//Blah. So much for the "awxxm post on wednesday." Oh well. This is better than nothing, I suppose.\
Carmine frowned, and looked at his map again. The route to Vandrin was supposed to be here. Instead, he saw it as five kilometers behind them.
“Damn maps are outdated,” Carmine complained, rolling it back up. “Estacado, did you see the sign to Vandrin?”
“Uh, nope.” Estacado said. “We should’ve by now.”
This was embarrassing. A group of elite soldiers who couldn’t even find their way back home.
“Let’s just ask someone for directions,” Grylls said, trying to be helpful.
“Probably not a bad idea,” Sig said. “What about you, old man?”
De Sade remained silent.
“How talkative,” Sig sighed.
“No,” Carmine said. “We find our own way home.”
“I dunno Cap,” Estacado said, worried. “The Colonel’s known for getting pissy about bad news. What if word gets out that Alex hasn’t been captured yet?”
“Estacado,” Carmine replied, “look at it this way. The worst he can do is yell and bitch and moan, and tell us to look harder, making some sort of empty threat. If we don’t catch him on the way home, we’ll sure as hell get him by the time we get there.”
“Whatever you say, boss,” Estacado uncertainly said. He heaved his two hundred-kilogram mortar and kept walking.
“So, how long did you live here?”
“About five years,” Alex replied. “I just decided I was tired of the merc life for a while, and settled down.”
Midna looked at the various items adorning Alex’s walls. Medals and honors from both sides cemented his past as one of the most influential mercenaries in Terian’s history.
“This place certainly isn’t opulent,” Midna said. “Didn’t they pay you well?”
“They did, but materialism was something I never really had time for. I did my job, they paid me, I moved on. I’m sure there’s tons of money in this house that I’ve never touched. Probably never will, either.”
Midna looked out the window, which overlooked a massive canyon. Asgarnia was at the very bottom, where snow met grass. “What made you decide to leave?”
Alex struck a flint, and a few logs inside the fireplace ignited, washing away the cold. “After a while I guess I got bored. I went out in search of an adventure.” He looked at the Twili medal around his neck. “Man, did I find one.”
The other side of Alex’s home was strewn with all sorts of smithing and forging tools, as well as a furnace. “You were a blacksmith?”
“Not quite,” Alex said. “The man I bought this house from was a blacksmith, and he didn’t like the fact that the native smithy in town was taking his business. I guess he just decided to leave his tools behind. The smithy in town, after promising I wouldn’t jeopardize his business, taught me a few things. Since then, all of my weapons, I made myself.”
Midna looked to the north. “How long should we stay here?”
“A day at the most,” Alex said. “The sooner we get moving, the sooner we get there.”
“Well, we still have some time,” Midna said, taking his shadow. “How about you show me around the area?”
