Hear that? Silence. That’s not a good thing around here.

Timeline/World: Through the Looking Glass – Atheria 2nd Generation
Current Date: January 22, 2059

Character: Milliardo Isaak
Race: Human
Age: 87, physically about 30
Current residence: Atheria City, Eresiel
 

---

Now and again, I head through the doors to help. This is a way of life I’ve had to learn about; I figure that most of us had to. I spent my whole life until we came here playing the bodyguard part, working the fields isn’t something I knew a single thing about. I mean, I knew about how food was grown, and I knew where it was coming from, but the action itself of working these fields, the land, and other such areas was new for me.

I figure that helping a little, even if they might not really need it, gives me a sense of purpose on those days when it makes sense to keep occupied. I never understood how retired folks could just, well, retire. My mind isn’t made to not have anything to focus on. I know that there’s plenty to do around but there are times when your mind doesn’t come up with anything you could be doing and that’s the part that I have some trouble with.

Whenever I head inside, I tend to check the system before I go in. I check to see which area might need help. I wonder if that’s a me thing, or if that’s just a general way of doing things for most of us who don’t work through those doors on something of a schedule. It gives me a chance to pick the proper attire to wear. I’m not going to be wearing the same things if I’m deep in the forest, foraging under the semi-dark of a thick canopy, or if I’m on flat land, either helping to herd cattle back to a particular spot or helping with crops of sorts.

On that particular outing, I was with a couple of the kids—I know they’re adults, but they’ll always be kids to me—in the forest. I’ve found it oddly soothing to be out there, foraging even though a lot of what we forage could be grown in greenhouses. There’s something about how it tastes when it’s from the wild—though that might just be me.

All the while I’m there, I can hear the sound of the fauna all around me. Chirping and singing birds, the sound of animals roaming around but at one point, oh, at one point, everything just went silent. It wasn’t gradual either—at least, I didn’t notice it happening gradually. One moment I’d located some of the herbs I was hunting to the accompanying song of the fauna, the next, it was dead silence and yeah, my head snapped up.

I wasn’t too far from the other two and we sort of just shared a look. Silence around these parts is never really a good thing. It usually means there’s a predator around and one big enough to frighten everything into silence. I don’t think that I can find it in myself to be afraid of predators, but I think that’s because I’ve never actually encountered one in the wild and that’s just my training giving me false bravery, I know. There’s no way I’d be able to fight off a bear or a big cat unscathed if I were to try, I’m sure.

We did the one thing that makes the most sense. We moved back towards the door as silently as we could. Avoiding confrontation with whatever had frightened the fauna into silence was the only smart thing to do. Had there been someone from the hunting team with us, things would have possibly been different, but I admit that this is one of the few things that I never actually thought to learn. The idea of hunting for food is foreign to me; not because I don’t understand how it works, but I’ve played a role all too similar to that of a hunter all of my life and I have absolutely no desire whatsoever to go back to that mindset if I can help it.

We got out of the area without even so much as a scratch and reported the potential issue into the system so no one else would accidentally drop in while whatever predator was out there still roamed. There was a notice about an hour later that the area was safe again, and since I still had a bit of time before I decided I was heading back home, I went back through, did a bit more foraging, got more herbs for the system and once my day was done, I went back home, I washed up, and that was that.

I did tell Ed about the event but seeing as none of us had been harmed in any way, shape or form—I still don’t know what predator it might have been—there was no real worrying to do about the whole thing.

Final Word Count: 804

I wouldn’t listen to the rumours about me. They’re true, of course, but who cares about such petty things?

Timeline/World: Until Tomorrow – New York City
Current Date: December 16, 2023

Character: Milliardo Isaak
Race: Human
Age: 40
Current residence: New York City Ruins, New York
 

---

I found myself a little under the weather recently and, with that in mind, I haven’t actually gone to help with the teams that roam to provide security. I felt bad about it for all of half a day when I was very kindly reminded by my loving other half that my brain was being idiotic, and I only went to help once or so a week at the most. They wouldn’t miss me if I didn’t show up that one or two times that I needed to stay at home to recover.

