[CookingwiththeCobra]

“I don’t think new clothes with help me be any less clumsy.” He hadn’t realized that it would be like entering a hell whole when he decided to come.

“Alrighty, the bar is right over here.” The walked down another dirt road that was less populated and on the end of the street there sat an old building that looked like it was about to fall to the ground. “Don’t worry about the building, it’s held together by magic.”

They walked up to the big door and she pushed it open, “what no saloon doors,” he muttered.

“Ha ha, you really funny.” She said in a monotone voice.

[CookingwiththeCobra]

They walked inside and were immediately bombarded with loud noise, the atmosphere resembled the guild halls but it was rougher here. Kevlar stood behind and directed him over to a table that was in the corner. Once they got there he noticed a very unusual crowd sitting at it. He sat down at the last chair and Kevlar pulled up an extra.

There was a man that was almost a complete skeleton except the parts of him that was in the sun, he had purple hair and an evil grin.

“That’s Valentine”

Maurice gulped when the man smiled at him, he turned his direction away from him.

Kevlar pointed to the kid next to the skeleton who was maybe around the age of 14, “and that’s Ida.” The kid smiled at Maurice but before he could say hello he recognized the person that sat to the boys left. “Morgana!”

“Hey Maurice, not getting into too much trouble right?” She laughed.

“Not without you around I’m not.”

“Over on Valentine’s right is the lovely Elliot,” Kevlar introducing everyone.

“Oh stop,” Elliot laughed. Maurice could tell that Elliot was a man but he was getting the vibe that he rather be a woman. Maurice wasn’t the one to judge so he went along with it.

“And… where’s Adze?” She wondered aloud as she looked at his empty seat.

“It’s too early for the undead to walk yet.” Valentine said as he finished his sentence with a cackle as if it was the funniest thing he had ever heard.

[CookingwiththeCobra]

“Ah, we’ll just have to catch him up later, so this is Maurice and he is here to help us keep our bar.” The rest of the people that were in the bar must have heard her because they all cheered at the moment and Maurice turned pink.

“Alright does anyone know where the papers to the bar could be?” Kevlar looked around at the table.

“Well I haven’t seen any paperwork on this place since we were kids and pops was still alive.” Morgana answered.

“Do you have any idea where he might have put the paper work?” Maurice asked, the paper work was his best lead in helping them and he planned on going all the way through on this piece of thread until it was completely unraveled.

Elliot snapped her fingers, “he used to travel for about 50 miles from here to go pick up the best alcohol for the bar, he told me one time that he was really good friends with the owner of the brewery there, that they knew each other as kids. Right after the funeral someone came to pick up some of his stuff and I bet you anything the papers were in that stuff.”

Kevlar nodded in agreement, “your right, I remember that. Alright saddle up, we have to a brewer to visit.”

[CookingwiththeCobra]

About two hours later they all stood outside the bar with their horses. Maurice came walking up with Kevlar wearing a completely different outfit.

“I feel ridiculous, I look like I walked right out of old black and white western.” Maurice looked down at his attire.

“Well you won’t complaining in 50 miles when that ‘ridiculous attire’ keeps you protected from the weather and everything else we run into.” She walked up to honey yellow horse that had nobody around it. “Here this is the horse you will be riding, she’s new so we haven’t named her yet. Don’t worry though we didn’t get her from the wild, she’s harmless.”

“Maurice looked at the horse, “can I name her?”

“Sure, why do have something in mind?” She asked.

“Yeah, her name is Mustard.” Maurice smiled and looked at everyone expecting them to not like it but they all smiled.

Morgana laughed, “see I told you he was funny.”

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Once everyone was settled on their horses they took off at a safe speed since they had Maurice with them. Kevlar had tied a rope between her horse Bird and Mustard just in case anything was to go wrong. Maurice held on tight as they traveled and he now secretly thanked Kevlar for making him switch clothes because the dirt with the his new hat the sun would have been beating down in his neck.

“Halt!” Kevlar yelled and the rest of the horses came to a sudden stop. Maurice wasn’t sure why she had made them stop but then all of sudden a train came flying past his face at an unimaginable speed and if he had been five steps forward he would have been a pancake.

“Can I puke?” Maurice asked, “because that was terrifying, how come there is no crossing signs?”

“This is the middle of nowhere there doesn’t have to be railroad crossing. We just have to be extra careful.”

“And extra crazy.” Maurice added as an after though.

Valentine trotted up next to him, “and that too!” Then cackled in his ear.

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“You guys travel in the most uncomfortable ways, haven’t you guys heard of a van. It could hold all of us and we could all be safely inside something with air conditioner.” Maurice complained.

Morgana trotted up next him, “because Maurice if we wanted that we would be living in a big city.”

“You don’t have to be in a big city to drive a vehicle,” he countered.

