Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

I

“Let your thoughts in, man. Even if you don’t wanna be alone with ‘em, you gotta let yourself acknowledge that they’re there. Let ‘em in, let yourself process them, and let ‘em go. It won’t stop them from being there, but it’ll help you worry less.”

Finn’s concentration was momentarily broken as a loud buzzing made its way into his right ear. He didn’t open his eyes, but he did raise an eyebrow at the strangeness of the sound. He’d been living out in the forest long enough to tell most of its animals by sound, but this particular buzzing had him drawing a complete blank. It sounded louder and more aggressive than anything he had heard before, and he detected hints of an almost guttural undertone to it. The part of his mind that had risen from the calm waters of his meditation told him that he should probably investigate the noise, and he decided that the best course of action would be to start by opening his eyes. Which he did, just in time to see an arrow whiz over his shoulder, barely two inches from his neck, and pin the bee that had been hovering there to the nearest tree.

Or at least he thought it was a bee. It definitely wasn’t a normal one, nor was it any kind he’d ever seen. It was easily at least the size of his ear and appeared to have three stingers protruding from its rear end, with wings that looked and flapped more like a bat’s than a bee’s. Or more accurately they beat out a last few desperate flaps before sagging to the sides as the bee gave what sounded like a final raspy breath before giving up entirely, the only movement now its yellowish blood dripping to the grass below.

“You were totally gonna let it sting me, weren’t you?” he said with a smile, not turning his head as the arrow pulled itself from the tree and whooshed back over his shoulder to its sender. “Because that felt a lot like a ‘fine, I guess I’ll step in’ kind of save.”

“Oh I was absolutely gonna let it sting you,” Huntress Wizard replied in a voice that sounded exactly the way her cute little smirk looked. “But it looked poisonous and you’re not immunized to this one, and I really didn’t want a repeat of the last mutant animal poisoning incident all over our floor.”

“I’m still trying to figure out how it got my vomit that color” he replied in a casually reminiscent voice. He decided he’d probably had enough meditation for the morning and stood up, stretching as he turned around to face the fearsome killer of mutant bees. Sure enough, she had the exact smirk on face he’d been expecting, and like he did every damn time he saw it, he smiled back. The leaves that made up her hair had turned entirely to shades of golden-brown now that autumn had properly gotten underway. The first time he’d seen that happen, his natural question was ‘wait, do they fall off completely in the winter?’ which, as it turned out, they did.

“Don’t think I’ve ever seen you use this spot before” she mused as she walked forward. Her head turned casually as if surveying the scenery, but her eyes narrowed with a look Finn had grown to recognize instantly. She was shifting her focus to the area around her, mapping out every inch of it in her mind, studying it, and learning its rhythms as easily as reading a book. If he really looked close, Finn could even tell when she found something important, the way her eyes widened almost imperceptibly and her fingers twitched ever so slightly. He had no doubt she had the whole place down by the time she had finished walking over to him.

“Anything else I should know about out there?” he asked with a raised eyebrow.

“Nah, just some termites and a few mating cicadas. How long did it take you to get out here?”

“I dunno. I was kinda trying to meditate as I walked and I was spacing out, so it’s all mostly a blur. What time is it?”

“About noon.”

“Noon?? How far did I walk?” He was genuinely shocked. He knew it had been a while, but he figured it would be a little past ten at the latest, and even that was allotting four hours of walking and meditation time.

“Only about an hour. You’ve just been meditating for a really long time.”

“Wait, how long have you been here?” he asked, suddenly realizing it was very possible she’d been watching him sit there for five hours.

She shrugged. “Not too long. I found you and then went to see if I could hunt us down some food. I set up a campsite if you’re hungry.”

Finn thought about it and suddenly realized he was in fact very hungry. He’d been up for hours and hadn’t eaten a thing, something he could already hear Jake chastising him for (“you gotta get your protein, brother. That’s how you keep yourself strong!”) He also suddenly became aware that he had spent the last six hours outside in 40-degree weather wearing nothing but his jeans.

“HW, please tell me you brought me a shirt.”

The playful smirk returned to her face as her eyes darted to the scars scattered across his torso. “Absolutely not,” she replied, not bothering to look back up.

Finn sighed, but couldn’t stop the smile that creeped across his face in return. She always had that effect on him, like it was impossible for him to be in a bad mood when he saw her happy.

Thank Glob I’ve still got something to smile about these days.

************

His appetite had started to return on the walk back, but it roared to life with a passion the second he saw the meal Huntress Wizard had been preparing. She’d had enough time to hunt and cook a deer while Finn was preoccupied, and she’d also made a soup that, while Finn couldn’t identify a single ingredient, smelled like one of the most appetizing things to ever grace his nose. The two of them had barely sat down when he grabbed his first piece of meat and devoured it with a speed that would have gotten a round of applause from Jake himself. Probably followed by “but seriously dude, slow down. Gotta save some for the lady.”

“Okay wait,” Finn said as he finally slowed down enough to speak in between bites, “did you bring all the stuff for the soup out with you and then make it, or did you find everything out here? Because this tastes really fresh, but I also feel like you’d have to go all over the forest looking for all the stuff you put in it. Wait, did you go all over the forest looking for all this stuff?” Huntress Wizard said nothing, taking a slow sip of her soup as her eyes seemed to narrow in on him once again, a little uncomfortably this time. “And if you’ve been running around getting all this, you should really eat some meat to keep your strength up. You’re always reminding me to eat and I really don’t want you to…” he trailed off as she set down her soup and looked him dead in the eye.

“So how bad is it?”

She asked the question so casually, as if he’d just mentioned he had a slight pain in his elbow or a family of possums living under his bed. For half a second he thought about trying in vain to protest that nothing he’d said warranted that question, but it was pointless. He could’ve rambled on for an hour and it wouldn’t change the fact that he’d told her everything she needed to know in the first five seconds after he sat down. She’d told him once that she could had entire conversations with people without actually listening to a single word they said (“relax, I’ve never done it to you.”) After all her time learning to watch animals, she could see people talking to her with nothing more than their body language. Finn still had no idea what most of his nonverbal cues were, and even if he did, he couldn’t stop them. She was always going to know when he wasn’t okay, just by seeing the way he walked or how he breathed or how he picked up a piece of freshly cooked meat. He sighed, his voice shaking much more than he wanted as he did so. He noticed himself needing a little more effort to look her in the eyes now.

“It’s been worse,” he replied honestly. “It’s been better, but...it’s been worse.”

“Do you want to talk about it?” There was no hint of irritation in her voice, nor was there any trace of anger. She spoke with the kind of patience that could only come out of someone who’d once stayed in the same dark dirty corner of a swamp for a week and a half waiting for the perfect moment to strike at a carnivorous three-headed giant. Of course she’d also gutted it and skinned it alive when the moment finally came, and Finn had no interest in pushing her anywhere near that point, especially since he’d seen her come a little too close for comfort before.

“No, I...I don’t. Not right now.” He still looked at her eyes every time he gave that answer, expecting to find some iota of judgment there. By now he’d seen it from everyone else, even if a lot of them didn’t realize they were showing it.

“It’s been over a year, Finn. I know it’s hard to let him go, but you have to keep moving forward and living your life. If you let this keep dragging you down, you’ll never get any better. Promise me you’ll try?”

He’d promised, as sincerely as he could manage, and left her to her next important meeting. The Candy Kingdom smelled too clean after all this time in the forest anyway. It burned his nose now.

“Look dude, I get it. I really do. I’ve dealt with this way too many times in my life. It’s not fair and it’s never going to not suck, but...sometimes you outlive people, but you gotta keep pushing forward. You’ve mourned for him, we all have...but now’s the time to start trying to pick yourself back up. And if I can help with that at all, you know how to reach me.”

She’d kissed him on the cheek, and it actually did get a smile out of him. She meant well, even if she gave him too much credit in assuming his recovery speed. Hopefully in another year he’d be able to give her that call. The thought had kept him smiling all the way back home.

