“There’s not a lot to say,” I shrugged. “I think I’ve told this to Yoona and her brother before, but I was an amateur MMA fighter before this, just local gigs, small crowds, stuff like that. I mean, I’m pretty sure some of the fights weren’t exactly legal, but it paid for my bills.”

  “I know a few venues like that,” Vadeem grumbled with a nod. “That would explain your skills. I’d imagine you made quite the fortune if you knew the right people.”

  I shook my head. “Nah, I only did it as a side gig. I mean, I was a good fighter, but the prospect of permanent brain damage didn’t sit well with me, regardless of how much they paid.”

  “True that,” Noel chimed in, “You don’t want to end up like Vadeem here.”

  “So did you do anything else back on Earth?” Yoona continued. "You did say fighting was a side gig."

  “Just some odd work here and there,” I answered, “I got out of college with a worthless psych degree and a mountain of student loans, so I was just trying to make ends meet before all of this. I wasn’t going to work some minimum wage job spending all those years in school, so I lived like that for a long time. Fighting was more of a hobby of mine than anything else.” I shrugged again. “My life’s not all that interesting, honestly.”

  “And no family?”

  “Nah,” I sighed. “My folks kicked me out the second I turned 18 and I haven’t seen them since. I honestly can’t say I even care if they’re still around or not, but they haven’t been a part of my life for close to a decade now. Can’t say I miss them or anything, they’ve never done me any favors in any case.”

  “Ah…” Yoona whispered, “I’m sorry.”

  “Eh, don’t be. Like I said, it’s old news, and I liked living on my own terms.”

  The high schooler nodded slowly. “But aren’t you curious about them at all? Especially given the situation now?”

  I pretended to think for a moment before shaking my head. “I’ve made peace with them. They’re out of my life, and I prefer it that way. Honestly, I don’t even know where they are now, or if they’re even alive. They weren’t… let’s just say that they weren’t living the healthiest lifestyle before, and there’s a reason why I agreed to leave in the first place.”

  Noel nodded. “I get ya, little bro. I’ve seen my fair share of folks like that. It’s best to move on at some point and not dwell on the past.”

  I arched an eyebrow at the redhead. It was rare for her to talk in such a non-Noel way. “Something similar happened to you?”

  “Something like that,” she mumbled, clearly unhappy with the topic. It was best not to prod such a sensitive topic any longer.

  “And I think we know about your situation as well, Yoona.”

  She forced a frown down and just nodded before glancing quickly over to her brother.

  “What about you, Father?” Yoona asked although I wish she hadn’t. I had almost forgotten the man’s presence for a while since he was usually content to stay in the background.

  “Me?” He smiled. “My life hasn’t changed since arriving here. I acted as a priest then as I do now, but before you ask, I do not have any close ties with family back home. It is the life that the Lord has given me, so I cannot complain. Aside from that, my faith has been the defining part of my life. We all carry our own crosses, and I am thankful that I have less of a burden than the poor souls that I tend to.”

  “So I guess we’ve all got something in common at least,” I said, “Although I do wish it could be something a bit less depressing.”

  “Nonsense!” Vadeem added with a smile. “Sure we-”

  Noel rolled her eyes and jabbed the big guy on the side. “You’re the best off out of all of us here, Vadumb! The rest of us are, like, orphans compared to you! You can't steal our sob stories!”

  He rolled his eyes. “-we don’t have a lot of family in the outside world, but…!”

  Noel grumbled. “Oh, don’t get started on that power of friendship and family stuff, please!”

  He laughed and gave the reluctant redhead a pat on the back. “I won’t, but you know it’s true, Noel.”

  “Yeah, yeah.” She rolled her eyes. “But I’m only saying that because I like the twins and your food.”

  Yoona burst out in laughter just then. “No, Vadeem’s right. I mean, we’re all stuck here where our lives are all constantly in danger, but… but if I’m honest, I like it here more than being back home. I know that’s ridiculous to say…”

  “Nah,” I answered, “I like it here as well, eh, most of the time anyway. Some of those Trials though…” I shivered and shook my head. “But I get what you’re saying; I wasn’t close to a lot of people before, so just hanging out like this is nice.”

  “Yup yup!” Noel added, “Aside from the constant Vadeem overdoses, I’ve been having way more fun here, so don’t feel bad, bestie!”

  “Now enough with the depressing talk,” Vadeem grinned. “We’re at the beach! The weather’s great, and I bet we can catch some fish here as well!” He got off from his position - destroying the mountain of sand that was covering him in the process - and turned to the frustrated twins. “Girls, I say it’s time we try our hands at catching us some dinner!”

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  “How though?” I asked, “We don’t have a boat, and it’s not like we can fish this close from the shore.”

  Vadeem shook his head. “Boat? Why would we need a boat when we got Vadeem!”

  And true to his words, he proved that we really didn’t need any kind of flotation device when he transformed into his titan form. Except this time, he was a lot bigger. Now Vadeem might have been around the size of a modest single-detached home before, but he was now the size of a damned midrise building. Goddamn it! That fucking doppelganger didn’t mention this change in his stupid reports!

  As if this were a normal occurrence, the twins started to crawl up his clothes like a pair of squirrels before ultimately settling on his broad shoulders. What was even stranger, however, was that when the two finally settled down, they took out some kind of foldable platform out of their inventories and started to secure the thing onto the sides of Vadeem’s clothing. Before long, they had built what looked to be a rubber viewing platform; heck, it even had shock absorbers and a little tent attached. Where on earth did they get that thing?

