Chapter 45: 46: What has to be

Fresh presses her face against the glass of the window of the dark alchemist’s shop. Despite the brightness of the day outside, little light seems to make its way inside of the shop which is nested down at the end of this little alley. As far as she can see, nothing stirs inside of the building. No light shifts. No movements break the darkness. No sounds shatter the quiet. Nothing. All she hears is the vivid life of the city around her, coming into stark contrast with the empty void that seems to lurk just beyond the thin, glass windows. The heavy presence of a black murk fills the inside of the building, almost seemingly threatening to push the glass out with the sheer pressure of its non-existence.

She gulps. Though, maybe she’s just being a little over-imaginative.

“It’s just an empty room…” she mutters to herself and presses herself off of the window, turning her back to the store to walk away. She doesn’t get far though and simply stands there, a few meters outside of the door, watching the people run by left and right down the main street, outside of the alley. Only she’s down here, standing alone outside of the door. As if everybody else in the city already knows that Donata, the alchemist, isn’t open for business anymore.

She finds her head turning around and before she knows what she’s doing, her hand is on the handle of the door.

It’s locked.

Sighing a breath of relief now that she’s freed of the burden of trying to snoop any further, she once again tries to leave. But this time her eyes catch something different, though she really wishes that they didn’t. Down on the corner of the building, near the adjacent wall, is a small, elongated, rectangular basement window.

She wants to go, to just go back to the store and to tell Jubilee about her successful outing. But as she thinks the thought, she is already knelt downward, her hands pressing against the glass.

The unsecured window, set down only a foot above the road, swings open, creaking quietly, as if whispering to her, giving her the okay to come in. ‘It’s fine. Nobody is watching. Come in. Come in…’

Not sure why she’s doing this and at the same time wishing that she wouldn’t, Fresh takes off her bag and squeezes herself through the window with some difficulty. The shape of her new body is not exactly accommodating of the act of squeezing through tight spaces. She lands on a wooden table not far below, several books flying down to the floor. Fresh reaches out to grab her bag, pulling it in behind herself and leaving the window open just a crack. Just a tiny smidge. Just enough so that she can get back out quickly, if she has to.

Fresh looks around the basement room. It looks to be some kind of alchemical-laboratory of sorts. The basement is about the size of Jubilee’s bedroom, but is filled with shelves that are lined with glass vials, beakers filled with all manner of liquids and floating substances, dead plants suspended in some unidentifiable goo. Fresh fidgets uncomfortably as she sees a single eyeball hovering in a clear liquid. She isn’t sure if it's a human’s, but she doesn’t look close enough to find out either. Suspended through the room are dry plants of all manner, hanging from the rafters.

On the far side of the room is a door and she quickly makes her way towards it, crinkling her nose as the oddly dusty smell fills it.

Something crunches beneath her boot and the girl looks down at the broken glass at her feet.

Kneeling down and carefully inspecting a shard, holding it up to the light of the window, she recognizes it as one of theirs. This is her and Jubilee’s glass.

Fresh looks around, seeing them now. The faintly glowing potions stacked in the corner of a table in the back. Her very own minor soul-potions. Her minor-antidotes. Had Donata been trying to figure out how they were made? She gulps and drops the glass back down, heading towards the door and carefully pulling it open, slowly peeking her head out to the staircase behind it and listening for any sounds coming from above.

There are none. All she hears is the muffled activity of the hive buzzing outside. But inside of here there is no-one. No-one but her and the heavily looming darkness that seems to stand atop the staircase, waving with a single finger, calling her allure.

Fresh gulps again a second time, shaking her head to remove the imaginary specter and quietly creeps up the staircase.

Being careful to avoid going near the windows, she inspects the back room of the alchemist’s shop, still not too sure what exactly it is that she’s doing or looking for. Hasn’t she technically broken in? Isn’t this illegal? If she gets caught, who knows what kind of punishments they have for burglars here in this world? Jubilee had more or less told her of Donata’s fate, so -

The girl looks around the dark space.

- So why is she here? What is she looking for?

She isn’t sure, but that lack of purpose doesn’t change her mind and she keeps going. It just feels like the right thing to do. As if something -

Her eyes scan the dark room of the back area behind the store-front.

- As if something in the darkness was whispering to her, telling her in words she can’t quite hear, but still understands. ‘Look. Look. Seeing is believing.’

The wood of the stairs creaks as she heads up to the next floor above and pushes open the door, revealing a bedroom that is lined with bookshelves on every wall, save for the window facing the street outside. Potted plants fill every nook and cranny, their leaves drooping low as if all of them were in mourning.

“They’re just thirsty,” says Fresh quietly to herself, rubbing her eyes and stepping into the bedroom. In the center, across from the door is a single bed, obscured by cloth drapes. She sighs a breath of relief as she sees that the bed is empty. But something catches her eye. Something obscured by a blanket, something that catches a dull ray of lazy light meandering through the bedroom window to her side, hitting the hidden thing from just the right angle to make it shine. Curiously, she slowly walks towards it and picks it up, pulling it free from the blanket covering it and holding it up towards the light.

Fresh looks at the piece of prismatic glass in her hand and her shade-bathed reflection looks back at her.