“Finn, the girls...they’re really worried about you. I can’t pretend I’m an expert in the emotional field and I’m probably the last person that should lecture anyone about processing grief, but there are people who CAN help you. Every one of Ooo’s princesses are in your personal debt, surely someone has the resources to-”

Finn had cut him off, screaming at him to get out and saying a few things he wished he could take back. He left so suddenly he didn’t even take his glasses with him. Finn had put his fist through the wall so hard he was sure he’d need a second prosthetic arm and then curled up in a ball and cried. It hurt so much he almost didn’t feel Huntress Wizard popping his arm back into place and tending to his bloody knuckles, and he didn’t feel her carrying him upstairs to bed at all. He’d awoken that night and immediately received a well-deserved reprimanding (she was brutally honest all the time and he loved her for it) and scrambled in a panic to make a phone call, apologizing profusely (“oh don’t worry about it, Finn. I of all people know what losing someone can do to you. I’ve said and done FAR worse and you’ve forgiven me more than I could ever ask. You really don’t need to apologize.”) He’d then realized it was four in the morning and apologized again (“oh, is it? I hadn’t noticed, honestly. I’ve been translating texts and well...I guess the time just slipped away from me today…”)

Maybe it was Huntress Wizard’s skill with reading people rubbing off on him, or maybe they just weren’t being subtle about it anymore. Either way, he’d seen them all think it at one point or another. He couldn’t even blame them, and frankly he agreed. “Jake’s been dead for a year now, Finn,” they’d say (sixteen months next Friday but who’s counting?) “and you’re still reacting like you’re in the first month of grieving. You have to let yourself move on.” As if that were all there was to it.

“Okay,” Huntress Wizard responded, smiling gently and placing her hand on his and bringing his thoughts back to the present. “Then we don’t have to talk about it right now.”

He knew he wasn’t handling his grief well. He knew that his friends were right and he couldn’t keep going on like this. He knew it was his fault for being so damn closed off and letting himself experience so much of the hurt again every day. But he also didn't have any idea how to get himself out of the hole he’d dug. He told himself he was trying to ask for help, but it was next to impossible to do when he didn’t actually know how.

“We should probably talk about the White Bear thing though,” Huntress Wizard added, very much in a tone that said “and this one isn’t optional.”

“Look, I know I haven’t been…” he paused, trying to find the best word for it and then proceeding to give up “...great lately, but I can’t just leave this alone. You saw the letter LSP sent, you know what they’re doing to those settlements. This is on me, and I gotta be the one to talk to them.”

“Finn, just because three idiots decided to form some stupid cult after you saved them once ten years ago doesn’t mean you’re responsible when they start hurting people. You didn’t tell them to do this. This is all on them.” She paused to really look at him, the worry in her eyes so strong that Finn was surprised it wasn’t actually radiating out. “Please Finn...let someone else handle this. Don’t add this to the list of things you’re already carrying around. I know you want to help, but you really need to help yourself right now.”

She was right, of course. He’d left the forest maybe three times in the last two months, and he wouldn’t exactly describe his attitude during those times as “pleasant.” How well he could actually hold a conversation depended entirely on him not getting hit with waves of grief, panic, or anger that now seemed to come at random. It actually hadn’t been that bad at first, mostly just a lot of days where he missed his brother so much it made him want to vomit (which he did several times), but he hadn’t counted on that being the start of something much worse. Simon had mentioned it once, something about how he was worried Finn’s grief would give way to a full breakdown from all the other trauma he’d endured in his life. He felt like he’d managed to avoid “massive psychotic breakdown” pretty well over the past year and a half, but he couldn’t deny that he felt like he was doing worse every day recently. He saw the Litch more and more in stray nighttime shadows, heard Fern’s footsteps in the crackling sounds of the forest, and, on his worst nights, found himself dreaming he was back in the Hall of Egress, terrified that everything he’d been through was just another part of the loop. Once Huntress Wizard had pulled his prosthetic arm too hard as she dragged him along to the river to show him something and he’d jerked away from her grip so suddenly that she fell to the ground from the force. She’d been careful not to push him too hard to find someone to talk to, since he’d shown that leaving his relative solitude had its own long list of problems (and for a while it really had looked like things were getting better), but he couldn’t keep ignoring the fact that he’d been getting much worse the past few months. He felt like she was about two more big incidents away from hogtying him, dragging him by the legs to the Candy Kingdom, holding Bonnie at knifepoint, and demanding she find or make someone that could give Finn proper help. He’d come to the forest as a last attempt to deal with all this himself, and it was very clear he’d failed.

“I know...I know. And you’re right. I should stay here. I’m really not ready for this.” She looked at him with an expression that said she damn well knew there was a “but” coming and was contemplating just knocking his stubborn ass out before he could get to it.

“But…look, just hear me out. Please” Her expression softened just enough that he knew he had about thirty seconds. “These people are crazy. And they’re dangerous. If anyone else comes at them, there’s going to be a fight, and it’s going to get a lot of people hurt. Whether I want it or not, these are people that think they’re following my example. I’m the only one that has any chance of talking them down. It sucks, it’s not fair, and it’s messed up, but I gotta try, even if I’m still all donked up from...really just the last ten years of my life. So please...I know you could stop me if you wanted to, but I’m asking you...please don’t. I have to go try to stop them from hurting anyone else.”

Winning fights with Huntress Wizard was a difficult task for him, but winning arguments with her was damn near impossible, admittedly because she was usually right. If she pushed back on this, there was no chance of him going. For a second he thought this might actually be the point where he got dragged back to the Candy Kingdom, but to his surprise she just sat there silently for a few seconds before letting out a simple “okay.”

“Okay?”

“Yeah. You’re right. You need to do this.”

He let out a sigh of relief he didn’t realize he’d been holding in. As much as he hated the idea of leaving the one place he felt any semblance of peace anymore, he took an odd comfort in at least knowing he had something he could actually set right.

“But,” she added, “I have some conditions.”

II

“Yo Finn, come check this out! We got a letter from Flame Princess!”

“Phoebe sent a letter? Cool, what’s it say?” Finn stood up and walked towards Jake, putting his breakfast on hold to see the letter. He briefly had to shield his eyes as a stray beam of morning sunlight pierced through the treehouse’s window.

“Hmmm, looks like she wants our help,” Jake remarked as he scanned the letter. “Says here there’s some ancient magic artifact she’s giving the Breakfast Kingdom and she wants us to deliver it so there’s no chance of anyone accidentally melting the place down again.”

Finn let out a chuckle as he walked back to his unfinished plate of eggs. “Man, you were there for that, was it really THAT bad? It was only like a couple of houses and one section of wall, right?”

“That entire place is made of breakfast, Finn,” Jake replied, clearly reliving the experience already. “You ever been trapped in a melting breakfast house? ‘Cause I have, and lemme tell ya brother, I do NOT wanna do it again. I’m still cleanin’ marshmallow goop out of my-”

“Whooooaaaa” Finn cut him off quickly, “okay man, I believe you.” He laughed as he scooped up the last of his eggs. “Melting Breakfast Kingdom bad.” He set his fork down and took a sip of his tea. “We totally got this. Plus when’s the last time we got something to eat in the Breakfast Kingdom?”

“Man, you’re right...it’s been...what, a year? Two?”

“Yeah, something like that.” Finn set down his tea and jumped up dramatically onto the table, accidentally knocking his plate to the floor. “Well that ends today! Today we transport Flame Princess’s thing to the Breakfast Kingdom, and then we feast!” He thrust his fist in the air. “The feast of champions! The most legendary breakfast in all of Ooo!”

“The Breakfast Kingdom signature pancake combo dish with all-you-can-eat appetizers????” Jake could barely contain his excitement.

Finn leapt down from the table and put his arm around his brother. “Three pancakes of the finest grains in the land, sweetened to perfection with just the right amount of honey and brown sugar,” he began, doing his best announcer voice to get Jake even more excited than he already was. “Three chocolate chip pancakes made with chocolate chips SO tasty that they once stopped a war when they were used as a peace offering.” He and Jake were grinning ear to ear now, and he had to reign his smile in a little in order to keep speaking as he went for the grand finale. “And three of the Breakfast Kingdom pumpkin pancakes, made with ingredients that only grow in Ooo’s most dangerous and unforgiving mountains. Together, these nine pancakes make the greatest breakfast ever devised by mortal hands. To eat it…” he drew close to Jake and lowered his voice to a whisper, “...is to achieve harmony with breakfast itself.”

Jake rubbed his hands together, his excitement raised through the roof by Finn’s speech. “Man oh man, I can taste it already!”

“Come on man, let’s grab our stuff and then we can head out. Now where did I leave my sword...?”

