Lightheadedness swelled into nausea. Felix struggled to breathe. He needed words, fast. Say something. Something clever.

“Uuuuuh. No?”

“Wretched thief.” An ugly snarl drew on Mrs. Gunhild’s lips.

Drumming of his heart swamped Felix’s thoughts. He turned to Erik for support and made his second big mistake for the day. Erik returned the look and glanced at the hidden orb. His expression cycled through fear, guilt, and more fear, and something else. Erik stepped in and snatched the prize.

He tossed aside the delving foil, an incredulous look in his eyes. “I-I can’t believe it. Felix, why would you try to steal this? Mrs. Gunhild, here, take it. I am terribly sorry. I don’t understand how this could happen during my management shift. I expected better of him.”

What? The question died in Felix’s throat. Dumbstruck, he could only stare at Erik.

Mrs. Gunhild accepted the orb. Gold reflected in her eyes as they returned to their normal, regular state of furious disapproval. “You wretched, unthankful, lackadaisical, little smear of worthless dirt. How dare you? How dare you steal from not only your employer, but from the Immortal Sofie, the very Abyssal Lord, who graciously protects us all from the horrors of the Abyss? How very dare you? I will have you locked up for a long, long time. Mark my words!”

Felix clutched his shirt. Nausea thickened. Blackness crept up the corners of his eyes, anxiety threatening to swallow him whole. He stared at Erik, utterly devastated.

“Wait…” Erik grinned like a kid who knows he’s done wrong, but hasn’t learned to apologize yet. “Wait a moment,” he pleaded with Mrs. Gunhild. “That might not be a good idea.” Mrs. Gunhild’s death glare froze him, but Erik continued, “Isn’t the tax pretty hefty on currency? Thirty percent? Do I remember it right?”

“Thirty-two. What are you getting at? Speak, boy.”

Erik licked his lips, visibly swelling with confidence. “Well. I’m just thinking. A potency orb is a tremendous sum. If I found so much as a fragment, I might just keep it without reporting it myself.”

“What exactly—” An ‘aha’ dispelled the storm from Mrs. Gunhild’s eyes with a twinkle that soon materialized into a greedy smile. “I see. Very clever, Erik. Very clever. You’ll make a sharp businessman one day. A dangerous one. Those handsome features, and that wit. If you don’t watch out, you might find yourself snatched by a mature lady like myself one day.”

Erik blushed as he chuckled uncomfortably.

“Grawr,” said Mrs. Gunhild, making a pawing motion towards Erik, and finishing it with a wink.

Felix’s nausea finally solidified. He hurried to the railing and hurled it into the Abyss. He remained vaguely aware of Erik and Mrs. Gunhild, but missed a chunk of their conversation.

“You.” Mrs. Gunhild packaged the word with ice cold threat and aimed her sharpest pencil directly at Felix. “If I hear a word of this, a single whiff, a teeniest morsel of a rumor. You know what’ll happen then, don’t you? I sincerely hope you have enough wits to figure out that much.”

Felix wiped his mouth. Picking up the discarded delving foil, he met Mrs. Gunhild’s glare and shot back in one look six months of repressed loathing.

Although he had an entire Abyssful of vitriol to unload, Felix kept the goodbye short and sweet. “I sincerely hope you’ll figure out why only liars and asslickers last more than a season at your ranch, but I doubt you look in the mirror often enough. Oh, and spoiler alert, Calitorn ends up sacrificing his immortality to be with Laika.”

“What did you say? You—”

She did continue speaking. However, Felix listened to none of it and marched off. Pier boards groaned as Erik ran to catch up.

“Felix! Wait up! Hey, Felix.” Erik latched onto his shoulder.

Felix spun around and swatted the hand away. “Go to ‘Byss traitor.”

“Hey, hey, what're you talking about? I handled it, didn’t I?” Erik raised his hands, doing his dopey ‘didn’t do nothing wrong’ smile.

Felix laid the wounded denizen on a stool so he could gesture furiously. “None of it was planned. Not a single word. None. Nada! You almost got me imprisoned, and your first move was to save yourself!”

