Care for a Pint

Zeph was staring at a large three-dimensional holographic projection. Schematics were displayed along with a list of numbers that were constantly changing. He didn't know what it was for or what it did, but it was pretty cool. To his left was a testing room. New weapons were being tested in it, including a prototype revolver. It seems that Bernard made some progress with the help of his new R&D enterprise.

"I told you it was impressive," Bernard said smugly.

"No kidding. I can't believe you did all this in a month." Zeph continued to look around.

"Would you like a tour?"

"You bet."

Bernard guided Zeph around the facility and explained some of the projects that they were working on. It was impressive and Zeph didn't understand half the stuff they were doing, but he was having a great time. The machines were a combination of magic and technology and watching them work was mesmerizing. Holographic displays were everywhere showcasing new ideas and progress reports. They finally made it to the end of the tour and Bernard showed Zeph a new Holo-pendant.

"This is the final product based on some of your feedback and ideas. We did what we could and I think most of the things you wanted are working." Bernard lifted up a different pendant for Zeph that was designed specifically for him. It was less conspicuous and was made of a semi-transparent jade with small glittering silver lights floating inside like stars in the night sky. "This one is for you."

"Woah." Zeph failed to come up with anything more complex to say. The pendant was captivating.

"Woah indeed. Like you suggested, the non-customized pendants work by using hand gestures. The holograms are three dimensional and interactive. We added the privacy feature so the images and sounds can be displayed only for the user. Our advances in spell-script allowed us to create a magic gathering circuit along the chain it rests on. That way it can be powered by the necklace and people won't have to supply magic from their own reserves. It was a stimulating challenge and had most of the researchers here working long hours to make it work. Everyone was excited to try these innovations, and word of our ideas is spreading through the magical engineering community."

"That's great. I'm so happy for you." Zeph switched out his pendant. "What should I do with this old one?"

"Hmm, keep it as a back-up if your new one breaks. If anything, it's the first working device of its kind, so it may hold some historical significance in the future."

"Gotcha." Zeph put it in his pocket.

With the tour done, Bernard brought Zeph into the room with the spiritual energy monitoring equipment. Relina and Eli were already there looking at the map. Eli would call and inform patrol teams of any lingering invaders while Relina was tracking them down. Without her, the system wouldn't work and Bernard already had people looking into a way to fix that problem. Hopefully, they could get a device working that didn't need a spirit mage to function. Zeph was looking at the map and watching Relina use advanced spirit magic while Bernard explained how the device worked.

"So now that you know that there are stragglers still lurking in our city, are you willing help take care of them?" Bernard decided it was time to start telling Zeph about Alex's idea.

"Am I going out there alone?" Zeph asked.

"No, Bianca will be out there as well. However, you will be responsible for the majority of the work while she stays hidden. The only time she will assist you is if she deems the situation too dangerous for you to take care of yourself." Bernard started to highlight a section of the city. "This will be the area you'll be starting in. Keva wanted you to be in high profile place, so we could get some good press and help assure the people that their Lord is willing to fight for them."

"Yeah but I'm not the lord."

"No, but you're the next one. Alex wants to display your prowess to the people. They'll feel safer with one of us out there taking an active role in cleaning up this mess. I'm too busy trying to get to the bottom of this whole thing, so that leaves you to be my representative. I also know that you felt somewhat useless the other night, and this may be a way for you to bolster your confidence, and resolve. There's also a secondary purpose for this." Bernard rubbed the back of his neck trying to think of a way to say the next part.

Zeph already had an idea what he was about to say. "I'm also bait. Aren't I? I'll be out there alone hunting monsters and it might make someone a little trigger happy." It made sense. He would be very hard to assassinate considering his constitution and most attempts wouldn't faze him too much.

"I'm sorry. At first, I didn't want you to do it, but Alex brought up some good points." Bernard continued to talk to Zeph and iron out the details of what he'd be doing for the foreseeable future. School wasn't an issue because it was temporarily closed. When it opened up, he could still skip because his grades were fine and he wouldn't be missing out on anything.

"I'll do it. I've been wanting to help out and you know what I decided my dream was. Save people, travel the world, witness wonders, and all that jazz." Zeph continued to assure Bernard that he had no problems with the plan and was looking forward to it. Relina and Eli joined their conversation and they started talking about the things Zeph would need to do and look out for in the coming days. The young lord didn't make it back home until evening.