I did ask said wonderful, other half of mine to, at the very least, let them know that I wasn’t going to show. They may not be my employers and don’t have to know about my location every minute of every day, but if I were in their shoes, I think I would appreciate knowing that someone I’m expecting to come in for the day, will let me know if they can’t make it. Maybe I’m just old-fashioned like that.

I’m not even sure how I got sick, or what I got sick with. We all ate the same things, over the last day or so that we’ve all been together and I’m the only one of us four who got sick. It was pretty bad, though I’d still see it as only being a little under the weather. I’m prone to understating things when it comes to my health and Neji has gotten onto my case more than once about it. I can’t help it. I’m still used to putting everyone else first.

In a way, I feel as though it wasn’t all that bad, but I’ve been told that while I was in and out of sleep with what felt, to me, like a mild fever, I was told that I was mumbling in said sleep and I don’t know whether the mumbling came from what I might have been seeing in my sleep, or if I might not have been hallucinating.

I was reaching out to an unseen person during that time. Reaching out or pushing away, none of them seemed to be able to tell since I was alternating, possibly. I mumbled something about rumours, about how they shouldn’t have been listened to even if they might have been true because they were petty things and no one cared about petty things; at least, not these petty things.

Or, in any case, that’s the gist of what I’ve learned of what came out of my mouth during my downtime.

It all more or less just sort of happened, too. Went to bed feeling fine, but when morning came with the warm air and the sun through the blinds, I couldn’t deal with it. The sun, though still only just barely peeking in through our window was too harsh for my eyes and I felt clammy. In a strange way, I think I almost believed myself back in the dead of summer when we had that heat wave. It had been so much hotter than we’d had up until that point. We lost a good few crops since it actually got ridiculously dry until they figured out a new irrigation system and that’s what I felt like on that morning.

My mind is trying to supply me with the fact that it took Ed a bit of time to convince me that we weren’t back in that heat wave and that I was the one giving off too much heat. I remember waking up some hours later—it was the following morning, to my dismay—and the room was just so much darker, it was blissful. They’d somehow managed to get new, or as new as they were, curtains for the windows that offered more black-out cover than the old ones had. It was strange but wonderful for my still tender eyes and head, at that point.

It took me about a week. I spent another half-day in bed, able to sit up and talk quietly and just have a presence near me, but the rest of that week was spent recuperating. I couldn’t really even walk more than a few steps before my energy waned and I had to sit back down. I’ve never felt that kind of weakness before and it terrified me. It terrified me to the point that I’m pretty sure Neji had to dose me because I was panicking. At least, with my mind in a more relaxed state, I wasn’t panicking.

All in all, not a great week, would not recommend it. I still don’t know what led to this issue, whatever it was. I don’t know if it’s the food or just something that’s been going around but all I know is that the other three thankfully didn’t get it. I would have felt like shit they had because that would have meant that they’d gotten it from me, and I would have put myself right into the doghouse. After doing my best to nurse them back to health as necessary, of course.

Final Word Count: 846

Don’t know about you, but I desperately need some sleep. Let me use your lap as a pillow.

Timeline/World: Until Tomorrow – Foreign Songs
Current Date: February 22, 2023

Character: Milliardo Isaak
Race: Human
Age: 39
Current residence: London, England
 

---

I am more than aware that, at first glance, most people would think me very much so uptight, stuck-up, and whatever other terms they might wish to use that would let them sleep better at night, so long as it denotes that I am someone who doesn’t know how to relax.

When I first came here—or more aptly, before we came here, when we were joined by Shai and Eduardo—I very much so fit that description. I was stressed out; I now had two more people to keep safe and I was so exhausted by day’s end that I felt better just keeping to myself and trying to unwind in whatever way I could. Sleep was often elusive but I made do with what I had.

Now, it wasn’t as per my job description to worry about these two new additions but I made it my job nonetheless. Neji was fond of having Shai around and I wasn’t going to just let Eduardo fend for himself when he was now part of the tiny little circle that was my job. I know that there are plenty of arseholes out there who much prefer to only focus on a single person for their job but it was a foolish idea in my case.

