The Systems Challenge

"So, that's pretty much what led up to us finding you guys," Sonya concluded.

Elin nodded, wondering if maybe Sonya would be able to help her with her issues with Kim. Such as how Kim had been treating her since Elmo and Jonas had disappeared and how she wasn't happy about it, but didn't know what to do about it.

"You know, I was wondering, did you ever find out about what abilities your wolf shape might have?" Elwin asked. "Or did you just focus on working with your dragon shape?"

"Actually, I did work with it a little, and it turns out that it has a kind of breath attack. Not exactly a cold breath, but it at least makes me feel a little chilly when I use it."

"So, in other words, it attacks with bad breath, huh?" Frank remarked.

"If you'd like, I could give you a first-hand demonstration," Sonya offered sweetly. "That way you could just see how 'bad' my wolf's breath is."

"I don't need to see it to know how bad it is," Frank replied dismissively.

"Anyway," Sonya said, clearly dismissing Frank's comments as well. "Since we finished with our story, Why don't we start discussing what we can try to get at the dragon?"

"Uh, about that," Bart said. "How would you suggest that we go about reaching it's, uh, eyes and all that? I mean, it's not like we can get up there on our own without the bear taking note of us?"

"Simple," Elwin answered, looking at Sonya. "We get Sonya to fly us there in her dragon form and then we either have her land on the bear or we jump from above it."

"Suppose we jump," Kim said, sounding like she might be getting a headache. "What will we do if we can't find a secure landing and one of us falls? I don't think we'll be able to heal them in time before they'd get squashed by the bear stepping on them."

Elwin merely shrugged. "If that happens, it happens. I mean, it's not like we started this meeting thinking that we wouldn't lose anyone. Even before we attacked the bear that first time, it's not like we thought this would be a simple fight. Especially with how big the bear is."

"Speak for yourself, Elwin," Patricia retorted. "I don't plan on dying in this fight. I don't know about you, but I'd like to at least have a chance at living in this world after this competition is over if I can't get back to my own world."

"I'd like to live too," Bart added quietly, though Elin wasn't sure if anyone else heard it.

"What're you going to do to make sure that you don't die?" Elwin snapped. "From what we know, there might not be anything that we can do to actually hurt that bear."

"I'm sure there's a way," Kim replied, sounding like she might actually know something, which made Elin wonder if she'd used the ability from her sword that had originally been 'disabled' when they'd first learned about it.

"Then why not enlighten us what that way is?" Elwin retorted.

"If you would calm down, you'll see that she indicated that she was confident that there was a way, not that she knew what that way was," Owen reasoned.

Elwin glared at Owen for a minute before turning away, clearly not willing to budge an inch on the subject.

"What if we had Elmo, Patricia, and Patrick on Sonya's back," Jonas suggested. "They could fly up to the bear's face and try using their abilities, trying to target the bear's eyes, nose, and throat if it opens it's mouth. If things get dicey, Sonya can just fly away and we can try again."

"Why me!?" Elmo protested, making Elin giggle. She understood where he was coming from, since she certainly wasn't that interested in getting pulled onto that."

"I can go to," Heather said.

"Not a chance," Sonya stated. "I'm not letting you get that close to that thing."

"And what're you going to do to stop me?" Heather snapped. "I'm not going to let you put yourself in danger while waiting to see if something might happen that'll make me lose you."

Elin wanted to voice her own support for Heather, but she also had a feeling if she said anything, that she might get dragged into that. Such as Sonya using her as an alternative for Heather, which in turn would mean that she'd have ended up getting herself involved in this as well.

"You know, what if we sent Frank as well?" Stanley suggested, though Elin wasn't sure that Frank would be in any shape to do anything in the morning.

Not with the way that he, Stanley, and Thomas seemed to be at that moment. They'd been able to rest the entire day after getting pulled out of the battle, but Elin didn't think that it was likely that they'd be able to move around much even after a full night's rest as well.

"If he wants to, I won't object to him helping, but he'd need to be ready to go when we head out, though," Sonya said. "If not, then he'd have to stay behind."

"He'll be ready if you'll heal us," Stanley answered.