*************

On the third day of his journey, Finn reached an old human city. Any sign indicating its real name had long since faded, rusted, or fallen apart completely, and even the graffiti that read “RAZOR CITY: BLADE BOYS TERRITORY” looked old and pitiful, much like the skeletons in bandit gear he passed every now and then that probably used to be the Blade Boys. After walking about twenty minutes without encountering a single living thing, he decided it was safe to assume Razor City’s days of being claimed by anyone were long behind it. He didn’t mind that though, it just gave him time to really stare at everything around him with less fear of being stabbed in the back.

No matter how many times he saw them, Finn still marveled at the old human cities. Sure, part of it came from his general fascination with all things from human culture (thank Glob Simon never seemed to get tired of his questions, because they came relentlessly anytime Finn had the chance to ask), but the old cities always captured his attention and imagination in a special way. “I suppose at some point we realized we couldn’t build out forever” Simon had mused, “so our solution was to build up. A lot of people back then thought that they could just keep doing things bigger and better and that would solve any problem they faced.” That approach obviously seemed like bad logic now, but as someone who’d spent a good portion of his early life solving his problems by hitting them, Finn felt a little more sympathetic.

He was vaguely aware of glass crunching under his shoes as he walked across the deserted city streets, using the sun to keep himself heading east. It would probably take around two days to reach the other end of the city if he kept a steady pace, maybe less if he found something he could ride. He’d tried once or twice before to fix up some of the remaining cars in the old human cities, but usually he just gave up and rode an enlarged Jake once the two of them got tired of walking. After a while he realized he found himself looking up quite a bit, staring at the concrete towers that had once housed hundreds of humans at a time. The urge to explore the place still hit him despite his current state of mind, as it did so many times when he came to places like this. If he didn’t have such a pressing mission to do, he’d probably give in to it.

He drew to a halt in front of an old storefront as it occurred to him that he badly needed some lunch. A little reluctantly, he sat down against the outer wall of the store and pulled his backpack from his back, digging around to see what he had left. He’d tried to fit as much as he could for the roughly nine-day journey and hoped he could hunt or forage for the rest. Fortunately (or probably unfortunately) he’d eaten less than he’d expected to these first three days, since he really didn’t have much of an appetite anymore. He settled on a sandwich he’d bagged and took a bite as he gazed out across from his seat in front of the old store to look at the crumbling highway he could see towering over the city’s other roads. When he asked Bonnie how a lot of this stuff was even still intact after a thousand years, she’d said her best guess was that most of Ooo’s matter had been infused with some level of magic after the Mushroom War. Apparently one of the occasional side effects to that was drastically reduced decay, which meant most of the buildings were still standing and that there wasn’t rust on every metal object in the city. She’d said that even after hundreds of years of study, the exact nature of it still confused the hell out of her.

“Okay,” he said to himself as he put his sandwich aside and pulled the sword from his back, turning it over in his lap. “I’ve been here for an hour and a half and haven’t seen a single living thing the entire time. Is that good or bad?”

"Well, you haven’t seen any signs that anything bad actually happened, so it just looks like everything either died or left” he responded to himself in his head. He had to hold conversations with someone to keep from going insane, so this was what it had come to. “So I think this is actually good.”

“Yeah but there’s gotta be like...at least a few giant scorpions or sentient man-eating plants somewhere in here, right?”

"Eh, probably. Something always pops up eventually in places like this. But as long as it’s all quiet, don’t sweat it too much. If you spend the whole walk through this place tensed up waiting to see a monster then you’re gonna give yourself a heart attack before you can reach the White Bear settlement.”

“Aw come on, I’m not that tense!”

“Dude, look at how hard you’re holding your sword hilt right now.”

Finn looked down to see himself white-knuckling the hilt of his sword like a giant was trying to tear it from his grasp and let go, the sword falling gently into his lap. Maybe he was just a little tense. Just a little.

“Just a little? Man, you’re gonna come out of this with muscle cramps from how tightly you’re wound right now.”

“Hey, I didn’t even say anything that time!”

“You’re talking to yourself in your head, Finn. Thinking something counts as saying it. Actually, speaking of things you’re thinking about, you should really talk about-”

“Nope,” Finn said as he stood up and put the backpack and sword back in their places. “I’m gonna keep walking and sing some songs to drown you out.”

“Finn you-”

"Not gonna talk about it!" he shouted before loudly belting any song that came into his head.

After another hour he gave up singing, but thankfully he was back to single-minded silence.

*************

“Condition one: if you start to feel yourself spiraling or hitting a bad place mentally, you turn back. You’ve still got a lot you’re dealing with and you can’t do it if you don’t have absolute focus.”

“Deal.” Finn and Huntress Wizard both knew he hadn’t had “absolute focus” for quite a while, but she seemed content with “as much focus as you can possibly devote to this.”

“Condition two: if you get too worn out to make the rest of the journey, you rest and you turn back. You won’t be any help to anyone if you show up at the settlement half-dead.”

“Deal, but...if I’m too worn out to make the rest of the trip, how am I gonna have it in me to turn back? Like what if that happens on the last day before I get there?”

“That’s condition three,” she replied, looking him dead in the eye. “I’m coming with you.”

“Deal.”

*************

He’d left that night while she was sleeping. He’d told her he needed to stay up late preparing (which was true) and that he’d probably be another few hours. She wasn’t thrilled, but it got the result he’d hoped for: by the time he got back to their room, she’d turned into a log (he still wasn’t sure how or why she did that) and was out cold, instead of asleep in their bed as...well, as Huntress Wizard. She could still snap awake at a moment’s notice like this, but when she slept without transforming she was nearly impossible to sneak out on. He’d taken extra steps to cover his tracks and hoped that he’d get enough of a head start before she woke up. He hadn’t even grabbed his hat before he left.

I’m doing this for the right reasons. I’m doing this for the right reasons.

He’d told himself that constantly ever since he’d left. He still wasn’t sure he actually believed it, but he figured he could keep repeating it until he reached the White Bear settlement, and by that point he’d have much bigger problems to deal with.

It was starting to get late, and Finn guessed the sun would be down in another hour or two. By this point he’d begun to see a few insects crawling across the crumbling stone streets and heard the buzzing of flies as he pressed further on into the city. At first his hand had gone to his sword, ready to draw it from his back if the small signs of life gave way to something much bigger and much worse, but after a decent amount of time with nothing trying to kill him, he’d started to relax again. Of course he wasn’t really able to “relax” much these days, but it was still an improvement. He found himself walking along an old highway, glancing at the rusted cars and faded paint as he went. Ahead of him, the highway briefly went into a tunnel, but it was short enough that he could easily see to the other side.

Whelp, if any monsters are gonna try to ambush me, that sure would be a great place to do it…

The Night Sword still hung sheathed at his back, and he briefly moved his hand up to the hilt just to reassure himself it was still there. PB’s prosthetic hand didn’t perfectly capture the sensation of touch, but it sent some electric signal that was close enough for him to take a little comfort in the feeling of the sword’s hilt. There should have been absolutely no reason for him to be nervous, but the nearer he drew to the tunnel, the more he was sure the middle of it was some deathtrap monster ambush point that was going to spring on him the second he stepped without a few feet of the tunnel’s halfway point. His hand tightened around the sword as he suddenly got the very distinct feeling he was being watched. He drew in his breath slowly as he approached the tunnel’s entrance, his metallic hand poised to draw his sword at the slightest sign of danger. His footsteps slowed as he neared the tunnel, and his eyes darted to anything around him that could even remotely be used like a hiding place. His uneasiness was only made worse when he realized that he once again heard absolutely no sounds from any living creature in the area.

The second he entered, the world outside the tunnel seemed to cut out. He could hear water dripping from the ceiling onto a puddle underneath six feet away from him, and swore that even his footsteps seemed louder in here. The thump-thump-thump of his heartbeat didn’t fill his ears like he had expected, but he could feel every single beat in his chest as he continued forward. Ahead of him, cracks in the tunnel’s ceiling let thin beams of evening light shine through, seeming to grow dimmer every second as the sunset drew nearer. He felt himself kicking up centuries-old dust with every step forward, careful to make as little sound as possible. Every instinct he had told him he was about ten seconds away from some claw or tentacle or bladed weapon flying at his head, and he slowly began to draw the Night Sword from his back. He became aware of a shallow, raspy breathing coming somewhere in the tunnel and felt his heart start beating faster. The feeling that he was being watched grew almost unbearable.

Focus. Stay calm. You have to make sure you see it coming. You HAVE to make sure you see it coming.