Eduardo slowly managed to make his way through my defences but, on that same note, coming to live here helped my stress levels to go down. I still had to keep Neji and the others safe but the general environment of things was much safer than it had been out there and, in private, I learned to relax a lot more than I ever had before in life.

Now, in public, I’m very likely to still be seen as that one arsehole who’s too uptight for anyone’s good and you’d possibly be right about it while still being a little right but I don’t really care all that much.

I still remember Ed’s reaction the first time I allowed myself to really relax around him. The day had been fairly rough—but had ended up on a good note—and come evening, as we were settling down to sleep, I faintly recall mumbling something along the lines of how I desperately needed sleep and I mock-demanded he let me use his lap as a pillow.

This was before we’d moved to the big house, our sleeping arrangements weren’t great but we made do with what we had. Eventually, the boys moved into one of the bedrooms together and while I was not fond of the idea, I allowed myself to be talked into us moving into the other bedroom, so we weren’t sleeping in the living room, constantly pulling the couches out and then back in, come the following morning.

I don’t know that I can say where it came from, this behaviour. It isn’t all that often that I just decide I need to flop and use his lap as a pillow but on that one night; I think I just felt emotionally exhausted in ways I hadn’t really allowed myself to be before and I needed the comfort of his presence close, no real question asked.

It really was the beginning of all things for us, though, in the long run. I mean, we’d slowly been getting closer but I know that I still wasn’t really ready to open up completely to him. So that one was the beginning of the end of this aloof behaviour with him. Now, there still are days when I might be a little more work-focused and all but that’s usually only when we have to go beyond the stone walls that surround this place and I’ve learned to separate my private and rather personal life from my work life. I hadn’t had a personal life before we met these two, so it was a learning process.

Do I have any regrets as to the way my life has turned out? None whatsoever, not really. I don’t know that regrets will ever be part of this life. It was hard at first—as most lives tend to be—but we made our way, we met people that helped us along the way and this is where I think we’re meant to be. There will always be potential dangers to deal with but that’s just part of the life we’ve grown up in and I knew from a very young age what I was getting into. So I don’t think I’d want to change much of anything in my life at this point.

Final Word Count: 763

Do any of you ever listen to me? Everything’s on fire now.

 
Timeline/World: Until Tomorrow – Foreign Songs
Characters: Milliardo Isaak
Race: Human
Age: 38
Current residence: London, England
Final Word Count: 766 words
 

---

I don’t know that any of us will be able to forget this summer’s gathering; it went downhill from the beginning and I’m just honestly grateful that no one was hurt.

It was a fairly big thing of the likes that does seem to happen every summer since we’ve come to work here and live here. It usually draws in men and women of power with whom the Matsuya business has had, well, business with over the last year or two. The guest list isn’t usually that big but there still so happens to be a pretty big group since most of them come at least with one or two security people of their own.

The yard is as secure as it might ever be. The stone walls that surround the property are high and still in great condition and the security cameras cover most of the blind spots that could be had. Not that it’s my job to run security for this place, I’m mostly just still looking after Neji, which in turn, means Jonothan and very delightful Eduardo. I do help now and again as they might need and I don’t mind, though.

Security wasn’t the issue this summer. The caterers were. The meal theme this year was a bit more exotic than I had first expected and a whole pig was being slow-roasted over fire. Not even a suckling pig, this was a whole hog, and it took some work to get the setup done well.

Which, in the end, is what caused the issue.

The people hired to take care of the pig, the pit and the whole thing claimed to be professionals. Looking at the info they had found, it did seem to be the case, everything looked to be legitimate, and everything really should have turned out well. It’s only later on—after the whole issue—that it was learned that the people had sent rookies our way because their main man was out for the count.

Even as I watched them do their preparations, I was sure something was off. None of them—there were four—seemed to know exactly how to set up the pit quite so, they didn’t know how much charcoal to use, the whole thing. None of them seemed to really know what they were doing.

