Vekrem and I spent the next few days in a room above the tavern. It was cramped, but no more cramped than a damn living room couch, I’ll tell you that. At least I had a bed… of sorts. More like an itchy blend of wool and hay.

  The human who ran the tavern was a servant of Vhol’s named Bron, and the big man eyed us curiously whenever we came and went, as if we were inherently to be distrusted. Likely he was spying on us, but the man had the subtlety of a sledgehammer.

  Ignoring his prying eyes, I used the time allotted to me to study the city of Silverock. I found it to be a place of beauty, with its glowing mushrooms that fit so perfectly with the architecture that you’d have assumed all towns were built that way. Yet, I found that underneath the outer layer of elegance and glamor, there was sickness. A rot… and I wasn’t just talking about the Radiant Rot, a disease that plagued many of the humans who lived there. Everywhere I turned, I seemed to find some sort of injustice. Human servants beaten for ‘offenses’ done. Ostracized and abandoned for becoming sick or old. If it weren’t for disease, I’m sure the rodrant’s would leave their corpses just lying in the streets, as if their deaths were worth little more than trash to be discarded.

  I made a promise to Vekrem that I’d not interject, and, although I wanted to break that promise so many times, I held true to it…

  Until the day I could no longer.

  I’d gone into the market using the lie that my ‘master’ had ordered me to pick up some fruit. More than once I wanted to knock some rat teeth in as the residents treated me as less than garbage. Checking the local fare, I’d discovered that while some fruit was similar to my own from Earth, they had a vast assortment of food I’d never imagined before. I often picked out some that looked interesting or smelled good, and made my way through the busy and loud streets back to the tavern, distinctly ignoring the street where they held the live auctions.

  I never wanted to see that again.

  Instead, I turned down an alley, then another and another, and before I knew it, I’d become lost, circling around until I came to a dead end.

  It was at that time I heard a sound.

  Great… I’m about to be mugged in another world. I just have the best luck.

  But surprisingly, nobody came for me. That noise I heard just became louder and louder until I could no longer ignore what I knew.

  It was the sound of a woman in distress.

  “Leave it be,” Dragon smoldered in my mind, and, I admit, I almost listened. Then I heard it; a sound that nobody should ever hear. A noise that I myself had made before in the darkest parts of my life.

  The sound… of acceptance.

  Whoever this was, their cries were so ignored, so inconsequential, that they didn’t even feel the need to cry them out any longer. No longer desired to scream out to a careless, cold world.

  My fucked-up sense of justice just couldn’t quite handle that.

  I listened for the soft sobs as I searched every nook and cranny of the winding alleyway until eventually I came upon a group. Three humans—two men and a woman—stood above another who was shrouded in darkness.

  Considering how quiet it was, it was no surprise when my loud footsteps were immediately noticed. One of the men turned to me, a smile on his chubby face as he approached.

  My muscles stiffened, and I expected violence, but instead, he merely clapped me on the shoulder. “So glad to see you aren’t the guard, friend.”

  I shrugged his hand off, gripping the cloth ‘bag’ I’d used to carry the fruit as I slung it off my neck. Looking towards the figure on the ground, I still couldn’t see if they were hurt as they lay motionless on the floor.

  The chubby man gave me an odd look, but I turned to him, forcing a smile as I asked, “What’s going on here… ‘friend?’”

  The man returned my smile, showing yellowish teeth, and a rank smell wafted from the depths of his mouth and through wide gaps. “Nothing that concerns you,” he replied. “Now… why don’t you just fuck right off, and there’ll be no trouble for ya.’ Besides… you don’t wanna get involved. See that—” he pointed to the shrouded figure with a long, crooked finger that had clearly been broken before, “that’s what happens to little thieves.”

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  “I stole nothing!” a woman replied. Then she screamed as one of the others stomped hard down on her leg.

  I strode forward, but the chubby man put his hand back on my shoulder, holding me more firmly this time. “Didn’t ya’ here what I said—”

  My fist clenched as I cracked the man square in the jaw, dropping the fruit I’d bought earlier to the filthy ground. He stepped back, slipping on one fruit, his foot sliding out, and compromising his balance. Wasting no time, I struck him again—

  And again!

  And Again!

