Something Like a Mission

“Most days, it’s errands and damage control. But every so often, the mess hands you a map—and dares you to call it a mission.”

“Beatrix!" Kain's voice cut through the air, sharp and insistent. His gait was lopsided, limping heavily as he barrelled toward me with a kind of desperate resolve. The timing couldn't have been worse—I had barely set foot past the Portal, the warmth of the realm wrapping itself around me like a stifling shroud.

“I need crutches,” he declared, his words not so much a request as a demand, flung at me with the urgency of a man on the verge.

I didn't even look up at first. My arms were full and my mind fuller. The weight of the camping gear shifted against my hip as I bent to lower the sleeping bag beside the Portal. Dust swirled around my feet, catching in the creases where earth and effort met. I waved Kain off. “You'll have to talk to Luke,” I replied, distracted and unwilling to be drawn into yet another crisis. One thing at a time.

"But look at my leg," he insisted, his voice cracking slightly now as he neared. There was something about the way he said it—not just annoyance or discomfort, but an edge of genuine pain.

I finally turned my head, eyes sweeping down to where a jagged line of red, trailed down his leg. The wound had been covered, but the blood seeping from beneath suggested it might have been bad. I winced, but only slightly.

“Looks like it’s bleeding,” I said flatly.

Empathy was there, buried deep—but I had too little emotional currency left to give more than the basics. My voice was dulled, buffered by exhaustion and a persistent ache in my temple that refused to fade.

Kain followed my gaze with a grunt, his shoulders sagging. “Not again.”

A small pang of guilt stirred. He wasn’t trying to be dramatic. This was the cost of Clivilius, of its sharp corners and untamed threats. And as much as I wanted to get on with my task and leave this encounter behind, the part of me still tethered to reason—still tethered to decency—reached for the most logical option. “You should probably go and visit Glenda.”

Kain’s response hit like a sucker punch. “Glenda’s gone.”

I froze, straightening slowly. “Gone?” I echoed, my heart already halfway to dread. “Is she—” The word dead hovered just behind my teeth, threatening to drop like a stone. “Dead?”

“Oh, no,” Kain replied, waving a dismissive hand, as though death were far too melodramatic a leap. “She went with Charity and Jamie to hunt the Portal pirate.”

For a moment, I could only stare at him, the sheer absurdity of the sentence crashing against the logic centres of my brain. Glenda? On a pirate hunt? The image didn’t fit. I tried to imagine her with a first-aid kit in one hand and a weapon in the other, marching into danger beside Jamie’s quiet brooding and Charity’s ruthless competence.

What an odd thing for Glenda to do, I thought, unable to keep the frown from deepening. She was meant to be the settlement’s calm, clinical centre—the person who patched people back together, not chased threats across the landscape. The idea of her being gone didn’t just unsettle me—it unbalanced something.

With a brief shake of my head, I tried to dispel the fog of questions swirling in my mind. Glenda’s unexpected departure gnawed at me—irrational though it may have been. There were more immediate fires to extinguish, more pressing duties that needed me now, yet the undercurrent of unease about her absence pulsed beneath the surface like a quiet but persistent drumbeat. Who would patch people up if something went wrong today? Who was left to turn to?

"You'll still have to ask Luke for crutches," I said to Kain, my tone firmer this time, though not unkind. I positioned myself deliberately in front of the Portal. "Sorry." There was nothing else I could offer him—neither time nor solutions.

“Bea—” Kain began again, his voice threaded with either protest or plea—I wasn’t sure, and I didn’t wait to find out. I inhaled deeply, letting the breath stretch and steel me against the next round. My tasks were stacking up faster than I could keep pace with, and though Kain wasn’t the enemy, he was yet another detour I couldn’t afford.

And so, without another word, I stepped back through the Portal.

The scent hit me first—a sharp blend of bleach, iron, and damp fabric—and then the unmistakable sound of chaos-in-progress.

"Shit," Leigh’s voice rang out, laced with frustration. My eyes snapped to him, crouched low on the kitchen tiles, the sleeves of his shirt pushed up and soaked, his hands darkened with water as he ineffectually swiped at the floor with a too-small towel. A wide arc of pinkish liquid fanned out around him, as if the blood refused to be washed away, like the memory it represented.

"Everything alright?" I asked, stepping into the room with the weight of several small boxes stacked precariously in my arms. My voice was casual, but a sliver of concern edged it, not just for the mess but for him—for what he was clearly trying, and failing, to scrub out of existence.

Leigh didn’t even look up. His hair hung slightly damp at the temples, sticking to his forehead as he worked, dragging the bath towel across the tiles in a rhythmic, stubborn motion. “Yeah,” he exhaled, the word fraying at the edges from exertion. “All good here.”

I paused, unsure whether to laugh or sigh. The absurdity of it—trying to clean this place, as if mopping up the blood might erase the consequences. As if the night’s horrors could be undone with lemon-scented detergent and elbow grease. The house was a crime scene masquerading as a home, and no matter how many towels Leigh used, I knew the scent of fear and violence would linger long after the floor dried.