Still, we were told they were professionals and we let them do their things but even an untrained eye could tell that their setup was by far too close to everything else, it wasn’t secure enough to keep the charcoal from going everywhere and, well the list goes on.

Things went from almost all right to completely out of hand when one thing caught on fire, and it slowly started to spread. One of the four on the team shrieked—which got the attention of everyone else who was then asked to back away—and yelling followed from the shrieking one about how none of them ever listened to him and everything was now on fire.

An exaggeration to be certain but not an outright lie. The table where everything had been set to be used once the pig had been fully roasted was lit and everything on it that could catch was on fire.

In a way, I think that the only thing I’m thankful for, as far as this whole summer gathering is concerned, is that nothing actually exploded. They had brought a propane tank, as though somehow, they thought that the pig would be roasted on a propane grill and not by natural, charcoal means. That tank had been on the other side of the hog set up and was spared from the flames though they still kept it far too close to the pit for my liking.

The hog was a failure after it had to be doused to extinguish the trail of flames from it to the table but thankfully, the big bosses seem to always have a second option on hand—not the first time the meal options don’t turn out to be what they should—and after a bit of a scare and some laughing as people calmed down, food was had and that was that.

I wasn’t there for the talk that happened between the group of four that had come for the pig roasting and the big bosses. I would have given plenty to be a fly on that wall, though. If there is one thing I know, is that things for the gatherings have to go according to plan, otherwise, well it’s not exactly good for business, is it?

I know you’re trying to convince me it wasn’t my fault, but I don’t think you have all sides of the story.

 
Timeline/World: Through the Looking Glass – Atheria 2nd Generation
Characters: Milliardo Isaak
Race: Human
Age: 85, physically about 30
Current residence: Atheria City, Eresiel
Final Word Count: 716 words
 

---

I don’t know if it was lucky parenting or something else, but we’ve never really had to break up fights. Then again, with the kids being thirteen years apart, I suppose that might have been a given but there’s also the fact that neither one of them ever really got into big trouble, not really.

There’s no point in denying that when our oldest was in her tube, I picked up a fair few books on parenting. I’d been with Neji all of my life and kids of any age hadn’t really been all that common. I didn’t know what I was expecting, and I did want to be prepared.

Most of the parenting books I’d picked up were useless and I learned most of what I needed to know on the get-go.

One such book talked about bad behaviour in kids and, in a way, it’s one of those things you hope you never had to deal with because you just want your kids to be good kids and our kids were great kids.

Even though it feels like forever ago at this point, I still remember reading up about how to not play favourites and how to break up fights in a calm manner and I recall just rolling my eyes and shaking my head a little. Then again, I suppose it’s just a matter of logic that you should try to hear both sides of the stories when you’re dealing with a situation like that, but I was raised with that mindset, so I didn’t need that kind of tidbits.

It’s not always easy but I do always try to listen to both sides of the stories before I point a finger and blame anyone or anything and, you know, most of the time, there’s no point in laying the blame because the person that might have been at the source of the whole issue already feels pretty bad about it all. I mean, it’s just one of those things.

I might have chucked that particular book into the fireplace after I’d skimmed only a few of the pages. Had it been something I’d snagged from the library I certainly wouldn’t have done that but on the cover wrap-around, it very clearly stated that these copies were printed on order and could be recycled. Dumping it into the fire was one way to recycle it, as I see it. Yes, I’m well aware that I could have sent it back and it would have been broken down and all the rest and I could have saved a tree and oh just cry me a river.

Every single thing that is on printed paper comes from an area where usage is controlled and where the trees are grown exactly for that purpose. We don’t waste here; I honestly can’t recall the last time I put a trash bag out to the street to be picked up. So don’t bother getting on my case about throwing a perfectly good book into the fireplace when I knew it was that or back into the machine. Both options were perfectly viable.

So no, for as much as I can remember, I don’t know that I’ve ever had to sit either of the kids down for them to tell me their sides of the story so that I could get the other side of that same but different story from someone else. I consider that we were pretty lucky in that regard, as I know, that there were a fair few kids with behavioural issues and, well, it’s one of those things.

