Calix's day hadn't quite gone as he expected. 

When he originally packed up his temporary camp that morning, the maxi had thought that he would be in for another dull and hopefully efficient day of traveling. Yet somehow the short time he spent passing by some rana's grave had been more eventful than anything in the past week since he left.

And now here he was, watching a fight that was honestly more pathetic than the two humans he passed earlier. An anguis hibri stood in the front, facing off with four humans while simultaneously defending a caela off to the side. The caela was crouched over another hibri with her hands spread above them, healing he assumed.

He had to give the anguis hibri some credit. He had managed to keep the humans from killing any of them so far. But his moves were sloppy and the gunshots were coming increasingly closer to hitting their targets.

Calix sighed and shrugged his backpack off his shoulders. The humans would likely cause trouble to him later, and he supposed letting the other group die wouldn't be ideal. The humans were obviously not soldiers and, based on their stances, had very little experience with using actual weapons. He could shut them down easily and be back on his way in no time.

He set his bag down and took a closer look at the area. The five humans were positioned in a semi-circle formation, each of them appearing to be holding the typical human hand gun. The anguis hibri was holding what seemed to be a whip. However, the hibri couldn't seem to get close enough to use it effectively.

Calix stepped back and took a deep breath. He had to act quickly. A string of doubts was already creeping upon him, some criticisms from others and the rest his own voice. He forced them away. He'd been training to fight with limited hearing for a while now. I'll be fine, he told himself, just move fast and keep them on your right.

He barreled into the human on the side closest to him, knocking the man to the ground. The gun fell out of the human's grasp and skidded across the grass away from them. He hoped at least someone from the group behind him had enough common sense to get the gun.

He regained his footing and turned right back to the man. The human scrambled to his feet and pulled a knife out of his pocket. The human to the man's right had begun to shoot at Calix, leaving the other three to continue to attack the other group

Calix ducked under a shot aimed at his head and side-stepped away from another. He'd have to disarm the other one as well. The human's shots were getting too close for his liking.

He darted to the side, hoping to catch the human off-guard. If he could just touch the gun he could put it out of use. Once any long-ranged options were taken away, both humans would be done for. He just hoped the anguis hibri could keep the others busy.

The human twisted towards him as he got close, thrusting the gun in front of them. He reached out and grabbed the human's arm, narrowly managing to redirect the blast to the ground. His hand brushed the gun as the human pulled themselves from his grasp. It was only a small touch but it was all he needed.

Calix shifted the gravity on the object and increased the weight. It dropped out of the human's hold and hit the ground with a loud thud. The previous weight of the gun settled on his shoulders.

Now deprived of their weapons, the humans were significantly easier targets. Calix took hold of the recently disarmed human and bashed their head into the dirt with satisfying ease.

He turned back to the man from earlier. The human held the knife he had earlier in front of him. The small blade was pathetic, really. Especially since he held it with shaking hands, looking like a frightened child.

Luckily for the human and unfortunately for him, the commotion from the other human shifted the attention of the three humans on the right. Calix now had three guns in his direction along with the knife on his other side.

Thankfully, the anguis hibri decided to take advantage of the distraction. He lashed out his whip at a woman on the right. The whip struck her hands and successfully knocked the gun out of them. The hibri was quick to kick it away.

Calix unsheathed his cutlass and moved to deal with the last armed humans. He slashed toward one's hands, trying to get rid of the weapon without having to use any more gravitational manipulation. The more weight that built up the harder moving swiftly would become.

One of the blasts hit the handle and knocked his cutlass away. He hissed in pain as the shot grazed his hand. It was only a yellow so nothing serious, but it still left his hand stinging. He was getting really tired of those moon-damned guns. Still, he managed to get a grip on one of the human's clothing and pulled them towards him. With the hold, he was able to send them head-first into the ground. Another one down.

The anguis hibri had taken down the woman he previously disarmed and was now fighting the remaining human. Calix went to help him when he caught motion in the corner of his eye. He turned right as the man with the knife slashed him in the arm. "That moon-damned ingrata..." he growled to himself. Too caught up in the other human, he got careless.

He couldn't even hear him coming.