He let out his breath, drew his sword fully, and in one swift movement turned to slash out the thing that was lurking at his right. It was a panicked swing, but even still it had years of technique behind it, and with the strength of his prosthetic arm it was easily strong enough to slice through a solid stone wall, more than a match for whatever was about to drag him into the dark and most likely eat him. If there had in fact been anything to hit, he would have sliced it clean in two.

But there wasn’t, and he instead found himself stumbling from the swing and falling face-first onto the dirty concrete. The raspy breathing grew louder and Finn scrambled to his feet, swinging the sword again, this time in wide arcs in front of him just to keep whatever was in the dark at bay. He tried to listen for footsteps, but all he could hear was the horrible breathing sound filling his ears. Despite trying his best not to, he found himself backing away from the tunnel’s center while still keeping his sword in front of him, feeling his heart beat so rapidly he thought it was going to explode out of his chest.

Jake would have told him to keep calm, that whoever or whatever was out there was probably feeding on his fear, or at the very least enjoying it. He would have said to take deep breaths and focus on the sword in his hand, on the feeling of the ground under his feat. He desperately wanted to do both, but all he could focus on was that damn breathing. It seemed to be coming from everywhere in the tunnel at once, making it almost impossible to pin down where whatever the hell he was fighting was actually standing. His left arm was starting to shake, but his metal one thankfully didn’t have that problem, meaning he was still able to hold the sword steady in his right hand, which he had finally started doing after his barrage of panicked swings. He could feel his heartbeat all the way down to the fingertips in his left arm, and though he knew it was impossible, he swore he could feel it in his right one, too.

Focus…dammit, FOCUS…don’t lose your cool any more than you already have…it’s almost on you, Finn…

He realized vaguely that he could no longer see, or at least that his mind didn’t seem to be fully registering whatever signals his eyes were sending. The breathing grew louder and more erratic, like some deranged animal going in for a kill.

ON YOUR RIGHT.

Finn turned to his right and swung the sword with all his might, easily three times as hard as his first swing. He felt it hit something this time, something hard and sturdy, and was aware that he took chunks out of whatever it was with the swing. He was vaguely aware of himself shouting, but it was drowned out by the single thought racing through his head screaming at him YOU NEED TO MAKE SURE IT’S DEAD OR IT’S GOING TO KILL YOU. He stumbled toward where he had felt the impact and almost immediately staggered backward as he felt himself bump into the tunnel’s wall. As his mind seemed to reconnect with his body, he realized that his vision was incredibly blurry and his eyes stung quite a bit. He wiped them, expecting to find some kind of venom or chemical and instead finding…

…tears?

He glanced at the wall in front of him, covered by shadows in the tunnel’s dim light but still clear enough to make out the line his sword had made when he slashed through it. He glanced at the ground below and saw chunks of the wall scattered at his feet. His heartbeat still shot through every inch of his body, but it had slowed just a bit. As his brain began to register that he hadn’t hit his attacker, it began to pick up again, but it seemed to be countered by a growing feeling of exhaustion. The raspy, erratic breathing once again began to fill the tunnel, and it seemed so close that Finn could swear it seemed like it was coming from inside his mind. It took him a second longer to realize that the breathing was his own.

He stumbled a few steps back to the center of the tunnel‘s road before dropping to his knees, his sword grasped in his metallic hand only because he had told it not to let go even though he felt the rest of him going limp. With what felt like all the effort he had left, he raised his head and looked ahead to the other side, to the city outside lit by the soft oranges and purples of Ooo’s sunset. He stared at the city full of golden light until his heart stopped hurting every time it beat and the sound of his own panicked breathing grew steady and eventually faded from his ears. He let the image in front of him burn into his eyes until the shadows stopped creeping out of the corners, and the feeling of dread that had been shooting up his spine finally dulled, growing more distant until it felt like it had faded entirely. He was, as he always had been, alone in the tunnel.

He let out a scream. Not one of fear or anger, not one that had the intensity or urgency of the heat of battle, but one that somehow sounded of loneliness, of exhaustion, of mourning and emptiness and all the things a scream shouldn’t sound like. It felt like what he imagined the last escaping breath of a dying animal would feel like. He couldn’t tell if it lasted three seconds or twenty, but he didn’t stop screaming until his lungs were completely empty. After unsteadily drawing his breath back in, he did the only thing that he had left to do.

He cried. Loudly, uncontrollably, and for what felt like a very long time. He cried in a way he hadn’t cried since the day he lost Jake, in a way that felt like a piece of him poured out with every tear, leaving him a little more empty inside. The sound of each sob echoed loudly across the tunnel, but he well past the point of either noticing or caring.

*************

When his tears had run dry and he finally gathered the strength to lift his head, Finn found that no more than twenty minutes must have passed. The sun still burned calmly as he struggled to pick himself up, a patient and gentle observer to the broken little boy trying desperately to be a hero again. Despite trying to turn his thoughts toward anything else, he couldn’t help but miss Huntress Wizard. The last year certainly had no shortage of moments where he found himself alone and wishing he could hear her voice or feel her hand on his shoulder (it had been a big part of his decision to move to the forest with her), but her absence felt more pronounced now than ever, seeming to pierce him through worse than any blade he’d ever felt. He briefly considered initiating another conversation with himself to once again attempt to rationalize his decision to go it alone, but quickly gave up. He didn’t have the energy to do anything other than drag himself forward unsteadily and hope he made it out of the tunnel. He tried as best he could to focus on slowing down his breathing, and by the end of the tunnel he at least got his heartbeat down.

He staggered out of the tunnel and half-walked, half-fell against the nearest car on the bridge outside, slumping against the door and letting out something that was halfway between a sob and a shaky sigh. He tried to focus, to calm himself and slip into a state of meditation to help him keep from spiraling into a complete wreck, but it was hopeless. There was no calming breeze, no faint buzzing or chirping, and just none of the calming pieces of the forest environment Finn had grown so comfortable in. He gave up and pulled himself to his feet, kicking the car door in a sudden fit of rage. He had no idea why he did it, he just knew if he didn’t let out whatever was building in him he’d probably rip his other arm off. He got a few kicks in before stopping and trying once again to breathe, knowing this wasn’t doing him any good.

If he’d been more focused, if he’d been paying more attention, and if he hadn’t been spending every bit of energy he had on just keeping himself upright, he might have noticed the car rattling even though his kicks had stopped. He might have heard the crunching of footsteps behind him, maybe even pick up on the subtle feeling that he was no longer alone.

But he didn’t, so the monsters took him completely by surprise.

III

“I’m tellin’ ya man, you’re gonna need to know this stuff! It’s coming up sooner than you think!”

“I’m nineteen, Jake. I’m pretty sure it’s not coming up for a while.”

Finn and Jake had been walking for about an hour and a half, which by Finn’s estimate meant they were getting close to the Flame Kingdom, maybe another hour at most. He’d asked if Jake wanted to enlarge himself to make the journey shorter, but Jake had responded that he wanted to take the scenic route. “I’m feeling like getting some air and breathing in the great outdoors for a little bit,” he’d argued. “Let an old man have his nature walk, Finn.” Finn had pointed out that Jake wasn’t THAT old, but of course he’d happily agreed to make a day of it, knowing he got a sweet meal at the end of all the trudging across Ooo.

“I had my kids when I was sixteen! That’s younger than you are now!”

“Man, you age differently than I do. That doesn’t count. You were like thirty at that point.”

“Yeah okay,” Jake admitted. “But still, I really think you’ll wind up being a dad eventually, and if you do then I just wanna make sure you’re prepared. I gotta make sure you do a good job.”

“Wouldn’t it be more helpful to tell me this when I’m actually closer to having kids?” Finn asked as he swatted at a fly with his metal arm. Why bring it up so early?”

“You are starting to get closer, man, even if you don’t realize it. You’ve grown a lot, and you’re really starting to turn into someone that a lot of people look up to. I’m pretty sure Bronwyn already thinks you’re a cooler dad than I am, and you’re getting great as a teacher too. I don’t even think you picked up swordfighting as fast as she did. You could keep an army of kids entertained with all the stories you’ve got, and you have the kind of good heart Mom always talked about with us. If having kids is the thing you choose to do, you’re gonna be great with them.” He paused briefly to swat at the fly, who had returned and now seemed to be shifting its focus away from Finn. “Plus I have noticed you’re out in the forest a lot of nights recently…”

“Ah dude, don’t make it weird,” Finn cut him off, but couldn’t help but laugh. “Let a man and his wizard have some privacy.”

