(26) "wipe those tears, kid"

Steve woke on a straw bed in the corner of a strange hut.

It was mid-morning. Distantly, birds could be heard exercising light and airy sopranos. Inside the hut it was quiet. Steven stayed still for a minute or two, just trying to get his bearings. Turning his head offered him still images: a rickety table, a bag of seed. His sword was propped against the bed, his sneakers placed neatly beside it.

The laces were… cut?

The bed was soiled with his blood. There was a sizable wound on his torso, patched up by a large bandage.

Images creeped back, ever so slowly. He’d been fighting something in a wooded area, fell.

It took him awhile to struggle up, but finally he was able to shuffle awkwardly outside. There was just grasslands for miles and miles. Distantly a
forest sprouted out of the land, too gloomy for the sunny day. Just next to the house, laundry on a clothesline fluttered gently in the breeze next to a few neat rows of tilled land.

Steve didn’t see anyone, however. He was alone.

The situation was familiar. He’d woken up in a shack like this before. Back in the beginning, when he was just a kid. Before the Change.

Back then an old man had been waiting for him outside, next to a blacksmith’s forge that had steadily puffed smoke. Svott had taken care of him for a little bit after that, given him a place to sleep, told him to pull it together. That was back when Steven could only utilize rips in the universe to travel, before he learned what he was capable of.

Svott was the one who taught him how to fight with a sword. Helped him forge the one he used now.

The old man was gone now, though. Died two summers ago.

In this universe, however, no one was around to help Steven. He lingered for a little while, trying to stick it out, but his side hurt too much, and a straw bed wasn’t exactly helping his back.

By the time a dusty wagon finally rolled up to the front door, Steve was already long gone.

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The linebreak won't copy and paste sorry im on my phone

Literally just came up with Svott’s name on the spot but you know what that’s a great name for an old man who lives alone in the middle of fucking nowhere

(pronounced suh-VAW-t)