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Says the guy who cuts out hearts from people's chests and eats them. Writ frowned at Vale, he never criticized his hobbies.

At least a crossbow had an air of class and civility to it. Sort of. It was still a rather sadistic weapon of choice, just the way arrows tend to wiggle deeper into someone's body after hitting made a bullet seem like a welcome change of pace. And there's nothing quite like the feeling of trying to pull out an arrow lodged in your eyeball.

At least Writ wouldn't have the mind to eat said eyeball.

"Yeah, wrestling can get pretty messy." Writ smirked at the obvious hint, "So, you hear from Faylen lately?"

"Yeah, I get that a lot." Writ smiled, grabbing a handful of kettle corn with his free hand, "Faylen came to see me the other had a couple of interesting questions the other day, poor kid, you should have seen him sweating it out." He offered Vale some of his popcorn, "Should teach you how to make a better lie one of these days, save a kid some trauma, yeah?"

Writ was disappointed, seems like Vale hasn't seen Faylen yet.

Writ looked down the furniture tent, "So, find any new couches you like?"

"Vale, Quinn's the kind of guy who surprises people by actually putting on a shirt, thought you'd know that by now." They had been dating a while back, right? He heard it from two other people, one of them actually being part of the couple. Maybe Vale was just used to it.

Writ decided to help out with his own moving advice, "Well, you could make the couch disappear. It's easy with a match and a liberal amount of gasoline. But I wouldn't recommend it if you're particularly attached to your house." Writ said, slowly sliding his hands across a suede love seat.

Writ saw that glint in Vale's eye. He looked at the couch, then at Vale, then at the horrendous couch again, then back to the elated-looking Vale.

"Really? Really?" Vale didn't have much taste if this was the couch that got him looking all giddy, "I know you're on a budget man, but I didn't know you had such low standards."

He raised a leg and stomped on one of the couch's loosely tied cushions. The collected dust flew up this stiff excuse of furniture. Apparently it had been rotting under the tent for some time now. Not really surprising considering that Writ felt uncomfortable just looking at the damn thing. He looked over to Sydni,

"Your brother doesn't know a good couch when he sees one, huh?"

"Vale, I hate to do this, but this is for your own good." Writ threw himself on the wicker couch along with Sydni, "Until you get your money back, you're going to have to push me along with this wretched couch." Writ dropped his kettle corn between him and Vale's sister.

It was a tough sacrifice to make, he nearly broke his spine when he plopped into the couch's cushions. Writ would've helped Vale if the couch was a bit nicer, but with two girls at home, they would slaughter him if he brought back that monstrosity. He was doing Vale a favor.

His sacrifice would not be in vain, how was Vale going to push him, his sister and an entire couch back? It was a challenge enough as it is, add in the Blacksuit barricades, and Vale was almost guaranteed to return the couch.

Vale didn't know that Writ was a native in Middling. He knew his town, and he knew the people in it. There were a few crazy characters around the area. Many of them wouldn't mind a...

"Hey!" Writ motioned to a passerby watching Vale's plight, "Come over here, take a seat!"

The man walked up, with a confused look on his face, "What are you doing?"

"Oh, you know, my friend and I, we got a bet that he can push this couch all the way back to his house by himself with people on it." Writ said, moving over and offering the man a seat, "If you get on, we'll split fifty fifty."

"How much you guys bet?" The man was seriously considering it. Writ expected as much.

Writ looked up in thought, "Mmm, about fifty bucks, not every day you can sit around and make yourself an even twenty five, so come on, come on, sit!" He pat the cushion. There were sparkles around his aura, not the seducing kind, but the kind that he gave off when he wanted some fast friends.

The man gave a shrug and sat down next to Writ, he offered a hand, "Fifty fifty if he chokes, shake on it." Writ took the man's hand, "Name's Josh."

But Vale, we never made a bet in the first place! Writ would've said if he was a mind reader, but he probably wouldn't have said it anyway. It helped to keep a bag of catnip in front of this kitty cat.

"No hard feelings Vale, like I said, this is for your own good." Writ called back to his friend with a genuine smile, he was unaware of his friend's injuries. Except for the eye, but pushing around a couch across Middling didn't really put much strain on the eye, did it?

He looked to Josh, "Can't you believe this guy actually payed money for this thing? I mean, you can feel it too, right? I'd rather sit on rocks."

"It feels like my grandma's house, you know what I mean?" Josh took a better look at Writ, "Yo, I know who you are, you're that werewolf they keep talking about in the papers."

"Well, Coyote, but yeah, I'm that guy."

"Yo, my cousin saw you fighting that horn guy!" He did some excited hand gestures, "He said you guys were beast, with all the fire and s**t going down. Last time I heard of you you took a bullet to the stomach."

"Ah, nothing but a flesh wound." Writ laughed, "I got better. You know those barricades that are up all over the place? Because of me and Vale they're up."

When Vale got into a fight in a crowded street, he'd understand why exactly Writ was so popular. He nearly got killed for fame (Or infamy, anyway) about three times now.

Writ got all the cool points because he played the Game with style.

"Who is this guy anyway?" Josh asked, jabbing a thumb to Vale's direction.

"Oh, that's Vale, he wrestles crocodiles in his free time." Writ said casually, "Threatens to kill me a lot, but he's a cool guy."

"Like at the zoo?"

Writ gave Vale a glance, where exactly did you find crocodiles around here anyway? Finding those amphibious sharp-toothed bastards in a desert area was as unlikely as finding clean water over in Harbors.

"Sure, let's go with that."

Josh was impressed, "Yo, that's hardcore man. He does that s**t every day?"

"From what I know, yep."

"We're not gonna win this" Josh looked at Vale with a frown, "********, I go to the gym every day and I feel like s**t compared to this guy." He took out a cell phone in his pocket and started calling, "Yo man, I need your help. I'm sitting on a couch with two guys from the Game."

A pause for the other side.

"Yeah, that Game. I got a bet with against this one Game guy that he can't shove this couch across Middling."

"I'm sitting on this thing man, and this guy is winning-- come over to Market and Maple, help me out, it's the easiest five bucks you'll make."

Josh shut his cell phone, "Help's on the way." he told Writ.

"Oh, I'm not evil Vale" Writ smiled, "Why do you think I'm doing this for you? It's either you give up and let me help you bring this thing back, or you get slaughtered by the girls in your house. You should be thanking me, I'm just saving you the trouble of the latter. Besides, if I were evil, I would've thought Sydni was a tasty snack, but I'm good with just Kettle corn." Writ reached for a handful of popcorn, just to realize that the entire bag was empty. He looked at Sydni, "You sure got a sweet tooth on you, don't ya?"

At the mention of the barricades, Writ went "Yep."

It was hard to lie with Vale around. Here he was, trying to make a good name for him and his friend, and Vale was making it harder by contradicting him!

"You know what I think? They wanna get as many of us as they can with those blockades, make sure none of the other players get any ideas. I mean, you saw what happened with just the two of us, get a whole bunch of us together, and we can do some major damage."

We would, Writ thought grimly, if we weren't all supposed to kill each other.