Not That Bad

Most people found prison--even a comfortable one like the islets--to be unbearable. It wasn't the facilities, but instead the lack of freedom. People who would spend their entire lives at home in their room would suddenly find spending all their time in their new room be absolutely unbearable.

Evan did not. For Evan, it was almost business as usual. The islets were pretty similar to life back in his own world. Contained. Limited. Comfortable, but only in an attempt to keep them compliant.

Business as usual indeed.

Getting out was not the great relief it was for most people, but seeing people he knew? That was nice. Inside he'd known no one, and he'd made few friends, keeping mostly to himself the way he had back in his homeworld. It was only outside that he knew people. Jugemu. Straga. Chloe.

Jugemu.

He split off the first moment he could, but to be safe, he needed to stick together. He couldn't just send one off without knowing where he was going back to, so that meant he had to see Jugemu first.

That didn't stop him from having three of himself waiting.

He didn't mind waiting. Not really. It wasn't like Jugemu had sworn a blood oath that he'd be waiting when he got out. He'd been waiting a full month and a half, and waiting an extra fifteen minutes for Jugemu to arrive was the very definition of not a big deal.

What mattered was that he had a ride at all.

At the very least he'd stopped second guessing him. He knew Jugemu would be there. He knew he'd show up.

So when he did, two of the Evan's grinned at him, with the third giving a small wave.

"It's fine," one of them insisted. "Honestly. What's the plan?"

Honestly? He just wanted a change of clothes.

The ferry back to the mainland, new apartment, dinner.

"Sounds good," One Evan said, starting to fall in and more or less usher Jugemu off. No time for standing around. Only time for getting home, and... well, maybe dinner.

Not home-home. That was long gone. But something like it. A place to rest his head in a bed that was less constricting than the islets.

"Food isn't bad there, but you don't really get to pick it. You just get told what's for dinner. Maybe two options, if you need some variety."

Requests for dinner. It seemed so normal and mundane that it almost caught him off guard. The Evan's were effectively flanking Jugemu, like the worlds most uniform squad of bodyguards, with the one on the right doing most of the talking.

"Whatever, I guess. You pick." He paused for a moment, considering that. "Can you cook?"

Okay, so apparently his questions was funny. He raised an eyebrow, giving a small shrug.

"So you're all-purpose," Evan said. "Cooking, cleaning, making sure I don't spend the next three days in bed." All those things. "Not really sure what I'm going to do," he continued as they shuffled onto the ferry. "Like, with the rest of my life. Find a job, I guess."

A thought crossed his mind, and Evan frowned. No, better not to ask.

Studying? Evan wrinkled his nose, obviously not liking the idea at all.

"No," he said. "No point in going back to school. I was never big on the whole education thing anyway. Something like bodyguarding or security's probably the best." He paused for a long moment, staring into space as they pulled away from the island towards the mainland.

"Firefighting, if I can manage it. But they probably won't take me with this on my record."

Vacation. God, no. Not at all.

"Feels like I was just on vacation. Totally separate from the world. I want to go drinking with Straga at some point, but god knows if he's even interested after how long I've been. Aside from that?"

Evan gave an exaggerated shrug. "Really, I don't care. I'll do whatever. So if you've got plans, suggest 'em to me."

Choose your destiny. How ominous. How... imposing? It felt like that.

His attempt to force Jugemu to have an opinion about his own life wasn't quite working.

But you know what? He was a little bit too tired for that right then. Too tired for another round of the Jugemu you should have an opinion about whether you live or die that doesn't start with the words 'whatever you wish'.

"Alright," Evan said. "We go home. We get Thai. We eat dinner. I crash into bed and sleep for a few hours in a bed that doesn't suck. Then we... I don't know. Hang out? Talk? Get to know each other?"

Home was where you lay your head, after all.

"Spicy as hell," Evan said with a laugh. "So show me the place."

—-

The apartment was an apartment in only the vaguest sense of the word. There were four bedrooms (two too many), a full bathroom, full kitchen... the whole thing. It was pretty much a house. A flat house, with a single level, in a building with a security guard and a main office.

It was home, though.

Or at least it was home right until Evan spotted a note shoved under the front door.

"Eh?"

He'd opened, read it, and gone to find Jugemu before long, which shouldn't have been hard since they were in an apartment, but like... god, it was a bit too big for him if he was being honest.

"Jugemu?"

Evan probably would have liked a studio apartment over the current one. But it wasn't bad. It was just a bit of an adjustment. A mansion to a hole in the wall to a fancy cell to a mansion and now to a fancy apartment.

Never mind, it was a lot of adjustment.

"Invitation," Evan said, holding up the letter. "Someone's holding a tournament and they want me to participate. Sounds kind of sketchy, but... can't say i'm not a bit curious."