Fall.

It seemed early in the morning, which probably meant she was still out training or had decided to sleep in. He wasn’t that sure. Battlefire still racing through his veins, he quickly got to his feet, swishing himself all over with cooling restorative water which, thankfully, did not freeze on him. The adrenaline started to fade as quickly as it had arrived, the taste of copper leaving his mouth. Eyes looking beyond forward, he turned and walked away.

He left the area without leaving a note or any kind of notification, leaving the hallway outside of Miss Mercury’s room wet, cold, and slightly reddish. By the time he arrived back at his room, his breathing was a bit heavy and focusing was a little more difficult than normal.

He closed the door and tried to sit down, falling onto his stomach instead. In a strained groan he called out. “Ahab,” He raised his voice slightly, “Ahab are you okay?”

“Ish hobbabere.” Came a muffled angry voice from the ball of jacket.

“What? I can’t hear you.” There was a bit of a slur in his words.

“I SAID IT’S HOT IN HERE,” Ahab burst out of the heated jacket and flew around the room. A normal flying squirrel was only capable of sustained gliding but Ahab was, in more ways than one, quite unusual, “That guy said it was a messenger job so I fell asleep. I was asleep! I was asleep and then it was freezing cold and then we were in here an— Tsubasa are you bleeding???”

His hoodie had been cleaved in twain by the bear’s attack, even leaving a sizable gash along his back. Had he not created the ice shield before diving, the claws might have bifurcated him vertically.

“Oh good. You’re okay. Okay. Good. I’m fine,” He murmured, “There are gonna be coagulants. I just need a second to sleep,” The waters of his own healing had warmed him up and staved off any immediate damage from the ice, it seemed, but his healing magic wasn’t enough to heal the damage to his back. He was nowhere near that talented with healing magics. It was fine though, now that he’d gotten back here. He closed his eyes and relaxed. Thank goodness he was back at the guild house, because it was nice and warm here.

Ahab, on the other hand, dropped down to the ground and grabbed at Tsubasa by the collar. “You can’t do that, dummy! Get up!!” Was the last thing Tsubasa heard before he took a little nap.

Meanwhile, Ahab hadn’t given up. He tried to pull Tsubasa back up and, when that failed, he slapped him once or twice. Usually that was enough to wake him up. However, he didn’t seem to snap to, which caused the little squirrel to panic. Ahab had never had a problem with his size before, he had always just figured the world was larger than it should be. But now, being unable to pick up his best buddy, he suddenly felt so... small.

“Come on you— Don’t… AUGH!!” He took a few steps to take flight again, stumbling over the suddenly dirty floor. He looked around him and realized that everything in Tsubasa’s hoodie pockets had spilled out all over the ground. The magic woven into it had been undone when it had finally split in half as the boy hit the ground.

In a moment of shock he did his best to stuff them back in, including a letter that had been stored in the other jacket. Whatever, he’d probably just misplaced it. Everything went back in the hoodie where it was supposed to be. And then Tsubasa woke up. He shoved the young man. And then Tsubasa woke up. He shoved him again. Nothing.

With a frustrated grunt he took flight and went towards the door. It was closed. Great. He landed on the door knob and tried to move it. Again, nothing. It weighed like three hundred pounds. He jumped on it a few times and it barely budged.

With a groan he took flight and flapped his way up to the ceiling then nosedived down onto the door knob. He grabbed it just as he passed it and forced it open with the combined momentum. “Help!!” He shouted, flapping his way back up to eye level. “Somebody—“ By horrifying chance, it was the old professor man that seemed to be passing through the hallway. He looked at the flying rat, turned his nose up and left, “W-wait!!” Ahab called, “Tsubasa’s hurt! He’s in his room and he’s hurt and you have to do something!!”

He stopped and looked at the little green menace, “Oh please if he’d come through the foyer someone would have seen him. I’ll not have any of your antics.”

“Please!!” Ahab said, attempting to pull him towards the room.

“Enough! I’m busy!” He turned to leave.

Ahab looked at the retreating man then back at the room. No one else was coming. There is a time when a flying green squirrel must do what he must do. He dropped down on the Professor Staff Man, stole his glasses and flew back at top speed towards Tsubasa’s room. There, he dropped the glasses next to the young man as he landed atop his head, arms splayed out in a ‘See??’ gesture.

The stuffy guild staffer came in a moment later looking to clean house. “WHY Y— COME HERE YOU DIRTY GREEN—“ His eyes fell upon the scene and he let out a quiet “oh my…”


Tsubasa woke up an indeterminate amount of time later, sitting in one of the resting beds in the infirmary. In a chair beside him was Ahab, who was curled into a ball sleeping on the remains of his hoodie. There was, it seemed, a small sewing needle and thread alongside the hoodie, which looked as though tiny hands had tried their very best to stitch it back up. An impractical job for others, an impossible job for him. But it seemed that it hadn’t stopped the little squirrel from trying.

Stuffed inside the pockets, like a squirrel having hidden nuts, were a fair amount of the belongings that had been stored within. Notebooks, energy drinks, a few extra cameras and snacks. Barely hanging from the pocket was the letter he had gotten from the Doctor, that he had been instructed not to open until this was all over. How had it gotten there? He quietly reached over and picked it up, examining it. It had been made out to him, strangely enough. He flipped it over and found that it had, quite literally, been sealed with a kiss. Lipstick coated the seal. He slid his finger underneath, opening it with a horizontal movement across the seal.

Hey kid,

I rewrote this when I met you. I’m not sure why. You looked like the kind of hero I needed at the moment. Maybe I’ve been in here too long. If the portal orb works properly, it should send you to a place you feel comfortable inside the guild hall, so hopefully you don’t end up in the ladies’ baths or something. I know where I’m sending you is dangerous, but I have no doubts that you’ll be able to get the Gem of Space and get back to the guild house with it. It’s half of what I need. If you remember what I told you. What I will tell you. What I will have told you. I’m trapped in a bubble outside of Time and Space. You guessed right. I need you to help me find something called the Gem of Time and bring both back to me. There might be a ritual or something that can let me store the excess time and space… energy, I guess is the best way to say it, that has accumulated within those two gems. I relied too much on the science side of magical technology to get me to this point, but it seems like the magic side might be the thing that brings me back. Figure it would be the thing I’m weaker with.

I’ve got a place for you to start. You’ll have to leave Fiore, but since you just came back from another planet, I think you won’t mind that. Search for everything you can find on a place called The Temple of Tears in Enca. The sooner you help me the better. The latest version of me wrote this and I’m on day 12,233. I’ve watched my entire movie collection six hundred times and I think I worked out the entire line of succession down to some kid who lives in Cedar. Help me.

Sincerely,
Mie Hasegawa

PS: If I end up trying to put the moves on you, I’m sorry. I’m so thirsty here.

He looked at the note and turned it over, closing it up and setting it back inside the envelope. Tsubasa took a deep breath, which hurt a bit but was manageable. It seemed as though whatever magic had been done to heal it had done its job, leaving just the aches remaining. As he sat in the bed looking at the envelope then at his jacket, his breath turned into a sigh. He reached over and skritched Ahab’s ear, causing the little squirrel to half open-one eye.

“Tsu? You're okay?”

“I'm okay,” Tsubasa said with a nod, “Just thinking that we’ve got a lot of stuff to do.”