"Hey, if Heather doesn't want to, I'm not going to try to pressure her to. You guys know what you did to us, so you'll just have to deal with the fact that you can't control us the same way anymore."

Elin wanted to ask what she was talking about, but at the same time, was certain that she didn't want to know. She couldn't say what the reason behind Sonya's statement was, but she also had a feeling that it probably was best that she didn't know. Just that there was a feeling that she shouldn't ask anything about that. At any time. Ever.

"Getting back on track, do you have a breath attack on your dragon form?" Patrick said, sounding more tired than Elin would have expected. "If you do, then maybe you could use that if we go with that suggestion of you hovering in front of the bear's face."

Sonya looked at Patrick for a moment before turning away. She said something that Elin wasn't able to hear, but when Kim elbowed Sonya in the side, she looked back and Patrick and said clearly, "Yeah, I have a breath attack, but it doesn't have that great of a range."

Elin wasn't sure how long the discussion lasted, other than it kept going on and on. She tuned out after a while, partly because she was getting rather tired and partly because she could see that things weren't likely to go anywhere. Not with how the discussion seemed to have devolved to everyone trying to make a point about their opinion rather than trying to figure out what might help things move forward.

When she decided to head off to bed, she was a little surprised to see Heather moving away at the same time. No one seemed to notice the two of them moving away from the fire, but Elin was more happy of that fact than anything else. For one, she herself wouldn't be as likely to get dragged back into that discussion. Where she was pretty sure nothing was actually going to get decided tonight anyway.

"Tired of them repeating the same things?" Elin whispered to Heather as both of them moved away.

Heather didn't look at Elin, but rather nodded. "It does get tiring."

"At least they're not expecting us to be involved, right?" Elin asked, trying to lighten the mood, but quickly sobered up when Heather didn't seem to react the way she had hoped.

"Regardless of what's decided, once Sonya's in her dragon shape, she won't be able to keep me from climbing on her back before she takes off."

Elin blinked. She didn't really get the sense that keeping Heather back or not had actually been decided, which made her wonder if it hadn't gotten decided because Heather didn't plan on letting that choice be made by others.

Which Elin could understand a bit of. If she had still been feeling about Kim the way she had before, she was pretty sure she'd be much like Heather was at this point. That no matter what the danger, if Kim was going in, she was as well. No matter what anyone else said.

They didn't go far, since they both knew that aside from monsters, there were any number of dangers from basic wild animals that could come at them while they slept if they didn't stay close enough to the rest of the group. Which was rather a pity in Elin's opinion, since they could still hear the discussion continuing to process under full volume.

"You know, I think I like the clothing we've gotten in this world over the clothing from my own world," Heather remarked, startling Elin at the change of the subject.

"Huh?" Elin asked, not sure what Heather was talking about, but then remembered what she'd said about what had happened to her before she came to this world. "Oh yeah. Your clothing was always a couple sizes too small, right? I'm not sure what you had meant by 'sizes,' but I guess it couldn't have been very comfortable."

"What're you talking about?" Heather asked, sounding like she was already well on her way to falling asleep, despite the noisy discussion.

"Just what you said about how things were in your own world just before you got pulled into this one," Elin replied, as she settled in near Heather, not sure if this was the place she'd staked out for herself earlier on or not.

Elin heard Heather start to sit up before she settled back down. "Oh yeah, I forgot I said that," she said, sounding like she was talking to herself. "Not sure I why I said that. It wasn't even remotely true."

Elin sat back up, startled. "What're you talking about? What wasn't remotely true?"

Maybe it was because she was so tired, but she felt like her brain wasn't grasping the point that she felt she should have already recognized. Although, it could also because Heather had changed the subject without Elin realizing. Not that she thought that had actually happened.

"That my clothing was always that small. That my parents would get for me," Heather said as she yawned. "Mostly it was always from off the clearance rack. Whatever cost them the least is what they'd go for. If it started to fall apart on its own, then that was my fault, even if the material was just too cheap to last as long as other items would have."

Elin nodded, even though she was pretty sure Heather couldn't see her do that. "At least you're comfortable now, right?"

Elin was pretty sure Heather smiled at that. "Yeah, I guess I am." Then there was a pause before she added, "Good night."