“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Artyom lied as naturally as he breathed.

  “Where did you hear about Scooby-Doo, Artyom?” asked Neitra, leaning forward with a soul-piercing glare. “You used it in the right context too, so I know it’s the same thing Tommy was talking about.”

  Artyom’s mind raced and tried to come up with a better excuse, but after a few heart-racing moments, he came to a different conclusion: should he even bother?

  If anyone could be considered to be on his side in this world, it was Neitra. She held even bigger secrets with him, like Lensa’s identity and the fact they’d both been targeted by the four ladies. And he’d revealed his true identity to key assets in previous missions, even when in stealth.

  Artyom let the muscles in his taught face relax and the exhaustion of years began to make his expression slough. He took a deep breath and let it out as a long-winded sigh, leaning back into the couch before turning to Neitra with sincere eyes.

  “I heard about it from back home,” he said. “I even watched it myself as a kid.”

  “Watched it back home? That means you’re also from California!” she exclaimed.

  “Not California, per-se, but another area within the same nation.”

  “But then what are you doing here? Were you also brought here to fight the Dark Lord?”

  Artyom shook his head. “No, I came here by myself. As for why, how do I describe this…”

  Neitra sat back patiently and let him consider his words before speaking.

  “I used to be a hero, just like Tommy, but I was summoned somewhere else. Somewhere far away. Another world altogether.”

  “By the goddess to fight a Dark Lord?”

  “No, by some miserable excuse of a king to fight in his war against six other kingdoms. And they were all just as bad as the king who summoned me; greedy, selfish, and with no appreciation for the value of human life.”

  “Just like the Dark Lord…” said Neitra in a low whisper.

  “Yeah, just like ‘em. Once I wizened up, me and the summoned heroes of all of those other kingdoms teamed up to find a way out of our predicament. And we did! Eventually finding our own little club of ex-heroes far away from anyone who could harm us. Now we go around to other worlds, making sure nobody from Earth gets taken advantage of like we were.”

  “Wow, another hero,” said Neitra with sparkles in her eyes. “And you have a whole team of them too! You could all come here and stop the Dark Lord, like you said in the catacombs!”

  “That… was a bluff.”

  “Really? How come? What’s stopping you all from coming here to help us finish the fight?”

  “They’re all busy saving the lives of other kids right now, they don’t have time to spare here without someone else being put in danger.”

  “Hold on, then why are you here?” asked Neitra. “Tommy isn’t in trouble, our side definitely isn’t as evil as the Dark Lord’s, and he isn’t being treated badly either.”

  “Truth be told, I got sent here on… vacation,” replied Artyom. “I was supposed to look into how Tommy even ended up here, because he wasn’t summoned the way it’s normally done. The plan was for me to head back once I had that info. But as you said, with how nice this side is and how evil the Dark Lord is in comparison, which isn’t something that ever really happens… I knew something was wrong. Very wrong. And the rest of his party trying to kill us only confirms that.”

  “Okay, but if something is wrong here like you said, why not have your other hero friends come here to stop the Dark Lord? He’s still killing people every day, including children. You all can save lives here all the same as anywhere else and finish your mission!”

  “We save kids from Earth.”

  The matter-of-factness of Artyom’s words and the force he put on the very last one temporarily stunned Neitra.

  “That’s our priority, and I’m here to save Tommy from whatever the others have cooked up for him.”

  The rogue began to work her jaw, and Artyom saw the disappointment seeping through her attempt at schooling her expression.

  “But with Lensa having run off to the frontier, kids should be a lot more safe now,” he added, a little more gently.

  Neitra’s expression softened, and she silently nodded before replying, “What about the soldiers laying down their lives in the war?”

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  “They’re not what the organization is for. We protect kids from Earth, not interfere with every multiversal war going on. There are countless of them happening. Thousands, millions, those numbers are nothing compared to how many are out there. We don’t have the resources to aid other worlds in what is frankly their responsibility; we only get involved if they bring someone from our home into their mess.”

  Artyom didn’t flinch when Neitra leered at him. This was always their mission, he’d had this speech with plenty of others before.

  After a moment, she let out a sigh. “That makes sense. I don’t like it, but it makes sense. You do what you can for the people who are important to you.” Neitra paused for a second before looking him more deeply in the eyes. “But aren’t we important to you?”

  Artyom hesitated for a fraction of a second, but still replied coolly. “The others have never been to this world before, they don’t know any of you.”

  “In that case… I’m still glad you’re here,” said Neitra with a soft smile.

  Artyom found himself smiling back.