Still, there was something oddly grounding about his efforts. He wasn't just cleaning; he was doing something. Trying. And in that small, stubborn gesture, I felt a flicker of kinship—a quiet, mutual understanding that while everything around us spiralled out of control, we would at least face the chaos side by side.

---

Kain had remained remarkably silent throughout the remainder of my trekking back and forth with camping supplies, though his silence was hardly passive. His eyes—those infuriatingly bright, ocean-blue eyes—trailed after me with every pass I made, each glance brimming with a wordless, aching request. Once so full of mischief and humour, they now shimmered with something more solemn, more insistent, and I could feel their weight pressing on my back even when I didn’t turn to meet them. A younger version of me might have faltered, might have been swayed by that gaze alone. But today, my will was a battleground—and I was determined not to lose it to blue eyes and wounded limbs.

Despite their allure, I managed to deflect the silent pleas, sheltering my resolve behind the task at hand. There was a relentless rhythm to my movements—drop off, turn, return, repeat—driven by the gnawing pressure at the edges of my thoughts. Jarod. The rendezvous loomed, demanding attention, siphoning every available ounce of focus from the moment.

But the silence wasn’t empty.

Kain’s unspoken appeals grew heavier, more invasive. His presence was like a persistent pressure behind the eyes—a headache that hadn’t yet bloomed but promised to. And in the quiet that filled the gaps between our exchanges, Leigh’s voice echoed more potently in my mind. His suggestion—no, his proposal—to entrust Jarod with a Portal Key no longer felt far-fetched. It had been absurd when I first heard it. Now, it was beginning to take shape as the only viable answer.

The responsibilities of Guardianship were multiplying like shadows at dusk, stretching longer, reaching into corners I hadn’t known existed. It was overwhelming. I was drowning in duties, barely a day into my tenure, and still adjusting to the new weight of the title I’d assumed. A title I hadn’t asked for, yet one that seemed determined to carve its mark into me all the same.

It was almost comical. Twenty-four hours. Not even that. And already I was considering delegation—expansion—recruitment.

But what choice did I really have?

Each demand placed upon me yanked at a different thread, and if I didn’t act soon, I’d unravel completely. Jarod stepping into this world wasn’t just a possibility anymore; it was starting to feel like an inevitability. And more pressingly—like my only chance at keeping myself afloat.

With the relocation of the camping supplies nearing completion, I found myself drawing a shallow, hopeful breath—just one moment of pause, one second of peace. But that fragile hope shattered the instant I glimpsed Paul’s silhouette cresting the dune. The sun, still high and relentless, cast his outline like a mirage against the amber sand, his form cutting an all-too-familiar path towards me. A grimace settled onto my face unbidden, etched by the slow grind of accumulating weariness.

His approach felt inevitable, like a tide that knew no retreat, and with it came the familiar sensation of my patience thinning—stretched taut, translucent. Paul had that walk—purposeful, loaded with expectation—and I braced myself instinctively. Another request. Another favour. Another slice of me, whittled away under the guise of necessity.

Before he could even shape his mouth around the plea, I intercepted it with a deflection, sharp but not unkind. “You'll have to ask Luke for crutches,” I said, words laced with the weary rhythm of someone running low on everything—time, energy, goodwill. I hoped, dimly, that it might be enough to send him on his way.

Paul's gaze shifted to Kain, whose body language spoke volumes in its quiet surrender—shoulders slumped, lips pressed into a tired line, eyes cast away. He didn't even try to back me up. His earlier insistence had withered, perhaps recognising the futility of trying to claw more from someone already hollowed out.

Paul turned back to me, his question measured but weighted. “Have you seen Luke?”

I paused, one hand gripping the edge of the final box I’d yet to move, the other pushing damp hair from my brow. My mind flicked through the morning like rifling pages.

“No,” I admitted after a beat, “I haven’t seen him since that initial encounter when I first arrived.” My voice bore a tinge of distance, almost as if I were recounting something from days ago, not hours. Time had begun to feel elastic here—stretching, folding, losing shape.

Paul’s expression tightened, brows pulling into a furrow as he rubbed his chin, the gesture slow and thoughtful. I could see the flicker of concern in his eyes, the mental calculation of logistics, responsibility, absence. It was a look I was coming to recognise and feel in myself.

And yet, despite the ache in my shoulders and the sand grinding into the creases of my shoes, a smile tugged at the corners of my lips. It was spontaneous, unwarranted, even a bit misplaced. But there was something about Paul—his roundabout earnestness, his animated eyebrows, the subtle echo of humour that lingered in his mannerisms. It reminded me of the banter I used to share with Gladys, of simpler moments. He wasn’t demanding in the way others were. He brought with him an odd sort of levity—even when he didn’t mean to.

After what seemed like an eternity in contemplation, Paul's posture subtly changed—his weight shifting forward, a flicker of resolution tightening the corners of his mouth. Whatever gears had been turning behind his furrowed brow had now clicked into place. His voice, steady and laced with resolve, broke the stillness that had stretched taut between us.

