Weariness was starting to eat away at Matt as he trudged back over to Olivia, having acquired a fresh pair of pants and underwear from the small stockpile he'd brought with him after Allie had gotten hurt. He also brought with him the last of the coldcuts–and it was the last, he was quite sure. Anything back at the Dilligaf would have gone bad by now thanks to the lack of refrigeration. He had hoped to get the solar panels up and running to get power back online… But with everything, he'd just never gotten the chance.

Lucas was sitting next to Olivia, his eyelids drooping closed as he leaned against his big sister. Olivia, for her part, was either ignoring Lucas completely or tolerating his presence as she pored through scroll after scroll, a look of intense concentration on her face.

A part of Matt wanted to just flop down beside his children and sleep for the next three days. But Allie wasn't back yet, and as much as it felt like everything was over, he wasn't willing to trust that feeling just yet. Who knew what else could be out there?

And how the heck are we going to make sure it stays out there? He wondered as he approached his kids. He couldn't see it, himself. It felt like they'd need walls, sentries, a veritable army in order to be safe. Unless Liv could find them like a safe zone or something in all those scrolls. Games had that, didn't they? Some place where the player could rest up and heal after a hard fight? Maybe they could find one of those.

If they existed.

"How's it coming?" he asked quietly as he came up on Olivia and offered her a sandwich. Olivia didn't even look up, but Hoolio's eyes snapped up to the ham-on-wheat and stared at it like it was golden treasure.

"Slow," Liv growled, reaching up and grabbing the sandwich without looking, then tearing it in half and offering up one half to her owl, still without looking. Hoolio hooted happily and started munching away, a look of owlish bliss on his face.

"Not finding anything, huh?" he asked as he bit into his own sandwich.

"Oh I'm finding all KINDS of stuff," Liv said, sighing and tossing another scroll over her shoulder, where it disappeared. "The problem is, it all depends on stuff we don't have. Like, your consul type has the ability to make workers more efficient and able to build things in like a tenth of the time it'd usually take. But that means we need workers, and tools, and an idea of what we're building. Or like, there's an ability Mom has that lets her soldiers erect a war camp in an hour. But she needs soldiers. And even if we could get it up… There's like, seven of us."

"Whomph," said Hoolio around a mouthful of sammich.

"Okay fine, eight," she said, giving the owl the side-eye. "But even with eight of us… That's not enough to guard, and fight, and harvest, and build, and…" she sighed and bit into her sandwich like it was her little brother and he'd just put salt in her shampoo again. "There's just not enough of us! These powers, they're supposed to support an empire, I think. And they're really strong and cool… But we don't have an empire. We barely have a cub-scout meeting."

"Could we conscript more of the local wildlife?" Matt asked, leaning against a rubble pile. "I mean, you have Hoolio. Could we get more? Maybe some predators, to help keep watch or something?"

"I don't think so," Liv wrinkled her nose. "Have you noticed? Everything that's brought us scrolls is little. There've been snakes and owls and stuff, but like, nothing that could legit pose a threat to us physically. I think the system has a strict set of rules about what animals can be used as messengers and what can't. And I'm not even sure if Hoolio is actually one of us now or if he's just along for the ride."

Matt opened his mouth to respond, but snapped it shut as a wave of soft golden light suddenly washed over them. He spun, his shield suddenly in his left hand and the strange sword Lucas had given him in his right, pulled from somewhere. Liv started, but then sat back and let out a breath.

"It's okay Dad. I think that light's from Mom, or Dinah, or Bel. It's the same color that comes from us when we activate a power."

"Does that mean something's happened?" Matt felt the weariness slough off, replaced by adrenaline again.

"I don't think so. That felt more like a searching power… Maybe Mom lit off one of her scout powers. She has a couple with her Consul ability. And anyways, if it was bad," she pointed at the radio on Matt's belt. "She'd call in, wouldn't she?"

"Right. Right." Matt sagged, relief opening the floodgates for weariness to come flooding back. "Should have figured that. Thanks Liv."

"Sure thing." Liv sighed and offered up the rest of her sandwich to the owl, who grabbed it greedily in its beak. "Maybe we need to check the boon list again. Dinah said she got one. Me and Luc and Bel probably do as well. Maybe something in there could be useful?"