“My point is,” Jake continued as he casually morphed his hand into a fly swatter, “you’ve got all the makings of a great dad in you, and you’ve got someone out there who loves you and would make a great mom. But you wanna be PREPARED for this stuff. It’s like exploring dungeons. We went in headfirst a lot back when we first started and it was harder for us.”

Finn raised an eyebrow. “Dude, we still charge into dungeons headfirst all the time. That’s like…the whole point of a dungeon.”

“Nah man,” Jake shook his head as he readied his fly swatter hand for the return of the pair’s new tiny nemesis. “I mean like how we did it WAY back. Remember the Temple of the One True Bird?”

Finn laughed. “Don’t make me think back to that, dude! I hated that place.”

“Exactly! Because we charged in! And by the time we realized we probably needed better equipment and a map, we were already stuck in the middle of that maze. Never even made it to the end of the temple!” He took a swing at the fly as it darted at his face, narrowly missing it. “And after that, we got better. We always agreed to walk out of any dungeon we knew we weren’t prepared for if it got too bad. Pretty soon we got so good at ‘em that we never had to, but that’s also because we kept learning. I’ve been stuck in the maze already, man. I got thrown into being a dad with no training and nothing to prepare me except how Dad raised us, and I figured out pretty quick that I was outta my depth. Heck, the kids grew up so fast that by the time I really had a handle on it, they were already out living their lives. I know you’re not gonna have rainicorn kids, but if anything I did learn helps you, I wanna share it.”

Finn was silent for a moment, looking his brother up and down as they walked, seeing him in a way he usually never did. Despite his knowledge of dogs’ aging patterns, Finn often forgot exactly how far beyond him Jake really was, how much OLDER he was. It felt strange to think that though they’d been born within the same year (as far as their parents could tell), Jake had lived a life that had already reached stages Finn was years or decades away from. It almost felt intimidating until he really thought about it and realized that if anything, it gave him something to help guide himself by. If Jake wanted to spend the rest of the walk telling him about being a parent, that was fine by him.

“Okay man, I see your point. I definitely wanna be prepared. What should I know?”

“Well,” Jake started before pausing to look around, twitching his nose slightly. “Hang on, the fly’s comin’ back.”

“You’re just gonna use a fly swatter hand? I mean I know I’m not above killing flies, but you let spiders and bugs and stuff out of the house all the time instead of killing them. I think it’s one of the things Huntress Wizard likes about you, actually.”

“Lesson one, Finn,” Jake replied. “You’ve got a lot of gifts that help you when you fight monsters. One of the tricks to being a parent…” he caught sight of the fly as it flew towards his face and swatted at it in one quick motion, “is finding a whole new way to use those gifts.”

Finn looked down at Jake’s hand and saw that instead of a swatter stained with fly bits, it was now a miniature house, complete with a chimney. Upon closer inspection he noticed multiple small holes in the house as well, realizing they were air holes for the fly, which was perfectly alive and well.

“Take this little guy for example. He didn’t ask to be smacked into a million pieces. He’s just flying around trying to get by. And I think what he wants from us…” Jake paused and pulled a piece of bread out of Finn’s backpack, “is just a little something to eat.” Jake set the piece of bread on the ground and lowered his house hand, shifting it back into its original shape and letting the fly go eagerly to its new meal. “And that’s also lesson two. With kids, just like with anyone, you gotta understand that even if it looks like they’re against you, there are reasons they do what they do. Maybe they’re angry, maybe they’re misguided, or maybe they’re just hungry, but there’s always gonna be something.” He stood up and started walking again, with Finn following close behind. “Now I know there are a lotta people out there that deserve to get their butts kicked for the horrible stuff they do, and I’m not saying you can reach out to everyone, but when you have kids it’s gonna be your job to put ‘em on the right path. Teach ‘em right from wrong, make sure they know how important it is to be a good person, and just do what you can to push ‘em in the right direction. It takes a lot of trial and error and you’re gonna find out a lot about yourself along the way, but as long as you use what you’re good at to help them be good people, you’re gonna be just fine.”

“Wow,” Finn replied. No matter how many clever metaphors or wise proverbs Jake spouted over the years, he was always impressed by every single one of them. “Yeah man, that does make sense.”

Jake’s nose twitched again, and he looked down the path they were walking to a cluster of trees where five people were very obviously hiding. “Hey man, you see that?”

Finn laughed. “Man, those have to be the worst bandits I’ve ever seen. You want me to take this one?”

“Nah man, I’m up for kicking some bandit butt.”

“Alright,” Finn said as he casually drew the sword from his back. “Let’s go fight some bandits.”

*************

The thing that lunged out of the car made a horrifying shriek as it tackled Finn to the ground, disorienting him so much he was barely able to actually register what it was. His body moved faster than his mind, and he instinctively threw a kick at the thing to get it off of him, sending it backwards enough for him to scramble to his feet and draw his sword.

The thing in front of him looked like someone had tried and failed to stretch dough or clay into the shape of a human, resulting in a pale, misshapen monstrosity that seemed to be in pain with every step it took. Its left leg was far too skinny to support its full weight, leading to it lurching forward at him as it growled and snarled. Despite its handicap it still moved fast, but Finn was still able to bring his sword down onto what seemed to be its head. His swing was met with almost no resistance, and blue goop covered the blade as he pulled it out. The thing dropped to the ground, presumably dead, and Finn took exactly one second to breathe before realizing it wasn’t alone.

He counted seven of them in his direct line of sight, and could already tell there were at least three more approaching behind him. All of them shared the first one’s white misshapen clay-like body, though each seemed to have been stretched and contorted in its own uniquely horrific way. Finn exhaled and readied his sword, trying to keep up whatever strength he had left and praying that the adrenaline rush he was feeling would carry him through the fight. He pivoted around to face the nearest of the approaching monsters behind him and took a swing at it, slicing clean through it. He quickly noted that there were (not counting the one he’d just killed) five more coming from behind him, and noticed two more coming from his left side. Assuming that there weren’t any more with the seven he’d just turned away from, that left him fourteen more of these things to deal with. Rattleballs had drilled the concept of counting opponents into his head over years of combat training, and Finn silently gave thanks to him for making it second nature.

Two more in front of him lunged into slicing distance and he immediately took one’s head off, feinting backwards to avoid a clumsy swing of the second one’s claw before cutting it in half at the midsection. There may have been a lot of these things, but they seemed to go down easy and thankfully stayed down once they got killed. He felt a strange wave of relief coming over him as he snapped into the clarity of combat (or “getting in the zone” as Jake had called it). As long as he kept reacting fast, he would be fine.

He spun back around as more of the things approached him from behind, keeping a two-handed grasp on his sword as he sliced off the oversized arm of one that it had used as a makeshift hammer. He brought the blade down near its shoulder, but unlike the others, this time it was met with more resistance. Even with the added strength of his metal arm, he was only able to get the sword most of the way through, stopping just short of his expected exit point. The thing gave a roar and he kicked it backward, pulling his blade out as it flew to the ground. As he fended off the attacks of three more, he noticed to his relief that it wasn’t getting back up. He took the legs off the nearest one and sent it facefirst to the ground before slicing across the back of its neck to keep it down. As more raced towards him, he switched his sword to a one-handed grip in his left hand and picked up the fallen creature’s body with his right, lifting it like a shield and charging at the remaining creatures in front of him, escaping the reach of the ones at his back as he did. His makeshift shield bowled over two of the monsters, and he was able to reach out with his sword at one of them and slice through it when it fell to the ground. He had no idea if he’d managed to kill it, but he had at least slowed it down. As he broke through their line, he dropped the body he’d been carrying and spun around to face his remaining foes now that he had them all in front of him. As soon as he did, any strategy he’d hoped to use immediately went out the window when he saw how many there were.

Well, so much for “I should be fine…”

There were now over twenty of them, with more crawling out of the tunnel or forcing themselves out of smaller hiding spaces. It seemed like there was still a finite number of them, but it had been much worse than he’d initially thought. Even with the exhaustion he was starting to feel, he could have handled fourteen of them, but this put the total at somewhere closer to thirty. He could already feel his left arm starting to burn, and his legs were shaking slightly under his own weight. He realized that he’d barely eaten the last three days and slept only marginally better, and as if finally accepting that, his body became twice as hard to move.

Dammit, not like this…

He gritted his teeth and shifted his stance, assuming a two-handed grip once again. The creatures snarled at him as they began to trudge forward slowly, and Finn could feel his heart beating down to his fingertips again.