Calix grabbed the man's wrist with the hand of his uninjured arm. The knife fell from his grasp onto the ground with the other weapons. A hard elbow to the temple left the man unconscious with the rest of the humans.

He let the man fall to the ground and turned back to the hibri. He had successfully defeated the last human. Calix breathed out a relieved sigh. They were finally down. He walked over and picked up his cutlass, sliding it back into its sheath. Once he bandaged the wound on his arm he'd be back on his way.

Unfortunately, fate seemed set on preventing him from making any progress. Just as he turned to walk away, the anguis hibri called out to him. "Hey!" The hibri moved towards him, "Thanks for saving us. I owe you one."

"Sure," Calix replied, glancing up at the sky. He needed to leave soon. The sun was going to set in a few hours and he wanted to reach some sort of checkpoint by then. He needed to get out of the area before the end of the week.

But again, just as he thought he could leave, the rest of the group started walking over. The caela and previously injured hibri were now joined by an anguis. The hibri seemed to be completely unharmed now. The wonders of caela magic he supposed. Maybe if no one spoke to him he could get away smoothly.

"Aidyn!" The anguis waved at the hibri. "You okay?"

"Yeah, I'm good!" the presumed Aidyn shouted back. Calix couldn't complain about the yelling at least. It was certainly making the conversation easier to follow.

"You seem better, Kei," Aidyn commented when they reached them. "You sure you're alright?"

"I'm doing great!" 'Kei' grinned. "Good as new."

"Sweet, so we all survived," Aidyn said with his own grin. "We fought Cynth Leeyung and lived. That's pretty awesome."

Calix didn't know who Cynth Leeyung was but based on the group's performance against the other humans, something told him that wasn't very impressive.

They continued having their own conversation. He took it as a sign he could leave. So he turned around and started walking towards where his backpack lay. He wasn't making great time, but stopping the humans was probably going to help him in the long run. If not, maybe this counted as heroics or something.

He almost laughed at himself. If there was one thing he was, it certainly wasn't heroic. It didn't matter any —

"Wait!" a desperate shout in his direction cut him off. Five steps, new record.

He sighed. Just when he thought he was getting somewhere, too. "Hm?" He reluctantly turned towards the voice.

It was the caela this time. She seemed surprised when he turned around. "Can... arm... you..."

Great, she was mumbling. Speaking quietly and barely moving their lips was an annoying combination. Not only did it make it difficult to hear but it also gave him no clues to the parts he missed.

"What?" Hopefully he'd get better keywords this time.

"I... heal... scratch... your arm... want..."

Better. She still spoke inconveniently quietly, but fortunately he caught enough to understand. She had offered to heal the cut on his arm from the man's knife.

Calix took a minute to debate the offer. He had the medical supplies in his bag to treat it himself. But better to save the resources he had for when he had no other option, right? He could take her if she tried anything.

"Yeah, okay," he replied after a moment. He moved closer to the caela and the rest of the group so she could reach him.

"So," the anguis spoke to him as the caela moved over to his left side, "I'm Jared!" He gestured towards the two hibri. "That's Aidyn and Kei. The caela is Ari. Who are you?"

Calix was glad the introductions were done by someone loud. Made things easier.

"Calix," he replied.

"Cool, where you from, Calix?"

"Up north."

"Where up north?"

"Everywhere."

"Right! I forgot maxis were nomadic." Jared's enthusiasm didn't seem to falter at his short, unspecific answers. "We aren't in the north, though. What are you doing down here?"

"Traveling. What about you?"

"A map led us here!"

Aidyn's eyes widened and he shot Jared a warning look. Jared, however, didn't seem to notice.

"A map?" Calix repeated. "What kind of map?"

"A map to the sour — " The rest of his statement was muffled by Aidyn's hand over Jared's mouth.

"A map to the... sourest food we can find!" Kei cut in quickly.

"Yes, that," Aidyn agreed with his hand still covering Jared's mouth.

"We just uh love sour foods," Kei said, "like lemons or grapefruit or — "

She was cut off by the caela moving over to her side. "I did the best I could," she said, thankfully speaking louder this time. "It's not totally healed but the bleeding has stopped."

