"Are you sure that Gantry is dead?" asked Momo.

  Max glumly nodded. "I'm pretty darn sure."

  Momo held a mug of cocoa, one hand fiddling with the bottom of it. "That’s…really surprising. Of all of us, I thought that he and you would be the most likely to survive."

  Max didn't know what to say. In fact, his heart felt like a bowling ball in his chest. It was obvious that Momo was melancholy, but for her, it had been years since she’d seen Gantry. For Max, it hadn't even been two months. Thankfully, his spirits were being silent and giving him privacy, or at least the illusion of it, the same as Lance currently was, leaving him alone with Momo.

  After first fetching some drinks, now Max and Momo had a conference room to themselves to catch up. So far, after the first burst of emotion at their reunion, it had been a slow-going sort of thing. A large part of it, Max could sense, was that Momo had been through so much, and she seemed to constantly be wondering what to actually tell him and what not to. Finally, after a little bit more small talk, she just blurted, "My world is almost dead. If I stayed there another two months or so, I would probably not be here to talk to you."

  "You mentioned some of that before. What happened?" asked Max.

  Momo smiled without humor and took a sip of her cocoa. "What it really kind of comes down to is bad leadership, rigid thinking, and the very nature of my world, Oas Panchia."

  "What do you mean?"

  "Well," she said and paused, seeming to search for the words for a few moments. "I told you before that my people, the Neusapiens, are an underground race, right? Or at least for the most part, forced into it. Anyway, because of that, we had good places within Oas Panchia to choke the monsters off, to create defensive emplacements. The problem is that the monsters could concentrate all of their efforts on those areas too, putting constant pressure on us. Everything was going okay, despite our relatively low populations, because we only really had to defend a few key areas. But then there was a monster leader that figured out how to burrow through rock. After that, it was all kind of downhill."

  "So they attacked your flanks, huh?" Max asked.

  She nodded. "The front line ended up not being the front line anymore. We were being attacked at the rear, invaded. But we couldn't give up the front line either because that was where the bulk of the enemy forces still were. We only ended up staying alive as long as we did because of me and Challengers like me who are stronger than average and could act as a quick reaction force."

  Max examined her with his manasenses and was proud to see that she was at least an A-rate adventurer by Earth standards, merely by the strength of her mana swordsman power. She might even be a low S-tier. But when he activated his third eye to look at her and saw the sheer number of spirits that she was bonded with now, he was doubly impressed. What's more, being a four-star mana body now, Max's third eye was stronger–it actually showed him more information.

  As he looked at Momo, witnessing the unfiltered truth, seeing all the spirits entwining her essence, he felt strange that it didn’t feel strange. Just a few months ago, Max was pretty sure the experience would have unsettled him. However, after bonding with Saliron and Anansi, his spirit had gotten tougher.

  With his strengthened third eye, Max could actually identify what some of Momo's spirits could do. He realized, with surprise, that she had one relatively high-level spirit that let her short-range teleport through shadow. She had a spirit that would let her multiply any projectile she threw, creating illusions that hit with physical force. Yet another increased the piercing power of her projectiles. It didn't take a genius to understand that Momo had found a number of spirits to help synergize with her throwing knives. Max could see that even after these years, she still wore the weapons that he’d bought for her in the Quartet. In fact, as she spoke, she touched them from time to time in what seemed like some form of comfort.

  "What about the mismanagement?" asked Max.

  Momo scoffed. "Our generals were used to fighting other Neusapiens. Against the monsters, their tactics were terrible. And on top of that, they refused to change or change their thinking. They absolutely refused to admit that the tactics they'd learned over their entire lives, which were very effective against others of our race, were all but useless against monsters the size of a house. The pride, all of it, killed…so many of my people.”

  Max nodded. "There has been a little bit of that on Earth too, but not that bad, at least not in North America. Even though the United States, my country, has lost a lot of land, far more than most other countries actually, the U.S. still had a very large military and had been able to get their act together by the skin of their teeth. But I still want to hear your story.”

  She nodded. "Alright. Anyway, for about a year that I was back, I was too junior to directly challenge the stupid decisions we were being given, and by the time I was both powerful enough and people would listen to me, it was already too late. And what’s worse, by that time, after protecting my people, fighting with them, working with other Challengers, I’d buried a lot of my resentment. It…it hurt, badly, to see my entire world ground down to the bone."