_________

"Yo, we came to plaaay!" Lili sang out while coming through the mansion's front door. Zeph heard her from the living room. Ivy and Lili came over often since Genevieve and Sharon arrived in Asperitus. They said it was because their moms and grandmas talked about boring stuff all the time and Zeph's house was much cooler.

Semara greeted the girls at the door and led them into the living room. "Your girlfriend's here peepers."

'Damnit she said that on purpose to rile them up.' Zeph mentally grumbled. "Not my girlfriend, and quit calling me peepers dangit."

"Sure thing peepers." Semara smiled mischievously and walked out of the room. She hid right behind the entryway so she could hear what happens next.

Lili sat on the couch. "Sup bud. Why is she calling you peepers?"

Zeph raised an eyebrow. "Sup bud? Why are you talking like that."

Ivy sat down next to Zeph and sighed. "She saw a show on CV and now she's trying to get something called street cred. I have no idea what it means, but she's been talking weird all day. She's been trying to imitate the way Eli talks because he's the 'coolest person' she knows."

Lili gave Ivy toothy grin. "Don't be hatin', you just jealous of my swagger."

"Oh dear lord shoot me." Zeph facepalmed.

"That aside, you didn't answer the question she asked. Why is Semara calling you peepers?" Ivy leaned towards him inspecting his reaction."

"Her top fell off in the pool, and she keeps teasing me by implying that I acted like a pervert and tried to peep on her." Zeph decided to just rip the band-aid off.

Bianca was next to Semara wondering how Lili would react. Trying to make Zeph flustered and get under his skin was becoming a favorite past time of the two shifters. The fact that Zeph took almost everything in stride was why it was so interesting. Shifters loved a challenge.

"You looked at her boobs!?" Lili said wide-eyed.

"Zeph!" Ivy shouted, her ability to think rationally failed as jealousy, anger, and disappointment started to fill her mind. "How could you do that? What's wrong with you? You can't go around just willy-nilly peeping at a girl's… a girl's… you know." She ended up standing and pointing at the boy like an old woman lecturing a bad puppy.

Everyone was surprised at Ivy's sudden outburst. The young lord sighed and stood up to look at the grumpy faced half-elf. She was about to continue her little rant, but Zeph brought his hand in front of her faced and *thunk* flicked her.

"Ow." Ivy rubbed her forehead.

"Calm down. Jeez, I didn't do anything. Her top fell off in the pool, and I'm pretty sure it was Bianca's fault. I didn't see anything and it wouldn't have been my fault even if I did." He sat back down. Ivy calmed down after the forehead flick. She was still upset, but she sat back down and tried to watch whatever show Zeph already had on the CV.

Lili watched her two friends sit in awkward silence trying to figure out why Ivy snapped like that. "OH! I got it," she smacked her fist into her palm in realization. "She's mad because you never show any interest in her, but you're always flirting with Semara."

Zeph scoffed. "I don't flirt with Semara. We mess with each other. I do the same thing with Bianca. It's just something we do for fun."

"I don't know, seems like flirting to me." Lili narrowed her eyes at him.

"Yeah, and what would you know about flirting?" Zeph asked condescendingly.

"Plenty, I've been watching Ivy's grandma teach her how to flirt for the last two weeks," Lili said triumphantly "C'mon girl. Show him what you got."

Ivy blanked out when Lili put her on the spot like that. She couldn't think of anything and just spouted the first thing that crossed her mind. "Ummm... hey big boy... come here often?" Even she knew that she screwed up halfway through saying what was possibly the lamest pickup line ever.

The two shifters had to cast a barrier so the kids couldn't hear their laughter. Semara turned to her friend, "It's better than any CV show." Bianca couldn't answer cuz she was still too busy laughing, but she nodded her head.

Lili gestured for Ivy to try again. "You can do better than that."

Ivy's eyes darted left and right. She couldn't remember a single thing her grandma taught her. 'Crap just wing it,' she thought. Finally, something came to mind. "Is it hot in here, or is it just you." The half-elf followed up by fanning her face with her hand and tried to look at him seductively.

Zeph looked at the awkward attempt at being sexy. "That's it. I'm out." he stood up and started walking away. "I'm going to get something to drink. I'll be back in a minute," he said before leaving.

Ivy groaned. "That was so lame." She leaned her head back on the couch and started thinking about what Lili said. "Do you really think he has a crush on Semara?" she asked Lili.