“Hey, come on. I get you’re angry that we lost the orb, but we can come back later to—”

Felix punched Erik mid sentence, right in his face. “That’s the last time I—”

Bright black shock hit Felix, followed by shining dots dancing across a wobbly view of the piers. Something began to fill the right side of his nose, while Felix regained his senses and found himself leaning against the railing.

“Come on then, coward. Let’s go.” Erik lifted his hands. “Come!”

Felix cleared his nose and spat bloody snot on the planks. He lifted a fist and charged, when a loud authoratitative tone stopped his fist.

“Everything alright here?” Liftmaster Johan was a large man of respectable age, poise, and achievements. Making trouble under his watch was a bad idea, unless you wanted to awaken the former iron torch hiding under that navy-blue uniform.

“Just a friendly argument,” Felix patted Erik’s shoulder.

Erik squeezed his back, hard. “Yup. All good, officer.”

Felix returned the squeeze as painfully as he could, and they both gave Liftmaster Johan a thumbs up.

Johan adjusted his peaked liftmaster hat. “Carry on then. Be sure to keep it civil.”

“Of course, officer,” said Erik.

“We’ll try our best,” promised Felix.

Casting them one lingering one lingering glance, the liftmaster departed. Felix picked up the denizen and the two walked off the decks in silence. Right side of Felix’s nose began to hurt.

“So...” Erik gave him a side-eyed glance.

“So,” Felix mocked Erik’s tone, and continued in his own, “I’ve had enough. Enough of your stupid ideas. Enough of you. Goodbye. Good luck.” His steps didn’t stop when Erik’s did.

“My stupid ideas? My stupid…” Erik blinked and laughed. “You’re the king of dumb in this town. To think I actually thought you’d join us and make it big. Yeah, you walk off. Coward. You’ll never earn a torch if with that attitude. You’ll never be a delver. You hear me? You’ll never be anything!”

Felix raised his hand alongside a single finger until he disappeared into an alley between a warehouse and a closed shop. He considered himself the winner of the fight. However, this victory tasted bitter and angry.

Cool evening, mild pain, nighbugs flicking near the electric lanterns, and his own huffing kept Felix company as he climbed the steep cobblestone streets of Half-Valley. Smell of beer and sounds of laughter intensified, as he approached the Terrace Street.

“Bii…” the bundle in Felix’s arms made a weird, meek sound akin to a ping. Wearily, it blinked open a pair of beady black eyes, and lifted its feelers. “Bii. Bii!” It continued to ping, the rhythm intensifying.

Felix found himself overcome by the sudden attack of pitiful cuteness.

“Take it easy little friend. You’re wounded.”

“Bii?”

“Wait a sec.” Felix dug out his last salary and held a chip towards the denizen. “This is a stability fragment. It fixes everything abyssal. Here, eat it, you should feel a little better.”

The denizen pinged, seemingly in agreement. Its paws helped the chip towards the cross-shaped mouth. It opened like a soft four pointed beak, allowing the denizen to nibble on the fragment.

Felix heard a jingle of gratitude in the ping it made. “Here, have some more.”

Before reaching out for more, the denizen patiently finished its first chip. It ate them one at a time, pinging almost as if groaning with pleasure. Darkened spots on its back regained their whiteness. Wounds knit shut. New fur bloomed where it had been sheared off.

“Wow. You’re a quick healer.”

“Bii.” It sounded like a humble admission.

While fetching more chips, Felix’s finger brushed the crumbled delving foil. Guilt weighed him into a frown. He handed it to the denizen. “Is this yours?”

It pinged in confirmation.

Felix sighed. “I’ve got a confession to make… um. Bii? May I call you Bii?”

“Bii.”

“It’s not very creative, I know, but you’re clearly friends with a delver and rather smart, so I’d feel a bit presumptuous to come up with a name for you. Like, imagine if I started calling your Mr. Björn. I’d feel pretty stupid.”

“Bii?”

“Stupider than I already feel.” Felix chuckled weakly.

Bii nodded, accepting the delving foil.

