Universe's End

Rory wasn’t certain what he expected when he awoke.

Well, first off, Rory wasn’t certain when exactly he’d fallen asleep, or more accurately, gone unconscious, but that was sort of beside the point.

Anyway.

Several things he might have expected upon waking up were to see Apostolos or Irene, Roxy, Zoey, or even Aelia, to name a few.

Not a red-headed man sitting in a chair near his bedside, flipping through a book.

“Awake now?” The man, whom Rory recognized as the First Monk, after a split second for his brain to fully kick back on.

“Um… yeah?” Rory asked, confused about what was going on.

“Hell of a fight you two had,” The man said.

“Tom, right?” Rory asked, reaching back for the man’s name.

“Correct on the name, honestly surprised you kept that near the front of your mind after everything that has gone down recently.”

“Uh-huh,” Rory mumbled. “So, about that?”

“Oh, the fight?” Tom asked, finally looking up from his book, what Rory briefly recognized as a romance novel that had become popular in Ehkorrus as fiction had become more popular, such as stories about made-up worlds without any magic, as implausible as that was to imagine.

Yeah, imagine that.

“To cut to the chase, it ended in a draw. You two threw two fucking nukes at each other.”

Oh. A draw. Well, that sort of blows, but-

“But on a technicality, Allison won,” Tom followed up with.

“What?” Rory said, surging upright. Or trying to surge, it was more like an awkward lean forward.

“Jungle rules, as the World Spirit Aelia called it,” Tom said with a shrug. “Basically, the winner would be decided by who recovered first, as out in the wild, whoever recovered first could get to stabbing the other person before they could defend themselves.”

“And the Spear recovered first?”

“She’s good at that,” Tom answered.

“Well… That fucking blows,” Rory huffed. All of that long-awaited build-up, just to end on a technicality.

“She wasn’t much of a fan either,” Tom shrugged.

“Where is she now?” Rory asked.

“Gone. She left with Eric, her sister, and Garfunk’s body, who they are going to give a proper funeral to.”

“Wait, Zoey went with her? Double wait, why are you still here?”

“We talked, myself, the Vanguard, and Eric. Eric still thinks you are a prick.”

“Perhaps warranted,” Rory muttered.

“But, with some time to think, and with things ‘settled,’ there was no point dragging it out into some eternal blood feud, not with the event with Aelia’s siblings coming up shortly. So, we decided to initiate a bit of a cultural exchange. I’d remain with you as a sort of quasi-envoy, and the Vanguard would finally have at least a little time to reconnect with her sister before things pick up once more. Oh, also, a few of your people went with us as well. Before you worry yourself, Allison has absolutely no hard feelings against your people.”

“Just me,” Rory clarified.

Tom gave him a sympathetic, knowing smile in response.

“So, she won,” Rory huffed again.

“It’s not all that bad. To paraphrase a bit, she made it very clear she didn’t like the end result. So, it was decided that the final reward would be split. Technically, the winner got rights to ‘control’ the planet, but well, Allison isn’t big on that sort of stuff. In fact, it was Garfunk who often delegated her responsibilities. Also, this event was originally from Aelia, so she also had sway in altering the rewards, though apparently that took convincing for E.O.N to agree to the terms.”

“So, the new rewards?”

“She got a Major Law, and you got planetary authority, which apparently isn’t the same as planetary rule, but as the rest of us got jack shit other than the significance of being involved, so hey, congrats to you.”

“Thanks, I guess,” Rory sighed, already knowing he was handing this sort of responsibility off as well. Irene would probably get a kick out of forming some planetary council or coalition, or whatever she would think up. “Did she mention what she wanted to use the Major Law for?”

“Yeah, and it’s a bit of a doozy,” Tom answered, before his eyes flicked downward to an invisible interface, then to Rory, who gave him a nod.