He looked over at his arm and sure enough the only blood left was old. A scab was starting to form at the edges of it. The pain had died down too. Good enough. "Thanks," he nodded at Ari. "Well, if that's all. Good luck on finding the... sourest foods I guess."

Jared tore Aidyn's hand away. "Wait! You should come with us!"

"To find the sourest foods...?"

"No, on our real mission!" He dodged Aidyn's hand this time. "To find the sources!"

Aidyn groaned and dropped his hand.

"Oh, Jared..." Ari sighed.

"The sources..." Calix repeated. "You mean the myths?"

"Yes! Well no, actually," Jared answered, "they're real!"

"Magical objects that give everyone powers are real," Calix said with skepticism. "Right."

"They are! Aidyn has a map to them," Jared unfolded a torn paper. "Oh, speaking of, look what I scored!"

The paper had marks across the side with what seemed to be the edge of a map. It didn't look like much to him but the group seemed interested.

"Where'd you get that?"

Jared handed Aidyn the map so he could look closer at it. "It's part of the other group's map. She didn't have the other half with her. Still something though!"

"Kei, can you read it?" Aidyn passed the map.

She stared at it for a moment. "A bit. I need a while to figure the rest out."

"So!" Jared turned his attention back over to Calix. "Like I said before, you should come with us!"

"Um." Calix was almost astonished. Were they seriously only working with that much information? They either had more they weren't telling him or were incredibly stupid. "Is that all you have?"

"At the moment, yeah!" Jared continued to seem unfazed by anything he was saying. "But hopefully there'll be clues at each destination. Like a scavenger hunt."

"Speaking of which, shouldn't we check the grave?" Ari suggested.

"Oh right!"

The group hurried over to the rana grave with Calix reluctantly trailing behind. Aidyn crouched down in front of it and squinted at the markings. "It's in rana I think. Kei, you can read rana, right?"

Kei nodded and crouched down beside him. "It's just grave stuff. Here lies Tercy Cess and a date. Nothing important."

"Wait, Kei, come here." Ari beckoned her over. "There's something on the side."

Kei stood up and moved to the side. "It says every six years, the sources... defire? That's not a word, hang on. Assign? The sources assign?" She furrowed her eyebrows. "Align! That's what it says."

"Every six years, the sources align..." Aidyn trailed off. "Maybe it means align like the moons?"

"The Almoons Festival!" Jared exclaimed. "That happens every six years, right? And that's when the moons align!"

"I bet you're right!" Kei agreed. "That would explain why the writing on the paper has moons written on it a couple times."

"Perfect, we were heading there anyway," Aidyn said. "No crazy changes necessary."

"Right. But before we go," Jared turned to Calix, "I still think you should come! I saw your fighting skills, we could really use your help."

He should say no. He shouldn't even be considering the anguis's offer. The last thing he needed in the position he was in was a "quest" (if you could even call it that). They were fools running after a fantasy, and he didn't need to be caught up in it. His only goal should have been leaving the area.

But, realistically, where was he to go? He didn't go back home. Maxis don't live in towns or cities or any set locations. He didn't even plan a proper route before he left. There wasn't a place for him. There was no place for a coward. Not even the moons.

The group needed him. Even if they were just a band of fools, he would have a purpose. He wouldn't be useless.

He glanced at Aidyn, who nodded at him, and then at Jared, whose eyes were silently begging for him to. So, despite all his instincts screaming at him not to, he agreed.

"Fine," he said. "I'll come."

｡･ﾟﾟ･｡

ALL OF OUR MAIN CHARACTERS

ARE FINALLY HERE

AND IT ONLY TOOK US TWENTY-FIVE WEEKS

But seriously — yay! We hope you're as hyped as we are! Thanks to our final writer, Hex (gorgothehexwolf), for Calix's magnificient intro chapter! And thanks to all of you for actually guessing something right for once!

Also, yell at your friends until they read Almoons. Selino is underpopulated and we need yalls' help >:(

Thanks for reading!

With virtual hugs, purple Google features, and Cat-licks the cowboy,

Grazing For Cabbages

(G.F.C.)