Though, I’m not going to lie, I might very well have also let Ed do most of the reading that we’ve had to because I have a hard time focusing on what I read when I do start reading. It all jumbles together in my brain and it makes no sense. I don’t have issues with the reading itself but keeping everything in nice and neat lines is just something I can’t manage when it comes to the written word so I don’t try half as hard as I know I could. There’s no point in frustrating myself into a pit of despair.

Recipe books though, those are something else entirely and I’m glad for that.

I’m constantly battling the urge to stay up, because I love sleep, but I’m not tired when I need to be.

 
Timeline/World: Until Tomorrow – New York City
Characters: Milliardo Isaak
Race: Human
Age: 38
Current residence: New York City Ruins, New York
Final Word Count: 733 words
 

---

With life as it is now, I don’t know that anyone really has a schedule anymore. I mean, I think that, for the most part, people tend to get up when there’s sunlight outside and they go to sleep when they’re tired or it’s dark out. It’s what makes the most sense. I know I still tend to usually get up with the first few rays of sunlight that crawl their way into our bedroom and I settle to sleep when I’m done with my day and I know I need rest.

I’m not even sure if there still is a working clock anywhere, at least, not out of the bunker. There still are computers out there but working clocks? I don’t know that there’s a point. Usually, it’s mostly just a ‘meet me up at X spot in Y-ish minutes’ or when the sun’s at that spot in the sky or something. People have adapted. At least, I’d like to think that people have adapted but maybe I’m wrong and we’re just a completely lost cause.

You can’t expect people to be ‘on time’ anymore when ‘on time’ isn’t really a thing. That’s how I see it.

Every so often, I help with the teams that roam through the streets and patrol the edges of the hub. It gives me a sense of purpose to help them, and it doesn’t really stress me out much.

Twice now, though, I’ve been paired up with this kid—he can’t be much older than early twenties and that makes him a kid to me—who just has a hard time keeping up. It’s not that I’m walking quickly and that we’re running a marathon but every time we start walking, he starts complaining about how he’s constantly battling the urge to stay up because he just loves sleep, but whenever he knows he needs to sleep, he’s just not tired.

It makes me roll my eyes a little, but I’ve refrained from telling him about what I think of the whole thing because I’ve been in worse situations and I live by the statement of when there’s a will, there’s a way and that’s all there is to it. I’ve had to switch my sleeping schedule around often as I was growing up and while it takes effort and willingness, it wasn’t that hard but I’m also a very stubborn person and I rarely let anything get in my way.

So during both of these times, I’ve had to slow down my pace, wait for him to catch up and just all around wait until he was done complaining that he’s just so tired he could sleep right then but he wanted to help so he couldn’t. I told him to just leave that first time, I couldn’t help it. He wasn’t doing me any favours, if nothing else, he was doing me a disfavour at that point and I don’t work so well with that, not when I’m doing this because I can and not because I have to anymore.

I mean, if you look at it from another angle, just sleep when you’re tired, wake up when you’ve rested enough and find something to do with your awake time that works with that schedule because it’s clear that he’s not going to be able to get his sleeping schedule under control, not really. I know kids like that, they’d much rather be complaining about everything that surrounds them instead of actually working on fixing the problem because the former is just so much easier in the long run.

After the second time, I did make a request to not pair me up with the kid if it was at all possible. They didn’t ask to know why, and I can appreciate that they seem to know better than to pry. It’s not like I’m unreasonable, I figure that I have a right to be paired up with someone who can do the rounds without causing any issues to the person they’re paired up with.

Who knows, maybe I’m not the first one to request to not be paired up with him and if enough of us bring it up, he might get shifted to another group. I think that would possibly be what works out for the best in the long run, but beggars can’t be choosers though we certainly can try.

Clearly, I’m no match for your wit. Surely that’s why you didn’t notice me snagging your wallet. You’re not getting it back.

