quest. “Fiiiiiiiiiine,” I drawled out. A popup appeared in front of me.

[Would you like to join user [Mara’s] party?]

I focused on accepting the request and felt a connection establish itself between me and Mara. I got a vague mental sense of where she was in relation to me, and a vague understanding of her status. I also got a new notification.

[Newcomer Questline: Kill 10 monsters has been updated. Being in a party spreads out the distribution of kills.]

[Updated Newcomer Questline: As a party kill 25 monsters.]

“Oh, wow. Girl, you need to eat something,” Mara said to me.

I sputtered, “W-what?”

“Yeah, I got some notification of your status when you joined my party, and babe, you need to eat. It’s practically lunch and you haven’t had anything but coffee today.”

“Not true. I had a snack cake when I was packing my bag.” I objected.

“Oh, babe. That’s not healthy. Come on, let me fix something up for all of us and then we’ll head out,” Mara insisted.

“Mara, I mean this in the nicest way. You know you’re a shitty cook. You’ve ruined peanut butter and jelly. I will fix something and then we can go.”

“If you insist…” she immediately acquiesced with a smirk. I knew what she was doing. She knew I would take over the cooking if she threatened to cook herself. Damn that woman for knowing me so well. I’d been had.

Mara couldn’t cook for shit, but she kept her fridge and pantry well stocked for when me or one of her other more culinarily inclined friends came over, which was probably pretty frequently. She was the most social person I knew. So in next to no time I’d whipped us all up an easy early lunch.

While I was cooking, I got a similar sense of connection to each new person that Mara added to the party. I could get a general idea of which direction they were, that they were close, and their general status. Everyone seemed to be ok. Though each time someone was added I could feel the added eyes on me and hear the whispered conversation Mara had with them about me. Apparently they could all feel me not taking care of myself. I wanted to die from shame. I swear I’m an adult.

When we sat down around the table in Mara’s kitchen, the only spot left for me to sit was next to Ashley. Because of course it was. I know at least Mara and possibly John were to blame for this. I begrudgingly sat there, but I tried to surreptitiously scoot my chair further away when I sat down. I’m not sure how successful I was when I looked up to Mara scowling at me.

Lunch was a mostly quiet affair. And Ashley only brushed against my arm three times. Not that I was counting. We mostly chatted about abilities. On top of my [Bone Spear], Mara’s [Flame Control], and John’s [Metal Skin], Oliver had a healing ability called [Healing Touch], and Ashley apparently didn’t even have an ability. She hadn’t absorbed her essence. Instead she had brought several guns that she had left by the door. I would have been more upset about bringing her along without an essence if I hadn’t seen that old preacher woman gun down the monsters in the cemetery so easily.

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

Mara thankfully could deal with cleanup. It was one of the reasons I was so willing to cook for her, I never had to clean anything afterward. The rest of us retired to the livingroom where the conversation shifted to planning for our little adventure.

“Does anyone have any ideas where we should start?” Ashley asked the group while she sat right next to me on the couch. Hello, there was an entire cushion on the other end she could have sat on and left some space between us. Who does that?

“Mara suggested looking over near Sapphire Lake at a minimum. Seems to be at least one per town so far,” I told the group.

“Sounds like a good idea to me,” John quickly agreed. “But where do we start there?”

“Well, I imagine it’s not in the town itself otherwise someone would have probably noticed it. So, maybe start at some of the farms and shit?” I suggested.

Ashley pulled out her phone and opened a map app. She leaned over to share the screen with me, “What do you think? Where should we start near Sapphire Lake?”

I was instantly enveloped in the cloud of her shampoo, soap, and that unique smell that seemed to belong to just her. And I felt the warmth radiating off of her as she leaned against my arm. Again, not that I noticed. It was just, maybe a little distracting. Anyone would be distracted.

“O-oh, ummm…” Focus! “I don’t know. Start on this side,” I indicated the direction we would be driving from, “and then maybe circle north?”

“Hmmmm,” Ashley hummed. “Okay, but how do we check? Maybe we should stop by one of the other sites and see if there’s anything to give it away? A feeling or a sound or something like that.”

“Yes! Perfect,” John called out. “How are we all getting there? I don’t think we should all take our cars. Too hard to communicate and coordinate. I don’t think we can all fit in one car either.”

“I’ll ride with you guys,” Mara announced as she walked back into the room. “Then Grace and Ashley can ride together in one of their cars.”

I tried to glare at her, but she refused to meet my eyes. Looking around, everyone else seemed way too excited about the prospect of pairing Ashley and myself together. Even the ever silent Oliver was smiling encouragingly at me. I should have done this shit solo.