  Max was quiet for a while, digesting what Momo had just told him. Even though it fell far short of what he felt like he ought to be doing or saying, he said, "I'm so sorry, Momo."

  She nodded, but then looked up, her eyes bright despite the unshed tears in them. "But you called me," she said, stating a fact. “Pulled me to you.”

  "That's right," said Max.

  Momo gave a shuddering breath. "I guess it worked out for the best because if you called me right away, I think I might have had regrets. Even though I didn't like my world or many of my people before, like I said, I started feeling patriotic and more…more angry as I witnessed innocents fall. But finally, eventually, I just had to face the truth that there wasn't anything I could do by myself, and the idiots running my world had already driven it into the ground."

  "So what's going to happen to your people now?" asked Max, and winced as he spoke, knowing it probably wasn't the most sensitive question to ask in the moment.

  But Momo didn’t flinch. "I maybe one of the the last of my kind. In fact, I probably will be, soon. So I suppose I need to find a male to mate with that I can have children with. As we know from the Quartet and most interspecies relationships that actually produce children, the child is either a mule or the same species as the mother. I suppose I just need to hope for the latter. If not, I guess the Neusapian species have ended our run."

  Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  There wasn't much Max could say to that other than what he knew she wanted to hear from him, and he wasn't ready to give that yet. It was more than obvious, even understandable, given her interest in him before, and after crossing who knew how many light-years of time and space to be here from a dying world. But then again, the fact that her world had been dying for the last few months, and Momo had been in such a dark space, also made it a good idea to wait, even if Max thought it was a good match. And he was still not sure.

  He could sense that if he got involved with Momo, there would be no slow dating to something serious. Momo was not human, and she could be intense.

  "What about you?" asked Momo. "How has your life been on this, on your world?"

  Then for the next hour, Max filled Momo in on everything he'd been doing since he got back to Earth, closing out the flood of information by pulling out his phone and showing Momo a video of himself fighting the Ape King. By the end, her eyes were wide.

  She chuckled. “You really never change. "It hasn't been much time for you, but you've sure been busy, huh?"

  Max nodded. "I definitely have, been busy that is."

  "So what's the plan now?"

  He frowned, his eyes distant, and said, "Now that I have a little bit of a break, I want to learn about all the knives that I got from Adjudicator Swan. Anansi can probably tell me about a lot of them."

  "Anansi is your divine remnant, right?" said Momo, the words unfamiliar to her, halting.

  "That's right. And you have no idea how badly he wants to come out and scare you."

  "Scare me?" Momo made a face. "Didn't you say he looks like a spider? I’m not scared of spiders, especially after fighting monsters in a dying world. How would he scare me?"

  Max groaned. "I’ve been telling him to calm down and stay in my soul. But now he’s asking me, no, demanding that I ask you this: Are you giving permission for Anansi to come out?” Max paused. “You have no idea how much he's yelling in my head right now that he wants to. I really suggestion you just ignore him."

  Momo's expression was confused, but she nodded. “I’ve never seen a divine remnant, never even knew that they existed. If he wants to come out and my opinion matters, then the answer is yes. That’s fine.”

  "Fine, just remember later that I tried to prevent this."

  Then, instantly, Anansi manifested on the table. Instead of his normal size, his spider body was larger, huge, and his human-shaped head was the same size as a human's. A strange sense of discordance and jarring power filled the room, too. The appearance was disturbing, horrific. On top of that, the remnant's aura suddenly burst out, stronger than Anansi had ever flexed it before.

  Max was completely unaffected, shielded by his own power, by other strong spirits and by Trill. On top of that, he was contracted with Anansi to begin with.

  Momo did not fare so well. Despite her own powerful spirits, Momo had limited protections, and she bolted back from the table, screaming. In a split second, she was throwing her knives, making them split in midair. The weapons howled as they slashed across the space between her and the table, passing directly the spider god’s remnant.

  Max could feel that it wasn't only Momo who had been startled or frightened. All around the area, in that section of the Patriot Guild building, powers were flaring as the nearby Challengers embraced their abilities, no doubt startled or even afraid of an attack. Max groaned, "Anansi, why are you being such a showoff asshole?"

  Anansi turned his head one hundred eighty degrees back to look at Max and grinned. "You only get one chance to make a first impression, right?" He turned back to Momo. "Hello, pretty female, are you going to be my contractor's mate?"