It shatters and falls into dust and she yelps, springing back a step as the crystal fragments fall to the floorboards. She looks down at them, as she turns to leave, her curiosity satiated. That hissing lizard voice in the back of her mind is satisfied now that it had seen for itself.

“It’s taken care of…” mutters Fresh, as one final confirmation, as she leaves the dark room to sneak back downstairs and back out of the basement window. For a brief moment, she considers watering the plants in the bedroom, or even taking them with her. But what if somebody comes back tomorrow and sees that someone had been here? What if somebody recognizes her with them? It’s too dangerous. She closes her eyes and apologizes to the plants as she steps outside.

Hurrying, she hustles back through the crowd, heading towards the shop. A smile comes to her, washing away the cool expression from her face, as she sees several people walking by, carrying their tote-bags.

“Took you long enough,” barks Jubilee at her as the girl wanders back into their store, looking around.

Fresh laughs meekly and lies. “Sorry… I got lost.”

“It’s… It’s a straight road,” says Jubilee, placing their hands on their hips and tilting their head. Fresh doesn’t respond and just looks away. Jubilee sighs, apparently not questioning the narrative in the least. “Whatever, it’s been slow anyways. I heard some work going on upstairs in your room, so I think your mattress got delivered.”

Fresh looks at them curiously. “You think? Didn’t… didn’t they have to come in and carry it upstairs?”

Jubilee waves her off. “The mannequins don’t work if you watch them.”

The girl rubs her arms. “They’re kind of creepy…” Fresh stares down at Jubilee, tilting her head as she notices something. “Jubilee! I just realized,” she says, not thinking, leaning forward over the counter. “Your mask makes you look like you have a mannequin face!”

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Jubilee glares at her through the slits of the wooden mask. “Are you picking a fight?” they ask, prodding a finger against her. “I’ll strap a bell around your neck and sell you to a dairy-farm!”

Fresh pulls back. “That’s so mean!”

“You started it,” snaps Jubilee.

Fresh scowls, but then her face softens and she leans back. “I’m sorry, I wasn’t thinking,” she admits, scratching her cheek and feeling bad now. Maybe that was insensitive of her to say. “Ah!” She opens her bag and pulls out the seed-cake. “Here! I got this for us to share later!” She puffs out her cheek and looks away, embarrassed. “If you want to…”

Jubilee sighs. “Sure. I’d like that.” The two of them stand there in an awkward silence for a moment. Jubilee clears their throat, cutting through the tension. “But first things first, we have a new business opportunity.”

“Huh?” Fresh looks around the empty store. “Really?”

“Yeah, look at this,” Jubilee grunts as they lift a fairly simple, but heavy looking sword out from beneath the counter. Fresh looks it over, staring at the edge of the blade. It is clearly nicked and worn and even has a shattering scar running through the top end of it. She feels like it’s vaguely familiar though.

“A broken sword?” she asks Jubilee, who nods in return.

“Yeah, some giant lummox of an orc ran in here crying and threw his sword down on the counter, asking about a -” Jubilee’s eye twitches as they glare at Fresh in agitation. “- a chicken… priestess…”

Fresh smiles with a vague smile, pretending she doesn’t know what Jubilee is talking about. “Huh? Is that so? How strange.”

They sigh. “Anyways, apparently he wants you to fix this. I told him to get bent and to go to the weaponsmith down the road but…” Jubilee shakes their head, shrugging. “He insisted. So, here you go.” Jubilee extends their arms, gesturing over the sword. “You’re officially a repair-worker now too.”

Fresh looks over the sword. “I don’t know how to repair swords though.”

Jubilee shrugs indifferently. “You’re a craftsman, figure it out, goo-brain. They paid in advance, though his priestess wasn’t happy about it,” says Jubilee. “So we’re obligated now. No refunds.” Fresh groans uneasily, looking over the well worn weapon. Jubilee continues. “Look, we need to diversify. We can’t just sell two kinds of potions, a dagger and a necklace -”

“- and the chickens,” amends Fresh.

Jubilee rolls their eyes. “Whatever. We need more offers, or we’re going to run out of customers,” explains Jubilee. “They’ll be back soon for more soul-potions, but we can’t rely on those alone. Repairs could be a steady stream of income, especially since we’re the first stop outside of the dungeon.”

Fresh lets out a strained grunt, trying unsuccessfully to lift the sword off of the counter. “It’s too heaaavy~”

“It’s just a sword?” asks Jubilee, crossing their arms and shaking their head. “Look, I don’t want you to swing it, I want you to fix it.”

Fresh pouts. “What about what I want? I thought I was the party-leader?”

Jubilee tilts their head, looking at her curiously. “And? What does the party-leader want?” they ask sarcastically.

The girl looks around the empty store and then to the sword and then to Jubilee and then to the seed-cake on the counter. The answer to the question is the shared connection that all four of those things have. Fresh sighs, she isn’t able to open up enough to tell Jubilee about that strong feeling in her heart directly however. She smiles. What is she scared of? This is just another step that she has to take. Just another step forward towards this new life of hers that is slowly coming together, piece by piece, fragment by fragment.

“Okay! I’ll do my best!” she exclaims, nodding.

Razmatazz

Well, doesn't look like anything went wrong today. I'm just as surprised as you are =)

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