I agreed to ride in Ashley’s car with her begrudgingly. It would allow me to angrily text Mara my displeasure. No other reasons. Nope…

When we stepped through the door, I had to wait a minute for Ashley to grab up her several weapons. She had some sort of hunting rifle, and one of those scary military looking guns with all sorts of doodads attached to the barrel. It was not made any less scary by it being painted a metallic purple with golden accents. And last she tucked a pistol into a holster she draped over her shoulders. She looked pretty badass I’d admit.

“So…guns, huh,” I lamely attempted conversation.

She laughed as she walked to her car, which was actually a large pickup truck of some sort. I don’t know. The wheels were big or whatever. “Yeah. I have four brothers and we all grew up hunting with my mom and dad. I still go to the range with my mom once a month. She’s the one who gifted me the AR,” she pointed to the military looking gun. “Purple’s my favorite color,” she confided as she loaded her arsenal into the backseat.

“I just never would have guessed?” I told her. “About the guns,” I clarified when she looked at me.

She turned to look me in the eye, “Why? Because I’m femme?” She turned away with a huff, “I’m a gay woman living in a rural town surrounded by conservative assholes.” She didn’t seem angry, just a little disappointed. “Plus, they’re just fun. You should try it before you judge.”

“I-I wasn’t judging. I’ve just never really seen one in real life, let alone shot one.” I stammered.

I climbed up into her truck, then watched Ashley effortlessly hop in. She fired up the truck and we were soon following behind John’s Subaru. We rode in silence that I felt slowly grow awkward and tense.

We arrived at the library pretty quickly. There was a massive crowd and it was continuing to grow by the minute. Several large, armed men stood around the perimeter in camo, corralling people to a line snaking across the street. I could barely make out the portal sitting in the lawn in front of the library through all the people. If Ashley’s truck hadn’t been so tall I wouldn’t have been able to see it at all.

Despite the men with guns marching around in the street, the entire thing seemed more like people in line for a ride at the amusement park than a stressful evacuation because the world was ending. I was duly impressed by whoever was running this thing.

We stopped in the middle of the street and two of the armed men jogged over to ours and John’s cars. Ashley rolled down the window while I tried to become invisible in the seat next to her in case things became violent.

The man approaching our truck was very tall. He wouldn’t have any problems talking to us through the window. He had a large, well-groomed, reddish blonde mustache and light brown hair. He pulled the mirrored sunglasses off his face as he stepped up to Ashley’s window. She rolled it down and shot me a look I couldn’t interpret.

The man took a quick look inside the truck, “Afternoon ladies. If you could park your cars on the next street over, we’re trying to keep this street clear for people coming in.”

“Oh, we’re not here to use the portal,” Ashley assured him.

He looked at her incredulously. “Ma’am,” he sighed. “Then what is it you’re here to do?”

“We just want to see if there’s any way to notice a portal without having to stumble directly onto it. We want to find more of the portals. There has to be more of them than two.” Ashley answered calmly. “And who are you to be telling people what to do?”

He raised an eyebrow at her. “Ma’am, we’re with the National Guard. We’re just here to keep things organized and fair. In fact a several people were already sent to the Belford site to stop them from charging people. We’re on y’alls side.”

Ashley sounded a little chagrined, “Sorry. You just kind of tend to expect the worst in an apocalypse.”

“Yes, ma’am. I understand. I can’t let you get any closer to the portal than this though. There are already people in line that have been waiting for hours.”

“But we’re not trying to use it,” I spoke up for the first time. “We really are just trying to see if there’s anything that will help us find some more.”

The man thought for a minute. “Look, I can’t let you get any closer, and I really do need you to get these cars off this street.” He held up a hand to forestall any interruptions, “But, I can tell you from being here that there is like a low level hum that you can feel more than hear if you get within maybe thirty or forty yards of it.”

Just then I got a text from Mara.

Hey, this dude is an asshole, and they won’t

let us look at the portal. Let’s go to the

other one.

Our dude was nice. He told us what

it feels like when you’re close to it.

If you can trust him. Could be lying.

It’s better than nothing. And time is

ticking. Ashley seems to believe him.

Oh! Why didn’t you say so? Ashley

has like a sixth sense about people.

If she’s good I’m good.

Damn. Betrayed by my own best friend. My opinion isn’t good enough, but Ashely thinks someone’s on the up and up and we’re golden.

The man waved goodbye to us and began walking back to the crowd. Ashley rolled her window up and threw the truck in reverse. I shot off a quick text to Mara telling her to just follow us.

“Ready to go hunting for portals?” I asked.

Ashley turned to me and gave me a wink, “You betcha.”

I felt my cheeks warm. I turned to look out the window as we headed out of town and toward Sapphire Lake this time. Stupid gay attraction.