 
Timeline/World: Through the Looking Glass – Atheria 2nd Generation
Characters: Milliardo Isaak
Race: Human
Age: 84, physically about 30
Final Word Count: 660 words
 

---

I’ve never had to deal with petty thievery. I don’t know if it comes from the area where we grew up or the fact that I was enough of a deterrent to keep exactly that, petty thieves, away from us. I suppose it could be a little bit of both. The place where I got my training, from as young an age as possible, was in a good neighbourhood. It was a rich neighbour that had more security detail than not.

After we left that place, we went to some unsavoury places but I truly don’t recall ever once—not even during the dark years—having to deal with some pick-pocket who thought their reflexes might have been better than mine. Not once. Helpful to that fact was the point that I never had my wallet on my person in a place that was easy to each or open to grabby fingers and I always had Neji do the same.

With that in mind, is it possible that, yes, some curious and fast fingers might have tried to cop a feel in pockets to find something worthy of their attention but didn’t find anything in the end? I suppose it might be.

Books are weird. I’m not often one to settle down and read, I never had much time to myself as I grew up for that kind of thing so even now, with this old life behind me and more of that new life before me, I don’t read as much as I’m sure I could. I don’t really get how people can just devour their way through books as quickly as I know some do, it baffles me. I get bored within an hour of beginning to read, even if the book has my attention. Reading word after word after word just wears my sight down to nothing comfortable and I have to pause anyway, so that might be it.

One of the more recent books I picked up to try and read—and yes, I’ve tried audiobooks but I find them to be even more distracting than trying to read a regular paper or electronic book—was about an unlikely friendship between a pickpocket and some heroine out on a quest. I got far enough in the book—two, three chapters in?—that the pickpocket had managed to snag the wallet from the heroine’s pocket and he was taunting about how, clearly, he was no match for her wit, so that was why she hadn’t noticed him snagging her wallet and that no, she wasn’t getting it back.

I guess I sort of just stopped there because, for one thing, pickpocketing is still a crime and taunting someone who could likely report you for that crime seems to be pretty stupid and, well, the premise of the book had seemed interesting but in those three chapters so far, I hadn’t even gotten a hint of what could have been. So I put it down, shrugged at it and told myself that maybe, in a few more days or weeks, I would give it another look but I wasn’t holding my breath.

Maybe that’s something else about reading, so often, I pick something up based on the synopsis either on the back or the inner flaps and just, so often I don’t really get that from what I begin to read and as I can only read so much before I have to stop, it’s never a win-win situation for me. I’ve lost count of how many books I’ve started reading but never finished, the number of the ones I have finished is so minimal—for my age, it feels like—that it is very much so unbalanced but what can I do about it, truly? Not much, that’s why.

I try, it doesn’t pan out, it gets added to the pile of things that just will not be and I focus on other things, instead.

I can’t trust anyone with this intel, but…It’s you, so I’m sure nothing too bad can happen if you have it.

 
Timeline/World: Until Tomorrow – Foreign Songs
Characters: Milliardo Isaak
Race: Human
Age: 37
Final Word Count: 781 words
 

---

It took two years before the boys seemed ready to give the whole ‘play date’ another try. I suppose I shouldn’t have been very surprised. They still don’t spend all that much time around others their age. They do spend time at school—a private and very safe school—but they don’t mingle much that I’ve heard of.

So sure, now and again, the adults will gather together for meetings of sorts and the kids will be in another room together, just doing what kids do. I wander between the two; neither is part of my assignment but I roam the halls much the way the regulars of the Matsuya security group do. I know Neji is safe where he’s at, so it only makes sense to help elsewhere.

Of the parents that came, two came with their own small security detail—two guards each—and while they did need to be frisked, they’re allowed to keep track of their own bosses while the meeting is taking place. One of the two guards that came with a woman whose connection to the host is lost to me is actually keeping an eye on the kids. It might be one of the reasons why I roam back and forth between the two rooms. It’s not that I don’t trust the guard—well, no, I don’t but that’s beside the point—but it’s just that I feel better knowing the Matsuya guard isn’t on his own with the woman’s own; even if that guard is a woman. I think that might actually be why I don’t trust them together. The woman seemed far too eager to head to the kid’s side once she knew who was watching over them.