  “So, what are your plans for Tommy?”

  “Right now, it’s to figure out how he was actually summoned here, and then to figure out how he fits into this whole conspiracy.”

  “And then?”

  “If I know Tommy will be safe, I’ll leave. But if they have something bad planned for him, I take him with me. The goddess will have to find another hero, someone who isn’t from Earth. And with how strong her creation Lensa was, I’m sure she can work something out. And I’m certain the rest of the party is just as powerful.”

  “Just as powerful…” Neitra’s face blanched. “They’re Fatewatchers too, aren’t they?”

  Artyom sat up and frowned. “Yeah, I think they are.”

  “Not just one Mythological Hero, but four? Oh, Gus is going to love hearing this.”

  “And they all wanted us dead, didn’t they?” asked Neitra, slowly shaking her head despite how fast her heart was now racing. “I joined to help stop the Dark Lord, the same as what they’re doing… why would they try to kill us for it?!”

  Artyom held in a sardonic chuckle. The weight of their reality was finally beginning to register for her, he wouldn’t blame the innocent rogue if she wanted to run away.

  “Do you think Lensa told them everything, won’t they just try to kill us as soon as they get here?”

  “If they could get away with killing us out in the open, they would have done that by now. No, I think their biggest goal right now is to keep Tommy under the guise of everything being perfectly normal. That his big adventure is as close to a straightforward fantasy as it gets. If they kill two members of his party in cold blood, he’s going to be asking a lot of questions, and that risks breaking their carefully crafted illusion.”

  “Then let’s just break it now and tell him about what happened!”

  “We don’t know if he’ll believe us, and if we do break it, nothing’s stopping the others from killing us. So it’s a stalemate until something big happens. Let’s hope we get what we want before it’s broken. That I find out they’re planning with Tommy, and for you that they defeat the Dark Lord.”

  Neitra slowly nodded. “In that case, I’ll stay right where I am. I’d be in danger no matter where I fought. But here, it’ll save the most lives if I can help Tommy get all the armor pieces faster.”

  Artyom’s brows rose as he leaned even more forward, but he soon felt a smile involuntarily creeping across his lips. “Yeah, that’s a good way to look at it.”

  “But still… why do Fatewatchers have to be so strong?!” she asked while balling her hands into a pair of fists and striking the cushioned arm rests. The blow was quickly absorbed by the plush, but left a permanent dent in the old stuffing. “We only survived in the end because you talked Lensa out of killing everyone. Not by making her care or feel bad either, but by telling her she would be better off sparing us!”

  Artyom looked at her before turning his head downwards. He took a deep breath. “I completely agree. That was also some serious bullshit, wasn’t it?”

  “Her mother was right there, and she just said to her face that she was going to kill her to make herself feel better!” continued Neitra. “And not just her, but her father as well, for what? ‘Tempting’ her into not doing her job by just existing? That was her own fault, not his!”

  “She isn’t human,” said Artyom after a long moment. “The part of her that wanted to kill everyone, that’s not part of a normal human conscience. It saw everything that got in the way of her mission, and decided the ideal way to deal with them was to kill them. Protecting her mother out of love? It told her to kill everyone she loves.”

  “Maybe Fatewatchers are just unstable or something? Or their nature just doesn’t work with human emotion.”

  “Yeah. Using cold hard logic like that made it feel like I was interacting with a machine, er… pick-your-path story instead of trying to convince an actual person. But it brings up a very interesting weakness.”

  “That human emotions make them break?”

  Artyom gave her a wry smile. “Exactly. Just another angle of attack for my emotional judo.”

  “Was that what you used when you pissed Lensa off into not wanting to talk to us?”

  “Err… yeah. But I have a better idea of what buttons to press next time, promise!”

  “I hope for our sake, you’re right.”

  The conversation died down and the two sat in silence. The wall clock blessed their ears with its obnoxious ticking, helping distract them from dwelling on everything that had just happened. A mundane frustration was infinitely better than confronting how deep you were in a quagmire of trouble.

  The minute hand made its way to the other side by the time the two cleared all the food.

  “You know,” said Artyom, getting up and stretching. “I’m going to get some fresh air, fighting for your life in a basement filled with human remains really puts you in the mood for some. I’ll meet you back at the hotel room.”

  Neitra nodded and let him go.

  As soon as Artyom was outside, he placed a hand on his pocket and felt the indent of his phone.

  “Oh yeah, I could’ve used that to get out when Lensa was trying to kill us all.”

  The sea breeze washed over him, making his hair and the green grass sway together.

  “Oops,” he said with a little smile.