"Beatrix," he began, locking his gaze to mine with the calm authority of someone used to getting things done under pressure, "I need you to source us a couple of caravans or motorhomes. They will make our living and sleeping arrangements a little more comfortable and also, hopefully, provide us with more safety than the tents currently do."

My body stilled, the rest of the world blurring slightly as the scope of what he was asking unfolded. Caravans. Motorhomes. Not just supplies or first aid—these were entire mobile homes. My pulse quickened with the weight of it. It wasn’t the kind of errand one could run with a quick dash to the corner shop.

"But I don't have enough money for that kind of expense. How am I supposed to get them?" The words escaped me before I had a chance to compose them, spilling out raw and unfiltered. It wasn’t just the practicality that jarred me—it was the sudden thrust of responsibility, the assumption that I could somehow conjure solutions from thin air.

Paul's answer came swiftly, his confidence in me like a torch shoved into my hands whether I wanted it or not.

"You've got a Portal, a place to escape to where nobody can catch you," he said, his tone buoyed by an undercurrent of both encouragement and dare. He paused for effect, letting his words settle like dust before adding, "I'm sure you have the creative abilities to pull the mission off."

He punctuated the statement with a cheeky smile and an odd little hand flourish that resembled someone energetically stabbing at their food with a fork—completely out of place and yet somehow perfectly in keeping with Paul's endearing eccentricity.

I narrowed my eyes at him, suspicion flickering to life like the first spark before flame. That gesture—too specific. Had Luke told him? My mind immediately jumped to my covert silverware escapades, my tiny acts of rebellion tucked into napkins and slipped into bags. Was nothing sacred anymore?

Still, I couldn’t suppress the faint twitch of a smile that pulled at the corners of my mouth. Paul’s exuberance was impossible to ignore. Like a virus, it spread with quiet insistence, and before I could fully fortify my cynicism, something stirred—something dangerously close to excitement.

The word he’d used—“mission”—echoed through my thoughts, lighting up a part of me that had been dimmed by blood, panic, and the weight of too many decisions. A mission. It sounded ridiculous. Reckless. Irresistible.

The idea of slipping unnoticed between worlds, using the Portal Key like a cloak of invisibility, sparked something primal and fierce. No longer just a girl stumbling into chaos—I could be the architect of my own rebellion. A new pulse beat through me, fast and hot, as if my body had remembered what it meant to be alive.

For the first time in what felt like days, I didn’t feel trapped. I felt ready. Or at least, ready to try.

Caught in the tug-of-war between reason and impulse, I found myself teetering on the precipice of a decision that could unravel in spectacular fashion—either as a brilliant escapade or an unmitigated disaster.

“A mission, you say?” I echoed, the words curling from my lips with a hesitant bravado, tinged with a flicker of daring that felt entirely too unfamiliar. There was a heat behind them, a slow-burning thrill that cut through the tedium of my existence. The drudgery of life with my parents—their routines, their expectations—had once felt like a safe, if suffocating, cocoon. Now it seemed more like a husk begging to be split apart.

Was I ready to step through the Portal, not merely to flee, but to rise to something more? To test the boundaries of my own capacity? The question buzzed through me like static, laced with a heady mixture of fear and reckless hope.

Still, I held my face as still as a marble mask, willing a calm I didn’t possess. Every twitch of uncertainty was locked behind a thin veneer of indifference. “Sure. I’ll do it.” The words dropped from my mouth, heavy and deliberate. A choice made. No fanfare. Just the quiet click of fate shifting underfoot.

Paul’s face lit up, his features brightening with almost boyish satisfaction, like a child watching a plan fall into place. The moment was fleeting. A flicker of triumph quickly eclipsed by something else—concern, perhaps, or the first signs of doubt. I saw the change before he even spoke, and instinctively, my muscles tensed.

I bit down on the inside of my cheek, a sharp, bitter tang of restraint grounding me. His next words arrived with all the subtlety of a slap.

“By the way, where’s Duke?”

The name sliced through me like cold steel. Duke. I felt my breath hitch, the memory of the dog suddenly crashing back into consciousness. The hallway. The bathroom. His absence rang like an alarm bell in my chest, and the guilt that followed was instant and gutting. How had I not noticed sooner? What kind of person forgets a loyal animal? And most importantly, where had I actually left him?

Panic surged beneath the surface, but I forced it down, covering my falter with a hasty deflection. “What do you want first, Duke or the caravans?” I shot back, hoping my faux-casual tone would distract from the tightness in my throat.

Paul exhaled, a sound steeped in frustration or fatigue—it was hard to tell. His response, though noncommittal, had a strange finality to it. “Get them in whatever order works the best for you. I don’t want to be too prescriptive… or restrictive.”

I nodded, perhaps too quickly, too eagerly, seizing the moment to move on before either of us lingered too long on my oversight. I masked a scoff with the motion, the kind of sarcastic bark I’d usually reserve for Leigh. But inwardly, I was spiralling. Over the years, I’d developed a decent poker face—honed through countless late nights across card tables—but Paul wasn’t without perception. There were cracks in his calm, fractures I didn’t like to see. And if he could sense my unease… I could only hope my own mask held better than his.

Duke. I had to find Duke.

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