Callie's Heroes

PART III - COLD HARD LOGIC

The five arrived together in front of the red and yellow marked house. Of course, it was easy to find as it was so much larger than the others. A four-meter door barred the way in, with a smaller, two-meter door, imbedded into it. Along the front of the building was a small, covered porch, and two steps leading down to the ground. Windows were simple openings, with wood shutters you could close against the outside if needed, but no glass in them.

“Home sweet home,” Callie said, slightly intimidated.

Tazrok gave a muted grunt and walked up the two steps to the door. He pushed it open and walked inside. “Not bad” could be heard from the Ogre.

Vanis went in next, followed by Callie, Xin and finally Lena.

The inside of the bunkhouse was … call it cozy. Two large Ogre-sized beds were towards the rear, one on either side. On the left were three smaller beds, and on the right were two, along with a small table with a mirror mounted over it. There was a wood and metal footlocker at the end of each bed as well as some kind of a clothing rack, maybe for this armor Fullo mentioned, next to each bed against the outside walls. Sitting on each bed was a pillow, a leather waterskin, and a blanket, extra-large for the larger beds. At the far back wall were two doors, one Ogre-sized and one standard.

“Which one are you taking?” Callie asked Tazrok.

The Ogre pondered each of the beds, before pointing to the one on the right. “That one.”

“Cool!” Callie said with a giddy laugh, “then I’ll take this one.” She moved towards the standard-sized bed closest to the other Ogre bed. She leaned the bow up against the footlocker and with a bit of a flying leap, she scrambled up into the bed and grinned at everyone else.

Lena, Xin and Vanis all exchanged glances, in a bit of shock at Callie’s silly outburst. “Why do you want that one?” Xin finally asked.

“Because,” Callie said, gesturing to the huge empty Ogre bed next to her. “two words, and Lena, back me up on this one … blanket … fort.” Back home, she had a raised bed with a space underneath that she’d surrounded by blankets and set up as a little refuge. It was her ‘introverts corner’, and it was hugely helpful when the world got to be too much, or she just needed to wall people away for a bit. The huge Ogre-sized bed was a perfect substitute, and Callie foresaw that it might be a nice retreat in the coming days.

Lena just stared at Callie, bouncing slightly on her bed, the big eyes on that tiny Gnome face shining brightly. “Huh!” she finally managed to get out. “Yeah. Why not, I guess. Blanket fort.”

Slowly shaking his head, Vanis took the middle bed on the right. “Gnomes,” he mumbled in exasperation.

“Oh lighten up, grouchypants!” Callie snapped at Vanis, smirking, “or I won’t let you come into my blanket fort!”

Everyone stared with a confused expression at Callie as she looked back, a big, happy grin on her face. Callie could tell they didn’t see the value of making a spot under the big bed, but they would in time.

Quickly trying to change the subject, Lena gestured to the remaining bed. “I guess that will be for the new housemate if we get one.”

Callie examined her own bed more-closely, seeing the mattress covering was the linen/burlap material similar to her clothing. The mattress was stuffed with something that crinkled lightly, perhaps straw or sawdust? It wasn’t soft, but it wasn’t hard either. In fact, it was remarkably comfortable, and much better than sleeping on the ground, for sure. After a long, hard day, it would be absolute luxury. Callie stood on the bed and tossed the pillow to the end by the footlocker, and then shook out the blanket. It was plenty large enough to cover the entire bed and she let it slowly float into position, before smoothing out a few remaining wrinkles.

“I wonder where we fill these?” Callie said, holding up her waterskin. “Fullo said we had to fill it and keep it with us all the time.”

“I doubt there's drinking water here in the bunkhouse,” Lena said.

“I will ask someone shortly,” Xin interjected, still sorting out the blanket on her own bed. “I just want to relax for a few minutes, though.”