  Momo looked like she was already getting herself black under control. And even in the midst of coming down from her immediate fight response to terror, Momo still managed a small smile. "His mate? Hoping so," she said. "And, if I'm being honest, I think it's only a matter of time."

  Anansi laughed, his guffaws so loud they rattled the door. "I like this one, Maxie," he said. "She's got spirit."

  Max growled, "Don't call me that. Only my mom calls me that."

  "No, your mom and I call you that now. Maxie."

  Suddenly, Lavinia manifested visually to one side and said, "Anansi, you’re being a dick right now, and you know it!"

  "Oh my," said the spider god remnant, his voice dangerous. "Are we such good friends now that you can address me like that?"

  Lavinia was not cowed in the slightest, and very levelly she responded, "Yes, that's correct. We are friends now, and I'm telling you that you're being a dick."

  Anansi moved one of his freakishly huge spider legs to his spider chest in mock hurt and said, "Oh my, you wound me, Lavinia!" Then his eyebrows raised a few times, and he crowed, "What are you wearing this time, my dear? Didn't you know that the emo phase is dead?"

  "Nothing's dead as long as the music is alive," Lavinia said reflexively. She put her hand onto her band t-shirt, cut raggedly, high enough to show her belly button, above a poofy skirt, her pantyhose slashed, her sneakers brightly colored.

  Anansi laughed again. "You look like My Chemical Romance threw up. And then you decided to wear it."

  Max groaned as yet another spirit manifested in the corner, this one tall, dark, and utterly disturbing. Then Saliron’s awful, ancient voice rang out, booming loud, audible to everyone. "Great One, I must protest. In my opinion, the emo phase in this world’s history was not so bad. I greatly prefer what the humans call ‘Metal’, but I can still hear the symphony and beauty of breaking bones in what is called ‘emo music.’"

  “How the hell does he hear breaking bones in that!?” Max whispered to himself.

  "Don't defend me, Saliron," said Lavinia levelly. "You're not helping."

  "How is it not helping to explain that a style of music in our Contractor’s world is more beautiful because it can reminds one of breaking bones?"

  As Max listened to the bickering, as usual, he wondered if Saliron was actually as socially unaware as he pretended to be, or if everything he did was an elaborate troll. Max still wasn’t even close to sure either way. He turned his head as he heard a scraping sound, and saw Momo backed up against the door.

  "Max, could you please dismiss your spirits?” Her voice was strained. “Mine are about to flee."

  Even as she spoke, suddenly, Slick manifested on the table beneath Anansi's feet and began doing cartwheels. The happy little spirit waved to Lavinia, before waving harder to Momo, then doing a little dance, obviously trying to impress her.

  "Slick can stay," Momo amended. “It would be great if you could maybe…settle the others down, though, Max. Please?”

  "This is unfair!" said Anansi, his voice coming out with what the dead spider god likely thought was great indignation.

  "Yep, it is," said Max. "Sure. Now get back in my soul. You knew exactly what you were doing."

  "Fine," said Anansi. But then he turned to Saliron and declared, "Emo music sucks!"

  Saliron chuckled, sounding even more than usual like a growl. "And what music do you prefer, Spider God? What has captured your interest on this world?"

  "Gangster rap," replied Anansi without hesitation.

  "That's it," muttered Max. He flexed his will, sucking all the spirits back into his soul space. Before Anansi completely vanished, he managed to give a salute and yell, "Tupac will never die! Bone Thugs-n-Harmony! Representing the–" And then finally, just like that, the room was empty of manifested spirits again.

  Momo peeled herself off the door and looked at the wall where her throwing knives had impacted like high-caliber bullets. "I guess I should apologize to Lance later, huh?"

  Max shook his head. "I don't think so. Lance is more scared of my spirits than your spirits are, I think. And he’s rich. The wall will be fine." He leaned back in his chair and sighed. "Anyway, to finish out our conversation from earlier, my plan is to find out what all my different color knives do, and then I'm going to take on some requests to kill some boss monsters around the planet, but especially in North America to start with.."

  “Oh, that makes sense.” Suddenly, looking uncharacteristically shy, Momo asked, "Can I come with you?"

  Max gave her an incredulous look. "If you're willing to, of course you can."

  She smiled at him, and in the back of Max's head, he heard Lavinia humming in approval.