It’s temporary, though, I know. This guard is new on the family’s team and I’ve yet to decide if I like him or not. He seems to be good with kids but he’s just so easily distracted that I don’t think he’ll last long here.

When I’d last walked back to the room the kids were in, the two guards were side by side—and I mean that just about literally, they were pressed up side by side and she was leaning in to whisper to him—but I stayed by the door, I only watched them for the time being. For one thing, I didn’t wear the Matsuya colours nor the set uniform. Mine looked similar but was different enough that most didn’t see me as a threat.

It was when she giggled at him—giggled!—that I cleared my throat and they jumped apart as though they’d been caught doing they shouldn’t have. I shook my head and, as I saw David coming up to take over the watch of the room, I pulled the guy aside and walked with him. I wouldn’t have been surprised if David had noticed the flaky behaviour of the guy and had decided to take over; last I’d known, he hadn’t been expected to step out from the security room.

As we walked, the guy told me that the other security officer had been a girl he’d once spent time with and the way he’d nudged my shoulder with a grin playing over his lips, as though letting me in on a secret, let me know just what kind of ‘spending time together’ they’d done. I told him that he had to stay focused on the task at hand; otherwise, he never would keep his job here. The first priority was the safety of the kids and he hadn’t even been paying attention.

He went on with a shrug, told me that she’d been about to tell him intel of sorts that she couldn’t trust anyone else with. She’d even somehow told him that since it was him, she was sure nothing too bad could have happened to that intel if she’d told him. That one did make me roll my eyes, she’d pretty much just insulted him and somehow, he hadn’t seen it. She’d pretty much just called him a non-threat but his loins clearly had other ideas in mind.

I don’t get kids but I suppose that’s because I’ve just spent so much time just training, even when I was his age, that I was more focused than he could ever be.

After our little walk, I brought him back to the kids’ room but the shake of David’s head clued me in enough that I walked him to the main room instead. I stayed with him, once there, not trusting him much but the rest of the day went by without a hitch.

I still don’t think he’ll be here very long.

See, if you really wanted me to believe you’re friendly, you’d drop the knife.

 
Timeline/World: Until Tomorrow – New York City
Characters: Milliardo Isaak
Race: Human
Age: 37
Final Word Count: 692 words
 

---

I never imagined my life as being something that I could call ‘peaceful’. As someone who knew from a very young age that I was being trained to act the part of bodyguard, peace just wasn’t part of the equations that made up my life. Calm, perhaps for a few hours but never truly relaxed; on the look-out; keeping my mind clear of all things that could have made me unable to give my boss my one hundred percent. A lot of people might like to say that I had a stick up my arse and they could be right.

The thing is, they have no idea what kind of life I’ve had to live up until that point and to be honest, it’s none of their business if they didn’t like me. I didn’t trust easy and I’m sure anyone who knew what I did for a living and how long I’d been doing it could understand why I was the way I was.

The thing is, now that the world has changed and has been changed for years; now that we’ve stared over and just have ‘restarted’ our lives to a point, I’ve somehow managed to reach what people would call a peaceful mindset. It’s not all that common but it’s gotten easier with passing days, weeks and months.

At least, up until this morning when I came face to face with some random stranger brandishing a knife. He claimed he was protecting himself; I’d like to claim bullshit. The few others who were around when he showed up, waving that knife, backed away near immediately but I stood my ground. I was as relaxed as I could look to be but you know, looks can be deceiving.

The guy claimed he was friendly, that he really was just looking out for himself but he was slurring his words—I don’t even know where anyone can get alcohol here anymore—and he still was waving his knife and someone tried to stammer out that if he truly was friendly, he wanted any of us to believe he was friendly, he’d drop the knife.