"No idea, but I think that you think he has a crush on Semara. You blew a gasket when you thought he snuck a peek at her, so that means you were jealous. Those are just my thoughts though. It took me a minute to figure it out, cuz you're so weird when it comes to Zeph." Lili brought her feet up on the couch to get more comfortable. "Having a crush seems hard."

"It sure is." Ivy leaned over on the armrest. "What should I do? I know he doesn't want a girlfriend anytime soon, but I really like him. Grandma says I should be more confident and aggressive, but it's not working. Do you have any advice?"

"Not really. I don't even know why you fell for him in the first place."

"I don't know, he just... makes me feel happy when I'm around him. It's hard to put into words."

"You don't look happy."

"That's because I'm having a tough time here. I think you're right and I am jealous of Semara. I'm jealous of Bianca too. He's so close to them. I'm just trying to figure how to get close to him too."

Lili shrugged. "Only thing you can do is wait. Be his friend. Be there for him. And hopefully, he'll realize how amazing you are and pull his head out of his ass." Ivy gasped at her friend's language.

Behind the entryway, Bianca and Semara had stopped laughing. "Well, that took a sad and unexpected turn," Bianca said.

"You know Zeph really well. Why doesn't he want to go out with her? She's a sweetheart," Semara asked.

Bianca tapped her chin trying to think of something to say. "Well, from what he's told me, Zeph isn't physically attracted to anyone his age and he just can't picture himself being in a romantic relationship with anyone right now."

Semara shook her head. "Wish we could give her some advice. Too bad we don't have a lot of experience to draw from."

Bianca and Semara suddenly felt depressed at that realization. Their love lives were practically non-existent. Right now a twelve-year-old girl was ahead of them. At least she had a boy she liked. The two shifters haven't met anyone that caught their interest in a long time.

"We need to get out more." Bianca sighed. The two shifters decided to join Ivy on the couch and try to cheer her up.

____________

A few minutes later, Lili walked into the kitchen and saw Zeph leaning against the counter petting Rin. "It's taking you a long time to get that drink."

He looked at her. "Yup, just figured I'd give Ivy some time to recover. She's probably feeling embarrassed cuz of what you said.

"Not really, she's just sad. She really likes you, you know?"

"I'm well aware."

"She's worried you're gonna find someone else and fall in love with them instead."

"Seems that way."

"She's also jealous of Bianca and Semara because you're so close to them."

"Well, they're basically my family."

Lili was getting angry. "Is that all you have to say? Don't you have anything else, an idea, or a plan or something? Why aren't you in there with her?"

"What Lili? What do you want me to do?"

"I want you to get your head out of your ass and love my friend." She stomped her foot.

Zeph sighed and walked up to Lili, andput his hand on her shoulder. "It doesn't work that way. As much as I enjoy hanging out with Ivy, I don't love her. I hate that I'm the reason she's sad, but I'm not going to lie to her or to myself. She knows how I feel. This is one of those things where the only person who can help her is herself."

Lili Leaned against the wall. "I know, but I just don't like seeing her like this. She was so happy when she first saw you. She still is most of the time, but sometimes she just gets so sad. I want to help her, but I don't know what I can do."

"Tell her to quit trying to get me to love her, and just act like herself. Her grandma's got her all wound up with ideas and plans to seduce me, and that's only putting pressure on her. She feels like a failure when it doesn't work. Just tell her to stop trying to be my girlfriend and just be my friend."

Zeph walked toward the freezer and started shuffling some items around.

"What are you doing now?"

"I've found that one of the best ways to cheer up a girl, in situations like this, is with a pint of ice-cream.

________

Zeph and Lili got the ice cream for Ivy and walked back into the living room carrying some snacks and drinks only to see something odd and depressing.

Bianca was sitting on the couch with Semara and Ivy. It seems that they were in the middle of a conversation. "At least you get to spend time with the guy you like. I haven't had a date in two years," the fox girl complained.

"That doesn't matter. We're strong independent women. We don't need men to be happy." Semara rested her head against the couch. "But, it would be nice to have someone. You know, go on dates, talk to, snuggle with." She sighed.

"If only I was older, maybe Zeph would actually want to go out with me." Ivy leaned on her arm and let out a long sad sigh.

Lili stared at them in disbelief. "Jeez, it's like I can see rain clouds over their heads."

Zeph looked down at the food in his hands. "We're gonna need more ice cream."