  Before I knew it, I was pummeling down on that fat fuck’s face with everything I had, my arms getting tired from the effort. In his features, I saw every person who’d ever mistreated me. I saw my stepfather. I saw the muggers in the alleyway. I even saw Gary, even though he wasn’t as bad as the others. Fuck it, I gave Gary a slug too.

  When I finally drew back, my hands hurt, the skin of my knuckles rubbed raw. The chubby man spat blood, sucking in air through swollen lips. His eyes were swollen shut. I rubbed his blood off my hands with the front of my pants, leaving red smears in the fabric.

  The other two, a man and a woman, took up positions, surrounding me. I took up a boxer’s stance, both fists clenched, protecting my head.

  Dragon whispered in my mind, “You’ve really done it—Lookout!”

  I didn’t see the man swing, but I more so felt it. Instead of withdrawing, I stepped back into him, throwing an elbow which caught him in the stomach. He gasped, and I felt spit hit the back of my head as he violently exhaled. Stepping forward, I turned at the same time, using the momentum to swing my arm in a haymaker. I struck the blow to the side of his head, and I felt cartilage break. He fell face first to the urine-caked floor, and I couldn’t tell if he still breathed as he laid still.

  Time slowed, and I let my senses take over my body, just as I’d done before. Without seeing, I turned, reaching out, and caught the woman’s wrist with my hand. With my other, I punched forward, catching her straight in the nose. Blood exploded as her nose broke, and she let go of the knife, which she had held an inch from my ribs. Looking down, it was a small knife, barely able to be called one at all.

  The woman covered her nose, as if she were trying to staunch the bleeding—

  It didn’t work.

  “Fffuck yyyou!” she exclaimed while stepping backwards towards the alleyway exit, never taking her eyes off me. “You’re so fucking dead. Dead!”

  She turned and ran before I could come up with a witty reply.

  “Yeah well… Go fuck yourself!”

  It wasn’t my best work, but it would do.

  Shrugging, I looked at the two men on the floor and decided they weren’t worth it, instead turning my focus on the woman who was still laying in the shadows.

  As I approached, she rose, and dusted herself off, stepping into the light. She was early to mid-twenties, had tanned skin, with light amber eyes. Her hair, dark and long, drifted down her back where it was met with ragged servant garbs. Most interestingly, she had some type of marking, which she kept hidden from me by keeping her head turned a certain way.

  She stepped up to me, pointing a slender finger into my chest accusatorially. “What did you do?”

  “Saved you… I think?” Unsure of myself, I scratched the back of my head. “Did I save you?”

  “Idiot!” she replied with some bite, kicking me in the shin as she did. I hobbled back indignantly, but she continued, “You’ve killed us both if we don’t run. Now! Hopefully they won’t remember my face. Or yours. Actually, if they remember yours, it’ll give me cover.”

  “I can just kill them,” I suggested, looking at the chubby man who was still conscious. At my utterance, he squirmed, but was still too injured to recover just yet. At the woman’s expression of horror, I amended, “I’m just kidding… They aren’t worth the trouble.”

  She relaxed a bit, but grabbed my coat and pulled. Suddenly, I found myself running, following her out of the winding back-ends and into a crowded street. Looking around, as if trying to gather her bearings, she shot off again at a sprint. I considered just going back to the tavern, but curiosity got the better of me as I gave chase.

  The rodrant commoners gave me dirty looks while the humans stepped aside, not wanting to become involved in whatever trouble I brought. Smart of them.

  It wasn’t long before we came upon a small shop at the corner of a nameless street. She put her hand to the door but, deciding against it, jumped a small fence into the back. I followed, ripping a small piece from my pant leg as I did. There, she opened a window and climbed inside.

  I stood, and deciding against it, I turned to leave, but she suddenly came back, saying, “Hurry, idiot—come in!”

  That was the second time she’d insulted me. But still curious, I did as she demanded, climbing in through the small window and falling a short distance to the ground and landing square on my back. Dust wafted in the air as I recovered. I coughed into the back of my hand.

  An older man walked into the room to check on the commotion, but before he said a word, someone at the door we’d just opted not to use knocked furiously.

  A voice rose above the loud bang bang bang of wood. “Silverock Sentinel’s,” they said. “Open the door now, or we’ll break it down.”