“That’s not my point. I grew up in a city and I came here to get rid of it. Here’s what I’m talking about. Tonight, when the last of the sun rays have completely gone we’ll head outside if we aren’t already out there and I can show the millions of stars that you have never seen.”

“I have seen stars before Morgana, in a city they just don’t disappear.”

Morgana laughed, “you would be surprised.” She moved forward and started to chat with Kevlar leaving him to think.

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As Maurice sat on his horse he thought about all differences between where he lived and were he was at now, and everything he came up with always gave an advantage towards the guild. It was hot in the plains. There wasn’t anything fun to do and they had angry border patrol on their asses almost all the time. He wondered if the guild got threatened like that, by some sort of government telling them they couldn’t be a guild anymore if they would fight just as hard for freedom as the people here do. Maybe, he knew Hellen would become furious and so would Edith. After thing a few more minutes he decided he too would probably be angry enough to rebel too.

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It had been hours that he had sat on the stupid horse, the horse wasn’t necessarily stupid it was the fact that he had to sit on her that was, the sun was setting over the horizon and Kevlar signaled for everyone to slow down. As soon as the gang stopped, Maurice hopped down and then almost immediately fell to the ground. He just sat there on the warm dirt because he it felt ten times better there than on the horse.

Valentine cackled, “looks like this is where camping tonight.” He finished it with another round of his high pitched laugh and moved to get off his horse. Everyone followed suit laughing at what Valentine had said as if it was a joke. Maurice was a very humorous person he thought but still couldn’t figure out why everyone thought the man was so funny?

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They all set out and started to put up camp. Kevlar got wood, with the help of Maurice, and started a big fire. While Valentine and Ida put up tents. Elliot started making food as Morgana found some old dried out tree logs to sit on. By the time the horses were fed and tied up to a nearby desert tree the sun had set completely and everyone was nice and fed.

The dessert had cooled off and nice night breeze was making its way through the Vast Plains. Maurice closed his eyes and let the wind ruffle his pink hair but was interrupted by Morgana and Kevlar standing in front of him.

“Come on we have something to show you.” They led hi far away from the camp fire so when he turned around it was only a spec in the distance.

“What’s this all about?”

Kevlar pointed up, “look.”

Maurice’s eyes traveled up into the night sky and faint, “whoa…” came from his lips. It was like being up in space itself. It seemed that every star that existed had decided to come out and dance as millions and trillions of star flickered in and out and he could swear that he could see galaxies away.

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“Now do you see why we choose to be here instead of anywhere else? Because if we were stuck inside a house with the lights on and the television playing we would miss this.” Morgana whispered not wanting to disrupt the peace.

“We’re not saying that living in ‘civilization’ doesn’t have its perks, we’re saying that being here seems to outweigh all that. Sometimes we enter the bustling streets of city but at the end of the day this were we belong, this is home.”

Maurice nodded sort of understanding what they meant now, “and I will do everything in power to help save it.”

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Late the next morning they traveled into an even smaller town than before and came to a halt outside of a large building. Kevlar looked over at Elliott, “is this the place?”

“That I can remember. The last time I was here was once when I was little with pops.” She shrugged her shoulders and hopped off her horse. She walked over to the doors and knocked. The rest of them followed her up and when there was no answer for about five minutes they all traveled around to the back of the building to see an older man yelling at a just as old dog to get off its lazy ass and if he could do it so could she.

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After chuckling for a few minutes Kevlar finally spoke up, “excuse me but is there a…” She trailed off realizing she didn’t know the man’s name and so she searched out Elliot for help.

She stepped up, “a Mr. Marvalo?”

The grouchy man turned around from his dog and straighten up, “that me.” He replied gruffly, “what do yer’ need?”

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“Well I’m Elliot Renae Zion and”

He interrupted her with a smile, “yeah I was real close to your pop!”

She smiled back, “yeah I know. That’s why here… you see border patrol is trying to take away the bar saying it’s their property. We were hoping that pops had given you the papers to land in his will with the rest of the junk he gave you.”

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“Oh kids I don’t what the old man gave me. Most it was just all his stuff from his desk that he didn’t want thrown out.” He started to hobble back inside and they all followed. Morgana gave a look to Maurice and he nodded. If all the important papers were there, there was a strong chance that the lease to the bar was somewhere in there.

They entered what used to an old office room from when Mr. Marvalo had a booming business. He walked over and pulled out a giant box that was filled with paper.

“This is all that I got from his office space.” He set the box onto of the dusty desk.

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Maurice was practically dancing on the inside because something he just loved was paperwork and words and the ability to manipulate both when together. He also loved to be around something so familiar especially in this foreign land that he was in. Out of all the things that his father had taught him, manipulation was the only thing he took with him from the slums. He left behind a lot of great skills that could make him amazing but sitting there in that dusty room reading old papers helping people being scared of the majority of the things that the world had to offer was a million times better than what his father wanted him to do.