Tazrok let out a long, low grunting noise as he laid out on his own bunk. Callie noticed that he must have grabbed a towel back at the bathhouse, and had tied it around his waist and between his legs, which managed to reduce the chance to see something unwanted. With a slight shudder, she had a momentary vision of being flashed earlier and was incredibly grateful.

“What’s in here?” Callie asked, hopping off the bed. She walked over to the normal-sized door inset into the back wall.

“Latrine?” Lena said.

Callie opened the door and looked inside. “Yup!” Callie entered and closed the door, apparently to do her business. “Oooo, you guys have plumbing here, too! And a bidet?” came Callie’s muffled voice.

“I can hardly keep up,” Lena whispered quickly to the remaining group. “Is it just me, or does it seem she’s always off in some random direction?”

Tazrok grunted in agreement. “Yes. Little One becomes … unfocused. Distracted.”

“The few Gnomes I’ve met have all been at least this … scattered,” Vanis said, keeping his voice low. “Brilliant Engineers, Artificers, Enchanters and even Tacticians, but sometimes you have to really work to keep them focused, and just to keep up with them for that matter, especially if they are younger. It can be absolutely exhausting, although a little fun in a way, too.”

“Really? I’ve only met one other Gnome, and he ran a smuggling ring, so I suppose that required a lot more discipline. But, he was also quite a bit older, I think well over one-hundred.”

“What’s worse,” Vanis continued, “this childlike immaturity we’re occasionally seeing is also absolutely common for Gnomes. Just know, when the issue is important, they are completely serious, but if the situation isn’t …”

“Then you get blanket forts and other sillyness?” Lena said, filling in the statement.

“Exactly,” Vanis said, with a sigh. “Given her circumstances, though, I think she’s handling it very well, and entitled to a little goofiness if it helps relieve the stress.”

“I’ve met no Gnomes ever,” Xin said, “But my Valley is not close to any Gnome settlements or the larger cities, so this is not surprising. You are saying all this is truly normal? Does she not understand where she is or what is happening?”

“This is very much what I’ve seen, Xin,” Vanis echoed again. “I assure you, she certainly does understand the stakes around her, so maybe it’s a mental coping mechanism?”

The Lizardkin slowly shook her head and frowned. “She must focus, Gnome or not.”

“Yes, she must,” Vanis agreed with a frown.

“What do we do about her?” Lena quietly asked the room, “For that matter, what do we do about all of us and her?”

Vanis looked towards the rear door. Callie was still inside. “Yes, this is the real question we must face,” he said, still keeping his voice low, “With the way she talks, it gets quite easy to believe this ‘other world’ story. The things she’s described, the words and phrases she uses, that would be hard to simply make up. If her story is true, that could get her, and us for that matter, into a lot of trouble if not handled delicately. We need to be careful.”

“I don’t know,” Lena said flatly. “I need to keep her safe, and am happy to do that, but we need a better plan than … ‘just see what happens’. And we all have our own issues to deal with because of the Curse.”

“I wish we knew who we could trust,” Vanis said. “We need to talk to someone in the leadership here. But who? If we go to the wrong person…”

“Watch for two days,” Tazrok said gruffly, shrugging

“What’s that?” Vanis said.

“Watch. See who trust.”

Vanis nodded, slightly skeptical. “I do suppose that is at least a reasonable course of action.”

There was a sound of rushing water, and a moment later Callie emerged. “There’s a big pile of clean linen rags and an empty basket, so I assume we use these to dry ourselves?”

“Probably,” Lena said.

Callie nodded, a sullen look on her face, and then tossed the cloth she was holding into the basket.

“Is something wrong?” Lena asked.

Callie held up a finger in a ‘give me a moment’ pose and walked to her bunk. She hop-climbed up and turned to sit on the edge. “Do you remember when you told me that Gnomes have really good hearing?”

“Yeah, on the way …” Lena started, and then trailed off.

“Callie, I am so …” Vanis started as he realized she had heard them talking.