“We— I found you wounded near the surface in the Squirming Abyss. You had the potency orb and the message with you, but…” Shame coiled its tight ropes around Felix’s chest. Thinking back on how they’d assumed the orb was theirs made him cringe. “I’m sorry. We stole the orb from you. We got greedy. Sorry. I know they aren’t even a fraction of the orb’s worth, but take the chips. Here, take the whole pouch. At least you’ll be able to deliver your note.”

Three rhythmic pings came from Bii, who pushed its head against Felix’s hand.

“Hey, hey watch it.”

A nudge pried the pouch from Felix’s hand. Chips scattered all over the street. A couple rolled through the sewer grates, others disappeared in the nooks between cobblestones.

Before Felix could so much as groan, Bii bounced from his arms and hopped around the ground. Whilst constantly pinging, as if trying to communicate, it gathered the chips on top of Felix’s shoe.

“You really don’t have to—”

Bii kept on pinging, dashing all over the place to gather the chips.

“Be careful, you only just healed.”

Bii placed the note on his other shoe, pinging with great purpose.

A sudden burst of laughter surprised Felix. He covered his mouth and tried to keep it in. More bubbled out of him, washing clogs of tension off his chest and mind. Bii pinged in a serious tone while rushing madly to collect the chips, as if the world was about to fall into the Byss. It was dumb, made no sense, and shouldn’t have been funny. But Felix laughed.

“Long day?” asked a slurring elderly voice from a balcony one floor above. It belonged to a man with gray stubble and a striped knit beanie decorated with a tuft.

“Yeah.” Felix waved his hand in greeting, smiling as he nodded. “Long day.”

“S’ that so. Have a drink, son. Your face says you need it.” The man leaned to grab something. Glass jingled. “You a whisky drinker, son?”

“Ah-haha, thank you sir, but you really don’t need to.”

“Underage? Don’t worry. Everyone drinks underage.” The tuft hatted elder straightened, his bony fingers strangling the neck of a dark bottle.

Felix waved his hands. “No, I am eighteen. Maybe another time. I need sleep even more.”

The man leaned in his chair. “S’ that so. Put some ice on that eye, or it’ll hurt like all Abyss come tomorrow. G’night, son.”

“Good night, sir.”

The elderly sir nodded off in his chair. Like any good citizen, Felix knocked on the downstairs door and informed the lady who answered that a drunken grandpa snored above them. She promised to take care of him.

Stars multiplied. Night grew crisp. The walk home felt light and fresh, relaxing, even meditative, when Felix chanced to take a glance at the view behind him.

The Abyss beyond cliffs of Half-Valley never truly darkened, remaining half-lit beneath luminescent clouds and various abyssal phenomena. Mountains and mountainous formations of indescribable plantlife had once again twisted into a new horizon, familiar, yet slightly different from the morning. New distant vistas could be spied in the impossibly large caverns in the clouds and openings in the mountains. Ephemeral, ever changing, the Abyss beckoned, teasing Felix with a thousand open doorways to adventure.

“One day,” Felix promised himself.

He was feeling surprisingly good. Work didn’t go as expected, but he still got paid. Plus, he was now free from that hag and didn’t have to listen to Erik anymore. It felt good to clean toxic people from his life. Worth a black eye.

He had plenty of time to look for a new job, while prepping for next year’s delving interviews. Something with a decent boss. Felix decided to ask his brother tomorrow, when he came home from the Abyss.

Bii jumped on his back and began pinging, as if it was explaining something. Felix felt obligated to help it, and, being honest, the mysterious note tickled his curiosity. It made him feel part of a conspiracy between experienced delvers. The hopelessly hopeful dreamer in him wanted to find a path to the Hollow Conservatory the note mentioned, receive great rewards, and return home as a legend or some hero of old.

Sure, the note was likely written in cipher. Nothing but a cryptic missive between rich delvers. Maybe even a prank?

In the real world, nobody was dumb enough to send a little denizen like Bii to carry a potency orb through the Abyss, merely to recruit someone random to help them. Dumb didn’t cut it. That would be plain bonkers.