  “Who else wants to come?” he rumbled as he adjusted the device. His voice sent literal shockwaves of force out. Good thing we were all super-powered, otherwise I think we’d go deaf from just being in his vicinity.

  “I’ll go!” Yoona said with a smile, “And my brother will as well, won’t you, Jae-Hyun?”

  The Regressor looked puzzled at being singled out but nodded in any case as his sister shoved a fishing rod into his hands. He sighed before hopping onto Vadeem’s outstretched hand. Yoona hopped on a second later before turning to the three remaining people.

  Marcus shook his head and nodded. He allowed himself to be scooped up by the big man and calmly walked up to the others, a fishing rod already in hand.

  “Ugh, but the Vadeem-mobile’s so bumpy last time…” Noel whined. “I almost got yeeted away when he jumped!”

  “Please never say that word,” Vadeem muttered with a sigh. It caused the ground to tremble.

  Now I was wondering what kind of situation called for using Vadeem as a mobile fortress, and of course, the stupid doppelganger diaries didn’t mention any of this. Guess it’s just up to my imagination again.

  “We got the springs installed,” Yoona added, “It shouldn’t be as bad as last time.”

  “It works,” Eva said.

  Her sister nodded. “Barely feel a thing.”

  “But he’s still so loud…”

  “And I have that part covered, young lady,” Marcus added before pulling out a small yellow talisman from his pocket. He placed it gently on the big man’s neck. “Try speaking again, Vadeem.”

  “Uh, sure. Hello?” The trinket glowed a bit when he spoke, but whatever magic was in the charm worked, and Vadeem went from rocket launch levels of loud to just obnoxious neighbor’s 3 am party levels of loud. Not bad.

  Noel sighed and slumped down. “Fine, I’ll get on. I’d feel bad for making everyone waste their money buying stuff if I don’t use it…”

  “Where did you get all those things anyway?” I asked. “I mean, I don’t think they normally sell DIY titan porch-conversion kits at Walmart.”

  “From the store, of course,” Yoona answered, “Nell can get us practically anything we ask for, and we can even custom order things if they don’t have what we need. It’s how we got the mobile platform in the first place, and we even got to make some modifications for a few hundred gold. It’s quite convenient really.”

  “Thank god Nell was there,” Noel added, “Imagine trying to navigate the store ourselves!”

  “Alright, enough talk,” Vadeem continued, “Is everyone getting on or what?”

  “Yeah yeah,” Noel mumbled before grabbing me by the arm, “Come on little bro, let’s get on the stupid-mobile.”

  “How-”

  Before I could finish that sentence, Noel jumped with me in tow - nearly dislocating my arms in the process - and landed right on Vadeem’s noggin. The big man grumbled something unintelligible before he swatted us off his scalp. We landed on his shoulder, and now that I got a better look at the setup, it was honestly pretty nice. Vadeem was so huge now that there was a lot of room to walk around, and the rubberized platform - which wrapped around his head like some kind of ridiculous collar you see on old English Arsitocrats - was firm, even when he moved.

  “Huh,” I said, stomping on the platform. “This really is pretty sturdy.”

  “Magic shock absorbers will do that,” Yoona said with a smile, “It’s almost like we’re floating around Vadeem, although I guess we look ridiculous if anyone saw us.”

  I chuckled. Having a gang of people fishing and sunbathing on some shoddily built deck around the neck of a literal giant would look ridiculous, but hey, if it works, it works.

  “All right, let’s get the fishing expedition started!” I said with a grin, “Just don’t go too deep!”

  “Eh, I’ve scouted out this lake before,” Noel said, “it’s not too deep outside of the very center. Not that it matters, most of us can swim or fly away, so it’ll only be Vadumb sinking like a rock if he goes there." She paused and a playful smile crept up her face. "In fact… Vadeem, go toward the very center, I heard there's great fish there! Go!”

  “I can swim as well, Noel,” Vadeem grumbled, “Bah, why do I bother talking with you? Walter’s right, hold on tight, we’re heading offshore!”

  The, er, Vadeem-mobile as Noel so kindly put it, started to bulldoze his way off the shore and into the water, obliterating any unfortunate sea creature or monster in his wake. The titan sank deeper and deeper as he waltzed his way further in, and Vadeem only stopped when he was almost neck high in water.

  “Ah…” he muttered as he closed his eyes and relaxed, “This is nice. It feels like I’m floating.”

  “You sure you’re okay with just acting like a platform?” I asked.

  “Oh, no worries,” he replied, “The water feels great, and I’m apparently a lot more buoyant than I thought in this form. It's like I'm wearing a life jacket, and your platform keeps the water off my face." He closed his eyes and let out a deep breath. "I think I’ll just relax for a bit while you guys do your thing.”

  “Uh, just don’t drown,” I added as I felt him completely relax his muscles. Now we were drifting around.

  “Yeah…” he muttered, “Just wake me up if something’s wrong. Man, I can get used to this kind of life.”

  He had his arms just above the surface of the water, which made for a great makeshift dock for the girls to sit on. Yoona took the twins and found a nice spot near the center of my titan-sized friend's arm. I was content to stay on the collar thing with my back to the sun. The sea breeze felt amazing.

  Yoona chuckled as she helped the twins set up their bait. “I agree, Vadeem. I wish these moments would last forever.” She smiled as the twins ran away to start their first tries at fishing. “Anyway, come on, let’s see what we can catch!”

  “Agreed, bestie!” Noel said beside her, already starting to reel in the first catch, “We’re going to feast like queens tonight!”

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