“It’s okay. I’d ask the same questions if I were you,” Callie sighed. “Look, I don’t know if what I’m going to say is going to make a lot of sense, but just let me talk for a minute.”

Everyone sat, giving Callie their full attention.

“I’ve been giving some thought, at least with the part of my brain that can apparently process all of this, about what has happened to me. I still don’t know what is going on, but I have a few theories.”

Callie drew a cleansing breath. “Theory one: I am still on Earth, which means this is all a figment of my imagination and none of you are real. This likely means that I’m either dead, dying, in a coma, or have gone certifiably insane. However, I am not really a fantasy nerd and what I do know about dungeons and dragons and Elves and the like come from a few books I read as a kid, and watching Lord of the Rings and Game of Thrones and a few other movies and shows like that. Nothing that is going on here is in any of those things, and I’m not smart enough to make all this up.“

Lena started to say something, but Callie held up her hand.

“Theory two: I am from here, this place is real, you are all real, and I have legitimate amnesia or some form of insanity and remember nothing. The problem with that is I would then be somehow making up fantastical ideas completely foreign to this world like trains and airplanes and electricity and cities of millions with buildings a hundred stories tall. It means I somehow have invented a Human mother and a dead Human father and I miss them both so hard right now. Somehow I know of weapons that can kill dozens of people in an instant at range, and bombs that can destroy entire cities at once. And somehow all of that fiction is still, completely and without a doubt, real to me.”

Callie again gave Lena another glare before she could interrupt.

“The last theory is that less than twelve hours ago I was on Earth. I was a twenty-six year old, five-foot-eight, chubby, Human girl from Chicago, Illinois, with a failing career as an accountant, no love prospects, living at home with my mom. And somehow, through means unknown … be it magic or reincarnation or mysticism or science or just divine bad luck … I was transported from Earth into the body of a three-foot tall Gnome with pointy ears, pink hair, a matching pink crotch, missing all my tattoos, and boobs small enough I no longer need to wear a bra. That last one is actually kinda nice, by the way.”

Callie could see Vanis slowly rubbing his chin, listening intently, but also deep in thought.

“You guys, when you think about it and peel apart the options. The last theory? The one that is the most ridiculous and implausible? That’s the one that actually makes the most sense!”

“You aren’t wrong, Callie,” Vanis said slowly.

“I also know, if all the stories I’ve ever read or movies I’ve seen have shown, when the being from another world is found out by the people in power? Well, that never goes very well for the person from another world. They are captured, dissected, and studied … or worse.”

“You’re also right about that,” Vanis said. “That’s exactly why I am fearful about going to the wrong person.”

“I have a lot of flaws. But I have one really bad flaw,” Callie said, “and it’s gotten me into a lot of trouble over the years; it’s gotten me really hurt. That flaw is that I believe what people tell me. So, if you tell me you will help me? If you tell me you’ll be my friend? I’m going to believe that. If you ask me to truly trust you? I am absolutely going to do that. But know that I will do it exactly once. If you lie to me? If you betray my trust? I’ll never be able to believe you again.”

Everyone sat in silence, unsure what to say.

“I need help, but I cannot and will not ask you to risk anything to help me. I just ask that if you are willing to help me, you be sure. If you aren’t sure, that’s truly okay. Just be honest. Because I don’t know if I can handle being hurt right now on top of everything else. It’s happened to me before and it nearly destroyed me. If I need to, I’ll just go right to Legate Galin or the Commandant and let the chips fall however they fall.”

“Callie, I…” Lena began.

Again, Callie held up her hand to cut her off. She picked up the waterskin and looked at it in her hands. “I’m going to go out into the garden for a little while and let you all talk. The sun may be really bright, but it does feel nice and warm. I’ll ask someone about where we find water.”

With that, Callie slid off the bed to the floor, and walked to the entrance, taking her waterskin with her. She turned and gave everyone a brave, but weak smile, before she lifted the latch, and walked out.