“Come on…” he growled, fighting to keep his sword held steady. “Come and get me…”

One of the few creatures with fully functioning legs broke into a sprint and charged at him ahead of the rest, swinging a giant blob of an arm at him. He sidestepped the blow easily and stabbed the thing through the side of the head, pulling his sword out immediately and turning to face the rest before it even hit the ground. Their snarling gave way to a deafening collective roar, and Finn screamed back as he ran forward to meet them. He swung his sword as he approached the closest ones and took them apart instantly, but found his blade caught halfway through the stomach of the next. Two more pulled him away from the still-embedded blade and threw him to the ground, with one attempting to get on top of him and finish the job. He punched it directly in the face with his metal arm, hard enough that his fist came out the other side of its head. Bits of blood and misshapen dough-like flesh poured onto him as he pulled his hand back out, but he ignored it and attempted to spring to his feet, only to find himself being tackled face-down from behind by another of the monsters. He balled his metal hand into a fist and backhanded it as he frantically turned onto his back, sending bits of its face flying off as he knocked it to the side. Before he could even pull his arm back, three more were on top of him, and he had to gasp for air as one threw itself down over his face. He wanted to scream, wanted to grab his sword and cut through them all, wanted to be able to do anything but lie there and panic, but no amount of thrashing would get the things off. He didn’t even have the final dignity of being able to take a deep breath before succumbing to his fate. His thrashing rapidly grew weaker, and he felt a pair of hands grab his leg and start pulling, realizing they were going to rip him apart. He expected some final thought to pass through his mind, but instead just felt like every emotion he was capable of having was hitting him all at once in an incoherent jumble. He assumed he was dying when that started to fade too. Within another few seconds, everything seemed to be gone.

*************

After the destruction of their treehouse, Finn and Jake had gotten to work almost immediately building themselves a replacement home. With help from PB and Marcy, they’d been able to put together a replacement in a smaller but no less impressive home built over a large hole that had most likely been dug by a giant. The house itself was only one story, but had two basement levels built into the hole, the first being a spacious area that they used for everything from charades tournaments to combat practice, and the second being mostly a storage room for Finn’s growing collection of weapons, with a smaller room next to it that the two hadn’t ever really found a good use for. Three hours ago, Finn had crawled into a corner of that room and started crying.

Jake’s funeral had been the day before, and he was genuinely proud of himself for holding it together the whole time. It felt surreal, like he was in some weird hyper-vivid dream that he would wake up from any minute now, but as the service had drawn to a close and Finn found himself alone with the empty house, the reality of it had started to set in. By the time he’d awoken the next morning, it had hit him in full force and he now found himself trying to hide from it as best he could.

He didn’t hear her coming, though that wasn’t really a surprise. Huntress Wizard could sneak up on Marcy, so he wouldn’t have had a chance even if he wasn’t feeling so disconnected from his own senses. Still, he smelled the scent of a fresh summer day in the forest that seemed to follow her everywhere, he heard her breathing gently as she sat down next to him, and most of all he felt her hand as she placed it over his. She didn’t say a word, she just let him squeeze her hand tightly, and he hoped that she understood his silent “thank you” for that.

It didn’t stop him from feeling empty, of course. Jake was gone and nothing was ever filling that void, but he felt something else happening too. Some other emptiness he hadn’t even realized he had was being filled in that moment, and it made things a lot easier to bear. He had no idea what he was going to do once he stepped outside that room, but he was glad he wasn’t going to be alone.

*************

Finn realized that he wasn’t dead when he heard a scream from one of the creatures, and the shock of that single noise cut through the void and seemed to bring back all his senses at once. He gasped for air and opened his eyes, realizing that he was actually able to gasp for air again. The monster that had thrown itself over his face was no longer on top of him, though the others were still pinning down his torso and legs. It took him a few seconds to realize that they were now dead, and as he groggily pushed them off he turned his head to face the rest of their companions.

They were all charging at a single spot, and getting cut down with ease. She had two wooden axes in her hands, but every slice cut clean through the creatures and sent bursts of blue blood spraying onto her. Within a few seconds, the remaining ones had been thoroughly taken apart, and Finn found himself locking eyes with a very disheveled, very bloodsoaked, very angry Huntress Wizard.

“FINN ELIAS MERTENS.”

Oh shit.

She stormed towards him with a look on her face that left him half-convinced she was going to take his head off next. She didn’t even bother to walk around the monster corpses, just stepping through any of the ones in her way with a squelching sound. He’d seen her frustrated before, he’d seen her mad, but what she was now was something Finn didn’t have a word for. One of the things on the ground, still barely alive, began to stir and hopelessly attempt to pull itself up. Finn opened his mouth to say “hey, behind you,” but she threw one of her axes without even looking and sliced its head clean in two, shutting Finn up before he got a word out.

“What. The hell. Were you THINKING?” Her voice was already raised to levels Finn hadn’t known it could reach and it was clear she was going to get a lot angrier. “You stupid, selfish, infuriating IDIOT!”

“Huntress Wizard-“

“I try to reach out to you and help you in EVERY way I can,” she continued, not letting him get another word in, “and you go and pull THIS crap? After ALL the effort you’ve made? After all the effort I’VE made? Why would you do that?” She looked as if she were about ten seconds from a full meltdown.

“HW, when was the last time you slept? You look like you’re about to-”

“DON’T TRY TO CHANGE THE DAMN SUBJECT, FINN!” her voice had somehow raised even louder, something Finn found fundamentally unsettling. “WHY DID YOU LEAVE?”

Finn tried to stop his own voice from quivering or raising, knowing if he matched her volume he actually would have a full meltdown. “Look...it wasn’t an easy choice, okay? I didn’t want to leave. I didn’t! But it was-”

“What, the right thing to do?” her voice had lowered marginally, though if anything it sounded even shakier now. “Why? WHY was it the right thing to do, Finn? Do you think you’re protecting me? Is that what this is?”

“No! Of course that’s not it!” He drew in a breath and ran his hands through his hair, trying to find the right words. “I was just trying to...I don’t know…”

“You could have gotten yourself KILLED out here, Finn! If I hadn’t come along exactly when I did, you probably would have! Did you seriously think you could do something like this all by yourself? Did you REALLY think you didn’t need anyone after EVERYTHING you’ve been through?”

He was about to respond, but hesitated, only briefly. In that brief moment, something new flashed in Huntress Wizard’s eyes.

“You didn’t…” she said, horrified. You didn’t expect to survive out here.” Tears began to flow down her cheeks as she looked him dead in the eye with an expression that had him struggling to find the right words of protest. Before he could properly gather his thoughts to say anything back to her, she punched him square across the face, hard enough that he was sure there was already a visible bruise on his cheek. He didn’t fall over, but he stumbled backward a few steps before looking back at her, too shocked to make a sound.

“YOU ASSHOLE!” she was almost sobbing now , and her voice felt loud enough to deafen him. “YOU CAME OUT HERE TO DIE? AFTER EVERYTHING I’VE DONE FOR YOU?” Her voice was starting to crack as she yelled, but she was far past the point of caring. “I HAVE HELD YOU AFTER YOUR NIGHTMARES, CLEANED UP YOUR VOMIT, HAD TO PRACTICALLY FORCE YOU AT BLADEPOINT TO EAT OR DRINK ANYTHING, AND TAUGHT YOU EVERYTHING I KNOW THAT COULD POSSIBLY HELP, AND YOU JUST SNEAK OUT IN THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT TO GO PLAY HERO AND DIE?” She didn’t punch him again, but she clearly wanted to. “SCREW YOU, FINN. SCREW YOU AND YOUR STUPID ‘I CAN DO IT MY WAY’ CRAP! IF YOU CAN’T ACCEPT MY HELP THEN WHY AM I EVEN HERE?”

“I didn’t ask you to be here!” he said angrily. “You don’t have to stay! If you don’t want to be here, don’t be here!”

“FINN, I DO WANT TO BE HERE!” She was almost screaming now. “I LOVE YOU TOO MUCH TO NOT BE HERE AND I HATE YOU FOR MAKING ME LOVE YOU BUT I’M HERE ANYWAY. I TRACKED YOU IN A PANIC AND JUST PRAYED YOU’D BE ALIVE, AND NOW YOU TELL ME YOU WANT TO DIE?”

“NO, I DON’T WANT TO DIE! BUT I’M GOING TO ANYWAY, SO I MIGHT AS WELL GET AWAY FROM YOU BEFORE I DO AND AND DO ONE LAST GOOD THING FOR YOU!”