"If we can figure out what they do with the translation thing still broken," Matt said, bolting down the rest of his sandwich and wiping his hands off on his pants. "That's a good idea Liv."

"Thanks." The word turned into a long yawn. "God I am so tired I could sleep for days."

"Who?" said Hoolio.

"Don't worry Hoolio," she said, patting the little blue owl on the head. "I'd make sure you were taken care of while I was asleep–"

She stopped and wrinkled her nose. "Hoolio." she sighed and tossed a sideways glare at Matt. "God, Dad, that is such a bad name."

"Nonsense," Matt said, turning back around and putting away his shield. "It's a perfectly fitting name. It reflects both his avian heritage and your own connection to latin america. Also he was tu abuela's favorite singer, so there's a familial connection too."

Matt tried to ignore the little hiccup in his gut at the mention of Olivia's grandmother. His mother. She lived in San Antonio these days, along with his dad. They weren't really present in his life anymore, but they'd been good grandparents to his kids, and they'd made a point of coming out every christmas…

And now he was never going to see them again.

He sucked in air through his nose and let it out slowly. Keep it together, man. Now was not the time to go all to pieces. Even though after everything that had just happened he felt like he was being held together with blue-tac and bailing wire.

Keep it together.

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Olivia stared at him for a long moment, mulling it over. Then she snorted and shook her head. "Nope. Sorry Dad, it's just a horrible horrible pun."

"She is right, you know. It truly is a horrible name."

Said the sword in Matt's hand.

Matt shrieked like a cheerleader on helium and jumped a foot into the air.

"Hail Caesar," said the sword, unconcerned and in a feminine voice. "And good greetings to you, Consul. I am Toraline, first of the Faeries Of Empire. Could you please explain to me why I appear to be trapped within an enchanted blade? Have the invaders been repelled? Has Caesar restored the council? I do not recognize your name."

Matt stared at the talking sword in his hand. His stares were copied and pasted by Olivia and now Lucas, who had woken up at Matt's shriek.

"Dad," Luc said in a faraway voice. "Did your sword just–"

"Talk? Yes, yes it did." Matt stared at the sword, now laying in the dirt where he had dropped it.

"Okay that is so cool." Liv swooped forward and grabbed for the sword–but this time Matt was faster, and he snatched up the hilt just before Liv's fingers could close over it.

"Hey!" Liv protested.

"No touching the possessed weapon," Matt said, keeping the sword out of her reach.

"I do not understand what is happening here. The last memory I have is of fighting against the invaders on the western shore–"

The sword stopped in mid-sentence, and Matt felt a strange tingling sensation suddenly encase the hand holding the sword. He yelped again but this time did not drop the weapon. Not with Olivia staring at it like a hungry wolf staring at a pork chop.

"You are Sojourners." The sword's voice was soft and considering.

"We're who?" Lucas asked, staring right along with everyone else.

"Who?" echoed Hoolio.

"Sojourners. Travelers from beyond the pale void, summoned by the workings of the System, like Mighty Caesar before you." There was a long pause, then the sword made a noise that Matt would have sworn sounded like a metallic sigh, tinged with sadness and longing.

"He is dead. Isn't he."

"Who?" said Hoolio.

"Who?" asked Lucas and Olivia together, although Olivia cut herself off halfway through and gave the owl a strange look.

"Caesar. Gaius Secundus. He who united the Seven Isles and the Lands Beyond under the rule of New Rome and the Pax Romana. Slayer of the Flatlands Beast, Vanquisher of Fort Despair, He Who–"

The sword stopped in mid-sentence again. And again, it gave a long sigh.

"I thought he would finally be the one," it said in a quiet, almost lost-sounding voice. "He had the power. He had the drive. He won. Until they conspired against him. Until… Tell me true, Sojourner. Does anything of New Rome still stand?"

Matt traded glances with his kids, then sighed and shook his head.

"I'm sorry… Toraline, was it? But we only, uh, arrived here a few days ago. We have no idea where we are or where this New Rome is."

"We stand upon its shores, of that I am certain", the sword said. "I can feel the power of my home, even in this form."

