The forest floor was much softer on Micro’s aching feet, but the dense foliage above was making it more difficult for him to see. He was starting to get used to walking on two feet, but he still tripped over the occasional rock, twig, and mushroom.

  “Were you always this clumsy, human?” Blue teased the boy as he stubbed his toe on an exposed tree root.

  “I wasn’t clumsy at all!” Micro defended himself proudly. “I could turn on a dime, and my brakes were responsive—”

  “I see,” she interrupted him.

  “By the way, you’re sure, right?”

  “About what?”

  “There’s no speed limit here?”

  “Stop it with the nonsense, boy—” Blue coughed. “You’re killing me…”

  Micro didn’t feel like he was moving very fast for a human, but he didn’t like the uncertainty of travelling without a certain speed in mind.

  “Wait, stop here for a moment.” Blue jumped off his shoulder onto the ground and approached a tree no different from any other.

  “Do you need to use the toilet?” Micro asked. “I can wait over here.”

  “No, fool!” she snapped back, not looking away from the tree. “Ah… That’s a shame.”

  She looked around the tree for a moment, and hung her head sadly.

  “Are you looking for a vending machine? There don’t seem to be any of those around here.”

  “No, to whatever that is…” With a disappointed look on her face, she jumped back up onto his shoulder. “That hollow tree was home to pixies once. It’s empty now.”

  “Where did they go?”

  “They’re gone.” Blue sighed. “I haven’t seen another pixie outside of a cage in a long time. Those creepy magicians…”

  “They should just use normal batteries,” Micro replied. “This place is so strange.”

  “Enough about that. Tell me more about your world!” Blue spoke playfully once again. “How did you get from there to here? Did you die?”

  “My world?” Micro pondered for a moment.

  “I’ve been in the same old world for much too long,” Blue said, nodding. “It’s getting boring. What’s yours like?”

  “Well, it’s a nice world. Most of the roads are flat. There’s snow sometimes, and a lot of work to do. The old man was always busy…” Micro smiled as nostalgic feelings washed over him, but his aching feet brought him back to reality quickly.

  “And…?” Blue frowned.

  “But then that boy on his little phone walked in front of me and—” Micro grimaced and took a deep breath. “There was a bright light, and then I was floating in the sky.”

  “Your world sounds as boring as it is confusing. I’m almost sorry I asked,” she interjected. “Grass is always greener, eh…”

  “Sorry…”

  The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

  “So you were summoned to another realm after you were in an accident,” Blue continued after stretching a little. “I’ve heard of that happening before, but it’s rare for the summoning to go well.”

  “It went well?” Micro asked.

  “Well, most heroes that arrive can barely talk,” Blue replied. “They’re pretty crazy, though they can walk fine. Maybe it didn’t go that well after all.”

  “I don’t think this is normal at all…” Micro agreed. “That lady was confused too.”

  “You mean the goddess, Nora?”

  “Yes, that was her name.”

  “Hear anything interesting from Nora?” Blue asked. “People never shut up about her these days.”

  “She said I had to save her followers from somebody, or something…”

  “She’s a wild one…” Blue sighed. “Just forget about her. She’s a young goddess and her worshippers are crazy. What do they call it again… a fad? Magic is so annoying!”

  “Aren’t pixies magical?”

  “No, I told you, we’re more like cultivators,” she argued back, but she frowned more at what she said. “Yuck, I take it back. They just copy us.”

  “They copy you?”

  “We use our own energy. Cultivators made cores that do that too,” Blue explained with a sour expression. “But magicians… They just steal it from other things every time we have something to do. Magicians are the worst!”

  “I see…” Micro frowned. “So they steal fuel instead of buying their own.”

  “You could put it that way.”

  “People like that really are terrible,” Micro agreed. “Not as bad as people who ignore traffic signs though.”

  “If you say so.”

  Their odd conversation continued as the forest grew darker, and soon it was cold enough that Micro could see his breath in front of him.

  “Hey, my exhaust comes out the front now.” Micro softly laughed as he waved his hand in the small cloud. “Laughing feels strange, not bad though…”

  “Everything you do is strange.”

  “Aren’t you cold?”

  “It does get cold this time of year.” Blue was also starting to shiver, and the light she could produce was growing smaller. “There’s a spot under that tree over there that looks warm. Go rest over there.”

  Micro ducked under a branch, and the two of them found themselves in a dark, cozy spot beneath the dense overgrowth.

  “Make us a fire, would you?” The pixie requested urgently.

  “How does that work?” Micro asked back.

  “What the…” Blue was too cold to comment on his strange question. “Just make a pile of sticks in that flat spot there and I’ll do the rest.”

  “Alright,” Micro replied. He picked up a branch to show Blue. “Would a twig like this do?”

  “Oh my… Yes! It’s fine!” the shivering pixie snapped. “Hurry! This is humiliating!”

  Though he had some difficulty seeing in the dark, he eventually managed to make a modest pile of dry branches and leaves as directed by Blue, who then gestured for him to sit down beside her.

  “How are you going to light it though?” he asked. “I don’t have a lighter anymore…”

  “Let’s see if I can manage this yet…” With her eyes closed, she held her hands together and took a deep breath. Micro watched closely as sparks formed at the end of her small fingers. “Hah!”

  With a shout, Blue threw a large spark into the pile of sticks, which steadily began to burn.

  “I’m weaker… than I thought…” she panted. “I really was close to death back there.”

  “Thanks for not leaving me behind, I guess.” She looked at Micro and waved. Her face shone a little as she thanked him. “This has been slightly more fun than dying.”

  “Well, I’ve never left a passenger behind, so…” Micro began to explain, but his attention was suddenly drawn from the grateful pixie. “Metal…?”

  “What’s the matter?” She asked while rubbing her tired eyes.

  “I just noticed somebody sleeping over there. I didn’t notice when it was dark.” He pointed in the direction of a bush, made visible by the orange glow of their little fire, next to which a man in rusted armour lay motionless.

  “EEK!” the pixie screeched and jumped behind Micro.

  “What’s the matter?” Micro asked. “Should I wake him?”

  “We need to get out of here—” Blue shouted, but then paused as she looked back at the figure once more. “Oh, never mind. He’s dead.”

  “Isn’t that a bad thing?” Micro asked in concern.

  “Well, dead things are less likely to kill us,” Blue replied.

  “Less?” Micro asked, his concern multiplied.

  “Most things can kill you out here.”

  “Oh dear…”