However indescribably mad she’d already been, she was easily three times that now. If it had been anyone else he would’ve made his peace with dying right then and there.

“HOW IS THIS A GOOD THING FOR ME, YOU BASTARD? HOW IS THIS IN ANY WAY GOOD?”

“BECAUSE AT LEAST THIS WAY YOU WON’T BE THE ONE WHO HAS TO BURY ME!”

He hadn’t meant to, but he’d shouted. He’d shouted just as loudly as she had, and something in his voice finally gave her pause. They stood there and stared at each other for what felt like an eternity and couldn’t have been more than three seconds.

“Please don’t yell at me again…” Finn said quietly as he wiped the tears from his eyes. “I really can’t handle more yelling right now.”

“Finn…”

She raised a hand to place on his shoulder. He didn’t mean to, but he flinched. It had been total instinct and he regretted it the millisecond after it happened, but it was already too late. The look on Huntress Wizard’s face nearly split his heart in half.

“Finn, I’m so sorry…”

“He wouldn’t stop bleeding,” Finn said, dropping to his knees out of exhaustion. “The whole time…his eye just kept bleeding.”

Huntress Wizard crouched down in front of him, very slowly and very carefully placing her hand on his shoulder.

“I thought…I thought he deserved to be buried. Out of respect or…I don’t know, I wasn’t thinking straight. But after I fought off the bandits, I just…I used my sword and I started digging. It just felt like the right thing to do.” He wiped away a tear from his eye, realizing that his hands were still stained with monster blood. “That was the last time I ever saw him. He was bleeding and limp and I shoveled dirt down on top of him until I couldn’t see him anymore.”

“Finn, I..I had no idea. I thought he’d been buried with the casket at the funeral.”

“Maybe he was, I really can’t remember,” Finn replied. “I know Marcy went back and dug him up and PB buried him properly or cremated him or something, but…I buried him first. After it happened. I didn’t know what else to do so I just grabbed my sword and started digging.”

He was shaking now, and even her hand on his shoulder could only do so much to help. His body seemed to have stopped doing what he wanted it to do, and he was left barely able to even keep talking without fully breaking down into a sobbing fit in her arms yet again.

“I don’t even know how to begin explaining what it was like to see him like that, Fauna. But I will never let that happen to you. I’d rather be torn to shreds out here alone than force you to go through that. However bad you think losing me would be, what I did…something in me died. Something I don’t think I’ll ever get back.”

She pulled her hood down and placed her other hand on his opposite shoulder, looking him directly in the eyes. All the anger on her face had vanished, replaced with something else he didn’t think he’d ever seen from her. It was like he’d finally reached the end of her near-infinite patience and found something gentle at the end rather than angry. Despite her cuts, bruises, and the blood splattered across her face, she was beautiful.

“Of course I had to meet you now…” she said, half-laughing, half-crying. “All the centuries of life I’ve got ahead of me and I fall in love before I’m thirty.” Her grip on his shoulders tightened and it felt like she was holding onto him for dear life. “You’re such an idiot, you know that? You’re an idiot and I’m never gonna find another idiot like you.” She wrapped her arms around him and buried her face in his chest. “Please don’t die, Finn…” her voice was barely audible now. “Please don’t die yet…”

He could feel her shaking as she started to sob, and was hugging him so tight now that it almost hurt. He wanted to say a million things in that moment but he couldn’t get a single word out. He felt utterly helpless and yet here she was, clinging onto him like he was her only lifeline. He had absolutely no idea what to do, and somehow he felt even more helpless than normal. He tried to get any of the words in his head out but nothing came to him, so he hugged her tightly and hoped that would be enough.

IV

The second day of their journey through the city passed without much happening, even now that the two were together. They talked as they traveled, but it was as if both of them were hesitant to say too much of anything for fear that they would start another fight. About halfway through the day, they’d found a group of creatures that looked like a bizarre mixture of a lizard and a horse and decided to try riding them through the city. Huntress Wizard had insisted on them each taking one, but Finn had adamantly argued that they’d ride together, mostly because he was worried she’d pass out soon. He wasn’t sure if she’d actually slept the night before, or any of the nights that she’d been tracking him down for, and even for her it was clearly taking its toll. He was proven right a few hours later when they were nearing the edge of the city, though he was able to steady her before she fell off the creature completely. She only stayed out for about an hour before waking back up and immediately demanding that they resume their journey. By the time they made it out of the city, the sun was in its last stages of setting, and they made camp in the woods that awaited them. Finn had made her promise to sleep this time, which she did, and tried to settle down himself without thinking too much about whether she’d ever be able to really look him in the eye again.

When he awoke the next morning, she was gone, though it wasn’t hard to find where she went. She was sitting near a stream fifteen minutes from their camp, cross-legged with her eyes closed, steadily breathing in and out. Finn briefly thought about trying to say something, but instead simply decided to sit down next to her and do the same, trying to let all the thoughts he was keeping at bay enter his mind so he could at least attempt to address them. As he settled down, he could hear the chirping of the birds from nearby trees, and as he focused in on it in order to help his rushing mind settle, he could hear the gentle rushing of the stream and distant crunching of leaves aligning with the chirping in an almost musical rhythm, and soon he was even able to distinguish between the voice of every bird in the area as their tenors sang over the bass of his own distant heartbeat. Somehow it felt better than it had in the forest, though whether that was the change of scenery or the comfort of having Huntress Wizard next to him he couldn’t tell. He sat there for what felt like hours just trying to process what had happened the last few days, sorting through it all as best he could and trying to let go of his worry that he’d lost the one person left who seemed to really care about him.

“Hey...thank you.” Her voice cut through the music and caused him to open his eyes. “For not leaving again.”

“Did you think I was going to?” he asked, not really sure he wanted the answer.

“Honestly? No. I really didn’t. But I think having it happen the first time really made me think about how scared I am of just...waking up and having you not be there. It’s something I’ve tried a lot not to think about, especially since...you know, the lifespan difference.”

He placed a hand on her shoulder. “I’m sorry I left, Fauna. And I’m sorry I left thinking I was going to die. And I’m sorry I put so much on you recently and I’m sorry I’ve been such a mess and just…” he took a breath, trying not to fumble over his words. “I don’t think I ever really thought about how much of a sacrifice it is for you to love me, especially when I do dumb stuff like this. And as much as you having to see me die scares me, you being alone scares me more. I just wasn’t thinking straight enough to realize that. And I’m sorry.”

“Thank you, Finn,” she said quietly, “I really do appreciate that. And thank you for not trying to do this on your own again.”

“I don’t have it in me to do that again, HW. It took pretty much everything I had to walk out on you the first time.”

She turned to look at him, the autumn leaves of her hair lighting up with brilliant gold in the morning sunlight. There was still blue blood on her face, and he realized he was probably still covered in it too. They’d been traveling nonstop and hadn’t bothered to wash it off, and he’d honestly forgotten it was still even there.

She started laughing, a full and loud laugh that Finn had almost forgotten she had. She tapped his nose while struggling to regain her composure, and he couldn’t help but smile back.

“You,” she said as she tapped his nose again, “look terrible.”

“Me? You look like someone tried to draw a tree and then spilled blue paint all over it!” he said as he burst out laughing.

“Finn, your beard looks like someone spilled blue paint over it.”

They looked at each other for a brief moment before Finn broke eye contact and looked at the ground. After everything that had happened, laughing with Huntress Wizard as if they didn’t have a care in the world just felt wrong. Even looking her in the eye too long started to hurt, because he was afraid if he kept looking, he’d see disappointment or anger, and even if they were justified it would still hurt.

“We, um...we probably should get cleaned up,” he said quickly. “And wash our clothes. Just so we can…you know…not have blood on them.”

She reached out for half a second to grab his hand before pulling back, dropping her gaze as well. “Yeah, I…I found somewhere that would work for that. It’s a hot spring a few minutes from our camp.”

She stood up and started walking presumably in the direction of the hot spring. Finn continued to sit by the stream, not really sure what else to do. He’d thought that maybe having her back might help him feel like maybe he was less lost, but there might as well have been an ocean between them and he had no idea how to cross it, or even if she wanted him to.

She had walked about ten feet away from Finn when she mumbled something, almost too low for Finn to make out. If he hadn’t already been running through the “listening to nature” meditation he had developed from Jake’s inspiration, he might not have been able to hear it at all.