"Then it's probably gone," Olivia said finally, breaking her silence. "I'm sorry. It looke like it's been destroyed for a long time. At least, assuming these mounds around us were a part of New Rome?"

"I see." The sword was silent for a long moment. Then it vibrated, and Matt got the inner impression of someone collecting themself. "Then in that case, it is my duty, as it is the duties of all the Fairies of Empire, to take up the cause of the Sojourners we encounter."

"You're being awfully calm for someone who woke up and discovered they'd got themselves put into a talking sword," Lucas said.

"These things happen. Doubtless we shall find an enchanter on our journey with the skills to remove my consciousness from this weapon and place me back into my original body. Or some reasonable facsimile. In the mean time, please summon your Fairy Companion that we might discuss how I shall fit into your plans moving forward."

Matt blinked, and felt something deep in his gut start to churn just noticeably.

"We don't have a companion," he said slowly.

"Yeah," Lucas finally chimed in, apparently having gotten his full of sword-staring. "We asked for one and got a skeleton."

There was a long, sharp kind of silence.

"You have not been contacted by any of my clan?" There was a note of some emotion that Matt couldn't identify in the sword's voice–and wasn't that just a sentence he'd never expected to think.

"We were brought here in a storm, and the only thing that met us when we woke up was a giant crab," he said.

Olivia had been staring at the sword this whole time. And finally something clicked on her gaze. Her head whipped around and her eyes snapped to the skeleton of the tutorial fairy, still where it had fallen before all the madness had descended on them.

"Toraline, were you a tutorial fairy?" she asked Matt's sword.

"yes. The First of my clan has always guided sojourners when they arrive in Seroco. I guided Caesar upon his first steps in this world." there was another pause, and another sad sigh. "I truly believed he would be the last. I suppose it was not to be. But I do not understand why none of my clan has contacted you. We were bound to the system, not the empire. Even if Caesar fell, our duties should have continued."

"Oh." Lucas said, frowning. "I wonder if because the system is busted that the fairies couldn't get to us, or maybe didn't know we were here or something? Like how it doesn't translate everything right?"

"... What?"

Matt felt another tingling burst of sensation flow up his arm from the sword, and this time he was able to identify emotion in the burst. Alarm, and fear.

"The system is busted," Olivia said, grumbling under her breath. "It doesn't work at all like it should. I've been looking through the scrolls. A bunch of the classes have things like powers that can be used once per day, but there's nothing to power them except the coins, so there's all sorts of wonky workarounds I think it had to do. Like the animal messengers delivering system notifications, and–"

"What!?" The sword almost vibrated out of Matt's fist, and he tightened his grip and took a step back. The emotions pouring down the blade were naked and roiling now, and he wasn't at all sure that something bad wasn't about to happen.

"System messages are delivered via direct interface with a Sojourner's mind," Toraline continued in a slightly less manic tone. "What in the world are you talking about, 'animal messen–"

"Hoolio," Olivia said, holding out a hand. "Scroll me."

"Hoo!" A scroll slapped into her outstretched palm.

The sword fell silent as Olivia unfurled the scroll, text-side out. It was some kind of Forest Ranger class, from what Matt could see.

"No… That is impossible. There are no contingencies for such a thing. I have been a loyal servant of the System for dozens of years, as has my clan before me. And not once has this ever even been dreamt of much less witnessed. You are deceiving me. You must be."

"If it helps any, here's what we use for our powers now," Lucas said in an apologetic tone as he pulled out a coin from somewhere.

Again the sword fell silent for a long moment.

"That is a mote of power," it finally whispered. "How did you… Where did you…"

"We earn them by performing tasks and killing monsters," Matt said, breaking into the conversation once more. "You recognize it?"

"It is the lifeblood of the System. It is what sustains it, what allows it to grant powers… It is the raw power of the world, collected and harvested by Systems in order to power their abilities and their acolytes. But… It should be given to those connected to the System. Not if it is being collected and utilized properly. But if it is not being collected…"

More silence.

"Oh, my Lord, what did you do?" the sword whispered.

Before anyone could answer, the radio on Matt's belt crackled to life.

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