Not surprisingly, that only made him angrier and he started ranting and rambling some more. That got everyone else to back away even further but it only ended up throwing me right back into the days of what my life was before all of this snow started. I won’t bore anyone with any of the details but let’s just say that it didn’t take long before he was disarmed, still cursing up a storm—even worse now—and had his hands bound behind his back with some good and strong natural rope.

Someone came to get him to the cells that don’t really get much use other than for things exactly like this and well, I haven’t kept track of him. I’d managed so much progress in leaving this part of me behind and it had taken me years, I don’t want to go back to how I was before. I don’t want to go back to waking up at the drop of a pin; I don’t want to think that everyone is out to hurt those I need to keep safe, I don’t want to live my life this way, not anymore.

It’s no way to live a life. I know I’ve never had a childhood or teenagehood or whatever you want to call. My whole life has been nothing but training to be what I became and then doing exactly what I was training for. This snow, this end of the world, it was a second chance at life and I refuse to let that be taken away from me. It’s going to take some time for me to be able to let go of the new frustrated focus that comes from the recent issue but I know I’ll manage.

I know Ed is going to be patient with me as he has been from the near get-go and things will go back to being all right. I just need time. I need patience. I need him to help me let go.

I was going to wish you the best of luck, but you don’t really deserve it.

 
Timeline/World: New York City – Surviving Earth
Characters: Milliardo Isaak
Race: Human
Age: 36
Final Word Count: 675 words
 

---

Some people are arseholes. I don’t think it can be seen in any different light, it’s just as it is.

We’ve been seeing a lot of people coming back into the hub over the last couple of years, it’s as though people know something is happening, it’s an innate thing though I wouldn’t even really be able to tell what that ‘thing’ that’s happening is.

There’s plenty of room in the hub, I’m sure it looks quite different from what it used to be but the folks who worked on cleaning things up and on making sure everything was as functional as it could ever be, have done a seriously great job.

I’ve tried my hands at most things, once Neji had convinced me that I didn’t really need to play the bodyguard part anymore. I still keep him safe, I still make sure he’s fine but, in the long run, he’s right. The world isn’t as it was anymore and I don’t need to be overprotective of him anymore. Not in the way I’d been. To me, he’ll always be the young man—family—who grew up needing a guard dog at his side, that won’t change. I’ve just learned to let go a little.

Now, as more people have been coming into the hub, some have actually decided to leave. I don’t understand why. It’s not as though we’re running out of room or we’re beginning to pile people on top of one another; there still are so many open areas, so many buildings that were fixed up but have lain dormant, waiting for someone else to come around, that housing these people shouldn’t even be an issue.

Lately, I’ve been helping with one of the hunting teams, it’s been a strange change of perspective for me but I’ve adapted to it. They approached me because someone else on their team had packed up and left like the few others who were doing the same. I figured it likely couldn’t hurt to give it a try and I’ve been at it since.

The oddity, however, is that on the first day, someone else from the team said they were transferring elsewhere, so they weren’t so much leaving the hub as going into another team, which I took to mean that they would likely be bringing someone else in. The man who left took a moment to speak to each old co-worker one-on-one, but when he stopped in front of me, he gave me this head-to-toe look, like he was trying to make sense of what he was seeing and he only told me that he had been about to wish me the best of luck, but that I didn’t really deserve it.

Consider me confused.

I looked after him as he left, a few of the guys who had been closer seemed to be as confused but they told me to ignore him, that he had always been grumpy and a bit of an ass and that he had no filter.

So I let it be, sure. What else could I do? Mulling over it wouldn’t have done me any good and I wasn’t going to go off after him, chasing him around, to get him to tell me why he thought I didn’t deserve to be wished the best of luck. If he’d said that I didn’t look like I needed it, it would have been one thing, but to be told that I didn’t deserve it is something else altogether. I don’t even know the man, that he judged me with just one look is stupid.

Of course, true to myself, I’ve done my best to let it go but it still bugs me a bit now and again, when it surfaces, I mull it for a bit and then make myself put it back to the little locked room in my mind until the next time it manages to sneak out. It’ll bug me for a while, I know, but there’s nothing I can do about it.