“Are you mad at me, Finn?”

She clearly wasn’t sure if he had heard it and was about to start walking again.

“Hey…” he said, trying to figure out exactly what words to use when absolutely none came to his mind. “Why would you think that?”

She didn’t face him, but he could tell she was crying again. “Everything I tried to do just kept pushing you away. I couldn’t help you get rid of your nightmares, I couldn’t help you actually want to leave the forest…I couldn’t even help you enough to get you to talk about burying Jake. Every time I nurse an animal back to health, I learn exactly what it needs and I make sure I provide it. It’s one of the first things I ever got good at. And I know you’re not an animal, okay? I know that. You’re beautiful and complex and still such a mystery and I love you for it, but…I was the last thing standing between you and dying alone next to some stupid tunnel. And I still couldn’t stop you from going out and trying to do it.”

Finn’s mind raced even faster, trying to find exactly what to tell her. How did he tell her that it wasn’t her fault, that she’d been keeping him alive for months just by being there, that so many parts of that statement were the exact opposite of the truth?

“Take a breath, brother. She just needs to know you understand, and even more than that, she just needs to hear you talk.”

He closed his eyes and inhaled, and then stopped thinking altogether and just let the words flow.

“Remember when I killed Fern? And I wasn’t able to fight anything because I kept seeing him? Well…even after that whole thing where you helped me out with it, I kept having these moments. Nothing huge, but I still just kept thinking about him. I kept thinking that I had pushed him to do all these terrible things that wound up making him want to kill me. I thought that I’d been a bad friend, that I hadn’t done enough for him, pretty much just that I’d pushed him so far that he started hating me. So like…even if it was a total accident when I actually killed him, I still did kill him, you know? And if I’d just been better or smarter or kinder, none of that junk would have ever happened. I talked to Jake about all that, and he just pulled BMO over and started playing every interaction between me and Fern that the little guy had in his memory. He spent an hour just talking to me about every nice thing I’d done for Fern, or about how most of the bad stuff I thought I did was just me remembering things differently because I wanted to blame myself. Did I make mistakes? Sure I did. Everyone does. But he looked me straight in the eye and told me it wasn’t my fault.”

He stood up and walked over to her, taking her hands in his as she turned around to look at him. “I can’t do what Jake did. No one can. I'm definitely not as wise as him and I'm not as good at talking, and I really don't have any of the things that made people listen to him. But what I do have is the ability to look right at you and tell you the truth. Fauna…” he looked again at her deep green eyes, really trying to see everything they had to offer, “this was not your fault. You didn’t fail to keep me alive, I just kept letting myself get worse. You were the single reason that I kept trying to get better. I know that’s a really bad thing, like I really shouldn’t have just had you as my one reason to live, but that’s my fault, not yours. I never hated you and I was never mad at you, and please don’t ever think that anything you did ever made me feel that way.”

“Remember when I said I didn’t want to settle down with anyone because I was afraid I’d go soft?” she asked. She wiped away her tears, her eyes now just watering instead of full-on crying.

“I don’t think that was exactly what you said, but yeah.”

She laughed again. “Well I think I’ve gone soft now.” Tears kept falling from her eyes, but Finn could almost see their exact transformation from ones of self-loathing to ones of much-needed relief.

“How does it feel?” he said, smiling at her.

“It feels horrible,” she said, quickly leaning in and kissing him. “And amazing. I hate it, but I’m also…weirdly okay with it?”

“Yeah,” he said as they both smiled at each other. “I think I know what you mean.”

*************

“I think I should shave the beard,” Finn said. He had his prosthetic arm wrapped around Huntress Wizard while she snuggled up next to him in the corner of the hot spring. Normally he took it off to bathe, but after she pulled him into the steaming water it hadn’t really been his top priority.

“I like the beard,” she replied, all the playfulness and laidback cadence now returned to her voice. “Maybe clean it up a little, but I think you should keep it.”

“Really?” he asked, stroking the beard with his free hand as he thought. “I think I look like a homeless salesman pretending to be a wizard.”

“Nah, you look more like a farmer pretending to be a wizard,” she replied as she poked at the beard. “I think you should grow it all the way to your feet. Just see how long it can get.”

“I am not growing my beard all the way to my feet,” he replied before leaning in and kissing her forehead.

“I’m gonna get you to do it. Just watch.”

All the blood and dirt from the past two days had fully come off by now, and they’d hung their clothes out to dry nearby. Finn had brought a spare set, though he wasn’t so sure about her. He figured if it came down to it she’d just go hunting naked and come back twenty minutes later wearing a lion pelt or something.

After a while, Finn started laughing.

“What?” Huntress Wizard asked as she looked up at him.

“I think the phrase you did use was ‘hard meat don’t get eat.’ That’s exactly how you put it.”

“Oh Glob…” she sighed as she brought a hand up to her face in exasperation. “Don’t you even start with that.”

“I’m just saying, that’s the actual sentence that came out of your mouth.”

“Yeah, I said a lot of dumb stuff back then. Leave me alone.”

Any other good meat analogies though?” he asked, stroking his beard dramatically in mocking deep thought. “I’m trying to remember…”

“Oh, bite me,” she replied, although she was smiling as she said it.

“You mean like-”

“Don’t say it,” she said, trying to sound as intimidating as she could while cuddling in a giant hot tub in a forest.

“Like a-”

“Don’t you dare-”

“-tender piece of meat?” he finished, smiling and raising his eyebrows.

She groaned and buried her face against his chest to hide her blushing, pretty unsuccessfully since he could still see her cheeks turning red. She mumbled something that he guessed was an embarrassed “I hate you,” and he laughed again as he wrapped both arms around her.

It was nice, he thought to himself. Probably the most peace he’d felt since Jake died, just knowing that the perceived ocean between him and Huntress Wizard has shrunk down to this small spring they now shared. It almost made him not want to get out, or even think about the world beyond what they had right now, but he decided that he’d let himself worry about that when it eventually was time to get up and dry off. For now, he was happy, and he was going to enjoy every second of it while it lasted.

*************

They set off again an hour later, trying to make whatever headway they could before nightfall. The settlement was a few days away, but they were both aware that they grew closer by the minute. It was a weird feeling, Finn thought, to have that much unease swirling around in his head when in every other sense he felt calmer than he had in a very long time, like oil that had been dumped into a lake.

“Hey, hold up a second,” Huntress Wizard called, and he turned to see that she had stopped a few feet behind him.

“What’s up?” he asked as he walked back, watching the colors in her hair shift as it reflected the setting autumn sun.

“Before we go any further, I wanted to give you something.”

“Yeah?” he asked. “What is it?”

She reached into a pocket in her cape that Finn hadn’t known was there, and very slowly, very carefully pulled out the last thing he’d expected to see.

“I’m not gonna lie, I was pissed when you left. I kinda lost it for a minute and got a little too carried away. I wanted to fix it, but I didn’t want to lose any time that I could spend going after you, so I took the two halves of it and just took them with me. I’ve been working on it whenever I’ve had the chance today.”

She very gently placed Finn’s hat into his hands, and it felt warm and familiar against the skin of his palms. If anyone else had taken a look at it, they wouldn’t even have been able to tell that it had been ripped in half and then sewn back together, but he could. He could see exactly how much care Fauna had taken with every stitch to make it perfect again, and as he slipped it on over his head he smiled, a kind of smile he hadn’t had in what felt like a very long time.

“So…how does it feel?” she asked, obviously nervous (and also obviously trying not to stare).

Finn looked down at his hands, the calloused flesh of his left and the cold steel of his right looking so vastly different, yet feeling like they went together perfectly. He ran both sets of fingers along the piece of bear pelt that now covered his head before pulling his right arm away and looking at his reflection in his metallic palm. He looked different, there was no doubting it. He hadn’t worn the hat much since going to live with Huntress Wizard, so seeing his beard with it was new, but it was something else too. He realized that the Finn he saw in his reflection seemed to be looking back at him and smiling as if to say “you got this man. Keep going.” It was something that seemed so foreign now he almost forgot he was seeing himself, half-expecting the man in his palm to reach out, fistbump him, and ask him to go climb a mountain and fight a cyclops.

“You’ve grown a lot, and you’re really starting to turn into someone that a lot of people look up to.”

He looked back at Huntress Wizard, a grin spreading across his face. “It feels pretty mathematical,” he said, feeling something come over him that he hadn't felt in at least a year. "It's a perfect fit."